“. . . How has this village become a whore?. . .” (Samih Al-Qasim)

tulkarem
Israeli forces maintained a complete closure Thursday of the occupied West Bank city of Tulkarem. (Photo: Ma’an News Agency, Dec. 10, 2015)

❶ Tulkarem completely sealed as Israeli forces search for gunman
❷ US nonprofits ‘donate over $220 million’ to West Bank settlements
❸ ‘I am a mother amongst hundreds, we are all worried about our children’: The systemic incarceration of Palestinian children
❹ Soldiers Kill a Palestinian in Hebron
❺ Opinion/Analysis: TRUMP  IS  NO  MORE  RACIST  THAN  MAINSTREAM  ISRAELI  POLICY
❻ Poetry by Samih Al-Qasim
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
TULKAREM  COMPLETELY  SEALED  AS  ISRAELI  FORCES  SEARCH  FOR  GUNMAN
Dec. 10, 2015
TULKAREM (Ma’an) — Israeli forces maintained a complete closure Thursday of the occupied West Bank city of Tulkarem in the search for a gunman who injured a former member of a Jewish terror group and his wife, locals said.
___Locals told Ma’an that Israeli forces on Wednesday night raided Tulkarem and surrounding areas directly after the shooting, closing entrances leading into the city with cement blocks.
More . . .
MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
US  NONPROFITS  ‘DONATE  OVER  $220  MILLION’  TO  WEST  BANK  SETTLEMENTS
Dec. 9, 2015
BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Over $220 million has been given in tax-exempted US funds to illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank over the last five years, according to an investigative report by Israeli news site Haaretz this week.
___Haaretz published the findings after analyzing thousands of documents from filed taxes as well as official papers from dozens of US and Israeli nonprofit organizations, several of which were directly involved with raising money to support settlements.
[. . . . ]
Through its designation of such organizations as nonprofits, the daily said, the US government is “incentivizing and indirectly supporting the Israeli settlement movement.”
More . . .
MONDOWEISS
‘I  AM  A  MOTHER  AMONGST  HUNDREDS,  WE  ARE  ALL  WORRIED  ABOUT  OUR  CHILDREN’:  THE  SYSTEMIC  INCARCERATION  OF  PALESTINIAN  CHILDREN
Reem Abd Ulhamid
Dec. 9, 2015
Palestinian children’s rights of survival, protection, education, health and development have been dramatically violated by Israel since the first Intifada. Palestinian children stand defenseless against Israeli policies that target them as potential “terrorists” and continue to justify and legalize a system in which child imprisonment and persecution is enforced under the umbrella of defeating “terrorism”.
___For Israel, throwing stones is a serious security offense, and one of the most common accusations leading to the arrest of Palestinian children in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The number of arrested Palestinian children has been escalating for the past two months.
More . . .

IMG_3241 - Copy
Members of SABEEL JERUSALEM WITNESS VISIT near barricade and IDF surveillance tower American contributor to Israeli settlements, Brooklyn-based nonprofit Hebron Fund, transferred $5.7 million to the illegal Jewish settlement in Hebron between 2009 and 2014. (Photo: Harold Knight, Nov. 7, 2015)

IMEMC-INTERNATIONAL MIDDLE EAST MEDIA CENTER
SOLDIERS  KILL  A  PALESTINIAN  IN  HEBRON
Dec. 09, 2015
Israeli soldiers killed, Wednesday, a young Palestinian man in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, after an alleged stabbing attack targeting an Israeli soldier and a settler. The slain Palestinian’s cousin was killed, near the Ibrahimi Mosque, Monday.
___Medical sources said the Palestinian has been identified as Yosri Zakariyya Miswada, 21; he was shot in the Shuhada Street, in Hebron city.
[. . . . ]
___It is worth mentioning that, ON MONDAY, ISRAELI SOLDIERS KILLED YOSRI’S COUSIN, Ehab Fathi Miswada, near the Ibrahimi Mosque, in Hebron.
More . . .
Related . . . Hebron: Another Palestinian Killed Under Stabbing Pretext
Opinion/Analysis
+972 MAGAZINE
TRUMP  IS  NO  MORE  RACIST  THAN  MAINSTREAM  ISRAELI  POLICY
Mairav Zonszein
Dec. 9, 2015
Israeli politicians are joining the global pushback against Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim racism. But guess what other country bans Muslim immigration?
More . . .

“PSALM  OF  ISAIAH’S  GRANDCHILDREN,”  BY  SAMIH  AL-QASIM

We are Isaiah’s grandchildren
calling out to him now,
calling out to his kind face,
our dreams trembling, behind crimson tears!
We are Isaiah’s grandchildren―
and we call to him now―crying in anger:
Isaiah who has slept for ages!
How has this village become a whore?
Its silver has been debased.
They’ve treated it with disdain,
mixing the wine of its people with water.
Why don’t you tell them of the widows’ claims?
O Isaiah of the struggle―
Hallelujah!
The messengers of peace here weep
for the bitterness and the malice,
after the pretenders to right,
the enemies of culture,
severed the heads of the peaceful!
O sad Isaiah!
Rise up now, and cry through a village
that’s falling upon the slope of peril:
“May God show you the error of your ways!
Why, after seventy years, have you resorted to trade
with merchants from every kingdom?
Rise now and cry out through Tel Aviv:
“A thousand woes on those
who do not seek the Lord. And go to Egypt
bearing the wooden boards
of the Orient’s cross!”
O beloved Isaiah!
That revelation comes from Tayma,*
From the lands of the Arabs: People!
Bring out the water to the refugees,
provide the long-hungry with bread,
bandage the wounds of those who have fled,
escaping the edge of the sword.
O brave Isaiah!
Rise up now so that
Palestine’s children will be able to play
without fearing the vipers’ fangs,
so two lambs might feel safe
in the lions’ jungle.
Hallelujah!
Then justice will reign among the nations
without the annihilation of right,
without silencing any tongue.
O Isaiah of the struggle!
The swords will be turned into plowshares
and the people’s spears be molded
into scythes, and then―
no nation will raise a sword to fight!
Little people know not war,
nor what bloodshed is.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
God of glory!
Our fight has been long,
and we were slaughtered and slaughtered in turn,
and have she our blood for ages.
God of glory!
We were tried for long, and rested. . .
Hallelujah! . . . Hallelujah! . . . Hallelujah!

From Al-Qasim, Samih. SADDER  THAN  WATER.  New  and  Selected  Poems. Trans. Nazih Kasis and Adina Hoffman. Jerusalem: Ibis Editions, 2008.
Available from ALIBRIS.
About Samih Al-Qasim.

IMG_3195
The Palestinian village (left) near the Tent of Nations, surrounded by 5 illegal Israeli/Jewish settlements. (Photo: Harold Knight, November 6, 2015) http://www.tentofnations.org/

 

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