From campus to a Gaza flotilla: the experiences of an activist academic [republished]

[NOTE: as originally published on TheConversation.edu.au February 22. 2012]

Canadian academic David Heap last year took part in an activist mission to challenge the Israeli military blockade of the Palestinian enclave of Gaza.

The Israeli government claims the blockade is necessary to maintain security for its citizens and prevent terrorism. Palestinians, their supporters and human rights experts say the policy amounts to collective punishment that is damaging the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

After a previous aid flotilla to Gaza was raided by Israeli special forces in 2010, leaving nine activists dead, more attempts to send boats carrying supplies to Gaza were launched, including the Canadian Boat to Gaza, carrying Heap.

Here Heap explains why he risked his own safety to stand up for an issue he passionately supports.

Last year, at the University of Western Ontario campus where I work, a student group called Solidarity with Palestinian Human Rights joined with other community groups in London, Ontario to help raise tens of thousands of dollars in support of the Canadian Boat to Gaza, a civil society campaign to challenge the blockade of Gaza.

The illegal blockade of course affects students and university staff along with everyone else in what has aptly been called the world’s largest open-air prison.

The security justification

Despite marginal improvements following the pressure arising from the 2010 Freedom Flotilla, aid deliveries to Gaza still supply a fraction of what the population needed before the current blockade was imposed in 2007.

As the Israeli NGO Gisha documents extensively, the Palestinians of Gaza have been deliberately “put on a diet” by the continuing military blockade which allows in only a calculated minimum of restricted supplies: a form of collective punishment. The situation in Gaza is recognised as dire by international humanitarian NGOs, and the blockade has been characterised as a serious violation of international law by experts at the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights (UNHCR) as recently as September 2011.

As my colleague, Dr. Ziad Medoukh (head of French and coordinator of the Peace Studies Centre at Al-Aqsa University in Gaza) notes: schools supplies, computer equipment and books are still among the goods that are severely restricted and only sporadically available in blockaded Gaza.

The hopes and aspirations of a whole generation in Gaza are being needlessly stunted due to senseless restrictions which have nothing to do with anyone’s “security”.

Complete blockade

Those who finish their studies and earn scholarships abroad are often caught by restrictions on human movement (a freedom which should be enjoyed by everyone under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) which cruelly curtail travel for academic, medical, commercial or family purposes.

While the occasional partial opening of the Rafah border with Egypt for some people (though few goods) is a positive development, Palestinians also have the right to free shipping traffic through the port of Gaza — the only Mediterranean port closed to shipping — and to the peaceful use of their own territorial waters, which they are currently denied.

They cannot depend on the whims of a neighbouring country to keep goods and people flowing in and out of Gaza.

The Canadian Boat to Gaza

These are some of the reasons why I was aboard the Tahrir, the Canadian Boat to Gaza which was part of the Freedom Flotilla II in July 2011, when we attempted to sail from Greece but were prevented by Greek authorities under international pressure.

A Google Maps screenshot showing the Tahrir was in international waters when confronted by Israeli naval forces. Lina Attalah, Almasy Alyoum, Cairo

The Israeli blockade of Gaza had been effectively outsourced to Greek ports, but our campaign continued undaunted. When the Tahrir, together with the Irish boat to Gaza (MV Saoirse), sailed from the southern Turkish port of Fethiye on November 2, 2011, I was again on board.

Though fewer in numbers than in July, the volunteers on the Tahrir were united in our determination to challenge the blockade of Gaza peacefully, through non-violent direct action. Apart from our Greek captain and five international journalists, our numbers included three Canadians, a U.S. citizen, Michael Coleman of Free Gaza Australia, and Palestinian student Majd Kayyal who has never been able to travel to Gaza directly, a mere 135 kilometres from his home in Haifa.

After about 50 hours at sea with almost continuous media coverage, our satellite communications were cut by the Israeli navy shortly after noon on Friday November 4, in stark contrast to the Greek authorities, who never interfered with communications or with media professionals when they stopped the Tahrir last July. Our last recorded GPS position was some 45 nautical miles from the port of Gaza, in international waters with a course set towards Palestinian territorial waters off Gaza. At no time did we set a course for Israel or Israeli waters.

Israel’s overwhelming use of force

In July, Greek authorities managed to take control of the Tahrir and more than 40 people on board, using only one small cutter and two Zodiacs carrying a total of six coastguard officers; in contrast, the Israeli navy deployed overwhelming force against our two small vessels.

The Tahrir, now with just 12 people on board, and the Saoirse, with 15, faced hundreds of heavily armed Israeli troops on at least three warships and between 15 and 20 assault boats equipped with water cannons and mechanical lifts.

Despite recognising that we were unarmed and would present no active resistance, the Israeli navy sent about two dozen heavily armed commandos to storm our vessel. I was tasered during the assault, and later bruised while being forcibly removed from the Tahrir.

Detention in Israel

Ironically, after being illegally kidnapped on the high seas, we were told we had illegally entered a country we never had any intention of visiting. Our six-day detention was marked throughout by manipulation and misinformation on the part of the Israeli authorities.

For example, we were told that if we signed a document waiving our right to appeal before a judge we would be deported home within 24 hours: Ehab Lotayef of Montreal signed such a waiver twice within the first 48 hours, and was nonetheless detained for six days, just like those of us who signed nothing.

Although cut short, the voyage of the Tahrir served to draw attention to the injustice of the blockade of Gaza, as well as to educate and mobilise Canadians and others against the blockade.

An ongoing campaign

Pulitzer Prize winner and civil rights activist Alice Walker from the US Boat to Gaza says challenges to the blockade of Gaza are the Freedom Rides of our time – and like the 1960s civil rights movement in the U.S. South, we must keep up the struggle despite attempts to intimidate us.

As my colleague Ziad notes, the Palestinians of Gaza are left with “a hope in international civil society solidarity which is organising throughout the world in order to try, through peaceful actions, to break this blockade.” (author’s translation)

He observes that though we did not reach the shores of Gaza this time, our message of solidarity was received throughout Palestine.

That is why we have to keep on challenging this blockade.

More mind games, and the language of resistance

It was almost two days after our kidnapping in international waters and being brought by force to Israeli jail that we finally got a chance to call home. After giving us a number different stories, the guards announced on the afternoon of Sunday November 6 that we would have three minutes each, on the phone in the office of the prison “manager”. We were to form a fair list, alternating men from the different countries, according to when each though he would find someone at home to answer.

We quickly formed up, with Mike from Australia, Hassan from U.K. and some of the Irish going first, due to the time-zone differences. Ehab and I agreed he would call Canada first, and ask his wife to call London to make sure my spouse was up (it was fairly early in the morning in Montréal and London, Ontario) and ready for my call.

When it was my turn I was ushered into the prison director’s office and sat down at a phone which was connected to some kind of electronic recording device. The prison manager watched while another guard dialled the number I gave them: it had to be a family member.

Bonjour mon amour, ça va? Tu me manques beaucoup.

I only managed to get a few more sentences out in French before they cut off the call. They said I must not speak a language other than English. Then they called for another guard, who came in and explained in French that I must not give any information other than about my own physical well-being and the prison conditions. No politics. As they dialled again, she asked me nervously:

Vous parlez toujours en français avec votre épouse?

Parfois en français. Parfois aussi en italien….

A small satisfaction to see the brief look of panic as my second call connected, but I decided against switching into Italian as well—who knows how long that might’ve delayed the rest of my call?

Bonjour mon amour. Il y a maintenant ici une flique qui parle français, tu comprends la situation?

Tu ne peux pas parler librement.

Exactement. On nous traite très très bien ici, comme des rois.

The French-speaking guard rolled her eyes at my obvious exaggeration. I had barely two minutes left of what was supposed to be a three-minute call, but I managed to communicate the essential points in between fluffy pleasantries. I also passed on a message for Mike’s parents, which he had forgotten during his call. Our superb home teams were of course in constant communication with each other.

Back at Section 5, the remaining Irish were trying to figure out which of them would be able to make his call in Irish and get answered by someone back home who would be able to take the call in Irish. Would the prison guards call in the rumoured Mossad security agents supposedly trained in the Irish language? In the end, most of them settled for simply speaking Irish English: when they spoke rapidly, we had enough trouble understanding them, the guards probably followed even less. By the time the last of them connected, he was able to give a full political report without any interference on the call. It seemed to us that the collective push-back to assert our right to communicate how we chose and about what we chose ended up creating more space for the later callers.

In Givon prison, the lingua franca among the men in Section 5 quickly drifted towards Irish English: there were twelve men from the Saoirse and only four of us (two Canadians, one Australian and one from the U.K.) from the Tahrir. Thus the game played board some fashioned out of the paper lids of foil food containers was “draughts” (pronounced drafts), not checkers, and the guards became “screws”. That is, they were called “screws” when not simply referred to as “dose fookers” –our Irish friends swore almost as easily as they breathed, at least when the guards weren’t listening.

Sunday night the overhead lights were “accidentally” left on in some of the cells –ours was one of them. With no way to escape the glaring light, Billy and I tried to call for the guards to shut them off – the switches were out of our reach –but of course they ignored us. In the morning, two guards came as usual for the morning rounds and asked how we were. I said we had not slept because of the lights.

Why did you not ask the duty guards to turn them off?

My visceral response was coloured by the stress of the moment as well as by the vernacular language we had become accustomed to using:

We tried calling, but we did not want to keep shouting and wake up all the other men just because you fuckers don’t do your job.

Which got a fast response from the guard:

You must not curse at guards or use foul language.

This English-speaking guard came and found me later in the courtyard, with the ranking officer in charge of the section, who did not speak English. He interpreted as the head guard said that if I cursed or used foul language at a guard again I would be sent to solitary confinement. 

I stared in disbelief (Foul language, seriously?? Had they been listening to these Irish guys curse? I thought but did not say).

As the guards walked away, my cell-mate Billy muttered under his breath, just audibly for him and me:

Fooking bastards.

Upon reflection and after chatting with the others, it became clear that I had been set up: manipulated to provoke a reaction that could be used to justify harsher treatment. The guards’ response was clearly planned to try to try to destabilize us, and might have succeeded were it not for the good sense and good humour of my prison mates, who snapped me out of it.

The same guard was at pains to “make nice” later that day, saying that he would miss us when we left and he had to go back to the “murderers and rapists” in the next section (pretty hard to take anything he said now seriously though…). 

So if we are not a security threat, then can we have the phone-cards that our consular representatives have brought for us? (there were payphones in the courtyard which we could’ve used if we’d been able to get phone-cards, one of the “rights” for migrants facing deportation which was prominently displayed on signs in several languages on the prison walls).

No, if someone makes a phone call from prison they might give instructions to a terrorist cell.

But you know we are pacifists not terrorists. What instructions are we going to give –for people to sit down in front of a door? Most people can figure that stuff out for themselves.

You know I cannot discuss politics.

End of discussion. We got no more phone-calls out, despite the prominent “migrants’ rights” signage in the prison.

We only had time to learn one phrase in the Irish language from our prison comrades, one which is applicable to our current struggle:

Tiocfaidh ár lá (pronounced CHOO kee ar lah): our day will come.

Language games, mind games

Some time after our internet connection and satellite  phones were blocked on the afternoon of November 4, we received our first radio hail from the Israeli navy:

Vessel Tahrir, this is the Israeli navy, please identify your course, over. 

We do not respond initially: we were not in a hurry to move through this process. When we eventually responded:
Tahrir here, over.

They demanded to know our course. Ehab and I had a discussed prepared our answer for this question: 

Our course is the conscience of humanity.

This did not satisfy them of course:

What is your final destination?

Ever-poetic, Ehab had a reply for this too: 

Our final destination in the betterment of mankind. 

(Under other circumstances,  I might’ve insisted on “humankind”, but whatever – I was not on the bridge at that point and our attention was on more pressing issues).

The Israeli navy informed us that they would board and search our vessel—initially they said we would be free to continue after inspection, but of course they did not keep to their word on that. We replied that we would not consent to being boarded nor would resist actively. Some back-and-forth with them ensued, as we tried to clarify their intentions after the search. 

We made it clear we would not negotiate with an illegitimate authority because we did not recognize their jurisdiction in international waters, but we were willing to keep talking to facilitate everyone’s safety. More back-and-forth by radio and with the Irish on the Saoirse by radio.

Suddenly, change of voice: 

Ehab Lotayef, Ehab Lotayef, hal tasma3ani?

A hail in Arabic, directed at just one of us, asking Ehab by name:  could  he hear them?. Obviously intended to destabilize us and also perhaps divide us. Narrowing communications to just Arabic would have excluded most of the rest of us on the Tahrir as well as those on the Saoirse who were on the same radio channel. We obviously could not accept a reduction of the multi-sided conversation to just two people speaking. We paused to consider our next move, then I took the radio:

Navire israélien, ici le Tahrir. Vous pouvez communiquer avec nous en français si vous le désirez. Fini.

No response. We waited a few minutes, then I continued: 

Buque israelí, aquí el Tahrir. Puede comunicarse con nosotros en español si desea. Fuera.

Another wait, still no reply for a while. The next hail returns to English.  Of course, we don’t really want them to communicate in French or Spanish or any language that excludes any of us, but they seem to have gotten the point. Future hails continue in English.

We were ultimately unsuccessful in establishing their intentions after boarding—despite their initial offer to let us continue our course after the inspection, once they boarded and took control, they of course directed the Tahrir towards the Israeli port of Ashdod. This much was at least consistent: virtually every interaction we had with anyone representing the Israeli state involved them offering information which was either false or misleading.