Posted on 12/03/2003 3:08:15 PM PST by Alouette
Palestinian protesters in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday attacked returning members of the Palestinian delegation to Geneva with stones and rotten tomatoes and eggs.
Witnesses said a large group of children waited at the Rafah border crossing for the Palestinian officials who attended the ceremony to launch the Geneva Accord in Switzerland. The first to arrive was Hasan Asfour, a former Palestinian Authority cabinet minister and a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.
The witnesses said that the children at first tried to talk to Asfour, but he ignored them and got into a jeep that had come to collect him. At this point, the children started throwing stones and rotten eggs and tomatoes at the vehicle. A group of masked gunmen also showed up, firing into the air and next to the jeep. Asfour left the vehicle and tried to get into a Palestinian police car, but was blocked by the angry demonstrators.
He then fled to the Israeli side of the border crossing. Unconfirmed reports said Asfour was wounded in the leg either by a stone or a stray bullet.
The next in line was Ashraf Ajrami, a senior official with the PA Ministry of Information. As soon as he crossed into the Palestinian-controlled side of the border terminal, the demonstrators, chanting "Death to the traitors and collaborators," pounced on him and stole his suitcases. He was rescued by Palestinian policemen, who drove him away in one of their cars.
Sources in Gaza City told The Jerusalem Post that the "reception" for the Geneva delegation members was organized by senior Fatah officials and representatives of the refugees in the southern Gaza Strip. The sources added that similar protests are expected in the next few days outside the homes and offices of the Palestinians who participated in the Geneva conference.
Following Wednesday's incidents, the IDF closed the Rafah border crossing and reopened it after the crowd left the area.
This is the second incident of its kind at the Rafah crossing border this week. On Sunday, Palestinian protesters attacked a number of delegates as they arrived at the border crossing on their way to Geneva. The crowd beat and hurled insults at the participants, condemning them as traitors and collaborators who would relinquish the right of return for all refugees to their original homes inside Israel.
Husam Khader, a popular Fatah legislator from Nablus who is standing trial in Israel for organizing terrorist attacks, on Wednesday launched a scathing attack on the Geneva Accord and its Palestinian authors. In a message from prison, Khader, who heads the Committee for the Defense of Palestinian Refugees Rights, called for bringing Geneva initiator Yasser Abed Rabbo and his colleagues to trial for betraying the interests of the Palestinians.
Khader accused the Palestinian negotiators of exploiting the issues to gain personal fame and glory. He also praised the residents of Rafah who attacked the Palestinian officials on their way to Geneva and upon their return.
However I think Yossi Beilin should be placed in a pillory in Rabin Square for all the good citizens of Israel to pelt with feces, rotten eggs and garbage.
Boy. Sounds like these people are ready to explode, or something. [::rimshot::] :)
The duplicity of the administration in this matter is breathtaking. I'm sure Beilin will enjoy the meeting with Powell and Wolfowitz tomorrow, and return to a warm welcome (doesn't look like criminal charges will stick). While I didn't think the road map would work, to collapse the effort like this is just plain stupid. Likely stupidity, not duplicity, and probably not much harm done here, but these same morons are running our foreign policy world wide. We need a new Secretary of State, and the election is far enough off to do it.
Where there is a buyer, there will be a seller.
I will be laughing until next week :)
Like this?
Well, when I lived in Israel, there was a "Day Old" fruit & vegetable stand in the Mahane Yehuda shuk. There was another one (different owner) in the Meah Shearim shuk. These guys would go around every day and collect the leftover produce from the first-class stands and sell it the next day, dirt cheap.
I never shopped there, I mean, you would have to pay me to eat that stuff. But I guess that those stands sell their product for purposes other than eating.
Anywhere an Islamic terrorist relieves flatulence. It smells very much like standing downwind of a schwein farm.
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Secretary of State Colin Powell said on December 3, 2003 that the 'road map' peace plan for the Middle East was not dead. 'What we need is commitment from the Palestinian leadership to stop terrorism...the more we talk about peace, the better,' he told a news conference in Marrakesh. Powell was asked by reporters about an unofficial Middle East peace plan unveiled on Monday in Geneva, just before leaving Morocco as part of a three-nation African tour. 'The road map is not dead,' he said, referring to a U.S.-backed plan to end three years of violence between Israelis and Palestinians. Powell is seen in Tunis, December 2 ------------------- No Colin, the Peace Process never dies, only the Jews (No disrespect to Christian Freepers, but the Christians die in places like Sudan, and NOBODY raises their voices about that).
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A young Palestinian man holds a picture of Palestinian minister Yasser Abed Rabbo with the word 'traitor' on it during a demonstration upon the arrival of Palestinian negotiators of the Geneva accords in the southern Gaza Strip (news - web sites) town of Rafah Wednesday Dec. 3, 2003.
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Palestinian protesters jump on the car of an unnamed Palestinian official on his return from Geneva, after taking part in the signing ceremony for the Geneva Accord at the border crossing with Egypt, in the Rafah Refugee Camp, southern Gaza Strip December 3, 2003.
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Palestinian protesters jump on the car of an unnamed Palestinian official upon his return from Geneva, after taking part in the signing ceremony for the Geneva Accord, at the border crossing with Egypt, in the Rafah Refugee Camp, southern Gaza Strip December 3, 2003.
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Geneva Borders ----------------------------- Palestinian student supporters of the radical Islamic Hamas movement hold up a map of pre-1948 British-mandate Palestine during a protest against the Geneva Initiative at the al-Najah University in the West Bank city of Nablus
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And the next generation, learning the lessons of peace --------------- A Palestinian child carries a submachine gun during a sit-in held in Beirut's refugee camp of Shatila to protest the unofficial Geneva Initiative peace plan which was launched in the Swiss city.(
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BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!
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