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News :: Israel / Palestine |
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150,000 Leftists in the Streets of Tel Aviv |
Current rating: 0 |
by haaretz via gehrig
(No verified email address) |
16 May 2004
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A very welcome bit of sanity. And some interesting comparisons to another rally -- the time 400,000 took to the streets to protest the massacres at Sabra and Shatila. |
The left won't be held hostage by the Likud
By Lily Galili
More than 150,000 people took part last night in a mass demonstration in Tel Aviv, and called on the government to pull out of Gaza and start peace talks.
The figures are not official and will probably be challenged by the right wing. However, the exact number of protesters is less important in this case. The rally, organized by the umbrella organization of all the left-wing movements, set out to bring a larger number of people than the Likud's 60,000 members who foiled Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan.
The throng that crowded into Rabin Square and spilled over into the surrounding streets gave an unequivocal proof they did. The terrorist attacks failed to get the peace camp out to the square. But the soldiers' deaths in Gaza, coupled with this public's sense of insult at being held hostage by Likud voters, drove the masses to the square.
Although recent events motivated the crowd to come, the spirit of the legendary rally of 400,000 after the Sabra and Chatila massacre 22 years ago, hovered in the air. The masses stood calling then defense minister Ariel Sharon a murderer.
For a brief time, beside posters of Peace Now, the Geneva Initiative, Labor and others, there was also one poster saying "Arik, the nation is with you." It quickly disappeared.
Sharon's aides told foreign journalists that both of these demonstrations were born of historical accidents - one in Lebanon, the second this week in Gaza.
In the 22 years stretching between the two rallies a new generation has grown up, but the composition of people in the square did not seem to have changed. "I am the silent majority who has been coming to every demonstration for 22 years," said Moshe Atzmon, a pensioner from Tel Aviv. For Yoram Gur, 38, of Kibbutz Givat Haim, this was the first demonstration in his life. He came to say that a minority cannot impose its will on the majority. With him was his nine year old daughter Roni.
The speakers at this rally were a little different from usual. Shimon Peres, Yossi Beilin and Tzaly Reshef were accompanied by Amir Peretz, Ami Ayalon and a bereaved father, Yinon Ashkenazi. Between the politicians' speeches, an Arab female student, a young man about to enlist in the army and a young resident of Sderot contributed their own statements.
"This is not a left-wing rally, this is a rally of the majority," said Peres to applause. "There are four times more people here than all the voters of the radical right."
The crowd loved him, even when he started talking again about the new Middle East. Amir Peretz was also received warmly. "We don't believe merely in disengagement but wish to add the values of equality and social justice," he said.
On the fringes of the crowd were the refuseniks, whom the organizers did not want at the center, as well as the women's movements calling to get out of Gaza.
People at the rally were already asking themselves how to continue the momentum created in the square.
(c) 2004, Haaretz Intl
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This work is in the public domain |
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Re: Additional Haaretz commentary |
by haaretz via gehrig
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
16 May 2004
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ocus / `The majority' is waking up
By Yossi Verter
Only the future will show whether last night's demonstration, the largest ever seen in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square, calling for a pullout from the Gaza Strip and the resumption of talks with the Palestinians, has any effect. Not every rally, however successful, is a historical watershed.
The "majority" that gathered, still doesn't count, but clearly it is waking up. If there was any significance in this mass rally, it was the boost of energy injected into the frail body of the Israeli left. The Likud referendum results that killed hopes for an end to the occupation of Gaza Strip, followed by the deaths of 13 soldiers, brought the masses to the square. The question is, what will keep them there - or more precisely, what will bring them back, again and again, in growing numbers and bearing a united message.
The politicians who addressed the crowd, Peres, Beilin and Peretz, do not represent even a quarter of the Knesset. Peres was well received, with the respect due and elder statesman. Beilin's speech was high in promise, but the absence of a single leader who might pull the cart, was blatantly obvious throughout the evening.
"I feel like the child of divorced parents who finally manages to get her parents to go out for an one evening," said MK Yuli Tamir.
To judge from the little political infighting among those representing the various factions, be they of the Geneva Initiative or the Labor party, on issues of procedure and substance of speeches, there will not be another such gathering. We can count on this bunch to foil, undermine, and trip up every successful move that manages to come out from under them.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was described in the days preceding the demonstration as an interested but cool observer. This is an optimal illusion. The agenda may appear to be the same, "pull out of Gaza," but the clear message of last night's demonstration, broadcast to the world was this - Ariel Sharon is a weak prime minister, the prisoner of a handful of extremists in his own party.
Even Peres, the supporter of unity, was forced to add to his speech one sentence rejecting a national unity government - which did not appear to deter the Geneva Initiative people from describing Beilin as one who is interested in precisely such a government.
After last night the pressure on Sharon to shake off the Likud extremists will intensify. If we add the change in Shinui's leader, Justice Minister Yosef Lapid, who is now pushing the prime minister to open talks with Palestinian leader Ahmed Qureia, then the demonstration may prove to be no less important than the one 21 years ago that forced Sharon to leave the Defense Ministry.
(c) 2004, Haaretz |
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Re: 150,000 Leftists in the Streets of Tel Aviv |
by NRA4Freedom
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
16 May 2004
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I guess I just don't understand how you can have "peace talks" when the Muslim side of the table has already stated and shown on many occasions that in no uncertain terms only the non existence of Israel itself would mean any form of "peace" to them. What's left to negotiate after that revelation? Islam itself doesn't appear to be about "peace", it appears it is about turning the entire world into an Iran like existence. And considering how women are treated under Islamic code, how on earth can ANY "woman's movement", feminists or not, be on the side of ANYTHING Muslim??? It simply makes no sense. |
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Re: 150,000 Leftists in the Streets of Tel Aviv |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
16 May 2004
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NRA,
Amen brother. I, too, cannot comprehend the Jewish Left in our country and especially abroad. To negotiate a settlement with the Arabs means certain death for Israel and all Jewish people.
Yet, the Jewish vote in this country, nearly always supports the democratic nominee. I am perplexed by this.
Leftist Jews absolutely amaze me. Are they to believe that their faith would be welcome in a communist country? Look at the former Soviet Union and all of the former Eastern Block countries.
Look at Socialist Europe. Anti semitism is clearly on the rise there. Without Republicans in all sections of government in the US, who exactly would be their friends?
Jack |
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Re: 150,000 Leftists in the Streets of Tel Aviv |
by NRA4Freedom
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
17 May 2004
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I guess what I'd like to see is for the leftists and/or the "revolutionaries" here to clearly outline THEIR vision and agenda for America. What exactly do they see America as within the framework of the world itself, and what vision of "freedom" do they see that I am missing. They claim that the government isn't "for the people " here, but other than the free elections we already have, how exactly do they intend to make America the way they want it? It almost sounds as if they don't want a "free" America, but rather, a dictatorship that they are in charge of?
And does anyone REALLY think that as long as Israel exists there will EVER be peace in that area of the world? Or is the real plan maybe, do they think that if we stop supporting Israel, that it will then collapse, and the Muslims can move in and saw off the heads of all the Jews, and the world will them somehow "live in peace and safety"? Is it the Jews "first" who must all die, and then all those evil "Christians", and that once the world is rid of them it can somehow "live in peace"? What in the world is going on in the minds of these people?
Maybe the real question is, can Israel "kick ass" without the help of the west. Because IF we do what they want, and abandon Israel, it will then immediately force a war. The Muslim Nations will perceive that Israel is now vulnerable, and will immediately attack her. But Israel kicked their butt once, and now maybe the time has come for her to do it again, only this time, they will need to really finish the job, in order to not just continue what has been happening to her for decades now.
God clearly stated in scripture that He would make Jerusalem "a cup of trembling" to the rest of the world. Since about 70 AD, Jerusalem was really nothing much but a muddy spot in the rode, and now look at what has happened...truly amazing. |
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Israeli army to destroy hundreds more homes |
by reposted by DR
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
17 May 2004
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Israeli army to destroy hundreds more homes
By Donald Macintyre, Independent, UK
17 May 2004
The Israeli cabinet vowed yesterday to step up military operations in Gaza, 18 hours after the largest anti-war demonstration in four years backed withdrawal from the occupied strip of land and a return to the negotiating table.
Shaul Mofaz, the Defence Minister, told ministers that the army would create a "different reality" along the Gaza-Egypt border to prevent arms smuggling. The Israeli High Court also lifted a ban yesterday on the army's programme of house demolitions in Rafah, the town on the border.
Ariel Sharon, the Prime Minister, is said to remain determined to disengage from Gaza, despite the opposition of his party. But the hard line taken by the cabinet yesterday suggests he is also determined to prevent Palestinian militants claiming that the withdrawal is any kind of retreat.
He said: "We will not allow Palestinian terrorism to attain the capabilities it aspires to, which would threaten the heart of the nation even after our disengagement from Gaza."
After a week in which 29 Palestinians and 13 Israeli soldiers died, Mr Mofaz was quoted by an official as saying, "We will deepen the fighting".
Mr Sharon told the cabinet that Israel had asked Egypt for assistance in halting weapons smuggling by militants across the border into Gaza. He was seeking variations to the Camp David agreement, which led to peace with Egypt in 1979, that would allow Egypt to move more troops up to its side of the border with Gaza. Mr Sharon also said he had asked the United States for help.
Israel Radio quoted Moshe Ya'alon, the army chief of staff, as telling the cabinet that Egypt had so far done little to prevent weapons being smuggled. He said militants were trying to bring Katyusha rockets into Gaza. He also said that the homes destroyed had been empty. The High Court's decision paves the way for the demolition of hundreds more homes in Rafah by the army.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency says that 88 buildings have already been destroyed, with 1,064 Palestinians being made homeless.
The High Court judgment said the army was entitled to carry out demolitions along the buffer zone on the border for security reasons if the military determined that soldiers' lives were in danger, or "according to operational needs". Where this was not the case, the army would have to publish demolition plans to allow time for legal proceedings to be brought, the judges said.
The demolitions were criticised in Jordan yesterday by Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, who said: "We know that Israel has a right for self-defence but the kind of action they are taking in Rafah with the destruction of Palestinian homes we oppose. We don't think that is productive."
General Powell also rebuked Yasser Arafat for a speech on Saturday in which he used a Koranic verse urging Muslims to "terrorise the enemy", saying the Palestinian President was making it "exceptionally difficult" to move the peace forward.
At the Israel-Gaza Strip border, Israeli soldiers killed four Palestinians as they tried to cross into Israel unobserved last night, Israel Radio reported. Neither the Israeli army nor Palestinian officials made any immediate comment on the incident. Earlier in the day soldiers found and detonated a large bomb in the same area.
Israeli air force missiles struck a building in Gaza City yesterday, housing the political branch of Mr Arafat's Fatah group and another belonging to the pro-Hamas al-Risala newspaper. Nobody was inside either office at the time.
Palestinian sources said several bystanders, including two children, were wounded in the attack on Fatah's office. The Israeli army said the targets had been "focal points of terrorist activity", and the building was used by its military wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.
Ahmed Halless, Fatah's secretary general in the Gaza Strip, said the Fatah site was a cultural centre. "Aggression will not bring peace. Violence will bring more violence," he said. |
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Re: 150,000 Leftists in the Streets of Tel Aviv |
by NRA4Freedom
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
19 May 2004
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"Aggression will not bring peace. Violence will bring more violence," he said."
And, he is somewhat correct. But we also know that appeasement won't ever bring "peace" either, for they have made it clear that as long as Israel exists, they will fight against them. So, what IS the answer??? |
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