Monday, June 27, 2011

What Hitler could not do


"What Hitler failed to do is going on today in the Diaspora" stated Yaacov Ne'eman, Minister of Justice of the State of Israel. From the podium of the Presidential Conference in Jerusalem, which was convened at the initiative of Israel's President Shimon Peres, Ne'eman sharply attacked the Diaspora Jews, of whom prominent representatives were present in the hall, and reiterated that intermarriage between Jews and non-Jews constitutes the realization of Adolf Hitler's goal. "The problem in the Diaspora is not conversion, is assimilation. Let's face the the truth, what the cursed Hitler could not do is now going on in the Diaspora, where a terrible assimilation is going on".

Intermarriage as the realization of Hitler's dream? Something is a bit odd here. Adolf Hitler was, to say the least, far from enthusiastic about mixed marriages. He expressed his clear opinion in the matter, not only in a long series of speeches full of hatred and venom, but also in a piece of legislation formally enacted on September 15 , 1935 and known as the "Nuremberg Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor": Moved by the understanding that purity of the German Blood is the essential condition for the continued existence of the German people, and inspired by the inflexible determination to ensure the existence of the German Nation for all time, the Reichstag has unanimously adopted the following Law, which is promulgated herewith: Marriages between Jews and subjects of the state of German or related blood are forbidden. Marriages nevertheless concluded are invalid, even if concluded abroad to circumvent this law. Extramarital intercourse between Jews and subjects of the state of German or related blood is forbidden".

Ten years after this infamous law was enacted, Nazi Germany was totally defeated and Adolf Hitler committed suicide among the ruins of Berlin. And three years later, on December 10 , 1948, an international gathering at Paris adopted a document which aimed at being the very  opposite of Nazi murderous racism - "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights",  enumerating the inalienable rights to which every human being is entitled - including Article 16: "Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family."


The right to marry and to found a family without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion! Did you know that, Mr. Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman? And the State of Israel signed this document, already in 1949. What a scandal! Who was Minister of Justice then?

Minister Yaakov Ne'eman's statement on mixed marriages continuing Hitler's work


Text of the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, forbidding mixed marriages


Text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, guaranteeing the right for a mixed marriage



Friday, June 24, 2011

Picasso in Ramallah, bulldozers in Bir Al-Ad and the fear of missiles


This week there arrived at the International Academy of Art, Palestine - in Ramallah - the painting  "Buste de Femme," which Pablo Picasso painted in 1943 when he lived in Nazi-occupied Paris. The painting is usually located at the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven in the Netherlands. Its value is estimated at seven million dollars and it was lent to the Palestinian gallery for one month.

Khalid Horani, director of the Academy of Art, who had conducted the negotiations with the Dutch museum told that it took no less than two years of discussions and coordination and struggles to overcome numerous bureaucratic obstacles and allow the valuable painting to move from the Amsterdam airport to that of Tel Aviv and from there through the IDF checkpoints to Ramallah. "Nothing is normal over here" Horani said. "We planned to get an art work here, but found ourselves going through all the political complications."

Fortunately, the project of the "Picasso in Palestine" exhibition got very energetic assistance from Hourani's Dutch colleague, Charles Esche, who said "Our Picasso was changed in the course of its journey to Ramallah. It gets another meaning, and the story of this travel will remain part of this painting's history."

Never before was a work of art on this level exhibited in the Palestinian territories. (Art Knowledge News ).

On that same day, at almost exactly the same hour that the valuable painting arrived at the showroom in Ramallah, bulldozers of the Israeli Defense Forces made their way to the tiny village of Bir Al-Ad in the South Hebron Hills, and in less than an hour demolished its miserable huts, destroyed sacks of animal food, uprooted plants and shrubs, leaving behind heaps of rubble and ninety homeless people. The nearby caves, also used for housing, were on this occasion not demolished, but the soldiers made sure to cut and sever the electricity cables which the inhabitants had installed to light them. "You here don't deserve to have electricity!" said one of the soldiers to a resident who dared to protest. Ezra Nawi and Rabbi Arik Asherman, Israeli peace activists who arrived at the spot after hearing the inhabitants' desperate pleas for help, were immediately taken off to military detention.

And this destruction was nothing new or unusual in the history of the Israeli occupation on the West Bank. It happens routinely, on one week in the southern West Bank and next week in its east, although such events receive very little attention and are rarely reported in any media. Had I wanted, I could have post here every week - and maybe two or three times a week - the story of the latest destruction, and they would all be alike as two peas in a pod (or two drops of blood), different only with changing name of the most currently destroyed village. As usual in such stories, the land of Bir Al-Ad is coveted by settlers – in this case, the settlers of the nearby Mitzpe Yair. Officially, Mitzpe Yair is an illegal outpost, even by the rather permissive standards of the Israeli occupation. Which in no way disturbs the same authorities to consider its inhabitants fully deserving of a regular supply of electricity which the army takes care to provide.

And two days after these events, the Army's Home Front Command conducted a civil defense exercise in unprecedented dimensions throughout Israel. And in this exercise horror scenarios were postulated of war on four fronts, against the Palestinians and the Syrians and the Lebanese and the Iranians simultaneously and the fall of seven hundred missiles. And citizens were to take the air raid alarms seriously and run immediately to the nearest shelter, if any. And a senior Home Front Command officer expressed dissatisfaction with the indifferent behavior of many citizens, especially the Tel Avivians who ignored the blaring sirens and continued to bathe in the sea. "When real missiles fall, we will see them running" said the officer with some vindictiveness.

But maybe the fall of the real missiles can be averted. If the day comes when e residents of Bir Al-Ad  can live peacefully in their miserable homes, and when loaning paintings to a gallery Palestinians would no longer need to struggle through the coils of Israeli military bureaucracy, and when all Palestinians - rich and poor, rural and urban -  are a free people in their homeland of Palestine, then might also the officers of the  IDF Home Front Command consign the horror scenarios to the archives and take off their uniforms for a refreshing swim on the Tel Aviv sea shore.

Photos and account of the destruction by Rabbi Arik Asherman

Account on the Rabbis for Human Rights website


Send a protest letter to Defence Minister Barak

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Why is this year different from all years and this vote from all other votes?


For decades, the UN General Assembly is meeting every year in the month of September. And every year it adopts by a large majority a series of resolutions initiated by the Palestinians. These resolutions gets reported (if at all) as a minor news item deep down on page 10 and go straight to the UN archives. No one seriously expects them to be actually implemented in reality. This year, it is quite different.

Never did a UN vote get such attention as the vote which is expected in September this year. This year, Israel's Defense Minister expressed apprehension that the expected UN vote might cause a political Tsunami. And the Foreign Ministry embarked on an emergency mobilization of all its diplomats in all countries throughout the world and instructed them, many months in advance, to focus their energies on the expected vote in the General Assembly. And the IDF and the police hold extensive exercises, half a year in advance, anticipating the United Nations vote and its predicted impact on the ground. And the Prime Minister of Israel and his  senior ministers are all the time running around the world, from one capital to another, in a non-stop campaign of conversations and speeches and persuasions and pressures, so as to gather and collect a General Assembly vote here and there. And the President of the United States of America in person undertook a trip to Europe and met with the prime ministers of Britain and Germany, in a desperate attempt to formulate and present the Palestinians with a substitute of equal value which may yet convince them to take back their appeal to the UN and save the United States and its President the difficult dilemma of what to do and how to vote in September.

What has changed? It is not the UN itself which had changed since last year. Its prestige was not greatly enhanced, nor did it gain additional concrete powers. UN Member States still determine their vote because of various interests, and the great powers still cast their veto due to similar considerations. Still, the situation did change. It is the situation on the ground which has changed.

44 years have passed since Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza - more than two thirds of the total period of Israel's existence. 44 years, during which the State of Israel has established dozens of settlements and created hundreds of accomplished facts and carefully refrained from annexing these territories and explained to anyone who asked that this was a temporary situation and that the permanent status negotiations shall be held in the future, once upon a time. And after 44 years Israel's PM still asserts that the final status would be determined in negotiations which would start once upon a time, when the Palestinians fulfill all the conditions presented to them, and that such negotiations might even be concluded at an even more distant future date, but that actually there is not much to hope for "since the conflict is in fact unsolvable."

Already for seventeen years the Palestinians have the Palestinian Authority with its President and Parliament, Prime Minister and Ministers duly placed in charge of ministries – everything which a sovereign state has, except for one thing: real power on the ground. Also seventeen years after the creation of the Palestinian Authority, a 19 year old Israeli corporal standing at the checkpoint on the road between Ramallah and Nablus has much more power and influence on the daily lives of Palestinians than the Palestinian Authority's President and its Prime Minister and all ministers together.

No wonder that Palestinians are less and less enthusiastic about the  Palestinian Authority which is supposed to represent them. No wonder that fewer and fewer Palestinians believe that diplomatic activity can make the occupation army and settlers go or that it might lead to the creation of a free and sovereign Palestine, whose borders would be based on the 1967 lines and which would have East Jerusalem as its capital.

Palestinian confidence in this option eroded further after the President of the United States called for negotiations based on the 1967 borders and Israel's prime minister rejected this call out of hand at the podium of the U.S. Congress while receiving the prolonged applause of American lawmakers from both parties alike.

The expected UN vote in three months from now, in September 2011, is the final test and the last chance - now or never. The Palestinian Authority's last chance to prove to its people that their hope to be a free people in their land is not lost, that the international community is behind them  and that through its support  a  miserable and hollow Palestinian Authority could be upgraded and turned into a real sovereign state.

In the UN Security Council, the United States has veto power, as is  officially enshrined in the UN Charter. In the United States Congress, the Government of Israel has veto power which does not appear in any written document but is enshrined deep within American politics, and which in effect controls the U.S. veto at the UN. And the United States remains the strongest power in the world, and its exercise of the UN veto is a highly significant gesture. Still, in recent years doubts are heard and fissures appear in the US global might, competitors and opponents show up to increasingly challenge the might of the American empire. If its veto is bypassed through the General Assembly, leaving the Americans in a less than splendid isolation in their opposition to Palestinian aspirations, these fissures would become somewhat wider.

And what would happen on the day after? In his famous speech Obama warned the Palestinians that the UN vote by itself would not create a Palestinian state - which is undoubtedly true. A UN vote in itself does not establish states which fail to materialize on the ground. Also the UN vote on November 29, 1947, did not in itself establish the State of Israel, it only provided a framework and legitimacy to the acts of David Ben Gurion and his colleagues. So, what will happen on the ground?

The influential columnist Tom Friedman urged the Palestinians to implement the creation of their state in practice through a non-violent struggle - large processions setting out every Friday to Jerusalem, with olive branches in their hands. For this scenario, Israel's army and police already begun to prepare and practice, and they have a wide spectrum of measures to counter what Army Chief of Staff Benny Gantz termed "The Demonstrations Threat" – from tear gas and stinking water to snipers who are instructed to shoot to kill.

But a state recognized by the International Community has various new possibilities open to it, even when its territory is still under occupation by a foreign army, and even if its full membership in the UN was stopped by an American veto. For example, to lodge a complaint to International Court in the Hague for the violation of its sovereignty by the occupying army and by the settlers illegally introduced into its sovereign territory by that army. Also, start individual international proceedings against particular officers in the occupation army, for personal acts in violation of International Law committed on its sovereign territory.

Once the state of Palestine is recognized, it will be much harder to send Israeli forces late at night into the heart of Ramallah, in order to detain Palestinians wanted by the Israeli security services for the purpose of " interrogation under moderate physical pressure". From the purely military aspect, there would be no problem to bring to bear a tremendous firepower which would overcome all opposition by the Palestinian police forces, but the Israeli officers involved may need immediately afterwards to get legal assistance. Adv. Michael Sfard already pointed out that the diplomatic tsunami of which the Defense Minister is so apprehensive might be dwarfed by the judicial tsunami which the State of Israel might face if insisting upon retaining the Palestinian Territories after September.

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-legal-tsunami-is-on-its-way-1.358758
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/a-legal-tsunami-on-the-horizon-1.362001

And inter alia, a sovereign state is definitely entitled to issue its own currency. If the Government of Israel insists upon keeping the Palestinian territories within a single economic framework with the State of Israel, there could suddenly flow into this shared economy an enormous amount of Palestinian Pound notes and coins, with vast economic  effects unforeseen and uncontrolled by the eminent economist Stanley Fisher, who apparently failed in his bid to head the IMF and will have to remain at the head of the Bank of Israel.

And yet, what if all this does not help the Palestinians? What if their state remains a piece of paper at the UN General Assembly, with no sign of it visible on the ground, with occupation keeping its usual routine and Israeli soldiers standing at the checkpoints through all the highways and the settlers in place,  driving bulldozers and building and expanding and bursting out in all directions? A great victory for the Israeli right wing and the vision of Greater Israel. A very great pyrrhic victory,

If the Palestinian leadership is revealed as having given false promises and false hopes and having nothing further to offer to its people, the revolutions in the Arab World would swiftly arrive in the Palestinian streets. The Palestinian Authority which failed to transform itself into a state will collapse like a house of cards, its government and parliament swept away without a trace, and with them all remaining support for a solution based on a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Palestinians would abandon en masse the demand for an independent state, and would instead adopt a call – already gaining support among them – for a single state from the sea to the Jordan, a democracy with voting rights for all. All settlements would remain in place - only that their Palestinian neighbors in Nablus and Hebron, Jenin and Ramallah as in Gaza and Rafah would also send their democratically elected representatives to the Knesset.
And just then, when support for a democratic state from the Mediterranean to the Jordan would spread throughout the world, an Israeli government – terribly fearful of the loss of  the Jewish state and the Jewish majority – would very urgently offer all that it refused and rejected before...

Monday, June 13, 2011

From Safed to Rome and Obama can wait


Beautiful is the city of Safed, a city of picturesque winding alleys at the top of a mountain in Galilee, an ancient city with a history of wars as well as spiritual events. Nowadays, the name of Safed became known in particular due to the famous Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, who from his Safed seat is publishing ever new rabbinical rulings and manifestos strictly forbidding the rent of apartments to Arabs. Young adherents of Rabbi Eliyahu wander the picturesque alleys of Safed, holding petrol cans, ready to set on fire the cars of those who dare to defy the rabbi's ruling.

Two weeks ago Rabbi Eliyahu traveled to Jerusalem on Jerusalem Day, so as to meet Prime Minister Netanyahu and applaud him for his promise to build ever more housing for Jews-only all around Holy Jerusalem. And the Prime Minister quickly organized a return visit to Safed. Not only did Mr. Netanyahu come personally to Rabbi Eliyahu's hometown, but he brought with him all his cabinet ministers with their spouses and partners and the government-loyal Members of the Knesset. And while strolling leisurly through the alleyways of Safed, the Foreign Minister fondly recalled a nice experience associated with Safed. Many years ago, when he was still General Manager of the Likud Party, Avigdor Lieberman had been able to establish the Likud branch in Safed in precisely the same house where Mahmud Abbas was born and grew up, and which, hahaha, the Palestinian Authority President had not seen since he was a young boy. A journalist present described the jolly good spirit.

And suddenly, a weird message from Washington. "President Obama is waiting for Israel's response to his proposal to resume peace talks with the Palestinians on the basis of the '67 borders, with the possibility of swaps of territory. The Palestinians have already agreed, and now the ball is in Netanyahu's court". Come on, who wants to talk with the Palestinians? We have far better talking partners! Directly from Safed, the PM with nine of his ministers set off to another ancient city, Rome, there to meet with good old friend Berlusconi. "We have no better friend than the Italian Prime Minister" declared Netanyahu. (What Italians think about Berlusconi is another subject...)

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Latin America from November to September


Last week, Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Eilon (yes, that non-diplomatic diplomat who likes to humiliate ambassadors by seating them on low chairs) went off urgently to the conference of the Organization of American States in El Salvador, in a final attempt to halt the diplomatic erosion among Latin American countries, which are one by one announcing their intention to recognize a Palestinian State at the crucial vote expected to take place in the UN Assembly General in September this year.

It's a bit reminiscent of historical events. Also in 1947 the representatives of the State in Being, the Israel which had not yet come into being, went among the Latin American countries and made great efforts to get their support for a crucial vote at the UN. And at that time, efforts were crowned with great success. Abba Eban, head of the Zionist delegation and future Foreign Minister of Israel, succeeded in creating a solid block of the Latin American ambassadors to the United Nations, a significant bloc of votes in favor of the Partition of the territory of Mandatory Palestine into two states, a Jewish one and an Arab one. Without this Latin American bloc, the Partition Plan would not have been adopted, and perhaps the State of Israel would not have come come into being. The State of Israel gave recognition and thanks to the ambassadors who took part in this great effort - Osvaldo Aranha of Brazil and Enrique Fabregat of Uruguay and Jorge Granados of Guatemala. Streets were named after them in towns and villages throughout Israel, and monuments erected in memory of those friends who stood by Israel at the hour or need.

And what is the situation today? Brazil already supports the creation of the State of Palestine, as do Uruguay, and Argentina. Deputy Minister Ayalon is left like the Dutch boy with his finger in the dike. What happened here? What happened to that friendship? Why do they abandone us in the lurch? But in fact, the Latin Americans have not changed so much. In 1947 they supported the partition of this land into two states, and today they support the same principle. (If anything, now they are willing to grant Israel more territory than in 1947, and the Palestinians – much less).

The one who has changed very much is the State of Israel. Those who sixty-four years ago struggled fiercely to get the United Nations to decide for partition and who danced all night with joy in the streets of Tel Aviv when the Assembly General so decided, are now fighting tooth and nail to prevent the UN from deciding again for partition. No partition, no partition, for God's sake! Dear Mr. Ambassador, can you not grant us this boon and vote "No", just this time? Please, please...



Sunday, June 5, 2011

An evening of hope, a day of horror


Yesterday evening the demonstrators marched through the streets of Tel Aviv and called for peace with the state of Palestine which will arise. Today the snipers shot across the border and acted with what the Government of Israel defined as restraint and moderation and killed "only" twenty unarmed demonstrators. In Syria itself  35 deminstrators were today killed by the army of their own country. 35:20 in the match of bloodshed between Bashar Assad and Binyamin Netanyahau. To be continued tomorrow?

On the march of protest and hope, read here
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/events/1307302934

See photos here
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/galleries/gallery_1307274890
 
Reaction to the moderate and restrained killing by the Israeli Defence Forces, here  
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/press_releases/1307301226




A hot day in Jerusalem


On the pages of the right-wing "Makor Rishon" columnist Uri Elitzur lamented "I had to spend this year's Jerusalem Day in Tel Aviv, where I felt pretty weird and unusual with my holiday clothes and the Blue and White flags hanging on my car. It must be admitted that this day of celebration has a rather limited impact – and not only on the streets of Tel Aviv. Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin, remarked in his speech from the podium that unfortunately only a particular sector marks that day, namely the religious-nationalist knitted kipa wearers. "Alas, the city is not united nor knitted together. Jerusalem Day was defined as a National Holiday by law, but the nature of the festivities in Jerusalem and the identity of those dancing in the streets teach us that the national holiday in its current form is more reminiscent of a sectorial holiday."

Prime Minister Netanyahu was the guest of honor at the Jerusalem Day celebrations at the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva, ideological stronghold of the knitted  kippot and the cradle out of which the Gush Emunim settler movement arose in the 1970's. "We came back to Jerusalem as prodigal sons coming home, we returned to Jerusalem as builders" stated the prime minister. "Jerusalem is in one of its Golden Ages. As all can see, residents of Jerusalem walk its streets with security and pride". And the PM concluded "May we meet next year in an even more built up Jerusalem" and was greeted with a thunderous applause.

And several hours later the religious-nationalist youths congregated in great numbers on the streets of East Jerusalem for the Dance of Flags which has become their annual tradition. They had come to show the Prime Minister and the Knesset Speaker and Rabbi Shapira and their other political and spiritual leaders how nationalist religious youths can walk with security and pride on the streets of an ancestral city, to which they had  come as prodigal sons rather then as conquerors. "Let your village burn, burn it down!" they chanted while marching and dancing with their multitude of Blue and White flags, and also "Muhammad is Dead! Muhammad is Dead!" and also "Slaughter the Arabs!" (this much of Arabic they knew and used, so as to make their words very comprehensible) and "Jerusalem is ours forever!" and "Death to the leftists!". Some moderates contented themselves with "Death to the terrorists! Death! Death! Death!"

And on one shop's door they left as a souvenir the graffiti "A stinking Arab son of death with a beard full of fleas". And so they continued and continued to march and sing and dance, from the mosque in the Sheikh Jarrah Neighborhood to the Damascus Gate and through the alleys of the Old City, with songs and  chants of hate and punching and kicking the closed and locked doors of the Palestinian homes and shops, none of whose residents  appeared on the street and only their faces peered from the windows.

With one exception. At the very eye of the storm in the heart of the Sheikh Jarrah Neighborhood, right next to the houses where in recent years settlers have entered in late night hours and threw their inhabitants out and set up residence in the homes and raised on the roof the Blue and White flag and the big sign "The sons have come home." One of the neighboring Palestinian families, who (still?) reside at their home, went out into the street and placed a small table and chairs on the sidewalk and sat down - father and mother and two grown daughters - calmly sipping tea. Between them and the furious crowd, cursing and dancing in ecstasy with flags, interposed dozens of activists who had answered the call of the Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity Movement.

Shoulder to shoulder they stood, students from the Hebrew University and veteran activists whose air was streaked with grey and residents of the threatened neighborhood. "Fascism will not pass, no, no it will not pass!" they chanted, and "Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies!" and "Sheikh Jarrah, do not despair, we will end the occupation yet!". An older woman in a traditional Arab dress tapped on a flat pan and cried out: "Obama and all the world, look and see what they are doing to us!", and  at her side a bearded Israeli activist held a more standard drum. One of the Sheikh Jarrah children, sitting on the shoulders of an activist, waved a Palestinian flag and called out in Hebrew "Thieves, thieves, get out of the houses now!" Opposite, beyond the police cordon, the forest of flags swayed in the hands of the dancers and from the very long song they sung only the refrain could be clearly discerned: "How I hate you, how I hate you all".

A young and energetic settler with a baby on his arm broke through the police cordon. "No, no, I don't want violence. Just a moment. Wait, I want to talk to you! We are all Jews, aren’t we?" No, here we are Jews and Arabs standing together, and some English people, too". "But let me ask you this, why you are demonstrating only here? What about Jaffa and Ramle and Acre, they all used to be Arab towns, too? "." We are for peace between two states, Israel and Palestine, on the basis of the 1967 borders, as Obama said." "But I just want to have the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Abraham bought it with good money. It is you leftists who stole the village Sheikh Munis and built on it the Tel Aviv University". "How about this: We will agree on a solution of dividing the land, and the people will decide in a referendum what they prefers to give up, Tel Aviv or Hebron?", "But do you not know that the Iranians want to deploy missiles on the Golan Heights?" "I asked you if you are willing to let the people decide whether to give up Tel Aviv or Hebron, do you have an answer?" The young man mutters "Oh, these leftists" and returns to his dancing partners, from among whom rises the chant "Sheikh Munis! Sheikh Munis! "And "Leftists in exchange for peace."

Suddenly a new factor appears on the scene: Knesset Member Michael Ben Ari, disciple and successor of the notorious Rabbi Kahane, pushed forward through the flag dancers, along with his assistants Baruch Marzel and Itamar Ben Gvir, and entered into an animated exchange with the police commander.  It was not possible to hear what he said, but a journalist who stood nearby heard and published it verbatim on the following day's Yedioth Ahronoth: "Don't you see how these leftist Nazis are stirring up the Arabs? What are you waiting for?" The results were soon to come. The police suddenly stirred into action and began to energetically shove the solidarity demonstrators. "Back! Back! Move back!" "Why are you pushing? This is a peaceful and non violent protest!" called one of the organizers on the loudspeaker, whereupon  the police intensified their pressure. "The settlers already know - the law is only for the right-winger!" chanted the protesters while being pushed back and back. "They arrested some of us!" -  the information passed down the line to those who had not seen it themselves, who broke out into "Beatings and detentions do not break our spirit!". The three detainees were dragged into the police van waiting on the next street.

After half an hour Ben Ari and his aides left the place along with many of the dancers and flags. The street began to empty, and solidarity organizers announcing the conclusion of the protest asked any who could to stay the night with the residents. But first, everybody joined in "We will not stop singing" which had become the unofficial anthem of the Sheikh Jarrah protesters -  based on the Israeli song made famous by Yehoram Gaon and to which new words are occasionally added to fit new events.


If the officer / puts you in detention / do not be surprised / by soldier of the occupation
All who rise / end behind bars /  and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing

If the officer / drags you off to gaol/ don't be surprised / serve the occupation he will
All who demonstrated / a night in Abu Kabir /  and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing


They have already arrested / Haggai and Daniel / but will they / turn on settlers who make hell?
They find it easy to catch / Bashar and Samir / and about them
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing


If in Bil'in / Supreme Court rulings are flouted / do not be surprised / It is a soldiers' country 
All who demonstrate / immediately becomes prisoners / and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing


If in Hebron / Shuhada Street remains closed / though everyone knows / it is illegal
All who protest / lightly threatened with death / and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing

If you wonder/ When Law is only for the Jews 
All who cry out/ wake up the public conscience / and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing


If bombing civilians/ is authorised/ don’t wonder / occupation hates morality
All who dissent / will be widely defamed / and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing

If shacks are destroyed / at Umm el-Hir / Ofra settlement / put off for another time
All who / will pay a heavy price / and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing


If ISM activists are expelled / and photographers all removed
There are those/ who make it known, not left hidden/ and for them 
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing

If shamelessly / Apartheid parades / and Foreign Minister/ racist, settler and what else
Get out, get out/ wake the city with great shout/ and for you
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing

If the judge / sends me to gaol / do not be surprised / That's occupation for you/
But if you keep silent / tomorrow you'll be a prisoner too/ and for you /  no one will be left to sing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing
We will not stop singing