THE DEATH OF YASSER ARAFAT

A great human being has died. He was the symbolic figure of the Palestinian people, because he was able to stay faithful to his people even under the greatest threats for his life (e.g. Beirut, 1982). He did not become entangled in the bonds and chains that tie the smaller peoples of the world tightly to the worldwide system of power and globalisation.
Nevertheless, many times he had to comply with diplomatic manoeuvres that opposed the interest of his own people. In this way he came between all frontiers.
Arafat was a revolutionary, but not a terrorist. As a revolutionary leader of the former Fatah, and later the PLO, he was able to extend his hand in reconciliation towards former enemies (e.g. Rabin). He knew the path of freedom and humanity and was ready to demand much of his people for these ideals (e.g. full recognition by the state of Israel). But he also knew the desperation of his people in the face of the imperial power politics of the military state of Israel. He knew the suffering of those whose olive trees have been cut down, whose water has been taken away and whose houses have been demolished. In this difficult situation he certainly did not always take the right decisions. Dear reader, if you had to watch how your friends are murdered, would you be able to appease your own comrades and negotiate peacefully with the murderers?
Of course, many Israelis had to face the same suffering. Nevertheless one has to see: Israel had the power and the money for a different solution to the conflict. With international support they could have ensured that the Palestinians, who share the same land with them, could have a future worth living. But the Israeli state is part of an international power cartel – it is supported through international, mainly American, money and weapons. This leads many of the Israeli people, who can not comprehend this situation, and inumerable Palestinians into unbearable human suffering.
Arafat was in a conflict that was no longer solvable on a human level. Hardly any political leader had to face such an unsolvable and cruel situation as Yasser Arafat. In addition, his personal living space was persistently decreased and destroyed – during the last years he could barely move. Certainly the reasons for his disease are to be found here.
It is not about glorifying Arafat. Great people sometimes make great mistakes. It is not up to us to judge his character. It is about working against the misinformation of the mainstream media and helping to bring out the truth.
One will say now that my view is too one-sided. We respect and honour the Jewish culture, and we know how much persecution the Jewish people had to endure through almost all its history. We have always held real respect for the wish of the Jewish people of reunion in the Holy Land. But because of this we have to raise our voice, for what is taking place in the Middle East has less to do with the Holy Land than with money and military policies of an international power cartel.
Please do not believe the information brought to you by public media. Rather, draw from authentic sources. Rather read, for example, books written by intimate experts like Uri Avnery, Felicia Langer or Ernest Goldberger. Under the eyes of the world public a people is being destroyed here without anybody seriously interfering. Is it really wrong to compare this to what happened under Hitler in Germany and the surrounding countries? The world closed its eyes there as well. Should we be silent again today? Stay silent again and again to the massacres that are committed today in the name of an international consortium of corporate groups, banks, governments, secret services and militaries all over the world? Stay silent about the massacres committed by the USA in Guatemala, Afghanistan, Iraq and so on? Stay silent about the massacres committed by Putin in Chechnya, Ossetia and so on? Stay silent about the unbearable crimes committed by China every day against Tibet? Stay silent about the demolitions committed by Israel in the Occupied Territories of Palestine …?
It is twisting the truth to claim that the Israeli atrocities are a response to the Palestinian terror. It was, rather, the other way around: the Palestinian terror was the response to the conquering (USA supported) politics of Israel. One has to know to what extent Israel has violated human rights – at least from the Six-day-War in 1967 onwards – to understand the situation of the Palestinians.
One calls this antisemitic?
Was it forgotten that Israelis and Palestinians are semitic all the same? Antisemitism was what was done to the Jewish people under Hitler. Antisemitism today is what is done to the Palestinians by Israeli politics and military with international support. The holocaust, under Fascism, must not remain an eternal excuse for Israel’s current actions, or the silence of the media and politicians about it. Let us not continue with terms that have always served to camouflage injustice. Whoever was a victim back then does not have the right to be a victimizer today.
The suffering of the Palestinian people had become unbearable long ago. Do you seriously believe it is pure menace or terroristic affinity when a 20 year old woman walks into a crowd with explosives around her waist and blows herself up? Would she not have chosen a different life? How deeply hurt and desperate must a young person be to do such a thing? This is no murder in the common way. This is overwhelming powerlessness and a last outcry against violence that can not come by throwing stones.
I know that this does not help the victims on the Israeli side. Here, as there, the same tears are shed. But maybe through giving truthfully accounts we can contribute to the end of the killing on both sides. Let us be careful when there is talk about “terrorism”. Indeed we live in a time of terror, but this is not only committed by the victims. In public terminology only those violent acts are named terrorism that harm the existing system of power. But they are built on terror themselves and keep spreading it every day. Did anybody think about all the destruction of life and violence (against nature, animals, children, peoples of the “third world” etc.) that is behind the stock exchange of the large corporations?
If there was an anti-fascist movement today it would fight the Israeli politics and create a public forum for truth to be called out in all directions. Help for Palestine!
But also help and solidarity for all Israelis who resist the injustice of their state and participate in informing the public. In the Middle East initiative that Tamera has been building up for a few years now people from Israel and Palestine meet to develop a common concept for peace. At its current state it is about the planning and preparation of a Peace Village, for which we have fairly mature plans in social and technological design. (For people who are more familiar with our project already: It is about the combination of the social design of a Healing Biotope as it is developed for some years now in Tamera/Portugal with the technological design of the “SolarPowerVillage”, creating new possibilities of food and energy supply especially in the dry and poor areas of the earth.)
As everywhere on earth, the war in the Middle East can not be ended by conventional means anymore. We need a positive vision for a new world of peace. A vision that is beyond the current positions of both sides. Such a vision can spread as a field building power once it is realized and functions anywhere. In this sense we work on the concrete build up of a “Global Peace Village”. With this we reflect upon the root meaning of the “Holy Land” in our times. May the holy source from which both came, join them again. For three years now every Friday at 10 o’clock am the big chime is rung to stop working for a moment and send a peace prayer to Israel and Palestine.
Shalom and Salam!

Dieter Duhm, Sabine Lichtenfels and Benjamin von Mendelssohn
Institute for Global Peacework (IGF) in Tamera/Portugal
Tamera, 12.11.2004