XPost: uk.politics.misc, soc.culture.palestine, soc.culture.egyptian   
   XPost: soc.culture.israel, alt.conspiracy   
   From: oO@oO.com   
      
   Aggression Under False Pretenses   
      
   By Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh   
      
   07/11/06 "Washington Post" -- -- GAZA, Palestine -- As Americans   
   commemorated their annual celebration of independence from colonial   
   occupation, rejoicing in their democratic institutions, we Palestinians were   
   yet again besieged by our occupiers, who destroy our roads and buildings,   
   our power stations and water plants, and who attack our very means of civil   
   administration. Our homes and government offices are shelled, our   
   parliamentarians taken prisoner and threatened with prosecution.   
      
   The current Gaza invasion is only the latest effort to destroy the results   
   of fair and free elections held early this year. It is the explosive   
   follow-up to a five-month campaign of economic and diplomatic warfare   
   directed by the United States and Israel. The stated intention of that   
   strategy was to force the average Palestinian to "reconsider" her vote when   
   faced with deepening hardship; its failure was predictable, and the new   
   overt military aggression and collective punishment are its logical   
   fulfillment. The "kidnapped" Israeli Cpl. Gilad Shalit is only a pretext for   
   a job scheduled months ago.   
      
   In addition to removing our democratically elected government, Israel wants   
   to sow dissent among Palestinians by claiming that there is a serious   
   leadership rivalry among us. I am compelled to dispel this notion   
   definitively. The Palestinian leadership is firmly embedded in the concept   
   of Islamic shura , or mutual consultation; suffice it to say that while we   
   may have differing opinions, we are united in mutual respect and focused on   
   the goal of serving our people. Furthermore, the invasion of Gaza and the   
   kidnapping of our leaders and government officials are meant to undermine   
   the recent accords reached between the government party and our brothers and   
   sisters in Fatah and other factions, on achieving consensus for resolving   
   the conflict. Yet Israeli collective punishment only strengthens our   
   collective resolve to work together.   
      
   As I inspect the ruins of our infrastructure -- the largess of donor nations   
   and international efforts all turned to rubble once more by F-16s and   
   American-made missiles -- my thoughts again turn to the minds of Americans.   
   What do they think of this?   
      
   They think, doubtless, of the hostage soldier, taken in battle -- yet   
   thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of women and children, remain   
   in Israeli jails for resisting the illegal, ongoing occupation that is   
   condemned by international law. They think of the pluck and "toughness" of   
   Israel, "standing up" to "terrorists." Yet a nuclear Israel possesses the   
   13th-largest military force on the planet, one that is used to rule an area   
   about the size of New Jersey and whose adversaries there have no   
   conventional armed forces. Who is the underdog, supposedly America's   
   traditional favorite, in this case?   
      
   I hope that Americans will give careful and well-informed thought to root   
   causes and historical realities, in which case I think they will question   
   why a supposedly "legitimate" state such as Israel has had to conduct   
   decades of war against a subject refugee population without ever achieving   
   its goals.   
      
   Israel's unilateral movements of the past year will not lead to peace. These   
   acts -- the temporary withdrawal of forces from Gaza, the walling off of the   
   West Bank -- are not strides toward resolution but empty, symbolic acts that   
   fail to address the underlying conflict. Israel's nearly complete control   
   over the lives of Palestinians is never in doubt, as confirmed by the   
   humanitarian and economic suffering of the Palestinians since the January   
   elections. Israel's ongoing policies of expansion, military control and   
   assassination mock any notion of sovereignty or bilateralism. Its   
   "separation barrier," running across our land, is hardly a good-faith   
   gesture toward future coexistence.   
      
   But there is a remedy, and while it is not easy it is consistent with our   
   long-held beliefs. Palestinian priorities include recognition of the core   
   dispute over the land of historical Palestine and the rights of all its   
   people; resolution of the refugee issue from 1948; reclaiming all lands   
   occupied in 1967; and stopping Israeli attacks, assassinations and military   
   expansion. Contrary to popular depictions of the crisis in the American   
   media, the dispute is not only about Gaza and the West Bank; it is a wider   
   national conflict that can be resolved only by addressing the full   
   dimensions of Palestinian national rights in an integrated manner. This   
   means statehood for the West Bank and Gaza, a capital in Arab East   
   Jerusalem, and resolving the 1948 Palestinian refugee issue fairly, on the   
   basis of international legitimacy and established law. Meaningful   
   negotiations with a non-expansionist, law-abiding Israel can proceed only   
   after this tremendous labor has begun.   
      
   Surely the American people grow weary of this folly, after 50 years and $160   
   billion in taxpayer support for Israel's war-making capacity -- its   
   "defense." Some Americans, I believe, must be asking themselves if all this   
   blood and treasure could not have bought more tangible results for Palestine   
   if only U.S. policies had been predicated from the start on historical   
   truth, equity and justice.   
      
   However, we do not want to live on international welfare and American   
   handouts. We want what Americans enjoy -- democratic rights, economic   
   sovereignty and justice. We thought our pride in conducting the fairest   
   elections in the Arab world might resonate with the United States and its   
   citizens. Instead, our new government was met from the very beginning by   
   acts of explicit, declared sabotage by the White House. Now this aggression   
   continues against 3.9 million civilians living in the world's largest prison   
   camps. America's complacency in the face of these war crimes is, as usual,   
   embedded in the coded rhetorical green light: "Israel has a right to defend   
   itself." Was Israel defending itself when it killed eight family members on   
   a Gaza beach last month or three members of the Hajjaj family on Saturday,   
   among them 6-year-old Rawan? I refuse to believe that such inhumanity sits   
   well with the American public.   
      
   We present this clear message: If Israel will not allow Palestinians to live   
   in peace, dignity and national integrity, Israelis themselves will not be   
   able to enjoy those same rights. Meanwhile, our right to defend ourselves   
   from occupying soldiers and aggression is a matter of law, as settled in the   
   Fourth Geneva Convention. If Israel is prepared to negotiate seriously and   
   fairly, and resolve the core   
   1948 issues, rather than the secondary ones from 1967, a fair and permanent   
   peace is possible. Based on a hudna (comprehensive cessation of hostilities   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)