ZGram - 7/24/2004 - "Ethnic cleansing in the silent mode"

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

Zgram - Where Truth is Destiny:  Now more than ever!

July 24, 2004

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

Ethnic cleansing strikes a chord in many of us who live with memories 
of World War II.  What you have below is ethnic cleansing, Israeli 
style, today:

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A Stranger in My Own Land: Changing the Map

Dr. Saber Zaitoun writing from Ramallah, occupied Palestine, Live 
from Palestine , 23 July 2004

Jewish version of Yafa's history, 'abridged' to gloss over non-Jewish 
events. Note how the 1000 years before the arrival of the Israelites 
are glossed over and shortened, and how all the other events relate 
to Jewish history, despite the majority of Jaffa's residents 
throughout history being non-Jewish! No mention of the 100,000 
Palestinians expelled in 1948, my own parents included.

Having seen the latest developments first-hand on this trip, it 
dawned on me that what's going on over there is a full-blown 
genocide. A genocide in slow motion, perhaps, but a genocide 
nevertheless. When Sharon's wall is completed, several million 
Palestinians will be completely surrounded by it, separated from the 
world and separated from each other. Their land and water sources 
will be on the Israeli side of the wall. Their only means of survival 
are on the other side, available only upon the approval of the 
Israeli military gatekeepers. This is indeed a genocide, subsidized 
in large part by Mr. US Taxpayer, ironically including myself.

The hurdles Israel imposes upon simple necessities for daily life are 
obviously meant to make people leave, and not come back. Ethnic 
cleansing for lack of a better word. Yet even as most Palestinians 
stay there, they are not to be seen. The West Bank has been 
transformed into a major Israeli playground, with little traces of 
Arab life within sight. An enormous network of new roads cut through 
the mountains, interconnecting massive Israeli colonies (so-called 
"settlements"). The old roads connecting Arab villages and cities 
were simply blocked off and left to rot. Arabs wishing to travel from 
one part of the West Bank to another need to follow narrow remote 
roads, and often get out of the car and walk over bare hills, risking 
getting shot at by Israeli "settlers" who hunt Arabs for sport.

A visitor driving on the new Israeli roads will see no signs of Arab 
life - just Jewish "neighborhoods", as the Israelis fondly call their 
illegal and oppressive colonies, built to surround Arab cities on 
lands illegally expropriated from Arab farmers. Even the signs are 
all in Hebrew and English, with the place names transformed to sound 
like Hebrew. For instance, instead of the historic villages of Upper 
Beit 'Ur and Lower Beit 'Ur, the same "Upper and Lower Beth Horon" 
mentioned in the Book of Joshua as existing before Joshua's invasion 
of Canaan, now you find a single large Jewish colony simply called 
"Beth Horon" built near its Arab namesakes. While the Arab villages 
still exist, they are conveniently out of sight from the new bypass 
road cutting deep through the mountain.

Names or the perceptions of them are critical to this conflict, it 
seems. Jerusalem, for instance, has for long been known to the Arabs 
as "al-Quds" - the Holy City. Since Israel took control of the city, 
they have been trying to impose the Arabized Hebrew name "Orashalim" 
on the city, e.g. in weather reports. As a child, I recall the road 
signs for Jerusalem were rather simple: "Yerushalayim" in Hebrew, 
"al-Quds" in Arabic, and "Jerusalem" in English. Later, when visiting 
back around 1993, I noticed the signs for Jerusalem had "Orashalim 
al-Quds" in Arabic, instead of the mere "al-Quds". Today, on a road 
sign near the Arab city of Nazareth, I read the obituary: "Orashalim 
(al-Quds)" with al-Quds in parenthesis and in finer print. That leads 
me to wonder: "What next?" Plain "Orashalim"?

Of course this colony and road construction craze has resulted in an 
enormous impact on the environment, as arable land and water sources 
get depleted, and scenic mountains and landscape get torn inside out. 
There is hardly a hilltop on the West Bank today where one can stand 
without seeing barbed wire or an 8-meter high wall. The 4.5 million 
Palestinian residents of the West Bank, Gaza, and Israel are all but 
invisible. I found it very quiet in Ramallah. Though Palestinians 
there are not happy with the situation, it is difficult for them to 
even peacefully protest when their oppressor is conveniently shielded 
from them by several layers of wall. It is very easy to control a 
captive population, with a captive economy.


The situation inside Israel proper is even worse. I cannot even dream 
about ever returning to my ancestral homeland near Yafa and Ramleh. 
Nowadays I have to plead just to get a permit to see those cities. I 
am not even allowed to stay overnight, my permit explicitly stating 
"5 AM - 10 PM", with some checkpoints effectively closing as early as 
6 PM. Driving through Palestinian land occupied in 1948, one finds 
extremely little traces that the area was ever inhabited by Arabs. 
Apparently, the massive destruction campaign Israel undertook after 
1948 paid well. If I'm careful and attentive, I might see a partially 
destroyed Arab building here, or a cactus patch from an Arab farm 
there, but most of the 418 villages Israel demolished to the ground 
betray no trace.

Crossing the "green line" from the West Bank to Israel, one is 
immediately transported from the 4th world to the 1st world. Israel 
presents itself today as a big megalopolis where speculators enjoy 
turning a buck from urban sprawl, while city centers (usually where 
Israeli Arabs live) are left to rot. Gone are the large swaths of 
orange groves between Ramleh and Yafa that existed as recently as 
1990. Instead the Israelis welcome Big Mac and strip malls and big 
boxes. Israel itself is now populated mostly by Russians. Whether in 
Haifa or Jerusalem, more Russian is heard on the street than either 
Hebrew or Arabic, and Russian is now the official language on street 
signs in many places. I wondered why should some Russian of Slavic 
origin (whose ancestors perhaps recently converted to Judaism and who 
has absolutely no connection to the land whatsoever) have more access 
to my ancestral homeland than myself. By what right? Because God said 
so?

We saw the same tendency back at the airport. Droves of people from 
all over the world were welcomed into Israel: Europeans, Americans, 
Argentineans, Ethiopians, Chinese. All passed easily through the 
border, except the few of us who actually originated from that land 
and ventured to go back, who were taken aside to that Arab room. 
There, we were ignored for hours, as if the airport attendants had 
more important things to do, as if they were telling us we were not 
welcome there.

I began having that feeling as early as 1993. It was my first major 
trip back after leaving for college in the middle of the first 
Intifada. Many things had changed, including a so-called "framework" 
agreement between the PLO and Israel. What struck me back then were 
the changes on the ground: the almost permanent closure of Jerusalem 
(a new step at that time), the massive building projects in the 
Israeli colonies in the West Bank, and the beginning of the massive 
road network linking those colonies and bypassing Arab towns. Riding 
on one of those roads (still legitimate at that time for a 
Palestinian), as we passed by Beth Horon, I noted a small sign in 
Arabic pointing to the twin villages of Beit 'Ur. Once on the main 
road from Ramallah to the West, the Beit 'Urs have become off the 
beaten track, to be reached from a side road off of the colonial 
road. I looked right and left, and instead of Beit 'Ur's familiar 
ancient domed village houses, I saw the red roofs of modern Beth 
Horon. Instead of Beit 'Ur's plowed fields surrounded by borders of 
cactus plants, I saw swaths of minefields surrounded by barbed wire 
protecting the new colony. This is the West Bank, right? Supposed to 
be the last Palestinian stronghold in the land of Palestine, no? I 
look for any sign that there is Arab life. Apart from that small 
Arabic sign for Beit 'Ur, all the remaining signs were in English and 
Hebrew only, pointing out Biblical relics and Israeli colonies with 
Biblical-sounding names. Suddenly, I felt like a stranger in my own 
land, as if history was ripped open and engulfed the memory of my 
forefathers. Thousands of years disappeared in the void, as the 1990s 
became connected to Biblical times. Back home, I was gripped by a 
fear that a tourist visiting the "Holy Land" and not knowing much 
history would never guess that any Arabs existed on the land. Driving 
in the West Bank just 100s of meters away from millions of 
Palestinians, the ignorant tourist can happily entertain the illusion 
that Jews have continuously inhabited an unchanged land since the 
time of Jesus.

The Israeli colony of Modi'in, in the West Bank (April 12, 2004)

In today's term, that frightening feeling of invisibility and 
alienation I sensed in 1993 was just a premonition of things to come. 
The rapidly expanding colonies I saw back then were mere embryos of 
the megalopolises that now hungrily jostle for every inch of that 
congested landscape. The red roofs of Beth Horon are now eclipsed by 
the skyscrapers of Modi'in, another brand new colony just down the 
road. The little sign pointing to Beit 'Ur is now gone, the side road 
connecting the Beit 'Urs with the colonial road is now completely 
blocked off, isolating those two villages from the world. The 
colonial road itself can no longer be directly accessed from 
Ramallah. Its one entrance from near the military camp by the village 
of Beitunia is now blocked off by a massive wall guarded by tanks. 
The only way for Palestinians to enter this road is to cross the 
first checkpoint to Jerusalem (which requires a permit), then ride a 
car with a yellow license plate, identifying one as "Israeli".

Tourists traveling to the West Bank today have to actively seek 
Palestinians in order to meet any. With few exceptions, Israel is in 
control of most historic and tourist sites, even within the West 
Bank. Before leaving on this trip, my wife and I spent much time 
pouring over travel books trying to identify places of interest for 
her. I desired to show her as much as I can of my country. It turned 
out all this time was unnecessarily wasted. Most places of interest 
were out of reach for Palestinians, several roadblocks away or beyond 
the wall. I was very, very lucky in obtaining a permit to visit 
"Israel" and Jerusalem. Most people there are not that lucky - an 
entire generation of Palestinian children having grown up in 
Bethlehem and Ramallah, only 10 min. away from Jerusalem, but having 
never set foot in that holy city. They live in one of the richest 
parts of the world, historically and culturally, yet are unable to 
taste this richness. By controlling the historic sites the Israelis 
also ensure that their version of history is what gets passed on to 
the tourists. The Israelis thus control the future, by ignoring or 
sidelining our past.

Today, I am really a stranger in my own country. I am discriminated 
against upon entering at the airport because the "city of birth" in 
my passport is "Jerusalem", yet I have to apply for a permit to visit 
that same birthplace.


Dr. Saber Zaitoun is the pseudonym of a Palestinian-American in his 
thirties. Dr. Zaitoun grew up under Israeli occupation and first came 
to the USA during the first Intifada to finish his education. He is 
married, and currently teaches at a University on the East Coast. For 
more information about his visit to Palestine, please see 
www.triptopalestine.com.

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