Gaza braces for Sharon to send in tanks in next phase
of war
Palestinians build sand barricades as Israel again
defies Bush
By Robert Fisk in Gaza
27 April 2002
They are coming. That's what most Gazans tell you. The
Israelis are coming. But the sand barricades are
pathetic. Even a mile from the Erez "safe crossing''
point constructed during the early days of the mad
dream of Oslo, the best that Yasser Arafat's legions
can do is erect a 15ft rampart of earth and sandbags,
with a 12ft gap for local cars ? and for Israeli
Merkava tanks when Ariel Sharon decides to drive in.
But the cops go on waving the donkey carts past the
traffic lights, and the Palestinian Authority guards
slumber with their Kalashnikov rifles in their tin
shack, ready for part two of the Sharon War on Terror.
The odd thing is that if the Israeli Prime Minister
really wants to dismantle the "network of terror'' of
which he speaks so frequently, Gaza ? the one place
the Israeli army has not yet dared to reoccupy ?
should perhaps have been his first target. For here
are militias aplenty, Palestinians who know how to
destroy Merkava-3 tanks, who can manufacture
short-range rockets and mortars and know the
principles of booby traps better than the refugee
gunmen of Jenin. As one local put it yesterday: "This
place is wired.''
Its people are certainly preparing for the worst. The
banks report massive withdrawals. Human rights groups
are duplicating their files. Everyone knows what
happened to the computerised archives of the
Palestinian ministries in Ramallah and Nablus and
Jenin; they were stolen by the Israeli soldiers
because, in the imperishable words of one Israeli
officer: "Documents have a very important value.''
But this is "Palestine".
"They say they've copied all their papers,'' a western
human rights worker said. "But I don't think they've
finished making CDs of all the files in our office and
the paper archives are too large to photocopy now.
They simply haven't started to get the work done.''
Yet there is a grim determination to accept the
future. Raja Sourani, a human rights lawyer with the
most eloquent, if pessimistic, view of the coming
weeks ? or days ? has few illusions. "I think it's
going to be bleak, black and bloody and I can see the
blood that will be shed will be Israeli as well as
Palestinian. The Palestinians are not ready to be good
victims any more. They have nothing to lose.
"The Israelis have opened Pandora's Box. I never in my
life have felt our morale and determination to be as
high as it is now. I'm very proud ? and I'm scared to
death.''So are the women of Gaza. Many are burying
their jewels in their gardens or backyards. "We heard
what happened to women in Ramallah who had thousands
of dollars of jewellery stolen by the Israeli troops
who entered their homes,'' a middle-class married
woman in Gaza City said without emotion. "One friend
of mine in Ramallah hid thousands of dollars in a big
bowl of rice in the kitchen when the Israelis came to
take over his house. He reckoned he would lose the
money when he was searched. But when he came back, the
rice was overturned and the money had gone.''The
graffiti warns of reoccupation. A hand grenade on one
wall, a drawing of a wired bomb on another predict the
doom of occupiers. Homes I entered were stuffed with
food, water, blankets, in some cases sandbags. As the
sea flopped on to the Gaza beach in the sultry
afternoon, a few fishing boats glided over the water.
But the catch doesn't count for much when four-hour
power cuts ? unannounced as usual by the corrupt
Palestinian Authority ? cut off deep freezes and
fridges.As one Palestinian militant remarked ? how
easily one falls into these categories to avoid
identifying someone who may soon be in a prison cage ?
an Israeli assault is "as certain as I am seeing you".
It was a matter of time, he said. "I don't trust the
Arabic news. I listen to the news in Hebrew from
Israel. Gaza sets the tone there ? the Israelis can't
complete their objectives without Gaza. It's here that
Palestinian history has been decided for the past 54
years.''True, up to a point. The Palestine National
Council first proclaimed Palestinian independence in
Gaza on 1 October 1948, adopting the old green, white,
black and red banner of the Arab Revolt as the flag.
But then the Gaza Strip became a slum backyard of
Egypt while the Mayor of Hebron handed over the West
Bank to the Jordanian monarchy at a ceremony in
Jericho. If Gaza is the last bit of unoccupied
"Palestine" left, it's a midden."I think everything
depends on three things,'' Mr Sourani said. "It's
about what's going on back in Washington. It's about
how far the Europeans will involve themselves. And
it's about how soon some dramatic event will take
place on the ground against the Israelis that will
give them an excuse to move. I know all about what is
called "looting and wanton destruction'' in the West
Bank. This is not new to us. We dealt with hundreds of
such cases in the past and won cases of looting
against the Israeli army in the Israeli courts.''Mr
Sourani has completed the duplication of all his human
rights records. "And when the Israelis come, we shall
keep on working here for human rights. We will not
allow ourselves to be panicked or become paranoid. We
learnt something from the Israeli occupation in the
past: to be professional and to be strategic. They
made our bones strong.''
In the coming days ? or weeks ? Mr Sourani's words may
well be put to the test.
________________________________________________________________________
For live cricket scores download Yahoo! Score Tracker
at: http://in.sports.yahoo.com/cricket/tracker.html
of war
Palestinians build sand barricades as Israel again
defies Bush
By Robert Fisk in Gaza
27 April 2002
They are coming. That's what most Gazans tell you. The
Israelis are coming. But the sand barricades are
pathetic. Even a mile from the Erez "safe crossing''
point constructed during the early days of the mad
dream of Oslo, the best that Yasser Arafat's legions
can do is erect a 15ft rampart of earth and sandbags,
with a 12ft gap for local cars ? and for Israeli
Merkava tanks when Ariel Sharon decides to drive in.
But the cops go on waving the donkey carts past the
traffic lights, and the Palestinian Authority guards
slumber with their Kalashnikov rifles in their tin
shack, ready for part two of the Sharon War on Terror.
The odd thing is that if the Israeli Prime Minister
really wants to dismantle the "network of terror'' of
which he speaks so frequently, Gaza ? the one place
the Israeli army has not yet dared to reoccupy ?
should perhaps have been his first target. For here
are militias aplenty, Palestinians who know how to
destroy Merkava-3 tanks, who can manufacture
short-range rockets and mortars and know the
principles of booby traps better than the refugee
gunmen of Jenin. As one local put it yesterday: "This
place is wired.''
Its people are certainly preparing for the worst. The
banks report massive withdrawals. Human rights groups
are duplicating their files. Everyone knows what
happened to the computerised archives of the
Palestinian ministries in Ramallah and Nablus and
Jenin; they were stolen by the Israeli soldiers
because, in the imperishable words of one Israeli
officer: "Documents have a very important value.''
But this is "Palestine".
"They say they've copied all their papers,'' a western
human rights worker said. "But I don't think they've
finished making CDs of all the files in our office and
the paper archives are too large to photocopy now.
They simply haven't started to get the work done.''
Yet there is a grim determination to accept the
future. Raja Sourani, a human rights lawyer with the
most eloquent, if pessimistic, view of the coming
weeks ? or days ? has few illusions. "I think it's
going to be bleak, black and bloody and I can see the
blood that will be shed will be Israeli as well as
Palestinian. The Palestinians are not ready to be good
victims any more. They have nothing to lose.
"The Israelis have opened Pandora's Box. I never in my
life have felt our morale and determination to be as
high as it is now. I'm very proud ? and I'm scared to
death.''So are the women of Gaza. Many are burying
their jewels in their gardens or backyards. "We heard
what happened to women in Ramallah who had thousands
of dollars of jewellery stolen by the Israeli troops
who entered their homes,'' a middle-class married
woman in Gaza City said without emotion. "One friend
of mine in Ramallah hid thousands of dollars in a big
bowl of rice in the kitchen when the Israelis came to
take over his house. He reckoned he would lose the
money when he was searched. But when he came back, the
rice was overturned and the money had gone.''The
graffiti warns of reoccupation. A hand grenade on one
wall, a drawing of a wired bomb on another predict the
doom of occupiers. Homes I entered were stuffed with
food, water, blankets, in some cases sandbags. As the
sea flopped on to the Gaza beach in the sultry
afternoon, a few fishing boats glided over the water.
But the catch doesn't count for much when four-hour
power cuts ? unannounced as usual by the corrupt
Palestinian Authority ? cut off deep freezes and
fridges.As one Palestinian militant remarked ? how
easily one falls into these categories to avoid
identifying someone who may soon be in a prison cage ?
an Israeli assault is "as certain as I am seeing you".
It was a matter of time, he said. "I don't trust the
Arabic news. I listen to the news in Hebrew from
Israel. Gaza sets the tone there ? the Israelis can't
complete their objectives without Gaza. It's here that
Palestinian history has been decided for the past 54
years.''True, up to a point. The Palestine National
Council first proclaimed Palestinian independence in
Gaza on 1 October 1948, adopting the old green, white,
black and red banner of the Arab Revolt as the flag.
But then the Gaza Strip became a slum backyard of
Egypt while the Mayor of Hebron handed over the West
Bank to the Jordanian monarchy at a ceremony in
Jericho. If Gaza is the last bit of unoccupied
"Palestine" left, it's a midden."I think everything
depends on three things,'' Mr Sourani said. "It's
about what's going on back in Washington. It's about
how far the Europeans will involve themselves. And
it's about how soon some dramatic event will take
place on the ground against the Israelis that will
give them an excuse to move. I know all about what is
called "looting and wanton destruction'' in the West
Bank. This is not new to us. We dealt with hundreds of
such cases in the past and won cases of looting
against the Israeli army in the Israeli courts.''Mr
Sourani has completed the duplication of all his human
rights records. "And when the Israelis come, we shall
keep on working here for human rights. We will not
allow ourselves to be panicked or become paranoid. We
learnt something from the Israeli occupation in the
past: to be professional and to be strategic. They
made our bones strong.''
In the coming days ? or weeks ? Mr Sourani's words may
well be put to the test.
________________________________________________________________________
For live cricket scores download Yahoo! Score Tracker
at: http://in.sports.yahoo.com/cricket/tracker.html