Israel: riding roughshod

AS US President George Bush puts the final touches to his new proposals to end the crisis in the Middle East, the violence between the Palestinians and Israelis refuses to die down. In fact, ever since Israel launched its latest drive to wipe out what it calls the ‘infrastructure of terror’ in the West Bank in April, there has been a marked upsurge in violence. The Israelis have made a number of incursions into West Bank towns in recent weeks and terrorized the local population by arbitrarily rounding up ‘suspected terrorists’ and destroying large parts of the Palestinian infrastructure. Rather than cowing down the beleaguered Palestinians, the ruthless Israeli measures have only served to provoke more violence. The most recent such incident was another suicide attack in Israel that killed 18 people. The latest Israeli response to such attacks is to begin the construction of a fence that will seal off the West Bank from Israel to prevent suicide bombers from entering Israel. The action has been denounced by the Palestinians as reflecting a form of apartheid worse than the South African brand.

Ironically, a section of the Israeli right has also opposed the fence for very different reasons. They fear that it could ultimately be seen as a de facto border between a future Palestinian state and Israel, thwarting their ambitions to ultimately annexe the West Bank altogether. As the violence escalates, Israel loses no opportunity to blame every attack on the Palestinian Authority and its leader Yasser Arafat, despite having rendered the Authority virtually impotent and making Arafat a virtual prisoner in his own land. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has been doing his worst to isolate Arafat and discredit him in the eyes of the US. He has been pushing the line that a Palestinian state will be a hotbed of terror and therefore should not even be contemplated for the time being. Recent statements emanating from the White House suggest that Sharon’s message is being taken seriously. While Arafat has still not been dumped by the US, he is being subjected to ridicule and reviling by senior figures in the Bush administration.

There are also signs that the administration is sharply divided over the question of a Palestinian state. The pragmatic secretary of state, Colin Powell, recently received a sharp rebuke from the White House for suggesting that there could be space for an interim Palestinian state. What this suggests is that the new US proposals will once again fall short of getting to the causes of the conflict in the Middle East and instead address its symptoms. Rather than dwelling on peripheral issues, such as the reform of the Palestinian Authority, any bid to end the violence between the Palestinians and the Israelis must relate to the roots of the crisis. Clearly, it is the continued occupation of Palestinian lands by the Israelis, the constant illegal expansion of Jewish settlements in these areas and a denial of a viable state to the Palestinians that has provoked the strife in the region. There can be no hope for a durable peace if the US refuses to accept these stark realities.

Azad Kashmir budget

THE deficit Azad Kashmir budget for 2002-2003 reflects no distinctive effort to improve the state’s revenues or to meet the situation arising from the routine shelling by Indian troops from across the Line of Control. A major claim on its total outlay of Rs 12 billion is made by non-development expenditure which amounts to Rs 8,773.5 million. The basic structure and composition of the budget, as before, indicates dependence on federal transfers. Resource availability has been estimated at Rs 2,700 million, while the Azad Jammu and Kashmir Council would supplement it with Rs 1,650 million. AJK’s share in federal taxes would be Rs 2,386 million. The federal government will provide Rs 2,680 million to bridge the gap between receipts and expenditure. Although the increase in deficit has been attributed to an increase in employees’ salaries, non-development expenditure has been steadily going up over the years. Especially the increase made in the budget in the salaries, perks and privileges of the state’s top-level functionaries, which seems out of tune with the critical military situation facing Pakistan and AJK on the eastern front, suggests an imprudent approach and a sense of misplaced priority at this time. The enhancement earlier made by the Pakistan government in the emoluments of ministers and governors, cited as a justification, is hardly convincing when a more appropriate course would have been to demonstrate a spirit of sacrifice and austerity and cut back on unnecessary spending.

In the development sector, stress has rightly been put on communications, agriculture and power generation so as to strengthen and properly utilize the indigenous sources of income. Rs 827 million have been allocated for roads and communications, indicating a substantial increase compared to the previous year’s figures. Inter-district roads and construction of a dual carriageway are important schemes in this sector. A major part of the programme, however, should be devoted to the repair and improvement of existing arteries in view of the terrible state of safety on roads. Other major schemes include the Northern Education Project and Neelum-Jhelum Valley Community Development Project. The government has decided to initiate work on a 60-MW hydropower project in Kotli by involving the private sector. For the education sector, Rs 458 million have been set apart, while Rs 270 million have been provided for health services.

Unfortunately, no significant effort has been made to promote income-generation schemes to meet the challenge of unemployment. Only eight million rupees have been given to small industries, although the allocation of Rs 130 million for information technology is encouraging. More emphasis also should have been laid on developing AJK’s natural resources without causing damage to its environment.

Discrimination in the air

IT is about time lawsuits were filed in America against airlines for indulging in discriminatory practices against people of Middle Eastern or Arab origin. In the days and months after the terrorist attacks of September 11, several cases became known where people with a Middle Eastern appearance were offloaded after other passengers refused to travel with them. Recently, the American Civil Liberties Union and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee filed suits against four major American airlines for offloading five passengers — four US citizens and the other a permanent resident — ostensibly on grounds of security. The case of the men — that they were taken off their flights for reasons that had nothing to do with security but because of bias and prejudice — seems a strong one. In fact, in most such cases those disallowed to travel were informed that they were being taken off because fellow passengers or, in some cases, crew members were not prepared to travel with them.

The question to ask is: how does an individual, duly cleared by security prior to boarding, suddenly become a security risk as soon as he enters the plane? When many such cases were reported soon after Sept 11, senior US officials, including the transport secretary, took pains to say that airlines were not supposed to do that. It is high time those in the upper echelons of the Washington administration took notice of such cases of plain illegality, discrimination and harassment and put a stop to these.