December 24, 2002
Kamloops Daily News



Contrary to the lyrics of the ageless Christmas carol; all
is not calm, all is not bright in Bethlehem tonight.  There
is silence but no calm.  There is darkness but no peace. 

Visitors have stayed away from the birthplace of Jesus this
Christmas.  Israeli troops will not withdraw from Bethlehem
despite Pope John's request.  Christians dare not visit for
fear of their lives.

It's a fear that Palestinians know all too well.  Just 10 
days ago in Bethlehem,  Abdullah Shawka and Abed Abu Mousa 
were shot and killed by Israeli troops.

The only brightness in Israel is the flash of automatic
weapons directed at foolhardy Palestinians who dare stick
their heads outdoors during curfew.   The silence is
occasionally broken by the sickening red roar of
Palestinians blowing themselves up.  They take as many
Israelis to eternity as they can,  as happened a month ago
when a suicide bomber killed 10 Israelis on a bus in nearby
Jerusalem.

The dream of a home for God's chosen people has turned into
a nightmare.

The birth of Israel was bloody.  "The violent birth of
Israel led to a major displacement of the Arab population,"
says the Encyclopedia Britannica.  In 1948,  approximately
1,000,000 Palestinians (the numbers are hotly disputed) were
driven from their homes by bombs or killed by Israeli
troops. 

The Palestinians fled for their lives into refugee camps in
the West Bank and Gaza strip.  There they remain packed into
shacks, living in squalor.  The fenced Gaza strip holds one
million Palestinians in an area of a few square kilometers.

Israel hasn't always been a right-wing country although it
has always considered its military as the will of God. 
Israel was founded on leftist principles of agricultural
communes (the kibbutz) and a strong trade union movement
(Histadrut).  The Histadrut evolved into more than a union
to become the largest employer in Israel.  In 1983 it
employed 85 per cent of all wage earners, including 170,000
Arabs.

Since the mid-1980's "Israel's economy has undergone a
dramatic transformation," says Adam Hanieh in the Monthly
Review (October, 2002).  The Israeli government privatized
state-owned enterprises and the Histadrut, relaxed
government control of capital markets, and reduced real
wages.  Capitalism flourished as money flowed into Israel
from businessmen such as Canada's Charles Bronfman

This transformation meant the undermining of  egalitarian
principles that Israel was founded on and the transfer of
wealth from average Israelis to the new capitalist class.

As the politics of Israel shifted from left to right,
conditions for the Palestinians went from bad to worse. 
Before the mid-1980's,  they provided a cheap source of
labour for Israel.  About 35 per cent of the Palestinian
workforce was employed as labourers, servants, gardeners,
and in low-paid positions in Israel.

After the 1980's Israel began to import foreign workers from
Asia and Eastern Europe.  By 1996,  6 per cent of the
Palestinian workforce were employed in Israel.

Although the Palestinians were no longer useful as an
exploited labour pool, they did present a political
solution.  If Israel was to exploit cheap labour in their
Arab neighbours, Jordan and Egypt, they had to make peace
with their own captive Arabs.

The solution was a deal with Israel's enemy, the Palestine
Liberation Organization.  The so-called Oslo Agreement in
1993 was supposed to  "end to decades of confrontation and
conflict."  It gave the Palestinians the right to self-rule
and a police force.  But these apparent concessions were
"carefully circumscribed within the context of Israel's
continuing control and domination," says Hanieh.

Israel recently demonstrated their contempt for self-rule by
holding the Palestinian President, Yasser  Arafat, under
house arrest as punishment for his failure to strongly
condemn suicide bombers.

Israel would like a "regime change" of the PLO.  It's a idea
borrowed from the U.S. - - if don't like the leader of a
country that you plan to colonize, replace them with your
hand-picked stooge.

The dominance of Israel was foretold in the Bible.   
"Blessed are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved
by the LORD?  He is your shield and helper and your glorious
sword. Your enemies will cower before you, and you will
trample down their high places," Deuteronomy 33:29.

With God, capitalism, and U.S. weapons on their side Israel
seems destined to succeed.  Will Palestinians cower before
Israeli tanks that flatten their dilapidated homes?  Not
likely.  The unholy terror will continue.

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