De Nuance van de NRC 87

Stroman van de Amerikanen en Israeli's, de Fatah-miljonair en militieleider Mohammed Dahlan.

Voordat ik verder ga met de analyse van de NRC-berichtgeving over de recente door Israel gepleegde oorlogsmisdaden in Gaza, wil ik eerst de context van het geweld nog eens duidelijk maken.

Op 21 juni 2007 schreef de Palestijns Amerikaanse publicist Ali Abunimah, schrijver van "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict" het volgende artikel in de Amerikaanse kwaliteitskrant The Chicago Tribune:

'U.S. decision to back Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the recent turmoil virtually guarantees an escalation in violence. Abbas has installed an unelected "emergency" government to replace the democratically elected Hamas-led national unity government. Some have portrayed Hamas' takeover of Palestinian Authority security compounds in Gaza as a "coup." But many Palestinians do not view it that way. In January 2006, Hamas decisively won legislative elections, giving it the right to form an administration. The U.S., despite its rhetorical support for democracy, decided to crush Hamas rule, imposing sanctions that have harmed ordinary Palestinians in the hope that Hamas would be forced out.When it won the elections, Hamas had already observed a one-year unilateral truce with Israel, and had suspended the suicide bombings against Israeli civilians that had made it notorious. It tried to enter mainstream politics through the front door, to play by the rules, but was undermined at every step. The bitter conclusion for many Palestinians is that the U.S. is not interested in supporting real democracy, and will intervene relentlessly to overthrow leaders it does not support, regardless of the will of the Palestinian people. The militias that Hamas took on and defeated in recent weeks were particularly hated in Gaza because they had abducted, tortured and killed many Hamas members and were widely seen as thoroughly corrupt. It so happens that these militias received arms and funding from the United States and had vowed to take on and defeat Hamas, overturning the result of the election.We have seen this strategy before. Does anyone remember the Nicaraguan contras? Despite the power-sharing deal Fatah and Hamas signed in Mecca last February, key Fatah leaders refused to place their militias under the control of an independent interior minister. He resigned in frustration, and the U.S. continued to funnel in weapons. Following its dramatic rout of Fatah positions, Hamas leaders gave televised speeches emphasizing that they were not at war with Fatah's rank and file (many of whom did not even fight) and did not want to seize power or overthrow Abbas, whose legitimacy they explicitly reaffirmed. Their problem, they said, was only with the U.S.-supported militia leaders, such as Mohammed Dahlan and Rashid Abu Shbak, who had made the job of the elected Hamas-led government impossible. As a goodwill gesture, Hamas leaders issued a general amnesty for all captured Fatah commanders and appealed for dialogue, reconciliation and reconstructing a national unity government. Abbas rejected these appeals and has opted to form an unelected government and rule by decree even though Palestinian law denies him that authority. This government will have little real power and will be considered illegitimate by a significant part of the Palestinian public. After more than a year of sanctions against the Palestinian people, Hamas is stronger and more popular than ever. Throwing more U.S. support behind Abbas and his unelected Cabinet will not reverse this trend.' Lees verder: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-oped0621gazajun21,0,4877386.story?coll=chi-newsopinioncommentary-hed

Deze context en deze feiten worden door de Nederlandse commerciele massamedia stelselmatig zo veel mogelijk verzwegen. Door de Europese en Amerikaanse politieke keuze voor de corrupte Fatah-kliek zien de journalisten het als hun taak om Hamas af te schilderen als het struikelblok voor vrede en Fatah als de enige hoop op normalisering. In deze verwrongen voorstelling van zaken heet het dat: 'Abbas met de Verenigde Staten de eisen [besprak] waaraan de regering moet voldoen om een einde te maken aan de boycot tegen de Palestijnse Autoriteit. Om het af te maken heeft hij per decreet alle milities van Hamas "onwettig" verklaard', aldus in dit geval Volkskrant correspondent Alex Burghoorn.

Hamas milities werden dus 'onwettig' verklaard, maar niet Abbas' eigen Fatah milities, onder leiding van de Palestijnse gangster, de miljonair Mohammed Dahlan, die rijk wist te worden in de tijd dat Israel steeds meer Palestijns land stal. Andermaal wordt onderstreept dat het Westen geen democratie duldt in Palestina zolang Israel niet zijn zin krijgt. Nu financiert en bewapend het Westen Fatah milities die bevelen uitvoeren van hun bazen die op hun beurt weer gehoorzaam luisteren naar de Amerikaanse en Israelische 'eisen'. En toen in 2007 de Palestijnse collaborateurs in Gaza in het nauw kwamen, mochten 'tientallen Fatah-leden met priveleges van Israel de Gazastrook verlaten,' aldus opnieuw de Volkskrant. 'Honderden anderen zijn bij de grensovergang Erez gestrand.' Laatst genoemden waren geen collaborateurs met speciale 'privileges'. En 'privileges' krijgen alleen vooraanstaande Palestijnse Fatah-leden die bereid zijn te luisteren naar de wil van Israel zoals die is vastgelegd in de zogeheten vredesakkoorden en die in de woorden van Shlomo Ben-Ami, de Israelische voormalige minister van Buitenlandse Zaken: 'were founded on a new colonialist basis, on a life of dependence of one on the other, forever.' Een opzet die allereerst resulteerde in een verdrievoudiging van de omvang van het door Israel geconfisqueerde Palestijnse land en een verdubbeling van het aantal Jooedse kolonisten op de West Bank. Maar daarover zwijgen de Nederlandse commerciele massamedia. Het feit dat de president, wiens termijn inmiddels is verstreken, een staatsgreep pleegde, de democratie afschafte en nu met de vijand onderhandelt wat de 'eisen' zijn, wordt gepresenteerd als de normaalste zaak ter wereld. De wil van de meerderheid van het Palestijnse volk wordt zodoende genegeerd. Palestijnen zijn kennelijk in de ogen van de betrokken Nederlandse journalisten een inferieur soort mensen dat niet geschikt is voor een eigen democratie. Men gaat er kennelijk vanuit dat de Palestijnse bevolking die eerder Fatah wegstemde, nu gedwee het hoofd zal buigen. En ook dat is een misvatting.

In de Volkskrant-versie van de werkelijkheid heette het schenden van de grondwet het opschorten van 'de drie paragrafen uit de grondwet... waarin staat dat een nieuwe regering alleen beedigd kan worden na instemming door het parlement.' De krant deed het voorkomen, net als alle andere Nederlandse massamedia, alsof een grondwet in een democratie kan worden 'opgeschort'. Maar zoals bekend, kan men een grondwet niet opschorten, dat is nu juist het kenmerk ervan, daarom heet het ook een grondwet, het geldt altijd, het kan niet worden opgeschort, om de simpele reden dat daarin 'de grondbeginselen der regering van een staat staan vervat.' Iemand die op eigen gezag de grondwet buitenspel zet, heet een dictator, maar dat kon de toenmalige president Abbas niet genoemd worden aangezien hij nodig was om de 'eisen' van Israel en het Westen klakkeloos uit te voeren, iets wat de Palestijnse bevolking en haar democratische gekozen regering met Hamas niet wilde.

Terwijl de Nederlandse commerciele massamedia alles in het werk stelden om Hamas zo slecht mogelijk af te beelden en Fatah als enig zinnig alternatief te portretteren, verschenen in de angelsaksische pers voltrekt andere verhalen zoals deze:

''Hamas acted on a very real fear of a US-sponsored coup
Washington's fingerprints are all over the chaos that has hit Palestinians. The last thing they now need is an envoy called Blair
Jonathan Steele
Friday June 22, 2007
The Guardian
Did they jump or were they pushed? Was Hamas's seizure of Fatah security offices in Gaza unprovoked, or a pre-emptive strike to forestall a coup by Fatah? After last week's turmoil, it becomes increasingly important to uncover its origins.The fundamental cause is, of course, well known. Israel, aided by the US, was not prepared to accept Hamas's victory in last year's Palestinian elections. Backed by a supine EU, the two governments decided to boycott their new Palestinian counterparts politically and punish Palestinian voters by blocking economic aid. Their policies had a dramatic effect, turning Gaza even more starkly into an open prison and creating human misery on a massive scale. The aim was to turn voters against Hamas - a strategy of stupidity as well as cynicism, since outside pressure usually produces resistance rather than surrender.The policy shocked even moderate western officials like James Wolfensohn, the former World Bank chief, whom the Americans had appointed to help Gaza's economy before the Hamas election victory. "The result was not to build more economic activity but to build more barriers," he said this week while explaining why he resigned in disagreement with US and Israeli strategy. It is also well known that Hamas was as surprised by its election victory as everyone else and that it offered its rival, Fatah, a coalition government of national unity. The offer was refused. If this was done initially out of wounded pride, Fatah's rejection of Hamas's regularly repeated overtures increasingly appeared to be coordinated with Washington as part of the boycott strategy. Reports have been circulating for months of a more sinister side to the boycott. According to them, the US decided last year on a plan to arm and train Mahmoud Abbas's presidential guard in a deliberate effort to confront and defeat Hamas militarily. Israel has already locked up several dozen Hamas legislators and mayors from the West Bank. The next stage was to do the same in Gaza but have Palestinians, rather than Israelis, run the crackdown. Arming insurgents against elected governments has a long US pedigree and it is no accident that Elliott Abrams, the deputy national security adviser and apparent architect of the anti-Hamas subversion, was a key player in Ronald Reagan's supply of weapons to the Contras who fought Nicaragua's elected government in the 1980s. Documents doing the rounds in the Middle East purport to have evidence for Abrams's "hard coup" strategy. One text recounts Washington's objectives as expressed in US officials' conversations with an Arab government. These are, among others, "to maintain President Abbas and Fatah as the centre of gravity on the Palestinian scene", "avoid wasting time in accommodating Hamas's ideological conditions", "undermine Hamas's political status through providing for Palestinian economic needs", and "strengthen the Palestinian president's authority to be able to call and conduct early elections by autumn 2007".'Lees verder: http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2108926,00.html

Deze westerse illegale inmenging in de binnenlandse aangelegenheden van een andere natie werd door de Nederlandse commerciele massamedia angstvallig verzwegen omdat het niet paste in de pro-Israel propaganda. Op zijn beurt draaide in die tijd de NRC de werkelijkheid 180 graden om en stelde de zaken zo voor: 'Washington/Jeruzalem, 20 juni 2007. "Verscherping boycot Gaza'' VS en Israël beloven steun aan Abbas... Abbas (Fatah) regeert met een noodkabinet van Fatahloyalisten op de door Israël bezette Westelijke Jordaanoever, sinds het moslimfundamentalistische Hamas, dat door het Westen als terreurorganisatie wordt beschouwd, vorige week alle macht greep in de Gazastrook. Bush noemde Abbas „een redelijke stem tussen de extremisten in uw [Olmerts] buurt”. Olmert zei ''elke mogelijke inspanning” te doen om met Abbas samen te werken... Maandag al hadden de VS en de Europese Unie aangekondigd de directe hulp aan Abbas te willen hervatten na een boycot sinds Hamas 15 maanden geleden na zijn verkiezingsoverwinning aan de regering kwam. Doel daarvan was Hamas te isoleren en te marginaliseren.' Lees verder: http://www.nrc.nl/buitenland/article726448.ece/VS_en_Israel_beloven_steun_aan_Abbas

De NRC verzweeg ook wie die 'Fatahloyalisten' nu precies waren. En om begrijpelijke redenen zoals de angelsaksische journalisten aantonen:

'Mohammed Dahlan, the Gaza warlord who has long been Washington’s anointed favorite to play the role of a Palestinian Pinochet. And while Dahlan is formally subordinate to Abbas, whom he supposedly serves as National Security Adviser, nobody believes that Dahlan answers to Abbas — in fact, it was suggested at the time that Abbas appointed Dahlan only under pressure from Washington, which was irked by the Palestinian Authority president’s decision to join a unity government with Hamas.If Dahlan takes orders from anyone at all, it’s certainly not from Abbas. Abbas has long recognized the democratic legitimacy and popularity of Hamas, and embraced the reality that no peace process is possible unless the Islamists are given the place in the Palestinian power structure that their popular support necessitates. He has always favored negotiation and cooperation with Hamas — much to the exasperation of the Bush Administration, and also of the Fatah warlords whose power of patronage was threatened by the Hamas election victory — and could see the logic of the unity government proposed by the Saudis even when Washington couldn’t. Indeed, as the indispensable Robert Malley and Hussein Agha note, nothing has hurt Abbas’s political standing as much as the misguided efforts of Washington to boost his standing in the hope of undermining the elected Hamas government.'
Lees verder: http://tonykaron.com/2007/05/15/palestinian-pinochet-making-his-move/

En ook dit verzweeg de NRC:

'The US financed the Palestinian Presidential Forces under control of Mahmoud Abbas with eighty million dollars. Not only that, but the war criminal of US General Keith Dayton also organize the training of these Palestinian troops. And beyond that, the European Union is financing the PA and paying part of the salaries of these troops.The images in the following video, which was released to the Internet some time ago and whose translation I am presenting to the world, will show you the well-trained Fatah-PA troops. The way in which they torture their Palestinian prisoners shows the great achievements of the training given to these PA thugs by the USA. The Palestinian Authority forces seen in the video torturing the prisoners are from the death squads controlled by Mohammad Dahlan. The victims seen in the video are Palestinians, one of the prisoners wears a t-shirt with the legend of the ‘Executive Forces”, a Hamas unit under control of the Interior Ministry. The video is a direct consequence of the foreign policy of the USA and EU. It was subsidized with tax money from all these countries.I am posting the translation of this Video from Gaza under the PA with deep sorrow and bitterness. I felt disgust while translating the horrible dialogues between the Palestinian jailers and their Palestinian victims, which shows the big danger to all Palestinians coming from the PA security system. The video shows some Palestinian prisoners caught by Muhammad Dahlan’s death squads. They are moaning of pain because of the torture inflicted on them, and all the while they are forced to recite denigrating chants for Muhammad Dahlan and Fatah. There is no different between these images of torture by Palestinian jailers and the images of torture by the American occupation for the Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib. The only difference is that the torture at Abu Ghraib was done by the American occupation, but in Gaza both jailers and prisoners were, and are, Palestinians. I felt shame while translating this video, I even felt shame to be a Palestinian. My shame is not because of my Palestinian roots, but to be identified as a Palestinian and to know that there are monsters capable of such inhuman acts, like Muhammad Dahlan, like the jailers in the video and like the corrupted systems of the PA, who also call themselves Palestinians. I translated the video because I am sure that most foreigners who see the video do not understand the whole story behind it, and I also found some mistakes in the attribution of this video on other websites. I also made this translation to ask the International Community, Governments, the UN General Council and Human Rights organizations to fulfill their duties and end the tragedy unfolding under the forces of the PA and establish an investigative body with the authority to trial and jail the Palestinian criminal Muhammad Dahlan and his troops. I also read that the US government is making pressure on President Abbas to give Dahlan power to control all the PA security systems, ignoring the will of the majority of Palestinians, who want him submitted to a revolutionary trial as a criminal and traitor. I have always criticized the State of Israel, and I will criticize them until the occupation of my homeland Palestine ends, but I never imagined that I would criticize my own people for doing the horrible things which are done to everybody in Israeli jails. I never thought that I would see this kind of thing done by Palestinian jailers. It was not my wish to translate and to post this video, but I am obliged to do so after seeing the level of savagery and to which the conditions in my homeland have deteriorated.The following videoclip shows scenes of real torture, and should UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES be watched by minors or by sick or impressionable persons. Discretion is advised before you press on the PLAY button.'
Lees verder: http://www.kawther.info/K20070624A.html

Ook ik waarschuw u, wanneer u geen gruwelijke beelden wilt zien, kijk dan niet. Het hoeft ook niet, wat u krijgt te zien zijn beelden van Fatah-folteraars die Hamasleden in Gaza martelden, voordat Hamas deze collaborateurs, die een staatsgreep probeerden te organiseren om de democratische gekozen regering ten val te brengen, uit Gaza verdreven. Al deze feiten werden en worden door de Nederlandse commerciele massamedia verzwegen omdat ze niet passen in de pro-Israel propaganda. De NRC verschilt wat dit betreft in niets wezenlijks van de andere Nederlandse massamedia. En het is belangrijk de hierboven geschetste context te weten om de analyse van de Gaza-berichtgeving van de 'slijpsteen voor de geest' te kunnen verklaren. Daarover later meer.