Tag: Ibrahim Nasrallah

“. . . I have prepared my poems And reclaimed my hand From the combat of the street . . .” Ibrahim Nasrallah

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NEWS OF THE DAY

Israeli settlers raze lands near Nablus

WAFA
Mar 1 2020
Extremist Israeli settlers embarked today on razing tracts of land in the villages of Qusra and Jurish, to the south of the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, according to local sources.
– – – – Ghassan Daghlas, a local official in charge of monitoring settler violence, told WAFA that settlers used bulldozers to raze lands in an area belonging to the aforementioned villages.    More . . . .

Another push to make Qalandia Airport a Jewish settlement

AL-MONITOR – PALESTINE PULSE
Feb  28 2020
By Daoud Kuttab
In a move that appears to directly contradict the Donald Trump administration’s Mideast plan, the Israeli Housing Ministry announced Feb. 18 its intention to build 11,000 housing units on the grounds of the runway of the former Jerusalem airport, known as the Qalandia Airport (Atarot Airport).
– – – – The US “Peace to Prosperity” plan states: “The State of Israel should allow for the development by the State of Palestine of a special tourism zone in Atarot, in a specific area to be agreed upon by the parties.”
– – – – Atarot, according to the plan, “should be a world class tourist zone that should support Muslim tourism to Jerusalem and its holy sites,” and would include restaurants, shops, hotels, cultural centers, and other tourism facilities, along with “state-of-the-art public transportation that provides easy access to and from the holy sites.”     More . . . .

Weekly Report On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (20– 26 February 2020)

PALESTINIAN CENTER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Feb 27 2020
Summary:
This week, PCHR documented 207 violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law (IHL) by Israeli occupation forces (IOF) and settlers in the occupied Palestinian territory.  As part of its excessive use of lethal force, IOF killed a Palestinian in Jerusalem and abused the body of a Palestinian in the southern Gaza Strip in a humiliating manner.  Moreover, IOF continued to use excessive force against the peaceful protests organized against Trump’s Peace Plan for the Middle East known as the “Deal of Century” that violates the rights of the Palestinian people and is in conflict with the United Nation (UN) resolutions and international law.  Meanwhile, settlers backed up by IOF continued to seize more civilian property and attack civilians and their property.     More . . . .

BACKGROUND/OPINION

The Systematic use of Torture and Ill-Treatment at Israeli Interrogation Centers … Cases of Torture Committed at al-Mascobiyya Interrogation Center

ADDAMEER Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association
Jan 23 2020
Since its creation, the occupying state enforced and developed laws and practices that led to both the systematic use of torture and to absolute impunity for the perpetrator of this crime. Historically speaking, several torture methods were used against Palestinians, that included but were not limited to shaking, the baby chair, covering the head with a bag, forced listening to loud music, the closet, ripping of nails, and many other methods that were used to extract confessions from Palestinian detainees. In fact, since the beginning of the occupation in 1967, 73 Palestinian detainees were killed in Israeli interrogations.
– – – – The Israeli occupation authorities never stopped resorting to torture as the standard operating procedure in extracting confessions from Palestinian detainees. In point of fact, the crime of torture is systematic and widely-spread with the complicity of the Israeli judicial system. At the end of 2019, the intelligence agency “Shabak” subjected a number of detainees at al-Mascobiyya interrogation center to severe physical and psychological torture, without any form of monitoring and protection. Addameer is the legal representative for around 50 cases of the detainees in interrogations.    More . . . .

POEM OF THE DAY

“ABSENCE,” BY  IBRAHIM NASRALLAH

Who loves the winter as you do?
And is fascinated by trees that resist the wind as you do?
And who like you perfects life
With such innocent joy?
God!
If only you were with me now
I have prepared everything
The chestnuts and the fire,
I have pulled back the blinds
And raised my prayer to the gypsy rain
Pleaded that it persist in its discord
And eternal rites
God!
If only you were beside me now!
I have prepared my poems
And reclaimed my hand
From the combat of the street
From the merchants
And the brokers
And the guardsmen,
And a frost that has tried so often
To squeeze you out of my heart
From bullets that have repeatedly aimed
To swallow up the ring of your voice
As you commune with the buds
Or kindle the fire
God!
Had you been with me
We would have sung our song now
The one which the wind almost uproots from my voice
Each time I sing it alone

–Translation by Ibrahim Muhawi
From RAIN INSIDE: Selected Poems, by Ibrahim Nasrallah. Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Google Books.

“. . . the walls arising from silent rocks. . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

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holy land 1 046Palestinian home demolished by Israeli Occupation Forces, Silwan neighborhood,
East Jerusalem. Demolitions have continued for decades.
(Photo: Harold Knight,  ‎JULY  ‎12,  ‎2006)

SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY. . . .
|    ISRAEL  COMMENCES  DEMOLITIONS  EAST  OF  JERUSALEM
Israeli bulldozers demolished a Palestinian-owned residential building, on Thursday morning, in the al-Zaayim village, east of Jerusalem.     [. . . .] Israeli soldiers prevented residents, locals and reporters from approaching the area. . .  the demolition was carried out under the pretext that the structure was built without the difficult-to-obtain Israeli permit.    ___Nearly all Palestinian applications for building permits in Area C are denied by the Israeli authorities, forcing communities to build illegally.    More . . .
. . . . Related  ISRAEL  DEMOLISHES  PALESTINIAN  RESIDENTIAL  BUILDING  IN  EAST  JERUSALEM
. . . . Related  ISRAEL  DEMOLISHES  PART  OF  PALESTINIAN  CEMETERY  IN  JENIN
. . . . Related  ISRAELI  BULLDOZERS  RAZE  LANDS  IN  SOUTHERN  GAZA
. . . . Related  ARMY  DEMOLISHES  MEMORIAL  FOR  PALESTINIAN  KILLED  BY  SOLDIERS
. . . . Related  ISRAELI  MILITARY  DESTROYS  TEACHING  FACILITY  AT  JORDAN  VALLEY  SCHOOL [KHIRBET IBZEIK]
|    REPORT:  IOF  CONTINUE  SYSTEMATIC  CRIMES  IN  THE  OCCUPIED  PALESTINIAN  TERRITORY
Israeli forces continued to use excessive force against unarmed civilians and peaceful protesters in the Gaza Strip

  • A civilian succumbed to wounds he sustained during his participation in the Return and Breaking Siege protests.
  • 77 civilians, including 12 children, a woman, a journalist and 3 paramedics, were wounded; 4 of them sustained serious wounds.
  • Israeli forces continued to open fire at the border areas in the Gaza Strip . . .   More . . .

|    BELGIUM  TO  UPGRADE  PALESTINIAN  DIPLOMATIC  REPRESENTATION  IN  BRUSSELS
Belgium has decided to upgrade the diplomatic status of the Palestinian representative office in Brussels, according to a joint statement issued on Wednesday.    ___This was announced following a meeting between Foreign Minister Riyad Malki and his Belgian counterpart Didier Reynders and Minister of Cooperation and Development Alexander De Croo in Brussels.    ___The two sides signed a joint declaration following their ministerial dialogue in which they affirmed their desire to develop bilateral relations in several fields . . .  More . . .

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION. . . .
|    THIS  IS  HOW  ISRAEL  WAS  ESTABLISHED  ON  FALSEHOOD  AND  AGGRESSION   A hundred and one year has passed since the notorious Balfour Declaration. A declaration made to those who do not deserve by those who do not own, initiating the first stage of suffering of the Palestinian people over the last 101 years of displacement, torture, and massacres, which resulted in the martyrdom of thousands of them.    ___The infamous Declaration, under which, the future of an entire people was destroyed, for the benefit of a handful of Jews gathered from the corners of the globe to build a state called Israel on the ruins of Palestine and the ruins of its children and women, including the victims of Deir Yassin, Sabra and Shatila, Kufur Kassem, as well as the bloody massacres committed against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.    ___THE  TEXT  OF  THE  DECLARATION . . .  More . . .
|   NORMALIZING  EXTERNAL  NARRATIVES  IN  PALESTINE’S  SPACES  FOR  EDUCATION   In collaboration with the Palestinian Ministry of Education,  the  EU  launched  a  competition  across  schools  in Gaza and the occupied West Bank called “Know Europe”. The aim, according to EU Deputy Representative Tomas Niklasson, is “to introduce ourselves again to students of Palestine: introduce our values, culture, history, and identity” and affirm the bloc’s purported commitment to supporting Palestinians.    ___THIS  EDUCATIONAL  ENDEAVOR  IS  TANTAMOUNT  TO  FORCING  GRATITUDE for symbolic recognition, decades after colonial conquest and entrenchment. Yet the reasoning behind the competition, according to the press release, is that “the European Union has a lot in common with Palestine and the region”. PALESTINIANS  KNOW  THERE  IS  NO  COMPARISON, yet this misconception is now being normalized through education, despite the obvious differences between a bloc of countries and Palestine’s disappearance.        More  .  .  .

POEM    FOR    THE    DAY.  .  .  .   

“THE  WINDOWS,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
Windows are a first step into the world,
a song on a spacious cloud,
a departure, a rose,
the braids of the moon falling over hills,
a heartbeat in the darkenss of the night
that travels in chains
and in men.
They are a threshold for the prayers
of our lonely neighbor,
an oasis for lovers
and children, the tempting fruit
in baskets, the seagull in the heart
bent down in sleep, the wisdom of the walls
arising from silent rocks and moving
toward mountaintops.

–From From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN INSIDE: SELECTED POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble.

“. . . He renovates a memory demolished like a wall . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

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WEb-wo24-israel-demolition
Khan al Ahmar Village with illegal Israeli settlement Kfar Adummim in background. (Photo: Reuters, in The National, Sept. 23, 2018)

SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY. . .

|   AL-MALKI  ON  CLOSURE  OF  US  CONSULATE:  US  HAS  ADOPTED  THE  AGENDA  OF  FAR-RIGHT  ISRAELI  SETTLER  MOVEMENT 
Minister of Foreign Affairs Riyad al-Malki strongly condemned on Thursday the recent US’ decision to close the US consulate in East Jerusalem, which mainly serves Palestinians, and merge it with the US embassy in the city.    ___“Closing of the US Consulate General in Jerusalem, which has operated independently since in 1844, and turning it into a unit in the illegally placed American Embassy in Jerusalem reflects the US administration’s determination to entrench its illegal embassy move and force its functions on the Palestinian side,” he said in a press release.    ___Al-Malki stressed that decision clearly “proves that the US administration has adopted the agenda of the far-right Israeli settler movement, treating the entire area of historic Palestine as one political unit under Israeli control.”    More . . .
|   UNRWA  DISMISSES  ISRAELI  THREATS  OF  CLOSING  ITS  JERUSALEM  OPERATIONS
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) dismissed on Thursday threats by the Israeli mayor of West Jerusalem, Nir Barkat, to close down its operations in occupied Jerusalem.    ___Barkat submitted to a parliamentary committee a plan to end UNRWA operations in Jerusalem and to turn over its services in health and education to his municipality.    ___UNRWA spokesman Sami Mshasha told WAFA that while these threats are worrying, they will not change facts on the ground since UNRWA exists based on international resolutions and binding bilateral agreements.    ___UNRWA was created in December 1949 by a United Nations resolution. . .    More . . .
|   122  DAYS  OF  DEMOLITION  THREATS,  ISRAEL  SEALS  OFF  KHAN  AL-AHMAR    Israeli forces assaulted protesters inside the Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar, east of Jerusalem in the central occupied West Bank, on Friday.   ___Israeli soldiers fired tear-gas bombs and pepper-sprayed Palestinian and international protesters and activists as they attempted to protest at the main road leading to the village, preventing them from doing so.   [. . . .] Large numbers of Israeli forces surrounded Khan al-Ahmar and sealed off its main entrance, declaring it a closed military zone.   [. . . .] The seal off came as an attempt to prevent hundreds of protesters and journalists from reaching Khan al-Ahmar to show solidarity with the residents of the village after 122 days of being under threat of demolition. . .  as part of an Israeli plan to expand the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Adummim.  More. . .
. . . . Related   Theresa  May  Condemns  Israel’s  Planned  Demolition  of  Khan  Al-Ahmar  (VIDEO)
. . . . Related   Israel  demolishes  7  structures  in  Jordan  Valley

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION. . . .

|  THE  UN  ‘SHERIFF’:  NIKKI  HALEY  ELEVATED  ISRAEL,  DAMAGED  US  STANDING
Ramzy Baroud
US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, has made her post a “more glamorous” position than her predecessors – as President Donald Trump [said] following her resignation announcement.    ___. . . we certainly know that, during her relatively brief stint, Haley has further diminished her country’s struggling reputation, entrenching US isolation in the world’s most vital international political body.    ___In her own words, Haley concluded that her mission at the UN was accomplished, commending herself on three achievements: the US has become more respected; it saved a lot of money and vigorously defended Israel against UN ‘bias.’   [. . . .] Nothing could be further from the truth and Haley, who is suspected of engineering a run for the White House in the future, has no evidence to back up her claim of new-found ‘strength’ and ‘respect’.   ___During his speech before the General Assembly on September 25, Trump’s outrageous claims were not met with thundering applause but humiliating laughter. So much for respect.    More . . .

NOTICES  FROM  ORGANIZATIONS. . . .

Eyewitness  Palestine  PALESTINE  2.0  DELEGATION  WINTER  2019  For  Returning  Delegates  and  Previous  Travelers
___Co-sponsored by the Hebron Freedom Fund, this delegation is meant for alumni of previous Eyewitness Palestine delegations, as well as other delegation programs.   ___Delve deeper into the issues and spend more time with specific Palestinian communities. Explore the current realities for Palestinians, including the repression of Palestinian strategic organizing, the separation and segregation of the Palestinian population, and creative ways communities are continuing to resist.   More . . .

POEM  FOR  THE  DAY. . . . 

“RENOVATION,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH

He renovates a tin window
to open it for the morning birds.
And renovates some stars that have burned out
in the streets, and a woman massacred in the neighborhood.
He renovates a memory demolished like a wall,
a bird’s scattered ashes,
light reflected off a blade in the dark,
a woman lost in a spacious bed
and a bellow.
He renovates a friend’s face as the sea breaks over it
and the singer who no longer resembles his songs,
the wind when it sleeps forgetting the immensity of an orbit,
the taste of words in conversation,
the taste of air and fruit
and two legs that have never carried a planet
while destruction prevails.
He renovates a womb, subdues horses
and poems that beg for livelihood in the shade
before slipping into a chicken coop or blowing by
like a steaming train.
He renovates pillars, neighs,
guns covered with moss from waiting.
He renovates a promise, roots, clouds,
and in the end he is slain alone like a lighthouse.

From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN  INSIDE:  SELECTED  POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009.  Available from Barnes and Noble.

“. . . Fear encloses the sweet basil and the alley’s mint . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

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❶ EU provides €317,000 to support West Bank farmers
. . . . . ❶― (ᴀ) UNRWA chief says US aid cut “most severe crisis in agency’s history”
. . . . . ❶― (ᴃ)  Dear Mr Trump, we’re facing a humanitarian disaster

  • Background: “The Palestinian Refugee Camps: The Promise of ‘Ruin’ and ‘Loss’.” Rethinking History

❷ Arab FMs meet again over US Jerusalem decision
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) AL-Malki: Arab response to US Jerusalem decision decides peace future
❸ Seven more healthcare centres in Gaza shut down
. . . . . ❸ ― (ᴀ) Israeli airstrikes target sites in northern Gaza
❹ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ EU  PROVIDES  €317,000  TO  SUPPORT  WEST  BANK  FARMERS
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA 
Feb. 2, 2018 ― The European Union announced on Friday its contribution of about €317,000 to the Palestinian Authority to support Palestinian farmers and agro-businesses in the West Bank.
___A statement by the EU representative office in Jerusalem said the eligible beneficiaries are farmers and agro-businesses in the West Bank directly affected by the Israeli occupation, and particularly farmers in Area B and C.    MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❶―  (ᴀ)  UNRWA  CHIEF  SAYS  US  AID  CUT  “MOST  SEVERE  CRISIS  IN  AGENCY’S  HISTORY”
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Feb. 2, 2018 ― Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) Pierre Krähenbühl said on Thursday that the recent US aid cut represents the most severe crisis in the agency’s history.
___Krähenbühl’s comments came during his speech at the meeting of Arab Foreign ministers in Cairo to discuss the Arab action in response to the US decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
___The UN official said the agency is facing an unprecedented financial crisis because of the US decision to reduce its contribution to UNRWA, adding that he has been travelling around the world to call for mobilization to help UNRWA overcome this crisis.   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❶―  (ᴃ)    DEAR  MR  TRUMP,  WE’RE  FACING  A  HUMANITARIAN  DISASTER
Al Jazeera English
by Mays Abu Ghosh
Feb. 1,  2018 ― Dear President Trump, Every evening, my grandmother sits us down and tells us stories about a piece of heaven on earth, a place called “Imwas”. She describes every little detail about this place – the water spring, the lavish trees and the flowers that bloom throughout the year. She tells us about the beautiful old stone houses, the fig trees and the cactus plants.
___Imwas is a village situated southeast of the town of Ramleh, where my grandfather owned a plot of land. After my grandfather passed, my father inherited the land. One day, my nine siblings and I will inherit this land from our father. We’ll build our home there, and we’ll harvest the crops of our field.     ___But for now, we live in a small apartment in the Qalandia refugee camp . . .    MORE . . .

Abreek-Zubiedat, Fatina.
“THE  PALESTINIAN  REFUGEE  CAMPS:  THE  PROMISE  OF  ‘RUIN’  AND  ‘LOSS’.”
RETHINKING  HISTORY, vol. 19, no. 1, Mar. 2015, pp. 72-94
[. . . .] According to the political theorist Hannah Arendt, a ‘refugee’ is a ‘stateless’ or ‘non-citizen’ person who threatens the nation-state system. Consequently, countries have acknowledged the need for a solution to the refugee problem, whose status is considered temporary, with two possible options: return to the homeland or country of origin, or naturalization in the host country. Historically, both solutions have failed. Arendt views the refugee camp as a ‘final solution’ involving the incarceration of refugees after denying their citizenship. Only then do they become homo sacer in the sense implied by ancient Roman law: destined to die, with their life defined as ‘bare.’
[. . . .]  Exclusion and the definition of modes of belonging and non-belonging and marking populations as ‘outside’ are sovereign acts that cannot be thought of independently of the actor which performed them. These acts are . . .  ‘nothingness acts’ which gain an inherent nihilistic relationship: ‘It is in one guise, a promise of creative destruction. In another, it can work to the opposite end; turn to sheer destruction, annihilating the very context of creativity’. . .  Nihilistic actions not only delineated the creation and development of the camps, but are themselves processes that led to paradoxical situations, veritably positioning the camps on the borderline between the ‘private’ and the ‘public’ spheres.
[. . . .] The refugees’ adherence to the idea of return was very strong. Their various architectural activities which left their mark on the region undermined the abnormal basis of the camp and created an opening for discussing refugee–camp relations, while emphasizing the idea that any attempt to dismantle a camp would only prove successful if citizenship were achieved. Through the many architectural practices discussed above, the refugees succeeded in rewriting the binary layout articulated in the language of planning, which defined a ‘private’ versus ‘public’ sphere. They knew how to dismantle this language through practices designed to negotiate the complexities of discourses about this same sphere, revealing contrasts, struggles, and conflicts reflected in the camp’s appearance, and the impossibility of a single, exclusive discourse with which to describe the harsh duality of camp existence.     SOURCE . . .   ..

❷ ARAB FMS MEET AGAIN OVER US JERUSALEM DECISION
The Palestinian Information Center    
Feb. 2, 2018 ― The Arab League, chaired by Djibouti foreign minister, Mahmoud Ali Yusuf, on Thursday held an emergency meeting in Cairo to discuss the US decision to recognize Occupied Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
___The meeting, which was attended by Arab foreign ministers or their representatives, was a follow-up to the previous sessions in December and January on Washington’s capital announcement as well as its declared intent to relocate its embassy to Jerusalem.
___The attendees discussed the repercussions of US president Donald Trump’s decision on Jerusalem and the implementation of the Arab League’s ministerial resolution on September 9, 2017, which stipulated that the Arab League should convene another meeting within a month to evaluate the situation and agree on future measures . . .   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❷  ―  (ᴀ)  AL-MALKI:  ARAB  RESPONSE  TO  US  JERUSALEM  DECISION  DECIDES  PEACE  FUTURE   
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Feb. 1, 2018 – Minister of Foreign and Expatriates Affairs Riyad al-Malki affirmed on Thursday that the shape of the Arab countries’ response to the US decision on Jerusalem will determine the future of peace and stability, based on an end of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967.
___Al-Malki’s comments came during his speech at the meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo during which they discussed the Arab action in response to the US decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
___“The shape and level of the Arab [countries’] response will determine the future of peace and stability, based on an end of Israeli colonization of all the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967. . . .   MORE . . .
❸  SEVEN  MORE  HEALTHCARE  CENTRES  IN  GAZA  SHUT  DOWN
Days of Palestine
Huge amounts of fuel needed to operate electricity generators to compensate lack of electricity caused by Israeli siege.
Feb. 01 2018 ― Gaza is heading to real disaster as seven more healthcare centres in Gaza Strip closed their doors on Thursday due to tightening 11-year-old Israeli siege.     ___According to the Palestinian ministry of health in the Gaza Strip, fuel ran out in seven more healthcare centres in different areas across Gaza.
___“This problem, which is a result of the Israeli sieged, happened due to the lack of fuel needed to operate electricity generators,” a statement by the ministry said.   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❸  ―  (ᴀ)  ISRAELI  AIRSTRIKES  TARGET  SITES  IN  NORTHERN  GAZA      Ma’an News Agency
Feb. 2, 2018     Israeli forces carried out airstrikes targeting several sites in the northern Gaza Strip on Friday before dawn.
___Locals told Ma’an that the strikes hit targets near the al-Nada Towers in northeastern Beit Lahiya. No injuries were reported.     ___The Israeli army had reported earlier that rockets coming from the Gaza Strip had landed in an Israeli town outside around Gaza.   MORE . . .

“THE  EXILE,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
Silence becomes solid in bones,
in a bird’s song,
in he meaning of a word,
spreading over all of the greenery
and swallowing up the town squares,
creeping like a desert snake
and dwindling the horses’ neighing.
Blossoming in my woman’s embrace,
in the song’s pale light
and in the flowers on the balconies.
I gather myself to lift dry clouds from my body
and prayers from my soul.
I see God’s sun, my face, and my hand: three doves.
The time that’s passed is more than age can carry
and my undulations are in restraints.
The spikes of my soul do not reach the horse’s back,
an angle overlaps another angle . . . within an angle,
this body of mine.
Poets surround me like the fruit of regret.
My mother says: White is laughter’s waterfall.
So we laugh till our blood explodes.
Fear encloses the sweet basil and the alley’s mint.
My love’s tough on my forehead is like a runaway train.
The wind on my shoulders is like a dead horse,
the Sea far away.
Time is a coffin, while nakedness is the daily news.
For thirty three years
I have been digging tunnels
so I might emerge from this cold womb. . .

From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN  INSIDE:  SELECTED  POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble.
Interview with Ibrahim Nasrallah.

“. . . We have a brother in the dust . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

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❶ Israeli settlers attack northern West Bank school
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Scores of settlers and police forces defile Aqsa Mosque
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴃ) Settlers conduct land survey south of Nablus
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴄ) Rabbi: Israeli settlement incubates worst violence against Palestinians

  • Background: “Childhood: A Universalist Perspective for How Israel Is Using Child Arrest and Detention to Further Its Colonial Settler Project.” International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies.

❷ Two boys lose eyes to Israeli fire
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) Israeli occupation forces abduct 4 Palestinian children in Jenin
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴃ) Palestinian child abducted by 21 Israeli soldiers returns home
❸ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAELI  SETTLERS  ATTACK  NORTHERN  WEST  BANK  SCHOOL  
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA    
Dec. 28, 2017 ― Jewish settlers attacked on Thursday students at the Burin High School in the northern West Bank district of Nablus prompting local residents to confront them and push them back, according to the school principal Ibrahim Omran.
___Israeli soldiers, who provided protection to the settlers who came from the illegal settlement of Yitzhar, fired tear gas and rubber bullets at the Palestinians causing several cases of suffocation from gas inhalation and rubber bullet injuries.
___Omran said the students were sitting for their mid-term exams when some 15 settlers attacked the school under army protection.     MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❶  ―  (ᴀ)  SCORES  OF  SETTLERS  AND  POLICE  FORCES  DEFILE  AQSA  MOSQUE
The Palestinian Information Center
Dec. 28, 2017 ―  Dozens of Jewish settlers on Thursday morning desecrated the Aqsa Mosque’s courtyards under tight police guard.
___According to local media sources, about 112 settlers entered the Mosque in groups through al-Maghariba Gate, while several police troops were deployed throughout the Mosque’s plateaus and among Palestinian worshipers.  MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❶―  (ᴃ)  SETTLERS  CONDUCT  LAND  SURVEY  SOUTH  OF  NABLUS
The Palestinian Information Center 
Dec. 28, 2017 ―  A group of Jewish settlers escorted by soldiers on Wednesday surveyed a vast tract of land in an area between the towns of Duma and Qusra, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.
___Local sources said that several settlers and soldiers were seen using maps in their land survey, expressing fears of Israeli intents to annex lands in their area for settlement projects.     MORE . . .  
.  .  .  .  .  ❶  ―  (ᴄ)    RABBI:  ISRAELI  SETTLEMENT  INCUBATES  WORST  VIOLENCE  AGAINST  PALESTINIANS 
Days of Palestine 
Dec. 27, 2017 ―  Toxic environment of radical Israeli settlements incubates violence, while Israeli occupation forces has miserable record of bringing those who attack Palestinians to justice, Rabbi Arik Ascherman said. 
___In an opinion article published by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz on Tuesday, Ascherman said he was attacked with a knife by a masked settler from the illegal settlement of Itmar in 2015 while he was leading Israeli occupation forces to a FIRE SET BY SETTLERS in a Palestinian olive grove.
___The attacker, Ascherman ironically said, was taken to court and then was sentenced, but to 150 hours of community service.   MORE . . .  

Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Nadera.
“Childhood: A Universalist Perspective for How Israel Is Using Child Arrest and Detention to Further Its Colonial Settler Project.”
International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies, vol. 12, no. 3, Sept. 2015, pp. 223-244.
[. . . .] . . . the general trend of settler colonialism is based on “a sustained institutional tendency to supplant the indigenous population” and a cultural logic of elimination that “reconciles a range of historical practices that might otherwise seem distinct” (Wolfe, P. (2006). Settler colonialism. p. 396). Furthermore, settler colonialism is located in programs of control, removal, and termination, and the invasion of the world of colonized people is a structure, not an event. Children who are maltreated in such a context suffer ongoing structural violence at the hands of the colonizer. . .  In the settler colonial project, settlers regard the new territory as theirs and conceive the birth and development of native children as contributing to a “demographic threat” that compromises their dominance over the territory. . .  demographic and social modes of control are  connected to structural preconditions that dispossess land and dominate movement and life. Controlling, subjugating, and abusing children enhances such dispossession.
[. . . .] Within this context, Palestinian children are viewed as security threats and therefore thrust outside of acceptable and established human rights framework and into a discriminatory structure of analysis. Mohammed Zine al-Majid, for example, was only four years old when an arrest warrant was issued in his name . . . Mohammed’s father recalled asking the armed officers who raided his home in search of his toddler son, “Are you sure you have an arrest warrant? A legal one?” . . .  Mohammed’s father could not believe that such a young boy could be considered a threat. Although the authorities left once they realized they had made mistake, the damage was already done.
___Legally, Mohammed was not treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention or the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of the Child . . . Mohammed’s case calls for an analysis of how, in the context of the military occupation of the Palestinian territories, arrest warrants for children are considered “legal,”“acceptable,” and “normal,” and not seen as child abuse.    SOURCE . . . 

❷ TWO  BOYS  LOSE  EYES  TO  ISRAELI  FIRE 
The Electronic Intifada     
Maureen Clare Murphy
Dec. 28, 2017 ―  With Israel’s crackdown on protests over Jerusalem has come a spike in violations of Palestinian children’s rights.
___Since 6 December, when President Donald Trump announced that the US recognized the city as Israel’s capital and pledged to move the country’s embassy there, Palestinian children have been among the hundreds injured and arrested by Israeli forces.
___Several children have suffered potentially irreversible head injuries, according to Defense for Children International-Palestine.
___Two have lost eyes.
___Two boys were hit in the face with tear gas canisters fired by Israeli soldiers from a watchtower near Erez checkpoint during an 11 December protest at the Gaza-Israel boundary.   MORE . . .    ..
.  .  .  .  .  ❷  ―  (ᴀ)  ISRAELI  OCCUPATION  FORCES  ABDUCT  4  PALESTINIAN  CHILDREN  IN  JENIN    
Days of Palestine     
Dec. 27, 2017 ―  Israeli occupation forces abducted on Wednesday evening four Palestinian children from Kafr Dan Neighbourhood in West Bank city of Jenin.
___Eyewitnesses said that the Israeli occupation forces raided a Palestinian farm in the area, attacked the farmers and abducted the four children.
___The eyewitnesses identified the four children as Hamza Sabah, Mohamed Salah, Mustafa Mer’e and Ahmed Salah.
___All of them were taken by a military jeep to the Israeli military camp in the area referred to by mass media as Salem Military Camp.    MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❷  ―  (ᴃ)    PALESTINIAN  CHILD  ABDUCTED  BY  21  ISRAELI  SOLDIERS  RETURNS  HOME
Days of Palestine
Dec. 28, 2017 ― The 16-year-old Palestinian teen, Fawzi al-Juneidi, who was recently arrested by Israeli soldiers, returned to his family late Wednesday.
___The boy was abducted on December 7 in the West Bank city of Al-Khalil after being dragged on the ground and blindfolded by heavily-armed Israeli soldiers.
___A photo of the blindfolded youth quickly became a symbol of ongoing Palestinian protests sparked by US President Donald Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.    MORE . . .    ..

“BROTHER,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
I have a brother in the dust
who has been waiting thirty years for his toys.
How did we not wait for him, he will ask us.
How did age take us by surprise?
How did we grow up?
And how is it, just like that, we’ve never invited him to join us?
Not once did we invite him
into our games in the mirror, in our dreams,
just like that!
One of our games is:
We have a brother in the dust.
When winter comes he waves with the grass.
He beguiles us with intense whiteness―that’s his habit―
then dwells close to our father, over there, inside mother.

From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN INSIDE: SELECTED POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble.
About Ibrahim Nasrallah.

“. . . After being killed I washed by the river . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

Harold KnightLeave a comment

❶ Health Ministry: Two Palestinians killed in Israeli shelling on Gaza
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Israeli forces detain 17 Palestinians, assault others in West Bank raids
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴃ) Student injured during Tulkarm university protests over Trump’s announcement
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴄ) Clashes with soldiers reported in some West Bank locations

  • Background: “Trumpian Ethics and the Rule of Law.” Creighton Law Review.

❷ Tens of thousands of Israelis hit the streets, and it has nothing to do with Trump
❸ Opinion/Analysis: Opinion/Analysis: Will the Jerusalem Freedom Intifada break out?
. . . . . ❸ ― (ᴀ) Trump protests evoke memories of the Second Intifada
❹ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ HEALTH  MINISTRY:  TWO  PALESTINIANS  KILLED  IN  ISRAELI  SHELLING  ON  GAZA 
Palestine News Network – PNN
Dec. 12, 2017 ― Two Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes on northern Gaza on Tuesday afternoon.
___The Palestinian ministry of Health announced that two youths were killed after an Israeli scouting plane in Beit Lahia town, northern Gaza strip.
___The ministry said that the two bodies of martyrs were moved to the Indonesian Hospital in the strip, while another youth is still suffering injuries.    MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❶  ―  (ᴀ)  ISRAELI  FORCES  DETAIN  17  PALESTINIANS,  ASSAULT  OTHERS  IN  WEST  BANK  RAIDS 
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Dec. 12, 2017 ― Israeli forces Monday night and early Tuesday detained at least 17 Palestinians and assaulted several others mostly in multiple raids across the West Bank, said security and local sources.   MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❶  ―  (ᴃ)  STUDENT  INJURED  DURING  TULKARM  UNIVERSITY  PROTESTS  OVER  TRUMP’S  ANNOUNCEMENT 
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Dec. 12, 2017 ― At least one Palestinian was injured on Tuesday during renewing clashes between Israeli forces and students at the campus of Palestine Technical University in Tulkarm, northwest of the West Bank, according to local sources.   MORE . . . 
.  .  .  .  .  ❶  ―  (ᴄ)  CLASHES  WITH  SOLDIERS  REPORTED  IN  SOME  WEST  BANK  LOCATIONS     
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Dec. 12, 2017 ― Palestinians clashed on  Tuesday with Israeli soldiers in at least two locations in the occupied West Bank, according to reports.   MORE . . .

MCKAY, JOHN.
“TRUMPIAN  ETHICS  AND  THE  RULE  OF  LAW.”
CREIGHTON LAW REVIEW, vol. 50, no. 4, Sept. 2017, pp. 781-799.
[Begin page 788] Anyone working for human rights in troubled places of the world will question whether their work contributes to peace. Working in the Middle East alone neither answers the question of how such a conflict ends between Israel and Palestine, nor answers how Israel might live in peace with its neighbors. Like many Americans who work for Palestinian rights and statehood, I came to this region supporting and believing in the State of Israel, and I left supporting the State of Israel. However, when I became deeply aware of the political situation and, in particular, of the policy of the occupying Israeli forces toward the Palestinians, my reaction was shock and dismay. As a law professor, lawyer, and human being, I condemn the violence that has been inflicted on both sides of this conflict. Scores of Palestinians have lost their freedom and many have lost their lives, as have Israeli soldiers and innocent civilians in both Israel and in Palestine. I cannot imagine, from the Palestinian side, how knife attacks against elderly couples in Tel Aviv or elsewhere in Israel, or against children, can ever be justified. Clearly the only path to a Palestinian state is the path of nonviolence, including the nonviolent refusal to cooperate in the Occupation. The peaceful paths of Gandhi and Martin Luther King are the only ones possible in this place. But for the Israeli side, the violence and slavery of nearly fifty years of occupation of the Palestinians, Israeli settlement-building, and the killing and imprisonment of Palestinian youth must end.
___The biggest obstacle to peace in the region is the unfettered building of settlements by Israel in occupied Palestinian lands. Almost everywhere you travel in the West Bank, when you look up to the hills, you will see an Israeli settlement, illegal in every way under international law. And they are building all the time. When asked whether I have hope for peace in the Holy Land, my answer has to be “No.” I do not have hope about how this problem can be resolved.  FULL ESSAY. . .

❷  TENS  OF  THOUSANDS  OF  ISRAELIS  HIT  THE  STREETS,  AND  IT  HAS  NOTHING  TO  DO  WITH  TRUMP 
+972 Magazine
Dec. 11, 2017 ―   Anti-corruption protests against Netanyahu are growing, and have already notched a win or two. And while the occupation couldn’t be further from the agenda, the movement could serve as a new rallying point for resistance to the authoritarian right.  MORE . . .
❸ OPINION/ANALYSIS:  WILL  THE  JERUSALEM  FREEDOM  INTIFADA  BREAK  OUT?  
The Palestinian Information Center
Dec. 12, 2017 ― The Palestinian people took to the streets in all the governorates of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the occupied city of Jerusalem, expressing their anger and rejection of the announcement by US President Donald Trump in which he recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
___“The uprising of the freedom of Jerusalem”, coincided with the anniversary of the first Intifada or “the Intifada of Stones”, which began on 8 December 1987, and documented the struggle of the Palestinian people and was considered a milestone in the history of the Palestinian cause after attempts to obliterate it and at a time the violations and measures against the Palestinian people by the Israeli occupation forces had increased.
___In an atmosphere similar to the one experienced prior to the first intifada, thousands of youths took to the checkpoints and contact points with the Israeli occupation forces in a number of locations, during which youths threw stones and Molotov cocktails at the Israeli occupation forces.   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❸  ―  (ᴀ)  TRUMP  PROTESTS  EVOKE  MEMORIES  OF  THE  SECOND  INTIFADA  
+972 Magazine
Zizo Abul Hawa
Dec. 12, 2017 ―   I was nearly 13 when the Second Intifada started. We were in school when Ariel Sharon visited the Temple Mount [Sep. 28, 2000]. School ended early when the rioting began. The children were told to return home; parents came to pick up their kids. My school was in the center of East Jerusalem, very close to the Old City.
[. . . .] We turned on the news and I thought to myself that surely this is a one-off event — tomorrow, it will all be over. No one could possibly want more of this, despite what I heard all around me: “tomorrow will be even worse, it’s Friday.”
[. . . .] Each day, it was the same, a kind of ritual: wake up, clean the blood and bullets from the streets, then riots and fires would start again. Tear gas and burning eyes. . . .
[. . . .] We didn’t return to school until January of 2001. We stayed home for more than three months. When we returned, it wasn’t the same. More than half of the class was gone, schoolchildren, 12- and 13-year-olds like me: some because their families had fled the area, or because they were wounded and in the hospital, or because they were arrested and in jail, or because they were buried deep in the earth. They say children always pay the highest price in war.     MORE . . .

“A  SPECIAL  INVITATION,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
My corpse hovered over a sea of silence.
My house was a cloud of dust,
the streets were a wild extinguishing dream
and the night was like the face of a friend divided
between silence and earning one’s keep.
The trees opposed their own colors
and the wind opposed riding a song,
a bird in the air was a period
then a comma in conversation.
The sky was arid.
After being killed I washed by the river
and the green along its banks
and when the mourners were late
I rushed to a wave in my mind and plucked a song.
I sang it for two whole nights until it waned
and broke like a mast.
When they were late
I turned onto every path to darkness,
like the soul breaking over the rims of flowers and wooden cups
and said: They will catch up with me on the way.
The road was lonesome and the moon ripped apart my body
although this was not the Age of War.
= = =
My funeral proceeds on its own
moved by the power of darkness to the grave site.
I heard him ask:  “Where are they?”
I recognized him by his clothes, his fear, his blue face,
and the blood on the collar of his shirt,
by the bullets embedded in his flesh.
I recognized him, I did.
But the mourners were late.
So I said:  “Invite my killer. . .”

Ibrahim Nasrallah   
From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN  INSIDE:  SELECTED  POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble.

 

“. . . A procession coming from far away . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

Harold KnightLeave a comment

❶ Israeli forces use live fire during clashes in hometown of Palestinian killed by settler
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Israeli forces open fire at Gaza farmers
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴃ) Israeli forces suppress protest in Hebron-area village
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴄ) Israeli forces suppress weekly march in Ramallah-district village

  • Background: “An Orchestra of Civil Resistance: Privilege, Diversity, and Identification among Cross-Border Activists in a Palestinian Village.” Peace & Change.

❷ November 2017 Monthly Incitement Report: Netanyahu is responsible for generating a culture of hate and racism in Israel
❸ The insecure residence of East Jerusalem Palestinians
❹ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAELI  FORCES  USE  LIVE  FIRE  DURING  CLASHES  IN  HOMETOWN  OF  PALESTINIAN  KILLED  BY  SETTLER     
Ma’an News Agency
Dec. 1, 2017 ― A day after a Palestinian farmer from the village of Qusra was shot dead by Israeli settlers, Israeli forces fired live ammunition, tear gas, and rubber-coated steel bullets at locals in the village after Friday prayers.
___Clashes erupted between Palestinians in the village, located southeast of Nablus in the northern occupied West Bank, following Friday prayers that were held at the site where Mahmoud Odeh, 48, was shot dead by an Israeli settler on Thursday.
___A local official told Ma’an that Israeli soldiers fired dozens of tear gas, live ammunition and rubber-coated steel bullets at locals, causing many to suffer from severe tear-gas inhalation.   MORE . . .   ..      Background at ③
.  .  .  .  .  ❶ ― (ᴀ) ISRAELI  FORCES  OPEN  FIRE  AT  GAZA  FARMERS   
Ma’an News Agency 
Dec. 1, 2017 ― Israeli forces opened fire at Palestinian farmers in the central Gaza Strip, according to locals.
___Sources told Ma’an that Israeli forces, stationed along the border between Gaza and Israel, fired at Palestinian farmers working their lands east of the al-Mughazi refugee camp in central Gaza.
___Meanwhile, in the Beit Lahiya area of the northern coastal enclave, Israeli forces opened fire on agricultural lands.   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❶ ― (ᴃ) ISRAELI  FORCES  SUPPRESS  PROTEST  IN  HEBRON-AREA VILLAGE 
Ma’an News Agency 
Dec. 1, 2017 ― Clashes erupted between Israeli forces and Palestinians in a village in the southern occupied West Bank district of Hebron after Israeli forces suppressed a protest in the area.
___Palestinians in the village of Khirbet Qalqas, located in the southern Hebron district, took to the streets of the village to stage a demonstration after Friday prayers.   MORE . . .
.  .  .  .  .  ❶ ― (ᴄ) ISRAELI  FORCES  SUPPRESS  WEEKLY  MARCH  IN  RAMALLAH-DISTRICT  VILLAGE 
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA 
Dec. 1, 2017 ― Israeli forces Friday suppressed a weekly march in Nilin village, west of Ramallah, causing a number of Palestinians to suffocate, said an activist.
___Mohammad Amireh, a local anti-settlement activist, said that Palestinians performed Friday prayers in their olive groves, south of the village, expressing their condemnation of the killing of a Palestinian farmer by Israeli Jewish settlers in Nablus-district village of Qusra.
___Protestors raised Palestinian flags and chanted slogans condemning the killing and stressing the importance of resisting Israeli occupation.   MORE . . .    ..

Hackl, Andreas.
“AN ORCHESTRA OF CIVIL RESISTANCE: PRIVILEGE, DIVERSITY, AND IDENTIFICATION AMONG CROSS-BORDER ACTIVISTS IN A PALESTINIAN VILLAGE.”
PEACE & CHANGE, vol. 41, no. 2, Apr. 2016, pp. 167-193.
[. . . .]  The regular weekly emonstrations [in the village of Bil’in] began in January 2005 and protested against the construction of Jewish settlements and the Israeli Separation Barrier on villagers’ land. The barrier threatened the livelihood of Bilʿin, cut villagers off from about 50 to 60 percent of their lands, and prevented their access to olive trees, the mainstay of the Palestinian rural economy. In response, Bilʿin’s residents organized a popular committee with members of diverse political streams. . . . Most of the previously separated land was eventually handed back to the villagers, but despite these changes, demonstrations in Bilʿin have not ceased.
[. . . .] On an organizational level, the sustained struggle benefited from four factors: the close relationship between the local popular committee and the village community; successful trust building and shared decision making between Israelis, Palestinians, and internationals; the creativity of the demonstrations; and the fact that Bilʿin is easily accessible for cross-border activists coming from Jerusalem or Tel Aviv.
[. . . .]  Civil resistance in Palestine has a long history that stems from the colonial interventions of the early twentieth century, including the British Lord Balfour’s promise to restore the Land of Israel.  Palestinian strategies of protest came into full force in 1923 after the British Mandate was formally established and included political entreaties, demonstrations, strikes, and ultimately armed rebellion. . .   Specifically noteworthy is the general strike held during the Great Revolt of 1936, which marked the last period of coherent and well-planned nonviolent civil resistance until the 1987 Intifada.
[. . . .]  It becomes clear that land is not just a political question in the West Bank. Retaining ties to farmland is also central to rural Palestinian culture, presenting yet another struggle that flows from the endangered status of the Palestinian nation and its confrontation with settler colonialism. Among Palestinians in Bilʿin, I noticed a strong connection between the local impact of the Israeli occupation and their land-related reflections upon the past, present, and future. Sustaining civil resistance was, in part, an expression of the desire to regain ownership of time and land for future generations.   SOURCE . . .  …

❷ NOVEMBER  2017  MONTHLY  INCITEMENT  REPORT:  NETANYAHU  IS  RESPONSIBLE  FOR  GENERATING  A  CULTURE  OF  HATE  AND  RACISM  IN  ISRAEL 
Palestine News Network – PNN 
Dec. 1, 2017 ― In November 2017 Monthly Incitement Report issued by PLO Department of Culture and Information PLO Executive Committee Member Dr. Hanan Ashrawi said that the real incitement stems from Israel’s military occupation of Palestine and its enslavement of an entire nation.
___She added that the Israeli hard line extremist government led by Benjamin Netanyahu is responsible for generating a culture of hate and racism in Israel, inciting violence and feeding extremism.
___Updated monthly, this report includes samples of recent derogatory and inflammatory comments and incitement by Israeli government officials and leaders specifically meant to distort reality and mislead public opinion.”
___Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “Hebron is the city of Patriarchs. City of royalty. And the Jewish settlement in it is anchored with an ancient historical right as well as government decisions and international agreements of today. The Jewish nation continuously votes in favor of the continuation of the Jewish settlement in Hebron… We will carry on building [settlements].” (November 15, 2017).     MORE . . .
❸ THE  INSECURE  RESIDENCE  OF  EAST  JERUSALEM  PALESTINIANS 
+972 Magazine Blog    
Nov. 30, 2017
Yaël Ronen
The goal of Israel’s policies in East Jerusalem is to shrink the size of the city’s Palestinian population. Here’s how.
___ More than 300,000 Palestinians live in East Jerusalem today. The vast majority are not citizens of Israel but permanent residents, who may naturalize in accordance with the Citizenship Law. For many Palestinians living in East Jerusalem, their residency status is more important than citizenship. This is because the government is obligated to respect and protect the civil rights of everyone present within its borders, not just its citizens; and its obligation to ensure social and economic rights, like education and social security, hinge on residency, not citizenship. However, because the residency status of Palestinians in East Jerusalem is not secure, they lack security in the rights to which they are entitled.
[. . . .] The treatment of East Jerusalem Palestinians as ordinary permanent residents is problematic both in principle and in practice. In principle, the status of permanent residents presupposes citizenship in another state, to which they may return and which would be obligated to accept them. This poses a problem for stateless individuals, who are not citizens of any country; if they lose their residency status, they remain with no legal status whatsoever. This is precisely the situation of East Jerusalem Palestinians: they are not citizens of any country that could take them in were they to lose their residency.   MORE . . . 

“THE  CELEBRATION,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
Flowers, songs, chants . . .
A memory from antiquity . . .
Saturday’s dawning sun . . .
An orphan is late . . .
A widow comes by embracing another widow . . .
A singer . . .
Verses from the Qur’an . . .
A flute on the outskirts of a neglected village . . .
Ancient soldiers . . .
Battles, defeated ages . . .
Thirty wars announced by daylight . . .
Another thirty still hidden in their sheaths . . .
Little ones dressed up for a feast . . .
Horses filled with the joy of their riders . . .
A procession coming from far away . . .
Ululations reaching the sky, a commotion . . .
Men emerging from darkness . . .
from yesterday’s newspapers, from the inkwell.
All of them came,
took pictures,
cursed the end of life and memory,
drank from the cup of a slain dream,
before their leader stepped forward
to cut the silk ribbon
and open the graveyard.

From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN INSIDE: SELECTED POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Amazon.

“. . . He renovates a memory demolished like a wall . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

Harold KnightLeave a comment

❶ Israel to Displace Entire Palestinian Communities near Occupied Jerusalem

  • Background: “Bedouins’ Politics of Place and Memory: A Case of Unrecognised Villages in The Negev.” Nomadic Peoples

. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Settlements watchdog warns of accelerated Israeli land seizures
❷ Israel orders Muslim worshipers to pay $37,000 after destroying mosque
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) Israel-Funded App Destroys Al-Aqsa Mosque, Builds Temple in Its Place
❸ Israeli soldiers invade many villages near Jenin, abduct one Palestinian
❹ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAEL  TO  DISPLACE  ENTIRE  PALESTINIAN  COMMUNITIES  NEAR  OCCUPIED  JERUSALEM 
International Middle East Media Center – IMEMC
Nov. 17, 2017 ― Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided to displace and remove dozens of Palestinian Bedouin families living in their communities around occupied East Jerusalem, after deeming their dwellings as “illegal,” to replace them with colonists.     ___His decision was made after meeting with representatives of the so-called “Jerusalem Belt Forum,” which is actively involved in displacing the Palestinians and replacing them with Israeli colonist settlers, in direct violation of International Law.     MORE . . .

  • Hall, Bogumila. “Bedouins’ Politics of Place and Memory: A Case of Unrecognised Villages in The Negev.” Nomadic Peoples 18.2 (2014): 147-164.   Source.
    (Note: This article presents the history of the Bedouin presence in Israel. A longer than usual excerpt is printed at the bottom of this posting.)

. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) SETTLEMENTS  WATCHDOG  WARNS  OF  ACCELERATED  ISRAELI  LAND  SEIZURES  
The Middle East Monitor – MEMO  
Nov. 17, 2017 ― Peace Now has slammed a recently issued legal opinion by Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit permitting the confiscation of private Palestinian land for the benefit of Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), warning it could accelerate land seizures.
___Mandelblit’s legal opinion was published in the context of Haresha, a settlement outpost near Ramallah, whose residents and supporters are seeking the retroactive legalisation of an access road.
___All Israeli settlements, whether state-sanctioned or unauthorised outposts, are illegal under international law, and are considered to form part of an inherently discriminatory regime.
___According to a statement by the settlements watchdog, “confiscating the land would constitute a severe violation of international humanitarian law and of the Palestinians’ right to own property”.  MORE . . .
❷ ISRAEL  ORDERS  MUSLIM  WORSHIPERS  TO  PAY  $37,000  AFTER  DESTROYING  MOSQUE 
Days of Palestine
Nov. 16, 2017 ― Israeli occupation authorities ordered Muslim worshipers to pay NIS130,000 ($37,000) seven years after destroying their mosque in Rahat, south of Israel.
___Be’er Sheva Magistrate’s Court ruled that the founders and operators of the mosque would pay the fine as a compensation for the state of Israel.
___The lawsuit was filed by the Southern District Public Prosecutor’s Office against eight residents of Rahat, who were members of the mosque committee, and demanded compensation of NIS459,500 ($130,000).   MORE . . .
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ)  ISRAEL-FUNDED  APP  DESTROYS  AL-AQSA  MOSQUE,  BUILDS  TEMPLE  IN  ITS  PLACE 
Palestine Chronicle  
Nov. 16, 2017 ―  An Israeli tourist exhibit has launched an app which allows visitors to Jerusalem to virtually destroy Al-Aqsa Mosque and replace it with a Jewish temple, furthering the government’s stated commitment to dismantle the Muslim holy site.
___The smartphone app is part of a government funded exhibition entitled “The Western Wall Experience”. When the app is pointed towards the mosque compound, it makes the Dome of the Rock disappear and replaces it with  a Jewish temple.   MORE . . .
❸ ISRAELI  SOLDIERS  INVADE  MANY  VILLAGES  NEAR  JENIN,  ABDUCT  ONE  PALESTINIAN  
International Middle East Media Center – IMEMC 
Nov. 17, 2017 ―   Dozens of Israeli soldiers invaded, earlier Friday, several Palestinian communities in the northern West Bank governorate of Jenin, installed roadblocks and searched cars, and abducted a young man.     ___Media sources said the soldiers abducted Jihad Faisal Bazzour, 28, from Burqa town, west of Jenin, after stopping him at Barta’a military roadblock, while heading for work.   MORE . . .

“RENOVATION,” BY IBRAHIM NASRALLAH
He renovates a tin window
to open it for the morning birds.
And renovates some stars that have burned out
in the streets, and a woman massacred in the neighborhood.
He renovates a memory demolished like a wall,
a bird’s scattered ashes,
light reflected off a blade in the dark,
a woman lost in a spacious bed
and a bellow.
He renovates a friend’s face as the sea breaks over it
and the singer who no longer resembles his songs,
the wind when it sleeps forgetting the immensity of an orbit,
the taste of words in conversation,
the taste of air and fruit
and two legs that have never carried a planet
while destruction prevails.
He renovates a womb, subdues horses
and poems that beg for livelihood in the shade
before slipping into a chicken coop or blowing by
like a steaming train.
He renovates pillars, neighs,
guns covered with moss from waiting.
He renovates a promise, roots, clouds,
and in the end he is slain alone like a lighthouse.

From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN  INSIDE:  SELECTED  POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Amazon.
About Ibrahim Nasrallah

  • From: Hall, Bogumila. “Bedouins’ Politics of Place and Memory: A Case of Unrecognised Villages in The Negev.”
    [. . . .] during the latter stages of British rule, there were between 60,000 and 90,000 Bedouins in the Negev region, occupying 98 per cent of the Negev lands, only 11,000 remained after the creation of Israel. Some of the Bedouins fled . . . while others were expelled to Jordan, the Gaza Strip and Sinai during and after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. This was followed by the policy of further displacements of the Bedouin community . . .  Using martial law, Israel relocated the Bedouin to a restricted area, in the north-eastern part of Negev, called ‘Siyag’ (whose literal translation refers to fence) . . . which they were not allowed to leave without official permission. The policy did not aim to settle the Bedouins, as they had already been sedentarised, but rather to remove them from their lands and concentrate the maximum number of people on the smallest possible space. This led to the situation in which the Bedouins were concentrated on ten per cent of the land they used to occupy, and kept under control and military rule until 1966.  [. . . .] In the mid-1960s, by the end of the military rule, the policy of land expropriation was followed by a new strategy. In 1965 the ‘Planning and Building Law’ . . .  denied the existence of Bedouin villages and defined them as agricultural territories, which meant that the villages were to be omitted from all master plans and no building permits could be granted. As a result, any construction on Bedouin land was by definition illegal . . .  The same law also provided for the demolition of unlicensed buildings and deemed necessary the confiscation of land if it was needed for public purposes. The consequences of the ‘Planning and Building Law’ were therefore twofold: firstly, by not recognising the Bedouin villages it condemned their inhabitants to marginalisation; secondly it transformed the dwellers of these grey zones into ‘lawbreakers’, ‘trespassers’ and ‘squatters on the state lands’. . .  the only way for Bedouins to escape this ‘illegality’ was to leave their ancestors’ land. In 1969, Israel enacted the Land Rights Settlement Ordinance, which declared that ‘lands, which at the time of the enactment of this law were classified as mawat, will be registered in the name of the State’. . .      ___Rendering historical Bedouin villages illegal and turning their land into state property was accompanied by a policy of transferring the rural community to government townships, where ‘they would modernise, develop new habits, and become accustomed to life in permanent houses’.  [. . . .] Since Bedouin localities do not exist, according to official records, the Bedouins are denied building permits and all basic services, such as electricity, running water, public transportation and sewage systems. According to Nūra, one of the female activists from al-Sirra, this systematic exclusion can be compared to a ‘slow execution of the villages and their residents.’ Yet, the Bedouins refuse to leave these spaces of denial and instead, relying on their own efforts and creativity, domesticate the landscape of unrecognised villages and transform them into self-governed entities with their own institutions and rules. [. . . .]

 

“. . . Boundless fear binds our hands . . . and our beating hearts . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

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❶ Israel to vote on annexing illegal West Bank settlements to Jerusalem

  • Background: “State Authority in the Balance: The Israeli State and the Messianic Settler Movement.” International Studies Review.

❷ Israel demolishes Palestinian Bedouin village for 120th time
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) UK parliamentarians urge Israeli compensation for demolished Palestinian homes
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴃ) Israel’s military informs Qabatiya family of plans to demolish its home
❸ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasralla
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAEL  TO  VOTE  ON  ANNEXING  ILLEGAL  WEST  BANK  SETTLEMENTS  TO  JERUSALEM
Ma’an News Agency
Oct. 25, 2017 ― Israeli ministers are expected vote next week on the so-called “Greater Jerusalem Bill,” which would annex 19 illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank to Israel’s municipal boundaries for Jerusalem, according to Israeli news daily Haaretz.
___Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threw his support behind the bill earlier this month, which would reportedly allow the settlers to retain their autonomy but afford them voting rights in the city’s mayoral race.
___It would meanwhile create “independent municipalities” for some 100,000 Palestinian citizens or residents of Israel who live within Israel’s Jerusalem municipality borders, but are located on the other side of Israel’s illegal separation wall.
[. . . .] According to the bill, the settlements of Maale Adumim — which itself is home to between 125,000 and 150,000 Israeli settlers — Gush Etzion, Efrat, Beitar Illit and Givat Zeev will be included under Jerusalem’s municipal jurisdiction, but not officially annexed to Israel, Haaretz said.     MORE . . .

Mendelsohn, Barak.
“STATE AUTHORITY IN THE BALANCE: THE ISRAELI STATE AND THE MESSIANIC SETTLER MOVEMENT.”
International Studies Review, vol. 16, no. 4, Dec. 2014, pp. 499-521.
(Barak Mendelsohn: M.A. in Security Studies, Tel Aviv University, 1999; Ph.D. in Government, Cornell University, 2006; Professor, Haverford College, 2007-present) For four decades now, the Israeli state has tolerated and even utilized the Jewish messianic movement in the context of its conflict with the Palestinians, even as the messianic movement has challenged and undermined the authority of the state.
[. . . .] The [Jewish messianic right] movement, only informally linked to the state’s institutions, is challenging state authority. Its actions regarding the territories Israel captured in 1967—primarily in the West Bank—have undermined the state and complicated policies to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Yet, successive Israeli governments since the 1970s have declined to exercise state authority when facing radical messianic groups in the West Bank. Moreover, both right- and left-wing Israeli governments have pandered to religious extremists and even supported them despite the fact that these extremists have operated outside Israel’s political system, violated the law, used unauthorized violence, and subverted state authority. Israel’s policy has not offered significant strategic benefits. In fact, it has backfired: Rather than ameliorating the Palestinian problem, it has intensified the conflict while reducing the state’s ability to reach a peace agreement. In addition, its settlement policies have weakened Israel’s international standing. Compromising state authority has had detrimental consequences, undermining Israel’s ability to change course even when its view of the settlements’ strategic value shifted. At the same time, it has deepened domestic divisions that threaten the state’s internal unity.   SOURCE.

❷ ISRAEL  DEMOLISHES  PALESTINIAN  BEDOUIN  VILLAGE  FOR  120TH  TIME
Ma’an News Agency
Oct. 25, 2017 ― Israeli authorities on Wednesday demolished the Bedouin village of al-Araqib in the Negev desert in southern Israel for 120th time, according to official Palestinian Authority (PA)-owned WAFA news agency.      ___WAFA reported that staff from the Israel Land Authority (ILA) accompanied by Israeli police and bulldozers raided the village and demolished the makeshift homes made out of tin that the residents build every time the village is demolished.     ___An Israeli court ruled last month that six residents of al-Araqib must pay 262,000 shekels (more than $72,000) for previous demolition costs, in addition to 100,000 shekels ($27,693) to cover the costs of the state’s lawyer. It was only the latest payment in which the village has had to compensate Israel for its routine demolitions in the village.    MORE . . .
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) UK  PARLIAMENTARIANS  URGE  ISRAELI  COMPENSATION  FOR  DEMOLISHED  PALESTINIAN  HOMES
The  Middle East Monitor – MEMO 
Oct. 26, 2017 ― A group of UK parliamentarians have urged Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson to seek Israeli compensation of Palestinian structures demolished in the occupied West Bank.
___Writing in a letter to Johnson, the parliamentarians ask whether the British government will join “eight other European countries in demanding compensation from Israeli authorities” for the demolition or damage of Palestinian structures funded directly or indirectly by the UK.
[. . . .] “You will be aware of the huge parliamentary concern about the impending demolitions of the communities of Khan al-Ahmar and Susiya”, the letter notes, “where structures have been built with EU funding”.
___“We continue to urge you to do everything within your power to prevent the demolitions of these communities and many others in Area C of the West Bank”.     MORE . . .  
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴃ) ISRAEL’S  MILITARY  INFORMS  QABATIYA  FAMILY  OF  PLANS  TO  DEMOLISH  ITS  HOME
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Oct. 26, 2017 ― The Israeli occupation forces Thursday informed the family of Mohammad Abu al-Rub of its intention to demolish its home in Qabatiya, south of Jenin, as a punishment for its son’s act, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.
___Abu al-Rub is currently in Israeli detention after he was accused to killing an Israeli in the town of Kufr Qassem inside Israel few weeks ago.
___The army informed the family that its home will be demolished in four days.
___Abu al-Rub was arrested along with fellow town member Yousef Kmeil and charged with killing an Israeli in Kufr Qassem.
___The Kmeil family was not informed that its house will be demolished yet.   SOURCE . . .  

“THE  SURVIVORS,”  BY  IBRAHIM  NASRALLAH
They were for a year at our doorstep,
sleepless with their brown flesh-and-blood complexions,
knocking against our ribs to make us see them.
At the end of the night they depart.
They circle around the city seven time
like the revolving sun,
like a reverberating echo.
They kill the silence      with their flutes
and light and birds hover around them
as they swim in the shadows
of tall wheat spikes and white stags.
As night falls the wind shakes the streets
and the darkness breathes out crazed spears among trees
jostling toward the windows and balconies.
We heard the hooves of their horses,
so we hid in the corners,
under beds, between ribs.
We hid like a storm among branches.
Their olives sill eventually grow tired . . .  we said:
It might snow . . .     soldiers might come by this evening and immediately kill them,
or like a sun’s fading light they might grow tired    
and kill themselves.
Night falls once more . . . the wind blows.
We hold our breath and retreat.
Boundless fear binds our hands . . . and our beating hearts.
The most recent among us said . . . Let us all rise up and ask them:
You who have been sleepless at our doorstep for a year and two nights:
What do you want?
Storms of corpses rushed to the corners.
The smell of death rose from the roofs of the mirrors,
from the colors of the eyes.
Let us all rise . . . the most recent among us said.
And when we reached the door, they shouted at us:
You. . .O dead ones . . . don’t open the door!

Ibrahim Nasrallah
From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN INSIDE: SELECTED POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble.

“. . . when we can run in the streets without anyone pronouncing us crazy . . .” (Ibrahim Nasrallah)

Harold KnightLeave a comment

❶ UN expresses ‘deep concern’ over ever-worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) Debunking Israel’s UN-bias claims
❷ Greek Orthodox patriarch says Israeli court ruling on church property politically motivated

  • Background: “Surviving Jerusalem: Fifty Years of Neglect and Daily Suffering Just to Remain.” Palestine-Israel Journal of Politics, Economics & Culture.

. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) EU calls on Israel to reconsider eviction of Shamasneh family in Sheikh Jarrah
❸ POETRY by Ibrahim Nasrallah
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ UN  EXPRESSES  ‘DEEP  CONCERN’  OVER  EVER-WORSENING  HUMANITARIAN  CRISIS  IN  GAZA  
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 12, 2017.   The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights office (OHCHR) expressed “deep concern” on Friday over the ever-deteriorating situation in the besieged Gaza Strip, three months after the electricity supply was severely cut by Israel at the behest of the PA.
___In May, the Fatah-led PA decided to slash funding for Israeli fuel to the coastal enclave, as Israeli authorities acceded to PA demands to dramatically reduce its electricity supply to Gaza, which was already reeling from lack of adequate access to electricity and fuel.
___The PA was accused of carrying out “collective punishment” on Palestinians living in the Hamas-led Gaza Strip, which had already been embroiled in a dire electricity crisis that was only worsened by increasing punitive measures by Israel and the PA.
[. . . .] “This has a grave impact on the provision of essential health, water and sanitation services,” Shamdasani said, adding that the large-scale power cuts were a life-threatening risk for vulnerable residents of the coastal enclave. “Israel, the State of Palestine, and the authorities in Gaza are not meeting their obligations to promote and protect the rights of the residents of Gaza.”    MORE . . .
. . . . . ❶ ― (ᴀ) DEBUNKING  ISRAEL’S  UN-BIAS  CLAIMS
Al Jazeera English 
August 13, 2017.   Nikki Haley, the US envoy to the United Nations, made headlines in June when she denounced what she claimed was a pattern of “anti-Israel” behaviour at the UN.
[. . . .] . . .analysts say there is little substance to her allegations that, in the words of Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, Israel has been “the UN’s punching bag”.
[. . . .] While issues concerning Namibia, South Africa, Cape Verde, Vietnam, Laos and others have in one way or another been resolved, Erakat told Al Jazeera, “the only one that hasn’t is Palestine”.
___ In 2016, the UN Security Council’s activity [saw] just one resolution dealt with Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. It was the first in almost eight years.
[. . . .]  It is a different story, however, elsewhere within the UN, where Israel faces frequent condemnation for its actions through bodies such as the UN Human Rights Council and the General Assembly.
[. . . .] “But this must be viewed in the context of the UN political organs as a whole,” [John Dugard, the UN’s former special rapporteur for human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories] added. “The Security Council and Quartet on the Middle East [UN, European Union, United States and Russia] are notoriously pro-Israel and refuse to pay adequate attention to Palestinian issues.”     MORE . . .
❷ GREEK  ORTHODOX  PATRIARCH  SAYS  ISRAELI  COURT  RULING  ON  CHURCH  PROPERTY  POLITICALLY  MOTIVATED  
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA 
August 13, 2017.   Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilos III said Sunday that a two-week old Israeli District Court ruling upholding a 99-year lease of church property in Jerusalem’s Old City to Jewish settler organizations is politically motivated.
___Theophilos said at a press conference in the Jordanian capital Amman that this legal battle, which has been going on for a decade, has resulted in an unjust decision that has ignored very clear legal evidence presented by the church, which made it clear that it was done in “bad faith, bribery and conspiracy” for the benefit of the group of settlers from Ateret Cohanim.
[. . . .] The Greek Orthodox patriarch said his church is going to appeal the District Court’s ruling, which he said will have a grave negative impact on Christian presence in the Holy Land, at the Israeli Supreme Court.   MORE . . .

Abu Ghoush, Amaal.
“SURVIVING  JERUSALEM:  FIFTY  YEARS  OF  NEGLECT  AND  DAILY  SUFFERING  JUST  TO  REMAIN.”
Palestine-Israel Journal of Politics, Economics & Culture, vol. 21, no. 4, Mar. 2016, pp. 6-11.
No one can imagine when first looking at Jerusalem, with the light rail, the clean paved roads, the old and new buildings, that just a few blocks away from the European-like main streets, there are Palestinian neighborhoods that look like slums, and not because the buildings are poorly constructed, on the contrary. More than 37% of Jerusalem s population are Palestinian residents who are living in East Jerusalem neighborhoods that lack basic services, adequate roads and safe sidewalks — when and if they exist.
___East Jerusalem, which is 70 square kilometers, compromises 56% of all Jerusalem, including the Old City. Palestinian Jerusalemites, or “Arabs,” according to the 2106 Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research statistical yearbook, make up 37.2% of Jerusalem residents. They live on just 13% of the land that was annexed in 1967. One-third of the annexed land, or about 34% of it, has been turned into Israeli settlements, while the rest is land Palestinian East Jerusalemites cannot develop because it is designated as an open space or a green area.
[. . . .]  East Jerusalemites see that Israeli settlements are built on their lands. The settlers receive better services and infrastructure by far, while it takes the Palestinians ages to get a permit to build one house to live in with their family or for their married children on land they own. And many times they try to get a permit and do not succeed. At the same time, huge settlements are built quickly. Infrastructure, roads and other services are provided — with long-time residents’ tax money — quickly and smoothly for settlers who just immigrated from outside.
[. . . .] Fifty years of neglect and no-planning has turned our Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem into places we do not approve of, but it has also turned us into people who are so worried about our survival and well-being that we no longer work together. We complain to one another about the situation, and we demand services and better conditions, but not in the right places nor in the right ways for our demands to be heard. We wait for the Jerusalem Municipality to solve our problems, knowing that it will not do anything unless it is forced to. . . .  Recently, with the support of Palestinian and international organizations, some neighborhoods have started working collectively to prepare plans which will eventually legalize their homes. But more importantly, they are beginning to understand that through pursuing the collective interest, individual interests are achieved as well and the impact will be stronger.   FULL ARTICLE . . .

. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) EU  CALLS  ON  ISRAEL  TO  RECONSIDER  EVICTION  OF  SHAMASNEH  FAMILY  IN  SHEIKH  JARRAH  
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
August 13, 2017.   The European Union missions in Jerusalem and Ramallah expressed concern at the imminent threat of eviction by Israeli authorities of the Shamasneh family from their home in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem.
___In a statement Sunday, EU missions called on the Israeli authorities to reconsider the decision, saying, “The eviction, of carried out, would be the first in the area since 2009. Further settlement plans including evictions are being moved forward in Sheikh Jarrah.”
___The Shamasneh family is one of at least 180 households in East-Jerusalem, mainly in Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, the Old City and Beit Safafa, facing the threat of eviction from their homes.   MORE . . .

“BEGINNINGS,” BY IBRAHIM NASRALLAH
When all the bids in the world flap their wings in unison
as one  body, when the waters of springs and mountain streams
gather in a dusty palm,
when a human being runs
and trees and the hidden future follow him,
when the world become simple
and I can climb onto a table in the office of the daily news
and speak of your love to the elegant shuttered windows,
to the good and bad paintings on the walls,
when I am able to freely place a gentle kiss
on your cheek in public,
when I am able to return with you after midnight
without a police patrol desecrating our bodies
in search of a confession,
when we can run in the streets
without anyone pronouncing us crazy,
when I am able to sing
and share a stranger’s umbrella
and when she in turn may share my loaf of bread,
when you are able to say I love you
without fear of death or imprisonment
and I can open a window in the morning
without being silenced by a bullet,
when I am able to grow older
and the trees are added to your attire
and we can count the drops of rain on each other’s faces
and sing and love free of weapons,
raids. Chronic fear, and disappearances –
another world will begin,
a new homeland will have been readied.
But for now we announce a new beginning with our death,
a new beginning of love.

About Ibrahim Nasrallah.
From Nasrallah, Ibrahim. RAIN INSIDE: SELECTED POEMS. Trans. Omnia Amin and Rick London. Willimantic, CT: Curbstone Press, 2009. Available from Barnes and Noble