Not as catchy a movie title as “Escape from New York” and as far as I know no movie director is filming it, but it has the advantage of being a real live human drama occurring as we speak:
10.15am GMT
Palestinians flood into Egypt after blowing up border wallMark Tran and agencies
Wednesday January 23, 2008
Guardian UnlimitedTens of thousands of Palestinians today poured into Egypt from Gaza after militants blew up part of the wall between the two territories in protest at an Israeli blockade.
On foot, in cars or riding donkey carts, Gazans burst into the Egyptian border town of Rafah to buy cigarettes, plastic bottles of fuel and other supplies that have become scarce and expensive after months of economic isolation.
“I have bought everything I need for the house for months. I have bought food, cigarettes and even two gallons of diesel for my car,” Mohammed Saeed told Reuters.
Many of the Palestinians, some travelling from the northern Gaza Strip, found transport towards the Egyptian coastal town of El Arish, about 40km away.
Others stayed on the Egyptian side of Rafah and clamoured to buy merchandise that has been in short supply in Gaza, even going as afar as emptying some shops.
Imagine having to blow a hole in a wall and travel miles on foot just to get the supplies (probably at drastically marked up prices) you need to live. I can’t, frankly, but that is exactly what the democracy of Israel has forced the Palestinians in the occupied territory of Gaza to do. Why? Because they were literally imposing a blockade on the inhabitants of Gaza as a “collective punishment.”
Last week Israel tightened its economic blockade on Gaza in response to an increase in rocket attacks from Palestinian militants. Egypt tacitly supported the Israeli decision by keeping its border with Gaza closed.
In response to international warnings of a humanitarian crisis, Israel yesterday allowed one-off shipments of fuel and cooking oil into Gaza. However, Gazans still face critical shortages of electricity, fuel and other supplies.
I know this is not a popular story in the US press or media, but usually we, as a people and our government, at a minimum, condemn governments who take such actions to starve and bomb ethnic minorities over whose territory they exert control. Hell, in Bosnia and Kosovo we put the US Air Force to work bombing Serbian military and civilian targets to get the Serbian government to cease its genocidal activities. But, as we all know, Israel is sacrosanct. Official and /or media criticism of its actions against people living in the “occupied territories” is simply not done.
Because, they’re only Arabs after all. Poor, dirty crazy Arabs. Less than human. They don’t even belong in Greater Israel. So why not starve them out?
But seriously, if collective punishment wasn’t the preferred modus operandi of the Israeli government to punish the many for the sins of a few, maybe Hamas wouldn’t be as powerful a political force in Gaza among ordinary Palestinians as it is today. Because when you trade large acts of violence (air strikes, economic blockades, massive detentions, bulldozing homes, etc.) for smaller acts of violence against you (as we are learning in Iraq) pretty soon everyone who used to be a moderate has been radicalized. But then when have the beneficiaries of “occupation” and “apartheid” and “ethnic cleansing” ever voluntarily surrendered their advantages out of humanitarian concerns for the people they exploit. Not very damn often in this world.
