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Violence in their midst

Amira Haas, a Haaretz correspondent, has been a tenacious and fearless writer on the subject of Israel's occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and the shameful by-product of how Israel treats its Palestinian citizens, as also those under occupation.

A series of violent crimes in Israel lately have shocked the Israelis. Don't be so surprised says Haas in her latest piece "Outcry over violence in Israel ignoring occupation" on Haaretz. Violence in the way we treat the Palestinians is in our very midst.......

"The most amazing thing about the wave of murders in recent weeks has been the collective Israeli stupefaction at the discovery of violence in our midst. Once again we have displayed our talent for excluding from the discourse the daily violence inherent in our continued domination over the Palestinians and their land.

Even when there are no Palestinian casualties and fatalities at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces, there is no letup in the everyday bullying by the occupation regime. Many Israelis are complicit in every travel restriction and expropriation order, from the cabinet ministers responsible, to the jurists who legitimize and codify, to the officers who implement and the typists and translators. Every soldier who guards a Jewish settlement, every rabbi who serves it and every kindergarten teacher there is partner to the primal act of the established violence that built it on Palestinian land (public or private, that makes no difference). This is violence that replicates and reproduces at every moment, because the initial theft is still doing damage. The military judiciary system, which tries only Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank, has an important role in the reproduction of violence."

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