Thursday, June 2, 2011

Unarmed, Peaceful Demonstrations have been going on in Palestine for Years!!!

Joseph Dana is an Israeli-American writer and freelance journalist based in Tel Aviv and Ramallah. He recently read an Opinion by Thomas Friedman. It was titled: “Lesson from Tahrir Sqaure." The section that Joseph wanted to respond to was:  

If Palestinians peacefully march to Jerusalem by the thousands every Friday with a clear peace message, it would become a global news event. Every network in the world would be there. Trust me, it would stimulate a real peace debate within Israel — especially if Palestinians invited youth delegations from around the Arab world to join the marches, carrying the Saudi peace initiative in Hebrew and Arabic. Israeli Jews and Arabs should be invited to march as well. Together, the marchers could draw up their own peace maps and upload them onto YouTube as a way of telling their leaders what Egyptian youth said to President Hosni Mubarak: “We’re not going to let you waste another day of our lives with your tired mantras and maneuvering.”
 He replies, although the NYTimes refused to print it, with first-hand eye witness information. There have been many peaceful demonstrations but there was no stimulation to "a real peace debate in Israel as well as a “global news event.” instead "Israel invariably responds to them with harsh military repression."  He closes the letter by informing Mr. Friedman and other readers that "The unarmed Palestinian protest movement has been a reality in the West Bank for years. Yet Israeli society has failed to generate any 'real peace debate,' nor has a 'global news event' occurred. Instead, Israel continues to annex more Palestinian land, jail peaceful demonstrators, and deepen its occupation."  Full Article "Taking on Thomas Friedman over unarmed resistance"


Some Great information from the Comments of Thomas Friedman's article.
  1. Ike Solem, CA  Wrote: "Israel also takes an enormous amount of the water, diverting much of it to the 37 Israeli settlements in the area. In fact, the water allotted to 9,400 settlers equals one third of the water for all 2.5 million Palestinians on the entire West Bank."  Article   AND he makes a great point that I have never heard of: "... isn't there something a little odd about Israel and Saudi Arabia, historically the most important U.S. allies in the Middle East, being so opposed to legal separation of Church and State, a cornerstone of U.S. democracy?"

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