Otkei Newsletter of the Israeli Council for Israeli-Palestinian Peace July-August 1990 No 42 P.O.B.956 Tel-Aviv, Israel 61008 Editorial Board: Uri Avnery, Matti Peled, Yaakov Phone: (03) 5565804 Amort, Haim Bar’am, Yael Lotan, Yossi Amitay Editor: Adam Keller _ /SSN 0 7 q2 -4 6 1 5 - Assistant editor: Be ate Keizer ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ESCALATION On April 11,1990, Labor Party leader Shimon Peres efforts to enforce that curfew - bringing the day’s failed to obtain a parliamentary majority for his pro­ total death toll to 13. posed government, which would have been a novelty Meanwhile, a day’s general strike was declared in all in Israeli history. It would have been Israel’s first Arab towns and villages inside Israel. The Commit­ government to rely for its majority on Arab Knesset tee of Arab Mayors, which organised the strike, Members and parties. Furthermore, it would have intended it to be peaceful; but as the daily newspa­ been the first Israeli government (since 1965, when pers - carrying on their front pages color photographs the PLO was created), whose program did not explic­ of the previous day’s carnage in Rishon le-Tzion - itly rule out the possibility of talking to these arrived in the Arab towns, the Intifada seemed for a “terrorists”. moment to have crossed the Green Line: in town Exactly two months after Peres’ failure, Likud after town youths burst out in stone-throwing and leader Yitzhak Shamir did obtain a (narrow) violent clashes with the police. The largest confronta­ parliamentary majority for what could be described tion took place in Nazareth, a town which has the as the mirror image of Peres’ failed government: double distinction of being the largest Arab town in Shamir’s is the first Israeli government to rely for its Israel - and of having a higher unemployment rate majority on the support of outspoken racists, who than any other Israeli population center. In Nazareth’s advocate the massive “transfer” of Palestinians. main street, hundreds of masked demonstrators The period between Peres’ definite failure and battled with the police, attacked government offices Shamir’s success has seen tensions rise sharply all and set a bank on fire*. over the Middle East. A major catalist in this process Meanwhile, the Palestinian Refugee Camps in was a 20-years old Israeli named Ami Popper. Early Jordan, held since 1970 under tight control by King in the morning of May 20, Popper left the house of his Hussein’s security services, broke out in massive parents in Rishon le-Tzion, wearing the army outfit demonstrations; clashes with the Jordanian army of his brother and carrying a gun. Popper set out for left several Palestinians dead. There were also huge the place where, at that hour, Palestinian day mobilizations at the Refugee Camps in Lebanon, labourers congregate. He opened fire, killing seven still bearing recent scars of their own. In fact, the and wounding many more. His exact motives have entire Palestinian people, in all its far-flung diaspora, not yet been determined. At the time, he was widely strongly manifested its anguish, and fury. described as deranged. Not long before, Popper had • been dishonorably discharged from the army after having spent some months in its prison. The prison This turmoil came as a complete surprise to Yitzhak duty of this deranged had been .. to guard other - Shamir - at the time heading a care-taker cabinet Palestinian - prisoners (Ha’olam Hazeh 6.6.1990). and engaged in forging a definite majority out of Within hours, news of the massacre spread throughout numerous rival right-wing and Orthodox factions. Israel, reaching the Palestinian workers wherever Try as they might to dissociate themselves from the they were; without anybody organising it, they “deranged” Popper, Shamir and his ministers could immediately laid down their tools and set out on their not dissociate from the fact that hundreds of way back home. On the Tel-Aviv/Gaza highway, Palestinians were killed, over the past two years, by thousands of crowded Palestinian cars went in soldiers of the army - thus making Palestinian life convoy, with their headlights on and their passengers cheap. Nor could the Rishon le-Tzion massacre be waving inprovised black flags. As the convoy reached disconnected from Rabbi Tzvi Neriya - “spiritual Gaza, the sky over the city was full of smoke from leader” of the National Religious Party, a crucial burning tyres and thousands of demonstrators Shamir ally - who stated publicly only a week poured into the streets. The military authorities before: Anybody who finds himself threatened by reacted furiously, declaring an immediate curfew; by Arabs should shoot in all directions without hesitating. nightfall, six more Palestinians had been killed in the In the international arena, the Israeli government found itself on the defensive. Palestinian leaders, on give legal recognition to the settlers’ already-existing hunger strike in East Jerusalem, called for a U.N. vigilante squads; on the other hand, Arens also Observer Force to be stationed in the Occupied Ter­ performed some cautious good-will gestures towards ritories, in order to protect their inhabitants. This the Palestinians such as the gradual re-opening of demand gained extensive international support, and universities, or the release of several hundred pris­ at some point it seemed that the United States, too, oners (out of about 10,000). would support - or at least not veto - such a The government also invited a senior U.N. official Security Council resolution. Paradoxically, Shamir to visit the Occupied Territories, as a symbolic was bailed out, at the last moment, with help from the substitute to the vetoed observer force; and even Palestinian side. hard-liner Housing Minister Sharon participated in For two years a Palestinian commando unit, belong­ the show of moderation by announcing that Soviet ing to The Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF), has Jews “will not be directed to settle in the Occupied been secretly training in Libya, in preparation for an Territories”, whatever the value of such a pledge may eventual sea-borne raid on the Israeli shores. In the be. (There is nothing to stop new immigrants - or wake of the Rishon le-Tzion massacre, PLF leader native Israelis, for that matter - from going, without Abu-Abas decided to send his men into action on being “directed”, to settlements where housing is May 30. Some of them did manage to land south of cheaper). Tel-Aviv, but all were soon killed or captured by the Moreover, the government has started flirting with Israeli army. After a week’s interrogation, the PLF Syrian President Hafez el-Assad, until recently por­ force’s deputy commander, Muhammad Abu-Shash, trayed as Israel’s arch-enemy; by some accounts, appeared on Israeli television. According to this regular channels for direct and indirect communica­ interview, the commandos had been ordered to enter tions between Jerusalem and Damascus are, by now, the H ilton hotel in Tel-Aviv, kill everybody, including well established. But it is very doubtful if, in return women, children and old people and then proceed to for peace with Syria, the Shamir government would the American Embassy to do the same there**. be willing or able to evacuate the Syrian Golan Shamir used to the full his propaganda advantage; Heights, occupied since 1967, and formally annexed first - to obtain an American veto on the dispatch of in 1982. U.N. observers, and second - to undermine the U.S. In the absence of a real peace process, there will be dialogue with the PLO. The PLF is a component of another war. The signs of escalation are already the PLO, and its leader has a seat on the Executive clearly discernable, and the possibility of war is Committee - the PLO’s equivalent of a cabinet. openly discussed by political leaders on both sides Therefore, the Bush administration considered the (for example, the dramatic statements of Defence raid to be a violation of the conditions under which Minister Arens, on July 24). The rather crude threats the U.S. entered into dialogue with the PLO. against Israel, made by Iraqui President Sadam I Hussein, have won him an unexpected amount of Due to its very program and composition, many support among a Palestinian people grown tired of Israelis could not help feeling totally alienated from endless diplomatic initiatives which brought them Shamir’s self-styled “National Jewish Government”. nothing tangible. Indeed, it is no accident that Abu- Abroad, too, the new government received a cool Abas is long known to be Sadam Hussein’s prot6g6 welcome. In the United States - the foreign country inside the PLO. most vital to all Israeli governments - the adminis­ With no perceptible advance towards freedom, tration, Congres, public opinion and even a signif­ resentment and frustration among the Palestinians icant part of the Jewish community all manifested will continue to build up, until a new catalist sets their displeasure. In response, Shamir and his min­ them off; King Hussein of Jordan - faced with a isters made considerable efforts to improve their worsening economy and rising fundamentalism as image. The massive wave of repressive measures - well as with a large discontented Palestinian popula­ which the government’s extreme right wing intended tion - might not survive; a Jordanian civil war would for the Occupied Territories - did not (so far) draw in the Israeli army from the West, the Iraqui materialise. Defence Minister Arens did promise to army from the East, and the Syrians from the North; The Other Israel P.O.B.956, Tel-Aviv 61008, Israel; Phone: (03) 5565804 Six issues/one year subscription rates: Institutions $50; Individuals $20/$30; Students/unempl.