To: U.N. General Secretary and U.N. Security Council

Petition to the United Nations Secretary General and Members of the U.N. Security Council to Establish a "No Fly Zone" over Gaza under the Principle and Norm of the "Responsibility to Protect"

To Be Presented to the Honorable U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and the Honorable Ambassadors of the U.N. Security Council.

"The United Nations, whose membership comprises almost all the states in the world, is founded on the principle of the equal worth of every human being."
–Kofi Annan, Former Secretary General of the United Nations

READ PETITION HERE: http://www.petitiononline.com/p181p194/petition.html

No-Fly Zone over Gaza - Petition
Video Produced by : Anthony Lawson
Petition Written by : Dr. Mohamed Khodr
Song and Music by : Michael Heart

Video link: http://vimeo.com/22986781

SIGN PETITION HERE: http://www.petitiononline.com/p181p194/petition-sign.html

NOTE: As you may already know, the Petition video has been removed by YouTube team. According to the e-mail and guidelines I received, it is the "shocking or disgusting content" of the Gaza Tonight Music video by Michael Heart: "We Will Not Go Down (Song for Gaza)", which I used. The video which has had over 1.5 million hits on the original website and thousands more on others and which are still up there. It makes you think, doesn't it.

I would suggest those without the stomach to view such images should do something to stop the carnage in Gaza.

–Anthony Lawson

by ISM Palestine

By Mohamed Khodr* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

[Author's Note: I urge all worldwide citizens who read this petition to please consider signing it to provide a voice for the voiceless Palestinians and to disseminate it as widely as possible urging others to do the same. Thank you for your humanity.]

This Petition will be presented to the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki- Moon, Members of the U.N. Security Council and Governments and Organizations in respective nations of Signers.

PLEASE SIGN PETITION AT:

http://www.petitiononline.com/pal0610/petition.html

"Brothers in suffering, brothers in resistance, brothers in ideals and conviction. It is now our duty to further strengthen this bond in order to secure this hard-won freedom for future generations."
--Guy Verhofstadt , former Prime Minister of Belgium

We The People, citizens of the world sharing a common planet, sharing the fate and destiny of life and death, sharing a globe decorated by the gifts of air, land, and sea, sharing the joys and sorrows of our fellow man and woman, hereby declare our freedom from fear, our freedom from all greedy, subjugating, occupying, and oppressive forces, our freedom to declare, resist, and fight by all means necessary man's evil toward fellow man without fear of consequences.

"I have no country to fight for; my country is the earth, and I am a citizen of the world."
Eugene Debs

Thus we unite in words, but more importantly in actions, to solemnly declare our full commitment to the liberty, freedom, equality, and most importantly, justice and peace for all mankind. We will not rest until every child is born free, lives free, and dies free.

We commit ourselves to the democratic principle that all men, women, and children are created equal in the eyes of God and humanity and are endowed with the inalienable rights to life, liberty, freedom, justice, honor, dignity, and respect. No people or nation shall be permitted to live arrogantly and act with impunity, denying freedom and justice to others and defying the will and laws accepted by all mankind.

We The People of the world reject and will resist any political, economic, or military power that seeks to oppress peoples while thieving their lands and resources to the benefit of the few, the elites, the greedily corrupt corporate dominated governments who utilize their military might to declare their right to the lands and wealth of weaker nations.

History is replete with powerful empires invading and enslaving peoples with an arrogance and sense of supremacy that the lives of the subjugated people are expendable and subordinate to their goals of economic thievery. But history has always shown that all empires crumble when the masses rise up in rebellion and resistance to reclaim their freedom from oppression.

As Napoleon stated:
"There are only two forces in the world, the sword and the spirit. In the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit."

We The People, in total recognition that the most catastrophic tragedy in modern history inflicted upon innocent natives is the illegal theft of a land, Palestine, and the forceful ethnic cleansing of two thirds of its people and destruction of hundreds of their villages to establish the State of Israel allegedly as a safe haven for the persecuted European Jews.

England gifted Palestine, a land it did not own or occupy, to Jews in a simple 68 worded letter, the Balfour Declaration, sent to a rich English Jewish banker, Lord Rothschild, in 1917. President Truman in 1948 recognized the newly established State of Israel within 6 minutes of its declaration of "independence" (from whom?).

"It is the duty of Israeli leaders to explain to public opinion, clearly and courageously, a certain number of facts that are forgotten with time. The first of these is that there is no Zionism colonialization or Jewish State without the eviction of the Arabs and the expropriation of their lands."
--Yoram Bar Porath, Yediot Aahronot (Israeli Newspaper), July 14, 1972 (Cited in Nur Masalha's "A land Without A People" 1997, p98).

Millions of Palestinians are now the largest refugee population in the world living in refugee camps run by the United Nation Organization, UNRWA, as dispossessed refugees in their own land and in a Diaspora in neighboring Arab countries and around the world. They have been refugees for 62 years while the world remains silent as Israel continues to expropriate and settle their remaining lands in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, all with the aid and protection of the United States, a superpower shackled by the powerful Pro Israeli lobbies and media.

World Governments maybe silent but we citizens of the world will "never again" be silent as Israel, the most condemned nation on earth by hundreds of U.N. Resolutions, the International Criminal Court, and Human Rights Organizations, continues to commit war crimes against Palestinian civilians, acting with total impunity and protection from its hostage supporter, the United States.

We The People, the signers of this petition from around the world today declare that words and silence are no longer an option, no longer a policy or behavior worthy of our humanity and our beloved values of brotherhood, justice and equality for all mankind.

We will join each other with dedicated courageous hearts and hands in an unrelenting worldwide massive movement and resistance against any government that adopts a direct or indirect policy of supporting Israel's illegal occupation due to domestic or international pressures.

We will unite and coordinate our actions through world wide organizations supporting humanity's goal to finally end Israel's Occupation and establish the Free State of Palestine within the 1967 borders. We will work through all means of communication, primarily through the Internet: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and websites.

This will be the first peaceful Internet Revolution and overthrow of a colonial power in history.

We should begin by educating ourselves on the Palestinian issue then launch massive educational campaigns in our respective communities and countries.

In democratic nations we must launch a voter registration campaign to ensure that politicians are held accountable for any action supportive of Israel.

In the United States most minorities are not registered to vote or don't vote. Given that minorities will become the majority of the American population in 40 years, their votes and future political clout will impact America's support of Israel and its foreign policy based on militarism. Voter registration, not money, is the key to free all humanity from the industrial-military-media complex that has whittled our intellect and replaced it with Pavlovian consumerism.

All of us must match if not surpass Israel's massive and well coordinated public relations machine that quickly feeds the lies and propaganda to its supportive western media. In every nation Pro Peace and Pro Palestinians organizations and activist websites must develop massive email lists to rapidly disseminate information requiring a rapid response from its listserves with emails, phone numbers, and faxes on whom to contact. Israel kills with bullets and supports its massacres with powerful media sound byres and talking points.

We must not allow our governments or institutions to serve Israel's interests above our own national interests. In the U.S., Congress eagerly sends billions of dollars to Israel while denying unemployment benefits, preventing the loss of hundreds of thousands of teachers, and feeding America's hungry children.

We will educate our peoples to totally boycott and divest from companies, corporations and their subsidiaries, academic institutions, labor unions, or any organization that directly or indirectly invests or does business with Israel, especially in the Arab and Muslim world.

We shall commit ourselves to participate and strengthen the already existing Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions campaigns against Israel.

(see: http://bdsmovement.net/, http://www.bigcampaign.org/, http://www.jai-pal.org/content.php?page=173, http://boycottisrael.info/, among many other campaigns)

We shall boycott and cancel all paid subscriptions to any and all media that is biased against the Palestinians and Pro Israel in its reporting and editorials. News is easily accessible through television, radio, and the internet.

We the People, vow to establish November 29 as an annual worldwide day of protest against Israel's illegal theft and occupation of Palestinian and Syrian land. This November 29 will be the 63rd anniversary of the war crime known as U.N. General Assembly Resolution 181 passed November 29, 1947, that illegally partitioned Palestine, giving European Jews 55% of Palestine although they constituted one third of Palestine's population, and 45% to Palestinians who comprised two thirds of Palestine's population, notwithstanding that all of Palestine, except 6%, was their land in 1947.

Contrary to western governmental lies and propaganda the Palestinians in 1988 agreed to recognize Israel's right to exist and to accept a Palestinian nation along the 1967 borders, a mere 22% of their previous homeland (now they own less than 14% of Palestine due to illegal settlements, military bases, the Apartheid Wall, and military buffer zones.)

Hamas on several occasions has repeatedly stated it will accept a Palestine state along the 1967 borders, including in a letter carried to President George W. Bush.

See: http://sabbah.in/bnx691
and
http://sabbah.in/bHkqi9
and
http://sabbah.in/buHrLH

The Arab League's Peace Proposal of 2002, reiterated in 2007, offered Israel a Pan Arab peace proposal that recognizes and normalizes all relations with Israel in exchange for Israel's withdrawal from all occupied Arab lands. Israel has never been interested in Peace thus rejecting this extraordinary plan.

For 2,600 years whenever Jews were given an opportunity to return to Palestine, the vast majority preferred living outside the "Promised Land".

Between 1880 and 1925, about 2,378,000 European Jews preferred immigrating to the United States while less than 40,000 Jews chose Palestine. Jobs and wealth have always surpassed their claim to Palestine. The situation exists till this day where more Jews live outside of Israel than inside with the greatest majority being in the United States.

[See: http://sabbah.in/92Clvx ; 'Encyclopedia Judaica]

We the People, in truth and courage will never stop our words and actions until a Palestinian child can enjoy all the freedoms, rights, privileges, and citizenship conferred upon him/her by his/her own independent State of Palestine with its capitol in East Jerusalem.

Palestinians will for the first time in 100 years learn to smile again, to laugh, to play, and finally to sleep in peace without fear and nightmares.

Our journey is long, difficult, and faces many obstacles, but it shall begin with a first step, your caring signature on this petition.

God bless all who sign this petition who love freedom for themselves and for all humanity.

Dr. Mohamed Khodr
U.S.A.

"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience. Therefore, (individual citizens) have the duty to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring."
~ Nuremberg War Crime Tribunal, 1950 ~

(Please visit this site: http://sabbah.in/cUUvVh to read Zionist's deliberate policy of ethnically cleansing Palestinians.)

* Mohamed Khodr is a political activist who frequently writes on the plight of Palestinians living under the brutal occupation of Israel, U.S. Foreign Policy, Islam, and Arab politics.

By Franklin Lamb* (Shatila Palestinian Refugee Camp, Beirut) | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

"We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change or resistance. Small acts, when multiplied by many people, can transform the world"

"If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory."

Professor Howard Zinn (1922-2010)

Hundreds of people from around the World have signed an Online Petition http://www.petitiononline.com/ssfpcrc/petition.html in the opening days of an international effort to achieve basic Civil Rights for Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon.

We Petition because we believe that alongside Statehood, and the exigency of lifting the criminal siege of Gaza, immediately granting the right to work and the right to purchase a home to Palestinians in Lebanon, after 62 years of indignity and degradation, is a fundamental imperative of basic morality and justice.

We Petition because as British journalist Robert Fisk wrote in the UK Independent on January 16, 2010 after a camp visit: " The Sabra and Shatila Palestinian Refugee Camps are repulsive, obscene, outrageous, filthy, stinking slums and a place of such squalor that the gorge rises that human beings even live there." The reason why Lebanon's 12 Palestinian Refugee camps are the worst of the 58 camps in the Middle East is due primarily to the fact that unlike occupied Palestine, Jordan, and Syria, Palestinians in Lebanon do not possess the most basic civil rights.

We Petition because many of us are from countries that continue to aid and abet this degradation, for which like each of our fellow citizens we bare personal responsibility and feel shame, as we contemplate the founding principles of our nations that we cherish being sullied by silence and inaction.

We Petition because Lebanon's Palestinian refugees are today, as has been the case for 62 years, systematically deprived of basic rights guaranteed by the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and because the Palestinian refugees are the only refugee population in the world excluded from the international protection accorded by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Statute and the Refugee Convention. At the end of 2008, at least 7.1 million Palestinians, representing 67 percent of the entire Palestinian population (10.6 million) worldwide were displaced persons. Among them are 6.6 million refugees and 427,000 IDPs. This makes Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) the largest and longest-standing case of displaced persons in the world today.

We Petition because the Lebanese government, in particular, as well as the broader international community, have the obligation to respect and ensure the full range of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of Palestinians living in Lebanon, without discrimination. These rights include the rights to work, to education, to the highest attainable standard of health, to adequate housing and an adequate standard of living.

We Petition because we want to twin with every Palestinian Refugee in Lebanon and to pay heartfelt condolences to the families of every Lebanese who died during the several aggressions launched against them. Each Petition signature links with our cherished friend, Badriah Haij of Shatila Refugee Camp, now ill and preparing for death and to meet the Prophets. Sixty two years ago she walked for two days into Lebanon at Maron al Ras from her village of Al Amoka near Safad, Palestine. Badriah's fervent death wish, and that of her daughter Zeinab and her siblings, is to have someone bring a handful of dirt from her family homestead for her children to sprinkle into her casket in Lebanon until, as Badriah believes, her remains will be returned to Palestine and she can rest in peace. Each signature links with Master Ali Hamise a young man of 11 years old who happened upon a delegation of visiting Europeans and Americans recently and they engaged the ill glad youngster near the garbage pile on Rue Sabra. Ali stunned the visitors with his knowledge of Palestine as he recited much history and the names of nearly 150 destroyed villages in occupied Palestine that he insisted must be rebuilt "so people can go home." "How could da kinder know all that?" a crusty German gentleman asked.

And each signature links in solidarity with more than 7 million Palestinians in the Diaspora, many forced to disperse to survive and whose Right of Return is inerasably engraved in international law.

We Petition because International law requires that civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights must be accorded the Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon without discrimination. Lebanon, like all Countries, must ensure that any discrimination against her hosted Palestinian Refugees is eliminated. The discretion given to countries in the extent to which they must ensure economic rights for Refugees does not justify restricting access to the right to work on the basis of preserving the right to return, as some in Lebanon have argued. Lebanon is obliged not to interpret the distinction between nationals and non-nationals to undermine their obligations under international human rights law.

For example, Lebanese Presidential Decree 11614 of 1969, as modified by Decree 296 of 2001, prohibits people who do "not carry a citizenship issued by a recognized state" from securing legal title to housing and land in Lebanon. This draconian legislation specifically targets Lebanon's Palestinian Refugees although they are not specified in the Decree. It means that Palestinian refugees, because virtually all stateless people in Lebanon are Palestinian refugees, and most Palestinian refugees are stateless: "No real right to housing, land or property of any kind may be acquired by any person that does not carry a citizenship issued by a recognized state, or by any person if such acquisition contradicts with the provisions of the constitution relating to the prohibition of Settlement (tawteen)." Article 1 of the amended Decree 296.

This law is in direct violation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) ratified by Lebanon on November 24, 2008, as well as other treaty obligation and numerous provisions of customary international law.

We Petition because the legal prohibition on Palestinian refugees in Lebanon registering legal title to housing and land greatly diminishes their chance of enjoying security of tenure outside the camps, leaving most of them with little choice but to remain in the camps and gatherings. Lebanese law also prevents Palestinian refugees from inheriting housing or land, and from registering real estate, even if they have been paying for it in installments for years.

We Petition because we believe Lebanon's Parliament will heed a sincere broadly based international urgent appeal to fulfill the unique Lebanese role in the region and exhibit its gifted people's deeply ingrained humanitarianism. And because courageous Lebanese officials working for the enactment of legislation granting civil rights to Palestinian Refugees urge us to do so, that they may demonstrate international support for and expectation of, correcting this grave injustice that has also diminished Lebanon's standing among the community of Nations. To its great credit Lebanon's new Parliament appears ready to seriously consider the enactment of basic civil rights for its Palestinian Refugees including the right to work and the right to own a home, have a recognized ID document and to move freely inside Lebanon and outside the camps without fear of harassment or arbitrary arrest.

We Petition to give Lebanon's Palestinian refugees a feeling of hope and power that many are in danger of losing and to convince them that ultimately power rests with the people themselves and, as has often happened in history they can use it as blacks, women and the anti-war movement have done in American history and that the anti-war movement must reconstitute and do again.

To paraphrase one of my Professors at Boston University, the late Howard Zinn, who later was also the inaugural speaker at the Boston University School of Law Seminar-Forum, which he helped me establish during the Vietnam war, (in order to bring guest speakers on social issues and enliven our law school curriculum, top heavy as it was, by way too much Corporate Taxation, Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Estate planning etc) however dire the conditions, however many will advise in all sincerity that those in power will not allow even the most basic civil rights for Palestinians in Lebanon we cannot give up the game before all the cards, including those from a multitude of supporters around the world, have been played.

The obstacles may seem invincible and also our opponents in their determination to hold onto the status quo. But that apparent power has, again and again, proved vulnerable in history to human qualities less measurable than entrenched political power such as moral fervor, determination, unity, organization, sacrifice, wit, ingenuity, courage, and persistence. No rational analysis and calculation of the imbalance of power need deter people who are persuaded that the cause for civil rights for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon is just.

Please join us!

Sign with us!

Distribute with us!

Post with us!

Make history with us!

Let's do this together!

Please support the enactment of basic civil rights for our Palestinian sisters and brothers in Lebanon in the sure knowledge that when we succeed, and succeed we shall, you will personally have improved the World.

Contact: palestinecivilrightscampaign@gmail.com

Website: www.palestinecivilrightscampaign.org

Palestine Civil Rights Campaign-Lebanon

PLEASE SIGN HERE!

http://www.petitiononline.com/ssfpcrc/petition.html

"Affixing my name to this petition expresses my wish to personally "twin" in solidarity with one of Lebanon's Palestinian refugees as they and their Lebanese hosts continue to work and prepare for their Return."

* Franklin P. Lamb, LLM,PhD
Director, Americans Concerned for
Middle East Peace, Wash.DC-Beirut

Board Member, The Sabra Shatila Foundation and the Palestine Civil Rights Campaign, Beirut-Washington DC
Shatila Palestinian Refugee Camp
Beirut Mobile: +961-70-497-804
fplamb@gmail.com

Lifta, a most picturesque Palestinian village, lies on the slopes of West Jerusalem below the highway linking it to Tel-Aviv. It has been abandoned since the invading Hagana underground forces backed by the Stern Gang drove the last of its Palestinian inhabitants in 1948 during the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

It was the one single event which changed the nature of the place and the whole region. Although dozens of houses were destroyed, many of them still remain poised on the landscape.

Lifta is considered by many as a rare and fine example of Palestinian rural architecture with narrow streets aligned with the slopes of the mountains around it. Its cubist forms are a wonderful manifestation of the mastery of the Palestinian stone masons who were the indigenous owners and builders of these houses.

Today Lifta is more or less a ghost town suspended in space and remains deserted despite the fact that most of its original Palestinian inhabitants live in the surrounding communities. The Israeli authorities refuse to allow them to return.

Now the Jerusalem Municipality has produced plans to turn Lifta into a luxurious and exclusive Jewish development – reinventing its history in the process.

The Plan, numbered 6036, was designed by two architectural offices: G. Kartas – S. Grueg and S. Ahronson, as part of the “local space planning of Jerusalem”. The plan was submitted on June 28, 2004, and according to its title refers to “The Spring of National”. The plan, submitted to the Jerusalem Municipality Planning Committee in 2004, was approved by a regional committee.

In 2005, objections to the Plan were raised by several groups, including Bimkom (alternative center for Israeli planning) and the representatives of the regional committee of the organization and construction for the Al Quds-Jerusalem area.

Main Issues:

• The original Palestinian inhabitants of Lifta, their memories of the village, their exile and longing to return to Lifta are not mentioned, or even considered by the Municipality Master Plan.

• Lifta captures the moment of destruction of Palestinian life in 1948. Its 3,000 original inhabitants fled – mostly to East Jerusalem and to the Ramallah area. However, unlike many of the 530 Palestinian villages and towns conquered and bulldozed during the war of 1947/48, a few of Lifta’s houses remain almost intact, yet deserted and declared ‘officially’ resettled.

• These set of circumstances have placed Lifta in a unique position: its original inhabitants are still around, living in the OPT and the Chicago area with a desire that the injustices done in 1948 be acknowledged and repaired.

• In Israel, renovation projects are frequently used to build a national narrative, ignoring the deep contradictions between planning and human rights that inevitably arise out of such initiatives.

• With Lifta, we have a place where a new national transformation results in the erasure of another’ people’s memory as evidenced in the new Masterplan.

• Lifta is a tangible embodiment of the larger context of events in the region during 1947/48. Lifta can be a vital place for contemplating and understanding the concept of historical continuity.

• Lifta’s heritage is a story of a multicultural society, embracing a strong sense of an ethnically and religiously diverse community of Muslims, Jews and Christians which encapsulated a healthy civil equality amongst its inhabitants and the neighbouring communities. If Lifta were to be rejuvenated with due care to preserving its memory, it could offer a unique opportunity for the start of a new dialogue towards a conciliatory outcome.

Petition’s Aim:

This petition aims to save Lifta through the World Monuments Fund , amongst others, and to draw attention to this site which has been threatened by neglect, vandalism and forced occupation by extremist settlers.

Sign the petition

Please also visit the sponsor: http://www.1948.org.uk/

"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.

The undersigned NGOs and individuals PETITION Call upon the General Assembly to create a special international tribunal to try Israel, its political and military leaders, for such crimes in violation of international law, human rights law and international humanitarian law in the Palestinian Occupied Territory of which they may be charged.

Creation of a Special Tribunal to try Israeli War Criminals

To: President and Member States of United Nations General Assembly

PETITION

To President and Member States of United Nations General Assembly
The Creation of a Special Tribunal to try Israeli War Criminals

Recalling that Israel was created by virtue of a General Assembly Resolution in 1947 against the wishes of the indigenous population of Palestine;

Recalling that the creation of Israel was achieved through the ethnic cleansing of the indigenous population, which resulted in the creation of the Palestinian refugee problem, and that more than half of the population of 1.5 millions of the Palestinian Occupied Territory called the Gaza Strip are Palestinian refugees who have become, with the other civilian population, victims of the recent Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip;

Noting that the UN Human Rights Council, in its ninth Special Session, has adopted on 12 January 2009, a resolution “on the grave violations of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory including the recent aggression of the occupied Gaza Strip” in which it “strongly condemned the ongoing Israeli military operation which had resulted in massive violations of human rights of the Palestinian people and systematic destruction of the Palestinian infrastructure”; and “decided to dispatch an urgent independent international fact-finding mission to investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law by the occupying power against the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory”(United Nations Press Release of 12 January 2009, Human Rights Council, ROUNDUP);

Recalling that Israel has in the past refused to cooperate with similar fact-finding commissions or even give them visas to enter;

Recalling Article 22 of the Charter of the United Nations

Recalling further the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice of 9th July 2004 on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall by Israel, the occupying power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, in which the Court emphasized the special responsibility of the General Assembly for the Question of Palestine;

The undersigned NGOs and individuals

Call upon the General Assembly to create a special international tribunal to try Israel, its political and military leaders, for such crimes in violation of international law, human rights law and international humanitarian law in the Palestinian Occupied Territory of which they may be charged.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Sign the Petition

Petition in support of call by United Nations General Assembly President Miguel D'escoto Brockmann for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/IJAN_Brockmann_BDS/?e

During the 57th Plenary Meeting on the Question of Palestine, President of the General Assembly Miguel D'escoto Brockmann broke a diplomatic taboo by describing Israeli policies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories as similar to those of the defunct apartheid regime in South Africa.

Brockmann also urged the United Nations to use the term ‘apartheid’ without fear, and recommended that the United Nations

"....should consider following the lead of a new generation of civil society, who are calling for a similar non-violent campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions to pressure Israel to end its violations."

Unsurprisingly, Brockmann has been branded as an antisemite by apologists for Israel.

We are appalled by the recurrent use of baseless accusations of antisemitism; they silence calls for compassion and humanity in the name of the Palestinian people. The use of such accusations to defend massive violence against civilians offends all people of conscience. The false invocation of the slur of antisemitism positions Israel, with great political and military advantage, as a victim, while desecrating Jewish histories and trivializing the real experiences and outcomes of antisemitism.

Likening Israel's policies to apartheid is not antisemitic. It is common sense. Israel's policies have been widely described in these terms by, among others, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Jimmy Carter, Jamal Zahalka, Azmi Bishara, Gideon Levy, John Dugard, Omar Barghouti, Danny Rubinstein, Amira Haas, Shulamit Aloni, Meron Benvenisti, and Ami Ayalon.

Calling for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel is not antisemitism. It is the recognition that only such a campaign can lay the ground for a long-lasting peace based on justice and reconciliation. In the words of Nelson Mandela,

"The responses made by South Africa to human rights abuses emanating from the removal policies and apartheid policies respectively, shed light on what Israeli society must necessarily go through before one can speak of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East..."

As Israel continues to ignore the growing outrage over the blockade of Gaza, and as Israel repeatedly breaks the cease-fire, blocks humanitarian aid and prevents journalists from covering the catastrophic impact of its actions, we the undersigned express our support for President Brockmann and urge the United Nations and all member states to adopt his recommendation without delay.

SIGN THE PETITION To: Israeli and Palestinian Authorities -Palestinian journalist Khalid Amayreh, who lives in the West Bank, has been invited to attend a media conference in Germany. As required, he set about to request all of the necessary travel documents, including a visa that needs to be granted from the German representative office in Ramallah. After routine questioning regarding his political affiliations, it was not only determined that he was not a member of any party, nor formally associated with any organisation, but it was clear that he had never been arrested or detained by Israeli authorities. Mr Amayreh was granted an entry visa to Germany. However, the Israeli military authorities have refused to give him a permit to leave the West Bank. No Palestinian can travel abroad without receiving such a permit beforehand, otherwise he or she would be turned back once arriving at the Israeli-controlled border terminal at the Allenby Bridge.

Mr Amayreh then went to his local District Coordination Office in Dura, where he was informed that his information was forwarded to the Shin Bet (General Security Services) of the Israeli government. Then two days later, the GSS informed the Palestinian office that Amayreh was “barred from leaving the West Bank for security reasons.” No further explanation was given.

His fortune in obtaining the required travel permission did not change as he applied to the Civil Administration Headquarters in Hebron, a metallic pen holding persons seeking the mandatory permission even to go to East Jerusalem for medical treatment, where it is not unusual to find them huddled and waiting their turn for ten or more hours, under the watchful eye of Israeli military watchtowers.

The Palestinian Civil Affairs Coordination Office in the West Bank was also unable to mediate on his behalf, as they too are entirely dependent upon the decisions, without clarification, evidence or justification, made by the Israeli Security division.

There is indeed no justification for the violation of this man’s civil and human rights, and along with him, the rights of all others who are denied freedom of movement with no justification whatsoever. The Occupation authorities, while they have no sovereignty over citizens of the Palestinian Authority, dictate what must be done with those citizens and the world seems to consider the violation of their rights acceptable and normal praxis. These people are not pawns on a chessboard, but are individuals who seek the basic liberties that all democracies are obligated to provide for their people. The Palestinian Authority does not exercise its duty of guaranteeing civil liberties to its own citizens, and treats them as if they shall be subject to the whims of the Occupier.

We ask for the immediate revision of the decision regarding Mr Amayreh, so that he is granted the documents necessary for him to exercise his freedom of movement allowing him to continue to provide for himself and his family in the work that he is employed in, as well as for the Palestinian Authority to assume a position that sets the freedoms of its citizens as a priority that is greater than the perceived “security” risks declared by the agency of the State of Israel.
http://www.petitiononline.com/k1h2a3l4/petition.html

SPANISH:
El periodista palestino Khalid Amayreh, que vive en Cisjordania, ha sido invitado a asistir a una conferencia de medios en Alemania. Según la reglamentación, se le solicitaron todos los documentos necesarios, incluyendo una visa que necesita le sea concedida por la oficina de la representación alemana en Ramallah. Después de un interrogatorio rutinario relacionado con su filiación política, no solamente se determinó que no era miembro de partidos políticos, ni que estaba asociado formalmente a alguna organización, sino que fue evidente que nunca había sido arrestado ni detenido por las autoridades israelíes. Se le concedió al Sr. Amayreh una visa de ingreso a Alemania. Sin embargo, las autoridades militares israelíes se han opuesto a concederle un permiso para salir de Cisjordania. Ningún palestino puede viajar al extranjero sin recibir tal permiso con antelación, de otra manera sería devuelto una vez que llegue a la terminal de frontera controlada por los israelíes en el Puente Allenby.

Después, el Sr. Amayreh fue a su Oficina de Coordinación de Distrito local en Dura, donde fue informado que sus datos personales habían sido enviados a la Shin Bet (Servicios de Seguridad General o GSS por sus siglas en inglés) del gobierno israelí. Luego de dos días, los GSS le informaron a la oficina palestina que Amayreh tenía “prohibido salir de Cisjordania por razones de seguridad.” No le dieron detalles adicionales.

Su suerte para obtener el permiso de viaje requerido no cambió cuando solicitó el permiso en las Oficinas Centrales de la Administración Civil en Hebrón, un corral metálico para detener a las personas que buscan el permiso para ir a Jerusalén Este por tratamiento médico, donde no es raro encontrarlos amontonados y esperando su turno durante diez horas o más, bajo la mirada observadora de las torres de vigilancia militares israelíes.

La Oficina de Coordinación de Asuntos Civiles palestinos en Cisjordania tampoco pudo mediar en su representación, dado que son totalmente dependientes de las decisiones, sin aclaraciones, evidencias o justificaciones, realizadas por la división de seguridad israelí.

De hecho, no existe justificación para la violación de los derechos civiles y humanos de este hombre, y junto con él, de los derechos de las demás personas a quienes les es negada su libertad de tránsito sin ninguna justificación en absoluto. Aunque las autoridades de ocupación no tienen soberanía sobre los ciudadanos de la Autoridad Palestina, dictan qué debe hacerse con esos ciudadanos y el mundo parece considerar que la violación de sus derechos es una práctica aceptable y normal. Estas personas no son peones en un tablero de ajedrez, sino individuos que luchan por sus libertades básicas, mismas que toda democracia está obligada a garantizarle a su pueblo. La Autoridad Palestina no ejerce su deber de garantizar libertades civiles a sus propios ciudadanos, y los trata como si estuviesen sujetos a los caprichos del ocupante.

Solicitamos la inmediata revisión de la decisión relacionada con el Sr. Amayreh, de manera que le sean concedidos los documentos necesarios para que ejerza su libertad de tránsito y pueda continuar desempeñando su trabajo para abastecerse él mismo y su familia, así como también que la Autoridad Palestina asuma una posición que le brinde la libertad a sus ciudadanos como una prioridad mayor a los riesgos de “seguridad” percibidos y declarados por la agencia del estado de Israel.
Sincerely,

The Undersigned

http://www.petitiononline.com/k1h2a3l4/petition.html

French abstract:

À: Les autorités israeliennes et palestines

Invité à une conférence en Allemagne, le journaliste palestinien Khalid Amayreh s’est vu octroyer un visa d’entrée en Allemagne par les autorités consulaires allemandes à Ramallah mais les autorités israéliennes lui ont refusé le visa de sortie de Cisjordanie. Cette pétition s’adresse aux autorités israéliennes et palestiniennes pour qu’elles permettent à Khalid Amayreh d’exercer sa liberté de mouvement.

Bien à vous,

Les signataires

SEE ALSO: Finkelstein and Me

Scottish effort to issue a British apology to the Palestinian people for Balfour. Please make the effort to sign the Petition.

Balfour Declaration and the rights of the Palestinian People
Raised by: Mr Gerald Quin on 15 April 2008

Petition by Gerald Quin calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to make representations to the UK Government inviting it to apologise to displaced Palestinians for the actions of Arthur Balfour and to promote early implementation of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 of 11 December 1948 to secure the Palestinian peoples inalienable right to live in peace and security in any part of their historic homeland.

Dear fellow Americans: Please take 2 minutes to kindly sign this petition (http://tinyurl.com/ytefbp) to Barack Obama on the issue of Palestine.

Obama, Call for Peace & Justice for Palestine

Dear Senator Obama:

As Americans who will be voting in this year's presidential elections, we have welcomed your focus on the need for new thinking about America's role in the world and your insistence that peace and security depend on respect for international law and for the rights, dignity, and common humanity of all peoples.

Surely one of the areas where it is most critical to apply these values is Israel/Palestine, where the policies the United States has pursued for 40 years have brought about neither peace nor justice. We have hoped you would articulate a new approach to this issue, one built on respect for the rights of the Palestinians as well as the Israelis.

Unfortunately, all we have heard from you so far on this issue is an increasingly fervent repetition of the same bankrupt policies pursued by George W. Bush and his predecessors. In particular, we were shocked to read your letter of January 23, 2008, to Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (see bellow attached image copy), about a proposed Security Council resolution on the situation in Gaza.

In it you focused on condemning Palestinian rocket attacks against Israel, but made no mention of the ongoing Israeli bombardments and raids that have killed hundreds of innocent residents of Gaza, as well as the calculated Israeli policy of denying the necessities of life - food, clean drinking water, medicines, medical care, school supplies, and the energy needed to power sewage treatment plants and hospital operating rooms - to all 1.5 million residents of the area, of whom more than half are children. When you say that "Israel is forced to do this," we hope that you are not condoning or encouraging Israeli human rights violations. You denounce Hamas as a terrorist organization, but ignore its repeated offers of a long-term truce with Israel - offers the Israeli government has summarily rejected, even though polls show that more 60 percent of Israel's own population favor negotiations with Hamas.

The brutal and disproportionate nature of Israel's recent actions in Gaza has been condemned around the world, including by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and by the European Union. Yet you, like Hillary Clinton and John McCain, have offered not a word of criticism of Israel, nor of sympathy for the people of Gaza.

This is not "change we can believe in."

We understand that you are under intense political pressure by those who consider themselves pro-Israel. But as your campaign leaflets say, "What this country needs is a President who won't just do what's right when the politics are easy, but will stand up when the politics are hard."

This is a time to show you mean that. We call on you to condemn the Israeli assault on Gaza and to outline a new policy on Israel/Palestine based on respect for international law and the rights and dignity of the Palestinian as well as the Israeli people.

Kindly sign this petition here: http://tinyurl.com/ytefbp

(Click image to enlarge)

Image by: Carlos Latuff

Petition: for two activists... that you know well
To all the friends of the freedom of speech and opponents of racism: (Names Updated regularly)

We are a group of Palestinians and other activists for the Palestinian cause of various nationalities and affiliations, and believe that unity and persistence is important to confront the injustice our people had suffered in the past and still at present, probably in the unforeseeable future by Zionist and colonialist powers.

Zionism has damaged us from the first day when they started implementing their colonialist project to colonize all of Palestine, and when the opportunity comes, extend it beyond the borders of historic Palestine, damaging other Arabs. From the first day, they had been resorting to physical, psychological, moral and propaganda terror against all sorts of resistance whether it is in armed self-defense, and even against the power of the word by Palestinians and their supporters. They had been resorting to personal and communal targeted assassination, terrorizing Palestinians and their supporters all round the world in order to shut up all sorts of resistance. They try to break us apart, because they know our unity is dangerous to their colonialist and racist plans. They had been trying to control and shut the free and honest media, and political activism by financial bribery and blackmailing when running for any sort of political offices at all levels, especially against those who call for the liberation of Palestine and the Right of Return of Palestinians to their homes and land and want them to live under a democratic, sovereign and free state under the rule of law.

Among those free fighters against Zionism are two non-Arab supporters of the Palestinian cause, two outstanding personalities who are also great fighters for the implementation of freedom and liberty to all the subjugated peoples of the world, Gilad Atzmon, the ex-Zionist London-based musician and writer, and Mary Rizzo, the Italy-based blogger of Peacepalestine http://peacepalestine.blogspot.com/. They have been attacked by Zionists for a long time, but they are also being attacked by certain other people who are in the movement for Palestine.

Almost no day goes past when Tony Greenstein is not waging a war against Gilad Atzmon and Mary Rizzo, and we believe his actions have overstepped all limits. We have watched as he tries to smear them as racists, and we are saddened that his attempts increase as our own situation becomes more and more dramatic. These useless and pointless defamation campaigns are intolerable, as he circulates falsity against these activists. His attempts to do this only hurt our cause and waste our energy, not the least, they distract from the important issues, and go against the very idea of unity that we value.

We, Palestinians and activists for Palestine, express our solidarity with Gilad Atzmon and Mary Rizzo, who when they realized the tragedies Palestinians and other Arabs suffered, especially ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homeland, at the hands racist colonialist Zionism decided to fight for the rightful Palestinian cause. Atzmon willingly liberated himself from this inhuman and destructive project, by choosing the road of self-imposed exile and public exposure of what the Zionist project is all about. Tony Greenstein created among his usual lies that some Palestinians attack and defame the two dedicated supporters of the Palestinian cause, Atzmon and Rizzo. We declare that he does not speak for us or in our names when he attacks these and other activists.

We also take the opportunity to condemn the strangling siege that is being imposed over the Gaza Strip in particular and the West Bank and the rest of the Palestinian Arab people in general to complete their ethnic cleansing from their historic homeland. We urge all peace loving supporters of the freedom of thought, against all racism and Zionism and dedicated to the just Palestinian Arab cause as well as Iraq and all occupied Arab lands, to sign the petition calling for an end to the defamation campaign and a focus on the issues that are important to our people. Add you name, location and organization or group you are part of if you wish. Send it to palestinesomoud@yahoo.fr. A list will be made public.

Initial Signatories: other names will be added and comments that have been sent will be compiled and published.
Adib S. Kawar, Nazareth, Palestine - Beirut, Lebanon
Walid Halabi, France-Italy
Arab Abdel-Hadi PMWATCH, Ansar Al-Quds. LEBANONVIEW, Free Palestine and others
Malak Abdel-Hadi, Palestinian living in Dubai
Shahira Mehrez, Egyptian living in Cairo, Egypt
Paola Pisi, Italy, URUKNET
Ismail Zayid, Canada
Nizar Issa, London, UK
Nadia Hasan, Chile
Dr Sadek Pharaon MD, Syria
Oren Ben Dor, UK
Manuel Talens, Spain
Dima Hamdan, London, UK
Iqbal Tamimi, Exiled Journalist Network - UK, A Palestinian journalist and poet
Samir Daoud - Akka Palestine - residence: Beirut - Lebanon
Nadia Daoud - Akka Palestine - Residence: Beirut - Lebanon
Hala Kawar - Nazareth, Palestine - Residence - Beirut - Lebanon
Wajih Freij - Jerusalem, Palestine - Residence: Beirut - Lebanon
Lamia Kawar - Nazareth, Palestine - Residence - Beirut - Lebanon
Ibrahim Kawar - Nazareth, Palestine - Residence - Beirut - Lebanon
Fausto Giudice, Secretary, France, Zapatist Alliance for Social Liberation
Ginette Hess Skandrani, France, Chairwoman, Zapatist Alliance for Social Liberation
Wael AlSaad, Düsseldorf-Germany. PYN Coordinator-Germany Palestinian Community Düsseldorf Board
Dr Hajo G. Meyer, Heiloo, the Netherlands, survivor of Auschwitz
The Radical Press, Canada
Mauro Manno, Italy
Manuela Vittorelli, Italy
Diego Traversa, Italy
Vicente Romano, Spain
Carlos Sanchis, Spain
Nancy Harb Almendras, United States, Germany
Zuhair Nafa, Palestine
Raja Chemayel, The Hague, Netherlands
Theodore D. Turner, Brooklyn, New York
Kristoffer Larsson, Sweden
Ellen Rohlfs, Germany, German-Palestinian Society and Gush Shalom
Hergen Matussik, Germany
Benedetta Scardovi-Mounier, USA/Italy
Cristina Santos, London, UK
Rocío Anguiano, Spain
Sigge Andersson, pre-med student, Sweden
Guenter Schenk, France/Germany, Aktionsbündnis für einen gerechten Frieden in Palästina
LanceThruster, LA, CA, USA
Mary Sparrowdancer, Tallahassee, FL
Birgit Jödahl, Sweden
Miguel Martinéz, Florence, Italy
Susanne Scheidt, Al-Awda Italia
Jean-Marie Flémal, writer and translator, WPB (Workers' Party of Belgium), Charleroi, Belgium.
Edna Spennato, South Africa-Brazil, Earth Heal Geoharmonic Research Project
Abdullah Husain, Palestine by birth, KSA, India by life accident
Wendy Campbell, California, USA, MarWen Media
Peter Brooke, UK, www.peterbrooke.org.uk
Daniel McGowan, Geneva, NY, Exec. Director, Deir Yassin Remembered
Debbie Brown, Hacienda Heights, California USA
Kenneth Rasmusson, Sweden
Redress Information & Analysis, London, UK
Schuyler Ebbets, USA, The People's Voice.org
Ragnar B. Johannessen, Norway, The People's Voice.org
Annie Selden Annab, Annie's Letters Blog
Jim Leven, UK, PSC member
Javier Fernández Retenaga, Spain
Shaukat Khawja, Toronto, Canada Profession: Engineer
Volker M., Canada
Lina Abubaker, London, UK
Brenda Heard, UK, Friends of Lebanon, http://www.friendsoflebanon.org/
Letizia Tessicini, Orte, Italy
Simon R-Levin, Manchester, UK
Paloma Valverde, Spain,member of CEOSI
Sarah Stevens, UK
Ralph Pinner, UK
Inge Soder, Germany
Sarah Gillespie, London, UK
Raja Ibrahim, Pistoia, Italy, ASSOCIAZIONE AMICIZIA ITALO - PALESTINESE
Haitham Sabbah, Sabbah's Blog, http://sabbah.biz/

First, let's start with this powerful Hip-Hop song - Eyes of A Souljah:

ACTION DAY!

What We Can Do to END GAZA SIEGE?

The Least you can do is to Distribute and Let Every One Know...

Forward to your friends, groups, organizations, governments and business to get involved in speaking out and supporting the Stop The Siege in Gaza.

Email any articles of http://www.end-gaza-siege.ps/ (Be sure to include a link to where the story is).

Here is a MUST READ letter (don't forget to forward):

Open Letter to Sir John Holmes, UN Undersecretary- General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator

Khalid Amayreh
November 19, 2007

Dear Sir: Greeting

You must be aware of the nightmare now unfolding in the Gaza Strip. Gaza is simply dying a slow and painful death at the hands of the children and grandchildren of the Holocaust. This is not an overstatement or exaggerated description of a people long tormented by a sinister occupying power that is hell- bent on decimating them, using the basest and most inhumane of means, such as preventing food and other basic needs from reaching them.

I could go on and one and on describing and explaining the catastrophic situation in Gaza where on any given day, children and other civilians succumb to their illnesses because Israel and other neighbouring countries wouldn't allow them to leave the blockaded territory for adequate medical care.

I don't know if your office is receiving daily and accurate reports from the Gaza Strip. But in case it doesn't, a quick glance at news reports from that tormented land would suffice to give you a fair idea of what is happening there.

True, some foodstuff and a few other commodities are being allowed to reach Gaza. However, these are utterly inadequate to meet the minimal needs of more than 1.4 million beleaguered human beings, the vast bulk of whom are unemployed, thoroughly impoverished and desperately hopeless.

"Innocent Palestinian Kids" - Photo: Fady Adwan

Besides, Gazans, like the rest of humanity, need more than bread and tea. They need to live a dignified life. This is their God-given right as humans. This right must not be compromised by political cannibalism that is brazenly practiced by a world claming to be civilized and enlightened when in reality its actions and behaviour are millions of light years apart from civility and enlightenment.

I am not going to blame Israel and the United States and their allies and friends for this unfolding tragedy. The Quran states "wala Yas'alu 'an thunoobihemol Mujrimun" meaning that "criminals are not much concerned about their sins."

This Quranic verse, which I am sure has Biblical equivalents, obviously applies fairly and squarely to child-killing and child-starving states and armies that kill children and innocent people knowingly and deliberately for political reasons.

However, as a UN official whose responsibility includes overseeing the situation in Gaza and preventing a Nazi-like catastrophe from taking place in any part of the world, you are called upon in the strongest terms to immediately take pro-active and tangible measures to save Gaza's helpless inhabitants from what looks a certain looming disaster, especially if the current draconian blockade continues.

There is no doubt that the firing by Palestinian guerrillas of homemade Qassam projectiles onto Israeli settlements in the area is a problem. But it is a problem made in Israel since the Jewish state stubbornly refuses to stop killing innocent Palestinians and destroying their homes and bulldozing their farms. Israel wants to keep up the killing of Palestinian children regardless of whether the Palestinian guerrillas observe a ceasefire or not.

This sufficiently explains Israel's adamant rejection of Palestinian ceasefire proposals made on several occasions by Prime Minister Haniya and other Gaza officials.

The reason for this may not be sufficiently clear for all, especially in the West where pro-Israeli media often turn the black into white and the big lie into a "virtually reality" glorified by millions.

Well, Israel simply doesn't view herself as humanly equal to Palestinians and non-Jews in general. That is really the crux of the matter and the mother of all sins in the Middle East.

Today, the people of Gaza nearly completely rely on the good will of the international community for their physical survival, which they have come to no longer take for granted, given the indifferent silence and brutal callousness of the international community towards their enduring plight.

Unfortunately and regrettably, the UN, too, is watching the tragedy in Gaza with passivity and a great modicum of indifference. This passivity, unethical and incompatible with UN Charter and ideals, serves only to embolden Israel to tighten its barbaric grip on that tormented region further and exacerbate the suffering of its people.

I am saying that because I am convinced that Israel, under whose harsh occupation we have been languishing for over 40 years, would refrain from taking more pornographic acts of genocide against our people only if the international community made it clear that such behaviour would be unacceptable. Otherwise, Israel would continue to test the will of the world so that if the world's conscience slumbered or looked the other way, Israel would commit the unthinkable.

This is not far-fetched at all. A state that only last year dropped 2-3 million bomblets on Lebanon, could commit a similarly monstrous crime against the more vulnerable and utterly unprotected Palestinians.

This week, many members of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, vociferously protested their army's failure to "completely paralyse Gaza," with some lawmakers asking their government "why there is still life in Gaza, why there is still electricity in Gaza. We must make sure to them who are the masters!"

This shows that were it not for the international public opinion, Israel would emulate the Third Reich. We are talking after all about a state without conscience, without morality.
So, Israel won't relent as long as the international community plays blind, deaf and dumb and looks the other way, while Gazans and other Palestinians are being killed, starved and brutalized.

Sir: Don't you ever count on regional states. These failed regimes prefer the legitimacy that comes from pleasing and appeasing the United States more than that which comes from doing the right thing.

Now what are you going to do to put an end to this nightmare? As a fellow human being, I urge you again in the name of the voiceless and the helpless in Gaza, ordinary people, un-politicised and nearly totally preoccupied with making ends meet, to take a meaningful action now to end this obscenity, the criminal blockade of the Gaza Strip.

I hope and pray you will deal with this matter with the urgency it deserves. Gaza is really facing a grave danger of collapse and demise, and we must never allow this to happen.
Gaza is already a replica of Ghetto Warsaw. For God's sake, we must not allow Israeli criminality, American acquiescence and international impotence to turn it into another Auschwitz.

Another good example is this Israeli soldier's tale letter:

Occupation Breeds Terror

Israel must leave the territories, and must do it soon - whether accompanied by concessions on the Palestinian side or not

When I first moved to this country, I was prepared to play my part by enlisting in the IDF and serving in the West Bank. While there, I saw for myself the effect my mere uniformed presence had on the Palestinians I encountered on a daily basis. Every interaction took place with me holding all the cards - it was me with the loaded gun in my hands; it was me barking instructions to "stop or I'll shoot", "lift up your shirt", "don't come another step closer"; it was me playing with my quarry as though they were puppets on the end of short, taut strings.
[...]
But that was when I saw the wide, silent eyes of the families' children as we screamed at their father - their hero, their protector - and wrested from him the reins of power inside his own house. And that's when it started to dawn on me just what kind of effect our actions were having on the next generation, who were guaranteed to end up hating us when all they saw was us herding them like cattle and imposing our will on them through the sights of our guns.
[...]
The unspoken truth that every Israeli knows, uncomfortable as it may be to admit, is that occupation breeds terror. Every incursion, every raid, every curfew and collective punishment, drives the moderates into the welcoming arms of the militants, who promise to return their honour and their wounded pride by fighting the oppressors' fire with fire of their own. And that fact alone should be enough to shake Israelis awake and realise that the occupation has to end, as much for our own security as for the sake of the Palestinians that we're subjugating... Read On! ( http://snipurl.com/1twq8 )

Alternatively, you can write your own article. Here is a comprehensive list of email addresses for UN Officials around the world:

belgium@un.int, ghana@un.int, france@un.int, gabon@un.int, italy@un.int, panama@un.int, peru@un.int, qatar@un.int, slovakia@un.int, southafrica@un.int, uk@un.int, tzny@tanzania-un.org, argentina@un.int, china@un.int, newzealand@un.int, australia@un.int, chinamission_un@fmprc.gov.cn, germany@un.int, congo@un.int, nycmis@um.dk, brazil@un.int, india@un.int, registration@hagueacademy.nl, otp.informationdesk@icc-cpi.int,visits@icc-cpi.int, inquiries@un.org, doalos@un.org, icaohq@icao.int, iran@un.int, syria@un.int, ghana@un.int, greece@un.int, peru@un.int, qatar-e@qatarmission.org, qatar@un.int, mission@newyork.mfa.sk, brazil@un.int, slovakia@un.int, sudan@un.int, korea@un.int, mission@newyork.mfa.sk, slovakia@un.int, ukraine@un.int, spain@un.int, jordan@un.int, venezuela@un.int, norway@un.int, italy@un.int, egypt@un.int, malaysia@un.int, iraq@un.int, cuba@un.int, spain@un.int, kazakhstan@un.int, kyrgyzstan@un.int, uzbekistan@un.int, turkmenistan@un.int, uae@un.int, kenya@un.int, kuwait@un.int, kyrgyzstan@un.int, nigeria@un.int, philippines@un.int, pakistan@un.int, mexico@un.int, poland@un.int, romania@un.int, niger@un.int,somalia@un.int, tajikistan@un.int, thailand@un.int, hredatabase@ohchr.org, cbb@ohchr.org, au@ohchr.org, VBye@ohchr.org, tb-petitions@ohchr.org, 1503@ohchr.org, ngochr@ohchr.org, udhr@ohchr.org, personnel@ohchr.org, InfoDesk@ohchr.org, onowosad@ohchr.org, jbroussin@ohchr.org, vbirga@ohchr.org, mhaugaard@ohchr.org, info@ofid.org, recruit@ofid.org, iaee@iaee.org, geoffrey.pearce@utoronto.ca, elbuy@qp.com.qa, j_kelly@qp.com.qa, ifad@ifad.org, jodinfo@iefs.org.sa, oapec@qualitynet.net, sgo@unctad.org, info@unctad.org, gdsinfo@unctad.org, diteinfo@unctad.org, ldc@unctad.org, dman@unctad.org, tc@unctad.org, unctadpress@unctad.org, actualidad@gmail.com, argentina@un.int, algeria@un.int, australia@un.int, belarus@un.int, belgium@un.int, benin@un.int, chile@un.int, colombia@un.int, cuba@un.int, ecuador@un.int,egypt@un.int, ghana@un.int, greece@un.int, libya@un.int, portugal@un.int, singapore@un.int, slovenia@un.int, slovakia@un.int, southafrica@un.int, srilanka@un.int, sweden@un.int, syria@un.int, ireland@un.int, venezuela@un.int, yemen@un.int, pubboard@un.org, inquiries@un.org, newscentre@un.org, buchanane@un.org, info@unmovic.org, unmovic-admin@un.org, Webmaster@iaea.org, info@icrt.org, info@ctbto.org, liaison@ctbto.org, info@iaea.org, INIS@iaea.org, INIS.CBL@iaea.org, official.mail@iaea.org, dirinfo@cen-prd.org.mx, afghanistan@un.int, albania@un.int, andorra@un.int, angola@un.int, antigua@un.int, armenia@un.int, austria@un.int, azerbaijan@un.int, bahamas@un.int, bahrain@un.int, bangladesh@un.int, barbados@un.int, benin@un.int, bhutan@un.int, bosnia@un.int, botswana@un.int, brazil@un.int, brunei@un.int, bulgaria@un.int, burundi@un.int, caf@un.int, cambodia@un.int, cameroon@un.int, canada@un.int, capeverde@un.int, chile@un.int, comoros@un.int, croatia@un.int, cyprus@un.int, czechrepublic@un.int, denmark@un.int, djibouti@nyct.net, dominica@un.int, drcongo@un.int, eqguinea@un.int, eritrea@un.int, estonia@un.int, ethiopia@un.int, fiji@un.int, finland@un.int, georgia@un.int, guinea@un.int, guyana@un.int, hungary@un.int, ireland@un.int, jamaica@un.int, jordan@un.int, latvia@un.int, lebanon@un.int, lesotho@un.int, liberia@un.int, Lithuania@un.int, liechtenstein@un.int, luxembourg@un.int, macedonia@un.int, madagascar@un.int, maldives@un.int, mali@un.int, malta@un.int, mauritania@un.int, mauritius@un.int, micronesia@un.int, moldova@un.int, monaco@un.int, mongolia@un.int, morocco@un.int, mozambique@un.int, myanmar@un.int, namibia@un.int, nepal@un.int, netherlands@un.int, norway@un.int, oman@un.int, Portugal@un.int, png@un.int, rwanda@un.int, samoa@un.int, sanmarino@un.int, seychelles@un.int, sierraleone@un.int, spain@un.int, stlucia@un.int, stp@un.int, suriname@un.int, togo@un.int, tto@un.int, tunisia@un.int, turkey@un.int, ukraine@un.int, uruguay@un.int, vanuatu@un.int, yugoslavia@un.int, zambia@un.int, zimbabwe@un.int, nauru@un.int, Official.Mail@iaea.org, burkinafaso@un.int, belize@un.int, costarica@un.int, dominica@un.int,elsalvador@un.int, gambia@un.int, grenada@un.int, guatemala@un.int, haiti@un.int, honduras@un.int, malawi@un.int, marshallislands@un.int, nicaragua@un.int, panama@un.int, paraguay@un.int, solomonislands@un.int, senegal@un.int, stvg@un.int, swaziland@un.int, stkn@un.int, stvg@un.int

Tip: Don't try to send to too many email addresses at once as that might be considered as spaming by your service provider as well by the recipient.

Update: You can also find contacts of Members of European Parliament and European Parliament institutions here:
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/members/public.do?language=en
and here:
http://europa.eu/whoiswho/public/index.cfm?fuseaction=idea.show_page&pagename=contact

Also, please sign this URGENT Petition:

http://www.petitiononline.com/etgs1/petition.html

Last but not least, you can join this Facebook group: The International Call to Stop The Gaza Siege Now!

http://apps.facebook.com/causes/view_cause/35445

An independent investigation should establish the real history and may help prevent future administrations from creating fraudulent wars resulting in great loss of life in the future. This petition is calling for an investigation by an independent prosecutor.

http://tinyurl.com/2ogd32

After you read the articles, you may choose to act on your own by emailing or calling your senators and congressmen via U.S. Capitol Switchboard (the phone number is (202) 224-3121 locally or toll-free 1-800-962-3524 nationally).

Lets say "Thank you President Carter." You can sign the petition at: http://tinyurl.com/ycegyc

This petition was initiated by the Israel-Palestine Working Group of Progressive Democrats of America. They support a US policy that supports the peace, security and welfare of Israelis and Palestinians.

Also, write to Congress to support President Carter. It is important that you tell Congress that you stand with President Carter in his belief that the United States has an important role to play in working to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by supporting human rights, international law and diplomacy. As President Carter points out "The United States is squandering international prestige and goodwill . . . by unofficially condoning and abetting the Israel confiscation and colonization of Palestinian territories."

Join AFSC and President Carter in Standing for Peace!

There are individuals within the Palestinian solidarity movement seeking to create divisions by:

• deliberately shifting focus away from Israel's war crimes and its supremacist Zionist ideology;
• imposing unilateral agendas by presenting both sides as victims;
• sabotaging service to the just cause of the Palestinian people;
• ignoring the issue of right of return for the Palestinians;
• utilising the platform of the Palestinian discourse to argue about anti-Semitism, which is not a Palestinian problem and not created by Arabs.

Our primary and single concern is solidarity with the Palestinian people.

As ethical human beings we consider it our obligation to:

• do all we can to allow the information to be diffused as widely and as quickly as possible;
• ensure the argument of the oppression and disenfranchisement of the Palestinian people stays in the forefront;
• present as clear and honest a picture as possible of the meaning of Zionism and the Jewish State;
• to cross the divide and to unite in our war against the Zionist crime.

We accept and believe in equality of all persons, regardless of their race, religion, political or other orientation. We believe that full and unconditional support of the Palestinian people is a condition sine qua non for activists to adopt, and we recognise that their attachment to their homeland is a fundamental and unalterable condition. To that end we advocate for one unified State with equal rights for all its citizens.

Any attempts at censoring reasoned critique of Israel and Zionism must be refused a priori, as it is in conflict with the goal of seeking to protect and support the Palestinian people - as their empowerment is the only way to peaceful coexistence for all the populations of the Middle East. Any attempts at dictating what the Palestinians should do will be looked upon with great circumspection and suspicion. Palestinians themselves wish to construct their own future and are not pawns to be shifted on the chessboard.

We demand free speech for sincere critics of Zionism and call for an end to campaigns created in order to ostracise its most vocal critics. Smear campaigns will not be tolerated, as we recognise that they are the instrument of choice of Zionists, and detract energy from our work. We will not hesitate to expose the instrumental usage of them, no matter the claimed principles of those who are engaged in creating such campaigns. On the other hand, open dialogue and reasoned argumentation is welcome and greatly encouraged as a tool to understanding and collaboration.

The indigenous people of Palestine are facing extermination by the hands of the Jewish State, and the world keeps silent. The sooner we draw public attention to Israel's needless wanton destruction, the sooner we can do away with this horrifying, insufferable situation.

PLEASE, sign the petition if you share our concerns.
http://www.petitiononline.com/grosveno/petition.html

Dear Friends,

We are hoping that you will choose to publish this open letter and that you will encourage your readers to sign the petition that expresses their support of the principles stated in the letter.

Those of us who have decided to write a letter have done so with a sense of urgency and responsibility. We recognise that each day brings about new horrors and misery to the Palestinian people. There is a plethora of information circulated that covers up or justifies crimes committed for the cause of Zionism. Unfortunately, the task of speaking out has become more and more difficult not only due to the overwhelmingly powerful Israel lobby, but also on account of many who declare that they are supporters of the Palestinian cause, yet place severe restrictions on the direction of discourse. They have a main agenda that places the Palestinian cause in the background, pandering to an idea that true peace can only happen if both sides assume their share of guilt, if both sides agree to recognise equal claims of victimhood. Those who refuse to accept this premise are continually ostracised and their efforts to serve the Palestinian people are blocked by acts of censorship, pressure and by threats that are at times based upon a series of smear campaigns that serve only to divide any movement that could be built where the interests of the Palestinian people take the forefront. Quite a few outspoken and dedicated activists have been targetted by individuals and groups whose objectives of gatekeeping are only serving the cause of the Jewish State.

We ask that you consider posting this open letter, signing it, and encouraging your readers to take responsibility for keeping the discourse open, for keeping the issue on the table, and not letting it be overwhelmed by campaigns to silence critics of Zionism.

http://www.petitiononline.com/grosveno/petition.html

Please let us know if you share our concerns. We would greatly appreciate your support of this campaign.

With warmest regards
Mary Rizzo

Amen!