LEBANON ON ALERT FOLLOWING "ISRAELI" THREATS(1)

Lebanon's Foreign Minister Mahmoud Hammoud said the country has been on alert since "Israeli" warplanes violated its airspace two days ago, and reserves the right to defend its land by any means. Hammoud was speaking on arrival in Qatar for an Organization of the Islamic Conference summit in Doha. The Minister is expected to call on Islamic ministers to support Lebanon's right to defend its territories and press "Israel" to withdraw from the occupied Shebaa Farms. "Israeli" Prime Minister Ehud Barak said Syria and Lebanon will pay a quote high price if Hizbollah carries out attacks against "Israeli" territory. "Israeli" military officials have been accusing the resistance movement of planning a large-scale attack against "Israeli" troops stationed near the border. They also accused Damascus of giving Hizbollah a "green-light" to launch attacks. Top "Israeli" sources said any attack will draw a harsh response that may draw Syria into the conflict. Hizbollah has been warning "Israel" against attacking Lebanon saying the response would be immediate and comprehensive. Tensions have been rising since Hizbollah resistance fighters captured three "Israeli" soldiers from the occupied Shebaa Farms. The resistance wants to swap them for Lebanese and Arab detainees held in the Jewish state. "Israel" did not withdraw from the Shebaa Farms area when it ended its south Lebanon occupation in May. 
 

SOUTH LEBANON VILLAGERS FACE HARSH WINTER(2)

Hanine-a south Lebanon hamlet bordering "Israel". Its residents were forced to evacuate in the late 1970s after vehemently refusing to collaborate with the Jewish state. The remains of the occupation are livid as Palestinian lawmaker Hanan Ashrawi, in a poem about "Israel's" destruction of Palestinian homes, wrote "Have you seen a stone house die?" Hanine's villagers flocked to return to their homes in May after occupation troops withdrew following a twenty-two year occupation. Not to be daunted, they enthusiastically pitched tents, donated by the Iranian Red Crescent, where their homes once stood. Winter is quickly blowing in and these people have vowed not to leave their village a second time. Fayyaz Abbas is having a hard time trying to convince his father and aunt to leave their devastated home in Hanine and return to Beirut for the winter. For them, the idea is unconceivable. [Amina Abbas, Hanine Resident, saying: "Since the liberation we've been living here. We will find firewood and stay warm. Why would we leave? This is our house, our wealth, our land."] Ali Soefan and his sister pitched tents on rubble where their homes once stood. They admit the cold lately has been unbearable. People here are asking where the promised state funds are. Some of them were furious at what they said is the lack of concern for their village. [Um Abdullah Soefan, Hanine Resident, saying: "We found nothing when we returned. The town-you can see it. This us our land-we're not going to leave it again. We won't leave it until we're corpses. When we die someone will bury us here, too. We're ready to sacrifice everything. We sacrificed to liberate it- and we will give up more...Do you think we will leave our land again?] Lebanon has been awaiting long-delayed and promised international aid to reconstruct the zone "Israel" occupied. People gather at Abu Wajih's tent for a midday talk about politics and the old times. His wife and children have given up trying to convince the 66-year-old, who has been declare mayor by villagers, to return to Beirut. [Abu Wajih, Hanine Resident, "When we returned we found the destruction. All our great-grandfathers work-gone...If it rains from above and floods from beneath us, we're staying. We're not leaving no matter what. My great-grandfathers are buried here. Do you think we can leave?] And after it was occupied for more than two decades. They will need more than determination to stay warm throughout the winter. 

Lebanon plans to boycott Islamic summit in Doha: official

Lebanon is considering boycotting next week's Islamic summit in Doha because of the "worsening of the situation" in the Palestinian territories, according to a Lebanese government source.

"The Lebanese government is in the process of reviewing, along with the president of the republic, Emile Lahoud, the possibility of not attending in the summit of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) ... because of the worsening of the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories," the source told journalists.

The official said the "Arab summit in Cairo held October 21 called on those Arab states that had not signed a peace treaty with "Israel" to suspend any normalisation steps (with the Jewish state) and to close those "Israeli" representative offices that they had allowed to function."

But Qatar has refused to follow the lead taken by Morocco, Tunisia and Oman, which have closed the "Israeli" trade missions in their countries.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Mahmud Hammud already went to Qatar Tuesday, and was due to take part Wednesday in a meeting of Mediterranean Arab countries aimed at studying a Syrian-Lebanese request to postpone the Euro-Mediterranean conference scheduled for November 15 and 16 in Marseilles.

Damascus and Beirut believe that, in line with the resolutions from the Cairo summit, Arab countries should not take part in regional conferences attended by "Israel".(3)

Moreover, four days before the OIC Summit is to be held in Doha, Saudi Arabia declared Wednesday its boycott of the Summit.The Saudi News agency explained that the decision comes as a result of "worsening of the situation" in occupied Palestinian territories, and that this recquires changes in official positions to face the current challenges.

An official in Crown Prince Abdallah's office said that Saudi Arabia had warned Qatar of its boycott of the Islamic Summit, due to the presence of the "Israeli" trade mission office in Doha, the capital.(4)

Palestinian fighters kills an "Israeli" in a Gaza attack(5)

Palestinian fighters carried out Wednesday morning a courageous operation on the Egyptian - Palestinian border.They opened fire on a car carrying a number of "Israeli" security employees who work at the Rafah crossing point to Egypt."Israeli" radio admitted that an "Israeli" woman employee at the crossing point was killed and a man was injured during the attack on the "Israeli" car. "Israeli" forces hurried to close Rafah crossing and Gaza Airport, which was overflown by "Israeli" warplanes. The "Israeli" army said that investigations indicates that three Palestinian gunmen reached the main road near the border with Egypt, and at a distance of 300 m from Rafah crossing point  opened fire at the car wounding a women, who later died. Another settler present in the car was also injured. Army radio also said that "Israeli" soldiers and the Palestinian fighters traded fire.

Five Palestinian martyrs in new clashes(6)

Five Palestinians were martyred during clashes with "Israeli" soldiers Wednesday, and two died of wounds sustained in previous clashes.

17- year- old Mohammed Musbah Abu Ghali was shot by an "Israeli" sniper in the heart during clashes in the quater of Amal (hope) close to Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza strip.Ayman Salah Wadi (19 years) was also killed by "Israeli" bullets in the head. Twelve Palestinians were wounded in the clashes.

Fares Audah was also killed in stone-throwing clashes with "Israeli" soldiers at the Karni crossing. He was shot in the neck.

In the Palestinian village of Hares in Nablus, a group of "Israeli" Settlers opened fire on Palestinians killing 14-year-old youth Raed Abd al-Majid and wounding four other Palestinians. The group of settlers with the support of the "Israeli" soldiers later surrounded the village of Maraddah and opened fire on the Palestinian inhabitants wounding 22-year- old Nasr al-Khafash in his legs.

On Tuesday, an "Israeli" settler ran over with his car on a 7- year- old Palestinian boy, Ahmad Khafash from Maraddah village. The boy directly passed away.

In addition, Mohammed Mahani (24 years) and a 13-year- old boy died on Wednesday from wounds sustained in clashes which took place in Karni crossing.

The number of Palestinian intifadah martyrs in the last six weeks has risen to 192.

The mothers should cut the cord (7)

By Avirama Golan
Nobody was surprised when, reacting to the bloody clashes in the territories, a group of "Israeli" Jewish mothers issued a statement that they were not prepared to sacrifice their children as soldiers in the "Israel" Defense Forces*, which they said was fighting needless battles in Nablus and on Mount Eval. A month later, the first group of "Israeli" Jewish mothers had organized itself, using the name of a now-disbanded group that had called for a withdrawal from Lebanon: Four Mothers. The new Four Mothers organization is demanding that "Israel" pull out of the territories - for the sake of the children.This is an interesting phenomenon. There are those who are saying that this is a welcome development. After all, they reason, in the heart of a militaristic society, whose members invariably see things through the telescopic sights of an army-issue rifle (especially at a time of confrontation or war), a group of courageous mothers has now arisen, and these women are not afraid of clashing with the top brass of the IDF, or with the defense minister, or even with the prime minister while they set new "civic boundaries" and say categorically, "This is as far as we are prepared to go."

A careful study of how "Israeli" politicians from the various political camps behaved during the different phases of the war in Lebanon - their decisions and their policy changes - will prove conclusively that the original Four Mothers movement, which constantly gained in strength and even recruited the fathers of "Israeli" combat soldiers, achieved several impressive media successes, contributed to a more focused debate on "Israel"'s continued presence in Lebanon and, in the final analysis, no doubt accelerated the withdrawal of IDF troops from there.

Actually, it would be no exaggeration to say that the determination of mothers to confront the IDF commanders responsible for sending their children into battle is a self-evident - perhaps even natural - result of the involvement of "Israeli" parents, especially mothers, in the military service of their children. This involvement expresses itself every weekend at the gates of military bases in the form of parcels filled with all sorts of cooked delicacies or cakes, cookies and other sweet goodies. This involvement expresses itself in the traditional "beret treks" (at the end of which novice soldiers are awarded the particular beret - red, green, black, gray, etc. - proudly worn by the members of their unit) when Mom and Dad join their beloved child for the last kilometer of the grueling ordeal, offering words of encouragement, praise and love. This involvement expresses itself in the telephone calls that angry parents make to battalion or brigade commanders, lambasting them for "needlessly bullying" their children.

In fact, it appears that there are no soldiers in "Israel", only "children" or "our children." In "Israel", when children leave home and are inducted into army, their departure, as pointed out by psychologist Professor Amia Lieblich in a brilliant study, does not mean that they are "leaving the nest," which is usually the case in other countries when teenagers move out of their homes. Quite the contrary, Prof. Lieblich defines the military units where "Israeli" inductees serve as distant branches of the traditional warm Jewish family that, nonetheless, effectively controls what goes in that branch.

In any event, the "Israeli" right ecstatically welcomed the creation of the new Four Mothers organization because the rightists regard that movement as additional proof of the hedonism of the left, whose members, interested solely in their own comfort and security and in that of their children, do not consider the price-tag in national terms. This viewpoint is not completely distorted, although it does confuse, and deliberately so, "mothers" with "the left." The left is currently maintaining a stony silence, which is only broken from time to time by a few mumbled, incoherent statements, while the vast majority of leftists have already made their peace with the eternal existence of "clusters of settlements" in the territories. As a result, a major change might take place in the public debate on the future of the territories and on the price that "Israeli" society is paying for continuing to hold on to them and continuing to allow the 200,000 Jewish settlers in those territories to dictate "Israel"'s national agenda. Given the current circumstances, that public debate could wind up being conducted between the following two parties: On the one hand, the military and the security forces, whose poker-faced commanders speak in an abstruse jargon, and, on the other hand, "Israeli" Jewish women, who speak from the heart.

This phenomenon has nothing to do with feminism or social issues. In fact, the opposite is true: A society that listens to what is being said by its female members, speaking from the traditional perspective of a spouse or mother, is actually backward. Women effectively trap themselves when they go along with this assignment of such an exclusive, and traditional, role, and when they make no effort to actively participate in accepted democratic channels in order to reach positions of influence and to use those positions to express their views - irrespective of their motherly or conjugal relationships. Which party will be supported at the ballot box by a woman whose oldest son wants to serve in the army canteen during his inducted period of service and whose youngest son dreams of becoming a member in the elite Duvdevan undercover unit?

The new Four Mothers organization could therefore end up leading the above public debate into even more of a dead end than it is already in right now and reducing even further the rationality and relevance of that debate. If the left adopts these charming mothers and turns them into the new symbol of the struggle for peace, it will lose yet one more opportunity to speak clearly about "Israel"'s social and political priorities and will allow private norms to blur political positions. Moreover, those who are enthusiastic about mothers getting involved in the issue of the territories should remember that the right can always present its own duo of mothers: Daniela Weiss and Miriam Lapidot

Battling for the right to speak up (8)

By Tamar Rotem

The Arab students at Ben-Gurion University have not been allowed to organize on campus.
Last week the sound of drumbeats came through the closed doors of lecture halls of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Be'er Sheva. Students had read in the newspapers that riots were expected at the universities. They looked uneasily at one another. Had the dire predictions come true?.The noise, it quickly turned out, was part of the festival atmosphere of happenings organized by the Students' Union to mark the first week of studies in the new academic year. Still, there were plenty of strident notes, mainly emanating from the Arab students at the universities. In the wake of the disturbances in and around Arab villages last month, they launched a campaign for recognition of their right to organize and demonstrate on campus. So far, the Arab students have chalked up a few points in their favor, including, for the first time, support from Arab and Jewish lecturers.

Despite the directive issued by the Council for Higher Education barring political activity on all campuses during the first week of studies, Ben-Gurion University last week permitted Arab and Jewish teachers to hold a symposium entitled "Jewish-Arab Equality and Coexistence on Campus and in the State." Some 300 students and lecturers showed up for the event, which was held last Tuesday in the presence of the university's rector, Prof. Nahum Finger.

Among the symposium speakers was Mahmoud Mahamid, the chairman of the Arab Students' Union, an organization that is not officially recognized by the university.

During the symposium many of those present noticed that everything was being documented by video cameras. It turned out that the university's security unit had decided to film those in attendance "for security purposes." A petition is currently being circulated in the university - it has so far been signed by about 20 Jewish and Arab lecturers - demanding that the institution's administration ensure that "this disgraceful act" never be repeated.

Ben-Gurion University always took a relatively conservative position in regard to Arab students and issues relating to freedom of expression, as compared to other institutions of higher learning. Now its approach is apparently about to change, although the episode of the filming of the symposium attests to the ambivalence of the heads of the university toward any such change.

There are few Arab students enrolled at BGU, and this is one of the explanations offered for why they have never constituted a genuine force on the campus, in contrast to the situation at the University of Haifa and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. There are some 750 Arab students at BGU among a student population of 15,000 or so. The majority of the Arabs (approximately 70 percent) there come from the north of the country.

Some 19 percent of the students (more than 2,000) at the University of Haifa are Arabs, and the proportion in Jerusalem is similar. "In the north they are plugged into their towns and villages, to their source of strength," explains Raif Jumaa, a member of the Culture Committee of the Students' Union at BGU and a resident of the village of Abu Snan in Western Galilee. "Here, the majority of the students are far from home and feel cut off."

The university's regulations do not permit political activity on the grounds of the campus. This effectively neutralizes the Arab students. Whereas other universities (Haifa, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University) have allocated areas for demonstrations, in Be'er Sheva the place for a meeting or demonstration (even if it refers to the size of the tuition fees) has to be coordinated anew each time. The elections for the Students' Union are also held on the basis of rules that differ from those in the other universities - not on the basis of political parties as is the case on the other campuses, but according to departments of study. However, in the natural course of things the struggles that are waged within the Students' Union generally assume a political character. In other words, there is political activity on campus, but it is concealed.

In contrast to the other universities, where Arab student committees operate freely, at BGU the body that is supposed to look after the well-being of the Arab students functions as a kind of shadow organization. For the most part, its activity is conducted outside the university (with police authorization), sometimes right next to the main entry gate of the campus. At the end of last year, elections to the Arab students' committee were held for the first time, one reason being to consolidate it as a legitimate body that represents the Arab students. Mahmoud Mahamid, who is active in the Hadash party and is doing his M.A. in Hebrew literature, was elected chairman of the committee.

Last week Mahamid wanted to organize a meeting between freshmen and veteran Arab students in order to help the new students to acclimatize. However, Dean of Students Ya'akov Afek initially turned down his request for a room in which to hold the encounter. It was only when lecturers exerted pressure that permission was granted to hold the meeting, albeit under restrictive conditions. "They told us what we could talk about and what we were not allowed to talk about," Mahamid says. "I was forbidden to refer to the violent events or to talk about discrimination and inequality. The next thing you know, they would have written my text for me and told me to read it out verbatim."

Finally a compromise was worked out, and the encounter took place last Wednesday in the presence of the dean of students and the rector. Mahamid did not mention the "violent events" by so much as a word.

Mahamid, 26, who is from Umm el Fahm in the Galilee, has been living in Be'er Sheva for the past seven years. He intends to do his M.A. thesis on Hebrew poetry of the Middle Ages (among the paitanim - the writers of liturgical verse - he likes Ibn Gvirol and Yehuda Halevy, though he is visibly uncomfortable at mentioning this). He thinks the university ban on organizing and demonstrating violates freedom of expression and is an attempt to silence dissent.

Nowadays, many of the lecturers at the university agree with him. In the wake of the disturbances in "Israel" and the territories, a group of lecturers, Jews and Arabs alike, including heads of departments and research institutes such as Dr. Lev Grinberg, who is the head of the Humphrey Center for Social Research, and Dr. Ismail Abu Saad, who heads the Center for Research of Bedouin Society, spoke out against the ban on campus demonstrations, and activity for freedom of expression was launched. Last week's conference on coexistence and equality was the first manifestation of the new thrust. Mahamid hopes to operate openly this year, with the backing of lecturers, in an effort to put a stop to the discrimination he alleges in the awarding of scholarships and dorm space.

Dr. Amnon Raz Karkutzkin, from BGU's Department of History, maintains that the university's demand for an apolitical campus is unreasonable, particularly in the existing reality in "Israel". "The right for party activity by Arabs is legitimate," he says. "An Arab students' committee is something elementary. Obviously, in a body consisting of a national minority, national and political issues will come up for discussion, because for the Arabs even the question of dorms is a political one, and the demand for recognition is also legitimate." At the same time, he notes, an incipient change in the university's approach is discernible. "The fact that the university lent its auspices to a meeting with the participation of the Arab Students' Committee was important. It helped calm passions and also contributed to the creation of a legitimate political dialogue. That was a step toward the recognition of the Arab Students' Committee."

"This is the most open campus in terms of relations between Jewish and Arab lecturers," says Dr. Tabath Abu Ras, from the Department of Geography, "but it is the worst in terms of freedom of expression. Even in Iran universities permit students to express themselves in every sphere." Not many at the university know that 20 years ago, Abu Ras, who is today a political geographer and a member of Hadash who assists the Arab Students' Committee, was expelled from the campus for engaging in political activity. He is now in his second year as a teacher. When he was studying for his B.A. and founded an Arab-Jewish students' movement called Campus in Be'er Sheva, he was expelled. He sued the university over the expulsion; the court sought to reach a compromise in which he would resume his studies on the condition he undertook not to engage in political activity. He decided to drop out of school. He later studied in the United States.

Now, Abi Ras says that it is important for him to point out that Jewish and Arab lecturers have been acting together. Next spring the Arab students will put their case to the university's Board of Governors. "It will not be so terrible for the university to allocate an area for political activity," he says. "We could agree on controlled political activity, and of course whatever is done would have to be within the framework of the law."

Next week BGU will host a conference on the right to demonstrate. Among those expected to attend are the civil rights attorney Avigdor Feldman, Prof. Kenneth Mann from Tel Aviv University, and activists from the Adalah organization for Arab minority rights in "Israel". Meanwhile the Rector, Prof. Finger, ardently defends the university's position. A students' union that is based not on political parties but on "representation by professions and disciplines" is preferable, he says, as it enables the problems that affect students to be dealt with more effectively. The university's approach, he says, helps it preserve "a bit of civility" and enables it to be "the only sane place around."

The university, he points out, does not prevent social or cultural organizing. "If the Arab students wanted to establish an Omar Khayam fan club, would we object?

Footnotes:

1 - Future TV 8-11-‏2000.

2 - Same Source

3 - AFP 8-11-2000.

4 - Manar TV 8-11-2000.

5 - Same source

6 - Same source

7 - Ha'aretz 9-11-2000.

8 - Same source

* This term is absolutely unacceptable. ""Israel"'s" Army is that of war and aggression for it protects land gained by force, confiscation and war in contradiction with the simplest rights of human confessed by the international laws and conventions.