http://www.ramallahonline.com/article.php?sid=424
by Edna Yaghi "Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them
not: for of such is the kingdom of God." - Prophet Jesus Summer is a time
when children fly kites high in the air-kites of all different shapes,
sizes and colors. Summer is a time when kids spend lazy hours by ponds
watching ducks and geese float merrily along lethargic lakes set against a
background of manicured rolling lawns.
Summer is a time when children play soccer on fields of green. It is a time
when they ride their bicycles and sell cool-aide at homemade stands. It is
a time when they count the stars lacing cool summer evenings and a time
when they dream of what their future might be. Summer is a time when
mothers take their infants out for a stroll on paved avenues. It is a time
when infants stare wide eyed in innocence at the world around them. Summer
is a time when children bathe in the sea and build sandcastles on the
beach. It is a celebration of life. It is in the summer when things take
wing, gardens bear fruit and picnics abound. But such things occur in
places where there is peace and where there is no war. In Occupied
Palestine, summer brings no special happiness for children. During the
Intifada, it is almost impossible to fly carefree kites. There are no ponds
to watch ducks and geese floating merrily on. Water supplies are cut off
from Palestinian cities and villages. Israeli soldiers shoot water tanks on
top of Palestinian homes to further exacerbate the critical water shortage.
And fresh springs are filled with cement or polluted so that the people in
the surrounding areas are not able to consume what little water there is.
With no water, there are no cool-aide stands and no chance for children to
sell their wares to passersby and no peaceful moments anyway even if there
were pure and bountiful supplies of water. There is little opportunity for
children to ride bicycles or scooters. And there is no time to stare at
evening skies or count stars. Palestinian children are more preoccupied
with merely staying alive. For those children brave enough to confront a
heavily armed enemy who occupies their land, there are Israelis snipers who
aim at infant hearts and heads in retaliation for a single stone. Many
children who have miraculously survived bullets aimed at their hearts and
heads will have to go through the rest of their lives as physically
impaired people. Thousands of such Palestinian children will never walk
again or see. Some children caught throwing stones are arrested by Israeli
soldiers and taken to prison. There they are severely beaten and tortured.
Some children have died due to torture. No human being should be tortured
but to subject a child to such inhuman treatment is the highest form of
savagery. One report about how Israeli police torture these children
included these methods: forcing children to stand in painful positions for
prolonged periods of time, beating minors severely for many hours and at
times these beatings were carried out with the use of various objects,
pushing children�s heads into toilet bowls and flushing the toilet, making
death threats and cursing and humiliating these children. A testimony from
Mohammed Sabatin, a 14 year old, states that 4 policemen took him, searched
him and beat him in front of his parents. Then the boy saw a strong
dark-skinned man dressed in civilian clothes enter the room where Mohammed
was being detained. The man kicked the boy with great force, beat him and
then put him in a room where 4 policemen were seated. Two of these
policemen tied the boy�s hands and feet and blindfolded him and took him to
a room with the blindfold still on. The 4 policemen took turns beating the
boy for about 4 hours. They hit him with a mop stick, kicked him all over
his body and swore at him in filthy language. Just recently, a family
traveling to a wedding ceremony was attacked by Jewish terrorists. Three
people were shot to death that day, including a tiny baby boy only 3 months
old. His mother, who was not in the car at the time of the attack, held up
his bloody clothes and wept. She had been trying to have a child for 10
years. Her son, Diya, was her only child. Five people from the same family,
including a four-month old girl and a three-year-old girl were wounded. On
Friday, July 20, infant Diya was wrapped in a tiny Palestinian flag and
carried in a funeral procession along with his dead relatives, through the
West Bank city of Hebron to his home village, Ithna. Baby Diya�s aunt, a
young bride of 17, contorted from pain in a hospital. She had been holding
the infant on her lap when the terrorists attacked. Her leg was full of
shrapnel, studded with metal rods and encased in a cast. No one had the
courage to tell her that her husband, Mohammed Salameh Tmeizi who was also
in the car had been killed and was being buried that day as well along with
tiny Diya. This war of aggression against the rightful owners of their land
is barbaric. But what about the effect of all this war and death and pain
on the children? What will happen to these children who have either been
the victims of Israeli atrocities themselves or have been witnesses of
others being victimized? How will these children grow up and how will they
be able to cope with the nightmare of war? Every child has the right to
live in peace. Every child has the right to be safe from physical harm.
Every child has the right to go to and from school without being shot at.
Every child has the right to be a child. And no child should ever have to
fight for the freedom of his or her people. Children should be brought up
in a healthy and safe environment. They should be treated with sympathy and
consideration and their basic needs should be met. The demolition of
houses, the uprooting of trees, the destruction of farmland, the pollution
or stoppage of water supplies are all things that children should not have
to face. Children should not have to live in constant fear that either they
will be slaughtered regardless of whether they throw stones or not. And
they should not have to witness the deaths of their relatives and loved
ones. The blood of these innocents stains all our hands but the hands that
it stains the most are Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, American
President George Bush, and all the Arab leaders who are either drunk or
might as well be because they seem to be completely oblivious to the
Palestinian Holocaust that is going on right under their upturned noses.
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