"They have decided upon cold-blooded murder"

[otherisr at actcom.co.il]

GUSH SHALOM  pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033 www.gush-shalom.org

Press Release
Sept. 6, 2003

òáøéú áàúø 
www.gush-shalom.org

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"They have decided upon cold-blooded murder" 
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Gush Shalom press release, 12/9/2003


"The government of Israel has tonight resolved to committ a cold-
blooded murder, with the implementation deferred - the cold blooded 
murder of the elected president of the Palestinians. Let there be no 
mistake about it. Let no one be fooled by the talk of 'deportation'. There 
is no intention that Arafat will susrvive the enecounter with Sharon's 
soldiers. I know Sharon, I have followed his career for decades, ever 
since he was a young commando officer carrying out brutal cross-
border raids. He has not changed in any essential, only in the amount 
of power held in his hands. He means to do it, he means to kill Arafat. 
He will watch for his chance, wait for a moment when the Amercians 
look elsewhere - and then he will pounce." That was the immediate 
response by Uri Avnery, former member of the Israeli Parliament and 
est Member and veteran activist of Gush Shalom (The Israeli Peace 
Bloc).  "The cabinet ministers of the Government of Israel have tonight 
adopted an ominous, criminal decision, whose implementation would 
entail rivers of shed blood - far beyond all the horrors we have already 
seen in the past three years. The effects will spread far beyoond the 
confies of this country - throughout the region and the world. The 
ministers who raised their hands for this infamous resolution will never 
be able to sheke of responsibily for what they have done". 

Avnery - spry and energetic, two days after his eightieth birthday had 
been marked at hundreds of political and personal friends packing the 
Tzavta Hall in Tel-Aviv - said these ominous words at the peak of an 
hours-long vigil opposite the gates of the defence minstry in Tel-Aviv, 
the place Sharon had chosen to gather the members of his Inner 
Cabinet. For hours we have been tensely waiting - more than a hundred 
Tel-Avivian activists of Gush Shalom, Ta'ayush and smaller groups, 
among them also the former KM Tamar Gozansli, as well as a similar 
number of Jerusalemites at a simultaneous vigil outside the Prime 
Minster's office - until we heard the cabinet's ominous decision on a 
squeking small transistor radio. 
 
Israeli peace activists seem doomed to spend a disportionate portion of 
their lives on that dismal small parking lot, coming again and again to 
manifest protest at ever more outrageous acts of the government and 
army - but this time was different. This time we had the knowlege that 
in one of the official buildings behind the fence on the other side of the 
street, a small group of men was at that very moment gathered to take 
life-and-death decisions - and we, whose own lives might be directly 
affeted, had no confidence whatsoever in their motives or their 
judgement. This lent an extra eletric quality to the atmosphere, the 
feeling of being actors in in vast tragedy - an extra poignancy to the 
ongoing chanting from young and not-so-young throats: "Sharon,  
Mofaz and Ya'alon -terrorists in power!" / "All the minsters - are war 
criminals!" / "Down with the occupation!" / "Sharon, Sharon, the Hague 
is waiting for you!" / " Jewish - Arab Brotherhood!" /  "Peace Yes - 
Occuption NO, NO, NO!". 

Oveall fluttered a big banner bering a long series of words: 
Liquidation>Suicide Bombing>Liquidation>Suicide 
Bombing>Liquidation>Suicide Bombing>Liquidation>Suicide 
Bombing>Liquidation>Suicide Bombing>Liquidation>Suicide 
Bombing>.....

And now what? The Americans blocked Sharon from sending his 
troops into the Palestinian presidential compound ialready last night - 
as according to some press accounts he planned to do. But how much 
reliance can be placed on the Bush Administaration - which itself 
engaged more than once in adventurous, ill-considered and ill-fated 
decisions? For us, at least, the immediate idea is to organise a visit of 
our own to Arafat's compound - not a visitation  of death and 
destruction such as Sharon is planning, but a visit of solidarity, of belief 
in the peace between this land's two peoples, a peace which is still 
possible and which is more then ever a vital need. 

Stay tuned for further developments (for further info call Uri Avnery 
+972-50-306440). 

Meanwhile, following is a chilling and inspiring message which we got 
from Yithchak Frankenthal, coordiantor of the Parents' Crircle - a group 
of Israelis and Palestinians who all lost loved ones in the ongoing 
violence, and are dedicated to try and put an end to it.

Date sent:         Wed, 10 Sep 2003 18:07:55 +0200
From:              Anat <anatl at theparentscircle.com>
Subject:        	Hillel Cafe


It is now 11:59 PM, half an hour after the suicide bombing 
at Hillel Cafe.
Just the night before, my wife and I and two of our 
friends were sitting at the Cafe until
around 11:40 PM. The place was packed. I can now hear the 
sirens of the ambulances racing
through the streets of Jerusalem. I cannot get the images 
out of my head; images of
severed arms, decapitated heads, people with nails and 
pieces or iron stuck in their
bodies, broken tables, the cake and sandwich bar shattered 
into thousands of pieces. What
happened to the sweet waitress who was serving us? What 
happened to the young bus boy? We
were sitting in the middle of the room; all those people 
came there for a good time and
were carried out in coffins. Is the high ceiling still in 
place? The glass wall shattered
into millions of shards, covering body parts and swimming 
in the blood that spilled on the
floor like water. Shema Israel, hear O Israel, we pray - 
but Israel is not listening. And
I feel empty inside, asking myself which of my friends and 
neighbors were at the Caf?
today? I am thinking about the people holding their coffee 
cups when the bomb went off,
and how they were lucky if the shatters only got in their 
eyes and did not kill them. I
think of the man biting into his sandwich not knowing that 
this would be his last bite
ever; about the piles of human bodies flying in the air 
into one another; about the
severed arm thrust into the young woman still seated at 
her table, but she feels nothing -
she is either in shock or simply dead. I see how tables 
are blown by the blast, hitting
the guests, and how in the fireball human flesh mixes with 
freshly-served cheese; and the
smell, the smell of explosives and burnt human flesh 
blending into one; and the quiet
after the blast, and the cries of pain and shock, the 
shock that comes after the quiet. I
think of the victory that the Chief of Staff has announced 
two months ago, saying we have
beaten the Palestinians, and I my heart weep: how could my 
army chief of staff be such a fool?
I think of the folly of the politicians who are leading us 
from one catastrophe to the
next, and I think about how the people keep silent. Has 
everyone forgotten? Adonai
eloheinu - the Lord is our G-od, not Greater Israel. I 
know the painful truth. The body
count will continue, because our political leaders are 
petty little people. So full of
themselves, they are clueless about conflict resolution; 
they slay Palestinians and expect
them to exercise restraint. These wise men believe that 
the occupation can continue; these
glorious generals have for there years now been "letting 
the IDF win," as the slogan goes;
they may be seasoned soldiers, but they are absolutely 
ignorant in conflict resolution.
They believe that by using terror to counter terror they 
can give us security. They
believe that they can devastate the infrastructure of 
Palestinian leadership and
government and at the same time stop militias from 
wreaking chaos. They have for two years
now been pronouncing Arafat "irrelevant", but what does 
that make of former defense
minister Binyamin (Fuad) Ben-Eliezer, of former prime 
minister Ehud Barak and of the
incumbent, Ariel Sharon? Are they any more relevant than 
he? How long will it take us to
wake up from this ongoing folly? How many more body bags 
will it take? Adonai ehad - G-od
is the only unshakeable truth, not any political creed. 
The beauty of Israel is slain upon
the Messianic pipedream - how long shall the petty leaders 
of this nation triumph? It is
now the morning after, and I have just learned that Dr. 
Appelboim was killed, along with
his daughter who was to get married tonight. I knew this 
wonderful, special man. My heart
bleeds for him; it was only two months ago that we had a 
chat and even argued over my
political views. How painful and despairing it is to see 
more blood being shed in vain.
The young bride, excited to start a family with her 
betrothed, is forever married in a
blood wedding to her father. They will lie side by side, 
as the silence of all eternity
quashes the joyful sounds of the wedding that will never 
be. Shema Israel, yitgadal,
veyitkadash shem? raba - hear O Israel, exalted and 
sanctified be the name of the great
Sovereign - these are the words of the Kaddish, the Jewish 
prayer recited over every
freshly-dug grave. Shame on you, leaders of the nations. 

Yitzhak Frankenthal, father of
Arik, who was killed because there is no peace.
     

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