The Five-Day Olmert Peace Stunt: A Proof Israelis Not Ready for Peace Yet By Hassan El-Najjar

An Editorial Note From Al-Jazeerah: News articles may be reduced in size or slightly changed to conform to the Conflict Terminology guide adopted by Al-Jazeerah. Changes also include correcting Arabic names and editing. So, readers are advised that news articles may not represent their original form in verbatim or size, according to the mentioned original sources.

The Palestinian Ma'an news agency reported the following breaking news headline, but without details, on December 3, 2006, at 3:50 pm ET: "Israeli artillery shells the northern Gaza Strip; Hamas announces suspension of ceasefire negotiations"

Almost all Palestinian resistance organizations warned that they would retaliate if Israeli occupation forces continue their aggression on the Palestinian people in the West Bank (See news reports below).

These news reports show that the ceasefire was just a temporary measure which lasted only few days after the Bush-Maliki meeting in Amman.

The Olmert peace announcement was nothing but a stunt. It contradicted simple facts on the ground.

Gaza Strip is still a prison for 1.5 million Palestinians. The Israeli occupation forces surround it from three directions in addition to controlling its airspace. The fourth direction, the Egyptian border, is indirectly controlled by Israeli occupation forces through European observers on the Rafah border crossing, which is by the way rarely opened.

The West Bank is still under Israeli occupation. Its lands are being stolen everyday through the Israeli Land-Grab Wall and by expanding illegal Israeli settlements.

Israeli occupation forces never stopped unprovoked raids on Palestinian cities, refugee camps, and villages to kill, injure, and kidnap Palestinians, demolish their homes, and humiliate them at checkpoints.

Palestinian resistance organizations in Gaza announced that they would abide by the ceasefire if Israeli occupation forces stop their unprovoked raids on the West Bank. Otherwise, they would retaliate by launching their home-made rockets at Israeli towns neighboring Gaza Strip, usually without any resulting casualties.

The problem so far has been that the Zionist Israeli occupation arrogance prevents Israeli leaders from accepting this idea of reciprocity. They want to keep raiding on the Palestinian cities, refugee camps, and villages in the West Bank until total submission of Palestinians to the Israeli occupation. They cannot comprehend retaliation by Palestinian resistance organizations against their war crimes, even in the form of launching rockets which do not cause casualties.

They do not understand equal mutual relations, symmetry, or reciprocity. These terms do not exist in the racist Zionist dictionary of false superiority. They forget that everything they have is from the United States, not from them.

Somebody has to tell them that the game is over. Humanity no longer tolerate racism, imperialist domination, and occupation. Palestinians have demonstrated that they insist on freedom.

There will be no peace without justice, which can never be attained without recognition of mutual equality and reciprocity.

The spokesperson of the National Resistance Brigades, the armed wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), Abu Salem, has warned on Sunday of the collapse of the ceasefire if Israel continues to violate it through aggression against Palestinians in the West Bank.

The spokesperson called on the Palestinian factions to reconsider their position in light of the Israeli stance, especially following the declarations of the Israeli defence minister.

In a blow to peace, Amir Peretz rejects spread of ceasefire to the West Bank; renews military operations

Many of those who were counting on, or at least hoping for, a balanced Israeli position on the fragile ceasefire holding out between the Israeli occupation forces and the Palestinian resistance organizations were disappointed by statements from the Israeli monster of war (wrongly self-described as minister of defense), Amir Peretz.

Peretz has decided to exclude the West Bank from the ceasefire agreement, and announced that the Israeli occupation army will resume full operations there.

Peretz has issued orders to his soldiers to shoot at Palestinians launching projectiles at Israeli towns from the Gaza Strip (which are usually launched in retaliation for Israeli attacks or raids on the Palestinian people).

Prime Minister Olmert stated, "we should act in a responsible way, and study all sides of the issue. We have strategic promises from European countries and the USA, although they don’t look at things the same way we do."

Peretz stressed that the Israeli occupation government is not even considering the expansion of the ceasefire to include the West Bank, and said that Israel is continuing its operations against the Palestinian resistance organizations (without any provocation from the Palestinian side).

He also claimed that the announcement about the truce came as a direct result of Israeli pressure and the international diplomacy which exerted pressure on the Palestinians.

Peretz believes that the truce might culminate with the release of the Israeli soldier (without mentioning the 10,500 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli occupation prisons and detention camps).

He expressed anger at what he called "the smuggling of money through the Rafah crossing, as Zahhar did" (meaning he is angry because of attempts break the sanctions regime aiming at starving the Palestinian people).

Peretz also announced that some concessions will be given to Palestinians over the Christmas and new year period, including giving permission for 500 Palestinian Christians from the Gaza Strip to visit the West Bank, and permission for 1200 of the Christians in the West Bank to visit Jerusalem and Nazareth (i.e. allowing 1,700 Palestinians to travel to some parts of their country! WOW! Are we living in the medieval times?).

The Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, has announced the suspension of its participation in the ceasefire, stating that "the discussion of the issue in the current circumstances stands against Palestinians. The internal situation should be given the top priority".

In a statement issued in Gaza, the movement stated "the comprehensive truce should come as part of a comprehensive national program for the next stage. Maybe the truce can be part of it, but this time is needed to make sure it is mature and ready."

The movement has called on everyone to make the national interest more important than the interest of the factions, and to pay more attention to the internal situation. "We must get our own house in order, before we get busy in relations with the Israeli occupation, who have escalated the aggression against Palestinians after the cease of projectile launching," read the Hamas statement.

Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhoum said that the 'calm' or 'cease-fire' has now been agreed to include not only the Gaza Strip, but the West Bank as well. The problem, as Barhoum said Sunday, is that the Israelis are not abiding by the agreement in the West Bank.

Including the West Bank was a major point of contention for Palestinians who agreed to cease resistance activities in the area where they were effective – the Gaza Strip – while the Israeli military continued its attacks on the West Bank. Citizens, officials, and members of the resistance were all calling on Israel to include the West Bank, and had finally gotten their wish.

Barhoum said the agreement to stop launching the projectiles that killed one Israeli woman was made in exchange for an Israeli pledge to stop its attacks and arrests on the West Bank and Gaza Strip that have recently killed and imprisoned hundreds of Palestinians. However, the Israelis do not agree to stop settlement and Wall expansion, checkpoints or land confiscation. But the practice of targeted assassinations, at least, is expected to stop.

However, Barhoum said, none of it has happened. “The brutal Zionist aggression on our people in the West Bank, from mass arrests and assassinations and invasions, means that the occupation forces did not comply with the calm which threatens to be detonated at any time. The continued aggression against our people in the West Bank confirms that the Zionist enemy did not abide by the new terms of the 'cease-fire.' Killings, attacks, and incursions in the West Bank carries the calm with the wind.”

He added that the Israelis “bear full responsibility for the failure of this 'calm.'”

Israeli media describe killing civilians as terrorism. However, when Israeli occupation soldiers kill Palestinian civilians, they do not describe the Israeli killers of civilians as terrorists. It's time for Israeli terrorist acts to be described as terrorism.

Israeli occupation forces use the term "arrest" for "kidnapping" Palestinians from their homes. Objective media worldwide should not fall to the Israeli trap. This is kidnapping.

The Israeli occupation of Palestine is illegal under international law. The Israeli occupation government and its occupation forces have no jurisdiction over Palestinians. Only legitimate governments can arrest citizens. It follows that the correct term is "kidnapping" Palestinians, not "arresting" them by Israeli occupation forces.