Israel
Tightens Stranglehold on 1948 Palestinians
By Isabelle Humphries, Washington Report
on Middle East Affairs, August 2002
This past June 12 the Green Patrol, created
25 years ago by then-Agriculture Minister
Ariel Sharon, oversaw the destruction
of 14 metal shacks in the Negev desert,
leaving some 125 Bedouin citizens of Israel
homeless. A week earlier the Israeli Knesset
voted to cut all child allowance by 4
percent—but with an additional 20
percent reduction in benefits for a child
without a relative who has served in the
army. As few Arab citizens serve in the
Israeli army, it is the one million Palestinian
Arab citizens of Israel who will be the
primary victims of this policy. At the
same time, Israeli courts continue to
investigate MK Azmi Bishara’s alleged
support of terrorism and restrict the
travel of MK Ahmed Tibi and Sheikh Riad
Saleh, leader of the Islamic Movement
inside Israel. As the media eye is turned
to suicide bombs, settlers and Israeli
military action in the 1967 territories,
Israel is tightening its colonialist control
over Arab citizens inside the Green Line.
Days
under fire
By Claire Theret and Peggy Henderson.
Al-Ahram Weekly, Aug 29 - Sep 4, 2002
It was during the Israeli invasion of
the West Bank last spring that the world
first found out about "the Internationals":
private individuals from different parts
of the world for whom solidarity with
the Palestinians meant being there. Two
British "Internationals", Claire Theret
and Peggy Henderson, returned recently
from the occupied territories. Below are
selected pages from their diaries: Israeli
television announces more suicide bombings
are to come. At the Hebrew University
in East Jerusalem, a bomb explodes in
the cafeteria over lunchtime, killing
seven people and injuring 70, 11 of them
seriously. Yesterday, the Reverend Jesse
Jackson visited Bethlehem, where he met
with the municipality and NGO representatives.
Local television in Bethlehem broadcast
the entire visit. Here in Aida, we all
watched, hoping for comfort and some sense
of justice. Unfortunately, as so often,
all we heard was that "both sides" have
to make compromises, and that "both communities"
should recognise the "humanity" of the
other.
The
immoral majority
By Johnathan Cook, Al-Ahram Weekly On-line,
8 - 14 February 2001
Likud leader Ariel Sharon's victory in
the election for prime minister has provoked
much gnashing of teeth among Israel's
left-wing peace campaigners. As their
standard-bearer, Ehud Barak, slipped ever
further in the polls, his reputation sullied
by months of fruitless negotiations with
Yasser Arafat, the future they painted
was doom-laden. If anyone is certain to
sink the peace process, they wail, it
is the right-wing general who masterminded
Israel's most inglorious military achievement,
the invasion of Lebanon in 1982, which
led to the massacre of Palestinian refugees
in the camps of Sabra and Shatila.
Life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness
by Ghassan Khatib, Bitter Lemons, August
26, 2002
Nearly one year ago, the tragic events
of September 11 set into motion significant
changes in American Middle East policy
that have had a negative impact on the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The climax
of that change was illustrated in the
infamous June speech of President George
W. Bush in which he nearly reclassified
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as part
of the “war on terror.”
Sir,
It's the Wrong War!
By Uri Avnery, Gush Shalom, March 3, 2002
After the invasion of the Balata refugee
camp by a regular brigade of the IDF,
the brigade commander appeared on television
and said that he had expected the Palestinians
to fight like tigers, but that they behaved
like pussycats. This is a frightening
sentence, because it discloses a startling
fact: the Brigade commander does not understand
in what kind of campaign he is engaged.
He has to be told, with all due respect:
"Sir, you are fighting the wrong war!"
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