JUST ASK AND THEIR CONSCIENCES WILL DO THE REST:

Shopkeepers to join W. Bank struggle: Reviving commerce is key to a Palestinian shift to nonviolent resistance (Richard Boudreaux, August 1, 2007, LA Times)

For 13 years, Hebron's Old City has been so carved up by fences, concrete barriers and Israeli army checkpoints that most of its shops have closed. Starting today, the new Palestinian leadership in the West Bank is waging a campaign to get them reopened.

The initiative is part of a government program favoring nonviolent strategies against the Israeli occupation, a policy shift that has provoked fierce debate among Palestinians over how to achieve statehood.

Under the slogan "This City Is Yours," the government is promising $200 a month for six months to any Old City merchant willing to navigate the maze of security obstacles, reopen his shop and keep it open, in the hope that customers will follow and help revive a historic district that now resembles a ghost town.

It is because Israel is an Anglospheric nation that non-violence will work against it, which is why Ariel Sharon was so bent on creating a Palestine.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 1, 2007 8:51 AM