Photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills)

One of the organizers of the event, Rula Khalaily, a student at the university and an activist with the Hadash Party, told +972  about the goal of the event:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Before the ceremony began, a group of between 200 and 300 right-wing protesters, including MK Michael Ben-Ari (National Union), screamed and chanted slogans such as “We brought a Nakba onto you” (to the tune of “We Come to Greet You in Peace”), “No to fascist Islam” and “go back to Syria.” They waved Israeli flags and signs that read, “Left-wing traitors.” A few wore shirts that said “Sheikh Munis Solidarity,” a play on words mocking the Sheikh Jarrah solidarity movement and referring to the destroyed Palestinian village on which Tel Aviv University was built.

Kiryat Arba settler Baruch Marzel wearing "Solidarity Sheikh Munis" shirt (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills)

They were making so much noise utilizing a bullhorn and air horns that it was impossible to hear the ceremony, which included a minute of silence marred by disruption.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Palestinian participants shared their families’ personal stories of displacement and read off the names of villages destroyed in 1948. They asked the crowd to try and ignore the disruptive protesters and avoid engaging in any confrontations with them. The police constantly had to prevent the rightists from getting close to those conducting the ceremony.

At one point a man ran over and grabbed a large banner being held by some students that said “Nakba” and tried to tear it up, but was stopped by the police, who took his ID and escorted him away. A total of three people were reportedly arrested.

Rightwing protester tries to disrupt Nakba ceremony (photo: Oren Ziv/Activestills)

I asked a young man (wearing an Israeli flag as a cape) why he came to disrupt the event and what bothered him. “If they want to protest they should do so in their universities in Bir Zeit and not at my university.” He added that his problem is not so much with the Arabs here but with the Jews showing solidarity with them. When asked why not respect the right of these citizens of Israel to conduct their ceremony in peace without disruption, he and others responded that it is a democratic country and he can scream and shout all he wants. “We came here with the specific goal of disrupting the event,” he said.

A Palestinian participant of the ceremony who was visibly upset by the protesters at one point started shouting towards them: “You are Zionists, you are not Jews. Maimonides was an Arab. You are Zionists, not Jews.”

Although the Tel Aviv University dean of students approved the ceremony, the university distanced itself from the event by demanding the students pay for their own security and banned the use of a sound system and Palestinian flags. Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar called the event “outrageous” and urged the university president to reconsider permitting the event to take place.

This was the first high profile Nakba commemoration to take place since the High Court of Justice’s decision to uphold the law last January. The “Nakba Law,” which was first passed on March 22, 2011, grants the Finance Minister the authority to limit the  public funding of institutions that commemorate the Nakba.

Arrest in Ramle, May 3, 2012 (photo: Activestills)

Last Thursday, May 3, 15 Israeli citizens – Palestinians and Jews (including one resident of Jerusalem) – as well as one American and one Canadian, were violently arrested after a demonstration outside the Ramle Prison in solidarity with Palestinian administrative detainees on hunger strike. Eight were arrested at the demonstration and then nine more outside the police station after the protest had ended. Adalah attorney Orna Kohn told +972 that even though the nine arrested at the police station were not within the parameters of the legal protest by the prison, “there were less than 50 people there, so it does not constitute illegal assembly anyway.”

Besides there being no pretense for the arrests since it was a legal and nonviolent protest, the activists in custody were reportedly beaten, verbally abused, threatened with rape, shocked by Taser guns while handcuffed, and held in custody beyond the time alloted by the judge.

Adalah, which is providing legal representation for all 17 activists, has filed a complaint with the Police Investigation Unit regarding the police brutality, and a complaint with the court regarding their prolonged custody. +972 contacted a police spokesperson for response but no comment was provided. Here is a rundown of events according to the Adalah press release from May 7:

On 3 May 2012, approximately 200 protestors gathered outside the Ramle Prison compound, where hunger strikers are being held in the Israel Prisons Service (IPS) medical center. They had a permit to protest issued by the police. At approximately 6:45 pm, after the demonstration ended and most participants had left, several individuals attempted to continue protesting by forming a picket line, which does not require a permit under Israeli law. However, the police violently attacked the group, beating them and using Tasers, even after the people were handcuffed. Eight participants including a minor were arrested.

After the initial arrests, some of protestors went to the police station to find out about the others’ status. There, the police attacked and beat the remaining protestors and arrested an additional nine people. Another five individuals were fined for disturbing the peace. Some of the women detained were sexually harassed, including threats of rape and repeatedly being called “bitches” and “whores.”

Irene Nasser, one of those arrested, has provided +972 with her account of the events. Here is an excerpt, detailing what she experienced while being held in custody, her legs and hands shackled.

Irene Nasser being arrested (Photo: Mati Milstein)

They pushed them [another three female arrestees] into the walls and crudely screamed at them to shut their mouths. While we were all already next to each other, the officers began kicking us. At that point we once again heard lots of shouting and heard them pushing some of the men into a second room, where they were shackled. There was one man who five officers dragged on the floor – it appeared to me that he was handcuffed – and simply began shocking him with a taser for several minutes continuously. The doors were open and we shouted at the officers to stop shocking him, and saying it was dangerous.

Three or four officers entered our room, shouted at us to shut up, shoved us, and told us to shut our mouths. One of the officers threatened us, “Do you want to be hit? Just try and do something. Do you want to be hit?” and the whole while they continued shocking the man in the hall with a taser. I was scared. The officers stood over him while he was lying on the floor, no less than five of them, and his whole body was shaking from the electric shocks. He did not resist – they continued to shock him with the taser on his upper body. He only screamed in pain.

Throughout the night, for several hours we heard lots of screams from the room the men were in. Both screams of pain and the officers screaming, including cursing. We were all very much shaking, six women, we tried to calm each other. I had my shackles on for hours. Three of us were on benches and three were on the floor. We were all in shock. We were trembling, we did not know what would happen. There was a lot of violence. I wanted to try to be calm. I was scared by I tried to remain calm. Several minutes later we began talking a bit amongst ourselves, trying to make jokes. Our bodies were in pain from the officers hitting us. On (P), (Th) and (D’s) bodies there were lots of scratches and bruises. (P) had two large scratches on her neck and somebody else was bleeding from her wrist.

Everyone had lots of bruises on our bodies. At some point (P) and (Th) stood up for a few minutes. Three officers entered and started shouting again. They told them to sit down, pushed all of us onto the floor, piling onto each other. One (of the officers) was holding a taser and used it to electrically shock us, for no reason, we were a human pile on the floor, and he tasered us. We shouted and we all were very terrified. I was shoved aside and sat on a chair. The officer with the taser approached me and tried to taser me, but accidentally hit my bag. They screamed at us to sit, and we answered that we were sitting, but they continued to shout, beat and curse at us.

According to a testimony published in Electronic Intifada, Thaira Zoabi, another protester arrested at the police station, was spit in the face by a policeman and threatened with rape:

The Israeli forces used [taser guns] and I have bruises on my arms and legs. I saw them open a protester’s mouth by force and spit in it, and they spit in my face as well. They beat us and used massive verbal violence. They did a full body search. While being under custody, a police officer of Ramle district addressed both me and another female activist while being cuffed with verbal sexual harassment, threatening to rape us. I have to admit I burst in tears.

Another woman who was among those arrested, Amany Khalifa, shared this with +972:

This was my first time being arrested, and it was a violent experience, physically, mentally and sexually. As a Palestinian and a female, I felt doubly oppressed by how the male police officers treated us. They said to us: “Dirty Arabs, we’ll show you what Palestine is,” and called us “bitches,” “whores,” and things like this. I clearly heard them threaten us to not even think about protesting again, certainly not within the boundaries of the State of Israel. It is clear the authorities are adamant about silencing any popular resistance, and especially anything inside the 1948 borders.

The activists were released to house arrest for 3 days on Friday after signing release terms of NIS 10,000 each. They are not allowed to speak to one another or anyone else who was at the demonstration for 14 days, or go within 50 meters of the Ramle prison compound. There are various charges filed against them by the police, including incitement, rioting and attacking an officer. There is as of yet no date set regarding the indictment. Meanwhile, Adalah is awaiting a response regarding the two complaints filed.

+972 will provide updates on the affair as it transpires.

Moriel Rothman contributed to this report.

The Ruweidi family outside their home in Silwan May 9, 2012 (Photo: Moriel Rothman)

The Jerusalem District Court ruled in favor of the Ruweidi family from East Jerusalem last week (May 2), accepting the claim that their home is not “absentee property,” as the Jewish National Fund has sought to prove in court since the 1990s. The Ruweidi family will thus be able to continue living in their home.

The JNF, operating through its subsidiary organization Himnutah and together with the rightwing organization ELAD, claimed the Ruweidi’s home was legally seized by the state. During the proceedings it turned out that the confiscation was based on a declaration made in 1987 by a Palestinian man who has no connection to the family, and is suspected of falsifying similar claims in East Jerusalem on several occasions.

Sameer abu Alaa al Ruweidi, Juma’a's nephew, expressed the family’s relief at the court’s decision:

“This house was one of the first four houses in Wadi Hilweh, built by my great great great great grandfather. First of all, we give thanks to God. We also pray that the rest of the land that we own, which has been taken by the settlers, will be returned to us, and that all of the palestinian houses that have been taken over by settlers in Jerusalem will be returned to their owners.”

The court affirmed that the house, located in the Wadi Hilweh neighborhood of Silwan and referred to as “Plot 51,” is in fact owned by Juma’a Muhammad Saalim al-Ruweidi, now 85 years old, who was born raised in the house.

According to the 1950 Absentee Property Law, all property belonging to a Palestinian living outside of the newly declared State of Israel could be – and was – transferred to the possession of the “Custodian of Absentee Property” – meaning, the state. On several occasions, those properties were then handed over to organizations like ELAD and the JNF. In the past, this law has been used disingenuously as a means for appropriating land from Palestinians in order to expand Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem.

To learn more about the legal significance and usage of the Absentee Property Law, read Ir Amim’s comprehensive report on the matter.

After years of legal battles regarding the Ruweidi’s home, the District Court ruled in 2004 that the family had failed to prove ownership. The family then appealed to the Supreme Court, who in 2010 ruled that the District Court must reexamine the evidence. On Tuesday, the family was vindicated when the court finally ruled that the evidence for “absentee property” was indeed insufficient and asserted the Ruweidi’s family ownership of the house.

Sameer abu Alaa al Ruweidi thanked the Wadi Hilweh Alternative Information center for their support, as well as Peace Now and Rabbis for Human Rights, who have accompanied the family throughout their legal battle: “We call on the Israeli government to put an end to the cruel practices of settlers taking over Palestinian houses through forged documents and by force,” said al Ruweidi.

Protestors expressed shock and anger over the fact that Mofaz led the opposition party into the government just days after announcing he would never join Netanyahu’s government, and accused both the prime minister and Kadima chairman of being liars and “shady dealers,” more interested in their own seats of power than the interests of the country.

Protestor in Tel Aviv holding a sign with the faces of Netanyahu and Mofaz that says: "Combinators', slang for shady dealers (Photo: Activestills)

Six people were arrested at the protest in front of Tel Aviv’s Habima Theater, among them Haaretz municipal journalist Ilan Lior,  Tel Aviv city council member Yoav Goldring, and a photographer with the free daily newspaper Israel Hayom. According to police the protest was organized without permit, and thus constituted illegal assembly.

Haaretz journalist Ilan Lior told Walla news (Hebrew) that he asked the police to cross the street in order to see what was going on and was aggressively rushed into a police car and arrested.

Click here to view the embedded video.

While according to a Haaretz poll, a majority of the Israeli public see the deal as motivated by personal gain and not the stability of the country, Israel Hayom released a poll Wednesday stating that Netanyahu’s popularity had increased since the deal, with 39.8 percent of the public approving of the deal, slightly more than the 31.9% who oppose it.

It remains to be seen whether the new government deal will help reignite the J14 “social justice” protests from last summer. Protests are planned around the country this Saturday May 12.

Here is a video showing more footage from the protest Tuesday night:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Read more:
Netanyahu the strongest prime minister since David Ben-Gurion
Did Mofaz sell himself short, or does he know something we don’t?
The irreparable damage of Netanayahu-Mofaz fiasco
Coalition deal’s bright side: Days numbered for rotten government
Through deal, Bibi buys ‘industrial peace’ for Iran war 

Children of al-Arakib watch as border police enter village (photo: Mairav Zonszein)

The Jewish National Fund resumed cultivating land Monday morning in al-Arakib, an unrecognized Bedouin village in southern Israel which the quasi-governmental agency has earmarked for a large forestation project. A week ago, the families in the village got word that the JNF would return and asked for activists to come and support them.

JNF equipment, escorted by heavy police presence, showed up Monday morning and sealed off the entrance to the village.  Families and activists watched from the village cemetery, the only spot that has been deemed untouchable due to its historic and emotional significance. Residents told +972 that JNF representatives gave their word in private conversations a couple of months ago that they would not plant on a specific plot of land - known as plot 24 – since it is the subject of an ongoing court case. However this morning they prepared this precise piece of land for cultivation.

Since July 17, 2010, the village has been demolished by the Israel Lands Administration (ILA) more times than anyone can count, and each time the families have returned and built it up again to confirm their claim on the land. Despite remaining steadfast in their claims to the land, most families have relocated to neighboring towns like Rahat to avoid the anguish of constant destruction, such that only a handful of residents still live inside al-Arakib.

Here is footage of the 25th demolition of the village:

Click here to view the embedded video.

The ILA claims the Bedouin are trespassing on state land, but the issue is still being fought in court proceedings over land ownership. While the residents do not have official land deeds, they do have documents from the Ottoman era showing their ancestors purchased the land in 1906. The state insists the land was appropriated in 1954 such that court findings regarding ownership before then are irrelevant anyway.

The issue of Al-Arakib is part of a larger story concerning 35 unrecognized villages inside Israel. According to a 2011 report by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, approximately half the Bedouin population in the Negev, about 90,000 people—live in quasi-recognized or unrecognized villages similar to al-Arakib. The government adoption of the Prawer Plan last September calls for the uprooting of 30,000 Bedouin citizens of Israel and their relocation to established Bedouin towns (with financial compensation), thereby denying the community’s connection to the land and way of life.

Critics of the plan have called it a “declaration of war” on the Bedouin community, since they are being treated like a security threat, and not as citizens with equal rights.

Rabbis for Human Rights activist Moriel Rothman contributed to this report. 

For more on Israeli policies regarding the Bedouin population, click here.

Read also:
Bedouin village of al-Arakib destroyed again
Where is the inevitable Bedouin intifada Israel guaranteed?
Jerusalem protest at JNF calls to halt Bedouin displacement
Police fire sponge bullets at Israeli citizens in al-Arakib

The Jerusalem Post ran an op-ed yesterday (Monday) by a writer and attorney from Washington, D.C. explaining why he is canceling his 50-year subscription to the New Yorker magazine. The poorly-argued and belligerent article directly implicates the magazine’s editor of 14 years, David Remnick, for being “unabashedly anti-Israel,” and personally attacks him as being unfit for the job and its salary since his “only previous editorial experience was at his high school newspaper.”

I guess the writer did not want to mention Remnick’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book on the fall of the Soviet Union when he was still a Washington Post correspondent, or his award for excellence in journalism, or his Editor of the Year award from 2000.

Instead he claims that Remnick went on a “diatribe” against Israel in his March 12 “Talk of the Town” article  because he merely pointed out what former Israeli prime ministers, American Jewish figures and the entire international community have already admitted: that Israel’s 45-year occupation is at odds with its democratic character, threatening it from within, and that if it does not change its policies it will become an apartheid state. According to the writer’s logic, Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert must thus also be “anti-Israel” for pointing out that Israeli policies conflict with democratic behavior.

He also attacks a Hendrick Hertzberg column from almost a year ago (directly implicating Remnick, who hired him to write regularly for the magazine) for calling the prime minister “Netanyahoo.” However, the writer clearly did not actually read the short piece, since this was not Hertzberg’s term but rather a quote from Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, who tweeted that he was “waiting for Netanyahoo” in the House Chamber to address Congress.  I guess that senator must be “anti-Israel” as well.

I could go on and on about the baselessness of the article, but suffice it to say, it is not fit to be printed in any self-respected newspaper. If you are interested, look yourself. Normally I wouldn’t bother to address an article of such poor caliber – but I believe it is worth noting since it perfectly illustrates the pathetic battle being waged by people and entities who relentlessly insist on being the authority over the definition of “pro-Israel,” but increasingly have little to no substance to their arguments – and instead attack others.

Figures like David Remnick, Peter Beinart and many other American Jews have been feeling a deep conflict between Israeli policies and their core liberal values, some for a long time. It is only in recent years that an increasing number of them have felt confident and frustrated enough to express it openly.

And no matter how many other countries commit human rights violations or struggle with their democratic record, it does not change the fact that Israel is continuing to act reprehensibly, or make it any less problematic. As long as Israel expects Jews to support it, and as long as the United States continues to unconditionally support Israel, no one should be surprised that the editor of the New Yorker chooses to allocate a few articles per year on the matter. In fact, if anything it shows disproportionate care for Israel and the future of the Jewish people, not an aversion to them.

I am not surprised that an American Jewish writer had the nerve to accuse David Remnick of a diatribe against Israel and to attack him for using “valuable New Yorker real estate” on such “trivial matters” as a grownup Orthodox man spitting on a schoolgirl. I am however appalled that the most widely-read English language Jewish newspaper in the world chooses to publish it – and by doing so positions itself squarely in the Israeli government propaganda machine, which is certainly not lacking hard working members.

This is not the first time the Jerusalem Post has aligned itself directly with a rightwing agenda or with belligerent acts aimed at silencing open dialogue about Israel, as was the case when one of its correspondents served as the mouthpiece for NGO Monitor’s attack on one of our donors, claiming we too are anti-Israel.

Especially considering a recent cartoon in the magazine showing Moses parting the Red Sea and some Israelites behind him commenting that they like him but just wish he could “be a little more pro-Israel,” I personally couldn’t be a happier subscriber.

When the Israeli government and its embassy in Washington discovered that CBS News show 60 Minutes was going to run a segment on the increasing departure of Christians from the West Bank, they felt obligated to step in. With Prime Minister Netanyahu’s advice and blessing, Ambassador Michael Oren decided months ago that before the show even aired, he must speak with the network’s chairman in order to make sure the report included an Israeli reaction, delaying the report’s airing from last Christmas to this last Sunday.

The Ambassador claimed he had information the 60 Minutes story was going to do a “hatchet job”  on Israel which, apparently for Israeli leadership and diplomatic officials,  means any mention at all of the possible suffering of Christian Palestinians in places like Bethlehem, due to the separation wall towering over their homes, or the myriad other hardships and violations committed by Israel’s military occupation.

In this clip from the full 60 Minutes report, Bob Simon tells Ambassador Oren that he has never in all his years of journalism been confronted with such interference in his reporting, before a story even aired.

Click here to view the embedded video.

By telling Bob Simon of CBS News that there is a ‘first time for everything,’ Ambassador Oren admitted that Israel’s Foreign Ministry is pioneering a new kind of diplomacy: pure damage control. Israel will continue to be an occupying force, while doing everything in its power to make sure its PR strategy is cleansed of any mention of it. Great plan.

As far as Israel is concerned, this makes perfect sense. As one Israeli diplomat told Haaretz: ”Ambassador Oren did what a diplomat is supposed to do to – prevent serious damage.”

How many faux pas will it take for Israel’s well-oiled PR machine to realize that the best way to prevent serious damage to its image is to simply act in a way that merits a better image? One that maybe wouldn’t require my taxes going to an ambassador that is wasting time making Israel look even worse than it already acts. This kind of effort doesn’t show the world how fair and democratic Israel is – but rather gives the world every reason to believe Israel has a lot it must hide and much “damage” to “control.”

Read also:
Omissions, half-truths and lies: Ambassador Oren in Foreign Policy
Ambassador Oren concedes Israel’s interference in U.S. politics

This shop sign assures all passersby that they carry all types of flags, including those that stick to the window, flag necklaces and flags for the car.

The amount of garbage it leaves behind, literally.

One can only hope that Israelis would put as much effort into examining their government’s and army’s behavior as they do in honoring them. Happy Independence Day.

This longer video showing the attack form a different angle, courtesy of Palestinian TV, shows footage of the event before and after. Decide for yourselves.

Tamimi was arrested in his home on March 24, 2011 for organizing protests and inciting against Israel, based on testimony by Islam Dar Ayyoub, a 14-year old resident of Nabi Saleh who was taken from him home in the middle of the night by Israeli forces for interrogation. His military trial is still ongoing.

Tamimi has been arrested by Israel a total of 11 times and spent around three years in administrative detention, but never convicted of an offense. Amnesty International has declared him a prisoner of conscience and called for his release.

This photograph was taken of him in his home yesterday, April 16, after he was permitted a temporary release from prison for 48 hours to visit his mother in the hospital, who suffered a stroke.

Bassem Tamimi in his home (Photo: Keren Manor/Activestills)

Read Bassem Tamimi’s statement to the military court nearly a year ago here, in which he explains his motivations for civil disobedience and fight for justice.

Read also:
WATCH: Army attacks protestors, journalists, in Nabi Saleh
Nabi Saleh: A tiny village’s struggle against the occupation