Posted on 03/30/2002 2:19:11 PM PST by kattracks
NEW YORK, Mar 30, 2002 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- Steve Quester is spending his spring break in the West Bank.
Quester, a public school teacher, is joining about 20 other American activists who are traveling to the Palestinian territories to act as human shields for Palestinians as the Israeli military mounts retaliatory strikes for a series of suicide bombings against Israeli civilians.
"We're going to put ourselves in the way between Israeli military aggression and a helpless civilian population," said Quester, 39, who departs Sunday for a ten-day trip. He and other activists, several of whom are already in the Mideast, plan to stay in Bethlehem, Nablus and Gaza.
The group, which includes Jewish and Palestinian Americans, hopes to engage in various nonviolent protests and activities "to stop the madness that's going on there," said Quester, who teaches first grade in the New York borough of Brooklyn.
Their goals include removing Israeli roadblocks around Palestinian towns, observing Israeli-controlled checkpoints, helping rebuild demolished Palestinians homes and accompanying Palestinians on protest marches, he said.
The activists are part of a growing contingent of foreigners, mostly from Europe, who are in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to protest the Israeli occupation and recent military action. On Thursday, about 600 activists arrived in Ramallah, where Israeli tanks have surrounded the offices of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat since Friday.
The U.S. activists are working in cooperation with a Palestinian-led coalition called International Solidarity Movement that has appealed to foreigners to bring attention to conditions under the Israeli occupation. This is the third time that Americans have made trips to the Mideast in conjunction with the coalition, most recently in December.
An American member of this coalition, Adam Shapiro, and an Irish woman, Caoimhe Butterly, spent Friday night inside Arafat's Ramallah compound. Shapiro left the offices Saturday, but Butterly decided to stay because she has medical training.
The Israeli siege is part of a major military offensive launched after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 22 Passover diners on Wednesday.
Quester, who has lived in Israel for three years and speaks fluent Hebrew and "shaky" Arabic, says his "heart breaks for everyone killed in the violence."
He believes the suicide bombers are "desperate and hopeless" and that that ultimately "all the heartbreak flows directly from Israel's policy" of occupying the Palestinian territories.
He hopes his trip will boost the morale of Palestinians "by seeing more internationals standing shoulder to shoulder with them."
"I'm a Jew," Quester said. "The Israeli army and government are perpetrating a great evil on the people of Palestine, and they're doing so in my name. I can't let this stand."
Also, as an American, Quester said he opposes the financial and military aid that the United States provides Israel, which in his opinion perpetuates the violence.
Israel receives more than dlrs 3 billion a year in civilian and military aid from the United States.
"We U.S. citizens have a special responsibility to stop the madness that's going on there," he said.
By MALCOLM FOSTER Associated Press Writer
Copyright 2002 Associated Press, All rights reserved
Only 20? It'd be nice to clean out more.
Really? So why'd you change your name, Steve?
Sorry, I've met a bazillion Jewish guys in my life and nary a STEVE in the bunch. Certainly none with a crusing handle like "Steve QUESTer". Yeesh.
Yeh, he's on a quest, all right. Stupid commie. Let him stay over there, we have enough of his type here already. When the IAC can pull in crowds of 600 to their meetings, and thousands to their rallies, they have human shields to spare. This is a good thing, people.
And seamole, I'm now up to THREE Americans on my hope-they-don't-come-back-because-they're-dead list.
By the way, for all their posturing in front of American reporters, I'll bet every one of them somehow manages to make it back home safely without a scratch on them.
Just stay away from Israeli shopping malls and pizza parlors... those places are dangerous!
I wonder if these losers would be sympathetic if people claiming to be oppressed started bombing the western universities where the wacko left peace-pretenders get their degrees and their stupid ideas about appeasement? I don't think so.
The far left loved the Nazis when Hitler and Stalin were best of buddies; I guess it should come as no surprise to see them repeating themselves by cuddling up to another batch of racists. They will deny that they ever supported the likes of hamas and the PLO later, of course, just as they denied their support of Hitler after Hitler when he broke with Stalin, and just as they denied they supported Stalin when the truth was becoming impossible to conceal about his mass murders.
Stay Safe
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