“Why We Sailed to Gaza” – A Conversation with Mairead Maguire and Yonatan Shapira

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Please mark your calendar for the next Ta’anit Tzedek fast day, Thursday, October 21, 12:00 pm (EST), which we will mark with a conference call, “Why We Sailed to Gaza” featuring Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire and Israeli peace activist Yonatan Shapira.

Earlier this month, both Maguire and Shapira recently set sail on flotilla of boats attempting to break the siege of Gaza by bringing symbolic amounts of humanitarian aid to its citizens.

Maguire is a well-known Irish peace activist who co-founded the “Community for Peace People” during the period known as “The Troubles” in Northern Ireland. She subsequently helped found the Nobel Womens Initiative, a group of six women Nobel Peace Laureates devoted to strengthening women’s rights and and advocating for justice and peace around the world.

More recently, Maguire has become involved in activism for peace and justice in Israel/Palestine. She has sailed on three boats to Gaza, in October 2008 (when they reached Gaza), on June 2009 and then on the MV Rachel Corrie in June 2010. In 2009 and 2010, the boats were intercepted by the Israeli Navy and she was arrested along with all the passengers. On her most recent attempt, Maguire remained in prison as she fought Israel’s efforts to deport her. The Israeli Supreme Court upheld the decision to deny her entry and she was deported from Israel earlier this month.

Shapira was an officer in the Israeli Air Force and flew hundreds of missions over the territories in a Blackhawk helicopter squadron during the course of his eleven year career. Following a targeted bomb assassination of a Hamas leader that killed fourteen civilians in Gaza, he became a prominent Israeli “refusenik,” authoring the Pilot’s Letter – a 2003 statement signed by 27 Israeli pilots who publicly refused to fly missions over the Occupied Territories. Since that time, Yonatan has gone on to co-found “Combatants for Peace” a prominent organization in the growing Israeli Refusenik movement.

Shapira has also become a public supporter of the internal Israeli movement for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) known as “Boycott from Within,” and regularly participates in Palestinian nonviolence campaign in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. According to witnesses aboard the “Jewish boat” to Gaza earlier this month, Shapira nonviolently resisted when the IDF boarded the ship and was tazered repeatedly in the heart by the senior commanding officer.

Here’s the call-in info:

Access Number: 1.800.920.7487

Participant Code: 92247763#

There will be a question and answer period during the call – please join the conversation! (Big thanks to our co-sponsors, Jewish Voice for Peace, the Shalom Center, and Shomer Shalom Institute for Jewish Nonviolence.)

Another Palestinian Gandhi Sent to Prison

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We’ve often heard asked “where are the Palestinian Gandhis?” The answer? Too many of them are sitting in Israeli prisons.

Exhibit A: Abdallah Abu Rahmah, a leader of the nonviolent campaign in the West Bank village of Bil’in, who was arrested last year by soldiers who raided his home at the middle of the night. An Israeli military court exonerated him on charges of stone-throwing and arms possession (the “arms” turned out to be empty bullet casings and tear gas canisters that Abu Rahmah had collected to prove IDF violence against demonstrators) but he was eventually convicted of “organizing illegal demonstrations” and “incitement.”

Here’s how Israeli activist Jonathan Pollak characterized these events last year:

On a pitch black early December night, seven armored Israeli military jeeps pulled into the driveway of a home in the West Bank town of Ramallah. Dozens of soldiers, armed and possibly very scared, came to arrest someone they were probably told was a dangerous, wanted man – Abdallah Abu Rahmah, a high school teacher at the Latin Patriarchate School and a well-known grassroots organizer in the village of Bil’in.

Every Friday, for the past five years, Abdallah Abu Rahmah has led men, women and children from Bil’in, carrying signs and Palestinian flags, along with their Israeli and international supporters, in civil disobedience and protest marches against the seizure of sixty percent of the village’s land for Israel’s construction of its wall and settlements. Bil’in has become a symbol of civilian resistance to Israel’s occupation for Palestinians and international grassroots.

Abu Rahmah was taken from his bed, his hands bound with tight zip tie cuffs whose marks were still visible a week later, and his eyes blindfolded. A few hours later, as President Obama spoke of “the men and women around the world who have been jailed and beaten in the pursuit of justice” upon receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, Abu Rahmah’s blindfold was removed as he found himself in a military detention center. He was being interrogated about the crime of organizing demonstrations. In occupied Palestinian territories, Abu Rahmah’s case is not unusual – about 8,000 Palestinians currently inhabit Israeli jails on political grounds.

Abu Rahmah’s sentence came down today: one year in prison, a six months suspended sentence for three years, and a fine of 5,000 shekels. The military prosecution is expected to appeal, which means he is likely to remain in jail indefinitely. Another Bil’in activist, Adeeb Abu Rahmah, was also sentenced for twelve months on similar charges but still remains in prison after fifteen months while prosecutors continue to appeal his conviction.

How can we in the Jewish community help promote peace and justice in Israel/Palestine? By standing in solidarity with courageous Palestinian leaders such as Abdallah Abu Rahmah. Click here to learn more about his case and how you can support his cause.

The IDF Belly Dance: This Is What Occupation Does to the Occupied and the Occcupier

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From Ha’aretz:

A video uploaded to YouTube shows an Israel Defense Forces soldier wriggling in a belly dance beside a bound and handcuffed Palestinian woman, to the cheers of his comrades who were documenting the incident.

The IDF’s internal investigation department ordered an immediate probe into the matter…

As the article notes, it’s only the latest incident of an IDF “Abu Ghraib-style” scandal – but don’t think for a second that all is well now that the IDF is “investigating the matter.” I’m in agreement with blogger Mitchell Plitnick, who points out that these incidents are just the outward manifestation of something much more fundamental and much more troubling:

In my work I’ve come to meet and get to know many soldiers, from several countries (most, of course, either Israeli or American), both active ones and veterans. I know that most soldiers do not behave this way. But it is clear, from every war, conflict, police action and occupation that there are always some soldiers who do.

Israelis are no different, but there is something that is different about this dynamic. It is that these soldiers are the products of a militarized society which has been holding millions of people under military occupation, with no rights of citizenship, for over 43 years. That has a long term effect on both occupier and occupied.

These soldiers are young men and women, who are the second or even third generation of occupiers. They have been raised in a culture that, as is natural for an occupying power, both dominates the Palestinians and also fears them. That fear is not limited to terrorists, but extends to the very existence of the Palestinians, and their legacy of dispossession.

The New Jersey Standard’s Editorial Bigotry

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Last week, the New Jersey Jewish Standard ran an announcement of a same-sex union – this week, after receiving pressure from local traditional/orthodox rabbis, they have announced that they will no longer “run such announcements in the future.” They defended their action by stating that their paper “has always striven to draw the community together, rather than drive its many segments apart.”

Well, I’d say the Standard is about to learn the true meaning of “communal division.” Their editorial decision is particularly appalling as it comes on the heels of the suicide of a gay New Jersey university student who was the tragic victim of cyber-bullying. We’d do well to ask which is more important: the views of a religious minority or sensitivity to prejudice that literally has life or death implications?

Please, please write to the Standard and let them know how outraged you are. If you are Jewish, I encourage you to add that this kind of bigotry has no place in our community. Click here for the contact info.

Protest the FBI Raids – Support Freedom of Dissent in post 9/11 America!

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On September 24, the FBI raided eight homes and offices of antiwar activists in Chicago and Minneapolis and subsequently issued a summons for them to appear before a grand jury in Chicago. I won’t go into the details of this egregious violation of the Constitutional rights of US citizens because this Democracy Now piece (part one above, part two, below) does a thorough job in covering all the sordid details. (You can read the transcript here.)

If you live in the Chicago area (and are outraged at the increasing criminalization of dissent in post 9/11 America), I encourage you to attend a rally to against the raids and support of the peace activists subpoenaed by the FBI on Tuesday, October 5 at 8:30 am outside the Dirksen Federal Building, 230 S. Dearborn Avenue, Chicago.

If you can’t attend the rally, please join me and a growing list of signers who have added their names to the following interfaith statement (to sign, send an email to MMcConnell@afsc.org):

We are people of faith and conscience who condemn the recent FBI raids in Chicago as a violation of the constitutional rights of the people and organizations raided. They are a dangerous step to further criminalize dissent. The FBI raids chisel away and bypass fundamental constitutional rights by hauling activists before grand juries under the guise of national security. An overly broad definition of “material support for terrorism” in the June 2010 US Supreme Court ruling concerns us as people of faith who continue to be actively engaged in humanitarian work and peacemaking.

The real illegitimate activities are U.S. foreign policies that support war and occupation. We believe that peacemaking is a sacred commandment. We feel compelled to work to end military solutions that kill and maim innocent people, destroy civil society institutions, create massive poverty and dislocation of people from their homelands, militarize our own nation and continue to create more animosity against the United States, thus undermining our security.

We are committed to a just peace in Israel and Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and Colombia. Some of us have visited these conflicted areas and accompanied those most affected by the violence. Some of us have permanent staff and volunteers working nonviolently for a peaceful resolution to these conflicts. We all stand opposed to the United States’ and all nations’ support of military aid and military intervention in these countries. The infusion of military aid has exacerbated violence rather than resolved it.

We believe in a divine spirit of justice and hope that promotes understanding and equality of all humanity. We refuse to remain silent in the face of the latest efforts of the FBI to chill dissent against war by invading homes of peace activists and calling a grand jury with sweeping powers to manufacture fear. We denounce the use of fear and the far-reaching labeling of critical dissent as “terrorism” that tramples on not only our right, but our duty to dissent as people called to a moral standard of justice for all.

Calling Out Political Islamophobia

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Many of you, I’m sure, read about the Pew study last August that determined 18% of Americans (roughly one in five) believe that President Obama is a Muslim. And I’m sure many might be tempted to disprove this claim as patently ridiculous. My response? What should it matter if he was?

Let’s be honest. Those who cast doubt on Obama’s religious affiliation are not driven by compelling evidence – they are simply fomenting Islamophobia for abject political purposes.

Take a look at this interview clip with Sarah Palin (above). She purports to be making argument against a media “double standard” – but she plays her true cards when she refers to our president as “Barack Hussein Obama.”

This is about as patently cynical as it gets. It’s clear that Palin and her ilk aren’t really all that interested in media accountability or presenting anything resembling evidence. They’re really just riding a rising wave of American anti-Muslim prejudice, pure and simple.

My two cents? We need to spend less time trying to dissuade irrational people from holding irrational ideas and more time calling out these Islamophobes for who they really are. No, Obama is not a Muslim, but if we’re not troubled in the least by the prospect of a Muslim president, then it seem to me we should be prepared to stand up and say so in no uncertain terms.

The Settlement Freeze: Painted Into a Corner?

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The deadline on Israel’s “settlement freeze” has come and gone. On the West Bank, construction crews are gearing back up and the settler celebrations have begun. Abbas is mulling over his options with the Arab League. Once again, the peace process seems to be hanging by a thread.

For their part, many analysts are now using a “painted into a corner” metaphor to dissect the impact of the settlement freeze. Israeli analyst Nahum Barnea, for instance, recently opined that,

Three politicians – Barack Obama, Benjamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas – painted themselves into a corner and didn’t know how to get out of it.

And none other than King Abdullah of Jordan said this on the Daily Show last week:

We all got painted into a corner on the issue of settlements, unfortunately, and where we should have concentrated was on territories and the borders of a future Israeli-Palestinian two-state solution.

It’s bewildering to me that the issue of settlements can somehow considered to be a pesky distraction to the peace process. How can talks on “territories and borders” proceed with anything resembling good faith if one side settles these disputed areas with impunity and the “honest broker” to the proceedings refuses to rein it in? How can we be expected to take such a process seriously?

We already know that one of the main reasons for Oslo’s failure was the inability to deal with the settlement issue directly. As a result, Israel took that as an opportunity to significantly expand its settlement regime during the course of the “peace process.” This has brought us to where we are today: in the wake of Oslo more than 500,000 settlers now live throughout the West Bank in settlements and small cities, with special Israeli-only highways that effectively cut Palestinian territories into individual cantons separated by military checkpoints.

Have we learned nothing from past experience? Here’s lesson #1: the settlements are not a side issue. The Israel’s settlement of the West Bank and East Jerusalem are – and have always been – a central obstacle to the peace process. Until it is made to cease and desist, I can’t see how the latest round of talks can be considered anything but a charade.

Jews, Power and Privilege: A Sermon for Yom Kippur 5771

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From my Yom Kippur sermon yesterday:

For matter how painful the prospect, I don’t think we can afford to dodge this question. If we agree that the inequitable distribution of power and privilege is a critical problem for us and for our world, then there will inevitably be times in which we are faced with an intensely difficult question: does tribal loyalty trump solidarity with the oppressed?

Actually, I’m coming to believe that this is not the best way to frame the question. I don’t really think it’s all that helpful to view this issue as some kind of zero-sum game; to see it as a question of tribal allegiance; to insist that I either stand with my own people or I don’t. I prefer to say it this way: that it is in my self interest as a Jew to stand in solidarity with the oppressed because I believe that Jews cannot be fully human while they benefit from a system that denies others their own humanity. For those with power and privilege, the struggle against racism and oppression is fought knowing that our own liberation is also at stake.

Click below to read the entire sermon:

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The Supreme Sacrifice: A Sermon for Erev Yom Kippur 5771

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From my Erev Yom Kippur sermon last Friday:

And as I think about it, perhaps this is why we read a Martyrology on Yom Kippur. As we remember our martyrs, we search our own souls and ask ourselves honestly: what have we done in the past year to prove ourselves worthy of these profound sacrifices? What have we done to affirm that these people did not die in vain? Did we indeed honor their memories by transforming loss into justice and hope for our world?

Click below to read the entire sermon:

A JRC member recently asked why we never do the Martyrology service on Yom Kippur. I wrote back to the congregant – and I’ll confess to you now: I’ve never been a huge fan of this particular liturgy.

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Jewish Voice for Peace Launches Rabbinical Council