Tag: Saeb Erekat PLO

“. . . a dream beyond, half formed, half grasped . . .” (Reja-e Busailah)

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Mohamed Hebali, killed today by Israeli soldiers. (Photo: The Palestinian Information Center, Dec. 4, 2018)

SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY. . .
|  DISABLED  PALESTINIAN  YOUTH  KILLED  BY  ISRAELI  MILITARY  IN  TULKAREM  RAID 
A Palestinian young man with special needs was fatally shot by the Israeli occupation army at daybreak Tuesday after the latter rolled into Tulkarem province, in the northern West Bank, and violently attacked Palestinian protesters.    ___Local sources said Mohamed Hebali, aged 22, was killed shortly after Israeli soldiers stormed Tulkarem and randomly unleashed spates of bullet fire.    ___Mohamed was hit with bullets in his chest and head.    More . . .
. . . . Related  250,000 people with disabilities in Palestine
. . . . Related  Children, students kidnapped by Israeli army in West Bank sweep
. . . . Related  9 Palestinians injured as Israel suppresses 18th naval march
. . . . Related  Palestinians suffer tear-gas suffocation during Israeli raid to Beit Ummar
|  ISRAELI  FORCES  DEMOLISH  COMMERCIAL  STRUCTURES  IN  NORTHERN  WEST  BANK  
Israeli forces Tuesday demolished several commercial structures in Hares village, west of Salfit in the northern West Bank, said a villager.    ___Fadi Suleiman, who owns one of the demolished structures, said that a large number of Israeli forces raided the village before a military bulldozer demolished a blacksmith workshop, a carpentry workshop and a laundry wash.    ___The structures were demolished purportedly for being built without a license from the so-called Israeli Civil Administration, in Area C, which accounts for 94 percent of the village’s land.  More . . .
. . . . Related  Israeli bulldozers raze lands in northern Gaza
. . . . Related  Palestinian family forced to demolish structures by Israeli occupation
. . . . Related  Israeli court rejects appeal to halt third demolition of Abu Hmaid family home
|  PALESTINIAN  LEADERSHIP  PRAISES  CANADA’S  COMMITMENT  TO  NOT  TRANSFER  ITS  EMBASSY  
Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) Executive Committee, Saeb Erekat, met with Canadian ambassadors, on Monday, and called on the Canadian government not to regard the independence of the State of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital on the 1967 borders and the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination as a “threat” to it.    ___Erekat met with the Canadian ambassadors to Palestine, Jordan and Israel, in the central occupied West Bank city of Jericho, to discuss the latest regional and international developments.    More . . .
. . . . Related  Haneyya reaches out to Turkish FM over US anti-resistance resolution
. . . . Related  Egypt proves itself a reliable mediator to Palestinians
. . . . Related  Israel launches military operation against ‘Hezbollah tunnels’

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION. . . .
|  CANADIAN  JEWISH  NEWS  PROMOTES  ‘TERROR  TOURISM’
By  Yves Engler
What should we make of a media outlet that praises those who join or give money to a foreign army, which occupies territory belonging to another people, terrorizes the local population by destroying houses, restricting their movement, subjecting them to military courts and shooting unarmed protesters?    ___What should we call the Canadian Jewish News, an unfailing flatterer of Canadians who join or finance a military subjugating Palestinians? Would “promoter of terror tourism” be an appropriate description?    ___Over the past month the CJN has published at least four pieces celebrating Canadian support for the Israeli military. On November 22 it reported, “Bayli Dukes, who recently won the Israel Defence Forces’ Award of Excellence for the Southern Command of the IDF, was a biology student at York University in Toronto less than two years ago. Tired of sitting on the couch and posting on Facebook about the situation in Israel, she decided there was more she could be doing.”    More . . .
| ISRAEL’S  NEW  WAR  OF  ATTRITION  ON  JERUSALEM’S  PALESTINIANS 
By Jonathan Cook
Czech president Milos Zeman offered Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultra-nationalist government a fillip during his visit to Israel last week. He inaugurated a cultural and trade center, Czech House, just outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls. . . .     At the opening, he expressed hope it would serve as a precursor to his country relocating its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.    [. . . .] It is this kind of endorsement that, of late, has emboldened Netanyahu’s government, the Israeli courts, Jerusalem officials and settler organisations to step up their combined assault on Palestinians in the Old City and its surrounding neighborhoods.    ___Israel has never hidden its ambition to seize control of East Jerusalem, Palestinian territory it occupied in 1967 and then annexed, as a way of preventing a viable Palestinian state from emerging.     More . . .

POEM  FOR  THE  DAY. . . . 

“ALI  OF  LYDDA,”  BY  REJA-E  BUSAILAH

Before the conqueror shot him dead
from the top of our roof,
he had on his head
as he walked homeward in the morning sun
a tray made of straw and of circles,
none vicious though:
each flowed into the next
from small to large to larger rounds:

the first bore the transformation
of the dream of wheat, its ears still close to the ground,
into loaves of exciting breath;
the second of a humble communion
of young and old breaking bread into lasting bond
under the sanctity of one roof;
the third of modest hopes
which rose and tossed like one vast field shedding green
in the wind and ripening sun;
the fourth of a dream beyond,
half formed, half grasped –

after he shot him dead
and the tray fell in a manner undignified
and the bread tumbled and scattered
on hot hard stone
in shapes of heads rolling about a sanctuary,
I heard the conqueror on the high roof
under the bare sky,
I heard him snort
I heard him spit on the ground
I heard him piss
through the eye of light.

From BEFORE  THERE  IS  NOWHERE  TO  STAND:  PALESTINE  ISREL  POETS  RESPOND  TO  THE  STRUGGLE. Ed. By Joan Dobbie and Grace Beeler. Sandpoint ID: Lost Horse Press, 2012.  Available from B&N.

“. . . an impossible burden weighs down . . .” (Majid Abu Ghoush)

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EmadShteiwi-e1537738542948
Shot with a live round in the head, east of Gaza city, Emad Daoud Eshteiwi, 21. Sept. 24, 2018. (Photo: IMEMCNews.)

SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY. . .

REPORT:  SETTLEMENT  ACTIVITIES  ESCALATED,  PARTICULARLY  IN  JERUSALEM  AND  JORDAN  VALLEY 
In his weekly report on Israel’s settlement activities in the West Bank, the National Office for the Defending Land and Resisting Settlements (NBPRS) reported, that  Israel’s settlement activities cover all the West Bank governorates encouraged by the US, and the absence of the international accountability. The Netanyahu government continues its grave violations of international law that amount to war crimes through demolishing and displacing the Palestinians, and at the same time legitimizing settlement outposts and confiscating Palestinian land the last of which a plan no 3/515, which aims to expand the settlement of Tina by building 135 new settlement units on 260 dunums of the lands of the Dahiriya town.    More . . .

ISRAEL  IMPOSES  8  DAY  CLOSURE  ON  WEST  BANK,  GAZA
The Israeli authorities declared an 8-day closure on the occupied West Bank and the besieged Gaza Strip starting late Sunday until next Monday, the first of October, for the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.    ___The Israeli army spokesperson confirmed that the closure will be lifted off the West Bank on Monday, September 24th night but would be imposed again on Thursday night until October 1st.    ___Crossings with the Gaza Strip would remain closed until October 1st.    ___This is the third closure imposed on the West Bank and Gaza in the month of September. . .     More . . .

ISRAELI  SOLDIERS  KILL  A  PALESTINIAN  IN  GAZA
The Palestinian Health Ministry has reported that Israeli soldiers killed, on Sunday evening, a young Palestinian man, and injured at least 20 others, including one medic, along the eastern part of the besieged Gaza Strip.    ___Dr. Ashraf al-Qedra, the spokesperson of the Health Ministry in Gaza, said the soldiers shot Emad Daoud Eshteiwi, 21, with a live round in the head, east of Gaza city, and moderately injured a medic in the leg.    ___He added that the soldiers also shot twenty Palestinians with live rounds . . .    More . . .

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION. . . .

ABBAS  ARRIVES  IN  NEW  YORK  FOR  GENERAL  ASSEMBLY  MEETING
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrived Sunday to New York, in the United States, to participate in the 71st Session of the United Nations General Assembly, amidst calls from pro-Israel lobbying organizations that the U.S. should deny Abbas entry into the US.    ___President Abbas will be delivering a speech this coming Thursday, and also intends to hold many meetings with world leaders and international delegations participating in the General Assembly sessions.    ___He is accompanied by the Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Dr. Saeb Erekat, Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister Ziad Abu Amro, Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki . . .    More . . .
Related . . .    Premier  to  tell  AHLC  meeting  ending  Israeli  occupation  answer  to  economic  growth
Related . . .    Italian  motorcycle  rally  in  solidarity  with  Palestinians
Related . . .    Japan  funds  project  for  additional  classrooms  in  Salfit  village
Related . . .    Jordan  takes  steps  to  support  Jerusalem’s  Palestinians

EXPLOITING  GAZA  TOPS  THE  UN’S  HUMANITARIAN  AGENDA 
What would prompt the UN to assert, without reservations or calculated statements, that Gaza has collapsed in terms of humanitarian necessities? So far, the international organization has relied on projecting extended time frames; the result being that Gaza was forced into a currently irreversible situation while the UN saves face, or believes it does, by stepping in at its designated intervals.    ___On Monday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory announced through a press release that it was releasing $1 million “to prevent the collapse of life-saving services in the Gaza Strip”.    [. . . .] The funding crisis exacerbates the humanitarian situation because the political intent is to maintain the continuation of violating human rights. In its previous warning of the impending collapse in services, there is no mention of Israel.    More . . .
Related . . .   LACK  OF  MEDICATIONS  THREATENS  LIVES  OF  425  KIDNEY  PATIENTS  [GAZA]

NOTICES  FROM  ORGANIZATIONS . . . 

THE  PALESTINIAN  ASSOCIATION  FOR  EMPOWERMENT  AND  LOCAL  DEVELOPMENT-REFORM     REFORM strives for a society where everyone has the capacity to participate effectively, individual and collective rights are respected, and pluralism is ensured in an independent Palestinian state.   Donate . . .

POEM  FOR  THE  DAY. . . . 

OCCUPATION,”  BY  MAJID  ABU  GHOUSH
Occupied Ramallah 17/11/06

Strange days cast dour shadows
Dusk. The fragrance of death
on a windowsill.
In the lingering heat
an impossible burden weighs
down on eyelids and chest;
the throat aches, the spine throbs.

Rose petals all tarnished with foul dust
from the poisoned world.
Black limousines sail past, flying
the skull and crossbones.
The grave yawns open early,
nightmares never leave.
Death squads. Detention camps.

Somewhere, an oud
pronounces its sad chords.
The invaders smile; tap their feet.
―Translated by John Glenday

Majid Abu Ghoush is prolific poet and novelist, a member of the secretariat of the General Union of Palestinian Writers, and a founding member of Poets Without Borders, Palestine.
From A BIRD IS NOT A STONE: AN  ANTHOLOGY  OF  CONTEMPORARY  PALESTINIAN  POETRY.  Ed. by Henry Bell and Sarah Irving. (Glasgow: Freight Books, 2014).

“Israel works hard to remove us from our land.”   (Resident of al-Zarnouq Village)

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SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY. . . .    

BEDOUIN  FAMILY  LEFT  HOMELESS  AS  ISRAEL  CONTINUES  NEGEV  DEMOLITIONS
Israeli bulldozers escorted by heavily armed Israeli forces demolished a Palestinian home, on Thursday, in the unrecognized village of Al-Zarnouq in the Negev area of southern Israel.   ___. . . large numbers of Israeli forces raided the AL-ZARNOUQ village and began to demolish the house under the pretext that it was built without an Israeli building permit.    ___Sources confirmed that Israeli forces demolished a 130-square-meter home, belonging to Akef Abu Quwaider. . . .   ___Residents of the village told Ma’an that the “Israeli authorities refuse to grant us permits to build our homes and to live our lives. Israel works hard to remove us from our land.”   More . . .
ISRAELIS  BULLDOZE  PALESTINIAN  LANDS  TO  EXPAND  ILLEGAL  SETTLEMENT
Israeli bulldozers continue to level Palestinian lands in SHOFEH village, southeast of Tulkarem, paving the way for illegal settlement expansion.    ___Local sources said Israeli settlers continue to bulldoze Palestinian lands in Shofeh, in the northern Occupied West Bank, in an attempt to expand the illegal settlement outpost of Avnei Hefetz.    More . . .
NEW  ISRAELI  SETTLEMENT  OUTPOST  IN  NABLUS
A new illegal Israeli settlement outpost was set up, on Thursday, on Palestinian-owned lands belonging to the residents of the QARYUT village, in the northern occupied West Bank district of Nablus.    ___A Palestinian official who monitors settlement activist in the northern West Bank, Ghassan Daghlas, said that the residents of Qaryut were shocked to find out on Thursday morning that Israeli settlers set up a new settlement outpost on their lands.   ___Daghlas said that Israeli settlers set up five caravans, which were stocked up with water and other supplies, in addition to construction material in preparation to set up more caravans.   More . . .
EREKAT:  NO  ONE  CAN  REMOVE  JERUSALEM,  REFUGEES  AND  SETTLEMENTS  FROM  THE  NEGOTIATIONS  TABLE
No one can remove the files of Jerusalem, refugees and settlements from any future negotiations between the Palestinians and Israel, said Saeb Erekat, secretary general of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), on Thursday.    ___He was referring to statements by US President Donald that after he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and not recognizing the right of five million Palestinian refugees for return to their homes they were force out from after Israel was created in 1948 on their land, these issues are now off the negotiations table. . . .   ___“There will be no peace without East Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Palestine on the 1967 borders, without resolving the refugees’ issue . . . ”  More . . .

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION. . . .

‘ANTI-SEMITISM  AWARENESS  ACT’  THREATENS  FREE  SPEECH  [IN  THE  US]
Sheldon Richman     
In May the benign-sounding Anti-Semitism Awareness Act appeared before the U.S Congress “to provide for consideration a definition of anti-Semitism for the enforcement of Federal antidiscrimination laws concerning education programs or activities.”    [. . . .] While the act is directed at education, the resulting law would reach beyond that realm because it would officially stigmatize as anti-Semitic any speech and activity, public and private, said to fall within the definition. Since this would at least chill the open marketplace of ideas, advocates of free speech should be concerned about the content of the definition and its revealing support material. We must not assume that merely because the definition is said to brand something anti-Semitic that it is actually anti-Semitic.   More . . .

SATELLITE  IMAGERY  AND  THE  PALESTINE-ISRAEL  EXCEPTION
Zena Agha
In the United States and beyond, the rules that apply to the rest of the world have long applied differently to Palestine-Israel. In the US, this exceptionalism often manifests as censorship of Palestinian perspectives and operates on many different levels: On university campuses, Palestine has become the exception to free speech, and in local government, Israel marks the exception to the right to boycott. Remarkably, this exceptionalism even extends to the quality of aerial photography and satellite imagery of Palestine-Israel.   ___Bipartisan legislation passed by the US House of Representatives in 1997 limits the quality of aerial photography of Palestine-Israel available to the public through platforms such as Google Earth and Bing Maps. The Kyl-Bingaman Amendment (KBA) to the US National Defense Authorization Act restricts the availability of high-resolution satellite imagery by preventing satellite operators and retailers in the US from selling or disseminating images of Palestine-Israel at a resolution higher than that available on the non-US market. The result: limited access to clear aerial photography of Palestine-Israel.    More . . .

NOTICES  FROM  ORGANIZATIONS. . . .

US  CAMPAIGN  FOR  PALESTINIAN  RIGHTS  (USCPR)
We are excited to announce our national conference is taking place in the Twin Cities, MN on September 28-30, 2018.   ___TOGETHER WE RISE will be a space for people to connect with and learn from others working in support of Palestinian rights across the country, and renew our commitment to the struggle for freedom, justice, and equality.  [. . . .] The program includes sessions such as Resilience Across Movements, Updates from Palestine, Intersectional Feminism and Gender Justice, Palestine in US Politics, and Global Struggles for Collective Liberation. Confirmed speakers include journalists Mariam Barghouti and Marc Lamont Hill, human rights lawyers Noura Erakat and Hassan Jabareen, and Indigenous rights activists Waziyatawin and Coya White Hat-Artichoker. Dozens of workshops will teach us about the militarization of the US/Mexico border, how to harness constituent power to make change in Congress, hold a direct action. . . .    More . . .

“WE  SHALL  REMAIN,”  BY  TAWFIQ  ZAYYAD  – 1970

It is a thousand times easier
For you to pass an elephant through the needle’s eye
To catch fried fish in the Milky Way
To plow the sea
To teach the alligator speech, a thousand times easier
Than smothering with you oppression
The spark of an idea
Of forcing us to deviate
A single step
From our chosen march.
Like twenty impossibles
We shall remain in Lydda, Ramlah, and Galilee.

Here upon your chests
We shall remain
Like the glass and the cactus
In your throats
A fiery whirlwind
In your eyes.

Here we shall remain
A wall on your chests.
We wash dishes in the hotels
And serve drinks to the masters.
We mop the floors in the dark kitchens
To extract a piece of bread
From your blue teeth
For the little ones.

Here, we shall remain
A wall on your chests.
We starve,
Go naked,
Sing songs
And fill the streets
With demonstrations
And the jails with pride.
We breed rebellions
One after another.
Like twenty impossibles we remain
In Lydda, Ramlah, Galilee.

Here, we shall remain.
You may drink the sea;
We shall guard the shade
Of the olive tree and the fig,
Planting ideas
Like the yeast in the dough.
The coldness of ice is in our nerves
And a burning hell in our hearts.
We squeeze the rock
To quench our thirst
And if we starve
We eat the dirt
And never depart
Or grudge our blood.

Here―we have a past
―a present
―and a future.
Our roots are entrenched
Deep in the earth.
Like twenty impossibles
We shall remain.
Let the oppressor review his account
Before the turn of the wheel.
For every action there is a reaction:
Read what is written in the Book.
Like twenty impossibles
We shall remain―in Lydda, in Ramlah
And Galilee.

From THE PALESTINIAN WEDDING: A BILINGUAL ANTHOLOGY OF CONTEMPORARY PALESTINIAN RESISTANCE POETRY.  Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2011. Reprint from Three Continents Press, Inc., 1982

 

“. . . And gagging on disaster, My sad city choked. . .” (Fadwa Tuqan)

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SPECIAL    POSTING:    ISRAEL’S  DESTRUCTION  OF  SOCIETAL  INFRASTRUCTURE  IN  EAST  JERUSALEM

(Articles generally in chronological order. The first of several such single-subject postings.)

ISRAEL  BANS  ACTIVITIES  IN  JERUSALEM  CONNECTED  TO  PALESTINIAN  AUTHORITY  GOVERNMENT.
National Public Radio (NPR)
Heard on All Things Considered, January 19, 2018.
KELLY MCEVERS, HOST:   President Trump has recognized Jerusalem as the capital Israel, but that doesn’t change Palestinian aspirations for a capital in part of the city. One thing that could strengthen these Palestinian claims would be national political institutions. NPR’s Daniel Estrin looks at how Israel has worked for decades to limit those institutions, whether they’re offices for leadership or even performances in theaters.   DANIEL ESTRIN, BYLINE: This used to be the Palestinian headquarters in Jerusalem – an old, stone mansion called the Orient House. Foreign diplomats were received here. The Palestinian flag used to fly. But Israel closed it in 2001 during a wave of Palestinian bombings. Israeli authorities deliver a new closure order every six months. It’s on the door for everyone to see.   More . . .

ISRAEL SHUTS DOWN PALESTINIAN INSTITUTIONS IN EAST JERUSALEM.
Asharq Al-Awsat.
February 3,2018.
The Israeli authorities decided on Friday to shut down a number of Palestinian institutions operating in the occupied city of East Jerusalem.   ___Internal Security Minister Gilad Erdan extended the order against a number of Palestinian institutions, including the Orient House, in East Jerusalem due to their affiliation to the Palestinian Authority.   ___The Israeli decision anticipated an expected decision from the PA to announce the city of Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian State.   ___Israeli sources said on Friday that Erdan’s order does not only involve political institutions, but also include a number of vital civil institutions, the East Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce, the Supreme Council for the Arab Tourism Industry, the Center for Palestinian Studies, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, and the Office for Social and Statistical Studies.
More . . .    Related . . .

PLO  CHIEF  DENOUNCES  CLOSURE  OF  PALESTINIAN  INSTITUTION  IN  JERUSALEM.
Ma’an News Agency.
March 14, 2017.
Israeli authorities sealed off and shut down the Mapping and Geographic Information Systems Department of the Arab Studies Society in occupied East Jerusalem on Tuesday, with police detaining the center’s director, Khalil Tufakji, during the raid.
___PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat denounced the closure and “the illegal detention” of Tufakji, describing the man as “a distinguished scholar from Jerusalem.”
___Erekat said in a written statement that Israeli forces also seized the documents, computers, and equipment from the office.
More . . .

ANGER  AFTER  ISRAEL  SHUTS  DOWN  PALESTINIAN  UNIVERSITIES  IN  EAST  JERUSALEM.
The New Arab.
July 15, 2018.
Anger has spurred over Israel shutting down two Palestinian education facilities in occupied East Jerusalem, as Israeli plans to annex the territory continue.
___Israel closed down Hind al-Husseini College and Al-Quds University’s College of Art – both of which are located in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood – until further notice after banning an academic conference taking place and detaining 15 participants.
___The conference was due to take place on Saturday at al-Quds University’s College of Arts.
___The two-day conference was organised by the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf and Heritage Reservation Society and was supposed to discuss the status of Muslim endowment and property, as well as the protection of Islamic and Christian heritage in the occupied city.
___The move was also condemned by the president of the Arab American University, Ali Abu Zuhri, who said Israel was taking exceptional measures to disrupt the Palestinian education system, according to Palestinian Authority news agency WAFA.
More . . .   Related . . .

OPINION:    DESTROYING    PALESTINIAN    UNIVERSITIES.
Haaretz.
Daphna Golan.
July 26, 2018.
As Israeli students are finishing their final exams, Palestinian students in the occupied territories don’t know whether their institutions will be opening for the coming academic year or if their lecturers will continue to teach, as dozens of lecturers with European and American citizenship are being expelled.
___Around half the foreign lecturers at Palestinian universities started receiving letters last November, saying their requests to have their residency visas extended had been refused because they’ve been “living in the area for more than five years.”
More . . .

EARLIER  REPORTS . . .

HOW  ISRAEL  IS  TARGETING  PALESTINIAN  INSTITUTIONS.
AL JAZEERA.
Ylenia Gostoli.
May 20, 2017.
[. . . .] According to the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, more than 30 Palestinian institutions and organisations have been shut down in the city since the 2001 closure of Orient House. Six-month closure orders have been continuously renewed ever since, in defiance of recommendations made in the 2003 Road Map drawn up by the Middle East Quartet as part of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
___”Targeting NGOs is targeting the presence of Palestinians in East Jerusalem. NGOs are the main body providing services, because according to Oslo [the interim accords signed by Israel and the Palestinians in 1993 and 1995], the Palestinian Authority is not allowed to be in Jerusalem,” Zakaria Odeh, executive director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, told Al Jazeera. “All policies, including house demolitions and residency revocations, have the goal to alter the demographic structure of Jerusalem as a whole.”
More . . .

ISRAEL  HAS  CLOSED  120  PALESTINIAN  INSTITUTIONS  IN  JERUSALEM  SINCE  1967.
Middle East Monitor.
February 17, 2014.
A Palestinian human rights organisation has revealed that the Israeli occupation authorities have closed more than 120 Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem since it completed its occupation of the city in 1967. Around 88 were closed down completely, while the others had to transfer their operations from occupied Jerusalem to the occupied West Bank.
___In a press statement, the Almakdasi Foundation said that the Israeli authorities have now closed-down the Islamic Club and Salwan Charity Foundation for a period of 30 days under the pretext of them receiving funding from Hamas and conducting activities on its behalf. This is despite the fact that both foundations have appropriate licences and Salwan presented evidence to prove its independence.
___The Almakdasi statement said, “These closures, along with all the others last year and every year since 1967, are part of Israel’s policy since the occupation began. The Israeli occupation authorities are trying to obliterate Palestinian identity and institutions.” The first to go was the Arab Jerusalem Municipality which was closed by the Israelis in 1967.
More . . .

“MY  SAD  CITY,”  BY  FADWA  TUQAN

(The day of Zionist Occupation, June 27, 1967)

The day we saw death and betrayal,
The tide ebbed.
The windows of the sky closed,
And the city held its breath.
The day the waves were vanquished, the day
The ugliness of the abyss revealed its true face,
Hope turned to ashes,
And gagging on disaster,
My sad city choked.

Gone were the children and the songs,
There was no shadow, no echo.
Sorrow crawled naked in my city,
With bloodied footsteps,
Silence reigned in the city,
Silence like crouching mountains,
Mysterious like the night, tragic silence,
Burdened,
Weighed down with death and defeat.
Alas! My sad and silent city.
Can it be true that in the season of harvest,
Grain and fruit have turned to ashes?
Alas! That this should be the fruit of all the journeying!
―Translated by A.M. Elmesseri

From  BEFORE  THERE  IS  NOWHERE  TO  STAND:  PALESTINE  ISRAEL  POETS  RESPOND  TO  THE  STRUGGLE.  Ed. By Joan Dobbie and Grace Beeler. Sandpoint ID: Lost Horse Press, 2012. Available from B&N.

“. . . my aim was to declare that the day . . .” (Ahmad Dahbour)

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SELECTED   NEWS   OF   THE   DAY

[Note: “See also” indicates a related story rather than additions to the linked story.]

ISRAELI  SETTLERS  RAID,  VANDALIZE  PROPERTY  IN  NABLUS
A group of Israeli settlers raided a number of Palestinian homes and vandalized vehicles, on Thursday, in the Urif village in the northern occupied West Bank district of Nablus.   ___Ghassan Daghlas, an official who monitors settlement activity in the northern West Bank, told Ma’an that Israeli settlers from the illegal Israeli settlement of Yitzhar stormed the Urif village and raided several Palestinian homes in the eastern part of the village.   More. . .  See also. . .
ISRAELI  FORCES  TO  DEMOLISH  PALESTINIAN  HOUSE  SOUTH  OF  BETHLEHEM    Israeli forces Wednesday delivered a demolition order for a Palestinian house in al-Khader village, south of Bethlehem, said a local activist.   ___Hassan Breijah, Coordinator of Anti-Wall and Settlement Committee, said that Israeli forces raided the town and handed Sameeh Ahmad Salah an order to demolish his house. . . under the pretense of unlicensed building. . . . in the southern section of the town, known as Khirbet ‘Alya. . .    ___He pointed out that the planned demolition is connected with an Israeli plan to construct a settler-only bypass road that would serve as a northern entrance to Efrat settlement.   More. . .
ISRAEL  ALLOWS  HUNDREDS  OF  THOUSANDS  OF  SETTLERS  TO  CARRY  GUNS      Israel’s Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan stated that Israel has eased the criteria for the obtainment of personal gun permits, Israel Hayom reported.   ___The move is expected to lead to hundreds of thousands of Israelis applying for a license.   ___The law is for new license applicants and holders of existing licenses, according to the sources.   More. . .
ONE  OF  PALESTINE’S  MOST  POPULAR  JOURNALISTS  IS  IN  JAIL  FOR  INCITEMENT
Oren Ziv
Ali Dar Ali was arrested for two posts he published on Facebook. But the prosecution and the judge are far more concerned with his large following than the content of the posts.    ___Israeli forces arrested Ali Dar Ali, one of the most renowned Palestinian journalists in the West Bank, at his home near Ramallah last week, for incitement to violence. . . .   ___Ali, who has been working for Palestinian television since 2007, is known for broadcasting live from demonstrations in the occupied territories, where he routinely documents clashes between young Palestinians and the army, as well as IDF raids on villages. Often times, he is the only journalist that covers these events as they unfold, and thus is able to document daily life under occupation from up close.   More. . .

COMMENTARY    AND    OPINION

EMBATTLED  TRUMP  STARTLES  ISRAEL  BY  DEMANDING  ‘HIGHER  PRICE’  FOR  HIS  DELUSIONAL  ACHIEVEMENTS  ON  JERUSALEM  The president’s claim that the future of the city was off the table is a mix of balderdash and poppycock wrapped in pure rubbish
Chemi Shalev
Donald Trump starred in the main headlines in Israel on Wednesday morning, just as he did in the United States, but for completely different reasons. Americans were reeling. . .   Israelis, on the other hand, were more flabbergasted by a few sentences that Trump uttered, intentionally or inadvertently, in his campaign-style rally in West Virginia.   ___The term that grabbed people was “higher price.” Israel would have to pay a “higher price,” Trump said, in return for his decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem. It’s the Palestinians’ turn, he said in his typical third-grade lingo, “to get something good.”   More. . .

IN  RESPONSE  TO  TRUMP  STATEMENT :  EREKAT  SAYS  THERE  IS  NO  PRICE  FOR  JERUSALEM
Secretary of the Executive Committee for Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Dr. Saeb Erekat, responded to US President Donald Trump and his National Security Advisor John Bolton statements about the removal of  Jerusalem from the negotiating table in the future by saying that there is no price for Jerusalem”.   ___Erekat added in his respons PNN received by Email that without East Jerusalem including Holy Haram, Church of the Holy Sepulcher, its old town and its walls as Palestaine capital there will be no meaning of Palestinian state”.   ___He added that Trump, Bolton and Netanyahu must understand that there will no peace without East Jerusalem as the capital of the state of Palestine on the 1967 borders.   More. . .

ISRAELI  RESTRICTIONS  STRANGLE  GAZA’S  CANCER  PATIENTS
Ahmad Kabariti
For the fourth time in two months, Nevin Abu El-Jidian failed to cross the Erez checkpoint, which separates the Gaza Strip from Israel and the West Bank. Israeli authorities asked her to come back again with an updated radiograph of her breast cancer. “The officer told me I have to go back to Gaza and take an updated one.” But, even then, passage into Israel is not guaranteed, the officer told her.    ___[. . . .] According to testimony collected by the Physicians for Human Rights – Israel, officers at the Erez crossing often exploit vulnerable patients to obtain information, forcing them to inform on friends and family. Refusal to collaborate results in denying passage to these patients.   More. . . See also. . .

THE  LANGUAGE  OF  PALESTINIAN  FREEDOM
Steven Salaita
Ash Sarkar, of “I’m literally a communist” fame, recently set Palestine Twitter ablaze with an unusual pronouncement: “. . . I’m making a decision to try and speak of Palestinians’ right to protection and self-defence rather than resistance.”   ___ Reaction against this message was swift. . . Palestinian critics, many of whom patiently explained the importance of terms like “resistance.”  ___[. . . .] “Resistance” doesn’t simply denote obstinacy; it connotes political and economic self-realization. “Fighting” isn’t an irrational desire to inflict harm; it is a necessary survival mechanism.  The colony cannot maintain its endurance without antagonism.   More. . .

NOTICES  FROM  ORGANIZATIONS

SABEEL  ECUMENICAL  LIBERATION  THEOLOGY  CENTER  (JERUSALEM)
Fall Witness Visit: October 30th – November 7th
Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center invites you to join us for 9 nights to experience the reality of life in today’s Holy Land. . .    ___Meet and reflect with Palestinian Christians and Muslims as well as with Jewish Israelis and internationals who partner with Sabeel in non-violent resistance against the violation of international and humanitarian law   More. . .
AUGUST  24TH  REPORT  FROM  THE  FRONTLINES:  USPCN’S  DELEGATION  TO  PALESTINE  (CHICAGO)
Attend this report back of the first USPCN delegation in eight years! Muhammad Sankari, Bassem Kawar, and Danya Zituni are the featured presenters.   More. . .

“OUR  COUNTRY,”  BY  AHMAD DAHBOUR
Who is it calls like this?
Who are you, Sir?
It was as if I had heard a voice that knew me, and perhaps for
you it was the same? Or am I mistaken? If I am, I ask your
forgiveness, Sir. For what reason do you think I would contrive
this dialogue? Believe me, I have no ulterior motive. But
let us assume I have faked this dialogue; my aim was to
declare that the day . . . Please listen, and don’t go away.
On our land exists a wall which we would like to have converted
into a room, only we weren’t granted building permission.
What can I say? Are these utensils sold in the market place?

Do you think that I am in the secret police? Then why are you
afraid of me? I’m only interested in words. So let it go if
I expressed myself badly. It is my country.
Don’t we have the right here to shake hands?
To form a friendship of sorts?
An adversary? A pal who forgives?
Or a passer-by who calls our name?
Don’t we have that right?
Isn’t it our country?
Did you hear a voice? Who is it that calls like this?
Who is it who calls our name?
—Trans. Lena Jayyusi and Jeremy Reed
—From Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature, Columbia University Press, 1992.

“. . . You may impose a nightmare of your terror . . .” (Samih Al-Qasim)

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❶ Tayseer Khaled: The Declaration of Independence Still The Guiding Standard of Our National Struggle

  • Background: Palestinian Statehood: Trapped between Rhetoric and Realpolitik.” International & Comparative Law Quarterly

❷ FM Malki says Palestine will not accept blackmail on PLO mission in US
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) European medical delegation conducts surgeries in Gaza
❸ Opinion/Analysis: The international community should prioritize Palestine’s security
❹ POETRY by Samih Al-Qasim
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ TAYSEER  KHALED:  THE  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE  STILL  THE  GUIDING  STANDARD  OF  OUR  NATIONAL  STRUGGLE
Palestine News Network – PNN
Nov. 18, 2017 ― In commemorating the 29th anniversary of the Palestinian Declaration of Independence, member of the PLO’s Executive Committee, Head of the Palestinian Expatriate Affairs Department , Tayseer Khaled, said that the Declaration adopted by the Palestinian National Council at its 19th session held in Algiers on Nov. 1988, remains a compass for our national struggle as well as the right to self-determination, the right of return and the right to establish a Palestinian State on all the occupied Palestinian territories of the 1967 aggression, on top of which Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the people and State of Palestine.
___Adding, the Palestinian people’s rights as specified in the Declaration of Independence are inalienable and will not be a negotiating issue.
___The American administration shall not waste time in promoting solutions that deny these rights. . .  the administration intends to provide what it named an “Deal of the Century” [which] has nothing to do with the international legitimacy’s resolutions, and it will be rejected by the Palestinians, stressing the need to return to the Palestinian Central Council and the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s resolutions, and to rebuild the relationship with Israel being an occupying colonial and apartheid state.   MORE . . .

Eden, Paul.
“II.  PALESTINIAN  STATEHOOD:  TRAPPED  BETWEEN  RHETORIC  AND  REALPOLITIK.”
INTERNATIONAL  &  COMPARATIVE  LAW  QUARTERLY, vol. 62, no. 1, Jan. 2013, pp. 225-239.
[. . . .] On 22 November 1974, UNGA Resolution 3237 (XXIX) granted the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) observer status in its capacity as a national liberation movement. Resolution 3237 included the right of the PLO ‘to participate as an observer in the sessions and the work of all international conferences convened under the auspices of other organs of the United Nations’. . . .  On 15 December 1988, the UNGA adopted Resolution 43/177 that acknowledged the proclamation of the State of Palestine by the Palestine National Council on 15 November 1988, affirmed the sovereignty of the Palestinian people over their territory occupied since 1967, and decided that effective as of 15 November 1988, the designation of ‘Palestine’ should be used in place of the designation ‘Palestine Liberation Organization’ in the United Nations system. . .
[. . . .] On 7 July 1998, the UNGA adopted Resolution 52/250, conferring additional rights and privileges on Palestine regarding participation in the work of the UN that had previously been reserved for Member States. . .  [. . . .] One of the key problems with the assertion that the entity under the control of the Palestinian Authority (PA) is a State for the purposes of international law is the fact that both the 1993 Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements (‘DOP’) and the 1995 Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (‘Interim Agreement’) clearly indicate that the Palestinian Authority lacks the capacity to conduct foreign relations.
[. . . .] There can be little doubt that the Palestinians have a right of self-determination but the powers currently possessed by the Palestinian Authority fall short of the independence necessary for Palestine (as currently constituted) to be regarded as a sovereign State. The fact that over two-thirds of the Member States of the United Nations currently recognize the existence of the State of Palestine is more indicative of a rhetorical commitment to the realization of Palestinian self-determination than anything else. As James Crawford notes, ‘[s]elf-determination, while it may and often does lead to statehood, is not the same thing as statehood.’ [. . . .]    FULL ARTICLE . . .

❷ FM  MALKI  SAYS  PALESTINE  WILL  NOT  ACCEPT  BLACKMAIL  ON  PLO  MISSION  IN  US     
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA 
Nov. 18, 2017 ― The Palestinian leadership will not accept any blackmail or pressure regarding the operation of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) delegation in Washington or negotiations, Foreign Minister Riyad Malki said on Saturday.
___He told Voice of Palestine Radio that his US counterpart, Rex Tillerson, had not yet signed the memorandum that is issued every six months and which allows the PLO mission’s office in Washington to remain open despite the expiration of the previous memorandum two days ago.
___He said that the US Secretary of State signs this memorandum based on his conviction that the PLO has not done anything that would affect the situation that exists on the ground.
___Malki said that failure to sign the memorandum so far may be part of US measures aimed at pressuring the leadership or create confusion in relation to several political topics.   MORE . . .
RELATED . . .   ..  US  THREATENS  TO  CLOSE  PLO  OFFICE  IN  WASHINGTON
. . . . . ❷ ― (ᴀ) EUROPEAN  MEDICAL  DELEGATION  CONDUCTS  SURGERIES  IN  GAZA
The Palestinian Information Center 
Nov. 18, 2017 ― A delegation from the Palestinian Doctors Union in Europe, France branch, on Saturday performed a series of qualitative surgeries in a number of hospitals in the Gaza Strip.
___The PIC reporter said that the medical crew conducted surgeries in al-Shifa, Nasser and Indonesian hospitals in Gaza in coordination with the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund.
___Director of the Gaza office of the Palestinian Doctors Union, Dr. Ahmad Abu Nada, said that the delegation, composed of two doctors named Nizar Badran and Raouf Salati, participated in the seventh conference organized by the faculty of medicine at the Islamic University of Gaza under the title “Health Crisis and Disaster Management in the Gaza Strip”.   MORE . . .
❸ OPINION/ANALYSIS:  THE  INTERNATIONAL  COMMUNITY  SHOULD  PRIORITIZE  PALESTINE’S  SECURITY 
The Palestinian Information Center
Nov. 17, 2017  The reconciliation agreement between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas increasingly resembles other political miscalculations which the international community still upholds as significant reference points . . . .
___Upon Hamas returning control of Gaza’s border crossings to the PA, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov, issued a statement that is flawed on many counts. Not only does it marginalise Hamas’s major political role in Palestine . . .   by completely failing to mention the movement, but it also insinuates that the reconciliation agreement constitutes “positive momentum”. . . .
___“I take this opportunity,” said Mladenov, “to remind all factions in Gaza of the importance of maintaining security and ending militant activities that undermine peace and security for both Palestinians and Israelis alike.” There was no mention of militant Israeli activities which underpin the occupation and siege of the coastal territory.
___According to Hamas, the UN official’s comments provided “cover for more Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people.”  [. . . .] there are elements missing from Hamas’s criticism which would shed more light upon the dismissive attitude of the international community towards Palestinians in Gaza.    MORE . . .

“I  MAY  LOSE  MY  DAILY  BREAD,”  BY  SAMIH  AL-QASIM
I may lose my daily bread, if you wish
I may hawk my clothes and bed
I may become a stonecutter, or a porter
Or a street sweeper
I may search in animal dung for food
I may collapse, naked and starved
Enemy of light
I will not compromise
And to the end
I shall fight.
You may rob me of the last span of my land
You may ditch my youth in prison holes
Steel what my grandfather left me behind:
Some furniture or clothes and jars,
You may burn my poems and books
You may feed your dog on my flesh
You may impose a nightmare of your terror
On my village
Enemy of light
I shall not compromise
And to the end
I shall fight.

“Poems of Resistance: 7 Poems for Palestine.” SCOOP  WORLD  INDEPENDENT  NEWS. January 2011. Web. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO1101/S00522/poems-of-resistance-7-poems-for-palestine.htm
About Samih Al-Qasim

 

“. . . the political apparatus often actively amplifies the sense of perceived threat posed by the Palestinians . . .” (Shuki J. Cohen)

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hasharon
Jordanian visitors wait outside Israel’s Hasharon prison where they came to visit relatives jailed in the Jewish state, on November 25, 2008 in Hadarim, north of Tel Aviv (Photo: Getty Images)

❶ Netanyahu distorts a Palestinian’s helpless reaction to occupying soldiers to dehumanize Palestinian parents

Background from International Journal Of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies

❷ 41 Palestinian women, including 12 minors, currently held in Israel’s HaSharon prison
❸ Hundreds of Israeli settlers raid Nablus-area village
❹ Poetry by Lahab Assef Al-Jundi
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ NETANYAHU  DISTORTS  A  PALESTINIAN’S  HELPLESS  REACTION  TO  OCCUPYING  SOLDIERS  TO DEHUMANIZE  PALESTINIAN  PARENTS
Mondoweiss
Philip Weiss
August 4, 2016
Two days ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted outraged commentary on a video of an encounter last Friday between a Palestinian father and son and Israeli occupying forces in Nil’in, Palestine.
___The video showed Ayoub Sroor daring Israeli soldiers to shoot his three-year-old child, Mohammad.
___Netanyahu said:  “I’ve just watched a video that shook me to the core of my being. In just a few seconds, it shows why our conflict persists… What did this child do to deserve this? The answer is nothing. He’s innocent . . .”
___PLO General Secretary Saeb Erekat issued a statement that Ayoub Sroor had suffered numerous “physical and psychological attacks” from occupying Israeli soldiers, which led him to seek psychiatric treatment given to torture victims. Here is a portion of Erekat’s response:      MORE . . .

Cohen, Shuki J. “Breakable And Unbreakable Silences: Implicit Dehumanization And Anti-Arab Prejudice In Israeli Soldiers’ Narratives Concerning Palestinian Women.” International Journal Of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies 12.3 (2015): 245-277.

The dehumanization of Palestinians . . .  is a complex defense, whose borderline-level of functioning may be a result of the multiplicity and intensity of the conflict between the motives that it aims to reconcile: The need to identify with one’s comrades, the need to service and obey the state, the need to contain and handle denigrated and potentially dangerous inhabitants who are devoid of legal status or recourse, and the need to maintain a sense of self as a moral and humane individual . . . to name but a few components of this individual – and arguably societal – conflict.
___Such complex conflicts are not unusual in clinical settings, and common psychoanalytic praxis usually advocates for an empathic acknowledgment of the defenses that the patient mounts in an effort to mitigate them. . .  However, in the case of political conflict, gauging the “adaptability” of a defense is complicated by the moral relativism that nationalistic sentiments (and agenda) command.
[. . . .]
As with most defenses, the testimonies [of “Breaking the Silence” members] suggest that the use of dehumanization increases with perceived anxiety. Here, too, the question where on the neurotic borderline-psychotic spectrum of reality perception does the anxiety actually reside and who is the arbiter of the reality when it comes to gauging said anxiety is an added layer of complexity. This is particularly true when – as is often the case in the trauma-ridden discourse in Israel – the political apparatus often actively amplifies the sense of perceived threat posed by the Palestinians. Once again, whether this induction of anxiety is motivated by an anti-Arab prejudice or by a survivalist sense that inducing (hyper)vigilance in the troops will protect them is anybody’s guess.  SOURCE.

❷ 41  PALESTINIAN  WOMEN,  INCLUDING  12  MINORS,  CURRENTLY  HELD  IN  ISRAEL’S  HASHARON  PRISON
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 5, 2016
Several dozen Palestinian women, including 12 minors, are currently being held in Israel’s HaSharon prison, according to a statement released Thursday by the Palestinian Committee of Prisoners’ Affairs.
___The committee said in the statement that 41 Palestinian women and girls are being held in the prison, with some suffering from deteriorating health conditions, adding that Israel’s treatment of women prisoners is against international law, and requires “international institutions to end their silence” and to stop Israel’s “perpetual crimes.”
___The committee also called upon all Palestinians to unite behind the prisoners’ cause, highlighting the recent escalation of raids and assaults by Israel Prison Service (IPS) officials in recent weeks in response to a mass hunger strike under way inside Israel’s prisons in protest of the arbitrary detention of Palestinians without charge or trial. More than 300 Palestinian prisoners have joined the strikes.   MORE . . . 

❸  HUNDREDS  OF  ISRAELI  SETTLERS  RAID  NABLUS-AREA  VILLAGE
Ma’an News Agency
Aug. 5, 2016
Some 400 Israeli settlers entered the village of Awarta in the northern occupied West Bank district of Nablus in the early morning on Friday and performed religious rituals in the area, according to Israeli sources.
___Israel’s Channel 7 reported that the Israeli settlers raided the village as they were escorted by Israeli forces, prompting clashes to erupt between Palestinian youths, Israeli settlers, and soldiers.
___Israeli forces reportedly detained seven Palestinians from the village for allegedly throwing rocks at the settlers.    MORE . . .      

settlers_guns1111
Israeli Settlers Invade Qasra Village Near Nablus, February 21, 2013 (Photo: occupiedpalestine)

“COLLATERAL  SAVAGE,”  BY  LAHAB  ASSEF  AL-JUNDI

Survivors of The Holocaust please
Talk to me. Help me understand―
So you sanction what’s being done
In your names?

I thought your spirits
grew more gentle
having lived through the unspeakable.

Bomb are not less lethal or evil―
Stop being so deathly afraid of the other.

A thousand eyes for an eye?
Children of the Holocaust
please do not lash out
as if you lost your sight.

Lahab Assef Al-Jundi
Lahab Assef Al-Jundi was born of Palestinian refugee parents and grew up in Damascus, Syria. He graduated from the University of Texas in Austin with a degree in Electrical Engineering. Not long after graduation, he discovered his passion for writing. He published his first poetry collection, A Long Way, in 1985. His poetry has appeared in numerous literary publications, and many anthologies including Inclined to Speak, An Anthology of Contemporary Arab American Poetry, edited by Hayan Charara, and Between Heaven and Texas, edited by Naomi Shihab Nye.
From BEFORE  THERE  IS  NOWHERE  TO  STAND:  PALESTINE  ISRAEL  POETS  RESPOND  TO  THE  STRUGGLE.  Ed. By Joan Dobbie and Grace Beeler. Sandpoint ID: Lost Horse Press, 2012. Available from Barnes & Noble.

 

“. . . It is my right to behold the sun . . .” (Fouzi El-Asmar)

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refugees
Photo and caption: Days of Palestine

❶ Israel Must Recognize Its Responsibility for the Nakba, the Palestinian Tragedy
. . . . . ❶― (ᴀ) The Israeli twins — Independence and Nakba
❷ Israel Controls More than 85% of the Land of Historical Palestine, says Statistics Bureau
❸ Hamas denies Israeli claims of Daesh presence in Gaza
❹ IN PICTURES: Israel clamps down on Nakba Day ‘return race’
❺ Palestinian refugees mark 68th Nakba Day in Haifa
❻ Opinion/Analysis: 68 YEARS: THE NAKBA CONTINUES
❼ POETRY by Fouzi El-Asmar
` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
❶ ISRAEL  MUST  RECOGNIZE  ITS  RESPONSIBILITY  FOR  THE  NAKBA,  THE  PALESTINIAN  TRAGEDY
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
Saeb Erekat
For the Palestinian people, the Nakba is a collective tragedy whose wounds have yet to heal 68 years later.  What we call the ‘Catastrophe’ is not just the destruction of at least 436 villages or the forced displacement of 70 percent of our people, but of our ethnic cleansing at the hands of a colonialist strategy. For reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians, Israel must recognize what it has done to the Palestinian people.
___It is time for Israelis to confront reality: when the Zionists came to Palestine, there were another people living here.      MORE . . .

. . . . . ❶― (ᴀ) THE  ISRAELI  TWINS — INDEPENDENCE  AND  NAKBA
Jewish Journal
Avrum Burg
May. 11, 2016
Independence Day is also the Day of the Nakba (in Arabic, the Day of the Catastrophe). There is no escaping it. Whether we like it or not, Israel’s story includes the Jewish story as well as the Palestinian one. Hence, the question that faces Israel today is a simple one: Can Nakba and Independence live together under the same roof? If the answer is no, there is an automatic result: We have to cancel the words and spirit of our Declaration of Independence (“… Israel … for the benefit of all its inhabitants. . . .      MORE . . .  

❷ ISRAEL  CONTROLS  MORE  THAN  85%  OF  THE  LAND  OF  HISTORICAL  PALESTINE,  SAYS  STATISTICS  BUREAU
Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA
May 15, 2016
The Palestinians Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said, the Israeli Jews utilize more than 85% of the total area of the historical land of Palestine, whilst Palestinians, who comprise 48% of the total population, utilize less than 15% of the land.
___In a report issued by PCBS to mark the Palestinian Nakba Day, the central bureau said, ”The Palestinian world population totaled 12.4 million by the end of 2015, which it stressed indicates that the number of Palestinians worldwide has multiplied about nine-fold in the 68 years since the Nakba.      MORE . . .

jews_stealing_palestine
Map from What Really Happened (http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/mapstellstory.html)

❸ HAMAS  DENIES  ISRAELI  CLAIMS  OF  DAESH  PRESENCE  IN  GAZA
The Middle East Monitor – MEMO
May 15, 2016
Palestinian resistance movement Hamas on Saturday denied recent claims by an Israeli army official that members of the Daesh terrorist group had recently entered the Hamas-run Gaza Strip from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
___“These allegations are promoted by the Israeli occupation; they are mere fabrications that have no basis in fact,” leading Hamas member Ismail Radwan told Anadolu Agency.
___The claims, he added, “seek to justify Israel’s decade-long blockade of the Gaza Strip”.       MORE . . . 

❹ IN  PICTURES:  ISRAEL  CLAMPS  DOWN  ON  NAKBA  DAY  ‘RETURN  RACE’
+972 Blog
Oren Ziv, Activestills
May 14, 2016
Abduallah Abu Rahmah, one of the leaders of the Bil’in protest movements, was arrested on Friday during a bicycle race in the West Bank to mark the 68th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba.
___Hundreds of Palestinian and international cyclists participated in the so-called “return ride” that kicked off in Ramallah and ended in the village of Bil’in, where grassroots protests against the occupation and the separation barrier have taken place weekly over the last 11 years.       MORE . . .  

❺ PALESTINIAN  REFUGEES  MARK  68TH  NAKBA  DAY  IN  HAIFA
Days of Palestine
May 14, 2016
Hundreds of Palestinians marked on Saturday 68th Palestinian Nakba Day as they organised ‘March of Return’ in occupied Palestinian city of Haifa.
___The march was organised in a site of a Palestinian village destroyed after its indigenous Palestinian residents were savagely massacred and some of them forced out by the Israeli Zionists in 1948.
___Organisers of the march said that it was held to highlight the internationally-recognised right of Palestinians, forced out of their homes, to return back.
___Palestinian members of the Israeli Knesset, activists and locals made their way to the destroyed village of Al-Tira in the outskirts of Haifa. The village was almost completely destroyed . . . .      MORE . . .  

❻ Opinion/Analysis:  68  YEARS:  THE  NAKBA  CONTINUES
International Middle East Media Center – IMEMC
Manuel Hassassian
May 15, 2016
The 15th May marks the Palestinian Nakba. The word Nakba means ‘catastrophe’ because that is exactly what happened in May 1948 when Palestine was wiped off the map [. . . .] 750,000 indigenous Palestinians were violently driven out of their homes in villages and towns and forcibly dispossessed by Jewish settler militias.
___Today, Israel is in ‘Nakba denial’. It will not acknowledge the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians which was perpetrated in order to create its self-declared state.   MORE . . .

“THE WAY,” by Fouzi El-Asmar

I shall not despair;
Whether my way leads to a jail,
under the sun
or in exile
I shall not despair.

It is my right to behold the sun
To demolish the tent and banishment
To eat the fruit of the olive
To water the vineyards
with music
To sing of Love
in Jaffa, in Haifa
To sow the fertile land
with new seeds
It is my right.

Let my way be
The reaching of one hand to another
That a tower of dreams be built.

This is my way
And if the last price to pay
is my sight
my life
I shall
but will not give up
my way.

El Asmar, Fouzi. POEMS FROM AN ISRAELI PRISON. Intro. By Israel Shahak. New York: KNOW Books, 1973.  Available from Amazon.
About Fouzi El Asmar.
Israel Shahak (April 28, 1933 – July 2, 2001) was a Polish Holocaust survivor and Israeli professor of chemistry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, known especially as a liberal secular political thinker, author, and civil rights activist. Between 1970 and 1990, he was president of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights and was an outspoken critic of the Israeli government. Shahak’s writings on Judaism have been a source of widespread controversy.

 

“. . . Is it from your hills that the angels sang to the shepherds . . .” (Jabra Ibrahim Jabra)

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Palestinian women shout slogans as Israeli police forces block Palestinians at an entrance of the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem’s old city, after Israeli police and authorities limited access to one of Islam’s holiest sites, July 26, 2015, following clashes inside the compound. (Photo: Oren Ziv / Activestills.org)
Palestinian women shout slogans as Israeli police forces block Palestinians at an entrance of the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem’s old city, after Israeli police and authorities limited access to one of Islam’s holiest sites, July 26, 2015, following clashes inside the compound. (Photo: Oren Ziv / Activestills.org)

(Please read “Purpose” above. Thank you.)

❶ PLO: Israel turning ‘question of Palestine into a religious war’
❷ Newspaper Review: Yeshiva Calls on Settlers to Enter al-Aqsa Site
❸ Israeli Police Demolish Stores Northwest of Jerusalem
❹ Review: Book of the Month, Four Cities, By Hala Alyan
❺ Opinion/Analysis: Why do they throw stones?
❻ Poetry by Jabra Ibrahim Jabra

◊  ◊  ◊  ◊  ◊  ◊

❶ MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
PLO:  ISRAEL  TURNING  ‘QUESTION  OF  PALESTINE  INTO  A  RELIGIOUS  WAR’
Sept. 20, 2015
RAMALLAH (Ma’an) – PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat released a statement on Sunday accusing the Israeli government of “enthusiastically trying to turn the question of Palestine into a religious war,” through its actions at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
____Erekat said in a statement that the PLO does not, and will not accept a religious narrative concerning the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis.
____Erekat also added that the increase in Israeli attacks against “the sanctity of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound” will not be accepted, and called on the international community “to assume its responsibility to protect the Palestinian people and their holy sites . . .
More . . .
Related . . .

❷ PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY – WAFA
NEWSPAPER  REVIEW:  YESHIVA  CALLS  ON  SETTLERS  TO  ENTER  AL-AQSA  SITE
RAMALLAH, September 20, 2015 (WAFA) – The three Palestinian Arabic dailies Sunday focused on calls made by a yeshiva school for Jewish settlers to take part in a large-scale entry to al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem, a move that will ultimately spark intense clashes between the Israeli police, settlers and Palestinian worshipers. [. . . .]
____On a different subject, al-Ayyam said the Israeli government is set to approve on Sunday an act that allows the Israeli police to use live ammunition against “stone-throwers” in Jerusalem.
More . . .

❸ PALESTINE NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY – WAFA
ISRAELI  POLICE  DEMOLISH  STORES  NORTHWEST  OF  JERUSALEM
Sept. 20, 2015
JERUSALEM, (WAFA) – Israeli police Sunday demolished five Palestinian-owned stores in the town of Hezma, just northeast of Jerusalem, according to local sources.
____An Israeli army force broke into the town in the morning and demolished five tinplate-surfaced stores, including a stone-cutting workshop, under the pretext of construction without a permit. [. . . .]
____Although Palestinians in East Jerusalem are living in a part of the internationally recognized Palestinian Territory that has been under Israeli military occupation since 1967, they are denied citizenship and classified only as ‘residents’ whose permits can be revoked if they move away from the city.
More . . .
Other IOF action . . .

❹ REVIEW: THIS WEEK IN PALESTINE
BOOK  OF  THE  MONTH:  FOUR CITIES,  BY  HALA  ALYAN
Reviewed by the TWIP Team
September, 2015
Black Lawrence Press, September 2015
Four Cities by Hala Alyan is a journey, on a heavy carpet, from New York to Damascus. Hala, who invokes elves and burning tires, is searching for home and love in places that everyone is trying to escape.
____In her second manuscript, which will be published this month by Black Lawrence Press, an independent publisher out of the United States, Hala brings to light Arabic words weaved with English in a way that only an Arab-American can.
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DANGEROUS TERRORISTS Palestinian youths throw stones towards Israeli border police during clashes at a checkpoint between the Shuafat refugee camp and Jerusalem November 7, 2014. REUTERS/Finbarr O’Reilly.
DANGEROUS TERRORISTS
Palestinian youths throw stones towards Israeli border police during clashes at a checkpoint between the Shuafat refugee camp and Jerusalem November 7, 2014. REUTERS/Finbarr O’Reilly.

❺ Opinion/Analysis
+972 MAGAZINE
WHY  DO  THEY  THROW  STONES?
Samah Salaime
Sept. 18, 2015
This article was first published in Hebrew on Local Call. Read it here.
Only in Israel can one speak about an intifada without mentioning the occupation. Only here can one change the IDF’s open-fire regulations without addressing what soldiers are doing on Palestinian land, with who sent them to walk around neighborhoods and cities, and for what purpose.
____Stone throwing has made headlines once again this week, and the entire establishment went into a craze over the question of “how do we deal with this?” Facebook was filled with creative answers, such as punishing judges who refrain from sentencing teenager stone-throwers to life. Any judge who shows mercy will not be promoted. The only thing lacking from this proposal was how to forcefully deal with these kinds of judges who also happen to be Arab. I suggest establishing a new investigative committee to look into how on earth these judges were appointed in the first place.
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“IN  THE  DESERTS  OF  EXILE,”  BY  JABRA  IBRAHIM  JABRA
Spring after spring, in the deserts of exile,
What are we doing with our love,
When our eyes are full of frost and dust?

Our Palestine, green land of ours;
Its flowers as if embroidered of women’s gowns;
March adorns its hills
With the jewel-like peony and narcissus;
April bursts open in its plains
With flowers and bride-like blossoms;
May is our rustic song
Which we sing at noon, in the blue shadows,
Among the olive trees in our valleys,
And in the ripeness of the fields we wait for the promise of July
And the joyous dance amidst the harvest.

O land of ours where our childhood passed
Like dreams in the shade of the orange grove,
Among the almond trees in the valleys―
Remember us now wandering
Among the thorns of the desert,
Wandering in rocky mountains;
Remember us now
In the tumult of cities beyond deserts and seas;
Remember us with our eyes full of dust
That never clears in our ceaseless wandering.
They crushed the flowers on the hills around us,
Destroyed the houses over our heads,
Scattered our torn remains
Then unfolded the desert before us,
With valleys writhing in hunger
And blue shadows
Scattered into red thorns
Bent over corpses left as prey for falcon and crow.

Is it from your hills that the angels sang to the shepherds
Of peace on earth and goodwill among men?
Only death laughed when it saw
Among the entrails of beasts
The ribs of men,
And through the guffaw of bullets
It went dancing a joyous dance
On the heads of weeping women.
Our land is an emerald,
But in the deserts of exile,
Spring after spring,
Only the dust hisses in our face.
What then, what are we doing with our love,
When our eyes and our mouth are full of frost and dust?

From THE  PALESTINIAN  WEDDING:  A  BILINGUAL  ANTHOLOGY  OF  CONTEMPORARY  PALESTINIAN  RESISTANCE  POETRY. Ed. and Trans. A. M. Elmessiri. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2011. Reprint from Three Continents Press, Inc., 1982.
Available from Palestine Online Store.
About Jabra Ibrahim Jabra

The home of the renowned Arab novelist, poet, painter and translator Jabra Ibrahim Jabra was destroyed in an April 4 car bomb attack that also killed 17 people in Baghdad. Photo: Holly Pickett for The New York Times. MAY 21, 2010
The home of the renowned Arab novelist, poet, painter and translator Jabra Ibrahim Jabra was destroyed in an April 4 car bomb attack that also killed 17 people in Baghdad. Photo: Holly Pickett for The New York Times. MAY 21, 2010