‘Ethnic Cleansing’ Gaza?

January 18, 2009

Are Israel and others preparing to move a significant number of people from Gaza to Egypt? I only have two data points for that right now, but they are disturbing.

Levi of Jews Sans Frontieres writes:

Meanwhile I have just received an email saying that there are rumours of an impending ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Rafah into Egypt.

Prof. As'ad AbuKhalil, aka The Angry Arab, has a picture up which shows a row of big tents set up on the Egyptian side of the Gaza border and asks.

Does anybody have information on this?

Ahdaf Souif sent me this from (Egyptian) Rafah (I cite with her permission): "Outside the general Hospital in Egyptian Rafah a city of tents has sprung up. I counted 200. But the soldiers there told me they have many more and can set them up immediately. They said the beds and furnishings for all the camps are ready. I was also told that other camps are being set up, in el-Arish and other locations. I was told these camps were being set up for “the Palestinian refugees.” Where will they come from? From Gaza. When? When they open the border. Officers then arrived and insisted that we leave immediately. Any information we wanted we could get from the headquarters of the Second Army in Ismailia. A soldier added that some TV stations had been here already – but they were with the Army."

Has anyone additional information on this?

What would be the consequences of such very dirty 'cleansing'?

Posted by b on January 18, 2009 at 08:41 UTC | Permalink

Comments

The Observer (with lots of witnesses quoted):

Israel stands accused of perpetrating a series of war crimes during a sustained 12-hour assault on a village in southern Gaza last week in which 14 people died.
In testimony collected from residents of the village of Khuza’a by the Observer, it is claimed that Israeli soldiers entering the village:
• attempted to bulldoze houses with civilians inside;
• killed civilians trying to escape under the protection of white flags;
• opened fire on an ambulance attempting to reach the wounded;
• used indiscriminate force in a civilian area and fired white phosphorus shells.
If the allegations are upheld, all the incidents would constitute breaches of the Geneva conventions.
…
The village of Khuza’a is around 500 metres from the border with Israel. According to B’Tselem, its field researcher in Gaza was contacted last Tuesday by resident Munir Shafik al-Najar, who said that Israeli bulldozers had begun destroying homes at 2.30am.

This seems an attempt to push the border, i.e. to move the Palestinians away from it.

Posted by: b | Jan 18 2009 9:05 utc | 1

I don’t cry easily, but ………….
Please distribute this message as widely as possible and contribute to the UNWRA as requested by Michael Heart, a singer with a conscience:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=dlfhoU66s4Y (for those who have the courage to watch the video)
http://michaelheart.com/Song_for_Gaza.html
WE WILL NOT GO DOWN (Song for Gaza)
(Composed by Michael Heart)
Copyright 2009
A blinding flash of white light
Lit up the sky over Gaza tonight
People running for cover
Not knowing whether they’re dead or alive
They came with their tanks and their planes
With ravaging fiery flames
And nothing remains
Just a voice rising up in the smoky haze
We will not go down
In the night, without a fight
You can burn up our mosques and our homes and our schools
But our spirit will never die
We will not go down
In Gaza tonight
Women and children alike
Murdered and massacred night after night
While the so-called leaders of countries afar
Debated on who’s wrong or right
But their powerless words were in vain
And the bombs fell down like acid rain
But through the tears and the blood and the pain
You can still hear that voice through the smoky haze
We will not go down
In the night, without a fight
You can burn up our mosques and our homes and our schools
But our spirit will never die
We will not go down
In Gaza tonight
All Music and Content Copyrighted. All rights reserved. © 2009

Posted by: Parviz | Jan 18 2009 9:28 utc | 2

i have said as much earlier on, one road out of hell via the Rafah crossing. ethnic cleansing,The Israeli pols are quite clear on the fact that the greater Israel is not complete until Gaza, all of Jerusalem and eventually the West Bank is integrated into what is/was biblical Israel. then of to Lebanon and Syria.
With Gaza rendered inhabitable, winter still on, a lot of women and children and elderly might seek ‘refuge’ in Egypt. and of course they will never have a right to return. I expect the men to try and hold out, but as they also want to be with their families – who knows.
why do people deny the obvious, Gaza makes no sense geopolitical in the ‘greater Israel’ dream. its a thorn in the eye, it needs to go.
Starvation and individual killings did not do the trick and will take to long.
But now, who will want to stay and rebuild in Gaza, and more importantly who will want to pay for rebuilding when everyone knows it is only a question of time (2 years max), for a new crop of Israeli draftees to arrive in need of target practice.
And Egypt with the help of bribes by eu/uk/us and a little bit of force and threat will comply, not having any other choice with their politicians payed and bought with US foreign and humanitarian aid.
Of course all of this will hide under the mantle of humanitarian aid and help for the poor wretched stressed wounded and demoralized people of Gaza.
tunnels, rockets, hamas, hogwash….pretense, made up reasons.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 18 2009 9:33 utc | 3

You’re right, b, looks like Israel has progressed from ‘collective retribution’ to ‘ethnic cleansing’.
What are you doing up at such an earthly hour?!

Posted by: Parviz | Jan 18 2009 9:35 utc | 4

parviz,
collective insomnia?

Posted by: sabine | Jan 18 2009 9:47 utc | 5

doubt it, somehow. remember Hamas wants the Rafah crossing open, too? Egypt (and Israel) wants to keep it closed? Hamas in Sinai would be much more efficient against Israel with help of the Muslim Brotherhood.
there has to be some kind of deal to stop the rocket fire. I can’t imagine the Gaza strip has run out after three weeks with an average of 20 rockets per day.

Posted by: outsider | Jan 18 2009 9:51 utc | 6

Egypt hardly wants to take the Gazans. Where are they going to go?

Posted by: Alex | Jan 18 2009 11:50 utc | 7

The tents are at the hospital. They must be for evacuated wounded, though nobody has been brought out so far. 200 tents is not enough for 1.5 million Palestinians.

Posted by: Alex | Jan 18 2009 12:06 utc | 8

About a week into Israel’s attack on Gaza, evicted Jewish residents from various communities petitioned the Israeli govt to let them resettle Gaza. I guess you would say they want the ‘right of return.’ I wonder if Israel will let them back, of course re-stealing the property of Gaza Palestinians.
Gush Katif evictees ask to return

Posted by: Ensley | Jan 18 2009 13:31 utc | 9

It’s the Gas offshore from Gaza.
Irony of ironies.

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jan 18 2009 13:58 utc | 10

They won’t go for complete cleansing of Gaza right now, I think; it’d be a bit too much. Though IDF might want to cleanse a nice wide strip along the border, where the tunnels are. The destruction of that village could be a clue and an example of what they have in mind. It wouldn’t mean 1.5 mio Gazans out in Egyptian desert, but several thousands, or more, evacuated from the border area.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Jan 18 2009 14:45 utc | 11

Sabine (5), go back to bed!
By the way, I’m 8 1/2 hours ahead of ET and do indeed detect occsional bouts of MoA collective insomnia, which means that I do occasionally find someone to talk to while it’s very dark over there.

Posted by: Parviz | Jan 18 2009 15:22 utc | 12

As I see it, Hamas wants the border permanently opened. What might be prepared here is a temporary one-way opening, i.e. let palestinians flee Gaza. After the bombardments IDF might not even need to shoot at them to get them to leave, just standing back a while might do it. New and improved cleansing. And then the fleeing palestinians would end up in a permanent refugee camp in Egypt, without jobs or rights. So another refugee camp could be added to the list.
After that the border would be shut again, to starve those that stayed behind. Officially to stop weapons smuggling. Repeat until there are so few left in Gaza that it can be safely colonized. If this is succesfull it will be repeated on the West bank. First intense violence, then let them flee, then intense violence, then let them flee…

Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Jan 18 2009 15:23 utc | 13

do not be surprised in the least when slothrop arrives with a filtered proposition that comes from his master thinker from his rhetorical royaume calling for a humanitarian extinction of the palestinian state, i will of course not be surprised at all – it is clear that slothrops sees himself as the ‘marxist’ adjunct to the american enterprise institute

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 18 2009 16:04 utc | 14

let’s see, slothrop will say we are wrong on the left to offer support for hamas – because they are fundamentalist kooks not open to his or john bolton’s fluid discourse, he will say that the political leadership of the palestinian leadership are none existent (again in his factless account he will not mention the massacres that constitute that)
he will then say that all arabs are feckless & he will bring out that hoary old argument that given that israel is the only democracy in the middle east – is stops the flood of the essentailist character of the people of the middle east (he will do this again – not knowing anything about the polyphonic nature of the cultrue & i think it is not an accident that slothrop has only one language – creating a kind of monomania in his texts) because in essence they are savages ready to seperate our head from our bodies (tho this will be filtered through something more ‘civilised’
he will then say like his friend bolton that the 2 state solution is dead, that jordan or egypt should be used to emasculate the palestian people
it is the way savagery has been articulated throughout the histories of empires
& slothrop always presumes the ‘civilisation’ of his culture – i on the contrary – think that western civilisation wavers from savager to barbarism & back again ? that, in essence, civilisation is very far from us

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 18 2009 16:58 utc | 15

re #14
how very convenient, simply have someone else take care of your problems, the land that has no value will be given to Jordan and Egypt and that is that. No right of return, nothing. and the Arabs and “West” have to pay for it.
r’giap, you have to be a serious masochist to read the vile bolton.
but, I bet you a dollar that this will get attention from all the serious pundits in DC. do not be surprised to hear Obama suggest himself. he does want to do something different in the middle east, right?

Posted by: dan of steele | Jan 18 2009 16:58 utc | 16

dan
the vile bolton is a ridiculous character – it is only in an impoverished world – that characters of such evil are given serious thought – normally they would be incarcerated – either in a hospital or prison

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 18 2009 17:01 utc | 17

this recent slaughter is probably the ‘softening the target’ for the neocon(bolton) eventuality. from the very beginning of it you could here shades of ‘move them to egypt’ coming round the bend. we are always the last to know.

Posted by: annie | Jan 18 2009 17:07 utc | 18

anni
watch as our slothrop present this as a good idea – with or without toupée – he will pretend unlike bolton – that it is a slefless mesure for the people of palestine
bloton however is so psychopathic thet even in an op ed page his hatred of the arab people drips from his every word
it would be a healthy sign if all the members of the american enterprise institute & connected ‘thinktanks’ are summarily arrested & are flown to bagram airbase to be interrogated

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 18 2009 17:16 utc | 19

@Parviz – By the way, I’m 8 1/2 hours ahead of ET and do indeed detect occsional bouts of MoA collective insomnia, which means that I do occasionally find someone to talk to while it’s very dark over there.
You are ahead only two or three hours of many posters here and even behind some. So don’t be surprised when they don’t post EST conform.

Posted by: b | Jan 18 2009 17:39 utc | 20

The heroism of the gazans is astonishing.

Posted by: slothrop | Jan 18 2009 17:56 utc | 21

b, thanks. What’s the approximate mix? e.g, 50 % U.S. nationwide, 30 % Europe, 15 % Far East and 5 % spread elsewhere? Or am I way off?

Posted by: Parviz | Jan 18 2009 18:55 utc | 22

remembereringgiap@14
I can see where Bolton’s idea will be taken very seriously by some. One the face of it, I have to admit, it seems like a reasonable way to deal with this particular problem of empire.
Of course, for me to do this, I need to forget thousands of years of Middle East history, which I can’t. But I’m sure it will be easy for the TV addicts to miss this salient point.
By the way, aren’t the Kurds suffering from a similar, but older, three-state solution?
The Neo-con types are quick to blame Iran for creating all the problems in the Middle East but many americans forget that Iranians are culturally different from the Arab states, despite their shared muslim religion. I might even be making some stupid cultural simplifications myself, but , from what little I remember this was part of the reason america helped install the Shaw.
The american political structure during the early fifties were trying to create other western-friendly states in the region and Iran was viewed as particularly favorable because of the cultural divide between the Persians and the Arabs.
Of course I shouldn’t forget that Mohammed Musaddiq was overthrown as much for control of his regions oil as anything.
Historically if you really look at how many different peoples lay claim to the region it seems crazy to create boarders defined by race. A solution I’ve read (I don’t remember where) was to have the UN take control of the region and turn it into some sort of peace zone managed by the UN.

Posted by: David | Jan 18 2009 18:58 utc | 23

Please, somebody, everybody, anybody, watch and comment on the video. Just to patronize me.

If a picture paints a thousand words then this one paints a trillion

Posted by: Parviz | Jan 18 2009 19:00 utc | 24

Bolton’s idea of a “three-state” solution is a complete non-starter, and not worth worrying about. Egypt and Jordan have absolutely no desire to take back the Palestinian territories they controlled before 1967. Though it is true that both countries are run by men more stupid than they were in the past. Only an ignoramus like Bolton could come up with such an idea.

Posted by: Alex | Jan 18 2009 19:19 utc | 25

Parviz, yes

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jan 18 2009 19:24 utc | 26

Parvis,
I would say that is about right when looking on the distribution of commenters. B could probably get some stats for all visitors.

Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Jan 18 2009 19:29 utc | 27

Parvis,
Powerful, wrenching.
I am truly angry and perplexed. What have the Palestinans done to merit the treatment meted out to them? Is there no leader (other than Hugo Chavez) who can stand up with a clear voice and condemn this massacre. Is there not one iota of human decency in any of the other world leaders? All I can do is live in the hope that the huge negative bias building up in the hearts and minds of decent people will eventually blowback onto that shitty little country in the middle east that is the cause of so much death and suffering in the world.

Posted by: Juno | Jan 19 2009 0:19 utc | 28

More pictures of the tents set up at Rafah can be seen at http://www.freespeechunlimited.com

Posted by: Avior | Jan 19 2009 11:02 utc | 29

the tents is going to be housing these people
A HREF=”http://archive.gulfnews.com/region/Egypt//”>link

Hundreds of victims of Israel’s three-week campaign in Gaza have been transferred across the Egyptian border at Rafah for urgent treatment. They are seen first at Al Arish, nearly 40 miles from the border.
Among them last week was nine-year-old Anas Haref, who arrived with a bullet in her brain. Dr Ahmad Yahia, head of the trauma team, broke the news to her grandmother that the girl was not expected to live.
“The bullet has damaged a big part of her brain,” said Dr Yahia. “It came in, hit the skull wall and then changed direction downwards.”

Posted by: sabine | Jan 20 2009 5:31 utc | 30

sorry for the ugly link thingy, i am still getting it sorted out, in a few hundred years i will be real good at it.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 20 2009 5:32 utc | 31

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