[GushShalom] Gideon Levy writes from terrorized Nablus & updates

Sun Jan 25 20:37:46 IST 2004

GUSH SHALOM  pob 3322, Tel-Aviv  61033 âåù ùìåí, ú.ã.,3322 úì àáéá 

#Only the knafeh is still sweet - Gideon Levy writes from  terrorized Nablus 

#Update on the five COs who started a year's prison term + Tuesday Haifa 
  action + anti-wall coalition news

#A Breaking Consensus - Editorial overview of The Other Israel
   Now on line.

                                #  #  #

Only the knafeh is still sweet
Gideon Levy 

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/386462.html

Hebrew\òáøéú 
http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArtPE.jhtml?itemNo=386531&cont
rassID=2&subContrassID=3&sbSubContrassID=0

Sun., January 25 

NABLUS, West Bank - The knafeh here is still the best in the world, living 
up to its reputation. In the early evening, Abu Salha's pastry shop, by the 
side of the road that climbs to the Refidiya neighborhood, is deserted, the 
shelves almost empty. A salesperson wearing transparent gloves slices 
the traditional sweet oriental hot cheese delicacy, the taste of which is the 
only thing that remains unchanged in this beaten and battered city. 

>From one visit to the next, one sees Nablus declining relentlessly into its 
death throes. This is not a village that's dying behind the concrete 
obstacles and earth ramparts that cut it off from the world; this is a city 
with an ancient history, which until just recently was a vibrant, bustling 
metropolis that boasted an intense commercial life, a large major 
university, hospitals, a captivating urban landscape and age-old objects of 
beauty.

An hour's drive from Tel Aviv, a great Palestinian city is dying, and 
another of the occupation's goals is being realized. It's not only that the 
splendid ancient homes have been laid waste, not only that such a large 
number of the city's residents, many of them innocent, have been killed; 
the entire society is flickering and will soon be extinguished. A similar fate 
has visited Jenin, Qalqilyah, Tul Karm and Bethlehem, but in Nablus the 
impact of the death throes is more powerful because of the city's 
importance as a district capital and because of its beauty. A cloud of dust 
and sand envelops the city, which gives the impression of being a combat 
zone during a cease-fire; its roads are scarred, its electricity poles and 
telephone booths are shattered, government buildings have been reduced 
to heaps of rubble. But the true wound lies far deeper than the physical 
destruction: an economic, cultural and social fabric that is disintegrating 
and a generation that has known only a life of emptiness and despair. 
More than any other place in the territories, a state of anarchy is palpably 
close here.

There is no city as blocked and sealed as Nablus. For the past three and a 
half years it has been impossible to maintain even a semblance of ordinary 
day-to-day life here. It is impossible to leave or enter. Some 200,000 people 
are prisoners in their city. The checkpoints at Beit Iba, Azmurt and 
Hawara, which cut off the city from all directions, are the strictest 
roadblocks in the West Bank. Even women in labor and elderly people 
have a hard time crossing, and most of the city's residents no longer even 
try.

Nablus also suffers from a very large number of casualties. In the latest 
Israel Defense Forces operation in the city, which was given the devilish 
name of "Still Waters," no fewer than 19 civilians were killed, six of them 
children, and 200 were wounded, according to a report of the Palestinian 
Human Rights Monitoring Group. These are the dimensions of a large-
scale terrorist attack, only without the public attention, and it's all 
happening in a period of significant respite in Palestinian terrorism. Who is 
going to investigate this wholesale killing and the killing of children, 
including Mohammed Aarj, 6, who was shot while standing in his yard, 
eating a sandwich? Afterward, the IDF refused to allow an ambulance to 
evacuate him, according to the Palestinians.

Atrocities have been perpetrated here under cover of the total media 
disregard of the events, residents of Nablus claim. Neighbors saw Abud 
Kassim being held by soldiers, and then a gunshot was suddenly heard: 
he was killed in his yard; Ala Dawiya was found dead with nine bullets in 
his chest; Fadi Hanani, Jibril Awad and Majdi al-Bash were shot to death 
at short range, according to the testimonies; the civilian Muain al-Hadi 
and his cousin Basel were ordered to escort Israeli soldiers as a "human 
shield," contrary to the explicit ban on the use of this procedure. No one in 
Israel heard about any of these events and no one will investigate them.

Within this reality live tens of thousands of people who have done no 
wrong. What's being inflicted on them is known as collective punishment 
and it is considered a war crime. They get up in the morning without 
knowing what the IDF has wrought in their city during the night and what 
it will do during the day. Most residents have long since lost their 
livelihood. Of course, it's possible to argue that they brought it all on 
themselves because of the terrorist attacks that originated in the city, but 
that argument cannot justify all the killing and wrongdoing. In the 
meantime, despite everything, some people are still buying delightful 
knafeh from Abu Salha.  

#Update on the five COs who started a year's prison term + Tuesday Haifa 
  action + anti-wall coalition news

See attachments 
Some is only in Hebrew or English - this is the way we got it.

#
A BREAKING CONSENSUS - Editorial overview of The Other Israel 111-
112 by Adam Keller
Now available at http://otherisrael.home.igc.org/ed.html
#

#
ôòåìåú ðîùçåú îùåèôåú éùøàìéåú-ôìñèéðéåú  ðâã äçåîä   
éåðúï 066-327736 - ôøðö'ñ÷ä 064-494030

For participating in ongoing joint Israeli-Palestinian 
protest actions against the wall, call:
Jonathan:066-327736 or Franceska:064-494030 
#

#
Veteran peace activist Gila Svirsky will be in the 
Philadelphia area in February, on a speaking tour. 
She has still time for invitations to Jewish audiences, 
in private homes or synagogues/temples or wherever. 
Contact: gsvirsky at netvision.net.il
#

#
Reservist refusers don't receive the IDF salary compensation for lost 
income. Many of them have a family to maintain. With an increasing 
number of refusers, the Keren Yesh Gvul (specific fund for 
compensations) is emptying rapidly. If you want the refusniks also in 
the future to receive at least something, send a cheque to:  
"Keren Yesh Gvul", POB 10276, Jerusalem 91102, Israel.
More information at http://www.yesh-gvul.org/
#

# 
çãù áàúø: áèçåï & äçåîä
http://www.gush-shalom.org/security/index.html 

New on the site: Security & The Wall
http://www.gush-shalom.org/security/english.html 
#

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