The Power of Nonviolent Persistent People and the Yin and Yang of Anarchy
WAWA Blog September 5, 2007
[West Bank: Occupied Territory] In a verdict released on Sept 4, 2007, justice ruled in the Holy Land!
In the petition of the village of Bil'in against The Wall (HCJ 8414/05), which in that area of the occupied territory of the West Bank, is mostly an electrified fence with miles of rolled barbwire that prevents the indigenous landowners access to their olive groves, Judges Beinish, Prokachya and Rivlin, of the Supreme Court ruled against the current route of The Wall/separation barrier and ordered the State to prepare a proposal for an alternative route.
Due to the power of nonviolent persistent people the empire and military occupation of Israel has now been justly ordered to leave the agricultural lands of Bil'in on the legally owned Palestinian side of the apartheid/separation barrier!
Dr. Barghouthi MP, Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative, explained that the steadfast peaceful resistance of the villagers of Bil'in resulted in the decision to partially remove the wall in the village. He also commended the heroic struggle of the people; local families and foreign sympathizers who maintained a peaceful popular struggle against the apartheid/separation wall that weekly occurred every Friday afternoon as a ritual over the last two and a half years. The persistence of nonviolent people forced the Israeli High Court of Justice to issue a just decision that ordered the removal of the wall from the village of Bil'in. Dr. Barghouthi added that the struggle must continue until the wall is fully removed from Bil'in and all legally owned Palestinian land.
Dr. Barghouthi explained that this decision of the Israeli High Court of Justice proves the effectiveness of the strategy of nonviolent resistance and international solidarity. Dr. Barghouthi has also called for all Palestinians to continue the struggle against The Wall, the settlements and the annexation of East Jerusalem; citing the ruling of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, which has deemed them all illegal.
"Residents of the village of Bilin went to court arguing that the current route, built on village land, kept them from their fields and orchards, which remained on the other side of the barrier. Villagers and their Israeli and foreign supporters have protested at the barrier every Friday for the past 2½ years…The Israeli government argued that the route was necessary to protect residents of the nearby settlement of Modiin Illit, and completed the section of fence that cut through Bilin despite the protests. A three-judge Supreme Court panel unanimously rejected the government’s argument Tuesday, ordering defense planners to change the barrier’s route so it causes less harm to the village’s residents. [1]
“We were not convinced that it is necessary for security-military reasons to retain the current route that passes on Bilin’s lands,” Chief Justice Dorit Beinish wrote in the decision. The judges specified that “this will require destroying the existing fence in certain places and building a new one,” and ordered the government to come up with a new route in a “reasonable period of time.” [Ibid]
"Israel began building the 425-mile barrier along the West Bank in 2002, saying it was a necessary weapon in its war against Palestinian suicide bombers. But the barrier juts into West Bank territory, provoking Palestinian claims that Israel is using security arguments to mask a land grab." [Ibid]
This most embarrassing blow against the empire and military occupation of Palestine just may be the second domino to fall in the occupation and apartheid/separation policies of the ethnocracy [human rights for Jews, but nobody else] of Israel.
Now that the highest court in Israel; the Supreme Court has ordered the State to redraw the route of its West Bank, what happened in Budrus and now Bil'in is all due to the persistence of people power and anarchy.
Palestinian farmers, workers, mothers, and students, together with Israeli and international volunteers, have been braving teargas, beatings, bullets, arrest, and even death to block the construction of The Wall with nothing more than their bodies.
Two Anarchists Against the Wall, Palestinian Ayed Morrar and Israeli Jonathan Pollak toured the United States in 2005 to wake up Americans about the persistent struggle and nonviolent resistance against the Israeli occupation and their illegal actions in Palestine. This reporter attended their Gainesville, Florida session and learned from Ayed Morrar, a community leader from the West Bank village of Budrus, how a few committed, thoughtful, persistent and nonviolent citizens changed their part of the world.
In 2004 the International Court of Justice ruled that The Wall is a violation of international law because it cuts through the West Bank appropriating Palestinian land and destroying Palestinian villages to make way for further Israeli settlements, all of which are illegal under international law.
Soft-spoken and humble, Ayed Morrar, led his village of Budrus in a nonviolent David versus Goliath victory over the Israeli military in 2003-2004. Through a campaign of 50 protests, the village of Budrus pushed The Wall’s path off of the village's land and onto the Green Line. Day after day, the people of Budrus; men, women and children, with only their bodies resisting the might Israeli army, blocked the destruction of their homeland and the illegal construction of The Wall by marching onto their legally owned land. Despite the Israeli soldiers’ attempts to stop them, these few thoughtful, committed nonviolent activists placed their bodies in front of the Caterpillar/Caterkiller bulldozers and took the punishment.
Hundreds of residents were injured during the campaign by Israeli soldier's billy clubs, tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Ayed was jailed for eight days by the Israeli authorities, but was released due to the international outcry that erupted because his only offense was organizing nonviolent protests.
The nonviolent resistance against the illegal actions of the Israeli government in Budrus was supported by justice and peace activists from ISM/International Solidarity Movement and from Israeli groups such as the Anarchists Against the Wall. The strategy implemented in Budrus served as a model for Bil'in and other Palestinian communities have joined in, to nonviolently resist Israel’s military occupation and the confiscation of their legally owned land.
Twenty-three year old, secular Jew, Jonathan Pollack, was one of the first Israelis to begin protesting regularly in the West Bank with Palestinians and internationals against the construction of the Wall in 2002. Pollack is one of the founders of Anarchists Against the Wall which has played a vital role in supporting Palestinians in nonviolent protest. Jonathan has participated in hundreds of nonviolent West Bank protests and has mobilized hundreds of Israelis to join Palestinians in resisting The Wall and the Occupation. As a result, Jonathan has been arrested and jailed repeatedly by the Israeli authorities. In April 2005 during a quiet protest in the village of Bil’in he was shot in the head from 40 meters by an Israeli soldier with a tear gas canister fired from an M16 rifle. He suffered internal hemorrhaging and wounds requiring 23 stitches. He has endured much more since then and still persists.
Despite Israeli government efforts to stop them, Ayed, Jonathan and their Palestinian, Israeli and international colleagues remain determined to continue their joint, nonviolent campaign against Israeli occupation and the denial of rights of the Palestinian people.
In Ayeed's village of Budrus, the people chanted in English "WE CAN DO IT!"
And they did!
And so have they in Bil'in! Woman, children, farmers, just regular people have persistently stood up to the Caterpillar/Caterkiller bulldozers and the IDF who wield billy clubs and shoot off tear gas canisters that can cause spasticity for weeks and which have even caused death. Regular people fed up with injustice have stood up to guns that shoot rubber coated bullets and have proved that non-violent activism works against even one of the mightiest and most well equipped armies the world has ever known.
Regular people have risen up and have told the Israeli government to back off from their land, back off from their trees, and back off from denying food to their children. In Budrus-and soon to be in Bil'in-The WALL is now on the GREEN LINE because regular people stood up to military occupiers and said:
Enough! This was never a land without a people; this has always been our home. If you want an apartheid wall, put it on your property, quit stealing ours! Put yourself in the ghetto, we will stand firm for freedom for right is on our side and the Geneva Convention and International Law affirms that occupied people have every right to rise up militarily against their oppressors! We will not be ethnically cleansed from the land of our ancestors, and these olive trees you uproot are our family! Every little child knows the name of every tree and we will not allow your illegal apartheid/separation wall to tear our families apart.
Regular people in Budrus, chanted in English: "We can do it!" And they did it! And so have they in Bil'in!
When this reporter attended a ritual Friday afternoon in Bil'in, regular people chanted: "The wall fell in Berlin! The wall will fall in Bil'in!"
It once looked hopeless that apartheid would fall in South Africa, but that was before regular people persistently and nonviolently took direct action and only then, justice was served .
Anarchy is best understood as Rebellion against UNJUST laws. The Yang [male positive force] of anarchy resists authority and causes disorder and is socially and politically incorrect by the norms of the status quo for it seeks the higher ground of justice.
The Yin or feminine passive force of anarchy births a new order out of the chaos and chaos is creativity in action.
1- http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070904/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_barrier
For more information, contact Dr Barghouthi: 0599201528
Other Sources:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20581935/from/ET/
October, November 2005, WAWA Blog http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Eye witness experience in Bil'in by this reporter, November 2006.
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>>Bil'in has the judgment,
>>Bil'in has the judgment, but Israel has the land.<
On the one hand, my heart leaps in joy. On the other, I am saddened and distressed at the practical outcome of the situation. It is times like this that I tell myself, we have to start somewhere. At least, the ruling was going in the right direction. That might lead to some momentum.
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The question that haunts me: "Into what is Christianity evolving?"
And the Beat Goes on...
I have been to the occupied West Bank village of Bili'in three times; January, March and November 2006.
What wraps up today's blog is my [slightly edited] report of my first visit there. But, I begin with an article from yesterday's Ha'aretz, forwarded by a most altruistic Jew named Dorothy from Jerusalem. A typical day for Dorothy includes attending seminars on Gender and Militarism and deciding which of the 2,000 emails a day that she receives, she should open and read and then disseminate to the justice and peace activists on her email list. She also spends about five hours a day driving Palestinian kids home from hospitals. She wrote the following commentary:
Dear All,
The Israeli high court now takes away with the left hand what it gave with the right just yesterday! Bil'in has the judgment, but Israel has the land. True, it's not all the land, but it nevertheless should be Bil'ins. This is having one's cake and eating it too. Whether or not it is moral is another question. But then, whoever claimed that a supreme court that oks assassinations and an apartheid wall at all is moral! -Dorothy
Ha'aretz Update Wednesday, September 05, 2007
High Court: Controversial settlement neighborhood to remain in place
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/901229.html
By Yuval Yoaz, Haaretz Correspondent
The High Court of Justice ruled Wednesday that dozens of existing buildings built in a controversial neighborhood of the West Bank settlement of Modi'in Ilit will not be demolished, despite the fact that they were built illegally and partially on private Palestinian land.
The High Court thus rejected a petition filed against the Matityahu-East neighborhood a year and a half ago by Peace Now and Bili'in Council. Residents of the West Bank village of Bili'in own some of the property on which the neighborhood was built.
In part, the court based its decision on the fact that the petitions should have been filed several years earlier.
Nonetheless, the High Court ordered settlers, the state, and construction companies to pay the petitioners' court fees, totaling NIS 160,000.
As a result of the ruling, the state will not remove the hundreds of settlers who stormed apartments they had purchased, after it became clear that construction company Heftsiba had collapsed.
Wednesday's ruling effectively seals the fate of the controversial settlement neighborhood, after on Tuesday the court ordered the state to alter the route of a 1.7-kilometer section of the West Bank fence, which had been designed to encircle the area on which additional parts of the neighborhood were to be constructed.
As a result, the court apparently has given approval to the existing status quo in the area - the existing part of the neighborhood will remain in place, but plans to expand the neighborhood will not be carried out.
For nearly three years, the fence has been the focus of weekly demonstrations at Bil'in, punctuated at times by violent confrontations between protesters, soldiers and police deployed at the site.
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My Blog from January 5, 2006:
My last day in the West Bank I traveled the potholed unpaved road to Bili'in, a village near Ramallah where villagers and Internationals have been nonviolently and creatively resisting The Wall, The Occupation and the fact that more than half of their land has been illegally annexed by the Israeli government.
In Bili'in, the Green Line is five miles from the electric fence being erected with sensors and cameras upon Palestinian land. The fence runs out a few yards from our van and we easily make our way over the rocky land to the Billin outpost.
The indigenous peoples began nonviolently resisting The Wall/Fence over one year ago. Thus far, 300 nonviolently resisting locals have been injured by the IDF more than three times and return for more.
Two weeks ago Internationals, Israeli's and locals implemented a creative challenge to the status quo imposed by the Israel government and the times they have a' changed: the Bili'iner's have erected their own outpost.
International, Israelis and the oppressed indigenous people of Bili'in, constructed a 10x10 brick edifice just yards from where the illegal settlement of 700 upscale apartments are being built.
The indigenous people of Bili'in brought their case against the settlers/colonists to the Municipal Court and that Court agreed the building of the settlement dwellings was illegal and ordered construction to cease. The case is now pending the Supreme Court decision.
About a half dozen Caterpillar tractors were moving earth for the anticipated paved road that only Jewish settlers/colonists, many from Brooklyn, New York, will be allowed to travel upon.
Eyad, landowner and leader of The Popular Committee in Bili'in explained, "A few weeks ago we brought in a caravan [trailer] on our land close to where the settlers apartments are being built. While we were inside the IDF [Israeli Defense Force] sawed the door open and pulled us out and roughed us up.
"So, we brought in another caravan and during the night we built a concrete brick building within four hours. All day and all night people stay here to resist the wall and occupation. People come and go; they are from all over the world. They support our nonviolently resisting the wall that is clearly stealing our land. This electric wall and the IDF are not allowing us onto our land to care for our olive trees. They confiscated our land and impose military law upon us and claim we are trespassing on our legally owned land."
Abdullah, Coordinator of Against The Wall in Bili'in informed me that there are 1,600 people who call home Billin and legally own 4,000 dunums of property. The Israeli government confiscated 2,003 dunums of agricultural land and is building apartments that Palestinians are forbidden to approach. The Israeli government continues the building of the illegal electric fence that prevents the indigenous land owners from accessing what is legally theirs.
During my visit I spoke with a few of two dozen Israelis and Internationals who were hanging around the brick house. Some stay for days while others sleep inside sleeping bags on the dirt floor of the cramped shelter for weeks at a time.
Soft spoken and intense twenty year old Suneela from New York stated boldly, "We are fighting an important struggle. If America would only learn the truth about what is happening here, they would stop their blind support of the Israeli government that denies people basic human rights."
Twenty year old Israeli born Yuval who has actively resisted the injustice in Billin for the past five months added, "This cause is very important to me because this is the only way to struggle. This is our only chance to bring back the popular Intifada: a chance for women and children to nonviolently resist the wall and occupation."
Elizabeth a pretty and waspy looking twenty year old from Indiana studying Middle East Foreign Policy in Jerusalem has lived every weekend at the outpost in Billin since its birth.
Forty year old Ratebaburabeme, a member of the Popular Committee, Stop The Wall Campaign and a delegate with Seeds of Peace in 2003 told me about when he was shot and jailed for two weeks because of his nonviolent resistant activities.
"The Judge said he would investigate the soldier who shot me, but the soldier lied and denied he shot. The matter was quickly forgotten by the Israelis...I teach Social Work and Psychology at El Quds Open University...Three weeks ago we could not come in here, but when the court admitted the settlement buildings were illegal we put the caravan on the property and when the IDF destroyed that, we built this room. Ever since, more and more Israelis, Lawyers, Sheiks, women and children come and stand with us in solidarity for human rights. Rachel Corrie's family has been here too."
This weekend I will be attending the 6th annual End the Occupation of Palestine Conference and one of the speakers is Cindy Corrie, Rachel's mother; another woman who like Dorothy-fill me with awe and help me feel like I should be doing so much more.
Learn More:
http://rachelcorriefoundation.org/
Eileen Fleming,
Reporter and Editor http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Author "Keep Hope Alive" and "Memoirs of a Nice Irish American 'Girl's' Life in Occupied Territory"
Producer "30 Minutes With Vanunu."