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One thing which this recent crisis
by Ted Rudow III, MA ( Tedr77 [at] aol.com )
Thursday May 27th, 2010


One thing which this recent crisis in the Mideast should show the world is that nothing has really changed in the Mideast. There's been talk of "Peace, peace" for years now, and that's about all it's been--talk.
Now sudden destruction has come upon the area, as travail upon a woman with child. It was inevitable, just like a woman going into labor when she's ready to deliver a child.
The Israelis have remained the same as always. Oh, they've talked of peace, and they've thrown the Palestinians a few crumbs here and there. They've let them control their little villages and rundown cities and slums, establish their own police force to arrest their own troublemakers, pick up their own garbage, and elect their own officials to supervise all that, but it's all pretty meaningless and no skin off the Israeli nose. The Israelis didn't want to run the dumps and dungheaps they let the Palestinians have anyway; it took too much time and energy away from their other work and was too much trouble.
They let the Palestinians have a few status symbols, things like their own airport and pass­ports and govern­ment buildings here and there, but a lot of good it did the Palestinians! At the first sign of trouble, the Israelis closed down their airport so the Palestinians couldn't fly out. They sealed off their cities and territories with tanks and troops so they couldn't go in or out, so what good were their passports? And they sent helicopter gunships to bombard some of their government buildings, police stations and TV stations with rockets, blasting them into oblivion. So much for symbols of Palestinian sovereignty and concessions from the Israelis!
The poor Palestinians have been hoping for change for years, but there's been very little change. They may seem to control their own little towns now, if you can call their run-down collection of huts and hovels such a thing, but at the first outbreak of violence they're surrounded by Israeli tanks and snipers. Even without violence, if they want to travel from one city to another, one place to another, they pass through Israeli roadblocks and suffer all sorts of indignities in the process.
Ted Rudow III,MA