Gaza Under Attack-
Eye Witness Account
By Kim Bullimore,
in West Bank
13 October, 2004
Green
Left Weekly
Seven
days after the Israeli military campaign in the northern Gaza region
began on September 28, 100 Palestinians one third of them under
the age of 15 have been killed, while more than 300 civilians,
including more than 80 children, have been wounded, 168 houses have
been demolished, along with kindergartens, dozens of grocery stores,
schools and olive groves. Electricity has been cut off and tens of thousands
of people have been left without drinking water.
The Israeli offensive,
which began on the night of the fourth anniversary of the second Palestinian
intifada (uprising), has been carried out in one of the most populated
regions of Gaza. In the past six days, more than 2000 Israeli troops,
accompanied by 200 Israeli tanks, dozens of apache helicopters and armoured
bulldozers have entered Jabaliya, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun refugee
camps which are home to more than 250,000 Palestinians.
The offensive also
began within days of Yom Kippur, the Jewish festival of atonement. In
a gross misappropriation of Jewish religiousity, the Israeli government
has dubbed the operation Days of Penitence.
Medical staff in
Balsam Hospital in Beit Lahia have reported severe food, medical and
blood shortages, while the staff at Al Awda hospital in Jabaliya have
reported that their medical emergency supplies have been exhausted as
a result of the high number of causalities. According to the Al Mezan
Centre for Human Rights, which is based in Jabiliya, the Israeli Defense
Force (IDF) has denied the Ministry of Health access to the government
clinic in Beit Hanoun, and denied all requests for access. Since the
start of the offensive, the IDF has refused to allow United Nation Works
and Relief Agency (UNWRA) medical staff access to their clinic to assist
with causalities.
IDF spokespeople
have publicly claimed that the offensive is in response to the death
of two children killed by a Hamas rocket attack upon the Israeli township
of Sderot. However, a number of commentators in Israel have argued that
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, under pressure from the extreme
right because of his Gaza disengagement plan, is exploiting
the death of the children to pursue his own agenda.
Sharons Gaza
disengagement plan, announced in February, was designed
to relieve international pressure on Israel, which had ratcheted up
because of its construction of the Apratheid Wall. The plan was designed
to give the impression that Israel was working towards peace without
giving into terrorism, while allowing Sharon and his government
to annex and consolidate more territory in the West Bank. Despite all
the hue and cry by right-wing opponents of disengagement,
the plan concedes little.
Under it, disengagement
was not to be immediate or unilateral, instead it was to take one
or two years to complete and would merely involve shifting the
path of the Apartheid Wall east to a new security line within the Occupied
Territories. This would take in more illegal settlements then the original
path, and would not result in the immediate dismantling of those illegal
colonies outside the new path, instead they would be relocated.
In addition, the
plan would exclude Palestinians from the negotiating table, in favour
of Washington-Israel talks. In return for disengagement,
the US would be asked to recognise the Apartheid wall, as well as the
illegal colonies of Ariel, Maaleh Adumim and Gush Etzio, annexing
further sections of the West Bank. Within days of the announcement of
the plan, however, the number of settlements to be moved dwindled from
17 to include only the most isolated colonies, with the
evacuation of the Katif block, the biggest colony in the Gaza being
postponed indefinitely.
In an interview
in April with the Progressive magazine, Uri Avnery, a former Knesset
member and founding member of Israeli peace organisation Gush Shalom,
claimed that the plan would result in the incorporation of 55% of the
West Bank into Israel. At the same time, Avnery argued, the Gaza will
become a giant prison camp, cut off on all sides. It will have no seaport
or airport and be cut off from its only neighbour, Egypt. There will
be no entering the Strip or leaving it except through Israel. Much as
now, Israel will be able to cut off the supply of food, raw materials,
water, fuel, gas and electricity, as well as the exit of workers and
goods. Israel will also be able to invade the Strip at any time in order
to prevent terrorist actions.
Sharons plan
might have meant little, but that did not stop other right-wing parties,
the extreme right within his own party and extremist settler groups
and rabbinical leaders condemning it. In early September, more than
20,000 settlers rallied in Jerusalem to protest the plan. Many of those
attending the rally warned that civil war was inevitable and that there
would be violent clashes between settlers and Israeli security forces
should the plan go ahead. Other settlers at the demonstration carried
signs calling Sharon a dictator and traitor.
Three days prior
to the demonstration, 185 former members of the Israeli government,
senior reserve officers in the IDF and other prominent Israeli professionals
signed a petition declaring disengagement a national crime, a
crime against humanity and is a revelation of tyranny, evil and arbitrariness
meant to deny Jews their rights
[that] lays the groundwork for
the ethnic cleansing of Jews from their homeland. A number of
the signatories to the petition went on to publicly accuse Sharon of
Nazism and anti-semitism.
Given this pressure,
Sharon is particularly wary of appearing to give in to Palestinian militants.
According to Israels daily newspaper Haaretz, an October
3 statement by Israeli defence minister Shaul Mofaz argued
that the aim of the [Gaza] operation is `to send a clear message
that Israel will not tolerate terrorist operations during the disengagement,
hints at the pressure by the right of the opponents of the disengagement
plan, who are taking advantage of the suffering of the Sderot residents.
The Gaza offensive
allows Sharon to continue to pose as the strongman of Israeli
politics at home, while propagating the fantasy that Israel is seeking
peace and is the victim in the conflict. Washington is quite
happy to continue to foster this. US Secretary of State Colin Powell
told the New York Times that Israels action in Gaza in relation
to the rocket attacks was a legitimate response.
The offensive also
allows Israel to maintain its military and economic stranglehold on
the Gaza. On October 3, Sharon and Mofaz separately described the Gaza
offensive as open-ended, saying that the IDF would establish
a buffer zone to spare Israeli towns from rocket attacks
and ensure that there is no withdrawal under fire next year.
The current offensive
is merely a continuation of military operations that have taken place
since Sharon first announced plans for disengagement. For
the past six months, the IDF has been systematically demolishing houses
and olive groves in Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya. In addition, hundreds
of houses have been demolished along the Philidelphi corridor near Rafah,
ensuring that Israel will control the border between the Gaza and Egypt.
As the US prepares
to veto a UN motion condemning the Israeli offensive and the illegal
collective punishment of civilians, the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza
continues to grow. Sharons strategy, if allowed to proceed, will
ensure that there is no road to peace and the continued construction
of the illegal Apartheid Wall and the further illegal annexation by
Israel of a further 55% of the West Bank.
[Kim Bullimore is
a member of the Socialist Alliance and is currently working with the
international human rights and solidarity group, the International Womens
Peace Service in Palestine. Visit http://www.womenspeacepalestine.org
]