http://www.newstatesman.com/200705280029
Children of the dust
John Pilger
As the Israeli army attempts to imprison an entire nation, it is the=20
youngest who suffer most. Half of all Palestinians killed in the past=20
six years are children
Israel is destroying any notion of a state of Palestine and is being=20
allowed to imprison an entire nation. That is clear from the latest=20
attacks on Gaza, whose suffering has become a metaphor for the tragedy=20
imposed on the peoples of the Middle East and beyond. These attacks,=20
reported on Channel 4 News, were "targeting key militants of Hamas" and=20
the "Hamas infrastructure". The BBC described a "clash" between the same=20
militants and Israeli F-16 aircraft.
Consider one such clash. The militants' car was blown to pieces by a=20
missile from a fighter-bomber. Who were these militants? In my=20
experience, all the people of Gaza are militant in their resistance to=20
their jailer and tormentor. As for the "Hamas infrastructure", this was=20
the headquarters of the party that won last year's democratic elections=20
in Palestine. To report that would give the wrong impression. It would=20
suggest that the people in the car and all the others over the years,=20
the babies and the elderly who have also "clashed" with fighter-bombers,=20
were victims of a monstrous injustice. It would suggest the truth.
"Some say," said the Channel 4 reporter, that "Hamas has courted this=20
[attack] . . ." Perhaps he was referring to the rockets fired at Israel=20
from within the prison of Gaza which killed no one. Under international=20
law an occupied people has the right to use arms against the occupier's=20
forces. This right is never reported. The Channel 4 reporter referred to=20
an "endless war", suggesting equivalents. There is no war. There is=20
resistance among the poorest, most vulnerable people on earth to an=20
enduring, illegal occupation imposed by the world's fourth largest=20
military power, whose weapons of mass destruction range from cluster=20
bombs to thermonuclear devices, bank rolled by the superpower. In the=20
past six years alone, wrote the historian Ilan Papp=E9, "Israeli forces=20
have killed more than 4,000 Palestinians, half of them children".
Consider how this power works. According to documents obtained by United=20
Press International, the Israelis once secretly funded Hamas as "a=20
direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO=20
[Palestine Liberation Orga nisation] by using a competing religious=20
alter native", in the words of a former CIA official. Today, Israel and=20
the US have reversed this ploy and openly back Hamas's rival, Fatah,=20
with bribes of millions of dollars. Israel recently secretly allowed 500=20
Fatah fighters to cross into Gaza from Egypt, where they had been=20
trained by another American client, the Cairo dictatorship. The=20
Israelis' aim is to undermine the elected Pales tinian government and=20
ignite a civil war. They have not quite succeeded. In response, the=20
Palestinians forged a government of national unity, of both Hamas and=20
Fatah. The latest attacks are aimed at destroying this.
With Gaza secured in chaos and the West Bank walled in, the Israeli=20
plan, wrote the Palestinian academic Karma Nabulsi, is "a Hobbesian=20
vision of an anarchic society: truncated, violent, powerless, destroyed,=20
cowed, ruled by disparate militias, gangs, religious ideologues and=20
extremists, broken up into ethnic and religious tribalism and co-opted=20
collaborationists. Look to the Iraq of today . . ."
On 19 May, the Guardian received this letter from Omar Jabary al-
Sarafeh, a Ramallah resident: "Land, water and air are under constant=20
sight of a sophisticated military surveillance system that makes Gaza=20
like The Truman Show," he wrote. "In this film every Gazan actor has a=20
predefined role and the [Israeli] army behaves as a director . . . The=20
Gaza strip needs to be shown as what it is . . . an Israeli laboratory=20
backed by the international community where human beings are used as=20
rabbits to test the most dramatic and perverse practices of economic=20
suffocation and starvation."
The remarkable Israeli journalist Gideon Levy has described the=20
starvation sweeping Gaza's more than a million and a quarter inhabitants=20
and the "thousands of wounded, disabled and shell-shocked people unable=20
to receive any treatment . . . The shadows of human beings roam the=20
ruins . . . They only know the [Israeli army] will return and they know=20
what this will mean for them: more imprisonment in their homes for=20
weeks, more death and destruction in monstrous proportions".
Whenever I have been in Gaza, I have been consumed by this melancholia,=20
as if I were a trespasser in a secret place of mourning. Skeins of smoke=20
from wood fires hang over the same Mediterranean Sea that free peoples=20
know, but not here. Along beaches that tourists would regard as=20
picturesque trudge the incarcerated of Gaza; lines of sepia figures=20
become silhouettes, marching at the water's edge, through lapping=20
sewage. The water and power are cut off, yet again, when the generators=20
are bombed, yet again. Iconic murals on walls pockmarked by bullets=20
commemorate the dead, such as the family of 18 men, women and children=20
who "clashed" with a 500lb American/Israeli bomb, dropped on their block=20
of flats as they slept. Presumably, they were militants.
More than 40 per cent of the population of Gaza are children under the=20
age of 15. Reporting on a four-year field study in occupied Palestine=20
for the British Medical Journal, Dr Derek Summerfield wrote that "two-
thirds of the 621 children killed at checkpoints, in the street, on the=20
way to school, in their homes, died from small arms fire, directed in=20
over half of cases to the head, neck and chest - the sniper's wound". A=20
friend of mine with the United Nations calls them "children of the=20
dust". Their wonderful childishness, their rowdiness and giggles and=20
charm, belie their nightmare.
I met Dr Khalid Dahlan, a psychiatrist who heads one of several=20
children's community health projects in Gaza. He told me about his=20
latest survey. "The statistic I personally find unbearable," he said,=20
"is that 99.4 per cent of the children we studied suffer trauma. Once=20
you look at the rates of exposure to trauma, you see why: 99.2 per cent=20
of the study group's homes were bombarded; 97.5 per cent were exposed to=20
tear gas; 96.6 per cent witnessed shootings; 95.8 per cent witnessed=20
bombardment and funerals; almost a quarter saw family members injured or=20
killed."
He said children as young as three faced the dichotomy caused by having=20
to cope with these conditions. They dreamt about becoming doctors and=20
nurses, then this was overtaken by an apocalyptic vision of themselves=20
as the next generation of suicide bombers. They experienced this=20
invariably after an attack by the Israelis. For some boys, their heroes=20
were no longer football players, but a confusion of Palestinian=20
"martyrs" and even the enemy, "because Israeli soldiers are the=20
strongest and have Apache gunships".
Shortly before he died, Edward Said bitterly reproached foreign=20
journalists for what he called their destructive role in "stripping the=20
context of Palestinian violence, the response of a desperate and=20
horribly oppressed people, and the terrible suffering from which it=20
arises". Just as the invasion of Iraq was a "war by media", so the same=20
can be said of the grotesquely one-sided "conflict" in Palestine. As the=20
pioneering work of the Glasgow University Media Group shows, television=20
viewers are rarely told that the Palestinians are victims of an illegal=20
military occupation; the term "occupied territories" is seldom=20
explained. Only 9 per cent of young people interviewed in the UK know=20
that the Israelis are the occupying force and the illegal settlers are=20
Jewish; many believe them to be Palestinian. The selective use of=20
language by broadcasters is crucial in maintaining this confusion and=20
ignorance. Words such as "terrorism", "murder" and "savage, cold-blooded=20
killing" describe the deaths of Israelis, almost never Palestinians.
There are honourable exceptions. The kidnap ped BBC reporter Alan=20
Johnston is one of them. Yet, amidst the avalanche of coverage of his=20
abduction, no mention is made of the thousands of Palestinians abducted=20
by Israel, many of whom will not see their families for years. There are=20
no appeals for them. In Jerusalem, the Foreign Press Association=20
documents the shooting and intimidation of its members by Israeli=20
soldiers. In one eight-month period, as many journalists, includ ing the=20
CNN bureau chief in Jerusalem, were wounded by the Israelis, some of=20
them seriously. In each case, the FPA complained. In each case, there=20
was no satisfactory reply.
A censorship by omission runs deep in western journalism on Israel,=20
especially in the US. Hamas is dismissed as a "terrorist group sworn to=20
Israel's destruction" and one that "refuses to recognise Israel and=20
wants to fight not talk". This theme suppresses the truth: that Israel=20
is bent on Palestine's destruction. Moreover, Hamas's long-standing=20
proposals for a ten-year ceasefire are ignored, along with a recent,=20
hopeful ideological shift within Hamas itself that amounts to a historic=20
acceptance of the sovereignty of Israel. "The [Hamas] charter is not the=20
Quran," said a senior Hamas official, Mohammed Ghazal. "Historically, we=20
believe all Palestine belongs to Palestinians, but we're talking now=20
about reality, about political solutions . . . If Israel reached a stage=20
where it was able to talk to Hamas, I don't think there would be a=20
problem of negotiating with the Israelis [for a solution]."
When I last saw Gaza, driving towards the Israeli checkpoint and the=20
razor wire, I was rewarded with a spectacle of Palestinian flags=20
fluttering from inside the walled compounds. Children were responsible=20
for this, I was told. They make flagpoles out of sticks tied together=20
and one or two will climb on to a wall and hold the flag between them,=20
silently. They do it when there are foreigners around and they believe=20
they can tell the world.=20
John Pilger's latest book, "Freedom Next Time", is published in=20
paperback by Black Swan (=A38.99). His first film for cinema, "The War on=
=20
Democracy", is released on 15 June
--=20
Remove both YOUR_SHOES before replying
apatriot #1, atheist #1417,=20
Chief EAC prophet=20
Jason Gastrich is praying for me on 8 January 2009
Apatriotism Yahoo Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/apatriotism
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make=20
you commit atrocities." - Voltaire
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