How the Gaza Freedom March managed Hamas

Haaretz journalist Amira Hass, who I saw in Cairo for the Gaza Freedom March, writes in her newspaper about the restrictions imposed on the brief visit by Hamas: The march was not what the organizers had dreamed of during the nine months of preparation. The day before the trip to Gaza, they already knew that…

Israelis may have to avoid their favourite luxury spots

The recent story of Tzipi Livni and her possible arrest in Britain over war crimes continues to play out: Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon on Tuesday met Tuesday with British Attorney General Baroness Patricia Janet Scotland to protest the slew of arrest warrants issued against senior Israeli officials in the United Kingdom. A delegation of…

Egypt continues its sordid role in tightening the siege on Gaza

One of the key points of the protests during the Gaza Freedom March was the role played by Egypt in sealing Gaza from the world. This Associated Press story provides some more details (a few friends who recently crossed into Gaza via the Rafah crossing tell me that it was impossible to determine the current…

Gaza’s suffering is Israel’s shame

My following article is published today by the Sydney Morning Herald/The Age: The 85-year-old Jewish, anti-Zionist, Holocaust survivor Hedy Epstein is a sturdy looking woman. Her slightly hunched frame hides the determination to continue a life-long dedication to social justice. This week in Cairo she joined close to 1400 international delegates on the Gaza Freedom…

How the Gaza Freedom March brought the assembled crowd together

The last days of the Gaza Freedom March here in Cairo were hectic, inspiring, frustrating and energising. The collective goal was to enter Gaza, but alas, that wasn’t to happen. I’m currently sharing a room with a girl who just returned from Gaza, and was quoted in the New York Times, and she tells of…

Sydney Morning Herald covers Gaza Freedom March

The following article appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald on 2 January: Hundreds of demonstrators gathered on either side of the Israeli-Gazan border to mark a year since Israel’s three-week war in Gaza and to call for an end to the blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt. About 85 demonstrators in Gaza were foreigners, part…

We can kill Palestinians with impunity, says Israeli

The depth of depravity in certain sections of the Israeli elite is stripped bare with this shocking piece published in Yediot. It doesn’t really need an introduction, except to say that such rhetoric will simply continue to isolate Israel even further. And they deserve it: A year has passed since Operation Cast Lead. The Gaza…

Caring about Palestine makes you a terrorist, didn’t you know?

A comment on an Haaretz article about the various protests in Israel and Palestine today over Gaza reminds us that any solidarity with the Palestinian people causes supposedly rational people to spit bile: These ‘protesters’ are nothing short of terrorists: supporting a group who yearns for the complete and total destruction of a sovereign nation…

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