I'm Not Rashid Khalidi...

...And so my op-eds you won't read in the New York Times. And I haven't has a letter in for a while. Therefore, my comments on his op-ed, What You Don’t Know About Gaza, you'll have to peruse here.

So, here we go:

NEARLY everything you’ve been led to believe about Gaza is wrong. Below are a few essential points [that Rashid has picked out for. what is uncomforable for him and his viewpoint, you won't find herein] that seem to be missing from the conversation, much of which has taken place in the press, about Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip [was there an attack, at anytime, now or previously, by Hamas? or is Israel's defensive actions always portrayed by Khalidi as "attacks"?].

THE GAZANS Most of the people living in Gaza are not there by choice. [not really. the older generation made a choice in 1947, in the main, to support an Arab, local and Middle Eastern, attempt to thwart a UN Resolution of compromise and partition and eliminate thereby the nascent Jewsih state.] The majority of the 1.5 million people crammed into the roughly 140 square miles of the Gaza Strip belong to families that came from towns and villages outside Gaza like Ashkelon and Beersheba. They ['they' are, who? the families? today's majority of the population?] were driven to Gaza by the Israeli Army in 1948. [and they supported the fedayeen 1950-56 and the PLO 1964 on, always using violence to try to solve their political clash with Israel]

THE OCCUPATION The Gazans have lived under Israeli occupation since the Six-Day War in 1967. [they lived, also, for a few months, too, in Novemeber 1956-March 1957 and it was better than the Egyptian occupation previously and afterwards] Israel is still widely considered [er, how "wide" is that? you and your radical progressive friends?] to be an occupying power, even though it removed its troops and settlers from the strip in 2005. Israel still controls access to the area, imports and exports, and the movement of people in and out. Israel has control over Gaza’s air space and sea coast, and its forces enter the area at will. [not exactly. where did all those Hezbollah & Iranian rocketry come from? how did tons and tons of ammunition, arms and explosives get in?] As the occupying power, Israel has the responsibility under the Fourth Geneva Convention to see to the welfare of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip. [nope]

THE BLOCKADE Israel’s blockade of the strip, with the support of the United States and the European Union, has grown increasingly stringent since Hamas won the Palestinian Legislative Council elections in January 2006. [gee, I wonder why] Fuel, electricity, imports, exports and the movement of people in and out of the Strip have been slowly choked off, leading to life-threatening problems of sanitation, health, water supply and transportation. [psst, Qassams are life-threatening, too]

The blockade has subjected many to unemployment, penury and malnutrition. This amounts to the collective punishment — with the tacit support of the United States — of a civilian population for exercising its democratic rights. [Germans also exercvised their democratic rights in 1933 and elected Hitler & Nazis to power. do we applaud? did that stop the British from bombing the hell out of them for supporting a government that launched a world war?]

THE CEASE-FIRE Lifting the blockade, along with a cessation of rocket fire, was one of the key terms of the June cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. This accord led to a reduction in rockets fired from Gaza from hundreds in May and June to a total of less than 20 in the subsequent four months (according to Israeli government figures). The cease-fire broke down when Israeli forces launched major air and ground attacks in early November; six Hamas operatives were reported killed. [er, were they on a picnic? singing at mosque choral practice or engaged, as is their wont, to commit terror?]

WAR CRIMES The targeting of civilians, whether by Hamas or by Israel, is potentially a war crime. Every human life is precious. But the numbers speak for themselves: Nearly 700 Palestinians, most of them civilians, [no proof of that Rashidi my boy] have been killed since the conflict broke out at the end of last year. In contrast, there have been around a dozen Israelis killed, many of them soldiers. [true, but all the Qassams are aimed exclusively at civilian targets unlike Israel's troops] Negotiation is a much more effective way to deal with rockets and other forms of violence. This might have been able to happen had Israel fulfilled the terms of the June cease-fire and lifted its blockade of the Gaza Strip. [it also could have happened if Hamas really wanted to arrive at a negotiated peace agreement ratehr than the leimination of Israel]

This war on the people of Gaza isn’t really about rockets. Nor is it about “restoring Israel’s deterrence,” as the Israeli press might have you believe. Far more revealing are the words of Moshe Yaalon, then the Israeli Defense Forces chief of staff, in 2002: “The Palestinians must be made to understand in the deepest recesses of their consciousness that they are a defeated people.” [by which, of course, he meant "defeated" in the sense of using violence to achieve political goals]