Saturday, March 13, 2010

this woman was wearing orange


In Rachel Corrie Family Finally Puts Israel in Dock, Jonathan Cook writes:

"Seven years after Rachel Corrie, a US peace activist, was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer in Gaza, her family was to put the Israeli government in the dock today.

A judge in the northern Israeli city of Haifa was due to be presented with evidence that 23-year-old Corrie was killed unlawfully as she stood in the path of the bulldozer, trying to prevent it from demolishing Palestinian homes in Rafah.

Corrie’s parents, Craig and Cindy, who arrived in Israel on Saturday, said they hoped their civil action would shed new light on their daughter’s killing and finally lead to Israel’s being held responsible for her death. They are also seeking damages that could amount to millions of dollars if the court finds in their favour.
An internal army investigation was closed shortly after Corrie’s death, exonerating both the bulldozer driver and the commanders who oversaw the operation.
"

Before she was murdered, Rachel Corrie wrote a series of emails to her family, and she explained that:

"no amount of reading, attendance at conferences, documentary viewing and word of mouth could have prepared me for the reality of the situation here. You just can't imagine it unless you see it - and even then you are always well aware that your experience of it is not at all the reality: what with the difficulties the Israeli army would face if they shot an unarmed US citizen, and with the fact that I have money to buy water when the army destroys wells, and the fact, of course, that I have the option of leaving. Nobody in my family has been shot, driving in their car, by a rocket launcher from a tower at the end of a major street in my hometown. I have a home. I am allowed to go see the ocean. When I leave for school or work I can be relatively certain that there will not be a heavily armed soldier waiting halfway between Mud Bay and downtown Olympia at a checkpoint with the power to decide whether I can go about my business, and whether I can get home again when I'm done."



Behind the Lines: Poetry, War & Peacemaking writes:

Suheir Hammad's "On the Brink Of (for Rachel Corrie)" is an elegy for an American activist who died when an Israeli bulldozer crushed her to death as she knelt, trying to stop yet another house demolition. The IDF driver of the bulldozer was acquitted of wrongdoing, ostensibly because he said that he did not see her. Never mind that she was wearing an orange vest and held a bullhorn in her hands.



In transit on her fateful journey to Gaza, Rachel wrote about death, death not as a metaphor, but a reality

2 comments:

Merche Pallarés said...

Today, I had time to see both videos! Wonderful and moving poem by Juheir Hamad and also the e-mail read by Maya Angelou. I hope Corrie's parents' courtcase in Israel comes to a just verdict. It would be a great lesson for Israeli authorities. Hugs, M.

northshorewoman said...

I hope so, too. It must be difficult for them but I'm sure they are interested in justice and truth in their daughter's death.