A translation of Shulamit Aloni's article in Ha'Aretz of 6 March 2003.

It seems to have been omitted from the English electronic edition of the paper.

The translation is by Zvi Havkin.

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6 March 2003

Murder of a population under cover of righteousness

By Shulamit Aloni

We do not have gas chambers and crematoria, but there is no one fixed
method for genocide.

Dr. Ya'akov Lazovik writes ("Academic Genocide", "Ha'Aretz", 4 March)
that in the State of Israel it is impossible that the regime and the
nation will plan and commit a genocide.  It is difficult to determine
if this is naivety or self-righteousness.  As we know, there is no
single fixed method for murder and not even for genocide.  The author
Y. L. Peretz wrote about "the righteous cat" who does not spill blood,
but only suffocates.

The government of Israel, using the military and its instruments of
destruction, is not only spilling blood, but it is also suffocating.
What other name can be given to the dropping of a one-ton bomb over a
dense urban area, when the justification uttered is that we wanted to
murder a dangerous terrorist and his wife?  The rest of the citizens
who were killed and injured, among whom are children and women, do not
count, of course.

How is it possible to explain the expulsion of citizens from their
homes at three o'clock in the morning on a rainy night, then
depositing bombs in the house and then departing without warning?
When those expelled returned to their home, the bombs were exploded
and a brutal murder and destruction of property was thus committed.
And what is the justification for what happened in Jenin?  We did not
destroy the whole neighbourhood, just 85 houses;  it was not
slaughter, we killed only 50-some citizens.  How many does one need to
murder and destroy for it to be a crime? - A crime against humanity,
as determined by the Laws of the State of Israel, not only the laws of
Belgium.

And more:  A curfew and closure of an entire city so that a few
celebrants from the racist bunch in Hebron could walk to the Cave of
the Fathers, and tanks destroying fruit and vegetable stands, and
bulldozers that destroy houses, and Generals who, in their arrogant
hubris, are willing to destroy a whole neighbourhood for the
convenience of a group of settler hooligans.  Curfew, closure,
brutality, murder, destruction of homes of suspects, while we keep
parroting the incantation that a person is innocent until proven
otherwise (as in the case of our Prime Minister and his sons).

The order that Ariel Sharon gave to the soldiers who went to wreak
revenge in Qibiah: "Maximize losses in life and property", has not
been forgotten.  Today Sharon, Mofaz and Yaalon, the three Generals
who manage the policy of this government, behave like that
self-righteous cat -  suffocating all the time.  Curfew and another
curfew, arrests and more arrests, destruction of roads, brutality to
the residents at road stops.  Benny Alon, (a minister in the present
government), already said: "make their life so bitter that they will
transfer themselves willingly".

This is done on a daily basis, in addition to the destruction.  The
Chief of Staff, Yaalon, already announced that he is "destroying for
re-building".  One can understand from his moves that the "building"
is building of more and more settlements.  So that they will not be
obliged, as military rulers, to take care of the residents'
well-being, the army uses sorties, followed by retreats.  They enter a
village, they kill, they destroy and they arrest, and then they
retreat.  Those who remain on the ashes and the ruins will take care
of themselves.

Many of our children are being indoctrinated, in religious schools,
that the Arabs are Amalek, and the bible teaches us that Amalek must
be destroyed.  There was already a rabbi (Israel Hess) who wrote in
the newspaper of Bar Ilan University that we all must commit genocide,
and that is because his research showed that the Palestinians are
Amalek.

The nation is not planning to commit genocide; the nation really does
not want to know what's happening in the territories.  The nation is
following orders given by the legitimate representatives of the
regime.  After the legitimate Prime Minister who wanted to bring peace
was murdered, the hand is loose on the trigger, greed is paramount,
and there is always some reason to brutalise all of the residents of a
city that number tens, if not hundreds of thousands, because there are
always people there who are on the "wanted" list.  It is sufficient
that one person is wanted to bomb and kill, by mistake, of course,
also women, children, workers and other humans - if indeed we still
count them as humans.

Of course with our self-righteousness, with our self-adoration in our
"Jewish ethics" we make sure to advertise how beautifully the doctors
take care of Palestinian victims in the hospitals.  We do not
advertise how many of those are executed in cold blood in their own
homes.

So it's not yet genocide of the terrible and unique style of which we
were past victims.  And as one of the smart Generals told me, we do
not have crematoria and gas chambers.  Is anything less than that
consistent with Jewish ethics?  Did he ever hear how an entire people
said that it did not know what was done in its name?

(The author was an MK and a minister, member of Meretz)