The video of an Israeli soldier in the West Bank caught pointing a loaded gun at the head of an unarmed Palestinian teen was supposed to highlight the aggression of the Israeli military, but in Israel it has prompted the exact opposite response. Almost 130,000 people have "liked" a page set up in support of the soldier, and hundreds have sent in images of themselves holding signs of support. The Israeli military, on the other hand, said the soldier apparently violated the norms of behavior. But the soldier's behavior was normal, not unusual, and a reflection of Israel's 47-year military occupation of the West Bank - a life in limbo in a country occupied by a repressive foreign army. Palestinians have no recognized nation, no right of citizenship and no power over their own daily life. They live in a constant state of fear. The occupier imposes economic strangulation and collective punishment by restricting free movement; enclosing population centers; closing borders; barring most of the people from working inside “its country” and imposing regular curfews, roadblocks, checkpoints, electric fences and separation walls. It also continues to build new settlements in occupied territories, violating the Geneva Conventions prohibiting an occupier from settling its population on conquered land. Israel denies the Palestinians their basic human rights including those under the Fourth Geneva Convention which governs the treatment of civilians in war and under occupation. There are 149 articles of this convention; Israel violates almost all of them. Israel sends its troops, tanks and heavy armor into occupied neighborhoods at will to maraud and destroy. It strikes at will from the air with sophisticated missile-firing attack helicopters and F-16s. And it gives its security forces the right to freely harass, arrest or kill extra-judicially anybody – man, woman or child - on any pretext. It bulldozes homes and the people in them if they don't escape in time, as punishment or for lacking a permit to build on their own land, in their own country. It steals land relentlessly, hoping it will have it all one day or at least all the parts it wants. It detains, imprisons and tortures thousands of Palestinians for the crime of fighting for their freedom against an oppressive occupier. Many in the Israeli military who saw the video, posted by a Palestinian activist, say they feel frustrated and powerless to respond when faced with violence, such as stone-throwing, from Palestinians. But isn't Palestinian reaction a product of Israeli prevention of access to essential and emergency health care, education, employment, and even to sufficient food and water? Israel has created a state of economic siege forcing up to nearly two-thirds of the Palestinian people below the poverty line of $2.20 a day and making over half the workforce unemployed. It destroys crops and orchards including more than one million olive trees. It imposes punitive taxes and provides few services or withholds them at will as collective punishment. Palestinians have no power to stop any of these abuses or to receive any redress in Israeli courts. Soldiers suspected of breaking rules of engagement are rarely prosecuted and regulations are easily broken. From 2009-2012, only 22 of 632 military investigations of violence by soldiers against Palestinians or their property ended in convictions. The Israeli protest campaign was largely aimed at the army's perceived failure to back the soldier in the video. However, it is not the soldier or his comrades who need backing, but those living under their control.
