HEBRON (Ma’an) — A group of Israeli settlers chopped down grape vines on Palestinian agricultural property in northern Beit Ummar on Monday, a popular committee spokesman said Monday.
Muhammad Awwad said the settlers destroyed seven grape vines in the Wad Abu al-Rish area near the illegal settlement of Beit Ein.
The vines belong to Hammad Abd al-Hamid Jaber al-Sleibi, Awwad said.
In 2013, there were 399 incidents of settler violence against Palestinians and their property in the occupied West Bank, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
Over 90 percent of investigations into settler violence by Israeli police fail to lead to an indictment.
More than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in settlements across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, in contravention of international law.
Mirrored from Maan News Agency
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Related video added by Juan Cole:
TeleSUR English: “Israel to steal more Palestinian land for settlements”
What do Israelis think these actions will accomplish?
Do they really think 6 million people can tell 7 BILLION people to just go f*** themselves without any consequences?
Lets say that Israelis get their deepest wish and they succeed in driving all the Arabs from the land between the Jordan River and the Med Sea, Then what?
Do they really think that will end it?
Do Israelis think they can have an armed fortress that will make them safe forever?
If they think that, they are totally delusional. The history of mankind has shown, REPEATEDLY, that all fortresses eventually get destroyed and all the people inside end up dead.
No group of humans can exist in isolation, especially not Israelis. Israel is NOT self sufficient in food or energy, but if it angers enough of the other humans on earth (which it would do by ethnically cleansing the WB and Gaza), it will become unlivable.
The path Israel is on is self-destructive and I can not understand WHY no one in Israel can understand this. What is the deep psychological problem they have that causes their delusions?
Based on 50,000 years of human behavior, I am pretty sure I know where this ends and it is not where Israelis think it will.
They had better hope there really is a “god” because they are going to need lots of consoling when their world falls apart.
It’s worked for almost 70 years and they’re still there so I doubt a change in strategy is anywhere in Israel’s future. Time is on Israel’s side. They’re now entering a 3rd generation of Palestinian land grabbing, and people living in adversity and under occupation (the Palestinians) for long periods of time eventually just get worn down. It’s got to be difficult to worry about the land your family used to own when your current family is having trouble eating. I wish it wasn’t true but I think it probably is.
You are right. That is the strategy.
Hey, I’m from the southern US, and have as much bigotry in my blood as the next Bubba. The problem with racism, however, is when you don’t give the other guy enough credit and go all stupid on the reality of things.
Israel (and this includes the non-extremist factions who give the Likudniks their tacit support), doesn’t get that the Palestinians will remember what is happening and keep coming back for thousands of years if that’s what it takes for satisfaction. The Jews essentially manufactured the illusion of a patrimony, but with the Palestinians there will never be a dimming of their collective memory. Looking at the development of a Palestinian identity, Israel has done a wonderful job at pulling together what was once a genuinely disparate group. Revenge is a dish best served cold, but it will be served. There’s always hope and Israel could turn around the momentum of its fate, but they’re continuing to dig an ever-deeper hole for themselves.
So, you’re all correct. There has never been any secret about Israel’s long-standing Iron Wall (e.g., Bunker) Strategy, only PR smoke to give them cover and facilitate manipulation of the US to finance the ultimate futility of their hubris.
Not gonna happen. Take South Africa, Dutch settlers, fore bearers of apartheid, started arriving there in 1488 and by 20th century they had acquired a nuclear bomb with the help of Israel that would give them security in perpetuity. Lesson, it’s impossible to maintain status quo even with nuclear weapons as long as you are the minority.
Your’re right. But I’d make a distinction: it can go the easy way or it can go the hard way for Israel (relatively speaking, of course). And the hard way, the longer they persist, could be quite ugly.
The longer I notice the results of closed-minded negativity and pig-headed stubbornness in various spheres, the more I’ve come to believe in the power of self-fulfilling prophecies.
Two important differences between Israel and apartheid South Africa:
1) Apartheid South Africa was designed to give whites a high standard of living on the back of cheap black labor (which meant that expelling or exterminating blacks wasn’t an option). Israel has always sought to AVOID dependence on Palestinian labor.
2) Apartheid South Africa never built nuclear ballistic missiles, only free-fall bombs delivered by aircraft. If the rest of the world had closed ranks on Apartheid this nuclear force could be neutralized by conventional air defense measures.
Carly, please do a search on “Israeli use of Palestinian labor” and see if you continue to believe the kleptocrats and thugs that run Israeli, Inc. are any different from the thugs that skimmed the wealth and stole the rights of non-Blankes in South Africa.
The context, please?
” Brick by brick: Deconstructing the use of Palestinian labor
‘Foreigners Among Us’ deals with the complex status of Palestinian workers in Israel. There’s only one gripe – it should have been held 20 years ago.” link to haaretz.com
“Palestinian Labour Migration to Israel: Labour, Land and Occupation”, link to amazon.com
“Palestinian Child Labour in Illegal Israeli Settlements,” link to mecaforpeace.org
No, Current Israel is nothing like South Africa, right? See e.g. “The unspoken alliance: Israel’s secret relationship with apartheid South Africa – link to mondoweiss.net
And for an interesting side-by-side comparison of Israeli and Afrikaner apartheid, look here: “Comparing South African Apartheid to Israeli Apartheid,” link to itisapartheid.org
The “invisible” issue: I wonder if there’s a book/movie from the Palestinian “house and construction slave” side like “The Help”… link to amazon.com
As to the nuclear weapons point, not sure what you are saying but reading this might clarify: “Limited Capability:
A History and Review of South Africa’s Nuclear Weapons Program,”http://web.wm.edu/so/monitor/issues/08-1/4-adams.htm Under “pressure from the West,” the Boers “voluntarily” dismantled their nukes, built with help from the Israelis, link to theguardian.com, and you appear to be inaccurate about South Africa’s available nuke delivery systems too: link to siliconafrica.com
Not that any of this matters, the way the Narrative and the Game are playing out. “Holy Samson Option, Batman!”
It worked for 70 years but it looks as if it’s not going to work for another 70. Polls show that younger Americans do not have any particular affection for Israel and their actions against Palestinians. Much like they apparently don’t really care if someone is gay or not.
UN Peacekeepers are needed to guard against these frequent assaults….as General Harkabi wrote…”the settlements are a block-ade to peace, a military liability, not an asset”
Just to give a little context to the apparent thinking and belief structures and “investments” of the nice people who are hacking the olive trees and grape plantings and demolishing the houses and appropriating the water and “price tagging” and “necklacing” over there, here is a little assortment of “properties on offer” being built on “reclaimed” land: link to smartapp.co.il.
Adding pricey, “gated” stock to the bubble housing market over there, and looking out over yet more “reclaimable” territory. And a little view of the Golan, Shebaa, maybe Lebanon and Syria too? Naw, they can’t see that far out or ahead, even from the swankier penthouses…
How much support for the West Bank occupation is coming from American and other Diaspora Jewish millionaires, who want to shift native Israelis into the illegal settlements so they can buy up their former properties in Israel proper for use as holiday homes?
Before the Likudians got busy putting Gazans to the sword most recent!y, a lot of disaffected Israelis took to the streets to protest the effects of the gonif business practice you are talking about. Maybe lawn chairs and mowing the grass have lessened the feeling of impoverishment of average folks. It pays to remember that even when there seems to be a common enemy a and Fear of Rockets in the air, Israelites seem mostly to be first and foremost “me firsters,” principally concerned about making “freiers” out of everyone else, even family members and of course their fellow tribalists despite the rules handed down in the Pentateuch and all the subsequent commentaries. While, of course, always on the alert not to be made a “sucker” of themselves, and never to leave money on the table unless it was a bribe. It seems many Jews around the world, who take their traditions of ethical conduct and right living more seriously, are having a kind of crisis of allegiance in relation to Israel as the people who now rule it, coming from a different mindset, have made it, and are making it worse…
“Patriotism is a word; and one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.”
And I guess we should all feel good that at least the roofs of “settler” structures, and the former Philistine olive groves and vineyards, are sporting made-maybe-in-China, US-maybe-funded solar panels… So there is that at least…