I'm reading her last letter's to her family in the USA, what we recieved from a special person who had access to these letters and kindly posted them as comments 
to my last post. Thank you!
I'm reading the same things what I hear from my friends all the time. Rachel's concernes were the same as mine and so many others are now.
Nothing has changed.
I also read about the same amazing kindness what lies in Palestinian's hearts no matter how much they have suffered they have this amazing power and gift to find strenght and happiness in their everyday life! Their hospitality and caring from a foreign person while their own lives and homes are being destroyed!
That amazed Rachel and it amazes me too. There must be a lot of angels among Palestinians!
Rachel was a brave woman! She came from the other side of the world to defend Palestinian civilians against Israeli military force from stealing their land and systematic destroyal of their infrastructure.
She witnessed the cruelty of this world and Israel and US convernment.
But her fragile body was crushed under one of Israelis bulldozers what Caterpillar kindly sells and delivers to them despite of knowing Israel uses them to demolish Palestinian civilians homes and liv
ing.
I'm afraid she is not the only one lost her life under those armored heavy machines. I wonder how many Palestinian lifes have been lost in that same horrible way?
I wanna borrow pieces from her letters here:
"..three checkpoints between here and Ashkelon (the closest city in Israel) make what used to be a 40-minute drive, now a 12-hour or impassible journey. In addition, what Rafah identified in 1999 as sources of economic growth are all completely destroyed - the Gaza international airport (runways demolished, totally closed); the border for trade with Egypt (now with a giant Israeli sniper tower in the middle of the crossing); access to the ocean (completely cut off in the last two years by a checkpoint and the Gush Katif settlement). The count of homes destroyed in Rafah since the beginning of this intifada is up around 600, by and large people with no connection to the resistance but who happen to live along the border. I think it is maybe official now that Rafah is the poorest place in the world. There used to be a middle class here - recently."
"And then the bulldozers come and take out people's vegetable farms and gardens. What is left for people? Tell me if you can think of anything. I can't."
"..that soldiers and tanks and bulldozers could come for us at any moment and destroy all the greenhouses that we had been cultivating for however long, and did this while some of us were beaten and held captive with 149 other people for several hours - do you think we might try to use somewhat violent means to protect whatever fragments remained?"
"You asked me about non-violent resistance.
When that explosive detonated yesterday it broke all the windows in the family's house. I was in the process of being served tea and playing with the two small babies. I'm having a hard time right now. Just feel sick to my stomach a lot from being doted on all the time, very sweetly, by people who are facing doom."
"Honestly, a lot of the time the sheer kindness of the people here, coupled with the overwhelming evidence of the wilful destruction of their lives, makes it seem unreal to me. I really can't believe that something like this can happen in the world without a bigger outcry about it. It really hurts me, again, like it has hurt me in the past, to witness how awful we can allow the world to be."
"This is what I am seeing here. The assassinations, rocket attacks and shooting of children are atrocities - but in focusing on them I'm terrified of missing their context. The vast majority of people here - even if they had the economic means to escape, even if they actually wanted to give up resisting on their land and just leave (which appears to be maybe the less nefarious of Sharon's possible goals), can't leave. Because they can't even get into Israel to apply for visas, and because their destination countries won't let them in (both our country and Arab countries)."
"After I wrote to you I went incommunicado from the affinity group for about 10 hours which I spent with a family on the front line in Hi Salam - who fixed me dinner - and have cable TV. The two front rooms of their house are unusable because gunshots have been fired through the walls, so the whole family - three kids and two parents - sleep in the parent's bedroom. I sleep on the floor next to the youngest daughter, Iman, and we all shared blankets."
"I know that the situation gets to them - and may ultimately get them - on all kinds of levels, but I am nevertheless amazed at their strength in being able to defend such a large degree of their humanity - laughter, generosity, family-time - against the incredible horror occurring in their lives and against the constant presence of death. I felt much better after this morning. I spent a lot of time writing about the disappointment of discovering, somewhat first-hand, the degree of evil of which we are still capable. I should at least mention that I am also discovering a degree of strength and of basic ability for humans to remain human in the direst of circumstances - which I also haven't seen before. I think the word is dignity. I wish you could meet these people. Maybe, hopefully, someday you will.
Rachel"
I'm happy for having to read her letters; to know her a little bit by this. I hope the world doesn't forget her and I hope someday the ones responcible of her death will be condemned.
Maybe someday we get the statistics whitch show us how many lifes has this battle cost between Israel and Palestine or Israel and all the other arab countrys.
Maybe someday someone says it is enough?
The world seem not to care the lives of Palestinians, maybe they care of one of their own?
Rachel; your memory will never die, you will be in the hearts of the Palestinians forever! You are a hero!
Dedicated to a 23 year old peace activist who was killed on March 16, 2003 when she was crushed by a bulldozer on the Gaza Strip
Rachel Corrie Memorial Website http://www.rachelcorrie.org/
Rachel's Words: http://www.rachelswords.org/
Rachel Corrie Foundation http://rachelcorriefoundation.org/
to my last post. Thank you!I'm reading the same things what I hear from my friends all the time. Rachel's concernes were the same as mine and so many others are now.
Nothing has changed.
I also read about the same amazing kindness what lies in Palestinian's hearts no matter how much they have suffered they have this amazing power and gift to find strenght and happiness in their everyday life! Their hospitality and caring from a foreign person while their own lives and homes are being destroyed!
That amazed Rachel and it amazes me too. There must be a lot of angels among Palestinians!
Rachel was a brave woman! She came from the other side of the world to defend Palestinian civilians against Israeli military force from stealing their land and systematic destroyal of their infrastructure.
She witnessed the cruelty of this world and Israel and US convernment.
But her fragile body was crushed under one of Israelis bulldozers what Caterpillar kindly sells and delivers to them despite of knowing Israel uses them to demolish Palestinian civilians homes and liv
ing.I'm afraid she is not the only one lost her life under those armored heavy machines. I wonder how many Palestinian lifes have been lost in that same horrible way?
I wanna borrow pieces from her letters here:
"I don't know if many of the children here have ever existed without tank-shell holes in their walls and the towers of an occupying army surveying them constantly from the near horizons. I think, although I'm not entirely sure, that even the smallest of these children understand that life is not like this everywhere. An eight-year-old was shot and killed by an Israeli tank two days before I got here, and many of the children murmur his name to me - Ali - or point at the posters of him on the walls."
"Now the Israeli army has actually dug up the road to Gaza, and both of the major checkpoints are closed. This means that Palestinians who want to go and register for their next quarter at university can't. People can't get to their jobs and those who are trapped on the other side can't get home; and internationals, who have a meeting tomorrow in the West Bank, won't make it. We could probably make it through if we made serious use of our international white person privilege, but that would also mean some risk of arrest and deportation, even though none of us has done anything illegal."
"I thought a lot about what you said on the phone about Palestinian violence not helping the situation. Sixty thousand workers from Rafah worked in Israel two years ago. Now only 600 can go to Israel for jobs."
"Now the Israeli army has actually dug up the road to Gaza, and both of the major checkpoints are closed. This means that Palestinians who want to go and register for their next quarter at university can't. People can't get to their jobs and those who are trapped on the other side can't get home; and internationals, who have a meeting tomorrow in the West Bank, won't make it. We could probably make it through if we made serious use of our international white person privilege, but that would also mean some risk of arrest and deportation, even though none of us has done anything illegal."
"I thought a lot about what you said on the phone about Palestinian violence not helping the situation. Sixty thousand workers from Rafah worked in Israel two years ago. Now only 600 can go to Israel for jobs."
"..three checkpoints between here and Ashkelon (the closest city in Israel) make what used to be a 40-minute drive, now a 12-hour or impassible journey. In addition, what Rafah identified in 1999 as sources of economic growth are all completely destroyed - the Gaza international airport (runways demolished, totally closed); the border for trade with Egypt (now with a giant Israeli sniper tower in the middle of the crossing); access to the ocean (completely cut off in the last two years by a checkpoint and the Gush Katif settlement). The count of homes destroyed in Rafah since the beginning of this intifada is up around 600, by and large people with no connection to the resistance but who happen to live along the border. I think it is maybe official now that Rafah is the poorest place in the world. There used to be a middle class here - recently."
"And then the bulldozers come and take out people's vegetable farms and gardens. What is left for people? Tell me if you can think of anything. I can't."
"..that soldiers and tanks and bulldozers could come for us at any moment and destroy all the greenhouses that we had been cultivating for however long, and did this while some of us were beaten and held captive with 149 other people for several hours - do you think we might try to use somewhat violent means to protect whatever fragments remained?"
"You asked me about non-violent resistance.
When that explosive detonated yesterday it broke all the windows in the family's house. I was in the process of being served tea and playing with the two small babies. I'm having a hard time right now. Just feel sick to my stomach a lot from being doted on all the time, very sweetly, by people who are facing doom."
"Honestly, a lot of the time the sheer kindness of the people here, coupled with the overwhelming evidence of the wilful destruction of their lives, makes it seem unreal to me. I really can't believe that something like this can happen in the world without a bigger outcry about it. It really hurts me, again, like it has hurt me in the past, to witness how awful we can allow the world to be."
"This is what I am seeing here. The assassinations, rocket attacks and shooting of children are atrocities - but in focusing on them I'm terrified of missing their context. The vast majority of people here - even if they had the economic means to escape, even if they actually wanted to give up resisting on their land and just leave (which appears to be maybe the less nefarious of Sharon's possible goals), can't leave. Because they can't even get into Israel to apply for visas, and because their destination countries won't let them in (both our country and Arab countries)."
"After I wrote to you I went incommunicado from the affinity group for about 10 hours which I spent with a family on the front line in Hi Salam - who fixed me dinner - and have cable TV. The two front rooms of their house are unusable because gunshots have been fired through the walls, so the whole family - three kids and two parents - sleep in the parent's bedroom. I sleep on the floor next to the youngest daughter, Iman, and we all shared blankets."
"I know that the situation gets to them - and may ultimately get them - on all kinds of levels, but I am nevertheless amazed at their strength in being able to defend such a large degree of their humanity - laughter, generosity, family-time - against the incredible horror occurring in their lives and against the constant presence of death. I felt much better after this morning. I spent a lot of time writing about the disappointment of discovering, somewhat first-hand, the degree of evil of which we are still capable. I should at least mention that I am also discovering a degree of strength and of basic ability for humans to remain human in the direst of circumstances - which I also haven't seen before. I think the word is dignity. I wish you could meet these people. Maybe, hopefully, someday you will.
Rachel"
I'm happy for having to read her letters; to know her a little bit by this. I hope the world doesn't forget her and I hope someday the ones responcible of her death will be condemned.
Maybe someday we get the statistics whitch show us how many lifes has this battle cost between Israel and Palestine or Israel and all the other arab countrys.
Maybe someday someone says it is enough?
The world seem not to care the lives of Palestinians, maybe they care of one of their own?
Rachel; your memory will never die, you will be in the hearts of the Palestinians forever! You are a hero!
Dedicated to a 23 year old peace activist who was killed on March 16, 2003 when she was crushed by a bulldozer on the Gaza Strip
Rachel Corrie Memorial Website http://www.rachelcorrie.org/
Rachel's Words: http://www.rachelswords.org/
Rachel Corrie Foundation http://rachelcorriefoundation.org/
