PYN, Paz Ahora, ISM Spain: Breaking
the Siege of Gaza, Taking to the Streets
Palestinian Youth Network (PYN), Paz Ahora, and ISM Spain
March 7th, 2008
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Breaking the
Siege of
Gaza, Taking to the Streets
After three
and a half weeks of waiting at Rafah with much needed medicines for
Gaza, on the evening of Wednesday, March 5, Saif Abu Keshek, General
Coordinator of the Palestinian Youth Network (PYN) managed to enter
the besieged Gaza Strip. Carrying 50,000 euros worth of medicines
unavailable or in very short supply in Gaza, Saif has been at Rafah
since February 12, 2008, waiting for permission to enter, each day
told to wait a little longer. “I finally made it in,” said Saif,
“but there are tons more aid for Gaza in dozens of trucks, still
held up at the border.”
Last week’s
Israeli military onslaught on Gaza, which killed over 120
Palestinians, many of them women and children, was met with
deafening silence from government leaders and international
agencies. This reality should not only sadden and enrage us, but
also make us realize how important it is that civil society steps up
to defend human rights in the face of organized impotence. Saif’s
entry into Gaza shows that the siege can be broken, but it needs
pressure and persistence and pressure, which governments and the
United Nations are not willing to exert. Currently that is not
happening, and as the situation worsens, foreign journalists are
being told to leave the Strip.
On the evening
of Sunday, March 2, Palestinians young and old took to the streets
of
Ramallah banging loudly on pots and pans, blowing whistles, and
screaming for people to wake up! Wake up we must. We must wake up
and believe that we indeed have the power to effect change; then we
must organize to show our representatives and decision-makers our
strength.
Things that
you can do:
U.S.
citizens — President Bush’s FY2009 budget request to Congress
includes $2.55 billion in military aid to Israel, a 9% increase over
actual spending in FY2007. This increase in military aid is the
first installment of a ten-year plan, signed by Israel and the
United States in August 2007, to increase military aid to Israel by
25%, totaling $30 billion over the next decade. Organize delegations
to go meet with your congressional representative. Send your
congressperson a letter here:
salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/641/t/2439/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=23113
Everyone – If
the United Nations is not willing to hold Israel accountable for
Palestinian lives, we can, by working on a grassroots level to
isolate Israel. Please step up the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and
Sanctions) Campaign. Work on getting your schools, unions, places of
worship, etc. to condemn Israeli atrocities, boycott Israel, and
divest from companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of
Palestinian land. Latest statement from the Congress of South
African Trade Unions (COSATU):
www.cosatu.org.za/press/2008/mar/press1.htm
Below is an
email sent from Saif on March 3, two days before entering Gaza,
describing the scene on the border. You can contact Saif in Gaza at:
+970-599-963-273.
————–
Escaping Death
March 3, 2008
The sound of
ambulance sirens all over the place; wounded people here and there…
This one is shouting and the other almost dying; and its red…
everywhere is filled with blood. “Run fast,” I heard them shouting.
“We need an ambulance, now, now, now… This guy is dying. Please help
him, please bring a doctor, give him pain killers… Do anything, just
help him.”
The medical
response is much slower than his painful cries. The medical workers
must check every one. They must decide who is more critical to move
first, taking the risk that someone may die before being checked.
Hundreds of people are waiting on the other side. Some people have
been waiting for a month to go back to Egypt; Palestinians who
entered to visit their families and now have no exit. Others,
Egyptians who went to visit Gaza and are now stuck. But the most
compelling are the Palestinian mothers and other family members who
are watching the ambulances depart with their loved ones, praying
that they will see them again, but not knowing. They cannot know.
Maybe they will die along the way? Or perhaps they will receive the
needed treatment but then get stuck in a detention center before
being allowed to go back home. You can never know. In this place
every thing is luck, or casualty.
I told them we
have medicine to take to Gaza; this medicine is needed for urgent
operations. They answered, “well, many wounded people are now in
Egypt, why you don’t give your medicine to an Egyptian hospital?”
Did they really open the border? Who is going to be with the wounded
ones? They will see no family before going back to Gaza. Visits are
very restricted, and you can talk to no one.
These people
are escaping death, but to an unknown destiny. They hope to find
some mercy away from the Israeli killing machine. They are in an
ambulance taking them to a hospital, and they don’t know when they
will return home, if they will. How painful it is to be wounded,
almost dying, with no family around you, with no visitors. And how
painful it is for any family not to be with their loved ones while
they are being treated, or maybe living their last moments in this
life. For some these last moments can be the only peaceful moments
in their life, what an irony, you escape death to live your last
moments dying away from your family.
The brutality
of this occupation, that it is living in us, it is living
everywhere, hunting us wherever we go. Perhaps some managed to
escape death today, but death is still hunting the rest in Gaza.
Isn’t it time
to reclaim the streets? Isn’t it the time to force change?
How many more
must die before we realize that our silence is just part of the
story; that one protest is not the answer; that the life of many
Palestinians
depends on what the civil society may or may not do? Maybe it is
time to get more radical. Maybe the Palestinians will help us to
escape death, a different kind of death — the death of our humanity!
Saif
Source Site:
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2008/03/07/pyn-paz-ahora-ism-spain-breaking-the-siege-of-gaza-taking-to-the-streets/
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