At the end of one of my first journeys to the Israeli-occupied West Bank in 2004, I endured a shocking experience at Ben-Gurion Airport. I never imagined that Israeli security forces would abuse a 79-year-old Holocaust survivor, but they held me for five hours, and strip-searched and cavity-searched every part of my naked body. The only shame these security officials expressed was to turn their badges around so that their names were invisible[...]
Not too many people have heard of AIPAC, which stands for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. It is not a PAC, under the standard definition of Political Action Committees, but a lobbying group. Here is how AIPAC describes itself on its website: "For more than half a century, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee has worked to strengthen the U.S.-Israel relationship. From a small pro-Israel public affairs boutique in the 1950s, AIPAC has grown into a 100,000-member national grassroots movement described by The New York Times as "the most important organization affecting America’s relationship with Israel."
That goal is one that we would ordinarily admire—American citizens bonding together to let their government know how they feel about issues that are important to them, as Americans. The problem here is that AIPAC is a group of American citizens who have bonded together to influence the American government to work for the interests of a foreign government—Israel[...]
Reposted from Alice Walker’s Blog The Cushion and the Road: Meditation and Wandering As the Whole World Awakens to Being in Harm’s Way ©2010 by Alice Walker I do not believe in war at all; although I am as capable of anger as anyone. To me war is something to be outgrown, recognized as immature, [...]
From Starhawk, originally posted on Starhawk’s Blog: We did it! Up until the moment we did, I didn’t quite believe we would, but we did! Went to bed last night thinking, “Yeah, Starhawk, you’ve done this a hundred times, yawn, nerves of steel, sleep like a baby,” and of course I hardly slept at all, [...]
From Jean Athey in Cairo: Gaza Freedom March Fifth Letter—January 1, 2010 Hedy Epstein, 85-year-old Holocaust survivor, has stolen our hearts. At four feet-ten, she is a giant. Her gentle smile lights up every room that she enters, and yet if you saw her on the street, you might not immediately sense her power. Unless [...]
The Gaza Freedom Marchers in Cairo received this message from the Youth of Gaza: Freedom dreamers in Gaza are awaiting the “candles of hope” outside One year after the Gaza massacre, it gladdens our heart to see all these supporters from around the world who regard us as their brothers and sisters, giving us enough [...]
Thursday, April 28, 2011
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