I am doing Protective Presence in the West Bank for 6 months and, for part of each week, I stay with a cluster of Palestinian families who are being targeted by extremist settlers. I have been hit, kicked, cursed—on my first day the army confiscated my passport and detained me. I experience it like a nightmare; I loathe every minute—my first head-on experience with a distorted ideology that justifies evil—and it’s my own fucking people! But also my first experience of the immense bravery of my fellow Israelis and the solidarity they are creating with Palestinians throughout the West Bank. And my Palestinian family is still in their homes, and they know that they are not alone.
Strong fences are one of the best protections for these families. My sister Tessa and I have launched a fundraiser to purchase 500m of metal fencing that the settlers won’t be able to cut through https://chuffed.org/project/185832-fences-for-taybeh.
If you love Israel like I do, please donate to the campaign. These settlers are destroying everything that Israel once stood for. If we want Israel to survive and thrive, we must fight this evil, for the sake of Palestinians and Israelis alike.
Thank you!
Charlotte
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LEFTIST ZIONIST STATEMENT, by the chief editor of Centre of the Web (this will be reposted at the bottom of all COTW submissions from Israel-Palestine). 1. I am against the antizionist misinformation and hate movement, including the very unholy alliance between Hamas and its sympathisers, and the so-called progressive left (of which I used to be proud to be a member); I am a left wing zionist; i.e. I assert the right of Israel to continue to exist, to not be destroyed, to not be dismantled (often used as a euphemism for destruction). 2. Like the original Kropotkin-reading zionists, my politics is anarchistic. My ultimate belief in a stateless global society does not mean that Israel should dissolve before any other state. Considering global history, it should probably be one of the last states to dissolve. However, the dissolution of a state is not the dissolution of a people or its historical link to its homeland. 3. Hamas (Queer-hating, women-oppressing, Jewish-world-domination-conspiracy believing Hamas) are not a liberatory movement. Their founders had strong links with movements whose representatives met with Nazis in Nazi Germany, to collaborate on eradicating all Jews. (Do your research). This is nothing to do with resistance against so-called settler-colonialism. Moreover, extremist settlers in the West Bank are not representative of Israel as a whole. 4. I am not Islamophobic. I support a peaceful solution in the Middle East in Israel-Palestine and the wider region. This of course includes an end to the horrible government of Netanyahu, and an end to the destruction of Gaza. It also includes an end to Hamas and all associated groups and governments, including the Iranian regime. This does not mean I support Trump and Bibis war.5. Supporting the same ends as another, does not mean that I support another`s means. 6.The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend. Think about that before you get into bed with Hamas. // Thank you. In solidarity with Standing Together, Movement Against Antizionism and Institute for the Critical Study of Antizionism
Featured image: ‘Aerial View’ 1996, acrylic on board
In 2000 I found a studio, housed within and named after an old Chocolate Factory, where the plan was to house 100 artists. It was a walk across the park from my flat and near to the allotment! I was creating my little natural world in London! I was the first artist in and my work became freer. I painted, sculpted, crafted, and made clothes, mostly from recycled materials.
‘Red Still Life’ 2000, oil on canvas
I came across a leaflet for a residency at Dorland Mountain Arts colony in California, applied for it and was accepted. Somehow, I made the money to go and so I made drawings of an ambitious painting I wanted to do there. I tentatively bought a huge roll of canvas thinking that I could cut it down when I arrived if it was too big.
In March 2001 I arrived at Dorland and I was shown to where I would be staying for the next month. Wow! The Retreat was sensational. It sat nestled on a remote hillside with fabulous views all around. It was a massive building with a canvas roof and windows which showed the moon coming up at night. The wood burner was the only source of heating and I had never lit a fire in my life. I soon learned and became an expert.
The Retreat
Robert, a permanent resident showed me inside the house and when he got back to the front door, he said “oh, and there is this…” He lifted a pole at the side of the front door and the whole front wooden wall opened out onto a concrete balcony. The amazing thing was, there was a massive drawing board attached to this wall and it was exactly the size of my canvas! Needless to say I didn’t cut it down and I spent the whole month painting outside.
Front wall, living space, and communal dining room
‘Past Life Present’ 2001, oil on canvas
My work had got bigger and bigger over the years, from tiny black and white graphics to this, a massive, colourful oil painting on canvas. It is about a vision I had of me and my relationships to people in a past life as Native Americans. The other people in the painting are from my present life.
I met a beautiful man called Ben at Dorland, who made amazing sculptures in wood. We hung out together throughout the month. I realised later in the month that I had fallen in love with him, but he had a girlfriend so I never told him. Keeping my feelings to myself was hard. When I left Dorland, I got onto the Greyhound bus and began to feel ill. I felt like I was having a heart attack. I was getting up to ask the driver to take me to a hospital when I instinctively pulled out a piece of paper and pencil and started writing. I wrote a 46-verse love poem about Ben on the bus and when I had finished, the pain in my heart had gone.
Dorland was an amazing break from my madness and gave me the motivation and energy for the beginning of a new life.
i want a feature in the Big Issue the ‘ last seen’ scenario ‘she seemed fine at the drop off!’ parked at the school gates waving goodbye to boys 6 and 8 in her favourite coat, non branded, clean, parka green.
the despair of staying here makes my nurture seem like torture there’s only comfort in escape i want to get away up the M8 music on full blast shoebox of stashed cash start a new life no questions asked.
but i imagine you led back to the school only a weary teacher to wait with then driven back when I don’t return to a house no longer a home.
i won’t leave my children a legacy of loss. i cant be like them. The Missing are those who go and stay gone i’ll be the one dashing back for the pick up shouting ‘sorry i’m late’ last seen at the school gate clutching kids.
In 2040 I will be 60. In 2050 I will be 70. I am lucky enough that I am likely to remain relatively healthy throughout my middle age; I like to think that my old age will not start until I am 70. I have read enough now about the -more or less global- Collapse of modern civilization that is highly probable before 2050, and highly possible by 2040. This means that civilization is likely to become decrepit before I do, and I am likely, like the majority of humans alive after 2040, to suffer a tragic death (although I may not). How can I make my death less tragic? How can I die well? Firstly, I can resolve not to die in a state of blind ignorance about what is happening to the world, as unfortunately, many are doomed to do (I urge you to read about Collapse, particularly its thermodynamic and ecological bases). Secondly, I can resolve not to die in a state of blind panic. If I know my death may be tragic, the least I can do to prepare is contemplate the various possibilities of my death, as well as maintain a good meditation practice of letting go: letting go pain; letting go all distractions from the present moment. This is dying well amidst Collapse.
Originally published in the Schemattic digital garden.
My wife and I were driving along the usual rough and pot-holed Quebec roads when suddenly, we turned a corner onto a recently renewed stretch of road. For Quebec, it was heaven.
This road is silky,
my wife said, and
It is the silk road!
Originally published in the Schemattic digital garden
