Wednesday, December 27, 2000
An Intifada in search of a leadership
By Amira Hass
A late-night urgent phone call from a village in the Salfit region of
the Palestinian Authority: "My
nephew has been arrested. It happened a week ago. He is only 15. We do
not even know where he
is being held in custody. To whom should we turn?"A phone call from the
same caller, a few weeks
earlier, a little after midnight: "Jewish settlers, with the assistance
of the Israeli army, are in our
orchards now and are uprooting trees. What can we do? To whom should we
turn?"
Yet another phone call from this caller, a week ago: "The road to our
village has been obstructed
since the start of the Intifada. Twice we have cleared away one
obstruction, so that we could travel
along this road freely. We got into arguments with the Israeli
soldiers. We said to them, 'We aren't a
bunch of animals that you can put in a cage.' 'Yes, you are!' they
replied. Twice, the Israeli soldiers
restored the obstruction. The third time we removed the large concrete
blocks, the mayor of the
town was with us. 'I'll argue it out with the soldiers,' he said.
Whether or not he argued with them, a
week went by and the huge concrete blocks were not brought in again.
Thank God, now we can
travel in our cars along this road."
These three telephone messages indicate a blatant side-effect of the
second Intifada: The absence
of the Palestinian Authority as an agency capable of offering support
to the residents under its
authority in the face of measures undertaken by the Israel Defense
Forces (IDF) or as an agency
capable of initiating activities that could be defined as a civil
uprising.
Palestinians whose loved ones have been arrested are continuing to turn
to non-government
organizations (NGOs), Israeli and Palestinian alike, or to seek the
assistance of lawyers. No
emergency organization has been set up in the PA to coordinate the
monitoring of the arrests and
to offer legal and financial aid to the families of arrested persons.
The PA has not initiated a thorough investigation of even some of the
shooting incidents or even
some of the cases in which Palestinians were killed by IDF personnel.
Most of the updated and
more precise information can be obtained from NGOs, especially from the
Palestinian Center for
Human Rights, which is based in Gaza.
The IDF set up hundreds of road obstructions throughout the West Bank
and the Gaza Strip. Except
for a small number of cases, the PA's regime, which is the official
leadership of the Palestinians,
made no practical attempt to challenge the IDF by sending in
bulldozers, by filling in ditches that
Israeli soldiers dug across roads to prevent vehicular traffic from
using those roadways, or by
removing obstructions consisting of huge concrete blocks or earth
ramparts - even in places that
were not continually patroled by the IDF. Instead, the PA's regime
focused on issuing press
releases and publicizing its grievances to world audiences.
Palestinian experts have sadly stated that only the Palestinian
ministries of education and health
acted quickly in order to adapt their operations to the state of
emergency and in order to serve
jointly as an agency offering support to the residents of the PA. Local
resident committees were set
up in some communities to provide mutual assistance and to provide help
to needy persons. The
establishment of these communities was the initiative of either local
community figures or NGOs.
During the first few weeks of the present Intifada, veterans of the
first Intifada and members of
NGOs, who (and this is no coincidence) belong to the Palestinian left,
said that this Intifada should
be an unarmed popular struggle, as was the case with the first
Intifada. These individuals failed in
this attempt. There is a need to study the connection between this
failure and the different nature of
the Israeli occupation today: Tight, stifling rings of encirclement
around Palestinian enclaves,
instead of an occupation army that confronts the populace at every
corner, on every street and in
every government agency. There is a need for investigating to what
extent the failure was due to the
effectiveness of the splitting up of the PA into separate territories
and to the effectiveness of the
severing of the natural ties between various parts of the PA (this
situation did not exist prior to the
signing of the Oslo agreement).
The PA has been so fragmented that the regime cannot function as a
centralized, unified agency.
That fact in itself, incidentally, can serve as proof that the PA's
leadership did not plan this uprising.
The new character of the Israeli occupation is not the only reason for
the absence of the PA as a
supportive agency capable of initiating actions. Another reason is the
breakdown in interpersonal
contact between the PA's top leaders and the Palestinian public as a
whole over the past seven
years. From the very start of the Oslo process, the Palestinian
leadership has exhibited a split
personality. As the leadership of a public still under the control of a
foreign occupying power, it
issued declarations left and right in its capacity as the spearhead of
a national liberation movement.
However, as a leadership capable of exerting only partial control in
accordance with permits issued
by the occupying army operating under the guidance of American, British
and German espionage
services, the PA's regime functioned as a body that safeguarded the
special privileges of its own
members. In the course of this very brief Intifada, the PA's regime did
not display sufficient insight -
or sufficient capacity - for adapting itself to the spirit of rebellion
that took hold of the Palestinian
public at large.
Members of the Fatah movement - the backbone of a regime that, in the
course of seven years, has
been unable to improve the living standards of the residents of the PA
- tried to restore its past
legitimization as a national liberation movement. However, they
preferred to do so by focusing on
the "militarization" of the Intifada - the opening up of safety valves
and the use of firearms, which
immediately erased the popular-civic character of this uprising.
At this point in time, an official leadership, whose presence during
its nation's most difficult hour was
simply not felt, must now act decisively: Can it waive its claim to the
right of return, and, if so, how
can that decision be implemented practically? Can it agree to the West
Bank being split down the
middle by blocs of Jewish settlements, and, if so, how can that
decision be implemented
practically? Can it agree to one street in East Jerusalem being
Palestinian, while the street running
parallel to it is Israeli, and if so, how can that decision be
implemented practically?
© <http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/copyright.asp?datee=copyright
2000 Ha'aretz. All Rights
Reserved
PALESTINIAN REFUGEES; ISRAELI HYPOCRICY
It is almost ironic that the Israeli demand for a renunciation of the
right of return comes up at a time
when a new flow of Palestinian refugees is created, and that the
alleged offer to evacuate the
Gaza strip is made while great efforts are underway to enlarge the
existing settlements at the
expense of Palestinian homes and lands.
Irit Katriel Dec 22, 2000
Another 'peace' production has begun, and again the impression is that
what is on the table is an
end to the occupation, dismantling of "most" settlements, exchange of
land for a few settlement
blocks in the West Bank which will be annexed to Israel, and a
peaceful and prosperous
rest-of-our-life alongside independent Palestine. We were almost
there, the story goes. Only
Temple Mount was in the way. And now, Barak is reportedly willing to
give up even that: "Minister
Yuli Tamir said Tuesday morning that the Jewish state could give up
sovereignty over Al Aqsa
Mosque compound in occupied Jerusalem in exchange of the Palestinians
1948 war refugees
renouncing their right of return as stipulated in Resolution 194 of
the UN General Assembly." (AFP,
Dec 20).
Renunciation of the right of return. Meaning: Tamir is selling us that
if the Palestinians will
completely absolve Israel of the robbery of 1948, Barak will agree to
return that which was stolen in
1967. But will he really? Examining the current course of events makes
that very hard to believe.
The Israeli media, forever preoccupied with internal politics, is no
longer reporting the crimes
comitted daily in the West bank and Gaza. But when the smoke will
clear, the reality on the ground
will be very different than it was three months ago. We will wonder
how it happened and why we
didn't know when it did. Reports from the ground are very scarce,
since "no Israelis are allowed in
[to Gaza] not even Israeli journalists" (NY times, Dec 10). To the
West Bank, Israeli journalists can
go, but they probably don't bother to anymore. Yet, detailed daily
reports are distrbuted over the
internet by Palestinian human rights and observer groups. An
occasional foreign media report also
reveals what is being done by the army. The pattern of events, even if
not their full extent, is very
clear and extremely alarming.
It is almost ironic that this Israeli demand for a renunciation of the
right of return of 1948 refugees
comes up at a time when a new flow of Palestinian refugees is created,
and that the alleged offer to
evacuate the Gaza strip (and even enlarge it in the land swap deal) is
made while great efforts are
underway to enlarge the existing settlements at the expense of
Palestinian homes and lands.
The most systematic and vicious destruction appears to be taking place
in the Gaza strip.
Residential areas close to settlements and military posts are the
targets. Khan Yunis refugee camp
has been shelled and shot at almost every night for weeks, damaging a
few houses every time,
according to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR). The
residents of the frequently
shelled neigborhoods have already evacuated. While this can be sold as
unproportional military
reaction to attacks on the settlers and soldiers, the same cannot be
said for the bulldozers that daily
sweep agricultural land, tear down greenhouses and wells, and demolish
homes. The general
pretext for such measures is the elimination of hiding places for
stone throwers, shooters or
bombers. But even this excuse doesn't explain why vegetable fields are
levelled.
The following is from the daily report of PCHR for Dec 12, which I
selected at random from the ones
they have sent:
Yesterday evening, at about 21:00, the Israeli occupation forces swept
more areas of agricultural
land to the north of a road branching from Salah El-Din Street (the
main road between the north and
south of the Gaza Strip) leading to Gush Qatif settlement bloc. The
affected areas are 800 meters
away from Al-Matahen junction in the middle area of the Gaza Strip.
The sweeping lasted until 2:00
local time this morning. It included:
1) A 40-donum area of agricultural land planted with palms and guavas,
owned by Salem
Mohammed Abu Shmas. In addition, an irrigation network was destroyed.
2) A 10-donum area of
agricultural land planted with vegetables, owned by Jehad Abu Madhi.
3) A three-donum area of
agricultural land on which three greenhouses planted with vegetables
were established, owned by
Mohammed Abu Nahyeh. In addition, an irrigation network, a well and a
water pump were
destroyed.
A similar paragraph, with different names, appears in each one of their
dry and factual lists of
events. It takes a rare media report to put a human tragedy behind an
uprooted olive grove, as in
this article about the West Bank village of Hares:
When Ali Abed Daoud Jaber, 76, awoke the next morning, he found he was
ruined. More than 400
olive trees were cut down by the Israeli army along the highway
leading to three Jewish
settlements. At least 110 were his. His entire olive orchard lay
felled on the stone-strewn ground.
"Where is God?" the old man screamed, gesturing with his cane as
villagers tried to calm him.
"They cut down trees my grandfather tended! Trees hundreds of years
old! I depend on my trees
completely.. . . What will I eat now? What will I drink?"
"He is become without a brain since he saw this," said Nasfat Khufash,
who belongs to a rural
development committee in the vicinity. "He was sitting in the middle
of the road, crying, this
morning."
(The Atlanta-based "Cox" News Service, Nov 28th).
Palestinians who have their own land, are relatively independent. In
times of strict closure, when the
wage-working residents of the refugee camps are unable to work and
quickly run out of money and
require food aid, the villagers can work their land. And if they are
unable to sell their produce, they
can still grow vegetables between the trees, and survive. This is what
they did during the first
intifada, and they were generally spared the starvation suffered in
the camps. Now, even this is
denied of them.
"The olive trees gave us food. Now they are only fit for the fire,"
said Nawaf Suf. "We believe they
want to deprive us of our livelihood, drive us off the land and make
common laborers of us, so we
have to go to the cities and work for Israelis." (there).
This is one explanation. Another is that the plan is to take the land
for the benefit of expansion of the
nearby settlements. In quiet times, destruction and expropriation in
such dimensions would have
been impossible. But nothing is better than the smoke cloud created by
the chaos of fighting to
distract attention from some olive trees and tomato bushes.
But the evil doesn't end with trees. The following unbelievable story
was reported by Phil Reeves in
The Independent On Dec 7th:
The residents of El-Kararah, a scattering of Palestinian smallholdings
in the Gaza Strip, were
preparing for bed when the Israeli armoured bulldozers came to flatten
their homes and to drive
them off the land. [...]
The bulldozers came at night - three armoured machines crowned with
machine guns and backed
by Israeli tanks - and began uprooting their orange and olive orchards,
transforming them into a
moonscape of twisted roots, broken tree trunks and rubble.
The villagers say that, as the bulldozers crashed into their houses,
they grabbed their children and
whatever possessions they could carry, and fled on foot, weeping and
screaming. Several of their
cattle were crushed to death as the bulldozers flattened the cow sheds.
The villagers briefly tried to stay on the land by holding a sit-down
protest, until Israeli soldiers began
firing bullets at them. They spent the first night, shivering and
bewildered, huddled in the open. Now
they live in stark poverty in tents supplied by the Red Cross and the
Palestinian municipal
authorities, in a palm grove near their former homes.
In at least one case, the Palestinians tried to resist, at a heavy
price in blood. On Dec 13th, PCHR
reported:
PCHR?s field officers reported that this morning, at approximately
1:45, a bulldozer, some tanks
and dozens of troops of the Israeli occupation forces moved from
Al-Tuffah roadblock towards the
refugee camp of Khan Yunis in order to demolish a number of
Palestinian houses, 150 meters
away from military posts of these forces. Hundreds of Palestinian
citizens confronted the Israeli
occupation forces, which fired artillery shells and heavy and medium
bullets at Palestinian civilians
and houses. The incident developed into an armed confrontation in
which some members of the
Palestinian National Security Forces participated. Fighting lasted
until 8:00 local time this morning.
The bulldozer of the Israeli occupation forces was able to reach a
number of houses and partially
demolished them. Artillery shells also hit other houses.
Four members of the Palestinian National Security forces were killed
and 28 Palestinian civilians
were wounded in this incident, PCHR said.
But not only Gaza is targetted. Jerusalem area seems to be going
through similar demographic
'adjustments'. In Beit Jala and Beit Sahour, Bethlehem and Ramallah,
which have been under heavy
fire, thousands are reportedly displaced. The shelled neighborhoods
have been evacuated.
Already on Nov 6th, the Emergency Committee of Beit Sahour reported
that "An emergency camp
has been set up in Beit Sahour in order to provide shelter for families
whose homes have been
destroyed or damaged by the Israeli occupation forces since the
beginning of Al-Aqsa Intifada. [...]
To date, eight homes have been completely destroyed, over 100 homes
have been damaged in
various ways, and over 130 families have been displaced. Those who
have not been able to stay
with relatives or friends now live in this emergency camp."
A month later, on Dec 5th, Edward A. Hazboun, President of The
Bethlehem Association,
distributed a letter in which he states "Shepherd's Field and Manger
Square have become refugee
quarters for people whose homes have been destroyed [...] Thousands
are being made refugees in
their own towns [...] New refugee camps are sprouting everywhere, from
shepherd field near
Bethlehem to the suburbs of Ramallah and Nablus."
*
If Barak is now offering to withdraw from the Gaza strip, why are the
army's bulldozers working so
hard to take more land near the settlements?
This question isn't asked, partly because the mainstream news isn't
following the events on the
ground, and mostly because it's elections season, when statements are
much more important than
deeds.
_________________________________________________________________
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An Intifada in search of a leadership
By Amira Hass
A late-night urgent phone call from a village in the Salfit region of
the Palestinian Authority: "My
nephew has been arrested. It happened a week ago. He is only 15. We do
not even know where he
is being held in custody. To whom should we turn?"A phone call from the
same caller, a few weeks
earlier, a little after midnight: "Jewish settlers, with the assistance
of the Israeli army, are in our
orchards now and are uprooting trees. What can we do? To whom should we
turn?"
Yet another phone call from this caller, a week ago: "The road to our
village has been obstructed
since the start of the Intifada. Twice we have cleared away one
obstruction, so that we could travel
along this road freely. We got into arguments with the Israeli
soldiers. We said to them, 'We aren't a
bunch of animals that you can put in a cage.' 'Yes, you are!' they
replied. Twice, the Israeli soldiers
restored the obstruction. The third time we removed the large concrete
blocks, the mayor of the
town was with us. 'I'll argue it out with the soldiers,' he said.
Whether or not he argued with them, a
week went by and the huge concrete blocks were not brought in again.
Thank God, now we can
travel in our cars along this road."
These three telephone messages indicate a blatant side-effect of the
second Intifada: The absence
of the Palestinian Authority as an agency capable of offering support
to the residents under its
authority in the face of measures undertaken by the Israel Defense
Forces (IDF) or as an agency
capable of initiating activities that could be defined as a civil
uprising.
Palestinians whose loved ones have been arrested are continuing to turn
to non-government
organizations (NGOs), Israeli and Palestinian alike, or to seek the
assistance of lawyers. No
emergency organization has been set up in the PA to coordinate the
monitoring of the arrests and
to offer legal and financial aid to the families of arrested persons.
The PA has not initiated a thorough investigation of even some of the
shooting incidents or even
some of the cases in which Palestinians were killed by IDF personnel.
Most of the updated and
more precise information can be obtained from NGOs, especially from the
Palestinian Center for
Human Rights, which is based in Gaza.
The IDF set up hundreds of road obstructions throughout the West Bank
and the Gaza Strip. Except
for a small number of cases, the PA's regime, which is the official
leadership of the Palestinians,
made no practical attempt to challenge the IDF by sending in
bulldozers, by filling in ditches that
Israeli soldiers dug across roads to prevent vehicular traffic from
using those roadways, or by
removing obstructions consisting of huge concrete blocks or earth
ramparts - even in places that
were not continually patroled by the IDF. Instead, the PA's regime
focused on issuing press
releases and publicizing its grievances to world audiences.
Palestinian experts have sadly stated that only the Palestinian
ministries of education and health
acted quickly in order to adapt their operations to the state of
emergency and in order to serve
jointly as an agency offering support to the residents of the PA. Local
resident committees were set
up in some communities to provide mutual assistance and to provide help
to needy persons. The
establishment of these communities was the initiative of either local
community figures or NGOs.
During the first few weeks of the present Intifada, veterans of the
first Intifada and members of
NGOs, who (and this is no coincidence) belong to the Palestinian left,
said that this Intifada should
be an unarmed popular struggle, as was the case with the first
Intifada. These individuals failed in
this attempt. There is a need to study the connection between this
failure and the different nature of
the Israeli occupation today: Tight, stifling rings of encirclement
around Palestinian enclaves,
instead of an occupation army that confronts the populace at every
corner, on every street and in
every government agency. There is a need for investigating to what
extent the failure was due to the
effectiveness of the splitting up of the PA into separate territories
and to the effectiveness of the
severing of the natural ties between various parts of the PA (this
situation did not exist prior to the
signing of the Oslo agreement).
The PA has been so fragmented that the regime cannot function as a
centralized, unified agency.
That fact in itself, incidentally, can serve as proof that the PA's
leadership did not plan this uprising.
The new character of the Israeli occupation is not the only reason for
the absence of the PA as a
supportive agency capable of initiating actions. Another reason is the
breakdown in interpersonal
contact between the PA's top leaders and the Palestinian public as a
whole over the past seven
years. From the very start of the Oslo process, the Palestinian
leadership has exhibited a split
personality. As the leadership of a public still under the control of a
foreign occupying power, it
issued declarations left and right in its capacity as the spearhead of
a national liberation movement.
However, as a leadership capable of exerting only partial control in
accordance with permits issued
by the occupying army operating under the guidance of American, British
and German espionage
services, the PA's regime functioned as a body that safeguarded the
special privileges of its own
members. In the course of this very brief Intifada, the PA's regime did
not display sufficient insight -
or sufficient capacity - for adapting itself to the spirit of rebellion
that took hold of the Palestinian
public at large.
Members of the Fatah movement - the backbone of a regime that, in the
course of seven years, has
been unable to improve the living standards of the residents of the PA
- tried to restore its past
legitimization as a national liberation movement. However, they
preferred to do so by focusing on
the "militarization" of the Intifada - the opening up of safety valves
and the use of firearms, which
immediately erased the popular-civic character of this uprising.
At this point in time, an official leadership, whose presence during
its nation's most difficult hour was
simply not felt, must now act decisively: Can it waive its claim to the
right of return, and, if so, how
can that decision be implemented practically? Can it agree to the West
Bank being split down the
middle by blocs of Jewish settlements, and, if so, how can that
decision be implemented
practically? Can it agree to one street in East Jerusalem being
Palestinian, while the street running
parallel to it is Israeli, and if so, how can that decision be
implemented practically?
© <http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/copyright.asp?datee=copyright
2000 Ha'aretz. All Rights
Reserved
PALESTINIAN REFUGEES; ISRAELI HYPOCRICY
It is almost ironic that the Israeli demand for a renunciation of the
right of return comes up at a time
when a new flow of Palestinian refugees is created, and that the
alleged offer to evacuate the
Gaza strip is made while great efforts are underway to enlarge the
existing settlements at the
expense of Palestinian homes and lands.
Irit Katriel Dec 22, 2000
Another 'peace' production has begun, and again the impression is that
what is on the table is an
end to the occupation, dismantling of "most" settlements, exchange of
land for a few settlement
blocks in the West Bank which will be annexed to Israel, and a
peaceful and prosperous
rest-of-our-life alongside independent Palestine. We were almost
there, the story goes. Only
Temple Mount was in the way. And now, Barak is reportedly willing to
give up even that: "Minister
Yuli Tamir said Tuesday morning that the Jewish state could give up
sovereignty over Al Aqsa
Mosque compound in occupied Jerusalem in exchange of the Palestinians
1948 war refugees
renouncing their right of return as stipulated in Resolution 194 of
the UN General Assembly." (AFP,
Dec 20).
Renunciation of the right of return. Meaning: Tamir is selling us that
if the Palestinians will
completely absolve Israel of the robbery of 1948, Barak will agree to
return that which was stolen in
1967. But will he really? Examining the current course of events makes
that very hard to believe.
The Israeli media, forever preoccupied with internal politics, is no
longer reporting the crimes
comitted daily in the West bank and Gaza. But when the smoke will
clear, the reality on the ground
will be very different than it was three months ago. We will wonder
how it happened and why we
didn't know when it did. Reports from the ground are very scarce,
since "no Israelis are allowed in
[to Gaza] not even Israeli journalists" (NY times, Dec 10). To the
West Bank, Israeli journalists can
go, but they probably don't bother to anymore. Yet, detailed daily
reports are distrbuted over the
internet by Palestinian human rights and observer groups. An
occasional foreign media report also
reveals what is being done by the army. The pattern of events, even if
not their full extent, is very
clear and extremely alarming.
It is almost ironic that this Israeli demand for a renunciation of the
right of return of 1948 refugees
comes up at a time when a new flow of Palestinian refugees is created,
and that the alleged offer to
evacuate the Gaza strip (and even enlarge it in the land swap deal) is
made while great efforts are
underway to enlarge the existing settlements at the expense of
Palestinian homes and lands.
The most systematic and vicious destruction appears to be taking place
in the Gaza strip.
Residential areas close to settlements and military posts are the
targets. Khan Yunis refugee camp
has been shelled and shot at almost every night for weeks, damaging a
few houses every time,
according to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR). The
residents of the frequently
shelled neigborhoods have already evacuated. While this can be sold as
unproportional military
reaction to attacks on the settlers and soldiers, the same cannot be
said for the bulldozers that daily
sweep agricultural land, tear down greenhouses and wells, and demolish
homes. The general
pretext for such measures is the elimination of hiding places for
stone throwers, shooters or
bombers. But even this excuse doesn't explain why vegetable fields are
levelled.
The following is from the daily report of PCHR for Dec 12, which I
selected at random from the ones
they have sent:
Yesterday evening, at about 21:00, the Israeli occupation forces swept
more areas of agricultural
land to the north of a road branching from Salah El-Din Street (the
main road between the north and
south of the Gaza Strip) leading to Gush Qatif settlement bloc. The
affected areas are 800 meters
away from Al-Matahen junction in the middle area of the Gaza Strip.
The sweeping lasted until 2:00
local time this morning. It included:
1) A 40-donum area of agricultural land planted with palms and guavas,
owned by Salem
Mohammed Abu Shmas. In addition, an irrigation network was destroyed.
2) A 10-donum area of
agricultural land planted with vegetables, owned by Jehad Abu Madhi.
3) A three-donum area of
agricultural land on which three greenhouses planted with vegetables
were established, owned by
Mohammed Abu Nahyeh. In addition, an irrigation network, a well and a
water pump were
destroyed.
A similar paragraph, with different names, appears in each one of their
dry and factual lists of
events. It takes a rare media report to put a human tragedy behind an
uprooted olive grove, as in
this article about the West Bank village of Hares:
When Ali Abed Daoud Jaber, 76, awoke the next morning, he found he was
ruined. More than 400
olive trees were cut down by the Israeli army along the highway
leading to three Jewish
settlements. At least 110 were his. His entire olive orchard lay
felled on the stone-strewn ground.
"Where is God?" the old man screamed, gesturing with his cane as
villagers tried to calm him.
"They cut down trees my grandfather tended! Trees hundreds of years
old! I depend on my trees
completely.. . . What will I eat now? What will I drink?"
"He is become without a brain since he saw this," said Nasfat Khufash,
who belongs to a rural
development committee in the vicinity. "He was sitting in the middle
of the road, crying, this
morning."
(The Atlanta-based "Cox" News Service, Nov 28th).
Palestinians who have their own land, are relatively independent. In
times of strict closure, when the
wage-working residents of the refugee camps are unable to work and
quickly run out of money and
require food aid, the villagers can work their land. And if they are
unable to sell their produce, they
can still grow vegetables between the trees, and survive. This is what
they did during the first
intifada, and they were generally spared the starvation suffered in
the camps. Now, even this is
denied of them.
"The olive trees gave us food. Now they are only fit for the fire,"
said Nawaf Suf. "We believe they
want to deprive us of our livelihood, drive us off the land and make
common laborers of us, so we
have to go to the cities and work for Israelis." (there).
This is one explanation. Another is that the plan is to take the land
for the benefit of expansion of the
nearby settlements. In quiet times, destruction and expropriation in
such dimensions would have
been impossible. But nothing is better than the smoke cloud created by
the chaos of fighting to
distract attention from some olive trees and tomato bushes.
But the evil doesn't end with trees. The following unbelievable story
was reported by Phil Reeves in
The Independent On Dec 7th:
The residents of El-Kararah, a scattering of Palestinian smallholdings
in the Gaza Strip, were
preparing for bed when the Israeli armoured bulldozers came to flatten
their homes and to drive
them off the land. [...]
The bulldozers came at night - three armoured machines crowned with
machine guns and backed
by Israeli tanks - and began uprooting their orange and olive orchards,
transforming them into a
moonscape of twisted roots, broken tree trunks and rubble.
The villagers say that, as the bulldozers crashed into their houses,
they grabbed their children and
whatever possessions they could carry, and fled on foot, weeping and
screaming. Several of their
cattle were crushed to death as the bulldozers flattened the cow sheds.
The villagers briefly tried to stay on the land by holding a sit-down
protest, until Israeli soldiers began
firing bullets at them. They spent the first night, shivering and
bewildered, huddled in the open. Now
they live in stark poverty in tents supplied by the Red Cross and the
Palestinian municipal
authorities, in a palm grove near their former homes.
In at least one case, the Palestinians tried to resist, at a heavy
price in blood. On Dec 13th, PCHR
reported:
PCHR?s field officers reported that this morning, at approximately
1:45, a bulldozer, some tanks
and dozens of troops of the Israeli occupation forces moved from
Al-Tuffah roadblock towards the
refugee camp of Khan Yunis in order to demolish a number of
Palestinian houses, 150 meters
away from military posts of these forces. Hundreds of Palestinian
citizens confronted the Israeli
occupation forces, which fired artillery shells and heavy and medium
bullets at Palestinian civilians
and houses. The incident developed into an armed confrontation in
which some members of the
Palestinian National Security Forces participated. Fighting lasted
until 8:00 local time this morning.
The bulldozer of the Israeli occupation forces was able to reach a
number of houses and partially
demolished them. Artillery shells also hit other houses.
Four members of the Palestinian National Security forces were killed
and 28 Palestinian civilians
were wounded in this incident, PCHR said.
But not only Gaza is targetted. Jerusalem area seems to be going
through similar demographic
'adjustments'. In Beit Jala and Beit Sahour, Bethlehem and Ramallah,
which have been under heavy
fire, thousands are reportedly displaced. The shelled neighborhoods
have been evacuated.
Already on Nov 6th, the Emergency Committee of Beit Sahour reported
that "An emergency camp
has been set up in Beit Sahour in order to provide shelter for families
whose homes have been
destroyed or damaged by the Israeli occupation forces since the
beginning of Al-Aqsa Intifada. [...]
To date, eight homes have been completely destroyed, over 100 homes
have been damaged in
various ways, and over 130 families have been displaced. Those who
have not been able to stay
with relatives or friends now live in this emergency camp."
A month later, on Dec 5th, Edward A. Hazboun, President of The
Bethlehem Association,
distributed a letter in which he states "Shepherd's Field and Manger
Square have become refugee
quarters for people whose homes have been destroyed [...] Thousands
are being made refugees in
their own towns [...] New refugee camps are sprouting everywhere, from
shepherd field near
Bethlehem to the suburbs of Ramallah and Nablus."
*
If Barak is now offering to withdraw from the Gaza strip, why are the
army's bulldozers working so
hard to take more land near the settlements?
This question isn't asked, partly because the mainstream news isn't
following the events on the
ground, and mostly because it's elections season, when statements are
much more important than
deeds.
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