Press Action ::: Call a Spade a Spade: Israel and Terrorism

Tuesday, January 20, 2004

Call a Spade a Spade: Israel and Terrorism

By Lauren M. Anzaldo

Since the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center made terrorism a topic of regular discussion, the word terror and its derivatives have been misused and overused for emotional and political effect.

America is leading the “War on Terror” (i.e., occupying Iraq, conducting deadly missions in Afghanistan, undermining civil liberties domestically and expanding an already bloated military-industrial complex). The Bush administration has accused some countries of aiding and abetting terrorists. Iran’s decision late last year to try two suspected al Qaeda operatives in country rather than extradite them to the United States, for example, supposedly indicated Iran’s support for terrorism.

Activists in the United States who challenge the status quo are termed domestic terrorists, and their activities are closely monitored by the CIA. Essentially, any action or person that America and its allies dislike is labeled, respectively, “terrorism” or “terrorist.”

America’s close ally, Israel, apparently dislikes no group more than the Palestinians. Israel and the United States consider Palestinians terrorists or, at best, potential terrorists. In fact, under the racist terrorist stereotype promulgated by the United States, most Arabs and Muslims fall into this category. A Jerusalem Post columnist in September suggested changing the name of the War on Terror to the War on Fundamentalist Islam because the most vicious terrorists reportedly subscribe to that religion.

For all of the talk of “terrorism,” though, there is little analysis of the word and its uses. What is terrorism? How is it defined, and, more importantly, what is the process for deciding whom to label a terrorist?

While volunteering this summer in the Jenin region of the northern West Bank, I met a 16-year-old Palestin an girl at a summer camp in the small agricultural village of Yamoun. She told me, “I wish that the Americans and other people would understand that we are not terrorists, but we are fighting terrorism.” What did this young girl mean when she said that Palestinians are fighting terrorism? Her statement implies that Israel is a terrorist state, which is certainly contrary to popular opinion in the United States.

Webster’s dictionary calls terrorism the systematic use of terror, a state of intense fear, especially as a means of coercion. The U.S. government elaborates on this generic definition in its official description of terrorism: the threat or use of violence against civilian populations to achieve political, religious or other ends.

During the two months that I spent in the West Bank, I witnessed numerous Israeli actions that easily fit this definition of terrorism: military incursions into populated areas; indiscriminate, random tank fire on city streets; rubber-coated steel bullets shot at close range at crowds of protestors; and house demolitions that leave innocent families homeless and sometimes result in the deaths of people crushed by massive armored bulldozers.

The destruction of Palestinian family homes -considered “collective punishment” and illegal under international law -is a perfect example of Israeli terrorism virtually ignored in the United States. The Israeli military claims that the tactic deters suicide bombings. This justification renders the act one of politically motivated violence (terrorism), yet Israeli home demolishers are not regarded as terrorists. In fact, Palestinians who defend themselves in the face of such treatment are dubbed terrorists, even though the United Nations charter upholds the right of colonized and oppressed peoples to struggle for self-determination, freedom and independence.

I am not alone in noticing these hypocrisies. While I was in Jenin, I worked with numerous Israeli peace groups that boldly speak out against the imperialist Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and the ongoing oppression of Palestinians.

There is also a growing movement of refuseniks, who decline to serve in the mandatory Israeli military and often face prison time for their principled resistance. In September, 27 Israeli pilots refused to fly bombing missions in Palestine on the grounds that such missions are unethical. The pilots stopped short of referring to these missions as acts of terrorism, but their public statement elicits that conclusion.

One Blackhawk helicopter pilot said, “I was proud to belong to the organization called the Israeli Air Force, but today I am ashamed. This is an organization that carries out actions that, in my eyes, are immoral and patently illegal. ... We are not in a war for our existence. We are in a war for continuing the occupation of the territories. And, in light of this dubious goal, I am not willing to be the murderer of innocent civilians.”

Israel has received international condemnation as well. A 2001 meeting in Geneva affirmed that the Fourth Geneva Convention, which deals with territories under military occupation, applies to the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories: the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Israel’s actions in these territories, then, are illegal and qualify as war crimes. This conclusion was moot as soon as it was reached, however, because America, the international superpower, didn’t attend the Geneva meeting and ignored the outcome.

Reams of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel and Palestine are similarly disregarded by the United States and Israel.

If ethics, international law and American policy indicate that Israel is a terrorist state and that Palestinians are entitled to defend themselves from attacks by that terrorist state, why are Palestinians and not Israelis considered terrorists?

The answer to this question is simple and relates to who does the labeling. The accepted imperialist perception holds that somebody who carries out terror against an empire or an empire’s allies is a terrorist. However, a similar action committed by an empire or one of its allies constitutes counter-terrorism or a just war. This theory is manifest in U.S. history from the colonial era of Native American slaughter to U.S.-sponsored coups in Latin America in the 1980s to the United States’ present involvement in Iraq.

The United States has had a close relationship with Israel since 1967, when Israel toppled Egyptian King Nasser and quashed pan-Arabism, a threat to U.S. dominance in the oil-rich Middle East. From 1967 on, the U.S.-Israeli bond was sealed. Today, the United States is Israel’s closest ally and largest financial supporter, in the form of about $3 billion in military aid annually. That money is used to buy the helicopters and F-16s that surveil and bomb Palestinian villages and refugee camps, such as during the 10-day April 2002 incursion into Jenin camp in which at least 250 homes were destroyed and 70 Palestinians murdered. The same American money buys the tanks used to enforce days -even weeks -of mass house arrest, the bulldozers that raze homes and sometimes run over people who get in the way, and the automatic weapons that soldiers carry to intimidate a mostly unarmed, undefended population.

If Palestinian armed resistance qualifies as terrorism, it is only fair that Israel’s more deadly acts be called by the same name. And if the Israeli and U.S. governments were truly interested in eliminating terrorism, as they claim, they would deal with all forms of it equally. To start, the United States might heed its own policy on denying aid to countries that regularly engage in human rights abuses, of which Israel is known to be guilty.

As professor, linguist and radical historian and scholar Noam Chomsky has said, “There is actually a simple way for the U.S. to decrease very significantly the amount of terror in the world, and that’s to stop supporting and participating in it.”

For more on Israeli terrorism:

Lauren M. Anzaldo is a teacher and global justice activist who spent two months living and working in the city of Jenin, Occupied Palestine (West Bank) during the summer of 2003. She recently returned from a speaking tour throughout her home state of Florida. Anzaldo can be reached at compassiontothecore@hotmail.com

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