PMWATCH -- January 1, 2009 -- Below is an action call from"WRITE! For Justice, Human Rights and International Law inPalestine," a group focused on mobilizing for letter writing onPalestine and Israel.
Please respond to this important action call.
For tips on writing letters, go to:
You can read more about the group at: http://www.writetruth.org/
Palestine Media Watch
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NOTE: WRITE! is not affiliated with Palestine Media Watch.
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WRITE! For Justice, Human Rights and International Law in Palestine
Unfortunately, the new year has not brought any change to theWashington Post editorial page in terms of fairness or accuracy. Onthe1st day of the 2009, the Washington Post publishes two op-eds,decidedly in favor of the most hawkish Israeli positions in the midstof the Israeli bombing campaign of occupied Gaza which has claimedthe lives of over 315 Palestinians and injured 939 (Al Mezan).
The first op-ed written by Ephraim Sneh 'Why Israel is Bombing Gaza'and the second is from Robert J. Lieber 'Hard Truths About theConflict' (1/1/09). Both accounts draw heavily from the officialIsraeli talking points -- Israel 'withdrew' from Gaza in 2005. Theyclaim Palestinians violated the ceasefire. Israel did everything itcould diplomatically including the delivery of humanitarian aid. Theauthors conclude that the only option remaining is to bomb Gaza andpossibly a ground assault while minimizing civilian casualties inorder to remove Hamas from power and put the Palestinian Authority incharge.
Please help to stop the propaganda campaign and write the WashingtonPost at:
Let them know that while the authors are entitled to their ownopinions, they are not entitled to their own facts --- and the Posteditorial page should not allow itself to be used as a publicrelations service for the Israeli military. Be sure to include yourname, address, and keep your letter under 150 words.
For further information:
Samer Badawi: Gaza Bombings Only Compound Historic Wrong
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-badawi_31edi.State.Edition1.2810ca7.html
Amnesty International: End Unlawful Attacks and Meet Gaza's EmergencyNeedsHuman Rights Watch: Civilians Must Not Be Target The Civilian Targetof Israel's
Bombing:
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10086.shtmlWRITE! Team
http://www.writetruth.org/******************************************************
Why Israel Is Bombing Gaza
By Ephraim Sneh
Thursday, January 1, 2009;
A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2008/12/31/AR2008123102772_pf.htmlWhen demands are made of Israel to halt its military activities inGaza, a brief historical reminder is in order.
In September 2005, Israel vacated Gaza, dismantled all thesettlements in the Gaza Strip and did not leave a shred of a presencethere.
In January 2006, rule over Gaza passed to the Hamas government underIsmail Haniyeh. Instead of bringing investors to Gaza, the Hamasgovernment brought the guerrilla-warfare trainers of the IranianRevolutionary Guard. Instead of launching economic projects, thisgovernment launched rockets every day at Israeli towns and villagesacross the border. They smuggled in vast amounts of explosives,weapons and rockets; they prepared themselves for battle.
In June 2007, in a brutal and bloody military coup, Hamas tookcontrol of Gaza and soon killed or chased out the leaders ofPresident Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement. Gaza became nothing lessthan a military base for Iran.
Up until the Hamas takeover, 750 trucks would cross the border eachday with imports and exports. As Israel's deputy defense minister atthe time, I was in charge of this activity and promoted this tradewith Gaza, since the border crossings were being controlled byAbbas's Presidential Guard, not by terrorists. The Hamas takeover iswhat in effect locked the gates of Gaza and forced its residents tosuffer.The rain of rockets on the citizens of Israel intensified. The cease-fire that lasted from June until Dec. 19 was used by Hamas toincrease its military strength -- mainly to smuggle in Grad-typerockets from Iran, which have a range of 20 miles. In recent days,these missiles have struck cities such as Ashdod, Israel's main port,and Beersheva, the capital of Israel's south. No sovereign statewould have resigned itself to having its cities -- cities such asHouston or Atlanta -- bombarded. No sovereign state would allowitself to be hit by even a single missile. That is the reason for themilitary campaign that Israel launched this week in a series ofaerial strikes.
But the campaign's objective is not to end the rocket fire. The trueobjective should be the end of Hamas rule in Gaza. Israel cannotresign itself to having a missile and terror base five miles from oneof its principal cities, Ashkelon.
Gaza's Palestinians, too, in telephone and e-mail conversations, areexpressing their urgent wish to end the nightmare that Hamas hasimposed on them. An end to the Hamas regime in Gaza is essential forthem, as well. It is not possible to govern Gaza in the absence ofclose cooperation with Israel on issues of trade, energy,environment, water and health. Those who reject the legitimacy ofIsrael can't provide a normal life for Gaza's 1.5 million residents,who on average are living on $2 a day.
Israel could bring about a collapse of the Hamas regime in Gaza bymeans of a lengthy, large-scale ground campaign. With a clear exitstrategy lacking, this is not an appealing option for us. At themoment, unfortunately, this is the only option available.Yet there is another way. Those demanding a cease-fire must produce acomprehensive solution, a "package" containing the following elements:
• Full dismantling of the military power of Hamas in Gaza, includingdestruction of all stockpiles of rockets and missiles.
• Transfer of control over border-crossings between Gaza and Egyptand between Gaza and Israel to the Palestinian Authority governmentof Salam Fayyad.
• Until the elections to the Palestinian parliament and thepresidency in January 2010, Gaza is to be run by a civilianadministration appointed by the government in Ramallah.
• Augmented Egyptian supervision of the border between Gaza and Egypt.
• The return of kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
Such an agreement will require international and regional support.Countries such as Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia can play animportant role. Syria, if it uses its influence over the Hamasleadership that is comfortably hosted by Damascus, can win pointstoward any future discussions with the United States and Israel.
In the absence of such a package, the fighting in Gaza will not end.Israel has no reason to end it.
Ephraim Sneh, a former member of the Israeli cabinet and deputydefense minister from 1999 to 2001 and from 2006 to 2007, is chairmanof the Strong Israel party.
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Hard Truths About the Conflict
By Robert J. Lieber
Thursday, January 1, 2009; A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2008/12/31/AR2008123102773.html
After Israel's dramatic airstrikes, the world's media are filled withimages of suffering Palestinian women and children, innocent victimsin what is being referred to as a renewed cycle of violence.Predictably, both sides are being urged to call a halt, though inmuch of the Middle East and parts of Europe these demands, and theblame, fall especially heavily upon the Israelis. In America, thereis relatively greater understanding and sympathy for Israel, buthere, too, concern is growing about the violence.While the details of the conflict often appear complex, thefundamentals -- hard truths about Gaza, its Hamas rulers and thewider Israeli-Palestinian conflict -- are straightforward. First,despite the tragic deaths of civilians, Israeli's airstrikes havebeen precisely aimed at Hamas fighters, installations and rocketlaunchers. Inevitably, the use of force causes injury and death toinnocents, but from initial figures announced by U.N. personnel, itappears that more than 80 percent of those killed were Hamas securitypersonnel or other militants -- a ratio that might compare favorablywith the use of force by U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan. In viewof Hamas's practice of deliberately placing missile launchers andother weapons in the midst of densely populated areas, the precisionis remarkable. It also reflects the fact that the Israel DefenseForces (IDF) seek to minimize civilian deaths, while Hamasdeliberately targets civilians.
Second, what we are witnessing is not a "cycle" of violence. The IDFairstrikes are a reaction to the unrelenting rocket and mortarattacks against the Jewish state. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005in the hope that the Palestinians would use the opportunity toprepare for an eventual agreement and a two-state solution in whichthey would live side by side in peace with Israel. Since then, therehave been more than 3,500 such attacks aimed at areas of southernIsrael, including over 200 launches since Dec. 19, after Hamas chosenot to extend a six-month truce. The expanding range of thesemissiles now covers an area populated by as many as 700,000 Israelis.
Third, Israel and Hamas have profoundly different aims. Israel hasaccepted the principle of a two-state solution as the basis forending the conflict. Hamas, by contrast, rejects this. Its languageof "resistance" or "ending occupation" (even though no Israelis,civilian or military, other than the kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit,have "occupied" Gaza for the past three years) is but a veiledexpression of Hamas's actual objective: destroying Israel andcreating an Islamist Palestinian state in its place. Credulousobservers may see more peaceful purposes, but Hamas leadersperiodically reassert these objectives, whether in the Hamas covenantor, in the words of a prominent Hamas cleric, Muhsen Abu 'Ita,speaking on Al-Aqsa TV and calling for "the annihilation of the Jewshere in Palestine."Fourth, any realistic hope of progress toward a peaceful resolutionof the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a successful two-statesolution requires that Hamas suffer a severe setback in the presentfighting in ways that seriously damage its capabilities and weakenits political credibility among Palestinians. Leading officials ofEgypt, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority know this and,notwithstanding their formulaic criticisms of Israel, have explicitlyblamed Hamas for the current violence. PLO and Fatah officials faultHamas for the deaths in Gaza, and an adviser to Palestinian PresidentMahmoud Abbas, Nimr Hammad, told the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar: "The one responsible for the massacres is Hamas, and not theZionist entity, which in its own view reacted to the firing ofPalestinian missiles." Indeed, Hamas's position as a radical,terrorist, adventurist, Islamist organization is underscored by theabsence of support for it by Muslim governments other than Iran andits surrogates.
Successful negotiations between Palestinians and Israelis remainhighly desirable, but their achievement would require that a singlecredible Palestinian authority ("one authority, one gun, one law," asAbbas puts it) be able to speak on behalf of its people, representthem in difficult but meaningful negotiations, and possess thecapacity as well as the will to enforce its side of a bindingagreement. But Hamas represents an alternative source of authorityand a direct challenge to the existing Palestinian leadership in theWest Bank, while also -- through its non-recognition of Israel, itssupport for terrorism and its refusal to accept prior negotiatedagreements -- rejecting even the most basic prerequisites fornegotiations.
Egypt and Jordan have made peace with Israel, not because theyembraced the ideas of Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism,but because they concluded that the effort to destroy the Jewishstate had failed and that refusing to come to terms with it washarmful to their national interests. Ultimately, peace will bepossible only if most Palestinians and their leaders become convincedthat terrorism and violence are a dead end and that they cannot underany circumstances prevail over Israel through the use of force. Iftoday's conflict leaves a seriously weakened and politically damagedHamas, that result is more likely to enhance the prospects for peacethan to weaken them.
Robert J. Lieber, a professor of government and international affairsat Georgetown University, is most recently the author of "TheAmerican Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century."
