From the International Solidarity Movement
The recent Arab uprisings throughout the Middle East and North Africa have proven that the Arab people are no longer willing to tolerate oppression and tyranny. They send a strong message to Western hegemonic powers and their oppressive regional allies that a new wave of nonviolent civil resistance will ultimately prevail over injustice and occupation. In addition, the Arab uprisings also send an important message to all people of the world that armed resistance is no longer the only option for pursuing change.
One must acknowledge that the recent successes of the Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions are a reminder that this inspirational movement for nonviolent civil resistance was actually born in Palestine. As American University of Beirut Professor Rami Zurayk notes, “The Arab uprisings have of course taken their inspiration from the Palestinian Intifada.” But as he further clarifies, the reverse is also true: there is “a constant feeding in from the Arab uprisings to Palestine and from Palestine to the Arab uprisings.”
Professor Zurayk is one of the Lebanese delegates for the Global March to Jerusalem (GMJ), a groundbreaking nonviolent civil resistance initiative scheduled for March 30, 2012 in Palestine and the four neighboring countries: Egypt, Lebanon Jordan and Syria. The GMJ is comprised of a diverse coalition of Palestinian, Arab and international activists who are united in the struggle to liberate the holy city of Jerusalem from illegal Zionist occupation. While the GMJ is made up of grassroots movements in each participating country, the march is also internationalized through a central coordinating committee with elected delegates from each region. More than thirty of these delegates met in Amman last December and in Beirut in January to discuss plans for hundreds of thousands of people to peacefully march to the holy city of Jerusalem, or to the nearest point possible according to the circumstances of each neighboring country, for not only Palestinian rights, but the rights of all humans. more
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