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Palestinians say fed up with gunmen
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| Fir3start3r |
Oh the Iron-E...
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Palestinians say fed up with gunmen
Thu Jun 7, 2007 12:49PM BST
By Wafa Amr
RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - For most Palestinians, black-hooded gunmen have long been respected symbols of resistance against Israeli occupation.
Now, frequent internal fighting and lawlessness gripping the Palestinian territories have transformed the militants into no more than gangsters in the eyes of many of those who once saw them as heroes.
"It's very ironic but I'm relieved the Israelis have started a bombing campaign. The gunmen killing each other on the streets were forced to go into hiding," said Mai, a Gaza housewife, referring to strikes aimed at halting rocket attacks on Israel.
Reflecting mounting public concern over recent fighting between Islamist group Hamas and his Fatah faction that killed some 50 people, President Mahmoud Abbas said this week Palestinians were on the verge of civil war.
The threat posed by internal bloodshed, he said, rivaled the dangers presented by Israeli occupation.
Gunmen, who once battled Israeli soldiers in the alleyways of towns and refugee camps in the West Bank and Gaza, have turned against each other in an on-going power struggle between Hamas and Fatah -- partners in a unity government.
Some of the militias formed by Fatah and Hamas are no longer controlled by their political leaderships and owe loyalties to clans or criminal gangs that enforce their own rules.
"Many of these groups are now a burden on society. They were created to fill a security vacuum under the pretext of national resistance, said legislator Nasser Jum'a, once a leading member of Fatah's al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.
"They then blackmailed people, attacked them and confiscated their freedoms as the weak official security forces failed to punish them," he said.
FED UP
Jum'a said ordinary Palestinians were so fed up with the armed groups "they now wish the Israeli occupation would take over in Gaza or hope for the return of Jordanian rule in the West Bank" to get rid of them.
In one recent incident in the West Bank city of Nablus, gunmen told shopkeepers to close their businesses as a sign of solidarity with a Fatah leader arrested the day before in an Israeli raid.
The gunmen shot in the air, stole a bulldozer from the Nablus municipality and closed the main road with mounds of sand, dividing the city in the same way Israeli forces had during their operation.
For the first time in the city, a bastion for militants, most of the shop owners refused to close down.
"These people have caused us a lot of suffering and are not involved in national resistance," said Najah al-Jabaji, who works in an advertising agency in Nablus.
But while sentiments seem to have turned against the militants, Israeli raids to detain them elicit strong public condemnation among Palestinians, who have long demanded the release of those held in Israeli jails.
Gunmen spearheaded a Palestinian uprising that began in 2000 and gained strength when Israeli military operations effectively destroyed the infrastructure of the official security services, some of whose members also belonged to militant groups.
The power vacuum was filled by militias loyal to a variety of political factions and rivalries spiraled into bloodshed after Hamas trounced Fatah in a January 2006 election.
More than 600 Palestinians have been killed in factional fighting since the vote, the Palestinian Independent Commission for Citizens' Rights says, a figure approaching the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the same period.
In a poll conducted by the Palestinian independent pollster NearEast Consulting in the West Bank and Gaza in May, 70 percent of those surveyed said they feel more insecure since Hamas came to power last year.
The poll, which coincided with a surge in internal fighting, also found 92 percent of respondents described themselves as depressed or very depressed, up from 22 percent in April.
"The internal crisis in the occupied territories was the main issue that made Palestinians feel depressed in May. It can also be noted that the problem of the Israeli occupation took a back stage in May," commentary accompanying the poll said.
"The message is that people are tired of inter-Palestinian fighting. They are fed up with both Fatah and Hamas, and all they want is to live in security before any thought of fighting Israel," Palestinian analyst Bassem Izbedi told Reuters.
(Additional reporting by Atef Sa'ad in Nablus and Said Ayyad in Bethlehem)
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>>Source<<
Queue the naysayers and Palestinian Truthers... :crazy: |
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| George Smiley |
| quote: | Originally posted by Fir3start3r
Queue the naysayers and Palestinian Truthers... :crazy: |
Excellent article, I take it you will never again be refering to the "Palestinians" as rejecting peace in favour of violence?!
Oh the irony!!
:p |
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| M.Johan |
There're another news dude:)
From the Palastenine media
showing peace's occurred between Hamas & Fatah
not in the other western media sources
in the arabic language
http://www.palestine-pmc.com/arabic...=4&opt=1&x=2384
If u want to know the reality
| quote: | As Gaza Burns
Laila El-Haddad writing from Gaza City, occupied Palestine, Live from Palestine, 16 May 2007
Things have been crazy in Gaza over the past two days. Very crazy. In between working and actually trying to keep our wits about us as we've been holed up indoors for two days no, I've had little time to blog.
Things are tenusouly calm at the moment with on-again-off-again gunfire, which is better than it was only a few hours ago. But things in Gaza have a way of changing very quickly-for better or for worse. Volatility is its defining characteristic.
We happen to be sort of be in the eye of the storm as it were. Fierce battles employing mortars, RPGs, and heavy machine gun fire were raging all around our house today, at times only a block away, interdispersed with the thuds of Israeli gunships bombing areas of eastern and northern Gaza.
Yousuf of course became more and more concerned as the day passed, until I finaly told him they were not firing, but rather making an enourmous pot of popcorn outside that would fill the streets once it was done. At first he wasn't convinced, then he later remarkred "Mama, I don't really like this kind of popocorn!" When the firing died down, he ran into my room excitedly shouting "Mama, Mama! I think the popcorn is done!!"
The city was literally transformed into a ghost town, and civilian life was all but paralyzed. Storekeepers kept shops closed and virtually all residents, including schoolchildren and university students, remainded penned indoors. Most did not even dare to go to their balconies.
The occasional shopkeeper who did stay open was harassed by gunmen patrolling the streets.
"I don't understand-what are they fighing over, the trash in the streets?" lamented one shopkeeper to me.
"We're in a malestrom and i don't see a way out."
Impromptu checkpionts were set up along the major roads, cutting off access from Gaza City to the north and south of the Strip.
Unidentified snipers took positions on high-rise towers through the city, as both factions vied for strategic control of various locations.
The victims of course in all of this were the residents, particularly those who lived in the towers. Many residents complained of having spend the past two days holed up in their ktichen without electrictiy, and ambulances not being given access to the injured in the buildings.
One woman told me gunmen searched apartments for armed men and set afire several flats.
The most troubling part is how this is unfolding with such purpose, and yet with so little protest. There is something far more sinister sinister behind it all of course, namely, the US's unambiguous plot to undermind the Unity Government by arming, training, and "stregthening" Abbas, Dahlan, and their respectivfe security forces. The latest plan was uncovered in a Jordanian newspaper last week before being whisked off the presses.
I talk about this in a Guardian article I wrote today. |
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6905.shtml
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk...es_in_gaza.html |
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| Fir3start3r |
| quote: | Originally posted by George Smiley
Excellent article, I take it you will never again be refering to the "Palestinians" as rejecting peace in favour of violence?!
Oh the irony!!
:p |
Yes, because they're NEVER rejected offers before.
OH! :crazy: |
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