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When I traveled to Cairo to participate in the Gaza Freedom March, I hoped to enter Gaza to contribute toward ending the siege and preventing future air assaults and invasions, such as the 22-day Operation Cast Lead that Israel launched against Gaza at the close of 2008.
I was also keenly looking forward to meeting a young Gazan who had greatly assisted my co-workers on a Voicesdelegation to Gaza during last year's Operation Cast Lead. At considerable risk to himself, this young man met members of Voices at the border, arranged housing, translated, and assisted in bearing witness to the devastation caused by the Israeli military assault. Due to the callousness of the Egyptian authorities, I was not able to meet this man or deliver much needed material aid to his community. Early this morning, my co-workers and I received an email from our friend in Gaza, saying that the Israeli military is once again bombing near the Rafah border. One Palestinian was killed and others were injured.
Given Israel's continuing siege and bombardment of Gaza, I am eager to learn lessons from our experience in the Gaza Freedom March, regroup and continue in the struggle to end the siege and occupation. Here are several of the lessons which I think are most important to communicate to the wider U.S. public.
The first is that the United States and Egyptian governments have been actively colluding with the Israeli government to maintain the siege of Gaza. All three are working together and they do not plan to stop imposing collective punishment on Gazans any time soon. This punishment is carried out through forbidding Gazans to exchange goods or travel outside of Gaza. What's more, all three governments are complicit in promulgating Israel's greater program of apartheid and displacement of the Palestinians. The second lesson is that the worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestine is alive and growing. The movement is at a critical point where we must apply pressure on all three governments through a variety of nonviolent tactics.
In reference to the complicity of the U.S., Israeli and Egyptian governments, I do not use the word apartheid lightly. I think this word sometimes polarizes people and causes them to self-censor information about the issue being discussed. That being said, I think that the broader international community nevertheless bears responsibility to recognize the plight of the Palestinian people and work to end Israel's oppression. Throughout the Gaza Freedom March presence in Cairo, our sisters and brothers from the South African delegation dynamically articulated the connections between injuries that indigenous Africans suffered under the white supremacist regime in Pretoria and the inequalities that Palestinians now face at the hands of the Israeli government.
The delegation informed us that just as blacks in South Africa were forced to live in Bantustans and provide cheap labor for industry controlled by whites, so the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are caged in smaller and smaller areas controlled by Israeli military checkpoints. The economic livelihood of the Palestinians is reliant upon free movement through these checkpoints and Israel often only grants access for Palestinians when it is financially useful for Israel. Similar to the situation in South Africa, Israel controls all the beneficial natural resources and siphons the productivity and profit of the resources away from the people of Palestine.
The state of Israel has not only exploited Palestinian labor, it has often attempted to forcibly relocate Palestinians in its quest to annex Palestinian lands. Palestinian resistance and international public opinion have thwarted Israel from successfully achieving its goal to appropriate all of Palestine. But given Israel's persistent thrusts for expansion and defense of illegal settlements, most Palestinians doubt Israel's commitment to an actual "peace process."
When analyzing the history of the conflict, The Israeli government's practice of apartheid and displacement of Palestinians seems almost too sinister to be true. But to further understand the situation, U.S. citizens might look to an analogy from our own history. The indigenous people of North America were first considered by colonizers to have great potential as slaves, but when the Europeans realized that the Native American tribes were not easily subjugated, they moved swiftly into a national policy of relocation and, at times, annihilation. Our supposed national heroes like Andrew Jackson practiced ethnic cleansing with a belief that they acted in the name of God and country. When seen in this light, the ideologies of Manifest Destiny and Zionism look like two sides of the same coin. For the United States, the endless "peace process" of double-crossing treaties was not considered complete until the indigenous peoples were either banished to a reservation, safely out of sight and out of mind, or killed outright.
Many people who study and discuss issues related to Palestine are aware of the South African and North American analogies, but the general public in the United States doesn't seem to notice that we are subsidizing these bloody policies with 3.5 billion dollars of military aid per year. Just last year, the Israeli government killed approximately 1,400 Palestinians in one campaign waged against Gaza, Operation Cast Lead, using weapons supplied by the United States. And according to the UN Humanitarian Monitor, food insecurity in Gaza this year has spiked to over 60 percent. So it's likely that more Gazans have died as a result of the heightened blockade that has been imposed by Israel and Egypt since the attack. Now Egypt and the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers are building a massive underground metal wall to prevent Palestinian access to tunnels under the Rafah border with Egypt, a last resort for importing much needed aid and commodities.
The complicity of these major world powers became very clear to those of us who participated in the Gaza Freedom March. The Egyptian government, most certainly with an arm twisted by the Israeli and U.S. governments, did not welcome us into their country as they initially indicated they would. (Next to Israel, Egypt is the second largest recipient of US military aid. So maybe this factored into their decision.) Within one week of the March's scheduled start date, Egyptian authorities notified us not to come.. When we arrived anyway, we were frequently detained. Our meetings were spied on and infiltrated. The vast majority of us were denied entry to Gaza. When we sought support at the U.S. Embassy, Egyptian police forcibly corralled us into a penned area outside the Embassy. U.S. officials in the embassy reiterated that we should not have come to march in solidarity with the Palestinians. When we decided to march in spite of this, we were met with riot cops, barricades and scores of secret police. Many of us were assaulted and a few suffered serious injuries.
This treatment was only a small taste of the Palestinian experience. The daily suffering caused by the separation of Palestinian families was highlighted by the drama of having persons from the Palestinian Diaspora with us on the march. Because of the siege, many of these Palestinian marchers, now relocated to other countries, had been separated from their families for great lengths of time and others had not even been able to meet their relatives living in Palestine. It was heart wrenching to see
Additionally, Palestinian activists in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem risk indefinite incarceration for organizing non-violent demonstrations and resistance activities. Many are arrested on trumped charges, like Abdallah Abu Rahmah, an organizer for the "Stop the Wall" campaign. Abdallah has been incarcerated and charged with weapons possession for collecting used tear gas canisters shot at him by the Israeli Defense Forces during a peaceful protest. Many others like Mohammad Othman, have been held for months without charges being brought at all. Mohammad was arrested while returning from addressing the Norwegian national pension fund about divestment from Elbit Systems, a major Israeli military contractor. Beyond detentions, Palestinians regularly face extra-judicial killings from air strikes, similar to last night's attacks near the Rafah border, carried out by the Israeli Air Force.
The Gaza Freedom March also gave us a sense of the Egyptian political experience. It's quite farcical for the United States and Israel to talk of advancing human rights in the region when they are allied with Hosni Mubarack's regime in Egypt. We witnessed first hand how the Egyptian government treats freedom of speech and assembly, especially when it comes to Egyptian citizens. Many Egyptian activists joined us in our demonstrations and they were singled out by plain-clothes police officers and forcefully made to leave. Often times they were followed home.
On one occasion, a young Egyptian-Palestinian woman was pulled out of our meeting by a senior officer who sent an undercover policeman after her. We formed a group to accompany her and made sure she made it home safely and without harassment. Every Egyptian activist I spoke with assured us if that had it not been for the international presence and attention around the Gaza Freedom March, they would have immediately been arrested, taken to a secured center and likely tortured for publicly demonstrating in support of Palestine. Still, Egyptians were eager to organize and wanted to hold meetings about how to further the movement. Much of the content of these clandestine meetings centered around forming a campaign of direct action to stop the underground wall being built between Egypt and Gaza. As a first step, international members of the march signed on as plaintiffs in a lawsuit with our Egyptian counterparts to challenge the legality of the underground wall.
With all the difficult decisions and unexpected frustrations surrounding the march, I was still very encouraged by the project. I found strength in Cairo among the marchers and the international movement they represented. The worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestinians is obviously alive and growing. Roughly 1300 delegates from 43 countries participated in the march, and those whom I met were some of the finest and most dedicated people I've come across. Not only that, I know the participants were only a fraction of the people from their communities concerned about Gaza who were not able to make it to the march. Each delegation brought its strengths. It was exciting to see the different organizing tactics employed, such as the French contingent's decision to hold an encampment for nearly one week in front of their embassy.
The Cairo declaration was formed and the South African group gave us insight to further focus the Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement (BDS) through "campaigns to encourage divestment of trade union and other pension funds from companies directly implicated in the Occupation and/or the Israeli military industries." They suggested very specifically targeting companies in our areas that both enable and profit from the occupation. For instance, Boeing, based in Chicago, exports Apache helicopters and F16 Eagle fighter planes to Israel that are regularly used in Israeli military operations in the Occupied Territories. Tactically, it makes a lot more senses to focus a campaign on Boeing than to randomly avoid an Israeli product at a supermarket, though you may want to do that too.
This siege may not have been broken on December 31st, but this year started much differently for the people of Gaza when contrasted with the devastation of last year's Operation Cast Lead. Organizers, activists and people in Gaza expressed their gratitude for the efforts of the Gaza Freedom March. International attention was focused on Gaza and there were solidarity marches all around the world.
With this attention, the international community has reached a critical point to put pressure on the U.S, Egyptian and Israeli governments to stop the siege. Despite being embarrassed by the bad press, Egypt and the United States are going ahead with construction of the underground the wall. Furthermore, Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is threatening to launch more operations like Cast Lead. The attacks launched this morning lend ominous credibility to these threats. Our friend in Gaza has said in the past that he longs for a chance to live a normal life, unencumbered by siege and constant fear of bombings. He understandably believes that there is very little chance that his voice will be heard in the halls of powerful governing bodies. But we can and must join our voices with his. Our urgent task is to widely announce the Cairo Declaration's call for BDS and to steadily build a stronger worldwide movement of non-violent direct action, inclusive of civil disobedience, to end the siege and occupation.
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When I traveled to Cairo to participate in the Gaza Freedom March, I hoped to enter Gaza to contribute toward ending the siege and preventing future air assaults and invasions, such as the 22-day Operation Cast Lead that Israel launched against Gaza at the close of 2008.
I was also keenly looking forward to meeting a young Gazan who had greatly assisted my co-workers on a Voicesdelegation to Gaza during last year's Operation Cast Lead. At considerable risk to himself, this young man met members of Voices at the border, arranged housing, translated, and assisted in bearing witness to the devastation caused by the Israeli military assault. Due to the callousness of the Egyptian authorities, I was not able to meet this man or deliver much needed material aid to his community. Early this morning, my co-workers and I received an email from our friend in Gaza, saying that the Israeli military is once again bombing near the Rafah border. One Palestinian was killed and others were injured.
Given Israel's continuing siege and bombardment of Gaza, I am eager to learn lessons from our experience in the Gaza Freedom March, regroup and continue in the struggle to end the siege and occupation. Here are several of the lessons which I think are most important to communicate to the wider U.S. public.
The first is that the United States and Egyptian governments have been actively colluding with the Israeli government to maintain the siege of Gaza. All three are working together and they do not plan to stop imposing collective punishment on Gazans any time soon. This punishment is carried out through forbidding Gazans to exchange goods or travel outside of Gaza. What's more, all three governments are complicit in promulgating Israel's greater program of apartheid and displacement of the Palestinians. The second lesson is that the worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestine is alive and growing. The movement is at a critical point where we must apply pressure on all three governments through a variety of nonviolent tactics.
In reference to the complicity of the U.S., Israeli and Egyptian governments, I do not use the word apartheid lightly. I think this word sometimes polarizes people and causes them to self-censor information about the issue being discussed. That being said, I think that the broader international community nevertheless bears responsibility to recognize the plight of the Palestinian people and work to end Israel's oppression. Throughout the Gaza Freedom March presence in Cairo, our sisters and brothers from the South African delegation dynamically articulated the connections between injuries that indigenous Africans suffered under the white supremacist regime in Pretoria and the inequalities that Palestinians now face at the hands of the Israeli government.
The delegation informed us that just as blacks in South Africa were forced to live in Bantustans and provide cheap labor for industry controlled by whites, so the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are caged in smaller and smaller areas controlled by Israeli military checkpoints. The economic livelihood of the Palestinians is reliant upon free movement through these checkpoints and Israel often only grants access for Palestinians when it is financially useful for Israel. Similar to the situation in South Africa, Israel controls all the beneficial natural resources and siphons the productivity and profit of the resources away from the people of Palestine.
The state of Israel has not only exploited Palestinian labor, it has often attempted to forcibly relocate Palestinians in its quest to annex Palestinian lands. Palestinian resistance and international public opinion have thwarted Israel from successfully achieving its goal to appropriate all of Palestine. But given Israel's persistent thrusts for expansion and defense of illegal settlements, most Palestinians doubt Israel's commitment to an actual "peace process."
When analyzing the history of the conflict, The Israeli government's practice of apartheid and displacement of Palestinians seems almost too sinister to be true. But to further understand the situation, U.S. citizens might look to an analogy from our own history. The indigenous people of North America were first considered by colonizers to have great potential as slaves, but when the Europeans realized that the Native American tribes were not easily subjugated, they moved swiftly into a national policy of relocation and, at times, annihilation. Our supposed national heroes like Andrew Jackson practiced ethnic cleansing with a belief that they acted in the name of God and country. When seen in this light, the ideologies of Manifest Destiny and Zionism look like two sides of the same coin. For the United States, the endless "peace process" of double-crossing treaties was not considered complete until the indigenous peoples were either banished to a reservation, safely out of sight and out of mind, or killed outright.
Many people who study and discuss issues related to Palestine are aware of the South African and North American analogies, but the general public in the United States doesn't seem to notice that we are subsidizing these bloody policies with 3.5 billion dollars of military aid per year. Just last year, the Israeli government killed approximately 1,400 Palestinians in one campaign waged against Gaza, Operation Cast Lead, using weapons supplied by the United States. And according to the UN Humanitarian Monitor, food insecurity in Gaza this year has spiked to over 60 percent. So it's likely that more Gazans have died as a result of the heightened blockade that has been imposed by Israel and Egypt since the attack. Now Egypt and the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers are building a massive underground metal wall to prevent Palestinian access to tunnels under the Rafah border with Egypt, a last resort for importing much needed aid and commodities.
The complicity of these major world powers became very clear to those of us who participated in the Gaza Freedom March. The Egyptian government, most certainly with an arm twisted by the Israeli and U.S. governments, did not welcome us into their country as they initially indicated they would. (Next to Israel, Egypt is the second largest recipient of US military aid. So maybe this factored into their decision.) Within one week of the March's scheduled start date, Egyptian authorities notified us not to come.. When we arrived anyway, we were frequently detained. Our meetings were spied on and infiltrated. The vast majority of us were denied entry to Gaza. When we sought support at the U.S. Embassy, Egyptian police forcibly corralled us into a penned area outside the Embassy. U.S. officials in the embassy reiterated that we should not have come to march in solidarity with the Palestinians. When we decided to march in spite of this, we were met with riot cops, barricades and scores of secret police. Many of us were assaulted and a few suffered serious injuries.
This treatment was only a small taste of the Palestinian experience. The daily suffering caused by the separation of Palestinian families was highlighted by the drama of having persons from the Palestinian Diaspora with us on the march. Because of the siege, many of these Palestinian marchers, now relocated to other countries, had been separated from their families for great lengths of time and others had not even been able to meet their relatives living in Palestine. It was heart wrenching to see
Additionally, Palestinian activists in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem risk indefinite incarceration for organizing non-violent demonstrations and resistance activities. Many are arrested on trumped charges, like Abdallah Abu Rahmah, an organizer for the "Stop the Wall" campaign. Abdallah has been incarcerated and charged with weapons possession for collecting used tear gas canisters shot at him by the Israeli Defense Forces during a peaceful protest. Many others like Mohammad Othman, have been held for months without charges being brought at all. Mohammad was arrested while returning from addressing the Norwegian national pension fund about divestment from Elbit Systems, a major Israeli military contractor. Beyond detentions, Palestinians regularly face extra-judicial killings from air strikes, similar to last night's attacks near the Rafah border, carried out by the Israeli Air Force.
The Gaza Freedom March also gave us a sense of the Egyptian political experience. It's quite farcical for the United States and Israel to talk of advancing human rights in the region when they are allied with Hosni Mubarack's regime in Egypt. We witnessed first hand how the Egyptian government treats freedom of speech and assembly, especially when it comes to Egyptian citizens. Many Egyptian activists joined us in our demonstrations and they were singled out by plain-clothes police officers and forcefully made to leave. Often times they were followed home.
On one occasion, a young Egyptian-Palestinian woman was pulled out of our meeting by a senior officer who sent an undercover policeman after her. We formed a group to accompany her and made sure she made it home safely and without harassment. Every Egyptian activist I spoke with assured us if that had it not been for the international presence and attention around the Gaza Freedom March, they would have immediately been arrested, taken to a secured center and likely tortured for publicly demonstrating in support of Palestine. Still, Egyptians were eager to organize and wanted to hold meetings about how to further the movement. Much of the content of these clandestine meetings centered around forming a campaign of direct action to stop the underground wall being built between Egypt and Gaza. As a first step, international members of the march signed on as plaintiffs in a lawsuit with our Egyptian counterparts to challenge the legality of the underground wall.
With all the difficult decisions and unexpected frustrations surrounding the march, I was still very encouraged by the project. I found strength in Cairo among the marchers and the international movement they represented. The worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestinians is obviously alive and growing. Roughly 1300 delegates from 43 countries participated in the march, and those whom I met were some of the finest and most dedicated people I've come across. Not only that, I know the participants were only a fraction of the people from their communities concerned about Gaza who were not able to make it to the march. Each delegation brought its strengths. It was exciting to see the different organizing tactics employed, such as the French contingent's decision to hold an encampment for nearly one week in front of their embassy.
The Cairo declaration was formed and the South African group gave us insight to further focus the Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement (BDS) through "campaigns to encourage divestment of trade union and other pension funds from companies directly implicated in the Occupation and/or the Israeli military industries." They suggested very specifically targeting companies in our areas that both enable and profit from the occupation. For instance, Boeing, based in Chicago, exports Apache helicopters and F16 Eagle fighter planes to Israel that are regularly used in Israeli military operations in the Occupied Territories. Tactically, it makes a lot more senses to focus a campaign on Boeing than to randomly avoid an Israeli product at a supermarket, though you may want to do that too.
This siege may not have been broken on December 31st, but this year started much differently for the people of Gaza when contrasted with the devastation of last year's Operation Cast Lead. Organizers, activists and people in Gaza expressed their gratitude for the efforts of the Gaza Freedom March. International attention was focused on Gaza and there were solidarity marches all around the world.
With this attention, the international community has reached a critical point to put pressure on the U.S, Egyptian and Israeli governments to stop the siege. Despite being embarrassed by the bad press, Egypt and the United States are going ahead with construction of the underground the wall. Furthermore, Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is threatening to launch more operations like Cast Lead. The attacks launched this morning lend ominous credibility to these threats. Our friend in Gaza has said in the past that he longs for a chance to live a normal life, unencumbered by siege and constant fear of bombings. He understandably believes that there is very little chance that his voice will be heard in the halls of powerful governing bodies. But we can and must join our voices with his. Our urgent task is to widely announce the Cairo Declaration's call for BDS and to steadily build a stronger worldwide movement of non-violent direct action, inclusive of civil disobedience, to end the siege and occupation.
When I traveled to Cairo to participate in the Gaza Freedom March, I hoped to enter Gaza to contribute toward ending the siege and preventing future air assaults and invasions, such as the 22-day Operation Cast Lead that Israel launched against Gaza at the close of 2008.
I was also keenly looking forward to meeting a young Gazan who had greatly assisted my co-workers on a Voicesdelegation to Gaza during last year's Operation Cast Lead. At considerable risk to himself, this young man met members of Voices at the border, arranged housing, translated, and assisted in bearing witness to the devastation caused by the Israeli military assault. Due to the callousness of the Egyptian authorities, I was not able to meet this man or deliver much needed material aid to his community. Early this morning, my co-workers and I received an email from our friend in Gaza, saying that the Israeli military is once again bombing near the Rafah border. One Palestinian was killed and others were injured.
Given Israel's continuing siege and bombardment of Gaza, I am eager to learn lessons from our experience in the Gaza Freedom March, regroup and continue in the struggle to end the siege and occupation. Here are several of the lessons which I think are most important to communicate to the wider U.S. public.
The first is that the United States and Egyptian governments have been actively colluding with the Israeli government to maintain the siege of Gaza. All three are working together and they do not plan to stop imposing collective punishment on Gazans any time soon. This punishment is carried out through forbidding Gazans to exchange goods or travel outside of Gaza. What's more, all three governments are complicit in promulgating Israel's greater program of apartheid and displacement of the Palestinians. The second lesson is that the worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestine is alive and growing. The movement is at a critical point where we must apply pressure on all three governments through a variety of nonviolent tactics.
In reference to the complicity of the U.S., Israeli and Egyptian governments, I do not use the word apartheid lightly. I think this word sometimes polarizes people and causes them to self-censor information about the issue being discussed. That being said, I think that the broader international community nevertheless bears responsibility to recognize the plight of the Palestinian people and work to end Israel's oppression. Throughout the Gaza Freedom March presence in Cairo, our sisters and brothers from the South African delegation dynamically articulated the connections between injuries that indigenous Africans suffered under the white supremacist regime in Pretoria and the inequalities that Palestinians now face at the hands of the Israeli government.
The delegation informed us that just as blacks in South Africa were forced to live in Bantustans and provide cheap labor for industry controlled by whites, so the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are caged in smaller and smaller areas controlled by Israeli military checkpoints. The economic livelihood of the Palestinians is reliant upon free movement through these checkpoints and Israel often only grants access for Palestinians when it is financially useful for Israel. Similar to the situation in South Africa, Israel controls all the beneficial natural resources and siphons the productivity and profit of the resources away from the people of Palestine.
The state of Israel has not only exploited Palestinian labor, it has often attempted to forcibly relocate Palestinians in its quest to annex Palestinian lands. Palestinian resistance and international public opinion have thwarted Israel from successfully achieving its goal to appropriate all of Palestine. But given Israel's persistent thrusts for expansion and defense of illegal settlements, most Palestinians doubt Israel's commitment to an actual "peace process."
When analyzing the history of the conflict, The Israeli government's practice of apartheid and displacement of Palestinians seems almost too sinister to be true. But to further understand the situation, U.S. citizens might look to an analogy from our own history. The indigenous people of North America were first considered by colonizers to have great potential as slaves, but when the Europeans realized that the Native American tribes were not easily subjugated, they moved swiftly into a national policy of relocation and, at times, annihilation. Our supposed national heroes like Andrew Jackson practiced ethnic cleansing with a belief that they acted in the name of God and country. When seen in this light, the ideologies of Manifest Destiny and Zionism look like two sides of the same coin. For the United States, the endless "peace process" of double-crossing treaties was not considered complete until the indigenous peoples were either banished to a reservation, safely out of sight and out of mind, or killed outright.
Many people who study and discuss issues related to Palestine are aware of the South African and North American analogies, but the general public in the United States doesn't seem to notice that we are subsidizing these bloody policies with 3.5 billion dollars of military aid per year. Just last year, the Israeli government killed approximately 1,400 Palestinians in one campaign waged against Gaza, Operation Cast Lead, using weapons supplied by the United States. And according to the UN Humanitarian Monitor, food insecurity in Gaza this year has spiked to over 60 percent. So it's likely that more Gazans have died as a result of the heightened blockade that has been imposed by Israel and Egypt since the attack. Now Egypt and the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers are building a massive underground metal wall to prevent Palestinian access to tunnels under the Rafah border with Egypt, a last resort for importing much needed aid and commodities.
The complicity of these major world powers became very clear to those of us who participated in the Gaza Freedom March. The Egyptian government, most certainly with an arm twisted by the Israeli and U.S. governments, did not welcome us into their country as they initially indicated they would. (Next to Israel, Egypt is the second largest recipient of US military aid. So maybe this factored into their decision.) Within one week of the March's scheduled start date, Egyptian authorities notified us not to come.. When we arrived anyway, we were frequently detained. Our meetings were spied on and infiltrated. The vast majority of us were denied entry to Gaza. When we sought support at the U.S. Embassy, Egyptian police forcibly corralled us into a penned area outside the Embassy. U.S. officials in the embassy reiterated that we should not have come to march in solidarity with the Palestinians. When we decided to march in spite of this, we were met with riot cops, barricades and scores of secret police. Many of us were assaulted and a few suffered serious injuries.
This treatment was only a small taste of the Palestinian experience. The daily suffering caused by the separation of Palestinian families was highlighted by the drama of having persons from the Palestinian Diaspora with us on the march. Because of the siege, many of these Palestinian marchers, now relocated to other countries, had been separated from their families for great lengths of time and others had not even been able to meet their relatives living in Palestine. It was heart wrenching to see
Additionally, Palestinian activists in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem risk indefinite incarceration for organizing non-violent demonstrations and resistance activities. Many are arrested on trumped charges, like Abdallah Abu Rahmah, an organizer for the "Stop the Wall" campaign. Abdallah has been incarcerated and charged with weapons possession for collecting used tear gas canisters shot at him by the Israeli Defense Forces during a peaceful protest. Many others like Mohammad Othman, have been held for months without charges being brought at all. Mohammad was arrested while returning from addressing the Norwegian national pension fund about divestment from Elbit Systems, a major Israeli military contractor. Beyond detentions, Palestinians regularly face extra-judicial killings from air strikes, similar to last night's attacks near the Rafah border, carried out by the Israeli Air Force.
The Gaza Freedom March also gave us a sense of the Egyptian political experience. It's quite farcical for the United States and Israel to talk of advancing human rights in the region when they are allied with Hosni Mubarack's regime in Egypt. We witnessed first hand how the Egyptian government treats freedom of speech and assembly, especially when it comes to Egyptian citizens. Many Egyptian activists joined us in our demonstrations and they were singled out by plain-clothes police officers and forcefully made to leave. Often times they were followed home.
On one occasion, a young Egyptian-Palestinian woman was pulled out of our meeting by a senior officer who sent an undercover policeman after her. We formed a group to accompany her and made sure she made it home safely and without harassment. Every Egyptian activist I spoke with assured us if that had it not been for the international presence and attention around the Gaza Freedom March, they would have immediately been arrested, taken to a secured center and likely tortured for publicly demonstrating in support of Palestine. Still, Egyptians were eager to organize and wanted to hold meetings about how to further the movement. Much of the content of these clandestine meetings centered around forming a campaign of direct action to stop the underground wall being built between Egypt and Gaza. As a first step, international members of the march signed on as plaintiffs in a lawsuit with our Egyptian counterparts to challenge the legality of the underground wall.
With all the difficult decisions and unexpected frustrations surrounding the march, I was still very encouraged by the project. I found strength in Cairo among the marchers and the international movement they represented. The worldwide movement in solidarity with Palestinians is obviously alive and growing. Roughly 1300 delegates from 43 countries participated in the march, and those whom I met were some of the finest and most dedicated people I've come across. Not only that, I know the participants were only a fraction of the people from their communities concerned about Gaza who were not able to make it to the march. Each delegation brought its strengths. It was exciting to see the different organizing tactics employed, such as the French contingent's decision to hold an encampment for nearly one week in front of their embassy.
The Cairo declaration was formed and the South African group gave us insight to further focus the Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement (BDS) through "campaigns to encourage divestment of trade union and other pension funds from companies directly implicated in the Occupation and/or the Israeli military industries." They suggested very specifically targeting companies in our areas that both enable and profit from the occupation. For instance, Boeing, based in Chicago, exports Apache helicopters and F16 Eagle fighter planes to Israel that are regularly used in Israeli military operations in the Occupied Territories. Tactically, it makes a lot more senses to focus a campaign on Boeing than to randomly avoid an Israeli product at a supermarket, though you may want to do that too.
This siege may not have been broken on December 31st, but this year started much differently for the people of Gaza when contrasted with the devastation of last year's Operation Cast Lead. Organizers, activists and people in Gaza expressed their gratitude for the efforts of the Gaza Freedom March. International attention was focused on Gaza and there were solidarity marches all around the world.
With this attention, the international community has reached a critical point to put pressure on the U.S, Egyptian and Israeli governments to stop the siege. Despite being embarrassed by the bad press, Egypt and the United States are going ahead with construction of the underground the wall. Furthermore, Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is threatening to launch more operations like Cast Lead. The attacks launched this morning lend ominous credibility to these threats. Our friend in Gaza has said in the past that he longs for a chance to live a normal life, unencumbered by siege and constant fear of bombings. He understandably believes that there is very little chance that his voice will be heard in the halls of powerful governing bodies. But we can and must join our voices with his. Our urgent task is to widely announce the Cairo Declaration's call for BDS and to steadily build a stronger worldwide movement of non-violent direct action, inclusive of civil disobedience, to end the siege and occupation.
"Zeldin's assertion that the EPA shouldn't address greenhouse gas emissions is like a fire chief claiming that they shouldn't fight fires," said one critic. "It is as malicious as it is absurd."
U.S. President Donald Trump's administration faced an onslaught of criticism on Tuesday for starting the process of repealing the 2009 legal opinion that greenhouse gases endanger public health and the welfare of the American people—which has enabled federal regulations aimed at the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency over the past 15 years.
Confirming reports from last week, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin unveiled the rule to rescind the 2009 "endangerment finding" at a truck dealership in Indiana. According to The New York Times, he said that "the proposal would, if finalized, amount to the largest deregulatory action in the history of the United States."
If the administration succeeds in repealing the legal finding, the EPA would lack authority under the Clean Air Act to impose standards for greenhouse gas emissions—meaning the move would kill vehicle regulations. As with the reporting last week, the formal announcement was sharply condemned by climate and health advocates and experts.
"Greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and are the root cause of the climate crisis," said Deanna Noël with Public Citizen's Climate Program, ripping the administration's effort as "grossly misguided and exceptionally dangerous."
"This isn't just a denial of science and reality—it's a betrayal of public trust and yet another signal that this administration is working for corporate interests, and no one else."
"Stripping the EPA of its ability to regulate greenhouse gases is like throwing away the fire extinguisher while the house is already burning," she warned. "The administration is shamelessly handing Big Oil a hall pass to pollute unchecked and dodge accountability, leaving working families to bear the costs through worsening health outcomes, rising energy bills, more climate-fueled extreme weather, and an increasingly unstable future. This isn't just a denial of science and reality—it's a betrayal of public trust and yet another signal that this administration is working for corporate interests, and no one else."
Noël was far from alone in accusing the administration's leaders of serving the polluters who helped Trump return to power.
"Zeldin and Trump are concerned only with maximizing short-term profits for polluting corporations and the CEOs funneling millions of dollars to their campaign coffers," said Jim Walsh, policy director at Food & Water Watch. "Zeldin's assertion that the EPA shouldn't address greenhouse gas emissions is like a fire chief claiming that they shouldn't fight fires. It is as malicious as it is absurd."
Dan Becker, director of the Center for Biological Diversity's Safe Climate Transport Campaign, similarly said that the proposal is "purely a political bow to the oil industry" and "Trump is putting fealty to Big Oil over sound science and people's health."
Earthworks policy director Lauren Pagel also called the rule "a perverse gift to the fossil fuel industry that rejects yearslong efforts by the agency, scientists, NGOs, frontline communities, and industry to protect public health and our environment."
"Donald Trump and Lee Zeldin are playing with fire—and with floods and droughts and public health risks, too," she stressed, as about 168 million Americans on Tuesday faced advisories for extreme heat made more likely by the climate crisis.
🚨 The Trump administration just took its most extreme step yet in rolling back climate protections.
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— Sierra Club (@sierraclub.org) July 29, 2025 at 4:58 PM
Justin Chen, president of American Federation of Government Employees Council 238, which represents over 8,000 EPA workers nationwide, said that the repeal plan "is reckless and will have far-reaching, disastrous consequences for the USA."
"EPA career professionals have worked for decades on the development of the science and policy of greenhouse gases to protect the American public," he continued, "and this policy decision completely disregards all of their work in service to the public."
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) highlighted that Chris Wright, head of the Department of Energy, joined Zeldin at the Tuesday press conference and "announced a DOE 'climate science study' alongside remarks that were rife with climate denial talking points and disinformation."
UCS president Gretchen Goldman said that "it's abundantly clear what's going on here. The Trump administration refuses to acknowledge robust climate science and is using the kitchen sink approach: making every specious argument it can to avoid complying with the law."
"But getting around the Clean Air Act won't be easy," she added. "The science establishing climate harms to human health was unequivocally clear back in 2009, and more than 15 years later, the evidence has only accumulated."
Today, Zeldin’s EPA plans to release a proposal to revoke the Endangerment Finding, which is the legal & scientific foundation of EPA’s responsibility to limit climate-heating greenhouse gas pollution from major sources.
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— Moms Clean Air Force (@momscleanairforce.org) July 29, 2025 at 12:58 PM
David Bookbinder, director of law and policy at the Environmental Integrity Project, was a lead attorney in the 2007 U.S. Supreme Court case Massachusetts vs. EPA, which affirmed the agency's authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act and ultimately led to the endangerment finding two years later.
Bookbinder said Tuesday that "because this approach has already been rejected by the courts—and doubtless will be again—this baseless effort to pretend that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses that cause climate change are not harmful pollutants is nothing more than a transparent attempt to delay and derail our efforts to control greenhouse pollution at the worst possible time, when deadly floods and heat waves are killing more people every day."
In a statement from the Environmental Protection Network, which is made up of ex-EPA staff, Joseph Goffman, former assistant administrator of the agency's Office of Air and Radiation, also cited the 2007 ruling.
"This decision is both legally indefensible and morally bankrupt," Goffman said of the Tuesday proposal. "The Supreme Court made clear that EPA cannot ignore science or evade its responsibilities under the Clean Air Act. By walking away from the endangerment finding, EPA has not only broken with precedent; it has broken with reality."
Aru Shiney-Ajay, executive director of the youth-led Sunrise Movement, responded to the EPA proposal with defiance, declaring that "Donald Trump and his Big Oil donors are lighting the world on fire and fueling their private jets with young people's lives. We refuse to be sacrifices for their greed. We're coming for them, and we're not backing down."
Israel has already summarily rejected the U.K. leader's ultimatum to take "substantive" steps to end the war on Gaza by September, agree to a two-state solution, and reject West Bank annexation.
United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer was accused of "political grandstanding" after he said Tuesday that his country would recognize Palestinian statehood if Israel did not take ambiguously defined steps to end its war on Gaza—conditions that were promptly dismissed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"Today, as part of this process towards peace, I can confirm the U.K. will recognize the state of Palestine by the United Nations General Assembly in September, unless the Israeli government takes substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza, agree to a cease-fire, and commit to a long-term sustainable peace, reviving the prospect of a two-state solution," Starmer said during a press conference.
"This includes allowing the U.N. to restart the supply of aid and making clear that there will be no annexations in the West Bank," the prime minister continued, adding that "the terrorists of Hamas... must immediately release all of the hostages, sign up to a cease-fire, disarm, and accept that they will play no part in the government of Gaza."
Member of Scottish Parliament Scott Greer (Scottish Greens-West Scotland) responded to Tuesday's announcement on social media, saying, "Starmer wouldn't threaten to withdraw U.K. recognition of Israel, but he's made recognition of Palestinian statehood conditional on the actions of their genocidal oppressor?"
"Another profoundly unjust act from a Labour government thoroughly complicit in Israel's crimes," Greer added.
British attorney and activist Shola Mos-Shogbamimu asserted that "Keir Starmer knows his time is up and pivots to save his career but it's too late."
"By placing a condition on recognizing Palestine this declaration is performative and disingenuous because before September he can claim Israel has substantively complied with the condition," she added.
Leftist politician and Accountability Archive co-founder Philip Proudfoot argued on social media that "decent" Members of Parliament "need to table a no-confidence motion in Starmer now."
"He has just used the recognition of Palestine as a bargaining chip in exchange for Israel following its BASIC LEGAL OBLIGATIONS," he added. "This is one of the lowest political acts in living memory."
Media critic Sana Saeed said on social media, "Using Palestinian life and future as a bargaining chip and threat to Israel—not a surprise from kid starver Keir Starmer."
Journalist Sangita Myska argued that "rather than threatening the gesture politics of recognizing a Palestinian state (that may never happen)," Starmer should expel Israel's ambassador to the U.K., impose "full trade sanctions" and a "full arms embargo," and end alleged Royal Air Force surveillance flights over Gaza.
Political analyst Bushra Shaikh accused Starmer of "political grandstanding" and "speaking from both sides of his mouth."
Starmer's announcement followed a Monday meeting in Turnberry, Scotland with U.S. President Donald Trump, who signaled that he would not object to U.K. recognition of Palestine.
However, U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce called Starmer's announcement "a slap in the face for the victims of October 7," a reference to the Hamas-led attack of 2023.
While the United States remains Israel's staunchest supporter and enabler—providing billions of dollars in annual armed aid and diplomatic cover—Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee have all expressed concerns over mounting starvation deaths in Gaza.
On Tuesday, the U.N.-affiliated Integrated Food Security Phase Classification warned that a "worst-case" famine scenario is developing in Gaza, where health officials say at least 147 Palestinians, including at least 88 children, have died from malnutrition since Israel launched its obliteration and siege of the enclave following the October 2023 attack.
Israel—which imposed a "complete siege" on Gaza following that attack—has severely limited the amount of humanitarian aid that can enter the strip. According to U.N. officials, Israel Defense Forces troops have killed more than 1,000 aid-seeking civilians at distribution points run by the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. IDF troops have said they were ordered to shoot live bullets and artillery shells at aid seekers.
Netanyahu—who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza including murder and weaponized starvation—responded to the U.K. prime minister's ultimatum in a social media post stating, "Starmer rewards Hamas' monstrous terrorism and punishes its victims."
"A jihadist state on Israel's border TODAY will threaten Britain TOMORROW," Netanyahu said. "Appeasement towards jihadist terrorists always fails. It will fail you too. It will not happen."
The U.K. played a critical role in the foundation of the modern state of Israel, allowing Jewish colonization of what was then the British Mandate of Palestine under condition that "nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine," who made up more than 90% of the population.
Seeing that Jewish immigrants returning to their ancestral homeland were usurping the indigenous Arabs of Palestine, the British subsequently prohibited further Zionist colonization. This sparked a nearly decadelong wave of terrorism and other attacks against the British occupiers that ultimately resulted in the U.K. abandoning Palestine and the establishment of Israel under the authority of the United Nations—an outcome achieved by the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000 Palestinian Arabs.
On the topic of annexing the West Bank, earlier this month, all 15 Israeli government ministers representing Netanyahu's Likud party recommended the move, citing support from Trump. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) found last year that Israel's occupation of Palestine, including the West Bank and Gaza, is an illegal form of apartheid.
Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron said his country would announce its formal recognition of Palestinian statehood during September's U.N. General Assembly in New York. France is set to become the first Group of Seven nation to recognize Palestine, which is currently officially acknowledged by approximately 150 of the 193 U.N. member states.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz subsequently threatened "severe consequences" for nations that recognize Palestine.
Starmer's announcement came on the same day that the Gaza Health Ministry said that the death toll from Israel's 662-day assault and siege on Gaza—which is the subject of a South Africa-led genocide case at the ICJ—topped 60,000. However, multiple peer-reviewed studies in the prestigious British medical journal The Lancet have concluded that Gaza officials' casualty tallies are likely significant undercounts.
"Eric Adams is a complete non-factor in this race," remarked a founding partner of pollster Zenith Research.
A new poll of the New York City mayoral race found that Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani is very well positioned to win later this year and that former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is only competitive in the race if every other Mamdani opponent drops out.
The survey, which was conducted by polling firm Zenith Research, showed Mamdani holding what Zenith founding partner Adam Carlson described on X as a "commanding" lead of 28 points among likely voters in a five-way race featuring Cuomo, incumbent Mayor Eric Adams, Republican Curtis Sliwa, and independent candidate Jim Walden. Even in other scenarios where other candidates drop out of the race, Mamdani would still garner more than 50% of likely votes in each instance.
However, Mamdani's lead becomes much smaller when the poll is expanded to all registered voters, among whom he only holds a three-point advantage over Cuomo in a head-to-head matchup. This suggests that Cuomo has room to grow as long as he can convince Adams, Sliwa, and Walden to exit the race.
Even so, commented Carlson, Cuomo faces significant headwinds that could block his path to victory even if he succeeds somehow in making it a one-on-one race.
"Another thing that’s extremely tough for Cuomo is that 60% of likely voters (as well as 52% of registered voters) would not even consider voting for him," he explained. "Only 32% say they wouldn't consider voting for Mamdani. Cuomo will need to go scorched earth to bring that number up."
New Yorkers who oppose Mamdani will have to place their hopes in the disgraced former governor, given the dismal standing held by incumbent Adams.
"Eric Adams is a complete non-factor in this race," remarked Carlson. "He polls at 7% in the five-way race, 14% if Cuomo drops out, and 32% if Cuomo and Sliwa drop out. More than half of [likely voters] strongly disapprove of his performance and have a very unfavorable view of him. 68% won't consider voting for him."
The poll also found Mamdani with an overall lead among Jewish voters despite efforts by opponents to paint him as antisemitic given his opposition to Israel's war in Gaza and his past reluctance to criticize the slogan "globalize the intifada," which he told The Bulwark he viewed as "a desperate desire for equality and equal rights in standing up for Palestinian human rights." New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, a progressive Jewish ally of Mamdani's who has endorsed his mayoral bid, acknowledged before the election that some Jewish people view the phrase as a threat of violence.
Among likely Jewish voters, Mamdani leads Cuomo by 17 points in a five-way race. Although Cuomo holds a double-digit lead over Mamdani among likely Jewish voters over the age of 45, Mamdani dominates among young Jewish voters by pulling in more than two-thirds of likely Jewish voters between the ages of 18 and 44.