[GushShalomBillboard] Hell in Nablus // CNN // Avnery article //demo J'lem

Sat Aug 3 16:02:59 IDT 2002

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[1] Hell in Nablus: Internationals at the spot and Israeli HR organization 
     try to stop collective punishment
[2] Israeli cables to ban CNN - sign the website petition 
[3] Indict the Murderers of Oslo!! - Uri Avnery
[4] Peace Now tonight in Jerusalem: Occupation=economic crisis

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[1] Hell in Nablus: Internationals at the spot and Israeli HR organization 
     try to stop collective punishment

[The following is based on information received from the
International Solidarity Movement, and on Israeli media reports.]

ISRAELI ARMY CARRYING OUT COLLECTIVE PUNISHMENT IN NABLUS

 International activists are currently stationed in Nablus homes due to be demolished 
as part of the policy of collective punishment - in which families are punished for the 
act of an already dead family member, sometimes an act committed long ago.
. 
The Shakhshir family home, in the Al-Aryone neighborhood, is one of those under 
threat. Seven international activists (6 Americans and 1 Irish) are now stationed there.  
In flagrant violation of international law banning collective punishment, ten members of 
two families residing in the home, are to be made homeless as revenge for the act of 
Ammar Shakhshir,   on March 17, 2002.  Among the famliy members are 5 children.  
The head of the family is disabled due to a stroke.

As of Friday evening, 4 homes had already been destroyed, with families thrown out of 
their residences by Israeli soldiers rampaging through the city.  International activists
witnessed Israeli tanks deployed on every corner of the Old City, while troops 
conducted house-to-house searches and used Palestinian civilians as human shields.  
(Footage available).

Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states “No protected person may be 
punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties 
and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited. Pillage is 
prohibited. Reprisals against protected persons and their property are prohibited.”

Over two dozen international activists are currently stationed throughout Nablus,
including in the Old City and in Palestinian Medical Relief Centers bearing witness and
trying to stop human rights violations.  

Meanwhile, the army is proceeding with its intention to deport to the Gaza Strip two 
Nablus inhabitants.  They have been accused of unspecified terrorist connections, but 
it is an open secret that they have been singled out as "the brothers of". The 
Jerusalem-based Hamoked (Center for individual rights) has taken up their legal 
defence. Adv. Yossi Wolfsohn was interviewed Friday night on First-Channel Israeli TV: 
"My clients are not guilty of any offense themselves; they have been arrested and face 
deportation because of acts atttributed to their brothers." 

The case is now before the military appeals committee which is little more than a 
rubber stamp. Next would come an appeal to the Israeli Supreme Court...

For more information contact: 

Jonathan                         ISM                 972 (0) 58 781 646
Susan                              ISM                 972 (0) 59 877 091
Dr. Ghassan Hamdam   UPMRC          972 (0) 52 844 608
Hamoked:                    972(0)2-6283555/2249/ 
                             or 972(0)2-6264438

[2] Israeli cables to ban CNN - sign the website petition 

On our website - http://www.gush-shalom.org - (Hebrew)  a petition against the 
decision to ban CNN from the Israeli cable television can be signed. The ban which 
brings our society still closer to the regimes it doesn't like to be compared with, is the 
culmination of a government-sponsored right-wing campaign against the so-called pro-
Palestinian bias of CNN.  Fact is that also from the Palestinian side there is a lot of 
criticism on CNN for being too pro-Israel. We consider the combination a sign that 
CNN is an important forum and that it is intolerable that the Israeli cable subscribers 
would be deprived of it altogether.

[3] Indict the Murderers of Oslo!! - Uri Avnery

                               Indict the Murderers of Oslo!!
                                    Uri Avnery- 3.8.02

     When I hear right-wing Israelis shout "Indict the Oslo Criminals!" I shudder. Not 
because of the inherent falsification, but because of the sound of the words.
     This slogan is a virtual (and perhaps conscious) copy of the slogan used by the 
Nazis in their successful campaign to undermine the Weimar republic. Their throats 
were hoarse from shouting "Indict the November Criminals!"
      The "November Criminals" were the German statesmen who, in November 1918, 
signed the armistice that ended World War I. After four years of valiant fighting, the 
German army was exhausted. The Kaiser had fled. The vaunted General Staff was in 
despair. The generals begged the statesmen to sign the capitulation, in order to save 
what could be saved.
     But according to Nazi legend, the very opposite had happened. The statesmen who 
had signed the armistice were traitors. They had stuck a knife into the back of the 
victorious army. The Nazi propaganda wizard, Joseph Goebbels, taught his pupils that 
by constant repetition one can turn a lie into truth, and the bigger the lie, the easier it 
is to get it accepted.
     The incitement against the "Novemberverbrecher" (November criminals) succeeded. 
They were murdered, and the Nazis became a democratically elected government.
     The campaign against the "Oslo Criminals" was successful, too. Rabin was 
murdered and the incitement assumes ever-growing dimensions. By this means, the 
extreme rightwing and the settlers hope to take over the state. According to the well-
known recipe, they repeat the historic lie endlessly, so that by now it is widely 
accepted as gospel truth. The media repeat it as a self-evident fact. The "left", or what 
is left of the "left", looks on as if hypnotized, unable to respond.
     The historic truth is, of course, that it's not the creators of the Oslo agreement who 
have caused a historic disaster, but its murderers. If there are "Oslo criminals"' they 
are the people who have undermined the agreement from its inception, prevented its 
implementation and, by a stubborn sabotage campaign, succeeded in derailing it.
     As a basis for peace, the Oslo agreement was not a good agreement. It could not 
be good, because the objective circumstances were bad. The balance of power 
between Israel and the Palestinians was something like 1000:1. According to all 
criteria - political, military, economic, technological and what not - Israel enjoyed an 
immense superiority. The success of the first intifada did somewhat redress the 
imbalance and make a compromise easier, but the situation was still far from a 
reasonable balance. Arafat was not so wrong when he told his people that this was 
"the best agreement possible in the worst circumstances."
     Considering this, the Oslo agreement was better than it might have been. It 
enabled  an enormous achievement: the recognition of the State of Israel by the 
Palestinian people, and the recognition of the Palestinian people and its liberation 
organization by the State of Israel. Until then, each side had denied the very existence 
of the other. This mutual recognition is an irreversible historical fact.  
     There is no need to enumerate the faults of the agreement, headed by the default 
to define its final aim. It outlined a set of interim stages without stipulating where they 
would lead. It set a time-table that was   much too long. The commitments of the two 
sides were formulated vaguely. These faults were not the result of carelessness, as 
many (especially Palestinians) believe, but were put into the agreement quite 
intentionally, especially by the Israeli army officers who, by request of Rabin, changed 
many paragraphs at the last moment.
     In the Israeli peace camp, many saw the faults clearly, but after a heated internal 
debate, most of us decided to support the agreement in spite of them. Our main 
argument was that after the historic mutual recognition, an irreversible peace dynamic 
would drive the process forward. 
     I am convinced even today that if things had been pushed forward rapidly, the Oslo 
agreement would have led to peace. At the time, we asked Rabin to heed the warning 
of former British Prime Minister David Lloyd-George who had said (about the Irish 
problem) that one cannot cross an abyss in two jumps. Rabin, a decent but hesitant 
person, was afraid to rush things. He himself drove the first nail into the coffin of Oslo 
by declaring that "there are no sacred dates". By doing so he justified the first 
violations of the agreement and allowed the antagonistic forces in Israel time to 
regroup for the counter-attack.
     Among the Palestinians, the agreement caused immense euphoria. I was an 
eyewitness to the explosion of joy on the day of signing. Attacks in Israel stopped for 
a long time. The Palestinians were convinced that in return for their major concessions 
(in Oslo, the Palestinians officially gave up 78% of mandatory Palestine) the 
Palestinian state would soon come into being in all the occupied territories, including 
East Jerusalem.
    It did not happen. One after another, successive Israeli governments refused to 
carry out their obligations, arguing that the other side, too, had violated the agreement. 
Israel has still not implemented the third withdrawal, which should have liberated 
almost all the West Bank (Area C) three years ago. Until today, the four promised 
"safe passages" between Gaza and the West Bank have not been opened. Settlement 
activity has continued on an ever-increasing scale. The economic and human situation 
in the territories has got worse daily. (For example: before Oslo, every Palestinian 
could travel freely in Israel proper and between Gaza and the West Bank, including 
Jerusalem. Oslo put an end to that.)
     On the Palestinian side, disappointment has created a dangerous situation. On the 
Israeli side, opposition turned aggressive and violent. The murder of Rabin, the deed of 
an individual expressing the will of a large camp, was the beginning of the murder of 
Oslo. The enemies of Oslo have come to power in Israel, and they are still running our 
state.
     All the Oslo processes have been turned on their head, and no other solution has 
taken their place. The bloody cycle of attack-retaliation- suicide-assassination has 
started again. 
     When the logic of peace gave way to the logic of war, all the achievements of Oslo 
assumed an opposite character. For example: the 40 thousand armed Palestinians, 
who were allowed to enter the Palestinian territories in order to serve as a solid 
foundation for the Palestinian state and safeguard peace and security, turned into an 
arm of the uprising against the continuing occupation. The Palestinian Authority, which 
was meant to be the nucleus of the state-in-the-making, became the center of the 
intifada.   
     All this would have been avoided, and peace between the two states would have 
become a reality long ago, had we moved forward quickly and resolutely on the Oslo 
road. The murderers of Oslo have prevented this - and they are mostly on the Israeli 
side, because we are the stronger party.
     The slogan "Indict the Oslo Criminals" should be turned against them. 

[4] Peace Now tonight in Jerusalem: Occupation=economic crisis
-----Original Message-----
From: Shiri Iram [mailto:shiri at peacenow.org.il]

                 Sharon-Fuad Government is perpetuating the occupation

                               Occupation=economic crisis

We just heard about the last economic commands that mean only one thing: more 
unemployed, more bankruptcies, more poor people and more hungry children.
No money for education, no money for the health system, no money for the benefit of 
creation new places to work, no money for handicapped people, No money for 
investments.
And on the same spot the government spends tons of money, for the routine life of the 
settlers.
The war of settlements cost us 
50 billion shekels already!
Sharon’s government is leading us to the lowest place morality and to a social-
economy crisis Argentina style
Join us
this upcoming Saturday night, 3.8.02, 
to a massive demonstration in front of the Prim Minister’s residence in Jerusalem
at 20:00hrs
Bring your friends with you- attached is a flier calling to the demonstration- spread it 
among              your friends (you can e-mail it, or print it and distribute).
Bring a few pots and spoons with you to wake up the PM before it’s getting too late!
                        For any further information please call 
                                   Shiri 054-687539 
                                   Office 02-5660648

	----
    Full transcript of the war crimes panel available on the Gush site
    For Hebrew   http://www.gush-shalom.org/archives/forum.html
    For English  http://www.gush-shalom.org/archives/forum_eng.html
    French available at request 

Also on the site:
    photo's - of action or otherwise informative 
    the weekly Gush Shalom ad - in Hebrew and English 
    the columns of Uri Avnery - in Hebrew, Arab and English	
    (and a lot more) 
		http://www.gush-shalom.org

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    Because the United Nations didn't send its protection force.
    Information about the International Solidarity Movement 
       - and how to support it in different ways -
            at http://www.palsolidarity.org/

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