What does it take to get Israel to just begin recognizing some Palestinian human rights?
1. Carry out democratic elections
2. Determine a government according to the election outcome
3. THEN isolate this government in one part of the country
4. Set an illegal embargo on the people there
5. Freeze the government’s bank accounts
6. Isolate the government internationally
The result will be:
1. The return of all stolen taxes belonging to Palestinians
2. An easing of roadblocks and security measures
3. Lifting of the illegally imposed economic embargo
4. International funding for a new non-democratically determined government
5. Normalization of relations between international governments and the non-democratically determined government
6. The legalizing of private American trade (the world’s largest economy) with Palestinians (previously this deed could result in incarceration)
7. The releasing of a political prisoner (with four life sentences) to strengthen the non-democratically determined government
To try and bolster this two-faced US foreign policy position in the Middle East, the US Secretary of State said Monday:
"Through its actions, Hamas sought to divide the Palestinian nation, we reject that. It is the position of the United States that there is one Palestinian people and there should be one Palestinian state."
In reality is it not Israel and the US that are dividing the Palestinians by politically immobilizing their elected leaders?
On Tuesday White House spokesman Tony Snow was reported saying,
"What's important is, you have to have a partner who is committed to peace, and we believe that President Abbas is. And therefore we are committed to working with this new emergency government.”
A source in the prime minister's entourage in the US explained,
"We want to make Hamas a pariah and prevent it joining the international game."
Hamas' violent takeover of the Gaza Strip last week resulted in two governments: the Hamas leadership headed by deposed Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza and a new emergency cabinet led by the Western-backed economist Salam Fayyad in the West Bank. Both are calling the other the perpetrators of a coup.
What are the sources of this division?
A fear overtook the Gaza Strip after Hamas took control of institutions this past week, which are rightfully theirs to control. The US and Israel’s anticipated and proclaimed reaction to the latest round of events (a democratically elected government taking over government institutions) is causing fear and uncertainty concerning Gazans future plight. Few outside of Gaza realize that the Gaza Strip can hardly be more isolated, or sink into a worse economic depression, save starvation, than it has in the past two years.
Many in Gaza consider the emergency government to be legitimate, for the sole reason that the world, not the majority of Palestinians, actually recognizes the new political entity (in the last parliamentary elections the new prime minister’s party received 2.4% of vote).
The colonial tactic of Conquer and Divide is being put to use on the Palestinians yet once again; initially in the Gaza Strip between Fatah and Hamas and now between the West Bank and Gaza.
This image, developed by Hamas (recalling the American deck of cards of their most wanted in Iraq), paints a vivid picture of the deep seeded divisions in Palestinian society.
Why was Hamas so determined to wipe out this “collaborative cell in Fatah”? To just touch on this question brings to the surface the deck’s Ace, a Dahlan funded hit man called Sameech Almadhoun, nicknamed “Almaleoun” (the cursed one) by many Hamas supporters. In the past weeks Hamas systematically executed his companions and leaders and finally Sameech himself after this small group of fighters wreaked havoc in their neighborhood in the Northern Gaza Strip.
Palestinians are more divided and polarized than ever which can be seen in their reaction to last week’s events. Each side is pointing out the ultimate blame in the other. Haaretz reported this account from a Fatah member who had fled Gaza,
"Hamas believes that nothing will stop them from rising to power. Everything is legitimate: to kill, burn, torture. Three people from National Security were decapitated with a knife, the way they do in Iraq. They cut off the legs of Samih al-Madhun [a senior Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades figure] after they killed him. They are animals."
My neighbor Ayman, a Hamas supporter, was kidnapped by Sameech one week before the latter was executed. Ayman was beaten and taken to the beach to be shot. His oldest brother, himself a Fatah activist, saved his life by calling the perpetrators and pleading for his younger brother’s life, many others were not as fortunate.
“Civil War” has often been uttered prematurely in the media, yet last week’s kidnappings, lootings and murders now taking place on a tit-for-tat basis between West Bank Fatah men and Hamas activists in Gaza demonstrate this new reality. Sameech and his companions were used to sow division between Palestinians.
Part of a Conquer and Divide strategy is timing. Why did Israel wait until this moment to consider Mahmoud Abbas a “partner committed to peace” when his positions have hardly changed since his election over two years ago? Why is Israel only now considering freeing Marwan Al-Barghouthi, a convicted Fatah activist? Why only now release the frozen government taxes ($570 million) that the Palestinians have desperately needed since Israel started withholding them in March of last year?
On Monday Haaretz’s Akiva Eldar wrote,
If Ariel Sharon were able to hear the news from the Gaza Strip and West Bank, he would call his loyal aide, Dov Weissglas, and say with a big laugh: "We did it, Dubi." Sharon is in a coma, but his plan is alive and kicking. Everyone is now talking about the state of Hamastan. In his house, they called it a bantustan, after the South African protectorates designed to perpetuate apartheid.
Just as in the Palestinian territories, blacks and colored people in South Africa were given limited autonomy in the country's least fertile areas. Those who remained outside these isolated enclaves, which were disconnected from each other, received the status of foreign workers, without civil rights. A few years ago, Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema told Israeli friends that shortly before he was elected prime minister, Sharon told him that the bantustan plan was the most suitable solution to our conflict.
Although Mahmoud Abbas and his new US backed government have finally received international status and the economic blockade is being lifted on Palestinians, the Palestinian cause seems to have been buried beneath the ruble. With internal division more than ever in the limelight, the source of all this mess, the atrocities carried out against Palestinians dating back to the early 20th Century, solidified in 1948 and ongoing land theft, colonial expansion and disregard of Palestinian human rights are forgotten amidst the chaos.
The Palestinians are more divided than ever, distracted by wrongs carried out against each other.
The plot of Conquer and Divide is a great smokescreen covering up the desecration of democracy and another attempt to lay to rest the Palestinian cause.
In Gaza the reality of being ruled by two governments for some is becoming a daily dilemma. My neighbor Mohamed is a police officer and responsible for security at the AlAqsa University in Gaza City. His superiors in the West Bank have informed him he is to remain home and will continue to receive his monthly salary. In return local Hamas authorities have informed the police force that they will be dismissed from the police if they do not appear for work.
Mohamed is faced with a tough decision, does he respect local authorities, which after all represent the Palestinian people’s elected government and at the end of the day are those that have most say in his day to day life in Gaza (after all the Fatah authorities deserted him along with other non-Hamas supporters, in Gaza)? Or, will he obey those that actually pay his salary, the new emergency government, not elected by the people and yet the governing body recognized by the West and other Arab nations alike as the sole representing political body of the Palestinians?
Mohamed says his colleagues will determine their actions according to who is paying their salaries. If the local Hamas authorities will pay them for their services they will obey them and go to work. If they continue to be paid by the President and his new emergency government in the West Bank they will remain at home.
Word has gone around that some officers will report to the West Bank authorities which members of the police force are obeying Hamas orders and working and that these will then be removed from their posts and their salaries canceled. This way they say the emergency government will determine who is a Hamas supporter (those that obey Hamas orders and work) and those that are Fatah supporters (those that obey Fatah orders and remain at work).
The future is unclear. How long will the Hamas government last in Gaza? Will the emergency Fatah government actually stand by “its people” in Gaza as it promised today? How about the economic boycott that is beginning to be carried out, within two days Gaza will run out of petrol, the electricity company will be forced to shut down, within a week supplies of most basic foods will run dry, will Israel continue the economic blockade?
Meanwhile, temporary Hamas policemen took to the streets today wearing brand new Hamas vests; traffic in the streets has never been so organized and disciplined. Finally, the Gaza Strip has just one government and just one police force governing it. A sense of order and security are the upsides that come along with the fear of a very uncertain future.
Meanwhile, a Katyusha rocket fired from Lebanon, landed in Israel. With a government proving itself to be rather incapable, Israel is getting into one prickly situation after another and sending 20,000 soldiers into Gaza sounds to me like another worthless bloodbath.
flo
The conversation at the lunch table with Isa and May, Elias and Rana was just about two things, immigrating and what the most vital shopping items are for their homes.
“People are thinking of how to spend the summer vacation we are thinking of how to stockpile food,” said Rana Al Najjar, one of my hosts as we made a trip to the shop to buy what food was still available.
News has spread through Gaza that in light of the economic embargo on the Gaza Strip we will run out of gasoline by tomorrow. This means electricity will also cut as the main power station in Gaza is run on petrol.
Our first stop was a natural gas shop where we drop off our oven’s gas bottles and were told to pick them up filled in the evening.
Next was a wholesale sugar store. Prices of sugar, flour and basic foods are going up as people are buying in a frenzy, afraid of shortages in coming days.
Our last stop was the grocers, where swarms of people were shopping in order to stock up for a very uncertain future.
My visit at the hospital this morning was difficult. On Friday Ghada’s brother was shot in his right leg twice, one bullet remained in his leg. When he first arrived at the hospital they had placed him on a wooden board waiting for space to be freed for him. His operation lasted many hours and ended with 33 stitches in his leg.
Ghada told me that he had screamed a lot the night before. When I saw him he was still writhing in pain. Sa’ed is 22 and had just working for the Fatah secret police two months ago. He is unmarried and jumped at this opportunity to take a job in order to prepare for his future. The events of the past days were not what he had reckoned for and whatever grudges Hamas held against the security apparatus he was not one with blood on his hands.
What I witnessed at the hospital was horrible and that was without even entering one single hospital room. Sa’ed was in a bed in the hallway, since they had run out of rooms and at one point even out of beds. Looking from the hospital window I saw at least three other young men being moved around on beds or wheelchairs with just their right leg bandaged. Being shot in the legs, a common occurrence in the past days of fighting is a horrible form of torture.
Mahmoud Abbas has declined a meeting with Hamas’ Khaled Mishal citing he would not meet with “murderers.” Furthermore, an internationally backed and recognized emergency government is to be sworn in later this evening, after the president has officially dissolved the democratically elected, Hamas dominated unity government.
I want to point out at this point that I called the events of the last few days a “coup” in accordance with what many in Gaza are naming it. In hindsight I consider Hamas to have a legitimate political right to the military takeover that occurred. Yet, this is not to say that this occurrence bodes well for the people, rather there is a fear of this turning into a social and humanitarian crisis.
The source of this fear of what the future holds is two-fold.
The at times double-faced statements of the Hamas leadership (in Sa'ed's case Hamas announced they did not harm any Fatah security force members that handed themselves over, Sa'ed did and was shot at by a sniper, then tortured and shot in the legs), a priority of their own people over the general public and their seeming lack of realpolitik, revealed in the few signs of a strategy or plan for the future by the Hamas leadership (after routing Fatah security forces and political leadership in Gaza and taking over their headquarters, Hamas declared they recognize Abu Mazen as president and do not consider Gaza a separate Palestinian entity). The consequences of this are felt by the people, not those in power.
Yet, my fear is rooted even deeper in the actions of the “International Community” (largely a pseudonym for the USA) who has refused to recognize a democratically elected Palestinian government in an election that was enforced on the Palestinians in accordance with an American Foreign Policy drive for “Democracy in the Middle East.” Moreover this “International Community” collectively punishes Palestinians for their “democratic” vote which the world’s sole superpower is not in favor of.
Because of a hypocritical promise of "freedom" through “democratic reform,” Sa’ed is suffering in an open air hospital bed in Gaza City, Rana, Elias, Isa and May are scrounging to stockpile food for an uncertain future and the entire Gaza Strip is punished on behalf of the duplicitous ideology and wishful thinking of a few rich white men.
After a turbulent few days and the initial stages of surprise some changes have started to become clear on the ground in Gaza.
UNRWA announced all its operations would return to full capacity after early signs that they would be reduced due to inter-factional fighting.
Hamas has announced that negotiations were taking place with Alan Johnston's captors and promised release by Saturday.
Under U.S. pressure the Government of Israel declared it would release tax monies withheld from the PA since Hamas' election victory early last year (over $700 million dollars) in order to strengthen Abu Mazen's political position vis a vis the Palestinians. As can be seen in this picture, the weak leader is in urgent need of anything he can get.
We walked the streets at midnight tonight, they seemed safer than ever. A friend of mine's brother was shot in the leg yesterday by Hamas forces and is in hospital after a critical operation. I will go visit him and Dr Attalah in the morning.
After routing Fatah in Gaza and taking over every last security stronghold, it seems Hamas has noticed it has reached a bit of a dead end politically and has declared its continued recognition of Abu Mazen as the legitimate Palestinian president.
Fatah on the other hand has responded by naming the Gaza Strip a renegade entity and declaring an emergency government in the West Bank. This is the most bizarre democracy concoction the U.S. hass created here.
What occurred across the Gaza Strip this week was not a civil war, from my understanding of the concept, because it was a one-sided offensive. Yet, we have seen little signs of tit-for-tat arrests and threats taking place between Fatah in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza.. this could be the birth pangs of something like a civil war.
In Gaza people awake today to a new reality. Last night, my host Isa told me military coups were the sort of thing he heard and read about, he never thought he would experience one. Yesterday Gazans did.
Although the final Fatah stronghold was still standing by the evening Hamas fighters were already making the rounds in the streets, three and four jeeps at a time, loaded with armed men wearing all black, their faces covered with masks, holding their guns in the air, a few, rather uncomfortably, waving to the people. On Alaqsa, the only remaining radio station being aired from Gaza belonging to Hamas, these areas are being called “freed” from the traitors.
A former Fatah spokesman, now speaking on behalf of Hamas, was heard on the air denouncing his former leaders, calling them US spies and traitors.
A further shock came around 8pm when Abu Mazen announced Gaza a renegade entity and declared his presidency over the West Bank. Gazans reacted with disgust. During the fighting of the past few days Abu Mazan was largely silent, ordering his forces to stay in their bases. Many consider Abu Mazen to have sold out his own leadership in the Gaza Strip by not coming to their rescue, now he was throwing his people (Fatah supporters) away, like garbage, they said.
With the electricity cut and cell phones working only rarely people clung to the radio to hear as the latest news unfolded. With only one local station in Gaza and only one perspective to be heard rumors abounded. Supposedly fishermen had called in to the Hamas station reporting that some of the Fatah leadership taking final refuge in the president’s compound had escaped by sea some heading South to Egypt, others north towards Israel. One report gave the name of a drug dealer and a Fatah spokesman supposedly escaping together on one boat.
Sitting on the street one could hear the news spread, often the same names of people who had been killed or thought to have escaped were mentioned among the people walking by. The coup d'état was the only thought on their minds of young and old.
A friend, who works with a Fatah security apparatus, told me that the Hamas men that came to his door checking IDs had treated him well. As long as one did not have his weapons on him and stayed home Hamas considered these Fatah members “honorable” in contrast to the “traitors” who resisted what Hamas considers their justified military coup. “Traitors” were at times either shot in the legs or depending on their status brutally executed.
One of the Fatah military compounds freed on Friday was the location of prisons and torture halls where many Hamas members had been tortured over the years for their opposition to the Fatah government. The Hamas celebration at taking it over was only logical.
On Wednesday Palestine TV, a Fatah station aired callers crying about the horrible scenes they had witnessed. An Islamic Jihad sheikh was interviewed condemning the events on the streets of Gaza. By Thursday all radio and TV stations belonging to Fatah in the Gaza Strip were closed down.
Generally people are very concerned about what the near future holds. The streets seem rather secure, but anyone that was at all in opposition to Hamas is scared, most are staying home or are in hiding somewhere. Cars are moving about, people are walking the streets, I am back at the Marna House, people are smoking shisha and laughing. Along the road outside old men are sitting in the shade playing backgammon. The combination of normalcy of life and fear of the unknown of the future makes for a strange atmosphere.
"If you have two brothers, put them in a cage and deprive them of basic and essential needs for life, they will fight, I don't think we should put the blame on the victim."
- Ziad Abu Amr, Palestinian Foreign Minster at news conference in Tokyo
Israel's strategy of Conquer ad Divide has reached another threshold. Israel’s right wing Maariv newspaper described Palestine as divided into Hamastan in the Gaza Strip and Fatah Land in the West Bank. What better way to turn the world’s attention away from its ongoing construction of illegal settlements in the West Bank and expansion of its illegal separation barrier that is confiscating Palestinian land.
The Jerusalem Post for its part is advertising Israel’s attempt to wash its hands of the blood running in the streets in Gaza which perpetuates the myth that Israel is free of the responsibility she has of creating the Gaza Strip in 1948. Israel, not Egypt is the one who ought to take responsibility for the ongoing crisis.
A new Oxfam report points out precisely this role of Israel as midwife to the crisis in Gaza, citing the economic crisis looming in Gaza. Oxfam is calling for the EU to end the boycott of PA.
Watch this short film on the underground economy via the tunnels of Rafah's border town by journalist Laila Al-Haddad.
Alvaro de Soto, the UN's recently retired Middle East envoy has condemned the UN's policy in the region and calls for the UN's withdrawal from the Quartet which is carrying out an economic embargo on the Palestinian unity government.
This from an article in Haaretz speaking of Bush's new plan for the Middle East to be announced later this month:
"The officials said the Americans see increasing military aid to Israel and supplying new American weapons to the Gulf states as important steps to bolster the moderate countries in the region and counter Iran's rising strength."
Enough weapons to stop the problems of the world. Violence and further supplying of arms is not the answer to these ills. I am sick of seeing my friends here look to the leaders of various factions, or some outside power's military as a savior to their social strife. I don't want to hear another person or politician or government tell me who they think is the right party or group to be armed, enough weapons! Enough worshiping the idol or war!
There is clear documentation that the US and Israel have been arming Fatah's factions, Hamas and others are being armed by other players in the Middle East. Such arming is the path to this death we see today and it makes me angry.
A home next to the president's is set on fire,
in another day of inter-fighting 23 are reported killed,
over 50 injured
The situation is back to as it was at the height of fighting a few weeks ago. I was caught in the Erez terminal for some time while it came under attack by Qassam fire from Gaza. Leaving Gaza last week I was holed up for almost two hours as a Qassam hit the army compound just inside the Erez checkpoint. It seems these projectiles are becoming more accurate.
As Jamal and I drove away from Erez he stopped a vehicle coming from Gaza City to ask about the conditions of the road. The driver told us there were Hamas checkpoints all along Salahadin Street, the most direct route to our destination so we took a smaller road that runs through the industrial area. For me there is no fear with such checkpoints and yet Jamal was a bit concerned as he is affiliated with Fatah although not a high ranked or active member. In the car’s rearview mirror I watched the fear in Jamal’s eyes as he attempted to remove a sticker of Yasir Arafat that his son Daher had stuck on the inside of the windshield of his car. The image of the deceased leader was a clear indication of Jamal’s party affiliation. Bit by bit, for the next ten minutes Jamal managed to peel off parts of the image.
We drove on as Jamal received calls reporting about the situation near his home. A Fatah leader on his same street was under attack and masked Hamas’ men were at the door of his home; his oldest son Daher had called to inform him. Jamal warned Daher not to leave the house. Four people had died in Beit Hanoun, a town in the Northern Gaza Strip, basically as I was crossing the border into Gaza, a matter of kilometers away. We reached my home without further incident. I tried to pressure Jamal to stay but he wanted to try and reach home before nightfall.
15 minutes later I called Jamal a number of times without answer and got extremely worried. Before we reached my home a civilian from Beit Lahya, where Jamal was heading, reported on the radio that a taxi driver had been kidnapped. The scene kept going through my mind, as Jamal didn’t answer my calls. Eventually he picked up, in a bit of a panic. He had suddenly come across a Hamas checkpoint; he crossed it after they searched his car. With many more checkpoints ahead he decided to turn back and will stay at my place for the night.
Before the news broke, Jamal received the call, his 55 year old neighbor who was being sought had been killed. Jamal’s nephew was shot in the legs; he had to tell his brother to go look for him at the hospital.
This will mean an escalation over the next days. The hopelessness in Gaza has reached a pinnacle. The economic siege is again bringing some people in Gaza to a breaking point and the factions have reverted to a demonizing tribalism, each pouring the blame on the other. The inhumane conditions everyone is living are finally taking their toll, sadly the consequences are taking this desperate, revolting form.
Another dark day in Gaza.
Recently I have realized that I take my childhood for granted.
These days children in Gaza are finishing their final exams. The summer has finally arrived, but I wonder what tidings it will bring for most children? Few news outlets have reported statements made by the Israeli deputy prime minister calling for Israel to shut off water and electricity to the Gaza Strip. In Gaza everyone is mentioning it, for the rest of the world this is not news.
Last Wednesday two boys were in the North of the Gaza Strip hunting birds with nets. They were shot and killed by Israeli army snipers at the border. The boys were no older than 12. My friend Wessam who is a photographer was called to the scene by one of the ambulance drivers that tried to come to their rescue, but it was already too late.
Abu Salim, a friend of mine recently told me that his children have learned to hit the floor once they hear any form of gunfire or explosions. With Israeli tanks near by and planes flying overhead they have spent many nights recently sleeping on the ground. It’s safer there.
My friend Mohamed from Biddo, a village near Ramallah says he has not seen the sea for 15 years. When his son asks him why they can’t go, he doesn’t know what to say. Jamal in Gaza is afraid of taking his kids to the beach near his house because last summer a whole family was murdered there by shells from an Israeli navy ship.
Children in Gaza are sort of like animals in a zoo. They eat and drink what they are given, their cage is always closed and there is only so much they can do and only so far they can go inside this little space.
It doesn’t really matter if its winter or summer.
Two days ago Dr Attalah brought me a big bag of potatoes. At long last the risk he took early this year to restore and cultivate his land in the Northern Gaza Strip which included re-digging his old well and buying a new motor have paid off… and yet not without cost. Dr Attalah is still $5000 in debt, which he cannot pay off. And then, two weeks ago when the Israeli forces again occupied an area in the Northern Gaza Strip they tore up a quarter of his land, but thankfully no harm was done to the motor and well this time.
While there the Israeli forces were stationed in a house that lies on the boundaries of Dr Attalah’s land. The owner of the home knew the risk of it being occupied was great during incursions because of its location, so he built a roof that the army could use to be stationed on (I have never built a house or had one built for me, but I don’t think it’s the norm in housing construction to make plans for an army to occupy part of a home). The soldiers had other ideas though and tore down all the walls in the top floor in order to turn that into their headquarters instead of the roof. The family was detained in the bottom floor for the week, their movement severely restricted.
Dr Attalah finally visited his land yesterday after many weeks of the danger being too great. Sa’id Alattar, a farmer was killed on his bike on the path near the land. An Israeli sniper shot him in the back; he was dead on the spot.
Abu Rushdie, the farmer who is renting Dr Attalah’s land did not stop tending to it throughout the past weeks. He cannot afford the losses of skipping a days work, especially at such a critical stage of harvest. He could not afford to hide in fear. Abu Rushdie and his boys, who help him with the work had to get permission daily in order to reach the land. Some days they were held from doing so, for five days they were given from 7am to noon to tend to what remained of their crops, while the Israeli tanks and snipers looked on nearby.
Why was Hamas so determined to wipe out this “collaborative cell in Fatah”? To just touch on this question brings to the surface the deck’s Ace, a Dahlan funded hit man called Sameech Almadhoun, nicknamed “Almaleoun” (the cursed one) by many Hamas supporters. In the past weeks Hamas systematically executed his companions and leaders and finally Sameech himself after this small group of fighters wreaked havoc in their neighborhood in the Northern Gaza Strip.
