These are some of the things I wish everyone knew

A speech by Kate Raphael at San Francisco Pride.

These are some of the things I wish everyone knew:

I wish everyone knew what an olive tree looks like when its branches are lopped off, heavy full ones they call ‘hamel’, which means pregnant.

I wish everyone knew how Caterpillar bulldozers uproot the trees to make room for a Wall that is twice as high and three times as long as the Berlin Wall.

I wish everyone knew that the Wall will not stop terrorism and that’s not what it’s for, but it does separate tens of thousands of people from their land and put 3 million people in prison which will increase the hate.

I wish everyone knew that the number of checkpoints in the Palestinian lands doubled during a time when there were no attacks against Israelis, and

I wish everyone knew that the number of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, which is another name for land theft, doubled during the last peace process.

I wish everyone knew that 4100 Palestinians and 1100 Israelis have been killed in the last four years, and

I wish everyone knew that 8000 Palestinians are in Israeli jails, and

I wish everyone knew that 2 million Americans are in American jails, and

I wish everyone knew that since 9/11 the US has disappeared people and secret prisons and 2000 immigrant detainees are held indefinitely without charges and is that how you spell PATRIOT?

I wish everyone knew that in 1970, the Iraqi constitution, under Saddam Hussein, declared all women and men equal before the law, and

I wish everyone knew that until 1991 women in Iraq were 38% of teachers and 31% of doctors.

I wish everyone knew that the Bush administration wants a quota of 25% women in the Iraqi legislature and women make up 15% of the US Congress and we have no quota.

I wish everyone knew that women in Palestine hold 18% of seats in local government and women in Israel hold 12%.

I wish everyone knew that the US state department says it has built 11 women’s centers in Baghdad and when was the last time they built a women’s center in Bayview? And

I wish everyone knew that Muslim women don’t need us to free them, but they do need us to stop oppressing them, and

I wish everyone knew that half of older lesbians depend on Social Security for most of their income, and

I wish everyone knew that under Bush’s social security plan the average retired worker would get less than half what they get now, and

I wish everyone knew that 12 million people are now held as slaves around the world, including some right here in San Francisco, and 80% of them are female and 50% of them are children, and

I wish everyone knew that Black women in the US are 20 times as likely to get AIDS as white women and AIDS is the third leading cause of death for Black women and

I wish everyone knew that marriage won’t help us get health care when 39% of people in this country don’t have health coverage from their job.

Most Americans think foreign aid is 24% of our budget but it’s actually less than 1%, and

I wish everyone knew that 22% of US children live under the poverty level.

I wish everyone knew that we’ve killed 25,000 Iraqi civilians since March 2003 and the US has 37,000 troops in South Korea and 16,000 in Afghanistan, and

I wish everyone knew that US women earn 76 cents to a man’s dollar but if they are Black they earn 66 cents and if they are Latina they earn 55 cents, and

I wish everyone knew that 25% of US women who become pregnant have abortions and 87% of US counties have no abortion provider, and

I wish everyone knew how it feels to watch gay people cross the picket line at Badlands to go drink half-price beer at a racist bar, and

I wish everyone knew that queers are a community and not a market sector, and

I wish everyone knew that the parade didn’t used to have barricades and used to be for everyone

I wish everyone knew about Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism and LAGAI Queer Insurrection, and

I wish everyone knew that Stop AIDS Now Or Else was the first group ever to block the Golden Gate Bridge, and

I wish everyone knew that the Bolivian people are rising up to throw out the gas companies and winning, and

I wish everyone knew about the Gay Liberation Front, and

I wish everyone knew that Stonewall was a riot, and

I wish everyone knew that revolution is possible.

Bil’in persists

By Rann

We arrived early for the usual Friday demonstration in Bil’in. The ISM flat in the village was full of Palestinians villagers and Israeli and international activists busily preparing the latest of the pieces of protest display this village is so well-known around Palestine for. This time it was a series of bits of fence, to be connected by activists covered in sheets reading “the wall tears us apart” and other such slogans in English, Arabic and Hebrew.

The demonstration proceeded along an alternative route to the one the weekly marches usually take. We spotted the soldiers waiting for us on the hill opposite and many villagers laughed at our successful bit of trickery. The joy was short-lasted as the soldiers spotted us and began running across the hills. They caught up with us near the road used by the construction crews working on the annexation barrier. The commander waved around a piece of paper and declared the area a closed military zone. We demonstrators stood our ground as many more came streaming over the hill. The situation was rather tense, and after around five minutes, the soldiers began throwing sound bombs and shooting their new ‘sponge’ bullets directly at demonstrators. I saw a soldier (who I recognized as one of the group who arrested me a few weeks ago) aim his weapon right at my face. I turned and ran. He fired, and hit me in the back of the neck with a ‘sponge’ from a distance of twenty meters. Turned out that was the least of six injuries that were to occur during the demonstration. One person was hit near the eye with what was probably a rubber-coated steel bullet. Four Israeli demonstrators were arrested, two of whom were released towards the end of the demonstration.

The army continued to shoot tear gas as demonstrators, as the latter moved up and down the hills. Palestinian youth responded with stone-throwing, and Israeli media later reported that one soldier was injured by a stone.

As the demonstration was coming to an end and many demonstrators were preparing to leave, the army invaded the village. Villagers had blocked the road with rocks, a trash can and a bathtub. An army jeep bypassed the barricades and entered the village. Soldiers shot many rubber-coated steel bullets, sound bombs and tear gas. One Palestinian boy was arrested. The boy apparently had not participated in the demonstration. His mother came to one of the village’s organizers in tears later on. Her boy needs medication and she was worried he would not be given access to drugs.

Bil’in is going to lose sixty percent of its land to the annexation barrier, yet every week the army exacts another toll from the villagers. This time it’s one more useless arrest, one more mother in tears among the injured. The price of non-violent resistance is huge, but Bil’in villagers persist, week after repressive week.

Israeli army enters Hares village, harass youths

Written by IWPS

On the afternoon of Saturday, July 2, approximately eight Palestinian children were playing at the entrance of Hares village. They ranged in ages from 1 year to 12 years old. An Israeli army jeep passed by and, according to villager accounts, stopped at the entrance to the village. Several soldiers approached the children and began to push and harass them. It is unclear to Palestinian residents why the soldiers decided to target these children. The Israeli soldiers left after 15 minutes.

Israeli Army Invades Nablus

Scores of Israeli army vehicles invaded Nablus today. Surely there can be no claims of a ceasefire on the Israeli side now.

Israeli armed vehicles entered Nablus just before 1pm, speeding around and firing randomly. Newly arrived international visitors, unused to the thunderous echoes from town’s rocky hillsides thought they were under full scale military attack. Apache helicopters whirred overheard, their conspicuous presence preparing residents for an assassination. F-16 fighter jets screeched across the sky (Fighter? The Palestinians have no anti-aircraft weapons, let alone an air force).

International visitors stood dazed in the surreal atmosphere of giant war film set. But we soon felt real fear too. This town has been bombed from the air before. As we stood and tried to track the movement of the Jeeps and Hummers through residential areas, phone calls came in from friends in other places. The army was shooting in El Ein refugee camp. Jeeps had arrived at the Balata refugee camp. Homes were occupied on the hillsides. By the time we arrived to join the medics the army had left, like a cartoon chase.

Our usually unshakeable Palestinian friends from the medical volunteers became nervous, speculating on the reason for the huge military presence. Aircraft, helicopters, a drone and tens of ground vehicles are not for nothing, they reasoned. Perhaps they have already filled the city with plain-clothes Special Forces to arrest or kill people, or perhaps this is just the first phase of a huge military attack on the town like the invasions of 2002.

Some news stations reported that two plain clothes Israelis, Special Forces, had entered the city and were lost presumed taken by Palestinian fighters. Allegedly, the Israeli army had given the Palestinians two hours to hand them over before a full military attack on the town. The usually boastful resistance fighters denied involvement or knowledge. The story seemed implausible. We spoke to a captain in the Palestinian Authority forces who also disbelieved it. “If two Israelis were in here, the Israeli army would contact us to ask the fighters to hand them over.” No such contact was made. As is so often the case, the first casualty is truth.

When we reach Balata refugee camp, ten jeeps and hummers are on the main street outside, with more on the other sides of the camp. No one heard the Israeli occupation army actually announce a curfew but it makes little difference. Roads are closed to all Palestinian vehicles, shops forced to close too, and most residents have locked themselves inside their homes. Children wander around the camp with spent tear gas cans and “rubber” bullets (metal cylinders coated in rubber) as souvenirs. Medics and journalists try to cross the army line into the camp but the soldiers aim their M16s to stop them and don’t explain why.

Doubtless the Israeli media machine will ignore today’s events and more neutral agencies play down the significance as there is no graphic footage of blood and destruction. Don’t think the Israeli forces exercised restraint today. For no disclosed reason, in response to no reported Palestinian action, hundreds of troops enter a town in the centre of the West Bank and subject civilians, already suffering from years of attacks, to a day of fear and anxiety. Medical volunteers were harassed and hampered in their work. Ambulances were
not allowed into the camp. People had to carry acutely ill residents to the gate and pass them over to paramedics under the scrutiny of army jeeps and hummers. Even when medics and international peace
activists accompany a sick amputee to his home along a street outside the camp, soldiers tail and harass them all the way.

Unprovoked, the Israeli army hurls gas grenades into the camp. Palestinian teenagers laugh as inexperienced international peace activists scatter and abandon phones, bags, and expensive cameras. Dutiful kids return the items and offer onions (that help relieve the effects of gas) and water while the visitors compose themselves. Small children lean out of windows to shout greetings to the foreign visitors, far more interesting and unusual than another army attack. A whole generation has grown up to think that being shot at is more normal than seeing a pale skinned stranger. Later two foreigners, one an international journalist, are cornered in a shop front by a gas grenade thrown at them. Trapped in a cloud thicker and stronger than the tear gas fired from canisters, one foreigner suffers mild facial burns.

The drone and a helicopter are still overhead but the ground vehicles began to withdraw at 5:30pm with no clear objective attained from the operation. What happened here today? No arrests or assassinations reported and nothing seized.

As frequently as we report these abuses, we hear from people outside that things seem better here now, as though the only troubles are petty squabbles between two equal opponents. When will the media report this conflict fairly? When will the world see that Israel is the aggressor here?

Tonight few people in Nablus and Balata will sleep well and instead fear the start of a new campaign against them. It is the responsibility of the International Community to curb Israeli aggression.

by ISM Nablus

On the spot: Tom Hurndall verdict

Stephen Farrell Middle East Correspondent of The Times, says that it seems unlikely the Israeli Government or military will learn any lessons from today’s guilty verdicts in the killing of British peace activist Tom Hurndall.

“Mr Hurndall’s father Anthony stood outside the court after the verdicts and said that this soldier [Wahid Taysir] had been a scapegoat laid on the sacrificial altar of the Israeli system, and that the fault lay much further up the chain of command.

“But judging by the comments from both political and military spokesmen afterwards, it doesn’t seem as though they accept that there is a fault in the system in the way that Mr Hurndall alleged.

“In fact, a government spokesman said that the fact that someone had been prosecuted showed that the Israeli system worked. And the military prosecutor said that this wasn’t a case of an Israeli soldier following the rules of engagement, as critics of the Israelis believe: it was a case of a soldier breaking the rules of engagement and lying about it afterwards, and when he was found out, being prosecuted.

“The Hurndall family has called for further changes to the system and for the military and government to take a close look at themselves and at the way their soldiers treat unarmed civilians.

“We will have to wait until August to see whether this soldier is sentenced to more than 20 months, which we believe is the most any Israeli soldier has ever been sentenced to in similar circumstances. The maximum term available is 20 years, and the prosecution has said that they are going to ask for a very severe sentence.

“I think he will get more than 20 months. Wahid Taysir claims that he has been a scapegoat because he is a Bedouin Arab, rather than a Jew, and because the victim was British. He says that if he had not been a Bedouin this prosecution would probably never have been brought.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-3-1671414,00.html