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| Palestine Chronicle | | The Palestine Chronicle is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization whose mission is to educate the general public by providing a forum that strives to highlight issues of relevance to human rights, national struggles, freedom and democracy in the form of daily news, commentary, features, book reviews, photos, art, and more.
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| | | FEATURED | The Dark Secret of Israel's Stolen Babies By Jonathan Cook - Nazareth http://www.palestinechronicle.com/dark-secret-israels-stolen-babies/
It is Israel's darkest secret - or so argues one Israeli journalist - in a country whose short history is replete with dark episodes. Last month Tzachi Hanegbi, minister for national security, became the first government official to admit that hundreds of babies had been stolen from their mothers in the years immediately following Israel's creation in 1948. In truth, the number is more likely to be in the thousands. For nearly seven decades, successive governments - and three public inquiries - denied there had been any wrongdoing. They concluded that almost all the missing babies had died, victims of a chaotic time when Israel was absorbing tens of thousands of new Jewish immigrants. But as more and more families came forward - lately aided by social media - to reveal their suffering, the official story sounded increasingly implausible. Although many mothers were told their babies had died during or shortly after delivery, they were never shown a body or grave, and no death certificate was ever issued. Others had their babies snatched from their arms by nurses who berated them for having more children than they could properly care for. According to campaigners, as many as 8,000 babies were seized from their families in the state's first years and either sold or handed over to childless Jewish couples in Israel and abroad. To many, it sounds suspiciously like child trafficking. A few of the children have been reunited with their biological families, but the vast majority are simply unaware they were ever taken. Strict Israeli privacy laws mean it is near-impossible for them to see official files that might reveal their clandestine adoption. Did Israeli hospitals and welfare organisations act on their own or connive with state bodies? It is unclear. But it is hard to imagine such mass abductions could have occurred without officials at the very least turning a blind eye. Testimonies indicate that lawmakers, health ministry staff, and senior judges knew of these practices at the time. And the decision to place all documents relating to the children under lock untl 2071 hints at a cover-up. Hanegbi, who was given the task of re-examining the classified material by prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has been evasive on the question of official involvement. "We may never know," he has said. By now, Israel's critics are mostly inured to the well-known litany of atrocities associated with the state's founding. Not least, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from their homeland in 1948 to make way for Israel and its new Jewish immigrants. The story of the stolen babies, however, offers the shock of the unexpected. These crimes were committed not against Palestinians but other Jews. The parents whose babies were abducted had arrived in the new state lured by promises that they would find in Israel a permanent sanctuary from persecution. But the kidnapping of the children and the mass expulsion of Palestinians at much the same time are not unrelated events. In fact, the babies scandal sheds light not only on Israel's past but on its present. The stolen babies were not randomly seized. A very specific group was targeted: Jews who had just immigrated from the Middle East. Most were from Yemen, with others from Iraq, Morocco and Tunisia. The Arabness of these Jews was viewed as a direct threat to the Jewish state's survival, and one almost as serious as the presence of Palestinians. Israel set about "de-Arabising" these Middle Eastern Jews with the same steely determination with which it had just driven out most of the area's Palestinians. Like most of Israel's founding generation, David Ben Gurion, the first prime minister, was from Eastern Europe. He accepted the racist, colonial notions dominant in Europe. He regarded European Jews as a civilized people coming to a primitive, barbarous region. But the early European Zionists were not simply colonists. They were unlike the British in India, for example, who were interested chiefly in subduing the natives and exploiting their resources. If Britain found "taming" the Indians too onerous, as it eventually did, it could pack up and leave. That was never a possibility for Ben Gurion and his followers. They were coming not only to defeat the indigenous people, but to replace them. They were going to build their Jewish state on the ruins of Arab society in Palestine. Scholars label such enterprises - those intending to create a permanent homeland on another people's land - as "settler colonialism". Famously, European settlers took over the lands of North America, Australia and South Africa. The Israeli historian Ilan Pappe has observed that settler colonial movements are distinguished from ordinary colonialism by what he terms the "logic of elimination" that propels them. Such groups have to adopt strategies of extreme violence towards the indigenous population. They may commit genocide, as happened to the Native American peoples and to the Australian Aborigines. If genocide is not possible, they may instead forcefully impose segregation based on racial criteria, as happened in apartheid South Africa. Or they may commit large-scale ethnic cleansing, as Israel did in 1948. They may adopt more than one strategy. Ben Gurion needed not only to destroy Palestinian society, but to ensure that "Arabness" did not creep into his new Jewish state through the back door. The large numbers of Arab Jews who arrived in the first decade were needed in his demographic war against the Palestinians and as a labor force, but they posed a danger too. Ben Gurion feared that, whatever their religion, they might "corrupt" his Jewish state culturally by importing what he called the "spirit of the Levant". Adult Jews from the region, he believed, could not be schooled out of their "primitiveness". But the Zionist leadership hoped the next generation - their offspring - could. They would be reformed through education and the cultivation of a loathing for everything Arab. The task would be made easier still if they were first detached from their biological families. Israeli campaigners seeking justice for the families of the stolen babies point out that the forcible transfer of children from one ethnic group to another satisfies the United Nation's definition of genocide. Certainly, the theft of the Arab Jewish children and their reallocation to European Jews chimed neatly with settler colonialism's logic of elimination. Such abductions were not unique to Israel. Australia and Canada, for example, seized babies from their surviving native populations in a bid to "civilize" them. The "re-education" of Israel's Arab Jews has been largely a success. Netanyahu's virulently anti-Palestinian Likud party draws heavily on this group's backing. In fact, it was only because he dares not alienate such supporters that Netanyahu agreed to a fresh examination of the evidence concerning the stolen babies. But if there is a lesson to be drawn from the government's partial admission about the abductions, it is not that Netanyahu and Israel's European elite are now ready to change their ways. Rather, it should alert Israel's Arab Jews to the fact that they face the same enemy as the Palestinians: a European Jewish establishment that remains resolutely resistant to the idea of living in peace and respect with either Arabs or the region. (A version of this article first appeared in the National, Abu Dhabi.) - Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are "Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East" (Pluto Press) and "Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair" (Zed Books). He contributed this article to PalestineChronicle.com. Visit: www.jonathan-cook.net. |
| EDITORIAL | Divide and Rule: How Factionalism in Palestine is Killing Prospects for Freedom By Ramzy Baroud http://www.palestinechronicle.com/divide-rule-factionalism-palestine-killing-prospects-freedom/
As Palestinians in the Occupied Territories begin preparations for local elections which are scheduled for October, division and factionalism are rearing their ugly head. Palestinian political platforms and social media are abuzz with self-defeating propaganda: Fatah supporters attacking Hamas' alleged failures, and Hamas' supporters doing the same. What is conveniently overlooked by all sides is that the performance of Palestinian municipalities is almost entirely irrelevant in the greater scheme of things. In the West Bank, local councils are governed by strict Israeli-PA arrangements. Aside from very few chores, village and town councils cannot operate without a green light: an endorsement from the Palestinian Authority itself conditioned on a nod from the Israeli occupation authorities. This applies to almost everything: from basic services, to construction permits to digging of wells. All such decisions are predicated upon political stipulation and donors' money, which are also politically-motivated. Blaming a local mayor of a tiny West Bank village that is surrounded by Israeli military walls, trenches and watchtowers, and is attacked daily by armed Jewish settlers, for failing to make a noticeable difference to the lives of the villagers is as ridiculous as it sounds. The local elections, however, are also politically and factionally-driven. Fatah, which controls the PA, is buying time and vying for relevance. No longer having a major role in leading the Palestinians in their quest for freedom, Fatah constantly invents ways to proclaim itself as a relevant force. It can only do so, however, with Israeli permission, donor money and US-Western political backing and validation. Hamas, which might endorse selected candidates but is unlikely to participate in the elections directly, is also embattled. It is under a strict siege in Gaza and its regional politicking proved costly and unreliable. While it is not as corrupt - at least, financially - as Fatah, it is often accused of asserting its power in Gaza through the use of political favoritism. While one must insist on national unity, it is difficult to imagine a successful union between both groups without a fundamental change in the structure of these parties and overall political outlook. In Palestine, factions perceive democracy to be a form of control, power and hegemony, not a social contract aimed at fostering dialogue and defusing conflict. Thus, it is no wonder that supporters of two Fatah factions, one loyal to PA President Mahmoud Abbas and another to Mohammed Dahlan, recently clashed in Gaza. Several were hospitalized after sustaining injuries. Of course, a main case in point remains the civil war of 2007, a year or so after Hamas won parliamentary elections. The Fatah-Hamas political culture failed to understand that the losing party must concede and serve in the opposition, and the victorious party cannot assume the vote as a mandate for factional domination. Other factors contributed to the Palestinian divide. The US, at the behest of Israel, wanted to ensure the collapse of the Hamas government and conditioned its support for Fatah based on the rejection of any unity government. Israel, too, inflicted much harm, restricting the movement of elected MPs, arresting them and eventually entirely besieging Gaza. The European Union and the United Nations were hardly helpful, they could have insisted on the respect of Palestinian voters, but they succumbed under American pressure. However, there can also be no denial that these factors alone should not have jeopardized Palestinian unity, if the factions were keen on it. To appreciate this further, one must look at the experience of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. Although they divide themselves based on factional and ideological affiliations, they tend to exhibit much more solidarity amongst themselves. When a prisoner from a certain group goes on hunger strike, he or she is often joined by a few, tens or even hundreds of other political prisoners from all factions. These prisoners find ways to communicate and transfer messages amongst themselves, even when in solitary confinement or shackled to their beds. They even hold elections in larger prisons to choose their own representatives and issue joint letters to Palestinians outside, calling for unity and a common strategy. If shackled prisoners are able to foster dialogue and adhere to a semblance of unity, those living in Ramallah mansions and those free to travel outside Palestine should be able to do so too. But the truth is, for many within the Palestinian leadership, unity is not an urgent matter and, for them, the ascendancy of the faction will always trump the centrality of the homeland. This is partly because factional politics is deeply rooted in Palestinian society. And like the Israeli occupation, factionalism is an enemy of the Palestinian people. It has constantly overwhelmed any attempt at fostering dialogue and true democracy among Palestinians. It is true that democracy is suffering a crisis in various parts of the world. In Brazil, a parliamentary subversion pushed an elected president out of office. In the UK, Labour Party plotters are entirely discounting the election of a popular leader. In the United States, democracy had been reduced to clichés while powerful elites are bankrolling wealthy candidates who are, more or less, propagating the same ideas. But Palestine is different. It ought to be different. For Palestinian society, dialogue and a degree of a democratic process is essential for any meaningful national unity. Without unity in politics, it is difficult to envisage unity in purpose, a national liberation project, a unified resistance strategy and the eventual freedom of the Palestinians. There can never be a free Palestine without Palestinians first freeing themselves from factional repression, for which they, and only they, are ultimately responsible. For Israel, Palestinian factionalism is a central piece in its strategy to divide and rule. Sadly, many Palestinians are playing along, and by doing so are jeopardizing their own salvation. - Dr Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include "Searching Jenin", "The Second Palestinian Intifada" and his latest "My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza's Untold Story". His website is www.ramzybaroud.net.
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| COMMENTARY | Do Palestinian Refugees Exist? By Mahmoud Zidanhttp://www.palestinechronicle.com/palestinian-refugees-exist/
The 2016 Olympic Games, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, have been marred by several dark spots from the get-go: the hyperbolised spread of the Zika virus in Latin America, which led some sportspeople to boycott the games; the volatile political situation in Brazil; the algae-filled swimming pool where competitions are held; the Russian doping scandal; the preparedness of the Olympic Village itself; the rampant chauvinism - not dissimilar to previous Olympic gatherings - defying the very purpose for which the Olympics was designed; the rise in crime; and so on. All these spots have made the Olympics this year arguably infernal. But perhaps there has been a beacon of hope, identified by many as the recognition of the sufferings of refugees by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). For instance, Ibrahim Al Hussein, a Syrian swimmer who had lost part of his right leg during the war in Syria, carried the Olympic Torch in Greece. A more publicised aspect of that recognition, however, was the formation of the Refugee Olympic Team. Commenting on the team, Thomas Bach, IOC president, declared: "We want to send a message of hope to all the refugees of the world." It is true that all refugees need messages of hope, but I doubt that all of them will interpret the team as such. The team comprises ten refugees, five from South Sudan, two from Syria, two from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and one Ethiopian. Initially, in March, 43 potential candidates were identified from refugee camps in Africa and Europe by national Olympic committees. According to the IOC website, the selection process was based on three criteria: personal circumstances, ability and UN-verified refugee status. In June, it was announced that 10 athletes had been selected to be members of the refugee team, with Syrian Yusra Mardini being the team's iconic image. Still, there was some controversy over the selection process when the names of the team members were publicised in June. Some refugee athletes claimed that the members were cherry-picked and, as a result, better-prepared athletes were excluded. But those reports were challenged by IOC. Nevertheless, one might still be sceptical about the selection process, acknowledging the impossibility of representing all refugee groups. For, it is difficult not to notice jarring absences. One may wonder where are Iraqis, Libyans, Yemenis, Haitians, Rohingyas and many others. Are there no skilled athletes among these groups of refugees? At the opening ceremony of the Olympics, Bach claimed: "In this Olympic world, there is one universal law for everybody. In this Olympic world, we are all equal." Apart from the medal table itself, the constitution of the refugee team contravenes Bach's statement, which was made in English. In fact, the Olympic Village itself displaced more than 70,000 Brazilians, a fact which suggests that the Olympic world is only a replica, albeit in disguise, of our world and is accordingly replete with exclusionary policies and practices. A flagrant example of that exclusion is the absence of Palestinians from the refugee team, an absence that begs such questions as: Are there no Palestinian refugee athletes? Are they not skilled enough? Answering the questions relating to the absence of Palestinian refugees is, interestingly enough, a little easier than addressing the set of questions about the absence of other refugee groups. Palestinians, in general, and Palestinian refugees, in particular, have always dealt with the problem of absence. The Israeli colonial machine has consistently promulgated two - among many others - myths: Palestinians do not exist, and there is no such thing as the Palestinian refugee problem. Instead of recognising the sufferings that they created, the Israeli colonists proposed - to give only one example - the so-called "Jordan option", which entails naturalising Palestinian refugees in Jordan. Thus, Jordan becomes an alternative homeland, and Palestinians lose any chance of returning home. Such ideas and myths are preposterous, but what is to be expected of a brutal colonial power like Israel, except its deliberate negation of Palestinians? What might be less expected is the United Nations' complicity with those processes. Take as an example the 1951 Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, which the United Nations Higher Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) describes as "the key legal document that forms the basis of our work". In that document, Article 1D reads: "This convention shall not apply to persons who are at present receiving from organs or agencies of the United Nations other than the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees protection or assistance." At the time of signing the document, Palestinian refugees were "provided for" by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). The existence of UNRWA means that the principles that apply to other refugees, including the right of return, do not apply to Palestinian refugees. On top of all that systemic negation, the very existence of a Palestinian delegation at the Olympics reinforces that logic and gives the impression that the Palestinian refugee problem has been resolved. Palestinian participation - despite all the impediments imposed on Palestinian athletes - is significant. Palestinian refugees should never be sidelined and excluded. The exclusion of Palestinian refugees, and other refugees for that matter, is only symptomatic of the fact that oppressive powers have even used humanitarian organisations and gestures - such as the presence of a Palestinian delegation - to further demonise, marginalise and oppress the already oppressed. Most importantly, those powers have always attempted to deprive the oppressed - Palestinians, as a case in point - of their humanity, some aspects of which are culture and sports, claiming that the oppressed do not have cultures and do not play sports. Sports and politics have always been intricately linked, and delinking them - let alone using sports itself for that delinking - will not succeed. The Olympics, or any other sporting event, should not be a façade behind which harrowing realities are hidden. Rather, sports should contribute to changing those realities. Like other refugees, Palestinian refugees are determined - against all odds - to create an alternative reality in which their presence is felt, not only in sports but also in their homeland. - Professor Mahmoud Zidan lives in Jordan. He contributed this article to PalestineChronicle.com. |
| FEATURE |
PC Olympics Special: Mohammed al-Khatib - 'I Believe in Miracles' By Hawa Monier
The Rio Olympics 2016 has drawn the attention of viewers worldwide - especially for the Palestine 6-member team which is the largest ever delegation from the region to an Olympics Games. However, not all Olympics-hopefuls made it to the sporting area. One such talented athlete is Muhammed al-Khatib, the 100-meter Palestinian sprinter who dreamed of becoming an Olympic sprinter. He just first needed a track. As a native of Hebron, a divided city in the southern West Bank, living under Israeli occupation, Khatib never had access to sports facilities of any kind. Most were destroyed in the Second Intifada, between September 2000 and February 2005 when an estimated 3,000 Palestinians and 1,000 Israelis lost their lives. "It was full-on war," said Khatib. "The last thing a lot of people think about [in that environment] is sports." In their Hebron home Mohammed's parents recalled the time saying "We all slept in one room together" to protect themselves from the shelling. Mohammed's mother Latifa said. "Every day was about mere survival." Despite the obstacles, Mohammed - the youngest of the four siblings - dreamed of a future outside the confines of Hebron, said his father, Awni, "Mohammed always thought of himself as a champion," said Awni, a chemistry professor and university dean in Bethlehem. When Khatib went to study at Birzeit University, just outside Ramallah, in 2010, track and field was not something even on his radar. That all changed in August 2012 when Khatib watched the male track and field events at the London Olympic Games. Many runners, he noted, hailed from smaller, developing countries that typically went unnoticed in the world of global sport. He knew that "that this is what I wanted to dedicate my life to." With no access to any professional coaching, he scoured YouTube for instructional videos on the techniques of track and field. He put into practice what he learned on the internet on his university track which was only 200 meters around, not the standard 400 meters, and the straightaway was 84 meters long, as opposed to the recognized 100 meters. The track was also asphalt, a surface potentially hazardous for runners' knees. By 2014, Khatib was one of the fastest sprinters in the West Bank. He contacted Bill Collins, one of the most decorated sprinters in U.S. track history to never run in an Olympic games. Collins had met Khatib in 2013, briefly training him. The young sprinter, Collins says, was raw. He owned no running spikes and had never seen a starting block before. In an e-mail, Khatib plead for help. Despite being sceptical, Collins "accepted the challenge." Khatib launched an Indiegogo crowdfunding page to raise roughly $9,000 that would cover airfare, three months of training with Collins and accommodation. The page went viral and Khatib raised $12,000 in just 72 hours. When Khatib arrived at Rice University's track stadium in January for his first full training session with Collins, he said, "I immediately felt 'wow, this is the real deal." Of Muhammed, Collins has said, "There's no failure in Mohammed." Since January, they have worked from scratch on every aspect of Khatib's form. Khatib is the only athlete trained by Collins who puts in two practices a day. He lived in a bare apartment with a Palestinian flag on the wall, and had virtually foregone any social life. With no access to a car, he typically rode his bicycle to practice. However, Khatib failed to make the qualifying time for the Olympics. Despite this, however, he said, "The more I go forth on this journey the more I am realizing that it transcends the physical training; it is a journey that rebuilds the bridges that once connected us all as one. As one phase ends another one begins, and this one beings with more strength and persistence. "This journey has taught me that all our dreams and visions are at the grasp of our hands. It all starts with an intention in the heart, a thought in the mind, and an action with the hands (or in my case with my feet)." "For now I go back to Palestine, to recharge and center myself before I venture into the next 4 years of training." He also said, "I extend my deepest gratitude to every one of you. I would have never done it without your support and motivation. Thank you so much for being part of this collective journey and dream." "All my Love" (Additional Information: NBC NEWS) |
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The Palestine Chronicle is an independent online newspaper that provides daily news, commentary, features, book reviews, photos, art, etc, on a variety of subjects. However, it's largely focused on Palestine, Israel, and the Middle East region. The Palestine Chronicle is a non-profit 501(c)3 organization. To contact the editor, submit an article or any other material, please write to: editor@palestinechronicle.com. For other inquiries write to: info@palestinechronicle.com. |
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Donald Trump greets the crowd in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Evan Vucci/AP 
