tel aviv lizard

My Birthday Demo

2008-04-25T22:01:00.011+03:00

Immediately following the regular Women in Black vigil in Tel Aviv Maxim square...

No dress code, a private-public demonstration of the personal and the political...

A giant plant as a present from WIBTA, and a pile of leftover signs from the vigil...

...and here's Shuki!

(End the dryspell! we want more hot butches!)

("Why not Berlin? - The Renewed Zionist Movement")

("Demonstration against Dalit's Birthday")

("Stop the privatization of butches! - Butches are a public asset!")

("Bring Back the Dykes and End the Occupation!")

("Love out of Freedom")

Oh... and here are some passer-bys giving us the finger!!!

but... isn't that the driver?

(sign below: "Yes to Lesbianism")

(sign on the left: "Enough with the Occupation! In need of more Lesbians!")

(left: "Demonstration, no matter why"; middle: "We Want")

The Etzel Party

2008-04-25T20:52:00.009+03:00

Just the first of the 60th year parties...

Last evening, an event celebrating "60 years to the liberation of Jaffa" was meant to credit the Etzel (the Irgun) with 1948 victories, and restore it to its rightful place in the national creation myth. A tour with testimonies of Etzel soldiers, a rally with speeches, all supposedly open to the public.

A coalition of some Jaffans and Tel Aviv lefties was organized to remind people of the 60,000 Jaffans expelled and of the state of un"liberated" Jaffa ever since.

The evening before the celebration, some have gone out to make beautiful graffiti along the route of the Etzel tour (an account in Hebrew of the night arrests).
During the event itself we have organized alternative tours, with some other testimonies, and an alternative rally in front of the Etzel rally (news stories in Hebrew of the demonstration with pics of the arrests).

Looking at my pictures from that night, the story is all about water and discipline.

Some are from my walk down on the beach to meet with the demonstration near the Etzel museum...
Beautiful beach day, Passover, hundreds of families, Palestinians and Orthodox Jews on vacation, bathing and eating and playing in the last rays of the sun...

When I reached the Etzel museum (which is of course a half-ruined Palestinian house) the place is already surrounded by police expecting us. Some demonstrators are trying to hold on to a hill across from the main event, whilc the police is pushing them back to a "cage" prepared in advance for us...
(60 years that Jaffa has no Cinema...)

Reuven Aberjil, formerly of the Israeli Black Panthers, recounting for us events from the occupation of Jaffa, including Etzel terrorist attacks on Palestinian civilians...

Pushing us back and forth, using their usual violence, the police is trying to prevent us from destablizing the Zionist narrative.

One policeman pushed me back and back and back and when I stood fast, he exclaimed: you are attacking a policeman! it was all a little funny... and this is when Aberjil, wisely, advised us all to sit down...

Plainclothes undercover policemen were wearing "queer-anarchist" drag... Three are arrested for no evident cause... One of then, S, is being pushed by them into an unmarked car, demanding to see their ID...
Later that night she was released with all the other arrestees, with no real charges...
... but not before two more of us were arrested outside the police station, where we were waiting for our friends' release... the cause was "not taking seriously police officers who take themselves too seriously" or something like that...

Altogether, a beautiful beach day, many curious people living and enjoying it together, very anxious police and some bruised demonstrators.

Bethlehem Night

2007-11-18T12:31:00.001+02:00

Beit Sahour, just next to Beit Lehem and Beit Jalla, is the legendary town that declared a tax rebellion during the first intifada and withstood the Israeli punishment for months. It is one of the centers of Palestinian civil society, issuing the call for Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions on Israel.

Last night I visited Beit Sahour, to speak in the AIC Center about the work of Israeli activists in response to that call. After the talk, we went on a night tour of the walls... Walls of Rachel's Tomb, Walls in front of the refugee camp A'ida, Walls along the Jewish roads in the valley, Walls around the Jewish settlement on the hill.

Scenes from the lost 48 villages shimmering on the Walls of the refugee camp in the car lights...

Graffiti artists on the Apartheid Wall, giving meaning to unintelligeble constructions. Lights freely provided by watchtower guards and security torchlights... and the driver kept telling recent stories: about the man who burned down his own olive trees, to keep them from being stolen by the Israelis... about working as a driver while running for office... about Israeli prisons...

and I knew all that, but forgot - how could I have forgotten? how did I fall back into my Israeli matrix, working and arguing politics, as if Occupation is just a word to be debated, as if the Walls have crept their way into me.

Naming Home

2007-10-08T01:32:00.000+02:00

Kiriat Ono is my home town.

It was established in 1939 by 38 Jewish families on land bought from the Palestinian towns Kafr ‘Ana and Al-Khayriyya. They called their new settlement Kfar Ono (=Ono Village), and later it became Kiriat Ono (=Ono Town).

Kafr ‘Ana was associated with the town "Ono" mentioned in the bible. In Byzantine era it was referred to as Onous. The newly arrived Jewish immigrants wanted to restore the ancient Hebrew name, they settled in a “densely populated Arab area”, in the aftermath of the great Arab rebellion.

In 1948, just before the Nakba, the town registry recorded 14,358 Arab residents, 2,334 Jewish.

Al Khayriyya, the other Palestinian town which hosted the Jewish settlement Kfar Ono, was originally called Ibn Ebraq, which goes back to the ancient name Bene Beraq mentioned in the bible and then in Roman times… It was only “during the British Mandate, (that) the villagers changed their village name to al-Khayriyya (=the good one) to distinguish it from the next door Zionist colony of Bene Beraq.”

In 1948, just before the Nakba, this town had 7,182 Arab residents, and 5,842 Jewish.

The next door Palestinian town of al-‘Abbassiyya also has a good name story: “The Romans referred to al-'Abbasiyya by Iudaea (=Judea), and later it was called al-Yahudiyya, meaning "The Jewish One" in Arabic. In 1932, the residents renamed it to al-'Abbasiyya, in memory of a Shaykh al-'Abbas.”

In April 1948 all the Palestinian towns in the Jaffa district, including these three, were occupied by the Jewish militia “Haganah” (which means Defense), and the Palestinian residents who had not left by then were made to leave. Later that year almost all buildings were destroyed to prevent the residents from returning.

This Haganah Operation was named “Operation Chametz”, after the Jewish tradition of cleansing the house of unwanted Chometz bread crumbs before the Passover holiday.

Nothing at all remains of Kafr ‘Ana today. Al ‘Abbasiyya became Yahud again - the Jewish one, and its mosque became a synagogue. Al Khairiyya, the good one, used to be in the plains, but today it is one of the tallest mountains between the Mediterranean and the Judean desert: Khairiyya Mountain has become the main garbage dump in the country, operating for over 50 years. These days there are plans to make it into “The Ayalon Park”.

From the Ayalon Park hikes plan:
"On the highest point of the upper plateau, where the cooling wind is flowing over the edge of the mountain the Summit View Point offers a great view... The strong wind mostly coming from the west is carrying the fragrance from the sea and of the plateau vegetation with it – a mix of salt, blossoms and Mediterranean herbs will encircle the visitor."

According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, there are 26,800 residents living today in Kiriat Ono. All are registered under “Jews and others”. There are only two categories in this table: “Jews and Others” and “Arabs”. An endnote explains: “The ‘Jews and others’ population includes Jews, other Christians (non-Arab Christians) and those not classified by religion.”

The refugees from Kafr ‘Ana, al Khairiyya and al ‘Abbasiyya are mostly in Jordan.

I have heard people joke about “Kiriat Oh- NO!”… But the origin of the word Ono is probably from “On”, which means male potency, virile strength.

Bil'in Celebration

2007-09-09T01:14:00.001+03:00

The only tear gas we breathed this friday came from this used canisters' display in the village center...
After almost three years of friday demonstrations, this time we came to Bil'in to celebrate.
Wagee is holding an Israeli right-wing newspaper, whose headline is "Victory to the Rioters". The "rioters" are the nonviolent demonstrators in Biliin, the victory is the recent Israeli supreme court ruling, forcing the army to change the route of the separation fence near Bil'in, and to return to the village some of its lands.
About 500 demonstrators, Palestinian and Israeli, marched to the fence where we were, as usual, stopped by the army.... The demonstration has started with a short prayer...

and then speeches:
here are excerpts from a moving speech by Bassel Mansour of the popular commitee (hebrew, english).
... and this is Muhammad of the popular committee:
...and this is Salam Fayyed the new PA prime minister:

Thanks to his presence, and perhaps to the fabulous truck-top DJ, the army has let us celebrate, and did not disperse the demonstration by force... so the Red Crescent guys could also relax...
...and the dancing began...
This is Mustafa Barghouti, on Wagee's shoulders...
...and this is Muhammad again...
Abdalla of the popular committee gives an interview
Wagee's son:

and here are our lawyers... Smadar with Wagee
... and Gabi with Yonatan... (Michael Sfard did not come)

The army stayed behind the fence, "SHOOTING" only film...

Taunting the soldiers (gently, gently...)

Note the soldier taking pictures of the party on his private cellphone, to bring home...
The dancing went on and on...
and when the organizers have declared the end of the demonstration, we have all marched back... this time, not running from tear gas, from sound grenades, from rubber coated bullets... just like that, walking away!

Wagee has invited us to his house - and offered us fresh figs from their trees... the view from their front porch includes the new settlement across the fence...
The struggle is not over. The fence is still here, and in many other villages, and next friday, the demonstrations will continue....
But today, we go back to the village square, where the village men are still dancing...

... and like always, the weary demonstrators waiting for their service taxis have to have some falafel...

...The palestinian taxis dropped us near one of the porous seams between "israel" and "palestine" (these are to be found everywhere, but less and less on the ground, more and more in our bodies and souls)...
...and here we are climbing to the Israeli-only highway, crossing back through the looking glass...
looking back behind my shoulder:
pictures: Dalit Baum and Yael Lerer

Excerpts from Speech - Bil'in Celebration

2007-09-08T17:50:00.000+03:00

Thanks to the (Cowardly) High Court
by: Bassel Mansour

Selected comments by the representative of the People's Committee of Bil'in, Bassel Mansour, to Israelis that participated in the demonstration after the decision by the Israeli High Court,
Bil'in, Sept 7th 2007.

Recorded by Ehud Ein Gil, Translated from Ha'aretz, Sept 11, 2007 by Red Pharmacist.

Lovers of peace, friends of freedom and justice... our partners in the struggle and in the creation of this partial victory -- I bless you in the name of our Palestinian people, in the name of the residents of Bil'in, that you came to know, and that came to know you, and that you stood by their side ever since they began their opposition to the fence and the settlement that squats on a large part of their land. You came to us without considering the consequences -- the Zionist occupational government attempts to implant the deceptive and distorted idea that the Palestinans are your enemy and want to kill you. By way of this shared journey, we proved the opposite and together we demonstrated the truth -- that Israelis can stand beside Palestinians and live with them in peace and security, and even struggle with them against injustice and occupation, on the fundamental basis that this occupation is an enemy of humanity.

You succeeded in overcoming the army's roadblocks in order to arrive here through a difficult mountanous path and were vulnerable to its shooting attacks. In this way many of you were wounded by bullets that originated from the unmerciful occupation army -- and not from Palestinians, that the occupation attempts to distort and portray as a vicious animal that wants to devour Israelis or throw them into the sea.

You were braver than your fearful government. You participated in the struggle actively and in every way -- morally, physically, in the courts and in the media. In the battlefield, you were on the frontlines, calling with us for freedom, in your belief that only the manifestation of justice will guarantee the creation of peace and security for our two peoples, and not the building of walls and the expanding of weapons' warehouses.

You have been real partners -- awake with us late at night, in confronting the almost daily invasions of village homes by the army; together with us you opposed many attempts to arrest, and you yourselves were injured and arrested -- and you conveyed the true picture to the Israeli society. You disputed the positions of the government and the army in every arena -- until the entire world was a witness to this special connection that was created on the land of Bil'in, that united the conversation and the meeting between cultures, creeds and religions. A connection like this must be victorious, history must immortalize it.

Honourable audience, one of the biggest difficulties in this campaign was how to organize and manage the connection with the Israelis in solidarity, after our Palestinians people have always suffered injustice from the Zionist occupation. This was done while Palestinians aspire to lives of freedom, respect, and culture, and the mobilization of the most amount of Israelis possible and international representatives to stand up to the injustice. Once the Israelis in solidarity understood all of this, they became dedicated to the work and became real warriors that earned the trust of all. They contributed much by revealing the true face of the occupation -- its tactics, its lies and its organized terror against Palestinians -- in opposition to those that attempt to normalize and whitewash the occupation.

These people were always willing to take upon itself whatever was asked of it by the People's Committee, and more than this, often took the initiative, offering ideas and suggestions. In this way, they demonstrated that they were true fighters -- not only fans or friends, or cogs in the machine of the occupation. They are heroes in the non-violent campaign of the brave.

Honourable audience, recently a decision was taken by the body called the Israeli High Court of Justice, to cancel sections of the fence in Bil'in and to return a small amount of the stolen lands. This decision was taken after a long campaign with the participation of peace workers from every land, and the shooting injuries of almost a thousand demonstrators, in addition to tens of arrests and many more assaults.

We went to this occupational court not out of faith in it, but to prove that these courts are nothing but tools of the occupation. They are like a soldier that shoots you in the head and kills you, and then wraps your head in a white cloth, to be portrayed as a first aid worker. In its decision, this court proved to be cowardly and causes injustice, and we turn your attention to the fact that our campaign was against the principle of the wall and not opposition to its route.

Therefore we will continue in our struggle, until the occupational government destroys the wall and the settlements in all of Palestine, and we will build together, with our bodies, real bridges of love and security and peace, in order to conquer the wall and we will crush all of the plans of the occupation until we reach the ocean that knows no border -- and on its safe shores, we will sing the song of freedom and peace, together -- far from the injustices of the occupation and its roadblocks and barriers.

Blessings and respect to all of the Israelis, each and every one individually, that believe in peace and our legitimate rights, and welcome to Bil'in.

Only Time

2007-01-15T14:39:00.000+02:00

It is only a matter of time.

Stalling negotiations. Stopping movement. Managing the conflict.
You see, time is on our side. Soon, everything will be allright.
In time, "facts on the ground" will become mere facts, and the genocide will be remembered.

Just wait. Stop here, don't move.
It is not much longer. Really, it just sounds like a lot. Divide by the number of minutes in a life, divide by the number of people in a country, divide unequally, take into account comparable worth in the global economy, take into account shortened life-span due to lack of clean water, health services, housing.

It is only time. Minutes, hours, years, taken from ordinary people's lives.

Comeon, don't be so impatient. Nobody likes the lines for security checks. Noone enjoys postponing plans, waiting for the curfew to lift, the schools to open, the guns to quiet down, the salaries to be paid, the roads to clear up, the permits to be processed.

Be grateful it is only a matter of time.
Only time, and for you, just one lifetime, not a second more.

Taking Back the Night

2006-11-25T23:58:00.000+02:00

November 25^th, 2006

International day of struggle against violence against women. The annual march, organized by the rape crisis centers, is again to be "a-political", all-inclusive, respectable.

The march leaving Rabin Square

But something happened in the march today. Maybe it is the famous serial rapist, who escaped from the police just two days earlier, in the same neighborhood. Maybe it is the president, facing charges of rape. Maybe it is the explicit violence all around us, reaching another peak. Something openned, and hundreds of women marchers were suddenly sitting across King George Street, blocking one of the busiest streets in Tel Aviv.

"We Are All A." (the initial used in the media for one of the women who filed a complaint against the President).

"Women Struggling for Social-Civil Equality and Peace"; "How Come There's Money for War but not for Welfare?"

"I am Black, You are White, Go Fuck Yourself", (reversing a recent well-publicized racist remark told to a Mizrahi woman by an owner of a cafe chain in TA)

The chants started with "No means No" and "My Body Belongs to Me" and then "Remove President Katsav, Social Justice Now", and then "Women Protest! Take to the Streets!" and suddenly the shouting gave way to a scream, a collective scream that rose from my stomach and from women around me sitting on the road, and seemed to have engulfed all of us, along with the stopped cars and the policemen and the cafes and the big mall and the city became a scream.

"War is Violence against Women" ;"Poverty is Violence against Women"

An eruption of spontaneous protest-fire, one infinite moment of NO, which ended, like all such moments, with police brutality and an arrest of the only Palestinian they could find.

S giving an interview to the Military radio station, after her release...

These days, it is highly recommended. Take an hour a day, sit in the middle of the street somewhere, and scream your head off. Walking back home through the same police looking for the same escaped rapist, I could feel again the angry blanket laid over this city. I have lost all feeling in my throat, but regained some in my heart.

Bloody Tanks

2006-11-18T22:58:00.000+02:00

November 18^th, 2006

Today, in a parking compound of tanks, APCs and military bulldozers just 5 km from the Gaza border across from Beit Hanoun, a group of Israeli activists (Anarchists against the Wall) has managed to "take over" the tools of war and call for their dismantling. Here are some pictures...

Preparations:

making vegan fake blood

our banner says: "dismantle the murder machines"

Arrival:

after waiting for hours and hours, we sneaked into the tanks parking area...

...and straggled to climb on top of the monsters.

The police and army were immediately there, threatening to use violence, but politely

Here we are:
We could see Gaza City just in front of us, it's houses rising in the flat plain. The army's reconnaissance baloons turned over our heads, and blasts from heavy weaponry went on and on in the distance.

We have brought pictures of the wounded and dead from the previous attacks on Beit Hanoun, cut-out cardboard figures of dead bodies, a few dead-body dolls and lots and lots of fake vegan blood...

We expected to be immediately attacked by the soldiers, and we have discussed ways of appearing non-threatening to them, of stalling until the police would arrive to arrest us... To our surprize, the police has arrived immediately and kept the angry soldiers away. When we declined to leave, they collected our IDs and started a long process of figuring out the legal options... That gave us the time to make our point more visible...

Some of us held on to the two monsters we took over, and the others spread throughout the compound, taping the images of the victims unto the machinery that was used against them...

A unit of young conscripts was marched over from a nearby military camp, to "clean" the tanks from those horrid images. We called out to the soldiers, as they were tearing the pictures into pieces: "take a look! - this is your doing!" - "what is this for? go home, let's put an end to all that killing..." and back to chanting: "in Sderot and in Gaza, girls want to live".

soldiers being rushed to the compound

Bulldozers too are tools of death in Gaza

When we have finally left the place, we left behind a few souvenirs to the soldiers who might return to operate the monsters on the next morning...

During the entire time, the attacks on Gaza never stopped. Qassam rockets were fired again into Israel later that evening. Two more people were reported dead by Israeli attacks that day.

Many of the pictures here (all those with a stamp) are by the fabulous photogragher-activists' collective activestills, see more of their pictures here. All other pictures are mine.

See also: Ha'aretz report, TV Channel 10 report (Hebrew), Ilan's report, Adam Keller's, Story in Arabic and picture from Al Quds Palestinian newspaper, and the campaign's website.

GUM STRIKE

2006-11-08T13:31:00.000+02:00

November 7

Crisis in Gaza.
New heights of obscenity. Months of siege - no power, no water, no entrance, no exit, no work, no fishing, no money... Israel destroyed the only power station and then constructed a power line with the Palestinian Authority's confiscated money... nightly supersonic booms over Gaza - "so they will not sleep", jokes our general. Last week, an invasion into Beit Hanoun. A military expert on the radio explained: "there is talk of a Hudna, a 7-year long cease-fire, and the army has to go in there before it goes into effect. You know what they can do in 7 years?"

About 60 killed in that week, 200 more injured, wide scale destruction. Pictures of women shot dead in a demonstration in Beit Hanoun, pictures of school children killed by a missile.

So here we meet again, the spot for ad-hoc demonstrations in Tel Aviv - across the street from the Army headquarters and the Ministry of Defence. I have been here so many times!
Today I am surprised to see there is hardly any sidewalk, the city has erected some fancy wall due to construction work. It is surreal, we are lined against a wall with painted houses and gardens and pedestrians and trees...

pic by activestills

We forgot the signs. Who was supposed to bring the Coalition's signs? Two people made their own, someone brought some signs made by "The Communist Youth" (Banki) for the Rabin rally on Saturday. Someone brought candles. Old friends gather. We chant the old goodies: "All government ministers are war criminals", "Peretz, Minister of Defence, how many children have you murdered today?" and I think of the power of rituals, and how many names of ministers we have used before in the same chant...

pic by activestills

("Lift the Siege off the Palestinians", and "No Military Solution, Only Negotiations")

pic by activestills

("Refusing to be Enemies - Israeli Communist Youth)

We start banging on the decorative wall. Someone starts a new chant: "Peretz, you have promised education and welfare, we got tanks and bodies". The van full of police in riot gear leaves the gate to the militry compound across the street. Only two bored soldiers are left on guard. We respond by the all-time favorite "Gaza, Gaza, do not despair, we will end the occupation".

("Prisoners' exchange YES, Bombings NO")

(The picture on the sign is of a Palestinian baby in hospital, and the inscription says:
"The State of the Jews has no God")

Finally, we march towards the big intersection nearby. We are an odd bunch. It's getting cold. Someone suggests a gum strike: we should announce that we would stop chewing gum until the occupation ends. Someone else feigns fear: No! the stock exchange would crush! I leave the dwindling group and continue walking to my next meeting. There we discuss future state formations that will allow for the right of return. One secular democracy? a confederacy with open borders? and what about the economic implications?

Pathetic? Audacious? Cute? Enraging? What are we doing here?

The next day, which is today, nineteen more Palestinian civilians were killed by Israeli artillery in Gaza. We are going back to the same corner this afternoon. I hope we remember to bring the signs.

TEL AVIV IMAGES 3

2006-11-06T22:57:00.000+02:00

Across the street from the same Rabin square, two graffiti inscriptions on a row of columns:

What is a good dissident?
Why marry and create children?
Do bad dissidents have ugly children?
Are beautiful Arab children good or bad dissidents?
Who is giving all these orders?
Why is it all in English?
What is the Hebrew for "dissident" anyhow?

FestiRabin

2006-11-06T00:34:00.000+02:00

November 4^th, 2006

So where were you when Prime Minister Rabin was assassinated?

(Sounds familiar? We also learned our assassination culture on American TV…)

I was there, in the peace rally, on November 4^th, 1995. Since then I seem to be doomed to return to the same place every year…

I have lived in Jerusalem at the time, not far from the Prime Minister's residence, and every week I had to make my way home through angry demonstrations of the Right against the Oslo Accords. The demonstrators' blood-thirst kept startling me, and it didn't help that many of them were armed.

That peace rally in 1995 made me so happy! I wandered around the huge crowd, humming the songs and cheering the speakers. Belonging, you know, is always relative. I wasn't a follower of the Labor party, but like many others, I felt optimistic about the Oslo process, and for the first time ever, I was surrounded by many others who felt the same.

I am not sure what it was about the murder that made me become more active afterwards. Maybe it was the realization that things could get much worse, that men with guns would use them, or that songs were just songs. Embarrassing as this may sound today, maybe some of it was the exhilaration of that rally, the feeling of possibility, that power of a great wave of people. That was my first experience of belonging in a mass movement, and I have not managed to reproduce it since…

The same event that helped politicize me was immediately depoliticized. That rally is reproduced every year as a memorial to Rabin, a show of national grief and unity. Always the same old songs and the new Rabin-songs, and mournful speeches about the loss of Rabin, of "Peace". Rabin has become "Peace", the last chance for the Ashkenazi State, and Rabin, i.e. "Peace", was murdered. Years go by and the youth in the rally do not age, they come in blue shirts and sit in circles and cry, longing for the big father that took "Peace" with Him, and left us all orphaned.

I have returned to the rally again and again, in wonder or irritation, alienated or disgusted, alone or in a group. Settlements, Intifada, Occupation and Re-Occupation, Demolitions, Closure, Ethnic Separation, Wall, Disengagement, Repression, Massacres, War, Assassinations, Bombings, Destruction, and the same square with thousands and thousands of people having a good satisfying cry over some lost "Peace".

Once I helped build a human Wall across the square, with the Women's Coalition for Peace… Once we held giant placards in front of the TV cameras… Always drawn back to the rally, always drowned in its deafening narcissism. This year I came to the rally with the "Gaza Coalition", calling for the end of the Siege and the Massacre in Gaza. We had fine brochures and pictures of the carnage and bumper stickers and Helium black balloons, and we walked around the square chained to each other and got some attention and even managed to get our message into some news-sites…

(these pictures and more by Yair Gil)

(These pictures and more by activestills)

And when the rally and our fliers were all over, I found myself back at our Helium-balloons corner, where more and more black balloons were handed out to the leaving crowd.

The old Zionist songs kept booming from the main loudspeakers, and suddenly I found myself dancing, with other radical, queer, anti-Zionist activists in black…

We danced in a circle, and then a second circle formed, in a mock Israeli folk dancing fashion, holding the chains around us. We sang too, knowing all the lyrics. The mournful crowd was streaming past us out of the square. And we, irreverent, span around thumping our feet, jingling the chains, and shouting each word of the old sticky songs to each other, surrounded by black balloons saying "SOS Gaza".

BACK TO BIL'IN

2006-10-30T02:21:00.000+02:00

October 27th, 2006

The invitation said:

"Back to Bil'in - Mass Demo, Friday, October 27th"

"...It is already 20 months that the village Bil'in has been fighting for its life and future - a long, hard struggle, often frustrating. On Friday, 27^th October 2006, a large demonstration will be held in Bil'in, for the first time in a long period. Please join us and come to support the people of Bil'in in their just struggle in this critical time."

So... I went back to Bil'in.

After months of being away, speaking abroad about the demonstrations against the wall and their importance, showing pictures of the demonstrators' creativity and courage, the army's brutality, suddenly I did not really want to be there.

Maybe it was seeing Lymor in another demonstration the previous day (Lymor was shot in the head in Bil'in: http://mishtara.org/blog/?p=70), maybe it was the change of perspective - from afar, these demonstrations seem so much larger then life and less dusty... and maybe it was just what it felt it was - the dry mouth, the burn in the pit of my stomach, the smell of tear gas in the air, and all that just from reading the invitation.

After a sleepless night, I took a sweater and a water bottle (the things that make us feel safer...) and joined about 200 other Israelis on different routes to Bil'in. So many people! and so many dear friends... some chatty, some somber. Maybe it was just me, but on our complicated way to Bil'in, all seemed to be focused on the same things - the smell, the sound, the future pain of violence. What is it about violence that catches our attention so fully, that touches us so deeply, that makes it so... so serious? Am I serious? how serious am I? I didn't know I was that serious...

R, a good and wise friend, was my partner. Let's take it slowly, I asked, let's march in the back, maybe stay in the village... we stood while the men leaders of all Palestinian parties and Israeli groups marched by, followed by the organizers and the activists carrying ladders to be used to cross the wire fences, and the young men with flags and chants... I watched them in awe and admiration and envy and guilt, like a woman watching her champions going into battle, or a glorious anciet ceremony of sacrifice and victory.

We were climbing up the road towards the fence, in the tail of an impressive and colorful march, when we started hearing some blasts, coming from behind us. The soldiers. Behind us.

I stop. Suddenly I cannot breathe. I cannot go on, cannot go back. On both sides of the road there are ancient olive trees. I am amazed to see some women and children picking the olives. One woman, standing on a ladder over a tree near the road, is smiling at us, inviting us to join the children below, collecting the olives into bags. I take their picture. Feeling guilty again, for being a tourist, for stalling, for not helping at least with the picking.

The mass of the demonstration is before us, up on the hill just in front of a row of soldiers and a gate in the fence. To the side we can see a group of activists using the ladders to cross the barbed wire; they are being shot at, gassed, concussion grenades go off in blasts at their feet. The blasts make me very white and heavy. I tell R to go on. Leave me here, go on to the front. I do not want to shame her by my cowardice. You are missing the whole demonstration, I tell her, and she says, the demonstration is here too.

Finally she takes my hand and we go on. We go up the hill and join the rest of the demonstration. People are chatting and chanting and waving flags and interviewing and watching the soldiers and each other intently. The activists who crossed over the fence are being chased by the soldiers. I stand among friends on that hill, and they are all alert and alive and tense and now I can relax.

When the first round of tear gas reaches us, we are prepared for retreat. I keep calculating wind directions and shouting suggestions to whoever wants to hear them. But the wind keeps changing. The blasts get nearer. We go down the hill and down the road to the village. Slowly. And then faster, and finally, as usual, we run some. I am reminded of other demonstrations. Stumbling through stony fields, falling down, blinded by the gas, choking, being chased by guns and horses and batons and fear, running for my life. But not this time. This time, being more afraid then ever, I am not surprised by the attack, it is almost a relief to actually smell the foul thing. I am alive.

Some gas canisters shoot over our heads and explode on the road blocking our escape. We go into the olive grove to avoid them, and there they are, the olive picking family. The children have some cloth covering their mouths and noses from the gas. They are picking olives.

Later, when the rest of the demonstrators were chased off by more and more rounds of tear gas and concussion grenades and rubber-coated bullets, we could still hear the continuing blasts and shots aimed at some stone-throwing children. Some wounded, some arrested and I was shopping for really cheap Labane and Yogurt to take home for the weekend.

Only much much later, on the bus home, I realized that in all this time I used my camera only once, and that the only picture I took was of the woman picking olives.

Other reports about this demonstration: by Yonathan Pollak, by Bill Dienst and the ISM Report.
More about the village and its struggle here.

THE JNF - FOR WHOM?

2006-10-28T13:47:00.000+02:00

October 26th, 2006

The Jewish National Fund (JNF) is the biggest owner of lands in Israel, acting as the trustee of "the Jewish People". The Israel Land Administration awarded it with other "state lands", including a large percentage of Palestinian "absentees" land, ie privately owned land confiscated from Palestinians following the Nakba. According to JNF by-laws, these lands are not to be sold or leased for a long term to non-Jews. In short, the JNF is one of the main tools used by the state to restrict non-Jewish ownership and use of land in Israel.

"The Blue Box", used for over a century to collect money from Jews abroad for "redeeming the land of Israel" and "making the desert bloom", has become a Zionist symbol. These days it is being used in an outdoors installation in Tel Aviv, as part of a JNF fundraising campaign for re-forestation efforts in the north.

Here is a short video about the JNF exhibition "Blue Box in the Boulevard" (note the European sentimental tone...).

And here is a giant Blue Box:

Zochrot ("Remembering") is an Israeli organization who works to raise awareness of the Nakba - the Palestinian catastrophe of 1948.

On Thursday (Oct 26th), I have joined them in a march-performance through the JNF installation of Giant Blue Boxes of different designs, under the title "The JNF (in Hebrew: "The Fund for Israel") - whom is it for?"

We held alternative "boxes" with names of Palestinian villages which were erased and "replaced" by Jewish towns on JNF lands, and by forests planted by the JNF.

We handed out fliers with names of the desroyed, erased and forgotten Palestinian villages, and erected our own "Blue Box" in the official JNF installation. Our big box shows on one side the official pre-48 story : swamps, wilderness, desert and on the other the actual erased map of Palestinian towns, whose ruins were "reforested" by the JNF.

You can also watch a short video of the event (highly recommended, but only in Hebrew...)

TEL AVIV IMAGES 2

2006-10-22T01:38:00.000+02:00

This is probably the work of two different street artists:

TEL AVIV IMAGES 1

2006-10-22T01:31:00.000+02:00

Walking down the street, I came upon a city monument to three women who were killed in a bombing...
It was interesting to see the way women and their contribution to the nation are portrayed... I do hope someone will intervene in the case they ever try to use my name for something like that.

INSCRIPTION ON THE FRONT OF THE MONUMENT:

On Friday, Purim eve, March 21 1997,

in "Apropo" Café,

Murderers in a criminal terrorist attack

Killed three young women,

Whose dream was peace:

Yael Gilad – a social worker, 32 y.o.

Michal Meidan-Avrahami – a physician, 32 y.o.

Anat Rosen-Vinter – a lawyer, 30 y.o.

God will avenge their blood,

Their memory will be sustained forever.

(TA municipality symbol)

PLACARD ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE MONUMENT:

YAEL:

As a social worker, and a mental health officer in her army service, she supported terror victims, as well as those struck by illness and bereavement – and terror struck her down.

MICHAL:

In her death, the new life in her womb was also taken.

ANAT:

Mother to a 6 months old baby, who was with her in the terrorist attack and was saved.

PICKING OLIVES IN THE SQUARE

2006-10-06T22:45:00.000+02:00

October 6th, 2006

The olive picking season is starting, and with it the settlers' harrasments of olive farmers in the West Bank, closed gates in the fences separating the farmers from the trees, impossible permits' system separating the farmers from farming, the lost olives of tens of thousands of uprooted trees and confiscated land due to the construction of the wall, and on top of it all, thousands of stolen trees which appeared as decoration in city squares all around Israel during the last 4 years.

Following reports that the army will bar the access of some leftist activists from joining the olive picking in the West Bank; the mysterious appearance of mature olive trees in the main Tel Aviv square, named after Rabin; and my recent move to a place near Rabin Square...

We went out today, Succoth eve, to Rabin Square... where there was the annual succoth fair selling some traditional Jewish ritualistic items among the olive trees...

Samira brought the big stick, Gamila Biso brought the cloth, the trees provided large green ripe olives, all covered with city grime and soot...

Then we stopped for a bit and listened to the raging grannies in an olive medley...
Olive picking is not something often seen in the middle of the city. People around and in the fair were curious, confused, many thought it was a holiday activity for the kids... our flyer discussed the olive picking in the West Bank, and included a poem by a fabulous poet - Agi Mishol - about those same trees that appeared in Israeli cities, and about their very recent history...

Gamila Biso (from the Olive Tree Movement) - in pink - and Arik Asherman (from Rabbis for Human Rights) spoke about the solidarity campaign in the olive picking season in the West Bank.
We all talked with people there, inviting them to join the campaign... we got the strangest reactions:

one orthodox man said that picking olives that are "not ready for eating" is against halachic law (we tried telling him that olives are never ready for eating off the tree... and rabbi Asherman tried telling him the he is "a real Rabbi").

a second man I spoke to took a real interest in my explanation about olives as a source of income and not just decoration, but when he glanced at our flier he exclamed "but you are talking about the Palestinians, and everybody knows that they uproot their own trees". his idea was that it was all done to blame the jews.

A third man (all men, I wonder why) gave us a lecture about how the Arabs burnt all those trees in the north of Israel (during the last war) and these are the trees we should care about...

The police came and went and came and went, they tried telling us we do not have a permit, we cannot put up signs... but they really could not find anything illegal with picking fruit off a public tree. we promised to clean up and so we did...

In the end, a few buckets of beat-up olives were packed into a car going to Jayyous in the West Bank, a Palestinian village whose trees were stolen. Maybe people there will find some use for them as decoration in the village square...

We started at 11am, and it was already 1pm, and time for the weekly Women in Black vigil, this time, under the olive trees in Rabin Square.

(pictures: Dalit Baum and Raafat Hatab)

SIFTAH

2006-08-31T23:18:00.000+03:00

"Siftah" is the Openning, the Start. A word used by merchants to describe the first sale of the day, the one that sets the tone for the rest of the day. A Siftah does not have to be very profitable, but it has to be early, and in good spirit to allow for good luck.

So today I went to my Siftah demonstration since returning to Israel. It was funny, and sad, and hollow and in the end there was no demonstration. I put on my new pants, my "The Wall Must Fall" T-shirt, I took my new camera and my new car to Ofer prison camp on the new road to Jerusalem.

All the important elements of the day were already there: First of all, since I am still staying with my parents (I am looking for a place!!!) going out of the house with this shirt was the main demonstration of the day. Secondly, taking my car to the demo was a first. I never used to do that. I dislike driving, I get lost a lot and I cannot imagine worrying about all that and about the demo too. And finally - I actually found the place. so you see, total success for the day's work.

The place - a big army camp, partially a prison, partially a military court complex, just off the 443 highway. A very weird place. soldiers, police, barracks, towers, walls, a lot of barbed wire, a lot of dirt roads going all over the place. Cars parked everywhere. Patrols.

Today some of the imprisoned Palestinian ministers and head of the PA parliament were supposed to be brought there to some court procedure, and the Palestinian Prisoners' Committee planned a demonstration at the prison, and invited Israelis to join.

I arrive at the camp complex and start asking around for the meeting place - the families visits' shed. Noone knows. One soldier tells me, perplexed, "but they are ARAB families!". yea I know. After driving back and forth, I find it, just in front of the big dirt road on which I have parked. There is a small parking lot next to it, with Palestinian licence plate cars and taxis inside. I cannot see any way in. I go around it. It is a cage of fences and barbed wire.

A few minutes later other lefties start arriving. I arrived at 11am, but I realize I was reading the invitation too literally. The first car to arrive was Gush Shalom's. Then a second car arrived with K, the organizer, from Jerusalem, and later there were three other activists who joined us, two from Tel Aviv, and one from Switzerland, a tall guy on a motorcycle. When I asked him "what brought you here" he answered, very solemnly, "Jesus spoke to me and asked me to spread his word". So we were about 10 courageous Israeli activists (including the Swiss prophet) - coming from all over the country, from 7 different organizations, with extremely good intentions.

Coming closer to the fence, we managed to understand how the people got in there. there is a narrow narrow path, along the outer concrete wall of the camp, leading people by foot further and further away... past the nearby "cargo only" checkpoint, all the way into the Palestinian city Ramalla. I never saw where the cars enter, but they must have a similar route. This is just another one of the intricate meeting places of Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank. We can almost touch, through the fence, Israelis outside, Palestinians inside, the actual prison just an extension of that, a site of special privileges. A real touching place.

K speaks on the phone with the Palestinian organizers - they were denied entry to the prison. they are demonstrating on the other side of the checkpoint. We drive there, we are not allowed through. Trucks only. This is one of the places where goods can pass from Israeli trucks to Palestinian trucks and vice versa. Is that considered touching? The soldiers at the checkpoint are amused. They suggest we try the next checkpoint over, or Qalandia checkpoint. "They will let you pass" they tell us, "but you will never get there on time". "On time?" I ask them. The time is a quarter to twelve, and the soldier winks: "the demonstration will end by noon". "How do you know?" - and he says - "I have my sources..." (I think it was clearly hinted that he knews they would be dispersed at noon).

We turn back to the prison. There are hordes of international media inside, and we decide to go into the courtroom. Apparently, it is our right as Israeli citizens... We leave the banners outside, ring a buzzer at the gate, and when asked "what are you here for" K utters the words of the spell: "we are Israeli citizens". And like magic, the little gate opens and we are let into the cage, to the families visits' waiting shed.

The Waiting Shed (note the design on the inside wall):
By now we were down to six apostles (including the Swiss prophet). And that was it. We were never let into the court. First we waited some, then there was a lunch break, then we waited some more and so on...

I chatted with the Swiss... he asked "why are we here" and I explained about the prisoners. He was appalled "but this is not democracy" then he was told that the prisoners' lawyers do not get to see the evidence against them, sometime they do not even know the full charges and he said "surely this is not democracy" and so on. I hope he does have some influence with higher powers.

I went inside to use the toilet (with an accompanying soldier) and got to talk to the press near the court, all of them Arab press, including Al Jazeera. At least in some parts of the world, imprisoning the elected political leadership is still considered big news. They interviewed the lawyers coming out of the courtroom, and I understood nothing and was pulled away by my nervous soldier, back outside to the shed...

K, who speaks Arabic, tried helping some of the people around us in the waiting shed to communicate with the guards of the gate to the courtroom. (I have read that book, The Trial?). One was there for the third time, each time she was sent back to her village 5 hours away. Each time she came back trying to explain herself, and now she was almost sent back again. Her story: she had posted bail at the court for a relative. 1000 shekels. Now, she wants a receipt. I do not know if she ever got that receipt.

The entrance to the courthouse:

When we tired of the whole thing and decided to turn back home, there were only three of us left, and the Swiss prophet. Next time, we promised each other, next time we will organize something. But today, today it hot and dusty we are too few and it is too late.

See also Adam Keller's report of the same day.

כמה קל לטפס, כמה קשה

2006-08-12T07:25:00.000+03:00