Bowed Heads and
Bantustans
Israel’s Vision of the Palestinian Future
by Neve Gordon
July 31, 2002
JERUSALEM: A few hours after the F-16 jet dropped a 1-ton
bomb on a crowded residential area in Gaza, killing 17 people -- 11 of them
children -- and wounding over 140 more, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon exclaimed
that the attack had been one of Israel's "biggest successes."
Israeli spin-doctors immediately understood that the
massacre would generate bad PR and changed the official line, using apologetic
adjectives like miscalculation, mistake, error, and oversight to describe the
deadly assault. Noble Peace Prize laureate Shimon Peres took it upon himself to
lead the remorseful choir, hoping to suppress world censure.
Despite harsh international criticism, Sharon remained
unrepentant. The Israeli press has suggested that his triumphant cry has less
to do with the operation's formal objective -- the extra-judicial execution of
Hamas leader Salah Shahada -- than with the successful annihilation of a
unilateral ceasefire agreement formally finalized by the different Palestinian
military factions a day before the massacre.
Predictably, Hamas did not wait long to retaliate. As I
write these lines, the television is broadcasting gory images of the dead and
wounded students of Hebrew University, which my partner and many of our friends
attend. Ambulance sirens echo outside, while every few minutes the number of
casualties is updated on the screen. Yet another massacre has been perpetrated.
There is nothing fatalistic about Middle East violence,
even though the carnage scenes have become routine. Butchery is an act of free
will. Sharon deliberately chose to add fuel to the dying fire when he bombed
Gaza, because he does not believe in a diplomatic solution to the bloody
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Neither do Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Sharon will now most likely use the Hamas attack in order
to justify Israel's further reoccupation of Palestinian territories. His
overall objective, though, is not to wipe out the Palestinian Authority, as
some commentators seem to suggest, but rather to forcibly change its role.
Regardless of whether or not Yasser Arafat remains in charge, if Sharon gets
his way, the "reformed" Palestinian Authority will no longer serve as
the political representative of an independent state. Rather, it will operate
as a civil administration of sorts, responsible for education, health, sewage
and garbage collection.
The strategy is clear: confer on the Palestinians the
costly role of managing civil life, but eliminate their political freedoms.
South Africans called it Bantustans.
To accomplish this vision Sharon needs to break the spirit
of the Palestinian people. This, it seems, is exactly what he has been trying
to do. Following the brutal Israeli assault
dubbed "Defensive Shield," he has held almost 2 million Palestinians
under tight military curfew. These people have been imprisoned in their homes
for over six weeks.
Sharon will continue the strangulation and humiliation of
the Palestinians, hoping that at a certain point they will bow down. The
reprisal attack by Hamas only gives him more ammunition, which is why he
considers the Gaza massacre a feat worth celebrating.
Neve
Gordon teaches politics at Ben-Gurion University,
Israel, and can be reached at ngordon@bgumail.bgu.ac.il