An-Nahar, Lebanon, August 20
At daybreak on Thursday, August 18, the Israeli navy wasn’t getting ready for a navy raid in opposition to a terror cell, as occurred prior to now in cities like Jenin and Nablus. Slightly, it was a raid in opposition to civil and human rights organizations within the coronary heart of Ramallah, teams like Addameer, Al-Haq, the Bisan Analysis Middle and the Protection for Kids Worldwide – Palestine. There’s completely little doubt that these organizations had been established in accordance with Palestinian regulation, that’s, they’re licensed and legit organizations that function throughout the Palestinian territories and even obtain funding from European Union member states. Their headquarters are all positioned close to the workplace of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh. They’re additionally simply down the road from the headquarters of the Palestinian safety providers, which is meant to stop the motion of Israeli navy items throughout the streets of Ramallah, or every other Palestinian territory. After all, nobody, except Israel, which is an occupying apartheid state, actually believes that these aid and assist organizations really pose a severe safety menace to anybody. Nonetheless, the Israeli navy is aware of that many of those teams acquire information on the bottom, conduct investigations, and write studies that make clear Israel’s violations of human rights within the Occupied Palestinian Territories. It’s clear that, in launching these raids, Israel is continuous its marketing campaign geared toward subjugating the Palestinian folks by weakening their civil society. Israel’s actions are additionally meant to ship a transparent message to the Palestinian Authority, based on which the Palestinians – regardless of having a president, a authorities, a flag, an anthem, embassies and even a safety power – are in the end nothing greater than pawns in Israel’s chess sport. It’s Israel that may in the end train management over all West Financial institution territory. Any Israeli concessions to the Palestinians will come within the type of financial advantages. In pursuing this technique, Israel additionally seeks to show the fragility of the Palestinian Authority and undermine its function in entrance of its folks. What’s vital now’s that this incident, like many different Israeli incursions into the cities of Jerusalem, Jenin, Nablus and Hebron, draw consideration to an incomprehensible and unacceptable actuality that should change. First, the Palestinian Authority should stop to keep up safety coordination and financial relations with Israel. Since 2015, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ignored the Palestinian Central Council’s determination to finish safety coordination with Israel. Furthermore, he isn’t doing something to strengthen the Palestinian scenario. As we speak, it appears as if the Palestinian Safety Providers, which devour about 40% of the Palestinian Authority’s finances, haven’t any actual mission apart from defending Abbas’ rule. Second, Israel’s incursions into areas which might be below the strict management of the Palestinian Authority, based on the Oslo Accords, should not be a actuality that the Authority merely comes to just accept. The Palestinian management should defend the Palestinian folks and Palestinian civil society organizations from Israeli assaults inside its personal sovereign jurisdiction. Third, it’s clear from all of this that the Palestinian management continues to undergo Israeli dictates, by relinquishing its proper to sovereignty. It hasn’t taken a single initiative to advertise Palestinian statehood on the bottom. As a substitute, it has fallen for the delusion that if the United Nations would acknowledge it as a state, all of its issues can be solved. Does the Authority assume that independence will merely be handed to the Palestinian folks on a silver platter? Does it actually consider it could stand idly by, treating the occasions unfolding round it as an observer, with out taking any initiative to alter the scenario? – Majid Kayali (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)
