Gaza Mom

A press release from the Free Gaza Movement among other solidarity and pro-justice activists in Turkey and elsewhere. As many may recall, the activists sailed two boats to Gaza in August 2008 (my Aunt and Uncle were on one of the boats, met by my parents in Gaza City’s harbor on the other side. It was a euphoric-if fleeting-moment). These were the first international boats to land in the port in 41 years. Since then, seven more voyages boarded Parliamentarians, human rights workers, and other dignitaries to witness the effects of Israel’s draconian policies on the civilians of Gaza. The last three voyages were illegally stopped by the Israeli navy when, in December, 2008, they rammed the DIGNITY in international water, turned back the SPIRIT OF HUMANITY by threatening to shoot all on board, then hijacking the SPIRIT on July 1, 2009, kidnapping the passengers and throwing them into prison for a week.

Friday, January 29, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: IHH, Ahmet Emin +90 530 341 19 34
Free Gaza Movement, Eliza Ernshire +44 754 011 22 94

[Istanbul, Turkey] Yesterday, the Free Gaza Movement and the Turkish Relief Foundation (IHH), announced a joint venture, sending 10 boats in the spring of 2010 to the besieged Gaza strip. Organizations from Greece, Ireland and Sweden have also promised to send boats to join the flotilla with the Free Gaza movement and Turkey.

Mr. Bulent Yildirim, chairman of the IHH said, “We sail in the spring to Gaza, and our last port is freedom; freedom for the 1.5 million Palestinians denied the right to rebuild their society. We will never stop sailing until Israel’s siege is lifted.”

Two cargo ships will be part of the flotilla, one donated by the Malaysia-based Perdana Foundation and one from IHH. Both will be laden with building supplies, generators and educational materials that Israel prohibits from entering Gaza since their brutal attack on the civilian population a year ago.

The many passenger boats accompanying the cargo ships will carry members of Parliament from countries around the world as well as high-profile journalists and human rights workers.

According to the chair of the Free Gaza Movement, Huwaida Arraf, “The illegal blockade on Gaza and Israel’s continued intransigence make a mockery of international law. If our governments will not take a stance to stop Israel’s abuse of the Palestinian people, global civil society is showing that we will.”

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Breaking the Silence released a booklet of testimonies Friday by female soldiers recounting various abuse cases involving Palestinians in the West Bank. Testimonies include systematic humiliation of Palestinians, reckless and cruel violence, theft, killing of innocent people and cover-up.

“I don’t know who or how, but I know that two of our soldiers put him in a jeep, and that two weeks later the kid was walking around with casts on both arms and legs…they talked about it in the unit quite a lot – about how they sat him down and put his hand on the chair and simply broke it right there on the chair” read one.

The complete story here at Ynet.

Back in July ’09, the group made headlines when it published a booklet of testimonies that said they went into Gaza “with guns blazing” and orders to “shoot first, worry later”. “If you’re not sure, kill” one soldier was quoted as saying.

In response, the government of Israel launched a campaign to repress the organization and pressure foreign governments from withdrawing their funding of it.

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I recently had the opportunity to interview cartoonist Joe Sacco about his latest work, Footnotes in Gaza, for Aljazeera English. The book is an investigation into two little-known massacres in the 1956 Gaza Strip. I say little-known because there is little record of these two tragedies outside of a short UN document and local eyewitness testimony.

Now, the subject war near and dear to my heart, as I disclose in my first question to him in the interview because my mother was a survivor and witness to those events in Khanyounis (her home town). She was eleven at the time, and I grew up with non sequitur details of what occurred that day-from the harrowing (mass executions) to the hilarious (my mother’s jokester of a cousin who-while awaiting imminent execution-asked his neighbor “what do you think they’re going to do to us??” (the reply: Make us dance-what do you think!!); My Aunt, who showed the soldiers about to execute her only son a coat she has purchased in Tel Aviv in hopes they would spare his life (it was, but only because a cease fire was declared)), never quite making sense of it all. ;Wasn’t 1948 was the really important date, I thought? And didn’t the Israelis occupy Gaza in 1967, so what were they doing there in 1956? And why haven’t I read about this anywhere?

“I can’t forget Ahmed Bitar-the newlywed they executed just outside the shelter we were staying in because he pleaded for mercy with his pregnant wife; or the bodies-all those bodies soaking in their own pools of blood along the castle wall in the town center; of my baby sister Mona, who couldn’t stop crying because she lost her pacifier,” she kept telling me.

And so when I came across Sacco’s book, I was thrilled-in whatever odd way one can be thrilled when reading about massacres…to discover that someone had finally bothered to investigate these incidents. I poured through the books pages one after another. I even showed some to my mother-she recognized many of the faces immediately.

“This is not something you can just forget or [say] ‘let’s move on’ [about]. It has to be acknowledged, it has to be talked about. History has to be written not just by the victors, but by the people being victimized” Joe said to me in the interview.

Afterward, he a request of me: that when the interview goes live, I re-link it here along with testimony from my mother. Well here it is that testimony, following by an exclusive excerpt from the book.

Free website – Wix.com

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As many of you know, I am a foodie of sorts-some (*ahem* Yassine) would call me a slow-food activist. I am particularly interested in the connections between food, culture, and politics and have written a lot about the foods of Gaza in specific and Palestine in general. Here is a short video I made using my flip of my mom (who is still visiting us in the US) demonstrating how to cook Rummaniya, an unusual Gazan vegetarian dish made from the unlikely combination of sour pomegranates, eggplants and lentils. In the process, she gets a little homesick and emotional. FYI: the poem she recites in the end is attributed to a Imam Shafi’i, a Muslim jurist whose teaching eventually led to the Shafi’i school of fiqh named after him. It is said he was born and raised in Gaza and missed it so much after leaving that he wrote this poem.

Rummaniya is a seasonal dish, made just before pomegranates are fully ripe in the fall. It is traditionally considered a “poor man’s food” because it is meatless and consists of cheap legumes and vegetables. You would be hard-pressed to find it in any restaurant (but hey-maybe one day at cafe Laila’s! .

The finished product

Here is the recipe for those interested:

Rummaniya

1 cup brown lentils
3 small eggplants (if they are big, one really big one, or two medium ones, or 1/2 kg)
3 sour pomegranates if you really can’t find them anywhere, you can use a few Tablespoons of pomegranate molasses, found at most Middle Eastern grocers.
1/2 cup flour
1 small onion, diced
2 T. Tahini
3 cloves garlic
2 whole dried red chili (or dried chili flakes)
1 teaspoon caraway seed
¼ tsp ground cumin
1 T. dried dill seed
1-2 tsps salt

1. Boil lentils in water until cooked.
2. Remove pomegranate seeds, put them in a blender; puree and strain, reserving juice. Set aside.
3. Cut unpeeled eggplant into cubes.
4. In a mortar and pestle (we call them zibdiya in Gaza, basically an unglazed clay/earthen bowl; if you can’t find them, use a mini-food processor), crush salt, dill seed, garlic, and chili. Set aside.
5. Saute chopped onion in some olive oil until golden brown; add eggplant until wilted and soft; add lentils; boil for a few minutes until well-mixed.
6. Mix pomegranate juice (or pomegranate molasses diluted in a few T. water) with flour until well-mixed, then slowly add to stew on stove-top while mixing.
7. Add crushed spices to stew and mix well until thickened.
8. When thickened, add Tahini, mix through for 5 minutes, and turn off heat. Pour into bowls and allow to cool before putting in fridge.

Top with extra-virgin olive oil, and garnish with pomegranate seeds if available. Serve with Kmaj/Arabic bread.

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