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Israel Rejects Peace & Palestine's Right to Exist

Israel Rejects Peace and Palestine's Right to Exist


By Genevieve Cora Fraser

Following nearly 21,600 days (60 years) of non-stop violence towards the Palestinians, Israel has once again refused Palestinians their Right to Return and Just Compensation as required by international law under UN Resolution 194.

According to Nobel Prize winner, Vice Premier Shimon Peres, "the Palestinians should forgo their demands for the right of return for Palestinian refugees."

“Right of return means only one thing - turning Israel into a Palestinian state,” Peres claims.

Shortly after the Zionist government was founded, Israel agreed to the terms of Resolution 194 as a basic condition of their legitimacy as a nation. Instead, they have spent 60 years denying Palestine's Right to Exist, despite the fact that it has existed since at least the ancient Persian Empire over 2,500 years ago, as maps of the empire demonstrate.

To insure that Palestine won't exist in the future, Israel has changed Israeli maps, renaming all of Palestine as part of Israel. Since 1967, Israel has also exercised a brutal siege over the population. Also known as, The Occupation, the Israeli government has waged non-stop violence against Palestine which includes, but is not limited to, the erection of a concentration camp Wall that allows them to starve and bombard the population at will.

Recently, the Israeli cabinet voted overwhelmingly to boycott the newly established Palestinian Unity Government. Israel hopes its actions will continue to inspire the United States and European nations to maintain their blockade of food, medicine, and money. In addition, Israel has prevented repairs to infrastructure, including electrical generation plants, which it had destroyed throughout sections of Gaza. One of the benefits to Israel is that by maintaining a stranglehold over the Palestinian land base, it can more easily confiscate Palestine's water supply for Israeli use or sell the water back to the population at exorbitant prices.

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Defining the Palestinian government, which is dominated by the ruling Hamas party, as a terrorist organization, Israel recently received billions more in aid from the United States in their effort to continue to hold the population at bay. Israel's efforts have not only been largely successful, it is believed by human rights and health organizations that by maintaining near starvation conditions and the loss of infrastructure has created conditions in Palestine which will further demoralize the population and make them increasingly prone to disease and premature death.

US Presidential hopefuls in both parties have lined up to praise and support Israeli actions. Writing on behalf of Salon, Gregory Levey commented that the closing dinner of the AIPAC conference was attended by a “who’s who of Washington’s A-list”.

Rejecting any progress toward a peace settlement is critical at this time for Democrats and Republicans alike, otherwise candidates are viewed as soft on terrorism, despite the Iraq Study Group's recommendation that progress on the Palestinian problem could help avert a conflagration in the greater Middle East.

It is estimated that there are approximately 9,395,000 Palestinians world-wide, with about 3.4 million living in the West Bank and Gaza. Palestine's refugee population is considered to be the largest in the world which adds considerably to tensions.

Palestinians have traditionally been considered to be among the most educated people in the world and, prior to Israel's onslaught, was prosperous by world standards. Yet today, many of Palestine's refugees live in squalor, restricted in their ability to work and subsisting mostly on hand outs from the United Nations and a few donor nations. Current Palestinian refugee counts include:


• Jordan 1,827,877 refugees

• Gaza 986,034 refugees

• West Bank 699,817 refugees

• Syria 432,048 refugees

• Lebanon 404,170 refugees

• Saudi Arabia 240,000 refugees

• Egypt 70,245 refugees

ENDS

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