Israel invades Gaza, Hits Bridges, Electricity
The Israeli military destroyed 3 bridges that connect Gaza, and knocked out electricity along the coast, as troops made incursions into Gaza.
I don't have time to comment much on all this right now, except to say that the use of force here is all out of proportion. Without electricity, you can't purify water, and uncooked water is a severe health problem, especially to babies. It can ultimately cause cholera.
The incursion was made necessary by the Sharon-Olmert unwise policy of unilateral withdrawal. Unilateral withdrawal means that no structure was put in place for security in the evacuated terrirories, which increasingly look like a failed state, a Somalia. The PLO and Hamas have fought hot encounters recently.
Why would anyone create a failed state all around their house, right in their neighborhood?
The US press has, as far as I can see, been irresponsible in not broadcasting much about the prologue to the present violence, the Israeli military's bombing of civilians on a Gaza beach earlier in the month. This atrocity was on the front page of every Arabic language newspaper every day for a while earlier this month. We cannot understand the region if we cannot understand how outraged they are, and the source of the outrage.
Predictably, the Israeli military's propaganda machine denied responsibility for the beach explosion. Human Rights Watch called the Israeli military inquiry "not plausible" based on its own evidence-gathering at the scene. The Israeli Army has a long history of using plausible deniability to muddy the waters about its accountability in deaths of innocents. If we had videotape of everything they have done in the West Bank and Gaza, we'd be having war crimes trials for the rest of the century. The fact is that Israeli culpability for the Gaza beach incident is, on the evidence gathered independently by HRW at least highly plausible. The press should be looking into it instead of taking talking points from war propaganda offices.
posted by Juan Cole @ 6/28/2006 12:50:00 AM
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5 Comments:
I agree that US press coverage of the conflict is and has been awful--nearly always presented from the perspective of the IDF. What's interesting is how hard one would have to work to warp the coverage. I recall reading a "middle of the road" book War without End by Anton La Guardia in which he tries really hard to be balanced but ends up having to indict Israel's policies and practices.
.....and to those top-rung 'progressive' bloggers who regularly critique the Bush Administration's 'war on terror'....thank you...your contribution to this important debate is duly noted. Unfortunately, when it comes to where the rubber hits the road on this issue, Israel/ Palestinian relations, your silence is deafening.
Of course, whenever attempting a comparative analysis of Israeli and Palestinian actions, the glaring inconsistency is that the IDF routinely uses plausible deniability to escape blame for its own atrocities, but when some Palestinian terrorist is responsible for an atrocity, all Palestinians everywhere are to blame for being such vicious, heartless Arabs...you know, even though they have no effective security forces or command structure for stopping such violence.
The IDF and Mossad is no different from Palestinian extremists when it calls the deaths of women and children 'acts of God.' Only, I find it much harder to believe that their leadership is not involved.
Professor Cole, do you think that Abu Mazen's acceptance of military aid from Israel will undermine what credibility he has among Palestinians? Isn't that exactly why they are helping him?
I'm confused by your criticism. Are you suggesting Israel pulling out of Gaza was a bad thing? It was generally supported by everyone, though some things here and there could have been done differently.
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I don't have time to comment much on all this right now, except to say that the use of force here is all out of proportion. Without electricity, you can't purify water, and uncooked water is a severe health problem, especially to babies. It can ultimately cause cholera. "
All out of proportion is an understatement. The probing questions are how and why.
Why first:
There were some interesting articles published just after the Ramallah and Jenin atrocities;long story short is that the invaders acted like Vandals. There was overwhelming evidence of needless destruction. One article was titled, "They Even Defecated Into The Photocopier."
British ITV had a nice clip documenting some Israeli soldiers who had pushed an infirm Palestinian woman, in her wheelchair, into the middle of a field. They had her surrounded and they were mocking her fright.
Today's occurrence is merely another occurrence. The destruction in Baghdad and other ancient cities, which some commentators now attribute to willful incompetence as prelude to deniability, all fits a pattern of racist violence by the US/Neocon and the Israeli/Likud cabal.
The why is simple. It is a worldwide pogrom.
The how is complex.
It requires a willingness on the part of Americans to allow Israel's creeping genocide to continue. This willingness is created and maintained through exploitation of the Holocaust and the stranglehold on reasoned debate by the Israeli lobby.
Our nation is ill if we allow Israel to trick us into abandoning our founding principles (We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal) in order to allow Zionists to pursue their childlike, racist dream.
Our nation can only be cured through careful reasoning and the courage to speak truth to power.
Here is an example. The pablum,"Israel has the right to defend itself." demands we consider exactly what defense means and how much of a right there is to self defense during a war of aggression.
Does Israel have the right to defend itself during pogroms against helpless Palestinians? Does Israel have the right to take water from one group of people in order to produce flowers for export?
At this point, there are many who now bring out the label "antisemite."
It is time to dispense with that nonsense.
The how question is answered with the non-defense of "We Americans allow Israel to destroy our principles." This fits nicely with the answer to the why question, namely "Israel is a racist nation with a genocidal agenda."
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