[GushShalom] "This is Sharonistan" - report on two anti-Wall events

[Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc)]

GUSH SHALOM  pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033 www.gush-shalom.org

International release, Nov. 8. 2003 

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"This is Sharonistan" - report on two anti-Wall events
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At the rendezvous point in the Liberty Bell Park. A hitch developed: the 
Jerusalem Ta'ayush people, who took upon themselves to organize the 
morning event, had underestimated the number of people. As more and 
more activists arrived  from Tel-Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem itself, it turned 
out that there weren't enough buses to transport everybody to the 
demonstration site in Sawahre, and the whole action was delayed for an 
hour. The mostly young organizers stayed remarkably calm: "It is very 
good that many came."

As the cavalcade set out at last across the invisible border between West 
and East Jerusalem, the activiststs meanwhile got detailed instructions for 
the eventuality of confrontation with the police. However, the 
contingency plans remained unused, no problems whatsoever with the 
police..But as we found later, the police was active further east, blocking 
the way for many Palestinian villagers who wanted to join the 
demonstration. Still. when we alighted from the buses, there was a 
considerable Palestinian crowd, of all ages, to welcome us. 

Sawahra valley. It  really looked like a replica of the Berlin Wall, that wall 
which had fallen exactly fourteen years ago - a long row of  giant concrete 
panels planted in the middle of a pastoral landscape. Did the Israeli military 
consciously emulate the East-German example? Or is this just what 
engineers/bureaucrats routinely come up with?

In no time, the dull grey was overlaid by an enormous lot of graffiti, as  
Israeli, Palestinian and international activists simultaneously pulled out 
spraypaint bottles and cheerfully set to work . There was complete 
freedom of speech - no attempts to censor or streamline:  "Barrier for 
peace" / No more ghettos! / No to the Apartheid Wall! / There are no good 
walls. / Here ends the Zionist dream and begins the nightmare. / Arabern 
raus, this is Sharonistan. / Zionism of dispossession. / Riv Muren 
Swedent. / Make peace - not walls./ Pull down the wall. / The Wall will fall. 
/ This wall is killing Israel, too. / Two states for two peoples. / Non au mur. 
/ Planting and sowing is better than the wall of blood. / One state for two 
peoples. / IDF go home. / The IDF is a terrorist organization. / Yes to 
reconciliation. / Remember the Warshaw Ghetto. / This is not the Israel we 
dreamed of. / Down with the wall. / Yes to peace - No to the wall. / Another 
future without a wall. / This is Israeli supremacy and Apartheid. / Yes to 
the Green Line. / Peace begins with vegetarianism. / This is not security, 
this is stupidity. / Ghetto Palestine. / Wall = ethnic cleansing. / Stop the 
shame! / The wall kills the chance for peace. / Concrete is not security. / 
Do you see a Nazi in the mirror? / We want peace, we don't want wall. / No 
to ghettos - Yes to compassionate listening. / Enough of Dispossession 
and Provocation; Long Live Peace and Brotherhood. / No hands meet 
when walls are built. / Let the Palestinians live! / Somebody is calling from 
the other side, do you listen? / Love thy neighbor. / Down with Zionist 
terrorism. / Long Live Free Palestine. / Peace Now! / Peace immediately! / 
Amor no guerra. ./ Remember the Maginot Line. /  Remember the Bar-Lev 
Line. / This is occupation is killing us. / Love without borders. / Legalize 
hash. / Education and not the wall. / The occupation kills, we want peace - 
and now. 

And, in some places also the standard inscription of each block (Ministry 
of Defence - Department of Construction) was transformed: Department of 
Destruction / Department of Occupation / Department of Apartheid / 
Ministry of Oppression. And the Japanese word for peace,  painted on 
many corners looked like an ornament. (Two separate groups of Japanese 
activists had arrived as well as the Buddhist monk, long-time resident of 
Jerusalem and a fixed feature of demonstrations.)

Then we set out in procession to the top of the hill, with Palestinian flags, 
rainbow peace flags, red flags of the DFLP, the round Gush Shalom Two-
Flag signs... En route, some information over the megaphones: The 
concrete blocks are not yet in their final place. Construction has been 
temporarily stopped by an appeal to the Supreme Court. The rally will take 
place at the wall site as designated by the army where Sawahre inhabitants 
have been maintaining a protest tent for the past month. 

Niham Abu-Gush, head of the Sawahre Civic Committee, addressed the 
gathered crowd: "Do you see the beautiful view of the valley? The 
mountain on the other side? When the wall is erected here, you will see 
nothing. And the houses over there have all got demolition orders." He 
was followed by Beate Zilversmidt of Gush Shalom ("The wall destroys 
Israel from the inside, economically and morally") and Yigal Bronner of 
Ta'ayush ("It has nothing to do with security; only with annexation and 
ethnic cleansing.")
			***
Between the morning action and the evening rally in Tel-Aviv, news 
broadcasts told of 11 Palestinians shot to death by soldiers in different 
locations during the past 48 hours...
			***
At Tel-Aviv's Cinematheque Square a giant screen was erected. In an 
effort to bring some of the occupation reality to the city, the images and 
the noise of bulldozers cutting down olive trees; soldiers shooting teargas 
grenades; demonstrators being dragged away from a bulldozer which they 
tried to block. Activists circulating among the crowd distributed a realistic 
replica of the confiscation order signed by General Moshe Kaplinsky of 
the Central Command: "Under my authority as commander of military 
forces and according to my judgment that it is needed for security reasons 
I order a strip of land at a varying width of 47 to 60 metres to be transferred 
to the possession of the army and be declared a closed military zone, as 
designated in the enclosed map." The map, however, marked the 
confiscated strip down a major Tel-Aviv thoroughfare...

Lin Dovrat and Hulud Badawi were the inspiring moderators, alternatingly 
in Hebrew and Arabic. Speeches were delivered by Einat Podgorny of 
Ta'ayush ("We will not stay silent about this crime and the destruction of 
our future"); Na'ama Nagar of ICAHD ("The Wall unilaterally annexes 
large parts of the West Bank, severely damaging property and living 
conditions"); the remarkably vivid Hannah Safran - Women's Peace 
Coalition (Israeli society is full of oppression, violence and hatred - 
against Palestinians, against migrant workers, against women, against the 
poor"); Adam Keller - Gush Shalom ("Sharon had  this annexation map 
ready since the 1970s, implementing it first through settlement activity, 
now through the Wall"); the poet Rawda Murkus ("At Tuwani village I 
feel occupied / And all women are occupied with me").

Most impressive was the direct appeal of Ossama Zachalke from the 
Sawahre Civic Committee who had joined the bus from Jerusalem. "People 
of Tel-Aviv! I came here to tell you what this wall will do to us in Sawahre.  
This is not a wall of separation between Israelis and Palestinians, but 
between Palestinians  and  Palestinians, between people of one  village. 
We in Sawahre are 30 000 people. The wall will divide us, 20 000 on one 
side, 10 000 on the other. Eight hundred families will be divided, in some 
places brothers are divided from each other, in another place a father and a 
son. In the one part, pupils will not be able anymore to go to school and it 
will be forbidden to die, as the cemetery will be on the other side."

Moderator Lin Dovrat then reminded the audience that Sawahre was but 
one of many dozens of afflicted towns and villages, and asked everybody 
to stay tuned for further activity, among other things signing the petition  
on the website: www.gader.org

                   The anti-Wall Coalition includes:
            Alternative Information Center * Black Laundry *           Coalition of 
Women for a Just Peace * Green Action *            Gush Shalom * 
HaKampus Lo Shotek * HaKav HaYarok *         Independent Media Group -
 Indymedia * Israeli Committee         Against House Demolitions * Mas'ha 
Group * One Struggle         * Peace Now * Ta'ayush - Arab-Jewish 
Partnership * Women                      Against The Wall * Yesh Gvul 


P.S.: The Israeli & Palestinian actions are part of a global campaign which 
includes demonstration in the U.S. (New York, Washington, Boston, 
Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco, New Orleans etc..; and one event or 
more in England, Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Holland, 
Norway, Sweden, Australia, South Africa, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, 
Bangladesh and Jordan - details on: 
http://stopthewall.org/worldwideactivism/62.shtml

Freelance photographer Eyal Ofer gave us the link to his recent series of 
professional photos of the Wall:  http://www.pbase.com/yalop/fence

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