Saturday, May 31, 2025

Mosab Abu Toha's poem "Daughter" on an official transport poster Victoria line train London "... That moment, her eyes sparkle with longing, I can see how she flies from the tent to a time when she leapt through our farm in every direction with eyes closed, only stopping at the fence, where our orange trees embrace our neighbour's olive trees..."

A friend sent me this photo that he took this morning on the Victoria line train London (southbound). It is a poster of my poem “Daughter” on the subway. It is an official Transport for London poster, too.

6:11 PM · May 30, 2025

"... I love the smell of oranges best

when she remembers"

Page 37 in The Forest of Noise

“In Forest of Noise, his astonishing second book, Mosab Abu Toha is the essential poet embodying the humanity of Gaza, the precious hopes and dreams of all humans, the searing collective cries of children, the indelible honest conscience, the heart and soul. Miraculously he has continued speaking and writing through the horrific genocide of his people and beloved place. His elemental poems dissolve the empty rhetoric and posturing with simple, striking truth. Not blows. Who else among us founds a library in our early twenties? Today Mosab’s books may be crushed, but his most powerful spirit is not.”—Naomi Shihab Nye, author of The Tiny Journalist

"From Gaza, the cries of parents rise to heaven ever more intensely as they clutch the lifeless bodies of their children, searching for food and shelter from bombs. I renew my appeal to leaders: cease fire, release all hostages, and fully respect international humanitarian law!" Pope Leo XIV

28 May 2025: "From Gaza, the cries of parents rise to heaven ever more intensely as they clutch the lifeless bodies of their children, searching for food and shelter from bombs. I renew my appeal to leaders: cease fire, release all hostages, and fully respect international humanitarian law!"

https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/audiences/2025/documents/20250528-udienza-generale.html

Pope Leo XIV

@Pontifex

If you want #Peace, prepare institutions of peace. This doesn’t refer only to political institutions, whether national or international, but to the entire forum of institutions – educational, economic, and social – that are involved. May 30, 2025 https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/speeches/2025/may/documents/20250530-movimenti-pace.html

The Holy See https://www.vatican.va/content/vatican/en.html

UNRWA Commissioner General statement on letter sent to the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs regarding the Government of Israel's continuous unsubstantiated claims against the Agency

27 May 2025

From Philippe Lazzarini, the UNRWA Commissioner-General as posted on his official X account (previously known as Twitter)

Over the past 20 months, the Government of Israel has continuously made unsubstantiated claims against UNRWA and its neutrality.

These claims have put the lives of UNRWA staff at serious risk and harmed the reputation of the Agency.

In a letter I have recently written to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, I repeated the concrete steps that UNRWA has taken for more than a decade in cooperation with the Government of Israel in line with transparency and neutrality.

In that regard, the Agency has requested on numerous occasions for cooperation from the Government of Israel by providing information and evidence to substantiate the accusations made against UNRWA.

To date, UNRWA has not received any response, nor has the Government of Israel shared any sufficient evidence, to back up these very serious claims against the Agency and its personnel.

The UN depends on Member States for security and information concerning its premises and personnel.

Member States – not the United Nations- are responsible for criminal investigations and prosecutions of armed militant activity.

It is expected that Member States will pursue their investigations in compliance with due process and report to the United Nations on the outcome of these processes where they may impact upon UN operations or staff.

In this case, the Government of Israel has neither shared adequate evidence with the UN to allow substantiation through administrative processes nor pursued its own criminal proceedings, which would also require the presentation of credible evidence and due process.

Had the Government of Israel taken either of these steps and cooperated with UNRWA, the Agency could have acted in accordance with its regulations and due process.

The minimum requirements are sufficient evidence and due process. The absence of both more than one year later raises the possibility that the accusations were unfounded.

In the letter, I urged once again the State of Israel to renew the decades-long cooperation with UNRWA in line with the United Nations Charter and other international frameworks.

I have requested that they put an end to the unfounded dis-information campaign against the Agency.

I have also stated that UNRWA, together with other UN agencies, is ready to continue the critical work it does in humanitarian relief, education and health care to Palestine Refugees. Gaza is a case in point where the Agency has the supplies and the structure to deliver at scale.

Background Information:

UNRWA is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. The United Nations General Assembly established UNRWA in 1949 with a mandate to provide humanitarian assistance and protection to registered Palestine refugees in the Agency’s area of operations pending a just and lasting solution to their plight.

UNRWA operates in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, The Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.

Tens of thousands of Palestine refugees who lost their homes and livelihoods due to the 1948 conflict continue to be displaced and in need of support, nearly 75 years on.

UNRWA helps Palestine Refugees achieve their full potential in human development through quality services it provides in education, health care, relief and social services, protection, camp infrastructure and improvement, microfinance, and emergency assistance. UNRWA is funded almost entirely by voluntary contributions.

Your support is crucial to help us provide emergency aid
to displaced families in Gaza

https://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/official-statements/unrwa-commissioner-general-statement-letter-sent-israeli-minister

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies]

United Nations & UNWRA are ready: They have the experiance and expertise to reach people in need

“We already have an aid distribution system that is fit for purpose,” said

@UNLazzarini to Guardian. “The clock is ticking towards famine, so humanitarian work must be allowed to do its life-saving work now.” To prevent the current disaster in #Gaza from spiralling further, 500-600 trucks of supplies are needed daily. This can only be achieved through the UN including UNRWA. Access to aid must be rapid, reliable, safe and sustained. Full article: theguardian.com/world/2025/may

Four people killed after starving Palestinians burst into UN food warehouse in Gaza

Deaths from crushing and gunshot wounds come a day after Israeli forces opened fire at a food distribution point

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/28/dead-injured-in-israeli-gunfire-at-gaza-food-point-reports

“Stop the clock on madness”: UN expert appeals to States after Israeli Army's Gaza aid distribution shootings- “It is a deliberate strategy – aimed at masking atrocities, displacing the displaced, bombing the bombarded, burning Palestinians alive and maiming survivors,” Albanese warned. “All camouflaged behind the language of aid, to divert international attention from legal accountability, in Israel’s attempt to dismantle the very principles upon which humanitarian law was built.”

UN Special Procedures

@UN_SPExperts

UN expert

@FranceskAlbs

appeals to States to ‘stop the clock on madness’ after #Gaza aid distribution shootings, reiterating her call for sanctions and arms embargo to hold #Israel accountable. “The time to save life is shrinking”.

30 May 2025

GENEVA – The international community must stop the clock on continued and deliberate misuse of humanitarian language and mechanisms by Israel aimed at obscuring and facilitating the commission of atrocity crimes in Gaza, a UN expert said today.

“We continue to witness a brutal humanitarian camouflage, where the red lines have led to massive atrocities. Israel pretends to promote humanitarian solutions in order to continue its control of Gaza and sustain its systematic denial of life-saving humanitarian aid to the starving population in the besieged strip,” said Francesca Albanese, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory.

“It is a deliberate strategy – aimed at masking atrocities, displacing the displaced, bombing the bombarded, burning Palestinians alive and maiming survivors,” Albanese warned. “All camouflaged behind the language of aid, to divert international attention from legal accountability, in Israel’s attempt to dismantle the very principles upon which humanitarian law was built.”

Albanese echoed concerns by the UN and other humanitarian actors about the Israeli aid system and the establishment of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation – a body backed by Israel and the United States to distribute aid under a system of full military control. The proposal has been criticised for failing to respect international law and the humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality.

On 27 May, thousands of Palestinian flocked towards the foundation's distribution sites to receive food packages after several days without food.

“Within hours, horrifying images and videos emerged from Gaza demonstrating how this mechanism functions and how the Israeli army fired on unarmed Palestinian civilians. It seems that there is no limit to Israel's actions,” the expert said.

At least 3 people were killed and 46 injured and seven went missing according to authorities in Gaza.... READ MORE https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/05/stop-clock-madness-un-expert-appeals-states-after-gaza-aid-distribution

One afternoon in Gaza, two family tragedies: the childhoods cut short by Israeli airstrikes. Relatives’ trauma over events on 23 May reflects a daily reality in Gaza: the killing and maiming of its youngest citizens

Lorenzo Tondo in Jerusalem and Malak A Tantesh in Gaza

Fri 30 May 2025 11.54 EDT

At about 3pm last Friday, Dr Alaa al-Najjar, a paediatrician at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, received the charred remains of seven of her 10 children, killed in an Israeli airstrike. The bodies of two others were buried beneath the rubble.

A few miles away, 11-year-old Yaqeen Hammad, known as Gaza’s youngest social media influencer, was killed after a series of heavy Israeli airstrikes hit the house where she lived with her family. She was watering flowers in a tiny patch of greenery eked out of a displacement camp when she died. Her cousin, 16-year-old Eyad, was gravely wounded.

Even by the terrible standards of the Gaza conflict, the deaths had the power to shock. But they were also a reflection of a daily reality in the territory: the killing and maiming of its youngest citizens and the destruction of a generation.

According to local health officials, whose estimates have generally been found to be accurate by the global humanitarian community, more than 16,500 children have been killed in the 19 months since the war began – a figure almost 24 times higher than the number of children killed in Ukraine, where the population is 20 times bigger, since Russia’s invasion. The World Health Organization tally for child deaths stands at 15,613.

Thursday, May 29, 2025

Minamanne- Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, Palestine

minamanne

Church of the Nativity

Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, Palestine (photo 1945) Image source: Library of Congress

This image of a Palestinian woman in her Malaka thobe, standing above the Church of the Nativity, is familiar to many Palestinians. When I see these pre-Nakba images I always think about the people in them. Who was she? What was her name, her story? I wonder how she lived through the Nakba just a few years later, how she carried the weight of memory and loss. Did she get to stay in Palestine, or was she displaced like so many of us?

Le Phénomène Gaza / Phenomenon in Gaza by Mahmoud Alkurd, Photograph by Mohamed Abusal Published by Éditions images plurielles (2020)

Le Phénomène Gaza / Phenomenon in Gaza by Mahmoud Alkurd, Photograph by Mohamed Abusal
Published by Éditions images plurielles (2020)

tatreezandtea

The images and videos circulating online of the tremendous suffering of my people—our children, their families, our families—are extraordinarily disturbing. They should rattle each person and their sense of humanity to the absolute and utter core. I wish this would all end… more than half of Gaza was children. We told you this would be a war against our children. But no one listened.

Tuesday, May 27, 2025

Irina Naji: The other day I was sent a photo found under the rubble of our house in Gaza. In the photo I am with my son - 1998. This is all that remains... and memories.

Irina Naji

The other day I was sent a photo found under the rubble of our house in Gaza. In the photo I am with my son - 1998. This is all that remains... and memories.

Artwork by Irina Naji

Palestinian Heritage

Irina Naji

Sunday, May 25, 2025

Blogged for Memorial Day- a letter I sent to my local newspaper 2025: This Earth Day please start noticing how much pollution and injustice war creates.

Dear Patriot News,

Our earth, our precious earth is home to a diverse and fascinating mix of flora and fauna, including us. We live we die. Life in general is not fair, but we human beings should do all we can to make life more fair, more bearable, and more beautiful for more people.

This Earth Day please start noticing how much pollution and injustice war creates.

Yes, we need to support our troops, but we tax payers should not be funding the weapons industry. Creating and selling weapons of war inevitably leads to killing and endless cycles of revenge and vindictiveness worldwide. No family is safe.

Our collective recorded history has been one of violence in many ways to countless people and to our planet. Our future needs to be different.

Our future needs to be of hope and helpfulness, cooperation and kindness- prioritizing good investments in nonviolence and sustainable practices that help our planet earth and all its inhabitants.

Weapons and war are poisoning our planet, just as much as racist hate poisons hearts and minds and turns people into monsters doing despicable things to others.

Harassing and killing people, destroying lives and livelihoods, is wrong. Be braver than a bully, be stronger than tyrant- be aware and be kind. Be kind to and about others, even those you do not like.

Diplomacy and dialogue create security- and prosperity for ALL, not just lucky billionaires.

Sincerely,

Anne Selden Annab

Prioritize Human Rights, The Rule of Fair & Just Laws, and Golden Rule Thinking: END WAR

My more recent Letters

Tragedies abound here on planet earth, but at least we can try to make our world a better, more fair, just and secure place for more people.

Racist times created hell on earth for "others" then, we really should know better now...

Dear America- Funding religious extremists and charlatans is a recipe for disaster.

Dear America- Please do not let this tragic situation became a reason for more people to be treated more unequally, with more Palestinians and Palestinian Americans being doxed, destroyed, and displaced.

Life is not a video game. These are real human beings and American made weaponry has been creating a Holocaust with The Rule of Lawlessness in the Holy Land.

Taxpayers' money should not be shoring up greed, corporate corruption, injustice, and war.

Please, let Golden Rule thinking and the rule of fair and just laws guide US all towards a better way forward.

State sponsored violence is not the way to convince vulnerable people to veer away from arming religious tyranny and terrorism.

Hate crimes are escalating here in America with people primed by to think, say and do horrible things...

Slavery, Segregation and Forced Displacement are wrong. Wrong then and wrong now

"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..." https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights

"When future generations read about Gaza with horror and wonder how the western world, with all its moral superiority, its rule-based order and its focus on international human rights law, allowed a livestreamed genocide to happen, what will you say? " What did you do during the genocide in Gaza? Arwa Mahdawi in The Guardian

‘It is too late for real justice in Gaza now. We can never bring back the dead children.’ Photograph: Hatem Khaled/Reuters

Now, when Israel is executing a “final solution” in Gaza, when it is far too late for dissent to make any difference, the tide is slowly starting to turn. Now that Gaza is flattened, turned into mass graves and rubble, people who have kept quiet for the past 19 months are slowly starting to speak up. Now that Israel and the US are not even trying to pretend that they aren’t intent on emptying Gaza and the West Bank of Palestinians, of “taking control” of all of the land, some criticism has started to trickle in.

Over in the UK, they’ve pulled out the “e” word. After 19 months of genocidal violence and almost three months of a starvation campaign the UK has decided to describe the situation as egregious. The UK, along with France and Canada, has threatened – and I’m sure Israel’s leaders are quaking in their boots over this – that there might be a “concrete” response if the mass killing and starvation continues.

Meanwhile, there’s been a slight shift in the media coverage. Instead of just parroting the Israeli government’s talking points, major media figures such as Piers Morgan are starting to challenge Israeli spokespeople about why the international media has not been freely allowed into Gaza to see what is happening for themselves.

All of this is too little, too late. It will not bring back little Hind Rajab, a five-year-old girl who was killed when 335 bullets were fired by Israeli soldiers into the car the terrified child was trapped in. Or the aid workers executed by Israel and buried in shallow graves.

It will not rebuild the hospitals, kindergartens, IVF centers and universities that have been systematically levelled by Israel. It will not give kids in Gaza – the largest cohort of child amputees in the world – their limbs back. It will not fix the long-term damage that malnutrition and almost two years of no schooling has done to a generation... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/may/22/israel-gaza-genocide

Annie's New Letters (& notes)

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