| Despite hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of troops, the US is unable to conclude its longest war. Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera Senior Political Analyst Last Modified: 07 Mar 2011 19:06 GMT | ||
The American media's one-obsession-at-a-time coverage of global affairs might have put the spotlight on President Obama's slow and poor reaction to the breathtaking developments starting in Tunisia and Egypt. But they spared him embarrassing questions about continued escalation and deaths in Afghanistan. In spite of its international coalition, multiple strategies, hundreds of billions of dollars, and a surge of tens of thousands of troops, the US is unable to conclude its longest war yet or at least reverse its trend. Recent "reports" from the war front have been of two kinds. Some official or analytical in nature and heavily circulated in Washington portray a war going terribly well. On the other hand, hard news from the ground tell a story of US fatigue, backtracking and tactical withdrawals or redeployments which do not bode well for defeating the Taliban or forcing them to the negotiations' table. For example, while the US military's decision to withdraw from the Pech valley was justified on tactical need to redeploy troops for the task of "protecting the population", keen observers saw it as a humiliating retreat from what the Pentagon previously called a very strategic position and sacrificed some hundred soldiers defending it. Likewise, strategic analysts close to the administration speak triumphantly of US surge and hi-tech firepower inflicting terrible cost on the Taliban, killing many insurgents and driving many more from their sanctuaries. But news from the war front show the Taliban unrelenting, mounting counterattacks and escalating the war especially in areas where the US has "surged" its troops. And while the majority of the 400 Afghan districts are "calmer", they remain mostly out of Kabul's control. What success? Those with relatively long memories recall the then defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld's claims that most of Afghanistan was secure in early 2003 and that American forces had changed their strategy from major combat operations to stabilisation and reconstruction project. But the Taliban continued to carry daily attacks on government buildings, US positions and international organisations. Two years later, the US was to suffer the worst and deadliest year since the war began. Today's war pundits are in the same state of denial. For all practical purpose, Washington has given up on its counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy devised under McChrystal and Petreaus. Instead, it is pursuing a heavy handed and terribly destructive crackdown that includes special operations, assassinations, mass demolitions, air and night raids etc that have led to anything but winning the country, let alone its hearts and minds. The killing of nine Afghan children last week - all under the age of 12 - by US attack helicopters has once again put the spotlight on the US military's new aggressive methods. The results are so devastating for the conduct of the war and to Washington's clients, that President Karzai not only distanced himself from the US methods, but also publicly rejected Washington's apology for the killings. Nor is the recruitment and training of the Afghan forces going well. Indeed, many seem to give up on the idea that Afghan security forces could take matters into their hands if the US withdraws in the foreseeable future. Worse, US strategic co-operation with Pakistan - the central pillar of Obama's PakAf strategy - has cooled after the arrest of a CIA contractor for the killing of two Pakistanis even though he presumably enjoys diplomatic immunity. Reportedly, it has also led to a "breakdown" in co-ordination between the two countries intelligence agencies, the CIA and the ISI. But the incident is merely a symptom of a bigger problem between the two countries. A reluctant partner, the Pakistani establishment and its military are unhappy with US strategy which they reckon could destabilise their country and strengthen Afghanistan and India at their expense. That has not deterred Washington from offering ideas and money to repair the damage. However, it has become clear that unlike in recent years, future improvement in their bilateral relations will most probably come as a result of the US edging closer to Pakistan's position, not the opposite. All of which makes one wonder why certain Washington circles are rushing to advance the "success story". Running out of options The Afghan government' incapability to take on the tasks of governing or securing the country beyond the capital, and the incapacity of the Obama administration to break the Taliban's momentum does not bode well for an early conclusion of the war. To their credit some of Obama's war and surge supporters realise that there is no military solution for Afghanistan. Clearly, their claims of battlefield successes help justify the rush to talk to the Taliban. But it is not yet clear whether the presumably ongoing exploratory secret negotiations with the Taliban are serious at all, or will lead to comprehensive negotiations and eventually a lasting deal. The last "Taliban commander" Washington dialogued with in the fall turned out to be an impostor - a shopkeeper from Quetta! If the Taliban does eventually accept to sit down with Obama or Karzai envoys, the US needs to explain why it fought for 10 years only to help the group back to power. Secretary of state Hillary Clinton has begun the humiliating backtracking last month: "Now, I know that reconciling with an adversary that can be as brutal as the Taliban sounds distasteful, even unimaginable. And diplomacy would be easy if we only had to talk to our friends. But that is not how one makes peace." Facing up to the reality The mere fact that the world's mightiest superpower cannot win over the poorly armed Taliban after a long decade of fighting, means it has already failed strategically, regardless of the final outcome. The escalation of violence and wasting billions more cannot change that. It is history. The quicker the Obama administration recognises its misfortunes, minimises its losses and convenes a regional conference over the future of Afghanistan under UN auspices, the easier it will be to evacuate without humiliation. Whether the US eventually loses the war and declares victory; negotiates a settlement and withdraw its troops, remains to be seen. What is incontestable is that when you fight the week for too long, you also become weak. All of which explains the rather blunt comments made in a speech at the end of February, by US Defence Secretary Robert Gates when he said "... any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should 'have his head examined,' as General MacArthur so delicately put it." |
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Failing in Afghanistan successfully
Monday, March 7, 2011
Kalau tak pangkah BN, bantuan ditarik balik
02 Rabiulakhir 1432H. [MOD] -Saya merupakan seorang warga Merlimau, Melaka yang bertugas di Sarawak. Saya sanggup pulang untuk Pilihanraya Kecil Dun Merlimau walaupun menelan belanja yang besar. Majikan saya bertanya kenapa saya perlu pulang ke Merlimau, bukankah ada undi pos? Saya jawab, “Maaf tuan, saya tidak yakin dengan undi pos.” Semangat berkobar-kobar kerana PRK tidak sama dengan PRU. Tentu banyak berubah wajah kampung saya.
Tepat telahan saya, memang berubah sama sekali! Lori keluar masuk, polis bersimpang siur di jalan raya. Kampung yang dulu aman damai kini tidak ubah seperti medan pertempuran. Bendera berkibaran sehingga menyukarkan saya untuk melihat kenderaan sebelum melintas jalan. Begitu ‘panas’ keadaan di Merlimau sehingga berkobar-kobar saya memangkah kertas undi, dengan harapan calon pilihan saya juga calon pilihan warga Merlimau.
Apabila keputusan PRK diumumkan saya jadi kecewa. Kecewa bukan kerana PAS tewas. Kecewa kerana orang kampung saya, orang Merlimau masih belum berubah, masih belum mahu berubah dan tidak mahu berubah. Pegangan saya dan keluarga tetap condong kepada PAS dan Pakatan Rakyat. Tetapi tidak dengan orang kampung saya.
Mereka terlalu selesa dengan kebendaan, terlalu mudah disogokkan dengan harta benda, dengan jalan tar sekangkang kera, dengan biskut marie sepeket dua. Mereka tidak nampak bagaimana Ketua Menteri tercinta dengan lahap rakus menelan setiap sen ringgit yang terbang di depan mata.
Saya cuma pulang untuk tiga hari, tetapi pelbagai kisah menarik yang saya dapat di kampung saya. Jiran saya seorang ibu tunggal anak 7, dengan pendapatan RM400 sebulan, disogokkan dengan jalan tar sehingga ke depan pintu rumah. Tetapi hanya ditabur dengan batu dan pasir, tar pula entah ke mana. Lain pula ceritanya dengan seorang ahli Umno totok, yang rumahnya di sebelah masjid.
Sehari sebelum mengundi, rumahnya cantik ditar setiap pelosok halaman. Yang seorang lagi bukan setakat rumah, hingga ke rumah-rumah sewanya juga siap ditar. Ibu tunggal diberi sepeket biskut marie, sekilo gula, dan sekilo tepung gandum dengan pesanan, “Kalau kau tak pangkah BN, semua bantuan ditarik balik.”
Seorang rakan saya merupakan petugas SPR yang juga pengundi, terpaksa menggunakan undi pos. Yang hairan bin ajaibnya, borang yang ditulis nama dan kad pengenalannya diarahkan supaya dimasukkan sekali dengan kertas undi. Jadi sesiapa pun boleh tahu siapa yang undi siapa. Sudah teluskah SPR?
Teringat saya dengan seorang pelakon kelahiran Merlimau yang juga penyokong BN totok. Mungkin sedang berlakon atau mungkin nak menunjuk pada anak-anak dara di sekeliling; dengan nada bongkak dia menjerit,
“Lagi-lagi sebut Allah, asyik nak minta tolong pada Allah je, bukannya nak usaha!” Na’uzubillah… bukankah segala usaha kita juga atas kehendak Allah? Semoga dia sempat bertaubat dan semoga kampung Merlimau yang saya sayangi ini tidak dilanda musibah dan mala petaka.
Banyak lagi kisah pilihanraya Dun Merlimau ini, tapi pada petugas-petugas jentera pilihanraya tentu sangat maklum. Merlimau merupakan kubu kuat BN, orang-orang Merlimau sangat setia kepada BN. Memang kami tidak meletakkan harapan yang tinggi untuk kemenangan PAS di sini.
Tapi untuk PRU13, saya berharap sesuatu boleh dilakukan kerana kami, sebagai pengundi Dun Merlimau ini amat mengharapkan perubahan. Mohon ahli-ahli Pakatan Rakyat di sini menyusun strategi untuk menghadapi PRU13. Kita perlu lakukan sesuatu untuk mengubah mentaliti pengundi bagi menjamin perubahan di masa akan datang. Insya Allah, karat BN di Dun Merlimau ini akan terhakis akhirnya.
Pengundi Dun Merlimau
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Saudi Arabia bans protest rallies
| Interior ministry vows to use all steps "to prevent attempts to disrupt public order" following recent Shia protests. Last Modified: 05 Mar 2011 15:15 GMT | ||
State television on Saturday quoted the interior ministry as saying that security forces would use all measures to prevent any attempt to disrupt public order. The ban on public demonstrations comes amid media reports of a huge mobilisation of Saudi troops in Shia-dominated provinces in order to quell any possible uprising. According to The Independent, a British newspaper, 10,000 security personnel are being sent to the region by road, clogging highways into Dammam and other cities. Shia protests A restive Shia population has staged a series of protests in the kingdom’s east in the past weeks. Their grievances range from lack of equal economic and employment opportunities to detentions without trial. On Saturday, small protests were held in the cities of Hofuf and Qatif. The government of Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy without an elected parliament that usually does not tolerate public dissent, denies any discrimination against the Shia community. The authorities, however, are increasingly on edge following the anti-governmnent protests sweeping across the Arab world. Last week, King Abdullah returned to Riyadh after a three-month medical absence and unveiled $37bn in benefits for citizens in an apparent bid to insulate the kingdom from protests. | ||
Friday, March 4, 2011
Pakistan buries Christian leader
| Pakistan buries Christian leader | ||||
Prime minister attends funeral in Islamabad of government minister killed after calling for changes to blasphemy laws. Last Modified: 04 Mar 2011 15:45 GMT | ||||
Around 2,000 mourners attended the funeral at an Islamabad church on Friday, including Yusuf Raza Gilani, the prime minister. Angry crowd had shouted "death for killers" ahead of the burial of Bhatti who was the country's only Christian minister and had challenged a law that stipulates death for insulting Islam. The two gunmen who shot Bhatti, 42, left leaflets desribing him as a "Christian infidel" and signed "Taliban al-Qaeda Punjab". "In Islamic sharia, the sentence for blasphemers to the prophet is just death," the pamphlet said. Gilani said: "I consider this day as a black day. All the minorities have lost a great leader. I assure you, we will try our utmost to bring the culprits to justice." Pakistan's blasphemy law sanctions the death penalty for insulting Islam or the Prophet Mohammed. Human rights groups say the law has been used to persecute Christians and other minorities. Bhatti’s killing is being seen as the latest sign of how violent religious conservatism is becoming more mainstream in Pakistan, a trend which could further destabilise the nuclear-armed US ally. Second assassination Bhatti's murder was the second high profile assassination this year of a politician opposing the blasphemy law. In January, Salman Taseer, a provincial governor, was shot dead by one of his bodyguards. In a sign of mourning, black flags fluttered above houses in Khushpur, Bhatti's mainly Christian home village, 290 km south of Islamabad. Men, women and children thronged the village cemetery for the burial. "These terrorists must be hanged publicly to stop them from committing such brutal crimes," Hina Gill, a member of the Christian Minority Alliance, said. Many Muslims were also present at Bhatti’s burial. "Shahbaz Bhatti has tried hard to promote inter-faith harmony but those who want to destabilise Pakistan have killed him," said Badruddin Chaudhry, a Muslim attending the funeral. Bhatti was travelling in his official car without a security escort when the gunmen opened fire on him near his house in Islamabad. He died on the spot after sustaining at least eight bullet wounds. A Rehman Malik, the interior minister, denounced the killing but said Bhatti himself was to blame for his death. "I think it was his mistake," Rehman Malik said, adding that Bhatti wanted to keep a low profile. "It was his own decision." Mosque explosion In a separate incident, a bomb exploded in a mosque in the northwestern Pakistani town of Nowshera, killing at least nine people and wounding over 30, police and hospital officials said.
"We have received nine dead bodies and 28 injured, there is one child among the dead," Abdul Hameed Afridi, head of the Lady Reading hospital in Peshawar, the main city in the region, told the AFP news agency. Adil Khan, a Nowshera police official, said: "Many people had left the mosque after prayers. Otherwise losses would have been higher." Witnesses described scenes of panic, with the mosque's windows and doors blown out by the strength of the explosion and blood sprayed on the building walls. "I was distributing rice among the devotees when suddenly a huge blast occurred and I remember seeing people running and falling in panic," Suleman Shah, a jeweller, said. The blast follows a suicide car bombing near Peshawar on Thursday which claimed ten lives. Pakistan has seen a wave of suicide attacks in the past three years, many in the country's northwest frontier region with Afghanistan, where the Pakistan military is battling Taliban fighters. | ||||
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
We are not the enemy
| An Arab Jew argues for bridging East and West with peace and justice for all. Jordan Elgrably Last Modified: 28 Feb 2011 12:11 GMT | ||
Today most Jews of Arab/Muslim lands live outside the region, or in Israel where we have experienced a history of discrimination from European-origin Jews who believe that their cultures are superior to ours. I would tell the people of the Middle East that not all Jews support the occupation policies of Israel’s military and government; and I would insist that the historic expulsions of Palestinians from their homes, businesses and properties in 1948 and 1967 were illegal, inhumane and did not occur with our knowledge or blessing. Yitzhak Rabin and other Israelis have admitted in Hebrew-language documents that there was a deliberate policy of expulsion or ethnic cleansing of Arabs from their homes. And the military policies of the state of Israel since 1967, combined with the extensive building of settlements, have undermined so-called peace processes where good faith efforts are required of all participating parties. The peoples of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, not to mention Bahrain and Yemen, are indeed in a historic period. They are rising up against autocracy and repression, against oppression by the state, calling for new freedoms. Palestinians under Israeli rule in the West Bank have the same desire to live freely, to escape the oppression of occupation and recover their human and civil rights. They have a right to enjoy their independence. The original UN Partition Plan of 1947 proposed a state for Palestinians and a state for Jews. This is the time when all Arabs and all Arab Jews who support peace, justice and democracy should speak out and say 'enough' to state oppression. Stop building settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, end the siege of Gaza, apologise to the Palestinian people for the historic wrongs Israel inflicted during the 1948 Nakbah and let us enter a new era of peace as equals who take responsibility for our actions. Israelis and Palestinians and all reasonable people around the world have understood that there is no military solution to the conflict. Violence will never solve anything. As a country, Israel should be integrated into the mosaic of the Middle East. It is time to end the conflict that began with the belief that Arabs and Jews are historic enemies. This was never true, yet decades of brainwashing have many Jews believing that Arabs and Muslims hate Israel because we are Jews. Instead, we should realise that Arabs/Muslims are like people everywhere, who want the same human rights that Americans enjoy. Those rights must extend to the Palestinians in the Occupied Territories and to Israel's Arab citizens. If Israel wants to preach peace, it should walk the walk - apologise for its wartime mistakes and missteps, compensate its victims and reform its military and occupation policies, as well as laws in Israel that discriminate against non-Jews. In other words, let us help Israel get on the same page as Americans who could never live under the kind of oppression Palestinians experience on a daily basis. |
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Profile: Muammar Gaddafi
| Oil-rich Libya's eccentric leader has held the country in a tight grip since he led a bloodless coup in 1969. Last Modified: 24 Feb 2011 22:01 GMT | ||||
He led a bloodless coup toppling King Idris at the age of 27, and has since maintained tight control of his oil-rich country by clamping down on dissidents. The ongoing bloody uprising poses the most serious domestic challenge to his rule. Among his many eccentricities, Gaddafi is known to sleep in a Bedouin tent guarded by dozens of female bodyguards on trips abroad. Gaddafi was born in 1942 in the coastal area of Sirte to nomadic parents. He went to Benghazi University to study geography, but dropped out to join the army. After seizing power, he laid out a pan-Arab, anti-imperialist philosophy, blended with aspects of Islam. While he permitted private control over small companies, the government controlled the larger ones. He was an admirer of the Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser and his Arab socialist and nationalist ideology. He tried without success to merge Libya, Egypt and Syria into a federation. A similar attempt to join Libya and Tunisia ended in acrimony. Crushing dissident In 1977 he changed the country's name to the Great Socialist Popular Libyan Arab Jamahiriyah (State of the Masses) and allowed people to air their views at people's congresses. However, critics dismissed his leadership as a military dictatorship, accusing him of repressing civil society and ruthlessly crushing dissident. To this day, the media remains under strict government control. The regime has imprisoned hundreds of people for violating the law and sentenced some to death, according to Human Rights Watch.
"In the 1970s against students, when he publicly hung students who were marching, demonstrating, demanding rights in Benghazi and in Tripoli and many other squares, and his opposition members abroad in the 1980s, including here in London and other places in Europe and in in Arab Middle East. "He executed, in probably the most brutal massacre that we saw, 1,200 prisoners in the Abu Salim prison who were unarmed, They were already in jail, he executed them in less than three hours." Mohammed al-Abdalla, the deputy secretary-general of the National front for Salvation of Libya Gaddafi played a prominent role in organising Arab opposition to the 1978 Camp David peace agreement between Egypt and Israel. Later shunned by a number of Arab states on the basis of his extreme views on how to settle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict among others, Gaddafi's foreign policy shifted from an Arab focus to an African focus. His vision of a United States of Africa resulted in the foundation of the African Union. Lockerbie bombing In the West, Gaddafi is strongly associated with "terrorism", accused of supporting armed groups including FARC in Colombia and the IRA in Northern Ireland. Libya’s alleged involvement in the 1986 bombing of a Berlin nightclub in which two American soldiers were killed prompted US air attacks on Tripoli and Benghazi, killing 35 Libyans, including Gaddafi’s adopted daughter. Ronald Reagan, the then US president, called him a "mad dog". The 1988 bombing of the Pan Am flight over Lockerbie in Scotland is possibly the most well known and controversial international incident in which Gaddafi has been involved. For many years, Gaddafi denied involvement, resulting in UN sanctions and Libya’s status as a pariah state. Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence agent, was convicted for planting the bomb. Gaddafi's regime formally accepted responsibility for the attack in 2003 and paid compensation to the families of those who died. Also in 2003, Gaddafi broke Libya's isolation from the West by relinquishing his entire inventory of weapons of mass destruction. In September 2004, George Bush, the US president at the time, formally ended a US trade embargo as a result of Gaddafi's scrapping of the arms programme and taking responsibility for Lockerbie. The normalisation of relations with Western powers has allowed the Libyan economy to grow and the oil industry in particular has benefited. However, Gaddafi and Lockerbie came back into the spotlight in 2009, when al-Megrahi was released and returned to Libya. The hero’s welcome al-Megrahi received from Gaddafi on his return was condemned by the the US and the UK, among others. In September 2009, Gaddafi visited the US for the first time for his his first appearance at the UN General Assembly. His speech was supposed to be 15 minutes, but exceeded an hour and a half. He tore up a copy of the UN charter, accused the Security Council of being a terrorism body similar to al-Qaeda, and demanded $ 7.7 trillion in compensation to be paid to Africa from its past colonial rulers. During a visit to Italy in August 2010, Gaddafi's invitation to hundreds of young women to convert to Islam overshadowed the two-day trip, which was intended to cement the growing ties between Tripoli and Rome. |
Golan residents recall their Tahrir
| Residents of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights celebrate their Arab identity as a form of resistance. Mya Guarnieri Last Modified: 25 Feb 2011 17:47 GMT | ||
"Now I'm 43," Monder says. "And I remember that every day in that period there was a conflict with the [Israeli army]. There were more soldiers here than residents." While the Israeli military occupation of the Golan began after the 1967 war, the strike and protests started on February 14, 1982, two months after the Israeli knesset passed the Golan Heights Law, legislation that effectively annexed the territory. The Israeli move was condemned by both the US and the United Nations - the latter has issued multiple resolutions against the annexation - and it remains unrecognised by the international community. Here, in the Golan, the annexation was embodied by the army's effort to distribute blue Israeli identity cards. In 1982, some 15,000 soldiers came to deliver the IDs to Syrian residents, a group that numbered less than 10,000 at the time. "The people refused them. They were against it. They threw them in the [soldiers’] faces," Monder says, adding that the army often responded violently to the unarmed protesters. An elderly man recalls standing on his balcony and flinging the identity card into the street below, which was full of Israeli soldiers. Another resident adds that the roads were "blue" with all the refused IDs. Syrian residents were somewhat victorious - while the Israeli attempt to impose citizenship failed and residents were classified as permanent residents, their land remains occupied. Every year, on February 14, the Syrian residents gather in the village of Majdal Shams to mark their intifada. They meet by the statue of Sultan Al Atrash, the Druze leader who led revolts against both the Ottoman and French occupations. Waving Syrian flags as they make their way through the town, they sing of their home country and chant of liberation and freedom. Samir Ibrahim, a 48-year-old dentist, serves as an impromptu translator. "They’re saying, 'Zionists go away from here.'" This year, the Syrian residents of the Israeli-occupied Golan offer up messages of support to the Egyptians, Tunisians, and all of the Arab people who are struggling against oppression. "Today is not a sad day. It's the day that we refused [Israeli citizenship]. It's a Tahrir Square day for us," Ibrahim explains, referring to the square that served as the nerve centre of the Egyptian revolution. From doorways and balconies, elderly women shower the passing crowd with rice. 'Born anew' The march ends at Shouting Hill. Syria is on the other side of the steep valley. Standing under banners of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, local leaders address the twin crowd that has gathered in Syria. Their words echo across the border. And messages of solidarity and support bounce back from their counterparts. Because the Israeli occupation has torn many of the area's households into two - some 120,000 Arabs were driven from their homes in the Golan during and after the 1967 war - families sometimes gather here on the weekends to talk with relatives on the other side. In the earliest days of the occupation, they shouted, hence the name Shouting Hill. Later on, they took to using bullhorns. Today some of the protesters hold binoculars. They scan the crowd in Syria, looking for their loved ones. Ibrahim's 18-year-old daughter is studying in Damascus. Because of Israeli movement restrictions, Ibrahim will not be able to see her until this summer. But she told her father that she would attend the rally today. Ibrahim cranes his neck, hoping to catch a glimpse of his child. "I talked to her this morning," he says. "She said she'd be wearing green." He cannot see her. And this day of celebration is tinged with sadness. Monder, who is a lawyer, remarks: "Family reunification is our right according to international law. The Geneva Convention says it's forbidden to injure the humanity [of an occupied people]. And it's part of our humanity to be in touch with our family." "People have died there [in Syria] and their parents can't go [to the funeral]," Monder says, adding that few homes in the Golan are untouched by this phenomenon. Families have been split in another way - hundreds of Syrian residents of the Golan have been political prisoners. Ibrahim points out a gentleman who did 25 years for resisting the occupation. Monder greets Amal Mahmoud, a woman who spent four years behind bars. "She's a heroine," Monder remarks, adding: "[Today's celebration] reinforces the hope that the day of liberation will come. Every February 14, we're born anew." Business as usual But the next morning, it is business as usual. Distribution trucks roll into the village, bringing Israeli-brand milk, sour cream and produce that the villagers made or grew before the occupation began. Since 1967, Syrian residents of the Golan have seen their lands illegally confiscated by Israel and used for Jewish settlements and wineries that, in violation of international law, profit from the occupation. According to Al Marsad Arab Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Golan, Jewish settlers are allocated five times more water than the area's Arab farmers. And Syrians in the Golan Heights pay more for water than Israelis. Their production strangled, the Syrian residents of the Golan have become a captive market. Some stores sell water from a local spring that has been bottled and sold by an Israeli company. Zaid Ouidat owns a small store within sight of the Al Atrash statue. Inside, the cooler is stocked with Israeli brands. "It's our land and [the Israelis] are holding it by force," he says. "They're not giving us the land to put goats and so we can't drink milk, we have no cows, nothing ... Someone comes to buy milk because they don't have any and where can they buy it?" "I think about this," Ouidat continues. "But what is there to do? There's no choice. If there was another way, I would import, but there isn't. What, I will bring it from Syria, from my people?" He gives a dry laugh. "This is Syrian land but no one can do anything about it," Ouidat says. "There are no options." Embattled Arab identity Taiseer Maray is the general director of Jawlan, Golan for Development. Founded in 1991, it was created as another form of resistance to the Israeli occupation. In the 1990s, he explains, Syrian residents of the Golan "realised that we should do more than go to demonstrations, that [protesting] is not enough". And, despite the fact that Syrian residents pay higher taxes than their Jewish neighbours, they were receiving far fewer services from the state. Jawlan was created to address both of these issues. The organisation built a medical clinic and a school. It provides health services throughout the area and offers a wide variety of educational and cultural activities. One of the organisation's goals is to reinforce the youth’s identification with Syria. After annexation, Maray says: "[The Israelis] opened the gates from the other side and tried to use the opportunity to make us Israeli .... You feel it in the schools." Maray points out that the Israeli educational system only hires Arab teachers that keep their politics quiet. And, in these schools, Syrian residents of the Golan are taught that they are Druze, not Arab. While most of the Syrian residents are of the Druze religion, Maray emphasises that it is just that - a religion. "They are trying to make us feel like we are something different than the other Arabs," Maray says. "We study all the Zionist ideology, all the literature, Hebrew, the tanach," he continues, referring to the Hebrew bible. "They teach us Arab poetry and culture. But they don't teach us about the culture of resistance .... The people in the Golan Heights were very much involved in the revolt against the French." Maray, a biologist and father of two, admits that his own children have come home parroting things they have learned in Israeli schools. But the society, organisations and parents all work on their children to shore up their embattled Arab identity. Tharaa, an 18-year-old girl who asked that her family name be omitted, remarks: "Our parents know what it was like in Syria because they were there, before the war. But we learn at school that we're from Israel." Her friend Walida comments: "All the time we feel like we are undefined." "Unknown," Tharaa says. "Like a dog." "Yes, like a dog," Walida agrees. The girls fall into silence. Tharaa says: "We hope to be known." |
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