As Gulf war nears
Repression breeds Palestinian resistance
By Richard Becker
Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation, both in street
actions and military operations, intensified in November. At
the same time, Israeli military forces made new incursions into
Gaza, and completely re-occupied Bethlehem and Hebron.
With the exception of isolated Jericho, all West Bank cities
are patrolled by Israeli tanks and heavily armed troops.
A looming question is what the Israeli government plans in
the event of a U.S. invasion of Iraq. Many Palestinians believe
that the Israeli authorities, under cover of a new U.S. war,
may move to expel the Palestinian population from key areas and
launch a major offensive in Gaza.
Palestinian children and youths have responded to the
presence of Israeli troops and tanks in Nablus, Ramallah,
Bethlehem, Jenin and other West Bank cities and towns with a
resurgence of street demonstrations. Although armor protects
them from the stones thrown by Palestinian demonstrators, the
Israeli troops have fired live ammunition.
Between Nov. 15 and Nov. 24, Israeli bullets killed at least
21 Palestinians and wounded scores more.
On Nov. 19, Israeli tanks and troops invaded Tulkarem,
killing five Palestinians and wounding 11 others. Two of the
dead and five of the wounded were under 18.
It would be hard to know this from the U.S. corporate media.
Their focus is almost exclusively on Israeli casualties. And
Israeli casualties have also been heavy. Twelve Israeli
soldiers and security, including a colonel, were killed in a
Nov. 15 firefight in Hebron. On Nov. 21, a bus bomb in West
Jerusalem killed 12 people and wounded more than 40.
The latest developments highlight the failure of Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon's policy of seeking to crush the
Palestinian resistance through extreme force, mass arrests and
economic strangulation. Because of this failure, Sharon, who is
infamous for his long career as a racist and war criminal,
faces a serious challenge in the upcoming primary election of
his Likud bloc.
The challenge--not surprisingly in today's Israeli
politics--is coming from an even more right-wing candidate,
former Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu. The winner will be
the Likud candidate in the general election, not yet scheduled
but expected to take place some time between late January and
March of next year.
New Palestinian military tactics
The Bush administration and most U.S. media misrepresented
and condemned the Palestinian attack in Hebron as a "massacre
of Jewish worshippers." The Israeli casualties, however, belied
this characterization: four Israeli soldiers, five border
police, and three armed settler security forces.
Hebron is well known as home to the most extreme of the
fascist settlers, many of whom are from the United States. The
settlers, who demand that all Palestinians be expelled from
Palestine, are armed with automatic weapons provided by the
Israeli army.
About 400 Israeli settlers live in the center of Hebron, a
Palestinian city of 160,000. Despite their tiny numbers (less
than one-quarter of 1 percent), the settlers have 20 percent of
Hebron. Outside Hebron there is the large Israeli settlement of
Kiryat Arba, made up of like-minded racists.
When Hebron is locked down under curfew--which it has been
for most of the past year--the settlers are allowed to roam
free to attack Palestinian civilians, homes and shops.
On the evening of Nov. 15, a Palestinian militia unit lured
Israeli military forces escorting a group of settlers into a
trap, according to a report on the DEBKAfile website. DEBKAfile
is a right-wing military and intelligence affairs website that
focuses on the Middle East.
When Israeli reinforcements rushed to the scene, they, too,
were ambushed. The Israeli casualties included Col. Dror
Weinberg, the highest-ranking Israeli officer killed during 26
months of the second Intifada (Uprising). Three Palestinians
were killed in the fight.
"It wasn't a massacre, it was battle," said Matan Vilnai, a
retired Israeli general and a leading member of the opposition
Labor Party. (Quoted in the National Post of Canada, Nov. 18,
2002)
Responsibility for the operation was claimed by the Islamic
Jihad operation, which said it was carried out to avenge the
assassination of one of its leaders the previous week.
The same organization also claimed a Nov. 22 attack on an
Israeli gunship off the coast of Gaza. Two Palestinians aboard
a small fishing boat were killed when it blew up close to the
Israeli ship. Four Israeli soldiers were wounded and the
gunboat damaged, in what was believed to be the first such
attack.
Israelis kill head of UN team to rebuild Jenin
On Nov. 22, an Israeli soldier shot and killed Ian Hook, 53,
manager of the Jenin camp rehabilitation project for the United
Nations Relief and Works Agency.
Much of the Jenin refugee camp, home to 13,000 expelled
Palestinians and their families, was destroyed by Israeli army
tanks and bulldozers in April. That rampage left at least 92
dead and more than 5,000 people homeless.
UNRWA is charged with providing health care, education and
food to Jenin and the other 58 Palestinian refugee camps. After
much of Jenin camp was destroyed, the U.S. government blocked
the UN from carrying out an investigation of Israel's actions.
Rebuilding efforts are just getting started.
The Israeli army tried at first to cover up the killing of
Hook, claiming that he was "caught in a cross-fire" between
Palestinians and Israeli troops. The army went so far as to
allege that Palestinian fighters were firing from inside the UN
compound in the camp.
But UN officials and other witnesses on the scene angrily
denied the official Israeli story. UN spokesperson Paul McCann
said, "From our inquiry so far, this report of firing from the
compound is totally incredible."
Hook was shot twice in the abdomen. He bled to death after
the Israeli army prevented an ambulance from transporting him
to a nearby hospital.
Three days earlier, the Israeli Army had attacked and
occupied the Medical Relief Center in Jenin. On Nov. 19, the
Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees sent out an
urgent appeal saying that "much of our equipment was
intentionally destroyed. Our doctors and nurses were threatened
at gun-point and prevented from accessing the center, which is
currently used as an operational base for the Israeli occupying
army."
Palestinian leader defies Israeli court
On Nov. 21 in Tel Aviv, Marwan Barghouti, a leading member
of Fatah, the largest Palestinian political party, and a member
of the Palestinian Legislative Council, was brought once again
before an Israeli court.
Barghouti was abducted from Ramallah and taken illegally to
Israel in May. He was charged with murder in the deaths of 26
Israelis who have died during the Intifada. Barghouti defiantly
rejected the charges against him.
"This court is a joke," shouted Barghouti. "This court
represents Israel's occupation, which has committed crimes
against the Palestinian people.
"I am not the one who should be in the dock, but the Israeli
occupation which settles on our lands, destroys our houses,
assassinates our activists.
"The war criminals are on the Israeli side," said Barghouti.
"The Intifada will be victorious," he chanted until silenced by
the court.
Gisele Halimi, a French lawyer assisting Barghouti's
defense, said the case is "a political trial which should never
have taken place. ... From the point of view of international
law, Israel's position in not defendable."
Reprinted from the Dec. 5, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
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