gaza in my heart, and on my mind

3 minutes and 18 seconds of inspiration from Gaza

2009-08-09T13:09:00.001-04:00

Kites, Gaza, and the American Ghetto

2009-08-06T08:08:00.004-04:00

White phosphorous rockets rain down on Gaza

Gaza youth fly kites on Beit Lahiya beach

Somehow when I first saw the Kite photo, the White Phosphorous photo leapt into my mind. The skies of Gaza went from having lethal plumes of smoke rain down through them, to homemade kites sail up through them. Such is life, with juxtaposing experiences and realities. After being flooded with images of bombs, rockets raining down on Gaza I smiled to see kites sailing, free, up, through the sky. But then I remembered Gaza in 2006-- the image from the beach then imprinted in my mind is of Huda Ghaliya hysterical after an Israeli bomb killed some 7 members of her family who had gone to the beach for the day to escape Israel's bombing campaign.

But this is Gaza-- and I suppose it is similar to other places on earth shackled by war, occupation, colonization, violence, and oppression in its many forms. Every bit of the land holds feelings of love and beauty, history and hope-- but also deep loss, violence, and fear. All these feelings and experiences are interconnected, although some disproportionately realized. As George Santayana observes, "the world is not respectable; it is mortal, tormented, confused, deluded forever; but it is shot through with beauty, with love, with glints of courage and laughter; and in these, the spirit blooms."

Alice Walker recently joined the Code Pink brigade on their mission to Gaza, and wrote poignantly and personally of her experience there. Walker grew up in Georgia during legal segregation in the States and wrote that she felt a "homecoming" upon entering Gaza. The experiences of Black Americans living in segregated Georgia's ghetto find commonality with those of Palestinians imprisoned in Gaza: life defined primarily (solely?) by nationality/race by an outside population; disenfranchisement; fear; movement and freedom limited by tangible physical boundaries; every positive action is one which breathes resistance and struggle. She discusses the pointed effort made by the Civil Rights movement to overcome hatred and work towards a common human spirit. It is this common spirit that somehow eludes our world leaders which we must continue to work towards realizing. Because it is there-- for those who are able, somehow-- surely through personal struggle, self-awareness, and a a deep sense of responsibility-- to rise above the "boxes" we put ourselves in which increase the divisions between us as people, above our own personal loss, the idea of "us" and "them"...the commonalities are evident, and they, hopefully, can lead us in learning to overcome these divisions of hatred which enable the most atrocious forms of violence.

Alice Walker did her part in visiting Gaza and, upon returning to the States and fulfilling a promise she made to a Palestinian woman she'd met during her trip, invited Oprah Winfrey to do the same. Let's see if Oprah's got it in her.

Gaza Today: August 6, 2009

2009-08-01T04:36:00.003-04:00

"The best place one could be on Earth"
(Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple, EI)

Traumatized children struggle to rise again

(Mel Frykberg, EI)

Running Kites in Gaza

(Guardian, photos)

Israeli soldiers admit a "shoot first" policy in Gaza offensive

(Ian Black, Guardian)

Gaza Today: July 9, 2009

2009-07-09T12:14:00.005-04:00

Hamas' choice: Recognition or resistance in the age of Obama

(Ali Abunimah, EI-- excellent opinion piece, parts of the speech found here)

Life in Gaza after the Israeli invasion

(Peter Beaumant et al, Guardian-- video)

Gaza aid crew detained, threatened with deportation

(Mel Frykberg, EI)

Gaza activists still in Israeli jail

(al Jazeera English)

Israel's wall still deepening the divide

(Ben White, Guardian)

Six months later, no reconstruction in Gaza

(Rami Almeghari, EI)

Israel criticized for thwarting medical mission to the Palestinian Territories

(Vikram Dodd, Guardian)

Gaza Today: June 10, 2009

2009-06-10T22:40:00.002-04:00

Building new foundations from the ruins of old ones

(Rory McCarthey, Guardian)

Gaza: the destitute and the forgotten

(Inigo Gilmore, Guardian, film)

Gaza: No right to life

(Inigo Gilmore, Guardian film)

South African study: Israel practicing apartheid and colonialism

(Human Sciences Research Council, EI)

Gaza farmers brave Israeli bullets

(Rami Almeghri, EI)

Gaza Today: June 6, 2009

2009-06-06T13:31:00.004-04:00

Obama in Cairo: A Bush in Sheep's Clothes

(Ali Abunimah, Guardian)

Calm voice, big stick

(Uri Averny, Maan News)

Misery hangs over Gaza despite pledges of help

(Ethan Bronner, NYT)

Obama should visit Gaza

(Medea Benjamin, EI)

Haroubi's Tree is a Symbol of a People's Changing Fortunes

(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

Gaza's emerging trash crisis

(Erin Cunningham, EI)

Palestinian farmers use permaculture to challenge occupation

(Sarah Irving, EI)

Death and destruction in Gaza neatly filed and documented

(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

Despite Israel's efforts, Palestinian festival celebrates literature

(Sousan Hammad, EI)

"After all this...how can you still laugh?"

2009-04-29T23:33:00.003-04:00

Tonight I saw a documentary called "Arna's Children". It was incredibly moving, and like all Palestinian works of art both soulfully uplifting at times and crashingly depressing. But true. Through and through.

It is a documentary about Arna, a Jewish woman born in the late 1920s, early 1930s in Galilee who joins the Jewish Brigade (a Jewish military group which drove out the Palestinians and helped establish Israel) and then marries Salim (?) a Palestinian man. The documentary is fuzzy on her life post marriage, but begins with her as an old woman in Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank, where she opens a theater for Palestinian children. Through art she helps the kids express their anger at their lives and the Israeli Occupation and find a way to resist the Occupation. The film starts around 1996 it seems. Jules, Arna's son and the film maker, returns to Jenin in 2002 after the Israeli incursion to see what has happened to his young friends. As is tragically predictable, Jules finds that three of the young boys Arna taught were martyred during the Intifada-- one killed by the Israelis during the incursion, two (I believe) joined militant groups and died during an operation.

The documentary shows the loss felt by the remaining friends at the death of the young men. It talks candidly about Palestinians' feelings on resistance and militancy. It's an incredibly good window into the complexity of life under Occupation. The experiences of Palestinians under Occupation are not monolithic, nor are the ways in which they process or cope with them. This is quite important to understand-- there is no one, single Palestinian experience, perhaps except that of Occupation...but this is responded to, dealt with, coped with, raged against, mourned in a multitude of ways. "Arna's Children" does really a fantastic job also of, without agenda, exposing the complexity of the history of Palestine. Arna was an Arab Jew who participated in the establishment of Israel, married a Palestinian, and lived her older years in Jenin working with the children of the camp. From that aspect alone, the film was phenomenal to watch. Two of the remaining boys speak of one friend, Yousef, who joined a militant group, and of the event that lead up to his joining it. A school had been bombed and Yousef found a 10 year old girl inside it, bleeding. He picked her up and ran her out, and she died in his arms. His friends say that after that something changed and hardened in him. I've read this before many times. In psychology, your body is able to buffer against stress through certain biological happenings. When your body can no longer buffer against this stress you "break down" in a sense and suffer severe stress or trauma. In literature I've read regarding suicide bombers there is generally one pinpointed event which breaks the person's ability to buffer against the stress of his/her existence, at which point they decide to carry out a violent act. I am not defending suicide bombing-- but it is of value to understand that it is not religious zeal, or insanity which can drive a person to undertake such an act. It's heartwrenching to watch the evolution, but is rooted in life events.

Of course, the film is heart breaking. It is racked with destruction-- emotional, physical, spiritual. The childhood lightness which dominates the first portion of the documentary gives way to an unbearably heavy reality of adulthood in Jenin. All I could think during the film was, what's the point? Helping children enjoy their childhood, fostering dreams within them of becoming the first "Palestinian Romeo" (like one kid says he wants to be) and then they grow up and into a reality which is worse and worse every single day. People respond differently to levels of psychological pressure and distress. Some reach their "breaking point" and are no longer able to, literally, bear the pressure of their life. Others manage to find and retain strength and go on to struggle and live.

There is one incredibly poignant moment in the film when Jules returns to Jenin, and he's speaking with a group of women and tells them he's heard the three boys were martyred. The women respond yes, with blessings for the boys and are so happy to see Jules again after he'd been gone 5 years, they are laughing and hugging him. Jules is so overcome with grief he looks at them and says, "But after all of this...how can you still laugh?" And the women respond, "This is our life!"

Destruction. Death.

That is their life. Interspersed with happiness and beauty, yes. But also with a disproportionate amount of loss.

It reminded me of a friend of mine in college who, also during the Intifada, turned to me and said, "I don't understand how Palestinians can still smile." These issues of resilience, continuity, struggle, they're fascinating and so so so so complex. Often for the sake of brevity and simplicity, we whittle them down to a few examples to represent a myriad of experiences. "Arna's Children" is a wonderful insight into the array of complexities that make up the Palestinian experience. If you have a chance, see it.

Gaza Lives on: April 28, 2009

2009-04-28T23:38:00.003-04:00

Boycott this Israeli settlement builder

(Abe Hayeem, Guardian)

Racism, boycott and a big dose of hypocrisy

(Isabelle Humphries, EI)

What credibility is there in Geneva's all-white walk out?

(Seumas Milne, Guardian)

Focus on Gaza

(a weekly update by al Jazeera on news items that have fallen out of the spotlight, al Jazeera)

UK campaigners score victory towards arms embargo

(Yasmine Khan, EI)

Efforts to track communicable diseases in Gaza

(IRIN, via EI)

Signs of worsening malnutrition among children

(IRIN, via EI)

"This is the next generation of Palestinian leaders"

2009-04-21T00:53:00.002-04:00

On Friday of last week, Dr. Mads Gilbert came to Barnard and shared with us his experience working in al Shifah Hospital in Gaza during Israel's war. It was extraordinary listening to him speak, watching his emotions range from fierce dedication to a humanitarian view, to awe and humility at his Gazan colleagues', to sombre quietude explaining exactly how a DIME explosive works, to visible heartache at the pictures he took and showed us of all the children he watched die over the two weeks he was in Gaza.

Dr. Gilbert is an emergency medicine doctor specializing in conflict medicine. He travels to Gaza often through NORWAC (the Norwegian Aid Committee, he's Norwegian) and spoke at length of the Norwegian people's commitment to Palestine and how traveling to work in Palestine for a stint is a kind of "right of passage" for Norwegian doctors. Dr. Gilbert began by introducing his presentation as an "eyewitness account, not a scientific presentation", as the data from Gaza has not yet been analyzed. He reminded the audience that this attack was not natural, not a tsunami or earthquake, but was manmade. His slides were comprised of heart wrenching photos of disfigured corpses in the hospital, young children who had survived, and their families. He told us that he was "urged" by the families of the deceased, disfigured, and maimed to show the world their photos, so we would all know what had happened. Dr. Gilbert encouraged us all to pick up the March 2009 special issue of the Lancet, which is all about health in Palestine (this is really groundbreaking, and I would really urge anyone remotely interested to try to get or read a copy of it).

Dr. Gilbert spoke about how Norway was occupied during WWII by the Germans, and how they are proud that they are no longer occupied. The Germans had labeled them terrorists for fighting back against their arms with homemade rockets...the analogy was not lost on us. He then wondered if perhaps Obama should go to Gaza, and tell the Palestinians there, "I am a Palestinian" just like JFK went to W. Berlin and told them "I am a German"...one of the seminal steps in bringing down the Berlin Wall...another wall nobody thought would ever come down.

Out of the blue, and within 30 minutes, on December 27 Israel killed 230 Palestinians. Dr. Gilbert said he'd been in West Beirut in 1982 and never thought he'd experience anything like that again...where Israel bombed people--laid siege on a city cutting off electricity, water-- and then bombed the rescuers who were altruistic enough to try to save lives. But then he went to Gaza.

Dr. Gilbert explained to us how DIME explosives work (Dense Inert Metal Explosives). It is an explosive made out of teungstun, and the only weapon that they know of which creates injuries like the ones he saw in Gaza and the ones that appeared before us on the screen. Limbs were torn off, with the bones splintered through. Abdomens would look slightly bruised but the victim would have experienced massive internal bleeding. However there is no remnants of the weapon-- no shrapnal. He said Israel used them in Gaza and Lebanon in the summer of 2006 and February and March 2008 in Gaza. These explosives, he reminded us, are developed, produced, and exported by the USA.

"If you bomb Gaza," Dr. Gilbert explained, "You have to kill children." It can be no other way in an area where 49% of the population is younger than 15 years old, and where the average age is 17.6 years old. DIME bombs basically produce an energy wave that literally tears people apart. The radius of the shockwaves are 5 meters from the central point of impact. Dr. Gilbert walked onto the middle of the stage and said if a DIME was dropped right there, himself and the first 4 rows of audience would be dead instantaneously. The fifth and beyond would suffer injuries.

Dr. Gilbert reminded the audience that on top of the 1434 deaths counted in Gaza during the war, 350 women experienced traumatic abortions and stillbirths. This could have been due to an injury or stress-induced from the war. At any given time in Gaza, 40,000 women are pregnant. And during the war, all delivery services were suspended because there weren't enough doctors to go around. All these things continue to happen during war-- women continue to give birth, need cesearians, have complications...

"Any medical system would have considered this a medical disaster," Dr. Gilbert remarked. "Even at Columbia hospitals, this would have been a huge challenge." Even with all the up-to-date, state-of-the-art equipment and supplies available here. Israel has denied Gaza hospitals supplies for the past 2 years during its economic siege. Dr. Gilbert spoke so highly of the staff of al Shifah hospital, so many of whom he counts as close, close friends-- not just colleagues. One of which was killed while he was there. Another's house was bombed, his wife was missing and his daughters brought into the hospital. They survived. The next day his nephew (13yrs old) was brought in. He died within 10 minutes. "This is our life, here," the doctor told Dr. Gilbert-- part doctor, part taking care of your own family. He praised the staff who were also besieged and exhausted for their tireless dedication. They worked around the clock learning where the most recent strike had been to try to manage the flow of patients. He said, "If you want to learn about human dignity these days, you should go to Gaza. They never act like the animals they are treated as."

Dr. Gilbert explained that IDF tanks, when the ground invasion began, entered Gaza through the center of the Strip-- effectively splitting it in half, so overflowing hospitals could not move patients around to other hospitals. The ambulances were refused by the tanks to cross, even though they were chaperoned by the ICRC.

Dr. Gilbert put the death toll as follows:

3 Israeli civilians were killed during the war.

10 IDF soldiers were killed during the war.

1314-1500 Palestinians were killed during the war.

431 Palestinian children were killed during the war (of which Israel admits killing 189).

118 Palestinian militants were killed during the war according to the 3 major groups in Gaza.

What was the point of this war? Dr. Gilbert asked. According to Shimon Peres, Nobel Peace Prize recipient, it was to give "a strong blow to the people of Gaza so that they would lose their appetite for shooting at Israel. That's all." He said this at the January 14th AIPAC conference, and remarked he was "satisfied" with the outcome of the war.

"That's all."

Just over 1300 dead Palestinians.

"That's all."

oh, and $2 billion worth of property loss.

Dr. Gilbert said that the IDF destroyed anything that could provide protein for the starving population. "There was no electricity, the only thing that would light up the night was the burning of the bombs."

He showed a picture of a 5yr old boy from the Samouni family, whose right arm was fractured. He stared into the camera with void eyes. He looked completely numb. "This is the next generation of Palestinian leaders." Dr. Gilbert said.

On the medical side, Dr. Gilbert informed us that when people are cold, they bleed more-- because hypothermia sets in. And it was cold in Gaza because it was winter. It was made colder in the hospital because all the windows had been blown out by bombs. So stopping the bleeding of patients was even harder. The policy had to be, "If you could walk and talk you were sent home". There was no room in the hospital for those who were not critical.

Dr. Gilbert began to speak about the bodies and the bombs and you could feel the rage at the injustice rising within him as his voice got louder. In the case of Gaza, "the virus was not HIV or e. Coli-- it was bombing, man-made, and could have been stopped if it had been wanted, and then the bodies would have stopped." He said, "It was my duty to report, as a doctor. Were there journalists there? Yes, of course, 600. But they were Niggers, they have curly hair and are dark, and not to be trusted. They could be 'al kayda'!" (In case the sarcasm is lost in translation here due to a lack of writing ability on the part of the author, Dr. Gilbert was making the very sound point that the Western world and press cried out throughout the war that there were no journalists in Gaza because there were no Western journalists, and how racist that mentality is-- obviously Arabs, Palestinians moreover, cannot be trusted to accurately report what is happening in Gaza.)

Right now, 80% of Gaza lives below the UN poverty line. And 63% live below the extreme poverty line.

Dr. Gilbert said he has never participated in so many amputations. I wonder how this generation will grow up. There was one boy who lost both legs and both arms. What kind of life is that for a 14 year old boy? It's not a life. "Everyone had cardboard boxes for their amputations."

"In 1938, they would have worn yellow stars and been called Jews," he said of the Palestinians in Gaza.

And when he was asked about the illegal use of white phospherous, Dr. Gilbert replied, "The siege is the most illegal weapon used against Gaza. White phospherous is just a distraction."

Indeed. And it continues. Dr. Gilbert is working on a book due out at the end of the year on his time in Gaza called "Eyes in Gaza."

You can hear him reporting from Gaza here and here.

(In the 2nd one, note how the Arab journalist needs to confirm with Mads, "From your point of view as a foreigner..." because obviously his point of view, as an Arab, cannot be trusted)

Gaza lives on: April 9, 2009

2009-04-09T10:07:00.002-04:00

Gaza is still an open-air prison, says Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams

(Guardian)

Not an analogy: Israel and the crime of apartheid

(Hazem Jamjoum, EI)

Israeli exports hit by European boycotts after attacks on Gaza

(Rachel Shabi, Guardian)

More than 150,000 Gazans without tap water

(EI)

Motorola drops bomb fuse unit following boycott campaign

(EI)

Israel created 'terror without mercy' in Gaza

(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Gaza war crimes investigation

(3 short films by Clancy Chassay, Guardian)

Gaza Lives On: April 1, 2009

2009-04-01T17:49:00.002-04:00

Gaza Offensive: Israel says no war crimes committed
(Helen Pidd, Guardian)

Israel's most moral army
(Rachel Shabi, Guardian)

Report excoriates Israel's use of white phosphorus in Gaza
(Marian Houk, EI)

A brave man who stood alone. If only the world had listened to him.
(Robert Fisk, the Independent)

Israel may have deliberately attacked sewage infrastructure
(Marian Houk, EI)

Palestinian men bear trauma of war
(Zeina Awad, al Jazeera english)

Academics in Lebanon call for Israel boycott
(EI)

Belgian campaign targets bank financing Israeli settlements
(Adri Nieuwhof, EI)

New York kicks off boycott campaign against Motorola
(EI)

Gaza lives on: March 22, 2009

2009-03-22T20:10:00.003-04:00

Gaza war crimes claims gather pace as more troops speak out
(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

'Shooting and Crying'
(Amos Harel, Haaretz)

Gaza: Nursing the Nightmares
(Clancy Chassay, Guardian, video)

Broad non-violent resistance to Zionism
(Ahmad Hijazi, EI)

Israeli siege kills another child patient in Gaza
(al Mezan, EI)

Gazans struggle for clean drinking water
(Mel Frykberg, EI)

IDF ceased long ago being the "most moral army in the world"
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

Gaza lives on: March 5, 2009

2009-03-05T21:15:00.003-05:00

Al Haq receives prestigious Geuzenpenning Prize
(Adri Nieuwhoif, EI)

Head of Palestinian Rights group banned from traveling to accept award
(Haaretz)

Waltz with Gaza
(film--Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Palestinian health care 'ailing'
(BBC)

Sustaining global solidarity
(Jamal Juma', EI)

US to boycott UN racism conference
(al Jazeera English)

Gaza solid waste in dire straits
(EI)

Aid as a weapon
(Ben White, Guardian) (** really good)

Clinton condemns Israel's demolition of Arab East Jerusalem homes
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

The war in el Atatra
(photos, NYT)

Israel may face war crimes over Gaza
(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

Proposal in Congress: No Gilad Shalit, no Gaza aid
(Haaretz)

Iran plans war crime trials for Israelis
(the Lede, NYT)

Month in Pictures: February
(EI)

gaza aftermath, day 39

2009-02-24T15:04:00.003-05:00

Robert Fisk: A fair point: Everyone is equal in their suffering in war
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

Palestinian olive oil bucks UK recession
(Guardian)

Israel and Hamas reject global call for arms embargo
(video, Guardian)

Jerusalem: no plans yet to raze Arab homes in area designated for park
(Haaretz)

"They killed me three times"
(Eva Bartlett, EI)

That's how we are. Singing and wrecking.

2009-02-23T16:43:00.002-05:00

Gideon Levy's take on Waltz with Bashir, 'Antiwar' film Waltz with Bashir nothing but a charade, is a devastatingly honest look at how self-centeredly the suffering in Waltz with Bashir is portrayed. Folman focuses nearly the entire movie on his own guilt and confusion about his role in Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982, except for the last 30 seconds of the film (I won't give it away for those who haven't seen it, although the article does). It centers around his moral and conscious wrestling with his actions and his own Jewish history. Levy rightfully holds the bar for art higher than Folman in that the movie focuses solely on the Israeli experience of 1982, and not the Lebanese or Palestinian. War affects everyone who participates in it or survives it, however in the spirit of true engagement and critical thinking Folman's movie could have done more to focus on the suffering of those who bore the heaviest burden in 1982--the Lebanese and Palestinians. That said, my personal reaction is still that I expect very little from mainstream Jewish Israel in terms of addressing past wrongs in regards to Palestinians in particular and Arabs at large. Not because I don't think they should address these wrongs, but because the Gideon Levys and Ilan Pappes and Amira Hasses of Israel are few and far between-- those who take a meaningful and truly critical look at Israel's past and have the moral courage to say "it's not always about us-- a lot of the time, it's about them." Folman's film poked larger holes in the illusion of the IDF being the world's most "moral army" at a very critical moment (the film came out during the Gaza war), and those who saw Waltz probably were led to reflect not only on Lebanon, but Gaza. So I accept Folman's baby steps of retrospectivity. Maybe the baby steps will grow.

THIS is important

2009-02-23T16:25:00.003-05:00

Please take a minute today, and support US Campaign to End the Occupation in their effort to end military aid to Israel. Throughout Israel's war on Gaza, we were all aware that the majority of arms used against Palestinians were either manufactured in or bought from the United States-- just one more way the US (and those of us who are taxpayers in the US) was complicit in the horrendous attacks on Palestinians. We, in the States, have elected a man to office who has promised change and meaningful partnership in the international community. Let's help him begin his 4 years on the right foot-- by demanding Israel be held accountable for its misuse of weapons in the war.

It only takes a minute. If you feel comfortable doing so, please personalize the message. Let's flood his office.

I just sent my message, who will join me?

Hold Israel accountable for its actions.

gaza aftermath, day 37

2009-02-22T22:20:00.003-05:00

Suspend military aid to Israel, Amnesty urges Obama after detailing US weapons used in Gaza
(Guardian)

Student apathy is good for business
(Hicham Yezza, Guardian)

Global boycott movement marks its success
(EI)

Columbia U faculty: support academic freedom in Palestine
(EI)

Durban II drafts: Israel is a racist, occupying state
(Haaretz)

BBC staff to deliver 400 strong petition over Gaza appeal decision
(Guardian)

Egypt opens Gaza border crossing
(al Jazeera english)

Hamas refuses to free Israeli soldier in return for lifting Gaza blockade
(Guardian)

Boycotting Durban II?

2009-02-18T17:32:00.003-05:00

In April, Geneva will host Durban II-- the World Conference Against Racism. Obama's government has inserted itself onto the planning committee to ensure a hand in the creation of its guiding documents, but has not yet committed to going. Nice start to the "hope and change" administration-- potentially boycotting a conference about racism. The "controversy" that surrounds Durban II is that during the first Conference in South Africa in 2001, Israel was criticized to be a racist state employing Apartheid. And this was before Israel began constructing the Apartheid Wall. So naturally, Israel is a little nervous about a world conference discussing racism.

Indeed, Livni declared that, "Israel expects the free world not to participate in Durban II." But then again, the "free world" is just that--free. It is not made up of the countries still recovering from colonialism, those fettered by economic colonialism, or those under unmitigated occupation. It is the luxury of the "free world" to disengage from discussions of colonial history and racism. But do they have an obligation and duty to treat the "unfree world" with the respect of participating in a conference on Racism?

Yes.

Will they lower themselves off their high imperial horses to the level of the "unfree world" and participate meaningfully, in cooperative partnership?

We wait to see.

What a nice luxury it must be to have that distance from oppression to decide not to look in the mirror, as Barghouti urged them to, and see that the "free world" is indeed an oppressive force to others.

I hope Obama has the courage and moral clarity to send representatives to the Durban meeting, and participate in it meaningfully. Boycotting a conference on racism is neither hopeful, nor change.

gaza aftermath, day 32

2009-02-18T16:40:00.002-05:00

Did Egypt sabatoge deal over Gaza, Shalit?
(Amal Ghazal, EI-- interesting, read this one!)

Obama officials meet with US Jews to explain their Durban II policies
(Haaretz)

Israel Palestine revisited
(Geoffrey Aronson, Guardian)

Gaza's forgotten elderly
(from PCHR)

Chasing Mirages in the Middle East
(Hasan Abu Nimah, EI)

Hamas no, Human Rights yes
(Peter Tatchell, Guardian-- for more reading on Hamas and its ideology/founding I suggest "Hamas" by Khaled Hroub, he actually contradicts to some extent what Tatchell says)

Israel braces for wave of lawsuits
(Mel Frykberg, EI)

From Gaza with love
(Khaled Diab, Guardian)

Hamas murder campaign in Gaza exposed
(Guardian)

Behind the violence in Gujarat, Gaza and Iraq is the banality of democracy
(Pankaj Mishra, Guardian)

South Africa Bantustans vs. West Bank

2009-02-13T12:59:00.004-05:00

This is the only question

2009-02-13T12:06:00.003-05:00

I read the news about Palestine and Israel a lot. I read books, watch interviews, listen to others' opinions, write about my own, attend lectures on law and history, watch Israeli movies, watch Palestinian movies, read novels and poetry, and have arguments. And throughout all this, my views and stances are reaffirmed to me. I question myself and these views, listen to pro-Zionist arguments, and my opinions have evolved through these exposures, but have always remained firmly rooted in where they started: humanity and human rights. But sometimes, with all these opinions and historical facts and points and nuances, thoughts get jumbled and I am susceptible sometimes to the "complexity of subtleties" of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that prevents some people from firmly coming down on one side or the other. And for this reason, I am so grateful for speakers and thinkers like Dr. Barghouti, who re-orient me, and clarify my thoughts.

It's not complicated, and it's not subtle.

When I say "one side or the other" I think it is generally interpreted as "Pro-Palestinian" or "Pro-Israel". What I mean here, and let me be clear, is that I am not on the "Pro-Palestinian" side-- I am on the side that believes that human rights, equality, and justice are applicable and deserved by every human and are not predicated on anything. This is the side that I am on. The other side predicates these values on other conditions. They are not absolutely, universally applied by this side.

No.

I know it is very, very, very difficult--psychologically and emotionally--for Jews to question Zionist ideals with which they have been brought up. I have seen numerous friends struggle with it. But it is imperative, of the utmost urgency, that these ideals be questioned. And it is so uncomfortable to question something this personal. Especially the Jews I roll with, who are very liberal, and largely see the world through a human rights paradigm and one of humanity. But this paradigm needs to be extended to Israel and Palestine-- not just to some extent, to the full extent. And when you start to feel a little uncomfortable, that's good. We should always feel uncomfortable when questioning assumed truths.

What Israel and Palestine comes down to is a grave injustice, not a myriad of complexities. An occupation--and anyone who has ever been to the West Bank, Gaza, or any refugee camp in any Arab country knows--is not subtle.

Dr. Barghouti spelled it out for us: If you believe that Israelis deserve security, economy, and peace, then (if you believe all people are equal), Palestinians also deserve security, economy, and peace. And it should not be predicated upon that of Israel. It is independently merited by the fact that Palestinians are human beings--no matter how hard the West and Israel try to deny us that label. We deserve peace because we are humans, not as some reward for giving up all our rights. And Israel and Jews absolutely deserve peace because they are humans--but not at the expense of that of Palestinians.

We stand and reaffirm, we are human--this is a human issue.

You either believe in equality for all people, or you don't. This is the only question. And it may be uncomfortable, but it's not complicated.

Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, "This is what Gaza is left with."

2009-02-13T11:13:00.006-05:00

Yesterday, I had the distinct pleasure and privilege of hearing Dr. Mustafa Barghouti speak about his recent visit to Gaza. Dr. Barghouti is a medical doctor, President and founder of the Union of Palestinian Relief Committees, and came in second place in the 2005 Palestinian national elections. He has been a continuously humane, clear, and articulate voice for Palestine in the recent years, presenting the kind of Palestinian face not often seen in American press. It was a pleasure to hear such an eloquent, and human response to the Palestinian reality. It was reminiscent of Edward Said...who Dr. Barghouti remembered at the beginning of his talk. The talk is supposed to become available online soon, at which point I will post it, but for now...some notes...forgive the length.

Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, "The Gaza War Crime: 12.27.08-1.18.09

Dr. Barghouti recently visited Gaza, and is speaking about what he saw and experienced there "out of a sense of duty and obligation." Israel wouldn't let him into Gaza, so he had to go to Egypt and cross through Rafah-- a trip that should have taken him an hour or two from Ramallah became an international trip. He said, for the first time in his life, he was so shocked by what he saw in Gaza, he could not speak about it for 4 days. The violence in Gaza "was not a war, it was unilateral actions" highlighting the vast imbalance of power between Gaza's military might and that of Israel. He noted that the media "describes civilians as women and children, as though men cannot just be civilians." He showed that, based on population sizes, the ratio of Palestinians who were killed in Gaza would be equal to nearly a quarter million Americans being killed (1,345 Palestinians in Gaza=247,489 Americans), and that on September 11, 2001 3,500 Americans were killed, and we all saw the reaction to that.

357 of Gaza's factories were destroyed. But, Dr. Barghouti pointed out, most were purposefully destroyed in the last 2 days of war, as Israeli soldiers were leaving the Gaza Strip. They laced the factories with dynamite and blew them up, "And I thought the Americans supported the private sector!" he quipped. Dr. Barghouti showed a series of photos of patients who had been burned by phosphorous bombs--at which many people could not look. One photo was of charred corpse of a baby maybe 8 months old. It didn't have any limbs. The remnants of the phosphorous bombs are still all over, reigniting at a touch. He commented on the new weaponry Israel has been testing on the people of Gaza (to be sold later to other countries if they prove "effective"). New bombs and bullets are chemically enriched. Here, he asserted, he was speaking as a physician. The DIME bombs work by eating the flesh and tissue of a person upon contact, eating through until it reaches the bone. "Dom Dom" bullets and bombs release a spray of chemical powder that burns the flesh upon contact and is released in such a manner that the powder lands on your skin each particle only a centimeter apart from the others, making it difficult to escape mass burning. They are still investigating whether Israel used depleted uranium or tungsten.

Dr. Barghouti showed a map of the buffer zone Israel has implemented inland of Gaza--a strip of land which runs all along Gaza's borders usurping 10-15% of land--a significant amount of which is agricultural land. Palestinians who enter this area (like farmers) are shot.

He revealed a heartwrenching strategy Gazan families used to minimize their casualties. As we know, many Gazans lost their homes and became homeless--taking refuge in schools and with relatives' whose homes were still functional. When these Gazans left their homes-- they would split up their children among different places of refuge, so that if one of the spots was hit not all of the family's children would die. He showed us slide after slide after slide of what Gaza looks like now-- which is literally a garbage dump. It looks like heaps and piles of garbage and rubble.

"This is what Gaza is left with," Dr. Barghouti remarked.

Regarding reconstruction, Israel is letting in neither cement nor glass--only food and medical supplies. When he asked why Israel would not let in glass (this is very needed as all the windows in buildings have been blown out...and the cement need is obvious) he was told "it is considered a strategic material"--meaning it could be used to make weapons, not windows.

Dr. Barghouti said he speaks so that "Nobody should say, 'We didn't know...'" He warned that a sewage flood was imminent. Of Israel's policies, he said, "This is not a move to the right, this is a move towards racism" and warned that these actions were not good for Palestinians OR Israelis. He asserted that "We, the Palestinians, will never accept to be slaves to an Occupation, or slaves to an Apartheid state." When asked what kind of government he would like to see in Israel, he half-joked he'd like Obama's government. He seemed cautiously optimistic by Obama's team, especially Mitchel's appointment, and said change won't come from Israel itself, it must come from outside pressure, namely the US.

On the Palestinian side, he noted that we need leadership, not government...that the rift between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority is "a stupid fight for an Authority that doesn't have any authority because it is under Occupation." He said the Palestinians need to go back to unity, but they need to go back to democracy and hold another election (Abbas' term expired on Jan. 9--over a month ago, during the war).

In response to the question "What do you think Israel's proper response would have been to the 8000 rockets that hit Israel from Gaza?" Dr. Barghouti responded that he does not support in any way the rocket attacks, and he does not want the Israelis to be bombarded, but that he expects Israelis also to say they don't want Palestinians to be bombarded with F-16s--and that if Israelis are entitled to social and economic security, then Palestinians are too. These are human rules. Gaza has been under siege for 2 years-- isn't this also an act of war? He restated that Israel broke the ceasefire on Nov. 4th.

He argued strongly for the effectiveness and necessity of boycott and divestment movements around Israel-- noting that Hampshire College, again, is leading the way in this movement (Hampshire was the first US school to divest from Apartheid South Africa).

When asked about a two vs. one state solution, Dr. Barghouti was torn in that, "My heart says two states, but my head says one." Explaining that he feels one state is just, but very far off, and he wants two states so his daughter can stop living under apartheid as soon as possible.

He said that he understands, very much, psychologically that for Jews now, after enduring centuries of persecution--from the Holocaust to Russian pogoms to the Spanish Inquisition, "it is so difficult to accept that they are sitting in the chair of the oppressor. It is time to look in the mirror. It is you."

He ended by postulating, "Are we equal human beings entitled to equal rights? This is the only question. It is a human issue."

"It could have been worse."

2009-02-13T11:01:00.002-05:00

Often in defense of Israel's attacks on the Palestinians (and Lebanese), I have heard people backwardly praise Israel's "self-restraint" in the level of destruction and death they cause. That they have the capability of killing literally every person in Gaza, or razing every home, but chose not to, somehow is twisted into a moral stand by Israel.

So the next time someone tells you, "Well, the Palestinians are lucky, Israel could have made it much worse." Remind them that this is the same colonial logic used by Belgium in its cruel colonization of Congo, in which, "Fievez, an official of the Free State, noted that those who refused to collect rubber or else who did not meet their rubber quota, "I made war against them. One example was enough: a hundred heads cut off, and there have been plenty of supplies since. My goal is ultimately humanitarian. I killed a hundred people, but that allowed five hundred others to live."" ("Free State" was a colonial enterprise in the Congo-- for more readings on this and more on the Third World Revolution, I recommend "The Darker Nations" by Vijay Prashad. Lots of history we weren't taught in school.)

So Gaza could have been worse, and Congo could have been worse...although, look at the state it's in now...

gaza aftermath, day 27

2009-02-13T10:09:00.004-05:00

Gaza 2009: Culture of resistance vs. defeat
(Dr. Haider Eid, EI--very interesting piece about the Palestinian activist movement, give a read, and opinions/reactions if you have them...am interested to hear what people involved, or not involved, think..)

Hamas 'close to truce' with Israel
(al Jazeera english)

Hampshire College first in US to divest from Israel
(Friends of Sabeel)

No Peace for Israel
(Ali Abunimah, Guardian)

Two is better than one
(Shimon Peres, Guardian)

Jimmy Carter: Include Hamas in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks
(Haaretz)

Go to Durban II
(Claude Kandiyoti, Haaretz)

PHILIP HAS BEEN RELEASED!!
"I was accused of being everything from an Israeli spy to a Hamas militant."
(Haaretz)

A 14 year old in Gaza asks, Why?

2009-02-10T18:29:00.005-05:00

Dr. Eyad El Sarraj is a psychiatrist in the Gaza Strip, and a founder of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, and is, in my eyes, a saint. A few weeks ago he wrote in the Boston Globe about his daughter's lack of understanding why this war happened. The work ahead of him, his staff, and the teams of community members they are training is tremendous and overwhelming.

On January 26, 2008, Dr. Sarraj wrote an Op-Ed in the Boston Globe asking why the stranglehold on Gaza was acceptable...why it was ok for Livni to spell out that it was "inconceivable that life in Gaza continues to be normal." And now, a year later, we are asking why Israel's attack on Gaza was "acceptable" and wonder that it is inconceivable that life in Gaza continues today.

Amidst the reports of trauma and death, people speak constantly in bewilderment of Palestinians' resilience. In my studies of mental health I have learned that two of the major sources of resilience are feeling you have control over your future-- that is actively resisting your stressful surroundings--and strong social networks. Palestine is a collectivist society, and much strength is drawn from large, closely knit family structures. Studies have found that one of the most frequently mentioned ways Palestinian children identify to contribute to the Palestinian resistance, is to attend school, educate themselves, and become professionals. I wonder where Noor, Sarraj's stepdaughter, will go to school now that Israel bombed hers.

Palestinians are indeed a incomprehensibly strong and resilient people. But resilience implies that there are difficult circumstances/environments against which to struggle and overcome. Palestinians don't want to be resilient...they want to live.

gaza aftermath, day 24

2009-02-10T10:29:00.002-05:00

Abducted in Egypt
(Ben White on Philip Rizk and others, Guardian)

Gaza's labyrinth lifeline
(photos, Guardian)

Breaking the Palestinian impasse
(Arjan el Fassed, EI)

Israeli closures prevent import of aid, cement into Gaza
(EI)

Hamas is not going away
(Mel Frykberg, EI)

Free Philip Rizk

2009-02-10T00:37:00.004-05:00

Philip is a Egyptian-German activist living in Cairo and was kidnapped/detained/taken by Egypt's secret police on Friday. He is the good friend of a dear friend of mine. Please read more at Amnesty International, or contact them if you have any information, or might be able to help in any way. And please keep him in your thoughts and prayers.

The truth is weapon feared by oppressive forces.

gaza aftermath, day 23

2009-02-10T00:07:00.003-05:00

Inside the Gaza tunnels
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Gaza: Living in the rubble
(Chasey, Tait, Khalil, Bennett, Guardian-- video)

Israeli Arabs fear a Gaza backlash as far right prepares for power role
(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

Israel's forgotten Palestinians
(al Jazeera english)

Church of England divests from Bulldozer Biz
(al Arabiya)

UN to resume Gaza aid operations
(al Jazeera english)

Dining with terrorists
(video, al Jazeera English-- visits the often ignored questions of what constitutes a terrorist? what is terrorism?)

Economic Peace? No, we can't.

2009-02-06T20:13:00.003-05:00

Gideon Levy argues in his article 'Let Netanyahu win', that if Netanyahu is to win the Israeli elections on Tuesday as predicted--this may be the only option left to engender real change between the Palestinians and Israel. He argues that Netanyahu is such a right-winged force that finally the "veil will be lifted" from the facade of Israel engaging in a peace process. A facade that has blocked from the general world's knowledge that while Israel may lament that it has "no partner for peace" it is actively sabatoging any real hopes for peace through its continuous expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank, house demolitions, imprisonments, extrajudicial assassinations (you know, when they "kill Palestinian militants"), its excruciating strangulation of Gaza for 2 years, the erection of the Apartheid Wall excising Palestinian land from the West Bank (who remembers in 2002 when they began this wall? It started as a "temporary security barrier"...now it looks like an apocalyptic fortress), and on and on...

Levy's argument could hold...on the condition that the world (namely the US) actually cares. Everything he says is predicated upon the Quartet taking offense to Israel's suddenly revealed oppressive, counter-peace, attitude. I do say really it depends on the Quartet, as a large (and growing) part of the world takes deep offense already to Israel's treatment of Palestinians and saw through its facade a long, long time ago. But we are not as powerful as those who unconditionally support Israel's inhumane imprisonment and oppression of the Palestinians-- reminding us all, always, that Israel's security is "paramount" while that of the Palestinians is negotiatable at best, irrelevant at worst (or at most realistic).

Could the facing off of Obama's SuperHero "Justice and equality? Yes, we can." attitude with that of Netanyahu's "we can lull them into submission through Economic Peace" attitude be what will finally push us towards a change? ("Economic Peace" is the idea that if Israel builds up the West Bank's economy (I don't think Gaza even factors into this equation anymore as Israel refuses to acknowledge it is still occupied) then economic security for Palestinians will be enough to ensure security for Israel without making any "painful concessions" of land. Palesinians will be content with an economy, and no country. I love this approach-- does Netanyahu really think that once Abu Mustafa's is given some collateral to re-open his factory he will forget he is a dispossessed refugee without a homeland and give up fighting to have his own country? Really!?) Will Obama extend his promise of "change" to Palestine? Do Palestinians deserve justice? Are we equal to Israelis? Because, as Levy points out, the term "process" no longer applies to tension between Israel and the Palestinians. "Process" implies some advancement of change over time. The only change over time Palestinians have seen is a rise in the numbers of their brothers, fathers, uncles, grandfathers, sons imprisoned; the rise in settlements stealing Palestinian land in the West Bank; a rise in the number of Gazans dependent on UN handouts to live (that's up to 80% now); an increased number of checkpoints throughout Occupied Palestine; fewer Gazans alive. The leaders have not changed--neither Israeli nor Palestinian. Neither actually look out for their people's best interest.

Is this really what Palestinians' future depends upon? Shock value? Sigh...

gaza aftermath, day 20

2009-02-06T19:49:00.002-05:00

UN halts aid to Gaza after 'Hamas theft'
(Guardian)

Let Netanyahu win
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

Israeli airstrikes hit Gaza
(al Jazeera english)

UN halts Gaza aid over 'thefts'
(al Jazeera english-- Hamas says theft was mistake)

War reporters used to prefer morality to 'impartiality'
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

Rise of the moderates
(Antony Lerman, Guardian)

List of Gideon Levy articles from Haaretz

From the Saturday Jan 31st issue of the Irish Times

2009-02-05T18:03:00.000-05:00

Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Irish Call for Justice for Palestine
Israel's bombardment of Gaza killed over 1,300 Palestinians, a third of them children. Thousands have been wounded. Many victims had been taking refuge in clearly marked UN facilities.

This assault came in the wake of years of economic blockade by Israel. This blockade, which is illegal under International Humanitarian Law, has destroyed the Gazan economy and condemned its population to poverty. According to a World Bank report last September, "98% of Gaza's industrial operations are now inactive".

The most recent attack on Gaza is only the latest phase in Israel's oppression of the Palestinian people and appropriation of their land.

Israel has never declared its borders. Instead, it has continuously expanded at the expense of the Palestinians. In 1948, it took over 78% of Palestine, an area much larger than that suggested for a Jewish state by the UN General Assembly in 1947. Contrary to International Law, Israel expelled over 750,000 Palestinians from their homes. These refugees and their descendants, who now number millions, are still dispersed throughout the region. They have the right, under International Law, to return to their homes. This right has been underlined by the UN General Assembly many times, starting with Resolution 194 in 1948.

In 1967, Israel occupied the remaining 22% of Palestine: the West Bank and Gaza. Contrary to Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel has built, and continues to build, settlements in these occupied territories. Today, nearly 500,000 Israeli settlers live in the illegal settlements in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem), and the number grows daily as Israel expands its settler programme.

Israel has resisted pressure from the international community to abide by the human rights provisions of International Law. It has refused to comply with UN Security Council demands to cease building settlements and remove those it has built (Resolutions 446, 452 and 465) and to reverse its illegal annexation of East Jerusalem (252, 267, 271, 298, 476 and 478). Since September 2000, over 5,000 Palestinians, almost 1,000 of them minors, have been killed by the Israeli military.

11,000 Palestinians, including hundreds of minors, languish in Israel jails. Hundreds are detained without trial. In addition, Israel is breaking International Law by imprisoning them outside the occupied territories, thereby making it almost impossible for their families to visit them. Every year, hundreds of Palestinian homes are demolished. The Palestinian population of the West Bank and Gaza lives imprisoned by walls, barriers and checkpoints that prevent or impede access to shops, schools, workplaces, hospitals and places of worship. They are subjected to restrictions of every kind and to daily ritual humiliation at the hands of occupation soldiers and checkpoint guards.

Invasion, occupation and plantation of their land is the reality that Palestinians have faced for decades and still face on a daily basis, as their country is reduced remorselessly. Unless, and until, this Israeli aggression is halted, and the democratic rights of the Palestinian people are vindicated, there will be no justice or peace in the Middle East. Israel's 40-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza must be ended.

The occupation can end if political and economic pressure is placed on Israel by the international community. Recognizing this, the Palestinian people continually call on the international community to intervene.

We, the signatories, call for the following:

* The Irish Government to cease its purchase of Israeli military products and services and call

publicly for an arms embargo against Israel.

* The Irish Government to demand publicly that Israel reverse its settlement construction, illegal

occupation and annexation of land in accordance with UN Security Council resolutions and to use

its influence in international fora to bring this about.

* The Irish Government to demand publicly that the Euro-Med Agreement under which Israel has

privileged access to the EU market be suspended until Israel complies with International Law.

* The Irish Government to veto any proposed upgrade in EU relations with Israel.

* The Irish people to boycott all Israeli goods and services until Israel abides by International Law.

gaza aftermath, day 19

2009-02-05T18:01:00.000-05:00

Out of the rubble
(Mouin Rabbani, The National)

Amnesty International Gaza resources

Maltese Civil Society: Suspend EU-Israel agreement
(press release, EI)

Israeli navy intercepts Lebanese boat on its way to Gaza
(Guardian)

IDF: No arms and little found aboared seized Gaza-bound ship
(Haaretz)

Israel's lies
(Henry Siegman, London Books Review)

Buried Alive
(Eva Bartlett, EI)

Israeli army says shelling of house where girls died 'reasonable'
(Guardian-- to see the video of Dr. Abu Eish, click here)

Gaza burn victims exhibit possible signs of white phosphorous wounds
(Amira Hass, Haaretz)

I didn't know the word for "siege" when I was 5.

2009-02-04T01:15:00.001-05:00

From the BBC to DIRECTV

2009-02-04T00:32:00.002-05:00

Please take a moment to protest DIRECTV's unwillingness to air an informational ad by the US Campaign to End the Occupation about Gaza. It's important that corporate America knows this kind of censorship and truth-choosing cannot be tolerated. If Obama wants the States to restore its dedication to equality and justice, then we should lead by example.

Please visit US Campaign to End the Occupation

gaza aftermath, day 17

2009-02-03T18:43:00.005-05:00

Israel and the politics of friendship
(Joseph Massad, Columbia professor, EI--good read)

Ghosts of 1948 haunt Gaza crisis
(BBC)

Palestinians make ICC overture
(BBC)

UN backtracks on claim that deadly IDF mortar hit Gaza school
(Haaretz)

From Gaza to Jerusalem: the impact of war on the Israeli elections
(Peter Beaumont, Guardian)

Abbas promotes Gaza plan in France
(al Jazeera english)

Waltz with Bashir, Gaza, and the post moral world
(Bradley Burston, Haaretz)

Arab talk focuses on Palestinians
(al Jazeera english)

Aid worker: Gaza an apocalypse
(Mel Frykberg, EI)

Welcome to Gaza

2009-02-02T15:08:00.004-05:00

This piece is written by a journalist friend of mine about his first two days in Gaza. Please go to JustImage.wordpress.com for more of his writings and personal accounts of Gaza today, as well as the photos that accompany this piece.

We walked through an area of Jabaliya today that was completely destroyed by Israel. How, F-16? No. Tanks? No. Apache? No. Unmanned drones? No. So then how were dozens of homes destroyed and thousands made homeless in one area?

Dynamite.

This is a country that world leaders have the audacity to say is acting in "self-defense" and goes and puts bombs inside civilian homes and blows them up.

Why? Who really cares? How can such an act ever be justified? As one boy responded when I asked him, "They didn't destroy this because there was resistance here, and not because they want the land. They destroyed it because we are Palestinian!"

So true. Why even ask for the logic behind what Israel does? They do it and get away with it, and they don't have to explain themselves to anyone.

I was walking with my friend when I saw a young girl sitting atop her flattened home. The home was three floors before it was destroyed, now its height was probably equal to that of one of the floors. The rubble provided a perfect inclined surface for climbing up on top of the building.

I approached the young smiley girl and shouted out, "how can I come up into your home?"

She pointed to the staircase lying parallel with the earth and said, "the stairs!"

As I laughed at her my friend followed and asked her, "What are you doing sitting here on top of the rubble, aren't you scared there might be explosives left and you could be hurt?"

I was expecting an answer that had something to do with her feeling sad about what happened and wanting to be close to where she had lived her entire life.

Instead she replied, "I wanted him to take my picture." I couldn't believe it. This girl, 7 maybe, knew I would stop and go take her picture if she was sitting on top of her destroyed home.

By now, Palestinians in Gaza are used to the routine. Israel destroys. Journalists come. Nothing changes, in fact it seems to only get worse.

Every older person who I've talked to has made it a point to tell me that these latest attacks by Israel have by far been the worst they've ever witnessed. Some of them have lived for more than six decades of war. Never have Palestinians seen or heard a non-stop Israeli bombardment like the one that lasted for three weeks just last month.

It's quite incredible, the amount of destruction in the aftermath of these attacks. And it's even more incredible that a population -- that is already mostly refugees of countless Israeli wars -- has the will to keep living their lives, resisting the massive force that is trying so hard to keep them down.

I don't like to generalize, but a broad statement can be made for the 1.5 million people across the Gaza Strip. Regardless of their class or where they come from, their religious or political affiliation, all are living in the open-air prison that is Gaza. And all are subject to Israel's indiscriminate attacks across the territory. There is nowhere to go, nowhere to run.

Even now Israeli planes continue to fly overhead bombing targets across Gaza. Each time a jet is heard everyone stops ... and listens, closely, quietly, shhhh ... as it passes with no sounds of earth rattling explosions you can finally exhale, relax. No one died that time, thank God. But it will return again and again, and if not next time then the time after, or the time after
that the sound of the jet will not fade in and out with no interruptions in between.

So, you wait. You sit knowing that you are alone. You, sitting in your home watching television are the "terrorist" committing the wrong in the eyes of the world.

What was that? Shhhh... listen.... is it? No, it's nothing. A car off in the distance, thank God. Sit back, relax... and smile to yourself when you realize how silly you were to think that doing so might actually be possible. There is no chance to relax when you're constantly waiting for something to happen.

Like I've heard many times in English from the hundreds of people who I've met in the past two days, "Welcome to Gaza."

gaza aftermath, day 16

2009-02-02T11:31:00.002-05:00

Gaza: The death and life of my father
(Fares Akram, Independent-- personal account)

Can Mitchell turn Jerusalem into Belfast?
(Ali Abu Nimah, EI)

A context for Gaza
(Duncan Kennedy, Harvard Crimson)

Sewage may contaminate Gaza drinking water
(EI)

States of confusion
(Khaled Diab, Guardian)

Gaza is no Warsaw Ghetto
(Mark LeVine, al Jazeera english)

Palestinian men bear trauma of war
(al Jazeera English)

gaza aftermath, day 15

2009-02-01T20:56:00.003-05:00

Israel threatens 'disproportionate' response to Palestinian rocketfire
(Guardian)

Palestinians vs. Tibetans-- a double standard
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

Gaza desperately short of food after Israel destroys farmland
(Guardian)

When did we stop caring about civilian deaths in wartime?
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

Coping in Gaza
(Photostory, EI)

Belgium to stop exporting 'arms that bolster the IDF' to Israel
(Haaretz)

Carter says Hamas must be included
(al Jazeera english)

Beyond the bounds of religion
(Shelina Zahra Janmohamed, Guardian)

A call from the ruins of Beit Lahiya
(video, Guardian)

Gaza: Families in the rubble of Jabal al Rayas
(video, Guardian)

'Phosphorus shells' hit UN school
(video, Guardian)

Breathing while Palestinian

2009-01-30T16:15:00.002-05:00

I recently attended a lecture on the legalities of the war on Gaza. The moderator actually began by commenting on how, from a legal view, the title "Understanding the War on Gaza" was contentious. That one mischievous little preposition, "on", opened up a Pandora's box of legal questions-- was the war ON Gaza? not IN Gaza? What legal implications are there that it was not an INTERnational war (in that it was not between two legally recognized nations)? Does this have implications for International Humanitarian Law (not really, was the consensus) What responsibilities does Israel hold as the Occupier? Is Gaza occupied? Who was the aggressor and who was the defender? Could the two year economic blockade Israel imposes on Gaza be considered an act of war? What are the criteria of self defense? And then on legal accountabilities...what options are there for holding Israel accountable for breaches of law-- should it be found to have broken it-- since it is not a member of the International Court of Justice? How is Hamas legally regarded? Is it regarded as a collective entity recognized by international law?

I must admit, I am not well versed in law. And while I took notes, the speakers posed a series of questions and expounded upon them, but did not take positions per se (except during the question/answer). With Israel/Palestine, there are many grey areas, and legally-- apparently-- it is a singular situation, and thus there is not a standard of international/war/humanitarian/occupation laws that always apply to it. There was discussion of Palestnians' focus on the Fourth Geneva Convention, and Israel's refusal to recognize it. Interestingly, one panelist relayed an annecdote from a SOAS colleague who every year has his students engage in a role playing activity. And he said that everytime he does this, whatever real-life politics those playing Palestinians hold, the "Palestinians" always rely on international law to make their arguments-- that invariably they find that legally, they are being wronged and have a case. Students who, in real life, may support Israel's expansionist policies and illegal activities-- when forced to see Israel through Palestinians' eyes--argue that its actions contradict international laws.

Much of the talk revolved around the legalities of "targetting" civilians, and the grey areas around that (a civilian may be targetted if he/she is directly participating in hostilities against the enemy, but only during the action of direct hostilities, i.e. if James had in the past directly participated in said hostilities, he cannot be targetted today for past actions, unless right at the moment of targetting he is directly participating in hostilities. That is my understanding) In response, a dear friend of mine stood up during questions and asked, "How can we begin to talk about 'targetting' when Israel is dropping one and two ton bombs into residential areas-- because ALL of Gaza is residential. How do they think they are NOT targetting civilians? With all the escape routes open to the people of Gaza (sarcasm), how can Israel not be held accountable for targetting civilians?" He received a thunderous round of applause from the audience, and an immediate shut down by one of the panelists that his argument held "0 in terms of legality".

I left the panel wondering if laws are created and upheld to issue justice to those whose rights have been violated, or to protect through "technicalities" and issues of "grey" those who execute violations. Rashid Khalidi presented the collective,mass criminalization of Palestinians as "breathing while Palestinian" (a pun off of the American saying "driving while black" that illustrates the non-Black's immediats assumption that if a Black person is driving in a White neighborhood he/she must be engaging in some criminal activity). That just breathing qualifies you as engaging in hostile activities, if you are Palestinian.

So do we try to revamp international law or work within its confines, as Israel continues to enjoy impunity from its actions, based on "technicalities" and "grey" areas? For Palestinians, it sadly seems they will be singing "I fought the law, and the law won" for quite a while without some way to hold Israel accountable for its actions. Do morality and law really not mix? in all the talk of the Law of War...where is the Law of Justice?

take a minute for 60 Minutes

2009-01-30T15:55:00.003-05:00

On sunday, CBS's news program 60 Minutes aired an in depth, honest look at the West Bank, Israel, and the Two-State Solution, "Time running out for a two-state solution?". It showed the realities of the settler movement and the Occupation's crushing effects on Palestinian lives.

In response, CBS has been attacked for being "anti-Israel" and "anti-Jewish"...it's important that we counter this negative feedback, to let CBS know that there are people who still support even-handed, objective journalism, and appreciate the courage they have to show truthfully the reality of Palestinian life in the West Bank.

Below are two links I've recieved through which you can submit notes of support for the program. Please take a minute to do that. You can edit the standard messages to write your own.

An example message:
Thank you so much for reporting and producing a balanced, objective piece on the reality of life in the West Bank for Palestinians. This is not a story that is regularly shown in the United States, and it speaks very highly of your show and your commitment to objective journalism that you featured such a story.

Again, thank you for continuing to uphold your dedication to balanced journalism.

Through Gaza Justice Action
Through J Street

gaza aftermath, day 13

2009-01-30T14:49:00.005-05:00

Every family has a story, here are some of them
(Eva Bartlett, EI)

Recep Erdogan storms out of Davos after clash with Israeli president over Gaza
(Guardian, includes video)

Spain investigates claims of Israeli crimes against humanity in Gaza
(Guardian)

Israel must investigate Gaza war crimes: US
(al Arabiya)

Gaza residents launch legal fight to make BBC broadcast aid appeal
(Guardian)

Gaza survivor describes day 48 members of family were killed in attack
(video, Guardian)

Secret Israeli database reveals full extent of Israeli settlement
(Haaretz)

gaza aftermath, day 11

2009-01-28T19:21:00.002-05:00

Obama's Gaza opportunity
(Tom Karon, Mother Jones)

The shortcut to peace
(Hasan Abu Nimah, EI)

Obama on Israel-Palestine
(Noam Chomsky)

Listen up, George
(Nicholas Noe, Guardian)

Gaza ceasefire of critical importance, says US Envoy
(Guardian)

Respect is not enough
(Wajahat Ali, Guardian)

Gaza Calling

2009-01-27T22:49:00.004-05:00

Gaza Calling
edited by Adam Shapiro
music by Checkpoint 303

Impartiality and the US Itinerary

2009-01-27T20:22:00.006-05:00

Obama sent Mitchell to the Middle East today to speak with all "the major parties involved". But not Hamas. Apparently they're either not "major" enough for the new President, or "involved" enough for Obama. Or perhaps he only wants US representatives to engage in dialogues with leaders who were democratically elected by their own people...oh wait, Mitchell's already met with Mubarak, there goes that explanation...

And as Obama made his first appearance on an Arab news station, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton assured the world that the US "backed the Israel's [sic] bombardment of Gaza." She voiced her concern that "The [Palestinian] rocket barrages which are getting closer and closer to populated areas [in Israel] cannot go unanswered."

So Hillary Clinton is alarmed by Palestinian rockets which are approaching "populated areas" in Israel, but supports the "bombardment" of Israeli rockets into Gaza-- the most densely populated area on earth. How very humanitarian.

I wonder who was the last US representative to visit the Gaza Strip. I really do. They all seem to be well aquainted with Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Ramallah (once in a while), Cairo...I literally do not recall ever hearing of a US representative visiting Gaza. Even after ALL of this destruction-- the unceasing images of dead and maimed children, the thousands of concrete buildings reduced to rubble, the bombing of graveyards and mosques, the exploded sewage system (yes, that's right-- on top of everything there is a public health crisis of broken sewage systems), the hundreds of thousands of Gazans without electricity, water, or medical attention-- Gaza is still not on the itinerary for US representatives pursuing a "true and lasting peace" in the Middle East.

But then again, it wasn't on the BBC either. Apparently recognition of Gaza's humanitarian catastrophe somehow compromises your "impartiality"...but we can recognize the threats of Hamas rockets into Sderot, and support the people of Sderot's security as "paramount" and remain even handed? What was the final exchange of deaths? 1,400:13? 108:1?

God keep us all from such racist impartiality in the face of barbarity, and give us the strength to continue to give Gazans the honor, dignity, and respect they deserve as we would give any other human on this earth. They are not an exception.

back to school in gaza

2009-01-27T20:15:00.002-05:00

the first placard reads: the martyr 'Amr Qudas

(the placards commemorate the memory of these boys'
schoolmates, killed during the Gaza attacks)

gaza aftermath, day 10

2009-01-27T19:47:00.003-05:00

Mitchell heads to Middle East to initiate dialogue between Israel and Hamas
(Guardian)

Gazans wounded in Israeli air raid
(al Jazeera english)

George Mitchell and the Middle East
(Gerry Adams, Guardian)

TV appeal for Gaza raises 1m pounds, despite BBC and Sky refusal (and BBC faces lawsuit over broadcast refusal)
(Guardian)

Obama: Time for Palestinians, Israelis to talk
(Haaretz, plus youtube video of his al Arabiya interview)

gaza aftermath, day 9

2009-01-26T19:25:00.002-05:00

The Indian example
(Radhika Sainath, EI-- on non-violence vs. violence as means of resistance)

Gaza appeal video
(Guardian-- the video BBC will not air)

Tony Benn makes his own appeal on BBC
(youtube video "if you won't broadcast the Gaza appeal then I will myself.")

Error of judgement
(Editorial, Guardian)

Fear and trauma in Gaza's schools
(al Jazeera english)

Writing checks for Gaza is easy. Politics is the tricky bit.
(Chris Patten, Guardian)

Americans turn to Al Jazeera for coverage of Gaza conflict
(Guardian)

For Gaza's dead children

2009-01-25T20:45:00.003-05:00

We have been flooded with your memories. Do not think your faces have blended together. Each of you has died a horrific and unique death. And we honor you and remember you. We remember you.

We see your chest, riddled with dime sized holes from phosphorous munitions...and know our silence was complience.

We see your eye lids stitched shut, after a bomb's fury ripped out your eyeballs...and we know our governments helped do this.

We see your porcelain faces, calm like a sleeping doll...and know we must fight so your brothers and sisters will never sleep this macabre slumber.

We see your body without legs and arms...and feel shame.

We see you without family, without your beloved parents...and know this is an unbearable loss, a void that no cease-fire, or two-state solution can ever fill.

I feel a sense of responsibility for these losses, these deprivations. That somehow, something I-- we-- could have done, would have spared these children their lives...and the loss of their beloved families. Their deaths and losses are done. We cannot bring them back to life through tears or guilt. But we can remember them. We can remember that their deaths do not have to be repeated. Ever. They were, and are, preventable. I think it is important to remember that this number of 1,300 is comprised of unique, beloved, funny, grumpy, smart, creative, stubborn, generous, strict, curious, human individuals-- each person has a story and a name. What we read as numbers of casualties and piles and piles of names, each one holding the story of an entire person, who was loved by many...both living and dead. We must remember they are human. They are not numbers.

In particular, I remember the lurch in my stomach reading about Shahed Abu Sultan, an 8 year old girl who was killed by an Israeli helicopter who shot her in the head. Her father wrote her a letter...

"I cried a sea of tears for you but those tears have not calmed my heart because you left, my daughter. I have no tears remaining, but my heart wants to go on cryng blood, my daughter, my beloved Shahed. Your smooth smile, your sweet and angelic face, we miss you with each moment, our darling. My daughter Shahed died once, but I die a million times a day...My heartache will go on forever."

We continue to fight for the children of Gaza, so they may have a future brighter, and less destructive, than phosphorous bombs. And for the babas of Gaza, so they will never have to cry again.

gaza aftermath, day 8

2009-01-25T20:22:00.002-05:00

Archbishop of Canterbury joins criticism of BBC refusal to screen Gaza appeal
(Guardian)

The BBC has been here before
(Nigel Fountain, Guardian-- BBC and apartheid 35yrs ago)

From London to Gaza
(George Galloway, Guardian)

Egypt aims to cement Gaza ceasefire
(al Jazeera english)

Children of Gaza in Egyptian hospitals
(video, al Jazeera English)

Schools reopen
(pictures, al Jazeera english)

gaza aftermath, day 6

2009-01-23T17:26:00.003-05:00

Please visit Electronic Intifada for a variety of excellent pieces on Gaza and Palestine in general...it is very hard to pick out just one or two to post, so I would encourage you all to visit it independently.

The children of Palestine
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian-- personal stories of 10 children who were killed)

UN human rights official:Gaza evokes memories of Warsaw Ghetto
(Haaretz)

Q/A with Taghreed el Khodary, NYT reporter from, and in, Gaza

The Self defense defense
(Rachel Shabi, Guardian)

Israel forms war crimes defense team
(al jazeera english)

BBC refuses airtime to Gaza aid appeal
(Guardian)

Is the BBC right on Gaza?
(Guardian poll-- please vote!)

In praise of...The Disaster Emergency Committee
(Editorial, Guardian)

Sharpeville, 1960, Gaza 2009
(Dr. Haider Eid, EI)

Why I'm boycotting Israeli produce
(Blog, Guardian)

Journey Home
(short film showing the return of exiled Palestinians to Palestine, al Jazeera english)

gaza aftermath, day 5

2009-01-22T11:35:00.003-05:00

Who will save the Palestinians?
(Mark LeVine, al Jazeera English-- very good read on the merits of violent vs. non-violent resistance and a brief history of Hamas)

So far, Obama's missed the point on Gaza
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

Gaza war ended in utter failure for Israel
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

Obama lays out Middle East vision
(al Jazeera english)

Protests over Gaza spread to eight English Universities
(Guardian)

Stop trying to Hamas, Deal with us
(Khaled Meshal, Haaretz)

gaza aftermath, day 4

2009-01-21T13:35:00.002-05:00

Why Israel won't survive
(Ali Abu Nimah, EI...excellent piece)

Israeli refuseniks confront the IDF from Ni'lin to Tel Aviv
(Haaretz, on the continuing refusenik movement)

Israel admits troops may have used phosphorous shells in Gaza
(Guardian)

Belgium court petitioned to arrest Livni upon arrival in Brussels
(Haaretz)

Israel's right to defend itself
(Jospeh Massad, EI)

Obama's foreign policy agenda is deafeningly silent on Gaza or Palestine
(White House)

Obama's Mid East policy could take cues from Northern Ireland experience
(Johnathon Freedland, Guardian)

Israel and the white heat of justice
(John Palmer, Guardian)

map of incursion

2009-01-20T18:33:00.002-05:00

A collective of activists in Beirut have created an illustrative map of the areas of bombardment in Gaza and the number of casualties and injured. This is a great resource for dissemination, and links to some blogs coming out of Gaza.

Hope and Change for Gaza? Yes, we can.

2009-01-20T13:14:00.002-05:00

Now the dust is settling in Gaza. Now we are collectively exhaling sighs of relief that no more Gazans are being killed, they are now only dying of treatable injuries made fatal by lack of medical supplies, medical personnel, and medical infrastructures like hospitals. Now puppet leaders who sold the Palestinians down the river years ago are lunching over how to "solve Gaza" and Israel is saying it will "continue" to negotiate with its Arab neighbors (note: its Arab neighbors in Gaza are not included). Now America-- and a large part of the world-- is celebrating the ushering in of Hope and Change with President Obama. Now Gazans are sifting through rubble and collecting bodies (and body parts) to try to identify and bury (where I don't know...as the graveyards are either full or bombed). Now the foreign press has entered and witnessed the carnage first hand.

Now the hard part comes.

The ongoing rage is subsiding, as pictures of dead babies fade to the background and calls for inquiries on war crimes come to the forefront. This latest round of massacring has produced an unprecedented level of open criticism of Israel. Calls for boycotts are being taken seriously across the world. People are finally organizing in a seemingly productive way for Palestinian rights. Because now-- this momentum-- is what will carry us forward to ensure that this never happens again. We need to continue this movement. Continue raising money. Donating time, talent, resources. Writing letters to the editor. Attending rallies. Writing poems. Convening town hall meetings. Attending town hall meetings. I attended a rally yesterday in which the speaker relayed at the last town hall meeting, they formed a Union of Mothers, and a Union of Bodega Owners (itihaad ashaab al mahalat, "wa kolna ashaab al mahalat") which promised to boycott Israeli goods. This movement of boycott was a strong force against Apartheid rule in South Africa. It should be embraced and executed to pressure Israel to respect Palestinian rights. We must keep up the momentum. Admittedly this becomes harder and harder with each day that "the Gaza crisis" fades into the memory of "another episode of violence in the Middle East". But we must remain organized. We cannot only be reactive to these atrocities. We must be proactive to prevent them from ever happening again. We must organize so Gaza does not keep rebuilding to point zero, but can move on and move forward and grow as a society and people have the right to. This is in all of our hands. It is incumbent upon us to use whatever means we can-- donations, art, writing, boycott, organizing-- so Gaza may live freely. So that one day justice may rain down on Gaza, and never again phosphorous bombs.

To Americans-- take a minute and write your representative and call President Obama ((202) 456-1111) and remind him that Hope and Change apply also to Palestinians. This only takes a minute and it is imperative that our voices are heard. It is unacceptable that a week ago, calls supporting Israel's actions outnumbered those condemning it 10:1. Get on the phone. You can also email him at president@whitehouse.gov

SAMPLE LETTER (please edit and personalize it!)

Dear Rep. ____,

As your constituent, I am very disappointed in your unwavering support for an Israeli operation in Gaza that everyday takes us further away from viable and sustainable peace in the Middle East.

The simple title of the resolution is troubling. While "reaffirming the United States' strong support for Israel," it includes "supporting the Israeli-Palestinian peace process" as a purpose. So clearly supporting Israel's actions, with little recognition of the humanitarian crisis that is and has been unfolding in Gaza, not only compromises American legitimacy in acting as a responsible broker of a peace arrangement, but threatens to make this conflict even more intractable. The more we back these extreme military actions without acknowledging grievances on both sides, the less we will be able to support a peace process. Most importantly, the more innocent Palestinian and Israeli civilians suffer.

Israel wants to protect its residents in the South, but is actually making life more dangerous for them, as it is clear that the operation is not achieving its stated goal of destroying Hamas's capability to fire rockets. Despite the beating it has taken, Hamas is still firing and probably will continue to. Gideon Lichfield, former JerusalemEconomist, questions whether deterrence works. "Deterrence has to be equal to the enemy's fear of defeat; when the only defeat is annihilation, there is no deterrence unless Israel is prepared to reduce all of Gaza to rubble." Hamas has shown that it will continue to fight back. Continued escalation of the conflict will not lead to a peaceful solution, but will only make life more miserable for the innocent civilians on both sides.

Apart from the humanitarian issue, I am concerned as an American that our legitimacy on the world stage has been severely compromised, fueling the fire of extremists who consider us their enemies. This is a national security issue, and I am concerned that we do not improve our own standing as an actor for peace or the prospects for peace in the region by blindly supporting Israel's more extreme policies, militarily and symbolically. If the U.S. wants to be a true friend to Israel, we ought to be willing to question its choices and determine that its actions are not always in the interest of regional stability.

I, and many other constituents in (STATE NAME), urge you to publicly express the need for an immediate cease-fire and resumption of aid flowing into Gaza.

As a Representative who believes in human rights and understands the importance of American standing in the world, take a stand. Do it for the Palestinians suffering under suffocating and hopeless conditions in Gaza, for the Israelis living in fear of rocket fire, and for Americans hoping that their country's legitimacy and standing in the world is not compromised.

Thank You,

gaza aftermath, day 3

2009-01-20T12:23:00.002-05:00

'I felt it was my duty to protest'
(an interview with Ilan Pappe, Guardian)

Outcry over weapons used in Gaza
(al Jazeera english)

Posturing and laughter as victims rot
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

UN Chief urges probe
(al Jazeera english)

Gaza doctors struggle to treat deadly wounds consistent with phosphorous use
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Gazans say IDF ignored white flags, shot at them
(Amira Hass, Ha'aretz)

Amid dust and death, a family's story speaks for the terror of war
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Gaza has exposed the Arab leaders to fury and contempt
(Ian Black, Guardian)

Israel wanted a humanitarian crisis
(Ben White, Guardian)

Israel's disconnect
(Julie Flint, Guardian)

gaza aftermath, day 2

2009-01-19T10:31:00.004-05:00

Gaza film shows white phosphorous from alleged Israeli attack
(Guardian)

The real damage in Gaza
(Anas Altikriti, Guardian...on Israel's ever decreasing moral clarity)

Israel rushes to withdraw troops as Gaza reconstruction talks begin
(Rory McCarthy, Guardian)

Before and After
(photos, Guardian)

Telling the truth about war
(Savitri Hensman, Guardian)

So I asked the UN secretary general, isn't it time for a war crimes tribunal?
(Robert Fisk, Independent)

gaza aftermath, day 1

2009-01-18T11:41:00.004-05:00

Lull after the storm
(Amjad Atallah and Daniel Levy, Guardian...long, very good)

Egypt summit backs peace efforts
(al Jazeera english...very good, critical)

Can Hamas still walk tall in Gaza's streets?
(Peter Beaumont and Hazem Balousha, Guardian)

"Israel has achieved nothing from this"
(Inigo Gilmore in Gaza, Guardian)

A pointless war has led to a moral defeat for Israel
(Editorial, Guardian)

An open response to A.B. Yehoshua
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

Hamas calls Gaza ceasefire and sets deadline for Israeli withdrawal
(Guardian)

Israeli ceasefire offers precious respite, but little has changed
(Ian Black, Guardian)

Israel accused of war crimes over 12-hr assault on Gaza village
(Fida Qishta in Gaza, Guardian)

Gaza Diary: To die with hope
(Mohammad Ali in Gaza, al Jazeera english)

Clashes follow Israeli "cessation"
(al Jazeera english)

We Will Not Go Down (in Gaza)

2009-01-17T14:18:00.001-05:00

hear Michael Heart's inspiring song/video on Gaza's steadfastness.

3's company? not with Israel

2009-01-17T13:20:00.003-05:00

Imminent is a unilateral ceasefire. As my friend assured me the other night that it would, it comes just before Barack Obama's inauguration and a hazy future of Israeli-American relations. Hazy in that Israel is unsure if it will receive a carte-blanche of destruction from the US government anymore. The relationship between these two nations will continue strong, while others (Mauritenia, Qatar, Syria, Bolivia, and Venezuela) have severed ties with Israel in protest of its inhumane attacks on Gaza. So Israel crammed this 3 week war in, just when Bush was fading out of public view and would surely not take any sort of action against them, and Obama--with his promises of "hope and change"-- had not yet assumed power.

Israel and the United States have signed an agreement for Gaza's border, in which the US will provide "technical assistance" to ensure that Gaza will "never again be used as a launching pad against Israeli cities", as Rice stated. Not, predictably, to ensure that Gaza will never again be starved, occupied, and strangled. It is certainly welcome news that Israel will soon cease its indefatigable attacks on the people of Gaza. God knows they need rest from bombs, shelling, blood, death, and destruction. But, as before-- this ceasefire agreement seems to be missing one key element...the consultation and agreement of Palestinians. Israel and the United States talk, and make agreements which shape the lives (and deaths) of Palestinians, without setting aside their colonialist ideals and taking seriously the words of the Palestinians. Israel runs on unilateral decisions-- its withdrawal fromg Gaza in 2005, its construction of the Apartheid Wall.

These unilateral, and bilateral decisions with the States, will not and cannot lead to any real peace. Palestinians, in the case of the Gaza attacks, Hamas, must have an equally respected and weighted voice in the outcomes of the land. Whether or not Israel likes it, whether or not Israel bombs the hell out of Gaza and builds innumberable illegal settlement-colonies in the West Bank, Palestinians exist. This is the problem Israel has faced since before its creation. Palestinians exist. When Palestinians are consulted, during "negotiations", Israel increases settlement building, continues the construction of the Apartheid Wall, continues demolishing homes, and jailing youth. But far too often-- during these episodes of bloody violence-- Palestinian representatives are not taken seriously in the creation of a cessation of violence. It just does not make sense-- you cannot create a real peace without legitimately and seriously talking with one of the two peoples involved. The US is not being bombed. The US is not being starved. The US has electricity and fuel and functioning hospitals. The US is not watching its children dying continuously with no ability to help them. Gaza is. The US should not replace Palestine in agreements, but should complement them (in absence of any real unbiased mediator). Sidestepping Palestinians reeks of colonialism, when Europeans would decide the fates of the dark, colonized "natives"-- drawing up borders that pleased their own interests, rather than those of the indigenous people, and placing sychophantic leaders, rather than democratically elected leaders from the people (ahem, Hamas). And we all know how well that policy worked out.

A real agreement must include the people of Gaza, the representatives of the people of Gaza. Hopefully Obama's administration will realize that in the case of Palestine-Israel, 3 is company, 2 is ineffective.

gaza attacks, day 22

2009-01-17T11:25:00.003-05:00

The Palestinians say: 'This is a war of extermination'
(Ahdaf Soueif, Guardian)

How many divisions?
(Uri Averny, Gush Shalom)

How to sell ethical warfare
(Neve Gordon, Guardian...read this then #3)

'We are creating suicide bombers from the sons of the dead'
(Guardian, on Israeli soldiers who refuse to serve in the army)

Trauma and terror in Gaza
(Sami Abdel Shafi (in Gaza), Guardian)

Fresh evidence of Israeli phosphorous use in Gaza emerges
(Guardian)

Qatar, Mauritania cut ties with Israel
(al Jazeera english)

Time for Israel to be put on trial
(Elna Sondergaard, EI)

Doctor's loss caught on video
(video, al Jazeera English...he was lucky enough to have an Israeli contact, what of the other fathers who have lost their children?)

The plot against Gaza
(Johnathon Cook, EI)

Israel shells UN school in Gaza
(al Jazeera english)

When it comes to Gaza, leave the Second World War out of it
(Robert Fisk)

gaza attacks, day 21

2009-01-16T10:08:00.003-05:00

at 3 weeks...

This is what Hell must look like
(the personal account of 2 Norwegian doctors who were working in Gaza. Gwladys Fouche, Guardian)

Syria: "Cut all ties with Israel"
(al Jazeera english)

In death, there is no rest in Gaza

2009-01-15T18:10:00.002-05:00

Yesterday Israel bombed Gaza's largest graveyard, Sheikh Radwan cemetery. In Gaza, where there is no more room to bury the dead, those who have already passed and were lucky enough to be afforded room for burial were bombed. Graves were destroyed. Bones are scattered everywhere. Even in death, there is no rest for the people of Gaza. I have two friends whose grandparents are/were buried there. I cannot imagine the distress they must feel at this violation of sanctity. My grandmother passed away this summer, which was an incredible loss for me. After two months in Beirut I finally mustered up the courage to go to her grave to leave flowers...and was overwhelmed with a sense of peace of being near her, knowing she was at rest. One of my grandfathers died before the Lebanese civil war, and his grave was destroyed during the war. How unsettling, unpeaceful it must be...my heart aches for those whose loved ones' eternal rest was irrevocably disrupted by bombs. How cruel and base to hit a cemetery. Is there no rest even for the dead?

That was yesterday. That was about the dead. Today, Israel bombed a UN warehouse, holding emergency relief supplies to be disseminated to Gaza. Thousands of tons of food and medical supplies will be lost. Burned away. And spitefully, Israel shelled the warehouse not with a conventional bomb, but with phosphorous shells-- whose smoke turns toxic when mixed with water. So now those who survive this onslaught will have that much less food, that fewer medical supplies to heal the wounded.

I am so horrified, outraged, and deeply saddened...I feel there are really no words that can in any way relay my profound sorrow.

Last March, I saw the New York screening of Sling Shot Hip Hop (an incredible documentary for those who haven't seen it) with a friend of mine involved in issues of social justice, but not particularly knowledgeable of Palestine. When we walked out, both a bit stunned by the impact of the film, he just said, "It's unbelievable..." and that word, "unbelievable" resonated so deeply at that moment. What happens in Palestine IS unbelievable, in the truest sense of the word. Until you have been there, until you have been forced through apocalyptic checkpoints, humiliated at those checkpoints, been interrogated senselessly, seen and felt the monstrous weight of the Apartheid wall, walked through the refugee camps (which are really ghetto-ized urban settlements, a testament to their permanence), until you have felt the racism and separation that permeates the air, you cannot fully and truly believe it. It seems nonsensical. Imagine a land where there are so many dead that there is nowhere to bury them. Imagine a land where nearly every man has been imprisoned, detained, or humiliated. Imagine a land where only certain cars with certain distinct liscence plates may use certain roads. Imagine a land where you live behind a 30 foot tall concrete wall with barbed wire and watch towers. Imagine that in Gaza, now EVERY child has been traumatized by war. Every, single one. Imagine.

This is Palestine. This is Gaza. And it's unbelievable.

Children in Gaza need to know we care

2009-01-15T18:03:00.003-05:00

send a message of love and solidarity to the children of Gaza...

gaza attacks, day 20

2009-01-15T00:38:00.007-05:00

Growing outrage at the killings in Gaza
(open letter to British government from British academics, Guardian)

US suspends munitions delivery to Israel
(Guardian)

Israel hits UN refugee agency in Gaza
(Guardian)

A crisis in Judaism
(Brian Klug, Guardian)

When Israel expelled Palestinians
(Randall Kuhn, Washington Times-- a scathing explanation of the creation of Gaza today. must read.)

War as child's play
(Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

The gates of Hell, the window to Heaven
(Leila al Haddad, Electronic Intifada)

Why children are the first casualties of war in Gaza
(Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, Guardian)

Venezuela breaks off Israel ties
(al Jazeera english)

Bolivia cuts Israel ties over Gaza
(al Jazeera english)

Babies born in Gaza war
(video, al Jazeera english)

the times they are a-changin'

2009-01-14T11:00:00.002-05:00

In Bob Dylan's immortal words...

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.

Indeed, this time around, in this invasion, public opinion is shifting. Or rather, those who were more reticent to voice their opinions are finding the courage to vocalize their horror. This time around. Increasingly, the words of "holocaust" and "concentration camp"are being applied to the carnage in imprisoned gaza. It took 1,010 dead Palestinians in 19 days, for public spokespersons to find their courage. Now we know at least the level of atrocity that provokes (some) public figures out of their silence. This word of holocaust-- long monopolized by the Jewish community-- is being vocally applied to Gaza. A member of the Vatican recently remarked that Gaza was increasingly resembling a concentration camp. Even the Israeli government, in early spring of 2008, warned of holocaust-like response to Gaza if rocket fire did not cease. This word, a taboo for so long, is finding its way out of the mouths of public figures in response to Gaza, and into public discourse. It is beginning. I recently saw the Israeli film Waltz with Bashir, in which one of the main characters describes the Sabra and Shatila massacres as reminiscent of images of concentration camps. Even within Israeli society there is a shift. Maybe now we can begin to apply this word to other appropriate situations, or dissect its meaning and how we use it. Is "holocaust" synonymous with "ethnic cleansing"? in which case there are a plethora of other historical holocausts. Or does it describe the perversely systematic nature of the experience? To hold the Jewish Holocaust, as horrific as it was, as the singular, apex of human suffering and barbarity is to continuously cast Jews as victims of persecution. And yes, there remains in the world a horrible level of anti-Jewishness. But by constantly evoking this image of Jewish suffering, one regards Jews as the victims of terrible oppression, which they were...but forgets that some Jews are now turning around and becoming oppressors. It somehow exonerates them from treating Palestinians with humanity. This experience, this word, exculpates them in the eyes of the world from gross human rights abuses and war crimes, constantly victimizing them. And that is what pains me so much sometimes, to know that a people who know this suffering...they can then inflict it upon others. But as they say, "history is doomed to repeat itself."

It has taken this level of barbarity for the international community to (sort of) find its voice and say "this time, Israel has gone too far." Not the other times-- 1,000+ dead Lebanese was easier to swallow because it took 33 days to get there. Not when Israel pounded Gaza in 2006, then also killing entire families with one bomb. Now we have an established baseline of outrage-- 1000 in 19 days. An exchange rate of aproximately 53 Palestinians killed each day.

So now some writers are questioning Israel's response and challenging whether this is an "appropriate" level of retaliation. Now they are able to find their voices. Now they are able to say that this is not "acceptable"-- by their standards, for it's always these Western figures who determine the level of "acceptable" numbers of deaths for the non-West, isn't it? How gross. Perhaps, perhaps, a positive outcome of this latest incursion will be that people will be able to voice criticism of Israel's inhumane, illegal actions and not be labeled anti-semetic (which is a misnomer as Semetic describes Jews and Arabs...two people linked from way back. So when you say "anti-semetic" you are refering to discrimination against the Semetic people, who are Arab and Jewish). Maybe standing up for human rights won't mean you are ostracized for your "radical" views. Maybe. I hope so, I hope some positive change comes out of the deaths in Gaza. Maybe the communities fighting for Palestinian rights will become more organized so WE don't let this happen again. Maybe more writers will find the courage to vocalize their condemnation of Israel's actions. Maybe people around the world will continue to see the real images of dead Palestinian children that give them pause to reconsider their inclination of "Israel has the right to defend itself." So keep your eyes wide, though the chance may come again.

gaza attacks, day 19

2009-01-14T00:02:00.004-05:00

Europe stalls on closer Israeli links in Gaza protest
(Ian Traynor, Guardian)

Palestinian death toll in Gaza reaches 1,000
(Guardian)

Amid the horror and doom of Gaza, the IRA precedent offers hope
(Johnathan Freedland, Guardian)

Israel's free ride ends
(Michelle Goldberg, Guardian)

War crimes in Gaza? lets look closer to home
(Phil Shiner, Guardian)

Israel may face UN cour ruling on legality of Gaza conflict
(Afua Hirsch, Guardian)

UN rappoteur Richard Faulk on Gaza offensive
(video, al Jazeera english)

In Lebanon, "we are all Gaza"
(Christian Porth, al Jazeera english)

Gaza Diary: Where is the humanity?
(Mohammad Ali from Gaza via al Jazeera english)

Displaced and desperate in Gaza
(Safah Joudeh, al Jazeera english)

gaza attacks, day 18

2009-01-13T10:21:00.003-05:00

Mideast Dream Team? Not Quite
(Roger Cohen, NYT)

Gaza, day by day
(the interactive guide to Gaza)

Gaza Diary: Are we not human?
(read this for a very real feeling of the fear and sense of injustice plaguing Palestinians in Gaza)

Gazans trapped in no man's land between fire, farmland
(Amira Hass for Ha'aretz)

Who will save Israel from itself?

Israel is targetting medics

Gaza survival
(2 minute video)

Demands grow for Gaza war crimes investigation

We believe in resistance, not revenge
(Basim Naim, Minister of Health in Gaza government of Hamas. This posting is not a show of support for Hamas, but I think it is important to hear what Hamas representatives have to say to get a balanced understanding of the players involved.)

the oppressed must bear the burden of liberating themselves, politely and inoffensively.

2009-01-12T16:12:00.004-05:00

at a protest yesterday against israel's continuing violence in gaza, a group of guys next to me started chanting "long live the intifada! long live the intifada!" (for those who don't know, 'intifada' means 'uprising' in Arabic)...and i thought how easy it is for us, over here, far far far away from hunger, true cold, and bombs to vocally support another uprising, without ourselves suffering any of the consequences of it directly. perhaps their call was for literally, another uprising. maybe they were chanting to lend their support to any sort of continued palestinian resistance--armed, intellectual, artistic...whatever form it might take...subsumed under the title of intifada.

peter beaumont wrote today in the guardian of the merits of armed resistance. for as long as i've been critically engaged in the palestinian struggle, i've tried to formulate one opinion on armed resistance-- good or bad? right or wrong? moral or immoral? and still, after years, it is grey in my mind. i know i don't believe in violence as means to an end. i have deep moral qualms about the taking of another person's life, even if that person has committed haneous, unforgivable crimes. i am not comfortable with violence of any form-- physical, emotional, psychological...but at the same time, i know that no resistance movement has ever suceeded which did not have aspects of it which were militant or violent. every independence movement i know of included factions which embraced violence-- from the Black civil rights movement in the US to the Indian independence movement to the anti-apartheid struggles of Africans in South Africa. struggles have always included an array of resistance strategies and actions. Even Patrick Henry, as we learned in 4th grade American history class, espoused the desire, "give me liberty or give me death!"...a life without liberty is none at all...so how do you acheive it? i don't know...

beaumont poses the question, "when do we regard armed resistance as being acceptable?"...which glosses over the fact that "armed resistance" implies that there is something to resist against-- implicit in this question is the acknowledgement that there is an oppressive force which merits resistance...armed or not being the focus of this postulation. and again the onus is borne upon the shoulders of the oppressed to fight their oppression and subjugation in terms acceptable to "the free world" and the judging allies of its oppressors. the oppressed must bear the burden of liberating themselves, politely and inoffensively.

so in turn, i would pose the question, "when do we regard oppression as being acceptable?"

gaza attacks, day 17

2009-01-12T15:35:00.002-05:00

Things one sees from The Hague
(Gideon Levy...excellent)

supreme emergency in gaza
(a look at armed resistance and an analysis of the term "terrorism" and how we use it)

Israel's 'colonial tactics' decried
(calling a spade a spade)

Israel continues to waltz
(review of the Israeli film Waltz with Bashir, and its relevance to Gaza now)

Medicine with frontiers
(a look at the Egyptian hospital which is barely receiving Palestinian patients)

Gaza conflict will shake the Arab world
(effect of Gaza on the rest of the Arab world)

Profits of war
(economics of palestinian-israeli conflict)

Abnormal state
(Israel's double standards with the UN)

UN watchdog condemn's war on Gaza

on defeat and a phoenix

2009-01-11T23:23:00.003-05:00

newspapers are declaring that Olmert says Israel is nearing its "objectives". none of these papers have clarified for us what exactly these purported "goals" are, other than the redundant, indefatigable line of "crushing Hamas capability". for us, sitting at home reading news obsessively, watching images of children dying, homes being crushed, and peace slipping further and further out of sight...this goal of crushing hamas, well, it seems a smokescreen for some greater, hidden aim. an aim which is now hidden behind the smoke of white phosphorous munitions.

the people of Gaza know the aim. every bomb that explodes cries out "we want to get rid of you" "your lives are worthless to us". they know the aim is to crush Gaza, not Hamas--two very seperate entities, although the Western press would not have you think so with its unfounded allegations Hamas fighters infiltrating every pore of Gazan society-- a paltry excuse and justification for Israel's indiscriminant attacks.

Rashid Khalidi spelled out Israel's hidden agenda in quoting the 2002 IDF chief of staff..."The Palestinians must be made to understand in the deepest recesses of their consciousness that they are a defeated people.”

and so the bombs resonate deep into the recesses of childrens memories...into palestinians' consciousness...but not that they are a defeated people. that they are an unvalued people. a hated people. that is what resonates in my consciousness, with every person in Gaza that Israel succeeds in getting rid of.

but not defeat.

never defeat.

Israel has never acheived this goal of convincing Palestinians that they are a defeated people, for all the billions and trillions of dollars worth of arms they have employed against them. for all the thousands of houses demolished. for the thousands of young boys illegally detained in israeli jails. for those same boys who are tortured. for the 1.5 million Gazans they have been starving. for the hundreds of Palestinian villages and towns razed and destroyed in the creation of Israel in 1948. never, never have Palestinians believed they are defeated.

because a people who have nothing, have nothing to lose. the fight will continue. this i know. this i see every time i go to a protest and see generations of Palestinians marching together. solid. strong. dedicated. from the 70 year old grandmother in her embroidered dress, to the 5 year old boy draped in a palestinian flag-- struggling to carry a sign his same height.

so if this is Israel's aim, they might want to revise it...because this is an unachievable goal. but Israel knows no way other than might. It will continue to bombard, and Palestine will continue to rebuild...for Palestine, and especially Gaza in its ashen hell, has proven time and time again that it is a phoenix which will rise from the rubble of Israel's destruction.

gaza attacks, day 16

2009-01-11T17:16:00.002-05:00

day by day in Gaza
(an interactive, day by day look at Gaza attacks)

Israel "using white phosphorous"

Gaza Diary
(voice from Gaza)

My hero of the Gaza war
(Gideon Levy on al Jazeera)

A big shudder on the wing
(Haaretz editorial against Israel's bombardment)

2009-01-10T19:12:00.001-05:00

(inspiration from Bethlehem)
keep fighting
keep loving

Palestine will be free.

gaza attacks, day 15

2009-01-10T14:26:00.003-05:00

The time of righteousness
(by Gideon Levy...READ THIS ONE)

If you (or I) were Palestinian

a week in Rafah

Israel: Boycott, Divest, Sanction

Tired Middle East comparisons
(Robert Fisk)

through the looking glass...

2009-01-09T18:29:00.003-05:00

this is a purely fictional piece, a fake news article I wrote...all the names are fictional, with one sole, presidential exception. so imagine, for a moment, if the press reported on israel/palestine with a "pro-palestinian" slant and world leaders viewed the conflict through the eyes of Gazans...(i personally hate this "pro-israel"/"pro-palestine" dichotomy...as though we are cheering on a boxing match, choosing sides. to me "pro-palestinian" is synonymous with pro-human rights, equality, and equity...)

(December, 2008 Gaza City) Today, in an unprecidented move, Israeli bombs rained down upon the tiny area of the Gaza Strip. Home to 1.5 million people, the most densely populated area in the world, the Gaza Strip is largely defenseless against Israeli invasions.

"Bombs were falling everywhere! I was about to go visit my neighbor to ask for some bread, when a bomb landed on her house just a few meters away. My children's school has been hit now too. Thank God they were not there. Why are they doing this to us!?" cried Hala Abusalim. The Gaza Strip, in which she lives, has been the site of ongoing aggression by Israelis for the past year and a half. For over a year, Israel has economically strangled this tiny area of land and the people in it. Mounting frustration due to hunger and lack of medical supplies are prompting some locals to pressure Israel to stop terrorizing them. "We just want to live, like everyone else. Why won't they let us live? My daughters have nightmares now and refuse to leave my side. We sleep together."

Ahmad Salah, a militant from Gaza says, "They have given us no choice. Our children want to live in peace. They want to be able to eat and go to school like all children around the world. We have no choice but to defend our families."

Over the summer, President-elect Barack Obama visited the Gaza Strip, coldly rebuffing the state of Israel, which has been largely ostracized of late by the international community for its actions of state-sponsored terrorism. He visited mosques and UN schools and sat with Gazan families who had been affected by the Israeli seige and learned that 262 children had been killed by the siege. During his trip he remarked, "If someone were denying my family food, electricity, education, freedom of movement, employment, infrastructure, and basic humanity-- well, I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure that stops."

Today, American politicians echoed Obama's sentiments, with Republican leader Allen Smith defying Americans to spend one week living in the conditions of terror and abject poverty of Gaza, and not to want to protect themselves against such cruelty. He reaffirmed the United States' commitment to human rights and the war on terror and pledged to rebuild Palestinian infrastructure and supply arms to defend Palestinians' right to exist.

As Gaza continues to be victim to Israel's aggression, 46 Palestinians were killed today. Ghassan Abdullah, the youngest victim, was a 5 year old boy who enjoyed school and playing with his friends. His favorite color was blue, like the sea. He wanted to be a teacher when he grew up.

Reporting live, from the Gaza Strip...where hope is grim, but determination is strong.

gaza attacks, day 14

2009-01-09T11:38:00.005-05:00

CNN and Mustafa Barghouti on who broke the ceasefire

Mark Regev interview
(with real questions..around minute 9)

Israel shelled Gazans after evacuating them, UN says

Rafah razed

Not in my name
(Jewish voice of dissent against Israel's bombardment)

the children
(they wonder where the hate comes from...it comes from bombs)

A Jew's prayer for the children of Gaza
(read after the pictures)

In the name of humanity, what is Israel doing?

2009-01-09T10:38:00.003-05:00

This is a question British Channel 4 news posed to Mark Regev, spokesman for the Israeli Prime Minister in a recent interview after Israel prevented the International Red Cross from accessing injured Gazans for 3 days (Regev's interview starts around minute 9).

What is Israel doing...the amount of destruction Israel has wielded upon Gaza is incomprehensible, and forever unjustifiable. And yet, people continue to justify it. Regev struggled to repeat over and over to the reporter that his soldiers were fighting a difficult war. This is true. A war of tanks and bombs and artillary against a people whose sole objective is to live, exist, physically endure is very difficult. Closed-eared people dogmatically argue that Hamas openly calls for the destruction of Israel in its charter. Yes, it does. And Israel's actions openly, actively work to destroy Palestinian society and advancement. Israel denies sick Palestinians medical visas to recieve the healthcare they need; denies students travel visas to attend universities abroad, trapping them inside of Gaza and wasting their scholarship; humiliates Palestinians through the daily experience of checkpoints; closes up Gazas borders so that Palestinians are literally starving; IDF soldiers shoot at peace protests in the West Bank; Israel demolishes homes in illegal acts of collective punishment; deports Palestinians; jails and detains Palestinians without trial; assassinates military leaders, without trial; uses torture, physical and psychological, on Palestinian detainees; and bombs the Gaza Strip.

Israel's bombs have a captive audience. There is nowhere to run to in Gaza. And those that do run are killed anyways. Hamas' charter may speak words of destruction, but Israel's government carries out acts of destruction on an unbelievable scale. Each morning for the past 2 weeks I have woken up immediately panicking about what horrible and gruesome and REAL image will greet me when my internet browser opens to The Guardian. And each day I am met with either billows of smoke sailing upwards from some bombed out building, or the picture of a child covered in blood-- indiscernable whether dead or half alive. I sponsor a nine year old girl in Gaza City named Nahid, and at every picture of dead children I pause, trying to figure out of the doll-like image is her. She is deaf, so she is at least spared the psychological terror of 14 days of bombs dropping. Although she can still feel the tremors from them I'm sure.

And Regev struggles to find words to justify his government's actions. He says they will launch an investigation of inquiry....there I laughed. The number of times Israel has launched an inquiry into an inhumane act is uncountable...the ones I remember now off the top of my head are Rachel Corrie's murder, Tom Hurndell's murder, when an IDF soldier shot a 10 year old girl in the stomach on her way to school at close range (and I think that was only "investigated" because of the particularly gruesome images of her with her guts spilling out), Israel's bombing a van full of Lebanese-Canadians escaping the south in 2006, the recent bombing of the UN school in Gaza, and now the obstruction of IRC staff to reach injured Palestinians. The investigations department of the IDF must be quite busy. And these investigations are carried out to placate international outrage, and it is appeased by these hollow actions. And then people forget. Until the next atrocity.

A ceasefire has been approved by the UN Security Council, with the US abstaining from the vote. Remain impartial-- never to even slightly condemn Israe's inhumanity. Now we wait for the ceasefire to be actually implemented. The implementation will mean a lessening in the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza. Israel will stop raining bombs down on Gaza. Children won't be blown up. Parents won't be crushed to death under rubble. This is good. But this is a bandaid. It is a momentary pause in the ongoing cycles of violence between Israel and the Palestinians. We must go beyond a ceasefire and address the root cause of all the violence in Israel-Palestine-- the festering colonization of Palestinian land ("occupation" is by definition a short term occurence, and after 42 years of "occupation" in which Israel has drastically changed the demographics of the West Bank and Gaza, I think the term colonization is more appropriate, and falls more in line with Israel's hegemonic, expansionist, racist ideals than is "occupation"). The Israeli government knows, deep down, what it must do. Olmert recently admitted the need to relinquish all the West Bank land to Palestinians in an interview with an Israeli newspaper (on his way out the door). And yet, it is not done, because that would somehow admit some sort of "defeat". And so more land is appropriated, and more children are killed.

The grimness of the Gaza reality, for me, is only tempered by the unbelievable amount of emails, facebook messages, and comments of support I have gotten from people I haven't spoke to in years. The number of people who have written to say they are DISGUSTED with what is happening, HORRIFIED by Israel's actions. The number of people who have sent messages of solidarity, love, and support is truly touching. It helps me believe that there is still humanity. There are voices of outrage. And when I get tired, which I am a lot, they help rejuvinate me. An American friend of mine just IMed me. We had been planning for months that to celebrate our Sagittarius birthdays we were going to treat ourselves to a Broadway musical and have a proper New York night out...but she wrote to ask, instead of spending the money on broadway musicals, would I mind if she gave the money to help Gaza instead? would that be ok? I teared up when I saw her request. It was so selfless, so sweet. So hopeful to me...it is incredibly touching to know that someone is actually giving up something she has been looking forward to, a real treat, to give money to a people far, far away. Someone whose life is not directly connected to Israel/Palestine. It is a beautiful gesture. It gave me a real sense of hope that people are taking this to heart. People unconnected to Gaza are going out of their way to help. That there is still some common link of humanity that links the world. That Heart still trumps Tanks. And so I ask, again and again and again and again-- to those who proudly present Martin Luther King's immortal words that "an injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere" on t-shirts, facebook profiles, magnets...live these words, don't let them just adorn your space...embrace the challenge of Gandhi to "be the change you wish to see in the world." Because words are words are words are hollow without action...

I know people have been struggling to remember the beauty in the world when we are so overloaded with images and actions of baseness. But it's there. I think it's just not always drawn to our attention all the time. But people are helping, we are all trying, together. And this is hope.

the world is not respectable;
it is mortal, tormented, confused,
deluded forever; but it is shot
through with beauty, with love,
with glints of courage and laughter;
and in these, the spirit blooms...
--george santayana

song for gaza

2009-01-09T10:20:00.003-05:00

The Narcicyst and Shadia Mansour came together and created a beautiful song of resistance against Israel's brutality in Gaza...Hamdulilah. The download is for free, but I am asking that people who download it and like it make a donation to one of the organizations listed below. Think of it as an activist-humanitarian-itunes fee/donation.

Hopefully a true ceasefire will be in place soon, and we can begin rebuilding Gaza, again. There is great need right now for monatary support, as well as spiritual. Please give anything you can, from $1 on up...

ANERA
UNRWA

thank you.

gaza attacks, day 13

2009-01-08T22:43:00.000-05:00

How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of humanitarian disaster
(READ THIS ONE...by Avi Shlaim, "Gaza is a classic case of colonial exploitation in the post-colonial era.")

What you don't know about Gaza
(by Rashid Khalidi-- quick, to the point...run in the NYT, featuring the facts the NYT usually omits)

Israel accused of delaying medical access to injured
(Red Cross on Israel impeding its access)

On rage and indifference

Too much to mourn in Gaza
(on the magnitude of death)

Jordan "reconsidering Israel ties"

gaza attacks, day 12

2009-01-07T12:04:00.000-05:00

"By choice they made themselves immune"
(excellent piece on how israel's actions in gaza are in line with their 1948 policy of ethnic cleansing)

Lucky my parents aren't alive to see this
(Amira Hass)

Why do they hate the West so, we will ask
(Robert Fisk)

Hypocrisy, thy name is Blair
(on Blair/the West's involvement in undermining any possibility of a ceasefire)

We'll Fight them in the Headlines
(on patriotism and journalism)

No Shelter
(Guardian editorial on ceasefire)

on self defense and dead children.

2009-01-07T00:45:00.000-05:00

today, israel bombed a UN school which was housing IDPs (internally displaced people) from gaza. israel has been dropping leaflets telling palestinians to leave their homes and seek shelter in schools and hospitals..."safe" places. the school was clearly marked as a UN building. it was filled with non-militants. it was filled with children. i opened the news this morning and my stomach churned at the image that faced me...the still frame of a video showing a young man carrying a little boy (half conscious? dead? i don't know...i haven't had the nerve yet to watch the video. i haven't had a stomach of "cast iron lead" yet to watch a boy dying. again.) i can't...not today.

again, israel bombed palestinian refugees. my mind raced back to qana I in lebanon in '96, when israel dropped a bomb on 100+ lebanese taking refuge in a UN camp in qana in southern lebanon. i don't understand...a phrase i find myself repeating over and over in my mind and my writing...i just can't understand. i distinctly remember walking to school that morning and trying to process what kind of army murders 100 people. how you can drop a bomb knowing there are living, breathing people underneath you. i wonder if killing is easier from far away...the distance of dropping a bomb rather than seeing the person whose life you're about to take face to face. they don't have to see the dead babies. they don't have to clean up the blood and try to identify remains. the memorial of the first qana massacre is horrific. there were parts of dead babies everywhere as most of the people taking refuge there were women and children. and then again, in 2006, israel delivered us qana II when it bombed and killed some 60 lebanese civilians again taking refuge there.

israel gives us sequels and trilogies to our tragedies.

so now qana was qana is gaza. in its war on lebanon in 2006, israel again dropped leaflets and sent text messages to lebanese (yes, somehow they have the technology to text you warnings) urging them--so humanitarily, the media showed us-- to leave southern lebanon, flee for their safety so they would not be "accidentally" killed in the war. and so, lebanese heeded the benevolent warnings of their attackers and piled into vans and cars drove north towards beirut, towards safety, as they were instructed. and then, in some perversely twisted game of dodgebomb, israel dropped vans and cars full of fleeing lebanese.

but in gaza, there is nowhere to flee to. israel closed the borders long ago. those who have left their homes have taken refuge in schools...which are now not safe either. hamas rockets hit a kindergarten recently in israel, but thankfully no children were there. israeli schools near gaza's borders have been evacuated since the incursions began. israeli children have somewhere to flee to. palestinian children flee to schools and are killed.

israel killed 40+ people today bombing the UN school. justified as "self defense". against whom are they defending themselves? the eight year old boy bleeding to death in the still frame i still cannot bear to watch? DO NOT TELL ME this was self defense. it is spiteful, purposeful targeting of palestinian life. israel bombed a school. they killed children. is it defending itself against educated palestinian children? crush palestinian infrastructure-- hospitals and schools-- and keep the population physically weak and uneducated. easier to keep divided and conquered. are they afraid that indeed, the pen is mightier than the sword? and that a palestinian population armed with pens might be able to defeat their western supplied army of proverbial swords? is this what israel defends itself against in its incursions in gaza? armies of educated palestinian children who might, despite all odds against them, grow up into educated palestinian adults? palestinian unity, palestinian education, palestinian strength, palestinian children...who are the future? yes. because breaking a society from every angle possible ensures it remains weak and divided.

so many times i have heard the plea for a movement of non-violence to be carried out by the palestinians. so many ask, "but why don't we see a palestinian gandhi? or martin luther king?" there are non-violent palestinian movements, but they are not as sexy as the image of violent, threatening, muslim/nationalist movements, and are thus overlooked by the media. in the city of ni'lin in the west bank, palestinians stage peaceful protests weekly against the encroaching apartheid wall, only to be met with rubber bullets, live bullets, and tear gas. but that doesn't make it into the news that much either. israel also has a habit of regularly jailing/detaining palestinian leaders, making organizing all the more difficult. but to those curious of why we don't see a strong non-violent palestinian movement, i throw the question back to them...why don't we see a strong non-violent jewish israeli movement? i am sure it exists, but not on a government level. the government still embraces the "might is right" mentality of destruction. the media does a huge disservice to people everywhere in ignoring those movements of meaningful coexistance and peace, polarizing people even further.

and now gaza is in darkness. they are recieving about 2hrs of electricity a day. for those unfamiliar with middle eastern weather, it is cold and rainy in gaza right now. people are sleeping with no heat, as they have been for the past 3 months. gaza is in darkness, starving, and bleeding, and israel maintains there is "no humanitarian crisis." and electricity is running out. i am glued to the computer all day reading news, having to tear myself away to take a deep breath, clear my head. but i am fearful that one day i will wake up and there will be simply no news because the electricity would have run out and no news can come out anymore. israel is barring western journalists from entering gaza, just as it did after the jenin massacre in the second intifada. as robert fisk notes, this practice has created a new sort of journalism-- most of the news coming out of gaza is being told by the victims themselves. for the first time, much of the news isn't sanitized by western journalists, rather it's being told directly by those whose lives are being destroyed. their voices are being heard, unfiltered.

but the electicity will run out. God only knows what horror will be unleashed if the world becomes truly blind to what is happening inside of gaza. if emails cannot be sent out. if phones cannot be recharged to assure friends, family, colleagues that yes, i am still alive. if gazans have no more lines to the outside world, and we have no more inside... i fear deeply israel is delivering sabra/shatila II. enough of the sequels and trilogies...

gaza attacks, day 11

2009-01-06T19:44:00.000-05:00

Israeli shellingof Gaza kills dozens at UN School in Gaza

Jon Stewart's take on Gaza

"As I ran I saw three of my children. All dead"
(voice from Gaza)

Keeping out the cameras and reporters simply doesn't work.
(Robert Fisk "The men and women who are under air and artillery attack by the Israelis are now telling their own story on television and radio and in the papers as they have never been able to tell it before, without the artificial "balance", which so much television journalism imposes on live reporting. Perhaps this will become a new form of coverage – letting the participants tell their own story.")

the graveyards are full (1.5.08)

2009-01-06T19:13:00.002-05:00

my head and heart are jumbled with worry and heartache and confusion and anger. each emotion battling the other and leaving me with knots of anxiety in my stomach. each emotion stronger than the other, surging in waves.

two days ago, israel invaded gaza on the ground. For what feels like weeks, so-called experts and commentators speculated on whether israel would actually do it—actually go through with the ground invasion. they opined about the “pros and cons” of a ground invasion, the strategies and goals behind such a move. they noted that israel hasn’t “won” a war in a city since the ‘70s. they postulated that israel might want to regain its reputation as a military might after the 2006 war against Lebanon. they argued that israel would not risk another loss like 2006. Comments, insights, speculations flew across newspaper headlines while israeli government officials and hamas leaders verbally sparred—each promising the other a long, painful, losing battle. words that fly above the heads of palestinians dying in gaza. And then they went in.

and now the comments and insights examine and try to discern israel’s military “strategy”. What is their goal in this ground invasion? how will they define victory? There is no clear answer. Nothing is clear in war, is what I am learning. There is no black and white. Nothing is ever simple. Israel ostensibly seeks to “crush” hamas and its infrastructure. It wants to be rid of hamas and their damned rockets. This is what it says. What it does is break Palestinian society. It crushes any and all semblance of life that exists/ed in gaza. Palestinian existence is antithetical to Israeli strategy. To Israeli existence, some might say.

Israel strangled gaza through hermetically closing its borders for a year and a half. It starved the people of gaza for the past two months and denied them medical aid. It cut off electricity and fuel supplies for two months. It bombed it for a week. And now idf troops have entered. This ensures only that more Palestinians will be killed. There will be more blood. More loss. More destruction. More tears. More grief. More calls for revenge. More despair. This is how this cycle goes. Every time it is somehow worse than the time before. Always worse than the time before.

The reality (I resist the word “situation” in its banality) of gaza is so bleak. So incomprehensibly bleak. So many people have been killed in gaza that the graveyards are full. People are reusing graves. Stop for a minute and process what that means—the scale of killing that encompasses.

The graveyards are full.

For over a year there has not been enough cement in gaza to give the dead a proper gravestone.

In life in gaza there is not enough food or medicine, and in death there are not enough graves or gravestones.

If this were a story being read in a literature class, this point would be highlighted and commented on—pointing to the great destruction and violence humans wreak upon each other. It would be poetic in its misery. But this is not a novel. Nor is it a poem. It is reality. Each day I wonder of my friends who have family, colleagues, and friends in gaza and the grief and pain they must be feeling, unsure if the rising numbers of dead include people they love. People they have laughed with. People they share secrets and memories with. And the numbers are rising, steadily. In 2006 it took israel 33 days to kill 1000 lebanese. So far they have killed 500 palestinians in 10 days. In the face of deaths and indignity like this, how can people still talk of victory? There is no victory in war. War in and of itself is a loss. In this war—this “operation cast lead” Palestinians are losing lives, homes, schools, mosques, hope, and future…israel is losing morality. And that is a heavy loss.

During college I heard a refusenik (a jewish Israeli soldier who refused to fight in the occupied territories during the 2nd intifada) speak of his experiences in resisting orders. When asked why he did not participate in the idf’s actions against Palestinians, he responded for him it was a question of morality. He said, “I do not fight because I am a jew, and I love god. In the torah it says, do not oppress as you have been oppressed.” A moral code by which I wish the entire world lived. The incongruity and hypocrisy of the jewish experience and israel’s treatment of Palestinians has always bewildered me. in the states, the jewish holocaust of world war II is upheld as the apex of world suffering and cruelty. It is rightfully held as a nadir in humanity. it is sacrosanct to suggest that another people's suffering could ever compare. the jewish holocaust seems to hold a monopoly on suffering. but I have never understood how a people whose collective identity is constructed in part by a feeling of persecution and suffering, can turn around and inflict such suffering on another people. After the holocaust the jewish community embraced the phrase and promise of “never again”. But now they have given the Palestinians their own “never again”…but our suffering has not ended. Instead we are blamed for it and told we brought it on ourselves. How awful to ever be told you brought death and destruction upon yourself—as though the perpetrator had no choice but to dispatch f-16s and apaches.

And as usual, this war reeks of racism blandly glossed over by the west. Arguments supporting israel’s actions which would have never been tolerated had the context been between another two people are accepted with open arms. The new york times published an opinion piece by benny morris, a once left-leaning revisionist jewish Israeli historian. He predictably supported israel’s aggression in gaza and remarked about the “demographic threat” of the arabs. That Palestinian populations have higher birth rates than jewish Israeli populations do and thus threaten the “jewish character” of israel. This is a common argument embraced and espoused by the Israeli government and a genuine concern of Israeli society. Imagine for a minute if Hillary Clinton wrote an opinion piece that black birth rates were threatening the white character of America. Imagine the disgust and shock and abhorrence you would feel to such feelings of racial superiority. There the racism is evident. But somehow this is a legitimate concern for jewish Israelis. Their existence is threatened by ours, and the world nods its head with sympathy.

Half of gaza’s ambulances have been destroyed. It sounds bad, but I wonder, realistically how much of an impact it really has on the death rate. Even before the incursion, gaza was desperately low on fuel and ambulances had to prioritize emergencies because they did not have enough gas to answer all the calls they received. And anyways the hospitals are overflowing and only the absolutely, critically injured are being seen. Half of hospital staff now is comprised of volunteers—so even if you make it to the hospital, those who care for you may not have medical training. And for the past 3 months the hospitals have been nearing a “critical shortage” of supplies…I am waiting to wake up one morning to read that the supplies passed the critical point and no longer exist. The hospitals will have nothing left to receive people with except empty rooms with beds to die in. So really, what impact does an ambulance shortage really have…

I cannot begin to comprehend what kind of fear the Palestinians of gaza are experiencing now. It is beyond my emotional scope of understanding. I understand that my stomach has been in knots for the past 10 days and that I almost began to cry at a protest a few days ago when a leader spoke of the maimed and dead children in gaza. But I cannot understand what it is like to not be able to sleep because every room in your house is vulnerable to bombing. To choose to sleep on the roof because it is safer, and maybe the sight of sleeping families on roofs will deter Israeli pilots from bombing those houses. To choose to stay home because it is safer, and because you would rather die at home. To receive corpse after corpse after corpse…all who were/are members of your family…and to know you don’t have any white cloth in which to bury them, and to know there are no more graves. I cannot understand how jewish Israelis can support such monstrosity, such breach of humanity. I feel that those who condone actions like israel’s in gaza…part of their soul must be dead. To will, to wish such pain on a people. I cannot comprehend it. I hope I never comprehend it. I don’t want to understand, accept, embrace cruelty. I hope I am forever baffled by it.

Those who claim israel has a right to defend itself ought to pause and reflect on whether military actions can or will ever bring israel security. They never have. Israel has bombed the hell out of gaza before. It may again. It has massacred populations and razed villages and erased histories from world memory. But in the end Palestinians continue to exist. I extend that the best self-defense for israel, a measure it knows it must take, is a true and just peace with Palestinians...one state for citizens of all backgrounds, reparations, and a right of return for refugees. Israel will try to crush hamas in this violent incursion. It will kill Palestinians who have nothing to do with hamas. It will create more anger and calls for revenge and the cycle will be perpetuated, each time with more destruction and flexing of might.

I recently saw a trailer for an upcoming movie about the jewish holocaust, in which a jewish survivor says “our revenge will be to live”. On the apartheid wall which excises the west bank from israel proper is written “to exist is to resist”. Indeed, for Palestinians, in their epic, pyrrhic struggle with israel, this is their greatest resistance and greatest victory.

searching for humanity in the rubble of gaza (12.28.08)

2009-01-06T19:09:00.000-05:00

what do you say, in the face of such barbarity? in the face of such utter and blatant disregard for human life? what are you left with other than the desire to just scream and scream until someone stops to listen. until bombs stop falling. until people stop dying. until palestinians stop being killed. until responses to said barbarity cease being "here we go again" and expressions of "grave concern". until killing is no longer routine and thus ignorable. until gaza and all of palestine isn't just living because it's not dying, but living because there is life, future, blossoming.

we are here, again. i am in dc, and bombs fall far away killing people i do not know, but whose faces look like those of my friends and whose names are familiar and pronounceable to me. names i've said a million times. names whose meanings i understand and make me wonder if those names are a window into the dead's past life.

israel's actions are cruel and strategic, and the world's reaction is predictable and disgusting.a "shock and awe" campaign. is there ever really true shock in war? and i doubt israel's violence is inspiring awe in anyone with a humane soul. this "operation clad iron" comes right before the new year, right before the palestinian elections and israeli elections. olmert is giving one last ditch effort to redeem his war reputation after not winning in lebanon or gaza in 2006. they say they hope the palestinians "overthrow" hamas, but i think really they hope palestinians remain divided between loyalties. a divided people is much easier to subjugate than one united..."divide and conquer"...throwing gaza into chaos ensures the palestinian elections will not take place in the coming weeks and israel can keep abbas. and the world looks on, either silent, or placing the blame on hamas for "laying a trap"...for goading them into this inevitable response of cruelty by launching rockets into southern israel. how quickly the world forgets that israel has been starving gaza since november 4th (nearly 2 months), destroying the capacity of its infrastructure through a denial of electricity and medical supplies. how quickly the world forgets this...always looking at palestine-israel through the lens of today's headlines, disregarding what was reality just a week ago. these things do not happen in a vacuum, as CNN would like us to believe.

i wonder what would happen if somehow a hamas qassam rocket killed 300 jewish israelis. would condoleeza rice express "grave concern" then? or would the IDF be restocked with more destructive weapons, maybe free of charge this time. would israel be blamed for bringing it on its own people through its destructive actions? probably not. why doesn't the international community "freeze out" israel like they did to syria? or impose sanctions on them for "misbehaving", according to Western standards, like they did with iran? and why is the syrian foreign minister the only arab leader i have seen quoted who has anything worthwhile to say?

in 5 years, 15 jewish israelis have died from hamas rockets. in 2 hours over 200 palestinians were killed by israeli "precision" bombs.

indeed, the silence is thundering, but more painful is the blame that is put squarely on the shoulders of hamas. that hamas brought it on the palestinians, with no more depth of analysis. how dare they. how dare they forget the inequality of power between israel and an occupied people-- militant groups or not. how dare they ever ever ever in any capacity justify killings of this magnitude. in one of my classes we were presenting on the effects of war on health (a huge topic in and of itself) and one exercise we had the class participate in was everyone sharing what war meant to them. most people talked of death, most people talked of their distance from war. when it was my turn i said what war means to me is being told your life counts less, or worse, that somehow you deserve it. having always experienced war at a distance, and mostly in very zionist atmospheres, this is always the ultimate message. you kidnap 2 soldiers, we kill 1000+ of you. you launch a few rockets that kill a few civilians, we bomb you and leave craters where there were once buildings and 285 corpses where there were once police, sons, sisters...

for those on the fence, who say "there is suffering on both sides", who placate the racism of israel with such blandness, yes, jewish israelis suffer. suffering is difficult to quantify. but step back and look at the imbalance, see the disparity, the magnitude of injustice israel executes against palestinians. there is certainly suffering on both sides, but not in equal proportions. ever. one people is occupied. another is an occupier.

synopsis headlines is all most people will read about gaza's suffering now. because people are lazy and there are a million tragedies going on all over the world right now and people are tired. very very tired. dueling realities always compete for people's attention. the fb ads staring at me right now as i write this are for zappos.com winter sale, and fixing your credit score. the two headlining stories today for the guardian are gaza and how huge the sales are on high st. eenie meenie miny mo...

i know all of you know everything i'm writing and perhaps feel similarly...but to counter the sense of despair and isolation, i write...in all the silence, and all the misplaced blame, it has comforting to see the outrage expressed through fb statuses and postings. really it seems trivial, but it is comforting to know that there is outrage. maybe they spark people who might otherwise have opted for the high st. article to take a minute and read...i am personally very tired, and verging on hopeless (verging, not there yet) but am thankful that others are trying too, somehow, to draw attention to the latest atrocity. that other people are screaming with me. that there is outrage. because ultimately...everything we do...it all will add up to freedom and blossoming. i really do believe it. in the rubble of gaza, we have to somehow hold on to our humanity so its still there when palestine is one day free.