Rumors are circulating that Israel’s Mossad is training 30 high-ranking Indian police officers in the techniques of targeted assassinations, to render the Maoist organisation “headless”. There’s talk in the press about the new hardware that has been bought from Israel: laser range-finders, thermal imaging equipment and unmanned drones, so popular with the US army. Perfect weapons to use against the poor.
Hat tip to writer Arundhati Roy, in Outlook.
Lasers glow red in the night like the eyes of wild beasts. An enemy spy drone, like a pale fish-shaped balloon, hovers high overhead to eavesdrop and snap photos. Heaps of fresh rubble cast weird shadows. And sonic booms – louder than a crack of thunder – trigger dread whenever F-16 fighter jets fly low.
In Gaza’s grim conditions, mothers find it hard to tell if their offspring are crying out of fright, pain or misery. But when normally bickering brats fall silent, it’s the first sign of mental scars from being constantly scared...
“Children between age six and 12 are the most vulnerable to phobias,” explains Maha el Shawwa, who coordinates all Welfare Association programmes in Gaza. “Littler ones just cling to their mothers or grandmothers, but school-age children start wetting their beds or fearing the dark. They feel ashamed and get teased mercilessly by neighbours and siblings. We try to promote awareness of these simple problems, so the mother won’t place the wet mattress in the sun to dry where everyone can see it.”
In Beit Hanoun, a northern Gaza town, householders discovered that Israeli snipers who stay alert at the trigger all night must wear disposable diapers because they are forbidden to leave their posts. The snipers leave the used ones behind – sealed plastic packets of contempt. Schoolboys who soil themselves at night because they fear walking down a dark hallway often get mocked by their peers as IDF goons with smelly pants. It’s a slow battle for them to regain confidence.
Little Omar, a two year old who witnessed Israeli troops demolishing his father’s orange groves and converting his house to a barracks, mounts a barren hill every morning and simply screams at the horizon.
While most older children attempt to swallow such rage, others feel the need to strike out.
Little Omar, attempting to play in his father's ruined orange grove, heads away from his hill.
Teensy weensy but with a fatal sting, the next generation of robotic weapons is being developed now, and within three years, they will wreak futuristic havoc in the Promised Land. When I first glanced at the headlines, I imagined that Shimon Peres was toying with the notion of creating White Anglo-Saxon Protestant androids to buzz the terrorists by remote control. No, not that kind of WASP.
According to the daily Yedioth Ahronoth, Deputy Prime Minister Peres and his military gadgetmongers envision swarms of cunning bionic hornets, and each one can give chase down a maze of alleyways, snap photos, and kill a specific target. These deadly miniature drones, powered by nanotechnology, will be precision-designed to circumvent human shields. But until someone devises mini-robot repellent, I can't imagine anything that would attract children more.
This sci-fi scenario really bugs me. Wouldn't it be simpler just to sit down and talk, then spend the billions of research and development shekels on health and education costs for the next generation of Israelis and Palestinians?
Posts
All Comments
