Life and Death in Occupied Palestine.
He stands on a small sandy hilltop wearing a bright yellow t-shirt, cigarette in hand. He is calling out to the soldiers on the other side of the fence
"Do not shoot, do not shoot. There are children and internationals here, do not shoot."
Thin white wisps of tear gas linger in the gentle breeze, a moment of calm in the confrontation.
Suddenly a tear gas canister whizzes past the camera making an audible "clunk" as it hits something to the right. He tries to let out a scream, but all he manages is a stifled yelp. One can almost hear his breath being cut short as the projectile punctures his chest. Another muted scream of pain. He falls to the ground then jumps up quickly, running a few steps before collapsing again. From "Another Muted Scream"
Bassem on a better day, flying a kite. Kites are often seen in Occupied Palestine, often flown in defiance of some curfew by the Occupation forces. When i was there i was much more impressed with this display than i ever was with the Blue Angels that annually fly over San Francisco.
Here is the video of the murder of Bassem Ibrahim abu-Rakhma (Known as Phil to his friends).
The Israeli authorities are now calling the shooting "due to unauthorized fire". There was just too much evidence to continue to make claims of a "riot" (the original claim by the Israeli authorities and reported in the Jewish Telegraph Agency news story, since retracted). There was no valid reason for the shooting. There may be an isolated arrest of an Israeli soldier (at most) in this case, but make no mistake, this was no isolated incident. Many other Palestinians have been killed in similar incidents. It is hard to believe that the shooting was "unauthorized", except if they are not authorized to use such force when someone is making a good video of the incident. The same can be said about American Tristan Anderson, who still remains unconscious in an Israeli hospital, (you can help Tristan and his family by going here) having been shot in a similar fashion just a month before Bassem. When Tristan was shot, that also with a Tear Gas Canister, no one near Tristan was being violent or provocative in any way, the protest itself was winding down, Tristan had only a camera in his hand.
Where is the Palestinian Gandhi?
Bassem was one of many Palestinian Gandhi's, and he has been buried. The energy he had to create peace and to save his village has been lost. In the case of Bassem's village of Bil'in, even the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the Israeli government to change the route of the Wall, though Israel has yet to comply. Consequently, Palestinian farmers cannot reach their crops and they are devastated economically. Israel's policy is intended to force Palestinians to give up and leave in order to survive.
The protests that come week after week, and even the intervention of the Israeli Supreme Court still have yet to yield one inch of farmland from taken by Israel. The military takes the land and is destroying the economic basis for this village. This has not stopped the protests. The Palestinians are joined by Israelis and internationals in their just and determined struggle. The Palestinians have their long tradition of "sumud" or steadfastness. The Israelis and the Internationals that join them know this:
That the Palestinian struggle for freedom is a struggle for all of us, that while any are oppressed we are all oppressed. To turn their backs on this struggle is to betray "our own people", that is, our humanity. This has been the message of the prophets and Jesus and echoed by Americans like Eugene Debs and Martin Luther King, that
"We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied together into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly ... We aren’t going to have peace on Earth until we recognize the basic fact of the interrelated structure of all reality." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
These Israelis and Americans and Europeans will not let their governments speak for them, that if their governments refuse to protect these Palestinians from these attacks and land confiscations in a meaningful way, they will do what they can themselves to create justice and peace.
So they still travel to Palestine, taking the risks that others have taken in other places long before them, from the hosts on the Underground Railroad to the Freedom Riders in Mississippi, who also took "foolish" risks for others. We honor soldiers who take up guns to travel to far off places to make war, even wars based on lies and greed, and yet it is sad that these people who support this freedom struggle are on occasion treated with scorn and contempt, by even a handful of people here at Daily Kos, when they travel to these places, people who have actually been invited by the residents themselves, and carrying only cameras and knapsacks, into the villages where there are children everywhere.
The fact that hundreds of Jewish Israelis have joined in these protests against the Annexation Wall that will basically destroy these villages is not lost on the Palestinians. In Sept. 2007, following an Israeli court decision that required the Wall to be rerouted so as to give the villagers of Bi'lin back most of their land, the villagers held a spontaneous demonstration of celebration, embracing the Israelis who have struggled with them for years.
Caution: Video Contains Scenes of Great Joy. and Dancing. In the Streets.
Tragically, as mentioned, no action has been taken by the Israeli authorities to comply with the court ruling they were celebrating, so the demonstrations continue, and some Israelis continue to join them.
In Ni'lin, where a similar campaign is taking place, (and where Tristan Anderson was shot on March 13th), something very interesting took place in January, unreported in the mainstream news:
Common Ground News
As a reporter for a Palestinian news agency in Bethlehem, I too travelled to Ni'lin, but last weekend beheld a spectacle perhaps more remarkable than these weekly Barrier protests: Villagers had set up an exhibition to coincide with the United Nations-declared International Holocaust Remembrance Day on 27 January, an exhibition organised by Ni'lin's Popular Committee Against the Wall.
Hassan Moussa, the exhibition's organiser, spoke to me over the phone from Ni'lin.....
"This is a way of extending our sympathy for the Jews," and the Palestinians' way of extending that sympathy "to the Israeli people, themselves," he says.
"Nobody thinks war will lead to peace and security. It will lead to more violence and hatred and agony, as well as suffering to this area, which is neither in our interest, nor the Israelis."
.....
As a Palestinian activist, Moussa says he also wants to convey his suffering: "My suffering will not lead to peace. When I lose my land, it's like losing your heart from your body."
The village's Municipality hosted the Holocaust Remembrance Exhibition at its headquarters in Ni'lin, where organisers say more than 1,000 visitors have paid tribute to the victims of Nazi atrocities committed against Europe’s Jews.
The exhibition of posters and texts, provided by an Israeli Holocaust museum, details "the genocide that was committed against the Jewish people during the 1930s and 1940s in Germany and in other parts of Europe," Moussa explains.
There is no doubt that peace is possible. The basis for that must be justice, not military domination. We can only see hints of that future peace at present, but it is tangible.
Now faith is the turning of dreams into deeds; it is betting your life on unseen realities. -- Clarence Jordan's "Cotton Patch" gospel
Bassem's deeds will not be forgotten and are not in vain, and while he was killed before he could see it -- the justice and peace he dreamed about will someday become reality -- because of his work and that of many like him.
UPDATE Thanks for putting this on the front page. The nonviolent movement for justice for Palestine deserves it.
I went this afternoon to an event in San Francisco put on by the American Friends Service Committee "Citizen Hearings on the Impact of US Weapons on Civilians in Gaza". It was powerful and heartbreaking. In attendance was an aide to Congresswoman Speier.
And as a "reward" for their solidarity work, it seems Jewish Israelis are now subject to the same harsh anti-democratic measures as their Palestinian sisters and brothers. Leaders of the "New Profile" network, an anti-militarist group, were arrested, computers confiscated, and they were forbidden to communicate with one another. Check out Ramara's diary
Keep the struggle on for justice and peace.