Israel’s hawks can't dodge blame for this day of violence

[villager]

<snip>

It’s good that there were no ifs or buts, no attempts to excuse the inexcusable. But still it rings hollow.

The words sound empty partly because, while this act is extreme in its cruelty, it is not a freak event. Talk to the Israeli human right groups that monitor their country’s 48-year occupation of the West Bank and they are clear that the masked men who broke into the Dawabsha family home in the early hours and set it alight committed a crime exceptional only in its consequences. “Violence by settlers against Palestinians is part of the daily routine of the occupation,” Hagai El-Ad, director of the B’tselem organisation, told me.

Indeed, El-Ad says this attack was the eighth time since 2012 that settlers have torched inhabited buildings. There have been dozens of assaults on property, too: mosques, agricultural land, businesses. “In most of these cases, they didn’t find the perpetrators, despite having the best intelligence agencies on the planet.” He is referring to the culture of impunity that has always protected the settlers.

That charge can be directed at past Israeli governments of the centre-left as well as the hawkish right: while the latter actively sponsored the settlement that followed the 1967 war, the former indulged it. But the right’s guilt runs deeper, which is why its tearful words of regret now sound so false.

Take Bennett. Put aside his repeated insistence that there will never be a Palestinian state, thereby crushing the dreams of an independent life for all those living under Israeli rule. Focus only on his conduct this week. Today’s murderous arson attack is assumed to be an act of revenge for the court-ordered dismantling on Wednesday of two buildings in the West Bank settlement of Bet El. The buildings were unfinished and empty. Israel’s supreme court ruled them illegal and ordered the army to demolish them. The settlers raged at the decision, demonstrating violently against the soldiers and police who were there to enforce it. And guess who stood on a roof at Bet El, egging the protesters on, stirring them to ever greater heights of fury? Why, it was Naftali Bennett.

<snip>

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/31/israel-hawks-dodge-blame-two-bloody-attacks-impunity-internal-divisions

[Israeli]

1. great article villager.....

thanks for posting ...I highly recommend that it should be read by all on here .

sooooooo true :

The prime example of turning on the tap – only to be appalled by the flood – is Netanyahu himself. Twenty years ago he stirred up crowds livid at then prime minister Yitzhak Rabin’s apparent concessions to the Palestinians. They waved placards depicting Rabin as a Palestinian terrorist, even as an SS officer – but Netanyahu said nothing. They carried a mocked-up coffin of Rabin and still Netanyahu said nothing. But when a far rightist assassinated Rabin, Netanyahu was of course among the first to be shocked, shocked, by such wickedness.

It’s true too that each “price tag” attack like yesterday’s – designed to show that even the slightest brake on the settlement venture will come at a price – helps entrench the position that territorial compromise is impossible, that the evacuation of settlements will trigger civil war. That is a conclusion that can only boost support for the Bibi-Bennett hostility to a two-state accord with the Palestinians. And yet, for all that, it would be wrong to see the Israeli right as a monolith – and even more wrong to see Israel itself that way. There are distinctions and they matter. This week’s men of violence illustrate them.

[villager]

2. The Likudniks were, at a minimum, the intellectual authors of Rabin's assasination

...and Netanyahu's election in the aftermath has always seemed like a ratification of that assassination, by the voters.

To this day, it's still appalling.

[Israeli]

3. here is an article from me in return ....

...nobody can say it better from the old Left than Yossi Sarid ....well except Shulamit Aloni , she is missed .

The second assassination of Yitzhak Rabin

Not only was there no applause when Benjamin Netanyahu entered – an uncomfortable silence engulfed the room. No one booed him, but no one stood up to honor him.

By Yossi Sarid | Jul. 16, 2015

Three months from now will mark 20 years since the murder. The Yitzhak Rabin Center asked Anita Shapira to compile a book commemorating the victim and his legacy. She approached me for a contribution as well.

This is how I opened: “Now we can admit: Not only was Yitzhak Rabin murdered, but his direction was buried along with him. … Now, those who buried him are giving the eulogies. Those who followed him during his life recite the mourner’s Kaddish for orphans. Those who stood then on the balconies now stand center stage at the memorial services – not to praise him, but to bury him for good. And Rabin awaits a successor.”

A week ago, the Rabin Center marked 40 years since the Entebbe operation. Only Yedioth Ahronoth found it newsworthy, and reported on the ceremony attended by both kidnapped victims and former commandos. No other newspaper freed up space to report on the event, despite the fact that the prime minister was present. This column takes it upon itself to make up for the omission, and is based on accounts from those who were there.

Not only was there no applause when Benjamin Netanyahu entered – an uncomfortable silence engulfed the room. No one booed him, but no one stood up to honor him. Only Muki Betzer got up and left the room in protest. Betzer commanded the forces on the ground during the operation, and he has never been satisfied with the Netanyahu family’s account of the events, which bestows all the glory and prestige on the fallen Yoni while detracting from others’ heroism. Was Betzer’s mistake staying alive? Official history is always written by the junta in power.

For all these years, the official family version of the story has been backed by Shimon Peres, as part of an unspoken agreement: I, the former defense minister, will play up the fallen Yoni at the expense of his subordinates and commanders (including Dan Shomron, later IDF chief of staff); and you paint me as the living spirt of the operation – in contrast to the hesitant Rabin.

This week I asked if the honored guest spoke about the events that preceded Rabin’s murder. No, I was told, not a single word of commemoration, let alone any expression of regret or asking for forgiveness. Netanyahu even made sure to point out to those in attendance that he had visited the center. Dalia Rabin, Yitzhak Rabin’s daughter and keeper of the flame, was quick to correct his mistake.

She beseeched Netanyahu to take a tour of the facility, and he agreed. She showed him the permanent exhibition, and he got a quick glimpse of that picture – Bibi and his riled up cohorts on the balcony, Rabin in an S.S. uniform, the crowded, roaring Zion Square – “death to the traitor.” Once, a few years ago, the prime minister agreed to visit the museum, but one of his advisers stipulated that this photograph must be removed before the visit could take place. The visit was canceled. Even governments have trouble rewriting history so crudely.

In the week of the Entebbe commemoration, Jerusalem hosted a screening of a film about the murder. Journalists reported on “laughter and thunderous applause” after the screening. The theater was completely filled “mostly religious people and people from the former Soviet Union, from Larisa Trembovler’s [Yigal Amir’s wife] milieu.” “Why didn’t they look for who really killed Rabin?” asked someone in the crowd.

He’s right. If they had really investigated politicians and rabbis then, Netanyahu wouldn’t be prime minister, and some of this generation’s greatest rabbis would be performing religious services for fellow prison inmates. As a former member of the Knesset subcommittee on covert operations during those black days – before and after the murder – I can attest: The Shin Bet and Israel Police did a poor job. They did not truly search for the roots of this crime against peace.

And one more sentence I wrote for Anita Shapira: “Twenty years after the murder, the murderer arouses more interest than the victim.” And here, I’ll add: Rabin died twice. Once when he was murdered, and once when he was forgotten.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.666422

[villager]

4. Very good -- and exactly like our 60's.

Yet the toxic legacy of the assassination continues to undo the very society that thinks itself "safe" by refusing to ask questions.

[Israeli]

5. JFK ??....nt .

[villager]

6. Yes -- the collective insistence not to ask too many unsettling questions, etc....

Else what might that mean for collective responsibility, or reaction?

But as with Israel, it ultimately meant the other side just grew more emboldened.

And in the U.S., JFK's assassination wasn't fully "ratified" until the American people "elected" Nixon five years later.... I'd always thought that Israel's version would be like if the U.S. had turned around and voted for Goldwater the following November...