Facing massive unrest linked to the torture death of a Palestinian detainee, Israel has responded by issuing a public demand for the Palestinian Authority to do whatever is necessary to stop all protests against Israel in the West Bank, implying that the resumption of tax transfers was conditional on ending the dissent.
Though the exact terms of the message were not made public, officials said it was “an unequivocal demand to calm the territory” and included the pledge to resume the transfer $100 million in seized tax money along with it.
Israeli Defense Ministry official Amos Gilad suggested that the protests were a “tactical move by the Palestinians” to draw attention ahead of President Obama’s planned visit, which is expected to not touch on the occupation.
Yet the protests are being driven by very specific events which Israel has direct control over. First the decision to recapture an already released detainee and then to keep him in prison for an additional month even though he’s in failing health from a hunger strike, and then the Saturday incident in which a detainee was tortured to death to get a confession to throwing stones.
Between this and the Likud MPs pushing through a resolution that will make any peace treaty virtually impossible to ratify, it seems Israel couldn’t be fueling more protests in the West Bank if they tried. Meanwhile, the “demand” for the PA to stop those protests, at a time when it is already struggling through massive strikes because they haven’t been able to pay employees over the tax seizures, seems to only underscore how little the Fatah-run PA can accomplish under occupation, just ahead of an election that could see Hamas swept into power.
The world demands from Israel to stop stealing the Palestinians lands.
Will somebody already whack this rabid Zionist dog? I just cannot stand them anymore.
Israel jails, tortures, murders, steal land , and then demands there be no protests. When will the world put and end to this racist, apartheid, expansionist, and murderous group of "exceptionalist thugs". I guess you just need to be "chosen".
The protests are a whole new phase in the Palestinian struggle to get their country back.
Invite President Obama to Israel for a real party. He should have a vivid idea of how hard it is to live with Palestinians protesting all the time.
worse than the worst spoiled mall brats !!!!!
Zionists worse than the worst spoiled mall brats !!!!!
Israel always steals this money. Only the pretext changes. The Palestinians could stop all public protests against their illegal occupiers, and the Israelis would still grab this money because they'd say someone farted in public.
Sumud
It sure takes alot of guts & sheer bravery
to arrest children for throwing rocks at occupying soldiers
then to haul them away to a jail to be traumatized by sheer 'legal' terrorism
until shaking in fear.bleeding, white with pain they sign confessions in a language they do not understand
My my what tremendous courage it must take to point a tank's barrel at a kid
who is on the way to school who dared to stop to throw a stone at the big ugly beast
What backbone & pluck one must possess to be armed to the teeth harassing women, children & unarmed men in their own country at a checkpoint deciding who can pass who cannot…& when
What kind of gallantry does one need to bomb schools & hospitals
using state of the art weaponry to destroy homes, farms & orchards
as brave cowards slaughter civilians en-caged in an open air prison for voting the wrong way in a free election but voting for a democracy your captors disapprove of
what absurd chutzpah this is to call this crime against humanity; self-defense or justified
A dozen jeeps screech to a stop outside a home in the occupied 'terror'tories
fully armed soldiers race out shouting then break down the door of a families home at 3 am
to photograph 13 year olds for future reference while mom & dad are forced to freeze by a gun shoved in the face outside in the chill of the night
after the raid to salute such daring gallantry with smiles and salutes which took such pluck & grit
But the truly brave the honestly courageous are those who don't blink when faced with such overwhelming force
real heroes are those who endure with unconquerable sumud day after day, year after year
they stay with unpassable defiance and refuse to cede or yield
as the Palestinian gets jeered harassed & marginalized by the court fed by zionist policies he smiles with a grace incomprehensible
West Bank Palestinians resist under the yolk of foreign military occupation as they survive by endurance
under the wire mesh overhang of the markets from the trash tossed from above
to the Palestinian who stands up to the racism,abuse & mistreatment with a smile of fortitude & the calmness of valor
i walked with your children on public dirt roads while red-eyed demonic pious immigrants waved guns screaming rabid hatred
i was atop a teachers house in Hebron who showed us where the occupation soldier pissed in her watertank during the 2nd intifada
i broke bread with a family whose lineage goes backs thousands of years and have a stone at the entrance to their farm with the word's; 'we refuse to be your enemy'
i was born in a land called canada
my ancestor blood flows Lakota blackfoot
i eschew nationalism, patriotism and others vices of bigotry, elitism, xenophobia & exclusiveness
but i shout with idealism & with solidarity i am Palestinian
i accept that all bloods flow red and one…
Jaffa; a clockwork orange
by michael hall
I have a key to a home that has no door nor walls
but i can still smell jaffa oranges sweet in the breeze down the hill
over there stands a park where a village once stood
so my grandmother told me one day, almost everyday
Have you ever been to the sea
i've never been there but my grandfather has
it was warm and salty he says with moist eyes
but for me the wet of the sea is not allowed
Not too long ago we walked this land from water to water
over the hills and down into the farms tending rows and rows of orchards
some of the olive trees were thousands of years old
before armored bulldozers came broke and razed them into piles of kindling
Al Quds is a dream for all of us to see
without roadblocks checkpoints and permits
without smug smartass soldiers barking and pushing
that day seems so far away
What is ours we cannot build upon
for illegal immigrants with an army tear it down
yet they build what they want where they want
with all the water filling their pools as our crops wither and die
I walked with children in the southern Hebron hills
on public dirt roads not bothering no one
but then it rides roaring down from inside a fortress colony
guns waving, curses launched from inside of beeping revving cars
In the courts to be tried by foreigners in your land is surreal
in a military court judged by bigotry what chance do you have
someone somewhere somehow saw you throw a rock at a tank
you must pay for scratching the paint
Inside the stinking squalid cell in between your beatings
the words of your grandparents echo in your heart
you can almost smell the oranges on the limbs of Jaffa
you can almost taste the salt of the sea….you endure as a freedom rider
flowers will bloom
they guffawed and laughed in the Knesset
recent immigrants talk about mowing the grass in Palestine
while out in the streets the ancestors of the holocaust
piously scream; may your children die, you dogs!
rubble everywhere among the screaming
terrified children being led away from the fire and smoke
gaza is being ripped apart again
no where to run or hide because everyone is trapped inside
for bibi and his hungry backers, this is just politics
to corral and convince the right to support this genocide, this ethnic cleansing
with another bird he seeks to contain abbass at the un
an old political move to sway the masses; pretext
the goal of the operation is to send gaza back to the middle ages
is this the statement from a 'chosen people'?
to justify the greatest crime in our time?
to kill those who refuse to die?
bombing human beings who cant get away
within the largest open air prison in the world
is a most odious crime
And why you ask they do such
They try to eradicate the crime the commit
by trying to erase it once and for all
the status quo is a virus they cultivate
the theft of land from those who fled a war back in 48 & 67
But they can't kill everyone and destroy everything
They delete a villages name and rename it a park
flowers still bloom and they cannot kill them all
Flower still bloom and always will…