Security forces braced on Friday for more violence after Israeli hardliners went on the rampage against Palestinians in retaliation for the eviction of settlers from a disputed Hebron house.
The entire southern West Bank was declared a closed military zone to prevent Israelis from converging again on the flashpoint city where a mob of Jewish extremists on Thursday shot and wounded three Palestinians, hurled rocks at others and torched homes, fields and cars.
Right-wing Israelis have vowed to exact revenge for Thursday's forceful eviction of some 250 settlers from the house that had come to symbolise hardliners' determination to fight for what they consider their God-given right to all the biblical land of Israel -- including the Palestinian territories.Israeli authorities were also worried about a Palestinian backlash amid simmering anger over the perceived failure of security forces to confront the rampaging mob in Hebron. Most Israeli media hailed the security forces, who used tear gas to finally drag the settlers from the house following an Israeli high court order on November 16.
The Israeli human rights group, B'Tselem, says settlers shot and wounded three Palestinians.
But the governor of the Nablus region, Jamal Moheisin, has warned that if Israel did not control the settlers,
We will call on the Palestinian residents to go out to the streets and fight back.UN envoy Robert Serry said in a statement,
I remain concerned about the potential for a further escalation of a tense situation. As the occupying power, the government of Israel is under obligation to protect Palestinian civilians, property and holy sites... actions of extremists continue to pose a threat to the peace process.Time for a poll, Mr. Serry.
Will all those who believe there will ever be a Palestinian nation-state, please raise their hand?
Israel has gone from a failing state to a FAILED state. Only our largess keeps Israel going.
ReplyDeleteIt did not have to be this way. Israel has had some visionary leadership in eras gone by, but it doesn't appear that there are any leaders left who have the courage to take a radically new path.
Jolly Roger's right: the fight between Israel and Palestine didn't have to be this way. Israel is suffering from their own Bush-like leadership.
ReplyDeleteI am horribly torn emotionally, wanting peace for both factions, and I can only credit the continual animosities on both sides to the fanatics.
Israel's right-wing state will do anything to keep the Palestinians from developing their own state. Meanwhile, they can continue to take their lands and water rights.
ReplyDeleteWhat bothers me most is the U.S. complicity in this whole affair. We stand by and just let it all happen.
And if you try to talk honestly about it-- as President Carter did-- you will be called anti-semitic and ostracized. This is why we hear so little about President Carter and the remarkable work he has done throughout the world.
I keep hearing something about the Palestinian birth rate out stripping the Jewish population and that in a few years (decades) unless there is a two state solution the Jews will be a minority in their UN created state. If the two state solution is, as it seems, dead. If or when that happens the Palestinian and the Israeli Arabs could find common cause and relegate Israel to the dust bin of history.
ReplyDeleteAnd what are the Arabs going to do with all the Jews, relegate them to the "dust bin" of history, too? The Palestinians, under the despicable "leadership" of Arafat, had a chance for their own state in 2000 (Man, was Clinton pissed off). They decided against it.
ReplyDeleteHey, I'm just the messenger. If the birthrate information I've read is correct and the right wing in Israel keeps treating the Arabs that have been granted citizenship as second class citizens then the Jews might be stepping into that dustpan.
ReplyDeleteThere is strong merit in what Will says about Palestinian leadership over the decades since the 1967 war. The demand for the Palestinian's so-called full 'right to return' to Israeli lands was specious and unrealistic. It was incompatible with the de facto existence of an Israeli state.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I think Beach Bum has a major point: Israel has engaged in piecemeal, yet steady ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their lands on the West Bank. While this has gone on for four decades, our American leaders have wrung their hands, cried crocodile tears, and forked over $$$ billions to an apparently non-self-sustaining Israeli state.
MacDaddy rightly singles out Jimmy Carter's efforts as exceptional;he could also credit Bill Clinton for a significant effort.
Yes, Israel. MacDaddy, I think the U.S. is explicit in this mess.
ReplyDeleteOn HAARETZ.com, a Jewish site, a Shmuel Rosner article entitled "Is Carter an Anti-Semite," he notes several points that undermine accusations of prejudice.
When Carter was on C-SPAN to talk about the book, a caller accused him of being an anti-Semite... However, Carter wanted to answer the caller, and what he basically said is this: "All I've been doing for last 20 years is to try and bring peace to Israel."
He also discussed the peace he effected during his presidency between Egypt and Israel. There have been no wars between the two nations since the Carter Administration.
Will makes a good point about Arafat refusing peace in 2000, but Soros is right: Clinton tried. It's not just Israel that causing this problem. The invisible Palestinians Refugees face discrimination, poverty and no access to basic services in Egypt, also. Why are no other countries in the Middle East helping the Palestinians?
BB, what are "Israeli Arabs"? Israel is not fighting the Arabs, but the Palestinians.
Off-topic: Vig got me into trouble again.