Bethlehem News Update Number 16, March 8, 2009

Bethlehem News Update Number 16, March 8, 2009

In this update:
- A reminder to call
- Endorsing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Efforts
- Families send messages to their loved ones who are political prisoners of Israel
- A farmer watches the Israeli’s kill his olive trees

It seems to have turned almost overnight from winter to spring. It is much warmer and there are wildflowers popping up on green patches. We wish the change in seasons would also bring a change in the news from Gaza, where the U.S.-funded Israeli military continues to kill and terrorize the population and the Israelis are still delaying supplies from getting in.
Yesterday we went to Jenin to meet students at the university there who are receiving scholarships through the Middle East Children’s Alliance. Like most of the West Bank, the distances are not huge, but the driving time is long because of checkpoints, road closures, and poor roads. (The Israeli occupation keeps the roads its illegal settlers and military use in good repair, while it restricts Palestinian’s from repairing their roads.) Jenin is in the north of the West Bank; surrounded by beautiful farm land and hills that this time of the year are very green. One can even travel some distance without seeing any menacing illegal settlements.
A colleague of ours here, Mazin Qumsiyeh also took a drive yesterday,and listened to a radio program that aired Palestinian families sending messages to their loved ones who are being held as political prisoners by the Israelis. Below we have included his moving account. It is followed by this morning’s sad report of farmer whose trees are killed before his eyes.

A Reminder: Call Congress: 202-224-3121; call Obama: 202-456-1414
During this past week, there were Apartheid Week activities on many college campuses in Canada, the U.S., the U.K., and other countries (http://www.apartheidweek.org). The organizers were successful at educating many of their fellow students and others about the reality of the Israeli occupation and apartheid. In your message to Congress and Obama this week, you can tell them (once again) that you want all U.S. aid to Israel ended until Israel ends its apartheid, occupation and violation of the human rights of the Palestinians. You can also ask if they were able to attend any Apartheid Week activities and refer them to the website (www.apartheidweek.org) if they weren’t!

Endorsing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Efforts
The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, to end the disastrous era of Israel’s apartheid and occupation, builds on the successful strategy that helped end apartheid in South African. In the wake of the brutal Israeli assault on Gaza, the BDS campaign has gained new momentum. March 30 has been called as a Global Day of Action on BDS by last month’s World Social Forum
Please encourage the organizations you belong to and work with to endorse the BDS campaign: http://www.bdsmovement.net/?q=node/52. You can also sign on as an individual endorser.

Families talk to their loved ones: political prisoners of Israel
Driving from Beit Sahour to Birzeit yesterday, I was listening to a program on radio Falastin titled “Wala Budda LilQayd An Yankasir”. The term is a verse from a poem that roughly translates to “the chain is destined to be broken”. The program is a lifeline for the nearly 13,000 Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli jails, [allowing them] to hear from their families outside the prison walls.
Since visitation rights are routinely denied or highly restricted, family members call in and have three minutes to say something on air. For those prisoners who have access to radio, it is a way to [at least] hear their loved ones. I listened for nearly one hour to impassioned messages and harrowing stories. All the voices I heard were of women.
One woman started her message by saluting women prisoners on International women’s day.
Another woman started with questions [to her husband] that will get no answers perhaps until the next personal encounter: “How is your health?” “How is your spirit?” “How are they treating you?” “Are you eating well?” She then put her five-year-old child on the phone who said “I miss you daddy,” and “don’t worry, mom puts on her seat belt and drives slowly.”
[And then a woman said]: “How are you my son? Inshallah [God Willing] your health is good. Inshallah your spirit is good. Inshallah you will be returned to us safe and sound. Your father’s funeral went well. Everyone in town came. He died 15 minutes before I arrived home from visiting you. (She breaks down crying and the announcer gently encourages her and then she continues). Everyone was there everyone took care of him. I pray to God every day to bring you back to me. I had your father and I had you. I need you my son. I miss you my son….”
[excerpted from email by Mazin Qumsiyeh]

A farmer watches the Israelis kill his olive trees
March 8, 2009, Ras 'Atiya, Qalqilya region: A Palestinian farmer has had a heart attack while Israeli forces cut down olive trees on his and other farmers' lands in the village of Ras Tira, Qalqilya region. He was immediately taken to hospital.
Two Israeli and three international Human Rights Workers (HRWs), from the US, Denmark and Sweden, have also been arrested and taken to an Israeli police station in the settlement of Qedumim after they joined villagers from Ras at Tira, Wadi Ar-Rasha and Dhab'a in protest over the Israeli destruction of the region's olive trees.
Residents from the area, joined by Israeli and international HRWs, were protesting the cutting down of olive trees due to the Israeli plans to change the route of the Apartheid Wall in the area. As the trees were being cut, villagers and HRWs demonstrated, while Israeli forces fired tear-gas into the crowds.
"The Israeli forces are chaining up the trees and cutting them down,” [reports activist Tom Patterson, a U.S. activist with the International Solidarity Movement.] “Just before, they gave everyone five minutes to leave the area, but then straight away went and took the Israelis and internationals. Women from the village have just come out to the fields and are throwing shoes at the soldiers. Israel is destroying more of the village's land for the settlements."
The villages of Ras at Tira, Wadi Ar-Rasha and Dhab'a are completely surrounded by both Israel's Apartheid Wall and the illegal Israeli settlements of Alfe Menashe.
[From www.palsolidarity.org]