IKRAR (Ikatan Kebajikan Rakyat)
19 JUN
The question is: What is this summit forIs it to force the Israeli enemy to cease fire and withdraw from Gaza, open the crossings, and lift the siege?
Is it to support the steadfastness of the brave heroes of Gaza?
Is it to support the resistors whose weapons are no match to the Israeli"s destructive war machines which killed the children, women, old, and doctors, and burned the lands of Gaza?
How can the Israeli invader and usurping occupier be supported with all types of weapons while the invaded Palestinians and holders of the legitimate right to resist be deprived of it?
What is expected of the EU countries (Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Spain) besides Arab and Palestinian submission to their schemes and conspiracies?
Neither the Palestinians nor Arabs nor Muslims nor free people around the world will submit to the American-Zionist-European war machines or schemes.
And if the purpose of this summit is to subjugate the Palestinian people or lower their steadfastness, firmness, and resistance, then it will fail as all other conferences which worked towards this aim did, and it will further increase the firmness of the Palestinian people. Moreover, all the Arab and Islamic people as well as the free peace-loving people will gather around the resistance offering it their emotional and material support despite the barriers and shackles.
It is the will of truth against the will of falsehood; the will of justice against that of oppression; the will of freedom against that of despotism; and will of resistance against that of occupation and aggression. It is this will of truth, justice, freedom, and resistance which will triumph, by the will of God.
The Muslim Brotherhood
Cairo
Muharram 21, 1430
January 18, 2009
Many professionals, both Christian and Muslim Arabs, previously critical of Hamas, are bitter about what they call Israel"s "! barbaric conduct" against Palestinian noncombatants, particularly wome n and children. No one I have encountered believes Israel"s narrative that this is a war against Hamas, not the Palestinian people. A near consensus exists among Arabs and Muslims that Israel is battering the Palestinian population in an effort to force it to revolt against Hamas, just as it tried to force the Lebanese people to revolt against Hezbollah in the summer of 2006. But Hezbollah weathered that Israeli storm, acquired a sturdier immune system and became the most powerful institution in Lebanon. In so doing it shattered Israeli deterrence, delivered a blow to US Mideast policy and expanded the influence of Iran, Hezbollah"s main supporter in the region.
In my recent travels I was struck by the widespread popular support for Hamas -- from college students and street vendors to workers and intellectuals. Very few ventured criticism of Hamas, and many said they felt awed by the fierce resistance put forward by its fighters. Israel"s onslaught on Gaza has effectively silenced critics of Hamas and politically legitimized the militant resistance movement in the eyes of many previously skeptical Palestinians and Muslims. Regardless of how this war ends, Hamas will likely emerge as a more powerful political force than before and will likely top Fatah, the ruling apparatus of President Mahmoud Abbas"s Palestinian Authority.
"No one dares any longer to question Hamas" right to represent the Palestinian people," said a 30-year-old leftist Palestinian, a graduate of the American University in Beirut. Why so, I asked. "The Islamist resistance has earned a place at the table with blood," he told me.
What Israeli officials and their American allies do not appreciate is that Hamas is not merely an armed militia but a social movement with a large popular base that is deeply entrenched in society. It cannot be wiped out wi! thout massacring half a million Palestinians. If Israel succeeds in killing Hamas" senior leaders, a new generation, more radical than the present, will swiftly replace them. Hamas is a fact of life. It is not going away, and it will not raise the white flag regardless of how many casualties it suffers.
More than the war against Hezbollah, Israel"s ongoing assault on Gaza has already undermined the legitimacy and authority of pro-Western regimes like Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia in the eyes of many of their citizens. They stand accused of collusion with the enemy against fellow beli! evers. Egypt, which shares a border crossing with Gaza, has suffered t he brunt of Muslim anger worldwide. Protesters have targeted Egyptian embassies in several countries and called on President Hosni Mubarak to open up his frontier with Gaza and relieve the suffering of besieged and bombed Palestinians.
Many Egyptians I talked to are outraged by Mubarak"s stance. They say that the country, the biggest in the Arab world, is in turmoil, and that people are boiling within: The Gaza conflict has exposed a widening gap between Egypt"s rulers and citizens and -- combined with the country"s deepening socioeconomic conditions -- could have serious repercussions! on stability. Although Egypt faces no imminent danger of a social revolution, the military remains an enigma, and we do not know how junior and senior officers feel about the government"s unpopular role toward the bloodshed in Palestine.
Suffice it to say that the so-called moderate Arab states are on the defensive, and that the resistance front led by Iran and Syria is the main beneficiary. Once again, Israel and the Bush administration have handed the Iranian leadership a sweet victory.
Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has sought to harness anger in the region by urging Muslims to launch a jihad against Israel and condemning pro-Western Arab leaders as collaborators with the Jewish state. In a new audiotape designed to capitalize on the Gaza offensive, bin Laden vowed that his organization would open "new fronts" against the United States and its partners beyond Iraq and Afghanistan.
He knows that the Palestine predicament resonates more widely and powerfully with Arabs and Muslims than the conflicts in the other two countries.
Israeli leaders still adhere to the discredited idea that there is a military solution to the country"s security dilemma. Although the Jewish state possesses military superiority over all its Arab neighbors, it has neither broken the political will of its adversaries nor achieved long-term peace and stability. In fact, Israel"s brutal and disproportionate use of force in Lebanon in 2006 and now in ! Gaza shows clearly the failure of its deterrence and the damage to its moral standing in the world. Killing large numbers of Palestinians and Arabs will not bring Israel security and will only deepen hatred of Israel among Arabs, even Christian Arabs, and Muslims throughout the world. If not stopped, the assault on Gaza may foil the best political intentions for a two-state solution.
President-elect Barack Obama appreciates that time is of essence. After initially being quiet about Israel"s assault, he vowed to press immediately for peace in the Middle East and pursue a policy of engagement with Iran. He said he was building a diplomatic team so that "on! day one, we have the best possible people who are going to be immediately engaged in the Middle East peace process as a whole." The team would "be engaging with all of the actors there" so that "both Israelis and Palestinians can meet their aspirations," Obama said.
That would mean not only an end to Hamas rocket fire and security for Israel, but political engagement with Hamas and an end to Israel"s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza -- and a viable, fully independent state for the Palestinians with its capital in East Jerusalem.
Fawaz A. Gerges is a professor of Middle Eastern studies and international affairs at Sarah Lawrence College. His most recent books are Journey of the Jihadist: Inside Muslim Militancy and The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global.
Ayuhai sdr ku...sepanjang hari di Aljazeera Tv kita diperlihatkan dengan gelagat pemimpin Mesir Hosni Mubarak berpelukan dengan pemimpin musuh sdr kita dan sepertinya amat akrab sekali...geramnyaaaaa.
Sdr kita dibom mereka boleh bersantai dan berpelukan dengan musuh-musuh sdr kita. Wahai rakayt Palestin dan Arab, hukum pemimpin kamu ini dalam pilihanraya akan datang dan halau mereka dari bumi kamu kerana adalah makhluk durjana yang khianat. Begitu juga kepada pemimpin di Malaysia..jika kamu bermusuh dengan rakyat dan berbaik dengan musuh rakyat kamu njuga akan dihalau suatu hari nanti. Mungkin bahasa ini tidak difahami oleh sdr kita di Palestin tapi pasti hati mereka sama luka melihat gelagat pemimpin khianat ini...Sebarkan...!!!
Inilah Gaya Pemimpin-pemimpin Arab
Selasa, 20/01/2009 12:21
Belum lepas dari ingatan kita, bagaimana keras kepala dan keras hatinya para pemimpin Arab melihat tragedi di Gaza Palestina. Mesir yang paling dekat dengan perbatasan Gaza sampai detik ini pun belum dan tidak mau membuka perbatasannya di Raffah. Begitu juga dengan Jordan, mereka secara geografis termasuk yang dekat dengan Gaza, hanya karena terikat perjanjian dengan Israel – mereka tega membiarkan saudara-saudara muslimnya di Gaza terbantai oleh Zionis Israel. Setali tiga uang dengan Arab Saudi, ali-alih menunjukkan sikap yang tegas terhadap aksi holocaust Israel di Gaza, untuk menghadiri KTT di Doha pun mereka enggan.
Mungkin gambar-gambar dibawah ini bisa memberikan penjelasan atas sikap kepala batu nya para pemimpin Arab melihat tragedi di Gaza.
Dari kiri, Raja Abdullah (Saudi), Menlu Arab Saudi, Saud Al-faisal, Raja Abdullah (Jordan), George Bush
Menlu Israel Tzipi Livni bersalaman mesra dengan Presiden Husni Mubarak (Mesir)
Mahmud Abbas (Fattah) berjabat tangan mesra dengan Menlu Israel Tzipi Livni
George Bush, Ehurt Olmert dan Husni Mubarak saling mempersilahkan
Raja Abdullah (Saudi) bergandengan tangan akrab dengan George Bush
Senyum saudara kembar, Ehurt Olmert dan Husni Mubarak
Raja Abdullah (Saudi) saling membalas cium dengan George Bush
Jadi wajar kalau para pemimpin Arab sangat 'banci' menghadapi Zionis Israel dan tidak tegas dalam menentang agresi dan holocaust yang dilakukan oleh Israel terhadap rakyat Palestina di Gaza.
Kita berdoa bersama semoga para pemimpin Arab dan semua pemimpin Muslim terbuka hatinya melihat tragedi kemanusiaan ini. Dan semoga mereka tidak lupa dengan firman Allah SWT :
"Janganlah orang-orang mukmin mengambil orang-orang kafir menjadi wali dengan meninggalkan orang-orang mukmin....."(Ali-Imran[3]:28)
(fq/berbagai sumber)
Mungkin gambar-gambar dibawah ini bisa memberikan penjelasan atas sikap kepala batu nya para pemimpin Arab melihat tragedi di Gaza.
Mungkin gambar-gambar dibawah ini bisa memberikan penjelasan atas sikap kepala batu nya para pemimpin Arab melihat tragedi di Gaza.
Dari kiri, Raja Abdullah (Saudi), Menlu Arab Saudi, Saud Al-faisal, Raja Abdullah (Jordan), George Bush
Menlu Israel Tzipi Livni bersalaman mesra dengan Presiden Husni Mubarak (Mesir)
Mahmud Abbas (Fattah) berjabat tangan mesra dengan Menlu Israel Tzipi Livni
George Bush, Ehurt Olmert dan Husni Mubarak saling mempersilahkan
Raja Abdullah (Saudi) bergandengan tangan akrab dengan George Bush
Senyum saudara kembar, Ehurt Olmert dan Husni Mubarak
Raja Abdullah (Saudi) saling mem
balas cium dengan George Bush
Israel Rekrut "Pasukan Blogger"
Selasa, 20/01/2009 14:44
Dalam agresi brutalnya ke Jalur Gaza, pemerintah Israel bukan hanya mengandalkan pasukan angkatan bersenjatanya tapi juga membentuk "Pasukan Blogger".
"Pasukan Blogger" adalah para blogger yang direkrut Israel untuk melawan apa yang disebut Israel sebagai "blog-blog anti-Israel", yaitu blog-blog yang berisi artikel atau gambar-gambar tentang kekejaman Zionis Israel terhadap rakyat Palestina.
Hari Minggu (18/1), Kementerian Israel yang mengurusi pemanfaatan sumber daya imigran secara resmi mengumumkan pembentukan "Pasukan Blogger" Para blogger Israel yang akan direkrut untuk menjadi "Pasukan Blogger" ini, diutaman blogger yang memiliki kemampuan bahasa asing lain selain bahasa Ibrani, seperti bahasa Inggris, Prancis, Spanyol, Rusia sampai bahasa Portugis.
"Pada masa perang, kami mencari berbagai cara agar orang-orang Israel bisa memberikan kontribusinya. Kami melihat ada potensi yang besar, dimana terdapat lebih dari satu juta orang Israel yang menjadikan berbagai bahasa asing sebagai bahasa ibu kedua mereka," kata Erez Halfon, direktur jenderal kementerian Israel pada surat kabar Israel Haaretz.
Para blogger yang berminat menjadi "Pasukan Blogger" Israel dipersilahkan mengirimkan data pribadinya ke email yang disediakan, kemudian blogger tersebut akan direkomendasikan ke departemen media kementerian luar negeri Israel. Selanjutnya, personel di kementerian tersebut akan mengarahkan blogger-blogger itu ke situs-situs anti-Israel yang dianggap menimbulkan "persoalan" bagi Israel.
Menurut Halfon, dalam jangka waktu 30 menit setelah program perekrutan "Pasukan Blogger" diumumkan, kementerian luar negeri Israel berhasil merekrut lima orang blogger. Perang Israel bukan hanya dilancarkan lewat darat, laut dan udara tapi juga lewat dunia maya. (ln/Haaretz)
| Wan Nordin Wan Yaacob Tue | Jan 20, 09 | 4:09:57 pm MYT | |
| KUALA LUMPUR, 20 Jan (Hrkh) - Dewan Pemuda Pas Wilayah Persekutuan hari ini melahirkan kekesalan terhadap tindakan sebuah syarikat telekominikasi tempatan yang menaja dan akan turut menganjurkan program konsert 'Rihanna Live in Kuala Lumpur' pada hari Jumaat, 13 Februari 2009 nanti. Menurut Ketua Pemuda PAS Wilayah Persekutuan, Kamaruzzaman Mohamad, Rihanna yang terkenal dengan lagu Bad Girl dan Umbrella sebelum ini dijangka akan mengadakan persembahan lewat pukul 8.30 malam di Stadium Bukit Jalil nanti. Iklan-iklan telah mula disebarkan melalui kaca TV, Surat Khabar, SMS dan ternyata ia adalah suatu usaha yang bersungguh dari Celcom dalam mengaut keuntungan dalam mengorganisasikan konsert ini, katanya. Rihanna atau nama sebenarnya Robyn Rihanna Fenty merupakan artis kelahiran Kepulauan Barbados yang menempah nama di Amerika Syarikat, katanya. Artis ini berkecimpung dalam genre R&B, Pop,Pop-Rock, dance dan reggae sering membawakan aksi yang menghairahkan dalam penyampaian lagu-lagunya disamping mengenakan pakaian ketat dan seksi, ujarnya. "Ini sememangnya tidak memenuhi citarasa budaya tempatan, dan tidak secocok dengan syarikat telekomunikasi itu yang dilihat sebagai sebuah syarikat tempatan yang sewajarnya mengutamakan budaya ketimuran dan artis-artis tempatan," katanya. Kehadiran Rihanna yang kini sudah menetap di Amerika sedikit sebanyak akan membawa keluar wang negara yang akhirnya akan masuk ke Amerika, katanya. Melihat kepada pengaliran wang ini, bukan sahaja membawa kita memahami erti kerugian buat negara tetapi satu penderitaan buat rakyat Palestin. Amerika menjadi sekutu Israel membekalkan senjata ketika pembunuhan ngeri di Gaza hasil dari sumbangan dan dana cukai yang diberi oleh penduduk Amerika, katanya. "Sama ada Rihanna sedar atau tidak kita sememangnya tahu bahawa duit cukai yang dibayar beliau turut menyumbang kepada peperangan di Gaza," katanya. Maka Pemuda PAS Wilayah menolak kehadiran artis ini di Malaysia atas dasar ketidaksesuaian gaya penyampaian lagu, pakaian dan juga atas sentimen menghormati rakyat Palestine yang tertindas angkara kekejaman Israel dansekutunya Amerika yang ditaja oleh kebanyakkan penduduknya. "Sama ada Rihanna terlibat atau tidak, bagi kami beliau juga adalah agen kepada kerosakkan muda-mudi yang ada di seluruh dunia melalui penyampaian lagunya dan juga penyumbang kepada kekuatan dana Israel melalui Amerika yang menjadi tempat beliau menempah nama," katanya. Memanggil Rihanna ke Malaysia umpama menghina adab ketimuran, merendahkan artis tempatan, sengaja merugikan ekonomi negara dan menyokong dasar perang Israel yang disokong Amerika, dakwanya. Sewajarnya dalam suasana ekonomi yang tidak menentu dan rakyat Palestin ditindas kini, Malaysia perlu meneruskan kempen boikot barangan Amerika termasuklah artis-artis mereka serta apa sahaja yang dikeluarkan dari negara itu terutama perkara-perkara yang negatif, katanya. _ |
| Ahmad Tajdid Tue | Jan 20, 09 | 11:53:02 am MYT | |||||||||||||||||||||
| KUALA LUMPUR, 20 Jan (Hrkh) - Himpunan Sejuta Umat di hadapan Kedutaan Amerika Jumaat, 23 Januari ini ditangguhkan ke suatu tarikh yang belum ditetapkan ekoran perkembangan terbaru di wilayah Gaza, kata Ketua Pemuda PAS Pusat, Salahuddin Ayub. Ketika menghubungi Harakah sebentar tadi, Salahuddin berkata, keputusan Hamas untuk menerima pelan genjatan senjata dan pengunduran tentera negara pengganas Israel daripada wilayah Gaza mendorong PAS Pusat menangguhkan perhimpunan itu. "Sebagai ganti, satu majlis ceramah umum 'Intifadhah Palestin & Kemenangan di Kuala Terengganu' akan diadakan pada tarikh yang sama di Markas Tarbiah PAS Pusat, Taman Melewar mulai jam 9.00 malam," jelasnya. Ceramah umum anjuran Pemuda PAS Pusat itu akan membariskan Presiden PAS, Tuan Guru Dato' Seri Abdul Hadi Awang, Salahuddin Ayub, Ketua Angkatan Muda KeADILan, Shamsul Iskandar Mat Akin dan Ahli Parlimen Kuala Terengganu, Mohd Abdul Wahid Endut. Pungutan derma untuk tabung kemanusiaan Palestin juga, ujarnya akan diadakan pada malam itu. "Orang ramai dijemput hadir untuk menyatakan sokongan terhadap perjuangan rakyat Palestin dan meraikan kemenangan PAS dan Pakatan Rakyat di Kuala Terengganu," tambahnya.- tajdid _ John J. Mearsheimer, The American Conservative - United States  Israelis and their American supporters claim that Israel learned its lessons well from the disastrous 2006 Lebanon war and has devised a winning strategy for the present war against Hamas. Of course, when a ceasefire comes, Israel will declare victory. Don’t believe it. Israel has foolishly started another war it cannot win. The campaign in Gaza is said to have two objectives: 1) to put an end to the rockets and mortars that Palestinians have been firing into southern Israel since it withdrew from Gaza in August 2005; 2) to restore Israel’s deterrent, which was said to be diminished by the Lebanon fiasco, by Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza, and by its inability to halt Iran’s nuclear program. But these are not the real goals of Operation Cast Lead. The actual purpose is connected to Israel’s long-term vision of how it intends to live with millions of Palestinians in its midst. It is part of a broader strategic goal: the creation of a “Greater Israel.” Specifically, Israel’s leaders remain determined to control all of what used to be known as Mandate Palestine, which includes Gaza and the West Bank. The Palestinians would have limited autonomy in a handful of disconnected and economically crippled enclaves, one of which is Gaza. Israel would control the borders around them, movement between them, the air above and the water below them. The key to achieving this is to inflict massive pain on the Palestinians so that they come to accept the fact that they are a defeated people and that Israel will be largely responsible for controlling their future. This strategy, which was first articulated by Ze’ev Jabotinsky in the 1920s and has heavily influenced Israeli policy since 1948, is commonly referred to as the “Iron Wall.” What has been happening in Gaza is fully consistent with this strategy. Let’s begin with Israel’s decision to withdraw from Gaza in 2005. The conventional wisdom is that Israel was serious about making peace with the Palestinians and that its leaders hoped the exit from Gaza would be a major step toward creating a viable Palestinian state. According to the New York Times’ Thomas L. Friedman, Israel was giving the Palestinians an opportunity to “build a decent mini-state there—a Dubai on the Mediterranean,” and if they did so, it would “fundamentally reshape the Israeli debate about whether the Palestinians can be handed most of the West Bank.” This is pure fiction. Even before Hamas came to power, the Israelis intended to create an open-air prison for the Palestinians in Gaza and inflict great pain on them until they complied with Israel’s wishes. Dov Weisglass, Ariel Sharon’s closest adviser at the time, candidly stated that the disengagement from Gaza was aimed at halting the peace process, not encouraging it. He described the disengagement as “formaldehyde that’s necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.” Moreover, he emphasized that the withdrawal “places the Palestinians under tremendous pressure. It forces them into a corner where they hate to be.” Arnon Soffer, a prominent Israeli demographer who also advised Sharon, elaborated on what that pressure would look like. “When 2.5 million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will become even bigger animals than they are today, with the aid of an insane fundamentalist Islam. The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day.” In January 2006, five months after the Israelis pulled their settlers out of Gaza, Hamas won a decisive victory over Fatah in the Palestinian legislative elections. This meant trouble for Israel’s strategy because Hamas was democratically elected, well organized, not corrupt like Fatah, and unwilling to accept Israel’s existence. Israel responded by ratcheting up economic pressure on the Palestinians, but it did not work. In fact, the situation took another turn for the worse in March 2007, when Fatah and Hamas came together to form a national unity government. Hamas’s stature and political power were growing, and Israel’s divide-and-conquer strategy was unraveling. To make matters worse, the national unity government began pushing for a long-term ceasefire. The Palestinians would end all missile attacks on Israel if the Israelis would stop arresting and assassinating Palestinians and end their economic stranglehold, opening the border crossings into Gaza. Israel rejected that offer and with American backing set out to foment a civil war between Fatah and Hamas that would wreck the national unity government and put Fatah in charge. The plan backfired when Hamas drove Fatah out of Gaza, leaving Hamas in charge there and the more pliant Fatah in control of the West Bank. Israel then tightened the screws on the blockade around Gaza, causing even greater hardship and suffering among the Palestinians living there. Hamas responded by continuing to fire rockets and mortars into Israel, while emphasizing that they still sought a long-term ceasefire, perhaps lasting ten years or more. This was not a noble gesture on Hamas’s part: they sought a ceasefire because the balance of power heavily favored Israel. The Israelis had no interest in a ceasefire and merely intensified the economic pressure on Gaza. But in the late spring of 2008, pressure from Israelis living under the rocket attacks led the government to agree to a six-month ceasefire starting on June 19. That agreement, which formally ended on Dec. 19, immediately preceded the present war, which began on Dec. 27. The official Israeli position blames Hamas for undermining the ceasefire. This view is widely accepted in the United States, but it is not true. Israeli leaders disliked the ceasefire from the start, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the IDF to begin preparing for the present war while the ceasefire was being negotiated in June 2008. Furthermore, Dan Gillerman, Israel’s former ambassador to the UN, reports that Jerusalem began to prepare the propaganda campaign to sell the present war months before the conflict began. For its part, Hamas drastically reduced the number of missile attacks during the first five months of the ceasefire. A total of two rockets were fired into Israel during September and October, none by Hamas. How did Israel behave during this same period? It continued arresting and assassinating Palestinians on the West Bank, and it continued the deadly blockade that was slowly strangling Gaza. Then on Nov. 4, as Americans voted for a new president, Israel attacked a tunnel inside Gaza and killed six Palestinians. It was the first major violation of the ceasefire, and the Palestinians—who had been “careful to maintain the ceasefire,” according to Israel’s Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center—responded by resuming rocket attacks. The calm that had prevailed since June vanished as Israel ratcheted up the blockade and its attacks into Gaza and the Palestinians hurled more rockets at Israel. It is worth noting that not a single Israeli was killed by Palestinian missiles between Nov. 4 and the launching of the war on Dec. 27. As the violence increased, Hamas made clear that it had no interest in extending the ceasefire beyond Dec. 19, which is hardly surprising, since it had not worked as intended. In mid-December, however, Hamas informed Israel that it was still willing to negotiate a long-term ceasefire if it included an end to the arrests and assassinations as well as the lifting of the blockade. But the Israelis, having used the ceasefire to prepare for war against Hamas, rejected this overture. The bombing of Gaza commenced eight days after the failed ceasefire formally ended. If Israel wanted to stop missile attacks from Gaza, it could have done so by arranging a long-term ceasefire with Hamas. And if Israel were genuinely interested in creating a viable Palestinian state, it could have worked with the national unity government to implement a meaningful ceasefire and change Hamas’s thinking about a two-state solution. But Israel has a different agenda: it is determined to employ the Iron Wall strategy to get the Palestinians in Gaza to accept their fate as hapless subjects of a Greater Israel. This brutal policy is clearly reflected in Israel’s conduct of the Gaza War. Israel and its supporters claim that the IDF is going to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties, in some cases taking risks that put Israeli soldiers in jeopardy. Hardly. One reason to doubt these claims is that Israel refuses to allow reporters into the war zone: it does not want the world to see what its soldiers and bombs are doing inside Gaza. At the same time, Israel has launched a massive propaganda campaign to put a positive spin on the horror stories that do emerge. The best evidence, however, that Israel is deliberately seeking to punish the broader population in Gaza is the death and destruction the IDF has wrought on that small piece of real estate. Israel has killed over 1,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 4,000. Over half of the casualties are civilians, and many are children. The IDF’s opening salvo on Dec. 27 took place as children were leaving school, and one of its primary targets that day was a large group of graduating police cadets, who hardly qualified as terrorists. In what Ehud Barak called “an all-out war against Hamas,” Israel has targeted a university, schools, mosques, homes, apartment buildings, government offices, and even ambulances. A senior Israeli military official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, explained the logic behind Israel’s expansive target set: “There are many aspects of Hamas, and we are trying to hit the whole spectrum, because everything is connected and everything supports terrorism against Israel.” In other words, everyone is a terrorist and everything is a legitimate target. Israelis tend to be blunt, and they occasionally say what they are really doing. After the IDF killed 40 Palestinian civilians in a UN school on Jan. 6, Ha’aretz reported that “senior officers admit that the IDF has been using enormous firepower.” One officer explained, “For us, being cautious means being aggressive. From the minute we entered, we’ve acted like we’re at war. That creates enormous damage on the ground … I just hope those who have fled the area of Gaza City in which we are operating will describe the shock.” One might accept that Israel is waging “a cruel, all-out war against 1.5 million Palestinian civilians,” as Ha’aretz put it in an editorial, but argue that it will eventually achieve its war aims and the rest of the world will quickly forget the horrors inflicted on the people of Gaza. This is wishful thinking. For starters, Israel is unlikely to stop the rocket fire for any appreciable period of time unless it agrees to open Gaza’s borders and stop arresting and killing Palestinians. Israelis talk about cutting off the supply of rockets and mortars into Gaza, but weapons will continue to come in via secret tunnels and ships that sneak through Israel’s naval blockade. It will also be impossible to police all of the goods sent into Gaza through legitimate channels. Israel could try to conquer all of Gaza and lock the place down. That would probably stop the rocket attacks if Israel deployed a large enough force. But then the IDF would be bogged down in a costly occupation against a deeply hostile population. They would eventually have to leave, and the rocket fire would resume. And if Israel fails to stop the rocket fire and keep it stopped, as seems likely, its deterrent will be diminished, not strengthened. More importantly, there is little reason to think that the Israelis can beat Hamas into submission and get the Palestinians to live quietly in a handful of Bantustans inside Greater Israel. Israel has been humiliating, torturing, and killing Palestinians in the Occupied Territories since 1967 and has not come close to cowing them. Indeed, Hamas’s reaction to Israel’s brutality seems to lend credence to Nietzsche’s remark that what does not kill you makes you stronger. But even if the unexpected happens and the Palestinians cave, Israel would still lose because it will become an apartheid state. As Prime Minister Ehud Olmert recently said, Israel will “face a South African-style struggle” if the Palestinians do not get a viable state of their own. “As soon as that happens,” he argued, “the state of Israel is finished.” Yet Olmert has done nothing to stop settlement expansion and create a viable Palestinian state, relying instead on the Iron Wall strategy to deal with the Palestinians. There is also little chance that people around the world who follow the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will soon forget the appalling punishment that Israel is meting out in Gaza. The destruction is just too obvious to miss, and too many people—especially in the Arab and Islamic world—care about the Palestinians’ fate. Moreover, discourse about this longstanding conflict has undergone a sea change in the West in recent years, and many of us who were once wholly sympathetic to Israel now see that the Israelis are the victimizers and the Palestinians are the victims. What is happening in Gaza will accelerate that changing picture of the conflict and long be seen as a dark stain on Israel’s reputation. The bottom line is that no matter what happens on the battlefield, Israel cannot win its war in Gaza. In fact, it is pursuing a strategy—with lots of help from its so-called friends in the Diaspora—that is placing its long-term future at risk. John J. Mearsheimer is a professor of political science at the University of Chicago and coauthor of The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. ght in as peacekeepers that created, according to Commandant of Marines Gen. R. H Barrow, "life-threatening situations, replete with verbal degradation of the officers, their uniform and country."The Bottom Line* NOTE: In addition to the authors above, for more information on Israel-Palestine in general we recommend the books by Sami Hadawi, Nur Masalha, Naseer Aruri, Salman Abu Sitta, Ilan Pappe, Edward Said, Alfred Lilienthal, Simha Flapan, Raja Shehadeh, Mazin Qumsiyeh, Ali Abunimah, Ron David, Avi Shlaim, Clayton Swisher, Greg Philo, Mike Berry, Jonathon Cook, Norman Finkelstein, Noam Chomsky, and Virginia Tilley.
Inilah hasil perang...... dan yang jelas ratusan anak-anak menangis siang mengharap belas dari sdr-sdrnya di dunia... , | |||||||||||||||||||||
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