Author: jameswagner

[This report from Steve himself just came through. The photo links are my own doing.]

First: The end of the truck story is that both guys got their trucks
back. The one guy got his back after all the vegetables rotted.
Early on Thursday morning Steve and other folks went to a roadblock
outside a village called Tel. There was an outbreak of hepatitis in
the village, and there was an ambulance scheduled to come and set up
a mobile clinic. Steve and company set to work on the roadblock with
picks and shovels. Along came soldiers in a tank (Steve calls tanks
APCs for Armed Personnel Carrier). They weren’t interested in negotiating anything and told the internationals to be gone in 5 minutes. Steve says “We saw one of them giving another one a tear gas grenade. We talked about it and decided the best thing was to leave.” There was another roundabout way for the ambulance to access the village. A confrontation wouldn’t accomplish anything, and people might get hurt.
In a previous report an occupied apartment building [in Nablus] was mentioned, with all the occupants locked in their homes. Steve and company went there. Soldiers told them to leave. Steve talked on his cell phone with a woman locked into an apartment in the building. People from across the way waved the internationals into another building, and brought them to an office. This was very timely, as it turned out some tanks were coming down the street.
Steve says this is life under curfew. You go outside your home, but not too far, and when tanks come, you get back inside and lock the door. Nablus has been under curfew for 60 days, during which the curfew has been lifted a total of 60 hours.
Curfew was lifted for 4 hours Thursday afternoon. Steve went with others to watch the checkpoint outside the occupied apartment building. Women and children were allowed through, but all men were stopped, their IDs taken and added to a big pile for examination. The delays for men were substantial, so that by the time their identification was checked, it was almost the end of the break in the curfew.
Among other things Steve witnessed: A woman in labor came to the
checkpoint with her husband. They were meeting an ambulance on the
other side of the checkpoint. The soldiers said they would let the
woman through but not her husband. She wouldn’t leave without him.
They added his ID to their pile. Eventually, the soldiers got their
list of “approved” men who would be let through. They made no effort
to even look at the man’s ID until they got this list, and even after
they got the list, they did not prioritize checking for this man.
The end result was that the woman in labor stood in the hot sun for
half an hour.
Another man had been waiting a week to rejoin his wife and children
on the other side of the checkpoint. His wife came with the kids, to
advocate for her husband. He was not let through, but the soldiers
said they could come across. The wife wouldn’t cross because she was
afraid she couldn’t go back, but she sent the kids. There was barbed
wire across the road that adults could step over, but was completely
impossible for the children to cross. The soldiers would not allow
any Palestinians to help the children. They were persuaded to allow
internationals to help the children. Steve was very upset by this
incident.
Steve stayed in Askar refuge camp in the home of family who has lost two sons, so their home is at risk of demolition.
Two internationals stay in Askar camp at all times, and Steve was one
of them today. He heard about Erica’s arrest. He wants people to
know that she was just walking down the street, in the company of a
young Palestinian man. This man was arrested along with Erica. He
was taken inside an occupied home, his hands were bound, he was
blindfolded, hit and kicked. After two hours, the soldiers told him
he could leave. It was after dark, and curfew was in effect, so the
man asked what he should do if he was stopped by other soldiers. The
soldiers who detained him answered that they would be glad to hold
him for longer if that is what he wanted. He left (and did not come
across any soldiers on his way home).
Steve says there is a big demonstrations being prepared for tomorrow. Everyone is “hunkering down” because a tank was overturned (in Nablus??). Apache helicopters have been heard overhead.
Also, a soldier was killed in Balata refugee camp and a heavy
retaliation is expected.
Steve says: “I can’t imagine how the Palestinians live with this day
after day. It’s really very stressful.”
That’s the report.
dsg

[Steve did report that his friend Erica had been arrested, and that she has support people here. This report just arrived from JATO (Jews Against The Occupation) rather than from Steve directly.]

Nablus-A member of the New York-based group Jews Against the
Occupation was arrested by the Israeli Military earlier today after
delivering food and medicine to Palestinian families. She has been
falsely charged with shielding rock-throwing boys.
Erica Weitzman, a Manhattan-based humanitarian aid and human rights
worker is currently being held at the Shogai Shomron military base
and will be transferred to a prison at the Ariel settlement to await
deportation.
Ms. Weitzman has been in the West Bank since August 9th, 2002 and has
been visiting civilian Palestinian apartment buildings that have been
taken over by the Israeli army for use as bases. The army generally
forces several families who live in the building into one small
apartment. Ms. Weitzman has been observing living conditions and
bringing food and medicine to these families who are not permitted to
leave their buildings, even during the short periods when curfew
is lifted. In the past 60 days in Nablus, the round-the-clock curfew
has only been lifted for a total of 60 hours, most of which have been
concentrated in time blocks.
Ms. Weitzman denies having contact with rock-throwing children.
“The more crimes the Israeli government commits against the
Palestinian people in the name of Jews everywhere, the more I felt it
was precisely my responsibility as a Jew to speak out against them.”
Ms. Weitzman said at a press conference held in front of the AIPAC
offices in New York before leaving for the West Bank.
Members of Jews Against The Occupation have maintained a presence in
the West Bank since April 2002, working in solidarity with non-
violent Palestinian organizers against the daily military violence
visited on Palestinian civilians. Jews Against The Occupation
recognizes that the acts of the Israeli government are not only
illegal and immoral, but pose a threat to Jewish lives and the fabric
of Jewish identity worldwide.
To interview members of Jews Against The Occupation currently in the
West Bank call:
– Ryan Senser, 011-972-56-375-202:
Former Hebrew schoolteacher, temple youth group leader, and college
Hillel President.
– Steve Quester, 011-972-67-308-192:
“Great evil is being perpetrated on the people of Palestine. Evil is
being done in my name, because I am a Jew. Evil is being done with
weapons I purchased, because I am an American. If I don’t stand up
against this evil, who will?” Former Hebrew schoolteacher, current
New York Public School teacher.
– Jeremy A. Hoffman, 011-972-56-711-040:
“My grandparents and great grandparents did not flee the Cossack
raids of Czarist Russia to have their history, culture and religious
tradition exploited to justify the destruction and devastation of
another
people.”
Jews Against The Occupation is a New York City based group of Jewish community leaders, and part of a growing movement of worldwide Jewish dissent against the illegal, violent actions of the Israeli government and the occupation of the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem.

[see the last ten lines of yesterday’s blog for an update on the radio sex story]

From Palestine, Steve has left messages saying that he is fine, but, because of logistical and technical (phone) problems, we don’t yet have another real report or live conversation. We expect one soon.

I was going to say, “Geez, is air next, but I immediately realized the air has already been sold to the polluters.

Around the world there is a growing social movement to protect water as a common resource. Because many large corporations have realized that water scarcity and pollution are going to define the next century, a tremendous surge of activity is taking place around the world to commodify and privatize water. Many public interest groups are mobilizing in opposition. One of the most active is Public Citizen, which is campaigning to protect universal access to clean and affordable drinking water by keeping it in public hands.

So reads The Nation email alert. The Jim Hightower piece within the current edition elaborates.

… dozens of American communities presently find themselves under assault by foreign powers with names like RWE, Suez, Vivendi and Perrier. These global corporate raiders are grabbing for our most essential public resource: water. In just the past few years, such transnational conglomerates (along with such US players as Bechtel, T. Boone Pickens, Monsanto and, until recently, Enron) have quietly privatized all or part of the water delivery systems in Atlanta, Berlin, Bolivia, Buenos Aires, Casablanca, Chattanooga, Houston, Jacksonville, Jersey City, Lexington, Ky., Peoria, San Francisco and many other places (some of which have reverted to public ownership), plus laid claim to whole bodies of water, including the Midwestern Ogallala Aquifer, Blue Lake in Alaska and Canada’s huge James Bay.

Henry Kissinger committed crimes against humanity in his support of the Argentine military dictatorship’s self-described “war on terrorism” in the seventies, when military and paramilitary units were systematically killing, torturing and kidnapping suspected leftists–including several American citizens–during the summer and fall of that year.
Newly declassified documents show the frustration of the American ambassador, Robert Hill, during those months.

“When he had seen Secy of State Kissinger in Santiago, [Kissinger] had said he hoped the Argentine govt. could get the terrorist problem under control as quickly as possible,” Mr. Hill wrote. “Guzzetti [the Argentine foreign minister] said that he had reported this to President Videla and to the cabinet, and that their impression” had been that the United States’ “overriding concern was not human rights” but rather that Argentina ” `get it over quickly.’ ”
Mr. Kissinger did not return phone calls from a reporter seeking comment.

This is the real reason the current administration is fighting the International Criminal Court; its concern is not for Private Ryan.

I can’t say anything more or better than Barry does on this subject.

As someone who thinks a pre-emptive strike on a country that few people other than Bush believe is a significant threat to us, I just signed Move On’s petition. This group got started during the horrors of the Clinton impeachment/Republican coup.
I will not feel safe in a world, as an American and a New Yorker, that justifiably believes that force is the only way to convince the USA of anything.
A Republican administration that has Kissinger telling it this is a bad idea is a danger to us all.

Please sign today.