Ezra Winton founder Cinema Politica @ Quebec BDS conference Montreal Oct 2010

Photo Ariel view on Israeli apartheid wall cutting though Palestinian lands.

As someone working in the media arts sector, I signed the 500 artist BDS letter along with Cinema Politica’s Executive Director Svetla Turnin. We signed because it was a tangible action that connected art to the resistance against oppression.

We also signed because we feel that too often artists and those working in the arts who are privately critical of Israel take two paths around the issue of Palestine’s occupation: Ignore it all together in their work and their public life, or adopt a liberal stance that argues it is not the role of art to intervene in such matters.

(…اكثر)

Adalah press release November 3, New York, NY.

Photo ActiveStills Maale Adumim settlement in the occupied West Bank.

November 3, New York, NY – Africa Israel, the flagship company of Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev, announced this week that it is no longer involved in Israeli settlement projects and that it has no plans for future settlement activities. Africa Israel subsequently denied that this was a political decision. However, in the last few years numerous organizations, firms, governments and celebrities have exerted pressure and severed their relationships with Leviev and his companies over their involvement in settlement construction and other human rights abuses, in response to a boycott campaign initiated by Adalah-NY.

(…اكثر)

Gaza City, Inter Press Service – IPS by Eva Bartlett

Photo Palestinian youth biking at United Nations school in occupied Palestine.

The focus on people’s movements in Palestine continues to gain momentum with growing nonviolent demonstrations in Gaza, the occupied West Bank including East Jerusalem, and with a Palestine-wide call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel.

Years of the nonviolent demonstrations throughout the occupied West Bank against Israel’s wall have finally generated some media interest in the issue of the wall and annexation of Palestinian land. Yet the behind-the-scenes work of Palestinian unions, Palestinian and international BDS groups, video conferences bridging Palestine to the outside world, and the struggle of Palestinian students to access an education continues largely unnoticed by the cameras.

(…اكثر)

Palestine News Network – PNN Jerusalem 01.11.10

Photo: Wolf Bonpiedbonoeil Palestinian youth in Beit Djibril refugee camp.

Human rights groups issued a report saying that the Israeli military police, better known as the border police, arrested 100 Palestinian children from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan in October.

(…اكثر)

McGill University lecture feat. Ala’ Jaradat of Addameer

Wednesday, November 3rd, 18h-20h
McGill University
Day Chancellor Hall room 102
3644 Peel Street
Montreal, QC
Canada

(…اكثر)

Huffington Post by Ayed Morrar, November 1, 2010

Photo Olive tree in occupied Palestine.

Budrus, a documentary film now debuting across the US, tells the story of a successful protest campaign by unarmed Palestinian civilians against Israel’s military occupation in my small West Bank village. Our struggle’s success and the consequent expansion of civil resistance to other West Bank communities may provide hope to viewers desperate for positive news from the Middle East, but today an Israeli crackdown on unarmed Palestinian protesters is threatening this growing movement. For our movement to thrive and serve as a true alternative to violence, we need Americans’ to demand that Israel, a close US ally, end this repression.

(…اكثر)

Palestinian Center for Human Rights – PCHR Sunday, 31 October 2010

Photo Kent Klich Palestinian home riddled with Israeli made bullet holes.

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) notes that the Spanish authorities refused to provide Avi Dichter, former Director of the Israeli General Security Services, with requested immunity prior to a planned visit to Spain. Mr. Dichter is currently the subject of a criminal lawsuit before the Spanish Courts in relation to his role in the Al Daraj assassination of July 22, 2002.

PCHR applaud this move, noting a welcome return to the rule of law. Spain, along with all other High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, is subject to a legal obligation to search for and prosecute all those suspected of committing grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions.

(…اكثر)

Haaretz 31.10.10 by Gideon Levy

Photo Kent Klich Bullet holes mark wall in Palestinian home in Gaza.

Once upon a time the staple piece of clothing was the blue shirt of the Labor Movement, and songwriter Mordechai Zeira sang about it: “And it’s much better than all jewels.” A new generation has arrived, and its shirt is darker. Today it’s black and bears the legend: We are all the victims of Goldstone.

Dozens of friends of the two Givati Brigade soldiers arrived wearing these infuriating shirts at a military court a few days ago. Their friends had been convicted of overextending their authority while risking the life of an 11-year-old, and to be precise, of conduct unbecoming of soldiers. The soldiers received the scandalous support of senior officers, and the two convicted men have become heroes.

(…اكثر)

29 October, 2010 | International Solidarity Movement

Photo Israeli soldiers moving to repress popular demonstrations in occupied Palestine.

Many shebab (youth), two journalists and a girl were injured on Friday at the weekly demonstration in An Nabi Saleh. Villagers had employed a new strategy in response to the increasing violence of soldiers and border police.

Demonstrators split up and approached the road from the two opposite hills divided by the valley. The side with most of the shebab was blocked with massive amounts of teargas and attacked by border police. From the other side, most of the internationals, women, and children entered the road and continued the demonstration.

(…اكثر)

Oct. 2010 Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements

Photo Israeli apartheid wall cutting through Palestinian lands.

Today’s demonstration in Bil’in against the Apartheid wall, organized by the Popular Committee of Bil’in, was joined by many local residents, Israeli activists as well as many internationals. As the group moved peacefully towards the Apartheid wall, they chanted to “Freedom to all Palestinian Political Prisoners”. Demonstrators carrying the Palestinian flag crossed through a gate to confront the awaiting soldiers with a simple question, “What are you doing here?”

(…اكثر)