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United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC) Conference, Stamford, CT March 25, 2012 Selected audio from plenary sessions and panel discussions

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Although Violence Captures Most Attention, Palestinians Carry on with Nonviolent Resistance

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Posted Nov. 23, 2011

Excerpt of speech by Mazin Qumsiyeh, Palestinian professor, author and activist, recorded and produced by Melinda Tuhus

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Mazin Qumsiyeh, a professor of genetics who worked at several American universities before returning to his native Palestine, is the author of four books, including his latest, “Popular Resistance in Palestine: A History of Hope and Empowerment.” As an activist as well as an academician, Qumsiyeh had hoped to be a passenger onboard the most recent ship convoy attempting to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza in early November, but was bumped at the last minute when the Turkish government forced organizers to reduce the number of passengers by two-thirds. Professor Qumsiyeh returned to his home in Beit Sahour, near Bethlehem, in time to present a talk on the Palestinian struggle to a group of international solidarity activists.

Less than a week later, Qumsiyeh was one of six Palestinians arrested when they boarded an "Israelis only" bus that brings Israeli settlers from the West Bank into Jerusalem. They called their action the Freedom Rides, in reference to dangerous journeys into the American South on interstate buses that black and white civil rights activists undertook in the early 1960s.

Between The Line’s Melinda Tuhus attended and recorded Qumsiyeh’s talk at Beit Sahour's Palestinian Center for Rapprochement Between People. An excerpt of the talk, which covers the history of the Palestinian non-violent resistance struggle, is presented here.

MAZIN QUMSIYEH: People are very familiar with this uprising, 1987 to 1991, which was called the Uprising of the Stones, because Palestinian children were using stones as you can see, to throw at the Israeli soldiers, who responded by shooting live ammunition, and when they didn't do that, as (Prime Minister) Rabin instructed them to, was to break the bones of Palestinians who participated. So they would literally catch people and break their long bones, intentionally.

These are all forms of resistance that Palestinians engage in: when these girls are going to school of course, this is nonviolent resistance. When these people are prevented from getting to Al Aqsa Mosque for prayers and they pray in the streets. For us to exist on this land is to resist, because basically, picking olives like we did last month under circumstances of occupation and colonization, especially in areas where the soldiers and the settlers do not want us to pick our own olive trees, is a form of resistance. When the shepherd woman took her sheep to the field like this and the settlers don't want her to do this, that's a form of nonviolent resistance. The settlers even went to the extreme of putting poison pellets for the sheep so they would eat those and die, and she will have no reason then to continue to go to this field. Yet, she continued to go to the field; she continued to pick up the pellets and clean the field.

Or these girls in Hebron, for example, where the soldiers prevented them from getting to school and they sat in the street and had their class in the street. Or these young people having their prayer, maybe for the last time, at this land which will be confiscated to build colonial settlements. Arguing with a soldier when you can see the bulldozer in the upper left-hand corner, a bulldozer uprooting olive trees that his great-grandparents had planted, these are all forms of nonviolent resistance.

These are all inspiring acts of what we call in Arabic, "sumud." "Sumud" means persistence, resilience, a combination of things. When these kids climb walls like this – this shows, by the way, that the wall is not about security, because certainly if these people could climb then anybody who intends to do harm on the other side. This is in Sheikh Jarrah. These kids actually lived in a tent outside their house after their house was taken over by settlers, and they come every Friday with internationals and Israelis to demonstrate in Sheikh Jarrah in front of their house which was taken over by settlers.

This is when we walked from Bethlehem, Manger Square, to go to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. On Palm Sunday, the tradition for us Palestinian Christians – accompanied by Palestinian Muslims – to walk to Jerusalem because Jesus, who is venerated also by Muslims, walked or rode on a donkey to enter Jerusalem. So we take palm leaves and things like that and we walk to Jerusalem. We take donkeys and go to Jerusalem, because Jesus did that. All the occupiers of Jerusalem before Israel allowed this tradition to continue; only Israel prevented this tradition in the last few years. I'm talking about the British, the Jordanians, the Ottomans, the Crusaders even, everybody who was here and occupied this land allowed this tradition to continue. Only Israel prevented this tradition from happening. So we said to ourselves, "No, we are not going to accept this," so we walked to Jerusalem. We took about a hundred or 150 people, and we walked. And of course, we pushed through the first gate, through the second gate, and we kept going. We reached about 300 meters into the so-called Forbidden Zone for us – Palestinian Christians and Muslims from Bethlehem – until they gathered enough forces to start to arrest us. And actually, the first creatures they arrested were this gentleman, this donkey and this mule. I kid you not. They arrested the donkey and the mule and they charged them with illegally entering Jerusalem without a permit. To enter a donkey into Jerusalem, you need a permit, of course.

I started by saying I'm very optimistic. This Boycott, Divest, Sanction (BDS) movement, just as an example, in the last six years, from the initial call by Palestinian civil society for boycott, divestment and sanctions, which happened in 2005. In those six years we accomplished more than what South Africa did between the initial call by civil society in South Africa, which was 1955 to the 1980s – over 30 years. So we did in six years what South Africa was able to accomplish in 30 years.

Find out more about Mazin Qumsiyeh’s work at www.mazinqumsiyeh.com.

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