- Dear friends,
-
- Alison, her husband and three small girls sometimes
attend
our church. They would come more often, but, her Palestinian husband
George
is rarely permitted by the IDF through the Bethlehem/Jerusalem
check-point.
-
- Below is her account of yesterday as reported from 2
different news channels. I guarantee, you will never see this reported
in the US mainstream media.
-
- Your witness in Jerusalem,
-
- Paul
-
- From Alison Nassar
immmathilda@yahoo.com
- 15 March 15, 2002
-
- Day Seven
-
- I watched the Hebrew news in English last night and I
heard all their pretty justifications for what they are doing. They're
"withholding the full extent of their military power". They're
"acting with restraint out of concern for minimizing civilian
casualties".
They're "disabling weapons factories". They're "dismantling
the terrorist infrastructure". Their purpose is "to establish
a cease-fire and return to negotiations". Their "highest priority
is peace". All this must sound so pacifying to the ears of the West.
So proper. So civilized. So sterile. So believable from a distance.
-
- And then we switched the channel and came back to
reality,
up close and oh, so personal. As the local cameramen made their way from
house to house, street to street, and camp to camp, we watched in horrified
numbness. No words could possibly describe what the camera was showing
us.
-
- The young woman with the baby on her hip just shook her
head, speechless, gesturing to the rubble of the home behind her with tears
slipping down her cheeks. The old man gazed uncomprehendingly at what
remained
of his home, his face seeming to collapse in on itself. The old woman,
standing amid splinters of furniture, tore at her headscarf shouting,
"What
can I say? What should I say?? What is there to say???"
-
- What can and must be said is that heavily armed Israeli
soldiers, accompanied by tanks, bulldozers, and helicopters, entered the
miserable homes of some of the most impoverished and wretched souls on
the face of this earth and vandalized everything in sight. They broke
furniture,
slashed clothing and bedding, shattered dishes and tvs, stole what money
and valuables they could find, and then knocked down the walls themselves,
leaving nothing. Leaving people who were already refugees homeless once
again. They entered shops and vandalized the merchandise. They entered
sewing workshops and vandalized the sewing machines. They entered computer
clubs and vandalized the computers. They entered printing shops and
vandalized
the typesetting equipment. They entered a small appliance repair shop and
what was left was not even recognizable. Words are truly inadequate to
describe the destruction. It must be seen to be believed, and it must be
believed because it is the ugly reality behind the pretty words.
-
- Next we saw the hundreds of "captured
terrorists",
blindfolded, bound at the wrists, and squatting in the sun, being processed
for arrest. Some wore only pajamas and slippers. Some were just a few years
older than Mathilda. Some were the age of George. Some we even knew. I
looked at their faces, my heart thudding, wondering how I would feel to
see my husband among them. And for the 1000th time in 10 years, feeling
thankful not to have sons.
-
- The cameraman wandered among the "shabab"
(young
men), asking them to describe their capture. "We were hiding in our
bedroom, trying to keep the children calm. There was no shooting, no
resistance.
Just the sound of the tanks and bulldozers. People screaming and crying
nearby. Suddenly the walls began to shake like an earthquake and our door
fell in. Twenty or thirty soldiers came running in. Some surrounded us
and some went to work smashing up the house with sledgehammers. They
pointed
to me and my brother and told us to put our hands up. I asked why. They
told us we were "wanted". I said we hadn't done anything, we
were only hiding from the tanks. They pointed their guns at our heads and
said we had to go with them. When we left they were still tearing up the
house. My mother and sisters and baby brother were hysterical. When we
got here, we saw all of our neighbors, lined up and waiting to be arrested.
None of us knows what will happen."
-
- Those factories that were vandalized were not
manufacturing
rockets. Those men that were arrested are not gun-toting activists. Those
families whose houses were destroyed were not terrorists. At least not
yet.
-
- When my eyes and ears had had enough, I turned away and
went to attend to my children's calls. Nadine looked into my face and said,
mom, are you crying? Yes, Nadine. Somebody has to.
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