Obama and Israel: making a mountain out of a mole hill
Added by PT Editor Sameh A. Habeeb
obama_israel
Paris, June 5, (Pal Telegraph) - It seems clear that Barack Obama and Israel are singing that same old refrain: Obama blustering, threatening; watch out, I could get angry... while the Netanyahu government plays the intransigent role. And for what result?
Will Obama finally be the one who obliges the outlaw state of Israel to respect international law? Some are holding their breath.
The media speaks of the American president's "firm stand." What sort of firmness is that? The AFP wrote again recently, "On Monday, before leaving for the Near East, the American resident Barak Obama reaffirmed the necessity for a certain firmness regarding Israel, on the subjects of a Palestinian state and the settlements in the Territories."
That's right: Obama is not demanding the dismantlement Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories. He's not demanding the end of the occupation, nor the end of the blockade of the Gaza Strip, nor the payment of the costs of the enormous destruction wrought on the Gaza Strip.
Obama is not demanding that Israel return to the Palestinians what was stolen from them. Not all, not even some. Obama's "demands" consist of calling for "a freeze in the settlements:" nothing new there! And the Palestinian state, where will that be now that Israel has annexed 89% of the Palestinian Territories, including East Jerusalem? What Bantustans will Obama propose to the Palestinians?
They dare to "arm wrestle" with us again: in what is now a well-oiled production. The Israeli government plays the "impossible and too painful concessions" card in order, as usual, to ratify a fait accompli. A fait accompli which consists of stealing and annexing practically all of the land in order to later give the impression of conceding when they stop, when there is no longer anything left to take.
Each time that Israeli leaders sit at the negotiation table or end by taking a "painful" decision, as did Sharon in the famous "disengagement" from the Gaza Strip in 2005, it is just an illusion. It's a way of winning time and pretending to have "good intentions." They have never conceded anything, not even in Gaza, where the removal of 7000 settlers, transferred to the West Bank, far from bringing freedom to those in the Gaza Strip, was accompanied from the first day by seclusion. Israel has never for a minute given the least control of their frontiers to the residents of the Gaza Strip, nor given the possibility for them to communicate with their brethren in the West Bank. The famous "disengagement" only permitted Israel to shelter the 7000 settlers, who would in that way not have to suffer from the bombardments which their army could pursue at their ease.
Honest people also know what the "Oslo peace process" succeeded in hiding. The Israeli Tanya Reinhart, who opposes Israeli policy, perfectly analyzed this total bluff in her book, Israel Palestine: How to End the War of 1948. She showed how the Israelis not only doubled the number of West Bank settlements in 7 years of negotiations, but that they never at any time accepted to dismantle the principle settlements, nor to return East Jerusalem, nor to give the least autonomy and viability to a Palestinian state, which would be cut up into pieces and deprived of access to boarders.
Today the Israeli right plays the uncompromising card, "all is for us," the right of the "natural expansion of already existing settlements" (sic).
Gilad Erdan, Israeli Environmental Minister, and close associate of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, yesterday declared on public radio that, When the American President calls for the freezing of construction, including children's playgrounds (in the settlements), he deviates from the agreements concluded with Israel by President (George W.) Bush, and added that Mr. Bush had indicated in a letter that the construction could continue in the large settlements in Judea-Samaria (West Bank), and that is is in vertu of this text that Israel then evacuated about 20 settlements in the Gaza Strip.
We know the song: the Netanyahu government - or another, will act as if they are ceding on this point (freezing the settlements) and everybody will breath a sigh of relief.
Israel will be able to hold on to all of her settlements, continue to occupy Palestinian territory, annex Jerusalem, leave in place the wall, the hundreds of checkpoints, make life impossible for the Palestinians who live in the Bantustans, and continue to starve 1.5 million others in the Gaza Strip ghetto! They can certainly continue to refuse to Palestinians the right of return to their lands and to remain the only people in the world in that situation, in spite of all the international laws which stipulate that the right to return is inalienable.
But we will be relieved: no new children's playgrounds in the settlements! (But maybe new swimming pools for settlers, "circular highways" or "security zones?")
The Israelis will have made a "painful concession," and isn't it that which counts? The settlers will cry out and menace. They will say, like the butcher Sharon, transformed into a man of peace, "Ah, what courage the Israeli government has to stand up to the pressure of a part of its population, its parliament, and its own government." And while we talk about the yet to be born children of settlers who will be deprived of playgrounds, Israel can continue to massacre Palestinian children, chase Palestinians, destroy their houses, uproot their olive trees and imprison and torture thousands of Palestinian men, women and children. She can also continue to show proof of a confident racism by refusing to give the same rights to Jewish and non-Jewish citizens, without being restricted by any government or institution. Investigation reports follow one another when the massacres become too obvious. And we continue to roll out the red carpet for all of those war criminals, presenting them to be men of courage who have made generous propositions, but which the Palestinian terrorists refuse to accept.
And Obama, like Clinton, will he undoubtedly replay the "I did what I could" scene, but the Palestinians made the negotiations fail? How could an outlaw state oblige another outlaw state to act morally? Obama has just raised the US military budget and sent new troops to Afghanistan. Is it really like that, that you take the road to peace and justice?
Public opinion is less and less duped. It knows that we can no longer count on our leaders to apply international rights and justice, the right of people to self-determination. this is why it becomes us to demand that Israel account for herself and to consider as pariahs those who pursue that macabre comedy. The campaign to boycott Israel must continue to gain influence in the world.
By Olivia Zemor
Pro Palestine activist in paris. She runs an NGO called Europalestine
http://www.europalestine.com
No comments:
Post a Comment