Kidnapped
In Gaza:
Chaos As A Strategy
By Ramzy Baroud
06 September, 2006
Countercurrents.org
Two
Fox News journalists, Steve Cantani and Olas Wing were released by their
Palestinian kidnappers in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, August 27. Just
one day earlier, two Reuters’ cameramen were seriously wounded
in an apparently deliberate Israeli strike on their clearly marked vehicle,
according to news reports. The names of the two wounded cameramen, however,
as well as their story went largely unreported. Their plight seemed
inconsequential compared to that of the Fox News journalists.
Video recordings released
earlier by the kidnappers of Cantani and Wing revealed undeniable similarities
between their scandalous style - wrecking with ignorance and artlessness
– and that of Iraqi groups, notorious for their gory beheadings
and other acts of savagery. The Palestinian group expectedly has no
clear past and no apparent affiliation with any other known Palestinian
faction. They laid impossible demands and employed Islamic rhetoric.
Both journalists were forced to convert to Islam, in a very disturbing,
yet amateurish act. Any Islamic interpretation, no matter how fundamental,
forbids such practice. Qoranic verses in this regard are any thing but
disputable.
Did the Holy Jihad Brigades
– a dodgy name by any Palestinian standards – know that
forcing a person to recite that “There is No God but Allah”
doesn’t qualify him/her as a Muslim? What business did the dubious
‘holly worriers’ of Gaza have demanding a release of “all
Muslim prisoners” in American jails? Not enough Palestinians in
Israeli prisons, perhaps?
How interesting that the
Palestinian kidnappers wished to ‘twist American arms’ –
which was of course met with US courage and defiance – the same
way that the capturers of Israeli soldier (name) on (date) tried to
extract concessions from Israel when rightfully demanded the release
of Palestinian women and children held illegally in Israeli jails. Once
again the American public are being introduced to the excessive ways
of Islamic terror, and once again are forced to appreciate the ‘courage’
and defiance of the Israeli government in the face of extortion and
intimidation.
While the kidnapping of the
two Fox News journalists – the method, the demands and the dark-age
presentation that lasted for two weeks – all exhibit the work
of a largely disturbed and ignorant young men – their timing and
the PR disaster they’ve caused is hardly above suspicion. It clearly
shows that there was in fact a hidden agenda behind that apparent idiocy,
one that had nothing to do with the spread of Islam or the release of
Muslim prisoners in American jails.
Though, it’s difficult,
if not impossible to determine for sure who was exactly behind that
charade, it’s important to fathom the context in which it took
place.
Israel, on one hand, had
desperately tried to link its fight against Palestinians – which
evolved into a war against Palestinian democracy following the January
2006 legislative elections – with America’s ‘war on
terror’. Palestinian factions, keeping wary of the dangerous Israeli
scheme seemed least interesting in any involvement with al-Qaeda and
its criminal affiliations. Desperate, yet canny Israeli attempts, reported
sporadically in world media, miserably failed.
The advent of Hamas to the
political scene in Palestine, and despite its utterly moderate position
if compared to most Islamic political and/or militant movements dotting
the Middle East and the Muslim world, enlivened Israel into once again
alleging the existence of that link: ‘Hamas to Israel is as al-Qaeda
to America,’ was the Israeli mantra.
That too has failed, even
with the help of President Bush and his administration, who have never
shied away from linking Hamas with al-Qaeda at every available opportunity.
The Israeli redeployment around Gaza of (date) was hardly the end of
the Israeli interest in the impoverished Gaza Strip. It left behind
a legion of self-seeking, dare I say pro-Israeli crowd, incessant in
its attempt to redeem the many privileges it had lost since the restructuring
of the political landscape introduced with the democratic toppling of
Fatah in the recent Palestinian elections. While many Palestinians wish
not to admit the size and significance of such a group, all signs point
to their unmatched influence, and ability to wreck havoc on Palestinian
society, permeate chaos, and impeding genuine attempts of Hamas and
a less corrupt Fatah faction to achieve a national unity government.
Though Palestinians are an
occupied nation, a unity government could be quite useful; without it
Palestinians have little chance to develop meaningful internal and external
strategies to unify their ranks and to resist Israel’s colonial
onslaught and unremitting land grabbing in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Every time officials from both sides promised that such a government
will be declared very soon, sometimes within hours, an event so dramatic
would spoil the arrangement, sending talks back to square one. The Israeli
one-sided hostilities against Gaza, which killed hundreds in recent
months, came at the heels of an inter-Palestinian agreement according
to wish Hamas would accept international law as the most plausible resolution
to the conflict with Israel, and also ensure the release of the captured
Israeli soldier. The kidnapping of the two American journalists was
also timed in such a way to embarrass the Palestinian government and
provide Israel with enough leverage to carry on with its incessant violence.
But how could the Palestinian
kidnappers be so outdated in their rhetoric, yet so skilful in producing
a faultless PR disaster, handing Israel the most convenient illustration
as of yet, of al-Qaeda-like mindset of Palestinians?
The kidnapping episode will
certainly be milked for all its worth – while the deliberate targeting
of the two Reuters journalists by the Israeli army will hardly register
for more than a day or two as a fleeting and extraneous piece of news.
The Israelis and their friends will eloquently associate the journalist
kidnapping with its most rational kin, the capturing of the Israeli
soldier. A few will dare challenge that narrative, or point at the discrepancies
between the Holy Jihad Brigades’ style and technique and other
Palestinian militants fighting Israeli occupation.
The irony in all of this
is that Israel, the United States and much of Europe behind them have
collectively punished the Palestinian people for electing Hamas, imposing
an effective siege, economic and diplomatic against Palestinians, which
resulted in further chaos and instability.
Regardless of who is exactly
behind the journalists’ kidnapping in Gaza, this episode highlights
the volatility of a situation when an elected government is being forced
to operate under ground (with many of its members already in Israeli
jails), leaving the matter of security to be handled by same Fatah factions
that caused most of the chaos and insecurity in Gaza.
Is it a surprise that the
Fatah security forces always fail to carry out even one arrest once
the release of foreign hostages is secured, perhaps with the hope that
the kidnappers will strike once more whenever such distractions are
convenient for both Israel and its beneficiaries? The mockery is most
disturbing.
Ramzy Baroud is a US author and journalist, currently
based in London. His recent book, “The Second Palestinian Intifada:
A Chronicle of a People’s Struggle” (Pluto Press, London)
is now available at Amazon.com. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of PalestineChronicle.com.