Time Mag. Reporter's Confession on Checkpoints
by Lee Green
On March 5th, Time Magazine published "No Room for Civility at the Checkpoint," by Jamil Hamad. Hamad writes that checkpoints are "humiliating," "collective punishment," that they encourage Palestinians to vote for terrorist groups, that they are " 'an invitation for the terrorists to try another way' ", and finally, that they are useless since he personally has never seen a bomber caught at the checkpoint he often goes through.
* Since he is at a checkpoint going into Israel, it's hard to understand why he doesn't view the security check as collective protection rather than collective punishment. After all, while he is in Israel, perhaps riding a bus or eating in a restaurant, he is just as much at risk of being blown up by Muslim-supremacist bombers as any Jewish Israeli is. One would think he'd appreciate the extra measure of safety the checkpoints bring to his time in Israel.
* Since the checkpoints were erected by Israel only in the wake of multiple, lethal terrorist infiltrations, Hamad's anger about being inconvenienced at checkpoints should logically be directed against the terrorists, not Israel. It is repulsive in the extreme for Hamad to direct his anger at the victim - Israel - and its government, which is working hard to protect its citizens againstkillers targeting innocent civilians.
* Hamad deplores the alleged "striptease" to which Arabs are subjected in passing through checkpoints. He forgets Americans have firsthand experience with the necessity for thorough security screening. 19 Islamist terrorists committed the 9/11 attacks that killed almost 3000 Americans and since then, every single traveler in America must go through a security checkpoint at every airport, no matter how remote or small. We too must take off our shoes, jackets, belts, and jewelry. People generally see it as a necessary, if onerous, inconvenience caused by terrorists, not some devious plan by the U.S. government to humiliate us.
* Hamad writes that since terrorists might just turn to another way of murdering Israelis as a result of the checkpoints, the barriers are useless. So his bizarre recommendation is apparently for Israel to abandon this effective means of thwarting terrorists and seizing weapons, and to allow terrorists to move around unhindered. No responsible government can, obviously, take such action if the terrorist threat remains.
* Hamad thinks that just because he hasn't personally witnessed a bomber being caught, that his checkpoint has no "security value." Checkpoints are effective and save lives. Since much of the security barrier has been installed, and Palestinians mostly must go through checkpoints to get into Israel, terrorism is down approximately 90%. There are other factors, such as the targeting of terror leaders for arrest or killing, but the barrier and checkpoints are considered to be significant factors.
Numerous would-be bombers and/or explosives have been caught at checkpoints. To mention just a few such incidents:
+ Abdullah Quran, the 11-year-old found carrying a bomb in his rucksack. His terrorist handlers tried to blow him up at the checkpoint when his bomb was discovered, but he and the soldiers were saved because the triggering device was faulty.
+ the explosives they found hidden in the mattress of a Red Crescent ambulance
+ Hussam Abdo, the 16-year-old mentally-challenged boy wearing a bomb-belt who was relieved when the Israelis caught him and sent a robot with scissors to him, so he could cut the belt off
+ the female bomber who was on her way to blow up the same Israeli hospital that she was due to go to for medical treatment
Hamad writes that "If the Israelis consider every Palestinian, from a child to an old woman, to be a terrorist, then the Israelis have a problem that's not going to be solved by walls and security checks. "
* Since children, women and men have, in fact, all been used as self-exploding bombs in the past, Israeli soldiers guarding the checkpoints into Israel must indeed see everyone as a potential threat to be checked for explosives.
*Hamad is right that there is a problem that "cannot be solved with walls [presumably he is referring to the security barrier, which is 95% fence] and security checks." The real problem is a Palestinian one at its essence. It's not about Israeli "occupation," but about the occupation of the Palestinian mind with supremacist beliefs and anti-Jewish hatred. A culture of extremism, murder, martyrdom and destruction has shaped an intense drive to kill Jews and destroy Israel.
Palestinians have been taught by their religious, political, education and cultural leaders that Jews are subhumans, and that Israel, being a non-Muslim state, is illegitimate. Until the Palestinians reform their own society and start fostering genuine, permanent acceptance of people from other religions as equals, including their Jewish neighbors, there will never be peace. If Hamad wants the checkpoints to go away, perhaps he should focus on the real problem - the occupation of the Palestinian mind with extremism.
The most striking thing about Hamad's "postcard from Bethlehem" is what's completely missing - any compassion for the victims of terror, their families, and for the Jewish children traumatized by past Arab terror attacks, children afraid to get on a bus lest, for instance, they suffer the fate of the 3 children from the Cohen family who all lost legs when a Palestinian bombed their schoolbus...Children who are afraid even in their own beds at night, because they recall the terrorist who broke into the home of Matan and Noam Ohayon, ages 5 and 4, and murdered them in their bedroom, along with their mother.
Hamad confessed to hiring kidnapper of his boss. Victim never found.
This isn't the first time that Hamad has made himself the subject of news stories. In 1975, Hamad confessed to hiring Yasser Karaki to kidnap Hamad's boss, Yusef Nasr, editor of the Al Fajr newspaper. (Jerusalem Post, April 28, 1975) Nasr reportedly had been about to fire Hamad from his deputy editor position. (Jerusalem Post, March 14). Nasr has never been heard from again and his body has never been found. The Post confirmed that Hamad had testified in court as a state witness and hence was not charged. (Jerusalem Post, June 13, 1975)
It's odd that Time magazine would employ someone who confessed to arranging and paying for the kidnapping of his own boss (presumed also to be a murder victim).
Is Hamad's boss perhaps afraid to challenge him, afraid to say no to outrageously biased reporting, lest he too suddenly disappear?
See the June 16, 1994, Jerusalem Post column, " 'Time' out for malicious bias", by David Bar-Illan, for another example of Jamil Hamad using Time magazine to spread false propaganda.
The article by Jamil Hamad appears below.
Time Magazine,
Monday, Mar. 05, 2007
Postcard from Bethlehem
No Room for Civility at the Checkpoint
By Jamil Hamad/Bethlehem
Every day at the Israeli checkpoint going from my home in Bethlehem to visit TIME's Jerusalem Bureau, I see a sign that makes me laugh. Written in English, Hebrew, and Arabic, it says: "Peace Be With You."
It's a pretty sentiment, suitable for the birthplace of Jesus Christ. The sign, put up by the Israeli Tourism Ministry, may be written in Arabic script, but its message of peace is clearly not meant for Arabs - not for me, not for the hundreds of Palestinian laborers, school kids, businessmen, teachers, people going to see doctors, who must run the daily gauntlet of Israeli security checks. A tourist who wants to go from Bethlehem to Jerusalem can make the journey by car in 15 minutes. I must go on foot and, depending on the mood of the young Israeli soldiers at the checkpoint, the trip can take an hour, two, three. Or sometimes, if there's a security alert, they simply close down the checkpoint to all Palestinians. Peace Be With You.
It's humiliating, and hard not to interpret this as a collective punishment against Palestinians. First, I walk into a long, wire mesh cage that runs along a 20-ft.-high concrete wall which, on the Palestinian side, is smeared with graffiti. On the wall, someone has painted a big pair of scissors as if to say: Cut along the dotted Line. If only it were that easy.
Then comes the Striptease, the long conveyor belt where you have to put all your belongings before going through the security check. Some days they make me take off my jacket, other days, my shoes or my belt. It's very frustrating, especially when you get behind a woman with lots of earrings and bracelets who doesn't know how the machine works - and there are hundreds of people pushing and shoving behind you. I've seen sick people desperate to reach a doctor, or people screaming because they're going to miss their airplane or connection to Jordan, but no matter how hard they shout, it never does any good.
After that, you have to show your ID and magnetic pass. There are five windows, but only one is ever open, no matter how many Palestinians are trying to cross through. The U.S. embassy people who perform periodic checks to make sure things are running smoothly at these checkpoints should really make surprise visits. Usually, the Israelis know beforehand that the Americans are scheduled for inspection. We can tell because that's when the soldiers open all the gates. But most of the time, there's only one soldier, and you have to be very patient and pretend to be sympathetic while he or she is on the cellphone for 10 minutes talking to a friend or a mother. Otherwise, if you try to hurry along the soldier in the booth, it puts him or her in a bad mood, and it can take a lot longer.
An Israeli general once told me, "Jamil, these checkpoints are nothing but an invitation for the terrorists to try another way." In fact, in all the years of crossing, I've never seen the Israelis catch a terrorist or a suicide bomber at the Bethlehem checkpoint. So what is the security value of this exercise?
Instead, the checkpoints have turned into places of humiliation by Israeli soldiers who are always shouting, and who assume that every Arab speaks Hebrew. We don't. So how can I understand it when the girl soldier is shouting at me so angrily?
Most Israeli soldiers don't speak Arabic, so they don't understand what the Palestinians are saying in line. I hear those voices. They think this process is a worthless humiliation. And they want to take revenge against the Israelis. How? By voting for their enemies, for the two Islamic resistance groups, Hamas and Islamic Jihad. This is how the Arab mind works: you are stronger, and you humiliate me. I'm weak. I don't have planes or missiles, but I do have the vote, and that's how I take revenge. I vote for your enemy.
If the Israelis consider every Palestinian, from a child to an old woman, to be a terrorist, then the Israelis have a problem that's not going to be solved by walls and security checks. Not all Palestinians are hostile to Israel. Most are interested in a peaceful life, in raising their children. A few believe in violence, but Israel can't punish all Palestinians just because of a few. At the same time, Palestinians shouldn't generalize about all Israelis based on a few settlers and extremists. But with these punishments at the checkpoints, it's very difficult. We feel humiliated. When I see that sign "Peace Be With You," I wonder: What kind of peace can this be?
Originally Published on 3/9/2007 for CAMERA