Madness has broken out in Gaza. It is therefore very important to keep a cool head. Through Al Jazeera I came across Yeshayahu Leibowitz (Hebrew: ישעיהו ליבוביץ; January 29, 1903 - August 18, 1994). He was an Israeli Orthodox Jewish public intellectual and polymath. (A scholar who made his mark in several fields.) He was a professor of biochemistry, organic chemistry and neurophysiology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, as well as a prolific writer on Jewish thought and Western philosophy. He was known for his outspoken views on ethics, religion and politics. Leibowitz warned that the State of Israel and Zionism had become more sacred than Jewish humanist values. He controversially described Israeli behavior in the occupied Palestinian territories as "Jewish-Nazi" in nature, while warning of the dehumanizing effect of the occupation on its victims, and its oppressors.
His characterization of the occupation is razor-sharp.
A retired Israeli lieutenant general. Mordecai Kedar was interviewed. He mainly reiterated that Hamas is like ISIS, rather short-sighted. I explain why. It is a piece of history that is little known. It starts with the mysterious death of Yasser Arafat on November 11, 2004. He was succeeded by Mahmoud Abbas after the elections on January 9, 2005. Abbas received the most votes. A Palestinian friend of mine then told me why he got so many votes. Voters wanted to give him a chance to show what he could achieve for the Palestinians, although expectations were not high. After all, he had become prime minister under pressure from the US and Israel to undermine Yasser Arafat and had yet to achieve anything. Nor did he get anything done after his election.
Elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council were held on January 25, 2006. As expected at the time, Hamas won these elections convincingly. After this, Hamas wanted to form a national unity government, but Fatah refused. A subordinate role was then reserved for her. Under pressure from Saudi Arabia, this succeeded and this government was established in Mecca in March 2007.
An important but forgotten date is Thursday, June 7, 2007. That's when the front page of the Jerusalem Post, which was founded as Palestine Post (An English-language daily founded in Jerusalem in 1932 as part of a Zionist-Jewish initiative.), stated, that Israel planned to deliver 4,000 Kalashnikovs to Fatah in Gaza with millions of bullets. Hamas then kicked out the leader of Fatah in Gaza: Mohammed Dahlan. He was born there in Khan Younis, in a refugee camp. He is a candidate to succeed Abbas if he dies.
Repeated skirmishes now followed between Hamas and Israel. Negotiations took place in secret in Switzerland between the two sides to reach an armistice. This was successful and came into effect on June 19, 2008 for a period of 6 months. Her name was Hudna.
That time was used to reach a 10-year armistice, which would then be used to reach a final settlement.
This went wrong. President Abbas announced the negotiations. Since Israel does not negotiate with terrorists, further negotiations were called off.
Subsequently, Israel again used violence against Gaza and on November 5, 2008, Israel killed five Palestinians in Gaza, after which Hamas no longer considered itself bound by the ceasefire until December 19.
On December 27, Israel started a war against Gaza. This was a profound experience for me. I took a photo of a 4-year-old boy wearing a mask in Bethlehem at the end of December. A 12-year-old boy took it off to see who was underneath. The boy snatched the mask back and placed it back on his head. This was indicative of the influence the war had on children.
The scary thing about the current situation is that it could provide an alibi for Israel to proceed with the so-called transfer, or the removal of the Palestinians from Gaza (and later from the West Bank). The fact that Palestinians are dying in the desert will be not a concern to the West. It does that often. The West has developed the habit of shouting when Israel does something that is wrong, and doing nothing else.
An important, but also painful question is: How did Hamas come about? In December 1987 at the beginning of the 1st Intifada, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin founded Hamas with the support of Israel as a counterbalance to Fatah based on the principle of 'Divide and Rule'. In doing so, Israel made the same mistake as the US, which supported Usama Bin Laden in his resistance against the Soviet Union from the late 1970s on. You cannot control people's minds.
Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was killed from an Israeli helicopter on March 2, 2004, while on his way to the mosque for the morning prayers at half past five.
A friend from Battir sent me the link to a song from 1973 in tribute to Kamal Nasser, who was murdered in his home in Beirout on April 10 of that year by a Mossad operation led by the later Prime Minister Ehud Barak. The song is called 'The urgent call of Palestine. Kamal Nasser was a writer, poet and politician. He was the spokesman for the PLO. The singer of this beautiful song is Ismail Shammout: https://youtube.com/watch?v=
I heard from a young friend that he suffers from tear gas that soldiers throw around in his neighborhood.
Palestinians are also being killed in the West Bank, at least 55. For example, a cousin of a nurse who is on duty with me, was shot dead at the Qalandia checkpoint without giving any reason. He showed me pictures of his dead cousin, 24 years old. Settlers fired on a funeral procession in Qusra south of Nablus, seriously wounding Ibrahim Wadi, 63, and his son, Ahmad, 26, and later dying. Furthermore, 11 UN employees have also been killed in attacks by Israel. This is called collateral damage. Too crazy for words.
What I fear is that fanatical Jews will compare the Palestinians to the Amalekites, who had to be wiped off the face of the earth. See the Jewish Bible Deuteronomy 25:19. It is a call for genocide.
There are fears that if an invasion of Gaza occurs, Hezbollah will open a second front on Israel's northern border. The settlers, who have been weaponized, may open a third front in the West Bank.
I read in the Jerusalem Post that the fencing around Gaza cost about 1 billion euros, which ultimately turned out to be worthless.
All in all, Yeshayahu Leibovitz was unfortunately proven right in his warning that the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israelis dehumanized both sides.
Uri Avneri was a white raven. As a young man he was a member of the Irgun. He became a peace activist. He befriended Yasser Arafat. Once when he visited Gaza, children greeted him with cheers.
Louis Bohte ofm
