Today, Thursday 4 June 2020, Israeli occupation forces abducted Palestinian university student Yahya al-Qarout from his family home in the Aqtaba area in occupied Tulkarem after large numbers of occupation soldiers stormed the home at 4:00 a.m. Al-Qarout is in his third year of study at Bir Zeit University, where he studies computer science. He is also the secretary as the preparatory committee of the Bir Zeit University Student Council.
Samidoun Network in occupied Palestine communicated with Yahya’s family, who told Samidoun representatives that this was his first arrest. His family is making attempts to reach the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Prisoners’ Affairs Commission in order to learn more about their son’s situation and seek his immediate release. He is expected to be brought before Israeli occupation military courts on Sunday.
The al-Qarout family noted that Yahya is a calm, dedicated student who loves sports, especially weightlifting and football, and is a very socially oriented person who always tries to help and support others.
This marks the latest arrest in an ongoing Israeli policy of targeting involved and active students and the Palestinian student movement as a whole. There are hundreds of Palestinian university students held in Israeli jails, including approximately 80 from Bir Zeit University.
Over the years, thousands of Palestinian university students have been targeted for arrest and persecution. Palestinian universities have been frequently raided by Israeli occupation forces; student organizations’ offices have been ransacked, their belongings confiscated and destroyed.
Palestinian student activities are notable for their political diversity and expression. Student council elections spark a vast amount of debate and political competition between all trends of the Palestinian movement and are often considered to reflect the prevailing sentiment in Palestinian society. This vibrant expression of a democratic political culture is routinely subjected to violent suppression by the Israeli occupation, including raids and arrests targeting student council members.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network once again urges broad global solidarity with Yahya al-Qarout and all Palestinian students facing repression, arrest and imprisonment targeting their right to education. This includes escalating academic boycott campaigns by students and faculty at universities around the world. Palestinian students continue to organize, struggle and learn despite severe and systematic repression, including torture under interrogation and arrests that inhibit and disrupt their academic careers. We demand the immediate release of Yahya al-Qarout and all imprisoned students!
This 1985 poster by the General Union of Palestinian Students indicates the systematic and ongoing nature of Israeli arrests and targeting of Palestinian students.
Are we heading towards an internal Palestinian conflict, or what some would call a “civil war?”
This question is employed by some to serve their own petty goals, and to throw it in the face of the Palestinian people in order to intimidate and frighten them. There are those who want our people to accept the conditions of the Zionist enemy, so they will not resist – to accept “reality,” in order not to address the crisis in the Palestinian internal situation. All of this under the pretext of “dedication to national unity!”
On the other hand, there are those who want to push our people into the wrong battle, pushing them to mix apples and oranges, until their feet are dragged into the mill grinder of self-destruction.
In both cases, we are led into a minefield that threatens certain death and a project that serves only the enemy, its allies and its agents.
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However, the above question remains legitimate if it is considered based on the historical experience of the Palestinian people, and if it is taken seriously and profoundly within its natural context.
Peoples and liberation movements confronting colonialism have experienced such internal conflicts or civil wars. They did not reach them suddenly or without precursors accumulating or conditions that led clearly to them. Nor did they reach the breaking point with internal political opponents because they “want” a new war or conflict that only adds to the daily torment at the hands of the colonizer. Indeed, the vast majority of the people seek a natural state of stability, preferring to manage their internal differences according to peaceful and democratic mechanisms, if they are able to do so. However, boiling internal struggles sometimes lead to the impossibility of coexistence between incompatible programs, classes and social forces, and the contradiction between them reaches the point of explosion and no return.
Despite the specificity of space and time for every people, area and nation, the writing of the martyr, Comrade Mahdi Amel, on the civil war in Lebanon remains an important intellectual and historical reference to understand the essence of sectarian conflicts, civil wars, their origins and the role of local and external forces. Mahdi Amel wished to emphasize that these events go beyond the form of a conflict between sects, leaders, factions and tribes. There is a ruling class that reaps all the benefits of the conflict and is willing to sacrifice human lives.
There is another example, in Lebanon also, that may seem quite distant from our understanding of civil war: when we discuss the role of the “South Lebanon Army,” collaborators with the Israeli occupation and its agents in the “security belt region.” The resistance dealt with them as an integral part of the enemy forces and legitimate targets of resistance fire. The presence of the Zionist enemy in the battle made this conflict appear as if it were entirely outside the scope of the internal clash in Lebanon. This facilitated the mission of the resistance to take on the battle resolutely, and achieve victory and finally liberation.
Examining the experiences of people’s movements and liberation struggles in China, Vietnam, Cuba, Sudan, the Philippines, Colombia, Ireland, South Africa and others is necessary to draw lessons and reveal similarities and differences. The same applies to the experience of the Palestinian people themselves, internal conflicts in their society and how there were (and are) local Palestinian forces obstructing the progress of their national liberation struggle from the time when Napoleon’s warships were anchored in front of the walls of Akka in 1799.
Perhaps more attention has to be paid today to our understanding of the meaning of internal conflict or civil war. This type of war is, in most cases, inseparable from conflict in a region or area. The Palestinian case is no exception. Moreover, the causes of internal conflicts are always present, and their elements may be discovered burning under the ashes. And this war does not always mean violent or clear political conflict. The internal conflict is the embodiment of a struggle between blocs, classes, political options and power centers. It is often a clash between the popular majority and between the systems and structures founded by modern colonialism to “allow” them to govern to the extent that the colonizer permits, ruling for its benefit. They serve as its instrument, weapon and shield, whose fate is decided only by a popular revolution or when the colonizer itself is defeated.
This is the reality of the conflict, and the rules of its development and contradictions in any society in which one class establishes a regime of oppression instead of dialogue and does not consider confronting the external enemy to be a national priority. Any regime that opts for the path of abuse, exploitation, monopoly, impoverishment and exclusion – as is inherent in the capitalist system – is a regime of the ruling minority, and its relationship with the people will eventually reach a critical point, inevitably colliding with the popular majority that has lost everything and now has nothing left to lose.
Today, the revolutionaries in the Philippines are fighting their “own compatriots” with weapons, but they realize that they are fighting the tools of imperialism and corporate plunder in their country. The people of the Philippines lived for 400 years under the yoke of the Spanish colonizer, which then transferred them to a direct American occupation in 1898, which persisted for nearly 50 years. This reality of U.S. hegemony and domination persists to this day, even if the mechanisms of hegemony, nominal control and systems of plunder have varied over time.
The Algerian people know how French colonialism established the “Harki Brigades,” armed battalions of puppet Algerians who served the French colonizing forces and committed crimes against the people. They are a faithful copy of the “Palestinian Peace Factions.” (paramilitary groups founded by British colonizers to crush Palestinian resistance in the 1930s and 1940s.)
These so-called “factions of peace” were established by Britain in Palestine, supervised by British forces and trained and armed by Officer O’Connor in the mid-1930s. They participated in the suppression of the Great Palestinian Revolution in 1936, the prelude to the Nakba of 1947-48. They were led by figures from feudal families, among the wealthy with close ties to imperialist and reactionary forces in the region, including Fakhri al-Nashashibi, Fakhri Abdul-Hadi and others, led by Ragheb Nashashibi, leader of the National Defense Party. British General Charles Tiggart established a complete security system from these brigades and established police military centers in the cities and border areas known as “compounds” (Muqata’ in Arabic, today the name used for the Palestinian Authority’s presidential palace in occupied Ramallah). These formed “security belts” to protect British-Zionist settlers from revolutionary attacks. The collaborator Fakhri Nashashibi wa assassinated in Iraq in 1941, while Fakhri Abdul-Hadi was assassinated by revolutionaries in the village of Arraba (Jenin district) in 1943.
Before the formation of the Palestinian Authority in 1994, the Israeli occupation established a system known as the Village Council Network. They also established other entities under various names and banners, all of which served the interests of Israel and the Zionist project. However, all of these were no longer necessary after the establishment of the Oslo authority and its instruments. The colonizer always works to create a buffer zone or system of mediation between itself and the colonized population through a subordinate local authority.
The armed clashes that took place between Palestinian forces in the year 1935, and in Jordan and Lebanon after the start of the Palestinian revolution in the 1960s, but also in Gaza in 2007, are all manifestations that embody this internal Palestinian conflict between one approach and its opposite, between classes and conflicting interests. The issue was not “personal” between Sheikh Izz al-Din al-Qassam and the feudal leader Ragheb Nashashibi, nor was it between the martyr Wadie’ Haddad and King Hussein of Jordan. Whoever claims otherwise only serves to promote illusions that benefit those who seek to market quick and ready answers.
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Yes, there is a Palestinian conflict that always exists. Its fire fades and escalates according to the balance of forces and the tension of the internal class struggle. This has been the norm since the feudal leaders and the big bourgeoisie came to power, becoming a handful of compradors, representing the occupation and capital in Ramallah, Amman and Nablus. Regardless of the causes that led to this reality – which are undeniably important and should be addressed in subsequent articles – the fundamental and unwavering truth is that there is a Palestinian minority ruling sector that holds the cords of political decision-making and monopolizes it with power, money and foreign, American, European and reactionary Arab support, due to its security coordination with the occupation. It is willing to commit political crimes in order to defend its interests. These forces have prevented victory, aborted more than one popular uprising, negotiated away land and rights and destroyed Palestinian national achievements.
This war is not a war between regions, nor between religious sects, nor between inside and outside, between right and left, between right and right, nor between Gaza and the West Bank, but rather it is instead a natural part of the major conflict: between a people who are under occupation and in exile and diaspora that yearns to liberate their land and their people, and, on the other hand, those forces serving the colonizer. It is part of a larger struggle between the Arab nation and civilization that is crushed daily from the ocean to the Gulf, and the imperialist, Zionist and reactionary projects and forces that seek to consume and control the wealth of the peoples.
The popular anger to be found contained in the Palestinian refugee camps in particular, and in the belts of misery and poverty, is not due to “envy” of those who live in palaces and accumulate wealth in foreign banks. This anger is due to the fact that these fortunes are based on the plunder of the wealth of the Palestinian people, whose rights have been stolen, looted and violated for over 72 years.
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However, if the residents of the palaces and the owners of the banks have their authority and its security devices, where may we find the power and authority of the camps and the popular classes? What is their alternative political project? Which forces express that vision today?
The land of Palestine that has been subjected to negotiations is the collective property of the Palestinian people. Natural resources and wealth are collective property. The natural gas stolen from beneath the seas of Palestine is collective property. The Palestine Liberation Organization and its institutions are also a collective property, but they have been confiscated, even kidnapped, and transformed into a private enterprise for a handful of merchants who have sold the cause, the land and the people. Our people realize that the network of Zionists, collaborators and thieves, which runs from Tel Aviv to Cairo and Amman to Ramallah, is one that pillages and sells their wealth, and it is these same forces that coordinate security with the Israeli occupation and conclude treaties of surrender. These include the Camp David agreements between Egypt and Israel of 1978 and 1979; the Wadi Araba treaty between Jordan and Israel of 1994; and, of course, the infamous Oslo accords of 1993 and their corollaries. This same sector excludes 99% of the Palestinian people and prohibits them from exercising their right to determine the fate of their national cause with their free and popular will.
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Are we, then, on the verge of a Palestinian civil war?
The truth is that we live in the heart of this conflict. We have not left this ongoing contradiction for one day, even if its expression differs from one stage to another, without taking the form of a violent popular confrontation until the present moment. Until the Palestinian people liberate their voice and collective national will, the popular classes lead and an alternative approach prevails, the surrendered and degenerated segment of the Palestinian minority ruling class will continue to dominate, make deals and sell the people’s accomplishments and gains, in the name of those very people but behind their backs, without accountability or censure.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network will be joining in the following social media campaign on Twitter on Friday, 5 June 2020, initiated by Palestinian organizers in Gaza. We urge all supporters of Palestine to join us in this online action alongside demonstrations and other actions to reject Israeli annexation and settlements on the 53rd anniversary of the Naksa, the 1967 occupation of Palestine’s West Bank, Gaza Strip and Jerusalem.
Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine is ongoing to this day.
On the 53rd anniversary of the “Naksa” (the 1967 occupation of Palestine’s West Bank, Gaza Strip and Jerusalem),
please join us on June 5, 2020 to express your solidarity with the Palestinian people and to reject the Israeli annexation by:
Tweeting with the two hashtags #Naksa and #StopSettlements
Time: 9:00 am Pacific/12:00 noon Eastern/4:00 pm UTC/6:00 pm Central Europe/7:00 pm Palestine
Palestinians in Houston, Texas joined a mass mobilization for Black liberation on Tuesday, 2 June 2020. (Photo by the Palestinian Youth Movement.)
Protests against state violence are erupting all over the U.S. in the wake of the police murder of George Floyd. A group of activists in the U.S. would like to create a short video, compiling statements by Palestinians in Palestine and the Arab world, expressing solidarity with Black communities in the U.S. If you are interested in contributing a short video message to this project please email us at donkeysaddle@gmail.com and we will send you additional info.
We hope to post the video within the week, so please let us know by Wednesday morning! #BlackLivesMatter
Palestinians in Oakland, California rallied for Black liberation on Tuesday, 2 June 2020. (Photo by the Palestinian Youth Movement.)
تندلع الاحتجاجات ضد عنف الدولة في جميع أنحاء الولايات المتحدة في أعقاب مقتل الشرطة لجورج فلويد. تود مجموعة من النشطاء في الولايات المتحدة إنشاء فيديو قصير ، يجمع بيانات من الفلسطينيين في فلسطين والعالم العربي ، معبراً عن التضامن مع الجماعات السوداء في الولايات المتحدة. إذا اردت المساهمة برسالة فيديو قصيرة لهذا المشروع ، يرجى مراسلتي بالبريد الإلكتروني، donkeysaddle@gmail.com, وسارسل لك معلومات إضافية. نأمل أن ننشر الفيديو في غضون أسبوع ، لذا يرجى إعلامنا قبل الأربعاء صباحًا!
Ubai Aboudi, his wife Hind, and their three children, Khaled, Ghassan and Basel.
On Tuesday, 2 June, the Israeli occupation military court in Ofer sentenced Palestinian American researcher Ubai Aboudi, the Executive Director of the Bisan Center for Research and Development, to 12 months in Israeli prison and a fine of 2,500 NIS (approximately $720 USD). Aboudi was initially abducted by Israeli occupation forces on 13 November 2019; he was held without charge or trial under “administrative detention” for two months, sparking an international outcry, especially among scientists and academics familiar with his work. Israeli occupation forces then transferred his case to the military courts, extending his detention.
His sentence will run 12 months from the date of his arrest, meaning that his release is scheduled for November 2020.
Aboudi, 36, is married to Palestinian writer and human rights defender Hind Shraydeh, who has tirelessly advocated for her husband’s release and for justice for detained Palestinians. They have three children, Khaled, Ghassan and Basil.
Shraydeh expressed her outrage at the unjust imprisonment of her husband: “Israel has been arresting and detaining key figures in Palestinian civil society and human rights organizations for decades. The Israeli military courts are yet another arm of Israeli repression of Palestinian civilians. These courts are unfair, lack proper due process and violate international human rights conventions. Israel doesn’t want Palestinians to work on building civic institutions even if they are as socially minded and promote education and gender equality, like the work Ubai was doing at the Bisan Center for Research and Development,” she emphasized.
“For Palestinians that are committed to peaceful means of improving our society, we are left with no options or opportunities to do so successfully. Ironically, the more successful a person or institution gets at doing their work, the more intensely they get targeted by Israel. Israeli terrorization of Palestinians as a people and Palestinian civil society as a whole and Israel’s continuous incitement against any support or sympathy for Palestinians shown by the international community is part of a systematic process aimed at forcing political solutions upon Palestinians that are counter to their interests and counter to justice.”
Prior to Aboudi’s arrest, he had been working with Scientists for Palestine to organize the Third International Meeting on Science in Palestine, which took place on 10-12 January 2020 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was also conducting research into the mechanisms used by the Israeli occupation to hinder Palestinian scientific development and suppress Palestinian academic research.
Hind highlighted this work as a particular target for Israeli repression: “I believe that Israel’s human rights violations are specifically directed towards Palestinians with strong relationships with international organizations aiming to implement progressive developmental change in Palestine. Israel silences people, muzzles their freedom of expression and the freedom to do academic research, weakens Palestinian infrastructure, and hinders any positive change civic institutions are attempting to effect – then incredulously asks ‘where is the Palestinian Mandela?'”
International outcry
The military court sentence comes one day after an international campaign on social media using the hashtags #Freedom4Ubai and #Science4Palestine. Dozens of organizations – including Samidoun – and hundreds of activists around the world called for Aboudi’s immediate release, highlighting the injustice of his case. Approximately one million people were reached on Twitter alone, in addition to other social media campaigns on Facebook and Instagram and many direct calls made to the State Department in Washington, DC. One major campaign demand was for the U.S. State Department and its embassy in occupied Palestine to end their silence and inaction and instead act quickly to release Aboudi, a U.S. citizen, and to demand that the bogus charges against him be immediately dismissed.
The campaign also highlighted the injustice of Israeli persecution of Palestinians, through “administrative detention,” imprisonment without charge or trial, as well as through the military court, where Palestinians routinely face bogus charges for social, political and cultural activities that are deemed “prohibited” by the Israeli military occupation. There are currently approximately 470 Palestinians held in administrative detention, and nearly 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails.
Israeli military courts convict over 99% of the people brought before them, presenting a stacked deck in which it is nearly impossible to obtain any measure of justice. It condemned the U.S. government, which provides $3.8 billion annually in military aid to Israel, for its complicity in the ongoing imprisonment of a U.S. citizen and his rigged trial before a military court that entirely fails to comply with international standards for fair trials. It also highlighted the ongoing torture and abuse targeting imprisoned Palestinian women, men and children, including many university students as well as academics and researchers like Aboudi.
The campaign also comes alongside ongoing efforts by international scientists and researchers to demand the release of their colleague, spearheaded by Scientists for Palestine, which launched petitions signed by noted scholars such as Noam Chomsky and Nobel Prize winner George Smith. The Scientists for Palestine campaign highlighted Israeli violations of the internationally recognized right to science for Palestinians, urging that “S4P and the undersigned supporters therefore condemn Mr. Ubai Aboudi’s abduction and detention in the strongest possible terms and call for the US State Department and the US ambassador in Israel David M. Friedman to end their silence and work to ensure his immediate release from military prison.” Hundreds of academics added their names to the growing list of signatories.
Denial of fair trial rights
Campaigners for Aboudi’s freedom and for justice for Palestinian political prisoners also highlighted the ongoing investigation by the International Criminal Court and the vast quantities of evidence cited by human rights organizations highlighting Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity, including its ongoing violations of legal due process, torture and abduction of Palestinian political prisoners and detainees. As Wattan TV, a Palestinian news agency, noted in its report on the case, “Palestinian detainees face a harsh reality…decisions that affect their lives come with a green light from the top of the political pyramid in the occupation state. These systems attempt to break the Palestinian prisoners’ will by subjecting them to sham courts, in order to undermine their resilience and steadfastness. Arrests may sometimes take the form of arbitrary and unjust administrative detention, based on secret files provided by the Israeli intelligence services. Detainees and their lawyers are forbidden from seeing these files. Detention orders may be issued for up to six months at a time, but they may be renewed indefinitely.”
The report noted further, “The occupation also buys time to manufacture charges and fabricate bogus hearsay evidence, as in Aboudi’s case. This is often based on coerced confessions obtained through the torture of other detainees under the “Tamir law,” which allows a Palestinian prisoner to be convicted in military court based on another’s confession under torture without external evidence or the detainee’s own confession. Hundreds of Palestinians are convicted each year in the Israeli military courts at a rate of up to 99.76%, under these circumstances.”
Coerced plea agreements
As a result, Palestinian prisoners are essentially forced into concluding plea agreements with the Israeli military prosecution. Estimates have indicated that over 90% of Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli military courts are convicted through such plea agreements.
Because the system presents a stacked deck to Palestinian prisoners, in which the Israeli military occupation forces serve as the arresting force, prosecutor and judges, it is almost impossible to be acquitted in the military courts on the basis of legal argumentation or by challenging military evidence.
When Palestinian prisoners refuse a plea agreement, they face repeatedly postponed hearings that drag out over the course of years, as in the case of Mona Qaadan, who faced dozens of arbitrarily postponed military court hearings. In addition, Israeli military prosecutors routinely refuse to provide relevant evidence to defense lawyers, citing security and confidentiality. Once again, the Israeli military court system routinely refuses to grant relief in these cases, providing Palestinians and their lawyers with no opportunity to defend themselves.
One of the best-known cases is that of Mohammed Halabi, the Palestinian aid worker from Gaza, who rejected a plea agreement over the demands of the judge in his case, saying that he refuses to acknowledge false allegations. He has been imprisoned for three years and faced over 126 hearings, most of them postponements, with no meaningful progress in the case.
In many cases, each hearing for some prisoners also involve lengthy, arduous journeys on the notorious “bosta” as they are taken to and from the court on each occasion. These journeys take hours and days; prisoners are shackled to metal benches and frequently denied access to sanitary facilities.
In many cases, the sentence imposed in such a plea agreement is far shorter than the lengthy process of repeatedly postponed hearings. As a result, these delays are an additional form of coercion to force Palestinians to accept plea agreements, especially if they wish to continue their lives, care for their families and develop their work in the future outside Israeli prison. All of this is done in order to essentially force Palestinian detainees to end the legal proceedings in order to receive a sentence and a date for their release, especially as they have no hope of obtaining a fair trial.
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Samidoun’s response
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network condemns this latest injustice against Palestinian American researcher Ubai Aboudi, a daily experience in the Israeli military courts. We pledge to continue to fight for the freedom of Ubai and all of his fellow Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and to continue to confront the ongoing complicity of the United States, European Union, Canada and other imperialist powers in the dispossession of the Palestinian people, the torture and imprisonment of nearly 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners, including nearly 200 children, and the ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by the Israeli settler colonial regime in Palestine for over 72 years.
Despite all of the injustices imposed on Ubai Aboudi and his fellow Palestinian prisoners, they are not isolated and they are not alone; they are an example of steadfastness and commitment to justice that inspires all of us around the world, including as we fight against anti-Black racism, police oppression and mass incarceration in our cities and communities. It comes as no surprise that the same U.S. regime that was built on the genocide of Indigenous people and the enslavement and exploitation of Black people and that terrorizes people around the world through its imperial military also works hand in glove with its settler colonial strategic partner, the Israeli state, to imprison and target Palestinians – including U.S. citizens and esteemed researchers like Ubai Aboudi.
We will not rest until we bring an end to these systems and structures of injustice, occupation, apartheid and oppression, in occupied Palestine, in the U.S. and everywhere around the world.
Freedom for Ubai Aboudi and all Palestinian prisoners! Freedom for Palestine, from the river to the sea!
This call to action is taking place amid an uprising across the United States sparked by the police murder of George Floyd, led by Black communities and movements struggling for justice, against anti-Black racism, for an end to police repression and for meaningful social transformation, including the liberation of Black political prisoners and the dismantling of police structures built on racism and oppression.
We strongly support the call of the Movement for Black Lives for a week of action to #DefundPolice and #DefendBlackLives, and we urge all Palestinian and solidarity activists to build and participate in this week, including the widespread marches, demonstrations and online actions.
Palestinian-American researcher Ubai Aboudi, executive director of the Bisan Center for Research and Development, was abducted from his home by Israeli occupation forces on 13 November, 2019 and put in detention without charge.
Ubai, who had been working with Scientists for Palestine to organize the Third International Meeting on Science in Palestine, which took place on 10-12 January, 2020 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was later transferred from “administrative detention” to an Israeli military court, once his case caught international attention.
Ubai, a Palestinian civilian, now faces an Israeli military trial which offends the most basic US and international standards of due process, on charges which were manufactured months after he was abducted. Moreover, it appears Ubai is being charged purely for his public, civilian work in the field of education and community service, activities which are lawful for Israelis to undertake, but which are smeared as “terrorism” when conducted by Palestinians.
And despite Ubai’s United States citizenship, as well as the U.S. government’s $3.8 billion in annual military aid to Israel, the U.S. has largely left Ubai and Hind Shraydeh, his wife and the mother of their three children, to suffer alone. The State Department has done nothing to ensure that Ubai is safe, has done nothing to ensure that he is receiving due process as required by international law, and has done absolutely nothing to protect Ubai from false and unlawful military charges.
Your calls and emails have been helping protect Ubai from even more Israeli violence. Now more than ever, Ubai and his family need us to take action to demand freedom for Ubai. On Monday, 1 June take action to demand freedom for Ubai and 4,700 other Palestinian political prisoners: Join us first thing in the morning on Monday, continue all day long, and join the coordinated social media storm on Monday, 1 June at 1 pm Eastern. (10 am Pacific/5 pm UTC/8 pm Palestine time.)
Israel is currently subjecting U.S. citizen and civilian, Ubai Aboudi, to trial before a military court, without due process, and for recently manufactured charges.
The U.S. government must immediately intercede to secure Ubai’s immediate and unconditional release, and must reject any charges against Ubai as illegitimate.
Ubai was interred in an Israeli military center for months without charge under “administrative detention” – along with over 400 fellow Palestinians – until international pressure forced the Israeli military to manufacture charges against him.
Israel, and its military, is now being investigated for crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, including for its breach of due process, torture and abduction of Palestinians.
Israeli military courts convict Palestinian defendants at a rate of 99.76%.
Israel routinely subjects Palestinians in military detention to mistreatment, including torture.The Israeli military apparatus is estimated to torture over 95% of Palestinians they abduct, including children.
The US must also impose meaningful sanctions for Israel’s crimes against Palestinians, including over 4,700 Palestinian political prisoners. These crimes include its abduction and torture of Palestinian men, women and children. The U.S. must immediately end its $3.8 billion in annual military aid.
Ask your organization to endorse this call to action. Please use the form here – visit the link at https://bit.ly/action4ubai.
Join a social media storm at 10:00 am Pacific time (1:00 pm Eastern time, 5:00 pm UTC, and 8:00 pm Palestine time.) Share content about Ubai with the hashtags #Freedom4Ubai and #Science4Palestine. Use this handy tweet sheet for suggestions: https://bit.ly/tweet4ubai
Post pictures and videos of yourself and your organization demonstrating in solidarity or holding up the signs to support Ubai.
Check below for signs that you can print out and hold, or design and share your own! Use the hashtag #Freedom4Ubai to help others find them.Take a selfie, like this one of Samidoun’s international coordinator, with one of the signs.
Demonstrate publicly where local conditions and restrictions allow. If possible, organize a car caravan, protest or rally in a public area, then share photographs and footage of it online with the hashtag. Bring the signs above to your local actions and demonstrations for social justice and against anti-Black racism and take a photo along with your banners and signs in defense of Black lives and for Black liberation.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network expresses its firmest support and solidarity to the Black liberation movement, the friends and family of George Floyd and to all of the people taking to the streets in Minneapolis and elsewhere to demand justice, accountability and an end to racist and colonial police terror. The blatant act of police murder, in full view of multiple cameras, indicates a form of confidence and impunity that is not limited to the murderer himself, Derek Chauvin, but reflects the institutional, racist, oppressive structure of U.S. policing. We support the uprising in Minneapolis, the intifada of people subjected to an ongoing, vicious and structural racism, inheriting a lengthy and rich tradition of Black resistance, organizing and struggle.
“Yet another murder of an unarmed Black person in the month of May. Finan Berhe, in Springfield, MD, Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick, GA, Breonna Taylor in Louisville, KY and now George Floyd in Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN and all this in the worst pandemic in a century. What an outrage, what an American made tragedy that the lynching of Black people continues unabated, that racist terror continues to stalk the land like a beast of prey. With the brutal, callous murder of George Floyd, when one cop crushed the breath out of brother Floyd with a knee pressing down on his neck while other cops stood by watching. At best they were complicit in the murder of George Floyd. No wonder the people rose up in righteous anger demanding justice for George Floyd and an end to this legacy of racial terror that plagues not only the Twin Cities but the entire country.”
As a Palestinian prisoner solidarity network, we are deeply aware that the United States and Israel not only share a common settler-colonial, racist foundation and fundamental reality, billions of dollars in military assets and a joint imperialist project in the Arab region but also tactics, trainings and “security” frameworks used against Black communities in the United States and against Palestinians living under occupation, apartheid and colonialism. We see the indelibly devastating images of the murder of George Floyd and recognize the same racist impunity that did not hesitate to cut down the lives of so many Palestinian and Black martyrs.
Image by Carlos Latuff for Mint Press News
U.S. police forces truly are occupation forces inside cities and communities nationwide, and so this sharing of tactics and joint colonial approach comes as no surprise. However, it must impel us toward escalated and meaningful action in solidarity with the Black liberation movement. There is a tradition of internationalism and joint struggle that has a profound history, legacy, present and future in both the Palestinian struggle and the Black movement, an anti-colonial, anti-imperialist framework for liberation.
“Palestinians know well the use of mass imprisonment to maintain racist domination and oppression and breaking the racist structures of imprisonment is critical to our liberation movement. We salute Mumia Abu-Jamal and all of the political prisoners of the Black liberation movement in U.S. jails and call for their immediate freedom…Since the earliest days of the Black movement in the U.S., from slaves revolting for freedom to the civil rights movement and beyond, Black people, organizations and movements have faced severe state repression, targeting, incarceration and killings at the hands of the state. U.S. domestic intelligence agencies such as the FBI, who target Palestinian and Arab communities for state repression, have for years focused on attacking Black movements, leaders and communities as a central project.”
The murder of George Floyd by police was the deliberate killing of a prisoner, a systematic extrajudicial execution. It was a death through torture at the hands of the state, a crime against humanity in a long line of such crimes committed inside and outside the United States by its authority, from the genocide of Indigenous people to the enslavement of Black people to the wars, killings and murderous sanctions of U.S. empire.
We recall the words of Ahmad Sa’adat, writing in response to the words of Black revolutionary Huey Newton:
“From inside the occupier’s Ramon prison, on behalf of myself, my comrades and the Palestinian prisoners’ movement, we extend our clenched fists of solidarity and salute and arms of embrace to our Black comrades whose struggle for liberation in the belly of the beast continues today against fierce repression…So when we witness the escalation against our movement as we see today in the Philippines, as we see the murderous and orchestrated attacks on our Palestinian resistance, as we see the criminalization of Black people and movements, it is clear that we are still facing the situation that Huey Newton identified and confronted. We are still seeking to defend our peoples from the relentless assaults of capitalism, Zionism and imperialism and their police and military forces…The struggle, the cause, and the movement of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Movement are not a closed file. It is an open file, an ongoing struggle and a continuing movement for justice and liberation….You could feel the legacy of the Black Panther Party and the continuing Black struggle on the streets of Chicago, Oakland and Harlem. There are people who carry within them the legacies of struggle as a human treasure. The experiences of the elders of our movement, especially those who have come through prison, stand alongside the ideas passed down through writing, books and literature in carrying on, from one generation to another, the trajectory and path of struggle toward a future in which youth are coming forward to lead Black and Palestinian revolutionary struggles for liberation.”
Sa’adat continued, with words that resonate with the images and sounds of people in motion in Minneapolis today. “The law – the law of the imperialist and the colonizer – is used to steal the rights and resources of our people and also to justify our imprisonment and repression and criminalization. Through the collective “breaking” of the law and its power to define justice and injustice – when people, collectively, confront and “break” the law, not merely as individuals but as a collective power, it loses its claim to legitimacy. Breaking of the law must become the norm, and not the exception – the law of capitalism, imperialism and exploitation.”
Samidoun expresses our deep solidarity with the intifada in Minneapolis and joins the demands for justice for the martyr George Floyd and the dismantling of the systems that killed him. We urge all to support the organizing being done in Minneapolis, including the work of the Minnesota Freedom Fund, an organization providing direct jail support and bail funds for protestors, as well as the array of movement fundraisers they recommend. We also urge all to join the NAARPR on the 30 May day of action against racist murders and police violence and for freedom for the imprisoned.
Glory to the martyrs – victory will come, through struggle. From Gaza to Minneapolis, from all of Palestine – from the river to the sea – to all of Turtle Island, one struggle for justice and liberation!
Huzaifa Halabiya Bader with his daughter, Majdal, after his release from his previous term in administrative detention
Former long-term hunger striker and Palestinian detainee Huzaifa Halabiya Bader was once again ordered to six months in administrative detention, imprisonment without charge or trial, by the Israeli Ofer Military Court on 25 May 2020. The new administrative detention order comes only five and a half months after he was released in December 2019 from a previous period of imprisonment without charge or trial, during which he conducted a 67-day hunger strike to win his freedom.
Israeli occupation forces raided his hometown of Abu Dis near occupied Jerusalem on 17 May, seizing Bader from his home. He was once again taken from his young daughter Majdal, who was born during his previous imprisonment. Bader, 29, suffers from a number of health concerns, and his imprisonment amid the COVID-19 pandemic is raising even greater alarms. He survived a serious fire in an accident as a young boy, leaving him with burns over the vast majority of his body, and later survived leukemia. As a result, he has consistently required specialized medical treatment, while Palestinian prisoners are subjected to systematic medical neglect and mistreatment inside Israeli jails.
Israeli occupation forces invade occupied Abu Dis on 17 May to abduct Huzaifa Halabiya Bader.
During his previous term in administrative detention, dozens of Palestinian prisoners joined solidarity strikes and refused meals to join the campaign for his release as he carried on a 67-day hunger strike for freedom. His community in Abu Dis maintained ongoing solidarity tents and vigils to demand his freedom, while protesters elsewhere in Palestine and internationally echoed the calls for his immediate release.
He is now one of approximately 500 Palestinians jailed without charge or trial, out of nearly 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners in total. Administrative detention was initially introduced to Palestine by the British colonial mandate and has been embraced by the Zionist regime to arbitrarily detain Palestinians, especially community activists, student organizers and other influential leaders in their community. Administrative detention orders may be issued for up to six months at a time and are indefinitely renewable; Palestinians have spent years jailed without charge or trial as a result.
It is notable that the new arrest and arbitrary imprisonment of Huzaifa Halabiya Bader comes as the Israeli regime – along with its U.S. imperialist partners – plans and promotes the official annexation of even more of occupied Palestine, specifically the fertile Jordan Valley.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network demands the immediate release of Huzaifa Halabiya Bader and all Palestinian prisoners, especially those jailed without charge or trial under administrative detention. Administrative detention is a colonial mechanism aimed to prevent, disrupt and target Palestinian resistance and organizing in any form, removing leaders from their communities as they confront the daily violence of Zionist colonialism, apartheid and occupation. We urge the broadest international solidarity to demand the release of Huzaifa Halabiya Bader and all Palestinian detainees, including building the movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions and the isolation of Israel.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network is a member organization of the International League of People’s Struggles. We urge all to get involved in the Week of International Struggle against US Imperialism, 25-31 May 2020!
Amid the pandemic, peoples and nations are rising up and asserting their interests and demands as corporations and governments gear up for a “new normal” under the same system. With more than a century since Lenin’s seminal work on imperialism was initially released, we continue to see the ongoing relevance and vital importance of building a broad proletariat-led movement to smash imperialism.
As US-based peoples, we are one with the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa and Asia: to fight back and defeat US intervention and fascist reaction.
We want an end to the old system of imperialism, plunder and war. We want real change.
TO PARTICIPATE:
Initiate offline and online actions within your organizations to confront and condemn US war and militarism and uplift anti-imperialist people’s movements. Share your events with us at bit.ly/ILPSUS-AntiImpeWeek
Invite your friends and networks to the ILPS US Facebook event and make sure to monitor for updates
Share updates on your events, actions, statements media and prop highlighting your anti-imperialist struggles on the Facebook event
The global scenario: acute crisis and inter-imperialist contradictions. The COVID-19 pandemic has conflagrated it. ILPS studies of state responses to the pandemic confirm the disasters wrought by neoliberal austerity and privatization policies which have crippled health care systems and put workers in even greater peril around the world. The military-industrial complex, the engine of monopoly capitalism, including big pharmaceutical companies, seek to exploit the crisis, destroy progress and steal more resources from state, natural environment and labour to keep profits flowing. They demand that the workers sacrifice themselves for the well-being of a few, to give up their livelihoods or risk direct contamination on the job in conditions which have been underpaid and unsafe all along. As usual, the most oppressed, poor and vulnerable populations are suffering the most.
Meanwhile, tensions among imperialist states run high and the US keeps on punishing states that do not comply with the US imperialist model and policies by maintaining cruel sanctions, depriving whole populations of medicine and food. Neither has the US and its allies relented its militarization, threats and active military engagements from Syria to Venezuela. It continues to support the most reactionary regimes such as those of the Philippines, Israel and India in order to attain their narrow and anti-social goals.
The situation is driving working people to organize community systems to cope, and at the same time they raise more questions, voice objections and act politically. The ILPS has called for a week of anti-imperialist activities as one step in uniting and building the anti-imperialist movement for a better way. This follows the development of its international and chapter-wide education programs to discuss and enhance understanding of the crisis informed by Leninist analysis and organization principles in this year of Lenin’s 150th birthday.
Commission 4 operates on the principle of just peace, which is peace with guarantees of social, economic and political justice. The people resist imperialism and reactionary, oppressive regimes, rightfully refusing to give up until their demands for land, political and social reforms are properly addressed. In fact, we urge that the people step up their education, organization and mobilization to stop imperialism and win just peace according to local conditions and in whatever ways they can.
Though its own society is crumbling, its people rising in anger and its global influence waning, the US is still the biggest military force charged with defending the monopoly capitalist system. It is the center of the world arms trade. It has a nuclear warhead stockpile of over 6,000 and has produced some 70,000 since 1945. Its rivals, Russia and China, have likewise kept and produced thousands. The US has at least 700 military bases around the world and sharing or visiting agreements in more locations. Its proxies and satellites such as Australia, Canada, Turkey and Colombia provide resources and act on its behalf. With a 2020 military budget of some $800 million, robbing its people of guaranteed public services and decent living conditions, it demands other states to give up funds and other resources and put their own people in harm’s way to supply its war machinery, for which inhumane domestic austerity programs have been intensified.
The context of an all-sided crisis of the global system and the major imperialist powers has inspired the US to adopt a multi-faceted, aggressive strategy dubbed as “hybrid war, ”often cloaking these destructive practices in terms such as ‘counterinsurgency’ or ‘overseas contingencies operations.’ That is the fierce and relentless repertoire of tactics including weapons of mass destruction, bio-weapons, xenophobia, economic coercive measures, cultural assault, media and psy-war, cyber warfare, espionage, deals with crooks and murderers, and political interference and manipulation. Politically, the US and company are leaning further to the Right, away from bourgeois democracy, social development, law and science. In desperation, they are collaborating with reactionary, fascist and terrorist elements while they try to bend the law and the truth.
LATIN AMERICA
In a recent webinar hosted by activists in the US, Carlos V. Ron Martinez, Vice-Chancellor of Venezuelan Foreign Affairs for North America, spoke about “why the US is obsessed with Venezuela.” He explained the two main reasons for the US’ desire for regime change in Bolivarian Venezuela: the nationalization of its oil industry and its independent foreign relations with states such as China, Russia and Cuba. Bolivarian policies rub against the geopolitical norms and policies that the US imperialists and its allies prefer. [Notes from a webinar entitled “An Inside View of Venezuelan Resistance to US Imperialism and How to Build International Solidarity” recorded on April 23, 2020 and uploaded to the Facebook page “Stop the Machine! Create a New World!”]
The Bolivarian government uses the oil industry as the “motor of its economy” to help the people. The late President Hugo Chavez revived OPEC discussions independently and began reversing privatization by renationalizing its oil industry in 2001. He renegotiated the terms of contracts with big private players such as EXXON in 2007. When world oil prices were dipping in 2013, President Nicolas Maduro reopened OPEC discussions. That is when US President Obama started imposing coercive economic measures against Bolivarian Venezuela by Executive Order. These sanctions have since intensified. Today some $5 billion are frozen in various banks out of allegations of corruption and $30 billion of revenues have been lost from the Venezuela state corporation’s sister company in the US, Citco, which the US overtook. Thus, the capacity of the renewed state to provide and build services for the people has been drastically reduced. The people cannot acquire daily necessities because of the sanctions. It makes coping with COVID-19 especially hard. [ibid.]
Vice-Chancellor Martinez describes this “bizarre context” which the US is employing a “maximum pressure strategy” to force the Bolivarian government to change. It has tried to take advantage of the switch in government and COVID-19. It is backing the most reactionary elements lead by Juan Guaidó who block discussions with all the opposition parties in the Venezuelan national assembly, while the US is threatening military intervention unless President Maduro accepts its “transition plan” to have him step down and have a coalition government chosen by the US to take over. It has even proposed this plan to the UN . It also continues its provocations, such as the outrageous, baseless indictment against the Maduro government for supposedly trafficking narcotics. “This [strategy] is basically overthrowing a government,” says Martinez. The US will not rule out a full scale, all-out military intervention. He describes it as “the biggest military mobilization in 30 years” going on in the waters surrounding Venezuela, in addition to land border incursions by mercenaries. This scenario of “hybrid war” poses a “very dangerous situation” for the Venezuelan people and the whole region. His government is calling for the US to step aside and allow parliamentary discussions to proceed in order to smooth out internal conflict. [ibid.]
WEST ASIA
West Asia (aka Middle East) is rife with conflict because of the long and brutal history of British colonialism, which the US inherited. The US and its partners in crimes against humanity including local reactionary leaders want to ensure that (1) transnational corporations have access to the oil and other industries, and (2) national independence and social liberation are thwarted. They are hostile to nationalized industry and social reforms, not just socialism. The Turkish state enjoys the support of its NATO allies in its barbaric campaigns to subdue labour and crush Kurdish self-determination movements in Turkey and Syria. Iraq remains in turmoil with Islamic state and NATO forces actively trying to frustrate Iraqi independence. The US is constantly challenging Iran for its independent policies. The US, Canada and European states support Saudi Arabia’s attacks on Yemen, which is destroying Yemeni society and causing famine. (Canada has made deals to supply the Saudi military.) Since 2011, the US, supported by its allies and mercenaries, and Islamic state terrorists have been assaulting Syria. Today, part of Syria is occupied by Turkey and Israel. Millions of displaced Syrians have fled and are languishing in refugee camps with little to no protection from COVID-19.
Despite the US’ hypocritical claims about democracy, human rights and international law, US imperialism and reaction oppose Syria’s struggle for sovereignty and independence. Speaking in a webinar hosted by Sanctions Kill on May 9, 2020, the Syrian Ambassador to the UN, Bashar Ja’afari, explained that the “punitive and unlawful unilateral, coercive measures” (i.e. sanctions) impede the Syrian government’s functions to support the health care sectors and finance responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Never endorsed by the UN Security Council, the illegal sanctions have been blocking bank transfers and freezing Syria funds abroad. This resulted to price inflation. Trade and humanitarian assistance is greatly restricted, except those allowed by US to reach terrorist factions in the west and north. The EU also refused entry to a Syrian aircraft sent to retrieve Syrians in Europe on May 9. Ambassador Ja’afari sums up the multi-pronged strategy of US-led imperialism as “health terrorism, financial terrorism, education terrorism, and media terrorism” in addition to military action. [Click on the Facebook or Youtube video link on https://sanctionskill.org/resources-2/]
“All Arab lands are under some form of colonialism today,” said Palestinian activist and writer Khaled Barakat during a webinar broadcast on May 16. The webinar was hosted by ILPS member Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network [https://www.facebook.com/SamidounPrisonerSolidarity/]. After invading and destroying Iraq society, the US wants Iraq, an intersection of various nations and conflicts, to also serve as a second control in the region. Barakat elaborated that Israel, far from having evolved as a nation-state historically, was manufactured by British colonialism and maintained by US neo-colonialism (aka present-day imperialism) to serve capitalism and Western imperialism. It is a settler colonizer. US-led imperialism supplies Israel with the arms and technology for it to be the strongest power in the region capable of protecting capitalism and maintaining reactionary rule, said Barakat. He asserted that “Israel is a deathtrap”, one that desires to perpetuate conflict. Israeli reactionary and US imperialist discourse fog up the reality that Israel occupied Palestine. Religion is not the source of the conflict, as three religions have always existed in the Palestinian population. The Israel state always gets in the way of dialogue and cooperation in the region. Peoples’ self-determination movements, such as those in Egypt, Lebanon and Tunisia, have really just begun recently, claimed Barakat, with the only measure of success so far being Tunisia.
The region is a pivotal arena of international struggle. It is important to work together to build the anti-imperialist struggle and aim to build socialist societies that do not oppress the peoples. This way, anti-imperialists can push national liberation movements, at their own pace and according to each set of circumstances, to unite with sectoral struggles, and march forward towards freedom and peaceful co-existence with social justice.
SOUTH ASIA
On August 5, 2019, India clearly unmasked its imperialist face to the world. The Modi government in India revoked Article 370 of its constitution that had allowed the Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOK) a certain amount of autonomy: their own constitution, a separate flag and freedom to make laws. From that day onwards, the IOK has been under siege by the Indian military. More than 700,000 Indian troops have been deployed to the region, with the people of IOK facing a fresh onslaught of brutal killings, harassment, and persecution. The region has been completely cut off from all types of communication including mobile and internet services.
Kashmiri activists believe that the fascist Indian government is now following Israeli Zionist strategies to subjugate Kashmiri freedom fighters, which is well proven by statements by Indian officials. A Muslim majority area, the IOK faces fresh waves of killings with the ultimate goal of bringing in Hindu Indian settlers to change the demography as is happening in Occupied Palestine. There have been blatant statements about purchasing land in Kashmir and diverting foreign investments to the region. As part of the multi-polar world where imperialist powers are vying to annex and occupy territories, the fresh onslaught on IOK is part of the open race for control of raw materials, labor and markets. Rich in its natural bounty, Kashmir is a key target for many reasons including its geo-political positioning.
There is little doubt that India is simultaneously flexing its muscles towards China, which also claims territorial rights to parts of IOK. This is also partly a retaliation to the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) agreement between China and Pakistan, the starting point of the corridor being Gilgit, and is considered by India to be part of the disputed territory of Azad Jammu and Kashmir that is supposed to be under Pakistani control.
India’s imperialist policies in IOK cannot be viewed solely on their own merit and need to be understood in the light of the current strong ‘bonding’ between fascist regimes of United States of America and India. Trump’s trip to India was an open acknowledgment of their combined political and economic ambitions in the Asia region, referred to as the Asian Century, which is where the future growth lies. No doubt, it’s the US hegemonic agenda and military power which India is counting upon for its aggressive posture in South Asia.
The struggle between capitalist and people movements not only in Kashmir but across South Asia is rising where the various states, through nation-state lenses, are trying to divide the people’s movements and nullify their aspirations of national liberation. The test of time is not to fall sway to the slogans created by fascist regimes that foster religious and national divides, but to come together on the basis of collective peoples’ solidarity demanding social justice and long-lasting peace. This is no doubt only possible by engaging in resistance against monopoly capital.
CALLS TO ACTION
The imperialist system is the root of most of the major problems facing the people. It is imperative that the people rise together against it with a vision of constructing a new way according to the people’s will and present regional conditions.
The following article, by Palestinian writer Hind Shraydeh, was originally published in Arabic at Hadf News:
Salam and Rubou’The different meanings of “Peace”
To some who hold power and authority, “peace” is linked with settlement and accommodation, with privileges they aspire to obtain in exchange for crumbs of the historic Palestine. Salam, on the other hand, whose name in Arabic means “peace,” exemplifies another meaning for the term.
Salam Taha was born in the village of Deir Abu Misha’al, situated northwest of Ramallah city. He adores the sea, although he was deprived of enjoying it due to the occupation. Salam usually escapes from the noise of the city to Khirbet Al-Rachniyeh east of the village, to relish the green views of his secret place, gazing towards the occupied Palestinian coast, confronting his feelings with absolute silence, and spending time in spacious verdant fields.
“He is the most shy among us but the bravest too,” says his friend at university.
Arrested while caring for his child
Israeli military soldiers raided Salam’s house after exploding its door to make their entry. They attacked Salam, forcing against the wall and cowardly hitting his body with their rifles.
It was four o’clock in the morning, when Salam was awake caring for his one-month baby, Cana’an. He never knew it is going to be his last turn in the ongoing rotation with his wife, Rubou’ or that he would be unable to look after his child for quite a long time.
Salam was tied to the kitchen chair, while military soldiers ransacked his place, turning it upside down. They were looking for his older mobile phone, which was directly in front of them the entire time, but they claimed not to notice it while acting in such a vicious manner.
Salam remained placid, as if he was unbothered, and mocked the soldiers’ actions, an attitude that angered the chief officer, who tried to provoke Salam by cursing his wife Rubou’ and directing profane insults at her while she prepared some milk for her child to calm his continuous crying during the assault. He stared at the chief officer with a shaming look, as if asking, “Is this the way you are raised to respect mothers?!”
He hummed a melody, with unidentifiable lyrics, repeating the only recognized words of it, which were “you may.”
After the extensive vandalism inside the house, the Israeli soldiers handcuffed Salam’s hands and grabbed him tightly from the shoulders. Rubou’ quickly knelt down on the ground, trying to put her husband’s shoes on with all care and diligence.
Salam saluted her, saying, “It will not take so long… I will come back soon.”
“This is how my husband was abducted on a Friday at dawn, 30 August 2018, only two days before his master’s degree studies commenced, as he was registered in the International Studies Program at Birzeit University,” Rubou’ says.
Salam with baby Cana’an
Earning his undergraduate degree with several interruptions
Over 80 students at Birzeit University are currently imprisoned in Israeli prisons. 20 of them are held under administrative detention, without any charges or trial. Their detentions are based on the “predictions” of the area commander of the Israeli military occupation, that these students might pose a “security threat to the state of Israel.” The rest of the students face indictments in military court, mostly revolving around involvement in student activities inside the university.
“Salam earned his BA degree in political science with a minor in public administration. His undergraduate studies were frequently interrupted by arrests, which extended the normal duration required to finish his studies,” Rubou’ stated.
There are students whose first university degree take them double the time they actually need to complete all their university requirements, in addition to courses related to their specialty. Students fail to join their classes, due to their repeated detentions, and yet try hard to resume their studies again at an older age with younger cohorts and sometime different generations than the ones that launched with them their academic journey.
Last week, three more student leaders were abducted by Israeli soldiers, just days before the end of the semester: Izz Shabaneh from the village of Sinjil, Mehdi Karajeh from the village of Saffa, and Basil Barghouthi from the village of Beit Rima.
Salam’s secret weapon
The Sunday after the invasion, Rubou’ knew that her husband is being held at Al-Moskobiyeh interrogation center in Jerusalem, where Salam remained for 46 days of harsh interrogation, during which he was banned from seeing his lawyer. Salam visited Jerusalem not as a tourist visiting the Dome of the Rock or the Holy Sepulcher, but rather stuck in an underground dungeon with numerous torture methods that are hatefully designed in order to drain the prisoner’s will. Fluorescent lights were switched on 24/7, causing him a severe headache and irritating his eyes, coupled with echoes of endless screaming and low temperatures directed on his body by an air-conditioner were only some of the examples of the constant pressure and inhuman treatment.
After three months of detention, Rubou’ decided to take the risk in order to cheer her husband up and transfer to him good feelings to help him stay strong and carry on with a brave heart. She decided to provide her husband with a secret weapon while attending his court session.
How is that possible if even a tissue is not allowed to pass through the punitive inspections and searches?! She took extra care of her outfit, wore her favorite jacket, closed its buttons, and luckily succeeded to pass through the first inspection, the second one through an automatic inspection machine, and the last personal one, that looks like two harassing hands passing an electronic stick over your body. After she waited outside in the cold for hours, the security guard notified Rubou’ that it was time for Salam’s trial. She walked into the court room with her surprise and unbuttoned her jacket, where Salam was able to see his son Cana’an’s smiling face printed on Robou’s T-shirt. For two minutes long, the security guards were frozen in place. They did not know how to deter such a secret weapon!
Rubou’ laughed while recalling the incident, saying: “I felt that we had won a victory … the guards were frozen and did not know what to do! They think they can abolish the longing in our hearts, but we proved them wrong. This was my way of resistance and standing by Salam’s side”.
82 days of harsh investigation in the Al-Moskobiyeh slaughterhouse
“Salam did not sleep for so long, he was immensely pale, and bleeding from his wrists due to the tight shackles around them. The prison administration employed a number of interrogators who created stories and fake scenarios about our family to weaken Salam. Some of their fabrications were about me, his wife, and our son Cana’an, found dead in a car accident, others were about bringing me for interrogation in a room adjacent to Salam’s cell”, Rubou said, recalling what Salam told her in one of her visits.
Rubou’ with Cana’an
Many deceptions and malicious tricks were practiced by the Israeli intelligence agency, known as the Shabak, in order to put pressure on Salam, with one sole aim: Extracting confessions from him in order to celebrate their delusional victory and prove their domination over Palestinians.
“Before his recent arrest, Salam underwent a colonoscopy, as he suffers from colon problems, stomach pains and hemorrhoids that caused him bleeding during the interrogation. The lawyer submitted Salam’s medical papers explaining his condition, but the fascist regime did not care about his medication, and refused to let him go to the bathroom frequently,” Rubou’ says.
The Israeli occupation deliberately mistreats prisoners, providing them with poor and inadequate health care in an attempt to exhaust the captives. As punishment for Salam’s steadfastness, the illegitimate military court sentenced him to 18 months in prison.
Just two weeks before the end of his sentence, when Rubou’ was wondering about the color of the dress that she planned wear to welcome her partner home, and the unique outfit she is preparing for her son Cana’an to wear, only two weeks before Salam’s sentence ended, the Israeli military forces sent him to the slaughterhouse of Al-Moskobiyeh once again. Salam underwent thirty-six days of cruel interrogation with an agitated and hysterical frequency, during which he was once again prevented from meeting with his lawyer.
Eighty-two days is the cumulative time of interrogation Salam has gone through, while the “civilized” world and the luckier youths of the colonial project live in isolation from the tragedies of the occupation, perhaps by playing soccer or baseball and setting some exciting plans for their travels to the Maldives. Eighty-two days of interrogation, and yet the occupation steals years from Palestinian youth: Their future, their families and their children.
Meanwhile, international human rights organizations act like Pontius Pilate, when he washed his hands of guilt for the blood of Christ. Such organizations’ roles are to adopt “codes of conduct”, or issue informative brochures, or to express their “mild” concerns about a rough death that happened in a sacred spot in the far reaches of the earth, called Palestine.
Salam is still detained without trial in the Eshel desert prison, after he was arbitrarily transferred in mid-March from Ofer prison overnight as a punitive measure, as a result of which he had to sleep a full night in the “Ramla crossing-point”, a place where prisoners are gathered before they are distributed to other prisons. This happened at a time when the occupation claimed to be cautious and to stop unnecessary movement between prisons, in order to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
“You may build a huge wall around me, and another wall around you, the enemy of the sun … Still I will not compromise” lyrics of an Arabic song
Eshel Prison differs in its structure from other prisons; it is more isolated and brutal. The square yard, known as the fora, in which the prisoners spend their outdoor time is covered, so that they do not see the sky at all, nor the sun’s light. It is not available all day, but only for specific hours, and it is also far from the prisoners’ rooms. When released prisoners describe this prison, some say: “The bathroom in Eshel does not accommodate a chubby person, and the showers are narrow. All can be coped with except the climate of the desert, the high humidity and temperature in the morning and extreme cold at night”.
Salam spends most of his time reading and trying to maintain a healthy pattern by playing sports. He keeps humming his favorite song, as he walks in the fora: “You may steal the last inch of my land… You may feed the years of my youth to the prison … You may put down the flame I keep rising… You may prevent me from kissing my mother …You may defeat the dreams I have for tomorrow. You may deprive my children of wearing their Eid holiday outfits… You may build a wall and yet another taller one… In that act you assure to the world that you are the enemy of the sun. Still I will not compromise. Until the last pulse in my veins, I will continue fighting,” an Arabic song by Lebanese singer Julia Butros,
Fatherhood on hold
“It is not easy to raise a child on your own, while the pictures of the baby’s father are hung on the wall”, Rubou’ said. “Cana’an will turn two years old in July, while he does not know his father. I finally obtained a permit to visit Salam after being banned for almost a year. The long-anticipated permit allowed me to visit my husband three times only before the spread of COVID-19, after which visits were suspended.”
“We were born in pursuit of joy, and for joy we die”
“To see my husband in front of me through an insulated partition and isolating glass without being able to touch his hand, and to speak to him through telephones which the jailers control, is not easy at all. This increases the pain in my heart,” Rubou’ says. “Salam and I experienced a beautiful love story at university, which was completed in our marriage, and Cana’an is the fruit of our love.”
“With all the suffering that I live alone with Cana’an, and all the decisions I have to make, serving as mother and father at the same time, I return to remember what we insisted on highlighting in our wedding card. ‘We were born in pursuit of joy, and for joy we die.’ This is our conviction, and this is our belief in which we live every day, and we will raise our children to follow it as well,” Rubou’ concluded.
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