The cynical purpose of the
visit is obvious. Its timing speaks for itself: Sharon wanted to divert
attention from Benjamin Netanyahu, who is trying to stage a comeback, to
himself. So the price was some dozens of dead and some hundreds of
wounded. So what?
The provocation itself follows an
old tradition of the right-wing. The riots of 1929, including the Hebron
massacre, were the result of a provocation by Betar (the forerunners of
today's Likud) at the Western Wall, in contravention of the rules imposed
by the British administration in order to maintain a fragile peace in the
temple area.
But it is no use accusing the bull
for ruining the china shop. That's how bulls are. The entire blame lies on
the shoulders of those who let him enter the shop: Ehud Barak and Shlomo
Ben-Ami.
Barak played a shameful part in the
provocation. As the Prime Minister, he is responsible for the peace
process. As Minister of Defense, he is responsible for the life and
security of the country's inhabitants, Israelis and Palestinians. Both
offices obliged him to prevent Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount, the
bloody results of which could be easily foreseen.
Instead, he committed two sins:
giving his blessing to the visit, fully knowing what the results would be,
and afterwards denying any connection between the visit and its results.
Why? Like most of Barak's acts and
omissions during the last year, the motive was fear. Sad to say, the
battlefield hero lacks civil courage, not to mention political courage. He
was afraid that if he had prohibited the visit, he would be blamed for
giving in to the Muslims. Out of fear of being accused of surrendering to
the Arabs, he surrendered to the Likud.
And where, during all these events,
was the Minister of Police (or rather the Minister of Internal Security,
by his high-sounding title)? Where was Shlomo Ben-Ami, he who aroused so
many hopes, the man of political and humane vision, the man of pure
intellect and social conscience, who was going to change the face of the
police, root out its racist character and turn it into a people-loving
force?
Ben-Ami was a partner to the
decision to let Sharon into the compound of the mosques and at this time.
He concentrated an immense force - more than a 1000 police officers - to
defend the band of provocateurs. Thus, he enlarged in advance the
dimensions of the inevitable outburst.
Like Barak, Ben-Ami committed a
double sin. As Prime Minister, Barak came to the rescue of Defense
Minister Barak, Foreign Minister Ben-Ami came to the rescue of Police
Minister Ben-Ami. There was no need for a brilliant intellectual in order
to allow the police to run riot on the Temple Mount, any primitive ruffian
as Minister of Police could do that. But Ben-Ami used some of his own
peculiar talents: he justified the evil deeds with honeyed words, he added
some new sophistication to the methods of brain-washing, lies and
half-truths which follow all acts of oppression against the Palestinians.
But all the words of hypocrisy will
evaporate into thin air, and what will remain is the picture seen by
hundreds of millions around the globe: a little child, Rami al-Duri,
crying in mortal fear with his last breath, before being killed by the
soldiers, together the para-medic Ghassam al-Balbisi, who tried to rescue
him, while his father was mortally wounded. This will remain like the mark
of Cain on the forehead of Sharon, Barak and Ben-Ami. And in the
background there echo the words of Bialik, the national poet: "The revenge
of the blood of a little child has not yet been conceived (even) by
Satan."
This whole chapter of violence.
stupidity and cowardice will take revenge on its creators. It has proved
to the world that under no circumstances can the Haram al-Sharif compound
be left in the hands of Israeli politicians, this cynical bunch that talks
reverentially of "the holy places of the nation" with its mouth full of
pork. It has shown the Israeli public that an end must be put to the
charade called "political process" and that a peace agreement must be
signed, leaving the Temple Mount to Palestine and the Western Wall to
Israel.
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