On Sunday, I wrote about joining a demonstration to stop rampant house demolitions in Vancouver. It made me think about listening here exactly a year ago to Dr. Jeff Halper, a Jewish-American Israeli and co-founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. Also a member of Club 69. I admired his analysis and commitment to justice.
Tonight, my friend Avril Orloff sent a link for a very much related letter-writing campaign. I sent the 2,125th letter of a target of 3,200 for the Action Network letter campaign “Prime Minister Netanyahu: Don’t Build Jewish Communities on the Rubble of Bedouin Villages”.
Here is information from the campaign’s sponsor, the Jewish Coalition for the Bedouin of Um al-Hiran and Atir, and below is a link if you too are moved to send a letter:
The Israeli government is now preparing to demolish the two “unrecognized” Negev Bedouin villages of Um al-Hiran and Atir, and to forcibly resettle their 1,200 inhabitants, who are non-Jewish citizens of Israel, to the overcrowded township of Hura. The government plans to build a Jewish community, to be called Hiran, on the rubble of the homes of their fellow citizens in the Bedouin village of Um al-Hiran. On Aug. 23, bulldozers began the work. Nearby, the government plans to expand the Yatir forest to overrun the Bedouin village of Atir.
On Nov. 22, 2015, the Israeli government approved the establishment of five more new Jewish communities in the Negev, two of which will be built where Bedouin villages already exist. This decision means that many thousands of Israeli Bedouin citizens will be forced from their homes into impoverished urban townships. The new Jewish community of Daya will be built on the ruins of the unrecognized Bedouin village of Katamat, which is home to 1,500 people, while the new Jewish community of Neve Gurion will be built on part of the land of Beer Hadaj, a recognized Bedouin village with approximately 6,000 residents.
Can you join me and send our letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Rivllin? Tell them not to build Jewish communities in Israel on the rubble of Negev Bedouin villages.