[Yhjusticenet] {Disarmed} FW: Gaza: What Just Happened and What It Means for Us and the World

[Athabasca United Church]

Hello all;

            For those of you who might be interested in some interesting
analysis of the current  Israel – Palestine situation I thought I would
forward this.  

 

 

Bruce Jackson DM
Athabasca United Church
Ph 780 675 2341
e-mail: athabascaunitedchurch at telus.net
4817 - 48 St.
Athabasca, Ab.  T9S 1R3


Remember the Root of War is fear. (Thomas Merton)

  "When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my
vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid."  Audre
Lord 1934-1992

 

  _____  

From: Tikkun & The Network of Spiritual Progressives
[mailto:RabbiLerner at Tikkun.org] 
Sent: June 17, 2007 12:49 AM
To: athabascaunitedchurch at telus.net
Subject: Gaza: What Just Happened and What It Means for Us and the World

 


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The triumph of Hamas was a goal of Israeli policy--though now they have no
clue about what to do. Discussion by Uri Avnery, and a discussion on Amy
Goodman's show. First, a perspective by Tikkun editor Rabbi Michael Lerner. 



[ EDITORI'S NOTE:
For many years, Tikkun has argued that a goal of Israeli policy has been to
strengthen Hamas sufficiently so that it's power in Palestine could be used
as an irrefutable 'proof" to the West that Palestinians couldn't be trusted
to run a state of their own, and that therefore all it could be allowed
would be the bantistun version of a state--little Palestinian enclaves cut
off from each other by a sourrounding Israeli Army and the Israeli settlers.
It was for this reason that Ariel Sharon came up with the "unilateral
withdrawal from Gaza" strategy as his alternative to what might have been
growing pressure for Israel to accept the terms of the Geneva Accord
negotiated by MK and former Israeli official negotiator with Palestinians
Yossi Beilin. Sharon's alternative was "unilateral withdrawal," rejecting
the notion of talking to the Palestinian Authority then under control of
Fatah and the pro-non-violence President Abbas. As we pointed out at the
time, if Israel had negotiated an end to its presence in Gaza with Abbas,
they would have strengthened the credibility of this pro-peace faction of
the Palestinian world. Instead, by leaving unilaterally without negotiating
with Abbas, they gave great credence to Hamas, which could say that it was
Hamas' armed resistance that had chased Israeli troops out of Gaza, and that
ll of the non-violence posturing of Abbas had won him nothing but being
ignored and labeled "not a partner for peace" by Sharon and then by Ehud
Olmert who became prime minister after Sharon had a stroke. Ariel Sharon was
no fool: his strategy was to strengthen Hamas so that the pressure from the
rest of the world to give Palesitnians a state would dramatically abate, as
it did. Now the strategy has paid off better than Sharon and Olmert had
dreamt: with visions of Palestinians fighting each other in the streets,
many people in the world are saying "see how these people never could run a
state."
On the other hand, much as I agree with Avnery that the situation is a
set-up that was created by the Occupation and the brutality of Israeli
treatment of Palesitnians, including the slow starvation of the people of
Gaza, I find it morally troubling that none of the champions of Palestinians
in this country like Abunimah (see below in the interview with Amy Goodman)
can face up to the following point: even when Jews were forced to live under
real starvation conditions and wild-overcrowding in the ghettoes of Nazi
Germany and then the concentration camps, they did not take up systematic
violence aganst each other. There is something in the culture of the
Palestinians, or of the Arab world, or of the Muslim world (you tell me
which, I'm not sure) that is too tolerant of violence, and too willing to
excuse it, whether it be in the disgusting violence of Sunnis vs. Shias that
took place in the Iraq/Iran war and in the current civil war in Iraq, in
Lebanon, and now the struggle in Palestine. We at Tikkun who have always
been critical of those distortions in the Jewish world that have allowed
Jews to deny the realities of the horrible oppression visited on the
Palestinian people by Israel and have consistently criticized those elements
in Jewish culture that contribute to the denial or even active support for
Israeli war crimes agains the Palestinian people and last summer against the
Lebanese, we who have consistently criticized the war ethics that have
allowed Christians to fight Christians for centuries, have a right to ask
Muslims, Arabs and Palestinians to be similarly PUBLICLY critical of those
elements in their own culture that have led to such distortions in their
world. And this, not because we want to let Israel off the moral hook of its
responsibility, but because if we want to build real peace and
reconciliation, we are going to have to seek repentance not only from
Israelis, but also from Palestinians--because both sides are too quick to
resort to violence, rooted as both sides are in the Strategy of Domination,
when what they really need is what we in the Network of Spiritual
Progressives www.spiritualprogressives.org have defined as the Strategy of
Generosity. And that new approach is the only way we are ever going to see
anything but an endless blame game and endless violence.
--Rabbi Michael Lerner Editor, Tikkun RabbiLerner at tikkun.org ]

Now for the analysis by:

Uri Avnery
16/06/07

Crocodile Tears 
אורי אבנרי דמעות תנין 
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/he/channels/avnery/1181993439/

WHAT HAPPENS when one and a half million human beings are imprisoned in a
tiny, arid territory, cut off from their compatriots and from any contact
with the outside world, starved by an economic blockade and unable to feed
their families?

Some months ago, I described this situation as a sociological experiment set
up by Israel, the United States and the European Union. The population of
the Gaza Strip as guinea pigs.

This week, the experiment showed results. They proved that human beings
react exactly like other animals: when too many of them are crowded into a
small area in miserable conditions, they become aggressive, and even
murderous. The organizers of the experiment in Jerusalem, Washington,
Berlin, Oslo, Ottawa and other capitals could rub their hands in
satisfaction. The subjects of the experiment reacted as foreseen. Many of
them even died in the interests of science.

But the experiment is not yet over. The scientists want to know what happens
if the blockade is tightened still further.

WHAT HAS caused the present explosion in the Gaza Strip?

The timing of Hamas' decision to take over the Strip by force was not
accidental. Hamas had many good reasons to avoid it. The organization is
unable to feed the population. It has no interest in provoking the Egyptian
regime, which is busy fighting the Muslim Brotherhood, the
mother-organization of Hamas. Also, the organization has no interest in
providing Israel with a pretext for tightening the blockade.

But the Hamas leaders decided that they had no alternative but to destroy
the armed organizations that are tied to Fatah and take their orders from
President Mahmoud Abbas. The US has ordered Israel to supply these
organizations with large quantities of weapons, in order to enable them to
fight Hamas. The Israeli army chiefs did not like the idea, fearing that the
arms might end up in the hands of Hamas (as is actually happening now). But
our government obeyed American orders, as usual.

The American aim is clear. President Bush has chosen a local leader for
every Muslim country, who will rule it under American protection and follow
American orders. In Iraq, in Lebanon, in Afghanistan, and also in Palestine.

Hamas believes that the man marked for this job in Gaza is Mohammed Dahlan.
For years it has looked as if he was being groomed for this position. The
American and Israeli media have been singing his praises, describing him as
a strong, determined leader, "moderate" (i.e. obedient to American orders)
and "pragmatic" (i.e. obedient to Israeli orders). And the more the
Americans and Israelis lauded Dahlan, the more they undermined his standing
among the Palestinians. Especially as Dahlan was away in Cairo, as if
waiting for his men to receive the promised arms.

In the eyes of Hamas, the attack on the Fatah strongholds in the Gaza Strip
is a preventive war. The organizations of Abbas and Dahlan melted like snow
in the Palestinian sun. Hamas has easily taken over the whole Gaza Strip.

How could the American and Israeli generals miscalculate so badly? They are
able to think only in strictly military terms: so-and-so many soldiers,
so-and-so many machine guns. But in interior struggles in particular,
quantitative calculations are secondary. The morale of the fighters and
public sentiment are far more important. The members of the Fatah
organizations do not know what they are fighting for. The Gaza population
supports Hamas, because they believe that it is fighting the Israeli
occupier. Their opponents look like collaborators of the occupation. The
American statements about their intention of arming them with Israeli
weapons have finally condemned them.

That is not a matter of Islamic fundamentalism. In this respect all nations
are the same: they hate collaborators of a foreign occupier, whether they
are Norwegian (Quisling), French (Petain) or Palestinian.

IN WASHINGTON and Jerusalem, politicians are bemoaning the "weakness of
Mahmoud Abbas".

They see now that the only person who could prevent anarchy in the Gaza
Strip and the West Bank was Yasser Arafat. He had a natural authority. The
masses adored him. Even his adversaries, like Hamas, respected him. He
created several security apparatuses that competed with each other, in order
to prevent any single apparatus from carrying out a coup-d'etat. Arafat was
able to negotiate, sign a peace agreement and get his people to accept it.

But Arafat was pilloried by Israel as a monster, imprisoned in the Mukata'ah
and, in the end, murdered. The Palestinian public elected Mahmoud Abbas as
his successor, hoping that he would get from the Americans and the Israelis
what they had refused to give to Arafat.

If the leaders in Washington and Jerusalem had indeed been interested in
peace, they would have hastened to sign a peace agreement with Abbas, who
had declared that he was ready to accept the same far-reaching compromise as
Arafat. The Americans and the Israelis heaped on him all conceivable praise
and rebuffed him on every concrete issue.

They did not allow Abbas even the slightest and most miserable achievement.
Ariel Sharon plucked his feathers and then sneered at him as "a featherless
chicken". After the Palestinian public had patiently waited in vain for Bush
to move, it voted for Hamas, in the desperate hope of achieving by violence
what Abbas has been unable to achieve by diplomacy.

The Israeli leaders, both military and political, were overjoyed. They were
interested in undermining Abbas, because he enjoyed Bush's confidence and
because his stated position made it harder to justify their refusal to enter
substantive negotiations. They did everything to demolish Fatah. To ensure
this, they arrested Marwan Barghouti, the only person capable of keeping
Fatah together.

The victory of Hamas suited their aims completely. With Hamas one does not
have to talk, to offer withdrawal from the occupied territories and the
dismantling of settlements. Hamas is that contemporary monster, a
"terrorist" organization, and with terrorists there is nothing to discuss.

SO WHY were people in Jerusalem not satisfied this week? And why did they
decide "not to interfere"?

True, the media and the politicians, who have helped for years to incite the
Palestinian organizations against each other, showed their satisfaction and
boasted "we told you so". Look how the Arabs kill each other. Ehud Barak was
right, when he said years ago that our country is "a villa in the jungle".

But behind the scenes, voices of embarrassment, even anxiety, could be
heard.

The turning of the Gaza Strip into Hamastan has created a situation for
which our leaders were not ready. What to do now? To cut off Gaza altogether
and let the people there starve to death? To establish contacts with Hamas?
To occupy Gaza again, now that it has become one big tank trap? To ask the
UN to station international troops there - and if so, how many countries
would be crazy enough to risk their soldiers in this hell?

Our government has worked for years to destroy Fatah, in order to avoid the
need to negotiate an agreement that would inevitably lead to the withdrawal
from the occupied territories and the settlements there. Now, when it seems
that this aim has been achieved, they have no idea what to do about the
Hamas victory.

They comfort themselves with the thought that it cannot happen in the West
Bank. There, Fatah reigns. There Hamas has no foothold. There our army has
already arrested most of Hamas' political leaders. There Abbas is still in
power.

Thus speak the generals, with the generals' logic. But in the West Bank,
too, Hamas did win a majority in the last elections. There, too, it is only
a matter of time before the population loses its patience. They see the
expansion of the settlements, the Wall, the incursions of our army, the
targeted assassinations, the nightly arrests. They will explode.

Successive Israeli governments have destroyed Fatah systematically, cut off
the feet of Abbas and prepared the way for Hamas. They can't pretend to be
surprised.

WHAT TO DO? To go on boycotting Abbas or to provide him with arms, to enable
him to fight for us against Hamas? To go on depriving him of any political
achievement or to throw him some crumbs at long last? And anyway, isn't it
too late?

(And on the Syrian front: to go on paying lip service to peace while
sabotaging all the efforts of Bashar Assad to start negotiations? To
negotiate secretly, despite American objections? Or continue doing nothing
at all?)

At present, there is no policy, and no government which could determine a
policy.

So who will save us? Ehud Barak?

Barak's victory in this week's Labor Party leadership run-off has turned him
almost automatically into the next Minister of Defense. His strong
personality and his experience as Chief of Staff and Prime Minister assure
him of a dominant position in the restructured government. Olmert will deal
with the area in which he is an unmatched master - party machinations. But
Barak will have a decisive influence on policy.

In the government of the two Ehuds, Ehud Barak will decide on matters of war
and peace.

Until now, practically all his actions have had negative results. He came
very close to an agreement with Assad the father and escaped at the last
moment. He withdrew the Israeli army from South Lebanon, but without
speaking with Hizbullah, which took over. He compelled Arafat to come to
Camp David, insulted him there and declared that we have no partner for
peace. This dealt a death blow to the chances of peace, a blow which still
paralyzes the Israeli public. He has boasted that his real intention was to
"unmask" Arafat. He was more of a failed Napoleon than an Israeli de Gaulle.

Will the Ethiopian change his skin, the leopard his spots? Hard to believe.

IN THE dramas of William Shakespeare, there is frequently a comic interlude
at tense moments. And not only there.

Shimon Peres, the person who in 55 years of political activity had never won
an election, did the impossible this week: he got elected President of
Israel.

Many years ago, I entitled an article about him "Mr. Sisyphus", because
again and again he had almost reached the threshold of success, and success
had evaded him. Now he might feel like thumbing his nose at the gods after
reaching the summit, but - alas - without the boulder. The office of the
president is devoid of content and jurisdiction. A hollow politician in a
hollow position.

Now everybody expects a flurry of activity at the president's palace. There
will certainly be peace conferences, meetings of personalities,
high-sounding declarations and illustrious plans. In short - much ado about
nothing.

The practical result is that Olmert's position has been strengthened. He has
succeeded in installing Peres in the President's office and Barak in the
Ministry of Defense. In the short term, Olmert's position is assured.

And in the meantime, the experiment in Gaza continues, Hamas is taking over
and the trio - Ehud 1, Ehud 2 and Shimon Peres are shedding crocodile tears.

http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1181993272/

Democracy Now, Friday, June 15th, 2007

As Hamas Seizes Full Control of Gaza and US Prepares Further Isolation, What
Next for Palestinians?

Ali Abunimah. Cofounder of the online publication Electronic Intifada . He
is the author of "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the
Israeli-Palestinian Impasse."
Laila el-Haddad. Palestinian journalist and mother living in Gaza. She
writes for Aljazeera.net and is making a film on Gaza's underground economy.
She maintains her own blog "Raising Youssef: A Diary of a Mother Under
Occupation." 
Fares Akram. Freelance journalist in Gaza city.
AMY GOODMAN: Hamas is in full control of the Gaza Strip following days of
bloody clashes with rival Palestinian faction Fatah. Hamas militants seized
the presidential compound in Gaza City overnight after a week of fighting,
which has left more than 100 people dead. 

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday announced the
dismissal of the Hamas-led government and declared a state of emergency.
Abbas said he would now rule by presidential decree until the conditions
were right for early elections. However, Prime Minister Ismail Haniya says
his government will press on and impose law and order. 

The Occupied Territories have now been effectively split into two separate
entities with Hamas in charge of Gaza and Fatah controlling the West Bank.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat told Agence France Presse: "This is
the worst thing I've seen since 1967." 

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave her backing to Mahmoud Abbas,
saying he had exercised his "lawful authority." There are reports today the
Bush administration will boost aid to Abbas while allowing Gaza to slip into
further despair in order to weaken Hamas' popular standing. Meanwhile,
Haaretz reports that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is planning to tell
President Bush that that there is an urgent need to view the West Bank and
the Gaza Strip as separate entities and prevent contact between them. United
Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon held preliminary talks on the idea of
sending an international force to Gaza, but Hamas rejected the move, saying
it would treat foreign troops as occupation forces. 

There are new fears violence will now spread to the West Bank where Fatah
militants have rounded up nearly 90 Hamas fighters and claimed to have
killed a Hamas member in retaliation for events in Gaza. 

This all comes as new details emerge about criticism from a former top UN
envoy on the U.S. and UN role in Israel and the Occupied Territories. In a
confidential report disclosed earlier this week, Alvaro de Soto condemns the
boycott on the Palestinian government and says the U.S. and Israel virtually
neutralized prospects for peace. 

AMY GOODMAN: Laila el-Haddad is a Palestinian journalist. She writes for
Aljazeera.net and is making a film on Gaza's underground economy. She
maintains a blog "Raising Youssef: A Diary of a Mother Under Occupation."
Laila lives in Gaza and the United States. She returned from Gaza last week,
joins us in our firehouse studio. Ali Abunima is cofounder of the
publication The Electronic Intifida, author of the book "one country: a bold
proposal to end the Israeli-Palestinian impasse." he joins us from Chicago.
And on the line from Gaza is Fares Akram, a freelance journalist in Gaza
city. We will go to you, Fares, first. Tell us what is happening today on
the ground in Gaza. 

FARES AKRAM: Well, now Hamas supporters and partisans, thousands of them are
taking to the streets to celebrate what they call the victory. A day of
victory in which Gaza was cleaned from the corruption and corruption makers.
Those [inaudible] have witnessed some violence as [inaudible] in central
Gaza Strip came under fire and one person from Hamas was killed. The
Israelis came after all the security compound that are loyal to a President
Mahmoud Abbas of rival Fatah, and have fallen in Hamas grip after days of
bloody fighting that left more than 130 Palestinians dead. 

AMY GOODMAN: And what is the feeling of the general population right now,
about what is happening, about Hamas being in charge of Gaza now, in
control, and Fatah of the West Bank? 

FARES AKRAM: During the fighting some of Hamas leaders have vote they will
clean Gaza from secularism. This has created fear among the ordinary people
that their personal freedom might be confiscated and Hamas maybe going to
impose radical thought on society. But soon after the capturing of the
security compound Hamas has assured the people that the fighting was aimed
at the coup-seekers among the security chiefs and those Fatah leaders who
implement US orders on the Gaza Strip. And their war was against those who
confiscate Hamas victory that the Islamic movement has achieved in January
in parliamentary elections. Now Hamas men are calling on the security
members to surrender and lay down their personal guns and give them an
ultimatum that ends after half an hour. But they said anyone who delivers
his weapons before that deadline he would enjoy full amnesty. And also Hamas
has given amnesty to Fatah people, including some major security chiefs who
were captured yesterday. And they released them today. Also, Hamas leaders
are assuring the people that they will spread Islam in a very civilized way
and will not be like the Taliban. They have been promising the people that
Gaza is very safe now. Any individuals can walk from Beit-Hanoon, in the
north of the Gaza Strip to Rafah City in far south of the Gaza Strip,
enjoying full safety without being ambushed or killed or his car stolen. So
Hamas has been promising the safety and security. And in the coming days
will show if Hamas promises can come through or not. 

AMY GOODMAN: And the reports that Hamas had executed some Fatah fighters
yesterday? 

FARES AKRAM: Yeah, at least they have executed two Fatah leaders. A day
after the execution the chief Hamas Moofti has issued the fatwa approving
the killing of Sami al-Madhoon, who Hamas accuses of being a symbol of those
who try to confiscate Hamas legitimacy. Sami al-Madhoon used to live in
northern Gaza and was responsible for arresting tens of Hamas men and
torturing them and also killing a number of Hamas partisans. Two months ago
Hamas reached a deal to evacuate al-Madhoon from the northern Gaza Strip and
position him in a security compound. The deal came into effect. But when the
previous round of violence erupted last month, al-Madhoon was responsible
for affecting and killing a number of Hamas men including three pro-Hamas
journalists. So Hamas has taken a decision to kill al-Madhoon, and they
mostly have approved that decision. But on the other hand this was the only
two events of public execution. 

AMY GOODMAN: Fares Akram, thank you for being with us. Joining us from Gaza
city, a freelance journalist. When we come back from break, Laila el-Haddad
and Ali Abunimah will be with us to talk further about the mass crisis in
Gaza and the West Bank. 

AMY GOODMAN: As we continue on Gaza and the West Bank, our guest Laila
El-Haddad, Palestinian journalist, mother, living in Gaza, just came to the
United States last week. And Ali Abunimah joining us in Chicago, cofounder
of the online publication Electronic Intifada. Describe what it is like to
live in Gaza right now and what you understand to be happening, Laila. 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: Well, as you mentioned, I was just there. I just came back
last Friday. The day I was trying to leave -- it took me several days to
leave because the Rafah crossing of course, which is still controlled by
Israel, and the only outlet for Gazans to the outside world, is open less
than a quarter of the time and is extremely difficult for people to pass. As
I was leaving, we were hearing reports of activity and things happening in
the southern Rafa, in the southern Gaza Strip. The beginning of this latest
bout of fighting. Of course, when I was there a month -- or a few weeks ago,
rather, the most recent state of fighting had begun. And then it was sort of
quelled and died down. For a few days it was extremely terrifying in our
apartment in central Gaza city. We were penned in there for about four days.
We couldn't leave. It was very unpredictable. The situation was very
volatile. There were snipers that had taken position on various high-rise
towers throughout the city and masked gunmen throughout the streets. What we
had seen was a new phenomenon we had not seen before, was these stopping of
cars and random abductions and targeting journalists, very specifically. So,
journalists were not going out on the streets. And again it was by masked
gunmen, nobody knew who was who and who was doing what. So it was best just
to stay indoors until that had passed. So it sounds very similar to what has
happened. Maybe this was in greater intensity in the past few days. 

AMY GOODMAN: Ali Abunimah, can you describe who is arming both sides, Fatah
and Hamas? 

ALI ABUNIMAH: Yes. What we've seen is really a direct result of the Bush
doctrine. Since January 2006 when Hamas won the legislative election fair
and square, the United States refused the election result and it has been
arming several Palestinian militias, particularly those controlled by the
Gaza warlord, Mohammed Declan. This is a repeat strategy of the contras.
These are Palestinian contras. And the architect of this policy is none
other than Elliott Abrams, the deputy national security advisor, who was
convicted for lying to congress in the Iran-contra scandal. And Alvaro de
Soto, the UN Reporter that you mentioned in the introduction, Amy, confirms
in detail the extent of the conspiracy that the United States has been
undertaking to overthrow the election result and destroy Hamas. And just a
few days before this round of fighting started on June 7, Haaretz, the
Israeli newspaper reported that senior Fatah commanders in the Gaza Strip
had asked Israel for millions of rounds of ammunition, RPG's, hand grenades
and armored cars to use against Hamas. So I think what we've seen is Hamas
taking a last resort move to put an end to what it describes as a coup
intended to overthrow the election result. It's a major blow for the United
States and for the Bush doctrine, although it's very hard to see how it
helps Palestinians very much considering that Israel and the United States
are likely to tighten the siege of Gaza and to continue to fund the
militias. We've already seen Condoleezza Rice throwing her support behind
Abbas and no sign of a letup in US interference and armed intervention in
Palestinian affairs. 

AMY GOODMAN: How did the weapons get to both sides? And does that aid that
Condoleezza Rice is talking about include weapons? 

ALI ABUNIMAH: Yes. The weapons that have been delivered to the Fatah
militias to the Palestinian contras of Mohammed Declan, come via Egypt and
are delivered with the direct coordination of Israel. The Fatah commanders
make requests to Israel and Israel coordinates the delivery of the weapons
to Egypt. Hamas gets its weapons. There are reports that Hamas receives
funding from Iran. Hamas also gets weapons from Egypt. What's notable is
that many of the weapons that Israel delivers to Fatah for use against Hamas
are then sold on by corrupt Fatah commanders to the highest bidders, so
recently Israel has been actually turning down Fatah requests for weapons
because they say to the Fatah commanders you just turn around and sell the
weapons to Hamas. So Gaza is absolutely awash with weapons and nobody seems
to have any difficulty getting hold of them. 

AMY GOODMAN: Ali Abunimah, you've written a book, One Country: A Bold
Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse. Now there's discussion of
three countries, not even a two-state solution. Gaza, West Bank, Israel.
Your response? 

ALI ABUNIMAH: I wouldn't put too much stock in that because the Israeli
policy of cutting Gaza off from the West Bank is longstanding. It's been for
more than a decade, that Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank can't travel
from one place to the other. What I think we are seeing is the collapse of
the two-state solution. Alvaro de Soto acknowledged that in his leaked
confidential report. And today in the The Washington Post Edward Abington,
the former US Counsel general in Jerusalem and now a lobbyist for the
Palestinian authority was quoted saying that these events signal the death
of the two-state solution. I think we have to recognize that the Israeli
policy of trying to create Palestinian ghettos [inaudible] is failing before
our very eyes. Palestinians are the majority population in Israeli-ruled
territory between Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea. And it's only a matter
of time before the world wakes up to this reality. 

AMY GOODMAN: Laila El-Haddad, what does this separation mean? And would you
say it's been effectively a separation between West Bank and Gaza for a long
time or life on the ground every day as you write your blog, "Raising Your
Child in Gaza"? 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: Yeah. I was just actually going to say initially when you
were commenting -- and not just you. Many people saying Gaza and the West
Bank has split now two different authorities. It's always been the case for
over a decade now that Israel has effectively separated Gaza from the West
Bank and in the recent two years hermetically sealed the Gaza Strip, as a
mentioned, opening the crossing less than a quarter of a time for a million
and a half people, the only passage for a million and a half people. So to
me I see this as the way it's being described in the separation as part of
the sort of larger plan. And what's taken place, of course in Gaza, while a
terribly tragic to watch as a Palestinian, for me signals the failure of the
Bush policy over the past two years of starving Gaza's population, of trying
to fund and arm Hamas [correction: Fatah] with something of $84 million.
I've seen these brigades they're trying to arm in Jordan and train in Jerico
and Egypt. As I was leaving they stalled the Rafah crossing as they allowed
in several hundred and thousand of these troops last Thursday. 

AMY GOODMAN: You interviewed one of the men who was recently executed. 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: That's right. I interviewed [name], who was [name] sort of
the right-hand man in the northern Gaza Strip and the head of what's known
as the Fatah death squads. I interviewed him in December for an article I
was writing about the infighting, the beginning of the infighting. It was
called "An Eye for an Eye in Gaza." I interviewed members of the Hamas
executive force and then [name]. I had asked him about the situation and
where he thinks it will go, where it will lead to, and who he gets his
orders from. I specifically asked him if he gets his orders from [name]. He
said everybody gets their orders from somewhere. And I said what do you
anticipate will happen? He said, well, it's going to get to a point where
we're not going to hold back anymore and we're going to take that extra step
and just attack. We're just waiting for the right time. So this was in
December, but I think he knew that his days were limited from this talk at
least 

AMY GOODMAN: You have also been writing about the underground economy. How
does that work? 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: Right. My colleague and I, [name] were working on a film
called, "Gaza's Underground Economy" which is about the tunnel trade in Gaza
that evolved over the past decade and a half or so as a direct result of
Gaza's economic and political isolation. This is a trade that takes place
under the Egyptian-Gaza border in southern Gaza Strip of Rafah. While
certainly there are basic weaponry like [name] bullets that are traded it
also involves something much more complex and is a means of substance for
families there. It involves everything from food processors to even car
parts and often heart medicines and even people who lack ID Cards that can't
come into Gaza are often smuggled through these tunnels. That trade has
evolved over the past few years as Gaza's isolation has increased. 

AMY GOODMAN: We're very much reporting on this as Hamas-Fatah internal
fight, a civil war. Where does Israel fit into this? 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: >> Plays a huge part. Every time this discussion comes up I
like to remind people this is not something that's happening in isolation,
it's not as though things just erupt. Certainly the factors were there --
the environment was ripe for this to happen, but this was the result of
years and years of siege and most recently a US-led global siege and an
Israeli siege and aggressive violent occupation of the Gaza Strip that has
completely isolated it from the West Bank, from Palestinians, from their
counterparts in Jerusalem, the West Bank and the outside world, of course.
In addition to the Israeli continued-- American, rather, training and
funding of Fatah. Something that is not unambiguous in any terms. As Ali
mentioned just last week they were asking and actually received training and
funding in Jericho. Israel allowed them passage to train in Jericho. 

AMY GOODMAN: You talked about the just retired UN Coordinator for the Middle
East has warned international hostility to the Palestinian Hamas movement
could have grave consequences by persuading millions of Muslims that
democratic methods don't work. He said, "Hamas is in its effervesce and can
potentially evolve in a pragmatic direction that would allow for a two-state
solution, but only if handled right. Your response to this? 

ALI ABUNIMAH: I think Alvaro de Soto's 53-page report is very revealing.
It's on the internet in p.d.f. form. It was leaked. It is a savage
indictment of US, Israeli and European Union policy. I think any objective
observer would agree with Alvaro de Soto and would agree that from the
moment it won the elections Hamas had tried to be pragmatic and flexible. It
had observed the unilateral truce with Israel. It had given up suicide
attacks against Palestinian civilians. And there was no response to that. On
the contrary. The United States, Israel, the European Union and some Arab
states decided to launch a war against Hamas by trying to deny Hamas its
fair share. And Hamas offer less than its fair share. It is the one that
immediately asked the election offered in national unity government by
denying it its fair share they have assured that Hamas has taken the whole
pie. It's time for them to radically change their approach, stop treating
the Palestinians like puppets and toys who could be manipulated, and start
treating them like human beings who deserve at least their full human rights
and freedom just like any other people. 

AMY GOODMAN: You said Palestinian -- suicide attacks against Palestinians.
You mean Israeli civilians? 

ALI ABUNIMAH: Of course. That's exactly what I meant. Hamas had effectively
suspended that tactic and had observed the unilateral truce with Israel -- I
mean just, Amy, in 2006 Isreal killed 700 Palestinians, half of whom were
civilians, and 141 of whom were children. In the same period Palestinians
killed 23 Israelis. And the world is demanding that Palestinians renounce
violence? It's time to start treating the Palestinians fairly and end this
dirty war that the United States and Israel are waging against the
Palestinians just as the United States and Elliott Abrams waged such a dirty
war for so long against people in central America. It's time for it to end. 

AMY GOODMAN: How does this relate to these two other crises now? You've got
Iraq. You've got what's happening in the occupied territories and its
relation to Israel, and you've got Lebanon. 

ALI ABUNIMAH: It relates directly because the wider US Strategy now is to
install or support puppet regimes and client militias throughout the region
in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine in order to fight proxy wars for
the United States, against this phantom enemy of an Islamic caliphate that
George Bush and his friends have dreamed up. And everywhere it's failing. In
Afghanistan the Taliban are resurgent. Iraq has new reports every day. The
US Can't even trust the Iraqi militias and the Iraqi army that it set up.
And we see the total failure of the surge as violence intensifies. In
Lebanon the United States has been arming and funding the Lebanese army,
hoping that it will be a counter weight for Hezballah. And we've seen the
Lebanese army performing very poorly against a few militants, foreign
fighters in the [name] refugee camp. Although they've caused devastation to
the refugee camp itself. And now we see the US-backed Palestinian contras
being routed in Gaza. Also, Amy, a final point. I wouldn't overestimate the
strength of Fatah or underestimate the strength of Hamas in the West Bank
because Hamas has considerable resources in the West Bank. The thing I fear,
though, is that the United States and its allies in the Palestinian
authority will be foolish enough to try to do in the West Bank what they've
just failed to do in Gaza. And that would bring increased disaster and chaos
for Palestinians throughout the West Bank as well. 

AMY GOODMAN: Laila El-Haddad, you write the blog, A Mother from Gaza . How
do you live every day? Talk about your son. How do people wake up in the
morning? Where do you go? How do you take shelter? 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: Obviously it's a very complicated situation to explain to a
3-year-old. I mean in terms of actually entering Gaza, of living in Gaza, in
terms of explaining what is Gaza and who is in control of Gaza. As we go
through the crossing he says, you know, "who's not allowing us through?" And
we're stuck in the crossing, And trying to explain to him who that is. Then
he sees, of course, on one side Egyptians and on the other Palestinians and
European monitors. Yet it's an outside force, meaning he Israelis ultimately
closing the crossing. Then, of course, going into Gaza and being subject to
periods of time these bits of infighting and him having to deal with the gun
fire so forth. Children are extremely adaptable. But, of course, he has
become terrified by the loud sound of the gunfire on the one hand or the
Israeli shelling on the other and just has taken to closing his ears. So I
just told him there was a lot of popcorn being made outside. And when the
gunfire subsided, he said, oh, I think the popcorn is done. Can we go and
see it? So he managed that fairly well at least for those few days. But it's
certainly very troubling, setting an environment to raising a child in for
any Palestinian, certainly. Whether your dealing with the occupation on one
hand or the infighting on the other. 

AMY GOODMAN: And the level of hunger, of malnutrition? 

LAILA EL-HADDAD: Hunger, people like to focus and certainly with cause on
the hunger and on the malnutrition. And that is a major concern, especially
seeing as how it's been so methodical. But I like to point out that it's not
just mere hunger that is the problem here. You're starving a people of their
basic freedoms and their rights. I think ultimately that's been the grand
scheme. Of course it becomes very significant and important. 

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both for being with us. We'll certainly
continue to follow this situation. Laila el-Haddad is a Palestinian
journalist, a mother living in Gaza, writing Raising Youssef: a diary of a
mother under occupation." ali abunimah, speaking to us from Chicago,
cofounder of the online publication The Electronic Intifada. his book is
called "one country: a bold proposal to end the Israeli-Palestinian
impasse." published by metropolitan books last year. 

 

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