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THE NEXT EXPULSION OF THE PALESTINIANS?
April 7, 2001
MER WEEKEND READING:
[Originally written January this year and published in the quarterly
publication Middle East Policy in March]
ARTICLE SUMMARY:
The effect of the four-month-old al-Aqsa intifada has been to
radicalize and polarize all sides and thus the current situation
poses a great danger to the Palestinian people. The Palestinians
have undergone two great episodes of expulsion during the wars of
1948 and 1967. Now that formerly "moderate" voices have been
marginalized or stilled completely, a consensus in Israel and
abroad is being strengthened which may lead to drastic action by
the Israelis as the opportunity presents itself. Another Middle
East war might serve as a screen for such action. Since the focus
of the dispute is over the question of sharing the land between two
peoples, historical precedents and the power imbalance point the
possibility that the Israelis may once again drive the Palestinians
from their land.
In the end only a rectification of the power balance will enable
the Palestinians to remain on their land. In the meantime, the
Palestinians must also depend on the international community to
restrain the Israelis.
Postscript:
As the date of the next elections for Prime Minister is now upon us
and with Ariel Sharon leading in the polls by large margins, it's
somewhat easier to conjecture that Barak's main concern, over and
above remaining in power, has been to reinforce Israel's
rejectionist policy which has not changed in its essentials since
the very beginning of the state.
THE NEXT EXPULSION OF THE PALESTINIANS: ONE STEP CLOSER?
By Ronald Bleier
"Barak has returned fewer territories than Netanyahu,
built more settlements than Netanyahu, and has not
kept one single commitment that he signed with the
Palestinians."
B. Michael, Yediot Aharonot, 13 October 2000
A few weeks before the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifada, Israeli Ex-Prime Minster
Yitzhak Shamir, in typically straightforward language, in an interview on the
Leon Charney show gave American TV viewers a clear view of the strategy of the
Israeli government. When asked if he thought that the Israeli government should
make concessions of more territory with the Palestinians, he said, no, absolutely
not. He explained that the Israelis needed all the territory that they currently
held for themselves. Israel, he said, was a tiny country and couldn't afford
to give any more land away. Similarly, he saw no need for the Israelis to give
up the Golan Heights. He explained furthermore that Israel's chief policy goal
should be to double its (Jewish) population to 10 million in the shortest possible
time.
Shamir made no mention in the interview as to how Israel would manage to find
the resources, especially the land and water, to accommodate such growth. The
current pressure on resources is enormous compared to what it was for example,
only 80 years ago, at the time of the Balfour Declaration in 1917. Then there
were only 60,000 Jews living in the former Palestine out of a total population
of about 680,000. Today, the same area holds almost 6 million Israeli citizens,
as well as about 2.2 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. One doesn't
necessarily need to be a confirmed Malthusian to understand that with this kind
of pressure on resources, the political effects will reflect the resultant scarcity.
The policies that Barak has pursued, and indeed the rejectionist policies of
every single Israeli government since 1948 may be seen as a reflection of the
struggle over scarce resources.
Shamir's silence on the question of resources details may help to shed light
on current events as the al-Aqsa intifada continues to pile up casualties, with
more than 380 deaths in a ratio of 10 to 1 Palestinian deaths to Israeli. If
Shamir's views accurately reflect those of the Israeli government, that would
explain the lack of meaningful concessions that the Israelis have made to the
Palestinians in the post Rabin period. Moreover the Shamir/ Israeli insistence
on retaining local resources on behalf of only one of the parties to the conflict,
has grave implications for future policy.
How the intifada got started
On September 28, 2000, the government of Prime Minister Ehud Barak permitted
Likud opposition leader, Ariel Sharon with a thousand Israeli soldiers to visit
Al-Aqsa (the Temple Mount), an action that many saw as a deliberate provocation.
When thousands of Palestinians protested peacefully after they left Friday prayers
the next day, the Israeli response was violent and disproportionate. Muslim worshippers
were confronted by a huge and provocative Israeli army presence and in the clashes
which followed, seven Palestinians were killed and 220 were wounded.
Why did Barak permit the confrontational Sharon visit and why did he oversee
such a violent response? When he was elected Prime Minster in May 1999, his reputation
was that of a moderate, committed to following through on the Oslo Accords. Although
he has employed the rhetoric of peace, there has been no practical difference
between his policies and those of his predecessor. While he was in power, Netanyahu
did everything he could to stall and torpedo any concessions to the Palestinians.
While Barak has successfully projected the opposite image, he has not retreated
even from one percent of Palestinian territory, and he has significantly contributed
to the abrogation of Israeli responsibilities under the terms of the Oslo Agreement.
For example, the third wave of Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian territory
was to have been accomplished by May 1999. At that point 60 percent of the West
Bank was to have been ceded to the Palestinians. Both the Netanyahu and Barak
governments ignored this deadline.
An examination of the post-Rabin era of Netanyahu and Barak, exposes, in effect,
a wall-to-wall national unity government, committed to holding the line against
making any more territorial concessions, just as Shamir had advocated. Meanwhile,
on the ground, oppressive Israeli control of key aspects of Palestinian life
has not abated. Palestinians continue to endure ongoing Israeli settlement building,
land expropriation and confiscation; expansion of Israeli controlled corridors
and by-pass roads; routine harassment and humiliation at scores
of key checkpoints; severe restrictions on travel even to their cultural and
economic center in East Jerusalem; continued rigid Israeli control of water resources;
and the stultification of the Palestinian economy. The Palestinians expected
little - and got less - from Netanyahu. But Barak has managed to crush their
hopes for a transition to self-determination. Moreover, he has succeeded in inflaming
the situation, making it ripe for the explosion and chaos that have ensued since
the end of September.
As usual, despite the iron grip that Israel has always maintained, Palestinians
have been pilloried as those responsible for the violence, not only by right
wing partisans, but also by many members of the Israeli peace movement. The confusion
and the demoralization of the left is an ominous development, for it means that
Barak's tactics have helped to prepare the way towards developing a consensus
for the next big expulsion of the Arabs. If massive ethnic cleansing takes place
once again, almost four and a quarter million Palestinians in the West
Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem and in Israel itself will be at risk.
Expulsions in 1948
Zionist apologists often skirt the issue of the expulsion of three quarters of
a million Arabs from the former Palestine in 1948-49 by pointing to the invasion
of five Arab armies (Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon) upon Israel's declaration
of a state on May 14. This argument strategically ignores the fighting that broke
out between the Jewish and Arab communities in Palestine shortly after the passage
of the U.N. Partition Resolution of November 29, 1947. Since the Jewish forces
at that time were far stronger and more unified than the Arabs, the Israelis
succeeded in winning virtually all the land ceded to them by the UN Partition
Resolution by the time of the declaration of the Israeli state. Moreover, before
the Arab invasion, the Zionists had already expelled 350,000 Palestinians. Indeed,
the reason in large part for the Arab invasion was the anger in the Arab street
as a result of the large scale ethnic cleansing that had already taken place.
According to Simha Flapan, a Jewish "new" historian - the school devoted in part
to destroying some of the Zionist inspired myths associated with the birth of
Israel -- the declaration of the Jewish state was a unilateral, and illegal act.
As the Jewish leaders well understood, the declaration of the new state would
bring war. Ben Gurion saw war as a calculated risk, that, if successful, would
gain more territory for the new state over and above the portions allotted to
them by the United Nations General Assembly. War would also achieve the Zionist
goal of ridding the country of hundreds of thousands more Palestinians. By the
end of the fighting, the Israelis achieved virtually all their war aims.
Despite the expulsion of about 750,000 Palestinians in 1948-49, Israel was fully
supported by the United States. Israel's entry into the U.N. was also facilitated
by the United States, based on the promise, never fulfilled, that the Jewish
state would allow the repatriation of the Palestinian refugees.
The power balance
The Arab-Israeli struggle has always been a conflict between two peoples over
a small country. Historically, in situations where there is a similar struggle
for control of territory, the stronger power drives out the weaker. If the rejectionist
policy that Shamir advocates is continued, then the land the Palestinians now
control is the maximum that they will ever control. As Palestinian protests mount,
attitudes on both sides seem likely to continue to polarize. And then the endgame
- the expulsion of the Palestinians - may only be a matter of
circumstance and timing. Israel's expansionist posture is likely to create the
conditions for the next regional war, already glimpsed by many observers as a
likely possibility. If there is war, it might provide a screen behind which the
Israelis may effect the next mass removal of the Palestinians.
At this time it seems most likely that the current round of fighting will not
lead to outright war -- war is the last thing that the Arab governments want.
Nevertheless, since time is on their side, the Israelis can continue to be masters
of patience. They can simply wait for the right moment to implement operations.
At the moment of writing, as we approach the February 6 election date and with
Barak trailing Sharon by significant margins in the opinion polls, the future
seems just as murky and impossible to predict as ever. On the American side,
the Middle East policy of the incoming administration of George W. Bush has perhaps
not even been formulated. Ironically, the accession of hardliner Ariel Sharon
to the position of Israeli Prime Minister, could make it more rather than less
difficult to implement plans for mass expulsions, since he is such a
lightening rod and a notorious hawk. For his part, Sharon is clever enough to
know how far he will be able to go, and that he can do much short of war to implement
Israeli aims. Alternately, as the master opportunist, he may find a way to implement
mass "transfer" of the Palestinians.
Palestinian ability to oppose possible Israeli schemes for their future is limited
by their weakness in the face of Israeli military power backed by the full force
of the United States. As far as the key questions of land confiscation, repatriation
of refugees, control over travel and borders, and much more, the Palestinians
have been able to accomplish next to nothing. They have protested and they have
inflicted some casualties on some military targets as well as on some civilians.
However, these latter tend to work against Palestinian interests since Israeli
victims serve the purpose of instant martyrdom and work to heightened tensions
and empower the forces of division and separation. When Israeli fatalities occur,
the peace camp tends to be thrown off course, confused and more and more marginalized.
Indeed precisely this mood of disillusion and lack of direction on the left may
be Barak's greatest victory thus far.
Many moderates and leftists both inside and outside of Israel make the argument
that since the two peoples, Arab and Jew, are inextricably tied to each other
by proximity and economics and so on, it is in Israel's best interests to find
a practical, political solution to the problem of sharing the country. "Israel
has no future but peace," is a typical formulation by such voices. But it would
be a serious mistake to count on Israeli good will or on the Israeli sense of
self-interest to bring about a durable accommodation between the two communities.
Once again the relevant lesson from history is that the stronger side tends not
to make tangible, lasting concessions of scarce resources to the weak. In the
last fifty years the hard liners, the advocates of Greater Israel, have triumphed
again and again, as they successfully forced the Palestinians into a smaller
and smaller and more difficult physical and economic space. And as they continue
to get squeezed, the ominous question continues to loom: Where will the Palestinians
be compelled to go? As things now stand, it is only the Israelis who have the
military and political power to enforce their answer.
What to do?
The Palestinians have an impossible tightrope to walk. They are expected to act
reasonably and moderately while their land and water resources are daily stolen
from them and their economy smothered. Moreover, the danger they face today seems
more existential than it did during the first Intifada which began in December
1987. The shattering of the promises of the Oslo accords, has disillusioned and
frustrated all sides. Moreover, the presence of tens of thousands of Palestinians,
mostly members of Arafat's security forces, now equipped with AK-47s and other
light arms, may work against the greater Palestinian interest. On the one hand,
these weapons have
helped to restrain the Israeli Army and the settlers from some of their rampages.
Yet, the very existence of these weapons makes it possible for the Israelis to
escalate the violence as they respond disproportionately with rocket and tank
shells, with helicopter gunships, with assassination teams and with army sharpshooters
who target stone throwers. They may also provide the excuse for worse outrages
to come.
Moreover, the Palestinians are even more clearly without effective leadership
than they were at the end of 1987, when the first Intifada began. As a number
of commentators have pointed out, the current Intifada is as much a protest against
Arafat and the Oslo Accords, and "the peace process" as it is against the Israelis.
The history of the post-Oslo period has exposed Arafat as never before as a tool
of the Israeli occupation. He has demonstrated that he cannot or will not bring
his people any more meaningful relief than the withdrawals already
accomplished during the Rabin period. Palestinians have experienced first-hand
the corruption and enrichment of Arafat's cronies and the harsh authoritarianism
of his rule. Arafat has done almost nothing to protest ongoing Israeli land confiscation
and settlement expansion. Nor does Arafat complain when Israel imposes travel
and closure restrictions on his people. Israeli control over Palestinian borders,
and barriers to Palestinian trade are taken as facts of life, nor is there any
longer any hope on the Palestinian street that these conditions will be ameliorated
by the current leadership.
Some of the lessons of twentieth century ethnic cleansing and genocide seem clear.
It often requires the cover of war before mass deportations can be implemented.
So it was with the Turkish genocide, with Hitler's holocaust, and with the ethnic
cleansing of the former Yugoslavia. Similarly, the Israelis also had to wait
until war broke out at the end of 1947 and again in 1967 before they could force
out hundreds of thousands of people from their homes. The only way the Palestinians
can remain in the former Palestine in significant numbers is to find a way to
rectify the power balance. This may or may not prove to be possible.
Palestinians clearly recognize the assets that they have. They have managed to
survive in the Occupied Territories and in Israel and to grow their population
to almost four million in the face of fifty years of blatant discrimination and
oppression. Time will tell whether their strength will be sufficient to maintain
them on their land. A key weapon for the Palestinians may well be the understanding
that war is their enemy. Their strength lies in their ability to stop the Israeli
hand by engaging the international community. Perhaps this will continue to be
sufficient and history will not have to tell the tragic tale of their removal
once again.
* Middle East Policy, Vol VIII, No.1, March 2001
|
April 2001
ARAB-AMERICANS - PATHETIC STATE OF AFFAIRS (April 30, 2001) Regular readers of MER won't be all that surprised; though many others will be, especially those who misguidedly and in many cases sincerely give their money, support, and most of all their hopes to these pathetic groups.
THE DARK SIDE OF ISRAELI INDEPENDENCE Day (April 30, 2001) Leave it to the Arab Americans to screw things up all the time. As the iconoclastic Israel writer Israel Shamir said as he prematurely departed American shores a few days ago: "With such Palestinian activists, who needs the Israeli lobby?"
ABDULLAH AND THE CIA - LONG HISTORICAL CONSPIRACY AGAINST PALESTINIANS (April 30, 2001) The Israelis and the Americans are busy using the Mubarak Regime in Egypt and the Hashemite Regime in Jordan in an increasingly desperate attempt to quash Intifada II and create still
more years for the Israelis to consolidate and make permanent their grip on the Palestinians.
WAR MACHINES ON THE MARCH - MER FLASHBACK (April 29, 2001) Before the Second Intifada began, before last year's aborted Camp David fiasco, before this year's sweeping victory of Ariel Sharon and the attempt to then position Ehud Barak as Defense Minister, MER was already writing about what was to come while most of the media was sidetracked with and seduced by "the peace process."
THE "APARTHEID PEACE" REMAINS THE GAME BEING PLAYED (April 28, 2001) They -- the same personalities representing the same countries that created this "Apartheid Peace" and its resultant intensified uprising against it -- are at it again.
THE SLAUGHTER IN ALGERIA (April 28, 2001) This book contains shocking testimony about what is happening inside a
country where, according to reliable estimates, more than 150,000 of its
citizens have been slaughtered during the past decade.
THE ARAB AMERICAN and JEWISH AMERICAN SCENES (April 27, 2001) You gotta love all these scams that so many so tragically so often fall for -- especially the confused and naive Arab Americans.
THE GAZA CONCENTRATION CAMP (April 27, 2001) Over the years the Israelis have essentially turned The Gaza Strip from a Ghetto to a kind of Concentration Camp. In this small area today live more than 1 million Palestinians, a large number of whom have never been able to leave and reenter.
ARAFAT'S ESCAPE PLAN - MER FLASHBACK (April 26, 2001) More than $100 million dollars in a secret bank account set up by the Israelis and designed to make it possible for Arafat and friends to flee a coup and set up a "government in exile"?
SHA'ATH and PERES DESERVE EACH OTHER -- BUT HOW TRAGIC FOR THE PALESTINIANS (April 26, 2001) Sharon is sending Peres to Cairo, and Sha'ath visiting Sweden says there is a "crack in the wall of darkensss."
BERKELEY STUDENTS TAKE THE LEAD (April 25, 2001) With the total failure of the Arab American organizations at the national level, and of course provoked now by an Intifada II that is half a year old and the election of Ariel Sharon as PM in Israel, the grassroots are finally stirring a little, students in the lead as at other times in history.
CASINO FIRST! (April 25, 2001) In the old days of Intifada I Yossi Beilin and Shimon Peres were busy pursuing their "Gaza First" strategy. It was never presented, but always designed, as a kind of trap for the Palestinians; and it was continually rejected by the Palestinian negotiating team that went to Madrid and then Washington, headed by Dr. Haider Abdul-Shafi.
Washington Scene: THE TRAGIC STATE OF ARAB AMERICAN AFFAIRS (April 25, 2001) Three things this week underscored the pathetically tragic state of affairs for the Arab American community which remains, well, politically retarded and as a result miserably weak...not to mention oh so co-opted and manipulated.
ISRAEL & TURKEY - MAJOR MILITARY ALLIANCE (April 25, 2001) While the misnomered "peace process" continues to dominate the news, arms continue to flood into the Middle East region and possible war preparations are underway.
SHIMON PERES - NOW HOLOCAUST DENIER! (April 23, 2001) For the past few years we have mentioned the great importance of the new military axis in the Middle East that adds Turkey's size and power to the U.S.-Israeli alliance that dominates and controls the region.
ARAFAT'S TRAVEL NOW RESTRICTED - MAYBE ON PURPOSE? (April 23, 2001) The front-page Washington Post article over the weekend about what the Israelis are up to helps reveal what the new General in charge of the Israeli Army, Ariel Sharon, is attempting to accomplish.
BLOODY SUNDAY AS SIX BOMBS ROCK ISRAEL, GAZA (April 22, 2001) Two explosions hit Israel over the space of several hours, and four
bombs were detonated in Gaza City which is under Palestinian control.
TERROR IN TEL AVIV TODAY AS US PREPARES FOR BIOLOGICAL ATTACK (April 22, 2001) Like so many things in life, terror is a two-edged sword. No doubt the Israelis will use today's bomb blast in Tel Aviv to still further clamp down on and try to choke the Palestinians into submission.
ISRAEL'S ETHNIC CLEANSING SECRETS (April 21, 2001) Israel's prime minister-elect, in the throes of forming a new
government, is known to be a militant nationalist. Ariel Sharon's view
of history is that the Zionists unequivocally have justice on their
side in the conflict over what is known to Jews as the Land of Israel
and to Palestinians as Palestine.
HISTORIC JEWISH STATEMENT SUPPORTING PALESTINIAN INTIFADA (April 21, 2001) Two months after the first Palestinian Intifada began in December 1987, a group of professionals, all American Jews including many professors and lawyers, joined together to publish as a full page ad in THE NATION Magazine of 13 February 1988 this historic statement: "Time To Dissociate From Israel"
ARAB AMERICANS STILL TERRIBLY WEAK (April 20, 2001) Three things this week underscored the pathetically tragic state of affairs for the Arab American community which remains, well, politically retarded and as a result miserably weak...not to mention oh so co-opted and manipulated.
FROM THE FRONT (April 19, 2001) Attempts by Ariel Sharon, Israel's prime minister, to crush Palestinian violence by adopting still harsher military tactics came to nought last night, after guerrillas in the Gaza Strip fired more mortars into Israel, and one of the worst battles for months erupted on the edge of Bethlehem.
MUBARAK - MORE FRIGHTENED THAN ANGRY OR CREDIBLE (April 19, 2001) They use to call him the "laughing cow". Anwar Sadat made him Vice-President thinking he'd never really have to worry much about him. And he himself has never made anyone Vice-President fearing any and everyone.
QANA MASSACRE - 5TH ANNIVERSARY (April 18, 2001) It was only four years ago;
but already it has been mostly forgotten -- the terrible Qana Massacre in
southern Lebanon, and the atrocious cover-up by Israel, the U.S. and the
U.N. that followed.
QANA REMEMBERED (April 18, 2001) It was five years ago today that hundreds of civilians under U.N. protection in southern Lebanon were brutally killed or maimed by the Israeli Army. With Shimon Peres then Prime Minister after the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, the Israelis desperately tried to cover it all up and pretend it was just a mistake of war.
LATEST NEWS FROM THE FRONTS (April 17, 2001) With a heavy rocket barrage, Israel seized
nearly a square mile of the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, retaking
Palestinian-controlled territory for the first time since 1994 in retaliation for
a mortar attack on a small Israeli desert town.
ROBERT FISK SPEAKS UP OH SO THOUGHTFULLY AND COURAGEOUSLY (April 17, 2001) The famous American Jewish iconoclastic journalist Izzy Stone (I.F.Stone) once told me over a long
dinner in my apartment that the role of real and serious journalists in our day and age needed to be "to
afflict the comfortable and to comfort the afflicted."
ISRAEL STRIKES STILL HARDER, IMPOTENT ARAB "CLIENT REGIMES" COWER (April 17, 2001) We shouldn't be surprised what the Israelis are doing. Ehud Barak may have hesitated, but after all in the end both he and Shimon Peres publicly gave their endorsements to Ariel Sharon and Sharon has been warning and threatening to do just such things for a very long time.
HASHEMITES CONTINUE TO COLLABORATE (April 16, 2001) Today the Jordanian Foreign Minister goes to Israel even as Israeli bombs kill Syrians, Lebanese and Palestinians and the whole region is being humbled and shaken by the Israeli Generals, accused war criminal Ariel Sharon now in charge.
CIA BUGS ARAFAT AND ALL P.A. LEADERSHIP (April 14, 2001) Arafat has been paid a very great amount of money for the deals he signed in Washington, Cairo, Sharm, Hebron, et. al. He, his family (the Tawils), and top cronies like Nabil Shaath, Abu Mazen, et. al., now have hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign bank accounts as a result.
EPILOGUE TO A DECADE - A SERIOUS ISRAELI ANALYSIS (April 14, 2001) From what would usually be called the far far left in Israel and whose voice is rarely heard these days beyond their own circles -- but which we would term the serious, sophisticated, highly committed and principled Israeli intelligentsia -- there is a magazine published every other month called "Challenge".
EASTER IN THE "HOLY LAND" (April 13, 2001) Two thousand years ago on the ancient streets of Jerusalem it was the Roman army in control, the Jewish people under occupation, and Jesus, a heretical Jewish rabbi, heading to his crucifixation as a result of "official" Jewish and Roman cooperation.
DEATH MY REMOTE CONTROL AS HIT SQUADES RETURN (April 13, 2001) Israel's strategy has always been to overwhelm and suffocate the Palestinians. At various times different tactics have been used ranging from diplomacy to brutality, from talk of "Statehood" to the imposition of neo-Apartheid.
ISRAELI ARMY ON THE RAMPAGE (April 12, 2001) A seven-year-old Palestinian girl was shot in the face by an Israeli rubber bullet while at school in the West Bank village of al-Khader when clashes broke out nearby, medical sources said.
IT'S WAR, MURDER, ASSASSINATIONS AND BEATINGS (April 12, 2001) With Robert Fisk, based out of Beirut and the longest serving Western journalist in the region, and Phil Reeves among the Palestinians and the Israelis, The Independent is usually heads above the English rest in both its coverage and analysis.
ISRAELIS ATTACK EVEN MORE BOLDLY (April 11, 2001) The Israelis won't be returning to "Zone A"; why should they? After all one of the major goals of the Madrid-Oslo "Peace Process" was to get the Palestinians into isolated and controlled "autonomous population centers" and let them fend for themselves.
ISRAEL BEGINS MINI INVASION STRATEGY (April 11, 2001) The Israelis have changed Generals, and the new master General Ariel Sharon is doing things his way. But then nearly everyone else among the Israeli elite has lined up right behind him.
ABDULLAH - KING OF JORDAN, AGENT OF THE ANGLO-AMERICANS (April 11, 2001) Abdullah II, ruler of Jordan, once called TransJordan, once called the East Bank of Palestine, is once again in Washington. The pattern is all too familiar.
ISRAELIS START USING GROUND TO GROUND MISSILES TO ATTACK PALESTINIANS (April 10, 2001) Starting yesterday, and for the first time in the occupied territories against the Palestinians, the Israelies have begun to use surface to surface missiles. In doing so the Israelis are once again throwing down the gauntlet to the entire Arab and Muslim world.
RACISM, MILITARISM, NEO-NAZISM IN THE "JEWISH STATE" (April 10, 2001) Racism, militarism, and a peculiar form of Israeli neo-Nazism thrives in today "Jewish State". Harsh conclusions, true; but buttressed by considerable evidence, both factual and ideological.
"VOICE OF AMERICA" EXPANDING TOWARDS CRUCIAL MIDDLE EAST (April 9, 2001) Just a few years ago, after the original Camp David agreement in 1978, the joke around Cairo was that the "Voice of America" was really all those loud muffler-broken U.S-supplied buses helping choke, or unchoke depending on your perspective, Cairo's teeming streets.
BARAK AND SHARON PLAN NEXT WAR (April 9, 2001) Long before anyone even thought Ariel Sharon might become Israeli Prime Minister...
Long before anyone even thought Shimon Peres would serve as Sharon's Foreign Minister...
While the "Peace Process" and plans for "Camp David II" were riding high...
MER was writing about the coming war being planned by Generals Barak and Sharon in tandem.
DEIR YASSIN REMEMBERED AND "THE QUILT" (April 8, 2001) "It's so unfair... After 50 years the Israelis have nuclear
weapons, the Mossad, Hollywood, a kosher White House,
and their own Assistant Secretary of State; while the
Arabs have corruption, secret-police, pathetic Arab-
American organizations, Arafat, and the 50th
anniversary quilt!"
THE PATHETIC ARAFAT - GIVER AND BEGGAR (April 8, 2001) This guy Arafat, and those who advise him, are truly getting ore pathetic all the time. We now learn that while his people suffer even worse than before as a result of what he and his cronies have done, and not done, Arafat has been busy giving expensive jewelry gifts to the former American President, First Lady, and Secretary of State (and no doubt there is a larger list!).
PASSOVER IN THE TIME OF THE INTIFADA (April 8, 2001) "I have been invited to a neighbor's Seder this year, and in my fantasy I have thought that I would rather sit on a box at home by myself in the dark with my face to the wall for the length of time the Seder lasts, out of a mixture of shame and protest against Israel's denial of freedom to her Palestinian neighbors."
THE LAST PASSOVER (April 7, 2001) "Is this the last Passover that I will celebrate?
My heart is not in the celebration this year.
And it can never be again until freedom for Jews
is also freedom for Palestinians."
THE NEXT EXPULSION OF THE PALESTINIANS? (April 7, 2001) The effect of the four-month-old al-Aqsa intifada has been to
radicalize and polarize all sides and thus the current situation
poses a great danger to the Palestinian people.
ISRAELIS AND U.S. CONGRESS POUND PALESTINIANS (April 6, 2001) What is happening now is the result of all the past years of ineptitude, corruption,
stupidities, and mistakes by the the various Arab "client regimes", Yasser Arafat's
included of course, as well as from the various "client organizations" allied
with them, especially in the US.
ISRAELIS BUILD, AMERICANS DECEIVE, ARABS WINK AND HIDE (April 6, 2001) This little game has gone on quite literally for decades now. The Israelis
twist and turn, delay and obfuscate, but all the while push forward. The Americans
say one thing and do another, and when the going gets hot they provide a little
criticism of Israel for the Arab media but reserve the important things that
really matter for ongoing and escalating cooperation with the Israelis.
"RIGHT OF RETURN" AMERICAN STYLE - PART 4 (April 5, 2001) This time they are going to march down a largely weekend deserted street in New York City, after gathering at a closed Israeli Consulate, to listen to a group of largely unknown speakers familiar only to themselves, with no strategy other than to gather among themselves to listen to themselves and to be able to say for themselves that they are doing something important...
ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT AGAINST TOP THREE ARAFAT PEOPLE? (April 5, 2001) Believing the official Israelis is all but impossible at this point; so one
has to do the best one can to put together the pieces in ways that make sense.
What happened yesterday was probably not an actual assassination attempt --
if that's what the Israelis wanted to do to these three they have the capabilities
to do so and not to miss.
THE JORDANIAN POLICE STATE (April 4, 2001) About five days before the convening of the Arab Summit in Amman,
dozens of masked security men armed to the teeth, along with officers
of the Intelligence service (mukhabarat), stormed the house of Siajj
Said Daraghmeh near Jabri on the Gardens Street in Amman.
"RIGHT OF RETURN" AMERICAN STYLE - PART 3 (April 4, 2001) Saturday a few thousand Arab Americans are planning to make it to Washington
"demanding" the "Right of Return" for Palestinian refugees. What should one
think about this?
"RIGHT OF RETURN" CONF A "DISASTER" - PART 2 (April 3, 2001) The region itself has corrupt and incompetent "client regimes", now including
that of Yasser Arafat. And that explains a great deal why such an important
and rich part of the world with over 200 million people is so regularly humbled
and bleeding.
"RIGHT OF RETURN" AMERICAN STYLE - PART 1 (April 3, 2001) This year the selected slogan for Arab Americans is "the Right of Return". A
couple of years ago at the time of the 50th anniversary of the 1948 war -- the
"nakba", the "disaster" -- the slogan was "the Quilt".
"INVASION" PREPARATIONS AS MUBARAK COMES COLLECTING (April 2, 2001) Hosni Mubarak of Egypt has come to Washington once again. His visits have
become customary to in a sense collect his allowance and meet with his new American
keepers, which are in fact really the old Bush crowd he is very familiar with.
PERES 'MORE AGGRESSIVE' THAN SHARON (April 2, 2001) "Peres is more aggressive than I am, (said Sharon). "Peres responded (to the Cabinet), "Yes, he had to restrain me this time."
PLOT TO KILL ARAFAT'S TOP PEOPLE (April 1, 2001) Yesterday the Senior U.S. Senator from New York, Chuck Shumer, went before
the Washington cameras to denounce Yasser Arafat as a "terrorist" and demand
he comply with U.S./Israeli dictate or else.
ANOTHER ARAB SUMMIT COMES AND GOES (April 1, 2001) If the demonstrators going to the Palestinian Rally in New York next weekend
had any guts, and any smarts, after they gather at the Israeli Consulate they
would move on and conduct their serious shouting where the Arab Ambassadors and
the Arab League hang their sorry hats.
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