A news story from The Guardian UK today confirms what I wrote yesterday about the toxic hypocrisy of power elites in Europe (and elsewhere) toward Israel and Palestine:

“The EU will offer Israel upgraded trade and diplomatic relations in more than 60 areas at a high-level meeting in Brussels on Tuesday, just weeks after European foreign ministers warned that Israeli policies in the West Bank ‘threaten to make a two-state solution impossible’…. One senior EU diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that despite private complaints of the inconsistency of chastising Israel with one hand while rewarding it with the other, not one minister was prepared to oppose Tuesday’s agreement.”

Private complaints, private deals.  There’s the whole rotten story.

By the way, these same ruling elites are busy, currently impoverishing millions of Europeans by the criminal transfer of public resources to their banker friends.

If you have the stomach for it, The Guardian story is here.

By way of antidote, the international grassroots BDS movement is here.  Another world, and story, are possible.

On July 21, bulldozers of the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) destroyed a water well near Khader village, in the southern West Bank.  Construction of the well was financed by the European Union (EU).

Ahmed Salah, coordinator of the popular committee in Khader, said that the EU-financed well was meant to help in reclaiming village land.  Water is life anywhere, but especially so in the Middle East.  Without it, crops wither, villages lose their means of survival, and eventually people have no choice but to leave.  Apparently Israeli authorities plan to clear the area for a park.

Salah added that the IOF bulldozers went on to vandalize vast tracts of cultivated land and crops recently harvested for market.

In nearby Khilat Um El-Fahm hamlet, the IOF destroyed a storage building filled with crops ready for sending to market, and at nearby Edhna village, they destroyed a water well and three greenhouses.

Crimes like these are routine throughout Palestine; they define the occupation.  (Here, for example, is a partial list from last week alone.)

The thing that caught my eye in the Khader report is the fact that the well was financed by ‘aid’ from the European Union.  The occupied West Bank is littered with such projects, some of which I saw on my travels for Our Way to Fight – wells, cisterns, roads, solar panels.  They are routinely destroyed by the Israeli army.   Complaints are lodged routinely by EU officials with their Israeli counterparts.  EU officials claim they’re doing their bit, another aid cheque is sent off, and so it goes.  Official criticism of Israel remains circumspect at best, and sanctions out of the question.

This is a bitter reminder of what a fantasy it is to imagine that, as things stand now, international ruling elites will force Israel to end its illegal occupation.   As long as it suits their larger purpose – business as usual – the destruction of Palestine will continue.

But then the same could be said of apartheid in South Africa.  International ruling elites defended, financed and armed the apartheid regime for decades, comfortably oblivious to side issues like compassion, reason, ethics or international law.  After many years of steady organizing work by grassroots activists in South Africa and other countries, eventually for international elites the cost of apartheid outweighed the profit.

While I still believe that individual support is vital to grassroots organizations working for justice and freedom in Palestine and Israel, BDS – the international movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions – remains our single best hope for raising the cost of Israeli apartheid until finally it outweighs the profit.

For the latest news on BDS, check here.

“What do Israel and the international community get in return for their systematic plundering of Palestinian livelihood?  A stubborn, collective Palestinian memory which refuses to cower under the weight of historical injustice.  If this was merely a memory it would not be a big deal, but those damn Palestinians insist on keeping that memory alive via the performing arts – music,  dance, theater, circus, festivals and the like…”  Sam Bahour, on the upcoming Palestine International Festival for Dance and Music.

  Palestinian circus school.  (Photo: Activestills)

Sam Bahour lives in the Palestinian city of Al-Bireh, about 10 miles north of Jerusalem.  Describing himself as “a Palestinian-American business development consultant,” he writes fiercely and with wry humor about living with, and against, the military occupation.  Sam Bahour blogs at www.epalestine.com.

Here he focuses on a spectacular cultural intifada which starts tomorrow, July 4.  Too late now to get tickets, but Sam offers a quick behind-the-scenes tour:

“Those damn Palestinians. They refuse to sit still.  They just don’t get it. They are unable to fathom their reality.  The more outrageous their situation becomes, the more human they become.  When all the powers-that-be think they have sufficiently battered (or bought) Palestinians into full political submission, we embark on yet another act of terrorism — the terror of dance, music, song, and cultural celebration.

This is not just any act of humanity; it has global dimensions.  The world had better take note. Continue reading →

Inspired and inspiring:

In cooperation with Palestinians in Gaza, and partners in the US, Australia and other countries, the Canadian Boat to Gaza has just announced a new, very creative challenge to the illegal and inhumane Israeli blockade of Gaza.

Gaza fishing boat after Israeli naval attack  (Photo: Saed Bannoura)

The Gaza’s Ark project will build a boat in Gaza, using local resources.  The boat will be constructed by Palestinian hands and expertise, with international assistance.  Then a crew of Palestinians and internationals will sail it out of Gaza, carrying Palestinian products to fulfill trade deals with international buyers.  Gaza is the only Mediterranean port to and from which shipping is forbidden.

The Gaza’s Ark project will help revitalize the ship building industry in Gaza, badly damaged by the invasion and blockade, and help transmit this disappearing expertise (another impact of the blockade) to younger generations.

Through trade deals negotiated between Palestinian producers in Gaza and international businesses and NGOs, a channel will be established to export Palestinian products still available despite the blockade.

Gaza’s Ark will also train Gaza’s sailors in the use of up-to-date electronic sailing equipment and techniques, denied to them for years by the blockade.

Although it will help in a very limited manner to alleviate Gaza’s unemployment crisis by paying wages to the boat builders and providing business opportunities to traders, this is not an aid project.  It is a peaceful action against the blockade which Israel unilaterally, unreasonably and illegally imposes on Gaza.

Gaza’s Ark also stands in solidarity with the Palestinian fishery in Gaza whose ability to operate in territorial waters and to derive a livelihood is threatened and attacked by the Israeli naval blockade.

This project will challenge the blockade by building hope on the ground in Gaza.  It affirms that, given the chance, the Palestinians of Gaza can rebuild their economy through outbound trade that threatens no one’s security.

With your support, work on Gaza’s Ark will start this summer.   Contact information follows below.

By the way, in case you were wondering what happened to the Canadian boat Tahrir: Along with its cargo of medical supplies the Tahrir was seized by the Israeli navy in international waters last November while it was sailing peacefully toward the Gaza Strip.  Such seizures are considered acts of piracy under international law.  Though Israel has never found nor even claimed to find anything dangerous or prohibited on board, it continues to hold the Tahrir.  Despite many requests, the current Canadian government has consistently refused to ask Israel to release the Tahrir and its cargo of desperately needed medical supplies.

For now the Tahrir (Arabic for freedom) remains under arrest.  On the other hand, try as it might, Israel can’t arrest the unquenchable yearning for freedom.

Follow the progress of Gaza’s Ark via regular updates here on the web, here on Facebook. and on Twitter (@GazaArk).

For more information, contact Gaza’s Ark at info@GazaArk.org.

Just in from the We Divest Campaign:

Pension fund giant TIAA-CREF [a US pension fund management firm for people in academic, medical, cultural, governmental and research fields] has removed Caterpillar, Inc. from its Social Choice Funds portfolio.  As of May 1, 2012, financial data posted on TIAA-CREF’s website valued Social Choice Funds shares in Caterpillar at $72,943,861.  Today it is zero.

Israeli Caterpillar D9 bulldozer, at work in Palestine

“We applaud this decision,” said Rabbi Alissa Wise, Director of Campaigns at Jewish Voice for Peace and National Coordinator of the We Divest Campaign.  “It’s long past time that TIAA-CREF began living up to its motto of ‘Financial Services for the Greater Good’ when it comes to the people of Israel and Palestine.”

Since 2010, We Divest has been urging TIAA-CREF to drop Caterpillar and other companies profiting from and facilitating Israel’s 45-year-old military occupation and colonization of the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip.

“By selling weaponized bulldozers to Israel, Caterpillar is complicit in Israel’s systematic violations of Palestinian human rights,” said Rabbi Wise. “We’re glad to see that the socially responsible investment community appears to be recognizing this and is starting to take appropriate action.”

Caterpillar has come under increasing criticism from human rights organizations in recent years for continuing to supply bulldozers to Israel, which uses them to demolish Palestinian civilian homes and destroy crops and agricultural land in the occupied territories, and to build illegal, Jewish-only settlements on Palestinian land.

On the same day, June 21, the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation announced that Caterpillar has been removed from the MSCI World Socially Responsible Index, a list used by Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) funds to determine acceptable companies for investment.  MSCI offers investment advice to 6,200 clients around the world, from pension plans to “boutique hedge funds.”

Last month, Friends Fiduciary, a Quaker institution, divested $900,000 worth of shares in Caterpillar stating: “We are uncomfortable defending our position on this stock.”

Next week, at the Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly in Pittsburgh, church commissioners will vote on a motion to divest from Caterpillar and two other companies, Motorola Solutions and Hewlett-Packard, which also profit from Israel’s military occupation of Palestine.

The motion follows years of thwarted attempts by the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s Mission Responsibility Through Investment Committee (MRTI) to negotiate with Caterpillar before calling for selective divestment.  The Committee’s  report notes that “Caterpillar’s complicity in non-peaceful pursuits led the 2010 General Assembly to denounce the company’s profiting from involvement in human rights violations.  Sadly, despite significant support for the shareholder resolution calling for a review of its human rights policy, Caterpillar has become even more intransigent.  It has cut off all communication with the religious shareholders. Caterpillar continues to accept no responsibility for the end use of their products.”