Hamas and Ourselves
1. U.S. critics refer to “Hamas’s genocidal charter” as odious. No doubt it is. Of course, the U.S. was a practitioner of genocide of the indigenous population across this land. Perhaps a few of those…
Category: Palestine
Free Palestine
Over the weekend (Scores of Palestinians being killed) The pro basketball player tweeted Free Palestine The president of the Zionist Organization of America stated “Anyone who uses the phrase ‘Free Palestine’ is either ignorant of…
The Way It Didn’t Turn Out
When the Roman pontiff Stood at the Bethlehem Wall All he had to do was summon The courage and compassion To afflict the comfortable And comfort the afflicted And say “Palestine must be free”
They Will Want To Know More by Cristina Cousins
Dear Friends, Cristina came to hear Remi Kanazi last Wednesday and to see Five Broken Cameras and hear Iyad Burnat last Friday. I asked her if she’d be willing to write a response. This is what she…
Elie Wiesel and the Question of Palestine
This essay was first published in Tikkun, November-December 2002. In his 1986 Nobel lecture, Elie Wiesel spoke with characteristic gravity on any attempt to reckon with the Holocaust: “There are no theological answers, there are no…
Holding It All
At a break during our all-day strategy meeting Yasmin told me She never felt more hopeless Than when she walked the roads of Rafah (Ruins to the left Rubble to the right) And all the…
Remembering and Forgetting
1. The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting. –Milan Kundera, Czech/French novelist 2. The Jews of my city are now forgotten, erased from its memory. Before, there were some…
In Praise of Fairuz
While on my walk The soft, tender voice of Fairuz was borne to me on the breeze As if coming from an ethereal howdah: “One day we shall return to our neighborhood….” Fairuz’s voice, in…
Sleepless (Life under Occupation/12)
Dear Carla, It’s 5 a.m. and I’ve been up 24 hours We visited a family yesterday The first two hours She beheld her brother Who was home after two years in prison: “How much weight…
Alice Walker to Hedy Epstein
Chris Wallach is reading Alice Walker’s latest book of poetry, The World Will Follow Joy: Turning Madness into Flowers (New Poems), and found this poem to Hedy.