Still More Food for Thought          
      and Uri Avnery
1.7.06
Agatha In The Rain
"Uri Avnery
1.7.06
Agatha In The Rain
"ISRAEL HAS declared war on the Palestinian
people! The Palestinian people will answer in
kind! The Palestinian rebellion will go on! The
Palestinian fighters are steadfast in the
service of the nation! Down with the
Nazi-Zionist occupation! Out with the unclean
infidels from the Holy Land! Destroyed Rafah -
we shall build you anew! Long live the
Palestinian revolution! Long live the State of
Palestine!"
A Hamas leaflet of last week? Not exactly. With
appropriate changes, this leaflet was published
on July 2, 1946 - sixty years ago almost to the
day - by the Haganah, after "Black Saturday".
Then, in the wake of a daring commando action by
the Palmakh ("shock troops" of the Haganah),
which blew up a number of bridges, the British
government of Palestine decided to carry out a
plan prepared well in advance. It was code-named
"Agatha". On June 29, 1946, 17 thousand British
soldiers fanned out all over the Jewish towns
and kibbutzim to confiscate arms and documents
and arrest the leaders of the Jewish community.
The British government affirmed its
determination to stamp out terrorism. In
Jerusalem, the soldiers occupied the
headquarters of the Jewish Agency, the de facto
government of the Jewish "state within the
state", and confiscated many documents that
clearly established its close connections with
the "terrorist headquarters" - the joint command
of the Haganah, the Irgun and the Stern Group,
which worked closely together at the time.
The soldiers broke into the homes of the
political leaders of the Jewish community and
arrested most of the Jewish Agency "ministers".
The leaders were detained in Latrun. But the
commanders of the underground organizations
decided to continue fighting, in order to prove
to the British that the arrest of the leaders
had not silenced them.
"Black Saturday" was a milestone in the fight
against the British. Within a year, they decided
to leave the country.
The similarity between the British "Agatha" and
the Israeli "Summer Rains" is striking. This
shows that every occupation regime is condemned
to repeat the actions of its predecessors, even
when they have been proved hopeless. This does
not mean that all occupiers are fools - only
that the logic of occupation itself condemns
them to do foolish things.

THE AIM of the present operation is, ostensibly,
to free the soldier Gilad Shalit, who was
captured by the Palestinian underground
(consisting of several organizations), in an
attack that even an Israeli military expert
called "a daring commando action".
If our army had kept its high military standard,
it would immediately have replaced all the
commanders responsible for the debacle. 50 years
ago this would have been done . But we have a
different army now. Nobody was removed. The
failed commanders just called the attack "a
terrorist act", the fighters "terrorists" and
the captured soldier "kidnapped".
The action proves, of course, an old military
maxim: for every means of defense a means of
attack can be found, and vice versa. The
"security" fence that surrounds the Gaza Strip
on all sides (except the sea), the like of which
is now being built inside the West Bank, can
stop thieves and people looking for work in
Israel, but not determined fighters who will
always find ways to cross it, whether from below
or above.
The "kidnapped" soldier served as a pretext for
an operation which must have been prepared a
long time ago. The Israeli and international
public has been told that the aim is to set him
free, but in practice it has put his life in
greater jeopardy. If the soldiers come near to
where he is hidden, he could be killed in the
cross-fire - as happened some years ago to the
soldier Nakhshon Waksman, who was captured by
Hamas. He was killed in the exchange of fire
between the soldiers and the Palestinians.
Waksman would probably be alive today, if there
had been an exchange of prisoners instead.
The connection between the "kidnapped soldier"
and the operation exists only in the realm of
propaganda. The same goes for the second
pretext: that the aim is to put an end to the
launching of Qassam rockets at the town of
Sderot.
True, this is indeed an intolerable situation.
The Qassam, a simple and inexpensive weapon,
causes more panic than real damage, like the
German V-rockets fired on London in World War
II. It terrorizes the population, and that is
its aim. Its purpose is to break the devastating
blockade that the Israeli government has been
maintaining against the Gaza strip since the
"disengagement". Until now, the army has not
come up with a means to put a stop to the
rockets.
But the Qassams, too, are not the real cause of
the "Summer Rains" operation. Its character
shows that it has a much wider aim: to destroy
the elected Palestinian government (Israeli
propaganda's "Hamas Government") and bring the
Palestinian population to its knees. This is
supposed to make it possible for the Israeli
government to carry out the "Convergence" plan,
annexing major parts of the West Bank to Israel
and preventing the establishment of a viable
Palestinian state.
A clear aim, which the operation is designed to
attain by simple means: breaking the Palestinian
population by the liquidation of its leadership,
destruction of its infrastructure and cutting
off of food supplies, medicines, electricity,
water and sanitary services - not to mention
employment. The message to the Palestinians: if
you want to put an end to your suffering, remove
the government you have elected.

CAN THIS succeed? Exactly like the the success
of the British operation. "Agatha" achieved the
very opposite.
Like all the failures of our army over the
years, from the battle of Karameh in 1968,
through the Egyptian crossing of the canal at
the beginning of the Yom Kippur war, to the two
intifadas, the reason lies with the abysmal
contempt that the army commanders hold for the
Arabs in general and the Palestinians in
particular. The Shin Bet meets the Palestinians
in the form of interrogated prisoners, who are
ready to say anything at all under torture, and
the despicable collaborators, who are ready to
sell their cousins for drugs or money. The
occupation commanders cannot imagine that the
Palestinians could react like any other people,
even - God forbid! - as we did in a similar
situation. What, these pitiful Arabs are like
us?
True, the British never behaved towards us as we
do now towards the Palestinians. But on the
other hand, the Palestinians' ability to suffer
oppression is much greater than ours. It is
based on the family structure that makes for
much more effective mutual help, and on the
experience of living for years in dire straits.
On "Black Saturday"' the Jewish community stood
together behind its besieged leadership. The
opposition from right and left rallied behind
Ben-Gurion (who was abroad) and Sharett
(imprisoned in Latrun). Experience shows that
every people behaves like this when a foreign
enemy attacks its leadership. Hamas is almost
certain to emerge much strengthened from this
test. The arrests prove to the Palestinian
public that its is a fighting, loyal leadership,
not corrupted by the amenities of power -
contrary to their predecessors, some of whom
were tainted by corruption.
The pretext for the operation - the release of
the captured soldier - will only harden the
attitude of the Palestinians. No issue is more
important for them than the release of
Palestinian prisoners - a matter that directly
concerns 10 thousand Palestinian extended
families, in every town, quarter and village.
These families are prepared to suffer anything
to secure their release.

THE SECOND victim of the operation is the
"Convergence Plan", which has become ridiculous.
In the eyes of the ordinary Israeli, it looks
like this: We have left Gaza, and now we are
returning. We dismantled the settlements there,
and got the Qassams on Sderot in return. Sharon
has failed, so Olmert will fail doubly.
That is true, but not for the obvious reasons.
The withdrawal from Gaza has not brought
security, because it was carried out without any
dialogue or agreement with the Palestinians. It
has not brought peace nearer, because it was
coupled with an open intention to annex large
parts of the West Bank. And, no less
importantly, we did indeed leave the Gaza Strip
entirely, but have blockaded it and cut it off
from the world. All this is even more true for
the "convergence" of Olmert.
The "Summer Rains" may have washed it off the
map.