Q. How Can the Cycle of Violence between Israelis and Palestinians Be Broken?

A. By addressing a root cause of the violence: the Israeli occupation
of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.


Since 1967, Israel has illegally occupied Palestinian land through
massive military repression. The devastating impact of that occupation
can be seen just from the actions taken by Israel in just the last six
months:

Israeli troops and settlers have killed over 500 Palestinians,
including 172 children under the age of eighteen.

Over 16,000 Palestinians, 40% of them children, have been injured by
Israeli violence. Over 1,500 of the injured are permanently disabled.

The Israeli Defense Forces have destroyed over 250 Palestinian homes
since September 2001 (2500 since 1987). Israel has uprooted 80,000
mature olive and fruit trees, causing vast impoverishment.

In the past 34 years, Israel has built over 145 settlements on
Palestinian land, populating them with hundreds of thousands of
Israelis, causing massive hardship. In the tiny Gaza Strip, for
example, 5,000 Jewish settlers occupy 20% of the land; 1.3 million
Palestinians must make do with the remainder.

The only way to end the violence is for Israel to close its
settlements and withdraw its military presence from Palestinian land.

This information is provided by Not In My Name, a gathering of
American Jews seeking a just peace to the conflict between Israelis
and Palestinians. We are part of Jewish Unity for a Just Peace, an
international network of Jewish organizations calling for an end to
the Israeli occupation. For more information, please visit
www.nimn.org or call 518 273 0167.