Posted: Friday, 16 January 2009 11:54AM
Palestinian Voices Grow Louder
Steve Corbett Reporting
Friday, January 16, 2009
With the bold colors of the Palestinian flag flying over his head, the young man signaled a new revolution in Northeastern Pennsylvania. Waving the symbol of his heritage, the young man led the charge into a new activism for Palestinians and their supporters who are now living in hard coal country.
This new face – accompanied by a new voice – joins the call of history in the quest for freedom.
Until now Palestinians have been largely silent in our area.
That changed utterly Tuesday, when a crowd gathered on Public Square in Wilkes-Barre to protest the recent Israeli attack on Gaza and the oppression of Palestinians who try to survive there.
I sat stunned when I saw brief film footage on the television news Tuesday night. And I looked forward to the newspaper stories the following day. But no news stories appeared.
The only mention of the peaceful protest was a color photograph in the center of page three in The Times Leader that showed a young man waving a Palestinian flag as he stood defiantly against attacks on his people.
Who were these protestors who gathered in the cold in a city no longer known for dissent? How many showed up? Who organized them? What are their stories?
I asked these and other questions Wednesday on “Corbett.” It didn’t take long for the Palestinian calls to come.
Young and old called to talk about human rights violations in Gaza, including a 10-year-old girl who made it clear that she was an activist for her people.
“I’m a protestor, too,” she said.
The callers were reasonable, intelligent people. They asked for understanding and help to stop the killing of civilians and the wholesale destruction of Gaza.
Some callers defended Israel, but the majority defended the Palestinian people.
Nobody overtly defended Hamas, the armed guerrilla army that will fight Israel until the end unless negotiations and concessions acceptable to both sides are agreed upon.
Yesterday the conversation continued.
A support rally for Israel was scheduled for last night at the Jewish Community Center, just a few blocks from the site of the pro-Palestinian rally. Yossi Olmert, the brother of Israel’s prime minister, was scheduled to be the speaker so I called the JCC and asked if he would call the show.
He did.
In a rapid-fire voice, Olmert took the hard line against Hamas that is the cornerstone of Israel’s attacks against Gaza. Making it clear that Israel would not negotiate with Hamas, he justified the attacks against Gaza and offered neither apology nor condolence.
Still, like the Palestinian callers, he endorsed the importance of public discussion.
Negotiation is needed more than ever.
Israel should talk with Hamas the same way the British government talked with the leaders of the Irish Republican Army.
And world leaders should talk with Israeli leaders, explaining that the slaughter of civilians and the destruction of the infrastructure are simply not acceptable.
A military solution will not succeed.
Olmert and people who agree with him only make it easier to recruit more Hamas members from a Gaza population of which 50 percent is under the age of 18.
The new American president must directly address this matter on his first day in office.
And we in Northeastern Pennsylvania must continue to talk about war in the Middle East, particularly the killing ground in Gaza. Unless we talk, we go nowhere. Diplomacy revolves around ideas.
Bombs and bullets are designed to kill.
Good ideas loaded with fairness, compassion and justice are designed to breathe life into the most desolate place.
Gaza is now hell.
That must change.
And we are duty-bound to change it.
Human rights color the banner of freedom that all of us should wave.
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