Sharon Must Be Stopped...

[Violet_Crumble]

by Mustafa Barghouthi
December 29, 2003


Last week, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon declared that if the Palestinians did not soon take significant steps to curb "violence", he would begin a unilateral "separation plan" to disengage entirely from any negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.

This ultimatum represents the summation of the Israeli government's skillful media strategy throughout 2003. Sharon is now testing the water, daring to say out loud what he has been working towards throughout his time in office: the consolidation of Israel's illegal seizure of 58% of land across the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and with it, the total subjugation of the Palestinian people.

Sharon's success in edging closer to this goal in 2003 is profoundly worrying. On the ground, Israeli troops have been steadily putting his plan into action, imposing a military occupation whose every act is calculated to degrade, humiliate and imprison the Palestinian population. The closure has been executed with the use of brutal and indiscriminate violence against innocent civilians and has cost thousands of lives. Today alone, 10 Palestinians were killed during Israeli attacks in Gaza, and the last week has seen daily invasions of the Belata refugee camp in Nablus, supported with tanks.

Yet the Palestinians find themselves in a situation unique in modern politics: as an occupied people held responsible for the security of their occupiers. The Palestinians' legal right to oppose Israeli hegemony has been turned against them by Sharon's presentation of the conflict as one between equally-matched military forces, and by the almost unconditional support he receives from many powers, in particular the United States.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4771

[punpirate]

1. For decades...

... the right wing in Israel has been determined to carry out a plan to wear down and disenfranchise the Palestinians, and Sharon has been the most vocal participant in that plan.

The original hope of Israel's right wing was to convince the Palestinians that resistance was futile, and that their best hope for any future was to retreat to Jordan.

Now that they have endured for three decades, the plan is to separate them from their livelihoods through the wall.

What few in this country realize, due to a dearth of accurate reporting to the rest of the world, is that the aims of the right wing in Israel are not much different than the aims of the right wing in this country--those aims are to bully the home populace into submission, even when the right wing is not the majority, even though their aims are not those of the general populace.

Brute force and intimidation are not the tools of diplomacy. Never have been. But, in Israel as in the U.S., they are being employed for singular and reprehensible aims. The Israelis are as fearful as are we.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[punpirate]

3. UN Resolution 242....

... that's a reference. Look it up and get back to me. You're solely deficient on the history of the region. Correct that, and we can talk.

Using Malvina Reynolds name, in this context, is somewhat of an abomination of her memory, ma'am.

[punpirate]

4. Ran out of time to edit...

... but _this_ is Malvina Reynolds, in her own words:

September 9

Peace isn’t treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven’s will.
“Peace on earth!” is what He said,
And I believe it still

Wars there have always been,
We walk the same old way,
We walk the way our fathers went
When they have gone astray
When they have gone astray

Peace isn’t treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven’s will.
“Peace on earth!” is what He said,
And I believe it still

Though the voice of reason speaks
Unreasoned voices rage,
And so we add another line
To history’s bloody page,
History’s bloody page

Peace isn’t treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven’s will.
“Peace on earth!” is what He said,
And I believe it still

We must learn to live with peace
And take it as our friend,
We must learn to live with peace,
Or all the world will end,
All the world will end.

Peace isn’t treason,
Peace is good reason,
Peace is heaven’s will.
“Peace on earth!” is what He said,
And I believe it still

Malvina Reynolds song, “Peace Isn’t Treason,” 1967



Love peace, and prosper.

[Resistance]

5. interesting

the "Arab community" kidnaps, promotes fear, suicide bombs, and takes hostages. I didn't know an entire community could do that, Malvina Reynolds.

[Jim Sagle]

6. Geez. ligthen up...you make him sound like Godzilla.

He's just one man, doin' the best he can...to make the world a safer place.

Won't you lend a helping hand?

[bluesoul]

7. Sharon?

LOL, this would be laughable but it's actually sad...

[Jim Sagle]

8. I guess you're mired in negativity today. Sorry 'bout that.

[number6]

15. he's smaller than Godzilla

but more destructive :nuke:

[Jack Rabbit]

9. Sharon should be stopped before he destroys two nations

For all his success however, Sharon has reached a strategic impasse, even as he pushes ahead with his plan. Throughout, he has applied the same bulldozer approach that he used in his previous wars as a soldier, but his background has blinded him to other political realities that military might alone will not resolve. In particular, he has turned a blind eye to the growing demographic problem in the occupied territories. The Palestinian population now stands at 4.8 million, matching that of Israel, and has a birth rate that far outstrips that of its occupier. These people cannot simply be wiped off the map, much as Sharon might desire it.
Moreover, Sharon has utterly failed to provide the security he promised to the Israeli people. In pursuing policies in the occupied territories that are calculated to kill and oppress, and abandoning any semblance of a strategy geared towards a peaceful solution, it should be abundantly clear to Israelis that their prime minister cannot guarantee their safety. In reducing the Palestinian population to the state of overwhelming desperation that can only ensure continued conflict, Sharon is consciously jeopardizing the lives of his own citizens, as well as those of the Palestinians. Sharon has also failed to break the strength of Palestinian resolve, and in attempting to rob them of a country and livelihood, he is breeding generation upon generation of Palestinians whose sole purpose will become opposition to the Israeli occupation.

This is indeed what Sharon has accomplished in a lifetime, if such can be called an accomplishment. It was a dark day for all on the Levant when he ascended to power. The situation was already bad; Sharon, with his intransigence towards Palestinian rights and his vision of a Greater Israel at the expense of Palestinian rights only made it worse. Anyone who would call Sharon a man of peace is either ignorant of the man's past or just morally blind.

Dr. Barghouti is correct. If three years of Sharon's brutality has not weakened Palestinian resolve to live in an independent state, it isn't going to be broken.

The time is long overdue to recognize that two nations exist west of the Jordan and need two states. It is time for reasonable men to seize the day and cast Sharon aside.

We should add a few notes about the author of this piece, Dr. Mustafa Barghouti. He is part of the progressive element in Palestinian affairs. He is a critic of Arafat and the PA as presently constituted. He calls for free and fair elections to be held in the West Bank and Gaza as a way of legitimizing those who would negotiate on behalf of the Palestinian people.

[Resistance]

10. If I am not mistaken

this is the same Dr. Barghouti who was once arrested and beaten by the IDF for giving a speech on non-violent resistance to the Occupation.

[Saudade]

11. Barghouthi

Mustafa is not the guy currently on trial.

Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi (MD, MSc.) is an active participant in the building of a democratic Palestinian civil society and is one of the most prominent leaders of the Palestinian struggle.
He is the Secretary of the Palestinian National Initiative, or Mubadara, a recently established democratic opposition movement in the realm of Palestinian domestic politics, co-founded along with Dr. Haidar Abdel-Shafi, Mr. Ibrahim Dakak and Dr. Edward Said.

http://www.palestinemonitor.org/mustafa/mustafas_page.htm

[Jack Rabbit]

12. Palestinian National Initiative

Organizations like the Palestinian National Initiative might be worth a serious look. We need to find and support a progressive alternative to Arafat and the Islamists.

Bush may give lip-service to the "Arafat must go" crowd, but don't expect him to look for real alternatives. He would be very happy with a version of Arafat who is just as crooked and more compliant. He's looking for a Palestinian Chalabi.

We need something better than that.

[Resistance]

13. I am pretty sure this is the same guy I am thinking of

Mustafa Barghouti was beaten and arrested once (at least) for giving a speech on non-violence.

[Jack Rabbit]

14. The incident is documented by AI

It happended about two years ago, as documented in this link.

[bemildred]

16. Well said.

Time is running out. He has wasted everything and
accomplished nothing, except making everyone miserable.

[Resistance]

17. Oh he's accomplished plenty

besides killing lots of people, he's stolen alot of land, which is the ultimate goal for most Israeli planners, remember.

[bemildred]

18. He is trying, but that won't work either.

Accomplished would mean a settled agreement where
they get to keep it, not a unilateral grab that must
be enforced with force indefinitely. Pretty much
everything he's touched since the tank battles in the
Sinai had turned into shit, and that is the truth.

Taking your own measure at face value, the high point was
after the '67 war. Since then they have given back the
Sinai, taken and left S. Lebanon, he's just admitted he
won't get to keep all of the W. Bank and Gaza with the
unilateral separation stuff, and there is another post now
about returning the Golan. If you think he is doing all
that because he doesn't/didn't really want to keep it,
then I have to disagree with you.

Strategically Israel would have done far better to settle
when they held more and better cards, it's all downhill from
here, and they need to get a clue, and Sharon is strategically
speaking a half-wit. Of course you can go along with DTF and
say they have just been doing what Uncle Sugar has told them to,
but I find that simplistic.

I have not even touched on economic or sociological factors.

All this is not to say that it hasn't been an ugly business for
the non-Jewish indigenous peoples of the area.

[Jack Rabbit]

19. A reckless prediction about Sharon

I just posted the New Year predictions by Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian in Editorials. Freedland predicts that Sharon will resign, enveloped in personal corruption and saddled with a broad consensus that his policies have failed.

The bad news, if Freedland's prediction hold, is that Sharon will be replaced by Netanyahu. That's not a great improvement.

[bemildred]

21. He does seem a gloomy fellow.

I think I'll wait and see what happens.

I am somewhat of the opinion that how well the USA
manages it's crisis is the most important factor, in the
sense that there is the potential for a return to
isolationism, or ordinary state-ism if you prefer,
and that can have profound effects on Israel, but I
see no way to judge how that will evolve.

His basic premise seems to be business as usual, and I
think that is most likely wrong.

[Gimel]

20. For one claiming neutrality

Statements like this, supposing to prejudice and KNOWING deep motivations are disturbing. "Most Israeli planners", remember, are interested in a peaceful settlement, including painful compromises. The Palestinians will not compromise, and send their war crime teams to commit mas murder on Israeli citizens.