My Grandfather Passed Away and I was Denied the Right to See Him

As posted on Electronic Intifada

I’ll never forget the hilarious conversation we had back in the summer of 2005. The extended family went to the beach that day. As the sun went down, my father ordered an argilah, and whenever he’d break to continue a conversation, I’d take the pipe and draw a few puffs, much to the indignation of my mother. Seeing how my dad obviously didn’t object his fourteen-year-old daughter smoking an argilah, she appealed to my grandfather, who was sitting right next to me and pretended not to notice. At her request, however, he jumped into action.

“Linah, I’m not satisfied with how you look,” his voice carried over half of Gaza’s beach. “You’re nothing but skin and bones. At your age, you should be bursting with life! A long time ago, young women used to be like this —” he made curvy shapes with his large hands — “and like this!” Another curvy motion. “You don’t eat enough. You have the body of a child.” He was really getting into his stride now, as I sank lower and lower in my seat, my cheeks flaming, highly aware of the stares from other people on nearby tables. “You should eat meat! Lots of meat! And fruits! Meat and fruit! And an assorted variety of nuts!” I wondered if the pilot in the F-16 plane above could see Sido’s wild gesticulations or possibly hear his voice. “Eat! Eat meat, fruits and nuts! Eat, so your breasts can grow! But smoking? NEVER!”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry from sheer embarrassment. He just used the b-word, more common sounding in Arabic.

“But you smoke,” I said in a tiny voice, desperate to gloss over my public humiliation.

“I smoke because I’ve been doing it for years now, decades! Since I was a young man. It’s an addiction, I can’t stop it.”

“There are nicotine patches you could wear on your arm.”

“Whoever invented them is an idiot. They don’t work.”

“Well, there are special types of gum you can chew —”

He stared at me. “That’s a fine idea! An old man, chewing gum with his mouth open! Heheheh.”

My grandfather, 84 year old Ibrahim Hasan Alsaafin, was older than the Zionist state of Israel when he died on Monday in the Khan Younis refugee camp, still yearning to return to his village of al-Fallujah 64 years on, a mere 15 miles away.

On my way to Hebron last Friday for the third annual global Open Shuhada Street protest, the taxi I was in passed by a sign pointing right with the black letters of “Qiryat Gat” emblazoned on it. My heart caught in my mouth, and I craned my neck to hold that sign in my vision long after the taxi turned left.

Qiryat Gat is the Judaized name for my village of al-Fallujah. My village became a Jewish-only settlement for Russian immigrants in the 1950s, and the site for one of Intel Corporation’s biggest manufacturing plants.

Al-Fallujah was completely ethnically cleansed on March 1st, 1949 — a year after Israel’s so-called independence. Sido Ibrahim was a young man then, 19 or 20 years old, and fought with Egyptian paratroops against the terrorist Zionist guerrillas, who attacked the village with jet fighters and long range canons for six months. Most of the villagers fled, taking with them only their children, some even leaving the doors of their houses open. Sido, along with my great-grandmother Nabeeha, joined the scores of villagers in providing food and supplies to the Egyptian and local volunteers who were defending the village. Among the defenders was the Imam of the village Sheikh Hussein, who was killed when a jet fighter droped a bomb on his shelter. Five minutes before this happened, he threw the helmet he got from the Egyptians to my Sido, insisting that he has nothing to do with it, and as a young man Sido has more right to wear it becauze he represents the future.

After six months of shelling and raids, the international community decided that al-Fallujah must be evacuated and remain under international control. Sido and my great-grandmother Nabeeha exchanged hugs and tears with the Egyptian fighters who dropped them off along with other civilians in Gaza in their trucks before returning back to Egypt. Sido did not forget to bring the land deeds with him, which we still keep, and my great-grandmother took the key with her, which we also still keep.

I haven’t seen my grandparents for six and a half years, despite a distance of only sixty miles apart. In that sense, there is no difference had I been still living in England or the US. We were separated from each other by incomprehensible racist laws of an occupying military state, which sought to encircle our hearts with barbed wire. Gaza is only an hour’s drive away from Ramallah, the same distance as London is from Portsmouth, the same distance as Philadelphia is from Atlantic City.

It kills me that I haven’t been able to see Sido. We live in the same small country, but a thousand and one hindrances kept us pinned to opposite sides. I’ve missed my grandparents so much. I wanted to dye my hair with henna again, something my grandmother always does. I wanted to look into her pea-green eyes and listen to her highly inappropriate delicious fairy-tales, which made me and my cousins curl our toes with delight when we were younger.

I wanted to take pictures of them, to record Sido’s voice, complete a mini-project about oral history and to hear stories of al-Fallujah. When my mother was first pregnant with me, Sido saw her sucking on a lemon and told her she’d be having a girl. I dreamed about my visit, teasing Sido if he remembered how he was so upset I wasn’t named Nabeeha after his mother when I was born, claiming that now that my parents were in a western country they’d be naming their children infidel names. He stopped complaining after my mother explained to him that “Linah” was an Arabic name, mentioned in the Quran chapter 59 verse 5.

It was always with a sense of pride and dignity that I tell people that my grandparents are from an era before the state of Israel came into being are still alive, and that they are still refugees. They are history in itself. They have lived through so many wars. I was so eager to document that from their point of view, and to get to know them more.

Sido was a cantankerous man. His tempers were hugely fascinating and downright scary. Sometimes his rage would manifest itself by flinging meticulously prepared dishes of food. I recall helping one uncle scrape bits of food from the kitchen ceiling and window once. He had a loud gravelly voice and would strike the fear of God into someone quite easily. In the mornings he would sit cross-legged on a mattress, reading from the Quran out loud, pontificating every word. He was a strict disciplinarian, and as long as you weren’t at the receiving end of his temper or walking stick, the whole situation would become very comedic. Once he chased one of my cousins up on the roof with a hose, cursing his lineage and my cousin’s future descendants, as the rest of my cousins and uncles almost wet themselves from laughing so hard.

At the same time, Sido had so much compassion and generosity in his heart. He loved babies, never in short supply in my family. It was a mark of honor when he called you to his room, where he would give his grandchildren sweets from a hidden stash. He would take out a clear plastic bag full of shekel coins from the folds of his white dishdasheh, and one by one would distribute them to us. Back then, you could buy so much stuff at the candy store with one shekel.

I really wanted a recent memory of Sido and I. A photograph, a conversation, a touch.

Sido died. A memory flitted in my mind’s eye. One summer, years ago, the electricity was off for hours. When it came back on again it was past midnight. Sido turned on the TV and leaned forward from his mattress, chuckling as he watched The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Occupation has denied us of so much. The right to visit family. The right to be a family.

Sido died, and I walked home in the late afternoon, willing myself not to bawl, a dull pain in the pit of my stomach. My eyes welled up when I thought of my dad, all alone in the UAE. My mother called my uncles earlier. One of them was crying so hard she couldn’t understand him. I called them later at night, and they seemed more calm. I asked to talk to my grandmother. The phone was passed from one room to the next, and I pressed my cell phone closer to my ear, listening to a world I couldn’t be in: a baby coughing, children murmuring, hushed voices, “It’s Abdullah’s daughter, talk to her.”

The formal statement given when someone passes away. The formal reply. The tears ensued.

“The pain in my heart, ya sitti, the pain in my heart!” my grandmother cried.

“God give you strength,” I whispered.

“This is life, people are born and people die, but the pain!”

I can’t accept that the unfairness of the whole situation. I’m not talking about death, because that runs its natural course. I’m talking about the mini-diaspora within my own family. It gets so overwhelming sometimes to think that we can’t be together because of a screwball xenophobic government, a whole state that wills it so. It doesn’t make sense. The heartbreak and the anguish, the suffering and the despair is totally absurd when one considers the reason why we must experience all of this. I believe my skin color is appropriate, but my religion isn’t. I don’t speak the chosen language of Hebrew. That human beings should be the cause of the suffering of other humans based on some imperial ideology is unfathomable, when you really think about it. I can’t accept that, and I can’t do anything about it, and who cares anyway? My last name is not Levy or Goldberg or Schliemann. What are basic human rights to a Palestinian when you’ve become so dehumanized in the world’s eyes?

My family wanted to go to Gaza last summer, but things simply didn’t work out. So we postponed it to January, but that also didn’t work out. I had firmly set it in my mind that this June, no matter what I will go to Gaza, inshallah. It is too late now.

The hardest part was talking to my father, all alone without his wife or children to comfort him. It’s hard listening to your father’s sobs over the phone. He told me this:

“Just two days ago, I was thinking of the fact that you are an hour’s drive away from your family and yet you cannot see them…I felt crushed under this feeling of injustice, but comforted myself by looking forward to next June when we can all meet again and you and your sister Deema will have the chance to see Sido…but he did not wait. Not only for me…Sido, my dad, was in a hurry …as he has always been…so he left us…but will never come back..and June will come to this world..but Sido will not be there..Allah Yerhamo…he spent his youth struggling to make us happy and to make us grow up to appreciate the love for our homeland, and instilled in us love of truth, justice and rightness..he loved your Mama, he always called her his 5th daughter. He loved you, Mohammad, Ahmad and Deema…I could see the joy in his eyes when I talked about you, and he always blamed me for not settling in Gaza…next to him.”

The Recurring Let Down of Ramallah Protests

I still haven’t learned how to stay away from a Ramallah protest, despite the detrimental irritating feeling disappointment that never fails to swell inside of me every time I attend one.

Ramadan started, and Bashar Al-Assad showed no sign of mercy as his murdering of Syrians did not let up. Combined with the two previous days, the numbers rose to over one hundred. A protest was needed here in Ramallah, if only to express our anger and horror at the Syrian dictator and solidarity with those suffering under the brutal killing machine regime.

As an oppressed people, we shouldn’t ignore the oppression of others. Other people seem to contend this point, believing that we as Palestinians already have a lot on our plate and don’t need to be involved in whatever shape or form in the affairs of other countries. That sounds exactly like the Palestinian Authority rhetoric, especially highlighted during Egypt’s January 25th revolution. In the most unlikely of all places given the humanitarian crisis gripping it, Gaza has dispelled this view as it actively involved in a campaign to raise money and aid for the starving refugees of Somalia.

Protests in Ramallah follow a certain agenda. They only happen with the full blessing of the PA, which inevitably means that the protests will get hijacked by Fateh thugs, the loudspeakers usurped with Fateh factional songs, and the yellow flags and memorabilia of Fateh will be waved in the air with furious gusto. Sometimes, it’s not that conspicuous. The protest, independently organized, will continue but if there are less than favorable chanting going on (read: calls for resistance) the police—plainclothes or otherwise—will move in to break it up. For the record, the plainclothes police aren’t the brightest light bulbs out there. You can always tell who they are because they stand at the peripheral edges of the crowd, and stare at you in a frank and unsettling manner.

A Facebook page materialized, announcing the Syrian solidarity march to be on Sunday the 14th. It was organized by something called the National Committee in Solidarity with the Arab Revolts, something I’ve never heard of. Searches proved to be fruitless, so I couldn’t tell whether this was independent from the PA or not. Nevertheless, I took my sister and we walked after iftar, deliberately ignoring all the other previous wasted protests we attended.

As we headed toward the Manara Square, Ramallah’s obtrusive schizophrenia tugged at all of my senses. Families, mostly women, were walking in a bid to healthily digest the iftar feast they must have consumed so readily. Young men were walking in couples, making me skirt their outstretched hands lest they “accidentally” brush against mine. Yellow-licensed (Israeli) cars revved their big engines, while the white-licensed cars (Palestinian) blasted their English and Arabic pop music in an attempt to drown out the engines. Lights were strewn all over stores, and a vendor seller shoved three plastic hairbrushes in our faces, before moving on to his next target. Weaving between the cars and the people on the disregarded sidewalks were men selling Barcelona/Real Madrid flags, keeping up a running commentary of only two words: “Barsha, Real, Barsha, Real, Barsha, Real.” It was the first leg of the Supercopa big between the two teams.

The Syrian solidarity protest was moving away from the square and down Rukab Street. I learned a long time ago not to spare a thought for how many were attending, since it was always going to be disappointing. The protesters were mainly from the villages. The ones leading the chants were from Nabi Saleh. We probably numbered around three hundred, a painfully low figure. My sister and I threaded our way to the middle of the chanting group and joined in. Chants against Bashar al-Assad and his cowardice, and his need to fix his lisp grew stronger. Only Palestinian and Syrian flags were waved. During that hour and a half, no one tried to take over the protest with their own factional party nonsense. I was aware of the other people, those who stood on the pavement and watched us pass, like we were a Macy’s Thanksgiving parade on show. Did it occur to them to join in, to protest the killings of thousands of innocent lives? Or were we part of an unscheduled Ramadan festivity?

Protests are all about catharsis. Unless they generate a huge amount of people, it is naïve to think that demonstrating will actually influence the decision making of those in authority. We were helpless, watching the Syrians getting murdered on the streets, wishing we could aid them in any way. For me at least, protesting does not in any way make me feel like I had accomplished something, nor does it content me. It loosens the tightened knot in my heart a bit, mostly at the relief that officially Ramallah is in solidarity with Syria and that the protest was allowed to happen without any hindrances, but in no way is my state of mind placated.

Thursday came around and brought with it news of a three-pronged attack on Eilat, where the casualties were mostly IDF soldiers. Despite having no factual evidence that the assailants came from Gaza, and despite Hamas and the Popular Resistance Committee denying any involvement, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barack announced that the source of this terror attack came from Gaza and that they would retaliate accordingly. How can a retaliation be carried out if the source of the original provocation is not yet specified? That didn’t stop Israel from killing five Palestinians in Rafah, among them a two year old boy. As the attacks started to intensify after midnight, I stayed up, checking on my family there from time to time. North Gaza and Rafah in the south were bombarded, as well as Ansar compound and a training ground for resistance fighters in the area of Khuza’a in Khan Younis. There was no chance for my family going to sleep, and the children were once again huddled in one room next to each other, the older ones muttering prayers mixed with curses. By the end of the night, the total number of thos killed were seven, two of them children. How ironic that Israel did not foresee the attack on Eilat, but immediately had confidential precise information where the assailants had come from. How ironic indeed, and what a way to end the laughable apolitical social justice revolution in Israel.

A protest in solidarity with Gaza was quickly organized on Friday. I hoped that the people planning to attend weren’t coming just because of the seven martyrs killed on Thursday. Our memories must extend further than that. On Wednesday a seventeen year old boy was executed, his chest and riddle riddled with bullet holes. His name was Sa’d Al-Majdalawi. This year alone, one hundred and forty three martyrs have been killed by Israel. I was glad something was being done, because it’s been something of a norm for Ramallah, being the bubble it is, to ignore any news that has to do with Gaza. We don’t need another hundred people to be dead until we start thinking about calling for a protest.

The last time a protest for Gaza was held in Ramallah was in January 2009, during Israel’s savage and ruthless invasion of the Strip. On that Friday, I lay in my bed curled up in a ball, wide awake in a state of numbing fear for my family in Gaza. My mother and older brother went. They came back a few hours later, stunned and ashen-faced, reeking of tear gas, and beaten up. The PA has bussed in brainwashed fools from the northern West Bank in addition to its own security forces to deliberately instigate and then attack the crowds who had gathered for Gaza. They held up framed pictures of Mahmoud Abbas and Hosni Mubarak, highlighting the collusion between the two figureheads in contributing to the siege on Gaza, and sang Fateh songs before descending down on the women, men, and young children where they proceeded to assault them viciously.

At the Manara, around fifty people had shown up. In the middle, a group of people were singing nationalistic songs like they were performing onstage. Chanting started sporadically, but people were more eager to sing. Meanwhile, my friend received a text that two more were killed in the Bureij camp. In Ramallah the singing continued. I was recoiling on the inside. It was completely disrespectful. I looked behind me and desperately wanted to laugh at the identical postures of my mother and sister, with their arms crossed and deep scowls etched into their faces. That this protest was organized on such a short notice is no excuse (another protest is set for this Sunday the 22nd). The names of the martyrs should have been up somewhere. A silent candlelit vigil would have been more deferential to the memories of the seven killed in Gaza, not this cringe-worthy festive atmosphere. The men in the middle were now jumping up and down, still singing. As the song died out, one of them yelled, “We want a state in September!” The senseless sheep around him repeated what he said. My friend, sister and I all responded at the same time more than once, “We do NOT want a state in September!” The sheep didn’t know who to repeat after. I was close to throwing up my innards. One of the singing men grabbed the flag from my hand which was handed to me by someone and said, “Ok, we’re done now.”

The sheep dispersed, and my mother shrilly said that it was shameful for us to even say we were at a solidarity protest for Gaza. She and my sister decided to meet my aunt somewhere, so I walked home alone, my feet pounding the pavement, seething the whole time.

Gaza Blackout

When I finally got home yesterday it was already around 1 am. After having iftaar at a great aunt's house, we then went to another aunt's house to welcome back her son from the ghurbeh-six years spent studying in Russia. I was dying for internet access. I've become somewhat of an addict, and for some reason the internet in my aunt's home wouldn't work on my laptop. The hours spent drinking tea and coffee and eating qatayif were a bit marred by the black looks I was shooting my mother. Yallah Ma are we planning on sleeping over?

I had planned on cobbling another informal post about the second PalTweetUp meeting. Instead, news across Twitter quickly spread about a mass communications cut in the Gaza strip, entering its seventh hour. My heart dropped somewhere between my toes. The first thought I had was "Ground Invasion. Air Raids. Naval Attacks." In short, another Operation Cast Lead.

Less than three years ago, my family in Ramallah were gripped by frustration, helplessness, and total despair. My father's family in Gaza were witnessing firsthand Israel's murderous onslaught that lasted for twenty two days, and all I could offer them was a watery phone call imploring them, rather stupidly, to stay safe. I'd start off with false cheeriness before my voice would break, the tears gushing down my face. If half the Samouni family were wiped out, who's to say my family won't be next? My uncles and their wives over the phone would be doing what I was supposed to be doing to them, comforting me, trying to downplay the risks and their suffering: "We're fine, the explosions are only shaking the building. Of course the children are terrified, but that means that we're all sleeping together, good for staying warm. Chin up Linah."

Quickly, news came in that the mass cuts were caused by Israeli bulldozers that destroyed a fiber-optic cable near the border, thus severing land lines, the internet, and cell phone connectivity. That didn't stop me from calling my uncles though. I tried both their land lines and their cell phones, over and over again. I tried to stop myself from overreacting. Why else would there be a massive communication breakdown? It's not a mistake. Mistakes on this large scale don't last for eight hours now. I pushed images of ground troops stealthily infiltrating Gaza from my mind. It was a scary notion, a cruel fact that Gaza was completely isolated from the whole world.

The only other explanation was an oversimplified one, that it was just a technical problem. That still doesn't deter from the real issue at hand: Gaza is still being effectively occupied. Israel controls all border crossings, including the Rafah border, and has the power to turn on and off the electricity that 1.7 million people depend on. It supplies water, and also can cut that off whenever it feels like it. For Gaza to become a black hole for those hours was a terrifying concept to grasp because no one know what was going on. Yasmeen Elkhoudary, probably the only one tweeting -- albeit from a shaky connection -- from Gaza via her Blackberry, provided information that land lines were working, and that to the best of her knowledge, there were no air strikes or anything of that kind.

My finger was still pushing the redial button religiously. Sixty miles separate Ramallah from Gaza, but it seemed like sixty thousand miles. Around 2:40 am, my uncle Mohammad from Tal il Hawa district picked up. I screamed, "'Amo!"

"Ahlain, ya 'ami. How are you?"

He sounded groggy. It suddenly dawned on me that I might have woken him up.

"Don't worry about it," he yawned. "I have to get up for su7oor anyway."

"What's going on? Why are all the telephone lines down? What's happening?"

"The land lines work."

"No, I think they only work within Gaza itself. Because I called you and Amo Mahmoud and Amta Najat and all I get is a busy signal."

"Yeah well..we don't really know what's going on. No one knows the reason for the power cuts. We've heard something about Israeli bulldozers digging too far and hitting a few cable lines, but that's about it. I'm surprised you managed to get through to me. You're probably roaming on the Orange network."

"Are you safe? Do you hear any drones? Missiles? Any news of anyone killed?"

"We're fine. The sky is quiet tonight. Nothing's happening on the ground. People got bored because of no electricity and went to sleep early."

"Are you sure there's nothing?"

"Yes habibti. Go to sleep."

"What time do you go to work? I'll call you then."

I tried my other uncle's cell phone. It was turned off. Relief flooded through my body. Nothing is happening, yet. A couple of hours later I finally crashed.

I woke up at 9am and immediately called Mohammad. He picked up and said something before the line disconnected. I swore under my breath as I realized my phone's battery died. Half an hour later there were confirmed reports that the communication lines were working again. The night had passed smoothly, relatively speaking. I called my uncle again at 2:45pm. He had went home because there was no work in the bank without the internet. People are still bewildered. He told me Jawwal's service connection was back on fifteen minutes earlier, not at 9:30am as some initially reported. I suppose it depended on the different districts and areas. A fifteen hour blackout is no different from a twenty hour blackout. He hadn't heard anything, not even rumors. I called my other uncle a few hours later. I heard waves crashing in the background. He was standing on a hill in Khan Younis overlooking the sea. He seemed convinced that what happened was just a technical problem, but the cynic in me won't shake off the feeling that there must be an ulterior motive on Israel's part.

The psychological warfare inflicted was just another used tactic of Israel's. My family and Gaza were safe, for now.

#PalTweetUp

There are Palestinians living in Palestine who are using Twitter not just to tell the world what they had for breakfast, but also for the potential to disseminate information that could as Joseph Dana said, cut through the lies and narrative control of the western media.

Today's meeting was hatched from the brains of two fellow tweeps, who wanted a space where everyone can finally meet face to face, translating a virtual network into a solid one. I was at the beginning a bit skeptical (did we really have to meet? what if we work better alone than together?) but that was my rays of optimism at work as usual.

In the build-up to the meeting, there was a lot of excitement. We were going to Skype with our brethren in Gaza, and since it's been so long since we've last seen a Gazan we were breathless with anticipation. Would they look like us? Have normal human features? Would they be malnourished and exceedingly thin? Would their accents be as bad as the Yankee twang?

An hour before the scheduled time, I reminded my mother where I was going. She looked at me in disbelief, then accused me of not telling her before. We argued for a bit-apparently after I'd graduated I've been going out way too many times-before she finally asked what we were going to do. I casually mentioned Joseph Dana's name and she shook her head, saying "Whenever a foreigner comes to talk you all get excited, that's what's wrong with this activism thing. They laugh at you and you all lap it up. God I can't wait until your dad is finally allowed back in here."

I should've mentioned to her that Joseph is an American-Israeli. I would have loved to hear her thoughts on that. I was also slightly miffed. She calls me a ghooleh then laments my supposed naivete. Just because I'm the whitest thing in Palestine doesn't mean...

Anyway, I was left with one last chore to do before I finally headed out. When I arrived at Bazinga I was struck by the colorful beanbags on the floor, and tried to mentally match up faces with Twitter names. Someone did the right thing and just asked out loud our names. The next 15 minutes or so were spent trying to connect with the aliens in Gaza, and even then the audio-video quality was choppy.

"Hello can you hear us?"

"Yes habibi. Can you see us?"

"Yep, can you see us?"

"No not really..looks like you're all too far away."

They were sitting at a table in Delice cafe. We were spread out across a room, slouched onto beanbags. They looked eerily just like us. In fact, one of them could challenge me for the whitest thing in Palestine title. We didn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed.

Finally, a stable enough connection was established. We began doing the introduction rounds. Mine was terribly boring, completely forgot to mention I was also from Gaza and had trained an army of cousins there to do my bidding last time I was there. Then that infiltrator Joseph Dana got up to talk about his flotilla experience on the American ship The Audacity of Hope:

• Basically the flotilla was successful on the level that showed how important a role social media can play.
• He was surrounded by old mostly Jewish women on the boat-not to belittle their endeavors or anything but to highlight the hilarity of Israel's hysterical hyperbole of the boat being part of a major security threat to Israel
• A complaint was filed, later known to be from an Israeli legal center in Athens about the boat not being sea-worthy
• His opinion is that they should have sailed within the same hour they got wind of the complaint
• The crew and passengers were sitting in their hotel rooms talking incessantly of when they were going to set sail
• When they finally did, it was a demonstration of "hippie language on steroids" on the deck, a lot of hugging, excess emotion that got annoying for a while

Then the discussion fell about as to how to use Twitter wisely. A lot of strategic thinking needs to go into how to use Twitter because ultimately it's all about getting the best message through to most people. So we must reign in our moral righteousness and reserve using terms like "Apartheid" or "IOF" when talking about Israel as we would be largely written off as jihadists, peace-hating Ayrabs, terrorists, etc. Less is more. If we use simple neutral words to describe Israel in the same sentence that mention house evictions in Sheikh Jarrah or the invisible ethnic cleansing taking place in the Jordan Valley, the discrepancy will be all the more obvious.

Then it was the Gaza tweeps to offer us something. Unfortunately they were too shy to sing GYBO's latest song The Mystery/اللغز but they did propose to lip-sync along while the link played. The organizers of this tweet-up got in touch with Bilal Tamimi, one of the main documenters in the village, and asked him if he could make a compilation video of the protests in Nabi Saleh. As the familiar faces of the villagers flickered across the screen I felt so honored to know them personally, for them to have taken me in so readily, as their own sister and daughter and friend. It was set to the soundtrack of my childhood, يا نبض الضفة which along with the song Onadikom never fails to get me at least a little emotional. The first song has the story of Lina Nabulsi, the 14 year old schoolgirl who was shot back in 1976 as one of its refrain, and my nine year old egotistical self in a weird twisted way believed that song was made in my honor.

The audio-video connection became more shaky, and in the middle of discussing the need for an independent news website (later to be turned romantically into a newspaper) the connection was lost, most likely because the electricity went out in Gaza. I would have loved for those tweeps to have pitched in with their ideas and opinions but plans are already being made for next time to accomplish some proper and much needed interaction and conversations. Here in Ramallah, we are wondering why in Gaza the youth don't criticize Hamas more, either viciously or in matter of fact way.

Anyway, everyone agreed that the idea of a representative media forum is imperative, especially since Palestinian media is rubbish and to put it quite nicely, we have serious reservations about Ma'an News Agency, both English and Arabic. The brainstorming began: correspondences from the West Bank, Gaza, '48 areas, the diaspora ("sorry for the divisions!"), the issue of internet security, the whole not-everyone-who-blogs-can-write-newsworthy-pieces colloquy, the content, the web design, etc.

Overall, it was simply refreshing to be in the presence of honest, smart, intelligent people with no political affiliations whatsoever (except for that infiltrator). It wasn't enough to just talk but also to share suggestions, plan productively, all for the hopes of breaking the stagnated work of Palestinian youths under occupation.

Good Shit

We remember watching Slingshot Hip-hop last year for one of our classes, which marked the beginning of our Narcycist/Lowkey obsessive mania after we chucked out Enya/All American Rejects/other god awful shit-but never Backstreet Boys- and concluding that Arabic rap isn't that bad. But then we saw a video for one of DAM's songs which had a lot of girls in tight clothes flipping their bouffants and dancing, so we stopped listening to them for a while. That was when we were still going through the "open-your-mind" phase, where naturally after years of crap school indoctrination we believed that anyone (well a Palestinian mostly) who spoke in favor for the cause had to be a respectable knowledgeable prayer-of-5-times-a-day type. Oi, Noura Erekat, your skirt is too short!

We were so judgmental. We feel like slapping our past 17, 18 year old selves. Still, that DAM video was awful, and when we found out that the girls were commissioned from our very own Birzeit University's Business college, that really explained a lot. Ya3ni we were not surprised :). Shoot, we're STILL judgmental.

The other rap group were from Gaza called PR, Palestinian Rapperz. They're mostly defunct now, with the lead rapper following his destiny in making less than satisfactory songs somewhere on a visa in the US. Or is it a green card hmm.

DARG Team, which stands for Da Arabian Revolutionary Guys, probably came after Jackie Salloum's shooting of the movie, since apparently they are the best known hip hop group in Gaza. The above video is their own rendition of the popular poem by Tariq Ziad turned song "Ounadekum" (Calling You) as a tribute to the slain Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni, which was his favorite song.

We Love It.

Oh, here we are, a lot of information on their Facebook page...

• Did the sound track for Aisheen “Still alive in Gaza” a documentary about the impact of the Gaza offense on people which was filmed in Gaza strip on February 2009 directed by the Swiss director Nicolas Wadimoff.

• The first Palestinian hip hope group to film a music video using the green screen and graphics designs “Rebuild by us”.

• Film the third music video Long Live Palestine featuring Low Key an MC from UK.

• Summer 2010 were able to leave the strip to Switzerland to work on the Gaza Meets Geneva project that took place for three months and were invited by Ville De Geneve were the team was able to record the third album titled Gaza Meets Geneva Vol. 2 featuring lots of hip hop and R&B artists from the EU.

• Presented the Palestinian and Gaza hip hop in EU in a six months tour played in Switzerland, France, Denmark, Norway and Sweden after nine months of failure trials to get out of Gaza.

• The first Palestinian and Gaza hip hop group to play in Syria and in AL Nerab the Palestinian refugee camp in “Aleppo” last summer.

• Won the first place on the first national hip hop competition that took place in the West Bank and had more than 50 participants from all over Palestinian territories and the lands of 48

We can't help but be finicky though. TARG doesn't sound that different from DARG, so would it have killed them to be "The Arabian Revolutionary Guys"? Yeah, we're showing our major right there.

Gaza Runs Marathon

Photo Cred: Marco Longari. Check out the rest here.

We LOVE this. LOVE IT. From the Guardian article:

Donkey carts, exhaust fumes and potholes were just some of the obstacles for runners in the Gaza Strip's first marathon.


There were no roads closed, no security tape and no guides, as the route was very simple: start at the border of Israel and stop at the border with Egypt.


The race started at 6am local time on Thursday, three minutes after sunrise, and the temperature was already at 21C. The starting point was Beit Hanoun, in the north-east, from where the runners headed west towards the Mediterranean.


More than 1,500 people took part in the event, hosted by the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), which raised $1m (£600,000) for its annual summer camps. The camps are a source of tension between the UN and conservative sectors of Gazan society who object to the mixing of boy and girls, even before puberty.


More than 1,300 schoolchildren ran the marathon in relays of a kilometre at a time, while about 200 ran a half or quarter-marathon. Only nine adult participants ran the whole course – seven Gazans and two UN workers. The winner was Nader al-Masri, 31, from Beit Hanoun who ran in the 5,000 metres at the Beijing Olympics and hopes to run at the London Games in 2012. He clocked two hours and 42 minutes.


By the time the race reached Gaza City, Masri had already developed a substantial lead. The coastal road runs past the harbour where sardine fishermen land their catch. The runners had to negotiate donkeys carts, vans and hundreds of blue boxes filled with fish as the fishermen and merchants cheered.


From the fish market, the runners passed the wasteland that was Yasser Arafat's presidential compound, destroyed by Israeli aircraft and ships in a series of bombings since 2001.


The UN – which provides services for refugees, a majority of Gaza's 1.5 million residents – also attempts to create a sense of normality, particularly for schoolchildren who are unable to leave. Earlier this week, the UN hosted the Israeli conductor Daniel Barenboim, who brought a 25-piece orchestra to play Mozart for an audience of 200 children and adults.


Chris Gunness, a UNRWA spokesman, said: "The Israeli authorities have kept many things out of Gaza but we are trying to make sure that the one thing that can get through the blockade is fun. The marathon definitely achieved that not just for the competitors but for the thousands and thousands of onlookers who applauded every runner."


Gemma Connell, the only woman running the marathon and the initiator of the event, finished the course in four hours and 45 minutes.


"I ran through refugee camps, past farmers and street cleaners. They all clapped and shouted: 'Salam Alaikum'. The variety of scenery and the welcome was incredible and there was the unspeakable beauty of the Mediterranean, which gave me the energy to keep going," she said.

No Fly Zone Over Palestine

Head on over to GazaTV News for more

Dear international community,

No we do not have vast oil resources, but Gaza especially is home to some exotic and beautiful flowers that used to be a major export before the calamitous siege, which is entering its fifth year. Also, Gaza grows its own strawberries, which the Palestinians in the West Bank are in desperate need of since the only strawberries they can get are the Israeli produced and excessively hormone-sprayed ones. They look large and ripe, but taste of absolutely nothing. They may also have cancerous substances. The war planes, F-16 missiles and Apache helicopters mostly frequent the Gaza Strip, which is where we are asking you primarily to focus the imposition of a no fly zone. You see, it is a heavily populated area-4,110 people per square kilometer, which in total encompasses 365 kilometer squares-and when Israel starts its bombing, there's no question of civilians not being killed in the process. Oh, and keep a look out for our grandparents' villages they were ethnically cleansed from-they're still Palestinian territory to us.

Oil is eventually going to run out, but flowers and strawberries aren't. Remember that.

Yours,
Palestinian Children

Gaza Pays Tribute to Vittorio

Honestly I just can't stop thinking about Vittorio. His pipe, workman's cap, "muqawama" (resistance) tattoo...all capture his passionate nature, his humanity. It's too late, but I fell in love with him.

"He survived so much, he was so strong and robust and this large, life-filled, hard living, sensitive, open man. He was all about staying human."


Solidarity statements in his honor.

What his mother wrote.
"...now we are closer than ever, with his living presence magnified at every passing hour, like a wind from Gaza, from his beloved Mediterranean, blowing fierily to deliver the message of his hope and of his love for those without a voice, for the weak and the oppressed, passing the baton."


Untitled from Mohammed Al Majdalawi on Vimeo.

Gazan Lives Are Worth Nothing

Where has the outrage been concerning the murder of 19 Palestinians in Gaza, among them children and elderly? What a shame that these victims do not carry the surname "Fogel", otherwise they would have enjoyed their mugs splashed on the front page covers of the mainstream papers. This is just sickening. It is absolutely despicable, that the Palestinians as the brown "other" are continually dehumanized in msm outlets by not giving them their proper due and coverage.

Hamas firing rockets is such a stupid tactic. They just don't learn; it has brought more harm than good to the rest of the civilian population in Gaza, which remains under siege (Egypt, sort this out.) Granted, the rockets are shoddy tinpots that barely kill anyone, but the fact that they are fired blindly targeting whoever into the surrounding settlements is such an idiotic move and fuels the braying hasbara machine of Hamas' bloodthirsty nature, as opposed to the IDF's upstanding morality.

Israel on the other hand have the latest technologically developed weapons and deliberately pick off their victims. Those boys playing football? Huge security threat. Tzipi Livni called for another Operation Cast Lead. Did anyone bat an eye? Pure craziness that just serves to showcase once again the innate hypocrisy of Israel.

If Hamas ceased to stop firing rockets, their form of lackadaisical resistance, the reality is still not going change. Israel will still murder farmers and passersby in the ridiculous 300 meter buffer zone-which keeps getting extended-, the strip will still remain under siege, and Israeli air strikes definitely won't stop. This collective punishment which has reduced the 1.5 million civilians, over half of them under the age of 18, to just mere numbers is definitely unacceptable.

The impotent Arab League asked for a no-fly zone over Gaza to be implemented. Well. Let's see what comes out of this even though I won't hold my breath. Who am I kidding of course it won't be enforced. After all, Israel has a right to defend itself and the thousands of women, children, elderly, and non-combatant men (who always get left out in this equation) who paid the price with their blood are just collateral damage. As you were.

UPDATE: They have names. One family broken as they lost their mother and older sister.

Amy Goodman from Democracy Now talks to Omar Barghouti about Gaza, BDS, PA's tactics regarding BDS and solidarity protests, and Juliano Mer Khamis.

Gaza Youth Breaks Out

When we first read the manifesto almost two weeks ago, our initial reaction was nothing short of being delighted. Nothing grabs our attention as forcefully as some serious case of fuck-ficking.

"Fuck Israel. Fuck Hamas. Fuck Fatah. Fuck UN. Fuck UNWRA. Fuck USA! We, the youth in Gaza, are so fed up with Israel, Hamas, the occupation, the violations of human rights and the indifference of the international community!"

Brilliant. Those first few lines adequately captured the boiling sentiment that we feel our generation ought to be experiencing, had fifty percent actually cared. We read on, thoroughly engrossed. Mainstream media has the tendency of portraying the people in Gaza as Hamas fanatics. That's about as true as saying the Palestinians in the West Bank are ardent supporters of Fateh. The manifesto expressed serious disapproval and sneering hostility toward Hamas, as GYBO described them as mentally incarcerating those in Gaza and imposing an authoritarian regime in telling people how to think, behave, live etc. They then went on to describe their miserable lives fraught with hope and happiness and at the end asked for three things: Freedom, Normal Lives (the ability of living in such a way), and Peace. The full proclamation can be read here.

Well. We were certainly enthralled! And our joyous mood further increased upon learning that this anonymous group of university students, with all their frustrations about a life cruelly restricted by the hawkish totalitarian eyes of Hamas, the strangulation of the siege, and the dominant destructive occupying force of Israel on a tiny immensely overcrowded strip of land, has attracted overwhelming support in such a short time period. Finally, we thought, a voice has spoken up, determined to shed light on the reality of what they go through in a way news reporters and journalists can never quite capture. After the years of passive silence on behalf of our generation, one small corner have let rip with exactly how they feel. We dreamed of drafting a similar mandate..."We, the youth in the West Bank, are so fed up with Israel, Fateh, the occupation, the violation of human rights, and the indifference of the international community!"

But then...something seemed a bit off. It was a small niggling feeling, but it was there nonetheless. This extraordinary piece of work has amassed thousands of supporters in such a brief amount of time...its popularity is unprecedented owing to the fact of being the first of its kind, yet more than one comment began to surface that this manifesto was in reality the clever work of Zionists. That these kids were commissioned and being pulled along their strings by the slick and manipulative gross hands of the so called professed enemy-Israel. That the enemy was in fact Hamas, and that these words were written to garner even more disgust and 'liberating operations' to effectively get rid of their ruling power. That even if the integrity of the manifesto was true, the Zionists would pounce upon it and seize it to further their own interests by their used methods of fabrication, slander, and lies. We held our breath, disappointment and resentment trickling in our hearts. Were we that naive to so readily champion the manifesto?

And then we got slapped in the face with THIS.

Lord, we feel so much at ease now. Quick excerpts:

"Many activists reject our movement and consider us as some Zionist machinery because in the manifesto, we’ve been denouncing Hamas – among others."

"Our followers, readers, and those who are not supporting us yet must keep in mind THIS message: we have ONE enemy which is the Zionist Occupier."

"What we want is UNITY, and NO MORE DIVISION, because it makes Israeli terrorism’s impact on our lives even worse."

"Our call is a call for SOLIDARITY, a call for PEACEFUL ACTION; we are holding out our hands & waiting for you to complete the bond. Make sure this is read, help us work for a better solution, HELP US MAKE IT!"

Our tiny doubt must have risen from the initial poorly worded manifesto, and we're not blaming them-English isn't their first language and they can be afforded some slack. We're now burning with curiosity as to what their next move will be, what their plan of action is, what it is they have in mind, how they will act, how they will counter act against censorship and possible infiltration and arrests. The first step is gathering support, then what? How do they expect to work with their supporters in accomplishing or at least working out a solution for the present injustices they (and we) endure on a daily basis if they committed to maintaining their identities a secret?

We honestly hope that this does become successful and a preclude to chapters forming in West Bank cities soon, and not just one of those We came We saw We conquered and now We sleep. Palestine desperately lacks university activism. Fingers crossed that will change.

Fuck Israel!

Because we couldn't resist. Shit, no pun intended.

Shared Experience About Gaza

Abu Yazan on the first day of the massacre:

"That day I was walking in the street with a friend of mine in the middle of Gaza City…we were laughing at some jokes he was saying…and all of the sudden we heard the roaring of the Israeli F16s…It is normal in Gaza to hear such things, so we did not pay much attention to that, we kept moving with our jokes….Then with a glance, an explosion happened in a police station that was around 150 meters away from us.. We went running to the place when another explosion took place followed by a third, then a fourth, a fifth, we didn’t know what was happening but we didn’t hesitate to keep on going to the first place bombed…We had our hands over our ears because the explosions never ended, it was very loud to the limit you think that you are the one being hit with those rockets."

Read the rest here:
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/12/27/abu-yazan-%e2%80%93-the-27th-of-december-a-day-i-will-never-forget/

An article by the BNC concerning the two year anniversary.

2 Years Since the Horrors in Gaza

Searching through pictures of the Gaza massacre is about as fun as staring at Tzipi Livni's bearded face on Al-Jazeera TV. It reinvoked those helpless frustrated emotions in us, as we were glued to our screens unable to tear our eyes away at the horrors taking place 5o miles away from us. The fact that we couldn't even express solidarity with our fellow Palestinians was extremely difficult to stomach, to say the least, as any signs and protests expressing resistance were cruelly trampled upon by old man Abbass and his despicable legion of brainless yes men.

Israel's Operation Cast Lead has had at least one positive impact-the increasing awareness and activism carried out through the boycott, divestment, and sanctions committee all around the world. It managed to open up the eyes of citizens worldwide who finally came to terms-albeit 60 years late- with Israel's gruesome and horrifying policies against an occupied population, all at the expense of the more than a thousand innocent civilians killed, which includes over 4oo children. Convoys have been organized and sent, and some have succeeded whereas others were denied access. Now, two years on, Gaza remains what it was before the 08/09 invasion-simply forgotton about in the eyes of the international community and great upholders of human rights, such as the United Failtions. Now, more than ever, the people of Gaza are reliant on conscientious citizens to keep on notifying the world of the past and present injustices done to them and the terrorism they were subjected to by the great democratic state of Israel. Bastards Ehud Olmert, Ehud Barack, and Tzipi Livni are still walking around free, not being held accountable for the atrocities under their orders. Il dinya dawara-what goes around comes around.

22 days living in absolute trepidation while the silent eyes of the world simply looked on. This will never do, and hopefully-as the right wing nut cases are gaining more power in the Israeli government, threatening a future civil war-the Gaza massacre will have marked a crucial point in the demise of Israel as a brutal occupying force. Maybe then we can all enjoy our reparations.

Viva Viva Palestina!

We're a bit late on this not so breaking news anymore-blame miscommunication and faulty internet servers, but here we are.

Finally we can rejoice in hearing about the Viva Palestina “smashing” the blockade and making it through into Gaza. Three cheers for Viva Palestina…hip hip hurray, hip hip hurray, hip hip hurray! Alrighty then back to the informative details. This convoy of approximately 150 vehicles, 370 people from 30 different countries and $5 million of aid has been recognized to be the biggest convoy ever to break the siege of Gaza. This epic journey took four weeks and five days from its starting point in London and traveled through France, Italy, Greece, Turkey and Syria. What a trip huh? Wait! it’s not over yet. In Syria the convoy was delayed for eighteen days because of ongoing negotiations with the Egyptian authority. Since Viva Palestina wanted nothing to do with the Israel border and didn’t want to hand the convoy’s aid to Israeli authorities they turned to the Egyptian border and the Egyptian authorities to allow their entrance into Gaza. When the final negotiations were reached, Egypt allowed the passage of all the convoys with the exclusion of 17 members including George Galloway from entering Gaza. We can take an educated guess about why that is and say that it might be because they’re “security threats” who oppose this “security” barrier, and do nothing but incite hatred and intolerance. When the sea journey came to an end at the Egyptian port of Al Arish a new journey on land began. The Convoy then drove the 40Km to the Egyptian/Gaza border at Rafah where they entered the Gaza Strip.

The Irene Stopped by Israeli Authorities

On the 26th of this month, a boat carrying Jewish activists set sail from Cyprus to Gaza in the hope of breaking the insufferable siege. Those on board included Ed (or David...no let's stick with Ed since he's the boss now) Miliband's mother, Marion Kozak, 82 year old Holocaust survivor Reuven Moskovitz, and Rami Alhanan, an Israeli whose daughter was killed in a suicide bombing in 1997.

Smuggled weapons must have been deeply smuggled under the boats nail planks or magnetically pulverised into anthrax powder, because according to European Jews for a Just Peace, the organization that launched the boat, the cargo included:

"symbolic aid in the form of children's toys and musical instruments, textbooks, fishing nets for Gaza's fishing communities and prosthetic limbs for orthopedic medical care in Gaza's hospitals."

Israeli naval commandos have peacefully boarded a Jewish aid boat attempting to break a naval blockade on Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces said at 11:30 A.M. Tuesday.

From Haaretz:

"IDF naval forces recently boarded the yacht 'Irene', and it is currently being led to the Ashdod seaport along with its passengers," the military said in statement that branded the boat a "provocation yacht".

IDF chief spokesman Avi Benayahu deplored the fact that "naval forces and fighters are being diverted from our main mission" to "a surreal assignment" of intercepting a boatload of activists.

"Its entire intention was to generate media attention and (stage) a provocation. This matter is especially regrettable as we are talking about a group of Jews and of Israeli citizens, and even someone who has worn an IDF officer's uniform."

Dear oh dear, how dare a bunch of conscientious Jewish folk, some with Israeli citizenship, have the absolute GALL to stage off such a publicity stunt that hurts the democratic sandy-beached Israel? Such PROVOCATION!!!

Didn't you know, Gaza is NOT under siege. Like, duh!

This Past (Past) Week

Where oh where have we been these past two weeks? Where were we, as self-professed football fanatics, when our team choice won? Where were were to gently mock Iker Cassillas' blubbering tears? And to capitalize on the moment by spamming our blog with Dahhvid Villa's mug

plastered all over? Shit, that's not gonna stop us.

All higgedly-piggedly like. Look at that face, bless him. The Ayrabs here celebrated like there was no tomorrow, honking yelling skidding along in their cars all night. Guns were brought out and shots fired in the air, and in Jordan, land of moronic people, one of these shots caught an old woman who died on the spot. Only Arabs...

Where were we when we missed the first lady of Arabic hip hop Shadia Mansour's private party at the Snowbar? Our Good Shit/mazzika section is all about hip hop, the sound of revolution etc etc etc, so how could we miss an opportunity like this? Oh well. By the way, Shadia's music is pretty amazing. She has a lovely voice that can switch to cutting edge lyrics in a second.

EU foreign policy cheif Catherine Ashton visited Gaza, humanitarian aid ships from Libya were refused access to Gaza's waters, and Gaza's borders with Egypt are open indefinitely, perhaps a sign of Mubarak's impending death? That's where our summer vacation will be! Fingers crossed.

Today starting from 8 AM fireworks punctured the periwinkle sky at rapid succession. The Tawjeehi results, which are the end of year results of 12th grade students and not high school elections as one foreigner explained sagely, are out and the names of the students who passed are in the newspapers. On campus, there were groups huddled around pouring over the long columns of tiny names, seeing whether their siblings/cousins/relatives/neighbors/friends/enemies passed or not, and just what their exact average is. One girl was passing out knafe! Mabrook/mazel tov, let the crazy nights and crazier parties begin. Our headaches are starting from now.

Lowkey was detained at Ben Gurion Airport Tuesday for half a day before being released. Wherever he's going, we're clawing our way to hang on to his coat tails.

A small meeting commenced today concerning the Right to Education conference taking part on the 27th and 28th of July. The aim is to build a global network of students concerned with the education rights of Palestians living in the Occupied Territories. We've signed up for this, and some 40 international students are expected to join in. Spread the word!

Links and Rants

Jon Voight. Better known as the guy who gave his Y chromosome that begot the former sexy Angelina Jolie (for us, she lost her appeal after having/picking up so many babies). He's 71, white, male, loaded, and a northern American. His contacts may include Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh, and all the other racist Tea Party goers. He, as any other sane person, is not happy with Obama and the way the president is running the country. He, like any other sane person, wrote a letter to express his opinions and frustrations, addressing the problems that in his opinion Obama is responsible for. Fair enough, after all this is the President who has no problem in ordering the assassination of US citizens on foreign soil, denies habeas rights to suspected terrorists, and loves being an ass in general. But back to Voight's letter, of which the content is unsurprisingly insane and full of poppycock.

"You will be the first American president that lied to the Jewish people, and the American people as well, when you said that you would defend Israel, the only Democratic state in the Middle East, against all their enemies," Voight wailed. "You have done just the opposite. You have propagandized Israel, until they look like they are everyone's enemy-and it has resonated throughout the world. You are putting Israel in harm's way and you have promoted anti-Semitism throughout the world."

Hm, we remember Obama at the Cairo conference a couple years back vowing to uphold the Arab countries' interests and values while serving to improve relations with the US. So, yeah Obama is a certified liar, but that's just another term for a politician. Ok time to break it down.

"The only Democratic state in the Middle East." Bitch please. Refer back to the wonderfully insidious (ok, it's actually pretty docile) website theonlydemocracy.org . But then Voight can't have known about the fact that this Democratic state has no internationally recognized borders? And that it is an occupying force devastating the lives of millions of measly Palestinians? Or that it harbors nuclear power? And that it gives automatic citizenship based on Religion and religion only? And that it is a Jewish state whose rights are exclusive to Jews, and not say, Palestinian citizens of Israel? What a flawed concept hmm.

"You have propagandized Israel and they look like they are everyone's enemy..." How exactly? By exerting the minimal pressure regarding the on-going illegal settlement building in Jerusalem and the West Bank? Oh how can we say that, this minimal pressure is not at all standardized political hogwash, a poor pantomime for the world. This minimal pressure was the cause for US-Israeli relations to reach the lowest point ever! Perhaps, by this minimal pressure, the world got a glimpse of what Israeli claims itself to be and what it is in reality. Oh, the demonization!

Ok, we can't be bothered with the rest, but of course it is all Obama's fault for promoting Anti-Semitism when the world took to the streets protesting loudly at the Israeli attack and murder of civilians aboard a humanitarian ship 3 weeks ago. You know, sarcasm aside, it partly is his fault, after all his administration continues the American tradition of supplying Israel with 3 billion dollars in military aid. But then, Obama isn't the one that gave the order from Canada to go ahead with the flotilla attack. Nooooo that was someone called Netanyahu. Right, Jon Voight, you are a clueless deluded silly ignorant old man, and now we know the reason for Angelina estranging you. After Sean Penn's lauding of Hugo Chavez, the Conservatives sought to bring this upon us? Ha.

Gilad Shalit and Palestinian Prisoners. Shalit's parents started their march to Jerusalem on Friday commemorating their son's 4th year in captivity. They will stay at a protest tent erected a year ago and pressure the Israeli government to secure Shalit's release. This goes to show, more than anything, the incompetence and seemingly indifferent view of the Israeli government, who apparently are portraying that the release of Shalit is not in their best interests, in contrast to their repeated rhetoric and assurances. One soldier in return for the release of Palestinian women and children and 300 other detainees. No? Ok, no Gilad. This is the way it works. The torture and detainment of Palestinian children is of course illegal under international law, and when we hear that a child's testicles are being electrocuted by Israeli interrogators who sneer in the child's face "you will never be able to become a father" vitriolic rage renders us senseless. Dear oh dear, we wonder how that child's mother must feel? Aviva Shalit at least can be 'comforted' with the knowledge that her brave son was serving with the Lions and fulfilling his duty to his state, and not say, captured while loitering at some alley.

Gaza Electricity Blackout. Again and again and again, the only power plant in Gaza has ran out of fuel to operate and the tiny coastal strip is plunged into darkness once again. Gazans will now have to go 15 hours a day without electricity and depend on Israel and Egypt for some. Imagine going 15 hours a day with no TV, computers, telephones, refrigerators, hot water, etc. An EU contribution to fuel shipments to Gaza was transferred (intercepted more like) by the rotten PA, who cited budget constraints. How much more do they have to bend over backwards for Israel?

World Cup Ponderings. Why do people support the teams they do? Political motivation is the main reason according to our parents and their generation. Brazilian flags are seen everywhere, rippling from windows and cars and stores, and all because Brazil kicked out its Israeli ambassador. We won't lie, if Turkey had qualified we would have been behind them religiously. But you see...Spain does have delectable players who can actually play, and Argentina...well it's Argentina for God's sake! We were so happy USA got knocked out by Ghana, before a snapshot of a memory caused us to pause. Back in 2006, after Ghana had beaten some team, one team member celebrated by waving the Israeli flag in front of cameras. What a blow. We wish we had selective retainment dammit. Anyhoo, it seems only fair that the other colonialist power in the world should be defeated, so England, we are humbly awaiting your exit. To show our good sportsmanship, we won't delight at your red sun burned skin or your tears, because your poor judgement clouds the inevitable i.e. you should have had it coming. England winning the world cup? What next, elephants flying to the moon? Teehee!

State Terrorism, Flotilla Under Attack

What poor, victimized Israel has done today is in the words of Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan "state terrorism." What they have done constitutes terror. They murdered civilians aboard a humanitarian ship. Those filthy criminals, assailants, murderers, barbarians. What they have done in the early hours of today is unfathomable. It is senseless. It is horrific, unnecessary, and brutal. Much like Operation Cast Lead. This time, instead of attacking, killing, and injuring a few thousand lowly Palestinians whose lives aren't worth that much anyway (pure sarcasm for the drain-brained) they've opened fire, wounded, and killed civilians and activists from so many different countries. So far, there are confirmed reports that 19 are killed, ten who are from Turkey. Yeah that's right, the quickest way to self-destruction is to jeopardize already troubled relations with the only country in the region that had an amicable relationship with it. We are beyond disgusted. We are beyond horrified. This, we did not expect. This, with the whole world watching, we did not see coming.

Under cover of the darkness before dawn, Israeli troops descended onto the main ship, Mavi Marmara, carrying 600 passengers in international waters (read it twice, international waters) and began shooting. This military action came with the full approval of Benjamin fucking Netanyahu, after speaking on Monday from Canada to top Israeli diplomats and officials. When we first heard about the news, we went numb. This is not even outlandish anymore, there are no extremities that Israel has not reached with such brazen impunity, allowing aggressive and destructive behavior to rule at the cost of innocent lives. Heard about the Israeli bombing of the USS Liberty ship back in 1967? 34 were killed.

We can't even collect our train of thoughts right now. Let's start with the Israeli version of how things went, if only to provide some harrowing comedic effect.

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs played Russian Roulette with itself, packing the single most absurd preposterous bullet. When that bullet was fired, the extremity of the bull shittedness was enough to cause a lot more innocent people to brain hemorrhage. The bullet read as:

During the interception of the ships, the demonstrators on board attacked the IDF navy personnel with live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs. Additionally one of the weapons used was grabbed from an IDF soldier. The demonstrators had clearly prepared their weapons in advance for this specific purpose.

Ok, so they use the victim card. They've been using it for more than 62 years. It never gets old! But, as Azmi Bshara derisively and correctly assessed, what kind of elite commando unit does Israel have if it allows a civilian to get close to him and intercept his weapon? We shouldn't even be doing this, humoring Israel's claims. No one with half a brain believes this nonsensical blabber above. And anyone with that half a brain is smart enough to know the deep bottomless well of Israel's stupidity. What the hell kind of people were on board this flotilla anyway? Hmm, maybe an underground selective inter-European guerrilla army. Don't be fooled by those women on the ships! They were trained at Qaddafi's special training school for his female bodyguards. And those parliamentarians? They are haters of Israel, not necessarily the crazy "Islamo-fascists" but just obsolete Roman emperors who have taken it upon themselves to single-handedly oversee the demise of Israel. This isn't far-fetched at all! No more than a heavily armed troop being attacked with knives and clubs!

The Free Gaza Movement have stated their own CORRECT* version of events. (*This is unbiased reporting from us.)

Under darkness of night, Israeli commandos dropped from a helicopter onto the Turkish passenger ship, Mavi Marmara, and began to shoot the moment their feet hit the deck. They fired directly into the crowd of civilians asleep. Streaming videos shows Israeli soldiers shooting at civilians. This attack has happened 75 miles off the coast of Israel, in direct violation of international law.

When will Israel's impunity end? When will it be held accountable to its atrocious war crimes? When will its perpetrators and leaders be tried (and hanged...or shot at by a firing squad made up of families that have lived off the injustice and occupation) as war criminals in international hearing courts? Damn you USA for your superpower-ness.

Turkey has 10,000 protesters in the capital, voicing their anger in front of the Israeli embassy, making their way to the city square and demanding justice.

400 people turned out in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where one of the ships carrying construction materials set off from.

In Edinburgh, Scotland, 200 people are starting out the protest.

London's protest has a massive turn-out!

Amman, Jordan has a 1000 people protesting.

Associated Press reports that smaller protests have broken out in Kirachi (Pakistan) and Sarajevo (Bosnia), and Thessaloníki (Greece).

Turkey, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, and Greece have all summoned their Israeli ambassadors for a meeting. France backs growing support for a thorough investigation of Israel's attack.

Citizens from all of these countries mentioned were aboard the flotilla.

Old man Abbas has politely heeded Israel's demand that no protests in Ramallah or the West Bank should be held. He has as compensation for his lack of balls issued a 3 day mourning period.

Sheik Raed Saleh of the Islamic Movement in Al-Quds and 1948 region is between life and death after sustaining an injury/getting shot at by a bullet on his head.

The worst feeling is that of desolate hopelessness, knowing that you can't do anything, while these good souls on the flotilla have suffered death and injury and terrorizing at the hands of mentally challenged state.

UPDATE: New day brings with it new clarifications, Sheik Raed Saleh is unhurt, in one piece, and detained at Be'er Sheva prison. There was a gathering of people around the Manara square in Ramallah but to us, that does not make up a protest. Protests should be of at least 1000 people, with their voices ringing loud and clear. See Cairo, Ankara, and London.

Israel is Threatened by Flotilla Humanitarian Aid

The world's complicity with the illegal siege on the Gaza Strip that has been imposed by Israel for a few years now is beyond despicable. We're going to use our favorite tactic, called Breaking It Down, to provide background information.

WHY has Israel imposed a siege on the Gaza Strip?

In 2006, the Palestinian people voted democratically to elect Hamas as their government. As a way of punishing the Palestinians for exercising their democratic rights, this led to an immediate boycott of Hamas from international (mostly Western) governments, on the basis that Hamas is a terrorist group who will not rest on their laurels until every single Jew in the occupied territories (the 1948 region is included) is driven out from the land into the sea. These governments refused to deal with such a wack ideology, and condemned Hamas as a dangerous violent faction that threatens potentially progressive peace plans. Is it not, just a teensy weensy ironic, how these same filthy hypocritical governments are dealing with and embracing whole-heartedly the deranged serpentine ideology of Zionism? Zionism is a racist doctrine that is established on the grounds of ethnically cleansing an indigenous population in order to make the land available for settlers. Israel is a colonialist settler state that upholds noble acts of Apartheid and continuously harasses Palestinians on a daily basis under its deplorable occupation. When the Palestinians have the nerve to elect democratically a political faction, a dreadful civil war between rival factions Hamas and Fateh, instigated and backed by the USA government, ensues. Hamas stage a coup, overthrow Fateh from the Gaza Strip, and fuel the justification for a boycott against it even more. Don't listen to the Israeli hasbara machine. Hamas has on more than one occasion offered a peace plan based on the 1967 borders (Jews aren't under threat anymore!) but Israel has rejected it every time. Ceasefires between Hamas and Israel are always broken by...Israel. Israel blocks off all of its border openings, Egypt does the same, and as a result, collective punishment on the 1.5 million population of the Strip is eventuated.

HOW bad is this unlawful siege?

Very bad. Gaza is dependent on Israel and Egypt for electricity, and since we can't ask anything more from generous Egypt, Israel monopolizes electricity. It destroyed the only power plant in Gaza during its last massacre last year, and has not given its permission nor approval to fully rebuild it again. As a result, those on life-support machines or any kind of machine that aids them medically had their conditions even more worsened. Medical supplies and medicine have ran out, culminating in up to 400 deaths. Food was once scarce, everyday items such as pens and papers and coffee and diapers and powdered milk were deemed too much of a threat to Israel's precious security to be allowed entry to Gaza.

WHAT has been done to counter this siege?

The siege has effected into an explosive tunnel industry, where everything is smuggled from Egypt to Gaza. Food, animals, cars, motorcycles, clothes, gas, generators- all have become available. There are deep risks that come with these tunnels, as they are liable to collapse unexpectedly and are subjected to Israel's bombing once in a while. Children have become involved in tunnels as a means for providing for their families, and they use drugs to drive off fatigue and claustrophobia. Also, the tunnel industry will be forced to abort its activities because of Egypt's plans for a border wall that will have steel blocks 30 meters underground. The supplies that come from the tunnels however are double or triple their normal price, and with close to 90 percent of the people living on less than two dollars every day, their availability is useless to those who can not afford them. Yousef Munayyer has published a piece in Ma'an News where he states, "That's all part of the plan. Israel seeks to squeeze the strip to the point of near catastrophe, bad enough to make people suffer, but just short of having to take responsibility for it." Humanitarian aid has arrived in ships and convoys from different countries and a diverse mix of citizens, yet they encounter danger once they either enter Gaza's waters (under threat of Israeli navy ships that harass/barge/block their progress) or provocation and hounding by Egyptian officials, who beat activists and subject them to ungodly exasperation, when they land in Egypt and try to make it through the Rafah border crossing. The only breath of life Gaza's population has are mostly from the tunnels, which will be redundant in the near future, and the humanity of the people who organize and put together these convoys and ships.

WHAT is going on now?

There's a flotilla of three ships, courtesy of the Free Gaza Movement, making their way to Gaza right now, carrying aid, reconstruction supplies, and a few hundred activists on board. Israel has vowed to stop the flotilla and arrest all of the activists. It tries to convey its image as one of a benevolent nature that allows aid to enter into the Strip every now and then, when the reality is that the supplies entering are of minimal amount. A couple of months ago, Israel once again played the altruistic card by allowing clothes and shoes to enter. Their compassionate humanity is just too much for us. By withdrawing from Gaza in 2005, Israel has created the illusion of a free and totally Palestinian territory. How far from the truth is that, when Israel still controls all of the borders and forbid fishermen from fishing more than 12 kilometers from the coast, while at the same time still raids Gaza and shoots at random boats and people from the sea. We won't ever forget what happened to Huda Ghaliya's family.

Break the siege on Gaza, spread the word about Israel's fascist imperialism, and never forget the 1.5 million Palestinians imprisoned on a strip of land 30 miles long, 5 miles wide.