Date/Time
Date(s) - 03/17/2024
3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Categories
We are cosponsoring this film screening; here is the description from Voices from the Holy Land:
Controlling the supply, distribution, and cost of water to an occupied people is apartheid in action.
Israel, through legal and illegal means, maintains near-complete control over the region’s freshwater aquifers, severely restricting Palestinians’ abilities to drill wells, install pumps, build water tanks, or even collect rainwater.
The average Israeli consumes over 3 times the water used by Palestinians on the water grid in the West Bank (9 times the water used by those off the grid). West Bank Palestinians pay 1/3 or more of their income to Israeli companies for drinking water.
Meanwhile, Gazans are now consuming less than 3 liters per day—hardly enough for survival.
VFHL offers three short videos describing the “hydropolitics” and structural water apartheid in the Holy Land. Our panel discussion will explore designed inequalities in water distribution; the physical, economic and regulatory controls; as well as the ecological problems of pollution and over-extraction.
Panelists:
- Nancy Murray is a co-founder of the Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine and co-founder and president of the Massachusetts-based Gaza Mental Health Foundation. She has been an activist for peace with justice in the Middle East since 1988, traveling often to the West Bank and Gaza Strip. She has taught at universities and prisons and worked on human rights issues in the United Kingdom and Kenya. Nancy served as director of education at the ACLU of Massachusetts for 25 years. She is the author of Palestinians: Life Under Occupation and several book chapters and articles on Israel/Palestine.
- Mazin Qumsiyeh is founder and volunteer director of the Palestine Institute for Biodiversity and Sustainability at Bethlehem University. He has published hundreds of scientific papers, book chapters, and articles, in addition to several books, including Sharing the Land of Canaan and Popular Resistance in Palestine. Topics of his work include, among others, the environmental impact of colonization, environmental and climate justice, and human rights. Mazin oversaw the formulation of a National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan and has spearheaded numerous empowerment projects. He publishes the blog Popular Resistance.
- Eyal Hareuveni is a researcher at B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. He is the author of Parched: Israel’s Policy of Water Deprivation in the West Bank, published by B’Tselem in April 2023. In addition to water, Eyal has explored such topics as settlements, East Jerusalem, and the separation barrier, authoring the report Standing Idly By: IDF Soldiers’ Inaction in the Face of Offenses Perpetrated by Israelis against Palestinians in the West Bank. He is a peace activist who refused to serve in the Israeli military.
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Jeff Halper (moderator) is an Israeli anthropologist, director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), and a founding member of the One Democratic State Campaign. He has served on the U.N. Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. In 2008, Jeff sailed with the Free Gaza Movement to break the siege. AFSC nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize, together with Palestinian Ghassan Andoni. Jeff’s latest books are Decolonizing Israel, Liberating Palestine: Zionism, Settler Colonialism and the Case for One Democratic State and War Against the People: Israel, the Palestinians and Global Pacification.
You must register to join the discussion & receive access to the film: Tinyurl.com/VFHL-March2024
Watch the Trailer: Tinyurl.com/VFHL-March2024Trailer
Don’t forget to watch recordings of previous Online Film Salon recordings in their entirety here, including that of the December 17, 2023 Online Film Salon on Humanity in Gaza. An article in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs on the December Salon can be found here. Also read an article on the November 2023 Salon on Marketing the Occupation – Part Two: Media and the Palestine Problem in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. An article on the July Salon on My Tree in Mondoweiss is here.
3 pm ET • 12 noon PT • 10 pm Jerusalem
The March 2024 Online Film Salon is Co-Sponsored by
SUPPORTER Organizations: Israel/Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) ♦ Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace ♦ Quaker Palestine Israel Network ♦ Unitarian Universalists for Justice in the Middle East ♦ Indiana Center for Middle East Peace ♦ Disciples of Christ Palestine-Israel Network ♦ Virginia Coalition for Human Rights ♦ Mennonite Palestine Israel Network ♦ Friends of Sabeel North America ♦ Center for Jewish Nonviolence ♦ Episcopal Peace Fellowship Palestine Israel Network♦ Northern New Jersey Jewish Voice for Peace ♦ United Church of Christ Palestine Israel Network ♦ Pace e Bene Nonviolence Service ♦ Churches for Middle East Peace ♦ Kairos Puget Sound Coalition ♦ Pax Christi USA ♦ Jewish Voice for Peace – San Diego ♦