The Times · 20 June 2002

CP-2002-132

Prominent Palestinians decry suicide bombings

By JAMIE TARABAY

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Transcribed from the clipping

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — More than 50 Palestinians took out a full-page newspaper ad yesterday condemning suicide bombings, a move that sparked debate at a time when most Palestinians support the attacks as an effective way to hit Israel.

The ad in Al Quds, a leading Palestinian daily, appeared yesterday morning — a day after a suicide bombing killed 19 people on a Jerusalem bus, and hours before another suicide attack killed seven more people at a bus stop in the evening.

In the ad, the Palestinians urged the militant groups behind deadly assaults on Israeli civilians to “stop sending our young people to carry out such attacks.” “We see no results in such attacks, but a deepening of the hatred between both peoples and a deepening of the gap between us,” the ad said.

The signatories included Hanan Ashrawi, a leading Palestinian spokeswoman and a legislator, and the Palestinians' senior Jerusalem official, Sari Nusseibeh, along with other prominent figures regarded as moderates. The ad urged other Palestinians to join them in their opposition to the bombings.

Among the others who signed the statement were noted Gaza human rights activist and psychiatrist Iyad Serraj, newspaper editor Hana Siniora, prominent economist Mohammed Ishtaya, Yasser Arafat's security adviser Mamdouh Nofal and Abdel Khader Husseini, son of the late Faisal Husseini, who was Nusseibeh's predecessor as top Palestinian official in Jerusalem.

“We felt we had to chart a course, not just break the silence,” Ashrawi said. “We wanted to create a momentum to get people to think with their minds and to reason, instead of always reacting emotionally and out of revenge and pain and trauma.”

With the latest attacks, Palestinians have carried out 71 suicide bombings in the past 21 months of Mideast fighting, killing about 250 people on the Israeli side.

The attacks outrage Israelis, and the government has responded with military strikes and incursions into Palestinian territory, aimed at suspected militants as well as buildings belonging to the Palestinian Authority government and security forces.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon says Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is ultimately responsible for failing to stop the attacks. Palestinians have held virtually no public debate on the issue. Polls regularly show strong support for the suicide bombings, though it has come down a bit in recent months, following the strong Israeli military response.

A poll released last week by a Palestinian think tank showed support for suicide bombings dropped from 74 percent in December to 68 percent recently. The survey, which had a margin of error of 3 percentage points, was roughly in line with other polls.

Ghassan Khatib, who headed the think tank and was recently named Labor Minister, said the modest decline in support for bombings was due to three reasons: international criticism of the Palestinians, the damage done to the Palestinian image by the bombings, and the consequences for the Palestinians, including Israel's military responses.

He said the newspaper ad was the strongest public expression to date opposing the bombings.

How this transcription was made

The paper is taken from Maria's slide label, not from a masthead: no masthead or folio appears on the clipping. It is the only clipping on that slide and the only label, so the mapping is unambiguous. Masthead not readable on the scan. The label on the slide read: UNCONFIRMED — Maria's label says The Times (New Jersey); no masthead, folio or paper name appears on either scan. The only credits are “AP photo” and “Associated Press” under the byline. — Assembled from 2 scans: s105_1 is the Page A1 block (photograph, caption, headline, byline and the first three columns), s105_2 is the jump on Page A6 under the jump slug CONDEMN, Continued from Page A1. The jump scan also carries a Talbots semiannual sale advertisement and the top of a Laser advertisement; both excluded. — Two clippings of one article, joined into a single image for the record (s105_1.png, s105_2.png).

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