Opinion
Palestinian leaders need to stiffle terror
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Also by Adam Smith:
- Runaway bride a case of desperation (May 5, 2005)
- Recent deaths not fodder for gun laws (March 15, 2005)
- Social Security in need of overhaul (March 10, 2005)
- Palestinian leaders need to stiffle terror (March 1, 2005)
- Iraqis make history, America vindicated (February 3, 2005)
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It should come as no surprise to anyone that the cease fire agreed to at Sharm el-Sheik was violated less than two weeks after its inception. It should also come as no surprise that the Israelis were not the ones to fire first.
There is no historical precedent to suggest that the hostility that has plagued the region for as long as there has been a state of Israel could be ended by the shaking of hands at an Egyptian beach resort. The culture of hatred toward Israel and Jews that is propagated in Palestinian territory and throughout much of the Arab world does not suggest that an end is near.
In fact, it is unlikely that anyone alive today will see an end to security personnel standing guard at the entrances to Israeli restaurants and entertainment venues in their lifetimes. Israel is, however, here to stay, and the current state of affairs is just unacceptable in this century. It is urgent that Middle Eastern and Western leaders take a more positive attitude than this writer has and work every day towards a peaceful, symbiotic relationship between Israelis and their Palestinian neighbors.
The first step is ensuring that this weekend’s attack on a night club in Tel Aviv does not mark a new beginning to the cycle of violence. Abu Mazen has hardly been in power long enough to be able to promise a cease fire and actually enforce it among radical groups. It would have been unreasonable for Israel to expect that the cease fire was actually going to include a cessation of terror attacks by Palestinian radicals. Mazen’s job at this point is to show the world that he is in fact serious about peace and clamp down on those responsible for violating the truce.
Unfortunately he believes that persuasion, not force, is the way for Palestinian leadership to end the violence being perpetrated by supposed fringe elements. It is irrelevant what method he decides to use as long as it produces results.
Israel’s role in all of this is to give Mazen’s administration room to work. A military response must be delayed until it is clear that the cease fire is not working. A military response is likely to only rekindle the cycle of violence and increase Israel’s guilt in the court of world opinion. Sharon has to keep the IDF at bay and give peace a chance. This method is unfortunately very slippery. If Israel backs off too much it will give terrorists the idea that it’s open season on Israel without consequences. The responsibility to prevent this from happening rests squarely on the shoulders of Palestinian leadership to dole out punishment on those who violate the cease fire.
As of the writing of this article, it is unclear exactly who is behind the attack, but it has been suggested that Syria may have been indirectly involved. Mazen must make a plea to Damascus to stay out of the conflict. Syria’s involvement does nothing to help the plight of the Palestinian people and inciting a continuation of violence only makes matter worse. It is imperative that Mazen work to curb the flow of Syrian funding to terrorists before Israel is forced to respond militarily.
Israeli leaders can only sit idly by for a limited amount of time before a response of some sort is necessary. A military response by Israel will bring an end to the cease fire. The Palestinians have already violated the terms while the Israelis have held their end of the bargain. The impetus now rests with Palestinian leadership to determine what will happen next.
Adam Smith (asmith@badgerherald.com) is a senior majoring in political science and economics.
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Stupidest rant, ever.
The attack was not Palestinian, but Lebanese. Is Palestine responsible for Lebanon?
i hate this topic.
Sane, sensible article. Thanks.
Probably Syrian actually, not Lebanese.
WAPMNIS
yeah, Lebanon doesn't have a, you know, government this week
This article is pointed and accurate....it's about time we had an article like this from this side of the debate.
If you read the article, he says that Syria could have been involved in this but that Abu Mazen should take control of the situation.
Adam, you're either lying or stupid.
Do you have any idea how many Palestinians where killed by the Israelis in the two weeks between the ceasefire and the bombing?
24, including 9 Children, if that is calm to you, that means you don't recognize Palestinian lives as equal to Israeli ones. That would be racist, you know?
So how is an occupied population is supposed to gaurantee the security of the occupying opressor?
Interesting logic!!!!
as mentioned before, i just want to add that the cease fire was broken by israel, 24 deaths have occured on the palestinian side, and yet you perpetuate the misrepresenations by the media. either you are ignorant or lying. ignorant is better, but at least do the work before you write.
CounterPunch / Electronic Intifada
The Meaning of "Calm"
Relativity, LA Times Style
By Alison Weir
Friday, Feb. 25, 2005, 9:30 p.m.
Well, I just got hung up on again. This time by an editor on the Los Angeles Times foreign desk. He didn?t give me his name.
I had called and attempted, as politely as possible, to give him a correction for the story on the Times? website tonight. This will probably be their front-page lead news story tomorrow morning.
The trouble is, their headline and lead paragraph are just plain wrong. And now, of course, they?ll stay wrong in the paper tomorrow.
The headline proclaims: "Palestinian Suicide bomber Shatters Calm of late." The lead sentence then goes on to state that this bomber "shattered a months-long period of relative calm??
The fact is, however, that the truce and this ?calm? were shattered long before this. The last suicide bombing against Israeli civilians was Nov. 1, 2004. It took three Israeli lives. Since that time, while Israelis have basked in ?relative calm,? 170 Palestinian men, women, and children have been killed.
During this LA Times? "months-long relative calm," another 379 Palestinian men, women, and children were injured and maimed. Anyone who has been to the West Bank or Gaza knows what this means: leg bones splintered, intestines torn open, teeth shattered.
Also, of course, during this ?calm? over 8,000 Palestinians have been sitting in Israeli prison cells, routinely abused and grotesquely humiliated; over 300 of them children.
None of this mattered to the editor I talked to. He explained that the story said relative calm. When I tried to question this adjective, he hung up the phone. So I guess I?ll just have to explain this word for myself.
Maybe he means that relative to 7 Israeli deaths, 170 Palestinian deaths are insignificant. Maybe he means that relative to Israeli grief, Palestinian grief is basically unmentionable. Maybe he means that relative to the weeping of Israeli mothers and fathers, the weeping of Palestinian mothers and fathers ? multitudes more of them ? is negligible.
Maybe he means that relative to his power, my attempt to set the record straight is laughably feeble.
Over all, I guess what he means is relatively obvious:
That he can run what he wants, distort what he desires, lead with his lies. I guess he means that facts don?t matter, truth is irrelevant, and deceit the order of the day.
I guess he means that Americans are pawns, readers are sheep, and people will just keep swallowing whatever the media choose to dish out.
I hope you?ll tell him he?s wrong: 800-528-4637 / readers.rep@latimes.com
#
Alison Weir is Executive Director of If Americans Knew. http://www.ifamericansknew.org/
#
Electronic Intifada http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article3638.shtml
CounterPunch http://www.counterpunch.org/weir02262005.html
If Americans Knew http://www.ifamericansknew.org/media/relativity.html
"24, including 9 Children, if that is calm to you, that means you don't recognize Palestinian lives as equal to Israeli ones. That would be racist, you know?"
Wrong again!
First of all, how many of those 24 were killed by Palestinians? Here's a hint: it's more than one.
Second, it's the Palestinians who demonstrate time after time that they themselves don't think their lives are worth as much as Israeli lives. Why else would Israel have to release hundreds of prisoners with blood on their hands just to get back the bodies of dead Israeli soldiers in order to give them the dignified burials they deserve? Sounds to me like Israelis value even their dead more than Palestinians value their own children.
What was it Golda Meir said? "There will be peace when the Palestinians love their children more than they hate ours."
adam, i invite you to come to a showing of the film "Peace, Propaganda, and the Promised Land" at 7pm, Wed. the 9th in room 2211 of the Law School. It addresses a lot of the misrepresentations prevalent in your article.
what did Golda Meir say, "Palestinians do not exist". Menachem Begin calls them "Two Legged Beasts". Yitzak Shamir calls them, "Grasshoppers who can be crushed". This is the language of your heads of state. It is the attitude that prevails toward Palestinians in Israel's quest for "peace". Until both peoples' rights are respected there will not be peace.
Last time I looked there were only 12 million Jews in the world. The Arabs nations were supportive of the Nazi policy of genocide during WWII. The Arabs have forced aproximately one million Jews to leave their Arab homelands. And yet their are people ignorant of history who want to make Israel the bad guys. Martin Luther King once said don't be fooled by anyone who says they are anti-Israel, but not anti-Semitic. If they are ant-Israel they are anti-semetic. He was right then and he is right now.
MLK never said that, it is a fabrication by zionist thugs. I challange you to produce a credible reference.
Well, that's nice of you to invite Adam, I wonder if he will go, or insist on his ignorance. Many people actually fear expanding their minds and being exposed to knew truths. If I knew who you are I'd make a bet he won't.
You know what, let's post here on the 9th, whether he'll go or not.
Actually, there are slightly less than 12 million Jews in the world now.
It has been estimated that from the time of Christ until today, had there not been constant murder & persecution of Jews, there should now be approximately 250 million Jews on the planet.
There have been ZERO Palestinians killed by any Israelies since the so-called truce.
Whomever says differently is purposely spreading misinformation and perpetuating a canard.This can be confirmed by even Israel's worst enemy, the NY Times.
Bottomline, Adam is 100% correct.
Arabs need to ACCEPT Israel's existance and work together with Israelies to create a middle east peace.
Sadly, I don't think they're ready yet.
i think it's simple:
if you're pro-israel, this article is brilliant. israel could bulldoze several MORE homes with people (including children) inside, and it would be palestine's fault.
if you're for the rights of oppressed people, palestinians could blow up a bus of just kids, grandmothers, and puppies, and it would be construed as a heroic defense of their land.
either way, you'll see things one-sided. neither side is anywhere close to being right. and it's not even religion behind this, because arabs are citizens of israel. it's the usual power politics, with religion as a poor scapegoat. just like hitler, who knew that the jews weren't the cause of all germany's problems, but scapegoated them for his own political power. not that israel or the arab middle east have concentration camps (yet), it's just a bad metaphor.
Here are the words of Martin Luther King with the proper citation at the end so you can look it up for yourself, but I am sure that all of you anti-semites out there aren't bothered by facts. You never have been before.
". . . You declare, my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely 'anti-Zionist.' And I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops, let it echo through the valleys of God's green earth: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--this is God's own truth.
"Antisemitism, the hatred of the Jewish people, has been and remains a blot on the soul of mankind. In this we are in full agreement. So know also this: anti-Zionist is inherently antisemitic, and ever will be so.
"Why is this? You know that Zionism is nothing less than the dream and ideal of the Jewish people returning to live in their own land. The Jewish people, the Scriptures tell us, once enjoyed a flourishing Commonwealth in the Holy Land. From this they were expelled by the Roman tyrant, the same Romans who cruelly murdered Our Lord. Driven from their homeland, their nation in ashes, forced to wander the globe, the Jewish people time and again suffered the lash of whichever tyrant happened to rule over them.
"The Negro people, my friend, know what it is to suffer the torment of tyranny under rulers not of our choosing. Our brothers in Africa have begged, pleaded, requested--DEMANDED the recognition and realization of our inborn right to live in peace under our own sovereignty in our own country.
"How easy it should be, for anyone who holds dear this inalienable right of all mankind, to understand and support the right of the Jewish People to live in their ancient Land of Israel. All men of good will exult in the fulfilment of God's promise, that his People should return in joy to rebuild their plundered land.
"This is Zionism, nothing more, nothing less.
"And what is anti-Zionist? It is the denial to the Jewish people of a fundamental right that we justly claim for the people of Africa and freely accord all other nations of the Globe. It is discrimination against Jews, my friend, because they are Jews. In short, it is antisemitism.
"The antisemite rejoices at any opportunity to vent his malice. The times have made it unpopular, in the West, to proclaim openly a hatred of the Jews. This being the case, the antisemite must constantly seek new forms and forums for his poison. How he must revel in the new masquerade! He does not hate the Jews, he is just 'anti-Zionist'!
"My friend, I do not accuse you of deliberate antisemitism. I know you feel, as I do, a deep love of truth and justice and a revulsion for racism, prejudice, and discrimination. But I know you have been misled--as others have been--into thinking you can be 'anti-Zionist' and yet remain true to these heartfelt principles that you and I share.
"Let my words echo in the depths of your soul: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--make no mistake about it."
From M.L. King Jr., "Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend," Saturday Review_XLVII (Aug. 1967), p. 76.
Reprinted in M.L. King Jr., "This I Believe: Selections from the Writings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr."
well, what about all the jews in the world that are critical of zionism. anti-semites? is anti-semitism a cheap way to try to discredit all independent human rights organizations critical of israel. is israel even representative of jews and judaism? are jews homogeneous? to love israel must you love jews? like messianic christians who hope to dispose of all non christians when the 'messiah' returns. it is an interesting debate really, but not one that should escape simple logic.
note: dr. king's spiel was printed in august, 1967.
i'd like to know when it was actually written, because two months earlier, as you should know, was the six day war.
usually, you would get an august magazine in mid to late july. production cycle for the issue would have been around late june, meaning that the latest dr. king probably could have written it would have been at the closure of the war. i think the time-frame of it being written is very relevant to the argument it is used to support.
i highly suspect it was written beforehand, and i wonder what his reaction would have been to israel stealing golan, sinai, west bank, and gaza from other nations. i do not think he would have been down with the militarization of either side. And the killing of children, not for that either.
and i do think it is possible to disagree with the policies of israel as a political actor, without hating jews.
It's this kind of thinking on the part of the Israelis that has indefinitely lengthened the quagmire between Israel and the Palestinians.
Actually, Israel officially stopped bulldozing homes months ago.
Israel WILL survive and eventually the Palestinians will wise up and understand that the Jews there are their relatives & bretheren.
Until that time, Israel needs to arm itself and not TRUST anything but their own ability to defend themselves.
I see about 10 posts above from the same person, all condeming Israel.
You're not fooling anybody with those lies.
They actually forced me to read up on the issues and the other poster & Adam are correct.
That film was PWND!