Friday, January 27, 2006

Israel, [againstwall] a call for donations (please forward) 27 Jan 2006

This is a call for donations to the legal fund of anarchists against the wall (AATW) http://www.awalls.org This group is actively supporting the Palestinian popular resistance to the so called Israeli "separation wall". This wall constitutes a theft of much of the land that Israel has not yet taken away from Palestinians and will create a situation where Palestinians are effectively enclosed in small unlivable cantons.

AATW has been active both through direct action and demonstrations against the wall. It insists on a joint struggle of Palestinians and Israeli and Its contribution to the struggle has been recognized by all those involved in the struggle.(see the above link for letters of support).

The group's work has also been recognized by the Israeli authorities which have rewarded it with violent repression, hundreds of arrests and dozens of indictments. The legal costs of defending against these charges is around $20,000 and counting. AATW is now calling for donations its legal fund in order to fight back against the legal persecution and continue its part in the fight against the wall.

For more details and for instructions on how to donate please see http://www.awalls.org
for more information please contact ksnitz@gmail.com

This is the site of an Israeli group known as "Anarchists Against the Wall" (AATW) which has been supporting the popular Palestinian resistance to the Israeli "separation wall".

This site does not contain and should not be understood as an official party line or a manifesto. The group has dedicated all its efforts to activities on the ground, and has left propaganda and the drawing of party lines to others. The actions which AATW been involved in are direct actions such as dismantling the wall/fence when possible and participation in Palestinian demonstrations. Much has been written by and about AATW, the links below are just a sample and should not necessarily be understood as an endorsement of the opinions represented there.

Anarchists Against the Wall first strated working as a group at the beginig of April of 2003, with the establishment of the Mas'ha peace camp against the wall. As construction of the wall was nearing, the village Mas'ha was facing the loss of 96% of their lands, which the wall left on the "Israel" side.

A camp of two tents was set up on the village's lands that were to remain on the other side of the wall. For four months a constant presence of Palestinians, Israelis and internationals was kept. During this period the camp was a base for information dissemination and direct-democracy decision-making. A number of wall related direct actions were planned and prepared at the camp. On July 28, 2003 Plestinians, international and Israeli activists forced open a gate in the wall at the village of Anin (See Haaretz article at:
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=323022 ) Late in August of 2003, with the wall almost complete, the camp moved to the to-be-demolished yard of a house in Mas'ha. Following two days of mass arrests the yard was demolished and the camp had ended, but the spirit of resistance it symbolized did not die with it.

A few Months later, November 9, 2003 – the international day against the wall – We removed about 20 meters of the wall at another joint action at the village of Zbuba, near Jenin.

Once again, at December 26, 2003, we returned to Mas'ha to force open a gate in the wall; a gate that was supposed to provide easy access for people to their lands, but in fact was closed for the 2 months prior. As we shook the gate, soldiers on the other side of it opened fire on us. One of us was struck twice with live ammunition, and his evacuation to an ambulance through the gate was prevented. He nearly died of blood loss, and reached the hospital in critical situation.

A few days later, daily demonstrations in the Village of Budrus began, and our presence in them was constant. Through its persistence in community mobilization, struggle and nonviolence, the village of Budrus was able to achieve significant victories. The most celebrated one is that the path of the wall was almost completely pushed away from the village's lands, only through the villages struggle. Without bowing in front of the occupation; without petitioning to the Israeli courts. Another victory, maybe even more important, was that for a good part of year, almost every village, to which the construction of the wall reached, rose up against it. Hundreds were injured and 9, all Palestinians, were killed in those nonviolent demonstrations, but the people were not deterred and continue trying to stop the bulldozers together with Israeli and international activists.

Those who wish to support the efforts of AATW and are in Palestine can get notices of upcoming demonstrations by subscribing to the email list Actleft on yahoo groups.

Thanks to the legal repression by the Israeli authorities donations for the legal defense fund are also urgently needed. AATW is faced with mounting legal expenses and is raising money to defend people who face indictments as a result of their political activities. You can donate online by following the link below http://www.awalls.org/donate.htm using PayPal, which is a secure and confidential tool.

Palestine-Israel, The joint struggle against the separation fence and occupation - 27-1-06

The weekend activity of the Israeli Anarchists Against The Wall started - as usual, at Thursday evening. About ten of us made our way to the Bil'in Center For Joint Struggle For peace - built on part of the village land which is on the West side of the separation fence, and to the village itself. (The struggle involving the structure of the center and the illegal construction of a new neighborhood of the settler town Modi'in Illit on the lands of Bil'in, obstructed the management of robing the lands. Because of the PR pressures the "civilian management" of the occupied territories even refrained for a while from issuing the demolition order for the structure of the center built at six hours of a rainy day when the state forces were not on guard. Because of our pressures, they even opened the road from the village to the center, they blocked about a week ago.)

On Friday the wave of harassment of the state forces applied to the Israelis activists on the way to Bil'in, started as usual. However, as it seems lately their efforts are not real serious and all Israelis arrive in time for the demonstration. It seems they just want to make it a bit hard for us to arrive but not blocking the way. They use less than 5% of the powers they put to work when they were really serious about it.

At noon, after the Friday prayer at the mosque, we started the usual march on the road leading towards the route of separation fence - about 80 Palestinians, 40 internationals, and 40 Israelis (just 10% of the previous Friday demo 400 that resulted from a general mobilization of the Israeli coalition against the fence). When we got near to the built section of the fence, we deviated from the road and rushed through the olive orchard towards a section of the fence in building and overcome the thin line of state forces and crossed to the olive orchard on the other side of the route of the fence. In previous cases we usually encountered a stronger opposition of the state forces and harsher retaliation against us - which was surprisingly absent this week.

They were not entirely passive though. After about a 20 minutes in which a group of 20 demonstrators climbed a hill an d shouted lot of slogans against the fence and insulting the state forces, a small contingent of state force driven them away from the hill and even detained four of our people... but they did not guard them and after a while, they just return to the group... and climbed another high point and continue shouting for a while. This time the state forces sent after them failed to stop them till they got down on their own as we finished our demo.

After the two hours of relatively quite demonstration we departed and started the way back to the village - leaving the state forces to do their ritual confrontation of tear gas and rubber coated bullets against the stone thrower youngsters who do it every Friday in the olive orchards adjacent to the non violence demonstration. Even this attrition war seemed to be toned down in comparison to previous Fridays

It will be a real boring if the state forces will not interfere with our Friday travel and demos and only guard that we will not destroy the fence.

Friday, January 20, 2006

Palestin-Israel, Bil'in, A very successful joint demonstration against the separation fence and occupation - 20-1-06

The 20-1-06 demonstration of this Friday in Bil'in was in many aspects the most successful of the more than 10 months weekly ones since February 2005. This Friday demo was on a special day - 11 days before the Israeli Highest court deliberation about the route of the separation fence on the lands of Bil'in, Five days before the election of the Palestinian Parliament a villager of Bil'in (which have only 600 valid voters) is on the regional list of candidates, few days after a temporary stay imposed by a highest court judge which stop the building and populating a new illegal neighborhood of the settler town Modi'in Illit. It was in the context of the not yet destroyed Bil'in center of joint struggle for peace on the West side of the fence route the Israeli state can not decide how to deal with.

This was the reason a general mobilization was decided on by a meeting of the Bil'in popular comity against the fence and the Israeli Anarchists Against The Wall activists representing the Israeli coalition against the fence.

The weather was too on our side - a warm sunny day after few rainy weeks. So were the undercurrents of the Israeli ruling elit which reflect the gradual diminishing of the power and prestige of the settler colonialist tendency.

about 350 Israelis arrived to the demonstration - mainly from Tel-Aviv region, Jerusalem, and Haifa. In spite of some hesitations, we changed from the last few tactics of early hour travel by small and private cars to go around the Israeli state road blocks on the roads to Bil'in, and decided on going by busses from points announced in advance, in not too early hour. Last few weeks we experienced diminishing efforts to block our arrival for the demos in Bil'in. And indeed, this Friday too no serious efforts were done to block the arrival of the Israelis to Bil'in. Some small and mainly symbolic acts were done by state forces which caused just small inconvenience to our people. At some points we suspected the state forces are intending us to be a test field for non lethal means for dispersing demonstrations - like they did in other cases they let us come easily to Bil'in... but this was not the case.

It seems a new wind is really blowing.

To the demo arrived also many Palestinians out of Bil'in - from other villages of the region who struggle too against the separation fence and people from Ramalla involved in the election - who interwoven their propaganda in this Friday Demo.

And so, at noon, after the prayer, about 1000 of us started the march towards the route of the separation fence, like in the previous two weeks intending to focus the attention on the use of the separation fence to enable the robbery of lands for the building of the settler town Modi'in Illit on the lands of Bil'in and neighboring Palestinian villages. On the march, in addition to the placards and chants, we prepared mentally to use the bigger number of participants to break through the live barrier of Israeli state forces who blocked our way to the Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace on the other side of the fence on the previous two Fridays.

When we arrived near the separation fence we found the state forces ready and blocking our way - including a unit of the most violent special forces of the police. After a short rest from the march and some preliminary confrontation, few of us held hands and break through the lines of state forces. In spite of brutal pushes, hits of batons and some shock grenades, 250 of us - the more experienced and daring, crossed their lines and the route of the fence to the West and marched towards the three weeks old Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace.

When we arrived there and had our meeting, state forces rushed there to block our way so we will not go to the illegal building area on the lands of Bil'in of the new district of the settler town Modi'in Illit (a judge of the Israeli highest court froze last week the construction and population.

After a short meeting and few speeches we returned to the East side of fence, but not in a way the state forces liked. Many of us stayed near the fence itself, and banged with stones on the metal line and gate bordering the fence. After the state forces failed to stop us even using their violence and attempted arrests they vent their frustration with a shower of tear gas canisters on the village youngsters who confronted them as usual with stones on the neighboring olive orchards.

After 3 hours of demonstration and confronting the state forces we finished the demonstration.

Below is the invitation for the mass demonstration ín Bil'in distributed widely towards this coming Friday 20.1.

The Coalition Against the Wall invites you to a mass demonstration in Bil'in, Friday, 20.1.06

Dear friends and comrades,
For almost a year now, we demonstrate regularly together with our partners from Bil'in against the wall and the settlements that rob over half of the village's lands. Trough this struggle we've managed breaking through many walls of silence in Israeli conciseness: we've exposed, time and again, the use of brutal military violence by the army in its attempts to suppress the struggle - violence that is contrasted by the demonstrators' nonviolence. We've managed to show that the path of the wall is not security driven, but settlement driven. On February 1st the Supreme Court will convene to discuss Bil'in's petition against the wall.
We invite all people - those that already stood with us in Bil'in, and those who still didn't - to come and join us in the struggle.

Transportation:
Tel Aviv: Arlozerov train station, El Al terminal, 9:30.
For more details contact Adar at 052-54.....
Jerusalem: Gan Hapa'amon Parking lot, 9:30.
For more details contact Yossi at 052-52.....
Haifa: Solel Boneh Square, 8:30.
For more details contact Oren at 054-67......

The Coalition Against the Wall:
Taayush, Gush Shalom, Coalition of Women for Peace, Alternative Information Centre, Anarchists Against Walls

Palestin-Israel, Bil'in, A very successful joint demonstration against the separation fence and occupation - 20-1-06

The 20-1-06 demonstration of this Friday in Bil'in was in many aspects the most successful of the more than 10 months weekly ones since February 2005. This Friday demo was on a special day - 11 days before the Israeli Highest court deliberation about the route of the separation fence on the lands of Bil'in, Five days before the election of the Palestinian Parliament a villager of Bil'in (which have only 600 valid voters) is on the regional list of candidates, few days after a temporary stay imposed by a highest court judge which stop the building and populating a new illegal neighborhood of the settler town Modi'in Illit. It was in the context of the not yet destroyed Bil'in center of joint struggle for peace on the West side of the fence route the Israeli state can not decide how to deal with.

This was the reason a general mobilization was decided on by a meeting of the Bil'in popular comity against the fence and the Israeli Anarchists Against The Wall activists representing the Israeli coalition against the fence.

The weather was too on our side - a warm sunny day after few rainy weeks. So were the undercurrents of the Israeli ruling elit which reflect the gradual diminishing of the power and prestige of the settler colonialist tendency.

about 350 Israelis arrived to the demonstration - mainly from Tel-Aviv region, Jerusalem, and Haifa. In spite of some hesitations, we changed from the last few tactics of early hour travel by small and private cars to go around the Israeli state road blocks on the roads to Bil'in, and decided on going by busses from points announced in advance, in not too early hour. Last few weeks we experienced diminishing efforts to block our arrival for the demos in Bil'in. And indeed, this Friday too no serious efforts were done to block the arrival of the Israelis to Bil'in. Some small and mainly symbolic acts were done by state forces which caused just small inconvenience to our people. At some points we suspected the state forces are intending us to be a test field for non lethal means for dispersing demonstrations - like they did in other cases they let us come easily to Bil'in... but this was not the case.

It seems a new wind is really blowing.

To the demo arrived also many Palestinians out of Bil'in - from other villages of the region who struggle too against the separation fence and people from Ramalla involved in the election - who interwoven their propaganda in this Friday Demo.

And so, at noon, after the prayer, about 1000 of us started the march towards the route of the separation fence, like in the previous two weeks intending to focus the attention on the use of the separation fence to enable the robbery of lands for the building of the settler town Modi'in Illit on the lands of Bil'in and neighboring Palestinian villages. On the march, in addition to the placards and chants, we prepared mentally to use the bigger number of participants to break through the live barrier of Israeli state forces who blocked our way to the Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace on the other side of the fence on the previous two Fridays.

When we arrived near the separation fence we found the state forces ready and blocking our way - including a unit of the most violent special forces of the police. After a short rest from the march and some preliminary confrontation, few of us held hands and break through the lines of state forces. In spite of brutal pushes, hits of batons and some shock grenades, 250 of us - the more experienced and daring, crossed their lines and the route of the fence to the West and marched towards the three weeks old Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace.

When we arrived there and had our meeting, state forces rushed there to block our way so we will not go to the illegal building area on the lands of Bil'in of the new district of the settler town Modi'in Illit (a judge of the Israeli highest court froze last week the construction and population.

After a short meeting and few speeches we returned to the East side of fence, but not in a way the state forces liked. Many of us stayed near the fence itself, and banged with stones on the metal line and gate bordering the fence. After the state forces failed to stop us even using their violence and attempted arrests they vent their frustration with a shower of tear gas canisters on the village youngsters who confronted them as usual with stones on the neighboring olive orchards.

After 3 hours of demonstration and confronting the state forces we finished the demonstration.

Below is the invitation for the mass demonstration ín Bil'in distributed widely towards this coming Friday 20.1.

The Coalition Against the Wall invites you to a mass demonstration in Bil'in, Friday, 20.1.06

Dear friends and comrades,
For almost a year now, we demonstrate regularly together with our partners from Bil'in against the wall and the settlements that rob over half of the village's lands. Trough this struggle we've managed breaking through many walls of silence in Israeli conciseness: we've exposed, time and again, the use of brutal military violence by the army in its attempts to suppress the struggle - violence that is contrasted by the demonstrators' nonviolence. We've managed to show that the path of the wall is not security driven, but settlement driven. On February 1st the Supreme Court will convene to discuss Bil'in's petition against the wall.
We invite all people - those that already stood with us in Bil'in, and those who still didn't - to come and join us in the struggle.

Transportation:
Tel Aviv: Arlozerov train station, El Al terminal, 9:30.
For more details contact Adar at 052-54.....
Jerusalem: Gan Hapa'amon Parking lot, 9:30.
For more details contact Yossi at 052-52.....
Haifa: Solel Boneh Square, 8:30.
For more details contact Oren at 054-67......

The Coalition Against the Wall:
Taayush, Gush Shalom, Coalition of Women for Peace, Alternative Information Centre, Anarchists Against Walls

Saturday, January 14, 2006

Palestine-Israel, The joint struggle of Bil'in change level 14 Jan 2006

The joint nonviolent struggle of the popular comity of the Bil'in village and the Israeli Anarchists Against The wall against the separation fence and occupation continue for more than 10 months. Our persistent weekly and some times daily struggle was integrating with shifting change in the Israeli power struggle and in addition to the media even the Israeli high court of "justice" seems to "favor" Bil'in. There are qualitative additions to the unexpected "leniency" the state treat the weekly Friday demonstrations in Bil'in, the less efforts to block Israelis from coming, the so called permit they say they give the demonstrations (though we did not asked for ones) after the change in high level policy just 10 weeks ago, less and less detentions of "wild" demonstrators. More and more cases of commanders restraining too belligerent soldiers and border police. The refraining from destroying the structure of the center for joint struggle for peace... And lately, the high court deciding on temporary stop of the building and population of the settler town on part of the robbed lands of the Bil'in villagers using the separation fence.

The weekend activity started early. On Thursday evening few of us already came from Israel to the center for joint struggle on the west side of the fence - now with free traffic of people to and from the village (just not at the Friday demo hours) and cars mainly after dark.... They even let us add a structure that enable us to sit around the fire in the rainy and windy days. We had there a friendly circle for few hours till some of us stayed for the night and the rest went to the village.

In the morning, after a coffee around the roofed fire few remained to keep the presence at the center and the rest went to the village till the Friday demo. During the morning the number of Israelis increased to 30 in spite the rain and the arrest the day before of two coordinators who did a direct action at the computing start up company Matrix which opened a section in the settler town Modi'in Illit built on robbed Palestinian land of Bil'in and other neighboring villages.

In the demo that started at noon as usual we marched from the center of village to the route of the separation fence. The clouds played our way and only very few drops came down during the demo - the umbrellas and rain clothes were mainly redundant. The peaceful mode of the last weeks resulted in the joining of young children to the 60 or so male adults of the village - 20% of the male adults of the village. About 20 internationals joined us too.

When we arrived to the fence route we made a maneuver that enabled us to reach about 10 meters from the route they usually prevent us. Some even got through the olive orchards and even banged for a while on the fence.

The state forces used only tear gas on the youngsters in the orchards who reverted to stones after the conflict with the state forces got heated. However, Even in this confrontation the state forces refrained from shooting rubber bullet and did the best to minimize the conflict.

Us, the ones who stayed on the road, got lot of threats, but they only once pushed us for a while few metes back. They also detained for an hour one of the village popular comity for the nonviolence struggle against the fence but released him at the end of the demo.
The google search count of "Bil'in" already surpassed 300,000; The google search count of "Bil'in" + anarchists surpassed 132,000; The google search count of "Anarchists Against The wall" surpassed 53,100

Sunday, January 8, 2006

Palestine-Israel, Media. The joint struggle against the separation fence and occupation get results 8 Jan

Contributor note: The conflicts within the Israeli ruling elite is both influencing the media manipulation of public opinions (its main tool in developed capitalist states) but also influenced by it in a complicated chain of feedback loops. In Israel, the interests of the main fraction of the business capitalist elite which has more to gain from fast compromise with the Palestinians is expressed in a surprising support the Israeli media is giving to the joint struggle of the Israeli Anarchists Against The Wall and the popular comity against the separation fence of the Bil'in village.
The power of this fraction increase lately faster and faster, and the power of the pro settler colonialism fraction diminish really fast last years of the second intifada. The joint struggle of Israelis and Palestinians was used by the media which is dominated by the pro compromise fraction of ruling elite as one of the levers to shift the public opinion to its side. This is the main reason that the Haaretz daily - the main pro business capitalist daily give lot of support to the "leftists" struggling for the end of occupation - including giving lot of space and support for the joint struggle in Bil'in. (Probably the only daily in the world that give such support for direct action of anarchists).

The following article about a radical act (the most radical till this day) of the Israeli supreme court that put a stay on the settler colonialist building activity on the lands of Bil'in robed with the help of the separate fence is both the result of our struggle and the shifting balance, and hopefully will accelerate it.
The most astonishing is the fact that the Attorney Aner Helman of the State Prosecution took the side of the "Peace Now" petition to the court against the builders of settler colonialist town that got till this day full support of the Israeli state. Ilan S.

> State mulls criminal probe into illegal settlement construction -- By Akiva Eldar

In a rare move against settlement expansion, the State Prosecution on Friday told the High Court of Justice it will look into the possibility of opening a criminal investigation pertaining to the illegal construction in the the Matityahu East neighborhood in the West Bank settlement of Upper Modi'in.

Attorney Aner Helman of the State Prosecution told the court it should issue a temporary injunction to forbid the plan to double the housing units in the neighborhood from 1,500 to 3,000.

Justice Ayala Procaccia on Friday ordered to halt construction immediately of the hundreds of illegal housing units in the neighborhood.

In a temporary injunction issued at the request of Peace Now, Justice Procaccia also ordered a cessation of efforts to populate or sell additional units at the construction site.

The injunction was issued against the defense minister, the Israel Defense Forces commander in the West Bank, IDF GOC central commander, head of the Civil Administration, the local council of Upper Modi'in and the building contractors Green Park, Green Mount and Ein Ami.

Helman added that the court should demand that Upper Modi'in's local planning and construction committee ensure the construction be halted, and stop allowing construction without permits from the West Bank command's central planning bureau.

He said that if proper actions are not taken by local officials, inspectors from the central command would be forced to act.

Helman also confirmed Haaretz' findings that a local licensing authority granted construction permits to dozens of apartments - 22 buildings of five floors or more - that are either completed close to completion.

The illegal construction is taking place on property belonging to the Palestinian village of Bil'in. The property was acquired by the settlement from land dealers through dubious powers of attorney, then rezoned as state land and leased or sold to settlers' construction companies.

The separation fence cuts Bil'in off from the land, thereby facilitating the settlers' access to it.

Friday, January 6, 2006

Palestine-Israel, Bil'in-Abud, The joint struggle against the separaetion fence and occupation 6-1-06

The Israeli media reported all the week about the illegal confiscation of the lands of Bil'in for the settler town Modi'in Ilit. One day the construction of housed on it were even stopped by authority.
The Israeli occupation "civil authority" which was supposed to decide on Thursday to destroy the Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace on a piece of land of Bil'in West side of the separation fence was postponed for another two weeks. They seem to decide not to do that before the Israeli highest court of "justice" about the use of the fence to annex Bil'in lands to Israel and the settler town Modi'in Illit.
The Friday demo of Bil'in was supposed to march from the center of the village to the center for joint struggle for peace on the other side of the separation fence. At noon, we started marching - few hundreds people, Palestinians from Bil'in and others, about 45 Israelis from the Anarchists Against The Wall initiative and others, and about 25 Internationals.
When we arrived near the route of the separation fence the Israeli armed forces blocked our way to the Bil'in center for joint struggle for peace. They pushed violently any one who try to advance and got into confrontation with plenty of tear gas grenades with the village youth who responded to the blocking of the way with stones.

After about an hour or so the demonstration was declared finished and we returned to the village before returning home.