Damascus AL-BA’TH (in Arabic) — “With the Events” column by ‘Abd-al-Karim ‘Abd- al-Rahim: “What Do They Want From Somalia?!”; Page 3

European observers and reporters have criticized what is happening in Somalia under UN banners. Although we are confident that what is happening is not an act of retaliation for the Pakistani troops who were killed in Mogadishu, we support the protection of troops who serve under the banners of establishing security and peace raised by the United Nations.

However, if we return to the objective behind the UN intervention in Somalia-whether it is the declared objective when Marines were deployed along the Somali coast or it is the undeclared objective when UN troops opened fire with machine guns and killed Somali civilians demonstrating for an end to the tutelage over their homeland, then the observer would realize that the United Nations became a party to the Somali conflict instead of remaining an advocate for security and peace among the Somali parties fighting for power.

What is strange is that international forces firing at civilians happens only when it is an Arab state; that is, a member of the Arab League. Observers who denounced both the ground and air attacks on the Somalis say that the United Nations cannot prevent a human being from exercising his right to declare his political and social opinion over his country’s soil!!

Despite the elections held in Cambodia under the super- vision of this international organization and the success of a certain list of candidates in these elections, other Cambodian parties are waging a war against UN forces. Meanwhile, the latter are not launching a ground and air attack on the Cambodian capital…. Why?

While the decision to attack Somalia and the decision not to punish Israel, which has been refusing to implement UN resolutions for more than half a century and is even refusing to implement Resolution 799, appear to be opposite decisions, both decisions undermine the Arabs and their human rights.

The Somalis have differences among themselves just as separate parties differ in any country of the world, but the methods differ according to customs, traditions, and concepts that prevail in these societies. The United Nations came to disengage the Somali factions not to kill them, shell their capital with aircraft and missiles, and kill their women and children. Although it is extremely painful to say, we believe that dying of hunger in the civil war is better than dying from UN gunfire!!

Unemployment has been killing the Palestinians in the occupied territories ever since the siege by Israeli forces three months ago. Reports say that there is a 51 percent unemployment rate in the occupied Gaza Strip and West Bank and that financial losses exceed $5 million each day. Moreover, because of the siege, children are being killed by occupation bullets or dying from anemia because of hunger.

So why does the United Nations not launch its ground and air attacks to protect 2 million Palestinians whose lives are in danger as a result of the siege? Why not use a single standard when dealing with Palestine and Somalia?!!
The bitter fact is that Somalia is an Arab state and tutelage is imposed by UN military force!!

_{^{FBIS-NES-93-118, 22 June 1993, p. 37}}