By JAMES LEECH To Arab men, women and chil- dren on the West Bank of the Jor- dan River, the recent Israeli car bombings and mutilation of. elected Arab mayors of the region were a gross extension of daily intimidation, deprivation, terror and torture under Israeli occupa- tion. While the world responded in horror, Canada’s big business media persisted in its stereotyped picture of Palestinians, hiding the reality. of families, children struggling for minimum health and education standards, and for their homeland. Palestinian women carry on a patriotic struggle through the General. Union of Palestinian Women. Expressing the views of the Palestine Liberation Organi- zation, the GUPW appeals to women in a wide spectrum of so- cial conditions. Its dynamic pres- ident, Mrs. Issam Abdul Hadie, is the only woman member of the Central Council of the PLO. Atits conference, Feb. 25-29 this year in Beirut, GUPW stressed ‘‘mobilizing the efforts of the Palestinian woman to participate in the struggle for the national liberation and to defend her mate- rial and moral interests by trying to improve her social, cultural, vocational and living standards in general.” Greater steadfastness ‘‘inside the occupied territories,”’ build- ing the National Front within the PLO and, ‘“‘the escalation of the armed struggle to foil the ‘self- rule’ scheme™’ put up by the Carter-Begin-Sadat axis at Camp David — these are among their aims. How hollow is the ring of ‘*self-rule’’ to be granted by the military occupationists in the light of the harassment, deportation, and now crippling by explosives of the elected representatives of the Arab people. The ‘‘self-rule’’ pretense is further exposed by the ongoing Israeli program of ‘“‘settlements’’ both rural and urban — the former in cities like Hebron and occupied East Jerusalem. GUPW president Hadie, who was imprisoned by the Israelis and later deported from her West Bank home (she now lives in Jor- dan), has represented her organization at many inter- national meetings, including a Lisbon conference in November 1979, supporting the Palestinians. She stressed there: ‘‘We are not anti-Semitic; we are against Zion- ism as a racist force which pre- vents the establishment of our homeland.”’ On that occasion she reviewed for the Tribune the Palestinian women’s struggle, going back to 1921 when they confronted the British High Commissioner, de- manding cancellation of the Bal- four Declaration which opened Palestinian lands to the Zionist scheme to populate the area with Jewish emigrants. “The most significant role for Palestinian women began in 1967," Hadie said, adding: ‘*Wherever there is a revolution, women participate; when resist- ance is called for, women partici- pate. Thousands have been in Is- raeli prisons, and many of us are Z < deportees.”’ With the formation of GUPW in 1965 and the 1967 war, women <= became ever more active. GUPW has committees on political, con- stitutional, organizational, foreign relations, social, financial and cultural matters. GUPW_ encourages the **strengthening and deepening of the relations of common struggle with all liberation movements and democratic and progressive forces in the world, and with the socialist bloc, headed by the friendly Soviet Union.”’ Camp David Fraud The Palestinian women’s union is today battling for the national unity of the Palestinians, ‘‘one of the primary conditions for vic- tory,”’ and the foiling of the self- rule hoax. Exposing the Camp David fraud is an urgent task. As Mayor Mohammed Milhem of Halhoul If the bomb drops In his speech to the Paris meeting, Soviet representative B.N. Pono- maryov quoted from a document sent to U.S. president Carter and Soviet leader Brezhnev by a group of American scientists who were alarmed at opinions circulating which argued that nuclear war would only result in partial damage and that mankind could survive. The scientists’ document shows what a 20-megaton nuclear bomb would accomplish. The Soviet delegate followed this quote by pointing out that the world’s-nuclear arsenals contain 1.5 million bombs of the type dropped on Hiroshima. Their total yield he said, exceeds the equi- valent of 50,000 million tons of conventional explosives which could wipe out every living thing on earth 15 times over. * * * ‘“‘A 20-megaton thermonuclear bomb exploded on a clear day at ground level on a large city would create a fireball 1.5 miles in diameter, with temperatures of 20-30 million degrees Fahrenheit. Everything in the downtown area, the streets and the earth below, and all living things, would be vaporized, leaving a crater several hundred feet deep. “At six miles from the epicentre, all people would be instantly killed by a huge, silent heat flash travelling at the speed of light. Glass would melt ' and buildings would collapse under a supersonic shock wave and winds of 300 miles per hour. ‘Even mild winds of 20 miles per hour would carry fallout as far as 150 miles where everyone exposed would receive a lethal dose within 24 hours. Sublethal doses would produce increased incidences of still-births, fetal malformations, leukemia and cancer. Genetic damage would ap- pear in subsequent generations. “Such an exchange would be completed in one hour and could destroy most life in the northern hemisphere ... it would be a different world afterwards, colder, harsher, and contaminated by radiation for thou- sands of years. The number of deaths would break all scales of compari- ’” son... PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JUNE 20, 1980—Page 6 Issam Abdul Hadie, speaking at a recent conference in Lisbon, de- scribes the struggle of Palestinian women for freedom. put it in the pamphlet, Palesti- nians and Human Rights (a publication he shares with the re- cently wounded Mayor Karim Khalaf of Ramallah): ‘‘We have no interest in legitimizing Israeli occupation by consenting to a thinly camouflaged version of it.”’ He denounced the Camp David requirement that Palestinians ‘‘seek a substitute leadership as a condition for any sort of participa- tion.””. While the crude and brutal at- tacks on the Arab mayors, and the lesser-known (at least in Canada) imprisonment and torture of Palestinian spokesmen are obvi — ous and despicable, the Israelis use more insidious methods © — destroy the future of the Palestr nians. During the Lisbon conference — the GUPW president express deep concern over the corruption of education of Arab childret under Israeli occupation. spoke of constant Israeli harass ment of teachers, school princr pals and students. She referred 10 arbitrary closing of schools a5# reaction to student demonstt® tions in the occupied territones: The demonstrations are triggered by many things, arrests of PIO fessors, blocking of shipments of books, refusal to allow studies of any but Israeli-approved texts: ““Some teachers, men and W men, have been deported for al- lowing the students to demot: - strate,’’ Hadie said. et “The Israelis are using administrative detention (founded by the British mandaté to put people in jail and leavé them, without respect to the fat! that many are under age.” A similar situation exists in th? | field of health. In May 1978 the World Health Organizatio? (WHO) expressed ‘‘its deep cof cern at the poor health psychological conditions suffered by the inhabitants of the occupie# Arab territories,"’ and com demned Israel for the ruinous measures it had taken tow Arabs under their military rule: In these conditions it is not s ing that the Palestinians resent the ceaseless distortions of the! cause and their purposes. ——— Computers and wooden hoes Spanning the centuries | KABUL — Revolution is a complex and, sometimes, contra- dictory process. This is all the more true here, in a country of contrasts where the past blends with the present. An old Afghan peasant told me his back pains had subsided fol- lowing ultra-violet ray treatment at a Soviet clinic. He went back to his field, tilling the land with a wooden hoe as his forefathers had tilled for generations ... In a Kabul bank a small shop- keeper checks his interest rates on a Japanese pocket calculator then leaves his fingerprint on the deposit slip. He is illiterate ... Two students at the poly- technical institute here are dis- cussing the latest achievements in astrophysics. Their professor tells me the father of one is sworn to kill the other's father. The two familes have been engaged in a blood fued for centuries. * * * The Republic’s new flag is tri- colored: Black traditionally means the struggle for independ- ence against colonialism. The green symbolizes nature, spring and the Moslem faith. Red is the color of the revolution. The new coat-of-arms shows an ear of wheat and a cog wheel, symbolizing the alliance of work- ers and peasants. The rising sun is the ancient symbol of Afghanis- tan, while the mihrab and minbar are Moslem symbols. A book opened with empty pages symbol- izes the holy book of Afghan his- tory and the country’s future to built by the people. Finally, the five-pointed star is both a symbol of the revolution and an ancient sign of happines* — Notes by APN correspondent! G. Borovik from Kabul . — The British Labor Party’s re- cent special conference held in London’s Wembly Stadium overwhelmingly accepted a document calling on the party to actively pursue a policy for peace and disarmament. The proposals were contained in an overall condemnation of Tory policies and were part of the Labor Party’s ‘‘Call to the people’’ under the slogan, ‘*Peace, Jobs, Freedom’’. Among the peace proposals were: Opposition to ‘‘the manufac- ture and deployment of Cruise missiles and the neutron bomb and refusal to permit their de- ployment in Britain by the United States or any other country.” ‘*., the safety of British people, and of the people of Europe, both East and West in- cluding the people of the Soviet Union, will be best secured by multilateral mutual disarmament in the nuclear and conventional fields. The arms race has begun. It must be halted at once. We de- dicate ourselves to this objective. ‘“‘We urge immediate rati- fication of the Agreement on Strategic Arms Limitatio® (SALT-II) ... and we regard it®” vital that new talks with the Pu! pose of further reducing the number of strategic nucles weapons held by both sidé should begin at once. We want 0 see a Comprehensive Test N Treaty. We support the U Committee on Disarmament. The section of the document ® tled ‘‘Policy for Peace’, open “Ways to secure lasting peat and progress towards disar™® ment must be first on the agent A third world war would dest? civilization.” ‘*We call upon all governments concerned to impart a ® tho! urgency to the negotiations have been taking place betwe East and West in Vienna .-- Reports from the London meet ing show overwhelming suP for the peace proposals. Adve cates of ‘“‘negotiation ae strength’? ‘were roundly b? pif and the tone of the meeting A described as ‘‘anti-nuc poe antitNATO and anti-Unit States.”