Tag: Cast Lead - Page 10 - International Solidarity Movement

‘We Are The Accusers, Not The Accused’ : EDO Decomissioners victorious in court

3 July 2010

On 16th January 2009 seven U.K. peace activists broke into the premises of EDO MBM, suppliers of weapons components and in the words of one of them, Elijah Smith ’set out to smash it up to the best of our abilities’.

It was an entirely accountable action which was always intended to end in a trial and each decommissioner had pre-recorded a video in which they stated the reasons for their participation –to help dismantle the war machine from the factory floor.

Once inside the building, they barricaded themselves in and set to work. Equipment used to make weapon components were trashed and computers, filing cabinets and office furnishings were thrown out of the windows. Once they were done they calmly waited for the police to arrest them. Two activists who supported them outside the factory gates were also on trial. All of the defendants have argued that what they did was not only morally necessary but crucially that it was legal. U.K law allows the commission of damage of property to prevent greater crimes.

Two of the accused, Simon Levin and Chris Osmond have extensive experience of working in Palestine with the International Solidarity Movement. Chris Osmond told the court that ’the humanitarian disaster unfolding in Gaza at that time meant it was imperative to act’. He cited the words of Rachel Corrie, the U.S activist who was killed by an IDF bulldozer in Rafah, as an inspiration. The court heard a passage of Corrie’s diary ’I’m witnessing this chronic insidious genocide and I’m really scared, this has to stop, I think it is a good idea idea for all of us to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop’.

During the trial the court heard not only from the defendants themselves but from Sharyn Lock, who was an international human rights volunteer in Gaza during Cast Lead. She was inside Al-Quds hospital in Gaza City when it was attacked with white phosphorus. She concluded her evidence by saying that she had no doubt that those who armed the Israeli Air Force ’had the blood of children on their hands’. The jury saw footage of the air attacks on the UNWRA compounds where civilians were sheltering and have been given an edited version of the Goldstone report.

Recently elected member of Parliament for Brighton Pavilion, Caroline Lucas also gave evidence supporting the decommssioners, saying that the democratic process ’had been exhausted’ as far as the factory was concerned.

On January the 17th 2009 the bombs had already fallen relentlessly on Gaza for three weeks. Massive, passionate demonstrations and pickets had been held in many cities around the country and the world in protest against Israel’s war crimes, but to no avail. A growing sense of helplessness was grabbing hold of the movement as the Palestinian body count stood at over 1400 and counting. 300 of the dead were children. It was against this background that the “citizen’s decommissioning” of EDO MBM/ITT took place.

EDO/ITT is an arms manufacturer, based in Brighton since 1946. They were acquired along with the rest of EDO Corporation by the multinational arms conglomerate ITT in December 2007. Their primary business is the manufacture of weapons systems such as bomb release mechanisms and bomb racks. This includes crucially the manufacture of the VER-2 Zero Retention Force Arming Unit for the Israeli Air Force’s F16 war planes.

Over the years, EDO have consistently denied supplying Israel, and despite over fifty court cases campaigners were not able to properly expose the links between the factory and the IAF. However the serious nature of the charges against the seven (the factory sustained nearly £200,000 of damage and may not have recommenced production for weeks) means that for the first time courts took the argument that EDOs business is fundamentally illegal very seriously.

Paul Hills, the Managing Director of EDO MBM, spent his five days on the witness stand last week being confronted with all the evidence gathered by campaigners over the years –evidence which exposes a complex network of collaboration between British, American and Israeli arms companies and the way in which their deals are clouded in secrecy. The Decommissioners were able to present Mr Hills, for the first time, with a dossier of evidence showing how EDO MBM use a front company in the U.S.A to indirectly supply components for the F 16 to Israel. Under U.K law the supply of weapons components that might be used in the Occupied Territories is actually a crime.

After hearing Hills’ explanations of his company’s business practices, Judge George Bathurst-Norman said that, despite Hill’s denials of dealing with Israel, it was clear that their was enough evidence to justify a genuinely held belief they did. He also offered the opinion that End User Certificates required for arms export licences were “ not worth the paper they are written on” as they can be easily manipulated.

There is a history of juries in British courts finding anti-war activists not guilty when they attack machinery used in war crimes. In 1996 four women from Trident Ploughshares decommissioned a Hawk jet that was about to be shipped to Indonesia – they were found not guilty. In 2008 the Raytheon 9, who damaged a factory in Derry supplying weapons to Israel during the 2006 Lebanon war, were acquitted by a jury and only two weeks ago a group of nine women carrying out a similar action at Raytheon during the Gaza attacks were also found not guilty by an unanimous jury.

On Friday, the jury found Simon Levin, Tom Woodhead, Ornella Saibene, Bob Nicholls, Harvey Tadman, Elijah Smith and Chris Osmond not guilty of “Conspiracy to Cause Criminal damage” by unanimous verdict in Hove Crown Court.

Chris Osmond said “This action was taken because of EDO MBMs illegal supply of weapons to the Israeli military. We brought the suffering of ordinary Palestinians into a British courtroom and confronted with the evidence they took the brave decision to find that our actions were justified.”

The decommissioners’ stance made it clear to companies like EDO that they can no longer count on not being held to account for their actions. There are now a growing number of people in the international community who are willing to risk their own liberty to stand up for the people of Gaza and to challenge Israel’s war crimes through whatever means possible.

For more information see www.smashedo.org.uk

Activists disrupt Caterpillar shareholder meeting

Kristin Szremski | The Electronic Intifada

11 June 2010

While pro-Palestinian activists and supporters of Israel lined opposite sides of South LaSalle Street outside the Northern Trust Building in Chicago on 9 June, James Owens, the outgoing CEO and Chairman of Caterpillar Inc., told a room full of shareholders the company was not responsible for the way Israel uses the bulldozers the company manufactures in the United States.

Owens made his remarks at the end of the annual shareholders meeting, which had been disrupted 14 times by individual protestors who stood up one by one and loudly proclaimed that the Israeli military uses Caterpillar’s D9 bulldozer to raze farmland, uproot olive groves and demolish homes, sometimes crushing people inside. As each activist stood, as many as five plain-clothed security personnel descended upon the speaker and physically escorted him or her from the room.

At one point, the audience started chanting, “Out, out, out” as activists were lead away.

Initially Owens stopped speaking with each outburst. But he attempted to speak over the twelfth protestor, Sandra Tamari, a Palestinian American activist from St. Louis. Undaunted, Tamari continued to talk until right before she was taken from the room; she turned and pointed a finger at Owens and at the board of directors seated to his right. The room fell silent as she said with charged emotion, “You should be ashamed! You should be ashamed. People are dying.”

“It is not the D9 that is killing people,” Owens said after the end of the business meeting, during the question and answer session. “People are dying in the Middle East and we’re sorry about that. We can’t help that.”

Owens maintained the company “can’t manage the four million pieces of equipment out there,” adding that if Caterpillar did not sell the machines to Israel, the bulldozers still could be purchased off the Internet.

In addition, Owens hid behind the US Foreign Military Sales program, which handles the sales of the CAT machines to Israel. “We’re not in the business of international relations. You need to take it up with Washington,” Owens said.

Several humanitarian organizations contend that since the D9 is sold through the FMS program the bulldozers qualify as weapons and as such Israel’s use of them to illegally demolish homes and target civilians violates the US Arms Export Control Act of 1976, which prohibits the use of military aid against civilians, according to a 2004 University of Wisconsin document on its investments in trust funds.

The D9 is no ordinary earthmover: it is more than 13 feet tall and 26 feet wide, weighs more than 60 tons with its armored plating, and can raze houses in a matter of minutes, according to the Center for Constitutional Rights. The CCR is one of the organizations that helped Cindy and Craig Corrie bring lawsuits against Caterpillar and the State of Israel for the 2003 death of their daughter, Rachel.

An Israeli soldier driving a CAT bulldozer crushed Rachel as she was defending a home in Gaza, targeted for illegal demolition. The case against CAT was dismissed but a civil trial began in Tel Aviv in March.

In addition to being retrofitted to hold heavy machine guns and in some cases grenade launchers, many D9 bulldozers are now driverless and can be operated by remote control, according to a March 2009 article in The Jerusalem Post.

“The unmanned D9 performed remarkably during Operation Cast Lead,” a commander was quoted as saying in the article. The Israeli military also used the driverless vehicle, dubbed “Black Thunder,” in the 2006 war on Lebanon. The commander was not named in the article.

Israel has demolished some 24,000 homes using the D9 since it illegally occupied the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem in 1967, according to Joel Finkel of Jewish Voice for Peace, who introduced a shareholder proposal requesting a review of CAT’s global corporate standards.

“This means that Israel has intentionally made hundreds of thousands of people homeless. … For decades, its primary tool to accomplish this has been the D9 bulldozer, which our company builds and services solely to help Israel cleanse Palestine of its non-Jewish inhabitants by destroying their homes,” he said.

In 2003, Caterpillar’s sales and revenue totaled $22.8 billion, with more than half of that coming from overseas markets. This year, the company projects sales and revenues to reach as high as $42 billion, with a goal of $100 billion by the year 2020. Dividend payouts have increased 125 percent since 2003, according to the Quarter 1 2010 analyst conference call, filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. While CAT executives point to emerging markets such as Latin America for the company’s recent growth, revenues were down by about 22 percent in the first quarter of 2010 in the Europe, Africa and Middle East sector compared to the same period in 2009.

The shareholder proposal asked Caterpillar to amend its current policy, the “Worldwide Code of Conduct” — which does not include language pertaining to international human rights — to conform with international human rights and humanitarian standards, according to the proxy statement filed with the US Security and Exchange Commission in April.

Shareholders have been submitting proposals to the annual shareholders meeting since 2004, when members of the Catholic organizations Sisters of Loretto and the Ursuline Sisters submitted a proposal in 2004 asking CAT to probe how Israel used the bulldozers. Then, the proposal was supported by a mere four percent of shareholders; 20 percent supported the current proposal Wednesday.

That the Israeli military uses the bulldozers has been well-established. Now, however, the military is taking things a step further. The Israeli military is now conscripting Caterpillar mechanics as “reservist soldiers” so they can maintain the machines on the front lines in an Israeli military operation, according to a November 2009 article in the Israeli daily Haaretz.

“During Operation Cast Lead and before, during the Second Lebanon War, our staff essentially volunteered, and were nearly at the front in order to care for the equipment. Sometimes they risked their lives,” Yossi Smira, director of Zoko Shiluvim, which owns the Israeli company that supplies the armored bulldozer, said in the article.

When a reporter asked Owens during the question and answer session whether he was personally affected by stories that mechanics are being conscripted as soldiers or that disabled people were crushed to death when bulldozers collapsed their homes around them, he said, “Absolutely. It’s tragic. But we can’t manage four million pieces of equipment out there.”

Meanwhile, the expelled activists were convened in an alley near a back door, waiting to receive their cell phones and other electronic items, which had to be checked prior to the meeting. They waited for more than two hours. And when a guard finally brought their items, he brought them from the fifth floor — one at a time.

The group of 14 was convened by Matt Gaines of Chicagoans Against Apartheid in Palestine. Activists travelled from Boston, St. Louis and Louisville to attend the shareholders meeting.

The only ticketed offense during the day came when an activist from Chicago was cited by Chicago police for “incitement” after a pro-Zionist protestor punched him in the chest. He was not allowed to file a complaint against the man who hit him, he said.

Kristin Szremski is the director of media and communications for American Muslims for Palestine. She is also a freelance journalist based near Chicago.

DCI: Child blown to pieces, one maimed and two injured in drone attack

Defense for Children International

On 7 January 2009, Husam Sobuh (11) decided to bring more food, blankets and clothes to the UNRWA school in Beit Lahiya, where he was taking refuge with his family. On his way, he met with his uncle Osama (36) and his two children, Huda (11) and Luai (9), who were going home for the same reason. During this dangerous journey to their neighbourhood, where combatants were now fighting, Husam sheltered in an empty house with Mahmoud Abu Laila (14) and Luai Sobuh (9). All of a sudden, the building was attacked twice by a drone plane. Husam was blown into two pieces. Luai was blinded, and his body badly injured in the attack. Mahmoud suffered several injuries but recovered, as did Huda, who is badly traumatized by the incident. Osama has heard of treatment to restore Luai’s sight in the United States, but can’t afford the treatment.

The following information is based on an affidavit taken by DCI-Palestine from Husam Sobuh’s father, Osama Rajab Mohammad Sobuh, on 11 November 2009.

When the ground offensive stage of Operation Cast Lead saw an escalation in the bombing and shelling of Beit Lahiya, Osama Sobuh decided to take his family and flee. He brought his wife, nine children, two daughters-in-law and one grandchild to the UNRWA run Abu Hussein School in Jabalia Camp. It seemed all of Beit Lahiya was there seeking shelter in the school. Conditions were bad, not enough food, blankets or mattresses for the overcrowded population.

On 7 January, Osama decided to return to his house in al-Amal, Beit Lahiya, to collect some clothes, food and blankets for himself and his family. He decided to bring the two youngest children, believing the soldiers wouldn’t shoot at him if he had young children with him. Luai (9) and Huda (11) were scared, but he reassured them that they would be safe. On their journey, they met their relatives Mahmoud Abu Laila (14) and Husam Sobuh (11), who were going home for the same reason. Reaching al-Amal, they found all the residents had fled: “We reached the neighbourhood at around 7:45am and found it completely empty. No one was there except for some fighters in the alleyways, side-roads and under trees. An Israeli drone plane was circling overhead; I felt it was flying above us and watching us.” Osama remembers.

Having reached their houses, they gathered what they needed and reconvened to start the journey back to the school together. Osama made a white flag for Luai to wave as they walked, and they set off around 8:00am. Only 150 metres from the house, Osama got a phone call: “As we were walking back, my son Rajab called me to ask me to bring the small cooker to boil milk for his little son Raed because there was no gas in the school.” He tried to convince Luai to go back but he refused, so he installed the children in the empty house, fearing the drone plane overhead would launch an attack if they stayed on the street. “I left the children and told them I wouldn’t be long. I left the bags with them. Huda followed me. I had walked for about 30 metres when I heard a huge explosion from the drone plane. I turned around and saw thick white smoke coming from the house … where the children were. Huda was thrown to the ground…”

As he tried to run back to Huda and the rest of the children, an Apache helicopter overhead started firing, forcing him to run in the opposite direction. He took shelter in a neighbour’s house: “I stood at the door and looked at my daughter whose left arm had been injured. She was crawling towards me. She was shouting; “Please help me father,” but I couldn’t do anything except wait for her to crawl to me because the Apache helicopter was still hovering in the sky and firing on the street.” Huda managed to reach the house, where she was taken inside and treated by the women of the house.

Osama waited by the door for the Apache helicopter to stop firing and leave, so he could go to his children in the empty house, 50 metres away. As he waited, the drone plane attacked again: “I saw something flying in the air and falling on the street. I looked at the street and saw thick smoke coming out of the house; a few seconds later, as the smoke started to clear and I saw a half body of one of the children thrown on the street.”

An hour after the first attack, the Apache left and Osama managed to reach his children: “Once I entered the first floor, I saw my son Luai on the floor. He wasn’t moving. His face, eyes, chest and left arm were bleeding. His left arm was completely blown off. Mahmoud was beside him. He was also unconscious and his stomach was bleeding. I saw legs beside them and I assumed they were Husam’s legs. The rest of Husam’s body was on the street. The stench of smoke, explosives, and burned flesh filled the air. I saw small pieces of flesh and bones glued to the walls and the ceiling. They were pieces of flesh and bones of Husam’s dismembered body.”

Osama and other neighbours gathered the children and found an ambulance to rush them to hospital. Luai was transferred to Shifa Hospital in Gaza, and later to a Saudi hospital for treatment. He was left completely blind and is in need of plastic surgery for injuries to his arm. Huda also sustained injuries to her. Husam was brought directly to the morgue.

Speaking to DCI the following November, Osama explains that Luai has changed a lot. He has been enrolled in a school for the blind and his grades have been badly affected. He is angry all the time and fights with everyone. Osama is finding it hard to fund his treatment. He has heard of a procedure in the United States that could restore his sight. He hopes some organisation or individual will donate the money to help his son. Huda and Mahmoud have recovered physically, but Huda has been badly traumatized by the event.

Gaza’s virtual connection to the rest of the world

Electronic Intifada

23 May 2010

Eva Bartlett

The Gazan skyline reveals a particular need to link with the outside world. (Emad Badwan/IPS)

GAZA CITY, occupied Gaza Strip (IPS) – “I’ve learned most of what I know about photo editing and graphic design via the Internet,” says Emad, 27-year-old filmmaker and editor. In Gaza, this sort of thing has become usual in a different way.

“This program isn’t available here,” he says, smiling triumphantly as he finishes downloading the latest edition of an advanced video editing program. “Even if it was, I can’t afford to pay $600 for it, not even if I worked for two months. But I need this for my work, so I looked for a free online version.”

Isolated under a siege which began shortly after Hamas was elected in 2006 and heightened severely in mid-2007, Palestinians in Gaza have suffered the effects of such alienation in all aspects of their lives. The economy has been destroyed both by the prolonged and choking siege and the 2008-2009 Israeli assault on Gaza, leaving unemployment hovering near 60 percent.

Aside from denying Palestinians in Gaza an astonishing number of the most basic of daily items, as well as material vitally needed for reconstruction or in the health sector or for schools and universities, the siege is a psychological attack and strangulation which has pronounced affects on Palestinians dreams, hopes and daily realities.

“I’ve tried on various occasions to leave Gaza, for workshops abroad and for study,” says 24-year-old Majed. “But even when I’ve secured visas and invitations, the closed Israeli and Egyptian borders have prevented me from leaving.”

Likewise, Hatem has held a number of scholarships to study in the US and Europe, all of which have been lost to the whims of the Israeli and Egyptian officials imposing the siege.

Defiant despite the worst of obstacles, Palestinians continue to seek ways to educate themselves, as well as to feel connected to the outside world.

“The Internet is the most helpful thing right now,” says Emad. “For example, I’d like to study lighting in university, but it isn’t possible. Those type of programs, or anything on filmmaking and photography, are not available in Gaza. And since I cannot leave, I look online.”

Artists and musicians, as well as independent filmmakers, have virtually no market in Gaza for their work.

“Because of the siege and closed borders, the Internet is vital for promoting my work,” says Emad. “Someone anywhere in the world can see my photography, designs or videos and contact me about them. But for me, the most important is constantly sending a message about the reality of Palestine, whether it’s about the lives of children, or about the war, or the hardships under siege.”

Mahdi Zanoon keeps busy volunteering and filming with an organization in Gaza’s northern Beit Hanoun. But when not working, he too longs for contact with the world outside. “I chat with friends in other parts of Palestine and in countries abroad,” he says. “It is a small means of escape, when we always feel choked.”

Denied the opportunity to leave and visit family and relatives outside of Gaza, the Internet fulfills another vital role. “It’s too expensive to call people outside Gaza, but using Skype or a messenger program, I can keep in touch with friends and family abroad.”

Activists and educational groups also make the most of the Internet and technology. Satellite-enabled video conferences and Skype hook-ups allow university students in Gaza to connect with those in the occupied West Bank and with universities outside of Gaza working to break the siege on education.

The annual Bilin conference on 21 April this year included a satellite hook-up with academics and activists in Gaza, as well as residents in one of the hardest hit areas during the Israeli war on Gaza.

Ezbet Abed Rabbo, which had 372 homes destroyed, 333 partially damaged and suffered some of the worst human rights violations and war crimes at the hands of Israeli soldiers, played host to the conference, enabling the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem activists to show their solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza. The conference also enabled continued dialogue between Gaza and the West Bank, something that the siege and Israeli policies works to severe.

But for many in Gaza, the Internet and television are less political and academic, and more about killing time. In a Strip where time is the only thing in abundance, lack of work and leisure activities leads more people to surf the net or watch television.

Turkish dramas have gained a wide audience in Gaza. “I like to see something different. Their clothes, their customs, their surroundings,” says Umm Fadi. “When the power cuts, I get so anxious because I don’t want to miss an episode of the drama.”

The programs provide a means of escaping the daily reality of life in Gaza, where many feel tomorrow will be no different from today or yesterday. “Nothing changes, every day is the same,” says Mohammed. “There’s no work, no freedom, nothing to do.”

“You know, we watch television for the news, but also see how life is in other countries,” says Mahfouz Kabariti. “My kids see ‘normal’ life in other countries and ask me why our lives are so different.

“Can you imagine, this is the 21st century and my kids have never seen a real train. They live by the sea and only dream of sailing.”

Gaza youth learn music and challenge the occupation

Electronic Intifada

21 May 2010

Eva Bartlett

Rita, nine, learning the basics of the violin. (Emad Badwan)

GAZA CITY, occupied Gaza Strip (IPS) – “Why are you rushing? Isn’t it nicer like this?” Mohammed Omer, oud (an oud is similar to a lute) teacher at the Gaza Music School, asks his student. Omer takes the oud and demonstrates, playing the song slowly, gracefully, with the ornamentations that are key to Arab music.

Mohammed Abu Suffiya, the 10-year-old student, has only been studying for six months but has already learned to read music and play a working rendition of a well-known song by Lebanese singer Fairouz.

Glancing only now and then at the sheet music, he begins to play again, more slowly and with more expression, his teacher accompanying him on a tabla (hand drum).

Mohammed Omer, 28, is one of five teachers at the Gaza Music School in Tel al-Howa, Gaza City. Formerly in the al-Quds hospital Red Crescent complex, the school moved to its current location not far from the hospital after the complex was bombed and burned during the 23-day Israeli assault on Gaza. A piano and at least two ouds were destroyed with the school premises.

The school opened about six months before the Gaza assault in December 2008-January 2009 as a response to the demand at the Qattan Center for the Child in Gaza City.

School director Ibrahim Najjar holds a music degree from Cairo. Mohammed Omer studied oud in Iraq. The piano and violin teachers are from Russia.

“We are open in the evenings, five days a week. Students receive one-on-one classes, 40 minutes each lesson,” says Najjar. “We teach the solfege system of note reading, because it is internationally understood.”

Currently, students can learn the violin, guitar, oud, qanoon (a zither-like instrument) and the piano. “We’d love to teach other instruments, but we lack professional teachers aside from the five we have.”

Fifty students now study at the institute, half in their first year, and half in their second, continuing from their start in the al-Quds complex.

Elena, the Russian piano teacher, works with 11-year-old Hada. “All my students are girls this year, but I hope next year will have some boys studying piano,” Elena says.

Tala, 11, is a second-year student, having studied piano in her first year. She sits with a qanoon before her, slowly plucking her way through a song, starting to find the techniques necessary to make music.

She has studied qanoon for a year now. “I chose it because it has a beautiful, unique sound. It is difficult, and not many people play it, so I wanted to learn it,” she says.

“When I play, I forget any problems and just think about the music.”

“All children like music, it’s the language of peace,” says Ibrahim Najjar. “And it’s good for the mind, body and our daily lives.”

At the moment, students are all from the Gaza City region. But this is more a question of logistics than preference.

“They don’t pay for the lessons,” says Najjar. “The Qattan center funds this program.”

But because transportation from regions outside of Gaza City is too expensive for most families, the students are local.

Najjar hopes to change this. “I’m trying to arrange a bus, so that students can come from any region of Gaza, if they have potential.”

“Even if they’ve never played an instrument, they can have the chance to learn. We test their ear: can they hear and hum a melody? And we test their rhythm: can they replicate a rhythm?”

Mahmoud Kohail, eight, has studied the qanoon for just under a year, but took first prize in a Palestine-wide competition in oriental music for ages seven to 11.

“Everyone asked me how many years he had been studying,” laughs Najjar. “When I told them it had been only 80 hours, they couldn’t believe me.”

Emad Kohail, Mahmoud’s father, is an accomplished oud player, and his mother a talented singer.

Also a doctor of mental health and alternative medicine, Emad Kohail explains how music has helped his son.

“Mahmoud suffered the same post-traumatic stress disorder [(PTSD)] that nearly all Gaza’s children suffer, as well as an attention deficit disorder,” he says.

“Music has made an immense difference in Mahmoud’s behavior. It has been a therapy for his PTSD and as a means of teaching him to focus.”

Ibrahim Najjar agrees that music is therapy, and constructive for children’s learning and mental health.

“There is a big difference in the students’ behavior from when they first came. Now, they are calmer, and listen and respect each other. I teach them this, but also to behave like this in all aspects of their lives.”

On a sunny Friday morning in Gaza’s south, east of Khan Younis, Abu Mohammed strums his oud for an appreciative audience: the children have been traumatized by a May 2008 Israeli invasion which destroyed their home and farm.

“They were terrified, we were in the house as Israeli tanks and bulldozers destroyed the land and our chicken coop attached to our house. My children were so frightened by the shooting and explosions,” says Laila Abu Dagga.

The family has since vacated their house, 470 meters from the Green Line boundary, instead renting a house half a kilometer away. But on this Friday morning, they revisit their home, with friends, clapping and dancing to Abu Mohammed’s music. “Music really helps people improve their mental health,” says Abu Mohammed.

The oud player says he had to struggle to learn music.

“My father was very religious and looked down on music, thought it was a waste of time. He used to keep me from playing, but I’d learn in private. He didn’t understand, but music can be resistance, my oud can be a weapon against the Israeli occupation.”

With a stigma against musicians still prevalent in Gaza, projects like the music school, and individuals like Abu Mohammed are vital to the society.

Learning on his own, Abu Mohammed in 2004 won the Gold prize in a competition sponsored by Palestine Television. His winning composition featured the story of a pregnant Palestinian woman who died waiting at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank for the Israeli soldiers to allow her to pass and continue to hospital.

He plays his own works, set to the words of poets, and highlights themes of the Israeli occupation, siege, and the war on Gaza. Political, traditional, therapeutic, Abu Mohammed’s music meets various needs.