From the church of the Nativity in Bethlehem where dozens of fighters held off Israeli military forces, to the streets of Palestinian towns in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Palestinian people refused to bow to the imperialist pressure and military onslaught by colonial-settler Israel during Powell's mission.

"The situation on the ground is that Secretary Powell leaves the situation worse than when he came," stated Saeb Erekat, a senior Palestinian official, shortly before Powell departed the area after holding a second meeting with Palestinian Authority president Yasir Arafat at his besieged Ramallah offices.

Despite some mild criticism of Israel's ongoing military operations in West Bank towns, the main focus of Powell's trip was to bring maximum pressure to bear upon Arafat to clamp down on Palestinian fighters leading the resistance. "You're on a dangerous path and you need to make a change," the U.S. secretary of state warned Arafat during one of their face-to-face meetings. Powell also floated the idea of holding a Middle East peace conference without Arafat, fitting in nicely with Sharon's stance that the Palestinian leader be excluded from such a gathering.

In the end, Powell went back to Washington empty-handed.

The Israeli rulers didn't pause for a moment in their military assault against Palestinians living in the West Bank the entire 10 days the U.S. delegation was in the Mideast. Israeli troops have occupied and laid siege to almost every major Palestinian population center on the West Bank, killing hundreds and arresting at least 5,000 people. Many of those picked up in sweeps are being sent to a newly reopened prison camp in the Negev Desert.

Israeli prime minister Sharon has stated that the Israeli dragnet is far from over. While announcing plans to pull out of some towns like Jenin and Nablus soon, other areas have been reinvaded and Israeli troops are maintaining a tight military encirclement around all these areas. The Israeli military has made clear that they have no intention of pulling out of Bethlehem or Ramallah any time soon.

However, the resistance of the Palestinian people in the face of Israeli's military might and the outpouring of solidarity they're winning throughout the Mideast region and around the world is creating deeper political problems for the capitalist rulers in Israel and their imperialist allies in Washington.

In recent days new facts have come out of how for 10 days groups of determined Palestinian fighters held off the drive by the Israeli army to destroy and take control of the Palestinian refugee camp in Jenin on the West Bank.

At least 200 Palestinians were killed in the camp, according to some relief agencies, although the actual number buried under the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israeli bulldozers and tanks is still unknown. Through the course of the fighting in Jenin, a town of 25,000 inhabitants, and the adjacent densely populated refugee camp where 15,000 people live, the Palestinians succeeded in killing 23 Israeli soldiers.

An article in the April 11 Toronto Globe and Mail told the story of several Palestinians who survived the assault on the Jenin camp. Their statements show why the Israeli rulers and their U.S. imperialist allies cannot crush the Palestinian resistance despite their military strength.

"The fighting, they said, was not led by any central command," the article stated. "The Palestinian Authority led the fight against an earlier Israeli incursion, but this time, much of the population took up weapons." Mohammad, a 26-year-old man, his head swathed in bandages, stated, "They are very strong people, who said, 'This is my home, my land, my camp, and even though I have only primitive weapons, I am willing to die in the camp.'"  
 
'Do not leave your land at any cost'
Hussein, a farmer, pointed out, "The Israelis are not fighting with a very strong belief. We are defending our beliefs and our honor and our land." A man named Ahmed added, "We learned from our parents and grandparents who left their land [after being driven off by the Israeli army] in 1948 and 1967. We learned: Do not leave your land at any cost."

The assault by the Israeli forces, in which an army has been transformed into a repressive military police, has taken aim at the most basic government infrastructure of the Palestinian Authority. Among the offices ransacked by Israeli troops was the Ministry of Education in Ramallah. As part of this operation Israeli soldiers blasted open a safe, reported an April 16 New York Times article, that "had been used to keep all school test records since 1960." Also removed was about $8,500 in cash. "This is an administrative massacre, and this will lead to chaos," stated Palestinian minister of information Yasir Abed Rabbo.

Photographs of the massive destruction resulting from the Israeli military assault have begun appearing in the capitalist media. Abdel Ghaani Awadeh, 76, spoke to reporters in a street in Nablus beside a car flattened by an Israeli tank. "I was here for the war with the British in 1936, the Germans in World War II," he said, and "in 1948 and the 1967 war" by the Israeli rulers. "And I have never seen bloodshed like this. They had an appetite for killing."

The Israeli soldiers used Palestinian civilians as shields, ordering them to open the doors of the houses that the soldiers would then search and ransack. In Jenin, Naifeh Masharkeh, 42, who succeeded in sneaking out of the camp alive, described how Israeli soldiers pounded on the door of her neighbor's house, then detonated an explosive to force open the door, just as the neighbor reached it, killing her.

The Israeli daily Haaretz quoted some Israeli officers expressing reservations about the widespread destruction in the camp. "When the world sees the pictures of what we have done there, it will do us immense damage," one was quoted as saying.  
 
250 missiles in 24 hours
According to reports received by the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights, "Israeli forces, including tanks, armored personnel carriers and bulldozers and backed by seven Apache helicopters, had fired 250 missiles and tank shells into the one square kilometre camp in 24 hours," reported a Financial Times article [1 kilometer = .62 miles].

In Rumaneh, Ahmed Amjad Khazem, a 35-year-old television engineer, spoke to reporters about his ordeal after being taken into custody by Israeli soldiers, an experience similar to that of thousands of other Palestinian men. He was "held for four days blindfolded and naked except for undershorts," stated an April 12 Times article. "During this time, he was beaten repeatedly by Israeli troops. The marks of plastic handcuffs which have bitten into his wrists are still raw."

In Ramallah, the entire city remains under curfew; no one is allowed outside his or her house except for five hours on Monday and Thursday. Prior to Powell's visit with Arafat in this city, Israeli authorities temporarily restored water to the Palestinian leaders compound, allowing toilets to flush and the place to be spruced up a bit. After the secretary's visit, they cut off the water supply once again.

As Powell made his way out of the compound after his second and final visit of his 10-day Mideast mission, Arafat could be heard by reporters saying, "Is it acceptable that I can't go out of the door?" A CNN dispatch describing this incident reported no response by Powell to the question.  
 
Resistance in Jordan
In neighboring Jordan, whose population is majority Palestinian, there is strong support for the resistance by Palestinians living on the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the Israeli assault. As many of the young men and women in Jordan take to the streets in protests and seek ways to aid their brothers and sisters across the border, they find themselves coming up against the capitalist rulers of Jordan as well.

Reporting from Amman, a Financial Times article noted, "The dream of the young men here is for the borders to be flung open so volunteers from the camp can join in." One young fighter named Ahmad told the London-based capitalist daily, "But we know we'd be killed by Jordanians before we get to the border and get killed by the Israelis."
 
 
Related articles:
Actions in Europe, U.S., condemn Israeli war
Palestinian activist describes daily protests inside Israel  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home