INTRODUCTION

Joshua Brown - A Committed Activist

Joshua Brown, tireless Baltimore activist, journeyed to the Middle East to take part in Freedom Summer 2002, organized by the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) www.palsolidarity.org. This is an ongoing article with journal entries.

ISM is a Palestinian-led movement of Palestinian and international activists working to raise awareness of the struggle for Palestinian freedom and an end to the occupation. Internationals arriving in the occupied territories have been jailed, injured, deported and killed for taking part in peaceful demonstrations and non-violent direct actions against the occupation. Friends of Joshua Brown showed no surprise at his willingness to risk his safety as a "witness" to the occupation.

In April, Brown and others started a Baltimore chapter of SUSTAIN (Stop U.S. Tax-Funded Aid to Israel Now) www.sustaincampaign.org. Nationally, SUSTAIN developed in 2000 to protest the investment of U.S. tax dollars amounting to 1.9 billion dollars (2001) in aid to Israel's military. Joshua Brown has been involved in both Canadian and U.S. movements to resist global capital exploitation and locally, Brown has invested a great deal of energy in CAGE (Coalition Against Global Exploitation) www.mobtown.org, started in Baltimore after organizations protested the IMF, World Bank and WTO in Seattle. The group organizes people to resist capitalist injustice and oppression and links this movement to local struggles.

Freedom Summer began for Joshua Brown on Sunday August 4. Freedom Summer 2002 consists of 54 days of non-violent direct action, each day symbolizing a year since the occupation began. Joshua Brown left from Baltimore on Sunday, August 4 and arrived in Israel on August 5. He plans to return at the end of August.


AUGUST 6, 2002 [JERUSALEM]

I'm inside the occupier's police state... I see young Israeli boys and girls browsing through shops, riding buses, walking the streets. There are heavy machine guns slung over shoulders, laid across laps, or held finger ready at the trigger.

My experience thus far has been that every Israeli is a soldier every Israeli is a cop. If I get into a conversation with an Israeli they seem to size me up and ask me all the same questions I was repeatedly subjected to during at least one hour of questioning by six different "security" people. So... after considerable grilling at Ben Gurion airport with airport security trying to take my backpack, getting lost numerous times in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and spending a night on the street in Jerusalem sleeping under a street vendor's booth I'm at a hostel in the Old City.

Justice for Palestine,
Joshua


AUGUST 8, 2002 [TOWN IN PALESTINE]

Fifteen International Solidarity Movement activists left Jerusalem this morning passing into the occupied territory of the West Bank through the Bethlehem checkpoint and on to a small Palestininian town for a day and a half of non-violence training and orientation.

The activists hail from the U.S., England, Ireland, Canada, Denmark, Vietnam, and Japan. There are students, sailors, squatters, writers, teachers, trade unionists, and translators, among others. The training was cut short today because curfew is being re-imposed in Bethlehem at 6pm today and one of the trainers has to get back home.

We have formed two affinity groups and at least one of them may go to Daisha refugee camp as soon as tonight or tomorrow because the Israeli army has been demolishing homes there. In the early hours of this morning the Israeli army destroyed two buildings, one home and one apartment building that was home to over 40 people. Word from the consulate is that additional homes may be destroyed in the near future.

During our training today a procession of about 30 cars went by the building horns blaring, I was alarmed and asked a young Palestinian man what was happening, "It's a wedding," he said. "People have to have their weddings in between the curfews".

As I have been sitting here typing away at an internet cafe. Curfew has officially begun. The street is quieter, but not silent, occasionally a car speeds by, and many Palestinian youth are here talking together and using the computers. The Palestinian people are strong, and resistance is their life-blood. We internationals are here to witness the conditions that the Palestinians are subjected to, to draw inspiration from their resilient spirits, and to take these messages home with us to as many people as will listen and as many more as possible.

Justice For Palestine,

Joshua


AUGUST 9, 2002 [BETHLEHEM]

Today we went to the Dihasha Refugee camp outside Bethlehem and met with Amer Dragma in his home which is to be demolished by the Israeli army. According to Amer, on March 2nd (or 3rd) of this year Amer's 18 year old brother, Mohmad Dragma, sacrificed his life to become a martar for Palestinian freedom.

Amer has lost his brother. Anytime now he is told he will also loose his home of 25 years. The Israeli army is constantly sending word that the demolition may happen that evening or the next morning, causing Amer and his family to live day to day with no assurance of what tommorow will hold. When the IDF does come to demolish a house their standard procedure is to give the family twenty or thirty minutes to gather their belongings and get out. Amer's house will not be the only one destroyed as it is directly attached on both sides and a full floor higher that both of the adjacent houses.

Speaking through a translator Amer related that perhaps his brother's death was powerful for some Palestinians because it proved to themn that they are not alone in their anger and frustration at the Israeli occupation, but Amer also stated that he felt that a political solution would be the only lasting solution to the occupation.

Earlier in the day during a training exercise I was asked how do you feel being here and being an American? I responded, "guilty." Considering the fact that either a Caterpillar buldozer sent from the U.S. or a bomb paid for by U.S. tax dollars will be used to destroy Amer's house, in some way, guilty I am. This was brought home for me when from among the smiling-faced and inquisitive tag-along children, one young boy, maybe 10 years old, said "Arabie?" apparently asking me if I was Arab. "No," I said, "American". He ran over to another boy slightly older, maybe 12 or 13 and repeated, "American!". The older boy said something in partial english I couldn't quite make out to the younger one. The young boy ran back over to my side cocked his head to look me in the eye and repeated the message, "America animal."

What could I say?

Joshua