Egypt is preventing some 1,300 protesters from around the world from entering the Gaza Strip through the Rafah border crossing, according to JTA.
Here’s the JTA news brief:
The protesters, from more than 40 countries, are part of the Gaza Freedom March, which was organized to protest Israel’s blockade of Gaza.
Some protesters, including a group of grandmothers, began a hunger strike Monday morning to protest Egypt’s refusal to allow them to enter Gaza, AFP reported.
Rafah is the only crossing into Gaza that does not require going through Israeli territory.
Hundreds of the protesters gathered at a United Nations building asking the international agency to intercede with the Egyptian government to allow them to travel to Gaza. French protesters also caused a disturbance by camping out in front of the French embassy in Cairo and blocking the road, a major thoroughfare in the city, according to AFP.
The protesters are scheduled to join Palestinians in Gaza and march from northern Gaza to the Erez Crossing on the Israeli border on Dec. 31.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to visit Cairo on Tuesday to meet with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Meanwhile, Egyptian security told Reuters it would open the Rafah crossing for three days beginning on Jan. 3, to allow Palestinian students, those seeking medical attention and Egyptian residents to pass through.
The Web site of the Gaza Freedom March reports that Hedy Epstein, an 85-year-old Holocaust survivor and peace activist, is a participant in the hunger strike that began Monday in Cairo.
According to the report on the Web, Epstein was 14, in 1939, when she left Germany on a Kindertransport to England. Epstein’s parents were murdered in Auschwitz in 1942. After World War II, Epstein worked as a research analyst at the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi doctors who performed medical experiments on concentration camp inmates.
“It is important to let the besieged Gazan people know they are not alone,” said Epstein. “I want to tell the people I meet in Gaza that I am a representative of many people in my city and in other places in the U.S. who are outraged at what the U.S., Israeli and European governments are doing to the Palestinians and that our numbers are growing.”
Several Minnesotans reportedly are participating in the Gaza Freedom March, including David Tilsen and Sylvia Schwartz, of Minneapolis; and Mark Tilsen, a Mendota Heights native now living in Rapid City, So. Dakota.
In a message sent through Facebook, David Tilsen said that a group of about 30 Americans attempted to speak with U.S. embassy officials in Cairo, but were blocked by Egyptian riot police, who corralled the group in the street outside of the embassy for five hours.
Gael Murphy, who’s taking part in the march, said she was told by Egyptian officers that the American Embassy called for the officers’Â help to protect its premises, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Eventually, the protesters spoke with an embassy official who told them that the decision to bar them from Gaza was a matter for the Egyptian government, according to Tilsen.
In addition to Israel’s siege of the Gaza Strip, Egypt has been imposing a blockade on Gaza since Hamas ousted the rival Fatah movement in 2007, and took complete control of the heavily populated strip of land.
Locally, supporters of the Gaza Freedom March will gather at the Hennepin County Government Center Plaza at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Dec. 30, and march through the skyways in downtown Minneapolis.
Meshugge.
According to the Gaza Freedom March webpage:
“The coalition conceives this march as part of a broader strategy to end the Israeli occupation by targeting nonviolently its flagrant violations of international law from the house demolitions and settlements to the curfews and torture.”
And although the coaltion consists of organizations & individuals who espouse that Israel does not have the right to exist, local media, especially KTSP, have made a point of reiterating an inane statement by organizers emphasizing that this demonstration is NOT anti-Israel.
This past week the media re-defined Palestinian terrorists who murdered an Israeli rabbi and armed Palestinians sneaking along the Gaza border fence as “activists”, so why not redefine what constitutes being anti-Israel?
And maybe we should call Israel’s patrol of the Gaza border, which has kept suicide bombers out of Israel, “a seige”?
I’m presuming the statement “In addition to Israel’s siege of the Gaza Strip” (2nd to last paragraph) was intended to be in quotes?
Wishing you a good year.
Hi Mordecai…
As this story received ajw coverage and includes a contingency of Minnesotans, perhaps it would be deligent to provide a follow-up …
“Egypt-Gaza border riot leaves Egyptian guard dead:
Hundreds of Palestinians protest Egypt’s rebuff of a Gaza aid convoy as well as a new barrier to smuggling tunnels. A dozen Palestinians are hurt as the protest turns violent.”
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-gaza7-2010jan07,0,6636501.story.
The irony, of course, being that non-violent “peace” activists’ passive-aggressive actions triggered the violence.
I am trying to understand why you blame the peace activists for the violence, and why you call them passive-aggressive. I am in awe of the Gaza aid convoy, led by European parliament members as they circled the middle east trying to get their several hundred truck caravan of food, medical supplies, clothing and other humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.
The violence that happened at the border was actually two incidents.
one was a police attack on the convoy when Egypt stopped them after their month long treck breaking a promise to let them through.
The other was a police attack on Palestinians who were trying to stop Egypt from building the barrier. Neither one had any involvement from the Gaza Freedom March, as we were about a hundred klicks away in Cairo and not allowed to get near the border.
The human tragedy in Gaza is beyond comprehension. We must all strain our hearts and our brains to work to solve this problem.
A member of the Gaza Freedom march.
Hi David,
While Code Pink et al define themselves as “non-violent”, they engage in activities that enable violence by others.
Activists flying halfway around the world in an attempt to rally 50,000 Palestinians into the streets (in the name of “peace”) only emboldens terrorists, whether that was the intent or not, and it helps establish a climate in which violence is likely to occur, perhaps is inevitable given the geopolitical situation, the current culture of violence, emotional lability and availability of weapons.
The tragedy of Gaza is not beyond comprehension.
Let us try.
I think what it all comes down to is whether or not you believe in Israel’s right to exist. This Gaza convoy you support is a heartstring ploy in the larger agenda of dismantling Israel. That cannot be ignored. The JCRC speaks to this in their response to you in the Southside Pride.
I think part of the problem, as per your Southside Pride article, is that you buy into the Arab colonial myth, drawing anologies to the European colonialization of the Americas. The error to this logic is that Jews were not foreign invaders to Israel/Palestine as Europeans were here in America. Jews who migrated to Israel during the past century were returning home, as we have done throughout the ages. Most Israelis btw are not Europeans, but Middle Eastern.
It’s said we’re all indigenous to somewhere. And I know where my ancestors are from. And it wasn’t Europe.
I think it’s excellent that you’ve engaged the JCRC in dialogue. I’ve always believed that if you give people all the information, they will make good decisions.
There are solutions for the people of Gaza. But I don’t believe the Cairo escapade was one, nor the other solutions you proposed in your Southside piece. The Arab boycott of Israel, btw, is not a new idea… it hasn’t worked in 65 years. And it’s illegal. And, well, dumb. Israel is a world leader in medical innovation and communication technologies. But if you want to throw away your laptop and cell phone and forego the latest in cardiac procedures, go right ahead?
In peace.
A member of the tribe.