16th April 2017 | International Solidarity Movement, Ramallah Team | Gaza, occupied Palestine
Today marks the 6th anniversary of the death of Vittorio Arrigoni, a journalist and an italian activist working with the International Solidarity Movement, in Gaza.
Arrigoni first went to Gaza in 2008, on an activist-organised flotilla seeking to defy the Israeli blockade over Gaza, imposed two years before. On April 16th 2011, when Arrigoni was 36 years old, his body was found in Gaza city, only a few hours after “The Brigade of the Gallant Companion of the Prophet Mohammad bin Muslima”, a Salafist group operating in Gaza, released the video where he was blindfolded and wounded. After investigations, his alleged murderers were arrested and sentenced to life-imprisonment (15 years after appeal).
Vittorio “Vik” Arrigoni wearing a kaffiyeh.
Vittorio Arrigoni was one of the international activists present in Gaza during Israel’s attacks on the Gaza strip in 2008-09, while volunteering with the Palestine Red Crescent Society, and was one of the few international voices dispatching information during the attacks, especially after Israel banned the entry of journalists into the territory.
For almost his 3 years living in the Gaza Strip, Arrigoni was a committed ISM activist, working in solidarity with farmers and fishermen, whose lives were being severely constrained by the blockade. His presence in protests and demonstrations allowed him to document and report the impact of the blockade, warfare and human rights violations in that territory. Arrigoni’s involvement with the Palestinian struggle made him a target for arrest and injuries by the Israeli military several times, and also led him to volunteer in Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in Lebanon.
After breaking the blockade in 2008, Arrigoni described that moment as being on of the happiest of his life, as “it became clear, not only to the world, but Palestinians also, that there are people who are willing to spend their lives to come and hug their brothers here in Gaza.”.
As it has been happening every year, Palestinians have commemorated the sixth anniversary of Vittorio Arrigoni’s death yesterday, by gathering in the port of Gaza. Vittorio’s memory is also honored in Gaza by the street and school that carry his name. Some of his thoughts on his experience in Gaza and on the solidarity with the Palestinian people have also been collected and turned into a book, “Gaza: Stay Human” (a nod to the way Vittorio used to sign his emails), first published in 2011.
ISM mourns this loss and hopes to honor Vittorio’s death by supporting and showing solidarity to the Palestinian people in their daily, non-violent resistance to the blockade in Gaza and the occupation.
“We must remain human, even in the most difficult times … Because, despite everything, there must always be humanity within us. We have to bring it to others.”
16th March 2017 | International Solidarity Movement, occupied Palestine
Rachel Corrie, April 10, 1979 – March 16, 2003 (Courtesy Rachel Corrie Foundation)
Today, March 16th, 2017, marks 14 years since the day that Rachel Corrie had her life taken. And though her life ended early, her courageous heart and defiant spirit will be carried onward, and continue to inspire many activists now and into the future.
Holding a megaphone, and wearing bright colors, Rachel Corrie stood in between a Palestinian house awaiting its demolition and the bulldozer about to demolish the house, in the town of Rafah in Gaza. For several days, ISM activists had been serving as protective presence in the homes that were on their way to being destroyed. Just hours before, a group of activists entered a Palestinian house about to be demolished, shouting at the military that they were inside, and they backed out.
The definition of a bulldozer: 1) a powerful track-laying tractor with caterpillar tracks and a broad curved upright blade at the front for clearing ground. 2) a person or group exercising irresistible force, especially in disposing of opposition.
A solidarity activist with ISM, Rachel Corrie used her body, her voice, her heart, and her will to try to stop one of many house demolitions plaguing the Palestinian people by the Israeli occupation forces. The driver of the bulldozer, a Russian immigrant, claimed that he did not see her. And, as the driver began to drive towards the house, he scooped up the dirt and took this beautiful human with him. Not once, but two times, as other activists shouted to stop through the loudspeakers. Rachel’s skull was fractured, and though she was still alive after the incident, not long after she was rushed to the hospital, she passed away. Rachel was twenty-three years old.
The case after her death proved to be controversial and contentious. Rachel’s parents sued the state of Israel, and many organizations criticized Israel for their one-sided investigation of the case. As of 2015, the court has rejected the appeal.
Rachel’s parents continue to do her work through the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice and launched projects in memory of their daughter. They have also advanced investigation into the incident and asked the U.S. Congress and various courts for redress. Rachel’s story has inspired a play entitled “My Name is Rachel Corrie”, followed by a book “Let Me Stand Alone” that includes journal entries and emails from her experience in Gaza.
This is a poem written by Rachel Corrie only a couple of months before her tragic death.
Leaving Olympia
January 2003
We are all born and someday we’ll all die. Most likely to some degree alone. What if our aloneness isn’t a tragedy? What if our aloneness is what allows us to speak the truth without being afraid? What if our aloneness is what allows us to adventure – to experience the world as a dynamic presence – as a changeable, interactive thing?
If I lived in Bosnia or Rwanda or who knows where else, needless death wouldn’t be a distant symbol to me, it wouldn’t be a metaphor, it would be a reality.
And I have no right to this metaphor. But I use it to console myself. To give a fraction of meaning to something enormous and needless.
This realization. This realization that I will live my life in this world where I have privileges.
I can’t cool boiling waters in Russia. I can’t be Picasso. I can’t be Jesus. I can’t save the planet single-handedly.
I can wash dishes.
Here is Rachel’s last email.
Hi papa,
Thank you for your email. I feel like sometimes I spend all my time propogandizing mom, and assuming she’ll pass stuff on to you, so you get neglected. Don’t worry about me too much, right now I am most concerned that we are not being effective. I still don’t feel particularly at risk. Rafah has seemed calmer lately, maybe because the military is preoccupied with incursions in the north – still shooting and house demolitions – one death this week that I know of, but not any larger incursions. Still can’t say how this will change if and when war with Iraq comes.
Thanks also for stepping up your anti-war work. I know it is not easy to do, and probably much more difficult where you are than where I am. I am really interested in talking to the journalist in Charlotte – let me know what I can do to speed the process along. I am trying to figure out what I’m going to do when I leave here, and when I’m going to leave. Right now I think I could stay until June, financially. I really don’t want to move back to Olympia, but do need to go back there to clean my stuff out of the garage and talk about my experiences here. On the other hand, now that I’ve crossed the ocean I’m feeling a strong desire to try to stay across the ocean for some time. Considering trying to get English teaching jobs – would like to really buckle down and learn Arabic.
Also got an invitation to visit Sweden on my way back – which I think I could do very cheaply. I would like to leave Rafah with a viable plan to return, too. One of the core members of our group has to leave tomorrow – and watching her say goodbye to people is making me realize how difficult it will be. People here can’t leave, so that complicates things. They also are pretty matter-of-fact about the fact that they don’t know if they will be alive when we come back here.
I really don’t want to live with a lot of guilt about this place – being able to come and go so easily – and not going back. I think it is valuable to make commitments to places – so I would like to be able to plan on coming back here within a year or so. Of all of these possibilities I think it’s most likely that I will at least go to Sweden for a few weeks on my way back – I can change tickets and get a plane to from Paris to Sweden and back for a total of around 150 bucks or so. I know I should really try to link up with the family in France – but I really think that I’m not going to do that. I think I would just be angry the whole time and not much fun to be around. It also seems like a transition into too much opulence right now – I would feel a lot of class guilt the whole time as well.
Let me know if you have any ideas about what I should do with the rest of my life. I love you very much. If you want you can write to me as if I was on vacation at a camp on the big island of Hawaii learning to weave. One thing I do to make things easier here is to utterly retreat into fantasies that I am in a Hollywood movie or a sitcom starring Michael J Fox. So feel free to make something up and I’ll be happy to play along. Much love Poppy.
3rd March 2017 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza team | Gaza, occupied
16th October Group (the foreign Media Unit in Athorayya association for Media ) held a seminar about the judaization of Jerusalem, on Monday 27 of February in Gaza city. the seminar aims at shedding the light on the suffering of the Jerusalemites and the holy sites under the Israeli Occupation.
British journalist ,Ben White-via Skype- discussed Israel’s violations of international law, focusing on policies of land colonization and displacement in Occupied East Jerusalem.
Alaa Shaaban, a member of 16th October Group confirmed that The most important objective of the wall is to implement the plan of judaizing Jerusalem by confiscating its lands and surrounding it with rings of walls and settlements that strangle it and isolate it from its Arabic and Islamic environment Samah Abu Sharekh, university student, stated that ” Up to 2006, 76 Islamic worship sites were destroyed, and 18 were turned into synagogues, and other 17 were turned into barns for animals” “such seminars target the activists to educate them about the Israeli violations of international law”
Wafa Aludaini, the manager of the 16th October Group said 16th October is a group of mainly females that aims at presenting the Palestinian issues to Westerners scientifically and objectively. 16 October endeavors to correct the stereotypical images permeating western media about Palestinian people.
23rd February 2017 | International Solidarity Movement, Gaza team | Gaza, occupied Palestine
The Boycott campaign-Palestine PCB organized an awareness campaign for some Schools in Gaza City in order to raise awareness of the importance of Boycotting the occupation and supporting local products.
A number of the boycott-campaign-Palestine activists took part in the campaign by entering classes and delivering a short speech in which they urged the students to the importance of the boycott and the seriousness of normalization.
Additionally, the campaign included a distribution of sample of local products. In their speech with the students, the activists pointed out the benefits of boycotting the occupation: reducing unemployment, supporting Palestinian economy, and raising public awareness of belonging to the homeland and resisting the Israeli occupation.
This activity is one of several others that the Boycott campaign-Palestine intends to organize during the upcoming period, targeting the Palestinian public to boycott the occupation and resist the normalization.
16th January 2017 | International Solidarity Movement, ISM Australia | Gaza, occupied Palestine
It’s 13 years since Tom Hurndall, a British activist with ISM, was shot in the head while trying to carry a small boy away from a conflict zone in Gaza. His face was among a wall of martyrs I saw on arrival in the West Bank–another sobering reminder of the capacity for humanity to dehumanise: any friend of my enemy (even a child) is my enemy. The reality of my fear was: this could be me. A different situation, less high risk, but regardless. This could have been any of my friends from home – people with lives conceivably similar to mine that took them to that place, with families that have been forced to mourn publicly. Perhaps a white face can help viscerally remind non-Palestinians of this commonality: that the Palestinian daily experience is one that would be normalised if you lived there. The posters of martyrs on the street would be your friends or your neighbours – and reinforce the reality that no life is worth more than any other. A self-evident truth, but sometimes it takes self interested emotive responses to really relate to that. Globally people are separated in their struggles by feelings of difference that would dissipate seemingly instantly over cups of coffee. We will realize we are not all that different from each other when we share in each other’s struggles and pain.
A photo of Tom Hurndall (top left) amongst other internationals and Palestinians executed by Israeli forces
