Gaza Comes to America. Hate Demonstrations Against Israel on the East and West Coasts.

The Chesler Chronicles ^ | December 31, 2008 | Phyllis Chesler

[Tailgunner Joe]

Rally in Bloomington targets Gaza incursion - January 4, 2009 - BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - About 30 people gathered outside the Monroe County Courthouse over the weekend to protest the Israeli army's incursion into the Gaza Strip. The crowd assembled Saturday at the Monroe County Courthouse square holding signs that read, "Free Gaza," "Where's Obama?" and "No U.S. support for ethnic cleansing." James Cooper of Indiana Students Against War says Israel's action in Gaza is of importance to everyone because the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is interconnected with other violence in the Middle East. He says the current strife could lead to a large number of deaths.

[Tailgunner Joe]

Pro-Palestinian protesters march on CNN headquarters - January 03, 2009 - Protesters calling for Israel to stop its assault on Gaza lined the sidewalk in front of CNN’s headquarters Saturday. “Gaza, Gaza, don’t you cry, in our hearts, you’ll never die,” chanted the crowd, which numbered about 50 when the protest began at 2 p.m., but more than doubled in size within 30 minutes. Some held signs calling for Israel to end its attacks on Hamas-occupied Gaza. Others compared the massacre to the Holocaust or to South Africa’s apartheid. “The perpetual violence has to stop,” said Tim Franzen , who works for the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization. Franzen said the group has staff in Gaza.

Saturday’s protest is the third in Atlanta this week. The other two were held last Saturday and Tuesday in front of the Consulate General of Israel . The protestors decided to gather in front of CNN to call attention to media coverage of the attacks, which are in their eighth day. “The media in the U.S. has a tradition of not providing an unbiased message,” said Ziyaad Lunat , one of the protest organizers. “They dehumanize the Palestinians.” The Emory Advocates for Justice in Palestine; Athens Justice for Palestine; and the International Action Center organized the protest. Similar ones are being held in other cities across the nation and in other countries. “Every person here is outraged by the military assault in Gaza,” said Dianne Mathiowetz , one of the organizers. “This, under all international law, is a war crime.”

[Tailgunner Joe]

Dozens gather in Iowa City to protest Gaza violence - January 03, 2009 - The protest was organized by People for Justice in Palestine and the University of Iowa Antiwar Committee. Members of both organizations stood in the cold for about an hour, holding signs in support of peace, Palestinian flags waving in the wind.

http://www.iowapjp.org/

http://www.uiantiwar.org/

[Tailgunner Joe]

200 protest Israel bombing Gaza - 12/31/2008 - "We're very concerned about the indiscriminate bombing of innocents in Gaza," said Frances ReMillard, whose group, Utahns for a Just Peace in the Holy Land, organized the protest. "Our government has taken the stance that Israel deserves to live in peace and security. Our position is that Palestinians deserve the same."

Rose Jones, a retired police officer who is majoring in political science, Middle East Studies and Arabic at the University of Utah, said she has witnessed firsthand some of the violence. She said she came under fire from Israeli soldiers while in the city of Ni'lin in the West Bank in November. She said Israeli soldiers began gassing the group she was with, and stopped only after she removed her hijab, showing her blonde hair. "When the smoke cleared, I looked up and there was a line of boys, some only five or six, who had stood up in front of me to defend me," she said. "They were throwing rocks, trying to save me, even though I was the one paying for the weapons that were being fired at us." She hopes to go to law school after completing her degree and return to what she hopes is then a Palestine state and work as an attorney.

http://jphl.org/

[Tailgunner Joe]

Seattle protesters call for peaceful end to Gaza Strip conflict - January 4, 2009 - The morning news of Israel's ground attacks in Gaza gave a sense of urgency to a Palestinian-organized demonstration at Seattle's Westlake Park on Saturday, where some 500 gathered to support a peaceful end to the conflict in the Gaza Strip. Nearly a dozen community groups of various religious, ethnic and political backgrounds co-sponsored the protest.

"Cease fire now," read some signs. And: "Stop the real terrorists/ US-Israeli war machine," and, "As a Jew, I cannot support attacks on civilians."

Neil Fox, who is Jewish, attended the protest with his wife and two daughters, who are 8 and 10. He described his own upbringing as Zionist but said he hopes to pass a different legacy on to his own children. He and his wife send their girls to Middle East Peace Camp for Children in Seattle's Magnuson Park to ensure they have personal connections to Palestinian and Muslim children, he said. American Jews, he said, have a particular responsibility to speak out against the Israeli government's military actions. "As a Jew, I want to tell Israel that they're not doing this in my name," he said.

http://www.middleeastpeacecamp.org/

Hundreds march in Seattle to protest Israeli attacks on Gaza - January 3, 2009 - In the crowd, Wendy Somerson, 40, a Jewish woman from Seattle, clutched a sign that read, "The State of Israel Betrays Jewish Values." "We don't support collective punishment of the Palestinian people. All people are equal and all lives are equal," said Somerson, a member of Jewish Voice for Peace. "The 400 Palestinian lives. We're mourning them just as we're mourning the four Israeli lives," she added, referring to those who have died recently. Voices of Palestine and other groups, including The Church Council of Greater Seattle and Jewish Voice for Peace, organized the rally.

http://www.voicesofpalestine.org/

http://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/

[Tailgunner Joe]

Rally in downtown Dallas protests Israeli attacks on Gaza - December 31, 2008 - In a peaceful demonstration at Dealey Plaza, men, women and young children held signs with a variety of slogans including "Stop the Holocaust in Gaza" and "Israel is the Real Terrorist."

In a speech to the crowd, Mustafaa Carroll, executive director of the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, called for an end to the "bombardment" of Gaza. He said residents have been denied food, water and other necessities. "Palestine must be given some hope of freedom from Israeli occupation," he said. The Rev. Charles Stovall, senior pastor of Munger Place United Methodist Church, also appealed for Israel to stop the strikes. "This is not a Muslim issue. This is not a Jewish issue," he said. "This is an issue of humanitarian rights." The crowd cheered at his words and chanted: "Occupation is a crime."

The Dallas protest, organized by the Muslim Legal Fund of America and the local chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, follows similar rallies around the world. "What's going on in the Gaza Strip is an atrocity and it needs to stop," said Noor Elashi, the daughter of Ghassan Elashi, one of five Holy Land Foundation defendants recently convicted of conspiring to send money to Hamas.

Local Muslims protest Gaza strikes - January 2, 2009 - "We need to tell the whole world, especially Austinites that your tax dollars nowadays are being used to buy F-16'S that will drop 2-thousand, 3-ton bombs on civilians in the Gaza Strip and that is absolutely unacceptable," says Mohammad Al Bedaiwi, a member of the Austin Network for Islamic Studies.

http://austinmuslims.com/

[familyop]

Regarding your comment #66, I wouldn’t blame Orthodox Jewish people for being more wary of taking Irish and Norwegian conversion candidates.

[familyop]

...Irish and Danish, rather.

[Tailgunner Joe]

Add this guy to the list:

"We're Jewish people making a statement," said demonstrator Jeff Warner. "I think it's important because Jewish Americans are assumed to back Israel no matter what it does, which is not true."

Warner... isn't that a *gasp* GERMAN name?