Saturday, February 11, 2012

Barbara Lubin: Hamas destroys Palestinians Houses in Gaza



Its a 'flying pigs" moment.
Dozens of homes in Gaza were destroyed by Hamas last week, and the world was silent. Until now.

The latest missive from Barbara Lubin of the Middle east Children's Alliance (MECA) is entitled In Gaza, 61 families lost their homes this week. It does take Barbara 4 full paragraphs before she admits that Israel wasn't responsible for the destruction. But for the truth impaired activist, this represents a sea change.

Way to go, Barbara

She writes

"The problem was that the government (not the Israeli Government, the government in Gaza) was demanding that all 61 families move out of their homes in 3 days but the families refused saying that they had lived next to the sea in their homes for 63 years. But they were willing to discuss this as long as the government found housing for all of them near to the sea.

This morning without any more discussion about 100 male and female police officers came to tell the families that they had 1 hour to get all their belongings out of their homes because they were going to demolish the houses. Dr. Mona and I ran down to the homes and pushed our way through the police and the onlookers and found our friend and her family. Everyone begged me to take pictures but the police made it clear that they would take away anyone's camera if they caught them taking photos.

I did get some pictures without being seen [the photos are too large to send via internet from Gaza but we will post them when Barbara returns to the US] and I called Dennis Bernstein at KPFA and talked to him which was pretty difficult because the police kept coming over and threatening Mona and me and all the men, women and children around us and shoving us with their bully clubs. People were screaming and crying. Everyone was going into their homes and carrying out whatever they could. An old man probably around my age (70) just sat in front of his candy store staring out in disbelief.

Mona and I stayed as long as we could unable to stop what was going on, begging the government stormtroopers to stop this nightmare and let us help with some kind of negotiation to deal with the situation, at least to figure out where the families were going to stay. But no all they did was push all of us around and give the peoples a few more minutes to get what they could out of their homes and then they started to threaten Mona and me with arrest and jail. As Mona and I ran from the scene I turned around only to see the enormous earth movers start leveling the homes..."


She continues....

"It is late, Mona and I are exhausted. We have just come home from the Mosque (one of about 15 enormous mosques that have recently been built, some right on the beach near the fishermen's homes) where the families are sitting women and children in one room and men in another. Some of the men have built a huge bonfire outside and are sitting and standing in front of it trying to stay warm."


Stop the presses. The Gaza we've heard about from MECA, and other anti-Israel advocacy groups is under siege. No construction is allowed. How ever were 15 enormous mosques contructed?

Tumbleweed and driftwood, maybe?

Applauses, Barbara, for your new found ability to speak truth. I look forward to more of it.

No comments: