If there's smoke, there's no cease-fire
Israel's propaganda machine worked overtime this week and proved
its efficacy. The prime minister, the foreign minister, intelligence officers,
officials and spokesmen changed overnight from a fight for a cease-fire to
a fight against a cease-fire initiative. For many months, they told the entire
world that it's a waste of paper to reach a cease-fire with the Palestinian
Authority, explaining that Tanzim and Fatah leaders are in control of the
street, along with Hamas. They claimed that with one hand, PA Chairman Yasser
Arafat signs condemnations of terror and with the other signs fat checks that
he shoves into the pockets of the terrorists. Some backed their claims by
saying that even Alistair Crooke, the head of the EU security team in the
territories whose integrity and professionalism is unassailable, says that
there's no value to a cease-fire that doesn't include at least the Tanzim.
But when a unilateral declaration for a cease-fire, an initiative that rose
from the deepest of the grassroots of the Tanzim and Fatah, was presented
to them, everyone made a mockery of it. They weren't impressed by Arafat and
his associates jumping on the bandwagon driven by Fatah's Hussein a Sheikh
and his associates, because Arafat et al fear being shoved off the road by
the young leadership. After we heard, unceasingly, that everything is under
Arafat's thumb, Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer announced to the Knesset's
Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that the cease-fire was initiated by
local leaders, and that they have no influence over the terrorists.
`Top-secret' proof
So, what should we understand from Crooke putting his personal and professional
reputation on the cease-fire? Really, how can we use European evidence, and
from someone named Crooke? It's enough that "most top-secret" proof exists
that the people who signed the article meant for the American, Israeli and
Arabic press are irrelevant. It's a shame that everything can't be revealed,
otherwise we'd all understand that the entire matter of a cease-fire against
all Israeli civilians is nothing more than a hollow lifesaver for Arafat.
We ignorant laymen have to believe them, just as we're supposed to believe
that nobody took into consideration that a ton of explosives dropped into
a crowded residential neighborhood might end in a disaster. But since the
"material" in this case is classified "top secret," there's no way to know
whether Israeli intelligence, which knew of every step that Salah Shehadeh
and his guests took, also knew that the Tanzim held a meeting last weekend
with Hamas in which they discussed, among other things, sending Shehadeh away
on a very long vacation. In other words, in discussions between EU representatives
and Ahmed Yassin, the Hamas leader was told that it won't be enough for the
political wing of the Hamas to join the agreement, the military wing also
has to sign on.
The agreement was that a declaration would be postponed until Hamas's military
wing, based in Damascus, adopt Yassin's recommendation to sign the declaration.
On Monday night, less than two hours before the bombing struck Shehadeh's
neighborhood, the Palestinians and Europeans involved in the move believed
the reaction would be positive. To create some facts on the ground, Yassin
and his people gave interviews to the Arab press in which they offered a
hudna, a truce, in exchange for an Israeli withdrawal to the June 4, 1967
lines.
There were days when such statements would take over the front-page headlines
of the press and result in a noisy debate in political and media circles in
Israel. The possibility that the six Israelis shot dead by terrorists after
the Gaza attack were victims of a vengeance attack by Palestinians for the
death of the children in Gaza went ignored. The odd accusation by Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon deliberately used
the Shehadeh assassination to undermine the cease-fire also barely drew notice.
Yossi Beilin, back this week from talks in Washington, says that the cease-fire
attempt and the Gaza bombing were the talk of the town wherever he went -
the National Security Council, the State Department and Congress. He says
that he was asked if it was an accident that for a third time, Sharon ordered
such an operation just as the chances for a cease-fire begin to take shape.
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Letter for an American editor
The heads of the Fatah and Tanzim movements planned to send
the following letter to one of the major U.S. newspapers last Tuesday. They
put it on hold after Israel's assassination of Saleh Shehadeh in Gaza.
We know that the names on this article are unknown to most Americans. And
we understand, because we read your newspapers and watch your news shows,
how you feel about us. We are a "gang" and a "bunch of murderers." We support
and lead political organizations with strange names - Fatah and Tanzim. We
"can't be trusted." But maybe, just this once, you should drop these prejudices
and listen to what we have to say. Here is what we say, directly, to the people
of Israel:
We, from the leaders of the most influential political movements among the
Palestinian people; we, part of those who represent those who, like you, have
been orphaned and widowed; we, who desire the comfort and security of not
just a state but a home - we choose the future. It is in the name of that
future, and in the name of all of those who have lost their lives that we
make this declaration: we will do everything in our power to end attacks on
Israeli civilians, on innocent men, women and children. We will do this without
seeking or demanding any prior gains.
Why now?
The bombings of the last few months have transformed your society. Those bombings
horrified and angered your people, and sent your nation into despair. It
did that to us. It sparked a rethinking of who we are as a people. It marked
a shift in our perceptions - not of you, but of ourselves. For a time we
were able to put this horror out of our minds. We were - and we are - the
oppressed, the dispossessed, and the forgotten, but the fundamental and unalterable
truth of our conflict can be read in our eyes and seen in our heart.
Our eyes look out to see what you are doing to us in our towns and villages
every day, but these same eyes look in at the hardened hearts of our children.
It may take a generation for us to teach our children a new way, to soothe
their bitterness, to erase their hatred, to teach them that there is hope
for the future. But we must begin. It is for them, for their future, that
we have made this historic decision. We are against targeting the innocents.
The truth of our conflict can also be read in our streets. In Gaza a crate
of tomatoes costs the equivalent of twenty cents. But the tomatoes can not
be purchased, for no one can afford them. Our hotels are empty, our restaurants
deserted, our factories closed, our businesses bankrupt, and our children
hungry. And for you? You can survive, for a time, with ten percent inflation,
and growing unemployment, and an army of young men in occupation of a foreign
land.
And soon - perhaps not tomorrow, or next week, or next year - but inevitably
and eventually, your hotels will empty, your factories will close, your businesses
will be bankrupted, your children will go hungry and your soldiers will want
to come home. You have friends in the world who will support you. But not
forever. And wouldn't you rather support yourselves?
There are those, in both of our societies, who will say that this statement
is simply a tactical political maneuver: that we hope to gain political points
to gain political leverage. And they are right. We hope that you will reciprocate
the historic declaration that we here make, and acknowledge the truth of the
statement that "peace cannot be built on a platform of violence against innocents."
Simply, no peace with the occupation. You must cease strangling our cities,
killing our youths, taking our land for your settlements, ripping up our orchards,
humiliating our women and children, detaining our young men in your squalid
camps, and demonizing those we choose to lead us. You have done all of these
things and continue to do them, and you know it. But whether you stop these
practices, or not, we will not shift our declaration. The rivers of blood
that have so embittered our peoples will be stanched. The suicide bombings
will be brought an end. By us. Now.
You, the people of Israel, should understand clearly what we are proposing.
We cannot stop the violence, today, immediately. There are those in our society
who will attempt to undermine and deter our efforts. Some of them, unfortunately,
may succeed. But we will now have the weight of public opinion on our side.
So too, there are those in your society and even at the very top of your government
who may attempt to provoke us. They will try to underestimate this declaration.
They have done so before. These people are our enemies, they must also be
yours. They are the enemies of peace. While provoked, we will do everything
in our power to keep our self-restraint.
You must understand one other thing. We will not stop fighting for our land,
we will not renounce our dream, or betray our birthright. We will continue
to resist your military occupation of our lands and cities, your building
of settlements, your house demolitions, your plan to deport our people.
Your occupation is illegitimate and we will resist it - your soldiers are
occupiers and will be treated as such. This is not a surrender, this is not
a retreat. We will continue to fight every moment of every day for our rights
and for our state. We are certain that we will achieve this, that we will
be victorious. But we will not do so by targeting the innocent.
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