Indicted Yet Commits Other Crimes

Ayoon Wa Azan

Jihad el-Khazen Al-Hayat - 21/11/06//


How is a small country like Israel able to face the entire world? How can it be accused, indicted and yet commits the same crimes the next day? Before answering these questions, I should first give the reader a glimpse of the world's opinion of Israel:

• The UN General Assembly condemned Israel's disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force in its attack on the Gaza Strip. Some 156 countries voted for the resolution; seven opposed and six abstained.The figures are misleading. The countries that voted against the resolution were the US, Israel and Australia (the Australian right-wing prime minister is at loggerheads with the Muslims in his country), Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Nauru and Palau. In other words, the whole world condemned Israel, as the Pacific islands are no more than just that - Islands, not countries - and they do what the US wants.

• The new UN Human Rights Council (HRC) condemned Israel for its brutal military action in the Gaza Strip. Indeed, the HRC has issued so far three resolutions - all of them against Israel.

• The International Court of Justice issued a resolution two years ago that condemned Israel and called on it to implement the Fourth Geneva Convention in the occupied territories. Last summer, Amnesty International and the Human Rights Watch (HRW) denounced Israel's wars on the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.

• Former US President Jimmy Carter published a new book, called 'Palestine Peace not Apartheid', in which he holds Israel responsible for the failure of the peace process and calls for the application of International Law on the Palestinians in the occupied territories. He also shows that Israel has not offered, contrary to its claims, a deal for the withdrawal from all the occupied territories except for 5%. He quoted former Israeli Prime Minister at the time, Ehud Barak, as saying that he had not offered anything because he realized that peace would not be achieved.
• France, Spain and Italy announced a plan to send an international force to the Gaza Strip to stop Israeli attacks there.
• Israeli groups for the defense of Palestinians in the occupied territories confirm that Israel has killed in the past six years around 3500 Palestinian civilians, including more than 700 minors less than 5 years of age. International organizations announced that Israel killed in the July War on Lebanon about 1140 Lebanese civilians, 30% of whom were children under 12 years of age.
How can Israel survive?It can survive because there is a pro-Israeli cabal in the US that managed to steer US foreign policy, destroy Iraq, and support the daily killings and destruction of the Palestinians and the entire region.

The whole world condemned Israel in the UN General Assembly. John R. Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN, accused anti-Israeli extremists of trying to "transform the organization into a forum that is little more than a self-serving and polemical attack against Israel or the US."
I say that Bolton is an extremist who will arouse hostility against the US, and that Israel is led by an extremist government that kills civilians and exercises collective punishment.

Bolton also said that the HRW has been focusing on Israel since its inception, and that it ignores the violations of human rights in Burma, Darfur, North Korea and other countries.

I say this is the weakest and meanest form of defense. It is true that there are violations of human rights around the world. But the violation of human rights in some places does not mean that Israel should be allowed to commit them in the occupied territories. The focus of the UN General Assembly and the HRC on Israel is judgment passed by the international community that cannot be refuted by an extremist like Bolton.

The ambassador, whose appointment was rejected by the senators themselves, is not alone in his support for Israel, which has committed Nazi-like crimes. I rejoiced at the Democrats' victory in Congress, just because their win is considered a defeat for the Bush administration and a popular condemnation of the US war on Iraq.

However, the new Congress will definitely not be any better for the Arabs or the Palestinians. The Democrats' victory means that Rep. Tom Lantos, a Jew of Hungarian origin and a pro-Israeli to the core, will be chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House of Representatives. I challenge anyone to argue that Lantos voted in support of any Arab and Muslim issue: he has been always against us. Last summer, he, as well as many other pro-Israeli representatives, was behind a draft resolution that praised Israel's longstanding commitment to minimizing civilian losses and welcomed Israel's continued efforts to prevent civilian casualties; even though 90% of the victims were Lebanese civilians. This means that Lantos participated with Israel in the mass murder, and then showed contempt for the victims.

At least the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Senate will be Joe Biden, more moderately committed to Israel. The Senate never inspires confidence; the Democrats won a one-seat majority. It is in the hands of Senator Joseph Lieberman, who was ostracized by the Democrats and returned to the Democrats' ranks. Like Lantos, Biden, and the rest of the gang, Lieberman is pro-Israeli and his record of voting in support of Israel is like that of Lantos'.
There is the new President of Congress, Nancy Pelosi. She is a liberal, and moderate. In all matters except Israel and its crimes, she enthusiastically supported it, to the extent of opposing the Roadmap in 2003 and attacking Carter's recent book.

Israel kills and destroys, and the whole world condemns it, but the US protects it, and so both are condemned. Opinion polls in Europe showed that the US is a threat to world peace. Other polls in the US have shown that a clear majority of the Americans is anxious about the world's hostility to their country. Therefore, the issue is not restricted to Arabs and Muslims.
This situation will not change as long as US foreign policy is controlled by Israel and its cabal, as well as Congress, whether the Republicans or the Democrats are the majority.

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http://english.daralhayat.com/opinion/OPED/11-2006/Article-20061121-0a8025c8-c0a8-10ed-01a4-77df26867b45/story.html