Crossroads in Palestine [Archives:2002/23/Focus]

BY NAWAL ZAID
The Palestinian cause has been the central issue in the Arab World for decades. It started with the UN decision in 1948 of dividing the Arab land of Palestine into two entities, one the Arab state of Palestine and the other the Zionist entity, Israel. It continued through the Arab-Israeli wars until the recent brutal aggression and massacres perpetrated by the Israel government headed by a man many believe is a notorious terrorist, Ariel Sharon, who represents the worst of governments in the bloody history of Israel.
Nowadays the Palestinian issue is at crossroads and facing Zionist and American scheming to undermine all agreements and resolutions since the Oslo agreements. After the September 11 events in the U.S., the Sharon government seized the opportunity to wage a barbaric war against the Palestinian people and their militant groups of resistance under a falsely-fabricated pretext of fighting terror.
Sharons Israel has used the US campaign against so-called terror as a pretext to put into practice its expansionist schemes at the expense of the Palestinian territories and the Palestinian peoples right to establish their independent state. Backed by the American administration of George W. Bush, the Zionist entity embarked two months ago on its massive military campaign against the Palestinian cities and towns in the West Bank. Its an unprecedented military invasion since the war of 1967. Hundreds of Palestinians were killed by tanks and warplanes, and some were buried under rubble of destroyed houses and buildings. Many Palestinians were taken prisoner.
The Israeli brutal offensive is still going on. The US is still backing the Zionist plans for neutralizing the Palestinian resistance movement. Now it is increasing its pressure on the Palestinian authority. All US plans and proposals to the Palestinian authority are channeled towards using Palestinian police and security forces to fight the Palestinian resistance movement under the pretext of fighting terrorism.
Israel and the American administrations are trying to use the pretext of fighting so-called terrorism as a means of destroying the Palestinian resistance. The American administration refuses to condemn the Israeli crimes of killing innocent Palestinians, demolishing their houses, burying them under rubble, destroying their farms and destroying all of the Palestinian infrastructure. Both the United States of America and Israel have reversed the equation by suggesting that the Palestinian self-defense is terror. At the same time, theyve been giving legitimacy to massacres and aggression against defenseless people.
All forms of resistance would always be the legitimate choice of the Palestinian people until they get rid of the Zionist occupation and until the UN Security Council resoultions are implemented. The US and Israel want to impose peace according to their own interpretation which means keeping occupation of Palestinian territories, and maintaining and increasing the number of Zionist settlements inside the Palestinian authority.
This plan puts an end to all international community and UN resolutions on Palestine and the Palestinian independent state. It would also give the Zionist entity and the US the opportunity to go ahead with their schemes against the entire Arab region, and reshape the entire situation in the way that serves the Zionist entitys plans of expansion in the region and Americas illegitimate interests in the Arab world and the Middle East. Ending the Palestinian cause according to the Zionist and American plots would give them breathing space to continue implementing their plans in phases.
America and the Zionist entity are mistaken if they think that it will be an easy task, because the Arab and Muslim peoples will not sit on their hands. Rather they will continue their struggle and resistance to achieve their legitimate goals.
America on its part should exert all efforts to befriend the Arab and Muslim peoples through pursuing just and unbiased policies recognizing their legitimate rights. Only then it will see stability, peace and security in the region, that is, if it wants to achieve such goals and not carry out colonialist plans.

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