Assalam Alaikum Brothers and Sisters,
You might have read and heard about the ethnic violence in the Westernpart of China, Xinjiang this past weekend. According to Chineseofficial media, 156 are dead and 1080 injured. However the unofficialfigures report that at least 600 people died in the clashed betweenUyghur Muslim and Han Chinese majority, and about 95% of the casualtiesare Uyghur Muslims. Chinese authorities have arrested at least 1400Uyghur s, claiming they took part in the riot. The official Chinesemedia, Xinhua, only shows the pictures of few Han Chinese injuries withno mention of the hundreds of Muslims who died in these clashes, puttingthe blame completely on the Muslims. The reality is far from it.
Please see the links below for some unbiased reporting.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0706/p06s04-woap.html
http://www.democracynow.org/shows/2009/7/7
The unrest in Xinjiang (East Turkistan), is near and dear to my heart.I am an Uyghur living in Chicago. My parents and the rest of the familyare still in Xinjiang. While they are away from Urumqi where theclashes happened, I still have not been able to get hold of them in pastcouple of days as the authorities have shut down internet and telephoneservices. I am praying every moment for their safety.
Uyghurs are the Turkic speaking Muslim people living in the northwestpart of China under occupation. Their short lived republic, EastTurkistan went under Chinese communist rule in 1950. Since then theyhave been subjected to severe discrimination because of their Muslimidentity and they have seen their 97% majority in Xinjiang shrink toalmost 50% in last few decades. There are many underlining sources oftension and humiliation of over 10 million Uyghur Muslims.
I am writing to you for your support in helping spread the word andplight of Uyghur Muslims. I go to Juma prayers and everyone prays aboutsuffering of the Palestinians, Kashmiris, Afghanis, Iraqis andChechnyans, however not once I have heard someone pray for the Uyghurs.
We are the forgotten people in this world and not even our Muslimbrothers and sisters have ever provided any moral support for us. WellI'm asking for the support in this hour of dire need. My brothers andsisters are being persecuted as we speak. They have been captured inmass arrests with no sight of what will happen to their future. Uyghurwoman with their children have went on street to protest against themass arrest of thousands of Muslim Uyghur men. Under communist Chineserule we are not allowed to practice our religion until the age of 18 andeven after the age of 18 if anyone who works for government liketeachers and doctor are not allowed to pray or go to Mosque. Ourchildren and teachers are force fed in schools during the month ofRamadan. There is a governmental agenda to slowly take Islam out ofcommon people's lives. Majority of the high paying jobs go to the HanChinese with a lot less qualification in our own home land. Our cultureis being slowly disappearing.
I urge you to send this to your friends and families and condemn thekillings and mass arrest of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. I ask you to pray forthe safety of the people of East Turkistan (Xinjiang), Uyghurs and HanChinese. I ask you to please stand in solidarity with your UyghurMuslim brothers. The moral support of Muslim community means a lot tome and the Uyghurs as we are desperate to be seen and heard by ourbrothers and sisters.I urge you to send a message of solidarity with Uyghur Muslims and prayfor them. I urge you to send this message to at least 5 other familymembers and friends.
Sincerely,Zulfiye OsmanNoman Khan (husband)
Senin, 13 Juli 2009
Defenseless Uighurs Run for their Lives
IslamOnline.net & News Agencies
Thousands of Han Chinese mobs, armed with bats and other weapons, are roaming the streets, hunting down Uighurs. URUMQI — With thousands of rampaging, armed Han Chinese mobs, running amok in the streets of Urumqi city, helpless Uighurs had no other option but to run for their lives.
"There is too much hatred around now," Ali, an Uighur man, told Agence France Presse (AFP) on Wednesday, July 8.
Thousands of Han Chinese mobs, armed with bats and other weapons, are roaming the streets, hunting down Uighurs.
"Get them! Strike! Strike! Strike!" dozens of Han Chinese armed with makeshift weapons screamed as they saw three Muslim Uighur men.* Internet, Blogs Solace Oppressed Uighurs * Eroding Uighur Identity Hearing the chants of the Han mob, the terrified trio began running but only two managed to escape leaving the third to face horror and dozens of attackers.
Not far away in central Urumqi, about 20 armed Han mobsters beat and kicked a Uighur man nearly to death."I'm too afraid to go home tonight," said Halisha, a 30-year-old eye doctor, insisting that he prefers to sleep in his small clinic rather than venturing into the dangerous streets.
"Who knows if I can trust my neighbors or the people on the street? It's safer here for now."
Urumqi has been boiling since Sunday, when nearly 1000 Uighurs took to the streets to protest discrimination and cultural and religious controls.
At least 156 people were killed and more than 1,000 wounded when police unleashed a massive crackdown on the Turkish-speaking minority of more than eight million.
The unrest has drawn global condemnation, with organizations and Western leaders urging China to exercise self restraint.
Several human rights groups have expressed concern over the fate of 1,434 people who were taken into police custody over Sunday’s unrest, saying they could be tortured or mistreated.
Genocide
The rampage of Han Chinese continued as Beijing poured thousands of troops into the city in a massive show of force.
According to eyewitnesses, none of the Han attackers was arrested by the security forces, who only worked on dispersing the mob.
Exiled Uighur groups warned of a "genocide" against Muslims in the Xinjiang region.
"A true genocide of the Uighur people is in progress," Torgan Tozakhunov, deputy director of the Uighur cultural centre in Kazakhstan, home to 220,000 Uighurs, told AFP.
"The Chinese authorities will have to answer for these crimes in front of the international community."Turkish Prime Minister Racab Tayyib Erdogan demanded on Wednesday an to "savagery" committed against Uighur Muslims.
"Our expectation is for these incidents that have reached the level of savagery to be rapidly stopped," he said in televised remarks.
"Necessary measures must be taken to prevent this brutality. We are temporary member of the UN Security Council for 2009-2010. We will also take these events into consideration there."
Uighur Muslims accuses the government of settling millions of ethnic Han in their territory, a vast region with large oil and gas reserves, with the ultimate goal of obliterating its identity and culture.
They also cite a recent government plan that has brought the teaching of Mandarin Chinese in Xinjiang schools, replacing their local dialect.
Source: http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1246346174901&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
Thousands of Han Chinese mobs, armed with bats and other weapons, are roaming the streets, hunting down Uighurs. URUMQI — With thousands of rampaging, armed Han Chinese mobs, running amok in the streets of Urumqi city, helpless Uighurs had no other option but to run for their lives.
"There is too much hatred around now," Ali, an Uighur man, told Agence France Presse (AFP) on Wednesday, July 8.
Thousands of Han Chinese mobs, armed with bats and other weapons, are roaming the streets, hunting down Uighurs.
"Get them! Strike! Strike! Strike!" dozens of Han Chinese armed with makeshift weapons screamed as they saw three Muslim Uighur men.* Internet, Blogs Solace Oppressed Uighurs * Eroding Uighur Identity Hearing the chants of the Han mob, the terrified trio began running but only two managed to escape leaving the third to face horror and dozens of attackers.
Not far away in central Urumqi, about 20 armed Han mobsters beat and kicked a Uighur man nearly to death."I'm too afraid to go home tonight," said Halisha, a 30-year-old eye doctor, insisting that he prefers to sleep in his small clinic rather than venturing into the dangerous streets.
"Who knows if I can trust my neighbors or the people on the street? It's safer here for now."
Urumqi has been boiling since Sunday, when nearly 1000 Uighurs took to the streets to protest discrimination and cultural and religious controls.
At least 156 people were killed and more than 1,000 wounded when police unleashed a massive crackdown on the Turkish-speaking minority of more than eight million.
The unrest has drawn global condemnation, with organizations and Western leaders urging China to exercise self restraint.
Several human rights groups have expressed concern over the fate of 1,434 people who were taken into police custody over Sunday’s unrest, saying they could be tortured or mistreated.
Genocide
The rampage of Han Chinese continued as Beijing poured thousands of troops into the city in a massive show of force.
According to eyewitnesses, none of the Han attackers was arrested by the security forces, who only worked on dispersing the mob.
Exiled Uighur groups warned of a "genocide" against Muslims in the Xinjiang region.
"A true genocide of the Uighur people is in progress," Torgan Tozakhunov, deputy director of the Uighur cultural centre in Kazakhstan, home to 220,000 Uighurs, told AFP.
"The Chinese authorities will have to answer for these crimes in front of the international community."Turkish Prime Minister Racab Tayyib Erdogan demanded on Wednesday an to "savagery" committed against Uighur Muslims.
"Our expectation is for these incidents that have reached the level of savagery to be rapidly stopped," he said in televised remarks.
"Necessary measures must be taken to prevent this brutality. We are temporary member of the UN Security Council for 2009-2010. We will also take these events into consideration there."
Uighur Muslims accuses the government of settling millions of ethnic Han in their territory, a vast region with large oil and gas reserves, with the ultimate goal of obliterating its identity and culture.
They also cite a recent government plan that has brought the teaching of Mandarin Chinese in Xinjiang schools, replacing their local dialect.
Source: http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1246346174901&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
Xinjiang Brutality Sparks China Boycott Calls
IslamOnline.net & News Agencies
Calls are growing to boycott the Chinese products over Beijing's brutal crackdown on Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province. (Reuters) ANKARA — Amid Muslim protests over China's deadly crackdown of its Muslim minority, calls are growing louder for a boycott of Chinese products over its treatment of Uighur Muslims.
"Consumers are the most effective weapon of our age," a spokesman of the Turkish consumer rights association told Agence France Presse (AFP) during an anti-China rally in Ankara on Friday, July 10.
"Our association is launching the biggest boycott against China today."The call echoes a similar one by Turkish Trade and Industry Minister Nihat Ergun for an all-out boycott of Chinese products over Beijing's atrocities against Uighur Muslims.
"If the country where we consume the good does not respect human values, we should reconsider our values," he said on Thursday.
"Consumers who buy a good must find out if the producing country respects human values or not."
At least 156 people were killed and more than 1,000 wounded when Chinese police unleashed a massive crackdown on the Turkish-speaking ethnic minority this week.
The deadly crackdown has drawn global condemnation, with organizations and Western leaders urging China to exercise self-restraint.
"Chinese items will be boycotted," said Maualana Habib-ur-Rehman, Imam of the India's largest mosque of Jama Masjid.
"If needed, we will talk to Muslim councils in the country and issue a fatwa forbidding Chinese products."
Protests
Thousands of Muslims took to the streets around the world on Friday to protest the Chinese brutal crackdown on the Uighurs.
"No to ethnic cleansing!" chanted crowds of Turks and Uighur expatriates in Ankara following the Friday prayers.
Many protesters waved the Uighur flag, depicting a white crescent on a blue background, as some others set fire to Chinese flags and goods produced in China.
"Murderer China", chanted some 200 protesters following the prayers at Istanbul's Beyazit mosque.
In Australia, hundreds of Muslims staged a protest against the Chinese treatment of Xinjiang Muslims.
"Death to Chinese terrorists" shouted the protestors outside the Australian parliament in the capital Canberra.
Indonesian Muslims were also out into the streets to protest the Chinese brutality.
"China can no longer act as tyrants towards those of their people who are of a different faith," Tifatul Sembiring, the head of Indonesia's largest Muslim party, the Prosperous Justice Party, said in a statement sent to AFP.
Uighur Muslims accuse the government of settling millions of ethnic Han in their territory, a vast region with large oil and gas reserves, with the ultimate goal of obliterating its identity and culture.
They also cite a recent government plan that has brought the teaching of Mandarin Chinese in Xinjiang schools, replacing their local dialect
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1246346210711&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
Calls are growing to boycott the Chinese products over Beijing's brutal crackdown on Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province. (Reuters) ANKARA — Amid Muslim protests over China's deadly crackdown of its Muslim minority, calls are growing louder for a boycott of Chinese products over its treatment of Uighur Muslims.
"Consumers are the most effective weapon of our age," a spokesman of the Turkish consumer rights association told Agence France Presse (AFP) during an anti-China rally in Ankara on Friday, July 10.
"Our association is launching the biggest boycott against China today."The call echoes a similar one by Turkish Trade and Industry Minister Nihat Ergun for an all-out boycott of Chinese products over Beijing's atrocities against Uighur Muslims.
"If the country where we consume the good does not respect human values, we should reconsider our values," he said on Thursday.
"Consumers who buy a good must find out if the producing country respects human values or not."
At least 156 people were killed and more than 1,000 wounded when Chinese police unleashed a massive crackdown on the Turkish-speaking ethnic minority this week.
The deadly crackdown has drawn global condemnation, with organizations and Western leaders urging China to exercise self-restraint.
"Chinese items will be boycotted," said Maualana Habib-ur-Rehman, Imam of the India's largest mosque of Jama Masjid.
"If needed, we will talk to Muslim councils in the country and issue a fatwa forbidding Chinese products."
Protests
Thousands of Muslims took to the streets around the world on Friday to protest the Chinese brutal crackdown on the Uighurs.
"No to ethnic cleansing!" chanted crowds of Turks and Uighur expatriates in Ankara following the Friday prayers.
Many protesters waved the Uighur flag, depicting a white crescent on a blue background, as some others set fire to Chinese flags and goods produced in China.
"Murderer China", chanted some 200 protesters following the prayers at Istanbul's Beyazit mosque.
In Australia, hundreds of Muslims staged a protest against the Chinese treatment of Xinjiang Muslims.
"Death to Chinese terrorists" shouted the protestors outside the Australian parliament in the capital Canberra.
Indonesian Muslims were also out into the streets to protest the Chinese brutality.
"China can no longer act as tyrants towards those of their people who are of a different faith," Tifatul Sembiring, the head of Indonesia's largest Muslim party, the Prosperous Justice Party, said in a statement sent to AFP.
Uighur Muslims accuse the government of settling millions of ethnic Han in their territory, a vast region with large oil and gas reserves, with the ultimate goal of obliterating its identity and culture.
They also cite a recent government plan that has brought the teaching of Mandarin Chinese in Xinjiang schools, replacing their local dialect
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1246346210711&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout
Rabu, 08 Juli 2009
Letter from an Israeli Jail by former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney
Letter from an Israeli JailBy former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney
Date: July 2nd 2009
This is Cynthia McKinney and I’m speaking from an Israeli prison cellblock in Ramle. [I am one of] the Free Gaza 21, human rights activists currently imprisoned for trying to take medical supplies to Gaza, building supplies - and even crayons for children, I had a suitcase full of crayons for children. While we were on our way to Gaza the Israelis threatened to fire on our boat, but we did not turn around. The Israelis high-jacked and arrested us because we wanted to give crayons to the children in Gaza. We have been detained, and we want the people of the world to see how we have been treated just because we wanted to deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.
At the outbreak of Israel’s Operation ‘Cast Lead’ [in December 2008], I boarded a Free Gaza boat with one day’s notice and tried, as the US representative in a multi-national delegation, to deliver 3 tons of medical supplies to an already besieged and ravaged Gaza.
During Operation Cast Lead, U.S.-supplied F-16’s rained hellfire on a trapped people. Ethnic cleansing became full scale outright genocide. U.S.-supplied white phosphorus, depleted uranium, robotic technology, DIME weapons, and cluster bombs - new weapons creating injuries never treated before by Jordanian and Norwegian doctors. I was later told by doctors who were there in Gaza during Israel’s onslaught that Gaza had become Israel’s veritable weapons testing laboratory, people used to test and improve the kill ratio of their weapons.
The world saw Israel’s despicable violence thanks to al-Jazeera Arabic and Press TV that broadcast in English. I saw those broadcasts live and around the clock, not from the USA but from Lebanon, where my first attempt to get into Gaza had ended because the Israeli military rammed the boat I was on in international water ... It’s a miracle that I’m even here to write about my second encounter with the Israeli military, again a humanitarian mission aborted by the Israeli military.
The Israeli authorities have tried to get us to confess that we committed a crime ... I am now known as Israeli prisoner number 88794. How can I be in prison for collecting crayons to kids?
Zionism has surely run out of its last legitimacy if this is what it does to people who believe so deeply in human rights for all that they put their own lives on the line for someone else’s children. Israel is the fullest expression of Zionism, but if Israel fears for its security because Gaza’s children have crayons then not only has Israel lost its last shred of legitimacy, but Israel must be declared a failed state.
I am facing deportation from the state that brought me here at gunpoint after commandeering our boat. I was brought to Israel against my will. I am being held in this prison because I had a dream that Gaza’s children could color & paint, that Gaza’s wounded could be healed, and that Gaza’s bombed-out houses could be rebuilt.
But I’ve learned an interesting thing by being inside this prison. First of all, it’s incredibly black: populated mostly by Ethiopians who also had a dream ... like my cellmates, one who is pregnant. They are all are in their twenties. They thought they were coming to the Holy Land. They had a dream that their lives would be better ... The once proud, never colonized Ethiopia [has been thrown into] the back pocket of the United States, and become a place of torture, rendition, and occupation. Ethiopians must free their country because superpower politics [have] become more important than human rights and self-determination.
My cellmates came to the Holy Land so they could be free from the exigencies of superpower politics. They committed no crime except to have a dream. They came to Israel because they thought that Israel held promise for them. Their journey to Israel through Sudan and Egypt was arduous. I can only imagine what it must have been like for them. And it wasn’t cheap. Many of them represent their family’s best collective efforts for self-fulfilment. They made their way to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. They got their yellow paper of identification. They got their certificate for police protection. They are refugees from tragedy, and they made it to Israel only after they arrived Israel told them “there is no UN in Israel".
The police here have license to pick them up & suck them into the black hole of a farce for a justice system. These beautiful, industrious and proud women represent the hopes of entire families. The idea of Israel tricked them and the rest of us. In a widely propagandized slick marketing campaign, Israel represented itself as a place of refuge and safety for the world’s first Jews and Christian. I too believed that marketing and failed to look deeper.
The truth is that Israel lied to the world. Israel lied to the families of these young women. Israel lied to the women themselves who are now trapped in Ramle’s detention facility. And what are we to do? One of my cellmates cried today. She has been here for 6 months. As an American, crying with them is not enough. The policy of the United States must be better, and while we watch President Obama give 12.8 trillion dollars to the financial elite of the United States it ought now be clear that hope, change, and ‘yes we can’ were powerfully presented images of dignity and self-fulfilment, individually and nationally, that besieged people everywhere truly believed in.
It was a slick marketing campaign as slickly put to the world and to the voters of America as was Israel’s marketing to the world. It tricked all of us but, more tragically, these young women.
We must cast an informed vote about better candidates seeking to represent us. I have read and re-read Dr. Martin Luther King Junior’s letter from a Birmingham jail. Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever imagined that I too would one day have to do so. It is clear that taxpayers in Europe and the U.S. have a lot to atone for, for what they’ve done to others around the world.
What an irony! My son begins his law school program without me because I am in prison, in my own way trying to do my best, again, for other people’s children. Forgive me, my son. I guess I’m experiencing the harsh reality which is why people need dreams. [But] I’m lucky. I will leave this place. Has Israel become the place where dreams die?
Ask the people of Palestine. Ask the stream of black and Asian men whom I see being processed at Ramle. Ask the women on my cellblock. [Ask yourself:] what are you willing to do?
Let’s change the world together & reclaim what we all need as human beings: Dignity. I appeal to the United Nations to get these women of Ramle, who have done nothing wrong other than to believe in Israel as the guardian of the Holy Land, resettled in safe homes. I appeal to the United State’s Department of State to include the plight of detained UNHCR-certified refugees in the Israel country report in its annual human rights report. I appeal once again to President Obama to go to Gaza: send your special envoy, George Mitchell there, and to engage Hamas as the elected choice of the Palestinian people.
I dedicate this message to those who struggle to achieve a free Palestine, and to the women I’ve met at Ramle. This is Cynthia McKinney, July 2nd 2009, also known as Ramle prisoner number 88794.
Date: July 2nd 2009
This is Cynthia McKinney and I’m speaking from an Israeli prison cellblock in Ramle. [I am one of] the Free Gaza 21, human rights activists currently imprisoned for trying to take medical supplies to Gaza, building supplies - and even crayons for children, I had a suitcase full of crayons for children. While we were on our way to Gaza the Israelis threatened to fire on our boat, but we did not turn around. The Israelis high-jacked and arrested us because we wanted to give crayons to the children in Gaza. We have been detained, and we want the people of the world to see how we have been treated just because we wanted to deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.
At the outbreak of Israel’s Operation ‘Cast Lead’ [in December 2008], I boarded a Free Gaza boat with one day’s notice and tried, as the US representative in a multi-national delegation, to deliver 3 tons of medical supplies to an already besieged and ravaged Gaza.
During Operation Cast Lead, U.S.-supplied F-16’s rained hellfire on a trapped people. Ethnic cleansing became full scale outright genocide. U.S.-supplied white phosphorus, depleted uranium, robotic technology, DIME weapons, and cluster bombs - new weapons creating injuries never treated before by Jordanian and Norwegian doctors. I was later told by doctors who were there in Gaza during Israel’s onslaught that Gaza had become Israel’s veritable weapons testing laboratory, people used to test and improve the kill ratio of their weapons.
The world saw Israel’s despicable violence thanks to al-Jazeera Arabic and Press TV that broadcast in English. I saw those broadcasts live and around the clock, not from the USA but from Lebanon, where my first attempt to get into Gaza had ended because the Israeli military rammed the boat I was on in international water ... It’s a miracle that I’m even here to write about my second encounter with the Israeli military, again a humanitarian mission aborted by the Israeli military.
The Israeli authorities have tried to get us to confess that we committed a crime ... I am now known as Israeli prisoner number 88794. How can I be in prison for collecting crayons to kids?
Zionism has surely run out of its last legitimacy if this is what it does to people who believe so deeply in human rights for all that they put their own lives on the line for someone else’s children. Israel is the fullest expression of Zionism, but if Israel fears for its security because Gaza’s children have crayons then not only has Israel lost its last shred of legitimacy, but Israel must be declared a failed state.
I am facing deportation from the state that brought me here at gunpoint after commandeering our boat. I was brought to Israel against my will. I am being held in this prison because I had a dream that Gaza’s children could color & paint, that Gaza’s wounded could be healed, and that Gaza’s bombed-out houses could be rebuilt.
But I’ve learned an interesting thing by being inside this prison. First of all, it’s incredibly black: populated mostly by Ethiopians who also had a dream ... like my cellmates, one who is pregnant. They are all are in their twenties. They thought they were coming to the Holy Land. They had a dream that their lives would be better ... The once proud, never colonized Ethiopia [has been thrown into] the back pocket of the United States, and become a place of torture, rendition, and occupation. Ethiopians must free their country because superpower politics [have] become more important than human rights and self-determination.
My cellmates came to the Holy Land so they could be free from the exigencies of superpower politics. They committed no crime except to have a dream. They came to Israel because they thought that Israel held promise for them. Their journey to Israel through Sudan and Egypt was arduous. I can only imagine what it must have been like for them. And it wasn’t cheap. Many of them represent their family’s best collective efforts for self-fulfilment. They made their way to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. They got their yellow paper of identification. They got their certificate for police protection. They are refugees from tragedy, and they made it to Israel only after they arrived Israel told them “there is no UN in Israel".
The police here have license to pick them up & suck them into the black hole of a farce for a justice system. These beautiful, industrious and proud women represent the hopes of entire families. The idea of Israel tricked them and the rest of us. In a widely propagandized slick marketing campaign, Israel represented itself as a place of refuge and safety for the world’s first Jews and Christian. I too believed that marketing and failed to look deeper.
The truth is that Israel lied to the world. Israel lied to the families of these young women. Israel lied to the women themselves who are now trapped in Ramle’s detention facility. And what are we to do? One of my cellmates cried today. She has been here for 6 months. As an American, crying with them is not enough. The policy of the United States must be better, and while we watch President Obama give 12.8 trillion dollars to the financial elite of the United States it ought now be clear that hope, change, and ‘yes we can’ were powerfully presented images of dignity and self-fulfilment, individually and nationally, that besieged people everywhere truly believed in.
It was a slick marketing campaign as slickly put to the world and to the voters of America as was Israel’s marketing to the world. It tricked all of us but, more tragically, these young women.
We must cast an informed vote about better candidates seeking to represent us. I have read and re-read Dr. Martin Luther King Junior’s letter from a Birmingham jail. Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever imagined that I too would one day have to do so. It is clear that taxpayers in Europe and the U.S. have a lot to atone for, for what they’ve done to others around the world.
What an irony! My son begins his law school program without me because I am in prison, in my own way trying to do my best, again, for other people’s children. Forgive me, my son. I guess I’m experiencing the harsh reality which is why people need dreams. [But] I’m lucky. I will leave this place. Has Israel become the place where dreams die?
Ask the people of Palestine. Ask the stream of black and Asian men whom I see being processed at Ramle. Ask the women on my cellblock. [Ask yourself:] what are you willing to do?
Let’s change the world together & reclaim what we all need as human beings: Dignity. I appeal to the United Nations to get these women of Ramle, who have done nothing wrong other than to believe in Israel as the guardian of the Holy Land, resettled in safe homes. I appeal to the United State’s Department of State to include the plight of detained UNHCR-certified refugees in the Israel country report in its annual human rights report. I appeal once again to President Obama to go to Gaza: send your special envoy, George Mitchell there, and to engage Hamas as the elected choice of the Palestinian people.
I dedicate this message to those who struggle to achieve a free Palestine, and to the women I’ve met at Ramle. This is Cynthia McKinney, July 2nd 2009, also known as Ramle prisoner number 88794.
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