July 21, 2014

My Dear Friends,

Thanks so much for all your Emails, concerns and payers.  We are safe and staying on the farm for safety’s sake.

It is a heavy time for us and especially for the people of Gaza. We are following the news daily, and we are seeing and hearing the bombing on Gaza from the farm. We are frustrated and sad of what is happening and the world leaders are still silent.

I am not writing a newsletter, it is not the time for it now, but here is a short report:

At the Tent of Nations, we are trying to keep our spirit high and focus on the positives. Yesterday we finished our 13th children’s Summer Camp with 20 children and 13 volunteers. We spent two weeks of activities based on day-to-day planning.  I am glad that our international volunteers were motivated, and they worked hard in a difficult situation. Parents were also under pressure, but some of them insisted to send their children to the camp in spite of the difficult political situation.  I will send you some pictures, and we made a video and it will be posted on our website as well as on our facebook page.

We started rebuilding the land in the valley where the trees were destroyed. We are trying to do it in a calm way. Our plan within this summer is to prepare the land for planting but also renovate the cave there and create a permanent presence of volunteers there. Since more than three weeks, four of our volunteers are working on daily basis for three hours a day in the valley.

On the legal basis, our lawyer prepared all the paper work, and we are having two legal battles – one in front of the Supreme Court and the other in front of the Military Court.

On the 4th of August we will start with the almond harvest, and we are expecting international volunteers to be part of the camp.

Please keep us in your prayers as we are going through this very dark tunnel.

Blessings,

Daoud

BEYOND TENT OF NATIONS

We are assuming that everyone who receives our FOTONNA Newsletter is also very aware of what is happening in Gaza and Israel at this time.  We have received so many articles written by both Palestinians and Israelis that it is difficult to forward all of them to you; however, we have attached a number of them to our website under the heading “Beyond TON – Must-read Articles” and will continue to add to them as they come to us.  If you have not been receiving these directly from other national organizations, we urge you to read them all and send letters of protest of the actions being taken by the Israeli government and IDF to your local media outlets, your political leaders, the U.S. Department of State, and President Obama.  We all recognize that you cannot equate the destruction of trees with the lives being lost, but you can equate the overall destruction taking place as prime examples of international laws being broken with impunity by the Israeli government and military.

The Tent of Nations might not be a direct target with the situation in Gaza, but the destruction of the trees in May 2014 illustrates just how tenuous their situation actually is and how bold the Israeli government has become in carrying out illegal incursions wherever they want to go.  With no strong backlash from governments anywhere in the world, the destruction of lives and trees and homes and whole villages will continue unabated until and unless we act with some sense of urgency and grass-roots power.  The first death in this situation should never have taken place.  When will we be satisfied that the last one will really be the last one, and who do we ask to volunteer to take that place in our history books?  If we do not become part of the solution, we continue to be part of the problem.

Join us in DC:

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
Aug. 2 National March on the White House
Stop the Massacre in Gaza!

Saturday, Aug. 2, 1:00 PM
Gather at the White House
Washington, DC
Transportation is being organized from all over the country.
Contact A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition at:
http://www.AnswerCoalition.org/
info@AnswerCoalition.org
National Office in Washington DC: 202-265-1948
Boston: 857-334-5084 | New York City: 212-694-8720 | Chicago: 773-463-0311
San Francisco: 415-821-6545 | Los Angeles: 213-687-7480 | Albuquerque: 505-268-2488

(FOTONNA Steering Committee members may be able to provide some housing for those attending from out of state.  Contact Kay at:  kayplitt@comcast.net.)

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