| Beirut demonstration |
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| Click picture to see demonstrations all over the world |
Lebanon sees rare unity - Aljazeera.net
Thursday, August 3, 2006, Posted at 9:19 GMT
Thousands of Lebanese have reached across the sectarian and religious divide
to help hundreds of thousands of mostly Shia refugees fleeing Israel’s bombardment in the south of the country...
...In west Beirut an office for the gay NGO Helem has been
turned into the coordinating centre for Samidoun.
Underneath the rainbow flag the activists work around the clock to make sure
the refugees in their care are provided for.
"I don’t think the refugees really care about the fact that we are a
gay rights NGO. They only care if the NGOs helping them are American," Helem activist Ghassan Makarem said..."
Read the whole story at Helem's website
The stench of death awaits people returning Report,
IRIN, 17 August 2006
Behind a destroyed school, Nabil Chrara sat on a pile of rocks, crying his heart out as
he watched a tractor dig up the bodies of four members of his family. "They refused to leave the house," he said.
The
village of Bint Jbeil, some 80 km south of Beirut, bore witness to some of the heaviest fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.
"They have been dead for 25 days now," said Nabil Chrara. "My neighbour survived, but not my family."
Behind him, Yusef
Abdalla Harb looked across from the tent he has erected over his ruined home to Maroun Al-Ras, a hilltop still occupied by
Israeli troops.
"Do you see their tank?" he asked. "This house was all my life," he added. "I had to work abroad for
20 years before I gained enough money to build it. So I'm not leaving before they do."
In Bint Jbeil, just 10 km north
of the Lebanese-Israeli border, barely a single house remains intact. As another resident, Hajja Umm Ali, stepped over debris
and shattered glass, she said she had packed what remains of her house into two black plastic bags...
Click here to go to Electronic Lebanon and read the whole story.
These are some signs made for a Lebanese solidarity event in Boston. The original inspiration
came from an interview I heard with Tina Naccache from Lebanon, who mentioned that they had made pictures
of bombs with US and Israeli flags on them for a protest in Beirut. It seemed right
to the point, and I came up with these--I really wanted to drive home the central point of US complicity
for an American audience, which I hope I've done passing well. The links between US imperial
desires, endless funding, and American popular apathy are often unexplored by the corporate media, even
though together they make for an explosive combination (pun intended). All these signs are copyleft, of course. Please copy and use them at protests far and wide. Danny -- 8/6/06
Rauda Morcos, from Aswat, spoke in Berkeley on May 31.
"...We have many members of ASWAT coming from the West Bank. So even if we want to
participate in the World Pride, they can’t be part of it. Why is that? Because during the international events in Jerusalem
and during the World Pride this year, there will be an increasing number of checkpoints. So many Palestnians, even if they
want to join, they cannot participate, because of the checkpoints and the closure that will be there. so we now know. So during
the World Pride there will be curfew and closure, almost for two weeks, to secure the visitors to the Jerusalem World Pride.
And this is one of the reasons and the most important reason. Other reasons were for having an international event, in a place
that not all the people can come. So many groups of gays and lesbians that we are in touch with from Arab countries around
Israel cannot enter Israel. A group from Lebanon that we are in touch with cannot even join. And from Egypt and from North
Africa, from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Jordan and many other places. So we thought that if they want to hold an international
gay and lesbian event, it has to be in a country that there is, at least, peace in the region. And that was the second reason.
The third reason was because Jerusalem is the heart, the core of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. And that wasn’t a
very smart decision to have it in a place where people are still fighting about.
So we see these reasons were enough for us to decide that we don’t want to
participate in such an event. and our responsibility as gays, as a lesbian group, as a queer group is to speak these words
out, for all the groups around us. And to ask directly that we cannot be free as lesbians or gays if we’re not free
as Palestinians. So we are asking all the groups to do these connections and to work on addressing the connection between
all kinds of oppressions. We cannot be okay with women and not be okay with native Americans. We cannot be okay with gays
and not be okay with Palestinians. So you’re either racist or you’re not. you’re either discriminating or
you’re not. We are all these identities and we don’t want to give up one of them. So these were all the reasons..."
Last year, an interfaith group of anti-queer clerics condemned Jerusalem Pride. Last
year's parade was attacked by fundamentalist. Now, with World Pride scheduled for August, right-wing clerics from Israel and
the U.S. are again trying to stop the event. While we disagree with the decision to hold World Pride in Jerusalem, QUIT! and
other members of the Coalition to Boycott World Pride Jerusalem condemn these anti-queer attacks, and reassert the right of
queers everywhere to demonstrate for their/our rights. Read more in the boycott statement. Read the articles below for more details.
'Bounty' For Killing Gays At World Pride
| Chief Rabbi Amar calls on Pope to denounce
Gay Pride Parade |
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| By Amiram Barkat and Gideon Alon, Haaretz
Correspondents |
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Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar has sent a letter to Pope
Benedict XVI, asking the Catholic leader to condemn the annual International Gay Pride parade scheduled to take place in Jerusalem
in August.
Amar asked the pope to "strongly and unequivocally come out against this terrible phenomenon, out of hope
that a general protest from different religious leaders will awaken the lost hearts who are deceiving themselves and immeasurably
harming their souls, and discourage the willful wrongdoer from cursing and corrupting the human way."
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| Israeli religious leaders condemn 2005 Jerusalem Pride |
Meanwhile, U.S. Rabbi Levin calls on Muslims to
protest World Pride...
Jerusalem WorldPride Event Could Spark Islamic Furor, Some Say
By Julie Stahl
CNSNews.com Jerusalem Bureau Chief
June 20, 2006
..."We're not coming here to suggest violence. But we are here to suggest peace, shalom," said Rabbi Yehuda Levin, founder
of the U.S.-based Jews for Morality.
Levin, who said he represents the views of more than 1,000 American Orthodox rabbis
and hundreds of thousands of Jews around the world, is pressing the Israeli government to prevent the event from happening.
Levin
called on Christian leaders in the U.S. and Muslim leaders in the Middle East to raise their voices against the event and
said if it goes ahead, Jews will defend Jerusalem "with our bodies and with our souls."
"I want to make an appeal,
a desperate appeal to the entire Muslim community," said Levin. "We are faced with the prospect of a WorldPride...six days
of promiscuity and debauchery unparalleled in the Middle East," he told reporters at a poorly attended press conference organized
for the benefit of the Arabic media on Monday.
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August 16, 2006
Elderly Palestinian and His Son Killed when IOF Bombard their House
Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) killed an elderly Palestinian and his son in Khan Yunis in the early morning
hours of Wednesday, 16 August 2006, when an IOF plane leveled their house with a bomb. IOF did not give them sufficient time
to evacuate the house; and they were killed during the evacuation. In addition, a second son and two neighbors were moderately
injured by shrapnel.
PCHR's preliminary investigation indicates that at approximately 01:00 on Wednesday, an Israeli security
officer called Abdel Hadi Hasan Radwan Sha'ath (31), who is an activist in Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, on his mobile telephone.
The Israeli officer told him to evacuate his house as it will be bombarded in a few minutes. Sha'ath was not in the house
at the time of the call; and he called his family to inform them of the warning...
Fifteen minutes after the first call and as the household were evacuating, an IOF plane dropped a bomb on
the house, destroying it completely. Hasan Radwan Shahin Sha'ath, the 69-year old owner of the house, and his son Ibrahim
(45) were killed. Their bodies were found 10 meters away from the house. They were killed by cement blocks shattered by the
bombardment. In addition, three civilians were injured. One of the injured is a second son of the dead house owner. The injured
were taken to Naser Hospital in Khan Yunis, where their injuries were listed as light to moderate. The injured are: Abdel
Rahman Hasan Sha'ath (35), Abdallah Nizar Abu Taha (29), and Mohammad Suliman Mustafa Sha'ath (35). In addition, five nearby
houses sheltering 10 families of 75 members sustained damage by the bombardment.
Click here to read the summary report from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights for the week of August 10-16
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| The writing's on the wall... |
On Sunday, August 6, Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism (QUIT!)
held a “comment wall” action at Harvey Milk Plaza. Placing newspaper articles, photos and butcher paper on the
Muni bus shelter, people were invited to write their comments about World Pride, which started that day in Jerusalem, and
the events in Lebanon and Palestine.
Jerusalem Open House statement --
WorldPride to proceed as planned - but the march will have to wait until after the end of current hostilities
"As a result of the current hostilities in the region, the Jerusalem WorldPride march will be postponed. The march, that
was scheduled to take place on August 10 in Jerusalem, requires extensive security, including police reinforcements from other
parts of the country, which the police are unable to provide for at these volatile times. Therefore, Jerusalem Open House
will hold the march at a later date, as soon as the circumstances in the region allow for the march to take place.
Other
Jerusalem WorldPride events - including the conferences, film festival, exhibitions, shows, religious and activist events,
literary events, and so on - will take place as originally planned, August 6 through August 12, in Jerusalem. The holding
of these events is part of the ongoing struggle for a democratic, free Jerusalem.
We continue to hear from attendees
from around the world informing us that
they will indeed be coming to Jerusalem. Their participation inspires us to work
toward a successful and safe WorldPride gathering in the spirit of the
principles we have always promoted: peace, tolerance,
and respect for
diversity in all its forms.
We are committed to marching in Jerusalem as we have done successfully,
annually
since 2002. A new date for this year´s Pride March in Jerusalem
will be announced as soon as a cease fire is achieved in
the region. We hope
and pray together with our colleagues and supporters around the world for a
near end to hostilities
and suffering in the region."
Speech is Not Free at SF LGBT Freedom Day
Overzealous monitors and members of San Francisco's Finest shut down
shut down distribution of a satirical product at the LGBT Freedom Day celebration.
2500 lucky festival-goers at today’s Lesbian/Gay/Bi/Trans
Freedom Day celebration received samples of a hot new product from Estee Slaughter Inc. In
the first appearance by the San Francisco-based cosmetics shrimp at the LGBTFD celebration (aka San Francisco Pride), volunteers
distributed thousands of the “RealityfoldTM” sleep mask. The
black mask, tastefully emblazoned in gold with the ES logo and “Make the Occupation Disappear,” bears this explanatory
text on its flip side:
UltraViolet: The Absolutely Very Last Article About World Pride
It will come as no news to UV’s faithful readers that the World Pride Jerusalem (WPJ) event is
finally happening this August in Jerusalem. WPJ was put off for a year due to the settler riots and other unrest that was
anticipated in conjunction with israel’s pull out from Gaza. But it is apparently going forward this year, despite the
extreme crisis in Palestinian communities caused at least in part by the withholding of customs revenues by israel and economic
aid by the u.s. and europe...
...We started the campaign not because we thought we could put a stop to WPJ, but because we were appalled
that a bunch of mostly u.s. and european queers would be crossing an international picket line to party in land that had been
wrenched from the indigenous people there, and which is still in dispute. We thought the campaign for a boycott would create
some discussion in queer communities about what’s going on in Jerusalem, the occupied territories, and israel. We hoped
it would create more awareness in queer communities of the international boycott and divestment campaign, and it would make
queer participation in that campaign more visible. We wanted to combat the oft-repeated lie that israel is the “only
democracy in the middle east,” and is a “haven” for queers in the area. We started the campaign because
we really and truly believe that the liberation of queers can only be accomplished with the liberation of Palestine, as the
liberation of Palestine can only be accomplished with the liberation of queers.
| Estee Slaughter distributors at SF Pride 2006 |
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| Who needs free speech, when we have commerce? |
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