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People always ask me, "How did you get so involved with the Palestinian
cause?" After all, I am not Jewish, nor Muslim. I am a 51-year old,
petite, green-eyed blonde, whose mother's side is fourth generation
American from Sweden, and on my father's side, his mother was off the
boat from Ireland and his father was second generation American from
England. I was brought up Roman Catholic, but now consider myself a
progressive, spiritual Christian
rather than religious. I believe that Jesus Christ is one of the
prophets of God, and He happens to be my favorite, however I rarely read
the Bible or go to church.
I consider
practicing The Golden Rule (Do unto others as you
would like them to do unto you) the most important key point to observe
in life and believe that Love is the most important aspect of God.
So, to begin to answer the question about how I got so involved with
the Palestinian cause, I think I can trace it back to the fact that I
dated a Palestinian man about ten years ago. He was a good friend. When
I first started dating him, he told me he was Jordanian. Later he told
me he was Palestinian, and I asked him why he didn't tell me that in the
first place. He replied rather ruefully that most people think of
Palestinians as terrorists. Since at the time I wasn't aware of this, I
just said that was too bad, thinking that it obviously sounded like
bigotry. We didn't talk about politics other than that.
At the time, I
was not at all aware of the Palestine- Israel conflict. At
any rate, what distinguishes me from many Americans is that I have
known a Palestinian, and now know many Palestinians. So I know that
Palestinians are human beings, not the "barbarians" Zionists and the
media try to portray them as. I know that our media tends to demonize
Palestinians by focusing on suicide bombers, whose actions are taken out
of context, leading Americans to think they are just crazy, rather than
people who are driven to desperate extremes because of the brutal,
long-term Israeli Occupation, which is funded by US taxpayers' dollars.
I know now that our government is
funding state-sponsored terrorism against essentially defenseless
civilians.
About ten years later, the second intifada broke out in September
2000. I was in my car and became riveted to a discussion between
Israeli and Palestinian speakers on the progressive
Berkeley
radio station KPFA. I couldn't get out of my car until the end of the
program because it was so compelling and fascinating. All I can remember
of it now is my basic impression and gut feeling that the Palestinians
have just cause to be resisting the Israeli Occupation. I started to get
the desire to learn more about the Palestine- Israel conflict. I had
lost contact with my Palestinian friend through the years; however I had
Jewish friends and acquaintances so I began asking them simple questions
to feel them out about their opinions on the conflict. The answers I got
back from them were not at all satisfactory or convincing to say the
least. To the basic question "Don't
you think Palestinians deserve some land of their own, I mean, after all
they have historical ties to the land?", typical responses included,
"No, they are barbarians, and nobody wants them" or "You don't know the
history and I don't have time to tell you" or "It's not your problem".
These answers indicated to me there was unfair prejudice and that I
was being stonewalled. So my suspicions were brewing that there was
something going on that most Americans were being kept in the dark
about, and that whatever it was, it wouldn't stand the light of day.
These suspicions were confirmed after 9/11 when my gut instinct told me
that one of the reasons that 9/11 happened was because of the injustices
happening in the Middle East, most specifically the Israeli Occupation,
funded by US tax dollars.
Right after 9/11,
I intensively researched the Palestine-Israel conflict and became
convinced that finding a just solution to the Palestine-Israel conflict
would be the number one top priority in the search for a just peace in
the world, and I e-mailed my thoughts to my entire e-mail list.
I am deeply
grateful to be living in the Bay Area and next to
Berkeley,
the birthplace of the Free Speech Movement, and home to many peace
activists who have been very inspiring to me. I went to an incredibly
eye-opening and moving slide show about the Occupation by Jewish peace
activist Penny Rosen wasser of the Middle East Children's
Alliance.
After hearing Penny talk and seeing her slideshow of the horrible
conditions under which Palestinians are forced to live because of the
Israeli Occupation funded by our US tax dollars, I was inspired to
become a peace activist dedicated first and foremost to peace and
justice for the Palestinians. Not many people leave
her shows with dry eyes, and I felt compelled to try to do something to
stop the Israeli Occupation which my government was supporting. I had
always wanted to make a documentary so I decided to make my first
documentary about the Palestine-Israel conflict to dispel the
disinformation that Americans are constantly served in the mainstream
media, so they might also feel compelled to take action to correct the
injustices being committed with our tax dollars.
My documentary is
entitled "Truth: Exposing Israeli Apartheid". It's a low budget, but
high impact documentary. Currently, I am working on another documentary
dealing with Zionism and the Palestine-Israel Conflict.
Myths such as
"Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East" must be debunked once
and for all. My documentary proves that Israel is indeed a "racist,
anti-democratic, apartheid, regime", and no one has more authority to
say it with conviction than the eloquent Israeli Refusenik who is
featured in my documentary. A picture says a thousand words, and peace
activist Donna Wallach allowed me to include some brutally honest
footage she took in Gaza of the apartheid conditions under which
Palestinians are forced to live.
Other peace activists also share their eye-witness experiences and
ideas.
Footage of local
Bay Area rallies is also included. I narrate the film,
provide some historical perspective, as well as offer some personal
insight about the situation.
Knowledge is
power, and I have been reading as much as I can about my subject
including "The Origin of the Palestine-Israel Conflict" written by Jews
for Justice in the Middle East, which is exceptional and I recommend to
everyone I can. I also sat in on a couple classes about the creation of
Israel taught by Stanford professor of
Middle East Studies, Joel Beinin, whom I had met at the Jewish Voice
for Peace. Jewish Voice for Peace has an excellent email newserve called
Jewish Peace News, however I found their organization not proactive
enough and too fuzzy on important issues. In fact, I found it very
frustrating that they preferred not to discuss nor take stands on the
hardcore issues such as one-state vs. two-state and the "right to
return", so I sought out other groups, and found Al-Awda as well as
Boycott Israeli Goods.org and others.
I
have started my own group called Americans for Justice in
Palestine-Israel, and we have already had meetings, met with
Congresswoman Barbara Lee's office and sponsored a rally against Zionism
and demanding an end to US aid to apartheid Israel. Fortunately, there
are many people drawn to this cause, and I am certain that in time, it
will become a mainstream cause, just like the anti-war movement against
the Viet Nam War and the
world-wide boycott of apartheid South Africa became mainstream causes
with positive results. Because of the internet, information can be
distributed much more widely than ever before. This wiil hasten the end
of the Occupation, and hopefully be a catalyst to achieving peace and
justice for the Palestinians and the world in general.
At first, I was a firm believer in the two-state solution. However,
now, I am convinced that the one-state solution is the most progressive,
reasonable and humane solution. After all when South Africa became a
true democracy and ended apartheid, it did not break up into one state
for blacks and one state for whites. Even the United States remained one
country after the Civil War, and segregation was outlawed because of the
Civil Rights Movement. I also believe that all four million plus
Palestinian refugees must be allowed to return to their ancestral
homeland inside Palestine/Israel as is their right according to
International Law, UN Resolutions, and world opinion. They must
also receive generous reparations from the
US
and Israel, as well as the UN.
The
UN, who gave away land that wasn't theirs to give away in the first
place to Eastern European Zionist Jews for a racist, Jewish supremacist
state, should send in peace-monitoring troops to oversee the transition
from the current Israeli government to form a new truly secular, truly
democratic government that equally represents all the citizens of the
new unified country of Palestine-Israel, otherwise known as The Holy
Land, or maybe just renamed Palestine, which is its name to many people,
and has been for thousands of years.
The key issue is equal rights for all the citizens regardless of
religion,
race, ethnicity or gender. There must be no military in the Holy Land
of Palestine-Israel, except for the UN peace-monitoring troops, and
otherwise all weapons must be strictly banned. Discrimination of any
kind must be made illegal. Equal rights for all regardless of religion,
ethnicity and gender must be enforced by law. This is the win-win
situation. We have seen the injustice and inhumanity of the win-lose
situation. If enough people in the world want peace and justice, there
will be peace and justice. The more people become educated about the
issues and open up their hearts and minds, peace and justice in the
Middle East
will become more than a dream. It will become reality. |
