[WCUSP] Fwd: FROM VIOLENCE TO CONSTRUCTIVE ENGAGEMENT

[yvonne simmons]

--- MAS INFO <masnet-service at maslists.org> wrote:

> From: "MAS INFO" <masnet-service at maslists.org>
> Subject: FROM VIOLENCE TO CONSTRUCTIVE ENGAGEMENT
> Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2006 11:15:01 -0500
> To: roweenayvonne at yahoo.com
> 
> From Violence to Constructive Engagement:
> 
> The Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation
> Outline On
> United States Policy and Ongoing Humanitarian Issues
> In the Israel-Palestine Conflict
> 
> Background
> 
> This year has been an extraordinary year in the
> evolution of the conflict between Palestinians and
> Israelis, as well as a time when the centrality of
> this conflict has become more of a focal point in
> addressing other issues of violence, warfare, and
> conflict in the Middle East region.
> 
> A major war between Hezbollah and Israel this past
> summer resulted in the devastation of much of
> Lebanon, and hundreds of Lebanese civilian deaths. 
> Repeated battles between Palestinian fighters and
> Israeli troops resulted in Israeli military attacks
> on Palestinian civilian targets in Gaza, including a
> June, 2006 attack on the major electrical power
> generating station in Gaza, which damaged civilian
> health, sanitation, and the country's water
> infrastructure.
> 
> While Iraq shares no geographical border with either
> Palestine or the State of Israel, we believe, as do
> many observers and scholars, that the conditions of
> occupation and oppression confronting the people of
> the West Bank and Gaza add political and military
> fuel to the armed violence inside Iraq.
> 
> Throughout the Muslim world, the reality of
> Palestine remains a primary impediment to building
> stronger bridges of cooperative and normalized
> relations between the United States and the more
> than 1.2 billion people in the global Muslim
> community.
> 
> We believe, as does the outgoing Secretary General
> of the United Nations, that the U.S. plays a central
> and indispensable role in providing a solution to
> the issue of Palestine.
> 
> While the State of Israel, the Palestinian
> Authority, and the populations of both countries
> share responsibility for resolving their conflict,
> we must recognize the unique role that the United
> States plays as the principle military and financial
> supporter of the Israeli state in the resolution of
> the conflict.
> 
> Indeed, as we witness increasingly frequent
> "anti-American" demonstrations throughout the world,
> fuel for much of the animus directed against the
> United States is the perception, and the reality of
> the lack of symmetry and fairness evident in
> official United States policy vis-à-vis the people
> of Palestine.
> 
> As an Islamic organization dedicated to the
> fundamental principle of universal human rights, the
> Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation has
> understandably deep sympathies with the people of
> Palestine, and a commitment to address the
> humanitarian crisis confronting them.
> 
> We are concerned with both the internal, factional
> violence that is preventing the people of Palestine
> from establishing a functional and unified
> government, and the external violence of land
> confiscation, economic strangulation, and military
> attacks against them.
> 
> We are, as U.S. taxpayers, equally concerned that
> our tax dollars are paying for weapons used against
> civilian populations.
> 
> But we believe that, in a larger sense, the true
> national interests of the American people would be
> better served by a re-evaluation of the unilateral
> (and largely uncritical) support of one party in the
> conflict- that is, the party with superior economic
> and military power, and the one in violation of
> numerous international laws and United Nations
> resolutions condemning the occupation of Palestinian
> land.
> 
> We further believe that violence - whether initiated
> by Palestinians or Israelis - is not the most
> effective means of ending the conflict.  Our hope is
> that justice and true freedom, for the people of
> both Palestine and Israel, could be better achieved
> through peaceful means, and through the
> demilitarization of the status quo.
> 
> We are certainly aware that current public opinion
> in the United States weighs heavily toward continued
> (and increasing) economic and military support for
> the positions of the State of Israel.
> 
> It is not our argument to deny the fundamental right
> of the people of Israel to survive in peace and
> security. But it is our position that the long-term
> interests of the United States would be advanced if
> American foreign policy in the region supported the
> demilitarization of the current conflict between the
> State of Israel and the people of Palestine,
> recognized the multilateral nature of violence in
> the conflict, and explored new possibilities for
> expanding humanitarian aid to the Palestinian
> people, while continuing efforts to provide support
> for the (largely unheard) voices, on both the
> Palestinian and Israeli sides, advocating the
> nonviolent pursuit of justice.
> 
> It is in this spirit that we offer the following
> points for consideration, in hope that they will be
> a catalyst for re-examining the substance and
> priorities of United States policy in this critical
> region of the world.
> 
> I.	The popular narrative regarding the history of
> the Palestinian people, from 1948 to the present, is
> presented by American mass media in a way that is
> neither accurate, nor in the best tradition of our
> national advocacy for victims of aggression and
> injustice.  Nor does it provide information for the
> general public that would enable them to understand
> the origins and the nature of the conflict itself.
> 
> The people of Palestine were subjected, in 1948, to
> one of the greatest dislocations of an indigenous
> population in the twentieth century.  A reported
> 750,000 people were driven from their homes, some
> into refugee camps in Jordan and Lebanon, others
> into exile outside the region, and still more into a
> state of internal displacement during Israel's
> "struggle for independence".  This period of
> history, regarded by the Jewish people as their
> liberation from the horrors of the European
> Holocaust, is viewed in a diametrically opposite way
> by the three generations of Palestinians who have
> suffered from dispossession, discrimination, and in
> some instances, massive violence and death.
> 
> II.	Israel has engaged in both conventional warfare
> against Palestinians and actions that are generally
> regarded as "terrorist".
> 
> American foreign policy has been shaped around the
> idea that Palestinian resistance in the
> Israel-Palestine conflict is essentially "terrorism"
> directed primarily against Israeli civilian targets.
> But the initial period of terror committed against
> Palestinians, including a number of massacres
> committed against women and children, began in 1948,
> the most historically notable being the massacre at
> the village of Deir Yassin, in which some 235 people
> were killed by the Irgun, a Zionist militia.
> 
> Moreover, direct American military and economic aid
> to Israel facilitates the ability of Israel to
> conduct military incursions into Palestinian towns
> and villages, to engage in detentions and mass
> arrests of ordinary Palestinian men, to blockade
> entire villages and permit the free travel of
> Palestinian people from one area of the occupied
> territories to another, in addition to subjecting
> countless Palestinians to the daily humiliations
> that are common to their collective experience under
> the occupation.
> 
> We do not advocate any form of terrorism in this
> conflict.
> 
> We do not believe that the killing of innocent
> civilians is justified in warfare (which is a truth
> made explicitly clear in the Holy Qur'an).
> 
> However, we strongly believe that the
> characterization of terrorism attributed only to
> Palestinians who commit retaliatory violence against
> Israelis is not only inaccurate, but also highly
> biased.
> 
> III.	The unilateral U.S. military support enjoyed by
> Israel in this conflict is a product, in part, of an
> obsolete and dysfunctional Cold War political
> paradigm that has no relevance to the political
> realities of the 21st century.  In the second half
> of the 20th Century, the United States heavily
> supported Israel, in part, because the Jewish state
> was a countervailing force against the expansion of
> Soviet interests (and the development of Soviet
> client states) in the region.  One former American
> official referred to Israel as "Our unsinkable
> aircraft carrier."
> 
> But the dissolution of the Soviet Union has created
> a new set of geopolitical realities in the region,
> and these realities open a space for more creative,
> multi-lateral policies that can encourage friendly
> relations with the United States for all the peoples
> of the Middle East, including the people of
> Palestine.
> 
> The United States, and the sole superpower in the
> world, is free to create and pursue constructive
> policies and international relationships that are
> not bound by the primary need to confront a Soviet
> Union that no longer exists.
> 
> IV.	The United Nations is deeply concerned about the
> alarming escalation of violence between Israelis and
> Palestinians.
> 
> In his last briefing to the Security Council of the
> United Nations on December 12, 2006, Secretary
> General Kofi Annan warned that tensions in the
> Middle East are near their "breaking point" and
> called for a "new and urgent push for peace from all
> sides, including the international community, lest
> the people of the region be consigned to new depths
> of suffering and grief."
> 
> Secretary General Annan also called for more effort
> on the part of the diplomatic Quartet - the United
> Nations, the United States, the Russian Federation,
> and the European Union, which is seeking a two-state
> solution, known as the "road map", for Israel and
> Palestine to live side-by-side in peace.
> 
> Mr. Annan went on to affirm that, "I believe that
> the fundamental aspirations of both peoples can be
> reconciled.  I believe in the right of Israel to
> exist, and to exist in a full and permanent
> security, free from terrorism, free from attack,
> free from the threat of attack
 I believe in the
> right of the Palestinians to exercise their
> self-determination.  They have been miserably abused
> and exploited
they deserve to see fulfilled their
> simple ambition to live in freedom and dignity."
> 
> V.	Leading members of the United States clergy
> representing Protestants, Catholics, Jews, and
> Muslims, also affirm that the United States holds
> the key to peace in the region.
> 
> In a statement released on Thursday, December 13,
> 2006, the National Inter-religious Leadership
> Initiative for Peace in the Middle East said that
> the U.S. did not fulfill its duty in pursuing a road
> map to a two-state solution in Israel and the
> Palestinian territories.
> 
> The statement further declared that, "The unique
> role of the United States in the region and the
> world, gives our nation a special responsibility to
> pursue peace.  The United States must make peace in
> the Middle East an urgent priority."
> 
> Signers of the statement include the President of
> the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the heads
> of the Episcopal, Evangelical, Lutheran, and
> Presbyterian churches, top executives of the Union
> for Reformed Judaism and the United Synagogue of
> Conservative Judaism, the head of the Greek Orthodox
> Church in America, and a national leader of the
> Islamic Society of North America.
> 
> We also note here that in December 2006, Nobel
> Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu attempted to visit
> Gaza on a humanitarian fact-finding mission, but was
> denied entry by Israeli authorities.
> 
> VI.	Human Rights leaders and advocates are universal
> in their condemnation of the existence of de facto
> ethnic and racial "Apartheid" in the State of
> Israel.
> 
> We note the sad but objective reality that virtually
> every aspect of Israeli society is racially
> constructed and racially divided.  Muslim and Arab
> Christian Israeli citizens live as second-class
> citizens, with unequal access to housing,
> employment, health care, and education compared to
> the Jewish majority population of the country.
> 
> While the state subsidizes housing and creates
> economic incentives for Jewish settlers in the
> occupied territories, which is a violation of
> international law under the Geneva Conventions, Arab
> and Muslim citizens of Israel face a constant threat
> of eviction and even demolition of their homes.
> 
> The fact that these activities take place within the
> context of Israel's heavy dependence upon United
> States aid, and that these racially discriminatory
> actions are not vigorously challenged by the United
> States government, convey to the world the notion
> that America is, sadly, complicit in the very acts
> of racial discrimination and unequal treatment under
> the law that our own constitution explicitly
> forbids.
> 
> VII.	Maintaining Israel has been a costly
> proposition for American taxpayers.
> 
> Israel, with a population of some six million
> people, is by far the largest foreign recipient of
> U.S. military and economic assistance.  In fiscal
> year 2005, for example, this aid package amounted to
> $2.2 billion in foreign military financing, and $357
> million in economic support. This translates to a
> full one-third of United States aid to foreign
> nations, although the population of Israel amounts
> to less than .001 percent of the population of the
> world.
> 
> Added to this amount is the transfer of charitable
> donations from U.S. citizens to Israel amounting to
> approximately $1.5 billion per year.
> 
> Israel, however, is not a poor nation.  It is the
> 16th richest nation in the world, with a higher per
> capita income greater than that of developed
> European nations like Spain and Ireland.
> 
> We argue that this disproportionately high transfer
> of military and non-military assistance contributes,
> at least in part, to the ability of Israel to both
> occupy Palestinian land and perpetuate the reality
> of a racially constructed domestic policy, with
> financial incentives and support disproportionately
> benefiting the majority Jewish segment of the
> population, while being denied to Arab and Muslim
> citizens of the same nation.
> 
> VIII.	There is a drastic need to address the
> violation of the basic human rights confronting
> Palestinians in the occupied territories, and
> especially the more than 1.4 million people in Gaza.
> 
> The Israeli violation of the basic human rights of
> the people of Palestine has created a deepening
> crisis that now threatens the very existence of
> Palestinians in the occupied territories, including
> the more than 1.4 million people living in the
> world's most densely populated area - the Gaza
> Strip.
> 
> While Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza
> face extreme economic hardships and deteriorating
> living conditions, the extreme conditions imposed on
> the people of Gaza by Israel now threaten the very
> existence of that population.  Consider the
> following statistics presented on November 16, 2006
> by B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for
> Human Rights in the Occupied Territories:
> 
> Some Israeli human rights organizations have issues
> an unprecedented call to the international community
> to insure human rights in Gaza because of the
> following:
> 
> •	Approximately 80 percent of the Gaza population is
> extremely poor, living on less than $2 a day.
> •	From July to November 2006, the Israeli military
> killed over 300 Palestinians in Gaza, including some
> 61 children.  Over half of these people were unarmed
> civilians who did not participate in the armed
> conflict.
> •	Seventy percent of Gaza's potential work force is
> unemployed or without pay.
> •	On June 28, 2006, Israel bombed Gaza's only
> independent power station, which produced 43 percent
> of Gaza's electrical requirements.  Since then, most
> of the population has electricity between 6 and 8
> hours each day, with "disastrous consequences on
> water supply, food storage, hospital functioning and
> public health."
> •	Gaza is almost entirely sealed off from the
> outside world, with virtually no way for
> Palestinians to get in or out.  Israel controls all
> population movement in and out of Gaza.
> •	Israel also controls Gaza's airspace and
> territorial waters.
> •	Israel controls most elements of the taxation
> system in Gaza, and since February 2006, have
> withheld tax monies legally owed to the Palestinian
> Authority. These revenues constitute one half of the
> total budget of the Palestinian Authority.
> Israeli warfare against the civilian population and
> infrastructure in Gaza is aided and abetted by the
> unchecked support enjoyed by the State of Israel
> from the United States - support resulting in the
> perpetuation of human rights violations and war
> crimes that diminish both the stature and the
> credibility of the United States throughout the
> international community.
> IX.	U.S. policy must support alternative visions for
> conflict resolution and social justice.
> 
> While the public policy of the Unites States focuses
> on material aid for Israel, and to a much smaller
> extent Palestine, there is virtually no mention of
> the need to support the numerous grassroots
> Non-Governmental Organizations in both Palestine and
> Israel that seek non-violent social justice and the
> protection human rights in the region.  These
> organizations have worked together to provide
> material and humanitarian support for the
> Palestinian people, and an end to the illegal
> occupation of their land.
> 
> While there are numerous groups working for these
> objectives, one such organization, Combatants For
> Peace, has emerged in 2006 as a voice for former
> Israeli defense force soldiers and former
> Palestinian Intifada combatants who have joined
> forces in a spirit of mutuality and mutual respect,
> to promote nonviolent means of ending the
> occupation.
> 
> Conclusions and Proposals for Next Steps
> 
> United States foreign policy cannot evolve in a
> political or moral vacuum.  U.S. foreign policy must
> be based on the interests of the entire American
> people, and a vision for supporting the creation of
> a world that supports dignity, freedom, and human
> rights for all.
> 
> We believe that armed violence, of any and all
> types, undermines that vision.  There has certainly
> been Palestinian armed violence directed against
> Israel.  But the contradiction in American policy is
> the failure to condemn the greater armed violence of
> colonialism and occupation, coupled with Israeli
> policies that drive the collective Palestinian
> population into deeper desperation and oppression.
> 
> Moreover, U.S. policy has contributed to the
> militarization of one side of the conflict (the
> Israeli side) to the detriment of all parties who
> seek genuine peace and mutual justice.
> 
> We believe that the world demands a new response
> from the United States.  This response should
> acknowledge the human and economic rights of all
> people in this volatile region.
> 
> Accordingly, as Muslims, as citizens, and as people
> deeply committed to justice, we call for the
> following:
> 
> 1.	Full United States compliance with the Arms
> Export Control Act, which prohibits the transfer of
> any U.S. weapons to Israel that are used to attack
> civilian populations in the West Bank and Gaza;
> 
> 2.	An end to the economic strangulation of
> Palestine, and especially Gaza, with the immediate
> transfer of (nonmilitary) assistance to Palestinian
> communities.
> 
> 3.	Provision for massive emergency assistance for
> the rebuilding of civilian infrastructures of the
> West Bank and Gaza, with due concern for access to
> electricity and water, and
> 
> 4.	Support for Palestinian and Israeli
> Non-Governmental Organizations involved in
> grassroots humanitarian and capacity building work
> in the occupied territories.
> 
> 5.	Building institutions that are able to bring a
> sense of balance and fairness to the national
> discourse on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and
> proposals for positive, new directions in U.S.
> foreign policy.  Primarily the advocates of Israel
> and the maintenance of the status quo dominate the
> current policy creation. The Muslim American Society
> (MAS) through its Freedom Foundation is striving to
> bring the legitimate aspirations and humanitarian
> needs of the Palestinian people into the equation,
> not just for the sake of "opposing views", but so
> that these voices will be considered and respected
> as equal stakeholders in a new future for the people
> of this region.
> 
> For the sake of both the people of the United States
> and the people of the Middle East, the time has come
> for a complete re-evaluation of national priorities
> and foreign policy objectives related to the
> Israel-Palestine conflict.
> 
> -----------------------------
> Ibrahim Ramey, the author of this report, is the
> Director of the Human and Civil Rights Division of
> the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation.  He
> has traveled to Iraq on two occasions (in 1998 and
> 2000) as is one of the founding members of the
> humanitarian Campaign of Conscience for the Iraq
> People, which openly challenged the sanctions
> against Iraq.
> 
> Ramey, in addition to having lectured at numerous
> U.S. universities on the issue of the Iraq war,
> served as a member of the U.S. Tribunal on Iraq,
> which investigated violations of international law
> committed by U.S. military forces during the initial
> months of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
>
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