Category: Press Releases

Free Gaza Movement Mission Statement

To view the Free Gaza Movement website click here

Background

2008 marks the 60-year anniversary of the Nakba, “the catastrophe”, when the overwhelming majority of Palestinians were forcibly evicted from their ancestral homeland to create the state of Israel. In contravention of International law, human rights, and basic principles of morality, Israel continues to deny these refugees and their descendants their right to return home. More than 5 million Palestinian refugees languish in refugee camps, while their homes, farms, and properties are inhabited by Jewish immigrants who arrived in Palestine from around the globe.

The historic illegal appropriation of Palestinian land, home and heritage is at the heart of the Middle East conflict. It has given rise to the largest ongoing refugee population in the world. It paved the way for subsequent land theft in 1967, and the ongoing ethnic cleansing that has squeezed Palestinians in the West Bank into ghettos and bantustans surrounded by 27-foot walls, sniper towers, and military guards. It has created the open-air prison of Gaza with an impoverished and overcrowded population of 1.4 million inhabitants.

Mission Statement

We want to break the siege of Gaza. We want to raise international awareness about the prison-like closure of the Gaza Strip and pressure the international community to review its sanctions policy and end its support for continued Israeli occupation. We want to uphold Palestine’s right to welcome internationals as visitors, human rights observers, humanitarian aid workers, journalists, or otherwise.

Who are we?

We are these human rights observers, aid workers, and journalists. We have years of experience volunteering in Gaza and the West Bank at the invitation of Palestinians. But now, because of the increasing stranglehold of Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine, many of us find it almost impossible to enter Gaza, and an increasing number have been refused entry to Israel and the West Bank as well. Despite the great need for our work, the Israeli Government will not allow us in to do it.

We are of all ages and backgrounds. Back home, we are teachers, medics, musicians, secretaries, parents, grandparents, lawyers, students, activists, actors, playwrights, politicians, singer-songwriters, web designers, international training consultants, and even a former Hollywood film industry worker and an aviator. We are South African, Australian, American, English, Israeli, Palestinian, and more.

What are we going to do?

We’ve tried to enter Palestine by land. We’ve tried to arrive by air. Now we’re getting serious. We’re taking a ship.

Contact:

Cyprus: Angela Godfrey-Goldstein – Tel. +357 99 075 194 or Tel. +972 547 366 393

FriendsofGaza@gmail.com

United Kingdom: Tel. +44 783 225 5713

FriendsofGaza@gmail.com

United States: Karin Pally – Tel. +1 310 399 1921

FriendsofGaza@gmail.com

Free Gaza Movement: An Israeli Jew in Gaza – A statement by Jeff Halper

To visit the Free Gaza Movement website click here

In another few days, I will sail on one of the Free Gaza movement boats from Cyprus to Gaza. The mission is to break the Israeli siege, an absolutely illegal siege which has plunged a million and a half Palestinians into wretched conditions: imprisoned in their own homes, exposed to extreme military violence, deprived of the basic necessities of life, stripped of their most fundamental human rights and dignity. The siege violates the most fundamental principle of international law: the inadmissibility of harming civilian populations. Our voyage also exposes Israel’s attempt to absolve itself of responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. Israel’s claim that there is no Occupation, or that the Occupation ended with “disengagement,” is patently false. Occupation is defined in international law as having effective control over a territory. If Israel intercepts our boats, it is clear that it is the Occupying Power exercising effective control over Gaza. Nor has the siege anything to do with “security.” Like other elements of the Occupation in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, where Israel has also besieged cities, towns, villages and whole regions, the siege on Gaza is fundamentally political. It is intended to isolate the democratically-elected government of Palestine and break its power to resist Israeli attempts to impose an apartheid regime over the entire country.

This is why I, an Israeli Jew, felt compelled to join this voyage to break the siege. As a person who seeks a just peace with the Palestinians, who understands (despite what our politicians tell us) that they are not our enemies but rather people seeking precisely what we sought and fought for – national self-determination — I cannot stand idly aside. I can no more passively witness my government’s destruction of another people than I can watch the Occupation destroy the moral fabric of my own country. To do so would violate my commitment to human rights, the very essence of prophetic Jewish religion, culture and morals, without which Israel is no longer Jewish but an empty, if powerful, Sparta.

Israel has, of course, legitimate security concerns, and Palestinian attacks against civilian populations in Sderot and other Israeli communities bordering on Gaza cannot be condoned. Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel, as an Occupying Power, has the right to monitor the movement of arms to Gaza as a matter of “immediate military necessity.” As activists committed to resisting the siege non-violently, I have no objection to the Israeli navy boarding our boats and searching for weapons. But only that. Because Israel has no right to besiege a civilian population, it has no legal right to prevent us, private persons sailing solely in international and Palestinian waters, from reaching Gaza – particularly since Israel has declared that it no longer occupies it. Once the Israeli navy is convinced we pose no security threat, then we thoroughly expect it to permit us to continue our peaceful and lawful journey into Gaza port.

Ordinary people have often played key roles in history, particularly in situations like this where governments shirk their responsibilities. My voyage to Gaza is a statement of solidarity with the Palestinian people in their time of suffering, but it also conveys a message to my fellow citizens.

First, despite what our political leaders say, there is a political solution to the conflict, there are partners for peace. The very fact that I, an Israeli Jew, will be welcomed by Palestinian Gazans makes that very point. My presence in Gaza also affirms that any resolution of the conflict must include all the peoples of the country, Palestinian and Israeli alike. I am therefore using whatever credibility my actions lend me to call on my government to renew genuine peace negotiations based on the Prisoners’ Document accepted by all Palestinian factions, including Hamas. The release of all political prisoners held by Israel, including Hamas government ministers and parliamentary members, in return for the repatriation of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, would dramatically transform the political landscape by providing the trust and good-will essential to any peace process.

Second, the Palestinians are not our enemies. In fact, I urge my fellow Israeli Jews to disassociate from the dead-end politics of our failed political leaders by declaring, in concert with Israeli and Palestinian peace-makers: We refuse to be enemies. Only that assertion of popular will can signal our government that we are fed up with being manipulated by those profiting from the Occupation.

And third, as the infinitely stronger party in the conflict and the only Occupying Power, we Israelis must accept responsibility for our failed and oppressive policies. Only we can end the conflict.

In the Israeli conceptions, Zionism was intended to return to the Jews control over their own destiny. Do not let us be held hostage by politicians who endanger the future of our society. Join with us to end the siege of Gaza, and with it the Occupation in its entirety. Let us, the Israeli and Palestinian peoples, declare to our leaders: we demand a just and lasting peace in this tortured Holy Land.

(Jeff Halper, the head of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, was a nominee for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. He can be reached at jeff@icahd.org.)

AATW: 23 arrested in protest outside army officer’s home following Ni’lin killings

Press release from Anarchists Against the Wall

23 demonstrators were violently arrested in front of the house of Colonel Aviv Reshef, who is the army commander of the regiment stationed in the Ni’ilin region.

The demonstrators were arrested while protesting the murder of two minors in Ni’ilin last week. The two – Ahmed Mousa, 10 years old, and Youssef Amireh, 17 years old, were shot by the Israeli border police.

The demonstrators, who were standing on the sidewalk at the time of their arrest, were violently arrested even though no law was broken in any way. The policemen even continued beating some of the arrested demonstrators once inside the police car. The 23 will remain in custody for the night and be brought in front of a judge tomorrow.

Ten year old Ahmed Mousa was murdered by a border policeman in Ni’ilin on Tuesday, July 29th. He was shot in the forehead from a short distance, while on his lands and posing absolutely no threat. The shot killed him on the spot, and two of his brothers had to carry his lifeless body back to the village, about a kilometer away, leaving a thick trail of blood behind them.

On Wednesday, July 30th, only hours after Mousa was buried, Youssef Amireh, was shot in the head by a border policeman sitting inside an armored jeep. He was shot despite the fact he was standing in a yard in his own village, and did not take part in clashes. Two rubber coated bullets, shot from a distance of ten meters, penetrated his skull and left him brain dead. After five days in a vegetative state, Amireh succumbed to his wounds and passed away.

Amireh is the twelfth Palestinian and seventh minor to be killed protesting the wall; thousands of others have been wounded and many seriously. From its inception, the popular struggle was met with severe military violence, despite its civilian and unarmed nature.

Anarchists Against the Wall said that: “In a place where an army allows itself to kill unarmed demonstrators day after day, we are not surprised that demonstrators protesting this acts are beaten up and arrested. Reshef is directly and morally responsible for the murders in Ni’ilin, and we will continue to demand his accountability, as well as continue to stand together with the people of Ni’ilin”.

For more details: Jonathan Pollak 0546327736

CPT: At-Tuwani children’s march to Tuba a success – Palestinians walk on road unused for 11 years

To learn more about the Christian Peacemaker Teams’ work in Palestine click here

3rd August 2008

At-Tuwani, South Hebron Hills: On August 2nd, more than one hundred children and their parents from the South Hebron Hills marched from the village of At-Tuwani to Tuba, calling for an end to settler violence and expansion in the area.

In a major success for the area, the children and their parents took the most direct path to the village of Tuba. For the past eleven years, school children escorted by the Israeli military have been the only Palestinians able to use this road. Palestinians parents organized the march to call attention to the violence faced by school children, the failure of the Israeli army to protect them and the effects
of Israeli settlement expansion. The march was a part of the annual South Hebron Hills summer camp for children.

The march initially attempted to take the path that children use when unaccompanied by the Israeli military, around the unauthorized outpost Havot Ma’on (Hill 833). The Israeli military declared the whole area a closed military zone and restrained the march with force, targeting leaders. Soldiers attacked and tried to arrest a Palestinian man. When a CPTer intervened, they knocked them both down and started choking the CPTer, but marchers nonviolently intervened and stopped the attack. One Israeli and one international member of Operation Dove were arrested. Palestinian organizers negotiated with the Israeli military and it was decided that the Israeli military would accompany the children and parents on the short path, using the road between Ma’on settlement and Havot Ma’on (Hill 833). A large group of settlers left Ma’on and harassed the marchers. A smaller group of settlers followed directly behind the marchers, but Israeli military and police prevented them from attacking the group. One village elder accompanying the children walked this road for the first time in years. Surprised by the settlement expansion, she
shared with a soldier about how she plowed this land years ago.

Participating in the march were children from the villages of Tuba and Maghaer Al-Abeed who have been regularly attacked by Israeli settlers as they walked to primary school in At-Tuwani. The children rely on an Israeli military escort to accompany them to school and prevent Israeli settlers from attacking them, but the Israeli military has recently declined to carry out their responsibility. The most recent settler attack took place on July 27th when the Israeli military refused to escort the children. Settlers flung rocks at the children with slingshots and physically assaulted CPTer Joel Gulledge.

Yousef Amira, shot in the head by Israeli forces in Ni’lin, has died

A Palestinian teenager, aged 17, who was left brain-dead on the 30th July after being shot in the head by Israeli forces, died this morning. His funeral will be held in Ni’lin later this afternoon.

Photos courtesy of Activestills

Israeli forces shot Yousef Ahmad Younis Amera with two rubber coated steel bullets from close range, leaving him brain dead. Actual death occurred at approximately 10am today. Yousef is the second child killed in the village over the past week. On Tuesday (29th July) 10 year old Ahmed Husan Yousef Mousa was shot dead by an Israeli border policeman.

According to ISM volunteers staying in the village, confrontations broke out hours after Ahmed’s funeral. Villagers built five barricades of rubble and stones that blocked the main road into Ni’lin preventing Israeli forces entering the village. At about 5:30pm an Israeli bulldozer attempted to clear a path through the barricades.

About 50 Israeli soldiers then attacked with sound bombs, rubber coated steel bullets and tear gas. They shot Yousef twice in the head at close range at approximately 7:30pm. Two other men suffered head injuries from a rubber coated steel bullets, but these injuries were not life threatening. A total of 17 people were injured.

According to Israeli Human Rights organisation B’Tselem, “the minimum range for firing ‘rubber’ bullets is 40m… the regulations emphasise that the bullets must be fired only at the individuals legs and they are not to be fired at children…”.

For several months protests have been held at Nil’in against the illegal Apartheid wall that annexes approximately 2,500 Dunums of agricultural land. The people fear this latest land grab will make their village economically untenable.

Yousef is the 8th child and the 13th Palestinian killed protesting against the Apartheid Wall. The other 12 are:

Ahmed Husan Yousef Mousa, aged 10.

Mohammad Fadel Hashem Rayan, age 25.

Zakaria MaHmud Salem, age 28.

Abdal Rahman Abu Eid, age 62.

Mohammad Daud Badwan, age 21.

Diaa Abdel Karim Abu Eid, age 24.

Hussain mahmud Awwad Aliyan, age 17.

Islam Hashem Rizik Zhahran, age 14.

Alaa Mohammad Abdel Rahman Khalil, age 14.

Jamal Jaber Ibrahim Assi, age 15.

Odai Mofeed Mahmud Assi, age 14.

Mahayub Nimer Assi, age 15.

To date, no soldiers or border police have been prosecuted for killing demonstrators.