When you go to the polls – take Gaza with you

[Jefferson23]

Op-ed by Hagai El-Ad, B'Tselem's executive director:

The Gaza Strip is the most silenced issue in the current election campaign. Silenced? Apart from certain politicians vying for credit for discovering the tunnel threat, Gaza is completely absent from this election – erased, along with this summer’s unpleasant war. Gaza is gone. Its residents do not exist. Our future, our suffering, isn’t interlinked with theirs. The Gazan neighbors of Sderot, Ashkelon, Nahal Oz, and Tel Aviv are invisible.



A-Tuffah neighborhood, Gaza city, 21 Sept. 2014. Photo: Anne Paq, Activestills.org

One might imagine that in an election that takes place so soon, not even six months, after a national trauma like this, there would be at least some politicians who insist on addressing it. You might imagine that even if all politicians tried to distance themselves from it, the public wouldn’t just take it and would insist on getting explanations for what happened and information about what’s to come. Why did we kill more than two thousand people? Why have more than seventy Israelis been killed? What are those who seek our trust planning other than the cruel inevitability of the next war in two years’ time? How many dead are planned for the summer of 2016?

If we’re not going to demand that Gaza be front and center in this election because of the hundreds of children we killed in Gaza this summer, then maybe we should for 4-year-old Daniel Tragerman’s sake. If we’re not going to talk about Gaza because of the tens of thousands still living in tents, schools or on the street, then maybe because of the 51 days of rocket attack alerts? If we don’t demand our politicians address Gaza in this election campaign because of the poverty and anguish, the eternal closure and the despair in the Strip, then at least let’s demand it because of the next round of violence, which is getting closer by the day.

Whether we think about Gaza or not when we go to the polls, Gaza isn’t going anywhere. The Israeli power, of which we are citizens, will continue to neighbor Gaza and the residents of the impoverished piece of land that is internally controlled by Hamas and externally controlled by Israel will continue to be our neighbors. Their future is our future is their future.

in full: http://www.btselem.org/gaza_strip/20150219_putting_gaza_into_the_elections

[guillaumeb]

1. the choice is clear

I feel the Israelis can either:
1)complete the genocide against the Palestinians begun in 1948 until they all migrate somewhere, or

2) co-exist peacefully behind the 1967 borders.

No amount of semantics can disguise the fact that the Israeli government seems unwilling to consider number 2.

[Jefferson23]

2. Unwilling? You're being generous, I think...the documented history shows the alleged

peace negotiations have never been anything but a farce.

[Dick Dastardly]

3. The Israelis must really suck at committing genocide.

Since 1970 the Palestinian population in the WB and Gaza has gone from about 1 million to over 4.5 million. The Palestinians have one of the fastest growing populations in the world.

The accusation of genocide is a disgusting insult to real victims of genocide.

Wiki clip
According to a 2008 article in The Guardian, using PCBS census figures, the Palestinian territories have one of the fastest growing populations in the world, with numbers surging 30% in the past decade (2008). There were 3.76 million Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, up from 2.89 million 10 years earlier.[8]

According to the U.S. Census, population growth mid-1990-2008 in Gaza and West Bank was 106% from 1.9 million (1990) to 3.9 million persons.[9]

According to UN (2010) Palestinian population is 4.4 million.[10] According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics(PCBS) population density in 2009 was 654 capita/km2, of which 433 capita/km2 in the West Bank including Jerusalem and 4,073 capita/km2 in Gaza Strip.[11] In the mid-2009, the share of population less than 15 years was 41.9% and above 65 years 3%.[11]
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_Palestinian_territories

[guillaumeb]

4. or some people do not know the definition of genocide

luckily for you I am always willing to help out :
Here is an excerpt:

The crime of "genocide" defined in internation law

The international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.

Article II describes two elements of the crime of genocide:


1) the mental element, meaning the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such", and

2) the physical element which includes five acts described in sections a, b, c, d and e. A crime must include both elements to be called "genocide."


Article III described five punishable forms of the crime of genocide: genocide; conspiracy, incitement, attempt and complicity.


Here is the full article, and you are welcome. And the US is a signatory to the Convention

http://www.preventgenocide.org/genocide/officialtext.htm