Shofat Camp Non violent Demonstration for Right to Worship Successful

Residents of Shofat refugee camp in Jerusalem, along with international and Israeli supporters, today demonstrated non-violently against the Israeli Border Polices’ often violent suppression of the camps residents’ right to cross the checkpoint at the camp entrance to pray in Al-Aqsa Mosque on Fridays.


Palestinian men women and children marched peacefully alongside Israeli and international activists to the checkpoint carrying banners declaring their right to worship at Al Aqsa Mosque and protesting against construction of the Apartheid Wall next to the Camp.

Upon reaching the checkpoint Border Police and soldiers, including two mounted officers, attempted to physically block the marchers’ progress. The residents’ leaders asked the Border Police commander why they could not pass and complained about the denial of a basic human right. Unprovoked by any aggression on the part of the demonstrators, the Israeli forces resorted to using sound bombs and tear gas.

Scared but undaunted, the Camp residents continued to press their right to worship and accompanied by Israelis and Internationals over 60 people were able to make their way past the checkpoint, despite continued harassment by the Border Police

Local resident Ibrahim said: “I am grateful for the people who joined with us today. It’s a first step and we will continue to demonstrate as long as they treat us this way. Today, they held back because of the presence of press and internationals, normally they are asking 10 yr old boys for documents or will not let them pass [documentation is not issued by Israeli authorities to Palestinian children until age 13] and they always treat worshippers brutally. They refuse to let buses through so the people have to go by foot whether it is hot or raining. It’s real suffering every day”

For further information contact:

Ibrahim on 0547372185
Lee on 0547385754

Bil’in: Un-cage Palestine!

by an ISM Media office volunteer

The non-violent demonstration against the Apartheid Wall on the land of Bil’in village this week was themed around the economic siege of Palestine by western powers. Israeli and international activists with pictures of western leaders taped to their chests carried a barbed-wire cage in which a Palestinian dressed in Palestinian flags was symbolically trapped. This was to signify the fact that Palestine is being made a prison created by the Israeli state and it’s western financiers.

The demonstration reached the fence gate which was closed to prevent the villagers accessing their own land. As has been the case for the last few weeks, the Israeli military enforced the closure of the gate by lining up jeeps and Border Police behind it. The demonstrators with the cage tried to open the gate and pass, but were prevented by the Border Police who beat those who got close to them with clubs. After a short while of trying this, the demonstrators gave up and instead dumped the cage on a jeep.

As was the case last week, the chanting group of demonstrators was broken up when the Border Police threw sound bombs at us. In response, several shebab from the village started throwing stones at the soldiers, who then opened fire on them with rubber-coated metal bullets. Most of the demonstrators moved out of the way of this unequal crossfire, shouting at the soldiers to stop firing at children, or talking to them in Hebrew to the same effect. Some from the village Popular Committee convinced the shebab to stop throwing stones. The demonstration regrouped and some tried to start a noise demo (banging in rhythm on a metal barrier which is part of the barrier), but the soldiers tried to arrest one of them – an international activist. Israeli international and Palestinian demonstrators prevented the arrest, simply by piling on the international. The soldiers gave up after a short while.

After a while, the demonstration was declared over by the Popular Committee. The demonstration left peacefully, making sure that the military jeeps were prevented from following us. Shebab from the village exchanged stones with tear gas and rubber-coated metal bullets with the soldiers.

No one was arrested this week. One Israeli demonstrator was mildly bruised (we think by a ricocheting rubber-bullet).

Jerusalem in Exile

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

From: PLO Mission – Washington, DC
A book in the making, help write it

An Invitation to Palestinians Across the World

Work started on the preparation of an exceptional book with a new concept “Jerusalem in exile – tangible memories” by artist Steve Sabella. The book seeks to explore the visual images of Jerusalem in the minds of Palestinians who live in the Diaspora, as well as Palestinians who live in Palestine but are incapable of reaching their city. The project will photographically materialize the various mental images Palestinians have of Jerusalem in their memories and imagination.

These participations will be presented on the “Jerusalem in exile” web site, and this art experience will be documented in a book which will be edited by poet Najwan Darwish. The book will compile various testimonies and texts on Jerusalem and other related subjects by a number of distinguished Palestinians artists, intellectuals and participants.

The work will also be inaugurated in Jerusalem in the form of an exhibition and will subsequently tour various cities globally. Go to http://www.sabellaphoto.com/sky.htm for Steve Sabella’s art statement, which presents the art project’s idea and includes an invitation to participate in the art project.

Please forward this invitation.

Your contributions will be published on the web site that will create a visual bridge through imaginings and memories that will connect Palestinians from all over the world with Jerusalem. Some of these contributions will form the book Jerusalem in exile tangible memories.

www.jerusalem-in-exile.net

Learning under occupation in Jordan Valley

by Tom

Al Jifflik is a small village in the northern Jordan Valley. The villagers live largely in houses built of plastic and tin, as they are barred in Israeli law from building or repairing their houses.

There is an UNWRA school for children up to 13 years old. Since 1967, the inhabitants have been asking for a school for the older children, but to no avail. So last year some people in the area decided to stop asking, and set up a school. They took an existing two-room house in the area, with a couple of outhouses that are used as a sleeping room and shower room for the teachers.

They concreted the ground and erected 6 large tents to use as classrooms, equipped with just desks, chairs and a blackboard. The school has electricity (which is unusual in this area), but no phone line and no address – post for the head teacher has to be sent to her sister in Jericho which is about 50km away.

This school is essential for the pupils. Without it, their education would end at 13 years. Their families have very little money and depend on them to work in the fields. To go to school further away there would be transport problems as there is no public transport. They would have to go through checkpoints. This not only makes their journey very long, but the girls were particularly upset about being searched and having their photographs taken. If the checkpoints are closed, they would have to find somewhere to sleep for the night. Then, they would not be able to go to school and help with the family farm.

The conditions are apalling. The tents flood when it rains, as they are at the bottom of a mountain, and the heat is unbearable in the summer. Yet the girls we spoke to said they would rather endure this than not be able to go to school. They say this even though the chance of getting work is close to zero, and most of the boys will end up working for the settlements for 40-50 shekels per day.

The teachers at the school all come from other areas in the West Bank and have to travel long distances and go through checkpoints to get here. They have to stay at the school, all sharing one very small room, and return home about once a month. They are now paid by the Palestinian Authority (PA), but with the US and EU withholding aid, and Israel withholding taxes due, they got paid nearly a month late last month, and don’t know if they’ll be paid at all this month. At last, the school has permission to build classrooms after going through a lengthy process, but there is no money available to build.

The head teacher of the school has a fighting spirit beyond belief. But the difficulties of life here showed themselves as we left. She got a lift from us to go down to the village, so she could pick up some medicine for her mother that somebody had brought from Jericho for her. She is very keen to set up links with schools in other countries and asked us if we might be able to facilitate this.

http://brightonpalestine.org/blog/?p=20

The London Times: “West ‘has to prevent collapse’ of PA”

From Stephen Farrell in Jerusalem

JAMES WOLFENSOHN, the international envoy to the Middle East, has resigned and issued a warning of the dangers ahead if the West cuts everything but humanitarian aid to the Palestinians.

Mr Wolfensohn, a former head of the World Bank, also cautioned that the UN, charities and humanitarian organisations will not be able to fill the gap if the Palestinian Authority collapses under financial pressure. Speaking in Washington after he ended his posting as envoy to the Quartet on the Middle East — the UN, the US, the EU and Russia — Mr Wolfensohn said: “It would surprise me if one could win by getting all the kids out of school or starving the Palestinians. And I don’t think anyone in the Quartet believes that to be the policy. I think that’s a losing gambit.”

Mr Wolfensohn stepped down on Sunday because of restrictions in dealing with the Islamic militant group Hamas, which dominates the Palestinian Government. He said that recent promises of aid from Arab states would provide only temporary relief to the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority, which has been unable to raise the $130 million (£71 million) a month it needs to pay 160,000 civil servants and keep services going.

He cautioned that if Israel continued to withhold authority tax revenues and maintain its restrictions on the movement of Palestinian trade and workers, by 2008 74 per cent of Palestinians would be living in poverty and 47 per cent would be unemployed. He echoed earlier warnings that fortifying NGOs could not replace the apparatus of the Palestinian Authority if it collapsed.

He also questioned whether the West wanted to bring about the collapse of the authority after spending billions since 1993 to establish it as the cornerstone of a viable Palestinian state. “Will we now simply abandon these goals?” he said. His report was also gloomy about the failure of a deal brokered last year by Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, to increase the flow of goods through the Karni crossing.

Gaza’s only goods terminal has been closed 50 per cent of the days that it has been scheduled to operate.

The Quartet met in New York yesterday to discuss whether it should replace Mr Wolfensohn. Meanwhile, Israeli officials indicated that Ehud Olmert, the incoming Israeli Prime Minister, plans to meet Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, after visiting Washington this month. It would be the first meeting between Israeli and Palestinian leaders for more than a year.