It all started as a nuisance in 1993. Twelve years later, this nuisance is becoming a major catastrophe for the over 200,000 Palestinians of East Jerusalem, following the abduction by Hamas activists of an Israeli soldier, who was later killed along with his captor in an Israeli army storming of the location where the captured Israeli soldier was held. A checkpoint was located near Al Ram intersection. At first Palestinians going into Jerusalem were delayed slightly by the checkpoint. The fact that Jewish settlers used the same road meant that the Israeli soldiers were careful not to allow long delays. Those returning were usually not stopped.

Then, the Israelis built alternate roads for Jewish settlers and the army took its time to let Palestinians who lived beyond the checkpoint in Jerusalem. Palestinian cars were then prevented, even cars of doctors and journalists. Individuals were allowed in but their cars were not. Some had to hire cars and drivers from Jerusalem just to be able to get in and out of the Holy City without having to change cars.

This went on until the break of Al Aqsa Intifada in late 2000. A new checkpoint was created in Kalandia that brought troubles for those trying to get in and out of Ramallah.

The entry of Palestinians from Jerusalem to Ramallah was also held up as cars and individuals were searched. People started parking their cars at either side of Kalandia and then picking a ride in a taxi.

Then came the wall. At first no one believed it will actually be up, dividing communities. In Abu Dis, the wall quickly became a reality as a major intersection connecting Izzariyeh to Jerusalem was blocked up. For those using the Ramallah-Jerusalem road the wall was still not a concrete fact. Until one day, workers started erecting the cement slabs. Again, at first, they were few and far in between. Like the experience with the previous checkpoints, there were still many alternate roads. But little by little the noose tightened up and people started to feel it.

I remember one day driving from Jerusalem to Ramallah just before sunset; as I approached the walled areas near Dahiyat Al Barid, the light was dimmed as the wall literally blocked the light of the sun. This darkness that the cruel wall has created continued.

This week, Al Ram junction, famous for connecting Bir Nabala with Al Ram on one side and Beit Hanina with Ramallah on the other, became desolate. As the wall came up closing the only opening left, the junction ceased to be a junction. It became a T, with cars and trucks unable to make the crossing. If you leave Al Ram, you can only make a right or left turn. An entire crossing point for people and goods was suddenly erased.

The bad news kept on coming. Haaretz quoted a military source as saying that Palestinians living in Jerusalem will soon have to have a permit to get into Ramallah or Bethlehem. Few people believed the report. Some said it was a rumour, but the Israeli army has not denied the report.

The Israeli press had more bad news. Jerusalemites were awakened last week to bad news that major property in the Christian quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem was sold to Jewish buyers who, in turn, will no doubt turn it over to the militant settlers slowly taking over the Old City of Jerusalem. Despite the denial of the patriarch, the story resonated with Palestinians, especially the Christian community that has been stung a few times before, most recently by the sale of the St. John Hospice overlooking the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Continued calls for the end of the colonial era of the Greek priests and the Arabisation of the Orthodox Church has not yet produced any results.

To top all of the above Israel announced that it was expanding its major settlement to the east of Jerusalem, Maale Adumim. Twelve thousand dunums of land belonging to the people of Issawieh were suddenly not their anymore as the Israeli army issued confiscation orders to pave the way for the building of 3,500 new exclusive Jewish houses, all in an area that Palestinian Arabs were looking at as the only one left for their natural growth.

What has been happening to Palestinians of Jerusalem is nothing short of a human catastrophe. What is needed is a serious, effective and continuous strategy to save what can be saved and to strengthen the resilience and the steadfastness of those who have survived the tragedy that has not stopped since 1967.

For the past few weeks, Los Angles-based Palestinian director Hanna Elias has been very busy in Ramallah. He has been casting, auditioning and rehearsing with actors who will take part in an important movie. He needs to find some 120 voices in order to dub into Arabic the world-class movie Gandhi.



While actors were streaming in and out of the studios of Al Quds Educational Television in Ramallah, something important was happening a few hundred kilometres to the north. Massive popular rallies, with hundreds of thousands of people, first against, then for Syria were conducted in the Lebanese capital, Beirut.



Unlike in previous conflicts, and despite the fact that they involved a number of previously (and currently) armed groups, these demonstrations were completely non-violent. Palestinians, along with the Arab world as a whole, have been watching their television screens with awe as hundreds of thousands of Lebanese, at times meters away from each other, were able to conduct their protests without violence.



Despite conventional thinking, non-violence is not a new philosophy in the Middle East. Palestinians still speak about their first intifada as being largely non-violent. They still remember how the late Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Shamir deported Jerusalem-born American Palestinian non-violence advocate Mubarak Awad for his calls for non-violent protests. The people of Beit Sahour, near Bethlehem, still proudly remember the 40-day siege by the Israelis following their refusal to pay taxes under the slogan "no taxation without representation."



Palestinian and Arab democracy activists would also like to think that their struggle for freedom, independence and equality started long before the D word became part of the daily rhetoric of the White House.



For one thing, Palestinians believe that the recent elections, in which more than one serious contender fought for the popular vote, were at least in part a key milestone in the democratic fever that seems to have been gripping a number of Arab countries.



But before American neo-conservatives start patting themselves on the back, they must take a closer look at the content of what is taking place.



Democracy might be the rule of the people by the people, but once people take up this right there is no telling what they will decide. It is true that anti-US forces (like those of Hassan Nasrallah) are temporarily (at least in Beirut) putting their guns aside and taking up democratic tools, but they have not changed their opposition toward the US or Israel.



Pro-democracy groups in Lebanon are also not automatically embracing the US but instead publicly supporting the anti-Israeli forces. In the run-up to the March 9 rally and during it, Nasrallah’s actions and words were clearly in favor of what he calls "silm al ahli" (community peace), in which he insists on the need to discuss and debate issues.



Speaking to the media following the fall of the pro-Syrian Karami government, Walid Jumblatt insisted that seeking independence from Syria was not to be understood as moving any closer to peace with Israel or rejecting pan-Arabism. However, he insisted, the Arab patriotism that he was speaking about was not the same as the classical pan-Arabism (often reflected in Ba’ath and other ideological movements).



The importance in these statements lies in the fact that for the first time in modern Arab nationalism, Arab patriots have succeeded in presenting an alternative and genuinely democratic form of Arab nationalism.



Until recently most calls for reform and democracy in the Arab world were easily shrugged off as unacceptable because they were a response to American or, even worse, Israeli demands and dictates. For a respected Arab leader to state opposition to call for the withdrawal of troops of a fellow Arab country and still sound supportive of relations with that

particular country seem very odd to the ears of most Arabs.



While what is happening in Lebanon is unique in many ways, it has sent shock waves throughout the Arab world, where the populations of the 23 Arab countries had all but given up on the possibility of a peaceful democratic movement that was also patriotic.



For the most part, these same Arab democrats believed that fellow Arabs in Palestine deserved the same democratic independence from the Israeli occupation that they were seeking from their autocratic regimes. When President Bush publicly embraced the democratic calls without backing down from his relentless support for the hard-line Israeli occupiers in Palestine, many Arab intellectuals chose silence. They were afraid that support for President George W. Bush’s calls could be interpreted as endorsing American tolerance for Israeli occupation, house demolitions, assassinations and other human rights abuses.



The recent successful elections in Palestine, followed by the dramatic elections in Iraq, certainly provided much of the backdrop for the successful turn of events in Lebanon. It wasn’t surprising, therefore, to hear pro-democracy playwrights like the Cairo-based Ali Salem declare on CNN: We Egyptians are jealous of what the Lebanese have done. 



Among the 120 voices that director Hanna Elias was screening, he was looking for someone to fill the role of the Indian non-violence hero, Mahatma Gandhi.



Jerusalem actor Hussam Abu Esha was given the role, speaking the words of Gandhi in the Arabic version of the film. But in real life, to date, there doesn’t appear to be any single clear candidate to fill the role

During the peaceful demonstrations in Lebanon last week, protestors carried huge photo posters of the heads of the intelligence services in Lebanon calling for their resignation or ouster. The thousands of protestors clearly broke the fear barrier by making such a public call against the dark forces that they accuse of running a police state.



The intelligence services are the main power brokers in most of the Arab world irrespective of whether the country in question is a monarchy or a republic. And what has happened in Lebanon is certainly shaking up intelligence services throughout the Arab world.



Political systems in the Arab world have reflected a curious case. Monarchies are moving closer to a constitutional monarchy in which royalty has basically symbolic but unifying powers. On the other hand, the republics of the Arab world are becoming more like monarchies with autocratic leaders grooming their sons, a la monarchy, to take over

power after they are gone.



While what is happening in Lebanon is unique in many ways, it has sent shock waves throughout the Arab world, where the populations of the 23 Arab countries all but gave up on the possibility of the success of a peaceful democratic movement that is also patriotic.



But the change that has begun in Lebanon will not make the resident of the White House very happy. Before American officials start celebrating about the Arab peoples adopting the "D" word, they must take a closer look at what Arabs are saying. Democracy might be the rule of the people by the people but once people take up this right, there is no telling what they will decide. Anti-US forces (like those of Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah) are temporarily (at least in Beirut) putting their guns aside and taking up democratic tools like non-violent demonstrations and public rallies. Pro-democratic groups in Lebanon are also not automatically embracing the US but are instead publicly supporting the anti-Israeli resistance. In the run up to the March 9 rally and during it, Nasrallah’s actions and words were clearly in favor of what he calls "silm al ahli" (community peace) in which he insisted

on the need to discuss and debate issues.



The anti-Syrian opposition groups in Lebanon were unpredictable in their new rhetoric. Speaking to the media following the fall of the Karami pro-Syrian government, Walid Jumblatt insisted that seeking independence from Syria is not to be understood as moving any closer to peace with Israel or rejecting pan-Arabism. However, he also insisted, the Arab patriotism that he was speaking about is not the same as the classical pan-Arabism (often reflected in Baath and other ideological movements).



The importance of these statements lies in the fact that for the first time in modern Arab nationalism a respected Arab patriot has succeeded in presenting an alternative and genuinely democratic form of Arab nationalism. Until recently, most calls for reform and democracy in the Arab world were easily shrugged off as a response to American, or even

worse, Israeli demands and dictates. For a well-respected Arab leader to call for the withdrawal of troops of a fellow Arab country and still sound supportive of relations with that particular country seems very odd to the ears of most Arabs.



For the most part, these same Arab democrats believed that fellow Arabs  in Palestine deserve the same democratic independence from the Israelioccupation that they were seeking from their autocratic regimes. When President Bush publicly embraced the democratic calls without backing down from his relentless support for the hard-line Israeli occupiers in Palestine, many Arab intellectuals chose silence. They were afraid that

responding positively to President Bush´s calls would appear to be backing down in their support for Palestine and the rights of its people to be rid of the pro-US Israeli government that was responsible for occupation, house demolitions, assassinations and other human rights abuses.



The recent successful elections in Palestine have also been a major source of inspiration. Mahmoud Abbas had to compete with a number of competent contenders and won with a solid majority but nothing close to the 90-something percentage that Arab leaders normally win with. This was an election, followed by elections in Iraq, where voters were given real choices, and certainly provided much of the backdrop for the successful turn of events in Lebanon. It wasn’t surprising therefore to hear pro-democracy playwrights like the Cairo-based Ali Salem declare on CNN that, "we Egyptians are jealous of what the Lebanese have done".



Arabs–whether leaders or the people, whether monarchies or republics–are seeing an expression of people power in different countries. The goal is no longer to change monarchies to republics or vice versa. The goal of the popular movement in the Arab world is to remind rulers that people and not intelligence services are the real source of power. -Published 10/3/2005 (c)bitterlemons.org



Daoud Kuttab is a Palestinian journalist and founder and director of

Ammannet, the Arab world’s first internet radio station.

A curious thing is happening in Lebanon and other parts of the Arab world. Democracy might be the rule of the people by the people, but once people take up this right, there is no telling what they will decide. Anti-US forces (like those of Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah) are temporarily (at least in Beirut) putting their guns aside and taking up democratic tools like non-violent demonstrations and public rallies. Pro-democratic groups in Lebanon are also not automatically embracing the US but are publicly supporting the anti-Israeli resistance. In the run up to the March 9 rally and during it, Nasrallah’s actions and words were clearly in favour of what he calls “silm al ahli” (community peace) in which he insisted on the need to discuss and debate issues.



The anti-Syrian opposition groups in Lebanon were unpredictable in their new rhetoric. Speaking to the media, following the fall of the Karameh pro-Syrian government, Walid Jumblatt insisted that seeking independence from Syria is not to be understood as moving any closer to peace with Israel or rejecting pan-Arabism. However, he insisted, the Arab patriotism that he was speaking about, is not the same as the classical pan-Arabism (often reflected in Baath and other ideological movements).



The importance of these statements lies in the fact that, for the first time in modern Arab nationalism, a respected Arab patriot has succeeded in presenting an alternative and a genuinely democratic form of Arab nationalism. Until recently, most calls for reform and democracy in the Arab world were easily shrugged off as unacceptable because they would be effected in response to American or, even worse, Israeli demands and dictates. For a well-respected Arab leader to state opposition to calls for the withdrawal of troops of a fellow Arab country and still sound supportive of relations with that particular country seems very odd to the ears of most Arabs.



While what is happening in Lebanon is unique in many ways, it has sent shock waves throughout the Arab world, where the populations of the 23 Arab countries all but gave up on the possibility of the success of a peaceful democratic movement that is also patriotic.

To be sure, the Bush administration’s strong push for democracy in what the president calls the Greater Middle East has made Arab democrats very uneasy. On the one hand, this call echoes deep-seated demands that have gone unnoticed in the entire region. Arabs fighting for genuine democracy, human rights and the civilian transfer of power have been gagged, jailed, imprisoned and killed. Those who survived placed themselves in self-imposed exiles to avoid the wrath of regimes.



For the most part, these same Arab democrats believed that fellow Arabs in Palestine deserve the same democratic independence from the Israeli occupation that they were seeking from their regimes. When President George Bush publicly embraced the democratic calls without backing down from his relentless support for the hard-line Israeli occupiers of Palestine, many Arab intellectuals chose silence. They were afraid that responding positively to Bush’s calls will appear to be backing down in their support for Palestine and the right of its people to be rid of the pro-US Israeli government that was responsible for occupation, house demolition, assassinations and other human rights abuses.



The recent successful elections in Palestine have also been a major source of inspiration. Mahmoud Abbas had to compete with a number of competent contenders and won with a solid but nothing close to the 90 something percentage that Arab leaders normally win. This election, that was followed by the elections in Iraq, where voters were given real choices, certainly provided much of the backdrop for the successful turn of events in Lebanon. It wasn’t surprising, therefore, to hear pro-democracy playwrights like the Cairo-based Ali Salem declare on CNN: “We Egyptians are jealous of what the Lebanese have done.”



The Lebanese Intifada has provided a strong model for the Arab world. Pro-democracy movements will no doubt look at the peaceful demonstrations in Lebanon as a patriotic act even though it appears to be in tune with the public wishes of the American administration and even some of the voices coming out of Israel. But while Israelis have expressed pleasure with the anti-Syrian movement, Jumblatt’s statements will dampen their expectations that this turn of events will provide them with a Lebanese government that will quickly sign a separate peace deal.



With two Arab peoples (Palestinians and Iraqis) suffering under foreign military occupation and with most of the rest of the Arab nation suffering from possibly more damaging and painful autocratic rule, the Arab world has never been so fragmented and hopeless. But despite this miserable state of affairs, a glimmer of hope has finally emerged giving lovers of peace, democracy and human rights something to celebrate.

Today is Women’s Day. In response to the call by the Director General of UNESCO, I decided, yesterday, to appoint Nahed Abu Toumeh as director for Al Quds Educational Television, for one day. I didn’t realize when I wrote the memo that Nahed would take the issue so seriously. She really got excited, came to work early dressed with a skirt and ready to take on the job very seriously. I was very happy for her and tried to be very supportive. She made decision, called for meetings, invited the press and gave the idea real meaning.

Sure enough the next day I got in easily and within an hour I had an extension to my reentry. For how long, I asked hoping it will not be the usual one year extension. “ We wouldn’t see you for three years,” Reem Dqedeq says. ‘Well I explained that tamara, my daughter will be coming from college this summer and she needs to get her ID card. “I am not sure we can give her such an appointment,” she disappoints me. She will have to wait in line…………The bad news about Tamara doesn’t dampen my spirits as I walk out of the Interior Ministry with a three year extension on my reentry. By the summer time, maybe we can get a similar break to get Tamara in, I convince myself.