News Blog

FFIPP: Internationals Palestinians and Israelis Working in Solidarity for a Complete End of Occupation and Just Peace

Feb
02
Jerusalem: After more than two years of struggle and almost 200 arrests, today the first court case  involving an activist from the Solidarity Movement came to a end: Dorit Argo was cleared of all charges, and the Police received a strong reprimand.

Dorit Argo, a Solidarity Activist, today was cleared of all charges in what was the first case to make its way through the court system, out of around 70 indictments filed against Solidarity Activists over the course of the struggle against Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem over last few years.

Solidarity in Silwan. Photo by: Oren Ziv, Activestills.

The Solidarity Movement, which became known following its successes in curbing the spread of settlements in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, is active throughout East Jerusalem, including in Silwan, a neighborhood known as a point of tension between settlers, police and Palestinians. Argo was arrested during a demonstration against of the settler movement in Silwan, let by a group called ELAD, which is in charge of the tourist site of the “City of David.” Argo, who was indicted for “public disturbance” and “attacking police officers” was cleared of all charges by Judge Shimon Stein in Beit Misphat HaShalom in Jerusalem.

Article.

Jan
31
Israel issue demolition orders to more than half of all the houses in the village of Aqaba near Jenin

Press Release January 30, 2012:
Gush Shalom, Tel-Aviv
 
Occupation rule's cynical game with the small village of Aqaba. Brigadier General Almaz makes a personal visit, promising to "look into the complaints". Then, his representative issues 25 demolition orders - in a village consisting of 45 houses in all
In a letter to Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Gush Shalom warns of a cynical game played by the occupation rule in the small village of Aqaba, the east of Jenin, which is over many years the target of repeated raids by the Military Government's Civil Administration, destroying houses and basic infrastructure. "A month ago they were here last time," Mayor Haj Sami Sadeq told  Gush Shalom. "They destroyed our access road, which we call 'The Peace Road' and demolished several houses. When the children who had been thrown out of their homes were crying, the soldiers posed for souvenir photos on the bulldozer, smiling and laughing".

In recent years, there was some interest in the village of Aqaba on the international scene, when an American human rights group called "The  Rebuilding Alliance" raised the issue in meetings with Representatives and  Senators and invited the village's mayor to a lecture tour in the United States. Following this international interest in the issue, the Civil Administration head  Brigadier General Motti Almaz, made an unprecedented personal visit to the village.
"He sat with me at the local council offices. I told him: 'You're destroying our homes and we build them again. What else can we do? This is our village, we have nowhere else to go. I told him that in our village there had never been clashes with the army, neither in the First Intifada nor in the Second one. For years the army carried out training with live ammunition among the village houses, villagers were killed and wounded. I personally, the mayor, was hit at a young age and remain in a wheelchair for life, and yet I feel no bitterness or hatred. I support peace. I just ask that they live us alone. I asked Almaz to approve a zoning plan for our village so that we can build legally. I asked him to allow us to rebuild the access road to the village - with our own money and labor, just that they don't destroy it. I asked him to let us build a school on 42 dunums of state land which are in the middle of the village and which we can't use. To allow us to be linked to the water pipe, so that we will no longer need  to fetch water by tankers, at twenty Shekels per cubic meter. I told him that ten years ago, the electricity pylons at the entrance to the village were pulled down, and in 1999 Knesset Members wrote to Defence Minster Ehud Barak and he gave instructions not to touch our electricity - but still, two months ago they came and again pulled down twenty pylons. I put all problems and issues to Brigadier General Almaz, and for everything I said he answered 'We will look into it', 'We will take care of it'. And he went off.
What happened next? A few days later there arrived in our village the local representative of the Civil Administration, a man named Yigal (he does not tell his family name) and started handing out demolition orders. Demolition orders for houses, for cattle sheds, even for the tabun bread ovens. Seventeen demolition orders in total. And he told us, this whole village is illegal, everything must be destroyed. Is this the 'looking into it' which the Civil Administration Head promised us? Then the Head of the Jenin Area Civil Administration, located at the Salem Chekpoint, came to our village. I asked him 'Why did you send us Yigal with the demolition orders?' And he said: 'No, I did not sent him, this did not come from me'. And then. after another few days Yigal came back with another eight demolition orders. Demolition orders also for our kindergarten and clinic. A total of 25 demolition orders for a village which consists of 45 houses in all. So what am I to do now? What can I tell villagers who ask me 'You are talking about peace. Where is your peace?' "
 

Jan
29
Diary by Karma Nabulsi

Karma Nabulsi is an Oxford academic and a former PLO representative.
London Review of Books, October 2010

...Exactly 50 years ago, Palestinians were at a similar stage of social and political fragmentation brought about by defeat and dispossession and the anomie that followed the Nakba of 1948. Without a country or the protection of a sovereign state, they were confronting, on the one hand, Israel, and on the other, sundry Arab regimes: between them they controlled every aspect of Palestinians’ social and civic lives as well as their physical space. They lived deep in the dust and disease of tent cities, without personal papers or property. In 1955, a young Palestinian writer, Ghassan Kanafani, moved to Kuwait from Syria, where he had been a teacher at a school set up for refugees by the UN, after himself being expelled from Palestine with his family in 1948. One of his people’s most perceptive chroniclers, he described their mood in his diary: ‘The only thing we know is that tomorrow will be no better than today, and that we are waiting on the shore, yearning, for a boat that will not come. We are sentenced to be separated from everything – except from our own destruction.’
But what appeared to Kanafani to be the collective end was in fact its extraordinary beginning. By the end of the decade, the revolution had found a language and a form. For the first time in a century of rebellions and uprisings against foreign rule, Palestinians could mount a collective challenge to international, Israeli and Arab coercion, and unify sufficiently to represent themselves...
...For Palestinians, whose national politics were undone in an instant over a single year in 1948, it took the concerted actions of tens of thousands of cadres across the region to hold the people together while at the same time putting sufficient pressure on those governments, both Western and Arab, that would have preferred to see us capitulate to Israel. The mood of that short period, as I remember it, was profoundly popular and democratic: pluralist, multi-party, universalist, secular and highly progressive...

Article

Jan
21
Celebrating Martin Luther King Day 2012

Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence
Declaration of Independence from the War in Vietnam
by Martin Luther King, Jr

Speech delivered by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4, 1967, at Riverside Church in New York City:

From Commondreams.org

...The world now demands a maturity of America that we may not be able to achieve. It demands that we admit that we have been wrong from the beginning of our adventure in Vietnam, that we have been detrimental to the life of the Vietnamese people. The situation is one in which we must be ready to turn sharply from our present ways...

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., April 4, 1967,  Riverside Church in New York City

There is something seductively tempting about stopping there and sending us all off on what in some circles has become a popular crusade against the war in Vietnam. I say we must enter the struggle, but I wish to go on now to say something even more disturbing. The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality we will find ourselves organizing clergy- and laymen-concerned committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy. Such thoughts take us beyond Vietnam, but not beyond our calling as sons of the living God...

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered....

Read Speech

Dec
31
Press Release: The Freedom Theatre

Press Release
Date: 2011-12-31

The Freedom Theatre, Jenin Refugee Camp

Israel Revokes Zakaria Zubeidi’s Amnesty

The co-founder, avid supporter and mentor of The Freedom Theatre, Zakaria Zubeidi, has been told by the Palestinian Authority that his amnesty has been revoked by the Israeli authorities. Zubeidi is since the 29th December being held in arrest inside the Palestinian security headquarters, supposedly on orders from Israel. No reason has been given for this incarceration.

The amnesty agreement, granted in 2007 by the Israeli Prime Minister’s office was in return for Zubeidi’s ending of armed resistance. Zubeidi managed to escape numerous Israeli attempts to assassinate him during the Intifada. The amnesty agreement allowed him to remain safe inside the Palestinian Authority district of Jenin where the Israeli military would not seek to arrest or assassinate him.

From captivity Zubeidi said yesterday: “I can stay under interrogation for a year if that’s what it takes but I just want to know that after that I will have my freedom."

After having been the leader of the armed resistance during the second Intifada, Zubeidi is since 2006 committed to cultural, non-violent resistance through theatre. He founded The Freedom Theatre together with Juliano Mer Khamis, who was assassinated earlier this year by unknown assailants. The Freedom Theatre is a cultural venue in Jenin Refugee Camp, which uses the arts as a form of resistance against oppression.

Zubeidi has become one of the main advocates for non-violent resistance through the arts. As Zubeidi states: “We used armed resistance to represent our case in the Intifada, and then we decided to follow the PA’s amnesty program and give up armed resistance, so then I continued my struggle against occupation through cultural resistance, and The Freedom Theatre is one of the institutions that have my full support.”

No reason has been given for the sudden withdrawal of Zubeidi’s amnesty. The Freedom Theatre regards this as yet another stage in the continued attacks and harassment that the theatre has been facing for several months; including attacks on the theatre and repeated nightly arrests of its members by the Israeli military.

- Whatever reasons the Israeli authorities will give for this cynical turn-around, it further jeopardizes the work of The Freedom Theatre in advocating non-violent resistance and puts Zakaria’s safety at risk. Zakaria has always kept to the conditions of the amnesty whilst supporting a cultural intifada, says Jonatan Stanczak, the third co-founder of The Freedom Theatre.

The Freedom Theatre strongly condemns these actions and wishes to emphasize that Zubeidi’s life is in real danger. The Freedom Theatre urges all its friends to contact the Palestinian Authority, the Israeli DCO in Jenin, the local Israeli representation and parliamentarians to voice opposition to this move and show support to Zakaria Zubeidi.

For more information contact:
Jonatan Stanczak, co-founder and present managing director at The Freedom Theatre:
jonatan@thefreedomtheatre.org
+46 (0)70 7908296

Nabeel al-Raee, artistic director at The Freedom Theatre, nabeel@thefreedomtheatre.org
+972 (0)59 996 8673

Zakaria Zubeidi at +972 (0)59 935 8506 (only available sporadically)
http://www.thefreedomtheatre.org/

Dec
29
Study: Average number of Palestinian arrested by Israel in 2011 is 276 per month, or around nine a day.

December 26, 2011
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- A report published on Monday has found that over 3,000 Palestinians were arrested by Israel's military in 2011.
Researcher on prisoner affairs Abdul Nasser Ferwaneh said that the average number of arrests in 2011 numbered 276 per month, or around nine a day...
...Since 1967, Israel has detained more than 750,000 Palestinians, including women and children, Palestinian Authority reports say. Around 40 percent of Palestinian men living in the occupied territories have been detained by Israel at some point in their lives...

Article

Dec
28
Alaa Abdel Fattah, Egyptian Blogger and Critic of Military Regime, Speaks Out After Months in Jail

From Democracy Now, December 28, 2011

Alaa Abdel Fattah, a prominent Egyptian revolutionary activist and blogger, has been released from prison after nearly two months behind bars. Fattah was ordered jailed by a military court on October 30 and summoned to face charges that included inciting violence — a charge he firmly denies. He refused to cooperate, rejecting the legitimacy of the military court who wanted to try him as a civilian.

We speak to Fattah about the Egyptian revolution’s ongoing struggle against the military regime and his ordeal in one of Egypt’s worst prisons, which prevented him from attending the birth of his first son. Fattah’s trial comes just as Egypt’s ousted leader, Hosni Mubarak, returns to a Cairo courtroom today to face charges over the deaths of 840 protesters during the uprising against his rule. "What comes next might be even tougher and even more difficult," Fattah says, "but I don’t think that this revolution is going to end without really completely renegotiating the order of power in Egypt and across the Arab world."

Interview

Dec
22
'If Jesus were to come this year, Bethlehem would be closed'

Phoebe Greenwood, Bethlehem
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 22 December 2011

Dr Jad Isaac: "The little town of Bethlehem? It will soon be the little ghetto surrounded in all directions by Israeli settlements...We've already passed the stage where Bethlehem can be saved..."

            A Palestinian shepherd watches his flock near the Israeli settlement of Har Homa, near Bethlehem. Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA.

If Joseph and Mary were making their way to Bethlehem today, the Christmas story would be a little different, says Father Ibrahim Shomali, a parish priest in the town. The couple would struggle to get into the city, let alone find a hotel room. "If Jesus were to come this year, Bethlehem would be closed," says the priest of Bethlehem's Beit Jala parish. "He would either have to be born at a checkpoint or at the separation wall. Mary and Joseph would have needed Israeli permission – or to have been tourists. "This really is the big problem for Palestinians in Bethlehem: what will happen when they close us off completely?"
Bethlehem is the heart of Christian Palestine and it swells with pride every Christmas. Manger Square is transformed into a grotto of lights and stalls crowned by a towering Christmas tree. Strings of illuminated angels, stars and bells festoon the streets. But just a few minutes' drive to the north, the festive atmosphere stops abruptly. A strip of Israeli settlements built on 18 sq km of what was once northern Bethlehem threatens to cut the city off from its historic twin, Jerusalem. To the Israeli authorities, these have been neighbourhoods of Jerusalem since 1967. One of the settlements, Har Homa, is built on land where angels are said to have announced the birth of Christ to local shepherds. A narrow corridor of land between Har Homa and another settlement,
Gilo, still connects Bethlehem to Jerusalem but the construction of Givat Hamatos, a new settlement announced in October, will fill this in a matter of years. Article.
 

Dec
11
Can I Dare? By Eyad El Sarraj in Gaza

December 9, 2011
 
Yesterday, my six year old son Ali went to his swimming hour after school in Wafa hospital for the elderly in the eastern part of the town.  It contains the only heated and covered swimming pool in Gaza.
 
Ali must swim as often as possible by doctors orders because of what is called 'Perth's disease ' which affects his pelvis joints.  So he goes to the pool every day.  His doctors are confident that as long as he gets his exercise there will be a spontaneous recovery and no further specific treatment is needed. I was told that Messi, the famous football player, also had this ailment.
Suddenly we heard an explosion from afar. I was getting a little worried. Ali must have arrived to the pool, I told myself. Then Hammam, my assistant, rushed in and announced that two people were killed by an Israeli missile. He said that the attack was in the middle of 'Omar Mokhtar,' the main street of Gaza. 

I was very worried and started to call everywhere. Ali and his coach were in the water and there was no answer. I learned the names of the people who were killed - Israel later claimed they were 'thinking' of attacking Israel!
It was lucky that there were no other victims in the usually busy street. Sometimes Israeli missiles are not always precisely guided. Time and time again they deliberately or mistakenly err, such as when they destroyed seventeen houses surrounding the house of the presumed target, Salah Shihada. During the last war on Gaza there were reports that the Israeli military actually targeted civilians.  And they even killed each other with friendly fire!
As if to make the point, Israeli drones or F16s launched another missile attack early this morning killing one man and injuring some seven children. While I am writing this, I heard some explosions.
Where is Israel heading? What is it trying to achieve?  Is it provoking retaliation by some Palestinian fighters in order to justify a new war on Gaza? Is it trying to sabotage the reconciliation efforts of the Egyptian government that  is pushing Hamas and Fatah to negotiate? Is intending to occupy the Philadelphia road running along the border that divides the Gaza Strip from Egypt in order to turn the Gaza Strip into a prison cut off from the world?  Does it bomb Gaza in order to prepare for an onslaught on Iran?
And can I dare to send Ali to swim tomorrow?

Dr. Eyad El Sarraj, President of FFIPP-International, founder and dirctor of the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme (GCMHP)in Gaza.

Thousands mourn protester killed at Nabi Saleh

December 11, 2011, Maan.

NABI SALEH (AFP) -- Thousands of Palestinians gathered in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh on Sunday to mourn a man who died after being hit in the head by an Israeli tear gas canister.

Mustafa Tamimi reacts after being hit by a tear gas canister
(Reuters/Haim Schwartzenberg)

Mustafa Tamimi's body was taken from the city of Ramallah in a funeral procession to the central Manara Square before being driven by ambulance to his home village of Nabi Saleh.

Tamimi was critically wounded in the village on Friday by an Israeli tear gas canister that hit him in the head after being fired at close range. He was evacuated to an Israeli hospital but died the next day of his wounds.

In Nabi Saleh, around 2,000 people gathered to receive the 28-year-old's body, which was draped with the Palestinian flag, his head covered with the black-and-white checkered kuffiyeh scarf.

Article

Nov
20
Filippo Grandi Commissioner-General, UNRWA

Waiting for Solutions in Uncertain Times: Palestine Refugees in the Middle East Context
 
Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford

16 November 2011

My presence here indicates your acknowledgement of the 4.8 million Palestinians registered as refugees with UNRWA in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and in the occupied Palestinian territory...(as well as) the millions of Palestinians contributing to life across the globe, who for reasons of personal choice and circumstance are not registered with UNRWA, yet nevertheless partake of the historic experience of exile triggered by the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1948.

We take the firm view that there can be no just and durable peace in the Middle East unless Palestine refugees are brought out of their state of dispossession and exile. The UN bid does not in and of itself tackle the plight of the refugees. Therefore, UNRWA will continue to advocate that the refugees’ legitimate rights and aspirations must be achieved in the context of discussions between political actors, including the parties - discussions that must be based on international law and UN resolutions and reflect the informed views and choices of the refugees...
We therefore maintain our insistence that any strategy to resolve the conflict and specifically to address the refugee issue must include as a central frame of reference the realization of the rights and entitlements of the Palestine refugees.  Any genuine efforts to wrest peace from the prevailing gloom must recognize the pivotal importance of the refugee constituency, and take the bold and principled steps required to harness its potential.  This will advance the refugees’ own interests, and serve the regional and universal good.  It also makes eminent sense, I may add, in a context where “Arab Spring” movements have at their heart the aspiration of all people to justice and rights.
The refugees have a crucial role and position in the unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict. Given the centrality of the Middle East in our history, past and present, providing them with real reasons for hope will contribute to improve the chances that our shared future will be a better one.
Lecture.

 

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