Israel’s Playbook: Why I Don’t Trust This New ‘Ceasefire’ | Avigail Abarbanel

(And airing some more of Israel’s dirty laundry)

 

I hate to pour cold water on headlines like the Guardian’s ‘Tears of joy and celebratory gunfire: how Gaza and Israel reacted to news of ceasefire deal’, from this morning, but I don’t trust this new ‘ceasefire deal’ or the process of negotiations. I always hope to be wrong when I make unpleasant predictions

It’s time people recognised Israel’s well-used playbook — the one generations of people in power have disingenuously pretended not to see. The Palestinian people have been living through seventy-seven years of progressive settler-colonialism and ‘incremental genocide’. Israel has never deviated from its settler-colonial programme: the single-minded determination to replace all the non-Jewish indigenous people of Palestine with those it defines as Jews. This is Israel’s raison d’être. Completing the process of creating an exclusively Jewish state, run by Jews for Jews only, is Israel’s reason for being.

Israel’s tactics are not original — perpetrators are rarely original. But as in all cases of settler-colonialism, the list is long and filthy, revolving around the characteristic policy of elimination.

In the colonised West Bank, Israel has used various means to make Palestinian life so untenable that people choose to leave — ethnic cleansing disguised as free choice. What we’ve been witnessing in Gaza over the past two years is merely an escalation of Israel’s existing polices and actions, but far worse and with the specific and blood-curdling intent of ‘finishing the job once and for all’.

The list of Israel’s illegal, immoral and cruel settler-colonial tactics includes, but is not limited to:

• Targeting children — There is nothing more devastating for parents than losing a child. Placing any parent in a position where they are powerless to protect their child from harm is guaranteed to cause depression and despondency. Israel has made it clear to Palestinians that they cannot protect their children from Israel’s brutality. Hundreds of Palestinian children are regularly arrested and detained in adult Israeli prisons where they are subjected to sexual and other abuse. Where we see vulnerable ordinary human children, Israeli Jews and their military see ‘future terrorists’. Israel’s dehumanisation of the Palestinians knows no limits. Even without arrests, Palestinian children are regularly subjected to intimidation and brutality at the hands of fully armed adult male soldiers. This is intended to destroy children’s mental health, interfere with their development, and break their parents — ultimately to destroy families.Israel knows how significant families and communities are for Palestinian resilience. Israel hopes that entire families will leave ‘voluntarily’ just to keep their children safe. 

 

• Targeting education — Education has always been crucial to progressing in life and to enabling people to feel useful and fulfilled. In oppressed populations there is a natural emphasis on education. The percentage of tertiary educated Palestinians is orders of magnitude higher than that of Israel, and Israel does not like it. It does not want its victims to appear refined, enlightened and knowledgeable. This contradicts the dehumanising image of Palestinians as ignorant, primitive sub-humans that Israel has always tried to peddle to the world. Israel has systematically interfered with Palestinian education at both school and tertiary levels. Among other things, Palestinian children are regularly subjected to colonist (aka ‘settler’) attacks on their way to and from school. Israeli soldiers can decide to disrupt classes or close a school or university arbitrarily without offering any reason or explanation. Israel has deliberately and systematically destroyed university education in Gaza and has targeted academic staff and students.

 

• Using mafia-like methods to recruit local informers — This serves to instill fear and destroy community cohesion and trust. I strongly recommend the 2013 film ‘Omar’ if you haven’t seen it yet. It’s a fictionalised account of real-life methods Israel has employed in the colonised West Bank for decades. 

 

• Disrupting everyday life, making it unbearable — Whistleblowers from Breaking the Silence who served in the colonised West Bank have testified that they were under orders to disrupt Palestinian daily life using a variety of tactics:
  

  These arrangements include a wide range of tasks given to us soldiers. From mappings, whose goal was well described by the soldier; to patrols, intended to make the presence of the army felt on the ground; to flying checkpoints aimed at “disrupting the daily life of the Palestinian population” (as is written in the briefing I received as a soldier); through randomly entering homes to “search” (what exactly we were looking for has never been explained to me); to “mock arrests,” that is, the arrest of an innocent person for the purpose of training and exercising soldiers. The purpose of these routine tasks, and many others for which space is limited to detail, is to achieve the same “deterrence,” that is, control, which has allowed the State of Israel to keep the Palestinians under military rule for 48 years to date. [my bold highlight]

   

  Soldiers often say that they didn’t understand the purpose of what they were instructed to do. But that’s because Breaking the Silence considers itself a Zionist organisation, refusing to acknowledge and oppose Israel’s settler-colonialism and its ultimate goal. From the soldiers’ point of view, the purpose isn’t clear. But the policy of disrupting daily life is carried out by the Israeli settler-colonial army in many ways: erecting new checkpoints without warning, closing checkpoints arbitrarily to block movement in or out of villages or towns, driving Humvees (High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, often armoured) noisily and fast through village roads for no reason, flying drones over people and buildings to take people’s photos or drop sound bombs or tear gas, threatening and harassing people for no reason, entering and searching homes in the middle of the night, demolishing public buildings, destroying stock in Palestinian shops, standing by or enabling thuggish attacks, arson, theft and vandalism by colonists who are all armed and trained by the Israeli military, and much more.

   

• Enacting an ever-tightening arbitrary permit checkpoint system — Palestinians in the colonised West Bank and in Gaza have been subjected to a system of arbitrary permits and a systematically expanding network of checkpoints that limit many aspects of people’s lives. Palestinians need permits to go anywhere, to cross the separation wall, to visit their own land and work in their own fields, to access medical care outside of their area, and much more. Palestinians are subjected to regular searches, which can escalate very quickly and are at the whim of the soldier who happens to man the checkpoint or the official granting the permit. 

 

• A military legal framework in the service of settler-colonialism — Palestinians have lived under brutal Israeli military law. Whilst military law can be used temporarily in occupied territory, Israel has weaponised it for decades to facilitate settler-colonialism, intentionally creating apartheid. This is illegal under International Law, and as Ayed Abu Eqtaish explains,
  

“Israeli military law does not seek to administer justice. The Israeli military law framework is a tool for legitimizing [sic] oppressive practices and punishing the Palestinian population.”

 

• Continuous expansion of colonies (aka ‘settlements’) — Going back decades, Israel has always provided financial incentives to its Jewish population to move to the colonised West Bank. Israel calls the occupied West Bank ‘Judea and Samaria’ (יהודה ושומרון), deliberately obscuring the fact that Israel is occupying these territories illegally. (Of course, all of Israel is built on stolen land). The perception in Jewish Israeli society is that those territories are an inseparable part of Israel, and the Palestinians who live there are there illegally and have no right to live there. For those who don’t read Hebrew, here is a translation of the headline of an article from an Israeli real estate site, dated 25th July 2023: 

• ‘Backed by government support, real estate companies are discovering Judea and Samaria: “An awakening that amounts to a revolution”.’ (בעידוד הממשלה, חברות הנדל”ן מגלות את יהודה ושומרון: “התעוררות שהיא מהפכה). 
• Among other things the article states:
  

  The current government is aligned with the worldview of its members, which is the expansion of construction in Judea and Samaria. Since the beginning of the year, plans have been advanced for the construction of almost 13,000 housing units in Judea and Samaria, of which plans for the construction of approximately 3,000 units have been approved for validation, and approximately 9,800 units have been approved for deposit. This represents a record number of apartments in a very short time. However, beyond the changing policy, real estate professionals we spoke with also report high demand in the area.”

  “For several years now there’s been an awakening that I would really define as a revolution. People have understood that the area is really close to the centre of the country — for example Revava, which is located west of Ariel, or Kiryat Netafim near it,” says Gabi Barsheshet, CEO of the Land Redemption Fund, an organisation engaged in developing land for housing in Judea and Samaria. “The proximity to the centre of the country and the rise in housing prices have made Judea and Samaria a realistic housing option, not just based on pure ideology.”

  An examination of how construction developers are responding to the new policy reveals that they too are changing. Long-established players in the field such as Dona, Mashav and Amana are now being joined by additional companies. ‘Ampa Israel’ is building hundreds of ground-floor housing units in Sal’it in western Samaria, in Barukhin, and will soon begin construction of 120 units in the settlement of Nofim. ‘Api Capital’ is building in Emmanuel, and the company Tzaf is currently building in Kiryat Netafim and in Nokdim in Gush Etzion. [My translation from the Hebrew — you will not find an English translation because Israel does not want people outside Israel to see this].

And if this isn’t chilling enough, consider this Ynet (Yediot Aharonot) article by Hila Tzion from 17th September (around three and a half weeks ago):

Headline
Smotrich: Gaza – a real estate bonanza, discussing with the US how we’ll divide percentages on the land

Subheading

The Finance Minister confirmed for the first time that the utopian plan for rehabilitating the Gaza Strip, which was revealed on ynet and reported to be ‘circulating’ in the Trump administration as well, is under discussion with the Americans – and explained: ‘We paid a lot of money for the war, we need to do percentages on the land. We’ve already done the destruction phase’

Article

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich addressed the question of ‘the day after’ in the Gaza Strip today (Wednesday), saying it should be turned into ‘a real estate bonanza’. The minister, speaking at the Urban Renewal Summit of the Real Estate Centre and Madallan 2025 conference, also said – against the backdrop of the utopian vision that’s also circulating in the Trump administration, according to which Gaza’s rehabilitation would become, among other things, a profitable real estate investment – that ‘I’ve already begun negotiations with the Americans’. This is the first official confirmation in Israel that the plan is under discussion. [My translation from the Hebrew and bold highlights].

Smotrich isn’t mincing any words. This typical settler-colonial daylight grand robbery of land and natural resources that characteristically avoids any mention or recognition of the two million people who have been living in Gaza, should ring alarm bells in everyone watching. But still, the vast majority of Jewish Israelis reading this on the popular Yediot Aharonot do not think any of this as wrong. Israel is not only settler-colonial, it’s also ferociously capitalist. It has a voracious entitled class whose members take their inspiration from their capitalist friends around the world and what they seem to get away with.

There are many more violent measures and policies that Israel uses against the Palestinians to advance its settler-colonial goals: economic control and exploitation, complete control of essential infrastructure, indefinite incarceration without charge, torture, humiliation, bombings, collective punishment, theft (aka ‘confiscation’) of land and real estate, and building and home demolitions.

So-called ‘peace’ or ‘ceasefire’ negotiations have never been anything other than another means to advance Israel’s settler-colonial goals. Israel has a long record of deception, underhand tactics such as murdering negotiating partners, and not fulfilling its end of agreements it signs. It usually blames the other side for violating agreements first, whilst pretending that its own violations are just ‘retaliation’.

‘Negotiations’ have traditionally helped Israel appear ‘civilised’ and ‘reasonable’ whist continuing to camouflage and advance its settler-colonialism. Settler-colonisers do not negotiate in good faith. In fact, the very idea of ‘negotiations’ between colonisers and colonised — perpetrators and victims — is deeply problematic. Real negotiations require both sides to have equal power, and abusive systems that are usually based on a gross power imbalance must be dismantled to prevent more harm to victims. Where one side is clearly more powerful, negotiations are used to maintain the power structure and coerce the weaker side to agree to the stronger side’s terms.

Israel has always held all the power — military, economic and political — and has always controlled the narrative. ‘Negotiations’ have bought time for Israel whilst its settler-colonialist machine not only continued, but accelerated. They enable Western powers, like the US, to pretend they’re doing something to help the Palestinians, whilst in reality they continue to enable Israel. ‘Negotiations’ are also intended to disable resistance and castrate international public opposition and protests. Israel is deeply concerned by the widespread international protests against it, and the widening of official and formal boycotts and sanctions. The impact of those on the Israeli economy has been devastating. Israel is trying to trick protestors to think that the goal of ‘peace’ is being achieved and there’s nothing more to fight for. Internally, Netanyahu wants to show his people that he is doing something to bring back those captured by Hamas two years ago, because he wants to remain in power indefinitely.

Whilst some people might be tempted to sigh in relief that perhaps the nightmare of the past two years is nearing its end, please don’t. Please remain vigilant and continue to protest and do everything you’ve been doing to bring an end to Israel’s settler-colonialist rule and safety, justice and freedom to the Palestinians.

Israel will not stop until it is stopped through decisive military intervention and economic and diplomatic starvation. Israel’s ultimate and deeply cherished goal is, and always was, clear — ‘all the land, without the people’ — and Israel has no intention of deviating from, or voluntarily abandoning this goal. I want to be wrong, but I don’t think I am. I know Israel.

Source

 

Related

Israel kills 9 Palestinians, wounds dozens in Gaza despite ceasefire deal – Hours after Israel and Hamas struck ceasefire agreement, Israeli forces attack different parts of Gaza, targeting displaced people’s shelters, homes, gatherings (Feature image)

 

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