Six Israeli assaults on Gaza in 16 years. Visualizing Palestine, Dec 28, 2023 Over the course of Israel’s 16-year blockade since 2007, the captive Palestinian population in Gaza has endured six Israeli military assaults, with devastating immediate and long-term consequences. The current Israeli assault is the most destructive by far. This video shows the cumulative impact of the failure to hold Israel accountable for war crimes and crimes against humanity. It didn’t start on October 7. The total killed by July 22 is over 39,000.
Read Palestine!, a project of the Madison-Rafah Sister City Project, is hosting a book club for high school students this summer. We will read They Called Me a Lioness by Ahed Tamimi and Dena Takruri.
Join us in reading They Called Me a Lioness, covering Ahed Tamimi’s childhood and adolescence living under Israeli military occupation in a small village in the West Bank. Ahed’s father Bassem Tamimi was recently released after 8 months in Israeli detention without trial.
Please give now to allow MECA to provide medical aid, clean water, food, psychological support, and more.
MECA volunteer fills containers from a water tank in Gaza. DONATE FOR WATER NOW.
“Death is coming, not just from bombs, death is coming from starvation, from dehydration, and from diseases. Using starvation and thirst as a weapon is hitting hard especially in these hot summer months.”
This is what Amal, MECA’s Water Coordinator in Gaza told me on the phone today.
With your solidarity and support, MECA is distributing 35,000 gallons a day in many areas of Gaza.
7. Attend your local city council or schoolboard meetings that are discussing or voting on ceasefire resolutions, teaching about Palestine, false accusations of antisemitism, or other matters about the genocide in Gaza.
8. DON’T GIVE UP! Every action we take brings a permanent ceasefire closer and builds the movement for justice in Palestine!
Please act now. Take one or all of these actions today. And, please, don’t stop.
The ICC is preparing to issue arrest warrants for Israeli officials, Israel nearly started a war with Iran, and the IDF is preparing to commit a horrifying massacre in Rafah, so naturally the mainstream press is very, very interested in “anti-semitism” on college campuses again. — Caitlin Johnstone
The Ride for Palestine on July 21 was a great success, with about 50 riders and others helping the Madison Team blow past our $3000 goal for a total of over $7,000! A special thanks to our co-sponsors Jewish Voice for Peace-Madison and Palestine Partners.
MECA has raised $280,000 of their $300,000 goal for the ride in Berkeley and around the country. The fundraiser will remain open until the end of August, so if you would like to contribute and help them reach their goal, you can do so here.
Online bids open June 28 and close July 8, 2024 Artists Meet-and-Greet Tuesday July 2, 5:30 – 7:00 pm at Java Cat Coffee Shop Art on Display Starting June 21 at Java Cat Coffee Shop and Online
Madison-Rafah Sister City Project (MRSCP) is partnering with more than 25 artists to present a silent art auction in response to the worsening humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
Bidding will open online at 8 am CT on June 28 and run until July 8 on more than 50 works of art, with proceeds going to Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA) for immediate purchase and distribution of desperately needed humanitarian aid in Gaza. Many of the artists represented are Wisconsin based, and their donated work includes photography, acrylic and mixed media paintings, pottery, textiles, prints, and embroidery.
In addition most of the actual works will be available for public view starting June 21 at Java Cat Coffee Shop, 4221 Lien Road on Madison’s eastside.
A meet-and-greet event with artists is scheduled for Tuesday, July 2 at Java Cat, from 5:30 to 7 pm. Attendees will have a chance to talk with some of the artists and to learn more about the work of the Middle East Children’s Alliance in Gaza.
Because entry of humanitarian aid continues to be severely (and unnecessarily) restricted by Israel, the people of Gaza are facing an unprecedented level of death, injury, displacement, disease, trauma and destruction of their ability to survive in their own land. Hunger is now so severe that the large majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people – especially babies, children, pregnant women, the elderly and those suffering from chronic diseases – face starvation and famine.
In spite of these difficulties, MECA’s Gaza staff has worked from the beginning of the crisis with local and international partners to source food and other necessities, procuring food and hygiene supplies from stores, warehouses, factories, and farmers.
Most recently MECA has been using international donations and their network of local grassroots community organizations to:
Deliver boxes of fresh produce from farmers and other food items like rice and lentils to 14,000 families now in Khan Younis (next to Rafah) and “Middle Areas” just north.
Provide soap, shampoo, sanitary pads, laundry detergent, toothbrushes and toothpaste.
Prepare about 8,400 hot meals a day, even after they had to close their community kitchens in Rafah.
Bring clean water by truck to families who fled from the North to Gaza City, and to several areas in areas of Khan Younis for people who fled from Rafah.
Begin installation for four new solar-powered “Maia” water desalination and purification units to provide drinking water to thousands of families daily.
Since 2003 MRSCP has supported many humanitarian projects for the people of Rafah including water purification systems, mental health resources, a playground, a children’s library, a house reconstruction, and more. Many of these projects have been in partnership with MECA and we remain committed to working with them to deliver humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.
An Israeli soldier closes an agricultural gate in the West Bank wall after Palestinian farmers crossed through during the olive harvest near the village of ‘Azzun ‘Atma, occupied West Bank, October 19, 2022. (Anne Paq/Activestills)
On Friday, July 19, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is unlawful and must cease “as rapidly as possible.” The court stated that Israel is obliged to immediately refrain from all new settlement activity; evacuate all settlers from the occupied territories; and pay reparations to Palestinian for the damage caused by Israel’s 57-year military regime. It also affirmed that some of Israel’s policies in the occupied territories amount to the crime of apartheid.
The ruling — known as an advisory opinion — stems from a 2022 request by the UN General Assembly, and is non-binding. But it marks the first time that the world’s top court has expressed its view on the legality of Israel’s control over the occupied territories, and constitutes a sharp repudiation of Israel’s long-held legal defenses.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas welcomed the ruling, describing it as “a triumph for justice” and calling on the UN General Assembly and Security Council to explore additional measures to put an end to the occupation. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed it as “absurd,” saying: “The Jewish people are not occupiers in their own land, including in our eternal capital Jerusalem nor in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank], our historical homeland.” The United States responded by affirming only that Israel’s settlements are illegal, and criticized “the breadth of the court’s opinion,” which, it said, “will complicate efforts to resolve the conflict.”
To understand more about the significance and scope of the ruling, +972 Magazine spoke to Diana Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer based in Haifa who served as legal advisor to the PLO from 2000 to 2005. During that time, she was part of the team that brought a case to the ICJ concerning Israel’s separation wall, whose route the court declared — in another non-binding advisory opinion — to be unlawful. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
How did you feel as you watched ICJ President Nawaf Salam read out the court’s opinion?
Thousands of people of conscience from across the country turned out to protest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to D.C. this week — including hundreds of American Jews who were arrested while engaged in prayerful civil disobedience, demanding an immediate arms embargo on Israel.
If the last two weeks have shown us anything, it is that the political terrain can shift on a dime. President Biden has dropped out of the Presidential election, and it is clear that grassroots pressure against his support for Israel’s genocide played a role.
Now is the moment to escalate movement demands for an arms embargo. The U.S. government needs to end its support for this genocide now.
‘Jews say stop arming Israel’
A day before Netanyahu’s address to Congress, hundreds of American Jews occupied the rotunda of the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill in prayerful civil disobedience, demanding an immediate arms embargo on Israel.
The sit-in, held by Jewish Voice for Peace, came nearly nine months after JVP’s mass protest in the same location, when U.S. Jews gathered in the hundreds, ten days into the genocide, to demand a ceasefire.
Christian Zionism is the misguided belief that the modern state of Israel is the Israel of the Hebrew Bible.
God’s promises to the Israelites thousands of years ago are considered by Christian Zionists to be eternal, and so bear directly on present-day politics.
Christian Zionists believe the Jews are “God’s Chosen People.” They have special rights and privileges that others do not have.
Historic Palestine is not Palestine, it is what they call “the biblical land of Israel.” It belongs to the Jewish people exclusively. It doesn’t matter that the history of the Palestinians, the indigenous people of Palestine, goes back to the Canaanite times 12,000 B.C. Christian Zionists ignore that Palestinians have the closest documented genetic similarities with the early indigenous Canaanites. Christian Zionists overlook that the Palestinians rightly claim the most long-standing and most recent presence in this land. Christian Zionists cherry-pick a few selected Hebrew scriptures which refer to divine promises of the land, such as Genesis stories about Abraham. And they invest these claims with absolute divine authority for all time.
Their method of biblical interpretation rips these ancient writings out of their historical, literary, and cultural context and transposes them straight into contemporary 21 st century politics as unquestionable divine edicts.
Christian Zionists are obsessed with end-of-the-world theologies and focus heavily on 2 of the 66 books in the Bible – Daniel in the Hebrew Scriptures and Revelation in the New Testament.
They teach the “Rapture”….basically that Christ will “rapture” all the saved Christians from the earth into heaven to spare them from the terrible events that will unfold for 7 years before Christ returns to rule for 1,000 years.
They long for the Second Coming of Christ, but believe it can only happen if certain things happen in history first:
All the Jews in the world must be gathered in the Holy Land.
They must build the Third Jewish Temple on “The Temple Mount,” the home of Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock, third holiest sites in the religion of Islam.
They must re-establish the cult of animal sacrifice as practiced in the first and second Temples.
Then, and only then, Christ will return, and the Jews must convert and accept Christ as the Messiah – or be annihilated if they refuse (it is difficult to imagine a more antisemitic message).
Like Jewish Zionists who were not content to “wait for the Messiah,” and took matters into their own hands, Christian Zionists concocted a theology that laid out a plan for “forcing God’s hand,” accelerating the timetable of history according to their own desires.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 24, 2024 Contact:Matthew Handverger, (508) 561-5226
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Representative Mark Pocan (WI-02) released the following statement announcing why he will not be attending Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Joint Address to Congress:
“For nearly 10 months, Netanyahu has waged a deadly and excessive response that has targeted Gazan civilians. It is wildly inappropriate to give the distinct honor of addressing Congress to a man who has violated international human rights law so severely that an arrest warrant for war crimes has been recommended by the International Criminal Court. I regret that one has not been issued yet, as I would have gladly served it to him on the House floor. Additionally, he’s failed to rescue or secure the release of the more than 100 of his citizens who remain hostages of Hamas, while ignoring the pleas of their family members to bring them home. It’s time for Netanyahu to agree to a ceasefire now and get the hostages back.”
As a member of Congress, Rep. Pocan is entitled to invite a guest to attend the speech. He has chosen Maya Roman, a cousin of Yarden Roman, who was taken hostage by Hamas on October 7th, 2023, and released after 54 days.
“They’re willing to kill anybody, imprison anybody, and whatever the international community says or the UN says or some human rights organizations say, they’re not bothered by it. And that’s also a new element in the world.”
— Anne Applebaum, author of Autocracy, Inc. She’s talking about North Korea, but it could be Israel, or the United States.
“We are seeing frequent allegations of Palestinian children being detained on their way home from school, or shot while walking on the street,” said the U.N. agency.
A Palestinian girl carries the representative shroud of a child during a demonstration of children on ‘Palestinian Child’s Day’ in Ramallah, West Bank on April 4, 2024. (Photo: Wisam Hashlamoun/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Three days after the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion stating that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is unlawful, the United Nations children’s rights agency said that after decades of being “exposed to horrific violence,” the number of children who have been killed in the West Bank since last October has skyrocketed.
Since Israel began its bombardment of the Palestinian territories nearly 10 months ago—with Gaza the primary target of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) attacks, but with West Bank communities also subjected to raids and other violence—143 Palestinian children have been killed in the West Bank, according to the U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
The number represents a 250% increase compared to the nine months preceding the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel, after which the IDF began retaliating in the occupied territories.
“The situation has deteriorated significantly, coinciding with the escalation of hostilities inside Gaza,” said Catherine Russell, executive director of UNICEF. “We are seeing frequent allegations of Palestinian children being detained on their way home from school, or shot while walking on the streets. The violence needs to stop now.”
More than half of the killings have been reported in the cities of Nablus, Tulkarm, and Jenin, the latter of which was the site of a major raid by Israeli forces earlier this month, in which 12 Palestinians were killed. All three cities have seen a rise in “militarized law enforcement operations” over the last two years, said UNICEF, as Israeli soldiers and settlers have stormed parts of the territory ” to scare Palestinians out of” their homes, as the International Crisis Group reported last year.
Gaza Unlocked, American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
Displaced in Gaza is a collection of personal testimonies from Gazans who have been repeatedly displaced within their homeland since October 7, 2023, with these stories being collected in May 2024, commissioned by the Hashim Sani Center for Palestine Studies at Universiti Malaya. Displaced in Gaza aims to raise global awareness about the violent and forcible displacement inflicted upon the Palestinians, and the impact this has had on every aspect of their normal life. Every story is unique, yet the endurance of the Palestinian people remains a common thread, linking each story of hope and loss together.
My name is Aisha Osama Abu Ajwa, I am 30 years old. I am from Al-Zaytoun neighborhood. Before the war, I could barely provide for their needs to secure a decent life for my 4 children. Now, the crimes of the occupation added two orphaned children for me to care for and nurture after the occupation killed their parents. I am now a mother of 6 children.
Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress on March 3, 2015. Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images
Israel’s assault on Gaza had killed at least 172 dependents of United Nations staff by the end of June, according to a confidential UN report obtained by Drop Site, in addition to 195 staff members.
The previously unreported data reflects the extraordinary toll not just for employees of the United Nations but for their families, and emerges as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to address a joint session of Congress Wednesday.
Netanyahu, the subject of a potential arrest warrant from the U.N.’s International Criminal Court, will meet while in the United States with outgoing President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump, and presidential hopeful/Vice President Kamala Harris. Harris, while meeting with Netanyahu privately, has declined to appear behind him during his address. At least 21 lawmakers, including some establishment figures such as Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., will be boycotting Netanyahu’s address.
The data put together by the U.N.’s Crisis Coordination Centre also includes a breakdown by agency, finding five U.N. Development Program dependents, four UNICEF dependents, three World Food Program family members, and two World Health Organization dependents have been killed. 158 dependents of staff for UNRWA, or the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, have been killed.
Protesters held a demonstration inside the Cannon US Capitol office building on Tuesday, one day before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to address Congress.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Protesters against the Gaza war staged a sit-in at a congressional office building Tuesday ahead of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress, with Capitol Police making multiple arrests.
Netanyahu arrived in Washington Monday for a visit that includes meetings with President Joe Biden and a Wednesday speech before a joint session of Congress. Dozens of protesters rallied outside his hotel Monday evening, and on Tuesday afternoon, hundreds of demonstrators staged a flashmob-style protest in the Cannon Building, which houses offices of House of Representatives members.
Organized by Jewish Voice for Peace, protesters wearing red T-shirts that read “Not In Our Name” took over the building’s rotunda, sitting on the floor, unfurling signs and chanting “Let Gaza Live!”
After about a half-hour of clapping and chanting, officers from the U.S. Capitol Police issued several warnings, then began arresting protesters — binding their hands with zip ties and leading them away one-by-one.
“I am the daughter of Holocaust survivors and I know what a Holocaust looks like,” said Jane Hirschmann, a native of Saugerties, New York, who drove down for the protest along with her two daughters — both of whom were arrested. “When we say ‘Never Again,’ we mean never for anybody.”
Participants pedaled through Madison’s scenic bike paths on Sunday, joining forces to raise money for humanitarian relief efforts in Gaza.
MADISON (WKOW) — Participants pedaled through Madison’s scenic bike paths on Sunday, joining forces to raise money for humanitarian relief efforts in Gaza.
The event, featuring an eight-mile route, centered around Tenney Park, where attendees enjoyed refreshments, live music, poetry readings, bike decorating and kite making.
“All funds raised, as outlined in our literature, are earmarked for Gaza, with occasional allocations to refugee camps in Lebanon,” explained Donna Wallbaum, a dedicated volunteer with the Madison Rafah Sister City Project. “Specifically for today, all proceeds will directly support emergency aid efforts on the ground in Gaza.”
Proceeds from the event will benefit the Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA), headquartered in Berkeley, California. MECA is committed to providing essential supplies such as clean water, food, and basic necessities to the people of Gaza and refugee camps.
“We’ve exceeded nearly 200% of our original fundraising goal, which is truly remarkable,” Wallbaum said. “This marks our third annual event, and we anticipate it becoming a cornerstone fundraiser. Today, our target is $300,000, a goal we are very close to achieving. We plan to continue and expand this effort next year.”
The Madison-Rafah Sister City Project, Jewish Voice for Peace-Madison, and Palestine Partners united as sponsors for the event, underscoring a collaborative community commitment to the cause.
August 9, 2024 Catholic Multicultural Center 5256 Verona Road, Fitchburg 6 pm
CMC has announced that the next destination in their Culinary Passport Series will celebrate the culture of the Palestinian people with a delicious meal from 3DE Mediterranean Cuisine.
The event will also feature traditional music and dance, and a panel discussion with neighbors of Palestinian background about their culture, the significance of food and cooking in their lives, as well as personal stories.
Register soon to secure your place; spots are limited. This series is a fundraiser to support the work of the CMC.
July 23, 2024 30 W. Mifflin Street, Madison 12:30 pm
World Beyond War and other groups will be holding a press conference outside Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s Madison office in opposition to Netanyahu’s planned address to the US congress the following day. The public is invited.
Letters have been sent to Sen. Baldwin as well as Rep. Mark Pocan asking for their response to Netanyahu’s visit. As of this writing, no response has been received.
“A group of us are meeting. We’re trying to figure out what’s the best to show that there’s not unanimity in Congress by any stretch of imagination for Benjamin Netanyahu. There is for the Israeli people, for the peace process, but Benajamin Netanyahu doesn’t represent either of those anymore.”
Palestinian foreign policy advisor Riad Malki and other members of the legal team take their seats before judges enter the International Court of Justice, or World Court, in The Hague, Netherlands, Friday July 19, 2024, where the United Nations top court is delivering a nonbinding advisory opinion Friday on the legality of Israel's 57-year occupation of lands sought for a Palestinian state, a ruling that could have more effect on international opinion than it will on Israeli policies. (AP Photo/Phil Nijhuis)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The top U.N. court said Friday that Israel’s presence in the occupied Palestinian territories is “unlawful” and called on it to end and for settlement construction to stop immediately, issuing an unprecedented, sweeping condemnation of Israel’s rule over the lands it captured 57 years ago.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly denounced the nonbinding opinion issued by the 15-judge panel of the International Court of Justice, saying the territories are part of the Jewish people’s historic “homeland.” But the resounding breadth of the decision could impact international opinion and fuel moves for unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state.
The judges pointed to a wide list of policies, including the building and expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, use of the area’s natural resources, the annexation and imposition of permanent control over lands and discriminatory policies against Palestinians, all of which it said violated international law.
The court said Israel had no right to sovereignty in the territories, was violating international laws against acquiring territory by force and was impeding Palestinians’ right to self-determination. It said other nations were obliged not to “render aid or assistance in maintaining” Israel’s presence in the territories. It said Israel must end settlement construction immediately and that existing settlements must be removed, according to a summary of the more than 80-page opinion read out by court President Nawaf Salam.
Israel’s “abuse of its status as the occupying power” renders its “presence in the occupied Palestinian territory unlawful,” the court said, saying its presence must be ended as “rapidly as possible.”
Growing numbers of Israeli observers have been saying publicly that Israel cannot win the Gaza war. Their judgment has nothing to do with what a new Human Rights Watch report defines as the war crimes and crimes against humanity that Hamas and its allies committed during their October 7, 2023 attack on Israel. Rather, it is a consequence of Israel’s response to October 7: a military strategy prioritizing mass bombardment, the annihilationist rhetoric of its military and political leaders, and media reporting that obscures the massive destruction, loss of civilian life, and humanitarian catastrophe that the rest of the world is witnessing (the daily Haaretz and +972 webzine are important exceptions).
University of Chicago professor of international affairs Robert Pape argues that Israel’s failure is fundamentally due to its “gross misunderstanding of the sources of Hamas’s power…. Israel has failed to realize that the carnage and devastation it has unleashed in Gaza has only made its enemy stronger.” “Hamas is Winning,” Pape’s article in the establishment US foreign policy organ, Foreign Affairs, proclaims.
Perhaps the most basic element of Israel’s failure to understand the Gaza Strip is that some 75% of its inhabitants on October 7 were refugees or descendants of refugees from the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, which Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe. Official and popular Israeli unwillingness to acknowledge the Nakba and the conditions created by Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip since 1967 and siege of Gaza since 2007 (abetted by Egypt) make it difficult to comprehend Palestinian political and military actions.
Figures from the core of Israel’s military and security establishment have been publicly asserting that Prime Minister Netanyahu’s announced war objectives of destroying Hamas and returning the hostages through military pressure were always unattainable. In a TV interview, IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said, “the idea of destroying Hamas is throwing sand in the face of the Israeli public.” National Security Council head Tzachi Hanegbi, a lifelong Likudnik and former minister with an impeccable rightwing pedigree, told the Herzliya Security Conference in June, “Hamas as an idea can’t be eliminated.”
A Public Affair Friday, July 19, 2024 12 pm – 1 pm 89.9 FM, live online, or in the archives
COLEEN ROWLEY is a retired FBI agent and was named one of TIME magazine’s Persons of the Year in 2002. She is a long-time member of Women Against Military Madness and Veterans for Peace and was with a group of peace activists at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. They had a big red “Stop the Genocide” banner.
MATTHEW HOH is the associate director of the Eisenhower Media Network. He is a former Marine Corps captain, an Afghanistan State Department officer, and a disabled Iraq War veteran. He wrote recently that “The elected majorities of both political parties argue Israel’s genocide of Palestinians must be supported because Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East…Wars overseas will come home.”
Both will be my guests this Friday at noon CT on WORT, 89.9 FM, www.wortfm.org, to discuss the RNC and American wars, especially the one on Gaza. Join us.
Esty Dinur … for, truly, I am not a website and my name is not Etsy
The Madison team is close to reaching its $3,000 fundraising goal, which will all go towards MECA’s $200,000 goal this year. At the time of this writing, the team has raised 97% of their goal. [130% at this posting]
MECA is a nonprofit organization based out of Berkeley, Calif. that “works to protect the rights and improve the lives of children in the Middle East through aid, empowerment and education,” according to their website. Since it was established in 1988, MECA has provided a wide variety of on-the-ground support in Palestine, including establishing clean water projects, implementing music programs in classrooms, and providing psychosocial support for children who have lost family members.
This year will mark MECA’s third annual bike fundraiser and all proceeds will go to emergency aid in Gaza in light of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Palestine, including emergency assistance to those who’ve had to flee their homes and medical supplies for hospitals and clinics.
Riders are encouraged to arrive at the Tenney Park Pavilion at 10:30 a.m. to decorate their bikes and participate in other arts and crafts, along with supporters and community members. There will be a “shove off” at 11 a.m., after which riders will embark on an 8-mile flat ride on the bike path, then return to the pavilion for more festivities and community building. The ride is anticipated to take approximately an hour and 15 minutes.
Donna Wallbaum, who is a member of MRSCP and is Madison’s team captain, highlighted the importance of showing solidarity with Palestine during this time. “It’s something we can do, right?” she said. “We can’t do a whole lot. But this is a tangible thing that can actually provide aid on the ground.”
Wallbaum emphasized that everyone, whether they’ll be riding or not, is encouraged to join this family-friendly event. “Not every action we do has to be directed towards politicians. We also have communities to build and solidarity to build, and so I wanted to also be part of a celebration of our togetherness,” she said.
Madison’s local chapter of Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP) will also be co-sponsoring the event. JVP member Samantha Bosco, who moved to Madison in November of last year, emphasized the importance of getting organized with fellow anti-Zionist Jewish Madisonians and showing solidarity with Palestine.
“The very first weekend I moved here, I started going to JVP meetings and getting involved in organizing our local Jewish community,” she said. [We’re] doing as much as we can do to show our support for Palestine and raise our voices against U.S. complicity in genocide.”
Both organizers noted that Madison is a great city to hold a fundraising team because of its strong bike culture, especially since cycling has a long history of popular protest and organizing. “Bikes to me represent a do-it-yourself kind of mentality, [of] each one teach one,” Bosco said. “They are very simple but very efficient machines that bring people together [and give them] freedom and empowerment.”
Madison’s love for cycling is mirrored in the perseverance of the Gaza Sunbirds, the region’s paracycling team made up of riders who are survivors of Israeli attacks and who often have prosthetic limbs. “[It demonstrates] the power of the bicycle to bring people meaning and freedom, even through such adversity,” Bosco noted.
Festivities at Tenney Park will continue until 2 p.m. and will include kid-friendly activities including kite making, sign decorating, chalking, live music, and a read-aloud. Those who are interested in participating in the ride are still encouraged to register.
Most of all, Wallbaum emphasized the event’s opportunity to provide one another with a moment of levity amidst such horrors. “As activists, we sometimes need to be together and heal with one another too,” she said. “This is hard to watch. It’s a very unique situation. This is a specific situation that’s happening very intentionally because of the United States. I think a lot of us feel the weight of that.”
To learn more about, donate to, or join the Madison team, click here.
Rodlyn-mae Banting Rodlyn-mae Banting is a writer and educator currently pursuing a master’s degree in Gender & Women’s Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Today marks exactly 10 years since the killing of four Palestinian children from the Bakr family by the Israeli military in Gaza. In marking this somber anniversary, @AlMezanCenter , @AdalahEnglish , and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) highlight the systematic… pic.twitter.com/gmwe5JmyBv
— Palestinian Centre for Human Rights – PCHR (@pchrgaza) July 16, 2024
What if every aspect of your life was under someone else’s control? This is the reality for millions of Palestinians who say Israel’s occupation has deprived them of freedom for generations.
Since October 7 conditions in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem have significantly worsened with settler attacks tripling in the West Bank, according to the United Nations.
In the 76 years since the Nakba Israel has controlled the resources Palestinians can use, the services they can access, where they can travel, and even what they can build on their own land. We take a look into the lives of three Palestinians, each facing their respective struggles under Israel’s occupation.
Presenter: Anelise Borges
Guests Leila Warah – Journalist and content creator Mohammad Hureini – Activist Sami Khalidi – Financial sector specialist
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July 16, 2024
We Are Not Numbers has relaunched its newsletter on a new, weekly schedule, commencing July 16. This follows several months of suspended publication.
Distributed via email, the newsletter provides subscribers with a list of annotated links to the most recently published stories, along with news about organization activities.
If you are not yet receiving the WANN newsletter, please use the subscribe button in the footer of our website.
Israeli army reservists near the settlement of Tekoa in the West Bank in October. Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times
A surge in Jewish settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank is raising the ire of some in the international community as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government officially expands its hold on the occupied territory by claiming more land and quietly assists extremists with tacit military support, according to rights activists.
The European Union on Monday sanctioned five Israeli settlers, two outposts and an extremist group that were “responsible for serious and systematic human rights abuses against Palestinians in the West Bank,” the European Council, the E.U. body that represents the heads of the member governments, said in a statement. The United States last week also imposed sanctions on Israelis and entities in the West Bank that the State Department said had incited violence against Palestinians or encroached on Palestinian land.
Peace Now, an Israeli organization that tracks Jewish settlements, responded to the European sanctions by accusing the Israeli government of failing to enforce its own laws and of being complicit in the settler violence.
The West Bank is home to about 2.7 million Palestinians and more than 500,000 settlers. Israel seized control of the territory from Jordan in 1967 during a war with three Arab states, and Israelis have since settled there with both tacit and explicit government approval, though the international community largely considers settlements illegal, and many outposts also violate Israeli law. Settlers are governed by Israeli civil law while their Palestinian neighbors are subject to Israeli military law.
PCHR’s Field Researcher and Survivor of Attack on UNRWA School Shelters Shares Her Story
Zainab Ahmad Mohammad Al-Khaldi, a resident of Al-Sudaniya area in northern Gaza and a volunteer field researcher.
On 07 July 2024, as we usual do, we headed to shelters and healthcare facilities such as Al-Maamadani Hospital or Kamal ‘Adwan Hospital in order to document the Israeli violations committed against children in northern Gaza.
At around 18:00, I left Al-Maamadani Hospital and headed to UNRWA-run Daraj Schools, near the Jabalia parking lot and not far from Al-Maamadani Hospital. These schools are considered the largest and most overcrowded school shelters for the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from across Eastern Gaza.
Just when I was about 10 meters away to the south of the first school entrance, the situation was suddenly turned upside down. Israeli warplanes launched more than six missiles in the proximity of the area, just 150 meters away to the east of the school, near what is known as the market stall, enticing fear and panic among the displaced, especially children and women.
Nevertheless, I went on and entered the school to do my work and fill out forms for children injured during the war. I thought that the school would be safer since it is run by UNRWA and is considered a civilian object expressly protected under international law, so I chose to stay among the IDPs there.
While at the school, anxious and cautious, I started filling out several forms and taking testimonies from the women there. At 18:30, More than seven shells struck the school yard and the buildings, hitting the third and fourth floors.
All of a sudden, IDPs in crowds started rushing out of school running for their lives, while shells continued to fall like rain.
I do not know how I was running with such crowds; no one knew what was going on or where to go. When I reached Yafa Street coming from Al-Sidra area, a shell fell in the proximity, and shrapnel scattered on people fleeing the looming threat of death. I fell on the ground as the burning shrapnel hit my under knee; too hot black fragments stuck to my body, causing burns and wounds. It looked like molten metal, red and black in color.
I tried to move forward and leave the area with the help of some of IDPs. They took me to the Jabalia parking lot where I saw several dead bodies lying on the ground along with people injured, all of them women and children. No one paid attention to them out of panic and fear. I saw a cart transporting the injured to Al-Maamadani Hospital, which turned out to be closed due to evacuation orders from the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF), so they were referred to the Indonesian Hospital.
Despite my injury, I kept walking, with fear overshadowing the pain. I was running so fast with other people and sobbing from exhaustion and fear. I arrived at Al-Sahaba intersection where Israeli quadcopters were unprecedentedly covering the sky and flying very low while opening fire randomly. The scene resembled the horrors of Judgment Day, as panicked crowds tried to escape, running for their lives.
When I reached Dabeet area, I had a good phone signal. I could no longer walk out of severe pain, and some colleagues contacted me to check on me. I was then transported to the Friends of the Patient clinic. Less than two hours later, I heard artillery shelling and heavy gunfire in the proximity of the universities area, so I decided to leave and head northwards to Al-Safatawi area.
The pressure is working — FIFA announced it will make a decision about whether or not to ban Israel by July 20!
The FIFA council is deciding right now how to vote, and FIFA’s top bosses hold tremendous sway. If we each send them messages on Instagram and Twitter, they will feel like the whole world is watching them, and that very well could influence them to vote in favor of a ban.
Below are some talking points to help you, and if you are a football fan, make sure to mention that!
Here are some talking points, but the more personal, the better:
I urge you to ban Israel from FIFA and stop whitewashing genocide on the global stage.
Israeli forces have killed at least 1000 athletes and destroyed all football infrastructure in Gaza including Al-Yarmuk stadium.
The Israeli Football Association is complicit in enforcing violent oppression of Palestinians – from blocking their ability to travel to games to failing to address racist chants towards Arabs.
The Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza and oppression towards Palestinian football are in violation of FIFA statutes – therefore I urge you to ban Israel.
FIFA has banned oppressive regimes before, they can do it again – but only if the council sees and feels pressure from every corner of the world. Let’s each take 2 minutes now and help make history!
Thanks for all that you do, Rewan, Eoin, Maen, Vicky and the team at Ekō
Ekō is a community of people from around the world committed to curbing the growing power of corporations. We want to buy from, work for and invest in companies that respect the environment, treat their workers well and respect democracy. And we’re not afraid to stand up to them when they don’t.
“Restraining Israel in October rather than enabling its operations in Gaza,” said one international policy expert, “could have avoided a lot of dead and mangled children.”
A man carries a child injured in an Israeli attack at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza on July 9, 2024. (Photo: Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images)
Doctors who have had to perform “a constant flow of amputations” on injured children in Gaza said Thursday that the injuries they have witnessed were consistent with the use of “fragmentation bombs” loaded with shrapnel—which Israel has used in the past and which rights groups have said are designed to cause maximum casualties.
Volunteer doctors who have worked at European Hospital and al-Aqsa Hospital over the past three months told The Guardian that a majority of the patients they operated on were children who had wounds that were barely discernible—called “splinter injuries” by Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a trauma surgeon from California—but caused catastrophic internal damage to the children’s bodies.
“About half of the injuries I took care of were in young kids,” said Sidhwa. “Children are more vulnerable to any penetrating injury because they have smaller bodies. Their vital parts are smaller and easier to disrupt. When children have lacerated blood vessels, their blood vessels are already so small it’s very hard to put them back together. The artery that feeds the leg, the femoral artery, is only the thickness of a noodle in a small child. It’s very, very small. So repairing it and keeping the kid’s limb attached to them is very difficult.”
The Guardian also spoke to explosives experts who reviewed pictures of the shrapnel found by medical staff and the doctors’ descriptions of the tiny external wounds they treated on seriously injured children, and said the accounts were consistent with bombs the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) fits with “fragmentation sleeves” around warheads.
Amnesty International first documented the IDF’s use of fragmentation bombs in Gaza in 2009 and said the explosives “appear designed to cause maximum injury and, in some respects, seem to be a more sophisticated version of the ball-bearings or nails and bolts which armed groups often pack into crude rockets and suicide bombs.”
Israel targeted Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif in a series of strikes in southern Gaza on Saturday, an operation that killed at least 90 people and injured 300 more, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
“There is still no absolute certainty” that Deif was killed, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a news conference. “But one way or another, we will reach every senior member of Hamas.”
An Israeli military official, speaking on background in line with protocol, said the Israel Defense Forces had “precise intelligence” that Deif, the head of the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, was in a “compound” in the Mawasi area west of Khan Younis.
Netanyahu said intelligence suggested “there were no signs” Israeli hostages were in the area of the strike, which aid agencies and Gaza’s civil defense force said took place within Israel’s designated “humanitarian zone” in Mawasi.
Video shows chaos after strike hits southern Gaza.
July 24, 2024 US Capitol Building 10 am to 2 pm CT
The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights is joining with many other groups and calling for people to come to Washington, DC to protest Israeli Prime Minister and war criminal Netanyahu’s address to Congress. Plans call for surrounding Congress with a People’s Red Line.
Whether or not you are going, please take a moment to sign this petition from Win Without War and others asking your Senators and Representatives to boycott Netanyahu’s speech.
Also consider contacting Rep. Mark Pocan (DC phone 202-225-2906) and Senator Tammy Baldwin (DC phone 202-224-5653) and insist that they boycott the speech.
Report on Israel’s Crimes and Violations of Palestinians’ Rights in the West Bank in June 2024
During the reporting period, the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) and Israeli settlers continue their violence against Palestinians and their properties in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, amounting to crimes and other violations of international law. These crimes have included willful killings, destruction of public and private property, arrests, threats, among others.
In this report, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) highlights a number of monitored and documented crimes and violations committed by IOF and Israeli settlers against the Palestinians:
Killings and violation of the right to life and bodily integrity
The IOF and settlers’ attacks during the reporting period in the West Bank have resulted in the killing of 36 Palestinians, including 18 civilians; amongst them 8 children, and the rest were members of the Palestinian armed groups. Ten of these members were extrajudicially killed (assassinations), and the rest were killed during Israel’s incursions into Palestinian cities.
So far in 2024, IOF attacks have killed 246 Palestinians, including 53 children, and 4 women.
According to our field documentation, Israel has employed different methods and weaponry, either by shooting in protests or confrontations, military raids and assaults, drone strikes, or by carrying out extrajudicial killings by Israeli special units.
On 01 June 2024, IOF killed 3 Palestinian civilians, including a child, in two separate crimes during an incursion into Aqbat Jaber refugee camp in Al-Bireh governorate and Ramallah governorate.
The Wisconsin Coalition for Justice in Palestine is encouraging everyone to make a phone call Wednesday, July 10 between 8 am and 5 pm CT to the Milwaukee Mayor’s office asking him to issue the permit for the planned July 15 march on the Republican National Convention. The march has made standing with Palestine one of its central issues.
Please call Mayor Cavalier Johnson at 414-286-2200 to give him the following message:
“Tell Mayor Johnson to give us the permit for our March on the RNC in Milwaukee on Monday, July 15, 2024, at 10am. We will rally at Red Arrow Park and march to the Republican National Convention at Fiserv Forum. We have waited long enough and are excited to march!”
We suggest that you keep trying and if you can’t get through, try on Thursday.
Saturday, July 13 – Vigil for Ceasefire in Gaza at Farmers Market
Join us and the Interfaith Peace Working Group as we gather for the third time this summer in an action featuring a display of shoes and a reading of Gazan victims’ names. Please let us know if you’d like to help read names or set up or take down the exhibit, at warabolition@gmail.com. Both the visual and the audio are powerful representations of the suffering. Some people are moved to tears by the vigil. Please note that, because of the Art Fair on the Square, this Saturday, July 13, the Farmers’ Market will be at Breese Stevens Field. Our vigil will be outside the stadium, in Reynolds Park, at the intersection of E Mifflin and N Paterson. Stop by for any time or the entire time as you can.
Monday, July 15 – March on the RNC
Next Monday, July 15, let’s join CODEPINK to march on the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. 10:00 am start. RSVP here. Drop us a line at warabolition@gmail.com for carpooling from Madison.
Israeli soldiers describe the near-total absence of firing regulations in the Gaza war, with troops shooting as they please, setting homes ablaze, and leaving corpses on the streets — all with their commanders’ permission.
Israeli soldiers from the 8717 Battalion of the Givati Brigade operating in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, December 28, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
In early June, Al Jazeera aired a series of disturbing videos revealing what it described as “summary executions”: Israeli soldiers shooting dead several Palestinians walking near the coastal road in the Gaza Strip, on three separate occasions. In each case, the Palestinians appeared unarmed and did not pose any imminent threat to the soldiers.
Such footage is rare, due to the severe constraints faced by journalists in the besieged enclave and the constant danger to their lives. But these executions, which did not appear to have any security rationale, are consistent with the testimonies of six Israeli soldiers who spoke to +972 Magazine and Local Call following their release from active duty in Gaza in recent months. Corroborating the testimonies of Palestinian eyewitnesses and doctors throughout the war, the soldiers described being authorized to open fire on Palestinians virtually at will, including civilians.
The six sources — all except one of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity — recounted how Israeli soldiers routinely executed Palestinian civilians simply because they entered an area that the military defined as a “no-go zone.” The testimonies paint a picture of a landscape littered with civilian corpses, which are left to rot or be eaten by stray animals; the army only hides them from view ahead of the arrival of international aid convoys, so that “images of people in advanced stages of decay don’t come out.” Two of the soldiers also testified to a systematic policy of setting Palestinian homes on fire after occupying them.
IDF soldiers were reportedly ordered to “turn the area around the border fence into a killing zone.”
An Israeli soldier is pictured securing a position at the Nir Oz kibbutz, one of the Israeli communities near the Gaza Strip attacked on October 7, on October 30, 2023. (Photo: Yuri Cortez/AFP via Getty Images)
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported Sunday that Israel’s military repeatedly employed a protocol known as the “Hannibal Directive” during the October 7 Hamas-led attack in an attempt to prevent the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers—even if it meant putting the lives of army captives and civilians at risk.
Haaretz found based on documents and interviews with soldiers and senior Israeli officers that Hannibal—an operational order developed in 1986 that “directs the use of force to prevent soldiers being taken into captivity” by enemy militants—was used “at three army facilities infiltrated by Hamas, potentially endangering civilians as well.”
During the first hours of the Hamas-led attack, according to Haaretz, Israeli soldiers were given an order: “Not a single vehicle can return to Gaza.”
“At this point, the IDF was not aware of the extent of kidnapping along the Gaza border, but it did know that many people were involved,” the newspaper continued. “Thus, it was entirely clear what that message meant, and what the fate of some of the kidnapped people would be.”
The full text of the Hannibal Directive has never been published. But according to a Haaretz story about the directive from more than two decades ago, part of it states that “during an abduction, the major mission is to rescue our soldiers from the abductors even at the price of harming or wounding our soldiers.”
A UN-RUN SCHOOL SHELTERING DISPLACED PEOPLE NEAR NASSER HOSPITAL IN KHAN YOUNIS WAS BOMBED BY ISRAELI WARPLANES ON JULY 3, 2024. (PHOTO: ABDULLAH ABU AL-KHAIR/APA IMAGES)
Casualties
38,011 + killed* and at least 87,445 wounded in the Gaza Strip. Among the dead, 28,200 have been fully identified. These include 7,779 children, 5466 women, and 2418 elderly people as of May 1. In addition, around 10,000 more are estimated to be under the rubble.*
561+ Palestinians killed in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. These include 136 children.**
Israel revised its estimated October 7 death toll down from 1,400 to 1,140.
677 Israeli soldiers have been recognized as killed, and 4021 as wounded by the Israeli army since October 7.***
* Gaza’s branch of the Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed this figure its daily report, published through its WhatsApp channel on July 4, 2024. Some rights groups estimate the death toll to be much higher when accounting for those presumed dead. ** The death toll in the West Bank and Jerusalem is not updated regularly. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health on July 3, this is the latest figure. *** These figures are released by the Israeli military, showing the soldiers whose names “were allowed to be published.” The number of Israeli soldiers wounded according to declarations by the head of the Israeli army’s wounded association to Israel’s Channel 12 exceeds 20,000 including at least 8,000 permanently handicapped as of June 1. Israel’s Channel 7 reported that according to the Israeli war ministry’s rehabilitation service numbers, 8,663 new wounded joined the army’s handicap rehabilitation system since October 7, as of June 18.
Key Developments
Israel kills 134 Palestinians, wounds 476 across Gaza since Monday, July 1, raising death toll since October 7 to 38,011 and number of wounded to 87,445, according to Gaza health ministry.
Hezbollah launches over 250 rockets and 20 guided drones at Israeli positions, at distances of up to 35 kilometers into the Galilee and the Golan heights, in response to Israel’s assassination of a Hezbollah senior commander in Tyre, southern Lebanon. Hezbollah commander identified as Muhammad Naameh Naser, 59, head of the “Aziz” unit.
Israel bombs surroundings of southern Lebanese towns of Kufr Shuba, Rashaya al-Fakhar, and Kuf Hamam.
U.S. envoy Amos Hockstein arrives on Wednesday in Paris to discuss de-escalation between Israel and Lebanon.
Office of PM Netanyahu and Mossad announce receiving Hamas response to amended U.S. ceasefire proposal. Israeli cabinet set to meet today to discuss Hamas response.
Israeli Channel 12 quotes Israeli officials saying that Hamas response “for the first time allows for making progress in negotiations.”
Israeli captives’ families demand Netanyahu accept deal, warn “millions will take to the streets” if he doesn’t.
Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot says Israel’s security branches angry at Netanyahu and Smotrich attempts to sabotage deal.
Israeli army recognizes killing of 7 soldiers since Monday, July 1, and 50 wounded, including 39 in Gaza.
Palestinian resistance factions announce attacks on Israeli troops in Shuja’iyya, Rafah, and Netzarim corridor.
Israeli airstrikes target 12 family houses since Monday, July 1, in Gaza City, Nuseirat, Rafah, and Khan Younis.
The Palestinian health ministry announces partial halt of operations in Naser Hospital in Khan Younis due to lack of fuel for power generators.
UN says 90% of Gaza’s population has been displaced at least once since October 7.
In West Bank, Israeli army kills 4 Palestinians in airstrikes on Tulkarem.
Israeli government approves confiscation of 13 square kilometers in Jordan Valley area, becoming largest single Israeli land grab in past 30 years.
An attendee of the recent NSMMS-CRASTE conference at Monona Terrace holds up a toy missile, distributed as a promotional item for defense contractor Northrop Grumman. Photo courtesy of Josh Jenkins.
A recent defense-industry conference at Monona Terrace highlights the gap between local declarations and local action.
On June 24, the National Space & Missile Materials Symposium (NSMMS) and Commercial and Government Responsive Access to Space Technology Exchange (CRASTE) kicked off a joint conference on missile and space technology at Madison’s Monona Terrace. While the event’s branding cloaked it in images of astronauts and NASA spacecraft, it was very much a conference for defense contractors. Its sponsors included companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman—each of which provide Israel’s military with missiles, bombs, and fighter jets.
The five-day conference, at a City of Madison-owned venue, comes after months of debate amongst Madison’s elected officials over resolutions calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Most recently, the Madison Common Council failed to enact a resolution in support of the UW-Madison student encampment after Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin authorized a multi-agency squad of riot police to carry out a violent crackdown. In December, however, the Common Council voted unanimously to call for an immediate ceasefire, and for “urgent political action to both de-escalate the crisis and to prioritize truth, reconciliation, restitution, and the building of a future for the Palestinian and Israeli people.”
Despite this ceasefire resolution, Monona Terrace—technically a city agency, with an operating budget of $14,701,064 for 2024—played host to weapons manufacturers largely responsible for the destruction of 70 percent of homes in Gaza and the deaths of over 35,000 people, mostly civilians.
With a “best by” date of July 2024 Playgrounds for Palestine Za’atar in 100 gm (small) boxes has been reduced from $8.00 to $5.00 each.
Za’atar is a mix of dried, crushed thyme with roasted sesame, salt, sunflower oil, and other spices. It has been a delicious addition to any table since medieval times.
Grown by Palestinian farmers in the West Bank and bought by Al’Ard (“the land“) in Nablus, following organic and fair trade practices.
AIDA is a private label of Playgrounds for Palestine. Playgrounds is currently donating 100% of its proceeds to Gaza aid.
an amendment blocks the State Department from citing the Gaza Health Ministry’s statistics
The Gaza Ministry figures have been cited broadly, including by the U.S. and Israeli governments.
The bodies of Palestinians killed during an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced people, at the Tel al-Sultan clinic in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, on May 27, 2024. Photo: Ahmad Salem/Bloomberg via Getty Images
THE HOUSE OF Representatives has voted to effectively conceal the death toll from Israel’s war on Gaza.
On Thursday, lawmakers voted 269-144 on an amendment to prohibit the State Department from citing statistics from the Gaza Health Ministry. The measure is part of the annual State Department appropriations bill. It was led by Democratic Reps. Jared Moskowitz, Fla., and Josh Gottheimer, N.J., and Republican Reps. Joe Wilson, S.C.; Mike Lawler, N.Y.; and Carol Miller, W.V.
In total, 62 Democrats joined 207 Republicans in supporting the amendment.
Here are the 62 Democrats who joined 207 Republicans to ban giving funds to the State Department to cite the Gaza Health Ministry, undermining the organization’s death & injury figures. https://t.co/n7DveMQaPQpic.twitter.com/Nas0Fgm4Ag
TENNEY PARK 1414 E. Johnson St or 402 N. Thornton Ave, John Wall Family Pavilion 6:30 pm – Create lanterns 7:30 pm – Program starts 7:45 pm – Launch lanterns
Join us for this family friendly event to commemorate the lives lost in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings 79 years ago and make sure that such nuclear attacks never again take place.
We remember the past so that we can envision and work for a peaceful, just, and nuclear weapon-free future.
☮️ We need volunteers for set-up and take-down. Please drop us a line at warabolition@gmail.com if you can help.
For the past 21 years, the Madison-Rafah Sister City Project has sought to foster person-to-person relationships with residents of the southern Palestine city of Rafah. Previous humanitarian projects for the people of Rafah, including water purification systems, mental health resources, a playground, a children’s library, a house reconstruction, and more.
Cassandra Dixon works as a carpenter in Madison, volunteers for the Madison-Rafah Sister City Project, and has made several aid trips to Palestine. Cassandra spoke with Monday Eight o’Clock Buzz host Brian Standing to talk about the art auction and about the how war in Gaza is affecting the civilian population.
Thanks to the amazing generosity of the Java Cat owners there will be a meet & greet event with artists contributing to our Silent Art Auction.
Besides seeing the artwork attendees will have a chance to talk with some of the artists and learn more about the work of the Middle East Children’s Alliance in Gaza. Refreshments will be available.
ADDAMEER Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, 26-06-2024
Over the past decades, Israeli occupation authorities have systematically used torture against prisoners and detainees in their prisons from the very first moments of arrest. Hundreds of prisoners have died in Israeli jails over the years as a result of various forms of torture, without any accountability from relevant international bodies. Recently, with the outbreak of comprehensive aggression against the Palestinian people across all locations and the genocidal war that has spared no one, not even prisoners in prisons, the use of torture has intensified to the harshest and most brutal forms. This increase in torture, especially against detainees from Gaza who were arrested from schools, shelters, and hospitals after the ground invasion by the occupation forces, stems from Israel’s longstanding impunity from accountability.
Since the beginning of the genocidal war against Palestinians, approximately 54 martyrs from all Palestinian provinces have died in Israeli occupation prisons due to torture, inhumane detention conditions, systematic abuse, and deliberate attacks. Among them, 36 were prisoners from Gaza and 18 were prisoners martyred in prisons under the Israeli Prison Service. It’s worth noting that the occupying state continues to withhold information about the martyr prisoners, as reports have revealed the deaths of dozens of martyrs inside camps and prisons without families knowing the fate of their loved ones or the names of those who have died in these camps. This underscores the scale of the humanitarian disaster faced by prisoners inside these prisons. The situation inside prisons and camps has become increasingly severe due to the punitive policies of the occupation authorities against prisoners and detainees. It is noteworthy that the number of detainees from Gaza and their information remains unknown until now, estimated to be in the thousands.
A UN-RUN SCHOOL SHELTERING DISPLACED PEOPLE NEAR NASSER HOSPITAL IN KHAN YOUNIS WAS BOMBED BY ISRAELI WARPLANES ON JULY 3, 2024. (PHOTO: ABDULLAH ABU AL-KHAIR/APA IMAGES)
