Dear friends,
Thanks so much for your concern, solidarity and support. I was released last night at around 6:45pm from Neve Tirtze prison in Ramle. Save for minor cuts and bruises, I am OK. I haven't gotten a chance to see Ellen Stark (the ISM volunteer shot in the arm) yet. I hear she has a broken wrist but is doing OK.
I was arrested on Friday at around noon as I tried to get the Israeli soldiers to stop shooting at people in Nabi Saleh (a small village of about 400 people), especially after ISM volunteer Ellen Stark was shot in the arm. We were in Nabi Saleh for a weekly demonstration by the villagers against the theft of their land. Simultaneous demonstrations were taking place in Jerusalem and in a number of villages throughout the West Bank. In Nabi Saleh, the demonstration took the form of people walking down a hill towards the confiscated land. "Stop shooting...a woman has been injured and needs medical attention"
http://www.freegaza.org/en/home/56-news/1154-ism-volunteer-shot-hospitalized-ism-co-founder-arrested
I yelled at the soldiers, making my way back up the hill to the road they stood on (shooting down at us knowing the rugged terrain we were on made it very difficult to move quickly to avoid their barrage of tear gas and bullets). When I got on the road the soldiers turned their guns on me but I just kept talking and walking towards them. "We have a woman that has been shot; she needs help. Stop shooting. There is no reason to be shooting at people like this. You are in THEIR village." For this I was handcuffed and thrown in a jeep, later accused of: (1) attacking a police officer; (2) cursing at the military and police; (3) obstructing the operations of the military; and (4) being in a closed military zone.
Instead of being taken to a police station, as Israeli citizens and foreigners are supposed to be, I was taken to the illegal settlement of Halamish where I was held for nearly eight hours outside in the cold. Two other Palestinians from Nabi Saleh, Omar who is 23 and Amjad, 22 were also arrested and brought there. The soldiers and border police were particularly abusive to Omar and Amjad, pushing them around, forcing them to stand for hours, handcuffed and blindfolded and every few minutes yelling at them to lift their heads, so they couldn't rest or fall asleep. When I protested this abuse I was told to "shut the f*** up" and if I didn't, I would get the same treatment. I responded, "I don't really care, but it's sad that you feel you have to treat people so inhumanely." "Shut the f*** up!"
At one point, when Omar couldn't feel his hands or move his fingers anymore (a combination of tight plastic cuffs and the cold, we were taken into a building supposedly to be checked by a doctor. The same officer who kept telling me to shut up, abusing his power because he can, ordered us to stand facing the wall. I refused this unnecessary measure and show of macho bullying, and was dragged back outside, lifted by my arms, while still cuffed behind my back, and then thrown on the ground. The dehumanization of Palestinians was not only evident amongst the soldiers, but also the Jewish settlers. Since we were held outside in the settlement, we were exposed to settler youth who surrounded and hurled profanities at us.
The ISM lawyer says that my arrest was illegal; that I should have been taken before a judge the same day I was arrested. Israeli citizens and internationals have that right. Palestinians don't. I was separated from Omar and Amjad at about 2:00 in the morning as after we were interrogated I was taken to a women's prison in Ramle, and they to the Ofer military prison. In the end I was detained for 31 hours then released. If I had not been released I would have come before a judge last night.
It will likely be at least another week before Omar and Amjad will be allowed to see a judge. At that point they will be accused of violence because they were protesting, unarmed, against the confiscation of their land. The heavily armed soldiers that invaded their village, immediately began shooting tear gas and rubber coated steel bullets; the soldiers that damaged 10 Palestinian homes and injured 25 people in Nabi Saleh aren't the violent ones. We are. Omar and Amjad are likely to have to pay a fine and/or post a hefty bail to be released, if they are not held for months first.
The police released me right before I was scheduled to come before a judge. This is likely because they had nothing to bring before a judge. I probably should have refused release and challenged their actions in court, but I really didn't want to make a big deal out of my arrest, when so many other worse things are happening.
That said, so many good things are happening also. Solidarity actions around the world are on the rise, the BDS movement is gaining more support every day, and the spirit of the Palestinian people is high. Israel expects to be able to continue stealing land and resources, subjugating the indigenous people, and using violence to subdue any kind of protest from the colonized and their supporters. We don't have the weapons Israel has to fight back, but we have our spirit and our voices with which we will fight. Israel should be under no illusion that it can intimidate or break us.
Thanks so much again for your concern and support!
In solidarity & struggle,
Boycott israHell!
Бойкот на израел и печелещите от окупацията! Boycott israHell and those who profit from occupation!
Showing posts with label volunteers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label volunteers. Show all posts
Monday, March 22, 2010
Monday, March 16, 2009
American Plastic Surgery Team Completes Mission in West Bank
On March 13th, a two-man American plastic surgery mission completed a
week of surgery on 28 burned and injured children at the New Jericho
Hospital. The surgeon, Dr. Randy Smith and his anesthesiologist, Dr.
Chip Story, have both worked with the PCRF in the past in Palestine,
and have treated several dozen children with complex burns and other
injuries that require skilled surgery not available locally. The PCRF
also supports a local plastic surgery program with Dr. Hisham Ammous
in the West Bank, sending him to different remote towns to provide
surgery, but still there are hundreds of children in need of surgery
that they cannot get because of the lack of plastic surgeons
throughout the West Bank. Last month the PCRF sent a Japanese plastic
surgeon to Jericho after he was denied entry into Gaza by both the
Egyptian and Israeli authorities.
week of surgery on 28 burned and injured children at the New Jericho
Hospital. The surgeon, Dr. Randy Smith and his anesthesiologist, Dr.
Chip Story, have both worked with the PCRF in the past in Palestine,
and have treated several dozen children with complex burns and other
injuries that require skilled surgery not available locally. The PCRF
also supports a local plastic surgery program with Dr. Hisham Ammous
in the West Bank, sending him to different remote towns to provide
surgery, but still there are hundreds of children in need of surgery
that they cannot get because of the lack of plastic surgeons
throughout the West Bank. Last month the PCRF sent a Japanese plastic
surgeon to Jericho after he was denied entry into Gaza by both the
Egyptian and Israeli authorities.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Occupied Palestine: the horror continues
Tomorrow is the sixth anniversary of the death of peace activist Rachel Corrie, crushed to death by a caterpillar tractor driven by the Israeli Defense Forces in occupied Palestine. She was trying to negotiate with the driver not to destroy the homes of Palestinians being subjected to collective punishment for demonstrating against the occupation (see our posts here, here, here). What makes this year's anniversary even more painful is fresh news: 37 year old Tristan Anderson from Oakland, California, a dedicated pacifist with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), is on life-support after being shot in the face by the IDF with a high velocity tear gas canister. More via Siun at Firedoglake:
Each week, Palestinians and international supporters gather in the West Bank town of Ni'lin to hold a prayer service and protest the building of the Israeli Wall.
The Ni'lin demonstrations are an attempt to stop construction of the Wall which is cutting residents off from their property. ISM notes:
Residents in the village of Ni’lin have been demonstrating against the construction of the Apartheid Wall, deemed illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004. Ni’lin will lose approximately 2500 dunums of agricultural land when the construction of the Wall is completed. Ni’lin was 57,000 dunums in 1948, reduced to 33,000 dunums in 1967, currently is 10,000 dunums and will be 7,500 dunums after the construction of the Wall. (Sium, Firedoglake)
When shot, Anderson was inside the village and far from any demonstration. He did not throw stones nor was he near anyone who could be considered threatening. While he wasn't shot by a bullet, the damage caused by these projectiles is well known to the locals. Here's what it can do and did to Tristan Anderson:
The impact of the projectile caused numerous condensed fractures to Anderson's forehead and right eye socket. During the operation, part of his right frontal lobe had to be removed, as it was penetrated by bone fragments. A brain fluid leakage was sealed using a tendon from his thigh, and both his right eye and skin suffered extensive damage. The long term scope of all of Tristan's injuries is yet unknown. It should also be noted that soldiers at the Ni'ilin checkpoint prevented the Red Crescent ambulance from taking Tristan directly to the hospital, forcing it to wait for approximately 15 minutes until an Israeli ICU ambulance (called by Israeli activists) arrived at scene, after which he was carried from one side of the checkpoint to the other. This, of course, is standard procedure - in the extremely rare cases where the army allows patients from the occupied territories to be transferred into Israel.
Interfering with medical services is a war crime, although it is a crime routinely committed by the IDF, as in this case. We don't hear about this in the US, nor do we hear much, if anything, about the non-violent resistance of the Palestinian people. Instead we hear only about the counter violence of the victimized. But the non-violent resistance is also real:
Why don’t the Palestinians adopt the tactics of Martin Luther King or Gandhi? And the answer is simply this—they do. For the last six years, they have mounted an ongoing campaign of civil resistance against Israel’s apartheid wall, which snakes through the West Bank, confiscating Palestinian farmland without compensation, destroying the life and livelihoods of whole villages, literally setting in concrete the fractured geometry of Israel’s incursions, her illegal settlements that eat away the integrity of any potential Palestinian state. In the spring of 2004, when the army was just beginning to bulldoze olive orchards and scrape land bare, the villagers of Mas’Ha set up a peace encampment on the wall’s route, inviting support from internationals and Israelis of good will. I’ve written elsewhere about what it was like to be there, encamped in one remaining grove under a full Passover moon, the despair of the bulldozers and the slim hope watching young Palestinians and Israelis sit together around a fire, sharing smokes and stories.
For six years, the movement has moved, from village to village, following the path of the wall. Six years of sparse and tiny victories—here and there, the route of the wall pushed back a few meters—but in Palestine, even the smallest victory stands out because it is so unusual, so different from the expected course of events. Like starving people who survive on crumbs, Palestinians nourish their determination to survive on even the smallest grains of success.
Mostly, I think, the movement survives because, in the face of horrific injustice, people need to do something. The vast majority of Palestinians do not want to strap on a suicide belt or pick up a gun. Contrary to all the stereotypes and racist assumptions, they don’t want to kill, or be killed, for that matter. But they want to do something.
So they come to the wall. Children carry signs, women sit in front of bulldozers, men chant slogans and pray. Supported by a few internationals and a few determined Israelis, mostly ignored by the world’s media, they face tear gas, rubber bullets, real bullets, arrests and beatings. And if the demonstrations have not yet stopped the wall nor won over the hearts of Israelis, they have at least given strength to the hearts of Palestinians and those who continue to hope against hope for some ultimate justice.(Starhawk)
This doesn't sound like much, but for these little victories, many have died:
Tristan, young though he seems to me, has had more of a life than Arafat Rateb Khawaje, who was shot in the back by Israeli forces at a demonstration in Ni’lin on December 28, 2008, when he was only twenty two. On the same day, Mohammed Khawaje, aged twenty, was shot in the head with live ammunition. Brain dead, he lingered for three days until he died in a Ramallah hospital. And they, so young, still had more life behind them than Yousef Amira, only seventeen, shot with rubber-coated still bullets on July 29, 2008. And yet they, too, seem ancient compared to Ahmed Mousa, only ten, shot in the forehead with live ammunition on July 29th, 2008. And that is just the body count of one village, one year. I grieve for Tristan because he’s a friend. I know him, I have marched with him shoulder to shoulder, sat in meetings with him, shared laughter and gossip and disbelief at the amount of liquor those British activists could put away. I feel for him in a way I should feel, but can’t, for those who are just names on a list to me.
We don't know what difference, if any, the new administration will make. It is hard to think it could be worse, but too often my imagination has shown itself inadequate to the viciousness of this occupation. If you want to do something, you'll find many concrete suggestions and links to peace organizations promoting non-violent resistance to that viciousness at The Jewish Voice for Peace.
This is the actual event. It is horrifying:
Each week, Palestinians and international supporters gather in the West Bank town of Ni'lin to hold a prayer service and protest the building of the Israeli Wall.
The Ni'lin demonstrations are an attempt to stop construction of the Wall which is cutting residents off from their property. ISM notes:
Residents in the village of Ni’lin have been demonstrating against the construction of the Apartheid Wall, deemed illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004. Ni’lin will lose approximately 2500 dunums of agricultural land when the construction of the Wall is completed. Ni’lin was 57,000 dunums in 1948, reduced to 33,000 dunums in 1967, currently is 10,000 dunums and will be 7,500 dunums after the construction of the Wall. (Sium, Firedoglake)
When shot, Anderson was inside the village and far from any demonstration. He did not throw stones nor was he near anyone who could be considered threatening. While he wasn't shot by a bullet, the damage caused by these projectiles is well known to the locals. Here's what it can do and did to Tristan Anderson:
The impact of the projectile caused numerous condensed fractures to Anderson's forehead and right eye socket. During the operation, part of his right frontal lobe had to be removed, as it was penetrated by bone fragments. A brain fluid leakage was sealed using a tendon from his thigh, and both his right eye and skin suffered extensive damage. The long term scope of all of Tristan's injuries is yet unknown. It should also be noted that soldiers at the Ni'ilin checkpoint prevented the Red Crescent ambulance from taking Tristan directly to the hospital, forcing it to wait for approximately 15 minutes until an Israeli ICU ambulance (called by Israeli activists) arrived at scene, after which he was carried from one side of the checkpoint to the other. This, of course, is standard procedure - in the extremely rare cases where the army allows patients from the occupied territories to be transferred into Israel.
Interfering with medical services is a war crime, although it is a crime routinely committed by the IDF, as in this case. We don't hear about this in the US, nor do we hear much, if anything, about the non-violent resistance of the Palestinian people. Instead we hear only about the counter violence of the victimized. But the non-violent resistance is also real:
Why don’t the Palestinians adopt the tactics of Martin Luther King or Gandhi? And the answer is simply this—they do. For the last six years, they have mounted an ongoing campaign of civil resistance against Israel’s apartheid wall, which snakes through the West Bank, confiscating Palestinian farmland without compensation, destroying the life and livelihoods of whole villages, literally setting in concrete the fractured geometry of Israel’s incursions, her illegal settlements that eat away the integrity of any potential Palestinian state. In the spring of 2004, when the army was just beginning to bulldoze olive orchards and scrape land bare, the villagers of Mas’Ha set up a peace encampment on the wall’s route, inviting support from internationals and Israelis of good will. I’ve written elsewhere about what it was like to be there, encamped in one remaining grove under a full Passover moon, the despair of the bulldozers and the slim hope watching young Palestinians and Israelis sit together around a fire, sharing smokes and stories.
For six years, the movement has moved, from village to village, following the path of the wall. Six years of sparse and tiny victories—here and there, the route of the wall pushed back a few meters—but in Palestine, even the smallest victory stands out because it is so unusual, so different from the expected course of events. Like starving people who survive on crumbs, Palestinians nourish their determination to survive on even the smallest grains of success.
Mostly, I think, the movement survives because, in the face of horrific injustice, people need to do something. The vast majority of Palestinians do not want to strap on a suicide belt or pick up a gun. Contrary to all the stereotypes and racist assumptions, they don’t want to kill, or be killed, for that matter. But they want to do something.
So they come to the wall. Children carry signs, women sit in front of bulldozers, men chant slogans and pray. Supported by a few internationals and a few determined Israelis, mostly ignored by the world’s media, they face tear gas, rubber bullets, real bullets, arrests and beatings. And if the demonstrations have not yet stopped the wall nor won over the hearts of Israelis, they have at least given strength to the hearts of Palestinians and those who continue to hope against hope for some ultimate justice.(Starhawk)
This doesn't sound like much, but for these little victories, many have died:
Tristan, young though he seems to me, has had more of a life than Arafat Rateb Khawaje, who was shot in the back by Israeli forces at a demonstration in Ni’lin on December 28, 2008, when he was only twenty two. On the same day, Mohammed Khawaje, aged twenty, was shot in the head with live ammunition. Brain dead, he lingered for three days until he died in a Ramallah hospital. And they, so young, still had more life behind them than Yousef Amira, only seventeen, shot with rubber-coated still bullets on July 29, 2008. And yet they, too, seem ancient compared to Ahmed Mousa, only ten, shot in the forehead with live ammunition on July 29th, 2008. And that is just the body count of one village, one year. I grieve for Tristan because he’s a friend. I know him, I have marched with him shoulder to shoulder, sat in meetings with him, shared laughter and gossip and disbelief at the amount of liquor those British activists could put away. I feel for him in a way I should feel, but can’t, for those who are just names on a list to me.
We don't know what difference, if any, the new administration will make. It is hard to think it could be worse, but too often my imagination has shown itself inadequate to the viciousness of this occupation. If you want to do something, you'll find many concrete suggestions and links to peace organizations promoting non-violent resistance to that viciousness at The Jewish Voice for Peace.
This is the actual event. It is horrifying:
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