Dear Friends of MidEast:JustPeace,
 
We’ve discovered a wonderful new effort to bring joy to the children of Palestine. 
 
It’s called Playgrounds for Palestine, and its goal is to assure that Palestinian children have access to colorful, safe, developmentally appropriate playscapes near where they live. 
 
Or perhaps more accurately, where they try to live as normally as possible despite the strength and weight of Israeli (and American) helicopters, tanks, bulldozers and guns arrayed against them.  Despite curfews, collective punishment, and checkpoints.  Despite being regularly shut out of their schools, watching the adults in their lives humiliated, and manifesting the symptoms of trauma associated with war and terror.
 
Playgrounds for Palestine (www.PlaygroundsforPalestine.org) believes that their project is “an expression of solidarity with the plight of Palestinian children.  It is an affirmation of their right to childhood.  It is a minimal recognition of their humanity.  It is an act of Love.” 
 
An act of love, indeed. 
 
*  Consider Rana.  She’s six, and has a shy smile that comes in flashes as she hides behind an older cousin or sibling.  Every day for a week while the playground near her home in Khan Younis was being installed, Rana and the children of the town would run to the site first thing in the morning on their way to school, in their uniforms and backpacks, to see the progress and to inquire for the hundredth time when it would be finished.
 
Rana thought that the slide would be her favorite part of the playground.  Then as six year-olds do, she changed her mind a few times as she began to contemplate other aspects of the playground.  The bright space became Rana’s home away from home–trite words that take on a vastly different meaning when you know that her actual home had been demolished a month prior.  She and her parents and seven siblings were living outdoors in a small village of tents.
 
*  Consider Ahmed, in all his ten years.  He was not very nice to the Playgrounds people initially.  The people of Gaza didn’t want “American charity,” he told them.  They asked if they could take his picture, something that Palestinian children love.  Ahmed was no exception.  He wanted his picture taken in every conceivable pose and expression.  The ice was broken and Ahmed became the official Playgrounds helper, making sure that the other children didn’t sneak a ride down the slide before it was ready (even though he did so himself).  As he went down, his shirt rode up, and it was plain to see that his slight chest and back were scarred by shrapnel.  And yet, his adult anger at “American charity“ was transformed. 
 
By something as simple as a slide.
 
In the first few months of 2008, more than 50 Palestinian children have been killed by the Israeli army, 33 of them in the space of five days during Israel’s operations in Gaza February 27 - March 3. 
 
When they are not being killed, Palestinian children are injured by rubber bullets and tear gas, forced to leave their homes or their country, separated from their families, arrested and detained for months or years, used in military and intelligence activities, beaten, humiliated and harassed, prevented from going to school or from receiving medical care; prevented from playing, laughing and living normal lives.
 
We can change at least some of that. 
 
Will you help build the next playground in Palestine?  Our contributions will benefit the one planned for Bethlehem this summer with help from Nathan Dannison, a young minister from Grand Rapids, Michigan, who will also be studying Arabic there. 
 
Please make checks payable to Playgrounds for Palestine and send to MidEast:JustPeace at P.O. Box 815, Suttons Bay, MI 49682. We will foward the contributions to Playgrounds for Palestine.
 
Thank you for your support.
The Mideast:JustPeace Collective 

<>GRAND RAPIDS MINISTER TO SPEAK ABOUT BETHLEHEM MISSION
Building Goodwill and Playgrounds for Palestinian Children
Nathan Dannison, a graduate student at Chicago  Theological Seminary and
director of Outreach Ministries at Park Church in Grand Rapids, will be in Traverse City  on Saturday, March 29, 2008 and Sunday, March 30, 2008 to talk about his upcoming trip to Palestine to learn Arabic, follow in the footsteps of Jesus, and finance and build a playground for Palestinian children in Bethlehem. The playground is a project of the Philadelphia-based Playgrounds for Palestine (www.playgroundsforpalestine.org), whose mission is to give Palestinian children bright, safe, developmentally appropriate places to play. The group describes its work as “an affirmation of their right to childhood and a minimal recognition of their humanity… an act of Love.”

Dannison’s presentations are sponsored by the local peace group MidEast:
JustPeace which was founded in Traverse City in 2002 to bring more
attention to the efforts to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands. Attendees will be asked to help with donations toward the Bethlehem
playground. Dannison will speak three times over the weekend.

• Saturday, March 29th at the Grace Episcopal Church Hall, 341 Washington St. at 6:00 PM beginning with a potluck Attendees
  are asked to bring a dish to share and their own plates and utensils.
  Presentation at 7:00 PM.
  
• Sunday, March 30th at the Traverse Area District Library at 2:00 PM.
• Sunday, March 30th at the Potter’s House Church, UCC at 5:00 PM. The Potter’s House Church, UCC meets at Grace Episcopal Church, 341 Washington St. The Potter’s House is co-sponsoring his presentation at their church.

<>“Ever since I became “politically aware” in high school the Israeli / Palestinian conflagration has deeply troubled me. In my adult
life have had an opportunity to spend my graduate career studying and             following Jesus of Nazareth, a man from Palestine, who was a healer and proclaimed the justice tradition of the prophet Isaiah and
the Tanakh,” said Dannison. “[Reports state that] only 2.5% of children living in the occupied territories are free from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, and one survey found that 83% of local children had witnessed shootings. This, coupled with the fact that Palestinian children are regularly killed by military actions carried out near their homes, is why I feel very strongly about what Playgrounds for Palestine is doing for the people who live in this impoverished region.” For more information please call Marian Kromkowski at 231.271.5600 or
Gina Aranki at 231.620.6515.

US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation Condemns H.Res.951 March 6, 2008
On March 5, the House of Representative passed by a vote of 404-1 H.Res.951, a biased, one-sided resolution on the situation in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian Gaza Strip. Read the US Campaign’s analysis of this resolution, learn more about what we did to­ protest it, and how you can take action.Read More »

A defeated policy, not a defeated people
Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada, 7 March 2008 Here
The fallacy that lies behind the differential concern for the lives of innocent Israelis and Palestinians is thatthe massacre in Jerusalem and the massacres in Gaza can be separated. Israeli deaths are “terrorism,” while Palestinian deaths are merely an unfortunate consequence of the fight against “terrorism.” But the two are intricately linked, and what happened in Jerusalem is a direct consequence of what Israel has been doing to the Palestinians for decades.

THE MEGA PRISON OF PALESTINE
By Ilan Pappe, The Electronic Intifada, 5 March 2008 Here
In several articles published by The Electronic Intifada, I claimed that Israel is pursuing a genocidal policy against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. The argument was that since Israel does not know how to deal with the Gaza Strip, they opted for a knee-jerk reaction in the form of massive killings whenever the Palestinians in the Strip dared to protest their strangulation and imprisonment. The end result so far is the escalation of the indiscriminate killing of Palestinians — unfortunately validating the adjective “genocidal” I and
others attached to these policies.

Rights Group: More than 50% of Gaza casulties weren’t militants by Haaretz Service Here
The human rights organization B’Tselem on Monday said in a statement that more than half of the Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip in Israel Defense Forces operations in recent days did not take an active part in the fighting. This statement came after the IDF Chief of Staff issued a statement saying that 90 percent of those killed were in fact armed militants.

The War on Lebanon: A Reader
Edited by Nubar Hovsepian, Olive Branch Press

Parts One-Three on Tuesday, March 25
Parts Four-Six on Tuesday, April 22
Discussion at 7PM at Horizon Bookstore in Traverse City
Buy the book at Horizon at get a 10% discount as part of MidEast:JustPeace Book Club

Our book selection for March and April is “The War on Lebanon: A Reader”, a compelling set of essays on Israel’s 2006 war on Lebanon.

What explains Hezbollah’s capture of two Israeli soldiers and the scale of Israel’s retaliation? Why did the US reject an early ceasefire, instead egging on Israel as it pummeled Lebanon and casualties mounted? Why did President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice believe the Lebanese and other Arabs would welcome the “birth pangs” of a “new Middle East” designed by the US and Israel? And where will it all lead? Can the party continue to be both part of Lebanon’s parliament and an independent resistance movement? Will Lebanon become a modern, non-sectarian state or will the confessional order be further entrenched?

These and other vital questions are addressed in this collection of essays by internationally respected scholars and experts from around the world who examine the ethical, legal and strategic issues of the conflict, and analyze the consequences facing the region and the world in the wake of the Israeli invasion. Ultimately, the solution for Lebanon is intricately connected to the wider issues of the Middle East, including the right of the Palestinians to independence.”

Contributors include: Rashid Khalidi • Yoav Peled • Virginia Tilley • Sara Roy • Ussama Makdisi • Noam Chomsky • Fawwaz Traboulsi • Asa’d Abukhalil • Lara Deeb • Georges Corm • Stephen Zunes • Irene Gendzier • Azmi Bishara • Yitzhak Laor • Rasha Salti • Elias Khoury • Ziad Majed • Rami Khouri • Assaf Kfoury • Richard Falk • Phyllis Bennis • Haneen Sayed • William Hartung • Fred Halliday • Nubar Hovsepian • Hanady Salman • Kirsten Scheid • Hiam Brinjikji • Asli Bali • Frida Berrigan • Zafiris Tzannatos

War with No End
MidEast:JustPeace joins the US Campaign Against the Israeli Occupation Book Club Selection for February:
The MidEast:JustPeace 2008 Book Club begins on Tuesday February 12, 2008 at 7:00 PM at Horizon Bookstore in Traverse City.   

The inaugural book for our 2008 series is “War with No End” an important new anthology of essays published by Verso Books in conjunction with United for Peace and Justice and the Stop the War Coalition (UK). Phyllis Bennis, John Berger, Naomi Klein, Arundhati Roy, Joe Sacco and others examine the consequences of the “War on Terror.”

On October 7th 2001, US-led forces invaded Afghanistan, marking the start of George Bush and Tony Blair’s “War on Terror.” Six years on, where have the policies of Bush and Blair left us? Bringing together some of the finest contemporary writers, this wide-ranging anthology, from reportage and “faction” to fiction, explores the impact of this “long war” throughout the world, from Palestine to Iraq, Abu Ghraib, the curtailment of civil liberties and manipulation of public opinion. The February selection provides an urgent, necessary reflection on the causes and consequences of the ideological War on Terror.
Copies of the book are available at Horizon Book Store in Traverse City. There is a 10% discount as part of the MidEast:JustPeace Book Club.  Selections include:
* “Come September,” by Arundhati Roy
* “Human Shield,” by John Berger
* “Songs of Resistance,” by Haifa Zangana
* “Weddings and Beheadings,” by Hanif Kureishi
* “Down! Up!,” by Joe Sacco
* “Mezzaterra,” by Ahdaf Soueif
* “Homeland Wars,” by Tram Nguyen
* “Not in Our Names,” by Sept. 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows
* “Building a Booming Economy Based on War with No End: The Lessons of Israel,” by Naomi Klein 

The Campaign Against Torture, a subcommittee of Traverse for Peace and Justice and in conjunction with the American Friends Service Committee, will host a two-hour workshop on our understanding of the practice of torture by the U.S. government on Saturday, January 26, 2008 at 10:30 AM at the Traverse Area District Library.

This fast-paced workshop will touch upon difficult questions for Americans: Are we by our by association and acquiescence a nation of torturers?  Are we willing to accept that a “war against terror” justifies just about any act imaginable?  What are the laws governing torture?  What is its history?  What should and can we do to confront the use of torture?  Join us to discuss these questions.
Public Invited/No Charge.
More information call: Terri DeFillipo 231-228-6030

Just One State  The gathering force of the one state solution for Palestine is a mortal threat to Zionist racism, writes Rumy Hasan

On the weekend of 17-18 November, a conference took place in London that I hope and believe will prove a historic event. The reason is that it discussed the one state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Organised by the SOAS Palestine Society and the London One State Group, it was held in the largest hall at SOAS, and was sold out in advance — an indicator of the thirst for discussion of this vision. For me it was the most inspiring event on Palestine I have ever attended.

The End of Israel?
Hannah Mermelstein, The Electronic Intifada, 19 December 2007
“The day will come when the two-state solution collapses, and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights. As soon as that happens, the state of Israel is finished.”
That’s right, the Prime Minister of Israel is currently trying to negotiate a “two-state solution” specifically because he realizes that if he doesn’t, Palestinians might begin to demand, en masse, equal rights to Israelis. Furthermore, he worries, the world might begin to see Israel as an apartheid state. In actuality, most of the world already sees Israel this way, but Olmert is worried that even Israel’s most ardent supporters will begin to catch up with the rest of the world.
“The Jewish organizations, which were our power base in America, will be the first to come out against us,” he told Haaretz, “because they will say they cannot support a state that does not support democracy and equal voting rights for all its residents.”

<>Fourth Annual MidEast:JustParty

Give Peace a Dance

 Monday December 3, 2007 

6:00 PM to 8:30 PM

Traverse Area District Library

New to this Year’s Event are Middle Eastern Dance Lessons! Join the Fun!
Other Attractions include Middle Eastern food, sweets, coffee and mint tea, a bazaar featuring Palestinian embroidery and Olive Oil,  music and more.   Suggested Donation $5
“That’s What It’s All About”