Wednesday, April 29, 2009

June Actions in Rafah to Break the Siege of Gaza


(Arabic text below) 

WE NEED YOU! HELP US BREAK THE SIEGE OF GAZA! OHIOANS AND OTHERS, 
INCLUDING RAGING GRANNIES, CODE PINK DELEGATES AND INTERNATIONALS ARE 
PLANNING NONVIOLENT DIRECT ACTION AT THE RAFAH, EGYPT CROSSING IN JUNE 
'09 AND BEYOND. 

GOALS: 
1. DRAW US AND WORLD ATTENTION TO THE FACT THAT GAZA, PALESTINE HAS 
BEEN UNDER SIEGE FOR 2 YEARS. LITTLE FOOD AND MEDICAL SUPPLIES ARE 
GETTING IN AND EXPORTS ARE NONEXISTENT. GAZA CANNOT REBUILD AFTER THE 
DEC-JAN ISRAELI ATTACKS THAT DECIMATED THE 360 SQ KM AREA, WHERE 1.5 
MILLION ARE TRYING TO LIVE. 

2. PRESSURE THE US, ISRAELI AND EGYPTIAN GOVTS. TO LIFT THE BLOCKADE 
PERMANENTLY. 

********************* 

Let go to Rafah NOW! 

Dear friends, 

Till now, more 300 organizations and individuals from 26 countries 
have endorsed the call “International Movement to Open the Rafah 
Border” and we thank you 

As you may know, there are always people from all over the world who 
are trying to get into Gaza in order to bring aid to the Palestinian 
people who are living under a desperate situation. 

Thousands of tons of food, medical and emergency shelter aid including 
blankets and mattresses, donated by countries including the United 
States and aid organisations, are denied entry through crossings by 
the Israeli government but also by the egyptian government. 

The United Nations has stated that 900,000 Gazans are now dependent on 
food aid following Israel‘s 22-day assault on the tiny coastal 
territory. 
Only 100 aid trucks are being allowed into Gaza each day - 30 less 
than were being brought in last year and substantially less than 
before Israel’s operation ‘Cast Lead’: an attack that has left over 
1,300 Palestinians dead, the vast majority of them civilians massacred 
in their streets and homes. With over 5,000 injured and 100,000 
homeless, admittance of aid is crucial at this time. 

This is a fraction of the estimated 500-600 trucks deemed necessary to 
sustain the population of Gaza according to the United Nations. 
According to UNRWA, food trucks are delivering enough food to feed 
just 30,000 people per day. 

Hundreds of medical patients, the injured from this war and Israel’s 
previous invasions, are being prohibited from leaving Gaza for 
indispensable medical treatment. Over 300 people have died of 
preventable and treatable conditions, due to the ongoing siege staged 
since 4 years ago. 

In Charm El Cheik, the world leaders promised billions of aid to Gaza, 
but why if the borders remain closed and if aid trucks cannot enter 
into Gaza. 

So we must establish a permanent sit-in at the Rafah border till the 
siege, which is a war crime, will be lift. 

Our main goal is not one people or a group enters into Gaza but our 
goal is to lift the siege and also to help the Palestinians to move 
freely through the crossing, an application of international law and 
the respect for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (December, 
10th 1948).* 

During our sit-in, we will organize coordinated actions on both sides 
of the border with our friends in Gaza. 

So, in order to organize this action, we need to know: 

-          When can you join us at the Rafah border? 
-          Will you come alone or with a group? If you will come as a 
group, how many people are you? 
-          How long can you stay there? 
-          Would you want to help us in coordinating this action? 

As you can guess it, the Egyptian authorities will do their best to 
prevent you to reach the Rafah border, so we will give you all the 
information and contacts in Egypt you need. 

If you cannot come: 

May be you can help a friend, an activist to come (through 
fundraising) 

You can also communicate with media and all your surroundings 

In support of this action, we will launch soon a "mailing protest 
campaign" to embassies (Egypt Embassy in your country, and your own 
embassy in Egypt) and to your Foreign Office 

So if you intend to come soon or in the coming months or if you need 
more details, please contact us at : intm...@googlemail.com and 
gazadelegat...@gmail.com  440-623-0492 

In solidarity 

* Article 13. 
 (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence 
within the borders of each state. 
 (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, 
and to return to his country. 

حتى الآن ، أكثر من 300 من المنظمات والأفراد من 26 بلدا أيدوا الدعوة 
إلى "الحركة الدولية لفتح معبر رفح الحدودي" ونشكركم . 

وكما تعلمون، هناك دائما أشخاص من جميع أنحاء العالم يحاولون الوصول إلى 
غزة من اجل إيصال المساعدات إلى الشعب الفلسطيني الذي يعيش في ظل وضع 
يائس. 

آلاف الأطنان من المواد الغذائية والطبية والمأوى والمساعدات الطارئة 
الطوارئ بما في ذلك البطاطين والفرشات ، والتي تبرعت بها دول عديدة من 
بينها الولايات المتحدة ومنظمات الإغاثة ، ومنعوا من الدخول عبر المعابر 
من الحكومة الإسرائيلية ، ولكن أيضا من جانب الحكومة المصرية. 

ذكرت الأمم المتحدة أن 900000 من سكان غزة يعتمدون الآن على المساعدات 
الغذائية في أعقاب الاعتداء الإسرائيلي على قطاع غزة والذي استمر لمدة 22 
يوم. 
فقط  100 شاحنة من  المساعدات يتم السماح لهم بدخول قطاع غزة كل يوم –اقل 
ب 30 شاحنة مما  كان مسموح بإدخاله في العام الماضي ، وأقل بكثير مما كان 
قبل العملية الإسرائيلية 'ممثلون الرصاص' :الهجوم الذي خلف ورائه أكثر من 
1300 شهيدا فلسطينيا ، غالبيتهم العظمى من المدنيين الذين ذبحوا في 
الشوارع والمنازل. مع أكثر من 5000 جريح و 100000 بلا مأوى ، وقبول 
المعونة أمر بالغ الأهمية في هذا الوقت. 

 هذا جزء بسيط من ما يقارب 500-600 شاحنة التي تعتبر ضرورية للحفاظ على 
السكان في قطاع غزة وفقا للأمم المتحدة. ووفقا للأونروا ، فان شاحنات 
الغذاء توفر ما يكفي من الغذاء لإطعام 30000 شخص فقط في اليوم الواحد. 

يمنع المئات من المرضى والمصابين, من هذه الحرب والغزو الإسرائيلي 
السابق  من مغادرة غزة لتلقي العلاج الطبي اللازم والضروري. أكثر من 268 
شخص لقوا حتفهم من جراء أحوال صحية ممكن الوقاية منها ومعالجتها  وجاء 
ذلك نتيجة لاستمرار الحصار المستمر منذ أربع سنوات مضت. 

وفي شرم الشيخ،  وعد زعماء العالم مساعدات لقطاع غزة تقدر بالبلايين ، 
ولكن لماذا إذا الحدود لا تزال مغلقة ، وإذا قافلات المساعدات لا تستطيع 
أن تدخل إلى غزة. 

لذا لا بد لنا من تحقيق إقامة دائمة في الاعتصام عند معبر رفح على الحدود 
حتى رفع هذا الحصار والذي يعتبر أصلا جريمة حرب. 

هدفنا الرئيسي هو ليس فقط السماح لشخصا واحدا أو مجموعة بالعبور إلى غزة 
ولكن هدفنا هو رفع الحصار وكذلك لمساعدة الفلسطينيين على التنقل بحرية من 
خلال المعبر، وتطبيق القانون الدولي واحترام الإعلان العالمي لحقوق 
الإنسان) كانون الأول / ديسمبر 10 عام 1948 

وخلال الاعتصام ، فإننا سوف نقوم بتنظيم إجراءات منسقة على جانبي الحدود 
مع أصدقائنا في قطاع غزة. 

لذا ، من أجل تنظيم هذا العمل ، نحن بحاجة إلى معرفة ما يلي : 

-- متى يمكنك الانضمام إلينا في رفح على الحدود؟ 

-- هل ستأتي بمفردك أو مع مجموعة؟ إذا كنت ستأتي مع مجموعة ، كم  عددكم؟ 
-- إلى متى يمكنك البقاء هناك؟ 

-- هل تريد أن تساعدنا في تنسيق هذا العمل؟ 

كما تظنون ، السلطات المصرية ستبذل ما بوسعها لمنعكم من الوصول إلى معبر 
رفح الحدودي ، لذلك سنقدم لكم كل المعلومات والاتصالات التي سوف تحتاجون 
إليها في مصر. 

إذا كنت لا تستطيع أن يأتي : 

قد يكون لك صديق ناشط ممكن أن تساعده على المجيء (من خلال جمع التبرعات) 

يمكنك أيضا التواصل مع وسائل الإعلام وجميع محيطك 

دعما لهذا العمل ، فإننا سوف تبدأ قريبا " حملة الاحتجاج البريدية " 
للسفارات (سفارة مصر في بلدكم ، والسفارة الخاصة بك في مصر) ، وإلى 
مكتبك  الخارجي. 

حتى إذا كنت تنوي المجيء قريبا أو في الأشهر المقبلة، أو إذا كنت تحتاج 
إلى مزيد من التفاصيل، يرجى الاتصال بنا على: 
 intm...@googlemail.com 

مع كل التضامن 

مادة 13 

1- للجميع حق التنقل والإقامة ضمن حدود المنطقة التي يسكن بها. 

 2- للجميع الحق بترك أي بلد من البلاد من ضمنها بلده, وله حق العودة 
إليها متى يشاء. 

_____________________________________________________________

Friday, April 17, 2009

Inside, outside; The siege and the tunnels

100_1438.JPG.jpg


Gaza Update #4: Outside, Inside   [Photo] Posted by Lora Gordon [Photo]



I just wanted to comment on a few things that have really struck me

here. It's always really funny to compare the conversation we have on

the outside about Gaza to the conversations people in Gaza have about

Gaza.


- The motorycles. I don't remember ever seeing a motorcycle the first

time I came here in 2003. Now they are everywhere. There are

apparently 720,000 registered and thousands more assumed to be

unregistered. That's one motorcycle for every two people in Gaza. I'll

be riding in a taxi or hanging out with old friends and inevitably

people of my parents generation will start complaining about the

motorcycles, how dangerous they are, how many accidents they've

caused. I haven't had time to properly research it but a friend told

me the motorcycle craze started when Hamas blew a hole in the wall in

2006 -- you probably remember the pictures of people pouring into

Egypt and loading up on goods for 11 days. I guess motorcycles were

one of the things people brought back. Since then they've been coming

through the tunnels.


- Microwaves and toaster ovens are also new here. They're still

luxuries, but now more common and available to the middle class. Many

friends have them newly and it seems like people are having the same

debate about their dangers as we did in the US when they came out.


- A friend shared the most interesting analysis of the tunnels that I

didn't totally agree with but wanted to share. Her family's house was

destroyed in 2004, along with most of her neighborhood. Since then,

most of the former house owners have rented out their uninhabited land

for the use of smuggling tunnels. She said her family was one of the

few refused, even though they were offered $30,000 for the first five

years, plus 25% of the profits from goods coming in. She said she

opposes the tunnels on principle because they jack up the prices and

the goods that come in through the tunnels are only affordable to

comfortable families. Prices have more or less doubled for almost

everything since 2005. She said it would better not to have chocolate

in Gaza at all, than to have chocolate that parents can't afford to

buy for their children, and that if the tunnels were gone it would

show the true face of the siege on Gaza. I personally thought her

analysis was a little hardline, but find it really interesting how

there are two different conversations going on about the tunnels

depending on which side of the border you are. Outside, people debate

whether Hamas is smuggling arms in, and whether this justifies the

full-scale bombing of Gaza, and seem pretty oblivious to the much more

significant economic implications of the tunnels and how they affect

daily life here, which is much more debated here in Gaza. No one in

conversations about the tunnels here ever talks about weapons, which

are an insignificant part of the business. People here talk about

prices, class, and motorcycles, and debate the quality of the

different origins of imports. Syria and Hebron seem to be the highest

quality, with Egypt and Gaza unpredictable, and China affordable but

bad quality.


- How smart people are. Strange kind of poverty where people speak two

or three languages and have travelled and worked internationally, have

various diplomas, yet are unemployed, homeless, and locked in.


- The one foolproof way to get out of eating something is to say

you're on a diet. If you say you have a health problem, someone will

have something to feed you to fix it. If you say you don't like a

certain type of food, people assure you it's because you haven't

tasted their version of it. But if you're on a diet, no questions

asked. People here have a lot of respect for diets.


- I was told by folks in the ex-pat nonprofit worker community that

boycotting Israeli products is possible in the West Bank and in other

countries but not in Gaza, since most of the fruit, meat, and yogurt

is Israeli. The same friend who gave me the class analysis of the

tunnels also said this was incorrect and that she boycotts Israel. She

said you have to know where to go to find the right products, and

sometimes go out of your way to get them, but that it can be done. She

then helped me find yogurt from Hebron, which I had been looking for

since arriving here. Her attitude struck me as similar to people who

commit to buying organic food despite the inconvenience.


- The graceful and practical way people have of dealing with tragedy

that I find harder and harder to say new things about but constantly

find fascinating. People are so graceful about their lives that it's

easy to forget the horrors, which then strike you at the most random

moments. This morning I had one of those moments. I woke up in my

friend Sally's bedroom and opened my eyes to see a couple holes in the

wall stuffed with pieces of blanket and clothes. She's seventeen and

her bedroom is smattered with bullet holes because the family lives on

the border with Egypt and has nowhere else to go. The holes I was

looking at were on the outer wall and were patched in that way to keep

out the cold.


- Similarly, I was walking with my friend Nahed to Sally's house and

we passed a couple of houses with particularly striking Swiss cheese

walls and clothes hanging out to dry. I asked her, a little horrified,

if people actually live there, and she said in a very matter-of-fact

way that they did. She told me not to be upset; it wasn't like their

house was particularly dangerous; all those bullet holes had been made

in the Al-Aqsa Intifada years ago, and the only reason they were still

there is that building supplies are nearly impossible to get ahold of

or afford because of the siege. Two small children then walked outside

and stood picturesquely at the door and I took a picture.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Dear Senator, How's this for balance?

Don Bryant
Gaza Delegation www.gazadelegation.blogspot.com
4053 Akins Road, North Royalton, Ohio 44133-5354

4/8/09

Dear Senator:

I have recently returned from the Gaza Strip, Palestine. I was part of the US Gaza Delegation for Medical/Mental Health and Humanitarian Relief, sponsored by fifteen organizations in Ohio, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. Our purpose was to assess the damage to the people and infrastructure since the recent Israeli invasion and 20 months siege of Gaza.

Personally, in one respect, I am trying to balance the equation in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. I have been supporting the Israeli government and society for 25 years, by paying my county and federal taxes. My county real estate taxes that purchase Israel Bonds ($5,000,000 from Cuyahoga County)) helped finance Israeli settlements on Palestinian land, and helped support the construction of a thirty foot wall that separates Palestinians from each other and their livelihoods. My federal income taxes help finance the Israeli military; US military aid to Israel $3,000,000,000+ annually! As the facts of the Nakba, (the catastrophe - when Palestinians lost their home and lives in 1948) and the occupation of Palestine have been disclosed to me in the past decade, I have been moved to support Palestinian liberation with my words, my feelings and my whole self.

Every time that I contact you on this issue, you tell me that Israel has the right to defend itself against the Palestinian attacks. Israel is the aggressor here and has been for 61 years! Why do you and the US Congress choose to whitewash Israeli aggression in this unbalanced conflict?

When I went to Gaza I saw a nation of people living with less than the basic needs. The water is polluted. The electricity is intermittent. The cars and machines are without spare parts. The housing, schools, hospitals, colleges and government buildings that were destroyed by 22 days of attacks by Israeli forces, the world's fourth largest military superpower, cannot be repaired because of the blockade.

I met with people that have lost dozens of family members form Israeli bombing, shelling, sniper shooting and murder. One thousand, four hundred, seventeen Palestinians were killed in the massacre. Civilians comprised 85% of those killed. I saw children who were maimed by the attacks. I saw people, some elderly, who are in need of medical care and cannot acquire even basic medical needs due to the siege which has compromised the hospitals in Gaza.

Sixteen ambulances were targeted and destroyed by Israeli forces. Medical and paramedical aid workers were targeted, and killed. Civilians were targeted and killed in route to, and in the bomb shelters, such as schools.

Our government supplies Israel with the military arms that have slaughtered these people. This is morally reprehensible and illegal by the Fourth Geneva Convention, which protects civilians in war, and the US Arms Export Control Act, which outlaws weapons shipments to states that target civilians. What will you do to bring the Israeli government to justice? What will you do to give back the lives to the Palestinians that have been stolen from them by occupation, siege, and military attacks?

I do not believe that Hamas is instigating these attacks, nor does the majority of the rest of the world. US news coverage is biased towards Israel (www.ifamericansknew.org). Hamas and Palestinians are resisting occupation and siege and they do have this right under international law. I condone no targeting of civilians.

My tax dollars and US military aid to Israel are contributing to greater civilian deaths than the Hamas rockets and other acts of violence against Israelis. Overall, deaths to Palestinians compared to Israelis since 2000 is approximately 4 to 1. The death to children ratio is over 10 Palestinian children for every one Israeli child.

Israeli security will be derived from justice for Palestinians. This requires political will, not military aid.

Don Bryant