Sunday, May 11

Israel’s Right to Terrorism

By *Ghali Hassan

In response to Palestinian Resistance to Israel’s
terror, Matan Vilnai, Israel's deputy defence minister,
threatened Palestinian with a holocaust. Vilnai told
Israeli Army Radio: “[the Palestinians] will bring
upon themselves a bigger shoah (holocaust) because
we will use all our might to defend ourselves".
An occupying power (aggressor) has no right to self-defence.
The deliberate killing of innocent and defenceless Palestinians
is not self-defence; it is terrorism.

For nearly sixty years, Jews – Israeli in particular –,
have exclusively used the word “holocaust” to describe
crimes committed against Jews by the Nazis, ignoring
the Nazi’s millions of none-Jewish victims. The holocaust
is not only being used as a Zionist tool (a weapon) to shield
Israel from any criticism, but also to manipulate the public
and gain Israel sympathy as a “victim state”. In addition,
Israeli leaders use the holocaust as a justification for
ongoing Israel’s terror and war crimes against the
Palestinian people. The creation of Israel brought
unimaginable suffering on the Palestinian people
and turned them into holocaust victims.

According to Gaza-based journalist Mohammed Omar
of rafahtoday.org, at least 130 Palestinians, including
39 children and 10 women were murdered by the
Israeli army in the last days of February 2008.
Even babies as young as six-month-old are targeted
by Israel’s terror. In addition, more than 370 children
were injured. Only one Israeli settler and two Israeli
soldiers were killed by Palestinian resisting Israeli
aggression against the people of Gaza, the perfect
pretext for mass murder of Palestinians. The
home-made Palestinian rockets used by the
Palestinian Resistance are nothing compared
with the F-16s bombers, helicopter missiles, cluster
bombs and artillery shells used by the Israeli war
machine against defenceless Palestinian population
under brutal occupation.

For more than a year, the 1.5 million inhabitants of
Gaza have been under brutal blockade enforced by
the Israeli army and backed by U.S. and European
leaders. Mass starvations of Palestinian children, daily
bombardment of residential areas, kidnapping,
imprisonment and assassination of political leaders
have become the norms. People have become used to
the suffering of the Palestinian people. According to
Israel, the terror is justified. The Israeli Supreme Court
(the guardian of Jewish Justice) has approved this policy
of collective punishment and mass starvation
(Ha’aretz, 02/02/2008). However, it is worth noting
that, Israel would not be able to perpetuate violence
on such scale were it not for the apathy and equanimity
of Westerners; they share responsibility.

The morally correct Western powers, led by the U.S.
– who never shies away from putting Israel’s interests
first – have unconditionally supported Israel’s violence.
Major European powers and the U.S. continue to provide
massive military, financial and political supports to Israel.
And with disregards to the suffering of the Palestinian
people, Westerners commemorate Israel’s genocidal
policy of ethnic cleansing and dispossession of the
Palestinian people by celebrating Israel’s so-called
“60th Anniversary”. British children are now required
to take lessons on the “Jewish holocaust”, while French
children are encouraged to identify with the personal
stories of French Jewish children who died in the
“Jewish holocaust”.

In addition to the unconditional backing of the West,
Israel has the unquestionable backing of Western media.
Global propaganda outlets such as, the BBC, CNN, New
York Times, etc. are tirelessly covering-up Israel’s war
crimes and spreading Israeli propaganda. As portrayed
by Western media, Israel is a “civilised” and “democratic”
nation, never initiates terrorist attacks or involved in daily
acts of terrorism. Israel simply responds and retaliates.
Israel responds to Palestinian throwing stones and retaliates
against Palestinian rockets. Israeli soldiers are ‘forced’ to kill
Palestinian children and pregnant women, and demolish
Palestinian houses. Israeli soldiers are not responsible
because they are facing a stronger enemy. The fact that
these crimes are acts of terrorism against defenceless people
doesn’t seem to interest Western media. The fact that Israel
is a racist apartheid state aimed at becoming a homogenous
“Jewish state” at the expense of the indigenous Palestinian
people is deliberately ignored by Western media. By contrast,
the Palestinians are portrayed as ‘militants’ – regardless of age
–, ‘seeking revenge’ and trying to ‘destroy’ a ‘peace-loving Israel’.

Of course, when it comes to “peace” there is no such discourse
among Israeli leaders. Peace has become Israel’s euphemism
for violence and Palestinian dispossession. For Israeli leaders,
peace means the ongoing killing of defenceless Palestinians,
initiated by Israeli violent provocations. And in collaboration
with Palestinian traitors (elites), Israel continues to build and
expand its illegal Jewish colonies (settlements) and
Jewish-only roads. The Apartheid Wall separates
Palestinian from their children’s schools, farms and
isolates them in designated ghettos deprived of land and
water. For the Palestinians, “daily living is defined by the
body count [of their love ones], the number of coffins being
hurried to the cemeteries, the crammed hospital corridors
and the overflowing of intensive care units”, said an editorial
in the Gulf News. It is genocide in slow motion.

In another development, a new opinion conducted by the
Israeli daily Ha’aretz and the polling company Dialog in
collaboration with Tel Aviv University, shows 64 percent
of Israelis favour a truce with the Palestinian Resistance,
including HAMAS, the highest majority to date. HAMAS
leaders said they would consider a ceasefire if Israel lifted
its blockade and ceased violent attacks in besieged Gaza
and the occupied West Bank. Successive Israeli leaders
have rejected every Palestinian proposal for ceasefire or
peace, blindly pursuing the Zionist policy of ethnic cleansing
of the Palestinian people from their homeland.

Finally, a “holocaust” will not bring peace to Palestine. Peace
will return to Palestine only if Israeli leaders end their
genocidal policy and the illegal occupation of Palestinian
land. Under the international Genocide Convention
adopted in 1948 after the defeat Nazism, incitement
to genocide is punishable war crime. Hence, Israeli
leaders should abide by international laws and revoke
terrorism and violence.

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