Israel, Destroyer of Lives
Words (exclusive of footnotes and bio): 730
Date: April 2, 2004
How much longer will we allow Israel to continue what the United Nations calls "a reign of terror upon innocent Palestinians"? [1]
These grave human rights violations "have been committed daily, hourly, even every minute, by the Israeli authorities against Palestinians," according to Amnesty International.[2]
Israeli soldiers have killed 2700 Palestinians and wounded 25,000 in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip since September 2000.[3]
480 of the deaths have been children under the age of 18.[4]
Over 80 human beings, denied medical treatment, have died at Israeli checkpoints.[5]
Just before Christmas, Israeli troops prevented a young mother, pregnant with twins, from getting to a hospital. The Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz described what happened next:
"The twin girls died one after the other. The first to die was the one who was born first, at the checkpoint. Several hours later came the death of her sister, who was born a few minutes after they finally left the checkpoint, and who managed to reach the hospital alive."[6]
Since September 2000, Israel has attacked ambulances 285 times, denied access to ambulances 1278 times, killed 25 medical workers and injured 420.[7]
Israel prevents 750,000 Palestinians from using hospitals in Jerusalem.[8]
Israel's malevolence is everywhere in the occupied territories. As the Special Rapporteur of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights wrote, "There is a humanitarian crisis in the West Bank and Gaza. It is not the result of a natural disaster. It is a crisis imposed by a powerful State on its neighbour."[9]
Some 60 per cent of the Palestinians in the occupied territories live below the poverty line. Almost 2.5 million people live on under $2 a day.[10]
Israel's demolition of Palestinian homes--illegal under the Fourth Geneva Convention--has left 14,852 people homeless.[11]
13-year-old Aya Al-Sha'er described his experience:
"The bulldozers came without warning. They destroyed two rooms and a bathroom. All of my family shouted in front of the bulldozer, but the bulldozer kept going on with its destruction.
My father said to the bulldozer, 'Please give me a little time to take our furniture out of the house,' but the bulldozer didn't agree to this and started shooting at my father. He was shot in the back and in the leg.'"[12]
Israel justifies its barbarism as self-defense, but it was Jews who introduced terrorism to the Middle East when Menachem Begin and his Irgun Zvai Leumi blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem on July 22, 1946, killing 91 people.[13]
In 1948 Jewish militias turned to wholesale terrorism, carrying out two dozen massacres of Palestinians, according to Israeli historian Benny Morris.[14]
They started the year with three car bombings, murdering 30 in the city of Jaffa on Jan. 4, 20 the next day at the Semiramis Hotel in Jerusalem, and another 17 at the Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem two days later.[15]
Israeli massacres of Palestinians continued throughout its "War of Independence": 120 villagers murdered in cold blood in Deir Yassin; hundreds killed at Lydda, including 80 machine-gunned inside the Dahmash Mosque; 50 villagers machine-gunned in Hula, Lebanon; 100 killed at al-Dawayima, with an Israeli eye-witness reporting that "the children were killed by smashing their skulls with clubs"; 13 young men mowed down by machine guns in open fields outside Eilabun; 70 young men blindfolded and shot to death at Safsaf; 12 killed at Majd al-Kurum, with a U.N. observer writing that "there is no doubt about these murders"; 14 "liquidated," according to the Israeli military's report, at Khirbet al-Wa'ra as-Sauda.[16]
Israel's atrocities did not stop in 1948. In 1953 Ariel Sharon's bloodthirsty Unit 101 murdered 70 villagers in Qibya, Jordan while carrying out orders to achieve "maximal killing."[17]
In 1956 there were four more massacres: 56 in Gaza City, 50 of Israel's Arab citizens at Kafr Kassem, 275 at Khan Yunis, and 111 at Rafah Refugee Camp.[18]
Israel's mass killing reached genocidal proportions during its 1982 invasion of Lebanon, when 18,000 civilians died, including 2000 slaughtered at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps by Israel's Lebanese allies.[19]
Israel has shown absolute contempt for Palestinian life.
The Palestinian people are fighting, quite simply, for their very existence.
Because the American government makes Israel's butchery possible, only the American people can stop it.
Five decades of complicity in Israel's crimes against humanity is enough.
Robin Miller is an independent scholar. Contact her at http://www.robincmiller.com.
Footnotes
1. "Report of the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights, John Dugard, on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel since 1967," 27 February 2004, document E/CN.4/2004/6/Add.1. Return to text
2. Amnesty International, "Statement to the UN Commission on Human Rights, Israel and Occupied Territories"; February 4, 2002; document MDE 15/027/2002. Return to text
3. Deaths
Palestine Red Crescent Society: 2,814 deaths from Sept. 29, 2000, to March 30, 2004.
Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group: 2697 deaths from September 29, 2000, to February 29, 2004.
Middle East Policy Council: 2829 deaths from Sept. 29, 2000, to March 28, 2004.
B'Tselem: 2445 deaths from 29 Sept. 2000 to 10 March 2004 (adding 2,397 Palestinians killed by Israeli security forces in the Occupied Territories and 48 Palestinians, residents of the Occupied Territories, killed by Israeli security forces gunfire).
Palestine Center for Human Rights (Gaza City): 2129 Palestinian civilians killed from 29 September 2000 to 03 March 2004. Return to text
Injuries
Palestine Red Crescent Society: 25,384 injuries from September 29, 2000, to March 30, 2004.
U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, "Humanitarian Action Plan for Occupied Palestinian territory 2003: Mid-Year Review," June 3, 2003: Since September 2000, the total Palestinian deaths exceeded 2,200 killed and over 28,000 injured. Return to text
4. Palestine Red Crescent Society: 477 children (under 18) killed, Sept. 29, 2000, to Feb. 29, 2004.
B'tselem: Fatalities in the Occupied Territories from 29 Sept. 2000 to 10 March 2004 included 460 minors under the age of 18.
Palestine Center for Human Rights (Gaza City): 464 children under age 17 (18?) killed From 29 September 2000 to 3 March 2004.
Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group: Deaths from September 29, 2000, to February 29, 2004:
Children 0-15 255
Children 15-17 231
total 486 Return to text
5. Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group: 81 Palestinians died at checkpoints from September 29, 2000, to February 29, 2004. Return to text
Palestine Red Crescent Society and World Health Organization, "International, Israeli, Palestinian Health Workers Call on Israeli Government to Guarantee Health Workers Protection," 15 March 2003: "By the end of February 2003, 90 Palestinian patients had died at Israeli military checkpoints in the oPt. Over the past 16 months, 51 Palestinian women have given birth in ambulances and cars at checkpoints and 29 newborn babies have died at Israeli checkpoints."
This document is also available here.
6. Gideon Levy, And the Twins Died, Ha'aretz, January 10, 2004. Originally online at http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/380975.html. Return to text
7. Palestine Red Crescent Society:
Attacks on ambulances: 285
denied access to ambulances 1278
Both based on time frame of Sept. 29, 2000 to March 26, 2004.
Palestine Red Crescent Society and World Health Organization, "International, Israeli, Palestinian Health Workers Call on Israeli Government to Guarantee Health Workers Protection," 15 March 2003: "Since the start of the current conflict in September 2000, 25 Palestinian health workers, including ambulance drivers, doctors, nurses and medical volunteers, have been killed and 419 have been injured."
This document is also available here.
Palestine Center for Human Rights (Gaza City): 18 deaths were on-duty medical workers, including doctors and paramedics. Return to text
8. Nadav Shragai, Palestinians Left Outside J'lem Fence Are Moving into Capital, Ha'aretz, March 16, 2004. "Some 750,000 Palestinians residents who live in Jerusalem's metropolitan area, but outside the barrier, will remain without hospitals." Return to text
9. "Report of the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights, John Dugard, on the Situation of Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories Occupied by Israel since 1967, Submitted in Accordance with Commission resolution 1993/2 A, U.N. Commission on Human Rights," 8 Sept 2003, document E/CN.4/2004/6. Return to text
10. "Consolidated Appeals Process (CAP): Humanitarian Appeal 2004 for Occupied Palestinian Territory," U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 18 Nov 2003. Return to text
11. U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, "Humanitarian Update, 19-30 JANUARY 2004," 30 January 2004. Return to text
12. "From the Children of Rafah" Return to text
13. Thurston Clarke, By Blood & Fire: The Attack on the King David Hotel, New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1981, 304 pp. Return to text
14. Ari Shavit, Survival of the Fittest, Ha'aretz, January 2004 (interview with Benny Morris). Originally online at http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=380986&contrassID=2. Return to text
15. Complete information on each of these atrocities is available on my website. Principal sources are as follows:
Jaffa, January 4, 1948:
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, pp. 83-84.
Hugh Humphries with Ross Campbell, Countdown to Catastrophe: Palestine 1948--A Chronology, Scottish Friends of Palestine, 2000, p. 9. Return to text
Semiramis Hotel in Jerusalem, January 5:
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, pp. 98.
R. Dare Wilson, Cordon & Search: With 6th Airborne Division in Palestine, 1945-1948, London: Aldershot, Gale & Polden, 1949, p. 269 (table).
Who Are the Terrorists? Aspects of Zionist and Israeli Terror, Beirut: The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1972, p. 19-20 (citing The Times (London), January 6, 1948).
Hugh Humphries with Ross Campbell, Countdown to Catastrophe: Palestine 1948--A Chronology, Scottish Friends of Palestine, 2000, pp. 9-10.
Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem, January 7:
Hugh Humphries with Ross Campbell, Countdown to Catastrophe: Palestine 1948--A Chronology, Scottish Friends of Palestine, 2000, pp. 11-12.
Who Are the Terrorists? Aspects of Zionist and Israeli Terror, Beirut: The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1972, p. 17 (citing The Times (London), Jan. 8, 1948).
16. Complete information on each of these atrocities is available on my website. Principal sources are as follows:
Deir Yassin (April 9-11, 1948)
Matthew Hogan, "The 1948 Massacre at Deir Yassin Revisited," Historian, Winter 2001.
Daniel McGowan and Marc Ellis, Remembering Deir Yassin: The Future of Israel and Palestine, New York: Olive Branch Press, 1998.
Lydda (July 11-12, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 426-428
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, pp. 126-127.
Guy Erlich, "Not Only Deir Yassin," Ha'ir [Israeli newspaper], 6 May 1992.
An article by Israeli historian Arieh Vitzhaqi from the April 14, 1972, issue of the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot, translated in "From the Hebrew Press," Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. 1, no. 4 (summer 1972), p. 145. Return to text
Hula, Lebanon (sometime during October 24-29, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 481
Article from Mapam newspaper Al Hamishmar by R. Barkan, title not given, quoting a letter from eyewitness Dov Yirmiya, translated in the Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. VII, no. 4 (summer 1978), number 28, pp. 143-145.
al-Dawayima (October 29, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 468-471.
David Gilmour, Dispossessed: The Ordeal of the Palestinians 1917-1980, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1980, pp. 68-69.
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, pp. xii-xiv.
Eilabun (October 30, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 479-481.
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, p. 164
Safsaf (October 30, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 481. ("In Safsaf, troops shot and then dumped into a well 50-70 villagers and POWs.")
Nafez Nazzal, The Palestinian Exodus from Galilee 1948, Beirut: The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1978, p. 95.
Majd al-Kurum (October 30, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 478.
Nafez Nazzal, The Palestinian Exodus from Galilee 1948, Beirut: The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1978, p. 92,
Michael Palumbo, The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland, London: Faber and Faber, 1987, pp. 171-172 (U.N. official's quote)
Khirbet al-Wa'ra as-Sauda (November 2, 1948)
Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 481.
Return to text
17. Benny Morris, Israel's Border Wars, 1949-1956, Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press, 1993. The Qibya massacre is extensively discussed on pp. 257-276. The "maximal killing" quotation is from p. 259. Return to text
18. Complete information on each of these atrocities is available on my website. Principal sources are as follows:
Gaza City (April 5, 1956)
E.L.M. Burns, Between Arab and Israeli, London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1962, pp. 140-141. Burns, a general in the Canadian military, served as Chief of Staff of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization from August 1954 until November 1956, and then as commander of the United Nations Emergency Force until the spring of 1957.
Husayn Abu al-Naml, The Gaza Strip, 1948-1967: Economic, Political, Social and Military Developments, Beirut: Center for Research, PLO, 1979, p. 121.
Ghazi al-Sourani, The Gaza Strip, 1948-1993, Beirut: Dar al-Mubtada', 1993, p. 27. Return to text
Kafr Kassem (October 29, 1956)
E.L.M. Burns, Between Arab and Israeli, London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1962, p. 305 (quoting from the Jerusalem Post)
Sabri Jiryis, The Arabs in Israel, New York: Monthly Review Press, 1976, pp. 140-153.
Khan Yunis (November 3, 1956)
E.L.M. Burns, Between Arab and Israeli, London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1962, p. 304
Michael Palumbo, Imperial Israel: The History of the Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, revised PB edition, 1992, pp. 30-32 Return to text
Rafah Refugee Camp (November 12, 1956)
E.L.M. Burns, Between Arab and Israeli, London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1962, p. 304
Michael Palumbo, Imperial Israel: The History of the Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, revised PB edition, 1992, pp. 30-32
19. 20,000 civilian deaths: By late December 1982, Lebanese authorities reported 19,085 deaths, 90% of them civilians. This does not include "people buried in mass graves in areas where Lebanese authorities were not informed." Noam Chomsky, Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel and the Palestinians, Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1999 updated edition, pp. 221-224.
2000 deaths at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps: While Israel's official Kahan Commission determined there were 700-800 deaths, official Lebanese reports describe 2000 bodies, and another 1000 may have been dumped in mass graves. These figures were reported by Israeli journalist Amnon Kapeliouk, who investigated the massacre immediately, "voluntarily discarding all data that could not be confirmed beyond the shadow of a doubt." See Amnon Kapeliouk, Sabra & Shatila: Inquiry into a Massacre, Belmont, MA: Association of Arab-American University Graduates, 1984. Casualty figures on pp. 86, 89; quote on p. 5. Return to text