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March 23, 2002
T.W. Croft
Enron's
Attack on Our
Economic Security
March 22, 2002
Robert Jensen
Corporate Power is a
Threat to Democracy
Tommy
Ates
The
Future of Black Academia
Rep. Ron Paul
Why are We in Ukraine?
March 21, 2002
McQuinn,
Munson, & Wheeler
Stars
and Stripes:
Killing for the Flag?
John Chuckman
How Change is Wrought
David
Vest
Hail
to the Chaff
March 20, 2002
Kay Lee
Censorship at Angelfire
Robert
Jensen
The
Politics of Pain
and Pleasure
Sheperd Bliss
Notes from Hawai'i:
Trouble in Paradise
Rick Giambetti
Prozac
and Suicide:
an Interview with
Dr. David Healy
Philip Farruggio
Bullies
Lori Allen
Live
from Ramallah:
The Madness of Occupation
March
19, 2002
Tariq
Ali
Nuke
Iraq?
Phyllis
Pollack
Roger
Daltrey's LA Surprise
Amir Ahmadi
War-Mongering
Academics:
The New Tartuffe
Ben White
Bomber
Blair
Fran Shor
Child-Murderers
and Madmen
March
18, 2002
Tom Turnipseed
Crazy
is Cool
Dave Marsh
DeskScan:
What's Playing At My House
Armen
Khanbabyan
The
Pentagon in the Caucasus:
Georgia Is Only the Beginning
Gabriel
Ash
Abdullah
v. Osama
Bernard
Weiner
Middle
East for Dummies
Alexander
Cockburn
Tipping
in America
March
17, 2002
David
Vest
The
Politics of Packaging
Tariq
Ali
The
Left's New Empire Loyalists
March
16, 2002
Chris
Floyd
Ashcroft's
Secret Snatches
March 15, 2002
Doron Rosenblum
Israel's Settler Warlords
Alex Lynch
Rhetorical
Attacks On Iraq
Norman Madarasz
Neo-Con Propaganda
and the National Review
Paul-Marie
de La Gorce
Making
Enemies
March
14, 2002
Dr. Susan
Block
RIP
Danny Pearl
Francis
Boyle
Bush
Nuke Plan Violates International Law, Again
Wayne
Saunders
Memo
to Paul McCartney:
There Are Two Kinds
of Freedom, Sir
H.P. Albarelli
Anthrax
Cover-up?
March
13, 2002
Amira
Hass
Are
the Occupied Protecting the Occupier?
CounterPunch
Wire
National
Review Editors Suggest Nuking Mecca
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Personal
Responsibility
for Corporate Elites?
Robert
Fisk
Arabs
Don't Want US
to Strike Iraq
Alexander
Cockburn
When
Billy Graham Wanted
to Kill One Million People
March
12, 2002
Kay Lee
Dangerous
Changes in
California's Prisons
John Patrick
Leary
The
Return of Otto Reich
Wole Akande
US
is Being Discredited
in the Eyes of Africa
March
11, 2002
Hani Shukrallah
This
is the Way the World Ends
Tommy
Ates
Bush's
New Nuke Policy:
Target Allies and Enemies
Lidia Andrusenko
The Great
Chicken War:
Bush v. Putin
Dave Marsh
10
CDs Playing On My Desk
John Chuckman
Footprints
in the Dust
Norman
Madarasz
Max
Steel in a Time of Chaos
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
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Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
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Photos by Allan Sekula
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War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
Search
CounterPunch
Read Whiteout and Find Out
How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
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March 23, 2002
Occupation and
Terrorism:
Politics from a Gun Barrel
By James Packard Winkler,
Ph.D.
The political battle continues in the Middle East
through gun barrels rather than across negotiating tables. Americans
are ill equipped to make sense of this historical conflict
that pits two Semitic peoples against each other, each side
exacting punishment and blood revenge in biblical proportion.
There are important perspectives that Americans should keep
in mind in order to understand this conflict and to help end
it.
Not Peace,
But Piece.
At issue is not peace, but piece, as
in land and water. The Palestinian people are living on land
taken by Israel in the 1967 war. Israel's claim to the land
is promoted by a radical group of settlers and ultra-nationalists
who insist on keeping the ever-expanding settlements. Since
the Oslo Accords, Israel, under both Likud and Labor Prime Ministers,
has cut and sliced the Territories into tiny pieces by building
roads, fences, settlements, irrigation and water systems, and
restricted areas in ways that undermine the political and economic
viability of a future Palestinian state. The resulting bits
and pieces of land amount to less than the state of Rhode Island.
Broken up as it is, and with its water resources diverted for
use by the Israeli settlements, it is not realistic to expect
this territory to support over 3 million Palestinian people.
The duplicity of negotiating "peace" while taking
away more land has infuriated Palestinians for many years, and
fomented radicalism.
Historical
Roots Run Deep.
Shortly after I arrived in early 1997,
I visited a Palestinian family north of Bethlehem whose home
had been demolished by the Israeli army--many times! Each time
the family rebuilt the home. They knew it might be destroyed
again. But their stubbornness is typical of people who have
deep family and cultural roots in this land. Americans do not
fully appreciate how deep-seated these roots are. One U.S. official
I met in 1998 reported on land confiscation and home demolition
which fuel settlement expansion. He expressed frustration at
the lack of attention back in Washington to detailed documentation
of these activities. Like many of us, this official experienced
first hand the irony of sincere hospitality extended by Palestinians
whose homes were demolished, as contrasted with hostility of
settlers he also investigated. The pervasive indifference of
Washington to concrete documentation of illegal and immoral
acts committed as part of Israel's settlement policy is deeply
disturbing.
Suicide Bombings and
Civilian Killings are Immoral; They Do Not Serve a Strategic
Purpose.
The killing of innocent civilians is
always unacceptable. The highly publicized suicide bombings
of Israeli citizens are unacceptable, as are the assassination
of Palestinian activists and killings of innocent women and
children inside homes and on the way to school. Killing civilians
is counterproductive for Palestinian aspirations for statehood,
as well as Israeli hopes for peace. Palestinian suicide bombings
unify Israelis on both sides of the political spectrum. The
vast majority of Israelis would gladly trade in the settlements
for peace and security with their Palestinian neighbors. Overwhelming
Israeli military force against Palestinian civilians, as demonstrated
by the destruction during the current invasions of Bethlehem
and Ramallah, inspires greater animosity and resolve among Palestinians
who feel compelled to exact revenge. Radical actions are often
the only recourse for Palestinians when the world stands idle
in the face of Israel's overwhelming military force.
Arafat is
not bin Laden.
Prime Minister Sharon has successfully
labeled Arafat as a bin Laden equal. This simplistic portrayal
of Arafat does not accurately represent the complexity of Arafat
and the conflict. The Palestinian Authority's role in one highly
publicized arms shipment by the Israeli government, and Arafat's
inability or unwillingness to exert maximum effort to control
Palestinian radicals indicate his delicate internal political
position and the extreme views within Palestinian society. It
is also true that Arafat is the elected representative of the
Palestinian people and their aspirations of statehood. American
officials and citizens have never been directly threatened by
Palestinians during my five years of work in West Bank and Gaza
or in Israel. If Arafat was equivalent to Al-Qaeda, as represented
by Sharon and the Israeli right wing, Americans could not continue
to work safely under U.S. government supported programs in the
Palestinian Territories. Arafat has repeatedly welcomed U.S.
involvement. Palestinians have a remarkable affinity for Americans
and our culture; many are American citizens. Labeling Arafat
as bin Laden makes rapprochement much more difficult in the
highly sensitive dynamic of this conflict. Singling out Arafat
does not explain why so many Palestinians have become radicalized
to defy overwhelming military odds against them, nor does blaming
Arafat address the historical problem of land confiscation and
occupation by Israel.
Occupation
is Immoral and Politically Not Viable for Israel or America.
Americans are a fair-minded people. Those
of us who work in the Palestinian Territories under U.S. foreign
policy, or have visited, are astounded that the occupation
of a people can continue with impunity. Most Americans would
be shocked to learn of the apartheid-like conditions of Israel's
occupation. Israel requires Palestinians to hold magnetic identity
cards, live in fenced off territories, and pass through cattle-like
processing centers. The daily humiliation of Palestinians at
checkpoints, Ben-Gurion Airport and border crossings, has for
years corrupted any sense of humanity or peaceful, neighborly
intent. It is in Israel's interest to extricate itself from
a territory where it is not welcome, and where it cannot effectively
govern. Israeli occupation of West Bank and Gaza will always
be a thorn in relations between Israel and Arab countries. As
long as America underwrites the occupation, our relations with
those nations will also remain strained.
Was There
A Viable Peace Deal on Offer?
Most Israeli and American policymakers
would have us believe that Arafat alone scuttled a peace deal
during Camp David. The American media bought the line that Israel
"offered" so much, that Israel made such a big compromise,
and was willing to give up so much. This is only part of the
truth. If you count the facts on the ground in July 2000, then,
yes, the Israelis "gave up" a lot. If you count from
the 1967 borders_which would be consistent with the U.N. resolutions
and the U.S. government position that the West Bank and Gaza
are occupied territories_its clear that the Israeli offer was
not acceptable to Palestinians, Arab countries and many fair-minded
observers. Palestinians lost their homes and lands as far back
as 1948. They already gave up a lot of land. They are simply
claiming lands occupied since 1967, and for at least a symbolic
recognition and just resolution of the refugee right of return.
Most Palestinians believed that a peace
deal, short of a perfect offer from Israel, was not possible
in a single meeting at Camp David because the consultative process
required the involvement of Arab states that have a religious
and historic interest in Jerusalem. Israel and the U.S. made
some strategic errors during the negotiations. The Americans
failed to fully consult with Arab countries in advance. It was
unhelpful in the delicate peace negotiations before conflict
erupted in September 2000 for Israelis and Americans to publicly
blame Arafat for not accepting the Israeli offer. Clinton and
Barak may have been ready, but legitimate Palestinian concerns
made Arafat unable at that time. An acceptable peace deal will
require Israel to negotiate in good faith to solve this historic
conflict, and take into account the sacrifice of land and resources
the Palestinians have already made.
America cannot afford to support, or
be perceived to support, Israel as an occupier. The occupation
is immoral and untenable. The larger U.S. stakes of Arab rapprochement
after September 11 require finesse and fairness. While we should
continue with loyal support of Israel as a friend and ally,
the U.S. should not support Israel as occupier, human rights
abuser, and provocateur. The United States world leadership
mantle requires that we act as an honest broker and hold both
sides accountable for their failures. The recent U.S. support
for two new initiatives--the Saudi proposal for peace and the
U.N. vote to recognize a Palestinian state existing next to
Israel--and call for Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian
Territories are positive steps.
James Packard Winkler lived in Jerusalem and worked in the Palestinian
Territories from 1997 to 2001.
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