Interview Daniel abugattasA PeruviAn-PAlestiniAn congressmAn

the voice of south AfricA

we Are with PAlestine

mAds gilbert

A A humAnitAriAn insPitAtion

M O T H E R P A L E S T I N E

the imPortAnce of internAtionAl suPPort

the humAnitAriAn situAtion in gAzA gAzA in numbers

Issue 2 . December 2014

Little girl rescued her toy after a night bombing in Gaza

Contributing writers Contributing organizations Andre V. Benites - Brazil Hoedje van Papier - The Netherland Ehab Zawati - Palestine Fourward Foundation - PeruGeorge Clark - United Kingdom Arvores Para o Planeta - Peru Tahiya Moosa - South Africa Asociación Civil Pasa La Voz- PeruTeus de Koning - The Netherlands Project Hope - Palestine Pavel Marmanillo - Peru Cuscopolita - Peru

graphiC artist

Ezequiel Valentín - Argentina Pavel M.

poets Mahmoud Darwish, Palestine Non Nominatus, Peru

The Grafitti spot 18

Since 2014

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Interview Daniel Abugattas. A Peruvian-Palestinian congressman

The Humanitarian Situation in GazaGaza in numbers

The importance of international support.

CONTENT

Mads GilbertA humanitarian inspiration

Uk and Palestine, a citizen’s opinionUK: “recognises the state of Palestine” 14

The voice of Sout AfricaWe are with Palestine 16

PoetrySilence of GazaHaiku for Gaza 20

GazaWar and Dignity, photo gallery 6

Dear ReaderThis past summer, Israel’s advanced military bombarded the tiny, impoverished and overpopulated Gaza Strip for a third time in six years. The military operation so called “Protective Edge” caused terrible consequences both physical and psychological upon the Gazans. The number of killed people ascended to more than two thousand. Furthermore, over 11,000 people were wounded and more than 100,000 Gazans were displaced. A frequent question is repeated: Why? Why do the Palestinians have to suffer all kinds of violence and discrimina-tion? Why do they, as part of the Human Kind, not have the chance to live in peace, without the daily humilia-tion and threat posed by the Israeli government and its systematic ethnic cleansing? Why do they have to suffer collective punishment in the form of the destruction of their homes and the limitation of their freedom? Why does the international community not have a stronger and active position, when one of the most powerful armies in the world creates chaos and instills horror on the lives of children, women and men who live under siege? Why have all these terrorist actions perpetrated by the Israeli government every single day against them in the name of some “divine right” not ended until now?

Back in 2007, Tel Aviv imposed a full blockade on the Gaza Strip after the ascent to power of the movement called Hamas. The members of Hamas exercised their right to resistance against the occupation in accordance with international law; nevertheless those actions are considered as acts of terrorism by the Israeli government and used over and over to justify new attacks.

At the same time, the international organization Euro-Mid1 has documented the use of Palestinian civilians as human shields by Israeli military forces in at least six cases in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis. These Gazans were held against their will for several hours or days to protect Israeli soldiers from fire whilst in the meantime they were subjected to systematic abusive and inhumane treatment, such as beating, humiliation and exposure to the hot sun for lengthy periods. In contrast, the Euro-Mid team did not find any evidence of Palestinians who were forced to stay in their homes or to use their bodies for the protection of Palestinian resis-tance factions, as charged by the Israeli government.

The indiscriminate attacks on noncombatants, deployment of unconventional weapons and the use of Pales-tinians as human shields are violations of international humanitarian law and constitute war crimes under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

Our main goal is to carry out the message of those who are suffering and do not have the opportunity to raise their voice, due to the blockade and the powerful Zionist lobby in the international press. The Palestinian people are limited in their basics rights and they live under a full Apartheid system, we cannot deny it.

The support that the Palestinian cause has received from all over the world is evidence that the international support can have a relevant role in the process of liberation of Palestine. Civilians and, in some cases, politicians from South Africa, The United Kingdom, Latin America, The Netherlands, Malaysia, Singapore, France, U.S.A, among others, have demonstrated against the illegal occupation, the violence, the bombing and the Apartheid that Palestine has suffered to date.

Please read and share. It will just take up a little of your time, whereas the impact will be multiplied, when your friends or relatives receive more information about what is happening in this faraway place, Palestine.

1 The Euro-Mid Observer for Human Rights is a nonprofit, nongovernmental human rights or-

ganization dedicated to exposing human rights violations and defending human rights.

More information at: www.euromid.org

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Mother Palestine #2

dr. mAds gilbert, a humanitarian inspiration

Mads Fredrik Gilbert (born June 2, 1947, Porsgrunn) is a Norwegian physician, humanitarian, activist and politician for the Revolutionary Socialist Party Red. He is a specialist in anesthesiology and head of the emergency medicine department at the University Hospital of North Norway and Professor of emer-gency medicine at the University of Tromsø.

Gilbert has vast experience from international hu-manitarian work, especially in locations where medical and political issues merge. Since 70’s, he has been actively involved with solidarity work con-cerning Palestinians, and he has served as a doctor during numerous periods in the Palestinian territo-ries and Lebanon.

He had spent two weeks in Gaza during Israel’s Op-eration “Cast Lead” attack in the winter of 2008-09, tending to the wounded and the dying in Al-Shifa hospital, and again for another week during a simi-lar assault -Operation Pillar of Cloud- in 2012.

The past summer, during the Israel’s Operation “Protective Edge”, he served in The Gaza Strip. His role represented vital importance in The Gaza Strip. Gilbert helped provide life-saving medical care dur-ing this summer’s 100-day attacks against Gaza. He spent 51 days in Al-Shifa hospital treating many of the 12,000 Palestinians who were wounded and killed in these attacks.

When he returned in October of this year and tried to enter in Gaza via the Erez crossing in Israel he was denied entry indefinitely. The Israeli government says that Gilbert is banned to enter Gaza for secu-rity reasons. The Norwegian embassy in Tel Aviv has taken up Gilbert’s case on his behalf after he was refused entry in October.

“When we came back to the Erez border station the Israeli soldiers told me I was not allowed to go into Gaza,” he told media.

“I had a valid permit for multiple entries, an invita-tion from the Palestinian Ministry of Health and a recommendation from the director at my hospital.”

In a written statement, Norway’s Secretary of State, Bard Glad Pedersen, said: “From the Norwegian perspective, we have raised Gilbert’s exclusion from Gaza and asked Israel to change their decision. The humanitarian situation is still difficult and there is a need for all health workers.”

Gilbert is a vocal critic of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and the blockade on the Gaza Strip. There are a lot of photos and television foot-age of Gilbert in his light green surgical wear in Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital treating wounded and dy-ing Gazans, that’s one of the proofs to confirm the necessity of his presence in Gaza.

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What can now be said about the massive Israeli attacks on Gaza summer 2014?This is a transcription of the 10-minute interview/essay by Truls Lie from Le Monde Diplomatique (Scandinavia):

T.L.: Israel is attacking Gaza again, why is this happening? I asked recently Dr. Mads Gilbert just after returning back home.

Dr. G.: This last attack was the most vicious that I’ve ever seen because of the systematic bombing of residential areas. Twelve to thirteen thousand Palestinians have been killed or injured during fifty days. For every Pales-tinian soldier they killed, they killed three times as many children and women. They bombed in their homes while they were sleeping; as well as hospitals, schools, mosques without any consequences. The Israeli impunity is one of the largest moral challenges of our time. We are writing history with the Palestinian blood. You cannot claim that you are defending yourself when you are in fact attack-ing the occupied people. This is a complete lie! It is an Israeli doctrine to punish people so hard in order to make them lose their appetite for resisting the occupa-tion.

T.L.: But you as a doctor?

Dr. G.: I say, as a Doctor, number one: stop the bombing, number two: lift the siege, number three: include the Pal-estinian people in the Human Community

T.L.: What about the Israeli’s security?

Dr. G.: I’m absolutely in favor of security for the Israeli people, but as long as they and their government keep occupying the Palestinians, keep murdering them; they will not have security and peace, because occupied peo-ple have the right to resist, even with weapons and that is according with International Law.

T.L.: This concept: Terrorist, as we know, has been used by so many governments.

Dr. G.: If you called somebody today a terrorist, you can kill him, you can execute him without any court order. If you look at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, it is actually a Death Penalty. This labeling of the Palestinian Resistance as a sort of a terror action is completely wrong and it serves the pur-pose of the Israeli colonial project to stand out any legiti-mate resistance of the Palestinians as terrorist.

Now, who was the last people to be labeled and through labeling being executing and almost extinct? It was Jew-ish people. The Nazis called Jewish people Untermensch. I mean, what did the Germans call the heroic resistance movement in forty to forty-five? They called them terror-ists. What did they do to them? They punished them by kill-ing them, and not only killing them but also burning down all their villages: Collective Punishment. It is the same to-day; we dehumanize them in a way that will allow us to do things that we would never do to our neighbor or to any-body we were disagreeing with. This is extremely danger-ous. It is no Hamas against Israel; it is the Palestinian people against the oppressor and the occupant Israel.

T.L.: What about Hamas accused of using children as human shields?

Dr. G.: Klaus Bednarz, I think it was who said: “The first vic-tim of war is the Truth.”I have not seen any documentation that the Palestinian fighters are using human shields, but show me the evi-dence and I will discuss it. If you would know the Pales-tinian Ethics, the family codes, the social codes. Nobody would accept that anybody took your family and push them in front of them in order to obtain a military goal. No-body in Palestine would accept that. I would say that they are moral people.

I’m not saying that there is a 100% support of Hamas. That is not the question! I don’t support them; I do not support any other fractions, I support Palestinian people and their right to resist the occupation and also their right to choose their leaders as they see them fit and to make the same stupid elections as we do sometimes. And I’ve heard com-plains about Hamas and the Hamas government.

Is anyone who saves lives and speaks out a threat?

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Dr. Mads Gilbert, working in Gaza, 2014

See, there is nothing peculiar about Palestinian people; they just exercise their right to resist and their right to say we want to be humans. T.L.: Inside Israel and Palestine there is so much ha-tred…

Dr. G.: No, I totally disagree. I do not see that hatred among the Palestinians. What I experience when I speak with people, with parents, sisters and brothers who have lost their dear ones they say: “we don’t want to kill, we don’t want death; we want to be left alone and to live in peace. Lift the siege, leave us alone and we will be fine. We don’t have any plans for revenge.” Everyone I talk to say that.

How can I only treat the amputation of a seven years old girl without understanding that this amputation is not by chance, but that is manmade? That is deliber-ated and it is part of an occupation regime that I have to try to stop.

T.L.: But why you Mads?

Dr. G.: Why me? I decided to be a doctor because I wanted to make a difference. I wanted to side up by the oppressed. I am by no means a hero; the heroes are the Palestinian doctors. I’ve learned much more from them than I can ever teach them. They have not been paid their salaries for four months due political reasons, because Israel and U.S.A. said “no” when Qatar offered to pay the wages of forty-four thousand civil serv-ers. No, don’t just move your head to that truth! This is extremely important; I mean this people are being drained on every possible part of their lives.

I cannot be blinded by my tears when I work. I feel ex-tremely anger by the fact that this was avoidable. This is not a tsunami or an earthquake; it is planned in a very detailed way by the Israeli government. The Pal-estinians are treated like animals and caged, bombed, starved, deprived or Human Rights and people don’t want to live like that, nobody wants to live like that. This is a whole full breath Apartheid system. If you have seen the character of the Israeli oppression of the Palestinians, you will never forget it. It is so sys-

tematic, so brutal and so merciless. Reality speaks for itself!I think that Gaza is a test for two things: New weaponry that they ….by the U.S. Army and Israeli Army and a sort of labo-ratory for can we wage a war against a population which is very resistant. I consider Israel a state which is exercising state terrorism.

I never feel so save safe as when I am in Gaza because their hospitality and care is in many ways endless. But in a way when you are standing there in the rain of the Israeli bombs and the horrible injuries can pouring in children and elderly women and you see how the Palestinian doctors, nurses and boy scouts at the entrance helping to unload the am-bulances; the backdrop is this intense of being human.

Gaza is a fantastic place, it is a beautiful place. They have a beautiful coastline. You know, the Mediterranean Sea from the Suez Canal all the way up to Beirut could be one of the most beautiful places on Earth and my dream is one day to be able to walk, to bicycle or to run from The Suez Canal all the way up to Beirut and only meet smiling faces, people living in Peace with each other: The Egyptians, The Palestin-ians, The Israelis, The Lebanese. Should we stop dreaming? No!

Photo by: Al i jaDallha

Photo by: ashraf amra

Photo by: ashraf amra

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Red Border Magazine • Issue 285

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Interview Daniel Abugattás A Peruvian-Palestinian congressman

President of the congress of Peru

Daniel Fernando Abugattás Majluf is a Peruvian congressman born in Arequipa in 1955. He has been a Congressman rep-resenting the constituency of Lima since 2006, and is the incumbent President of the Congress.

Besides his legislative activities and his po-litical career he is one of the most active members of the Palestinian Federation of Peru which was founded back in the 80’s. He is of Arab descent from two Arab families who left the Middle East several decades ago. Back in time, when the fam-ily Abugattás arrived at Peru the state of Israel did not exist. His family was one of the first to settle in the southern region of Peru, Arequipa. Nowadays, an eight meter high concrete wall and hundreds of kilo-meters long separates Beit Jala, the city of his ancestors, located in The West Bank of the Palestinian Territories.

This past summer he was one of the most representative voices in Peru against the aggression perpetrated by Israel against Palestine- Both in Gaza as well as in The West Bank.

During a forty minutes phone call inter-view he answered some questions about

the effects of the military incursion and mas-sacre in Gaza, the illegal Jewish settlements in The West Bank, the media lobby that exists in Peru, the diplomatic position of Peru and how crucial is the BDS movement (Boycott, Divest-ment and Sanctions) as the strongest method to put pressure on Israel in order to set Pales-tine free. Here is an extract of the interview that took place in November 10, 2014.

M.P.: Peru is far away from The Middle East, could you tell us if the Peruvians are well in-formed about what is happening in Palestine?D.A.: Well, this last aggression of Israel against Palestine had more coverage than the last at-tacks, but there remains a lack of information among the Peruvian population and this is, in a certain extent, due the Jewish media lobby that exists in Peru. There are several mass me-dia outlets that do not relay the truth about Palestine and manipulate information.

M.P.: What was the reaction of the Peruvian population about this situation? D.A.: There were a lot of demonstrations in favor of Palestine and against the violence in-flicted against civilians in Gaza, but it wasn’t in the appropriate scale to show the support needed by the Palestinian people. However, it is a great step that some sectors of the popu-lation get involved in the international politics

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What is the BDS?The global movement for a cam-paign of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel until it complies with international law and Palestinian rights was initiated by Pa-lestinian civil society in 2005, and is coordinated by the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), establis-hed in 2007. BDS is a strategy that allows people of conscience to play an effective role in the Palestinian struggle for justice. - See more at:

www.bdsmovement.net

and the defense of Human Rights.M.P.: Some countries have recalled their am-bassadors, among them Peru in coordination with El Salvador and Chile. What is your opinion about these diplomatic actions? I have to say that it was a sample of conscience, but not enough to force Israel to stop all the bombing, the construction of illegal settle-ments and the siege. There is a long way to go until we arrive at permanent solution. But it seems unlikely due to Israel’s position and all the plans that they are carrying out nowadays. The only way, in my opinion, to achieve real goals with the Israeli government is to promote the boycott against all the economic activities that Israel has as well as the companies that in-vest in the occupied territories.

M.P.: What is the humanitarian situation nowa-days in Gaza?The situation in Palestine and especially in The Gaza Strip is chaotic. There are a lot of displaced people who still living in UN schools. The wa-ter supply and electricity are very limited and this has caused lack of appropriate medical care. Added to unemployment and the ongo-ing blockade there is a very critical situation in Gaza.

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Between an Intifada and inter-Palestinian armed conflicts and genocidal military operations (Pillar of Defense, Cast Lead and Protective Edge) Israel strug-gled to maintain their duties under international humanitarian laws even in times of apparent politi-cal stability, leaving international organizations the duty to sustain basic human needs in Palestine. Over the last 10 years people in Gaza have been through 3 deadly wars. Half of the population are between the ages of 0 and 15 years old, which represents al-most 900,000 people of the 1,8 million inhabitants of the land strip. As a consequence of the latest “Op-eration Protective Edge” over 2,000 people were murdered and 27,5% of the victims were children.

In cooperation with Egypt, Israel holds since 2007 a strict blockade of Gaza’s borders whereby July 2013 only a truck load of goods per day was allowed to en-ter according to UNOCHA. The availability of drink-able water and electricity is seen as being one of Israel’s political goals since the water from artesian wells inside Gaza are over 90% unsafe to drink and the power plants ran by Gaza’s government aren’t able to fulfill the demands of the whole territory. Take for example during the recent escalated vio-lence between Israel and Gaza when in July the Deputy Defense Minister of Israel Danny Danon called for a full cut of fuel and electricity supply to Gaza, claiming that “on the one hand [they, Israel] fight Hamas and on the other [they] provide fuel and electricity that are used to transport missiles”. Fortunately, contrary to the Deputy’s appeal made on July 9th this measure was ignored for instance and it could have caused great damage to a part of the land strip’s population in need of medical care that had been directly affected by the war.

Source: www.www.icrc.org

The Humanitarian

Situation in Gaza

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Hospitals need electricity, ambulances need fuel and displaced people need shelter. By the end of Opera-tion Protective Edge, nearly half of the Hospitals in Gaza were damaged or destroyed by the war and 47 ambu-lances were damaged of which 14 completely destroyed.

The cost of reconstruction of Gaza was estimated by WHO in $8.1 billion dollars and one of the biggest chal-lenges for the international organizations working in the land strip is the shortage of medical supplies and energy. Today around 90% of the medical facilities in Gaza are operating again, with exception of 5 Minis-try of Health medical centers which were completely destroyed. With only 6 hours of energy per day, few severely injured people - out of the over 11,000 in-jured during the conflict – are lucky to cross the bor-der and get treatment in West Bank, East Jerusalem, Egypt and even Israel. But that isn’t the case of Nisreen.

Mother of two children, she and her family have been displaced since the beginning of the ongoing tragedy. Nisreen has cancer in her spine diagnosed in March. But given the catastrophic situation of the shortage of medical supplies and lack of infrastructure in Gaza, she has to seek treatment somewhere else and wait for the approval for financial funding from the Minis-

try of Health of a government with a broken economy. In an interview given to the WHO she pragmatically said that “after the conflict, there’s a lot less charity to go around because there are now so many orphans.”

Following the cease of hostilities from both sides in Gaza and the negotiation initiatives taken in Cairo, these or-phans had to move on with their lives just like every other war they’ve gone through the past decade. While those children’s injuries have barely healed, at the school, classes have started but their scars from the doom of war over their childhood may take a lifetime to disap-pear if not assisted by professional workers such the ones from the International Committee for the Red Cross. The Red Cross like many other international organiza-tions has been working for decades in the occupied Palestinian territories and was of vital importance on the emergencies of past months bringing hope to people who had lost everything and working against a system that prunes the development of a Palestin-ian society making deliberately use of violence to achieve political goals with no concern on internation-al humanitarian laws. Such is this negligent Occupa-tion by a military power with a chronic pursuit of war.

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Gaza 2014: Palestinian children in front of his destroyed house

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United Kingdom: July 2014

Mother Palestine #2

Last summer, during the conflict in The Gaza Strip -Pales-tine, we saw a lot of demonstra-tions in Europe and all over the world. These demonstrations couldn’t stop the war or decrease the suffering for the Palestinian people. But it was a sign of soli-darity that is important, and even gives hope for the future.

The famous philosopher of En-lightenment, Immanuel Kant, explained that attitude of the world public is in the long term the most important thing. When he reflected on the French Revo-lution, he rightly acknowledged that on the short term an auto-cratic regime would return. But, he said, the enthusiasm of the public all over Europe shows that the values of this Revolution will ultimately overcome authoritar-ian regimes. And so it happened, it took a long time, but ultimately a democracy with basic rights for everyone is realized in most countries, at least to some extent. So what pointed to the outcome in the long term was the attitude of world public, the desire for the values of freedom, equality and brotherhood. These values are still thriving people nowadays when they protest against the attacks that Gaza suffered. And as Kant explains, this judgment of the public is not driven by in-

“Not the power of weapons, but the dignity of every individual human being will reign.”

terest or power; they are not in-volved in the conflict themselves.

And precisely because this judg-ment by the public is not driven by interest, it is a reason that brings hope for the future. The wars can continue for some time, the struggle for power can go on for years to come. But in the end all power is temporary, and ultimately the values that do not derive from power or interest will prevail. Ultimately there will be justice and equality. Not the power of weapons, but the dig-nity of every individual human being will reign.

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The importance of International Support

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UK and Palestine, a citizen’s opinion

This summer’s Gaza conflict was watched from the safety and security of my own home. I was safe as missiles rained down like an Monsoon on the people of Gaza, but unlike many pre-vious wars, conflicts and aggressions I’ve seen in the world over, none had ever made me so upset and angry as this one.

The men, women and children and Gaza were slaughtered whilst they slept in their beds, and I watched on my sofa, fortunate to be surrounded by my family without any threat of be-ing bombed, beaten or booted out of our homes in the name of some divine power. The time I spent in the West Bank taught me that the Palestinian people are some of the most graceful, kind, caring and patient peoples the world over. They don’t deserve to be the victims of what has been termed the longest on-going “re-holocaust”.

Whilst my family, friends and I were ap-palled at such a disregard for human life, my governments as governments are so often think of their needs and wants before the human beings and their lives. Most politicians are spine-less, and if they offered PhDs in be-ing spineless British politicians would receive top marks. Whilst blood was spilt as children playing football were killed on beaches, all that our Politi-cians could muster was the useless mundane rhetoric of “Palestine must

respect Israel’s right to exist” which is often coupled with unfounded accu-sations of anti-Semitism from British Zionists.

But what about the right of the Pales-tinians to exist? Are they not deemed worthy of their rights being upheld, freedom to move, and freedom to live within their own homes without con-stant fear of being uprooted on a daily basis? Being British, I’m often embar-rassed by our foreign policy: the war in Iraq, Afghanistan, The Falklands, our lack of response to Rwanda and Yugoslavia and going even further back our involvement in Apartheid in South Africa and Australia and our role in the slave trade and the massa-cre of the Native Americans.

A handful of British politicians had the nerve to stand up to our govern-ment; Sayeeda Warsi a prominent female member of the Conservative party quit her cabinet role, whilst nu-merous Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs deplored the government’s lack of involvement in the region. Recent-ly however 274 MPs from all sides of the House of Commons voted “to rec-ognize the state of Palestine”. Sadly however this vote is not binding and while 274 MPs voted, 372 were absent, abstained or voted against the mo-tion. Slowly progress is being made.

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“But what about the right of the Palestinians to exist? Are they not deemed worthy of their rights being upheld, freedom to move, and freedom to live within their own homes without constant fear of being uprooted on a daily basis?”

London 2014

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After returning from my three-month teach-ing experience in Nab-lus, Palestine, I left with a heavy heart. Heavy because I was leaving a place that had be-come so close to my heart but more so be-cause of the situation that was developing at the time. Israel had just begun attacking The Gaza Strip, in what was to become known as Operation ‘Protec-tive Edge.’

Having spent so much of my time getting to know the Palestin-ian people and learn-ing more about the extreme volatility of the Israeli- Palestin-ian conflict, coming home, I felt it was my responsibility to assist and engage in the lo-cal protests and activ-ity against these hor-rendous attacks on the people of Gaza.

This year, South Africa celebrated 20 years of democracy, 20 years of freedom for people who had previously been op-pressed and abused by the ruling white party, who considered them inferior citizens and un-equal human beings. With our historical back-ground it made perfect sense for South Africans to align themselves with the people of Palestine, standing against the immense racism and Apartheid that exists currently in Palestine, having experienced this in our own country, not long ago. We, as South Africans, knew that we could not sit back in si-lence and watch this land being reduced to dust, without standing up and fighting back.

In true African style, peo-ple of all backgrounds, genders and ages stood

together, through pro-tests, rallies and march-es, around the country, much like we did during our very own struggle against Apartheid, to be the voice of the voiceless and the voice of those millions of oppressed Palestinians. We staged some of the biggest pro-tests and marches that South Africa has seen, since our own fight for freedom, pre liberation in 1994.

“The vast majority of

South Africans chose

to be on the right side

of history, supporting

the people of Gaza

and the people of

Palestine.”

The voice of South Africa

South Africa, Capetown 2014

Red Border Magazine • Issue 285

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Cape Town 2014: More than 200,000 people demonstrated in favor of Palestine

Though there were, and always will be, people who choose to be ignorant or turn a blind eye, the vast majority of South Af-ricans chose to be on the right side of history, supporting the people of Gaza and the people of Palestine. Notable South Afri-can activists and freedom fight-ers as well as many leaders in Parliament, took the platform to speak out against the inhu-mane attacks on Gaza and the continuous attacks against the Palestinian people.

“As South Africans we refuse to sit by and watch

what happened to us, happen to another.”

As South Africans we refuse to sit by and watch what happened to us, happen to another people. We stand strong as a symbol of hope for the people of Palestine, reassuring them that despite the many hardships they are suffer-ing through, there is a glimmering light at the end of the tunnel. We fought tirelessly, for countless years to achieve our freedom and equal rights, and we did. And as such, so will the people of Palestine.

Bethlehem-Palestine

Saintetienne-france

Bethlehem-Palestine

Malasya

newcastle-united kingdom

Cusco-Peru

Bethlehem-Palestine

The Gaza Strip-Palestine

Bethlehem-Palestine

Birm-United kingdom

Mahmoud Darwish,

“Silence for Gaza”

“Gaza is not the most beautiful city.Its shore is not bluer than the shores of Arab cities.Its oranges are not the most beautiful in the Mediterranean.Gaza is not the richest city.It is not the most elegant or the biggest, but it equals thehistory of an entire nation.Because it is more ugly, impoverished, miserable,and vicious in the eyes of enemies.Because it is the most capable, among us,of disturbing the enemy’s mood and comfort.Because it is his nightmare.Because is minded oranges, children without a childhood,old men without age and women without desiresBecause of all this it is the most beautiful, the poorest and richest among us,and the one most worthy of love.

Non Nominatus,

Haiku for Gaza

The flowers asked me,at the end of this cold night,where are the children?A small grey stone said:“Father Sun shines with sorrow,the white Peace has ran.”The wind is blowingagainst the blue solitudeof pensive women.A hanging raindrop,in the memory of time, tells the world: “Don’t stop.”Some children are gone,are they raindrops, new rainbows?they give us power.Rockets and black smokeagainst all our playful souls,with violent strokes.They came yesterday,with their words made of rough leadto instill red fear.They have forgotten,that weapons just weapons are,beyond that, nothing.The flowers smiled,they already knew the answer; Freedom is coming.