Archive for the ‘Palestine’ Category

Reem Banna – in her own words on Assad

Posted: 02/01/2022 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Palestine, Resistance, Syria
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In 2012, the beloved and greatly mourned Palestinian singer Reem Banna publicly declared her dedication to a Free Syria and denounced the silence of the world in the face of the “most criminal and backward regime of the Arab world”, the Assad regime. Following is her declaration in Arabic, English and Italian.

“For the first time, I declare my position regarding what is happening in Syria: Bashar Al-Assad is a delinquent, a criminal and a child-killer… The regime of Assad is the most criminal and backward regime of the Arab world. Shame on anyone who continues to remain silent. Every moment that passes without us standing up and doing something, means hundreds of Syrians being killed. We are silent in the face of the killing of over 11,000 Syrian martyrs. At the same time and, unfortunately, there are some who are still defending this regime and delude themselves with the worn out justifications defending a ruler who has lost an entire country and perhaps will lead to no one being left, except for some of his Shabiha (para-military gangs for the regime – translator’s note) and some other cowards, after having gotten rid of the population… The conspiracy… it is the most tremendous cosmic conspiracy against Palestine and Syria… this is my position on it. Even if I will be boycotted, even if I will be stopped and denied entry into any Arab country at all… art without a position and action is an art that differs only in form from cabaret, but with more elegance. All of those who glorify a homicidal ruler, who do not stand up against him, are free to do so…. But I will not accept that someone hinders me on account of my position. Whoever would like to cut me out of their “friends” list… let them do so… they are absolutely free to do what they want.

And to the shabiha who are going to jump on spreading this status far and wide in order to increase the perimeter in which to kill me psychologically, on a human level and technically, I say to you: Palestine taught me to never be silent against injustice. Close your eyes if you want to, but do not dare to close the eyes of others.

Long live the free Syrian people… Long life Syria as a free country, for freedom. I love you Syria.” Reem Banna 30/5/2012

Reem Banna:

“Per la prima volta dichiaro la mia posizione su quanto sta accadendo in Siria: Bashar al-Assad è un delinquente, un criminale e un assassino di bambini.. Il regime di Assad è il regime più criminale e arretrato del mondo arabo.. Vergogna su coloro che continuano a stare in silenzio.. Ogni momento che passa e noi non facciamo nulla… Centinaia di siriani vengono uccisi.. Non rimaniamo in silenzio sull’uccisione di oltre 11.000 martiri arabi siriani.. Allo stesso tempo e purtroppo.. alcuni stanno ancora difendendo e si illudono con le logore giustificazioni su un sovrano che ha perso un intero paese e forse nessun altro rimarrà, alcuni dei suoi shabiha e alcuni codardi dopo essersi sbarazzati del loro popolo.. La cospirazione…è la più grande cospirazione cosmica contro la Palestina e la Siria.. questa è la mia posizione.. anche se verrò boicottata, mi sarà impedito e negato l’ingresso in qualsiasi paese arabo. .l’arte senza posizione e azione.. è un’arte che differisce solo nella forma dell’arte del cabaret.. ma più elegantemente.. tutti coloro che glorificano  un sovrano omicida.. non gli faccio causa.. è libero.. ma non accetterò che qualcuno mi faccia causa per la mia posizione .. chi vuole togliermi dalla sua lista di amici.. lascia che lo faccia… è assolutamente libero..

E allo shabiha che ora si affretterà a trasferire questo status per aumentare il perimetro in cui uccidermi psicologicamente, umanamente e tecnicamente.. Dico lui: la Palestina mi ha insegnato a non tacere sull’ingiustizia.. Chiudete gli occhi se volete, ma non chiudere gli occhi agli altri. Lunga vita al popolo siriano libero.. Lunga vita alla Siria come patria libera, per la libertà.. Ti amo Siria.

 30/5/2012


ريم بنا

أعلن لأوّل مرّة موقفي مما يحدث في سوريا: بشار الأسد سفّاح ومُجرم وقاتل الأطفال .. النظام الأسدي أكثر نظام مُجرم ومتخلّف في الوطن العربي .. عار على الذين يستمرّون بصمتهم .. في كل لحظة تمّر ولا نتحرّك .. يُقتل فيها مئات السوريين .. لا للصمت على قتل أكثر من 11.000 شهيد سوري عربي .. وفي نفس الوقت وللأسف .. ما زال البعض يُدافع ويوهم نفسه بالتبريرات المُهترئة لحاكم أضاع بلد برمّتها وربما لن يبقى فيها غيره وبعض من شبّيحته وقلّة من الجبناء بعد التخلّص من شعبه .. أما بالنسبة لموضوع “المؤامرة” .. فهو أكبر مؤامرة كونية على فلسطين وعلى سوريا .. هذا موقفي .. حتّى لو سيتم مُقاطعتي ومنعي وحرماني من دخول أي بلد عربي .. الفن من دون موقف وفعل .. هو فن لا يختلف إلا شكلاً عن فنّ الكاباريهات .. لكن بأناقة أكثر .. لكل مَن يُعظّم بحاكم قاتل .. أنا لا أحاكمه .. هو حُرّ .. لكن لن أقبل بأن يُحاكمني أحد على موقفي .. مَن يرغب بحذفي من لائحة أصدقائه .. فليفعل .. له مُطلق الحُريّة ..

وللشبّيحة الذين سيسارعون الآن في نقل هذا الستاتوس لتوسيع رقعة قتلي نفسيّاً وإنسانيّاً وفنيّاً .. أقول لهم: إن فلسطين علّمتني أن لا أسكت عن الظلم .. لن أتجاهل هذا الدم النازف لو على قطع رأسي .. وأن فلسطين .. أيقونة تحميني من قذاراتكم .. أغمضوا أعينكم إن شئتم .. لكن لا تفقأوا عيون الآخرين ..

عاش الشعب السوري الحُرّ .. عاشت سوريا وطناً حُرّا للأحرار .. أحبّك سوريا

30/5/2012 عرض أقل

Syrian “tourism”, taking a page from the Hasbara Handbook

Posted: 09/13/2019 by editormary in "Israel", Activists and Activism, Assad, BDS, Europe, Hasbara / Zionist Propaganda, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Human Rights, Internet and Communication, Palestine, Politics, Refugees, War, Zionism
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all that glitters

Any person who has been a campaigner for Palestinian rights is aware of the various techniques that Israel uses to whitewash the occupation of Palestine and the oppression that the Palestinians are subject to. Along with Hasbara, which is a kind of prepared narrative to dominate the talking points and shift the discourse to a place where it makes Israel appear to be the underdog fighting for its legitimate rights instead of its actual reality as a brutal militarily occupying force against Palestinians, there is “whitewashing”. When regimes or countries that are not democratic use whitewashing, they make use of propagandists to determine talking or selling points that make these countries seem more democratic, more progressive and more appealing than they really are. The curtain is never pulled back to show what lay on the other side of all that “great stuff”.

Israel invests heavily in campaigns of tourism. “Two Sunny Cities, One Break” and “Douze Points” are only two of the campaigns in recent years that have sought a new, fashionable kind of tourist, one that was looking for the nightlife and a place to party 24 hours, and mostly a place to continue the promotion with selfies to be shared, encouraging yet more tourism to Israel in a virtuous circle. In the advertisements, the emphasis is on discotheques, pools, chic restaurants and bars. It’s all about fun and hedonism. That doesn’t mean that the “heritage” tourism, to religious sites and kibbutzes has stopped, it’s just that the advertising focus wants the potential tourist to believe that going to Tel Aviv is exactly like going to Milan, Prague or Madrid, only in this case, your holiday will never be spoiled by rain and your fun never stops. It is selling the side of Israel that reaps the benefits from the occupation, and doesn’t actually have to even think about Palestinians existing on the other side of the wall or who are living imprisoned on the outskirts of Jewish Settlements or any of the other situations where Palestinians do not experience full rights, including the right of free movement in their own country.

The BDS movement has a statement on ethical tourism which begins as follows:

Based on the UN’s World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) affirmation in its statutes that it fundamentally aims at “the promotion and development of tourism with a view to contributing to […] universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion”

It would follow that tourism to countries where there is a brutal occupation, violations of human rights and enclaves of persons living in grave peril under bombing and siege by their “government” and its allies would be exactly like violating the BDS call to boycott Israeli tourism. To go to places like that would require a particular behaviour set in order to be ethical, and that set has to be consistent. One can’t dance in the Tel Aviv discos and also show solidarity by avoiding all institutional links of any sort with Israel. You can’t pick and choose parts from each; it’s all or nothing.

The Syrian government has learned so much from the Israeli government’s use of hasbara, of throwing the rock and hiding the hand. One can say that it realises that slick propaganda is the other side of military occupation and oppression. They are working hard at whitewashing Syria, pointing out the sun, fun and pride of the “loyalist” Syrians (who never had to experience the bombs and destruction of any of the opposition areas, because the opposition did not have the military power or the conviction to subject the civilian population to sieges and air strikes). But, the regime can’t do it alone. It can’t put up slick advertisements on major Western TV channels. It is really limited in the extent to which it can promote the false narrative. This means that it has to find an alternative.

syrian ministry tourism.PNG

Facebook main photo of the Syrian Ministry of Tourism

The Syrian Ministry of Tourism has always been the propaganda arm of the regime. In the past, the process of vetting (and interrogating) tourists, with those finally passing through all the hoops specifically having limited or no access to some places and making a person fully aware that the “walls have ears”, made tourism there a sort of adventure tourism and a bit of a Truman Show. You accept that you have certain limits, which you are careful to not overstep. And how could you ever forget, with pictures of Big Brother everywhere, at public transport hubs and markets, but even on archaeological sites and churches. Everyone around you knows you can be called a spy, so you will only hear the most glowing and fervent praise of the government. The element of it being an inauthentic experience for everyone was more than mitigated by: for the tourist,  beautiful scenery and a very different kind of experience (something to write home about as weird but exciting), for the Syrians playing along, making some money off of tourists. Everyone played the game, but at least, everyone knew it was a game.

CWmrTSyWcAAe0TW

The regime in the past also had a habit of involving bloggers and journalists – and not just those whose topic was travel, but especially those who were active in blogging for Palestine or Arab Nationalism – in “junket trips” where they not only had the government approved handlers, but were also shown many of the same places, with a similar narrative and the instructions to “take the talking points back home”, with a sort of briefing of what the points were. That allowed them to create a group of people who, given the amount of perks and the hospitality, were either blinded or they felt morally obligated to pay back the courtesy. Letting oneself be wilfully blinded works if someone can ignore reality. That was certainly easier in the past, when Syria was never in the news, when people “disappeared” for having told a joke or their opportunities were determined by how much they were able to prostrate themselves before the dynasty in power and all of its long arms around the country.

Today, it is impossible to ignore what is going on in Syria. That half of the country’s population has become refugees or internally displaced. That enormous areas of the country have been destroyed by constant and relentless air raids by the regime and other occupying forces, with Russia and Iran’s proxy militias playing the leading roles in these destructive raids, expecting their payback now and in the future. That hundreds of thousands of civilians have “disappeared” and many have been documented in photographs smuggled from a Syrian prison where they were tortured to death. That massacres of all kinds have been documented, with loyalists rejoicing and calling the victims terrorists, even the children who were slaughtered by knives, nerve gas or barrel bombs.

To go to Damascus and other regime-held areas, partying in the shisha bars, sunbathing at the beaches, buying souvenirs in the souks and visiting the sites, whether pretending to be “independent”, while employed by RT, or on a fact-finding mission, getting only the facts the regime wants one to get, with the loyalist behaviour doing the self-censorship, would require a certain, pathological kind of disconnect from reality, along with a severe ethical deficit.

To go to Saydnaya and to just look at the beautiful church, denying that the regime’s most brutal torture prison is located in the same village, is just like going to Tel Aviv, and not pulling the curtain back on Hebron’s misery.

Beware of any “journalist” or “tourist” going to Syria being anything but a propaganda tool for the regime and a knife in the heart of the Syrian people whose struggle for freedom was also a struggle to no longer play the game of lies and deceit. To live in their own country, authentically, without the oppression of the dynasty in power.

Ken O’Keefe is back and talking BULLSHIT

Posted: 06/29/2017 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Grassroots Activism, Ken O'Keefe, Middle East, Palestine
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Ken O’Keefe is back with a band new video of himself ranting (give the sheeple what they want?) and doing his usual Tourettes-inspired performance. He tells us he reckons he might be arrested, and if he is going to get arrested (and whatever for, pray tell?) he will go on a hunger strike. YAWN. Well, it might be interesting if you actually were emotionally stimulated by that psychotic HERO/VICTIM schtick he’s into about himself. Because, as you know by now, 99% of the things he writes about or rants about have himself in the middle of them. What’s a narcissist to do if they can’t stop talking about the Most Fascinating of Subjects?

At any rate, the new video, to spare you having to see all 17 minutes of it yourself, as a public service, we provide a really quick rundown of the salient points.

First, the title, and what a title!

Ken O’Keefe on the “Jewish Supremacist Talmudic Satanic Pedo Bankser Cult”

Yes.
He wrote that.
“Bankser”.

And also the rest of it. Hitler couldn’t have written a better title, could he?
Ken dropped the stuff about Zionism being the problem. For all the years and years Palestinians have been pounding the reality that they oppose those who oppress them, and those who oppress them are Zionists, they have no problem with Jews and have nothing to do with the racist rants going on. No. That is old school, that is too “politically correct” and the Palestinians’ will doesn’t matter any more. For Ken, the problem isn’t Zionism, it’s Jews, no nuance.

Anyway, here are some choice bits: Hitler Ken talks about the MAJOR problems of everyone  (else) in the whole damned activist world making videos about current events while he has been laying low, but busy, so busy. Oh, Laying Low is what got him into all the trouble with his Fans in the first place. He put on a big show to get a lot of money ASAP for something no one quite understood and which we wrote about here and here and here and here, warning people it was a scam, but people got scammed. His entire team challenged him and like all his teams in the history of Kendom, LEFT HIM and couldn’t stand to see his ugly face ever again. And like all these events, they are “idiots and agents” (left out clowns this time). He goes on for a while about how all those other people are horrible and [shock, horror] how they want him to prove that he is innocent after all the accusations. Somehow, Ken doesn’t think he has to prove his innocence. People just have to believe him. Oh, he DOES have a mickey mouse “statement” (unsigned and hilarious as all hell) on his site. Claims that is enough to keep the plebes satisfied, so they better STFU if they expect him to prove the accusations against him as false. Uhm. OKAY.

But, the brilliant thing is this: “I control the money!” he says with a wry smile.

Yeah.
That’s the problem Kenny boy.

People would like the money BACK, or that something actually is done with it THAT IS THE PROJECT THEY THOUGHT THEY WERE GETTING.

But Ken doesn’t “Do” projects that are actually going to serve the purposes for their creation, as we will point out very shortly.

Ken says that his purpose is to be a Lure for the Bait.
Uh, yes… try to figure that one out on your own. In “my” dictionary it sounds like “Controlled Opposition”, so in this, he actually does seem to finally say something that makes sense in its own roundabout way.

He’s says he’s going “back to the Jewnited States” soon. The land of Jewish Banksters. He is FORCED to use a USA passport (yeah, sure… first they force you to go to the Jewnited States, then they make sure you use a USA passport to do it, the nerve!) He’s pretty sure he’s going to get arrested, so he preventively told us he will hunger strike, because Ken’s Rights are sacrosanct. He assures us he would not commit suicide.

Then we get to the up closse and personal portion of the video. He brags about his girlfriend who has many talents including telling the World War II story – (the Greatest Story Never Told, all that Hitler lovefest stuff).  In the video we get him doing a little less of “come to yer uncle” that we had grown accustomed to, and instead have an “Against All Odds” romp video of them in the sunset, where at a certain point it looks like she is trying to see if there is something in his shorts. It’s pretty tacky, but we have gotten used to tacky from the Ken and GF team. And yes, we can deal with his being overwhelmed with lust/love for her, but when he says that when a woman like her shows interest in a man “You wouldn’t even THINK for a second before you’d be with her, or maybe you’re homosexual”, you have to fight to hold back the vomit.

And, that’s pretty much that! He said the J-word, he coupled it with other triggers including Pedo and Satanists, (oh, never mind that one of the people in the campaign promoting and pimping for his World Citizen Solution had THIS cool picture of what is commonly known as Lucifer as his icon on facebook). Ken’s speaking such “truth to power!”luke brown

At any rate, we know, yes.. we know that this WCS will end up like everything else he does… end up being all spent in the RUNNING of the thing.. the THING never ever happens!! (Trade not Aid, Samouni Project, Ferry to Gaza, Tahrir 4 Gaza… where did all that money (or all that little money in some less successful Go Fund Ken’s Ego campaigns) go? It sure didn’t go to Palestinians in any way other than them being a background for his own showing off of his major ego.

You don’t believe me? Well, let’s have a look at just ONE project, shall we? ALOHA PALESTINE.

It had big name promotors, Tony Benn, Jeremy Corbyn, Lauren Booth, Alexei Sayle (well, little big names, but we aren’t picky right now, it was a European-based project, but he did insert all kinds of inspirational Gandhi and Nelson Mandela quotes in there). He went around promoting it with Lauren Booth and made quite a flashy little video with animation of a cool looking ship.

Got a LOT of money.

 

This is the ferry… well, not really. This is the ANIMATION of the FERRY, because that is as far as he ever intended to have it go. Here are the returns found at the Companies House. Oh, of course, no taxes paid, it was a CIC, all the money is clean. Because you are doing something for the benefit of society and the community. Ken’s society and community are evidently his own little ring of people who make the money while the project develops…..but then, the project goes kaput and all that money… DONATED MONEY from basically normal people who have to work for a living and scrimp and save, but always try to keep anything extra aside for those who need help and money more than they do. In this case, he used THE PALESTINIANS, and gave them nothing in return.

Look at the accounts filed, available for anyone to peruse on the Companies House site.

£36,690 was spent in ADMINISTRATIVE EXPENSES out of £36,888
LET THAT SINK IN…. £36,690 spent to have £198 that could be used for the ferry!
And that was just the FIRST YEAR! in the second year, it went in the hole £2091.

£0.00 for the Palestinians. People pimping for Ken,  pushing for others to donate, then, lots of money coming  in and NOTHING spent on anything but Ken and his cronies. Let that sink in. It makes his rants just seem like some hot bullshit from a snake oil salesman.

On The Allies We’re Not Proud Of: A Palestinian Response to Troubling Discourse on Syria

Posted: 10/12/2016 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Culture and Heritage, Documents, Grassroots Activism, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Human Rights, Middle East Issues, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Petitions, Refugees, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Strategy for Liberation, War
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whatsapp-image-2016-10-11-at-4-20-47-pm(Palestinian readers, PLEASE  sign the petition linked at the bottom) We, the undersigned Palestinians, write to affirm our commitment to the amplification of Syrian voices as they endure slaughter and displacement at the hands of Bashar Al-Assad’s regime. We are motivated by our deep belief that oppression, in all of its manifestations, should be the primary concern of anyone committed to our collective liberation. Our vision of liberation includes the emancipation of all oppressed peoples, regardless of whether or not their struggles fit neatly into outdated geopolitical frameworks.

We are concerned by some of the discourse that has emerged from progressive circles with regards to the ongoing crisis in Syria. In particular, we are embarrassed by the ways in which some individuals known for their work on Palestine have failed to account for some crucial context in their analysis of Syria.

The Syrian revolution was in fact a natural response to 40 years of authoritarian rule. The Assad regime, with the support of its foreign financial and military backers, is attempting to preserve its power at the expense of the millions of Syrians whom the regime has exiled, imprisoned, and massacred. We believe that minimizing this context in any discussion of Syria dismisses the value of Syrian self-determination and undermines the legitimacy of their uprising.

We also believe that an important consequence of all foreign interventions, including those purportedly done on behalf of the uprising, has been the setback of the original demands of revolution. The revolution is a victim, not a product, of these interventions. It is imperative for any analysis of Syria to recognize this fundamental premise. We cannot erase the agency of Syrians struggling for liberation, no matter how many players are actively working against them.

Though we maintain that the phenomenon of foreign aid demands thorough critique, we are concerned by the ways in which foreign aid has been weaponized to cast suspicion on Syrian humanitarian efforts. Foreign aid is not unique to Syria; it is prevalent in Palestine as well. We reject the notion that just because an organization is receiving foreign aid, it must follow then that that organization is partaking in some shadowy Western-backed conspiracy. Such nonsense has the effect of both undermining humanitarian efforts while simultaneously whitewashing the very crimes against humanity that necessitated the aid in the first place.

Furthermore, we object to the casual adoption of “war on terror” language. Enemies of liberation have historically used this rhetoric to target humanitarians, organizers, and community members. From Muhammad Salah to the Midwest 23 to the Holy Land Five, our community is all too familiar with the very real consequence of employing a “war on terror” framework. Therefore, we reject a discourse that perpetuates these old tactics and peddles harmful and unwarranted suspicion against Syrians.

Along these lines, it is our position that any discussion of Syria that neglects the central role of Bashar Al-Assad and his regime in the destruction of Syria directly contradicts the principles of solidarity by which we abide. We have reflected on our own tendency to heroize those who advocate on behalf of the Palestinian struggle, and we fear that some members of our community may have prioritized the celebrity status of these individuals over the respect and support we owe to those Syrians affected most directly by the war, as well as those living in the diaspora whose voices have been dismissed as they have watched their homeland be destroyed.

We will no longer entertain individuals who fail to acknowledge the immediate concerns of besieged Syrians in their analysis. Despite reaching out to some of these individuals, they have shown an unwillingness to reflect on the impact of their analysis. We regret that we have no choice left but to cease working with these activists whom we once respected.

We would like to encourage others who are guided by similar principles to do the same.

Abdulla AlShamataan
Abdullah M
Adam Akkad
Adnan Abd Alrahman
Ahmad Al-Sholi
Ahmad Kaki
Ahmad N
Ahmed A
Ala K
Ala’a Salem
Alex T
Ali A. Omar
Amal Ayesh
Amanda Michelle
Amani Alkowni
Ameen Q.
Amena Elmashni
Amira S
Andrew Kadi
Areej
Bashar Subeh
Bayan Abusneineh
Budour Hassan
Butheina Hamdah
Dana Itayem
Dana M
Dania Mukahhal
Dania Mukahhal
Diana J.A.
Dareen Mohamad
Dena E.
Diana Naoum
Dina A.
Dina Moumin
Dorgham Abusalim
Dr. Isam Abu Qasmieh
Eman Abdelhadi
Eyad Mohamed Alkurabi
Eyad Hamid
Farah Saeed
Faran Kharal
Faten Awwad
Fatima El-ghazali
Fouad Halbouni
Hadeel Hejja
Haitham Omar
Haleemah A
Hana Khalil
Hanin Shakrah
Hanna Alshaikh
Hani Barghouthi
Haneen Amra
Hareth Yousef
Hazem Jamjoum
Heba Nimr
Helal Jwayyed
Husam El-Qoulaq
Ibraheem Sumaira
Imran Salha
Jackie Husary
Jannine M
Jehad Abusalim
Jihad Ashkar
Jennifer Mogannam
Joey Husseini Ayoub
Jumana Al-Qawasmi
Karmel Sabri
Kefah Elabed
Khaled B
Laith H
Lama Abu Odeh
Lama Abu Odeh
Lana Barkawi
Lara Abu Ghannam
Leila Abdelrazaq
Lila Suboh
Linah Alsaafin
Lojayn Ottman
Lubna H
Lubna Morrar
Loubna Qutami
Magda Magdy
Mai Nasrallah
Mahmoud Khalil
Maisa Morrar
Majed A
Majed Abuzahriyeh
Manal Abokwidir
Manal El Haj
Maram Kamal
Mariam Saleh
Mariam Barghouti
Mekarem E.
Mariam Abu Samra
Mira Shihadeh
Mohamad Sabbah
Mohammad Al-Ashqar
Mohamed Hassan
Mohammad Abou-Ghazala
Mona N
Msallam Mohammed AbuKhalil
Nadia Ziadat
Nadine H
Nayef Al Smadi
Nidal Bitari
Nour Azzouz
Nour Salman
Nusayba Hammad
Omar Coolaq
Omar Jamal
Osama Mor
Omar Zahzah
Osama Khawaja
Rami Okasha
Rana Asad
Randa MKW
Rani Allan
Rania Salem
Ramzi Issa
Rasha A.
Rawan A.
Rawya Makboul
Reem J
Reem S
Reema A
Riad AlArian
Riya Al-Sanah
Ryah A
Sabreen Ettaher
Salim Salamah
Samar Batrawi
Samar Azzaidani
Sameeha Elwan
Samia S.
Sami J
Sami Shahin
Samya Abu-Orf
Sarah Ghouleh
Sara Zubi
Sarah Abu.
Sarah Ali
Sarah Shahin
Shady Zarka
Seham A
Shifa Alkhatib
Shahrazad Odeh
Shirien D
Sima Dajani
Sonia Farsakh
Susan Al-Suqi
Tahani H.
Taher Herzallah
Talal Alyan
Tamar Ghabin
Tarek Abou-Ghazala
Tareq R
Tasneem Abu-Hejleh
Tawfieq Mousa
Yahiya Saad
Yamila shannan
Yasmeen sh
Yasser Quzz
Yazan Amro
Zaid Muhammad
Zachariah Barghouti
Zeina Labadi

SOAS Palestine Society

add you signature clicking this link 

The “One World Citizen” (Final) Solution: Ken O’Keefe’s going to save the world (again)! Really! This time he is! While plugging a 27 part film defending Hitler.

Posted: 01/14/2016 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Internet and Communication, Middle East, Palestine, Politics, Syria, Video, War
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428097_262703293816760_2024946056_nKen O’Keefe has followed in the great tradition of many cult leaders or conmen, (which are basically often the same thing). He has to make the public see him as an outsider who broke from the masses by suddenly having seen the light, and then HE is going to get you to also “think out of the box” as he leads you to Truth. But first you have to just TRUST him… oh, yes, and finance his projects. That’s always the important part! Others pay for him to be “free”. He’s worth it!

His latest scheme is … well…. We don’t know exactly what it is, and oddly enough, neither do his fans and supporters. They have to TRUST him and just shut up and send the money because this plan is just so… so EARTH-SHATTERING that he could be KILLED for revealing it. Ooooh, the DRAMA!

Message on Facebook from a supporter when unwilling to respond to direct questions about his Indiegogo money collecting page:

For those of you who would like more information on what we are proposing and the strategy involved, a note from Ken O’Keefe…

“What can be said about the strategy has been said quite clearly, we are going to employ a method of lawfully, peacefully removing ourselves from the obligation to fund war. The details of the strategy will not be released however, unless I am harmed or killed or have an “accident” or we get the funding, so only the crux of the strategy can be released now, and this is done for valid strategic reasons. I fully accept that some will not donate because of this limited information, but it does not change the fact that it is the wisest path for us to take. Put it this way, does a warrior advertise the method of his attack before he attacks? The answer to that question reveals why we cannot wisely release the details of the strategy before we have the resources to initiate the mission and critically, to defend it. People who respectfully acknowledge this wisdom of this decision I respect wholeheartedly. People who DEMAND to know the details right now, when it would be incredibly stupid for us to do so, that I have no respect for.

The bottom line is we do not start this mission without the money or me getting hurt or killed, the latter being particularly unfortunate for me so let us just get the money. TJP”

Got it? It’s really clear as mud, but it HAS TO BE!

Ken O'Keefe with other characters of this story, Max Igan and David Icke

Ken O’Keefe with other characters of this story, Max Igan and David Icke

But Ken is NOT alone, he is just ONE WORLD CITIZEN. One of the other organisers, Max Igan (is: “a researcher, truth seeker, radio host, film-maker and one of the leaders of global awakening movement. This man is a must listen to for all those serious about stopping the NWO in its tracks. His real given name remains anonymous and his second name is Maxwell. His last name also remains anonymous. He lives in Queensland, Australia and at the time of June 2012 he was 54 years old” – taken from a fan site) wrote this to promote the incredible project and “explain” what it is:

“O’Keefe is working on a legal, lawful framework to be able to checkmate the Government cronies from within their own legal fiction and provide a platform whereby support for war essentially becomes illegal. It is only one initiative been launched by one man from one idea, but I believe it may be an idea whose time has come and I fully support Ken O’Keefe’s World Citizen initiative because I truly believe that if enough people get involved, it will indeed stop the system in its tracks by using a language average people can understand to legally and lawfully implement an initiative that everyone wants. Namely, an end to all war.

Ultimately whatever the remedy turns out to be, nothing will ever work until we are prepared to face the stark and obvious truth, that all that exists here within our civilization is people, and we as a species are allowing people we entrust with positions of management to wage endless wars, destroy and pollute our habitats and strip us of our rights, our dignity and our freedom, simply because they write things down on paper and call it “law”. It is time we created and implemented the means to peacefully, lawfully and effectively remove ourselves from this farce, and to hold those responsible for it accountable for their actions. Should we fail to rise to this occasion and do so, then the responsibility for this mess lies with ourselves alone.”

Again, clear as mud!

kok indie 24There are many, many requests for the money. It’s posted and shared thousands of times, and it even has so far gotten a huge amount of donations from 650 people:

They also get exclusive prizes like a World Citizen Decree, but they have to pay the shipping themselves!

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Some of Ken’s begging looks like this:

Seeking the Better World in 2016

Aloha brothers & sisters,

First off to those I have neglected to stay in touch with as friends and family should, please forgive me, it is not for a lack of love or respect, I hope we will see or talk to each other soon.

I am sure many if not most of you can see the incredible pace with which this world is moving, and it should be noted that this is in positive and negative ways, not just the latter. It truly is remarkable and unprecedented if you ask me and I remain realistically optimistic about our prospects for creating a better world in 2016. But I am also fully aware that our world is fraught with danger and the ever present possibility of full scale World War III looms; and it is with that perspective I finally launched something that I truly believe will change the world… if only WE get this mission to the full launch stage in the next 3 months or so. And so it is I write this appeal to you with a most sincere Happy New Year’s wish to all of you and your families and loved ones, with a 100% commitment to do my part to make 2016 the breakout year for a better world.

While I really despise asking for money, I will ask your support in this mission and also request that you share the link below with everyone you can.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/world-citizen-solutions#/

Thank you again and all the best in this new year.

TJP (Truth Justice Peace)

And then Ken gets a little pushier, and also explains that he has to pay all the key people, including himself. This is very, very important that he does not lose any money on any of this saving the world stuff.

Ken O’Keefe with Trevor Labonte and 91 others.

25 December 2015 at 08:38 ·

I want to wish everyone a lovely Christmas Day and thank everyone from the bottom of my heart for the love and support and generosity in giving to the world citizen mission. I truly accept whatever happens in this crowdfunding campaign, all that is important is that I do my best. If it succeeds we go forward, if it does not then it won’t. I have worked with “volunteers” and lost control of great missions because of a lack of finance to pay people to do quality world changing work. This time I operate with the money to pay all key people, including myself, or it ain’t happening. I see that there are some attacks occuring and I always expected this and it truly does not phase me in the least, been there done that. So on this Christmas Day I send love and respect to my genuine friends and wish all the best fo the tortured souls who find solace in slander/libel. That is a painful place to be and I truly feel sorry for such people. Let love be your guide and you will not operate in such a way.

I provide the link once again to give and will do so repeatedly until the end of the campaign or the beginning. TJP

Let’s look at the actual begging for money in its entirety to get a better idea of what someone is being asked to finance (spelling and grammatical errors in the original):

“Humanity’s challenge at this decisive point in history is to face a monster that is desperately attempting to expand it’s tyrannical system of human enslavement. Simultaneously human consciousness is growing with unparalleled expansion and this is a grave threat to the tyrants. Only one of these forces, humanity or tyranny, can succeed and the world we handover to our children and future generations will be defined by our success or failure in this regard. The irony is that the tyrants have no power but that which we have unwittingly relinquished to them… in order to create a better world we simply need to take our power back. That is my ultimate goal; a better world. My wisdom in this matter comes from the knowledge that the attainment of this goal is not up to me, it is up to us.”

Ken O’Keefe, Nov. 2015

Finally you can create real and lasting change!  You, as an individual, can positively impact and influence all of humanity, not just for now but for all future generations. We are excited to introduce the pre-launch for the world citizen solution, a no compromise yet peaceful and lawful way to extract ourselves from tax obligations that literally make us accomplices to perpetual war.  Or in other words, financiers of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

We are 100% entirely dedicated to ending the perpetual cycle of war and ushering in a lasting era of justice and peace. The success of this Indiegogo Campaign will ensure that by March 2016 you will be part of something ‘game changing’.

Ken O’Keefe and his team are currently developing a legal and social strategic initiative that will have profound effects on releasing humanity from its current paradigm. It’s time to stand up for what you know is right. It’s time for your voice to be heard. The time is now.

Stand for those who have no voice, for those who are set to inherit what we leave behind, for our children and their children. Make a stand for real peace and real transformation. Be part of this growing movement of change and ensure a peaceful future for those you love.

Funds raised for this project will be allocated for the following:

–  Legal documentation and support
–  Copywriting
–  Website development
–  Staff costs
–  PR / Media / Branding
–  Video / Editing
–  Administration Costs

Our dedicated team and the contracted individuals involved will be paid for their time while spearheading this initiative. Such a solutions focused project requires complete and confidential commitment and we are proud to support our team members with monetary appreciation for their time, effort and skills.

Should we not meet the required funding target we will not proceed with the project and allocate funds to the parties involved for their time and the remainder to a nominated charitable organisation.

It is our conviction that success will bring forth a highly effective and robust, revolutionary strategy ready for immediate implementation. This strategy will enable the good people of the earth to break free from the control systems we have unwittingly submitted to. This will result in the cessation of mass murder due to war and ongoing world conflicts.

Such an endeavour does not come without its risks and challenges, aspects we are not ignorant to and will do our best to overcome. The greatest challenge at this birthing stage of the project is exposure and funding. This is where we need you!

If you resonate with this project, are tired of the never ending cycle of war and want a better world for your children then please SHARE this with your friends, family and acquaintances.

Your donation, your time and your efforts to share and broadcast our mission across the world is symbolic of so many of the great leaders before you. Make your mark and be part of the movement. We are inviting you to join us, by challenging the existing concept of social responsibility, to create genuine security through justice with a real and lasting peace on earth.

As with all great endeavours, it is the follow through and commitment of those involved that will define success or failure.  But arguably the most critical elements of all with such a potentially world changing mission is that of timing and presentation.  The question of timing is critical and it is our position that we are indeed at that time in history wherein billions of people around the globe are completely opposed to war and genuinely seeking a way to end this madness.

(end)

There… understand now? It’s just about not paying taxes, and a few of his friends took that up with him, as it is not a new or original idea. The following discussion is from a public post on Facebook.

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Steve Lewis The solution he is proposing is Lawful Rebellion. Withhold all taxes.

Tahra Ahmed Hahaha. That solution has been around for years. There are already many groups promoting that. So what is so top secret about this?

Tahra Ahmed Steve I am very well aware of Lawful Rebellion. Indeed it was I who introduced Ken to the concept for the first time when I had him as my key speaker at my Seek Speak Spread Truth Conference over 2 years ago. I was also going to have David Messenger of Practical Lawful Rebellion speak but he couldn’t make it . However his details remaineeded on my website so Ken was interested to find out more and I discussed it with him.

Steve Lewis Interesting. I do have to say I am only guessing it’s LR or some form of global tax rebellion having listened very carefully to what he says. He does mention it very briefly. The whole thing does seem ill thought out and, well, rushed. Possibly deliberate simply to cause exactly this kind of debate and questioning. Perhaps a little like those single word or phrase advertising campaigns we occasionally see which arouses curiosity until we find out what it’s all about.

Or perhaps I’m just making excuses as I could not bear the fact that he may have sold out. There are many hideous double bluffs out there after all.

Tahra Ahmed posted the following, basically concerned about others involved in the project: “The New Age / Spiritual New Age Movement has been completely infiltrated, created, managed and corrupted by a network of handlers, intelligence agencies, gangsters and criminals to gather information, gain access to and manipulate claims to the collateral accounts and ownership of titles, trusts, investments, UN grants, funds, accounts and technology on behalf of the Vatican and Rothschild and fraudulent banking families.

It seems fitting that he recently ratified (ITNJ) International Tribunal for Natural Justice is set up and chaired by Sacha Stone. How and when does he sleep?”

Well said Patrick Soddoff.

My question is how do two of the Alternative Media’s biggest names ‘Ken O’Keefe and Max Igan become thick as theives with the likes of this narcissistic ego Sacha Stone of the Agenda 21 Transhumanism promoting NEN?

Apparently they have all come up with a world solution in taking on the private Banking cartel. And they have set up a Go Fund Me account for which Ken is very busily asking for money. But this is the strangest thing of all – the detailsof the solution are all top secret! Eeer but I thought it was because of SECRET societies, which have created the cancer of corruption, that the world is in the chaos it Is in right now!

But wait. It gets even stranger…… people are actually donating! For something they have no knowledge about.

I have been asking both Max Igan and Ken O’Keefe for an explanation since yesterday but have not heard anything back from either. Please see my comments for a full list of questions.”

So…. Tahra Ahmed started asking Ken and Max some questions, which have since been removed from Facebook (see below) and was dealt with in the standard way that anyone is who asks for transparency and explanations for where people’s money is going, the persons involved and what they are going to do, since we are not talking about feeding the hungry, clothing the poor or putting the roof over the head of a refugee. She was attacked. But in the KOK world, even among those who are his supporters, it gets morphed into “haters gonna hate”. I  myself begin to feel sorry for the poor truthers who can’t get no truth from fellow truthers who ask them to TRUST!!!!

Max Igan wow, working on the ‘secret solution’ were we?…. damn, and I thought we were all just gathered to get a pic together by the gate while we were all in the one spot….. Im glad you were there to clear up what we we ‘actually’ doing in this pic….. but wait…. you weren’t there at all were you…. you just thought it would be a good way to attack someone who has defended you, supported you, gone out on a limb and copped abuse for you…. nice….. lying little turncoat that you are Tahra…. you could have asked either of us about this before launching your hate campaign… all you have proven to the world is how self absorbed and spiritually bankrupt you are and how little you require to fabricate a story…. totally disgusted with you

Tahra Ahmed And guys I know I am pretty fierce and fearless. But I am sure there are at least a few of you who can stand with me in asking questions to get to the TRUTH. After all that is what is most sacred to us Truth Seekers.

Ken responded with his usual anger in the way cult leaders will do, diguised as “feeling sorry for this sad individual” and claims that his very life is in danger:

Ken O’Keefe I have been in the so-called activist scene for so long that I have witnessed and experienced the sort of backbiting and smearing that Tahra is exhibiting over and over and over. One of the things that is truly remarkable is how people who have done little all too often mouth off and talk shit and sit in judgement of those who actually do physical, tangible work. “Thick as thieves”, what an interesting way to describe me and brother Max Igan, by a woman who sits in judgement because she apparently wishes to play God. I feel sorry for this sad individual, truly I do.

I do not know what questions she has asked because I have not been online for a couple of days and have yet to see any communications from her. But the only one I reckon that merits a reply is with regard to the lack of details as to the strategy. The are very solid reasons for this, and as the plan requires serious tactical execution, I will not compromise the strategy because Tahra so and so wishes to play God. The crux of the plan is to peacefully, lawfully remove ourselves from the obligation we currently have to pay for mass-murder. A sort of “Not in my name” for real kind of thing. If you do not think that is enough for you to support, then do not support. I respect that, but sniping and playing God merits no attention beyond what I have written here.

For those who think my record is sufficient to merit trust, please give and rest assured this plan is world changing. And as for strategy, if anything happens to me, such as me going to jail or having an “accident”, the entire strategy will be revealed and in death if necessary, the mission will happen. TJP Bona Dea

Tahra Ahmed Dear All Inc ‘Ken O’Keefe and Max Igan, I am saddened that my asking some very pertinent questions on Ken’s idea has resulted in quite vitriolic attacks on me personally. I am sad because I have a lot of respect for both Ken and Max on a professional level and love them as fellow passionate, activist brothers. No where have I cast assertions on their good character. At no time have I been disrespectful to either. Not even when they have used particularly offensive and personal language against me.

All I have asked are a few pertinent questions. Am I really being a “paranoid backstabbing” blah blah because I don’t trust blindly?

And the only person that I have real concerns about is Sacha Stone. I have given my reasons for this.

My post stems from protecting ken and Max from him. And ultimately protecting our movement. Ken is probably our best man for the job of uniting our movement and so he will be targeted by the cabal. And we must be vigilant of such infiltrators.

We all need to pull together and be prepared to be held to account at all times. For our own protection! And we need to always be fully transparent. So I will not back down from asking questions. That is what makes me a Truth Seeker. So why should I stop now?

I would love to give this project my backing. I have been call for us to unite for over two years. And first I must have my questions answered.

Tahra Ahmed Max Igan what has been particularly shocking is the extreme venom you have first directed towards me and then Bob. I have never heard you be so angry, foul mouthed and vile about the evil satanic IsraelI Jews when they have been butchering and bombing and torturing the brave and beautiful innocent souls in Palestine. It’s been very disturbing to know that your hate and venom for us is more than for those devils. So why is that? Usually people lash out like this when they are cornered and exposed.

I still hope this is not the reason why you ‘Ken O’Keefe and Patrick Soddoff are behaving in such a way. I hope that it’s bcos you genuinely blv that Kens idea is great and you are lashing out bcos you don’t want it to be derailed,

So if the latter is the case then I respectfully urge you all to be TRANSPARENT about

  1. the idea,
  2. about the breakdown of the budget and how much each item on Ken’s list will cost and
  3. about the structure of showing the financial accounts.

Our main concern is that we do not have a repeat of the financial theft and fraud of the hard earned money of the good folk who are so desperate for a solution..

This is the main concern. Can you appreciate that it is a very reasonable concern especially after the disgusting fiasco of how TPV turned out to be another financial fleecing scam?

Max Igan no Tahra, what has been the most shocking is your lies and fabrication of bullshit in order to undermine this initiative and big note yourself…. My tolernce level for liars who fabricate bullshit about myself or my friends is at an all time low….. all I can feel for you and your spiritually bankrupt actions is pity and disgust

 

Yes, they often respond to those who ask for transparency that they Pity them, after thy of course insult them and call them liars.

Not content to be left out, the person who fabricated the promotional video joined in, insisting on the cult of secrecy and asking why something was even being questioned:

Patrick Soddoff Tahra, when you wrote these words… “My post stems from protecting ken and Max from him. And ultimately protecting our movement.” I would imagine you wrote them because you cared.

When I have a good friend who I see heading for trouble, I privately contact them, explain my concerns and see how things develop, keeping an eye on the situation at all times.

By your own words you “trolled him” incessantly, and very publicly, to the point of harassment. I will not bother quoting each and every post you cast aspersions directly at Ken on, but go back and look at how you presented yourself. Not even the most arcane among us could possibly construe this treatment as rational, or caring for someone you love and respect. Not by a long shot. It was openly hostile.

I too offered you some insight privately, trying to head off what I construed as the beginning of your diatribe, but you refused, telling me that you wanted transparency, so you were going to pursue this in a public forum, claiming “insight” as your guide.

Ken has spilled his own blood giving his support to several causes and has been a fearless warrior for change for a long time, probably back when you were still a schoolgirl, and I find it appalling that you would step up to the bitchy level with such gusto when you self admittedly say you have no idea what it’s about. It’s hardly the course of action one would expect from a friend who loves and trusts you.

If you and your group refuse to participate in his initiative, all well and good, but trying to poison the well in the manner you displayed only causes the very division you say you are concerned about.

Tahra Ahmed Patrick my trolling consisted of copy and pasting my list of questions in reply to about 5/6 comments as well as in the comments of the post Ken tagged me on. So me thinks you are running away with your imagination when you refer to “each and every post” . It was only one post. And bcos of the respect I have held him in, it is still just the one post. Not hostile. Just persistent. Not an iota of diatribe against Ken or Max. Just shock and disgust at their even associating with the likes of Sacha even in the minimum of ways! And huge concerns for the wellbeing of any world solution with that snake slithering around. And admittedly where my angry undertones towards Ken and Max were coming from was at their terrible judgment in having him actually endorse this project. This does raise huge concerns in me about Ken and Max for the first time. Not for their intention. But their judgment.

With regards to your offer to disclose to me the contents of Ken’s “highly embargoed” project, I was shocked at your lack of integrity in offering to show me something that you had given your word to Ken to keep secret. I am a stand for complete integrity and transparency. I don’t want to be part of a secret hierarchy who have all the information. That is exactly the vile belief that has been so destructive to humanity. How could I demand transparency and openness of ken and then be privy to a secret little society?

(end)

But what about the money…. A few people ask about it:

Selene Woods So what happens to the money already donated…if this appeal does not reach its target?

If the money can not be returned…and theres only 17days left on the appeal….with only a quarter of the overall amount raised…..what is really going to be done with £30, 000 to stop war?

Bona Dea Hi Selene, I believe the money is being returned if target is not reached… if target is reached all necesary will be employed to make worldcitizen.solutions idea into a reality and i believe once launched it will be a gamechanger… but ideas dont just magically manifest without funding – many projects are injected with hundreds of thousands or millions with no promise of transparency or duty to create a better world… so i gave what i could financially and am putting in a lot of time and energy to spread the word so i know in my heart i did *something*

There are even some who don’t care if it’s a scam. They like Ken, that’s enough. That his previous projects have never had any success doesn’t seem to occur to them.

Sam Spruce I know quite a bit about Ken O’Keefe and I support this project because he is behind it. If it fails it fails. If it’s a scam then I’ve been scammed. But the failure will be extremely small scale. If it comes to something it will be significant and for me, given Ken’s record to date, it is one of the few initiatives I will lend my efforts to. Just sayin’ like. wink emoticon

but, friends, let’s just assume the money will be returned, because the Facebook page states this (and don’t miss the heart going into the open hand, but they want stuff you can put in the bank:

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Then other doubts begin to emerge, (the previously expressed one about Sacha Stone and his pro Agenda 21 campaigning and NGO), but this one is particularly interesting, because the truthers are concerned about another fleecing:

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the two million dollar scam of David Icke and TVP . You can read about it from another one of the many who donated, in the article linked here and quoted below. http://beforeitsnews.com/banksters/2014/07/david-icke-responds-to-the-peoples-voice-2-million-dollar-scandal-2434760.html

“For those who are not up to speed, over the course of the last year or so, David Icke raised almost two million dollars for the People’s Voice Network. (I mistakenly said it was only 1 million on our show, so forgive me for underestimating the size of the scandal). The People’s Voice operated for about a month before another emergency fund raiser was put out, threatening to shut down the network. The people responded with even more of their hard-earned money and they were relieved of not only their money, but also their voice.

I knew this was a scam right off the bat, but I bit my tongue, smiled, and continued to be cordial to the people promoting it. How did I know it was a scam? Because I’ve built a network myself. While this network isn’t as elaborate as the People’s Voice wanted you to believe it was (even though it turned out to be nothing more than uploaded videos to Youtube or live streamed on their Youtube channel), I know what a thousand dollars buys, what ten thousand dollars buys and what two million dollars buys.”

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But wait! Ken lists as his “employer” TPV

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He had his own little show called Ken O’Keefe’s Middle East, where the argument was naturally…. 9/11

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BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!!

Those who were questioning about where the money was going and why Ken was actually reinventing the wheel if all it is is HIS version of Legal Rebellion (not paying taxes, or picking your own personal “World Citizenship”, something that has existed since the early 1900s) noticed the photos from Bali. Yes… Ken and company had a business meeting in Bali and here is one of the souvenir photos:

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With a fun-packed thread that followed, truly a MUST read where you will see the suspicions not only about the campaign and those involved in it, but the extensive usage Ken makes of Illuminati symbolism: https://www.facebook.com/bobbie.brand.96/posts/1528164517482415

In which we find these gems where Ken’s minions reported her questions enough to get them removed:

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Among those pictured with Ken O’Keefe (not his real name), the above-mentioned Max Igen (not his real name), Sacha Stone (not his real name), are a few new-age and global awareness “activists” and a Life Coach / Liz Taylor impersonator named Samantha Bachman. Who is she? I had to look her up because I’m not that familiar with the new age scene, but know it revolves around sales.

I found her website where there is a manifesto that ends with the line:

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Quite.

You can clearly see that for someone who puts her picture on her site where she holds her book next to the king of cheap flights, her own services don’t come cheap:

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But she’s worth it, she’s got a PhD in “metaphysics”. Never mentions from where though. Looking it up in internet, you can get most of them through home learning, and you too can become a life coach.

Also in the gang are persons named Deanna Amato and Sean ADL Tabatabai, who raised funds for the 2 million dollar scandal of TPV, and one of the donors to that fundraiser is NONE too happy:

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The fans are not at all happy, at least, the Truthers are raising some red flags:

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There is one last thing though: Ken doesn’t only appeal to Truthers and New Age followers. His main base he has chosen as those in the Palestinian campaign. While he doesn’t have that many Palestinians that interact with him, that doesn’t seem to bother him. He knows all about the situation and he has explained it in his own take on History, which I will call “The One World Citizen (Final) Solution”. All you need to do is to read his last Facebook wallpost. While he’s still asking for support and money, he’s also promoting films that stress that Hitler was not so bad, that he was misunderstood, and he puts a link up and asks persons to watch endless episodes of “Adolf Hitler: The Greatest Story Never Told” and some  video by a woman who wrote that: Adolf Hitler was “just not to be understood from the believed Holocaust or his alleged war obsession, but only by a divine mission in the world-historical context.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_Haverbeck

Check out the screenshots, and lose no time to pay into the ONE WORLD CITIZEN (FINAL) SOLUTION

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Now, since this blog is very concerned about war, and not just in words, we feel it is important that you know Ken’s position on the Refugee issue and in particular, the war in Syria. Watch this video (and if you can bear the over-wrought gesturing) see for yourself that Mr Ken O’Keefe pulls out the standard lines used in the mainstream media that there is no uprising, there is no revolution, there is no tyranny, there is just Wahabi-inspired terrorism of ISIS and that is what the Syrians are fleeing. You will see him state that the Syrian war is “our problem, we created it” and that the people are fleeing from ISIS, while Assad is instead an independent leader who has just gotten a lot of bad press… Sounds like how he feels about Hitler, doesn’t it. Ken O’Keefe is a genocide denier. Throw your money at him!

Progressively worse: how Obama strengthens totalitarianism

Posted: 08/07/2015 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Grassroots Activism, Human Rights, Middle East, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Resistance, Syria, War
0

kafranbelwritten by Ruth Riegler     What foreign policy values does Obama actually believe in? From his speeches, each one a lovingly crafted oratorical masterpiece, one would imagine him to be a hybrid of Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jnr, an impassioned idealist working tirelessly for a world of brotherhood, peace, love, justice, freedom, respect for human rights and other exceedingly laudable and desirable objectives.

In the real, non-rhetorical world, he’s been the best thing for totalitarian expansionism since the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, with the world’s most repressive regimes joyously taking advantage of this new US détente with brutal authoritarianism.

Having ordered the bombing of seven Muslim nations in six years to date, and collected half the world’s dictators on speed-dial, Obama’s expanded the endless global war of terror beyond GW Bush’s wildest dreams, now making its Middle East front fully sectarian in a partnership with Tehran’s theocratic regime, to whom he’s graciously delivering control of most of the Mashreq as a means of ensuring “regional stability” of the totalitarian variety, while the rest of the region remains under the control of other US-friendly dictators.

The Syrian and other Arab peoples’ feelings about yet another Western-backed regional takeover and their concerns about the resulting ever-worsening regional meltdown, meanwhile, are ignored or treated with a condescension more commonly seen from a kindergarten teacher addressing four-year-olds, in the traditional Western policymakers’ style. All of which rather jars with the Age of Aquarius foreign policy visions outlined in the POTUS’ aforementioned lovely speeches.

This isn’t just the customary understandable gap between unattainable lofty ideals and messy reality; this is an intergalactic-sized Grand Canyon. How is it that a president who came to power on a platform of progressive yearning for a fairer, better world ended up being the BFF and helpmeet of totalitarianism worldwide? How did the president of peace become the warmonger supreme?

Much of the answer lies precisely in that ‘progressive’ worldview. Obama is the archetype and patron saint of contemporary Western progressive values, primary among which is a boundless Orientalist arrogance and condescension for non-Western peoples. For the West’s ‘progressives’, the timeless leftist ideals of universalism and solidarity with the oppressed, liberté, égalité, fraternité – are passé. At heart, though unlikely to admit it, progressives fundamentally share the far left’s and far right’s belief that freedom, equality and brotherhood are far too important to be shared with the non-Western masses, reserving their solidarity instead for the leaders of modishly despotic regimes.

The one partial exception to this adulation of oppression overseas amongst Western progressives is Palestine – although even this laudable support for freedom, justice and human rights extends only to those Palestinians in occupied Palestine itself, while those in Syria dying for the same basic rights are dismissed, like Syrians, as expendable “collateral damage” or of course – in true Zionist style – as “extremists” and “terrorists”.

Indeed, the Western ‘progressive’ politicians and media deploy exactly the same lexicon of dehumanisation to support exactly the same apparently endless ‘war on terror’ as the conservatives and neocons who are their supposed arch-nemeses, with the only perceptible difference being that the progressives have outsourced more of the grunt work and added more touchy-feely patently ludicrous speeches about supporting human rights.

While neocons preferred to abuse the words ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’ to justify carpet-bombing and backing for totalitarianism, progressives prefer to radically reinterpret the ideas of ‘peace’ and stability’ for the same purpose.

As with Bush’s preferred version of ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’ via bombs and occupation, progressives’ preferred version of ‘peace’ and ‘stability’ in the region is of the maximum security prison variety – those are, after all, peaceful and stable places by their nature and woe betide the tens of millions of inmates demanding freedom and human rights.

In both cases Washington’s objective takes precedence over the wishes of the subject peoples, for whom subjugation, despotism and rule of terror remain the only constants, whether the glossy rhetoric from the faraway backers of that oppression is neoconservative or ‘progressive’ in nature. Meaning that Washington is doomed to be treated with the same disregard by the Arab people in turn.

from Radio Free Syria: https://www.facebook.com/RadioFreeSyria

Arresti, Detenzioni, Torture, Fame, Stupro… Essere una ragazza palestinese in Siria

Posted: 08/07/2015 by editormary in Counter-terrorism, Human Rights, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Syria, War
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muslim-girl-crying-8(Traduzione di Claudia Avolio)

Una ragazza palestinese diciottenne di nome Huda ha spiegato nel dettaglio le orribili esperienze vissute nelle carceri del regime siriano, che vanno dalle percosse alla tortura con scariche elettriche agli stupri multipli.

Huda, originaria del campo di rifugiati palestinesi di Yarmouk, a Damasco, che non ha voluto diffondere il suo vero nome per ovvie ragioni (la paura di ulteriori ripercussioni da parte del regime) è stata arrestata da membri del Fronte Popolare per la Liberazione della Palestina – Comando Generale (FPLP-CG), gruppo pro-regime, all’entrata del campo verso l’inizio del 2013 quando aveva 16 anni con accuse di “terrorismo”.

Huda ha detto che lei ed altre tre donne palestinesi del campo di Yarmouk sono state torturate dal personale del FPLP-CG prima di essere consegnate al tristemente noto braccio “Palestina 235” del regime di Assad a Damasco, in cui è stata incarcerata per i quattro mesi successivi.

Ha ricordato di aver subìto tutte le forme di tortura da parte degli agenti di sicurezza del regime ogni volta in cui la portavano fuori dalla cella che misurava appena 3 metri per 4 ed in cui è stata tenuta insieme ad altre diciotto donne, la maggior parte palestinesi come lei. I torturatori del regime hanno iniziato con le scosse elettriche, ha detto Huda, seguite da percosse con fruste e corde. In seguito è stata trasferita al “Braccio 215” sempre a Damasco, in cui nelle sue parole la tortura è “esponenzialmente” peggiore di quella che aveva sofferto al braccio “Palestina”.

Al “Braccio 215”, ha ricordato ancora la ragazza, “gli investigatori interrogavano giovani donne e uomini del campo di rifugiati di Yarmouk, chiedendo nomi [di chiunque si opponesse al regime]. Quando negavamo di conoscerli, ci picchiavano, torturavano, lasciavano morire di fame e ci davano scosse elettriche. Sono stata stuprata nel corso della mia permanenza lì per oltre 15 giorni. A volte sono stata stuprata ripetutamente più di dodici volte al giorno da diversi funzionari e guardie della prigione”.

Huda ha scoperto di essere rimasta incinta nel corso di uno degli stupri quando ha abortito per via delle percosse quotidiane che le venivano inferte come sempre, di cui ha detto che il risultato è stato “il mio essere ferita e sanguinante al punto di perdere conoscenza. Mi hanno gettata in una cella piena dei corpi di detenuti uccisi sotto tortura, in cui sono stata obbligata a restare, circondata da quei corpi e da quel sangue per circa tre settimane. È stato allora che ho scoperto di essere incinta, quando ho abortito per via delle percosse”.

Lo stupro di detenute donne è pratica comune, ha spiegato Huda, aggiungendo: “Una di loro ha tentato di suicidarsi sbattendo la testa sui muri della cella. Ogni volta perdeva conoscenza per alcune ore”.

La ragazza ha ricordato un caso di cui è stata testimone quando una ragazza palestinese di 20 anni nella stessa cella ha dato alla luce un bambino concepito quando è stata stuprata ripetutamente dalle guardie del regime. “Dopo che è nato, non riusciva a guardare il bambino o a tenerlo vicino a sé nella cella, e non sopportava il suono del suo pianto. Voleva solo sbarazzarsene, ucciderlo mentre non guardavamo, perché la sua esistenza era un promemoria del fatto che fosse stata stuprata dai funzionari”. Ha continuato dicendo: “Alcuni giorni dopo una guardia è entrata e ha portato via il bambino – sapevano che la sua presenza nella cella era una prova della tortura che l’aveva creato”.

Prison-HandsHuda ha parlato di come sia quasi morta in uno dei centri di detenzione del regime per via degli effetti della tortura, della fame e dello stupro, che l’hanno ridotta sanguinante in modo grave; le guardie del regime l’hanno lasciata nella sua cella senza alcun riguardo sanitario né medicine.

Tra le forme di tortura psicologica che ha ricordato, Huda ha detto che mentre era tenuta nella cella coi corpi senza vita di altri prigionieri è stata obbligata a mangiare del cibo gettato sul pavimento davanti a lei come a un animale, cibo che si era mescolato al sangue rappreso lasciato dalle ferite dei prigionieri morti. I detenuti ricevevano un pasto al giorno composto di bulgur (grano spezzato), a volte accompagnato da una fetta di pane. Ha detto ancora: “Potevo sentire dei lamenti dalle celle vicine mentre camminavano sui corpi delle persone per portare dei cadaveri fuori nel passaggio che collega le celle”.

Ha descritto guardie ubriache far subire ai detenuti percosse in modo indiscriminato senza alcuna ragione o giustificazione, insieme a costanti abusi verbali in cui insultavano i prigionieri e la loro religione, aggiungendo che un’altra giovane donna è morta per le ferite riportate alla testa nel corso di queste percosse date a casaccio.

Funzionari e guardie si vendicavano spesso sui prigionieri delle perdite subìte dall’esercito del regime in scontri con le forze ribelli all’esterno, nonostante i prigionieri non avessero nulla a che farci, ha detto ancora Huda, ricordando poi una donna che è stata punita e messa in una cella di isolamento per oltre tre mesi dopo che ha insultato Assad nel corso delle torture.

Yarmouk, agosto 2015, manifestazioni contro il perdurante assedio del campo profughi palestinese vicino a Damasco.

Yarmouk, agosto 2015, manifestazioni contro il perdurante assedio del campo profughi palestinese vicino a Damasco.

Dopo essere stata finalmente rilasciata dalla prigione, Huda ha scoperto che suo padre era morte in un bombardamento da parte del regime del campo di Yarmouk molti mesi prima, mentre lei era in carcere, e che quattro dei suoi fratelli erano stati imprigionati. Quando ha cercato di scoprire dettagli su dove fossero finiti, recandosi all’ufficio dell’OLP a Damasco e all’ambasciata palestinese, è stata informata da un membro dello staff che “se non fossero stati terroristi non li avrebbero arrestati per così tanto tempo” e che “meritavano di venire arrestati visto che erano terroristi”. Huda ha detto di essere riuscita a identificare tre dei suoi fratelli dalle foto trapelate di detenuti che sono morti nelle prigioni del regime sotto tortura, mentre il destino del suo fratello più giovane resta sconosciuto.

Il Gruppo Palestinese di Lavoro in Siria ha chiesto che il regime siriano rilasci tutti i prigionieri palestinesi e ne riveli la sorte, sottolineando che quanto sta avvenendo nelle prigioni del regime è un crimine contro l’umanità sotto ogni standard. Il gruppo ha ufficialmente catalogato 933 prigionieri palestinesi detenuti dal regime, confermando l’uccisione sotto tortura di 408 di loro, di cui 77 appurate dalla pubblicazione di immagini trapelate di alcuni dei prigionieri uccisi sotto tortura nelle prigioni del regime.

Articolo tratto dal Gruppo Palestinese di Lavoro in Siria

Via: Shahba Press

English version https://wewritewhatwelike.com/2015/08/07/arrest-detention-torture-starvation-rape-when-you-are-a-palestinian-girl-in-syria/

Arrest, Detention, Torture, Starvation, Rape… when you are a Palestinian Girl in Syria

Posted: 08/07/2015 by editormary in Counter-terrorism, Human Rights, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, Refugees, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Syria, War
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muslim-girl-crying-8(translated by Ruth Riegler) An eighteen-year-old Palestinian girl named ‘Huda’ has detailed her horrific experiences in Syrian regime prisons, ranging from beatings and torture with electric shocks to multiple rapes.

Huda, from Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus, who wished to withhold her real name for understandable reasons (fearing further persecution by the regime) was arrested by members of the pro-regime ‘Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command’ (PFLP-GC) at the camp entrance in early 2013 when she was 16 years old on charges of “terrorism”.

She said that she and three other Palestinian women from Yarmouk camp were tortured by the PFLP-GC personnel prior to being delivered to the Assad regime’s infamous ‘Palestine – 235’ branch in Damascus, where she was imprisoned for the next four months.

She recalled being subjected to all forms of torture by the regime’s security agents whenever they took her out of the cell there measuring roughly 3 x 4 meters, where she was kept with eighteen other women, mostly also Palestinians. The regime’s torturers began with torture by electrocution, she said, followed by beatings with whips and rods. After this she was transferred to ‘Branch 215’ also in Damascus, where she said the torture is “exponentially” worse than that she’d suffered at the Palestine Branch.

At Branch 2015, she recalled, “the investigators were interrogating young girls and young men from Yarmouk refugee camp, demanding names [of anyone opposing the regime]. When we denied knowing them, we’d be beaten, tortured, starved, electrocuted. I was raped during my stay there for more than 15 days. Sometimes I was raped repeatedly more than a dozen times a day by different officers and prison warders.”

Huda found out that she had been impregnated during one of the rapes when she miscarried a baby as a result of one of the daily beatings administered as standard, which she said resulted in “my being injured and bleeding heavily, losing consciousness. They threw me into a cell filled with the bodies of detainees killed under torture, where I was forced to stay, surrounded by those bodies and blood for approximately three weeks. Then I found out I was pregnant when I miscarried as a result of the beatings.”

Rape of the female detainees is commonplace, she explained, adding, “One of them tried to commit suicide by battering her head off the walls of the cell. Each time she’d lose consciousness for a few hours.”

Huda recalled one case she witnessed when a 20-year-old Palestinian girl in the same cell gave birth to a baby boy conceived when she was repeatedly raped by the regime guards. “After the birth, she couldn’t bear to look at the baby or keep it next to her in the cell and wasn’t able to endure the sound of his crying. She just wanted to get rid of him, to kill him when we weren’t looking because his existence was a reminder to her of being raped by the officers.” Huda added, “A few days later a guard entered and took the baby away – they knew that his presence in the cell was proof of the torture that created him.”

Prison-HandsHuda recalled how she nearly died in one of the regime’s detention centres due to the effects of torture, starvation and rape, which left her bleeding severely; the regime guards left her in the cell without any medical attention and no drugs, she added.

Among the forms of psychological torture she recollected, Huda said that while she was kept in the cell with the dead bodies of other prisoners she was forced to eat food thrown on the floor in front of her like an animal, which had mixed with the congealed blood that was left there from the wounds of the dead prisoners. Detainees received one meal a day of bulgur wheat, she said, which was sometimes augmented by a round of bread. She added, “I could hear groaning from neighbouring cells as they stepped on people’s bodies to bring dead bodies out into the connecting passage between the cells.”
She described drunken guards subjecting detainees to random indiscriminate beatings for no reason and without justification, in addition to constant verbal abuse cursing the prisoners and their religion, adding that another young woman had died from the head wounds inflicted during one of these random beatings.

Officers and guards would often take revenge on the prisoners for regime military losses in clashes with rebel forces outside the prison, despite the prisoners having nothing to do with it, she added, further recalling that one woman was punished by being subjected to solitary confinement for over three months after she cursed Assad during torture.

Yarmouk, August 2015, protests against the ongoing seige in the Palestinian refugee camp Yarmouk, outside Damascus.

Yarmouk, August 2015, protests against the ongoing seige in the Palestinian refugee camp Yarmouk, outside Damascus.

After finally being released from prison, Huda learnt that her father had died in regime bombing of Yarmouk several months previously while she was incarcerated, and that four of her brothers had been imprisoned. When she tried to find out details of their whereabouts from the PLO office in Damascus and the Palestinian embassy there, she was informed by a staff member that “If they weren’t terrorists they wouldn’t have been arrested for so long” and that they “deserved to be arrested since they were terrorists.” Huda said that she had been able to identify three of her brothers from leaked photographs of detainees who died in regime prisons under torture, while the fate of her youngest brother remains unknown.

The Palestinian Working Group in Syria has demanded that the Syrian regime release all Palestinian prisoners and reveal their fate, stressing that what is taking place in the regime’s prisons is a crime against humanity by every standard. The group has officially catalogued 933 Palestinian prisoners detained by the regime, with 408 of this number confirmed to have been killed under torture; 77 of these deaths were confirmed by the publication of leaked images of some of the prisoners killed under torture in the regime’s prisons.

From Palestinian Working Group in Syria
Via: Shahba Press

http://www.shahbapress.com/news/2002/%D8%B4%D8%A7%D8%A8%D8%A9-%D9%81%D9%84%D8%B3%D8%B7%D9%8A%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D8%AA%D8%B1%D9%88%D9%8A-%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7%D8%B5%D9%8A%D9%84-%D9%85%D8%B1%D9%88%D8%B9%D8%A9-%D8%AA%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%B6%D8%AA-%D9%84%D9%87%D8%A7-%D8%AF%D8%A7%D8%AE%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B3%D8%AC%D9%88%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B3%D9%88%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%A9.html

The Usefulness of Palestine

Posted: 06/07/2015 by editormary in "Israel", Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Human Rights, Iran, Lebanon, Middle East Issues, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Resistance, Syria, War
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Some of the victims of the massacre of civilians in the 1976 Tal al Zaatar Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon by Assad's forces and Maronite Lebanese troops

Some of the victims of the massacre of civilians in the 1976 Tal al Zaatar Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon by Assad’s forces and Maronite Lebanese troops

Written by Ruth Riegler
Since the 1948 Nakba, association with the cause of Palestinian freedom has been endlessly useful.
It hasn’t been useful in any way, of course, for the vast majority of Palestinians, who continue to languish in disempowered internal or external exile from their lands, now occupied for over 67 years and counting. But for generations of regional and other leaders, totalitarian regimes, pundits, activists and anyone else fancying a bit of easy reflected glory, Palestine has provided an invaluable patina of revolutionary kudos by association.

Every government in the Middle East and a good few elsewhere, more particularly the nominally anti-imperialist regimes and dictators, plays the ‘anti-zionist’ card professionally: the Assads, father and son, have been adept exploiters of Palestine since Hafez al-Assad first seized power. The regime has relied heavily on its ‘heroic resistance’ reputation, winning admiration and praise worldwide. The most cursory analysis of the regime’s actual ‘resistance’ shows a long track record of cynical exploitation, betrayal and oppression of Palestinians since Hafez first seized power right up to the modern day, ranging from its attempts to hobble the PLO and complicity in the massacre in Lebanon’s Tel al Zaatar camp to the current ongoing ‘Second Nakba’, demonstrating the Assads’ true distaste for freedom, for Palestinians as for Syrians, Lebanese or anyone else who stands in their way.

Some of the residents of Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus who have starved to death under the continuing regime siege on the camp, much of which has been destroyed by two years of regime aerial and heavy artillery bombardment.

Some of the residents of Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus who have starved to death under the continuing regime siege on the camp, much of which has been destroyed by two years of regime aerial and heavy artillery bombardment.

Should Palestine actually be liberated or Zionism be dismantled, as the Assads have always been fully aware, the regime would need to find new excuses for its savage domestic repression. But as the Assads and the other ‘axis of resistance’ leaders are well aware, people will always prefer the reassuring lie of jam tomorrow to the dark reality of totalitarianism today.

Indeed, that bleakly ironic dependence on exploiting the cause of Palestinian freedom to justify brutal domestic oppression is a common feature to all the ‘axis of resistance’ members. Any demands for greater freedom, investment in infrastructure, more schools or anything else can quickly be dismissed with accusations of those behind them being Zionist agitators attempting to derail the always-imminent glorious liberation. Any questioning of the Assads’ expenditure of 90 percent of GDP on the military for decades has been quickly countered with the insistence that this is essential both to defend the homeland from Zionist expansionism and for that same ever-imminent liberation. In reality, as we continue to see, the regime’s military juggernaut, like that of the Assads’ ‘anti-imperialist’ allies, has been reserved exclusively for use against Syrian and Palestinians in Syria, but small details like this don’t stop the regime’s hot air emissions about “opposing Zionism.”

The Iranian regime, the fulcrum of the ‘resistance’ axis, is even more adept in and reliant on its exploitation of the cause of Palestinian freedom. Having sold itself as the great saviour of Palestine, prevented from triumphant liberation of Al Quds only by fiendish Zionist plots for 36 years to date, Tehran is wholly dependent on Israel’s continuing occupation to justify its own domestic totalitarianism and more recently its own colonialist regional empire (re) building and occupation. As Ahwazi Arabs have known for a very long time, of course, the Iranian regime is little different in supremacist essence and bone-deep racism to its counterpart in Tel Aviv; indeed, it’s one more bitter irony that the Israeli occupation is less savage overall than that imposed by the ‘great liberators’ in Tehran, both domestically and regionally.

With the regional regimes and tyrants, however, their lie of support for Palestinian freedom at least has the excuse, however pathetic and contemptible it is, of being essential to their own survival. Those in the West who continue to cynically abuse the cause of Palestinian freedom to support, justify and/or deny Assad’s and Tehran’s genocidal oppression lack even that despicable and threadbare figleaf of justification. George Galloway, ‘Stop the War’, Cynthia McKinney and countless other prominent Western activists for Palestinian freedom (or for the freedom of those Palestinians under Israeli occupation, with other Palestinians being considered unworthy of liberation) lack even that miserable semi-excuse. Indeed, they continue to parrot Assad’s and Tehran’s now surreally obscene and utterly discredited script of anti-zionist, anti-imperialist revolutionary zeal to justify another, ongoing Nakba and regional occupation.
Even more ironically, the language of the selective Western supporters of (some) Palestinians’ freedom, like that of Assad and Iran, is now largely indistinguishable from that of the devoted Zionists and neocons who they claim are their sworn enemies; any barbarism, any crime against humanity, no matter how monstrous, up to and including ethno-sectarian cleansing and genocide, can be justified or mitigated as being part of a valiant battle against Islamist terrorism to protect the state, and those crimes which can’t be manipulated can be simply denied or ignored.

The nobility and rightness of the cause of Palestinian freedom, of Syrian freedom, of freedom as the right of all peoples, are unsullied by those who exploit others’ suffering to justify their own vast inhumanity. All that the exploiters reveal and emphasize is their own profound and utterly shameless moral bankruptcy.

from Radio Free Syria 

Are you Progressive Except for Syria? Take the handy test here!

Posted: 02/26/2015 by editormary in "Israel", Grassroots Activism, Human Rights, Iran, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Politics, Refugees, Religion, Resistance, Syria, War
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pes 3WRITTEN BY Mary Rizzo.
We have all already heard of the phenomenon of PEP (Progressive Except on Palestine), in which those who consider themselves progressives (liberals in the USA) or leftists are pretty liberal on every single issue except the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, their syndrome has been pointed out and diagnosed fully. A lot of them justify this position by saying that supporting the government of Israel is a liberal position. Their problems are not our problem… they need help that we surely can’t provide.

However, there is another phenomenon far more worrisome because it involves those who are Progressive ALSO for Palestine, and that is the case of PES (Progressive Except on Syria). Those who are afflicted by this malady feel safety in numbers, because they are in fact the majority of non-Palestinian supporters of Palestine. They will actually USE the argument of Palestine as justification of their support of Assad, even though his regime has a terrible record regarding Palestinians, (as did that of his father).  They will argue that support of Assad is a progressive (liberal) leftist value. Whether it’s called “selective humanitarianism” “double standards” or “hypocrisy”, it is a dangerous and insidious disease and should be cured. Here is a little test to discover if perhaps YOU are afflicted with this mental illness.

pes 2Do you perhaps suffer from PES without being aware of it? Fear no more! We’re happy to provide you a self-diagnosis test with simple YES / NO replies so that you can discover your own hypocritical stance, and hopefully, be on the path to the cure.

  1. Did you protest or complain about the unfairness of the USA elections for any reason but believe that Assad won a landslide victory in free and fair elections?
  2. Do you think that Assad is fighting terrorism?
  3. Do you think that the Palestinian cause is being defended by Assad?
  4. Do you believe that the war in Syria is all about foreign aggression “due to their national and pan-Arab stances” and is not a people’s uprising? In fact, you think the whole Arab Spring has got to be “exposed” as an imperialist, western plot.
  5. Do you think that the Intifada in Palestine is legitimate and that the uprising in Syria is manufactured (while of course saying so having been paid guest to Assad’s presidential palace)?
  6. Do you think that the Palestinian cause is being defended by Hezbollah even when they target and kill Palestinian refugees and ignore the growing tensions between Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and Hezbollah?
  7. Do you condemn religiously-inspired militias such as ISIS and Al Nusra when they commit murder and use violence against civilians but have not condemned Hezbollah when it commits murder and uses violence against civilians?
  8. Do you think that it was a good idea for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC) to shoot on the Palestinians who mourned those killed on Naksa Day 2011?
  9. Have you called Gaza “the world’s largest open-air prison” but don’t agree with the UNHCR claim that Syria’s war “is more brutal and destructive than the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has turned into the worst humanitarian disaster since the end of the cold war.”?
  10. Have you endorsed or thought a No Fly Zone was a good idea for Gaza but reject it as Imperialist meddling or a bid to save Al Qaeda if it’s done in Syria?
  11. Do you condemn the Palestinians tortured to death in Israeli prisons (since 1967, a total of 72 Palestinians have been tortured to death) but have not condemned the 200 Palestinians tortured to death in Syrian prisons since 2011? You naturally probably don’t know about the at least 11.000 Syrians who were tortured to death inside these prisons.
  12. Do the at least 10,000 bodies of prisoners in Syrian regime prisons that were ordered to be catalogued by the regime mean nothing to you since you don’t have details on what the reasons for their deaths could be?
  13. Do you call for release of political prisoners from Israeli jails but do not call for the release of the tens of thousands of political prisoners in Syrian jails?
  14. Have you actually asked for money to bring Gazan children to make a protest for the NFZ but think that asking for a NFZ in Syria is a bid to help Al Qaeda?
  15. Do you think Al Qaeda and ISIS are Mossad / CIA inventions?
  16. Do you protest against the death penalty in the USA: Executions in 2014, 35, but don’t do the same for Iran: executions in 2014, Between 721 and 801 at least.
  17. Do you think it is wrong for the US to provide Israel with armaments because it engages in war crimes but at the same time, think it is justified for Russia to provide the Syrian regime with armaments and military experts because “it’s war against NATO”?
  18. Do you condemn Israel’s “extra judicial killing” but claim that Assad must do everything he needs to maintain power because blocking his actions in any way, even by condemning them “… could end up ousting Assad. It would mean replacing him with pro-Western stooge governance. It would eliminate another Israeli rival. It would isolate Iran. It would be disastrous for ordinary Syrians.”
  19. Have you ever praised Assad’s government because it is secular, or “fighting the enemy of the West”: because after all, you only see the alternatives being Assad or the “Islamic Fundamentalists”?
  20. Did you support Haniyeh and Meshaal until they started waving the Syrian revolution flag?
  21. Do you erroneously refer to the Syrian revolution flag as the “French Mandate Flag” ignoring that even the Assad regime celebrated it as the Independence flag each “Evacuation (Independence) Day on 17 April to celebrate the resistance against the French colonialists?
  22. Do you know the names of at least one Palestinian dissident/political writer but don’t know any Syrian ones?
  23. Do you call the opposition to Assad “Western-backed rebels” either from a Pro-Israel or Pro-Iran standpoint?
  24. Did you protest for Palestinian detainees and even know their names but not do the same for Palestinian detainees in Syrian’s prisons?
  25. Do you know the name of at least one minor arrested or killed by Israel but don’t know the name of at least one minor arrested or killed by the Assad regime?
  26. You have protested against the racist and discriminatory Apartheid Wall and checkpoints in Israel/Palestine but you have nothing much to say about Syrian military checkpoints and sniper-lined checkpoints?
  27. Did you get angry when a US newspaper used a photo of Iraqi deaths, claiming they were Syrian, but when Palestinian supporters use Syrian ones, it’s “illustrating the suffering in Gaza”?
  28. You have protested against Israeli use of phosphorus bombs but you have nothing much to say about the unconventional weapons use by Assad against both opposition fighters and civilians such as barrel bombs and chemical weapons?
  29. Are you critical of the US for intervening in affairs of other countries but think it’s normal for Iran and Russia to be sending troops into Syria to help the regime?
  30. You would never consider Palestine compromising with Israel but you believe that the opposition must compromise with the regime in Syria.
  31. Do you condemn the Saudi monarchy and refer to them as Wahhabis, Salafis, etc., but refuse to recognise that Iran is a theocracy?
  32. Do you think that Assad is simply doing everything he can to protect the minorities in his country?
  33. Do you call the Israeli occupation of Palestine ethnic cleansing but do not speak out against the regime-driven massacres in Syria that are ethnically based?
  34. Do you refer to the Assad regime, Hezbollah and Iran as the “Axis of Resistance” even when they don’t react to Israeli attacks on them?
  35. Do you think the following two statements are both true?
    a. Dissent in the United States is patriotic.
    b. Protesting in Syria is an assault on the State and needs to be quelled.
  36. Do you think the following two statements are true?
    a. Pepper spraying protesters in the USA is a violation of human rights.
    b. The Syrian regime has to use whatever force it deems necessary against protesters, because they protesters have violent intentions.
  37. Do you think that Israel must be brought to the ICC for crimes against humanity but think that the Syrian regime should not?
  38. Do you condemn the USA vetoes on the UN Security Council in favour of Israel but praise the Russian and Chinese ones in favour of Assad both to stop sanctions and to prohibit ICC investigation including three Chinese vetoes on Syria alone out of eight total vetoes in their history?
  39. Do you think the following statements are both true?
    a.Calling a U.S. citizen anti-American or un-American for being critical of the US government is ridiculous, knee-jerk, unintelligent and actually incorrect.
    b.People who are critical of Assad are closet or overt imperialists and want US control over the region.
  40. You do not believe that Russia is an imperialist state while you are certain that Syria is an anti-imperialist state defending itself against imperialist onslaught.
  41. Do you think that Erdogan is seeking to dominate politics in the region in an attempt to restore what was once the Ottoman Empire or even think the US is trying to establish an Islamic State but support Iranian domination and the Shi’a Crescent?
  42. Have you signed petitions against companies such as Soda Stream and Coca-cola but not against weapons provider, the Russian monopoly Rosoboronexport or even the western companies providing the Syrian and Iranian regimes with surveillance equipment that they use against dissidents and opposition?
  43. Do you call innocent victims killed by American drones or victims of war crimes but consider the Syrians and Palestinians killed by Syrian bombs and chemical weapons collateral damage?
  44. Do you reject the USA/UK “War on Terror” but believe that Assad has a right to use whatever means possible to kill whoever he considers as a terrorist in Syria and that Syria is a sovereign nation fighting Al Qaeda?
  45. Have you mentioned the Blockade on Gaza in conversations and know it is illegal and a crime against humanity but don’t feel the same about the Blockade on Yarmouk?
  46. Do you respond to criticism of Assad by pointing out USA human rights violations?
  47. You know the name of USA civilians killed by cops or vigilantes, but you don’t know the name of a single Syrian victim of torture in the Assad prisons.
  48. You have protested for the closure of Gitmo, but you don’t raise your voice or even one eyebrow over the Syrian Torture Archipelago in which “The systematic patterns of ill-treatment and torture [in the 27 detention facilities run by Syrian Intelligence] that Human Rights Watch documented clearly point to a state policy of torture and ill-treatment and therefore constitute a crime against humanity.” Moreover, you don’t want to notice that Syria’s government has been cooperating with the CIA extensively in renditions and the torture programme.
  49. You think that Israel should not have nuclear capacity but that Iran should have nuclear capacity. Extra points if you support Non-Proliferation. Super extra points if you participated in any No Nukes events in the West or signed any such petitions, super extra and mega extra points if you are against nuclear power.
  50. You believe that the Palestinian struggle is about human rights but the Syrian protests were sectarian and religious-oriented, driven by people who wanted to overthrow and overtake power illegitimately if not in fact manufactured by the West?
  51. Do you believe it’s normal for the Syrian constitution to be amended every time that it serves the Assad family but the US Constitution is sacred and especially no amendments should be made to limit gun possession whether you detest the US government or think it should basically call all the shots around the world?
  52. Do you think that Jews protesting the Israel government are noble people who are fighting for human rights and justice while any Syrian protesting the Assad regime are in cahoots with the Israeli government.
  53. Do you believe that, “We must not in any way call for the removal of President Assad unless he commits acts of terror against us. Assad’s government has committed no such act, thus rendering it criminal for foreign governments to undermine the Syrian regime. You either stand for national sovereignty, or against it. The choice is yours.” While at the same time have supported efforts from the liberals or conservatives to have Obama impeached?
  54. Do you believe that foreign countries helping the Palestinians militarily to win against Israel is legitimate but helping Syrians win against Assad is meddling and think that “any further intervention in Syria would be for U.S. interests, like weakening an ally of Iran, and would encourage Assad’s allies to step up their armament shipments. The carnage would continue, and perhaps increase.”?
  55. Do you reject claims that the involvement of Iran and Russia in favour of Assad is meddling?
  56. Do you think that the entire Syrian war is for the purpose of the US weakening Syria so that it can pursue its own interests in the region but ignore the fact that Russia has enormous interests in Syria that are far more evident?
  57. Have you ever found yourself denying Assad had chemical weapons but also applauding the Syrian regime’s decision to hand them over to Russia as a strong gesture towards peace?

pes 1

How many questions did you answer YES to?

Between 1 and 5? You are headed towards selective humanitarianism, or even are afflicted with Western Privilege Syndrome!

Between 6 and 10? You are dangerously using double standards and believe that human rights aren’t something universal, but allow your ideological or dogmatic prejudices to influence your ethical judgement!

Over 10? You are a dyed in the wool Hypocrite! Maybe you should avoid “current events” altogether, you have no understanding of what human rights and justice mean, you should wash your mouth out before you ever speak about human rights for Palestinians or anyone.

Do wars end?!

Posted: 12/29/2014 by editormary in "Israel", Children's Corner, Human Rights, Middle East Issues, Palestine, Refugees, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, War
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GAZA MS 1WRITTEN BY FIDA SHURRAB, PHOTOGRAPHS BY MOHAMMED HASSAN SHURRAB

Wars are always classified within historical eras with a start and end dates. However, do wars really have an end? Do wars end when bombings and strikes stop? Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, have witnessed three wars within six years, each war ended leaving a mass of destruction at all levels, and none of them has really ended. When the people in the Gaza Strip speak of the memories they have of the wars, all of a sudden, memories turn to be very alive scenes, as if the wars have taken a place in their hearts and souls.

Do we, in Gaza, overcome the trauma? Psychologists have to expand their theories in the post traumatic disorder interventions when it comes to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Living and surviving three wars is not an easy life story. Damages have occurred in our life system. In what way in the whole world can people get used to the sounds of bombs, because people in Gaza did? This needs to be brought to the attention of the whole world, the people in Gaza Strip lost their lives during the past three wars, they are alive but without souls, their humanity has been easily raped by the silence of the international world watching genocide taking place.

GAZA MS 2We gained nothing from wars! An old woman once said, as a survivor of three wars: “In the 2008 war, I lost my eyes, and in the 2014 war, I lost my home. Loss is all I’ve gained”. In wars, we harvest loss and pain. A child, 4 years old, keeps repeating: “Every time I go to sleep, I hear loud explosions, and I cover my face with a blanket to hide from the rockets. I am afraid of sleeping”. The war visits the people every night in their dreams. People, during the war, run under heavy shelling looking for a safe place, leaving their houses, people were displaced in the schools and the streets. Many of them lost their children when they were running. A young man, from Al Shejeaya, was holding his son in his hands while running looking for a shelter, when shrapnel hit his child, cutting him into pieces. This man has nothing to speak about except the moment of his biggest loss, he says: “Why live?! I lost my pregnant wife, and I could not protect my child, he died in my hands. All of my life was snatched away in a matter of seconds”.

We need to live without remembering the scenes of the massacres, we want to stop expecting wars at every second, is that a too much for a human being?

Having a tour of the massively destroyed neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip is not easy. The rubbles of thousands of houses are not only a pile of stones, those rubbles are huge amounts of stories, memories, dreams and hopes which all have been brutally scattered.

Meeting a mother who has lost a child in the war is like meeting a mountain dipped with anguish. All she can talk about is her child whom she lost, she does not speak of his/her death but rather of his/her life, hobbies, things they hated and things they loved, as if she denies the fact that she lost him/her forever; and telling her the truth is like committing a crime. Forgetting is impossible, but death has become a habit. Losing the souls of the beloved ones can take the lives of the survivors with them in the graves, this leads us to the fact that we are also buried in life.

GAZA MS3The war has done a hellish job in the Gaza Strip, the war did not end, people are still suffering its severe consequences, the only different thing is that the explosions have stopped; otherwise, the stories of pain and loss continue to be our antagonists in the Gaza Strip.

We Shall Not Forgive nor Forget!!!!

According to the UN reports:

  • 2,127 Palestinian citizens were killed during the 51 days of war. The number of deaths included 544 children and 302 women.
  • The number of wounded is 10,744, including 3,258 children and 2,089 women. About 3,000 wounded are expected to have lifelong disabilities.
  • About the Israeli attacks, the Israeli occupation carried out 60,664 attacks, including 8,210 airstrikes, 36,718 tank and artillery shells and 15,736 naval strikes.
  • The number of houses targeted by the occupation is 16,002, including 2,358 completely destroyed and 13,644 partially destroyed.

Defying the media lies about Syria – finding truth in the body of evidence

Posted: 08/26/2014 by editormary in Counter-terrorism, Grassroots Activism, Human Rights, Middle East, No thanks!, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Politics, Refugees, Religion, Resistance, Syria, Uncategorized, War
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Most of us recognise this picture as being from Aleppo. Aftermath of one of the market bombings by the Syrian regime against a civilian population. It circulates also as Gaza, where those who are then corrected, instead of saying, "this is terrible and a crime against humanity" say instead, "Well, it REPRESENTS the suffering of the Gazans". The point is lost and truth is not served.

Most of us recognise this picture as being from Aleppo. Aftermath of one of the market bombings by the Syrian regime against a civilian population. It circulates also as Gaza, where those who are then corrected, instead of saying, “this is terrible and a crime against humanity” say instead, “Well, it REPRESENTS the suffering of the Gazans”. The point is lost and truth is not served.

WRITTEN BY MARY RIZZO
The question invariably arises when one loses faith in the narratives of the news media: If the mainstream media sets forth aspects of an issue in order to put forth a particular agenda of the dominant or powerful sector of society, and even the so-called alternative media presents its own narrative to push ahead its own ideologies or values and effect the situation with its own “solutions”, where is one to turn to if one seeks to know the truth?

The answer is simple and complicated at the same time. One has to find the truth oneself. The truth is indeed “out there”. The problem though is that it is an enormously cumbersome and time-consuming task to get to it, so difficult and depressing, in fact, that too many give up on it and fall back on whatever the media narrative is, even when we know and have the proof that it is full of lies, full of holes or full of propaganda. The truth can be found not in the various narratives of the news media, but in the vast and bottomless well of the body of evidence. To get to the truth, one has to do one’s own digging, sorting, one has to do one’s own thinking. One can only get to the truth on one’s own and only with great determination and persistency.

It is absolutely frustrating to look at the news on TV or read it in the paper and see things that not only “don’t look right” but “don’t feel right”. We claim (well, most of us who are interested in civil justice and world peace) that we are supporters of human rights. But do we realise that often what we feel as a violation of our own rights on our own soil we shrug off as just “the way they do things” when it is on a vast scale in another country. Mass arbitrary arrests, bombing of civilian areas, torture, policies of terror and starvation to subjugate a population are wrong in our own lands as they are wrong in other lands. However, for a very long time, the extent of these policies has been kept hidden from us, that is, our media only reported on institutionalised (policy-based) violations of human rights when at some level our own interests were involved or there has been what is perceived as a connection between “us” and “them”.  Somehow, the bigger the atrocity is, the more distant we feel from it and the easier it is to keep us away from this reality. We accept as well the media narrative, which sometimes is just the echo of the regime or dominant narrative because the truth, the reality is far, far worse than what even our wildest ideas of it could be.

Orphans in Ras al-Ain, survivors of a Syrian regime aerial raid; the winter clothes alone should tell observers to look beneath the "insta-pundit labelling" of the sufferers as Gazans.

Orphans in Ras al-Ain, survivors of a Syrian regime aerial raid; the winter clothes alone should tell observers to look beneath the “insta-pundit labelling” of the sufferers as Gazans.

There is a reason  why reality is not presented fully to us and why so many populations have been presented as “other”. The people are depicted as deserving of the oppression because they are primitive, not ready for rights and still needed to be controlled by a powerful figure that would take care of their interests, though at times he might be a little rough, he’s probably some kind of oriental despot that we have to learn to live with out of some perverted idea of “relativism”.

We extend our disgust in various ways towards the population and their ignorance. If they voted, they never did it “right”. If they didn’t vote, that was because they didn’t view democracy as a value and therefore if internal movements towards democracy arose, they would be depicted as being driven from reactionary forces abroad who would then throw the rulers out of power and establish their own protectorate. In essence, the individuals and the geographical/ethnic/linguistic/religious groups they belonged to did not have their own agency to affect their own change, and if they are not “willing” to help themselves, it’s very easy to promote the idea that they are impermeable to change or that it has to be imposed from outside if there is going to be any. Otherwise, they get what they deserve.

One of the innocent victims of the bombing of Azaz. The Assad regime kills them an the world lets them dig the dead infants out with their bare hands. This picture has also circulated with great success as having happened in Gaza.

One of the innocent victims of the bombing of Azaz. The Assad regime kills them an the world lets them dig the dead infants out with their bare hands. This picture has also circulated with great success as having happened in Gaza.

Only those who  have forgotten (or who haven’t realised) that personal freedom is a right for every human on the planet and that there is a series of rights that belong to every human being in order to truly be considered as being a free individual, regardless of the geopolitical situation in which he or she was born or currently is living will be interested in finding the truth and rejecting the “story”, “spin” or “narrative” that any news providers is giving. News providers don’t appear out of nothing, they obtain their information and disseminate their information according to their own interests. If they support a particular ideology, they will have a bias towards only giving information that supports the tenets of their ideology. If they claim to be media providers that are free of ideological bias and hidden agendas, however, they are going to have to have an ethical code of some sort, they are going to have to follow some kind of criteria for the selection of the material they present.

This is the reason that the only way towards knowing and obtaining the truth is to sort through the body of evidence. We can’t pretend to know everything about everything or even something about everything, but if we are interested in international affairs, if we are interested in civil and human rights, we can’t afford the luxury of laziness. We can’t accept everything that is handed to us as “news” and what IS handed to us under that guise has to be scrutinised very carefully. We have been presented with a multitude of “instant pundits” and experts under various titles who assure us that they have a very consistent response to all the issues they speak about and yet, the only thing they are consistently doing is neglecting the bulk of material that comprises the body of evidence. Their arrangement and analysis of information is sometimes even based on no evidence at all, but mere speculation and repetition of what anyone could recognise as propaganda if they actually look at their sources of information or the repetition of specific images over the course of time.

A body of evidence, on the other hand is not sorted, is not usually accompanied by “analysis” of experts and it has a scientific criteria that we can apply, it has a rationale that we can use to judge and verify its strength. First of all, we have to have access to information that is as close as possible to those affected by events. We unfortunately know that witnesses to events, particularly in the worst and most inhuman situations, are too busy trying to survive or escape than they are in trying to inform the outside world about what is happening to them. Outsiders who make it in often themselves become victims of the same situation, so the number of outsiders must be dramatically reduced in order to prevent complications. But, in situations such as war in Syria, the body of evidence is overwhelming in its immensity. There are literally millions of photographs and videos available to anyone at any time. There are millions of witnesses who are able to tell what is happening instead of just posing for a photograph in their miserable setting of an overcrowded and disease-infested refugee camp. There is actually SO MUCH information that we are numbed by the overwhelming quantity of it… but mostly, it is surprising to find that despite the fact that the consistency and veracity of it (given strength by its size, range, content, precision, directness) is overwhelmingly constant: and almost always pointing in the same direction and the news media still seems to ignore it in favour of its own bias which is that of ignoring the voice and evidence of the oppressed in favour of a different narrative with its own appeal and history.

One of the hundreds of banners by the Kafranbel Media Centre... direct, to the point, and with no need for interpretation.

One of the hundreds of banners by the Kafranbel Media Centre… direct, to the point, and with no need for interpretation.

Since the onset of the uprising, protesters were determined to document the events in every way possible and to disseminate what they gathered outside of Syria. They did not own media providers, they were not part of an information “system”, they simply were providing evidence, most of it videos documenting the events and photographs of places during a protest or march or immediately following a sniper attack, a bombing, and later, a massacre. What has developed in Syria is a multitude of independent media aggregators, the Sham News Network, the Aleppo Media Centre, the phenomenon of the Young Lens photographers, the Kafranbel Media Centre and hundreds of others in every province and town, no matter how small. They collect, subtitle, disseminate and identify the evidence of the hundreds of thousands of witnesses to the war in Syria. They open YouTube channels, Facebook pages and blogs where anyone and everyone, INCLUDING mainstream and alternative media providers can tap into their evidence, and luckily, some outside news aggregators have picked up on their evidence and helped spread it far and wide. The problem is, the media providers that have a long history and prestige or are financed by advertising or political interest groups don’t tell a “sexy” story if it’s just about the (now four-year-long) struggle for survival of a besieged and oppressed people who have the misfortune of neither being of interest to the “imperialists” or the “anti-imperialists”, which are by the way, simply code words to express two variations of reactionary ideological thinking, where individuals don’t have rights, collective rights are also selective and all people can be fit into the prism of the narrative or spin of their administrations, regimes or leaders.

There is no shortage of evidence, the evidence provided meets all the criteria to be accepted as valid, even if it contradicts the story of the mass media, which often just serves as an amplifier of those who have the most power, preserving their interests. There is a clear causal chain that is evident to anyone who decides to access the body of evidence. The causal chain’s importance is heightened by the sheer magnitude of the evidence available. Literally, there are thousands of photographs and videos available that document the enormous quantity of atrocities committed against the people. It is not difficult to corroborate the evidence of the perpetrators of a massacre, and while the “pundits” will take the word of one “anonymous insider” whose words seem to mimic the regime narrative regarding who is responsible for the nerve gas attacks against the populations of the “free” towns that were resisting Assad and often victim to the regime’s violent attacks with more “orthodox” means, they refuse to study the evidence of experts who state that the only possible perpetrator is the regime and produce convincing argument that stands up to scrutiny, likewise corroborated by third party investigators who see more than the films, but have access to the sites or can scientifically test the tissue of survivors.

Infant victims suffocated in their sleep by Sarin in Al Ghouta (at the Arbeen field hospital). The fate of these innocent vicitms was "too horrifying" to be shown, but that all changed when they were recycled as victims of Israel and not of Assad and our indifference.

Infant victims suffocated in their sleep by Sarin in Al Ghouta (at the Arbeen field hospital). The fate of these innocent vicitms was “too horrifying” to be shown, but that all changed when they were recycled as victims of Israel and not of Assad and our indifference.

Yet, how could anyone in their right mind continue to even question or doubt such an obvious massacre as that of Ghouta? How could the proof of the culpability of the regime be in doubt for even one minute when their sponsors and patrons in the UN Security Council vetoed decisions made in Human Rights Commission following a detailed war crimes report to support the effort to bring the matter to the International Criminal Court which would judge the body of evidence in a legal seat and then exercise Justice, which then the world powers would have a leg to stand on when they took positions for or against Assad? By closing their eyes to the evidence, despite how great, consistent, direct, precise and applicable (i.e., bearing all the qualities that give what is known as “strength” to a body of evidence) they are able to hide the truth, but not to stop it being true.

Not only the massacre of approximately 1500 men, women and children by suffocation from exposure to nerve gas, but hidden or distorted are the numerous and well-documented “white weapons massacres” by knives and bayonets that are the signature of the Shabbiha thugs who operate for Assad, terrorising villages and leaving hundreds murdered despite their age, condition or innocence. The massacres of Houla, Banyas, Deir Ezzor and countless others have left in their wake hundreds and hundreds of photographs, videos and eyewitness testimony. If one looks at most of the news media though, you are going to find very little reference made to these events and they are simply not providing information on them, often with the ill-disguised goal of exclusion of the videos or pictures due to “the excessive cruelty of the images”, where they fall into the vacuum of oblivion, where our consciences can’t be reached and therefore our outrage can’t be aroused.

Instead they promote “massacres that weren’t” or at least that have no consistent body of evidence such as the “Adra Massacre” or the “Kessab massacre”. The “Hatla Massacre”, depicted as a sectarian attack against Shi’a Muslims by the agencies of the regime, bears a great deal of evidence that it was an armed conflict between anti-regime and pro-regime fighters with civilians caught in the crossfire and not a premeditated massacre to terrorise the population, though as a result, for a time the civilian population fled, as is the case in the entirety of Syria given the amount of urban warfare involved.

What are the images that people remember from the news? They see a “rebel” (not even a member of the Free Syrian Army) eating a heart, they see a “Christian” crucified by Islamists, and to them, the vision of these two images, out of context and factually incorrect (at least in the case of the crucifixion, the victims were Free Syrian Army soldiers, who by their identification are Sunni Muslims) become “the icons” and the real atrocities that matter. The tens of thousands of photographs of the torture of starved prisoners in regime jails was just a blip on the radar. The atrocities committed against Syrians who are tortured to death for crimes they did not commit are too vast to even contemplate. So, see the pictures, then forget them, that is how it works. It is much easier to bear one image and give it any meaning you want or you have been told. It’s not worth it to differentiate between types of atrocities and their intensity of occurrence.

a composite photo of some of the thousands of Syrian infants slaughtered in every way possible, one of them even wrapped in a Syrian Independence Flag... they finally got some interest when they ceased to be victims of Assad.

a composite photo of some of the thousands of Syrian infants slaughtered in every way possible, one of them even wrapped in a Syrian Independence Flag… they finally got some interest when they ceased to be victims of Assad.

But the opposition to Assad, the suffering population has its own iconic images. Millions of them, some of them so familiar to those who have been seeking truth and evidence from Syria for these four years that it comes as a painful shock to see them “recycled” as being Palestinian victims of Israel’s brutal attacks in Gaza. To see the photos cropped to cut out watermarks, Syrian flags or anything that identifies the identity of the victim and the circumstances of his or her death has been a genuine shock and additional accumulation of suffering when one considers that these photos and videos have been shared for years, in the vain effort to inform the world of the situation and the extent of this crime against humanity that is the genocide of the Syrian people, first by Assad’s regime and its infiltrate forces and since the past two years also by the rogue “Islamist” forces that are conducting their proxy wars for the domination of either Iran or Saudi Arabia in the name of their stated objective of the creation of a Caliphate in the Levant.

ISIS, as well as Hezbollah, makes the claim that their enemy is the West, but they are only good at slaughtering and oppressing other Arabs, including Muslims or those who have come to witness and share the information of the besieged and oppressed people, including journalists and human rights workers and volunteers. To the distracted observer, the war is a sectarian war that is now in the face-off stages of secularism vs obscurantism and there is no interest in investigating the facts, but to act “better late than never” against the enemy that is perceived as dangerous to the West, forgetting in essence the actions and objectives of the tyrant whose policies were at the genesis of the entire uprising and who has only consolidated his power in farcical elections that would never be accepted by anyone if they were to happen in their own countries under such condition and lack of democracy or legitimacy. His “election” has given him the perceived license to kill as much and as brutally as possible, and it is a license that he has taken full advantage of.

A roof in Aleppo, again, not surprisinging attracting interest only when it is mislabelled as being the destroyed home of a Gazan.

A roof in Aleppo, again, not surprisinging attracting interest only when it is mislabelled as being the destroyed home of a Gazan.

It is indeed frustrating to realise that the body of evidence proving the total destruction of Syria, its people and its infrastructure, including those who are living in the Palestinian refugee camps who have been subjected to siege, torture, arrest and death no less than their brothers and sisters in Gaza and in the rest of Syria, has been ignored for years, only to be carted out and presented as a different war, a different enemy, a different sponsor. Sometimes the Syrian independence flags that are used by every faction against Assad with the exception of the “black flag Jihadis” are not even cropped out or the subtitles changed. It is with a sickening Orientalism that these victims are passed off as someone more worthy of support, and at least for them, some support has been forthcoming. It is as if Arabs are interchangeable and a defiant Aleppo survivor who painted his ultimate resistance on the ruins of his bombed out roof has become a Gazan. The situation is not identical, though similar, but only one defiant resistant soul is honoured at the expense of another, whose suffering again is buried under rubble and debris. Nothing to see here, move along!

Another iconic image of Syrian grief and suffering, mislabelled and blamed on anyone but Assad!

Another iconic image of Syrian grief and suffering, mislabelled and blamed on anyone but Assad!

There are shameless people who spread pictures and videos that depict persons in a state of shock after their loved ones are carried off dead in blankets among the buildings that were made to explode and collapse on top of them after air raids in civilian areas. The viewer should use a bit of healthy scepticism to realise that in July winter coats are not worn in Gaza and this event is someplace else, the victims are someone else. The perpetrator of such heinous crimes is not Netanyahu but instead it is Assad.

All of this evidence, the weight of which presents a picture that again and again shows the reality of the situation, the true story of what is happening, stripped from agendas and narratives, all of it is there for us to view. It is a deliberate choice we can make to ignore it and take the easy way out of accepting the stories told by the media that are deliberately hiding or altering this information in such a way so that the struggle to know the truth is stifled, and it is out of our hands to effect change in a positive way to those who are suffering (those whose side we have to be on, no matter what other considerations might influence us such as proximity or religious/ethnic affiliation).

If those who survived a massacre decided to document it, and took all the risks linked to that, they did this so that the truth would not be hidden. They did it in the hopes that those who had the power, influence or ability could help and protect them. They did it not because they want to shock us or draw us into a world that has nothing to do with us, but because this is our world already, it is only a short flight away from many of us or even has touched our shores with its outpouring of survivors of unspeakable atrocities. If we refuse to be lazy, we can look for the truth and we can find it. We are no longer bound to being complicit in genocides and then claiming in the same breath, “we didn’t know” and “never again”. It will be never again ONLY if we make it so NOW. Our task is to be an amplifier of the voices of the people, not a substitute or interpreter of them.  We have the enormous possibility of affecting change simply by not keeping information buried or tearing it out of context. If we choose to, we can save lives and make a better world. It’s up to us. Can we be up to the task? Isn’t it a noble goal to seek the truth and serve the truth?

The Syrians know the Media isn't divided into Mainstream or Alternative. Until evidence is all that matters, they will hold the high moral ground.

The Syrians know the Media isn’t divided into Mainstream or Alternative. Until evidence is all that matters, they will hold the high moral ground.

The not so subtle racism of some types of solidarity

Posted: 08/05/2014 by editormary in "Israel", Counter-terrorism, No thanks!, Culture and Heritage, Europe, Grassroots Activism, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Politics, Resistance, Syria, War
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Against war and imperialism. Now and forever Resistance.

WRIT Against war and imperialism. Now and forever Resistance.

WRITTEN BY FOUAD ROUEIHA, translated by Mary Rizzo

I keep on seeing photos and videos that come out of Syria passed off as if proof of the atrocities committed by the Israelis in Palestine… but with everything the Zionists are doing, is there really any need to turn to these falsifications to make the point?

Moreover, I see these images on the pages of people who for over three years have not given a damn about what is happening in Syria, that is, in the instances when some of them were not rooting for the criminal Assad and his disgusting allies.

When faced with the same images (with the sole difference being the caption, which indicates Palestinians as the victims and Israelis as the perpetrators) there is today those who “shout” their protest and indignation on the social networks while seeing them in action for the past 3 years, they never did anything for Syria but repeat that the situation was “too complex for me to take sides on” or that “Assad’s surely no saint, but at least he is secular” (as if Hamas, which today will get their support because they deem it the legitimate resistance, was a secular movement).

The latest example? The video in the link below in which Assad soldiers are torturing a misfortunate soul while continuing to repeat to him in Arabic, with a clear inflection common to Alawite speech, “So you want freedom?” … a phrase that is sadly known among Syrian activists:
https://www.facebook.com/magarimuori/posts/837975529547680

But there is an abundance of examples, in recent days I have seen the famous (for us Syrians) video of the Syrian refugee boy who was beaten by a Lebanese boy upon incitement of his  family, also this was passed off as “”Israeli boy who beats a Palestinian boy in the West Bank”… when I mentioned it to the random “know-it-all” (who from his profile boasts Iraqi origins and is always posting the Qu’ran in transliteration and translation) he answered, “In fact, the dialect seems Lebanese, but I can assure you that in Israel much worse things happen”… So, someone who doesn’t know that in Israel Hebrew is spoken and not Arabic, and then claiming to recognise the Arabic dialects when in actuality the distinction between the dialect of northern Palestine and southern Lebanon is so slight that it would not be able to be detected unless by a highly trained ear.

If the solidarity between ourselves and the Palestinian people wasn’t written in our history, our soul and our culture, these disgusting propagandists that once again humiliate our dead by taking advantage of the documentation of their suffering for their own purposes would have been enough to break our connections.

But luckily, they won’t be able to do that. The pro-Palestinian movement however, which for decades I felt part of, appears to me to be more of a shadow, a tradition. The support for Palestine is an indispensable trendy position of the “leftist” groups, including those who are nostalgic for Stalinism, and instead of being a true desire of solidarity and support FOR the Palestinians, it is a movement AGAINST Israel and the United States (and make no mistake, their policies make me sick as well) in an aprioristic manner and not limited to healthy anti-zionism or anti-capitalism.

Speaking with Palestinians who live in Palestine and not connected to political movements (and therefore, excluded from the élite of Ramallah or Gaza) the reciprocity of solidarity between us Syrians and them is more than evident, in addition to the historical reasons that unite us there is also the deep reciprocal understanding of our suffering. But Palestinians abroad that talk are especially those who are close to the dominant groups, those who don’t accept the criticisms of the Oslo Accords or the Palestinian National Authority, or classic case, those people who support Assad and yet never talk about the Palestinians persecuted by him in Syria or in the siege of Yarmouk.

palestina_liberaIn particular, the “pro-Palestinians” who stand by Assad are in general the same ones who chant “Free Palestine, Red Palestine” in the protests, leaving out the fact that for Palestine to be truly free it has to be the Palestinians alone who decide if it should be red or yellow or purple or anything else… otherwise we will act just like the governments that we have criticised when they isolated the Palestinian government the day after Hamas won them in what were considered fair elections, in those days we said: “We aren’t fond of Hamas, but democracy means also letting those we don’t like govern when they win.”

These characters talk of international interests, regional equilibrium, energy market, areas of influence, national sovereignty… but never once have be heard them talk about popular sovereignty, will of the people, of the reasons that brought the Arab masses to fearlessly stand before bullets.

They assume that the people who have filled the streets and squares in protest don’t have their own will, their own personal reasons or agency, but that instead they follow the designs or interests that manoeuvre every event like demiurges, with the amazing capacity to control to the smallest detail complex dynamics in which the number of variables is incalculable and among them, the illogical way that humans sometimes act, which social sciences only are able to forecast according to probability, getting their forecast wrong most of the time.

There is a subtle (but not even too much) racism in the incredulity of those who don’t think that the Arab populations desire freedom and dignity, desires that evidently can only be born from mature societies like the western ones, countries that have obtained democracy in spite of the fact that 3 days before the hanging of the corpse of Mussolini in Piazzale Loreto they were hailing the dictator or who had democratically elected Hitler. Those who say that Arab societies are primordial and tribal, used to a perpetual state of conflict and fatalist to the point of not giving value to the lives of individuals. Societies permeated by superstition and an invasive religion, populations that need a strong leader to prevent them from self-destructing, winding themselves into a spiral of barbarity that is comprised of throat-cutters, decapitation, stoning, flagellation and infibulation.

That the dictatorships (illuminated? Benevolent?) are the best instrument for preparing a society for a democratic evolution is just one of their pet concepts…

There is not much difference in this from the racism of those who insist that the populations of the Middle East are angelic: the Arabs are fearless revolutionaries, incorruptible, willing to become martyrs at all costs to defend their cause and their land. The Arab culture is that of hospitality, tolerance and friendship, not yet exposed to the defects of capitalism and materialism.

Ladies and gentlemen, it might seem strange to you, but the Arabs are simply persons, who suffer for their dead and cry for their children when they know they are going to be tortured. Among the Arabs are people who take advantage of the gaps in power caused by the revolution so that they can create their own little empires or for their own personal gain. There are noble heroes and scum of the Earth, fine thinkers and hopeless bigots. Just like some criminals managed to sneak themselves in with the resistance fighters against Fascism, there are some who let themselves go to personal vendettas, looting and taking advantage of the situation, in the exact same way that there is “among us”. Just like there are those who sacrificed their own lives, those who divide their pitiful crumbs of bread with their brothers in arms, but also with their enemies, there are shining examples among the revolutionaries but there are also among the supporters of the Ba’ath regime decent persons who take no part in the crimes of Assad, while all the same preferring his regime to uncertain alternatives that risk to become the caliphate of Baghdadi… a black and white world does not exist, let’s leave the die-hard fan where he belongs, in the stadium.

Do we want to do activism? Let’s do it for human rights, for self-determination of peoples, let’s do it listening to the people and not who claims to represent them. Let’s do it asking ourselves questions without thinking that we have simple, final or complete answers, leaving everyone the benefit of the doubt. Let’s do it with humility and without paternalism or idolatry of those we support.

The Deserving and Undeserving Dead

Posted: 08/05/2014 by editormary in Children\'s Corner, Counter-terrorism, No thanks!, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Human Rights, Middle East, Palestine, Politics, Refugees, Resistance, Syria, War
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Aftermath of attacks in Douma, near Damascus. The Assad regime drops barrel bombs repeatedly, sometimes just to target those who recover the dead and wounded.

Aftermath of attacks in Douma, near Damascus. The Assad regime drops barrel bombs repeatedly, sometimes just to target those who recover the dead and wounded.

WRITTEN BY RUTH REIGLER
In the 19th century, wealthy Western philanthropists wishing to bestow their patronage on the less fortunate would first distinguish between the ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ poor to decide, in effect, who among the poorest, most wretched and powerless ‘deserved’ to eat or starve, live or die.

While this concept has largely, thankfully, died out at least towards Western peoples, it has since been adopted by Western ideologues and others worldwide to distinguish between which non-Western peoples being subjugated and slaughtered by oppressive states deserve patronage and a show of compassion and which should be dismissed as unworthy of empathy – the deserving and undeserving dead.

The ideologues of both the Western left and right base their faux compassion on which governments nominally or actually support or oppose those states and rulers perpetrating oppression and genocide and in what name the oppression and genocide are perpetrated. Broadly speaking, liberals and leftists will claim to oppose injustice, oppression and genocide as and when they’re backed by Western powers and support them when they’re perpetrated and backed by non-Western states, with the right inverting this – Western-backed oppression and genocide good, non-Western-backed genocide bad.

It’s noteworthy that the stance of the neo-nazi far right is indistinguishably aligned with the Stalinist left, sharing the same taste for totalitarianism.

In both cases, the subjugated and slaughtered peoples are one-dimensional ciphers, existing only to support the ideologues’ and activists’ own political views; thus, when Pol Pot’s anti-imperialist rhetoric to justify mass oppression and slaughter was swallowed and regurgitated by the left, there was not a word of complaint from the Western left about the killing fields; only after the covert US support for Pol Pot was exposed was there a sudden outpouring of outrage for the victims.

When Iraqis were killed by US warplanes in the name of a US invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein, the right smeared the victims as terrorists while the left professed outrage at the slaughter. Iraqis are still being slaughtered in massive numbers by US helicopter gunships, but now that these aircraft are bought and used by the Tehran-allied Maliki government, the left has lost interest – the subjugation and genocide are, as usual, approved or disapproved dependent on the perpetrator’s and backers’ identity, and the left’s long love affair with Tehran means that there can be no liberal or leftist condemnation of that regime’s participation in and sponsorship of repression and mass slaughter, either domestic or regional.

Likewise on Palestine, the fact that Israel’s subjugation and oppression are primarily backed and sponsored by Western powers means that expressing support for Palestinian freedom and horror at Israel’s brutal subjugation and slaughter are rightly de rigeur for any liberal or leftist, while the political right automatically aligns itself with Israel. In both cases, this is only nominally out of any concern or interest in the subjugated people being slaughtered by warplanes, who simply serve as useful props for either condemning or supporting Western governments’ policy, being labelled victims of genocide or terrorists by the left or right respectively. If, by some miracle, Russia and China were to switch overnight to being Israel’s primary supporters while the US proclaimed itself the backer of Palestinian freedom, there is no doubt that the vast majority of liberals and leftists would become ardent Zionists overnight, while the right would take to the streets for Palestinian freedom, despite the actual subjugation and slaughter themselves being unchanged.

This is most clearly shown at present in Syria, where the world’s liberals and leftists have adopted the same Islamophobic rhetoric they properly abhor when deployed by Tel Aviv or Washington to justify a totalitarian regime’s genocide which has now been underway for over three years. Assad and Tehran, just as adept as any hasbara at prompting the hatred of Muslims never far beneath the surface with most Westerners fed War on Terror drivel for over 13 years, add a patina of anti-imperialist oratory to keep the useful idiots happy in justifying a genocidal Nakba unprecedented in the past 65 years. Meanwhile Tel Aviv’s supporters on the right, who themselves have no real objection to Assad’s genocide continuing, enthusiastically point to the left’s support of Assad in order to justify their own backing for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

This monstrous alternate indifference to or exploitation of people’s subjugation and slaughter as a political tool is, of course, not limited to the Middle East; it can also be seen in North Korea, DRC, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Chechnya, Kashmir, Burma, where oppression and slaughter are also viewed as ideological tools in an endless point-scoring ideological dispute. With Washington having outsourced its endless ‘War on Terror’ as a global franchise and the world’s left long ago abandoning the great ideals of universal brotherhood, of Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité as rights for all humankind in favour of selective, expedience-based faux-compassion, the bodies of the subjugated and slaughtered peoples are reduced to a one-dimensional backdrop for political posturing. Reduced to mere ciphers useful for political debate, the dead, both ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving,’ are, in the end, ‘collateral damage’ all round.

The garbage in Yarmouk taken away by Jafra’s embrace

Posted: 05/23/2014 by editormary in Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Ideas and Projects, Music, Poetry, Events, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Resistance, Syria, War
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A Jafra volonteer looks at piles of debris during a cleaning campaign

A Jafra volonteer looks at piles of debris during a cleaning campaign

WRITTEN BY Claudia Avolio

In Yarmouk people are busy cleaning the streets of trash and rubble, Starting from the constant work of the Jafra Foundation in the camp, a dialogue evolves between the protagonists: the trash and a camp scraper.

In Arabic, one of the words describing garbage is zubala and it comes from a verb – zabbala – that means to manure, to fertilise. Cleaning the streets of Yarmouk of garbage and rubble activated in my mind an image of what this Arabic root brings with it: zibl, the manure itself. As if those streets received from the gesture of being unburdened a new substance. Something will allow them to grow better in this return to how they were before, even under this siege. And this happens, for me, in the embrace that the scrapers (which made me think of The Crying of the Excavator by Pier Paolo Pasolini, written in 1956) make in their efforts to attend to garbage and rubble to take them away.

That poem by the Italian poet Pier Paolo Pasolini entitled “The crying of the excavator” (1956) in the incipit of which these verses seem to give no way out: “Only to love, only to know / counts – not having loved, / not having known. It’s anguishing / to live a consummated  / love. The soul stops growing”. This image for me comes now in contact with an opposing, regenerative force, which lies in the way Jafra Foundation constantly renews its efforts in the streets of Yarmouk so that “the soul that stops growing” as mentioned in the poem starts to grow again once it is free from the garbage.

To the youth of Jafra and to the new metaphorical fertiliser its efforts are giving to the streets of Yarmouk goes this short dialogue that hopes to be just a soft countermelody to their amazing work and love for the camp.

volunteers removing rubble and garbage from the devastated camp

volunteers removing rubble and garbage from the devastated camp

“Jafra Foundation has been working in the cleaning of Yarmouk Camp since the municipality stopped functioning at the beginning of 2013. Since that time, the Jafra cleaning team works to clean Yarmouk Camp from the garbage and the rubble that was accumulating in the camp to protect the civilians from all kinds of sickness that they were vulnerable to because of the accumulating garbage in the streets.

Jafra will continue working in Yarmouk Camp to help the people there, as we belong to all the vulnerable people in all the streets.

WHENEVER DEATH SURROUNDS US

WE CHOOSE TO CELEBRATE LIFE

Jafra shall continue to the end.”

(from the video of Jafra Foundation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8Vpy2M3jBo )

“You can dig up anything, time: hopes

passions. But not these pure

forms of life…”

(from “The cry of the excavator” (1956) – by the Italian poet Pier Paolo Pasolini)

the scraper: We must leave now.

the garbage: I am ready.

the scraper: You will not forget.

the garbage: Never. Their gestures have made a cast of this concrete

the scraper: Even after the concrete collapsed.

the garbage: It knows all the names of those who hit it.

the scraper: And the faces of who will take care of its children. Of the walls that will be built.

the garbage: I met the streets. I heard it all. All of it.

the scraper: I must take you away. For their sake.

the garbage: Because you are the soul transforming weight into space. Your arm that raises me is the last accusation. I am your raised hand, asking for permission to speak. For those who lost this right.

the scraper: Taking you away from here is my freedom finding again its way home.

the garbage: From the corners of these sidewalks I desired to be a tree and I couldn’t. With heavy branches made of black bags I stretched to the sky, with the wind. Looking for a passage, saying: “I am here”.

the scraper: Now that you leave, life will try to come closer to the soil.

the garbage: That same life is asking to be heard. And hasn’t got any fear.

the scraper: Only those who chase life must be scared of it.

the garbage: Because life is still here. You give birth to it pushing me faraway.

the scraper: While you are leaving, a trace remains that feeds the seeds. Paths grow up after your departure.

the garbage: Wings of light dust. The fine dust becomes light again and doesn’t make people sick anymore.

the scraper: With the breath of the streets came back to the surface after a long time holding its breath.

the garbage: I was calling you and saw you appear with your youth.

the scraper: Through their efforts, through the contagion of ideas, I realized I wouldn’t stay still. That every street was waiting for me and my youth to be there.

the garbage: They breed these streets with you. In the struggle of the arms that defeat carelessness.

the scraper: The sun will come and sit here, in the place you used to occupy.

the garbage: While you’re taking me away, the space starts to offer an opportunity.

the scraper: In this embrace of ours the street regenerates.

the garbage: The street walked by your youth, the street they will not abandon.

the scraper: Whatever happens, they’ll take care of it.

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“LES TRÈS GRANDES SOUFFRANCES DU CAMP DE YARMOUK”, un entretien avec Wesam Sabaaneh.

Posted: 05/08/2014 by editormary in "Israel", Children\'s Corner, Counter-terrorism, No thanks!, Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Human Rights, Interviews, Middle East Issues, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Strategy for Liberation, Syria, Uprooted Palestinians\' Testimonies, War, Zionism
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20.000 - 30.000 civils sont toujours pris au piège à l'intérieur du camp. #SaveYarmoukCamp Les souffrances continuent sans répit dans le camp de réfugiés de Yarmouk.

20.000 – 30.000 civils sont toujours pris au piège à l’intérieur du camp.
#SaveYarmoukCamp
Les souffrances continuent sans répit dans le camp de réfugiés de Yarmouk.

Wesam est un jeune palestinien qui milite au sein de “JAFRA”, une organisation communautaire qui aide la population de Yarmouk, en Syrie. Il a très gentillement accepté de répondre à nos questions, pour le public italien, mais pas seulement celui destiné à la Péninsule, puisqu’aussi bien Wesam aurait pu s’exprimer en anglais si son interviewer n’avait pas été arabophone. Cet entretien est la traduction anglaise de la version italienne tirée de l’arabe d’origine. (Interview & traduction italienne de Fouad Rouieha, traduction anglaise de Mary Rizzo, traduction française de Eric Lamy). 

Commençons par décrire Yarmouk.

Le camp de réfugiés de Yarmouk est situé au sud de Damas. Il s’étend sur plus de sept kilomètres carrés, juste à côté des districts du centre, tel celui de Midan Zahir. Pour faire court, le camp fait partie du tissu urbain de Damas. Avant le début de la révolte, il comptait 700.000 âmes, dont 220.000 palestiniens d’origine, le reste étant des syriens. Le camp de Yarmouk fut établi en 1957 : la majorité des palestiniens qui y vivent sont des fils de réfugiés de 48, principalement originaires du nord de la Palestine auxquels s’ajoutèrent ceux qui vinrent de Jordanie en 67 et 70. Avant la révolution en Syrie, Yarmouk était une zone économique florissante, considérée comme la capitale de la diaspora palestinienne. Il s’y tenait un marché considérable, le commerce y prospérait. Une véritable ferveur pour les questions sociales et politiques y prévalait, sans oublier ce dynamisme culturel qui faisait de Yarmouk le centre culturel de Damas, le lieu où il se passait quelque chose, où des festivals étaient organisés. Un grand nombre d’artistes célèbres sont originaires de Yarmouk. Pareil à d’autres quartiers, mais plus particulièrement animé, les rues étaient peuplées de boutiques et de restaurants que fréquentaient tous les damascènes. Le weekend, ou pendant les congés, les rues étaient si populeuses qu’on avait du mal à y circuler ; c’était un quartier très peuplé mais également réputé pour la sécurité qu’il offrait.

Vous parlez de l’existence d’un activisme politique, mais être militant, en Syrie, était complètement tabou à cause de la surveillance policière et de la répression toujours possible. Était-ce différent pour les palestiniens ?

J’ai mentionné l’activisme politique en rapport avec la Cause Palestinienne, qui n’avait pas de lien avec la situation syrienne. Yarmouk était une des bases pour les factions palestiniennes : le Front Populaire, le Hamas, le Front Populaire-Commandement Général, le Jihad Islamique, le Fatah… l’activité politique autorisée impliquait le camp de Yarmouk et la Palestine, mais rien qui pût se rapporter directement à la Syrie. Les syriens vivant à l’extérieur du camp assistaient à nos discussions, mais tant qu’il n’était question que de Palestine, tant que la politique syrienne n’était pas évoquée, il n’y avait aucun problème.

Une rue de Yarmouk.

Une rue de Yarmouk.

Parlez-nous de la cohabitation entre syriens et palestiniens-syriens. Peut-on parler d’intégration réussie ou, au contraire, a-t-on assisté à la création d’une sorte de ghetto ?

Entre nous, personne ne faisait de différence. À Yarmouk, nous avons vécu ensemble pendant 50 à 60 ans. Les mariages mixtes sont monnaie courante et nous sommes tous mélangés. Il faut dire que parfois une même famille est partagée entre les deux nations (la Palestine du Nord et la Syrie méridionale n’étant pas séparées à l’époque qui a précédé l’exil palestinien ; des familles et des clans étaient établis de chaque côté de la frontière. Il n’y a pas de différence entre syriens, palestiniens, libanais et jordaniens car des relations d’amitié et de parenté ont toujours existé.

On dit qu’au début de la révolution les palestiniens-syriens du camp ont tenté de se démarquer du conflit.

Non, nous n’avons pas tenté de nous en affranchir : il y a eu un débat considérable pour déterminer si le camp devait s’investir dans la confrontation. Une partie d’entre nous pensait que les militants de Yarmouk qui voulaient se joindre à la révolution devaient s’engager en dehors du camp, sans l’impliquer. Nous savions que si Yarmouk était visé par des représailles, elles seraient extrêmement violentes : c’est malheureusement ce qui est arrivé. Ensuite, l’idée à circulé selon laquelle Yarmouk pourrait être un lieu de repli sûr pour les syriens déplacés, pour les blessés, afin de leur permettre d’accéder aux soins médicaux et au ravitaillement. Au cours des deux premières années, Yarmouk à rempli ce rôle. Quand les affrontements ont éclaté dans les zones de Al Hajar Aswad ou de Tadamon, Yarmouk était un centre de distribution de produits médicaux et d’entraide. Nous accueillions les réfugiés. Avant eux, nous avions déjà recueilli les réfugiés de Homs : il y avait là tant de familles ! Pour eux, nous avons ouverts des refuges, profitant des écoles de l’UNRWA (agence de Nations Unies pour les Réfugiés Palestiniens, n.d.l.t.) et de celles de l’état. C’était des refuges protégés pour ces gens où ils furent accueillis, nourris et logés. Lorsque le Commandement Général à incité certains d’entre nous à prendre les armes contre l’Armée Syrienne Libre, Yarmouk a été directement impliqué dans les combats : l’ASL est entrée dans le camp et il devint, comme les autres districts de Damas, la cible du régime syrien.

On nous a rapporté des abus commis par l’ASL…

Ceux qui sont entrés dans Yarmouk n’étaient pas tous de même obédience : il y avait là des tas de gens différents et, parmi eux, des criminels de droit commun déguisés en révolutionnaires, comme cette “Brigade des Fils du Golan” qui était, en fait, un gang de kidnappeurs et de voyous. Ils ont incendié des maisons et en ont pillé d’autres. Cela a duré 6 mois, puis l’ASL, constituée de palestiniens et de syriens, les à délogés du camp.

 Concernant la révolution syrienne, qu’elle est la position des factions palestiniennes à l’intérieur du camp ?

Elle est contradictoire : d’un côté, les partisans du FPLP-GC, du Fatah Al Intifada qui combattaient aux côtés des loyalistes. Les proches du Hamas ainsi que des groupes indépendants se battaient contre le régime. La division qui existe dans la population syrienne est la même qui affecte la société syro-palestinienne.

une victime de la famine.

Une victime de la famine.

Pouvez-vous chiffrer la population vivant à l’intérieur du camp ?

Nos données diffèrent de celles de l’UNRWA : nous sommes sur une base de 25 à 30.000 personnes, dont 5000 syriens, le reste des résidents étant palestiniens. Ceux qui sont restés n’ont nulle part où aller et il n’y a plus de place dans les refuges. Pauvres d’entre les pauvres, ces palestiniens et ces syriens n’ont pas d’argent pour louer une maison et ils n’ont pu trouver de place dans les dispensaires du camp. Certains d’entre eux ont pu, un temps, s’installer dans les différents jardins publics de Damas, mais ils en sont revenus. Il y a aussi ceux qui n’ont pu fuir de peur que leur fils soit enrôlé de force dans l’armée. Il y a là des gens qui n’ont pas de papiers, pas de carte d’identité et ne peuvent donc pas sortir du camp. Soyons un peu logiques : il y a 30.000 civils à Yarmouk. S’ils avaient vraiment été des combattants, Damas serait tombée en 2 jours ! Parmi les hommes en armes à l’intérieur du camp, on compte environ 1000 palestiniens et 500 syriens : voilà tous les combattants du camp. Ces palestiniens sont natifs de Yarmouk. Ils ont formé des comités de dėfense, pas seulement contre le régime mais pour des raisons de sécurité interne : les institutions ont volė en éclat, l’anarchie est partout. Il fallait protéger les résidents des voleurs, des kidnappeurs. Ces comités de défense remplissent, en fait, une fonction de police. Il leur arrive même de régler des problèmes familiaux.

Aujourd’hui, comment décririez-vous la situation humanitaire ?

Yarmouk vit sous siège partiel depuis décembre 2012. Cela signifie que les civils peuvent entrer et sortir avec ce qu’ils peuvent transporter. Bien sûr, les camions chargés de nourriture sont interdits. Depuis le début du siège, nous n’avons réussi qu’à faire entrer 4 camions, ce qui a entraîné l’arrestation de quelques volontaires et la mort de Khaled Bakrawi. En juin 2013, le siège à été complètement fermé : plus personne ne put entrer ou sortir, plus de nourriture, plus de produits médicaux, plus aucun bien de consommation ne furent autorisés à pénétrer à l’intérieur du camp. Au bout de 4 mois sont apparus des cas extrêmes de malnutrition et les gens ont commencé à mourir. À ce jour, nous avons répertorié 154 cas de décès dûs à la faim, sans parler des cas où la faim n’est qu’un facteur du de la mort. La nourriture continue de manquer ; il y a bien eu des tentatives diplomatiques ces deux derniers mois qui n’ont abouti qu’à la livraison de 12000 paniers-repas qui ne permettent chacun que d’assurer la subsistance d’une famille de 4 personnes pendant 10 jours. Quiconque en a reçu un n’a plus rien aujourd’hui. Plus tard, 5000 paniers contenant de la confiture, des dattes et un peu de pain furent distribués. Cette dernière livraison fut assurée par l’UNRWA, tandis que nous avons réussi à en distribuer entre 4 à 5000.

Des volontaires de JAFRA distribuent des sacs de nourriture.

Des volontaires de JAFRA distribuent des sacs de nourriture.

La situation médicale et sanitaire : il n’y avait qu’un seul hôpital en activité à Yarmouk, l’Hôpital de Palestine, qui a été fermé par suite du manque de carburant (“mazot”, une sorte de fioul utilisé pour les groupes électrogènes et les stérilisateurs, ndlt). Comme l’électricité a été coupée dans le camp il y a treize mois, l’hôpital ne peut plus compter que sur les générateurs. Il n’y a plus de produits médicaux dans le camp et le seul médecin présent à Yarmouk a été tué il y a 6 mois, comme il sortait de l’hôpital, au cours d’un bombardement. Le personnel médical ne se compose plus que d’infirmières ; leur travail est guidé par l’expérience, mais ils ne sont ni médecins, ni spécialistes. Le mois dernier, nous avons pu exfiltrer 400 cas graves hors du camp. Au cours de l’évacuation, certains ont pourtant été arrêtés par les forces de sécurité du régime. À ce jour, nous avons des cas de malades qui réclament leur évacuation, mais il est absolument impossible aux civils de quitter le camp.

Parlez-nous de la vie quotidienne d’un résident de Yarmouk. J’imagine qu’il est peu probable qu’il puisse y travailler ?

Il n’y a plus de travail à l’intérieur du camp. Les routes sont fermées : pas de déplacement, pas de commerce possible. Le problème majeur est le prix élevé de la nourriture, car la contrebande de denrées est apparue. Il y a un mois et demi, un kilo de riz coûtait environ 12.000 livres syriennes (LS), l’équivalent d’à peu près 70$. Le tarif a baissé légèrement le mois dernier, mais il faut se dire qu’il coûtait 1$ voici trois ans, qu’il coûte 1$ dans les zones qui entourent le camp, soit soixante-dix fois moins ! Un litre de fioul pour groupe électrogène revient à environ 600/700 LS et coûte seulement 100 LS dans Damas. De toutes façons, il n’en reste presque plus à l’intérieur du camp. Certaines ONG – dont notre Fondation JAFRA – ont mis en place des projets agricoles d’auto-suffisance à l’intérieur du camp. Cela n’a pas trop bien marché l’hiver dernier à causes du temps, mais cela va beaucoup mieux. Il y a ceux qui ramassent de l’herbe dans les prés, et nous avons recensé 5 morts dûs aux snipers du régime qui surveillent ces prés. Les autres se contentent d’exister à l’intérieur de Yarmouk, fouillent les maisons abandonnées à la recherche de nourriture, une poignée de riz ou de farine, quelques épices, n’importe quoi qui puisse se manger. Voilà comment vivent ces gens…

Au cours des mois écoulés, lors de tentatives d’introduire des convois d’aide humanitaire, des attaques ont eu lieu : le régime en a rejeté la responsabilité sur les rebelles.

Il ne s’agissait pas d’attaques directes, bien qu’il y ait eu des tirs dont nous n’avons pas pu établir l’origine. Les deux parties s’accusent mutuellement. La milice accuse le Commandement Général, et celui-ci dénonce les islamistes armés. En réalité, des tirs de la milice ont empêché la distribution mais, franchement, je ne pense pas que l’intention était délibérée. Ils souffrent du siège comme les autres et sont logés à la même enseigne. Je crois plutôt qu’au cours d’un engagement avec les forces loyalistes les convois ont été pris entre deux feux.

 Pour finir, avez-vous un message à faire passer à la société italienne ?

Il y a à peu près 30.000 personnes dans le camp de Yarmouk, dont 1200 enfants. Beaucoup sont nés pendant le siège. J’y étais il y a trois mois : ces enfants ne savent plus le goût de la nourriture. L’un d’entre eux rêve de déguster une simple pomme de terre, de manger quelque chose de bon, quelque chose de sucré. Des personnes âgées ont besoin de remèdes pour leur tension artérielle, leurs problèmes cardiaques, leur diabète, tous les traitements simples et basiques dont le manque total cause leur décès. Les blessés sont contraints à l’amputation par faute de simple traitement. Pas de médicament, pas de médecin ! Nous avons besoin de vaccins pour nos enfants. Les problèmes sont immenses : ils n’ont plus la moindre idée de ce qu’est une vie normale et n’imaginent même plus comment est-ce en dehors du camp. Quelle faute ont donc commis ces enfants et ces civils pour souffrir autant ? Ce qui se passe à Yarmouk est contraire à tout principe d’humanité, contraire à toute notion de patrie, contraire à toute idée de panarabisme, toutes choses pour lesquelles le régime syrien se targue d’être en première ligne !

English: http://radiofreesyria1.wordpress.com/2014/05/06/extreme-suffering-in-yarmouk-camp-interview-with-wesam-sabaaneh/

A guide for the Palestinian or “pro-Palestinian” shabiha sympathizer in your life.

Posted: 05/05/2014 by editormary in "Israel", Counter-terrorism, No thanks!, Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Human Rights, Jordan, Lebanon, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Politics, Refugees, Religion, Resistance, Strategy for Liberation, Syria, War
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WRITTEN BY NICOLE MAGNOONA GERVITZ

Hafez al-Assad (second from left) is briefed by one of his officers in a reserve trench. Next to Hafez al-Assad is Defense Minister Mustafa Tlas, and next to Tlas is Rifaat al-Assad, 1973.

Hafez al-Assad (second from left) is briefed by one of his officers in a reserve trench.
Next to Hafez al-Assad is Defense Minister Mustafa Tlas, and next to Tlas is Rifaat al-Assad, 1973.

Black September 1970: Hafez al Assad made the decision to send tanks into Jordan to support the Palestinians against Hashemite King Hussein. The PLO won popular support amongst the Arab masses after the regimes were thoroughly discredited in the 1967 humiliation at the hands of Israel. King Hussein ordered his Jordanian military to attack the PLO forces in Jordan because of their declared policy to overthrow him. Assad refused to send any major Syrian military support because he feared another war with Israel would erupt. He refused to provide air cover to the Syrian tanks and they were forced to withdraw following the bombardment by the Jordanians. This left the Palestinians isolated, abandoned, and several thousand of them were massacred by Hussein’s Jordanian military. Only a few weeks after Black September is when Hafez al Assad led his military coup in Damascus.

1973: Syria attempted to regain control of the Golan Heights and it was another failure. Hafez al Assad found himself becoming the security guard for Israel’s northern border. Colonel Rafik Halawi, the Druze commander of the infantry brigade that was destroyed by the Israelis in the Golan, was executed under the orders of Hafez before the war even came to an official close. The Syrian regime claimed he was killed in battle with Israel and anyone who was caught saying anything otherwise was threatened with torture and imprisonment.

Palestinian soldiers in Lebanon, 1976

Palestinian soldiers in Lebanon, 1976

1976: Hafez al Assad supported the Lebanese Christian fascist Phalangists against the Lebanese Communist-PLO alliance that had formed in opposition to both Phalangist and Ba’athist tyranny. The Syrian military’s invasion of Lebanon in 1976 was approved by the US. However, the Lebanese Communist-PLO alliance wiped the floor with the Syrian occupation forces in June of that year. Two months later Hafez al Assad made an example out of such resistance. The Phalangists, backed by Hafez al Assad, committed a massacre of Palestinian people at the Tal al Zaatar refugee camp. With the blessing of the Arab League the Syrian government decided to ally itself with Israel to prevent the defeat of the Phalangists. They besieged the Palestinian camps of both Karantina and Tel al Zaatar with Syrian weaponry and 2,000 Palestinian people were slaughtered. An open letter from the Palestinian resistance within the camps was released that summer;

“Syrian weapons are being used – most unfortunately – against our camp, while the rulers of Damascus continue to repeat that they are here in Lebanon in order to defend our camp. This is a murderous lie, a lie which pains us more than anyone else… But we wish to inform you that we will fight in defense of this camp with our bare hands if all our ammunition is spent and all our weapons are gone, and that we will tighten our belts so that hunger will not kill us. For we have taken a decision not to surrender and we shall not surrender…”

Palestinian refugees fleeing Tel al Zataar refugee camp. Merit goes also to Hafez Al-Assad

Palestinian refugees fleeing Tel al Zataar refugee camp. Merit goes also to Hafez Al-Assad

 

Photographs of a few of the tens of thousands of Syrians massacred in Hama in 1982.

Photographs of a few of the tens of thousands of Syrians massacred in Hama in 1982.

1980’s: As part of its vicious crackdown against leftist dissidents during the 1980’s Hafez al Assad’s regime arrested hundreds of activists from both the Party for Communist Action and the Syrian Communist Party in an attempt to smother the last remaining voices of dissent after it had crushed the Muslim Brotherhood. It was the Syrian Communists who worked with a group of Palestinian dissidents called the Palestinian Popular Committee in the Yarmouk refugee camp in the Damascus governate. The Palestinian Popular Committee was founded in 1983 but was forced to dissolve two years later as a result of Hafez al Assad’s campaign of arrests. 200 members of the Party for Communist Action were arrested by the Syrian security forces in 1986.

The PLO began to splinter in 1983. Colonel Saed Abu Musa was Arafat’s rival and he led a rebellion amongst al Fatah in the Bekaa Valley. Abu Musa had been a professional soldier in the Jordanian army before joining the PLO. The Syrian regime supported him and assisted in supplying him with weapons. Abu Musa and his followers ran Arafat’s men out of Tripoli that summer. When a reporter from Newsweek asked Yasir Arafat for a comment regarding this mutiny he responded with, “Don’t ask me about the puppets and the horses of Troy… Assad wants my pen. He wants the Palestinian decision, and I won’t give it to him.” Most of the Palestinian refugees chose Arafat over a Syrian puppet, but as a result of Hafez’s meddling Arafat’s men were forced out of Tripoli and the Palestinian resistance was disempowered.

In the “War of the Camps” between 1985 and 1988 Hafez al Assad recruited the Shia Lebanese Amal Movement. It was in armed conflict with Hezbollah at the time and it opened fire on the Palestinians and Hezbollah simultaneously.

Lebanon: Tripoli is a Sunni majority city with an Alawite minority that is given financial support by Syrian government. Syrian Alawites are placed in the Lebanese Parliament entirely due to pressure from Damascus. Lebanon’s naturalization laws are also completely subverted. Palestinian refugees who have lived in the impoverished refugee camps since the Nakba of 1948 and its sequel in 1967 cannot attain Lebanese citizenship whatsoever, but Syrian Alawites can at any time.

a scene from within the Tadmur prison, where many political dissidents were tortured to death.

a scene from within the Tadmur prison, where many political dissidents were tortured to death.

2000: While Bashar al Assad was praising the second intifada hundreds of Palestinians were languishing in his jails. Attieyeh Dhiab Attieyeh, a Palestinian in his early 30’s, died in Tadmur prison in early 2000 due to medical neglect. He was already very ill when he was transferred in Tadmur in 1996. Attieyeh was a member of Fatah, the faction led by Yasser Arafat, and had been arrested in 1989 in south Lebanon before being sent to Syria.

2008: There is a similarity between the Hama massacre of 1982 and Cast Lead. In both massacres the minarets of the mosques were destroyed by the invading occupation forces. They claimed that the minarets were being used by Islamist snipers. There’s no evidence of that in either situation, but there is evidence of the distaste for orthodox Islam expressed by both sets of perpetrators.

May 2011: A few Palestinians from the Yarmouk camp managed to break the siege on Deraa and deliver some desperately needed medical supplies.

Sending Palestinians directly into the line of fire.

Sending Palestinians directly into the line of fire.

Nakba Day 2011: Hundreds of Palestinians from the refugee camps in and around Damascus were bused to the demilitarized zone that separates Syria from the Golan Heights. The safety of the Palestinian civilians was not prioritized. The fence was breached and Israeli occupation forces opened fire and a dozen Palestinian people were killed. There was a repeat of this bloodshed in June on Naksa Day; the anniversary of the outbreak of the June War in 1967. Another dozen Palestinians were shot and killed. This was unprecedented because never before had the Syrian government bused hundreds of Palestinian people to the Golan on either anniversary. Why 2011? To deflect attention from the ongoing slaughter in the streets. One of the main intelligence branches in Syria deals only with Palestine-related issues. It’s impossible for the Syrian government to not have known that a breach of the fence in the Golan would’ve cost Palestinian lives.

images (6)Fall 2011: Ghiyath Matar, a young man with Palestinian origins living in the Daraya suburbs of Damascus, pioneered the tactic of handing out roses and water to the Alawite security forces sent to shoot demonstrators. By early September of 2011 he was dead. His mangled corpse was delivered to his family four days after his arrest. Several US envoys attended his funeral. The spokespeople for the Assad regime said an armed gang was responsible for Ghiyath’s torture and death, and that is half true because, after all, there was an armed gang running the government.

As a result of Bashar al Assad’s genocidal campaign of government repression Yarmouk became a home for one million internally displaced Syrian refugees by the end of 2011. When the Free Syrian Army gained ground in the southern suburbs of Damascus the Syrian military began to shell the camp while, at the same time, arming the pro-regime PFLP-GC. Mortars were fired at the camp by Assad’s forces before the FSA ever stepped foot in it.

victims of the mosque massacre in central Yarmouk, from Syrian Air Force bomb raids

victims of the mosque massacre in central Yarmouk, from Syrian Air Force bomb raids

Summer 2012: Alawite para-militaries who lived in Nisreen street, close to Yarmouk, opened fire on a massive anti-government demonstration. They killed ten Palestinians, including a little boy.

Fall 2012: The FSA set up a supply line through Yarmouk, and massive collective punishment at the hands of the regime ensued. Syrian government forces and Alawite militias encircled Yarmouk and by October of 2012 the entrances to the camp were only open two or three days a week. The civilians bore the brunt of the violence; starvation, disease, and random shelling.

December 2012: Syrian regime warplanes bombed a mosque in Yarmouk that was housing internally displaced Syrian refugees. Dozens were killed. The excuse for such an atrocity was that the FSA had hidden some weapons in the basement of the mosque. 

2013: Khaled Bakrawi, a young Palestinian-Syrian community organizer and founding member of the Jafra Foundation for Relief and Youth Development, was arrested by Alawite state security forces in January of 2013 for his leading role in carrying out humanitarian and aid work in Yarmouk. By September the Palestinians of Yarmouk learned that Khaled was killed under torture in a detention center in Damascus.

Khaled Bakrawi and Hassan Hassan, two Palestinians active in community services both tortured to death in Assad regime prisons.

Khaled Bakrawi and Hassan Hassan, two Palestinians active in community services both tortured to death in Assad regime prisons.

Khaled Bakrawi took part in the June march into the Golan. He witnessed the leader of the PFLP, Ahmad Jibril, lead the people into the Israeli-occupied cease-fire zone. Knowing what was going to happen he tried to dissuade his fellow Palestinians from following Ahmad Jibril’s orders, but to no avail. Khaled was forced to watch Alawite state security forces relax and drink tea while Israeli occupation soldiers rained bullets down on his neighbors. Khaled took two bullets in his leg. The young man who was labeled a hero for taking a few Zionist bullets would later fade away into obscurity following his murder at the hands of Bashar al Assad’s security forces.

Palestinians in Yarmouk are also sometimes murdered by other Palestinians. The Russian BM-21 Grad Rocket was used to attack Yarmouk in July of 2013. Two grad missiles were fired onto the Hamdan bakery on July 24th, killing fifteen civilians. It was reported by both Reuters and the Yarmouk Camp Coordination Committee that this attack was carried out by the PFLP. Fifteen Palestinians in Yarmouk died of starvation between September and December of 2013. The number of Palestinian refugees killed since 2011 in Syria has reached 1,597, in addition to 651 others lost or imprisoned, and 74 tortured to death in regime detention centers by the fall of 2013.

The Assad regime’s annihilation of the country is good for Israel: – An Arab despot who crushes his own people always has a special place in the Zionist heart. Israel has always relied on corrupt Arab despots like Bashar al Assad to put down the masses for them,- An anti-Iranian sentiment is being sown in the Arab world as a result of its colonization of Syria. – Hezbollah is too busy murdering Syrians to cause Israel much trouble. – Israel no longer faces any pressure to give up the Golan Heights.

 

You can take your neutrality and hang yourself with it. 

If you are interested in the sources, feel free to message me and I will send you 583736648728255485947476 books, articles, videos, photos, more books, human rights reports, and advocacy organizations.

SEE: http://www.scribd.com/doc/220568814/Understanding-a-Revolutionary-Syria-Rebellions-Uprisings-and-the-Persistence-of-Tyranny

 

 

Tel Al-Zaatar et Yarmouk – sièges des camps de réfugiés, les similitudes

Posted: 03/11/2014 by editormary in Children\'s Corner, Human Rights, Lebanon, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, Refugees, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Syria, Uprooted Palestinians\' Testimonies, War
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Tamim-Al-Barghoutipar Tamim Barghouti, traduit par Eric Lamy

À trois reprises, les médias furent trompés : “la gravitė de la famine était exagérée”, “les témoins oculaires mentaient” et “les victimes de la faim n’avaient faim que de célėbrité”. Dans ces trois cas précis, les forces assiégeantes mangèrent et burent devant les caméras des reporteurs, juste à côté du camp, pour mieux humilier et insulter ceux qui y vivaient.

Le camp de réfugiés de Yarmouk (à Damas) est assiégé depuis des mois, soumis à des bombardements terrestres ou aériens. De nombreux réfugiés sont morts de faim, n’ayant d’autre ressource que de se nourrir de feuilles ou de cactées ; le manque d’eau potable à également entraîné des affections intestinales et des maladies de peau.

Des nouveaux-nés ont péri de même, ainsi que leurs mères, des personnes âgées, des malades et des blessés, à cause du manque de médicaments. Toute personne qui essaie de quitter le camp est abattue, et le camp à été bombardé à de nombreuses reprises.

Même quand le régime syrien a permis l’entrée de l’aide dans le camp (grâce à la pression des médias étrangers), il a aussitôt refermé le siège quand l’attention des médias s’est relâchée.

Les tentatives des soutiens du régime syrien pour nier leur responsabilité vis-à-vis de Yarmouk sont pathétiques : le camp jouxte Damas. L’armée syrienne est seule responsable, légalement et moralement et aussi sur le plan régional, puisqu’elle contrôle entièrement la ville.

Quoique les supporteurs du régime prétendent qu’ils ont le droit pour eux, leurs actions immondes seraient moins ignobles s’ils ne prétendaient pas les accomplir au nom d’une cause prétendue.

Pour ce qui est d’affamer les Palestiniens, le régime syrien en a une longue expérience, peut-être même la plus accomplie que tout autre pays arabe. Trois des quatre pays qui entourent la Palestine ont été impliqués dans la mort de Palestiniens. Septembre, Sabra & Shatila et le blocus de Gaza… Pour autant, un seul pays sur les quatre fit couler le sang Palestinien à trois reprises : Tel Zaatar, la Guerre des Camps de réfugiés, et le camp de Yarmouk aujourd’hui.

À trois reprises, la scène se répète : le régime syrien utilise des milices alliées et leur donne l’ordre d’encercler le camp. Concernant le camp de Tel Al-Zaatar (1976), Damas a utilisé les milices chrétiennes maronites (et notamment les Phalangistes de la plus importante milice chrétienne), sans oublier les “forces Kataeb”, les “gardiens du Cèdre” et le “mouvement Marada”.

Au cours de la Guerre de Camps (1985/1988), le régime syrien à recruté la milice shiite Amal qui était, à l’époque, en conflit armé avec le Hezbollah pour le contrôle de Beyrouth et du Sud-Liban. Le Parti de Dieu ne prit pas part à la Guerre des Camps, mais Amal ouvrit le feu sur les Palestiniens et, simultanément, attaqua le Hezbollah.

Comme aujourd’hui, le régime syrien s’appuie directement sur son armée ainsi que sur des milices Palestiniennes inféodées, comme le Front Populaire pour la Libération de la Palestine – Commandement Général (FPLP – CG) et le groupe Fatah al Intifada.

Dans ces trois différents camps de réfugiés, l’eau et l’électricité furent d’abord coupés : les gens furent privés d’approvisionnement jusqu’à manquer de tout, jusqu’à mourir de faim. Dans ces trois cas, la faim à poussé les gens à manger des feuilles et à réclamer des fatwas pour être autorisés à manger des chats, des chiens et des cadavres d’animaux. Les femmes qui s’aventuraient jusqu’aux puits et autres pompes de forage à l’extérieur du camp étaient abattues par les snipers positionnés autour du camp.

Hussein Ayyad et Maysa Khatib, habitants de Tel Al-Zaatar, ont raconté que les corps des femmes tuées par les snipers tombaient dans les puits ; les gens étaient obligés de puiser l’eau dans laquelle restaient les corps des martyres. Impossible de les en retirer car les snipers continuaient de leur tirer dessus.

Dans ces trois exemples précités, les médias furent mystifiés : l’importance de la famine était exagérée, les témoins oculaires mentaient, et les victimes de la faim n’avaient faim que de célébrité. De la même manière, les forces assiégeantes mangeaient et buvaient devant les caméras, près du camp, afin d’humilier et d’insulter plus encore les habitants du camp.

Une des chaînes de télévision libanaise qui soutient le régime syrien à diffusé un reportage sur le Camp de Yarmouk montrant les soldats loyalistes en train de manger avec un des reporters de la chaîne, niant que les habitants du camp soient affamés et imitant les scènes où du lait maternisé était gâché pendant les sièges de Sabra & Shatila et de Burj El-Barajneh (dans les années 80). Le premier, imposé par le Liban et soutenu par Israël, dura trois mois, de juin à septembre 1982. Le second, mis en place par le Liban et soutenu par la Syrie, à duré 4 ans, de 1985 à 1988.

À chaque occasion, le régime syrien s’est justifié en arguant que les Palestiniens entretenaient des opinions radicales, qu’ils étaient des résistants invétérés. Mais Damas ne s’en prit jamais à Israël, même quand l’état hébreu à bombardé Damas. À chaque fois, l’humiliation des Palestiniens relayée par les médias était un élément essentiel de la guerre livrée contre eux. Non content de démoraliser les gens dans les camps et tous ceux qui les défendaient pendant le siège, il fallait aussi salir l’image de la Palestine, des symboles politiques et culturels Palestiniens. Il fallait aussi semer la confusion dans l’opinion publique syrienne et libanaise, dans leur réaction à de telles actions et, enfin, les convaincre de ne rien tenter pour s’opposer au siège des camps de réfugiés.

Refugee camp in Damascus, SyriaLe 9 janvier 2014, le porte parole de l’UNRWA, Christopher Gunness à déclaré que “la profonde souffrance des civils de Yarmouk s’aggrave. Les rapports confirment que la malnutrition est extrêmement répandue, de même que l’absence de soins médicaux, surtout pour ceux qui ont été blessés à cause du conflit, ainsi que les femmes prêtes à accoucher, avec des conséquences fatales pour certaines d’entre elles.”

Le journal britannique The Guardian relate que le même porte-parole de l’UNRWA déclaré, le 9 février 2014 (un mois après sa première déclaration) que le Dr Ibrahim Mohammed, qui travaille au sein de l’UNRWA, à sauvé un bébé de 14 mois appelé Khaled, souffrant de grave malnutrition. Depuis 2 mois, ce bébé ne vivait presqu’exclusivement d’eau. Noor, sa maman de 29 ans, avoua qu’elle n’avait, pour toute nourriture, que des décoctions d’épices. Quand il n’y en eut plus, ils se mirent à manger de l’herbe, mais celle-ci vint aussi à manquer.

Dans un message attesté du Réseau Euro-Méditerranéen pour les Droits de l’Homme (REMDH), une organisation basée à Genève qui collabore avec l’UNRWA pour apporter de la nourriture au camp, le REMDH rapporte qu’une jeune fille de 15 ans, prénommée Heba et son bébé de 5 mois, à raconté au personnel des Nations Unies qui distribuaient la nourriture qu’ils n’avaient pas mangé depuis trois jours, et qu’elle n’avait pas pu donner le sein à son bébé. Quand les infirmiers donnèrent de l’eau au bébé, il se mit à gonfler, n’ayant rien avalé depuis plusieurs jours. Les infirmiers en furent si inquiets qu’un médecin de la Croix Rouge Internationale dut le prendre en charge.

Ces exemples de famine furent accompagnés, dans le passé, par le massacre de quiconque tentait de quitter le camp. Dans le cas de celui de Tel Al-Zaatar, par exemple, après avoir affamé le camp pendant des mois, les Phalangistes, soutenus par le régime syrien [de Hafez al Assad, père de Bashar] annoncèrent qu’ils allaient autoriser les Palestiniens à quitter le camp afin d’être acheminés dans des refuges de la Croix Rouge. Quand les Palestiniens commencèrent à quitter le camp, les miliciens les massacrèrent, comme le raconte Maysa Al Khatib, une des survivantes de la tuerie, dont le témoignage fut, avec celui de Hussain Ayyad, publié dans l’appendice Palestinien du journal libanais Al-Safir du 12 août 2013 et du 15 septembre 2012.

“Tous les hommes de plus de dix ans qui tentaient de quitter le camp, comme de nombreuses jeunes filles, jeunes femmes et femmes âgées furent massacrées. Un des assassins s’approcha d’une jeune femme qui portait son nouveau-né de deux jours. Il empoigna son bébé et le projeta au loin. Celui-ci retomba dans des arbres mais la mère ne put localiser l’endroit où son bébé avait atterri.”

Une jeune femme blessée aux jambes se traînait parmi la foule. Un des meurtriers dit à un autre : “emmène-la donc sous le figuier, pour lui donner un peu de bonheur !” La femme répondit que la mort était mille fois préférable. Il la tua d’un coup de feu en disant : “crève donc !”

“Ghazi, mon cousin, portait ma grand-mère sur ses épaules, pensant que le fait de la porter lui éviterait la mort. Mais ils la tuèrent avant de l’assassiner. Une vieille femme glissa et tomba dans un fossé : comme elle tentait de s’en extraire, un des assassins lui dit : “où vas-tu ? Reste donc là où tu es ! ” Et il lui tira plusieurs balles dans la tête.

Abu Yaseen Freijah, un infirmier de l’UNRWA, vêtu de sa tenue blanche, soutenait sa femme, qui avait reçu une balle à l’épaule. Les meurtriers s’emparèrent d’elle et lièrent ses jambes à deux voitures, qui l’ont écartelée.

Mon cousin Ali, âgé de 17 ans, doux et inoffensif, fut attaché à l’arrière d’une voiture qui démarra en trombe. Abu Akram, un marchand de tissu bien connu, essaya de dissuader les assassins de s’en prendre à son fils en leur offrant tout l’argent qu’il possédait. Ils tuèrent son fils sous ses yeux avant de l’abattre, et de prendre tout son argent.

À ce jour, les coupables du massacre de Tel Al- Zaatar et de la famine organisée imposée pendant la Guerre de Camps n’ont pas été punis. Certains d’entre eux sont même devenus ministres ou responsables de conseils représentatifs, au Liban ou en Syrie. Ces tragédies se répètent dans le Camp de réfugiés de Yarmouk. Bien que le début de la tragédie à Yarmouk soit semblable à celle de Tel Al-Zaatar, nous devons agir pour que tous ces gens-là ne finissent pas de la même manière !

Tamim Al Barghouti est un poète palestinien et un scientifique engagé en politique. Il vient d’une famille lettrée. Son père est le poète palestinien Mourid Barghouti et sa mère, romancière érudite, est Radwa Ashour, d’origine égyptienne. Cet article fut publié en arabe dans le journal Shorouk, le 25 février 2014.

 

On the first anniversary of the Yarmouk catastrophe: solutions failing and defiance succeeding

Posted: 01/17/2014 by editormary in Human Rights, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Syria, War
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victims of the mosque massacre in central Yarmouk, from Syrian Air Force bomb raids

victims of the mosque massacre in central Yarmouk, from Syrian Air Force bomb raids

By Mahmoud Sarhan, translated by Jimmy Phoenix

The memory of Palestinians of the Yarmouk refugee camp – south of Damascus – carries two harsh memories of two catastrophes: the first was the catastrophe of being kicked out of their land in 1948, while the second dates to 16-12-2012, which marks the Syrian opposition barging in the camp and the MIG strike which was executed by the Syrian Air Force over Falluja school and Abdul Kadir Alhusaini Mosque in the middle of the camp. And both were being used as refugee centers for those who fled from other locations, and these MIG strikes killed 170 refugees and caused many casualties as well. Afterwards, many rumors went around talking about a 24-hour warning given to the camp citizens before the regime forces would break in. As a result, thousands of citizens who were horrified by the massacre that just took place packed their bags and headed out of the camp in a scene more like the new Palestinian diaspora which was described as being worse than the first one. And many activists consider the MIG strike of the 17th December 2012 as the actual date of the catastrophe. According to Mohammed Almaqdesi – the official speaker of the Palestinian camps news association – that after the MIG strike, many Facebook pages affiliated to “Jibril” (PFLP – General Command) spread a rumor that the Syrian army commanded the people of Yarmouk camp to evacuate the camp, which is what actually was done, fearing the occurrence of another massacre just like the Mosque and School massacre.

yarmouk 2At that time, Yarmouk camp sheltered thousands of Syrian families who evacuated to it from neighboring provinces, even some came from the cities of Aleppo and Homs. Which caused schools, mosques and houses to overflow with Syrian emigrants, which seemed for a while to be a safer place from the burning hell across the country. Yet, that didn’t suit the Syrian regime, who used genocide and group punishment against civilians after exiling them from their houses and forcing them to leave, seeking refuge from the inferno scorched by the regime’s military as soon as they suspected the presence of the FSA in it. However, Yarmouk camp succeeded for 9 months to stay unbiased despite the repeating attempts to drag it to the war, which was obvious through shelling it with mortars repeatedly and accusing the opposition for bombarding the camp. One of those barrages caused the “Alja’oona” massacre in 2-8-2012, which resulted a death toll of more than 20 martyrs and tens of casualties. Though, the main attempt to drag the camp into the conflict was from the “Jibril group” (or the PFLP – General Command) and its withdrawal from the agreement of the PLO factions, forming armed popular committees supported by the regime, which eventually caused those committees to overpass their duties within the camp and engage in armed clashes with the FSA in the Alhajar AlAswad and Tadamun areas. And not just that, but some groups even overpassed Jibril to receive orders directly from the Syrian Republican Guard (aka Presidential Guard), who eventually made the regime succeed in taking control of the green zone and eliminating the sanctuary the camp represented. This eventually forced the FSA to enter the camp in order to get oust the regime forces.

According to Almaqdesi: the FSA intended upon liberating only Alhajar Alaswad and the neighborhoods interlocking with Yelda Area. But Baian Miz’il broke into the entire camp along with his forces, ignoring the plan. Here, a new name rises up “Baian Miz’il”, one of the leaders of the south region FSA, who were found to be a regime agent, and has been the cause of letting the regime regain control of some of the that area’s neighborhoods. Thus, the regime bears the responsibility of dragging the camp into that bloody conflict so that he could make a few victories. Considering the military side, the regime tightened its grasp totally on all the neighborhoods of the southern region, using only one check point consisting of a few hundred soldiers and mercenaries. Which somehow reduces the burden of spreading soldiers around the camp and costing the regime many forces that would be better deployed to other sensitive regions as it sees fitting. Add to that, the regime also cut the supply lines to the camp and the safe haven that the camp represented as well as the popular revolution’s surrogate, which is represented by thousands of Syrian refugees who fled to the camp. All that is considered to be a part of the regime’s means of punishing revolting areas and its residents wherever they are.

While from the political point of view, the regime used the “kicking the Palestinians out of the camp” strategy to support the alleged propaganda of the “universal conspiracy” against the regime, and using it to press on all Palestinian, Arab, and international bodies as well to come to its aid. The regime succeeded in involving Yarmouk Camp through “Jibril’s faction” and one of his goons, therefore, succeeded – using few a soldiers only, to impose a suffocating siege on all the areas out of his control in the southern area of Damascus for a period of one year, which allows him to stall in executing any initiative presented by the PLO or anyone else. And according to “Mamdouh” – a politician activist, the regime sees no interest in making truces, and any initiative or ceasefire is nothing but a trick which he uses in the context of a psychological warfare which he imposes upon the besieged to ruin their spirit, waiting for things to change and for the facts on the ground to get to his side. And until now, all the initiatives presented by the PLO have failed, while those presented by NGO’s in Yarmouk seem to be suspended between PLO officials’ statements, and Jibril’s people’s belief that it is bound to fail, and none of the distress calls made to help the besieged from an incoming humanitarian crisis caused by letting them stay for 6 months without food or medicine are listened to. Also, the camp’s residents’ attempts to neutralize the camp’s status and force Jibril and the regime to execute the recent initiative, which has brought about the death of four citizens in the “coffins” march, during their march to the regime forces’ check point outside the camp, returning to face the monopoly of the dealers inside. Even the kids went in the “empty vessels” march demanding the siege to be lifted. In the camp’s catastrophe anniversary, the citizens celebrated it by demanding the siege to be broken and neutralized from the entire situation and stop killing them by bombs, bullets and hunger. Yet, we haven’t received any reaction from the besiegers, and after a whole year, all the popular and formal attempts represented by the PLO failed and did not bring about any change regarding the camp’s situation, and the regime succeeded in eliminating the refugees’ green zone and cutting the supply lines by using just a paper to negotiate with. And that comfortable situation enforced the regime to bargain with all sides, considering that the Syrian regime is the puppet master from now on, and it becomes the only one to benefit from Yarmouk’s catastrophe. And according to what Mamdouh said, I guess there one significant difference between who besieges the Gazans and who does the same in Yarmouk, where Palestinians are being besieged by either the occupation or the “defiance” regime.

http://alhayat.com/Details/587914

SYRIA/PALESTINE: Palestine and the Syrian Revolution

Posted: 11/21/2013 by editormary in "Israel", Counter-terrorism, No thanks!, Culture and Heritage, Grassroots Activism, Hasbara / Zionist Propaganda, Human Rights, Internet and Communication, Middle East, Nakba and Right of Return, Palestine, People's Movements / Struggles, Refugees, Religion, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance, Strategy for Liberation, Syria, Uprooted Palestinians\' Testimonies, Video, War, Zionism
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This is a transcript of a presentation given by Palestinian anarchist Budour Hassan on 17 November 2013 at a Teach in on Syria in New York organized by the MENA Solidarity Newtork US . There is a link to the video of the presentation below.

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In April of 2011 a famous megastar Egyptian blogger told Syrian revolutionaries that they needed to raise Palestinian flags during the demonstrations on Friday just to prove that they support the Palestinian resistance and to deny the narrative by the regime that the regime supports the Palestinian cause.

Now I asked myself then, do Syrians have to do that? Do Syrians have to raise the Palestinian flag just to prove that they support Palestine? Do Syrians have to show their nationalist credentials so the world supports their cause? And the answer was clear to me then: No, Syrians do not have to do that. Now a Syrian friend told me at the start of the uprising that we avoided raising Palestinian flags and talking about Palestine not because we don’t support the Palestinian cause, but because this cause was exploited by the regime to a degree that turned it into just a political tool, and we love Palestine so much that we don’t agree to turn the cause into a political tool, and this is why we avoided using it. And I think that Syrians do not have to do this, Syrians do not have to wave a Palestinian flag to prove that they support us. Because Palestine is not a flag. Definitely Palestine is much more than that.

Palestine is the refugees in Yarmouk camp who supported the revolution from the first day, who aided displaced Syrians and who participated in protests, documented the uprising, and helped as much as they could. The revolution is also the Palestinian refugees in al Raml refugee camp in Latakia who took a hard beating by the regime and had to deal with a heavy crackdown starting from July 2011. And the revolution lives not in the palaces of the regime, nor in the speeches of a resistance leader who thinks that just because he leads a resistance movement this gives him the right to speak in the name of Palestinians, and to kill innocent people in Syria not just in the name of resistance but also in the name of Palestine. So this is why I think that Syrians do not have to prove anything to anyone.

Secondly, even though if we suppose that the Syrian regime does in fact support the Palestinian resistance, does it mean that this allows the Syrian regime to control Syria, to prevent people from expressing their opinions, to kill and torture hundreds of thousands of Syrians just because they dare say no to more than 40 years of oppression, to more than 40 years of injustice? Of course not. Even if Bashar al Assad was the only person capable of liberating Palestine I would not support him, and I’m sure that many Palestinians would not do so either. Because our liberation cannot be established on the enslavement of another people, particularly when this enslavement is an enslavement of our sisters and brothers in Syria.

And in fact the truth is that the Syrian regime has never truly supported Palestine; for the Syrian regime, Palestine has always been a fig leaf and always been a political tool. And it started from the 1970s when the Syrian regime helped other militias in Lebanon to crack down on the refugees in Tel al-Zaatar. The siege and massacre in Tel al-Zaatar cannot be forgotten. And the massacres that the regime helped the Amal party in Lebanon commit in the 1980s also against refugees in Lebanon and against the PLO cannot be forgotten either. And the siege the regime is imposing in Yarmouk refugee camp, preventing people from getting medical aid or baby milk, preventing people from going in and out of the refugee camp, cannot be tolerated and cannot be just ignored, as many are doing unfortunately just because they think that this regime is for resistance, and that this regime is for the human rights of Palestinians.

Now the thing is that me as a Palestinian, I don’t need to say this for many people just to convince them about the justice of the Syrian cause. Because in my opinion it is very clear that this revolution was a revolution for freedom and dignity. But unfortunately for many of us here in Palestine, because there is a polarization among Palestinians, as is the case in many other Arab countries, about the Syrian regime, we had to say it over and over again and to try to convince our comrades — or our former comrades – that they need to stop supporting the Syrian regime, that all we hear about the Syrian regime’s support of resistance is nothing but propaganda.

Now unfortunately it didn’t really help. People mostly stick to their opinions regarding the regime. If we want to talk about what the reaction of Palestinians toward the Syrian revolution is, it varies. Unfortunately the left, mostly the mainstream left, supports the Assad regime. And here lies the irony, because one of the most supportive parties of the regime is called the Israeli Communist Party, and it supports the regime because, it says, “Well, this regime is against imperialism.” But at the same time these people had absolutely no problem in participating in protests alongside Zionists in Tel Aviv, liberal Zionists for instance. So how can you say that you support the Syrian regime because it is against imperialism and on the other hand participate in protests with Zionists?

And also there are others who say that we supported the Syrian Revolution when it was nonviolent, but then after it got violent we couldn’t support it anymore, and it was hijacked. So yes, the Syrian Revolution was indeed hijacked, and we know that there are many Salafis, many jihadists and many other groups, and many pro-America and pro-imperialist groups that tried to hijack the Syrian Revolution. But that does not by any means tarnish the Syrian Revolution, and it also doesn’t mean that just because a revolutionary movement was hijacked that we should stand on the sidelines and stop supporting it.

Of course there are still so many revolutionaries working on the ground, many of them are nonviolent, and there are even many nonsectarian armed brigades that we cannot ignore. If the revolution was hijacked we don’t just go and start blaming the people for it being hijacked. We actually do everything to side with the people in order to get the revolution back on the right track. And this is what many leftists couldn’t understand.

Now on the other side of the spectrum you have the right wingers and the Islamists who support the Syrian Revolution but not truly because they believe in the right of freedom and dignity, but because they think that it is a Sunni uprising against an Alawite regime. Now this is why it was for me very hard to participate in protests organized by Islamists in support of the Revolution, because for me, although of course there are religious movements inside the Revolution, it still a Revolution for freedom, equality, social justice and dignity. And this is why I cannot agree with the line of the Islamists here in Palestine who support the Revolution just because they see it as Sunni versus Alawite.

Now there is a small section among the Palestinian left that supports the Syrian Revolution that doesn’t lecture Syrians about what they have to do, and how they failed. And we managed to organize a few protests, in Haifa for instance, in Jeruslaem, and in other places in Palestine. Although they were small protests I think it meant a lot for us to show the Syrian people that yes there are people in Palestine who stand with you, and there are people who don’t buy into the regime propaganda.

I mean it says a lot that in Syria right now there is an intelligence branch, one of the most notorious intelligence branches in Syria, it’s called “Palestine.” That means that there are people being tortured, including Palestinans, by the way, that are being tortured in the name of Palestine, in the name of our country, in the name of our cause, because we believe it is a cause for freedom.

Now to those Palestinians and to those people who believe that the Syrian regime is truly supportive of Palestine, and who do not support the Revolution, who stand on the side and say “no, we don’t want to support the Revolution, or who remain neutral: I say you have a Palestine and I have my own.

Your Palestine is an intelligence branch in Damascus that kills and tortures people, while my Palestine is Khaled Bakrawi, the martyr from the Yarmouk refugee camp, who was arrested and tortured to death. Your Palestine is a speech by Bashar al-Assad, while my Palestine is the chants of Syrian freedom fighters in Hama. Your Palestine is just empty rhetoric, while my Palestine is people in Bustan al-Qasr raising the picture of Samer Assawi, the hunger-striking prisoner.

My Palestine is people from the north to the south chanting in solidarity with Gaza during the recent war on Gaza last year and saying “Oh Gaza, we are with you ‘til death.” They did it when they were bombarded by the Assad regime and they were shelled. My Palestine is that of the Syrian Revolutionary Youth in Damascus who raised a pamphlet in solidarity with the Palestinians in the Nakab and said “Prawer shall not pass!”

So Syrian revolutionaries, even when they face the most terrible cases of torture, of persecution, and of crackdown, they still remember their sisters and brothers in Palestine, they still chant in solidarity with them and do not forget about the prisoners.

So I think it is very important to remember that, and to remember the hundreds of thousands of Syrians and Palestinian prisoners who still languish in regime jails, for example Ali Shihabi, the communist Palestinian who has been detained in Syrian regime jails for almost a year, and Maher al-Jajeh also, another youth activist from Yarmouk refugee camp, who has been detained by the Syrian regime for more than a year and no one knows what is going on with his case now.

Also we will not forget the martyr Anas Amara, who was murdered simply because he was trying to get aid into Yarmouk refugee camp and trying to break the siege. And my Palestine is that also of Jihad Asad Muhammad, the Syrian journalist who even prior to the Syrian Revolution was always writing in solidarity with Palestine, and who like many others did not believe that this Palestine is Bashar al-Assad’s Palestine, but this is a cause that interests all Arabs.

So I just ask one last thing: I ask people who think that Bashar al-Assad supports Palestine or still believe his propaganda, just go over history a little bit, read more about what he and his father did to Palestine and to the Palestinian camps. And even if you are not convinced, don’t let this fact, don’t let political gains affect your support of the Syrian revolution. Because it is obviously not about geopolitics. We do not know whether if the revolution wins in Syria how will that affect the Palestinian cause. It might indeed damage us, I do not know. But I do not care on the other hand. Because my support of the Syrian Revolution is unconditional.

And I do believe that even though it is getting more and more complicated, and despite all the terrible groups that are trying to hijack the Syrian Revolution, especially the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq, which we obviously oppose like so many Syrians, the same Syrians who started protest against the regime and are also protesting against the Islamic State, so I have faith in these people. I have faith in a woman like Souad Nofal, I have faith in those who are so resilient and steadfast in Damascus and in Daraa, birthplace of the Revolution, and in Aleppo and in Salamieh, the fantastic city that has been protesting since the first days of the uprising.

So I have faith in these people, that even though things are getting more and more complicated, that they can manage to keep the uprising going, and even if this means bad things for my cause I really do not care. What I care about is the freedom and dignity of my Syrian sisters and brothers, and to reject that my name or my country or my cause be used or coopted by the Syrian regime to kill and persecute my sisters and brothers in Syria.

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