New unity in Palestinian struggle

Unable to defeat the Palestinian people’s determination to assert their rights and sovereignty after 60 years of the most brutal occupation and expropriation of land, the entire U.S.-Israeli strategy for years has been based on exacerbating every division, every difference in the Palestinian struggle.

March 18 protest denounces visit of Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak to New York. WW photo: Greg Butterfield

In an effort to set one group against the other they have used classic imperialist tactics, such as imposing collective punishment upon the entire civilian population in an effort to heighten internal tensions and break the determination to resist. This is combined with ruthless repression, assassinations and kidnappings of more revolutionary and militant forces; bribes, meager incentives and false promises to more moderate groups and individuals; and the sowing of suspicion and disinformation all the while and at every turn.

However, events this week demonstrate that such ruthless repression can divide a movement, but can also be the source of a new level of unity. In one outrageous act, Israeli forces have succeeded in uniting the Palestinian movement in a way it has not been in years.

On March 12 in broad daylight, Israeli Special Forces gunned down four popular Palestinian leaders sitting in a car in the West Bank city of Bethlehem. They riddled the car with more than 500 bullets.

The four men—Mohammad Shehadeh, a leader of Islamic Jihad; Ahmed Balboul, a local commander of Al Aksa Brigades aligned with Fatah; and Issa Marzouq and Imad Al-Kamal of Islamic Jihad—were in Bethlehem meeting with other Fatah activists in preparation for Fatah’s sixth movement conference.

The four were considered local heroes who had long evaded Israeli capture. Shehadeh ran in the Palestinian elections and received more than 7,000 votes. Marzouq was voted onto the Bethlehem city council on an Islamic Jihad ticket in 2005.

Again and again Israel has attempted to destroy all forms of Palestinian self-government. More than half the members of the Palestinian parliament are today in Israeli jails. Many others have been assassinated.

In an interview earlier on the day of the attack, the resistance leaders had visited the offices of Ma’an News Agency. Shehadeh had said, regarding Israeli promises of amnesty: “The Israeli occupation doesn’t want to arrest us. Really, they want to assassinate us.”

A week before Shehadeh’s assassination Israeli forces had totally destroyed his home. Now, in a show of unity, Hamas, Fatah and the Lebanese resistance organization Hezbollah have all pledged to defy Israel and rebuild it.

The funeral in Bethlehem, a Muslim and Christian city, for the four veteran fighters was a mass outpouring of tens of thousands of Palestinians and a general strike that united all the Palestinian political forces. The flags of Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine were flown together and Shehadeh’s body was draped in the flag of Hezbollah.

The March 16 London Observer, in an article entitled “Militant’s death unites Bethlehem—Stalled peace process fuels support for Hizbollah,” described the funeral. “School principals, teachers and students from the Bethlehem School, the Catholic School and the Greek Orthodox School paraded to the mourning tent outside the church chanting and waving placards praising the Palestinian ‘martyr.’”

The major corporate media all expressed their concern at the overwhelming unity of political groups and especially at the rage of Fatah forces, which had remained committed to negotiations with Israel, even during the full scale attacks on Hamas in Gaza.

In past months Zionist efforts at playing one group against the other reached a new level of intensity. When, in a democratic election in January 2006, the Palestinian population dared to overwhelmingly elect Hamas—the organization more intransigent to Zionism and imperialism—the Israeli occupation, with active U.S. participation, took more extreme measures.

The April 2008 issue of Vanity Fair magazine describes U.S. efforts to organize a coup to overthrow the Hamas government, including the funneling of arms and funds to Fatah forces, whose present leadership is preferred by the U.S. over Hamas. Palestinian tax revenues were withheld and international aid was choked off.

When U.S.-backed efforts to foment a civil war in Gaza failed nine months ago, and Hamas took total control there, Zionist forces resorted to the most extreme form of collective punishment. Even the most basic civilian necessities—medicine and fuel for electricity, heat and cooking—were cut off.

Gaza is home to more than one million Palestinian refugees. On an almost daily basis Israeli forces have bombed civilian targets in the area from U.S. supplied jet aircraft and attack helicopters. Tanks routinely roll into populated centers and thousands of Palestinian leaders have been kidnapped. Hundreds have been targeted with assassination.

In early March a new Israeli offensive in Gaza resulted in more than 120 Palestinian deaths and hundreds of injuries. Palestinian forces have continued to show defiance and intransigence by firing rockets over the Israeli-built wall of Gaza into Israel.

The assassination of the four leaders came a day after it seemed that Hamas in Gaza had agreed to a cease-fire. It confirmed once again that Israel is opposed to any form of peace. It will use every opportunity to further enflame the repression and intensify the occupation.

U.S. and Israeli forces claimed that they would continue to negotiate with and provide resources to Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of Fatah. The promise, raised once again at the November 2007 Annapolis meeting, was that talks would lead to a Palestinian ministate under some form of limited Palestinian sovereignty.

These talks have now lasted more than 15 years, since the 1993 Oslo Accords promised a Palestinian state within three to five years. During them, Israeli land confiscations and the building of formidable settlement complexes have continued. So has the building of hundreds of checkpoints and roadblocks, miles of separate roads and massive three- and four-story walls snaking through and around hundreds of Palestinian villages and towns.

Throughout this brutal process the Zionist government has had the unconditional diplomatic, political, economic and military support of U.S. imperialism. No matter how outrageous the Israeli repression, it is always followed by new demands on Palestinians to make new concessions to prove their commitment to a “peace process.”

This year, Israel granted a much-publicized amnesty to 178 political prisoners. But in the same period they have kidnapped another 642 Palestinians in the West Bank. Targeted assassinations in both the West Bank and in Gaza are a daily occurrence. More than 10,000 Palestinian political prisoners fill Israeli jails.

The International Middle East Media Center (www.imemc.org), in their “This Week in Palestine” report, said Israeli forces had invaded the West Bank 47 times and kidnapped 78 Palestinians during the same week as the latest assassinations.

In an interview with Ma’an during Bethlehem’s Christmas Eve celebrations, Shehadeh, radiating confidence and smiling, said: “The Palestinian people are capable of raising the flag of liberty and completing their mission. Israel has to realize that military occupation of Palestine does not solve its problems, either now or in the future.” Asked why he rejected amnesty in favor of continuing with the armed struggle, he said, “It is revolutionaries who have the right to give amnesty to the occupation, and not the opposite.”

During these same holiday celebrations, Israeli InfoLive.TV spoke to Shehadeh, who appears on camera armed and surrounded by many smiling civilians in Bethlehem’s Manger Square. He said, “The Palestinian people and their resistance have survived scores of years.” Asked if he had a message to the Palestinian people, Shehadeh said: “To love each other and to unite. The day of victory will arrive no matter how distant. We will win.”