By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian
Ariel Sharon's decision not to blast the Palestinians out of existence
after last week's suicide bombings is, at first sight, mystifying.
While
jets blew up the Palestinians' police station in Ramallah and Israeli
soldiers occupied their East Jerusalem headquarters, these reprisals
were
far less bloody than most people had predicted.
Several hypotheses have been advanced to explain this uncharacteristic
restraint. Sharon is seeking to keep faith with his more conciliatory
foreign minister, Shimon Peres. He is hoping to collect some moral
credit, which he will use to defend much fiercer intervention at a
later
date. The seizure of Palestinian offices does more to hurt their cause
than the murder of prominent figures. All these explanations are
plausible, but there is another possible interpretation, overlooked
by
almost everyone. In killing Palestinians, Ariel Sharon can no longer
be
sure that he is killing only Palestinians.
For the past few weeks, foreign peace activists belonging to the
International Solidarity Movement have been arriving in Jerusalem and
the
West Bank, joining demonstrations, staying in the homes of threatened
Palestinians, turning themselves into human shields between the Israeli
army and its targets. A few days ago they were joined by one of the
most
remarkable forces in British politics, a group of mostly middle-aged
or
elderly campaigners called Women in Black UK. These Hell's Grannies
have
moved straight into the front line, ensuring that the brutality with
which the Palestinians are routinely treated now has international
repercussions: Israel can't hurt local people without hurting them
too.
For the past few nights, members of the solidarity movement have been
sleeping in the homes of Palestinians in the Bethlehem suburb of Beit
Jala. Eight hundred and fifty homes here have been shelled by soldiers
stationed in the neighbouring Jewish settlement of Gilo, as the army
seeks to expel the Palestinians in order to expand Israel's illegal
plantation.
The foreigners have been standing at army checkpoints, photographing
soldiers when they stop people trying to leave or enter their communities
and recording the names of those they arrest. The soldiers hate this
scrutiny, but whenever the monitors arrive at a checkpoint, there's
a
marked reduction in the violence there.
The Women in Black also helped to organise the demonstrations outside
Orient House, the Palestinian headquarters seized by Israel on Friday.
They established the physical and political space in which Palestinians
could protest non-violently. Arrested and beaten up with the local
people, the women witnessed the torture of Palestinian prisoners in
the
police station, which would otherwise have gone unrecorded.
In short, these volunteer peacekeepers are seeking to do precisely
what
foreign governments have promised but failed to do: to monitor and
contest abuses of human rights, to defuse violence, and to challenge
Israel's ethnic cleansing programme. Their actions put us all to shame.
As well as seeking to enforce peace, they are trying, hard as it is
in
the current atmosphere, to broker it. They have been suggesting to
their
Palestinian hosts some of the novel means by which injustice can be
confronted without the use of violence. They have plenty of experience
to
draw on.
Some of these Hell's Grannies have been involved in the Trident
Ploughshares campaign which, over the past fortnight, has been running
rings round the marines guarding the nuclear submarines in Scotland.
To
the astonishment of the guards, the protesters there have managed to
evade the tightest security in the United Kingdom, swimming into the
docks in which the submarines are moored and spray-painting the words
"useless" and "illegal" on their sides. They have launched canoes and
home-made rafts into the paths of submarines trying to leave their
berths. They have cut through the razor wire and roamed around the
base,
hoping to arrest its commander for crimes against humanity. A few days
ago, they blocked the main gates of the nuclear warhead depot, their
arms
embedded in barrels of concrete, bringing work to a halt as the police
tried to figure out how to extract them.
Two years ago, three of these women climbed into the Trident programme's
floating research laboratory on Loch Goil and, as a delightful new
video
commissioned by the Quakers shows, threw all its computers into the
sea.
In Greenock court, they were acquitted of criminal damage, after the
sherriff accepted their defence that the Trident programme infringes
international law: rather than committing a crime, they were preventing
one. Soon afterwards, the women "borrowed" a police boat from the Trident
base in Coulport and drove it into the submarine docks at Faslane.
Among
them was one of the women who were also found not guilty in 1996 after
smashing up a Hawk aircraft bound for East Timor. The subsequent
publicity forced the government to stop exporting Hawks to Indonesia.
Though they're acquitted as often as they're convicted, Hell's Grannies
have spent much of the past few years in jail. They take full
responsibility for their actions. If the police fail to spot them,
they
ring them up and ask to be arrested. Their candour, clarity and humour
have played well in court, but the risks of this accountable campaigning
are enormous. The prosecution began yesterday of 17 British and American
Greenpeace activists, who are being tried on terrorism charges after
peacefully occupying the Californian launch pad being used for George
Bush's missile defence tests. In the Middle East such tactics are likely
to be still more dangerous, as Israeli soldiers have shown no hesitation
in killing protesters in cold blood. But, as Gandhi recognised, the
brutal treatment of non-violent campaigners can destroy the moral
authority of the oppressor, generating inexorable pressure for change.
The Women in Black are clearly prepared not only to die for their cause,
but also to make what Dostoevesky correctly identified as a far greater
sacrifice: to live for their cause. They are ready to lose their homes,
their comforts, their liberty, to be vilified, beaten up and imprisoned.
Their accountable actions require a far greater courage than throwing
bricks at the police.
Most importantly perhaps, these campaigners never cease to acknowledge
the humanity of their opponents. They seek not to threaten but to
persuade. The results can be astonishing. The MoD police who pulled
the
Trident swimmers out of the water ferried them back to their camp,
rather
than arresting them, while massaging their legs to stop cramp. When
Angie
Zelter, one of the co-ordinators of Women in Black, was on remand for
her
attempts to demolish the British military machine, she was visited
in
prison by a timber merchant whose business she had once tried to shut
down. He had, as a result of her campaign, stopped importing mahogany
stolen from indigenous reserves in Brazil, and started refashioning
his
business along ethical lines, and now he needed her advice.
All this is a long-winded way of saying something which, in the 21st
Century, sounds rather embarrassing: these people are my heroes. They
confront us with our own cowardice, our failure to match our convictions
with action. We talk about it, they do it. Hell's Grannies are walking
through fire. If they can, why can't we all?
George Monbiot, in the Guardian
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...and from "Nanoose Update", Dec. 1997:
(contact Norm for the complete newsletter)
NANOOSE PEACE-WALK
Using household hammers,
Andrea Needham and three other British
women did
$3 million worth of disarmament in the cockpit weapons control system,
wings and fuselage of a fighter jet which destined for sale to Indonesia.
They took this action only after many years of peace activism on behalf
of
East Timor - which was brutally invaded by Indonesia in 1975. More
than
one
third of East Timor's population, 200,000 people, have so far been
killed
by the Indonesian military.
After Andrea had spent 6
months in prison awaiting trial, the
jury
returned a verdict of "Not Guilty" . British law
stipulates that, if
necessary, citizens have the right and the duty "to use force
to prevent
a crime". Thanks Andrea! (and to the jury!)
Andrea is a thirty-two
year old registered nurse. She has worked
in
shelters for the homeless in Britain and the USA, and cared for elderly
persons and refugees. She spoke at the peace walk, and later at a potluck
dinner at the home of Eileen Sowerby, about the genocide of East Timorese
people and her personal commitment to activism.
When Indonesian
President Suharto arrived in Vancouver for the November APEC
meetings,
Andrea also spoke at the parallel People's Summit.
Special thanks to
Kealey Pringle of the Victoria Peace Centre
and Terry
Wolfwood of the Barnard-Boecker Centre Foundation, who brought Andrea
to
Canada and coordinated the East Timor - Seeds of Hope tour, during
which
Andrea spoke at a numerous media events and meetings on Vancouver
Island,
as well as at the People's Summit.
?
PHOTO: British peace activist par-excellence Andrea
Needham joined
Merve Wilkinson and 75 other NCC supporters at the 14th
annual
Remembrance Day peace-walk at Nanoose. (Nov. 11, 1997)