Gaza under Siege:"A Silent Violence of Suffering That 98 Percent of Congress Avoids Mentioning"

Ralph Nader,

"Gaza under Siege:

Loads links, A Video & Action Alert for US citizens.

Andrew Silvera

by Ralph Nader

The world's largest prison --
Gaza prison with 1.5 million inmates, many
of them starving, sick and penniless --
is receiving more sympathy and protest
by Israeli citizens, of widely impressive backgrounds,
than is reported in the U.S. press.

In contrast, the humanitarian crisis brought about by
Israeli government blockades that prevent food,
medicine, fuel and other necessities from coming into
this tiny enclave through international relief
organizations is received with predictable silence
or callousness by members of Congress, including
John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

The contrast invites more public attention
and discussion.

Israel has militarily occupied Gaza for forty years.
It pulled out its colonials in 2005 but maintained an
iron grip on the area -- controlling all access, including
its airspace and territorial waters. Its F-16s and
helicopter gunships regularly shred more and
more of the areas' public works, its neighborhoods
and inflict collective punishment on civilians in
violation of
Article 55 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

As the International Red Cross declares, citing treaties
establishing international humanitarian law,
"Neither the civilian population as a whole nor
individual civilians may be attacked."

According to The Nation magazine, the great Israeli
human rights organization B'Tselem, reports that the
primitive rockets from Gaza, have taken thirteen
Israeli lives in the past four years, while Israeli forces
have killed more than 1000 Palestinians in the occupied
territories in the past two years alone. Almost half of
them were civilians, including some 200 children.

The Israeli government is barring most of the trucks
from entering Gaza to feed the nearly one million
Palestinians depending on international relief, from
groups such as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency
(UNRWA). The loss of life from crumbling health care
facilities, disastrous electricity cutoffs, gross malnutrition
and contaminated drinking water from broken public
water systems does not get totaled. These are the
children and their civilian adult relatives who expire in
a silent violence of suffering that 98 percent of
Congress avoids mentioning
while extending billions of taxpayer dollars to
Israel annually.

UNRWA says "we are seeing evidence of the stunting
of children, their growth is slowing. . ." Cancer patients
are deprived of their chemotherapy, kidney patients are
cut off from dialysis treatments and premature babies
cannot receive blood-clotting medications, reports
Professor Saree Makdisi in the February 2, 2008
issue of The Nation.

The misery, mortality and morbidity worsens
day by day. Here is how the commissioner-general
of UNRWA sums it up -- "Gaza is on the threshold
of becoming the first territory to be intentionally
reduced to a state of abject destitution, with the
knowledge, acquiescence and-some would
say-encouragement of the international community."

Amidst the swirl of hard-liners on both sides and in both
Democratic and Republican parties, consider the latest
poll (February 27, 2008) of Israelis in the highly
respected newspaper -- Haaretz: "Sixty-four percent of
Israelis say the government must hold direct talks with
the Hamas government in Gaza toward a cease-fire and
the release of captive soldier Gilad Shalit. Less that one-third
(28 percent) still opposes such talks. An increasing
number of public figures, including senior officers in the
Israeli Defense Forces' reserves have expressed
similar positions on talks with Hamas."

Hamas, which was created with the support of
Israel and the U.S. government years ago to counter
the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), has
repeatedly offered cease-fire proposals.

The Israeli prime minister rejected them,
notwithstanding "a growing number of politicians and
security offices who are calling for Israel to accept a
cease-fire," according to Middle East specialist,
Professor Steve Niva.

There is a similar contrast between the hardline
Bush regime, the comparably hardline Democrats in
Congress, and a recent survey by the American
Jewish Committee (itself often hawkish on Israeli
actions toward the Palestinians) of American Jewry.

As reported by Eric Alterman in the January 7, 2008 issue
of The Nation, "a majority of Jews in this country oppose
virtually every aspect of the Bush Admistration/neocon
agenda," including his war in Iraq and his belligerence
toward Iran.

By a 46-to-43 percent plurality American Jews continue
to support the creation of a Palestinian state, notes
Alterman. Other polls show even higher support,
among Jews in America, for a two-state solution.

Then Alterman comes to his conclusion, writing:
"These views, however, have been obscured in our
political discourse by an unholy alliance between
conservative-dominated professional Jewish
organizations and neoconservative Jewish pundits,
aided by pliant and frequently clueless mainstream
media that empower these right-wingers to speak
for a people [Jewish-Americans] with values diametrically
opposed to theirs."

Makes for a healthy, constructive
political debate doesn't it?

If Democrats and Republicans were serious about
peace in the Middle East, they would showcase the
broad joint Israeli and Palestinian peace movements.
These efforts now include the over 500 courageous
Israeli and Palestinian families who have lost a loved
one to the conflict and who have joined forces to form
the Parents Circle -- Bereaved Families Forum.

Together, these families are expanding a non-violent
initiative to push for a peaceful resolution to the
conflict. Even though some of the families have
visited the United States, their efforts are almost
unknown even to U.S. observers of that area's turmoil.

A new DVD documentary titled Encounter Point
(see www.encounterpoint.com) recounts the
activities and passion of these Palestinian and Israeli
families steeped in the peace philosophies of Mahatma
Gandhi and Nelson Mandela.

Ralph Nader, a son of Lebanese immigrants, was born in Winsted,
Connecticut on 27 February 1934. He is a consumer advocate,
lawyer, and author. This article originally appeared on his Web
site Nader.org on 7 March 2008.