|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Gaza: The Calculus of Chaos
|
By Khaled Mohammed**
Rafah – Gaza
|
Jan. 19, 2006
|
 |
|
Militants attacking the Palestinian telecommunications company January 2006, calling for a lift of taxes from bills.
|
A
masked gunman was setting up a roadblock along Salah Al-Deen
Street, Gaza’s main north-south highway. One of his
comrades, his voice muffled by his mask, leaned close to
whisper, “Why here? Why make problems for ordinary
people? Shouldn’t we be blockading some ministry in Gaza
City?”
“We’ve
done that,” said the other. “Now we have to get the
citizens to understand we’ve been begging for jobs and have
been ignored over and over.”
To
the motorists trapped far back in the growing traffic jam, it
must have seemed
like
a time warp back to the bad old days when the Israeli Army
closed roads for any, or no, apparent reason. But now their
adversaries were fellow Palestinians.
“We
cannot accept this [chaos] even though there is justice
in the militants’ demands.” |
|
Roadblocks,
abductions, taking over government offices and public buildings,
even private wars that descend into public chaos—this has
become everyday life in the Gaza Strip. To the distress of
Palestine’s friends, and very likely to the delight of her
enemies, a relative handful of the armed, desperate, and
frustrated have created a public relations nightmare for Gaza. The
high officials of the Palestinian Authority, while issuing
predictable condemnations, have been woefully short on any
useful action. While the armed demonstrations and building
takeovers sound dramatic, and always have the potential to turn
tragic, the Palestinian security services have no more interest
in starting a shooting war with fellow Palestinians than do the
armed militants. When all goes well, the militants fire in
the air. The police arrive and fire in the air. Demands
are stated. Promises are more or less made. Everyone fires
in the air some more. Then, honor satisfied on both sides,
everyone goes home—and nothing has changed for anyone. But
at least no one has been hurt.
In
some ways, the inter-family vendettas are more disturbing, with
two especially bad ones growing into major violence in the last
month. In Beit Hanoun in North Gaza, a feud between the
Al-Kafarneh and Al-Masri families escalated into a full-scale
shooting war, with the fighting families imposing curfews on
their neighbors, and setting up checkpoints and free-fire zones. One
wonders what terrible crime, or alleged crime, started this
conflict that to date has killed and injured scores—surely
they’re fighting over an alleged murder, rape, or massive
theft?
In
fact, all this bloodshed began when a donkey-cart driver of one
family scratched a car owned by someone from the other clan. In
Khan Younis in southern Gaza, two other families have gone to
war for equally murky reasons—the only thing clear is the
amount of collateral damage to uninvolved citizens, as
bystanders get caught in the cross-fire. It is, however, a sign
of the huge frustrations Gazans are living with; the powerful
armed families have seen no action whatsoever from the
Palestinian Authority in restoring the lands they lost to the
now-empty Israeli settlements. If they were so eager to
wage war over a dented car, could they actually reclaim and
start rebuilding their ruined farms and groves?
 |
|
The American School in Gaza’s deputy principal greets the crowd January 2006 following his release.
|
Kidnappings
of foreigners, mainly journalists and NGO workers, have
mushroomed in the last few months, with 18 incidents to date. Without
exception, the foreign victims have been released unharmed and
they told the press they had been treated well by their captors. In
almost every instance, the masked militants were asking for jobs
within the Palestinian Authority.
Perhaps
the most dramatic case was the New Year’s Eve kidnapping of
24-year-old Kate Burton and her parents, all citizens of the UK. Burton
had been living in the Gaza Strip for a year as a volunteer with
the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights. Her parents came to
Palestine for the Christmas holidays and toured Bethlehem and
other pilgrimage sites in the West Bank. Wanting to show
her parents her home in Gaza, Burton and her parents flew to
Egypt and entered Gaza through the Rafah Crossing; soon
afterwards, they were abducted by armed militants and held
for two days. The irony, of course, is that those
victimized by the abductions—NGO workers and international
journalists—are the very people working to help the
Palestinians, or at least report the truth of daily life in Gaza
to the international community. Worse, in the heat of each
kidnapping crisis, the Palestinian Authority usually promises
jobs to the militants and never, ever keeps those promises.
Hostages
abducted by militants are the very people working to
help the Palestinians. |
|
One
of the 20 Al-Aqsa Brigade militants who invaded a government
building in Khan Younis agreed to speak on condition of
anonymity. Asked what he was protesting, or against whom,
he replied, “We’re protesting against every government
official setting up roadblocks to our employment. We spent
years sacrificing and risking our lives for a better future for
Palestine. Now we want jobs and the Palestinian Authority
is ignoring us.”
Asked
if there wasn’t some better way to express grievances and
stage protests, he replied, “Some get their demands through
pure favoritism and good connections. We don’t have any
special connections, so power and pressure seem the only means
available for us,” he explained.
Abu
Nabil Abdel Razeq, a social reformer who heard this exchange,
commented, “It’s dangerous that the chaos is so out of
control; and it’s shameful because it harms not only the
government targets but normal citizens. We cannot accept
this, even though there is justice in the militants’
demands.”
The
Burton kidnapping, plus border clashes between rogue militants
and Egyptian police, brought new protests from Gaza’s citizens
and other militant factions. A coalition of six militant
groups, including Fateh, Islamic Jihad, Hamas, and the Popular
Front, issued a statement condemning the kidnappings and other
forms of violence as “not serving the Palestinian national
interest.”
Some
international media have, simplistically and incorrectly, stated
that the Israeli occupying army imposed civil law and that its
withdrawal is the cause of the present internal problems. To
the contrary, the Israeli Army did all in its power to destroy
Gaza’s civil institutions, especially the Gaza police and the
Palestinian Authority; and since Israel’s withdrawal, it has
maintained a stranglehold on Gaza’s economy.
Of
course, the Palestinian Authority has committed non-violent
“crimes of omission” by promising jobs to the militants time
and again, and failing, time and again, to keep those promises. The
militants, with their dangerous, if rarely lethal theatrics,
seem the obvious villains, while the high government officials
do little more than watch. But the incontrovertible fact is
that many in the Palestinian Authority are collecting high
salaries and living extremely comfortable lives while many other
Gaza citizens cannot find food to feed their children. Yet,
in the eyes of the world, when the militants fire in the air and
occupy a public building, they are, of course, the
“terrorists” whereas the Palestinian Authority is
blameless—all of which, sad to say, makes it that much easier
for the Sharon government to solemnly declare “they have no
partner for peace.”
**
Khaled
Mohammed is a young
journalist from Rafah, Gaza.
|
|
|
|
|
|
