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Ethnic cleansing
By James Brooks, Burlington Free Press 10/17/2003
If Palestinians stopped the terror, would peace follow? This summer provided a clear answer: No. On June 30, Palestinian militant groups pledged a truce that largely held until the second week of August. By July 31, Israel had killed nine Palestinians, wounded 328, imprisoned several hundred, continued its curfews, closures and land thefts, built three new settlement outposts, and expanded its global search for Jews to fill the settlements. Still the Palestinian truce held. Israel stepped up its assassination campaign, slaughtering civilians in the streets from Apache gunships, targeting leaders who supported the truce. Finally it snapped. The Israelis "knew it would." During the "relative calm," Israel accelerated construction of its 400-mile apartheid barrier, a monstrosity that has wiped out entire villages. If completed it will steal another 45 percent of the West Bank, including all of Jerusalem, the Jordan Valley, and most of the farms. Why is Israel the No. 1 recipient of our foreign and military aid? Why do we insist they use our weapons to destroy Palestine? Why, Sens. Patrick Leahy and James Jeffords and Rep. Bernie Sanders, do you vote these funds year after bloody year? On the record, are you for ethnic cleansing, or against it?
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