'An account of
the daily reality for Palestinians'
Operation
Defensive Shield
Witnesses to
Israeli War Crimes
Muna Hamzeh
and Todd May
Published by
Pluto press, London, Sterling, Virginia, 2003
Pp. 199
“FROM THIS day on, he who does not become Palestinian in
his heart will never understand his true moral identity,”
wrote celebrated Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish following
the massacre in Jenin refugee camp in 2002.
`Operation Defensive Shield' documents the largest
military offensive against Palestinian civilians since the
1948 Arab-Israeli war. It records what happened in the West
Bank in the spring of 2002 and what it foreshadows for the
future of the region.
On March 29, 2002, Ariel Sharon's army launched a
military operation, using Merkava tanks, Apache attack
helicopters and F-15 fighter jets. At the end of the
mission, on April 21, 2002, Israel destroyed the Palestinian
economic and social infrastructure, levelled large swaths of
residential area, killed 220 people, injured hundreds more
and arrested thousands.
The book is divided into four chapters tackling issues
related to the mass destruction in Palestine, mainly in the
Jenin refugee camp, by Israeli army and bulldozers.
Muna Hamzeh, a Palestinian-American journalist and author
who has been writing about the Palestinian issue since 1985,
and Todd May, professor of philosophy at Clemson University
in South Carolina, argue that the operation was an
introduction to Israel's racial cleansing of the
Palestinians. They provide a historical context, a
chronology and an analysis of the conflict that situates the
horror of those days in their proper perspective.
The writers believe that the operation can also be
understood as a reinvasion by occupiers. It can be seen as
an operation to destroy the understructure of a nascent
state and an exercise in massive violation of a people's
human right.
“The Operation Defensive Shield may be the prelude to a
second and final dispossession of the Palestinian people,”
the writers point out.
The book comprises 25 articles written by Palestinians,
Israeli and international peace activists. These stories
present an account of the daily reality for Palestinians who
endure the death and destruction that Israel's strategy has
caused throughout the occupied territories.
Ran Hacohen, 32, a teacher at Tel Aviv University, writes
in an article titled “Auschwitz logic” that people sometimes
say that better is the greatest foe of good. “Israel is now
demonstrating how the greater evil is evil's best friend.
And many thanks to Adolf Hitler for setting such
insurmountable standards.”
The witnesses' voices bring to life the aggressive nature
of the Israeli government and army.
Beth Daoud, an American from Colorado, writes that on day
16 of the Operation Defensive Shield the Israeli army
bulldozers systematically demolished two residential
neighbourhoods inside Jenin refugee camp.
“The Israeli army reoccupied six Palestinian villages and
cut off electricity inside the Church of Nativity and those
besieged inside say they are running out of food and water,”
writes Daoud who works as a councillor for the
developmentally disabled.
The authors present a statistical overview of the effects
of Operation Defensive Shield on people and the civilian
infrastructure of Palestine.
They show that the numerous studies conducted by
international and Palestinian organisations on the effects
of the operation leave no doubt that the Palestinian
population was forced to endure enormously harsh and inhuman
conditions that violate both a multitude of international
laws and the basic humanity of the Palestinian people.
Hamzeh, the author of `Refugees in Our Land: Chronicles
From a Refugee Camp in Bethlehem', and May, who has been
active in the Palestinian rights movement since 1988, also
analyse the European and Arab responsibility towards
Palestine's people and land.
This book can be found at Bustan Lil Kutob bookstore in
Shmeisani.
Hada Sarhan
Monday, September 22, 2003
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