Saturday, January 6, 2024
Child of Handala - a modern interpretation of the 21st-century generation of Palestinian Nakba survivors.
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CHILD OF HANDALA |
Child of Handala
Passion Makes Perfect
Child of Handala is a modern interpretation of the 21st-century generation of Palestinian Nakba survivors.
A re-ignition of the immortal symbol "Handala". A unique intellectual lens into the world's current events.
https://www.childofhandala.blog/
https://twitter.com/ChildofHandala
https://www.facebook.com/Child.of.Handala/
https://www.instagram.com/child.of.handala/
https://www.pinterest.com/childofhandala/child-of-handala/
Ralph Nader on Gaza Ceasefire & Why Suppression of Palestine Advocacy Is the Real Problem on Campus
"$14.3 billion is larger than the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency. It’s 20 times the budget of the Occupational Safety and Health Agency. It’s four times the budget of the National Park Service, which has 300 million visitors. So there is rising opposition to it in the Congress, mostly among Democrats, but not enough. And I think the Jewish Voice for Peace and other valiant people who are resisting should focus more on the Congress."
Ralph Nader on Gaza Ceasefire & Why Suppression of Palestine Advocacy Is the Real Problem on Campus
January 05, 2024
Transcript
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman.
We end today’s show with Ralph Nader, longtime consumer advocate, corporate critic, four-time former presidential candidate. We’ll talk to him about several topics, including his new book, The Rebellious CEO: 12 Leaders Who Did It Right. He’s also the founder of Capitol Hill Citizen newspaper, has been named by Time and Life magazines one of the 100 most influential Americans of the 20th century.
But, Ralph, let’s begin with U.S. policy in Gaza. Amidst the protests nationwide calling for a ceasefire, senior Biden education official Tariq Habash resigned this week — he’s the first Biden appointee — over what he called Biden’s, quote, “complete unwillingness to demand an immediate and permanent cease-fire” in Gaza. Biden is facing reelection amidst a broader Middle East conflict. Ralph, you said, quote, “Biden and Congress are vigorously enabling the annihilations” in Gaza. What do you mean? And what do you feel needs to happen?
RALPH NADER: Well, the important thing in the U.S. here is to focus on Congress and the White House, because they are waist deep in this genocidal war in Gaza. The Congress is basically a rubber stamp and doesn’t even have public hearings as it shovels billions of dollars to Israel. And it’s about to pass, unless Bernie Sanders and others who are opposed, a $14.3 billion — with a “B” — appropriation for Israel, military arms and other aspects of the Israeli right-wing regime’s priorities.
And $14.3 billion is larger than the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency. It’s 20 times the budget of the Occupational Safety and Health Agency. It’s four times the budget of the National Park Service, which has 300 million visitors. So there is rising opposition to it in the Congress, mostly among Democrats, but not enough. And I think the Jewish Voice for Peace and other valiant people who are resisting should focus more on the Congress.
As far as Biden is concerned, it really gives a new meaning to hypocrisy. He keeps saying publicly that Israel should reduce its impact on civilian casualties and let humanitarian trucks in. At the same time, he’s sending ships full of munitions and cargo planes full of munitions to Netanyahu. You cannot have humanitarian trucks coming in — and there needs to be about 700, at least, a day — if you don’t have a ceasefire, because who’s going to go in? The roads are torn up. They can’t get to their destination. The hospitals and clinics have been destroyed or disabled. There’s no markets. There’s no ability to receive these materials. And the Israelis are letting in maybe 10, 20 trucks a day, but they’re delaying hundreds and hundreds of trucks ready to come in, which Biden has already paid for. So, Biden is playing Netanyahu’s game, but he’s trying to get away with highfalutin adherence to international law.
We don’t hear enough about the violation of international law, U.S. treaties, Geneva Conventions. It’s as if the U.S. can do anything it wants in Syria and Iraq, and Israel can continue to bomb repeatedly in Syria and do other violent acts, and the press never raises the issue of law... READ MORE or watch the video https://www.democracynow.org/2024/1/5/ralph_nader_on_stopping_gaza_war
Friday, January 5, 2024
Dr. Salman Abu Sitta: The tiny Gaza Strip, only 1.3% of Palestine, became a temporary home for 2.3 million Palestinian refugees.
Nancy Harb Almendras
Please read this excellent article by Dr. Salman Abu Sitta. Everything is made clear regarding the 75 year prelude to the current situation.
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| Israel has no borders, neither by its own admission or by international law. That is why it is grabbing any land it can. There is not a single acre in Israel obtained legally, it is acquired only by force and massacres. |
I could have been one of those who broke through the siege on October 7
Nothing can hide the determination and courage of those young people who returned to their land on October 7. I could have been one of them had I been much younger and still living in the concentration camp called Gaza.
Yes, I could have been one of those who broke through the fence had I been much younger and was still living in the concentration camp called the Gaza Strip.
My story is the same as all of them. On May 14, 1948, my family on our land, “Ma’in Abu Sitta,” was attacked by a Haganah force of 24 armored vehicles. The force destroyed and burnt everything. The soldiers demolished the school that my father built in 1920; they stole the motor and equipment in the flour mill and well pump; they killed anyone in sight.
On that day, when Ben-Gurion announced his state, I became a refugee. We were pushed into the prison compound called the Gaza Strip, 4 kilometers away from my home.
I was not alone. Palestinians living in 247 towns and villages in southern Palestine were driven to this enclave by dozens of massacres, such as in Bureir, Abu Shusha, Ed Dawayima, and many others.
The tiny Gaza Strip, only 1.3% of Palestine, became a temporary home for 2.3 million Palestinian refugees. The Israeli attacks against them, by land, air, and sea, and with a complete siege, never stopped for 75 years.
I went to school in Egypt, but my cousins never wavered to cross the barbed wire called the Armistice Line and tried to return home, in the same manner of October 7. They crossed the barbed wire and attacked the occupiers of our land. They retrieved an elderly relative who remained, they watered the remaining cattle, and they generally tried to restore life to Ma’in Abu Sitta, our land.
I can never forget my cousin, Hassan Madi, with his smiling face and pleasant demeanor. He used to come back to tell us what happened to our groves and what the settlers did to our place. He was a very brave fida’i. He used to sneak into the settlers’ camp and listen to them talk. He was killed by a mine buried on his route.
Fifteen other young people from my family were killed in the couple of years after 1948. In the period from 1948 to 1956, an estimated 5,000 Palestinians were killed trying to return home.
The settlers set up prefab units on my land, which developed into Kibbutzim. Their names are current in the media nowadays. Nirim was built on my father’s land. I was born a few meters away from the Kibbutz site. Ein Hashlosha Kibbutz, a few kilometers to the north, is built on land that belonged to my father and his cousins, a huge wheat and barley field. Nir Oz was built on the land of my father’s uncle, Haj Mahmoud. His son Hamed, a civil engineer, devoted his life to the liberation of Palestine and was a key actor in forming the PLO in 1964, remaining in its executive committee for over 40 years. The fourth kibbutz on our land was named Magen. This is the site of Sheikh Nuran, a venerated site where women sought blessings for their newborns. This was the ancient site of St. Hilarion, a key figure in Christian Palestine. The site was his worshipping retreat in fourth-century Byzantine Palestine.
Today, when you hear the names of these kibbutzim, you must recall on whose land they were built. You must remember that the owners of this land have never given up their right to return home.
This applies to over two million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. When you hear talk about the hostages, remember they are the true hostages for over 27,000 days. They came from 247 towns and villages in southern and central Palestine. See Map 1 for the origin of Gaza refugees. They are crowded in camps at a density of 8,000 persons/km2.
Not only were they expelled and made refugees in 1948, but they were constantly attacked in camps in exile in 1953, 1956, 1967, 1971, and 1987, and with fierce regularity since 2006 up until today. In a twist unknown in colonial history, their ethnic cleansing has been upgraded in 2023 to a genocide of unparalleled proportions. The extent of its ferocity, the number of women and children killed, the vast areas of destruction, and the number of dropped bombs on such a tiny place in less than three months exceeds anything known in two world wars.
The Gaza Strip is bound by the Armistice Agreement signed between Egypt and Israel on February 24, 1949. See Map 2 of Gaza’s armistice line below. Article 2 of the Agreement states that the Line does not confer or deny rights to the warring parties. It is merely the line at which warring parties stopped on that date.
Israel has no borders, neither by its own admission nor by any article in international law. In 1948, Israel occupied 20,500 km2 (80% of Palestine), of which only 6% was obtained through the collusion of the British Mandate. The rest was obtained just by military force.
One year after the official Armistice Agreement in February 1950, Israel complained that many refugees had crossed the line and suggested to Egypt that to avoid clashes, it should establish a temporary line called modus vivendi, provided that the original agreement remains in force. This reduced the area of the Gaza Strip from 555 km2 to the present 365 km2. As Map 2 shows, this temporary line became unofficially the regular line shown in maps and maintained by Israel.
There is a macabre element in this fact. Many of the attacked kibbutzim, Nirim, Nir Oz, and Ein Hashlosha, that were built on my and others’ land, actually fall within the Gaza Strip proper, as Map 2 clearly shows.
Israel has relentlessly tried to chew more and more of the Gaza Strip as a “buffer zone.” No international body ever contested Israel’s continued reduction of the tiny Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, the war against those young people who crossed the line to return home continues. They have to contend with falling bombs in Gaza and a relentless smear campaign abroad.
The false information and ugly defamation attributed to them, like beheading babies and a campaign of raping women, have turned out to be entirely false, but its effect lingers on. Anyone who knows them in Gaza knows they have a strict moral code.
Nothing can hide the determination and courage of those young people. They have stood fast for 90 days, longer than in any Israeli war with its neighbors.
When the dust settles down, if it does, history will show who heroically defended his homeland and who, on the other hand, committed so many heinous crimes. This memory will chart the history of both peoples.
Dr. Salman Abu Sitta
Dear President Biden: Stop racist hate- start by stopping Israeli violence, and the Zionist stranglehold on your brain.
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Can you see her? |
American newspapers tend to simply reprint Israeli propaganda,
exasperating a cruel situation and ignoring the very real plight and
suffering of the native non-Jewish men, women and children of historic
Palestine. In response, many people, especially younger smarter people,
aren't really bothering with America's mainstream newspapers- they are
getting a plethora of Pro-Palestine news and opinion online through web
sites, and through social media sites.
American leadership is idiotic to stew in Zionist news and opinion,
rather than seeking out the full and total truth. Open your eyes, your
mind and your heart. Humanity needs honorable leadership- and a CEASEFIRE NOW !
76
years ago, following the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust, The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights was born "Whereas
recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and
inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the
foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world..."
60
years ago America's Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended segregation in
public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of
race, color, religion, sex or national origin. This is considered
one of the crowning legislative achievements of our collective
civil rights movement.
So
why exactly are you forcing American tax payers to fund and empower
Israel's segregation policies and Apartheid in The Holy Land?
Why are you arming Israel's destruction of Gaza?
Stop racist hate- start by stopping Israeli violence, and the Zionist stranglehold on your brain.
Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
NOTES
My letter to USA Today 1-5-2024 RE 50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict
My letter to the New Yorker RE Mosab Abu Toha's A Palestinian Poet’s Perilous Journey Out of Gaza
Ibtisam Barakat: A Palestinian Whose Childhood Was Destroyed by War Pleads for Peace- Never letting children endure war again is the “never again” that might actually heal our wounded humanity.
But where should people go...
Shereen Audi "I really wanted to spread some hope and positivity and give that feeling to the world and to everyone who needs it... all I wish for Palestine and for our world is peace and light.."
Ottoman Era Palestine circa 1890's... Palestinian fishermen in Tiberias (Tabriya)
May the new year bring a free Palestine. Jordanian artist: اسامه حجاج-Osama Hajjaj Instagram: osamahajjaj
Israel eases up on bombing parts of Gaza, but only as famine and disease take their hold.
I hear reports and see TV commercials showing that Anti-Semitism and other forms of racist hate is increasing. We need to stop that trend
Together, we have the power to shift the narrative on Palestine and build a future of collective liberation- Visualizing Palestine NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS
Homeless in my homeland by Hanin A. Elholy
Almost all the universities in Gaza destroyed or damaged. A huge amount of students and academic staff killed.
Mosab Abu Toha · Heartbreaking to learn that Ammar Ghraiba, a young motion graphic designer and an aspiring filmmaker, got killed today. Our journalists, poets, and filmmakers are killed. But the story, the poem, and the film continue.
Like Palestinians in the rest of east Jerusalem, most Armenians do not hold Israeli citizenship but only residency...
The Jewish settlers 'living the American dream' in the West Bank
My letter to USA Today 1-5-2024 RE 50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict
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I
very much enjoyed reading about Anan Ameri and Dick Soble's 50
year long respectful relationship in Violet Ikonomova's 1-5-2024
article "50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue
on Israeli-Palestinian conflict"
This
long lasting friendship and dialogue between a Jewish American and
a Palestinian American has been facilitated by a common language
and America's current legal framework of full and equal rights for
all people, regardless of supposed race or religion.
76
years ago, following the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust, The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights was born "Whereas
recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and
inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the
foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world..."
60
years ago America's Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended segregation in
public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of
race, color, religion, sex or national origin. This is considered
one of the crowning legislative achievements of our collective
civil rights movement.
Forging
peace, specifically a just and lasting peace for as many people as
possible, regardless of supposed race or religion, is both a noble
and a necessary goal, for everyone's sake: Religion should be a
personal, private choice, not a state funded project.
Sincerely,
Anne
Selden Annab
American Homemaker & Poet
NOTES
50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict USA Today 1-5-2023
My letter to the New Yorker RE Mosab Abu Toha's A Palestinian Poet’s Perilous Journey Out of Gaza
Ibtisam Barakat: A Palestinian Whose Childhood Was Destroyed by War Pleads for Peace- Never letting children endure war again is the “never again” that might actually heal our wounded humanity.
But where should people go...
Shereen Audi "I really wanted to spread some hope and positivity and give that feeling to the world and to everyone who needs it... all I wish for Palestine and for our world is peace and light.."
Ottoman Era Palestine circa 1890's... Palestinian fishermen in Tiberias (Tabriya)
May the new year bring a free Palestine. Jordanian artist: اسامه حجاج-Osama Hajjaj Instagram: osamahajjaj
Israel eases up on bombing parts of Gaza, but only as famine and disease take their hold.
I hear reports and see TV commercials showing that Anti-Semitism and other forms of racist hate is increasing. We need to stop that trend
Together, we have the power to shift the narrative on Palestine and build a future of collective liberation- Visualizing Palestine NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS
Homeless in my homeland by Hanin A. Elholy
Almost all the universities in Gaza destroyed or damaged. A huge amount of students and academic staff killed.
Mosab Abu Toha · Heartbreaking to learn that Ammar Ghraiba, a young motion graphic designer and an aspiring filmmaker, got killed today. Our journalists, poets, and filmmakers are killed. But the story, the poem, and the film continue.
Like Palestinians in the rest of east Jerusalem, most Armenians do not hold Israeli citizenship but only residency...
The Jewish settlers 'living the American dream' in the West Bank
Powerful Bansky
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| Powerful Bansky |
50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict USA Today 1-5-2023
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Anan Ameri & Dick Soble: "For any two other people, the debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict might have gotten ugly. He’s Jewish and supports a two-state solution. She’s Palestinian and wants one state with equal rights, which critics say would spell the end for a Jewish homeland. He condemns the Oct. 7 Hamas attack. She says it was to be expected. Though she doesn’t want civilians killed, “violence,” she says, “breeds violence.” But these two are not enemies. They’re best friends, and have been close for more than 50 years." |
50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict
USA TODAY NETWORK
Jan 5 2024
"... On a one- versus two-state solution, Ameri supports one, covering the area of Israel and the Palestinian territories. She previously supported two, but now sees the more than 700,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as an insurmountable barrier and doesn’t believe a nation of Palestine would be permitted to arm itself.
Soble supports two states, in part to maintain a Jewish homeland in the event global antisemitism again rises near the extremes of the Holocaust.
But on an overarching point, they agree: Both want an immediate end to the war.
“There are those who believe in one-state, two-state, and there are now 17,000 people who have no state,” Soble said, referring to the number of Palestinians killed by the time they spoke. “So we have to prioritize what we put our political efforts behind, and any other discussion sidetracks us from (the cease-fire being) critical to getting to any other solution.”
Interviewed separately, Ameri and Soble both spoke to the shared values and principles they say make their open dialogue possible"... READ MORE https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/01/05/cross-cultural-friendship-survives-israeli-palestinian-conflict/72087017007/
Wednesday, January 3, 2024
My letter to the New Yorker RE Mosab Abu Toha's A Palestinian Poet’s Perilous Journey Out of Gaza
letter from Gaza- Dec 25 2023
Mosab Abu Toha
A Palestinian Poet’s Perilous Journey Out of Gaza
Following
Hamas’s October 7th attack and Israel’s invasion, Mosab Abu Toha
fled his home with his wife and three children. Then I.D.F.
soldiers took him into custody.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/01/01/a-palestinian-poets-perilous-journey-out-of-gaza
Dear Editor,
Thank you for publishing Mosab Abu Toha’s "A Palestinian Poet’s
Perilous Journey Out of Gaza."
I know I am not allowed to say this, but Israel's pervasive
persecution, impoverishment, and displacement of Palestinians
reminds me of Nazi Germany. And the horrifying fact is that
American leadership is fully aligned with funding and arming
racist Israel's long term violations of international law and the
native non-Jewish Palestinians basic human rights.
Gaza 2023 is
Ending the Israel/Palestine conflict matters immensely. All people need a just and lasting peace based on the rule of fair and just laws, and true equality for all people, regardless of supposed race or religion. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. But there is a very real need to prove to the world that arming religion with taxpayer's money, lethal weaponry, and the will to kill "others" is a very bad idea.
Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
American Homemaker & Poet
Ibtisam Barakat: A Palestinian Whose Childhood Was Destroyed by War Pleads for Peace- Never letting children endure war again is the “never again” that might actually heal our wounded humanity.
World / January 3, 2024
A Palestinian Whose Childhood Was Destroyed by War Pleads for Peace
Never letting children endure war again is the “never again” that might actually heal our wounded humanity.
The violence in Gaza may have started on October 7, 2023 for Israel and for the world. But for Palestinians it started 75 years ago, and never stopped.
My Palestinian mother is 79 years old. She grew up in Jerusalem. Seventy-five years ago, she was 4 years old, and Israel drove her, her family, and all of her village out of their homes, which they would never see again. They became part of the Palestinian diaspora.
During the attack on Kharrouba, my mother’s village, she was asleep and when everyone fled, she was left behind. My grandfather walked for 16 hours, risking his life, to find her. That trauma still marks every day of my mother’s life.
Kharruba, her town of origin, was one of more than 400 Palestinian towns and villages that were either depopulated violently or destroyed after Palestine was torn up and Israel came into being on May 14, 1948.... READ MORE https://www.thenation.com/article/world/palestine-gaza-children-peace/
[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES or quotes or watch videos IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]
Shereen Audi "I really wanted to spread some hope and positivity and give that feeling to the world and to everyone who needs it... all I wish for Palestine and for our world is peace and light.."
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| shereen_audi on instagram |
#artistvsart2023 🍉It was my honour doing art about Palestine since October helping to draw attention towards the situation in Palestine in a gentle way🇵🇸 even though it’s a very dark and rough time I really wanted to spread some hope and positivity and give that feeling to the world and to everyone who needs it. Now the year is ending and all I wish for Palestine and for our world is peace and light instead of war and hate. May the new year holds nothing but love and light 💡to everyone everywhere . #artistvsart #artistsoninstagram #artforpeace #artforacause #artists #artoftheday #artofinstagram #artforpalestine
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| Such a busy day 😅 wait up for my next one ☝️ @thestudio 🍉 |
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shereen_audi Collage
on paper with the Title: With Love to Palestine 🇵🇸 size 35cm x 43
year : 2023 media : collage on paper in solidarity with the people of
Palestine 🇵🇸 #artwork #palestine
"The work of Shereen Audi, who splits her time between Canada and Jordan, also serves as a symbol of hope. She has created a number of collages on paper, wood and canvas, including With Love to Palestine,
in which she’s used images of lemons, olives, birds, jasmine, poppies
and watermelons. These elements represent what Palestine is famous for
and what makes it beautiful, she says, and the artwork has been shared
far and wide across social media platforms in recent days.
She hopes these new pieces “help draw attention to the situation in this beautiful country that only deserves peace and deserves to stay alive”.
With Love to Palestine is one of her favourites, it gives “a feeling of light in these dark times and a little bit of hope to everyone”, she adds.
She has donated a print of the piece to Gallery Bawa in Kuwait, which is holding an emergency relief sale called Prints for Palestine. All proceeds will be donated to the Kuwait Red Crescent Society. The gallery is collaborating with research platform and collective Mathqaf in Doha, which reached out to the artists involved, and Dubai’s Gulf Photo Plus, which is helping with printing, packaging and shipping."
Arab artists supporting Palestine with bold new works
Horrified by the Israel-Gaza war, many creatives are donating works to raise relief funds for trapped Palestinians
"Pablo Picasso once described artists as political beings, constantly aware of the heartbreaking things happening in the world. “Painting is not made to decorate apartments,” he said. “It’s an offensive and defensive weapon.”
For many artists across the Arab world witnessing the war unfolding in Gaza, weaponising their art has become the only way for them to process the tragedies."... READ MORE https://www.thenationalnews.com/arts-culture/art-design/2023/10/30/arab-artists-supporting-palestine-with-bold-new-works/