From Occupied Palestine

My 20th year
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 15 May 2005

Our age in this parallel time is the age of the revolution, before the birth of some of its factions. Before the Arab satellite stations and the spread of the hamburger culture in our capital cities. We are even from before the invention of mobile phones, modern communications systems and the Internet. We are part of history, and history is a situation and the root of a past that is no longer. But we are the roots of a past that continues and has not ended. We speak to you in the present tense, in order not to turn into your future.

He'll shoot and he won't weep
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 28 February 2005

The appointment of Major General Dan Halutz to chief of the General Staff is the appointment of the right man at the right time. The Israel Defense Forces deserves a man lacking moral inhibitions, after three years' service by a chief of staff whose actions were characterized by very few moral inhibitions.

The neighbors across the way
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 11 February 2005

In contrast to the private villas - tin shacks. In contrast to a 'secure' road - suffocation. In contrast to international attention - total disregard. The 8,500 Palestinians of the Muasi region are the Palestinians no-one has heard of.

No border between Yesha and the IDF
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 6 February 2005

The Israel Defense Forces must disengage from the settlers now. This process of disengagement will be difficult - the IDF is deeply invested in the settlement enterprise - but it is obligated by reality. Even before a single settler family is evacuated, the army must untie its Gordian knot with the settlers, which has bound it for many years. The time has come for it to again be the Israel Defense Forces, as intended, rather than the Settler Defense Forces, as it has been throughout the long years of occupation.

New year, old story
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 3 January 2005

During operations last weekend in the Gaza Strip, the army demolished 14 Palestinian homes, injured 30 Palestinians and killed 10, including a mentally disabled youth. Ringing in 2005.

A quiet weekend: The Israel Defense Forces managed to conduct two operations in Gaza during a four-day period starting last Thursday and continuing through this past Sunday. This is how the New Year's celebration there looked: 10 Palestinians killed, including two teenagers, one of whom was mentally disabled; 30 Palestinians injured, including a cameraman from Channel 10; and another 14 homes demolished.

Dear soldier
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 17 December 2004

'Do you really think soldiers enjoy killing innocent little children who wander through the casbah in Nablus?' Letter from a paratrooper.

A.L., a paratrooper who is serving in Nablus, wrote to me in the wake of my article "Suffer the little children" (Ha'aretz Magazine, December 3). The article described how Israel Defense Forces soldiers shot four children in the Nablus casbah, killing three of them and wounding the fourth, a 3-year-old. Here is the letter, almost in full:

Twighlight zone: Suffer the little children
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 4 December 2004

In the present intifada, 323 Palestinian children under the age of 14 have been killed by IDF fire. Three recent examples from Nablus...

Why waste ammunition? A few days ago, an Israel Defense Forces soldier fired at two boys in the casbah of Nablus. Just a lone bullet that penetrated the body of one of the boys, exited, penetrated the second boy, and killed both of them. Two 15-year-old boys standing with their arms around each other on the street that descends to the marketplace.

Killing children is no longer a big deal
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz , 17 October 2004

More than 30 Palestinian children were killed in the first two weeks of Operation Days of Penitence in the Gaza Strip. It's no wonder that many people term such wholesale killing of children "terror." Whereas in the overall count of all the victims of the intifada the ratio is three Palestinians killed for every Israeli killed, when it comes to children the ratio is 5:1. According to B'Tselem, the human rights organization, even before the current operation in Gaza, 557 Palestinian minors (below the age of 18) were killed, compared to 110 Israeli minors.

One out of every nine
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 26 September 2004

Everyone is only carrying out orders and they are going by the book. But a book that prevents medical treatment to dying patients, hassles them and humiliates them, is a wicked book, and a society in which only the metal detector speaks is a sick society.

The beginning of the start of the end
GIDEON LEVY
Ha'aretz, 29 August 2004

How long can the costume ball go on? How long can we pretend the spit in our faces is rain? There are now signs that it can't go on forever - it is not the beginning of the end, but it looks like the beginning of the start of the end of the occupation.