New update 26/04/02

Concerning the situation here in Bethlehem, talks arrived to a dead end concerning the nativity and the situation in Bethlehem. A lot of games are played, and nothing changes on the ground. Israelis talk about a military operation to enter the church, and still about people as hostages inside.

Yesterday Israelis have agreed to release 9 young people, in coordination with Palestinians to be sent home, but after interrogation they released them, and on their way back home, Israelis re-arrested them. They were finally released again this afternoon…. So it is really a situation that is not leading any where, pacifically at least, till now.

Still some areas of Aida camp have no electricity, no water, and no telephone. We are in a real lack of a lot of medications now, and milk for children…

Al-Rowwad center remains open as an emergency clinic receiving people from Aida, part from Beit Jala and the neighboring areas…

But the main thing is this continuous pressure and humiliation that, with the silence of the world's governments generally, and the support of US government specifically, does not come to an end. The main response came from Jenin camp, this camp which is living catastrophic conditions have rejected all the help that came from USAID saying that US bring us help, while giving Israel weapons, bombs and Apache helicopters and F16s to kill us too... We don't want their help, and the help was returned back....What is really lacking is not food or money or anything that turns this suffering and resisting people into beggars.... A lot of organizations, a lot of people choose this moment to ask for donations… misery is a chance to ask those who are emotionally touch, so they donate…What happens tomorrow, and the day after…

Today we do not need money…. Because we can’t get out of our houses… because we have an occupation waiting at every corner of the streets… at every entrance or exit of each quarter or camp or village or city…We don’t need food that come in packages from everywhere in the world… these packages which are a sign of humiliation more that a sign of solidarity for our people (with all my respect to the good intentions of people)… which increase the numbers of unemployed among the Palestinians and make more food factories and food industries as will as drug industries close their doors because of impossibility to have access to the port or not allowed to import primary materials because of this closure…

Schools are still closed… even those areas which are considered as open, a lot of Israeli checkpoints which have for main function to humiliate the people, search them physically, and making normal things a hell and transforming simple things into nightmares. When all this injustce and crimes are over, you will find the ways to better help our people "return to life" more powerfully and to re-establish the society and the infrastructure, which the israeli occupation with all its force tries to destroy...

The thing that is lacking is breaking the silence, and make these sleeping governments aware that their people are angry because of their complicity with Israeli war crimes… a people is massacred every day, and injustice is still continuing, and everybody stay, probably praying that a miracle could be achieved.... miracles are not done in a WORLD WITH NO FAITH, in a world that have lost it's humanity and dignity, in a world that has to beg for his rights and the rights of the others, in a world that has lost the ability to think, the capacity to learn and to understand, the power to change things, and the wisdom to make this change... Peace be upon you all, hopefully, while you still alive…