ZGram - 4/28/2003 - "Get yourself a Rachel Corrie Poster"

Mon Apr 28 18:56:01 EDT 2003

ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny:  Now more than ever!

April 28, 2003

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

This one is really important.  Therefore, I am giving you the URL at 
the beginning and at the end. 

Go to http://ifamericansknew.org/rachelcorrie/poster.htm - you will 
find this essay there, along with instructions as to what you can do. 

Here is the essay itself:

[START]

On March 16th, an Israeli soldier driving a bulldozer two-stories 
high crushed to death 23-year-old Rachael Corrie, an American 
nonviolent human rights protestor. According to numerous witnesses 
and photographic documentation, she was killed intentionally.

Rachel and a handful of others practicing Gandhian nonviolence in the 
Gaza Strip had been pleading with Israeli soldiers for two hours not 
to destroy a Palestinian family home. Suddenly, the Israeli bulldozer 
operator began driving his giant bulldozer toward the home, Rachel 
sitting in its path. Witnesses report that she then stood up on the 
mound of debris and dirt pushed by the bulldozer blade and looked 
straight at the operator through the window. He continued, and she 
was pulled underneath the tractor, its blade crushing her. He then 
backed up, running over her again, burying her deeper into the dirt.

Three friends ran to Rachel and dug her out. According to an 
eye-witness report by Joe Smith of Kansas City: "Her body was in a 
mangled condition, she said 'my back is broken!' but nothing else. 
Her eyes were open and she was clearly in a great deal of pain." A 
Palestinian ambulance made it through Israeli forces, and took her to 
the hospital, where she died. Reports are unclear whether it was her 
fractured skull or the suffocation caused by crushed lungs and being 
buried in the dirt that caused her death.

George Bush has yet to condemn this atrocity by an "ally" who 
receives more US funding than any other nation on earth, over $10 
million per day. Congress has yet to pass a resolution condemning 
this use of American tax money to kill an American citizen. The U.S. 
State Department has yet to impose any diplomatic sanctions 
whatsoever against a government whose "apology" for one of its 
soldiers crushing a young, peaceful American student has consisted of 
calling it "regrettable," and blaming Rachel for the Israeli 
soldier's decision to kill her.

The American media have yet to accord this horror the attention it 
would normally merit, if it had been done by any other country on 
earth, including the U.S. government. We heard about Chandra Levy for 
many months. We read about the students in Tiananman Square for 
years. We heard news reports about Rachel Corrie for approximately 
two days. Apart from her hometown Washington state newspapers, there 
were virtually no follow up stories - no stories about the memorial 
service held the next day in Gaza that was broken up by an Israeli 
tank, while the bulldozer that killed her drove slowly, exultantly 
past. No stories about Israeli forces blocking the ambulance carrying 
her remains from exiting Gaza. No stories about Rachel's grieving 
parents and siblings, about their inability to travel to Palestine. 
No stories.

This erasing of Rachel, her message, and her death is unconscionable. 
It is also extremely dangerous. Such silence is giving Israel a green 
light to escalate its killing of civilians, of peaceful protesters, 
of young girls. The day after Rachel was killed the Israeli military 
killed another 9 Palestinian civilians, including three children, the 
following weeks still more.

Israel has killed Americans before. On March 29, 2002, Israeli forces 
killed a 21-year-old American in Ramallah as she held her baby on her 
lap. She was Palestinian-American, so perhaps that's why mainstream 
media largely failed to report this death. On June 8, 1967, Israeli 
forces attacked a US Navy ship, the USS Liberty, killing 34 American 
servicemen, injuring 172. And nothing happened. The story was 
universally buried, the attack unmentioned in history books and 
reports on the Middle East. The families of those killed were given 
moderate sums for the loss of their young sons, husbands, brothers, 
fathers. After many years of finagling, Israel finally paid the US a 
minute fraction of the value of this ship - with no interest for the 
years it had delayed.

Historians have since written that the fact that Israel was able to 
attack a US ship and kill and maim American servicemen, with 
virtually no consequences, convinced Israeli hardliners that Israel 
could, whenever it wanted, get away with murder.

Rachel Corrie's death may prove to be another pivotal point of 
escalation. If the world -- in particular, if Americans -- allow this 
incident to go virtually unnoticed, then our lack of outcry will give 
a green light to an Israeli regime known for its brutality: If Israel 
can get away with using an American financed, American-built 
bulldozer to kill a young American woman, then it will feel it can 
get away with anything.

This may have already begun. Several months ago over 1,200 American 
and Israeli professors wrote: "We are deeply worried that "the 'fog 
of war' could be exploited by the Israeli government to commit 
further crimes against the Palestinian people, up to full-fledged 
ethnic cleansing." Now, following Rachel's death, Israel seems to 
have begun a trial run in Tul Karem, rounding up 1,000 to 2,000 
Palestinians. Israeli Historian Ilan Pappe reports [April 2]: "Under 
the cover of the Iraqi war it seems that the Israeli government is 
stepping up its preparations for major operations against the 
population in the occupied territories."

It is time for the world to send an unequivocal message: No more. 
This time we will stop it.

It is time for Americans to turn the light bright red:

Israel, we will not forget Rachel Corrie. No longer will we look the 
other way. No more may you use American money to kill children, 
American money to kill Americans, American money to crush young women 
to death, American money to kill peace.

No more.

___________________

Alison Weir, the founder of If Americans Knew, is a freelance 
journalist who traveled throughout the Palestinian Territories in 
winter, 2001. She is the mother of a daughter born the same year as 
Rachel Corrie.

[END]

Here is the URL again:  http://ifamericansknew.org/rachelcorrie/poster.htm 