American Jew says she hates what Israel is doing

Want to feel the teargas and see the effect it has? Join a protest at the West Bank town of Bil'in in the spring of 2010 starting at 23:00 of the video below.

But above all, listen to the Israeli from Tel Aviv who participates in the protest. Listen to the Australian and the American who have come so far from home to support justice by way of the International Solidarity Movement.

The American, a Jew, says (at 31:25)

I'm ashamed of it (the American flag)...the way we aid Israel, give them carte blanche and we don't do anything for the Palestinians except spew a lot of rhetoric.

INTERVIEWER: Why would you come here?

A couple of reasons. I'm Jewish, so I hate what Israel is doing especially because they claim to be the home of the Jewish people and it isn't, it's Zionism. It's everything against what Judaism stands for so I come to put a different face on Judaism and I believe we are supposed to stand for the oppressed wherever they are...and as an American because my money is used against the Palestinians and so it's important for me to come and stand with the Palestinians and work with them.

The first half of this video is a visit to the home of a Palestinian slain while protesting in 2009. The video is one of almost 100 videos called Sleepless in Gaza and Jerusalem - something anyone who wants to get to know the Palestinians and their situation should watch.

Palestinian crossing point tutorial

You know I am a fan of the series of videos called Sleepless in Gaza and Jerusalem. There are eighty-nine 25 minute episodes that I know of and I am working my way through them one at a time finding it like a personal visit to the occupied territories. When I discover an exceptional episode, I present it to you. One follows below.

Episode 36 is simple - Ashira, a Palestinian and a regular host of "Sleepless", goes to see how a checkpoint works at the seam zone. The seam zone was created when the Wall was erected because the Wall is built on Palestinian land. The area caught between the border of Israel and the Wall is called the seam zone and it's a tragedy for many Palestinians because it puts the Wall between them and their property. In some cases, as at the town of Bi'lin, the wall runs right through the town...hence the demonstrations opposing it there.

Take a look at where this video takes place so you will understand a bit about what you are viewing. I've placed a red rectangle on this map of the entire West Bank to highlight the area that I zoom to in the next picture.


In the detail below, the white oval centers on the locale of the video - RED is the separation wall, GREEN is Israel's border. Note how the wall snakes around far into Palestinian territory. That territory is the seam zone. The video takes place on the road that connects Ras A-tira to Ras 'Atiya, both Palestinian towns but with the wall in between. Notice the short purple section of wall - a proposed change to get rid of the problem this video shows. Nice idea but it has never been implemented as the map was made in 2008 and the video was made earlier this year (2010).



Thus prepared, you are ready to watch. I apologize for the distorted (though understandable) audio, that's the way it was recorded. The two Israeli women that accompany Ashira on her adventure are from the praiseworthy Israeli group Machsom Watch.

being true to Judaism

Earlier this year, an attempt by the University of California at Berkeley student senate to have the school engage in the Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement against Israel failed. It was vetoed by the senate president Will Smelko.

Part of the process were hearings. At one (video just below) 84 year old Hedy Epstein testified. Her speech is only ten minutes long, but reveals the view of those who suffered from the Holocaust yet do not see Israel as the spokesman for or representative of worldwide Jewry or the precepts of Judaism. By the way, when she refers to the president - it is to the student senate president, not Barack Obama

To emphasize the relationship between the suffering of Jews in past times and the suffering of Palestinians at present, I provide a second video. You need not watch it all. The pertinent segment is from 3:00 to 9:00 minutes, during which a Palestinian woman breaks down in anguish over living in fear for her home and family in the face of a threatened Israeli demolition project in her East Jerusalem neighborhood of Al Bustan. At first calm and composed for the interview, she finally cannot hide her despair. I challenge any viewer not to feel it with her. In an uncanny similarity - both Hedy Epstein's father and the Palestinian woman's husband were marched away from their homes in their pajamas by the authorities.





To conclude - the words of a former soldier in the IDF, Chen Alon, from an article published in Haaretz...

In testimony to the makers of the documentary film "On the Objection Front" (2004 ), Alon said, "As a 19-year-old kid it doesn't seem so terrible to you to enter someone's home. But when you live your life and have a family and a home of your own, and you argue for an hour about where to hang each picture and where each thing should go, suddenly the thought arises that someone will knock on your door and you will have to open, and 10 animals like me enter, and each of them can kick a chair, mess up a cupboard, open a door, spill everything on the floor, tell you 'Open this door,' ask you, 'What are these papers?' And this can happen on any given day at any given time, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the day, at whatever time someone can enter your home without any sort of permission or authorization. Just because he feels like it; and even if he doesn't feel like it - because he has to. Because he was ordered to enter homes twice during the patrol. That is an intolerable thought.