Institutionalized Israeli Impunity

Throwing the Dog a Bone
by Noura

I hate to be so consistently pessamistic in my writing. But, here I
go again…it's a little hard to be hopeful when running for the bone
you trip on the electronic razor wire fence! I mean, does anyone
believe Israel would unilaterally (do anything!) withdraw from the
West Bank if it was not in their interest to do so? Virtually
everyone in their right mind knows that they can not sustain the
brutal level of ongoing military occupation of the West Bank,
economically, morally and especially if they want to be seen by the
world community as anything but a piranha state, they have to get
out sooner than later. You have to give the Israeli's credit though,
they have succeeded in convincing the world that today Israeli's
will vote a "referendum" with the difficult option of continuing a
legacy of military occupation, or not.

Israeli voters are torn between the generous decision of voting for
Kadima, started by Sharon, a known war criminal. Kadima is
pledging to "unilaterally withdraw from most of the West Bank".
Headed by Ehud Olmert', his plan is a way to create "'facts on the
ground' without any negotiation with a Palestinian counterpart. It
will withdraw from isolated settlements but annex the largest ones,
seizing Palestine's most resource-filled areas and isolating
Jerusalem to prevent the establishment of viable Palestinian
statehood in the future."*

Forget peace talks, Israel knows that everything according to
international law and human rights will work against what they want,
a pure Arian, I mean Jewish state. For Palestinians inside Israel,
the "rightist" Yisrael Beiteinu led by Avigdor Lieberman party "has
been aiming at the lowest instincts of some Jewish citizens by
advocating for an Arab-free Israel - by placing Arab towns and
villages outside the national borders and stripping the residents of
their citizenship" According to Ha'aretz, his party's popularity has
been increasing weekly in the polls."

Since we're talking about "unilateral withdrawal", does anyone
really still believe Gaza is not Occupied? If so, see this recent UN
report http://electronicintifada.net/bytopic/427.shtml describing
the Humanitarian Crisis happening in Gaza at this moment, because
Israel refuses to allow food, aid and medical relief to be delivered
to the people. Unilateral anything by Israeli is SURE to have dire
consequences, and can be sure that whoever is voted in, will
not "unilaterally" give up one bit of land or air space that they
want, and this wall that has already stolen territory deep into the
West Bank and caused so much additional hardship, land theft,
destroyed thousands of homes and livelihoods, and of course
imprisoned the entire population.

Make no mistake about it, this election is not about peace, nor is
it about ending the ongoing war crimes. It is about how Israel can
most effectively disengage [rid] itself from the "Palestinian problem", which is really the Palestinians right to self determination, equality and
overall human rights.

*http://www.palestinemonitor.org/nueva_web/infos_materials/in_focus/i
n_focus_38.htm

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