[Reader-list] The world just watches - IHT

[Harsh Kapoor]

The International Herald Tribune                 April 5, 2002

The world just watches

      By Neta Golan

For the international peace observers currently holed up within Yasser
Arafat's presidential compound - myself among them - it is not Israeli
actions but the inaction of the international community that has most
shocked us.

Inside the pock-marked building surrounded by Israeli tanks and snipers,
there is one question on everyone's minds: How many international laws does
Israel need to break before the United Nations demands a full and immediate
Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank?

The list of violations is reaching unprecedented levels, even for a conflict
with a long history of ugly behavior on both sides. Collective punishment is
illegal under international law, but Israel has now escalated from
interrupting food shipments to shutting off water to the Palestinian city of
Ramallah, endangering the lives of 120,000 people. The shelling of
Palestinian civilian structures such as power plants, schools and sewage
facilities is occurring at an alarming rate. Unarmed civilians are being
killed daily.

There are also growing reports of Israeli troops raiding hospitals and
firing on ambulances and journalists. These are grave breaches of
international conventions.

Anthony Shadid, a correspondent for The Boston Globe, was shot on Sunday as
he walked away from an interview in our building. The area, under full
Israeli control, was quiet and there was no crossfire. Shadid was wearing
the required signs on his back and front indicating that he was with the
official press. Soon after he arrived at a hospital, Israeli troops raided
it with machine guns drawn. When he was subsequently transferred for further
medical treatment, his ambulance came under fire from Israeli soldiers
manning a checkpoint.

Israel is making a mockery of the Fourth Geneva Convention, the founding
document of international human rights law, and by its tacit acceptance, the
United Nations is severely eroding its credibility in the region and beyond.


Those of us inside the presidential compound need help desperately - but not
half as much as those on the outside who are facing the full brunt of the
mass round-ups and house-to-house raids. The situation cannot deteriorate
much further. Medical supplies have run out. Food is scarce.

Pressure from abroad is essential. The presence of international "human
shields" throughout the occupied territories has been very important in
limiting the indiscriminate nature of Israeli military actions.

Nothing short of a UN demand for a full withdrawal to the 1967 UN recognized
borders, however, will succeed in restoring calm and opening the way for
peace negotiations. Simply pulling the troops out of the recently invaded
regions will not suffice. In the compound we are left wondering, not without
fear, whether the international community will allow the permanent expansion
of the already illegal occupation and the exile if not assassination of the
Palestinian leader.


Neta Golan, an Israeli, is among the 40 international peace observers
occupying Yasser Arafat's besieged office. This comment, which she wrote
with Ian Urbina, an associate editor of the Washington-based magazine Middle
East Report, was contributed to the International Herald Tribune.