Author: Kairos Puget Sound Coalition

The status of children in our respective societies is emblematic of the status we attribute to God.

By Jesse Steven Wheeler | Friends of Sabeel North America (FOSNA)  | Feb 24, 2022

The greatest irony to all of these so-called “holy wars” waged in the name of God (read: real-estate disputes) is that it is God himself whom we betray.

But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. —Mark 10:14 (NRSV)

The Children of Occupation

Last week witnessed the first tragic murder in 2022 of a Palestinian child, when Israeli occupation forces shot and killed 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Salah in the village of Silat al-Harithiya. Reports indicate that he posed no direct threat to the soldiers. On Tuesday this week, Israeli forces shot and killed 13-year-old Mohammad Rezq Salah in the town of al-Khader near Bethlehem. After he had been shot, local media report, “Israeli forces prevented Palestinian ambulances from arriving to the scene.”

Continue reading “Defacing the image of God”

Confusing advocacy for Palestinian rights and a truly democratic Israel with antisemitism perverts the accusation and undermines the legitimate fight against it.

By Joshua Shanes | Religion Dispatches | Feb 3, 2022

Perhaps it feels easier to cry “antisemitism” than to spell out the actual argument because there really isn’t one—or a good one, at any rate.

Amnesty International has just released a new, comprehensive report on the situation in Israel/Palestine. Like earlier reports from Human Rights Watch, Yesh Din, and B’Tselem—leading human rights groups documenting Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians along with Palestinian organizations like Al-Haq and Al Mezan—Amnesty has concluded that Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid, a category of international law named after the old South African system but distinct from that specific case.

The basis of the accusation is widely and deeply documented. Charges include extensive and ongoing dispossession of land and property, unlawful killing and arrest, denial of basic rights and freedoms, restrictions on movement, and much more. Some of these—particularly ongoing crimes in the West Bank—are well known. Amnesty goes beyond some earlier reports, however, in documenting how Israel has been engaging in some of these crimes since its foundation. They call for Israel to reform itself to be in compliance with international law and to offer justice to its past victims.

Continue reading “Rather than attack Amnesty for labeling Israel an apartheid state critics could address the actual problems”

The death of an elderly Palestinian-American on the West Bank last month highlights the worst aspects of Israeli policy.

By Melvin Goodman | CounterPunch | Feb 9, 2022

The Israeli investigation of this particular incident was far worse than a whitewash; it was unconscionable.

Israel dismisses charges of “apartheid against Palestinians” as anti-Semitic propaganda, and the United States has been an enabler of Israeli racism over the years with its hands-off attitudes toward the inhumanity of Israeli actions on the West Bank and Gaza. But the tragic death of an elderly Palestinian-American on the West Bank last month highlights the worst aspects of Israeli policy. The nature of the death, directly due to Israeli brutality and negligence, amounts to manslaughter. The outrageously tepid response from the Israeli military’s central command tells us everything we need to know about Israel’s unconscionable occupation policy.

Continue reading “Israel, an Apartheid Nation? Of Course!”

The PA’s duty own entanglement is enabling apartheid.

By Ramona Wadi | Middle East Monitor | Feb 8, 2022

If the deterioration of Palestinians’ political rights has been evident to anyone with or without a shard of humanity, why does the Palestinian Authority have to cling to such reports rather than set the alarm bells ringing itself?

Palestine is always defined by an indefinite present dissociated from its past, a bludgeoning lie against which Palestinians are always struggling. Ever since the UN recognised Israel’s colonial project as a state and projected the humanitarian paradigm onto the Palestinians driven out of their homes and land, it has become convenient for world leaders and diplomats to remain within those parameters.

It has also become incumbent upon human rights organizations to raise awareness of the ramifications of political issues that the international community prefers to ignore. Israeli apartheid is now a mainstream concept, yet Palestinians have been warning about violent, racist segregation and discrimination for years. “Zionism is apartheid,” declared the PLO in 1985, decades before the human rights organization B’Tselem declared Israel to be an apartheid state last year, followed by Human Rights Watch and, more recently, Amnesty International.

Continue reading “The PA shouldn’t need an Amnesty report to prove Israeli apartheid”

A recent physical attack on the Nassar family highlight the never ending struggle for Palestinian existence on their own land.

By Jonathan Kuttab | Friends of Sabeel North America (FOSNA) | Feb 2, 2022

The family’s persistence in remaining on the land has been one of the most remarkable examples of Palestinian sumud (or steadfastness) I have seen.

I have been associated with Tent of Nations and the Nassar family for many years. In fact, my law office in Jerusalem has been and continues to represent them in their ongoing legal battles to save their land from the Israeli government and the Jewish settlers who have been trying for years to steal it from them. I myself have participated in activities on their land. One time, I even found myself alongside Rev. Alex Awad and a Lutheran German minister alone with Daoud in confronting the settlers who were bulldozing into their land.

While the 100-acre farm has been in their family since their grandfather bought it over a century ago—and they have the documents to prove this!—the Nassar family’s attempts to hold onto their land and prevent the settlers from taking it over has been an ongoing battle. Every time we win a battle in the courts, new obstacles are created and new challenges arise. Because their title to the land is confirmed by law, Israel has been using new tactics, including claims for public expropriation and declarations that the entire area is “state land” and subject to confiscation.

Continue reading “Tent of Nations”

In Palestine, climate change is compounded by political and economic decisions.

By Muna Dajani | Al-Shabaka | Jan 30, 2022

In the case of Palestine, the effects of climate change are influenced and exacerbated by Israeli settler colonialism and theft of natural resources.

Overview

Through its participation in the 2021 UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) and other international forums, the Palestinian Authority (PA) continues to promote a state-centric approach to climate change that ultimately blocks legitimate climate and environmental justice in Palestine. In effect, Palestinian leadership has reduced the Palestinian liberation struggle – inherently a struggle for climate and environmental justice – to a failed state-building project since the 1993 Oslo Accords.

Justice is rarely addressed in these international conventions and forums, leaving Palestinians confined to the logic of international donors who seek to manage the occupation instead of pressuring Israel to end it. The normalization and depoliticization of Israel’s climate apartheid characterize the existing approach to addressing Palestine’s climatic and environmental issues, and they must be countered by Palestinians and international climate justice advocates alike.

Continue reading “Challenging Israel’s climate apartheid in Palestine”

By forcing Elbit Systems to close one of its factories, we showed what direct action can achieve when governments remain indifferent to Israeli apartheid.

By Huda Ammori | +972 Magazine  | Jan 23, 2022

When every attempt to campaign through traditional methods is dismissed, and people’s lives are at stake, it is our duty to take direct action.

Earlier this month, we at Palestine Action received thrilling news: Israel’s largest arms company, Elbit Systems, announced that it had decided to sell its weapons factory in Oldham, a town in the north of England, and leave the area for good.

Through 18 months of sustained direct action, and with the unwavering support of the local community, our #ShutElbitDown campaign made it intolerable for the Israeli arms factory to continue operating on our doorstep. This is a welcome victory for all those who have worked tirelessly to campaign for the rights of Palestinians, and, crucially, for the Palestinian people themselves.

The case against Elbit is clear: its weapons — drones, tanks, bullets and more — are developed and marketed through being “tested” on the captive population of the Gaza Strip, which is besieged under an illegal military blockade. These products are then sold on to other brutal regimes, further violating human rights around the globe — for example, in occupied Kashmir. Yet despite Elbit’s immorality, the British government has been more than happy to assist the company in facilitating such crimes against humanity.

Read the full article here →

A complaint arguing that a Reform synagogue violated New York labor law could point toward a new strategy for Palestinian rights advocates.

By Isaac Scher | Jewish Currents | Jan 25, 2022

The facts of the case show a notable synagogue struggling with whether to recognize anti-Zionism as a legitimate mode of Jewish life.

On July 22nd, Jessie Sander was fired from her job as a Hebrew teacher in the education program of the Westchester Reform Temple, a high-profile congregation in Scarsdale, New York. According to a legal complaint obtained by Jewish Currents, the dismissal—which occurred before Sander, 26, had even met her students—came in response to a blog post Sander co-wrote criticizing Israel.

Sander had been offered the job on May 10th, the same day that Israel initiated an aerial bombardment of Gaza that killed, according to the most recent count, 260 Palestinians over the course of 10 days. On May 20th, the day Israel and Hamas agreed to a cease-fire, Sander and a friend published the blog post, in which they condemned Israeli “settler-colonial violence” and referred to themselves as anti-Zionists. “Being anti-Zionist has made us even more invested in building Jewish community and fighting for justice for all Jews,” they wrote. “Jews in the United States must speak out against genocide in our name and state-sponsored murder disguised as support for Jewish people.”

Continue reading “A Hebrew teacher called herself an Anti-Zionist. She was fired.”

At around 3:00 am Wednesday morning Israeli forces raided the Salhiya family home in Sheikh Jarrah and forcibly displaced the 15 family members living inside the house before demolishing the family’s home.

By Yumna Patel | Mondoweiss | Jan 19, 2022

The Salhiya family, like the other Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah under threat of forced expulsion, were displaced from their homes during the Nakba in 1948, and were settled into Sheikh Jarrah as refugees.

After a standoff that captured global attention, Israel forcibly displaced a Palestinian family from their home and demolished it in the middle of the night on Wednesday, in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

At around 3:00 am Wednesday morning Israeli forces raided the Salhiya family home in Sheikh Jarrah and forcibly removed the 15 family members living inside the house.

Continue reading “‘Two-time refugees’: Israel forcibly expels Palestinian family from Sheikh Jarrah, demolishes their home”

At a summer camp for kids from conflict zones, I met my brave, funny friend Aseel. He was Palestinian. I was Israeli. When he was killed by police, my hope for our future died with him.

By Roy Cohen | The Guardian | Jan 13, 2022

That year, I got a glimpse of the connections that were possible between Palestinians and Israelis. Our relationships would always be complicated, but we had discovered we had a lot in common, and we had a lot to say.

On 11 May 2021, I was sitting with a small group in a cafe in southern Tel Aviv, studying Arabic. Our teacher, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, had been telling us that he and his pregnant Jewish wife kept getting turned down by landlords who would not rent their property to a “mixed” couple. We were almost at the end of the three-hour class when air raid sirens sounded. A few days earlier, missiles had been launched from Gaza into Israel, but this was the first time they had hit Tel Aviv. Beyond the fear of an airstrike, I had a sad, heavy feeling. I had recently returned to live in Israel after 15 years studying and working abroad. I remembered a time, in the mid-1990s, when I had believed that Israel was going to be different, more just and less violent. That belief now felt like a distant memory.

My faith in Israel’s future had been inspired by an experience I shared as a teenager with a group of extraordinary people. As we waited for the rocket fire to stop, I recalled one of those people in vivid detail, a person I have barely been able to talk about in my home country for more than 20 years. His name was Aseel Aslih. Continue reading “‘In our teens, we dreamed of making peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Then my friend was shot’”