MUBARAK AWAD, mubarak@nonviolenceinternational.net, @NVIntl
President of Nonviolence International, Awad said today: “Cutting off of food, water, and fuel is collective punishment on an industrial genocidal scale and must be reversed. Ethnic cleansing in which Palestinians are expelled to Egypt or anywhere would be a crime against humanity. We are seeing the growth of Jewish pogroms on the West Bank. Now genocidal practices towards Gaza have begun. Who would have thought a Jewish state would even contemplate these kinds of things?
“The president of the U.S. should not just be parroting the words of the Israelis such as misreporting that Hamas was cutting off babies’ heads. How can Biden give unconditional support to Israeli leaders who are calling Palestinians animals and threatening to do whatever they want?
“The U.S. must stop all arm sales and funding to Israel. The use of violence will create more hate. Nonviolent political resolution is the only way forward.”
Awad recently wrote an article advocating peace: “I have spent my life advocating for Palestinians and Israelis to use nonviolent means to resolve their conflicts. Because Israel feared Palestinian unity and mass nonviolent action, I was expelled by the government in 1988. Since then, I have, on several occasions, personally advocated with Hamas leaders to abandon armed struggle and embrace nonviolent campaigns. Yet, today, Palestinians and Israelis are once again killing each other.” He also recently signed a statement with Rabbi Cat J. Zavis of Tikkun, human rights lawyer Jonathan Kuttab and others.
The New York Times reported in 1988, after Awad helped launch the first Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation, the Intifada: “Mubarak Awad, the Palestinian-American advocate of nonviolence, was deported from Israel today after an eight-month fight with the Government to remain in East Jerusalem, where he was born.”