The death of Yasir Arafat, symbol of Palestinian independence for 40 years, has opened up an opportunity for peacemaking in the Mideast that we must seize. Many who distrusted Arafat considered him a major obstacle to a peace settlement. Others feel the same about Israel’s prime minister, Ariel Sharon.
Having recently returned from a multi-faith peacemaking delegation to Israel and Palestine, my second in two years, I believe that a further obstacle to peace is Americans’ unawareness of the extraordinary flowering of grassroots peace initiatives in Palestine and Israel — and between the two peoples. If Americans could see through the media barricade, they might be able to pressure Washington to break its own blinders. Israel does indeed have partners for peace.
One of Israel’s promising Palestinian peace partners is Jamil Roshdy, leader of the Popular Campaign for Peace and Democracy in Al-Aroub refugee camp near Bethlehem. Roshdy, 40-something, tall with movie star looks, served 10 years in Israeli prisons for his nonviolent activism during the first Intifada of the late 1980s. Roshdy was one of the nonviolent warriors who kept the Palestinian uprising’s minimal violence from maximizing.
Some time before his imprisonment, Roshdy told us in October, he was helping to protect the Al-Aroub camp, his home, from Israeli attack. A tank rammed through the camp’s narrow street and somehow flipped over. Suddenly defenseless, the Israeli soldiers faced quick death by snipers or mob rage. Roshdy and his friends formed a protective cordon around the terrified soldiers. They helped the soldiers turn over and repair the damaged tank. They guarded them as they rumbled out of the angry camp. The tank commander told Roshdy that he never again wanted to fire upon Palestinians.
Not long after, Roshdy was arrested. In prison, he met up again with the Israeli commander, who had been promoted to a high rank. But now he was a fellow inmate. The decorated officer had decided to become a “refusenik,†one of hundreds of Israeli soldiers and reservists who publicly refused to serve in the West Bank or Gaza. His unit’s rescue by Roshdy in Al-Aroub decisively influenced his courageous choice.
Roshdy is one of a rising generation of Palestinian leaders, Arafat’s sons and daughters, who came of age in the first Intifada and to maturity in the second. Once ambivalent about tactics like rock throwing, they are clear now that violence only begets more extreme violence. They resolutely condemn suicide bombings as self-defeating, playing into Israel’s hands.
Nasser Laham is a charismatic TV commentator in Bethlehem who publicly denounces suicide bombings and expresses concern for Israelis’ suffering, while steadfastly loyal to Arafat. Ibrahim Issa, mid-30s, visionary director of Hope Flowers School outside Bethlehem, is preparing a new generation of nonviolent leaders by making peace education the core of the learning process for Palestinian kids. Sami Awad and Husam Jubran (the latter, like Roshdy, spent a decade in Israeli prisons), leaders of the Holyland Trust, have organized hundreds of rigorous nonviolent trainings for a few thousand Palestinian activists throughout the West Bank. Sheikh Talal Sider in Hebron, a founder of militant Hamas, has repudiated the organization he once led and calls for a nonviolent path to peace. Facing the risk of assassination by former Hamas comrades, he told us it is God’s will whether he lives or dies. These are a few of the pillars in the growing army of Palestinian peace partners.
These Palestinian peacemakers are already negotiating with Israeli partners at the grass roots, sometimes unlikely interlocutors. For example, prominent Orthodox Rabbi Menachem Froman of the Tekoa settlement in the West Bank, founder of the settlers’ peace movement Gush Emunim, has talked frequently with Muslim clerics, and with Arafat, about how transforming Jerusalem into a true “city of peace†could pave the way to peace and reconciliation.
It is Roshdy’s passion, the growing grassroots peace initiative of the Popular Committee for Peace and Democracy launched by Palestinian educator Sari Nusseibeh, the PLO’s East Jerusalem representative, that holds the most promise. Their peace proposal, unknown to Americans and to most Israelis, has been signed not only by several hundred thousand Palestinians but also by a comparable number of Israelis. Among its bold measures is to relinquish the Palestinians’ “right of return†to Israel — a major stumbling block. This is an especially compelling concession since it comes from the refugee camps. This compromise should be enough to convince Israelis that a new generation of Palestinian peace partners has found its voice, prepared to join hands across the wall of war. But peace will bloom only if concerned Americans support the peacemakers on both sides.
Historian Stewart Burns, a professor at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and Williams College, returned recently from his second citizen peacemaking delegation to Israel and Palestine. His latest book, “To the Mountaintop†(HarperCollins), now in paperback, is a biography of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Burns may be contacted by e-mail at stewartb@mcn.org.
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Lanesborough Town Meeting to Vote Budget, Bylaws & Vehicle Purchases
By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — Tuesday's annual town meeting includes a $14 million operating budget, new short-term rentals, accessory dwelling units and sign bylaws, and free cash article appropriations.
Voters will gather at Lanesborough Elementary School on June 9 at 6 p.m. to decide on 20 warrant articles.
The fiscal 2027 budget is up a little over 10 percent. Some of the main increases are the Mount Greylock Regional School District and McCann Technical School: the McCann assessment is up more than 30 percent based on factors including enrollment and the school renovation project, and Mount Greylock's is up 11 percent.
Article 11 is for the town to vote to approve from free cash the sum of $16,298.48 for the McCann Technical School roof and window replacement project so as not to impact the budget. Article 3 is appropriate $7,586,284 for Mount Greylock Regional School assessment.
Another notable increase was in life and health insurance, showing an increase of about 26 percent.
Ambulance Director Jen Weber is planning 24-hour coverage, which means more staff and a hike in her budget. One of the articles asks the town to appropriate $234,100 to operate the Ambulance Enterprise Fund for salaries and expenses.
Many town departments are looking for new vehicles. The Fire Department is looking to replace its outdated 1996 fire engine. There are two articles related to the truck at a total of $813,366. Article 12 would transfer $225,000 from free cash into the Fire Truck Stabilization Fund; Article 13 would transfer $605,000 from the fund and authorize the borrowing of $208,366.08.
The total includes a $100,000 contingency cost to cover any additional costs if a 2026 model-year chassis cannot be secured before new emissions standards go into effect in 2027.
The board at its last meeting moved the $225,000 transfer to come before the borrowing article, changing the stabilization number. If the $225,000 is not voted on, then they will amend the next article's number on the floor, subtracting the $225,000. This shows the borrowing number significantly lower.
Article 17 asks for the transfer of $80,000 from free cash to replace a police cruiser.
Police Chief Rob Derksen's aim is to replace one vehicle every other year, meaning the oldest vehicle gets replaced about every 10 years.
He stressed that if delayed this year, the town may have to double up in a future year to get back on schedule, and that paying later usually costs more. The article will ask for $80,000 from free cash, the vehicles used to be funded by the BHRD.
Lastly, the Highway Department is looking to replace a 2014 International dump truck that will be a total of $330,000 and will take two to three years to receive.
Money will be used from last year's approval of $250,000 from free cash for the replacement of a 2012 highway front-end loader that was underspent $49,261. Town meeting is being asked to approve a transfer of $53,274.85 from free cash and the use of $227,464 from funds from the Sale of Town Real Estate to fund the balance.
Other free cash proposals include $1,200 to purchase software to support tracking and ongoing maintenance schedules of town-owned vehicles; $42,000 for the replacement of the Highway Department's storage shed roof, $200,000 to reduce the tax levy.
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