Israel/West Bank: The Dividing Wall by BBC World News / United Press International BBC World News / United Press International 11:00am 14th Feb, 2004   23 February 2004    "Middle East: Annan condemns suicide bombing in Jerusalem" (UN News)    United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today condemned the suicide bombing in Jerusalem yesterday as a “heinous crime” and called on the Palestinian Authority (PA) to punish those responsible.    “The deliberate targeting of civilians is a heinous crime and cannot be justified by any cause,” Mr. Annan said in a statement issued by his spokesman in Tokyo, where he is on an official visit. “We urge the PA to take the steps necessary to bring to justice those who plan, facilitate and carry out such crimes.“Our thoughts and condolences go out to the families and victims of this crime,” the statement concluded.    18 February, 2004,    Red Cross slams Israel barrier (BBC World News)    The International Committee of the Red Cross has condemned Israel's building of a barrier in the West Bank as "contrary" to international law.    The aid agency said the barrier, whose proposed route cuts into Palestinian areas, went "far beyond what is permissible for an occupying power". Israel says the barrier is designed to stop suicide bombers. But Palestinians dispute the barrier's legality and say the wall is little more than a land grab.    The ICRC's comments come just days before a hearing at the International Court of Justice in The Hague on the legality of the controversial barrier. Israel says the court does not have the authority to hold hearings on the barrier.    The ICRC, a neutral, Swiss-based organisation, has been observing construction of the security fence. It says that, where the barrier runs through occupied territory, thousands of Palestinians have been deprived of access to water, health care and education. It has also caused extensive damage to Palestinian land and property, the agency adds.    "The problems affecting the Palestinian population in their daily lives clearly demonstrate that it [the barrier] runs counter to Israel's obligation under [international humanitarian law] to ensure the humane treatment and well-being of the civilian population living under its occupation," it said in a statement.    "The ICRC, therefore, calls upon Israel not to plan, construct or maintain this barrier within occupied territory." The organisation stressed that it respected Israel's right to protect itself and the statement did not call for a halt to building altogether.    But BBC's Imogen Foulkes in Geneva says it was an unusually outspoken statement from a normally neutral body. The Israeli ambassador to international organisations in Geneva, Yaakov Levy, told the Associated Press news agency that Israel "regretted" the ICRC's decision to criticise the barrier.    "There is a danger that the position presented by the ICRC will be turned into a political tool against Israel's measures of self-defence," he said.    February 14, 2004    Israel won't testify at wall 'trial' by Ian MacKinnon. ( Published by The Australian)    Israel has maintained its hardline opposition to this month's international court hearing into the legality of its West Bank barrier by refusing to give oral evidence.    The Israeli cabinet's decision yesterday comes as supporters and opponents of the barricade prepare for a media blitz in The Hague, the Dutch city where the trial begins on February 23.    A centrepiece of the Israeli public relations campaign will be the charred, mangled skeleton of the bus in which 11 Jerusalem residents were killed and 50 wounded by a suicide bomber on January 29.    Zaka, the Orthodox Jewish organisation that gathers human remains for ritual burial after such attacks, said yesterday it would air-freight the bus to The Netherlands in two large pieces.    The group will then reassemble it somewhere in the city as a reminder of why Israel needs the complicated network of concrete walls, razor-wire-topped fences and security trenches it is building to keep Palestinians out.    Israel's decision to boycott oral arguments and instead rely on written submissions is based on its contention that the 15-member court lacks authority to rule on Israel's "basic right of self-defence", according to a statement issued by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office.    After the January 29 bus attack, the Israeli Government posted on one of its websites a graphic five-minute video showing the charred vehicle drenched in blood and strewn with body parts. Within days, the site had received almost half a million hits.    Also planned for the streets of The Hague is a march past the court by 920 Jewish students from Israel, the US and Europe, each carrying a photograph of an Israeli killed since the start of the intifada in September 2000.    Palestinians are planning to counter the Israeli campaign by showing the economic havoc the barrier causes to those it cuts off from farmland, jobs, schools and hospitals.    Palestinians decry the barrier as a land seizure that in places cuts deeply into the West Bank. They call it an "apartheid wall" that obstructs travel between villages and restricts farmers' access to agricultural lands.    Up to 10 Palestinian farmers are to tell of the hardship caused by the fence since it appeared almost two years ago. But already the group fears that its star witnesses may be denied travel permits by Israel, and is making contingency plans so they can give videophone testimony.    Their tales of woe will be underlined by exhibits of pictures and stories that dramatise how the presence of the wall has dramatically changed the lives of tens of thousands of people.    The public relations blitz matches the legal manoeuvring. Both sides have hired top lawyers, with two British barristers helping to marshal the arguments outlined in the hearing.    Palestinians also are planning large demonstrations throughout the West Bank and Gaza on the day the court convenes. Demonstrations by the Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign are scheduled on the weekend of the hearing in The Hague and cities worldwide.    Palestinians' opposition to the wall produced a UN General Assembly resolution last year asking the court to rule on its legality.    "Walls of Hurt" by M.J. Rosenberg.    WASHINGTON, Feb. 13 (UPI) -- I have visited Israel dozens of times, but this month's Israel Policy Forum study mission with a group of Seattle activists created sensory overload unlike anything I have experienced in the past.    First of all, the country remains essentially empty of tourists. I visited areas which are usually filled with Americans and heard no English around me, only Hebrew and Arabic. Abandoned by foreign tourists, Israelis have undergone a personality change. They have never been so friendly to the few foreigners who visit. In the past, some shopkeepers in Jerusalem acted as if they were doing you a favor. Now they radiate warmth and helpfulness, whether you purchase something or not. On Jaffa Road, Israelis and Arabs competed to give directions to a confused American. There is an undertone of sadness, particularly in Jerusalem which once prided itself on being "one city, undivided."    One morning I walked around East Jerusalem and saw no Israelis except for a soldier or two. When I told Israelis about my stroll to the other side of the city, they looked at me as if I was crazy. "Why would you go there?" they asked.    The walls are back, at least psychologically, and those walls are often as impermeable as the concrete ones going up outside the city. For me, this is especially poignant. In 1968, I spent several months on Salah al-Din Street, in the heart of East Jerusalem, as a member of a Jewish student group. Today, it is unimaginable that the Israelis would house Jewish students there.    In Tel Aviv, a city which remains upbeat despite everything, young soldiers are everywhere. The ones I saw weren't guarding anything; they were at historic sites getting imbued with Zionist history as a part of basic training. They look just like American high school kids (they are only 18). Horsing around, flirting, singing along to hip-hop tunes on the radio, it is painful to imagine that many of them will be in combat units in a few months.    And, despite all that we hear about growing resistance to army service, virtually all Israeli teenagers will go. I asked our 17 year-old cousin whether he was nervous about going. A tall, handsome Orthodox kid, he shrugged off the question. "I'll do what I have to do," he said. He said that he hoped that he would not have to serve at checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza but that if he must, he must.    Our relatives, who came to Israel after the Holocaust, have, until now, not had to worry about a son in the army. The first generation born in Israel consisted of three daughters. But the second native-born generation includes several boys and their grandparents live in dread of the day they will have to don their uniforms.    The mother of one told me that she was "sure when he was born that the wars would be over by the time he was 18. And after Oslo, I even thought that maybe he would not have to go into the army at all. Now I think that even my grandchildren may not see peace." She asked me why "the United States doesn't try to help anymore."    The scene on the Palestinian side is just as depressing. Our group visited the separation barrier Israel is building to defend itself from the suicide bombers who have succeeded in taking 900 Israeli lives since 2000. The segment in a neighborhood called Abu Dis, just outside of Jerusalem, is a solid 30-foot concrete wall.    There is a part of it that is not solid concrete but more makeshift, and here Palestinian laborers were crossing home after work. They were crawling and climbing through and over the wall. It was not easy but a whole line was doing it.    I went over to watch and a French camera crew asked me my impressions. I told them that I understood why Israelis needed a wall and that, if it adhered closely to the '67 lines, it could contribute not only to Israel's security but to a real reduction in tensions. But, I added, it was deeply troubling to see a neighborhood dissected. I also said that I felt badly for these Palestinians who suddenly found themselves cut off from jobs, markets, and schools. "Innocent people are suffering," I said. Then I returned to our bus.    Nothing I said was particularly exceptional, or so I thought. A young Palestinian felt differently. In fact, having overheard what I said to the journalists, he gathered up his courage and boarded our bus.    He asked if he could speak to the group, borrowing a microphone from our Israeli guide. He told us that until hearing what I had said to the French journalists, he had believed that all American Jews hate Palestinians and lack any sympathy for them as fellow human beings. As a result, he hated all Jews.    But having heard one Jew empathize with the Palestinian plight, he had changed his mind. He would never again hate "all Jews" nor would he continue to believe that all Jews hate Palestinians.    He thanked me for changing his attitude and said he would "never forget it." He then walked off the bus, leaving our group in shock and some near tears. I was left shaking. I had neither said nor done anything unusual and yet this young man said that he was "changed forever" by my words. But I had done nothing except express some empathy.    Apparently Palestinians are so unaccustomed to any show of compassion from Jews (or anyone else?) that hearing a few words of sympathy is a life-altering experience.    Something is terribly wrong. Young Israelis, like our cousin, are manning checkpoints to guard their country against Palestinians who are walking around with such hurt and anger that some do indeed become threats to Israelis. Palestinians are watching Israelis build a wall to keep them out and in some places to cage them in.    Can anyone possibly believe that walls alone can protect anyone against burning hate and burning hurt that grows until it explodes. I'm not just talking about the Palestinians either. Israelis too are in terrible pain.    In 1967, after Israel re-unified Jerusalem (East Jerusalem had been governed by the Jordanians), Israel's Defense Minister Moshe Dayan ordered the walls dividing the city to be torn down. He was told that it was impossible; it would take months before the two peoples -- divided by walls of concrete and walls of hatred for 19 years -- could safely mix.    Dayan gave the order anyway and two cities became one -- and one of the world's most beautiful.Thirty-seven years later, the walls are back.    (M.J. Rosenberg is director of policy analysis for Israel Policy Forum.)
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