The International Solidarity Movement is reporting that two people, an Israeli and Palestinian protester, were shot with live ammunition during the weekly nonviolent protest in the West Bank village of Ni’lin. Both protesters were shot in the leg, and both evidently are known to film the Nil’in protests.
Perhaps related, the IDF took a more aggressive stance towards the media during the Bil’in weekly protest today as well. Above is a video of Al Jazeera English’s Jacky Rowland reporting on Bil’in’s weekly protest. Watch as the IDF begins shooting tear gas directly at her beginning about one minute into the video. Thanks to the internet this news is finally able to get out.
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i have attended the demo in bil’in and agree with the sentiment. however every week people throw rocks at the soldiers/wall – my flatmate seth goes more often and says it always happens.
now it may well be fair to throw rocks and is certainly unlikely to hurt anyone, however is it still a ‘non-violent’ protest? it didn’t feel non violent to me or the people i went with. the Palestinians i was talking to didn’t seem that concerned that is was non violent and the anarchist against the wall who organise a lot of people to go were actually up for some violence against the wall.
now all of this might be fair enough – in fact it is quite within their rights to violently resist occupation but again i feel uyncomfortable to refer to it as non violent – which the lady from al jazeera did in her report.
any thoughts?
You are right. If they threw rockets in this demonstration, they shouldn’t just be called non-violent; they should be treated like this: http://mondoweiss.net/2009/06/iranian-intifada-is-celebrated-in-the-us-while-palestinians-are-still-ignored.html
http://mondoweiss.net/2009/06/breathtaking.html
Violence against the wall is not “violence.” Bring in bulldozers, rip it up, it’s not “violence.”
When they tore down the Berlin Wall, the whole world applauded.
You will never see a report giving the real situation in Palestine, as Jacky Rowland did on that clip, in the US. It’s a sign of how corrupt the MSM is in the US. Wrapped around AIPAC’s finger. Trying to find balance in Jim Crow. Like Jim Crow systems are balanced.
Last July 1 Al Jazeera English began broadcasting in Washington, D.C., its first around-the-clock carriage in the U.S. outside of Toledo, Ohio and Burlington, Vt.
At least that was the plan…
Why involve corruption from the start? I rather like the Chomsky/Herman propaganda model of mainstream media – especially when it’s interpreted in a not cynical manner(and most people already give it a much more manipulative interpretation than Chomsky and Herman intended). It doesn’t require ill will. I recently found this article http://www.coastalpost.com/07/05/16_Words_Biased.html where a journalist describes a few intrinsic problems with western reporting. Quote The problem is not that journalists do not always adhere to their own professional codes and methods, though that does happen. It is that even if correspondents strictly obey all the rules, they still present a fundamentally biased and skewed picture of the Middle East. . If you ignore this propagandamodel then you’ll attribute too large responsibility for the way the media work to other factors as corruption or jewish ownership of the media.
Rocks are not in the same category as rubber bullets, live ammunition and tear gas.
Years ago I participated in non-violent demonstrations and direct actions in the West Bank. It was a shock when the first peaceful demonstration was met with IDF tear gas, rubber bullets, sound bombs and eventually, live bullets. I watched an Israeli news photographer being beaten to the ground by soldiers; his cameras confiscated. My first instinct was to help him. I didn’t. Was his camera considered a weapon? We ran for cover, remaining “trapped” for about two hours as the Israeli soldiers continued their violent action.
As a naive American motherand grandmother, I believed Palestinian grandmothers and mothers should stop their children from throwing those rocks. After all, the rocks hit tanks, jeeps, maybe even soldiers in riot gear; causing soldiers to “defend” themselves with tear gas and bullets. At times rock-thrower’s were injured, even killed by the bullets; but the soldiers were provoked into action, what else could they do?
Watching our non-violent action be met with violence, even live bullets shocked and then angered me. I watched as young Palestinian men, teenagers really, brought tiers quickly setting them on fire. The rock throwing began.
My motherly reaction? I wanted to hurl rocks as hard and far as I could in the direction of the IDF. Not in violence to injure but in defiance of Israel’s military; to protest of the injustice and to show I would not be bullied or have my self respect taken away. Even it it meant being shot!
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