Human Rights Watch (HRW) has accused Israel of increasing its arbitrary repression of Palestinian non-violent activism lately. Abdullah Abu Rahma’s arrest — which I reported on in the second segment of my interview with Starhawk — is part of this crack-down in Bil’in, Nil’in, and Ramallah, where grassroots demonstrations have begun to mobilize Palestinians, Israelis, and international solidarity against the wall being built between the occupied territories and Israel. According to HRW,

Israel is building most of the barrier inside the West Bank rather than along the Green Line, in violation of international humanitarian law. In recent months, Israeli military authorities have arbitrarily arrested and denied due process rights to several dozen Palestinian anti-wall protesters.

Starhawk believes that the Israeli government fears this non-violent resistance more than the violent action they’ve contended with for years. Why? Because the government knows the movement’s power to shift public opinion and mobilize people against Israeli injustice. These grassroots efforts undermine several pillars of Israeli control in the occupied territories, according to Starhawk, and start to shatter the story that Palestinians are all evil terrorists.

Volunteers with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), the International Women’s Peace Service (IWPS), and various Christian Peacemakers Teams (CPT) have also brought more of the truth to light by telling their stories of life in Palestine. Once the picture shifts, Starhawk believes it will become impossible to countenance the level of repression and injustice going on there.

Star urges each of us to become better informed. The websites above for the ISM, IWPS, and CPT are good places to begin. Star also suggests the opposition press in Israel. According to Star, Gush-Shalom, whose primary aim is to influence Israeli public opinion towards peace and reconciliation with the Palestinians, has a good analysis of what’s going on. And although he was vilified for its publication, Jimmy Carter’s book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, represents an even-handed depiction of the situation in Israel.

But as an activist, Starhawk doesn’t stop there. She suggests that we all take action as well. Until there is peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, Starhawk believes that the situation will continue to create other kinds of injustice that put us all in danger. She says,

The whole situation [in Palestine] is like a festering sore on the psyche of the world that continues to spawn other kinds of violence and other kinds of oppression and repression all around it.

I asked Starhawk one final question in this interview about Palestine, namely why the American government continues to support the Israeli government in this struggle. Star reiterated what many of us already know, that there are powerful, vocal, and virulent lobbies in this country that have made politicians afraid to take any real stand for justice in Palestine. According to Star, these lobbies don’t speak for all American Jews, but have their own special interests they pursue. The most important of these groups is AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which Wikipedia portrays as

Describing itself as “America’s Pro-Israel Lobby,”^[2] AIPAC is a mass-membership organization whose members include Democrats, Repulicans, and independents. The New York Times calls it “the most important organization affecting America’s relationship with Israel.”^[3] It has been described as one of the most powerful lobbying groups in Washington, DC, and its critics have stated it acts as an agent of the Israeli government with a “stranglehold” on the US Congress.^[4]

Star finished this interview with words that were music to my ears. She suggested that American Jews and the America people in general should begin to listen to different voices when it comes to Palestine. Her suggestions include Jewish Voice for Peace, J Street, and Tikkun, all of which are offering very different takes on the situation from the big Israeli PACS. I don’t need to tell readers of Tikkun Daily that it’s time for us to listen to those voices.