Tag: Palestine

CT Protests Over the Khalil Abduction

by Stanley Heller, Middle East Crisis Committee

A protest on March 12 in Hartford, originally called by CT Labor for Palestine, morphed into a protest over the taking by ICE of Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate.

The rally took place in front of the Ribicoff Building in Hartford which. among its federal offices, houses ICE.

Several score people walked up and down in front of the building with signs with various messages. Many said, “Free Mahmoud Khalil”. Others said, “Justice for Palestine, Prosecute the War Criminals,” “I Stand Against Genocide,” “Healthcare not Warfare,” “End All US Aid to Israel,” and “We are Standing for Social Justice.” One banner (from MECC) called on unions to sell off their Israel Bonds.

Photo: Stanley Heller, Bay View Park, New Haven

There were many messages from the speakers. One warned that Khalil and Palestine rights supporters were just the first targets and that we all had to stand together. Another talked about the extensive repression at Wesleyan and Yale and other campuses. I mocked the Israeli soldier who claimed to have the proof of Khalil’s support for terrorism, whose own “evidence” showed nothing of the sort.

In New Haven a few days later, a much larger rally condemned Israeli actions. A huge banner was featured that read: “Free Mahmoud, Protect Free Speech.” Many signs were provided by the Party for Socialism and Liberation and a theme was ‘Free All Palestinian Political Prisoners.”

The rally took place on March 16 and one protester held a sign featuring a picture of Rachel Corrie. Corrie, on March 16, 2003, was deliberately run over by an Israeli military Caterpillar tractor and killed.

The park was near an I-95 overpass. At the close of the rally people went to the overpass with their signs and then draped the extra-large banner over the railing.

You can see video of both protests at the YouTube channel of “The Struggle Video News.” Go to YouTube and search for the above channel, or scan this QR code.

Our website is: thestrugglevideo.org.

300 Activists for Palestinian Rights at All-Day Hartford Conference

by Stanley Heller, Middle East Crisis Committee

The pews were filled at the Hartford Unitarian Society for a major conference about U.S. activism during a time of immense killing of Palestinians and Lebanese. Thunderous chanting filled the hall. The best part was that 80 to 90% of those attending seemed to be under 30. Participants were members of a score of activist groups in Connecticut and Massachusetts. A workshop of nearly 40 people founded a Labor for Palestine chapter. Our group and members of Jewish Voice for Peace New Haven took part in a panel on Jews confronting Zionism. I gave a slide show based on my book Zionist Betrayal of Jews using photos to show how Zionist leaders consistently allied with far-right parties, even groups that were violent antisemites, in their single-minded quest to drive out Palestinians and create a Jewish state.

In speeches to the whole assembly, Hesen Jabr, a Palestinian-American nurse, described how she was fired right after being given a nursing award because of her remarks and social media posts about the attacks on Palestinians. Sultana Hossain, who is part of the Amazon Labor Union and Labor for Palestine spoke about efforts to organize for Palestinian rights in the one unionized (Long Island) Amazon plant.

The conference took place among new threats of repression. The radical right is pushing for a bill that would give the Secretary of the Treasury the power to designate any nonprofit as “terrorist supporting.” If it passed, the Secretary (who serves at the pleasure of the President) could on his/her own devastate a group. There would be no need to show any evidence or provide due process. A group so designated would lose its tax-exempt status. That might be the least of its problems. Once designated as supporting terrorists it would no doubt be demonized and attacked in social media or worse. It’s believed groups supporting Palestinian rights would be the first targets.

Yale Police Arrest 47 Student Protesters for Trespassing on Beinecke Plaza

Yale Daily News, April 23, 2024

Yale police arrested 47 pro-Palestine student protesters on Monday morning. Shortly after 6 a.m., officers arrived at Beinecke Plaza, where protesters demanding that Yale divest from military weapons manufacturers had set up tents during the third night of their overnight encampment. Police detained protesters who refused to vacate the Plaza. …

The protesters were charged with trespassing, a Class A misdemeanor, before being released with a citation and an assigned court date of May 8. Yale Police Chief Anthony Campbell ’95 DIV ’09 said they had issued a warning to protesters on the Plaza last night at 11 p.m. and in the morning before 7 a.m. prior to arresting student protesters.

Arrested students will be referred for Yale disciplinary action — which could include reprimand, probation or suspension.

About 250 protesters rallied in support of the arrested individuals, flanking detainees and police officers as they boarded the buses.

[Read the entire article at yaledailynews.com/blog/2024/04/22/live-police-begin-arresting-pro-divestment-protesters-on-beinecke-plaza]

Rally in Hamden for Ceasefire Resolution

by Paula Panzarella, rally participant

photo: Paula Panzarella

On Feb. 20, from 6-7 p.m., over a hundred people were in front of Hamden Town Hall, rallying in favor of a draft resolution for a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza fighting. “Permanent Ceasefire Now,” “Another Jew for a Free Palestine,” “Stop the Killing,” and “Let Gaza Live” were some of the banners held by the crowd.

Shortly after 7 p.m., many people attended the meeting to give testimony about the need for local municipalities to take a stand against the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza. The hearing lasted well past midnight, with more than four hours of public commentary. The Town Council did not vote that night and may take up the resolution at a following Town Council meeting.

Ceasefire Now

by Joan Cavanagh, NH Sunday Vigil for Peace and Justice

November 26, 2023: The actions of the terrorist organization HAMAS on Oct. 7, 2023, were an atrocity, a war crime against innocent civilians, with a death toll of 1,200 people, accompanied by rape and other forms of torture, as well as the taking of hostages. We condemn these actions with horror and without equivocation.

The actions of the Netanyahu government in response, murdering more than 14,000 people, reducing Gaza to rubble, destroying any means by which survivors can treat their wounded and sick, and cutting off their food, water, and access to the outside world, have only amplified that villainy.

Whatever you know, believe, or have been told about the current U.S. funded and supplied Israeli government war on Gaza, or indeed about the history of Israel and Palestine, please recognize that there is no moral, political, ethical, or legal justification for genocide—the deliberate elimination of an entire group of people.

Shamefully, most of our elected officials from the executive branch on down refuse to call this siege what it is and are doing nothing to end it. Indeed, they are voting to continue it by sending money and armaments to further fuel it, even while asking for brief “humanitarian pauses” out of the other sides of their mouths. And, as usual, the arms merchants are making a handsome profit each day the war continues. They are the only beneficiaries of this all-out assault on a population with nowhere to go to escape. This war must end, and it must end now.

The good news is that from all the corners of Earth, there comes a concerted human outcry against this inhumanity. Resistance actions, led by Jewish Voice for Peace and other organizations, are happening all over this country and throughout the world. There have been nonviolent shut-downs, blockades, and takeovers of congressional office buildings, headquarters of war-profiteering companies (including Colt, in Hartford), the Statue of Liberty, the United Nations, and many more, involving in total millions of people.

Please find a way to join that outcry. Speak out, write, march, demand accountability from our own government. Here in Connecticut, contact directly—and repeatedly—all of your federal representatives to demand that they act to stop this war. Ignore their perfunctory form letter replies. Keep up the demand, no matter what justifications or evasions that they give. RESIST THIS ENDLESS WAR

Veterans for Peace Joins International Delegation to Gaza Border

by Gerry Condon, Veterans for Peace

I have the honor of representing Veterans for Peace on an international delegation currently in Cairo, Egypt. We are seeking permission to travel to the Rafah border crossing with Gaza, where hundreds of trucks loaded with humanitarian aid are being held up. We are calling for an immediate end to the US-backed Israeli slaughter of innocents in Gaza. And we are calling for the border with Egypt to be opened up to allow the massive delivery of desperately needed food, water, medicine, and fuel.
We are among the first of many international humanitarian and human rights delegations that are heading for the Gaza border in order to provide practical and moral support to the Palestinian people.

We encourage people all over the world—and especially in the United States—to continue pressing for a Ceasefire, Humanitarian Aid, the Release of All Prisoners, and Negotiations that respect the Palestinians’ Right to Survival, Dignity, and Self-Determination.

Below are excerpts from the press release we released on Sunday, November 12.

“ …In response to the Palestinian and Arab calls for civil society to challenge Israel’s deadly occupation by heading immediately towards the Egyptian-Palestinian crossing to bring urgent humanitarian relief to 2.3 million people, we have just submitted a request to the Egyptian authorities for permission to travel to Rafah….

“We urge all peoples and governments to act urgently to end this horror. There are hundreds of aid trucks currently parked in the desert waiting to enter the Rafah crossing. We demand they be allowed to reach Palestinians whose needs are dire and desperate.”

“Stop Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza Now! Open the Rafah border Now!”
veteransforpeace.org, 206-499-1220

Israel-Gaza War’s Grief Spills onto Church St.

by Thomas Breen, New Haven Independent, Oct. 9, 2023

Half an hour into a tense and loud and flag-filled standoff between pro-Palestine and pro-Israel protesters on the front steps of City Hall, city police brought in barricades to physically separate the two sides….

That was the scene outside of City Hall at 165 Church St. Monday afternoon during an at-times combustible, but never violent, set of dueling rallies sparked by the horrific bloodshed of the ongoing war in Israel and Gaza.

photo: Thomas Breen

Several hundred people from across the city and the state turned out for the parallel protests … The two sides took turns, and shouted over one another, about the Israeli occupation, Hamas terrorism, open-air prisons and blockades, the kidnapping and murder of civilians, the righteous uprising of a dispossessed people, the righteous defense of democracy….

“Free, free Palestine!” one side cheered over and over again at Monday’s rally. “From Hamas!” cheered the other side in response.

The pro-Palestine protest was organized by a number of student and local lefty political groups, including the Connecticut Democratic Socialists of America, Yalies for Palestine, the Party for Socialism and Liberation-Connecticut, and Wesleyan Students for Justice in Palestine….

The pro-Israel contingent, meanwhile, saw a mix of New Haveners and Connecticut residents, many of whom are members of the Chabad Lubavitch Hasidic community, and nearly all of whom have close ties to and family and friends currently living in Israel….

Joshua Pernick, the rabbi in residence and director of Jewish life and community relations at the Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven, told the Independent about his brother, who after a weeklong vacation in the United States returned to his home in Holon, Israel, this weekend just hours after Hamas began its attack. He and his wife and six-month-old child have been shuttling between shelters ever since, Pernick said. … ​“The problem of terrorism is it doesn’t discriminate….”

Faisal Saleh, the founder and director of Woodbridge’s Palestine Museum, showed up to the other side of City Hall’s steps Monday to support those rallying for Palestine.

Saleh was born and raised in the West Bank. He moved to the U.S. when he was 17, in 1969. He said he’s been communicating with Palestinian artists in Gaza who he knows through his museum work every few hours, just to make sure they are still alive amid the Israeli army’s strikes.
“Everybody is waiting to see what will happen,” he said….

[The article can be read in its entirety at newhavenindependent.org/article/israel_palestine]

News from Palestine from Dr. Qumsiyeh

by Stanley Heller, Director, Middle East Crisis Committee

Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh, Director of the Palestine Institute for Biodiversity and Sustainability, spoke twice in Connecticut in August, once at the Palestine Museum US in Woodbridge and the next day in Hartford at the Unitarian Society. He brought us up to date on the impressive activities of his institute and the Palestine Museum of Natural History, which is one of its projects.

Qumsiyeh lived in Connecticut at the start of the 2000s as he headed the Cytogenetics Department at the Yale Medical School. He was very active in Palestinian human rights work and co-founded the Palestine Right to Return Campaign. He returned to Palestine a decade ago. In his talks, he maintained that despite what is usually said, Palestine was a peaceful area for most of its thousands of years history. He dated recent problems to the Zionist movement and its settler colonial project.

As a bit of activism at the events we passed out copies of a picture of a two-year-old boy named Mohammed Tamimi, who was shot to death by an Israeli sniper on June 1. The ultra-right Israeli government almost immediately excused the sniper from all responsibility and expressed “regret.” We briefly chanted “Justice for Mohammed Tamimi.”

The one bit of good news discussed was the open letter called the “Elephant in the Room,” which was signed at the time of the meetings by over 700 academics and public figures decrying Israeli apartheid and telling Jewish leaders in the U.S. that democracy in Israel could only be maintained if it included equal treatment for Palestinians. The number of signers, overwhelmingly Jewish, has since swelled to more than 1,800. The wall of Jewish support for the Israeli government has a deep fissure.

The Palestinian Exception to Free Speech

by Noor Kareem and Craig Birkhead-Morton, Yale Daily News
Feb. 7, 2023

Although Yale claims to be a bastion of free speech that provides a forum for addressing all political and cultural issues, the one exception to this is the issue of Palestinian liberation.

The discourse around Palestine at Yale is surrounded by fear and restraint. Discussion is often prefaced with the familiar acknowledgment of how complicated the topic is, immediately obscuring the power relations between a Western-backed occupying power and a population subjected to life under occupation…

Many incorrectly frame Zionism — the political project seeking to establish Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people — as synonymous with Jewish identity. This conflation of the Jewish people with the Zionist state makes any criticism of the occupation immediately deemed “antisemitic.”

In reality, Zionism is an ideology and a political movement that, in the words of its founders, necessitates the erasure of Palestinians and the violent seizure of their land in the pursuit of creating a modern nation-state.

If we have learned one thing from the last couple of years, it is that silence kills. The lack of discussion on the systemic nature of Israeli war crimes has given total impunity to a state that murders civilians, massacres refugees and bombs a city already under siege. Since the assassination of American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh by Israeli forces in May 2022, the Biden administration has failed to hold Israel accountable. The number of murders is showing no signs of slowing down so far, as 2022 was the deadliest year for Palestinians since the Second Palestinian Intifada. And as of Feb. 6, 2023, 36 Palestinians have already been killed…

In December 2022, Yalies4Palestine launched the first-ever BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) campaign at Yale. Prior to this, Yale was the only university in the Ivy League not involved in the BDS movement, largely due to this campus’s pro-Zionist climate. This is despite public institutional condemnations of human rights violations in Iran and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We must overcome this culture of hypocrisy and call on Yale to take a stand against the Israeli occupation… As students at one of the most elite academic institutions in the world, we have an obligation to illuminate truth and honor light over darkness. Join us in fulfilling this obligation by signing and sharing our petition demanding that Yale cancel its contract with G4S — a security company involved in some of the world’s worst human rights abuses, including those in Israel — and by taking the initiative to learn more about the BDS movement.

[Article can be read in its entirety at yaledailynews.com/blog/2023/02/06/kareem-birckhead-morton-the-palestinian-exception-to-free-speech. To find out more about the BDS Committee for Yalies4Palestine, email [email protected] or [email protected]]

Notes to PAR Readers

We urge you to check the internet for the many demonstrations protesting the bombing of Gaza. As of this printing, there were rallies and marches in Hartford, New London, New Haven, and Manchester, as well as in cities throughout the US and around the world. The New Haven rally and march on May 22 was in solidarity with the people of Palestine and Colombia, fighting for their right to life and self-determination. Video footage is available at thestruggle.org.

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