One of the few glimmers of hope in relation to the Israel-Palestine conflict in recent years has been the growth of a movement of international solidarity with the Palestinians calling for a just resolution to the conflict and utilising the techniques of nonviolent direct action to oppose the Israeli occupation, the best known example of which is the International Solidarity Movement (ISM).
Activists from around the world - many from the US and Britain - have travelled to the…
A few days before the bombing started, my friends Zaid and Asmaa and I decided, when the time came, we would be running through the streets of Baghdad together, tearing down Saddam portraits and letting down the tyres of US tanks. The fatal flaw in an otherwise perfect plan was that tanks don't have tyres, but it reflected what many Baghdadis told me. They did want rid of Saddam, but they wanted to do it themselves, not have the US and Britain invade and rescue - and impose their chosen…
International Solidarity Movement activists have been taking action with local Palestinians against the ongoing construction of the “apartheid wall”. (ISM point out: “The officially stated reason for building the `security fence' is to prevent the unauthorised passage of Palestinians out of the West Bank. However, the route of the so-called `security fence' does not follow the internationally recognised pre-1967 borders of the State of Israel”.)
The wall has recently gone up around…
Friday 11 April, Israeli soldiers shot another peace activist with the International Solidarity Movement. Tom Hurndall, a 22-year-old British civilian was shot in the head by the Israeli military, while trying to move Palestinian children out of the line of Israeli fire. The International Solidarity Movement was protesting at the Israeli military tactic of shooting into Palestinian civilian neighbourhoods, by making their unarmed presence known to the Israeli military. Tom was wearing a…
Answering an appeal from Palestine/Israel to help pick olives, I joined a group of friends from Switzerland for a couple of weeks (28 Oct - 10 Nov 2002) under the auspices of the YMCA and ATG (Alternative Tourism Group, Beit Sahour/Bethlehem).
Jerusalem, November 2002. Israeli Women in Black protest against the occupation PHOTO: FRANCO PERNAEntering Israel in Tel Aviv took a long time, but without major difficulties. We reached Bethlehem after a couple of hours, including a stop…
The gang of lads asked my name, then dissolved in giggles, slapping each other's shoulders, when I told them mine and asked theirs. Overcoming their shyness, they asked where I was from, how old I was, what I thought of Baghdad, and we danced down the street together to the clatter of drums and hand clapping.
It was an anti-war march, organised by the students at the Non-Aligned Students and Youth Organisation (NASYO) conference. A Japanese group carried a banner saying “Japan - Iraq…
Cooperation for development has long ceased to be the prerogative of states. Apart from the big NGOs and church organisations, there are more direct ways in which citizens of countries in the North - be it through unions, small NGOs, or sup-port committees - have been playing an active part in building solidarity between peoples.
In step with the growth of civic consciousness and commitment, local and regional administrations have become more involved. The sum of these social…
Peace Brigades International (PBI) is a non-governmental organisation working with communities world-wide to address conflicts in nonviolent ways. We send teams of volunteers into areas of conflict to “make space for peace”.
PBI only enters countries where our international presence has been requested, and after a thorough study of the specific conflict. After that, we assess whether PBI's presence would be effective in dissuading violence, or in persuading parties to address their…
Greetings from the front lines in the battle for democracy in Colombia. I'm not referring to a war waged between the Colombian military, right-wing paramilitaries and left-wing guerrilla groups, but rather the war waged on peaceful civilians who dare to raise their voices or organise politically.
Colombia is often referred to as “the oldest democracy in Latin America” because of its nearly uninterrupted series of elections during the last century. However, civil society and the…
There are many reasons not to drink Coca-Cola, but this most symbolic of drinks has yet to face a coordinated boycott campaign. However, it is now facing a combination of court cases and international public hearings accusing it of employing paramilitaries to kill and harass trade unionists in Colombia.
Seven Colombian trade union negotiators working for companies associated with Coca Cola have been killed, mostly in the mid-1990s, but there are currently around 50 who have been…
Witness for Peace
The basic method of Witness for Peace has been for US citizens to go to a zone of conflict and report back to their home community what they have seen - in particular, forms of aggression or human rights violations supported by the US government. This played a useful role in putting the brakes on direct US military intervention in Nicaragua in the 1980s. Witness for Peace is now organising several delegations a year to Colombia, visiting a range of peace and human rights…
There is a diverse and rapidly growing movement to end US military involvement in Colombia. The US has backed the Colombian military in that country's brutal civil war since the 1960s, and groups like the Colombia Support Network and the Colombia Human Rights Network have worked for years to draw attention to the suffering of the Colombian people and inspire solidarity with the courageous struggles of Colombia's nonviolent popular movements. That movement has grown dramatically in response…
The San José de Apartadó Peace Community See page 23. The “Nunca Más” (“Never again”) Project This group works in the area of recovering historical truths regarding national human rights violations. The Women's Organisation of the People (OFP)See page 28. The Committee for Solidarity with Political Prisoners (CSPP) This committee, based in Medellín and Bogotá and in the Chocó and Urabá areas, provides legal advice and defence work for prisoners belonging to social organisations or members of…
In July, 36 activists were sentenced to terms of between 90 days and six months in prison for their symbolic trespassing at the US “school for assassins” the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Co-operation, (formerly the School of the Americas) in November 2001.
Some were also given fines on top, with one activist receiving a US$5,000 fine and a six-month prison sentence. Four of those sentenced elected to go to prison immediately, the rest were released on bail and will be…
The “International Solidarity Movement” (ISM) is a series of nonviolent solidarity events in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, undertaken by foreign peace activists, coordinated by the Palestinian Centre for Rapprochement.
The campaign planned for this April was going to include helping farmers cultivate land under threat of Israeli seizure, removal of roadblocks, protests against checkpoints - attempts to halt the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Instead we found ourselves having to…
