Palestinian Anxiety Is Warranted

Terrorist--this term has recently become almost synonymous with the words Arab and Muslim fundamentalist.

Almost every night, news reports show Palestinians throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers, helping to portray the Palestinians either as terrorists or anarchists. But the media never shows the reason why Palestinian teenagers go out on the streets and risk being shot--not something the average person would do.

But then the average person does not live in an atmosphere where his or her sacred places of worship are desecrated. It is not uncommon to find mosques in the Gaza Strip splattered with paint--the work of vandals. The mosque in the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza strip has a red dome, and orange and green walls. This embarrassing piece of art was done mostly by Israeli soldiers shooting paint from fire engines. Somehow we never read about this in the newspaper.

Similarly it is never reported that the Islamic faith prohibits terrorism. The media unthinkingly attributes acts of violence to Muslim fundamentalists. Yet the term Muslim fundamentalist refers to those who follow the literal wording of the Qur'an, and in Islamic law there is no justification for terrorism.

The proper avenue for criminal justice is through courts of law, and only those found guilty of actually committing the crime can be held accountable. Vigilantism is clearly forbidden, as are random acts of retaliation against innocents. Even in a state of war, children and those who are not physically fighting cannot be targets. This goes beyond the West's conception of fair war; Western cities have many times come under severe bombing resulting in civilian casualties.

The definition of terrorism is fairly clear: it refers to the intimidation of innocent people through arbitrary violence. But the media's use of the term terrorist is one-sided.

When an Arab or Muslim commits an act of violence all of Islam is implicated, but when a non-Arab, non-Muslim commits an act, especially in the Middle East, the perpetrators are portrayed as aberrations and the focus is often shifted away from the incident itself.

A Palestinian quoted in the Washington Post argued that whenever an Israeli kills an Arab, "they say, he's crazy, and when an Arab throws a stone, they say he's terrorist!" This sentiment, while not totally accurate, has a core of truth.

To illustrate the point one only needs to look at the media's coverage of the recent Hebron incident. Last Friday, Dr. Baruch Goldstein, an extremist Jewish settler from the Kiryat Arba settlement walked into the Hebron mosque while Muslims were kneeling down in worship and sprayed the prayer hall with bullets, killing 40 to 50 Muslims on the spot and wounding many others. Many news agencies, however, shifted the focus from the massacre to other topics, like the retaliation that may ensue.

While the violent acts of any Muslim, practicing or not , are blamed on all of Islam, Goldstein was depicted as a maverick, or even a lunatic. Thus, the massacre was reported as a departure from the norm. However, Goldstein's act of hate was not an isolated incident.

There have been other incidents involving Israeli soldiers desecrating religious sites, dragging worshippers out in the middle of prayers and beating them, entering mosques and shoving their muddy boots in the faces of the worshippers as they kneel, and outlawing the call to prayer in the Gaza Strip.

Incidents of beatings, mass arrests with no charges, curfews that last in excess of 20 days at a time, and forced deportations into the abandoned mountains of Lebanon are also commonplace.

The Israeli government's response to such incidents has been almost nonexistant. Its most usual retort is to reassert that the Israeli armed forces have full authority for the security of the region. Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, on his recent visit to Harvard, reiterated that Palestinians cannot be trusted with issues of security and that Israel should be responsible for the protection of Israelis as well as Palestinians.

Despite these assurances, peace and security are still lacking. Palestinians have paid a heavy toll for Israel's unwillingness to disarm the settlers or bring in international observers. While censorship of foreign media has made visual evidence difficult to come by, smuggled video tapes show the harrassment, and sometimes brutality, which Palestinians are subject to. International doctors who have worked in the occupied territories report that they have treated patients that had less than a handful of ribs left unbroken.

It is apparent that Israel's current solution to the security concerns of the region may be working well for the Israelis, but past and current incidents indicate that for the Palestinians there is no guarantee of peace or security.

The lack of trust the Palestinians feel toward the Israeli government additionally complicates matters, and their distrust is not unwarranted. After the massacre in Herbron, the Israeli government announced on Friday that the settlement in Kiryat Arba would be put under curfew. Despite the announcement, however, the settlers were free to move about, according to the commander of an Israeli army patrol.

Furthermore, Palestinians find it hard to trust the soldiers who are supposed to provide security. Goldstein should have been forced by the guards to remove his ammunition, as is usually required before entering the mosque; however, he walked in with three cartridges with 35 bullets each.

It took the Israeli guards watching the incident from TV cameras a considerable amount of time to get to the scene. There were also allegations that some of the soldiers were involved in the shooting. The Israeli army replied by stating that there were 111 shells found in the prayer room and assured the media that it is possible for one individual to fire 111 bullets in 30 seconds. The videotapes of the incident from the monitoring cameras have not been released.

In addition to being unable to trust the security forces, the more militant settlers are a cause of anxiety for many Arabs living in the region. The reaction to the massacre by some in the Israeli settlements is, to say the least, disturbing. Despite the Israeli government's condemnation of the act, many settlers and rabbis voiced a different opinion.

Rabbis in the Nir seminary referred to Goldstein as "a hero, a holy man, a righteous man" in front of a thousand mourners, further adding that he would spend eternity in the company of Israel's bravest men and renowned sages. And one of the speakers (apparently not satisfied with the praises) added, "you are at a higher level than us...you did it for the sake of heaven."

It is one thing to have a few extremists voicing such an opinion, but it is quite another story when religious leaders start praising the killing of people kneeling down in prayer.

The Palestinians are also discouraged by the fact that United States usually gives Israel over $4 billion in aid annually. That amount is more than the sum of all US foreign aid to East Asia, the Pacific, the Western Hemisphere, and Africa. Some of this aid money undoubtedly fuels the Israeli military, and some of it goes to building new settlements, and supporting old ones.

At Goldstein's funeral the rabbi expressed his feeling by saying, "one million Arabs are not worth a Jewish fingernail." And Goldstein was buried as a hero. So what was Goldstein? Was he a hero, a murderer, a militant or a terrorist? It seems there is no consensus, especially not among the Israeli settlers and Jewish religious leaders. And in the West, a media that is always ready to label Muslims as terrorist is hesitating now.

The Financial Times headlined an article on the massacre, "Killer `was the kindest man--he wouldn't hurt a cat...'" Someone looking through headlines would at least see that Palestinians in the West have been elevated in status from a fingernail to cat.

Omar Maabreh '94 is president of the Harvard Islamic Society. Rami A. Thabet '97 is a member of the Harvard Islamic Society.