IDF cantonizes West Bank, sealing in 800,000 Palestinians

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"For a month now, since the second week of December 2005, the Israel Defense Forces has severed the northern part of the West Bank from other sections, and prohibited residents from traveling toward Ramallah and points southward.

The ban applies to some 800,000 people, residents of the Tul Karm, Nablus and Jenin provinces. Until January 2, the ban applied just to residents of Jenin and Tul Karm. Since then it has been extended to Nablus area residents.

The IDF did not issue an order on the new arrangements, which people only found out about at the permanent and so-called flying checkpoints that have prevented them over the past four weeks from traveling southward from the Za'atara junction (the Tapuah checkpoint). They were not informed how long the travel ban would be in effect.

The IDF has also cut off direct traffic links within the northern West Bank. The main artery - Road 60, running from the Shavei Shomron settlement to the road leading to the settlements Mevo Dotan and Homesh, has been closed to all Palestinian traffic since mid-August by means of three steel gates. Military sources have told international organizations that this road will be closed to Palestinian traffic until the construction of an additional security fence around Shavei Shomron is completed."

more

[DELUSIONAL]

1. Just like Indian Reservations

Very effective -- locked them in, let them starve or die of thirst.

Oh right, that happened in Poland -- and Hitler learned some of his ethnic cleaning management from the USA. Hitler really admired the was the US handled the Indian "problem".

[Wordie]

2. Many need to get out in order to work, don't they? eom

[Tom Joad]

3. Yes, people need to travel freely for trade, for work, for health care....

This sealing off of each village destroys the economic, cultural and civic life of the whole of Palestine. It is massive collective punishment. Treating people in such a way will not bring peace, or security.

In the words of Amira Hass:
According to that logic , Israel has the right to institute a double legal standard in the occupied territories: one for Jews, another for Palestinians. Unlimited rights for Jews in housing, freedom of movement, livelihood, infrastructure, and land and water use, versus an organized system of stripping the Palestinians of human and civil rights. According to that logic, Palestinians must make do with increasingly smaller "land cells" whose private ownership they can prove. The broader expanses, whose ownership is not registered with the Israel Lands Administration, automatically belongs to "Israel" and the settlers' councils.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/670068.html

Such a double legal standard was called Apartheid in South Africa. The land cells there were called "Bantustans".

[Wordie]

4. Let's call it what it is: criminal behavior in violation of international

law.

[Englander]

5. I call it Apartheid.

An interview with the author of;

Apartheid Israel : Possibilities for the Struggle Within
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1842773399/102-5461748-3964914?v=glance&n=283155

'Apartheid Israel
Uri Davis interviewed by
Jon Elmer

>snip

Elmer: A classic apartheid construction -

Davis: A classic apartheid construction when it refers to the essential attributes of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which is essentially a conflict between a settler-colonial state and an indigenous population dispossessed by the colonial project.

But the situation in Israel is significantly different when compared to South Africa in one or more important senses. First, visitors to South Africa would have been hit in the face by apartheid immediately: benches for whites, benches for non-whites; toilets for whites, toilets for non-whites; parks for whites, parks for non-whites; transport for whites and transport for non-whites.

However, the first impression of Israel to a lay-visitor would possibly be the impression of a standard liberal Western democracy: there are no buses for Jews, buses for non-Jews; parks for Jews and parks for non-Jews; beaches for Jews and beaches for non-Jews. The core apartheid is veiled, and the Jewish National Fund plays an important part in the construction of this veil.

The Jewish National Fund, including the Jewish National Fund of Canada, projects itself as an environmentally friendly organization concerned with ecology and sustainable development. It plants forests and establishes recreation facilities open to all. Well, it is the case that JNF forests and facilities are open to all, but it is equally the case that that most - almost without exception all - of these forests are planted on the ruins of Palestinian Arab villages ethnically cleansed in the 1948-49 war.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=6257

[occuserpens]

6. Arafat's diplomacy is gone

In the 1990-ies and early 2000-ies, development like this would result in international diplomatic outburst, PA and Israel would use the UN for fierce verbal exchanges. Now, after the Gaza withdrawal, discredited UN is busy investigating Syria, and nothing like this happens.

Israeli right must be happy about this change and take current situation as their important accomplishment. The problem is, anti-Israeli diplomacy and PR was an important function of PA under Arafat, this is exactly why he was hated. Now it is obvious that Abbas cannot replace him in this respect. So, Hamas and more radical factions of PLO will take care of the situation without much reliance on the Western public opinion.

[Wordie]

7. Yes...we hear so little these days,

but that also may be because of the war on terrorism, and a possible confusion within our own media of the Palestinian cause with the tactic of terrorism. Or possibly just the Iraq war itself. I do wish somehow it would garner some more attention, whatever the reason it hasn't lately, because it appears the land grab works best when there is no attention. Heaven knows, Bush is unlikely to understand it all anyway.

Here's more from the article:

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) stated in a letter last week to GOC Central Command, Major General Yair Naveh, that there is concern that the travel ban was imposed as a punitive measure against the civilian population and is "therefore improper by dint of being a collective punishment strictly prohibited under international humanitarian law."

The letter by ACRI attorney Limor Yehuda said that these "comprehensive travel bans" create "a disconnect between parts of the West Bank and populations and communities that are interconnected in all aspects of life, and brings in its wake a mortal blow to the ability of the entire population to maintain economic, social and cultural ties."

The IDF calls this prevention of movement from the northern West Bank to other areas "differentiation." It was implemented several times last year, for varying durations. Sometimes the separation is in both directions.

The "differentiation" can be felt in the small number of Palestinian vehicles on the roads, as well as in the very lengthy wait cars and people have to endure in exiting the Hawara checkpoint, south of Nablus, and at the flash checkpoints set up at exits from side roads used by Palestinians. However, according to activists from MachsomWatch, the human rights organization that is documenting the policy of restricting Palestinian freedom of movement, the "differentiation" is lasting longer this time and is being enforced more strictly.

http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasen/spages/670068.html

Another euphemistic term: "differentiation"

[Scurrilous]

8. CFL Alert: Israel Cantonizes and Seals 800,000 Palestinians in WB

<snip>

"The US Citizens for Fair Legislation (CFL) launched an alert to the US administration and Congress states that Israel cantoinzed the West Bank (WB) and sealed 800,000 Palestinians.

In an alert issued Saturday, CFL said that IOF "kept the West Bank severed and prevented Palestinians from Tulkarem, Nablus, Jenin and adjacent areas from traveling towards Ramallah."

It added that Israeli soldiers have also cut off direct traffic links within the northern WB. The main artery - Road 60, running from the Shavei Shomron colony to the road leading to the colonies Mevo Dotan and Homesh, has been closed to all Palestinian traffic since mid-August by means of three steel gates.

In a statement , the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) said that the collective punishment of close to 1 million Palestinians is prohibited under international humanitarian law adding that "what Israel is doing to the Palestinians in the WB is economic, social and cultural collective punishment."

"Tell your representatives that it is hard for Palestinians to focus on elections or anything resembling a normal life when these travel bans are disconnecting people from their families, jobs, schools and communities. What Israel is doing to the Palestinians in the West Bank is economic, social and cultural collective punishment," the CFL alert concluded."

http://english.wafa.ps/body.asp?id=5127

[Tom Joad]

9. Action such as this will bring real peace to the region.