In the afternoon we went out to see the boat, The Audacity of Hope. It was really thrilling. We heard about how it had been a rusty, old thing and it has been transformed into a lovely vessel fit for 50 passengers. We could see that a lot of sweat and love went into the transformation, trying to make it as comfortable as possible for us. It’s so sad to think that it might well end up in the hands of the Israelis if they intercept and confiscate it. What a shame! We took photos but are not allowed to send them out yet. We want to wait till we’re ready to sail before sending out the photos. We’re also trying to be discreet about where we’re sailing from, but I’m sure the infamous Israeli intelligence knows even before we do!

We divided up into committees for all the tasks we need on the boat. People are so great about volunteering to take on everything that needs to be done. We have a kitchen crew to prepare the meals; a medical crew that is already getting a medical profile of each passenger to try to foresee any problems; a clean up crew to keep the place tidy; a security group to make sure someone is on the lookout 24/7; a group with experience on boats to help the captain; a media crew to be a liaison with the on-shore media team; and a spiritual/cultural group that will help keep us grounded and upbeat. We already started a singing group that I am part of, and practiced songs for about an hour today. Everybody is contributing their skills, their time, their energy. It’s beautiful. A few people are even sleeping on the ship tonight to keep guard. We don’t want anyone going on board to plant weapons or mess with the engine. The Israelis are known for doing things like that, you know.

We treated ourselves to a lovely Greek dinner tonight, with lots of fresh salads and fish (octopus, squid and great little fried fish that you just pop in your mouth whole). Then back to work in the evening–conference calls with the teams back home, liaison with international committees from the other boats, and more planning, planning, planning. As we sat outside our hotel working, a stream of international folks from the other boats stopped by–Swedes, Spaniards, Canadians, Greeks. It’s amazing how many people from around the world have been working to pull this together!

It seems that due to the political crisis in Greece and how that has affected the Greek ship, we have had to change the date we set sail by a few days. But that gives us a few more days to get ready, so it’s not too bad. We’re just all so anxious to get on board and start our journey…

The only conceivable purpose for this gross violation of my bodily integrity was to humiliate and terrify me. But it had just the opposite effect. It made me more determined to speak out against abuses by the Israeli government and military.

Yet my own experience, unpleasant as it was, is nothing compared to the indignities and abuses heaped on Palestinians year after year.  Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is based not on equal rights and fair play, but on what Human Rights Watch has termed a “two-tier” legal system – in other words, apartheid, with one set of laws for Jews and a harsh, oppressive set of laws for Palestinians.

This, however, is the legal system and security state AIPAC (The American Israel Public Affairs Committee) will defend from May 22-24 at its annual conference.  And, despite this grim reality, members of Congress will converge to hail AIPAC and Israel.  The Palestinians’ lack of freedom is bound to be obscured at the AIPAC conference with its obsessive focus on security and shunting aside of anything to do with upholding fundamental Palestinian rights.

Several years ago near Der Beilut in the West Bank, I saw the Israeli police turn a water cannon on our nonviolent protest. As it happened, I recalled Birmingham, Alabama in 1963 and wondered why an ostensibly democratic society responded to peaceable assembly by trying, literally, to drown out the voice of our protest.

In Mas’ha, also in the occupied West Bank, I joined a demonstration against the wall Israel has built, usually inside the West Bank and occasionally towering to 25 feet in height. I saw a red sign warning ominously of “mortal danger” to any who dared to cross in an area where it ran as a fence. I saw Israeli soldiers aiming at unarmed Israelis, Palestinians and international protesters. I also saw blood pouring out of Gil Na’amati, a young Israeli whose first public act after completing his mandatory military service was to protest against the wall. I saw shrapnel lodged in the leg of Anne Farina, one of my traveling companions from St. Louis. And I thought of Kent State and Jackson State, where National Guardsmen opened fire in 1970 on protesters against the Vietnam War.

So as AIPAC meets and members of Congress cheer, I hold these images of Israel in my mind and fear AIPAC’s ability to move US policy in dangerous directions. AIPAC does a disservice to the Palestinians, the Israelis and the American people. It helps to keep the Middle East in a perpetual state of war and this year will be no different from last year as it keeps up a steady drumbeat calling for war against Iran.

AIPAC pretends to speak for all Jews, but it certainly does not speak for me or other members of the Jewish community in this country who are committed to equal rights for all and are aware that American interventionism is likely to bring further disaster and chaos to the Middle East.

Israel, of course, would not be able to carry out its war crimes against civilians in Lebanon and Gaza without the United States – and our $3 billion in military aid – permitting it to do so. At 86 years old, I use every ounce of my energy to educate the American public about the need to stop supporting the abuses committed by the Israeli government and military against the Palestinian people. Sometimes there are people who try to shout me down and scream that I am a self-hating Jew, but most of the time the audience is receptive to hear from someone who survived the Holocaust and now works to free the Palestinians from Israeli oppression.

The vicious discrimination brought to bear against Palestinians in the occupied territories deserves no applause this week from members of Congress attending the AIPAC conference.  Instead, they should raise basic questions with Israeli officials about decades of inferior rights endured by Palestinians both inside Israel and the occupied territories. As for me, I will be across the road at an alternative convention called Move Over AIPAC. To sign up and join me, visit www.MoveOverAIPAC.org.

Hedy Epstein is a Holocaust survivor, who writes and travels extensively to speak about social justice causes and Middle Eastern affairs.

Take action by attending Move Over AIPAC, a gathering in Washington DC from May 21-24, 2011, to expose AIPAC and build the vision for a new US foreign policy in the Middle East! More information can be found at www.MoveOverAIPAC.org.

For a people who have been sleeping for three decades, Egyptians have awoken with a jolt and are spontaneously organizing themselves in a manner that is nothing short of a miracle. The police, after teargassing, beating and shooting protesters during the first few days of protests, have now vanished from the streets. Instead, citizen committees are doing everything from controlling traffic to patrolling their neighborhoods and protecting the shops.

The main square in Cairo—Tahrir Square—is the headquarters of the revolution. Hundreds of thousands of people clogged the square today, and thousands have been camping out all week and insist they will stay until Mubarak leaves. They are young and old, mostly men but a surprising number of women and children. They are professionals and farmers, well off and poor, urban and rural, PhDs and barely literate. Some are long-time political activists who have been jailed by the regime; most have never engaged in anything political.

Army tanks line the entrance to the square, but a cordon of civilians separate the army from the protesters. Civilians also set up a 24-hour security detail to check people coming in—men frisk the men to make sure they have no weapons; women inspect the women’s belongings. The young people have organized clean-up crews, collecting garbage, sweeping, holding signs encouraging people to put their trash in the bins. A group of volunteer health workers in white coats walk around taking people’s blood pressure and checking up on their health.

All the stores around the square are closed, but no one is going hungry. Supporters are constantly bringing in food and water to share. “Please, take a roll, madam,” an elderly man urges me. “Have some candy,” says a young girl handing out sweets. “Is there anything you need? Water? Food? Drink? Just tell us,” a man insisted. People are taking care of each other as if they were one big family.

“Where do you go to the bathroom?,” I asked one of the women, as there is not one port-a-potty or bathroom in sight for this sea of people. “We go out to the street, knock on doors and ask to use the facilities. Complete strangers are opening their homes to us,” she answered.

The techies in the group hooked up a live wire from the light pole to set up a phone charging station. Others hung a big white sheet from a building overlooking the square and rigged up a projector to broadcast Al Jazeera live. The government has closed down the internet, but everywhere you look, people are photographing and videoing the street scenes from their cell phones.

Circles of people gather to recite poetry, play music or sing. Others march round and round chanting “Down with Mubarak, down with Mubarak.” They hold handmade signs with all kinds of slogans. While mostly in Arabic, some signs in English say things like “Christians and Muslims, together against Mubarak” and “USA, Stop supporting Mubarak; We don’t wanna hate the USA.”

Some people are playing chess; others are quietly reading the Koran. Young girls gather around their Kindle reading revolutionary verses. A women walks around with a picture of Che Guevara, explaining who he is to anyone who will listen. “It’s important to educate the young generation about revolutionary heroes,” she insisted.

Everywhere, people are engaged in animated political discussions about their nation’s future. Some support Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohammad El Baradei as an interim leader. Others believe he is too far removed from the people, since he has lived abroad for 30 years, and they prefer a collective, interim government to write a new constitution and hold free and fair elections. Religious men with long beards, aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, argue that Egypt needs a Muslim government; others disagree vehemently, insisting on a secular state. The discussions are passionate, but also friendly and respectful.

Egyptians have no idea what the future will bring, but one thing is certain: they have discovered their voices. One man who is helping with security told me that a few weeks ago, when his family was watching news on TV about people taking to the streets in Tunesia, his 10-year-old son asked him if he would participate in something like that in Egypt. “I was silent,” he said, “because I didn’t know the answer.” At the first sign of protests in Cairo, however, he jumped in. Now every night he runs home to show his son photos from the day’s events. “My son is very proud of me,” the father beamed. “So you are doing this for your son and the next generation?” I asked. “Not really,” he laughed. “I am doing this for myself. For the first time in my life, I am proud to be Egyptian.”

No matter how the situation in Egypt unfolds, a new nation has been born. Ordinary people are doing extraordinary things. They have overcome their fears and regained their dignity. They are writing their own destiny.

This is what a revolution looks like.

Medea Benjamin is cofounder of CODEPINK and Global Exchange. She can be reached for interviews in Cairo at (20) 107148431.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was quoted in an AP report yesterday as saying,”We cannot succeed … in Afghanistan by killing Afghan civilians”. While he stays tight-lipped about the disastrous unmanned drones, he goes on to say that it will take at least 2 YEARS for the troop surge to begin working. The brief article is full of other quotes that are as equally mind-boggling, like, “We’ve got to be very, very focused on making sure that we proceed deliberately, that we know who the enemy is,” Mullen said. “The enemy uses this very effectively against us.” Make sense of that if you dare. And read Robert Dreyfuss’s article, “Obama’s Great Afghanistan Gamble” published in Mother Jones last month. The tagline is Everyone knows 17,000 more troops can’t win the war in Afghanistan. So what’s the exit strategy? Need we say more??

MADRE, an international women’s human rights organization, is doing fantastic work around highlighting the real stories of Afghan women–drawing attention to the fact that US airstrikes that kill civilians further endanger Afghan women and their families! Check their most post here and read up on courageous Afghan women standing up for their rights today!

In our recent visit to Iran, we saw among the young university women what an important role model Shirin Ebadi is to them. As a female law student told us, “Shirin is our hero. That’s why many of us decided to study law. We want to be like her and help the women of Iran gain equal status with men in areas such as marriage, divorce, custody of children, inheritance.”

Shirin Ebadi received worldwide recognition when she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005. The Iranian government has tried repeatedly to silence her, but to no avail. The latest government clampdown happened this weekend,  when  two human rights centers that she founded were illegally shut down without explanation or written justification.  Both groups are highly respected in Iran and worldwide for their role in improving human rights conditions.  The Center for Participation in Clearing Mine Areas helps victims of landmines in Iran, and Defenders of Human Rights Center, reports human rights violations in Iran, defends political prisoners, and supports families of those prisoners.  Ebadi was also taken into police custody briefly Sunday following the raids.

The closure occurred just hours before a 60th anniversary of Human Rights Day celebration at the center, and is a sign of the increasing actions against women’s rights and human rights activist by the government.  “The collective activities of the human rights activists in Iran have angered the Iranian authorities so much that they have illegally ordered the closing down of two NGOs,” Ebadi has stated in response to the incident.

Ebadi vowed to continue her work, saying “Obviously such a move does not have a positive message for other rights activists in Iran, but my colleagues and I will fulfill our duties under any circumstances.”

If Iran truly champions human rights, the centers must be allowed to remain safely open.   CODEPINK Women for Peace has created a petition to Iranian President Ahmadinejad calling on him to allow women’s right and human rights activist to continue their work in Iran safely and freely, and to re-open the two organizations. Please sign it here:   http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/424/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=1787