Palestinian activists in the West Bank are expanding their nonviolent protest efforts against civil and human rights abuses with a new campaign set to launch next week.
Palestinian activists are increasing their efforts to expose Israel's segregation policy in the West Bank, as well as violations on their civil and human rights. In a message to the press, the Popular Struggle Committee announced that on November 15, Palestinian activists "will reenact the US Civil Rights Movement's Freedom Rides to the American South by boarding segregated Israeli public buses in the West Bank to travel to occupied East Jerusalem."
Palestinians in the West Bank have lived under Israeli military control since 1967. Among other restrictions, they can only vote in elections to the Palestinian Authority, which has very limited power on the ground. They cannot travel out of the West Bank or receive visitors without Israeli permits, and they are tried in military courts, which curtail the rights of defendants. Jews living in the West Bank enjoy full citizenship rights.
The Popular Struggle Committee - organizers of the upcoming "Freedom Rides" - describes their initiative set for next week in this way:
Several Israeli companies, among them Egged and Veolia, operate dozens of lines that run through the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, many of them subsidized by the state. They run between different Israeli settlements, connecting them to each other and cities inside Israel. Some lines connecting Jerusalem to other cities inside Israel, such as Eilat and Beit She'an, are also routed to pass through the West Bank.
Israelis suffer almost no limitations on their freedom of movement in the occupied Palestinian territory, and are even allowed to settle in it, contrary to international law. Palestinians, in contrast, are not allowed to enter Israel without procuring a special permit from Israeli authorities. Even Palestinian movement inside the Occupied Territories is heavily restricted, with access to occupied East Jerusalem and some 8% of the West Bank in the border area also forbidden without a similar permit.
While it is not officially forbidden for Palestinians to use Israeli public transportation in the West Bank, these lines are effectively segregated, since many of them pass through Jewish-only settlements, to which Palestinian entry is prohibited by a military decree.
With the Arab Spring still reverberating, Occupy Wall Street blooming and the PA's U.N. statehood bid still on the table, expect similar efforts to be born as Palestinians in the West Bank continue to embrace nonviolent resistance to the occupation.
UPDATE: Israel decides to punish the Palestinians by approving 2,000 housing units in the West Bank to be rushed for construction.
Its pretty bad when the United States tries to hold the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization hostage by purse strings with the sole intent of ensuring that the Palestinian Peoples not be treated, as well, People.
Its kind of like Goldman Sachs withholding their measly 5 grand from a Credit Union for backing OWS.
Play my way, or no payola, you see.
U.S. lawmakers halted $80 million in annual funding to UNESCO because Palestinian membership was approved. The U.S. was due to make a $60 million payment in November. They will not, now, all because they don't want Palestine to have a seat on an international board dealing with science, education, or culture... all those pesky things that keep Peace at bay. (eyeroll)
"The UNESCO General Conference's action does not diminish our determination to work with UNESCO to advance U.S. national interests. Therefore, we will maintain our membership in UNESCO and our commitment to UNESCO," the State Department said.
(READ: ...you can't have our money unless you obey us, but we are staying in UNESCO...because you know, education, science and culture should have a US slant?? wtf.)
Israel, of course, is now going to add even more punitive measures against an already besieged State for daring to "join the world community" instead of being the non-entity they have been forced to be for the past 60 something years.
But Palestine will Prevail, for the World supports them!
In case you do not already know this, Alice Walker is participating in the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. She is sailing along with other Americans of conscience on the "Audacity of Hope." The boat is carrying nothing but letters and messages of support and solidarity to the people of Gaza whom have been facing a long-term blockade by the Israeli government and military. One wonders if messages of love and solidarity are deemed enough of a danger that the Israeli military and government will interfere; but we can only hope not and that the Gaza Freedom Flotilla will be allowed to complete its journey.
Here we go again. After the brutal attack that started with live ammo mixed with rubber bullets raining down on the civilian peace activists before Israeli special forces boots even hit the Mavi Marmara's deck last May and the international outrage that followed, you would think Israel might attempt a less brutal tactic.
According to the Haaretz article, in an Israeli government briefing on April 12, officials said that Israel's policy concerning the event has not changed, saying that "ships would be stopped by force if they sailed to Gaza."
Worse, besides all the punitive border closures into Gaza of late, making medicine and basic food unavailable, Gaza has been getting pounded by Israeli forces. It seems the Left has abandoned the cause, it is being ignored since Goldstone kinda-sorta recanted under enormous pressure, barred from his Grandsons Bar Mitzvah and attacked by vile smears by the power machine behind the Zionist Right Wing.
For the past two months, the Israeli military has attacked houses and facilities in Gaza almost daily, either by US F16s, Apache helicopters air or from tank shelling, mortars or sniper fire from fortified concrete bunkers overlooking the Gaza border. From March 16-29, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) killed 14 Palestinians, including six civilians, and injured 52 Palestinians, including at least 40 civilians (19 children), between 16-29 March, according to the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
(This stays up top today, for obvious reasons.. - promoted by Diane G)
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Tonight we have the honor of speaking to world renown Noam Chomsky, one of the most brilliant minds of our times!
Hear Professor Chomsky on the "information wars," free speech, socio-economic stressors, Wikileaks, Gaza, the Settlements and more!
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"The army knows the kids are there to collect. They watch them every day and they know they have no weapons," said Mohammed Abu Rukbi, a fieldworker with DCI. "They usually fire warning shots but the kids don't take much notice."
Mohammed Sobboh, 17, [ABOVE] was shot just above the knee on August 25 when he was 800 metres from the border, he said. The 12 people in his family have no other income and are not entitled to aid from the UN as they are not refugees.
Israeli soldiers shot dead a horse and a donkey used by Mohammed and his brothers to carry the rubble, he said.
In the course of three months this summer Israeli soldiers shot and wounded 10 Palestinian teenagers who collect building materials from demolished structures in the former Israeli settlements and the Erez industrial zone in the northern Gaza Strip, dozens or hundreds of meters from the border. Palestinians believe the shootings are aimed at keeping people away from these areas, but despite the great risk dozens of nearby residents, many of them minors, continue to come in order to collect bits of cement and gravel from inside the buildings that were destroyed by the Israel Defense Forces around the time of the 2005 disengagement, and sell them to contractors and factories in the Strip. ...
Every day dozens of people come to the ruins of the industrial zone and the settlements, such as Elei Sinai, in wagons drawn by donkeys or horses. One of the teens, who was shot on August 25, told Defence for Children that in recent months soldiers also shot and killed one of the donkeys and three of the horses.
Most of the children tell of a father who is unemployed. Some were among the thousands of Gazans who worked in Israel up until 2006, when their work permits were revoked. The father of one of the teens was forced to close his store as a result of Israel's ban on the entry of goods it did not define as "humanitarian" into the Strip. After the death, about two years ago, of a 14-year-old shooting victim identified as "N.," the teen dropped out of school to help support his family. That is the story of all these teens, dropping out and going out to work. They all said in their statements that they are afraid to go back to collecting gravel. Some have difficulty walking or carrying heavy loads as a result of their injuries.
We officially demand that the US administration and the Israeli government provide a map of the borders of the state of Israel which they want us to recognize. ...
We want to know whether this state includes our lands and houses in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. ...
If this map is based on the 1967 borders and provides for the end of the Israeli occupation over all Palestinian lands... then we recognize Israel by whatever name it applies to itself in accordance with international law.
This of course under-reported in the U.S. move by the Palestinians (the latest U.S. 'news'/propaganda on I/P, by the way, is "Israel offers settlement freeze in exchange for recognition; Palestinians say 'no'") is smart if it increases international attention on what the U.S. and Israel are asking Palestinians to recognize: a borderless state fully expanded into Palestinian territory. Abed Rabbo added:
It is important for us to know where are the borders of Israel and where are the borders of Palestine. Any formulation the Americans present - even asking us to call Israel the 'Chinese State' - we will agree to it, as long as we receive the 1967 borders. We have recognized Israel in the past, but Israel has not recognized the Palestinian state.
Amira Hass asks what is delaying treatment of a 47-year-old Palestinian woman, Khalida Jarrar, who needs diagnostic brain tests that cannot be done in the West Bank due to lack of the necessary medical equipment?
This is a mere footnote in the chronicle of the Palestinians' life under foreign rule. But this footnote is a typical chapter in the history of Israeli society: a democratic society that gives those wonderful fellows from the Shin Bet a blank check to act like the last of the great dictators and juggle with their subjects' lives - without elections, without oversight, without supervision. Their word is sacrosanct. And if they say, as they did in reply to Haaretz, "Relevant information exists indicating that [Jarrar's] exit from the area poses a risk to our security," we all salute.
'Salute' cuz that's what's done in an incorrigibly (?) militarized society (things seem to have gone much further militarization-wise than they have in the U.S., though Americans can relate). And, of course, as Hass notes, if there were any evidence that Jarrar was dangerous, she would've been arrested long ago. The real explanation for her brutal treatment may relate to the fact that she is a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, representing the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. She wants the Israel occupiers out, and the occupiers don't like that.
"President Barack Obama rises at the UN and calls for a further moratorium on building in the settlements, as if it's a crime for peaceful people to have children and add rooms to warm and hospitable homes." Shmuley Boteach, Jerusalem Post
I'd like to know if the peaceful people of East Jerusalem having their houses bulldozed are entitled to these things? Or the Bedouins? Settlement expansion is part of the same manifest-destiny mentality that makes people like Mr. Boteach feel entitled to the entire West Bank. And I wouldn't call this an act of peace.
Dear Mr. President,
Rumor has it you've been writing your own letters lately. I don't know if this account is true or not, but I do believe that you are desperate enough to continue the peace talks that you would make the offer you're rumored to have made to Prime Minister Netanyahu. Increasing our aid money, our weapon sales, our UN-veto frequency in exchange for a 2-month extension on the settlement freeze might seem like a good deal. Let's be honest, the US was going to veto those resolutions, sell those weapons and send that money anyway. I'm sure you still will, and so is Netanyahu, which is why he rejected your offer. I suppose in this sense you had nothing to lose by making it.
But the nature of your offer to Netanyahu highlight the utter foolishness of our policy toward Israel. Unconditional veto of UN resolutions? What does that say about our respect for the UN, the Security Council, or the process of seeking international justice? That no matter what Israel does, the US will use our veto to defend it. I suppose I was foolish to think that your administration had more respect for the UN than the previous one, but it really is disappointing to see how little you care for the institution and its purpose. Your alleged offer makes it clear that Israel may commit whatever human rights violations it sees fit and count on US support. Just like your reaction to the Mavi Marmara. Or the Goldstone Report. Or the Gaza war. Just like your complete lack of outrage over the cold-blooded murder of Palestinian children by Israeli troops. Your policies make it impossible to defend your administration against those on the left who wonder what the point of voting is, any more.
So the settlements will expand. The peace talks will break down. You can't ask President Abbas to abandon his already fragile legitimacy for peace talks that Israel has done nothing to indicate sincerity about. I am sorry, if not surprised. This is why it doesn't matter if you really made that offer to Netanyahu or not. The US cannot continue to pretend to play an honest broker while being this cozily in bed with one side of these negotiations. If you are serious about peace, if you want to earn your Nobel or secure your legacy or if you honestly want to ease the suffering on both sides of this conflict and leave the world a little safer for Sasha and Malia than you have to cease the charade of neutrality. The US can be neutral, it can be an honest broker and can lead both sides to a just and peaceful future. But it has to be more than just lip-service. We have to end the funding of Israel's occupation forces and insist that the Israeli people pay the bill themselves. We have to end our unconditional defense of Israel to the world and base our positions on the values of the United States of America- respect for human life, human rights, and for international law. We have to stop selling weapons to a regime that targets civilians and stop giving tax breaks to us groups funding illegal settlements. If we can practice real neutrality, we can achieve real peace.
Over at FireDogLake.com, you'd better not post anything too critical of Israel. Moderator and abuser of power Rayne will probably step in to disrupt the thread, issue threats, and order people to cease asking questions she doesn't like.
Rayne's latest round of abuse began when truthexcavator posted an entry on what turned out to be a five-year-old news article about an israeli soldier acquitted of murdering a 13-year-old Palestinian by filling her body with enough bullets to drop a charging rhinoceros. Truth made the horrendous mistake of comparing what Israel is doing to palestinians to what the Nazis did to Jews during the Holocaust.
I was shocked when I heard about this story, but I am less shock of the verdict by the Israeli Army. I'm passed the point of getting mad at Israel. I don't even think of it as a country anymore. I wish it was a country because the Jewish people deserve better. But it's not a country, just as Nazi Germany wasn't a country.
This morning I woke up to news of a US organization working to send their own aid ship in defiance of the Gaza blockade. This ship will be called The Audacity of Hope, and, because it has also been endorsed by Rashid Khalidi, it is being linked to you by some right-wing media sources. I can see why it might be annoying to suffer the criticisms of political convictions you don't actually have, so I would imagine that you viewed this news as one more headache. I heard it, and, for a moment, all I wanted to do was throw out my plans for the next year and join the crew.
I've spent the day talking myself out of it. As much as I want to go, to stand with those brave people willing to defy the unjust and cruel policies of the Israeli government toward Gaza, I have obligations. Completing my education this year is something I need to do, not only for myself but for all of the people in my life who believe that I can. Going out into the world to fight oppression and injustice is something that will have to wait another year. Still, I believe with all of my heart that this is the right thing to do, and so I am donating what I can to their efforts. The magnitude of Israeli crimes toward the Palestinian people and the people of Gaza, especially, demand resistance.
I do regret any political problems this mission will cause for your administration, if only because I think it is a shame you haven't adopted official policies that would warrant this criticism from the right. In your book, you talk about the courage it takes to keep having faith in our country, in change, in a better future. Your whole moral and philosophical worldview seems to demand equal rights, freedom, and the end of oppression. So I don't think you should be offended by the name of the ship. Hope has been an audacious thing for Gaza, and for those who would see it freed. That the Americans organizing this act in the spirit of your writing is not nearly as surprising or difficult to accept as your own willingness to set that spirit aside when convenience or politics demand.
I know, my provocation likely falls on deaf ears. You will not support this ship, if anything, you are likely to denounce it and seek to distance yourself from Khalidi. I know this. But I have the audacity to believe, still, that I could be wrong. That your courage and your convictions might not be strangers on this issue forever. I have faith that you could change your mind, and see that, no matter how hopeless, the fight against this kind of injustice is always worth whatever criticism it will face. The people of Gaza deserve the same justice, opportunity and hope that you promised to America. Can you fault the Americans who would invest time and money, put on hold their lives, risk physical safety and freedom to make it happen? Does it make you, even in secret, even just a little bit proud?
Respectfully yours,
Kelsey
If you'd like to donate to the Audacity of Hope, please visit US to Gaza.
Ghassan Elashi. I'd like you to know his name. He is the father of six children, and he is serving a 65-year prison sentence, allowed no visits with his children and only 2 phone calls a month. His crime is not murder or rape or theft, but charity; what you would call material support. He is one of the "Holy Land Five," convicted of sending money to Palestinian charities run by Hamas. The prosecution, which relied upon the testimony of an Israeli intelligence officer to make their case, does not believe that one dollar of the money Ghassan sent to Palestine went toward violence or acts of terror, but, as the hospitals and schools and food it bought were linked to Hamas, the good will it may have garnered is, apparently, just as dangerous.
I want to live in the real world. I try to be pragmatic, I try to understand the complexity and nuance of cases like this. I find fault with much of Hamas's charter, with their goals and with their methods. But what options have we given them? Hamas has done charity and community service work, they have honored cease-fires, they have participated in legitimate elections and won. Leaders of Hamas have indicated that their stance on Israel is softening. What do they have to do to gain international legitimacy without sacrificing domestic credibility? These projects funded by the Holy Land Foundation were helping some of the poorest people on earth just to survive and have access to basic services. It doesn't make Hamas' violent past all better, but it doesn't make every member of the party terrorists. How can we ignore the complexity of this situation? How can we look at this work, that by any other group, in any other place, you would praise as God's own, and call it a crime?
Ghassan Elashi. Please remember that while you call on Americans to give our time and our money to the betterment of those less fortunate, that this man will sit in prison for 65 years because he tried to help.
Today you issued a proclamation. I wanted to use today'd letter to comment on this, but I thought I'd let your words speak for themselves. (I think you'll see where I'm going with this.)
For Immediate Release July 16, 2010
Presidential Proclamation--Captive Nations Week
The "threat" of the one-state solution has long been tossed about in discussion of the fate of Palestine and Israel. I find myself ambivalent on the subject. In some respects I think it is a good idea; it would end the apartheid system of segregated "Arab" and "Jewish-only" neighborhoods and streets (at least in the law, though, obviously, de facto segregation would likely continue.) It would incentivize working together, learning from one another, and mutual respect, as both Palestinians and Israelis became responsible for the fate of their country. I think it might also mitigate the inequitable resource usage, especially regarding water. It would help both sides, economically and educationally. It would offer legitimacy of each in the eyes of their current enemy's allies.
On the other hand, I worry about the backlash. Ethnic and religious violence on a larger scale. I don't imagine the leaders of the Likud party (or even Labor) being too eager to share their nuclear launch codes (and other military secrets) with the leaders of Fatah, or the PFLP, or Hamas. The military would certainly have a had time adjusting, and the mandatory service for all citizens might need to be reconsidered. It would be ugly, difficult, maybe even bloody, for at least another generation. I, for one, am not confident enough in the outcome to be comfortable calling for a solution that would lead to more lives lost. But doing nothing is also a choice, and the status quo of slow partition is also ratcheting up the body count.
In an International Relations course at Boise State University, one the best professors I ever had gave us an assignment. He divided us into three teams- A, B, and the UN. We were given a map, with different symbols for resources and different concentrations of ethnic groups A and B. He said, every one divide up the map, let's see what we end up with. Needless to say, a heated and unresolved argument ensued. Had we been dividing anything besides land, I would have said, let team A divide it up, and let team B pick their half first. But land is not a heard of cows. Land has history, people's homes, holy sites, cemeteries. I never thought to suggest that we forget the partition all together, and neither did any of my classmates. Looking back, I wonder if, at least in simulation, it would have been a wise idea.
I know that your administration is publicly opposed to the one-state solution. But I'd like to know what your ideal endgame looks like. What outcome can you imagine as best? I think, no matter where you draw the borders, Israel and Palestine will have to work together, rely on one another, trust one another, to a degree that does not yet seem possible. South Africa today did not seem possible during the years of apartheid, either. And it has been a long and bloody road to a present that is yet far from ideal, but I don't think that a South Africa White and a South Africa Black would have been a better solution. What are your thoughts on the one-state solution, Mr. President? I don't believe it isn't something you've given thoughtful consideration. Have you, entirely, rejected the possibility? If so, what was your reasoning for doing so? How do you envision the region, ideally, in 10 years? In 50? What does a solution look like, to your mind?
I've heard many times the sentiment Nicholas Kristof expressed today in his column "Waiting for Gandhi." The idea that the Palestinians have not found their Gandhi, their Dr. King; that one man, could save them all. I don't know if things are that simple. I don't know if a Messiah complex (or a waiting for a Messiah complex) is really what will make things all better. I admire Dr. King, and I admire Gandhi, but they were mortal men that achievement, history and personal sacrifice elevated to something higher, something, quite possibly, unattainable. I think that resting the salvation of an entire people on one man's shoulders is a dangerous proposition. For one thing, it discourages those who would walk the paths of these great men, but could never, alone, hope to fill their shoes. I think you might be able to empathize with this, given those who hailed you as the natural heir to Dr. King (or even Jesus) and then turned their backs when miracles did not appear in your first 100 days. How does a man meet such impossible expectations? And, when he cannot, how does he keep his spirit, his sanity, or his integrity when people give up hope? It isn't fair for us (or for Palestinians, or any one) to expect the work of healing our wounds and steering our nations to collective better destinies to belong to one man. We all must be that man.
Kristof naively describes the non-violence practiced by many Palestinian activists as a recent development, something "that some Palestinians are dabbling in." Perhaps Mr. Kristof has only recently witnessed it himself, but nonviolent resistance has been practiced by activists against the occupation for decades. I feel that this is an aspect of resistance that the media deliberately overlooks, but also that the Israeli government and the American government, fail to recognize, praise, and reward as an alternative to violence. The nonviolence is not less effective because it hasn't found a face for T-shirts of the next generation of hipsters yet.
I was reminded by a fellow blogger recently of some wise words from Rachel Corrie's posthumously published writings.
Anyway, I'm rambling. Just want to write to my Mom and tell her that I'm witnessing this chronic, insidious genocide and I'm really scared, and questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of human nature. This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don't think it's an extremist thing to do anymore. I still really want to dance around to Pat Benatar and have boyfriends and make comics for my coworkers. But I also want this to stop.
When I first read these words I felt, personally, called out by them. I needed to drop everything and devote my life to making this stop. I didn't imagine I could do it myself, and I didn't think Rachel thought she could, either. I don't think that I am special or significant or destined to singlehandedly stop injustice. I have no delusions of these kind, but I do feel that my efforts are needed. All of us, every one of us, is called upon to help. Seeing these words again, and then reading Mr. Kristof's column, his claim that "so far there is no Palestinian version of Martin Luther King Jr," I felt them even more powerfully. No one should wait for Gandhi, or Dr. King, or the next great man. That isn't what they taught, and it isn't how they succeeded. History may have elevated them in isolation, but they did not, and could not, have walked alone. At the risk of invoking a cliche seen on stickers and posters in every dorm in the country, Gandhi called us all to be that change we wish to see in the world. This kind of wisdom, that we all have a role to play, a greater cause to serve, a place on the road to our better future, is something that more of us have to take to heart.
As a Post-Script to the Wild Wild Left, I wanted to emphasize that I don't think most of the people here fall into the category of those who thought Obama was the next Jesus and then turned their backs on him. I think that those of you who are aware and engaged and participating all the time in the efforts to make this country better have every reason to be angry at our President for the ways he's let us down, compromising his own promises and our faith in him. The crowd I'm intending those remarks for are those who think that wearing the HOPE t-shirt and casting a vote once every 4 years is enough to kick back and expect him to take us the rest of the way alone. I honestly believe that President Obama's failings are no worse than our own, that more of his promises might be kept if more people would participate in the work that needs to be done. And, I don't know any of you that well, but I know a lot of you work really hard to do just that, so please don't take offense.
(Welcome Phil! This needs more attention... - promoted by Diane G)
A Zionist State of Mind, A Dreamscape Of Ghosts: One Jew's Hard Awakening
Although my mother fled Nazi Germany, as a child, on a Kindertransport, with a few family valuables sown into her clothing, and I was brought up on the myths and hagiography of the Zionist state, I, over time, came to recognize the folly of the whole colonialist enterprise - the folly of ethnic exclusion and expulsion, the inherent tragedy of nationalism based on the delusion of religious birthright. With much sorrow, I came to the sad realization that the dream of the State of Israel was based on European chauvinism and exceptionalism. This reckoning has been a difficult one for me to bear -- the hardest awakening of my adult life.
My father was born on a Reservation in the American mid-west. His people, like the Palestinians, resisted invaders of European ancestry and were crushed. At present, both peoples remain exiled and caged in their native land.
The Jewish side of myself understands the historical traumas that gave rise to the yearning for a tribal Homeland. Atavistically, I suffer the Jewish state's collective night terrors and reel in its daylight rationalizations for its brutalities. But the Native American in me knows the rage of those crushed by the heartless force of an invading people.
When will peace finally come to that battlefield of religion they call the Holy Land? When will that day finally come? When the last Muslim and the last Jew have killed each other in the ruins of Jerusalem? Would Likud finally be satisfied? Would Hamas finally be satisfied?
The Israeli/Palestinian conflict has multiple causes, there are legitimate grievances on both sides, but there are also demagogues on both sides, fanatics on both sides, cynical exploiters of religion on both sides, killers of children on both sides. That vicious cycle of violence has to be stopped, the crisis has to be resolved. Blockading Gaza won't resolve it, blockading Gaza is making it worse.
Politicians will never bring peace to this world, they're all Netanyahus, they're all Palins, they're all Obamas dancing on the puppet strings of their corporate masters. Not one of them is worth a damn. People like you and me will have to be the peacemakers. We can be, and we'll have to be. Believing we can end the killing isn't an illusion. Believing we can't is the illusion.
Roger Waters knows who the peacemakers will be, he knows what must be overcome and who will overcome it . . .
Let them in the parade and let people along the parade route judge for themselves. I've booed and shouted opinions at a few organizations in gay pride parades.
Do we have to act as if everyone with a sign in a gay pride parade has to follow a certain script?
It's strange that the phrase 'Israeli apartheid' is now banned at a major political event in Toronto. This involves a pro-Palestinian group that has marched in Toronto's gay pride parade for many years, as have groups supporting Israeli government policies. That 'both sides' approach seems so civilized and democratic, but times are a-changing and not for the better.
This year's Toronto Gay Pride Parade Grand Marshal has resigned and 23 former Pride Toronto activists announced on Monday they have pulled out of Pride festivities after organizers banned the term "Israeli apartheid" from its 10-day event.
"Pride's recent decision to ban the term 'Israeli apartheid' and thus prohibit the participation of the group Queers Against Israeli Apartheid in Pride celebrations this year is a slap in the face to our history of diverse voices," said Alan Li, a co-founder of Gay Asians Toronto who rejected his appointment as grand marshal.
"Pride's choice to take a pre-emptive step to censor our own communities' voices and concerns in response to political and corporate pressure shows a lack of backbone to stand up for principles of inclusiveness and anti-oppression." . . .
... and as promised, I have sent the following to Buhdy re their Israel/Palestine policy:
Buhdy,
I greatly appreciate that you allowed me to post on the flotilla massacre. I hope that I didn't disappoint you. You may recall at the time that I had asked for a 7-10 day temporary lift of the ban, with the hope that the policy could be re-evaluated. You gave me a one-shot, but I hope we can still consider re-evaluation.
My wife and I were going to bed that night, when one last check on the news reported the Freedom Flotilla massacre. Suddenly, we were wide awake, in shock and horror. Transfixed. We talked, noting that Huffington had a long piece, then a few minutes later only a snippet from the AP. We despaired that this was going to get covered up by the media, blacked out, with only the Israeli military's accounts of their victimization at the hands of terrorists: "Every [activist] that approached us wanted to kill us ... I had to fight against quite a few terrorists who were armed with knives and batons," says a wounded captain in Haaretz.
I finally went to bed, but my wife spent the rest of the night weeping.
Round 1
Imagine our surprise next day when we started reading the coverage. The NY Times gave it top front-page billing, as did other press. In the shock of the moment -- even with most quotes coming from the IDF -- the coverage was damning of Israel. The most wrenching image -- at least to me -- was from the NY Times, Echoes of Raid on 'Exodus' Ship in 1947, with the story of the 1947 Exodus, desperate Jewish refugees trying to break the British blockade to get into Palestine. The connection was relentlessly driven home, the poor and desperate bridging the centuries in pain. What went wrong?
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