The children of Palestine

I don't know what to do anymore. It breaks my heart to keep reading this stuff, but I can't seem to stop either. Like moving to the front of the line to get a better look at a bad car accident.

I've been photocopying the entire article where this information came from and leaving them everywhere around town, but I need to do more. I can't sleep at night because of it. I lay there awake in my bed, hearing my daughter's light snores coming from her room, and I think of how many parents can no longer say the same thing.

Trapped in a car this Summer with a friend of mine on a road trip for 4000 miles really gave me a clear idea of what racism and bigotry are really all about. When our CD player in the car died driving through the middle of Nevada (on our way to Area 51), and the radio boasted nothing but Christian redemption for our souls, our talk turned to Middle Eastern politics. A touchy subject to begin with, but really touchy when it's 120F outside the car and walking back home to Vancouver is just one badly worded remark away.

That was when he told me the expression, "The only good Arab is a dead Arab."

When asked of his position on what should be done in Israel, he told me that the only solution is to take every last Palestinian and ship them off to Jordan. And if the Jordanian government didn't like it, we should just nuke them. Needless to say it was a fucking long drive through Nevada!

Let me just say, as someone wise just pointed out, that this article is definitely one-sided. I make no qualms about that. In a day where we have 1 corporation owning 99% of the Canadian print media (Excluding the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star), and openly displaying pro-Isreali propaganda, we have no choice but to counter-comment whenever and wherever we can.

Robert Fisk, writer for The Independent, on December 13th 2000 states it simply. "The abuse being directed at anyone who dares to criticise Israel is reaching McCarthyite proportions."

If you want to see what the world's reporters are facing these days, I suggest you go here" http://electronicintifada.net/v2/theroleofthemedia.shtml

This article is but one taste of what is going on in the Holy Land these days. And with Ariel Sharon voted in for another term, things will only get worse... Much worse. We, as a people, need to stand up and say no! We won't allow the indiscriminate killings of innocent civilians to go on anymore! We won't allow a people to be driven off the face of the Earth by an oppressing government, that your government and mine, whether you live in Canada, the US, or the UK, sanctions and fully supports.

Never forget the words of Moshe Ya'alon, Ariel Sharon's new chief of staff, describing the "Palestinian threat" as "like a cancer – there are all sorts of solutions to cancerous manifestations. For the time being, I am applying chemotherapy."

More information then I could ever convey to you here is located on the website http://www.electronicintifada.net. I plead with everyone here to spend some time there. It is from them that these statistics came from. It is to them that I give my thanks for opening my eyes to the truth. The truth may cut worse then the sharpest blade, but I would rather my blood be spilled, then to live my life in ignorance.

This is just a small sampling from October 31st to December 2nd of some of the atrocities that have been committed on the children of Palestine.

31 October to 2 December 2002

December 2: Jenin: Mutaz Odeh, 18, died of a gunshot wound to the heart when Israeli occupation forces opened fire on a group of civilians who were stoning Israeli tanks and armored vehicles. 21 others injured, two seriously. (PCHR, LAW)

November 30: Gaza City: Hatem al-Ajla, 16, shot dead by Israeli occupation forces, with gunshot wounds to the back, according to hospital sources. (AFP)

November 28: Hebron: Abbas al-Atrash, 3, was in his house, when he was killed by bullets fired by Israeli occupation forces. Doctors said that he was hit by a bullet in the abdomen as he stood at the window. The occupation army claimed the toddler was killed by shrapnel from an explosive device thrown at its forces. No occupation forces were injured by the alleged bomb. (Agencies)

November 25: Nablus: Jihad Al-Faqih, 8, was shot and killed by Israeli occupation forces with a bullet to the heart. The killing occurred as many Palestinians decided to ignore the permanent curfew imposed on the city and go to school or work. Some unarmed Palestinians confronted the occupation forces who were in tanks and armored vehicles, and some people stoned them. The occupation forces opened fire on the civilians, killing Jihad, who was not among the stone throwers. 13 others were injured by the soldiers, including 7 other children and two women. (LAW, Agencies)

November 22: Jenin: Muhammad Bilalweh, 12, was shot dead by Israeli occupation forces with a bullet to the left eye. The occupation forces opened fire on a group of children who began stoning them after an Israeli armored bulldozer had demolished a building that was home to six families. Earlier the army had entered the camp in force, firing indiscriminately. Three other children suffered serious injuries from gunshots and shrapnel. (LAW, Agencies)

November 19: Tulkarm: Ehab Alam al-Zalqa, 16, was shot and killed by a member of an Israeli death squad disguised as a Palestinian. The killing occurred when the death squad, who had been spotted by civilians, was stoned. After killing Alam, the death squad caught and executed on the spot the person they were hunting after confirming his identity. Two other civilians were killed by the death squad, and ten others, including five children injured. (PCHR, LAW)

November 20: Tulkarm: Amr al-Qudsi, 14, was shot dead by an Israeli soldier with a gunshot to the back. Following an earlier incident, in which an Israeli death squad killed four people in the town, a group of children gathered and stoned an Israeli jeep. The jeep stopped, a soldier got out, took aim at Amr, and killed him. (LAW, Agencies)

November 16: Jenin Refugee Camp: Ibrahim al-Sadi, 17, was shot and killed by Israeli occupation forces. Israel surrounded a number of houses in the center of the refugee camp, including the house of Sheikh Bassam Ragheb al-Sa'di, wanted by Israel for alleged activities in Islamic Jihad. Israeli soldiers noticed al-Sadi's son Ibrahim, 17, passing near a house with a gun in his hands. Immediately, they fired at him without warning. He was killed by a live bullet in the chest. According to eyewitnesses, the son passed by the area accidentally and he did not fire at the Israeli soldiers, rather he was trying to get away from them. Ibrahim's brother, Abdulkarim, had been killed by Israeli occupation forces on September 5. (PCHR)

November 15: Nablus: Imran al-Shila, 15, was killed by a bullet to the chest by Israeli occupation forces who opened fire on a group of children who threw stones at them in the Old City. (LAW)

November 14: Nablus: Jalal Awijan, 17, was killed by a gunshot wound to the chest, when Israeli occupation forces in tanks and armored vehicles opened fire on a group of school children. (LAW)

November 13: Rafah, Gaza: Hamed Asad Hassan al-Masri, 2, was killed by a live bullet to the chest. That evening, Israeli occupation forces began shelling Block J in Rafah refugee camp, forcing the little boy's family to flee their home. As they left the house, Hamed was hit by a bullet fired by the occupation firces. His mother, Asmaa, 31, was critically injured by live ammunition and shrapnel to the abdomen, pelvis and limbs. (PCHR)

November 11: Rafah, Gaza: Nafez Mishal, 2, was shot by Israeli occupation forces who opened fire on civilian homes in the Tel al Sultan neighborhood of the refugee camp. He died two hours later of a gunshot wound to the abdomen. Nafez had been sitting on his father's lap playing with a balloon, when the balloon escaped. The toddler got up to run after it and was then cut down by a volley of bullets from an occupation army watch tower. The occupation army claimed it was "returning fire," although all witnesses said that the soldiers had, as they often do, opened fire without provocation. Two other children, aged 9 and 14 were injured in the same incident. (The Independent, PCHR)

November 11: Rafah, Gaza: Muhammad Rifat Abu al-Naja, 9, died of wounds he sustained the previous month. Abu al-Naja was seriously wounded when Israeli forces at the Egyptian border, south of Rafah, shelled Palestinian houses in Block O in Rafah refugee camp on 17 October 2002. Six Palestinian civilians, including 3 children and 2 women, were killed in that incident, and more than 40 others, including Abu al-Naja, were wounded. (PCHR)

November 5: Rafah, Gaza: Adham Ibrahim Hamdan, 16, shot by live bullets in the head and Eyad Nafez Abu Taha, 17, shot by a live bullet in the head. The two boys were killed by Israeli occupation forces who had invaded Block L of Rafah refugee camp, demolished three houses, and fired indiscriminately at civilians. 12 Palestinian civilians, including 4 children under the age of 18, were wounded. (PCHR)

I found these statistics on the website http://www.electronicintifada.net.
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights -- Gaza (PCHR)
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights and the Environment (LAW)
Wire services: Agence France Presse, Associated Press

I don't know what to do anymore. It breaks my heart to keep reading this stuff, but I can't seem to stop either. Like serving in my country’s military reserve even though I know it’s not perfect.

I’ve been reading some w/us and decided to look up some “facts” for myself and writing them up here, but I need to do more. I sleep fine at night because I understand that the media is never objective and always serves a purpose, for each “fact” published there is an equal and opposite “fact” somewhere else. I know my parents laid awake until they heard my voice on the phone the other week when there was Yet another terrorist bombing in Tel Aviv

Addicted to Everything2 this Spring on a day off I really got a clear idea of how propaganda can define the one sided opinions of people who don’t really know what is going on. I have been born to Israeli parents and lived in Israel for 15 years including 3 years military service and a month of reserves (Last year in the southern west bank during operation “Homat Magen”) Middle Eastern politics is a touchy subject which people who haven’t lived directly on either side, will never really understand.

It pains me to hear anybody using the expression, "The only good Arab is a dead Arab."

My personal position is that the problems of Israel with it’s neighbors are extremely complex and anyone who thinks that just shipping Palestinians to Jordan, or killing them or giving them land is enough… Is naïve. Needless to say there are a lot of fucking idiots in Israel who think otherwise.

Let me just say, as nobody yet has pointed out, that this article is definitely one-sided. I make no qualms about that. I think being a Palestinian sucks, they have hard lives, getting the raw end of the deal both being attacked by the Israeli government / army, being seriously fucked over by their own corrupt government and having fanatic run terror groups sometimes ruining it for everyone else.

Dr. Ahmad Abu Halabiya, Member of the Palestinian Authority-appointed "Fatwa Council" and former acting Rector of the Islamic University in Gaza. On 13 October 2000 over an official Palestinian Authority television station broadcast said "Have no mercy on the Jews, no matter where they are, in any country. Fight them, wherever you are. Wherever you meet them, kill them. Wherever you are, kill those Jews and those Americans who are like them - and those who stand by them - they are all in one trench, against the Arabs and the Muslims because they established Israel here, in the beating heart of the Arab world, in Palestine.

If you want to see what the Palestinian authority think about peace and terrorism in their own words I suggest you go here: http://www.iris.org.il/quotes.htm

This write-up is just another taste of what is going on in My Home these days. And with the appointment Of Abu Mazen As Palestinian Prime Minister, I hope things will get better… even if just a bit. We, as a people, need to stand up and say no! We won’t allow Arafat to sabotage yet another step towards peace. We won’t allow the Chairman and his cronies to kill those who are interested in having a real dialogue and progress towards peace! We won’t allow a people to be driven off the face of the Earth by likes of the Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad or other terrorist groups which the Palestinian government lead by the ex-terrorist Arafat funds, sanctions and fully supports

Never forget the words of Shiekh Hamed Bitawi, chairman of the Palestine Religious Scholars Association and head of the PA's Sharia Court of Appeals in Nablus, describing the “Palestinian options” by saying “Our choice is the military option. We must put an end to the despicable negotiations. The time has come for jihad and martyrdom”

More information then I could ever convey to you here is located on the website http://www.hasbara.org.il (And many others) I will not plead with anyone here to spend time anywhere on either side, because I don’t believe subjective websites and organizations serve any purpose in truly understanding the nature of the conflict here. I invite you all to Israel and Palestine to talk to real people on both sides, so see what Israelis think as well as Palestinians, it might surprise you. Statistics can show whatever you want them too, just pick the right statistic and time frame. You can prove practically anything. I hope I am opening some eyes to how one side's certain websites are.

I will not give a list of crime committed by the “children of Palestine”, since they happen daily. I have seen 12 year olds smuggle explosives, and 14 year olds throw Molotov cocktails. I know the rules of engagement and the mentality of most soldiers in the IDF who are virtually children themselves serving in their mandatory 3 year tour of duty who are more interested in getting home for the weekend and sleeping off the last 21 days of hellish work, maybe catching a movie or going to a pub before going back to base Sunday morning.

I will not give the dates where whole classes of Palestinian children were taken out of school to throw stones. As it is a thing of the norm in the occupied territories.

A rather interesting study of noncombatant casualties shows that most Palestinian deaths are teenaged boys and young men. Which would contradict the accusations that Israel targets women and children. According to the study “"There appears to be only one reasonable explanation for this pattern: that Palestinian men and boys engaged in behavior that brought them into conflict with Israeli armed forces."

Facts? Not always, we all believe what we want to. They all tell us what they want too… My personal experience in the occupied territories is almost nothing compared to soldiers who served or are now serving in full combat positions (As opposed to me, I was a “Jobnik”) But I have seen enough with my own eyes to understand that what you read and what is going on might as well be the stories of two different planets.

Martin Fletcher NBC's Tel Aviv bureau chief noted "The whole uprising was media-oriented, and, without a doubt, kept going because of the media," and in his own words said that the Palestinians manipulated the Western showing themselves as “David Vs. Goliath” Fletcher openly admitted accepting invitations from young Palestinians to film violent attacks against Jewish residents of the West Bank.

"It's really a matter of manipulation of the media. And the question is: How much do we play that game? We do it in the same way that we turn up at all those Bush or Reagan photo opportunities. We play along because we need the pictures."

I found these quotes on the website http://www.us-israel.org/
http://hasbara.org.il
and http://www.iris.org.il
All highly subjective websites, as http://www.electronicintifada.net is.
This has been an enwhysea from the "otherside" writeup