Wednesday, 31 March 2010

Vatican Hotline Outrage

The Catholic Church’s move to open a hotline to report sex abuse has infuriated victims who say it’s another ploy to keep the church’s darkest secrets under lock and key.

The Roman Catholic Church is the last place victims of predator priests should turn to. That, according to victims, is how the church got into this mess in the first place. And it’s why victims’ groups are outraged by a new church-sponsored hotline for victims to report alleged crimes.

“Victims should tell loved ones and police first,” said David Clohessy of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP. “Calling the church should be a last resort.”

The church does not agree. On Tuesday, days after SNAP inaugurated a new support group for church abuse victims in Pope Benedict’s home country of Germany, a local bishop there, Stephan Ackermann, announced the creation of the hotline.

As the world’s Catholics celebrate the solemn Holy Week leading up to Easter Sunday this weekend, the mother church in Rome is strategizing a complex defense to combat both the growing number of alleged victim accusations and a slew of new sex abuse lawsuits against the Vatican itself.

At the heart of the controversy is not the crime itself, pedophilia, but the cover-up by church officials. Hundreds of Catholics across Europe and the United States who claim to have been abused by priests as children have come forward in the last few months, each with a similar story. When they or their families told church officials about the sexual abuse, they either were accused of lying or they were asked to sign an agreement not to go to the civil authorities.

Leaders of SNAP warn that the hotline is not a useful outlet for victims and survivors of abuse. Instead they say it is a new layer of self-protective bureaucracy for the church to hide behind. “We urge victims to not call this phone number, for their sake and the sake of others,” the organizers of SNAP announced in a global press release. “Reports of abuse should go to the independent professionals in law enforcement, not the biased, self-serving staff in chancery offices.” More

Law firm implicates Vatican, Pope in abuse case

Alleged victim's lawyers: Vatican protected priest

Is AIPAC Still the Chosen One?

For decades, AIPAC has dominated DC's Israel lobby. But a popular president and dissent within the advocacy ranks could lead to a showdown on Middle East policy.

Jeremy Ben-Ami, the slight and soft-spoken executive director of J Street, says the change on Capitol Hill is palpable. More and more members of Congress see AIPAC as an obstacle to America's crucial national interest—a durable Middle East peace deal. "Our role is to demonstrate that there is significant and meaningful political support for leadership to achieve peace," Ben-Ami says.

In January, when Obama named former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell as his special Middle East envoy, J Street got 104 legislators to sign a statement supporting Mitchell. (The traditional Israel lobby views Mitchell, in the words of the Anti-Defamation League's Abraham Foxman, as a little too "even-handed.") In May, when AIPAC's warning letter to Obama began amassing signatures in the House—it ultimately got 328—J Street and its allies put out a competing House letter calling for strong American leadership that accumulated 86 names. "There are a number of members of Congress who are seeking out new voices on the issue," says Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Md.), one of those 86, who visited Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza in May. "There is still a resistance to having open, honest dialogue out of fear about being on the wrong side of AIPAC, but I'm not going to be driven by what one lobby says. What I learned on my trip is that I don't think AIPAC represents even the majority view in Israel."

Netanyahu, who made a pilgrimage to Capitol Hill last spring after meeting with Obama, discovered the emerging new reality firsthand. The Forward, a Jewish newspaper based in Manhattan, quoted the prime minister's aides as saying their boss was "stunned" by "what seemed like a well-coordinated attack against his stand on settlements," even from traditional Israel supporters like John Kerry (D-Mass.), who chairs the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee—as well as representatives Berman and Henry Waxman (D-Calif.). While all have impeccable credentials with the Israel lobby, it's clear that they're increasingly unhappy with Jerusalem's hard-right tilt. And when legislators can point to different views within the Israel policy community, it's harder for groups like AIPAC to accuse them of being anti-Israel. More

The Convenient Media Rope-A-Dope With The Pope

I had written something yesterday and I just couldn't put it up. It was all true- so far as I know what the truth is- but it was a hard, hammering diatribe and I'm getting sick of that. Hopefully I will be more successful today, at least on my own terms.

The thing that hits my mind, over and over, and... is the inescapable reality of our present day, is that perceptions and events are being manipulated for the benefit of the people manipulating them and... nothing is going to change until their power to do so has ended... by whatever means necessary. This seems obvious and hardly needs to be said. The thing is, it's obvious to you and me but not to the people who really need to catch on if there is any hope of change (we can believe in... snicker).

Yes, the Pope is a perverse and ironic cartoon but all this information we are hearing has been out there for a long, long time. Is it breaking now because cosmic forces (for those of you who believe in such things) have demanded it? Is it breaking because certain vested interests who control the media (big hint) want the church destroyed so that they can continue in their efforts to destroy Christianity and to bestialize and enslave humanity? Is it a combination of both, without the latter knowing this, because it doesn't believe in the former... unless you count the ancient demon they worship?


This isn't accidental. What you should be thinking about is why? Those controlling the media and all the pornographic empires that have the dual purpose of making money and destroying humanity; they are also in control of every gay movement; most human rights movements and god knows what else and all of these are being used to drive the world toward a global pre-war cabaret society only... much, much worse and with a higher percentage of whores and serving staff with the rest either dead or in camps.

The health care bill was written by the insurance companies so that now, you not only still don't have health care but you have to pay for it too. The Republicans are touting this tea party horror that will accomplish nothing but allow people too stupid to think, a way to channel their rage. The terrible irony in all of this is that the AMA-Pharmaceutical combine is invested in making you sick instead of healing you so that you can now pay to be made worse off than when you went in to be healed.


Think about the mentality of the kind of people who are doing the manipulating. Would they stop short of anything if they could profit from it? No.


As it stands now, the system has to come down. They know what they are up against and that is why they are starting to arrest so-called militias and why they did 9/11 in the first place. They have arranged the laws so that anyone can be declared a terrorist for just about any reason and the kicker is that one has no choice; if they are at all still human, except to become a freedom fighter, which automatically makes you a terrorist.


The purpose of showcasing The Pope is to create a target for public outrage. The purpose of this Tea Party scam is to create a channel for outrage and there will be other targets and other channels because this is just the prelude to something else and they have to stay at it or else you might even realize that they are the one's doing it all.
They have been dumbing down the population for some time to militate against any kind of mass catching on and it's worked. Most people are now watching a 3 Card Monte Game all day long and they just can't figure out why they never can pick the queen. The queen isn't there dummy, no matter which card you pick. The shills in the game; the people who show up and appear to be winning- so that you will be sucked in to playing- and the people cheering and encouraging from the sidelines are all part of the scam. Now you can just transpose this analogy into real life and see who we are talking about in present terms.


Stop looking at what is in front of you as if that's what's happening. That is not what's happening. What is happening is going on behind what you are looking at and something is going on behind that too.


As it stands now, there is no way for humanity to climb out of this torture porn without eliminating what has the upper hand over all that they experience. Therefore, this is going to happen in some way and with some degree of severity. The good news is that evil will destroy itself but... you don't want to be standing too close when that happens. A lot of people are going to be because they are just too confused and invested to be able to step back.


Has anyone made Pope Soap on a Rope yet? Some of you who need money out there might think about making this and selling it on EBay. Now is the time to capitalize on this sad affair. Hold it a moment... some people already are.


I've no desire to defend this pope. I could see the cut of his gown from the beginning and a number of us knew about his previous duties. It could well be what he learned in that office that led to his being voted pope. I suspect they had no choice. Whatever you think you know about this affair, it is much bigger than that. Furthermore, no matter what is going on in the various churches, since they threw everything meaningful out of the window, while keeping the cash register, the Zio-Nazis are exponentially worse. The danger of the Zio-Nazis is, far and away, beyond these other things and just about anything bad that is happening, they have a hand in. They are joined by opportunists of every stripe and the motivation is to be one of those who are behind the right side of the wire.


Most of what is going on at the moment is a distraction. When it is not a distraction, it is a prelude. The key to what is intended can be discovered by studying changes in the laws. There are the evidences of intent. We know that 9/11 was done by Israel in concert with willing elements in the US and UK governments. All the changes they made in the laws to protect us from foreign and domestic enemies [which they happen to be] have been geared toward where they have brought you and where they are taking you. Anyone who claims to be informed and is in the public eye and does not acknowledge what is true is working for them in some capacity or too scared to be honest and then... should probably shut up because they are doing more harm than good.


When someone comes along and tells you that the Saudis control Hollywood and points your attention to 'everyone but' Zionist Israel, then that person is in their employ. That person is making a whole lot of money by telling you lies. The United States has no greater enemy than Israel and the solution is to remove from government everyone who supports Rothschildlandia and to cut off ties with Israel and toss everyone who is from that criminal organization out of the country and forbid their return. More

Words! Words! Words! The shackles that bind the US to Israel

Sonja Karbar reminds us that beyond Washington’s superficial admonishing of Israel over its humiliation of the Obama administration lie the unbreakable shackles that paralyse the US and prevent it from translating its words into real action to rein in the Zionist monster.

”The disconnect between words and actions might please those who want peace more than they want justice for the Palestinians, but for many the words have been done to death. By the time proximity talks morph into full negotiations, there will be no Jerusalem left to negotiate and no Palestinians left in Jerusalem. All words will then be meaningless.”

“There isn’t one I haven’t heard” or so goes one of the lines in a well-known American musical. Yet, this time the world is imbuing the words with new meaning when it comes to US-Israel relations. The hope is that at long last the US is going to discipline Israel.

Alas, in the flurry of words, the music has not changed. America seems as much bedazzled by Israel as a parent who is blind to the antics of an over-indulged, demanding child. No amount of insults seems to shatter the illusion that the precious being is in fact a monster.

Just as the parent can no longer control a child’s obnoxious behaviour, so too America finds itself hamstrung by Israel’s illegal settlement expansion into Palestinian territory and its determination to take and Judaise all of Jerusalem. And while this time there have been some firm admonishments, there have been no follow-up consequences. America is lapsing into the same old routine of placating Israel with promises to keep the faith.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference in Washington DC provided the meeting place for the usual Israel love-in. There, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu plumbed the depths. He lied when he said that Jews had built Jerusalem 3,000 years ago. He lied when he said it was theirs to build again. He lied when he said “it is our capital”.

No one pulled him up over those lies. Instead, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton waffled on about how Israel’s behaviour exposes the daylight between them that others in the region hope to exploit – the same daylight that US Vice-President Joe Biden vowed did not exist between the two countries – and how it endangers the proximity talks and America’s essential role in bringing those to fruition. But, not before she had told the audience that America’s commitment to Israel was “rock solid, enduring, unwavering and forever”. More

Israel's Blood Diamonds

By Seán Clinton

Every year, consumers the world over unwittingly spend billions of dollars on diamonds crafted in Israel, thereby helping to fund one of the world's most protracted and contentious conflicts. Most people are unaware that Israel is one of the world's leading producers of cut and polished diamonds. As diamonds are normally not hallmarked, consumers cannot distinguish an Israeli diamond from one crafted in India, Belgium, South Africa or elsewhere. The global diamond industry and aligned governments, including the EU, have hoodwinked consumers into believing the diamond trade has been cleansed of diamonds that fund human rights abuses, but the facts are startlingly different.

Israel -- which stands accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, genocide, the crime of apartheid, extrajudicial executions within and outside the territory it controls and persistent serious breaches of the Geneva Conventions -- is the world's leading exporter of diamonds (see Figure 1 below). Israeli companies import rough diamonds for cutting and polishing, adding significantly to their value, and export them globally via distribution hubs in Antwerp, London, Hong Kong, New York and Mumbai.


Figure 1

In July 2000, the global diamond industry set up the World Diamond Council (WDC). The WDC was established as a response to public outrage about the use of diamonds to fund bloody conflicts in western African countries and it includes representatives from the World Federation of Diamond Bourses and the International Diamond Manufacturers Association. The council's ultimate mandate is "the development, implementation and oversight of a tracking system for the export and import of rough diamonds to prevent the exploitation of diamonds for illicit purposes such as war and inhumane acts." Significantly, the WDC limits its concern about human rights violations to those funded by rough diamonds only.

In 2003, the WDC introduced a system of self-regulation called the Kimberly Process Certification Scheme to stem the flow of "conflict" or "blood diamonds." In keeping with the limited concerns of the WDC the UN-mandated Kimberly Process adopted a very narrow definition of what constitutes a conflict or blood diamond: "rough diamonds used by rebel movements or their allies to finance conflict aimed at undermining legitimate governments." As a result of this tight ring-fencing, the much more lucrative trade in cut and polished diamonds avoids the human rights strictures applying to rough diamonds, provided the industry uses only Kimberly Process-compliant rough diamonds. Regardless of the human rights violations and atrocities funded by revenue from the Israeli diamond industry, governments and other vested interests party to the Kimberly Process facilitate the unrestricted access of diamonds crafted in Israel to the multi-billion dollar global diamond market.

The WDC created a web site called Diamondfacts.org to promote the virtues of the industry. It lists 24 facts extolling the benefits of the diamond industry -- primarily to India and countries in Africa. Some of the benefits include that an estimated 5 million people have access to appropriate healthcare globally thanks to revenues from diamonds; diamond revenues enable every child in Botswana to receive free education up to the age of 13; the revenue from diamonds is instrumental in the fight against the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

While these facts are laudable the list makes no mention of other less savory facts, including the fact that revenue from the diamond industry in Israel helps fund atrocities and human rights abuses such as the killing, maiming and terrorizing of thousands of innocent men, women and children in Palestine and Lebanon -- the sort of atrocities the Kimberly Process is supposed to prevent being funded by revenue from diamonds.

The list of "Diamond Facts" paints a one-sided, positive image of the industry. It implies that the greatest benefits are being felt in some of the poorest nations of the world. But Israel, one of the wealthiest nations, towers over all other countries in terms of the net benefit derived from the diamond industry. The added value to the Israeli economy from the export of diamonds was nearly $10 billion in 2008 (see Figure 2 below).

Figure 2

The WDC website is equally selective when it comes to providing information about which countries are most dependent on diamonds. It explains that Namibia, one of the minor diamond exporting countries in monetary terms, derives 40 percent (<$1 billion) of its annual export earnings from diamonds and that 33 percent ($3 billion) of the GDP of Botswana, another minor player, is derived from diamond exports. The WDC fails to mention that the much more lucrative, high-value end of the diamond industry is the main artery of the Israeli economy, accounting for more than 30 percent of Israel's total manufacturing exports worth nearly $20 billion in 2008 (" ("Trade Performance HS: Exports of Israel"accessed 25 March 2010) (See Figures 3 and 4). By comparison, the budget for Israel's Ministry of Defense was $16 billion in 2008.


Figure 3


Figure 4

Revenue from the diamond industry helps fund Israel's illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories, its brutal subjugation of the Palestinian people and its international network of saboteurs, spies and assassins. None of this is alluded to in the WDC's "Diamond Facts."

Contrary to claims by the diamond industry and jewelers that all diamonds are now conflict free, they are not. Israel's dominant position in the industry means that diamonds crafted in Israel are interspersed globally with diamonds crafted in other countries. Consumers who purchase diamonds that are not laser-inscribed to identify where they were crafted run a significant risk of purchasing a diamond crafted in Israel, thereby helping to fund gross human rights violations. The Kimberly Process Certification Scheme strictures only apply to rough diamonds, thus allowing diamonds crafted in Israel to freely enter the market regardless of the criminal actions of the Israeli government and armed forces. The Kimberly Process is seriously flawed and is being used by the diamond industry and jewelers to pull the wool over consumers' eyes by telling them that all diamonds are now "conflict free" without explaining the limitations and exactly what that means.

All this is hardly surprising given Israel's dominant position in the diamond industry. Israel currently chairs the Kimberly Process. The notion of self-regulation by any industry that is intrinsically linked to the violations it purports to want to eliminate is something that neither governments nor the general public should tolerate. It is impossible for the public to have confidence in the diamond industry's attempt to self-regulate as long as it facilitates the trade in diamonds crafted in Israel, which, if the Kimberly Process applied the same standards to all diamonds, would rightly be classified as blood diamonds and treated accordingly.

Given the failure of Western governments to hold Israel to account for numerous breaches of international law including international humanitarian law, breaches of the UN Charter, its failure to abide by more than 30 binding UN Security Council Resolutions, breaches of EU Agreements and disregard for the 2004 advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice, they are unlikely to insist that the diamond industry broaden the definition of a conflict diamond to include cut and polished diamonds that fund human rights abuses.

Consumers should have the right to know where a diamond was crafted and consequently the right to choose an Israel-free diamond. These rights are not available to consumers today.

In 2005, Palestinian civil society called for an international campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel similar to that which helped bring an end to the apartheid regime in South Africa. The international BDS campaign has to date focused much of its boycott activities on the most easily targeted Israeli products including fruit, vegetable, cosmetics and some plastic products. Targeting these products helps to increase public awareness of Israeli crimes and to some extent satisfies the public's desire to register disapproval of Israel's actions. However, these products account for only a small fraction of Israel's total manufacturing exports. Even if the boycott of these products was totally successful it would not make a significant difference to the Israeli economy or to Israel's ability to further its expansionist goals.


Figure 5

The diamond industry is a major pillar of the Israeli economy (see Figure 5 above). No other developed country is so heavily dependent on a single luxury commodity and the goodwill of individual consumers globally. Anything that threatens the carefully-nurtured image of diamonds as objects of desire, romance and purity could have serious consequences for the Israel diamond industry and the country's ability to continue funding its illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories, the construction of illegal colonies and other associated criminal activities that render it the pariah of the modern age.

The international BDS campaign needs to focus global attention on the diamond trade that facilitates Israel's ongoing crimes against the Palestinian people and its neighbors in the region.

Seán Clinton is the chairperson of the Limerick branch of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign and a former Boycott Officer on the National Committee of theIreland Palestine Solidarity Campaign..

Celebrating The Land; Celebrating Palestine

The Palestinian calendar is full of special days. Growing up, day after day and year after year, we were introduced to these special days, and with time more such days joined our calendar. Almost every month there is something to commemorate; a day to commemorate the Nakba of the Palestinian people, a day to remember the martyrs killed by the Israeli occupation army, a day to remember every crime committed by Israel and its allies against the people of Palestine. And there are days when we celebrate our legitimate rights: we celebrate our right to self-determination by remembering the heroes of our resistance movement, we celebrate our right to live freely in our land by remembering the prisoners imprisoned for freedom, and we celebrate our right to live by celebrating Palestinian mothers, celebrating Palestinian children and celebrating the reason for all other celebrations: we celebrate Palestine.

But of all the Palestinian special days, maybe one of the most important days is the Palestinian "Land Day". In addition to the Nakba commemoration day, the "Land Day" was somehow always dominant. It is a day of protest; a day when demonstrations and marches unite Palestinians in occupied Palestine with those in the Diaspora. It is a day we all participate in because it is our day; the day of the Palestinian people and their land. It is a day to commemorate and a day of tribute to those who fell for Palestine, for the land and for our national identity. It is a day to shout out loudly that we are all part of the Palestinian people and the Palestinian cause, sharing the identity, the pain and the struggle. It is a day of solidarity amongst Palestinians everywhere and with the whole free conscientious world. It is a day to embrace the land, to embrace Palestine. Land day is Palestine day, a day of protest against Zionism and its Zionist entity and its theft of Palestinian land. Land Day is a day for us to declare that we are all Palestine and that Palestine is one: from the River to the Sea.

My earliest memory of the Land Day was when I was a small child staying at my grandparents house in Dheisheh refugee camp. That morning, the house was completely empty except for my grandmother, my sister and me. After hearing the rain of bullets outside and being told by a neighbour that the soldiers are shooting at school children, my grandmother told my sister and me to stay in the bedroom and not leave the house and went to the UNRWA school to protect the children. At home, hearing the gun shots, the screams, the sounds of clashes outside, my sister and I took refuge under the bed and I only left it when I heard a big bang in the house and went to look what had happened; a gas bomb had crashed into the house through the bathroom window and had filled the whole house with suffocating gas. I ran to the kitchen looking for the onions as we were taught to do in such cases. I clearly remember how when I saw that gas canister whirling in the house with its cloud of poisonous gas I was fixed in my place first, looking at it and watching it whirl before kicking it back into the bathroom. That day, my father came to take us back home before the situation worsened and a curfew was imposed. On the way to the car, there was another sight I will never forget: that of the main Jerusalem Hebron road running along Dheisheh filled with Israeli soldiers armed from head to toe and shooting everywhere and at everyone. As we ran towards the car, I kept looking at my father fearing he might get hit by one of the thousand bullets flying around us. That day I got to know the Israeli occupation and its brutality, and what it means to be a Palestinian oppressed by Zionist soldiers who know no mercy; I was a child and no one told me lies and propaganda or taught me to hate as the Zionists keep claiming. It was the reality of our life, it was what we encountered daily, it was the Israeli crimes committed on a daily basis against an unarmed occupied people that opened our eyes to what occupation and Zionism are. That day, the "Land Day", a Palestinian child from Dheisheh was killed by the IOF. I don’t remember his name, I was only a child, but I remember the shooting, the gas and Israeli occupation soldiers everywhere waging a war against unarmed Palestinians.

Growing up, the land was always part of my upbringing and the upbringing of every Palestinian. We didn’t go to Paris or London for the summer vacation, like some "PA" families do these days. The only places for us were Sawahreh, Jerusalem and Dheisheh. Other "holiday destinations" were Hebron and Nablus, but only to visit my uncles in Israeli prisons there. When in the 1980’s the Israeli occupation army surrounded Dheisheh refugee camp with a barbed wire and Zinc plates, it caused somewhat of a sensation. Dheisheh was practically transformed into an open air prison. All entrances to the refugee camp were closed with cement and barrels and the main entrance had a revolving door which the residents called "Ma’atta Il Jaj" i.e. chicken plucker. And in that big prison the Israeli army patrolled the streets and the alleys. It was a prison as we know prisons from TV or from real life. Every half an hour or an hour, depending on the general political situation, a patrol of sometimes 6 sometimes up to 12 Israeli soldiers would pass our street. During the day, we children would just stop playing and watch as they pass, and in the night we would lie in bed and count as they pass: 1, 2, 3, 4… till the last soldier had left our street. while studying in Germany, it happened a couple of times that at night I would wake up to the sound of a group of people running up or down the staircase in my building, and would automatically start counting; 1,2,3… before realizing where I was and that these weren’t Israeli soldiers. We would be sitting in the living room watching cartoons, and they would be sitting on our roof or on the roof of the neighbours pointing their guns towards us. And when they leave the roof, they would leave a dump site behind them, would even use the water tanks as their WC knowing that the refugee camp often suffered from water shortages. But this was nothing compared to their arrest raids, when they would beat everyone and turn everything upside down. And to escape that "prison", we used to run to Artas, Nahaleen and Al-Khader. No one I know in Dheisheh ever said I am from Dheisheh. They all had homes and want to return to these homes. Dheisheh is a temporary stop, a forced stop until total liberation and the return to Jrash, Deiraban, Zakariya, Al-Malha and all the other towns and villages. These villages are not erased, for they exist in our hearts and on our maps. So, you would be sitting in the prison called Dheisheh and would hear stories about places that seem far away but are closer than you would think. You would hear about the valleys, the hills and the beautiful houses, about the apple and the almond tree in the backyard, about the wheat fields dancing under the sun, about the water spring singing to the butterflies. And you would lean forward and smell the fresh-baked bread and the Jasmines on the windowsill and you would stretch your hand to pick an apple or touch the sea of wheat or splash the running water. For it is all there, waiting for those who were once forced out of their homes to come back and rebuild the homes, plant the apple and almond trees, bake bread and sing under the olive trees.

And when in Sawahreh, we used to spend the time on the land. The land was our home, out haven and our playground. The fields and the prairies, the hilltops and the valleys were our home, the home we were born to, the home to which we always return, the home we loved and which loved us back. The olive and almond fields were our haven, we would sit beneath them and think of life, cry our pain in silence, celebrate our joy, and plan for the future. The hills of Jerusalem were our playground; we would follow the shepherds and their goats, race to the strange round stone structures that spread everywhere. We would climb the trees in search of bird nests and sneak into the caves in search of snake nests. We would see who was fastest to slide down a hill without getting bruised and who would fastest to climb up the hill without sliding back to the base. The fields were our playground; we would play hide and seek amongst the olive trees, and play house and school under the almond trees, and we would take an afternoon swim in the sea of wheat. We would make a swing under the cypress trees and see who would fly the highest, and we would sit under the fig trees and enjoy its fruits while telling folktales. We would search the caves and the hilltops, the pathways and the fields for traces of the folktales we heard from grandmother. We would wake up early in the morning to see the sun rise, hear the birds and smell the fresh air. We would sit up late outside, not talking but listening to the land talk to us. In the springs we loved the sight of the blossoming almond trees and the thousands of poppies that made a beautiful carpet of the land. In the summers we loved the sight of the golden wheat fields and loved the smell of burned wheat. In the autumns we loved to join the harvest and looked forward to the first rainfall. In the winters we loved to run in the olive fields under the rain and wait for the rainbows to decorate the Jerusalem sky. We were the rulers over the lands and the land was our kingdom. And when I came back from Germany, I wanted to see it all again, live it all again. And when I stood on top of the hill and looked around me I saw the land that was once was not there, instead the Zionist colonies have spread from one side to the other, engulfing the land and blocking the sunrise and the rainbows. Instead, there stood a "container checkpoint" as the people call it, dividing the area into two and standing between me and the prairies of my childhood and youth. Instead, there stood a wall imprisoning Jerusalem, besieging the city and strangling it. Instead, there were IOF military camps on the hilltops, killing the birds in the sky and the poppies on the ground. And I saw Jerusalem empty and sad and I saw Al-Aqsa a prisoner in its own home. Today, there are prisons everywhere in occupied Palestine. You travel from Jerusalem to the south, passing the villages of Bethlehem and Hebron and would only encounter one concentration camp after the other; everywhere the land is surrounded by barbed wire and there is a sign big enough for everyone to see: No access allowed. Refugee camps and some villages are even surrounded by barbed wire as Dheisheh once was. All the way, the same view would be repeated; armed Zionist colonists roaming the roads of Palestine and waving their machine guns. Bus stops with children of the Zionist colonists laughing and playing, protected by Israeli soldiers or Zionists colonists, while Palestinian children going to school or returning from school have to walk all the way to their villages passing these bus stops and wondering if they will be harassed or even killed by these Zionist usurpers. I remember travelling several times from Bethlehem to Hebron, watching one Zionist colony after the other, one barbed and "closed" area after the other. I remember thinking: all that has remained for us are a few ghettos here and there. Watching the colonies spreading like cancer on the hills of Palestine while the so-called leaders of the Palestinian people beg the Israelis for a water well or an extra millimetre in Ramallah, I thought of the Nakba and of the land.

Do you Remember Jrash? Deiraban? Zakariya? Al-Malha? Al-Walaje? Al-Birra? Sirin? Do even know these and all the other places? Have you even heard of them?

Palestine is not only Ramallah and Bethlehem, Nilin and Bilin. Palestine is the sea breeze in Akka, the sunrise in Al-Majdal, the green meadows in Al-Jaleel, the romantic desert of An-Naqab. Palestine is the arches of Jerusalem, it is the mountains of Jericho, it is the grapevines of Hebron, it is the hilltops of Nablus, it is the sea waves of Gaza. It is the 531 Palestinian villages and towns depopulated and destroyed by the Zionists during the Nakba. Palestine is the villages and towns that are there in our memory, it is the ancient mosque and the beautiful church that still stand witness to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, it is the olive and almond trees that stand witness to the Palestinians who worked this land, it is the graves that stand witness to the generations that lived in this land and died in it, it is the stones scattered where once beautiful homes decorated the area and stand witness to a history that refuses to be erased. Palestine is Haifa, Yaffa, Al-Jalil and all of Jerusalem, it is Ras Il-Naqoura and Im Il-Rashrash, it is the land between the River and the Sea. And because Palestine is all of this, we celebrate it all, every part of it, and we will defend every part of it and this land will always be part of us and we are part of it.

The Zionist entity is built on the theft of Palestinian land, and the infamous Zionist quote "A Land without a people for a people without a land" has been used to usurp Palestine and to ethnically cleanse it of its indigenous people. But Palestine was never empty and its lands have an owner: the Palestinians who loved their land and cared for it (see And then they came and turned our paradise into a desert). And despite the many waves of Zionist colonists coming to usurp Palestine, Palestinians remained the majority in Palestine till the eve of the Nakba: of the 2,156,700 people living in Palestine, 1,693,700 were indigenous Muslim, Christian and Jewish Palestinians, making 79% of the total population. Zionists tried owning Palestinian land by ways of trickery, theft and some bought lands from non-Palestinians because of the Ottoman Land Codes which allowed Palestinian lands to pass into the hands of foreigners who didn’t even live in Palestine and later sold the land to Zionists. But despite all Zionist efforts to control Palestinian land, until the eve of the Nakba Palestinians owned 87.5% of the total area of Palestine, while Jews owned only 6.6%, the remaining 5.9% were classified as "state land" by the British mandate government. During the Nakba, Palestinian villages were ethnically cleansed and destroyed, erased to forge history and hide the fact they ever existed. The goal was always the land, Zionists knew and know that without stealing Palestinian land their entity is meaningless. And so, the theft of Palestinian land continued after the Nakba and plans were being prepared for the theft of the rest of Palestine, i.e. East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. And while the Zionists were crying "Nazis" and "Holocaust" and refusing to "forgive" Germany, they were cashing money from Europe and others openly and from Germany in secret, and their planners were implementing the Nazi regional planning policies in occupied Palestine.

The "Judaization" of Palestine is a Zionist state policy aiming at ethnically cleansing all of Palestine, preventing the return of the millions of Palestinian refugees, forcing the rest of Palestinians out of Palestine and having control over all Palestinian land. The process of "Judaizing" Palestine began long before the Nakba. As early as 1882 and maybe earlier European Zionists were preparing regional plans for Palestinian cities they wanted to occupy and "Judaize". This policy culminated during the Nakba, when around 80% of the Palestinian population was forced out of their homes, towns and villages by Zionist terror militias and made refugees. Around 531 Palestinian villages and towns (85% of all Palestinian villages and towns) were ethnically cleansed of their residents, destroyed and many completely erased off the face of the earth. In their place Zionist colonies were built and the lands belonging to these villages were confiscated to build more Zionist colonies and parks. Some 25 laws, including ancient Ottoman and British mandate laws and newly drafted Zionist laws such as the "Land Acquisition Law" of 1953 and the "Absentees’ Property Law" of 1950, were used to confiscate Palestinian land and declare it state land. The aim was: stealing land and property of Palestinian refugees and others who although live in occupied Palestine were considered absentees and increase Jewish presence in Palestinian areas to prevent Palestinian majority points in "Israel". Land belonging to Palestinian living in occupied Palestine was confiscate with excuses such as "security" or "settlement activities" and Palestinian access to these lands was prohibited. While restrictions are placed on Palestinian building and land ownership, Jews from all over the world have the right to the land of the Palestinians.

The "Judaizaion" of the Galilee was always one of the main projects of the Zionist entity. "In a speech addressing the Zionist Action Committee on April 6, 1948 Ben Gurion said: We will not be able to win this war if we do not, during the war, populate upper and lower, eastern and western Galilee, the Negev and Jerusalem area … I believe that war will also bring in its wake a great change in the distribution of [Palestinian] Arab population." And prior to the Operation Hiram in October 1948, the Israeli Foreign ministry advised its terrorist army "to try during the conquest [to make sure] that no [Palestinian] Arabs inhabitants remain in the Galilee and certainly that no refugees from other places remain there."[1] As later with the Zionist colonization in the West Bank and the "Judaization" of Jerusalem, the "Judaization" of the Galilee was encouraged by government incentives such as tax exemptions, land and housing subsidiaries and loans. Regional plans for the Galilee were drafted one after the other, all based on: Zionist control over Palestinian land, Jewish majority in mixed areas, and explicitly calling for the disruption of Palestinian geographic contiguity there through building more Zionist colonies. Despite all Zionist efforts to "Judaize" Palestine, Al-Jalil (Galilee) remained predominantly Palestinian. In spring 1976, Yisrael Koenig, who was the Northern District Commissioner of the Israeli Ministry of Interior for 26 years, prepared a secret internal government document known as the "Koenig Memorandum", which was published in full in Autumn 1976 by an Israeli newspaper. In its first and main section entitled "The Demographic Problem and the Manifestation of Arab Nationalism" Koenig "warns" of a "demographic threat" posed by the increasing Arab population in Galilee and calls openly for its "Judaization" through reducing the number of Palestinians living there. Among other things, the Memorandum calls for land expropriation, building new Zionist colonies amongst Arab communities to fragment the Arab population and isolate it. It also calls for limiting funds for Arab communities in general and to Arab families in particular and infesting them with taxes thus creating financial pressures so these families have no time to think about politics and involvement in it. Koenig recommends scholarship programmes for Arabs to encourage them to study abroad and then make it difficult for them to return. As for those living in occupied Palestine, Koenig recommends making it difficult for them to find jobs and calls for "creating" weak and compliant Arabs to lead the Palestinians communities. The Koenig Memorandum played a vital role in the events ensuing the Land Day and Zionist governments implemented the Koenig memorandum and continue to follow its recommendations till today.

Early 1975 yet another Israeli governmental plan was introduced to "Judaize" the Galilee under the name of "Galilee Develop Plan". As with all land regulation plans, it’s aim was to create a Jewish majority in the Galilee and a new population distribution through Zionist colonization. 50 Zionist colonies called the Mitzpim (lookouts) were to be established in the Galilee amongst Palestinian communities. To do this, on 29.02.1976 Israel confiscated 21,000 Dunums of lands belonging to the Palestinian towns Sakhneen, Arraba, Deir Hanna and Arab Assawa’id. A huge popular conference took place in Nazareth on 18.10.1975, the first since the Nakba to be organized by Palestinians inside Palestinian areas occupied in 1948. And after further meetings it was decided that a general strike and marches would take place on 30.03 in protest of land confiscation. The "Land Day" was thus born and it was significant because it was first time since 1948 that Palestinians as one organ organize a wide scale political action against the Zionist entity. Previous protests and actions had been limited and scattered. Since then this day is marked by Palestinians everywhere. The Israeli answer to the declared strike started on the eve of the "Land Day", when Rabin, Israeli prime minister at the time and Peres, defence minister at the time sent thousands of occupation soldiers and police forces to the Palestinian villages and towns to break up the planned strike and quench any peaceful marches and protests. Palestinians were beaten and arrested, shops and windows destroyed and curfews were imposed. The first martyr, Khair Mohammad Yasin (23 yrs old), fell on the eve of "Land Day" after being shot and then prevented by Israeli army tanks from reaching hospital until he bled to death. On the 30th of March 1976, and despite Israeli threats, the curfews and the huge presence of the IOF, the general strike was strictly observed all over the Palestinian towns and villages in protest of the Israeli measures to steal more Palestinian land and ethnically cleanse Palestine of what is left of its indigenous people. Shops and businesses were closed, and thousands joined the protest marches. Israeli tanks and helicopters were everywhere and when the Israeli army tried breaking up the strike by force using live ammunition, clashes erupted leading to the death of a further 5 Palestinians. Tens were injured and hundreds arrested. In Sakhneen Khadija Qasem Shawahneh (23 yrs old), Raja Hussein Abu Rayya (30 yrs old) and Khader Eid Mahmoud Khalaila (24 yrs old) were killed, 50 were injured and 70 were arrested. In Kufr Kanna Muhsin Hasan Said Taha (15 yrs old) was killed, women and children were beaten by the Israeli police and many were arrested. In Taybeh Ra’fat Ali Az-Zheiri (21 yrs old) from Nur Shams refugee camp was killed. Many were injured in clashes throughout Palestine, others arrested and some even had their arms and legs broken by the IOF after being arrested. Many of those who joined the strike and the protests later lost their jobs. The story of Khader Khalaila is typical of how the Zionists shoot to kill and when the victim doesn’t die they prevent help to ensure death. Ahmed Khalaila recalled that "when a neighbor stepped outside her house, she was shot and injured…. He and his older brother, Khader, tried to help the woman. When they were about 50 metres from her, Khader was shot in the head. "He was still breathing and we hoped he could be saved, but there were checkpoints at all the entrances to the village. We knew no ambulance would be coming for him." Eventually the family managed to get him into a car and drove towards the nearest hospital. Held at a checkpoint, Mr Khalaila said, the family watched as Khader bled to death as he lay across his younger brother’s legs on the back seat. Khader was 24 and recently married. No one ever came to investigate what had happened, or offered the family compensation. "It was as if a bird had died," he said. "No one was interested; no questions were asked in the parliament. Nothing."[2] The Palestinians in the Palestinian Territories occupied in 1967 responded to the revolt of their brothers and sisters by joining. They too went out to the streets to protest the theft of their land and the "Judaization" of Jerusalem. They went out to protest living in refugee camps while their homes and lands are given to Zionist colonists. Demonstrations spread like fire uniting Jerusalem, Al-Jalil, Nablus, the Muthallath, Gaza, Akka, Hebron, Nazareth, Ramallah, Al-Naqab and all of Palestine. Later that day, the protests spread to Palestinian refugee camps in the Diaspora. The land had united Palestinians everywhere, and it continues to do that till today. The "Judaization" of the Galilee continued to be a main Zionist plan. In 1977, Sharon, agricultural minister at the time, created a council for the Mitzpim which came to be known as the Misgav Regional Council: Galilee land fell under the control of the Misgav and Palestinian communities there were surrounded by more Zionist colonies which limited their growth and isolated them.

Today, the "Judaization" of occupied Palestine continues through ethnic cleansing, land expropriation and colonization. This has intensified particularly in the heart of Palestine: Jerusalem. After the 1967 war, municipal boundaries of Jerusalem were changed to include land belonging to Bethlehem and Ramallah. Today, the holy city is witnessing a frenzied campaign of "Judaization" and house demolition, forced evictions, colonization and land confiscation have become daily. The path of the Zionist wall engulfs more Palestinian land and confines Palestinians to tiny Ghettos. The international community and the Arab world watch and do nothing other than the casual "shy condemnation". They are partners in the Zionist crime not only through their silence while Israel continues to kick Palestinians out of their homes but through their support of a 2-state solution which is nothing but a formula for a one racist Zionist entity enslaving Palestinians and holding them prisoners in tiny ghettos. It is the land that brings Palestinians together and the confiscation, the on-going ethnic cleansing and the "Judaization" bring more Palestinians and international anti-Zionist activists together such as witnessed today in occupied Jerusalem. Since that first "Land Day" Palestinians in all of occupied Palestine, those in the Diaspora and Palestine supporters worldwide have commemorated this day through demonstrations, marches and various solidarity actions. For the Palestinians in occupied Palestine, every day is a "Land Day"; they defend their land daily against the IOF and the Zionist colonists, they work the land despite Zionist threats for the land is theirs and many have fallen while defending the land. During the British Mandate, Palestinians refused to keep silent as the British government gave their land to the Zionist colonists. Many Palestinians were labelled "terrorists" for defending their lands and many fell while defending these lands, while the usurper and the killer was protected and labelled the "victim"; not much different from today. During the Nakba Palestinians protected their lands and fought the Zionists terror militias to the last breathe and to the last bullet and as they were forced out of their homes they saw these homes being made to the ground and saw their towns and villages being erased. And they, who had homes, lands and lives became refugees yearning for Palestine. Palestinians who remained steadfast in Palestine saw the Zionist entity take the lands of their brothers and sisters who were made refugees and give it to immigrants from Europe and elsewhere. They saw how the Zionist entity was taking their land to build more illegal colonies while prohibiting them from building a shack. Palestinians have homes, they have lands, they have but one homeland: Palestine. No Palestinian wants to live as a stranger in his own homeland. No Palestinian wants to see a Zionist colonist from Germany, Russia, the US or Canada take her/his land or the land of another Palestinian. No Palestinian wants to live in a refugee camp when she/he has a home and a land. The "Land Day" is day of protest, a day of remembrance and a day of resistance. It sends a message to the Zionist entity and its supporters, to the Arab regimes and to the collaborating so-called PA: No Palestinian will ever give up her/his right to Palestine or the right to return. For it is a day to declare that we are the land, that we will hold on to the land, remain attached to the land and be part of the land. It is a day to shout out loud so the whole world and those claiming to represent us hear us: We will never give up our legitimate rights, we will never give up our right to defend our land and our right to return.

Our roots are in this land and we can’t live elsewhere. The Zionists wish us to disappear, want us to disappear, they want the earth to swallow us and that we no longer exist and threaten their Zionist dream. Without a land, there is no existence and Israel tries to destroy the existence of the Palestinian people. But despite the brutality with which Israel faces unarmed Palestinians protecting their land, and despite all its efforts to erase the Palestinian national identity and crush Palestinian political aspirations, Palestinians rise up again and again for their land, their homeland. Every revolt, every Intifada and even the smallest demonstration is a fight for the land. Palestinians have a deep connection with the land, they are part of it, and no power can break that connection. Our blood is mixed with this land, so how can anyone expect us to betray our blood? Yes, we Palestinians are tired of the death and the suffering, yes we yearn for a normal life, a peaceful life. But it is not any "life" or any "peace" that we will accept: we will never accept to live like animals in Ghettos in our own land, because life without dignity is no life, peace without justice is no peace. The Palestinian spirit which the Zionist entity did its best to subdue and kill is never dead and will never die. Again and again, it rises up and revolts as one and is more alive with every revolt. Intifadas are never planned, nor are they controllable. They are the reaction of a people that yearn for freedom and want to break off the chains of slavery and oppression. Israel never expected the first Intifada in the 1980s, thought us too weak and too subdued to rise up against its tyranny and brutality. And the Intifada broke out like a volcanic eruption. Israel and the so-called PA didn’t except nor want a second Intifada in 2000, thought us too weak and too subdued to rise up against their tyranny, brutality and corruption. And the second Intifada broke out like a tornado. And today Israel and the so-called PA don’t want a third Intifada, they think us too weak and too subdued to rise up against their tyranny, brutality, corruption, collaboration and their joined efforts to destroy Palestine and Palestinian rights and national identity. But the third Intifada will come, and it will come like an earthquake: stronger than a volcanic eruption and a tornado put together for we have had enough from both the occupiers and collaborators. The struggle for the land was and will always be the driving force of the Palestinian people, and the revolution of the land will only take place when all the land revolts.


"Land Day" Martyrs (partial/initial list @ http://poppiesofpalestine.wordpress.com)

30.03.1976

1 Kheir Mohammad Salim Yasin (23 yrs old) from Arraba, shot dead by the IOF

2 Khadija Qasem Shawahneh (23 yrs old) from Sakhneen, shot dead by the IOF

3 Raja Hussein Abu Rayya (30 yrs old) from Sakhneen, shot dead by the IOF

4 Khader Eid Mahmoud Khalaila (24 yrs old) from Sakhneen, shot dead by the IOF

5 Muhsin Hasan Said Taha (15 yrs old) from Kufr Kanna, shot dead by the IOF

6 Ra’fat Ali Az-Zheiri (21 yrs old) from Nur Shams refugee camp and was shot dead by the IOF in Al-Taybeh


1 Sliman Ahmad Al-Jundi (17 yrs old), from Yatta, Hebron, shot dead by the IOF

2 Mohammad Faris Az-Zein (17 yrs old), from Al-Yamoun, Jenin, shot dead by the IOF

3 Husni Mohammad Shahin (22 yrs old), from Al-Yamoun, Jenin, shot dead by the IOF

4 Mohammad 'Arif Qasim Salah (22 yrs old), from Burqa, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

5 Khalid Mohammad Salah (23 yrs old), from Burqa, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

6 Wajiha Yousif Rabi’ (50 yrs old), from Deir Abu Mish’al, Ramallah, shot dead by the IOF

7 Abdil-Karim Mohammad Musa Al-Halayqah (25 yrs old), from Ash-Shayyukh, Hebron, shot dead by the IOF

8 Shakir Mohammad Ali Malsiyeh (20 yrs old), from Deir Bzeigh, Ramallah, shot dead by the IOF

9 Mousa 'Azmi (30 yrs old), from Zita, Tulkarim, shot dead by the IOF

10 Iyad 'Azmi (21 yrs old), from Zita, Tulkarim, shot dead by the IOF

11 Ma’rouf Mahmoud Nu’man (27 yrs old), from Zita, Tulkarim, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2000

1 Sheikha Yousif Abu Salih (72 yrs old), from Sakhneen, suffocated by gas fired by the IOF

30.03.2001

1 Ayish Ghazi 'Mustafa Zamil (19 yrs old), from Deir Al-Hatab, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

2 Ahmad Mahmoud Abu Maraheel (16 yrs old), from Balata RC, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

3 Sufian Sa’eed Abdel Rahman Saloum (31 yrs old), from Balata RC, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

4 Murad Salih Ahmad Sharay’ah (21 yrs old), from Balata RC, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

5 Khalid Shihadeh Deeb Al-Nahleh (27 yrs old), from Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

6 Mohammad Abdel Muhsin Khalid Al-Wawi (20 yrs old), from Ramallah, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2002

1 Ahmad Fathi Mahmoud 'Ajaj (23 yrs old), from Seda, Tulkarim, killed by IOF missile

2 Azmi 'Adel Mahmoud 'Ajaj (21 yrs old), from Seda, Tulkarim, killed by IOF missile

3 Ahmad Abdel Jawad (22 yrs old), from Nablus, killed by an explosion

4 Isma’il Ibrahim Deeb Isa (56 yrs old), from Ramallah, shot dead by the IOF

5 Hussein Husni Hussein Al-Ashqar (27 yrs old), from Qalqilia, shot dead by the IOF

6 Fathi Jihad Fathi 'Amerah (18 yrs old), from Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

7 Majdi Abdel Jawad Abdel Jabbar Khanfar (21 yrs old), from Silet Ath-Thahir, Jenin, shot dead by the IOF

8 Muhannad Ibrahim Fayyad Salahat (16 yrs old), from Bethlehem, shot dead by the IOF

9 Nuha Ziyad Ahmad Ikte’ (8 yrs old), from Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

10 Khalid Fathi Mohammad 'Awad Allah (32 yrs old), from Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

11 Sa’id Abdel Rahman Mohammad Mahdi (60 yrs old), from Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

12 Omar Musa Mohammad Diab (54 yrs old), from Jericho, killed by IOF missile

13 Ahmad Kallab (61 yrs old), from Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

14 Shahir Abu Shara (33 yrs old), from Ramallah, shot dead by the IOF

15 Abdel Rahman Tawfiq Abdallah Is’id (58 yrs old), from Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2003

1 Mahmoud Ali An-Najjar (18 yrs old), from Jabalia, Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

2 Rami Jamil Mutlaq Ghanim (20 yrs old), from Deir Al-Ghusoun, Tulkarim, shot dead by the IOF

3 Mahmoud Mohammad Rashid Al-Mashharawi (22 yrs old), from Ash-Shaja’iyyah, Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

4 Mohammad Farouq Tafish (16 yrs old), from Jabalia, Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2004

1 Fatima Mohammad Shreiqi Al-Jallad (7 yrs old), from Khan Younis, Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2005

1 Mu’tasim Al-Aqea’ from Qablan, Nablus, shot dead by the IOF

30.03.2006

1Ahmad Mahmoud Ahmad Masharqa (23 years old), from Hebron, shot dead by the IOF


30.03.2007

1 Kamil Kamal Kamil Mousa (21 years old), from Al-Maghazi, Gaza, shot dead by the IOF

[1] www.palestineremembered.com
[2] http://www.thenational.ae/article/20090330/FOREIGN/382507494


© http://avoicefrompalestine.wordpress.com

Monday, 29 March 2010

Vatican confirms report of sexual abuse and rape of nuns by priests in 23 countries

[Remember that woman who got past security at the Vatican during Christmas mass and knocked Pope Benedict XVI down? We were told she was mad?]



The Catholic Church in Rome made the extraordinary admission yesterday that it is aware priests from at least 23 countries have been sexually abusing nuns.

The Catholic Church in Rome made the extraordinary admission yesterday that it is aware priests from at least 23 countries have been sexually abusing nuns.

Most of the abuse has occurred in Africa, where priests vowed to celibacy, who previously sought out prostitutes, have preyed on nuns to avoid contracting the Aids virus.

Confidential Vatican reports obtained by the National Catholic Reporter, a weekly magazine in the US, have revealed that members of the Catholic clergy have been exploiting their financial and spiritual authority to gain sexual favours from nuns, particularly those from the Third World who are more likely to be culturally conditioned to be subservient to men.

The reports, some of which are recent and some of which have been in circulation for at least seven years, said that such priests had demanded sex in exchange for favours, such as certification to work in a given diocese.

In extreme instances, the priests had made nuns pregnant and then encouraged them to have abortions.

The US article was based on five documents, which senior women from religious orders and priests have presented to the Vatican over the past decade. They describe a particularly bad situation in Africa. In a continent devastated by Aids, nuns, along with early adolescent girls, are perceived by some as safe sexual targets. The reports said that the church authorities had done little to tackle the problem.

The Vatican reports cited countless cases of nuns forced to have sex with priests. Some were obliged to take the pill, others became pregnant and were encouraged to have abortions. In one case in which an African sister was forced to have an abortion, she died during the operation and her aggressor led the funeral mass. Another case involved 29 sisters from the same congregation who all became pregnant to priests in the diocese.

The reports said that the cultures in some African countries made it almost impossible for a young woman to disobey an older man, especially one seen as spiritually superior. There were cases of novices who applied to their local priest or bishop for certificates of good Catholic practice that were required for them to pursue their vocation. In return they were made to have sex. Some incidents of sexual abuse allegedly took place almost within the Vatican walls.

Certain unscrupulous clerics took advantage of young nuns who were having trouble finding accommodation, writing their essays and funding their theological studies.

Forced to acknowledge the problem, the Vatican has tried to play down its gravity. In a statement issued yesterday the Pope's official spokesman, Joaquin Navarro Valls, said: "The problem is known and involves a restricted geographical area. Certain negative situations must not overshadow the often heroic faith of the overwhelming majority of religious, nuns and priests".

One of the most comprehensive documents was compiled by Sister Maura O'Donohue, an Aids co-ordinator for Cafod, the London-based Catholic Fund for Overseas Development.

She noted that religious sisters had been identified as "safe" targets for sexual activity. She quotes a case in 1991 of a community superior being approached by priests requesting that the nuns be made available to them for sexual favours.

"When the superior refused the priests explained they would otherwise be obliged to go to the village to find women and might thus get Aids."Sister O'Donohue said her initial reaction to what she was told by her fellow religious "was one of shock and disbelief at the magnitude of the problem".

While most of the abuse happened in African countries, Sister O'Donohue reported incidents in 23 countries including India, Ireland, Italy, the Philippines and the United States.

She heard cases of priests encouraging the nuns to take the pill telling them it would prevent HIV. Others "actually encouraged abortion for the sisters" and Catholic hospitals and medical staff reported pressure from priests to carry out terminations for nuns and other young women.

O'Donohue wrote in her report how a vicar in one African diocese had talked "quite openly" about sex, saying that "celibacy in the African context means a priest does not get married, but does not mean he does not have children."

The head of the Vatican congregation for Religious Life, Cardinal Martinez Somalo, has set up a committee to look into the problem. But it seems to have done little beyond "awareness raising" among bishops.

More recently, in 1998, Sister Marie McDonald, mother superior of the Missionaries of Our Lady of Africa, put together a paper entitled The Problem of the Sexual Buse of African Religious in Africa and Rome.

She tabled the document to the Council of 16, made up of delegates of the international association of women's and men's religious communities and the Vatican office responsible for religious life. She noted that a contributing cause was the "conspiracy of silence".

When she addressed bishops on the problem, many of them felt it was disloyal of the sisters to send reports.

"However, the sisters claim they have done so time and time again. Sometimes they were not well received. In some instances they are blamed for what happened. Even when they are listened to sympathetically nothing much seems to be done" One of the most tragic elements that emerges is the fate of the victims. While the offending priests are usually moved or sent away for studies, the women are normally chased out of their religious orders, they are then either to scared to return to their families or are rejected by them. they often finished up as outcasts, or, in a cruel twist of irony, as prostitutes, making a meagre living from an act they had vowed never to do.

One of the few religious in Rome willing to talk about the report was Father Giulio Albanese, of MISNA, the missionary news agency. "Missionaries are human beings, who are often living under immense psychological pressure in situations of war and ongoing violence. On one hand it's important to condemn this horror and it's important tell the truth, but we must not emphasise this at the expense of the work done by the majority, many of whom have laid down lives for witness" said Fr Albanese "The press only talks about missionaries when they are killed, kidnapped or are involved in something scandalous" he added.

As the Vatican digests the unpalatable evidence of how their own priests are ruining the lives of their sisters, many Catholics hope a strong message may come from on high. With the American bishops, the Pope spoke in clear terms about paedophile priests, telling them this was a scourge that had to be faced. Some now hope that he may be equally courageous in denouncing an evil which has been covered by silence and shame for too long.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/vatican-confirms-report-of-sexual-abuse-and-rape-of-nuns-by-priests-in-23-countries-688261.html




Holy Father, I can stay no longer in this Church of Disgust

The Fallibility of the Infallible Pope

Israel’s Delusion=The World’s Misery

Note to those scratching their heads over Israel’s “recent” belligerent behavior viz-a-viz the Obama Administration’s insistence that the Jewish state actually abide by international law and cease construction in the territories pirated by her in 1967–

DON’T.

Neither should anyone be shocked over the fact that–with miniscule exceptions–protests from the Chosenite quarter of humanity over all the bloodshed and chaos caused by the Jewish state in what used to be called the Holy Land are virtually non-existent. For the sake of those who have suffered incalculably, namely the Palestinians, Lebanese, Iraqis and others in the region, let us not pretend we had no way of knowing.

We knew, or at least we should have. As we are always told–“ignorance of the law is no excuse, the “law” in this case not being just some ordinary, run of the mill law, but rather THE LAW, meaning the word of God Himself, or so they say.

No, we’re not being cheeky here. Indeed, GOD HAS SPOKEN and all anyone need do in figuring this out for him or herself is crack open the playbook being used in mapping all this misery out and see for themselves.

After all, lest we forget, according to the narrative in question, for some indescribable reason the creator of the universe DID decide one day to focus His infinite attention and affection on one tiny, seemingly insignificant percentage of his handiwork, commanding them to then go about the business of invading, stealing, enslaving and genociding those who did not “bless them” in a way deemed acceptable.

That right folks, invasion, theft, enslavement, and genocide, all the things we are told by Jewish interests are part of “Islam”, but which in reality are not, but rather the nuts and bolts of the Jews‘ religion.

And let’s not dabble in the business that this is all a “Netanyahu” thing. Miraculously, Bibi (the same war criminal credited with gloating over the deaths of 3,000 Americans after the 9/11 attacks, characterizing such as “good” because of the “immediate sympathy” the tragedy would generate for Israel) actually spoke the truth in his recent speech to AIPAC when he pointed out that the Judaization of Palestine (termed “redemption by the Jews) through expanded settlement is something that has gone on from the very beginning. Indeed, as inconvenient as it is and as much as it may fly in the face of the fashionable business these days of separating between “good” Jews (leftists who sort-of/kind-of dare to consider Palestinians as human beings) and “bad” Jews (rightists who take literally all that stuff in the Old Testament about the Arabs being “Amalek“ whose eternal destruction is commanded by God) the fact is that they are 2 wings on the same bird. When comparing the two, they differ from each other as much as the Corleones did from the Tattaglias in The Godfather–two crime families engaged in similar “business” but with different names.

As we said earlier, no one should be scratching his or her head over any of this intransigence or belligerence. This was as hard to predict as birds flying south for the winter or 2 dogs sniffing each other’s rear ends upon meeting for the first time. There was, is, and always will be this irrational, magnetic pull towards this kind of business when it comes to Jews and Jewish interests. Remember that old saying we were all taught growing up, meant to make us mind our diet–”You are what you eat”? Well, the Jews have been “eating” all this Old Testament garbage now for 4,000 years and as a result it has gone to their collective head and done almost irreversible internal damage. Having made heroes out of their Hebraic forefathers who invaded, raped, enslaved and stole, why then should anyone be shocked when 4,000 years later we get Ben Gurion, Begin, Rabin, Sharon, Netanyahu, et al?

You see, that’s the problem when certain people claim to hear the voice of God in their heads. Things get lost in translation. Remember Abraham? He starts hearing voices telling him he and his bloodline would be exalted above everyone else, and the next thing you know he’s got a knife to his son’s neck, ready to slit his throat and burn his body as proof of his loyalty to those voices he’s hearing. More

'BABYLON THE GREAT' IS ISRAEL

By Rev. Ted Pike

In the mystical book of Revelation, the apostle John sees a scarlet woman called “ Babylon the Great, Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth.” She is drunk on the blood of Christians and rides a many-horned and -headed beast. John was told this woman symbolized a city that would one day rule and corrupt the world. Who is this woman? Does she exist today?

The answer lies thousands of years in history, in a story of redemption, love and betrayal – recounted in Ezekiel 16. This stern yet tender allegory tells how God rescued Israel from death as a rejected infant and chose her for His spiritual bride – not because of her goodness but out of His compassion. From the furnace of Egyptian bondage, the tiny Hebrew nation burst forth. She plagued Pharaoh, crossed the divided sea and finally lived under Moses’ leadership in the desert of Sinai. There God entered the covenant of spiritual marriage with His bride. But that happiness was so brief!

[Israel] you trusted in your beauty and played the harlot because of your fame and poured out your harlotry on every passer-by who might be willing… (Ezekiel 16:15).

From Moses through the prophets, Israel is repeatedly characterized as an imperious whore. In more than 80 instances, she is specifically denounced as a harlot or lewd woman. Isaiah and the other pre-exilic prophets aimed their wrath at Jerusalem: “How the faithful city has become a harlot!" (Isaiah 1:21) Isaiah denounced apostate Jews as “sons of a sorceress, offspring of an adulterer and a prostitute” (Isaiah 57:3).

Did Israel’s evil ways end in the dusty annals of the Old Testament? No. Israel rejected Jesus Christ, her Messiah. She has never yet repented. This compels an inevitable conclusion: Israel of today and tomorrow is the same symbolic woman once chosen as God’s unique bride but ultimately divorced and cast away because of her spiritual adultery.Israel is that “Mother of Harlots” John saw on the beast of Revelation 17 and 18.

Israel was the first to marry God (Christ) and be spiritually one with Him. Thus the position she enjoyed as a spiritual bride was unique to her. Likewise, only apostate Israel can be the “mother” of spiritual whoredom. When she was chosen as Christ’s bride, other nations were disobedient like a child to its parent. Only Israel was made capable of a wife’s infidelity. As a result, when she became a spiritual whore, she was indelibly marked, “Mother of Harlots.” Jeremiah said, “You had a harlot's forehead, you refused to be ashamed.” (Jer. 3:3) Other apostate systems may be spiritual harlots but only Israel is “mother” of that scarlet sorority. And without repentance, neither time nor wanderings can remove that epithet from her. When Israel shouted, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” her resurrected spouse banished her. The Jewish people were condemned to wander like a woman divorced for adultery, perpetually looking for that substitute husband (anti-Christ) who would take the place of the One she killed.

The Great City

What has happened to that rejected unfaithful wife today?

Revelation 17 confronts us with the specter of a city “which reigns over the kings of the earth.” It has physical power—more wealth and importance than any other city—but also spiritual power, embodying the full potentiality of human degeneracy. “What city is like this great city?” the merchants of the earth will wail. This city is so commercially important that when she falls, world trade also comes crashing down. The title “the great city” is exclusive. There will doubtless be other powerful cities in the end time but John witnesses “the great city,” an unequaled center of trade, political power, culture and human bondage.

And to whom does that term refer? In Revelation, “the great city” (hey polis megaley in Greek) is used to clearly refer to Jerusalem, capitol of the Jewish people! When the two witnesses are killed, their dead bodies lie in the streets of “the great city (hey polis megaley). "... Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified” (Revelation 11:8). This unmistakably implies that powerful, corrupt Babylon and the great city “ Sodom and Egypt, where our Lord was crucified,” are the same city… Jerusalem.

The apostle Peter, bishop of Jerusalem, also calls Jerusalem “ Babylon.” He sends greetings from the church in Jerusalem saying, “She who is in Babylon…sends you greetings” (1 Peter 5:13). Peter never visited Babylon. He is clearly identifying the moral cesspool of antiquity, Babylon, with the city where Christ was killed.

There are other reasons to believe “ Babylon the Great” means the Jewish city. When she is destroyed, Revelation describes the fall of this city as different from that of “Gentile” (ethnos) cities. “And the great city was divided into three parts and the cities of the nations (Gentiles) fell…” (Revelation 16:19) A city which is not Gentile must, of course, be Jewish.

Also, Rev. 18:24 says that the great city is guilty for having shed the blood of the Hebrew prophets and righteous from the beginning of history. Jesus said the same concerning the rulers of Jerusalem, the Pharisees: "that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar" (Matt. 23:35).

Yet even from earliest post-apostolic times, Christians have misread Revelation’s prophecy. They thought Babylon the Great meant Rome, which has traditionally been described as sitting on seven hills. Yet the city of Rome encompasses many more than seven hills. This is not true of Jerusalem. Ernest L. Martin, Ph.D. points out:

the City of Jerusalem as it existed in the time of Christ Jesus was also reckoned to be a 'City of Seven Hills.' This fact was well recognized in Jewish circles. In the Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer, an 8th century A.D. midrashic [Talmudic] narrative (Section 10), the writer mentioned without commentary (showing that the understanding was well known and required no defense) that, "Jerusalem is situated on seven hills." ("The Seven Hills of Jerusalem” http://www.askelm.com/prophecy/p000201.htm)

Armenian Christians, living for centuries in Palestine, taught their schoolchildren that the seven hills are: Mt. of Olives, Mt. Scopus, Mt. Zion, Mt. Moriah (the Temple mount), Golgotha, Hill of Moses, and Mt. Herzl.

Scripture also describes only one city as center of world rule in the last days, and that is Jerusalem. Paul states clearly that the anti-Christ will declare his one-world authority from the temple at Jerusalem, where he proclaims he is God. (2 Thess. 2:4) When the two witnesses resist him, they do not battle a papal anti-Christ but “the wicked profane prince of Israel” in Jerusalem. (Ezek. 21:25) These scriptures point to Jerusalem as the epicenter of one-world rebellion against God; Jerusalem and Babylon are one!

Modern Judaism is Babylonian

There is more depth to the metaphor. Judaism literally is Babylonian, more than nearly any other religion or culture. Most of its religious laws and traditions, including the Babylonian Talmud and Zohar (Kabbalah), come from nearly 1,600 years Jews spent on the fertile plains of Shinar. Few religions have a deeper tradition of occult. Revelation describes Babylon the Great deceiving the world through her “sorceries” and the Jewish encyclopedias tell us it was Judaism which carried Babylon’s black arts, demonology and astrology to the West.

This is as true today as ever. Jewish supremacism today is not only erecting a political, financial, commercial world empire but spewing filth on the nations through their movie and TV media. (link to Jews in media article) They spearhead freedom-destroying, pro-homosexual hate crimes laws worldwide and abet all forms of left-wing and anti-Christ radicalism through their “civil liberties” fronts such as ADL, ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

And just as “Babylon the Great” will deceive the world, so Jewish leaders today present a whitewashed façade to Christians and the world – an illusion of goodness that has never been more convincing or scrupulously maintained. The Jewish lobby deceived Christians into unquestioning support of Israel’s ambitions and atrocities in the Mideast; this is awesome evidence of the manipulative influence Jewry will enjoy as we draw even closer to the end. When Christ warned that the delusions of the end time would be so irresistible that “even the very elect” could be deceived, He was speaking of our day!

In our day we witness the continuing and monstrous complications of that great divorce of Christ from his chosen bride millennia ago. We are not simply approaching the foothills of anti-Christ. We are in them. Through intrigue and deception, the control and commercialism of “ Babylon the Great” has come surround us. Yet we have not perceived it. We have, in fact, assisted it.

Babylon is now.

How should Christians respond to the fact that Israel and Babylon are one? Jesus tells us the answer. "Come out of her, my people, that you may not participate in her sins, and that you may not receive of her plagues, for her sins have piled up as high as heaven…" (Rev. 18:4-5)

(Adapted from Israel: Our Duty Our Dilemma by Rev. Ted Pike, 345 pages, illustrated, available for $24.90 post-paid from NPN, P.O. Box 828, Clackamas, OR 97015)

Take Action: DC! Tomorrow, March 30th - International Day of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Against Israel

Where: Lord & Taylor, 5255 Western Ave., Northwest Washington DC 20015; next to Friendship Heights metro

Tuesday, March 30th, 5pm, join us in marking the international day of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. We will be protesting against the Israeli cosmetic company AHAVA at the Lord and Taylor’s store in Washington DC. AHAVA is made in a settlement using Palestinian resources taken from the Dead Sea. The address of Lord and Taylors is 5255 Western Ave Northwest Washington DC 20015. It is next to the Friendship Heights metro. Spa attire (bathrobes and towels) are recommended but not required. We will provide signs and fliers, but if you would like to make your own sign, messages could include: AHAVA: Made by Israeli Profiteers in Occupied Palestine; Have a Heart--Don't Sell AHAVA Cosmetics; Don't buy AHAVA Cosmetics; Settlement Products Kill Hope for Peace; There is no love in Occupation.

We’ll meet in the underground parking lot of the store. If you are planning to come, please call Medea Benjamin at 415 235 6517. Thank you and hope to see you there.

OSCE equates Stalinism to Nazism

On Friday the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly carried a controversial resolution that equates the Nazi regime with Soviet Stalinism. Many see the document as blatant attack on Russia.

The resolution, titled “Reunification of divided Europe” and put forward by Lithuania and Slovenia, states that Europe has suffered from two totalitarian regimes: the Nazi and the Stalinist. Both brought about genocide and crimes against humanity.

Heated debates

The document itself wasn’t available on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) website by Thursday, but according to Russian news agencies, one of its demands was to stop glorifying the Soviet past and get rid of structures that whitewash history.

Read more

For a final and Europe-wide condemnation of totalitarianism, the OSCE resolution offered to set a Nazism/Stalinism remembrance day on August 23 (the day when the controversial, Europe-dividing Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was signed by Germany and Soviet Union).

“The USSR destroyed more people than Hitler. Russia occupied my country in 1921, and now President Medvedev has created a special commission to glorify criminals,” Georgian MP Georgy Kandelaki said during the discussion, which ended with the adoption of the resolution by a majority of votes.

However, according to Russian Gazeta daily, the decision was far from unanimous.

Greek Communist MP Kostas Alissandrakis noted that the resolution is “not aimed against Stalin, who is long dead, but against Communism in general, and in the times of a crisis, when workers’ discontent is on the rise”.

French MP Michele Billieu suggested that they go all they way and add France to the list of totalitarian regimes for having concentration camps for Spanish refugees in late 1930s, the US for McCarthyism, and the whole Christian world for the religious ideology that inspired persecution based on religion.
Not the first anti-Russian declaration

A similar resolution to condemn the Crimes of Totalitarian Communist Regimes was adopted in early 2006 by PACE. Moscow rushed to slam it as an anti-Russian ploy then, and this time generally followed suit.

“Russia’s parliament has already voiced its assessment of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact back in 1992, and any new measures would be redundant,” deputy head of Russian Foreign Ministry’s information department Igor Lyakin-Frolov told Kommersant.

The head of Russia’s delegation to the OSCE, Aleksandr Kozlovsky, called the resolution an “insulting anti-Russian attack”.

“Those, who put Stalinism on the same scale as Nazism are forgetting that the Soviet Union suffered the most casualties and made the biggest contribution to Europe’s liberation from Nazism,” Kozlovsky said.

Member of the Public Chamber of Russia, TV and radio host Nikolay Svanidze, however, refuted Kozlovsky’s arguments.






“It was not Stalin’s regime that was victorious over the Nazi Germany, but the Soviet people. Similarly it was not Aleksandr I’s villainous regime that helped rid Europe of Napoleon, but the Russian people,” Svanidze told RT.

Svanidze agreed with the resolution in principal.

“I don’t see any real differences from a humanitarian point of view. One destroyed people based on their ethnicity, the other – based on their social status. But those differences are, alas, minor. The only significant difference is that Nazism was condemned officially, while Stalinism wasn’t. Not that it makes the latter any better,” he added.

“Prior to war anniversaries, people with historical complexes wake up and attempt to lay all the blame on Russia. Using humanist ideas as a cover, they attempt to put Russia and Germany on the same level and blame Russia for all the mistakes of Stalin’s regime,” Chairman of the Federation Council Foreign Affairs Committee, Mikhail Margelov, told Kommersant.
Raising potentially harmful questions

Following the resolution, a number of potentially serious questions may be raised.

Poland will host events commemorating the start of WWII in September, with Russia’s Prime-Minister Vladimir Putin is expected to attend.

With certain points of the resolution openly condemning decisions of Russia’s government, his visit might be jeopardized.

According to Russian media, the call “to stop glorifying the Soviet past” quite clearly alludes to the recent resurrection of massive military parades in Moscow. Meanwhile, many see the call “to get rid of structures that whitewash history” as a reference to the commission to counter attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests, which has recently been set up by President Medvedev.

Another potentially harmful question is the issue of compensation for damages from the alleged ‘occupation’, which some former Soviet republics may demand from Russia, who is considered the successor of the Soviet Union.

Svanidze sees the compensation issue as “an entirely separate question”.

“First of all, Russia hasn’t lost a war. Secondly, Russia is not the Soviet Union. If it has to pay reparations, then so do Ukraine, Georgia and Belarus and other former Soviet countries,” he said.

Read also Europe's new chairing state frowns at Russia

Ruben Zarbabyan, RT


The Bankers Behind Hitler, Stalin and Israel

Jew Stalin far worse than Jew Hitler

Israeli spy agency Mossad still unchallenged in the West

”If journalists of the so-called free Western press ever took stock of Victor Ostrovsky's revelations, they've neatly swept them under the carpet. The hoax, the disinformation and deception created by Israel's Mossad, is finally crumbling like the Tower of Babel it reflects.”

The British are again catching up with Israel's trickery. The BBC announced on 23 March that an Israeli diplomat had been expelled from the UK.

That action resulted from Israel's involvement in forged British passports related to the assassination in January of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai.

Ironically, David Miliband, the British foreign secretary, expressed less concern about the criminal assassination than the forgery of British passports. Is the BBC also more focused on passport forgeries than assassinations?

The BBC reported” "It is not the first time British passports have been misused by Israel. In 1987 the country was caught forging UK passports for an intelligence operation, and Israel promised it would not do it again."

In this latest perfidy, forged passports from France, Ireland, Germany and Australia were also used in the operation. Dubai officials said they were "99 per cent certain" that agents from Mossad were behind the killing.

Author of more than 62 books, Professor James Petras comments: "The Mossad openly stated that Mabhouh was a high priority target who had survived three previous assassination attempts. Israel did not even bother to deny the murder." More

Stuck Between A Wall And An Occupation

Aida Refugee Camp, Bethlehem: When Bilal Jadou's grandmother was sick last year, and in need of immediate medical care, the family called the Jerusalem emergency service and requested an ambulance -- only to hear on the other end of the line that no Israeli ambulances would be permitted to reach the house without permission from the Israeli military. "Try the Bethlehem ambulance service," the emergency dispatcher told Jadou. When he called the Bethlehem ambulance, they told him to have his grandmother meet them at the other side of the main Bethlehem-Jerusalem checkpoint because they weren't allowed to cross. Jadou's house is on the other side of the sprawling apartheid wall, separated from his community and the West Bank, and in a permanent state of oppressive bureaucratic and administrative limbo as nearby settlements are intended to spread onto his land.

The Electronic Intifada correspondent Nora Barrows-Friedman interviewed Jadou, 26 years old, about his situation. They spoke inside Aida refugee camp, in Bethlehem.

Nora Barrows-Friedman: Tell us about your situation and why this story is so important in the context of what's happening here in the Bethlehem area, especially in Aida camp, which is right up against the wall, cutting the land of families here in half.

Bilal Jadou: My family is separated from each other. We used to live in the refugee camp here and in our other house that used to be within five minutes walking distance from here. Since the wall was built, we can't communicate as a family. Some of us live in this house in Aida, and the others live in our other house on the other side of the wall.

I have six brothers and three sisters. Two of the brothers, including me, and one of our sisters, are allowed by Israel to live in the house on the other side of the wall. No one else is allowed to be there. Now it sometimes takes two hours to cross the checkpoint in Bethlehem to see our family in Aida camp. Other times, the Israelis close the checkpoint entirely and we can't see each other at all.

NBF: How did the Israelis choose who was able to live in the house on the other side of the wall?

BJ: They said it was purely because of "security reasons," and we still don't know why some got permission and some didn't. Also, we can't add anything to the house; we can't build onto the house. At any time, they can come and take my permission and say it's for "security reasons."

NBF: Do you have a special ID card now? Such as a Jerusalem residency card? How are you identified as someone who lives on the other side of the wall?

BJ: I still have a West Bank Palestinian ID, with a special permission slip for just the Tantur area [where the house is]. If Israeli police catch me anywhere else other than at my house, or if they catch me working inside Jerusalem, they will take my permission away. I can just be inside the house, and nothing more.