Daniel Lubetzky

OneVoice Palestine participated in the Strengthening Nonviolence in Palestine, organized by Realizing the Dream, Inc. Middle East Nonviolence and Democracy Center, and The Center for Democracy and Community Development. More than 200 people attended the conference, in which Martin Luther King, III- the oldest son of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the founder of Realizing the Dream, INC talked about his father’s nonviolent struggle to grant the African Americans their civil rights in the U.S.A.  Johnny Mack, the executive vice president of Realizing the Dream, talked about the need for adopting nonviolent technique to reach a solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

Mr. Jamal Zakout, advisor of the Palestinian Prime Minister, talked about the government’s policy (Salam Fayyad’s Plan) of declaring the independent Palestinian state by in August 2011, and about supporting all nonviolent actions against the occupation.

Ms. Lucy Nusseibeh, Director of the Middle East Nonviolence and Democracy addressed the violence within the Palestinian society as well as the need to confront it. The rest of the speakers concentrated on using different kinds of nonviolent actions against the Israeli occupation, and the need to avoid using armed/violent resistance, because then they will give Israel an excuse to crush the resistance.

Abdallah, OVP director of youth leadership, talked also about Palestinian internal violence and the problem of accepting the other’s opinion and about OVP role in promoting the concept of nonviolence in the Palestinian society. Ezz, OVP director of PR mentioned the story of Mr. Hasan Mustafa, graduate of the American University of Beirut- 1946, from the village of Bater and how in 1948 he saved the population of the mentioned village from being expelled by the Israeli forces, Haganah, through negotiations, and how if we had 1000 like Hasan Mustafa, the Palestinians could have changed their fate and saved their towns and villages. He also stated that negotiations are the most excellent nonviolent method to end the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians.