[News] Breaking Into a Prison - Gaza

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://www.counterpunch.org/kysia07032008.html

July 3, 2008

A Mission to Uphold the Law


Breaking Into a Prison

By RAMZI KYSIA

I want to tell you a secret and I want to ask you a question.

Shhh! - Come closer. Listen carefully: I'm part of an international 
conspiracy to break into the world's largest open-air prison this 
summer by sea. Will you help me?

This August, the Free Gaza Movement will set sail from Cyprus to Gaza 
on a ship carrying needed medical supplies. We will not be asking 
Israel for permission.

For over two years the state of Israel has severely restricted the 
Gaza Strip's ability to import fuel, spare parts, and other necessary 
materials. Israel maintains complete control over Gaza's air space 
and territorial waters, near complete control over travel into or out 
of Gaza, near complete control over Gaza's imports and exports, and 
near complete control over Gaza's own tax revenues. Little is allowed 
in. As a result, Gaza's economy has completely collapsed. [1]

This has consequences, both vast and personal.

In Gaza City, the Atfaluna Society for Deaf Children operates a 
school for 275 students, ages four through seventeen. That is, they 
used to operate a school. It was forced to close in mid-April because 
of the severe fuel shortages caused by the Israeli blockade. Atfaluna 
has also been unable to supply children with new hearing aids or 
batteries for over eight months - ever since Israel blocked their 
importation due to "security" concerns. The Atfaluna Society has 
asked for our help. Will you help them? [2]

The troubles faced by the children of Atfaluna are but one story in a 
sea of human misery. Because of the siege, eighty percent of families 
in Gaza are now dependent on international food aid just to be able 
to eat. [3] There is over forty percent unemployment , and 
ninety-five percent of Gaza's industries, as well as a majority of 
private businesses, have been forced to shut down. [4] Because of 
shortages in fuel and spare parts, Gaza's only power plant is running 
at less than seventy percent of capacity, and electrical outages of 
several hours a day are the rule rather than the exception. [5]

Running water is now available to most households for only four to 
six hours a day. Sewage treatment centers no longer function 
properly. Millions of liters of raw sewage have been pumped into 
heavily populated neighborhoods, and in order to avoid being forced 
to literally flood these residential areas with even more raw sewage, 
the Mediterranean Sea has been turned into a toilet. Since January of 
this year over 10 billion liters of untreated and only partially 
treated sewage have been released into the Mediterranean. Gaza's 
fishermen state that the sewage has killed off most of the sea life 
in the immediate vicinity. [6]

The humanitarian condition of the one and a half million men, women, 
and children illegally incarcerated in Gaza is now at its worst point 
in the last forty years of Israeli occupation.

Israel's pitiable attempts to achieve absolute security through 
absolute domination have only led us all into disaster. The rocket 
attacks by militants in Gaza against Israeli civilians are as 
deplorable as they are predictable - given the suffering caused by 
this blockade, - but these attacks are also irrelevant to the 
humanitarian catastrophe caused by Israel's siege. The one does not 
justify the other. The one cannot justify the other.

What is needed in our world today is not simply protest against the 
violence of terrorist groups and terrorist governments. What we need 
is a new militancy, a greater resolve, rooted in the profound respect 
for human life, and sustained by the profound disrespect for any 
government or group that attacks our sisters and brothers around the 
world. Protest is not enough. Our living, and our dead, both cry out 
for more. We must build a movement of direct civil resistance against 
violence and oppression.

In one month, the Free Gaza Movement will sail on just such a mission 
of civil resistance.

We are students and teachers, human rights observers and aid workers, 
lawyers, medics, activists - parents and grandparents. We are 
Americans and Europeans, Israelis and Palestinians, Australians, 
South Africans, and more. We are of all ages and backgrounds. 
Collectively, we have years of experience volunteering in Gaza and 
the West Bank. Because of our human rights work, the state of Israel 
has banned many of us from re-entering Palestinian areas. Because of 
the ongoing blockade, the rest of us find it almost impossible to 
enter Gaza at all. Despite deteriorating conditions, the great need 
for international assistance, and the invitations of our Palestinian 
partners - the Israeli Government will not allow us into Gaza to 
help. Will you help?

We must break the siege of Gaza. Conditions there are already 
catastrophic. We have to raise international awareness about the 
prison-like closure of Gaza and deeply pressure Israel and the 
international community to lift the blockade and end the Occupation. 
As people of conscience our actions must be commensurate with the crisis.

We've tried to enter Palestine by land. We've tried to arrive by air. 
Now we're getting serious. We're taking a ship. Please look into your 
hearts and ask yourselves if the collective punishment and virtual 
imprisonment of one and a half million human beings can ever be 
justified. If your answer's "no," then we want your help this August 
when we break into Gaza and try to break out of this siege.

Ramzi Kysia is an Arab-American writer and activist, and a member of 
the Free Gaza Movement. You can receive regular updates on their 
efforts to break the siege of Gaza by signing up for their 
newsletter. If you'd like more information, or if you can donate 
money or medical supplies (such as hearing aids), please visit their 
website at <http://www.FreeGaza.org>FreeGaza.org.

REFERENCES

1. "Power Shortages in the Gaza Strip," United Nations Office for the 
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 8 January 2008; "Impact 
of Fuel Shortages on Gaza Sanitation," OCHA, 29 April 2008.

2. Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Narratives Under Siege

3. "Gaza Humanitarian Crisis," A Joint Statement by Nine Israeli 
Human Rights Organizations: B'Tselem, Association for Civil Rights in 
Israel, Amnesty International Israel, Bimkom, HaMoked, Gisha, PHR 
Israel, Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, and Rabbis for 
Human Rights; 16 November 2006; "The Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian 
Implosion," A Joint Report by Amnesty International, CAFOD, CARE, 
Christian Aid, Medecins du Monde UK, OXFAM, Save the Children UK, and 
TRoCAIRE, Executive Summary, March 2008.

4. "The Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian Implosion," Joint Report, p. 8, March 2008.

5. "Impact of Fuel Shortages on Gaza Sanitation," OCHA, 29 April 2008.

6. "Power Shortages in the Gaza Strip," OCHA, 8 January 2008; "The 
Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian Implosion," Joint Report, Executive 
Summary, March 2008; "Impact of Fuel Shortages on Gaza Sanitation," 
OCHA, 29 April 2008.




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