Saturday, January 12, 2013
Bab al-Shams Village... We, the sons and daughters of Palestine
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| Bab al-Shams Village |
A few months ago the Israeli government announced its intention to build about 4000 settlement housing units in the area Israel refers to as E1. E1 block is an area of about 13 square km that falls on confiscated Palestinian land East of Jerusalem between Ma'ale Adumim settlement, which lies on occupied West Bank Palestinian land, and Jerusalem. We will not remain silent as settlement expansion and confiscation of our land continues. Therefore we hereby establish the village of Bab al-Shams to proclaim our faith in direct action and popular resistance. We declare that the village will stand steadfast until the owners of this land will get their right to build on their land.
The village's name is taken from the novel, 'Bab al-Shams,' by Lebanese writer Elias Khoury. The book depicts the history of Palestine through a love story between a Palestinian man, Younis, and his wife Nahila. Younis leaves his wife to join the Palestinian resistance in Lebanon while Nahila remains steadfast in what remains of their village in the Galilee. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Younis smuggles through Lebanon and back to the Galilee to meet his wife in the 'Bab Alshams' cave, where she gives birth to their children. Younis returns to the resistance in Lebanon as his wife remains in Bab Al Shams.
Bab al-Shams is the gate to our freedom and steadfastness. Bab al-Shams is our gate to Jerusalem. Bab al-Shams is the gate to our to our return.
For decades, Israel has established facts on the ground as the International community remained silent in response to these violations. The time has come now to change the rules of the game, for us to establish facts on the ground - our own land. This action involving women and men from the north to the south is a form of popular resistance. In the coming days we will hold various discussion groups, educational and artistic presentations, as well as film screenings on the lands of this village. The residents of Bab al-Shams invite all the sons and daughters of our people to participate and join the village in supporting our resilience.
Palestinians Set Up Tents Where Israel Plans Homes
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| Palestinians erected tents in the contested piece of Israeli-occupied West Bank territory known as E1 on Friday. Jim Hollander/European Pressphoto Agency |
Israel says that most of the E1 area is Israeli land. Protest leaders
said they had set up their encampment on a parcel of land owned by a
Palestinian family from A-Tur, a neighborhood of East Jerusalem. They
added that the landowners had given their full permission for the
encampment and had joined the activists at the site.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/12/world/middleeast/palestinians-set-up-camp-in-israeli-occupied-west-bank-territory.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_ee_20130112&_r=0
By ISABEL KERSHNER
Published: January 11, 2013
JERUSALEM — Adopting a tactic more commonly employed by Jewish settlers who establish wildcat outposts in the West Bank, scores of Palestinian activists erected tents on Friday in a hotly contested piece of Israeli-occupied West Bank territory known as E1, and they said they intended to stay put...READ MORE
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Israel continues to demolish Palestinian homes- and peace
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| Jamal K Kanj: January 2013, 4 story house belonging to a Palestinian family demolished in E Jerusalem, while Israeli Government financed illegal Jewish only settlements |
Israel uses the crisis in Syria to try to coerce Abbas into relinquishing Palestinian refugee rights
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| Palestinians cross a road flooded and swept away by heavy rains in the northern West Bank village of Kabatyeh, Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2013. (AP Photo/Mohammed Ballas) |
http://news.yahoo.com/palestinian-leader-rejects-deal-syria-refugees-105551580.html
Palestinian leader rejects deal on Syria refugees
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas says he rejected a conditional Israeli offer to allow Palestinians from war-torn Syria to resettle in the West Bank and Gaza.
Palestinians in Syria are descendants of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled or were expelled in the war over Israel's creation in 1948.
The fate of Palestinians uprooted
by Israel's creation is an explosive issue. Israel worries that a mass
influx of Palestinians could destroy the notion of a Jewish state.
Last month, Abbas asked the U.N.
to seek Israeli permission to bring Palestinians caught in Syria's civil
war to the Palestinian territories.
Abbas said in comments published
Thursday that Israel linked its acceptance to refugees relinquishing
claims to returning to what is now Israel.
Abbas says "we rejected that."
Israeli officials declined comment.
*****
Abbas to U.N.: help Syria refugees enter Palestinian territory
December 19, 2012
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| Snow covers the Dome of the Rock in the Old City Photograph: Darren Whiteside/Reuters |
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A Palestinian man, and a snowman, stand on the roof of a house near the Dome of the Rock Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA
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| Palestinians play in the snow next to a section of Israel's separation barrier in Qalandia, between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah Photograph: Majdi Mohammed/AP |
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Walls and winter rains afflict Palestinian towns
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| Maan News Photos Palestine Floods |
By Noah Browning | Reuters
QALQILYA, West Bank (Reuters) - Heavy winter downpours have turned some Palestinian lands in the occupied West Bank into a morass of filth and flooding as an Israeli barrier blocks the waters from draining away.
In Qalqilya, a town of 42,000 in the northern West Bank almost completely surrounded by the concrete wall, Khaled Kandeel and his family huddled by an open fire in a shed as trash-laden water swelled through his pear orchard.
"Before the wall,
the water used to drain fine, and flowed down to the sea easily. They
could just flip a switch and end our suffering, but they don't," Kandeel
said, his breath steamy from the winter cold.
Israel
started building the barrier, a mix of metal fencing, barbed wire and
concrete walls, in 2002 in response to a wave of Palestinian suicide
bombings.
Drainage channels
run under the imposing ramparts but their automated metal gates are
mostly closed and now clogged with refuse and stones that block the
outflow of storm water.
The Israeli military,
citing security reasons, generally bars locals from clearing the
obstructions or digging their own channels close to the barrier.
Built mostly within
occupied land and not on the "Green Line" which was Israel's de facto
border before the 1967 Middle East War, the barrier inside the West Bank is deemed illegal by the U.N.'s International Court of Justice.
It directly impacts
the farming, grazing and environment of about 170 communities, the
United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) says.
Hemmed-in residents
of northern towns in the West Bank have been deprived of large swathes
of rural land, forcing poorly-regulated waste dumping closer to farms
and homes.
Driving rain could
not mask the stench of raw sewage being unloaded from a tanker on a
village road outside Qalqilya on Tuesday, its putrid contents mixing
with the brown torrent pouring past olive trees clustered on the hills.
"Raw sewage is
disposed near, or on, agricultural land resulting in the contamination
of soil and groundwater," UNRWA said in a report.
SUNK SOUQ
Planning
restrictions, inked as part of interim peace accords by Israeli and
Palestinian negotiators almost two decades ago, widely limit locals'
ability to build water infrastructure or repair damaged or polluted
wells.
But in Hebron,
whose old city is a flashpoint of conflict with Jewish settlers, rare
coordination with the Israeli military allowed Palestinian officials to
lift the concrete slabs which separate the ethnic enclaves to relieve
flooding.
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Excellent letter in the Guardian by Keith Lichman RE Israel's drift
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/08/steady-drift-right-israel
While Jonathan Freedland's evident horror at Israel's shift to the right is welcome (Comment, 5 January), his explanations fail to account for the country's steady drift to the right since its inception and the ineluctable logic of imposing a Jewish state in someone else's country. The internal contradictions of a state in which the rights of Jewish and Palestinian citizens were supposedly "separate but equal" could only be resolved by the transformation of the state into one of genuine equality, ie a secular democracy, or by the rising hegemony of those who celebrated separateness and inequality.
That religious extremism and rightwing anti-egalitarians have become dominant in Israel is inextricably linked to the theocratic underpinning of the state. Like most other European Jews, I lost family in the Holocaust and I have experienced racism in the country of my birth, but my survival as an English Jew does not depend on the existence of the state of Israel and my right to "return" to a country to which I have never been. It depends on my being treated as a human being with the same rights and needs as everyone else. The same rights that everyone born in Israel or Palestine or anywhere else in the world should have.
Keith Lichman
London
While Jonathan Freedland's evident horror at Israel's shift to the right is welcome (Comment, 5 January), his explanations fail to account for the country's steady drift to the right since its inception and the ineluctable logic of imposing a Jewish state in someone else's country. The internal contradictions of a state in which the rights of Jewish and Palestinian citizens were supposedly "separate but equal" could only be resolved by the transformation of the state into one of genuine equality, ie a secular democracy, or by the rising hegemony of those who celebrated separateness and inequality.
That religious extremism and rightwing anti-egalitarians have become dominant in Israel is inextricably linked to the theocratic underpinning of the state. Like most other European Jews, I lost family in the Holocaust and I have experienced racism in the country of my birth, but my survival as an English Jew does not depend on the existence of the state of Israel and my right to "return" to a country to which I have never been. It depends on my being treated as a human being with the same rights and needs as everyone else. The same rights that everyone born in Israel or Palestine or anywhere else in the world should have.
Keith Lichman
London
My letter to the Washington Post RE Wading into the Middle East morass By Jackson Diel
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| Film Forum Emad Burnat is a Palestinian farmer who lives with his wife and four small children in the village of Bil’in in the central West Bank. Teamed with Israeli filmmaker Guy Davidi, the two men document Burnat’s experiences with his neighbors, the Israeli army, and Israeli activists as his village is increasingly drawn into a multi-year conflict over the construction of a barrier that will confiscate much of the village’s cultivated land. His “five broken cameras” are all shot or smashed in the course of nonviolent demonstrations by the villagers: olive trees are burnt; buildings are bulldozed and lives are lost. |
RE: Wading into the Middle East morass By Jackson Diel
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/jackson-diehl-wading-into-the-middle-east-morass/2013/01/06/8879ec84-55c6-11e2-8b9e-dd8773594efc_story.html
Dear Editor,
Times change- awareness is raised: 5 Broken Cameras, a deeply personal, first-hand account of non-violent resistance in Bil’in, a Palestinian village threatened by encroaching Israeli settlements, is up for an Oscar.
Awareness has been raised and continues to rise- that is not a morass, that is a golden opportunity to finally move beyond the extremist rhetoric, militancy, cynicism, religious idiocy, bigotry, ignorance, misinformation and propaganda that has been sabotaging peace in the Middle East for decades.
Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
NOTES
The
Office of International Religious Freedom ( http://www.state.gov/j/drl/irf/)
Given the U.S. commitment to religious freedom, and to the
international covenants that guarantee it as the inalienable right
of every human being, the United States seeks to:
Promote freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countriesPalestinian Refugees(1948-NOW) refused their right to return... and their right to live in peace free from religious bigotry and injustice.
".... it being clearly understood that nothing
shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious
rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine..."
The Golden
Rule... Do unto others as you would have them do unto you
"Where, after all, do
universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home -
so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of
the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person;
the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he
attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are
the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal
justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without
discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they
have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action
to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for
progress in the larger world."
Eleanor Roosevelt
Empowering
Peace & Palestine
"The only way to honor our tragic histories is to create a future for our children free of man-made tragedy. This means making peace fully, completely and without reservation, between Israel and Palestine."
"The only way to honor our tragic histories is to create a future for our children free of man-made tragedy. This means making peace fully, completely and without reservation, between Israel and Palestine."
The Arab Peace Initiative
Refugees
and the Right of Return
Palestinian refugees must be given the option to exercise their right of return (as well as receive compensation for their losses arising from their dispossession and displacement) though refugees may prefer other options such as: (i) resettlement in third countries, (ii) resettlement in a newly independent Palestine (even though they originate from that part of Palestine which became Israel) or (iii) normalization of their legal status in the host country where they currently reside. What is important is that individual refugees decide for themselves which option they prefer – a decision must not be imposed upon them.
Palestinian refugees must be given the option to exercise their right of return (as well as receive compensation for their losses arising from their dispossession and displacement) though refugees may prefer other options such as: (i) resettlement in third countries, (ii) resettlement in a newly independent Palestine (even though they originate from that part of Palestine which became Israel) or (iii) normalization of their legal status in the host country where they currently reside. What is important is that individual refugees decide for themselves which option they prefer – a decision must not be imposed upon them.
My letter to the NYTimes RE Israel’s True Friends by Roger Cohen
 |
| 1856 map of ancient Palestine |
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/08/opinion/israels-true-friends.html?ref=global&_r=0
Dear Editor,
Negotiations shaped to entrench sovereign violations of international law and the Palestinians basic human rights become another weapon of war rather than a tool of peace:
Israel's continued settlement expansion in the West Bank is indeed self-defeating and wrong... AND so is Israel's ongoing refusal to respect the Palestinian refugees' inalienable legal and natural right to return to original homes and lands.
A good faith quest for a two state solution recognizes that rampant religious extremism, bigotry, and hate mongering are making a bad situation worse, with dangerous ramifications world wide.
Compromise for both sides is agreeing that there are two separate sovereign states where once there was one area referred to in our history books and on antique maps as historic Palestine.
Compromise for both sides is finding ways to ensure that all people, regardless of supposed race, religion or gender are respected equals protected by the rule of fair and just laws.
Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
NOTES
The
Office of International Religious Freedom ( http://www.state.gov/j/drl/irf/)
Given the U.S. commitment to religious freedom, and to the
international covenants that guarantee it as the inalienable right
of every human being, the United States seeks to:
Promote freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countriesPalestinian Refugees(1948-NOW) refused their right to return... and their right to live in peace free from religious bigotry and injustice.
".... it being clearly understood that nothing
shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious
rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine..."
The Golden
Rule... Do unto others as you would have them do unto you
"Where, after all, do
universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home -
so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of
the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person;
the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he
attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are
the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal
justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without
discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they
have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action
to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for
progress in the larger world."
Eleanor Roosevelt
Empowering
Peace & Palestine
"The only way to honor our tragic histories is to create a future for our children free of man-made tragedy. This means making peace fully, completely and without reservation, between Israel and Palestine."
"The only way to honor our tragic histories is to create a future for our children free of man-made tragedy. This means making peace fully, completely and without reservation, between Israel and Palestine."
Palestinian refugees must be given the option to exercise
their right of return (as well as receive compensation for
their losses arising from their dispossession and
displacement) though refugees may prefer other options such
as: (i) resettlement in third countries, (ii) resettlement in
a newly independent Palestine (even though they originate from
that part of Palestine which became Israel) or (iii)
normalization of their legal status in the host country where
they currently reside. What is important is that individual
refugees decide for themselves which option they prefer – a
decision must not be imposed upon them.
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Options... a poem by Anne Selden Annab
Options
Perhaps Palestine
should give up on Israel
and apply instead to be
The 51st American state.
American law could then
meet Israel face to face-
property laws, civil rights,
real democracy
citizenship
true equality,
job opportunities
plus a bill of rights
freeing Palestine
(and eventually Israel)
to be of the people
and for the people
and by the people.
We've welcomed in Alaska
and Hawaii
why not Palestine too
Not for oil, or military bases
but for peace and justice
and The Golden Rule
AP Interview: Palestinian PM blasts Arab donors... In an interview Sunday Fayyad said that the cash crunch is pushing an additional 25 percent of the Palestinian population, or 1 million people, into poverty.
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| Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad gestures during an interview with The Associated Press in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Sunday, Jan. 6, 2013. Fayyad is blaming Arab countries that haven’t delivered promised financial aid for an escalating financial crisis in the Palestinian territories. In an interview Sunday Fayyad said that the cash crunch is pushing an additional 25 percent of the Palestinian population, or 1 million people, into poverty. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed) |
| Associated Press
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — The Palestinian self-rule government
is in "extreme jeopardy" because of an unprecedented financial crisis,
largely because Arab countries have failed to send hundreds of millions
of dollars in promised aid, the Palestinian prime minister said Sunday.
The cash crunch has gradually worsened in recent years, and the Palestinian Authority now has reached the point of not being able to pay the salaries of about 150,000 government employees, Salam Fayyad
told The Associated Press. The number of Palestinian poor is bound to
quickly double to 50 percent of the population of roughly 4 million if
the crisis continues, he said.
"The status quo is not sustainable," Fayyad said in an interview at his West Bank office.
The Palestinian Authority, set up two decades ago as part of interim peace deals with Israel,
is on the "verge of being completely incapacitated," Fayyad warned.
Only a year ago, he said he expected to make great strides in weaning
his people off foreign aid.
The self-rule government was
meant to be temporary and replaced by a state of Palestine, which was to
be established through negotiations with Israel. However, those talks
repeatedly broke down, and for the past four years the two sides have
been unable to agree on the terms of renewing the negotiations....READ MORE
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