Monthly Archives: August 2013

The Founding Statement: The Popular Movement for One Democratic State on the Land of Historical Palestine

30 Friday Aug 2013

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(The popular movement announced its establishment on May 15, 2013, (The Nakba Day), in Ramallah. Here, for the first time, you can read its founding statement in English. It was published before in Arabic and Hebrew.)

The catastrophe of the Palestinian people has continued for over a century. This catastrophe began with the Balfour Declaration, issued on November 2, 1917 by the British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour to Baron Walter Rothschild, a leader of British Jewry for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. The Balfour Declaration was followed by the imposed British Mandate for Palestine of 16 September 1922, which denied the Palestinian people their natural right to self-determination and the establishment of their independent state on their national land.

This catastrophe was aggravated by the disaster of the Nakba of 1948, which resulted in the seizure by Israel of most of the Palestinian territory, the displacement of almost 750 thousand Palestinians, and the establishment of the State of Israel on Palestinian territory. This disaster was then followed by the Israeli aggression of 1967, which resulted in the occupation of the remaining Palestinian territories (the West Bank of Jordan and the Gaza Strip and the Sliver of Hamma) and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from the newly occupied territories. This was accompanied by attempts to obliterate the national Palestinian personality, which represents a depth of civilization and a historical connection of the Palestinian people with their national home.

International and regional efforts and initiatives followed one another from the early 1930s onwards with the view to finding a just solution to the Palestine Question and to putting an end to the Palestinian-Israeli and Arab-Israeli conflicts. These efforts, however, ended up in failure, due to Zionist intransigence and racialist mind-set, such as do not accept the other, deny the presence of the victim and correlatively hide criminalities committed by Israel. In the shadow of the Oslo Agreement, Israel waged a frenzied settlement campaign to change the fait accompli on the ground and to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state. In doing so Israel went to extremes in denying the presence of the Palestinian people and dedicated its own understanding of the territory occupied in 1967 as a disputed territory, not as an occupied territory.

With the launch of the contemporary Palestinian revolution at January 1, 1965 and the assumption of the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) by the Palestinian resistance in the year 1968/1969, the Palestinian resistance considered the one democratic state (ODS) on the land of historical (mandatory) Palestine to be a just solution for the Palestine Question. This solution was, however, quickly followed by a transitional solution (i.e. return of the refugees, self-determination, independent state with Jerusalem as its capital), which was then effectively reduced to what was is known as the two-state solution and was in effect predicated on the recognition of the Israeli occupation of the part of Palestine, the part it had occupied in 1948.

The resumption of the one democratic state solution comes today in the shadow of the occlusion of the political horizon, the failure of all attempts at a fragmented settlement of the Palestine Question, the continuing Israeli seizure of land and “judaization” of Palestinian territories, the denial of the legitimate national rights of the Palestinian people and the reduction of the Palestinian presence into unviable, disconnected and isolated bantustans, thereby making the establishment of an independent and sovereign Palestinian state impossible, rendering the interim self-government arrangements of  the Oslo accords into a permanent status.

Thus, we are experiencing all-embracing and deep crises and a closure of the political horizon under an occupation that costs Israel little, additional to the de facto annexation by Israel of most of Palestinian land, consolidating a single state and a fascist and racist system based on racial discrimination in law (that is, apartheid). Additionally, we now face a new Israeli condition demanding that we recognize the State of Israel as a “Jewish” state in its Zionist interpretation, even without a definition of its borders, implying the writing-off the right of return for 1948 Palestine refugees and opening the way for displacement of our people living in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel in 1948. All of these enable Israel propel the conflict into a dangerous stage, which forewarns of a bloody explosion and ethnic cleansing, thereby bringing about yet another stage of the kind of human tragedy in which the Palestinian people have been living since the disaster of 1948.

Faced with this gloomy and bitter situation, establishing a one democratic state on the land of historical (mandatory) Palestine, a democratic state for all its inhabitants, based on a democratic constitution, the values of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which guarantee freedom, democracy and equality of rights without discrimination based on race, religion, gender, colour, language or political or non-political opinion, national or social origin, wealth, place of birth or any other status – establishing this state is, indeed, a just and feasible solution for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Our initiative comes as a continuation of the efforts by the groups that preceded us in conferences and activities held and pursued in different places throughout the world suggesting the establishment of the one democratic state as a solution, with the Munich Declaration as a common denominator.

Our commitment to the choice of a one democratic state on the land of historical Palestine is based on the following:

  1. The Palestinian people is one people embracing all of its components: in the territories occupied by Israel in 1948, in the territories occupied by Israel in 1967 and in the refugee camps built in the 1967 occupied territories and in the diaspora. Despite their subjection to different systems and laws, the Palestinian people maintained their unity and their national identity. The Palestinian people living in apartheid Israel are not integrated in Israeli society. After 60 years of attempts to impose upon them co-existence and after subjecting them to ethnic cleansing, they still uphold onto their national identity. At the same time, all Palestinians living in the territories occupied in 1948 and in the 1967 Israeli occupies West Bank and the Gaza Strip resist Israel’s occupation policies, particularly Israeli settlement policies, seizure of land and apartheid measures and policies impinging upon all walks of Palestinian life and implemented by the Israeli occupation forces. Likewise, Palestinian refugees in refugee camps in the diaspora and in foreign countries continue to uphold onto their national affiliation and Palestinian identity, rejecting all plans for resettlement and refusing alternative homelands to their own national home.
  2. There are universal values to which civilized nations aspire. These represent freedom, justice, equality, democracy and the acceptance of the other, regarding cultural, racial and religious differences as an enrichment for the society, rather than as a cause for racial discrimination. Therefore, all Palestinian strategies of resistance ought to be guided by these values, namely, human rights values, and by the standards of international law and predicate the struggle on this basis.
  3. Palestine is the place where the religions were revealed. It is not possible for the followers of any one religion to expel the followers of other religions or to attempt to make one of the religions the standard of the political system in Palestine. All systems or strategies of resistance should be based on respect for all religions, including respective religious symbols, places of worship and sacred places as well as encourage religious tolerance and coexistence among the followers of different religions.
  4. The fundamentals of social justice and equal opportunities for all citizens of the one democratic state, embracing all its ethnic and religious components, fair redistribution of public resources and respect for women and gender equality for women and men in all walks of life are to be cornerstones of this state.
  5. Jerusalem is the capital of the one democratic state.
  6. Solution of the refugee problem implementing United Nations General Assembly resolution No. 194 of 1948, by which every Palestinian in the world will have the right to return to Palestine; to recover his/her properties and real estate or receive fair compensation in the event he/she not want to return; to receive fair compensation for the suffering that they have incurred as a result of their displacement from their homeland; and by which every Palestinian internally displaced person (muhajjarun) inside Israel be able return to their villages and properties out of which were expelled in 1948.

Recovery the rights of 1948 Palestine refugees and Palestinian internally displaced persons does not entail expelling any Jewish family from Palestine, but on the contrary – aims at effecting a historical reconciliation among all inhabitants of Palestine, embracing all their components. We further fully realize that all the other solutions suggested (such as the two-state solution or the confederal solution) do not provide a just solution to the refugee problem, such as guarantees their right of return to the residence from which they were expelled. In fact, some of these solutions barter the establishment of a Palestinian state with the implementation of the return of the refugees to their abode.

The establishment of one democratic state will be able to provide a solution to the conflict at chore, and address all the elements of the conflict in historical Palestine as well as build a regime based on justice, equality and democracy. A democratic state cannot be an aggressive state, will not be motivated by expansionist greed, and, hence, it will not be in conflict over borders with any neighboring state. Being established on the land of historical Palestine the one democratic state will be an indivisible part of the regional system, cooperating and in harmony with the rest of the regional states, rather than in contradiction or conflict with them.

One would expect the Zionist movement to refuse this choice because the said movement is based on a racialist and apartheid basis, and on the non-recognition of the other. It is a movement based on colonization, occupation and settlement, predicated on force and suppression.

The principle of acquisition of territory by force is totally and absolutely rejected. It cannot constitute a basis for an acquired right, individually or collectively. The Zionist colonial settlement in Palestine is, therefore, an illegal settlement and cannot at all be accepted as a fait accompli. Confronting this settlement will be central to the resistance program of this Popular Movement. Further more, the establishment of a one democratic state does not entail marginalizing combating the policies and designs of the Israeli occupation, the cause of the daily suffering of the Palestinian people, highlighted by settlements and land grabs, the “judaization” of Jerusalem and other aggressive actions. In fact, resistance to Israeli occupation settlement policies and the policies and measures of Israeli apartheid is central to the combative program of our Popular Movement.

In order to achieve a just solution to the Palestinian–Israeli conflict we, the signatories here-under, have decided to declare the launch of “the Popular Movement for One Democratic State on the Land of Historical Palestine” and strive to reach all our people, wherever they live including the general public in Israel, particularly those who have an interest in this choice. The Popular Movement will try to gain the backing and support of all the forces committed to freedom, justice, equality and democracy in our attempts to develop policies and procedures adequate to resisting  and putting an end to the Israeli racist system of apartheid and occupation. The success of this choice will, therefore, represent a civilized model for the achievement of peace, co-existence and democracy as well as for solution of conflicts among peoples.

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Awda AlAan! Return Now!

29 Thursday Aug 2013

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Awda AlAan! Return Now!

It is more than a year since a group of youth from the destroyed village of Iqrit decided to personally implement their right of return and transferred the center of their lives to the village. Only two weeks ago we went there for the first time, when they declared the festive opening of Iqrit’s football stadium. Today (August 28, 2013) we went there again – as they were attacked by inspectors from the Israel Land Administration and the police, and called for solidarity visits.

Today’s attack

Iqrit is an hour’s drive from Haifa, just near the Lebanese border. You turn from the mountain road to a bumpy unmarked concrete path – one of the achievements of the Zionist attackers today was to remove any sign that may help visitors find their way to the village. At the top of the mountain you see the church building – the only building that was spared from the bulldozers. Around it, in makeshift tents, we found Iqrit’s youth and some visitors discussing the events of the day.

They had prior notice that the inspectors plan to attack on Sunday, so they called for alert and mobilization. Many people didn’t go to work and stayed on the ground. When the inspectors came and so some 30 people gathering in the village f\grounds they simple went away. Today’ morning they came again, found there only three young man and one women and carried their plot.

It was not the first visit of inspectors and the police, neither the great doomsday evacuation. It was just another unleashing of Zionist outrage at the youth that reclaim their right to live on their ancestors’ land.

At first the youth there offered coffee to the inspectors and tried to argue with them in a civilized way, to explain them that it is their land and that they have all the rights to be there. But the inspectors were determined to cause harm. In a mountain full of weeds they looked for tea herbs that were planted by the young villagers and uprooted them.

The four helpless youth got really angry when one of the inspectors “uprooted” also a big iron cross that was placed in the grounds and threw it away. Insulting religious symbols still make a special emotional resonance, for the attackers as well as for the locals. You can see some of it in a video that the youth succeeded to film and post in Facebook.

Another special target was a bed that one of the youth put in the open air just where the house of his grandfather stood – in order to sleep “in” his family’s home. The bed was carried away and deliberately broken. When we were discussing the event, people suggested that the bed reminded the inspectors of the Palestinian’s tendency to reproduce, and was targeted for this reason.

Not a protest

We were sitting together, enjoying the fresh air, the youth and some less young residents of Iqrit and political activists that came in solidarity, drinking coffee on the top of the mountain and looking at the Mediterranean beach, where you can see Mount Carmel and Haifa at the southern end. Everybody was discussing the experience of the last year and the perspective for continuing the struggle. (The picture above is from the wall of Bir’am’s church.)

“Why didn’t you call on us to come before?” We asked the youth that initiated the return. “When you make a protest tent you can’t rely only on the people of Iqrit.”

Their answer was that this is not a protest. It is their return to their village. They are rebuilding their lives in this old new place. They described a long process that they had to undergo personally and as a community. They didn’t want to make their personal return a window dressing for public relations.

But they are keenly aware that this is part of a bigger political struggle. They may be attacked again and again, and in a much more brutal ways. They know that their parents paid a much higher price in their struggle for return. They know that they need all the help that they can get, from every corner of the world. But for them the return to their homes and lands is not the end of the struggle, it is a new beginning.

Returning Now

From Iqrit we went on to Bir’am, some 20 kilometers to the east, where residents have declared their return two weeks ago (on August 17, 2013). In Bir’am we found, along the youth, some old people that lived there and experienced the forced expulsion, and now sleep in tents on the remains of their demolished houses. The returning people of Bir’am have already received official notification that the area is “closed” and that they should evacuate.

For three days, August 22-24, “Youth for the Prisoners” organized a volunteer work camp in the destroyed village of Ghabsiya, north of Kfar Yasif. The title for the day was “I will not remain a refugee”. Hundreds of youth from all around the area took part, as well as some old villagers from Ghabsiya.

In another grassroots initiative and a first of its kind, refugees from Mi’ar, just west of Sakhnin, plan to distribute tomorrow special leaflets to residents of Ya’ad, a Jewish-only settlement that is built on their lands.  They just want them to be aware that they are personally responsible for their continuing dispossession, not only the government.

My old Arab friends used to quote Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, saying about the Palestinian refugees: “The old will die and the young will forget”. Israel’s 65 years of aggression and racism didn’t let anyone forget. Now the young generation is leading the way to implementing the right of return.

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Our Ethics Condemn the Crimes of the Military

25 Sunday Aug 2013

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Our Ethics Condemn the Crimes of the Military

(This call for a demonstration in Haifa was published on Facebook on behalf of several Palestinian activists from the Patriotic Youth… The demonstration had to take place on Sunday, August 25, 2013. More than 120 activists expressed their desire to participate. The invitation was later deleted for reasons that were not yet specified…)

From politics to ethics

The crimes committed against our peoples in Syria and Egypt, and the justifications of these crimes by different official bodies, were they Arab or foreign, are an additional confirmation that we are beyond the stage of political debate. There is no place for political positions or activity unless it is within the framework of the principled defense of morality. This morality is represented by the basic Human Rights of the Arab citizen wherever he is, the right of the Arab person to live in dignity and to exercise his fundamental rights to demonstrate, hold sit-in or resist any official decision through peaceful means, which are legitimate morally and according to international conventions.

The military’s intervention in politics

The image reflected from our Arab region shows that the military is the master of the scene in Syria and Egypt. The army comes to politics under the pretext of security and then kills the citizen in the name of ideology. It only attempts to silence and kill innocent people so that all justifications for murder will be present, whatever the size of the crime and whatever the means. This way the clearing of a peaceful sit-in or spraying children with chemical weapons become a maneuver aimed first and foremost to eliminate the sacred status of the human being, whose dignity and rights constitute the first origin of real national security and real democratic transformation.

The sanctity of the holy sites

We also call upon all those who are interested in the unity of our societies for a better future, to stand firmly against any attempt at burning or desecration of any of the holy sites. Do not enter the language of fitna (sectarian division) to peoples’ minds, whether fuelling it with the pretext of refusing it, or strengthening it in order to gain advantage.

Finally, because the progress of our societies requires a moral compass, which is the first and last origin for any position about any political event, and because silence is the neutrality that complements the crime, we invite you to participate in the demonstration and to light candles…

( You can read the original text in Arabic in حيفا الحرة )

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Dying for Freedom in Egypt

18 Sunday Aug 2013

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Dying for Freedom in Egypt

Looking at the images of people escaping the Al-Fath mosque in Cairo today (Saturday 17.8.2013) under constant police fire, I stare at the terrified faces of those people, some of them injured, many lost friends and relatives in the massacre. I imagine that I see myself there, between them, running down the street.

But you’re not a Muslim Brother, some of you will wonder. But I do stand for principle. My land was not confiscated, but I was demonstrating in the day of the land in March 30, 1976. This is not a problem.

What I ask myself is whether I would dare to go to Rabaa Al-Adawiya while I knew that the army was preparing for a massacre. But, I encourage myself, on October 2, 2000, when we heard that the police shot at our friends in Um Al-Fahm, Nazareth, Arabeh and Sakhnin, killing some of them, we sat in the middle of Al-Jabal Street in Haifa and refused to move, even as the police were approaching to attack us. So, maybe, you could find some people of democratic and leftist principles in Cairo’s streets, ready to die with the Muslim Brothers to defend Egypt’s democracy and to oppose tyranny.

It is time to remember that eternal saying of the struggle for liberty: “If you’re not ready to die for freedom, you don’t deserve to live free”. It doesn’t intend to prevent the right for free life from anybody, no matter how coward or indifferent he or she may be. It comes to express the simple historic fact, that without the bravery and sacrifices of millions of freedom loving people we would all be slaves up to this day and till the end of history.

Basic Values

In these days of division, confusion, wild propaganda and outright terror, you should stick to the most basic values.

For me the killing of protesters is a clear red line. The Egyptian military regime clearly initiated and organized a massive massacre of peaceful demonstrators in order to consolidate its illegally acquired power.

And, by the way, any people that come to cheer up when the army or the police are shooting people in the streets are, to my taste, a despised lynch mob. If there happen to be many of them it is just a sad observation about the fragility of the Human soul – it has nothing to do with revolution, democracy or whatever.

Humanistic values should come first. They are the basic attitude, motivation and moral grounds behind any struggle for freedom and justice. Politics should come at the end of it – as calculated means to achieve goals. But when your politics loses its humanistic moral grounds it becomes a corrupt grab for personal or clique power.

Respect for the other is at the base of all Human values. How can anybody call himself a Democrat, a Liberal, a Leftist, a Socialist, a Revolutionary or pretend to belong to any other tradition that claims to speak for Human Rights and Dignity and support the rule of the army that kills demonstrators in the streets?

Democracy is at the Heart of the Struggle

The martyrs (Shuhada) of Rabeaa Al-Adawiya and all those shot demonstrating in Egypt over the last month and a half are martyrs for democracy. They demonstrated because the elected government of Egypt was removed by a military coup, not in order to promote any special partisan or religious agenda.

Unlike the demonstrators at Morsi’s days in power, they didn’t attack the presidential palace and didn’t constitute any physical threat to the army’s rule. The only threat from the demonstration was their moral claim to restore the democratically elected government. Their presence in the streets called off the army’s bluff as if it represents the Egyptian people. A-Sisi couldn’t stand the power of their words so he decided to drown their voices in the barrage of gunfire and rivers of blood.

Democracy is not a small thing, not a technical detail in the managing of the state apparatus. In all its forms Democracy is intended to represent the sovereignty of the people. The fact that the legitimacy for the state exists only as far as it serves the people. And the fact that the people themselves should decide by whom and how they should be served, not any Patron. Those Socialists that cite Marxism in order to dismiss Bourgeois Democracy ignore the basic fact that the Socialist criticism of it was based on the claim that Socialism will bring more democracy, not less of it.

The Arab Spring, like the Great French Revolution and all the great revolutions over the last 200 years were first and foremost about democracy. The rule of the people over the mechanisms of state power is inseparable from the right of the people to decent lives from all other aspects.

The Arab people will continue to struggle for freedom, democracy and social justice even in the face of the most murderous oppression. When one day democracy will be the only imaginable order of the day, all the tyrants will be seen as a remote nightmare and we will all thank those people that gave their lives in this holy struggle.

Israel

As I write these lines I read in today’s American New York Times:

“The Israelis, whose military had close ties to General Sisi from his former post as head of military intelligence, were supporting the takeover as well. Western diplomats say that General Sisi and his circle appeared to be in heavy communication with Israeli colleagues, and the diplomats believed the Israelis were also undercutting the Western message by reassuring the Egyptians not to worry about American threats to cut off aid.

“Israeli officials deny having reassured Egypt about the aid, but acknowledge having lobbied Washington to protect it.

“When Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, proposed an amendment halting military aid to Egypt, the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee sent a letter to senators on July 31 opposing it, saying it “could increase instability in Egypt and undermine important U.S. interests and negatively impact our Israeli ally.” Statements from influential lawmakers echoed the letter, and the Senate defeated the measure, 86 to 13, later that day.”

It is still the same old story. In order to ensure Israel’s superiority in the region, Western powers are ready to support any murderous Arab tyrant… But this doesn’t reduce any millimeter from the value of Arab Democracy – it just says that the Arab will continue to pay a high price in the struggle for freedom and democracy as long as the racist colonization of Palestine continues to be the major aim of imperialist policy in the region.

Previous posts on the Egyptian Revolution

Massacre in Cairo – July 27, 2013

Down with the Coup – July 6, 2013-08-18

On the Constitutional Referendum – December 22, 2012

Welcome President Morsi – June 30, 2012

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Branding ODS in Arabic and Hebrew

17 Saturday Aug 2013

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Branding ODS in Arabic and Hebrew

Proposals for discussion between ODS supporters

The following suggestions are fully serious – but their main purpose is to start an open and creative discussion…

After we succeeded to put the (very initial) organizational structure on the ground, and before we start mass marketing, we need to set the brand name to be catchy and expressive.

Or, in another perspective, after more than nine months working on the creation of our new dear baby-movement – it is time that the loving family will convene to give it a proper name.

You have an historic opportunity here to think well in advance – a good name is a very important element in promoting a good cause. Just think of other movements that were started in a rush and got stuck with incredibly horrible names like “Occupy”!

In Arabic

I like the way our comrades in Ramallah called the movement:

“الحركة الشعبية للدولة الديمقراطية الواحدة على ارض فلسطين التاريخية”

“Al-haraka al-sha’abiya lildawla al-dimokratiya al-waheda ‘ala ardh Falestin al-tarikhiya”.

Meaning: The popular movement for one democratic state on the historic land of Palestine.

The idea is very good and well expressed, but in order to compete in the free market of ideas you need something simple and catchy like Fatah or Hamas.

I would suggest taking only 3 letters from the long name. We may call the movement:

ح.ش.د. أو حشد

H. Sh. D. – or Hashd…

According to “Google translate” it could mean “Mobilize” or “Gathering” or many other things, most of them going in our way…

It expresses dynamism, determination and popular struggle.

What would our Arabic expert say about it?

In Hebrew

The Yaffa group tried to be more humble, calling itself:

“קבוצת יפו למען מדינה דמוקרטית אחת”

“Kvutsat Yaffo lema’an medina demokratit ahat”.

Meaning: “Yaffo group for one democratic state”.

It doesn’t claim to be “the movement” yet, only one element in its future formation.

For the final product I would suggest to use the “movement” anyway, making it:

התנועה למען מדינה דמוקרטית אחת – ת.ל.ד או תל”ד

In three characters again, it is T.L.D. You would usually pronounce it TALAD – which doesn’t have any particular meaning, but it could also be read as “Teled” – meaning “will give birth” which is somehow optimistic and bears the connotation of a new beginning.

(By the way – learn also from the experience of Azmi Bishara’s Arab party “Al-tajamu’ al-watani al-dimokrati”, which is known in many places by its catchy Hebrew acronym “Balad” – even though almost nobody knows where this acronym came from…)

Why those 3 letters?

In English we already have ODS – which is well known and shouldn’t be replaced.

But this is appropriate only for the westernized elite.

In Hebrew we sometime use מד”א “M.D.A” or Mada – which is the exact comparable to ODS – but it is already occupied by Israel’s famous emergency and ambulances services, and it will be a hard fight to take it away from them.

In Arabicددو  “Dadu” seemed to my un-expert ears as a non-starter for many reasons.

Also, to make a virtue out of necessity, we don’t start by building ODS but build a movement first. So we need a name for the movement, something you can say you are a member of, something you actively support. We need a name to sign declarations, to be mentioned in the press.

Still we want simple and short names.

So here comes the trick:

I put aside the “State” thing – it might be an unavoidable evil, but not something we really love.

I also put aside the “one” – It is too much like “One Country, One Leader” – while we aspire for openness and pluralism.

So we are left with Democracy for all –

حشد – حركة شعبية ديمقراطية

תלד – תנועה למען דמוקרטיה

Movement for Democracy

It is not a proposal to change our program or the full name of the movement. The full and clear names may be kept as they are, to be written at the top of every official declaration and letterhead paper.

It is only that good branding should give the free spirit wings to fly.

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Small Stories from a Big Demonstration – ‘Ara against Ethnic Cleansing in the Naqab

03 Saturday Aug 2013

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Small Stories from a Big Demonstration – ‘Ara against Ethnic Cleansing in the Naqab

In 15/7/2013 the day of rage against the Prawer plan was declared by the High Follow-Up Committee – the official leadership of the ’48 occupied Palestinians. As described in a previous post, it was Al-Shabab Al-Watani (the Patriotic Youth  – a social milieu, not any formal entity) that made this day a success.

The 1/8 Rage Day was initiated by the same youth to keep the momentum of struggle. There was no organizing body, no official leadership. The date, the political slogans and the timing of the demonstrations were all set through events on Facebook. Soon everybody that have a Facebook account and some consciousness started to publish details of the Prawer plan and calls for action.

Powerful Momentum

The youthful spirit proved very effective. Many groups met in different places to organize.

Determined not to stay this time in the virtual world, the youth prepared a special hard-copy leaflet – and it was a special leaflet with visual illustration of the meaning of the Prawer plan:

  • Confiscation of 800,000 dunam (200,000 acres) of Arab land.
  • Second Nakba.
  • Expulsion of 40,000 Arab people from the homes.
  • Ethnic Cleansing.
  • Destroying 40 Arab villages.
  • Concentration of the Arab that constitute 30% of the Naqab residents on 1% of its land.

This leaflet was divided in tens of thousands of copies all over the county, with the activists making a point of speaking with ordinary folk to raise awareness. Being so well designed, this special leaflet was really read in many homes (unlike the sorry fate of most leaflets).

In Haifa the momentum that was created toward 1/8 enabled the establishment of a “Popular Committee”, which brought together most of the parties that are active within the Arab population, as well as many local movements and NGO’s, with the youth activists taking the initiative and keeping a strong influence. It came after a long period that the Arab Parties and the youth activist hardly worked together. (If you know Arabic you can read the declaration about the establishment of the Haifa Popular Committee.) On Tuesday 30/7 the Haifa committee organized a pre-1/8 demonstration in Carmel Avenue – the main street of the tourists’ German Colony quarter – that was well attended.

In another sign of the youthful and creative spirit of the organizers, they started also a special Facebook event in Hebrew to talk with the Jewish public, explain the injustice of the Prawer plan in facts and reason and mobilize support.

Going to ‘Ara

There were two demonstrations designated for Thursday, 1/8 – one in the Naqab itself and the other in the ‘Ara-‘Ar’ara junction along the 65 highway from Tel Aviv to the north. The organizers decided that the people from the north, Haifa included, will go to ‘Ara. People were calling to reserve places on the bus, so the organizers knew they need another bus.

We waited for the second bus, which came late, and we waited more on the 65 road north as traffic was jammed. Well, it is jammed every day at 17:00 as tens of thousands of workers make their way home from the central area, but it was jammed more, if not because the demonstrations blocked the road than at least because the concentration of police forces caused havoc. About a kilometer before the location of the demonstration we abandoned the bus, took our Palestinian flags and Anti-Prawer slogans and started walking along the street.

When we reached the junction we saw that a big police force, with the help of the frightening horses, was holding the demonstrators, almost a thousand of them, on the main entrance to ‘Ar’ara, some 50 meters off the main street.

For half an hour the people from the late Haifa bus were almost the only demonstrators that were really near the traffic lights on the main road, and they gave the police lessons in civil disobedience.

“Silmiya” – Peaceful Resistance

First, before the police organized to confront the new group, some youth were sitting on the crosswalk, blocking the traffic. Soon a police force organized and dragged the youth out of the street, beating them, but both sides avoided a full confrontation and the demonstration re-organized few meters off the street.

Then, confronted with a superior police force the small demonstration moved along the road, approaching the street at another point. The police reorganize to close the line in front of us. This backward and forward dance was repeated several times.

Later there appeared a group local youth that came from a small alley at our back. The police left us altogether and went to chase them. Our small demonstration went back to the main street, causing some disruption, but now with the intention to finish our solo performance and join the bigger body of demonstrators behind the police’s barricades.

Beaten for avoiding confrontation

After being wounded by 3 stun grenades in Shakhnin on 15/7, I came this time determined to be careful and avoid any major confrontation. When the youth sat in the middle of the street I stood aside. When they were pushed off the street I was for some time the only demonstrator that stayed just near the traffic light, but when a young policeman came to me and told me quietly: “You are and old man, I don’t want to push you, so go and stand with the group”, I evaluated my options and obeyed.

When the demonstration went again to the main street and crossed it – I joined – but was in the rear. When I found myself with another demonstrator in the traffic island, when everybody else already crossed the street and there was a red light for us – I preferred to stay and wait for the green light.

But then there happened a miracle. The police didn’t want us separated from the group of demonstrators – so they blocked the traffic and instructed the two of us to cross. For once, by my choice to be quite and law abiding, I cause another irregular stoppage of the traffic in the main road.

The police was bored of chasing us around the junction, so they now decided to push all the late comers to join the main demonstration. They organized a line and started pushing. Some people tried to stand their ground, claiming that they did nothing illegal, that they have the right to demonstrate.

One demonstrator was explaining a policeman: “Don’t push me there, it is a dangerous place. There are policemen on horses there”.

I stayed faithful to my decision to avoid confrontation, so when the police organized the line I simple move aside. Soon, many demonstrators, instead of pushing back at the police or being push, simply dispersed. Somehow we were demonstrating near the main street again.

When, for the 3rd time, the police organized the line again and started pushing, some of them were already really angry. This time I felt the danger and really moved away… One old policeman in blue uniform, probably a high ranking officer, decided that it would be appropriate for him as an old man to beat me, like police-women can lawfully beat female demonstrators. So he chased me, tore my shirt, beat me and threw me on the ground.

It was a final proof that my head is made of pure stone – I heard the sound of the back of my skull hitting the pavement but I hardly felt anything.

Soon I was surrounded by tens of youth caring for me, while on the other side the police was organizing their line again and starting to push. When they reached me some of the youth were shouting at them: “See what you did to him, he will die!” At that moment the police stopped pushing to asses the situation and the brave correspondent of the Arabic “radio a-shams” pushed a microphone at me, still lying on the ground: “May I interview you?”

To avoid any farther dramatization of the scene I allowed two policemen and a few caring youth to raise me and take me away, apparently not dead…

Gas and Stones

After some time I joined the main body of the demonstration. It was a very tense confrontation with policemen and demonstrators pushing each other along the line. It could hardly end without flaring up.

In the rear of the demonstration I had a good opportunity to say hello to many good friends and hear some of the traditional leaders calling desperately whoever they know from the youth: “Is there nobody that can stop it and let the Shabab go home? Is it not already enough?”

After some time it flared up with gas and stones. The police was catching demonstrators, journalists and bystanders, beating them and arresting them. The cloud of thick gas in the main street, between shops and homes, sent everybody crying and fleeing away.

I made the mistake to run away, with many others, in the direction of the wind, so the gas was chasing us. Soon somebody gave me an onion. I chewed some of it and my felt better. After the gas was dispersed by the wind, I limped back to the main street. Now the main street and the streets leading to it were full of people. Apparently, many people from ‘Ara and ‘Ar’ara, who didn’t come to the demonstration in the first place, came out to the sound and the smell.

20 people were detained. Most of them were beaten badly. Some of them were also beaten after they were arrested. Some were just beaten and thrown away without even being brought to the police station. On Friday morning the rest of the detainees, 10 of them, were brought to the Haifa court. The police requested to extend their detention for 5 days to continue their interrogation on charges of assaulting policemen. They detainees showed the signs of beating on their bodies to the judge. Adalah, as usual, did a great job for the defense. All were sent to house detention.

How I missed my flight to space?

On Thursday night I went to the emergency clinics for medical examination. As I told the Russian doctor that I was beaten by the police, he checked me in a hurry and wrote down that all is well. If I would want a medical clearance to be the next Astronaut to go to space – it was my day to get it. I was so confused that I missed my chance.

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