King David Hotel destroyed in 1946
The last shot in the slain Reuter’s cameraman Fadel Shana’s video is that of launching of a shell of an invading Israeli tank in his direction. If situation anywhere can be so dangerous it is just there. Most of the cameramen on ground in Gaza are the deprived and dispossessed Palestinians who work for foreign news agencies to eke out existence. They know too well that there is no chance of survival when caught in a fight. That is why Shana had declined to give lift to a free lance photographer Ashraf Abu Amra “No, I won't take you with me today. It's too dangerous."
But was the situation there any better for any one else. Scores of reporters and activists, including British and American, have been mercilessly struck down by bulldozers or cut down by bullets by the Israeli soldiers with impunity. An American woman protesting against the Israeli drive to demolish Palestinian houses came before the bulldozer and was killed. The scene was caught live on camera. No one felt any remorse even in the US whose citizen she was. Former Prime Minister Golda Meir of Israel called the Arabs as rodent that deserved extermination. The former secretary of state Madam Albright described the killing of innocents Palestinian civilians as price worth paying.
But was the situation there any better for any one else. Scores of reporters and activists, including British and American, have been mercilessly struck down by bulldozers or cut down by bullets by the Israeli soldiers with impunity. An American woman protesting against the Israeli drive to demolish Palestinian houses came before the bulldozer and was killed. The scene was caught live on camera. No one felt any remorse even in the US whose citizen she was. Former Prime Minister Golda Meir of Israel called the Arabs as rodent that deserved extermination. The former secretary of state Madam Albright described the killing of innocents Palestinian civilians as price worth paying.
President Carter in a documentaryIt is puzzling that the Americans who vaunt their love for their own nation so much can swallow all this. It could be that the media is so tightly controlled by the Zionists that they do not allow truth to come out or they have thoroughly brainwashed the American public. It could also be lack of knowledge of the ‘other’ people. But how could it be so when the Americans win the highest number of Nobel Prizes and have the most advanced college and university system. That Palestinians fire rockets in Israeli settlements is deplorable but their argument is that the Israelis have occupied their land and are systematically destroying their houses and resources. That is against the international laws of occupation of a country. It is called slow genocide taking place routinely. Amidst people who have gone through the Holocaust and squirm and wince if someone denies it can be so indifferent!
But there is something amiss here. The former President Jimmy Carter was visiting Middle East. He was talking to Khaled Meshaal the Hamas leader when violence was actually taking place in Gaza. He did a remarkable diplomacy there and yet there are American congressmen who have asked their government to revoke President Carter’s passport! President Carter won Nobel Prize for his work in bringing peace to the Middle East and he is a proven practicing Christian for all his life. He was currently getting the Hamas fighters to stop firing rockets into the Jewish settlements and the release of Gilat Shalit, the Israeli solder kidnapped by Hamas two years ago. Israel chose to fight a war with Hezbollah in the Southern Lebanon to get Shalit back. President Carter was dealing with his contact on both the sides to get hundreds of Palestinians released from Israeli jail in exchange for Shalit and hence preventing another future war.
All that seems to be remote now that on Saturday 19 April there was another eruption. Three Palestinians were gunned down at Karem Shalom crossing and 13 Israeli soldiers wounded. This happened hours before the Jewish week long festival of Passover.
All that seems to be remote now that on Saturday 19 April there was another eruption. Three Palestinians were gunned down at Karem Shalom crossing and 13 Israeli soldiers wounded. This happened hours before the Jewish week long festival of Passover.
The furor over President Carter meeting Khaled Meshaal is a conundrum viewed historically. Former Prime Minister Menachem Begin was a member of a known terrorist organization responsible for the killing of many British during Britain’s mandate over Palestine. President Jimmy Carter had invited him to the White House for peace talk. How come terrorists of one hue are untouchable and of another touchable! The terrorist organization Irgun was the most dreaded one. Palestinians and the British feared them more than the Israelis fearing Hamas today. Begin was assigned by Moshe Sneh (chief of the Haganah General Headquarters) with instructions to blow up the King David
Hotel of Jersalem on July 21, 1946. His team of terrorists dressed as Arab porters carried out the attack. The chief was disguised as a Sudanese. When the debris was cleared on 31 July it was officially announced that 91 people had been killed in the explosion: 28 Britons, 41 Arabs, 17 Jews and 5 others. The British who were targeted condemned the terrorist attack and expressed "their feelings of horror at the base and unparalleled act perpetrated today by a gang of criminals." The man who would become the first President of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, who was then in Paris, joined the chorus of condemnation, and in an interview to the French newspaper 'France Soir', declared that the Irgun was "the enemy of the Jewish people".
Hotel of Jersalem on July 21, 1946. His team of terrorists dressed as Arab porters carried out the attack. The chief was disguised as a Sudanese. When the debris was cleared on 31 July it was officially announced that 91 people had been killed in the explosion: 28 Britons, 41 Arabs, 17 Jews and 5 others. The British who were targeted condemned the terrorist attack and expressed "their feelings of horror at the base and unparalleled act perpetrated today by a gang of criminals." The man who would become the first President of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, who was then in Paris, joined the chorus of condemnation, and in an interview to the French newspaper 'France Soir', declared that the Irgun was "the enemy of the Jewish people".
Do the Israelis really fear anyone, even the Americans? There can be no deterrence here. They easily destroyed the Osirik nuclear plant in Iraq and yet they along with their American friends created such a hype over the nonexistent weapon of mass destruction of Saddam Hussein that the Iraqis are still paying with their life and limbs on daily basis as the world watches it helplessly.
Meanwhile the humanitarian disaster is looming larger and larger in the Gaza strip. As occupying power Israel is indifferent to world opinion. It is turning the screw on the Palestinians almost every week.
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