Monday, January 16

STAY HUMAN

11 homes were demolished by the Israeli occupation authorities in one dayin the village of Qalanswe (occupied in 1948 https://youtu.be/IFMZvMZWpLA
). The pace of home demolitions accelerated recently and are expected toaccelerate more as Israel violaes human rights and international law with international impunity. Donald Trump will follow on the heels of Obama in
giving a green light for further ethnic cleansing. The conditions for revolution are there just like they were in 1936 and 1987:

1) Political factional leadership disconnected from the people’s needs or thoughts and the natives who dislike the existing political factions and want serious change.

2) Most people have given up on political structures and the so called “peace process” (an industry of talk and profit for elites).

3) A colonizer-occupier so self-assured that they have things under “control” they actually do things like killing unarmed demonstrators or demoliting homes or collective punishment. Israel just decided to deport
from Jerusalem 12 family members of a Palestinians who killed four soldiers who illegally occupy East Jerusalem (International law recognizes such acts
as legitimate forms of resistance). This cockiness can accelerate the arrival of uprisings.

4) An international world order that does not see the centrality or urgency for the Palestinian issue and is complicit in the crime (even projecting Israeli flags on state buildings in Europe last week and instituting laws that attack freedom of speech).

These conditions were present before every one of the uprisings (1881, 1904, 1912, 1921, 1929, 1936, etc). In South Africa under apartheid there was also 14 or 15 uprisings before apartheid ended. Let us hope that this
coming one in Palestine will be the last. Netanyahu just sent his jets attacking Syria (a violation of International law). Obama dropped 26,000 bombs in 2016 on seven countries. We do not expect Trump to do any better!
Local leaders also do not give us chance for optimism. Abbas believes in talking and the King of “Saudi Arabia” believes in bombing hospitals and schools in Yemen to serve Israeli interests and keep his throne. And as JFK once said: once you make a peaceful revolution impossible you make a
violent revolution inevitable. It is time to think globally and act locally.

Aِِcting locally, we at the Palestine Museum of Natural History and Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability (http://palestinenature.org)
are working hard. It has been another busy and productive week for us locally. Two manuscripts were accepted for publication. We received good news on one grant and submitted two more grant proposals. Israel gave a
permission to Prof. Zuhair Amr from Jordan to come spend two weeks with us in Bethlehem working on research (on land snails, shrews, geckos and ,more). The video of my denial of entry to Jerusalem revceived 5000 views
on facebook and over 2000 views on youtube (https://youtu.be/r0IIvCaxaKo).
We attended a workshop on Palestine Future (trends to 2030) and agreed to take some action plans. We formed a committee to prepare for a national
network of museums. We received and rejected two offers of large funding that required us to collaborate with Israeli institutions (violating BDS rules). Even though our financial situation is difficult, our motto in the museum continues to be RESPECT (for one self, for others, for nature).

The coming week promises even more: we are expecting more volunteers (local and internationals), we expect three international delegations (visitors), we expect to make two field trips, and to finish two more research manuscripts. Please join us because we are the people we have been waiting for! In other words change comes from us working together.

A poem about life by Mazin Qumsiyeh in English and German
https://promosaik.blogspot.com.tr/2017/01/facing-life-von-mazin-qumsiyeh-in.html

‘James Bond’ of Philanthropy gives away the last of his fortune. “His name does not appear in gilded letters, chiseled marble or other forms of writing anywhere on the 1,000 buildings across five continents that $2.7
billion of his money paid for”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/05/nyregion/james-bond-of-philanthropy-gives-away-the-last-of-his-fortune.html?_r=1

Stay Human/Bleib Mensch
and come visit us in Palestine

Mazin Qumsiyeh
A bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at home
Professor and (volunteer) Director
Palestine Museum of Natural History
Palestine Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability
Bethlehem University
Occupied Palestine
http://qumsiyeh.org
http://palestinenature.org



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