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A-Ram’s dignified protest
and how violence was used to break it (Gush Shalom)

The initiative came from the local leadership of the residents of the a-Ram Jerusalem suburb. Mayor Sirhan Salayme took an active role. Israeli peace groups were invited to jointly make plans of action “against the occupation and for a peace that is just for both peoples.”
It was not the first time of such joint efforts. Much of what we earlier together demonstrated against, has become a-Ram’s sad reality: the Wall which bisects the main street of a-Ram, makes the going to the other side of the road a very long journey (to say the least). But then, the a-Ram residents don’t give up, so why should we.
The first in a series of joint actions would be a protest march on Saturday May 13, by a few hundred Israelis - as many as could be mobilized by the Israeli anti-Wall partners.
The Palestinian side would bring schoolchildren, teachers, neighborhood residents and supporters, in much bigger numbers.

The slogans were meticulously formulated, as to make sure that all the different participants could agree with them: “No to Walls and Checkpoints / Yes to Negotiations / No to Unilateral “Convergence ” / Jerusalem Open to All Her Residents.

The very organizing of this action proved wrong the Israeli government’s assertion that “there is no partner. ” In spite of the Wall which was built to separate, the residents of a-Ram continue their joint activities with Israelis. But, when the day came, it turned out that this fact is not at all appreciated by the Israeli authorities. The demonstration became a very stormy one.

It had been so carefully prepared as a non-violent protest. The pupils of the elementary schools in their school uniforms led the demonstration, with the smallest in front. But to no avail: the army and police had decided in advance to suppress the demonstration by force.

When the 200 Israeli peace activists approached the a-Ram Checkpoint, it became clear that they would not be allowed to pass. Therefore they went around. At a point where the meters-high grey concrete slabs have not (yet) been erected they broke through a fence. Quite some demonstrators succeeded in passing quickly through the breach, but those who where stopped by police had to remain on the “Israeli” side and demonstrated there.

On the main road of a-Ram, which is already divided by the Wall, the Israelis joined the Palestinian march which was already on its way, led by Mayor Salayme. Right behind
the massed schoolchildren, the leaders of all Palestinian parties - from Fatah to Hamas - had formed a line. White-haired Uri Avnery was invited to join and walked between the
red-bearded Hamas leader, Sheikh Abu- Tir, and the former presidential candidate Mustafa Barghouti. Next to them was the Minister for Jerusalem Affairs of the new Palestinian
government, Abu Arafah, also a Hamas member.

Further on along the road, in the middle of a-Ram, the police and army had concentrated a large force. Rows of policemen blocked the road, with mounted police in front and a large number of army Hummer vehicles behind. Seeing this, the organizers diverted the schoolchildren into a side street, and the thousand demonstrators, men and women, young and old, marched on towards the improvised tribune that had been prepared in advance, still with the line of party and organization leaders in front.

When still about 50 meters from the police line, they were suddenly, and without any provocation, bombarded with a salvo of tear gas canisters. The road was covered with clouds of gas. The demonstrators found shelter in adjoining buildings, and thus Abu-Tir and Avnery found themselves together in the guest room of one of the houses.

Some minutes later, when the gas had dispersed, the demonstration went on, but it was attacked again and again by the soldiers, Hummers and police riders; this lasted about
two hours.

Ten activists were arrested. After a few hours, the three Israeli detainees were released, but not the seven Palestinians. It seems that Occupation Authorities have
embarked upon a more aggressive approach towards non-violent joint protest. The day before, police in Bil’in shot two international activists and a foreign photographer in
the head with rubber coated steel bullets. All three were hospitalized.

But in spite of it all, something important was achieved during the difficult hours of the a-Ram protest march: in this demonstration there existed a complete national unity of
all Palestinian factions, and the Hamas representatives showed no hesitation to march side by side with Israeli peace activists, treating them with marked friendliness.

Israeli partners:
Gush Shalom, Anarchists Against The Wall, ICAHD, Alternative Information Center, Bat Shalom, Mahsom Watch, Women’s Coalition for Peace, Taayush and Yesh Gvul.

A series of photos:
gush-shalom.org/pics/a-ram-13-5-06/

Bill

Shahak is alas not a historian of Judaism and Jewries. He says almost nothing about Jewish-Arab symbiosis in al-Andalus, does not mention Jewish Reform, the influence of Tolstoy on Aaron David Gordon, the social anarchism of Kropotkin and Gustav Landauer inside haPoel haTzair and other streams of ‘left’ Zionism, the entire complex around Buber, Magnes, Akiba Simon, Henrietta Szold (Brit Shalom, Ihud) — but instead creates a monochromatic caricature of Jewish ‘Orthodoxy’ and its classic insularity and ‘hatred of the Other.’ Didn’t Shahak realize where his real readership lay?

[I mention Buber, Szold, A. D. Gordon, the fanatic anti-militarist who started the kibbutz movement. Sure, left Zionism people were all Jewish nationalists involved in a overtly racist colonial-settler enterprise. But a number were social anarchists nonetheless. In their time (paradoxically) a possible political mode, however ’schizoid.’ In ours a total contradiction. The picture is complex. Here something by Oved on anarchism in the kibbutzim: www.anarchistcommunitarian.net/articles/ kibbutz/kibbtrend.html ]

ABBC.NET You can find Shahak’s entire text at this site: www.abbc.net/historia/shahak/english.htm Check it out. While you’re at it, take a look at this site more generally, where the Lobby features prominently. It is alas a virulent anti-Jewish site that delights in Shahak’s ‘analysis,’ and is loaded with articles on the sinister power of Jews in America, ‘Jewish racism’ and that stuff: www.abbc.net/ Henry Ford would feel at home there. So would Julius Streicher. Are these our Genossen?

Another openly anti-Jewish site featuring Shahak’s book on Judaism is www.biblebelievers.org.au/jewhis1.htm An Australian supremacist Christian church. It denies the Bible (Tannach) is Jewish.

CYBER-RACISM I can’t stress too much how the Internet has changed this ballgame of xenophobic racism and its propagation. That is why vigilance is so necessary. Sure, there’s a much broader issue here of how people way off your own wavelength may use what you write and say to their own ends. Mearsheimer and Walt touch on that in their response to letters to the editor in the LRB, dissociating themselves from the far right that has so gleefully welcomed their analysis. This remains a complex issue — which in a digital world I’m more confused about than ever before.

I’ve worked very closely a couple of decades with Palestinians, and never encountered this kind of vicious anti-Jewish racism. Never. The Palestinians inside the resistance movement I am connected with would reject this trash immediately. The Bedouin I fought side by side with as well. This site includes Luther’s infamous “The Jews and their Lies” along with Shahak, they make good company.

Statements like “Jewish supremacy is accepted as legit in Israel and by most supporters of Israel whether or not they would put it those exact terms” (Jeff) fit in well with this broader caricature construction. Ergo: most ’supporters’ of Israel are ‘Jewish supremacists’ however we may define ’supporter.’ Or the loaded word ’supremacist.’ Just think through the implications of such thniking. That’s what I’m concerned about.

IT IS ONE STRUGGLE I hate to reopen this discussion, but I’ve been fighting anti-Jewish racism since I was a kid. And I see the fight against its percolation (through discourse, attitude) into the global left — and our own struggle against the Israeli ruling class and corporate-military elite and its distinctive fascism, as one single fabric. The fight against the Wall, and the fight against demonizing people as Jews in talk about ‘Jewish supremacy,’ or demonizing Palestinians in the many modes popular. I think my friend Toma Sik, an old left veteran from Tel Aviv who worked with us in the Bedouin resistance struggle and was probably murdered by the Mossad on a lonely road in Hungary two years ago, would agree. I wish I could ask Toma.

A MARKET OF INSIDIOUS GENERALIZATION So generalizations like “Most Israelis, across the political spectrum, have contempt for Jews in the diaspora, as well, all for different reasons and all of them, in essence, correct. The rightwingers consider their supporters abroad to be ‘checkbook zionists’ while the left, finds them contemptible for their refusal to oppose criminal Israeli policies and actions” seem pretty absurd to me. As does: “But we know what Israel thinks about […] the existence of non-Jews, in general.” A parody of any reality. To anyone who knows some of the complexity here.

Zionist collaboration with the Nazis is not what it’s about. That’s not why I nor anyone I know is in motion against Zionism. What we don’t need are burlesque constructions of Israelis, Palestinians, Jews, anybody.

GRASSROOTS DIRECT ACTION Regarding struggle from the bottom up, Chomsky says something about direct action and resistance: “It’s true that centralised power, whether in a corporation or a government, is not going to willingly commit suicide. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t chip away at it, for many reasons. For one thing, it benefits suffering people. That’s something that always should be done, no matter what broader considerations are. But even from the point of view of dismantling the master’s house, if people can learn what power they have when they work together, and if they can see dramatically at just what point they’re going to be stopped, by force, perhaps, that teaches very valuable lessons in how to go on. The alternative to that is to sit in academic seminars and talk about how awful the system is.”

A-RAM – MAY 13 PEOPLE’S MARCH OF PROTEST: Grassroots ta’ayush, togetherness in resistance is one way forward. Dismantling the master’s Wall. As in the joint Palestinian/Israeli demo against the Wall at a-Ram on May 13. Bifurcated a-Ram is the antipode emblem of one democratic united multinational state. Here a powerful description from B’Tselem of that town’s plight: www.btselem.org/english/Separation_Barrier/A-Ram.asp .

a-Ram is a substantial town of some 58,000 Palestinians, not a ‘village.’ From the May 13 call: “the residents of A-Ram continue their joint activities with Israelis, against the occupation and for a peace that is just for both peoples. This march is the first in a series of actions by a coalition of Israelis and Palestinians together with the residents of A-Ram.”

AL-NAKBA MAY 15 Our people can’t march in Gaza protesting its strangulation — but in a-Ram and all along the Wall and across Israel and in Bil’in and Budrus, Jews and Palestinians and Scandinavians and Japanese can join hands and are. Monday May 15 is al-Nakba Day. And there will be demos by Jews and Palestinians together, to mark that commemoration of destruction. Like the activists at zochrot: www.nakbainhebrew.org/index.php?lang=english

Here a thoughtful article by Eitan Bronstein on the Nakba and Israeli reception of it: www.palestineremembered.com/Articles/General/Story1649.html Timely for this hour