[R-G] MIDEAST: A 'Police State' Celebrates

[Anthony Fenton]

MIDEAST:  A 'Police State' Celebrates
By Nora Barrows-Friedman
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45462

JERUSALEM, Jan 19 (IPS) - The Israeli government is stepping up  
efforts to suppress dissent and crush resistance in the streets.  
Police have been videotaping the demonstrations and subsequently  
arresting protesters in large numbers.

According to Israeli police reports, at least 763 Israeli citizens,  
the majority of them Palestinian and 244 under 18 years old, have been  
arrested, imprisoned or detained for participating in such  
demonstrations. Most have been held and then released, but at least 30  
of those arrested over the past three weeks are still being held in  
prison.

Ameer Makhoul, director of Ittijah, the Union of Arab Community-Based  
Associations in Haifa, tells IPS that these demonstrations "are part  
of the uprising here inside the Green Line, to share responsibility  
and to share the challenge with the people in the Gaza strip."

As an organiser of many of these solidarity demonstrations inside  
Israel, Makhoul himself was arrested by the Shin Bet (the Israeli  
secret service). "They called me, came to my home and held me for four  
hours," he tells IPS. "They accused me of being a terrorist and  
supporting terror. They said that they are watching me and monitoring  
me." Israel, he said, "has become a terror state."

The Shin Bet has accused Makhoul and the hundreds of others arrested  
of "being a rebel, threatening the security of the State of Israel  
during war time."

Makhoul believes that such threats are being implemented by Israel's  
security forces "(in order to) break our will and the spirit of our  
people. But I think our spirit is much, much stronger here in Haifa  
and in Gaza than the Israeli oppression."

On Jan. 15, a Haaretz-Dialog public opinion poll taken in Israel found  
that 82 percent of the Israeli population believes that Israel did not  
go too far in its three-week operation in Gaza, "despite pictures from  
Gaza depicting massive destruction and a large number of wounded and  
killed, including women and children," reports Haaretz.

At a demonstration last week in front of Kishon prison north-east of  
Haifa, where some of the Palestinian demonstrators are being held,  
Israeli anarchist and professor of mathematics Kobi Snitz tells IPS  
that this figure is indicative of the current social climate inside  
the state.

"People are made to be afraid. Virtually all Israelis, particularly  
Israeli Jews, are convinced that Hamas was the one that violated the  
ceasefire. This just isn't true...(But) you won't find this in the  
Israeli media. There is no understanding of the level of violence used  
on Gaza by the Israeli military. And the police operate under the  
assumption and guidelines that every political expression now is to be  
repressed and prevented."

IPS asked Snitz to describe the momentum of these daily protests  
across the country. "These demonstrations happened virtually by  
themselves," he says. "At this point, anybody who is not severely  
indoctrinated or ignorant just feels compelled to do something every  
day. It's unbearable to sit at home and not do anything."

Last Saturday night in the coastal town of Jaffa, south of Tel Aviv,  
several thousand demonstrators - including Palestinians, various peace  
groups, Israeli anarchists and teenaged Israeli refusniks fresh from  
jail for refusing to serve in the mandatory military - marched through  
the main street in the old city with flags, banners, and vociferous  
determination to keep up the fight inside Israeli society against  
their government's lethal operations in Gaza. Israeli security forces,  
carrying weapons and video cameras, heavily flanked the protesters.

But activists say it is crucial to expand the discussion from this  
current struggle for Palestinians inside the Gaza strip outward into  
the larger context. "I'm here to take a stand for Gaza," Mahmood Jreri  
of the acclaimed Palestinian hip-hop group DAM, based in Lydd (east of  
Tel Aviv), tells IPS during the march.

"The main reason (I'm here) is to say that we are not part of what the  
Israeli government is doing. The Palestinian people are fighting for  
their freedom and fighting against the occupation. When Palestinians  
have their freedom, then there will be peace here." (END/2009)