Coming
Soon!
From Common Courage Press
Recent
Stories
June
30, 2003
Uri
Avnery
Hope in Dark Times
June
28 / 29, 2003
M.
Shahid Alam
Bernard Lewis: Scholarship or Sophistry?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Meet Steven Griles: Big Oil's Inside
Man
Laura
Carlsen
Democracy's Future: From the Polls or the Populace?
Alan Maass
You Call These Democrats an Alternative?
C.Y.
Gopinath
Bush and Kindergarten
Noah Leavitt
Bush, the Death Penalty and International Law
Joanne
Mariner
Rehnquist Family Values
Ignacio
Chapela
Tenure, Censorship and Biotech at Berkeley
Bob
Scowcroft
Bush's Squeeze on Organic Farmers
Jon Brown
Tom Delay: "I am the Government"
Kam
Zarrabi
Keep Your Hands Off Iran, Please!
Ron Jacobs
Big Bill Broonzy's Conversation with the Blues
Julie
Hilden
Fear Factor: Art, Terror and the First Amendment
Adrien
Rain Burke
The Anarchists' Wedding Guide
Adam
Engel
US Troops Outta Times Square
Poets'
Basement
Witherup, Guthrie, Albert, Hamod
June
27, 2003
Jason
Leopold
CIA: Seven Months Prior to 9/11 Iraq
Posed No Threat to US
David
Vest
Supreme Silence: Bush's Bunker-Hunker
David
Lindorff
The Catch and Release of "Comical
Ali"
Ray McGovern
Cheney, Forgery and the CIA
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/26
Website
of the Day
John Kerry, Teresa Heinz & Ken Lay: The Politics of Hypocrisy
June
26, 2003
Sen.
Robert Byrd
The Road of Cover-Up is a Road to Ruin
Jason
Leopold
Wolfowitz Instructed the CIA to Investigate
Hans Blix
Paul
de Rooij
Ambient Death in Palestine
Chris Floyd
Mass Graves and Burned Meat in Bush's New Iraq
Elaine
Cassel
Wolfowitz as Lord High Executioner
CounterPunch
Wire
Musicians Unite Against Sweatshops
Sheldon
Hull
Squatting in Mansions
Ben Tripp
A Guide to Hating Almost Anyone
Uri
Avnery
The Best Show in Town
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/25
Website
of the Day
Ordinary Vistas:
The Photographs of Kurt Nimmo
June
25, 2003
Bruce
Jackson
Buffalo Cops Wage War on Pedal Pushers
Mickey
Z.
The New Dark Ages
David Lindorff
Indonesia's War on Journalists
Dan
Bacher
Butterflies and Farmworkers Confront USDA and Riot Cops
Adam Federman
"Success is Not the Issue Here"
Elaine
Cassel
"Ain't No Justice": Fed Judge Quits, Assails Sentencing
Guidelines
Bill Kauffman
My America vs. the Empire
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/25
Website
of the Day
You Are Being Watched:
Elevator Moods
June
24, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
Supreme Indemnity
Holocaust Denial at the High Court
Roya
Monajem
A Message from Tehran: Is It Worth
It to Risk One's Life?
John
Chuckman
The Real Clash of Civilizations
David Lindorff
WMD Damage Control at the Times
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/24
June
23, 2003
Marc
Pritzke
Washington Lied: an Interview with
Ray McGovern
Conn
Hallinan
The Consistency of Sharon
Wayne Madsen
Commercials, Disney & Amistad
Edward
Said
The Meaning of Rachel Corrie
Steve Perry
Bush's Wars Web Log 6/23
June
21 / 22, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
My Life as a Rabbi
William
A. Cook
The Scourge of Hopelessness
Standard
Schaefer
The Wages of Terror: an Interview with R.T. Naylor
Ron Jacobs
US Prisons as Strategic Hamlets
Harry
Browne
The Pitstop Ploughshares
Lawrence
Magnuson
WMD: The Most Dangerous Game
Harold
Gould
Saddam and the WMD Mystery
David Krieger
10 Reasons to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
Avia
Pasternak
The Unholy Alliance in the Occupied Territories
CounterPunch
Summer Reading:
Our Favorite Novels
Todd Chretien
Return to Sender: Todd Gitlin, the Duke of Condescension
Maria
Tomchick
Danny Goldberg's Imaginary Kids
Adam Engel
The Fat Man in Little Boy
Poets'
Basement
Guthrie, Albert & Hamod
June 20, 2003
Walter
Brasch
Down on Our Knees
Robert
Meeropol
The Son of the Rosenbergs on His Parents Death and Bush's America
Russell
Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
Grannies and Baby Bells
Norman
Madarasz
Pierre Bourgault: the Life of a
Quebec Radical
Gary
Leupp
Bush on "Revisionist Historians"
Steve
Perry
Bush's Lies
Marathon: the Finale
Hot Stories
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
June
30, 2003
Hope in Dark Time
We Are The Patriots
By URI AVNERY
On
June 28, an important event took place in Ramallah. Three hundred
personalities, half of them Palestinians, half of them Israelis,
took part in the founding conference of the first wholly integrated
joint peace organization--the Joint Israeli-Palestinian Action
Group for Peace.
This followed the publication, two months
ago, of a joint political statement signed by 1500 Palestinian
and Israeli personalities.
The occupation forces tried to prevent
the Israelis from reaching Ramallah, some of them had to walk
two kilometers in the heat to evade the checkpoints.
I was invited to give one of the keynote
speeches. I would like--however immodestly--to publish it here
in full. UA
Dear Friends,
Today we come together, Israelis and
Palestinians, Palestinians and Israelis, to create something
completely new: a Joint Action Group for peace.
Not for a hudna (truce), not for some
temporary compromise, not just another little step in an endless
step-by-step process, but for a real peace, for a just peace,
for a peace with dignity, for a peace between equals.
What we are trying to do is completely
new. We do not want to set up just another framework for cooperation
between enemies, but a completely integrated task force. Not
an Israeli movement with a Palestinian tail, nor a Palestinian
movement with an Israeli tail. But an organization in which we
all, Israelis and Palestinians, shall be full partners, united
by a common vision of a free Palestine and a free Israel living
together, side by side.
Of all the people I have met in the long
fight for peace, the one whom I miss most at this meeting is
Issam Sartawi, who was  murdered 20 years ago. He would be sitting
here. His spirit is with us.
Sartawi was a patriot, an ex-Fedai, who
believed that the only way for the Palestinian people to achieve
their national aims is to win the hearts of the Israeli people.
In the same way, I believe that the only way for Israel to find
a secure and prosperous future is to win the hearts of the Palestinian
people.
Sartawi believed that the battle for
Israeli public opinion is not just one task among many, but that
it is the main front in the Palestinian struggle for liberation.
In the same way, I believe that the battle for reconciliation
and justice together with the Palestinian people is the main
task of every real Israeli patriot. And we are the real Israeli
patriots.
When we created the slogan "Two
States for Two Peoples", we did not mean separation. We
certainly did not mean two ghettos living side by side, each
surrounded by high walls and electric fences. On the contrary,
we meant close neighborly relations, cooperation, partnership,
open borders, free movement of people.
In order to convince our own peoples
that this is possible, that this is not simply a dream of naive
peaceniks, we must prove in our day-to-day activities that we
can work together and speak together with one voice. It is a
tragedy that in all these years, especially since Oslo, no joint
peace organization has come into being.
Of course, we have often met in action.
We have many common memories. We have been beaten up together,
we were tear-gassed together, we have demonstrated together many
times. But there was never the one thing that was needed: regular,
systematic, continuous joint action, day after day, week after
week, month after month. We must now correct this historic mistake,
which has had grievous consequences for peace.
We are meeting in dark times. Targeted
assassinations, suicide bombings, the killing of women and children
have become routine events. On both sides, people live in a state
of fear, hopelessness and apathy. But we have no reason lose
hope. Looking back on the decades of our struggle, we see a steady
move towards peace.
There were times when almost all Israelis
denied even the existence of the Palestinian people. "There
is no such thing as a Palestinian people," said Golda Meir.
Today, there is hardly an Israeli who denies it.
Many years ago, when we raised the idea
of two states living side by side, we were a tiny minority on
both sides. Today, the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians
accept this idea, and the whole world supports it.
Thirty years ago, when we established
the first contacts with the PLO, we were considered traitors.
Today it is official Israeli policy.
Seven years ago, in a joint demonstration
with Faisal Husseini (Had he lived, he, too, would be sitting
here!) at the wall of Jerusalem, we broke the Israeli taboo and
declared that Jerusalem will be the capital of two states. Today
this idea is generally accepted even by those who hate it.
We are still very far from victory. Many
hardships and much suffering still lie ahead. But if we act together,
with vigor and determination, our vision will prevail.
We must be the lighthouse, the fixed
light that gives the direction and shows the way.
What can we do in practice?
I propose the following actions:
* Set up joint expert committees to prepare
within three months the full text of an Israeli-Palestinian peace
agreement, including detailed solutions for all the problems--borders,
Jerusalem, settlements, refugees, security, water--and present
it to the public, showing that such an agreement is possible.
If some disagreements remain, we shall say so candidly.
* Set up a joint Committee for Truth
and Reconciliation, on the South African model, in order to examine
the history of the last 120 years and establish a true picture,
acceptable to both peoples.
* Set up immediately a joint Press Office,
to address the Israeli, Palestinian and world media.
* Set up a joint operations staff, to
plan public campaigns and demonstrations.
These are only a few ideas for discussion
today. I am sure that many of you have more. Let's put them on
the table.
The main thing is, let us do it together
and carry it through, until the peace which we all desire comes
to this beloved country.
Some weeks ago, when we met Yasser Arafat,
some journalists asked him when will peace come. He said: Both
Uri Avnery and I will see it in our lifetime. Arafat is 74 years
old, I shall be 80 in a few weeks. So let's get moving!
Uri Avnery
is an Israeli writer and peace activist with Gush Shalom. He
is one of the writers featured in The
Other Israel: Voices of Dissent and Refusal. He can be
reached at: avnery@counterpunch.org.
Weekend Edition
Features
M.
Shahid Alam
Bernard Lewis: Scholarship or Sophistry?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Meet Steven Griles: Big Oil's Inside
Man
Laura
Carlsen
Democracy's Future: From the Polls or the Populace?
Alan Maass
You Call These Democrats an Alternative?
C.Y.
Gopinath
Bush and Kindergarten
Noah Leavitt
Bush, the Death Penalty and International Law
Joanne
Mariner
Rehnquist Family Values
Ignacio
Chapela
Tenure, Censorship and Biotech at Berkeley
Bob
Scowcroft
Bush's Squeeze on Organic Farmers
Jon Brown
Tom Delay: "I am the Government"
Kam
Zarrabi
Keep Your Hands Off Iran, Please!
Ron Jacobs
Big Bill Broonzy's Conversation with the Blues
Julie
Hilden
Fear Factor: Art, Terror and the First Amendment
Adrien
Rain Burke
The Anarchists' Wedding Guide
Adam
Engel
US Troops Outta Times Square
Poets'
Basement
Witherup, Guthrie, Albert, Hamod
Keep CounterPunch
Alive:
Make
a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online!
home / subscribe
/ about us / books
/ archives / search
/ links /
|