Category: Press Releases

Tree-planting action to be held in At-Tuwani

Christian Peacemaker Team

23 January 2010

On Saturday 23 January Palestinians will demonstrate against the recent destruction of a grove of olive trees and plant new trees, in order to show their determination to continue accessing and cultivating their land. On the afternoon of 14 January Palestinians discovered that a family-owned olive grove in Khoruba valley had been destroyed. Twenty mature olive trees were broken at their trunks. The family believes that Israeli settlers from the Ma’on settlement and Havot Ma’on outpost are responsible for the vandalism. This is the fifth time since 1997 that settlers have destroyed the olive trees in this grove. This most recent attack on Palestinian agriculture follows a month of Israeli settler violence and harassment aimed at preventing Palestinian farmers from plowing their fields and thus earning their livelihoods.

Demonstrators will gather in At-Tuwani village and walk together to the nearby olive grove at 9:30am.

Don’t be complicit in Israel’s apartheid: boycott the 2010 Tel Aviv International Student Film Festival

A Joint Statement by PACBI and PSCABI

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and the Palestinian Students‘ Campaign for the Academic Boycott of Israel (PSCABI) call on students, lecturers and film-makers to boycott the 13th International Student Film Festival, scheduled for June 2010 in the city of Tel Aviv. PACBI and PSCABI believe that this festival, as with similar cultural initiatives supported by the Israeli government, is openly designed to whitewash the crimes of Israeli apartheid.

Festival organizers have highlighted the aim of the festival, noting that it is “a unique cultural and social means to presenting a different Israel to the world, [an] Israel which supports and invests in pluralism, culture and equal opportunity.” This language reveals – as did similar endeavors by the South African Apartheid regime – a cynical and systematic attempt at manipulating world opinion. It aims to obfuscate the real nature of Israeli military occupation and apartheid, and to divert attention from its ongoing war crimes by portraying Israel as a vibrant, cultural and artistic hub. It is for this reason that the festival is heavily funded and supported by the Israeli government.

In 2009, this policy of using culture to whitewash Israeli violations of international law was openly confirmed by the Israeli government with the launch of a global ‘Brand Israel’ campaign. According to an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesperson, the objective of this rebranding campaign, which “could include organizing film festivals” is to convey the message that “a better image for Israel and a better performance of that image is part and parcel [of] Israel‘s national security. Contrary to popular belief, national security is not just based on military power, it‘s also a strong economy and a strong image.”

This attempt to create a ‘better image for Israel’ through film, dance, music and literary events is all the more horrendous given the bloody military assault conducted in 2009 against the occupied Gaza Strip which left over 1,440 Palestinians dead, of whom 431 were children, and 5380 injured. The 1.5 million Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip, the overwhelming majority of whom are refugees who were expelled from their homes by Zionist forces in 1948, were subjected to three weeks of relentless Israeli state terror, whereby Israeli warplanes systematically targeted civilian areas, reducing whole neighborhoods and vital civilian infrastructure to rubble and partially destroying Gaza’s leading university and scores of schools, including several run by the UN, where civilians were taking shelter. A UN Fact Finding Mission headed by the prominent South African judge, Richard Goldstone, accused Israel of deliberately and indiscriminately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure and committing war crimes in this war of aggression.

The orders for this assault came from Tel Aviv, a place the festival organizers hope to honour as “the city that never sleeps – an even more turbulent, energetic and lively place. Could we ask for a warmer home for a Festival dedicated to young artists, to young art?” Moreover, this offensive hubris ignores the fact that the city itself is built on the remains of the homes of Palestinian refugees expelled in 1948, and to which any Palestinian ‘young artist’ from Gaza or the West Bank, let alone from the large Palestinian refugee community in exile, is barred from visiting.

Today, the siege on Gaza continues, and the festival organizers are apparently oblivious to these war crimes – preferring to pretend that a festival supported by the Israeli government can “bridg[e] cultural gaps and develop tolerance through cinema”.

It should be noted that in the lead up to the previous Tel Aviv festival in 2008, the renowned French film-maker Jean-Luc Godard canceled his participation following PACBI’s request to boycott the event. He had been due to participate as an honorary guest and to hold master classes with Israeli film students.[vi]

Because of the Festival’s open ties with the Israeli state, and its clear aim to normalize Israeli apartheid and whitewash Israel‘s persistent violations of international law and human rights in the minds of filmmakers, students and other cultural workers, PACBI and PSCABI view any participation in this event as a form of immoral complicity and call for a its complete boycott. We urge filmmakers, lectures and students to heed the Palestinian civil society call for a boycott of Israel and its complicit institutions, as they did in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. This is the bare minimal form of solidarity that we expect from any people of conscience around the world to support our struggle for freedom, justice and a meaningful peace in our region.

Eight arrested following a night raid in Ni’lin

Popular Struggle Coordination Committee

18 January 2010

Four residents of Ni’ilin have been arrested last night during a military incursion into the West Bank village. Four others, who were not home at the time of the raid surrendered themselves in the morning. These recent arrests are a part of a concerted assault on the popular movement and the arrest of three prominent organizers from the village last Wednesday.

At around 3:00am tonight, a large military force invaded the village of Ni’ilin to stage mass arrests of residents suspected of participating in demonstrations against the Wall. During the incursion, over ten houses were raided and ransacked.

Tonight’s raid is the 13th staged in the village since 16 December. In this period alone, 16 of the village’s residents have been detained on various charges relating to anti-Wall protests, including three prominent organizers last Wednesday. Since May 2008, when demonstrations in the village began, 106 arrests of Palestinian anti-Wall activists have been made in Ni’ilin.

The arrests today are an escalation of an ongoing and extensive Israeli attempt to suppress the Palestinian popular resistance. Similar raids to the ones conducted in Ni’ilin have also been conducted in the village of Bil’in – where 34 residents have been arrested in the past six months, and the cities of Nablus, Ramallah and East Jerusalem.

Among those arrested in the recent campaign are also five members of the Bil’in Popular Committee, all suspected of incitement, and include Adeeb Abu Rahmah – who is already held in detention for over six months, and Abdallah Abu Rahmah – the Bil’in Popular Committee coordinator.

Prominent grassroots activists Jamal Jum’a (East Jerusalem) and Mohammed Othman (Jayyous) of the Stop the Wall NGO, involved in anti-Wall and boycott, divestment and sanctions campaigning, have recently been released from detention after being incarcerated for long periods based on secret evidence and with no charges brought against them.

Mohammed Khatib, coordinator of the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee said that “The arrests and persecution will not break our spirit. They are afraid because our movement of simple, unarmed civilians sheds light on their violence, on the injustice of the occupation. No prison wall could hide this truth”

Free Wa’el Al-Faqeeh

Wa'el Al-Faqeeh

15 January 2010

On the night of December 9th 2009, over 200 Israeli soldiers entered the northern West Bank city of Nablus. Their mission: to round up local grassroots activists, whose promotion of popular struggle Israel had no answer for. Amongst those taken was 45 year old Wa’el Al-Faqeeh. Fifty soldiers stormed his home, pointing their weapons at him and his family as though the man they had come to arrest embodied a formidable threat. But those who know Al Faqeeh know that he worked tirelessly – and on a largely voluntary basis – in defense of human rights and the promotion of the strategies and philosophy of Palestinian non-violent resistance.

Political prisoner Wa’el Al-Faqeeh has been detained without charge by Israeli authorities for over a month, and is now facing trial in a military court scheduled to begin on the 19th of January. The abduction of Al-Faqeeh from his home, along with 4 other activists in the Nablus region, marked the beginning of the recent surge in Israel’s targeting of leaders of Palestinian popular resistance.

We call on you to take effective and public action to end the arrest, detention and mistreatment of Palestinian human rights activists such as Wa’el Al-Faqeeh. Deprived of his liberty and his voice, we ask you to join us in exercising our freedom of speech where he can not by calling for the release of Wa’el Al-Faqeeh and all political prisoners inside Israel’s jails.

What you can do to help:

* Contact your representatives asking them to exert pressure on Israeli officials to release Wa’el Al-Faqeeh and to end the unlawful imprisonment of human rights defenders. Click here to send a letter to Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Union. Click here to send a letter to the American consulate in Jerusalem, or use the sample letter here to send to your respective representative. You can find a list of embassies and their contact information here.

* Host an event, or hold a demonstration or action in your area to raise awareness, support – and even funds – for Al-Faqeeh and all political prisoners. You could organise a film night, street projection, “Free the Prisoners” party, or a demonstration outside an Israeli embassy or consulate in your country. Organisers can contact palreports@gmail.com for media support.

* Wa’el Al-Faqeeh faces military court on the January 19. His legal defence comes at a high price and contributions to his legal fund support both Al-Faqeeh and his family. You can make a donation to the Free Wa’el fund here.


You can follow updates on Al-Faqeeh’s case and get in touch with his supporters by joining the Free Wa’el Facebook group here.

Palestinian olive grove destroyed in the night

15 January 2010

Christian Peacemaker Team

For immediate release:

Palestinian woman examines her family's destroyed olive grove in Khoruba

In the afternoon of 14 January Palestinians discovered that a family owned olive grove in Khoruba valley had been recently destroyed. Twenty mature olive trees were broken at their trunks. The family believes that Israeli settlers from the Ma’on settlement and Havot Ma’on outpost are responsible for the vandalism.

A Palestinian farmer informed internationals who documented the destruction that this was the fifth time since 1997 that settlers have destroyed the olive trees in this grove. He also stated that the trees would not be able to bear olives for at least three years.

This most recent attack on Palestinian agriculture follows a month of Israeli settler violence and harassment aimed at preventing Palestinian farmers from plowing their fields and thus earning their livelihoods.