Although various human rights groups have documented and examined the practices used by the state of Israel against Palestinian political detainees, including child prisoners, this book is the first to be published which also provides an in-depth critical analysis of the political motivations behind these actions.
Separated into three sections - Framework and Context, Arrest through Incarceration, and Analysis & Conclusions - this book sets out not only to tell the complete story…
One of the stickiest problems for individuals and organisations trying to engage with the horror that is the conflict between Israel and Palestine is the issue of antiSemitism. It lurks as a spectre of guilt for those coming to the topic without a “legitimate” interest, ie being Jewish or Palestinian. And it is hurled at anyone who dares to criticise the state of Israel by those who support any of that state's actions, however bloody.
This little book - hardly more than a pamphlet -…
Non-violence as a strategy has been practised throughout the Israeli women's peace movement since the founding of Women in Black in early 1988, one month after the first Palestinian Intifada broke out.
The Women in Black movement began as a small group of Israeli women carrying out a simple form of protest: once a week at the same hour and in the same location--a major traffic intersection in Jerusalem--they donned black clothing and raised a black sign in the shape of a hand with…
In his introduction to this beautiful memoir, the late Edward Said says: what gives this book an unmistakeable stamp of profound authenticity is its life-affirming poetic texture. This is no surprise as Barghouti is indeed a poet of great sensitivity, he is the author of nine books of poetry; few of his poems are translated into English. For us in the English-speaking minority world, the idea that there is a body of Palestinian literature is probably as remote and unbelievable as…
Before you get stuck into reading this thematic section on nonviolent action in Israel/Palestine, we thought it important to point out some inconsistencies in language that you are about to discover.
Firstly, we have not altered, attempted to standardise, or drawn any specific political inferences from the way in which contributors have described geographic locations in the region. Peace News house style attempts not to make any implicit comment on the “solution” to the…
The “Apartheid Wall”, intended to be about 350 miles long and which confiscates 60% of the occupied West Bank's land and encloses numerous communities in several enclaves or Bantustans, is being built at great speed. Already almost 100 miles have been completed in the north and south West Bank and in the Jerusalem area.
Salfit in the north West Bank and Budrus in the West Ramallah district, are two places in Occupied Palestine where women and girls are playing a strong role in…
“Can you dance your tragedies? Can you dance your dreams? If you are Palestinian, you almost have no choice but to try doing both, for if you do one without the other, you choose to indulge in obsessive victimness or naive illusion” [From the introduction to El-Funoun's latest production]
On 9 March 2004, El-Funoun will celebrate its Silver Jubilee. For a quarter of a century, El-Funoun has indeed danced some of the Palestinian tragedies and dreams, challenges and ambitions. But…
I spent last summer as a volunteer on the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel. Participants in this World Council of Churches initiative spend three months living in the region to try to learn more how the conflict affects ordinary people.
On a day-to-day basis we were monitor-ing violations of human rights and international law, providing protection by our presence, and supporting both Israelis and Palestinians in their non-violent acts of resistance to the…
As a Palestinian dance choreographer working in the midst of conflict, I am often asked: what is the rationale of your artistic engagement under the circumstances?
If “engagement” with something is interpreted in a passive sense, as a mere relation to that thing, then the question implies a certain degree of volition in deciding whether or not to relate to issues of conflict and trauma. I personally do not think that in a situation of conflict artists have a choice of whether or…
In January 2004 Rudi Friedrich met Gush Shalom activist and member of the Refuser Parents Forum Adam Keller at his home. A few days earlier five refusers, Haggai Matar, Matan Kaminer, Noam Bahat, Adam Maor and Shimri Tzamaret were sentenced to prison terms of one year by a military court - after more than 14 months' detention already - for their refusal to “serve” in the Occupied Territories. Rudi asked Adam to discuss the situation and relevance of the refuser movement.
RF: How…
It is January 2004, the sun is shining and it feels like a warm day in Jerusalem. We are starting our journey early in the morning, to meet up with Ghassan Andoni from the Palestinian Centre For Rapprochement Between People, based in Beit Sahour. He has invited us to come to Bir Zeit, a Palestinian University close to Ramal-lah, where he is a professor of physics.
Ramallah is not far away from Jerusalem, just 20 kilometres. The town is located in the occupied territories and can…
In the face of the lack of progress in any official “peace process” in Israel/Palestine, there have recently been some unofficial proposals prepared - by peace campaigners or by less entrenched politicians on each side. The highest profile of these initiatives, the Geneva Accords, came from a group including former Israeli and Palestinian Authority ministers last November.
The aim was to provide a tangible demonstration that, contrary to Israeli claims, a partnership for Israeli-…
The principal focus of non-violent campaigns in Israel-Palestine is the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza strip. However, given the lack of symmetry between the situation of the Israelis (the occupiers), Palestinians (the occupied), and outsiders, actors from these different parties cannot apply similar roles and methods of intervention.
In this article, I will follow the categorisation offered by Amos Gvirtz, founder of Israelis and Palestinians for Nonviolence…
The recent death of Edward Said robbed the Palestinians of their most eloquent advocate in the West. One of the most committed and articulate of Palestinian allies still with us however, is the Professor of International Law at Illinois University, Francis A Boyle. Boyle has produced a tool for the reader “to go out and work for peace with justice for all peoples and states in the Middle East”.
While eschewing polemic for an analysis that is rooted in international legal principles…
For all its failings, it's sometimes worth reminding oneself that some of the best journalists (as well as some of the worst!) work for the corporate media. Amira Hass is one such reporter.
The daughter of survivors of the Nazi holocaust, Hass was, until September 2002, the chief West Bank and Gaza correspondent for Ha'aretz, Israel's leading liberal daily. Between 1993 and 1997 she lived in Gaza - the only Jewish Israeli journalist to have done so - covering the Oslo “peace” process…
