zenekar
01-02-2010, 06:41 PM
Published on Saturday, January 2, 2010 by CommonDreams.org
Gaza Freedom March: What We've Accomplished So Far
by Robert Naiman
CAIRO, Egypt - Some of us reached Gaza and particpated in the Gaza Freedom March as planned. All of us significantly raised the profile of dissent - particularly, American dissent - against the blockade of the people of Gaza imposed by Israel and Egypt, with the backing of the United States and the acquiescence of Europe. The groundwork is being laid for future campaigning in the U.S. for "citizen sanctions" against the Israeli government that could help change the balance of forces influencing U.S. policy, so that U.S. policy becomes a force for peace, rather than continuing to perpetuate the Israel/Palestine conflict as the U.S. is doing today.
The New York Times (yes, the New York Times had two articles on the march) reported:
Hundreds of demonstrators gathered on both sides of the Israeli-Gazan border on Thursday to mark a year since Israel's three-week war in Gaza, and to call for an end to the blockade of the area imposed by Israel and Egypt. About 85 of the several hundred demonstrators inside Gaza were foreigners, part of a group of more than 1,000 who arrived in Cairo in hopes of entering the territory but who were stopped by the Egyptian authorities. After days of negotiation, Egypt permitted a small delegation to cross the normally closed border at the southern Gazan city of Rafah.
Hundreds of us - confined to Cairo - protested against the Israeli/Egyptian blockade where we were. Our protests in Cairo were front-page news in the Egyptian press - and were reported in the U.S. as well.
The Christian Science Monitor reported:
Unable to protest the blockade from within the territory, they have protested it from here. The result has been a tense confrontation between American and European left-wing activism and a repressive police state engaged in a rigorous four-year-long crackdown on critics of the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Medea Benjamin, an American citizen, cofounder of the antiwar group Code Pink, and one of the march organizers, says she and 50 other US nationals were "beaten up" by Egyptian police when they went to the US Embassy in Cairo to attend a previously scheduled meeting with embassy staff on Tuesday morning.
And the New York Times noted that:
One protester, Hedy Epstein, 85, a Holocaust survivor, arrived in Egypt from the United States on Saturday. She said she started a hunger strike on Monday. "My message is for the world governments to wake up and treat Israel like they treat any other country and not to be afraid to reprimand and criticize Israel for its violent policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians," Ms. Epstein said. "I brought a suitcase full of things, pencils, pens, crayons, writing paper to take to children in Gaza -- I can't take that back home."
It wasn't a starting point of the protest to highlight the role of the Egyptian government in enforcing the blockade. It was the government of Egypt which, by refusing to let us pass, put its role at center stage. The Egyptian government justifies its closure of the border crossing at Rafah by invoking "security" - just as the Israeli government does. The Egyptian policy is often explained as being a result of its opposition to Hamas - but enforcement of the blockade on Gaza by Egypt as a political weapon against Hamas is collective punishment of Gaza's civilian population - just as grave a violation of international law as the Israeli enforcement of the blockade.
Egypt's actions in enforcing the blockade are powerful evidence for the widely held Arab view that in their policies towards the Palestinians, Egypt's President Mubarak and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu are "tizein bilbass" - two butts in one underwear. The events of the last week have transformed the "Israeli blockade" of Gaza into an "Israeli-Egyptian blockade," something that will dog Egypt's international relations - including calls for sanctions against Egypt - until the siege has been lifted.
It is almost certain that new organizing around "boycotts, divestment and sanctions " against the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza will take place in the United States as a result of the Gaza Freedom March. There is a strong push from Palestinian solidarity activists in South Africa and Europe for American solidarity activists to do more to promote the "BDS" campaign. There are plans for a delegation of Palestinian and South African trade unionists to tour the United States, and for student activists in the U.S. to train other student activists to launch BDS campaigns at universities.
Greater activity in support of sanctions against the Israeli government in trade unions, universities, and churches in the United States could eventually change the political terrain in Washington, by legitimizing the idea that the Israeli government should face real consequences from the United States for continuing its present policies. This year we saw the Obama Administration's initial insistence on a total freeze of Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank fizzle out, in large measure because it wasn't backed by any "or else" - even the idea of conditioning a part of U.S. aid to Israel on a real settlement freeze failed to gain any traction. A newly invigorated BDS campaign in the United States could create hundreds of organizing hooks to build momentum for a real change in U.S. policy.
Robert Naiman is Policy Director at Just Foreign Policy
___
Vanunu: Our Duty to Speak Up
The absurd persecution of nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu did not relent on his release
by Duncan Campbell
More than five years ago, Mordechai Vanunu, a former technician at the Israeli nuclear facility in Dimona, was released from prison after serving 18 years for revealing Israel's nuclear weapons secrets. This week he was arrested again in Jerusalem, accused of talking to foreigners, in breach of conditions imposed on his release.
It was in 1986 that Vanunu told his story to the Sunday Times and was lured to Italy by a Mossad agent, where he was drugged and sent back to Israel, charged with treason and espionage. He emerged from prison in 2004 believing even more passionately in a nuclear-free world, and non-violence as a solution to the problems in the Middle East. His defiance has taken the form of talking to whoever will listen, and for this he continues to be prevented from joining his adoptive parents in the US or supporters who have offered him a home elsewhere. His latest arrest stems from a relationship with a Norwegian woman. As his lawyer said this week: "He is not accused of divulging any information. She is not interested in nuclear matters - she is interested in Mordechai Vanunu, who seems to be interested in her."
The absurd rationale for the restrictions is that he could still pass on damaging secrets to foreign powers. If that were the real reason, why was he initially told that he could leave the country if he just behaved for six months and did not talk to foreigners? Moreover, the idea that - a quarter of a century after holding a junior technician's post at Dimona, he has something dangerous to pass on is not remotely credible.
The real reason for harassing Vanunu is a vindictiveness towards a man who has been impertinent enough to come out of jail unbowed. Of course, if Vanunu had been allowed to leave the country, he would have drifted out of public consciousness. Now, every time he is arrested the world is reminded that Israel has a nuclear weapons facility, a fact used by its enemies to justify their own weapons programmes.
A terrific new documentary, The Most Dangerous Man in America - which will be seen in Britain soon - tells the story of Daniel Ellsberg, the whistleblower who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon papers about the conduct of the war in Vietnam, and faced the possibility of a 25-year jail term. Like Vanunu, Ellsberg had come across the secrets of what his government was doing and believed he had a duty to share it with the world. Like Vanunu, Ellsberg was vilified by his government; but the crude attempts to blacken his name backfired and Ellsberg was dramatically cleared. From his home in California, Ellsberg - now one of Vanunu's most consistent supporters - said yesterday: "I correspond to the American Vanunu, though Nixon didn't succeed in giving me the 115-year sentence he indicted me for." Without such whistleblowers prepared to risk their freedom, we would live in greater ignorance of what governments plan.
What happens to Vanunu is important for Britain and the British press. It was to London and the Sunday Times that he came with his story. It was from London that the first stage of his illegal kidnapping took place. The foreign secretary has this week rightly protested on behalf of Akmal Shaikh , executed for drugs smuggling in China. There is a similar duty to speak up on behalf of a man who trusted that Britain was a place where he could safely tell the world about the proliferation of nuclear weapons. As Yossi Melman wrote in Haaretz at the time of Vanunu's last arrest: "In a proud country that purports to observe the judicial and moral norms of the enlightened world, one might have expected it to take courage and allow Mordechai Vanunu to be free once and for all."
© 2010 Guardian/UK
Articles printed from Common Dreams | News & Views (https://www.CommonDreams.org)
____
Gaza Freedom March: What We've Accomplished So Far
by Robert Naiman
CAIRO, Egypt - Some of us reached Gaza and particpated in the Gaza Freedom March as planned. All of us significantly raised the profile of dissent - particularly, American dissent - against the blockade of the people of Gaza imposed by Israel and Egypt, with the backing of the United States and the acquiescence of Europe. The groundwork is being laid for future campaigning in the U.S. for "citizen sanctions" against the Israeli government that could help change the balance of forces influencing U.S. policy, so that U.S. policy becomes a force for peace, rather than continuing to perpetuate the Israel/Palestine conflict as the U.S. is doing today.
The New York Times (yes, the New York Times had two articles on the march) reported:
Hundreds of demonstrators gathered on both sides of the Israeli-Gazan border on Thursday to mark a year since Israel's three-week war in Gaza, and to call for an end to the blockade of the area imposed by Israel and Egypt. About 85 of the several hundred demonstrators inside Gaza were foreigners, part of a group of more than 1,000 who arrived in Cairo in hopes of entering the territory but who were stopped by the Egyptian authorities. After days of negotiation, Egypt permitted a small delegation to cross the normally closed border at the southern Gazan city of Rafah.
Hundreds of us - confined to Cairo - protested against the Israeli/Egyptian blockade where we were. Our protests in Cairo were front-page news in the Egyptian press - and were reported in the U.S. as well.
The Christian Science Monitor reported:
Unable to protest the blockade from within the territory, they have protested it from here. The result has been a tense confrontation between American and European left-wing activism and a repressive police state engaged in a rigorous four-year-long crackdown on critics of the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Medea Benjamin, an American citizen, cofounder of the antiwar group Code Pink, and one of the march organizers, says she and 50 other US nationals were "beaten up" by Egyptian police when they went to the US Embassy in Cairo to attend a previously scheduled meeting with embassy staff on Tuesday morning.
And the New York Times noted that:
One protester, Hedy Epstein, 85, a Holocaust survivor, arrived in Egypt from the United States on Saturday. She said she started a hunger strike on Monday. "My message is for the world governments to wake up and treat Israel like they treat any other country and not to be afraid to reprimand and criticize Israel for its violent policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians," Ms. Epstein said. "I brought a suitcase full of things, pencils, pens, crayons, writing paper to take to children in Gaza -- I can't take that back home."
It wasn't a starting point of the protest to highlight the role of the Egyptian government in enforcing the blockade. It was the government of Egypt which, by refusing to let us pass, put its role at center stage. The Egyptian government justifies its closure of the border crossing at Rafah by invoking "security" - just as the Israeli government does. The Egyptian policy is often explained as being a result of its opposition to Hamas - but enforcement of the blockade on Gaza by Egypt as a political weapon against Hamas is collective punishment of Gaza's civilian population - just as grave a violation of international law as the Israeli enforcement of the blockade.
Egypt's actions in enforcing the blockade are powerful evidence for the widely held Arab view that in their policies towards the Palestinians, Egypt's President Mubarak and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu are "tizein bilbass" - two butts in one underwear. The events of the last week have transformed the "Israeli blockade" of Gaza into an "Israeli-Egyptian blockade," something that will dog Egypt's international relations - including calls for sanctions against Egypt - until the siege has been lifted.
It is almost certain that new organizing around "boycotts, divestment and sanctions " against the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza will take place in the United States as a result of the Gaza Freedom March. There is a strong push from Palestinian solidarity activists in South Africa and Europe for American solidarity activists to do more to promote the "BDS" campaign. There are plans for a delegation of Palestinian and South African trade unionists to tour the United States, and for student activists in the U.S. to train other student activists to launch BDS campaigns at universities.
Greater activity in support of sanctions against the Israeli government in trade unions, universities, and churches in the United States could eventually change the political terrain in Washington, by legitimizing the idea that the Israeli government should face real consequences from the United States for continuing its present policies. This year we saw the Obama Administration's initial insistence on a total freeze of Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank fizzle out, in large measure because it wasn't backed by any "or else" - even the idea of conditioning a part of U.S. aid to Israel on a real settlement freeze failed to gain any traction. A newly invigorated BDS campaign in the United States could create hundreds of organizing hooks to build momentum for a real change in U.S. policy.
Robert Naiman is Policy Director at Just Foreign Policy
___
Vanunu: Our Duty to Speak Up
The absurd persecution of nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu did not relent on his release
by Duncan Campbell
More than five years ago, Mordechai Vanunu, a former technician at the Israeli nuclear facility in Dimona, was released from prison after serving 18 years for revealing Israel's nuclear weapons secrets. This week he was arrested again in Jerusalem, accused of talking to foreigners, in breach of conditions imposed on his release.
It was in 1986 that Vanunu told his story to the Sunday Times and was lured to Italy by a Mossad agent, where he was drugged and sent back to Israel, charged with treason and espionage. He emerged from prison in 2004 believing even more passionately in a nuclear-free world, and non-violence as a solution to the problems in the Middle East. His defiance has taken the form of talking to whoever will listen, and for this he continues to be prevented from joining his adoptive parents in the US or supporters who have offered him a home elsewhere. His latest arrest stems from a relationship with a Norwegian woman. As his lawyer said this week: "He is not accused of divulging any information. She is not interested in nuclear matters - she is interested in Mordechai Vanunu, who seems to be interested in her."
The absurd rationale for the restrictions is that he could still pass on damaging secrets to foreign powers. If that were the real reason, why was he initially told that he could leave the country if he just behaved for six months and did not talk to foreigners? Moreover, the idea that - a quarter of a century after holding a junior technician's post at Dimona, he has something dangerous to pass on is not remotely credible.
The real reason for harassing Vanunu is a vindictiveness towards a man who has been impertinent enough to come out of jail unbowed. Of course, if Vanunu had been allowed to leave the country, he would have drifted out of public consciousness. Now, every time he is arrested the world is reminded that Israel has a nuclear weapons facility, a fact used by its enemies to justify their own weapons programmes.
A terrific new documentary, The Most Dangerous Man in America - which will be seen in Britain soon - tells the story of Daniel Ellsberg, the whistleblower who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon papers about the conduct of the war in Vietnam, and faced the possibility of a 25-year jail term. Like Vanunu, Ellsberg had come across the secrets of what his government was doing and believed he had a duty to share it with the world. Like Vanunu, Ellsberg was vilified by his government; but the crude attempts to blacken his name backfired and Ellsberg was dramatically cleared. From his home in California, Ellsberg - now one of Vanunu's most consistent supporters - said yesterday: "I correspond to the American Vanunu, though Nixon didn't succeed in giving me the 115-year sentence he indicted me for." Without such whistleblowers prepared to risk their freedom, we would live in greater ignorance of what governments plan.
What happens to Vanunu is important for Britain and the British press. It was to London and the Sunday Times that he came with his story. It was from London that the first stage of his illegal kidnapping took place. The foreign secretary has this week rightly protested on behalf of Akmal Shaikh , executed for drugs smuggling in China. There is a similar duty to speak up on behalf of a man who trusted that Britain was a place where he could safely tell the world about the proliferation of nuclear weapons. As Yossi Melman wrote in Haaretz at the time of Vanunu's last arrest: "In a proud country that purports to observe the judicial and moral norms of the enlightened world, one might have expected it to take courage and allow Mordechai Vanunu to be free once and for all."
© 2010 Guardian/UK
Articles printed from Common Dreams | News & Views (https://www.CommonDreams.org)
____