In
de Gazastrook ligt het werkloosheidspercentage op 27%, voor jongeren ligt dit zelfs op het ongelofelijk hoge percentage van
60%.......
Jongeren
protesteerden aan de grens met Israël i.h.k.v. de Great Return March,
o.a. een protest tegen de Israëlische blokkade van de Gazastrook voor allerlei goederen,
zoals bouwmaterialen, voedsel en zelfs medicijnen..... Goederen die
Israël mondjesmaat toelaat en bij onrust 'gewoon' achterhoudt.....
Zo heeft Israël de afgelopen week ook de levering van water verder teruggebracht n.a.v. de
protesten aan de grens van de Gazastrook en Israël..... Voorgaande zaken, het moedwillig onthouden van voedsel, medicijnen en water zijn misdaden tegen de menselijkheid!
In
de periode van de Great Return March, van 30 maart tot 15 mei, heeft
Israël meer dan 100 mensen vermoord, waaronder kinderen, duidelijk
herkenbare hulpverleners (inclusief een arts) en idem herkenbare
journalisten, daarnaast zouden er volgens Palestijnse autoriteiten
meer dan 10.000 mensen gewond zijn geraakt........ Volgens Israël hebben de slachtoffers zich schuldig gemaakt aan terreur en zijn ze daarom beschoten (en vermoord, al gebruikt de fascistische apartheidsstaat Israël dat woord uiteraard niet).......
Israël
stelde uit zelfverdediging niet anders te kunnen doen dan met scherp schieten en gebruik te maken van het chemisch wapen traangas (waardoor een baby van 8 maanden overleed), echter er is geen Israëlische burger of militair
omgekomen tijdens de Great Return March, er is zelfs geen
zwaargewonde gevallen aan Israëlische kant...... Eerder werd gemeld
dat er zegge en schrijve één militair licht gewond is geraakt......
Zelfs
met scherp schieten op met stenen gooiende jongeren, die NB al onder
schot werden genomen als ze de grens op minder dan 300 meter
naderden, is buiten elk moreel rechtsbeginsel en kan niet anders dan
als een welbewuste massamoord worden gezien....... (bovendien hoe ver kan je gooien
met een steen..??)
Kortom
de jongeren die hun leven in de waagschaal stelden en stellen, hebben weinig
andere keus, ze leven in een openluchtgevangenis, waar het aan alles
ontbreekt en een toekomst hebben ze niet, ook naar een ander land
gaan (vluchten) is welhaast onmogelijk.....
In het hieronder opgenomen artikel van Reese Erlich, gaat hij ook in op het
recht van vluchtelingen terug te keren naar hun voormalige
geboortegrond, dan wel naar een levensvatbare Palestijnse staat (die
zoals je begrijpt niet bestaat, noch op korte of middellange termijn zal bestaan, dat is zeker.......).
Afgelopen dinsdag meldde WDR 5 in het nieuws van 10.00 u. dat er vanuit de Gazastrook
met 'raketten' op Israëlische doelen is geschoten (fysiek onmogelijk
daar deze 'raketten' op goed geluk worden afgeschoten, zeg maar als
een veredelde vuurpijl en er is dan ook niemand gewond geraakt of
werden er zaken vernield......
Uiteraard heeft Israël met grof geweld
terug geslagen, ook al was de actie van de Palestijnen puur uit wanhoop en
is hun handelen een reactie op de enorme terreur die Israël uitoefent op de Palestijnen..... Of er bij die Israëlische actie Palestijnen gewond raakten of werden vermoord, wist de nieuwslezer niet te melden....
Opvallend lang aandacht voor deze 'raketaanval' uit de Gazastrook,
terwijl er amper aandacht was bij WDR 5 voor het op grote schaal moorden door
Israël........
Erlich stelt in het volgende artikel dat Israël de Palestijnse leiders niet moet vertrouwen, zoals de Palestijnen de Israëlische overheid niet moeten vertrouwen. Daar zou ik toch op willen merken dat het vooral de Israëlische overheid is die totaal onbetrouwbaar is....... Bovendien zijn de zionistische joden nog altijd de echte terroristen in wat men Israël durft te noemen, een land dat voor het overgrote deel van de Palestijnen werd gestolen (met grof en bloedig geweld....)
Why
Young People Are Protesting in Gaza
May
27, 2018 at 3:52 pm
(ANTIWAR.COM Op-ed) — On
my most recent reporting trip to Gaza, I stayed with a family living
just a short walk from the Israeli border. At dusk we watched a
beautiful sunset over the Mediterranean and could forget the ongoing
conflict for just a few minutes.
Living
conditions for the family have gotten much worse since my visit. They
have electricity four hours a day, medicine is in short supply, and
they have to get all their water delivered by truck.
Overall
unemployment in Gaza is 27 percent, with youth unemployment at a
staggering 60 percent, according to
the World Bank.
That
high unemployment presents the biggest problem, said one of my hosts,
family member Jihad Mosalami, an English professor. “People can’t
survive,” he told me in a phone interview.
Many
of Mosalami’s students were among the tens of thousands who have
gathered to demonstrate at
the fence separating Gaza and Israel of the past several weeks. “A
few went to the fence to throw stones,” he said. “Others went to
the fence to pray.”
It
didn’t matter to Israel Defense Forces soldiers, who shot tear gas
and live ammunition at the gathering Palestinians.
“It
was like hell,” said Mosalami.
From
March 30 to May 15, Israeli security forces killed
over 100 Palestinians and
wounded more than 10,000, according to the Palestinian health
officials. No Israeli soldiers were killed or even seriously injured
during this same period.
Palestinians
organized the “Great March of Return,” to protest the Israeli
military blockade of Gaza. Israeli soldiers control all food,
medicine, building supplies, and other goods that enter or exit Gaza.
The Israeli military frequently holds up essential goods to pressure
Hamas, the ruling party of the Palestinian enclave.
Israeli
authorities claimed they were protecting their border from hordes of
Palestinians, some armed, intent on crashing through the fence. In
reality, no one got though the double fence or the large “no man’s
land” buffer zone created by Israel. The soldiers shot civilians to
intimidate them – not out of self-defense.
But
these tactics backfired. Palestinians won the political battle by
gaining renewed sympathy
for their struggle around the world.
The
young generation of Palestinians discovered they “can make a
difference, not least of which is bringing global attention to their
cause,” Brian Barber told me. He’s professor emeritus at the
University of Tennessee and a senior fellow at the Institute
for Palestine Studies in
Washington D.C. The protests gave young Palestinians “their first
taste of vibrant collective action … as their parents had with the
first intifada.”
Why
would young people risk their lives to protest the occupation? Let’s
take a look at some of the underlying political issues.
What’s
the Right of Return?
Sixty-eight
percent of people living in Gaza are registered
with the U.N. (UNas refugees, either expelled from Israel in 1948 or their
descendants. I’ve interviewed Palestinians who still have the keys
to their 1948 houses. Under international law, these refugees have
the right to return to their towns and villages, according to James
Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute.
There
are 5 million Palestinians worldwide. As a practical matter, many
would not want to return to Israel. Their homes and villages may no
longer exist. And many Palestinians “don’t want to live as a
minority in Israel,” Zogby told me.
If
Israel recognizes a fully independent, viable, and contiguous
Palestinian state, many refugees would return there. Years ago the
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) proposed that a limited number of
Palestinians should be allowed to return to their villages in Israel
while the vast majority would have the right to return to a newly
independent Palestinian state.
But
Palestinians won’t make any compromises on such a critical issue
except in the context of an overall peace settlement. (As of press
time, neither the United States nor Israel have shown any interest in
peace talks.)
One
state or two?
For
many years the left and progressives supported the concept of one
state in which all Palestinians would be free to return to Israel as
equal citizens. The democratic state would champion one person, one
vote with no discrimination based on ethnicity or religion.
Eighty-one
percent of Israeli Jews reject the idea of a one-state solution,
according to a 2017
poll,
because the return of millions of Palestinians would eliminate Israel
as a Jewish state. The one-state plan has little support even among
progressive Israelis opposed to the occupation of the West Bank and
Gaza.
By
the 1980s, the Palestine Liberation Organization began to propose a
two-state solution in which the Palestinians and Israelis would have
their own states living in peace. Negotiations would determine
borders based on Israel’s pre-1967 territory. Different parts of
Jerusalem could serve as capitals for both countries. The two-state
solution served as the basis for the 1993 Oslo
peace accord.
Successive
Israeli governments never
implemented the
Oslo agreement, however. They continued to build Israeli settlements
in the West Bank, and unilaterally built a wall dividing Israel and
the West Bank that doesn’t follow the 1967 border line.
In
March a Palestinian
poll showed
48 percent of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza supported two
states and 50 percent opposed. But only 28 percent supported one
state.
“I’m
not an activist or politician,” said my friend Mosalami, “but I
do believe the majority of Palestinians will accept two states. It’s
the practical solution.”
But
doesn’t Hamas reject two states?
Actually,
Hamas is willing to accept the two-state solution. Soon after Hamas
won the 2006 Palestinian Authority parliamentary elections, its
leaders faced reality. Having one state was not possible and most
Palestinians favored two states.
“We
accepted that our state should be on the 1967 borders, but Israel
rejected that,” then top Hamas leader Khaled
Meshal told me.
He confirmed that position with former President
Jimmy Carter.
I reconfirmed that view with two different Hamas ministers during a
2011 trip to Gaza.
Hamas
doesn’t emphasize that position because there are no peace talks on
the horizon. Hamas leaders want Israel or the United States to put
forward a viable two-state option, and then it will respond.
But
isn’t Hamas a terrorist organization?
How
could Israel trust them in negotiations?
Hamas
is a political party with an armed militia that functions as Gaza’s
security force. It considers itself a national
liberation movement fighting
occupation forces through armed
struggle.
Hamas has intentionally killed civilians, including bombing buses and
restaurants.
Using
terrorist tactics, however, does not make one a terrorist
organization. Jewish militias fighting the British and Arabs in 1948
and 1949 used terrorist tactics. They murdered and tortured Arabs in
the village of Deir
Yassin,
forcing residents to flee. They blew up the King David
Hotel,
killing over ninety Jews, Arabs, and British soldiers.
Some
of the Jewish militia tactics parallel recent events in Gaza. Yuri
Avnery, today one of the Israel’s major peace movement leaders,
described how he participated in a 1948 Tel Aviv march organized by
the Irgun, a militia later incorporated into the IDF.
Civilian
Irgun youth marched down a street “where the offices of the British
administration were located,” Avnery
wrote.
“There we sang the national anthem, ‘Hatikvah’, while some
adult members set fire to the offices.”
I
oppose the use of terrorism whatever the justification. But Hamas is
fundamentally different from Al Qaeda or the Islamic State, who use
terror to ethnically cleanse groups they oppose – Christians, Jews,
Shia Muslims, and others. Those organizations refuse to participate
in elections and use religion as the excuse to give themselves
absolute power.
Hamas
promotes a conservative religious agenda but it is not the Islamic
State. I would not vote for Hamas if I lived in Palestine. But Hamas
is a legitimate party whose views are part of the Middle East
political reality.
Labeling
Hamas a terrorist organization gives Israel, and the United States,
an excuse to never hold peace talks. The Israeli government labeled
the Palestine Liberation Organization terrorists until Israel agreed
to the Oslo peace talks. Then they became peace partners.
Earlier
this month Hamas offered Israel a “hudna”
or ceasefire. Hamas sources told the website Al
Monitor if
Israel lifted the siege of Gaza, Hamas would enter into negotiations
with Israel for a long-term ceasefire.
Should
Israeli leaders trust Hamas? No. And Palestinian leaders shouldn’t
trust the Israeli government. But there is a common need to begin
serious discussions to establish a viable Palestinian state. Each
side can advance partial measures and verify their implementation
before moving ahead.
My
Gaza friend Jihad Mosalami said, “They have to negotiate and reach
a deal. People in Gaza want a decent life.”
He
acknowledged that the current leadership in Washington and Tel Aviv
won’t start talks anytime soon.
“We
won’t have war forever,” he said with just a hint of optimism.
“The war will end and there can be peace.”
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Zie ook: '
Israël vermoordde minstens 16 ongewapende demonstranten tijdens grootschalig protest'
