The Palestinian Diaries

Israel is denying Palestinians access to clean, safe water while allowing unlimited supplies to Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank!

Swimming pools, well-watered lawns and large irrigated farms in Israeli settlements… stand in contrast next to Palestinian villages whose inhabitants struggle even to meet their domestic water needs

between 180,000 and 200,000 Palestinians in West Bank rural communities have no access to running water

Israel’s daily water consumption per capita is four times higher than the 20 liters per capita consumed in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (by Palestinians)

Israel, controls much of the West Bank’s supplies, and uses more than 80% of water drawn!

Israel’s war on Gaza early this year left water reservoirs, wells, sewage networks and pumping stations severely damaged.

The water situation in Gaza had now reached a “crisis point,” with 90 to 95 percent of the water supply contaminated and unfit for human consumption.

Palestinians suffer severely of water shortage

Since hundreds of years, and till some years ago, all these lands, and water resources, were totally Palestinian, but everything was taken from them through unfair wars and massacres over the years…

~Source: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/10/20091026132714361238.html

Her brother is one of hundreds being detained by Israeli authorities without charge...

Israel is violating international law by detaining hundreds of Palestinians, some of them for years without charge or trial.

Israel holds hundreds of Palestinians in prolonged detention based on undisclosed suspicions, without informing them what these suspicions are, without giving them an opportunity to defend themselves, and without notifying them when they will be released

The prisoners find it “impossible” to challenge their detention because the evidence against them is often kept secret by the Israeli judges who review the cases!

Source: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/10/20091014135748382585.html

Ehud Barak - Israel's defence minister

A group of Palestinian families is seeking the arrest of Ehud Barak, Israel’s defence minister, during his two-day trip to Britain.

Lawyers acting for 16 Palestinians, who accuse Barak of war crimes for atrocities committed during the Gaza war, sought on Tuesday to have their case heard at a magistrates court in central London.

The families have accused Barak of committing war crimes including the assassination of a senior Palestinian minister and unlawful killing of civilians during the Gaza war at the beginning of this year.

More than 1,400 Palestinians, at least one-third of them women and children, were killed in Israel’s December-January offensive in the Gaza Strip.

Happened Before !

In 2005, human rights groups criticised the British authorities for failing to arrest Doron Almog, an Israeli army general for whom an arrest warrant for alleged war crimes had been issued, when his aircraft landed in London.

Almog stayed on the aeroplane at Heathrow airport after apparently being informed that he could face arrest. He was allowed to return to Israel !

~refrence: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/09/2009929154053730432.html

Naji al-Ali

Handala

On August 29, 1987, Naji al-Ali, one of the Arab World’s most renowned political cartoonists, was shot dead in London by unknown assailants. The murder case has never been solved.

Al-Ali, who was born in Palestine in 1938 and became a refugee when Israel was created 10 years later, is perhaps best remembered for his iconic cartoon character of Handala, a ten year-old shoe-less urchin who bears witness to the grim realities of a region torn by war, corruption, inequality and cynicism.

Here you can see a full interview with his son…
And here you can see a gallery of his cartoons…

In the previous post of this series, I said that the US is like a lion, which rules a big jungle, this lion has to protect his throne from other lions’ greed.

The US started lately two wars, one in Afghanistan as a reaction for the September 11 attacks. Another in Iraq, which was meant to free the Iraqi people from the rule of America’s enemy Saddam Hussein (knowing that Iraqi people didn’t ask for it).

The question I asked last post was: what would the US directly benefit from fighting in Mideast, and What is the relation between the US and Palestine?

-

But, to answer this question we need to know what is Mideast?

It’s a big area which is inhabited by 400+ million persons, 95% of them are Muslims, and most of them are Arabs.
It contains the Arab/Persian Gulf, which is the biggest source of Oil (black gold) around the world.
It contains Mecca, the holy land of Islam.
It contains Egypt, the strongest Arabic army (which Israel fought for many times, till they reached a peace treaty)
It contains many calls for unification, which means a new lion to be created!

Mideast is an area of millions who share the same: religion, language, ethnicity, politics, financial state, etc…

That’s because since 1300 years ago and till the 19 century, these countries were united in one big empire (Islamic Empire) but, one by one, they were separated, as England, France, and other European countries converted parts of this big empire into territories, which later became independent countries.

European Colonization in 1945

Globalization, which is a big American-supported idea, isn’t accepted by most of the Muslims around the world (especially in Mideast), that’s because they think differently than Americans do, they don’t like Secularism, or some of the unfair (as seen by Muslims) freedoms of the western world.

Muslims and Arabs people refuse the way US thinks and acts, also the US refuses the way they think.
This means that if the Arab world is united, a very big threat would appear to the US and its allies (a powerful lion with different ideas, which means a second cold war, or worst)…

So it’s very important for the US to be sure, that Mideast is united if and only if Muslims accept the US way of thinking and living…

-

The question now: what does the US benefit directly from supporting Israel in the Arab-Israeli conflict, and why would it be pro-Israeli even if it knows it’s the bad one?

That’s what we answer next post isA.

-

Older posts:
We All Live in America – 1/5

During Israel’s recent Gaza offensive, Israeli soldiers unlawfully shot and killed 11 Palestinian civilians, including five women and four children, who were in groups waving white flags to convey their civilian status.

Human Rights Watch said in a report released today: The Israeli military should conduct thorough, credible investigations into these deaths to tackle the prevailing culture of impunity, Human Rights Watch said.

The 11 civilians killed and at least eight wounded comprise a small fraction of the more than 1,100 Palestinian civilians and combatants killed during what Israel called Operation Cast Lead in December 2008 and January 2009. However, these deaths stand out because the civilians were in groups waving a white cloth, T-shirt, or scarf, and no Palestinian fighters were in the area at the time, Human Rights Watch said..

In one case documented in the report, on January 7 in eastern Jabalya, two women and three children from the family of Khalid ‘Abd Rabbo were standing in front of their home after an Israeli soldier ordered them outside – at least three of them holding pieces of white cloth – when a soldier near a tank opened fire, killing two girls, ages 2 and 7, and wounding the third girl and their grandmother.

“We spent seven to nine minutes waving the flags, and our faces were looking at them [the soldiers],” said the grandmother, who was shot twice. “And suddenly they opened fire and the girls fell to the ground.

In each of the incidents, the evidence strongly indicates that, at the least, Israeli soldiers failed to take all feasible precautions to distinguish between civilians and combatants before opening fire, as required by the laws of war. At worst, the soldiers deliberately shot at persons known to be civilians.

~source: Human Rights Watch http://www.hrw.org/node/85113

New song by Sami Yusuf dedicated to the children of Palestine and all those who are suffering daily by oppressive brutality.

~src: www.samiyusuf.com

Home demolitions are on the rise and are carried out under the guise of being unlicensed, but for Palestinians obtaining a license from the occupying Israeli administration is nearly impossible.

The massive demolition will include up to 6,000 Palestinian houses in East Jerusalem. Those without licenses in the city range from between 15 to 20 thousand!

Jewish groups and the occupying Israeli administration are active in Judaizing neighborhoods and buildings in the Old City.

Palestinians do not possess many effective means to resist the Israeli measures aimed at Judaizing the city, only the popular sit-ins, demonstrations and political contacts with the West, especially Western diplomatic missions. But the achievements made by Palestinians in Jerusalem are modest compared to the progress of the settlement project, backed by the Jewish National consensus and Zionist lobby.

~Source: http://english.pnn.ps/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=6197

~ref: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/20/gaza-white-phosphorus

Firas Mazloom was born in Gaza just as Israel started its siege on the impoverished Palestinian territory two years ago.
Like others in Gaza, Israeli restrictions prevented him from getting the medical treatment he needed.
And now he is dead.

Israel killed two-year-old Firas…

~ref: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/05/2009514144415929204.html

Irgun and Lehi soldiers carried out the slaughter in a cold and premeditated fashion. The attackers lined men, women and children up against the walls and shot them!
~Simha Flapan, Israeli author, The Birth of Israel.

April 9, 1948

04:45

Gaber, an old village man, who lived in this land for 80 years, and before him, his father, grandfather, and all the family lived there. Gaber suddenly heard sounds of explosions, in minutes all his grandchildren were awaken, they all were screaming, no one knew what was going on!

Gaber stood up like a man, he ran to hold the children. His son Ahmed, living with him in the same house, looked through the windows to see what is going on. Sara, Ahmed’s wife, ran towards a poor candle to have some light, while the children were still crying, screaming, and the grandfather was still holding them.

“Oh God! the terrorists are here”, Ahmed shouted, he meant the Irgun gang, they were known for their brutal terrorist actions practiced daily on the poor innocent Palestinians living in the villages around Deir Yassin…

“But, we signed a non-aggression pact with the Israelis!“, Gaber said with a rough sad tone…

The explosions sounds were rising, and the voices of men were rising too, shouting words in Hebrew, that Gaber and his family didn’t understand.

“OMG! there are more than 120 armed Israeli, they are throwing grenades into every house!“, Ahmed shouted.

“What can we do?! Though hundreds of people live in the village, there are only 10 men who have guns!“, Gaber said with a disaster-covered voice, while voices of other screaming houses started to rise up, many people are hearing the explosions too!

6:00 a.m.

Tens of villagers are brutally killed including children and women, all the men who have guns were killed, hundreds of hand grenades were thrown into village houses, hundreds of people are trapped in the village with no protection, and hundreds are wounded., and the terrorists of Irgun and Lehi are running low on ammunition.

8:00 a.m.

Terrorists obtained thousands of rounds from the Haganah to continue their assault.

10:00 a.m – 10:59 a.m.

Haganah squads continued providing covering fire, and fired on unarmed villagers fleeing south towards Ayn Karim.

11:00 a.m.

More than 110 unarmed villagers were killed outside their homes, tens were bombed while hidden without covering inside their homes, tens of children and women were bombed, tens were killed while fleeing out of the village

Q: What happened after the massacre?

A: The massacre continued…

Some of the survivors, aprrox. 125 Palestinian villager were taken prisoners, then later killed brutaly, and their bodies were never found.

After the massacre, 55 parentless Palestinian children were left inside the village without any protection, absolutely without no one. These children later were found by a lady who took them and raised them as the orphans of Deir Yassin.

Later

Till today there are big evidences of sexual rape to many of the children, executed at the time of the attack by the Israeli attackers, many of the raped schoolgirls were killed, and many of those who survived – due to customs – refused to talk about what happened to them, but many were found with ear injuries, a doctor who witnessed the aftermath said:

Many young schoolgirls were raped and later slaughtered. Old women were also molested. One story is current concerning a case in which a young girl was literally torn in two. Many infants were also butchered and killed. I also saw one old woman who gave her age as one hundred and four who had been severely beaten about the head with rifle butts. Women had bracelets torn from their arms and rings from their fingers and parts of some of the women’s ears were severed in order to remove earrings. !!

Hundreds of thousands of unarmed, hopeless, poor villagers all around Palestine left their homes and traveled to other Arab countries, fleeing from Israeli massacres, after hearing about this massacre…

In 5 weeks, Israel was born over the bodies of dead Palestinians massacred in Deir Yassin, and the United States of America was the first country in the world to recognize it, and till today, US is the biggest supporter to Israel!

It doesn’t matter where you are.. It won’t matter if you never visited the US, you’ll still be a citizen of the United States of America (the international version).

America is the strongest army around the globe, the strongest economy, and the widest culture of all.

One good movie of Hollywood would reach all around the world like a flying bird, and convince millions of people of the American Dream without much effort, at least they see how the people in the movie are living and having fun, while they are troubling in their own countries.

American Dream is somehow simple, and affordable (specially in the US), it states that everyone should be rich and happy!

In fact happiness includes everything else, like freedom, education, dynamic laws, bla bla bla…

But the most important thing, is to be rich…

That’s why America had to fight many wars, in many far areas around the world.. you have to spend trillions of dollars in times of wars to make benefit of much more trillions in times of peace.

America chose to start many wars under the name of freedom, equality, and democracy, in many nations like Iraq, Afghanistan, and others, but most of these wars were a need for the survival of the US, not a need for the people of these countries.

But Why?

America is like a lion. The lion has to prove its strength with the time, or other lions will simply eat him. These other lions include, China, Russia, Europe (ya, if they have the chance, they will do it).

There is one rule that was never broken: it’s impossible for a lion to last forever.

Through the history, many of the greatest civilizations were decomposed, altered, or simply destroyed. Islamic Civilization, Rome, Britain, and other very big nations, simply vanished.

Maybe yes, there are great chances for some of these civilizations to come back, and be the lion of the world, but when, we can’t predict yet.

As we might ask, what would the US directly benefit from fighting in Mideast, and What is the relation between the US and Palestine?

In the next post of this series, we’ll know isA.

// isA: in shaa’ Allah = If God Wishes or God Willing (in Arabic Language).