Post by Moses on Apr 5, 2004 8:36:39 GMT -5
CITIZEN-TIMES.com
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Conflict between Israelis, Palestinians dehumanizes those on both sides
By: Asheville Citizen-Times
Posted: April 3, 2004 2:58 p.m.
Michal Sagi, a Jewish Israeli, began to protest the treatment of Palestinians at checkpoints in the Occupied Palestinian Territories following an incident she saw on a Jerusalem street.
Two border policemen were pointing their guns at a young Palestinian woman in a veil.
"Her stuff was all over the place," according to Sagi, who was in Asheville recently as part of tour to promote peace in the Middle East. "They were demanding her to lift her top in order to prove that she has no explosives. It was quite obvious that she didn't because (a) they weren't panicking, the street remained open, people went by near them, cars went by and (b) she was wearing only one layer, you could see that she doesn't have anything besides her vulnerable body underneath."
Sagi called to them asking them to stop. They refused and got angry at her, pointing their guns at her. So she just stood and stared until, after a few minutes, they let the young woman go.
A few days later, Sagi said, she saw some literature for Checkpoint Watch, "and everything fell into place." Checkpoint Watch is a group of about 400 Israeli women who go out twice a day to checkpoints to observe and to intervene and attempt to mediate in cases of blatant abuse or hardship.
"We write reports. We want to make sure that no one - no one - will be able to say, `We didn't know,'" Sagi said.
Asheville was one of 10 U.S. cities visited by Sagi and two other women, Nahla Assali, a Muslim Palestinian, and Nuha Khoury, a Christian Palestinian, as part of a 17-day tour titled "Jerusalem Women Speak," sponsored by Partners for Peace. Partners for Peace is a Washington-based nonprofit that promotes "a just and lasting settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."
Their visit came shortly after the assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, called the "master architect of Hamas" by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, which questioned in an editorial the wisdom, though not the justice, of killing an elderly, blind paraplegic.
"Yassin's assassination . was not a necessity in terms of thwarting terror attacks, and a very high price is likely to be paid for it," the editorial said.
But the words and stories of these three women bring home the cost of the conflict in human terms in a way no stories of assassinations or posturing political leaders ever can.
It's a price being exacted every day from everyone on both sides. These women believe America can do much more to help bring peace to their troubled region.
"The message we are trying to convey to the American public concerns the occupation and how dehumanizing it is for both Palestinians and Israelis," said Khoury, a Christina Palestinian and a lecturer and deputy director of the Dar al-Kalima Academy in Bethlehem. "We are trying to give a voice that is rarely heard in the media. Typically the Palestinian is depicted as being this bloodthirsty terrorist. ... We are trying to tell them that the majority of Palestinian people are normal people. They want to raise their children. They want to have normal lives. They don't want to be continuously humiliated because this is the overriding feeling of what occupation is like. It's a loss of dignity. Your life is threatened all the time. You are not secure in your own home. In order to earn a living you have to cross one checkpoint after the next. You are losing so much time, time that could be spent with family and friends and children."
According to statistics gathered by one organization, 97 percent of Palestinian children between the ages of 10 and 19 suffer from post-traumatic syndrome, Khoury said, and that 83 percent have seen a shooting in front of them. Another 62 percent have seen a close relative being hurt.
"So these are traumatized young people. Every day they have to prove to themselves and to others that they are human beings. And some of them, where their anger is directed in negative ways, might end up killing themselves and other people. We are trying to tell the American public that occupation kills - it kills both sides - and they can do something about it."
To shop, to go to work, to go to school or to go for medical care, Palestinians must cross at least one if not more checkpoints, said Sagi, who works at Melitz, an organization providing informal educational services to Israelis and Diaspora Jews. Sagi previously worked at the Jewish Agency for Israel to promote solidarity in the Jewish community throughout the world.
"Ninety percent of checkpoints are not separating Palestinians from Israelis," she said. "Ninety percent are around Palestinian cities preventing Palestinians from getting from one place to another. ... Permits are hard to get, and for every different purpose you need a different permit. You wait in line for hours . and when you are standing in line you don't know if you'll be able to cross today, if your permit will be valid today, because the orders are very arbitrary, they keep changing them from day to day. And only after you wait for a few hours and get to show your permit to the soldier, then you'll find out if you are crossing today or not."
The occupation must end, she said, not only for the sake of the Palestinians, but for Israeli society.
"We are corrupting the second generation," Sagi said. "The first time I went to the checkpoint it really hit me how occupation is corrupting - to what extent - those soldiers. You know, they weren't born with a gun. They weren't born rude. They weren't born violent and insensitive. Insensitivity is one of the major characteristics of a soldier at a checkpoint. The gun becomes an extension of the hand. The voice becomes rude. The face becomes dark. And I keep thinking, how will they behave once they are home with their partner, their kids, with their family. They shouldn't do that. For the first mission as an adult (to be) to control someone else's life - it's not normal. They should have more of a childhood before they become - well, people should never become like that."
On Friday there seemed to be news of a move in the right direction on the occupation front when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said in published interviews that he would withdraw from all of the Gaza Strip and four West Bank settlements. It was the first time he had revealed the scope of his unilateral "disengagement" plan. He also said the withdrawal would be underway within a year.
"We need to get out of Gaza, not to be responsible any more for what happens there," he said.
Sharon has said he will let his divided Likud Party make a final decision on a withdrawal plan, and approval is certainly not assured. Sharon is to hold a binding referendum among 200,000 party members after his return from an April 14 meeting with President Bush. Meanwhile, the violence continues.
Also on Friday, Israeli police clashed with worshipers at the Al Aqsa Mosque compound, also known as the Temple Mount, in the most violent confrontations there since the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian fighting in September 2000.
The conflict is mainly over land, said Nahla Assali, a Muslim Palestinian who recently retired from Birzeit University's Department of English Language and Literature.
". I don't know if we sit alone with the Israelis if we are going to strike a peace plan. We need, I think, a very strong third party to do good homework on what it takes for the Palestinians and the Israelis to come to a fair and endurable peace settlement. Without that, I think the cycle of violence is the future awaiting both sides."
While true peace can only be achieved between the Israelis and the Palestinians themselves, the United States, which gives $3 billion a year in aid to Israel, carries a huge responsibility for developments in the Middle East. It's not enough for the Bush administration to voice opposition to occupation and support for a Palestinian homeland.
In the name of humanity, the United States must do its "good homework" and take an aggressive, engaged, ongoing and unrelenting role in mediating a peace that will allow young Israelis and young Palestinians to grow up with dignity and decency.
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