There’s a great deal of talk about the “Wall”.
The UN hates it. The EU thinks it’s a barrier to Peace. The Americans have shown their reluctant displeasure with it. And the Palestinians absolutely despise it.
So far so good.
This past Sunday (December 21, 2003), CBS’s 60 Minutes did a piece on the “Wall”, which they pretended to be balanced reporting, since they purported to show both sides.
60 Minutes showed the suffering the “Wall” is causing to “some” Palestinians who are inconvenienced from reaching their land and jobs. And of course, the ever present “humiliation”.
If only 60 Minutes would have shown the same concern for the millions of Israelis who’ve lost friends and loved-ones at the hands of Palestinian and other Arab TERRORISTS. Especially after the Oslo Peace Talks collapsed in 2000 at Camp David, because Arafat wouldn’t say yes to Peace.
Does 60 Minutes not believe, that it is humiliating for Jewish Israelis to be seen as body parts strewn along sidewalks and streets? Or to have Jewish Israeli flesh and blood scraped off walls, ceilings, floors and windows after being blown up by Palestinian suicide murderers?
Does 60 Minutes think for a second, that it is not a hardship for Israelis who have to fear 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, that some Palestinian murderer is going to end their lives, or maim them, or do the same to someone they care about?
The “Wall” kills no one. The “Wall” harms no one. The “Wall” is a defacto barrier and possible future border between Palestinians who want to murder and TERRORIZE Jews. And the Jews who don’t want to be TERRORIZED, murdered and maimed. That’s what the “Wall” is.
Since Ariel Sharon accelerated the construction of the “Wall”, during the past 2½ months, there has not been one suicide bombing or mass murder in Israel until this Christmas Day (2003), when a Palestinian suicide murderer killed four people in Tel Aviv, wounding and maiming as many as 20 or more.
I have heard this “Wall” referred to as the Berlin Wall and the Apartheid Wall. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Apartheid was the White South African policy of using Black Africans for cheap labor, and then not allowing them to live an equal life in their own country. The Blacks were banished to Townships.
In this case, the Israelis are telling the Palestinians that they don’t necessarily want them leaving their territories to come into Israel.
If this “Wall” is akin to Apartheid, then so is the US/Mexico “Wall”, and the US/Canadian border. Both of which exist exclusively to control who gets into the USA, and who does not.
How do these US barriers differ from Israel’s “Wall”? Mexicans and Canadians are not trying to enter the USA to TERRORIZE and murder innocent Americans. Yet the USA maintains a Wall between themselves and their peaceful neighbors nonetheless.
Where was 60 Minutes’ equivalence between the American Walls and Israel’s Walls?
The other contention that this “Wall” is like the Berlin Wall is also a specious argument. The Berlin Wall was created to keep people in, like caged animals. Israel’s “Wall”, is to keep people out. Quite a difference don’t you think?
Comparing Israel’s “Wall” to Apartheid and the Berlin Wall is nothing more than a psychologically dishonest equivalence; very much like the Arab and anti-Semites’ use of the Swastika as an equivalent to the Star of David.
The Palestinians and Israel’s Arab neighbors have had more than ample opportunities to make Peace with the Jewish State, and to create a separate sovereign homeland for the Palestinian people.
But; regardless of whatever Israel has offered and brought to the Peace Table, including the 2000 Ehud Barak, Camp David agreement with President Bill Clinton and Yasser Arafat, it seems never to be enough.
The Palestinians and other Arabs turned down the Balfour Declaration in 1917, the Peel Commission in 1937, the UN Resolution to create a Two State Solution in 1948, the Oslo Accord in 1993, and now the Road Map to Peace in 2003.
And for those who’ve tried to make Peace:
On July 20, 1951, King Abdullah of Jordan was assassinated by Palestinians while visiting the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. They killed him out of fear that he was about to enter into a Peace Treaty with Israel.
On October 6, 1981, President Anwar al-Sadat was murdered by members of the Moslem Brotherhood while attending a military parade. He was assassinated for making Peace with Israel in 1979.
It takes an idiot to repeatedly bang his head against a brick wall in the belief that if he bangs his head ad infinitum, the brick wall will give before his head breaks.
This has been the bitter experience of the Israelis, banging their heads against the Palestinian/Arab/UN/EU brick wall without so much as making a dent.
Some Israelis finally got the message that this brick wall is not going to give.
So what’s the solution?
The Israeli “Wall” is the near final admission by Israel, that they have run out of options with the Palestinians, and they have come to the final conclusion that they can no longer bang their heads against the Palestinian/Arab brick wall.
These are facts 60 Minutes ignored in their Sunday broadcast. It’s really a pity since they are terribly pertinent to the whole reason for Israel’s “Wall”.
60 Minutes focussed on the financial suffering, inconvenience and humiliation the “Wall” is causing some Palestinians. But they didn’t deal with the true reason for the “Wall”, and its success in stopping Palestinian murderers from doing their evil deeds in Israel.
They also didn’t focus on Ariel Sharon’s offer to the Palestinians: “Stop the violence, return to the ‘Road Map For Peace’ which the Palestinians had agreed to in writing, and Israel will stop building the “Wall”. This is quite an important offer to ignore. No?
What 60 Minutes also failed to mention was the Gaza “Wall” created by Israel. Since Israel built a “Wall” around Gaza, not one murderer of Israeli Jews successfully entered Israel from Gaza to do their evil deed. Not one!
So why didn’t 60 Minutes show the success of the Gaza “Wall”? And if the West Bank “Wall” is so unfair, why is it that 60 Minutes didn’t think the Gaza “Wall” was equally unfair; unfair enough to at least talk about it in their segment?
In a near perfect world where your neighbors don’t try to murder you and your family, or blow up your home, having a “Wall” to separate you from them is not necessary, and perhaps even unfriendly. But this is not a near perfect world.
And in the Middle East amongst the Arabs, it is just about as imperfect as one can imagine.
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One Comment
Well done, Howard. In my opinion your decision not to run is the correct one. You are such a master of the written word that I would hate to see the political arena dilute your wisdom and common sense.
Susanne Sauer, Douglassville, PA
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