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Collective punishment, through a child's eyes

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If you want to see the truth about collective punishment, look at it through the eyes of a child.

Laila El-Haddad spent the last three weeks in a dismal apartment she was forced to rent in El Arish, Egypt, together with her son Yusuf, who is two years and nine months old.

Every few days the two tried to travel to the Rafah border crossing, about 50 kilometers away, attempting to return to their home in Gaza.

These were distressful efforts: Together with another 5,000 or so residents of Gaza, who have also been waiting in recent weeks to return to their homes, she was crammed with her toddler for hours in an endless line at the crossing. "Elbow to elbow, like cattle," is how she describes this in her blog, until being pushed back in shame once again.

* * *

The previous day, she described bits of conversation with her toddler in her blog:

"Why are we still here, in Arish?"

"Because we are waiting to enter Gaza, dear."

"But then why don't we go to Gaza?"

"Because the ma'bar [crossing] is closed, my love."

"Well, who's closing it mommy?"

"What do I tell him? 'Some bad people.'"

"You mean like in the stories, like Shere Khan in the Jungle Book?"

"Yes, sure, like Shere Khan."

"'But who are they? Who are these bad people? Is it the yahood [the Jews]?' He asks, mimicking what he's heard on the border."

"What do I say? I hesitate. 'Look, there are some people; some are good, some are bad. And the bad ones are closing the border.'"

"But why? What did we do?"

"I wish I knew, my dear. I wish I had all the answers, my love, so I could answer all your questions. I wish I didn't have to answer such questions to start with."

El-Haddad then writes an open letter to Defense Minister Amir Peretz: "- what can I tell a 2-year-old - of borders and occupation and oppression and collective punishment? What would YOU tell him?"

The TRUTH is that the little boy already KNEW all he needed to know about what was going on.

Anything else would have been extraneous information, muddling the waters of an otherwise crystal clear crime.

They did nothing wrong, yet they were being punished.

Does it really matter then who was doing the punishing? or for what so-called reason?

The truth is that this conduct is unacceptable no matter who does it, and nothing in the world can justify it.

It's high time people stopped looking at WHO commits these crimes and instead stop them no matter what.

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Submitted by qrswave on Sun, 2006-12-10 16:10