Spirit in Action

Jerusalem Women Speaking tour - Jewish, Muslim, & Christian Middle Eastern tour

Partners For Peace sponsors Israeli & Palestinian peace-working women to speak throughout America, to tell their first-hand stories and call all to peace & justice. Tal Dor, Huda Abu Arqoub and Amal Nassar spoke to students of North High School in Eau Claire this April.

Broadcast on:: 06 May 2007
Audio Format:: other

I have no hands but yours to tend my sheep. No handkerchief but yours to dry the eyes of those who weep. I have no arms but yours with which to hold. The ones grown weary from the struggle and weak from growing old. I have no voice but yours with which to see. To let my children know that I am out and out is everything. I have no way to feed the hungry souls. No clothes to give and make it the Reagan and the more. So be my heart, my hand, my tongue, through you I will be done. Fingers have I none to help I'm done. Welcome to Spirit in Action, my name is Mark helps me. Each week I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service. Above all I'll seek out light, love and helping hands being shared between our many neighbors on this planet hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. Wisconsin's Chippewa Valley was privileged in April to receive a four day visit from the 13th annual Jerusalem Women's Speak tour. This is an annual event sponsored by Partners for Peace, an organization which aims to bring about a just and lasting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Among other work they bring together Middle Eastern women, peace activists who are Jewish, Muslim and Christian, living in Palestine and Israel to speak their experience to the American people. From my point of view it is so very important that this is a quest that transcends religious affiliation. All three of the major religions born in that area are represented by the women speaking on this tour. And they all three are acting from a deep well of religious inspiration to motivate and support them in this peace work, peace work which also seeks justice and compassion. While in the Chippewa Valley they spoke and gave a number of presentations, you'll be listening today to a talk that they gave at North High School here in Eau Claire, which is just one of three times I heard them speak. Unfortunately there were not recordings for all of the events, but I want to convey to you a bit that I learned about them in the presentations and in talking with them directly. Tal Dor is Jewish Israeli, born of parents who immigrated to Israel from South Africa. She grew up without knowing Palestinians firsthand, like almost every one of that nation. Unlike virtually all Israeli young adults, she served in the Israeli army, which has universal conscription. She has a degree as a social worker, as well as in community organizing and facilitating groups in conflict. Tal is a powerful and compassionate voice in a troubled land. Huda Abu Argub is a Palestinian Muslim from Hebron, Palestine. Her work as an educational consultant with the Ministry of Education brings her into contact with wide ranges of the Palestinian countryside, land and people. Huda has witnessed firsthand the abuses and disfunctions of the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Witness that clearly leaves her deeply distressed, yet she is firmly devoted to non-violence. Huda told me that her faith as a Muslim is central to her life. Amal Nasar is a Christian Palestinian from Bethlehem, Palestine. In fact, she is Lutheran, like so many of the folks in Northwest Wisconsin where I live. But her experience is so much harder, so much more demanding in terms of faith. Christians are, perhaps, the major ignored minority of Palestine. Playing in Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, perhaps it seems that Christians could better hear the plea which Amal and other Christian Palestinians send out for peace and justice. Amal, like so many Palestinians, has a deep love for the land and has donated some of her family plot for the "tent of nations" under the umbrella of the Bethlehem Bible College. The first time Tal, Huda and Amal met was on their way to the USA for this speaking tour because the walls, both literal and figurative, between Israelis and Palestinians are steep and strong. Their shared mission as part of the Jerusalem Women's Speaking Tour is to overcome the walls and find peace. I invite you to listen in as Tal Dor, Huda Abu Arguab and Amal Nasser of the Jerusalem Women's Speaking Tour, sponsored by Partners for Peace, speak to the students of North High School in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. My name is Jake, how are you doing? I work with Partners for Peace in Washington, D.C., we're the hosts of this program. So I just want to say thanks to all of you, thanks to North High for bringing us through. I'm going to be very brief and introduce our three guests, the speakers for today. They're three women from Israel and Palestine and that's what we as Partners for Peace do. We take different women that are peacemakers from Israel and Palestine around two different communities in the U.S. This is a great crowd. I think this might be our biggest event that we've had in the past three weeks. So, let me take a quick poll. How many of you all know where Palestine is? All right, all right, it's pretty good. How many of you all know where Israel is? Oh, there's some more, there's some more. Suzanne, put up that first map. This is Israel and Palestine, it's the same place. So if you all know where Israel is, you all know where Palestine is, all right? So now how many of you all know where Palestine is? All right, that's better. Well, hopefully the rest of you will be able to raise your hand after this presentation. Sitting here next to me are three incredible women from Israel and Palestine. First, Huda Abu Arqub, who is a Muslim Palestinian from the village of Dura. Dura is located next to Hebron in the occupied West Bank. Next to hers, Amal Nissar. Amal is a Christian Palestinian, Huda and Amal are Palestinian women. We got to keep the applause to the minimum because we only have less than an hour and we want to give them lots of time. So thank you very much, but we got to keep it short. Amal is from Bethlehem, where you all know about Bethlehem. Bethlehem is, what you don't know is maybe that Bethlehem is also occupied Palestinian city in the West Bank. And last, but not least, is Tal D'Or. Tal is a Jewish Israeli. She grew up in Heifa and lives in Tel Aviv, is the capital city of Israel. I'll turn it immediately over to them. They'll have a presentation, watch a little music video, and then we'll have a discussion, all right? Thanks. Shalom, Marhaba. If I speak in Hebrew, it will be okay. I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. It won't be okay for me either. My name is Tal, and I was born and raised in Israel. I was born to South African parents that immigrated after '67, and '67 Israel occupied what is today the occupied territories, the West Bank and Gaza Strip, you can see it. My grandfather actually fought in 1948 in the war to create Israel. So when I grew up, I heard one side of the story. I heard the side that speaks about the need for the Jewish people to have a country, how heroic my grandfather was to come and fight for a land, but I never heard the other story. I never met Palestinians, I never heard their narrative and their story, and it only happened when I was 23. When I was your age, you were 16, 15, 17, yes to all? Okay. When I was your age, I'm trying to remember occasions that we sat like this in the auditorium, and I remember that we had politicians coming to speak to us, and we also had soldiers coming to talk to us about going to the army, and we had different units sitting in front convincing us to which unit we should go to. I remember thinking the whole time about my army service, what should I do, what is the best thing, how incredible it would be to be in uniform, and this is what we used to look up to when we finished high school. This is what we knew that we would be doing, maybe 2% of us would question it, but most of us, and I was one of these most, we didn't question, and it was clear to me that I have to do the army and that I have to serve my country, and this is the way to serve my people. Luckily enough, I was in a unit of soldiers, of teacher soldiers that were teaching juvenile delinquents, youth that dropped off school and have some romance with the police, this is what I did, I taught English mostly. I didn't even know where the occupied territories were, probably like you, I saw a map, it didn't mean much to me, but I didn't know how I can get there, I didn't know how I can take a car and drive to Palestine, I didn't even know that Palestine existed, I only know that there are some territories that we are occupying for our safety, this is what I knew, this is what I was told. And when I was 23, it's quite an old age I think to realize things, I met for the first time Palestinians, and I went, I had to go to Cyprus, Cyprus is not in Israel in Palestine, it's a little island in the Mediterranean Sea, and we had to meet over there because it was after the second in Tifada, the uprising of the Palestinian people in 2000, and we couldn't meet anywhere, and for the first time I heard stories that I didn't know before, I heard stories about the Israeli army that I didn't know before, and I heard the word Naqba, that I never knew before, and I said, what is Naqba? And I was told it's the Palestinian catastrophe, Naqba in Arabic is catastrophe of 1948, and then I realized that my whole childhood and my whole growing up, I never even knew the word, and I never knew a whole story that I have relation to. 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In the hills of Ayalon, I don't know, I would be interested if you could teach me who gave this place the name. But this is what I do back home. I go to the Tel Aviv University and I say, who lived here before it was the Tel Aviv University? I see old Arab buildings and I realized that it was a village called Shechemunis and nobody told me about that. And then I start researching and I hear about the struggle that the Palestinians had to hold onto their village while fighting with the Israeli army in 1948. So this is what I do. I am a social change activist and an activist against the Israeli occupation. On one hand, I am involved in partnership with Palestinian nonviolent activists and direct actions to try and stop the building of the apartheid wall, of the separation wall in Palestine, and try to resist to military actions in Palestine. And I also work inside my own society. And I insist that my voice will be heard and insist that what I have to say and the change I went through, everyone around me will see a whole new story and a whole new truth that we were not taught. How many of you don't agree with your government? That's scary. How many of you agree with everything your government does? Only one man is at a coincidence. Two men. Gender issues will leave for a different lecture. What I am coming to say, I am not representing my government because I have a lot of criticism against my government from where I come from, but I am representing a voice, a very strong voice of Israeli activists who are not willing anymore to be occupiers, who are not willing anymore to support war and occupation, and who want to live in peace and real justice and equality in Israel in Palestine. Thank you. (Applause) Hello. I'll start by teaching you an Arabic word. That means peace. Salaam. Good. Thank you. While I'm speaking, I would invite you all to do some reflection on how you live your daily life as teenagers in the United States, and to be thankful to the blessings that God have given you. And I want you to hear what an average teenager, Palestinian teenager, go through on a daily basis. And I will start with the fact that sometimes, in many times through our history, our schools were occupied by the Israeli occupation forces. Literally, we are not allowed to go to our schools, and our schools are used as military bases. Then our local radio is taken over by soldiers who are 18, 19-year-old Israeli soldiers. And this is what we hear all the time on our local radio. You filthy Palestinians are not allowed to leave your houses. Any dirty rat of you leaving the house will be shot. And after five minutes, you hear them saying, "All the dirty Palestinian men who are under..." And of course, they use bad words more than that. But I'm in a school, I can't use them. I'm sure that you are familiar with them, but I'm not going to use them. You dirty Palestinians, men under the age of 35, you are to go to the playground, the school playground, taking your IDs and staying there. So the movement starts, the house's door is open, and the men who are under 35 are leaving the house. Guess what happened? Shooting happened immediately. And the reason why the shooting took place is that those dirty men violated the curfew orders. Care few means that you are not allowed to open the front door of your house. You are not allowed to stand on the window. You are not allowed sometimes to move inside your house. Then we hear the announcement again. And then the Palestinians get reluctant. They don't follow the order. And in no time you hear hard knocks on the doors. They don't give you the chance to go and open the door. They break into the house and they start arresting men inside the house. Once this happened with me and they were coming to arrest my brother who was 13-year-old. And guess what? We were 13 women in that house. We encircled my brother, created a human shield between him and the Israeli soldiers who were all covered with the uniform and ugly uniform, big boots carrying M16s. Dogs are with them barking at us. Sorry. I got excited. It's exciting. But at that moment we knew the women in the house that we have to beat fear or fear is going to beat us. And we de-arrested my brother. So they couldn't take my brother from us. We were beaten. We were kicked. We were called all kinds of names, not pretty ones, for sure. And we managed to let them be afraid of us. We didn't have anything to make them afraid of us because of, like, we didn't have even a shoe on us to beat them with. We took it all in and they didn't know how to deal with us because they are army. They are soldiers. They don't know how to shoot, but they don't know how to break a human shield. And they left the house and we managed to save my brother. He was 13 years old. The last thing that is happening with us on a daily basis now, and I see my students every day going through it. And I'm, as a teacher, I go through it is the checkpoint. It's a large part of our life. It's a new culture that was introduced to us by the Israeli occupation forces. You stand on a checkpoint. See those blue dots here on this map? These are all checkpoints inside the West Bank, inside the occupied Palestine. And they are separating Palestinian towns from Palestinian towns. So if I want to go to the school that I'm teaching in, I have to cross from my hometown, which is Dura here on the map. I don't know if you can see it. And you see how many checkpoints around it in the southern part of Dura, I cross from two to five checkpoints every day. What I do is I have to be obedient. I have to be polite. I have no right to make any kind of facial or body expression. If I laugh, and this has happened to me, I laughed once and the soldier got pissed off, sorry to use the term, but he thought that I'm laughing at him. He felt insecure and he was yelling at me in Hebrew. And people there told me that they were bad words. Thank God I don't understand Hebrew. And I was grounded for three hours. I was waiting there on the checkpoint for three hours. Of course, I lost my day, my work day because of that. When I get the chance to cross the checkpoint, I have to be searched. My bags are opened. And I have to show my ID that says that I'm Palestinian. And then I go through a process of investigation, interrogation. Where are you going? What are you doing? Why your students do so? And so, your teachers are bad because you don't teach your students how to be obedient, you know, and that kind of stuff. This is how the teenagers in Palestine live on daily basis. And I want you to see how the students act on a checkpoint. If you can see the last one, these are checkpoints. This is what the students have to go through. They have to negotiate with an M16 made in the United States, not with a human being, a soldier. They have to negotiate with it. They have the right to go to their school or not. And it's always no. You have no right to learn. You have no right to go to schools. And guess what we do? We sit there on the checkpoint and take our classes. This is how we live, and I would invite you all to reflect on that and be grateful to whatever blessings you have, and that allows you to come to school. Thank you. This is how the teacher helps me, your host of spirit and action, and you're listening to Jerusalem Women Speak, a tour of women from that troubled land addressing Americans with their first-hand experience as Jews, Muslims, and Christians, very concerned for peace. Their annual tour is an effort of partners for peace. And we were graced by their visit here in Wisconsin's Chippewa Valley just last month. The third Huda Abu Arguab, a Muslim Palestinian, speak about her life in occupied Palestine. And now the third member of their group, Amal Nasser, is our speaker. Consider a visit to tentofnations.org to find out about the special project for peace and international understanding which Amal has nurtured. But first, let's head back to North High School to listen to Amal Nasser and the other members of the Jerusalem Women Speak Tour. Hello, I am Amal Nasser. I am a Palestinian Christian from Bethlehem. I work at a character's baby hospital, dealing with sick children. I go through in my daily life, living under Israeli occupation and segregation is not an easy life. I would like today to share with you what kind of situation we have at the Bethlehem area. I work in a baby hospital, and if a mother wants to come from the Hebron area, as we have seen the map from Hebron to Bethlehem, Hebron is the southwest of Bethlehem. The mother, she has to carry her sick child coming from Hebron to Bethlehem area, passing several checkpoints, several times we received dead children because it was too long on the way until she reached the emergency section. I have a small story, one of the stories that happened during our daily life in Palestine. A mother is supposed to go to Jerusalem. It's time for her to have the baby. In Jerusalem, we have a hospital supported by the United Nations, and the refugee card, Palestinian refugee, and she has not to pay when she has this card. So she has to go from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. Going from Bethlehem to Jerusalem, she needs a special permit, but it was emergency, and she has to go to this hospital that she don't pay. On the checkpoint, they search her, they ask for a permission, she don't have. They ask for the driver, no permission. They investigate her more than half an hour, nearly one hour. In the car, the mother has bleeding, so a big amount of blood was lost from her. They insist not to let her pass. They send her back to one of the governmental hospital inside Bethlehem, and then when she arrived the hospital, the mother died. She delivered the baby, and the mother died. Another part of the Israeli occupation, we have land confiscation. I give my family as an example. We have owned some land, piece of land, southwest of Bethlehem, nine kilometers away, located on top of Hill, 900 meter over the sea level, above the sea level. And you can see the land just in the middle, surrounded by four Israeli settlements. You can see the four settlements, Gosh Etcion, Elayzer, Ephraad, Nevidaniel, and Bitar. The land was attacked by the settlers in 2002. They're trying to come through the land, to open a road through our land. They want to destroy the trees that we have been worked since my family, both the land in 1916. We could hardly stop this project because it was a violence with the settlers coming on the land, attack us with the big bulldozers. And then they tried also to uproot 250 olive trees from our land. They smashed several tanks of water on the land. And on the land, you can see, we are just a few meters away from the settlements. But we don't have running water, we don't have electricity. We have only caves, we are not allowed to build a house. Because they say Israeli military always forces, they say that you are not to build any building on this land. While the settlements, you can see them how big the settlements are. They say that it's agricultural land, you are not allowed to build. Even for the agriculture, we try to dig our own system, to collect rainfall. We were, the settlers came in and they wrote a fine, that we have to go to the court because we have dug our own system to collect rainfall. We are not allowed to collect rainfall. Try to think positively, despite of all difficulties and troubles, the continuing pressure on the Palestinian people living in the West Bank and Gaza, still people try to hold in their land and dignity. To think positively, to change this atmosphere of pressure and oppression, we establish on the land, we donate it from my family land, a piece of land that we establish a small project called "Tent of Nations" that aims to the people building bridges. And while we are talking about peace, we need to build bridges together. To know about each other, to learn from each other, from different background and culture, we invited locals and internationals to come to this land, to participate in the program activities, and trees try to teach to educate young people how to be connected to the land. Because the land, for us, like a mother, we have to be very strong, attached and connected. And for us, as Christian, is not easy to give up hope. We have always to keep hope alive in order to get this connection to meet people as much. We live in a very small spot of the world, but we have a lot of conflict. We have lack of interactions. We are not allowed to meet Israeli locals. We are not allowed to go to Jerusalem. We are not allowed to help a seminar. This "Tent of Nations" project, inviting people to give lectures on the land, seminars, talking about non-violent resistance, and how to defend your land in an unviolent resistance. Today, "Tent of Nations" invites you all to come and see and experience its story of the land, and to plant an olive trees. Thank you. (Applause) All right, thanks to you all. We're going to queue up a video. DJ Suzanne is going to queue up a music video for us right now. Sit tight. Notice some people have to leave. What's the guy like a baseball or something like that? We'll miss them. They're going to miss us more, though. Ladies and gentlemen, we Edelmo de High are happy to present our interpretation of the classic folk tale, Little Red Riding Hood. So, please, enjoy. (Applause) You can turn my eyes and tell me what you see. You can't see your dad's eye 'cause you can't relate to me. You got 'em by a different sense. I'll actually snow sent to you. You're the perfect people that want. Little Red Riding Hood. Can you make it tranquil? If it's to cross your eyes, should y'all wake you right into? Thinkin' got hit and let me rise. You worry 'bout your education. If it wheels you hands up pain, I worry 'bout my vulnerable life. Get my survivor another day. You take your spear and skin and you take it. If it's you 'cause you can't lie, my fear is that this ain't that it's just like we're turnin' around and you come back. You know that you're the one you go. You know that we can see in mind. It's just like you're nobody, nobody knows. Someone tell me, "Oh, that's no pride at night. I promise you one day is for the more. My brother is for the more. My sister is for the more. My sister is for the more. My brother is for the more. My sister is for the more. My sister is for the more. See I'm not thorough for quite some time. Fifty-seven years so cool. Tell me the reason that I'm weak. It's the checkpoint on my way to school. The tower is the right of me on my land. And the torture of my mother. They're in prison and I'm an innocent father. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. 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The bullet in my high baby brother. The bullet in my high baby brother. The question is, why were the soldiers coming into people's homes and resting? Why when they left their homes where they shot? Because it's the occupation. This is what the military occupation does when they occupy people and they stop their movement. Those people were peaceful people living in their houses. They were not carrying guns or bombs. They were inside their houses. But this is how the military institution treats ordinary people. >> Wouldn't you say this is a bit biased towards the Palestinian point of view? What about like an Israeli point of view about the whole occupation? I don't know. It seems like Palestinians are the only ones being represented in this presentation. >> I understand your question. And I think the other story that you are hearing from the official Israeli point of view is very well presented in the mainstream media here in Israel. And not only that, we know very well because we live it, that the American government is supporting that occupation. It's supporting that human rights violations on daily basis in Palestine. It's not a biased voice because it's coming from the people who are living the life. Not coming from the officials who have VIPs and driving their lemurs and the streets. It's coming from the people who can't cross from one town to another who can't use certain streets in Palestine. It's coming from Palestinians and Israelis who are working for peace and seeing the issue as a human rights issue. >> The situation is biased. The situation is not equal. The minute you used the word occupation, meaning you said that there is one side that is occupying and one side that is occupied. And I thought I represented my voices in Israeli. Maybe it's easier not to hear it. But there are other voices coming out of Israel that are not as heard. And this is what we are trying to do. We are trying to show a population that wants to resist the military occupation, meaning that there is an unequal power dynamic. And I don't believe in neutrality. Neutrality. It doesn't exist. You always come from a perspective. You always bring a baggage with you. So when people tell you I'm neutral and I'm bringing both sides, then I should invite you to question where they come from, what are the politics, who pays their salary. And you can see in yourself that there is no such thing. You always come with a baggage with you that defines where you're coming from. >> For me I can say that maybe it's a new information that you have been just today listening for our speech because not much tell about what kind of situation the Palestinian living under occupation. And what you hear in the news, mostly the negative side of the Palestinian. But you don't much hear about the positive. We have many groups in Palestine working to achieve peace, non-violent resistance. I'm not sure that you hear much about the positive action, what Palestinian they are trying to do to achieve peace. >> You know the first sentence in the last verse of that song is "American do you realize that the taxes that you pay feed the forces that traumatize my every living day?" And I think as Americans we got to recognize that. We got to listen to those words. We got to think about that. Those are our tax dollars that are feeding the situation. And it's our media that's portraying it in an unequal way. And that's why we're bringing voices of people on the ground, bringing voices of people that are working for peace both Israeli and Palestinian. And I'm sorry. That's not biased. That's peace. You know it's human rights. We got some questions in back. >> Hi. I was just wondering like what the average Palestinian or Israeli thinks of Americans? >> I can say that the average Israeli wants to be an American. This is one of our problems that we don't want to belong to the Middle East, but we want to be something else. And I think that most people can see the difference between the government and the people. But the problem as I see it is that most Israelis don't know the support that the United States has on the occupation. In Israel people know that the United States support Israel financially with billions of dollars. But we don't know that more than 50% doesn't come in form of money, but comes in form of weapon and bullets and fuel for military planes. So basically we are encouraged to continue the occupation because somebody is making money of this occupation. It's serving people's interests and we don't even know it. So this is one of the things that we need to learn that the American government is supporting the occupation and is profiting from Israel being such a militaristic society. >> And for the average Palestinian, believe it or not, we can still make the distinction between the people and the government of the United States. And we do really believe that there are so many people in the United States are struggling with their governments foreign policies, but when we are on a checkpoint or being bombed from the air and we see that the bombs, the shells and everything that every kind of arms that Israelis is using written on it made in USA, we think of the people of the United States, whether they know that their tax money is being used to kill other people either in Palestine or in Iraq or Afghanistan or even sometimes in Africa with the armed trade business. >> Is it possible that maybe the checkpoints wouldn't be necessary if it wasn't for like the suicide bombings and such and maybe the Israelis are protecting themselves from those kinds of incidents? >> If I want to tell about this security that you say, that checkpoint for security reason, I don't think so. Because most of the checkpoints are inside the West Bank. We have nothing to do with Israel. There is a wall, they have their own checkpoint and then if I want to move inside the West Bank from Bethlehem to the South, I'm not going to Jerusalem. That's considered under Israeli control. I have to pass several checkpoints. What do you think about it? Is there security or what? >> You say our taxes go to the people who are at the checkpoints and standing with guns, but you tell us that our taxes go from the United States to there, how would we stop that? Because we don't really control our taxes. We have to pay them either way. So what can we do just to stop or anything like that? >> Excellent question. >> Yes, it's a very good question. And actually that's why we are here. Part of why we are here is to inform you about the money or the extreme amount of money that is going to support the occupation. And I guess partners for peace have put together a list of things that Americans can do in order to stop that. And I guess also you can start mobilize and ask for your government to give you more money for education and health services and to help the poor, like in the Middle East, we don't believe that American people have poor people among them or homeless people among them. So I would encourage you as young generation going to vote one day and you are going to be leaders one day to think of what could be done with this money to improve the American life, to make the American life more and more just for every American who lives in the United States. >> Do you guys drink in Starbucks? >> No. >> Because you don't have it or because you don't like it? >> What? >> Expensive. And it's bad coffee also, no? Starbucks gives money to build Israeli settlements. So the settlements that are stealing Amal's land are partially paid by Starbucks. This is one example that we can do is when we don't go to Starbucks from political reasons, we tell everybody that we can't, that they should not go to Starbucks. There is a list of American companies that are supporting the occupation. Caterpillar company that you know them as a company that builds your roads, we know them as the company building the wall and demolishing homes. So we need to know who are the companies, what are the companies that are profiting of this occupation and we need to boycott them. This is one example that only a big massive popular resistant can make a different difference. And you can take the pamphlets that we are giving out. You can read more, you can research more and you can insist to make a difference to know that when you buy a cup of coffee here, it has an influence on our home. Like Kuda said, we have pamphlets, I'll put them up here. So when you guys are, after we finish, you can come up and pick them up. So please do come up and check them out, ask us questions. We'll take another question, we'll give those women here a chance to wrap up. I just want to ask you one favor. Any one favor? All right? Chill out until they answer this last question and then y'all can talk. All right? Cool. What other actions could we take to make this situation better? What could we possibly do to make this known to more people? Do you know Rachel Curry, guys? Have you ever heard of Rachel Curry? American citizen who used to live in Washington state and she joined the international solidarity movement and she was courageous enough to go to Gaza and protest against home demolitions? Do you know what kind of bulldozers that demolish houses and abruth trees in Palestine? Caterpillar. Do you know where is Caterpillar? Yeah. Caterpillar is an American brand that makes tanks and bulldozers and sells them to the Israelis. I think Rachel Curry's parents are engaged in many activities in the United States to file lawsuits against Caterpillar. They are also advocating for other organizations who collect money and send the money for people to build houses or for organizations that work on peace. I guess if you have the time, I think that you have a very busy life here. If you have the time, think of such small things to do and you will know what to do. We invite you to come and see for yourself and act. Come to Israel. Come to Palestine. Meet people. Meet activists. Join the plant and olive tree. Join the actions and see for yourself. See what you can do there and how you can bring your knowledge from there to here. Speak to people. I advise you to read more. Don't wait for the news to come to you through Fox and CNN. Go and read more. Go inside websites that give more information. They tell stories that show movies. Listen to music that speaks about occupation. Music that tells the word. Don't listen only to the music. Listen to the words. And tell people what you have learned and insist on every if every one of you tells the story to four people. We will have a massive movement that will resist the occupation and the weapon trade between the United States and the Middle East. And that is a lot. Thank you. Salaam. Hello. Thanks to all of you. Please do. Check out the yellow sheet that you have or come up here and get one and check out one website. Go to one website. Thank you so much. Peace. You've been listening to a spirit in action visit with Taldur, Huda Abu Argub and Amal Nasar. Jewish Israeli, Muslim Palestinian and Christian Palestinian respectively as they address the students of North High School in Eau Claire Wisconsin as part of the Jerusalem women's speak tour sponsored by Partners for Peace. You can visit my website northernspiritradio.org to hear this program again or to find links to Partners for Peace dot org or to Amal's tent of nations dot org and for info on the music featured today. The theme music for spirit in action is I have no hands but yours by Carol Johnson. Thank you for listening. I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. You can email me at helpsmeet@usa.net. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is spirit in action. I have no higher cause for you and this. To love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. To love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. To love and serve your neighbor. [MUSIC]