Jenin:

international | anti-capitalism | news report

Sunday October 12, 2003 23:01

by www.soundslikefreedom.org - sounds-like-freedom

sounds_like_freedom at yahoo dot co dot uk

Give me liberty or give me death

The last 8 days of reprisal, mass arrests and curfew in Jenin, Occupied Palestine

"give me liberty or give me death" - the walls of Jenin refugee camp.
for free information from Jenin, Occupied Palestine see www.soundslikefreedom.org
Jenin woke up smaller today (07/10/2003), missing 31
boys and men, arrested during the early hours of the
morning, about 17 from the refugee camp and 14 from
the city and outskirts. The tanks and APCs used in the
operation retreated at about 6 o'clock, while the men
were held in a house in Harat Sharkiyye, later to be
taken to Salem military base for interrogation. It was
an attack at anyone associated with the politics of Jihad Islami.

Families and friends now grieve for those brutally
wrenched from them this morning. Some have gone
through this process many times before, having either
lost other sons in similar operations or seen the same
son be incarcerated and released time and time again,
one as many as four times in the last year. Others are
left reeling from the shock of having had soldiers in
their house, cocking their guns and barking orders at
them, telling them to leave the house and go outside
in the middle of the night and then taking their
sons, brothers, fathers, and husbands with them,
mostly young boys 17-20 years old. One house had five
men taken from it, the youngest a boy of fifteen. The
soldiers beat him in front of his family and took him
away with blood streaming down his head. Two brothers
were taken from a family that lost two other sons to
Israeli prisons only six months back. Two young wives,
8- and 9 months pregnant respectively, are now left to
tend to their scared and sleep-deprived toddlers
without help from their husbands. The woman who is
nine months pregnant has three other children ubder
the age of five. One of her daughters was so
traumatised she couldn't look at me without crying, my
foreign-ness reminding her of the soldiers. Apart from
the obvious grief of losing a life-partner and parent,
they also fear the financial consequences that this
will bring. Maintaining a livelihood under an
occupation characterised by its long bouts of
crippling curfew and closure is hard enough as it is
when the family unit is whole and strong, but
imprisonment and killings deal further blows to a
fragile situation. Parents are found sifting through
cardboard boxes of photos of their sons, talking about
them as if they were dead only hours after their
unwarranted and brutal arrests. Others put on a brave
face, shrugging as they relate tales of past
detainments, kidnappings and beatings that have all> ended relatively well.
The family of Sheik Bassam, the political leader of

Islamic Jihad arrested only a week ago suffered
another loss, when the army came to take Izz, their
sixteen year old son. He is not wanted by the
Israelis, but the soldiers said that "his father is a
terrorist". Izz's mother has already had to endure the
deaths of her oldest sons, twins aged 17, who were
assassinated outside her house. Her remaining children
have had enough trauma but still the soldiers come and
take what and who they can. The next day they were
tired with wide eyes, talking quickly about the
soldiers taking their brother away. It is likely they
want to use Izz to make his father talk. He is anyway,
the last male left in the family of arrestable age,
though not of killing age as his cousin was killed> when he was only a baby.

The next day (the 8th of October 2003) saw the arrests
of twenty five more young men in Jenin, and the day
after that brought the arrest toll to 71 in three days.>

Report from 12/10/2003 in Jenin:>
Today is the eighth day of manata jawal (curfew) in a
row, with curfew having been lifted for only three or
four hours one day last week so people could stock upon supplies.
The IOF arrested the wife of Amjad Esa Badi (the Jenin
head of Saraya Al Quds- Jihad Islami's military wing),
a few days after their home was demolished. Following reports
in the Israeli press, the word on the street is that she, along with
certain close relatives to other political activists, is now to be exiled
to Gaza.

Today has been fairly quiet, and most of the shops are
open, but yesterday and the day before the army was
enforcing curfew. Hummers were chasing around trying
to arrest people, and tanks/ APCs were shooting a lot.
As far as I am aware, no one was shot yesterday, but
Mah'mod, a 14 year old from the refugee camp, climbed
on to a tank or APC and a soldier opened the hatch and
hit him in the head with his rifle. I was not there,
but he has a big bruise on his head and his family are
saying this is what happened.

The day before that two people were shot, a ten year
old boy and the kid who sells coffee on stone throwers
corner. He was shot in the knee by an APC. I don't know
when and where the ten year old boy was shot, but apparently he will be ok.

They have stopped the night time raids on Jihad Islami
members as far as I am aware (presumably because there
can't be that many men on their list they havn't
taken). There are still 60+ people languishing in
Salem though, and it is unsure what will happen to> them.

I assume you have already heard the news of at least 9
Palestinians killed in Rafah, Gaza , 70+ injured and
100 house demolitions since the area was invaded on
Thursday night. The Israelis are now pulling back from
their invasion of Rafah though, or so they claim, local sources contradict this.

There are already noticeable demographic gaps in the Jenin population, a massive amount of young men having either been arrested or forced into hiding and seclusion by Israeli suspicions. Many keep watch throughout the night, so as not to be caught unawares if or when the soldiers come, and then sleep away half the day. Others no longer stay in their families' houses, preferring to move around in the hope of fooling Israel intelligence services and their Palestinian collaborators. It's not in any way a long-term sustainable situation, causing great extended trauma to both those in hiding and their loved ones. When a man is wanted, common opinion is that it is not a matter of if but of when he will be caught. Resistance to the occupation will not be tolerated and the propaganda machine manufactures tales of terror to mask what is really going on - the taking and torturing of what are clearly political prisoners. Political prisoners with personal ambitions and dreams now shattered try passing through a checkpoint, boarding an airplane, getting a work
permit... with an Israeli police record of any kind), and with people who love them now fearing for their lives, thumbing their ID polaroid, talking about them in the past tense. Their loved ones sit in "cells" too low to stand or kneel in, being interrorgated, beaten, humiliated and threatened. It is the experience of any Palestinian woman who resists the ocupation of her land and every Palestinian man whether he resists or not, because whatever he does, the first lesson he must learn is in exactly whose hands the power lies. And nothing teaches you that better than prison, the most complete theft of your liberty possible, next to death.

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Comments (22 of 22)

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Which Jenin?

by avi H.

Mon Oct 13, 2003 04:02

Is this the same Jenin from where suicide bombers originate to kill Israeli women and children?

Amnesty International, in its report on Palestinian terrorism stated that "attacks on civilians are not permitted under any internationally recognized standard of law, whether they are committed in the context of a struggle against military occupation or any other context. Not only are they considered murder under general principles of law in every national legal system, they are contrary to fundamental principles of humanity which are reflected in the international humanitarian law. In the manner in which they are being committed in Israel and the Occupied Territories, they also amount to crimes against humanity." "Without Distinction. Attacks on Civilians by Armed Palestinian Groups" Amnesty International, 2001

In contrast, it is perfectly clear that the IDF does not as a policy directly target Palestinian civilians, otherwise it would be killing them in vast numbers, given its firepower. Could it be that the Israelis are simply acting in self-defence and that the Palestinians have brought all this misery down on themselves?

Avi is right

by Neo-Anarchist

Mon Oct 13, 2003 06:30

A well thought out argument, Avi and very true. The IDF does NOT deliberately target innocent civilians. It targets civilians which it KNOWS to be menbers of Arafat-backed paramilatary groups.

The deliberate targeting of innocent civilians by suicide bombers is repulsive and is a crime against natural justice. The Palestinian paramilitaries bring the scurity forces of the IDF onto themselves because of their avowed aim of annihilating the state of Israel.

We are repeatedly being shown biased articles like this one when it is clear that the IDF only targets houses known to belong to paramilitary members.

On the other hand, Plaestinian suicide bombers slaughter indiscriminately. It is barbaric and a crime.

Disregard for human life

by kokomero

Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:00

Palestinian children too numerous to mention, armed only with stones, or in many cases only with pens while sitting in their classrooms have been murdered in perverse "target practice" by IDF assassins armed with high-tech weapons sitting safely in their tanks, watchtowers or bunkers hundreds of meters away.

Explain that away if you can Avi. H. the self-confessed galil-toting goon and gloating participant in oppression and state-sanctioned murder!

Also the IDF shows a complete disregard for the lives of Palestinian civilians by using F16 and helicopter gunships to murder political opponents and their families as well as innocent bystanders.

Not even in their worst days in the north of Ireland did the British stoop to this level, for instance when two British soldiers were abducted and executed by the IRA after straying into a funeral the Brits did not start blowing up Sinn Fein offices or republican clubs in West Belfast.

The cruel occupation and brutal oppression of the Palestinian people by the Israelis must end as the annexation and occupation of Kuwait by the Iraqis had to end!

Wake me up

Mon Oct 13, 2003 22:13

when this idiot says something based on fact. The disproportionate number of Palestinian casualties is the result both of the sheer number of Palestinians involved in violence and of untrained mobs and militia facing off against a well-trained regular army. Typically, IDF squads of less than 20 will be attacked by hundreds of assailants, armed with rocks (and the rocks can be fairly big), Molotov cocktails, grenades, explosives, pistols, assault rifles, machine guns. Most of the participants are boys and young men, although Palestinian policemen are often involved. Faced with an angry mob, rubber bullets and, unfortunately, live fire can be the only way to neutralize the threat; and if it is necessary to use aircraft or helicopters to hit terrorists about to commit atrocities against Israelis, that will always happen too. You see, if you do the maths, you will find this always saves lives overall; espcially, as the terrorists just want to kill Jews and past experience shows they cannot be placated by any amount of concessions.

Incidentally, the PA has used many schools to encourage attacks against Israelis. Caches of knives, clubs and iron bars are frequently found hidden in school buildings. To hit an Israeli car with some missile is regarded as heroic. That's why a lot of schools have been closed down.

All this is part of the total militarisation of the Palestinian population thrust on it by its truly depraved leadership and the pyscho terrorist groups it is in bed with. If he still could, which somehow I doubt very much, I bet Arafat, compulsive liar of genius, ex-KGB agent and pal of Ceauscescu, would get a hard-on just thinking of all the Jews he has been responsible for murdering down the years, one way or another.

Hitting an Israeli car with a rock IS heroic...

by David C.

Tue Oct 14, 2003 03:29

The Palestinian population is in the same situation that the European Jewish population was in in about 1939, except that the Palestinians know what's coming.

Here are the long term options for Israel:

#1: Give back the stolen land in the occupied territories (i.e. obey the Geneva Convention, UN Security council res 242, etc)..

#2: Exterminate or ethnicaly cleanse 4 million people..

Anyone who pays any attention to this knows which one the likudniks have chosen...

Like the heros of the Warsaw ghetto before them, the Palestinian are justified is fighting back in whatever way they can...

No. Targeting of civilians is never justified

by Jihadi

Tue Oct 14, 2003 03:48

"Whatever way the can" is WRONG. It is an act of evil to deliberately target civilians anywhere, in any conflict. If the Palestinians targeted military personnel only, then they might actuallt gain some sympathy in the world. Right now, all they're doing is handing Sharon a license to take wahever measures he likes, including fencing and demolishing homes.

A question...

Tue Oct 14, 2003 04:41

Would it have been morally acceptable to have targeted the families of SS officers during the Warsaw intifada in 1943? - say if you thought it might drive the germans out of the city?

I don't have an easy answer - I'm just asking. I don't think these are easy issues...

Well trained?

Tue Oct 14, 2003 09:56

The IOF in the occupied territories is not well trained for the situation they are in ie peace-keeping, and furthermore neither they nor their political leaders in the Knesset have any interest in keeping the peace as is obvious.

Killing civilians as any moron should know does nothing to enhance Israeli security, as if we should believe in any case that a 12 year old boy is any threat to the Israeli state, and even less so to a soldier with body armour, helmet and M16.

From the number of children killed in protests and schools it can only be concluded that the Israelis having learned nothing from the past and are now engaged in a deliberate campaign of infanticide against the Palestinian people.

Coupled with the latest race-laws preventing Palestinians resident in Israel from marrying, and the apartheid wall it looks more and more like "Arbeit macht frei" for the Palestinians under Israeli occupation!

Peace in Israel and Palestine...

Tue Oct 14, 2003 21:30

The Geneva Accords show that peace is possible...
The moderate center of Israeli and Palestinian politics is rallying behind the Geneva Accords - a detailed, realistic plan for peace negotiated by respected negotiators on both sides.

How will the extremist killers in Hamas and Likud react?
Both Arafat and Peres have tentitively supported these Accords, which were negotiated by the Oslo Accord negotiators without official support. The Accords will be signed in geneva next months, then mailed out to every household in Israel and Palestine. It is probable that the vast majority of people on both sides will enthusiasticaly embrace the plan.

But Hamas, Likud and the other ghouls of the region will likely fight to the death against this plan for peace.

How can the world support the Geneva Accords and the people of Israel and Palestine to find a just peace?

See
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4968.htm

Geneva Accords

Wed Oct 15, 2003 11:06

For the time being, these mean totally zilch, as they do not have the backing of any of those with real power over the Palestinians, namely: Arafat, Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Syria and Iran. If they are soft, strong and thoroughly absorbent, though, they might be good as toilet paper. This is something, as they must surely be running out in the Muqata (Arafat's compound) by now.

By the way, it is an open secret that Arafat is dying from heart disease. I have heard that he is now 'sinking fast' and has been attended by King Abdullah's doctors. Needless to say, when he does die, it will be blamed on an Israeli murder plot.

Fight the power

Wed Oct 15, 2003 12:35

As usual you seem to take us all for complete idiots and are not telling the truth.

The people who really control the middle east are the Americans through their Israeli proxy, and until they have an interest in long term peace there will be none.

In the meantime it suits the Israelis very well to have a divided and impotent Palestinian leadership (and middle-east at large) as this allows them to continue establishing "facts" on the ground such as the annexation of large swathes of territory in the Wesk bank using the wall as a "security" device as cover.

Let us not forget that Israel has already admitted to supporting Hamas in the past as part of it's divide and conquer strategy, and unsubstantiated personal attacks against the Palestinian leadership such as your allegations of theft from state coffers, impotence and heart-disease are just another facet of it!

Of course these same "facts" will then be brought into play in setting the ground rules for a highly asymmetric peace-agreement in favour of the Israelis, and/or massive levels of compensation for Israel for the dismantling of these same "facts".

While this continues the 400,000 Palestinians ethnically cleansed from their homes and lands in 1948 get nothing and will probably languish for another 50 years in refugee camps under the yoke of Israeli oppression.

Wed Oct 15, 2003 16:41

The do mean zilch 'for the time being' (they haven't even been signed yet), but Arafat has said good things about them and so has Peres. The warmongers and die-hard land thieves on both sides will hate, but the people might demand it. It will be mailed to all households on both sides and the polls show that majorities on both sides see a just peace along approximately these lines.

Watch Likud nazis and Hamas goons rachet up the blood and gore if peace seems possible. Why have peace when you can have land?

Arafat

Wed Oct 15, 2003 18:39

This man never lies, obviously.

Avi's Back

by yay

Wed Oct 15, 2003 19:06

Yay! Go Zionism, go.

Both interesting and sad

Thu Oct 16, 2003 00:52

how people on this site use Zionism as a swear word. It is simply the connection of the Jews to their homeland; and by the way, most of Israel's Jewish population does not originate in Europe or the US at all: Instead, they were driven out of Arab countries by discrimination and murder.

Zionism...

Thu Oct 16, 2003 02:07

Zionism is the connection of the zionist Jews (not all jews) to their new (i.e. since 1948) homeland and also to the homeland of the Palestinians - a connection that is now enforced with techniques that are very reminicent of those used by the nazis and by aparthied south africa..

The vast majority of people of the world, including most arab peoples and most palestinians, accept zionism regarding Israel's pre-1967 borders, although issues of compensation for land lost in the 1940's remain. This is no longer an issue for anyone except a few extremist nuts in terrorist groups.

But the zionism of 'greater israel' - i.e. the outright theft/colonization of the west bank, gaza, etc - is as sociopathicly facist as anything done by hitler and is evil to its core. This new, evil, Israel is quite capable of exterminating 4 million palestinians in the modern equivalents of work camps and gas chambers - in fact many, many of israel's senior leaders speak publicly about doing just that.

I used to think of 'Plucky little Israel' as heroic and good. Now I think of it as a diseased monster that personifies evil - all because of the settlements - and I am not alone in how my thinking about israel has changed. The colonization of the occupied territories is destroying israel. It is making israel a moral leper that is not worth defending.

Mistaken

Thu Oct 16, 2003 10:43

I don't think anybody on this site has anything against Zionism as an idea, even when it comes to an Israeli state within the 1967 borders as demanded by the UN.

The problem is when this idea gets translated into fact. If you adopt a consistently arrogant and myopic position based on the primacy of the rights of Jews and Israelis above all others, you can rightly expect criticism.

As for swearing I see only one person in this forum who consistently hands out personal abuse!

On the subject of Likud and Hamas both baying for blood, don't forget who funded Hamas in the past, they are one and the same!

The Zionist dirty tricks department is very resourceful and will stoop to any depth to undermine the Palestinian leadership as will be shown when the truth about yesterdays fatal attack on US observers emerges.

You should read some history

Thu Oct 16, 2003 15:26

The Jews have continuously inhabited the land of Israel for over 2,500 years - since well before the start of the Arabs as a people. Jewish independence in Israel in ancient times lasted for hundreds of years. Palestine was never an exclusively Arab country. No independent Arab or Palestinian state ever existed there. Traditionally, the Arabs considered Palestine as part of Syria. Moreover, the Arab Higher Committee to the UN in 1947 stated that 'politically, the Arabs of Palestine were not independent in the sense of forming a separate political entity.' Palestinian Arab nationalism did not become a significant political movement until after the 1967 war. Palestinian claims to be descended from Canaanites are a recent phenomenon and contrary to the historical evidence, as it is quite clear that the Canaanites died out three milennia ago.

The Balfour Declaration issued by Britain in 1917 was part of Britain's League of Nations Mandate for the territory. It specifically referred to 'the historical connections of the Jewish people with Palestine' and to the moral validity of 'reconstituting their National Home in that Country'. Furthermore, the British were instructed to 'use their best endeavours to facilitate ' Jewish immigration , to encourage settlement on the land and to 'secure' the Jewish national home. The word 'Arab' does not figure in the award of the Mandate. The Mandate was accepted by the 52 governments of the League of Nations in 1922.

The territory involved included both Israel, the West Bank and Jordan. (Jordan was East Palestine, Israel and the West Bank was West Palestine.) Subsequently, the British reneged on their commitment to the League and gave Jordan, 3/4 of the land area originally allotted as the Jews'national home, to the Arabs. In Jordanian citizens are to this today not permitted to be Jews, nor does the PA want Jews living in the West Bank, all of which is very racist. Israel allows muslims to live in Israel, in contrast.

Israel has been prepared to give up its strong claims to the West Bank in return for peace but no peace has been forthcoming from the Palestinians. We tried and we tried to make peace with these wild people. If it goes on this way, especially after all the efforts that the Palestinians have been making to annihilate us, they will lose out, as we will just wall them off inside the West Bank and Gaza for good. They can then stew in their own juices, can't they, because we won't be providing them with the jobs we used to or anything else for that matter. As Aba Eban, Israel's foreign minister years ago, once said, 'The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.' I agree. What a bunch of losers they are.

Basically

Thu Oct 16, 2003 16:29

It is impossible to make peace with a people who dispatch suicide bombers and teach their youth to hate.

The Palestinians are not fucked by Israel; they are fucked by their own leaders and those of Arab countries.

It's history but not as we know it

Thu Oct 16, 2003 17:21

Firstly Palestine was not the Brits to give away so this does not legitimise Israels claim to anything.

Your looking for legitimacy to the League of Nations, an organisation which sold out the Polish and Czechoslovakians, and lead to Hitlers extermination of the Jews, is frankly, hilarious.

The Palestinians were expelled by the Zionists from the land they had inhabited for centuries and they have a right to a home and compensation as a result. The Israelis already have theirs gained through ethnic cleansing and their squatter state has been recognised, not content with that they want to steal more land from the Palestinians, how neighbourly!

Israel allows Muslims to live in Israel as long as they are content to be quasi-citizens with no right to marry whom they wish, this hardly qualifies as equal citizenship as we know it. Jordan at least has the excuse that Jews have already taken enough of their territory already, and the same goes for the Palestinians in the West bank.

Israel has no claim to the West Bank under any of the UN resolutions going back to 1948, end of story.

Israel is actually the country bent on the political/military annihilation of its neighbours (why else do they need spy sats, nukes, WMD, assassination squads etc.) and any such claims about the Arabs are fanciful pipe-dreams at best and lies at worst.

Get back to your pre-1967 borders and join the real world!

Hmmmm.

Thu Oct 16, 2003 20:20

It's interesting how the 'greater israel' zionists rarely actually blame the palestinian people themselves for resisting occupation. They talk about palestinians being 'taught to hate', or being 'fucked by their own leaders'. They seem to believe that if only those few extremists could be removed then the palestinian people would gladly submit to slavery or ethnic cleansing or extermination... Was that how it was with the heros of the Warsaw ghetto too? (I bet the germans thought so)...

Jews have lived continously in Italy, France, Greece, etc for thousands of years too, but that doesn't mean its OK to steal land there - even if the Brits say its OK.

The racist white south africans used to claim that there were no blacks in South Africa when their ancestors showed up in the 17th century. Even israelis used to talk about 'a land without people for a people without land' - despite the centuries of palestinain fields, homes, ruins, etc. right in front of their eyes. It is interesting how clear and obvious lies often work as well as subtle lies...

Be honest. This conflict is about land, land, land, land, land. Despite having won their own state, the Likudnik israelies want more of it, and they are fully prepared to join with the nazis in sociopathic amoral hell to get it...

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