1. Putin sets tough conditions for Chechen peace talks
MOSCOW, Sept 7 (AFP) - President Vladimir Putin on Friday said that he would agree to peace talks with Chechen separatists fighting Russian troops, but only if the rebel leadership surrendered its weapons.
"Talks are always better than any military actions, and we are prepared to enter into contact with anyone," he told a gathering of regional leaders in southern Russia, in televised comments.
But despite a softer tone than in the past -- when he has flatly ruled out any talks with breakaway Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov -- Putin laid down two preconditions certain to be rejected by the rebel side.
He said negotiations could only take place if the Chechen guerrillas accepted Russian sovereignty and after "the surrender of weapons by all bandit formations and the handover of particularly odious bandits ... who have Russian blood on their hands."
A liberal Russian member of parliament, Boris Nemtsov, has suggested holding peace talks with Maskhadov to end the nearly two-year-old guerrilla war, which claims Russian soldiers' lives every day.
Maskhadov was elected as president of the separatist republic in 1996 in a poll overseen by the OSCE, the pan-European security body, but Moscow said it no longer recognized his legitimacy when it sent in troops in October 1999.
Putin, speaking in the neighbouring republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, meanwhile called on inhabitants of the North Caucasus to support the Russian state and bring an end to years of conflict and confrontation with the central government in Moscow.
"We have to get away from the conception of the North Caucasus as permanently associated with conflict and confrontation. I am confident that this can be done. Kabardino-Balkaria illustrates this," he said.
"The time for the protest democracy of the 1990s has gone and we must proceed to developing the state," Putin told the meeting in Kislovodsk, quoted by Russian news agencies.
The Russian president also said that unless more Chechens could be persuaded to join Russian law enforcement agencies which are fighting the separatist rebels and have been accused of widespread abuses against civilians, unrest in the breakaway republic would not die down.
"What are we going to build in Chechnya? Will we build and then tomorrow bomb and again destroy?," he said.
"It is clear that we won't achieve anything unless we give the Chechen people the chance to work in law enforcement bodies and security services," Putin said.
He asserted that seven gubernatorial elections to be held in the region in 2002 would be a serious test for both the North Caucasus and Russia.
In Chechnya "people have emerged for whom the interests of the population are the first priority and who are not afraid of becoming targets of bandits," the president added.
Pro-independence guerrillas in Chechnya have assassinated dozens of Chechens working for the pro-Moscow administration and police, branding them as traitors.
Putin arrived in Kabardino-Balkaria on Thursday, seen as an anniversary of independence for separatist Chechens.
On September 6, 1991, militiamen loyal to Dzokhar Dudayev, who became the first breakaway president in Chechnya, stormed the Supreme Soviet, one of the main organs of Soviet power.
2. No Paper More Pro-Israeli Than Times, Says Former Journalist
Islamic Republic News Agency(IRNA)
Posted Friday September 7, 2001 - 10:02:45 AM EDT
London - Former Middle East correspondent for The Times, Sam Kiley, says that he resigned from the daily last month because it was the most pro-Zionist newspaper, which robbed him of his ability to report on the Palestinian intifada "No newspaper has been so happy to hand the keys of the armoury over to one side than The Times, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News International," he said.
Kiley said that Murdoch was not only a "close friend of Ariel Sharon, Israel's prime minister," but that he had also "invested heavily in Israel." "The Times' foreign editor and other middle managers flew into hysterical terror every time a pro-Israel lobbying group wrote in with a quibble or complaint and then usually took their side against their own correspondent," he said.
In an article for the London Evening Standard Wednesday, the former Times correspondent detailed how the paper's editors deleted words and phrases to "rob its reporters of the ability to make sense of what was going on" in the occupied territories.
"I was told I should not refer to 'assassinations' of Israel's opponents, nor to 'extrajudicial killings or executions'," he said, References that "Jewish colonies on the West Bank and in Gaza were illegal under international law" were deemed "gratuitous," he added.
Kiley also referred to one of his reports mentioning Sharon's "hard-line government" and to a Palestinian village being "hemmed in on three sides" by settlements being "ripped out of the paper after the first edition" because such terms were seen as "unacceptable." "No pro-Israel lobbyist ever dreamed of having such power over a great national newspaper. They didn't need to. Murdoch's executives were so sacred of irritating him," he said.
The former Times journalist also confirmed reports that the pro-Israel lobby had forced the BBC and CNN in particular to agonise over the use of loaded terms were "cerainly true." In the last few weeks, it has been claimed that the BBC has dropped the use of 'Israeli assassination' and CNN 'illegal Jewish settlements' because of pressure from the pro-Zionist lobby.
"In war, words are a weapons, we all know that. And few belligerents have been so good at hijacking language to its own cause than Israel," Kiley said.
Dar Es Salam - Police in Dar Es Salaam have arrested seven Muslims for entering into courtroom while full equipped in an attempt to initiate chaos to pressurize for the release of their colleagues who are apparently facing court charges for staging an illegal demonstration mid last month.
Armed Muslims were arrested mid this week at the Dar Es Salaam-based Kisutu Resident Magistrate's Court hiding screwdrivers, knives, when 41 Muslims were brought before the court for the second hearing. The police, according to the Dar Es Salaam Regional Police Commander, Mr. Alfred Tibaigana, decided to conduct a body search because the Muslims had earlier threatened to initiate chaos aimed at fleeing their colleagues.
He said Women Muslims had threatened in their recent meeting held in the city that they would carry stones, knives and other weapons and asked support of men to defend them from the police attack. Following the tight security mounted by the police everyone who attended court session was thoroughly searched in which five men and two women Muslims were arrested.
They were found holding weapons. According to him, it is illegal to hold a weapon when one went to listen case proceeding. He said police were still interrogating the suspects and they would be taken to court if they will be found to have charges to answer.
About 170 Dar Es Salaam residents were arrested on August 24 when Muslim zealots were holding illegal demonstrations. Out of them, 41 are facing court charges for various counts including bombing of buildings. Offices of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) were blasted during the demonstrations aimed at fleeing one Sheikh Khamis Rajab Dibagula for defaming Christianity. Dibagula was jailed for 18 months by Morogoro District Court two months ago.
Meanwhile on Tuesday the Court denied bail to the accused Muslims for the second time saying for the sake of their safety and that of other Dar Es Salaam residents. The accused were charged with unlawful assembly, neglecting or refusing to obey a lawful order, unlawful demonstration in public places, arson, causing grievous harm malicious language, damage to property and walking in public while armed.
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4. Belgium suspends war crimes probe of Ariel Sharon
By Reuters
September 7, 2001
BRUSSELS - Belgium has suspended a probe of Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon for alleged crimes against
humanity pending an appeals court ruling on its
legality, the lawyer for the state said Friday.
Lawyer Michele Hirsch said that the examining
magistrate in the case, Patrick Collignon, had
temporarily halted his investigation and asked an
appeals court to decide whether he has jurisdiction in
the matter.
Collignon opened a probe against Sharon in early July
after finding merit in two complaints filed against
the prime minister for his alleged role in a 1982
massacre of Palestinians by Lebanese militiamen at the
Sabra and Chatila refugee camps.
Hirsch has argued that the investigation breached
Israel's sovereignty because the case had already been
decided when an 1983 state inquiry found Sharon, then
5. US to Grant Israel $65 Million Each Year for Missile-Defense Technology
Middle East News Online
By Fady Alhur, Middle East News Online Reporter
Posted Friday September 7, 2001 - 05:34:35 PM EDT
WASHINGTON (MENO) - Following on the footsteps of the Untied States Israel is now working on its own missile defense system.
It is Israel's hope to protect the country with three batteries of Arrow anti-missile installations by the end of the decade, according to officials. A formal delegation is in Washington to celebrate with President George Bush the news of a successful Aug. 27 testing.
Israel, whose economy is in shamble as a result of the violence, would spend $2 billion to $2.5 billion on the Arrow missile shield by the end of the decade.
Bush pledged $65 million to support the project this year.
Much more US money will be poured into the project in coming years, but visiting officials is seeking more in order "to cope with an accelerating missile threat." Israel is claiming that Iraq, Iran and Syria are posing a threat to its security.
A Middle East expert in Washington told middleeastwire.com on condition of anonymity that Israel's allegations are ridicules.
"In the last several years, it was Israel who threatened the security of its neighbors, striking Lebanon regularly, killing Palestinians and Syrians, and was cough spying on Iran and Iraq," he said.
"It's a shame that our administration will pour hundreds of millions of dollars to back Israel's fantasies while our welfare system is collapsing, and hundreds of thousands of homeless Americans crowed our streets," he added.
At the Israeli Embassy Dan Peretz, director of the Arrow program, said Israel is preparing for an attack of hundreds of missiles.
"The process is accelerating. It is not a hypothetical threat. We know that we need it and we know that we need it fast," he added.
"The threat we face in the Middle East is a real one. We are emphasizing the readiness of the Israeli Arrow project to counter this threat." But Israel is already making plans to profit from the project as the official indicated, saying that Arrow technology eventually may be sold to Turkey, India and other countries.
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6. Milosevic refuses UN-appointed lawyers
BELGRADE, Sept 7 (AFP) - Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic has refused assistance from three lawyers appointed by the UN war crimes court because he is convinced they will conspire against him, one of his Yugoslav lawyers said Friday.
Zdenko Tomanovic, one of Milosevic's Yugoslav lawyers, told the Tanjug news agency that his client had told him in a telephone conversation Thursday that he did not "recognize the three-member legal team and will refuse any contact with them."
"Milosevic was emphatic that all of the lawyers... would serve as accomplices in a rigged political process" against him, Tomanovic said.
Milosevic has warned the lawyers that they are "taking a huge moral responsibility as accomplices in a process of reprisal against the leader who has opposed NATO," Tomanovic quoted the former Yugoslav president as saying.
The UN war crimes tribunal based in The Hague on Thursday appointed Branislav Tapuskovic, a Yugoslav, Steven Kay, a Briton, and Mischa Wladimiroff, from The Netherlands, as "friends of the court" to assist Milosevic following his refusal to appoint a defence team.
The three will not be representing Milosevic, as during his last appearance before the tribunal on August 30 he again refused to be represented before the tribunal, saying the court was illegal.
However, Judge Richard May announced at the time he would appoint a legal assistant to help the defendant in future court appearances.
One of the three, Tapuskovic, was quoted by daily Danas on Friday that he had not yet contacted Milosevic or his family, adding that he had accepted the role to contribute to a fair trial.
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7. Russians say Israel must return occupied territories
MOSCOW, Sept 7 (AFP) - Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told the visiting Palestine Liberation Organization number-two Mahmud Abbas on Friday that Moscow wants Israel to return "occupied Arab territories."
Ivanov's meeting with Abbas, known by his nom de guerre of Abu Mazen, came one day after the completion of a three-day visit to Moscow by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Russian officials said nothing in public about Israel's military presence in Palestinian territories during Sharon's Moscow stay.
Ivanov said that the Middle East peace process must include "the Palestinians' right to self-determination and the creation of its own state, as well as the return of occupied Arab territories."
At the same time Ivanov underlined that a peace deal must ensure the long-term security of both the Palestinians and the Israelis.
Such a deal should "ensure even and permanent security of all the states and people of the region, both Arabs and the Israelis,' Ivanov said.
The top Russian diplomat repeated Moscow's support for the peace plan drafted by former US senator George Mitchell and stressed that Russia, a co-sponsor of the decade-old peace process, saw only a political solution to the conflict.
Russia "is deeply concerned by the dramatic events in the Middle East, and especially those surrounding the Palestinian territories," Ivanov said.
"We are convinced that the conflict does not have a military solution, and can only be solved through diplomatic means."
Separately, Moscow announced that President Vladimir Putin's top Middle East envoy, Vladimir Vdovin, would leave for the region on Sunday to hold a new round of talks with both Palestinian and Israeli authorities.
Russia has sought to re-assert its role in the stalled peace process, with Palestinian sources telling Russian news agencies earlier Friday that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat would shortly make another visit to Moscow.
"There is no reason to make special preparations for such a visit," added Ivanov. "If it is needed, no obstacle stand in its way."
Putin struck a cautious tone during his meeting with Sharon, refusing to add his voice to widespread condemnation of Israel's hardline tactic in its clampdown on an 11-month Palestinian uprising in the region.
The Russian leader condemned international terrorism, adding that he and Sharon had some things in common because Russia was now fighting "terrorists" in breakaway Chechnya.
Abbas on his arrival in Moscow was quick to stress that separatist Muslim guerrillas in the North Caucasus had little in common with the Palestinians in the Middle East.
"There is absolutely no similarity between us Palestinians and the Wahabites who are fighting in Chechnya," Abbas told NTV television.
The television station, in a commentary, remarked that Israeli and Palestinian officials have engaged in a "tug of war over Russia's role in the Middle East peace process."
8. Kenyan Muslims in show of support to Palestinians
MOMBASA, Kenya, Sept 7 (AFP) - Hundreds of Kenyan Muslims took to the streets here Friday to show solidarity with Palestinians, who they said are victims of Israeli and US oppression.
"Mankind is today crying that peace shall prevail in Palestine, but America and Israel are guilty of killing Muslims with their skewed policies," said Sheikh Ali Shee, the chairman of Kenya's Council of Imams.
The demonstrators set Israeli and US flags on fire amid chants of "Allahu Akbar (God is Greater)" and "Death to Zionists and Great Satan (a reference to the United States)" soon after the afternoon prayers.
JERUSALEM, Sept 7 (AFP) - Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's approval rating has jumped sharply in recent weeks, according to an opinion poll by the daily Maariv published Friday.
The poll, conducted during a period of escalating tension, showed 59 percent support for Sharon's performance as prime minister six months after his government of national unity was installed, compared to 49 percent in a similar poll in mid-August.
Dissatisfaction with Sharon stood at 32 percent in the latest survey, down six points, while nine percent expressed no opinion.
The hawkish prime minister made his strongest advance on the security front, with 53 percent of Israelis supporting his handling of security issues, against 38 percent previously.
Opposition to his security measures was down to 40 percent from 53 percent.
If elections, expected in November 2003, were held now, the poll showed Sharon would beat former rightwing leader Benjamin Netanyahu with 40 percent of the vote to 29 percent.
He would crush either of the two candidates battling to head the Labour Party, with 50 percent of the vote to 17 percent against Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer, and beating Parliament Speaker Avraham Burg by 51 percent to 20 percent.
Israelis have a slight preference for Ben Eliezer as the next Labour Party leader with the survey giving him 39 percent backing to 31 percent for Burg.
In this week's party leadership election, the moderate Burg headed the hawkish Ben Eliezer by 1.7 percentage points, but the official result is on hold while the party investigates Ben Elizer's complaints of fraud.
The Maariv poll, carried out by the Gallup organisation, covered 593 Israelis and has a margin of error of 4.5 percent.
Posted Thursday September 6, 2001 - 10:15:43 AM EDT
Jerusalem - MUCH HAS changed since an 18-year-old Ali Jeddah planted a bomb on Strauss Street in West Jerusalem, injuring nine Israelis. That was in 1968, just one year after Israel won the June 1967 War and occupied the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, and several months after the establishment of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Ali was one of its newest and most loyal followers - a role for which he would pay a heavy price.
Ali was sentenced to 20 years in prison for his actions. He was released 17 years later in the prisoner exchange of 1985 between Israel and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command under Ahmad Jibril, who was holding three Israeli soldiers hostage.
From its beginnings, the PFLP had high ambitions. Adopting a Marxist-Leninist philosophy, it praised the working class, socialism, class struggle and above all, armed struggle against the Zionist enemy. Like all Palestinian factions at the time, including the Palestine Liberation Organization's mainstream Fateh movement, it called for the liberation of all of historical Palestine - "from the river to the sea" - from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean.
In 1968, the PFLP carried out its first major operation. Commandos from the Front hijacked an Israeli El Al 707 aircraft en route from Rome to Tel Aviv, forcing it to land in Algiers. The passengers were taken hostage and the hijackers called in their ransom.
The PFLP demanded that 16 Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli jails be released in exchange for the hostages' freedom. Only a month later did Israel acquiesce, marking a sweeping victory for the Front and a humiliating defeat for Israel.
Since then, the Popular Front has been a bothersome thorn in Israel's side. Based out of Damascus and under the command of the distinguished white-haired physician George Habash, better-known as "Al Hakeem," the PFLP kept its hard-line philosophy of liberation, maintaining a large enough stronghold inside the occupied Palestinian territories and the Palestinian refugee camps in Syria, Lebanon and Jordan.
Following the November, 1988 declaration of Palestinian statehood in Algiers on only 22 percent of historic Palestine - i.e. the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem - the PFLP, along with other marginal leftist factions and Islamic movements, rose to the forefront of the Palestinian opposition. Up until the early 90s, just prior to the Oslo Accords, the leftist faction second only in the Palestine Liberation Organization to Yasser Arafat's Fateh was able to maintain a respectable seven to eight percent of student council votes in most West Bank universities, the microcosm of Palestinian political representation.
In one exceptional year - 1993 - the PFLP coupled with the Islamic resistance movement Hamas in the Birzeit University student council elections. The victory was a tremendous blow to Fateh, which traditionally wins the presidency and most of the 51 seats. But the fact that the PFLP had to team up with a movement nearly antithetical to its ideological beliefs was a sign of waning confidence.
"Until 1989, the PFLP was still active," explains Jeddah, in reference to the front's armed struggle against Israel. "But after 1989, it began to drop - especially since the Oslo Accords." The 1994 Oslo Accords, signed between Israel and the PLO marked a drastic turning point in the history of the Palestinian liberation movement. Not only had the leadership recognized Israel's right to exist, it had now signed an ambiguous agreement that might - at best - promise the Palestinians a state.
"I think one of the most serious and negative results of the Oslo Accords was that there was a re-collapse of the entire national liberation movement," says Jeddah.
No doubt, the Popular Front was deeply affected. Jeddah says the entire front was "struck by a thunder bolt" when the accords were signed. Even George Habash would reportedly sit with his closest confidantes back in Damascus expressing his shock over Arafat's actions. "Imagine that if such a leader - with such a rich history and experience - had been hit so hard, what do you think was the case for the average person?" Jeddah asks.
Professor of political science at Birzeit University Ali Jarbawi attributes the Front's decline in popularity and in action to other internal and external factors.
"All the Palestinian leftist movements lost rank following the collapse of the Soviet Union and later, after the negotiations process began," he says. These two factors, he contends, combined with the Front's ideology calling for the liberation of all of Palestine were what led to the sharp decrease in its support, especially inside the occupied Palestinian territories.
"The demands of the people inside were [for the] minimum," he explains, referring to the Palestinians of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. "They wanted an end to the occupation, a state, and they were ready to concede to Israel." He says it is this contrast between these people "who had a lot to lose" and the leadership of the Front outside of Palestine "who had nothing to lose and were therefore more radical" that caused a growing distance between the two. "People just didn't buy it anymore," Jarbawi says of the PFLP's ideology.
Jeddah maintains that the problem lies more with the leadership inside - i.e. the Palestinian Authority - and the people with whom they have fallen out of trust. He says this overall mistrust is what is damaging the strength of the revolution as a whole.
"I go to the Balou area in Al Bireh [City Inn junction] often. The leaders go [and] each one sends his men to call one of the television crews to make declarations and then they leave those youngsters to be shot." But the real turning point in the PFLP's history was the return of its then deputy secretary-general Mustapha Al Zibri, or Abu Ali Mustapha in 1999. One year later he was elected secretary general when the ailing Habash resigned.
Mustapha was well-known throughout the Palestinian territories and in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon and Syria as Habash's second-hand man and a PFLP loyalist. As such, his return to the autonomous Palestinian territories at the request of President Arafat was seen by many as a shocking comedown.
Jeddah is wary of making harsh statements about the move, especially in light of Israel's recent assassination of the leftist leader. But it is clear that he, like many other PFLP members, were far from pleased.
"I had my own criticisms," he says carefully, dragging heavily on his cigarette. "Even to the last day of the mourning period I would say that my only criticism is that Abu Ali Mustapha came back because he came back under the umbrella of the Oslo Accords." Jeddah, however, does not believe that the return - which was certainly coordinated with the PFLP's Damascus leadership - caused a major split in the movement. "I know as a fact, that although a lot of young comrades did not like the way that Abu Ali Mustapha came back, they stayed and went on to become members of the PFLP." So, why then did Israel choose to assassinate him? Other than participation in popular demonstrations and a series of car bombs in the past few months in which no Israelis were killed or injured, the PFLP and its leader have kept a relatively low profile.
Both Jeddah and Jarbawi have similar views as to why Israel decided to hit the Front where it would hurt the most. "The Israelis are not stupid," says Jeddah. "They realized that the PFLP was like a pyramid that was on the edge of collapsing." Mustapha was, to them and most likely also to the Front, the man who came to save this pyramid from falling.
"After he became the secretary-general," says Jarbawi, "it seems he began to organize the PFLP from inside and move it more towards the radical wing of the Front." The activist and the political analyst are in agreement- as is most of the Palestinian street - that Mustapha's assassination was a message from Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to the Palestinian leadership. "They wanted to send a political message, especially to [President] Arafat that the level of the confrontation has been raised to the leadership level and that no one is immune," says Jarbawi.
No doubt the message was received. The PFLP leader was struck by two laser-guided missiles launched from Apache helicopters as they hovered over the Ramallah skies. His body - decapitated - was shrouded in the Palestinian flag and an estimated 50,000 Palestinians marched in his funeral calling for a continuation of the Intifada and revenge for the death of their leader.
The question remains as to whether the Front - already struggling to keep its head above water - will be able to pick itself up after this staggering blow.
Jarbawi says the most important urgent factor is whether the PFLP can maintain its cohesion and prevent an internal split. If so, he says that the Front has a lot to work with.
"There is a lot of sympathy with the PFLP right now," he says. "If they take advantage of this, they can benefit tremendously." He also says that if the Front chooses to resume its operations outside of Palestine - reminiscent of activities in the 1960s and 70s, they will also find a wide popular platform in the territories that support them.
Still, he cautions, the Popular Front should never expect to regain its past glory.
"Like I said, the entire Palestinian left was delivered a blow and the Front did not allow for internal reform in terms of its ideology." Still, Palestinians may yet get a taste of what the Popular Front might have offered if only the winds of change had blown in its direction. -Published 5/9/01 (c)Palestine Report Palestine Report - "Palestine's Only Independent News Digest" published weekly by the Jerusalem Media and Communications Center (JMCC). Full version available by subscription only. To subscribe please visit our website at http://www.jmcc.org/media/reportonline.
Israel is paying a price -- and this is not a reference to economics. But even so the price being paid by the Palestinians is immensely greater.
Israel continues to create facts on the ground that as in the past will determine the foreseeable future. More settlements, more "aliyah" (Jewish imigration to Israel from abroad), more military advances, and now more fences and barricades to further divide and imprison the Palestinian population within the overall military occupation. True, Israel is suffering, especially in terms of international reputation. But this has happened before, and each time the Israelis have managed to repair the damage through intensive media warfare, public relations blitzes, and diplomatic chicanery. The Palestinians on the other hand continue speaking mostly to themselves and have yet to develop any powerful network of capable allies; not to mention how badly co-opted, corrupt, and incompetent are the "client regimes" and "client organizations" who have so terribly failed them for so long.
And now we find that a further fracturing of the Palestinian population is taking place. The masses are being divided and imprisoned behind actual and legal fences; while the VIPs and Elites are continue to send their money, and in many cases their families, out of the country. This too is a major Israeli victory and it still could yet lead to the long-time Revionist Zionist goal of eventually transforming Jordan into the Palestinian State and declaring the conflict resolved, like it or not!
The following excerpt is from a brief and unusual article in the Palestinian publication Al-Hayat al-Jadida" -- title: "THE LEADERSHIP IS CORRUPT": "We continue to bring out all the embarrassments and crimes in our midst... Senior figures in the Palestinian Authority are leaving the homeland, leaving the area that is their responsibility without permission from above, without informing a soul and for no reason related to their tasks. They are leaving because of their own personal interests or fears, and sometimes they also use despicable excuses. If the individual who is responsible for control and monitoring were to print out from the computers at border terminals the number of departures and days absent from the homeland in one year, then since the beginning of the intifada, the figures - backed by signatures and dates - would be distressing. Many go away, leave their jobs, among them director-generals, aides and members of parliament. And if anyone asks where they are going to, the answer is also distressing: to their homes and families... People will serve the ruling authority as long as it is made up of responsible and respected people who inspire awe - isn't there a limit to tolerance and forgiveness?"
And this article from Middle East Newsline:
PALESTINIAN ELITES FLEE TO JORDAN
AMMAN - Jordan has acknowledged the influx of thousands of Palestinians
from the West Bank over the last eight months.
Jordanian officials said nearly 200,000 Palestinians entered the Hashemite
kingdom from the West Bank over the spring and summer and never returned.
They said the Palestinians have been seeking long-term visas to remain
indefinitely in the kingdom.
The Palestinians include much of the elite in the West Bank as well as families
of Palestinian Authority officials. The officials said they are uncertain over
whether this marks policy by PA Chairman Yasser Arafat.
So far, Jordanian leaders have not publicly complained about the Palestinian
influx. But King Abdullah is said to have raised this issue with Arafat and has
stressed that he will not allow the Palestinians to make Jordan an alternative
homeland.
For his part, Jordanian Prime Minister Ali Abu Ragheb has denied that
Palestinians from the West Bank have remained in the kingdom. He said about
180,000 West Bankers entered Jordan so far this year. All but 5,000 have
since returned.
"Jordan is a state founded on solid grounds with its institutions and leadership,"
Abu Ghareb said. "God willing, the Palestinian state will rise on Palestinian soil
while Jordan is and will remain the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan."
At the same time, the prime minister said Jordan will not allow the transfer of
Palestinians to the kingdom. Abu Ragheb blamed Israel for the concerns
expressed in Jordan. [MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE - Thursday, 6 Sept 2001]
URGENT CALL TO UNESCO TO PROTECT THE MOSQUES OF AL-AQSA AND THE DOME OF THE ROCK AS WELL AS OTHER MUSLIM SITES IN AL-HARAM AL-SHARIF (THE HOLY COMPOUND)
THE GOVERNMENT OF ISRAEL FUNDS FUNDAMENTALIST JEWISH NGOs
AIMING TO RE-BUILD THE THIRD JEWISH TEMPLE ON AL-HARAM AL-SHARIF
Israel is possibly the last remaining member state of the UN regulating racialist land tenure policies in law and through acts of Parliament (Knesset) to the effect that some 93 per cent of the territory of the state is reserved for the settlement, cultivation and development of one tribal (ethnic) group only (for people classified in law as Jews only).
Non-Jews, notably the Palestinian-Arab citizens of Israel, currently numbering some 1 million people, representing approximately 20 percent of the total population of the state, are still allowed in law access to less than 7 per cent of the territory of the state and control less than 3 per cent of the total local municipal and city jurisdictional areas in the state. Additionally, some 3 million Palestinian-Arabs live under Israeli belligerent occupation since 1967 and some 4 million 1948 Palestine refugees have been made stateless not only by the practice but equally significantly by the laws of the State of Israel, and denied their right to return to their country and to their properties inside Israel since 1948.
Israel may be the only remaining apartheid state accredited for membership with the UN, and as an apartheid state persists in blatant violations of all UN Security Council resolutions relevant to the question of Jerusalem.
In the context of Israel's apartheid policies and violations of all UN Security Council resolutions relevant to the question of Jerusalem, it may be in order for this World Conference Against Racism to note that there are currently some twelve fundamentalist Jewish NGOs operating in occupied Jerusalem, of which the Temple Institute is one, committed to re-build the third Jewish temple on the site of al-Haram al-Sharif with the view to resume Jewish sacrificial rituals there.
Some of their literature, notably the literature of the Temple Institute displayed here today, projects the structure of third Jewish temple on the site of al-Haram al-Sharif IN PLACE OF the mosques of al-Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock.
The Temple Institute runs a museum in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem occupied in 1967, propagating among other things the myth that the Jewish Holy Arc is buried in a crevice somewhere in the inner layers of al-Haram al-Sharif.
This fundamentalist Jewish ideology seems to be sufficiently influential to motivate the Government of Israel to demand Israeli sovereignty over the inner layers of al-Haram al-Sharif. It is in order to point out that it was, among other things, this demand, together with the refusal of the Government of Israel to recognize the basic human rights of the 1948 Palestine refugees to return to their country and to the title of their properties inside Israel, that had led to the collapse of the last round of negotiations between the Government of Israel (led by Prime Minister Ehud Barak) and the PLO (led by President Yasser Arafat) under US auspices (mediated by President Bill Clinton).
The Government of Israel funds some or all of these fundamentalist Jewish NGOs, notably the Temple Institute. Citizens of the State of Israel opting for alternative national service in lieu of compulsory military service may opt to do their national service with these NGOs, notably the Temple Institute.
These fundamentalist Jewish NGOs funded by the Government of Israel represent an immediate danger to the integrity of the mosques of al-Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock, and an illegal threat to the focal point of Muslim religious and cultural heritage in Palestine.
The al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site for Muslim communities worldwide, is in real and immediate danger
THIS IS AN URGENT CALL TO UNESCO TO PROTECT THE MOSQUES OF AL-AQSA AND THE DOME OF THE ROCK AS WELL AS OTHER MUSLIM SITES IN AL-HARAM AL-SHARIF (THE HOLY COMPOUND)
THIS IS AN URGENT CALL FOR THE WORLD CONFERENCE AGAINST RACISM TO CALL FOR INTERNATIONAL SANCTIONS AGAINST THE STATE OF ISRAEL FOR VIOLATING ALL UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY AND SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTIONS RELEVANT TO THE QUESTION OF JERUSALEM
Contact:
Dr Uri Davis
Chair
AL-BEIT: Association for the Defence of Human Rights in Israel
16. The Roadblocks to Freedom in the Occupied Territories
Copyright: http://www.iviews.com
Published Friday September 07, 2001
By Vikram Sura
Editor's Note: The following is one report in a several part series on the situation in the Qalandiya refugee camp in the Occupied Territories.
It was 4:30 p.m. on Friday, March 2, and Abdel Kareem Abu Assabeh was returning to his home in the Qalandiya refugee camp on the West Bank. Kareem had just bought a loaf of bread for his eight-month-old daughter. Unknown to him, Israeli soldiers had entered the camp for the first time in half a year, in pursuit of stone-throwing teenagers. They found none. Just as Abu Assabeh, 24, a carpenter, reached out his hand to unlatch the gate to his home, he convulsed and dropped to the ground. According to eyewitnesses in the camp, an Israeli army sniper lurking behind a wall 200 yards away, had fired a bullet into Abu Assabeh, piercing his back and perforating his lungs. An hour later, he was pronounced dead at Ramallah State Hospital with the bullet still lodged in his chest.
In the week before Assabeh's death, four Palestinians have been killed in skirmishes with soldiers, notes B'Tselem, an Israeli human rights group.
Abu Assabeh instantly became a "shaheed," a martyr. Countless posters of his face were pasted on the walls in Qalandiya camp, which straddles the main highway between Jerusalem and Ramallah. Technically, Qalandiya falls within "Area C," a zone established by negotiation between Palestinians and Israeli officials. Area C is assigned to total Israeli control.
Married two years ago, Abu Assabeh is survived by his eight-month-old daughter, Hadeel, and 22-year-old wife, Laura. "He didn't throw any stones, he was in our house near the gate!" cries Munir Abu Assabeh, Kareem's 28-year-old brother. "He was in a shop getting some bread for his daughter, then near the gate [of his home] they shot him," adds Munir, who teaches social studies to 7th and 8th graders at a school in Be'er Sheva in the Negev. "You don't feel comfortable in your life."
Comfort and security are unattainable cliches for the people in the twin Palestinian cities of al-Bireh and Ramallah. The sizzling tension between the Palestinians and the Israeli reserve soldiers stationed to man the road- blocks along the highway, and to protect the 1,000 Jewish settlers in the Psagot settlement adjoining Ramallah, upsets people like Munir who are uninvolved in the daily conflict.
According to B'Tselem, since the start of the Aqsa intifadeh in late September, 357 Palestinian and 62 Israeli lives have been lost in the skirmishes, assassinations and extra-judicial killings in the occupied territories of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
In Ramallah alone, on the West Bank, 45 Palestinians including nine security force personnel, and nine Israelis, among them four soldiers, have been killed according to LAW, a Palestinian human rights group, which fights rights abuses by both Israeli and Palestinian Authority forces. The Israeli Defense Forces blame the Palestinians for firing on Psagot and accuse Force 17, the elite branch among the Palestinian security forces in Ramallah, of masterminding bomb attacks within Israel; while the Palestinians question the Israeli legitimacy on the West Bank.
Munir Abu Assabeh says that it is futile to either register a police complaint or haul his brother's assassin to a court of justice. When asked why he hasn't approached the authorities, he says, "You are not going to get anything out of it." Besides the human rights organizations that document deaths and petition authorities for redress on behalf of the victim's families, official institutions do little to safeguard the refugees themselves or their property. But this state of affairs is not restricted to the camp.
Vikram Sura is a New York-based freelance journalist. He had an opportunity to report from the Palestinian territories this March while traveling there as a student of the Columbia Journalism School.
17. Realities of Indian Policy in Kashmir Expose the Hypocrisy of Their Politics
Copyright: http://www.iviews.com
Published Tuesday September 04, 2001
By Zia Sarhadi
Following in the footsteps of the occupiers of Palestine, L. K. Advani, the Indian home affairs minister, announced on August 20 in Srinagar, capital of Indian-occupied Kashmir, that Indian soldiers accused of torture, extra judicial executions or rape of women would be immune to prosecution under a new law. Not that unruly Indian soldiers ever felt any compunction about killing or raping Kashmiris, but this new law tells the army of occupation that it has a complete carte blanche in its dealings with them.
This follows another announcement: India intends to double the strength of its military presence in Kashmir by raising 30 additional battalions of the Rashtriya Rifles over the next five years. India already has 700,000 soldiers in Kashmir who have indulged in wanton killing, terrorism and gang-rapes. At least 70,000 Kashmiris have been murdered since the uprising began in December 1989, and countless others maimed.
The new Indian policy also confirms reports that India is working closely with Israel. Jane’s Defense Weekly reported last month that Indo-Zionist collaboration in the military, technological and intelligence fields had reached unprecedented heights. Each is an alien occupier involved in a campaign of state terrorism to crush the aspirations of the indigenous people. Both are also highly militaristic societies but present themselves to the world as "democracies": Israel claims to be the "only democracy" in the Middle East; India maintains the fiction of being the "largest democracy in the world". Yet their behavior in their occupied territories puts both outside the pale. Two other policies are common to both: each is involved in fighting the Islamic movement in the area that it occupies; each is an ally of the US.
These facts have important implications for Muslims globally. It is interesting to note that most Muslim regimes have no qualms about dealing with either. The close Indo-Zionist collaboration is also evident in their common stand vis-à-vis the World Conference on Racism in Durban, South Africa (August 31 to September 7). Israel, backed by the US, has been working overtime to smother debate on the theme of "Zionism is racism", while India does not want its caste system to be discussed. At least 160 million Dalits in India live lives of degradation and humiliation under religiously-sanctioned apartheid.
India has been far more successful in hiding its ugly face than has Israel. But for some awareness among the Muslim masses of the Zionists’ crimes in Palestine, every regime in the Middle East would have ‘normalized’ relations with Israel long ago. Yet the same awareness does not exist when it comes to dealing with India. Even in such places as Tehran, the Hindus are welcomed and a number of trade and other agreements have been signed. The Kashmiri struggle for self-determination has been misunderstood by most Muslims: they think it is merely a territorial dispute between India and Pakistan. This shows the success of Indian propaganda.
Indian propaganda was somewhat blunted during the Agra summit (July 14-16) because of Pakistan’s insistence on the centrality of the Kashmir dispute. In fact, in Pakistan there had been hopes before the summit that India was now in earnest about resolving the 54-year-old ‘dispute’, but such hopes have now died. Islamabad now seems to understand that Delhi simply wanted the pretence of a dialogue, without really addressing the root of the problem. Vajpayee said that India was prepared to discuss Kashmir, but only as part of a "composite dialogue," clearly rejecting its central position in the troubled relations between the two nuclear neighbors. In addition, India’s insistence on the inclusion of "cross-border terrorism" in the abortive joint declaration was mischievous and devious. No Pakistani ruler could agree to such an expression, because it has profound political and legal implications.
It implies first that the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir is an internationally-recognized border when it is not; second, that the uprising in Kashmir is not indigenous but instigated by "terrorists" from the Pakistani side of Kashmir. Indian rulers deserve full credit for deviousness; they have been trying to turn the LoC into an international border and have frequently suggested this at international forums, presenting it as a "reasonable" proposal. If Pakistan were to accept this, what was, and is the purpose of the uprising in Indian-occupied Kashmir that has been under way since 1989, in which more than 70,000 Kashmiris have perished and countless thousands have been maimed?
To suggest that the uprising in Kashmir is not indigenous is also an insult to the aspirations and sacrifices of the Kashmiris. No outside help can sustain a movement for 12 years if it does not enjoy local support. In fact, last year, when the Hizbul-Mujahideen announced a two-week ceasefire, Advani admitted that the uprising was indigenous and that Delhi had to talk to these groups. Advani, and indeed Indian rulers in general, have a remarkable ability to speak from both sides of their mouths.
This was also evident in the manner in which they approached the Agra summit. While publicly stating that they would like to be flexible on Kashmir, and would like to create an atmosphere conducive to good neighborliness, in private they have insisted on Pakistan surrendering to Indian demands.
Indian hypocrisy is also evident in the fact that immediately after the Agra talks, Delhi announced the formation of another 30 battalions of the Rashtriya Rifles to be deployed in Kashmir. Similarly, the Disturbed Areas Act as well as the Special Armed Forces Act, under which soldiers are exempt from any legal constraints, have been extended to Jammu as well (until recently they had applied only to Kashmir and to areas within 20 kilometers of the border in Jammu).
The Hindustan Times reported on August 4 that since Delhi ended the ceasefire in Kashmir in May, the number of Kashmiri deaths has risen from 97 to 225 per month. India insists on calling them "militants." ,India’s own casualties at 43 per month have remained steady (before India’s ceasefire announcement of last November, casualty rates were about 160 "militants" and 36 Indian soldiers per month.) Clearly India has intensified its violent policy in Kashmir even while claiming to be talking "peace" with Pakistan. It was to discuss these "successes" that Advani went to Srinagar and gave the glad tidings that henceforth Indian soldiers could shoot to kill and rape women without any fear of restraint or punishment.
Despite all this, India continues to enjoy an excellent press in the west, especially now that the US wants to enter into a strategic partnership with it in order to contain China. Next time someone talks about "democracy," human rights or self-determination in the US, advise them to examine the record of its two allies, Israel and India, and try to explain why they should have a license to kill, pillage and rape any people.
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Zia Sarhadi writes for Crescent International, the newsmagazine of the global Islamic movement.
18. History Repeats Itself as Israeli Government Persecutes Christians
Copyright: http://www.iviews.com
Published Friday August 31, 2001
By Omar Fayez
Through religion and history we have seen how the Christian minority, as soon as it came into being, suffered persecution from the Jewish authorities. One of their most ruthless persecutors, Saul, once he converted, became himself the victim of the same persecution.
Today, more than two thousand years after the birth of Jesus, the Christians of Palestine are once again being threatened by the Jews; this time through the Israeli policies blindly supported by the U.S. in all their atrocities. Since the creation of Israel in 1948, through the current intifada (civilian uprising) on September 29, 2000, the Jews of Israel have systematically harassed, beaten, killed and expelled Palestinian Christians.
Today, the birthplace of Christianity, Bethlehem and its suburbs of Beit Sahour and Beit Jala, are encircled by Israeli tanks and heavy weapons which have imposed an economic blockade of the areas. In these areas there are numerous school, covenants, hospitals and churches all supported and run by the Palestinian Christians. There are over 55 churches located in these areas alone, including the Church of the Nativity and Rachael's Tomb. Christian institutions such as the Holy Family Hospital, Christian Society for the Holy Land Hospital, Efta Institute for the Deaf and Dumb and the Children's Village S.O.S. are all subjected to the ruthless military occupation of Palestine and its Christian communities.
Today there are over 50,000 Christian Palestinians located in the West Banks and Gaza Strip. The entire Christian community is Palestinian and like their Palestinian Muslim comrades, suffer the exact same brutal and humiliating experiences under Israeli occupation. In the past ten months, Israel has bombed Bethlehem and its suburbs with U.S. artillery and U.S. made Apache helicopters. Nader Abu Amsha, director of the Christian Aid-funded YMCA Rehabilitation Center in Beit Sahour called upon the international community for an international protection force (which Israel opposes) to protect the Palestinians in the West Bank. Mr. Amsha described the situation today, "they [Israel] have been attacking us from three directions with [U.S.-made] helicopter gunships- the worst attacks for months [and] people are terrified."
INTERNATIONAL LAW
The only thing that the Palestinians, both Christian and Muslim, ask is for the international community to implement their human rights as other people do in other parts of the world. The Palestinians are not asking for unsubstantiated claims, but the rights enshrined in the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international law. There have been numerous UN Resolutions that have addressed these rights. Security Council Resolution 242 and 338 provide for full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza. UN Resolution 194 guarantees the rights of the Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and live in peace with their neighbors. While waiting for their rights under international law, the Fourth Geneva Convention is supposed to be protecting the Palestinians from the Israeli occupiers. Despite all these rights enshrined under international law, the Palestinians, both Christians and Muslims, are being targeted daily by Israel through its military and government policies.
DESPERATE CONDITIONS
While the media may focus attention on the military confrontations and diplomatic maneuvering, there is also an economic war waged by Israel against the Palestinians. Israel has laid siege to the Palestinian territories for nearly a year now. For the Palestinian Christians living in Gaza, an area with the highest population density in the world, this area has been turned into a virtual prison. Factories have stopped producing, prices of commodities have skyrocketed, schools have been closed and some bombed by Israel, transportation has stopped, and fuel and electricity have been curtailed. Israel is trying to strangle the Palestinian economy and force its Christian community further into poverty and debt, and, as in the past, force the Christians to leave biblical Palestine.
Palestinian Christians have also been denied access to medical care. The Israeli occupation affects the old and young the most. Article 17 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states: "The parties to the conflict shall endeavor to include local agreements for the removal from besieged and encircled areas of wounded, sick, infirm and aged persons, children and maternity cases, and for passage of all religious, medical personnel and medical equipment on their way to such areas." Numerous Palestinians have died at Israeli checkpoints denied access to emergency medical treatment. There have been over 170 Israeli attacks on Palestinian ambulances including: the death of two doctors, 112 emergency medical technicians have been injured, and 75% of the ambulances have been attacked by Israeli or settler gunfire. Many ambulance drivers have been forced from their vehicles at gun point and beaten by soldiers- one group beaten for four hours by Israeli soldiers. Palestinians in the occupied territories are suffering everyday and this does not include the countless psychological traumas that face the children.
Israel's brutal attacks and blockades of the West Bank and Gaza intentionally target schools. More than half of the Palestinian population is below the age of 16, and hundreds of schools have been attacked, closed or seized by the Israeli army. Schools have been targeted by Israel and dozens of children and teachers have been killed. One school was surrounded and attacked more than 20 times by bullets and tear gas. Last December, the Israeli army surrounded the al-Sharageh school for girls in the Palestinian town of Tulkarem and opened fire injuring dozens of students. They did the same to numerous other schools, including the schools for deaf children.
These are not isolated instances of Israeli brutality, but a daily systematic attack on the Palestinians and their Christian communities. Israeli attacks on Palestinians occur everyday with alarming frequency and brutality. For example:
On August 27, 2001, Israel attacked the predominantly Christian village of Beit Jala, near Bethlehem. The Israeli army seized residential homes and expelled the residents with their children during the night time raid. Additionally, they seized a girls' orphanage and denied the Lutheran teachers and staff access to protect and comfort the orphaned children. Bishop Munib Younan, head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Holy Land, was distraught when he told the Jerusalem Post, "it is totally unacceptable to enter church premises and frighten orphans".
On August 15, 2001, Israel sent a large contingent of armored and infantry troops to surround Bethlehem and its suburbs. That day, Israeli soldiers seized the homes of three Palestinian families and set up observation posts. These families were sent fleeing into the streets without any belongings and ordered to not come back,, according to an August 1 repor,t in the Jerusalem Post..
On August 7, 2001, Israeli troops backed by police prevented human rights activists and the Christian Peacemakers Team to bring blankets, tents and household supplies to Palestinian Christians who lost their homes when Israeli troop bulldozed them.
On August 3, 2001, 70 volunteers of Christian Peacemakers took it upon themselves to use their own bodies as human shields to protect the Palestinians in Beit Jala that had been attacked daily by Israeli guns and tank shells, the Associated Press reported.
Civil rights organizations and their Christian members are being marked for arrest and deportation by the Israeli Interior Ministry. The Israeli army frequently raids churches and arrests clergy. On May 30, 2001, Father John of the New Life Church was arrested then deported after Israeli police broke into his church.
On July 17, 2001, the Israeli army attacked Bethlehem with US made Apache helicopters killing four people only 400 yards away from the Church of the Nativity. Besides the two Palestinians killed, the injured included a 10-year old girl who lost an arm. One of the killed was Terra Sancta, a teacher in the Latin Catholic Patriarchate School.
Moreover, Israel does not issue entry permits to Christians who want to pray at their holy places in Jerusalem, even though it is their religious right to pray wherever they choose. Israel further discriminates against Christian pilgrims in Bethlehem by refusing to let them leave or enter the city even to see sick or injured relatives. In another, all too frequent occurrence at an Israeli roadblock, Rev. Clarence Musgrave, minister of St. Andrew's Church in Jerusalem, described the difficulties facing Palestinians. "She [a Palestinian Christian] had to give birth at a roadblock. I would urge you recognize that there are prisons in what we call the Holy land" (source: The Herald, 24 may, 01).
Bethlehem's Mayor Hanna Nasser, a Christian, is faced with the impending and inevitable Israeli military invasion of his beloved Christian city. Reverend Mitri Raheb, Pastor of the Lutheran Church in Bethlehem, stated that "the worsening economic situation, due to Israel's repeated closures, has led many to lose hope that there is going to be peace in the region."
POPULAR MISCONCEPTION
There is a widespread misconception in the United States that the plight of the Palestinian Christians is due to Muslim hostility. This perception is strongly contested by Palestinian Christians. The Palestinian Liberation Organization is led by Yasser Arafat himself married to a Christian woman and committed to the rights of Christians in Palestine. The primary reason for Palestinian Christian suffering is wholly due to the hostility of Israel. The intolerable conditions of life under Israeli occupation whether in the West Bank, Gaza or Israel is encountered everyday through Israeli troops and settlers.
Palestinian Christians lament that few Christians in the United States even know they exist. Palestinians are incorrectly, and intentionally, perceived as only Muslims; yet at the highest levels there are Christians working and struggling in Palestine. One of the top Palestinian intellectuals with a record of championing civil rights, Hanan Ashrawi, a Christian from Jerusalem, was recently appointed director general of media affairs for the Arab League.
However, Israeli government policy has been to try and suppress the rights of Christians in Palestine by any means available. On May 5, 2001 in occupied Jerusalem, the Israeli government threatened to deport Dr. Hanna Atallah, prominent spokesperson for the Orthodox Church in the Holy Land because he was critical of the Israeli terror practices and repression against ,the Christians in Palestine. Israel threatened to deport, Atallah if he was elected Patriarch, on the grounds that it was not permissible that a Palestinian be allowed to sit at the helm of the Orthodox Church in the Holy Land.
In another case, following his election, Ireneous I, the newly appointed patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church in Palestine stated that, "I will serve the church and I support the Palestinian people and their just issues." Pursuant to laws dating back to the Byzantine Empire, the government(s) of the Holy Land has the right to approve or disapprove of all candidates for the office of patriarch. Despite the fact that Israel rejected all the nominees for the election of the new patriarch (the Palestinian Authority approved all of the nominees) and despite Israel's attempt to interject lies of corruption and bribery in the church to subvert the rights of Christians in their practice of religion, Ireneous I was selected to lead the community in these grave times. After the death of the first patriarch, a secret Israeli government committee was established to figure out how Israel should intervene in such elections so as to control any organized Christian support of Palestinian rights. Included were representatives from Israel's Foreign Ministry, the Prime Minister's Office, the Israeli Religious Affairs Ministry and Jerusalem City Hall. The fact that the Palestinians are Christians and that the churches have vast real estate holdings have made them the target of Israeli aggression (source: Israeli Ha'aretz, 14 Aug. 01).
Even more abhorrent, Israel has now created its own "Christian authority" in Palestine by naming a so-called Christian embassy in Jerusalem. The embassy says local Christians do not represent the true church since it is staffed with and run by Jewish people claiming they are Christian fundamentalists who raise money under the guise of Christian initiative projects but actually funnel the money to support the building of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. These are the same settlements which house armed Jewish settlers that attack the Palestinians, destroy their property and vandalize their holy sites.
Numerous other Christian leaders have spoken to the world to support the plight of Palestinian Christians in light of the brutal and ruthless occupation by Israel. On August 10, 2001, the general secretary of the World Council of Churches, Dr. Konrad Raiser, described the continued Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory as a "clear violation of international law" (source: Ecumenical News International, 10 Aug. 01). Additionally, the US's largest Lutheran church called on the U.S. government to withhold all economic and military aid to Israel. In calling for such action, Lutherans said they were following the words of Jesus to comfort "the poor, the powerless and the outcast" (source: Los Angeles Times, Lutheran Asks U.S. to Withhold Aid to Israel, 11 Aug. 01).
Many Christian groups have taken it upon themselves to condemn Israel for its human rights violations against the Christian and Muslim Palestinians. The United Methodist Council of Bishops passed a resolution on May 4, 2001 demanding a cessation of Israeli aggression. The resolution read, in part: "Whereas the basic freedoms and human rights of Palestinian people continue to be violated. We therefore call upon the United States government through Congress to use all measures possible, including the cutting off of all funding to the Israeli government, to insure that the following conditions are met: all human rights violations cease, buildings of roads for the purposes of dividing the Palestinian lands through the West bank and Gaza cease, no more Jewish settlements are built in the oc,cupied territories, all home demolitions cease."
ISRAELI LAWS DISCRIMINATE AGAINST CHRISTIA,NS
The Israeli military and settlers are only the tools in which Israel carries out its government based policies of discrimination and harassment against the Christians in Palestine. The official Israeli practices that discriminate on the basis of religion include:
"The Israeli government, its entities, and the Jewish National Fund now control over 93% of the country's land area. As a matter of policy the Government and the Jewish National Fund have enacted statutes prohibiting the sale or lease of land to non-Jews; "
The Israeli Ministry of Religions allocates 98% of its budget to Jewish only institutions, despite the existence of Christian and Muslim minorities;
"The Israeli government has recognized only Jewish holy places under the 1967 Protection of Holy Sites Law, therefore denying government funds to the preservation of Christian religious sites; "« The Religious Jewish Services Law (1971) authorizes the Minister of Religious Affairs to establish religious councils in Jewish towns and cities, councils which oversee the preservation and maintenance of religious institutions and cemeteries. There exists no corresponding council for Christians or Muslims; "
The Law of Return guarantees immediate and automatic citizenship to Jewish immigrants of any nationality, but excludes native Christians and Muslims who were born there, and now forced to live in poverty stricken refugee camps, from returning.
"Israeli citizens are required to carry ID cards with them at all times which indicate whether they are Jewish or non-Jewish."
The Israeli Knesset has introduced numerous bills to ban Christian missionary activity. Outrageously, Knesset bill 174c was introduced which would make it a crime punishable up to one year in prison to posses or distribute "any tract or publication in which there is inducement to religious conversion." This bill would make it illegal to possess a copy of the New Testament.
CONCLUSION
It is absolutely necessary for all Christians to recognize that Palestinians rightly insist on an end to Israel's five decade long occupation. Palestinians, both Christian and Muslim, view this occupation, maintained by force and marked by daily inhumane sufferings, abuse and violence at the hands of the Israeli army and settlers, as a central cause of the current crisis. Israel has a fundamental right to security, but security will not be won by the ongoing annexation of Palestinian lands, blockades of villages, US- made F-16 and Apache helicopter air strikes on cities, destruction of crops and homes, and numerous other excessive uses of force.
After more than 50 years of Israeli persecution the millions Palestinians, many of whom are Christian, are still under an inhumane and brutal occupation, and the refugee status of nearly five million more Palestinians is still largely left unaddressed. The United States sends more than $6 billion each year to Israel. The Apache helicopters, tanks, F-16 jets and bullets that kill the unarmed Christians of Palestine are all a gift from the U.S. taxpayer. These first 11 months of the Intifada are just the beginning of the long war for the Palestinians in their quest for freedom and justice. Like the South Africans before them and the Americans that rose up against colonial oppression of England during the Revolutionary War, the Palestinians will overcome this horrific ,assault on the people of Palestine.
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Omar Fayez is an attorney of international law in Chicago.
8 September 2001 | 