Subscribe to Print Edition | Tue., November 06, 2007 Cheshvan 25, 5768 | | Israel Time: 13:47 (EST+7)
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What cease-fire?
By Amira Hass

Talking about making and breaking a cease-fire spares the Palestinians from having to admit the failure of their Qassam missile publicity stunts. Proposals to widen the cease-fire to the West Bank sidestep any need for an inter-Palestinian debate on the destructive uselessness of a suicide-based "armed struggle."

"Cease-fire" is yet another hollow term, showing that the Palestinian representatives - elected or not, Hamas or Fatah or Palestine Liberation Organization-Tunis, from Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to the last spokesman of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' "Brigades" - keep falling into the traps set for them by the politics of Israeli occupation.

Talking for and against the cease-fire fits in with the distorted picture of reality that Israel has been constructing since September 2000, of two symmetric, fighting sides - in which the Palestinians are the aggressors and Israel, attacked, defends itself and retaliates.
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On the Saturday and Sunday before the Palestinians "broke the cease-fire," Israel Defense Forces soldiers killed nine Palestinians. Among them was a 17-year-old girl, a 15-year-old boy and a policeman who was on the roof of his house and was not involved in any "battle."

At 5 A.M. on April 21, an IDF force attacked Kufer Dan, near Jenin. The force took over a few houses and turned them into shooting posts. Most of the fire was aimed at a certain house in a western neighborhood. Mohamed Abed, 23, was shot and killed on the roof of another house. The soldiers said they had detected an armed man and shot him. Palestinian sources say Abed was unarmed and merely wanted to check what was happening outside.

Between 9 P.M. and 10 P.M. on Saturday, an IDF force attacked the Jenin refugee camp - a routine activity. Military vehicles surrounded the Bargheesh family's house. One member of the family, who is an Islamic Jihad activist, is wanted by Israel. According to media reports, the IDF said its forces had called on the family to come out of the house and "for un unclear reason the girl remained inside."

This is not true, people in the refugee camp say. The parents and their daughter, Bushra, were all at home when she was shot in the head and killed. Camp residents believe the soldier who shot the schoolgirl dead had fired from a distant shooting post. The wanted brother was not found.

On Sunday at 10 A.M., an IDF force raided the village of Deir Abu Masha'al, north of Ramallah, blocked all the entrances and imposed a curfew. Youngsters, including Khaled Zahran, 15, threw stones at the soldiers. The soldiers fired back. Zahran was wounded in the abdomen and died later.

Five of those killed were Islamic Jihad and Fatah gunmen. They were killed in Jenin and Nablus, in routine raids. Nobody bothers to check any more when exactly these raids took place and whether they were intended to effect an arrest or to carry out a death sentence without trial.

The sixth person killed was a Gaza municipal employee, aged 43, who was in his car in Beit Hanun when it was struck by an Israeli missile on Saturday night. According to Palestinian sources, he was not a "military" activist. Half an hour earlier, another missile missed three Islamic Jihad activists.

But even if none of the nine had been killed, there would have been no cease-fire on Saturday and Sunday, just as there was no cease-fire last week and in the weeks before that. Because the military occupation, even when it does not kill, is Israeli fire, which has not ceased for 40 years - regardless of the Palestinians' reactions or lack thereof.

Israeli fire includes the Civil Administration's every refusal of a permit to build a Palestinian house, every person who is denied passage from Gaza to the West Bank, every shekel of tax money that is not transferred to the Palestinians, every roadblock in the West Bank, every dunam of land stolen since June 1967, and every settlement - old or new, big or small, within the Israeli consensus or not. Neither the Qassams nor any negotiations process has managed to stop this Israeli fire.
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  1.   Amira Hass,why don`t you leave Israel? 09:47  |  Hastaroth 26/04/07
  2.   interesting idea 09:51  |  David 26/04/07
  3.   shoe on the other foot 09:58  |  ricki bobbi 26/04/07
  4.   Pals have become victims of their own violence 10:17  |  Alicia 26/04/07
  5.   The israeli public has been conned! 10:54  |  Factual 26/04/07
  6.   Who speaks the truth...?? 10:59  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  7.   hastaroth 11:41  |  A.M. 26/04/07
  8.   "He said "She said "They said-THIS ISN`T JOURNALISM 11:55  |  Ben 26/04/07
  9.   Changing shoes 12:07  |  Dany 26/04/07
  10.   Why do you call it a publicity stunt? 12:12  |  Israel Israeli 26/04/07
  11.   Swiss Dino 12:22  |  Brody 26/04/07
  12.   Independant monitors 12:26  |  Rebecca 26/04/07
  13.   Shooting a child in the head is not war on terror; it is terror! 12:41  |  Tupac 26/04/07
  14.   Stamp the terror out where it breeds. 12:59  |  HonestAbe 26/04/07
  15.   #13 12:59  |  Niina 26/04/07
  16.   Amira hASS 13:04  |  Alexander 26/04/07
  17.   Have you, Ms Haas, stopped to ask the following questions: 1) Why 13:05  |  Avihu 26/04/07
  18.   #8 Ben. And "we say"... 13:09  |  Maureen Ann 26/04/07
  19.   Well said Amira 13:15  |  yuval 26/04/07
  20.   amira hass the expert 13:15  |  lars 26/04/07
  21.   TUPAC Shooting a child you mean like sleeping baby Shalhevet Pas 13:18  |  PETER. S.M 26/04/07
  22.   DINO, me and the BBC 13:20  |  FOX 26/04/07
  23.   Sounds like suicide bombers,drive by shootings,roadside bombs etc 13:21  |  PETER SM 26/04/07
  24.   # 11 Brody What about a Fathwa...?? 13:22  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  25.   Swiss #6 13:24  |  Lynn 26/04/07
  26.   Deir Abu Masha`al is in Gaza?????? 13:37  |  peter 26/04/07
  27.   Are you a Jew! 13:45  |  Dolly 26/04/07
  28.   Poor Terrorists 13:50  |  Niall 26/04/07
  29.   Maureen Ann 13:58  |  Niall 26/04/07
  30.   Poor Ms. Hass` Paternalism 13:58  |  Fed Up 26/04/07
  31.   AMIRA,the 15 year old stone throwing boy was shot 14:04  |  lakshmi 26/04/07
  32.   AMIRA SPEAKS THE TRUTH,among the few courageous journalists left 14:11  |  Vijaya 26/04/07
  33.   # 22 FOX 14:12  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  34.   Swiss Dino 14:16  |  Star of David 26/04/07
  35.   #18Mauren-OH! NO! You`re onto us Jews... 14:17  |  Ben 26/04/07
  36.   # 25 Lynn 14:19  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  37.   Maureen Ann re NIALL 14:24  |  Star of David 26/04/07
  38.   fox 14:24  |  bev 26/04/07
  39.   Thanks for you point of view 14:31  |  Andrea 26/04/07
  40.   The Chicken and the Egg and a few Toy Ducks 14:34  |  Ronnie Wolman 26/04/07
  41.   Niina : who ever you are 14:43  |  Jonathan 26/04/07
  42.   reaction to # 1 14:44  |  Jojo 26/04/07
  43.   The Simple Fact 14:46  |  Eitan Lee Al 26/04/07
  44.   Avihu 17, and what are the answers to the three 14:47  |  Nur 26/04/07
  45.   # 18 MaureenAnn...why do you bother? 14:51  |  Albert Amato 26/04/07
  46.   # 34 Star of David 14:53  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  47.   lLAKSHMIWhy are the children in the front line throwing stones & 14:55  |  Peter S.M. 26/04/07
  48.   THANKYOU AMIRA for the courage of your convictions! 14:58  |  Martha 26/04/07
  49.   THANKYOU AMIRA for living up to our true prophetic traditions 14:59  |  mildred 26/04/07
  50.   Thanks AMIRA for telling it like it is 15:00  |  Ralph 26/04/07
  51.   chicken and the egg? 15:02  |  peter 26/04/07
  52.   Ronnie Wolman 15:07  |  GABE1 26/04/07
  53.   DINO, #33 Peace for Land? 15:08  |  FOX 26/04/07
  54.   Hey Bev #38 15:12  |  FOX 26/04/07
  55.   AMIRA,Israel the VANDAL has demolished a historic 8th century 15:16  |  sara 26/04/07
  56.   If the situation is broken find a way to fix it 15:17  |  Sam 26/04/07
  57.   Thankyou Amira,for drawing attention to the lack of parity 15:20  |  Alan 26/04/07
  58.   If the suspects would go easily, then no need for force 15:21  |  Jason 26/04/07
  59.   Yuval #19 15:23  |  Sarah 26/04/07
  60.   # 44, Nur: I hoped you knew the answers to the questions, but 15:24  |  Avihu 26/04/07
  61.   Amira Hass does not live in Israel 15:25  |  Mark Marshall 26/04/07
  62.   #35Ben. Holy cow! 15:29  |  Maureen Ann 26/04/07
  63.   Hello Dino #6 15:29  |  S 26/04/07
  64.   3Niall "Permanent concentration camps" 15:34  |  Maureen Ann 26/04/07
  65.   The 1st paragraph was great.... 15:36  |  Avrum 26/04/07
  66.   # 36 Swiss 15:42  |  Lynn 26/04/07
  67.   hamas promotes terrorism among children. 15:43  |  maria 26/04/07
  68.   TO nr.#1 15:45  |  Gybor 26/04/07
  69.   Gabe 1 Eggs mixed within the Chickens,sitting Ducks 15:49  |  Ronnie Wolman 26/04/07
  70.   Amira let`s combine your ideas with yesterday`s Sharon`s, 15:51  |  Maybe peace s hiding 26/04/07
  71.   alan 16:07  |  Niina 26/04/07
  72.   Hass will quote from every TOM DICK & AHMED 16:08  |  Mitch Iginer 26/04/07
  73.   All pals love to stay pleasantly in the roof??? 16:11  |  Alain 26/04/07
  74.   more to alan 16:11  |  Niina 26/04/07
  75.   Too Bad, the Palestinians did not learn from years past 16:15  |  El-birawi 26/04/07
  76.   Amira `5th column` Hass 16:18  |  SystemF 26/04/07
  77.   SARA name the building.Its history and current usage. 16:18  |  PETER. S.M 26/04/07
  78.   # 53 FOX 16:25  |  Swiss (Dino) 26/04/07
  79.   No change possible....................... 16:37  |  Just Curious 26/04/07
  80.   What`s Haaretz`s psychology behind promoting Hass? 16:37  |  Fortuna Benmayor 26/04/07
  81.   A rampart against Asia 16:41  |  The Other Alan 26/04/07
  82.