New Article
One Year Of Sharons Rule,
Soaked with Blood and Violence
Ramzy Baroud
The severe Israeli so-called retaliation and its killing of scores of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza in the course of recent days, although a simple reflection of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharons violent vision for a more secured Israel, is also a reflection for the decayed state of affairs experienced by the Israeli government.
Sharons response to the successful Palestinian groups of the enormous security measures that always surround Israeli army installations in the West Bank and Gaza, appeared harsher than past retaliations.
As reflected in his increasing violence, Sharon seems to be expressing more than anger, but frustration and even desperation. Palestinians are changing strategies and the Israeli ط·آ·ط¢آ·ط·آ¢ط¢آ¹ط·آ·ط¢آ¢ط·آ¢ط¢آ©bulldozer is no longer able to garner western world sympathy and green lights for his often-brutal policies against Palestinians.
But what is exactly wrecking Sharons plans?
When Sharon began his term in office on March 7, 2001, much was at stake in the eyes of the Israelis. They were convinced, and are still convinced, that Palestinians are resorting to terrorism to pressure Israel into further promises on the negotiation table. They failed to see the immense suffering experienced by Palestinians, the humiliation and anger. What worsened matters was that both Israeli leaders, competing for the prime ministership were hard-liners, unrealistic and too arrogant to understand the changing reality of their world.
Both former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak and Sharon give great emphasis to security, yet vowed to practice the same policies that resulted in the shattering of Israels sense of security in the first place: violence against Palestinians, fencing them off, cracking down on whatever freedom they had left.
The Israelis were ready to re-test their older, more militant breed of leadership, take the top of the hills (Sharons message to Israeli settlers years ago) kind of leaders, who would pop up (Sharons message to Lebanese Phalangists two decades ago) terrorists from poor refugee camps and massacre 4,000 in the process. The political arena in Israel was ready, or readied, for Sharons arrival. The man came to power, like a king returning from a long exile, angry and ready to crush.
But once he rose at the stage and every one listened attentively, Sharon had little to say. Once he felt the mounting pressure and increasing demand for him to outline his political agenda and detail his vision of peace, he introduced the most ridiculous plan: Palestinians to recover only 42 percent of the occupied West Bank. In exchange, and under the pretext of security, Sharons plan denied Palestinians every aspiration they ever hoped for, their freedom, humanity, sovereignty, Jerusalem, economic, political and geographic independence, and most importantly, security.
Expectedly Palestinians who continue to adhere to international law that strongly backs their demands for territorial and human rights, rejected the plan. The western media boasted: Palestinians reject Sharons peace proposal.ط·آ·ط¢آ£ط·آ¢ط¢آ¢ط·آ£ط¢آ¢ط£آ¢أ¢â€ڑآ¬ط¹â€کط·آ¢ط¢آ¬ط·آ·ط¢آ¥ط£آ¢أ¢â€ڑآ¬أ¢â€آ¢
However, Sharon clearly had a vision, a very violent one. He spoke about it openly, proudly, and carried it out in an immediate and swift fashion: violence and more violence.
But it never happened before that violence managed to quell the Palestinian peoples resistance. Even Sharons presumably successful military venture during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, where Israel, with American mediation, forced Palestinian resistance out of Lebanon, was a great failure. The resistance never faded. New groups grew out of the massacres and the brutality. The little kids of South
Lebanon at the time became the fighters who forced Israel out, shattered and humiliated.
But the aging warrior never quit. He fought hard and long to return and rule Israel, with more promises of security for all, magic recipes of how to deal with the Palestinians, the terrorists, how to reclaim the land of Israel, how to protect the settlements and much more of this worn political discourse that earned Israel nothing but the hatred of its neighbors and isolation in International institutions.
Sharon knew too well that the cornerstone of his success to stay in office, considering his poor or nonexistent political agenda, was convincing the Israelis that he is on a mission, a fight against the terrorists, that Israel is not yet secured and that he was needed more than ever.
He jumped on the wagon of war on terror to have a free hand to crush the Palestinians without a word of protest. But Palestinians wouldt yield. Sharons war empowered their tenacity, his radical discourse inspired their defiance. Their uprising, despite the unsure political stances of their leadership went on strong.
Yet despite that failure and deadlock, Sharon managed to remain in power, strong and unchallenged. He knew how to push Palestinians to the edge and trigger suicide bombings.
But now, Palestinian groups are changing tactics. This strategy change, although evident in the targeting of Israeli soldiers and Israel militants in the West Bank and Gaza, was confirmed by the West Bank Fatah leader, Marwan Barghouti.
We are entering a new phase of struggle in the Intifada to concentrate on targeting Israeli checkpoints that are the symbol of humiliation at the hands of occupation troops,ط·آ·ط¢آ£ط·آ¢ط¢آ¢ط·آ£ط¢آ¢ط£آ¢أ¢â€ڑآ¬ط¹â€کط·آ¢ط¢آ¬ط·آ·ط¢آ¥ط£آ¢أ¢â€ڑآ¬أ¢â€آ¢ Barghouti was quoted at the Israeli daily Ha'aretz on February 20.
Mostly Israeli soldiers and militant settlers paid the price for the new strategy. The usual strong condemnations that follow Palestinian retaliatory attacks against Israeli targets were hardly echoing in much of the Western world. Something went wrong in Sharons calculation. It was difficult to garner sympathy out on an incident in which Palestinian fighters kill Israeli soldiers, who have likely murdered Palestinians in their own lands.
The equation suddenly flipped out of Sharons favor. Yes, Sharon still uses such attacks as a pretext to bombard Palestinian towns and villages, but not many others see it that way anymore. Even as the anti-Israeli attacks culminated, an influential organization compromising over a 1,000 retired Israeli generals and security chiefs demanded a unilateral pull out of the occupied territories. The initiative followed the signing of a letter by now 110 army reservists who refuse to work the occupied territories.
Sharons cause is a loosing one. One year after his term in office, Sharon is proving the same proven theory time and again, that security cannot be attained through murder, assassination and dehumanization, that peace is born out of justice, not the shells of tanks or the heavy bombs of F-16 warplanes.
Sharon is not getting it and likely never will. He fought his losing war for over fifty years and emerged with nothing to show for it, save the blood of thousands of Palestinian civilians and the rubble of hundreds of homes which he demolished.
But it is not Sharon only who deserves the blame for these atrocities; Israel is after all ط·آ·ط¢آ·ط·آ¢ط¢آ£ط·آ·ط¢آ¢ط·آ¢ط¢آ¢ط·آ·ط¢آ£ط·آ¢ط¢آ¢ط·آ£ط¢آ¢ط£آ¢أ¢â‚¬ع‘ط¢آ¬ط·آ¹أ¢â‚¬ع©ط·آ·ط¢آ¢ط·آ¢ط¢آ¬ط·آ·ط¢آ·ط·آ¢ط¢آ¹ط·آ·ط¢آ¢ط·آ¢ط¢آ©the only democracy in the Middle East as its PR experts often boast; its time that collective responsibility to be taken. Sharon is a product of a culture of violence, the Israelis must realized that they can never subdue a nation to accept injustice, no matter how advanced their weapons are, no matters how accurate their snipers might be.
One year of Sharons term in office has passed, soaked with blood and failure; fifty three years of Israels existence has passed, soaked with blood and failure.
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New Poem
Defiance
By Mahmoud Darwish
Tighten my fetters.
Confiscate my papers
and cigarettes.
Fill my mouth with dust.
Poetry is blood in the heart,
salt in bread,
moisture in eyes.
It is written with fingernails,
with eyes,
with daggers.
I shall proclaim in my detention cell,
in the bathroom,
in the stable,
under the lash,
manacled,
in the violence of chains,
that a million birds
on the branches of my heart,
are singing fighting songs
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