Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 2008, page 82

Publishers' Page

Gazans Tear Down the Wall.

After months of crippling siege, thousands of Palestinians marched to the Rafah border and tore down the 40-foot walls of the prison in which they have been caged. Crossing into Egypt, they bought desperately needed fuel, bread, meat, milk, and medicine—while supplies lasted. As this issue went to press, it was unclear how long Israel and Egypt would allow the 1.5 million Gazans to live like normal human beings. But after waiting in vain for the “civilized” world to demand an end to their starvation and oppression, the people of Gaza finally took matters into their own hands. We salute them.

Words From Rachelle Marshall.

We know every regular reader of the Washington Report will notice the absence of our usual lead article by Rachelle Marshall. We’ll give her legion of admirers their monthly fix by quoting from a Jan. 1 letter she wrote to us : “It turns out I have a fractured pelvis and will be in one institution or another for several weeks. Meanwhile, I’m…getting the best and kindest care imaginable. What hurts more than the physical pain is knowing what happens to women like me in Gaza or Baghdad. This week’s events brought those situations home the way nothing else could.…[It’s clear] that Israel will not give up control of the West Bank and Gaza, under any circumstances.…Israel is not risking a single soldier by invading Gaza, it systematically murders with air strikes and mortar attacks.…Something I read recently said that what is going on is not an Israeli-Palestinian “conflict,” but a crime against an entire people. This made startling good sense to me.” Clearly Rachelle is down but not out, and we eagerly await her return to these pages.

Meanwhile, on the Campaign Trail…

In trying to rebut Sen. Hillary Clinton’s charge that her Democratic presidential opponent Sen. Barak Obama is offering “false hopes” to the nation, Obama said that if Martin Luther King had listened to such skeptics in 1963 he would have told the crowd at the Lincoln Memorial, “You all go home, we can’t overcome,” instead of giving his “I Have a Dream” speech. “That’s what hope is. Imagining and fighting and struggling for it and sometimes dying for it,” Obama said. “There’s no false hope in that.” But just days later he sent a letter to Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, urging Washington not to allow a Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip to pass unless it noted the rocket salvos into Israel. Now that’s what we call...

False Hope.

Paid Advertisements.

We’ve always had trouble finding companies willing to advertise in a publication which criticizes Israeli policies. (In fact, we think there’s a direct correlation between the power of advertisers and the cowardice of the mainstream media.) Potential advertisers fear offending Christian and Jewish Zionist activists and customers, and shy away—not realizing that more and more Americans, including Jewish and Christian readers, are joining our reasonable ranks. When the FBI and CIA, both looking for new Arabic-speaking employees, asked to advertise—and pay for the ads!—we literally could not afford to say no. Plus we firmly believe that when our government and media include more Muslim- and Arab-Americans, we’ll stop making the stupid errors that are giving us a black eye at home and abroad.

Your Support Has Counted.

As you can see from our 2007 end-of-year Angels’ List on the preceding pages—which has spilled onto our page!—Washington Report readers really came through with donations to help us survive a drastic increase in postage and paper prices. Every dollar you contribute—including an extra $5 from many of you, including a sympathetic prisoner—adds up. Thanks to your help, we sent an introductory copy of the last issue to 1,400 churches, and will be sending this issue to 2,500 Iranian Americans. We’ve also sent readers many extra boxes of free magazines and Remember These Children booklets to distribute at meetings and demonstrations across the country. Subscribers also send clips from local newspapers to help us keep abreast of important news. Sadly, we lost one of our most active and supportive friends, Florence Richards (see p. 78), who would call us whenever she read or heard something fascinating that she knew we could use in the magazine. So to honor Florence Richards and the heroic people of Palestine and Iraq—and everyone who fights for justice, truth and hope—help us continue our work in 2008 and…

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