Israel Economic Protests: What Game is Being Changed?

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This past April, the Forward reported:

(The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) has reported that poverty is almost twice as widespread in Israel, 19.9% of the population, compared to the OECD average, 10.9%. The gap between the overall standard of living in Israel and that of the lowest tenth of the population was three times higher than the OECD average. In its latest release of data, made public April 12, the OECD reported that 39% of Israelis find it “difficult” or “very difficult” to live on their current incomes, well above the OECD average of 24%.

Those stats might explain this more recent news out of Israel:

More than 150,000 protesters took to the streets in 12 Israeli cities, calling for a change in the division of wealth and the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

In Tel Aviv, an estimated 100,000 protesters marched from Habima Square to the Tel Aviv Museum. “We are happy to see the people of Israel taking to the streets, each in their own city, each with their own troubles, but many troubles that are common to all of us,” said one of the organizers, Yonatan Levy.

This one is a game changer, no question, but the jury is still out on how much it might eventually change, or what the game even is. Indeed, as Dahlia Scheindlin and Joseph Dana have just reported in +972:

Every grievance is coming out: there are slogans against the huge concentration of the country’s wealth into the hands of a very few, slogans raging against enormous economic gaps between rich and poor in Israel, lists of demands for just resource distribution and for various elements of a welfare state, salary hikes and lower costs, better education conditions and health care; against the national housing committees law, against the government, for Tahrir. At 10pm on Friday night, when a song group spontaneously burst into chants of “The people! Want! Social Justice!” one young woman sang out beatifically, “The people! Want! All Sorts of Things!”

It’s also notable that one critical cause of this economic disparity is glaringly absent from the protesters’ concern, as Aziz Abu Sarah noted last week:

What amazes me is many Israelis’ inability to make the connection between the continuation of the occupation and the domestic problems Israel faces today; Israel is building constantly in the West Bank but it is failing to provide housing to its citizens within Israel proper. The current Israeli government’s focus on improving living standards in settlements while failing to do the same for the rest of the country is a moral failure.

According to a Peace Now report published on July 20, settlers in the West Bank receive 69 percent discount on the value of the land (so that buyers have to pay only 31 percent of the price of the land) and 50 percent funding of the development costs of the building project. In 2009 Israel investment of settlements public building (excluding East Jerusalem) was 431 million shekels, which was 15.36 percent of all public investment in construction for housing that year, despite the fact that they compose only 4 percent of the residents of Israel.

Scheindlin/Dana drive this critical point home in their article as well:

On Friday, some protesters hassled other Palestinian protesters, citizens suffering from housing crises. It came to scuffles. The diminutive Palestinian flags they hung were removed. Joseph recalls the struggles against apartheid in South Africa and Jim Crow south. Can we imagine the ruling classes there demanding “social justice” without addressing their gravest internal injustices? What does the term “social justice” mean if so many who don’t have it are left out? Sure, let’s protest exorbitant housing costs – but why call it “social justice” if the very crux of social justice, namely equality, is not addressed? Can Israelis have a social justice revolution without speaking about the rights of people they control and occupy?

The remarkable power of these grassroots protests is undeniable – but just how far it goes in shifting power still remains to be seen.

(While we wait, however, at least we can enjoy this great mix by Israeli viral video satirist Noy Alooshe – see above…)

Jenin Freedom Theatre Raided: Please Respond with Support!

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Readers of this blog know I’ve been a huge fan of the Jenin Freedom Theatre ever since my visit there this past December.  I’m saddened to report that its facility was recently raided by the IDF.

From a 7/27 Freedom Theater press release:

Special Forces of the Israeli Army attacked the Freedom Theatre in Jenin Refugee Camp at approximately 03:30 this morning. Ahmad Nasser Matahen, a night guard and technician student at the theatre woke up by heavy blocks of stone being hurled at the entrance of the theatre.

As he opened the door he found masked and heavily armed Israeli Special Forces around the theatre. Ahmed says that the army threw heavy blocks of stone at the theatre, “they told me to open the door to the theatre. They told me to raise my hands and forced me to take my pants down. I thought my time had come, that they would kill me. My brother that was with me was handcuffed.“

The location manager of The Freedom Theatre, Adnan Naghnaghiye was arrested and taken away to an unknown location together with Bilal Saadi, a member of the board of The Freedom Theatre. When the general manager of the theatre Jacob Gough from UK and the co-founder of the theatre Jonatan Stanczak from Sweden arrived to the scene they were forced to squat next to a family with four small children surrounded by about 50 heavily armed Israeli soldiers.

Jonatan says: “Whenever we tried to tell them that they are attacking a cultural venue and arresting members of the theatre we were told to shut up and they threatened to kick us, I tried to contact the civil administration of the army to clarify the matter but the person in charge hung up on me.“

The Freedom Theatre is still reeling from the murder of its director, Juliano Mer Khamis last April – and now this. It’s heartbreaking to contemplate that an institution whose only mission is to give hope and courage to the children of Jenin is physically under attack by both fundamentalist Muslims and the Israel Defense Forces.

Please click on the clips above and below to learn about the Jenin Freedom Theatre and why so many of us are inspired by its work. Then click here and please support them with a donation.

Massacre in Norway: “The Answer to Violence is Even More Democracy”

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So much to say about Friday’s tragic massacre in Norway. Chief among them: the death (I hope) of our misguided assumptions that terrorism must necessarily = Islamism.

Much has been written about the immediate media speculation – most notably by the New York Times – that this attack was carried out by an Islamist terror group. As journalist Ahmed Moor correctly points out, these assumption reveal just how deeply this meme is ingrained in the American consciousness – one that cuts across right-left political lines.

I’m also in full agreement with Moor when he says the real “Clash of Civilizations” is not between the West and Islam, but between “normal, sane people of the world and the right-wing zealots who see doom, destruction, hellfire and God’s Will at every turn:”

Anders Behring Breivik, Mohammed Atta and Baruch Goldstein are all cut from the same rotten cloth. Anwar Al-Awlaki and Glenn Beck – the peddlers of the faith – all share the same core afflictions.

These men are insecure, violently inclined, and illiberal. The outside world scares them. They hate homosexuals and strong women. For them, difference is a source of insecurity. Their values are militarism, conformism, chauvinism and jingoism. Worst of all they seek to pressure us into compliance while they work frantically to destroy themselves – and the rest of us with them.

All indications are that the hate-mongers – who are on the same side of this war, irrespective of religion – are winning in America. The unreflective, superficial, wan editors of the NYT are an indication of just how successful the right wing has been at eviscerating the left.

Terror expert Robert Lambert actually warns that ultra-nationalists pose an even greater threat than al-Qaeda, citing a disturbing litany of European plots that were foiled before they were able to be carried out. (Of course, as the example of Timothy McVeigh tragically reminds us, we Americans should not be so blase as to assume ultra-nationalist terror is only a European problem.)

What should be our response?  I can think of none better than that of Norway’s Prime Minister, Jens Stoltenberg. (Oh, would that we had heard these kinds of words from President Bush following 9/11):

This is a message from all of Norway: You will not destroy us. You will not destroy our democracy or our quest for a better world. ..This night we will comfort each other, talk with each other and stand together. Tomorrow we will show the world that Norway’s democracy grows stronger when it is challenged…

We must never cease to stand up for our values. We have to show that our open society can pass this test too, and that the answer to violence is even more democracy, even more humanity, but never naivete.  This is what we owe to the victims and to those they hold dear.

May the memory of the victims be for a blessing.

Boycott Law: Israel Further Delegitimizes Itself

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The Knesset’s new “anti-boycott law” in a nutshell:

According to the law, a person or an organization calling for the boycott of Israel, including the settlements, can be sued by the boycott’s targets without having to prove that they sustained damage. The court will then decide how much compensation is to be paid. The second part of the law says a person or a company that declare a boycott of Israel or the settlements will not be able to bid in government tenders.

The upshot? For comparison purposes, consider this: if this law had been passed by the US Congress, the city of Montgomery could have legally sued MLK for leading a boycott against its bus system.

My two cents? Israel, a country that repeatedly claims the mantle of “the only democracy in the Middle East” is fast dismantling its own democracy. Knesset member Nitzan Horowitz put it about as well as it could be put, I think:

We are dealing with a legislation that is an embarrassment to Israeli democracy and makes people around the world wonder if there is actually a democracy here.

And I’d only add this: any law that manages to unite the Anti-Defamation League and Jewish Voice for Peace in opposition has to be one helluva stinker.

Here’s the thing: Israel and its “right or wrong” advocates have been working overtime fighting what it considers to be “delegitimization” of the Jewish state. But for all the effort exerted, in the end it is Israel that delegitimizes itself by passing increasingly anti-democratic legislation such as this. It’s not the first time we’ve seen the Knesset pass such a bill, and although it pains me to say so, I believe we’re going to see similarly odious laws coming down the pike in the future.

Among the many reactions to this law from throughout Israeli society, I found it extremely notable that Peace Now – an organization that has resolutely refused to support boycotts – has now called for a boycott of settlement products in reaction to the legislation.

Hear, hear. If you believe that the Occupation is immoral and unjust, then boycotting products produced in the Occupied Territories is a moral and just thing to do.

Even if you’re queasy about a full-blown boycott of all Israeli products, please consider boycotting products produced in West Bank settlements. Click here for a full list of settlement products as well as companies that engage in West Bank construction and services. If you’d like to sign on to a public settlement boycott effort, I encourage you to join Code Pink’s “Stolen Beauty” campaign of Ahava beauty products, which come from the Occupied West Bank settlement of Mitzpe Shalem.

(For a detailed guide to the implications of the new law, check out Noam Sheizaf’s excellent piece in +972. )

New Clergy Report: Workers Speak out on Hyatt Injustice

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Please, please read the recently released “Open the Gates of Justice: A Clergy Report on Working Conditions at Hyatt Hotels.”

Readers of this blog know I’ve long been standing in solidarity with Hyatt workers who have called for boycotts at eighteen hotels across the US. We’ve watched with deep dismay as Hyatt, a multi-billion dollar corporation, has eliminated jobs, replaced career housekeepers with minimum wage temporary workers, and imposed dangerous workloads on those who remain.

The centerpiece of this new report is the direct testimony of hotel workers themselves, who speak eloquently to the injustices they endure – as well as their desire only to be valued as workers for the important work they do for Hyatt hotels. Their testimonies came from numerous interviews conducted by clergy from across the country who fervently believe that the struggle for worker justice is a central tenet of all of our faith traditions.

From the introduction to the report:

It is part of the purpose of this report to challenge the complacency that we and the mainstream religious community have previously exhibited to these business practices, to identify these practice as oshek/oppression, and to propose steps that we, as people of faith, can do to stand in solidarity with workers as they challenge their employers to live up to the ideals set by our religious traditions for more equitable workplaces and a more equitable society.

I was also thrilled to read enthusiastic support for the report in a recent Forward editorial:

(This) much is clear: The extensive documentation and textual support in the rabbinical report is a welcome addition to a growing number of efforts to link Jewish law and scholarship to timely social concerns. Advocates for the environment, labor, sustainable agriculture and development policy increasingly use Jewish language and teachings to frame their arguments. The rabbinic report on Hyatt calls social teachings on labor “the best kept secrets of our religious tradition.” Not anymore.

And click here to read a substantive feature on the report from the Boston Jewish Advocate that just came out today.

Action Alert: Free Captain Jack and the US Boat to Gaza!

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This from Joseph Dana yesterday:

The US boat to Gaza, The Audacity of Hope, is dead in the water. Its captain, an American citizen who goes only by the name Captain Jack, will be brought before a judge on felony charges on Tuesday in Athens. Passengers on the ship have been given the freedom to leave the military port where the boat is currently detained but crew members have been forced to stay on board. Many passengers are choosing to stay with the ship and its captain out of solidarity for their plight. Some passengers have begun a hunger strike to protest the Greek government and its handling of the US boat captain…

Saturday night, charges against the US captain were elevated to felony charges for which he could face jail time. This has generated guilt among the passengers of the US boat split between leaving the boat and standing in solidarity with their captain. Some passengers have already left Athens, including the Pulitzer Prize winning author Alice Walker. Other passengers have begun a hunger strike in protest of the Greek government.

Please join me in voicing your protest over the Greek government’s unjust treatment of Capt. Klusmire and the passengers of Flotilla II. Here is some contact info:

– Call the State Department at  (202) 647-4000. Ask for the Overseas US Citizen Services Duty Officer and you can speak to a live State Department official.

– E-mail the US Embassy in Athens at: athensamemb@state.gov or  athensamericancitizenservices@state.gov.

– Call the US Embassy in Athens at 011-30-210-721-2951.

– Please also try to call, fax or email your members of Congress.

When you call, I recommend focusing on US to Gaza’s three key requests:

– That the State Department fulfill its duty to advocate on behalf of Captain Klusmire and insist that Greek authorities drop the charges against him.

– That the State Department demand the immediate release of the US boat, The Audacity of Hope, and allow it to sail to Gaza.

– That the State Department demand the Greek Government stop the harassment of all boats involved in a nonviolent action and to let the entire Freedom Flotilla go.

Volunteering + Values: What’s Motivating the Jewish Young Folk?

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Repair the World, has just released “Volunteering+Values,” a report commissioned  “to understand the full extent of Jewish young adults’ volunteer habits and preferences.”  I’d say its findings/recommendations contain implications that North American Jewish communal institutions would do well to heed.

Conducted by the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis
University and Gerstein|Agne Strategic Communications, V+V surveyed a sample of Jewish young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 and investigated their volunteer commitments and attitudes.

Among the findings I found notable:

Only a small portion of Jewish young adults prefer to or actually do volunteer with Jewish organizations … The minority of Jewish young adults who volunteer through Jewish organizations do so to support their own people and community. By contrast, the vast majority of Jewish young adults say it does not matter if they volunteer with a Jewish or non-Jewish organization.

Hand in hand with this finding, the report noted a growing universalist identity among Jewish young people:

Jewish young adults are primarily drawn to service through universal rather than Jewish-based values or identity … Only a very small portion of Jewish young adults volunteer as a means to represent the Jewish community to the larger society.

Not surprisingly to me, many Jewish young people seem to be turned off by what they perceive as the overly tribal concerns of the organized Jewish community:

Today’s Jewish young adults have grown up amidst and are at home with ethnic and religious diversity … As a result, most are concerned for all victims of poverty or injustice, not just those who are Jewish. It appears that they do not believe that Jewish organizations share this concern for universal causes.

I was particularly struck that Israel ranked consistently at the bottom of the list of priorities of young Jews. According to one graph, only 1% of those surveyed cited Israel/Middle East Peace as an “issue focus of primary volunteer work” (at the top of the list: “Material Assistance to the Needy.”) Another graph charted the geographic focus of primary volunteer work thus: 79%: Local Community, 13%: Domestic Non-Local, 4%: Developing World, 3%: Israel. (This trend is particularly noteworthy since the primary sample used by V+V was the Birthright applicant pool – a data base of 300,000 young Jews who either participated or applied for a Birthright Israel trip between 2001 and 2010.)

Among the many strategic implications identified by the study, this one resonated for me in particular:

Efforts are needed to educate Jewish young adults of the deep connection between Jewish thought and volunteering without implying that it is an exclusively Jewish perspective or only pertains to support of the Jewish community. Jewish young adults, regardless of denomination or level of religious involvement, should be encouraged to “own” a Jewish perspective on service. Widespread efforts are needed that draw attention to and link the universal and Jewish values that Jewish young adults already hold with the causes about which they care most deeply.

As always, I’d love to hear reactions.

Freedom Flotilla II Ready to Set Sail

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A year after the tragedy aboard the Mavi Marmara, Freedom Flotilla II to Gaza is getting ready to set sail. This time around it will include a US-flagged boat, “The Audacity of Hope,” that will carry dozens of American activists. Click above to watch an interview with two such Americans: attorney Richard Levy and my friend Kathy Kelly, from Voices for Creative Nonviolence.

Here’s Kathy:

It isn’t just a matter of humanitarian cargo being brought into Gaza. It’s a matter of people having been subjected to a state of siege, isolated, 45 percent unemployment, inability to reconstruct after the terrible assaults in Operation Cast Lead, people being trapped, young people not being able to get out to avail themselves of education. There are so many reasons why this siege is wrongful. And so, I think it’s misleading to think that we’re people that are trying to be charitable. We’re people who are trying to say that it’s wrong to impose collective punishment on a civilian population because you want to affect their governance.

(Click here for a full transcript of the interview.)

Joseph Dana will be aboard “The Audacity of Hope” and will report on his experiences for The Nation, blog on +972, and, as usual, send out his ubiquitous tweets via @ibnezra. Medea Benjamin will also be on the boat and will be posting reports on the Code Pink Blog. Other American passengers include Gabriel Schivone, a young Jewish Voice for Peace member, and novelist Alice Walker. (Click here for her essay, “Why I’m Sailing to Gaza.”)

Readers of my blog know how I feel about Israel’s immoral, illegal blockade of Gaza. I also remain firm in my agreement with the UN Human Rights Council report findings that the Israeli military attack on Mavi Marmara passengers amounted to “extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution.”  (Among those killed was an American, Furkan Dogan, who was shot while videotaping the attack. The US has thus far refused to hold Israel accountable for killing an American citizen in international waters.)

The IDF is already holding military exercises in anticipation of Flotilla II. We can only hope and pray for a peaceful conclusion to this peaceful act of civil disobedience.

For their part, the American passengers of “The Audacity of Hope” have sent the following letter to President Obama:

As U.S. citizens we expect our country and its leaders to help ensure the Flotilla’s safe passage to Gaza – as our country should support our humanitarian demand that the Gaza blockade be lifted. This should begin by notifying the Israeli government in clear and certain terms that it may not physically interfere with the upcoming Flotilla of which the U.S. boat—The Audacity of Hope — is part. We—authors, builders, firefighters, lawyers, social workers, retirees, Holocaust survivors, former government employees and more—expect no less from our President and your administration.

Our boat will sail from the eastern Mediterranean in the last week of June. We shall be grateful to you for acting promptly and decisively to uphold the rights of civilians to safe passage on the seas.

JRC Israel/Palestine Study Tour Featured in +972!

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Aziz Abu Sarah has just posted a wonderful piece in +972 about our JRC trip to E. Jerusalem and the West Bank last December:

To my knowledge this is unprecedented, a delegation of Jewish congregants sleeping in Palestinian refugees homes, eating from their food, playing games with their children and grandchildren—a few even smoking hookah all night long with the youth of the camp. They talked about music, life, culture, romance, and–against my advice–even politics. The host families were the average Palestinian families and not the elite Palestinians. Some family members did not speak English, yet they did not have a problem communicating. They proved that the language of humanity transcends any linguistic boundaries…

Some Jewish extremists claim that if a Palestinian state is to be created, the Jews will not be able to visit their holy sites in the West Bank. They argue that Palestinians would not grant them the freedom to worship there. This argument is the basis for many settler justifications of the Occupation.

Nineteen Jews proved that this notion is not necessarily true. The Palestinian families in Deheisheh Refugee Camp did not mind hosting Jews, not just in hotels but rather in their homes. They stayed under the same roof, with no protection, no weapons or checkpoints. They were safe because they came as friends, not as enemies. They came with flowers and gifts, not with guns.

Hotel Workers Speak Out Against “Un Troussage De Domestique”

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Having been involved in the Hyatt boycott here in Chicago, I’m familiar with the hotel chain’s increasingly abysmal record on worker safety. Now I’m learning that the issue of sexual assault against hotel workers in general has long been a serious problem, long predating the current unpleasantness with Dominique Strauss-Kahn:

On June 2, hotel workers held speak-outs on sexual harassment and assault by customers in eight cities. The events were organized by UNITE HERE, the hotel union.

“These customers think they can use us for anything they want, because we don’t have the power that they have or the money that they have,” said Yazmin Vazquez, a Chicago room attendant.

Hotel workers face injuries from the physical stress of their work, including the awkward lifting of heavy mattresses hundreds of times a day. But the hidden hazard of hotel work, housekeepers say, is customers’ assaults on their dignity and physical integrity.

Workers report that male customers expose themselves, attempt to buy sexual services, grab and grope them and, in some cases, attempt to rape them…

The management response has been “deafening silence,” (said Annemarie Strassel of UNITE HERE), adding that she’s aware of only one hotel in which a staff meeting was called around the issue.

(h/t: Susan Klonsky)