From Xinhua, Aug. 22:
Mexico’s Jews march for Middle East peace
More than 1,500 people, mostly Jews, staged a peaceful protest on Monday, calling for peace in the Middle East and an end to the armed conflict between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah guerrilla.
The demonstrators, most of whom were young people, chanted for peace in front of the Israeli embassy in Mexico City, and protested against the month-long conflict, which started on July 12, and has left more than 1,300 Lebanese and over 150 Israelis dead.
Officers from the Public Security Department of Mexico City sealed off the Sierra Madre Street in the northeast of the city, where the embassy is located.
A delegation of the demonstrators was received by the Israeli diplomatic mission, which delivered a letter calling for a swift solution to the conflict.
Israeli authorities on Sunday, said that they would begin covert operations targeting the armed wing of Hezbollah, in apparent defiance of a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire.
See also:
NYC: Jews stage Penn Station “Die-in”
Indigenous Middle Eastern Jews condemn Israeli aggression
Jews in Britain protest Israel’s Gaza aggression
Colombia: police attack march for Lebanon
See our last posts on Israel/Palestine, Lebanon and Mexico.
Jews, Israel and The Palestinian People
I thought most Jewish people, especially Ashkenazi Jews, the
most privileged group in Israel, hated Palestinians, Arabs,
and didn’t care what horrors have been inflicted on the Palestinians
for decades by the Jewish nation, Israel.
I was frankly, very surprised, to learn that Jews care
and care deeply, what happens to non-Jews, Palestinians,
Arab people in particularly, really I was shocked!
The Jews I have spoken to refer to the Palestinians, Muslims,
Israeli Arabs, as ragheads, muzzies, and feel that Israel isn’t
cruel, harsh enough towards them.
They eagerly point to the terrible harm caused by Palestinian
Suicide Bombers, but when I or one of my co-workers try to bring
up the terrible conditions that the Palestinian people live
under, they never want to hear it.
So we talk among ourselves, and demonstrate to each other
and everyone we know, the videos, pictures, such as the following,
for example.
http://www.bubbleshare.com/album/49180/overview
The Promised Land
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14034.htm
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12011945@N00/194173135/in/set-72157594202020048/
I did not know that there were Jewish people that
felt very strongly that the horrors being carried out
by the Israeli government against innocent people should be
stopped.
Because the Jewish people that I know, at work, just in
my neighborhood, have very strong feelings about defending
Israel and Israel’s right to exist, regardless of whether or
not Palestinian people are shunted into refugee camps,
cut off from medical supplies, electricity, food, decent
schools, have their homes demolished, because someone in their
family is suspected of who knows what.
They don’t care.
So I was crying when I saw the Jews demonstrating on video,
in NY and around the country.
It was very emotional for me.
Try these links
Kibush: Occupation Magazine
Alternative Information Center
Breaking the Silence: Israeli veterans speak
Jews Against the Occupation
Israeli Committee Against Housing Demolitions
And check out:
http://www.wri-irg.org/news/2003/yahni.htm
Sergio Yahni
19 March 2002
To: Minister of Defence Ben Eliezer
Ministry of Defence
An officer for whom you are responsible has sentenced me today to 28 days in military prison for my refusal to serve in reserve duty. I did not refuse only to serve in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, as I have for the past 15 years, I refused to serve in the Israeli army in any capacity.
Since 29th September 2000, the Israeli army has waged a ‘dirty war’ against the Palestinian Authority. This dirty war includes extra-judicial killings, the murder of women and children, the destruction of the economic and social infrastructure of the Palestinian population, the burning of agricultural fields and the uprooting of trees. You have sowed fear and despair but failed to achieve your ultimate objective; the Palestinian people did not give up their dream of sovereignty and independence. Neither did you provide security for your own people despite all the destructive violence of the army over which you have responsibility.
In light of your great failure, we are now witness to an intellectual debate amongst Israelis of the worst kind: a discussion about the possible deportation and the mass killing of Palestinians.
The failed attempt of leaders of the Labour Party to impose a settlement on the Palestinian people has dragged us into a ‘dirty war’ for which Palestinians and Israelis are paying with their lives. The racist violence of the Israeli security establishment, who do not see people but only ‘terrorists,’ has deepened the vicious cycle of violence for both Palestinians and Israelis.
Israelis are also the victims of this war. They are the victims of the irresponsible and failed aggression of the army over which you are responsible. Even when you waged the most deadly attacks on the Palestinian people, you did not fulfil your duty: giving security to the citizens of Israel. Tanks in Ramallah cannot stop your most monstrous creation: the desperation which explodes in coffee shops. You, and the military officers under your command, have created human beings whose humanity disappears out of desperation and humiliation. You have created this despair and you cannot stop it.
It is clear to me that you have risked all of our lives only in order to continue building illegal and immoral settlements, for Gush Etsion, Efrat and Kedumim: for the cancer which eats away at the Israeli social body. For the past 35 years, the settlements have turned the Israeli society into a danger zone. The Israeli state has sowed despair and death both for the Palestinians and Israelis.
Therefore I will not serve in your army. Your army that calls itself the ‘Israeli Defence Force’, is nothing more than the armed wing of the settlement movement. This army does not exist to bring security to the citizens of Israel, it exists to guarantee the continuation of the theft of Palestinian land. As a Jew, I am repelled by the crimes this militia commits against the Palestinian people.
It is both my Jewish and human duty to resolutely refuse to take any part in this army. As the son of a people victim to pogroms and destruction, I cannot be a part of your insane policies. As a human being, it is my duty to refuse to participate in any institution which commits crimes against humanity.
Sincerely
Sergio Yahni