Year: 2012

West Bank couple, deported to Gaza, recount difficult years in Israeli prison

by Joe Catron

30 January 2012 | The Electronic Intifada

Obada Saed Bilal and Nili Zahi Safad (Joe Catron)

“This is the life of Palestinian people,” Obada Saed Bilal said one recent morning. “If I hadn’t been detained, I would have been wounded or martyred. I was in detention for over nine years, but I still resist. My marriage and university studies are my ways to keep fighting now.”

Obada and his wife, Nili Zahi Safad, sat in the lobby of the Commodore Gaza Hotel. The Ministry of Detainees in Gaza has temporarily housed them there, along with a number of other former political prisoners who, like Bilal, were freed in the prisoner exchange on 18 October 2011.

Israel forced Bilal, a native of Nablus in the West Bank, to relocate to Gaza following his release, along with 204 other prisoners expelled from their homes in the West Bank.

Safad moved to Gaza shortly after her husband’s arrival. They had been married for only twenty days when his arrest separated them on 16 April 2002.

“I was brutally beaten for two hours,” Bilal said, recalling the 1am military raid in the West Bank village of Aghwar in which he was detained. “Then I was taken to the Petach Tikva detention center in Tel Aviv. They interrogated me for ninety days. This was my most difficult time as a prisoner. I was kept in isolation, handcuffed and blindfolded, and interrogated for about twelve hours every day.”

After his interrogation, the Israeli authorities sent Bilal to Ashkelon, where a military court sentenced him to 26 years.

Isolation

Safad, also a former political prisoner, told a similar story.

“I was detained at a checkpoint,” she said of her arrest on 11 November 2009. “I was returning from Hebron to Nablus, when they arrested me and sent me to detention. They kept me in isolation for ninety days before transferring me to the HaSharon prison for women. About 17 women were detained at HaSharon then; now there are only seven.

“While being interrogated, women are treated exactly like the men,” she added. “We were deprived of food, sleep and even access to the toilet. They shouted insults at us. I was kept handcuffed and blindfolded. Once they chained my hands to the ceiling for four days.”

Bilal and Safad told The Electronic Intifada that their conditions barely improved after they were transferred to prisons following their ninety-day interrogation periods.

“Our daily life was harsh and difficult,” Bilal said. “Our basic human and medical needs were routinely denied. The jailers treated us poorly, the food was awful and we were routinely denied any contact with our families. I wasn’t able to see mine for three years. We were kept handcuffed for ten hours a day, and only given one hour for recreation. Sometimes they punished us by denying even this.”

The Israeli authorities seemed determined to prevent contact with family members inside the prison. “Once I met my two brothers in prison. But when the jailers learned that we were brothers, they separated us,” Bilal said. “And when my wife was arrested, I asked to be placed with her, but the prison administration refused.” Their reunion seemed less likely after Safad completed her sentence and was released on 10 July 2011.

Renewed vows

The authorities also tried to prevent inmates from forming any bonds with each other. “They transferred us among prisons only to confuse us. As soon as we made new friends, they would transfer us again. This was psychological punishment,” Bilal explained.

He had a problem with his eyesight before his arrest, and it became worse in prison. “But they refused to treat it,” he said. “It deteriorated until I couldn’t see at all.”

The International Middle East Media Center reported in late November that there were at least forty persons living with disabilities, such as Bilal’s blindness, among the prisoner population. Many prisoners have died due to systematic medical negligence and torture (“Forty disabled Palestinians are imprisoned by Israel,” 30 November 2011).

Today, Bilal and Safad’s lives go on in a new city, far from their families and community in Nablus.

Bilal, an An-Najah National University public relations student when arrested, has returned to his studies, this time in politics and religion at the Islamic University of Gaza. He and Safad continue supporting Bilal’s brothers, Moad and Othman, both current political prisoners.

The couple also marked the end of their separation by renewing their marriage vows. “We held another wedding party after I was released and my wife came to Gaza, to celebrate our life and resistance,” Bilal said. “This is our message to the world, that we must celebrate our struggle and keep fighting.”

Joe Catron is an international solidarity activist and boycott, divestment, and sanctions organizer in Gaza. He blogs at joecatron.wordpress.com and tweets at @jncatron.

Solidarity with Khader Adnan!

29 January 2012 | The Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat

Khader Adnan, an imprisoned Palestinian activist and a spokesperson for the Islamic Jihad party, has been on an ongoing hunger strike since December 17. He is facing severe health consequences for his 43-day hunger strike and needs international support and solidarity to publicize his case and that of his nearly 5,000 fellow Palestinian political prisoners inside the jails of the Israeli occupation. He was transferred today to a hospital and is continuing to refuse food, awaiting the arrival of two Palestinian doctors. He is currently in a wheelchair because he cannot walk, due to weakness from his hunger strike.

Addameer details the experience of Khader Adnan with the Israeli occupation. He is currently held under administrative detention (arbitrary detention without charge or trial, based on secret evidence, and renewable indefinitely for repeated periods of up to six months.) Khader Adnan was issued a four-month administrative detention order on January 8, and faces another military court hearing on January 30. This is the eighth time Adnan has been detained, and he has served a total of six years in Israeli prisons – mostly without charge or trial under the administrative detention scheme.

Addameer reports:

Khader was arrested on 17 December 2011, when Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) raided his home outside Jenin at 3:30 am. Before entering his house, soldiers used the driver that takes Khader’s father to the vegetable market, Mohammad Mustafa, as a human shield by forcing him to knock on the door of the house and call out Khader’s name while blindfolded. A huge force of soldiers then entered the house shouting. Recognizing Khader immediately, they grabbed him violently in front of his two young daughters and ailing mother.

The soldiers blindfolded him and tied his hands behind his back using plastic shackles before leading him out of his house and taking him to a military jeep. Khader was then thrown on his back and the soldiers began slapping him in the face and kicking his legs. They kept him lying on his back until they reached Dutan settlement, beating him on the head throughout the 10-minute drive. When they reached the settlement, Khader was pushed aggressively out of the jeep. Because of the blindfold, Khader did not see the wall right in front of him and smashed into it, causing injuries to his face.

Following his arrest, he was taken to interrogation, refused medical care and treatment, subject to physical abuse and mistreatment including being tied to a chair in a stressful position, causing extreme back pain, and pulling on his beard so hard that his hair was ripped out. Khader was subjected to abusive language about his family, and refused to speak any further to interrogators, as well as refusing food. In retaliation, he was placed into isolation and solitary confinement, denied family visits, awakened in the middle of the night and strip-searched. He has refused to end his strike, protesting the illegitimacy of his arbitrary detention by an illegal occupation authority as well as cruel and inhumane treatment and abuse.

This is not his first hunger strike – in 2005 he protested his isolation in Kfar Yuna with a 12-day hunger strike. Khader Adnan’s hunger strike has sparked solidarity tents in Gaza, and a planned protest in Ramallah on January 30.

Ahmad Sa’adat and hundreds of other Palestinian prisoners participated in a 23-day hunger strike in October 2011, demanding an end to isolation, abuse, and denial of family visits; Israeli promises to end isolation, aimed to secure the end of the strike, proved to be false, as Sa’adat has now spent nearly three full years inside an isolation cell.

The Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat calls for solidarity with Khader Adnan and all of the steadfast prisoners inside the jails of the Israeli occupation who daily confront with their bodies and their lives the ongoing attacks of the occupation army and prison guards.

Addameer has issued a call to action – we encourage you to take up Addameer’s call, linked here, and also:

Picket, protest or call the Israeli embassy or consulate in your location and demand the immediate freedom of Khader Adnan, Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian political prisoners. Make it clear that you are watching the situation of Khader Adnan and that Israel is responsible for his health and life, and demand an end to the use of isolation, solitary confinement, and administrative detention. Send us reports of your protests at Israeli embassies and consulates at campaign@freeahmadsaadat.org.

Write to the International Committee of the Red Cross and other human rights organizations to exercise their responsibilities and act swiftly to demand that the prisoners’ demands are implemented. Email the ICRC, whose humanitarian mission includes monitoring the conditions of prisoners, at JER_jerusalem@icrc.org, and inform them about the urgent situation of Khader Adnan. Make it clear that arbitrary detention without charge or trial is unacceptable, and that the ICRC must act to protect Palestinian prisoners from cruel and inhumane treatment.

Arraf to CPDS: Israel losing the PR battle

by Yousef M. Aljamal

30 January 2012 | Centre for Political and Development Studies

For the third week in a row, the Centre for Political and Development Studies (CPDS), a Gaza-based think tank, held a video link to explore issues related to the Palestinian cause, with the presence of Palestinian and international activists. Huwaida Arraf, the co-founder of  the International Solidarity Movement, chair of the Free Gaza Movement, and a prominent Palestinian-American activist, talked to Gaza activists about “The Palestine solidarity movement: Countering Zionist propaganda globally.”

Choosing discourse to communicate with others is one of the basic requirements to get one’s voice heard. Zionists have mastered this, while Palestinians have been misrepresented in the West. Ironically, Palestine’s just story isn’t getting out. “Through the years we have not done a very good job of conveying our plight, and that’s largely because telling our story was left to our ‘official spokespeople’ who didn’t know how to communicate well with the western media”, said Arraf. “On the other side, Israel depends largely on PR, a fundamental part of its strategy. One of the biggest propaganda projects is The Israel Project. Its annual budget for last year alone was eleven million dollars. This is not counting the official support of the Israeli government, companies, and AIPAC”.

“Israel is losing the PR battle for various reasons: law and justice are on our side, there is an increasing awareness among Palestinians, the growth of alternative media like Facebook and Twitter, and, I believe, the effect of the International Solidarity Movement”, Arraf continued.

The second Palestinian Intifada, which was characterized by Israel’s aggression against Palestinian civilians and the role of the media in covering it, pushed Arraf, with the help of other colleagues, to found ISM. It grew to include 8,000 activists, who have worked hard to expose Israel’s grievous and vivid violations of human rights in Occupied Palestine.

“One of the reasons we founded ISM was because we noticed what was happening in terms of Israel’s massive use of violence”, said Arraf. “The media was not portraying the truth of what was happening. We realised that the Palestinian civil society, and Palestinians as a whole, especially after Oslo, needed a resource to be able to stand up and confront what Israel is doing”.

ISM turned out to be something practical, not merely a plan on paper. Its first campaign included 50 people. Since then, over 8,000 activists have actively worked on the ground to help the Palestinian people.

“The first campaign started in August, 2001”, said Arraf. “Fifty people came. We started another campaign. We tried to say the conflict is not about a religion against another. It’s about freedom versus occupation. It’s not Muslims against Jews. We wanted the mass media to know this. ISM aimed at forming advocacy groups and helping the Palestinian people sustain their struggle and get their stories heard”.

Palestinians share values with all other nations, based on tolerance, understanding, and working together for the good of humankind.

“Once, I organised a meeting between a Palestinian farmer from Bodrous village in the West Bank, named Ayed Murra, and a Vermont senator on Capitol Hill”, said Arraf. “We talked about how the wall affects farmers in the West Bank. We spent an hour talking to the senator, who lives in an area full of farmers”.

Israel tries to tell the world that the entire Palestinian movement is Hamas. They play on an anti-Islamic atmosphere in the West. This clearly distorts history and the facts on the grounds.

“Hamas was founded in 1987” said Arraf. “What about the ethnic cleansing in 1948 and 1967? Op-eds and articles were written on Hamas accepting a truce with Israel.  In 2003, the late Palestinian president, Yasser Arrafat, arranged a ceasefire included all Palestinian factions. In the first two-and-a-half months, Israel killed 74 Palestinians and destroyed 480 Palestinian homes”.

Absence of leadership is one of the things Palestinians are discussing today. “The current leadership does not represent the Palestinian people, particularly who live in the Diaspora”, said Arraf. Elections should be held to represent the Palestinian people as a whole. This will help them win representation for their aspirations and dreams.

“The Palestinian leadership is gone, of course”, said Arraf. “Direct elections to Palestinian National Council should be held. After years of not having a strong Palestinian official voice to be able to refer to in terms of what to do abroad, there came the unification of the Palestinian civil society in the form of BDS”.

“CPDS is looking forward to work hand-in-hand with ISM to help the Palestinian people get heard”, said Dr. Mahmoud Alhirthani, CPDS chairman. “It would be a good idea to organize lectures and courses with your help to make this idea a success”.

Next Sunday, the General Union of Palestinian Students (GUPS) in the United Kingdom will talk with Gaza activists at CPDS on how to be a good ambassador of Palestine when in the U.K. This link is part of a programme named “For you, Palestine”, aiming at drawing Palestinian people’s attention to global issues that can help them represent their cause.

Kufr ad-Dik: At the crossroads of Israeli confiscation

by Neil

30 January 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank

The village of Kufr ad-Dik in the Salfit region of the West Bank has become the latest in a series of villages to launch weekly protests against mass land theft by Israeli occupying forces.

Residents of Kufr ad-Dik took part in their fifth demonstrationon Friday, 27th of January. While this demonstration was short due to weather conditions, the previous demonstration on the 20th of January was much longer. Israeli forces used large amounts of tear gas to repel the protesters before firing more gas directly into the village and using rubber bullets on some remaining demonstrators.

Two ISM activists were the only internationals present at the most recent demonstration, and there were   no Israeli activists. This is in spite of the presence of perhaps dozens of internationals and Israelis at the  nearby demonstration in Nabi Saleh.

Eighty percent of the land of the village has been confiscated by  the Israeli military  in the name of security. The village is surrounded by four different settlements as well as a collection of recently built Israeli factories. Israel currently has plans to build a fifth settlement nearby atop a hill.

Eleven houses are currently under demolition orders, some of them for the past three years.  A total of twenty-one farm buildings have also been served with demolition orders. So far five of them have been demolished. Most recently, on 17th December, three wells and five rooms belonging to one farmer were destroyed.

The region of Salfit, in which Kufr ad-Dik is situated is extremely important to Israel both because of its possession of significant water resources. Its location comes at at a point where the border separating 1948 lands and Palestinian villages is quite thin. There are currently eighteen illegal Israeli settlements in the Salfit region, but only eleven Palestinian villages.

Neil is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed.)

Stop the Jewish National Fund greenwashing ‘Green Sunday’ February 5, 2012

27 January 2012 | Stop the JNF Campaign

The Jewish National Fund has designated Sunday 5th February as ‘Green Sunday’, when it encourages people to donate money to ‘plant trees in Israel’.  The JNF claims to have environmental objectives.  Don’t be taken in.  The JNF’s tree planting is a cover for ethnic cleansing.

The JNF exists to acquire land in Israel/Palestine for the sole use of Jewish people.  For more than 100 years, the JNF has been complicit in expulsions of Palestinians from their homes, the destruction of their villages and prevention of the return of refugees – by planting trees over the remnants of the destroyed homes.

Environmentalists are asked to use the opportunity of the JNF’s ‘Green Sunday’ to take a stand against this greenwash, when ethnic cleansing masquerades as environmental action.  Don’t support the JNF’s ‘Green Sunday’, but publicly denounce the JNF.

Environmental groups throughout the world are adding their support to the international call from Palestinian civil society to Stop the JNF.

Don’t support the JNF’s ‘Green Sunday’. Instead, use the opportunity to: