The public outcry against the Israeli assault by some of Washington's closest allies, including throughout the semicolonial world, has unraveled the U.S. rulers' efforts to build up a war drive against Iraq. After first backing Sharon's military moves during the first few days of the invasion, U.S. president George Bush called for Israel to withdraw its troops from the West Bank. He announced Powell's mission to the Mideast on April 4, but provided Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon with an additional week to extend the slaughter, with the secretary of state not scheduled to arrive in Jerusalem until April 11.

During the intervening week Israeli forces accelerated their assault over the entire West Bank, upping the total killed since the invasion was launched March 29 to at least 300 Palestinians, and wounding hundreds more. Some 2,000 people have been detained. Over this time 26 Israeli soldiers are reported to have been killed and many more wounded by fierce resistance put up by Palestinian fighters, particularly in the Jenin refugee camp. In one day of fighting there on April 9, 13 Israeli soldiers were killed as well as 100 Palestinians.

In the Jenin refugee camp, where 15,000 people live in tight quarters, U.S.-supplied AH-64 Apache helicopter gunships have pounded the densely populated area with rounds of missile fire as troops waged house-to-house searches. Israeli tanks crushed cars parked on the streets and bulldozers demolished houses, some with people still inside them.

Through these murderous occupations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Israeli rulers are turning their professional military force into a repressive police force. Washington provides Israel with an annual infusion of about $3 billion a year in military and economic aid.

"Since 7:00 a.m., I have been counting about 40 rockets being shot on refugee camps," stated Najeh Jarrar, a 60-year-old college professor in a telephone interview with the New York Times. He said he was cowering with his wife and child between their bathroom and kitchen. "We don't know where the bullets will fall."

Muhammad Saadi, 22, told the Times that he and his family were in their two-room house when an Israeli bulldozer smashed into one room. "The ceiling fell half a yard from us and we shouted to the soldiers that we were inside," he said. "They told us to come out, and destroyed the house. The house across from us was also demolished."

A 51-year-old Palestinian metalworker who was arrested April 7 and held for 24 hours at an Israeli army base reported that 25 Israeli troops using sledgehammers smashed through the wall into his brother's apartment.

Women and children who have managed to flee the camp suffer from dehydration. These residents "reported corpses collecting on the streets and water supplies running so short that some mothers were mixing baby formula with sewer water to feed their children," stated an April 10 Washington Post article. Similar atrocities are happening in a number of other cities in the West Bank, which have been declared war zones. Though reporters are barred from these areas, photos have appeared in the capitalist media showing the destruction of entire neighborhoods.

Israeli army officials are not allowing ambulances into the areas where they're conducting military operations, which include the Palestinian towns of Bethlehem, Nablus, Ramallah, and Salfit. "There is always a fear of terrorists being brought in and out in ambulances," stated an Israeli army official.

"I think there are no injured," said Ziad Isa, a doctor at Razi Hospital in Jenin, "after six or seven days, the injured on the street have died."

Water and food supplies are running low as Israeli troops have imposed shoot-to-kill curfews on the population. The Financial Times reports that some 400,000 people in the West Bank are without running water as a result of the destruction of equipment and pipes by Israeli tanks and bulldozers.  
 
Prisoners as human shields
The young Palestinian men being rounded up by the Israeli forces are stripped, handcuffed, and blindfolded as they're taken to detention centers for interrogation. A number are being used as human shields by the Israeli troops. An article in the New York Times describes the example of Kamal Taleb, 43, who together with other residents was ordered at gunpoint to walk in front of soldiers as they moved from house to house, and to enter several homes as a protective shield for the troops.

In response to a lawsuit filed by B'Tselem and three other Israeli human rights groups, Israel's Supreme Court April 7 upheld an army order denying any legal rights to Palestinians being held as prisoners. According to a Financial Times article, the court threw out the group's petition, which "quoted an Israeli source at the Ofer detention center as saying detainees were being subjected to torture during interrogation, including repeated instances of them having their toes broken."

The army issued an order April 5 extending the time that those detained will not have access to lawyers from eight to 18 days. "One detainee," reported the Financial Times, "a doctor who questioned why he had been arrested, was allegedly told: 'We don't know who is a terrorist. That's why we're arresting everybody.'"

This brutal, inhuman treatment of the Palestinian population by the Israeli military forces occurs in the midst of a hypocritical campaign by the U.S. rulers, which is hyped up in the capitalist media, that seeks to blame "suicide bombers" for the violence occurring in the region.  
 
Powell's trip met with protests
Powell's trip to the Mideast region has been met by massive protests against Israel's occupation and Washington's complicity with it. Hundreds of thousands marched through the streets of Rabat, the capital of Morocco April 7. Their chants included, "Sharon assassin, Bush his dog."

The action, reflecting the deeply-felt sentiment of the masses of working people in the country, has forced usually pliant and pro-imperialist allies like Moroccan King Mohammad to somewhat take their public distance from Powell. Morocco was the first stop on Powell's trip, which also included Egypt, Spain, and Jordan before finally arriving in Israel. At a joint news conference, the king posed the question to Powell, "Don't you think it would be more important to go to Jerusalem first?"

The secretary of state also met with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, whose vacation in Morocco happened to coincide with Powell's visit. According to a New York Times article, the Saudi monarch told Powell that "the U.S. must restrain Sharon," and that "American prestige and credibility are collapsing very quickly."

Of deep concern to the U.S. capitalist class and their pro-imperialist backers in the region is their fear that the very moves undertaken by Israel to crush the Palestinian resistance will instead result in deeper protests and radicalization throughout the area. The operation undertaken by Israel, Powell told NBC's "Meet the Press" before embarking on his mission, "opens us up to new instabilities and new insecurities and new threats in the long term for Israel and the region."

Adnan Abu-Odeh, a former adviser to the king of Jordan, more specifically pinpointed the rulers' problem. "You don't know what will happen," he stated. "There is an accumulation of grievances, one against Israel and America and one against the Arab regimes."

In Jordan, where the majority of the population is Palestinian, there have been a growing number of demonstrations in solidarity with the Palestinians' fight. Reflecting the pressures they're under, Queen Rania and two other princesses felt the need to place themselves in the front of one such action of 2,000 people in the streets of Amman. During the first week of April about 200 demonstrations took place in Jordan

Some 300,000 people participated in a demonstration in Yemen, in the capital city of Sana. Another sizable action took place in the port city of Aden where the local authorities killed one of the protesters.

Coinciding with Powell's visit to Egypt, demonstrations erupted in Cairo, Alexandria, and Tanta. At the University of Alexandria, a march by some 7,000 students was attacked by the police, who fired buckshot, tear gas, and water cannons. At least one student was killed and more than 100 others injured.

Even in Bahrain, where the U.S. Fifth Fleet has its headquarters, protests have erupted. A 24-year-old hospital worker was killed with a shot to the head during one such demonstration by the U.S. embassy there. Demonstrators also took to the streets in Kuwait over the course of several days to protest Israeli military action in the Palestinian territories. Even the government in Turkey, one of Israel's strongest allies, felt compelled to issue a statement demanding that "the tanks should turn back now."

In a gesture toward the Bush admin–istration's call for Israel to withdraw from the occupied Palestinian towns, Sharon announced a pullback April 8 from the West Bank towns of Qalqilya and Tulkarm. Israeli tanks and armored vehicles, however, continue to maintain a tight blockade around both towns. Powell said that this withdrawal was not enough. He also announced that he plans to meet with Arafat in Ramallah, with or without Sharon's consent. Sharon has informed the Israeli parliament that his plan is for the military to withdraw to "buffer zones" between Israel and the West Bank. These zones, the planning of which has been in the works for awhile, will involve Israel annexing areas that include dozens of Palestinian hamlets. According to one estimate, about 400,000 Palestinians would fall under permanent Israeli jurisdiction if this plan is implemented.
 
 
Related articles:
Washington: End all aid to colonial-settler Israel!
U.S. protests demand 'end the occupation!'
Palestinian struggle for self-determination  
 
 
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