Non-violent protesters are rising up to challenge the Israeli occupation, from the chambers of Congress to the shores of the Mediterranean. And while other action have received global media coverage, a small West Bank village named Nabi Saleh has been struggling without the attention it deserves.
Its residents have been organizing a campaign to challenge the illegal theft of their land by the settlement of Halamish since January 2010. Dozens of men and women have been gathering every Friday to voice their opposition to the injustice they face, using creative actions and non-violent demonstrations. The weekly protests are also joined by international and Israeli solidarity activists.
In an attempt to silence their dissent, the Israeli army has utilized banned high-velocity tear-gas projectiles, rubber-coated steel bullets and at times, even live ammunition at demonstrations. Additionally, the Army is conducting an ongoing arrest campaign against men, women and children in the village. Between January 2010 and April 2011, the Army carried out 73 protest-related arrests. One of the arrested is Bassem Tamimi, a main organizer and member of the local Popular Committee.
Netanyahu retorted to an interruption by a pro-Palestinian protestor in Congress, that only in democratic nations are such protests allowed. But the violent attack she faced from nearby AIPAC delegates in the Congressional Gallery and the jailing of non-violent organizers across the Palestinian Territories suggests otherwise. Tamimi, a father of four and a respected member of his community, is sitting in jail for the crime of non-violent organizing.
In his recent court, Tamimi stated, “I organized these peaceful demonstrations to defend our land and our people.” Tamimi also challenged the legitimacy of the very system which tries him, saying that “Despite claiming to be the only democracy in the Middle East you are trying me under military laws […] that are enacted by authorities which I haven’t elected and do not represent me (See Tamimi’s full statement).”
Speaking on behalf of the European Union, Ambassador András Dékány stated, “The rights of Israeli and Palestinian Human Rights Defenders protesting peacefully against settlements and the separation barrier are severely curtailed. While the EU welcomed before this Council in March the release of Abdallah Abu Rahma, the EU is concerned that other human rights defenders continue to be detained for their non violent protests. The EU is observing the trial, which opened on 5 June before an Israeli military court, of Bassem Tamimi, an activist of the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh affected by the illegal settlement expansion. The EU is also concerned by reports that journalists in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip are exposed to severe harassment as this affects negatively the right to freedom of expression. Impunity for such acts is unacceptable (see EU’s full statement).”
Tamimi’s next hearing will take place on the June 27th at the Ofer Military Court , when testimonies will be heard in this case for the first time.
Will you tell you government to act?
Join us in calling for release of Bassem Tamimi and Naji Tamimi.
Sign the petition and get updated news about the Freedom Flotilla II – Stay Human
We are writing to ask for your support for the Gaza Freedom Flotilla scheduled to set sail in the second half of June to the besieged Gaza strip. You can help prevent an assault on the nonviolent activists aboard the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza by signing on to our petition.
At least ten ships with dignitaries, doctors, professors, artists, journalists, and activists, as well as construction supplies and humanitarian aid, will sail from ports in Europe to Gaza in an act of non-violent civil disobedience to persuade the international community to fulfill its obligations towards the Palestinian people and end Israel’s four-year illegal blockade of Gaza.
This is the second, large-scale citizen-to-citizen flotilla to be launched by international grassroots groups. Organized by 14 national groups and international coalitions, the flotilla will carry approximately 1,000 passengers. It will include a US boat named The Audacity of Hope, which will have aboard dozens of dedicated social justice activists. Learn more about the US Boat to Gaza.
The last Freedom Flotilla in May 2010 included seven vessels carrying nearly 700 passengers from 36 different countries. Israeli commandos attacked the boats, shooting and killing nine passengers, injuring over 50 and imprisoning all aboard.This tragedy opened the subject of Gaza on the world stage and put considerable pressure on Israel to ease the draconian siege on Gaza – something the international community had failed to do for 3 years. Learn more about the Free Gaza Movement and support their efforts.
We ask you to sign this petition to show the overwhelming public support for an end to siege of Gaza and the rights for Palestinians. We also demand that the American administration apply pressure on Israel to ensure that passengers are not violently attacked and to allow the flotilla to sail to Gaza.
Petition Letter: Freedom Flotilla to Gaza
Dear President Obama,
We demand that the US government apply political pressure on Israel to ensure that passengers aboard the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza are not violently attacked by the Israeli military.
The Freedom Flotilla II, to sail in late June, will hold around 1,000 passengers demanding for an end to the draconian siege on Gaza. International organizations, including the United Nations, have condemned the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip. Your administration must pressure Israel to uphold international law and allow the Flotilla to pass to Gaza.
Around 50 American social justice activists will partake in this mission aboard a boat named, The Audacity of Hope. We ask for your support in ensuring their safety on this passage.
The right to return is a core goal of the Palestinian liberation struggle. Since 1947-1948, when over 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homes – and more than 700,000 were ethnically cleansed from their country altogether – they and their descendants have organized to demand the rectification of this historic injustice. The refugees of the Six-Day War in 1967 (after which Israeli forces drove 300,000 Palestinians out of the occupied Gaza Strip and West Bank ), the 1967-1994 Israeli administration of the occupied territories (during which Israel stripped 140,000 Palestinians of their residency rights), and the ongoing colonization of Palestine and displacement of its indigenous inhabitants, have added their voices to the growing global movement for return.
In recent years, the right to return has also emerged as a key demand of international solidarity activists supporting Palestinian aspirations for freedom. On July 9, 2005, for example, the Palestinian Civil Society Call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) – the founding document of a Palestinian-led global movement for justice in Palestine – stated that “non-violent punitive measures should be maintained until Israel meets its obligation to recognize the Palestinian people’s inalienable right to self-determination and fully complies with the precepts of international law by … respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties.”
Today the seven million Palestinian refugees are the world’s largest group of refugees, comprising one-third of the total refugee population. Their right to return to their homes, and to receive compensation for the damages inflicted on them, are enshrined in international law. Resolution 194, which the United Nations General Assembly adopted on 11 December 1948 and Israel agreed to implement as a condition of its subsequent admission to the United Nations,
resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible.
Additionally, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the General Assembly on December 10, 1948, states that “everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” And Resolution 3236, which the General Assembly adopted on November 22, 1974, “reaffirms … the inalienable right of the Palestinians to return to the homes and property from which they have been displaced and uprooted, and calls for their return.”
Despite its clear obligations under international law, Israel continues to resist demands by Palestinian refugees that they are allowed to return to their homes. Most recently, on Sunday, May 15, the 63rd commemoration of the Nakba, or “catastrophe,” of the 1947-1948 ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Israeli troops responded to demonstrations by unarmed refugees marching towards their homes with lethal force.
Israeli forces killed at least 15 demonstrators on three borders (with occupied Gaza, Lebanon, and between Syria and the occupied Golan Heights), wounded hundreds more with live gunfire, artillery shells, and tear gas, and unleashed a wave of arrests and repression in the occupied West Bank. This massive violence could only have been planned as a show of brute force, intended, along with Benjamin Netanyahu’s repeated assertions that “it’s not going to happen,” to dissuade Palestinian refugees from asserting their historic rights and the global consensus for the right of return.
Yet the most enduring story from May 15 may be that of Hassan Hijazi. A 28-year old Palestinian refugee living in Syria, he braved the gunfire that killed four others along the border with the occupied Golan Heights, then hitchhiked, and finally took a bus, to his family’s home in Jaffa. Before turning himself in to Tel Aviv police, he told Israeli reporters, “I wasn’t afraid and I’m not afraid. On the bus to Jaffa, I sat next to Israeli soldiers. I realized that they were more afraid than I was.”
Millions more are resolved to follow Hijazi’s path. On Sunday, June 5, the 44th commemoration of the Naksa, or setback, Israel’s 1967 expulsion of 300,000 Palestinians following the Six-Day War, Palestinian refugees will return en masse to the borders. Announcing the mobilization on May 18, the Third Intifada Youth Coalition said, “The last few days proved that the liberation of Palestine is possible and very achievable even with an unarmed massive march if the nation decides it is ready to pay all at once for the liberation of Palestine.”
The Preparatory Commission for the Right to Return, a nonpartisan coordinating body, has requested that supporters of the Palestinian liberation struggle also take action on June 5, by staging rallies, marches, and protests throughout the world demanding Palestinian refugees’ right to return. Appropriate venues could include Israeli embassies, consulates, and missions, BDS campaign targets, and foreign governments and international organizations that enable Israeli crimes.
”The May 15 marches were not an isolated incident, but were rather a declaration of the foundation of a new stage of struggle in the history of the Palestinian cause, entitled: ‘The refugees’ right to return to their homes,’” a statement by the Commission says.
For the first time ever, the Palestinians have switched from commemorating their displacement with statements, festivals, and speeches, to actual attempts to return to their homes.
The scene of refugees marching from all directions towards their homeland of Palestine sent a powerful message to the entire world that the refugees are determined to return to their homes however long it may take; and that 63 years were not enough to kill their dream of return; and that the new generations born in forced exile who have never seen their homeland are no less attached than their grandparents and fathers who witnessed the Nakba.
What happened on May 15 was only a microcosm of the larger march soon to come, a march that will be made by Palestinian refugees and those who support them. They will pass the barbed wire and return to their occupied villages and cities.
The crowds will head out from everywhere there are Palestinian refugees toward the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and occupied Palestine’s borders with Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon, in peaceful marches raising the Palestinian flag and the names of their villages and towns, the keys to their homes, and certification papers.
The Arab Spring’s “winds of change” are blowing through the refugee camps, no less than the Arab capitals, toward Palestine. And they show no signs of stopping.
The International Solidarity Movement is appealing for activists to join our team in the besieged Gaza Strip. We are hoping that this coming month’s Freedom Flotilla along with the Italian Stay Human convoy will bring an influx of activists into Gaza who will help carry on the important work that Vittorio Arrigoni was an essential part of before his death.
After being barred from Gaza in 2003 following the murders of Rachel Corrie and Tom Hurndall, ISM Gaza was reinstated in August 2008 when ISM and other volunteers traveled aboard the historic, siege-breaking voyage of the first FreeGaza Movement boat. ISM has maintained a constant presence in Gaza since that time, for over two years of Israel’s crippling siege.
ISM volunteers refused to leave when Israel began bombing Gaza in December 2009. During the devastating 23-day assault, activists accompanied ambulances and provided vital testimony to the international media.
Daily life in Gaza is a harrowing struggle. Israel’s siege has made rebuilding bombed structures virtually impossible, and thousands of Gazans continue to live in tents. The siege deeply restricts Gaza’s food supply, but Israel also prohibits Gazans from producing their own food. In stark violation of international law, Israel enforces a three-nautical-mile fishing blockade. The Israeli-imposed ‘buffer zone’ swallows up a third of Gaza’s farmland, which lies along the Israeli border. Farmers are routinely shot and killed simply for working their land well inside Gaza’s borders.
ISM Gaza volunteers accompany farmers and demonstrators in the ‘buffer zone’, as well as working to strengthen the link between Gazan students and the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Visit https://www.palsolidarity.org/main/category/gaza/ to watch videos and read reports by ISM Gaza.
As the international community becomes more critical of Israel’s policies, it is vital to have individuals on the ground that can attest to the conditions inside the open-air prison of Gaza. Their voices lend strength to efforts abroad, as BDS campaigns gain momentum and freedom flotillas become pandemic.
Those interested in joining the ISM Gaza team are required to attend a preliminary training in their home country and have communicate with the volunteers in Gaza prior to arrival. Entering Gaza is an arduous process that requires some time to be spent in Egypt.
Also recommended:
– Previous experience with organizing / activism, preferably in the Middle-East
– A historical understanding of the Palestine and some knowledge of the current political situation
– Arabic language skills
– respect for Palestinian traditions and values
– Ability to stay in Gaza for an extended period of time (over a month)
For more information about where to attend a preliminary training or other questions, please email gazaism@gmail.com
On the 21st April, a meeting regarding the discussions and reflections on the murder of Vittorio Arrigoni was held in Rome amongst different activists. From the gathering, the need to organize a convoy to Gaza through Egypt was decided.
Let’s start this process by sharing those points:
– We want to go to Gaza through Rafah Border Crossing with all in the world that need to say aloud what Vittorio used to say: Stay human! We want to do it from Egypt because, in the post Mubarak era, that border must be opened to break the siege imposed for too long on the people in Gaza.
– We want to be in Gaza on the 15th May which is the 1 month anniversary of Vittorio’s death. It will be also Nakba day, when thousands of young Palestinians, as already announced, will go back to the street all over the world to ask for the end of the occupation and also, a new unity and the end of the internal division within the Palestinian authorities.
We want to go to Gaza for different reasons:
– Although Vittorio was killed, it has to be clear that they can not stop the international support for the Palestinian people. Also thanks to him now the international support is much stronger and united against the occupation both of Gaza and of the West Bank.
– We want to give voice and continuity to the work that Vittorio, together with palestinian men and wemen was bringing forward. Partucularly the independent information that he managed to pass to the world from the besieged gaza strip. For this reason, we will bring materials, tools and all we need to give life to a Media Center dedicated to Vittorio.
– The Freedom Flotilla will soon sail towards Gaza. Even though the two initiatives are organised separately, the two journeys, both via land and via sea, could reinforce each other to break the siege of Gaza.
Further info:
– The convoy will last six/seven days in order to give the possibility to participate for as many people as possible.
– It will take place between the 11th and 19th May.The exact dates will be agreed in few days with the people in Gaza that will host us.
So, lets start to get ready!
– It will cost around 450/500 Euros all included. And depending on the number of participants, it might be cheaper.
– For any question and to join the caravan please contact us using this e-mail vik2gaza@autistici.org or this phone number
+39-3333666713.These contacts will be running from monday 25th of April.
– We are opening a website called ‘vik2gaza’ to publicise information.
– We will activate a bank account where we will start to collect feas for accommodation and transport costs and the visas from Egypt.
– We will need some personal preparation to engage in this trip.
CO.R.UM.- Convoglio Restiamo Umani – Stay Human Convoy
……………………………………………………………………………………………………….
ANDIAMO A GAZA!
A Roma il 21 Aprile si è svolta una assemblea cittadina frutto delle discussioni e delle riflessioni scaturite dopo l’assassinio di Vittorio Arrigoni. Dall’assemblea è uscito un largo consenso e una ferma convinzione della necessità di andare a Gaza adesso, passando dall’Egitto.
Iniziamo questo processo condividendo i seguenti punti:
– Vogliamo andare a Gaza passando dal valico di Rafah con tutti e tutte coloro che nel mondo condividono l’urgenza di gridare forte e chiaro quello che la voce di Vittorio ci ha detto tante volte: Restiamo Umani! Lo vogliamo fare dal confine egiziano perché reputiamo nell’era post Mubarak che quel valico deve aprirsi per rompere un assedio a cui la Striscia di Gaza è ormai da troppo tempo costretta.
– Vogliamo stare a Gaza il 15 maggio, ad un mese dall’uccisione di Vittorio, il giorno della nakba, quando migliaia di giovani palestinesi hanno annunciato che torneranno in piazza in tutto il mondo per chiedere la fine dell’occupazione ma anche una nuova unità e la fine delle divisioni interne all’Autorità Palestinese.
Vogliamo entrare per diversi motivi:
– Perchè anche se hanno ucciso Vittorio deve essere chiaro che non possono fermare la solidarietà internazionale verso la popolazione palestinese e che grazie a lui è ancora più forte e unita control’ occupazione di Gaza e della West Bank.
– Perchè vogliamo continuare a dare voce ai percorsi che Vittorio, insieme agli uomini e alle donne palestinesi, stava portando avanti, soprattutto quel lavoro di informazione indipendente che Vittorio aveva saputo trasmettere da una Gaza continuamente assediata. Per questo porteremo giù le nostre attrezzature per dar vita ad un Media Center dedicato proprio a lui.
– A breve partirà anche una Flottilla internazionale alla volta di Gaza e le due iniziative via terra e via mare, anche se diverse e organizzate separatamente, si possono rafforzare a vicenda per rompere l’assedio.
Alcune informazioni pratiche per iniziare:
– la durata del convoglio sarà di circa 6/7 giorni per poter dare modo a tante persone di organizzarsi con cosi poco anticipo.
-il periodo sarà incluso tra l’11 e il 19 maggio, le date saranno definite in maniera più dettagliata entro pochi giorni. Intanto
cominciate a tenervi liberi e libere!
– il costo di tutto il periodo sarà di circa 450/500 euro, sperando di abbassare la cifra con il crescere delle persone.
– stiamo aprendo un sito internet per raccogliere tutte le informazioni necessarie si chiamerà vik2gaza
– abbiamo attivato una e-mail (vik2gaza@autistici.org) e un numero di telefono (+39-3333666713) per raccogliere le adesioni.
– stiamo attivando un conto presso il quale sarà possibile versare una quota di partecipazione per organizzare gli spostamenti e i
pernottamenti.
– saranno necessari dei momenti di preparazione per poter affrontare nel migliore dei modi questo viaggio.
