Category: In the Media

Activists demonstrate and work land, despite Israeli military harrasment

24 April 2011 | Palestine Solidarity Project

On Saturday, April 23, eight Israeli activists and 24 international volunteers joined residents of Beit Ommar for an action near Karmei Tsur organized by the Beit Ommar National Committee Against the Wall and Settlements. The international contingent included volunteers from the Palestine Solidarity Project and International Solidarity Movement, as well as the Belgian group Checkpoint Singers. The demonstrators gathered in the lands near Karmei Tsur, and marched towards the settlement carrying flags and signs and chanting against the occupation.

As the protest neared the settlement, soldiers from the Israeli Defense Forces lined the path. The protest continued beside the military for several hundred feet, before the soldiers stepped out and blocked the road. The IDF refused to let the demonstration pass.

The Checkpoint Singers began to sing as protesters argued with the soldiers, asking to continue their peaceful demonstration on their land. The lieutenant in command showed papers labeling the area a closed military zone and told the assembled protesters that anyone still in the area in three minutes would be arrested. The demonstrators refused to go.

Three minutes passed, and the soldiers prepared to move in. Then, Ahmed Abu Hashem gestured to his land, a field next to the road. “We are here to work my land,” he said.

“Then where is your tractor? Come back with a tractor, and you can work on your land,” the lieutenant replied.

Abu Hashem explained that a tractor was not needed, as stones needed to be cleared from the field by hand first. The lieutenant said that such an action needed to be coordinated through them first.

“Coordination my ass,” shouted a Beit Ommar resident.

Abu Hashem turned away from the soldiers, looping around the military line and walking onto his land. The rest of the protesters followed, and the soldiers formed a perimeter to attempt to contain the movement. As the choir sang anti-opression songs, Palestinians, Israelis, and internationals began to pull stones from the earth and add them to the rock walls bordering the field. Whenever a they approached the soldiers, the military would retreat, and soon a handful of the faster workers had pushed the IDF three-quarters of the way across the field.

While the demonstrators cleared the field, soldiers called out to them and asked them to stop. Despite the closed military zone and threats of arrest, work went on and on one was detained. The action dispersed on its own terms, and only after a substantial number of stones had been removed.

Gaza children draw to honor slain activist

24 April 2011 | Ma’an News Agency

Children in southern Gaza spent Saturday drawing pictures to honor slain Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni.

Over a hundred children and their mothers participated in the memorial event, organized by a charity in Khan Younis.

Children also wrote letters expressing their condolences to Arrigoni’s mother. The letters would be sent by email, and would include an invitation to the activist’s mother to visit the coastal enclave “and see how the people love and appreciate her son,” organizers said.

“We wanted to tell, through drawings, that we are a people who love peace and what happened was nothing to do with our religion or morals,” 11-year-old Tasneim Al-Farra said.

“I cried after I learned that the man had abandoned his homeland and came to defend us. He deserved to be honored, not murdered,” she added.

Asmaa Khalafallah, 12, said she would never forget Arrigoni, and that he would “live forever in the minds of Palestinian people.”

Thousands of Gazans participate in slain Italian activist’s funeral

19 April 2011 | Palestine News Network

Palestinians carry the body of Vittorio Arrigoni. Photo: Independent.
Palestinians carry the body of Vittorio Arrigoni. Photo: Independent.

On Monday, politicians, NGO workers, and activists took part in the funeral of Vittorio Arrigoni who was killed last Friday by a Salafist group in Gaza. Palestinian police officers carried Arrigoni’s coffin and marched in the funeral. Those in attendance carried his picture and, in reference to his killers, chanted, “death for terrorists!”

According to Palestinian security sources, the body of Arrigoni was transported from Gaza City to Rafah, to be handed to his parents at the Rafah crossing with Egypt. Palestinian police officers told local media that they would continue to investigate the murder of Arrigoni and that they will bring the murderers to justice.

Police officers themselves decided to participate in the funeral on Monday to honor this solidarity activist that sacrificed his life for Gaza.

Vittorio Arrigoni: The man I knew

Nicole Johnston | Al Jazeera English

There is a packet of pipe tobacco sitting in my Gaza City apartment.

It’s Victor’s. He left it behind the last time I saw him, about one month ago.

Anyone who knew Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni knew that he was usually puffing away on a pipe. Like a wise sea captain.

I had hoped to give his tobacco back to him this weekend, to catch up before he left Gaza and returned to Italy.

He was heading home to see his father, who has been very ill. Also to have a break from Gaza and return refreshed on a new flotilla aiming to set sail to Gaza at the end of May and break the siege.

I last heard from him on Wednesday. It was a short text message asking me if I’d just heard the loud booms. These were sonic booms from low flying Israeli war planes. No, I replied, I hadn’t.

The following day he was kidnapped and shortly afterwards killed. Members of a Salafi group say they are responsible.

I first met Vik on a story inside Gaza’s buffer zone. A team from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) was accompanying a farmer and a dozen Palestinian women onto their land while they harvested their crop.

This area has been declared a no-go area by Israel. Inside the buffer zone Israeli soldiers shoot and sometimes kill Palestinians. ISM hopes the international presence will deter the Israelis.

It didn’t seem much of a deterrent when we were there. Even with a film crew present Israeli troops fired shots. We crouched down low into the wheat.

Vik and his colleagues stood their ground. When they decided it was too dangerous to stay any longer, we followed them out. We went into the buffer zone once.

Gaza’s ISM volunteers were doing it every week. Some say it was foolhardy bravery. But there was no doubting their commitment to the cause.

So after bonding in the buffer zone, I met Vik and his colleague, Adie Nistelrooy, many times. Sometimes it was over pasta, a seafood meal, or a shisha pipe and a World Cup football game.

The last time we all gathered, I thought I was farewelling them both from Gaza. A group of us ate, danced and watched the night slip away from my ninth floor apartment.

Adie did leave Gaza a day or two later. Vik ended up staying one month longer. A month that has changed everything.

The news of his death has shaken Gaza’s small community of internationals and the Palestinians he counted as his dear friends. Italy has evacuated its nationals.

I often walk by myself through Gaza’s dark streets at night, heading home from a café or after visiting a friend’s apartment. Usually I carry a torch in the stretches of road where the electricity has been cut. With Hamas police manning checkpoints and street corners across Gaza City, it felt safe.

Now I hope it still is. Because that’s what Victor would have wanted.

Position of the local Palestinian Christian community on restrictions on religious rights (especially during Holy Week)

08 April 2011 | Kairos Palestine

The Palestinian Christian initiative Kairos Palestine has issued a statement spelling out the position of the Palestinian Christian community concerning Israeli imposed restrictions on religious rights, especially during Holy Week.

The statement notes that “for Christians, Holy Week in Jerusalem has a special spiritual connection.” It says that the various gathering points to which pilgrims from all over the world journey, namely the Old City, its gates and roads, the Mount of Olives, Via Dolorosa and The Holy Sepulchre Church, are equally important to the Palestinian Christians of the West Bank and Gaza.

The statement underlines the strong desire of Christians in the West Bank and Gaza “to join their Jerusalemite Christian brothers and sisters in the liturgical events leading to the resurrection, the holiest celebration in Christianity”.

The statement points out that “in every country that respects (and practices) freedom of worship, they do so without “restrictions from the governing authorities”. It proceeds to bemoan the fact that the occupying power has denied free access to Holy places of worship to both Christians and Muslims on several important occasions over the last decade.

This discriminatory and restrictive policy by Israel allows only 8000 pilgrims and few hundreds of locals to enter the city on Holy Fire Saturday. The Holy Sepulchre Church and other crucial religious sites are rendered “off limits for Christians through a complex network of walls, checkpoints, and security apparatuses”.

Traditionally, Palestinian Christians welcome The Holy Light seated on the roof of the Patriarchate and at the Church of Saint Jacob, adjoining the Holy Sepulchre. This religious tradition is something they are unwilling to forfeit because it is a violation of a fundamental human rights and a restriction on their right to religious freedom. It further upsets a centuries old tradition for the Palestinian Christians.

Kairos Palestine decries this unjust and one-sided policy which compels Christians and Muslims to apply for permits to enter while Jews continue to have free access. At best, not more than two or three thousand Palestinian Christians will receive entry permits. The permit system instated by Israel is in obvious violation of various Human Rights, international covenants and treaties to which Israel is a signatory.

Kairos Palestine rejects “the imposition of a permit/quota system to access our churches and shrines”. The Kairos statement points to how “the heavy presence of Israeli Police and Military forces prevents Christians from accessing the Holy Sepulchre Church and the Old City” thus disturbing the spiritual atmosphere of Easter”. The presence of Israeli commanders in and around the Tomb of Christ under the pretext of security is unacceptable.

The Kairos statement states that such actions taken against Palestinian Christians are an affront not only to them, the first and oldest Christian community in the world, but also to Christianity as a whole.

The Palestine-Israel Ecumenical Forum urges churches around the world to support the call of Kairos Palestine which invites “all our leaders, friends, brothers and sisters around the world to continue exerting pressure on Israel, to end its military occupation on this land and to respect international law and human rights”. In terms of practical measures, Kairos Palestine urges:

Church leaders not to submit and accept the conditions that deprive indigenous and international worshippers of the joy of celebrating Easter.

Letters to political representatives to pressure Israel by political means to end its restrictions on the freedom to religion in general and with regard to the Easter celebrations in particular.

Letters of protest to Israeli ambassadors in your countries complaining against such actions.

Click here for the full text of the statement from Kairos Palestine.