| Friends, Today's demonstration in Tel-Aviv was wonderful. We were roughly 200, mostly women. We wore black and banged vigorously on our pots and pans in time to the slogans led by Dalit, Iris, and perhaps others. A specially nice touch was the black, helium-filled balloons with the message printed on it ”End the Occupation, End the Closure - Coalition of Women for a Just Peace”. Sample slogans (they rhyme in Hebrew): 1-2-3-4: Get out of Kiryat Arba. 1-2 and also Beit El, Netzarim, and Ariel. Fuad, Fuad, Minister of Defense, How many children have you killed today? End the closure in the territories; get out of their bloodstream. Bring the soldiers home, get rid of the checkpoints. Etc. Reporters and TV cameras were there, but I didn't see if anything made it to the local or international news yet. Every day this week was filled with actions sponsored by the Human Rights Tent in Tel-Aviv. The schedule for the next few days (sponsored by a mix of organizations): Friday, 13 April: Continue rebuilding the Shawamreh home in Anata. Meet at 10:30 at Gan HaPa'amon in Jerusalem. Women in Black regular weekly vigil at 13:00-14:00 in six locations. Saturday, 14 April: Joint Palestinian-Israeli demonstration at Bethlehem checkpoint (see separate announcement). Sunday, 15 April: Demonstration at um-Tuba to prevent 7 homes from being demolished (see separate announcement). Monday, 16 April Removal of roadblocks creating a siege of the village of Atara, near Ramallah (sponsored by Rapprochement - details to follow). At 18:00, general meeting of the Coalition of Women for a Just Peace in Tel-Aviv (see separate announcement). Tuesday, 17 April: Day off. Catch up on work, sleep, errands, chores, relationships... Wednesday 18 April: Removal of the Halhul roadblock at 10:00, which obstructs travel south to Hebron (sponsored by Rapprochement - details to follow). Anyone still holding a job after this period will have to answer to a higher authority. Gila Svirsky |
