Pummeling
The Victim
By Rima Merriman
08 November 2006
The
Electronic Intifada
The
terrible imbalance of power between the Israelis and Palestinians makes
it impossible for Israel, regardless of which government is in power,
to deal with the Palestinians in any way except through a lens of assumed
moral, cultural, and racial superiority, as though military prowess
equates with civilization and home-made rockets equate with savagery
and a sub-human status.
The savagery, though, belongs
to Israel and to anyone who has the power to stop a bully in his bloody
pummeling of a much weaker opponent but instead stands aside, watching
under the cover of the manufactured excuse that the bully is defending
himself against his hapless victim.
Europe may be looking askance
at Iran's attempt to arm itself, but really, that's a coin Europe understands
very well. When the Middle East and North Africa were under the control
of the European powers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
they certainly loved this notion that there is a hierarchy of races
and civilizations and that they belonged to the superior one -- primarily
as a result of their military power. As a French writer put it, "The
basic legitimation of conquest over native peoples is the conviction
of our superiority, not merely our mechanical, economic, and military
superiority, but our moral superiority."
The current savage spectacle of the beating up of Gaza ("conquest"
is too fancy a word for what's happening) is rooted in this kind of
thinking. It's what makes Moslems cheer for Iran's attempts to arm itself
to a point that will move it magically out of the shameful circle of
terrorism/evil into the fancy circle of a "power". It seems
that's the avenue that will bring it and the Islam it represents moral
superiority in the eyes of the US and Europe.
The Israeli exercise of power
over its subject people in the occupied Palestinian territories (OPT)
takes on many different shapes. One is military, as in using its powerful
arsenal of weapons to go into Palestinians towns and cities on a daily
basis and find and slaughter selected people at will -- as in sweeping
into Beit Hanoun in the Gaza Strip and mowing whatever stands in its
way, even people taking refuge from its civilized terror in a mosque.
When Israel's present campaign in Gaza is all over (is this still "Summer
Rain" or have the Israelis moved into "Winter Blues"?),
the Palestinians will no doubt crawl out from under the rubble and look
for uncivilized ways to take revenge.
Then there are the refined
democratic deliberations that Israel exercises through its various cabinets
at the same time it has some Palestinian cabinet members under lock
and key, the most recent of whom is the Palestinian Minister of Labor,
kidnapped on November second.
The Israeli diplomatic-security
cabinet (responsible for "strategic-political-defensive issues",
naturally, as Israel's armed forces must constantly defend and subdue
what they conquered by force) met the other day and voted to keep up
the "military pressure" on Hamas in the Gaza Strip; to allow
General Keith Dayton, the American security coordinator in the occupied
territories, to arm and train forces loyal to Mahmoud Abbas; and to
grant the request of the US to allow the Badr Brigade, a wing of the
Palestine Liberation Army that is currently stationed in Jordan, to
relocate to the occupied territories.
And speaking of "relocations",
the Israeli diplomatic-security cabinet, which should be called "The
Israeli Cabinet for the further Subjugation and Containment of the Palestinian
People", gave cursory attention to a tool the Israeli government
has long used in order to effect what many justly see as ethnic cleansing
of Palestinians from the OPT, including Jerusalem. Since Israel controls
the population registry of Palestinians in the OPT as well as the borders
of the territories with the outside world, it controls who is permitted
to have a Palestinian ID; who is permitted to enter the OPT; who is
permitted to live there; who is permitted to work there; and who is
permitted to live in Jerusalem specifically. Israel gives a very limited
number of visas and permits - far, far below the need and the demand.
This power and control on
Israel's part manifests itself in various damaging and isolating ways
for Palestinians, but the most egregious manifestation is family break-up.
Israel is not issuing permits to thousands of spouses and close family
members of Palestinians who hold various nationalities to reside in
the OPT. This is a policy that Israel has practiced with various refinements
since the Oslo Accords. One of these refinements foils the attempts
(through the procuring of tourist visas at the border) of Palestinian
expatriate nationals as well as regular nationals of every country in
the world who are looking to live in the OPT in order to be united with
their families or in order to work in the OPT and contribute to its
development.
In response to "sharp"
criticism from the US and EU for preventing their nationals from procuring
residency permits in the OPT, the diplomatic-security cabinet ratified
a request by Defense Minister Amir Peretz, according to Haaretz, "to
'launder' the presence in the West Bank of some 5,000 Palestinians who
hold American or European passports." Unfortunately, this gesture
comprises barely a single underwear from the dirty wash that Israel
needs to launder. Furthermore, it is bound to create internal conflict
among the Palestinians. How are they supposed to fairly divvy up this
gift of 5,000 permits? Perhaps they will organize a lottery.
There are thousands of nationals
of less powerful countries than the US and the EU who have a right to
live with their families in the occupied territories. Many of these,
for example, are Jordanians. Even though Jordan has a so-called peace
treaty with Israel, it apparently has no clout to ask the Israeli government
to process the thousands of family unification applications that families
have already filed on behalf of some of its citizens (Israel is currently
sitting on more than 120,000 such applications). Thousands of other
nationalities are currently living "illegally" in the OPT
with their families afraid to speak up, imprisoned in their homes.
Back to Gaza, the majority
of whose captive population is made up of refugees from cities and towns
now within Israeli borders. One sadly notes no discussion in Israel's
diplomatic-security cabinet, as it was considering the Gaza Strip and
Israel's fancy "defensive" attacks on it, of a plan to return
these people to their homes or to compensate them - a basic right for
those people codified in international law.
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