This week’s news from Bil’in tells of Israeli troops firing tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets:
“Israeli military attacks weekly Bil’in protest, 17 injured including 7 journalists.”
Rachel Corrie‘s parents were among those supporting the rights of villagers who undaunted by the armed-to-the-teeth bullies of the US backed Israeli government. What precisely is a terrorist, and who are the terrorists?
Friday March 28, 2008 16:51
Scores of residents of Bil’in, a village near the central West Bank city of Ramallah, along with their international and Israeli supporters, took to the streets on Friday to conduct their weekly nonviolent protest against the Israeli Wall and illegal confiscation of the village’s land.
Israeli troops manning the wall and its gate that cuts off the villagers from their land showered the protesters with tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets immediately after the protesters reached the gate.
17 were injured including seven journalists. Medical sources identified some of the injured journalists as Fadi Al Arouri, a photojournalist, Najud al Qassem, a cameraman, Moheb Al Bargouthi, a reporter, and George Haltah, a cameraman.
Also among those injured was Eyad Burnat, of Bil’in popular committee, who told IMEMC “I was trying to protect one of the village youth who was attacked by the soldiers when soldiers attacked and beat me up.”
The parents of Rachel Corrie, the American peace activist who was killed by the Israeli army in Gaza five years ago, took part of the Bil’in protest. Her father, Mr Craig Corrie, praised the nonviolent resistance in Bil’in and called for more support for the Palestinians in their struggle for freedom.
Rachel Corrie was killed in 2003 in Rafah city, in the southern part of the Gaza strip when an army bulldozer ran over her while she was protecting a local family home from being demolished by the Israeli army.
http://www.imemc.org/article/53799
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MI51PKXPUHA
That anyone can behave as Israeli army personnel do regularly and routinely to Palestinians is the first question. That they do it knowing that they are being recorded beggars belief. That the international community says and does nothing indicates something else. As is repeated with sickening regularity this is the seed-bed of Middle-Eastern issues. The only answer is that the only interest that the US government and allies, chiefly Britain, has is in getting resources at any cost. Lives in this context along with misery and suffering don’t enter into the equation. What other explanation is there?