Peace Agreements and Refugees – Lessons Learned
Badil 12/4/2003
Most peace agreements specify the rights of refugees but Middle East initiatives offer only options and quotas -- Palestinians make up the largest group of refugees in the world but their legal rights aren’t even mentioned in initiatives being promoted to bring peace to the Middle East. Conflicting parties in other parts of the world have been able to define their differences, find common ground, sign peace agreements and, most importantly, resolve refugee issues. Peace agreements that don’t recognize and provide for the voluntary exercise of refugee rights carry the risk of sanctioning mass population displacements in the future.
Each refugee case is unique and so are the mechanisms set up to facilitate permanent solutions for refugees. But in most cases, the right of refugees and displaced persons to return to their homes and repossess their properties is seen as an important element in finding durable solutions.
The Palestinian-Israeli conflict to date is unique, not so much because of its particular characteristics, although some of these are certainly unique, but more so because of the complete absence of refugee rights and subsequent Israeli state obligations. As pointed out in Part I of this series, there is also a virtual absence, in any peace proposals to date, of human rights regulations or provision for the establishment of human rights institutions.
Human rights provide a common framework to regulate relations between former antagonists, mediate future disputes and reconcile past injustices. “In a balanced human rights perspective, the primary aspect is the right to remain in, or return to, the country of origin. It is the violation of this right which is the cause of the problem of refugees.”*
Divide and destroy
By Alex Klaushofer, Electronic Intifada 12/4/2003
Over the past few months, the barrier that Israel is building to cut itself off from the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank has come to symbolise the divide between the two peoples at the heart of the Middle East crisis.
Cutting into Palestinian lands by up to six kilometres, the barrier takes different forms along its length - here an imposing concrete construction, there a steel fence and a tangle of barbed wire.
But whatever the barrier's form, its impact on the communities it dominates is devastating. In the farming villages of the northern West Bank, what was once a self-sufficient way of life is dying out because farmers cannot access their land.
The fertile valley that supported most of Jayyous's 3,500 people with yields from olive groves and citrus orchards is now locked behind the barrier, accessible to some only through gates administered by the Israeli army.
A few farmers are just managing to cling onto their land, forced to accept the permit system imposed by the Israeli authorities to get through the gate. Yet even with permits they must queue for the gate openings at the beginning and end of each day.
Present but uncounted
By Nazir Majali, Ha'aretz 12/5/2003
The Arab citizens of Israel have no place in the peace process between their country (Israel) and their people (Palestinians). They are ignored not only by the right and the government, but also by the Israeli peace camp.
The people of the Geneva Accord spent more than two years on the talks with the Palestinian group. They did a wonderful job: All along they added more and more important personalities, expanded their ranks, developed closed topics, got assistance from experts, took into account all kinds of sectors and factors, brought in people from the right and people from the center, saw to the Jews with origins in the Muslim countries and did not forget a representative from the Russian community - but only the Arabs of Israel were invisible to them, as if they were not citizens of the state.
I presented this question to one of the senior people among them, and the answer was very odd: We ignored you intentionally, he said and added: After all, you understand the situation in this country. We are trying to enlist the people on the right and, to put it mildly, the Arabs of Israel don't attract the right. In the end, they did take a few representatives of the Arabs of Israel, whether for decoration or to fix the mistake.
Ami Ayalon also worked on the same principle. With him, too, you will not find a single Arab citizen of Israel in the leading group. The executive director of his campaign also answered the same question in the same way. And, going back in history, the veterans of the peace camp thought in the same manner. It took many years for the Peace Now people to acknowledge the Arabs of Israel, and only at the end of the 1990s did they agree to cooperate with their peace forces.
The minutiae of racism
By Dr. Azmi Bishara, Arabic Media Internet Network 12/4/2003
Anti-Semitism wasn't born with Israel or with Israeli propaganda. It is much, much older. The term itself dates to the Germany of the 1870s, where it was used self-referentially to describe an ideological antagonism towards the Jews of central Europe . Some attribute it to the German activist and preacher, Wilhelm Marr, who in 1879 founded the Bund der Antisemiten -- the Anti- Semitic League -- to combat what he claimed were Jewish designs to destroy German society from within by sewing the seeds of corruption and decadence. Anti-Semitism is thus a modern term coined in a specific context and delineating a specific referent: Jews.
What sense is there in attempts to blur the boundaries of the definition of the term and the phenomenon it identifies by claiming that racism against the Arabs is a form of anti-Semitism because the Arabs are Semites too? Why implicitly acknowledge this ethnic racial term, as though it were scientifically sound, and subsume ourselves beneath it? Racism against the Arabs does not have to be described as anti-Semitic in order to be condemned. Nor did hatred of the Jews in Europe arise because they were Semites. But anti-Semitism has become a term that lumps together diverse phenomena in a single definition -- hatred or incitement to hatred against Jews in Europe using religious, ethnic racial, nationalist or social pretexts. A more recent tendency has been to project the term retroactively across history and horizontally across different cultural contexts.
Anti-Semitism is not the only type of racism that merits condemnation. The genocide perpetrated against the Aztec people and civilisation and against other native American peoples is no less odious for not being anti- Semitic but rather a form of colonialist racism that dehumanised the indigenous inhabitants.
Sharon's policy is bringing us to the brink of existential abyss
By Victoria Buch, Arabic Media Internet Network 12/5/2003
I am a member of a women's human rights organization named MachsomWatch. The organization monitors military checkpoints (CPs) that restrict the freedom of movement of Palestinians around the West Bank. We make an effort to increase the awareness of the Israeli and international public of what is happening there. Moreover, MachsomWatch attempts to act against human rights abuses at the checkpoints. The activity is problematic, since the very existence of the multitude of checkpoints constitutes one large-scale violation of human rights and soldiers who man the CPs act upon orders from their superiors. Still, now and then we succeed in helping by mediating between Palestinians and soldiers, or by procuring help in blatant cases, which are not covered by the orders. I should like to tell you about what we saw lately at CPs in the Nablus area and also to share with you some thoughts concerning the real objectives of the closure policy.
A large majority of the roadblocks do not separate Israelis from Palestinians. Rather, they separate Palestinians from Palestinians. In particular, Palestinian towns such as Nablus are surrounded by a ring of CPs, which restrict motion between the town and the surrounding villages. The CPs make it difficult for the villagers to reach the town services, such as shopping-malls, hospitals, clinics, schools, work-places, etc. Currently, in the Nablus area, the CPs are manned by elite paratrooper units. Their other assignment is to provide security for neighboring settlements.
Let me describe a "typical" roadblock. Two or three soldiers are stationed in the middle; their job is to check IDs. Palestinians wait at a distance behind a "holy" plastic barrier. Additional soldiers, serving as security cover, are stationed nearby. Frequently, their guns are pointed at the waiting queue. We tried to argue with the soldiers in the past that scaring people by pointing guns is quite unnecessary, but we were unsuccessful. And so the Palestinians wait, for one hour, for another… and sometimes for much longer. A person arrives at the top of the line, and is summoned by the soldier. The ID is shown, sometimes the coat is opened to show "no explosives", an explanation may be requested as to where he or she is heading. And then, the 19-year-old soldier determines if the person can pass, according to the orders of that day.
Danny the Red in the land of white and blue
By Jonathan Yavin, Ha'aretz Friday Magazine 12/5/2003
Three days with Daniel Cohn-Bendit - from the Jabara checkpoint to the Mount Scopus campus - and from memories of the 1968 student revolt in France to reflections on the local conflict. About 30 Israeli decision-makers - not Knesset members or ministers, according to the press release - created a sleepy half-circle last Monday in the offices of the German Heinrich-Boell Foundation in Tel Aviv. They were there to meet with Daniel Cohn-Bendit, "Danny the Red," the leader of the student revolution of 1968, who had come to Israel for a three-day visit. They all spoke about peace, and there was talk, talk and more talk, in the hope of perhaps producing yet another initiative. Danny the Red would have set fire to a tire, but Danny has not been red for quite some time now, and no longer exhibits the mischievousness of his youth.
Daniel Cohn-Bendit of today wears a polo shirt under a well-cut suit. After all, he is a member of the European Union Parliament, the representative of the French Green Party. His behavior with his interlocutors is also parliamentary: He places a conspiratorial hand on a shoulder, or grasps an arm with diplomatic familiarity. Only a special effort will uncover any signs of his rebellious nature: One of the lenses of his round glasses has a tiny chip, his steps are quick and energetic, his thoughts follow an associative train and, of course, there is his hair. That shock of red that gave him his name is still there.
Black Sabbath in Burqin
Editorial, Ha'aretz Friday Magazine 12/5/2003
A soldier fired in all directions after children threw rocks at IDF equipment. Three bullets hit a 15-year-old boy; he was killed on the spot. Another bullet struck a hearing-impaired boy, age 14; he died the next day. The IDF spokesman expressed regret. Then, not far away, another boy, 12, was killed.
The soldier stood at the intersection and fired in all directions. The children ran for their lives, to no avail. Mu'taz was killed first, falling in one alleyway, and Subah died next, falling in another alleyway. This was Black Sabbath in Burqin in early November: two children killed, both from the same village. Throughout the territories, 12 Palestinians were killed that Saturday, and Burqin lost Mu'taz Amoudi, 15, and Subeh Subeh, 14. The neighboring Jenin refugee camp lost a child the same day - Ahmed Zar'ouna, 12.
The soldier's temper apparently boiled over after the children dared to throw rocks at the sides of the IDF vehicles that had invaded the village and parked in the sandy plaza. The soldier took off after the children he saw, to punish them properly, until he shot them one after the other - three bullets in Mu'taz's body and one in Subeh's back. Shopkeeper Riad Fawzi, who was about to close his store, was struck in the abdomen by the soldier's gunfire. His neighbor, Zakiya Balalu, who was injured in the hand, says the soldiers also delayed Mu'taz's evacuation by about 15 minutes, as he was lying in a pool of blood by the tractor behind which he had tried to take cover.
Damascus needs creativity to get out of Washington’s doghouse
Editorial, Daily Star 12/5/2003
The New York Times published an interview with Bashar Assad this week, and the Syrian president has to be deeply disappointed with the results. Widely interpreted as an unconventional means of circumventing the diplomatic roadblocks that have kept Damascus in Washington’s doghouse for months, the tactic seems to have backfired by exposing Assad’s position to ridicule. Coupled with reports that Israel rebuffed a recent Syrian offer to arrange a full cease-fire by Hizbullah, the Times fiasco confirms that bolder and far more imaginative steps are required to break the logjam. It is too late for “feelers” to have any positive effect, especially when Damascus has failed to address the glaring inconsistencies between official policy and official practice.
Like those from every other Arab capital, demands from Damascus that Iraqis be allowed to elect their leaders have a distinct ring of the inauthentic. A Times editorial emphasized precisely this issue to punctuate what was otherwise a highly disingenuous deconstruction of Assad’s assertion that his country’s problems with America stemmed entirely from the Arab-Israeli conflict. But don’t fault the newspaper: The blame lies squarely with Assad and his advisers for failing to appreciate the vulnerability of his credibility and to predict the enthusiasm with which one of the world’s most solidly pro-Zionist newspapers would indict Israel’s most steadfast foe for a sin common to the entire Arab world.
“Reaching out” to the United States is a fine idea, but the strategy cannot succeed unless Syria has something concrete to offer, some inducement capable of causing the American foreign policy establishment to change course. It is not enough to secretly proffer a truce on a border that is usually calm in any event. Damascus has to identify the goals it shares with Washington and make realistic suggestions on how it might help accomplish them. US priorities in the region currently center around achieving stability in Iraq, a concern that Syria has to share, so that would be a good place to start.
US Justice Dept. Programs Harmed Muslim Immigrants
By James Zogby, Palestine Chronicle 12/5/2003
WASHINGTON - There is growing concern that the Department of Justice (DOJ) has over-reached in the post Sept. 11 period, implementing several programs that have caused harm to Arab and Muslim immigrants and visitors to the United States. Of particular concern have been: The large number of detentions and deportations that took place right after the 2001 terrorist attacks; the so-called “voluntary call-in” of 8,000 young Arab and Muslim immigrants; and the special registration program that has targeted visitors from twenty-five Arab and Muslim countries.
It has become a shared concern of many law enforcement officials and civil rights leaders that these programs have had a negative impact not only on the affected communities but on the United States’ overall effort to combat terrorism, and the image of the United States overseas.
While President Bush was articulating a message of support to Arabs and Muslims, these DOJ initiatives were undercutting that message. All of these efforts relied on crude profiling that targeted individuals on the basis of their religion and ethnicity. Fear was created as thousands of Arab and Muslim immigrants and visitors became concerned about their rights and status in the United States.
The fact that many of those detained were held without charge, in secret, denied access to attorneys and their families, and in many instance, deported, fed this fear.
War and economy in the Middle East
By Marwan Bishara, Daily Star 12/5/2003
As US President George W. Bush’s vision of a “new Iraq” turns into nightmare, and his partner Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel undermines peace plans real and virtual their assurances that they will prevail through “war on terrorism” are falling on deaf ears, especially among the people on whom America needs most to prevail, the international and local business community. Hundreds of those Middle Eastern and international business leaders have descended this week on Dubai for two important meetings: the prestigious international Young Presidents Organization (YPO) and the Welfare Association, a large philanthropic group of rich Palestinian Arabs. Though unrelated, the two share similar agendas and skepticism regarding the promise of a “new Middle East.”
YPO members who are keen to educate themselves and network their actions within the region should take advantage of the weekend’s meetings of the Welfare Association to rub elbows with hundreds of its Palestinian and Arab senior members who, for several years, joined hands in support of the idea of a “New Palestine” only to have their fingers burned. At the core of the Welfare Association lies an expatriate group of around 60 senior Palestinian businessmen most around 60 years of age with an average wealth of over $60 million. Ever since they were denied the right to return to their homeland Palestine along with tens of thousands of entrepreneurs, five decades ago, they have played a major role in the development of a number of Arab economies.
After decades of investment, regionally and internationally, the Palestinian Arab business community has learned first hand that areas of conflict are surging catastrophes not emerging markets; that militarization of any conflict contributes to the wealth of the corrupt and the erosion of the spirit of entrepreneurship; and that only military merchants benefit at the expense of productive economies.
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