Stay Cool: The Children of Gaza and more
Apartheid Israel institutes new procedures and tightening its fascist grip on the colonized/occupied to prevent International support by Toufic Haddad
(Video) Lest we forget: Stay cool; the children of Gaza
(Video) Israeli PR (supported by Palestinian and Western Elites who profit) claim that life is booming in the West Bank and checkpoints are removed. Booming economy for some maybe (I see lots of fancy late model cars and SUVs). But the average person does not see it. Here is the checkpoint at Birzeit which was supposedly vacated but soldiers seem to come and go at their will to harass people like this group that was held for 5 hours.
On Dignity and Solidarity. A thoughtful article by the late Edward Said that is still on target and worth reading and rereading. Since this article was written several years ago the symptoms that Edward Said spoke of have only intensified. Many observers believe that conditions in Palestine are ripening for a revolution. See the article also here.
How the Israel lobby took control of US foreign policy by Jeff Gates
See also: Anti-Zionists: The New Heretics by Jeff Gates
On the radio: Voice of Palestine, Canada will be interviewing this Tuesday August 11, 2009 between 8:00-9:00 pm PDT (Pacific Time) Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh – http://qumsiyeh.org – from Bethlehem.
Dr. Qumsiyeh is the President of the Palestinian Center for Rapprochement Between People – www.pcr.ps
- and is a professor at Birzeit and Bethlehem Universities in the occupied West Bank. We will talk with him about the Fateh Convention that is being held in Bethlehem and the reaction of the Palestinian street towards this convention. We will also discuss the conference he attended in Toronto in June about mapping models for the future of Israel/Palestine. Voice of Palestine broadcasts weekly on Vancouver Cooperative Radio (CFRO) 102.7 FM, Vancouver, Canada. The show broadcasts for one hour every Tuesday night from 8 to 9 pm PDT (Wed. morning from 6:00-7:00am Palestine time). It first went on the air in September 1987, and has hit the airwaves every week since then. People outside of Vancouver can listen to the show live on the Internet http://www.coopradio.org/listen/
Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
A bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at home
Bethlehem, Palestine
http://qumsiyeh.org
Join the Conversation
Very often I don’t have the time to read articles that are sent to me through mailing lists, as well as to watch videos I hear or read about. This time I took a moment to watch the video about the Atarot/Bir Zeit checkpoint. Probably because I’m sensitive to the issue because I’m volunteering at MachsomWatch as well. Not as often as I would like to, unfortunately, because THIS is really something that can make a difference and can help in some cases – even though we all know that what we’re doing is not more than a drop in the ocean.
From my experience and knowledge of what the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) are actually doing at checkpoints as well as in the West Bank and Gaza at all, I was NOT surprised by what I saw. Yet, something is growing in me when I see and hear about abuses like that: … I don’t know how to call it – someone said the other day that we’ll have to invent new words for all this – so I’d call it “speechlessness”. How can one describe such a scene? Horrible? Awful? Disgusting? Shocking?… I think it’s more than all that: it’s deliberate injustice, deliberate abuse that these soldiers and all other members of the IOF know that they will go unpunished. And the victims – whoever they are and whatever they have to endure – know that they have NO way to defend themselves, no access to justice – none at all. Because in Israel – and I feel that it’s happening more and more, or maybe just stronger or more openly – INJUSTICE is now called JUSTICE and that in any other “normal” place would be called “good” has become “bad” here (like empathy, compassion…) and “bad” has become “good” (like beating up a Palestinian for no reason at all). “Right” has become “wrong” and “wrong” has become “right”. In this sort of mentality literally EVERYTHING becomes possible. I’m scared…