Democratic Palestine : 7 (ص 6)
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- Democratic Palestine : 7 (ص 6)
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Occupied Palestine
What Zionist National Unity Means
The de facto annexation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is not being
moderated by the Israeli national unity government. On the contrary,
the new government is trying to capitalize on the results of seventeen
years of occupation and especially the iron fist policy unabashedly
applied by the previous Likud government. In this the Labor Party's
role is providing the linkage between the iron fist and US plans for the
region.
Israeli Defense Minister Rabin has
announced plans for «improving the
quality of life of the residents of the West
Bank and Gaza Strip.» He has also
promised to replace the Israeli military
officers appointed to run Palestinian
municipalities with Arab appointees.
Prime Minister Peres has hinted at eas-
ing political and economic restrictions,
and announced a series of decisions:
Nablus businessmen will be permitted to
establish a bank dealing with Jordanian
currency (something forbidden since the
1967 occupation); Al Najah University is
to be opened before the expiration of the
four months stipulated by the closure
order; $5000 rather than $3000 can be
brought in by those entering the West
Bank from Jordan; licensing a cement
factory and a hospital; reducing censor-
ship.
There is indeed reason to be scepti-
cal of these ‘goodwill’ gestures. First of
all, they are no more than gestures and
will not actually improve the fot of the
mass of West Bank and Gaza residents.
The structural damage wrought on the
Palestinian economy by occupation is
too great to be reversed by a few pro-
jects. As an example, the bank will be
supervised by the Bank of Israel. As
such it will not be independent.
Moreover, it will provide a new venue for
Israeli monitoring of Palestinian
economic transactions and further sub-
Ordination of the West Bank’s economy
to that of the Zionist state. Similarly,
appointing Palestinians to head
municipalities is just another attempt to
cover the fact that the Israeli occupiers
have fired the elected mayors, as well as
a sleazy trick to lure collaborators willing
to rule over fellow Palestinians.
Dollars for imperialist ‘peace’
More important, these measures
are linked to US plans to resolve the
issue of the 1967 occupied territories
and the Arab-Israeli conflict generally to
imperialist-Zionist advantage. The
statements of Labor figures in the
national unity government coincide with
US Secretary of State Schultz’s call for
«improvement in the living conditions»
of the population of the occupied ter-
ritories. They also coincide with the invi-
tation of five Palestinian professors from
West Bank universities to participate in a
New York conference in October enti-
tled: Middle East Peace and Develop-
ment. This was sponsored by a group of
US businessmen, mainly of Jewish and
Arab origin, including Najib Halibi,
father-in-law of Jordan’s King Hussein.
Peres himself had met with representa-
tives of this group when he visited the
US in September. According to Al Fajr,
October 26th edition, there are reports
The reality of Zionist «development»: On November
1st, the Israeli military authorities demolished 33
shacks inhabited by Palestinian migrant farmers in
the Jiftlik area of the Jordan Valley.
that ‘Israel’, Egypt and the US have sec-
retly approved the group's plans for
investing in projects in the West Bank
and Gaza Strip. These US businessmen
have been deliberating such ventures
for over a year but were earlier discour-
aged by then Prime Minister Shamir.
Labor’s entry into the Zionist govern-
ment provides the chance for hitching
this ‘private’ initiative up to the US-Israeli
plans. Jerusalem newspaper, Al Talia,
had the following comment in its October
11th edition:
«This proposed investment belies
American claims that the Reagan plan
will restore the occupied territories to
Arab control. It is legal recognition of
Israeli authority over the West Bank and
Gaza Strip through the permission
which these authorities will grant for
investment. (This) means that the future
of this area will be neither Palestinian
nor Jordanian. It is the expression of the
American policy which opposes Palesti-
nian rights to _— self-determination.
Foreign investment, they think, will bols-
ter non-nationalist tendencies and
broaden the social base of the pro-
American forces.»
Also in mid-October, Freij, the only
mayor of a major West Bank town not
disposed by the Israelis, and five mayors
appointed by the ‘civil’ administration, as
well as a village league head and a West
Bank deputy in the Jordanian parliament
were invited to attend the cocktail party
held by Defense Minister Rabin for his
US counterpart, Weinberger. This meet-
ing was condemned by Palestinian
nationalists such as mayors Bassam
Shakaa and Karim Khalaf, and Haider
Abdul Shafi, head of Gaza’s Red Cres-
cent Society.
These political and economic
moves combine into the most serious
attempt to date to split the united posi-
tion of the Palestinians under occupa-
tion. Waving dollars and promises of
less restrictions, the enemy forces hope
to entice an exclusive group of Palesti-
nian businessmen and pro-Jordanian
notables to definitively break ranks with
’ the majority's adherence to the PLO and
its goal of an independent state. More
dangerous still is that the enemy hopes
to broaden this group to include middle
class professionals and _ intellectuals
who are sincerely concerned about the
desperate need for development in the - هو جزء من
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