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This letter from Bil′in′s Abdallah Abu Rahmah was conveyed from his prison cell by his lawyers. Please circulate widely.
January 1, 2010
To all our friends,
I
mark the beginning of the new decade imprisoned in a military detention
camp. Nevertheless, from within the occupation′s holding cell I meet
the New Year with determination and hope.
I
know that Israel's military campaign to imprison the leadership of the
Palestinian popular struggle shows that our non-violent struggle is
effective. The occupation is threatened by our growing movement and is
therefore trying to shut us down. What Israel′s leaders do not
understand is that popular struggle cannot be stopped by our
imprisonment.
Whether
we are confined in the open-air prison that Gaza has been transformed
into, in military prisons in the West Bank, or in our own villages
surrounded by the Apartheid Wall, arrests and persecution do not weaken
us. They only strengthen our commitment to turning 2010 into a year of
liberation through unarmed grassroots resistance to the Occupation.
The
price I and many others pay in freedom does not deter us. I wish that
my two young daughters and baby son would not have to pay this price
together with me. But for my son and daughters, for their future, we
must continue our struggle for freedom.
This
year, the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee will expand on the
achievements of 2009, a year in which you amplified our popular
demonstrations in Palestine with international boycott campaigns and
international legal actions under universal jurisdiction.
In
my village, Bil'in, Israeli tycoon, Lev Leviev and Africa-Israel, the
corporation he controls, are implicated in illegal construction of
settlements on our stolen land, as well as the lands of many other
Palestinian villages and cities. Adalah-NY is leading an international
campaign to show Leviev that war crimes have their price.
Our
village has sued two Canadian companies for their role in the
construction and marketing of new settlement units on village land cut
off by Israel's Apartheid Wall. The legal proceedings in this
precedent-setting case began in the Canadian courts last summer and are
ongoing.
Bil'in
has become the graveyard of Israeli real estate empires. One after
another, these companies are approaching bankruptcy as the costs of
building on stolen Palestinian land are driven higher than the profits.
Unlike
Israel, we have no nuclear weapons or army, but we do not need them.
The justness of our cause earns us your support. No army, no prison and
no wall can stop us.
Yours,
Abdallah Abu Rahmah
From the Ofer Military Detention Camp
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