Democratic Palestine : 36 (ص 6)
غرض
- عنوان
- Democratic Palestine : 36 (ص 6)
- المحتوى
-
Violation Since Shamir’s «Peace Prop-
osal» - April 1 through October 1,
1989,» which documented the follow-
ing: 178 Palestinians was killed by gun-
fire (58 of them 16 years of age or
younger), while an additional 36 were
killed by the other means; 3,387 were
injured by live ammunition, of them
1,211 were children, in addition to
12,816 injuries from other causes; 250
houses were demolished in this six-
month period, while 60 were sealed;
1,674 curfew days were counted, aside
from partial and night curfews, while
there were 1,434 arrest raids and 204
tax raids; 37,740 fruit and olive trees
were uprooted and/or burned; over
14,000 Palestinians were in prison,
2,124 of them administrative detainees.
In all, 21 were expelled from their
homeland, under the emergency laws,
in 1989. (Many others were administra-
tively expelled on pretexts of visa vio-
lations, despite having been born in
Palestine, or lived most of their life
there. In the Ramallah area alone,
about 150, mostly women and chil-
dren, have been expelled in this way
since the start of the intifada, cruelly
breaking up families in a policy of
creeping mass transfer.) It is striking
that the only human rights violation
that was reduced in the second year of
the intifada was «official» expulsion -
21 as opposed to 33 in the first year.
This, hke the opening of West Bank
schools, shows that international con-
demnation does affect Israel. At the
same time, it is obvious that Israel
hopes to use such token improvements
to deflect criticism of its continuing
gross violations. Unfortunately, much
of the international media has played
along with this game, whether inten-
tionally or not, as detailed coverage of
the intifada has almost dropped out of
the spotlight.
Israel can’t penetrate the
intifada
There were obvious links between
the political and physical attacks, and
the attempts to penetrate Palestinian
unity. One was the increased use of
the border guards, which quickly led to
6
the unprovoked assault on Nahhalin on
Apnil 13th, when the guards and army
together killed five residents of this lib-
erated village near Bethlehem, and
injured at least 50 others, many of
them in their homes. The idea of
deploying the border guards against
the intifada was to partially relieve the
army after its sustained failure to dent
the popular momentum. Another mali-
cious intent was to divide among Pales-
tinians themselves, since Druze resi-
dent in the Zionist state are recruited
into the border guards. In Israeli soc-
iety, the guards are considered «sec-
ond-rate» compared to the army; this
force is also heavily manned by Orien-
tal (Arab) Jews. So the Israeli Orien-
talists delighted in finding forces that
supposedly know «Arab traditions» -
creating the picture of Arabs fighting
Arabs.
However, this tactic failed on two
counts. The border guards were no
more successful than the army against
the intifada, despite committing ram-
pant atrocities. Moreover, the attempt
to divide various sectors of the Palesti-
nian people failed dismally, especially
at the Druze Initiative Committee
organized a series of activities to show
that the guards are not at all represen-
tative of their community. Druze dele-
gations traveled to Jerusalem to donate
blood for the injured of the uprising,
and women relatives of border guards
met with West Bank women to express
their solidarity with the intifada. Druze
leaders pledged to impose social and
religious sanctions against any Druze
committing murder in the occupied ter-
ritories - a method that has previously
proved effective in the struggle of the
people of the Golan Heights against
the occupation. In the end, the tactic
only served to accentuate the racism
pervasive in the Zionist society. The
Israeli press was filled with scandals
about the border guards from the
perspective that they were substandard
and moreover «Arabs» and Kahane
supporters, whereby mainstream
Zionists would like to claim innocence
of their crimes. It is also noteworthy
that the deployment of the guards
didn’t change the basic ratio of army
killings: regular soldiers continued to
shoot-to-kill, while the guards were
charged with terrorizing the Palesti-
nians in more «weird ways - atrocities
against women, etc.
The second intersection between the
attempt to break Palestinian unity and
the increase in violent repression is
related to collaborators. While many
collaborators changed their position
under the impact of the intifada, those
who remained in the service of the
occupation began to take an even
more sinister role. This was apparent
in the number of incidents in which
collaborators joined Shin Bet agents in
hunting down and summarily executing
local leaders of the uprising. In view of
this, one can understand the intensified
war on collaborators, needed to pro-
tect the masses, preserve united ranks
and build the independent society and
state. Also for this process, the UNL
issued detailed regulations.
It was typical that some western
journalists seized this opportunity to
write about the intifada, after having
«forgotten» it for months. This feeds
into the atmosphere of promoting
Shamir’s plan as if it. were a reasonable
chance to stop the violence, meanwhile
neglecting the fact of the occupation’s
daily violence against Palestinians. In
general, 1989 was marked by a danger-
ous international tendency to focus on
what the PLO should do to make a
solution possible, while putting to the
side the reality of the uprising and
Israeli repression. The PLO bears
main responsibilityfor working to cor-
rect this situation, by gearing its peace
offensive to protecting the intifada and
promoting the conditions for its con-
tinuation and escalation. But we also
call on progressive forces everywhere
to increase their solidarity in the polit-
ical and informational fields. The
importance of international solidarity
cannot be underestimated. In view of
the Israeli government’s intransigence,
the intifada is heading for a long strug-
gle; it will be a permanent feature of
the next decade, in the struggle for
freedom and independence. @
Democratic Palestine, December 1989 - هو جزء من
- Democratic Palestine : 36
- تاريخ
- ديسمبر ١٩٨٩
- المنشئ
- الجبهة الشعبية لتحرير فلسطين
Contribute
Not viewed