The Harsh Soil of Occupation

As this is written, the Palestinian uprising in the occupied territories of Gaza and the West Bank has raged for two months, with no signs of abating in the near future. Seeing TV news reports of Israeli soldiers beating, gassing, and shooting Palestinian youth, many Americans undoubtedly have the impression that the discontent of the Palestinians and the intransigence of the Israelis is a new thing. That's not surprising. If you depend on the mainstream U.S. news media for a window on the world, you would be only dimly aware of the fact that for more than 20 years the Israeli army has ruled one-and-a-half million Palestinian Arabs with an iron fist.

But in fact, the current cycle of Israeli repression and Palestinian resistance is new only in its degree. For most of the past 20 years, Israel has confiscated Palestinian land and colonized it with settlements in flagrant disregard for international law regarding territories acquired in war. Israel has censored the Palestinian press, expelled Palestinian community leaders, and shut down Palestinian schools and other indigenous institutions. All this has gone on with the economic and political support of the U.S. government.

At every step along the way, the Palestinians have resisted Israeli attempts to deny them their land, leadership, and human rights. Sometimes their resistance has taken the form of ugly, indiscriminate, and inexcusable violence. But much of it has been political and peaceful.

The Palestinians have waged strikes, boycotts, and fasts. They've pleaded in court, and stood before bulldozers, to stop the illegal confiscation of their lands. They've built universities, newspapers, unions, legal institutions, women's groups, and a myriad of other organizations in an attempt to create alternative centers of power and plant the seed of their future independent state in the harsh soil of occupation.

In the midst of the current violence, Israel claims it cannot be forced to deal with the Palestinians until law and order and national security are restored. But over the years, Israel's repression of peaceful opposition and refusal to deal with nonviolent nationalist leaders have been unremitting.

In fact, the occupation policy of expelling potential troublemakers has been aimed especially at educators, journalists, lawyers, and other professionals who had the potential to represent Palestinian aspirations peacefully. More recently, when a group of leading Palestinians attempted to offer an alternative to the current stone-throwing by putting forth a plan for nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience, they were quickly arrested and detained.

The last two months, and the last 20 years, provide ample proof that Israel is not simply interested in protecting itself from violence and restoring order. It is interested in forcing acquiescence in the eradication of Palestinian national identity and national rights.

IN THE SAME WAY, much American media coverage of the Palestinian resistance is framed in terms of the day-to-day humiliation of searches and censorship and the horrendous poverty of the Gaza refugee camps. These harsh realities are among the sparks that ignite Palestinian rebellion.

But the conflict cannot be reduced to issues of civil liberties or social welfare. It is ultimately an issue of two sovereign nations with claims to the same land. And it won't be resolved until the Israelis come to terms with the Palestinians' chosen leadership, which, like it or not, is represented by Yasser Arafat.

If it ever comes, such a solution will have to be at the initiative of the Israelis and Palestinians themselves. At this point the mainstream Palestinian leaders seem ready to deal while the Israelis are not. In times past the reverse has been true. However, there is even now a substantial minority within Israel that wants a just peace. Fifty thousand Israelis recently demonstrated against the brutality in the occupied territories. Hundreds of young Israeli soldiers or reservists have courageously refused to serve in the occupied territories.

Those Israelis, like their peace-seeking Palestinian counterparts, have found little solace from the United States. Even during the current bloodshed, our government has managed to make only the most muted and ineffectual of protests. We continue to withhold unequivocal recognition of Palestinian national rights and try to act as if the PLO doesn't exist.

In fact, last fall the U.S. State Department, acting under pressure from Congress, closed the small Palestine Information Office which represented the PLO in Washington, D.C. That action displayed the Reagan administration's obliviousness to Middle East political reality, as well as its disdain for American democratic traditions.

Unfortunately, it is not only the Reagan administration that turns a deaf ear to Palestinian grievances. People in South Africa or Nicaragua may have the realistic hope that a change in the U.S. presidency might mean some small improvements in their situation. But the Palestinians can only expect a new president to be even more hostile to their aspirations.

Among the candidates, only Jesse Jackson has taken a clear stand for Palestinian self-determination. Ironically, Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.), who has gained support in some peace movement circles for his stands on the arms race and Central America, has one of the worst Middle East records.

I doubt that Simon, or others with a similar split vision, holds any special animosity toward Palestinians. But he, like the other candidates, is a politician. There are clear political rewards to be gained by applauding every move of the Israeli government, regardless of its consequences for international peace. There is little countervailing pressure to take a broader and longer view, even from constituencies who claim to be rooted in a concern for peace and human rights.

Danny Duncan Collum is a Sojourners contributing editor.