Susiya and the ONGOING Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

 

July 27, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

Where Islamic fundamentalists control places, including in Iran and in regions controlled by ISIS, life is hellish. And some of those crimes are exposed in the U.S. media (when that suits the interests of the U.S. empire). But the crimes of the United States and its partner-in-crime, Israel, dwarf all that.

Whatever real tension exists between the U.S. and Israel these days, one thing is NEVER questioned by the powers-that-be and their media: the myth that Israel is a bastion of enlightenment in an Arab world full of terrorists who are bringing horrors to people. The reality is that Israel is a regional and global hitman for the U.S. empire.

Israel was built on the violent ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. That’s not “ancient history.” TODAY: There are over three million Palestinians— people driven from their homes, along with their descendants— in Jordan alone; over 600,000 in war-torn Syria, hundreds of thousands in Lebanon. And the remaining Palestinians within the borders of Israel and lands it claims outside its recognized borders are subject to constant ethnic cleansing.

Take the case of the town of Susiya. This town is in an area of Palestine that the “international community,” as it is called, considers illegally occupied by Israel. In Susiya, Israeli authorities are moving to demolish at least half of the dwellings and to remove the 340 Palestinian residents.

And this is not the first time. The people of Susiya have been removed from their village three times before. In 1986, the original village of Susiya was forcibly demolished with the justification that it was situated on “an archeological site.” In 1990 and again in 2001, the villagers were forcibly relocated and eventually the people moved to some of their farmlands nearby. During this entire time, vigilante Israeli settlers destroyed their olive trees and subjected them to attacks. The villagers were denied access to two-thirds of their farmland that was declared “too close” to a nearby Israeli settlement. And during all this time, the villagers also tried to pursue legal appeals in the Israeli court system, only to be continually beaten down. This May, an Israeli appeals court again rejected the demands by the people of Susiya to be free of a fourth impending destruction, and Israeli military authorities have announced it will be carried out. The Israeli Supreme Court is due to rule on Susiya’s final appeal sometime in the next week.

You won’t hear this story in the mainstream media. And you won’t hear about the resistance to the ethnic cleansing of Susiya, including the participation of people from around the world.

 

 

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