al-Nakba: the Palestinian "Catastrophe"

Ironic, how quickly innocent victims can become ruthless victimizers

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The US public, in the view of long-time Middle East correspondent and author Alan Hart, is the most poorly informed population in the world on Israel and Palestine. 
Since Israel is the largest recipient of US foreign aid and the US alone supports Israel in the UN  through vetoes of UN Security Council Resolutions to censure and sanction Israel (46 times as of 10/1/18), awakening US public awareness is a key element in our activism. To do so, we have provided well-publicized and well attended public presentations by authoritative speakers in university and central public settings to promote understanding and support of human rights and international law and to effectively expose and oppose the false Zionist narrative.
 
In addition, most of our speakers have been interviewed for weekly community TV broadcasts we provide that greatly enlarge their reach to our local public. 

Sponsored Community Events

Paying the Price for Peace
 
S. Brian Wilson

Author of Blood on the Tracks and subject of the documentary film, Paying the Price for Peace, Brian is a Vietnam veteran whose deeply disturbing experiences there led him to fully committed anti-imperial activism against US-supported atrocities supporting the Contras attempting to overthrow the socialist government of Daniel Ortego in 1980s Nicaragua. US military supplies were being shipped to the Contras from the Concord Naval Weapons Station in Oakland, CA.  Brian joined a group blocking these supply trains with their bodies to cause delay and attract press attention.  On his first mission with this group the train refused to stop and severed his lower legs.

Paying the Price for Peace was shown, followed by a presentation and discussion with Brian.

September 21, 2016

Campbell Senior Center, Eugene


Dr. Steven Salaita

Co-sponsored by an academic department at the University of Oregon, Dr. Salaita discussed the cancellation of his contract by the University of Illinois for a tenured faculty position following his tweets condemning Israel for its 2014 "Protective Edge" assault on Gaza that killed over 2,100 Palestinians and devastated their infrastructure, including residential housing, schools, mosques and clinics, reducing their already densely crowded and blockaded territory by some 40%.

April 10, 2015

EMU Walnut Room, University of Oregon


"Refusing to be Enemies"

Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta

An author and seven-year Jerusalem resident, Maxine distinguished between the "co-existence" promoted by "liberal Zionists" and non-violent "co-resistance" to the occupation between Palestinians, internationals, and Israelis of conscience, using as examples the International Solidarity Movement, ICAHD and BDS.

March 7, 2015

Wesley Center, University of Oregon


"The War Around Us"

Two Al Jazeera broadcast journalists trapped in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead were the only outside reporters witnessing and documenting the events. This documentary film is narrated by the reporters with their footage of the Israeli assault that killed over 1,400 people with widespread destruction of Gaza's crucial infrastructure including sewage treatment, the electrical grid, schools, hospitals and public safety facilities.

Feb. 13, 2015

Growers Market, Eugene


Exploring the right to Peace: Palestine & the BDS Movement

Nada Elia, Ph.D.

Recognizing U.N. designation of 2014 as the year of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, we co-sponsored this presentation with Occupy Eugene as a contribution to Eugene's United Nations Peace Week.  Drawing upon her personal experience and perspective as a Palestinian native, author, professor and former war journalist, Dr. Elia described Israel's ethnic cleansing, dispossession, occupation, blockade, and relentless violence against the Palestinian people.

Sept. 19, 2014

Campbell Senior Center, Eugene


An Evening with Alison Weir

Discussion by If Americans Knew director and President of the Council for the National Interest of her new book, Against our Better Judgment, which reports "the hidden history of how the U.S. was used to create Israel."

June 5, 2014

Downtown Athletic Club, 10th & Willamette, Eugene

Alison, a former news editor, described how her quest for truth began upon discovery that the U.S. public has been consistently misled by our media. The event was well attended with standing room only and a lively Q&A.

 
"Slingshot Hip-Hop"

Engaging, award-winning documentary of young Palestinian hip-hop artists from within Israel (the '48 population), the West Bank and Gaza (the '67 populations). 

October 22, 2013

UO Willamette Hall 110.

These young adult artists meet for the first time although growing up only miles from each other and bond excitedly through their shared art form and common resilience and spirit of resistance to Israeli oppression. 

 
"Roadmap to Apartheid"

Multiple award-winning documentary film & discussion, co-directed by Israeli Eron Davidson & South African Ana Nogueira, Narrated by Alice Walker

July 18, 2013

Cozmic, 8th & Charnelton, Eugene

This film compares Apartheid South Africa with the Israeli occupation, using many juxtaposed images and interviews with victims of both systems.

 
 
Israeli Racism & the BDS Movement

Skype presentation at UO "Social Justice, Real Justice" conference

Robin Kelly, Ph.D., UCLA Professor of History and National Board Member, US Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel

February 15, 2013

EMU, University of Oregon

As a Black American, Dr. Kelly has experiened racism and following a visit to Israel/Palestine as a USACBI board member he described how Israeli racism "is the worst I've ever seen."
 

Freedom Sailors: An Extraordinary Story of Courage and Determination

Greta Berlin, Co-founder, Free Gaza Movement & Co-editor and contributor, Freedom Sailors

October 15, 2012

Cozmic, 8th & Charnelton, Eugene

Greta describes the development and first voyage of the Free Gaza boatlift project and a new Gaza Ark project to challenge the Israeli blockade with an outgoing commerical vessel.

 
Occupy Peace (co-sponsored with CodePink)

Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CodePink; author, Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control

Harris Hall, Eugene

July 1, 2012

In her presentation and TV interview, Medea discussed her new book exposing and opposing drone surveillance, assassinations and remote warfare, as well as CodePink's demonstrations against the political power of AIPAC at two national conventions.

 
Who Profits from the Israeli Occupation?

Dalit Baum, Ph.D., Israeli Feminist, contributor to The Case for Sanctions Against Israel, co-founder of www.whoprofits.org

Willamette 100, University of Oregon

April 17, 2012

Dr. Baum discussed the need for the BDS campaign against Israel and its methods, with special emphasis on the moral and economic power of divestment and their website that identifies corporate targets for divestment, in particular Caterpillar, Motorola and Hewlitt-Packard.
 

Report from multiple trips to Gaza 

Kit Kitredge

Eugene Public Library

December 8, 2011

Kit is a CodePink activist who was aboard the recent Freedom Waves Canadian boat intercepted by Israeli naval forces in international waters and was imprisoned by Israel for three days.  She presented slides and accounts of this and her June 2010 experiences aboard The Audacity of Hope boat to Gaza, three other visits to Gaza, and her eyewitness account from Tahrir Square in Cairo in January 2011. 

 
Gaza Update

Nuha Masri

Willamette Hall 100, University of Oregon

October 29, 2011

Nuha is a Palestinian-American UC Berkeley student born and raised for 10 years under Israeli occupation in Jerusalem reporting on her service as a UNESCO intern in Gaza and experience in the January 2010 Gaza Freedom March where she was among those selected for entry into Gaza.



Al-Nakba Commemoration

Harris Hall, Eugene

7 pm, May 4, 2011

Showing of historic Nakba footage and 50' documentary film, Reel Bad Arabs.

The films were followed by discussion with Palestinians Chris Bargout and Kamal Hasan whose families were ethnically cleansed from Ramle and Haifa in 1948.



Breakthrough: Transforming Fear into Compassion

Richard Forer, author of above-titled book

Lawrence Hall 128, University of Oregon

7 pm, March 10, 2011

A Jewish-American ex-AIPAC supporter, Richard shares his journey from a "righteous" defender of Israel who adamantly resisted examination of the evidence, through an "awakening" as he discovered irrefutable facts incompatible with his previously conditioned "Jewish identity," to an activist for Palestinian human rights, described in his newly released book of the above title.


Belonging, a documentary film by Tariq Nasir

Dr. Ibrahim Soudy

Knight Library Browsing Room, University of Oregon

7 pm, December 9, 2010

The film traces the filmmaker's displaced family over two generations, including historic footage.
Dr. Soudy speaks on the role of international civil society in securing Palestinian human rights.



Missing Headlines: Stories of Life in Palestine

Emily Schick, International Solidarity Movement activist

Harris Hall, Eugene

7 pm, October 13, 2010

Emily shares her observations and slides from five months in the West Bank and East Jerusalem coordinating ISM media and working with Palestinians facing dispossession and attack.


Update Gaza

Gerri & Bob Haynes, palliative care nurse & cardiologist husband/wife team

Harris Hall, Eugene

7 pm, July 22, 2010

Gerri & Bob just returned from leading a medical delegation to Gaza and described their findings and interactions with the people of Gaza, emphasizing their continuous stress and its effects, including slide show of post-Cast Lead conditions.

 
Report from the West Bank

Peter Chabarek, local activist 

Unitarian Universalist Church, 477 E. 40th, Eugene

7 pm, June 8, 2010

Second presentation by Peter of his slide show with discussion of the occupation and Palestinian non-violent resistance from his recent tour of the West Bank with Global Exchange.


A Nakba and Apartheid that Dare Not Speak their Names

Saree Makdisi, UCLA professor of English literature and author,
                       Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation
Kamal Hasan, Palestinian refugee whose family was expelled from Haifa
                     during the Nakba
Waddah Sofan, wheelchair-bound Palestinian shot in the back at age 19 by the IDF
Saed Bannoura, wheelchair-bound Palestinian shot in his village
                         by Israeli death squad

Lawrence Hall, University of Oregon, Eugene

7 pm, May 22, 2010

Nakba commemoration with Nakba photo exhibit, filmed interviews with Nakba survivors, 1950 BBC documentary film on the refugees, keynote address by Dr. Makdisi, and panel discussion with dispossessed and IDF-disabled Palestinian residents of Oregon.

 
Report from the West Bank

Peter Chabarek, local activist 

Eugene, March 17, 2010

Rachel Corrie commemoration with slide show and discussion of the occupation and Palestinian non-violent resistance from his recent tour of the West Bank with Global Exchange, a San Francisco-based human rights organization


The One-State Solution

Ali Abunimah, Author, One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse and Co-founder, The Electronic Intifada

Lawrence Hall, University of Oregon, Eugene

1 pm, March 5, 2010

Counteracted Israeli hasbara propaganda and support for the Bantustan "2-state solution" and presented 1-state model.


One Year After Gaza

Rebecca Tumposky, U.S. Chapter Organizer, International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network

Monadel Herzollah, U.S. Palestinian Community Network; Founder & President, Arab American Union Members Council

Eugene, February 25, 2010
Portland, February 26, 2010
Corvallis, February 27, 2010

Presented Jewish alternative to Zionism based in social justice and solidarity with Palestinian demands for human rights.



Palestinian Prisoners in Israel

Ala Jaradat of Addameer, Palestinian Prisoner Support and Human Rights organization 

Portland State University, Portland

November 20, 2009

Described the thousands of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel through arrest or administrative detention, routinely tortured, and denied due process rights.

 
Eyewitness Gaza

Darlene and Donna Wallach, Jewish anti-Zionist social justice advocates who challenged the Israeli blockade aboard the first FreeGaza boalift in August 2008 and remained through December 2008 to re-establish the ISM in Gaza

Harris Hall, Eugene, May 27, 2009

Film footage of life in Gaza, including Israeli Navy attacking Gazan fishermen.

 

Film: The Land Speaks Arabic

Chris Bargout, son of a Nakba survivor of the Lydda massacre and Ramle expulsion in July 1948

Harris Hall, Eugene, May 13, 2009

Nakba commemoration featuring film on Zionist history preceding the Nakba, followed by discussion.


 
Gaza War Crimes Investigation

Attorney Tom Nelson, Member, National Lawyers Guild delegation to Gaza to investigate evidence of Israeli war crimes during Operation Cast Lead

Harris Hall, Eugene, May 4, 2009

Description, slide presentation and discussion


Film: Occupation 101

Alison Weir, Founder & Director of If Americans Knew

Commemoration of the death of ISM worker Rachel Corrie by IDF bulldozer in March 2003 

Harris Hall, Eugene

March 16, 2009
Film on Israeli occupation followed by presentation by Ms Weir.

 
Palestine: From Apartheid to Warehousing

Jeff Halper, Co-Founder and Director, Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions

United Lutheran Church, Eugene, October 11, 2008

Presentation relating Israel’s Gaza strategy of deliberately "warehousing" an unwanted population to "shock doctrine" principles described by Naomi Klein to serve "disaster capitalism."


The Palestine/Iraq Nexus

Mazin Qumsiyeh, author, Sharing the Land of Canaan and Popular Resistance in Palestine

Harris Hall, Eugene, March 3, 2008
University of Oregon, Eugene, March 4, 2008

Touring with Wheels of Justice, Mazin's presentations connected Israel with the attack on Iraq and the common theme of Arab demonization.


Distorted Reporting in the U.S. Press

Alison Weir, Founder & Director of If Americans Knew

University of Oregon, 2007

Graphic presentation of data comparing reporting accuracy of Israeli and Palestinian deaths in the NY Times, Oregonian and San Francisco Chronicle.


The Israel Lobby

Jeff Blankfort, Bay Area print and broadcast journalist

University of Oregon

May, 2006

Discussion of the power of the Lobby and denial of this by prominent "progressive" figures who avoid debating this with Mr. Blankfort, and its decisive influence in the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Demand Freedom, Justice and Equality in the Holy Land