While the world looks the other way, the colonization of the West Bank continues

[grassfed]

Run time: 06:12 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMkgNIQVZuE   Posted on YouTube: March 09, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: March 09, 2009 By DU Member: grassfed Views on DU: 884

 
While the world looks elsewhere, Israel continues its methodical assault on the West Bank. The video above was shot yesterday in the Palestinian village Wadi Rasha. The village is located north of Jerusalem and caught in the area between the green line (Israel's internationally recognized border) and the separation barrier. This area is called the seam zone and has been the site of the most intense ethnic cleansing in the West Bank as Israel is colonizing the area with the expectation that the barrier will become its new border if it is forced into a two state agreement.

Wadi Rasha has already been subjected to home demolitions and intense restrictions over any freedom of movement. As the video shows, Israel is also destroying any chance for livelihood to force the residents out.

The resident of Wadi Rasha says it better than any commentator could:

The industrial area of Alfe Menashe was built on land stolen from us. Now they steal the land that you see here. We have no other income but through our land.

This village has been here since about 150-200 years ago. Givat Tal has been there for 3.5 or 4 years. Alfe Menashe has been there for 25 years. I am 38 years old, older than it. I was born in this village. I am not allowed to build houses. I am not allowed to pass (into Israel) to go to work. I am not even allowed to pass to my own land. As you see, they stole from me everything. They left all the village 33 dunams from 1500...

The courageous act of Palestinians to stay on their land in the face of this campaign is a profound act of daily nonviolent resistance that is often ignored. Additionally, as the video shows, international and Israeli activists offer much needed solidarity in the face of the destruction. Unfortunately it may be too late.

http://www.philipweiss.org/mondoweiss

[peacetalksforall]

1. Israelis who steal and abuse. Why did we support them all these decades?

Death and destruction in Gaza. Death and destruction in Lebanon. Continuous invasion and takeover.

Who the hell do they think they are?

No more aid. Why do they need our aid to buy bulldozers and handcuffs?

Who do they think they are out on the waters of the Mediterranean - stopping ships - harming ships and people - deciding what the traffic can be?

What is this madness?

[WhoIsNumberNone]

3. Why, you ask?

Well let's see-

We have lots of wealthy Jews in this country who support it, and are willing to put their money behind it- both through political contributions and (tax deductible) private donations to Israel. Influential Jews will also brand any politician who doesn't support Israel strongly enough as 'antisemitic'- The kiss of death to most any American politician.*

We have lots of Armageddonist christians in this country who also think this is great. After all, Jesus doesn't return until the Jews have rebuilt the temple, right? Gotta support Israel in order for that to happen.

As a destabilizing influence in the Middle East, Israel helps to keep oil prices high- which the oil companies love.




* Jews make up 6% of the population of the United States last I heard- but per capita they are a wealthy 6%. And if you are branded 'antisemitic' all their campaign contributions will go to your opponent. Also they vote. in a system where 50% voter turnout is considered high, that 6% segment can swing an election. All the more so because that 6% is not uniformly distributed- they are concentrated in jackpot states like New York and California, so the price of not kissing the Israeli ring can be disastrous in a Presidential election. Do you think Obama would have won if he hadn't gone before AIPAC and pledged his support and friendship to Israel? Maybe- but I wouldn't have liked to to gamble....

[JohnyCanuck]

2. They don't think of it as colonizing,

or taking land that is not theirs. To them it's nothing more than making another pastrami sandwich.

Winston S. Churchill III, grandson of the famed British prime minister, recalled last October at the National Press Club here a telling encounter he had had in 1973 with the hawkish Ariel Sharon, now the Israeli prime minister, about Zionist objectives. "What is to become of the Palestinians?" Churchill asked. "We'll make a pastrami sandwich of them," Sharon said. Churchill responded, "What?" "Yes, we'll insert a strip of Jewish settlements in between the Palestinians, and then another strip of Jewish settlements right across the West Bank, so that in 25 years' time, neither the United Nations nor the United States, nobody, will be able to tear it apart."

http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=4171

[WhoIsNumberNone]

4. It's not Nazism when Jews do it...

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

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[Grinchie]

5. The inhumanity of the Israeli's is overwhelming

They behave like a cancer that has learned how to subvert and use all the trappings of Government for their own growth and consumption.

We need to shut off the blood flow, i.e. money so these assholes can try to defend themselves with sticks and rocks like the Palestinians.

Unfortunately, the U.S. is in the Arms Business, and it would curtial the only product America has the capacity to produce and export, regardless of the fact that we give them the money to buy our own product.

This video in it's neutral presentation of the cold, calculated behavior of a bunch of Soldiers obeying orders is as powerful as Gandhi. I wonder how many of these protests end up "Disappeared" when the Israeli's don't want the world to see how greedy and inhuman they are when it comes to seizing property that is not theirs.

Let them rot in hell.

[peacetalksforall]

6. And they are a 'democracy' just like the U.S. - freedom of press once a grand

concept, now crapped on by greedy earth resource thieves - just like the U.S.

Weapons, intelligence, deals, secrets, partnerships - back and forth between the U.S. and Israel.

We've been messed with.

[Smith_3]

7. The thing is, the foundation of the state of Israel was an illegitimate act to begin with.

Only through bribery and blackmail, and the full weight of their allies the USA and Great Britain were the Israelis able to force the resolution of the partitioning of Palestine through the United Nations. Not a single Arab Nation voted "yes". This is not "anti-semitism" it is simply stating historic facts. Countries that "deny Israels right to exist" to this day have every reason to. They have consistently done so ever since they were screwed over by the white western imperialists and zionists in Flushing Meadows. The whole discussion over a "soulution" to the middle east problem can never lead to anything, unless it is done under the premise that the foundation of the state was illegitimate. Fine, the democratic structure "Israel" exists now. That is ok and should not be changed. But Palistineans need to be granted full citizens rights in the country which is rightfully theirs as a whole. In addition, special protection for the territories that they currently hold as "reservations" with a similar legal framework as those of american natives must be established.

[JohnyCanuck]

9. "Israeli Settlers Terrorize Palestinian Villagers"

Israeli human rights group Peace Now released a report several weeks ago stating that the Israeli government is currently building an additional 73,300 illegal housing units in the West Bank. The report added that this would increase the total number of Israeli settlers in the area by 100 percent.

International human rights organizations have argued that the motive behind the accelerated settlement-building is to establish facts on the ground and to make the establishment of a viable, contiguous, and independent Palestinian state nearly impossible.

Currently, the West Bank is effectively divided into three cantons by military checkpoints and the settlements. Palestinian towns and villages are surrounded by Israeli settlements while swathes of their land has been confiscated to build settlers-only bypass roads.

While Israeli officials are furthering the facts-on-the-ground scenario through official government policies, an unofficial war between Israeli settlers and Palestinian villagers over the continued land expropriation continues unabated.

"The settlers are carrying out a deliberate policy to try and drive us off our land and intimidate us into leaving so that they can take our land," said Hafez Hreini, 37, one of the villagers. Hreini's mother, 79-year-old Fatima, was left bleeding after a settler threw a rock at her head in another encounter with the settlers.

http://atheonews.blogspot.com/2009/03/israeli-settlers-terrorize-palestinian.html