Palestinians have been harvesting their trees for hundreds of years. This year will be no different.
Even here, however, the reality of the occupation is inescapable.
Israeli settlers began harvesting Palestinian olives on Monday in the northern West Bank district of Qalqiliya and Nablus, a Palestinian Authority official said.
Ghassan Doughlas, who heads the PA file on northern settlement activity, said settlers brought sheets and ladders "as though they were the owners of the land" and started harvesting the olives from Palestinian land.
In Nablus, Doughlas said settlers from Yitzhar ascended on the Palestinian olive groves in the Burin village to harvest them, while in Qalqiliya, settlers from the illegal Ramat Gil'ad and Gil'ad outposts picked olives from the Palestinian villages of Jinsafut and Far'ata. Maan
oh yes, the routine of systematic theft from the "Only Democracy in the Middle East."
then there is the sham of "peace" talks, under the leadership of Prime Minister Netanyahu.
Amira Hass:
In the late 1970s or early 1980s, [Israeli] Professor Asa Kasher spoke at a conference of some kind about the differences between Labor Party governments and Likud governments.
The Labor governments were hypocritical, and there is something positive about hypocrisy, Kasher said. At least the hypocrite knows there is a binding system of values, and that he is not acting according to them. As a result, he disguises his actions.
It was understood from Kasher’s comments that Labor governments knew that ruling over another people against that people’s will was an impermissible act. The Likud, Kasher said at the time, as memory permits to reconstruct after the passage of 30 years, doesn’t feel at all bound by those values. The impermissible had become legitimate.
By that measure, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has become a Laborite who is playing the hypocrites’ game, whereas Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman is the 2010 version of a Likudnik, by Kasher’s definition.
At least Lieberman is no hypocrite. A racist yes, but not the hypocrite.
She goes on to describe an interview that took place over Army Radio with a government minister who states that the settlement freeze (such as it is) cannot be expected to continue, especially since Palestinians are still allowed to build. But of course, this man has it wrong. Not only will a Palestinian be denied the right to build in Tel Aviv, but also much of the West Bank. Or his home will be demolished. His tree may be uprooted, his water well destroyed, not only by settlers allowed to roam freely, but by the Israeli military itself.
Whatever Israel wants, it takes. With rewards from the US Congress.
As long as the US refuses to put up any conditions for continued military aid to Israel, it will do whatever it wants. there is no change there in sight. Even a verbal call to end the settlement expansion seems impossible. It should be kept in mind that all the settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law, but when Obama, like many Presidents before him, expressed some concerns about the settlements, with no promise of taking action in the event that Israel refused to halt their expansion (no talk of dismantling the settlements, to comply with international law of course) it was greeted by a chorus of boos from Congress, liberals and conservatives alike. So obama backed down, some partial and very limited "freeze" was enacted, to expire in a few days, and aipac won.
As the quasi-freeze ends, the talks will end, as there will not much to discuss as Israel pretends on one hand to support a Palestinian state and then with the other builds at a frantic pace Israeli settlements in that supposed state. I predict a chorus from Congress, if not the Obama administration, placing all the blame on the Palestinians, ignoring that the actions of the Israeli state makes peace impossible.
Palestinians will harvest their olives in the next few months, some of them working around military restrictions and Israeli settler attacks and outright theft.
What will not be harvested soon is peace, that can only come from justice.
If our government refuses to demand justice, then it is up to us. First, we must demand that our congressional representatives support international law and freedom for all people. Second, if we want change we can join the call to end Israel's impunity, and join the Palestinian call forsanctions and divestment. Israel must learn that enforcing an apartheid system has consequences.