Israeli Apartheid Week - Beirut, March 1-6

The first-ever Israeli Apartheid Week to be held in Lebanon kicks off this Monday, at the American University in Beirut. AUB joins events in 40 other cities worldwide in a rapidly expanding international expression of solidarity with Palestine. Lectures, panel discussions, poetry readings, film screenings, and a concert will explore the ways and means of Apartheid against the Palestinian people and Palestine's methods for coping with, challenging and overcoming the racist Israeli system.

In conjunction with the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanction (BDS) Campaign against Israel, the week's events will "educate, inspire and mobilize the next generation of students in the spirit of resistance to apartheid and injustice." For more information, visit Israeli Apartheid Week - Beirut here or check out the event on Facebook here.

Want to attend? Here's the week's schedule:

Monday, March 1, 2010

6pm : West Hall, Bathish
Opening
A poetry reading with Mourid Barghouti, followed by discussion (Arabic)

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

12 noon : West Hall, Auditorium B
Student Round Table, Mapping Israeli Environmental Destruction (English)
Green Line

6pm : College Hall B-1
Connecting Struggles Against Zionism and Imperialism (Arabic)
Nahla al-Shahhal, Hana Ibrahim and Amer Jubran

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

12 noon : West Hall, Conference Room, Third Floor
Student Round Table, Israeli Apartheid (English)
Matthew Cassel, Electronic Intifada

3:30pm : College Hall B-1
Film Screening, Amandla! A Revolution in Four Part Harmony
A documentary film depicting the struggles of black South Africans against the injustices of Apartheid

5:30pm : Break with refreshments

6pm : College Hall, B-1
Historical and Contemporary Responses to South African and Israeli Apartheid (English)
Natasha Thandiwe Vally (University of Witwatersrand, South Africa), followed by a discussion moderated by Noel Ignatiev.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

3:30pm : West Hall, Auditorium A
Film Screening, Sling Shot Hip Hop
Discussion led by Shadia Mansour, Lowkey and Amal Kaawash

5:30pm : Break with refreshments

6pm : West Hall, Auditorium A
Women and the Struggle: A call to the next generation
Soha Bechara, being introduced by Jean Said Makdisi

Friday, March 5, 2010

Art Workshop and Lunch in Berj el-Barejneh refugee camp
Juan Fuentes

12 noon : West Hall, Auditorium C
Student Workshop, Resistance Strategies and Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS).
Rami Zurayk and Rania Masri

6:00pm : West Hall, Common Room
Concert: Free Palestine!
Shadia Mansour, Lowkey and Amal Kaawash
Admission: 5,000 LL

Saturday, March 6, 2010

12 noon : Ta Marbouta, Hamra
Presentation on the Egyptian wall and discussion of methods of confrontation
Stop Gaza Wall Campaign

Sit-in closes road outside Egyptian Embassy

Falastine Horra shut down the road in front of the Egyptian Embassy in Beirut on Saturday, demonstrating against the Wall of Shame's construction on the southern border of Gaza. The protest was coordinated with a demonstration outside the Egyptian Journalists Syndicate in Cairo, with upwards of 300 in attendance.

In Beirut, protesters marched from Shatila refugee camp to execute a peaceful sit-in at the Egyptian Embassy, closing Camille Chamoun Avenue for half an hour. Traffic on the prominent thoroughfare just south of Cola taxi park was funneled to a single lane, intermittently allowed past the embassy beneath a large Palestinian flag.

The sit-in's disruption brought the Wall of Shame to a popular consciousness threatened by normalization of the Occupation and complicity with the daily assault on Gaza's inhabitants. Protesters decried Hosni Mubarak's betrayal of the Palestinian cause, the international community's blind eye to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and the United States' influence in the Arab regimes' complicity.

Protesters in Cairo denounce the Wall of Shame. Courtesy of Tabula Gaza

"Down with Mubarak, Netanyahu's dog," read signs at the Cairo demonstration. While Mubarak's government has repeatedly disassociated itself from the Wall of Shame's secretive construction, Al-Masry Al-Youm, and Egyptian-based news organization, has confirmed the subterranean Wall. Built of steel panels lowered 18 meters into the ground, the Wall will strangle the smuggling tunnels that have kept Gaza alive during the sustained blockade.

A local driver on the Sinai peninsula, which abuts Gaza most significantly at the typically closed Rafah border crossing, described shuttling employees of The Arab Contractors, an Egyptian construction group tasked with the Wall of Shame's construction. "Two months ago, an engineer hired me to drive engineers, technicians and workers every day from Al-Arish city to the town of Rafah," he said. The construction site has also been affirmed by Electronic Intifada, BBC News, and Ma'an News Agency.

The coordinated protests mark the beginning of a joint movement in Cairo and Beirut to inspire a popular condemnation of the Wall of Shame where Arab and international governments have hesitated to raise a finger. Falastine Horra will continue to initiate actions in Beirut in conjunction with other activist movements in the city, in Cairo, and internationally.