Now, a few days after my release from jail in the wake of my trip to Gaza, I’m posting a few notes to sum things up.

First, the mission of the Free Gaza Movement to break the Israeli siege proved a success beyond all expectations. Our reaching Gaza and leaving has created a free and regular channel between Gaza and the outside world. It has done so because it has forced the Israeli government to make a clear policy declaration: that it is not occupying Gaza and therefore will not prevent the free movement of Palestinians in and out (at least by sea). (Israel’s security concerns can easily be accommodated by instituting a technical system of checks similar to those of other ports.) Any attempt on the part of Israel to backtrack on this – by preventing ships in the future from entering or leaving Gaza with goods and passengers, including Palestinians – may be immediately interpreted as an assertion of control, and therefore of Occupation, opening Israel to accountability for war crimes before international law, something Israel tries to avoid at all costs. Gone is the obfuscation that has allowed Israel to maintain its control of the Occupied Territories without assuming any responsibility: from now on, Israel is either an Occupying Power accountable for its actions and policies, or Palestinians have every right to enjoy their human right of traveling freely in and out of their country. Israel can no longer have it both ways. Not only did our two little boats force the Israel military and government to give way, then, they also changed fundamentally the status of Israel’s control of Gaza.

When we finally arrived in Gaza after a day and a half sail, the welcome we received from 40,000 joyous Gazans was overwhelming and moving. People sought me out in particular, eager it seemed to speak Hebrew with an Israeli after years of closure. The message I received by people of all factions during my three days there was the same: How do we (“we” in the sense of all of us living in their country, not just Palestinians or Israelis) get out of this mess? Where are WE going? The discourse was not even political: what is the solution; one-state, two-state, etc etc. It was just common sense and straightforward, based on the assumption that we will all continue living in the same country and this stupid conflict, with its walls and siege and violence, is bad for everybody. Don’t Israelis see that? people would ask me.

(The answer, unfortunately, is “no.” To be honest, we Israeli Jews are the problem. The Palestinian years ago accepted our existence in the country as a people and are willing to accept ANY solution — two states, one state, no state, whatever. It is us who want exclusivity over the “Land of Israel” who cannot conceive of a single country, who cannot accept the national presence of Palestinians (we talk about “Arabs” in our country), and who have eliminated by our settlements even the possibility of the two-state solution in which we take 80% of the land. So it’s sad, truly sad, that our “enemies” want peace and co-existence (and tell me that in HEBREW) and we don’t. Yeah, we Israeli Jews want “peace,” but in the meantime what we have — almost no attacks, a feeling of security, a “disappeared” Palestinian people, a booming economy, tourism and ever-improving international status — seems just fine. If “peace” means giving up settlements, land and control, why do it? What’s wrong with the status quo? If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.)

When in Gaza I also managed to see old friends, especially Eyad al-Sarraj of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program and Raji Sourani, Director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, whom I visited in his office. I also received honorary Palestinian citizenship, including a passport, which was very meaningful to me as an Israeli Jew.

When I was in Gaza everyone in Israel – including the media who interviewed me – warned me to be careful, to watch out for my life. “Aren’t you scared?” they asked. Well, the only time I felt genuine and palpable fear during the entire journey was when I got back to Israel. I went from Gaza through the Erez checkpoint because I wanted to make the point that the siege is not only by sea. On the Israeli side I was immediately arrested, charged with violating a military order prohibiting Israelis from being in Gaza and jailed at the Shikma prison in Ashkelon. In my cell that night, someone recognized from the news. All night I was physically threatened by right-wing Israelis – and I was sure I wouldn’t make it till the morning. Ironically, there were three Palestinians in my cell who kind of protected me, so the danger was from Israelis, not Palestinians, in Gaza as well as in Israel. (One Palestinian from Hebron was in jail for being illegally in Israel; I was in jail for being illegally in Palestine.) As it stands, I’m out on bail. The state will probably press charges in the next few weeks, and I could be jailed for two or so months. I now am a Palestinian in every sense of the word: On Monday I received my Palestinian citizenship, on Tuesday I was already in an Israeli jail.

Though the operation was a complete success, the siege will only be genuinely broken if we keep up the movement in and out of Gaza. The boats are scheduled to return in 2-4 weeks and I am now working on getting a boat-load of Israelis.

My only frustration with what was undoubtedly a successful operation was with the fact that Israelis just don’t get it – and don’t want to get it. The implications of our being the strong party and the fact that the Palestinians are the ones truly seeking peace are too threatening to their hegemony and self-perceived innocence. What I encountered in perhaps a dozen interviews – and what I read about myself and our trip written by “journalists” who never even attempted to speak to me or the others – was a collective image of Gaza, the Palestinians and our interminable conflict which could only be described as fantasy. Rather than inquire about my experiences, motives or views, my interviewers, especially on the mainstream radio, spent their time forcing upon me their slogans and uniformed prejudices, as if giving me a space to explain myself deal a death blow to their tightly-held conceptions.

Ben Dror Yemini of the popular Ma’ariv newspaper called us a “satanic cult.” Another suggested that a prominent contributor to the Free Gaza Movement was a Palestinian-American who had been questioned by the FBI, as if that had to do with anything (the innuendo being we were supported, perhaps even manipulated or worse, by “terrorists”). Others were more explicit: Wasn’t it true that we were giving Hamas a PR victory? Why was I siding with Palestinian fishermen-gun smugglers against my own country which sought only to protect its citizens? Some simply yelled at me, like an interviewer on Arutz 99. And when all else failed, my interlocutors could always fall back on good old cynicism: Peace is impossible. Jews and Arabs are different species. You can’t trust “them.” Or bald assertions: They just want to destroy us. Then there’s the paternalism: Well, I guess it’s good to have a few idealists like you around…

Nowhere in the many interviews was there a genuine curiosity about what I was doing or what life was like in Gaza. No one interested in a different perspective, especially if it challenged their cherished slogans. No one going beyond the old, tired slogans. Plenty of reference, though, to terrorism, Qassam missiles and Palestinian snubbing our valiant efforts to make peace; none whatsoever to occupation, house demolitions, siege, land expropriation or settlement expansion, not to mention the killing, imprisoning and impoverishment of their civilian population. As if we had nothing to do with the conflict, as if we were just living our normal, innocent lives and bad people decided to throw Qassam rockets. Above all, no sense of our responsibility, or any willingness to accept responsibility for the ongoing violence and conflict. Instead just a thoughtless, automatic appeal to an image of Gaza and “Arabs” (we don’t generally use the term “Palestinians”) that is diametrically opposed to what I’ve seen and experienced, a slavish repeating of mindless (and wrong) slogans which serve only to eliminate any possibility of truly grasping the situation. In short, a fantasy Gaza as perceived from within a bubble carefully constructed so as to deflect any uncomfortable reality.

The greatest insight this trip has given me is understanding why Israelis don’t “get it:” a media comprised by people who should know better but who possess little critical ability and feel more comfortable inside a box created by self-serving politicians than in trying to do something far more creative: understanding what in the hell is going on here.

Still, I formulated clearly my messages to my fellow Israelis, and that constitutes the main content of my interviews and talks:

1. Despite what our political leaders say, there is a political solution to the conflict and there are partners for peace. If anything, we of the peace movement must not allow the powers-that-be to mystify the conflict, to present it as a “clash of civilizations.” The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is political and as such it has a political solution;
2. The Palestinians are not our enemies. In fact, I urge my fellow Israeli Jews to disassociate from the dead-end politics of our failed political leaders by declaring, in concert with Israeli and Palestinian peace-makers: We refuse to be enemies. And
3. As the infinitely stronger party in the conflict and the only Occupying Power, we Israelis must accept responsibility for our failed and oppressive policies. Only we can end the conflict.

Let me end by expressing my appreciation to the organizers of this initiative – Paul Larudee and Greta Berlin from the US, Hilary Smith and Bella from the UK, Vaggelis Pissias, a Greek member of the team who provided crucial material and political input, and Jamal al-Khoudri, an independent member of the PLC from Gaza and head of the Popular Committee Against the Siege and others – plus the wonderful group of participants on the boats and the great communication team that stayed ashore. Special appreciation goes to ICAHD’s own Angela Godfrey-Goldstein who played a crucial role in Cyprus and Jerusalem in getting the word out. Not to forget our hosts in Gaza (whose names are on the Free Gaza website) and the tens of thousands of Gazans who welcomed us and shared their lives with us. May our peoples finally find the peace and justice they deserve in our common land.

Update: (Aug. 27) Jeff Halper has been released. See press links below.

Police on Tuesday detained an Israeli activist who had sailed to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip to challenge Israel’s blockade of the coastal region.

They accused Jeff Halper, who also holds United States citizenship, of violating a ban on Israelis entering Gaza.

Halper was among 44 “Free Gaza” activists from 17 nations who sailed in two boats from Cyprus to the Gaza Strip on Saturday in defiance of the blockade.

He spent three days in the Gaza Strip before entering Israel through the Erez border crossing, where police detained him.

According to Halper, Israeli forces at the crossing initially told him that if he came with the boat, he should return the same way. However, he said, they allowed him to cross into Israel shortly afterward.

“He is being questioned at the police station in Sderot for entering the Gaza Strip in defiance of a military decree banning Israeli citizens from doing so,” Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

Halper told Haaretz on Tuesday that he expected to be interrogated upon his return to Israel. He expressed satisfaction with his success in entering and leaving Gaza, and said he did not fear harassment by Israeli security forces.

Israel allowed the activists to sail to the Gaza Strip, the first foreigners to reach the territory by sea since travel restrictions were tightened after Hamas’s takeover more than a year ago, saying it wanted to avoid a public confrontation.

The activists brought with them a symbolic shipment of hearing aids.

As part of an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire that took effect in June, Israel has eased its blockade of the territory, allowing in more humanitarian goods and medical equipment.

Two small boats, the SS Free Gaza and the SS Liberty, successfully landed in Gaza early this evening, breaking the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The boats were crewed by a determined group of international human rights workers from the Free Gaza Movement. They had spent two years organizing the effort, raising money by giving small presentations at churches, mosques, synagogues, and in the homes of family, friends, and supporters.

They left Cyprus on Thursday morning, sailing over 350 kilometers through choppy seas. They made the journey despite threats that the Israeli government would use force to stop them. They continued sailing although they lost almost all communications and navigation systems due to outside jamming by some unknown party. They arrived in Gaza to the cheers and joyful tears of hundreds of Palestinians who came out to the beaches to welcome them.

Two small boats, 42 determined human rights workers, one simple message: “The world has not forgotten the people of this land. Today, we are all from Gaza.”

Tonight, the cheering will be heard as far away as Tel Aviv and Washington D.C.

Quotes for publication

“We recognize that we’re two, humble boats, but what we’ve accomplished is to show that average people from around the world can mobilize to create change. We do not have to stay silent in the face of injustice. Reaching Gaza today, there is such a sense of hope, and hope is what mobilizes people everywhere.”
–Huwaida Arraf

Huwaida is Palestinian-American, and also a citizen of Israel. She’s a human rights activist and co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement. In 2007 she received her Juris Doctor from American University in Washington D.C. Currently she teaches Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at Al Quds University in Jerusalem. Huwaida sailed to Gaza aboard the SS Liberty.

“We’re the first ones in 41 years to enter Gaza freely – but we won’t be the last. We welcome the world to join us and see what we’re seeing.”
–Paul Larudee, Ph.D

Paul is a cofounder of the Free Gaza Movement and a San Francisco Bay Area activist on the issue of justice in Palestine. He sailed to Gaza aboard the SS Liberty.

“What we’ve done shows that people can do what governments should have done. If people stand up against injustice, we can truly be the conscience of the world.”
–Jeff Halper, Ph.D

Jeff is an Israeli professor of anthropology and coordinator of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), a non-violent Israeli peace and human rights organization that resists the Israeli occupation on the ground. In 2006, the American Friends Service Committee nominated Jeff to receive the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize with Palestinian intellectual and activist Ghassan Andoni. Jeff sailed to Gaza aboard the SS Free Gaza.

For More Information, please contact:
(Gaza) Huwaida Arraf, tel. +972 599 130 426
(Gaza) Jeff Halper, tel. +972 542 002 642
(Cyprus) Osama Qashoo, tel. +357 99 793 595 / osamaqashoo@gmail.com
(Jerusalem) Angela Godfrey-Goldstein, tel. +972 547 366 393 / angela@ichad.org

NICOSIA, Aug 23 – Activists seeking to challenge Israel’s sea blockade of Gaza are struggling with rough seas and disruptions to their communications, the group said on Saturday.

The 44 “Free Gaza” activists set out on Friday from Cyprus in two wooden boats. They expected to reach Gaza’s coastline, which is patrolled by the Israeli navy, on Saturday.

Among those seeking to highlight poor living conditions of Palestinians in Gaza, is the sister-in-law of Middle East peace envoy and former British prime minister Tony Blair, and an 81 year old American nun.

Activists still in Cyprus said communications with the boat had all but broken down since Friday evening.

“The electronic systems which guarantee our safety have been jammed and scrambled,” said Ramzi Kyzia, a spokesman for the activists, quoting from a statement received from the boats.

“Both of our ships are flying Greek flags in international waters and we are victims of electronic piracy.”

Kyzia said the activists communicated the statement in the only satellite telephone connection they managed to make from around 1630 GMT on Friday. He said they were worried about communication in the event of an emergency.

The activists were experiencing rough seas and called on the Greek and international community to “meet their responsibilities and protect civilians on board,” Kyzia said.

“We are civilians from 17 nations on this project to break the siege of Gaza. We are not experienced sailors.”

Israel pulled its troops and settlers out of Gaza in 2005 but has tightened restrictions on the territory since the militant Islamic movement Hamas seized control there last year from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ security forces

Israel and Hamas agreed on a ceasefire in June. It calls on both sides to stop cross border violence and on Israel to ease its blockade on the Gaza Strip.

The truce has largely held, although Gaza militants have fired rockets into Israel and the Jewish state has periodically closed its borders with the coastal enclave.

Israel claims that since the “disengagement” in 2005 it no longer occupies Gaza. However, the International Committee of the Red Cross and other international human rights organizations reject this claim since Israel still exerts effective control over Gaza. As an Occupying Power, Israel has a responsibility for the well-being of the people of Gaza under the provisions of the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention. Israel has abused its control and responsibilities by wrongfully obstructing vital supplies and humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.

As Israel’s 41-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip defies international consensus, and because Israel has grossly violated its obligations, we do not recognize Israel’s right to stop us outside its own territorial waters, which we will not be approaching. To remove any “security” pretense that Israel may raise, we have had our boats inspected and certified by Cypriot authorities that they carry no arms or contraband of any kind. We have invited Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to join us on our voyage and, in fact, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs has itself told us the Israeli government “assume[s] that your intentions are good.”

We are human rights activists, invited to visit Gaza by our Palestinian partners, and each of us has vowed to do no violence, in either word or deed. If Israel chooses to forcibly stop and search our ships, we will not forcibly resist. Such a search will be under duress and with our formal protest. After such a search, we fully expect the Israeli navy to stand aside, as we continue peacefully to Gaza. If we are arrested and brought to Israel, we will protest and prosecute our kidnapping in the appropriate forums. It is our purpose to show the power that ordinary citizens of the world have when they organize together to stand against injustice. Let there be no doubt: the policies of repression against the civilian population of Gaza represent gross violations of human rights, international humanitarian law, and constitute war crimes. The goal of our voyage is to break the illegal siege on the people of Gaza as a step toward ending the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

For more information, please contact:

• JERUSALEM: Angela Godfrey-Goldstein
  Tel. +972 547 366 393
• CYPRUS: Osama Qashoo
  Tel. +44 78 333 81660 / +44 79 779 3595

Satellite phone numbers available on the boats will be:

• 00 870 773 160 151
• 00 870 773 160 156
• 00 881 651 442 553
• 00 881 651 427 948

Like many Israelis in the summer months, Prof. Jeff Halper departed for Cyprus last week from Ben-Gurion International Airport. However, Halper, a veteran left-wing activist from Jerusalem, will not be returning by plane. This weekend, he and 40 other human rights activists will sail for the Gaza Strip, with the goal of breaking the siege Israel has imposed there.

Halper, a lecturer in anthropology and the chairman of the Israel Committee Against House Demolitions, is the only Jewish Israeli who will sail aboard the ship, Free Gaza.

After arriving in Cyprus, he met with activists from 17 countries around the world. They are now preparing for their departure at the University of Nicosia dorms. “Right now, we’re holding discussions and training,” Halper said on Tuesday. “We are presenting different scenarios of what might happen, and preparing ourselves for every situation. It is possible the navy will stop us and not allow us to enter. We have no idea how they’ll do it, but we’re organizing. If they catch us, we will resist passively.”

It is still unclear how the Israel Defense Forces will react to the arrival of the two ships on the Gaza coast, but Halper is not worried. “All the participants on board are very experienced and determined people and they know why they’re going in,” he says. “The beauty of a non-violent activity is that we win, no matter what. If we break the siege, we win, and even if they arrest us, we win, because this will expose the face of the occupation and prove Israel is still an occupier in Gaza.”

The trip is expected to last 24 hours. Before entering Gaza, the ship plans to anchor overnight on the border between international waters and Gaza’s territorial waters. “We believe Israel will not be able to stop us there,” he says.

Halper, 62, immigrated to Israel from the United States in 1973 because of his opposition to the Vietnam War. In 1997, he set up the Israel Committee Against House Demolitions – an organization that works to block the IDF’s activities in the territories in general and the demolition of Palestinian homes in particular. Over the years, he has participated in numerous protest activities against Israeli policies and was, among other things, one of the supporters of the academic boycott against Israel.

Nevertheless, in participating in the journey to Gaza, he emphasizes he is an Israeli. “I see this is as a mission, also as an Israeli who is saying that the occupation is destroying all of us. We hoped that more Israelis from the peace movements would come,” he says.

Doesn’t he feel a need to show solidarity with the residents of Sderot and the areas around Gaza, who suffer from Qassam rockets fired from the Gaza Strip?

“There is no coming to terms with Palestinians’ attacks on civilian populations in Sderot,” he says but stresses that Sderot residents are also victims of the Israeli occupation. “The residents of Sderot have more in common with the Palestinians than they have with the people of Tel Aviv, who go to the beach and live the good life.”

Halper also calls for the release of Gilad Shalit. “I hope I don’t join him,” he says jokingly, but adds he is not worried about entering the Gaza Strip. “I asked the Palestinian organizations that invited us if they were interested in having an Israeli aboard the ship. They told me: ‘Come. You’re our guest.’ I’ve been traveling freely around the territories for years. I know that if you come in peace, there is nothing to worry about. I’m more worried about the Israeli army’s response.”

In any event, Halper does not even hope to return to Jerusalem via Gaza. “I know there’s no way,” he says. “I’ll have to go back to Cyprus and fly from there. Then we’ll see whether they arrest me when I arrive in Israel.”

In another few days, I will sail on one of the Free Gaza movement boats from Cyprus to Gaza. The mission is to break the Israeli siege, an absolutely illegal siege which has plunged a million and a half Palestinians into wretched conditions: imprisoned in their own homes, exposed to extreme military violence, deprived of the basic necessities of life, stripped of their most fundamental human rights and dignity. The siege violates the most fundamental principle of international law: the inadmissibility of harming civilian populations. Our voyage also exposes Israel’s attempt to absolve itself of responsibility for what is happening in Gaza. Israel’s claim that there is no Occupation, or that the Occupation ended with “disengagement,” is patently false. Occupation is defined in international law as having effective control over a territory. If Israel intercepts our boats, it is clear that it is the Occupying Power exercising effective control over Gaza. Nor has the siege anything to do with “security.” Like other elements of the Occupation in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, where Israel has also besieged cities, towns, villages and whole regions, the siege on Gaza is fundamentally political. It is intended to isolate the democratically-elected government of Palestine and break its power to resist Israeli attempts to impose an apartheid regime over the entire country.

This is why I, an Israeli Jew, felt compelled to join this voyage to break the siege. As a person who seeks a just peace with the Palestinians, who understands (despite what our politicians tell us) that they are not our enemies but rather people seeking precisely what we sought and fought for – national self-determination I cannot stand idly aside. I can no more passively witness my government’s destruction of another people than I can watch the Occupation destroy the moral fabric of my own country. To do so would violate my commitment to human rights, the very essence of prophetic Jewish religion, culture and morals, without which Israel is no longer Jewish but an empty, if powerful, Sparta.

Israel has, of course, legitimate security concerns, and Palestinian attacks against civilian populations in Sderot and other Israeli communities bordering on Gaza cannot be condoned. Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel, as an Occupying Power, has the right to monitor the movement of arms to Gaza as a matter of “immediate military necessity.” As activists committed to resisting the siege non-violently, I have no objection to the Israeli navy boarding our boats and searching for weapons. But only that. Because Israel has no right to besiege a civilian population, it has no legal right to prevent us, private persons sailing solely in international and Palestinian waters, from reaching Gaza – particularly since Israel has declared that it no longer occupies it. Once the Israeli navy is convinced we pose no security threat, then, we thoroughly expect it to permit us to continue our peaceful and lawful journey into Gaza port.

Ordinary people have often played key roles in history, particularly in situations like this where governments shirk their responsibilities. My voyage to Gaza is a statement of solidarity with the Palestinian people in their time of suffering, but it also conveys a message to my fellow citizens.

First, despite what our political leaders say, there is a political solution to the conflict, there are partners for peace. The very fact that I, an Israeli Jew, will be welcomed by Palestinian Gazans makes that very point. My presence in Gaza also affirms that any resolution of the conflict must include all the peoples of the country, Palestinian and Israeli alike. I am therefore using whatever credibility my actions lend me to call on my government to renew genuine peace negotiations based on the Prisoners Document accepted by all Palestinian factions, including Hamas. The release of all political prisoners held by Israel, including Hamas government ministers and parliamentary members, in return for the repatriation of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, would dramatically transform the political landscape by providing the trust and good-will essential to any peace process.

Second, the Palestinians are not our enemies. In fact, I urge my fellow Israeli Jews to disassociate from the dead-end politics of our failed political leaders by declaring, in concert with Israeli and Palestinian peace-makers: We refuse to be enemies. Only that assertion of popular will can signal our government that we are fed up with being manipulated by those profiting from the Occupation.

And third, as the infinitely stronger party in the conflict and the only Occupying Power, we Israelis must accept responsibility for our failed and oppressive policies. Only we can end the conflict.

In the Israeli conception, Zionism was intended to return to the Jews control over their own destiny. Do not let us be held hostage to politicians who endanger the future of our society. Join with us end the siege of Gaza, and with it the Occupation in its entirety. Let us, the Israeli and Palestinian peoples, declare to our leaders: we demand a just and lasting peace in this tortured Holy Land.