Israeli settlers wage campaign of intimidation on Palestinians and internationals alike
Date: 25 October 2004.
'Israeli settlers in the Occupied Territories have stepped up attacks against Palestinians and are waging a campaign of intimidation against international and Israeli human rights activists. Their aim is to eliminate the presence of witnesses to their attacks, thereby depriving the local Palestinian population of this only form of limited protection.
Two US citizens, members of the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT), were assaulted on 29 September by masked Israeli settlers who beat them with clubs and chains as they accompanied Palestinian children to school near the Tuwani village, South of Hebron. Kim Lamberty sustained a broken arm and knee and bruising to her face, while Chris Brown was left with a punctured lung and multiple bruises. Members of the CPT and other Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) have been escorting Palestinian children to school to protect them from attacks by Israeli settlers.
A group of hooded Israeli settlers attacked Amnesty International delegates and members of the CPT and the Operation Dove NGO on 9 October as they returned from accompanying Palestinian primary schoolchildren back to their home. The attackers first threw stones at the five internationals and then attacked three of them with wooden clubs. An Amnesty International delegate sustained multiple bruises on her back, arm and leg and the Operation Dove member collapsed and had to be taken to hospital by ambulance. On both occasions, the attackers came from the nearby Israeli settlement of Havat Ma’on and returned there after the attacks.
Rather than taking steps to stop and prevent such attacks and hold Israeli settlers accountable, the Israeli army and security forces have responded by imposing further restrictions on the local Palestinian population.
After the attack, the Israeli army informed the Palestinian villagers that, if the children are accompanied by internationals on their way to and from school, no army patrol will be on site to protect them from Israeli settlers. The Palestinian villagers reluctantly accepted that the schoolchildren have to make the journey without their international escort, but, two days later, on 12 October, the children were again chased by Israeli settlers from the Havat Ma’on settlement while on their way to school. The Israeli army patrol, which was present, did not intervene. Israeli settlers again threw stones as the children passed near the settlement on their way to school on 17 October.
The only alternative is for the schoolchildren to avoid passing near the Israeli settlements by making a long detour that lengthens their walk from 20 minutes to more than two hours each way.
As in previous years around the time of the olive harvest, Israeli settlers have also stepped up attacks on the local Palestinian inhabitants and farmers throughout the West Bank, preventing them from harvesting their crops and destroying or damaging their trees. The Israeli army has done little or nothing to stop the settlers’ attack and has, instead, banned the Palestinian farmers from going to their fields, ultimately helping the settlers to force the Palestinians off their land.
Throughout the West Bank, Palestinian farmers are increasingly worried that their olives, one of their few remaining sources of livelihood, are being stolen, destroyed or wasted as they are prevented from working in their fields.
In the northern West Bank region of Nablus, where Palestinian villages are surrounded by Israeli settlements and settlers’ roads, the Israeli army is only allowing Palestinian farmers between two and six days — on set dates — to go to their fields to harvest their olives. Palestinian farmers who have tried to go to pick their olives on days other than the set dates have been attacked by settlers and turned away by Israeli army patrols. In the meantime, Israeli settlers have been picking olives in Palestinian groves and have destroyed and burned olive trees in various areas.
Palestinian farmers, accompanied by internationals from the Ecumenical Accompaniment Program, were harvesting their olives in Yanun, near Nablus, on 7 October when two settlers and eight soldiers came and told them to leave. The soldiers did not intervene when armed settlers assaulted a Palestinian farmer, fired shots on the ground near him and tied his hands. The farmer was left handcuffed until a member of the Israeli peace group Taayush (Co-existence) arrived at the scene and intervened with the soldiers.
Palestinian villagers in Yanun have been subjected to attacks by Israeli settlers for years and several families have been driven from the village by repeated attacks against them and their property. All remaining inhabitants were forced to flee the village by Israeli settlers in October 2002. They were later able to return with the help of Israeli and international peace activists. Promises by the Israeli army to keep the Israeli settlers in check have produced no results and settlers have continued to attack and intimidate the villagers with impunity.
In the southern Hebron region, on 15 October, after Israeli peace activists from Rabbis for Human Rights had coordinated with the Israeli army that the Palestinian farmers harvest their olives on that day, the farmers were attacked by armed settlers. The Israeli army patrol responded by telling the Palestinian farmers to leave, claiming that they did not have sufficient forces to protect them from the settlers.
Two days later in Yassuf, near Nablus, Palestinian farmers, accompanied by Israeli and international peace activists, were once again evicted from their olive grove when Israeli settlers turned up. The soldiers, whose presence was supposed to ensure that the Palestinians could harvest their olives, told the farmers and their Israeli and International helpers to leave.
On 11 October, a 26-year-old Palestinian farmer, Hani Shadeh, was shot and seriously wounded in the neck by an Israeli settler as he was picking olives with other farmers in Asira al-Qibliya, a village near Nablus and near the Israeli settlement of Yitzhar. The day before, Israeli settlers had set fire to an olive grove near the Israeli settlement of Tapuach.
Israeli settlers responsible for attacks on Palestinians and their properties have not been brought to justice in the vast majority of cases. Such impunity encourages settlers to commit further attacks and abuses. In the rare cases when Israeli settlers have been brought to justice, they have been treated with a degree of leniency uncommon in other cases.
On 27 September, an Israeli settler from the Elon Moreh Settlement near Nablus shot a Palestinian taxi driver dead. Sayyed Jabara, father of eight, was driving his passengers between Nablus and Salem. The settler claimed that he shot Sayyed Jabara because he thought that he intended to attack him, even though Jabara was not armed. He was released on bail less than 24 hours after the murder.
Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories, established by Israel in violation of international law, are the main reason for the stringent restrictions imposed on the Palestinian population. Some three-and-a-half million Palestinians are prevented from moving between towns and villages; confined to isolated enclaves and cut off from their workplace, their land, health and education facilities and other crucial services.
This is done to keep Palestinians away from Israeli settlements and from the network of roads built for the exclusive use of some 380,000 Israeli settlers. Settlements also continue to be expanded and new ones to be set up on expropriated Palestinian land.
Israeli settlers who attack and harass Palestinian villagers frequently come from settlements established without formal government authorization and which the Israeli authorities have publicly pledged to dismantle. However, settlers are increasingly influential in the army, in government and in parliament. The rare attempts by the Israeli army and security forces to dismantle unauthorized settlements have been mostly half-hearted, with settlers simply refusing to leave or allowed to return to the site shortly after having being evacuated.
In recent months, the Israeli government has announced its intention to dismantle all Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated places in the world where the presence of some 6,000 Israeli settlers has resulted in one-and-a-half million Palestinians being confined to less than 60% percent of the land. However, the Israeli government has no intention to evacuate more than 100 settlements in the West Bank, which take up some of the most fertile Palestinian land and best water resources. On the contrary, Prime Minister Sharon’s bureau chief recently confirmed that the planned pullout from the Gaza Strip is intended to strengthen Israel’s hold of large parts of the West Bank.
Amnesty International has repeatedly called on the Israeli authorities to take measures to evacuate Israeli settlers from the Occupied Territories and, in the meantime, to prevent attacks by Israeli settlers, to investigate the numerous attacks committed by settlers and to bring those responsible to justice. Amnesty International has also repeatedly called on Palestinian armed groups to stop targeting Israeli civilians both inside Israel and in the Occupied Territories.'
your direct question is bullshit, unrelated, and utterly pointless. if someone broke into my home I would call the police and protect my family if necessary. happy? its just a baiting question.
how is it unrelated? - that is exactly what is happening all over ... you know very well that the palestinians have tried going thru the "police" ... that is why there are UN resolutions put forth to tell these settlers to leave - and they haven't ... so, what do yuo expect them to do?
I have no problem with them resisting. I do, however, have a problem with unarmed Israeli civilians be (key word here)..deliberately targeted.
if these "civilians" are in lands that don't belong to them and they have been asked to leave and they don't ... then they are legitimate targets ... having said that - like previously mentioned ... the number of actual deaths of israeli civilians is nominal compared to that of palestinians ... i'm not sure how you want to rationalize that - in my opinion, it's because we have one side being the aggressor and the other just trying to fight back ..
your direct question is bullshit, unrelated, and utterly pointless. if someone broke into my home I would call the police and protect my family if necessary. happy? its just a baiting question.
how is it unrelated? - that is exactly what is happening all over ... you know very well that the palestinians have tried going thru the "police" ... that is why there are UN resolutions put forth to tell these settlers to leave - and they haven't ... so, what do yuo expect them to do?
I have no problem with them resisting. I do, however, have a problem with unarmed Israeli civilians be (key word here)..deliberately targeted.
if these "civilians" are in lands that don't belong to them and they have been asked to leave and they don't ... then they are legitimate targets ... having said that - like previously mentioned ... the number of actual deaths of israeli civilians is nominal compared to that of palestinians ... i'm not sure how you want to rationalize that - in my opinion, it's because we have one side being the aggressor and the other just trying to fight back ..
wow, another supporter of targeting and killing civilians? agree to disagree. you aren't going to convince me otherwise. wow, just wow. this place is ridiculous
wow, another supporter of targeting and killing civilians? agree to disagree. you aren't going to convince me otherwise. wow, just wow. this place is ridiculous
i can agree to disagree ... it would be good if you answered the question so that we could at least garner how you view the situation but alas that's not in the cards ...
wow, another supporter of targeting and killing civilians? agree to disagree. you aren't going to convince me otherwise. wow, just wow. this place is ridiculous
i can agree to disagree ... it would be good if you answered the question so that we could at least garner how you view the situation but alas that's not in the cards ...
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
yet you have spent now two pages not only justifying but encouraging the killing of unarmed Israeli civilians. class act.
ok ... knowing that the death of unarmed israeli civilians is few and far between - if i brought my family to your house and took it over without the use of any weapon ... what would you do? ... goto the police maybe? ... well, what if they did nothing? ... what if you went to the world and the world said to those people - you must leave ... but they don't ... what would you do?
I'd kill them, and then I'd kill their parents, and their siblings, and aunts, and uncles, and their parents' friends. Becuase they're all legit targets for supporting the occupation of my house.
your direct question is bullshit, unrelated, and utterly pointless. if someone broke into my home I would call the police and protect my family if necessary. happy? its just a baiting question.
how is it unrelated? - that is exactly what is happening all over ... you know very well that the palestinians have tried going thru the "police" ... that is why there are UN resolutions put forth to tell these settlers to leave - and they haven't ... so, what do yuo expect them to do?
I have no problem with them resisting. I do, however, have a problem with unarmed Israeli civilians be (key word here)..deliberately targeted.
if these "civilians" are in lands that don't belong to them and they have been asked to leave and they don't ... then they are legitimate targets ... having said that - like previously mentioned ... the number of actual deaths of israeli civilians is nominal compared to that of palestinians ... i'm not sure how you want to rationalize that - in my opinion, it's because we have one side being the aggressor and the other just trying to fight back ..
Non-violent resistance worked ok for Ghandi and the American civil rights movement. At a certain point, Americans can't stomach brutal violence, no matter how much the establishment wants to make it go quietly away. If we could turn the tide on racism within our borders, I guarantee that we can force our reps to end the blank check we write Israel.
I'd kill them, and then I'd kill their parents, and their siblings, and aunts, and uncles, and their parents' friends. Becuase they're all legit targets for supporting the occupation of my house.
and that is what is happening right now ... they are fighting back ...
Non-violent resistance worked ok for Ghandi and the American civil rights movement. At a certain point, Americans can't stomach brutal violence, no matter how much the establishment wants to make it go quietly away. If we could turn the tide on racism within our borders, I guarantee that we can force our reps to end the blank check we write Israel
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
Huh? I don't think you picked up on the sarcasm and mockery in my response.
I'd kill them, and then I'd kill their parents, and their siblings, and aunts, and uncles, and their parents' friends. Becuase they're all legit targets for supporting the occupation of my house.
and that is what is happening right now ... they are fighting back ...
Non-violent resistance worked ok for Ghandi and the American civil rights movement. At a certain point, Americans can't stomach brutal violence, no matter how much the establishment wants to make it go quietly away. If we could turn the tide on racism within our borders, I guarantee that we can force our reps to end the blank check we write Israel
that would indeed make a huge difference
The fact that you think I was serious about that and you think that's ok is sickening.
And that last part is the only point jlew and I are making. It WOULD make a huge difference. Yet when we suggest it, we're called names and told we support Israeli genocide :roll:
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
Huh? I don't think you picked up on the sarcasm and mockery in my response.
clearly not ... so - you would do nothing as well then?
Non-violent resistance worked ok for Ghandi and the American civil rights movement.
The thing is, there's the Hollywood Gandhi, and then there's the real Gandhi. It's a good idea to read some of Gandhi's own words and realize that the whole non-violence thing which has been built up around him is something of a myth.
Meanwhile:
Michael Neumann - from 'The Case Against Israel':
'Nonviolence has never "worked" in any politically relevant sense of the word, and there is no reason to suppose it ever will. It has never, largely on it's own strength, achieved the political objectives of those who employed it.
There are supposedly three major examples of successful nonviolence: Gandhi's independence movement, the U.S civil rights movement, and the South African campaigns against Apartheid. None of them performed as advertised.
Gandhi's nonviolence can't have been successful, because there was nothing he would have called a success. Gandhi's priorities may have shifted over time: he said that, if he changed his mind from one week to the next, it was because he had learned something in between. But it seems fair to say that he wanted independence from British rule, a united India, and nonviolence itself, and an end to civil or ethnic strife on the Indian subcontinent. What he got was India 1947: partition, and one of the most horrifying outbursts of bloodshed and cruelty in the whole bloody, cruel history of the postwar world. These consequences alone would be sufficient to count his project as a tragic failure.
What of independence itself? Historians might argue about it's causes, but I doubt any of them would attribute it primarily to Gandhi's campaign. The British began contemplating - admittedly with varying degrees of sincerity - some measure of autonomy for India before Gandhi did anything, as early as 1918. A.J.P Taylor says that after World War I, the British were beginning to find India a liability, because India was once again producing it's own cotton and buying cheap textiles from Japan. Later India's strategic importance, while valued by many, became questioned by some who saw the oil of the Middle East and the Suez canal as far more important. By the end of the second world war, Britain's will to hold onto it's empire had pretty well crumbled, for reasons having little or nothing to do with nonviolence.
But this is the least important of the reasons why Gandhi cannot be said to have won independence for India. It was not his saintliness or the disruption he caused that impressed the British. What impressed them was that the country seemed (and was) about to erupt. The colonial authorities could see no way to stop it. A big factor was the terrorism - and this need not be a term of condemnation - quite regularly employed against the British. It was not enough to do much harm, but more than enough to warn them that India was becoming more trouble than it was worth. All things considered, the well-founded fear of violence had far more effect on British resolve than Gandhi ever did. He may have been a brilliant and creative political thinker, but he was not a victor.
How about the U.S civil rights movement? It would be difficult and ungenerous to argue that it was unsuccessful, outrageous to claim that it was anything but a long and dangerous struggle. But when that it is conceded, the fact remains that Martin Luther King's civil rights movement was practically a federal government project. It's roots may have run deep, but it's impetus came from the Supreme Court decision of 1954 and from the subsequent attempts to integrate Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The students who braved a hell to accomplish this goal are well remembered. Sometimes forgotten is the U.S government's almost spectacular determination to see that federal law was respected. Eisenhower sent, not the FBI, not a bunch of lawyers, but one of the best and proudest units of the U.S army, the 101st Airborne, to keep order in Little Rock and to see that the "federalized" Arkansas national guard stayed on the right side of the dispute. Though there was never any hint of an impending battle between federal and state military forces, the message couldn't have been clearer: we, the federal government, are prepared to do whatever it takes to enforce our will.
This message is an undercurrent throughout throughout the civil rights struggles of the 1950's and 1960's. Though Martin Luther King still had to overcome vicious, sometimes deadly resistance, he himself remarked that surprisingly few people were killed or seriously injured in the struggle. The surprise diminishes with the recollection that there was real federal muscle behind the nonviolent campaign. For a variety of motives, both virtuous and cynical, the U.S government wanted the South to be integrated and to recognize black civil rights. Nonviolence achieved it's ends largely because the violence of it's opponents was severely constrained. In 1962, Kennedy federalized the National Guard and sent in combat troops to quell segregationist rioting in Oxford, Mississippi. Johnson did the same thing in 1965, after anti-civil rights violence in Alabama. While any political movement has allies and benefits from available circumstances, having the might of the U.S government behind you goes far beyond the ordinary advantages accompanying political activity. The nonviolence of the U.S civil rights movement sets an example only for those who have the overwhelming armed force of a government on their side.
As for South Africa, it is a minor miracle of wishful thinking that anyone could suppose nonviolence played a major role in the collapse of Apartheid.
In the first place, the ANC was never a nonviolent movement but a movement that decided, on occasion and for practical reasons, to use nonviolent tactics...
Secondly, violence was used extensively throughout the course of the Anti-Apartheid struggle. It can be argued that the violence was essentially defensive, but that's not the point: nonviolence as a doctrine rejects the use of of violence in self-defense. To say that blacks used violence in self-defense or as resistance to oppression is to say, I think, that they were justified. It is certainly not to say that they were nonviolent.
Third, violence played a major role in causing both the boycott of South Africa and the demise of Apartheid....the boycott only acquired some teeth starting in 1977, after the Soweto riots in 1976, nd again in 1985-1986, after the township riots of 184-1985...
In short, it is a myth that nonviolence brought all the victories it is supposed to have in it's ledger. In fact, it brought about none of them.
How does this bear on the Israel-Palestine conflict? In that situation, success is far less likely than in the cases we have examined. Unlike Martin Luther King, the Palestinians are working against a state, not with one. Their opponents are far more ruthless than the British were in the twilight of the empire. Unlike the Indians and South Africans, they do not vastly outnumber their oppressors. And neither the Boers nor the English ever had anything like the moral authority Israel enjoys in the hearts and minds of Americans, much less it's enormous support network. Nonviolent protest might overcome Israel's prestige in ten or twenty years, but the Palestinians might well suppose they do not have that long.'
At a certain point, Americans can't stomach brutal violence, no matter how much the establishment wants to make it go quietly away. If we could turn the tide on racism within our borders, I guarantee that we can force our reps to end the blank check we write Israel.
Absolutely, they have every right to use violence against the occupation. Against MILITARY and authoritative elements of the occupation. Not against random civilians. By all means, they can and should defend themselves. But they should not attack civilians when doing so. Just as Israel should not attack Palestinian civilians or take their land.
You talk as if they have some great military equipment that can target who they want.
They have "rockets" made from fertilizer. It can barely travel anywhere. They resist how they can and right now that is through these illegal settlers. In fact, most of the time, the "rockets" don't even land remotely close to anyone, or even to a person. I already explained my problem with this condemning of Hamas "targeting innocent people" (yeah, they're sooo innocent living on that stolen property and using all their beloved foods, drinks, and medicine while the people in Gaza starve) - the problem with condemning Hamas is as if you are placing the same standard on the Israelis and the Palestinians. The Israelis clearly choose to target innocent civilians living in refugee camps. The Palestinians struggle in any way they can, and if they had the ability to target Israeli military more easily, I'm sure they would. Once the Palestinians have the second strongest army in the world, then you can yell at them about targeting civilians. Secondly, I don't like all this emphasis on Hamas as if it is now part of the problem that started this whole Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I already logically explained how Hamas came as a result of the problem caused by Israel and their land-grabbing operations, but jlew simply brushed it aside. I wonder what you think about that? You don't try to correct the results of a problem, you try to correct the problem itself: Israel.
The fact that you think I was serious about that and you think that's ok is sickening.
And that last part is the only point jlew and I are making. It WOULD make a huge difference. Yet when we suggest it, we're called names and told we support Israeli genocide :roll:
maybe sickening to you but what is sickening to me is that current treatment of palestinians by israelis ... have you a solution? ... the sad part is that although your sarcastic response to a palestinian situation is exactly what the response is by israel to a rocket attack ...
your suggestion of not writing a blank cheque to isreal i would assume would be welcomed on this board ...
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
I'll repeat myslef yet again. I said I would call the police and protect my family from those breaking into my house.
I wouldn't go track down and kill everyone who thought that breaking into my house was a good idea.
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
again. WOW. soulsinging wasn't being serious. he would NOT go kill the extended family and friends of someone who broke into his home. yet somehow you feel that is a widely accept view? I really can't believe what I'm reading today. its utterly shocking.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
Huh? I don't think you picked up on the sarcasm and mockery in my response.
clearly not ... so - you would do nothing as well then?
I'd call the cops. And if they didn't help, I'd hogtie the dude and toss him out. But I would not go around killing the innocent people in his life in order to prove a point. Guilt by association sounds alarmingly like the kind of justification Bush used for the Iraq War... "well, they're all Islamic and they didn't STOP 9/11, so clearly they side with the hijackers and are fair game for killing." or "the people of Iraq didn't topple Saddam, so clearly they're part of his regime and we can kill them at at will."
See what kind of atrocities you can rationalize when you start saying that anyone tangentially tied to a guilty party is fair game for killing?
If Hamas wants to attack military installations, police stations, checkpoints, fair play to them. But once they start targeting schools, cafes, residences, etc... they're committing war crimes. I don't care what justification you offer. Yes, Israel is the far worse offender on this count, but it doesn't make it ok for others to do it less. I can't rape and murder the hot chick down the hall and say "well, she dressed like a slut so she was asking for it, and besides, Ted Bundy raped and murders 50 women, so compared to him, I''m ok."
The fact that you think I was serious about that and you think that's ok is sickening.
And that last part is the only point jlew and I are making. It WOULD make a huge difference. Yet when we suggest it, we're called names and told we support Israeli genocide :roll:
maybe sickening to you but what is sickening to me is that current treatment of palestinians by israelis ... have you a solution? ... the sad part is that although your sarcastic response to a palestinian situation is exactly what the response is by israel to a rocket attack ...
your suggestion of not writing a blank cheque to isreal i would assume would be welcomed on this board ...
Yeah, the US should stop vetoing every measure to hold Israel accountable. For that matter, stop all military aid to Israel. Let them sort it out without us propping them up. They can afford these abuses because they know nobody can do anything about it.
But to get to that point, Hamas has to change. I'm sorry, but given the climate in the US now, it's way too easy for a Judeo-Christian country to point at Islamic terrorists and say "we're just defending ourselves." Until Hamas can have clean hands when talking about violence, public opinion will not change in the US to the extent that it needs to. Is it fair? No. But you know what? Life isn't. Cry me a fucking river and then deal with it.
Until Hamas can have clean hands when talking about violence, public opinion will not change in the US to the extent that it needs to. Is it fair? No. But you know what? Life isn't. Cry me a fucking river and then deal with it.
The Palestinians have tried non-violence on numerous occasions. They tried it during the cease-fire last year until Israel broke the ceasefire by conducting a raid which left 6 Palestinians dead. Did the American public give a shit about Hamas keeping it's side of the bargain? Nope. Cry me a fucking river indeed.
my view of the situation can not be any clearer.I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
I'll repeat myslef yet again. I said I would call the police and protect my family from those breaking into my house.
I wouldn't go track down and kill everyone who thought that breaking into my house was a good idea.
i didn't say anything about tracking down and killing everyone - you guys put that in there for effect i presume ...
i simply stated my family came and took over your house ...
we all know they've tried the non-violent route ... and that has done nothing for them ...
I'd call the cops. And if they didn't help, I'd hogtie the dude and toss him out. But I would not go around killing the innocent people in his life in order to prove a point. Guilt by association sounds alarmingly like the kind of justification Bush used for the Iraq War... "well, they're all Islamic and they didn't STOP 9/11, so clearly they side with the hijackers and are fair game for killing." or "the people of Iraq didn't topple Saddam, so clearly they're part of his regime and we can kill them at at will."
See what kind of atrocities you can rationalize when you start saying that anyone tangentially tied to a guilty party is fair game for killing?
If Hamas wants to attack military installations, police stations, checkpoints, fair play to them. But once they start targeting schools, cafes, residences, etc... they're committing war crimes. I don't care what justification you offer. Yes, Israel is the far worse offender on this count, but it doesn't make it ok for others to do it less. I can't rape and murder the hot chick down the hall and say "well, she dressed like a slut so she was asking for it, and besides, Ted Bundy raped and murders 50 women, so compared to him, I''m ok."
there are two issues here:
1. are illegal settlers legitimate targets? i believe they are - so, they aren't innocent civilians to me (which is the point of my questioning)
2. this is a war - so, israel has been killing and oppressing innocent civilians for years and now that the palestinians are fighting back - now, everyone has to fight fair all of a sudden? ... in your example ted bundy was convicted and put in jail ... what consequences have israelis suffered? ... have they paid for their crimes?
i didn't say anything about tracking down and killing everyone - you guys put that in there for effect i presume ...
i simply stated my family came and took over your house ...
thats why your original question is pointless and irrelevant. you are trying to apply would I would do personally if my house was "invaded" and apply it to entire countries.
Comments
Even those that plead ignorance can be counted as accessories to a war crime under international law.
Anyway, read on, it makes for interesting reading:
http://mazinx.wordpress.com/israeloccup ... als-alike/
Israeli settlers wage campaign of intimidation on Palestinians and internationals alike
Date: 25 October 2004.
'Israeli settlers in the Occupied Territories have stepped up attacks against Palestinians and are waging a campaign of intimidation against international and Israeli human rights activists. Their aim is to eliminate the presence of witnesses to their attacks, thereby depriving the local Palestinian population of this only form of limited protection.
Two US citizens, members of the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT), were assaulted on 29 September by masked Israeli settlers who beat them with clubs and chains as they accompanied Palestinian children to school near the Tuwani village, South of Hebron. Kim Lamberty sustained a broken arm and knee and bruising to her face, while Chris Brown was left with a punctured lung and multiple bruises. Members of the CPT and other Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) have been escorting Palestinian children to school to protect them from attacks by Israeli settlers.
A group of hooded Israeli settlers attacked Amnesty International delegates and members of the CPT and the Operation Dove NGO on 9 October as they returned from accompanying Palestinian primary schoolchildren back to their home. The attackers first threw stones at the five internationals and then attacked three of them with wooden clubs. An Amnesty International delegate sustained multiple bruises on her back, arm and leg and the Operation Dove member collapsed and had to be taken to hospital by ambulance. On both occasions, the attackers came from the nearby Israeli settlement of Havat Ma’on and returned there after the attacks.
Rather than taking steps to stop and prevent such attacks and hold Israeli settlers accountable, the Israeli army and security forces have responded by imposing further restrictions on the local Palestinian population.
After the attack, the Israeli army informed the Palestinian villagers that, if the children are accompanied by internationals on their way to and from school, no army patrol will be on site to protect them from Israeli settlers. The Palestinian villagers reluctantly accepted that the schoolchildren have to make the journey without their international escort, but, two days later, on 12 October, the children were again chased by Israeli settlers from the Havat Ma’on settlement while on their way to school. The Israeli army patrol, which was present, did not intervene. Israeli settlers again threw stones as the children passed near the settlement on their way to school on 17 October.
The only alternative is for the schoolchildren to avoid passing near the Israeli settlements by making a long detour that lengthens their walk from 20 minutes to more than two hours each way.
As in previous years around the time of the olive harvest, Israeli settlers have also stepped up attacks on the local Palestinian inhabitants and farmers throughout the West Bank, preventing them from harvesting their crops and destroying or damaging their trees. The Israeli army has done little or nothing to stop the settlers’ attack and has, instead, banned the Palestinian farmers from going to their fields, ultimately helping the settlers to force the Palestinians off their land.
Throughout the West Bank, Palestinian farmers are increasingly worried that their olives, one of their few remaining sources of livelihood, are being stolen, destroyed or wasted as they are prevented from working in their fields.
In the northern West Bank region of Nablus, where Palestinian villages are surrounded by Israeli settlements and settlers’ roads, the Israeli army is only allowing Palestinian farmers between two and six days — on set dates — to go to their fields to harvest their olives. Palestinian farmers who have tried to go to pick their olives on days other than the set dates have been attacked by settlers and turned away by Israeli army patrols. In the meantime, Israeli settlers have been picking olives in Palestinian groves and have destroyed and burned olive trees in various areas.
Palestinian farmers, accompanied by internationals from the Ecumenical Accompaniment Program, were harvesting their olives in Yanun, near Nablus, on 7 October when two settlers and eight soldiers came and told them to leave. The soldiers did not intervene when armed settlers assaulted a Palestinian farmer, fired shots on the ground near him and tied his hands. The farmer was left handcuffed until a member of the Israeli peace group Taayush (Co-existence) arrived at the scene and intervened with the soldiers.
Palestinian villagers in Yanun have been subjected to attacks by Israeli settlers for years and several families have been driven from the village by repeated attacks against them and their property. All remaining inhabitants were forced to flee the village by Israeli settlers in October 2002. They were later able to return with the help of Israeli and international peace activists. Promises by the Israeli army to keep the Israeli settlers in check have produced no results and settlers have continued to attack and intimidate the villagers with impunity.
In the southern Hebron region, on 15 October, after Israeli peace activists from Rabbis for Human Rights had coordinated with the Israeli army that the Palestinian farmers harvest their olives on that day, the farmers were attacked by armed settlers. The Israeli army patrol responded by telling the Palestinian farmers to leave, claiming that they did not have sufficient forces to protect them from the settlers.
Two days later in Yassuf, near Nablus, Palestinian farmers, accompanied by Israeli and international peace activists, were once again evicted from their olive grove when Israeli settlers turned up. The soldiers, whose presence was supposed to ensure that the Palestinians could harvest their olives, told the farmers and their Israeli and International helpers to leave.
On 11 October, a 26-year-old Palestinian farmer, Hani Shadeh, was shot and seriously wounded in the neck by an Israeli settler as he was picking olives with other farmers in Asira al-Qibliya, a village near Nablus and near the Israeli settlement of Yitzhar. The day before, Israeli settlers had set fire to an olive grove near the Israeli settlement of Tapuach.
Israeli settlers responsible for attacks on Palestinians and their properties have not been brought to justice in the vast majority of cases. Such impunity encourages settlers to commit further attacks and abuses. In the rare cases when Israeli settlers have been brought to justice, they have been treated with a degree of leniency uncommon in other cases.
On 27 September, an Israeli settler from the Elon Moreh Settlement near Nablus shot a Palestinian taxi driver dead. Sayyed Jabara, father of eight, was driving his passengers between Nablus and Salem. The settler claimed that he shot Sayyed Jabara because he thought that he intended to attack him, even though Jabara was not armed. He was released on bail less than 24 hours after the murder.
Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories, established by Israel in violation of international law, are the main reason for the stringent restrictions imposed on the Palestinian population. Some three-and-a-half million Palestinians are prevented from moving between towns and villages; confined to isolated enclaves and cut off from their workplace, their land, health and education facilities and other crucial services.
This is done to keep Palestinians away from Israeli settlements and from the network of roads built for the exclusive use of some 380,000 Israeli settlers. Settlements also continue to be expanded and new ones to be set up on expropriated Palestinian land.
Israeli settlers who attack and harass Palestinian villagers frequently come from settlements established without formal government authorization and which the Israeli authorities have publicly pledged to dismantle. However, settlers are increasingly influential in the army, in government and in parliament. The rare attempts by the Israeli army and security forces to dismantle unauthorized settlements have been mostly half-hearted, with settlers simply refusing to leave or allowed to return to the site shortly after having being evacuated.
In recent months, the Israeli government has announced its intention to dismantle all Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated places in the world where the presence of some 6,000 Israeli settlers has resulted in one-and-a-half million Palestinians being confined to less than 60% percent of the land. However, the Israeli government has no intention to evacuate more than 100 settlements in the West Bank, which take up some of the most fertile Palestinian land and best water resources. On the contrary, Prime Minister Sharon’s bureau chief recently confirmed that the planned pullout from the Gaza Strip is intended to strengthen Israel’s hold of large parts of the West Bank.
Amnesty International has repeatedly called on the Israeli authorities to take measures to evacuate Israeli settlers from the Occupied Territories and, in the meantime, to prevent attacks by Israeli settlers, to investigate the numerous attacks committed by settlers and to bring those responsible to justice. Amnesty International has also repeatedly called on Palestinian armed groups to stop targeting Israeli civilians both inside Israel and in the Occupied Territories.'
how is it unrelated? - that is exactly what is happening all over ... you know very well that the palestinians have tried going thru the "police" ... that is why there are UN resolutions put forth to tell these settlers to leave - and they haven't ... so, what do yuo expect them to do?
if these "civilians" are in lands that don't belong to them and they have been asked to leave and they don't ... then they are legitimate targets ... having said that - like previously mentioned ... the number of actual deaths of israeli civilians is nominal compared to that of palestinians ... i'm not sure how you want to rationalize that - in my opinion, it's because we have one side being the aggressor and the other just trying to fight back ..
no they're not.
wow, another supporter of targeting and killing civilians? agree to disagree. you aren't going to convince me otherwise. wow, just wow. this place is ridiculous
Sure, they just decided to go and live there because the shiny new white houses and olive groves looked nice.
again. unarmed civilians living in land post-1967 are not committing war crimes.
i can agree to disagree ... it would be good if you answered the question so that we could at least garner how you view the situation but alas that's not in the cards ...
my view of the situation can not be any clearer. I do not support the targeting and killing of civilians. that is where we disagree.
I'd kill them, and then I'd kill their parents, and their siblings, and aunts, and uncles, and their parents' friends. Becuase they're all legit targets for supporting the occupation of my house.
Non-violent resistance worked ok for Ghandi and the American civil rights movement. At a certain point, Americans can't stomach brutal violence, no matter how much the establishment wants to make it go quietly away. If we could turn the tide on racism within our borders, I guarantee that we can force our reps to end the blank check we write Israel.
and that is what is happening right now ... they are fighting back ...
that would indeed make a huge difference
so ... your answer is that you would do nothing ... which is fair enough response ... soulsinging's response represents a more wider opinion i believe ...
Huh? I don't think you picked up on the sarcasm and mockery in my response.
The fact that you think I was serious about that and you think that's ok is sickening.
And that last part is the only point jlew and I are making. It WOULD make a huge difference. Yet when we suggest it, we're called names and told we support Israeli genocide :roll:
"again. grass is NOT green."
wtf
clearly not ... so - you would do nothing as well then?
The thing is, there's the Hollywood Gandhi, and then there's the real Gandhi. It's a good idea to read some of Gandhi's own words and realize that the whole non-violence thing which has been built up around him is something of a myth.
Meanwhile:
Michael Neumann - from 'The Case Against Israel':
'Nonviolence has never "worked" in any politically relevant sense of the word, and there is no reason to suppose it ever will. It has never, largely on it's own strength, achieved the political objectives of those who employed it.
There are supposedly three major examples of successful nonviolence: Gandhi's independence movement, the U.S civil rights movement, and the South African campaigns against Apartheid. None of them performed as advertised.
Gandhi's nonviolence can't have been successful, because there was nothing he would have called a success. Gandhi's priorities may have shifted over time: he said that, if he changed his mind from one week to the next, it was because he had learned something in between. But it seems fair to say that he wanted independence from British rule, a united India, and nonviolence itself, and an end to civil or ethnic strife on the Indian subcontinent. What he got was India 1947: partition, and one of the most horrifying outbursts of bloodshed and cruelty in the whole bloody, cruel history of the postwar world. These consequences alone would be sufficient to count his project as a tragic failure.
What of independence itself? Historians might argue about it's causes, but I doubt any of them would attribute it primarily to Gandhi's campaign. The British began contemplating - admittedly with varying degrees of sincerity - some measure of autonomy for India before Gandhi did anything, as early as 1918. A.J.P Taylor says that after World War I, the British were beginning to find India a liability, because India was once again producing it's own cotton and buying cheap textiles from Japan. Later India's strategic importance, while valued by many, became questioned by some who saw the oil of the Middle East and the Suez canal as far more important. By the end of the second world war, Britain's will to hold onto it's empire had pretty well crumbled, for reasons having little or nothing to do with nonviolence.
But this is the least important of the reasons why Gandhi cannot be said to have won independence for India. It was not his saintliness or the disruption he caused that impressed the British. What impressed them was that the country seemed (and was) about to erupt. The colonial authorities could see no way to stop it. A big factor was the terrorism - and this need not be a term of condemnation - quite regularly employed against the British. It was not enough to do much harm, but more than enough to warn them that India was becoming more trouble than it was worth. All things considered, the well-founded fear of violence had far more effect on British resolve than Gandhi ever did. He may have been a brilliant and creative political thinker, but he was not a victor.
How about the U.S civil rights movement? It would be difficult and ungenerous to argue that it was unsuccessful, outrageous to claim that it was anything but a long and dangerous struggle. But when that it is conceded, the fact remains that Martin Luther King's civil rights movement was practically a federal government project. It's roots may have run deep, but it's impetus came from the Supreme Court decision of 1954 and from the subsequent attempts to integrate Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The students who braved a hell to accomplish this goal are well remembered. Sometimes forgotten is the U.S government's almost spectacular determination to see that federal law was respected. Eisenhower sent, not the FBI, not a bunch of lawyers, but one of the best and proudest units of the U.S army, the 101st Airborne, to keep order in Little Rock and to see that the "federalized" Arkansas national guard stayed on the right side of the dispute. Though there was never any hint of an impending battle between federal and state military forces, the message couldn't have been clearer: we, the federal government, are prepared to do whatever it takes to enforce our will.
This message is an undercurrent throughout throughout the civil rights struggles of the 1950's and 1960's. Though Martin Luther King still had to overcome vicious, sometimes deadly resistance, he himself remarked that surprisingly few people were killed or seriously injured in the struggle. The surprise diminishes with the recollection that there was real federal muscle behind the nonviolent campaign. For a variety of motives, both virtuous and cynical, the U.S government wanted the South to be integrated and to recognize black civil rights. Nonviolence achieved it's ends largely because the violence of it's opponents was severely constrained. In 1962, Kennedy federalized the National Guard and sent in combat troops to quell segregationist rioting in Oxford, Mississippi. Johnson did the same thing in 1965, after anti-civil rights violence in Alabama. While any political movement has allies and benefits from available circumstances, having the might of the U.S government behind you goes far beyond the ordinary advantages accompanying political activity. The nonviolence of the U.S civil rights movement sets an example only for those who have the overwhelming armed force of a government on their side.
As for South Africa, it is a minor miracle of wishful thinking that anyone could suppose nonviolence played a major role in the collapse of Apartheid.
In the first place, the ANC was never a nonviolent movement but a movement that decided, on occasion and for practical reasons, to use nonviolent tactics...
Secondly, violence was used extensively throughout the course of the Anti-Apartheid struggle. It can be argued that the violence was essentially defensive, but that's not the point: nonviolence as a doctrine rejects the use of of violence in self-defense. To say that blacks used violence in self-defense or as resistance to oppression is to say, I think, that they were justified. It is certainly not to say that they were nonviolent.
Third, violence played a major role in causing both the boycott of South Africa and the demise of Apartheid....the boycott only acquired some teeth starting in 1977, after the Soweto riots in 1976, nd again in 1985-1986, after the township riots of 184-1985...
In short, it is a myth that nonviolence brought all the victories it is supposed to have in it's ledger. In fact, it brought about none of them.
How does this bear on the Israel-Palestine conflict? In that situation, success is far less likely than in the cases we have examined. Unlike Martin Luther King, the Palestinians are working against a state, not with one. Their opponents are far more ruthless than the British were in the twilight of the empire. Unlike the Indians and South Africans, they do not vastly outnumber their oppressors. And neither the Boers nor the English ever had anything like the moral authority Israel enjoys in the hearts and minds of Americans, much less it's enormous support network. Nonviolent protest might overcome Israel's prestige in ten or twenty years, but the Palestinians might well suppose they do not have that long.'
This part I agree with.
They have "rockets" made from fertilizer. It can barely travel anywhere. They resist how they can and right now that is through these illegal settlers. In fact, most of the time, the "rockets" don't even land remotely close to anyone, or even to a person. I already explained my problem with this condemning of Hamas "targeting innocent people" (yeah, they're sooo innocent living on that stolen property and using all their beloved foods, drinks, and medicine while the people in Gaza starve) - the problem with condemning Hamas is as if you are placing the same standard on the Israelis and the Palestinians. The Israelis clearly choose to target innocent civilians living in refugee camps. The Palestinians struggle in any way they can, and if they had the ability to target Israeli military more easily, I'm sure they would. Once the Palestinians have the second strongest army in the world, then you can yell at them about targeting civilians. Secondly, I don't like all this emphasis on Hamas as if it is now part of the problem that started this whole Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I already logically explained how Hamas came as a result of the problem caused by Israel and their land-grabbing operations, but jlew simply brushed it aside. I wonder what you think about that? You don't try to correct the results of a problem, you try to correct the problem itself: Israel.
maybe sickening to you but what is sickening to me is that current treatment of palestinians by israelis ... have you a solution? ... the sad part is that although your sarcastic response to a palestinian situation is exactly what the response is by israel to a rocket attack ...
your suggestion of not writing a blank cheque to isreal i would assume would be welcomed on this board ...
is this some sort of intelligent response? I really dont even know how to respond. you've said nothing that disproves what I said.
I'll repeat myslef yet again. I said I would call the police and protect my family from those breaking into my house.
I wouldn't go track down and kill everyone who thought that breaking into my house was a good idea.
again. WOW. soulsinging wasn't being serious. he would NOT go kill the extended family and friends of someone who broke into his home. yet somehow you feel that is a widely accept view? I really can't believe what I'm reading today. its utterly shocking.
WHAT DO YOU BASE THAT STATEMENT OFF OF?
I thought the caps added a nice touch to it. Making it bold helped a little as well. I was considering underlining it, but decided not to.
I'd call the cops. And if they didn't help, I'd hogtie the dude and toss him out. But I would not go around killing the innocent people in his life in order to prove a point. Guilt by association sounds alarmingly like the kind of justification Bush used for the Iraq War... "well, they're all Islamic and they didn't STOP 9/11, so clearly they side with the hijackers and are fair game for killing." or "the people of Iraq didn't topple Saddam, so clearly they're part of his regime and we can kill them at at will."
See what kind of atrocities you can rationalize when you start saying that anyone tangentially tied to a guilty party is fair game for killing?
If Hamas wants to attack military installations, police stations, checkpoints, fair play to them. But once they start targeting schools, cafes, residences, etc... they're committing war crimes. I don't care what justification you offer. Yes, Israel is the far worse offender on this count, but it doesn't make it ok for others to do it less. I can't rape and murder the hot chick down the hall and say "well, she dressed like a slut so she was asking for it, and besides, Ted Bundy raped and murders 50 women, so compared to him, I''m ok."
the law. show me a law that states unarmed Israeli civilians living within post 1967 borders are committing war crimes.
Yeah, the US should stop vetoing every measure to hold Israel accountable. For that matter, stop all military aid to Israel. Let them sort it out without us propping them up. They can afford these abuses because they know nobody can do anything about it.
But to get to that point, Hamas has to change. I'm sorry, but given the climate in the US now, it's way too easy for a Judeo-Christian country to point at Islamic terrorists and say "we're just defending ourselves." Until Hamas can have clean hands when talking about violence, public opinion will not change in the US to the extent that it needs to. Is it fair? No. But you know what? Life isn't. Cry me a fucking river and then deal with it.
The Palestinians have tried non-violence on numerous occasions. They tried it during the cease-fire last year until Israel broke the ceasefire by conducting a raid which left 6 Palestinians dead. Did the American public give a shit about Hamas keeping it's side of the bargain? Nope. Cry me a fucking river indeed.
Meanwhile, the settlement building continues.
i didn't say anything about tracking down and killing everyone - you guys put that in there for effect i presume ...
i simply stated my family came and took over your house ...
we all know they've tried the non-violent route ... and that has done nothing for them ...
there are two issues here:
1. are illegal settlers legitimate targets? i believe they are - so, they aren't innocent civilians to me (which is the point of my questioning)
2. this is a war - so, israel has been killing and oppressing innocent civilians for years and now that the palestinians are fighting back - now, everyone has to fight fair all of a sudden? ... in your example ted bundy was convicted and put in jail ... what consequences have israelis suffered? ... have they paid for their crimes?
thats why your original question is pointless and irrelevant. you are trying to apply would I would do personally if my house was "invaded" and apply it to entire countries.