Testimony: the violence with which the "Seperation Wall" is being built
Following is a further piece of evidence of what is going on in the Palestinian villages whose land is being taken up for building the "Seperation fence". (In fact, the term "fence" common in the Israeli media, is misleading - what is being built is a monstrous wall, 8 metres high. The situation described in the following press release of ISM (International Solidarity Movement) makes aall the more necessary and urgent the Gush Shalom protest planned for tomorrow (Saturday, Oct. 26).
(...) At 2:30 pm today,[Oct. 23] the 17-year old Maher Arref went to his family's vegetable fields to gather some food for his home. Arref was ambushed by six Israeli military police, without warning and without dialogue. They beat him with their boots and rifle butts, stripped him and threw him into the nearby cactus plants, and detained him until 5pm. Activists from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) arrived shortly after Arref was released. Private Israeli security personnel, employed by the building contractors erecting the "Seperation fence", did not disclose any information about the incident and threatened to shoot the ISM activists when they persisted in inquiring about what had happened.
Arref said the soldiers claimed to have recognized him from demonstrations in the village earlier in the week and threatened to kill him and his family if they were to see him again. In the past week, residents of the village have stood in non-violent protest against the destruction of their land and olive trees, perpetrated in order to make way for the building of the so-called "security fence" which will isolate over 8,600 dunams of the village's agricultural land. The village was under curfew yesterday as a result of these acts of resistance. Today's event happened on the very time that the army declared that Palestinian farmers are free to tend to their fields and continue the olive harvest, rescinding yesterday's military order prohibiting Palestinian farmers from doing so.
All of the Arref family's agricultural land will be isolated on the western side of the security fence. ISM activists will accompany the family to their fields tomorrow morning.
ISM Contact information:
Nida Sinnokrot 972 (0)67 512 648
Michael McGrath 972 (0)52 694 380
Reminder: tomorrow (Sat., Oct. 26) Israeli-Palestinian-international demonstration
Tomorrow, Saturday October 26, we shall demonstrate, together with Palestinian inhabitants and a large group of international peace activists, against the wall of separation and hatred which is being erected to "separate" Israel from the West Bank - The Bad Wall - a Prison for Palestinians, a Ghetto for Israelis.
Meeting places
10.45: Arlozorov St. Railway Station, Tel-Aviv
11.30: Egedd Station, Kfar Sava
Please phone as soon as possible to the Gush office, 03-5221732, to ensure seats, and state name, phone and number of participants. Not later than Friday noon. Two-Flag T-shirts are appropriate.
What's bad about the wall?
"The Separation Wall" which is being erected, far from the media spotlight, is good only for the building contractors who line their pockets to the tune of millions and billions. For everybody else, Israelis and Palestinians alike, this wall is bad - very bad. It is locking the Palestinians in a prison - a ghetto, some would say, or a series of ghettos. And, in fact, it making Israel, too, into a ghetto from which the hope of ever achieving peace will recede further and further.
Under the cover of "security" and "separation", the regality of Aapartheid is being institutionalized. An enormous robbery of Palestinians lands is taking place, by erecting a wall between villagers and their fields and olive groves. Thousands of Palestinians lose their last remaining lands. Hundreds of demolition orders for Palestinians homes were already issued. Whole villages will be cut off from the rest of the West Bank. A whole city - Kalkilia with its tens of thousands of inhabitants - will become an enclave completely surrounded by fences, walls and checkpoints, a virtual prison camp. Palestinian daily life will become hell, even more than they already are - and that will have a direct impact on Israeli daily life as well. When the wall is completed, the whole West Bank will become pressure cooker in which masses of desperate and angry Palestinians will be imprisoned, together with violent and aggressive settlers and a trigger-happy army. Possibly, in the short range the wall will prevent a few suicide bombings (even that is not certain). In the longer (and not so long) range, the explosion will be enormous and terrible. By its very nature, this wall is a "solution" by brute force,. It is a continuation of the dangerous illusion that tanks and bulldozers enable Israel to unilaterally impose twisted solutions upon its neighbors. There can be no alternative to negotiations, to a peace agreement, to to an agreed border, to a reconciliation between the two peoples. Only this can give a new hope to the desperate Palestinian youths, remove their temptation to put on explosive belts and set out for Israeli cities. There can be no replacement to the Green Line as the peaceful border between the State of Israel and the State of Palestine. In a border of peace there will be no need of fence. In an ongoing occupation, without peace and without a border, a wall will do no good - on the contrary, it will cause untold human suffering and a grave damage to the chances of peace and reconciliation.
Report from the ground - the wall destroys daily life
We have decided to initiate this action, though knowing that several other worthy peace actions are scheduled for the same day, in response to an urgent call from the ground. The following is taken from a press release sent out a few days ago by the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) whose members maintain a constant presence in the villages directly affected by the construction of the "Separation Wall".
(...) The villagers have been protesting the illegal confiscation of the destruction of their precious farmland full of beautiful olive groves. The Israeli contractors have gone on working despite the villagers' appeal to the High Court. Villagers were accompanied by the ISM team to protest the illegal work activity. ISM members defied orders to make way for the bulldozers that were on their way to uproot the olive trees and farmland. ISM members and Palestinians stood their ground even when the army lobbed twelve tear gas canisters directly at the crowd and 3 sound bombs. The crowd only dispersed when soldiers started shooting live ammunition in the air and then aimed their guns directly at the crowd. One ISM member, Tom Winston from the Seatte area, was arrested and kept in detention for several hours, after standing in the way of the private security guards employed by the contractors. Later, two Palestinian brothers have been arrested for refusing to clear the site and let the bulldozers complete the destruction of olive trees on their land - Ehab Khaled (21 years old), and Fadi Khaled (17). At the time of writing [Sunday afternoon] bulldozers have now begun the destruction of the olive groves, belonging to the Khaled brothers. Palestinians and the ISM team are surrounding many other olive trees, so far untouched, to keep them from being uprooted.(...)
Similar reports keep coming in from village after village along the site of the intended "Separation Wall".
Another tragic week - an assesment of the situation
It has taken forty-eight hours to identify the charred bodies left in the wake of Monday's suicide bombing at Karkur Junction in northern Israel - young and old, soldiers and civilians, Jews and Arabs, fourteen random victims who happened to travel on an Israeli bus. Just as random as the lists of victims resulting from the wild shooting sprees by Israeli tanks and helicopter gunships at Palestinian population centers. (The excuse that civilians are not deliberately targeted, and the perfunctory apologies offered by government officials, are fraying thin when such killings of civilians have come to be an almost daily occurrence). This time, the Sharon Government - under strong pressure from President Bush, anxious with the faltering support for his Iraqi war plans - refrained from a conspicuous retaliation for the bombing, such as last month's siege of Arafat headquarters. Instead, the army opted for further tightening the already heavy burden of occupation, curtailing the meager "humanitarian measures" of the past month, and for petty acts of tyranny not big enough to get the attention of the international media. (The house of a bomber dead for half a year was blown up, as well as that of one already long in Israeli custody on charges of terrorism, on the doubtful theory that throwing their families into the street would "deter future bombers".) The cycle of occupation and oppression, hatred and bloodshed continues to roll, and the only possible solution - the end of the occupation - remains a distant dream. By now, it is obvious even to the most otiose that, however long Ariel Sharon remains Prime Minister of Israel, he will continue to talk in the abstract of "willingness to make painful concessions" while having no intention whatever of ever making these concessions or even specifying what they may be. Increasingly, the general Israeli public is becoming aware that the Sharon Government has driven the country into an impasse in all spheres - the never-ending war with the Palestinian as well s the fast-deteriorating -economic situation. The atmosphere of "national unity" which sustained Sharon in the past year and half seems in the process of breaking up. True, the highly-visible campaign to remove illegal settlement outposts, undertaken by Defence Minister and Labor Party Leader Ben Eliezer, lacks credibility. It is generally regarded as a transparent ploy in Ben-Eliezer's struggle with dovish claimants to the Labor leadership. Yet that very ploy is proof to existence of a dovish constituency in the Israeli society, a constituency which even cynical politicians must recognize and attempt to mollify...
Yesterday morning, dozens of high school pupils refusing to serve the occupation came to the Tel Hashomer Induction Center to accompany their fellow Haggai Matar, whose call-up date came due. Walking with him up to the very gate, they sang to the strains of a guitar which one of the youths brought along: "No, thank you, Mr. Sharon/ Go yourself to Hebron/ Damn your schemes all to hell/ We're off to cozy prison cell". Haggai got an initial term of 14 days, to be followed by further orders to enlist and further terms of imprisonment upon refusal. Later that day, family members visited Uri Ya'akobi, who had already gone four times through this cycle, and found him in good spirits and as determined as ever, though complaining of hard work at the prison kitchen. He was obviously on good terms with the non-political prisoners who comprise the majority of the prison population.
It is with fine young people like these that Israel's hope for a better future rests.
My Rights, Our Power: A Joint Campaign Launched in Palestine to Raise Awareness on Women’s Fundamental Human Rights
Date posted: March 09, 2019
By UN Women
1_March 2019, Ramallah – On the occasion of the International Women’s Day (8 March), a week-long joint campaign “My Rights, Our Power” was launched today in Palestine to raise awareness on women’s fundamental human rights. The joint effort, with participation from over 30 national and international partners from civil society organizations, media outlets, and international development agencies, targets youth, women, and men in various geographic areas in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza to promote women’s human rights in Palestine.
The campaign comes at a crucial moment when the anticipated adoption of the Family Protection Bill is at a standstill, raising concerns among national and international stakeholders about the consequences of such delay on safeguarding women’s fundamental human rights in Palestine. According to the Palestine report of the International Men and Gender Equality Survey (IMAGES), nearly one in five Palestinian men (17 percent) surveyed said they had perpetrated act of physical intimate partner violence against female partners, while 21 per cent of women surveyed reported having experienced such violence.
“Family violence, usually committed by a family member who has social or economic power over others in the family, causes enormous pain and suffering to all members of the family, especially the women and children,” said a spokesperson from civil society, which has vigorously initiated the development of the Family Protection Bill (FPB), and has strongly pushed its adoption since 2004.
“The violation of women’s human rights manifests in various levels and should be also understood from economic, cultural, and social aspects,” the spokesperson added, highlighting the lack of opportunities and freedom of choice, as well as limited access to justice and services that women in Palestine still experience.
The joint campaign aims to raise awareness of the general public, especially youth, women, and men on women’s fundamental rights in line with international standards and embedded in the Family Protection Bill draft endorsed by the previous Cabinet at the end of December 2018. Five key messages, addressing women’s right to a life free of violence, right to achieve justice and seek help in case of violation of such life, as well as the right to equal opportunities and right to make one’s own choices, will be distributed through various channels such as radio, social media, helpline (121), outreach activities, and on-site events. The closing event of the joint campaign will take place on 8 March in Jerusalem and will celebrate women’s achievements using TED-style talks, followed by art performances.
“My Rights, Our Power” joint campaign is part of the global International Women’s Day 2019 campaign under the theme of “Think equal, build smart, innovate for change”. The theme focuses on innovative ways in which we can advance gender equality and the empowerment of women, particularly in the areas of social protection systems, access to public services and sustainable infrastructure, echoing the theme of the 63rd session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW 63) taking place in New York on 11-22 March 2019.
The participating organizations of the “My Rights, Our Power” are (in alphabetical order): 17 Palestinian women’s organizations represented by Al-Muntada (coalition), British Consulate-General, Business Women Forum, CARE International, Consulate General of Sweden, Consulate General of Belgium, EUPOL COPPS, EU Representative Office, FAO, General Union of Palestinian Women, Government of Japan, CowaterSogema/GROW Project, International Labour Organization, Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, Ma’an TV, MIFTAH, Netherlands Representative Office, Nisaa FM, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Palestinian Working Woman Society for Development, Palestinian Family Planning and Protection Association, Representative Office of Canada, Representative Office of Denmark, SAWA, Sawasya II, Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, Sports for Life, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Representative Office of Norway, UNDP, UNESCO, UNFPA, UNICEF, UNOPS, UN Women, Women's Centre for Legal Aid and Counseling, Women’s Studies Center.
For more information, please contact Eunjin Jeong at UN Women via eunjin.jeong@unwomen.org or 059 2321 308, Majd Beltaji at UNESCO via m.beltaji@unesco.org or 059 4501 506.
