Live From Occupied Palestine

Always was, Always will be Aboriginal Land: commemorating Invasion Day in Australia

2012-01-26T01:50:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

as you will be well aware, this blog is primarily dedicated to providing updates, news and information about Palestine. I do occasionally post on other issues in the Middle East. Today, my post is specifically about Australia and the 224th anniversary of the European colonisation and ethnic cleansing of this country.

One of the reasons, I became active in the Palestine solidarity campaign was because I saw the similarities between the Indigenous struggle of the Palestinian people and the struggle of Indigenous Australians. Coming from a family of mixed heritage (my mother is Aboriginal and my father is Anglo-Australian), my first engagement with political activism was around Aboriginal and Indigenous rights and the struggle for land rights and justice in this country.

Today, the 26th January, is marked officially as "Australia Day", however, to Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders (the Indigenous people of Australia), the day is known as Invasion Day and/or Survival Day. On this day, we commemorate and remember the struggle of Indigenous Australians against colonisation, dispossession and injustice and continue to mark the fact that the struggle for Indigenous Australian rights continues in this country.

Aboriginal Australians have been no different from the Palestinians in fighting back against ethnic cleansing and settler-colonisation. Our people actually carried out an extensive armed resistance to European settler colonialism. This resistance began the moment Cook set foot on Australian soil in 1770 – the Gweagal people attacked Cook’s landing party with spears and woomeras. From that moment on Aboriginal resistance never ceased.

When Phillip arrived in Australia in 1788, Aboriginals continued their resistance – lead by warriors like Pemulwuy (Eorua people), in Western Australia an armed resistance was led by Noongar warriors Yagan, Calyute and Weeip. In Tasmania, Aboriginals waged years of resistance against settler-colonisation. The Aboriginal resistance during this period was intensive, as was the colonial repression. From1828 - 1832, the colonial forces implemented martial law and at the end of this period only a small number of Tasmanian Aboriginals remained alive, the majority of them killed by the colonisers.

In Queensland, the Kalkadoon people similarly waged an armed struggle against the Queensland police and settler-colonialists in the 1870s and 1880s. The Kalkadoon’s land ran from Mount Isa to Conclurry, and they were re-known for being fierce warriors. As soon as European settlers began their land grab of Kalkadoon land, they were met with a fierce resistance from the Kalkadoon. The Kalkadoon actually formed disciplined units, armed with stone clubs and razor sharp stone pointed spears,and engaged in guerrilla warfare against the European settlers and police in the region. After the police massacred many of the Kalkadoon women and children in retaliation for the killing of the settler-invaders, the Kalkadoon took a stand in an area known as Battle Mountain in 1884.

After initially having the upper-hand in the battle, the Kalkadoon were defeated due to the invaders superior modern weaponry. More than 200 of their warriors killed during the battle, breaking the back of the Kalkadoon resistance. Modern studies estimate more than 900 Kalkadoon lost their lives in battle or died from arsenic laced flour, blankets infect with the measles and poisoned water holes.

By the 1900s Aboriginal armed resistance to European invasion had come to an end, however, this did not mean the end of Aboriginal resistance.

When the Israeli Knesset passed the Nakba bill in an attempt to prevent Palestinians commemorating the Nakba (the catastrophe) and the ethnic cleansing of their people by Zionist settler-colonial forces, the Israeli right-wingers such as Danny Aylon claimed that there was no other country in the world which would "standy by while its celebrations of independence are turned into a memorial service".

Aylon clearly either didn't know or chose to ignore the fact that in Australia, Aboriginal Australians have since the first official "Australia Day" in 1938 marked it as a day of mourning, resistance and struggle.

Prior to 1938, the individual states had marked the day as a celebration of European colonisation on state level not at a national level. In 1934, the NSW state government marked the day by re-enacting Captain Phillips' arrival and flag-raising at Sydney Cove and by staging a parade. As part of the day, 120 motorised floats, stretching 1.5 miles, took one and a half half hours to pass through the streets of Sydney. The theme of the parade was "March to Nationhood".

The organisers of the event to try and create some sort of bizarre authenticity brought in 26 Aboriginal people from Menindee, a settlement of Wiradjuri and Barkendjii people on the River Darling, and from Brewarrina east of Bourke (the Murawari people) to act out Aboriginal resistance to the British landing, and to pose on the first float in the parade.

That day, there were also other Aboriginal people at the proceedings, including Aboriginal activist, William Cooper, founder of the Australian Aborigines' League in Victoria in 1936, as well as Jack Patten, Bill Ferguson and Pearl Gibbs who was the head of the Aborigines' Progressive Association. For these Aboriginal leaders and activists, Australia Day was a "day of mourning"

As a result, in 1938, on the 150th anniversary of colonisation, Aboriginal Australians gathered at a national conference to mark a "national day of mourning and protest" and issued a 10 point statement protesting the racist mistreatment and oppression of Aboriginal Australians.

The statement called for Aboriginal people to be able to access the same citizenship rights as those of white-Australians - something that would not be granted until 1967 (for more information click here).

The conference also called for Aboriginal land rights, equal employment opportunity, improvement in standards of health, housing and education. The conference also took a stand against the government sanction stealing of Indigenous children (for more information click here). In addition, the conference argued for the termination of the Aboriginal Protection Board and the dumping of the Aborigines Protection Act 1901-1936 (NSW) which restricted controlled all aspects of Aboriginal life, from marriage to employment.

Over the next 35 years Aboriginal resistance continued. You can read more about it here in an article I wroted in 2001 - click here to read.

In 1972, Aboriginal resistance and the Aboriginal land rights struggle reached a new level when four young Aboriginal activists set up the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy.

In 1972, the then Prime Minister, Billy McMahon government in response to an Indigenous land rights claim by the Yirrakala people issues a White Paper on January 25, 1972 declaring that it was in the "national interest" and the interest of Aboriginal people themselves that mining exploration on Aboriginal reserves should continue. The Indigenous response was immediate. Four Aboriginal activists, with the aid of the Communist Party of Australia, traveled to Canberra to establish the tent embassy in protest. Soon Aborigines came from all over the country to help staff the embassy.

The Aboriginal Tent Embassy protesters put forward a number of key demands, including calling for Aboriginal legal title to and control of mining rights on existing reserve lands and settlements throughout Australia; the preservation of all sacred sites throughout Australia; compensation monies for land not returnable, in the form of a down payment of $6 billion and an annual percentage of gross national income.

The embassy formed alliances with anyone — black or white — who supported the call for indigenous rights.

It was the tent embassy's reliance on Aboriginal self-organisation and direct public protest action which resulted in thousand of Australians marching in Canberra and around the country in support of Aboriginal rights.

I have included below the film "Tent Embassy" (in four parts) below which outlines the history of the Tent Embassy and some footage taken from Ningla A-Na (Hungry for our Land) (1972), a film documenting Black activism in Australia in the 1970s, in particular the Tent Embassy.

Today we once again remember that "White Australia has a Black History" and we remember once again today and always that the land on which today's Australia stands: "Always was, Always will be Aboriginal Land"

in solidarity, Kim

Warning:

Tent Embassy & Ningla A- Na

contain images of Indigenous people now deceased

TENT EMBASSY

Directed by Frances Peters-Little

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Ningla A-Na (Hungry for our Land) (1972)

2nd police attack on Embassy

3rd police attack on Embassy

Inequality Report: Discrimination against the Palestinian Arab Minority in Israel

2012-01-20T22:30:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
Adalah: the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in February 2011 issued the following report called: The Inequality Report: The Palestinian Arab Minority in Israel. The report outlines the systematic discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israels and notes there are over 30 laws that actively discriminate against the Palestinian Arab minority in Israel.

In the last year, since the report was issued, Adalah has also issued a number of briefing documents outlining the range of NEW discriminatory laws either passed or being considered by the Israel Knesset. You can access their June 2011 briefing paper on the new laws here.

To read more of Adalah's reports or about their work, you can visit their website here.

In solidarity, Kim

The Palestinian Arab Minority in Israel - Inequality Report

New Comprehensive BDS Booklet: Targeting Israeli Apartheid

2012-01-17T03:26:00.001-08:00

Targeting Israeli Apartheid: a Boycott Divestment and Sanctions Handbook

"Wall Museum" tells the stories of Palestinian women in Occupied Bethlehem

2012-01-15T00:33:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

as many of you will be aware, many Palestinians and Palestine solidarity activists refusing to be intimidated by Israel's apartheid wall have used it as "canvas" for liberation, spraying it with slogans and painting images and art work on it highlighting the Palestinian struggle for human rights, justice and self-determination. Sumoud Story House, based in Bethlehem has now launched an inspiring resistance project utilising the apartheid wall once again as a canvas to tell the stories of Palestinian women.

Please find below a report which appeared in Maan News, along with photos of this amazing project.

In solidarity, Kim

***

New 'wall museum' tells women's stories

Published Saturday 24/12/2011 (updated) 03/01/2012 : Maan News

A "wall museum" displays stories told by Palestinian women, on Israel's separation barrier in Bethlehem (MaanImages/Jenny Baboun)

BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- A unique museum has been set up on the path of Israel's wall, which snakes through the West Bank city of Bethlehem.

An initiative of the Sumud Story House, it is designed to communicate Palestinian women’s stories about the "truth of Palestinian life which the wall tries to hide and kill," a statement said.

Each panel contains a story that was either written or chosen by Palestinian women’s groups who convene at the Sumud Story House.

During Christmas, 25 posters are being attached to the wall on the northern side of Rachel’s Tomb. Through individual sponsorship, the museum will gradually expand.

The Sumud Story House is part of the Arab Educational Institute in Bethlehem.

Israel's High Court exposes Israel's apartheid regime

2012-01-13T22:43:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

On 11 January, Israel's High Court rejected a legal challenge by a range of Israeli human rights groups to one of Israel's most notorious examples of Apartheid legisilation - the 2003 Temporary Amendment to the Citize3nship and Entry to Israel Law. The law made it almost impossible for Palestinian spouses of Israeli citizens to live with them in Israel. The law is a clear example of enforced separation and discrimination based on ethnicity and nationality. This was apartheid nature of the law was confirmed by the High Court ruling, which justified upholding the law by saying: "human rights are not a prescription for national suicide".

Below is a video by Adalah which was made in 2009, explaining the discriminatory nature of the Citizenship Law. Adalah was the lead human rights organisation that sought to challenge the law. I have also included a statement issued by the Palestinian NGO Badil, which campaigns for Palestinian refugee and residency rights.

In solidarity, Kim

***

Israel’s High Court exposes Israeli apartheid regime

13th January 2012 – BADIL Resource center for Palestinian residency and Refugee Rights

On 11th January 2012, Israel’s High Court rejected a legal challenge, brought by Adalah, ACRI and other Israeli human rights organizations, to one of the most obvious pieces of Israeli apartheid legislation: the 2003 Temporary Amendment to the Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law.¹ This law suspends the possibility of Palestinian citizens of Israel and Jerusalem ID-holders gaining permission, through family reunification, to legally live in Israel or occupied East Jerusalem with their spouses from the occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) or from purported “enemy states.”² This decision confirms the Court’s earlier ruling on the issue, in May 2006, and entrenches this discriminatory law within the apartheid legislation of Israel, whose public institutions uphold the regime.

In May 2002, Israel issued decision 1813 which froze the applications for all Israeli citizens or East Jerusalem residents which involved Palestinian spouses from the OPT, giving the reason that the government feared a "creeping right of return" through the unification process. In 2003, this policy was legally enacted by the Knesset, which passed the 2003 Temporary Amendment to the Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law which was amended in 2005 and 2007. Since the overwhelming majority of Israeli citizens wishing to marry spouses from the OPT are Palestinians, the law is overtly discriminatory towards Palestinians and violates the right to family life. Notably, the 2003 amendment does not change the situation for Israeli citizen spouses applying to be joined either by foreign spouses or Israeli settler spouses living in the OPT.

Similarly, the process of applying for family reunification by those living in the OPT (i.e. to bring their spouses in from outside the OPT) has been under Israeli control since the 1967 occupation. According to MIFTAH over 150,000 applications for family reunification in the OPT were requested between 1973-2000 and only a few thousand of them were approved by Israel. Since 2000 the whole procedure has been officially frozen and only a few thousand more have been granted on the basis of "good will gestures."

This “system” is one of many Israeli apartheid measures aimed at changing the demographics in Israel and the OPT towards an exclusive Jewish population. Palestinian families who happen to have different residency statuses –Israeli citizen, Jerusalem ID, West Bank ID or Gaza ID- issued by Israel cannot legally live together within “Historic Palestine” which includes Israel and the OPT. They are then faced with a choice of living abroad, living apart from one another or taking the risk of living illegally in one place or another.

This demographic intention is reflected in one of the reasons given by the Court for its decision: “human rights are not a prescription for national suicide.” This reason was further emphasized by Knesset-member (MK) Otniel Schneller who stated, “the decision articulates the rationale of separation between the (two) peoples and the need to maintain a Jewish majority… and character of the state” and by MK Yaakov Katz who said “.. the State of Israel was saved from being flooded by 2-3 million Arab refugees.” This illustrates once more the Israeli self portrait as an exclusively Jewish state with a different set of rights for its Jewish and non-Jewish (mainly Palestinian) inhabitants.

Israel can either be the self-proclaimed modern and democratic nation state with equal rights for all its citizens, regardless of their religion, ethnicity, language or tribal heritage or an ethnocracy, enforcing a regime which ensures domination by one “racial” group over another; thus an apartheid state. Israel’s High Court has clearly illustrated that it is the latter.

Adalah has identified more than 30 main laws which discriminate, directly or indirectly, against Palestinians and constitute the legal aspect of the Israeli regime which was recently identified as one of apartheid³ across all of historic Palestine by the Russell Tribunal on Palestine.
-----
1. The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (Temporary Order) 5763-2003
2. Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon.
3. See BADIL's forthcoming working paper no 13: Israeli Apartheid over Mandate Palestine

Report: Third National BDS Conference, Hebron, Occupied Palestine - 17 December 2011

2012-01-13T03:23:00.000-08:00

January 9, 2012 by BDS Conference team: BDS Global Wesbsite

On 17 December 2011, Palestinians gathered in the city of Hebron in the occupied West Bank for the Third National Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Conference. The event took place against the backdrop of continuous Israeli violations of Palestinian rights, and a growing resistance against injustice worldwide as demonstrated by the Arab revolutions and the occupy movements. Just minutes away from the conference venue, 500 Jewish settlers live under escort of the Israeli military in a colonial enclave in the middle of old Hebron, terrorizing local Palestinian residents on a daily basis, with the stated intent of driving them from their homes. Hebron is also an important commercial center in Palestine, and thus was a fitting venue to hold the national BDS conference, after it was held in Nablus and Ramallah in previous years.

The day started early with about 500 Palestinians from all corners of the West Bank, as well as 48 Palestinians representing a diverse sector of civil society including trade unions, student and women groups, academics, cultural workers and NGOs, all uniting under the banner of BDS.

There was also a visible international presence as well as that of Israeli partners who have responded to the 2005 BDS call. Notable was the absence of representation from Gaza, under an Israeli imposed siege, and refugees outside historic Palestinian, although their contribution to the movement was acknowledged.

The conference was an opportunity to take stock of the movement’s achievements worldwide, and to develop strategies to face the challenges ahead. The BDS movement witnessed impressive growth in 2011.

Achievements include the withdrawal of German company Deutsche Bahn from construction of the A1 train line connecting Jerusalem to Tel Aviv; the forced closure of settlement company Ahava’s London flagship store and the loss of a $10 bn contract by French company Alstom in Saudi Arabia as a result of its role in the construction of the illegal Jerusalem Light Rail in occupied Jerusalem. 2011 was also the year when Israel’s foremost agricultural export company and a major BDS target – Agrexco – went bankrupt thanks in part to a sustained Europe-wide campaign.

The movement has now visibly spread beyond its traditional base of Palestine solidarity groups. The call for a military embargo of Israel received an enthusiastic response in Brazil and South Korea while in Australia, a nationwide debate involving government politicians and national media outlets ensued following the adoption of the movement’s principles by Marrickville Council in Sydney. A number of well-known artists have cancelled their scheduled performances in Israeli venues following appeals from BDS activists. Over a hundred Swiss artists vowed to boycott performances in Israel. Similarly, over 200 Swedish academics pledged to implement an academic boycott of Israel. The campaign for the academic and cultural boycott of Israel (ACBI) has undoubtedly been one of the most visible, and successful campaigns this past year.

Governments and corporations are yet to end complicity with Israel’s policies of occupation, colonization and apartheid, as is clear from Israel’s continued violations of international law. Nevertheless, the costs for Israel are now undeniable, as BDS is proving to be the most effective tool to challenge Israel’s impunity. Governments and corporations can now expect strong and principled opposition from a truly global movement. Israel and its supporters in turn have recognized BDS as a “strategic threat” that could become an “existential threat”, yet unable to mount effective opposition to the movement.

The opening session of the conference covered these exciting developments. Dr. Wael Abu Yousef, representing the Coalition of National and Islamic forces, said that despite internal political divisions between the political parties, BDS is an unshakable point of consensus among them. Omar Barghouti, a founding member of the BDS movement, emphasized that while the movement is inspired by the South African anti-apartheid struggle and other struggles for national liberation around the world, it is foremost a Palestinian movement, rooted in decades of nonviolent popular resistance to Zionism.

Michael Deas, the BNC coordinator in Europe, and Adam Horowitz, co-editor of popular blog Mondoweiss, spoke in the first panel about developments of the campaign in Europe and the US. There was much interest in the numerous successes the BDS movement has achieved, in addition to an element of surprise about the movement’s wide reach and successes. Questions asked by the audience reflected these sentiments. There was consensus amongst participants that these victories should be widely publicized as to promote awareness amongst Palestinian civil society about the strength and victories of the BDS movement.

The second panel addressed the possibilities for implementing a boycott of Israel locally and in the Arab world. Rania Elias, member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), said Israeli and international actors have been major players promoting Palestinian normalization with Israel, which runs counter to Palestinian aspirations and universal opposition to normalization within Palestinian civil society. The audience voiced their opposition to normalization, and demanded that the Palestinian Authority takes a strong stance to end all forms of normalization, and to hold those involved accountable.

Palestinian economist Ibrahim Shikaki provided a detailed critique of the current state of the Palestinian economy, dangerously developing to become subjugated to Israel in the long-term. He warned against attempts to replace a national resistance discourse with that of economic development.

In his analysis of Israeli dominance of the Palestinian consumer market, Salah Haniyyeh of the Economic Monitor noted that the Palestinian Authority lacks procurement legislation within its own government institutions to favor Palestinian and Arab products over Israeli ones. He also lamented the perception of Israeli products as being superior to Palestinian ones, calling on organized efforts to promote local produce. Hanniyeh considered shortsighted the idea that the economic boycott of Israel should be halted for the risk it could pose to livelihoods of some families and instead emphasized the need for proactive strategies to protect workers while forwarding the national cause. Omar Assaf, representative of the Palestinian Trade Union Coalition for BDS (PTUC-BDS), in turn condemned the existing Oslo framework as a major obstacle for social justice as it served to legitimize Israel’s security aspirations and economic dominance. The establishment in 2011 of PTUC-BDS represents a positive development in the consolidation of the workers’ efforts to isolate Israel, Assaf stated.

The hall awakened during the Q & A session with loud cheers in support of a number of enthusiastic interventions. There were suggestions for the development of a united front against normalization. Some expressed unhappiness about the role of foreign donors in turning Palestinians into consumers instead of promoting true economic independence. The loudest cheers however were reserved for the urgent need to bring the struggle back to the people, BDS being one such avenue, contrasting it to the role of the peace process in removing Palestinian popular agency.

Following lunch, participants split into groups for workshops on aspects of BDS relevant to the local context (students and youth, women’s organizations, civil society institutions, formal labor, and popular committees against the wall and settlements and international work). Each session agreed recommendations that were then presented to the conference at the end. Recommendations varied from strengthening the culture of boycott through awareness raising campaigns to developing mechanisms to actively oppose all levels of normalization.

It was evident throughout the day that there is huge enthusiasm and energy among all those attending to contribute more actively to the global BDS movement, and activate the boycott within their respective organizations and institutions.

Four Palestinians arrested in "car protest" challenging Israeli Apartheid and Occupation

2012-01-10T16:23:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
yesterday a group of approximately 50 Palestinians participated in a "car protest" in the Occupied West Bank. The protest sort to challenge Israeli Apartheid and Occupation, highlighting the fact that Palestinians can not drive an certain roads which have been designated by the Israeli Occupation Roads as roads which can only be used by Israelis, in particular Israeli settlers. Four Palestinian activists were arrested during the non-violent protest and another one after the protest, simply for wanting to drive their cars.

I have included below two videos from the protest, as well as the commentary from Haithem Khatib from Bil'in village which was attached to his video of the protest. In addition, I have included the +972 report on the protest.

In solidarity, Kim

***

Video by Fadi Arouri

Video by Haithem Khatib

Report by Haithem Khatib: "Israeli Occupation forces arrested Khaled Atallah Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh), Azmi Shyoukhi (Hebron), the young Omar Saleh Al-Tamimi (Nabi Saleh) and a Palestinian girl by the name of Anwar. Further the Israeli intelligence services demanded confiscated the id and car of Mahmoud Zwahre. When he managed to evade arrest, Israeli army called him telling him he would be put on wanted list if he does not turn himself in for arrest within 30mins. Mahmoud is now also arrested, 10mins ago, he was at the DCO in Jericho, to be taken to Ma'ale Adumim. In addition, the IOF apparently held the identity card of Naim Marar intending to force him to turn himself in to the occupation authorities. In addition, since last night, ITF imposed a tight security cordon on the village of Nabi Saleh... Many people joined to show their rights to pass the road freely at Jericho checkpoint today, israeli soldiers were not accept to go trough the road"

***

Tuesday, January 10 2012|Mairav Zonszein

Palestinian ‘car protest’ in West Bank challenges road segregation

Palestinians attempted to set out in a motorcade of about 50 cars from Jericho en route to Ramallah this morning, to protest and challenge the system of Israeli-only roads throughout the West Bank, according to Twitter updates over the last few hours with the hashtag #carprotest.

Palestinian car protest stopped in Jericho (Photo: Israeli Ta'ayush activist)

According to an Israeli Ta’ayush activist I spoke to who was there and who prefers not to be named, dozens of cars manned by Palestinians from the West Bank tried to leave Jericho this morning in a non-violent protest action, but were stopped by Israeli forces, who blocked the four lanes entering and exiting the Palestinian city.

Border Police used excessive force on several protestors, and at least two Palestinians were arrested, one man and one woman and we heard of more being detained later on. After about an hour and a half, the forces began allowing cars to pass through at a very slow pace, and about two kilometers further on, another “flying” checkpoint was created that was stopping and inspecting the vehicles

There are hundreds of checkpoints in the West Bank that are used to control and restrict Palestinian freedom of movement. According to a report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories, there were 522 roadblocks and checkpoints in 2011 throughout the West Bank, and four out of the five roads that lead into the Jordan Valley are not accessible to Palestinian vehicles. Some more facts from the report indicate that in 2011:

An additional 495 ad-hoc ‘flying’ checkpoints obstructed movement around the West Bank each month (on average), compared to 351 in the past two years. 200,000 people from 70 villages are forced to use detours between two to five times longer than the direct route to their closest city due to movement restrictions; One or more of the main entrances are blocked to Palestinian traffic in ten out of eleven major West Bank cities.

So far, according to unconfirmed Twitter reports from about 2:30 P.M. local time, at least three men and one woman were arrested for driving on the road, among them, Khaled and Omar Tamimi from Nabi Saleh. The motorcade has been stopped by Israeli forces in Jericho but there are indications on Twitter that the protestors are trying to regroup and try different tactics and locations.
Similar direct action protests took place in November when Palestinians reenacted the

A woman being taken by soldiers from the protest scene (photo: Fadi Arouri)

US civil rights “Freedom Rides” by getting on a bus serving only Jewish settlers in the West Bank on its way to East Jerusalem

Palestine 1896

2012-01-09T02:06:00.001-08:00

First film footage taken in Palestine by the Lumier Bros.

Israeli Hasbara gets a comic book: Captain Israel vs BDS

2012-01-07T17:21:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
As many of you will know doubt recall, Stand With US, a US based Zionist group which originally started out on US campuses and which works closely with the Israeli government announced that it would be producing a comic book with a "superhero" called "Captain Israel". According to Stand With Us CEO, Roz Rothstein, the comic book was being published because “Israel’s Jewish connection to Israel and the land is always being challenged, [and] we wanted to reestablish our Jewish roots and make sure that everyone understood the history, stuff we know and take for granted and that others try to chip away at.”

The comic book, of course, is part of Israeli and Zionist hasbara efforts which repeats and promotes much of the racist Zionist mythology that Palestine was "a land with out a people for a people without a land". As Mark LeVine, a professor of Middle Eastern history at the University of California at Irvine notes the first edition of the comic book was filled with with historical inaccuracies and Zionist mythology, particularly about the narrative of how Israel was formed. According to the comic, 400 years before the first World War, “…Palestine was an unimportant backwater of the Ottoman Empire, sparsely populated, barren, impoverished.... Until, in the latter half of the 19th century new Jewish immigrants from Europe and Russia... began to repopulate the desolate land, buying it legally from absentee Palestinian landlords." (you can read the first volume of Captain Israel here)

Volume two of Captain Israel reveals even more clearly the hasbara (propaganda) nature of the comic book, Volume two (which you can read in full below) is called "Captain Israel vs BDS", in which Captain Israel combats the BDS "snake". As Jewish American blogger and writer Max Blumenthal has pointed out, one of the most disturbing things about the Stand With Us comic is over use of anti-Semitic tropes in order to supposedly prove that BDS is anti-Semetic.

in solidarity, Kim

Captain Israel vs. BDS

Amazing video footage from Bil'in, as village commemorate the 1 year anniversary of the death of Jawaher Abu Rahma

2012-01-06T15:29:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

on 1 January 2011, Jawaher Abu Rahma was killed by Israeli Occupation Forces when she was overcome by the huge quantities of teargas fired by the IOF at unarmed protestors in Bil'in. In April 2009, the IOF also killed Jawaher's brother Bassem, a well-known leader of the Bil'in Popular Committee. Bassem was killed when the Israeli Occupation Forces fired a teargas canister directly at him, hitting him in the chest killing him within minutes of being hit. This week's demonstration in Bil'in marked the 1st year anniversary of Jawaher's death with over 300 people attending the demonstration. Please find below some amazing footage of the demonstration filmed by Haithem Khatib - who regularly documents the demonstrations in his village. The footage is of the IOF crossing the wall onto the village land and shows at least one protestors managing to throw a teargas canister back into an Israeli jeep and anothe protestor physically jumping in front of a soldier to prevent him firing on unarmed demonstrators.

In solidarity, Kim

B'Tselem video: Shooting back in 2011 - a round up of footage shoot in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

2012-01-05T17:26:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
Since 2007, B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, has been running a camera distribution project (formerly known as the "Shooting back" project) in which it distributes video cameras to Palestinians living in the some of them most dangerous part of the Occupied West Bank, Gaza and Occupied East Jerusalem. The idea is to allow Palestinians to present "the reality of their lives to the Israeli and international public, thereby encouraging action to improve the situation". As B'Tselem notes, the project is unique in that it enables Palestinians themselves to document the infringement of their rights and to present their daily lives, their anger, pain, joy, and hope.

In 2011, volunteers in B'Tselem's camera project filmed over 500 hours of footage in the West Bank. B'Tselem has compiled a mere two minutes of the footage shot in order to provide a review of 2011.

To see more videos from the B'Tselem project, visit their website here and their video channel here.

In solidarity, Kim

**

Will there be justice for Mustafa Tamimi?

2012-01-04T19:33:00.000-08:00

By EMILY SCHAEFFER: Jerusalem Post: 2 January 2012

Tamimi, a moment before he was hit. The weapon and tear gas canister are circled in red (photo: Haim Scwarczenberg)

The death of 28-year-old Mustafa Tamimi of the village of Nabi Saleh last month raises questions about the Israeli military establishment’s investigative processes.

Tamimi was only the latest casualty of the IDF’s abundant use of tear gas to disperse Palestinian popular protest. Dozens of people have been seriously injured or killed in recent years, including Bassem Abu Rahma, who died in 2009 after being shot in the chest with a tear gas canister in the nearby village of Bil’in, and Abu Rahma’s sister Jawaher, who died one year ago this week after inhaling tear gas.

Because the tear gas canister killed Tamimi – rather than severely injuring and disabling him – the Israeli military has already launched an investigation. That is an improvement over the Bassem Abu Rahma case, when it took more than a year (and significant pressure from his family, neighbors and Israeli human rights organizations Yesh Din and B’Tselem, all of whom presented the then military advocate-general with a draft High Court of Justice petition) to get the military to investigate.

Today, IDF policy requires a criminal investigation to be launched immediately whenever military operations in the occupied Palestinian territories cause death (excluding armed exchanges). The policy was presumably introduced to boost the system’s compatibility with international legal standards.

But closer examination of Israeli military investigations, from before and after the policy change, reveals that the mere fact of investigation does not guarantee that it will be independent, impartial, professional, effective, prompt and open to public scrutiny.

In fact, Yesh Din’s recently published report, “Alleged Investigation,” reveals major failings in the investigations of the full spectrum of offenses allegedly committed by Israeli soldiers against Palestinians and their property – from looting and theft, to beatings and shootings, to causing death. So serious are these failings that only 6 percent of all cases in which a criminal investigation is opened lead to the indictment of suspected soldiers.

These failings stem directly from the lax investigative tools and methods employed by the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division (MPCID). For instance, the MPCID has no offices in the occupied Palestinian territories, so without NGOs and other agencies, Palestinians have little access to the military justice system. Fewer than 10% of complaints filed by Palestinians reach the MPCID without the intervention of outside agencies.

More significantly, few Military Police investigators speak or read Arabic, they rarely visit the scene of the crime, often neglect to question key witnesses, and hardly ever make use of conventional investigative tools beyond collecting testimonies (such as polygraph tests, line-ups, etc.).

What is more, Military Police investigations suffer from extreme delays, which necessarily damage the potential of the investigations to uncover the truth and lead to the prosecution and conviction of suspects. As a result, for instance, Bassem Abu Rahma’s death is still under investigation. His sister’s death and, for instance, the shooting of a 15-year-old in Hebron on his way home from school in 2008, an incident that caused permanent brain damage, go uninvestigated.

Since 2000, 39% of all complaints received by the MPCID were not investigated at all.

Mustafa Tamimi (far left, back row) with his family. Photo by Activestills

The result of a defective military investigations system is that Israeli soldiers act with virtual impunity, whether damaging personal property during nighttime searches, standing idly by while settlers harm Palestinians and their olive groves, or violating rules of engagement by shooting tear gas at close range directly at demonstrators like Tamimi and Abu Rahma. Meanwhile, the Israeli public sleeps well, believing that the bad apples are weeded out through an effective military justice system.

The Tamimi case presents Israel with an opportunity to make a clear choice. By appointing independent, professional investigators and dedicating the necessary resources Israel can establish itself as a nation that respects the rule of law. Alternatively, by dragging its feet and maintaining a system that is fraught with defects, the country will continue to flaunt international law and its responsibility to protect civilians under occupation and their property.

The Tamimi family and friends can only hope Israel chooses the former and conducts a prompt, thorough and effective investigation.

Emily Schaeffer is an attorney and a member of the legal team of Israeli NGO Yesh Din – Volunteers for Human Rights, where she coordinates the organization’s “Accountability Project,” representing victims of crimes committed by soldiers and security personnel in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Co-existence vs Co-resistance: a case against normalisation

2012-01-03T08:56:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
as mentioned in my previous post "What is normalisation?: normalising the abnormal" about what is normalisation and why it should be opposed, there has been resurgence of discussion amongst many Palestinian activists and their supporters as to exactly what is normalisation and if it should be engaged in or opposed. In my previous post here, I included a copy of the statement issued by the Palestinian Academic and Cultural Boycott campaign against Israel on the issue, which explains in detail what normalisation is and isn't.

In response to an article published on +972 magazine written by Palestinian writer Aziz Abu Sarah supporting "normalisation" and painting "anti-normalisation" as irrational (you can read the article here), Omar Rahman has written an eloquent response explaining why Abu Sarah is wrong and why "normalisation" undermines the Palestinian struggle for human rights and self-determinantion.

in solidarity, Kim

****

Tuesday, January 3 2012|Omar Rahman

Co-existence vs. Co-resistance: A case against normalization

In a recent debate on +972, proponents and detractors of normalizing relations between Israelis and Palestinians in the current political environment make their cases.

In his recent post on “normalization,” my colleague Aziz Abu Sarah was right about one thing, the topic is reaching a fever pitch within Palestinian society. What Aziz gets wrong is the logic of anti-normalization as he attempts to paint it as some form of unjustifiable reactionism, ignoring its most cogent and compelling arguments. In truth, projects that constitute “normalization” promote a false image of parity between the conflicting sides and foster a dangerous psychology within the minds of the oppressor that stifles progress towards a just resolution of the conflict.

Although the “anti-normalization” debate has been around a long time, its resurgence in public discourse can likely be attributed to two things: the rise of the BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) movement and the beginning of a transitional period in internal Palestinian politics.

Due to the very nature of the BDS movement, everything pertaining to Israel is put under the microscope and scrutinized. Subsequently, any relationship between Palestinians and Israelis is done so in spades. BDS encourages its adherents to look critically at everything they do and everything that is happening around them. It is important to distinguish what works in the service of achieving Palestinian rights and what does not, or even works against it. This is why the BDS movement has produced strict and coherent guidelines for what can be considered worthy of boycott and what constitutes normalization.

Secondly, the era in which Palestinians and Israelis engaged in dialogue under the wider auspices and example of governmental-led negotiations is coming to an end—at least for the time being. We are now at the cusp of a transitional period in Palestinian politics where the lack of a clear strategy and path forward on the diplomatic and resistance fronts is forcing Palestinians to look internally at the state of their own society and political situation.

Reconciliation and reform within their fractured political system are desperately needed in order to move cohesively in a new direction. Thus many Palestinians have started to re-examine the logic of their relationships with Israelis and criticize those Palestinians who have benefited immensely from it over the years while others around them have suffered.

When we consider the resurgence of anti-normalization, we must also remember that the post-Oslo period witnessed an explosion in normalization programs and projects between Israelis and Palestinians. Any organization, group or program that had “joint” or “co-existence” in reference to Israelis and Palestinians was instantly given credibility and financing on the world stage. Such programs became extremely lucrative and many people profited with little regard to the actual state of the conflict and its overall deterioration. Even prior to the breakout of the Second Intifada, but largely afterwards, normalization programs lost their relevance. We were no longer in the post-conflict transitional period we thought Oslo had ushered in, and things got worse, not better.

FEELING COMFORTABLE WITH OPPRESSION
It has become senseless for Israelis and Palestinians to act like nothing is wrong with the status quo and carry-on with such projects. Normalization may be fine for those bridging the gaps between people in India and Pakistan or Venezuela and Colombia—where the two sides are on equal footing—but not in Israel/Palestine where one side lives under the yoke and chain of the other. When we seek to normalize this relationship by giving each other equal standing and equal voice, we project an image of symmetry. Joint sports teams and theatre groups, hosting an Israeli orchestra in Ramallah or Nablus, all these things create a false sense of normality, like the issue is only a problem of recognizing each other as human beings. This, however, ignores the ongoing oppression, colonization, and denial of rights, committed by one side against the other.

Moreover, normalization creates a false sense in the mind of Israelis that they are working for peace, while in actuality, though maybe unwittingly, they are contributing to the calcification of the status quo. Their energy is misdirected away from root causes and channeled into making the current situation more tolerable—largely for themselves—by helping them to cope with wider injustices occurring in their name. Many Israelis who participate in normalization projects believe that they are detached, that they are not part of the problem, because they have some Palestinian friends or colleagues, even if they are doing nothing to rectify the actual injustices that have been committed by their society daily for over half a century. In the words of Israeli architectural theorist Eyal Weizman in his monumental work on the architecture of occupation, Hollow Land: “The history of the occupation is full of liberal ‘men of peace’ who are responsible for, or who at least sweeten, the injustice committed by the occupation. The occupation would not have been possible without them.”

Likewise, these normalization projects are put on display for all the world to see, so that they may all feel comfortable and say: look, the moderates are resolving the differences in a civilized manner. This is probably why the largest contributors to normalization projects are not Israelis and Palestinians themselves, but rather the international community. These programs work in much the same way as endless negotiations, offering a semblance of progress so that the world may deceive itself without having to take real action.

I do not discount the authenticity of Israelis who desire to see a just peace. Nor do I overlook the importance of meeting your enemy on a human level, of the power of these efforts in defusing tension, mistrust, and misunderstanding. But we can’t ignore the negative impact of normalization given the ongoing occupation and colonial enterprise. We must ask ourselves, what did all the normalizing get Palestinians after Oslo except for deterioration in their circumstance? For all the money pumped into these programs why are there no statistics or data showing they work? Why does no one think to question the effectiveness of normalization, including its proponents, in the case of Mr. Abu Sarah’s article? We can sit back and comfort each other that we are not fanatics or extremists, and that may be all well and good, but the fanatics are determining the reality on the ground while liberals and moderates provide a veneer of normality and progress.

The truth is when we “normalize” relations with Israel and Israelis without bearing to the political situation, we legitimize Israel despite its continued oppression of Palestinians and its colonial policies on Palestinian land. We must remember that the greatest boon in Israeli history came after the Oslo Accords were signed. Many countries around the world that had refused to have “normal” relations with Israel reversed their policies. This false peace opened Israel up to the wider international community, spurning unprecedented growth and trade. By reversing the normalization trend, we strip the conflict of many illusions and niceties in favor of exposing the raw truth.

Mr. Abu Sarah portrays anti-normalization like it is based purely on hate for the “other.” In order to do this he ignores the strongest arguments against normalization in exchange for obscure notions that take anti-normalization to the extreme; such as any instance in which a Palestinian and an Israeli come together constitutes normalization. In my own experience meeting people who are against normalization, I came to understand that Israelis are valued and encouraged to take part in the resistance movement to occupation. As long as an Israeli is working for Palestinian rights and the end to occupation, the cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians is perfectly legitimate and justified. This is the concept of “co-resistance” as opposed to “co-existence,” and should hardly be described as radical.

Yet, Mr. Abu Sarah’s article chooses to harp on these extreme cases at the expense of a serious argument over the topic. In what constituted an extensive blog post, there is little argument discussing why normalization activities are valid and beneficial; rather the entire piece is devoted to portraying anti-normalization as irrational. Some of his claims are true, such as those who use “normalization” as a character attack for dubious ends. But none of that still gets to the heart of the matter. I simply want to know, are we better off today because of normalization projects?

THE KIDS RETURN HOME
I wish to conclude this piece with an example of normalization from my own history. When I was fifteen years old, I was a participant in the Seeds of Peace program, which brings young teenagers from conflict zones together to a summer camp in the northeastern United States. Although originally set up for Israelis and Arabs, the program expanded over the years to include Greek and Turkish Cypriots, Indians and Pakistanis, and others. In each session there was also a delegation of American teenagers, of which I was a part. This was still prior to the breakdown of the Oslo Accords and the outbreak of the Second Intifada and most believed we were on the path to peace. Teenagers, who for the most part had never met someone from the other side before, would tell stories from their own experience in the hope of making their enemy understand them. Yet, I can still remember feeling at the time that the effort would be somehow wasted when these kids returned home because even I knew that, despite pretenses, there was no real peace on the ground. During my trips to the West Bank to visit my extended family, I would see and feel the military presence that continued to persist in the still-occupied territories. And in the “co-existence” sessions at Seeds of Peace, I would hear from those Palestinians what life still held for them.

The most poignant moment for me, however, was when a Palestinian teenager near the end of the program asked an Israeli teenager if he would still join the army and serve in the occupied territories, to which the answer was “yes”. To me, this said it all. What did this whole program mean if in a few years that Israeli teenager would be sitting at a checkpoint in the West Bank and shoving his M-16 in the face of a Palestinian while asking for his ID? Would it make him a more compassionate soldier serving in an inherently unjust system? When all the fun and games were over, we each returned to our respective societies and things stayed the same.
If these teenagers had returned to a cold peace, it may have been different. They could continue to work to establish more friendly relations between their respective peoples. But for Palestinians and Israelis, they live everyday in a system of imbalance and injustice where one side is oppressing the other through an engineered structure of superiority and subjugation.

That is it. Normalization can try to make you forget that fact, but the next time a gun barrel is pointed in your direction, or a cousin is arrested and thrown in prison, or the home of a neighbor is bulldozed, or your relatives in Gaza fall under the bombs, you will be hard pressed to do so.

+972 Person of the Year: Woman activist of the Arab world

2012-01-01T03:14:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

as 2011 draws to its close, a number of websites and magazines around the world announced their "Person of the Year". Time Magazine, announced "The Protestor" as their person of the year - a nomination I very much agree with. However, like many, I was surprised that the image of the protestor they chose to represent "the protestor" was not one from the Arab Spring.

While I agreed with their choice of a woman protestor on their cover, like many others I believed the image should have been that of one of the many incredible woman activists involved in the Arab Spring over the last year.

I was, therefore, very excited to read that +972 magazine had chosen as their "person of the year", the "woman activist of the Arab world". Lisa Goldman, eloquently explains why they have chose as their person of the year, "the woman activist of the Arab world" and gives a short biography of some of the prominent woman activists, as a sample representing thousands of Arab woman activists across the Middle East.

My personal choice from Goldman's list for the most inspiring activists are my friend, Nariman Tamimi - who is an outstanding representative of the courage and dedication of every Palestinian women I have ever had the privilege of meeting and Samira Ibrahim, who courageously took a stand against the "virginity tests" imposed by the Egyptian military.

in solidarity,

Kim

*****

Thursday, December 29 2011|+972blog

+972 Person of the Year: Woman activist of the Arab world

From Bahrain to Tunisia, at demonstrations, in interviews and in their own writing, they repeat, “We will not be quiet.” In their refusal to view the rights of women as a cause separate from civil rights, human rights and pro-democracy activism, female Arab protestors have taken feminism to a new level.

By Lisa Goldman

An Egyptian woman at a December protest in Cairo (photo: Mosa'ab Elshamy)

During the January 25 uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak, two women from vastly different backgrounds worked side-by-side at Tahrir Square, organizing the distribution of donated food and medical supplies. One was a secular, feminist attorney who wears slim jeans and has her hair done at one of Cairo’s most expensive salons. The other was an Islamist who covers her face with a niqab and drapes her body in a black abaya. When they were not at the square, they spoke about organizational issues on the phone. They were in constant contact for 18 days, both fully committed to the revolution. “But,” said the secular attorney, over cappuccinos and biscotti at a trendy Cairo café, “We were never alone together in a private place, so I have never seen her face. I worked with this woman day and night for nearly three weeks. She is one of the toughest, smartest people I know. But I have no idea what she looks like.”

The Arab Uprising has upended many popular clichés about the Middle East. Over the past year we have seen pious Muslims demonstrating for a secular democracy. We have seen Christian protestors at Tahrir Square protecting Muslims as they pray. And we have seen Arab women – veiled and unveiled, Islamists and secular liberals – demonstrating side-by-side at the front lines of the anti-regime protests in Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain and Palestine. Many of these women have become the de facto faces and spokespeople for their revolutions – addressing television cameras, giving interviews and writing articles for the international media. They have been at the front lines of violent confrontations between protestors and riot police. Their confidence and bravery are all the more extraordinary given the obstacles women face in the socially conservative Middle East.

During the 18-day anti-Mubarak uprising in Egypt, women in Tahrir Square remarked that they had never experienced an atmosphere so free of sexual harassment. But it turned out that this was just a brief idyll, perhaps limited to the bubble of revolutionary Tahrir Square. It ended the day Hosni Mubarak resigned, with the widely covered sexual assault of CBS reporter Lara Logan. Since then, Egyptian women have suffered sexual violence at the hands of both men in uniform and thugs in civilian clothes, in addition to the harassment – insults and groping – that has for years been commonplace in public spaces.

In November, Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian-American journalist, was viciously beaten and sexually assaulted by paramilitary riot police near Tahrir Square. In interviews on that experience, she pointed out that her ordeal was not unique – that she had escaped relatively unscathed compared to hundreds of other Egyptian women, thanks in large part to her media prominence and US citizenship. Ms. Eltahawy accused the Egyptian military junta of using sexual assault as a tactic to suppress dissent, trying to deter women by humiliating them as well as beating them. As if to prove that point, less than one month after Ms. Eltahawy went public with the details of her experience, the world was outraged to see a video showing Egyptian paramilitary police dragging a veiled women along a Cairo street near Tahrir Square, kicking her repeatedly in the head, beating her with riot sticks, stripping her to her underwear and stomping on her breastbone.

That incident was the catalyst for a march of thousands of Egyptian women in downtown Cairo. Waving photos of the woman who was stripped and beaten, they chanted slogans to express their anger at the military regime’s violence against female protestors. Observers commented that the morale at that march was high, with the female marchers ringed by supportive men, who formed a human protective chain. From Bahrain to Tunisia, at demonstrations, in interviews and in their own writing, they repeat, “We will not be quiet.” In their refusal to view the rights of women as a cause separate from civil rights, human rights and pro-democracy activism, female Arab protestors have taken feminism to a new level.

For its Person of the Year for 2011, +972 Magazine has chosen the Arab woman activist. For illustrative purposes, I have selected a few prominent activists, of the many, many more who we honor. The women mentioned in this article include a secular Tunisian feminist academic and a veiled Yemeni Islamist journalist. Both are crusaders for human rights and democracy; both were nominated for the Nobel Peace Price; one of them won. I also highlight two prominent Palestinian women – one a citizen of Israel and the other a grassroots activist from a small West Bank village. From Egypt, two women who refused to back down after they were beaten, tortured and sexually assaulted; one is a secular, cosmopolitan journalist and the other a veiled supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood from a small town in southern Egypt. Both are outspoken, articulate and independent. These women are united in their refusal to be cowed, their unshakeable self-confidence and their insistence on continuing their activism.

Yemen

Tawakkol Karman accepting the Nobel Peace Prize (photo: Leif Riksheim/Flickr)

Yemeni activist Tawakkol Karman, 32, shares the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize with two Liberian women “for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work.” Tawakkol Karman is a feminist and a journalist, a married mother of three who founded Women Journalists Without Chains in 2005. A prominent human rights activist for years, she has been at the forefront of the Yemeni Arab Uprising, leading rallies against President Ali Abdullah Saleh. Ms. Karman is a member of a conservative Islamist party, but she also removed her niqab, or face veil, in 2005 as a means of demonstrating that it is not mandated by Islam. “Women have been marginalized for too long,” she said.

Listen to Democracy Now! interview Tawakkol Karman during a visit to New York in October 2011.

Egypt

Asmaa Mahfouz (photo: European Parliament/Flickr)

One week before the January 25 revolution that toppled Hosni Mubarak, Egyptian activist Asmaa Mahfouz uploaded a video to her Facebook page. The 26-year-old woman, who became one of five recipients of the 2011 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, exhorted fellow Egyptians to come to the streets on January 25 “for freedom, justice, honor and human dignity.” She added: “Whoever says women shouldn’t go to protests because they will get beaten, let him have some honor and manhood and come with me on 25 January.”

The video went viral, and she is widely credited for inspiring thousands to join the demonstrations that first day of the Egyptian uprising. Ms. Mahfouz is a co-founder of the April 6 Youth Movement, which began organizing against the Mubarak regime in April 2008. She continues to be active politically, running for parliament in this month’s first post-Mubarak elections, and recently visited the Occupy Wall Street protestors in Zuccotti Park. Asked what advice she had for women, she answered, “You have to believe in yourself.”

Mona Eltahawy (photo: Dirk Eusterbrock)

From her home base in New York City, Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy gained fame in the United States as she raced from interview to interview, speaking passionately and intelligently on behalf of the Egyptian revolution from the first day of demonstrations on January 25. In between interviews she tweeted incessantly, gaining a following that now numbers well over 100,000. In November 2011, during a visit to Cairo, she was at a demonstration near Tahrir Square when Egyptian paramilitary police attacked and beat her brutally. They assaulted her sexually, beat her over her entire body and broke her right hand and left arm. She was arrested and kept in detention, blindfolded and denied medical attention, for 12 hours. Her own phone had been lost during the beating, but once at the ministry of interior she borrowed someone else’s and managed to tweet “beaten arrested in interior ministry.” Thanks to her wide following, which includes many prominent journalists, Ms. Eltahawy’s tweet immediately went viral and helped catch the attention of State Department officials.

Released the following day, Ms. Eltahawy immediately tweeted about the details of the assault she suffered at the hands of Egyptian military police, even as she was taken to the hospital to have her arms X-rayed and put in casts. Despite the pain and trauma, she gave several television interviews and continues to speak and write about it as a means of highlighting the fact that tens of thousands of Egyptians have been beaten, killed and jailed under the rule of SCAF (the Supreme Council of Armed Forces), the military junta that has ruled Egypt since Mubarak’s resignation. She continues to advocate forcefully for SCAF’s immediate resignation, to be replaced by a civilian government.

Samira Ibrahim

On March 9, 2011, Samira Ibrahim was one of several female protestors who were dragged from a demonstration at Tahrir Square by soldiers who beat them, arrested them and then subjected them to forced so-called “virginity tests.” An army officer, who was not a physician, performed the so-called test – actually a sexual assault – in an open room, before many leering observers. In her description of the assault, Ms. Ibrahim says that when she tried to refuse to undress, one of the soldiers used a taser to administer electric shocks to her stomach until she submitted. “I know that to violate a woman in that way was considered rape,” she said in an interview. “I felt like I had been raped.” In a video interview, Ms. Ibrahim speaks about her background and her insistence on filing a police complaint: “If I drop these charges, what happened to me could happen to any woman in Egypt,” she asserts. The police, she says, have refused to respond to the death threats she has received on her mobile phone, so she has simply stopped answering. “I am not afraid,” she says.

Ms. Ibrahim, 25, is from a small town in southern Egypt, nine hours from Cairo by train. She traveled alone to Cairo, with the full support of her traditional, Muslim Brotherhood-aligned family, to file a complaint in civil court against the Egyptian military. Of all the women who were sexually assaulted in this fashion, she is the only one to file a complaint; she was also one of the first to speak out early against the Egyptian military, at a time when the army was still widely perceived as being on the side of the people and the revolution. This speaks to her bravery – not only because so many activists and bloggers have been arrested, tried summarily in military courts, and sentenced to years in jail, but also because the loss of virginity carries an enormous stigma for women in her traditional society.

On December 27, Ms. Ibrahim was vindicated: The civil courts in Cairo stated that they believed her account of the army’s use of sexual assault as a tactic against female protestors. This is made more significant by the fact that many Egyptians did not believe her – particularly because the other women who were subjected to the so-called virginity test were too ashamed to press charges. The court also reminded the army that the use of sexual assault on female prisoners was illegal. In response one Egyptian woman tweeted, “Did we really need a judge to rule that virginity tests were illegal?”

Tunisia

Lina Ben Mhenni (photo: David Sasaki/ Flickr)

Lina Ben Mhenni, a 27 year-old cyber activist who blogs in French, English and Arabic under the name Tunisian Girl, was a human rights crusader well before the uprising began in her country. Once demonstrations against Ben Ali regimebegan, she started to travel around the country in order to record video, take photos and interview people. She became one of the most important reporters of the revolution, regularly interviewed and quoted by the international correspondents who belatedly recognized the importance of the demonstrations, which ultimately provided the spark for the Arab Uprisings that spread across the Middle East. Ms. Ben Mhenni was also nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize this year. She continues to speak out for civil rights in Tunisia; like many Egyptian activists, she asserts that the situation in Tunisia has not changed much with the fall of the old regime, and that the revolution is far from over. In this speech at the Oslo Freedom Forum, she also reminds her audience that the role of social media should not be over-estimated.

Syria

Razan Ghazzawi (photo: Jillian C York/Flickr)

When human rights activist Razan Ghazzawi was arrested in early December, the first thing she did was alert her friends to shut down her Facebook page and take control of her Twitter account, lest they be used by Syrian security to incriminate others by association. Ms. Ghazzawi, 30, is a veteran activist who works for the NGO Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression. She is passionate about Palestine, but contemptuous of pro-Palestinian activists who support the Syrian regime. In a conservative region, she is openly homosexual and vocal about LGBT issues. And in the fearful climate of Syria’s 9-month old uprising, during which thousands have been killed and tortured by the army and security forces, she blogs and tweets under her real name, campaigning for the release of political prisoners.

Ms. Ghazzawi was on her way to Jordan for a conference on press freedom in early December when she was detained at the border by Syrian officials, then arrested on a list of charges that included “weakening national sentiment” and carried a jail sentence of up to 15 years. Her strong online presence and wide network of connections assured an immediate, sustained online campaign for her release, which came two weeks later. Despite her arrest, Ms. Ghazzawi refuses to be silenced. She continues to campaign for the release of political prisoners.

Bahrain

Zainab Alkhawaja

Zainab Alkhawaja, 28, caught the world’s attention with her immense courage when she stood alone in front of soldiers firing tear gas and bullets at Bahrain’s Pearl Roundabout. She is the daughter, wife and sister-in-law of jailed opposition leaders. Her father is one of the leading human rights activists in the region, and her husband was recently sentenced to four years in jail for activism. Ms. Alkhawaja, who is the mother of a little girl, tweets fearlessly under the username Angry Arabiya, documents demonstrations in real time and details the army’s violence toward unarmed civilian protestors. She has gone on a hunger strike to protest the brutal arrest of her father, she has written an open letter to U.S. President Barack Obama and she has suffered beatings and arrests.

Two weeks ago, an amateur video showing police dragging her away from a demonstration by force went viral. Ms. Alkhawaja was released from detention a few days later, after what she described laconically as a “difficult experience.” In a recent interview with the New York Times’ Robert Mackey, she explains lucidly that the alleged Sunni-Shia’a divide in Bahrain is actually a construct of the ruling Sunni minority regime that is sold to the international media. Sunni and Shia’a are in fact very integrated in Bahrain, she says, asserting that the struggle is not a sectarian one. Bahrainis, she explains, know this is a national – not sectarian – struggle. She points out that both Sunni and Shia’a anti-regime activists have been arrested and tortured. Her own husband, she says, has been tortured because of her activism. “But we are strong,” she says. “And I will not be quiet.”

Palestine and Israel

Nariman Tamimi (photo: ActiveStills)

Nariman Tamimi of Nabi Saleh is one of the main organizers of the unarmed anti-occupation demonstrations in her tiny West Bank village of 500 people. Trained as a medic, she also documents the human rights abuses committed by the Israeli army for the human rights NGO B’Tselem. Her husband, Bassem, also an anti-occupation activist, was arrested by the Israeli army in March 2011 and is in detention at Ofer Military Prison pending his trial, which has been delayed several times. A veteran activist, Bassem Tamimi has been arrested 11 times, although he has never been charged with any offense.

To make matters more stressful, there is a pending demolition order on their home. Ms. Tamimi, who is the mother of five children aged 5 to 14, has also been detained and released since her husband was jailed in March. Her cousin Mustafa was killed on December 11 when he was shot in the head with a tear gas canister fired by an Israeli military policeman at very short range. That same day, at the rally for international human rights day in Tel Aviv, attorney Nisreen Alyan read aloud a speech written by Ms. Tamimi.

With your help we can cross the bridge of optimism with our heads raised high. Your massive presence, believers in justice, democracy, equality and in all of the disappearing values will redeem us. You are free people in the world. Release us from the occupation and bring us freedom, justice and peace, for you and for us. Let there be peace for you and also for us.

The next week, armed with her video camera and her medic’s supplies, Nariman Tamimi again led the protestors at Nabi Saleh’s weekly demonstration against the occupation.

Rawia Aburabia (photo: ACRI)

Rawia Aburabia is one of only five female Bedouin attorneys in Israel and a leader in her community. She is a tireless advocate for the rights of Bedouin women and Bedouin in general in Israel. For her Master’s thesis, she wrote about the issue of polygamy in Bedouin society; she is now the leading expert on polygamy in Israel. Ms. Aburabia authors important articles and position papers, and organizes activism against the state’s continuing efforts to displace Bedouin from their traditional lands in the Negev desert; in a recent article for Haaretz newspaper, she described the state’s attitude toward its Bedouin citizens as follows:

When a Jewish Israeli wants to go and live in the Negev, it is called the development of the south, but when Bedouin already living there want to continue to live in the same place, it is considered an effort to “take over state lands.” When Jewish Israelis choose to live in a rural setting the government provides them with infrastructure adapted to the model of a kibbutz or moshav. When Bedouin want to lead a rural life, suddenly there are unrealistic criteria they must meet.

A woman from a deeply conservative society, and a Bedouin in a state that treats them as second class citizens at best, Ms. Aburabia has faced significant challenges in her life. She is supremely self-possessed, impressively accomplished and absolutely unwavering in her advocacy for the civil and human rights of the Bedouin in Israel.

Testimony of a Palmach fighter who expelled Palestinians during the Nakba: "We came to inherit the land ... The land was not empty when we inherited it".

2011-12-30T16:20:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

The Israeli group Zochrot has posted a video testimony from Amnon Neumann, a man who fought with the Palmach during the Nakba of 1948. “Zochrot", which means "Remembering" in Hebrew and seeks to raise public awareness of the Palestinian Nakba, especially among Jews in Israel, who bear a special responsibility to remember and amend the legacy of 1948.”

The video was filmed on 17 June, 2010 in Tel Aviv, with an audience of about 20 people. The event was initiated and organised by Amir Hallel. The testimony was video-recorded by Lia Tarachansky. Miri Barak prepared the transcription. Eitan Bronstein edited, summarized, and added footnotes. Translated to English by Asaf Kedar. Video editing by Zohar Kfir

In the video Neumann discusses the ethnic cleansing and massacres carried out by Zionist terror forces against the unarmed civilian Palestinian population in 1948. Nuemann was a member of the Palmach, which was the "elite" of the Haganah (the fore runner to today's Israeli Occupation Forces - the IDF).

Neumann explains that the reason for the Nakba was "Zionist ideology". He explains: "This is very clear. We came to inherit the land. Who do you inherit it from? If the land is empty you inherit from no-one. The land was not empty when we inherited it".

Warning: this video may be distressing to some, especially Palestinian refugees as the video describes in detail the forced expulsion and the killings of Palestinian civilians.

in solidarity,
Kim

What is normalisation?: Normalising the Abnormal

2011-12-29T18:40:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

in the last couple of weeks, there has been a debate (once again) on a number of Palestinian and Israeli sites, as well as twitter and Facebook about the issue of "normalisation" and what it means in relation to the Palestinian struggle. This latest discussion came about as a result of Palestinians activists taking a stand against a range of pro-normalisation conference in Occupied East Jerusalem. It has come to light in the last few days that the organisers of at least one of these conferences also organised a pro-normalisation conferences held in the illegal Israel colony of Ariel.

As most Palestinians will tell you, opposition to the "normalisation" of Zionist-settler colonial occupation and apartheid has long been a central component of Palestinian national movement. One of the first major anti-normalisation campaigns staged by Palestinians occurred in 1936 when Palestinian engaged in a six month boycott against Zionism and British imperialism.

Having spent an extensive amount of time in Palestine, it has been my experience that the majority of Palestinians both in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and outside the territories oppose normalisation with Israel as long as Israel continues to oppress, occupy and carry out apartheid against the Palestinian people.

In October this year, the Palestinian Academic and Cultural Boycott campaign against Israel issued a statement explaining in detail what "normalisation" is and isn't. In my opionion, the definition adopted by both PACBI and by the Palestinian BDS campaign in 2007 is simply a formalisation of what Palestinian society has widely understood to be "normalisation". I have included it below.

In solidarity,

Kim

Israel’s Exceptionalism: Normalizing the Abnormal

In the Palestinian and Arab struggle against Israeli colonization, occupation and apartheid, the “normalization” of Israel is a concept that has generated controversy because it is often misunderstood or because there are disagreements on its parameters. This is despite the near consensus among Palestinians and people in the Arab region on rejecting the treatment of Israel as a “normal” state with which business as usual can be conducted. Here, we discuss the definition of normalization that the great majority of Palestinian civil society, as represented in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, has adopted since November 2007, and elaborate on the nuances that it takes on in different contexts.

It is helpful to think of normalization as a “colonization of the mind,” whereby the oppressed subject comes to believe that the oppressor’s reality is the only “normal” reality that must be subscribed to, and that the oppression is a fact of life that must be coped with. Those who engage in normalization either ignore this oppression, or accept it as the status quo that can be lived with. In an attempt to whitewash its violations of international law and human rights, Israel attempts to re-brand [1] itself, or present itself as normal -- even “enlightened” -- through an intricate array of relations and activities encompassing hi-tech, cultural, legal, LGBT and other realms.

A key principle that underlines the term normalization is that it is entirely based on political, rather than racial, considerations and is therefore in perfect harmony with the BDS movement’s rejection of all forms of racism and racial discrimination. Countering normalization is a means to resist oppression, its mechanisms and structures. As such, it is categorically unrelated to or conditioned upon the identity of the oppressor.

We break down normalization into three categories that correspond to differences pertaining to the varied contexts of Israel’s colonial oppression and apartheid. It is important to consider these minimum definitions as the basis for solidarity and action.

1) Normalization in the context of the Occupied Palestinian Territory and the Arab world

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) has defined normalization specifically in a Palestinian and Arab context “as the participation in any project, initiative or activity, in Palestine or internationally, that aims (implicitly or explicitly) to bring together Palestinians (and/or Arabs) and Israelis (people or institutions) without placing as its goal resistance to and exposure of the Israeli occupation and all forms of discrimination and oppression against the Palestinian people.” [2] This is the definition endorsed by the BDS National Committee (BNC).

For Palestinians in the occupied West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and Gaza, any project with Israelis that is not based on a resistance framework serves to normalize relations. We define this resistance framework as one that is based on recognition of the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people and on the commitment to resist, in diverse ways, all forms of oppression against Palestinians, including but not limited to, ending the occupation, establishing full and equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel, and promoting and advocating for the right of return for Palestinian refugees – this may aptly be called a posture of “co-resistance” [3]. Doing otherwise allows for everyday, ordinary relations to exist alongside and independent of the continuous crimes being committed by Israel against the Palestinian people. This feeds complacency and gives the false and harmful impression of normalcy in a patently abnormal situation of colonial oppression.

Projects, initiatives and activities that do not begin from a position of shared principles to resist Israel’s oppression invariably allow for an approach to dealing with Israel as if its violations can be deferred, and as if coexistence (as opposed to “co-resistance”) can precede, or lead to, the end of oppression. In the process, Palestinians, regardless of intentions, end up serving as a fig-leaf [4] for Israelis who are able to benefit from a “business-as-usual” environment, perhaps even allowing Israelis to feel their conscience is cleared for having engaged Palestinians they are usually accused of oppressing and discriminating against.

The peoples of the Arab world, with their diverse national, religious and cultural backgrounds and identities, whose future is more tangibly tied to the future of Palestinians than the larger international community, not least because of continued Israeli political, economic and military threats on their countries, and the still-prevalent and strong kinship with the Palestinians, face similar issues with regards to normalization. So long as Israel’s oppression continues, any engagement with Israelis (individuals or institutions) that is not within the resistance framework outlined above, serves to underline the normality of Israeli occupation, colonialism and apartheid in the lives of people in the Arab world. It is, therefore, imperative that people in the Arab world shun all relations with Israelis, unless based on co-resistance. This is not a call to refrain from understanding Israelis, their society and polity. It is a call to condition any such knowledge and any such contact on the principles of resistance until the time when comprehensive Palestinian and other Arab rights are met.

BDS activists may always go above and beyond our basic minimum requirements if they identify subcategories within those we have identified. In Lebanon or Egypt, for instance, boycott campaigners may go beyond the PACBI/BNC definition of normalization given their position in the Arab world, whereas those in Jordan, say, may have different considerations.

2) Normalization in the context of the Palestinian citizens of Israel

Palestinian citizens of Israel – those Palestinians who remained steadfast on their land after the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 despite repeated efforts to expel them and subject them to military law, institutionalized discrimination, or apartheid [4] – face an entirely different set of considerations. They may be confronted with two forms of normalization. The first, which we may call coercive everyday relations, are those relations that a colonized people, and those living under apartheid, are forced to take part in if they are to survive, conduct their everyday lives and make a living within the established oppressive structures. For the Palestinian citizens of Israel, as taxpayers, such coercive everyday relations include daily employment in Israeli places of work and the use of public services and institutions such as schools, universities and hospitals. Such coercive relations are not unique to Israel and were present in other colonial and apartheid contexts such as India and South Africa, respectively. Palestinian citizens of Israel cannot be rationally asked to cut such ties, at least not yet.

The second form of normalization is that in which Palestinian citizens of Israel do not have to engage as a requirement of survival. Such normalization might include participation in international forums as representatives of Israel (such as in the Eurovision song competition) or in Israeli events directed at an international audience. The key to understanding this form of normalization is to consider that when Palestinians engage in such activities without placing them within the same resistance framework mentioned above, they contribute, even if inadvertently, to a deceptive appearance of tolerance, democracy, and normal life in Israel for an international audience who may not know better. Israelis, and the Israeli establishment, may in turn use this against international BDS proponents and those struggling against Israeli injustices by accusing them of being “holier” than Palestinians. In these instances, Palestinians promote relations with mainstream Israeli institutions beyond what constitutes the mere need for survival. The absence of vigilance in this matter has the effect of telling the Palestinian public that they can live with and accept apartheid, should engage Israelis on their own terms, and forgo any act of resistance. This is the type of normalization that many Palestinian citizens of Israel, along with PACBI, are increasingly coming to identify and confront.

3) Normalization in the International Context

In the international arena, normalization does not operate all that differently and follows the same logic. While the BDS movement targets complicit Israeli institutions, in the case of normalization there are other nuances to consider. Generally, international supporters of BDS are asked to refrain from participating in any event that morally or politically equates the oppressor and oppressed, and presents the relationship between Palestinians and Israelis as symmetrical [5]. Such an event should be boycotted because it normalizes Israel’s colonial domination over Palestinians and ignores the power structures and relations embedded in the oppression.

Dialogue

In all these contexts, “dialogue” and engagement are often presented as alternatives to boycott. Dialogue, if it occurs outside the resistance framework that we have outlined, becomes dialogue for the sake of dialogue, which is a form of normalization that hinders the struggle to end injustice. Dialogue, “healing,” and “reconciliation” processes that do not aim to end oppression, regardless of the intentions behind them, serve to privilege oppressive co-existence at the cost of co-resistance, for they presume the possibility of coexistence before the realization of justice. The example of South Africa elucidates this point perfectly, where reconciliation, dialogue and forgiveness came after the end of apartheid, not before, regardless of the legitimate questions raised regarding the still existing conditions of what some have called “economic apartheid.”

Two Examples of Normalization Efforts: OneVoice and IPCRI

While many, if not most, normalization projects are sponsored and funded by international organizations and governments, many of these projects are operated by Palestinian and Israeli partners, often with generous international funding. The political, often Israel-centered, framing of the “partnership” is one of the most problematic aspects of these joint projects and institutions. PACBI’s analysis of OneVoice [6], a joint Palestinian-Israeli youth-oriented organization with chapters in North America and extensions in Europe, exposed OneVoice as one more project that brings Palestinians and Israelis together, not to jointly struggle against Israel’s colonial and apartheid policies, but rather to provide a limited program of action under the slogan of an end to the occupation and the establishment of a Palestinian state, while cementing Israeli apartheid and ignoring the rights of Palestinian refugees, who compose the majority of the Palestinian people. PACBI concluded that, in essence, OneVoice and similar programs serve to normalize oppression and injustice. The fact that OneVoice treats the “nationalisms” and “patriotisms” of the two “sides” as if on par with one another and equally valid is a telling indicator. It is worth noting that virtually the entire political spectrum of Palestinian youth and student organizations and unions in the occupied Palestinian territory have unambiguously condemned normalization projects, such as OneVoice. [7]

A similar organization, though with a different target audience, is the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information (IPCRI), which describes itself as “the only joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think-tank in the world dedicated to the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the basis of 'two states for two peoples’. IPCRI “recognizes the rights of the Jewish people and the Palestinian people to fulfill their national interests within the framework of achieving national self-determination within their own states and by establishing peaceful relations between two democratic states living side-by-side.” [8] It thus advocates an apartheid state in Israel that disenfranchises the indigenous Palestinian citizens and ignores the UN-sanctioned right of return of the Palestinian refugees.

Like OneVoice, IPCRI adopts the ubiquitous “conflict paradigm” while ignoring the domination and oppression that characterize the relationship of the Israeli state with the Palestinian people. IPCRI conveniently neglects a discussion of the roots of this “conflict,” what it is about, and which “side” is paying the price. Like OneVoice, it glosses over the historic record and the establishment of a settler-colonial regime in Palestine following the expulsion of most of the indigenous people of the land. The defining moment in the history of “the conflict” is therefore not acknowledged. The history of continued Israeli colonial expansion and the dispossession and forcible displacement of Palestinians is conveniently ignored, as well. Through IPCRI’s omissions, the organization denies the resistance framework we have outlined above and brings Palestinians and Israelis into a relation privileging co-existence over co-resistance. Palestinians are asked to adopt an Israeli vision of a peaceful resolution and not one that recognizes their comprehensive rights, as defined by the UN.

Another disturbing, but again entirely predictable, aspect of the work of IPCRI is the active involvement in its projects of Israeli personalities and personnel implicated in Israeli violations of the Palestinian people’s rights and grave breaches of international law. IPCRI’s Strategic Thinking and Analysis Team (STAT), includes, in addition to Palestinian officials, former Israeli diplomats, former Israeli army brigadier generals, Mossad personnel and senior staff of the Israeli National Security Council, many of them reasonably suspected of committing war crimes. [9]

It is no surprise, therefore, that the desire to end the “conflict,” and the desire to realize “a lasting peace,” both of which are slogans of these and similar normalization efforts, has nothing to do with obtaining justice for Palestinians. In fact, the term “justice” has no place on the agenda of most of these organizations; neither can one find clear reference to international law as the ultimate arbiter, leaving Palestinians at the mercy of the far more powerful Israeli state.

An Israeli writer’s description of the so-called Peres Center for Peace, a leading normalization and colonial institution, may also well describe the underlying agenda of IPCRI and almost all normalization organizations:

In the activity of the Peres Center for Peace there is no evident effort being made to change the political and socioeconomic status quo in the occupied territories, but just the opposite: Efforts are being made to train the Palestinian population to accept its inferiority and prepare it to survive under the arbitrary constraints imposed by Israel, to guarantee the ethnic superiority of the Jews. With patronizing colonialism, the center presents an olive grower who is discovering the advantages of cooperative marketing; a pediatrician who is receiving professional training in Israeli hospitals; and a Palestinian importer who is learning the secrets of transporting merchandise via Israeli ports, which are famous for their efficiency; and of course soccer competitions and joint orchestras of Israelis and Palestinians, which paint a false picture of coexistence. [10]

The normalization of Israel – normalizing the abnormal – is a malicious and subversive process that works to cover up injustice and colonize the most intimate parts of the oppressed: their mind. To engage in or with organizations that serve this purpose is, therefore, one of the prime targets of boycott, and an act that BDS supporters must confront together.

PACBI

--------------

[1] http://www.forward.com/articles/2070/

[2] Translated from Arabic: http://www.pacbi.org/atemplate.php?id=100

[3] http://www.pacbi.org/etemplate.php?id=1673

[4] http://www.pacbi.org/etemplate.php?id=1645

[5] http://www.pacbi.org/etemplate.php?id=1108

[6] http://www.pacbi.org/etemplate.php?id=1436

[7] http://pacbi.org/atemplate.php?id=163 (Arabic)

[8] http://www.ipcri.org/IPCRI/About_Us.html

[9] http://www.ipcri.org/IPCRI/R-Projects.html

[10] Meron Benvenisti, A monument to a lost time and lost hopes, Haaretz, 30 October 2008. http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/a-monument-to-a-lost-time-and-lost-hopes-1.256342

Posted on 31-10-2011

Remembering Gaza three years on ...

2011-12-27T23:10:00.001-08:00

Christmas in Gaza

2011-12-24T15:17:00.001-08:00

by Ruqaya Izzidien
24 December 2011 | Al Akhbar English
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(Photo: Ruqaya Izzidien, Al Akhbar English) - Click here for more images

This Christmas marks the third anniversary of the 2008-2009 Israeli war on the Gaza Strip; a winter in which 19-year-old Ramy El Jelda saw his home bombed just two days after Christmas. He returned to the site a couple of days later to find his Christmas decorations scattered across the road.

“The baubles and bells were on the floor. The tree had been blown out of the house and was in the street. We cried. That is how we celebrated Christmas in 2008.”

Today the small number of Christmas trees that grace Gaza are primarily plastic and limited to Christian households, hotel lobbies and uptown restaurants. The Israeli blockade leaves Christmas tree fairy lights in a ghostly darkness during the daily eight-hour rolling blackouts.

For Ramy and the 3,000-strong Christian community in Gaza, festive Christmas celebrations go hand-in-hand with isolation and travel restrictions to Bethlehem, despite Israeli public claims to the contrary.

But this year holds hope for a happier occasion, despite the obstacles that Palestinian Christians in Gaza continue to face.

“Christmas helps children remember they are young,” explained Ramy, describing the traditions of the Greek Orthodox community, which celebrates Christmas on January 7. “On Christmas Day we go to our grandmother’s house and my whole family has lunch together. It is a small Eid (feast) but we celebrate for three days, visiting each others’ homes.”

Jaber El Jelda, a distant relative of Ramy, is the director of the Orthodox Church, one of Gaza’s few churches, along with the Baptist Church and Holy Family Catholic Church. He explained how the Orthodox Christian community marks the occasion.

“We organize a party on the first of January and offer children gifts, celebrating Christmas with songs and folklore and the traditional Palestinian dabka dance. We, and members of the Baptist and Catholic churches celebrate in each others’ celebrations. We’re like one.”

Although Christmas in Gaza bears a resemblance to its portrayal in other countries, the echoes are overwhelmingly superficial, as Ramy explained, “We put up a tree in the home and decorate it with bells. We put candles and holly around the house and children receive gifts of money, called eideyya.”

Ramy considers Christmas in Gaza to be disconnected to festivities outside of the siege. “Christmas in Gaza is different; it is a local celebration, not connected to Christmas outside. We don’t really ‘do’ Santa and it’s not like I’ve seen Christmas celebrated in the movies.”

Bethlehem off-limits: Israel’s Facade of Tolerance
Christmas for Gaza’s Palestinians entails far more complications than complex wrapping and tree decorations. As a small minority in the coastal enclave, the Gaza Christian community would traditionally visit Bethlehem, Jerusalem or Ramallah for the festive season, joining their families and communities in a full celebration.

Ramy described how all Christians used to be permitted by the Israeli government to visit the West Bank for Christmas. “Now they only give permission to a few people and you must be over 35 or under 16. Invariably, if parents receive permission, the children don’t and vice versa.”

It is a loophole that many Palestinians believe is being exploited by the Israeli authorities. The Israeli authorities have advertised that 500 Christians are allowed to celebrate Christmas in their holy sites as a ‘goodwill gesture.’ But in practical terms, very few of those eligible are granted the right to make the fifty mile trip from Gaza to Jerusalem, and those who do have to sacrifice a Christmas with their families.

Jaber has given up requesting permission because his sons are at university and therefore will automatically be denied travel rights. “My uncle and cousins live in Ramallah, but I can’t celebrate Christmas with them because my children are over 16 and are therefore too old for permits. How could I go out of Gaza to celebrate Christmas if I can’t take my children? It’s ridiculous.”

Even the process of receiving permission is unreliable, Jaber explained. “My brother is 52 and wanted to go to the West Bank for Christmas, the Israeli authorities just told him that ‘although we know you aren’t a terrorist, we don’t want you in Israel.’ He had worked in Israel for about 25 years.”

For this reason, Ramy considers the Israeli publicity machine to be exploiting the Christian community, “The Israeli government does this to benefit from us, so that they can say that they allow Christians to go to Bethlehem for Christmas, but really we can’t practically go. They exploit us to improve their image.”

Jaber stressed how the Christian community in Gaza suffers at the hands of the Israeli authorities at other times of year too. “Our Greek priest and archbishop face problems getting to Gaza, even though they have diplomatic passports. They have to enter through Israel but sometimes access is denied.”

Muslim-Christian relationship
Ramy studies at the Hamas-run Islamic University, like a number of Christian students in Gaza. He was offered a place at Birzeit University, but he was forced to continue his education in Gaza, as Israel forbade him from studying in the West Bank.

Despite this, he enjoys his time at the Islamic University and says he is exempted from certain classes, like Quran study, to accommodate his beliefs. “All my friends are Muslims. I don’t care if my friends are Christian or not. My Muslim friends here in Gaza also wish me Merry Christmas and come to visit me at Christmas. So what the media says about Arabs and intolerance isn’t true.”

Jaber agrees that the relationship between Muslims and Christians is very good in general, although his church has experienced infrequent targeting. “Fourth months ago the cables for our church bells were cut, but now everything is good. The government told the community to leave us alone and this helped.”

He stressed that such attacks are unpleasant but not representative of Gazan Muslims as a whole, “It’s a minority of people who create problems; most people understand us and believe that we have our religion, and they have theirs.”

Rana Baker is a Palestinian Muslim who studied at the Catholic Holy Family School in Gaza City. “It was a great experience; at school, my Christian classmates fasted Ramadan with us and we celebrated Christmas with them. We had Islamic books and they had Christian books. I never saw any discrimination and, as a student, you were judged solely on your academic merit.”

Rana remarked that, however small the celebrations, the festive season is one that is marked and enjoyed in Gaza, even for Muslims. “I really love Christmas, I like to hang out with my Christian friends at this time of year. I wish them a happy Christmas and they do the same for me on Eid.

“The relationship between Muslims and Christians in Gaza is really good. Palestine is one of the few places left where Muslims and Christians are really close. We are brothers and sisters.”

Christmas in Bil'in

2011-12-24T15:15:00.000-08:00

by Popular Struggle Coordination Committee: 24 December 2011

Bil'in marks Christmas with Santa dropping by to protests against the Wall. The army shoots tear-gas canisters directly at protesters.

Two Days before Christmas Day, the village of Bil'in shows some holiday spirit. A few dozen residents, joined by Israeli and International activists, joined the weekly demonstration against the Wall and settlements.

With a number of protesters dresses as Santa Claus, the merry march proceeded from the center of the village towards the separation Wall, ringing bells and chanting slogans for Palestinian independence. Upon reaching the Abu Lamon grove, which has been recently returned to the village following a long popular and legal campaign, some protesters were able to cross the barbed wire which surrounds the Wall.

For the battalion of soldiers, this apparently gave a signal for the opening salvo. The army began instantly shooting large amounts of tear-gas canisters, some directly at protesters in breach of army's own open fire regulations.

This manner of direct shooting caused the death of Mustafa Tamimi in Nabi Saleh three weeks ago, as well as the death of Bassem Abu Rahma in Bi'lin. Some clashes then erupted near the Western end of the Wall, between local youth and the army, luckily not ending in any severe injuries.

A similar demonstration was also held in the neighboring village of Ni'ilin, where it also ended relatively peacefully, with no injuries or arrests recorded.

Live Sniper-Fire Injures Protester in Nabi Saleh

2011-12-23T20:31:00.000-08:00

by Popular Struggle Coordination Committee: 23 December 2011

Two weeks after the killing of Mustafa Tamimi during a demonstration in the village, an Israeli sniper shot a protester with live 0.22" caliber ammunition, banned for crowd control purposes.

Earlier today, an Israeli military sniper opened fire at demonstrators in the village of Nabi Saleh, injuring one in the thigh. The wounded protester was evacuated by a Red Crescent ambulance to the Salfit hospital. The incident takes place only two weeks after the fatal shooting of Mustafa Tamimi at the very same spot. Additionally, a Palestinian journalist was injured in his leg by a tear-gas projectile shot directly at him, and two Israeli protesters were arrested.

Protester evacuated after being shot with live ammo in Nabi Saleh today. Picture credit: Oren Ziv/ActiveStills

The protester was hit by 0.22" caliber munitions, which military regulations forbid using in the dispersal of demonstrations. Late in 2001, Judge Advocate General, Menachem Finkelstein, reclassified 0.22” munitions as live ammunition, and specifically forbade its use as a crowd control means. The reclassification was decided upon following numerous deaths of Palestinian demonstrators, mostly children.

Despite this fact, the Israeli military resumed using the 0.22” munitions to disperse demonstrations in the West Bank in the wake of Operation Cast Lead. Since then at least two Palestinian demonstrators have been killed by 0.22” fire:

Az a-Din al-Jamal, age 14, was killed on 13 February 2009, in Hebron,
Aqel Sror, age 35, was killed on 5 June 2009, in Ni'lin.

Following the death of Aqel Srour, JAG Brig. Gen. Avichai Mandelblit reasserted that 0.22” munitions "are not classified by the IDF as means for dispersing demonstrations or public disturbances. The rules for use of these means in Judea and Samaria are stringent, and comparable to the rules for opening fire with ‘live’ ammunition.”

Contrary to the army's official position, permissive use of 0.22” munitions against demonstrators continues in non life-threatening situations.

Background
Late in 2009, settlers began gradually taking over Ein al-Qaws (the Bow Spring), which rests on lands belonging to Bashir Tamimi, the head of the Nabi Saleh village council. The settlers, abetted by the army, erected a shed over the spring, renamed it Maayan Meir, after a late settler, and began driving away Palestinians who came to use the spring by force - at times throwing stones or even pointing guns at them, threatening to shoot.

While residents of Nabi Saleh have already endured decades of continuous land grab and expulsion to allow for the ever continuing expansion of the Halamish settlement, the takeover of the spring served as the last straw that lead to the beginning of the village’s grassroots protest campaign of weekly demonstrations in demand for the return of their lands.

Protest in the tiny village enjoys the regular support of Palestinians from surrounding areas, as well as that of Israeli and international activists. Demonstrations in Nabi Saleh are also unique in the level of women participation in them, and the role they hold in all their aspects, including organizing. Such participation, which often also includes the participation of children reflects the village’s commitment to a truly popular grassroots mobilization, encompassing all segments of the community.

The response of the Israeli military to the protests has been especially brutal and includes regularly laying complete siege on village every Friday, accompanied by the declaration of the entire village, including the built up area, as a closed military zone. Prior and during the demonstrations themselves, the army often completely occupies the village, in effect enforcing an undeclared curfew. Military nighttime raids and arrest operations are also a common tactic in the army’s strategy of intimidation, often targeting minors.

In order to prevent the villagers and their supporters from exercising their fundamental right to demonstrate and march to their lands, soldiers regularly use disproportional force against the unarmed protesters. The means utilized by the army to hinder demonstrations include, but are not limited to, the use of tear-gas projectiles, banned high-velocity tear-gas projectiles, rubber-coated bullets and, at times, even live ammunition.

The use of such practices have already caused countless injuries, several of them serious, including those of children - the most serious of which is that of 14 year-old Ehab Barghouthi, who was shot in the head with a rubber-coated bullet from short range on March 5th, 2010 and laid comatose in the hospital for three weeks.

Tear-gas, as well as a foul liquid called “The Skunk”, which is shot from a water cannon, is often used inside the built up area of the village, or even directly pointed into houses, in a way that allows no refuge for the uninvolved residents of the village, including children and the elderly. The interior of at least one house caught fire and was severely damaged after soldiers shot a tear-gas projectile through its windows.

Since December 2009, when protest in the village was sparked, hundreds of demonstration-related injuries caused by disproportionate military violence have been recorded in Nabi Saleh.

Between January 2010 and June 2011, the Israeli Army has carried 76 arrests of people detained for 24 hours or more on suspicions related to protest in the village of Nabi Saleh, including those of women and of children as young as 11 years old. Of the 76, 18 were minors. Dozens more were detained for shorter periods.

Israeli activist choose jail over freedom in solidarity with Palestinians arrested at Mustafa Tamimi's funeral

2011-12-22T12:54:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,
please find below Haggai Matar's article about one of the Israeli activists arrested at Mustafa Tamimi's funeral along with 22 other Palestinian, Israeli and international activists last week. The activist choose not to be released from jail instead taking a stand to remain in jail while the Palestinians activists also remained jail.

While Haggai Matar is right that this is the first time in a long time that an activist arrested at a protest in the Occupied West Bank refused to be released in an act of solidarity with Palestinians rather than be released immediately after their arrest, there have been a number of recent cases where Israeli activists arrested either in the Occupied West Bank or in Israel when they participated in anti-occupation actions, who have choosen to go to jail in an act of solidarity with Palestinians rather than pay fines to the Israeli state. The two activists to do so most recently were Israeli activists, Kobi Snitz and Jonathan Pollak.

In solidarity, Kim

***

Lesson from Israeli who chose jail, solidarity over segregation

For the first time in many years, an Israeli activist chose to put into practice the notion promoted by Henry David Thoreau: “Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison…”

By Haggai Matar | Translated by Ruth Edmonds

December 20 2011|+972blog

Truth be told: We all should have acted like ‘A’. Every Friday, across the West Bank, Israelis and Palestinians demonstrate together. They stand together opposite the same soldiers, chant the same slogans, give the same speeches, run away from the same clouds of tear gas and the same spray from the disgusting “skunk” machines, and get arrested for the same reasons and with the same false accusations.

However, it is at that point that the legal mechanisms of racism start kicking in. The Israelis are released from the police station with limited conditions or with similar conditions from court. An Israeli detainee has to be brought in front of a judge within 24 hours. The Palestinians are taken to Ofer Military Prison. From the outset, the military orders that dictate their lives allow the authorities to detain them for eight whole days before they are even required to allow judicial review of the detention. Even then, in most cases, the court will decide to allow an extension and then another extension and then detention till the procedure regarding an indictment has ended. This process can take a number of months and in the end, the arrested Palestinian is released. The arrested Israeli, however, his friend and partner, was free that whole time.

That is how it always is under apartheid law. As a rule, we activists always made sure that if Palestinians were arrested, Israelis are arrested too so as to show solidarity, to protect our friends inside detention and to document the way they are treated. But then we sign the required injunction – and go back home.

Until A. came along. A. was arrested last Friday together with 20 Israelis, Palestinians and internationals at the main demonstration in Nabi Saleh marking a week since the murder of Mustafa Tamimi. Among those arrested was a close family member of the Tamimis, Mohammed Tamimi, as well as Mohammed Khatib from the Popular Committee of Bil’in – one of the most moral, creative, funny, determined, brave and moving people I have ever met in my life. When the time came to sign the conditional release form at the police station (a 15 day-injunction to stay away from Nabi Saleh) A. and another friend refused. They were brought before the judge, refused again, and were sent back to detention. They notified the authorities that they were standing in solidarity with their friends Tamimi and Khatib and they would not agree to be released while the two others were still in detention.

In the end, Khatib was released and so was A.’s friend, who finally signed the conditional release form. But Tamimi and A. stayed in detention – Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Yesterday morning (Monday) A. was supposed to be brought in front of a Magistrate’s Court in Jerusalem, which was expected to extend her detention once again. However, the police had apparently grown tired of A., and decided to release her without conditions – thus almost literally throwing her out of her detention cell.

A. succeeding in communicating an exceptional message of solidarity. She demonstrated, with her action, with her imprisoned body in a disgusting cell at the Russian Compound in Jerusalem, the absurdity of the apartheid laws of the occupation, the way they differentiate between partners in the struggle by their origins, by the nationality dictated to them, by the ID card they carry in their pockets.

The distance between home to jail
The truth is that this is what we all should have been doing. Just like we are arrested together, so should we stay in prison together. We should refuse, all of us, to sign the release forms, all the Israeli activists arrested in the same protest together with all the Palestinian activists. Our community “elders” say that once, it really was like that, in the first Intifada and before. Everyone refused, everyone was jailed together (at the time, they explained, authorities would not separate between the arrestees at the detention center, unlike today).
Bus alas, we do not refuse. We sign. We give up on demonstrations for two weeks in one place and go to others, and then come back again to the place from where we were originally banned. At the end of the day we always go home: to comfortable warmth, to a soft bed, to sleepy cats, to familiar food, to favourite books and to the embraces of lovers. We go back to routines, to work, to tasks, to meetings, to nights out, to Facebook, to the blogs, the newspapers, the greengrocer, the neighbour whose bike is blocking ours, to family dinners, to a light that needs fixing in the hall, to our studies and to the streets that turn into a river when it rains for more than five minutes.

Our friends do not. They stay dressed in IPS (Israeli Prison Service) issued uniform, in a cold tent in Ofer Military Prison, with nothing from home. Remember how Abudallah Abu Rahmah described the months in jail with no shoes and no watch? Well, it’s something like that.

Abu Rahmah, like Tamimi and Khatib, are the men jailed under a government that unjustly imprisons just about anyone. They are the men Thoreau was referring to. And this is the place for the just man to be imprisoned too. A. was doing the most just thing that can be done under the regime we have here.

There is no end to the reasons for signing a release form, for the reasons to return home. It can be said practically that it will not help since, of course, the Palestinians are not released any sooner due to this refusal. It can be said that it just snatches away more good activists who are very much needed on the outside. It can be said that a worthy struggle requires not only fairness but also the well-being of the strugglers, and there is a need to do as much as possible so as to survive and not burn out. It can be said that it is a more sustainable way as opposed to a situation where we will all be in jail. And it’s true. It’s all true. However, despite everything, there is something very right, more right, in A.’s actions. Something that marks clearer than ever before the ugliness of the system. And like a beacon of light illuminates the alternative to this method. Therefore, today, also those of us sitting at home – we are all A.

Haggai Matar is an Israeli journalist and political activist, focusing mainly on the struggle against the occupation. He is currently working at Zman Tel Aviv, the local supplement of Maariv newspaper, and at the independent Hebrew website MySay.

Palestinian artist, Larissa Sansour banned and censored by French company Lacoste from Lacoste Elysée Prize in Photography.

2011-12-21T23:03:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
over the last few days, more and more information has been unfolding about the banning and censorshp of the Palestinian artist, Larissa Sansour and her stunning photographic art work, Nation Estate.

I have included Ali Abunimah's original article on the censoring of Sansour, as well as Abunimah's follow up article which sheds some light on why Sansour may have been censored. According to Abunimah's research, one of the largest shareholders of Lacoste is a major donor to Israel and Zionist causes.

In the wake of the controversy, Musée de l’Elysée cancelled the competition altogether and Lacoste issued a statement pulling out of funding the competition in the future. Links to both statements can be found in Ali Abunimah's second article below.

I have also included Sansour's stunning images. You can visit her website here to see more of her wonderful work.

Personally, I fell in love with her photographs as soon as I saw them. As a huge sci-fantasy fan, not only do I love the political content of her work, I also think her dystopic sci-fantasy depiction of a futuristic Palestinian nation estate is a stunning re-imagining of the Palestinian struggle.

in solidarity, Kim

***

French clothing firm Lacoste censors, expels Palestinian artist Larissa Sansour from prestigious contest

by Ali Abunimah 21 December 2011, Electronic Intifada

Image from Larissa Sansour’s Nation Estate project censored by the Lacoste Elysée Prize

(Larissa Sansour )

The high-end French clothing chain Lacoste has demanded the removal of work by Palestinian artist Larissa Sansour from the shortlist for the €25,000 Lacoste Elysee Prize that is awarded by the Swiss Musee de l’Elysee with sponsorship from the firm.

A Palestinian who is “too pro-Palestinian”

Sansour was among eight finalists shortlisted for the 2011 prize. According to a press release issued by Sansour, “Lacoste stated their refusal to support Sansour’s work, labelling it ‘too pro-Palestinian.’”

This latest instance of apparent censorship of Palestinian artists by a cultural institution comes just months after the Museum of Children’s Art in Oakland, California censored an exhibit of art by children in Gaza just before its planned opening under pressure from anti-Palestinian Zionist groups.

Sansour refuses to sign statement that she withdrew voluntarily

Sansour, who is based in London, is a native of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank. The press release explains:

As a nominee, Sansour was awarded a bursary of €4,000 and given carte blanche to produce a portfolio of images for the final judging. In November 2011, three photos for Sansour’s Nation Estate project were accepted, and she was congratulated by the prize administrators on her work and professionalism. Sansour’s name was included on all the literature relating to the prize and on the website as an official nominee. Her name has since been removed, just as her project has been withdrawn from an upcoming issue of contemporary art magazine ArtReview introducing the nominated artists.
In an attempt to mask the reasons for her dismissal, Sansour was asked to approve a statement saying that she withdrew from her nomination ‘in order to pursue other opportunities’. Sansour has refused.

Søren Lind, Sansour’s assistant, told The Electronic Intifada today that the Lacoste company had yet to give any public response on the matter. A Google-cached image of the official Elysée Prize website captured by The Electronic Intifada proves that Sansour’s name was on the shortlist until at least 12 December, and then removed on the current version.

Imagining a Palestinian state as science fiction

Sansour’s multimedia project Nation Estate was “conceived in the wake of the Palestinian bid for UN membership. Nation Estate depicts a science fiction-style Palestinian state in the form of a single skyscraper housing the entire Palestinian population. Inside this new Nation Estate, the residents have recreated their lost cities on separate floors: Jerusalem on 3, Ramallah on 4, Sansour’s own hometown of Bethlehem on 5, etc.”

Sansour was born in Jerusalem and her multimedia work has been exhibited all over the world. The photo above, from the exhibit, is published courtesy of Sansour. More can be seen at her website.

***

Image from Larissa Sansour’s Nation Estate project censored by the Lacoste Elysée Prize

(Larissa Sansour )

Owner of Lacoste, which censored Palestinian artist, is major donor to Israel, Zionist causes

Submitted by Ali Abunimah: 22 December 2011, Electronic Intifada

Image from Larissa Sansour’s Nation Estate project censored by the Lacoste Elysée Prize

(Larissa Sansour )

One of the largest shareholders of high-end French fashion firm Lacoste is a major donor to Israel and Zionist causes.

Lacoste has been at the center of a scandal over the company’s insistence that Palestinian artist Larissa Sansour be forced out of the prestigious Lacoste Elysée Prize in Photography.
The Musée de L’Elysée in Lausanne, Switzerland, which administers the prize today took the extraordinary step of canceling the 2011 contest in protest at Lacoste’s insistence that Sansour be excluded. Lacoste has also announced that it will no longer sponsor the contest, which now appears to be dead.

Ownership of Lacoste

Philippe Nordmann, a Swiss national, is CEO of Maus Frères SA a family-owned holding company which owns stakes in several retail brands. Maus owns France-based textile firm Devanlay which holds a 35 percent stake in Lacoste SA. The other 65 percent of Lacoste SA is owned directly by the Lacoste family, according to the Lacoste company press kit.
Devanlay is the global manufacturer and distributor of Lacoste’s clothing and hold the license for the Lacoste brand in the United States.

Lacoste stakeholder’s close ties to Israeli president

Nordmann, a direct descendant of the founder of Maus Frères SA, has been a major philanthropist to Israel and Zionist causes.
He is a member of the international board of governors of the Peres Center for Peace, and almost certainly a donor to the organization named after Shimon Peres, the current President of Israel.

Supporting Judaization of Palestinian land at expense of Palestinians

Earlier this month Nordmann was at Peres’ official residence to receive the “Distinguished Citizen’s” award given by the Beautiful Israel Yakir council. According to The Jerusalem Post:

The council recognizes individuals, organizations, institutions and industrial plants that have undertaken projects to beautify the environment and to improve the quality of life.

The Magshim (Realization) award went to the 35 development towns from Kiryat Shmona to Eilat that are collectively celebrating the 60th anniversary of David Ben-Gurion’s decision to send new immigrants to barren stretches of rock and sand all over the country, and to establish vibrant communities.

In contrast to this Zionist mythology, the areas where dozens of Jews-only “development towns” were built were not barren, but had been the homes of ethnically-cleased Palestinians who now live as refugees, forbidden from returning because they do not meet Israel’s ethno-religious criteria. Nordmann funds many projects in Israeli towns, the Post adds.
Ironically, Sansour’s censored art project Nation Estate imagined the reconstruction of the Palestinian homeland in the form of a skyscraper.

Why was Sansour forced out of the Elysée Prize?

There’s no evidence that Nordmann had a direct role in the decision to force Sansour out of the contest, but given the mystery surrounding the affair, it is fair to note as a matter of public record his company’s major stake in, and influence over Lacoste as its brand manager and distributor, and his public support and philanthropy for Israel and Zionism.
The Musée de L’Elysée confirmed in its press release announcing the suspension of the contest that Larissa Sansour’s work had been withdrawn from the Lacoste Elysée Prize under pressure from the sponsor - Lacoste:

The Musée de l’Elysée has based its decision on the private partner’s wish to exclude Larissa Sansour, one of the prize nominees. We reaffirm our support to Larissa Sansour for the artistic quality of her work and her dedication.

“A high-ranking someone at Lacoste”

Sansour herself told Lebanon’s Daily Star:

Last week the director of the museum [called] me and [said] that unfortunately a high-ranking someone at Lacoste (nobody knows his name) demanded that I be taken off the list of nominees … The strange thing is that Lacoste was in on [the selection] process from the very beginning, so they were fully aware of my work when they nominated me.

Images captured by The Electronic Intifada prove that Sansour was at least until 12 December listed as a nominee and then subsequently removed from the competition’s official website.

Lacoste’s denial

In a 21 December statement, reproduced at The Washington Post, Lacoste denied a political motive for the censorship of Sansour, and claimed that her work, uniquely, out of the eight nominees did not fit the theme.

Today, Lacoste reputation is at stake for false reasons and wrongful allegations. Never, was Lacoste’s intention to exclude any work on political grounds. The brand would not have otherwise agreed to the selection of Ms. Sansour in the first place.

After receiving works from all entries, Lacoste and the Musée de l’Elysée felt the work at hand did not belong in the theme of “joie de vivre” (happiness), which had been the case for other applicants at previous steps in the selection process.

After agreeing with the Musée de l’Elysée, the decision was made known to Ms. Sansour and she was presented by the Musée de l’Elysée with an offer to hold an exhibition of her works in a different forum.

This explanation makes no sense. Why would the financial sponsor of an art competition that was to judged by an independent jury of artists prejudge the contest by removing one artist in advance?
This was a point the Musée de L’Elysée made in its own statement: “An expert jury should have met at the end of January 2012 to select the winner of the Lacoste Elysée Prize 2011.”
That won’t happen because someone at Lacoste, we don’t know who, did not want Larissa Sansour’s work to be seen.

Corporate censorship of the arts

Lacoste’s reaction and the Musée de L’Elysée’s failure to stand up earlier to the company’s pressure only vindicates Sansour’s own warning about corporate involvement in the arts. In her 20 December press release breaking news of the scandal, Sansour said:

I am very sad and shocked by this development. This year Palestine was officially admitted to UNESCO, yet we are still being silenced. As a politically involved artist I am no stranger to opposition, but never before have I been censored by the very same people who nominated me in the first place. Lacoste’s prejudice and censorship puts a major dent in the idea of corporate involvement in the arts. It is deeply worrying.”

But there is a bright side. The clumsy and crude attempts at censorship – whoever is behind them – have backfired, and more people are likely to see and appreciate Sansour’s work than ever before.

10,000 Egyptian women march in Cairo calling for the fall of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF)

2011-12-20T23:23:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
more on the inspiring protest by Egyptian women. According to the Associated Press article run in The Australia, around 10,000 women have marched through central Cairo calling for the fall of Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF).

The Guardian also has a series of stunning photos from the Women's March, which can be viewed by clicking here.

Inspiring!

In solidarity, Kim
**

AP's raw footage of Women's march in central Cairo

Egyptian women hit street over violence

Associated Press report: The Australian: 21 December 2011

Egyptian women shout slogans during a protest in downtown Cairo's Tahrir Square to denounce the military's attacks on women and to call for an immediate end to the violence against protesters. Source: AFP

AROUND 10,000 women have marched through central Cairo demanding Egypt's ruling military step down in an unprecedented show of outrage over soldiers who dragged women by the hair and stomped on them, and stripped one half-naked in the street during a fierce crackdown on activists the past week.

The dramatic protest, which grew as the women marched from Tahrir Square through downtown, was fueled by the widely circulated images of abuses of women.

Many of the marchers touted the photo of the young woman whose clothes were partially pulled off by troops, baring her down to her blue bra, as she struggled on the ground.

"Tantawi stripped your women naked, come join us," the crowd chanted to passers-by, referring to Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, the head of the military council that has ruled Egypt since the February 11 fall of Hosni Mubarak.

"The daughters of Egypt are a red line," they chanted.

Even before the protest was over, the military council issued an unusually strong statement of regret for what it called "violations" against women - a quick turnaround after days of dismissing the significance of the abuse.

The council expressed "deep regret to the great women of Egypt" and affirmed "its respect and total appreciation" for women and their right to protest and take part in political life. It promised it was taking measures to punish those responsible for violations.

The statement suggested the military's fear that attacks on women could wreck its prestige at home and abroad, which has already been heavily eroded by its fierce, five-day-old crackdown on pro-democracy protesters demanding it surrender power.

The ruling generals have campaigned to keep the public on its side in the confrontation, depicting the activists as hooligans and themselves as the honorable protectors of the nation, above reproach.

In unusually harsh words, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday accused the Egyptian security forces and extremists of specifically targeting women.

"This systematic degradation of Egyptian women dishonors the revolution, disgraces the state and its uniform, and is not worthy of a great people," she said.

In a possibly significant hint of new flexibility, the council also said in its statement that it was prepared to discuss any initiatives to help the security of the country. In recent days, a number of political factions have pressed the military to hand over power by February, rather than June, when it promised to hold presidential elections.

In the past, police in Mubarak's regime were accused of intentionally humiliating women in protest crackdowns. But images of women being abused by soldiers were particularly shocking in a society that is deeply conservative and generally reveres the military.

The independent press has splashed its front pages with pictures of soldiers chasing women protesters, including ones in conservative headscarves and full face-veils, beating them with sticks and clubs and dragging them by their hair. The crackdown has left 14 people dead - all but one by gunshots - and hundreds wounded.

The images of the half-stripped protester, whose identity is not known, clearly had a powerful resonance. A banner showing a photo of her on the asphalt - one soldier yanking up her black robes and shirt, another poised to stomp on her chest - was put up in Tahrir Square for passing drivers to see.

"The girl dragged around is just like my daughter," said Um Hossam, a 54-year old woman in traditional black dress and a headscarf at the march. "I am a free woman, and attacking this woman or killing protesters is just like going after one of my own children."

Ringed by a protective chain of men, the women marched from Tahrir to the Journalists' Syndicate, several blocks away, chanting slogans demanding the military council step down.

Many accused the military of intentionally targeting women to scare them and their male relatives from joining protests against the generals. Previously, the military has implied women who joined protests were of loose morals. In March, soldiers subjected detained female protesters to humiliating tests to determine if they were virgins.

"They are trying to break women's spirits, starting with the virginity tests. They want to break their dignity so that they don't go out and protest," Maha Abdel-Nasser, an engineer who joined the march, said.

Two sisters, Yomna and Tasneem Shams, said they never took part in previous protests because their parents wouldn't allow them. But they happened to be downtown and spontaneously joined the women's march.

"No one should ever be beaten for expressing their opinion," Yomna, 19, said. "I am proud I took part in today's protest. I feel I can tell my kids I have done something for them in the future."

Some also criticized Islamic parties, which stayed out of the antimilitary protests and did not participate in the march - even though religious conservatives often tout their defense of "women's honor." Pro-democracy activists accused them of being worried about anything that might derail ongoing, multistage parliamentary elections, which the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood and the more conservative Al-Nour Party have dominated so far.

"This is a case of honor. But they clearly don't care for honor or religion. They now care only about their political interests," said Mohammed Fawaz, one of the men in the protective chain around the marching women.

The protest also is likely to deepen the predicament of the military as critics began to talk openly about putting them on trial for abuses, and politicians are floating ideas for their exit, perhaps in return for immunity.

Emad Gad, a newly elected lawmaker, said that without guarantees they would not be prosecuted, the generals won't hand over power by the end of June as promised. Foremost on their minds, he said, was the fate of Mubarak, who ended in court facing charges that carry the death penalty after ruling Egypt for nearly 30 years.

"They didn't get clear assurances and that is why they try diabolical tactics to make sure they get these guarantees," he said, citing the military's attempt to enshrine in the next constitution language that would shield it from civilian scrutiny.

"We have to address their fears, their interests and future role," he said.

The public and many activists welcomed the military when it took power from Mubarak in February. But relations have deteriorated sharply since as the democracy activists accused the generals of hijacking their uprising, obstructing reforms, human rights abuses and failing to revive the ailing economy or restore security.

The most recent protests - and an earlier round of protests that saw a deadly crackdown last month - have seen unprecedentedly bold ridiculing of the military, which for decades was considered a revered institution above criticism. Young protesters have heaped profanities into their antimilitary slogans, demanded the execution of Tantawi and taunted soldiers in Tahrir.

On Monday, a member of the military council, Maj. Gen. Adel Emara, took a hard-line in a press conference, denouncing the protests as a conspiracy to "topple the state" and accusing the media of fomenting sedition.

He defended the use of force by troops, saying they had a duty to defend the state's institutions and declined to offer an apology for brutality toward female protesters. He did not dispute the authenticity of the image of the woman being dragged half naked by soldiers, but said Egyptians should not see it without considering the circumstances surrounding the incident.

The apparent change in attitude with the statement of regret left some women unimpressed.

Sahar Abdel-Mohsen, a 31-year old activist, doubted the promise to punish those responsible and said the statement was in response to the US criticism. "This is an apology to one woman, Hillary Clinton."

"This is like someone raping a girl, and then going to the police station to marry her (to avoid prosecution) and then divorce her as soon as he leaves," she said.

"It is an attempt to exonerate themselves after the deed is done, but with little accountability."

Egyptian women demand an end to military rule

2011-12-20T18:36:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,
please find below two videos: one of the protest by Egyptian women against the Egyptian military and one in which Ghada Kamal Ahmed Abdelkhalaq recounts details about being tortured by the Egyptian army as well as specifics regarding their behavior and tactics. Her testimony is an Arabic but Jadaliyya website has provided an english transcript of her testimony, which is also below.

I have also included the photo which has been seen around the world of the Egyptian army brutally beating a young unidentified Egyptian woman in the streets near Tahrir Square. You can read Ahdaf Soueif article, "Image of unknown woman beaten by Egypt's military echoes around world" in the Guardian on the brutality of this beating against the young woman here.

Egyptian women have a played and continued to central role in Egypt's uprising calling for democracy and human rights. As one friend said recently, they are beyond inspiring!

in solidarity,
Kim

Egyptian women send a message to SCAF

Egyptian military brutally beat young unknown Egyptian woman protestor

Ghada Kamal Ahmed Abdelkhalaq's testimony against the Egyptian military

Translated Transcription from Jadaliyya. To view original post on Jadaliyya, click here.

My name is Ghada Kamal Ahmed Abdelkhalaq. I am twenty-eight years old, and I work as a pharmaceutical doctor. I’m originally from Mansoura, but I currently live in Cairo. I am a member of the April 6 Youth Movement, and I also work on the Baradei campaign in Mansoura.

Yesterday—to start from the beginning—as you know, Aboudy, an Ultras fan, was kidnapped and abused. He was completely disfigured. So of course people were angry. So a fight broke out between them and the forces inside the Parliament building. It got more fierce, rocks were being thrown from both sides. Then the forces inside the building began to set fire to the tents. The tents are set up so they are tied to the steel bars in the gates. They poured gasoline onto them and threw stuff to light them on fire. Then they left the ground floor and started going up, all the way to the tenth floor, onto the roof. Then they started showering us with rocks. They dropped large chunks of ceramic blocks, each one so big, had it landed on someone’s head I doubt they would survive. Each piece had sharp, pointy edges like teeth. And of course they were using water hoses—they gave me a shower last night. Cold water—and some said they even used hot water. They were standing up there, making improper gestures at people. They would throw rocks at us and then dance. I mean, really trying to wind us up.

People were completely defenseless and isolated. Even when people would throw a Molotov or anything else, the water hoses would instantly put it out. So there was really no match between the two sides. And it got more intense. I was hit by rocks several times all over my body.

At around eight in the morning or so, they called—I should say, I am not certain of the time because I did not look at my watch. They called for the other front, stationed outside the other gate to the Parliament from the direction of Tahrir. They said we would be surrounded and closed off. We found an entire squad on the other side, two of the officers were completely masked, incredibly built up physically, like soldiers I had never seen before.

One of them had no badge or rank; the other had one identifying the Mezalat brigade. Of course people worried about the gate being opened—if protesters were attacked from both sides, they would be done for. So people stood by the gate and chanted the usual, “Down with military rule” and “the people want the fall of the field Marshall,” and so on. The soldiers and officers lined up behind the masked men and started making very pornographic gestures. I mean, this is what provoked people into cursing, just so you have the context. At one point, for example, I personally saw one of them begin gesturing to his genitals. I mean, personally, I do not know what to tell you, just obscene moves that would infuriate anyone. So people began yelling insults. And the two masked men standing up front were filming people as they cursed, recording the insults completely out of context—so the viewer would not know why they were cursing. When really, behind the camera there are soldiers provoking these reactions.

The armed forces turned and went inside once they saw the people explode. I walked down to the road with the bank near Qasr el Aini Street. I was of course exhausted by then so I grabbed a blanket and decided to rest until anything else happened. Right away, I found myself being nudged awake by people saying the army had arrived and was attacking. I got up—barely awake but I saw everyone running into side streets. I have a habit, when I am running—I always look back to see if anyone is being beaten or arrested, you know, to make sure there is help. So as I turned, I saw Dr. Sanaa—I did not know her name at the time. She was sprawled on the ground, surrounded by loads of soldiers. One had grabbed her by the hair, and they were going at her with sticks. Of course I was hardly conscious of what I was doing—in this kind of situation there is no room for thinking. It is a sense of humanity. So I threw my bag to someone behind me and ran. I ran to her, wanting to throw myself onto her and shield her even a little from the beating. It was clear they were beating her for more than five or six minutes. Before I had even reached her—the soldiers split the party—some moved in to attack me and the rest continued with her.

So before I could reach her, I was hit with the baton on my head—it cracked it open. Needed four stitches. I got beaten with the batons on every inch of my head—they really do a good job of that. And of course my arm here, and my leg, my back and my behind. I mean, very severe beating. Then one soldier said, “Get her—that is the one who has been cursing all day. We want her.” He grabbed me by the hair, in an incredibly painful way. He started swearing at him and threatening me. Then began the kicking and beating, with sticks—there must have been around ten soldiers hitting me all at once. They started with their boots—and you know their boots are really heavy, I think the heels are made of iron, probably because they are used in the desert or something. And so with his boots he would kick me right here and pull my hair. Finally he said, “take her inside.”

So on the way in, everyone in your path hits you. They use some long contraption that looks like a whip, but it is made of plastic—it disfigures you, not just injures you. And of course the insults, you know, beyond your imagination. When I fell—I do not know, maybe you can still see the mark it left—one of them stepped on my face. And when I fell they also started kicking me in the chest. So they took me inside. But in the interest of fairness, one of the soldiers that were beating me—I guess he must have felt something and pitied me.

So after fifteen minutes or more of abuse, inside the Parliament he finally said, “enough.” He took me inside. One of the masked men that had been outside, was now in there. I did not recognize him of course—he recognized me. He said, “Welcome! It is you.” Of course I could not process this at first. He said, “I was the one outside, with my face covered.” I kept quiet. He said, “So you are a revolutionary, then!” and I said, “Yes.” He swore at me, using an incredibly filthy word. He said, “Aren’t you the one who was swearing at us? Today I will show you whether or not I am a man. Tonight I will have a party just for you.” He said “I am a Sa’idi [from Upper Egypt], I will not let you go, you are not getting out of here. Today, that is it, you are mine.” And indeed, he actually made it a point to everyone else standing around, that I was his.

He called himself Hossam, of course I do not think that is his real name. He slapped me across the face. Ongoing insults, and threats. Threats, I mean, of a sexual nature. I would have no problem with threats of execution. We are out there knowing we might die any minute. It is not the end of the world. But for me as a girl, sexual assault, I mean, that is the last thing, the absolute last thing a girl can take. A respectable general came in, dressed in a suit, I think there must have been some pressure outside the parliament. He said, “People, do not worry, do not be afraid … anyone who does not need stitches or treatment, will be released.” Of course my head needed stitches, but all I could think of was that I needed to get out—no way I could stay in the same place with that person. I said to him, “General, sir, I am telling you, you need to personally see to it that I get out of here.” The masked soldier suddenly took the general aside and spoke to him privately. After they spoke, the general completely ignored me, and the soldier returned to threatening me—“Don’t stand in front of me, go to the back,” he said.

Then Dr. Ziyad came in, from the field hospital, to take everyone out—so he decided to escort the girls out first; there were seven of us. So I whispered to him, worried he may not notice me, and told him the soldier was keeping me from leaving. I had to whisper because they were beating up anyone who talked. So I whispered to him, and he noticed. And he went to the soldier and said he would take all of us, but the soldier said, “No – this one, she will not leave.” So the doctor persisted and decided to speak to the general. He told him, “I am not leaving without all of them,” and the general of course reassured him, saying “Of course, they will all get out.” It became clear that it was a political charade—people needed to get out, that’s it. So the doctor told the soldier that his superior, the general, said everyone should be let go. And so the soldier told me, “No problem, you will get out, but I am going to shoot you.” A clear, sound threat in front of everyone, that “if I find you outside the gates, I will shoot you. I am a Sa’idi, and I will not let you go.”

So this is how it went for me. I do not know if I can talk about other people. But there were plenty of others, fairly respectable people, I do not know his name but for example an engineer—they planted a piece of hash in his wallet! I mean, poor guy, they planted a piece of hash in his wallet. There were situations worse than mine, I mean one situation, if you are not moved by it, I mean—this other person. One person who looked fairly destitute, his head was cracked open, bleeding. I mean clearly needed nothing short of divine intervention. He was pleading with them, saying, “Give me strength Prophet Muhammad. I did not do anything.” And there he is, being beaten and cursed. It really moved me. Someone who had not done a thing, and he was just seeking God’s help.

Of course the other girls who were with me, some of them, one had her eye smashed. Another was bleeding from her nose and was hysterical; it was clearly her first time with them. I mean she may have been out there once or twice but looked fairly inexperienced, she kept shaking and bleeding. And there was Nour. Ayman Nour, who was also beaten, sworn at with the dirtiest language, by the same masked man, saying things like, “You are not a man” and so on, using other incredibly low and obscene language. Alaa Abdel Fattah’s sister was with us as well, and he told her, “What does your Mom do?” and she told him, she is a professor. “And your Dad?”—an engineer. And so he would call her “you daughter of so-and-so.” I mean, the kind of insults! It is just—inhumane treatment. So we finally went outside with Dr. Ziyad. We were under the generals’ protection. They must be trained in morale upkeep—after their rank and file destroy us, they come out with this “good side.”

Fairly well-known activists could have been released because of negotiations. But the people that are completely unknown—I call them “heroes outside the spotlight.” And they really are heroes. Do not think we are heroes, we are not. When one guy in his undershirt is being disparaged for looking like a thug, and he is in the frontlines trying to rescue a girl. And he says, “You are an educated person, I am done for anyway,”—that is a hero. An unsung hero. These people are seriously left behind, and I do not think they will be released. Not unless we find out who they are and there is real pressure. Without that they will not be released. Because yesterday, were it not for the pressure from outside, they would not have released anyone. I am sure of that.

Mohammed Khatib: On my release from jail

2011-12-19T19:38:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

please find below a statement which has been released by Mohammed Khatib on his arrested and detention by the Israeli Occupation Forces. Mohammed was arrested with 22 other activists, including Palestinians, Israelis and Internationals on Friday 16 December when they attended Mustafa Tamimi's funeral in Nabi Saleh. Israeli Occupation Forces attacked mourners at the conclusion of the funeral when they attempted to peacefully march to land belonging to the village.

Mohammed is a leading member of the Bil'in Popular Committee Against the Wall and has played an active part in linking-up the non-violent struggles being carried out by villages throughout the Occupied West Bank.

For more information on the struggle of Bil'in village, you can visit their solidarity website here.

As Mohammed notes in his statement, Mohammed Tamimi, a young activists from Nabi Saleh was arrested at the same time he was but has not been released from prison yet.

In solidarity,

Kim

BBC's video report on the demonstration

Mohammed Khatib being arrested in the wake of Mustafa Tamimi's funeral on 16 December 2011

Dear friend,

I have just been released from jail, after three days inside. I was arrested last Friday, together with 22 others, in the village of Nabi Saleh, during a demonstration commemorating the murder of Mustafa Tamimi. Our arrest took place as we peacefully protested near the entrance to the Jewish-only settlement of Halamish, which is built on lands stolen from Nabi Saleh.

Minutes after we got to the gate, Israeli Border Police officers moved in to remove us from the scene. Palestinians, Israeli and international activists, we were all shackled and dragged away into military jeeps that transported us to the adjacent military base, which is in fact part of the settlement.

In the military base, still shackled, I was assaulted by a settler who hit me in the face, leaving me with a bloody nose. Shortly after, the settler also attacked a female Israeli activist who was by my side. The soldiers and policemen present did not prevent the attack, nor did they bother to detain the settler after the fact. Instead, the zip-tie locks on my hands were removed, only for my arms to be bound again, this time behind my back.

Hours later, at the police station, I learned that to cover up their responsibility for my attack, the soldiers have laid a bogus complaint against me for assaulting them. My hands were tied, my face was bleeding, but it was I who spent the night in the inside of prison cell.

Mohammed Tamimi from Nabi Saleh was also arrested during that same demonstration. While the police decided to release all the others, he and I were to remain in jail. During our demonstrations, soldiers often take pictures, to later use them as "incriminating evidence". This time, the soldiers used one such picture to accuse Mohammed of throwing stones during a demonstration a few weeks or months back. The man pictured in that photograph is not Mohammed Tamimi from Nabi Saleh, regardless, he remains in jail. Military law allows Israel to keep us Palestinians in jail for eight days before seeing ajudge, and even then, it is a soldier in uniform who is the so called neutral arbitrator.

As the prison doors closed behind me, my happiness was clouded by the fact that Mohammed Tamimi was not released. The battle for his freedom is only beginning, as our lawyers prepare the petition for his release. If you can, please help us fund legal aid for him and for the countless others who are regularly arrested protesting Israeli Occupation.

I would also like to use this letter to extend my gratitude to Ayala Shani, an Israeli comrade who was arrested with me. She refused the injustice of being released while both me and Mohammed Tamimi were still detained. As these words are written, she is still in jail, despite having been offered her freedom twice already by Israeli courts.

Sincerely,
Mohammed Khatib

Mohammed Khatib arrested by IOF - 16 Dec 2011

Mohammed Tamimi being arrested by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) - 16 Dec 2011

Mohammed Tamimi and Israeli activists arrested by IOF - 16 Dec 2011

Egyptian military attack unarmed protestors and set fire to Tahrir Square - 12 dead, over 400 wounded in 4 days

2011-12-19T07:59:00.000-08:00

Jonathan Pollak: A courageous Palestinian has died, shrouded in stones

2011-12-16T00:01:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

please find below an Haaretz article by Israeli activist, Jonathan Pollak, on the death of Mustafa Tamimi.

Jonathan's article's is one of the best explanations, I have read, to the disingenuously question or statement made by many Zionsits about Palestinian stone throwing. Their statements are usually made in an attempt to discredit the Palestinian struggle and to justify the brutal military assaults by Israeli Occupation Force with high tech weaponry on Palestinians who have nothing except rocks to defend themselves. Jonathan, however, clearly explains that for Palestinians throwing stones is about refusing to submit to Israeli occupation, its is about resistance to the occupation and defense of your family, friends and homeland.

As Jonathan writes: "Mustafa died because he threw stones; he died because he dared to speak a truth, with his hands, in a place where the truth is forbidden .... Mustafa was a brave man killed because he threw stones and refused to be afraid of a soldier bearing arms, sitting safely in the military jeep covered in armor".

I have know Jonathan for many years and he is one of the most dedicated, committed and passionate activists I have been fortunate to meet and work with over the years Jonathan was one of the original founders of the Israeli Anarchists Against the Wall and he is currently the media spokesperson for the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee.

In 2009, Jonathan gave evidence at the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, which was headed by Justice Richard Goldsone. Jonathan's testimony, along with the testimony of Mohamed Srour, described the murders of Arafat and Mohammed Khawaja from the village of Ni'lin. Arafat and Mohammed were killed by Israeli Occupation Forces during a demonstration against Israel's Operation Cast Lead, the 22 day military assault on Gaza which resulted in close to 1400 Palestinians being killed, the majority of whom were civilians, including at least 350 children. You can read Jonathan and Mohamed's testimony here.

Last year, Jonathan was sentenced to 3 months imprisonment for taking part in a Critical Mass bike demonstration in Tel Aviv in protest of Israel's blockade of Gaza. Jonathan was the only person convicted, although he was arrested along with 30 other protestors.

In solidarity,

Kim

****

A courageous Palestinian has died, shrouded in stone

The army spokesman was right - Mustafa died because he threw stones; he died because he dared to speak a truth, with his hands, in a place where the truth is forbidden.

By Jonathan Pollak: Haaretz, 13 December 2011

Mustafa Tamimi threw stones. Unapologetically and sometimes fearlessly. Not on that day alone, but nearly every Friday. He also concealed his face. Not for fear of the prison cell, which he had already come to know intimately, but in order to preserve his freedom, so he could continue to throw stones and resist the theft of his land. He continued to do this until the moment of his death.

According to British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, in response to the reports about the shooting of Tamimi, the spokesman of the GOC Southern Command wondered on his Twitter account: "What was Mustafa thinking running after a moving jeep while throwing stones #fail." Thus, simply and mockingly, the spokesman explained why Tamimi was to blame for his own death.

Mustafa Tamimi, from the village of Nabi Saleh - son to Ikhlas and Abd al-Razak, brother to Saddam and Ziad, to the twins Oudai and Louai and sister Ola - was shot in the head at close range on Friday. Hours later, at 9:21 on Saturday morning, he died of his wounds. A gas grenade was fired at him from an armored military Jeep at a distance of only a few meters. It was not out of fear that the person who did fired the shot hit him. He poked the barrel of the rifle through the door of the armored vehicle and fired with clear intent. The shooter is a soldier. His identity remains unknown and perhaps it will always remain unknown. Maybe this is for the best. Identifying him and punishing him would only serve to whitewash the crimes of the entire system. As if the indifferent Israeli civilian, the sergeant, the company commander, the battalion commander, the brigade commander, the division commander, the defense minister and the prime minister had no part in the shooting.

The army spokesman was right. Mustafa died because he threw stones; he died because he dared to speak a truth, with his hands, in a place where the truth is forbidden. Any discussion of the manner of the shooting, its legality and the orders on opening fire, infers that the landlord is forbidden to expel the trespasser. Indeed, the trespasser is allowed to shoot the landlord.

Mustafa's body is lying lifeless because he had the courage to throw stones on the 24th anniversary of the first intifada, which begot the Palestinian children of the stones. His brother Oudai is imprisoned at Ofer Prison and was not allowed to attend the funeral, because he too dared to throw stones. And his sister was not allowed to be at his bedside in his final moments, even though she is not suspected of having thrown stones, but because she is a Palestinian.

Mustafa was a brave man killed because he threw stones and refused to be afraid of a soldier bearing arms, sitting safely in the military jeep covered in armor. On the day Mustafa died, the frozen silence roaming the valley was only slightly less chilling than the shrilling sound of his mother's laments which fell upon it occasionally.

Thousands of stone-throwers followed him at his funeral. He was lowered into his grave and stones covered his body. Soldiers stood at the entrance to his village. Even the anguish and solitude of separation was intolerable for the army, who set their soldiers and arms to shower mourners with teargas as they went down to village lands following the funeral. While the soldier who shot Mustafa is at large, six of the demonstrators were put behind bars.

Mustafa, we walk behind your body with our heads bowed and eyes full of tears. We cherish you, because you died for throwing stones and we did not.

Video: Mustafa Tamimi's funeral and attack on mourners by Israeli Occupation Forces

2011-12-15T23:15:00.000-08:00

Video by Team Palestina

Video by Thameenahusary

Crikey Blogs: Discussing the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign

2011-12-13T21:18:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

I was recently invited, along with four other writers/activists, to contribute an article to a discussion on the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign. Our articles were published on Crikey Blogs on Tuesday.

The project was coordinated by NAJ Taylor for his This Blog Harms which is attached to Crikey. All 5 participants were asked to address a statement (see below) about the issue of BDS and "balancing competing harms".

I have included below my article in full, as well as links to the articles by the other 4 discussants and the question/statement which we were all asked to address in our articles (to read the articles just click on "Discussant 1 of 5" etc)

In solidarity, Kim

****

STATEMENT/INTRODUCTION TO ARTICLES BY NAJ TAYLOR:

Following the reaction to my blog post on the application of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanction (BDS) of Israel campaign in October, I approached five members of the Middle East diaspora and community in Australia to each discuss, in their own words, the following proposition:

To what extent is the BDS effective at balancing competing “harms” – the use of ”non-violent” harm to injure Israel economically, politically, reputationally and militarily and the relief of the “violent harm” endured by Palestinians under Israeli occupation? How useful is a campaign that “balances competing harms” for the Israeli and Palestinian, as well as Jewish and Muslim, diaspora – and wider Middle Eastern community – in Australia?

Discussants:

Discussant 1 of 5: Amin Abbas is a diaspora Palestinian.

Discussant 2 of 5: Antony Loewenstein is a Sydney-based independent journalist and author who has written for The Guardian, Haaretz, The Nation, Sydney Morning Herald and many others. His two best-selling books are My Israel Question and The Blogging Revolution. He is currently working on many projects, including a book about vulture capitalism, a book on the Left in contemporary politics and another title on Israel/Palestine.

Discussant 3 of 5: Kim Bullimore is a long-time socialist, political activist and anti-racism campaigner. Kim is a volunteer with the International Women’s Peace Service (IWPS-Palestine), the only all women international peace team working in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. She also writes regularly on the Palestine-Israel conflict for the Australian newspaper, Direct Action and blogs at Live from Occupied Palestine. In 2010, Kim co-organised the first national Australian BDS Conference.

Discussant 4 of 5: Les Rosenblatt is a Melbourne writer and political activist with a strong interest in Middle-Eastern politics and history. He has written several book reviews and articles on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict for Arena magazine and elsewhere. Les also promotes the science of climate change and is seeking to understand how best to respond to the GFC Mark 2. Les was active in the Australian Jewish Democratic society over many years and participated in a Middle East Dialogue project organised by La Trobe University’s Centre for Dialogue a couple of years ago.

Discussant 5 of 5: Moammar Mashni is the co-founder and manager of Australians for Palestine. He works to articulate the concerns of Australia’s Palestinian communities among politicians, churches, unions, universities and the media and to raise Australian public awareness of the Israel-Palestine conflict’s dynamics. Moammar was born in Australia to a Palestinian refugee family.

*****

CHOOSING TO DO NO HARM

By Kim Bullimore - 13 December 2011

Melbourne, AUSTRALIA: In December 2008, the Popular Committee Against the Wall from the Palestinian village of Bil’in in the Occupied West Bank and the Israeli Anarchists Against the Wall were jointly awarded the Carl Von Ossietzky Human Rights Medallion in Berlin. The Award, named for the 1935 German Nobel Peace Prize winner Carl Von Ossietzky – a journalist and pacifist – who died in a Nazi concentration camp, is awarded each year for “outstanding service in the realisation of basic and human rights”. The International League of Human Rights who awards the prize noted that the two groups were an exemplary example of non-violent grassroots resistance to Israel’s occupation polices.

In their speech at the award ceremony, a representative of Anarchists Against the Wall (AATW) noted that as activists they were originally reluctant to accept a prize for political activism, saying “we would prefer not to be singled out for glory, and receive gratitude for what we feel is our duty”. The AATW representative, however, stated that despite this they would accept the award because:

“Here on this podium, just as in the olive groves of the West Bank, our primary moral duty is not to maintain ideological purity, but rather to stand with Palestinians in their resistance to oppression. We recognize the importance of garnering international support for the ongoing struggle … We believe that standing here, in the current state of affairs, is a direct continuation of the blocking of bulldozers, standing side by side with the stone throwers, or running away from teargas along with young and elderly protesters. Here, as in the olive groves, I would like to stress that we are not equal partners, but rather occupiers who join the occupied in THEIR struggle. We are aware of the fact that for many, the participation of Israelis in a Palestinian struggle serves as a stamp of approval, but in our eyes, this partnership is not about granting legitimacy. The Palestinian struggle is legitimate with or without us. Rather, the struggle is an opportunity for us to cross, in action rather than words, the barriers of national allegiance”.

For Palestine solidarity activists, such as myself, who have worked with Palestinian, Israeli and international activists campaigning in both Palestine and Australia against Israel’s occupation and apartheid practices, the Palestinian initiated Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign is a similar continuation of the work done on the ground in Palestine: of blocking bulldozers and standing shoulder to shoulder with Palestinians struggling for freedom. The BDS campaign, like the struggle on the ground in Palestine, gives not only activists like myself but ordinary people across the world who believe in human rights and justice for all, the opportunity to cross in action rather than words, the barriers of national allegiance to stand with Palestinian society which since 1948 has suffered decades of human rights abuses and harm at the hands of the Israeli state.

The Palestinian BDS campaign initiated in 2005 by Palestinian civil society does not seek to “balance competing harms”. Instead its focus is on preventing further harm being done to an occupied and oppressed people. This is because the Israel-Palestine conflict isn’t a symmetrical struggle, played out on level playing field by two equal nations. Instead it’s an asymmetrical struggle, between a settler-colonial nation and a colonised, occupied, stateless Indigenous people. It is, therefore, a conflict marked by the dispossession of the Indigenous Palestinian people and their oppression by a stronger colonial entity, Israel.

As a result the Palestinian BDS campaign, which is conducted within the framework of international human rights law, is a non-violent punitive campaign launched by a colonised, oppressed people against the colonial state which is oppressing them. This is why at its heart; the BDS is an anti-colonial campaign which seeks to struggle against the “normalisation” of Palestinian dispossession via Israel’s occupation and apartheid practices, while also seeking to non-violently contribute to the Palestinian struggle for self-determination and national liberation.

It is in this framework that the campaign calls for non-violent punitive measures to be maintained against Israel until it meets its international obligations to recognise the Palestinian peoples inalienable right to self-determination and until it complies with international law by (1) Ending its occupation and colonisation of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall; (2) Recognising the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and (3) Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.

Opponents of the BDS campaign, however, have sought to paint the campaign as anti-Semitic and/or harmful to Palestinians and any possible peace process. As BDS National Coordinator Hind Awwad notes, this second claim is not only patronising but it also paints Palestinians as immature children who don’t know what’s best. Similarly the argument that BDS is supposedly anti-Semitic doesn’t hold water. As the Palestinian BDS National Committee has repeatedly pointed out, not only does BDS actively oppose all forms of racism (including anti-Semitism), the campaign is aimed not at individuals but at businesses or institutions which directly contribute to the grave human rights abuses and international law violations of the Israeli state and military or to the rebranding campaigns that attempt to whitewash Israel’s crimes

Recently at a debate on the Palestinian cultural boycott in London, Omar Barghouti explained that the basic principle behind the campaign is ‘DO NO HARM”. Barghouti explained “all BDS asks you at the basic level is to refrain from undermining our struggle – from doing harm by abetting the cover-up of our oppressor’s crimes”, saying this is simply “a profound and basic moral obligation [of] refusing to be an accessory to a crime”.

Today, people of conscience around the world have a choice: do we choose to DO HARM and undermine the struggle of the Palestinian people for human rights and self-determination OR do we choose to DO NO HARM and refuse to be an accessory to Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians? Today, which will you choose?

Kim Bullimore is a long-time socialist, political activist and anti-racism campaigner. Kim is a volunteer with the International Women’s Peace Service (IWPS-Palestine), the only all women international peace team working in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. She also writes regularly on the Palestine-Israel conflict for the Australian newspaper, Direct Action and blogs at Live from Occupied Palestine. In 2010, Kim co-organised the first national Australian BDS Conference.

The death of Mustafa Tamimi: eyewitnesses describes last moments

2011-12-13T04:18:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

please find below accounts from Palestinian and French activists who witnessed the murder of Mustafa Tamimi by the Israeli Occupation Forces in Nabi Saleh.

The first account is by Ibrahim Bornat, a well-known Palestinian activists from the village of Bil'in. Bornat was with Mustafa in the moments before he was shot.

The second account is from French activist, Anne Paq, who is an activist with the Israeli photographic activist group, Activestills, that regularly documents Israel's ongoing occupation of the Palestinian people. Anne regularly attends and documents the Palestinian resistance to Israel's occupation in Nabi Saleh.

You can also read Linah Alsaafin's harrowing account, No miracle yesterday in Nabi Saleh: Mustafa Tamimi murdered here

in solidarity,
Kim

***

Eyewitness Describes Mustafa Tamimi's last moments.

Monday, 12 December 2011 07:59 Ben Lorber for the Alternative Information Center
Original articles is here

Ibrahim Bornat, artist and activist from Bil’in, was standing next to Mustafa Tamimi when Tamimi was shot in the head with a tear gas canister at close range by an Israeli soldier (Bornat can be seen standing directly next to Tamimi in these photos). Here is his testimony about his experiences when Mustafa was critically injured on Friday, December 9:

Mustafa Tamimi

"Mustafa and I were alone, it was just the two of us, with the rest of the protesters quite far behind, and we were chasing the jeep and telling it to leave. We got separated from the rest, because the soldiers threw almost 50 tear gas canisters at once, so the whole protest was pushed back. The tear gas went over our heads and we got closer to the soldiers, shouting at them that they had thrown enough.

The jeeps turned around to leave as they were shooting gas behind us. One jeep, however, lingered and seemed to be waiting for us to get closer. As we reached the jeep, the soldier opened the door and shot two rounds of tear gas. I think I saw this soldier’s face, but Mustafa definitely saw and whoever he is, Mustafa knows best.

Mustafa pushed me down, and one canister that was aimed for me flew over my head. The second one hit Mustafa, but I didn’t know it hit him at first because I thought ‘for sure they wont shoot at us from so close.' I thought he had just ducked down, and then I thought that maybe he had just passed out from the gas, because there was gas all around him.

I went to him, laying face down on the road, and I turned him over and pulled the cloth off his face.

Of what I can say about it, it is worse than words can say. The whole half of his face was blown off, and his eye was hanging out, and I tried to push his eye back up. I could see pieces of the inside of his head, and there was a pool of blood gathering under him. His whole body was trembling. It started from his feet, then up to his arms, then it reached his chest, and then his head, and then a gasp came out and I’m sure at that moment he died. He gasped, and let out a bunch of air, and I knew at that moment his soul had left. I have seen many people, not a few, die in front of me, and I know death. Maybe later on they revived his heart, but I knew that his soul had left.

I ran back to get people, because we were far away, but there was no ambulance around, so the people around gathered him and put him in a servee [a communal taxi] and tried to leave. The soldiers stopped the servee and tried to arrest Mustafa, but when they saw that he was on the brink of death, they began to act as if they were humanitarian, to revive his heart. But what is ‘humanitarian’, to shoot someone to kill, and then to try to help him? These were the same soldiers from the jeep that shot him. They shot him, then say they want to help him. What they really did is prevent him from leaving.

The body lay on the ground for half an hour. They wanted Mustafa’s ID, and they also wanted the ID of his mother, of another family member, and of Bassem Tamimi’s wife, because these people wanted to go out with him too... They were doing some kind of medical treatment while he was lying on the ground, but this was no hospital, and what he needed was to be taken to a hospital. He should have been flown out in that moment. There is nothing you can do for him on the street there.

I was with the family the whole night afterwards, especially with his father, who is very sick and on kidney dialysis. Mustafa’s family believed there was still some hope, so I did not want to tell them that I knew he was already dead. His father is very sick, and kept falling asleep and waking up again, and we didn’t tell him much at first, only that Mustafa had been shot but that, God willing, he would be okay. There are some things that are hard and give you no hope, and then there are some things that are hard, but there is something nice about them. Martyrdom is something that is hard, but it is also honorable, and that gave his family a lot of comfort.

I knew Mustafa as a brother in the resistance. We were close in the resistance to the occupation. Anyone who comes out with me in our resistance to the occupation is close to me, as close as my mother, brother, or father, whether they be Palestinian, Israeli, Jewish, Muslim, or international. He was free, and a person who is free fights the occupation. That’s the thing I can most say about him- he was freedom.

We defend ourselves through strength, through courage, through our right to this land, through steadfastness. The occupation, to defend itself, has to kill people. But we defend ourselves with our right. This is my philosophy."

***
Mustafa Tamimi, Martyr in Nabi Saleh

by Anne Paq: Activestills: 10 December 2011

Original article is here

(c) Anne Paq/Activestills.org, Nabi Saleh, 09.12.2012

I have no words now. Just heard about the tragic news about the death of Mustafa Tamimi; 28 year-old resident of Nabi Salih, killed in cold blood by an Israeli soldier who opened the door of the jeep, aimed and shot him in his face, just a few meters away from him. see the pic there just second before Mustafa was hit.

The repression carried out by the Israeli army against unarmed protesters was extremely violent yesterday. Unarmed protesters were attacked by tear gas canisters often shot directly at the level at the heads and by rubber-coated steel bullet. A 15 year old boy was shot like this in the foot and now his foot is broken, another one in the arm for the same result. Even after Mustafa was hit, and we all knew how critical it was after seeing all the blood on the street; the Israeli soldiers kept locking the village and some of them had the nerves to smile and joke, even in front of the family members of Mustafa. This is how cruel this occupation is.

This was such an intense day, I want to write more about it but right now I don't have the strength.

The truth is that every week when I go to this protest I think that this is a miracle that no-one was seriously injured or killed. Yesterday there was no miracle and Mustafa. He died as the UN was passing by to "observe" and they did not even stop when we told them that somebody was seriously injured and that they should do something. I will always remembered Ola, Mustafa's sister, who ran to the Israeli soldiers begging them to let her pass so that she can be with her brother (the Israelis stopped the car in which Mustafa was a few meters away after the military gate at the entrance of the village). They did not let her. Her screams are still in my ears.

(c) Anne Paq/Activestills.org, Nabi Saleh, 09.12.2012

To set the record straight- Mustafa was killed INSIDE his village, he was protesting against the occupation and colonization of HIS lands. He did not carry a weapon, just stones. Stones against a fully equipped army, a military armored jeep. He had the right to defend his village, even according to international law, and he did it with courage.

Somebody was killed in cold blood and the guilty person will never be judged in a court. The Israeli army will conduct a useless investigation to whitewash his soldiers. It will conclude that the soldiers were onl responding to "violent riot". But this is the other way around. Violence is the essence of the occupation. Resistance, despite all the martyrs and suffering will continue. Mustafa will not be forgotten. The brave people of Nabi Saleh will bury their first martyr today or tomorrow but not their spirit of resistance.

I feel honored to know them and document their just struggle. But right now, what I feel is rage, outrage but also the strong conviction that one day, one way or another; justice will prevail.

Mustafa, your struggle is not a vain one and people will carry it further and further...until victory.

Mustafa Tamimi: A murder captured on camera

2011-12-12T06:50:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

please find below Haggai Matar's article on the murder of Mustafa Tamimi.

Haggai is a well-know Israeli political activist and journalist. In 2002 Haggai was one of the Shministim (Year 12 high school students) who was jailed because he refused to be drafted into the Israeli military at the conclusion of his high school year. Haggai, along with Matan Kaminer, Noam Bahat, Shimri Tzameret and Adam Maor — served a year of consecutive prison terms before being court-martialled and sentenced to a further two years imprisonment in January 2004. They were, however, released in September 2004.

You can also read Israeli human rights organisation, B'Tselem's report on the killing of Mustafa Tamimi here

For more updates and information about Nabi Saleh, you can visit the Nabi Saleh Solidarity web page here or join the Nabi Saleh Solidarity facebook page here.

in solidarity,
Kim

****

Photographs of the firing directly at a-Tamimi, by Haim Scwarczenberg, 9 Dec. '11.

Sunday, December 11 2011|+972blog

Mustafa Tamimi: A murder captured on camera

By Haggai Matar

Mustafa Tamimi of Nabi Saleh died yesterday morning in Beilinson Hospital. There’s no debate over the cause of death: Tamimi was shot in the head at close range during the weekly demonstration in his village. The weapon: a high force, long range tear gas canister. According to a number of witnesses, backed up by photographs, the canister was fired point-blank, in total contravention of army regulations, from a distance of less than ten meters. The shooter: an Israeli soldier, from a Jeep.

Mustafa Tamimi is on the left. The weapon and the tear gas canister are circled in red (photo: Haim Scwarczenberg)

It’s not every day that the authorities come in possession of such a picture, which can supply more than 1,000 words in an indictment. The picture shows, firstly, the shot, an instant before the canister strikes him. This picture also shows that Tamimi may have thrown stones at the military Jeep, but it’s also clear that the Jeep is both closed and armored, and there is no doubt that Tamimi constitutes no danger to the lives of the soldiers – especially had they shut the door. In the picture you can also see the canister in the air, and the forbidden angle at which it’s flying toward Tamimi. You can’t see the shooter, but you can easily see that he was driving in military jeep S0661410. You can easily figure out who drove it by calling 02-5694211. From there it probably won’t be too hard to figure out who else was in the vehicle, and who opened the door to fire at Tamimi.

But this won’t happen. Unlike Bassem Tamimi – an organizer of the demonstrations in Nabi Saleh, who has been in jail since March and whose trial used testimonies taken from minors pressured by illegal interrogation methods – it’s safe to assume that the soldier who shot Mustafa Tamimi won’t be arrested in the near future. He won’t sit in jail while awaiting trial for murder, or manslaughter, or even negligent manslaughter. The past has proven to us that maybe, just maybe, if some organizations and dedicated attorneys invest in a prolonged military struggle, the soldier will be charged with firing against regulations, or illegal use of a weapon, or a moving violation like driving in a military vehicle with the door open. Maybe, just maybe, he will be convicted and demoted, and maybe he’ll even be fined or get a two-month sentence. Suspended sentence, of course. But maybe not.

I haven’t been to Nabi Saleh. They have been protesting there against the occupation for two and a half years, against the army-supported settler seizure of the village’s lands and spring. But I haven’t made it there. I have written on several occasions about the struggle there, but I didn’t join the demonstrations. I’ve been to Bil’in, Ni’lin, Ma’asara, Um Salmona, Jius, Hebron, Susya, Salfit, Azon, Jenin, Beit Ommar, Ramallah, Jericho, Walajeh, and more – but I haven’t been to Nabi Saleh.

The photographs of violence that have come out of Nabi Saleh simply scared me. The beatings, the rubber bullets from close range, the many wounded, and the army that roams the streets and fires tear gas into homes around the village – there’s nowhere to hide. Nobody had been killed until now, but it was just a matter of time. My friends told me that things had calmed down there lately, that it wasn’t like it had been at the beginning, that it was manageable, that you could fade back and find safety if you wanted to – I started to consider going.

More and more friends on Facebook are sharing the close-ups of Tamimi’s head after he was shot – covered in blood – and the video clips of his evacuation. I have no choice but to look at the photographs, and my body stiffens, freezes, shakes a bit. Before I was notified of Tamimi’s death, the photographs reminded me of Tristan Anderson, the American whose skull was shattered by a similar canister by similar soldiers in Ni’lin, in a demonstration at which I was present. I remembered the horror of that day, and the time that Anderson then spent in the hospital, hovering between life and death until he left in a wheelchair, in which he’ll probably remain for life. I remembered Matan Cohen, and Limor Goldstein, and their injuries, and my own light injuries. I remember Bassem and Jawaher Abu Rahma, who were killed in Bil’in, and 10-year-old Ahmed Moussa, who was killed by soldiers in another demonstration – and more.

It is simply shocking. Truly shocking. I look around, and I don’t see my society shocked. Not shocked at all of these people, or at the two head injures in Nabi Saleh yesterday, or at the two arrests in a peaceful demonstration in Ma’asara, which didn’t even get any coverage. I see the careful reports reading, “Palestinians claim that…” and the blind faith in the stance of the IDF Spokesperson. And the lack of shock shocks me even more. Especially shocking after all this are the reader comments, which claim that “they deserved it” or that describe the weekly popular demonstrations in the occupied territories, despite the repression and the injuries and the arrests and the terror and the death, as a “game,” or “theater,” or a “hangout of anarchists and bored Arabs.” And I hope that somehow, the UN Special Rapporteur on Free Speech, who spent Friday in Nabi Saleh when Tamimi was shot, sees and understands what is happening here, and maybe will manage to give us some assistance from outside. He, or the European consuls who are witnessing the trial of Bassem Tamimi, or diplomats who document the destruction of the caves and wells in the South Hebron Hills. But I have a hard time believing.

But – a shred of hope? Despite it all? Is there a source of encouragement, alongside all these killings, alongside the father of son who were killed in Gaza, and the death and bereavement that follows us everywhere thoughout this land of occupation and repression and war? Yes. The human spirit. It may be a cliché, but I believe in the words of Charlie Chaplin: We want to live by each other’s happiness — not by each other’s misery. We don’t give up on the eternal struggle for a future that is better, freer, more equal, more just, and in the long run, we achieve something. Capitalism and racism may incite us to selfishness and war, but ultimately, occupations collapse, empires fall, and humans continue to create and protest and build and love. And alongside such pictures of murder, this must be remembered.

Haggai Matar is an Israeli journalist and political activist, focusing mainly on the struggle against the occupation. He currently works at Zman Tel Aviv, the local supplement of Maariv newspaper, and at the independent Hebrew website MySay. This piece originally appeared on MySay. Translated by Noa Yachot.

Critically Injured Mustafa Tamimi of Nabi Saleh Dies of His Wounds

2011-12-10T22:46:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,

my apologies for the delay in posting this up. The last 48 hours have been terrible for the people of An Nabi Saleh and its has been difficult to deal with the horrendous news that 28 year old Mustafa Tamimi has died. Mustafa was shot deliberately in the face on Friday with a teargas canister by an member of the Israeli Occupation Forces from a short distance.

Please find below the press statement from the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee on Mustafa's death..

in sadness,

Kim

****

Critically Injured Mustafa Tamimi of Nabi Saleh Dies of His Wounds

by Popular Struggle Coordination Committee: 10 December 2011

Mustafa Tamimi, a 28 year old resident of Nabi Saleh, was shot in the face yesterday, during the weekly protest in the village of Nabi Saleh.

He sustained a critical head injury, under his right eye, and was evacuated to the Belinson hospital in Petah Tikwa. The severe trauma to Tamimi's brain, caused by the shooting, left the doctors with little to do to save his life, and he eventually passed away at 09:21 AM today.

Tamimi's funeral will take place tomorrow, leaving Ramallah at 10:00 AM towards Nabi Saleh, where it is expected to reach at around 11:00 AM.

Mustafa Tamimi (left) a moment before his injury. Circled in red are the barrel of the gun and the projectile that hit him. Picture credit: Haim Scwarczenberg

A photo of the incident shows Tamimi at a distance of less than 10 meters behind the semi-open door of an armored military jeep with the gun aimed directly at him. Clearly visible in the photo is also the tear-gas projectile flying in his direction.

The incident took place in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh today, when dozens gathered for the weekly demonstration in the village, protesting the theft of village lands by the adjacent Jewish-only settlement of Nabi Saleh. After the army dispersed the peaceful march, minor clashes erupted followed by a severe response from the Israeli forces. Several people were hit with rubber-coated bullets and directly shot tear-gas projectiles. Three were evacuated to the Ramallah hospital for further treatment, including a 14 year-old. One protester was arrested.

In complete disregard to the army’s own open fire regulations, soldiers often shoot tear-gas projectiles directly at groups of protesters or individuals. Rubber-coated bullets are indiscriminately shot at protesters from short distances on a regular basis. The Israeli army also resumed the use of high velocity tear-gas projectiles in Nabi Saleh, despite the fact that they have been declared banned for use, after causing the death of Bassem Abu Rahmah in the neighboring village of Bil’in, in April 2009, and the critical injury of American protester Tristan Anderson in Ni’ilin in March of the same year.

The demonstrations, which have been held regularly for the past two years have seen hundreds of injuries to protesters by Israeli forces, as well as dozens of arrests carried out by Israel with the aim of suppressing dissent.

Background

Late in 2009, settlers began gradually taking over Ein al-Qaws (the Bow Spring), which rests on lands belonging to Bashir Tamimi, the head of the Nabi Saleh village council. The settlers, abetted by the army, erected a shed over the spring, renamed it Maayan Meir, after a late settler, and began driving away Palestinians who came to use the spring by force - at times throwing stones or even pointing guns at them, threatening to shoot.

While residents of Nabi Saleh have already endured decades of continuous land grab and expulsion to allow for the ever continuing expansion of the Halamish settlement, the takeover of the spring served as the last straw that lead to the beginning of the village’s grassroots protest campaign of weekly demonstrations in demand for the return of their lands.

Protest in the tiny village enjoys the regular support of Palestinians from surrounding areas, as well as that of Israeli and international activists. Demonstrations in Nabi Saleh are also unique in the level of women participation in them, and the role they hold in all their aspects, including organizing. Such participation, which often also includes the participation of children reflects the village’s commitment to a truly popular grassroots mobilization, encompassing all segments of the community.

The response of the Israeli military to the protests has been especially brutal and includes regularly laying complete siege on village every Friday, accompanied by the declaration of the entire village, including the built up area, as a closed military zone. Prior and during the demonstrations themselves, the army often completely occupies the village, in effect enforcing an undeclared curfew. Military nighttime raids and arrest operations are also a common tactic in the army’s strategy of intimidation, often targeting minors.

In order to prevent the villagers and their supporters from exercising their fundamental right to demonstrate and march to their lands, soldiers regularly use disproportional force against the unarmed protesters. The means utilized by the army to hinder demonstrations include, but are not limited to, the use of tear-gas projectiles, banned high-velocity tear-gas projectiles, rubber-coated bullets and, at times, even live ammunition.

The use of such practices have already caused countless injuries, several of them serious, including those of children - the most serious of which is that of 14 year-old Ehab Barghouthi, who was shot in the head with a rubber-coated bullet from short range on March 5th, 2010 and laid comatose in the hospital for three weeks.

Tear-gas, as well as a foul liquid called “The Skunk”, which is shot from a water cannon, is often used inside the built up area of the village, or even directly pointed into houses, in a way that allows no refuge for the uninvolved residents of the village, including children and the elderly. The interior of at least one house caught fire and was severely damaged after soldiers shot a tear-gas projectile through its windows.

Since December 2009, when protest in the village was sparked, hundreds of demonstration-related injuries caused by disproportionate military violence have been recorded in Nabi Saleh.

Palestinian protestor severely injured in Nabi Saleh: Israeli Occupation Forces shoot shoot protestor directly in the face with teargas canister

2011-12-09T20:21:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,
very distressing news from Nabi Saleh in the Occupied West Bank. On Friday, as the village marked the two year anniversary of non-violent demonstrations against the ongoing confiscation of their land, the Israeli Occupation Forces fired directly and deliberately in to the face of 28 year old Mustafa Tamimi from the village. As you can see by the photgraphs below, Mustafa was only metres from the jeep in which the soldier fired from. It is illegal under Israeli military operating procedures to use teargas as a weapon (as opposed to "crown control/dispersal). However, the Israeli Occupation Forces regularly use teargas as a weapon firing it directly at the heads and bodies of Palestinian protestors.

At the time of Mustafa's injury, there was extreme concern that he had lost his eye and that he may die. He was evacuated to an Israeli hospital. According to tweets from activists at the hospital, the Doctors performed a CAT scan and he it appeared that his eye may be saved. There was some internal bleeding in his brain and he was about to undergo an operation.

Please find below the media release issued by the Popular Struggle Coordination Commitee.

Also Many others were also injured at the demonstration. Bisan Tamimi, the 16 year old daughter of my friend Naji Tamimi who is currently in Israeli Occupation military prison for being a leader of the non-violent struggle in Nabi Saleh was shot with a rubber bullet and now has a broken arm. Wa'ad Tamimi, the 14 year old son of my friends Bassem and Nariman Tamimi was also shot with a rubber bullet and now has a broken leg. Wa'ad's father, Bassem is also currently in Israeli Occupation military prison for being a leader of the non-violent struggle in Nabi Saleh.

I will publish updates as the come to hand on Mustafa's condition.included is a video taken in the immediate aftermath of Mustafa being shot. Warning: the images may distress.

In solidarity, Kim

****
Protester Severely Injured in Nabi Saleh

by Popular Struggle Coordination Committee: 9 December 2011 - access original post here

Mustafa Tamimi, a protester from Nabi Saleh, was hit in the face by a tear gas projectile shot directly at him from only a few feet away during the weekly demonstration in Nabi Saleh

Mustafa Tamimi, a 28 year old resident of Nabi Saleh, was shot in the face today, during the weekly protest in the village of Nabi Saleh. He sustained a severe injury to his head, under his right eye, and was evacuated to the Belinson hospital in Petah Tikwa. He is currently anesthetized, breathing through tubes, and his condition is described as serious. Tamimi is undergoing treatment in the trauma ward of the hospital, and is expected to undergo surgery later tonight.

Mustafa Tamimi (left) a moment before his injury. Circled in red are the barrel of the gun and the projectile that hit him. Picture credit: Haim Scwarczenberg

A photo of the incident shows Tamimi at a distance of less than 10 meters behind the semi-open door of an army jeep with the gun aimed directly at him. Clearly visible in the photo is also the tear-gas projectile flying in his direction.

The incident took place in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh today, when dozens gathered for the weekly demonstration in the village, protesting the theft of village lands by the adjacent Jewish-only settlement of Nabi Saleh. After the army dispersed the peaceful march, minor clashes erupted followed by a severe response by Israeli forces. Several people were hit with rubber-coated bullets and directly shot tear gas projectiles. Three were evacuated to the Ramallah hospital for further treatment. One protester was arrested.

The demonstrations, which have been held regularly for the past two years have seen hundreds of injuries to protesters by Israeli forces as well as dozens of arrests carried out with the aim of supressing dissent.

Video by B'Tselem

Background
Late in 2009, settlers began gradually taking over Ein al-Qaws (the Bow Spring), which personally belongs to Bashir Tamimi, the head of the Nabi Saleh village council. The settlers, abetted by the army, erected a shed over the spring, renamed it Maayan Meir, after a late settler, and began driving away Palestinians who came to use the spring by force - at times throwing stones or even pointing guns at them, threatening to shoot.

While residents of Nabi Saleh have already endured decades of continuous land grab and expulsion to allow for the ever continuing expansion of the Halamish settlement, the takeover of the spring served as the last straw that lead to the beginning of the village’s grassroots protest campaign of weekly demonstrations in demand for the return of their lands.

While the model of regularly held protests around the construction of Israel’s Separation Barrier became a common one in recent years, the protests in Nabi Saleh mark a significant break from that tradition, in that protest there is entirely unrelated to the Barrier. This expansion of the popular resistance model symbolizes the growing support the model enjoys among Palestinians, and the growing positive discourse around it across the Palestinian political spectrum.

Protest in the tiny village enjoys the regular support of International and Israeli activists, as well as that of Palestinians from the surrounding areas. Demonstrations in Nabi Saleh are also unique in the level of women participation in them, and the role they hold in all their aspects, including organizing. Such participation, which often also includes the participation of children mirrors the village’s commitment to a truly popular grassroots mobilization, encompassing all segments of the community.

The Israeli military’s response to the protests has been especially brutal and includes regularly laying complete siege on village every Friday, accompanied by the declaration of the entire village, including the built up area, as a closed military zone. Prior and during the demonstrations themselves, the army often completely occupies the village, in effect enforcing an undeclared curfew of sort. Military nighttime raids and arrest operations are also a common tactic in the army’s strategy of intimidation, often targeting minors.

In complete disregard to the army’s own open fire regulations, soldiers often shoot tear-gas projectiles directly at groups of protesters or individuals and rubber bullets are indiscriminately shot at protesters from short distances. The army has also resumed using high velocity tear-gas projectiles in Nabi Saleh, despite the fact that they have declared banned for use after causing the death of Bassem Abu Rahmah in Bil’in in April 2009, and the critical injury of American protester Tristan Anderson in Ni’ilin in March of the same year.

Since December 2009, when protest in the village was sparked, hundreds of demonstration-related injuries caused by disproportionate military violence have been recorded in Nabi Saleh.

Between January 2010 and June 2011, the Israeli Army has carried 76 arrests of people detained for 24 hours or more on suspicions related to protest in the village of Nabi Saleh, including those of women and of children as young as 11 years old. Of the 76, 18 were minors. Dozens more were detained for shorter periods.

Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education

2011-12-08T19:23:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,
as you will no doubt be aware, Israel and their Zionist supporters around the world have repeatedly raised a hue and cry about the content of Palestinian school books. Very little has ever been said about the content of Israeli school text books. While it occassionally has been discussed in the Israeli media, very little about it has been said outside of Israel.

Recently, Israeli Professor Nurit Peled-Elhanan completed a study on the depiction of Palestinians and Palestine in Israeli school tex books. Her study will be published in an upcoming book called Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education.

Nurit Peled-Elhanan argues that her study shows that the textbooks used in the Israeli school system are laced with a pro-Israel ideology and that they play a part in priming Israeli children for military service. As part of her study, she analysised the presentation of images, maps, layouts and use of language in History, Geography and Civic Studies textbooks. She discusses how the books might be seen to marginalize Palestinians, legitimize Israeli military action and reinforce Jewish-Israeli territorial identity.

In the following interview (28mins in length) with Alternate Focus, she discusses her study.

In solidarity, Kim

Egyptian protests demand end to military rule

2011-12-07T04:35:00.001-08:00

Egyptian protests demand end to military rule

By Kim Bullimore

More than 100,000 Egyptians packed Tahrir (Liberation) Square on Friday, November 27 for the ninth consecutive day since new protests began on November 18, calling for democracy, social justice and an end to the military’s control of the country. Despite the death of at least 40 protesters and injuries to more than 2000 others at the hands of the security forces, hundreds of thousands have continued to flood onto the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and other major centres.

Chanting “Freedom, freedom” and “The people want the fall of the marshal”, the protesters called for the resignation of Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the leader of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF).

Egyptians vow to keep protesting until SCAF steps down.

Since the fall of President Hosni Mubarak — after a thirty year rule — in February, Tantawi, who had served as Mubarak’s defence minister for two decades, has been the de facto ruler of Egypt as the leader of the SCAF. Since Mubarak’s fall after 18 days of protest in January and February, Egyptians have continued to protest, calling for a transition to civilian rule and an end to the SCAF’s repression.

Repression

According to a report issued by Amnesty International on November 22, the SCAF has undermined the struggle for democracy and continued the repressive rule that protesters in January and February fought so hard to get rid of. An Amnesty media release issued the same day noted: “Egypt’s military rulers have completely failed to live up to their promises to Egyptians to improve human rights and have instead been responsible for a catalogue of abuses which in some cases exceeds the record of Hosni Mubarak”. According to Philip Luther, Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa acting director, “By using military courts to try thousands of civilians, cracking down on peaceful protest and expanding the remit of Mubarak’s Emergency Law, the SCAF has continued the tradition of repressive rule …” He went on to say: “Those who have challenged or criticised the military council — like demonstrators, journalists, bloggers, striking workers — have been ruthlessly suppressed ...”.

According to the report, “Broken Promises: Egypt’s Military Rulers Erode Human Rights”, between February and August, the SCAF had admitted, some 12,000 civilians had been tried by military courts, with at least 13 being sentenced to death. Another international organisation, Human Rights Watch noted in September that this number is more than the total who faced military trials during the 30-year rule of Mubarak. Military tribunals had convicted 8071, including 1836 suspended sentences, while a further 1225 convictions are awaiting ratification by the military. Those tried were charged with “thuggery”, “breaking the curfew”, “damaging property” and “insulting the army”.

According to Amnesty, in an attempt to suppress negative media reports, the SCAF had sought to intimidate and jail scores of journalists, broadcasters and bloggers by summoning them before the military prosecutor. One blogger, Maikel Nabil Sanad, was sentenced to three years in prison in April for criticising the military and for objecting to military service. Another blogger, Alaa Abd El Fatta, who had criticised the military has been held since being arrested on October 30.

The SCAF has used brutality to repress protests. In October, 29 Coptic Christians were killed when the security forces opened fire on a protest. Many of the protesters died from bullet wounds or from being run over by speeding armoured vehicles.

The military have also sought to intimidate female protesters and dissidents through “virginity tests”. Seventeen female protesters among the 173 protesters arrested on March 9 were forced to undergo the tests, which involved a soldier inserting two fingers into the women’s vaginal opening against their will. In an interview with the Global Post on 21 November, one of the 17, Samira Ibrahim, who has taken legal action against the military, said that she was detained for four days and was “beaten, electrocuted, and forced to strip naked in front of male officers”. Another of the women, Rasha Abdelrahman, has also filed a complaint against the military for sexual assault and torture. Her lawyer, Mostafa Shaaban, told the Global Post that he was not optimistic about winning the case: “The Supreme Council of Armed Forces will not solve the problem, because they are the problem.”

New demonstrations

Protests against the SCAF that began on Friday, November 18, were originally called by a range of Islamic forces. However, the protests were attended by tens of thousands of Egyptians from across the political spectrum, demanding that the SCAF announce a date for handing over power to a civilian government. While parliamentary elections were set to start on November 28, the SCAF had made it clear that they were not willing to hand over power until July 2012 or even later.

The first attacks on the demonstrators by the police and military came when smaller groups of protesters led by the April 6 youth movement decided to camp in Tahrir Square overnight after the mass rally on Friday. In the wake of the attack, hundreds and then thousands of Egyptians began to pour into the square.

The Associated Press reported on November 19 that as the protesters’ ranks grew, “thousands more riot police streamed into Tahrir Square blocking off the entrances and clashing with protesters”. Protesters chanted slogans including “Riot police are thugs and thieves” and “Down with the marshal”. Many were beaten and arrested by the police and military.

On Sunday 20 November, Egyptian and international media reported that at least three people were killed when police and the military opened fire on dozens of protest tents inside Tahrir Square.

Protests quickly spread to other parts of Egypt, including Ismailiya (located on the Suez Canal), where more than 4000 protesters took to the streets, and Alexandria, where more than 2000 demanded the fall of the SCAF. Protesters in both cities were violently attacked by police and security forces.

According to a November 21 Reuters report, the police also attacked a makeshift hospital in Tahrir Square but were driven back by protesters hurling chunks of concrete from smashed pavement. On the same day, protesters told a Democracy Now correspondent in Cairo, Sharif Abdel Kouddous, that the security forces had been firing rubber bullets, live ammunition and tear gas, tear gas being fired at the unarmed protesters for 24 hours non-stop. One protester told Kouddous: “I am here because we don’t feel like we had a revolution at all. Our demands at the beginning of the revolution were freedom, dignity and social justice. We have not seen social justice. We had a regime that looked like this building here. The building is 10 stories. We got rid of two stories, but there are eight stories to go that we can’t get rid of. They’re built in tight. They’re the ones ruining the country, left and right.”

In the wake of the military and police attacks, a number of political parties and individual candidates announced that they were putting their electoral campaigns on hold and joining the protests. According to the British Guardian on November 21, Bothaina Kamel, Egypt’s only female presidential candidate and an outspoken opponent of military rule, was arrested in the crackdown on protesters. Kamel told the Guardian before her arrest that the violence against the protesters exposed “the ugly face of Mubarak that has been lurking behind SCAF all along”.

In an attempt to quell the growing protests, on November 22 Tantawi accepted the resignation of the interim civilian prime minister, Essam Sharaf and his cabinet and took to the radio on the same day proposing a referendum to decide when military rule should end. In response to Tantawi’s speech, nineteen political organisations issued a statement condemning the speech as an insult. The statement noted that Tantawi had not apologised for the violence of the security forces and had not mentioned the release of detained civilians who were facing military trials.

In the wake of the ongoing protests, the SCAF issued a public apology on their Facebook page two days later on November 24, apologising for the killing of more than 35 protesters by the Egyptian security forces. In the wake of the apology, a tense truce took place between the military and the protesters, with protesters vowing to remain on the streets.

Anger was fuelled on Friday, November27 when the SCAF appointed Kamal el-Ganzouri, who has served under Mubarak, to the prime ministership. Despite the truce, clashes have still continued to occur sporadically, with one protester being killed when he was run over by an armoured military vehicle outside the cabinet building on Saturday, November 28, when protesters had gathered to prevent el-Ganzouri from taking up his new post.

Nearly 100% conviction rate against Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli military occupation courts

2011-11-30T18:04:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,

Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, has published a report revealing that Israeli military courts have an almost 100% conviction rate against Palestinians. I highly recommend that this article be read in conjunction with my previous post, Stone Cold Justice, about Palestinian child political prisoners, as it confirms many of the observations made by John Lyons in his article.

In a comment piece on the Haaretz article and the IOF internal reported cited by Haaretz, Noam Sheizaf on +972 magazine notes: "Unlike Jews, Palestinians under Israeli control in the West Bank are tried in military courts, where the rights of defendants rights are minimal, and the prosecution enjoys a low burden of proof and – most importantly – wears the same uniforms as the judges – IDF uniforms. In a military court, the testimony of a soldier who arrested a Palestinian can be enough to send a minor to prison. The results are staggering: Palestinians have no chance to walk free from an Israeli trial".

Sheizaf goes onto point out that this conviction rate is constant, with little change in figures on conviction rates between 2006 and 2011. For his full commentary and links to other articles and information on Palestinian prisoners, please click here.

Please feel free to share these two very important article with your networks.

In solidarity, Kim

---

Published Haaretz: 29.11.11

Nearly 100% of all military court cases in West Bank end in conviction, Haaretz learns

Report shows the military appeals courts decidedly favor the prosecution, with judges accepting 67 percent of prosecution appeals, as opposed to only 33 percent of appeals filed by the defense.

By Chaim Levinson Tags: Palestinians IDF

Virtually all - 99.74 percent, to be exact - of cases heard by the military courts in the territories end in a conviction, according to data in the military courts' annual report, which has been obtained by Haaretz.

The report also shows that the military appeals courts decidedly favor the prosecution, with appeals court judges accepting 67 percent of appeals filed by the prosecution, as opposed to only 33 percent of appeals filed by the defense.
The military courts, headed by Col. Aharon Mishnayot, deal with all criminal and security cases involving Palestinians, from their detention through their appeals. Only very exceptional, usually symbolic cases are heard by Israeli courts.

The military court system also includes committees that hear appeals against decisions by Israel Defense Forces commanders, committees that approve administrative detentions, and a committee that approves expulsion orders.

According to the report, 9,542 cases were wrapped up in 2010, of which 2,016 involved hostile terror activity, 763 disorderly conduct and the rest Palestinians staying illegally in Israel, traffic offenses and criminal activity.

The report states that 25 cases ended in full acquittal, meaning that the conviction rate is 99.74 percent. But 4 percent of the cases result in at least partial acquittal on one or more of the charges.

The administrative detention panels, headed by Lt. Col. Shlomi Kokhav, handled 714 requests for administrative detention in 2010, of which 98.77 percent were approved.

Only 51 percent of these requests were honored in full, however. The rest offset days the suspect had already been held, or put certain restrictions on the relevant military commander.

Stone Cold Justice: Palestinian child political prisoners

2011-11-30T02:06:00.001-08:00

Dear friends,

please find below John Lyons' excellent article on Palestinian child political prisoners which appeared in the The Australian over the weekend.

Anyone who reads The Australian on regular basiswill be aware of its heavy pro-Zionist/pro-Israel bent. The appearance of Lyons' article is therefore a rare, but welcome surprise.

in solidarity, Kim

***

Stone cold justice

by: John Lyons
From: The Australian
November 26, 2011 12:00AM

Four Palestinian youths and their guard in an Israeli courtroom. Picture: Sylvie Le Clezio Source: The Australian

YOU hear them before you see them. The first clue that a new group of children is approaching is a shuffle of shoes and a clinking of handcuffs and shackles. The door to the courtroom bursts open - four boys, all shackled, stare into the room. Four boys looking bewildered.

They wear brown prison overalls and they trail into the room where their fate is to be decided by a female Israeli army officer/judge, who is sitting at the bench, waiting. The look on the face of one of the boys changes to elation when he sees his mother at the back of the court. He blows her a kiss. But his mother begins crying and this upsets the boy. He begins crying too.

We're sitting in an Israeli military court which is attached to the Ofer prison in the West Bank, 25 minutes from Jerusalem. Mondays and Tuesdays are "children's days". Hundreds of Palestinian children from the age of 12 are brought here each year to be tried under Israeli military law for a range of offences. The majority are accused of throwing stones and, as the court has close to a 100 per cent conviction rate, almost all will be imprisoned for anything from two weeks to 10 months. Some will end up in adult jails.

Today, groups of children in threes and fours shuffle in; some cases last only 60 seconds, just long enough for the child to plead guilty and hear their sentence. Sitting in a room 50m away, more children wait. Despite their confessions, many insist that they did not throw stones or molotov cocktails, and the human rights group Defence for Children International estimates that about a third who pass through the system have either been shown or signed documentation in Hebrew - a language they cannot understand.

Others are said to have confessed under coercion. Since January 2007, DCI has collected and translated into English 385 sworn affidavits from Palestinian children held in Israeli detention who claim to have suffered serious abuse: electric shocks, beatings, threats of rape, being stripped naked, solitary confinement, threats that their families' work permits will be revoked, and "position abuse" - which involves a child being placed in a chair with their feet shackled and hands tied behind their back, sometimes for hours.

This courtroom has become a front line of one of the oldest conflicts in the world, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is Israel's conveyor belt of justice, but it is a world away from Israel: in Israel a child cannot be sent to prison until 14; in Israel there are laws against a child being taken away at night; and in Israel a child cannot be interrogated without a parent.

The Israeli Defence Forces, concerned at the growing debate about Israel's treatment of children, has given The Weekend Australian Magazine rare access to the court. They say too many journalists write about it without visiting it. They are keen for me to spend time with the army prosecutor in charge of the cases who will be my guide during three visits to the court. I have a briefing with him before the trials begin. The main point he wants to emphasise is that, two years ago, the army set up this military juvenile court to take note of children's needs. If a child needs a welfare officer or a psychologist, they are available.

Inside the courtroom, the army's public relations unit wants the IDF guide to sit next to me to explain each case. I'm told I can quote him as "my guide" but not name him and we are allowed to photograph some of the older children but not the younger ones. Nor will they allow us to photograph children handcuffed and shackled trying to walk - "absolutely not," my guide says. The army obviously realises that such a photo would be enormously damaging. After September 11 I'd seen images of alleged terrorists walking like this but I'd never seen children treated this way. It's not surprising that Israel doesn't want this image out there - it would look uncomfortably like a Guantanamo Bay for kids.

Several countries, led by Britain, are turning up the heat on Israel over the treatment of Palestinian children - not only the manner of their arrest and interrogation but also the conditions in which they're kept in custody. MP Sandra Osborne, part of a British delegation that recently visited the military court, said of the visit: "For the children we saw that morning, the only thing that mattered was to see their families, perhaps for the first time in months ... A whole generation is criminalised through this process."

Gerard Horton outside Ofer prison in the West Bank. Picture: Sylvie Le Clezio

Source: The Australian
Into this world has walked Gerard Horton, an Australian lawyer. Horton was a Sydney barrister for about eight years and his practice included contract disputes, building insurance cases and employment matters. In 2006, while studying for a masters in international law, he volunteered for three months for an organisation that represented Palestinian prisoners in the West Bank. He has worked there ever since.

During his five years at Defence for Children International Horton says the office has increased its evidence-gathering capacity and will only pursue credible allegations based on sworn affidavits. He takes me through the arrest process: "Once bound and blindfolded, the child will be led to a waiting military vehicle and in about one-third of cases will be thrown on the metal floor for transfer to an interrogation centre.
"Sometimes the children are kept on the floor face down with the soldiers putting their boots on the back of their necks, and the children are handcuffed, sometimes with plastic handcuffs which cut into their wrists. Many children arrive at the interrogation centres bruised and battered, sleep-deprived and scared." The whole idea, he says, is to get a confession as quickly as possible.

DCI has documented three cases where children were given electric shocks by a hand-held device and Horton claims there is one interrogator working in the settlement Gush Etzion "who specialises in threatening children with rape". Some cases contain horrifying allegations, such as this one from Ahmad, 15, documented by DCI, who was taken from his home at 2am, blindfolded and accused of throwing stones. "I managed to see the dog from under my blindfold," he says. "They brought the dog's food and put it on my head. I think it was a piece of bread, and the dog had to eat it off my head. His saliva started drooling all over my head and that freaked me out. I was so scared my body started shaking ... they saw me shaking and started laughing ... Then they put another piece of bread on my trousers near my genitals, so I tried to move away but he started barking. I was terrified."

In another case, Ezzat H, 10, who was interrogated but not charged, testified: "A soldier pointed his rifle at me. The rifle barrel was a few centimetres from my face. I was so terrified that I started to shiver. He made fun of me and said, 'Shivering? Tell me where the pistol is before I shoot you.'" Another boy, Mahmoud A, was taken by soldiers from his West Bank home in February, aged nine, after apparently playing near a boy who'd thrown stones at soldiers. His mother, Rana, said a soldier told her: "We are capturing him until you bring us the other boy." Now 10, Mahmoud says during the interrogation a soldier hit him "hard" in the face "four or five times" when he said he did not know the names of any stone-throwers. The day we visited his home a soldier shouted his name as we passed a checkpoint. Mahmoud began crying and locals told soldiers he had been doing nothing wrong.

Yahia A, 15, accused of throwing stones, testified that he was tied to a metal pipe and beaten by a soldier, and that an interrogator placed a device against his body and gave him an electric shock, saying, "If you don't confess I'll keep shocking you." The interrogator, he said, gave him another electric shock - at which point he could no longer feel his arms or legs, had a pain in his head, and confessed.

There are many other allegations: a boy kept in solitary confinement for 65 days; other boys kept in solitary confinement with the lights on 24 hours a day; a seven-year-old boy in Jerusalem taken for interrogation who says he was hit during the questioning. The boy's lawyer said that when his mother turned up looking for him, authorities denied he was there - even as he was being questioned inside.

These sorts of reports are fuelling a clamour for change in Israel among groups such as the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Yesh Din, Defence for Children International, Hamoked, B'Tselem and the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel. DCI says that in 76 per cent of its cases children reported violence.
Stone-throwing is a big problem in the West Bank, with the Israeli Defence Forces reporting 2766 incidents of rock-throwing against them or passing cars this year (up to November 14). Israeli police also say a crash in September that killed a man and his infant son may have occurred after a rock hit their car.

But the central issue here is that Palestinian child prisoners in the West Bank are treated by Israel in a way that would be illegal in Israel itself. In Israel the maximum period of detention without charge is 40 days - for Palestinian children it is 188 days. In Israel the maximum period of detention without access to a lawyer is 48 hours - for Palestinian children it is 90 days. For the past 44 years a Palestinian was regarded as an adult at 16, compared to an Israeli at 18, but Israel recently lifted this to 18. About 83 per cent of Palestinian children before military courts are sent to prison, while 6.5 per cent of Israeli children before regular courts go to prison.

Concern about the treatment of children prompted 60 of Israel's leading psychologists, academics and child experts to go public. They wrote: "Offensive arrests and investigations that ignore the law do not serve to maintain public order and safety. On the contrary, they inflict harm on a particularly weak population and widen the cycle of hostility and violence."

The Israeli Government would not discuss individual cases but did concede changes needed to be made. "There are many things that need to be improved," Israel's international spokesman, Yigal Palmor, said, adding that Israel was engaged in "slow reform and improvement" and was working with human rights groups. "This is a general problem that derives from the fact that the West Bank is under military jurisdiction and military law and there is obviously a discrepancy between the civil code in Israel and the military law in the West Bank. That is the root of the problem. But extending fully Israeli law to the West Bank would be tantamount to annexation."

Israel is under pressure to at least allow filming of interrogations. "We want interrogations of children audiovisually recorded," says Horton. "This would not only provide some protection to the children but would also protect Israeli interrogators from any false allegations of wrongdoing."

Australian diplomats have shown no obvious interest in the military courts despite our Ambassador to Israel, Andrea Faulkner, being told about the treatment of children a year ago. She refused to comment on the situation for this story. Says Horton: "It is disappointing that of all the diplomatic missions in the region, Australia has been conspicuously silent on the issue of the military courts."

It's 10 o'clock on Monday morning and my guide and I take our seats in court. He asks me to report that the reason Israel brings children to court is for security. With us is an army public relations officer who says stones can be dangerous. I agree, telling him there was a case in Sydney some years ago of a truck driver who was killed by rocks.

The judge - army officer Sharon Rivlin-Ahai - walks into the court. I'm shocked when the door opens and the first group of boys appears - wearing prison overalls, handcuffed and with feet shackled. The handcuffs are taken off before they come through the door but the shackles remain. The four are dealt with in minutes and the next batch is brought in. My guide must see me blanch when the door opens - one of the boys looks so young. He leans over to me: "He looks much younger than he is. He's actually 18." I tell him I simply cannot believe this - he looks 12 or 13. My guide examines the charge sheet. "He's actually 15." The boy waves at his mother. She breaks into tears, which makes him cry as well. "Throwing 10 stones," my guide says as one boy stands. How would soldiers in a fortified jeep know it was 10 stones? "They know," he says. Others are brought in. My guide must see my discomfort at how young they seem. He leans across: "They look very young but they're not."

Then enters Moad, 15. "He's pleading guilty," my guide says. The judge quickly hands down her verdict: three and a half months' jail and a 2000 shekel ($525) fine. As child number 15 stands, something hits me: not a single child has pleaded not guilty.

I tell my guide I've never seen any court where 100 per cent plead guilty. "The thing the indictment is based on is true evidence," he explains. "Usually the evidence is their admission to police."

He seems pleased everything is going so smoothly. "It all moves quickly when there is agreement," he says. And he has high praise for the judge. "She's a very pleasant judge," he says. "Very pleasant." Pleasant judge aside, he senses I'm not convinced all this is fair. "The cases don't take long because there has already been agreement between the two sides," he says.

Israeli human rights group Yesh Din found that in 2006 only 1.42 per cent of cases before the military courts had any evidentiary hearing. They reported: "Attorneys representing suspects and defendants in the military courts believe that conducting a full evidentiary trial, including summoning witnesses and presenting testimony, generally results in a far harsher sentence, as a 'punishment' the court imposes on the defence attorney for not securing a plea bargain."

Another Israeli group, No Legal Frontiers, concluded: "No separation of powers exists within the military regime and thus the army is at the same time the legislature, the judiciary and the executive. These fundamental flaws are irreparable as long as the occupation persists."

Horton says the military courts function as a system of control: "The army has to ensure that the 500,000 Jewish settlers who live in occupied territory go about their daily business without interruption from 2.5 million Palestinians... it is no coincidence that most children who are arrested live close to a settlement or a road used by settlers or the army."

He says it's an effective system; quite often the children emerge scared and broken. But there is little recourse. From 2001 to 2010, 645 complaints were made against Israeli interrogators; not one resulted in a criminal investigation. "Sometimes if there is a group of children who throw stones and the settlers or soldiers are not clear exactly who has thrown them, the army can go into a village at two or three in the morning and five or 10 kids get roughed up and it scares the hell out of the whole village," says Horton. He adds that when the army arrests children they usually don't say why or where they are taking them.

Former Israeli soldiers have formed Breaking the Silence, a group that has gathered more than 700 testimonies about abuses they committed or witnessed. Former Israeli army commander Yehuda Shaul says the army sets out "to make Palestinians have a feeling of being chased". "The Palestinian guy is arrested and released," Shaul says. "He has no idea why he was arrested and why he was released so quickly. The rest of the village wonders whether he was released because he is a collaborator."

Fadia Saleh, who runs 11 rehabilitation centres in the West Bank dealing with the effects of detention, says: "Usually the children isolate themselves, they become very angry for the simplest reasons, they have nightmares. They have lost trust in others. They don't have friends any more because they think their friends will betray them. There is also a stigma about them - other children and parents say, 'Be careful being seen with him, or the Israeli soldiers will target you too.'"

Back in the children's court, my guide says the judges are independent, "even if they are part of the army". He adds: "We have a couple of acquittals every year." When I say that's not very high, he says: "A couple of dozen or so acquittals."

In comes Mahmoud, 15. "He's going to plead guilty," says my guide. I'm no longer surprised. "He threw one stone and the agreement is 45 days in prison and 1500 shekels [$400] fine."

One of the last is Mohammed, also 15. He's charged with "attempting to throw 10 stones". I ask how anyone could know he attempted to throw 10 stones if he didn't throw one. "He wasn't able to do it but he attempted to," my guide answers. Mohammed is the closest we come to a not-guilty plea - he rejects the charge. From the back of the court his mother is trying to say something. The boy makes it clear he doesn't want her to speak but the judge rules that she can. The boy stares at the floor as his mother begins. "There are eight people living in our small house," she says. "They are difficult conditions and Mohammed has had a hard life. I ask that a sentence not be given."

The judge thanks the mother then begins her summing up. You can see the mother tensing. The verdict: four months in prison. The mother bursts into tears. The judge adds: "Because of the severe economic situation of the family I have decided not to impose a fine."

The case lasts six minutes - the longest "trial" of the day. Mohammed has been in prison for a month and my guide explains that had he pleaded guilty he would be free now instead of just beginning another three months. He is taken from court. His mother sits at the back of the court, crying.

The judge - still very pleasant - closes the court for the day. The lawyers pack up. My guide had noted earlier that things were going smoothly. In fact, the whole day went extremely smoothly.