Israel Wants Walls, not Peace
by Stephen Lendman
Imagine! Israel has no constitution. It has no declared borders. Its policies reflect racial and ethnic supremacy.
Lawless occupation harshness is longstanding. Belligerence is a way of life. Institutionalized racism is official policy. So is state terror.
Jews are afforded rights denied Muslims. Palestinians are viciously persecuted. Crimes of war, against humanity and slow-motion genocide persist daily.
They're longstanding. They're out-of-control. They continue during ongoing so-called peace talks. They've been dead on arrival for decades.
They'll achieve nothing this time like before. Long time Israeli collaborators continue the charade. Sham talks deny reality.
Pretense substitutes for peace. The dirty charade persists. So does the worst of occupation harshness.
Imagine talking peace while prioritizing war. Imagine media scoundrels regurgitating the Big Lie.
Imagine them repeating it every time new talks begin. Imagine deceiving their readers disgracefully.
Israel gets Congress to endorse its ruthlessness. Edward Said once said it's able to enlist virtual total Senate support in a matter a matter of hours. It's nearly as strong in the House.
James Petras [3] filled in important blanks. Israel buys influence. It "uses its financial firepower to dictate Congressional policy." It's to insure US lawmakers are in lockstep with its interests.
It buys politicians like toothpaste. It gets billions of dollars in US aid annually. It spends pennies on dollars received from all sources to get more.
It's one of the most surefire rackets ever imagined. US tax dollars and other contributions are spent for greater amounts of them in return. Congressional largesse flows like water. Whatever Israel wants it gets.
Hundreds of congressional members are generously rewarded. Campaign contributions fill their coffers.
One hand washes the other. Influence buying is longstanding policy. It's "blatant bribery" said Petras.
It should be "subject to felony prosecution and imprisonment for both parties." In America, it's business as usual. It's considered legitimate lobbying.
Congress "resemble(s) a high-price brothel or white slavers' auction," said Petras. Wars serving Israel's interests persist. Millions of lost lives don't matter. It's a small price to pay.
"Payola" matters more than peace. Zealots replace outliers. Corruption is deep-seated. Dirty politics persists. Both countries pretend to be democracies. Dark side reality explains otherwise.
Democratic values don't exist. Rule of law principles are spurned. War on humanity persists. Unchallenged dominance is sought. Persuing it extracts a high price.
Israel is the only nation surrounding itself with walls. It does so to steal land. It does it to enforce repression. It has nothing to do with security. Building them is devastating for affected people.
Israel's Apartheid Wall will exceed 800 km when completed. Its route is largely within the Green Line. Its aim is stealing around 12% of Palestinian land. It's doing so with:
- 34 fortified checkpoints; they include three main terminals, nine commercial ones, and 22 others for cars and workers to control Palestinian movement;
- 44 tunnels, connecting 22 "small ghettos inside 3 main ghettos (West Bank's north, central and south);"
- 634 checkpoints or other military obstructions; they include trenches, roadblocks, and metal gates; and
- 1,661 km of Jews-only roads; they connect settlements and
accompanying blocs; they complement the Wall.
Combined with settlements, military zones, parks, commercial developments, other closed areas, and open spaces, over 60% of West Bank is being annexed.
It may exceed 75%. Land theft continues unabated. Israel wants all valued Judea and Samaria for Jews alone. It wants Jerusalem as its exclusive capital.
It wants Palestinians ethnically cleansed. It wants them confined to isolated cantons. Ideally it wants them gone.
Villages are being destroyed. Residents are dispossessed. Resources are stolen. Free movement is denied. Viable Palestinian self-determination remains a convenient illusion.
Israel is building a monster. It's expanding. It's annexing the entire Jordan Valley. Netanyahu pledged never to relinquish it. He intends maintaining a permanent presence along the Jordan River.
The Wall's cost may exceed $2.5 billion when complete. Construction involves eight meter-high Wall sections. They're double the Berlin Wall's height.
They're fortified with watchtowers, a 30 - 100 meter-wide buffer zone, electric fences, trenches, cameras, sensors and military patrols.
Other portions consist of razor wire topped fences, patrol roads, sand paths to trace footprints, ditches, and surveillance cameras.
Communities are encircled. They're isolated. Others are between the Wall and Green Line. They're in the so-called Seam Zone. Landowners and residents need permits to access homes and farmland.
The effect is devastating. Thousands are separated from property and means of subsistence. Others lose out altogether. They're dispossessed to facilitate construction.
Dozens of Palestinian communities are affected. US tax dollars given Israel punish them. They're losing their villages, homes, land and livelihoods.
They're less able to access healthcare, education, religious sites and other West Bank communities.
They're totally separated from Gaza. Israel wants Palestine irrevocably divided. It wants both areas denied access to the other.
Israel's massive land grab persists. Settlement expansions are facilitated. So is other exclusive Jewish development.
Doing so is a war crime. It violates Fourth Geneva provisions. They relate to protecting civilians in time of war.
Israel is an occupying power. It abuses Palestinians grievously. It's done it for decades. It gets away with murder in the process.
It does so because world powers able to intervene responsibly turn a blind eye. It's how it's always been. Palestinians pay an enormous price. They're on their own to pursue justice.
Settlement expansions continue. Over 600,000 settlers live on confiscated Palestinian land. Many more will follow. Thousands more Palestinians will lose land, homes, livelihoods and futures.
Gaza's already surrounded by walls and razor wire. They extend 55 km from northwest Beit Lahia to Rafah. A 300 - 600 meter buffer zone is included.
It prohibits Palestinians from accessing valued farmlands. Around 30% of Gaza's most fertile areas are affected. Thousands of Palestinian farmers can't access their fields. Anyone trying is shot. Children are vulnerable like adults.
Israel confronts anti-Wall resisters violently. Thousands are injured. Some are killed. Many are arrested. Israel considers self-defense terrorism.
Fortress Israel is walling itself in along its borders. In April 2012, construction of a kilometer long wall began covering part of its border with Lebanon.
A security fence already runs along its entire border. It's bolstered with a 16 - 23 wall between the Israeli town of Metulla and Lebanon's Kila village. It supplements southern Lebanon-based UN Blue Helmets.
Israel built a giant security barrier along along its 150 mile Sinai border. It's over 16 feet high.
Israel's Southern Command calls it "the Defense Ministry's most grandiose engineering project since Bar-Lev Line" Suez Canal fortifications.
Steel rods 30 millimeters in diameter are welded in crisscross fashion. They're topped with razor wire. Barbed wire supplements it.
So does concertina wire fencing. It's built like a three-story pyramid. It's equipped with cameras, radar and motion detectors.
It's overkill. It's very hard to penetrate. It cost over $400 million. It stretches from Gaza to just north of Eilat.
Fortress Israel perpetuates conflict. Israel needs it to defend the indefensible. It justifies belligerence and occupation harshness. It makes more enemies than friends.
In February, Israel began building what it calls the world's most advanced border system. It separates Golan from Syria. It'll cost around $250 million.
It's equipped with technology able to monitor movement and suspicious activity. Data collected is transmitted to a central control center. It's analyzed for fast response.
On November 3, Maan News [4]headlined "Maariv: Netanyahu plans to build wall at Jordanian border." Construction will begin once other walls are completed.
Netanyahu claims they protect Israeli settlements from possible invasion. According to Stop the Wall's Jamal Juma [5], they're "wall(s) of oppression."
They're segregation walls. They're stealing Palestinian land. They'll remain until people opposing them resist.
"Walls around the world that have been built to suffocate and oppress people have fallen down."
"Why would the Israeli wall stay? We are not going to settle for it. We are not going to accept the system they are imposing on us," he said.
"Israel tries all the time to build walls around itself, claiming that people hate them and target them."
"Israel has harmed the whole region around it. Israel is building a wall around Palestinian areas, claiming it’s for security - but it amounts to apartheid for the Palestinian people."
"They built a wall around Gaza and turned it into a jail - the biggest prison in the world. We know how devastating the situation in Gaza is."
"They still occupy parts of Syria, and are now building a wall on occupied land. They want to keep this land and keep themselves as occupiers."
"To keep building walls is not a solution. (Israel) needs to make peace with the region. In Syria and the Arab world, there are six million Palestinian refugees because of Israel."
"They have to solve the problem of the refugees, to give them the right to return to their homeland that has been taken from them."
"Israel cannot build its future at the expense of the people of the region. (W)alls are not going to protect the Israelis. People have rights, and they will keep claiming those rights."
"We are not going to settle for this. We are not going to accept the system they are imposing on us."
Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rdeina said more walls confirm "the failure of peace talks."
"Without a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, there will be neither peace nor stability in the region, and the leaders of Israel will be responsible," he said.
Walls don't prevent conflict. They separate people. They isolate them. They make enemies. They lose friends.
They create problems. They don't solve them. They prevent peace, reconciliation, equity and justice. Israel builds them for that purpose.
It plans another. It's a fence, not a wall. It's 100 meters long. It cuts through four West Bank Palestinian villages.
It's on privately owned agricultural land. It separates nothing. It can easily be bypassed on foot. It's part of Israel's apartheid project.
It serves no other purpose. Not according Central Command head General Nitzan Alon. He calls it "necessary for military purposes." It's "to prevent terrorist operations."
Israeli state-terrorism alone threatens. Palestinian civilians are defenseless against its ruthlessness.
They have seven days to file an official complaint. Doing so won't help. Israel denies them all rights.
Occupation harshness persists. Militarized cruelty runs things. Collective punishment is official policy.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book is titled "Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity."
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
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