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Gaza Freedom March: What We've Accomplished So Far
CAIRO, Egypt - Some of us reached Gaza and particpated in the Gaza Freedom March as planned. All of us significantly raised the profile of dissent - particularly, American dissent - against the blockade of the people of Gaza imposed by Israel and Egypt, with the backing of the United States and the acquiescence of Europe. The groundwork is being laid for future campaigning in the U.S. for "citizen sanctions" against the Israeli government that could help change the balance of forces influencing U.S. policy, so that U.S. policy becomes a force for peace, rather than continuing to perpetuate the Israel/Palestine conflict as the U.S. is doing today.
The New York Times (yes, the New York Times had two articles on the march) reported:
Hundreds of demonstrators gathered on both sides of the Israeli-Gazan border on Thursday to mark a year since Israel's three-week war in Gaza, and to call for an end to the blockade of the area imposed by Israel and Egypt. About 85 of the several hundred demonstrators inside Gaza were foreigners, part of a group of more than 1,000 who arrived in Cairo in hopes of entering the territory but who were stopped by the Egyptian authorities. After days of negotiation, Egypt permitted a small delegation to cross the normally closed border at the southern Gazan city of Rafah.
Hundreds of us - confined to Cairo - protested against the Israeli/Egyptian blockade where we were. Our protests in Cairo were front-page news in the Egyptian press - and were reported in the U.S. as well.
The Christian Science Monitor reported:
Unable to protest the blockade from within the territory, they have protested it from here. The result has been a tense confrontation between American and European left-wing activism and a repressive police state engaged in a rigorous four-year-long crackdown on critics of the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Medea Benjamin, an American citizen, cofounder of the antiwar group Code Pink, and one of the march organizers, says she and 50 other US nationals were "beaten up" by Egyptian police when they went to the US Embassy in Cairo to attend a previously scheduled meeting with embassy staff on Tuesday morning.
And the New York Times noted that:
One protester, Hedy Epstein, 85, a Holocaust survivor, arrived in Egypt from the United States on Saturday. She said she started a hunger strike on Monday. "My message is for the world governments to wake up and treat Israel like they treat any other country and not to be afraid to reprimand and criticize Israel for its violent policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians," Ms. Epstein said. "I brought a suitcase full of things, pencils, pens, crayons, writing paper to take to children in Gaza -- I can't take that back home."
It wasn't a starting point of the protest to highlight the role of the Egyptian government in enforcing the blockade. It was the government of Egypt which, by refusing to let us pass, put its role at center stage. The Egyptian government justifies its closure of the border crossing at Rafah by invoking "security" - just as the Israeli government does. The Egyptian policy is often explained as being a result of its opposition to Hamas - but enforcement of the blockade on Gaza by Egypt as a political weapon against Hamas is collective punishment of Gaza's civilian population - just as grave a violation of international law as the Israeli enforcement of the blockade. Egypt's actions in enforcing the blockade are powerful evidence for the widely held Arab view that in their policies towards the Palestinians, Egypt's President Mubarak and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu are "tizein bilbass" - two butts in one underwear. The events of the last week have transformed the "Israeli blockade" of Gaza into an "Israeli-Egyptian blockade," something that will dog Egypt's international relations - including calls for sanctions against Egypt - until the siege has been lifted.
It is almost certain that new organizing around "boycotts, divestment and sanctions" against the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza will take place in the United States as a result of the Gaza Freedom March. There is a strong push from Palestinian solidarity activists in South Africa and Europe for American solidarity activists to do more to promote the "BDS" campaign. There are plans for a delegation of Palestinian and South African trade unionists to tour the United States, and for student activists in the U.S. to train other student activists to launch BDS campaigns at universities.
Greater activity in support of sanctions against the Israeli government in trade unions, universities, and churches in the United States could eventually change the political terrain in Washington, by legitimizing the idea that the Israeli government should face real consequences from the United States for continuing its present policies. This year we saw the Obama Administration's initial insistence on a total freeze of Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank fizzle out, in large measure because it wasn't backed by any "or else" - even the idea of conditioning a part of U.S. aid to Israel on a real settlement freeze failed to gain any traction. A newly invigorated BDS campaign in the United States could create hundreds of organizing hooks to build momentum for a real change in U.S. policy.
19 Comments so far
Show AllThis is a good thing to have happened--More enlightenment regarding the pitiful plight of the Palestinian people--trapped at both ends, by their Zionists-occupier-friends-neighbor, who won't open the back gate, 'cause the wicked club said so. END ALL OCCUPATIONS NOW--DON'T WAIT TILL WE MAKE YOU!
I agree with what you're saying, except, as someone who's Jewish, I object to the incessant and excessive use of the word "Zionist". Zionism came into existence for a reason; the Holocaust, as did the State of Israel, generally. The Jews, too, have needed an independent, sovereign nation-state where they're a majority, due to Jewish history, in order to normalize them. Yet, the Palestinians need their own independent, sovereign nation-state where THEY'RE a majority, in order to normalize them, too. Both peoples need self-determination in the forms of their own independent, sovereign nation-states as a means of protection against oppressions, pogroms, and explotations.
While we're on the subject of the Palestinians, it's also true that, while Israel's treatment of the Palestinians overall has been exceeding harsh, the Arab countries, with their political exploitation of the Palestinians as a political football for 40 years for making war on Israel in an attempt to destroy it, therefore also depriving the Palestinians of independence, nationhood and sovereignity, and by keeping an impoverished, angry Palestinian population in refugee status, and the Palestinian leaders themselves have also stuck it to the average Palestinian people, with their corruption, cronyism, and expropriation of money given to them by the international community for themselves instead of using it to help establish the necessary independent, sovereign Palestinian nation-state in West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. This, unfortunately, is something that's all too often overlooked. Imho, one doesn't have to approve of Israel's occupation of the above-mentioned territories and its harsh treatment of the Palestinians to be aware of all that.
God bless the organizers of this march. Though little to no attention is being paid by the media - no surprise there - they are still making a historic comment on the travesty of the blockade and the US support of it.
The Real News Network had a report yesterday on the Gaza Freedom March.
http://therealnews.com/t2/
press coverage poor. well, ann coulter on time magazine cover. glenn beck, too. but, no noam chomsky. then, iran, iran, everywhere, when it comes to nuclear centrifuges, but mainstream commentatators seem forbidden to mention how many hydrogen and neutron bombs that israel actually has. darn that left-wing media!
Yes, press coverage was invisible to the US, even here in LA where there was no coverage at all of a demonstraion at the Israhell embassy on Wilshire. But here's what was reported by OpEdNews on this under reported LA demonstration against israhell right on Wilshire on the 30th:
http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Israel-Gaza-Face-Off-I-by-Linda-Milazzo-091230-80.html
The LA Times has again shown its failure as a big city news rag.
Fair.org has a good list of media email addresses to use for contacting national press urging coverage.
I know it seems futile sometimes, but if we don't push them, we know things won't change.
Citizenship requires effort. Justice requires effort. Peace requires effort.
Occupation and apartheid by Israel is an abomination and a disservice to Jews around the world. Ultimately a two state solution fair to BOTH sides must prevail.
I, too agree that Israel's occupation of West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, with its housing demolitions, roughing up, killing and maiming of innocent Palestinians civilians and subjecting them to all kinds of humiliation, not to mention their settlement/settlers' policies, is an absolute disgrace. While I agree that both sides, over the past several decades, have contributed much to this horrendous situation and have done unspeakable things to each other in the names of their religions and in the name of humanity, I agree that Israel should and must do its part by pulling its troops and settlers out of West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem and to allow the Palestinians to create their own independent, soveriegn nation-state alongside Israel, and not in place of it, the way many people want.
This:
"Ultimately a two state solution fair to BOTH sides must prevail."
is something that I completely and totally agree with you on, because, regardless of what anybody else says or thinks, the two-state solution is the only fair, safe, sane and sensible solution to this decades old conflict.
It is far too late for a Two State Solution.
A ONE State solution is the only thing that is possible.
A State for Jews , Muslims , and Christians.
ALL with Equal Rights.
I disagree with you here, Fairy Dust.
I firmly believe that the two-state solution is still possible. Israel has to yank her troops and her settlers out of West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem....now!
Also, most Israelis and most Palestinians alike support and want the two-state solution, and so do most American, Israeli and European Jews.
The two state solution is as just as the "Separate but Equal" doctrine was in the old south of the 1950s and 60s.
Jim Crow is alive and well in Israel.
Just yesterday, an American reporter revealed that when colonists in East Jerusalem beat up a Palestinian boy, the ambulance dispatcher (who is Israeli and Jewish - located in West Jerusalem) asked if the boy was "Jewish or Arab?", before responding.
Quote:
"That was when I heard what I couldn’t believe… honestly, you read about this kind of thing, but you never realize how serious it is until you hear it for yourself. The policeman called for an ambulance. The ambulance, over the radio, responded by asking in Hebrew “Is it an Arab or a Jew?” Immediately an angry woman (presumably the injured boy’s mother) shouted “OF COURSE! OF COURSE That’s what they ask… Because if he’s an Arab, WHY SHOULD THEY COME?” I couldn’t believe my ears. I didn’t understand… Why would an ambulance dispatcher ever pause to ask the ethnicity of an injured child before rushing to pick him up? At that moment, I was overwhelmed and had to step away from the situation. I imagined my own son lying in pain and bleeding, no matter how severe, with an ambulance dispatcher asking in the background for clarity on his religion or ethnicity. I believe that the original dispatcher who asked the police officer about ethnicity was from the Magen David (the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross)".
Now, Hasbara trolls will come on here and tell you, "every society has a racist or two they're not proud of", without mentioning how prevalent such bigotry is in Israel and especially in Jerusalem against Palestinians.
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/01/a-slice-of-life-in-sheikh-jarrah.html
A low and dishonest decade
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1261364564316&pagename=JPArticle%2FShowFull
Dec. 31, 2009
Caroline Glick , THE JERUSALEM POST
Upon returning from Cairo on Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu proclaimed, "It's time to move the peace process forward."
The most sympathetic interpretation of Netanyahu's proclamation is that he was engaging in political theater. It was a low and dishonest statement uttered at the end of what has been, in the immortal words of W.H. Auden, "a low and dishonest decade."
Everyone with eyes in their heads knows that there is no chance of making peace with the Palestinians. First of all, the most Israel is willing to give is less than what the Palestinians are willing to accept.
But beyond that, Gaza is controlled by Hamas, and Hamas is controlled by Iran.
For its part, Fatah is not in a position to make peace even if its leaders wished to. Mahmoud Abbas and his deputies know that just as Hamas won the 2006 elections in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, Hamas would win elections today. To maintain even a smudge of domestic legitimacy, Fatah's leaders have no choice but to adopt Hamas's rejection of peaceful coexistence with the Jewish state.
Clearly, now is not the time "to move the peace process forward."
No less than what it tells us about Netanyahu, his statement is notable for what it tells us about Israel. Our continued willingness to ensnare ourselves in the rhetoric of peace processes demonstrates how little we have progressed in the past decade.
In 1999, Netanyahu was ejected from office by an electorate convinced that he was squandering an historic opportunity for peace between Israel and its neighbors. A majority of Israelis believed that Netanyahu's signature policies of demanding that the Palestinians abide by their commitments to Israel, and maintaining the IDF's security zone in south Lebanon were dooming all hope for peace.
His successor, Ehud Barak, promised to remove IDF troops from Lebanon and forge a final peace with the Palestinians and with Syria within a year. After winning the election, Barak famously promised a swooning crowd at Rabin Square that the "dawn of a new day has arrived."
Barak lost no time fulfilling his campaign promises. He withdrew the IDF from south Lebanon in May 2000.
He launched talks with Syria in December 1999. For four months he begged Syrian dictator Hafez Assad to accept the Golan Heights, stopping only after Assad harshly rebuffed him in March 2000.
And in July 2000 at Camp David, Barak offered Yasser Arafat Gaza, 90 percent of Judea and Samaria and half of Jerusalem in exchange for peace. After Arafat rejected his offer, Barak sweetened it at Taba in September 2000, adding another 5% of Judea and Samaria, the Temple Mount, and extra lands in the Negev, only to be rejected, again.
Barak made these offers as the wisdom of appeasement exploded before his eyes. Hizbullah seized the withdrawal from Lebanon as a strategic victory. Far from disappearing as Barak and his deputy Yossi Beilin had promised it would, Hizbullah took over south Lebanon and used the area as a springboard for its eventual takeover of the Lebanese government. So, too, with its forces perched on the border, Hizbullah built up its Iranian-commanded forces, preparing for the next round of war.
Similarly, Barak's desperate entreaties to Assad enhanced the dictator's standing in the Arab world, to the detriment of Egypt and Jordan.
To the extent he required encouragement, the ascendance of Hizbullah, Syria and Iran made it politically advantageous for Arafat to reject peace. Buoyed by their rise, Arafat diverted billions of dollars in Western aid from development projects to the swelling ranks of his terror armies. Instead of preparing his people for peace, he trained them for war.
Arafat responded to Barak's beggary at Camp David and Taba by launching the largest terror offensive Israel experienced since the 1950s. The Palestinians' orgiastic celebration of the mass murder of Israelis was the final nail in Barak's premiership, and it seemed at the time, the death-knell of his policies of appeasement.
A year and a half after he took office, the public threw Barak from power. Likud leader Ariel Sharon - who just a decade earlier had been taken for dead - was swept into power with an electoral landslide. To the extent the public vote was for Sharon, rather than against Barak, the expectation was that Sharon would end Barak's appeasement policies and defeat Arafat and the terror state he had built in Gaza, Judea and Samaria.
But this was not to be.
Rather than abandon Barak's policies, Sharon embraced them. He formed a unity government with Labor and refused to fight. He didn't fight after 22 teenagers were massacred outside the Dolphinarium nightclub in June 2001. He did not fight after the September 11, 2001, attacks and the Palestinian celebrations of the slaughter in New York and Washington.
Sharon did not order the IDF to fight until the carnage of March 2002 that culminated in the Seder massacre at Netanya's Park Hotel forced his hand. Had he not ordered the IDF to dismantle the Palestinian terror infrastructures in Judea and Samaria at that time, he faced the sure prospect of being routed in the Likud leadership race scheduled for November of that year.
Operation Defensive Shield was a textbook example of what you get when you mix weak politicians with a strong society. On the one hand, during Defensive Shield, the IDF took control of all the major towns and cities in Judea and Samaria and so enabled Israel to dismantle Palestinian terror networks by remaining in place in the years that followed.
...
Yes, Netanyahu (N'yet and yahoo) will only make a "real" peace proposal if we in the U.S. cut off all of our funding to Israel. Egypt will join the world of humanity only if we in the U.S. cut off all of our funding to Egypt. The whole world, with even half of a pea-brain, knows the cure for the ills that ail the Middle East. Peace is not an option when so many trillions can be made without it by those two countries.
Reply to “DaMiddleRoad” (who posted the JP propaganda here ...)
It was not only a “low and dishonest decade”, but as many “revisionist” historians have revealed in their meticulous research (most of them Israelis like Ilan Pape, Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, Shlomo Sand, and of course US scolars like Norman Finkelstein, Noam Chomsky, Joel Kovel, etc.) the state of Israel was built on a pack of lies and a distorted Zionist self-image of a higher Jewish morality:
“I am prepared to swear, for us and our descendants, that we will never destroy this equality and we will never attempt to expel or oppress the Arabs.
Our credo, as the reader can see, is completely peaceful. But it is absolutely another matter if it will be possible to achieve our peaceful aims through peaceful means. This depends, not on our relationship with the Arabs, but exclusively on the Arabs’ relationship to Zionism.”
This stunning peace of twisted logic & morality is a good example of the mindset of Zionists long before Hitler appeared on the scene. To be forced to achieve “peaceful aims” with violent means due to the ugly resistance of the “primitive Arabs” is the great calamity that has befallen the Zionist colonisation project. But the author of these lines knew from the start, that a peaceful “settlement” was impossible:
“Zionist colonization, even the most restricted, must either be terminated or carried out in defiance of the will of the native population. This colonization can, therefore, continue and develop only under the protection of a force independent of the local population – an iron wall which the native population cannot break through. This is, in toto, our policy towards the Arabs. To formulate it any other way would only be hypocrisy.”
Vladimir Jabotinsky ,The Iron Wall, first published on Nov.4, 1923
Well, the Zionist leaders have practiced the art of “information dominance” ever since in order to create the illusion, that their brutal repression and ongoing land theft has nothing to do with the proliferation of Islamic “terrorism”. This “engaging in political theater” is very successful because it is amplified by the media which, to this day, does not collapse in ridicule while using the Orwellian expression “peace process” for this abominable charade.
“Everyone with eyes in their heads knows that there is no chance of making peace with the Palestinians. First of all, the most Israel is willing to give is less than what the Palestinians are willing to accept.” (JP)
Another example of “perception management”:
This is not about what Israel is “willing to give” but about the rules of international law and the universal rights of the Palestinians that Israel must obey if if wants to be called (and treated like) a civilized state and a “democracy”.
Israel’s respect for their rights must not be “earned” by the Palestinians by accepting even more deceptive proposals, this is no quid pro quo exercise, but a case of perpetrator and victim, of oppressor against the oppressed, of falsehood against historical truth.
So there can be no “peace negotiations” at all without the first indispensable step: honesty, admission of wrong-doing, dealing with your own guilt to establish trust. But we all know this will never happen so the (self-)deception has to go on and the “Godfather” is happy to lend his lethal support ....
President Obama on the recent violence in Tehran:
“The United States joins with the international community in strongly condemning the violent and unjust suppression of innocent Iranian citizens, which has apparently resulted in detentions, injuries, and even death. For months, the Iranian people have sought nothing more THAN TO EXERCISE THEIR UNIVERSAL RIGHTS. Each time they have done so, they have been met with THE IRON FIST OF BRUTALITY, even on solemn occasions and holy days.”
The Palestinians have also been seeking respect for their universal rights for decades and ecountered the “iron fist of brutality” (and the Iron Wall) of Israel AND – as we all know- this is only possible because the US SUPPORTS THE BRUTALITY and even pays for it with US tax dollars. But moral outrage in the context of foreign policy is used very selectively of course, and even the gravest violations of human rights are ignored when those who commit them, serve “the interests of the US” (by being reliable “partners” for the dirtiest clandestine “interventions”, shady arms deals, criminal finance, etc.)
“Compromisers ... attempt to convince us that the Arabs are some kind of fools who can be tricked by a softened formulation of our goals, or a tribe of money grubbers who will abandon their birth right to Palestine for cultural and economic gains. I flatly reject this assessment of the Palestinian Arabs.” (Jabotinsky )
Well, Arafat let himself be tricked by that “softened formulation of our goals” and fell into the trap of Oslo which meant accepting Israel’s land theft as a fait accompli and get nothing in return. After the “policeman” could no longer keep the “terrorists” in check, he was finally disposed of. Some “money grubbers” (i.e. in Fatah) will always exist and they are of course the preferred “partner for peace” while Hamas with all their faults, are not corrupt, so they are a real problem ...
Everyone with an IQ above room temperature knows that Israel does not want peace, because not only has it broken all agreements it ever negotiated with Palestinian leaders, it also deliberately provoked new outbreaks of violence in periods of “calm”: http://www.antiwar.com/ips/ghariblobe.php?articleid=14014
The role of the compliant media has been to reinforce the established frame of the “evil” Hamas “terrorists” who – for no reason at all - seek to destroy the state of Israel. We are supposed to believe that increasing support for Hamas is the result of religious indoctrination, not the natural outcome of a brutal and inhumane occupation: a complete disregard for the human, civil and political rights of the Palestinians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza.
Hi,
I agree with everything Tocqueville said. I just think that he should "follow the money". Without our money, Egypt, MAYBE would help their fellow humans in Gaza. Without our money, MAYBE the good Israelis would have a chance to voice their views.
Love, Happy New Year, and Bless You All
Reply to "independentminded":
"I agree with what you're saying, except, as someone who's Jewish, I object to the incessant and excessive use of the word "Zionist". Zionism came into existence for a reason; the Holocaust, as did the State of Israel, generally.
The Jews, too, have needed an independent, sovereign nation-state where they're a majority, due to Jewish history, in order to normalize them. Yet, the Palestinians need their own independent, sovereign nation-state where THEY'RE a majority, in order to normalize them, too.."
You have got the historical facts wrong, so your arguments are built on clay feet (on indoctrination rather)...
Zionism was not the result of the Holocaust and neither was the creation of Israel.
Zionism started much earlier in the late 19 century with Theodor Herzl (1860-1904), an Austrian-Hungarian journalist who lived in Vienna.
Most "Jews" in Western Europe, notably Germany were quite happy and proud to be major contributors of the great cultural achievements (arts and sciences). The problems started when a tide of romantic nationalism swept Europe in the 18th and in the 19th century national chauvinism (together with militarism) got the upper hand.
Another story are the great numbers of "Jews" in Eastern Europe and czarist Russia who lived in abject poverty and under systemic discrimination.
A though provoking analysis of the roots and goals of Zionism can be found here:
http://www.vho.org/aaargh/fran/livres/LBzad.pdf
I contend that
-that Judaism is a religion, so being "Jewish" refers to a religious belief (and the rich cultural heritage coming with it)not an ethnic category
(see Shlomo Sand's "The Invention of the Jewish People" and the history of the Khazar kingdom)
- therefore there is no Jewish "race" nor does it need to have a nation-state to become "normalized" (!)
- that the Palestinians are the descendants of the ancient inhabitants of the province "Judea"
- that it is absurd to claim a piece of land based on "devine decree" (even Jabotinsky writes about the "birthright of the Arabs")
- that the Zionists abused anti-semitism for their own purposes (instead of fighting it as even Ghandi advised)
- that deep in their hearts Israel's leaders are ashamed that their forefathers never fought anti-semitism (judaeophobia) but even exploited it, while the "dirty Arabs" put up so much resistance ...
"...Yet, the Palestinians need their own independent, sovereign nation-state where THEY'RE a majority, in order to normalize them, too.."
The Palestinians were and still ARE a majority - if massive ethnic cleansing had not occured:
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/3041
(pls read "THE ETHNIC CLEANSING OF PALESTINE" by Ilan Pappe)
The descendants of refugees alone are more than 4 million people and of course the Arab birth-rate is much higher than the Israeli one, so the "demographic threat" was clear to Israeli leaders from the beginning ....
Ben Gurion believed that the "highest duty of an Israeli woman is to give birth to at least four healthy children" and what the IDF has done to inhibit Arab fertility is shockingly evident ...
The "Two-state solution" is a fantasy because there is no land left for a viable Palestinian state: Israel has stolen the best parts in the West Bank and grabbed even more thru the illegal "security fence" ( a hidden annexation) The remaining 22% of the original UN-mandated "Palestine" have been reduced to "Swiss cheese" because Israeli roads and settlements have cut it into a puzzle of bantustans ..
watch this video to get the picture:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13749.htm
The Palestinians already have their "home" and they used to be quite "normal" until the Zionists arrived ...
Only a "one state solution" is possible (perhaps with some kind of autonomy for the "Arab" part)but this means to give up the "Jewish" state concept: no peaceful democracy can be built on racist foundations and abuse of religion ...
toqueville, moi, fairy_dust and everybody else here:
I stand by the things that I've said about the I/P conflict and what I think the best solution is.
You people can talk for three days, but you never recognize the dollars that affect the situation. When Israel requested year before last year that their donations from the U.S. be in Euros, what do you think that meant? They probably made a $1 for 1 Euro deal at that time and that means that they are $1.7 to $1 ahead this year. And we are going to pay the difference! And screw it! We don't owe them more than we gave the victims of Katrina, but BLAH BLAH BLAH, they got more! And they continue to get more than any state in the U.S. for any emergency situation. Wake up Americans. That country, Israel, is stealing our souls. Wake up you Fundamentalist Christians who are selling the souls of the entire Christian world for the current anti-Christian Israelis! I can tell you that there are more Christians in Bethlehem and Nazareth than in the whole stupid country of Israel proper (Bethlehem is behind their stupid wall and it has the most literate and the most Christian population in the entire region.)
I hate being alive in these so stupid times.