1st August 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Update 2nd August:
Thanks to every one who responded to our urgent action alert, the Egyptian authorities opened the gate to allow the trapped group of foreign passport holders in!
Lets keep the pressure up on the Egyptian government until it opens the Rafah crossing to everyone and ends it’s complicity with Israel’s genocide.
See the Action alert issued by civil society organizations and public figures to demand the opening of the Rafah crossing here.
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This morning a group of over 70 people, mostly women and children carrying foreign passports, planned to take advantage of the ceasefire to leave Gaza and enter Egypt. Israel began bombing Rafah and the Egyptian personnel closed the Egyptian side of the border, leaving them trapped at the crossing, as the bombs fall around them. The Red Cross is not being allowed to reach them due to the bombing in the area.
Their nationalities include German, Norwegian, Bulgarian, and Egyptian.
Call the German, Norwegian, Bulgarian foreign office and political representatives to demand that the Egyptian government opens the crossing and allows civilians to take refuge.
“The situation is very scary, the borders are closed and we are here, 70 people, mostly women and children trapped. I can see the smoke and fire, and I can hear the explosions very close to where we are,” said Nalan, one of the women trapped at the Rafah Crossing, talking to The Real News.
Listen to the audio recording of a phone call with Nalan Al Sarraj, correspondent for The Real News Network, trapped at the crossing here.
A call issued by civil society organizations and public figures including African National Congress (ANC) leaders Ahmed Kathrada, Ronnie Kasrils, and former vice president of the European Parliament, Luisa Morgantini and Richard Falk states that “Despite a call from Egyptian citizens to lift the siege, the Egyptian government which controls one border and has the option to be part of a humanitarian response to the besieged people of Gaza, has instead supported the Israeli plan for return to the status quo of slow genocide.”
Egypt must open the Rafah crossing. Photo by Eyad Al Baba /APA images.
11th April 2014 | International Solidarity Movement | Occupied Palestine
The International Solidarity Movement today remembers Tom Hurndall, an ISM volunteer who was shot in the head by an Israeli sniper in Gaza. This terrible injury left Tom in a coma for nine months and he died January 13th 2004, at the age of 22.
11 years ago today, the Israeli army were invading the city of Rafah, in the Gaza Strip when Tom and other ISM volunteers saw a group of children in a street where snipers were firing. Witnesses say that bullets were being shot around the children, who were paralysed by fear and unable to move. Tom succeeded in pulling one child to safety, but when he returned for another, he was shot in the head by a sniper.
Today we pay tribute to Tom Hurndall, and to his family who lost their brother and son. We must remember that Gaza still experiences injustice and oppression, and we will continue to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
4th March 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Rosa Schiano | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Bahaa Al Farra. (Photo by Rosa Schiano)
In the shadow of the bleachers of Yarmouk stadium in Gaza City, still damaged by Israeli bombing, 400-meter Olympic runner Bahaa Al Farra trains. Bahaa took part in the London Olympics, along with three other Palestinian athletes, in 2012. “I started racing at the age of 14,” he said. “We used to compete mostly among students. The coaches attended the competitions and selected the best players.”
That’s how he met his current coach, Ibrahim Abu Hasira, seven years ago. “In 2005 I had the opportunity to compete in a competition in Egypt, but due to the closure of the crossing I could not attend it,” Bahaa said. “Whenever we have opportunities, we face problems related to the siege and military aggression. Several times I stopped the sport due to depression or a bad mood. The first time I left the Gaza Strip was in 2011, when I went to Korea. I was very motivated. Then in March 2012, I competed in Istanbul, and in August 2012 in London for the Olympic Games. But after a week, we were told that we should leave, because we would have risked not being able to return to the Gaza Strip due to the problems in the Sinai.”
Bahaa Al Farra (left), Ibrahim Abu Hasira (center), and runner Mohammed Abu Khousa. (Photo by Rosa Schiano)
“London was a great experience,” Bahaa said. “I met gold medalists. I hope someday Palestinians can win gold medals. It was nice to see how people support the athletes. I felt great emotions. I hope one day to get on the podium. I’m running to represent my country and my people, to make sure that other people know Palestine. I run to prove that despite the suffering in which we live, some runners emerge from the darkness and manage to do something important.”
The Gaza Strip has no quality sports facilities where runners can train, Bahaa said. “This land is not suitable for runners, and would require appropriate shoes,” he said, indicating the ground on which he trains. Yarmouk stadium does not have a track for athletics. It is not a track and field stadium and there is a lack of equipment for athletes, such as starting blocks. Athletes myst train to use them, but have the opportunity only when they go abroad or shortly before competitions.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Bahaa has lost at least five opportunities to train or race abroad due to closures of the Rafah border crossing. “Sometimes when there is a chance, I say ‘goodbye’ to my friends and family, I go to the crossing and then I go back home,” he said. Since the overthrow of Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi in July 2013, openings of the Rafah crossing have been limited. The new Egyptian authorities open the crossing only sporadically, reinforcing the Israeli siege and isolating the population of the Gaza Strip more and more.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Now Bahaa hopes to compete in the 2016 Olympics in Brazil. “We hope there are international organizations that can sponsor Palestinian athletes,” he said. “We need training camps”. years old, Bahaa trains every day, except Friday, in Yarmouk stadium, on the beach or in the street. Like all Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, he faces daily challenged due to the siege. “Sometimes I come home after training and I have no chance to take a shower because due to the lack of electricity, there is no hot water,” he said.
A football match in Yarmouk stadium. (Photo by Rosa Schiano)
According to Bahaa’s coach, Ibrahim Abu Hasira, “the psychological state of the runners is one of the worst aspects. The obstacles faced by the athletes cause great damage. Often they suffer from depression. I knocked on the doors of many organizations. They replied that there are no donations. I try to encourage the athletes to kill the depression caused by the siege. I treat them as a father, not as a coach. I try to let them overcome their psychological problems. Here athletes face few possibilities. I have been in many European countries in the past. I have seen how sport is considered. If you want to compare the situation there to that of Gaza, you could say that there is no life in Gaza. When athletes are able to leave the Strip, and they know about life in other countries, they feel very motivated. Then they return here to depression.”
Israeli violations: the report of the Palestinian Football Association
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Just a few days ago, a paper on Israeli violations against Palestinian athletes drafted by the Palestinian Football Association was published on the Internet. It had been presented at the annual conference of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) in 2013. Jibril Al Rajoub, President of the Palestinian Olympic Committee and the Palestinian Football Association, denounced these offenses during a press conference June 2013, especially those concerning restrictions on the movement of Palestinian athletes, coaches and sports clubs directors, as well as international experts, consultants, trainers and representatives of bodies such as FIFA, and on the entry of sports equipment into Palestine. Al Rajoub also pointed out that Israel had prevented the construction of sports facilities on Palestinian land near illegal Israeli settlements.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
The paper stresses that the sport, and football in particular, face a series of obstacles and deterrents whose main cause is Israel’s military occupation. Football, the document states, should bring people together, promoting ethics, building bridges of friendship between peoples, and be based on the values of peace and fair competition. The restrictions imposed by Israel instead damage the morale of young Palestinian players, undermine their future as athletes and hinder the growth of football, and sport in general, in Palestine.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Israel has committed human rights violations against Palestinian athletes, many of whom were detained; restricted the freedom of movement of athletes and other sports figures; impeded and obstructed to construction of sporting facilities or destroyed existing structures (like the destruction of stadiums and sports clubs during bombings of Gaza); restricted the receipt of sports equipment sent by FIFA or donated by other sports organizations and federations, or releases donations only after the payments of exorbitant taxes; interfered in the organizations of friendly matches between Palestine and other associations through political intervention and pressure to discourage games; and intervened militarily during football matches.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
These actions are violations of the basic rights in FIFA statutes and the Olympic Charter. The document gives examples of athletes killed or detained by Israeli military forces, like the football player Mahmoud Sarsak, captured when he was leaving the Gaza Strip for the West Bank to play with a new club. He was detained for more than three years without process, and released in 2012 only after 90 days of hunger strike, under pressure from FIFA’s president, other sporting bodies and international public opinion.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Israeli checkpoints prevent athletes, like all other Palestinians, from moving freely between Palestinian cities, while players who live abroad do not easily obtain permission to enter the Palestinian territories. For the players of Gaza Strip it’s difficult to enter the West Bank. Like other residents of the Gaza Strip, an athlete must obtain a special permit from Israeli authorities and indicate the reason for the visit, in addition to the destination city. If an athlete has to go to Ramallah, and for some reasons finds himself in another Palestinian city, he is likely to be deported to Gaza. Even permits to go to Jordan are obtained after exhausting procedures that negatively impact athletes’ performances. These restrictive measures prevent players in the Gaza Strip from joining the national team, and Gaza athletes from competing in the West Bank, like on 21 February, 2013, when Israel authorities barred 23 runners from participating in the International Palestine Marathon in Bethlehem without giving any reason.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
When Palestinian athletes from Gaza do not get permission from Israeli to go to the West Bank, they must travel separately and reach their team abroad. Delays at border crossings and other obstacles can cause the loss of their flights.
The latest violation against Palestinian athletes took place on 31 January, when two Palestinian football players, Jawhar Nasser Jawhar, age 19, and Adam Abd al-Raouf Halabiya, age 17, were returning from a workout at Faisal Al Husseini stadium in the West Bank town of Al Ram, and were wounded by Israeli forces near a checkpoint. While the two men were walking, the Israeli soldiers opened fire and released their dogs to attack them. The soldiers dragged the two athletes down the street and beat them. They were transported to a hospital in Jerusalem, and have undergone different surgeries for the extraction of bullets from their bodies. Jawhar was wounded by 11 bullets: seven in his left foot, three in the right, and one in his left hand. Halabiya was wounded by a bullet in each foot. Doctors at the Ramallah hospital where they were taken before transfer to the King Hussein medical center in Amman said it would take six months of treatment to assess if the two young athletes would be able to walk again. But they will not be able to play any more.
(Photo by Rosa Schiano)
Al Rajoub has called for the expulsion of Israel from FIFA for its racist policies which violate international law. “The Israeli brutality against the two young men emphasizes the insistence of the Occupation on destroying the Palestinian sport, he said.”
Three days later, on 3 February, Avi Luzon, president of the Israel Football Association and Jibril Al Rajoub, met with FIFA president Sepp Blatter in Zurich to discuss implementation the agreements from the meeting on 23 September for facilitating the movement of players, coaches, referees, officials and equipment into, out of and within Palestine. The process, which is part of the “FIFA Israel-Palestine task force” announced by Blatter in July 2013, will be monitored by FIFA.
16th December 2013 | International Solidarity Movement, Silvia Todeschini and Henni | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Gaza’s bad weather has disrupted access lines and flooded whole areas. Thousands of families have been evacuated. Numerous injuries and two deaths have been reported. The Zionist siege and occupation contribute to aggravating the situation for tens of thousands of people.
The main route of access between the north and south of the Gaza Strip, called Saladin Street has been flooded, making travel very difficuly. A microbus running from Gaza to Rafah must be able to avoid deep pools of water by going from one lane to another, slowly and laboriously climbing over the hedge that separates them. Some cars are blocked because the water is high enough to disable their engines. Carts are pulled by donkeys, who walk with their feet in the water.
(Photo by Silvia Todeschini)
The neighborhood of Rafah where Khaled el- Sadi Alul lives is called el- Madakha. He lives with three wives, eleven sons and six daughters in a house that is cold and wet. You can see your own breath. The veil Khaled’s first wife wears seems to smoke because it is damp, and body heat causes its moisture to evaporate.
The woman is particularly sensitive to the cold, because she suffers from asthma and is diabetic. Khaled should also avoid low temperatures, because two weeks ago, pruning a tree, he fell down broke a rib. It puncture his lung, which required a surgery to drain the blood from it. Some of the windows and the roof of the house were destroyed during Israel’s “Operation Cast Leas” military offensive. The roof has been replaced with a sheet of corrugated material which costs little, but contains carcinogenic asbestos.
Khaled says that that at midnight between Thursday and Friday, everyone was at home asleep . They had heard rain, but it did not look heavy, and there was no electricity, so they were in darkness. Sleeping on the floor, they woke up because their mattress was wet. The water came five centimeters above the mattress. They called Civil Defense, but were told the whole Gaza Strip was in a flood emergency, so nothing could be done.
(Photo by Silvia Todeschini)
They called the 109. The municipality said it would send a car, but it never arrived. The water that had invaded was sewer. They had to place a pipe out of the home, to ensure that water poured into the yard. Then they had to make a hole in the wall that separates the garden from the space in front of the kitchen door, to let it drain, all in the dark and without power. “We spent horrible hours,” says Khaled ‘s first wife “In three hours we emptied the water that had accumulated in the house with buckets. You can still feel the smell!”
This family is just one example of what bad weather means here in Gaza, and certainly not the worst case. “We pray Allah to end the siege,” Khaled said. “If we had electricity, when something like this happens, at least we could see and understand what is going on.”
For five days, Khaled’s sons have not attended school because it is also flooded. Or perhaps it would be better to say that a lake has formed around it and the school seems to float in it, making it accessible only by boat. Even the football field in front of the school looks like a rectangular lake. A few days ago, water reached the first floors of the houses, and ten families, of a total of 70-80 people, were evacuated by boat through the first floor windows of their homes. Some were taken on Friday evening,, others Thursday morning, to a nearby school that serves as a shelter. But they are not isolated cases.
(Photo by Silvia Todeschini)
In the Jabalia refugee camp, which lies at a low point in the north of Gaza, a young man on the street reported that one man had died from the fatal mixture of broken electricity wires and water in the streets. Boys said that last year, three people and one horse were killed the same way: an electrical wire broke and fell into knee-high sewage water, which the wastewater plant and pumps couldn’t move out of city.
Yusuf Khela, manager of the Jabalia municipality, says that two projects have been underway. One project would pump water
directly to the to the wastewater plant further north without passing the sewage treatment plant in Jabalia. To manage this, it would be necessary to pump 3000qm3/h, but because of the fuel shortage, it is often difficult to manage these. The municipality installed two pumps in case one runs out of fuel, to guarantee at least some pumping of water.
(Photo by Silvia Todeschini)
Even if there is fuel, it will be expensive, costing 7 NIS per liter. To afford these, the government is even cutting employees’ salaries in order to fuel the pumps. If they stop working, the rain, salt and sewage water mixing together, particularly during the heaviest rain in decades, would first flood all of Jabalia camp.
A second project to manage the camp’s water problems is an infiltration system. Khela says that sometimes UNRWA gives money to cover the coast of fuel for Jabalia camp, if it is not stopped at the separation barrier.
Each year a large amount of NGOs and UN organisations give money in order to supply the fuel and the basic needs of Palestinian people. Unfortunately, it is often not used to meet these needs. Streets gets bigger, even if this means cutting parts from the surrounding houses. But projects like solutions for sewage water in Jabalia camp are set up only after deaths are reported.
Most houses are accessible only by stairs in order to prevent the entry of water. The poorest houses, covered only by thin metal roofs, suffer the most. Heavy winter storms often carry these makeshift roofs away. On 11th December, a young girl died in Khan Younis after one struck her in heavy winds.
18th October 2013 | 3deVuit, Maria del Mar Fernández | Gaza, Occupied Palestine
Israel continues to maintain a full, tight closure by land, sea, and air, on the only coastal enclave left to Palestine. This has become even worse since July, as the Egyptian government closes the Rafah crossing on a regular basis and has destroyed many tunnels through which the inhabitants of Gaza could receive food, medicines, fuel and construction materials that Israel bans from entering or allows in insufficient quantities.
Israeli forces destroyed Rafah’s international airport in 2001. (Photo by Radhika Sainath)
The Rafah border crossing, through which it was possible to get in or out, is now closed whenever Egypt decides, and open for only a few hours. In fact, from my entry on Saturday until Wednesday, it has been closed. It is not known when they will open it again. We are jailed. Patients cannot travel to hospitals abroad, and some of them have already died. Lots of students, registered in foreign universities, are stuck here. Even Palestinians who have been working in foreign countries for many years have lost their jobs after not being allowed to leave.
I have been lucky enough to be able to come back to Gaza. But a trip that should take four hours from Barcelona to Gaza has taken me four days. The Rafah airport, built with foreign funding, operated from 1998 to 2001, when it was bombed and bulldozed by Israeli armed forces. Gaza has been completely besieged by Israel for seven years, and also by Egypt since July of this year.
From Cairo to Rafah there are some 370 kilometers by road, crossing the Sinai Peninsula. The flights from Cairo to el-Arish, about 50 kilometers from Rafah, were already quite expensive, but now, as el-Arish is considered a war zone, there seem to be no flights.
I was lucky not to have chosen 6 October, when a national holiday is celebrated in Egypt, to arrive in Cairo. Because of the clashes there, 51 people died and hundreds were injured and arrested. I did not board any of the flights arriving in Cairo by 2:00 am, either, because there is a curfew after midnight. It was great that two men unexpectedly waiting for me when I got off the plane were really from the Cairo press center. I could not forget that a journalist and a psychiatrist, both Canadian, were arrested by the Egyptian government while going to the Gaza Strip. They were still in prison when I arrived.
As there were no more bus tickets to el-Arish on Friday, I took the bus to Ismailia, some 130 kilometers from Cairo, with the intention of getting the one to el-Arish from there. I could have taken a shared taxi from Cairo, but have always preferred to travel by bus, as I think the danger of being kidnapped is less. Four foreigners had recently been kidnapped while travelling through the Sinai Peninsula. There was news that the Rafah border crossing would be open on Saturday. I could not travel to el-Arish until Friday, as it seemed the military did not want foreigners around, especially if they were journalists. I could stay in el-Arish overnight, since if you take the bus in the morning from Cairo, when you arrive in Rafah via el-Arish, the border will have been closed since 2:00 pm.
But when I arrived in Ismailia, I had to travel on to el-Arish in a shared taxi for seven people. I was the only woman and the only foreigner. The Egyptian student who so kindly and selflessly arranged my trip, and obtained a good price for me, also gave me her telephone number, so that I could call her on my arrival to make sure everything was okay.
I had previously been told that on my arrival to el-Arish, the military would be waiting for us, and that I should show my willingness to make no problems and follow their directions. They were very busy when we arrived there, though, due to some attacks on the zone, and the taxi driver was able todrop me at the hotel. On our way there, we were only asked to show our identity cards and passports twice. Finally, when on Saturday at midday I could cross the Rafah border to the Palestinian side, I couldn’t help shedding tears when I saw a bus full of Palestinians that had just been rejected on the Egyptian side and forced to return to Gaza.
On Monday, the Spanish embassy in Cairo had been unable to reach me. I had not advised them that I had arrived safely, nor told the newspaper for which I am writing, the 3deVuit in Vilafranca del Penedès, Spain. The embassy phoned them, they both kept calling me, and in the end, I could confirm that I had arrived safely to Gaza, to their relief. I am so grateful to them for their concern for me.
In Gaza, I have seen people much more distressed than before. They cannot understand why they have suffered this tight Israeli blockade, now worsened by the Egyptian one, for seven years while the world keeps silent. They feel abandoned by other countries. There are shortages of food, medicines and fuel. There are daily cuts of electricity and Internet for more than 10 hours. Fishermen cannot fish because there is not enough fuel. The Egyptian navy has also fired at them several times. Israeli F-16s hover above our heads, each time lower and lower. Israeli tanks and bulldozers launch incursions into the “buffer zone,” destroying Palestinian land and the work done by Palestinians farmers there, almost every day. But now it is the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha. and everything possible is done so that children may feel happy. Their mothers have made cakes for them.
This article was first published in Catalan by the 3deVuit newspaper in Vilafranca del Penedès, Spain.
