I Read the News Today. Oh, Boy ! - D. Hamilton

Or, if you prefer, "The Middle East, Part VII." rdj


"Israel Seizes Deputy Palestinian PM.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - "Israel seized Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister Naser al-Shaer, a top official of the Hamas militant group, at his home in the occupied West Bank on Saturday.

"Hours later, a Palestinian gunman killed an Israeli soldier near the West Bank city of Nablus and was then shot dead by troops, the army and medics said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

[dph - The above two sentences are inserted to provide "balance" although it is completely unrelated to the rest of the article.]

Israel has more than two dozen Hamas lawmakers and several other cabinet ministers in custody since late June, after it launched an offensive in response to the kidnapping of a soldier in a cross-border raid from the Gaza Strip.

[dph - Hezbollah are "in custody." Israelis are kidnapped.]

Violence has continued in the West Bank and Gaza Strip since war broke out with Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas on Israel's northern border after two soldiers were abducted on July 12 in a cross-border raid.

[dph - Also after many incidents initiated by both sides including daily Israeli incursions into Lebanon, Israel aerial reconnaissance over Lebanon, etc, for many years, but let's choose this one.]

A ceasefire came into effect on Monday. "An Israeli army spokesman confirmed troops had taken al-Shaer into custody, saying it was "due to his membership in a terrorist organization." Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a Hamas leader, condemned the arrest and said government and people would remain undaunted. "Israel's aims to undermine the Palestinian political system and to put obstacles before the government and the people … This is blackmail but we are determined to continue our march," Haniyeh said.

Huda al-Shaer, the official's wife, said he was picked up at their home in the West Bank town of Ramallah. She told Reuters that "several jeeps circled the house before dawn" then troops came to the door. An officer told her after checking their identity documents, "'sorry madame, but your husband has to come with us'. He let him first say goodbye to our four children," al-Shaer said.

[dph - Reminds me of Ms. Furst whose home in London my family stayed in for three weeks back in 1981. She described to us over dinner how the Gestapo had let her say goodbye to her children.]

"Two lawmakers from Hamas, a militant group that seeks Israel's destruction and swept to power in the Palestinian Authority in March elections, also confirmed al-Shaer had been seized by Israeli forces."

Stop! Retake.

"Two lawmakers from Hamas, a militant group that seeks Israel's destruction and swept to power in the Palestinian Authority in March elections, also confirmed al-Shaer had been seized by Israeli forces."

[dph - The writer of this article, Wafa Amr, would probably tell you that he/she is a fervent practitioner of purely objective journalism. However, the use of the term "a militant group that seeks Israel's destruction" is an entirely editorial addition. It parrots the principal propaganda device consistently utilized by the apologists for Israel. Like Condi Rice's mushroom cloud, the specter of elderly Holocaust survivors being marched into the Mediterranean by swarthy Arab commandos is a staple of disinformation. Of course, the "enemy" must be depicted as totally vile and intractable, so as to provide a cover story justifying our own vile and intractable behavior. The reality is that the USA and Israel have blocked resolution of the Israel/Palestine issue for decades, robbing and brutalizing Palestinians throughout the process, while fair terms for the resolution of this conflict have remained conspicuously obvious. But for Israel and its patron, these terms must be avoided at all costs. Demonizing the "enemy" is crucial.

According to Amr, Hamas "swept to power". This characterization is to subtly disparage that they handily won the most fair and transparent election ever held among Palestinians. The results of democracy are only commendable when they advance the objectives of the imperial ruling class. I am not in the head of Hamas leadership. Given their life experiences, it might be possible that they could have fallen prey to negative attitudes toward Jews. However, one makes peace with enemies, not friends. It is my understanding that Hamas has publicly and officially accepted the Arab League Peace Proposal of 2002 as a basis for negotiation.

That document, which can be googled up in a second, clearly recognizes the sovereignty of the nation of Israel, as it is presently constituted, i.e., as a Jewish state. It absolutely recognizes Israel right to exist, points to a financial deal on "the right of return" and otherwise describes fair terms that are the obvious resolution of the whole conflict. Yet, this proposal, which remains in effect, is tossed down the memory hole of sanitized "history."

Aggressors need rationalizations. Hitler claimed that the Polish army was massing on Germany's border preparing for an imminent attack. A modern innovation is for leaders of aggressor nations to develop systematic ideological rationalizations for their tribalist impulses, greed and excess testosterone. The paradigm was "anti-communism," the central cover story for post WWII American aggression. It became the official state religion, blasphemous transgressions of which could land you in jail. With that "enemy" no longer viable as a propaganda mandala, a new one had to be found. "Anti-terrorism" has now clearly become the central organizing myth for general public brainwashing. Those who propagate this myth recoil in horror at the suggestion that the "enemy" has legitimate issues or is even worthy of negotiation given their innately despicable characteristics and barbarian beliefs.

So the Iranian president is thus demonized as rejecting the "Zionist entity" and questioning the validity of the Holocaust. Suppose radical secularists refuse to support governments that discriminate in favor of particular religions. They, too, could be said to reject the "Zionist entity". Is that what Ahmadinejad is talking about? Probably not, but who knows, unless, perhaps, you read Al-Jazeera. And if someone complained that, although Jews were the principal victims of the Holocaust, they were not the only victims and do not own the Holocaust as they sometimes seem to claim, would it also be said that person questioned the accepted orthodoxy of the Holocaust, an infraction that will get you thrown in jail in Germany? We only get second hand sound bites of what people like the Iran president say, filtered through sources programmed to be infallibly reliable at being completely biased and in total denial about it. To find out what Ahmadinejad might actually mean in practical terms would require the US government to talk to his government, which given the 18 page letter he sent Bush earlier this year, he seems open to. But that is impossible. It might lead to the dissemination of information inconsistent with the sacred cover story. It might even lead to peace, which is completely unacceptable given the inherent need of the owners of large amounts of stock in war industries to be ever more greatly enriched.

Meanwhile, the oppression in Palestine has perhaps never been worse than now. Half the government of the Palestinian Authority is confined in Israeli jails along with several thousand of their compatriots. But we hear little about it and what we do hear has the Israeli depravations whitewashed for American consumption. Never forget that all murdered Palestinians were at least malicious militants, if not outright terrorists, regardless of age or gender or the prior untimely death of their close family members.]

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David Hamilton