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The
local and international political circles were stunned by
the report presented by Mr. Kofi Anan, the Secretary-General
of the UN, to the General Assembly on 1/8/2002 regarding the
events that took place in Jenin refugee camp and the rest of
the Occupied Palestinian Territories during the period
starting early March 2002 and ending 7th May
2002. The report came out deficient, without any direct
condemnation of the Israeli government. We wish to make the
following comments on the report:
1)
The Secretary-General chose to write his report in a
narrative style without any evaluative remarks. In addition,
there was not much confidence and assurance in
the recital of information. Evidence of this is clear from
the expressions that were used (reports claimed, some
sources mentioned, it is impossible to determine, it was
estimated).
Since
the Secretary-General confessed in his report that:
A)
The fact-finding team that was formed by Mr.Anan was
not able to visit the area concerned (the West Bank and
Jenin camp) because of the “concerns” of the Israeli
government.
B)
As to the date of submission of the report, the
Israeli government has not responded to Mr. Anan’s
information request.
Therefore,
it was more appropriate of the Secretary-General of the UN
to announce clearly that he was unable to produce a detailed
comprehensive report on the events that took place in Jenin
camp because the Israeli government did not show any
cooperation in this issue. He could have recommended that
the Security Council, who have unanimously adopted
resolution 1405 (2002) to develop “accurate” information
regarding recent events in Jenin camp, take the necessary
measures against Israel.
2)
Mr. Kofi Anan mentioned in his report a passage of text from
the Geneva Convention relative to the protection of Civilian
Persons in Time of War, of 12 August 1949, to which Israeli
is High Contracting Party. The Convention provides that the
civilian population may not be willfully killed, tortured,
taken as hostages or suffer humiliating or degrading
treatment. What Mr. Anan seems to have forgotten is that the
actions of the Israeli army in the Occupied Territories
blatantly violate this convention and represent serious
breaches to the International humanitarian law. The UN,
which Mr. Anan represents as Secretary-General must stand
firm and take action to stop those Israeli violations.
3)
Not only did Mr. Anan adopt the Israeli and American
position against the Palestinians, but he also used the
language used by Israeli and American politicians. For
example, he used the term “terror/terrorist” 17 times in
his report to describe the Palestinians and/or their
actions. He also used phrases and expressions that are often
used by the Israeli spokesmen, such as: the Israeli Defense
Forces, Operation Defensive Shield, the Palestinian terror
infrastructure, Palestinian terror attacks which have
plagued Israel. This was unexpected, as the writer of the
report is the Secretary-General of the UN, whose words and
writings must be objective, balanced and wisely selected.
4)
Mr. Kofi Anan spoke in his report about the practices of the
Israeli army in the Occupied territories, such as: killing
civilians, demolition of homes and schools, destruction of
public and private property, round-the-clock curfews, severe
internal and external closures, paralyze of vital supplies
and first aid, But Mr. Anan did not mention that Jenin
district represent “the rich food basket” for the
Palestinian economy, with 300,000 acres of fertile
agricultural land, and its population consisting mostly of
farmers. But the Israeli constant incursion into the region
with heavy military tanks and bulldozers has completely
destroyed this food basket.
5)
Mr. Anan has mentioned some of the violations carried out by
the Israeli authorities, which had devastating effects on
the Palestinian people (in items 37-41 in the report)
followed by a description of the situation in Jenin camp,
saying the camp contained arms caches and explosive
laboratories (item 46 in the report). This sequence of
narration gives the reader an impression that the Israeli
practices in Jenin camp were justified and acceptable.
6)
Although Mr. Anan said in the summary of the report that he
has prepared his report with complete reliance on the
available resources and information, including submissions
from the five United Nations Member States and Observer
Missions, documents in the public domain and papers
submitted by non-governmental organizations, he did not give
an exact number of Palestinian victims who were killed in
Jenin camp, which was the core objective of the whole
matter. He wrote (in item 43) “at least 52 Palestinians,
of whom up to half may have been civilians … were dead”.
It would appeare that Mr. Anan believed the Israeli story,
since he said that “Israeli officials informed UN
personnel they believed 52 Palestinians were dead. (this was
written in item 57 of the report). Notice the use of the
word ‘dead’ instead of ‘killed’.
7)
In item 60 of the report Mr. Anan described the Israeli
military operation inside Jenin camp by saying “helicopter
gunships to fire TOW missiles against such densely populated
area .. anti-aircraft guns, able to fire 3000 rounds a
minute .. scores of tanks and armoured vehicles equipped
with machine guns .. and bulldozers to raze homes and to
burrow wide lanes.” We ask the Secretary-General of the
UN: When Israel uses all these weapons against a refugee
camp that is supposed to be protected by UNRWA, doesn’t
that represent a war crime? Shouldn’t the International
community prosecute Israeli officials who carried out that
crime?
8)
Mr. Anan wrote in his report (item 51) “Using
loudspeakers, IDF urged civilians in Arabic to evacuate the
camp.” However, what Mr. Anan probably doesn’t know is
that when civilians heard those calls, they believed them
and went out, to be killed in cold blood by the Israeli
forces. For example, Ahmad Basheer Hamdouni, 70, went out on
4/4/2002 to try search for some food for his grandchild, but
the Israeli soldiers saw him and shot him immediately. Two
other neighbors from the camp; Abdel-Karim al-Sa’adi, 27,
and Waddah Fathi al-Shalabi, 36, were murdered as they went
out from their homes, each carrying a child in his hands.
The Israeli soldiers stopped them, snatched the two children
from the arms of their fathers and gave them to the women.
Then the soldiers took the two men into a deserted home and
killed them in cold blood.
9)
The Secretary-General realizes that since June 1967 Israel
has imposed a military occupation on the Palestinian West
Bank (including East Jerusalem) and Gaza Strip. Therefore,
the fundamental problem is the Israeli occupation, not the
Palestinian resistance. Resisting occupation by a vivid
population is a natural legitimate right. Clearly, It is not
terrorism. Therefore, the Palestinian armed men who fought
the Israeli army in Jenin camp, cannot, and must not, be
described as ‘terrorists’. On the contrary, they were
decent fervently patriotic men who refused to accept
humiliation and wanted to live in dignity, after the UN
failed to provide them with the essential protection. Those
Palestinian refugees have already suffered deportation
twice, in 1948 and 1967, thus it only was natural for them
to try to defend their homes, even though they must have
understood they will at the end be terminated by the Israeli
mighty army.
10)
The Secretary-General did not mention in his report that the
Israeli government showed complete ignorance to, and did not
implement, the two resolutions approved by the Security
Council; # 1402 issued on 30/3/2002 and # 1403 issued on
4/4/2002, which demanded the withdrawal of the Israeli
forces from the Palestinian cities. It was advisable for Mr.
Anan to recommend that the Security Council take punitive
measures against the Israeli government.
Mr. Anan agrees, as mentioned in
the observations of the report, that “there is a very wide
support in the international community for a solution in
which two states, Israel and Palestine, live side-by-side
within secure and recognized borders, as called for by the
Security Council resolution 1397 (2002). However, what Mr.
Anan does not announce, although he surely realizes, is that
as long as the United States Administration is dominating
the UN and its resolutions, no such solution may be
attained.
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