---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2000 12:17:18 +0000 From: MER <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: MER <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: East Jerusalem Chaos, Fear, Repression _______ ____ ______ / |/ / /___/ / /_ // M I D - E A S T R E A L I T I E S / /|_/ / /_/_ / /\\ Making Sense of the Middle East /_/ /_/ /___/ /_/ \\ EAST JERUSALEM CHAOS AND FEAR http://www.MiddleEast.Org News, Information, & Analysis That Governments, Interest Groups, and the Corporate Media Don't Want You To Know! - - - - - - - - - - IF YOU DON'T GET MER, YOU JUST DON'T GET IT! To receive MER regularly email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] MID-EAST REALITIES - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington, D.C. - 6/12: It's a very complicated situation; and a very sensitive time. In one very important sense articles of this kind coming right now play into the Israeli hand by making it possible to further push and cajole Yasser Arafat into a "final settlement" at a time of maximum Israeli power -- and this is clearly the main goal of former commando General now PM Ehud Barak. On the other hand such articles also further stimulate the Israeli opposition -- but this is probably thought to be a necessary scenario if the public relations aspects of all this are to work so that Arafat can be brought to the White House lawn pen in hand one more "final" time. So much for the timing aspects, however. What is more and more clear overall is that the Israelis are trying to bring to the now-enclaved Palestinians a kind of mafia statelet where repression, lawlessness, fear, and corruption are considerably greater than at any time in the past and can be locked in for some time to come. Such a regime fits well the kind of sandwich the Zionists and the Hashemites have long wanted to have with the Palestinians wedged inside. Rather than real independence and freedom in a democratic State, the Israelis through the Arafat regime (and with much help and encouragement form the Hashemite Regime) are attempting to trap the Palestinians into "final status" agreements from which fear will be ever-present and extrication exceedingly difficult. Doing so involves allowing to develope, at least for now, the situation that is described in this Ha'aretz article about East Jerusalem. ABDUCTION OPPOSITE THE JUSTICE MINISTRY "...the approaching negotiations on Jerusalem will be accompanied by serious Intifada incidents within the city, as a means of pressure to obtain concessions." "...the residents of East Jerusalem, who for years saw Israeli rule as permanent, are no longer sure of this." "PA uses terror - including murder - to control Jerusalem Arabs." [Ha'aretz, by Nadav Shragai, 12 June 2000]: #1 PA kidnaps people in the middle of Jerusalem for criticizing PA and suspicion of cooperating with Israel About a month ago, N. was driving his car down Saladin Street in the center of East Jerusalem. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a vehicle speeding towards him from behind. Within a few seconds the car blocked his way, two husky fellows jumped out, opened the doors of his car, held a pistol to his head and ordered him to drive in the direction of Jericho. For three weeks N. was held on the premises of the Palestinian security service and interrogated on suspicion of having collaborated with Israel. The abduction itself, symbolically enough, was carried out opposite the Israeli Justice Ministry on Saladin Street, and the details of it became known to Israeli police investigators from N. himself, only after he was released. Y., a teacher in a municipal school in Jerusalem, had a similar experience. He was abducted as he was crossing the street near the school where he teaches. He, too, was blocked by a car. He was taken to Abu Dis, where the abductors, members of the Palestinian security force, changed cars and continued to Ramallah. Y. was tortured, and returned home after three weeks, exhausted and broken. Last weekend, Palestinian journalist Maher al Alami was kidnapped from his home in Shuafat, after he expressed criticism of the policies of the PA in the field of human rights. In recent months a similar fate also befell three Muslim clergymen connected to the mosques in Ras al Amud, Beit Tsafafa and Hizma. Two weeks ago, elements at the Shin Bet informed Minister of Public Security Shlomo Ben-Ami that since the beginning of the year, more than 40 people - some of them Israeli citizens - have been abducted from Jerusalem, which is under Israeli sovereignty, by Palestinian security forces. Not long ago the government was informed that the Israeli security services have in their possession a list of 42 Palestinian land dealers who are being threatened by the Palestinian security services because of professional connections with Jewish land purchasers. This is not the first time that the PA security services have operated on Saladin Street. In at least one case they used the modus operandi of civil police. #2 PA security takes the place of Israeli Police - Israel Police recommend dealing with PA instead of Israel in Jerusalem One of the buildings on the street, which is abandoned, became a center for drug dealers and narcotics addicts. The neighbors recall that once or twice they complained to the Jerusalem police, but nothing happened, so the PA security service was called into action. Eyewitnesses relate that Palestinian police wearing civilian clothes dragged out of the building three young men known to be drug dealers and beat them up. The three were taken for interrogation to a Palestinian police installation in Ramallah. A strange incident, which apparently is not the only one of its kind, took place recently in the Beit Hanina area. The house of one of the residents of the village was broken into. The man rushed to the nearest police station and there, to his astonishment, the duty officer, an Israeli policeman, directed him to the men of Jibril Rajoub's Preventive Security force. "They are patrolling the area. Ask them for help," recommended the duty officer in all seriousness. #3 Israel find hard to keep track of the 6 PA security organizations operating in Jerusalem A many-tentacled octopus There are six Palestinian intelligence and security forces active in Jerusalem, to a greater or lesser extent. Professionals in Israel sometimes find it hard to define their functioning, in part because of the internal competition among these bodies themselves. The most active is Jibril Rajoub's Preventive Security force. He has at his disposal, in Jerusalem alone, hundreds of men in the field, many of them graduates of Israeli prisons who served terms for hostile acts. Five additional bodies, apart from Rajoub's men, are also active in the city, with varying degrees of intensity. The Palestinian General Intelligence, headed by Toufiq Tarawi, is very active in engaging collaborators within the city. Force 17 is commanded in the West Bank by Feisal Abu Sharah, who visits Jerusalem from time to time. The "blue" Palestinian Police is under Razi Jibali, who is located in Gaza; his representative in Jerusalem is Muhammed Jabri, who operates from Ramallah to Abu Dis. There is also the Military Intelligence headed by Moussa Arafat, and finally, the "Provincial Security," which is subordinate to the governor of the Province of Jerusalem, Jamal Othman Nasser. The men of this branch are active in particular in the organization of sulhas - formal reconciliations between feuding individuals or families - and the enforcement of rulings by the Palestinian mediation bodies. #4 GSS first wanted PA to operate in Jerusalem - now out of control The security services of the PA began operating in Jerusalem about seven years ago with the agreement of the Shin Bet. At first, this was minor, clandestine activity, almost on tiptoe, but gradually it grew to such dimensions that a senior Shin Bet official has recently called the phenomenon "a many-tentacled octopus. A Golem that has risen up against its creator." The Israeli agreement to security activity by the PA in Jerusalem was given because of operational considerations of the Shin Bet. With the withdrawal from territories in Judea and Samaria and the collapse of the network of collaborators to which Israel was connected, the Shin Bet found it difficult to obtain information of what was going on in those areas. The Intifada and the strengthening of the power of the PA in Jerusalem also created intelligence difficulties within the city itself. The PA was prepared to help Israel with preventive intelligence under certain conditions, the most important of which was freedom of action in East Jerusalem. Israel agreed to pay the Palestinians in the coinage of jurisdiction in Jerusalem, and to come to terms with the existence of foreign police, enforcement, prevention and intelligence forces in its capital in exchange for services the Palestinians provided in other areas, and sometimes in Jerusalem itself. Gradually, the operations grew to dimensions that are out of control, which has led to protests not only from the Israel Police but also from the Shin Bet. However, the top government level, in its various manifestations (former prime ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, Benjamin Netanyahu and currently Prime Minister Ehud Barak), in coordination with the head of the Shin Bet, have chosen to turn a blind eye. #5 PA uses terror - including murder - to control Jerusalem Arabs, operates from many locations Operations from innocent sites Looking the other way exacts a price. Israeli apparently has gained intelligence cooperation with the Palestinians - which by its very nature remains secret, so that it is hard to evaluate it - but has lost portions of sovereignty and control in the area it has declared to be its capital. The Palestinian security forces prevented Arab citizens of East Jerusalem from voting in the municipal elections and have imposed terror, beaten people up, thrown cherry bombs, threatened and called commercial strikes. The Arabs of East Jerusalem, as an independent constituency, participated in the elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council. The Palestinian security organizations replaced the mufti, who had been appointed by Jordan on the Temple Mount, with a mufti of their own choosing and have detailed armed body guards to Palestinian VIPs, as a way of demonstrating their power. They have also detailed their own guards to the Shaariya religious court in East Jerusalem. The Palestinian security organizations have invested considerable money and resources in the establishment of a network of collaborators and informers, with one aim - the prevention of real estate deals designed ultimately to bring land into Jewish hands. And frequently, they have succeeded. The height of the operations against the land dealers has been, as is known, the murder of a number of them. Rajoub's men and Tirawi's men have summoned residents of East Jerusalem to testify, for interrogations and for questioning. Sometimes they have been tortured, or held under arrest for many long weeks. The "reconciliation commissions" - mechanisms for mediation - have become a part of life in East Jerusalem, and anyone who insists on turning to an Israeli court has been subjected to threats or even the victim of violence. The Palestinian Police has become an address for complaints in criminal matters and property matters in East Jerusalem. The principal of a school in Beit Hanina, who was beaten up by her students, turned to the PA Police. The Indian ambassador to Israel, who one day discovered that the Palestinians had taken over the Al Aksa School building in the Old City - real estate under Indian ownership - chose to turn to the PA people, and not to the Foreign Ministry or to the Israeli courts. An intelligence report that surveys the modes of operation of the Palestinian security organizations in Jerusalem reveals that they operate "as the opportunity presents from seemingly innocent sites such as the Ambassador Hotel, the American Colony Hotel, the Shabiba center on Saladin Street, the Palestinian Prisoners Club in the Nuzha Building, the Philadelphia Restaurant on Rashidiya Street and the Al Quds Restaurant on Saladin Street. "Detective operations are carried out, along with patrols and demonstrations of presence in areas where there is criminal activity by drug dealers, prostitutes and pickpockets, for example in the environs of Gethsemene, Saint Anne's Church, the Lions Gate' and the Via Dolorosa," the report says. "They are guarding the Al Aksa Mosque and have detailed bodyguards to the governor of the province, the mufti and other dignitaries." # 6 PA extorts funds from Jerusalem Arabs The report also looks at their operational methods: "The funding of some of their activities by 'donations," which are on the borderline of extortion/protection money from wealthy people in Jerusalem;" "the use of couriers, usually taxi drivers on the Jerusalem-Abu Dis line, for transmitting messages;" "the use of hired guns" and "the use of operational cells who carry out special missions - abductions and punishments." #7 GSS admits situation out of control with PA ignoring limits set on operations Toufiq Tarawi himself told Palestinian Television only a few months ago (February 20) that: "Insofar as possible, and even though there are provisions in the agreement that anyone carrying an Israeli identity card must not be arrested," Palestinians with Israeli papers are also arrested. "We arrest them and bring them to trial," said Tirawi. "Among them are people who have spent three or four months in prison, and have been released on bail or not on bail." "Israel's dependence on the Palestinian security services," admitted a top Shin Bet official a few months ago, "is what gave rise to the growth of these bodies in East Jerusalem, and now we are no longer the only address there." However, it was not only this dependence that led to the PA takeover of East Jerusalem. Alongside the security operations, the PA continues to conducted considerable diplomatic activity in East Jerusalem, as if it were its capital. The minister in charge of Jerusalem affairs, Minister Without Portfolio Haim Ramon, has recently said several times from the Knesset podium that the extent and level of diplomatic activity has gone down since Ehud Barak took office, particularly at the Orient House. Feisal Husseini addressed the limitations imposed by Israel on activity at the Orient House during the visit by Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Jozias van Aartsen in September 1999 to the al Mukassed Hospital in East Jerusalem: "The Palestinians have begun to receive their visitors at different sites in East Jerusalem. In effect, nothing has changed. Even if the meetings do not take place at Orient House, that is still where they are organized." #8 Hundreds of PA events in Jerusalem since Barak's election, official foreign visitors Since Barak was elected prime minister, there have been hundreds of events held in East Jerusalem organized or under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority. Here are some of the more outstanding ones: the Palestinian Minister of Social Affair Intisar Al Wazir (Umm Jihad) held a working visit to the Austrian Center for Community Aid in the Old City; the PA's mufti, Sheikh Arama Tsabari, hosted a representative of the American Consulate in Jerusalem in his office on the Temple Mount; Feisal Husseini had diplomatic talks with the Russian envoy to the Middle East, Aleksander Sultanov; Moroccan legislators and mayors visited Orient House and the Temple Mount as Husseini's guests. This was a return visit after Husseini, as a representative of Al Quds (Jerusalem), signed a twin cities agreement with the city of Fez; the speaker of the Jordanian parliament visited Orient House as the official guest of the Palestinian Legislative Council and its speaker, Ahmad Qureia (Abu Ala). There have also been visits to Orient House by official delegations from Tunisia and Qatar, as well as by French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine and the interior minister of Zimbabwe. Palestinian security men accompanying high-ranking foreign visitors distance, often by force, Israeli security men who try to continue to perform their duty inside Orient House, which even now enjoys in effect extra-territorial status. At the American Colony hotel, British Foreign Minister Robin Cook paid a visit. The Palestinian Authority Culture and Arts Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo, has visited Palestinian cultural institutions in the city. At the offices of the Chamber of Commerce a cooperation agreement between the PA and the government of Tunisia was signed; at Orient House, a cooperation agreement with Israeli Arabs was signed. Members of the Palestinian Legislative Council took part. A site that has become particularly popular during recent months, which has gradually replaced Orient House as the venue for the reception of official guests, is the Temple Mount. There, among others, the vice consul of the United States, the French consul, the Spanish ambassador to Israel, a religious figure from India and the Jordanian minister of culture have been greeted as official guests of the PA and its mufti. #9 Israel security warns of danger of handing over Abu Dis to PA Losing control At a meeting of the Jerusalem Forum that was held at the Public Security Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami's office about two weeks ago, security sources estimated that the handing over of Abu Dis, its great proximity to Jerusalem and the territorial continuity between it and al Azzariya and Arab neighborhoods within the jurisdiction of the Jerusalem municipality will lead to a further expansion of PA activities in East Jerusalem in general and on the Temple Mount in particular. Ben-Ami asked whether anyone though that there was a positive side to the handing over of Abu Dis to the Palestinians. No one said a word. Alongside the intensive security operations of the PA in Jerusalem, Israel has succeeded over the past year-and-a-half in significantly increasing the sense of security among Israelis who live in or visit East Jerusalem. The markets in East Jerusalem, especially in the Old City, are buzzing with tourists and Israelis, as they had not been for some years now, and there is almost no hostile terrorist activity. However, there is a fear that this quiet is only temporary. #10 PA expected to clash in Jerusalem to pressure to concessions The governing infrastructure that the PA has built up for itself in East Jerusalem is the basis for the demand the PA Chairman Yasser Arafat is now making in the talks with Israel to get real authority in East Jerusalem. Intelligence estimates are that the approaching negotiations on Jerusalem will be accompanied by serious Intifada incidents within the city, as a means of pressure to obtain concessions. In this campaign, activists of the Tanzim (the popular movement of the Fatah) are expected to take part. They participated in the recent violent outbreaks in the territories, and in one way or another the security organizations and the diplomatic institutions operating in the city on behalf of the PA are also expected to take part. Israel, which for years has been trying to depict East Jerusalem as an integral part of the country, is now, after 33 years, discovering that in many senses the Arab areas of the city are being taken from its hands. #11 Not all east Jerusalem residents want PA - looking for refuge in Israel Not all the residents of East Jerusalem are pleased with this emerging trend. There are still several advantages to living in Israeli Jerusalem: National Insurance Institute payments to children and the elderly and national health insurance, as well as the freedom of expression and human rights, which are not among the sacred principles of the Palestinian. People have an eye on their own interests as well as on their principles. It is for this reason, perhaps, that when the first reports came out of Israel's intention to hand over to the Palestinian Authority civil-municipal control of Beit Hanina and Shuafat, a number of wealthy residents of these neighborhoods hastened to look into the possibility of acquiring "refuge apartments" in the "secure area" - in Jewish neighborhoods like Nahalaot and Pisgat Ze'ev. It is too early to evaluate whether this interest is the beginning of a trend. It is clear, however, that the residents of East Jerusalem, who for years saw Israeli rule as permanent, are no longer sure of this. 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