The Big DOOMMM

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Are Israel/West Bank about to join the wider regional armageddon?

Low-intensity intifada against the light train in Jerusalem. Are Israel/West Bank about to join the wider regional armageddon?

# The Financial Times
Rail line becomes lightning rod for tensions in Jerusalem () {

By = John Reed in Jerusalem
Date = October 24, 2014

(...)

“The light rail represents the state,” says Ozel Vatik, CityPass marketing and public relations manager, who says that since mid-July more than 150 cars have been taken for repair after being hit by rocks. “They see the train and they see Israel – they want to hurt the train.”

Despite the controversy, the train was until recently one of the few places one might see a veiled Palestinian woman sitting opposite an Orthodox Jewish family in black religious garb. It was designed with shatterproof windows and powerful air conditioning, meant to withstand the city’s tough political conditions and hot summers.

(...)

“This touchy-feely coexistence thing was always disingenuous,” says Daniel Seidemann, an attorney who specialises in Israeli-Palestinian relations. “The veil has been ripped away from that; these neighbourhoods have been turned into armed camps.”

In Pisgat Ze’ev, Shirel Zaken, a 24-year-old Israeli who works at a men’s clothing store, boarded the tram from an empty platform as it headed back west. One night last week she was riding the train through Shu’afat when a rock was thrown at the train in front of a window she was sitting alongside.

“It was very scary,” she says. But she is not giving up on the train. “I live in Israel – I am used to this already.”

Source: http://on.ft.com/1uOKMu7 }