Posted on 01/14/2005 6:43:54 PM PST by Salem
Several Berkeley residents plan to protest Sunday’s display of the remains of a Jerusalem commuter bus blown up by a suicide bomber last January. Protesters say the display, which will be held on Center Street beside Martin Luther King Jr. Park from noon to 3 p.m., is out of context and creates an inaccurate representation of the complex Middle East conflict.
Among the organizations planning to protest is the Middle East Children’s Alliance, which said it will also display pictures of the Palestinian children killed during recent violence.
“I want them to understand that there is suffering on both sides,” said Barbara Lubin, the organization’s executive director. According to Lubin, some 650 Palestinian and 120 Israeli children have died since September 2000. Several thousand adults have been killed.
The organization also wants to educate viewers about what they see as the root cause for violence on both sides: Israel’s occupation. “All of us abhor violence, but there is really only one way to stop it, and that is for Israel to get out,” she said.
The Israel Action Committee (IAC) of the East Bay is sponsoring the event. The Jerusalem Connection (formerly called Christians for Israel), a Washington D.C.-based organization, brought the bus to Washington D.C. from Europe where it was originally displayed outside The Hague to protest the International Court of Justice’s vote to condemn the separation wall Israel is building in an attempt to keep out terrorists.
IAC’s chair, Susanne “Sanne” DeWitt, has led the project, personally paying more than half of the $11,000 it cost to ship the bus across the country to Berkeley. The city is also requiring her to pay for a private security company to assist Berkeley police and to purchase $1 million worth of liability insurance.
Late last year, before the city granted her a permit, DeWitt posted a scathing letter on the Internet that said the city’s insurance and security demands, among other things, had “placed obstacles in my way at every turn.”
“They were reluctant [to issue the permit],” she said.
Lisa Caronna, the deputy city manager, said the permit request was originally submitted while the person needed to approve it was away on medical leave. Otherwise, she said the city treated the application like any other for a special event.
“We had to go through a whole variety of issues that we normally do,” she said.
DeWitt said the event is broadly supposed to address global terrorism. She said it is also a reaction to Representative Barbara Lee’s refusal to support a resolution passed by Congress in July condemning the International Court of Justice’s ruling on the wall.
“I feel that people in her district should know about her vote,” DeWitt said.
Jim Hutchens, the president of the Jerusalem Connection, said that along with the bus there will be a display of enlarged photos of the victims. This has raised concern for at least one family member of the 11 Israelis that died on the bus.
Carrie Devorah, a photojournalist based in Washington D.C., was supposed to speak at the Berkeley rally but decided to travel to Israel for the one-year anniversary, Jan. 29, of the death of her brother, Yechezkel “Chezi” Goldberg, on the bus.
Devorah said she was unaware that the tour has been using enlarged photos of the victims and said her family was never contacted for permission. While Devorah said she wants people to know about the impact of suicide bombings, she is concerned her brother’s image and name could be misused.
“It is my hope the bus will be retired after the first anniversary and be removed from the controversy it is being taken into,” she said.
They want to get killed, or "martyred", if I may use this palesclinically correct word. That culture of death, that they eagerly embraced, is infectious, lethally.
Can't have the truth told in Bezerkly, can we?
So all Palestinians are terrorists? Even the kids?
This is the excuse that Hamas use to target all Israelis.
Everyone gets conscripted so everyone is a soldier and therefore a target.
Maybe they could organize a "Rachel Corey Memorial Pancake Breakfast" to help raise funds!
Mark
I don't know, but I have a suspicion that stats from the current Islamocraze are as reliable and clear as those of our domestic gun-grabbers. I believe the Israelis target aggressors or those 'bystanders' in the immediate area of same, as a rule, and the PLA does not. For every act of violent retribution by the Israelis, the Palistinians have done a score of attacks. In addition, the PLA attacks seek innocents, not combatants, and their attacks are hugely violent and destructive.
bttt
Not all of them are actively terrorists, all of them are terrorist sympathizers, kids inlcuding.
Even the kids?
Sometimes.
This is the excuse that Hamas use to target all Israelis. Everyone gets conscripted so everyone is a soldier and therefore a target.
"All jewish women are mothers of the future israeli soldiers and therefore are a target. All jewish men are fathers of the future...", etc.. What else can one expect to come out of that palestanian culture of death and destruction? Nothing.
So the Israelis call them all terrorists and they call them all Soldiers of oppression.
Pretty Damn depressing.
Build the wall and get the hell behind it.
That is my opinion.
As I mentioned earlier, not all palestanians are actively terrorists, all of them are terrorist sympathizers.
...and they call them all Soldiers of oppression.
That is what the palestanian culture of death and destruction is about too - inventing countless excuses for not being anything else, like a culture of building lives, for instance.
Build the wall and get the hell behind it.
Walls tend to have something to be thrown over them...
Better to have the wall than not.
Easier to protect than settlements built here and there
Once the wall and disengagement are complete it will be harder for the Palestinians to commit terror acts.
I hold out hope that then a resolution of this situation will commence.
WARNING: This is a high volume ping list
"650 Palestinian and 120 Israeli children have died since September 2000"
Every last one of the deaths is due to the Arab mass-murderers.
<< Salem
".... is out of context and creates an inaccurate representation of the complex Middle East conflict."
Out of context? Looks to me to be a failure to acknowledge truth, plain and simple, on the part of the commies. >>
Those moral-equivilency-confused, mass-murder-celebrating, evil little bastards don't like the images of dead Human children being introduced into their Goebellsesque "choice" propaganda either.
Truth and Veracity overload their delusionally and psychopathologically imbalanced "minds."
Wow. This is a little odd. Whenever a situation arises in which a work of art is deemed controversial (and calls for censorship arise), I usually find myself siding-- out of a true belief in the power and freedom of artistic expression-- with left-wing supporters of the NEA, etc. But not here.
Here I find myself siding with my fellow conservatives against a group of bitter, Politically-Correct Berkely "liberals" who are taking the (usually far-right) position that their personal offense at or bias towards an exhibit gives them the right to censor the exhibit and ban/punish the artist.
Have these Bezerkely idiots completely lost it? Do they even respect their own (supposed) value systems anymore, or have they begun to sacrifice all values of freedom of speech and expression to the altar of their personal political agendas?
Don't they realize that the battle for free and open artistic expression is being set back by their odious connections with the very type of Muslim extremist who would seek to destroy all art that doesn't glorify their personal religious teachings (Allah this, infidel that)? Here, the lefties are taking sides with the repressive reactionary wingnuts (Muslim terrorists here) to promote a kind of left-wing anti-art crusade. They are saying that If the art in question happens to be sympathetic to Israel or the Jewish viewpoint, that they have the right to impose their own views on others by stepping in and destroying it. What ugly, anti-Semetic, and (in the end) anti-artistic arrogance. What ignorance. To Hell with them.
God Bless Israel, and God Bless America.
What Muslim is not an Islamist?
Hmmmm...a Berkely liberal and a ME terrorist share the same thoughts. No surprises here.
They're called "collaborators" and are beaten to death, dragged through the streets, and strung up before a mural of a smiling Arafat.
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