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This month, a civil lawsuit in Israel in the case of our daughter Rachel Corrie will converge with the seven-year anniversary of her killing in Gaza. A human rights observer and activist, Rachel, 23, was crushed to death by an Israel Defense Force (IDF) Caterpillar D9R bulldozer as she tried nonviolently to offer protection for a Palestinian family whose home was threatened with demolition. This lawsuit is one piece of our family’s seven-year effort to pursue accountability for Rachel while, also, challenging the Occupation that claimed her life.

On this day, when Rachel’s presence is powerful for many of us, we’re asking all of our friends to support Rachel’s vision of freedom for Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip by participating in what we are calling the International Day of Conscience. Please join her struggle by calling the White House today – this link has all the information you need:

http://tinyurl.com/Corrie4Gaza

Seven years later, Rachel’s memory is still vibrant. I’m writing to you from Israel where we are plaintiffs in a civil case against the state of Israel for its responsibility in her death. In addition to seeking accountability through the Israeli court system, we’re asking all of our friends to support Rachel’s vision of freedom for Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip by participating in a national call-in day to the White House.

I hope I can count on you to:

* Call the White House at 202-456-1111
* Urge Special Envoy for Middle East Peace George Mitchell to visit Gaza and demand that the United States break the blockade of Gaza by providing immediate humanitarian aid and building materials.
* Tell us about your call. Tracking your calls makes a difference.

You can also make the call tomorrow. Please forward this email to help spread the word.

Thank you,
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Cindy Corrie

P.S. Click here to view the trial updates page on the Rachel Corrie Foundation website.

PA cancels ceremony honoring leader of 1978 terror attack in Israel
By Reuters

The Palestinian Authority on Wednesday ordered the cancellation of a ceremony to honor the woman who led a 1978 hijacking of a civilian bus in Israel that left 35 people dead.

The cancellation of the ceremony planned for Thursday coincided with a visit to the West Bank by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, who met with Palestinian leaders as part of Washington’s efforts to revive the moribund Middle East peace process.

Three Palestinian officials involved in organizing the event to honor Dalal al-Mughrabi, killed in the attack, said Israel told the Palestinian Authority to cancel the ceremony at which a traffic circle near Ramallah was to have been named after her and a memorial plaque unveiled.

The Israel Defense Forces, which controls access to the city, said initial checks could not find record of such a demand.

Mughrabi is remembered as a heroine by Palestinians, while Israel considers her a terrorist.

A member of the Fatah group led at the time by the late Yasser Arafat, Mughrabi and a group of fighters landed by sea on a beach in northern Israel.

They shot dead an American woman taking photos of wildlife and then hijacked the bus on the busy Haifa-Tel Aviv highway, where they shot at passing cars.

The vehicle was brought to a halt at a police roadblock at the entrance to Tel Aviv, where a gunfight ensued and explosives detonated.

“The commemoration should have been on the 11th, on the anniversary of her martyrdom,” said Rashida al-Mughrabi, Dalal al-Mughrabi’s sister and an officer in the Palestinian Authority security forces.

“A decision to cancel the celebration came from official channels,” she told Reuters

source

by F. William Engdahl*

Microsoft founder and one of the world’s wealthiest men, Bill Gates, projects an image of a benign philanthropist using his billions via his (tax exempt) Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to tackle diseases, solve food shortages in Africa and alleviate poverty. In a recent conference in California, Gates reveals a less public agenda of his philanthropy: population reduction, otherwise known as eugenics.

read on

We call all of you, from all parts of France to join the big mobilization against the installation of AGREXCO/Carmel in the port of Sète (South of France, near Montpellier) on Saturday March 6. We will gather in front of the Region headquarters in Montpellier in the morning, to tell the region representatives headed by George Frêche, notoriously racist, and the candidates in these new regional elections that we refuse any collaboration with Israeli war crimes, occupation and colonialism. And then we’ll march to the port of Sète who is 35 km away from Montpellier.

We are organizing buses, trains and cars so that many of you can participte in this important initiative that is also an international one. Please write to tell us if you are prepared to join us.

The BDS campaign is progressing everywhere. We want to congratulate the comrades who led two remarkable actions last week-end : one at the airport of Liege (Belgium) against the import-export of “israeli” goods and war ammunition, and the other at the Brussels Holiday exhibition where 8 activists dressed in El Al hostesses and stewards proposed free tickets to Israel to the public, in order to thank Belgium for its military collaboration with Israel.

This progress in the Boycott campaign explains the threats, slanders and trials we undergo, with the complicity of our governement. Our friend Sakina Arnaud has just been condemned for “discimination” and “provocation to racial hatred” by some judges in Bordeaux for having put a sticker “Israel Apartheid Boycott” on a bottle of “Israeli” orange juice in a Carrefour supermarket. The judges accepted the summing up for the prosecution, which was made by the government itself that had followed the Israeli lobby demands. She was condemned to pay 1000 euros as a fine, and 500 euros to each of the two zionist agencies that were opponent parties, because odf a so-called “discrimination against a nation”.

Sakina Arnaud is appealing against the judgment and we’ll keep supporting her, including financially. We already sent 500 euros that we collected. Thank you for your help. Please send your checks to EuroPalestine, 16 bis rue d’Odessa. 75014 Paris. Please mention “in support of Sakina” at the back of the check.)

Talking about boycott, we call every one to pay attention to flowers next Sunday, which will be Saint Valentine day. Do not offer flowers from the occupation and lie.
The Franco-Israeli Chamber of commerce itself confesses that the thousands of tons of flowers exported by Israel in all Europe on that occasion, are labelled “Made in Holland” after a little detour via the Netherlands.

Don’t forget that many of these flowers come from Israeli settlements on Palestinian confiscated lands; while Palestinian villages are deprived from water, Palestinian houses demolished in many places, and Palestinian workers treated as slaves in places like the Jordan Valley. Without speaking of the Gaza strip that used to export 80 million tons of flowers a year, ten years ago, before the siege and the Israeli massacres last winter. But Israel dared show its “generosity” last year for Saint-Valentine by allowing 25000 flowers to get out of Gaza !

Don’t say “I love you” to any one with these bloody flowers !

Best wishes,

CAPJPO-EuroPalestine

http://www.europalestine.com

A “docu-music-video” of Detroit MC Invincible’s song People Not Places. Kabobfest calls it the “greatest hip hop song for Palestine ever.”The video, like the song, is a powerful indictment of both the ongoing dispossession of the Palestinian people, and attempts to shield young American Jews from this reality through programs like Birthright.

Be sure to watch the entire thing. The video continues after the song is over to show how there are some very similar conditions to Israel/Palestine right here in the US, and that as hopeless as the situation might feel at times there is an amazing capacity for change.

Lyrics