Posted on 01/25/2002 4:27:23 PM PST by RCW2001
Forget peace if the rules differ for Israel
By CESAR CHELALA
Special to The Japan Times
NEW YORK -- Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's decision to keep Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat under siege in the West Bank city of Ra- mallah shows an utter disrespect for the Palestinian leader and for the Palestinians. While Sharon insists that Arafat will not leave the city until the assassins of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi are apprehended, those in Israel responsible for assassinating scores of Palestinian leaders in state-sponsored terrorism go free, with no Israeli commitment to capture and punish them.
Coming on the heels of the destruction of the runway of the Palestinian-controlled international airport in the Gaza Strip and the destruction of the road between the towns of Rafah and Khan Younis, Sharon's decision can only have ominous consequences for the chances of peace in the region.
The latest Israeli moves follow the Jan. 3 seizure of an arms-loaded boat that Israel alleges was Palestinian-owned and a serious threat to the Israeli population. Yet the United States sends Israel weapons worth about $2 billion a year, weapons that are used for attacking and killing Palestinian soldiers and civilians in unequal battles pitching high technology against stones.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell backed Israel's demands that Arafat arrest and try those responsible for trying to smuggle weapons aboard the vessel in the Red Sea, adding that the arms shipment was a violation of the Oslo accords of 1993. But so is Israel's continuing building of settlements, the assassination of Palestinian leaders and the attacks against the civilian population.
Why is it OK for Israel to continue to receive U.S. arms to assassinate Palestinians, but not OK for the Palestinians to defend themselves?
As Khalil Jahsan, vice president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee recently said, "Why is the Israeli side allowed under Oslo to continue to arm itself and continue to administer violence against the Palestinian people, when the Palestinian people are not allowed even to use stones? If Yasser Arafat was not bringing in weapons to defend the Palestinian people against Israeli occupation, he wouldn't be fulfilling his responsibility."
Israeli reprisals have been brutal and indiscriminate, involving civilian non-combatants, women and children. According to the Israeli military command, following the Jan. 9 attack by two Hamas guerrillas that killed four Israeli soldiers, the Israeli army demolished 20 uninhabited Palestinian homes. The International Committee for the Red Cross, however, said that 93 Palestinian homes had been demolished by the Israeli military, leaving more than 600 people without homes.
It is "a prime example of excessive and unreasonable force" and "a shameful chapter" in Israel's history, said Zeev Schiff, an Israeli military affairs analyst, because there was no military need to do it.
The Palestinians are not blameless in this process. They have also attacked civilian populations and killed innocent women and children. Given the phenomenal difference in arms between the two sides, though, their actions can be interpreted as desperate measures by people whose basic rights have been systematically denied, including the right to have a country, the right to work and the right to basic standards of sanitation and health. Palestinian areas in the West Bank and Gaza look like Gruyere cheese -- where the holes are the settlements -- rather than an independent country of which people can be proud.
Unrelenting Israeli incursions into Palestinian areas, the demolition of dozens of homes, the continuation of the siege against Arafat in Ramallah, more construction of settlements and state-sponsored assassinations of Palestinian leaders seem designed to crush any prospect of peace in the region.
Humiliating Arafat further and allowing more radical groups to take control is not in the service of peace. Until both sides in the conflict are treated under the same rules, the specter of violence will continue to dominate the political landscape in the Middle East.
Cesar Chelala is an international consultant on health and social issues and a cowinner of an Overseas Press Club of America award for an article on human rights.
The Japan Times: Jan. 24, 2002
Let me see if I understand this. There is a huge advantage in armaments for Israel and Israel uses that advantage by selectively responding to horrific attacks on civilians by notifying the targets in advance, destroyes unoccupied property, and bulldozes runways. IOW, Israel attacks property while taking steps to safeguard lives. The palestinians use what meager weapons they have to attack innocent civilians. One wonders what would happen were the advantage in armaments to be reversed? Would the Palestinians pre-warn? Would they target property instead of civilians?
So far, so good. ;^)
Although I find just about everything else in Chelala's article to be absurd, I have to agree with him here. It is wrong to lay siege to Arafat, and bad politics to boot.
Parking tanks outside Arafat's house is a concrete way of sending the message that Israel doesn't recognize Arafat or the Palestinian Authority. They might just as well simply reoccupy these territories now, rather than let this drag on, because their actions preclude any meaningful relationship with what exists of the Palestinian government.
Of course, the point shouldn't be lost that the PA has never intended for peaceful coexistence with Israel. Aside from the repeated, public declarations to this effect by Arafat and practically everyone in charge of the Palestinian Authority, their open support for -- and even sponsorship of -- self-admitted terrorist groups speaks much more loudly than even the hateful dross that spews forth from their mouths.
Imal
Palestinian "leaders?" The people who plan and support terrorist acts are not leaders, they're criminals. Israel has shown remarkable restraint in NOT killing so-called "political" leaders who are part of organizations encouraging terror against Israel.
Right on and AMEN, Tex!
It's never a good idea to forget who we are. Or at least who we should aspire to be. Thanks for the perspective injection for the thread.
Imal
Oh, boo hoo hoo! These are the same swine who danced in the streets and oo-loo'ed to celebrate the 9/11 attacks. Maybe one day they will learn to pretend to act like humans.
The ritual "see, I'm fair" argument immediately swatted aside with rhetorical blather. The difference in power of arms has nothing to do with correctness or validity to position. Here the "phenomenal" difference reaches for an image of the righteousness of the little guy because he's little. He qualifies "can be interpreted." What weasel words, he won't even stand up to the premise of his position, but allows insinuation to do his propaganda. Instead, he places primacy on his feelings, his interpretation on the way things over there should be to fit and confrom to his morality. He cements the lefty silliness with "right to work" and other comfortable buzzwords, not thinking about why, if these rights were actually denied, they are "denied" and the context of the denial.
In sum, just another patronizing effort to deny Palestinians their voice because he doesn't like what many of them really say. Ignore it, blame Israel.
Stop imposing American values on foreign peoples, i.e., the Arafatists! Your cultural imperialism is patronizing, the expectation that different peoples share or should share your views blinds you from objectively understanding the situation.
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