Area Israelis, Palestinians speak out on war

Font Size:

By Thomas Geyer | Saturday, July 22, 2006 | No comments posted

With Israeli defense forces attacking Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza in retribution for the kidnapping of three soldiers earlier this month, Quad-Citians on both sides of the issue have been closely watching developments.

For Rabbi Henry Karp of Temple Emanuel in Davenport, he says Hamas — which won the majority of seats in the Palestinian Parliament during January elections — is showing its true colors.

John Dabeet, of Muscatine, Iowa, the founder and president of Americans and Palestinians for Peace, or AMPAL, said the root cause of the problem that sparked the violence in Palestine and Lebanon is not being addressed.

Israel, Karp said, “waited to see if Hamas would take the mantle of leadership and take responsibility, or continue its quest to eliminate Israel. Now they’ve found out.”

Hamas conducted a raid from Gaza and captured Israeli Cpl. Gilad Shalit on June 25.

“When Hamas accepted responsibility for this kidnapping, it was made crystal clear Hamas is committed to the course it had set out for itself before the election; and that is as an organization devoted to terrorism, to death, to killing and to the death of Israel,” Karp said.

The kidnapping was an act of war, he said, as was the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev by Hezbollah during a cross-border raid from Lebanon that prompted the bombing of Lebanon.

“Hamas and Hezbollah are now in a state of war with Israel,” Karp said.

But for too long, Dabeet said, American and Israeli foreign policy has marginalized the Arab man.

“The only thing an Arab person wants is justice,” said Dabeet, a native Palestinian and Christian Arab who teaches economics at Muscatine Community College.

“And the Palestinians believe they are not receiving justice,” he said.

Dabeet said he still remembers being turned away from his father’s house in Jaffa in what now is Israel at age 3.

He and his family learned that Jewish settlers had moved into the house only when a stranger opened the door and refused them entrance, he added. His father still held the deed.

A just peace with Israel, he said, will be based upon Israel returning the lands that have been occupied since 1967.

“We’re not asking for the whole of Palestine,” Dabeet said. “We’re giving up 78 percent of Palestine. What we are talking about is the remaining 22 percent.

“And I will guarantee they will not find one Palestinian who is willing to give up one percent of that 22 percent,” he added.

The United States has no right to criticize Israel’s actions against Hamas in Gaza, or against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, Karp said.

“In response to one morning of terrorism,” he said, the United States “has invaded two sovereign countries and overthrown their governments.”

Israel, he said, has a right to protect itself. “Israel has responded in the only way a responsible country could respond,” Karp said.

“Unless something dramatic happens,” he said, “Israel now will not stop until Hamas is destroyed. To stop short is only to ask for future anguish.”

Dabeet said Israel’s right to exist is well established. “But they want to keep killing us, demolishing our homes, and separating families and brothers and sisters, and building their apartheid wall,” he said.

The only country that can put pressure on Israel is the United States, he added.

“The majority of Arabs in the streets are not against Americans, they’re against U.S. foreign policy,” he said.

And unless the United States is willing to tell Israel to give back the lands occupied in 1967, he said, Arab people who support the Palestinians, “will ensure there will be no peace, and there will be no stability.”

Thomas Geyer can be contacted at (563) 383-2328 or tgeyer@qctimes.com.