<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">It's useful to read Mazin.<div>--mkb<br><div><br><div>Begin forwarded message:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px;"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium; color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 1);"><b>From: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium;">Mazin Qumsiyeh <<a href="mailto:mazin@qumsiyeh.org">mazin@qumsiyeh.org</a>><br></span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px;"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium; color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 1);"><b>Date: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium;">May 5, 2012 4:00:53 PM CDT<br></span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px;"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium; color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 1);"><b>To: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium;"><<a href="mailto:brussel@uiuc.edu">brussel@uiuc.edu</a>><br></span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px;"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium; color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 1);"><b>Cc: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium;">Human Rights Newsletter <<a href="mailto:humanrights@lists.qumsiyeh.org">humanrights@lists.qumsiyeh.org</a>><br></span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px;"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium; color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 1);"><b>Subject: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'; font-size:medium;"><b>[HumanRights] Time for change?</b><br></span></div><br><div>*Time for change?*<br><br>*by Mazin Qumsiyeh*<br><br> <a href="http://popular-resistance.blogspot.com/2012/05/time-for-change.html">http://popular-resistance.blogspot.com/2012/05/time-for-change.html</a><br><br><br><br>Palestinian political prisoners illegally held in Israeli jails are on<br>hunger strike and some are near death. The population of strikers includes<br>200 child prisoners, 27 Palestinian legislative council members, and 456<br>prisoners from Gaza who have not been allowed family visits since 2007<br>[1]. Meanwhile, colonization continued at a relentless pace. Ramzy Baroud<br>and Jeff Halper argue that Israel is “fixing” the outcome and is an<br>“end-game” scenario to take over most of the West Bank and leave us in<br>small cantons [2]. Yet, judging from my research into the carefully planned<br>Zionist project, such plans are not end games but mileposts to give the<br>Zionists time to consolidate gains in preparation for the next round of<br>expansion in precisely the way Ben Gurion described it to his son in 1937.<br> Ben Gurion explained lucidly how the new state of Israel when established<br>on part of the coveted land would be a base of steady expansion and growth<br>in the future with or without agreement from “Arabs” [3]. I pondered how<br>little has changed in the intervening 75 years. Colonial Israel continues<br>to push the envelope and expand with or without agreement from compliant<br>“Arabs”. Compliant Arabs existed in 1937 (headed by Ragheb Al-Nashashibi)<br>and existed in 1967 and in 2012. There also existed intellectual and<br>honest Arabs throughout our history.<br><br><br><br>Zionist colonization is not driven by emotion or haphazard action. It is<br>done as instructed by the founding father of Political Zionism Theodore<br>Herzl in 1897: "we must investigate and take possession of the new Jewish<br>country by means of every modern expedient." Modern expedients advocated by<br>Herzl include planned methodical structure to remove the native people<br>(with or without agreement of some Arabs) and create a large Jewish state.<br>Herzl was not specific on size of the "required estate" but Ben Gurion and<br>people of his era thought it possible to go as far as between the Nile and<br>the Euphrates.<br><br><br><br>The plans of colonizers are remarkably similar and known from the diaries<br>of Herzl in 1897, from the letter from Ben Gurion to his son in 1937, the<br>Allon plan of 1967, and from the Hebron accords of 1997. It is a plan of<br>expansion without some Arabs consenting or occasionally with agreement from<br>some Arabs. These agreements, like the treaties that some Native Americans<br>signed with the government of the United States in its expansionary<br>phase, were and are violated because they are merely consolidation tools<br>[4]. I think like these Native American chiefs some Palestinians thought<br>that they are doing the best they could under difficult circumstances.<br>Most of the Native American “leaders” had no concept or understanding of<br>the true nature of the notions and emotions driving the Westward expansion<br>of the white colonialists in the USA. They did not delve deeply into<br>notions of manifest destiny, choseness, and racism that characterize their<br>oppressors. One could say the ideology of Native Americans exhibited the<br>exact opposite of their colonizers and thus they presumed that white rulers<br>are ultimately human and could be dealt with as equals.<br><br><br><br>Peace for natives is to get their freedom, to live in dignity, and most of<br>all to get the boot of colonization off our necks. Peace for the<br>colonizers is to have the victim stop wiggling under their boots. Towards<br>this they devised ingenious plans including a Palestinian Preventive<br>Security force. Any rational human being can see this dictation and<br>imbalance of power in daily news. Thus the people are left out of<br>decisions whether on “negotiations”, on "national reconciliation", ongoing<br>and not going to the UN, or on how they may eventually be liberated.<br>Despairing and riding a ship without compass or rudder, the people grumble<br>and boil underneath and later erupt in revolt.<br><br><br><br>Needs and desires of the colonizers and the colonized are not the same.<br>Occupiers and colonizers want more opportunities to progress via<br>consolidation and strengthening of the status quo and allowing them to<br>expand further. We, the occupied and colonized people, want to halt and<br>eventually reverse the process of injustice. Palestinians want to return<br>to our homes and lands and live peacefully as we did for millennia. We<br>insist on return and self-determination. We insist that the country must<br>remain multi-ethnic, multi-religious, and multi-cultural. This is not a<br>border dispute nor is it a quibble over the Israeli illegal control of the<br>religious sites. Like in the struggle in South Africa under apartheid, it<br>is a struggle that pits two very different visions of the area: one of<br>racism and apartheid and the other of justice and equality.<br><br><br><br>Sporadic acts of heroic popular resistance are not enough to reach peace<br>with justice. Coordination and joint action must take place. What hinders<br>it is a system developed by the occupiers and agreed to by some of the<br>occupied people. Personal economic benefit maintains the status quo. What<br>is done with support from a Palestinian authority is nothing short of<br>making this occupation the most profitable in history (several billion<br>dollars flow annually to Israeli coffers as a result of this<br>occupation). Already Israeli and Palestinian business deals are being<br>executed for example in area C. This is the “economic peace plan” of<br>Netanyahu and others. Those who may think of disrupting the status quo are<br>investigated and punished. Most Palestinians are excellent diagnosticians<br>and have figured this out. But I think many have not started to articulate<br>solutions or ideas to get out of this mud hole that the Oslo Process<br>(actually started with the 10 point program in 1974) put us into. It is<br>not going to be easy and it does require sacrifice. But those delusional<br>individuals who think that they have a salary or a position and they do not<br>want to risk rocking the boat should think again. They should think of how<br>their children or grandchildren would live under a system of racism and<br>oppression. This is as true of Israelis as it is true of Palestinians.<br><br><br><br>Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) give us hope. Shimon Peres, the<br>architect of Israel’s arsenal of Weapons of Mass Destruction and a war<br>criminal once explained: "In order to export you need good products, but<br>you also need good relations....[If] Israel's image gets worse, it will<br>begin to suffer boycotts. There is already an artistic boycott against us<br>and signs of an undeclared financial boycott are beginning to emerge."<br>International figures who worked against apartheid in South Africa argued<br>convincingly of why this can help here in Apartheid Israel [5]. But BDS is<br>only a tool and certainly not sufficient to effect the needed<br>change. There has to be a structured program from the people which<br>includes an articulation of a vision with concrete goals for the<br>future. In my book “Sharing the Land of Canaan” in 2004 I argued for<br>precisely such a program to move from apartheid to a state of all its<br>citizens. These notions have gained widespread acceptance among<br>intellectuals and activists of various religious and political<br>backgrounds. To arrive to this vision, we need organization.<br><br><br><br>Organization requires visionary leadership arising organically from a<br>maturing rising population. We should not be reluctant to push our<br>existing leaders and if they are not willing to move then to create<br>alternative leadership. ALL Factions have aging and non-innovative<br>leadership and ALL factions have younger energetic and dedicated (but<br>marginalized) individuals. Clearly the status quo is devastating for us<br>and cannot last. We know from history that people will rise-up and DEMAND<br>change.<br><br><br><br>Is it time for varied voices to coalesce into a thunderous uproar that<br>cannot be ignored? May we organize meetings and discuss publicly the path<br>forward? While many for example discussed the failure of the "two state<br>solution" and some articulated future visions, we need more than that. Can<br>we as a people in 1948 areas, in the WB and Gaza and in exile create<br>mechanisms and structures that take us to where we decide to go? Can we<br>convince the world and even Israelis that we are serious about working for<br>a future of peace with justice and prosperity for everyone? Voices of<br>negativism must not dominate this critical stage. This conversation must<br>be open to people of goodwill from all factions and from independents.<br>While it must start among Palestinians, we must later involve our trusted<br>supporters from around the world. We do have the resources: financial,<br>intellectual, emotional, and physical. Let those who have skills in<br>organizing organize and those who have skills in media work do media work.<br>Let those who have skills in social networking do that. Those who have<br>skills in music write songs for the revolution. Imagine if we can get even<br>5% or even 1% of the Palestinians around the world as participants in an<br>organized effort. The change that could happen can be monumental.<br><br><br><br>The world today only respects those who respect themselves and struggle for<br>their own rights. We have nothing to be ashamed of as Palestinians even<br>though 7 million of us are refugees or displaced people. We have a lot to<br>be proud of from our history [6]. We cannot give up now that the crisis of<br>Palestine weighed on the world conscience and when the Arab spring could<br>change the whole geopolitical reality of the Middle East. Even if we fail<br>at our goal this time, the positive spirit that results would enrich all<br>our lives. It would unleash the creativity and the energy that we know is<br>in us. Change can and must happen because ours is an existential struggle<br>for 11.5 million Palestinians in the world and for our children and<br>grandchildren born and unborn. Each of us has a role to play and has<br>skills and other resources to contribute. Even if we start slow and among<br>a few individuals, it will grow because we have no other choice. Let us get<br>on with it.<br><br><br><br>[1]<br><a href="http://www.alhaq.org/documentation/weekly-focuses/569-palestinian-prisoners-near-death">http://www.alhaq.org/documentation/weekly-focuses/569-palestinian-prisoners-near-death</a><br><br>[2] Ramzy Baroud- Israel plots an end-game<br><br>http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2012/05/03/illegal-settlements-bonanza-israel-plots-an-endgame/<br>,<br><br>Jeff Halper<br>http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/2012428124445821996.html but<br>see also Susan Abulhawa's reply to Jeff Halper<br>http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=19274<http://palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=19274#.T6RigYJSHIA.twitter><br><br>[3] Ben Gurion letter to his son, sent October 5, 1937 Translation here<br><br>http://www.palestine-studies.org/files/B-G%20Letter%20translation.pdf<br><br>[4] The Oslo accords were an excellent tool by Israel to consolidate its<br>hold and in violations of the Geneva conventions allowed Israel “civil<br>control” in >60% of the West Bank called area C. In further negotiations<br>it was leaked how much people like Saeb Erekat were willing to keep going<br>in handing over these areas to Israel<br>http://www.aljazeera.com/palestinepapers/<br><br>[5] Desmond Tutu on the need for Divestment from Israeli apartheid<br><br>http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/justice-requires-action-to-stop-subjugation-of-palestinians/1227722<br><br>[6] “Popular Resistance in Palestine: A history of Hope and Empowerment”<br>http://www.qumsiyeh.org/popularresistanceinpalestine/<br>-------------- next part --------------<br>An HTML attachment was scrubbed...<br>URL: <http://lists.qumsiyeh.org/pipermail/humanrights/attachments/20120506/0758d7ce/attachment.htm><br>_______________________________________________<br>HumanRights newsletter<br>http://lists.qumsiyeh.org/mailman/listinfo/humanrights<br>This message was sent to brussel@uiuc.edu. 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