More on Israel's assassins
Friend Judy S sent me the URL for an interesting examination of the degree to which Israel's policy of extra-judicial executions (a.k.a. assassinations) has affected/stimulated the development of similar policies by the UK and the US. I don't know anything about the writer, Richard Bennett. But he seems to present a LOT of information and I can't imagine someone would do this in the public media, on such a sensitive subject, without being pretty sure of his sources.
On another note, my old friend Tom Friedman has a fairly good piece on the Israeli assassins issue in today NYT. His main point is that-- regardless of whether Israel has the "right" to undertake such killings, or not-- the policy seriously undercuts the chances for peace by strengthening the Palestinian hardliners of Hamas.
Is Tom assuming there that Sharon actually wants peace? No, he doesn't seem to be doing that. (Hey, Tom was in Beirut in the summer of 1982. He has a pretty good take on Sharon.)
But he does pull his punches in a couple of significant ways. First, by not even mentioning the possibility that maybe Sharon and his cronies might actually want to undercut the chances for peace? Second, by not specifying just how many Palestinians have died in these gruesome and deliberate acts of (totally illegal) killing.
According to recent figures from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, whose work is very carefully done and whose director, Raji Sourani, is a man of huge integrity, no fewer than 243 Palestinians had been killed in assination operations between the beginning of the current intifada and June 3, 2003. (Of course, the number has risen substantially since then.) Of the 243, "at least 90 (37% of the total number of killed in assassinations) were bystanders, of whom 31 (13%) were children."
Okay, so we assume that "only" 90 of those killed in those operations were bystanders. Then 153 of them were in some way connected with Palestinian militant groups.
Tom F, in his piece, writes, "Have you noticed how often Israel kills a Hamas activist and the victim is described by Israelis as "a senior Hamas official" or a 'key operative'? This has led me to wonder: How many senior Hamas officials could there be? We're not talking about I.B.M. here. We're talking about a ragtag terrorist group. By now Israel should have killed off the entire Hamas leadership twice. Unless what is happening is something else, something I call Palestinian math: Israel kills one Hamas operative and three others volunteer to take his place, in which case what Israel is doing is actually self-destructive."
Well, by that token, then Israel's deliberate killing of 153 Palestinian militants would have persuaded 459 of their friends to step up and take their places.
I disagree with quite a few things Tom writes. (What else is new?) But it's certainly worthwhile to see him hammering home the essential point that, "The fact is, Ariel Sharon's two years of using the Israeli Army alone to fight terrorism have not made Israelis more secure."
Odd that Sharon calls for Palestinians to end the violence, while knowing the bombing/destruction of Palestinian Police Headquarters had/has virtually incapacitated Palestinian ability to do so. Rarely does the press pick up on this deliberate Israeli disconnect.
Let's hope Sharon's use of "occupation" will serve to remove more than cosmetically, the vertiginous settlements in Palestinian land.
Sharon, the licenced psychopath and wanted war criminal, does not want peace. The same applies to the rest of his Likud gangsters.
Sharon has been telling the settlers to build "new settlements without fuss", in other words steal more Palestinian land without attracting attention from the outside world.
I have told my Palestinian friends that Sharon and the other terrorist Netanyahou have no intention of giving up an inch of Palestinian territory through negotiations. The only way is to get it back by force. Israelis only fear force and as we know the zionist lobby controls the White Holuse and its moronic president, so relying on Uncle Sam is a waste of time.
Thanks to M Powell and Adriana P. for their comments. When Adriana says, "Israelis only fear force" I fear that's the language of despair. And it completely mirrors the way many hardline Jewish Israelis speak about the Palestinians. So if you go with that logic, I'm afraid the cycle of violence only keeps turning.
Unless, that is, the concept of "force" is broadened to include what Gandhi called "soul force"-- satyagaraha -- which is, I'm strongly convinced, the only way for Palestinians and Israelis who long for a normal, security life to break out of the cycle of violence once and for all.
As I develop this blog, and the Comments boards on it, I'm trying to figure out what kinds of things I will edit out of the 'comments'. I think I have a number of options-- pre-publishing editing, post-publishing editing, etc etc.
I do want the discourse on the boards to stay respectful, though censorship-wise I'll try to stay minimalist. The statement "Israelis only fear force" comes close to expressing a damaging stereotype, i think. I know PLENTY of Jewish and Palestinian Israelis who definitely don't fit it. Who have, in fact, been courageous workers for peace.
At this point, I'll just note that fact, and leave it at that.
Funny...I didn't hear any comments about religion yet. Most people don't understand that for thousands of years, Israel has been the most fought over piece of land. Why? All the riches there? No...there is a very strong religious tie that most Americans (including myself to be sure) don't fully understand. Now, as much as I want peace in Israel, for all people concerned, I am also a believer in the Bible. I realize that bringing the bible into an argument is pointless if we can't agree on wether or not the bible is even accurate or not; however, on my side of the fence it without a doubt the word of God. The bible tells that the Jews are God's chosen ppl; With that in mind I wouldn't want to mess with them LOL Also, the Bible says that fighting in the region will not cease until the messiah sets up his earthly kingdom. I don't use this as a cop out to get out of trying to help the situation there; certainly there is something we can do to ease the problem, but I just don't think it will stop anytime in any of OUR lifetimes.