A Random Act of Murder in a Systematic Program of Genocide

By Brother Patrick White

The students and staff listened intently as Father Peter Du Brul gave his Arabic homily from the altar in the Bethlehem University chapel. This American Jesuit, who had worked for most of his priestly life among the Palestinians, who spoke their language and who is known also as teacher and friend by so many students, held their rapt attention.

"We come together," he said, "to make an act of faith in Anton's life, what he lived for, and died for. But we especially come to make an act of faith in his resurrection." Gently and movingly he spelled out the Christian message to the hundreds of Palestinians packed into the chapel. Many were weeping, and with good reason.

Anton Shomali was summarily murdered by two Israeli border policemen as he was returning alone to him home in the small Palestinian Christian town of Beit Sahour early in the evening of Saturday, May 2nd. There had been a minor demonstration in the town shortly after 6 p.m., and prudence dictated that any young Palestinian man in the streets would try to remain inconspicuous, since Israeli soldiers were patrolling the area.

As Anton left a steep path that ran down into a street leading to his house, he was stopped by the two border policemen and shoved against the wall of a neighboring house with his hands raised. Two women eye-witnesses, one at her door a few yards away and another on a balcony across the street, saw one of the policemen thrust his automatic weapon into the young man's back and fire three rounds of rubber bullets into Anton's body. The Makassed Hospital report I received described extensive injuries causing massive internal bleeding, the blood eventually flooding the lungs. X-rays revealed square-shaped bullets in Anton's body, the rubber thinly coating their metal cores.

Seizing Anton, who weighed only about 130 pounds, the Israeli border policemen dragged him down a flight of stone steps to a concealed balcony adjoining the house below. Without calling for an ambulance or medical help they then disappeared, leaving him bleeding to death. Sami Qumseyha, who lives in the house, saw the Israelis through his window and when they had left discovered Anton on the floor of his balcony. At first he thought the young man had only been beaten, but then realized to his horror that Anton was dying. Later a small private car took Anton to Jerusalem, where doctors struggled in vain to save his life.

More than a week later I talked to Mr. Qumseyha and to the two women who claimed to have witnessed the shooting. They were all still in a state of shock. Sami insisted that I sit with him on their family balcony to drink coffee. He told me that his wife, who was clearly in the last stages of pregnancy, nearly lost the baby. "My three children will take a long time to recover from this!" he exclaimed with great concern. (I had noticed earlier several children replacing fresh flowers at a little shrine by the roadside in memory of Anton.)

Sami Qumseyha, the librarian in the Makassed Hospital in Jerusalem, speaks fluent English. He told me he heard one border policeman say to the other in Hebrew, as they dragged Anton down the steps to his balcony, "Why? why?" The day before, Sami said, he had been watching special Israeli Independence Day television programs. Films recalling the Nazi brutality inflicted on the Jews were shown. "And now they do this to us!" he exclaimed.

Driving back to Bethlehem, I thought about the televised beating of a black man by Los Angeles policemen that was played and replayed to the American public. On the West Bank and in Gaza there are no Palestinian TV networks to report the far greater outrage in Beit Sahour.

Nor under this awful military occupation are there courts to which Palestinians can look for justice or redress. It is ironic that capital punishment, a topic that arouses such controversy when it is applied in the United States, is forbidden by law in Israel except in exceptional cases like that of Adolf Eichmann. Yet friends working for international agencies, and members of the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem maintain that death squad killings of Palestinians without trial are being carried out by the Israeli security forces with increasing frequency.

What we all are witnessing in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and in Gaza is a gradual but persistent policy aimed at the destruction of a people. Killing and maiming Palestinians is an everyday occurrence that no longer makes world news. The process is cumulative and although mere numbers and statistics can be of little value, the following comparison with the United States may be helpful. The Palestinian population of 1.8 million on the West Bank and in Gaza stands in proportion to that of the United States at approximately 1 to 122.

The 1,060 Palestinians killed, the 125,080 seriously injured and nearly 500,000 detentions by the Israeli security forces since the beginning of the intifada would thus compare with 129,320 deaths in the United States, 15,259,760 injured and nearly 61,000,000 detentions. The same numbers, wildly out of proportion to the total population, would obtain in regard to other violent acts against the Palestinians such as sealing or demolishing house, deporting residents and uprooting olive trees.

Directly affecting all of the population are such measures as long curfews suddenly and frequently applied, constant harassment, and the ghettoization of the occupied territories with the imposition of permits that control movement. The consequent sense of helplessness experienced by nearly all Palestinians causes depression, the breakdown of traditional values and fragmentation within the society. Use of collaborators and the clever manipulation by the intelligence services of a weak and marginalized society result in violence among factions and continue the process of disintegration.

Taxes, many of them illegally imposed, are extorted from a population that has no vote or representation. Palestinians pay far heavier taxes than do Israelis and receive far fewer services in return. Such is the devastation of the West Bank and Gazan economies by restrictions on economic activity that 70 percent of their populations now live below the poverty line as currently defined in Israel. Furthermore, the accelerating confiscation of Palestinian land and settlement of Israelis on it in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza currently taking place can only be described as flagrantly unjust as well as illegal under international law.

The term "genocide" was first used by Polish scholar Raphael Lemkin in his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, published in the United States in 1944. The United Nations Convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide was adopted in 1948.

Article Two specifically includes within the convention's definition of genocide all those actions deliberately inflicted on a group calculated to bring about its destruction in whole or in part. These acts can occur either in war or in peace.

From what I have seen going on around me during the past seven years on the West Bank, in East Jerusalem and in Gaza, genocide as described by Raphael Lemkin and the United Nations Convention in 1948 is being inflicted systematically and daily on the Palestinians. Their lives are being made so unbearable in order that auto-transfer will take place.

I felt my fears confirmed when U.S. State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler's statement of support for two United Nations resolutions affirming the right of return for Palestinians was greeted with derision by Israeli Prime Minister Shamir.

"The term 'right of return' is an empty phrase that is utterly meaningless for the Palestinians," Shamir thundered at an election rally. "It will never happen, in any shape or form."

Child Martyrs of the World

As Father Peter raised the host at the consecration during Mass last Friday, I was struck by the convergence of religious themes decorating the chapel, and the fate of Anton. In a fresco that runs around the walls of the building, I caught sight of the faces of the Palestinian children of Bethlehem, Beit Sahour and Beit Jala, used years ago as models by the artist to represent the child martyrs of the world. Above these frescoes, in the series of stained glass windows recalling the life of the youthful Christ, my gaze was drawn to the scene depicting the slaughter of the Holy Innocents. Above the windows, on frescoes from the Old Testament covering the three ceiling domes, I focused on the scene of Cain and Abel. These images, and their juxtaposition, imparted to me the mystery and tragedy of our human condition.

And yet Father Peter told us that each one of us through our faith must confirm Anton Shomali's life. Anton, that quiet, bright business student, was recognized by his peers as a compelling leader. I suspect he was murdered by border police precisely because of these qualities. Now what he lived and died for was being passed on to us: "This is my body which will be given up for you." Change can take place. We prayed together in faith that we, too, could be changed.

Brother Patrick J. White teaches at Bethlehem University, a Catholic institution in the West Bank.