{"id":236544,"date":"2021-06-20T07:50:34","date_gmt":"2021-06-20T07:50:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=236544"},"modified":"2021-06-22T06:52:53","modified_gmt":"2021-06-22T06:52:53","slug":"palestine-smashed-houses-crushed-orchards-a-trail-of-unrestrained-malice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=236544","title":{"rendered":"Palestine: Smashed Houses, Crushed Orchards, A Trail of Unrestrained Malice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barbara Nimri Aziz \u2013 Global Research June 18, 2021<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Residents of Sheikh Jarrah\u2019s resistance to eviction by Israeli Jews evolved into a\u00a0military confrontation so lopsided,<\/a> the Israeli bombardments against Gaza so terrifying, it drew widespread condemnation<\/a> (the US government excepted).<\/em><\/p>\n

The Palestinian dead, injured and homeless are still being tabulated, while eviction processes of Sheikh Jarrah\u2019s Arab inhabitants continue, even as we learn of similar forced displacement of Arabs in nearby Silwan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Another Israeli scheme to dislodge Palestinians is home demolition\u2014they number in the many thousands and continue (in Bustan, Silwan) even as I write.<\/a>\u00a0For a glimpse of these all-too-routine violations, I append my newly-digitized April 5, 1996 Christian Science Monitor <\/em>article based on what I witnessed \u2014 I likened it to a lynching \u2013 when on assignment in the West Bank 25 years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s quite a spectacle, a Palestinian home being blown apart. Furniture, dishes and clothes, hastily removed, are deposited helter-skelter in the path or road.<\/em><\/p>\n

Villagers stand by, silent and grim . Heavily armed soldiers are massed to prevent any disruption. Confused, awed children turn sullen.<\/em><\/p>\n

Americans rarely see Israel\u2019s demolition policy at work; but it\u2019s a regular form of punishment. All Palestinians, from toddlers to the elderly, are familiar with it. Perhaps it\u2019s happened to a neighbor. Perhaps they themselves were hauled out of their house in the early morning and told by a soft-spoken Israeli officer, with his troops surrounding the residence, that he has his orders. The entire town is aroused. Neighbors join in the frantic rush to save some household items; they know it\u2019s useless to protest.<\/em><\/p>\n

The silent frenzy of losing a home this way has no parallel. It\u2019s not like a flood or a fire; it\u2019s more like a lynching. There\u2019s no one to call for help. Hundreds of soldiers surround the house and village to ensure no one interferes with the bulldozers and dynamite teams.<\/em><\/p>\n

Legalized destruction<\/strong><\/em><\/h2>\n

It\u2019s all done legally too. That is to say, a paper, written in Hebrew, is presented to the householder spelling out the order to blow up or bulldoze his or her home, or to seal it. Often the order charges that the house lacks a building permit. Typically, a family has two hours\u2019 notice.<\/em><\/p>\n

In a village near Hebron in 1991, I saw the remains of a mosque that was flattened weeks before. The land had been cleared because of some building infraction, neighbors told me.<\/em><\/p>\n

At other times, particularly during the intifadah (uprising), a family is informed that their son was caught (not convicted but simply picked up and charged) throwing a Molotov cocktail, or that he was captured in an attack on an Israeli.<\/em><\/p>\n

In some cases, only the family orchard (their livelihood) is leveled. Again, the family is notified when the machines are already on the nearby road. Orchards have been destroyed based simply on a report that some Palestinian children were hiding from soldiers among the trees, or Jewish settlers claim that someone they were pursuing was heading in that direction.<\/em><\/p>\n

During the first three years of the intifadah (1987-1991), when communal punishment was the norm for civil disobedience, the Palestinian Human Rights information Center recorded 1,726 demolitions or sealings of homes. On average, there are nine Palestinians living in a home; so those lost houses represent about 15,000 men, women and children, forcibly made homeless during that time. Often the dwelling is not even the family\u2019s original home but a shelter inside a crowded refugee camp built with the help of United Nations funding.<\/em><\/p>\n

Israel says it demolishes certain houses because they\u2019re the homes of \u201csuicide bombers\u201d. The news media, which remains silent about these actions, are effectively sanctioning the policy. So conditioned is the public that whatever is done to an \u201cIslamist terrorist\u201d seems justified and is endorsed. Are we right to stand by silently and accept that?<\/em><\/p>\n

Consider this: The demolitions are retaliatory actions that strike deep into the core of Palestinian identity. They are bound to have some traumatic effect on children. Such devastation may quell opposition temporarily, but the long-term effects may be very different. People may become more embittered and hostile towards Israeli authority. Blowing up the home of a family may in fact move the brothers and sisters of a dead man into closer identification with his actions.<\/em><\/p>\n

Israel does not respond in this manner to all heinous acts. Look at the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by the Israeli law student. Look at Baruch Goldstein, the Hebron mass murderer. Their actions repelled most Israelis, yet their homes and families remained unharmed. No, these destructive acts are specifically designed for and executed against Palestinians.<\/em><\/p>\n

Palestinians\u2019 view<\/strong><\/em><\/h2>\n

Palestinians see this type of punishment as another method Israel uses to \u201cclear the land\u201d, to deny their existence, to implement its \u201ccleansing\u201d policy. People deprived of a home may have one less link with the land. But such actions have other consequences. Children witness their homes, the places they were born, blown apart. They watch fathers and other male relatives helplessly held at gunpoint. They imbibe the horrified reaction of their mothers and grandmothers.<\/em><\/p>\n

The house as the center<\/strong><\/em><\/h2>\n

Because this form of punishment is so rare, few can imagine the impact of a house being blown up in front of its owners. We have to understand how central the house is to Palestinian life. Even today, most Palestinians are born at home. This is the place for daily prayer, for family meals, for weddings, for homecomings from jail, and for funerals. This is where everyone gathers to pass the evening. It is not a shelter; it is a community. It is the place for consolation and joy, the haven and the refuge.<\/em><\/p>\n

Mother is the manager, so the home is unequivocally associated with her power and protective role. Harming the house is like violating the mother. Many children will feel they must avenge this injustice. Especially with the world community standing by seeming to sanction the destruction, family members may feel more responsibility to seek justice. Anyone who understands this would advise Israel to cease this practice for these reasons, if not for moral ones.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Above: a sturdy old Jerusalem wall replaced by a parking lot … below<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Author\u2019s note: Israel\u2019s removal of Palestinians is interminable: sometimes it\u2019s by shrewd legal maneuvers; sometimes it\u2019s by harassment, sometimes it\u2019s violent takeovers, and sometimes it\u2019s brutal demolition. A protracted process, it\u2019s so routine that it hardly garners outside attention. Besides residences, Palestinian orchards and nature preserves are savagely destroyed by Israeli forces<\/a>. A recent egregious case was reported by my colleague Raouf Halaby in Counterpunch<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This article was originally published on the author\u2019s blog site, Barbara Nimri Aziz<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

BN Aziz<\/em><\/strong> whose anthropological research has focused on the\u00a0peoples of the Himalayas is the author of the newly published \u201cYogmaya and Durga Devi: Rebel Women of Nepal\u201d, available on Amazon<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even today, most Palestinians are born at home. This is the place for daily prayer and family meals, it is the place for consolation and joy, a haven and a refuge. That\u2019s why the IDF has routinely demolishes homes, it’s a means of psychological warfare aimed at the whole community<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":80397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[61,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-236544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-Commentary","category-Israel_Anti-Semitism_Zionism_and_US-UK_allies"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=236544"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236544\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":236566,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236544\/revisions\/236566"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/80397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=236544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=236544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=236544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}