[WCUSP] Fwd: [womeninblack] Abunimah: Mahmoud Abbas' war against the Palestinian people]

[yvonne simmons]

Dear all, I feel we need to do an action about this
and the upcoming vote in congress on Iraq. In Peace
> 
> UPDATE FROM THE ELECTRONIC INTIFADA
> http://electronicIntifada.net
> _______________________________
> 
> Mahmoud Abbas' war against the Palestinian people 
> 
> By Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada, 10 August
> 2007
> 
> http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article7160.shtml
> 
> "Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was apparently
> more
> delighted by the banquet prepared for him by the
> wife of
> Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat than he was
> with
> meeting President Mahmoud Abbas in Jericho the day
> before
> yesterday," the Lebanese newspaper As-Safir reported
> on
> its website on 8 August, citing Israel's Channel 10
> television station.
> 
> Channel 10's correspondent spoke of the "hospitality
> and
> warmth" that marked Abbas' reception of Olmert and
> his
> delegation, noting that "Erekat's wife insisted on
> personally preparing and serving" the banquet.
> Olmert, the
> report added, "was unable to conceal his delight and
> appetite for the rich food and for the hospitality
> and
> generosity" the Israelis received from their
> Palestinian
> hosts.
> 
> Behind all the theater, the results of the meeting
> were as
> meagre as can be expected. Olmert publicly affirmed
> his
> commitment to the "two-state solution," while
> spokesmen
> briefed the press that Israel was not ready to
> discuss any
> fundamental issues, such as borders, halting
> colonial
> settlements, or the rights of refugees. The exercise
> was
> aimed at maintaining the fiction of a "peace
> process" from
> which Abbas will supposedly one day be able to
> deliver
> results.
> 
> Yet while he treats Olmert to delicacies in Jericho,
> Abbas
> is doing his best to ensure that Palestinians in
> Gaza
> continue to suffer and starve due to the closure of
> the
> commercial and civilian crossings and tightened
> siege
> imposed by Israel since Hamas fighters routed US-
> and
> Israeli-backed Fatah militias in early June.
> 
> A source who works directly with Abbas' ministers in
> the
> unelected and illegal "emergency government" of
> Salam
> Fayyad in Ramallah wrote to me that "Abbas has
> explicitly
> ordered the Rafah border to close and remain closed
> with
> the purpose of strangling Hamas." The source, who
> was
> motivated to speak out by his outrage, but requested
> anonymity because he fears reprisals, added that
> Abbas "is
> ready to see his own people die for his political
> games."
> The source added that while Abbas' official public
> relations pronouncements are that the border is to
> be
> opened at once, "what is going on in the meetings is
> the
> opposite."
> 
> What my source confirmed had already been revealed
> by
> Haaretz in a 8 July article that reported that Abbas
> "asked Israel and Egypt prevent the movement of
> people
> from Egypt to the Gaza Strip through the Rafah
> border
> crossing" and that "Abbas and a number of his aides
> asked
> that the request not be made public" ("Abbas asks
> for
> Rafah Gaza-Egypt crossing point to remain closed,"
> Haaretz, 18 July 2007).
> 
> Abbas' policy of colluding with Israel to starve his
> own
> people is having its effect. The United Nations
> agency for
> Palestinian refugees UNRWA issued a desperate appeal
> for
> the borders of the besieged strip to be reopened.
> Filippo
> Grandi, the agency's deputy commissioner general
> warned in
> a 9 August statement that within weeks Gaza could
> "be one
> hundred percent aid dependent" (Press Statement by
> Filippo
> Grandi, Deputy Commissioner General, UNRWA, Gaza
> City, 9
> August 2007.)
> 
> All 600 garment factories in Gaza have shut down
> because
> they cannot import raw materials and 90 percent of
> factories involved in the construction industry have
> closed, the BBC reported on 9 August, citing figures
> given
> by the UN. As many as 120,000 workers in Gaza are
> likely
> to lose their jobs, and even UNRWA and the United
> Nations
> Development Programme have had to halt construction
> of
> shelters for refugees. ("UN warns over Gaza economic
> woe,"
> BBC News, 9 August 2007.)
> 
> In what might be a tacit admission of Abbas'
> complicity,
> Grandi made a direct appeal not only to Israel, but
> to the
> "Palestinian authorities" to take "immediate steps
> to open
> up the Karni Crossing, to imports and exports, as
> well as
> humanitarian goods." He added, "Only this will allow
> the
> little that remains of Gaza's economy to survive."
> 
> As the people in Gaza suffer strangulation,
> thousands of
> their relatives were stranded in desperate
> conditions on
> the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing,
> refugees
> exiled even from their place of exile. Many are
> people in
> poor health who went to Egypt to seek medical
> treatment,
> and at least 31 have died while waiting to return
> home.
> 
> On the political front, Hamas has continued to react
> to
> Abbas' escalating war with equanimity, issuing daily
> calls
> for dialogue, reconciliation and a return to a
> national
> unity government. Despite the siege, it has also
> continued
> to hold its own successfully, paying the wages of
> thousands of government employees whose salaries
> Abbas and
> Fayyad had confiscated.
> 
> Abbas, while literally embracing the occupier and
> colonizer, has continued to angrily reject any
> intra-Palestinian dialogue. Yet it is doubtful how
> long
> this position will be tenable. Abbas, under a veto
> from
> the Bush administration refuses to talk, even as
> some
> senior Israelis have started to advocate direct
> dialogue
> with Hamas.
> 
> One of those is Efraim Halevy, the former head of
> Israel's
> Mossad intelligence agency. Speaking to the Wall
> Street
> Journal, Halevy said, "I don't say we should talk to
> Hamas
> out of sympathy to them. I have no sympathy
> whatsoever for
> Hamas. I think they are a ghastly crowd ... But I
> have not
> seen anybody who says the Abbas-Fayyad tandem is
> going to
> do the job" ("What if Israel Talked to Hamas?
> Ex-Spymaster's Plan, Seen as Heresy by Some," Wall
> Street
> Journal, 1 August 2007).
> 
> Halevy expressed doubts about the US strategy of
> trying to
> prop up Abbas and isolate Hamas, calling it
> "political
> fantasy." He called for Israel to negotiate a
> long-term
> truce with Hamas, something the movement has already
> offered. Halevy, the Journal reported, "is part of a
> small
> band of public figures who now say that, because of
> Hamas's growing clout, it is becoming impossible to
> avoid
> such a dialogue. Former Secretary of State Colin
> Powell
> joined the group in a recent interview with National
> Public Radio."
> 
> Unashamed, Abbas carries on; he recently received
> another
> large arms shipment -- 1,000 rifles -- coordinated
> by
> Israel and Jordan to strengthen his militias against
> Hamas. All these provocations are having an effect.
> While
> Hamas' civilian leadership continues to offer olive
> branches, the rank and file of the resistance
> movement are
> showing signs that their patience is wearing thin.
> 
> Following Fayyad's recent call for all resistance
> forces
> to unilaterally disarm in front of the occupation,
> and the
> subsequent publication of his "government program"
> that
> omitted mention of armed struggle, the Palestinian
> Resistance Committees (PRC) issued an ominous
> warning. In
> a 28 July press conference a spokesman for the group
> -- a
> coalition of resistance fighters from various
> factions
> including Fatah, responsible for capturing the
> Israeli
> prisoner of war Gilad Shalit -- "dubbed Abbas,
> Fayyad and
> other members of the government the 'Ramallah
> traitors'
> and vowed they will receive an 'identical response
> as to
> the Israeli occupation'" ("PRC: Fayad and 'Ramallah
> traitors' targets for attack," Haaretz, 28 July
> 2007).
> 
> Meanwhile, another Hamas member, Mou'aiad Bani Odeh,
> 22,
> died in an Israeli hospital after being transferred
> from
> al-Juneid prison, run by Abbas' forces. Bani Odeh,
> Hamas
> alleges, succumbed to injuries resulting from
> torture
> inflicted by Abbas' men, who continue their campaign
> of
> repression against Hamas members throughout the West
> Bank.
> ("Hamas member dies after being tortured in jail run
> by
> Palestinian Authority," Ma'an News, 10 August 2007.)
> 
> The signs are that unless Abbas and his entourage
> reverse
> course and end their war against the Palestinian
> people,
> the apparent calm that now prevails will soon be
> shattered
> by another storm.
> 
> 
> Ali Abunimah is co-founder of The Electronic
> Intifada and
> author of One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the
> Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.
> 
> --
> ABOUT US: The Electronic Intifada (EI) is a
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> 
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>  
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