- Reports from the battlefront indicate that Arafat is cutting back on the rock throwing demonstrations. The counterattack over the use of children may be having an impact. Hard hitting web sites showing Palestinian children being trained to kill/be killed took awhile to come on line, but they came! - Expand the pressure.
Individual activists can make a difference. Florida Pediatrician Jonathan Reich reports that he managed to get the issue brought before the executive committee of Save the Children. He's organizing a call-in protest to Amnesty International on Wednesday November 8. Their number is 800-634-2095. Amnesty blames Israel for the violence against children.
-- The video image of a 12 year old Palestinian will remain with us forever, despite the proof indicating that he was killed by Palestinian gunmen.
-- Be proactive. Don't wait to react. Send letters to your local newspapers. Call the local TV/Radio news producers to politely discuss the issue.
Use the following items if you wish:
1. Arafat's deliberate strategy to use children reflects a long-time pattern of PLO use of children in their fight against Israel.
-In the 1970s Arafat established military training camps for “cubs” and proudly exhibited to the press children shooting rifles and rolling through fiery obstacle courses.
-In the 1982 war in Lebanon, Israeli soldiers were confronted on numerous occasions by “RPG kids” – young teenagers equipped with anti-tank rocket propelled grenade launchers.Hesitation to shoot was fatal to the Israeli soldiers.
-During the intifada ten years ago, youth throwing rocks were a major component of the anti Israel activity.
-Today, Palestinian children are an integral part of Arafat’s strategy of confrontation.Unlike the intifada, however, the children are integrated into the battle plans of armed Palestinian forces.25,000 children were trained this summer by the Palestinian Authority in the use of firearms and the making of Molotov cocktails.They were indoctrinated to prepare for war against Israel, not for peace.(See The New York Times:Palestinian Summer Camp Offers the Games of War By JOHN F. BURNS, August 2, 2000.)Children serve as infantry in the confrontations between Israeli and Palestinian soldiers.In scenes reminiscent of Iranian children sent to the Iraqi front equipped with plastic keys to heaven, Palestinian children are sent close to Israeli positions with rocks and Molotov cocktails, while the gunmen and snipers fire from positions 100s of yards back..(See USA Today, West Bank Street lashes Now Organized Warfare, Palestinian Sniper Network, Police Join Firefights, by Jack Kelley, October 23, 2000)
2. Arafat has been fanning the fires of hate for years -Despite Arafat’s commitments to stop incitement against Israel, official Palestinian publications and media have been spewing forth venom and anti-Semitism for years.-Official Palestinian radio and television broadcast bloodcurdling calls from mosque preachers calling for the killing of Jews.TV broadcasts, including children's shows, echo Arafat’s words and repeatedly glorify the youthful martyrs, encouraging others to follow their path.
-Palestinian schools teach hate.What do the Palestinian schools teach? Ninth grade textbooks assert, "Treachery and disloyalty are character traits of the Jews and therefore one should beware of them."Jihad and martyrdom are glorified as the means to liberate "Palestine," and children's poems contain calls to war and bloodletting. Fifth graders memorize such lines as, "I shall take my soul in my hand and hurl it into the abyss of death." The same verses are recited by children on official Palestinian television. Sixth graders read of a young boy growing up with "the love of Jihad flowing through his veins and filling every fiber of his being." "Joy" comes only at "the sight of the enemy lying dead" or "fleeing for their lives."
-Palestinian schools encourage students’ violence.Children belong in the classrooms, but the Palestinian Authority has been sending them out into the streets.And college students have been at the forefront of the fighting.
[See The Jordan Times, School's out, it's intifada time, October 25, 2000. Thirteen-year-old Omar Assad throws down his school satchel, puts on his ski mask, loads up his slingshot and sets off down the rock-strewn road towards the armed Israeli soldiers - school is out and it's time for his extracurricular activities. For Omar and his schoolmates who every day after classes swell the ranks of those clashing with troops protecting a road to a Jewish settlement near this flash point West Bank town, the afternoon's activities have much in common with football practice….Colleges and universities have been closed all month, the students being in the forefront of the assaults on the Israelis. "Those are my students over there," a math professor from the nearby Bir Zeit University said.]
3. International Children's Advocates call on Palestinians to stop abusing children:
-- Sweden's Queen Silvia raised this issue at a meeting of the World Childhood Foundation that took place at the United Nations last month. She strongly criticized Palestinian parents for abusing their children: "As a mother I'm very worried about this. I'd like to tell them to quit. This is very dangerous. The children should not take part."
-- Carol Bellamy, UNICEF Executive Director, in a statement to the Special Session of the Commission on Human Rights regarding the situation in the Middle East UNICEF, October 12: