Also this week Palestinians, internationals and Israelis expressed protest by trying with their bodies and bare hands to stop the bulldozers. Yonathan Pollack (Anarchists Against Fences) was not the only one wounded this week during non-violent resistance. What makes him special is, of course, that he himself is an Israeli.

 

Israeli activist Yonathan Pollack hospitalized with a headwound (ISM report)

 

 

A few days earlier Neta Golan and Shelley Nativ had been convicted for an old case of "obstructing soldiers and police in conducting their duty" - read: chaining themselves to olive trees about to be uprooted.
read more: http://www.geocities.com/toi_billboard/convicted.htm

 

 

 

 

Let us in this context mention that Thursday, April 7, a Qassam rocket landed in the Israeli border town of Sderot, though fortunately not causing damage - the first case in several months. In a sad and odd coincidence it was the same day that Israeli and Palestinian mayors, prominent among them the mayor of Sderot, provided some good news:

 

 

 

Same Thursday, hundreds of Israelis, among them quite a few Jewish ones, went to Deir Yasin, in a commemoration of the 1948 atrocities organized by Zochrot http://www.nakbainhebrew.org/

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Right now,  three imprisoned COs: Eyal Barami, Alex Cohn and Misha Adar; Yahel Avigur is expected to get a third consecutive term within days.

 

Background and support info + text of refusal letters:
Eyal - http://www.refuz.org.il/Default.aspx?tabid=164
Alex - http://www.refuz.org.il/Default.aspx?tabid=175
Misha - http://www.refuz.org.il/Default.aspx?tabid=176

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Friday April 8, a silent walk through Tel-Aviv  http://www.middleway.org/

 

Saturday April 9, a working day in the Negev Bedouin village of Um Al-Hiran - renovating the bridge leading into the village, expanding the football court and planting olive trees as a symbol of coexistence and solidarity with the village residents who face evacuation...
More on: http://dukium.org/index.php?newlang=english
Contact: Ariel Dloomy ??“ ariel@dukium.org

 

A whole series of anti-nuclear actions is planned at the occasion of  'Mordechai Vanunu, one year out of prison, but not yet free.'
https://mailman.gush-shalom.org/pipermail/actil/2005/000084.html
Contact: Rayna Moss legalese@netvision.net.il

 

 

 

TOI editors Adam Keller and Beate Zilversmidt represented Gush Shalom at the Malaysia 'Peace in Palestine' conference (March 28-30). Though we went there a bit sceptical, we came back in good spirit. We are under the impression  that the host country will heed the call of the participants - to be more involved and take an initiative of mobilizing other "South" countries in order to create a counter momentum addressing the inbalance of powers involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

 

Summary of the Action Plan:
 
(a) revival of the non-aligned movement in order to politically strengthen the Palestinian plight and prevent Palestinians from reverting to acts of despair 

 

(b) an assertive role of the non-aligned countries towards Israel with a selective
boycott (i.e. Caterpillar, which provides armoured bulldozers to destroy Palestinian homes; Third World countries buying Israeli weapons or inviting Israeli experts to train their secret services) as a clear hint  towards the possibility of further sanctions to make Israel comply with UN resolutions, but also with the message: Israel to be accepted among the nations, also by Muslim countries, once  it withdraws to the '67 borders and lives in peace side by side with an independent Palestinian state.

 

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Israel will not remain a Jewish and democratic state if it fails to really disengage from the West Bank and Palestinian east Jerusalem. Disengagement in the form of negotiations for peace is possible with the current Palestinian leadership. I hope and pray that Sharon will hear the message of Malaysia

 

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/Printer&cid=1112581160717&p=1006953079865
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Pressure rather than Violence, Gush Shalom from Kuala Lumpur
 
What made this conference different was that it wasn't just a gathering of NGO representatives, but that there was serious governmental interest on the part of the host country: "The government of Malaysia considers the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the continuation of the occupation a phenomenon endangering not only the Middle-East, but the entire world, as it tends to deepen the hostility and suspicion between the United States and the Muslim World. Therefore, Malaysia is going to take a high profile involvement in an effort to end the occupation and the conflict" said Abdullah Badawi, the prime minister of Malaysia, in a conversation with members of the Israeli delegation. The occasion for the conversation was the festive dinner given by the Malaysian PM to more than 500 civil society delegates from 34 countries, gathered at the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur for a three-day conference on peace in the Middle East.

 

read more: http://gush-shalom.org/pressureratherthanviolence.html
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An international campaign similar to the one against South Africa's former apartheid
policy is needed to create an independent Palestinian state existing peacefully with
Israel, the Malaysian prime minister said Monday. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi expressed hope that a three-day conference of civil society delegates beginning Monday would initiate such a campaign.

 

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=557784
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PUTRAJAYA, March 29 (Bernama) -- Peace, an elusive entity in the conflict between Israel and Palestine, is achievable but with several conditions, say peace activists attending the three-day Peace in Palestine Conference, here.

 

Adam Keller, an Israeli who is spokesman of Gush Shalom, the Israeli Peace Bloc, felt peace between the two warring factions in West Asia could be attained for the sole reason that both sides were exhausted from fighting.

 

More at: http://www.peacemalaysia.com/
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"The haunting melody came at the end of [Huwaida Arraf's] talk on the sufferings of her fellow countrymen and women. (...) "I have a terrible, terrible voice but I'll sing to you this Palestinian freedom song at the top of my lungs so that you can join us in our struggle," she said.

 

http://www.peacemalaysia.com/
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The translation was published by Gush Shalom as background for a protest letter campaign against house demolitions in the Bethlehem area:
https://mailman.gush-shalom.org/pipermail/intl/2005/000031.html 

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"It was announced this week that the government plans to stiffen the rules for granting citizenship to non-Jews"

read on: http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=562013
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[Betar Jerusalem's football fans]  didn't like the fact that an Arab Israeli scored the equalizing goal against Ireland, thus leaving Israel still in the race for the World Cup. They did not like the fact that the Arab team has twice defeated Betar Jerusalem. "You can go crazy over the fact that Arabs beat us," said one of the fans, repeating the same kind of contemptible racist remarks made for generations about Jews in the countries where they were in the minority.

full text: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=562034
   ~~~