Category: Press Releases

Israeli soldier shoots British ISM activist Tom Hurndall in Gaza

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Between 4:30 and 5:00 PM today Israeli snipers shot another ISM activist in the head. Tom Hurndall from Manchester Britain is currently in critical condition in a helicopter on his way from Europa Hospital in Khan Younis to a hospital in Bir Sheva. He is 22 years old.

According to Laura, the activists were being shot at while protecting some children from Israeli gunfire. Tom was in plain view of the sniper towers and was wearing a bright orange fluorescent jacket with reflective stripes. The nine ISM activists and many children were in the process of leaving the area. Sniper fire from the tower was hitting the wall close beside the children, who were afraid to move. Tom was attempting to bring them to safety when he was shot. There was no shooting or resistance coming from the Palestinian side at all.

According to Laura, the plan had been to put up a tent where a tank parks itself every night in front of a Mosque. The soldiers in the tank shoot down the street, terrorizing people who come to pray. The group had discovered earlier that the tank was already in place and had begun firing into the air. The Palestinian organizers felt the plan had become unworkeable, and the action was abandoned.

Laura and two Palestinians decided to go assess the situation. She soon realized that the tank had moved from where it had been. It was now possible to set up the tent. She spoke to Tom D by phone and they decided to meet at the roadblock. The Israeli snipers in the eastern tower began shooting in Laura’s path.

When they arrived at the roadblock, the rest of the group was already there. The snipers began firing again: this time at the wall of the building next to the activists. As a result, the group began the process of leaving.

Tom saw a little boy in an open space, clearly visible to the tower. Tom went to get him out of the way. He looked back and saw two more girls whom he also went to retrieve. As he went to get them, he was shot in the back of the head. He fell to the ground in a pool of blood. The ambulance arrived quickly, after about two minutes.

For years the Israeli army has killed Palestinian civilians with impunity. Now they are targeting unarmed international peace activists and human rights workers. On March 16, Rachel Corrie was run over and killed by a bulldozer operator in Rafah while trying to prevent home demolitions. On April 5, in Jenin, Brian Avery was shot in the face by an APC in an unprovoked attack on a clearly unarmed group of internationals. Six months ago in Jenin, Caoimhe Butterly was shot in the leg and UN official Ian Hook was murdered.

We ask the world community to stand up and demand that Israel honor international agreements protecting civilians, whether they are internationals or Palestinians, and hold Israel accountable for these crimes against humanity. And we demand an end to the illegal and brutal occupation that these murders defend.

For more information contact:

Allison 067 742 780;
Raf 054 389 466;
Nick 055 874 693;
Alice 067 857 069;
Tom ISM Media Coordinator Beit Sahour, Occupied Palestine 02-277-4602; 067-862-439; 052-360-241

International Solidarity Movement activist seriously injured in Jenin

Palestine Red Crescent Society

Press Release
http://www.palestinercs.org/pressreleases/PR050403WBRR.htm

Jenin – (5 April 2003): At approximately 7:23 pm, PRCS Emergency Medical Services (EMS) received a call to respond to an injured person near the town’s main square. Within several minutes a PRCS ambulance was on the scene, and the medics immediately administered emergency first aid to the injured person, who was suffering from serious wounds to the face due to Israeli Army heavy machine gun fire from an armoured personnel carrier (APC). The ambulance transferred the injured person to Jenin’s Dr. Khalil Sulieman Hospital for treatment where the shooting victim underwent emergency surgery. It was only at the hospital where the patient was identified as 24 year-old Brian Avery, an American citizen from New Mexico. According to the PRCS report, EMS medics were unable to identify Brian at the scene due to the severity of his facial wounds.

It is worth noting that Brian has on occasion volunteered with the PRCS Jenin Branch in addition to his role as ISM activist.

Israeli soldiers attack children in Bethlehem

by Kristin Ess

Over 1000 children, aged roughly between 8 and 12 years old, gathered today in Manger Square in front of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity to demonstrate in support of the Iraqi people. The kids were holding hand-made signs and banners.

Manger Square is not near an Israeli imposed checkpoint, nor is it near an illegal Israeli settlement. It is the center of an Area A Palestinian town under Palestinian Authority control (before Israel’s invasion). According to numerous eye-witnesses, two Israeli jeeps drove up and began throwing sound bombs, firing tear gas at the children, and shooting into the air.

These kids came from the Bethlehem area, from Beit Jala and Beit Sahour, from Azzed, Aid’ and Deheisha Refugee Camps. The Israeli soliders injured three of the children who are now in the hospital.

One of the directors of Aida Camp’s Lajee Center says, “The children were crying, you know, because they were scared. Some threw up from the gas.”

ISM statement on the killing of Rachel Corrie

OVERVIEW AND BACKGROUND

Our friend and fellow activist for peace, Rachel Corrie, was murdered on Sunday March 16, when she was purposely run over by an Israeli-driven, US-made (Caterpillar D9) bulldozer, while trying to prevent a Palestinian civilian home from being demolished by the Israeli military in the Rafah area of the Gaza Strip.

Rachel was in Rafah volunteering for the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), a Palestinian-led movement of both Palestinians and internationals working together for an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory. Rachel and the ISM have chosen nonviolent, direct-action methods and principles to resist the daily brutality of Israel’s 36-year-old military occupation and its ongoing and illegal land confiscation and settlement of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

A direct result of the international community’s failure to offer Palestinians an international protection force, Rachel Corrie and other ISM activists have actively confronted Israel’s policy of home demolition and international apathy towards this policy by living with families under threat and by refusing to leave homes or areas threatened with demolition. The ISM believes that its presence slows the process of destruction and hopes that the international community will ultimately act to support the daily nonviolent struggle of normal Palestinian families to exist.

Demolishing civilian homes is an atrocious act of violence that violates Articles 12 and 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Articles 33, 53, and 54 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Despite this clear international prohibition, the Israeli military government has carried out thousands of these home demolitions with impunity; resulting in thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians left without basic shelter and experiencing a cataclysmic blow to their lives, some becoming refugees for the second or third time in their lives.

Deaths during home demolitions are far too common. On 2 December 2002, 68-year-old Ashur Salem, deaf, was crushed to death when the Israeli army dynamited his home while he was sleeping. On 6 February 2003, 65-year-old Kamla Abu Said, partially deaf, was also crushed to death when the Israeli army razed her home in Gaza. On February 19, brothers Said and Ala Heloo, were crushed to death when the Israeli army blew up a nearby building causing the collapse of their home. And less than two weeks before Rachel’s killing, on 3 March 2003, 33-year-old Nuha Sweidan — 9 months into her pregnancy — was crushed to death when the Israeli military dynamited an adjacent home to her own, causing Nuha’s house to collapse on top of her. This is only a small sample.

None of the governments or international bodies that criticize Israel’s destruction of Palestinian homes has taken any concrete actions to stop it, despite universal condemnation by human rights organizations. Words of criticism are empty when they come at the very moment an additional $1 billion in supplemental military aid to Israel and an extra $9 billion in loan guarantees are under consideration by the US Congress. Rachel’s death should at least give them pause. Instead, news of her death was juxtaposed in one newspaper with two articles detailing wide bipartisan support for further aid to Israel.

On Sunday 16 March 2003, Rachel and her fellow ISM volunteers were confronting the drivers of two bulldozers who were in the process of razing Palestinian civilian land and homes. For two hours, Rachel and other ISM activists followed the bulldozers, trying to block their passage and hamper their efforts at destruction. Rachel was clearly identifiable in a bright fluorescent orange jacket and was speaking through a bullhorn when she was brutally run over.

In its attempts to sweep responsibility for the incident under the carpet, the Israeli government has undertaken efforts to discredit Rachel, and to blame her and her colleagues for her death. Reports from the other seven ISM volunteers who witnessed the event and what is plainly obvious from photographs taken at the scene — before and after — make it incredible to assert that Rachel’s death was an “accident”. Following her crushing by the bulldozer, an Israeli tank came near the fallen activist and her friends, and then backed off. At no point did the Israeli forces offer any assistance.

The Israeli government typically blames its victims for their fate. In the pages of the international media Palestinians whose homes are destroyed or who die trying to protect them are reflexively called “terrorists” or “terrorist supporters”. Rachel was not Palestinian and therefore was hard to label a “terrorist”, but nevertheless, Rachel was blamed for her own death. In addition, Rachel was accused of “protecting terrorists”, even though the home she died protecting was that of a Palestinian medical doctor.

NOTES ON THE EVENTS AND AFTERMATH

– When she was killed, Rachel was engaging in what is typically a relatively low-risk action, serving as an international monitor to an ongoing, blatant abuse of international human rights law and confronting a soldier in the process of committing an act of violence against an unarmed, nonviolent Palestinian family.

– Rachel was clearly identifiable and non-threatening in both her nature and approach. Rather, Rachel did put her life on the line to stand up against a policy that is inhumane. Thousands of people do this every single day around the globe, in an effort to stop violence and atrocities against land, people, animals and crops. In this case, the bulldozer driver decided not to stop when Rachel nonviolently confronted him, instead choosing to run her over with a 9-ton bulldozer. Rachel is guilty only of assuming that another human being into whose eyes she was looking would not take her life.

– A picture has been circulated that shows Rachel burning a drawing of the American flag. Trying to use this picture to somehow indicate that Rachel deserved to be run over by a bulldozer is an appalling act of demonization that infers that forms of protest which include flag burning are capital offences. In the words of Rachel’s parents: “The act, while we may disagree with it, must be put into context. Rachel was partaking in a demonstration in Gaza opposing the war on Iraq. She was working with children who drew two pictures, one of the American flag, and one of the Israeli flag, for burning. Rachel said that she could not bring herself to burn the picture of the Israeli flag with the Star of David on it, but under such circumstances, in protest over a drive towards war and her government’s foreign policy that was responsible for much of the devastation that she was witness to in Gaza, she felt it OK to burn the picture of her own flag. We have seen photographs of memorials held in Gaza after Rachel’s death in which Palestinian children and adults honor our daughter by carrying a mock coffin draped with the American flag. We have been told that our flag has never been treated so respectfully in Gaza in recent years. We believe Rachel brought a different face of the United States to the Palestinian people, a face of compassion. It is this image of Rachel with the American flag that we hope will be remembered most.”

– Eyewitness testimony to Rachel’s killing is clear and consistent. However, some journalists chose to selectively quote Rachel’s colleagues, leading to different reports of the events that led to Rachel’s death. For example, some media outlets reported that Rachel “slipped and fell”, leaving out the additional detail her colleagues reported — that she fell under the weight of the dirt and rubble that was heaped on top of her.

– Some journalists reported that Rachel sat, crouched, and/or lay in front of the bulldozer, implying she could not be seen. Witnesses report that first she sat down in front of the bulldozer when it was still at least 10 meters away and she was in plain sight. Then as the bulldozer kept advancing, she got up, climbed up on a mound of dirt and rubble, in order to look the bulldozer driver in the eye. It is not credible to assert that the bulldozer driver could have missed her.

– The photographs taken on the day of the incident and at the scene show various angles of Rachel engaging the bulldozer drivers and show two different bulldozers. Again, reading the eyewitness testimonies will clarify that Rachel and the other ISM volunteers were in the area engaging two bulldozer drivers for approximately two hours before Rachel was crushed. The photos are 100% consistent with the eyewitness accounts and offer clear evidence that the bulldozer drivers were aware of the presence of the ISM volunteers and their efforts.

– The Israeli Embassy in Washington DC has been using quotes by Thom Saffold in the Washington Post (Monday March 17, 2003), to try to advance their claim that Rachel bears sole responsibility for her death. Thom Saffold, while a previous volunteer with the ISM, is not a spokesperson for the ISM, he was not present at the incident, nor is he currently in Palestine with the ISM. Washington Post correspondent Molly Moore distorted the plain meaning of Saffold’s words when she irresponsibly composited three separate and unrelated statements into a single quote that does not reflect the philosophy of ISM or Saffold’s original meaning.

CONCLUDING STATEMENT

Rachel Corrie was acting in the tradition of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King when her life was deliberately snuffed out. Many justice and human rights defenders before Rachel have lost their lives in their struggle for righteousness and in their attempts to make this world a better place and, sadly, others will follow after her.

Rachel was a mature, conscientious human being who worked to bring people together and did wonders as an ambassador of the true face of the American people in a different part of the world — an American people that does not turn up outside Palestinian homes and give their occupants 5 minutes to gather what possessions they can, before bulldozing into dust the fruits of a life spent working to provide for a family.

In a very direct way, Rachel stood up for family values and for those who were too poor and powerless to be able to protect themselves. She was a true American hero.

The United States government has a particular responsibility to investigate Rachel’s death, not only because she was a US citizen killed by a foreign government, but also because the US government actively supplies Israel with the military hardware and funds that enabled and continue to enable Israel to carry out these illegal and immoral acts.

The world cannot go on ignoring the violence that continues daily to claim the lives and livelihoods of many other unarmed, nonviolent Palestinian civilians. Rachel Corrie offers us an opportunity to look through a window into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and see things as they are. Let us not close the curtains and go about our business. She and the people of both Palestine and Israel deserve better.

RELATED RESOURCES

For eyewitness accounts and photos:
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT
https://www.palsolidarity.org

RACHEL CORRIE MEMORIAL WEBSITES
http://www.distanceeddesign.com/rachel/
http://www.rachelcorrie.org

PHOTO STORY: ISRAELI BULLDOZER DRIVER MURDERS AMERICAN PEACE ACTIVIST
Nigel Parry and Arjan El Fassed, The Electronic Intifada, 16 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1248.shtml

THE DAY AFTER: ISRAELI FORCES KILL 9 PALESTINIANS, INCLUDING 3 CHILDREN
PCHR, press release, 17 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1258.shtml

REMEMBERING RACHEL CORRIE
Peter Bohmer, The Electronic Intifada, 17 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1252.shtml

OF BROKEN BODIES AND UNBREAKABLE LAWS
Laurie King-Irani, The Electronic Intifada, 19 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1259.shtml

RACHEL CORRIE, NUHA SWEIDAN AND ISRAELI WAR CRIMES
Steve Niva, The Electronic Intifada, 17 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1250.shtml

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL CONDEMNS KILLING OF RACHEL CORRIE
GROUP CALLS FOR INVESTIGATION, SUSPENSION OF WEAPONS TRANSFERS
Amnesty International , Press Release, 17 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1265.shtml

ACTIVISTS DEMAND IMMEDIATE HALT OF CATERPILLAR
BULLDOZER SALES TO ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES
Press Release, SUSTAIN, 18 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1261.shtml

“THIS IS NOT A POEM. THIS IS A PROMISE.”
Suheir Hammad, Poetry, 20 March 2003
http://electronicIntifada.net/v2/article1272.shtml

The closest eye witness account on the murder of Rachel Corrie

by Tom Dale
March 17, 2003

Many of you will of heard varying accounts of the death of Rachel Corrie, maybe others will have heard nothing of it. Regardless, I was 10 metres away when it happened 2 days ago, and this is the way it went.

We’d been monitoring and occasionally obstructing the 2 bulldozers for about 2 hours when 1 of them turned toward a house we knew to be threatened with demolition. Rachel knelt down in its way. She was 10-20 metres in front of the bulldozer, clearly visible, the only object for many metres, directly in it’s view. They were in Radio contact with a tank that had a profile view of the situation. There is no way she could not have been seen by them in their elevated cabin. They knew where she was, there is no doubt.

The bulldozer drove toward Rachel slowly, gathering earth in its scoop as it went. She knelt there, she did not move. The bulldozer reached her and she began to stand up, climbing onto the mound of earth. She appeared to be looking into the cockpit. The bulldozer continued to push Rachel, so she slipped down the mound of earth, turning as she went. Her faced showed she was panicking and it was clear she was in danger of being overwhelmed. All the activists were screaming at the bulldozer to stop and gesturing to the crew about Rachel’s presence. We were in clear view as Rachel had been,
they continued. They pushed Rachel, first beneath the scoop, then beneath the blade, then continued till her body was beneath the cockpit. They waited over her for a few seconds, before reversing. They reversed with the blade pressed down, so it scraped over her body a second time. Every second I believed they would stop but they never did.

I ran for an ambulance, she was gasping and her face was covered in blood from a gash cutting her face from lip to cheek. She was showing signs of brain hemorrhaging. She died in the ambulance a few minutes later of massive internal injuries. She was a brilliant, bright and amazing person, immensely brave and committed. She is gone and I cannot believe it.

The group here in Rafah has decided that we will stay here and continue to oppose human rights abuses as best we can. I want to add that more than 10 palestinians have died in the Gaza strip since Rachel.

If you’re wandering about Rachel: her writings, photos of her and statements on her death are available on the below website. More photos: go to yahoo news section, search for photos by ‘rachel’.

If you’re wandering about the International Solidarity Movement: www.palsolidarity.org

If you’re wandering about Rafah: in the southern Gaza strip, next to the Egyptian border. Apart from suffering in excess from the problems all over Palestine: Israeli manipulation of the water supply, economic strangulation, regular shootings and army operations, Rafah is afflicted by the building of an extra border wall. It has caused hundreds of homes to be destroyed. The house in question, that of a doctor, like dozens of others in the area is not set to be demolished because of any supposed link to militants. Only because it lies within 100 metres of the new border wall, currently in construction. Families receive no compensation from Israel, and are frequently given just a few minutes warning in the form of live ammunition being shot through the walls of their house.