‘Days filled with terror’: Palestinians in Jenin recount harrowing 10-day Israeli army invasion
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Tag: Jenin
The Israeli army is destroying civilian infrastructure, blocking medical access, and conducting mass arrests in its largest West Bank operation in years.
Inside the brutal siege of Jenin
“Mini-Gaza”
Calls by Israeli leaders to turn the West Bank into “mini-Gaza” are “translating into military operations,” the United Nations human rights office warned on Monday.
“Israel’s genocidal violence risks leaking out of Gaza and into the occupied Palestinian territory as a whole,” stated Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the West Bank and Gaza.
“There is mounting evidence that no Palestinian is safe under Israel’s unfettered control.”
Albanese warned that “apartheid Israel is targeting Gaza and the West Bank simultaneously, as part of an overall process of elimination, replacement and territorial expansion.”
“The long-standing impunity granted to Israel is enabling the de-Palestinization of the occupied territory, leaving Palestinians at the mercy of the forces pursuing their elimination as a national group.”
Lethal Israeli assault destroys 70 percent of Jenin’s streets
Tamara Nassar 4 September 2024
West Bank
During a military raid on Jenin, Israeli soldiers strapped an injured Palestinian civilian to the front of a military jeep and paraded him through the street as a human shield. He was eventually handed over to Palestinian medical teams.
Source: Mondoweiss – News & Opinion About Palestine, Israel & the U.S.
Nurit Peled-Elhanan maintains that these same books instill racist attitudes and enhance ignorance of “. . . the real social and geopolitical situations and of geographical and historical discourse.” Upon graduation from secondary school, young Israelis are drafted into military service to implement Israeli policies against Palestinians “. . . whose life-world is unknown to them and whose very existence they have been taught to resent and fear” (p. 232). How does Peled-Elhanan arrive at such conclusions?
Peled-Elhanan demonstrates that all Israeli schoolbooks hold some common assumptions about Palestinians and history. They emphasize Jewish historical rights to the land. Arabs are hateful and a threat to the state. Also, the Arabs have twenty-one states and the Jews have only one. Palestinian citizens are seen as a demographic problem (or threat). The Palestinians in the occupied territories must be controlled, otherwise they will kill Israelis. Therefore the only solution resides in: “A Jewish state, Jewish majority, Israeli control” (p. 21)
What is a soldier to do? Does he obey or disobey? The schoolbooks that taught him/her imbued them with fear of a dehumanized “other.” Indeed, school texts can be seen as a weapon whose use is justified precisely because the “other” is actually an imposter and an intruder. The soldier is the true “indigene.” With such logic, how can an Israeli soldier ever consider the “other” as an equal? Israeli education, as currently constructed, disallows education for peace and coexistence from its curricula (p. 232).
The Israeli army’s recent attack on Jenin refugee camp resulted in 13 deaths (12 Palestinians, including four children, and one Israeli soldier killed by suspected friendly fire). An additional 143 Palestinians were injured, with 20 in critical condition, and up to 4,000 displaced. While this mass displacement has received less media attention than other aspects of the Israeli operation, it is central to understanding the region’s politics. Forced migration has always been core to the dynamics of modern Palestine and Israel. Most Palestinians are refugees, and Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is organised around control of movement. While often framed as a fight over religion and ideology, this is ultimately a struggle around demographics, displacement and mobility.
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