Here is Millian’s response:

Hi, I work for the American Red Cross in their biomedical services division. I am are sorry for your experience and are very appreciative that you stayed and donated blood, a truly lifesaving gift. I wanted to let you know that the American Red Cross uses the U.S. Government’s Health Information for International Travel reference tool as the source document to assess countries with a malaria risk. The guide does not include all countries in the world, but does include all countries with a malarial risk. There has been no recent change in the list and we apologize if our staff was mistaken about that fact. As you are aware and highlighted in your blog post, the Palestinian Red Crescent is a fully recognized member of the global Red Cross and Red Crescent network. Thank you again for taking time to share the gift of life with others.

Stephanie Millian, Director of Biomedical Communication
American Red Cross

I spent some time doing research about the Health Information for International Travel source document that Millian cites and found that it is put together every two years by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a federally-funded public health agency in the United States. The document, more informally known as the Yellow Book, identifies a diverse array of global health risks and highlights all recorded instances of disease outbreaks with a special focus on malarial transmission. The American Red Cross uses this guide to update its database of international travel destinations which is then used to determine whether or not someone is eligible to donate blood depending on the countries they’ve visited within a certain time period of time.

Millian’s response suggests that the Red Cross’s database contains only those countries with a risk of malarial transmission. Countries that do not pose any malarial risks are not included. However, this makes little sense. As I related in the initial article, the Red Cross staff was instructed to report that I had traveled to Israel rather than to Palestine since Palestine could not be found in the database. I am forced to conclude that Palestine’s absence from the database indicates that the country poses no risk of malarial transmission.

However, the most current Health Information for International Travel document indicates that Israel poses no malarial risk as well. In fact, the 2010 edition of the Yellow Book found Israel to be just as safe from malaria.

No further inspection is necessary to realize the double standard. If Israel and Palestine are both free of any malarial risks, why is it that only Palestine’s name is absent from the list?

This is where the American Red Cross has an opportunity to shine. Although its databases are based on the U.S. government’s updates on global health, the Red Cross should put to work its own resources to examine the risk of malaria in Palestine so that it too can be included in the database. By leaving Palestine out, the Red Cross has logically already declared Palestine a safe travel destination, so based on my assessment of Millian’s claims, all that the Red Cross needs to do is include Palestine in the database’s index so that it reads “Palestine, no malarial risk” the way Israel, Canada, Bulgaria, and other countries are listed. Of course, this may read as wishful thinking, but for an organization that works so closely with the Palestinian Red Crescent, this is the least the Red Cross could do to respect and reinforce global health initiatives.

It also makes logical sense. When I travel to Palestine, I do not travel to Israel which is outside of the concrete walls, road blocks, checkpoints, race-based ID systems, military closures, and border sieges. To maintain Palestine’s absence from the list and to claim that it is because it poses no malarial risk (which, as I have shown, is clearly not a sufficient reason) is to reject the existence of Palestinian blood donors or the travel logs of people who’ve traveled to the occupied territories.

Sharing the gift of life is a two-way road. The CDC is the next level of outreach, but for right now, the American Red Cross has the privilege of setting the standard.

Sami Kishawi

Nine weeks into Khader Adnan’s hunger strike, solidarity activists spray paint a stencil of Adnan’s face on Israel’s apartheid wall. Adnan was violently taken from his home near Jenin on December 17, 2011, and has since been held under administrative detention without being charged and without being allowed to exercise his right to a trial. Today marks his 65th day without food.

This photograph merits its own post. Palestine’s graffiti culture is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Typically, pieces commemorate social or political heroes: the newly-wed neighbor, Palestine’s martyred children, an Italian activist who put his neck on the line for Palestinian human and civil rights, or, in this case, a baker whose only “crime” was growing a beard, being Palestinian, and refusing to break.

The stencil on the left says “Free Khader Adnan” in Arabic. The one on the right was adapted from the popular banner icon made by @shishibean displaying Khader Adnan’s mouth as a lock.

In due time, when Israel’s apartheid wall is knocked down, I hope whoever is in charge of taking down this particular slab of concrete looks deeply into Adnan’s eyes and recognizes that his persistence and strong will played a overwhelming role in collapsing Israel’s institutionalized discrimination against Palestinians.

The photograph was originally found in an article about Randa Adnan and her support for her husband.

Two weeks ago, I put out a call for questions people might have about the blog. The responses were interesting to say the least, and they’ve given me an opportunity to give readers a glimpse of the behind-the-scenes action of blogging for SMP. Here’s a small compilation of the best questions I’ve been asked along with the most honest answers I can give.

Do you ever sleep? You post at awkward hours.
School plays a tremendous factor in what time I get to experience this luxury you call “sleep”. At the end of the day, I do sleep but not as much as I should. This isn’t a consequence of the blog though. Typically, I’ll already be up studying or finalizing an assignment and if I choose to take a break, I’ll scrap together an article or publish one that has already been prepared.

How did you become a journalist?
Some of you might not know this but I’m not a journalist. In fact, I’ve never formally studied journalism. My university doesn’t offer the major and, in case you’re interested, none of my op-ed submissions have ever seen success. But even if a journalism degree was an option for me, I’d probably avoid it unless I intended to become a reporter. As much as I love the field, it doesn’t seem to have yet made the full transition from traditional print journalism to today’s cyber journalism and that, to me, is a bit off-putting. Regardless, I’m into blood vessels and whatnot so I’m taking the pre-med route.

How do you balance school and blogging?
It can be done. I’m not a powerhouse blogger so publishing three or four things per week is acceptable by my standards. Although the posts do take time, I try to strategize when exactly I get to work on them. You might notice lulls in the blog’s activity and those are almost always because I’m studying for exams. School takes precedence, but if school is out and the guys are playing Xbox like thirteen year olds, I get to work on a new post.

How did you get into blogging in the first place?
I joined Twitter almost two years ago and @iRevolt suggested I write. It was tricky at first but I eventually got into the habit of regularly updating the site with fresh content. It’s nice to see blogs taken seriously, especially on Twitter, so the support has definitely fueled my work.

Have any bloggers inspired you or SMP’s message?
As I said, @iRevolt really motivated me to begin writing. She even offered to purchase the domain and set the site up for me! I’ve definitely employed her sharp writing style in many of my posts, specifically the scathing and more effective ones. The blog also pays homage to Mondoweiss and Electronic Intifada, two websites that continue to redefine reportage on the Middle East and regularly inspire me with new ideas and fresh takes on issues I can’t always wrap my head around. Plus, their teams of writers are among the most supportive you’ll ever meet and have given me opportunities far beyond the reach of this blog.

Why are you so one-sided?
Because it makes no sense to side with injustice. But if the question is referring to my pro-Palestine stance, it’s because I believe in human rights. Israel’s discriminatory policies and illegal practices don’t make headlines anywhere near as often as they should, so I’ve joined the effort that seeks to expose the occupation of Palestine for what it is. I don’t make up statistics or facts about Israel’s policies and anyone who feels insulted by this alleged one-sidedness should probably enlighten themselves first.

How many hits do you get?
Page views are a private affair for most bloggers, including myself. But to give you an idea of where this site stands, let’s just say that SMP’s total page views amount to the number of hits Google receives in roughly six and a half seconds, according to statistics from 2009.

Does SMP have any traditions?
I wouldn’t call this a tradition just yet but I flip upside down any photos I use of people holding their thumbs up. Besides that, I have a variety of rules that could, in a way, operate as traditions. I believe in only featuring original content so I don’t crosspost articles. I also prefer to publish on Tuesdays. I’m hoping the cupcake contest becomes an annual thing.

What gave you the idea for a cupcake contest?
People enjoy making cupcakes just as much as they enjoy eating them. After being blown away by a dozen Palestine-themed cupcakes myself, I thought it would be nice to extend a challenge to anyone interested. Some questioned the purpose of the contest, saying that its rude or foolish to politicize baked goods, but I took that as a sign that these fluffy cakes might help people loosen up a bit.

What was your favorite article to write? Your least favorite?
Of the 280 or so posts published on the blog, I enjoyed writing these two the most: “StandWithUs and Captain Israel: BDS is a ‘barbaric destroyer snake’” and “A Palestinian mother, a Palestinian son, and Eid in America“. I enjoy critically analyzing things, and being detail oriented gives me the pleasure of pointing out the subtleties that bigots and racists try to slip by. Although the Captain Israel article isn’t as scathing as my other pieces, I was thoroughly amused by the sheer absurdity of the comic. The night I spent writing that piece will forever be a time to remember. As for the second piece, I like writing about the more personal side of Palestinian life. We’re too often bungled up in politics to really take advantage of the time we share with family and friends, and although it’s a sacrifice we have to make, it’s worth writing about. Mama has always been the central figure in my life so to better understand myself and my values, I look to my experiences with her.

As for my least favorite article ever written, I have plenty of those. I’m extremely critical of my writing and so the writing process can sometimes drag out for days until I feel satisfied with a paragraph or opening sentence.

Ever regret publishing something on the site?
Yes, actually, but only once. I made a silly connection one time and wrote about it. After rereading the article by accident a year later, I couldn’t believe how ridiculous and disagreeable it sounded. I won’t disclose any details about the content of the article but I will say that I’ve disappeared it. Besides that, I’m happy with everything on the blog. Although some of my reportage has gotten me into trouble and although I still face heat for my critical stance on Mona Eltahawy’s style of debate, I enjoy the work and I’m proud of the results.

What camera set-up do you use for your photographs?
I am by no means a professional photographer so don’t let the technical sounding names convince you to think otherwise. I’m fortunate enough to use a Nikon D90 (although, given the chance, I would consider swapping it for a D7000). I don’t own any fancy lenses but those aren’t always necessary. I used a stock 18-105mm f3.5-5.6 for this amazing balloon release in Chicago to commemorate the children killed during Israel’s invasion of Gaza three years ago.

What are your future plans for SMP?
I hope to host another cupcake contest and make it an annual event with bigger and better prizes. I also hope to do more groundwork in Palestine but that can only happen if I get another opportunity to travel there. I’ve got two small-scale projects in mind for right now but they’re still in the development phase. In due time, you will be the first to know.

Sami Kishawi

The demonstration began at the beginning of the program. The soldier acknowledged the presence of the demonstrators and likened the message of the students to Gilad Shalit’s experience ”under captivity in Gaza with no right to speak, no visitation from the Red Cross, no legal restitution whatsoever”. Expectedly, the soldier failed to mention Khader Adnan or any of the other 300 or so Palestinians — youth included — currently detained indefinitely and without charge in Israeli detention facilities.

The soldier goes on to call the Palestinian children killed during Israel’s invasion “terrorists”.

Watch the video here, and follow the group on Twitter here.

A Valentine's Day donkey in the Gaza Strip

My dear love,

I write this letter to you on February 14 otherwise known as Valentine’s Day. As I walk through the halls of my high school, I see every typical thing you’d expect to see on Valentine’s Day. The popular girl walking with a huge teddy bear holding chocolate roses, the ‘I love you’ balloons tied to backpacks, the bouquet of flowers or boxes of chocolates in the hands of students as they rush to class. I also see a fair share of boyfriends sneaking flowers into their girlfriend’s lockers. I see couples who purposefully dressed in the same color or even the same shoes just to match with each other. But what I don’t see today is my true dear love. I haven’t seen you today. And I haven’t seen you for eight months, since the last time I saw you on July 16, 2011.

Palestine, I love you with all my heart. Better yet, you are my heart. My blood flows to your beat every second of every minute of the day. I’d be helpless without you. Palestine, you are my pride. My joy. My love. My life. You give me a reason to keep fighting every day. You are my true love and I will always have you. I don’t need to see you every day of my life to stay in love with you. I saw you for a whole month and I could never get enough of seeing you. I even began packing ten months in advance! I couldn’t help it. I needed that visit to be the best one, and alhamdulillah, it was. Alhamdulillah.

I have an everlasting devotion to you and your people. You will never disappear. You will stay with me. You will always be there for me. Even if I have to struggle to see you, I will do everything in my power to. I might need to stand outside of gates for days just to see you but I will do that. Anything for my love. Anything for you ya Falasteen.

There is one thing that is trying to take you away from me. You know who I’m talking about. Israel. Yes, they want to take you away from me. They hurt you so they can take you, steal your land and your culture, too. They uproot the most beautiful olive trees from your fertile and luscious soil. They bomb you. They throw white phosphorous grenades at you. They shell your buildings and patrol your shores. They prevent others from sailing and fishing deeper and deeper into your seas. They prevent me from seeing you. They don’t want us to be together.

They really don’t. They’ve even killed those just like me, the others who share an equal love with you. They’ve imprisoned others just because they dream about you. They’ve put us all under siege, even those of us living restlessly thousands of miles away. All of this just so we can stop loving you. But let me reassure you. Mama always told me to hold on to you — to embrace you — and I will forever cherish her great words of wisdom. I will never let you go ya Falasteen. Even if I get locked behind a gate which is just a mere inches away from your open arms.

As I profess my love to you, I’ve come to realize that I don’t need roses or a box of chocolates from you to know that the feelings are mutual. I know you love me because you are with me in every second of my day. You keep fighting and resisting just so we can be together. One day we will be together. Hassle free and, ultimately, occupation free.

Deena Kishawi

Deena Kishawi is a junior in high school who devotes her time to raising awareness about the occupation of Palestine and the use of Islamophobia as a strategy in mainstream media. She is highly involved in community organizing and one day hopes to one day share her experiences with her family in Gaza City. She tweets here.

Of the fifty-four photographs honored with the distinction, three feature Palestinians as the subjects. Three. The first shows Palestinian refugees fleeing from their homes again in 1976 during civil war in Lebanon. The second, from 1982, reveals the aftermath of the Sabra and Shatila massacre. The third, taken in 1993, shows Palestinian children raising toy guns as a sign of defiance at the close of the First Intifada. You’d think, then, that giving the world three opportunities to witness the realities lived by Palestinians would prevent the perpetuation of such injustices, no?

Here are the photographs with brief captions.

1976

Palestinians flee the La Quarantaine district of Beirut, Lebanon in January 1976. What makes this photograph especially moving is the context behind it, the fact that these refugees were remade into refugees. The father likely experienced the same rocking explosions almost three decades ago when he was a child, and now his children get to follow in his footsteps. (Photo by Françoise Demulder)

1982

Ten bodies lie outside of a building in Lebanon’s Sabra and Shatila refugee camps after Christian Phalangist forces, guarded by the Israeli military, massacred upwards of 3,500 Palestinians. The massacre began on September 16, 1982 and lasted until September 18, 1982. (Photo by Robin Moyer)

1993

Palestinian children wave toy guns in the air in Gaza City in the Gaza Strip. Although the First Intifada had come to a close by September of that year, the population had been energized to resist the oppressive occupation of its land. The Second Intifada began seven years later. (Photo by Larry Towell)

Sami Kishawi

Valentine’s day is right around the corner and for many around the world, it’s a time to embrace the loved ones, the husbands and wives, the mothers and fathers, the sisters and brothers, the new friends and the old. But under Israel’s apartheid regime, there can’t be any of that. It’s against the law. It’s a demographic threat.

To highlight just how Israel’s segregationist policies affect the lives of everyday Palestinians, a team of socially-conscious community leaders headed by our very own Tanya Keilani launched a new project called “Love Under Apartheid“. The website features stories of Palestinians at home and abroad whose love lives, be it with their families or friends, have been forced to circumnavigate Israeli watchtowers and race-based ID checks. Sirene, for example, is a Palestinian citizen of Israel who fears she’ll be unable to visit her fiancé in Gaza.

Like most Palestinians, Israel’s policies have taken a negative toll on my ability to express my love, too. Rarely am I able to visit my family members in Gaza — to hug my aunts and uncles — since the borders are sealed to me. Finding a wife in the West Bank is virtually out of the picture seeing that, as a Gazan, Israeli authorities won’t let me through the checkpoints. “You have no reason to be here,” said a soldier to my family as we tried to visit the West Bank once in 2000.

But I’ve got it easy. Just eight months ago, my mother, sister, and I spent two full days at the Rafah border crossing waiting for Egyptian authorities to consult with Israeli authorities over how many Palestinians to, essentially, set free. There we met a young woman who had been waiting under the sun for at least three days. Her wedding in Cairo was fast approaching and her wedding dress, tucked away near her luggage, was getting dusty. We waited together up until the day of her marriage. She was just hours away from becoming a wife, hours away from her fiancé and his family in Cairo.

Luckily, and thankfully, she was allowed through. She may have been late to her own wedding, but at least she was given an opportunity to do what hundreds if not thousands of Palestinians only dream about doing. Others, wedding dress and all, have resorted to traveling through the tunnels dug underneath Gaza’s borders. But not all of them make it out.

So while you buy your mother a rose or send a box of chocolates to that awkward boy who sits behind you in class, think about the walls, the laws, and the checkpoints Palestinians are forced to deal with whenever they try to do the same.

Click here to watch the promotional video for the Love Under Apartheid project. And click here to learn more. When tweeting about the project, please use the hashtag #LoveUnderApartheid which trended worldwide in less than four minutes.

In preparation for the National BDS (Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions) Conference that took place last weekend at the University of Pennsylvania, there was much controversy regarding the ethics of BDS and its implications of being hosted on the University’s campus. With frank judgment, I anticipated an anti-BDS or pro-Israel type demonstration on campus. Driving there I imagined all sorts of scenarios and confrontations and how I would respond yet only to be dumbfounded by their silence when I arrived to Penn. This shocked me considering how fast media coverage grew as the PennBDS conference approached. I was at least expecting to see a small gathering marked by Israeli flags, but no such activity commenced.

On the second day of the conference we were later informed of anti-BDS advocates present at the conference. Their presence was evident but their attendance was marked by silence. Martin Himel, a Zionist filmmaker, registered as a media attendant later to be discovered posing as a journalist from Canada’s CBC.  Himel uses this mask in an effort to gain an insider’s perspective of the conference, attempting to justify the criticisms PennBDS has received. Another presence was marked by StandWithUs, an anti-Palestine group, at Ali Abunimah’s keynote address. When Abunimah, co-founder of Electronic Intifada, asked the audience if there were any StandWithUs attendees, the crowd was marked by silence. Himel’s alias and StandWithUs’s silence depict such proponents as cowardly and simply pathetic for creating such negative buzz surrounding the conference to only result in no action. Ironically enough, StandWithUs is notorious for working with Israeli officials to muffle those of the Palestinian cause yet self-silenced themselves here.

For weeks, PennBDS has been the target of spewed denunciation by pro-Israeli activists and national organizations, including the University president herself. The organizers were seriously concerned of the predicted confrontations that would ensue on campus and the safety of the conference’s attendees resulting in the request of security guards at the conference. The heightened hatred towards the event therefore made the silence unforeseen. As bothersome as this escalation of controversy was, it turned out to be pointless and a waste of time for the stressed organizers and perturbed speakers that resulted in no gains or losses.

My take as to the rationale of the anti-BDS silence on campus is the witnessing of the nonviolent characterization of the conference. I presume that once one would ascertain the event’s schedule, one could only fathom the unprecedented nonviolent means of resistance by the BDS movement. The anti-BDS advocates could have nothing to hold against the movement and its supporters in regards to StandWithUs’s allegations of “incitement to violence against Israelis” and similar accusations.

Although the anti-BDS advocates were in a way silent, they were very outspoken outside the realm of the conference and I was shocked to find the faculty’s public display of bias at Penn. Excluding the fact that the University’s president took weeks to issue a statement in response to the controversy and a Penn professor’s letter of denunciation and hatred towards the conference in the Daily Pennsylvanian, the university’s Political Science department, who refused to co-sponsor the conference, co-hosted an event the night before the conference featuring Alan Dershowitz discussing the hindrances and negativity of the BDS movement. Regardless of Dershowitz’s past urgencies of Israel to incite violence against Palestine, the department’s decision to co-host one event over the other is a clear form of bias against students’ expression of opinion that the president so vehemently held the University against in her letter to the Daily Pennsylvanian, in which she stated the University’s openness for “exchange of ideas” and “expression of views.”

There is only a matter of time before such hasbara inscribed occurrences will come to an end. Although the faculty failed in maintaining a platform of equal opinions, the silence of the anti-BDS proponents was a step in the turnover of the voiceless to the voiced, the unjust to the just.

Bayan Founas

For years now, Israel and its supporters have been calling on Palestinians to find their Gandhi, so to say. It appears that he was found a little over one week ago after local villagers safely delivered a stranded Israeli soldier to his unit during a military incursion near Ramallah in the West Bank. The coverage was overwhelmingly positive — after all, the soldier came out of his debacle unscathed — but we must not allow this supposed PR win to dehumanize the Palestinian people or to mask or outweigh their values and principles.

Naturally, I, like many, hold mixed views over what took place in Budrus. I certainly recognize the humanistic gesture undertaken by the locals when they escorted the frightened soldier through the village but I stand at odds with the idea of voluntarily assisting an occupying force and normalizing its presence, especially as it storms through Palestinian towns and arbitrarily detains men and children. My contention, however, isn’t nearly as troubling as the perceived sense that after six and a half decades of failed opportunities, Palestinians have finally done the “right thing”, that this act of courage, as I’m hearing it said, has shown the world the human face of an otherwise ugly and brutish people.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how it’s being pushed. The Palestinians, for the first time in ages, have chosen to work with not against their occupiers and deserve a round of applause. But the patronizing claps, as deafening as they might be, frame Palestinians as the aggressors. In so doing, the applauding audience, saturated with mainstream reporters and orientalists, is complicit in mitigating Israeli accountability and reducing Palestine’s rich history of nonviolent resistance and activism to a nub. So is this really a model PR win?

This is a hard question to answer because, naturally, the problem is multifaceted. For one thing, there is no formal protocol for dealing with Israeli soldiers who happen to lose their way in a foreign town. The actions undertaken by the Budrus locals were indeed well-intentioned and, I’m sure, spared the community from an imminent re-raid in search of the missing soldier. So in this sense, the PR win was earned. But this shouldn’t sidetrack us from the more important issue, that there is no protocol for questioning Israel’s actions in the territory. What was the soldier doing in the village in the first place? Which house was he planning on forcing his way into? Which youth was he going to transfer to Cell 36?

The problem lies deeper than that. This isn’t the first time Palestinians have championed a nonviolent attitude, contrary to public belief. In fact, nonviolent resistance lies at the core of Palestinian activism. The weekly protests against the Wall in Bil’in and Nabi Saleh are excellent examples, especially when taking into consideration Israel’s tendency to fire projectiles at the faces of unarmed activists. Budrus itself was glorified in a film documenting its extensive history of nonviolent opposition to the occupation. Furthermore, Palestinian civil society maintains its global call for an active boycott of Israeli goods. To ignore this field of Gandhis is to invalidate the values of an entire people, to shamefully define Palestinians in whichever way is necessary to justify Israel’s unrelenting abuse of their civil and human rights. As noble as these actions might be, the positive coverage doesn’t take into account the long history of righteous actions undertaken by Palestinians at home and abroad.

But the problem runs deeper still. People within the pro-Palestine camp have tasted the potent potion of this kind of PR success and are already making themselves comfortable. Now, PR successes in today’s mainstream media are few and far between so this is all but an understandable reaction. The most powerful media industries, reflecting the stances of their governments, award Israel the impunity it needs to maintain the longest lasting occupation in modern history. But that rare PR win is still not something to celebrate if it mislabels, dehumanizes, or patronizes Palestinians by playing into the farfetched notion that they can actually be ‘tamed’, that they can do something right for a change.

After all, who defines “right”? The same establishments that stand in silence as Israel razes bedouin towns deemed ethnically unfit? The same individuals who commended Israel every day of its twenty-two day assault on Gaza? The same governments who turn a blind eye to the apartheid policies enforced with their military aid? Since when are Palestinians expected to bend over backwards to fit Israel’s perception of peace, a term it so grossly misunderstands?

So let the boycotts do the talking. March in Nabi Saleh weekly. Keep the Gandhis coming. They may believe Palestinians are inherently violent, that they are nothing more than security threats, that their first good deed happened one week ago, but they will see otherwise. The greatest and most representative PR win of all is on its way.

Sami Kishawi

1. Israel doesn’t even want peace.

If it did, it probably wouldn’t be incarcerating children or building concrete barriers through Palestinian villages or preventing Arabs from marrying Israelis or arming fanatical settlers colonizing the West Bank or demolishing homes or tearing through olive tree groves or shooting high velocity tear gas canisters at the faces of unarmed demonstrators.

2. I heard everyone there is in the army.

In Israel, military service is compulsory for all citizens above the age of 18. Recruits serve between two and three years and are given the opportunity to extend their service. Clearly, not everyone in Israel is in the military at any given moment, but the mandatory service means that most adult citizens have, at one point or another, served as an active military unit involved in the maintenance of a condemned and illegal occupation of Palestine.

Mind you, there does exist a refusenik subculture in Israel, but unless these individuals refuse to join the military for religious reasons, they are often stigmatized and prosecuted under Israeli law. Maya Wind, for example, spent forty days in a military prison for refusing to join the Israeli military on the basis that she could not agree with the military’s illegal activity towards the Palestinian people.

3. One time I visited Canada for a break. Do you ever visit your neighbors for vacation?

What these students fail to do is realize that Israel’s self-imposed isolation is an immediate consequence of it’s own strategies. It’s no wonder that after pointlessly invading Lebanon, killing Turkish nationals, destroying Palestinian natural resources, shooting Egyptian military guards, training assassins targeting Iranian scientists and fathers, and occupying Syria’s Golan Heights, Israel’s political and economic ties with its neighbors have waned. The question that should be asked, however, is if Palestinians are allowed to visit their literal neighbors because part of Israel’s systematic abuse of human rights involves denying Palestinians the right to move, even between villages in the West Bank. B’Tselem and other human rights groups have performed extensive research on Israel’s roadblock system in the West Bank and around the Gaza Strip.

4. Are you in the army?

See number 2.

5. Is it Hamas or hoomoos (hummus)?

It’s neither. This ignorant attempt at mocking an Arabic word is about as classy as this video gets.

6. Can women vote in Israel?

Yes, and they can vote in many other countries too — including Palestine. Sure, women’s rights aren’t up to par in countries all over the world, but Israel should not take that to mean that it’s off the hook. In a 2009 report published by the U.S. State Department, “the [Israeli] Government, through the Chief Rabbinate, discriminates against women in civil stats matters related to marriage and divorce”.

But on the topic of rights, why not ask about the rights immigrants, particularly Ethiopians, are permitted in Israel?

7. Do you speak Jewish?

I’m certain no sane people do because it isn’t a language. But to insinuate that this question is asked by those supportive of the Palestinian cause is an insult. If anything, those individuals invested in human rights are equally invested in respecting people of all faiths and backgrounds.

8. I think we should boycott hoomoos (hummus).

This jab at the growing BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) movement means only one thing: boycotting apartheid is becoming mainstream. I commend the actors for including this line because it truly is laughable at best. BDS isn’t a movement against hummus. It’s a nonviolent and effective plan of action against those who profit from Israel’s abuse of human rights. It just so happened that Sabra Hummus’s ties to the Israeli army (through its parent company) were recently revealed.

9. Ehh. Noo?

No comment.

10. Israel uses unproportionate force against the Palestinians.

In 2011, the United Nations published a report condemning Israel’s use of disproportionate force after using “direct live fire against unarmed demonstrators” commemorating the Nakba. During the 2008-2009 invasion of the Gaza Strip, Israel killed more than 1400 Palestinians including upwards of 926 civilians (although the Israeli military claims only 295 were killed — which is still 295 too many). The civilians, namely the 300 or so children, posed absolutely no threat to Israel, and their deaths are all testaments to Israel’s disproportionate use of force against Palestinians. These are but a few undeniable realities.

11. Jews have no connection to the land of Israel.

But of course they do! Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East that limits its democracy to Jews.

12. Do you have a GPS on your camel?

This joke, another in poor taste, is an excellent example of classic hasbara strategies. Generally, camels are stereotypically associated with Arabs and Bedouin. Here, however, Israel takes advantage of the stereotype, attaches it to itself, and uses it to victimize Israelis as also being on the receiving end of ignorant camel jokes.

13. Ehh.

No comment.

14. Is everyone there a rabbi?

Of course not. But is everyone in Gaza a member of Islamic Jihad or Hamas?

15. (Licking Sabra hummus foil top) Mmm, Hamas.

See number 8.

16. What’s a rabbi?

Again, to include this in a video clearly targeting social justice and pro-Palestine activists implies their ignorance which is insulting and, more importantly, incorrect.

17 – 21. You mean Palestine. / Palestine? / Palestine? / You mean Palestine? / (While swinging shovel into car) You mean Palestine?

What? Does Palestine not exist? Are you on Sheldon Adelson’s payroll? And what’s with the woman pretending to smash her car window with a shovel? Is that supposed to be an impersonation of someone who puts in the effort to call out Israel’s attempt at colonizing Palestinian land and erasing its history and identity?

And now it gets dramatic.

22. No, we mean Israel, because Israel wants peace.

If Israel really wants peace, is it logically fitting for it to threaten Iran with an invasion? Does it make sense for Israel to maintain control over who gets to visit Muslim holy sites and when? Is evicting families from their homes or bulldozing their homes before their eyes an act of peace?

23. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East.

Last I heard, half a dozen Arab nations revolted against corrupt dictators (who, interestingly enough, Israel had no problem befriending). Tunisia’s elections have moved along smoothly and Egyptians demand nothing less. But please, reread number 11.

24. Jews have been in Israel for three thousand years.

And they’ve also lived all around for periods almost as long as that. Do Jews, then, have a right to claim the entirety of Europe? Or how about North Africa where many of them lived in comfort during the Fatimid dynasty in the tenth through twelfth centuries?

25. Israel wants peace.

See number 22.

26. Hamas doesn’t want peace.

Don’t shift the blame. According to an infographic published on the Israeli military’s blog, the rocket threat posed by Hamas resulted in 44 deaths between 2006 and 2011. This amounts to 0.02 people killed per day. Meanwhile, in twenty-two days, Israel killed more than 1400. This breaks down to at least 64 Palestinians killed by Israel per day. It is a shame that humanity has is being discussed in terms of statistics, but the numbers are quite telling. While Hamas may not want peace with an occupier and invader of its land, Israel certainly does not want peace either, and it does not in any way have a track record of showing otherwise.

27 – 30. Peace. / Peace. / Peace. / Peace.

Okay, we get it, you’re thirsty for peace. But peace is a successor to justice, something that you will no longer be able to ignore.