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MID-EAST REALITIES - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 3/15/2002: Like so many words, this one "conspiracy" is overused and misused by many. That makes it all the more important to know whom to trust and rely on, whom to take seriously, whom to discount.
There is a huge historical conspiracy afoot at the moment. The goal is nothing other than to use the ruler of Saudi Arabia, Abdullah, to twist the Middle East to American dictate and Israeli designs.
It is a conspiracy similar to what was done to use Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to force and bribe a "peace" between Egypt and Israel more than two decades ago. That "peace" was followed by so many dastardly historical explosions and so many millions of Arab, Muslim and Palestinian dead -- including the Iran-Iraq War, the Lebanon War, the Algerian War, the Gulf War, the Afghan War, the Palestinian Intifadas, the apartheid-style "Peace Process"; all coupled with growing repression and deception which in fact was the crucible from which al-Qaeda was born leading to 9/11 and leading to today's potentially catastrophic situation.
It is a conspiracy organized and managed by many of the same forces - the CIA, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Mossad, the White House/National Security Council and a group of intensely involved sub-agentss who work with these forces and whose goal has always been to further Israeli interests and American goals, while subjugating the Palestinians and always dividing and weaking the Arabs -- among them Henry Siegman at the Council on Foreign Relations, Judith Kipper at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, James Zogby at the so-called Arab-American Institute, Fouad Ajami at Johns Hopkins University..and this is just a few who make up the public face of this vast conspiracy. More to follow...much more.
And this is also the oveall context for author Muna Hamzeh's thoughtful and important article that follows, as difficult as it may be for many people to understand and accept.
March 14, 2002
Until this week, the killing of collaborators had never been turned into a public display in the Occupied Territories. In the first Intifada, collaborators were killed, but their bodies were never hung in public or tied to the backs of pick-up trucks and dragged through the streets. But twice this week, once in Ramallah and once in Bethlehem, Palestinians killed three collaborators and made a public display of their bodies. In the first case on March 12, the body of Ra'ed Naem Odeh was hung upside down at Al-Manara Square in the center of Ramallah. The Al-Aqsa Brigade said they shot and killed him on suspicion of collaborating with the Israelis to assassinate one of the Brigade's senior members, Muhanad Abu Halawa and two of his comrades, earlier this month.
Today in Bethlehem, Mahmoud Sabatin and Deifallah, were shot dead by group of Palestinian militiamen. The bullet-riddled body of Mahmoud Sabatin, was then tied to the back of a pick-up truck and dragged from neighboring Beit Sahour to Bethlehem. He was dragged into Manger Square were the militiamen attempted to hang him but were prevented from doing so by Palestinian police. Both men were killed on suspicion of collaborating with Israel and leading to the assassination of the military leader of the Fatah hawks in Bethlehem, Hussein Obeiat in November 2000. I was still in Dheisheh the day Obeiat was assassinated. We drove to the scene shortly after an Israeli Apache gunship shelled Obeiat's car as it drove down a street in Beit Sahour, killing him instantly and two women who were walking by. It was clear that day that the Israelis would have not been able to assassinate Obeiat had they not had help from collaborators. How else would a gunship have shown up at the precise moment that Obeiat drove by?
Between the start of the Al-Aqsa Intifada on September 29, 2000 and February 5, 2002, the Israeli military - with the help of collaborators - has been able to assassinate 62 Palestinians. This number, provided by LAW, a Palestinian human rights group, includes 20 innocent bystanders who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Turning the killings of collaborators into a public display may seem like a barbaric act for those of us who don't support violence in any form. Yet the issue of collaborators has long been swept under the carpet at a very high cost to the Palestinians, as all the assassinations have shown. The Palestinian Authority has failed to address the issue or even deal with it. How could it when many collaborators work within Arafat's security forces and ministries.
When Arafat first arrived in Gaza in May 1994, I was working on a documentary film for Channel Four in London that kept me in Gaza for extended periods of time for nearly six months. Some of the Palestinians we were filming were members of the Fatah Hawks resistance fighters, who later joined Arafat's security forces because they sincerely believed that was how they could best help build a Palestinian state. I remember how angry these young men were when they reported to work, only to discover that some of those higher ranking than themselves were collaborators, whom they had personally kidnapped and interrogated in the first Intifada. Within a few months after the inception of Arafat's Authority, many of these former Fatah Hawks lost faith in their leadership for its clear lack of commitment to rid its ranks from those willing to sell their fellow countrymen for a buck.
The fact that the Palestinians are willing, for the first time, to make such a public display of the killings of collaborators underlines the extent of the need to rid themselves, once and for all, of those willing to commit the highest act of treason. Perhaps the hanging in Ramallah two days ago and the lynching in Bethlehem today will make the hundreds of other collaborators consider the cost of their collaboration. Hizbullah in South Lebanon was able to succeed in riding itself of collaborators and the Palestinians have to do the same if the resistance is going to have any chance at bringing the occupation to an end.
For their part, the Israelis will continue to recruit collaborators in whatever way they can. They detain young teenagers, torture them physically and psychologically and then seduce them with money as a way to end their pain. After rounding up 600 men in Dheisheh this week, the Israeli military was not able to arrest a single person that they claim is a member of a "terrorist" group. Instead, the army released all 600 men with the exception of 70. Then they released 50 more, until the final count of who they actually took away was only 20. According to sources in Dheisheh, all 20 males are between the ages of 16-18 and non "have anything to do with anything". How many of those will be tortured into collaboration? How many will succumb to the coercion? And how can a 16 year old civilian, with no training on how to handle pressure under torture be expected to resist the temptation of ending his horrible physical and psychological pain? Clearly, the Palestinians need to create a the conditions whereby young detainees are de-briefed upon their release. And they need to create the conditions whereby it would be impossible for un-repenting collaborators to live within Palestinian society.
Up until now, those known to have collaborated with the Israelis have been able to return to their homes and live their lives unharmed. True, no one socializes or mingles with them. But they are there, watching what takes place around them and reporting it to the Israelis. At this stage in the game, when Israel has no red lights to stop it from committing its war crimes, collaborators need to be ostracized and forced to leave the Palestinian Territories. The damage they have done historically, and in this Intifada particularly, cannot be downplayed or overlooked anymore. The fact that the Palestinians have been able to produce so many collaborators can no longer be excused or ignored.
And perhaps it is time for Palestinian resistance fighters to learn another lesson from Hizbullah . Their fighters were never seen parading down the streets, with their guns in hand, and their faces exposed for all to see. The South Lebanese say the identity of the fighters was never revealed to the local population. In the end, Hizbullah was able to rid South Lebanon of their occupiers without signing any agreements, let alone agreements that contain one degrading compromise after another.
As brutal and barbaric as the scenes of this week's hanging and lynching may seem, it is time to clean house. It is time to impose some serious internal changes. We are quickly reaching another Sabra and Shatilla and another Palestinian Nakba. We need to rethink our strategies before we wake up one day and discover that the unthinkable has happened, again. And when that happens, not even Allah will be able to save us.
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| Source: http://www.middleeast.org/articles/2002/3/698.htm |