Invasões Bárbaras vs Resistência = Intifada?

CHUTZPAH!

Neste domingo, o governo de Israel aprovou uma lei definindo seu Estado como Estado Judeu a fim de considerar os cidadãos palestinos cristãos e muçulmanos de segunda classe e privá-los de seus direitos básicos. O KNESSET receberá a lei para sanção, ou não, nesta quarta-feira. Binyamin Netanyahu bota mais lenha na fogueira da latente Intifada.

A proposed law that defines Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people is stirring fierce debate in the country and among politicians.
Rights groups have condemned the draft legislation as "racist" and say it discriminates against Israel's minorities, which make up 20 per cent of the population.
The Cabinet vote, which comes at a time of heightened tensions with Palestinians, was passed by a majority of 14 votes to 6.
The wording of the bill has yet to be finalised, and requires approval by the Knesset.
It is intended to become part of Israel's basic laws, and would recognise Israel's Jewish character, institutionalise Jewish law as an inspiration for legislation, and drop Arabic as a second official language.
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu says the bill is necessary because people were challenging the notion of Israel as a Jewish homeland.
Addressing the cabinet, Netanyahu said: "The state of Israel is the nation state of the Jewish People. It has equal individual rights for every citizen and we insist on this.
"But only the Jewish People have national rights: A flag, anthem, the right of every Jew to immigrate to the country, and other national symbols. These are granted only to our people, in its one and only state."
So are the edges being blurred in Israel between politics and religion, the state and democracy? 

Quando estava na universidade cursando jornalismo, era cheia de ilusões e de idealismo. No trabalho, as ilusões foram implodindo e não ficou nenhuma. Uma das ilusões perdidas era de passar uns tempos em um kibbutz em Israel, sinônimo, na minha geração amordaçada e oprimida pelos milicos, de solidariedade e socilalismo. 

O idealismo, graças a Deus, resistiu a tentações, cooptações e a desilusões sucessivas. É graças a ele que faço este trabalho e por causa dele que batalho tanto pela causa palestina.
Comecei a seguir o conflito - que via então na ótica da grande mídia - em 1982. Meu primeiro choque foi o massacre de Sabra e Shatila (Blog 15/01/12). O mundo, no dia 18 de setembro de 1982, assumiu feições bestiais como as das bestas libanesas pseudo-cristãs teleguiadas por Israel e as dos soldados israelenses comandados por Ariel Sharon. Foi aí, em Sabra e Shatila, que perdi minha inocência. Sofri um estupro emocional de tamanha violência que temi que o baque me derrubasse para sempre. Não derrubou. Como diz Nietzsche, o que não mata, reforça (aliás uma das poucas coisas sensatas que ele falou). Paradoxalmente, este horror reforçou meu idealismo. Reforçou minha convicção que o jornalismo que eu queria praticar não era uma profissão e sim uma missão que evitasse que outras pessoas fossem enganadas por notícias erradas, por interesses escusos e agenda própria com informações destorcidas, ilusórias, que transformavam vítimas em algozes e algozes em vítimas deturpando os Direitos Humanos de justiça. Como vi que era o caso da ocupação israelense da Palestina.
Até então, via os palestinos como me vendiam: terroristas desalmados que atacavam até atletas em plena Olimpíada, um povo com quem o nobre Estado de Israel, cheio de vítimas do holocausto, tinha de defender-se custasse o que custasse. Enfim, era enganada pela grande mídia como eram, e são ainda, muitos contemporâneos mais velhos e mais experientes, porém, ignorantes como o mundo todo que engolem até hoje a ladainha mentirosa veiculada através do lobby sionista.  
De 1982 a 2014, vi a face da Palestina ser conspurcada dia a dia pela ocupação militar, depois pela importação de judeus estrangeiros que mal falavam nem hebraico e espezinhavam os nativos como se a terra fosse deles que a surrupiavam, e não dos proprietários de direito e de fato. Depois veio o muro da vergonha que começou a ser erguido quando o de Berlin foi derrubado - como se os sucessivos governos israelenses quisessem revelar ao mundo, da maneira dissimulada que os caracteriza, que estavam determinados a substituir os nazistas nos mínimos detalhes, começando pelo resultado daquela guerra que revelou o Mal que os homens têm estocado, de tocaia, pronto para emergir e atacar a presa fácil.
A presa, neste caso, era o povo palestino, já mutilado pela Naqba (Blog 15/05/11) da qual eu jamais ouvira falar ao longo de minha escolaridade brasileira nas melhores escolas e universidade federal. Minha ignorância foi um motor a mais. A primeira coisa que fiz foi aplicar o que aprendera no curso de jornalismo, a colocar e responder as questões básicas: Quem, Como, Quando, Onde e Por quê. No fundo, informar é simples, pelo menos nos países em que o diploma é obrigatório, basta respeitar a primeira lição que aprendemos na faculdade e não servir interesses econômicos e políticos e sim a verdade, e quando possível, contribuir a que justiça seja feita onde ela é pisoteada.
A Naqba é uma das três vergonhas internacionais do século XX. A primeira foi o genocídio dos armenianos; a segunda foi o genocídio dos judeus e dos ciganos; a terceira foi e está sendo o genocídio dos palestinos.
Os impérios Otomano e Nazista foram devidamente extintos e embora os armenianos continuem esperando que a Turquia reconheça o mal causado por seus antepassados, os alemães já fizeram seu mea culpa prolíficamente. Ambos genocídios antecedem as gerações de hoje, portanto, não há como intervirmos no passado e retificá-lo - nestes casos citados, infelizmente. Contudo, o genocídio dos palestinos começou em 1948 e continua com uma crueldade de sofisticação imprecedente. Nele, podemos podemos influir; ele, podemos combater com nossas ferramentas cidadãs de boicote e de pressão política; contra ele, podemos lutar informando quem só recebe informação da grande mídia que repete os comunicados de imprensa israelense e que se dobram aos lobbies sionistas influentes. E podemos inverter o processo da Naqba e contribuir para a evolução do mundo em que vivemos.  
Pois é, a Naqba. Quando se fala em Naqba, não há como não pensar em Deir Yassin, o vilarejo vizinho de Jerusalém que 120 para-militares dos grupos israelitas Irgun e Lehi (chamados então de terroristas), com a assistência do Haganah (ídem), riscaram do mapa no dia 09 de abril de 1948 massacrando todos seus habitantes então presentes.
A carnificina de Deir Yassin não é amaior ou a mais importante ou a mais horrenda das que Israel cometeu na Palestina. Outras a sucederiam com igual ou maior selvageria. Mas as atrocidades que os israelitas cometeram naquela época, naquele momento - só três anos após a descoberta dos campos de concentração - foram surpreendentes. A sofisticação das armas utlizadas contra as famílias fizeram desta carnificina a mais marcante por ter sido a mais sádica - como se o espírito de Hitler tivesse baixado em Menahem Begin, comandante do Irgun na época, que ordenou o ato ou que ficou de braços cruzados enquanto seus correligionários atuavam cruelmente. A tal ponto que no dia seguinte, o judeu mais célebre do planeta nessa década pós-guerra, Albert Einstein, lavrou seu horror na carta acima, e posteriormente, condenou explícitamente os outros massacres que os judeus protagonizariam em sua desenfreada conquista territorial que gerou a Naqba e o status quo atual.
Por que estou rememorando Deir Yassin justamente nesta semana?
Por causa do atentado que os dois jovens palestinos, membros do grupo de resistência Frente Popular de Libertação da Palestina (que não tem absolutamente nada a ver com o Hamas) fizeram contra a sinagoga matando quatro rabinos, um policial israelense, e sendo executados em seguida.
Os rapazes residiam em um bairro de Jerusalém Oriental, ocupada civil e militarmente, cercado pelo muro da vergonha. Vivem na terra em que nasceram assim como seus ancestrais, mas já nasceram enclausurados e frustrados com a impotência frente à ocupação de uma das maiores potências militares do planeta.
O ataque não ocorreu em um lugar anódino, sem história, sem um karma pesado. A sinagoga atingida se encontra em um lugar maldito de Jerusalém. O bairro foi construído sobre os escombros de casas e um tapete de sangue derramado bestialmente em 1948. Pois Har Nof é onde foi Deir Yassin - vilarejo palestino destroçado para imigrantes judeus se instalarem. Este bairro, assim como outros em Jerusalém Ocidental que eram vilarejos palestinos "extintos" durante a Naqba, tem um grande significado no imaginário palestino. Na História da ocupação e de seus antepassados.
Nada justifica a violência. Sou contra a cem por cento. Mas o que fazer quando não há vias diplomáticas? O que fazer quando seu antagonista é um Estado bandido, terrorista, que não respeita nenhuma lei internacional e lhe rouba dia a dia mais terreno, que o oprime com cada vez mais instrumentos maus? Que o empurra para um abismo moral e físico insuportável?
Como disse acima, os jovens Ghassan e Udai Abu Jamal são membros do Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Uma antiga organização palestina de resistência. O PFLP é de tradição laica. A motivação dos jovens foi totalmente política e não religiosa. É um sinal que as antigas organizações de resistência próximas da OLP estão revivendo e reativando os conhecidos métodos de Intifada.  
Eu não consigo dar lição de moral aos palestinos que cometem estes atos desesperados porque sei o que vivem, como sobrevivem, quão sem perspectiva é seu futuro, sua vida, já que, inclusive de seu lado da Linha Verde, não têm garantida nem sua própria moradia e direito de residência.
Lamento pelas famílias que perdem seus entes queridos, isto sim. Mas me pergunto o que estes três estadunidenses e este inglês que têm país e cidadania estavam fazendo em terra que não é deles. Como há rabinos, em princípio, homens de princípio, que aceitam "trabalhar" em sinagogas cujos alicerces são fincados vidas destroçadas e um mar de sangue?
Só palestino é que tem de ter consciência do valor da vida?
Os judeus israelenses e imigrantes estão isentos do dever de consciência?

Desde a Operação militar israelense Protective Edge na Faixa de Gaza - que deixou mais de dois mil palestinos mortos, mais de 500 crianças desmembradas pelas bombas da IDF - que os palestinos que vivem na Cisjordânia vêm demonstrando sua insatisfação com passeatas e manifestações reprimidas a gás lacrimogênio, stun grenades (estrondo e luz ofuscante que provoca cegueira "momentânea", não é letal, mas causa dano), balas de borracha e balas de verdade que já mataram vários jovens.
Como disse em blogs precedentes, faz meses que Jerusalém ocupada está sofrendo uma investida de desapropriação e apropriação imobiliária crescente, com os palestinos sendo cada vez mais privados de seus direitos naturais, ancestrais, de propriedade. E além disso, os colonos - armados até os dentes - estão cada vez mais agressivos, não economizam tiros, e têm incendidados mesquitas e vandalizado igrejas impunemente.
Querem dar a ilusão que este conflito territorial é um conflito religioso, mas não é. É o que é. Um país que ocupa outro e que procede a uma limpeza étnica programada para ocupar terras alheias. Não são judeus contra cristãos e muçulmanos. São israelenses extremistas + israelenses inconscientes + imigrantes judeus ignorantes + empresários venais que veem lucro em desgraça, que oprimem o povo palestino - cristão e muçulmano - com o objetivo de tomar sua terra e apagar sua História e seu passado.
Não tem nada de religioso nesta história. Binyamin Netanyahu e sua corja não são religiosos, muito pelo contrário. Usam a quipa como um instrumento de propaganda a mais. E quando declara Israel Estado Judeu, faz isso com agenda dupla. Por um lado, para marginalizar mais ainda os residentes palestinos com ou sem cidadania israelense e poder melhor dispor de seu destino; por outro, a fim de cooptar os judeus sionistas abastados que vivem em outras terras. Para que soltem mais dinheiro para os assentamentos e que deem mais força aos lobbies que protegem a limpeza étnica da Palestina. Como Hitler fez em sua época. Controle das finanças e da informação são primordiais a qualquer vitória, política ou bélica.

É raro encontrar um palestino sem consciência. E é pela consciência da verdade fundamental do que move a ocupação que os palestinos ficaram, no mínimo, incomodados com o ataque aos rabinos. Houve um sentimento de incômodo, de vergonha. A IDF (Forças de Ocupação Israelense) já assassinou vários imãs palestinos, mas isto é irrelevante para a grande mídia. E quando a morte atinge famílias de homens de "batina", as próprias mulheres palestinas lamentam. Se fossem colonos bárbaros ou soldados da IDF, não lamentariam.
Os palestinos não são santos, às vezes cometem crimes, menos hediondos do que Israel, mas cometem de vez em quando, em escala individual, humana. Pois se encontram em um beco sem saída. Tentam defender seu passado, seu futuro, seus direitos. Sendo que Israel comete crimes em massa e no quotidiano sem motivo, sem razão, visando possuir o alheio, exterminar um povo inteiro.
E o problema não se restringe a Jerusalém, os palestinos de Belém também vêm sofrendo bastante, assim como a cidade.
Desde a Operação Brother's Keeper (investida da IDF massissa na Cisjordânia com a mentira de estar à procura dos três jovens colonos sequestrados, que já sabiam estarem mortos) que  as tensões de Jerusalém se propagaram para Belém. Desde julho que a situação vem piorando. A presença da IDF é constante e ostensiva. No dia 11 de novembro as restrições pioraram porque os soldados cimentaram as bocas dos túneis que ligam Belém a Wadi Fukin, al-Kahder e Nahalin, aumentando a frustração dos habitantes, que pensam que é mais um estratagema para expandir a ocupação. Os residentes perderam acesso a escolas, hospitais, a famílias e amigos. E é assim que Israel procede. Isola uma comunidade até estrangulá-la e ela não ter como respirar a não ser que mude, que abandone suas casas, e aí chegam os invasores civis, os colonos.

E estes estão cada vez mais volentos. Atacam os oliveirais e as lavouras palestinas diariamente, depredando e incendiando sem que os soldados da IDF intervenham. Cometem crimes contra pessoas, culturas e propriedades sem nenhuma consequência. É um terrorismo de provocação e de destruição incessantes. Pois Belém está cercada de colônias judias, ditas assentamentos, com gente da pior espécie.
Um consultor jurídico do Badil, the Resource Centre for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights ONG baseada em Belém focalizada nos direitos dos refugiados dos campos próximos, confirma que "the situation, on the whole, is getting worse. Night raids and arrests are all occuring with greater frequency. There's not a single member of the community that's not affected by it." E os soldados israelenses  operam na impunidade. A situação em Belém já era "horrific" antes dos problemas em Jerusalém começarem. E "the structural disenfranchisement and regular rights violations of Bethlehem's residents were already cause for concern. Measuring whether or not it's gotten more or less horrific ove the past months is missing the point. To me, it's all part of the same stream. palestinians are frustrated, and they(re fighting back on their own."
Ainda bem que contam com este e outros voluntários estrangeiros que têm consciência e alma.

Trocando em miúdos, a situação na Palestina atingiu, novamente, um ponto de violência dos invasores e de resistência dos nativos que tem um nome que nós jornalistas pronunciamos de voz baixa, comedida, como se fosse a palavra que gerasse o fenômeno de resistência ativa e não o fenônemo que chamasse a palavra que todos receiam pronunciar: Intifada.
Desde julho, quando Israel começou sua Operação militar Protective Edge em Gaza logo após a Operação Brothers' Keepers na Cisjordânia que os jovens de Jerusalém, Belém, Hebron, estão em um estado de espírito e de ânimo que lembra o ano 2000, o ano 1987, e a Intifada.
O que está acontecendo na Cisjordânia tem os sinais da Intifada - passeatas e atentados isolados - mas ninguém quer usar o nome e numerá-la Terceira Intifada. Como se a palavra significasse desgraça. Enfim, desgraça para Israel, pois desgraça os palestinos vivem nela desde a Naqba e desgraçona desde 1967. A vida dos palestinos é uma desgraça que não acaba. E a frustração é palpável nestes jovens que tinham no máximo 13 anos no fim da Segunda Intifada que terminou com promessas de melhora que não aconteceram e eles só viram as coisas se degradarem - o muro encompridar, sua terra encurtar, desapropriação de lares, de identidade, dignidade e sobretudo, sem perspectiva de um dia as coisas mudarem para melhor em vez de piorarem.
Durante a O. Protective Edge viram seus compatriotas em Gaza serem massacrados, mas o Hamas aguentar firme, enquanto eles lá na Cisjordânia eram pisoteados calados. O sentimento de vergonha pairava no ar.
Durante a O. Brothers' Keepers em plena Cisjordânia de sequestros indiscriminados, os jovens sentiram a consciência de sua vulnerabilidade, sentiram que os dias de todos os palestinos estavam contados.
No dia 08 de outubro a IDF resolveu dar uma lição nos jerusalemitas e pegou pesado na repressão fora da mesquita Al-Aqsa deixando mais de 20 feridos e centenas indignados.
Na semana seguinte, novas confrontações foram registradas quando centenas de policiais israelenses invadiram a mesquita distribuindo cassetadas, gás, granadas e balas.
Aí no dia 22, um palestino que não podia mais, jogou seu carro em uma estação de trem em Jerusalém lotada matando dois israelenses.
As tensões se intensificaram com as múltiplas iniciativas de grupos israelenses ditos de extrema-direita de tomarem a mesquita Al-Aqsa e Mahmoud Abbas soou o alarme.
No dia 06 de novembro um outro palestino atropelou soldados israelenses perto de Hebron algumas horas após a morte de outro israelense ter sido morto em Jerusalém e 14 serem feridos em um atentado similar.
No dia 07 de novembro o assassinato do rapaz palestino na Galileia, baleado nas costas por um soldado da IDF, piorou a situação que já estava grave entre o governo israelense e os 1.5 milhões de palestinos do país.
Em vez de tentar acalmar os ânimos, Binyamin Netanyahu optou pela provocação ordenando a demolição das casas dos rapazes que participaram dos atentados para punir a família.
Israel demole moradias palestinas constantemente, mas a demolição como punição coletiva parara em 2005 no fim da Segunda Intifada - até a punição tem cheiro de intifada que os israelenses temem mais do que o diabo.

Pois Israel gosta de ver os palestinos de joelhos, com as mãos atrás da cabeça, olhos vendados, submissos a seus desmandos nas barragens, nos checkpoints, quando invadem e ocupam casas de famílias apavoradas.
Palestino que se dobra, sofre a humilhação calado, é assimilado a animal doméstico, domestiscado.
Palestino que resiste à violência e crueldade israelense quotidiana é chamado de terrorista. Tanto pelos EUA quanto pelo governo israelense que é criminoso de carteirinha, pela IDF, que é o exército mais amoral do planeta, pela grande mídia que publica os comunicados de imprensa que saem de Tel Aviv como papagaios - por ignorância, preguiça de conferir a notícia ou por serem bem controlados pelo lobby sionista.
Todos estes ingredientes, o da repressão e opressão dos ocupantes israelenses civis e militares + os assassinatos que estes cometem diariamente nos territórios palestinos ocupados + a frustração galopante dos jovens palestinos + a resistência em forma de atentados esporádicos + o último golpe dado por Netanyahu da lei de Estado Judeu de Israel = Intifada.
Lamento dizer a palavra que todos calam embora desde julho esteja em todas as cabeças e todas as bocas sussurrarem como se fosse uma praga. Intifada.
A não ser que Mahmoud Abbas queira e consiga controlá-la. A não ser que Marwan Barghouti dê contra-ordem das masmorras em que se encontra enjaulado.
Quanto ao atentado à sinagoga, cedo a palavra abaixo às duas partes. A dois jornalistas israelenses do jornal Haaretz Amira Hass  e Gideon Levy - e a uma palestina - Rania Khalek. Assim você poderá ter uma ideia própria com maior conhecimento de causa.
Antes, eis o vídeo da palestra de Richard Falk sobre o Estado Judeu.

Palestinian women stand in front of Israeli border police officers
in the Jerusalem districkt of Jabal Mukaber, Nov. 18:14 (Reuters)

In recent weeks, government officials have called for intensifying the collective punishment of Jerusalem’s Palestinian residents to deter potential attackers. But these official, public threats did nothing to deterUday and Ghassan Abu Jamal. They planned their murderous operation despite knowing their families would suffer one way or another: violent raids on their houses, arrests, humiliation, having their houses sealed or destroyed. They surely knew that if they weren’t killed, they’d be arrested, perhaps tortured during interrogation and sentenced to life. But none of this deterred them.

It’s too easy and early to label Tuesday’s murder in a synagogue as another incident in an emerging religious war. Hamas and other organizations that exploit religion would surely prefer to portray it that way; it strengthens their position as against the PLO’s narrative, which still sees the roots of the conflict as colonial-national and requiring a political solution. But this dichotomy isn’t complete: Even Hamas officials and other pious Muslims frequently say the problem isn’t with Jews as a religious community, but against the occupation.

Nevertheless, there’s no doubt that the skullcap, the hat and the prayer shawl are symbols, both for cartoonists and for those who physically want to harm representatives of the occupation. Like the keffiyeh and the hijab, they are visible signs that make it easier for someone who wants to take revenge on “the enemy.” Similarly, a synagogue during morning prayers is a convenient target – not because it’s a house of prayer, but because it’s full of people who are undoubtedly members of the occupying nation.

One also shouldn’t make light of the feelings roused in Jerusalem’s Palestinians, and Palestinians in general, by the discovery of the body of bus driver Yusuf al-Ramouni. Police hastened to declare him a suicide, but Palestinians don’t see the police as an agency whose goal is to protect them. On the contrary: This is the police force that escorts the bulldozers that destroy their homes, that protects the settlers, that kills Palestinian demonstrators and petty criminals for no reason. Thus Palestinians fundamentally distrust the police’s motives.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the synagogue attack. His condemnation was honest and genuine, for both moral and pragmatic reasons. In besieged, destroyed Gaza, spokesmen for several Palestinian organizations congratulated the martyrs and voiced support and understanding for their deed. But among the broader public, the main reaction was silence.

When PLO and Fatah representatives are making the rounds of European capitals to encourage votes in favor of recognizing a Palestinian state, most people understand that such an attack could undermine the Palestinian cause, if only for a few weeks. Killing Jewish worshippers in a synagogue looks bad when Palestinian human rights groups are pushing Abbas to join the International Criminal Court so Israeli officials can be indicted for war crimes and violating international law.

Palestinians believe that all means, including armed struggle, are legitimate to fight the occupation. But in private conversations, even those who support killing Israelis seem embarrassed by an attack on civilians at prayer.

So why are those who oppose murdering civilians at prayer keeping silent now? Because they share the despair and anger that pushed the Abu Jamals to attack Jews in a synagogue. Like the Abu Jamals, they feel themselves under assault: The Israeli nation is constantly attacking them with all the tools at its disposal.

The Har Nof neighborhood, where the attack took place, is built on the lands of the former Palestinian village of Deir Yassin. Those who are keeping silent now see the murder as a response to an Israeli policy toward the Palestinians that has been one long chain of attacks, dispossessions and expulsions since 1948."

Amira Hass , Haaretz. Nov. 19, 2014 | 9:02 AM

Israel: Stop Punitive Home Demolitions - Policy Amounts to Collective Punishment, Potential War Crime: Prime Minister Netanyahu should reject a policy of punitive home demolitions,” Stork said. “It is a basic principle of law that one person should not be punished for another’s crime.” Joe Stork.

"As Tuesday’s grisly murder of five Israelis in a Jerusalem synagogue by two Palestinian assailants continues to dominate headlines, major media outlets are actively erasing the Israeli violence that preceded the attack and the surging anti-Palestinian assaults that have followed.

In typical fashion, The New York Times buried information alluding to Palestinian death and suffering in the fourteenth paragraph, while CNN disappeared Palestinians from the discussion entirely.

The Washington Post went even further, using the synagogue attack as an opportunity to erase Israeli violence against Palestinians both past and present.

Noting that the attack site is located in what used to be Deir Yassin — a Palestinian village destroyed in 1948 after Zionist militias deliberately executed more than one hundred of its inhabitants, including children — the Post rendered the massacre an unproven accusation against Israel.

Following an uproar on social media, the Post quietly removed the reference to Deir Yassin from the piece without issuing an explanation or correction.

These same media outlets are gleefully painting Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip as heartless monsters based on a marginal celebration that took place in Gaza City.

“Residents of the Gaza Strip paraded in the streets singing victory songs, giving out candy, waving flags,” declared The New York Times, eliciting images of widespread jubilation.

An earlier New York Times piece claimed that in Gaza City, “praise for God and the attackers poured from mosque loudspeakers.” That paragraph appears to have been quietly scrubbed without explanation, but not before Zionist ideologues had a chance to exploit it.
Speaking from Gaza where he is currently stationed, journalist and Mondoweiss contributor Dan Cohen told The Electronic Intifada that there was indeed a celebratory rally organized by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in Gaza City but the celebrations were far from widespread.

“A small minority celebrated. That’s what being besieged and bombed does to people,” said Cohen, adding that it was hardly representative of the sentiment in Gaza, where residents are desperately preoccupied with escaping what he calls the “catastrophic” deterioration of conditions in the rubble-cluttered enclave.

Cohen also rejected The New York Times’ claim that celebratory praise for the synagogue attack rang out from mosque loudspeakers. There were a couple of cars driving around with megaphones that could be heard expressing joy for the attack, said Cohen, but that’s all. Gaza resident Mohammed Suliman and journalist Jehad Saftawi, who were with Cohen when we spoke, concurred.

While fringe celebrations among Palestinians have been widely reported, the more commonplace right-wing Israeli demonstrations agitating for greater violence and “death to Arabs” have been conspicuously absent from establishment media coverage, even though mainstream reporters are clearly aware of these rallies.

This follows a longstanding pattern that was most apparent during Israel’s recent assault on Gaza, which killed nearly 2,200 Palestinians, most of them civilians, including more than five hundred children.

As Israel mercilessly targeted civilians in the densely populated coastal enclave, western media outlets published scandalous justifications for the mounting atrocities, frequently blaming Palestinians for their own slaughter.

Under this convoluted paradigm, racist Israeli mobs joyfully singing “In Gaza there’s no studying, No children are left there” were virtually ignored in the mainstream press, as was the rampant genocidal incitement in Israeli social media and from high-level Israeli lawmakers.

Amid a rising tide of Israeli fascism, the mainstream media narrative of an Israel under constant and unrelenting attack from wildly violent and murder-celebrating Palestinians is more than just dishonest. It is dangerous propaganda that shields Israel’s unchecked extremism from scrutiny, guaranteeing and inciting further atrocities against the defenseless and disenfranchised Palestinian population, some of whom will respond with violence.

Profiles of the Jewish victims killed in the synagogue attack have appeared in one media outlet after another, interspersed with quotes from heartbroken loved ones. The same cannot be said of the countless Palestinians attacked, maimed and killed by Israeli violence, whose names and photos rarely make it into mainstream news accounts.

Here are some of their harrowing stories from the last two weeks alone, stories that will be replicated thanks in no small part to a mainstream media that sees them as unworthy victims.

On 13 November, Israeli police shot eleven-year-old Saleh Samer Attiyeh Mahmoud between the eyes at close range with a sponge-tipped bullet in Issawiyeh — a village in occupied East Jerusalem — permanently blinding him in his left eye and severely damaging the vision in his right.

Residents in Issawiyeh had been demonstrating against Israel’s closure of three of the village’s four entrances when they were met with brute police force, now an everyday occurrence accross East Jerusalem neighborhoods inhabited by Palestinians who dare to push back.

Lining the Israeli police arsenal in this area are “sponge rounds” that “are made of high-density plastic with a foam-rubber head, and are fired from grenade launchers,” according to the Ma’an News Agency. “Israeli police have been using them in Israel and occupied East Jerusalem since the use of rubber-coated metal bullets was prohibited, but protocol explicitly prohibits firing them at the upper body,” adds Ma’an.

Yet the upper body is exactly where Israeli police are aiming this weapon, especially at child targets.

On 31 August, Israeli police shot sixteen-year-old Muhammad Sinokrot in the head at close range with a sponge-tipped bullet as he chatted on his cell phone while making his way to mosque for night-time prayers in East Jerusalem’s Wadi al-Joz neighborhood. He died days later.

Even then Israeli police insisted that they shot him in the leg, causing him to fall and hit his head. This was exposed as a lie after an autopsy determined that the teen was shot in the head, as his family had stated.
On Friday, 14 November, Mayar Amran Twafic al-Natsheh, ten years old, was riding in her grandfather’s car near the Shuafat refugee camp checkpoint when Israeli forces opened fire on their vehicle, striking Mayar in the face with a rubber-coated steel bullet that penetrated and shattered the car window.

Adding insult to injury, Israeli police detained Mayar’s father as she lay in a hospital bed recovering from a fractured skull.
On 16 November, Israeli forces from the Nahal Brigade opened fire on a ten-year-old Palestinian boy for walking too close to the southern fence of the Kissufim checkpoint between present-day Israel and Gaza.

The Israeli army defended the soldiers’ actions, arguing that because loitering is prohibited in the area, the soldiers “followed protocol by shooting into the air, shooting the lower body, then … it was decided to follow the procedure by shooting the center of the body.”

Critically wounded by a bullet to the neck, the child was flown out by helicopter for treatment at Soroka University Medical Center in Bir al-Saba (Beersheva), a city in the Naqab (Negev) region of present-day Israel.

To justify shooting a small unarmed child, the Israeli army asserted with zero evidence that “the boy was sent as a scout by one of Gaza’s terror factions to test the troops’ level of alert and response times.”  
On Tuesday, 18 November, in the aftermath of the synagogue attack, a Palestinian teenager identified by Ma’an News Agency as sixteen-year-old Ibrahim Mahmoud was shot by an Israeli settler following a settler riot near Beitin village in the West Bank.

Ibrahim was one of several Palestinians attacked that day.

While walking in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Kafr Aqab, 22-year-old Fadi Jalal Radwan was stabbed in the legs and back by a gang of Israelis after they asked him for a light.

Over the summer, as Israeli lynch mobs roamed the streets in search of Palestinians to attack, they would ask their potential victims for a cigarette or the time to determine, based on the accent in their response, if they were Arab.
Almost immediately after 32-year-old Yousuf Hasan al-Ramouni, a Palestinian bus driver, was found hanged to death in his bus at a terminal in West Jerusalem, where anti-Arab sentiment is alarmingly palpable, Israeli police labeled it a suicide, insisting there were “no signs of violence on the body.” This was contradicted by photos of al-Ramouni’s lifeless body that surfaced on social media, revealing bruises along his torso.

Al-Ramouni’s colleague, Muatasem Fakeh, disputed the suicide claim.

“We saw signs of violence on his body,” he told AFP. “He was hanged over the steps at the back of the bus in a place where it would be impossible to hang yourself alone.”

Al-Ramouni’s family adamantly rejects the Israeli line as well, maintaining that he was a happy father and husband who would not take his own life.

The police have since cited an Israeli autopsy report that ruled al-Ramouni’s death a suicide as proof that their initial assessment was accurate. But Saber al-Aloul, a Palestinian pathologist who participated in the autopsy, suspects al-Ramouni was murdered and believes further forensic tests will prove this to be the case.

While anything is possible, the Israeli authorities have a history of promoting false narratives to cover up hate crimes committed by Jewish Israelis against Palestinians.

After sixteen-year-old Muhammad Abu Khudair was forced to drink gasoline and burned alive by three Jewish extremists, Israeli police planted the nasty rumor that Abu Khudair was murdered by his family in an anti-gay honor killing.

According to data compiled by Yesh Din, an Israeli legal advocacy group, from 2005 to 2014 Israeli police failed to properly investigate 83 percent of settler hate crimes against Palestinians in the West Bank.

Israeli police have demonstrated a similar lack of interest in getting to the bottom of attacks on Palestinians inside Israel.

On 11 November, Nihad Mufid Ahmad Nalowa, a 35-year-old Palestinian worker from the West Bank, was shot dead by an identified gunman in Zemer, a Palestinian town located inside Israel.

Days earlier, on 8 November, Mahmoud Kamel Qalalweh, a 23-year-old Palestinian worker, was critically injured when unidentified assailants deliberately set his body on fire in Tamra, a Palestinian village in northeastern Israel.

Neither case elicited much attention. Nor is it clear whether Israeli police are investigating the incidents.

Israel’s Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch was accused of inciting vigilante violence after applauding the swift police execution of the Palestinian driver responsible for a vehicular attack in Jerusalem on 5 November.

“The action of the border police officer who chased the terrorist and quickly killed him is the right and professional action, and that is the way I would like these incidents to end,” said Aharonovitch. “A terrorist who strikes civilians should be killed.”

Many understood this as a call for police and armed civilians to act as judge, jury and executioner against perceived “terrorists” — which seems to be interchangeable with “Arabs” in the Israeli lexicon.

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel and the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights linked Aharonovitch’s incitement to the police murder of 22-year-old Kheir Hamdan days later.

On 9 November, in the Galilee village of Kufr Kana, Israeli police shot Hamdan after he banged on their vehicle with an unidentifiable object.

CCTV footage of the killing reveals that, contrary to the police version of events, the officers shot Hamdan at close range without warning as he ran away and then shot him again after he was injured and bleeding on the ground.

Nevertheless, in the immediate aftermath of the synagogue attack, Aharonovitch announced that he would seek the easing of gun restrictions for Israelis. In a society increasingly gripped with genocidal hatred of its indigenous inhabitants, such a move could prove disastrous."

Rania Khalek, 11/20/2014 in Electronic Intifada, 20/11/2014. For more of Rania's work check out her website Dispatches from the Underclass and follow her on Twitter @RaniaKhalek.

Killings of Palestinians by soldiers and policemen [and jewish settlers] will never shock Israel. The propaganda machine will whitewash everything, and the media will be its mouthpiece.

"There was a massacre in Jerusalem on Tuesday in which five Israelis were killed. There was a war in Gaza over the summer in which 2,200 Palestinians were killed, most of them civilians. A massacre shocks us; a war, less so. Massacres have culprits; wars don’t. Murder by ax is more appalling than murder by rifle, and far more horrendous than bombing helpless people trying to take shelter.Terror is always Palestinian, even when hundreds of Palestinian civilians are killed. The name and face of Daniel Tragerman, the Israeli boy killed by mortar fire during Operation Protective Edge, were known throughout the world; even U.S. president Barack Obama knew his name. Can anyone name one child from Gaza among the hundreds killed?

A few hours after the attack in Jerusalem, journalist Emily Amrousi said at a conference in Eilat that the life of a single Jewish child was more important to her than the lives of thousands of Palestinian children. The audience’s response was clearly favorable; I think there was even some applause.

Afterward Amrousi tried to explain that she was referring to the way the Israeli media should cover events, which is only slightly less serious. This was during a discussion on the ridiculous question: “Is the Israeli media leftist?” Almost no one protested Amrousi’s remarks and the session continued as if nothing had happened. Amrousi’s words reflect Israel’s mood in 2014: Only Jewish blood elicits shock.

Israeli deaths touch Israeli hearts more than the deaths of others. That’s natural human solidarity. The bloody images from Jerusalem stunned every Israeli, probably every person.

But this is a society that sanctifies its dead to the point of death-worship, that wears thin the stories of the victims’ lives and deaths, whether it be in a synagogue attack or a Nepal avalanche. It’s a society preoccupied with endless commemorations in the land of monuments, services and anniversary ceremonies; a society that demands shock and condemnation after every attack, when it blames the entire world.

Precisely from such a society is one permitted to demand some attention to the Palestinian blood that is also spilled in vain; some understanding of the other side’s pain, or even a measure of empathy, which in Israel is considered treason.

But this doesn’t happen. Aside from exceptional murders and hate crimes by individuals, there is total apathy — and the obtuseness is frightening. Killings (we dare not say murders) by soldiers and policemen will never shock Israel. The propaganda machine will whitewash everything, and the media will be its mouthpiece. No one will demand condemnations. No one will express shock. Few will even consider that the pain is the same pain, that murder is murder.

How many Israelis are willing to give a thought to the parents of Yousef Shawamreh, the boy who went out to pick wild greens and was killed by an army sniper? Why is it exaggerating to be upset by, or at least give some attention to, the killing of Khalil Anati, a 10-year-old boy from the Al-Fawar refugee camp?

Why can’t we identify with the pain of bereaved father Abd al-Wahab Hammad, whose son was killed in Silwad, or with the Al-Qatari family from the Al-Amari refugee camp, two members of which were killed by soldiers within a month? Why do we reserve our horror for the synagogue and not consider these killings disturbing?

Yes, there is the test of intent. The typical Israeli argument is that soldiers, unlike terrorists, do not intend to kill. If so, then what exactly is the intent of the sniper who fires live bullets at the head or chest of a demonstrator a distance away who poses no threat? Or when he shoots a child in the back as he’s running for his life? Didn’t he intend to kill him?

The attack in Jerusalem was a horrendous crime; nothing can justify it. But the blood that flowed there is not the only blood being spilled here murderously. The degree to which it is forbidden to say that is incredible."

Gideon Levy | Haaretz. Nov. 20, 2014 

O que é ser palestino em Jerusalém ocupada?
Ser palestino em Jerusalém é sofrer de um tipo de statelessness. Não são cidadãos de Israel nem da Palestina. Não têm direito de voto, não têm passaporte oficial e não podem atravessar a fronteira.
Têm direito de residência em suas moradias ancestrais, mas este direito exige uma batalha quotidiana para mantê-lo, pois Israel pode (e retira) a "autorização" de moradia quando bem lhe dá na telha a fim de instalar um imigrante judeu ou um marajá israelense.
Por incrível que pareça, os palestinos jerusalemitas têm de provar constantemente às autoridades israelenses que não têm outra residência. O que significa que passam a vida pedindo recibos de médicos, padeiros, matrículas, etcétera, que provem que vivem na cidade e no bairro.
Quando viajam para o exterior ou obtêm cidadania de país estrangeiro, perdem direito a suas casas. Os filhos não herdam automaticamente as propriedades familiares.
Eles não podem reformar suas próprias casas, aumentá-las com o aumento da família, e quando ousam, a obra é derrubada.
É de uma dessas famílias que os dois rapazes que cometeram o atentado na sinagoga saem.
A linha vermelha nesta batalha é a mesquita Al-Aqsa em particular e Jerusalém em geral. Na cabeça dos palestinos Israel atravessou a linha e avança sem parar.
De 2011 até hoje, israelenses extremistas (cada vez mais) e colonos judeus incendiraram 10 mesquitas. Nenhum dos terroristas foi parar atrás das grades. Nem os terroristas da IDF que só neste ano destruíram 63 mesquitas e danificaram 153 na Faixa de Gaza. Sem contar as dezenas de civis despedaçados.
Desde a ocupação de Jerusalém Oriental em 1967, os palestinos têm sido expulsos de sua cidade de ano a ano para ela ser judeinizada. A poucos metros da mesquita Al-Aqsa, o bairro popular Silwan tem sido desapropriado em uma rapidez tal que os invasores judeus israelenses ou estrangeiros já o chamam de City of David, em sinal de provocação diária. Em um dia negro em que 23 apartamentos foram ocupados por colonos, apareceu um anúncio nos jornais israelenses parabenizando os invasores judeus: "The strengthening of Jewish presence in jerusalem is our common challenge... With your settlement act, you make us proud". Por incrível que pareça, Eli Wiesel era um dos assinantes do anúncio, mas o pior são os assinantes israelenses: Shlomo Aharonishky, ex-chefe da polícia israelenses; o general de reserva Amos Yadlin, ex-chefe do serviço de inteligência da IDF e candidato à liderança do Labor Party. Como diz o Meron Rapoport: "In short, not a bunch of right-wing lunatics, but the flesh and bone of the Israeli establishment". Pois é, e isso dá medo nos democratas estrangeiros e deixa os palestinos preocupados com a radicalização de Israel. Um dos sinais desta radicalização é o tratamento dos palestinos-israelenses que vem piorando sem parar.
E aí chegamos a esta possível-provável Terceira Intifada. Por que até Netanyahu a teme? Porque esta não ficará do lado de lá da Linha Verde. Ela vai incendiar também Israel de Jaffa à Galileia porque as batalhas serão travadas dentro dos muros que Israel construiu para fechar os palestinos em guetos controláveis, e também do lado de fora, em seu próprio Estado. Sem contar as fronteiras do Golã que Bashar el-Assad não controla mais. A porta está aberta daquele lado para a entrada dos refugiados.
Sem ir muito longe, Jerusalém vai sim, ser transformada em campo de batalha porque os colonos estão bem armados e atiram sem piedade. Vai ser um massacre. A IDF pode bloquear todas as estradas, aumentar o controle policial, demolir residências, mas acho que a Intifada está em movimento sobretudo após o anúncio de expansão das colônias.
A batalha vai ser por Jerusalém. Netanyahu cometeu um grave erro de cálculo contando com a inabalável passividade dos palestinos. Esta é uma nova geração. Não é a que foi dobrada, cooptada, acostumada a baixa a cabeça e engolir sapos. Esta cresceu idealizando Yasser Arafat, Marwan Barghouti, e me pareace pronta para lutar por seus direitos legais conforme as leis internacionais. Esta nova geração quer um Estado soberano e liberdade. E sabe que mendigando, jamais o obterá.
Se eu estiver certa e a Terceira Intifada já estiver em andamento, desta vez, considerando a frustração ambiente, ou vai ou racha. Ou os palestinos conseguem que justiça seja feita e que tenham seu estado soberano nas fronteiras de 1967 ou nenhum israelenses jamais dormirá sossegado.
Espero estar enganada. Mas Israel está oprimindo, reprimindo e pressionando além do que um ser humano é capaz de aguentar.

The Unholy City

"In its long and checkered history, Jerusalem has been occupied by dozens of conquerors. Babylonians and Persians, Greeks and Romans, Mamluks and Turks, Britons and Jordanians – to mention just a few.
The latest occupier is Israel, which conquered and annexed Jerusalem in 1967.
(I could have written "East Jerusalem" – but all of historical Jerusalem is in today's East Jerusalem. All the other parts were built in the last 200 years by Zionist settlers, or are surrounding Arab villages which were arbitrarily joined to the huge area that is now called Jerusalem after its occupation.)
This week, Jerusalem was in flames - again. Two youngsters from Jabel Mukaber, one of the Arab villages annexed to Jerusalem, entered a synagogue in the west of the city during morning prayers and killed four devout Jews, before themselves being killed by police.
Jerusalem is called "the City of Peace". This is a linguistic mistake. True, in antiquity it was called Salem, which sounds like peace, but Salem was in fact the name of the local deity.
It is also a historical mistake. No city in the world has seen as many wars, massacres and as much bloodshed as this one.
All in the name of some God or other.
Jerusalem was annexed (or "liberated", or "unified") immediately after the Six-day War of 1967.
That war was Israel's greatest military triumph. It was also Israel's greatest disaster. The divine blessings of the incredible victory turned into divine punishments. Jerusalem was one of them.
The annexation was presented to us (I was a member of the Knesset at the time) as a unification of the city, which had been cruelly rent asunder in the Israeli-Palestinian war of 1948. Everybody cited the Biblical sentence: "Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together." This translation of Psalm 122 is rather odd. The Hebrew original says simply "a city that is joined together".
In fact, what happened in 1967 was anything but unification.
If the intent had really been unification, it would have looked very different.
Full Israeli citizenship would have been automatically conferred on all inhabitants. All the lost Arab properties in West Jerusalem, which had been expropriated in 1948, would have been restored to their rightful owners who had fled to East Jerusalem.
The Jerusalem municipality would have been expanded to include Arabs from the East, even without a specific request. And so on.
The opposite happened. No property was restored, nor any compensation paid. The municipality remained exclusively Jewish.
Arab inhabitants were not accorded Israeli citizenship, but merely "permanent residence". This is a status that can be arbitrarily revoked at any moment – and indeed was revoked in many cases, compelling the victims to move out of the city. For appearance's sake, Arabs were allowed to apply for Israel citizenship. The authorities knew, of course, that only a handful would apply, since doing so would mean recognition of the occupation. For Palestinians, this would be paramount to treason. (And the few that did apply were generally refused.)
The municipality was not broadened. In theory, Arabs are entitled to vote in municipal elections, but only a handful do so, for the same reasons. In practice, East Jerusalem remains occupied territory.
The mayor, Teddy Kollek, was elected two years before the annexation. One of his first actions after it was to demolish the entire Mugrabi Quarter next to the Western Wall, leaving a large empty square resembling a parking lot. The inhabitants, all of them poor people, were evicted within hours.
But Kollek was a genius in public relations. He ostensibly established friendly relations with the Arab notables, introduced them to foreign visitors and created a general impression of peace and contentment. Kollek built more new Israeli neighborhoods on Arab land than any other person in the country. Yet this master-settler collected almost all the world's peace prizes, except the Nobel Prize. East Jerusalem remained quiet.
Only few knew of a secret directive from Kollek, instructing all municipal authorities to see to it that the Arab population – then 27% - did not rise above that level.
Kollek was ably supported by Moshe Dayan, then the Defense Minister. Dayan believed in keeping the Palestinians quiet by giving them all possible benefits, except freedom.
A few days after the occupation of East Jerusalem he removed the Israeli flag which had been planted by soldiers in front of the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount. Dayan also turned the de facto authority over the Mount over to the Muslim religious authorities.
Jews were allowed into the Temple compound only in small numbers and only as quiet visitors. They were forbidden to pray there, and forcibly removed if they moved their lips. They could, after all, pray to their heart's content at the adjoining Western Wall (which is a part of the compound's ancient outer wall).
The government was able to impose this decree because of a quaint religious fact: Orthodox Jews are forbidden by the rabbis to enter the Temple Mount altogether. According to a Biblical injunction, ordinary Jews are not allowed into the Holy of Holies, only the High Priest was allowed in. Since nobody today knows where exactly this place is located, pious Jews may not enter the entire compound.
As a result, the first few years of the occupation were a happy time for East Jerusalem. Jews and Arabs mingled freely. It was fashionable for Jews to shop in the colorful Arab market and dine in the "oriental" restaurants. I myself often stayed in Arab hotels and made quite a number of Arab friends.
This atmosphere changed gradually. The government and the municipality spent a lot of money to gentrify West Jerusalem, but Arab neighborhoods in East Jerusalem were neglected, and turned into slums. The local infrastructure and services degenerated. Almost no building permits were issued to Arabs, in order to compel the younger generation to move outside the city borders. Then the "Separation" Wall was built, preventing those outside from entering the city, cutting them off from their schools and jobs. Yet In spite of everything, the Arab population grew and reached 40%.
Political oppression grew. Under the Oslo agreements, Jerusalemite Arabs were allowed to vote for the Palestinian Authority. But then they were prevented from doing so, their representatives were arrested and expelled from the city. All Palestinian institutions were forcibly closed down, including the famous Orient House, where the much admired and beloved leader of the Jerusalem Arabs, the late Faisal al-Husseini, had his office.
Kollek was succeeded by Ehud Olmert and an Orthodox mayor who didn't give a damn for East Jerusalem, except the Temple Mount.
And then an additional disaster occurred. Secular Israelis are leaving Jerusalem, which is rapidly becoming an Orthodox bastion. In desperation they decided to oust the Orthodox mayor and elect a secular businessman. Unfortunately, he is a rabid ultra-nationalist.
Nir Barkat behaves like the mayor of West Jerusalem and the military governor of East Jerusalem. He treats his Palestinian subjects like enemies, who may be tolerated if they obey quietly, and brutally suppressed if they do not. Together with the decade-old neglect of the Arab neighborhoods, the accelerated pace of building new Jewish neighborhoods, the excessive police brutality (openly encouraged by the mayor), they are producing an explosive situation.
The total cutting-off of Jerusalem from the West Bank, its natural hinterland, worsens the situation even more.
To this may be added the termination of the so-called peace process, since all Palestinians are convinced that East Jerusalem must be the capital of the future State of Palestine.
This situation needed only a spark to ignite the city. This was duly provided by the right-wing demagogues in the Knesset. Vying for attention and popularity, they started to visit the Temple Mount, one after the other, every time unleashing a storm. Added to the manifest desire of certain religious and right-wing fanatics to build the Third Temple in place of the holy al-Aqsa Mosque and the golden Dome of the Rock, this was enough to create the belief that the holy shrines were indeed in danger.
Then came the ghastly revenge-murder of an Arab boy who was abducted by Jews and burned alive with gasoline poured into his mouth.
Individual Muslim inhabitants of the city started to act. Disdaining organizations, almost without arms, they started a series of attacks that are now called "the intifada of individuals". Acting alone, or with a brother or cousin whom he trusts, an Arab takes a knife, or a pistol (if he can get one), or his car, or a tractor, and kills the nearest Israelis. He knows that he is going to die.
The two cousins who killed four Jews in a synagogue this week – and also an Arab Druze policeman – knew this. They also knew that their families were going to suffer, their home be demolished, their relatives arrested. They were not deflected. The mosques were more important.
Moreover, the day before, an Arab bus driver was found dead in his bus. According to the police, the autopsy proved that he committed suicide. An Arab pathologist concluded that he was murdered. No Arab believes the police – Arabs are convinced that the police always lie.
Immediately after the Synagogue killing, the Israeli choir of politicians and commentators went into action. They did so with an astonishing unanimity – ministers, Knesset members, ex-generals, journalists, all repeating with slight variations the same message. The reason for this is simple: every day the Prime Minister's office sends out a "page of messages", instructing all parts of the propaganda machine what to say.
This time the message was that Mahmoud Abbas was to blame for everything, a "terrorist in a suit", the leader whose incitement causes the new intifada. No matter that the chief of the Shin Bet testified on the very same day that Abbas has neither overt nor covert connections with the violence.
Binyamin Netanyahu faced the cameras and with a solemn face and lugubrious voice – he is a really good actor – repeated again what he has said many times before, every time pretending that this is new recipe: more police, harder punishments, demolition of homes, arrests and large fines for parents of 13-year old children who are caught throwing stones, and so on.
Every expert knows that the result of such measures will be the exact opposite. More Arabs will become incensed and attack Israeli men and women. Israelis, of course, will "take revenge" and "take the law into their own hands".
For both inhabitants and tourists, walking the streets of Jerusalem, the city which is "joined together", has become a risky adventure. Many stay at home.
The Unholy City is more divided than ever before."
Uri Avnery, 21/11/2014

"Palestinian student activist Majd Hamdan was not surprised when Israeli police officers aggressively demanded to see his identification card last week as he made his way home from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
The 23-year-old undergraduate student of computer science said that he was partially targeted as an individual for being “an influential activist.” But Hamdan also noted that fellow Palestinian student organizers are continuously harassed by Israeli police and campus security.
After Hamdan asked the officers why they needed to see his identification card, they struck him several times, handcuffed him and hauled him off to the police station. It was the eighth time he has been arrested since he began his studies nearly three years ago.
“But my arrest was also a way of targeting the whole Palestinian student movement on campus,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “Israel wants to deter us from continuing our struggle and to break our resolve. There is ongoing persecution of Arab student leaders on university campuses.”
The uptick in repression is not limited to Israeli academies.
In addition to the dozens of discriminatory laws that limit their access to state resources and stifle their political expression, an estimated 1.7 million Palestinians in present-day Israel are enduring a wave of arrests and repression.
Protests in Palestinian cities, towns and villages across the country began this summer after the murder of Jerusalem teen Muhammad Abu Khudair by right-wing Israelis. Protesters have also been angered by Israel’s ongoing crackdown on Palestinians living in occupied East Jerusalem and Israeli settler incursions into the compound of the al-Aqsa mosque.
Demonstrations grew in frequency and size after a police officer fatally shot 22-year-old Kheir Hamdan (no relation to Majd) in the Galilee village of Kufr Kana during the early hours of Saturday, 8 November.
When police officers from the nearby city of Nazareth arrived in Kufr Kana to arrest his cousin in relation to a family dispute, Kheir Hamdan struck a police vehicle with an object that officers allege was a knife.
The officer who shot Hamdan subsequently stated he fired a warning shot first before aiming at the youth’s body. But CCTV footage obtained from nearby security cameras disproves that claim. Instead, four officers exited the vehicle and one shot Hamdan’s midsection at point blank range as the youth turned to run and his back was facing the police. Hours after the young man’s slaying, thousands of locals marched through Kufr Kana in protest. More than a hundred police officers gathered at the village’s northern entrance and fired tear gas canisters and “skunk water,” a putrid smelling liquid regularly used by Israeli occupation forces against Palestinians in demonstrations.
The Higher Arab Monitoring Committee, a group that represents Palestinians in Israel, subsequently declared anationwide general strike for the following day.
Protests were held on university campuses in Haifa, Tel Aviv, Bir al-Saba and Jerusalem, as well as in Palestinian towns and villages across the Galilee and Triangle regions in the north of present-day Israel.
More than one hundred Palestinians in Israel were arrested in the two days following Hamdan’s killing, according to Mossawa, a Haifa-based advocacy group which states that dozens of Palestinian citizens have been killed by police since 2000.
“So far, there have been about 35 arrests in [Kufr Kana], mostly young people,” said Waseem Abbas, a lawyer and representative of the village’s local branch of Balad, a Palestinian political party in present-day Israel. “The arrests are a tool to frighten the people here.”
Speaking to The Electronic Intifada by telephone, he explained that Israeli authorities “say that they have a list of around 160 names of local youth who participated in the protests that they plan on arresting.”
Other arrests took place in Nazareth, Turan and other nearby Galilee villages, Abbas added. “The situation in Kufr Kana started to calm down, but anger grew again after a meeting between the mayor and Yitzhak Aharonovich,” he said, referring to Israel’s public security minister.
Adalah and the Higher Arab monitoring Committee called on the Israeli government to dismiss Aharonovich. An Adalah press release notes the “direct connection” between Hamdan’s killing and statements Aharonovich made the previous week.
Adalah was referencing comments by Aharonovich after Israeli Border Police killed a Palestinian man who drove his car into a crowd of Israelis in Jerusalem on 5 November, killing a Border Police officer. The driver, Ibrahim al-Akri from the Shuafat area of Jerusalem, was shot and killed by another officer.
“The action of the Border Police officer who chased after the assailant and quickly killed him was correct and professional and that is how we want these incidents to end,” Aharonovich said at the scene of the incident.
And in the case of the shooting of Kheir Hamdan in Kufr Kana, Aharonovich declared his support for theofficer, despite the fact that the CCTV video footage showed that they had lied about firing a warning shot before killing the young man.
“The minister stated that anyone who attacks Israeli Jewish citizens should be killed immediately,” the press release states. “In any democratic society that respects the life of its citizens, any government minister that makes statements such as those by Yitzhak Aharonovich should be immediately dismissed.”
Right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared his support for the police after Hamdan’s shooting, and lashed out against the Palestinian minority in present-day Israel.
Referring to protesters in Palestinian areas across the country, Netanyahu declared: “Whoever doesn’t respect Israeli law will be punished to the fullest extent. I will direct the interior minister to consider stripping the citizenship of those who call for the destruction of the State of Israel.”
On 10 November, Netanyahu “invited” Palestinian citizens who protest against Israeli repression to move to the occupied West Bank or the besieged Gaza Strip.
“To all those who demonstrate against Israel and in favor of a Palestinian state, I say something simple: I invite you to move there; we won’t give you any problem,” he said, asreported by the Israeli daily Haaretz.
Extreme right-wing foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman called on the government to forcibly transfer Palestinian citizens residing in the Triangle region.
“Us here and them there. The Triangle must be part of the Palestinian state,” Lieberman said, adding also that Palestinian lawmaker Haneen Zoabi, a member of Israel’s Knesset, should be “behind bars.”
Jaafar Farah, director of the Mossawa advocacy group, explained that “the atmosphere of delegitimizing the Arab community [in present-day Israel] comes straight from the prime minister” and is present at all levels of the government.
“A prime minister who urges us to go to Gaza is part of the problem,” Farah told The Electronic Intifada, adding that police brutality and anti-Palestinian vigilante violence is the direct result of racist incitement by politicians.
“In the last three years, there have been more ‘price tag’ attacks across the country, and in seventy different events [protests], there have been violent attacks on Arab citizens.”
Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the United Nations monitoring group OCHA has documented a weekly average of 98 search and arrest operations so far this year. This is an increase of last year’s rate of 75 operations per week.
Aminah Abdulhaq, advocacy officer for the Jerusalemites Campaign, a group that campaigns for the rights of indigenous Palestinians in that city, noted that the current presence of Israeli occupation forces “throughout East Jerusalem is the highest it’s been since the second intifada,” referring to the uprising that began in September 2000.
“Over the past several weeks, Israel has exploited recent incidents of violence to collectively punish Palestinian Jerusalemites and [stifle] their resistance efforts,” Abdulhaq told The Electronic Intifada.
According to current Addameer figures, an estimated 6,500 Palestinians were already being held in Israeli prisons as of 1 October. Of those, 182 were children and 500 were administrative detainees held on “secret evidence” without charge or trial.
Today in Silwan, a Jerusalem-area village, Israeli occupation forces razed the family home of Abd al-Rahman al-Shaludi, who drove his car into a group of pedestrians in Jerusalem on 22 October. The crash killed one child and a woman, and injured seven other Israelis.
Israeli forces shot and killed al-Shaludi on site and subsequently labeled him a terrorist.
Demolishing Palestinian homes as a form of punishment was common practice by Israel until 2005, according to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, but it was largely discontinued by then Israeli defense minister Shaul Mofaz.
Under international law, punitive demolitions are considered “a war crime and a crime against humanity,” according to the Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq.
B’Tselem and international human rights organizations such as Amnesty International also insist that punitive demolitions violate international law.
Israeli occupation forces reintroduced the policy in August, when the homes of two men accused of kidnapping and killing three Israeli teens were destroyed by Israeli soldiers using explosives in the West Bank city of Hebron.
Speaking to Israeli intelligence on Wednesday, Netanyahu threatened that “there will be more home demolitions” following the killing of four worshippers and a policeman at a Jerusalem synagogue yesterday, the right-wing Times of Israel reported.
Despite the mass arrests and a spike in attacks on Palestinians by Israeli occupation forces and settlers, protests have continued in cities, villages and refugee camps across the occupied West Bank.
Meanwhile, according to Mossawa’s Jaafar Farah, as Palestinians in Israel are targeted by the police rather than protected by them, “we in the Arab community have had to start protecting ourselves … because there is no other option.”
Patrick O. Strickland (19/11/2014) is an independent journalist and regular contributor to The Electronic Intifada. Find his reportage at www.postrickland.com. On Twitter: P_Strickland_

The great deceiver Mark Regev speaks, tries to deceive but is less arrogant and very scared. Very scared of a third Intifada that would do much more harm because the frustration among Palestinians inside and outside the Green Line is stronger than ever.

Por que o great deceiver Mark Regev insistiu em dizer que seu governo é favorável à solução dos dois estados? Não porque pense isso e sim porque a União Europeia vai sancionar também os políticos que afirmarem o contrário. A matéria do Barak Ravid, abaixo, traça as linhas gerais do documento. 

"An internal European Union document on proposed sanctions against Israel, which Haaretz obtained in its entirety on Monday, reveals new details on the suggestions being made in the internal discussions among EU member states that have been taking place in Brussels. Among the options under consideration are measures against European companies that work in settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
If this measure should be carried out, it could harm quite a few Israeli businesses that work with European companies on projects in the settlements. For example, the Dutch Foreign Ministry recommended that the Dutch water company Vitens not carry out projects in the settlements in collaboration with Israel’s water company, Mekorot. Several months previously, the Dutch government recommended that the Royal Haskoning infrastructure company reconsider constructing a sewage purification plant in East Jerusalem for the Jerusalem municipality.
High-ranking European diplomats who were involved in discussions about the document told Haaretz that work on the topic began on September 11. The EU’s Political and Security Committee in Brussels, which is made up of the ambassadors of the EU’s 28 member states, gave the committee of experts on Middle Eastern affairs – which is known in EU jargon as the Mashreq-Maghreb Working Party, or MaMa for short – the task of drafting a document containing the response measures to acts by the Israeli government that are liable to make the two-state solution an impossibility. Examples of this are construction projects in the E1 area between Ma’aleh Adumim and Jerusalem, and in the Jerusalem neighborhoods of Givat Hamatos and Har Homa, both of which are over the Green Line. The European Union believes that construction in these places endangers the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state with territorial contiguity and could keep Jerusalem from being the capital of both states.
The high-ranking European diplomats emphasized that, contrary to the claims of Israeli Foreign Ministry officials, the EU European External Action Service – and particularly its director, Christian Berger – served only as coordinator between the member states that made the action proposals included in the document.
“A large group of member states pushed for this move after the failure of the talks between Israel and the Palestinians, and after the war in Gaza,” the European diplomats said.
“Several states, including some that are considered great friends of Israel, are the ones who conceived the move and are now hiding behind the EU’s foreign service so that it can act as the bad cop.”
The senior European diplomats said the document was written after a mandate was received from the political echelon of all 28 member states. “This is not a case in which eurocrats in Brussels are working against Israel on their own,” the European diplomats said. “This is a sign that a great deal of anger and frustration exist in the member states. In recent months there were meetings of European foreign ministers in which ministers, who are considered extremely close to Israel, spoke in the most critical way against the policies of Netanyahu’s government.”
The European diplomats added that although the Israeli Foreign Ministry knows very well which countries are behind this move, it finds it convenient to accuse the EU’s foreign service.
“The fact is that there is an agreement among all 28 member countries of the European Union to discuss measures against Israel, and that is what should worry the government in Jerusalem and the Israeli public,” they said. “This paper will be handed over to the political echelon in Europe, which will decide which actions, if at all, to take.”
The full document about the sanctions includes further measures in addition to the ones reported in the two articles on the topic that were published in Haaretz over the past two days.
The section about relations with the Palestinians proposes that the EU reassess “EU funding or capacity-building activities indirectly helping to perpetuate the status quo of occupation” to make sure that the funds are not used indirectly to perpetuate the Israeli occupation of the West Bank.
That section also proposes “support, or non-opposition,” of unilateral Palestinian actions such as “applications to international organizations” or requests for recognition.
The document also proposes examining the possibility that additional European countries recognize a Palestinian state, as Sweden did recently.
On the other hand, the paper also suggests punitive measures against the Palestinians. For example, in response to negative actions by the Palestinians, “the EU could continue to dissuade [the Palestinians] from moving ahead in the context of international organizations and use its leverage to that end.”
In the section about bilateral relations with Israel, the document proposes actions such as a “no contact policy with settler organizations/Refuse to engage with settlers, including public figures and those publicly rejecting the two-state solution.”
A measure of this kind could lead to a boycott of senior government ministers such as Naftali Bennett and Uri Ariel of Habayit Hayehudi, many Knesset members from Likud, and, even in extreme cases, President Reuven Rivlin, who does not support the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
The document also states that one of the measures could be a reassessment of the distribution of EU funds that are provided to joint projects with Israel “in line with the ‘more for more, less for less’ policy.” In other words, it also includes an incentive in the form of greater European investments in joint projects with Israel in response to progress in the peace process.
Another incentive in the document is the issuing of statements, coordinated with all 28 EU member states, “to openly support Israeli leaders taking hard decisions and help recreating a positive dynamic, including in relations with the Palestinians.”
Barak Ravid. Haaretz, 17.11.14. Haaretz obtains full document of EU-proposed sanctions against Israel

Israel blockade is still crippling Gaza's economy

Completando o assunto dos artigos acima:
"Israeli newspaper Haaretz recently reported on an internal European Union draft document proposing sanctions against Israel if its government continues to act in ways that render a two-state solution impossible. The revelations were quickly and widely disseminated on social media, and touted as a sign that the EU had had enough of Israel's intransigence.
However, those hopes were swiftly dashed by the bloc's new foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, who last week denied that there were plans to sanction Israel. A discussion among EU foreign ministers was more about "how to start a positive process with the Israelis and Palestinians to relaunch a peace process", she said. "It was not at all a question of isolating or sanctioning anybody."
It is an intriguing affair, given that Haaretz is a respected newspaper whose articles on the issue seem to be well researched, sourced and verified. Indeed, Mogherini's denial came on the same day that Haaretz published the EU document.
It is deeply disappointing that sanctions may not even be considered. Article 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement, which forms the legal basis of their relations, states that those relations "shall be based on respect for human rights and democratic principles". When it comes to the Palestinians, Israel is in blatant violation of this article.
Obstructive and destructive
Worse still is Mogherini's public denial that sanctions are an option. The message this sends to Israel's government is that it has carte blanche to continue its obstructive and destructive policies unimpeded. In the current climate of a radicalised Israeli polity and society, as well as tensions and unrest not seen since the last Palestinian uprising, this is extremely irresponsible and dangerous.
srael's actions in the week since Mogherini's denial already display a total disregard for EU concerns. Two days after the bloc's foreign ministers condemned plans for new settlement-building, Israel announced more illegal colonisation of occupied territory (in addition to the thousands of settlement homes recently announced).
Israel also rejected an appeal by the EU's five biggest members - Germany, France, Britain, Italy, and Spain - not to demolish more Palestinian homes, a practise that Human Rights Watch said on Friday "amounts to collective punishment, a war crime". Why would Israel listen to the EU or its member states when it knows there will be no punitive measures?
The EU is choosing to squander the decisive leverage it could have over Israel as the latter's largest trading partner. This only adds to Israel's sense of impunity, which is also nurtured by vast and unquestioning US support, including US veto power that renders the UN Security Council paralysed and irrelevant regarding the Israeli-Arab conflict.
Mogherini's statement will undermine the significance of ongoing legislatives votes in various EU member states to recognise Palestine. It will also vindicate those who think such steps are purely symbolic, and will lessen pressure on governments to reflect the will of their own parliaments.
EU inaction would also go against public sentiment in Europe, where opinion polls have consistently shown that those who sympathise with the Palestinians far outnumber those who support Israel, even in countries whose governments have close ties with the latter.
BBC World Service polls of international views on Israel over the last three years show that among EU member states, the highest percentage of positive sentiment was only 21 percent (in France), and was as low as 4 percent (in Spain in 2013). Positive sentiment was also in single digits in Germany last year (8 percent). As such, EU inaction over Israel's treatment of the Palestinians is woefully out of step with public opinion and that of elected MPs.More bark than bite
Even without Mogherini's denial, a number of the sanctions reportedly floated are not particularly strong. According to Haaretz, they include "coordinated condemnations of the settlements; joint protests to the foreign ministry and prime minister's office; and more sharply worded communiques on the Israeli-Palestinian issue after the European Union's monthly foreign ministers' meetings". In other words, the EU may stop saying please.
"There is also a proposal to reconsider the European Union's commitment not to participate in debates at the UN Human Rights Council under Clause 7, which relates specifically to the state of human rights in the West Bank," Haaretz reported. However, it is unclear how EU participation would make a difference when Israel has consistently ignored the council's resolutions since its creation in 2006.
Other sanctions reportedly include "marking products manufactured in the settlements in EU supermarkets" (not prohibiting their sale), "limiting cooperation with Israel in various areas" (not stopping it), and "restrictions on the free-trade agreement with Israel" (not reconsidering the agreement itself).
None of this sounds like it would give Israel cause for serious concern.
"Labelling settlement products, implementing the EU-Israel trade agreement properly, and distinguishing between the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel are not really sanctions in my opinion," an expert on international law regarding the Israeli-Arab conflict, who has written extensively on EU relations with Israel, told me.
This whole affair makes the EU look supine, but it is not cause for Israeli celebration. The tide of European public opinion continues to turn against Israel - this cannot be indefinitely ignored or defied.
Furthermore, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel continues to make significant gains in Europe regardless of individual governments' stances. EU inaction is likely to further bolster BDS if it is seen as the only effective avenue for European rejection of Israeli policies".
Sharif Nashashibi is an award-winning journalist and analyst on Arab affairs. He is a regular contributor to Al Jazeera English, Al Arabiya News, The National, The Middle East magazine and the Middle East Eye.            

Inside Story: Israel's stance - Provocation or deterrence? 

"The conventional wisdom in Middle East diplomacy is that the question of Jerusalem is best left for last. Given its sensitivities, few dare tread into its complexities. Instead, the focus has often been on dealing with Gaza first. During the Oslo process, "Gaza [and Jericho] first" was the accepted beginning, and Ariel Sharon chose an exit out of Gaza as the means of creating a new political reality. Even former US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice was kept busy with Gaza, and in particular the Rafah crossing - a level of diplomatic resolution unusual for someone at her level. Gaza is a crucial issue that demands attention and resolution; however, as we are witnessing today, leaving Jerusalem aside is not without consequences.
The recent violence has been triggered by two factors. The first is the threat of changes to the status quo on the Haram Al Sharif or Temple Mount, the holiest site in the city for both Muslims and Jews. The new and rising demand by right wing Jewish religious groups to pray on the platform is eliciting much negative reaction by Palestinians. Given the deep distrust about Israeli intentions, changing the status quo on that site is perceived as a further encroachement of Israeli control over a Muslim site. The desire to pray may seem benign, but, as long as the conflict remains unresolved, it weaves dangerously into the fiery politics around the site.The second factor has to do with the status of Palestinian East Jerusalemites. They compose one third of the population of the city, they have a special Israeli ID for "residents of Jerusalem", but they are not Israeli citizens, and they view the Israeli presence as an occupation, mostly rejecting any role in municipal politics.
Their status points to a larger problem. Arab Jerusalem was always naturally connected to its Palestinian hinterland until Israel built the wall around the city for security reasons, separating it from the West Bank.
East Jerusalemites can still go to the West Bank, but the process is complicated and time consuming. More importantly, West Bankers need permits, acquired only with great difficulty, to enter Jerusalem. The natural social and economic linkages between the West Bank and Jerusalem have been broken.
Jewish identity
Furthermore, over the last 10 years, East Jerusalem has undergone a slow but sure process of changes on the ground. From new Jewish settlements, to re-zoning of green space, to the renaming of street names, the Arab character and reality of the city is being slowly eroded in favour of Jewish identity.
Some Israelis believed that the economic benefits that accrued to Arab Jerusalemites through their blue residents ID and links to Israel, would keep them peaceful. However, the changing status of the city and the holy sites, alongside neglect of Arab areas, has trumped this approach.
The power of religoius symbols and national identity, as well as the need for authentic, and not ersatz, autonomy has turned out to be more powerful. Time ran out, and Palestinian Jerusalemites rejoined their brethren in the West Bank and Gaza in fighting occupation in its many forms. Indeed, the nature of the Palestinian violence, from the use of a car as a weapon, to knives and axes demonstrates that, terrible as they may be, these reactions are neither well-armed nor organised. They are grassroots reactions to the realities that Palestinians are living. The challenge for Israel is homegrown; East Jerusalemites are free to move in the city, and, by Israeli choice, the Palestinian Authortity has no role in the city.
These factors, together, point to the heart of the problem. Many Israelis, and especially the right wing, have long stated that Jerusalem is their indivisible capital. However, this has translated into changes in the nature the city and now, critically, the holy sites. The very idea that Jerusalem - a city of complex meaning and deep symbolism to billions across the globe - should be controlled by one side may be simply unsustainable, and require examination.
Jerusalem is at the heart of Jewish history and faith, as it is for Christians and Muslims. The panoply of holy sites, especially in and around the Old City, mark these powerful connections, and many are angered when they cannot access them, or when their status appears to change. Israelis experienced these fears before 1967 and Palestinians do today; however, such concerns do not speak to unilateral control as the answer. Indeed, the deeply possesive, and sometimes aggressive, approach to these holy sites may be the very problem. It incorporates a denial and diminishing of the other that can hardly be called religious in any true sense. A lighter touch may provide greater possibility and stability.
The demands on Jerusalem, today and in the future, are many: the capital of two states, Israel and Palestine, the management of holy sites and pligrimage for three monotheistic faiths, and a living city that needs a functioning municipality. There is no shortage of studies and answers to managing all these issues; what is lacking is the political will to effect change.
Need for third parties
Given the international nature of the city, many of these solutions point to the need for third parties to play a role in the city. Whether through special arrangements or special regimes, this third party role will be necessary for the management of heritage and religious sites, as well as, potentially, for security matters. The Jordanian role, as stated in the Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty, also cannot be ignored in this regard.
Indeed, the question of security control will be most difficult for Israelis to compromise over. However, it is also one of the most basic barometers of whether various groups have equal treatment and a sense of legitimacy. Today's reality leaves the doop open for further radical Israeli expansion. Unchecked, and lured by a potent mix of ideology and the holy sites, their actions have and will elicit an inevitable counter-reaction.
As John Kerry's intervention demonstrated last week, talks on Jerusalem can no longer wait. This is not all bad news, the classic approach of leaving the city until last has left it vulnerable to the destructive desires of the most extreme. Practical and symbolic answers to Jerusalem may not only defuse current tensions, they may begin to unravel the very DNA of the conflict, the downward spiral around identity and possession, with positive ripples into the other areas of the conflict.
No doubt, Gaza requires immediate redress because it is an isolated and besieged place destroyed by war. Unfortunately, it has also served as a tragic convenience to distract diplomats and decision-makers from other equally important matters.
Jerusalem can serve as the necessary counterpoint to Gaza, and it may be time to consider a new twin set to begin to heal the wounds, the place with the largest human and humanitarian problem alongside the locale with the most symbolic weight: Gaza and Jerusalem first.
Many policymakers across the planet don't dare to tread into this space, but leaving the wound in Jerusalem open is an act of irresponsibility by the international community.
The cost of doing nothing is now apparent for all to see."
John Bell is Director of the Middle East Programme at the Toledo International Centre for Peace in Madrid. He is a former UN and Canadian diplomat, and served as Political Adviser to the Personal Representative of the UN Secretary-General for southern Lebanon and adviser to the Canadian government.

E em cumplicidade vergonhosa com Israel e os Estados Unidos, o ditador do Egito, general Sisi, ofereceu-se para policiar o novo eventual Estado da Palestina para os israelenses dormirem sossegados e ele impor aos palestinos o mesmo jugo que vem impondo a seus compatriotas desde que deu o golpe militar: Sisi offers to send troops to future Palestinian state to ‘reassure Israelis‘

Reservista da IDF Breaking the Silence

According to UNICEF, every year about 700 Palestinian children from 12 to 17-years old get arrested, interrogated and detained by IDF.
Segundo a UNICEF, todo ano cerca de 700 crianças palestinas de 12 a 17 anos são presas, interrogadas e detidas pela IDF. 

Reporter: What do you make out of this latest video? Have you arrested children like that yourself?

Nadav Bigelman: Unfortunately it didn’t surprise me. I can say that as a soldier who served also in Hebron as a combat soldier between 2007 until 2010, I took part several times in arrests like this. I think what people need to understand is that … soldiers look at Palestinians in the way not as at human beings. In that way they also won’t look at them as at children or teenagers… As a soldier who served…in the Occupied Territories, I can say that when you need to arrest someone, that is the order you were given, you would arrest him, you would detain him, you would handcuff him. It doesn’t matter if he is 8-years old, 25-years old, 50 or 60. The order is very clear - if you need to arrest him or detain him, then you do it. If he is 10-years old you would also do it. After a while you stop looking at people as people, you stop looking at children as children, you stop looking at teenagers as teenagers, you look at them just as at Palestinians, just as at people that can always potentially be terrorists.

R: What made you stop and look at these children as children, not just Palestinians?

NB: One of the things that I went through is during [service in] the army I started asking questions. It took me a while, only after I got out of the army, I broke my silence, - I gave a testimony to the organization I am a part of now, Breaking the Silence. And I started to be exposed to more and more things like that. What people should understand is that children and the youth are only part of these kinds of groups. We are talking about the elderly, or women, or any kind of groups of people that the army wants to deal with, to arrest, to detain, whatever, they would do it. I started to think that maybe the problem here is much bigger and that this is the nature of the occupation, this is how controlling millions of people looks like.

R: Do you feel any pressure from your peers, from Israeli society for coming out, for speaking out against the IDF?

NB: I am not speaking against the IDF. I was a soldier. I am representing here a group about 950 soldiers that served either in the Gaza troop or the West Bank. What we are saying is that the problem in many ways is not the army, the problem is what the army is sent to do and that is to control about 4 million people under a military regime. We have been doing it for almost 50 years.

R: So who is responsible for this problem, for using the army in this way?

NB: There is no doubt that we are trying to show to the Israeli public and to the international community that we keep on choosing day after day to control millions of people. Once you do that, and I can say again from my own personal experience and after I had hundreds of testimonies, that this is how it works. You cannot control people without force, you cannot take people’s liberty and freedom without them resisting you and then arresting them, and then we can see images and videos just like we have seen in the last few days. This is how the occupation works; it cannot be quiet, it cannot be symbolic, it cannot be non-violent because my definition - it is a violent structure.

E não esqueçamos a Faixa de Gaza / Let's not forget the Gaza Strip 

After refusing to cooperate with UN Human Rights council, Israel agreed to cooperate with the UN Headquarters Board of Inquiry established by Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon to investigate the damage to UNRWA facilities during Operation Protective Edge in Gaza in July and August - as long as a number of its conditions are met. As many, I believe that one of them is that a US stooge be appointed vice-chair of the comittee and Israel remains, once again, unblamed.  

Apartheid Adventures 

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