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In the Gaza Strip, there are a vast number of inspiring individuals prepared to put their personal reputation (and even their own physical well-being) on the line for matters of conviction. Dr. Eyad Sarraj is one of the more prominent of these figures and I was fortunate enough to speak with him on several occasions during my time in the Gaza Strip.

Dr. Sarraj, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, is the founder of the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme—a groundbreaking NGO in Gaza catering to the masses of Palestinians suffering from emotional trauma, especially victims of torture. Sarraj is well known for his outspoken criticism of the Israeli occupation and of corruption in the Palestinian Authority.

In the excerpts that follow, I discuss the state of Palestinian democracy with Dr. Sarraj. (more…)

It was shocking for me to discover that there are over 54,000 Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank even more trapped and isolated than most Palestinians. They are the citizens lacking a hawiyye (national identification card), which were issued by Israel under the provisions of the Oslo Accords. When the second Intifada broke out, the cards stopped coming and many people who had come to Gaza visiting friends and family have been trapped here ever since. Most disturbing of all, they do not technically exist.

For the past 15 weeks some of these people in Gaza have been staging sit-ins in front of the Palestinian Legislative Council in an attempt to raise awareness about their plight and demand political action. To their credit, I have noticed an increase in the media coverage of this issue, which is an important step. Here is an article by Laila El-Haddad about the situation and another on Yahoo News. Some of the stories are terribly tragic… I spoke with many of these people people today at the sit-in. Here is just one of the short interviews I took… (more…)

Jennifer Loewenstein is a busy woman. On top of her work as associate director of the Middle Eastern studies program at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Loewenstein is also a prolific freelance journalist and human rights activist. Over the years, she has spent a great deal of time in the Gaza Strip—including a period with the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights—and has firmly established herself as a major voice in the Jewish-American peace camp.

With Gaza isolated from the West Bank and a half-hearted peace conference looming, this is a significant (albeit bleak) period in the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict. For advocates of Palestine, it is a discouraging period—especially with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza reaching unprecedented levels, shut behind walls, and totally cut off from the world.

Prior to the economic boycott, Gaza was already second only to some African countries in its dependence on international aid… One can only imagine how desperate things have become since the West, in a hypocritical campaign spearheaded by the United States, halted aid to Gaza. I discussed some of these issues with Professor Loewenstein a few days ago in the following short interview. (more…)

Mona El-Farra is an inspiring individual. This modest and unassuming woman seems to have innumerable projects up her sleeve, ranging from her physician work at the Gazan branch of the Palestine Red Crescent Society to her role as Health Development consultant with the Union of Health Workers Committee.

On her website profile, Ms. El-Farra writes that she is “… a physician by training, a human rights and women’s rights activist by practice.” To her credit, she has the experience to back it up. Not only has Ms. El-Farra directly worked to improve the situation in Gaza through her physician work, she has also toured the United States advocating for human rights in Palestine, appearing at venues as diverse as Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now! and various American university campuses.

I first came across Ms. El-Farra in 2006, when I discovered her blog: From Gaza, With Love. Since then, I have followed her blog journey, though the frustration of military occupation and the devastating realities of everyday life in Gaza… and I was delighted to interview her the other night. (more…)

In Gaza it seems that everyone carries with them a well-honed set of opinions ready to blurt out for international journalists and other interested foreigners. Of course, I don’t doubt their substance but I must confess that, despite the horrors of military occupation and the terrible life in Gaza, many stories begin to sound the same. This may well be another reflection on the tragedy that is Gaza—so many heartwrenching anecdotes of human sacrifice are trivialized by the sheer quantity of victims.

During the first Intifada, the Palestinian cause caught the world’s sympathetic attention as images of children throwing rocks at tanks hit television screens worldwide. For a short time, the Palestinian resistance movement was entirely nonviolent. Citizens staged strikes, held public demonstrations at military checkpoints and for a while it seemed that the brutality of Israeli occupation was finally being exposed to the world. But it was not to be. Israel responded with Yitzhak Rabin’s notorious “break their bones” policy—and Israeli soldiers literally set about breaking the bones of children caught throwing stones.

The crushed hopes of the peace process and the endless Israeli expansion of settlements destroyed any possibility for a Palestinian state. On top of this, Israeli military measures grew ever more draconic. (more…)