Tag: AIPAC

“. . . Israeli soldiers do not value human souls and they kill for many reasons . . . as if they are hunting birds . . .” (Talal Nimir)

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mustafa-nimir
Mustafa Nimir, killed by Israelis “BY MISTAKE” (Middle East Monitor, Sep. 6, 2016)

❶ Israeli intelligence informs father of slain Palestinian his son was ‘killed by mistake’
❷ No Surprise: Congressional Likudniks Blame Palestinians for Violence in Israel
. . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) Terrorism and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
. . . ❷ ― (ᴃ) The Big Lie: Israel’s Concern For “Security”
. . . ❷ ― (ᴄ) Israeli and Palestinian voices on the US op-ed pages
. . . ❷ ― (ᴆ) Room with One View
❸ POETRY by Fouzi El-Asmar
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAELI  INTELLIGENCE  INFORMS  FATHER  OF  SLAIN  PALESTINIAN  HIS  SON  WAS  ‘KILLED  BY  MISTAKE’
Ma’an news Agency
Sept. 6, 2016
Israeli intelligence on Tuesday informed the family of Mustafa Nimir, who was shot dead by Israeli forces on Monday during a military raid on the Shufat refugee camp in occupied East Jerusalem, that the 27-year-old was “killed by mistake.”
___Mustafa’s father, Talal, told Ma’an that Israeli intelligence summoned him and his wife on Tuesday to the Nabl Yaqoub police station in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina and informed the family that . . .  that Mustafa and his brother-in-law, 25-year-old Ali Tayser Nimir who was injured at the time, were not attempting to carry out an attack.
___Israeli forces shot Mustafa dead and injured Ali when the two came under live fire while driving near clashes that erupted between local youth and Israeli soldiers during a military raid in Shufat refugee camp. The two were returning home after picking up food for their family.
[. . . .]
___ “Their sorry will not bring back Mustafa,” Talal told Ma’an after speaking with the Israeli police. “Israeli soldiers do not value human souls and they kill for many reasons and have different excuses, as if they are hunting birds.”       MORE . . .   

❷ NO  SURPRISE:  [US]  CONGRESSIONAL  LIKUDNIKS  BLAME  PALESTINIANS  FO R VIOLENCE  IN  ISRAEL
Washington Report On Middle East Affairs
Shirl McArthur
Jan./Feb. 2016
[. . . .]
___Probably to demonstrate its continued political clout after its embarrassing defeat over the Iran agreement, AIPAC strongly and successfully pushed three anti-Palestinian measures [in Congress]. Predictably, none of the three made any mention of the fact that there have been twice as many Palestinian as Israeli deaths during the violence, nor of the harsh and degrading actions of Israel’s government causing the humiliation and frustration driving individual Palestinians to take desperate actions. . . . [A] letter, sent Nov. 5, expressed concern “over the recent wave of Palestinian violence” and urged the “PA to take concrete steps to avoid further violence.” When sent, it had 369 signatures.
___The other two measures strongly pushed by AIPAC were the House and Senate resolutions condemning “the Palestinian terror attacks against Israelis” and anti-Israel “incitement” by PA officials and PA-controlled media outlets. . . .     MORE . . .
. . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) TERRORISM  AND  THE  ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN  CONFLICT
Mondoweiss  (reprinted from Middle East Policy)
Jerome Slater
April 21, 2015
For several reasons, Israeli terrorism has been morally worse than that of the Palestinians. First, at least since the 1980s, most — though not all — Palestinian terrorism has been largely driven by the just cause of national liberation in part of Palestine rather than the unjust one of the destruction of Israel. By contrast, while there is a strong case that Zionist terrorism was instrumental in the establishment of the state of Israel during the 1940s, a just cause, since at least 1967 Israeli terrorism has had no just cause. Contrary to the widely accepted mythology, its primary purpose has not been “self-defense” but rather the prevention of a two-state settlement and maintenance of the occupation and other forms of control over the Palestinians.    MORE . . .   
. . . ❷ ― (ᴃ) THE  BIG  LIE:  ISRAEL’S  CONCERN  FOR  “SECURITY”
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
Rachelle Marshall
March, 2011
Like the self-deluding crowds that praised the king’s new clothes as he strode by stark naked, U.S. policymakers have long refused to acknowledge that Israel’s security is in less danger from its Arab neighbors than from maintaining an oppressive occupation. Thanks to pressure from America’s Israel lobby, Washington long ago assumed as a sacred trust the obligation to spend billions of dollars a year assuring Israel’s military superiority in the Middle East. As a result, Israel is one of the most heavily armed nations in the world, with a politically powerful military establishment.
___Protecting national security has from the beginning been less of a concern to Israeli leaders than acquiring more territory.       MORE . . .

parents-001
Parents of Mustafa Nimir (Photo: Ma’an News Agency, Sep. 7, 2016)

. . . ❷― (ᴄ) ISRAELI  AND  PALESTINIAN  VOICES  ON  THE  US  OP-ED  PAGES
Electronic Intifada
Patrick O’Connor
Mar. 13, 2006
In the US media, Palestinians generally aren’t allowed to speak for themselves or to articulate their historical narrative. Israelis, however, are permitted to speak, to explain the Israeli experience and even to explain about Palestinians. As a result, the Israeli story is known in the US while Palestinians are dehumanized. This report exhaustively details the extent to which Palestinian voices have been silenced in the op-ed pages of major US newspapers for the past five years. This report compares the number of opinion pieces published by Israeli writers with those published by Palestinian writers between September 29, 2000, and December 31, 2005, in the op-ed pages of The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and The Washington Post, the five US newspapers with the greatest circulation.       MORE . . .
. . . ❷ ― (ᴆ) ROOM  WITH  ONE  VIEW
Editor & Publisher
Ahmed Bouzid
Sep. 23, 2002
Despite the evidence, the simple view that Palestinians slaughter civilians and Israelis at worst unintentionally or mistakenly kill them (with “stray bullets” and “errant shells”) still prevails, unshaken, in the reporting of the conflict by all the major U.S. newspapers. The result is coverage that reports, as a matter of routine, suicide bombings by Palestinians with blaring headlines and Page One photographs, while the killing of Palestinian civilians (even children) is covered with little fanfare.
___This occurs even though human-rights organizations on the ground report that Israel does target civilians, deliberately and systematically. . . .
___Yet coverage of the conflict continues to sketch a far different reality.    MORE (SOURCE) . . .

“TO  A  JEWISH  FRIEND,”  BY  FOUZI  EL-ASMAR
Don’t ask me
the impossible
Don’t’ ask me
to hunt stars,
walk to the sun.
Don’t ask me
to empty the sea
to erase the day’s light
I am nothing but a man.

Don’t ask me
to abandon my eyes, my love,
the memory of my childhood.

I was raised
under an olive tree,
I ate the figs
of my orchard
drank wine from
the sloping vineyards
Tasted Cactus fruit
in the valleys
more, more.

The nightingale has sung
in my ears
The free winds of fields and cities
always tickled me
My friend
You cannot ask me
to leave my own country.  (March 1971)

El Azmar, Fouzi. POEMS  FROM  AN  ISRAELI  PRISON. Intro. By Israel Shahak. New York: KNOW Books, 1973.
Available from Amazon.
About Fouzi El Asmar.

“. . . the homeless, the eternal wanderer . . .” (Mourid Barghouti)

Harold KnightLeave a comment
1-sysyia-sky
Afternoon sky over Sousia Bedouin Village, South Hebron Hills (Photo: Harold Knight, Nov. 7, 2015).

❶ Israeli forces demolish structures, assault locals in West Bank village
“`Article from Transactions Of The Institute Of British Geographers
❷ Israeli Forces Detain 16 Palestinians, Shoot and Injure Two Brothers
“`Article from The Nation
❸ Opinion/Analysis:  AN  ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN  CONFEDERATION?  NOT  SO  FAST
❹ POETRY by Mourid Barghouti
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAELI  FORCES  DEMOLISH  STRUCTURES,  ASSAULT  LOCALS  IN  WEST  BANK  VILLAGE
Ma’an News Agency
June 19, 2016
Four people were injured and 26 Palestinians were left homeless on Sunday afternoon after Israeli forces assaulted locals and demolished Palestinian structures in the village of Susiya in the southern occupied West Bank, in what activists said was an unprecedented move to carry out a demolition during the holy month of Ramadan.
___According to the Israeli organization Rabbis for Human Rights, two homes were demolished in the southern part of Susiya, in addition to agricultural structures, including a barn and an outdoor kitchen.   MORE . . .   

[. . . .]
When talking and writing about the destruction of Palestinian property, it is usually a case of house demolitions and rarely home demolitions. This slippage perhaps occurs easily when moving from Arabic to English, since the Arabic word beit can be translated as both house and home. However, in English, while house refers to a built structure, as Blunt and Dowling point out in their recent book on the subject, there are multiple experiences of home:

“Some may speak of the physical structure of their house
or dwelling; others may refer to relationships or connections
over space and time. You might have positive or
negative feelings about home, or a mixture of the two.
Your sense of home might be closely shaped by your
memories of childhood, alongside your present experiences
and your dreams for the future.”
(Blunt A. and Dowling R. Home Routledge, London. 2006)

I understand the term house demolitions to mean the destruction of a built form used as ⁄ for housing, and the term home demolitions to imply the destruction of a set of material, social and affective relations that constitute home. While writing about house demolitions may invoke images of a bulldozer reducing concrete, steel and other building materials to a pile of rubble, talking about home demolitions  broadens the discussion to examine the extensive economic, political, cultural and social geographies (and temporalities) of such violence. My understanding of home demolitions is very similar to what Porteous and Smith term ‘domicide . . . defined as the deliberate destruction of home by human agency in pursuit of specified goals, which causes suffering to the victim’. (Porteous J. D. and Smith S. Domicide: The Global Destruction Of Home. 2001).

  • Harker, Christopher. “Spacing Palestine Through The Home.” Transactions Of The Institute Of British Geographers 34.3 (2009): 320-332.   SOURCE.  
1-susyia-settlers
From Sousia Village looking across valley to encroaching Jewish settlement (Photo: Harold Knight, Nov. 7, 2015)

❷ ISRAELI  FORCES  DETAIN  16  PALESTINIANS,  SHOOT  AND  INJURE  TWO  BROTHERS
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
June 20, 2016
Israeli occupation forces Monday detained 16 Palestinians from across the West Bank district, as well as shot and injured two brothers, according to local and security sources.
___In Hebron, forces detained seven Palestinians, including two journalists, during a military raid into Hebron city.
___Forces reportedly stormed several neighbourhoods in the city before detaining Hamza al-Jamal, Hazem Neurokh, Suhaib Abu Nejmeh, Mohammed Taha, and Firas Abu Snaineh, in addition to two journalists who were identified as Adeeb al-Atrash and Rani al-Haymoni. Al-Haymoni’s two brothers were shot and injured with rubber-coated steel bullets during his arrest. They were both transferred to hospital for medical treatment.      MORE . . .   

Seeking to quell the unrest, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that his government would undertake more stringent measures to suppress Palestinian protests, including the use of live rounds against demonstrators and the immediate demolition of residences belonging to Palestinians involved in violence. PALESTINIANS ARE NOT SAFE, NOT EVEN IN THEIR OWN HOMES [emphasis added]. Israel is also threatening to remove Palestinians from Jerusalem, rendering them stateless.
[. . . .]
___And while the mainstream Western media focus heavily on the loss of Israeli lives, Palestinian deaths are often treated as mere numbers and statistics. More importantly, lost in the media coverage of the violence from “both sides” is the fact that only one side is occupying the other.
[. . . .]
___Palestinian civil society and the international solidarity movement have both reached a point of strength and maturity not seen since the first intifada of the late 1980s. In the United States, solidarity groups are making inroads into AIPAC’s traditional arenas on Capitol Hill, particularly in the Democratic Party. This growing movement should do everything it can to prevent Washington from vetoing an international protection force or from using it to cement a sellout of Palestinian rights.

  • BUTTU, DIANA, and NADIA HIJAB. “Palestine Besieged.” Nation 301.19 (2015): 8-11.   ARTICLE.  

❸ Opinion/Analysis:  AN  ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN  CONFEDERATION?  NOT  SO  FAST
+972 Blog
Yuval Eylon
June 19, 2016
The latest hit in the peace plan business comes from “Two States One Homeland,” an initiative that eschews both the two-state solution and the one-state solution, instead envisioning a confederation between Israel and a future Palestinian state [. . . .]
___On paper it [leaving settlements] seems like a fair exchange. However with hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens in sovereign Palestinian territory, the Palestinian state will inevitably lack all sovereignty. The disparities in power ensure that Palestinian sovereignty will remain a formality, while actual sovereignty will remain in the hands of Israeli settlers. On the other hand the State of Israel will gain hundreds of thousands of laborers who lack both citizenship or even the very ability to become citizens of Israel.        MORE . . .  

“THE  STAB,”  BY  MOURID  BARGHOUTI
The moonlight said:
I am the first of the homeless,
the eternal wanderer;
you find me on the breakwaters,
on the soldier’s helmet,
on the false teeth of the party’s general secretary,
in the begging of the willow and in the river’ obstinacy,
on the woman’s brow when pleasure lifts it,
on the executioner’s fingernails and the robber’s key-ring,
on parliament’s oppressive dome,
on a deserter’s medals,
on the tilted surface of a bomber,
on the marble steps,
on a knife blade
which a friend takes from the front of his cloak
and points at your backbone.
And in my moment of agony,
I beg the clouds:
“Hide me!”

Barghouti’s essay, “Verbicide,” in which he describes being a refugee.
From Barghouti, Mourid. MIDNIGHT  AND  OTHER  POEMS. Trans. Radwa Ashour. Todmorden, UK: Arc Publications, 2008. Available from Amazon.

 

“. . . the voice shouts in vain like the voice of all that came before death . . .” (Jabra Ibrahim Jabra)

Harold KnightLeave a comment
Palestinian man protecting himself from IOF attack. Photo from Bil'in village this Friday afternoon. (Photo credit: Mohammed Yasin)
Palestinian man protecting himself from IOF attack during weekly non-violent protest. Photo from Bil’in village this Friday afternoon. (Photo credit: Mohammed Yasin)

❶ Young Palestinian killed in Hebron after alleged stab attack
. . . . . ❶―(ᴀ) Palestinian killed after alleged stab attempt at Gush Etzion
. . . . . ❶―(ᴃ) Israeli forces blockade Bethlehem-area town for 2nd day
❷ IOF attack weekly nonviolent protests in the occupied West Bank
❸ No to Normalisation
❹ Watchdog: Israeli press violations reached ‘new peak’ in 2015
❺ Opinion/Analysis: THE  UNRAVELING  ILLUSION  OF  PALESTINIAN  AUTONOMY
❻ Poetry by Jabra Ibrahim Jabra
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `

On March 14, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe Ya’alon at AIPAC convention. (Photo: AIPAC)
On March 14, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe Ya’alon at AIPAC convention. (Photo: AIPAC)

❶ YOUNG  PALESTINIAN  KILLED  IN  HEBRON  AFTER  ALLEGED  STAB  ATTACK
MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
19 Mar. 2016
A Palestinian youth was killed by Israeli forces near an illegal settlement in the southern occupied West Bank on Saturday after he allegedly stabbed a soldier, Israeli security sources said.
___Israeli police spokeswoman Luba al-Samri said Israeli border police at the Abu al-Rish checkpoint near the Kiryat Arba settlement on the outskirts of Hebron noticed a “suspicious” young Palestinian.      MORE . . .    
. . . . . ❶―(ᴀ) PALESTINIAN  KILLED  AFTER  ALLEGED  STAB  ATTEMPT  AT  GUSH  ETZION 
MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
18 Mar. 2016
A Palestinian man was shot dead after allegedly attempting to carry out a stabbing attack at the Gush Etzion junction, shortly after two Palestinians were detained on suspicions of planning an attack in the illegal Shaare Benjamin settlement.      MORE . . .
. . . . . ❶―(ᴃ) ISRAELI  FORCES  BLOCKADE  BETHLEHEM-AREA  TOWN  FOR  2ND  DAY
MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
18 MAR. 2016
Israeli forces closed the entrances to the town of Beit Fajjar in the central occupied West Bank for the second day in a row on Friday, after two youths from the town were killed for allegedly carrying out a stabbing attack on an Israeli soldier.      MORE . . .

❷ IOF  ATTACK  WEEKLY  NONVIOLENT  PROTESTS  IN  THE  OCCUPIED  WEST  BANK
PALESTINE NEWS NETWORK
19 Mar. 2016
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) on Friday 18 March, attacked the weekly nonviolent protest against the apartheid Wall and the illegal Israeli settlements, in Bil’in village, west of Ramallah, Kufur Qaddoum town, northern of Qalqilia, as well as in Nil’in village, causing dozens to suffer the effects of tear gas inhalation. Furthermore, the IOF tried to suppress a demonstration in Bethlehem.      MORE . . .

❸ NO  TO  NORMALISATION
PALESTINE CHRONICLE
18 Mar. 2016
Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon admitted in his speech at the annual AIPAC conference, the largest Zionist lobby supporting Israel in the US, that the overthrow of Mohamed Morsi and the installation of Egyptian President Abdel Fatah Al-Sisi was planned, in cooperation with generals in the Egyptian and Gulf armies and intelligence agencies. He also said that Israel’s interests will always be served by having military regimes in the Arab world, especially in Egypt.      MORE . . .  

❹ WATCHDOG:  ISRAELI  PRESS  VIOLATIONS  REACHED  ‘NEW  PEAK’  IN  2015     
MA’AN NEWS AGENCY  
18 March. 2016
A Palestinian press freedoms watchdog on Thursday said 2015 had seen an “unprecedented” increase in Israeli violations against Palestinian journalists across the occupied Palestinian territory.
___The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms, known as MADA, recorded a total of 599 violations against media freedoms throughout the year. . . .       MORE . . .

❺ Opinion/Analysis:  THE  UNRAVELING  ILLUSION  OF  PALESTINIAN  AUTONOMY
+972 MAGAZINE
Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man
18 Mar. 2016
Palestinians have been told for decades that limited autonomy in the West Bank is just a stop along the road to sovereignty. But more than 20 years after Oslo failed to bring usher in independence, the illusion is unraveling — and fast.      MORE . . .   

“BEYOND  GALILEE,”  BY  JABRA  IBRAHIM  JABRA

When I lived with Christ,
died with him and was resurrected
my voice was still shouting in the wilderness,
a voice unlike my own
burning with an unfamiliar fire.

Whose fire?
Give me shade and cold water,
and I will hang my memories on
a wall in some deserted room.
The crowd has scattered and the guests are gone;
the voice shouts in vain
like the voice of all that came before
death and Galilee.
On my lips are traces of honey
and hemlock.
Have I come after death to hear my voice
pulling me toward a long-deserted void?
Give me shade! And you, woman,
put a chunk of ice in your water.
The sun is burning. Life after death
is tiresome. And still my voice is drawn by the fire.
For whom? For whom
have I closed my eyes, while on my lips were
those traces of honey and hemlock?
(1962)

“As a Palestinian, Jabra has sought to express in his poetry the anger, bewilderment and alienation experienced by his countrymen, uprooted from their land and its traditions” (page 171). From WHEN  THE  WORDS  BURN:  AN  ANTHOLOGY  OF  MODERN  ARABIC  POETRY:  1945-1987.  Translated and edited by John Mikhail Asfour. Dunvegan, Ontario, Canada. Cormorant Books, 1988.
About Jabra Ibrahim Jabra.
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“. . . a reality that is willfully obscured by the complicit international community . . .” (Ramona Wadi)

Harold KnightLeave a comment
destruction
❶ A research centre affiliated to the PLO has revealed that the Israeli occupation authorities destroyed 478 Palestinian buildings and other facilities during 2015. (Photo: MEMO File Photo)

❶ Settlement expansion and the disappearance of Palestinian memory
❷ Palestinian killed after suspected car attack near Huwwara
❸ Israeli forces detain 16 Palestinians from West Bank
❹ Young Palestinian patriot cut down by Israeli bullet
❺ Opinion/Analysis: +972’s Story of the Year: The Right has officially taken over
❻ Poetry by Fadwa Tuqan
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ THE MIDDLE EAST MONITOR (MEMO)
SETTLEMENT  EXPANSION  AND  THE  DISAPPEARANCE  OF  PALESTINIAN  MEMORY
Ramona Wadi
Dec. 30, 2015
Israeli pressure group Peace Now, which defends Israel’s right to exist “within secure borders” and advocates for the two-state paradigm, has revealed that the Israeli housing ministry is planning the construction of 55,548 settlement units in the occupied West Bank. . . .
___For Palestinians. . . “Greater Israel” and its ramifications are about the concept of disappearance with regard to history and memory – a reality that is willfully obscured by the complicit international community.   MORE . . .
❷ MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
PALESTINIAN  KILLED  AFTER  SUSPECTED  CAR  ATTACK  NEAR  HUWWARA
Dec. 31, 2015
A Palestinian was shot dead after a suspected vehicular attack near the Huwwara military checkpoint in the northern occupied West Bank district of Nablus, Israel’s army said.
___A spokesperson for the Israeli army told Ma’an that an assailant ran his car into Israeli forces who were stationed on highway 60 near the Huwwara checkpoint for security purposes.
___The forces opened fire on the man, killing him on scene, the spokesperson said.   MORE . . . 
❸ MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
ISRAELI  FORCES  DETAIN  16  PALESTINIANS  FROM  WEST  BANK
Dec. 31, 2015
Israeli forces overnight Wednesday detained 16 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank, a prisoners’ rights group said.
___The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society told Ma’an that four Palestinians were detained from Bethlehem, identifying the detainees as Ahmad Amer Odeh, 20, from the Aida refugee camp, Ahmad Mahmoud Shakarneh and Noor Izzat Shakarneh from the Nahalin village, and Muhammad Salem Khalil Jibrin, 20, from the Tuqu village.    MORE . . .

alayan
Mahmoud Alayan, killed by Israeli troops Nov. 19. (Photo: Electronic Intifada)

❹ THE ELECTRONIC INTIFADA
YOUNG  PALESTINIAN  PATRIOT  CUT  DOWN  BY  ISRAELI  BULLET
Budour Youssef Hassan
Dec. 31, 2015
Mahmoud Alayan was a Fatah party supporter and an active member of its campus chapter at his school.
___He was also an implacable opponent of the status quo in occupied territory to which a Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority clings.
___That defiance ultimately cost him his life.   MORE . . . .
❺ Opinion/Analysis
+972 MAGAZINE
+972’S  STORY  OF  THE  YEAR:  THE  RIGHT  HAS  OFFICIALLY  TAKEN  OVER
Noam Sheizaf
Dec. 30, 2015
Benjamin Netanyahu and the Right finally took over Israel this year. The right wing successfully isolated and delegitimized the Left, eliminated any serious ideological challengers, put the country’s Palestinian citizens in its crosshairs, and quietly ushered us into an un-democratic one-state era.
___Save for the brief episodes of the Rabin and Barak governments, the Israeli Right has been in power since 1977 . . .  In the 70s and 80s the right- and left-wing blocs were relatively balanced, but over the past 15 years the Likud . . . has been the unchallenged, dominant force in the Israeli political system. . . .  The Right is in the driver’s seat, alone.  MORE. . .

1-Bibi-limo-speech-March-2-Amos-Ben-Gershom
❺ Benjamin Netanyahu makes final notes to a  speech against the Iran deal he delivered to AIPAC in Washington. March 2, 2015, Washington D.C. (Amos Ben-Gershom/GPO)

“MARTYRS OF THE INTIFADA,” BY FADWA TUQAN

1
They drew up the map of the road to life
they paved it with precious stones and with their young hearts
they raised their hearts as stones on their palms
embers and flame
and with these they pelted the monster of the road,
now is the time to show courage and strength,
their voice was heard strong everywhere
it reverberated everywhere
and there was courage and strength
they died standing
blazing on the road
shining like stars
their lips pressed to the lips of life.

2
Death charged and drove its scythe through them
they stood up in the face of death
fairer than palm groves
fairer than the yield of wheat
fairer than bright day rising
fairer than the trees which the rain has bathed in the lap of dawn
they rose they sprang they were on their way to the battlefield
and there they spread like balls of fire
they burned they shone and gave forth light
in the middle of the road–and then disappeared like the sun.

3
Ah dream of theirs which appear in the distance
embracing the happy future!
You will bring about their rebirth
along with their great tomorrow.
Their rebirth will come will rise out of the depth of death and darkness,
on its face it bears good tidings
and on its broad brow a star shines.

4
Earth shall suckle him all through life
neither the concentrations of evil
nor the demons of earth land and sea
shall tear him from its breasts
never will he be weaned whatever the usurper’s cruelty
he shall not be weaned
until in a perfidious night death paints
the nipples of the bountiful breasts with the juice of bitter apple.

5
Look at them in the distance!
How they rise up higher and higher
while the whole world watches!
How they climb up ever higher
on a ladder of their gushing blood!
Never shall treacherous death seize their hearts
as long as rebirth and the new dawn
remain their vision which guides them on the path of sacrifice!
Look at them falcons in their Intifada
how they join to the heavens the land and their sacred country!

About Fadwa Tuqan
Posted in University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth
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“The reason, see, is that I am an Arab. . .” (Fouzi El-Asmar)

Harold KnightLeave a comment
Harvesting tomatoes in Gaza
Harvesting tomatoes in Gaza

from DALLAS MORNING NEWS
GAZA EXPORTS FIRST PRODUCE TO ISRAEL SINCE HAMAS TAKEOVER
By Fares Akram, Associated Press
Mar. 12, 2015
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli authorities allowed the import of Gaza produce on Thursday for the first time since Hamas seized control of the territory in 2007, a move that will aid Gaza’s battered economy and help pious Jews observe a biblical farming sabbatical.

Some 27 tons of tomatoes and five tons of eggplants were cleared to leave Gaza for Israel, Palestinian officials and Gaza merchants said.

“Exporting to Israel is better, but insufficient,” said Gaza merchant Hosni Shehada, who oversaw the preparation of half-ripe tomatoes and large eggplants for export at his warehouse.

Before Hamas took over the seaside territory nearly eight years ago, Gaza merchants used to export hundreds of tons of vegetables to Israel on a daily basis. (More. . .)

from MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
15-YEAR-OLD PALESTINIAN ENTERS 76TH DAY IN ISRAELI CUSTODY
March 12, 2015
Fifteen-year-old Palestinian Khalid Hussam al-Sheikh entered his 76th day in Israeli custody on Wednesday after he was

Khalid Hussam al-Sheikh entered his 76th day in Israeli custody
Khalid Hussam al-Sheikh entered his 76th day in Israeli custody

sentenced to four months jail time and given a 2,000 shekel ($495) fine for throwing rocks and burning tires.

Al-Sheikh’s family told the Ahrar Center for Prisoners Studies and Human Rights that Khalid was not medically treated by Israel since he was detained on Dec. 25, 2014 despite the fact that he suffers from anemia. (More. . .)

from INTERNATIONAL MIDDLE EAST MEDIA CENTER
ARMY KIDNAPS NINE PALESTINIANS IN JERUSALEM AND NABLUS
by IMEMC & Agencies
March 12, 2015
Israeli soldiers kidnapped, on Wednesday evening, three young Palestinians including a 10-year old child, and four women, in occupied East Jerusalem, in addition two Palestinians near the northern West Bank city of Nablus.
Amjad Abu ‘Asab, head of the Jerusalem Detainees Committee, said the Police kidnapped Mohammad ‘Awad, 17, and Nour az-Zaghal, 17, from Ras al-‘Amoud neighborhood in Silwan. (More. . .)

Funeral of Tawfiq Abu Riyala, Gaza
Funeral of Tawfiq Abu Riyala, Gaza

from MONDOWEISS
ISRAEL SHOT AT GAZA FISHERMEN 5 TIMES IN FIRST 7 DAYS OF MARCH, KILLING 1, INJURING 2
Ben Norton
March 11, 2015
Israeli forces shot at Palestinian fishermen off the coast of Gaza on 7 March, killing one, a man by the name of Tawfiq Abu Riyala. Two fishers were also arrested.

Associated Press implied that it was not a purposeful attack on the part of Israel, and that the innocent fisherman was to blame for his own death, writing: “It was not clear how the fisherman ended up in the line of fire.” Such an attack on defenseless, unsuspecting fishermen is not uncommon, however. Not by any means.

According to the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, since the summer 2014 ceasefire agreement, in at least 10 incidents, Israel has injured 17 Palestinian fishers and detained 49 more. (More. . .)

from MONDOWEISS (Opinion)
BY BUSTING UP PEACE EFFORTS, AIPAC MAY HAVE BURST ITS OWN BUBBLE
Medea Benjamin
March 11, 2015
Early in the morning of March 3, on AIPAC’s national lobby day and just hours before Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu was set to address the joint session of Congress, AIPAC President Robert Cohen, along with the group’s Policy Director and two associates, briskly approached the Congressional office of Speaker of the House John Boehner. To their horror, they found the office locked and surrounded by crowd of CODEPINK activists staging a sit-in to protest the Netanyahu speech. . .

When finally cornered after seeking refuge in the office of Congressman Steve Stivers, the policy director agreed to talk to the CODEPINK group. But he kept repeating the mantra that Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism and as such, cannot be trusted in a nuclear deal.

This is the AIPAC line, and its strategy is to sabotage the negotiations . . . there is speculation that AIPAC was behind the letter by 47 Republican senators to the Iran government . . . AIPAC’s underhanded efforts to scuttle talks with Iran threaten to move us down a dangerous path towards war. But it’s not just AIPAC’s position on Iran that poses a threat to peace. AIPAC tries to undermine any attempts by the Palestinians to take their grievances to the international community. (More . . .)

“Because I Am an Arab,” Fouzi El-Asmar
I sit in preventive detention.
The reason, see, is that I am an Arab.
An Arab who has refused to sell his soul
who has always striven, sir, for freedom.
An Arab who has protested at the suffering of his people
Who has carried with him the hope of a just peace,
Who has spoken out against death at every corner
Who has called for and has lived a life of brotherhood.
That is why I sit in preventive detention
Because I carried on the struggle
And because I am an Arab.

Born in Haifa, Palestine, Dr. El-Asmar grew up in a Palestinian area of Israel. In 1958, he became a member of the editorial board of the literary monthly, Al-Fajr, and in 1966 he became editor of the Arabic magazine, Hadha-al-Alam. He attended Central Connecticut State University (then Central Connecticut State College) and received his B.A. degree there with honors in 1975. He subsequently earned a Ph.D. from the University of Exeter in England.Then in 1979, he became the managing editor of the London-based international newspaper, Asharq Al-Awsat.

Dr. El-Asmar lectured and taught at a number of universities, including St. Antony’s College, Oxford University, and Bradford University in England, and the American University in Washington, D.C. He held dual Israeli and U.S. citizenship and resided in Bethesda, Maryland.