The Carnage Continues: Is Arab Blood So Cheap? [Archives:2000/43/Focus]

COMMON SENSE
By: Hassan Al-Haifi
Just to show that Israel is not concerned about what was agreed upon in Sharm El-Sheikh or had any worries about what the Arab Emergency Summit being held in Cairo would produce, on the eve of the latter the Israelis emphasized their thirst for Palestinian blood by killing 10 Palestinians and injuring over one hundred, many of whom were youngsters below 18 years of age. It is this kind of homicidal mentality that gets the Arab masses so infuriated and it is this kind of genocide that has characterized Israel since its inception. To underscore the contempt which Israel has for even its sponsor the United States, and in particular to Mr. William Clinton, Mr. Ehud Barak went on the air on Friday night to tell the world that for all intents and purposes the peace process is put on hold until the Israeli ammunition is close to running out.
This kind of theatrics is really unbelievable in the wake of the United Nations Security Council condemning Israel for its excessive use of force, but not for murder or genocide, which is the only way that one can describe what the whole world has been witnessing for three weeks now live and in color. A civil protest has turned into an all out war situation, with the use of just about every type of killing tool at the disposal of the Israeli Defense Forces. When asked about what the standing instructions for the Israeli security forces has changed to, after the Sharm El-Sheikh Summit, an Israeli Officer stated: Our orders remain, to use restraint as much as possible, but when they come at you, shoot to kill, or something to that order. He was not saying that with any feeling of embarrassment or shaken conscience, for the Israelis know that to have come to live in Israel, there is no room for soft consciences or moral indignation. In fact, the whole being of Israel rests on the invalidity of normal human values and rights accorded in a civilized world. As much as Israel seeks to project the image of its civilized behavior, one is inclined to believe that Israel continues to insist that what is good for the rest of the world is not good for Israel and what is bad for the rest of the world is good for Israel. It is this kind of logic that prevails in the mentality of Israeli leaders and it is this kind of mentality that the United States is being drawn into adopting, notwithstanding the serious handicap this poses to American foreign policy makers, who seemed to have forgotten the John Foster Dulles theory that what is good for Israel is not necessarily what is good for the United States.
It goes without saying, that as evil as what Israel is doing in the streets of the West Bank and Gaza, and even in its Arab Israeli enclaves, would not be so ugly and unforgivable, let alone acceptable from a civilized society, if we can give some credence to the Israeli self acclaim, had it not been assured the cushioned support of the United States. Even some of Israels old friends cannot find justification in what Israel is doing to the unarmed Palestinians, who have suffered so much under the hands of arrogant elements of a people who continuously claim to have a monopoly on suffering from persecution and oppression. But the Israelis state that neither the United Nations nor the European Union are objective enough to organize a Committee of Inquiry to look into the mess that Israel and Israel alone is responsible for in the Levant this last month. Why? Because they already know what the verdict reached by such a Commission is bound to be, and because any Commission of Inquiry acting according to its conscience can only conclude that Israel – and Israel alone – can only be blamed for the murder and injury of so many innocent people, who have been victimized by the international community, as well as by Israel for four generations. It is really the conscience of the international community that is facing the test now. We have given up testing the conscience of the likes of Ariel Sharon and Ehud Barak since Deir Yassin. But, the international community is not expected to just watch and hope that perhaps somebody, somewhere out there in the land of McDonald Hamburgers and Boeing Aircraft will start to understand that the United States just cannot sit and watch while its spoiled brat wreaks havoc in the Holy Land – of all places, without so much as a stir from the Global Superpower. Even after the Untied States had grudgingly abstained from voting on the United Nations Security Council Resolution softly condemning Israel for its excesses, the Israelis still feel they have the Green Light from the United States to carry on as usual in Palestine, as though they are free from accountability. To add fuel to fire, the Israelis have the audacity to declare that they are not willing to accept a United Nations Commission of Inquiry, because it is biased. Yet, the United Nations was not biased when it voted for the unjust partition of Israel in 1948? It was Israels friends that sought the United Nations to take over the British mandate of Palestine in 1948, because the British lost hope in believing that the Zionists were going to be grateful to them for setting up the national home for the Jews at the expense of the indigenous Palestinians, and the British Officers and soldiers fell victim to the vary forces they trained to defend this national home the Haganah, Stern and Irgun gangs. Whet makes the Americans think that the IDF or Israels intelligence and clandestine organs will not also turn against the Americans, once they find that the Americans also have a soft conscience when it comes to seeing innocent blood unleashed. Ask CNN how much pressure they have met up with just for trying to be as objective as possible, without meeting a wobble of accusations of negotiating for the Palestinians, as Ehud Barak told Christiane Amanpour, when she interviewed him and asked him You say that you have given a lot to the Palestinians, just what is it that you have actually given them? A question that neither Barak nor Dennis Ross would be able to answer to this day. Nevertheless, we can answer for them, because we see it now everyday. Rather than dropping food and candy from airlifts to ease the deprivation brought on by the ongoing siege of the Palestinians, Ehud Barak has given rockets fired from Apache Helicopters. Just imagine Apache Helicopters against rock throwing youth and old men; tanks against ambulances, rifles with telescopic scopes against randomly thrown pebbles that could hardly be considered as lethal weapons. The Israelis surely have given too much to the Palestinians! Too much hell that is! Yet, they want us to believe that they are right and they are moral! The irreverence of Israeli logic never ceases to amaze the listener.
However, watch out Israel! The Arab leaders are holding their Extraordinary Summit. More tears than cheers are the result of leaders, who really have not gotten the gist of what their people are telling them. Their people are telling them, We want you to do something, and now! However, they do nothing, as usual. What a disgraceful nation have we become that 21 or so states, sitting atop the richest natural bounties, on which the entire western world depend upon, for its vitality and strength, cannot say to all those western powers, Well we have power too and if you do not tame your baby, soon enough, we are going to keep our resources for our kids. We will live on the money you owe us now for all the oil you have taken without remembering that the dignity of its owners just cannot be forsaken so easily. It has worked before and it can work again!
Yes, Arab leaders, peace is fine and we want you to seek peace. However, we do not want you to forsake the purity and dignity of Arab blood. Those are our children in Palestine also and they are entitled to all the love and care that any Arab children, who have yet to taste the bloodthirstiness of Ariel Sharon and his friends in the Israeli Defense Forces, are entitled to get.
The Israelis say it is Ya Arafat who is responsible! Yassir Arafat is also a Palestinian and Yassir Arafat would be a traitor, not just to the Palestinian people, but to all the Arabs (Christians and Moslems), if he so much as told the Palestinians: Just keep it inside, it will wear out in time. That is really like saying Arab blood is cheap. The Arab masses – from Mauritania, who sent the Israeli diplomatic corps packing home, without even waiting for an official break in relations, to Lebanon, where Hizbullah continues to lift our heads high, even in the most sorrowful of times, by keeping those Israeli myths, as nothing but myths that can easily be erased and stained, with the shame and humiliation that is rightly due to the Israelis – have told their leaders that they are tired of their impotence and that it is time they realize that Arab blood is not cheap, whether they are the ones who spill it or the Israelis who spill it!

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