PHM-Exch> Stop the Israeli brutality on Gaza REACTIONS

[Claudio Schuftan]

From: Maria Hamlin Zuniga
Given some of the comments on the PHM statement why not remind people
that our PHM Charter CLEARLY STATES our position on War, Conflict and
OCCUPATION.
Maria

Xxxxxxxx

From: patmatem at yahoo.co.uk
Counting the number of dead once a conflict or war has started is like try
to pick water poured on desert sand! Yes, Isreal has a superior military
might in the middle east and has purportedly used it to defend its citizens
that were being threatened by incessant missiles from the Gaza strip but
who would turn a blind eye to such threats?

It is true that the issues of the Isreali-Palestinian rivalry dates back
farther than many of us care to think back but correcting the situation
does not lie in condemning and vilifying any one side. We must get both
sides to stop acts of terrorism and return to the dialogue table.
Please let us call a spade a spade and if we have no solution to the
rampaging injustices, we should at least refrain from letting our emotions
fuel a bad situation further.

Pat Matemilola
*+++++++++++++++++++++
From: *kathy sheetz <kathysheetz at hotmail.com>

I am an American. After 911 I started to attend different lectures to learn
more about the mideast and the role of the US. At one point I agreed to be
a medical person for a group of international civilians who decided to take
a boat to Gaza to break what they called the draconian siege of Gaza. I
went, not really knowing that much.

The time was Aug 2008. We did break the siege. The first boats to enter
Gaza in 41 yrs from international waters. My life changed forever after
that trip.

I find I can only tell people to go see for themselves. Not easy to do. But
the people guiding me have been courageous Jews from the US and Israel.

You can find the "other side" of the story in the US main stream media. But
here are two stories.

I can only share what I know. Especially in the US, people simply "dont
know", but there is an awakening.  I can only hope people find their own
truth soon.

Kathy

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
From: adufem2000 at yahoo.com
Dear All, the exchange of brutality by both the Palestine & Israel should
stop to show respect for the sanctity of human life. Peace is a
pre-requisite for devt. I wish UN do something fast to save innocent souls.

Femi Tinuola PhD, Associate Professor of Sociology, Kogi State University,
Anyigba, Nigeria
+++++++++++++++++++++++
From: majdy ashour <majdyash at yahoo.com>
What Israel is doing to Gaza is like burning your next door neighbour's
house down because he plays his music too loud.



Comparing killing civilians in Gaza with the psychological traumas caused
by Hamas rockets fired into Israeli cities, which were home to our parents
and grandparents before 1948, is simply meaningless.



Majdi Ashour, MD, MPH, PHM- Gaza

xxxx

>From paul.hamel at utoronto.ca

I don't want to crowd this list with a fight over "who started what".  One
does need to be clear, however, that people in Gaza are trapped in what I
have seen is rightfully referred to as the world's largest open air prison.
Like the work we do in PHM, unless we address the roots of this so-called
conflict, that is the crushing oppression of all aspects of Palestinian
life and culture, both in Israel and in the Occupied Territories, and the
overwhelming military force rained upon a population without a military,
then the people who promote this wonton destruction of a people and defend
it through marketing the idea that they are the aggrieved party have truly
colonized our minds.

Paul

Xxxxxxx



From: Edlira Xhafa edlira_xh at hotmail.com

Of course there is nothing new about media bias in reporting
Israel-Palestine conflict (see just the examples from BBC and CBC).
Here is what Chomsky and others have clearly argued:

“The lack of widespread public outrage at these crimes is a direct
consequence of the systematic way in which the facts are withheld and/or of
the skewed way these crimes are portrayed.

We wish to express our outrage at the reprehensible media coverage of these
acts in the mainstream (corporate) media.

We call on journalists around the world working for corporate media outlets
to refuse to be instruments of this systematic policy of disguise. We call
on citizens to inform themselves through independent media, and to voice
their conscience by whichever means is accessible to them”.

Edlira

Xxxxxx

  From:    pdvos at itg.be

Only if we can agree that in a situation of more than 60 years of
aggressive state terrorism, colonization, organized impoverishment and
apartheid, can the question of “cause”  be analyzed in a comprehensive way.




Pol

Xxxxx

Fom: sehar.sufi87 at gmail.com

The offensive tactics of Israel go way further back than a couple days ago.
It goes back more than 40 years. See: http://bit.ly/S0tWsF ) It is *so
necessary to know the kind of mind-boggling crimes against humanity Israel
is committing with the FULL BACKING of the U.S.*
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