Hebron Etzion
_______ Bloc Betar Jerusalem
/Kiryat \ _______ ______ _____________
/ Arba \ / Efrat \ / \ / \_______
___/ \____/ \__/ \____/ Maaleh Adumim
######### #### #### # Tekoa ______
# # # # # # # # _____ / \
# # # # # ### ##### / \ / \
# # # # # # # # # _/ \____/ \_
### ## #### #### # #
"Rebuilding Jewish Life in Judea, Israel"
***********************************************************************
JUDEA ELECTRONIC MAGAZINE Vol.10, No.5 Tishrei-Heshvan 5763/Sep-Oct 2002
***********************************************************************
Website: http://www.womeningreen.org/judea OUR 10TH YEAR!
Contents:
* We Won
* Why We Live In Israel
* Religious, a Mother, and an Officer in the Border Patrol
* Muslim Scholars Say Jerusalem is Holy Only to Jews
* Going Home to Gaza
* New Jewish Neighborhood in Eastern Jerusalem
* More Jews Moving into Arab Musrara
* A New Resident in Yesha
* The Mohamad A-Dura Affair: One of the Biggest Frauds in Media History
* Remembering the Contribution of North Americans in Israel
* So What will Be?: Palestinian Statehood Fades / About the Palestinian
Refugees / A Palestinian State? Never!
***********************************************************************
WE WON
Charley J. Levine
Our own personal war against terror is far from over, but the truth
is that we have reached a certain point of historical gravity and come
out the other side victorious. We have been so understandably
preoccupied with day-to-day threats and bloodletting that we have lost
sight of the long-term reality.
The Arab violence is winding down. Six months ago we were afflicted
virtually non-stop with daily suicide bombers.
The Palestinian infrastructure was dealt a huge blow. Since the IDF
moved into previously untouched Palestinian hotbeds of violence after
the Pessah attack in Netanya, the situation on the ground has changed
dramatically. A high proportion of terrorists in the top and secondary
leadership tiers have been eliminated or arrested.
Arafat's credibility has crashed. Less than one year ago, a globe-
trotting, legendary symbol of revolutionary chic, Arafat today is a
pathetic figure holding court in his incredibly shrinking impromptu
prison compound. Compare Arafat to Sharon's reshaped image: trustworthy
confidante of President Bush, cooperative partner in the evolving
military campaign against Iraq, stable leader of his beleaguered but
determined people.
We have won this phase of the struggle. All the rest - and it might
still take a while - is basically a mop-up operation.
(_Jerusalem Post_, In Jerusalem, 4 Oct 02, p. 6)
***********************************************************************
WHY WE LIVE IN ISRAEL
Sherri Mandell
Two weeks ago Sgt. Ari Yehoshua Weiss, 21, the son of American
immigrants Rabbi Stewart and Susie Weiss from Ra'anana, was killed in
Nablus. I had met Susie and Stewart just a few weeks earlier, when they
invited me to speak in Ra'anana at the outreach center where Stuart is
the rabbi. I spoke about losing my son Koby to terrorism a year ago -
how the pain is staggering but with enough support and love from others,
you can go on and find meaning in the tragedy.
At Ari's funeral, Stewart explained that Ari was named after the
lion because he and Susie wanted him to be a strong, courageous person,
and Yehoshua (Joshua)because they wanted him to be a leader. His parents
chose his name so that the initials of his first and middle name formed
the initials of Eretz Israel.
At the shiva, [the weeklong mourning period], Susie told me that
when I spoke in Ra'anana, she thought she could relate to my pain. Now
she knows that she had had no inkling. It is pain that you keep drowning
in, over and over.
All parents that make aliyah to Israel know that by coming here,
they take the horrible risk of losing a child, of entering this pain.
Before my husband and I made aliyah, Rabin and Arafat had their famous
handshake and we naively hoped that maybe our sons would not have to go
to war. Instead, my 13-year-old son Koby and his friend Yosef Ish-Ran
were killed by terrorists, stoned to death in a cave near our home in
Tekoa.
We never thought it would happen to us though. Nobody does. You
couldn't make aliyah if you thought that you would be the one.
Still, every new immigrant knows the risks, even before these past 2
years of violence. And we still come. Why?
Recently I spoke with a group of people from a synagogue in Florida
who were on a solidarity mission to support Israel. One of the women
explained that she'd been to visit Israel last winter and in June and in
September. I asked her why she came. She thought for a moment before
replying that it was like "visiting a sick relative in the hospital."
That answer didn't sit well with me. Yes we are suffering. But
regardless of the enormity and magnitude of the pain, we do not live in
a hospital. No matter how bitter our experience, we aren't sick and
neither are our kids. You can see the beauty of the children in this
country and know that, despite our perilous situation, we and our
children thrive.
One new immigrant told me that when she lived abroad she felt that
life passed in front of her. Here she says, "Life passes through me."
If being Jewish is the deepest part of us, then living here feeds
that part of ourselves. But there is a terrible and tragic price to pay
for living here, for loving this country. No death of a child here is
embraced. Our sacrifice is not one we seek or give willingly.
The meaning of the word "Israel" is - "he who struggles." By living
here we are part of the struggle for the Jewish homeland. That struggle
is as old as Jewish history. That struggle is not yet over. In this
struggle, we need to remind ourselves of this: We brought our children
here to live more fully, to love more, to give more - not to die, not to
be killed.
Susie and Stewart can teach us about this love. During the week of
Rosh Hashana, after speaking to Ari who was stationed in Nablus, and
hearing he was hungry, Susie spontaneously organized local merchants and
friends to donate a feast for the 35 boys in Ari's unit. In one day, she
collected shwarma, and cartons of soda, and cookies, and enough food to
feed an army, literally. Susie's love is what fed the boys in the army
in Nablus that night.
We cannot allow death to constrict our vision or limit our love. Ari
can still lead us if we remember the real reason we moved here: just as
the pain is greater here, so is the love.
(20 Oct 02, Arutz 7; Sherri Mandell can be reached at
Info@KobyMandell.org)
***********************************************************************
RELIGIOUS, A MOTHER, AND AN OFFICER IN THE BORDER PATROL
Elyashiv Reichner
"During my first three months of pregnancy I continued running with
full pack." Meet Lt. Shifra Buchris (nee Ginsburg), who until 5 years
ago was a young settler from Beit El, a graduate of the ulpana
(religious girl's high school) in Ofra, and today, at age 24, heads the
Border Police station in Dimona that is responsible for a section of the
northern Negev, and is the mother of a baby daughter (age 1 1/2).
"I enlisted in 1997 into the course for the Border Patrol, and my
sister also served in the Border Patrol. In Beit El there were those who
said I was influencing the girls to join the army, and in the religious
sector more girls are going into the army today.
"There are boys who are suitable for combat and boys that are not.
It is exactly the same for girls. Everyone needs to serve their country,
each according to their nature and their abilities. For most girls who
come to me for advice, I recommend the army, even if not the Border
Police, because this is an Israeli experience that is a shame to miss
out on.
"During riots and rock throwing, I've found myself in situations
where I ran ahead alone and the boys with me took cover behind the jeep.
So I don't see that my being a girl has a bad influence on the fighters.
The opposite, it spurs them on. You see a girl running and so you run
too. The soldier says to himself: If that girl isn't afraid, then I'm
not afraid."
(_Makor Rishon_ Magazine, 4 Oct 02, p. 21+)
***********************************************************************
MUSLIM SCHOLARS SAY JERUSALEM IS HOLY ONLY TO JEWS
Ayelet Kedem
Dr. Nissim Dana, Middle East expert at the College of Judea and
Samaria in Ariel, is seeking to prove that the relationship between Jews
and their land - and between Islam and Judaism - is protected by the
Koran.
Searching among the 114 sections of the Koran, he found 30 sections
that relate in some way to Jews and their land, as well as 120 koranic
interpretations dealing with these sections.
"The Koran always speaks of Jews negatively," says Dana, but there
is no doubt of their right to the land. "The Koran makes a clear
distinction. It speaks negatively of Jews, but not of Judaism and its
relation to the land. There are three or four different places in the
Koran where Allah tells Moses that the Land of Israel belongs to the
people of Israel. Even more so, the interpreters speak of the future
land of the people of Israel from the Euphrates to the Nile."
Aldawari Ahmed, who died in 1895, wrote that the al-Aqsa Mosque is
built on the ruins of the Temple of King Solomon. Ali al-Kari wrote in
the 17th century: "The liars who raise the importance of Jerusalem are
growing. And the fact is that the Temple was built by Solomon previous
to the al-Aqsa Mosque."
Dahan has even found writings, such as that of Even Timiya in the
14th century, that relate to the Temple Mount as a place holy only to
Jews.
(_Makor Rishon_ Yoman, 23 Aug 02, p. 4)
***********************************************************************
GOING HOME TO GAZA
Matt Rees
Orit Cohen hobbles angrily away from the house as fast as her
prosthetic foot will take her. The 13-year-old doesn't want photos taken
of the injury she suffered 22 months ago when a roadside bomb blew up
her school bus. From the doorstep, her father Ophir calmly watches her
go. He knows she can't run far. Her leg is still weak, and in any case
no one ventures alone outside Kfar Darom, an isolated Israeli settlement
in the Gaza Strip, a tiny fortress under constant threat of Palestinian
attack.
Three of Ophir Cohen's eight children lost limbs in the bus bombing,
an incident that shook his commitment to stay in Kfar Darom, a
settlement of 51 families. But after living near Tel Aviv for 21 months
during the children's rehabilitation, Cohen and his wife Noga brought
their family back. "It wasn't easy," says Cohen, watching Yisrael, 8,
roll by awkwardly on skates. The boy has a prosthetic leg to replace the
one he lost just below the knee. "But if you believe this is your land,
you know you belong here." Ideological settlers like Cohen believe
they're living on land God gave to the Jews, as recorded in scripture.
The Cohens' return to Kfar Darom is a sign of the growing defiance
among Israel's 7,000 Gaza Strip settlers and their 200,000 counterparts
in the West Bank. Though settlers are prime targets for attacks, given
their proximity to Palestinian communities and the animus their presence
evokes, Israelis are still moving into the territories for ideological
reasons or for the financial incentives the government offers, such as
income-tax breaks and cut-rate mortgages. Since the outbreak of the
latest Palestinian uprising two years ago, the settler population in the
West Bank has risen 4.8%, more than double the increase in the overall
number of Israelis. In the 20 Gaza settlements, 242 new families have
moved in, adding to the 1,155 families there. Only 25 families have
left. Twelve years ago, Ophir Cohen left Jerusalem and was one of the
first settlers to move to Kfar Darom, a community of Orthodox Jews. All
his children, except the eldest, Orit, were born there. From the
beginning, the settlement was ringed with machine-gun emplacements. With
today's heightened dangers, it is now hedged by tanks and 3.5-meter
concrete barriers. On Nov. 20, 2000, the Cohen children boarded their
bus to the nearest school, in a settlement two miles away. The bus had
barely left the compound when Cohen heard a thunderous boom. He rushed
to the scene. By the time soldiers allowed him through, an ambulance had
taken away three of his children. Inside the bus, Cohen saw the corpses
of two adults. With that image in his mind, he drove fast to find his
children at the hospital in Beersheba.
Orit and Yisrael each lost one limb; Tehila, who is now 10, lost
both legs below the knee. During the kids' recuperation at a hospital
near Tel Aviv, victims maimed in other attacks visited the kids to show
them how well prosthetic limbs could work. Cohen and his wife weren't
sure they would ever return to Kfar Darom. The terror strikes kept
mounting. The big suicide bombings in Israel's cities grabbed the
headlines, but attacks on settlers were far more frequent. Of the 624
Israelis killed in the past two years, a disproportionately high 125
were settlers, and 70 were Israeli soldiers.
Still, the Cohens felt a religious and national duty to ignore the
dangers. So they returned to find Kfar Darom's population had increased.
The settlement's most recent addition: eight prefabricated apartments
with roofs reinforced against the mortars that Palestinian militants
shoot toward Kfar Darom most nights. A new school had been built in the
settlement so local children don't have to risk the roads each morning.
But not every danger can be guarded against. On a recent afternoon, a
rocket-propelled grenade hit the army guard post at the edge of Kfar
Darom, punching a grapefruit-size hole in the reinforced concrete turret
where a soldier usually stands watch. This is the Cohen family's welcome
home.
(_Time Magazine_, 7 Oct 02,
http://www.time.com/time/europe/magazine/article/0,13005,901021007-
356056,00.html?cnn=yes
***********************************************************************
NEW JEWISH NEIGHBORHOOD IN EASTERN JERUSALEM
Avi Peled
In two years, the first residents will move into the new Jewish
neighborhood of Golden View (Nof Zahav), overlooking the Temple Mount
and the Mount of Olives. The neighborhood is located on undeveloped
Jewish-owned land near Jerusalem's Jewish East Talpiot and Arab Jebel
Mukabar neighborhoods.
Directing the project is former Israel Police Chief Arye Amit, today
director general of the Digal company, legal owners of the land.
Immediately after the Six-Day War a Jerusalem contractor saw the
potential of the area and began to acquire land. The legal process took
30 years and was completed by his sons.
According to Amit, the residents of neighboring Jebel Mukabar do not
oppose the new neighborhood since they are sure to benefit from improved
services. "We will link them to sewage treatment and bring in a modern
infrastructure of roads, lighting, underground communication cables, and
more."
(_Arutz 7 Weekly_, #9, 12 Sep 02, p. 4)
***********************************************************************
MORE JEWS MOVING INTO ARAB MUSRARA
Nadav Shragai
The police are preparing for another takeover by a Jewish family
of a property in Arab Musrara in Jerusalem, between Damascus Gate and
Hanevi'im Street, after a court ruled an Arab family claiming ownership
does not have the rights to the property that was owned by Jews before
the state was founded.
A court order to expropriate the house from Arabs claiming ownership
was issued at the request of the heirs of the Jewish people who owned
the property up until the declaration of the state, and a purchaser of
the property. They are backed by one of several non-profit organizations
run by MK Benny Elon (National Union-Yisrael Beiteinu), with the purpose
of gaining Jewish footholds in and around the Old City, as Elon says, to
prevent the division of Jerusalem.
The history of the property is similar to other properties the
Jewish non-profit organizations have already acquired. Originally
Jewish, it was rented to Arabs before the War of Independence and in
1948, when the city was divided, it came under the control of the
Jordanian Guardian of Enemy Property, which leased it to the heirs of
the original post-1948 renter. After the Six-Day War, control of the
property reverted to the Israeli Guardian of Property.
Arab Musrara already has two Jewish families, and the house in
contention is expected to accommodate four more families. A few months
ago, court orders resulted in the expulsion of 12 Arab families in the
Shimon Hatzadik neighborhood, where Jews lived in the past. Elon and his
organizations say their plan is to populate the area between Sheikh
Jarrah and Musrara with Jews.
The Nahalat Shimon site in the Musrara area will be the ninth
eastern Jerusalem Jewish residential area established outside of the
major government-sponsored housing complexes built after the 1967 war.
The others include Jewish residences in the Muslim Quarter of the Old
City; St. John's Hostel in the Christian Quarter; the City of David-
Silwan; Beit Orot on the Mount of Olives; Ras al Amud; Shimon Hatzadik;
Arab Musrara; and Abu Tor, where Irving Moskowitz bought a house in the
Arab part of the village.
(_Ha'aretz_, 4 Oct 02)
***********************************************************************
A NEW RESIDENT IN YESHA
Despite the difficulties faced by residents of Yesha (Judea, Samaria
and Gaza) over the past two years, its population has increased at a
faster pace than that of the rest of the country. Arutz-7's Haggai
Segal spoke today with one of the newer residents, Dr. Gideon Ehrlich of
Bar-Ilan University, who moved to the relatively isolated community of
Negohot, west of Hevron, close to a year ago:
Q: Up to about two years ago, the only way to travel to Negohot was
through [PLO-controlled] Area A?
Ehrlich: To tell you the truth, I don't exactly recognize Areas A,
B, or C; they have no significance for me. In general, there are
definitely many Arabs in this area....I don't agree with the use of the
word Palestinian. I myself was born in Palestine. Creating a concept of
a "Palestinian nation" causes us only trouble, and there is no point in
using the word over and over....We moved here about a year ago from
Kiryat Ono, near Petach Tikvah.
Q: Why?
Ehrlich: It started from a gathering organized by the Southern
Hevron Hills communities entitled "Together on the Mountain." We saw
there a few things that seemed to emphasize a differentiation between
two types of population - those who lived in Yesha and those who didn't.
For instance, they put on a play showing a girl who was preparing her
Bat Mitzvah celebration, and little by little her relatives called with
various excuses about why they couldn't attend....In addition, when the
event was over, we all drove away, many cars together on the road, and
suddenly we reached an intersection, and all the cars with us turned
right to the various communities of the southern Hevron area, while we
were the only ones to turn left, the only ones going towards the "other"
part of Israel....We felt the separation very strongly at that moment,
and we said to ourselves that if so, we choose to be with the "Yesha"
population....We began to look for a place to live in Yesha where we
could bring some benefit - not just to [a place] where we would just
increase the statistics - and we found that Negohot could be that place.
At the time, it only had about 12 families; now there are about 22-24.
Q: The families there are pretty young....Are you the oldest?
Ehrlich: Yes, we're the oldest, but the difference is really not
that great; almost everyone here is at least ten years older than our
grandchildren.
Q: Do your own grandchildren come to visit you?
Ehrlich: Yes, certainly. By the way, most of them also live in Judea
and Samaria.
Q: What did your colleagues in the Computer Science Department at
Bar-Ilan University say about your move?
Ehrlich: They saw it as something very natural. Most of them support
that which helps the People of Israel hold fast onto their Land, and
some of them live in Yesha, and in general it was quite natural.
Q: How do you see the future?
Ehrlich: My view in general does not differentiate between the two
sides of the 1949-1967 ceasefire lines. But the Arabs will not stop
exactly at the borders that were agreed upon in Lake Success in 1949
[the post-Independence War ceasefire lines, known today as the Green
Line]. This was not a line that anyone really agreed upon or recognized;
there was even a dispute shortly afterwards about whether Israel should
settle the Lachish region [between Ashkelon and Judea]....Once the Arabs
get to the Green Line, they'll continue further towards the Blue Line,
i.e., the coastline; the Arabs simply do not accept our presence
here....We must go forward with the confidence that this country is for
the Jews to come back home to - a true Ingathering of the Exiles.
(Arutz Sheva News Service, 5 Sep 02,
http://www.IsraelNationalNews.com)
***********************************************************************
THE MOHAMAD A-DURA AFFAIR: ONE OF THE BIGGEST FRAUDS IN MEDIA HISTORY
Interview with Nahum Shahaf, Chief Israeli Investigator
Nahum Shahaf: I'm a scientist, a physicist specializing in
ballistics and the technology of filming images. I was appointed on this
basis. Aside from myself there was another civilian specialist and two
Israeli army officers. In addition, we drew on the expertise of dozens
of scientists who specialized in different aspects of the inquiry.
We did hundreds of hours of questioning with most of the people
involved in the incident - cameramen, many doctors, Palestinians and
Israelis — we did a meticulous re-enactment of the events and analyzed
shooting angles; we collected hours of film, audio tapes, and written
documents; and I can assure you and easily prove to you that the Israeli
soldiers at the Netzarim crossing did not kill Mohamad A-Dura. From
their position there is no way they could have seen Jamal A-Dura and the
child crouching behind him. What's more, there is no possible shooting
trajectory between the Israeli soldiers' position and the place where
Jamal and the child were sitting.
Q: The father and his child were hit by Palestinian gunfire?
Shahaf: It is more accurate to say that the only people who were
shooting in the direction of Jamal A-Dura and the child were in fact
Palestinians but they aimed just to the side of their heads to give an
impression of combat underway.
Q: But the France 2 television images show that the child was killed
and the father seriously wounded. Jamal A-Dura had an operation for
these wounds at a hospital in Amman.
Shahaf: Not so. Jamal A-Dura was treated in a Jordanian hospital but
this was for an earlier incident, a hand wound dating back to the
previous intifada. He told me this himself in a recorded statement.
Jamal was not wounded at Netzarim, I have absolute proof.
Q: And his son, Mohamad?
Shahaf: The boy we see in the French TV report is not Mohamad A-
Dura. He's not 12 years old, like Mohamad; he's a bit over 14. He looks
younger because in the reportage and the photo he's sitting on his back,
not his bottom.
Q: And the bloodstains seen in the France 2 report? Not true either?
Shahaf: I can show you a filmed document where you can clearly see
that the impact of a bullet that supposedly hit the boy right in the
stomach is in fact a piece of red cloth, used to look like blood, that
falls onto his shirt as the film is shot. Now you can understand why
the Palestinian Authority won't allow an autopsy of the body and why the
dozens of cameramen who were there couldn't film the ambulance that
supposedly came to evacuate the wounded.
Q: No Mohamad A-Dura, no casualties, no ambulance?
Shahaf: There is no Mohamad A-Dura affair. It's an imposture, picked
up and passed on by unscrupulous Western journalists and exploited to
the dregs by Arab media and all their partisans.
Q: The whole affair was staged?
Shahaf: This is a common technique on the Palestinian side. Didn't
you see the film of the Jenin funeral where the corpse falls off the
stretcher and climbs back on with no help from anyone? Several of these
short films were shot in the Netzarim area on the day before the A-Dura
affair, as on that day and the following days. They had directors,
cameramen, and volunteer actors. We found these films. You can see them
shooting little horror scenes. Often the director gets angry at the
volunteers for their bad acting. The wounded get up and go back for
another take, Palestinians who are watching laugh and clap their hands.
Of course I can make all these rushes available to you. By the way, on
one of the rushes you can clearly distinguish France 2 cameraman Talal
Abou Rahma actively taking part in shooting one of these scenes.
Q: The A-Dura episode is one of these morbid scenarios?
Shahaf: Absolutely. In shots where you see the so-called seriously
wounded father and the dead child you can clearly distinguish the script
boy in front of the camera signaling with his fingers that it's the
second take!
We had enough time to get all the filmed evidence and testimony that
established with sufficient proof what really happened that day at
Netzarim. Including the cameraman of the little scene, France 2
cameraman Talal Abou Rahma, who declared on a document I recorded that
he never affirmed, and no Palestinians affirmed, that it was the
Israelis who killed Mohamad A-Dura! Talal Abou Rahma got many prizes for
his coverage of the A-Dura affair, for one of the biggest impostures in
the whole history of audio-visual media.
(Metula News Agency, info@menapress.com, #041809/2 EV, tr. from
French)
***********************************************************************
REMEMBERING THE CONTRIBUTION OF NORTH AMERICANS IN ISRAEL
Judy Lash Balint
On September 10, the Association of Americans and Canadians in
Israel (AACI) held its annual ceremony commemorating those American and
Canadian Israelis killed in acts of terror over the past year at the
AACI Memorial Forest near Shaar Hagai, just off the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem
highway not far from Beit Shemesh.
There are more than 200 names on the simple plaque that nestles
among the pine trees in the forest. Many of those listed are soldiers
who fell defending the country in all the wars since 1947. But over the
past two years of Arab violence, the numbers being added have jumped
dramatically, and they're almost all civilians. This year 25 new names
were engraved on the plaque.
As three AACI members take turns reading short profiles of those who
had fallen, it's difficult to realize that it's less than a year since
Shoshi Ben Yishai, 16, was killed in a bus attack; or that it was only
last February that Keren Shatzky, 14, was murdered one Saturday night
while eating pizza in Karnei Shomron.
Fluttering American and Canadian flags flank a larger Israeli flag
as parents of young terror victims light the memorial torch. U.S. and
Canadian government representatives lay wreaths in front of the memorial
as the recently bereaved families seated in the front row look on.
Several IDF officers, sons of U.S. immigrants, were killed in battle
this past year, most during Operation Defensive Shield. Simcha and
Penina Mellick sit quietly through the ceremony in the back row. In the
alphabetical reading of the fallen, the name of their son Gedalya, is
read right before that of one his closest friends, Matanya Robinson, who
was killed one day before Gedalya last April. Both boys were 21 years
old.
(14 Sept 02)
***********************************************************************
So What will Be?
PALESTINIAN STATEHOOD FADES
Nicole Gaouette
Analysts in Jerusalem say the basic concept underlying Middle East
peace efforts – a state for both peoples – is becoming obsolete. The
idea of co-existing states, based on a land-for-peace formula, has been
the blueprint for peace efforts for more than a decade. But now,
Israelis and Palestinians are increasingly questioning whether an
independent Palestinian entity is even feasible.
"Are they ready to put a stop to terror?" asks Ephraim Inbar, a
political science professor at Bar Ilan University outside Tel Aviv.
"For the time being the answer would be negative and so they have failed
the basic criteria of a state, establishing a monopoly over the use of
power. You can't have a state with militias running around."
Compounding matters is the death of mutual trust. Polls show most
Palestinians don't think this conflict can be solved peacefully and that
support for militant Islamic parties, which advocate Israel's
destruction, is growing.
Among Israelis, more people are talking about the concept of
"transfer," literally moving Palestinians to another country. At the
grassroots level, bumper stickers around Jerusalem urge people to
"Deport the [expletives]."
Among the intelligentsia, prominent historian Benny Morris writes
about the historical "logic of transfer," while former leftwing
stalwarts like author A.B. Yehoshua now espouse the idea.
(_Christian Science Monitor_, 23 Oct 02;
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1023/p06s01-wome.html)
***********************************************************************
Sample from Daily Alert - http://www.jcpa.org/daily
ABOUT THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES
Ruth Lapidoth
The number of Arab refugees in 1949 was between 538,000 (Israeli
sources), 720,000 (UN estimates), and 850,000 (Palestinian sources). By
2001, the number of refugees registered with and supported by UNRWA had
grown to about 3.5 million.
The UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees does not
include descendents in its definition of refugees, nor does it apply to
a person who "has acquired a new nationality, and enjoys the protection
of the country of his new nationality." Under this definition, the
number of Palestinians qualifying for refugee status would be well below
half a million.
UN General Assembly Resolution 194 of 11 December 1948 does not
recognize any "right" to return, but recommends that the refugees
"should" be "permitted" to return, subject to two conditions - that the
refugee wishes to return, and that he wishes to live at peace with his
neighbors. The violence that erupted in September 2000 forecloses any
hope for a peaceful co-existence between Israelis and masses of
returning refugees.
UN General Assembly Resolution 393 of 2 December 1950 recommended
the "reintegration of the refugees into the economic life of the Near
East, either by repatriation or resettlement."
Security Council Resolution 242 of 22 November 1967 affirms the
necessity "for achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem." The
Council did not propose a specific solution, nor did it limit the
provision to Arab refugees, probably because the right to compensation
of Jewish refugees from Arab lands also deserves a "just settlement."
(Jerusalem Viewpoints - Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs;
http://www.jcpa.org/jl/vp485.htm)
***********************************************************************
A PALESTINIAN STATE? NEVER!
Jan Willem van der Hoeven
As soldiers are brutally lynched; as holocaust survivors are
massacred while sitting at their traditional Passover meal; as whole
families are killed or wounded while enjoying pizza in a downtown
restaurant; as soldiers and innocent civilians are burned alive in the
bus that was supposed to take them home - all these actions that,
according to the polls, are supported and acclaimed by more than half of
the Palestinian people; some still consider offering part of God's holy
land, promised to Israel, to this 'nation' of killers, lynchers, and
callous snipers of infants, children, and parents.
This is the height of absurdity. No nation in the world would ever
do such a thing!
Far better, surely, is the solution put forward in 1957 by none
other than the official Advisor on Refugees to the World Council of
Churches, Elfan Rees, who writes in _The Refugee Problem Today and
Tomorrow_:
"I hold the view that, political issues aside, the Arab refugee
problem is by far the easiest postwar refugee problem to solve by
integration. By faith, by language, by race and by social organization,
they are indistinguishable from their fellows of the host countries.
There is room for them, and land for them, in Syria and in Iraq. There
is a developing demand for the kind of manpower that they represent.
More unusually still, there is the money to make this integration
possible. The United Nations General Assembly, five years ago, voted a
sum of 200 million dollars to provide 'homes and jobs' for the Arab
refugees. That money remains unspent, not because these tragic people
are strangers in a strange land, because they are not; not because there
is no room for them to be established, because there is; but simply for
political reasons."
(The author is Director of the International Christian Zionist
Center, Jerusalem; October 24, 2002)
***********************************************************************
*** BACK ISSUES ***
1993 - Vol. 1: Issues 1.1-1.6 1998 - Vol. 6: Issues 6.1-6.6
1994 - Vol. 2: Issues 2.1-2.6 1999 - Vol. 7: Issues 7.1-7.6
1995 - Vol. 3: Issues 3.1-3.6 2000 - Vol. 8: Issues 8.1-8.6
1996 - Vol. 4: Issues 4.1-4.6 2001 - Vol. 9: Issues 9.1-9.6
1997 - Vol. 5: Issues 5.1-5.6 2002 - Vol. 10: Issues 10.1-10.5
Back issues are available through the JUDEA website:
http://www.womeningreen.org/judea/index1.htm
To SUBSCRIBE (free), send an e-mail message with "subscribe" as the
subject to: amiel2@womeningreen.org.
JUDEA Magazine is a bi-monthly electronic magazine produced and
transmitted from Judea, Israel, specializing in stories about the
rebirth of Jewish life in a tiny and unique corner of civilization. Mail
address: Judea Magazine, Yael and Mark Ami-El, Editors; Tekoa; D.N.
North Judea, Israel. JUDEA Magazine is offered without charge on the
Internet. All material may be reprinted with attribution to JUDEA
Magazine and original source as cited. Comments are welcome by e-mail
to: amiel2@womeningreen.org
***********************************************************************