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<div class="ItemCreateDateDiv oneline"> <span
id="ItemCreateDate01" class="ItemCreateDate">9-10-2015 </span>
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<h1> <span id="ItemHeaderText" class="ItemHeaderText">Why be
afraid of an Intifada?</span></h1>
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<div class="ItemFullImageDiv"> <b><small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://english.palinfo.com/site/pages/details.aspx?itemid=74040">http://english.palinfo.com/site/pages/details.aspx?itemid=74040</a></small></small></b><br>
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<div class="ItemMiniTextDiv"> <span id="ItemMiniText"
class="ItemMiniText">By Nada Elia<br>
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One telling meme has been circulating on social media over the
past week: “My name is Fadi. I’m 19 years old. I was being pursued
by Israeli settlers. So I rushed to the Israeli police for help.
They shot me dead.” Along with the meme, the videotape of the
killing of Fadi Alloun, as the settlers who had pursued him
chanted “Death to Arabs,” has gone viral.<br>
<br>
Alloun’s death is symbolic of the predicament West Bank
Palestinians find themselves in, in their own occupied land, where
they are hounded by armed settlers, who have the full protection
of the Israeli military, while the Palestinian Authority, in
charge of “coordinating security” with the Israeli forces, fails
yet again at protecting its citizens. <br>
<br>
Since Alloun’s death, five more Palestinians have been killed,
over 175 Palestinians injured, and scores detained, as violent
clashes with the Israeli military spread throughout the West Bank.
More are expected to fall victim to this latest round of “fierce
clashes,” as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised an
“all-out war” on Palestinians, who continue to take to the
streets. The escalating violence has given rise to talk of a
“third Intifada,” with various politicians and some media warning
about such a development, as if it were to usher a significant
deterioration in the living circumstances of Palestinians in the
West Bank. <br>
<br>
Is a Third Intifada in the making? How exactly does one define or
recognise an Intifada, that Arabic word that has entered Western
discourse, finding its way into the Merriem-Webster’s dictionary,
and now in currency with the #BlackLivesMatter movement, who use
it to describe the grassroots rebellion against law enforcement
violence in the US? And why would an Intifada be a negative
development, something to fear, if it is indeed a rebellion, an
uprising, against a racist, brutal, murderous, occupying
juggernaut? <br>
<br>
Which begs the question, how does one understand an “all-out war”
on the Palestinians, as distinct from the murderous violence
Israel engages on a daily basis? Is the seven decades-long
violation of the most basic human rights of a people not “an
all-out war” against that people, when it is implemented through
apartheid, dispossession, disenfranchisement, home demolitions,
restrictions on freedom of movement, all-encompassing structural
violence, and, in Gaza, a siege that is tantamount to genocide?<br>
<br>
Any journalist covering Palestine/Israel knows it is extremely
easy at any given time to give an exact count of Israeli
casualties, if any, over the previous week, even as it is
quasi-impossible, at that same time, to give any more than an
approximation of Palestinian casualties. Do we count Palestinians
who die of malnutrition as “casualties?” What about those who die
due to lack of access to healthcare? What about miscarriages as a
result of stress? And what words do we use to describe the
situation in Gaza, in between the recurrent vicious land, air, and
maritime assaults Israel refers to as “mowing the grass?”<br>
<br>
How does one define “low intensity conflict,” as distinct from
“all-out war?” Would the people of, say, England or the US
consider the circumstances of Palestinians under occupation, in
those periods not identified “all-out war,” livable? Why, then,
the “fear” of an intifada? Is it a fear of a change in the status
quo that politicians are invested in, a status quo of peace talks
that never translate into peace, road maps that lead to nowhere,
while the military industrial complex grows ever more murderous?<br>
<br>
“What possibly awaits us here is something like a new intifada,”
said Martin Schafer, spokesperson for the German Foreign Ministry.
“That can’t be in anyone’s interest – it can’t be something anyone
in Israel wants, or which any responsible Palestinian politician
wants.”<br>
<br>
But here’s part of the problem: truly responsible Palestinian
politicians are not at the political helm. The so-called
“Palestinian Authority” of Mahmoud Abbas is not responsible for
the safety of the Palestinian people, it is not accountable to the
Palestinians, it is a sub-contractor of the occupation. Like most
politicians, Abbas is more invested in the process, than in
genuine peace. “Responsible Palestinians” are the civilians who
persevere in their dogged attempts to survive, to go to school, to
work, feed their families, have dreams and ambitions, be free, be
sovereign. Responsible Palestinians rebel against injustice and
violence.<br>
<br>
Intifadas are good. They reveal to the world that Palestinians
have not, will not, acquiesce to their oppression. The third
intifada must be against the ongoing occupation as undertaken by
the Israeli forces as well as their sub-contractor, the
Palestinian Authority. Only then will the farce of Peace Accords
and Road Maps be finally tossed into the trash heap of history,
where it belongs. <br>
<br>
An escalation in Israeli violence, both "state violence" and
"state-facilitated settler violence," along with an escalation in
angry Palestinian resistance - because there is always resistance,
but it changes qualitatively, in response to escalating Israeli
violence - do not necessarily make for a Third Intifada. Yet the
right mix of elements are there, the climate is ripe, and an
intifada may indeed be brewing. The hope - not fear - is that this
time, it will be against both Israel and all involved in the farce
that is the “peace talks”. It is time for action.<br>
<br>
<br>
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><em>- Nada Elia is a Diaspora
Palestinian writer and political commentator.<br>
The article was published in the Middle East Eye website.</em></span>
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