"Right and wrong are the same in Palestine as anywhere else. What is peculiar about the Palestine conflict is that the world has listened to the party that has committed the offence and has turned a deaf ear to the victims."
--Famed British Historian Professor Arnold Toynbee

"In the name of justice there cannot be subjection and in the name of peace there cannot be impunity."
--President Alvaro Uribe Velez of Colombia

"Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."
-- Elie Wiesel

The Honorable Marit Arnstad, Chairman of the board

The Honorable Rector Torbjern Digernes

Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Trondheim, Norway

Rarely in history do individuals, minority groups, or institutions have an opportunity to courageously adopt a principled unpopular stand that could be transformative in world affairs.

For sometime during the genocide of Gaza it was two extraordinary Norwegian physicians and humanitarians who risked their lives to save the lives of Gazans.

'This is what hell must look like'

Two Norwegian doctors witnessed first-hand the nightmare scenes inside Gaza
Guardian, January 16, 2009

Norway has always been known for its worldwide humanitarian efforts and generous foreign aid. It is no coincidence that Norway is always ranked first in the world by the United Nations.

The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) has just such a historic opportunity tomorrow when it considers voting for an academic boycott of Israel, a nation that for too long has lived by violence, ethnic cleansing, military expansionism, illegal occupations, subjugation of millions of innocent Palestinians, defied all divine and international laws that respect and value human life, and that since its establishment has committed countless terrorist acts and war crimes, lately documented by the Goldstone Report, all with impunity, never accountable for its actions in courts of justice, the U.N., or to all of humanity. The West, especially the U.S., has constantly protected Israel's interests at the expense of its own interests.

You may remember this headline in Aftenposten, 12/1/06:

"USA threats after boycott support"

"US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice threatened Norway with "serious political consequences" after Finance Minister and Socialist Left Party leader Kristin Halvorsen admitted to supporting a boycott of Israeli goods."

A quote by the Nobel Prize Winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn encompasses both Israel's non stop violence against innocent Palestinian, Lebanese, Syrian, Egyptian, and Jordanian civilians and its brilliant intimidating propaganda that established the persecutor as the persecuted.

"Violence can only be concealed by a lie, and the lie can only be maintained by violence. Any man who has once proclaimed violence as his method is inevitably forced to take the lie as his principle."

As a former academician I plead and urge you to take the only righteous stand possible against Israel and that is for your esteemed University to vote yes on an academic boycott of Israel. Your courage will open the door for Universities and other institutions around the world to follow your example.

In 1982 Sharon invaded Lebanon committing a widespread genocide that began in Southern Lebanon and ended in a three month devastating siege of Beirut, a city overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of refugees from Southern Lebanon who fled the Israeli army's advance. This genocide resulted in the murder of 20,000 Lebanese and Palestinian civilians other than the cold blooded massacre of 1,700 Palestinians in the refugee camps of Sabra and Chatila. Under Sharon's protection, encouragement, and direction, the Christian Phalangists shed the blood of men, women, the elderly, and children. Sharon even provided powerful night lights for the murderers' to commit their slaughter. All the world could do is condemn the massacre without laying blame on Israel.

From the air, sea, and land Sharon unleashed his murderous campaign upon a crowded urban city bombing churches, mosques, hospitals, schools, orphanages, retirement homes, electrical and water plants, roads, bridges, the airport and sea port; not even ambulances and medics were spared.

He would bomb bakeries where men, women, and children stood in long lines for scarce bread.

Planes would bomb an area and await the gathering of ambulances, medics, and citizens to pull persons out of the wreckage only to bomb it again to inflict more casualties.

Ambassador Phil Habib, Reagan's personal envoy to stop the genocide in Beirut worked hard to reach a peace agreement between Sharon and Lebanon while promising the safety of the Palestinian civilians upon the departure of Yasser Arafat and the PLO from Lebanon. However, he discovered that Israel could never be trusted to keep its word.

In John Boykin's book, "Cursed is the Peacemaker" (2002, Applegate Press) he quotes Ambassador Habib as saying.

"I had signed this paper which guaranteed that these people in west Beirut would not be harmed. I got specific guarantees on this from Bashir (President of Lebanon) and from the Israelis--from Sharon'. He said he 'had been given assurances... that no action would be taken against the Palestinians remaining in the camps.... On the basis of those assurances we (Americans) had given our word. We had been deceived.... Sharon was a killer, obsessed by hatred of the Palestinians,' Habib said. 'I had given Arafat an undertaking that his people would not be harmed, but this was totally disregarded by Sharon whose word was worth nothing.'"

As is customary with Israel and U.N. Resolutions, Israel defied and rejected over a dozen UN Security Council Resolutions asking Israel to at least allow humanitarian aid into Beirut.

Israel's intransigence to make peaceful concessions to the Palestinians that they too may enjoy the freedom, liberty, and independence their occupiers enjoy makes us all complicit in this tragedy with our silence and inaction.

"He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it."
--Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

It is shocking that the world accepts Israel's genocides and threats against its neighbors as fait accompli without regard to the never ending suffering of Palestinians under its brutal military occupation. Palestinians and Lebanese die, suffer, and endure in silence in a world conditioned to accept Israel's "right to self defense", a euphemism for wanton murder. They die in silence absent from the western conscience due to the blanket support of most western media outlets, none more so than in America ,the nation exporting democracy and freedom through smart bombs and biased politicians who if dare to criticize Israel jeopardize their ambitions and become the recipients of the worst media smears. In the U.S. no debate or action is allowed against Israel neither by our own "never challenge Israel" government nor by our staunchly Pro Israel media.

The academicians and experts invited to your university to speak on this issue know first hand their personal victimization at the hands of Pro Israel forces. They have risked much for the truth and are honorable men and women.

Please do the right thing and vote for an academic boycott of Israel, a nation that is neither civilized nor democratic, by setting an educational precedent for your university, faculty, alumni, but most importantly for your students, that standing up for principle is the foundation for all just laws and human rights for all peoples and not just the powerful few.

Teach them to adopt "freedom from fear" as their guiding principle in life while facing all challenges, especially challenges that discriminate between the powerful and the weak, the haves and have nots, that no people should be victimized by the power of money and weapons.

""Freedom from fear" could be said to sum up the whole philosophy of human rights"
--The late Honorable Dag Hammarskjold

"Giving Flight To Dreams"....Yes, we dare to dream, we dare to act.

- On November 8, Israeli tank shells killed at least 18 people in their sleep. Eight children are said to be among the dead. Of the 18 killed, 13 were from the same family and over 40 more were wounded in a residential attack on Beit Hanoun. According to witnesses at the scene all of the dead are women and children. The human cost of the attacks on Beit Hanoun have resulted in over 75 Palestinians killed in less than a week.

- On November 6, the international Red Cross condemned what they called a deliberate Israeli attack on clearly marked ambulance workers; the ICRC issued a statement saying that, "The International Committee of the Red Cross is appalled by this failure to protect personnel engaged in emergency medical duties. The individuals concerned and their means of transport were clearly marked with a distinctive emblem conferring the protection of the Geneva Conventions [on the conduct of warfare]," continued the same statement." Two paramedics were killed.

- On November 3, two Palestinian women who were taking part in non-violent protest were killed when Israeli Occupation Forces began shooting at a group of hundreds of women from Beit Hanoun. To watch video of the attack on unarmed women, click here.

- Call, Fax and Email your representatives today and ask them to stop supporting the indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinian women and children. Tell them that you expect this country to do what it must to stop the killings in Gaza. Israel would not be able to commit these crimes if not for the support of the U.S. In fact, in Palestinian media has been showing pictures all day of the shrapnel being pulled out of the bodies of Palestinian victims all of it stamped: Made in the U.S. It is unacceptable for us to be supporting war crimes in the territories. Tell your elected officials to take heed of the elections we just had in this country. The Republicans ought to realize that we have had enough war, lies and corruption. The Democrats should know that we can, as a people, come together for change and that they must support justice in this world by condemning Israeli atrocities or we will not vote for them either. Supporting Israeli war crimes is not only immoral but it is never going to make this country safer.

EMAIL AND OR CALL THE WHITE HOUSE
WHITE HOUSE COMMENTS LINE: 202-456-1111
WHITE HOUSE SWITCHBOARD: 202-456-1414
WHITE HOUSE FAX: 202-456-2461
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Source: Citizens for Fair Legislation: www.cflweb.org

TO SEND OUR PREWRITTEN LETTER TO YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS CLICK HERE

Or you can quote all the above and tell him/her:

Stop supporting the indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinian women and children. I expect this country to do what it must to stop the killings in Gaza. Israel would not be able to commit these crimes if not for the support of the U.S. In fact, today, I saw pictures of shrapnel being pulled out of one of the Palestinian victims in Beit Hanoun and that shrapnel was stamped: Made in the U.S. It is unacceptable for us to be supporting war crimes in the territories. I expect my elected officials to take heed of the elections we just had in this country. The Republicans ought to realize that we have had enough war, lies and corruption. The Democrats should know that we can, as a people, come together for change and that they must support justice in this world by condemning Israeli atrocities or we will not vote for them either. Supporting Israeli war crimes is not only immoral but it is never going to make this country safer.

Beit Hanoun II & the elusive "International Community". [Hat tip: Editerette]

Two Egyptian Guards Shot Dead, 25 Egyptians Injured on Gaza Border...

SEND OUR PREWRITTEN LETTER NOW: http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/CFLWeb/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=1251
OR, WRITE YOUR OWN:
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Citizens for Fair Legislation
For Immediate Release
September 20, 2005
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CFL ALERT: ISRAEL PREPARING TO ILLEGALLY APPROPRIATE MORE PALESTINIAN LAND BY CONNECTING SETTLEMENTS IN THE WEST BANK TO JERUSALEM; ASK YOUR REPS TO SUPPORT THE ONE STATE SOLUTION.

TALKING POINTS:
*Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon pledged on Monday, September 19, to connect the Ma'aleh Adumim settlement (colony) to Jerusalem. The Sharon government has indicated that they have Washington's permission to continue to build on illegally occupied Palestinian land. Please take a moment to remind your elected officials that UN Resolution 252 calls on Israel to rescind all measures that change the legal status of Jerusalem, including the expropriation of land and properties thereon and that Israel stop taking measures to unify Jerusalem as the "Jewish capital". The current plan to extend Ma'aleh Adumin to Jerusalem shows that the disengagement from Gaza was nothing but a plan to steal more Palestinian land in the West Bank.

* Ask your representatives to clarify statements made by Sharon. If in fact the U.S. is supporting the continued occupation of Palestinian land, please ask your representatives to officially abandon the roadmap as U.S. sanctioned settlement expansion contradicts the possibility of a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel.

*Ask your representatives to support the one state solution with equal rights for Palestinians and Jews as well as the right of return for Palestinian refugees. Tell your representatives that if they support the right of Israelis to continue to steal Palestinian land, that they should also support the internationally recognized right of return of Palestinians inside of Israel (portion occupied in 1948).

*Tell your representatives that as an American you can only support one democratic state with equal social and human rights for Palestinians and Israelis. A true democracy respects the rights of each citizen equally. Historic Palestine now has 6 million Jews and over 5 million original Palestinian inhabitants (with many million more living along the borders as refugees). If the U.S. expects all different ethnic and religious groups in Iraq to live together in one unified democratic nation, there is no reason for this government not to demand that Israel do the same and offer citizenship to
Palestinians in their own country.

EMAIL AND OR CALL THE WHITE HOUSE WHITE HOUSE COMMENTS LINE:
202-456-1111
WHITE HOUSE SWITCHBOARD:
202-456-1414
WHITE HOUSE FAX: 202-456-2461
==============================
Citizens for Fair Legislation is a grassroots organization committed to encouraging a fair domestic and foreign policy with an emphasis on the US/Arab world.
http://www.cflweb.org