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Rachel Corrie Gets Her Day in Court
On March 10, in the Israeli city of Haifa, American peace activist Rachel Corrie will get her day in court. Rachel's parents, Cindy and Craig Corrie, are bringing suit against the Israeli defence ministry for Rachel's killing by an Israeli military bulldozer in Gaza in March 2003.
Four key American and British witnesses who were present at the scene - members of the International Solidarity Movement - will be allowed into Israel to testify, despite having been barred previously by the Israeli authorities from entering the country. This reversal by the Israeli authorities is apparently due to U.S. government pressure, the Guardian reports. (Three cheers for any U.S. officials who contributed to this pressure. What else could you make the Israeli government do?)
A Palestinian doctor from Gaza who treated Corrie after she was injured has not been given permission by the Israeli authorities to leave Gaza to attend. (This would seem to be important testimony concerning the nature of Rachel's injuries - did U.S. officials exert pressure for his appearance?)
This case isn't just about accountability for Rachel's death. It's a test case for the power of the rule of law in Israel, when the rule of law comes into conflict with the policies of military occupation.
When the rule of law in Israel comes into conflict with the policies of occupation, the rule of law often loses. But it does not always lose, particularly when the rule of law gets a boost from vigorous protest and political agitation. This month, Reuters reported, Israel began rerouting part of its "West Bank barrier" near the village of Bilin - the site of many Palestinian, Israeli, and international protests - in response to a petition filed in 2007 by Palestinians whose land was confiscated for the project. This was only a partial victory, because it only affected a minority of the confiscated land. But it shows that the rule of law in Israel is not totally impotent against the occupation, particularly when the rule of law is aided by protest and agitation.
It's also a test case for the power of nonviolent resistance to the Israeli occupation. It's a commonplace among some poorly informed commenters - Edith Garwood of Amnesty International cites Bono, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof and President Obama as recent examples - that Palestinians should "find their Martin Luther King." But this commentary is foolish and retrograde, as Rahm Emanuel might say. A necessary condition for the ascendance of a King or Gandhi -type movement in Palestine is that if Palestinian nonviolence activists are killed by the Israeli occupation, the government of Israel pays a significant price for that killing. If the Israeli government can kill an American peace activist and pay little price, what chance do the Palestinian Kings and Gandhis have?
It's instructive to do a press search on the recent developments in the Rachel Corrie case. Searching on Yahoo News, I found Israeli and Palestinian press, Jewish and Arab press, British and Australian press. But outside of the Seattle Weekly - Rachel is from Olympia, and Brian Baird is her Representative - I found no general US press. Isn't it remarkable that we Americans have to read the British press to find out about developments in the case of our compatriot? Isn't this state of affairs something that Bono, Nicholas Kristof and President Obama ought to reflect on, especially given the fact that they have significant ability to do something about it?
The persistence of Rachel's case as a thorn in the side of the Israeli occupation authorities recalls the 1960s Costa-Gavras docudrama "Z," about the political fallout from the assassination by the U.S. - supported Greek government of the Greek parliamentarian and peace movement leader Gregoris Lambrakis. There is a powerful scene in the movie in which one of Lambrakis' associates visits Lambrakis' widow to deliver the news that four high-ranking military police officers have been indicted in the killing. On the way to meet her Lambrakis' associate passes a group of Greek students painting the letter "Z" on the sidewalk, meaning "he (Lambrakis) lives." Marveling at the students' determined activism in the face of mounting repression, Lambrakis' associate says, "It's almost as if he were alive."
They murdered her, and yet she dogs them. It's almost as if she were alive.
16 Comments so far
Show All"It's instructive to do a press search on the recent developments in the Rachel Corrie case. Searching on Yahoo News, I found Israeli and Palestinian press, Jewish and Arab press, British and Australian press. But outside of the Seattle Weekly - Rachel is from Olympia, and Brian Baird is her Representative - I found no general US press. Isn't it remarkable that we Americans have to read the British press to find out about developments in the case of our compatriot? "
This pretty much sums up the state of journalism in the U.S. and the enormous and vicious power wielded by the Israeli lobby here.
Agree. And if by chance MSM evening news decides to report on the verdict in a 20 second clip, we'd better hope a snowstorm doesn't blow through the Northeast that day and get reported instead.
In summary, for the most part MSM downplays reporting on events that don't follow US policy (often either not reporting or only reporting as token events) and plays up reports that follow US policy (threat of Iraq and Iran) and in between provide tabloid news to keep the masses uneducated.
How many of the "unbiased" reports we read and see in our media are produced by reporters whose dual U.S./Israeli citizenship is concealed?
Take a look at "Media Reporting on Israel: All in the Family," by Alison Weir on counterpunch.org today, and you'll be (unpleasantly) surprised.
Petrkrop: Oh yes, this is well documented and well-known outside of the United States. Robert Fisk, a British journalist, has spoke about this in detail. He says when one enters the US, one enters a "bubble" of mis-information and omissions that simply does not exist in other parts of the world. The USA is the most heavily propagandized nation on earth, and coverage of Israel/Palestine is one of the most glaring examples.
Be careful you critics of the "non-existent vast Jewish conspiracy" - the Hasbara response will be that you will be accused of being fanatic adherents of the Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion.
Yes, the US press is at about the level of Stalin's press in the USSR. It only serves as a way to know what those who run the country are saying about any particular issue, or if it censured. Rachel Corrie is an issue that is heavily censured precisely for her heroism against US interests in Israel. But like Spartacus she will always be a symbol of humanity's fight for justice.
-"They murdered her, and yet she dogs them. It's almost as if she were alive. "
Yes, and in general, I think this is a positive attitude not often heard in these hallowed circles of progressive blather.
More often than not you hear: "the Greens can't win, why bother voting"..."everybody else will vote for the Ds and Rs so what good will my vote do?", "the vote is rigged, what can I do?"
The people that make a difference, the people we remember, are better than that.
From article:
..."But it shows that the rule of law in Israel is not totally impotent aganst the occupation, particularly when the rule of law is aided by protest and agitation."
Not totally, perhaps. However "the rule of law" is also used to enforce second-class citizenship of Palestinians holding Israeli citizenship. The same rule of law is used to "justify" bulldozing crops and olive trees, confiscating land and ethnic cleansing and installing colonial settlements on Palestinian land. The law is used to imprison thousands of Palestinians as political prisoners.
The rule of law also institutionalized slavery in the USA, racism, and segregation. The rule of law also was used to murder millions of Jews, Gypsies, Gays, Poles, Communists and others in Nazi Germany. The rule of law was used to instituionalize Apartheid in South Africa. And so on...
One must be very careful about enshrining "the rule of law" as some sort of moral, divine or holy entity. As all human constructs, the law is often used as a tool of repression and even atrocities.
I never met Rachel, but she was in my house some months before her death. (It was late, and I was asleep at the time.) I grew up in Olympia, and she traveled in the same local circles, went to the same local liberal arts college. Olympia is brimming with social progressives, so growing up there, my milieu was one of political and social awareness. We expect people to be engaged, working for positive change against violence and inequity in the world--not to be stagnant, couch potato types who let news of customary power dynamics simply wash over them. So, when GW Bush was appointed President, my perception of reality was struck a powerful blow; it meant that approximately half the U.S. preferred a dimwit in the most powerful office in the world instead of someone bright, intellectually-engaged, and attentive. When Rachel was murdered, a friend called to tell me the news, recounting how he'd met with her just months before and how she'd been so excited to go to Gaza to help protect wells and homes of civilians along the border who were being dispossessed by the invading Israelis. This was basic human compassion: let them keep their homes, let them drink water. The "protection" Rachel offered, along with her compatriots, was simply her presence. Her American presence. And, that day as she stood there, in front of the house threatened by the military bulldozer, the driver trapped her feet with a shovelful of earth, then drove over her before she could pull herself free, crushing her. The pictures taken by her friends at the scene and later at the hospital are heartbreaking. I anticipated the paroxysms of outrage the "warrior President" would undoubtedly demonstrate at the chutzpah of a soldier of a protectorate to harm a hair on an American civilian head, but stunningly he offered no comment, and the entire event was bypassed by the American media. Where had Bush's hyper-stylized nationalism evaporated to on the rare occasion it might have been useful? For me, Rachel Corrie's death will always be a kind of gruesome exclamation point on the bizzaro, ironic-horrorshow of the "Bush era." Though it is just one death in hundreds of thousands that took place under his watch, it's a microcosmic expression of the attitudes of the time: Cheney-styled cynicism and misanthropy; Bush-styled intellectual laziness.
How can you atttribute this to the Bush era? What has changed?
Ray Berthiaume
Thank you so much for your powerful testimony. I wish cable & dish TV would carry English Al-Jazeera!
We're supposed to get it in Canada this spring, as it was approved last year, but I haven't seen any notification yet. You can get it online. From what I've seen it seems to use mostly BBC type reporters.
YES!!! Rachel lives!!! Take that, you murdering bastards!!!
This is what needs to happen, is establishment institutions everywhere need to be brought to full account for what they've done to progressives for the last half century. The political killings, maimings, imprisonment, disenfranchisement, harassment, ignorance, everything needs to come down on them...
Let justice be done, and "for those who have ears, let them hear."
"But this commentary is foolish and retrograde, as Rahm Emanuel might say."
Interesting that he'd quote Emanuel, since Emanuel was in the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) in the early 1990s, and his father was in the Israeli terrorist group known as Irgun (Google it). How someone with that past can become Chief of Staff to the U.S. President is something to think about.
count folk bernadotte: j.f.k.'s 1963 letter to the israeli prime minister: google up these two topics and make copies of the first thing you see. store them, read them, and give them to friends. you now have learned everything you need to know about the sate of israel, unless, of course, you'd like to know what george marshall thought about the subject in may of 1947.
So long as we settle for our press omitting relevant news and information, we will see the usurpation of Arab East Jerusalem continue and the security and well being of our way of life remain in danger. Consider that PBS Newshour and NPR, our public media, systematically omit news and information on the Palestine Question. This leaves the public without the insight that would enable them to challenge their political leadership's ring in the nose as they are led around by Israel. I wonder why "public" news organizations that depend on the public for financial support are given a pass by contributors.