Viewpoint Attacks are ruthless on both sides of Jerusalem
By NEVE GORDON
The last suicide bomber blew himself
up no more than 300 yards from my Jerusalem apartment. The windows shuddered as
the deafening sound filled the air. Then came a moment of silence followed by
the loud echo of sirens.
A friend who had seen the attack was still traumatized a week
later. The vivid images of dead bodies scattered on the road could not be
erased. There were seven of them, she said, not counting the wounded.
Another suicide bomber detonated himself on a bus in a different
part of town a day earlier. He killed 20 people and wounded many more.
Immediately after the assault, I called friends who live close to where the bus
exploded to make sure they were OK. These chilling phone calls have become
routine in Israel. A busy line on the other end is considered good news.
Not surprisingly, the Jerusalem landscape has also changed. Police
and military checkpoints have been erected not only on many of the roads
leading into the metropolis, but also in the city itself. Every supermarket,
bank, cafe, hotel and restaurant is now obliged to employ security guards who
search customers as they enter.
Despite these and other measures, many Jerusalemites continue to
feel insecure. The once bustling downtown is often empty, since residents
prefer to stay home rather than risk a night out on the town. They know that no
military operation can stop the suicide bombers.
While the media spends much time covering the attacks in West
Jerusalem, most commentators have often blurred the difference between the
personal and national dimension of the threat. The very real personal threat
every Israeli feels when he or she enters a mall, takes a bus or walks into a
crowded pub, should not be mistaken for a national threat. The random killings
of civilians in no way jeopardize Israels existence.
Moreover, the media has consistently failed to expose what is
happening on the citys occupied East Side, where Palestinians live. Like
West Jerusalem, the East is also under attack. Not by suicide bombers, of
course, but rather by Israeli authorities.
The Jerusalem municipality -- headed by Likud mayor Ehud Olmert --
together with the military and police have been exploiting the ongoing conflict
in order to accelerate Israels geographic and demographic conquest of
East Jerusalem. The strategy is clear: to strangle and intimidate the
Palestinian population. Several methods are being employed to accomplish this
goal, including house demolitions, expulsions, land confiscation, curfews and
the revocation of residency and social benefits.
Since the beginning of the year, the municipality has destroyed 25
Palestinian houses and filed demolition orders for hundreds more. About six
weeks ago, several Palestinian families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood
were expelled from their homes, where they had been living since the 1950s.
Not much later, 115,000 square meters of land were confiscated
from Palestinian residents of Jabal al-Mukaber in order to build 400
luxury apartments for Jews. On the other side of town, in Issawiya,
an additional 25,000 square meters of land have recently been expropriated. In
this case, the land was taken from the resident in order to build a military
base. All of these techniques have one aim: to systematically reduce the number
of Palestinians in the city.
During this same period, the authorities have occasionally imposed
curfews as a means of intimidating the Palestinian population. Imagine living
in a city where a few hundred yards from your house thousands of people are
shut in their homes for days on end simply because they are members of a
different ethnic group; children cannot go to school, and adults cannot get to
work. As if this collective punishment were not enough, soldiers often walk the
streets during curfew throwing stun grenades and shooting at water tankers
simply to frighten the population.
The attack on the East is, to be sure, different from the one on
the West, particularly in terms of the methods employed. Yet, it too is
ruthless. The political objective is to ensure Israels demographic
dominance and to create an irreversible situation, whereby Jerusalem cannot be
divided and no part of the city returned to the Palestinians.
This attack, unlike the one in the West, constitutes both a
personal threat and a national one. And while it is currently less gory than
the one perpetrated by suicide bombers, it is sowing dragons teeth for
the future.
Neve Gordon teaches politics at Ben-Gurion University,
Israel.
National Catholic Reporter, July 19,
2002
|