Jerri Bird (Jerine Bettybea Newhouse b 1926): "A viable, independent Palestinian state would be a step in the direction of two peoples in the same land living harmoniously"

Family Photo - Jerri Bird, an activist for Middle East peace, died Dec. 13 at her home in Washington. Pictured are, from left, Jerine "Jerri" Bird, her children, and her husband Eugene Bird, in Jerusalem in 1956.

In her activism, Mrs. Bird often confronted the argument that a Palestinian state would jeopardize Israel’s security needs... “Israel is already the one of the most modern military forces in the Middle East, and this has not protected it against violence,” she wrote in a 2002 letter to the editor published by the New York Times. “Israeli human rights violations against Palestinians guarantee continued violent resistance. A viable, independent Palestinian state would be a step in the direction of two peoples in the same land living harmoniously. The only alternative is endless bloodshed.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/jerri-bird-dedicated-activist-for-middle-east-peace-dies-at-86/2012/12/19/ee78d382-493d-11e2-ad54-580638ede391_story_1.html

Jerri Bird, ‘dedicated’ activist for Middle East peace, dies at 86

By Adam Bernstein, Published: December 19

Jerri Bird spent three decades accompanying her husband on his Foreign Service assignments throughout the Middle East during the Cold War. They witnessed ethnic and religious tensions that often spiraled into extremist violence and lured generations into a cycle of terror, grief and the desire for retribution.

“An eye for an eye has turned into twelve for one or better,” she wrote to her parents in Oregon at the start of the 1956 Suez Canal crisis. At the time, she and her husband were stationed in East Jerusalem... READ MORE