CAIRO: Israel has started massive celebrations in most cities and settlements on the 63rd anniversary of the Israeli occupation of Arab territories in 1948 as part of the country's Independence Day celebrations. According to Israeli public radio, the celebrations began on Monday in the centers of many Israeli cities, where they set up a number of art shows and fireworks. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent a congratulatory message to the people where he said that “Israel is an isle of progress, democracy, development and freedom, in a region stretching from western India to the Atlantic Ocean across the Middle East and North Africa. “At this moment Israel has been able to put an end to the differences within its community. We must be proud of the achievements of the Jewish state and above all must feel the strength of the national unity which is the opposite of what is happening in some neighboring countries,” he added in an indirect reference to what happened in Egypt from the sectarian strife in recent days. The Speaker of the Israeli Knesset, Reuven Rivlin, delivered a speech during the ceremony, saying that any party, whether from the right or left, is not worth boycotting and that no center deserves ostracism from the community. “During the last year, we have seen repeated attempts to empty the political controversy from its real content either through the removal of certain groups or through the fatwas calling for the rejection of certain categories by the society. The differences between the various groups do not cause fear, because there is a partnership in the fate of all,” said Rivlin. He pointed out that Israeli democracy has faced difficult tests and passed through successfully despite the fact that the Israeli society lives in an atmosphere saturated with tension. In a provocative step to the feelings of Egyptians, Israeli newspaper, Ha'aretz, published photographs of Israeli soldiers directing their weapons towards Egyptian prisoners of war (POWs) in the 1956 war and taking pictures next to them. This was part of the commemoration of Israeli soldiers who were killed in the country's wars. Ha'aretz also published other photos of Egyptian POWs soldiers in the war of June 5, 1967, or the “6 days” war and other pictures of Palestinian prisoners in the war of 1948. In its album “Israel's wars since the 1948 war until operation Cast Lead in 2008,” the newspaper published photographs of the occupation of Sinai in 1956, as well as the image of the ship “Bat Yam,” while sinking in the War of Attrition. Ariel Sharon, former Israeli Prime Minister, who served as commander of armored forces in the war of June 5, was not absent in the pictures. The paper published two photos of him; the first was while he met with soldiers in Sinai, 1976, and the second was showing Menachem Begin, former Israeli Prime Minister, by his side. Ha'aretz also published a collection of rare photographs of the former Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan as he visited troops in Sinai; beside him was the Chief of Staff at the time Abraham Tamir. This is in addition to a photo of a soldier raising the Israeli flag on Sinai during the June 5 war. Moreover, there were photographs of Israeli soldiers next to the bodies in the massacres committed by Israel in Sabra and Shatila, the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, 1982, and photos of the Qana massacre in 1996. It is noteworthy that in 2008 the Israel's Channel Two published a video of Benjamin Ben-Eliezer killing Egyptian POWs in cold blood, giving rise to feelings of anger among Egyptians. Yet, Tel Aviv did not provide any apology, although former Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit submitted a formal protest on the video. On the other hand, Dozens of students from the Ain Shams University in Egypt organized a march in support of a third Palestinian Intifada, Tuesday, and demanded the stoppage of exporting Egyptian gas to Israel and the expulsion the Israeli ambassador to Cairo. A group calling for a “third Palestinian Intifada” from May 13 to May 15 has been launched on Facebook after the series of uprisings and revolutions in the Arab world. Although a large number of Facebook users joined the page, the administration of the social networking site closed the group on claims from the Israeli information Minister Yuli Edelstein that the page is inflammatory. Yet, the creators of the page denied any inflammatory activity saying that they only call for peaceful protests and declared that they will launch another website that would be hard for anyone to close. Aluf Ben, Head of reporters department in Ha'aretz, wrote in an article that “if the Palestinians decide to go out to the streets in thousands to the Old City of Jerusalem, Israel will not be able to control them, even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be unable to stop them even if he committed a massacre similar to that by Muammar Gaddafi.” BM
