Irony of Ironies!!

While our young Palestinian prisoners go on a hunger strike every now and then demanding justice,  especially those who are under administrative detention without charge or trial, I was shocked to hear this morning that the Israeli settlers are staging a hunger strike in front of the offices of the Prime Minister in Jerusalem.   What was shocking is not the hunger strike itself, as we have been watching the Israelis for some time now, demonstrating against the Prime Minister demanding his stepping down.   What is  ironic about this hunger strike is that the Jewish settlers  are demanding the legitimizing of the illegal posts they have  in the West Bank, because they cannot  survive without water and electricity?”  Indeed  nobody can beat such impudence.  

 

However we have to remember that all the settlements are illegal according to international law because they are built on occupied territories, and they all started by being illegal according to the Israeli definition, meaning they did not get the permit of the Israeli government.  So the definition of being legal or illegal is determined by Israel itself, defying international law.  

 

It remains to be said that around 45  Palestinian villages in the Galilee and the Negev, that have existed before the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948,  are still unrecognized and have no services, water, electricity, transportation, education, etc. whereas those new illegal Jewish settlements that have been mushrooming all over the occupied Palestinian territories of 1967 have the most modern services including swimming pools that have been  depleting the water resources of the Palestinian towns.  Indeed the irony of ironies.  Samia

A New Dawn?

The joy and relief at seeing an end to the Trump era reminded me of the story of the widow who was living in a very small and crowded house with her family.  She sought the help of her parish priest, and he advised her to get a goat? What a crazy suggestion she thought as I hardly have room for my children.   But she took his advice hoping for a miracle,  which the church keeps talking about.  She got herself a goat, and God knows what she went through for two weeks until the priest checked on her and advised her to remove the goat.  Ah she sighed with relief.  The house seemed so spacious and she was happy and ever so grateful for the advice of the priest, although the house was the same.  

 

The sigh of relief  at the end of the Trump era,  came from so many people as well as governments around the world,  However we cannot belittle the over   74 million votes that he got.  For us, Palestinians,  ever since the US approved the partition scheme of Palestine in 1947, and was the first to  recognize the State of Israel, we never had a fair deal, irrespective of who the president of the USA was.  Yes we had some who were more understanding and were keen to stop our demise, but the pro-Israel vote which has been so entrenched in the American legislative system has always been the obstacle for a fair and just solution for Palestine.  But we never had it as bad as we did during the term of Donald Trump.  So in Palestine it was also a great relief to see him go.

 

With so much damage done for our cause by the many free gifts that  Trump had offered  Israel on a silver platter, we should not expect Mr. Biden to retrieve all those gifts.  To start with,  his hands are already full trying to mend the situation in the USA itself,  and he is not going to be any different than other administrations for keeping Israel as a priority.  After all   he is  very familiar with the region as he had served as Vice President  during Mr. Obama’s term, so he is certainly more knowledgeable and more of an experienced  statesman than Mr. Trump.  However Mr. Obama’s term was one of the most disappointing, maybe because we had expected so much from him, especially   after his Cairo speech and after his courageous stand against the settlements.  Unfortunately, he was unable to deliver anything to the Palestinians, not withstanding his very generous financial commitment to Israel for the next ten years, shortly before the end of his term. 

Was that really necessary, or was he trying to mend matters with Netanyahu whose mutual animosity was so apparent.  And all that, at the expense of the Palestinians.  

 

Shielding Israel and turning a blind eye to all its violations in the occupied territories has always been the normal stand of  the US, locally and on the international arena.  But the most recent report of the B’tselem Israeli human rights organization, labeling  Israel as an apartheid state, should be a wake up call for  both Israel and the USA.  So dare  we hope that for a change,  Mr. Biden will launch a new dawn by realizing that justice for the Palestinians and ending the occupation will actually not only be the right thing to do, but will also benefit Israel and grant it the security that it  demands and which it  constantly uses to justify all its violations?

Christmas 2020

The Little Town of Bethlehem is not celebrating

It was the first to be hit by a virus so invading

Tourists carried it during a flourishing season

Causing a complete lockdown of all the region.

Easter has gone and now it's Christmas time

It's getting worse and the virus is in its prime

The Christmas tree stands lonely in the square

No choirs or pilgrims, a scene so sad and rare

With the news of the vaccine, hope is rising

Holding onto hope for us is not surprising

Hope has been the secret of our surviving

Despite the occupation ever so brutalizing

As we face this monster of a pandemic altogether

The least we can do is to be kind to each other

May the spirit of Christmas continue to prevail

And may justice, peace and liberation tip the scale

An Open Letter to the European Union On the UN Human Rights Day

 

For the last few days,  we have been hearing  about the European Union contemplating  to impose sanctions on Turkey.  I am not going to indulge in the reasons justifying those sanctions.  However,  on this 10^th day of December,  I want to seize the occasion of the United Nations Human Rights Day to pose a question to the European Union,  that  has been watching the daily violations of Palestinian human rights by the Israeli occupying forces including the demolition of schools which the European Union itself  has provided funding for.  When will the European Union think it is appropriate to consider or in fact to actually impose sanctions on Israel?  After the visit  to the site of the schools and the wide coverage it had on the media,  all that the European Union Representatives did was to condemn the action.  Israel could not care less, and it has become immune to any condemnation of its violations in the occupied territories.  Even when it kills young people,  it claims that it has a right to defend itself.

 

However,  I am sure Israel  won’t be that  immune if it is made to feel the brunt of its violations by some action on behalf of the international community.  So I am wondering what it is going to take for the  European Union to consider imposing sanctions on Israel, for its continuous  violations during its 53 years of a military occupation, which in itself is a violation of  the United Nations resolution 242 passed by a unanimous vote of the Security Council  on November 22, 1967  for the withdrawal of the Israeli forces based on the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war.

Reflecting on the Power of Hope

For  the last few days I have been reading a book about the Palestinian poet from Beit Sahhour,Anton Shomali (1914-1979) written by Aziz Al-Asa, a writer and a  researcher. Many of you remember Beit Sahhour not only for the YMCA Shepherds field service during the Christmas celebrations, but for its civil disobedience against the Israeli occupation during the first Intifada which had erupted in 1987.  By then Anton Shomali had passed away.  

  

However, the writer highlights the poetry of Anton which seems to be a documentation of the different historical periods of Palestine, some of which the poet himself  lived through.  There is a reference to the Crusaders, the Ottoman Empire, the British Mandate, the Nakba of 1948 as well as the Israeli occupation of June 1967. 

 

It seemed ironic that while I was reading one of the poems which was an Ode to Hope, I received a notice from a Palestinian-American friend,  Mary Trolan, about a new book: 

A History of False Hope: Investigative Commissions in Palestine, by Lori Allen.  

 

Ever since I can remember, we have been struggling and hoping for justice in our own land.  When we were still in school we heard of one commission after the other coming to study the options for a solution for  Palestine.  No wonder the title of Lori Allen is A History of False Hope.   Why in the first place was there a need for a solution for Palestine?  Is it because Palestine as well as other  countries of the Middle East have always been coveted by colonial powers?  Our parents thought that their liberation  from the Ottoman Empire was truly a new era of Independence, and that the law of the Jungle,  “Might is Right”  had come to an end with the establishment of  the United Nations in 1945 after  the end of World War II.    Unfortunately that did not happen, and the British and French  ended up being the new colonial powers in the region dividing greater Syria according to their own vested interests.   

 

Palestine fell under the British Mandate for twenty five  years, during which the  British  facilitated the implementation of the Balfour declaration* which eventually led to the partition of Palestine by the UN resolution 181 on November 29, 1947, and the dispossession of the Palestinians for not accepting the partition plan.  How could the Palestinians  have accepted to partition their  own land? As if that was not enough,  the UN allocated 56% of Palestine to the Jewish population who owned only 7% of the land at that time. 

 

Once again the United Nations adopted resolution No. 194 on December 11, 1948 to allow  the return of all the  Palestinians who were forced out of the country by the Jewish militias or who fled in fear.  The injustice was so glaring that we were sure it would be redressed.  That is why we never ceased to hope,  not  even after the occupation of the rest of the Palestinian territories in the wake of the June 1967 war.  Once again the United Nations passed a resolution 242 on November22, 1967  for the withdrawal of the Israeli forces based on the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war.  Although that never materialized,  we were  still hoping despite the failure of all the peace negotiations, and  the hopelessness of the situation.  But we do realize that the impotence of this international body seems to be so apparent only when Israel is concerned, and which has always been shielded by the USA.

 

However we keep hoping,  because this is bound to change eventually.  With the lockdowns all over the world due to the Covid 19 pandemic we see more and more webinars taking place in favor of the rights of the Palestinians, and more books published in favor of Palestinians as well which was not possible ten years ago.  That is why we keep quoting the renowned  Arab poet from the Abbasside era Al-Mutanabi, which translates from Arabic as follows:    “Life would be unbearable without a glimmer of hope.”   On the other hand, in his Ode to Hope,  Anton Shomali writes:

 

O HOPE
Without you no one would have rebelled ,no one would have feared
Without you no one would have labored , no one would have worked hard
Without you despair would have darkened the  conscience of every man
Without you life would have become meaningless , abandoned and man idle and dependent
Without you the world would have become a grave for every kindness and every good deed. (Translated from Arabic by Tania Nasir)

However we have to realize that Hope, like Faith, without deeds is dead.  
So as we continue to hope for justice and independence to prevail, we and all our friends who support us, have to work towards that goal in deeds and not only in words.  

 

 

*The Balfour Declaration.

His Majesty's government views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country

This Week in Palestine, Personality of the Month: Dina Nasser (my daughter)

Personality of the Month

Dina Nasser

Dina Nasser is a Palestinian public health nurse with a post-graduate specialization in operating room nursing. She received her RN degree from the Nightingale School of Nursing, St. Thomas’ Hospital, in London, United Kingdom, and her operating room specialization at Lewisham Hospital School of Nursing before obtaining her master’s degree in public health at Birzeit University. Her main areas of expertise are infection prevention and control and emergency-care training.

Dina has dedicated the majority of her career to improving the quality of health care services for all Palestinians. She has 35 years of clinical experience in the Palestinian health system and in the capacity building of health professionals. Her work has led to the development of national protocols and guidelines for infection prevention that have been endorsed by the Palestinian Ministry of Health. She has the ability to work with teams and adapt current settings to international standards to mitigate the risks of work in environments with limited resources in fragile economies. She is both a mentor and a role model for the new generation of nurses.

Dina facilitated the development of the infection-prevention program at Augusta Victoria Hospital and played a leadership role in the team working to ensure sustainability and alignment with international standards required for the International Joint Commission accreditation.

She began her clinical career at Makassed Hospital as an operating room nurse where she set out safety and infection-prevention standards. She worked with a Norwegian NGO to support operating room nurses who trained at Al-Ittihad Hospital in Nablus and helped develop the national curriculum for operating room nurses taught at Al-Quds University. Dina then assumed the position of deputy field nursing officer at UNRWA, moving on to the post of field nursing officer, where she remained for eight years, supporting the capacity building of nurses, promoting teamwork, and fostering the adoption of systems and standards in infection prevention and control for Qalqilya Hospital, particularly in the operating rooms.

She is among the founders of Juzoor for Health and Social Development and set up the first American Heart Association training center in Palestine, where she remains on the national faculty for basic life support, preparing new instructors and supporting national centers.

At Augusta Victoria Hospital (AVH) on the Mount of Olives, Dina started as a part-time health adviser in 2008 and served as the chief operating officer (COO) from 2019 to November 2020. In 2014 and 2018, she led the AVH missions to Gaza during some of the most tumultuous times, liaising effectively with stakeholders and the WHO in supporting care for the injured.

Dina has presented the work of the AVH infection prevention team at three conferences of the Association of Professionals in Infection Control (APIC) in the United States. At an APIC plenary session in 2019, she presented AVH’s national engagement in addressing antimicrobial stewardship and infection-prevention practices through a quality-improvement collaborative effort of 22 hospitals, including all Ministry of Health hospitals.

Her accomplishments in putting in place the protocols of infection prevention and hand hygiene at AVH became all the more important during the COVID pandemic when, as COO, she played a pivotal role on the front line with the emergency response team, supporting the staff and working with the ancillary teams to ensure readiness and safe practices to safeguard the health of AVH staff and patients.

Reflecting on the pandemic, she says, “I am grateful that we achieved some advances in hand hygiene during our national quality improvement collaborative, even though some health managers had been skeptical about our efforts in focusing on hand hygiene. Imagine what would have happened under COVID had the nation been three years behind!”

Guided by the nursing code of practice, Dina is a leader and a resource. Yet when the need arises, she works hand in hand to get the job done. She is particular about work quality and always encourages teams to communicate effectively and do better. Her trademark debriefing questions: “What went well? And how can we do better?”

Reflecting on All Saints Day

 Today the Catholic Church as well as other  Christian Churches  celebrate All Saints Day.  The number of saints  had  increased along the years, that it seemed more appropriate to allocate one day for all of them together.  

 

As I watched the Sunday service on TV this morning, and which has become the norm ever since the Corona Pandemic, there was a special prayer for all those saints.    However I could not help but think of the many saints who are living amongst us and we hardly recognize them, let alone say a special prayer for them.  

 

Did we ever think of the many anonymous angels of mercy whom we do not recognize because we do not see them when they lend a hand to an elderly or a handicapped person,   or when they knock at the door of a lonely person to give him or her some solace.  I can think of some teachers with special compassion who have made a whole difference in the life of  school children particularly those with special needs.  And during this pandemic I cannot but think of all those nurses and medical teams who have been on the go continuously to save lives.  What they have been  doing is beyond their duty.

 

And of course under this oppressive occupation,  there are those who check on families whose children have been in prison for years and years with no hope of having them released in their  life time.  But then could we not consider some of those prisoners themselves as saints, like Maher El- Akhras who has  been detained without charge or trial and is in his 97^th day of a hunger strike and is willing  to sacrifice his life,  so that the brutal and illegal  Administrative detention is completely abolished.  A detention Israel inherited from the British mandate gives Israel the right to hold anybody under administrative detention for a certain period without charge or trial,  and which could be renewed  continuously. 

 

So on this All Saints day, please  pray for Maher, and maybe a prayer for some compassion on the part  of the Israeli military  will help release Maher.