{"id":12967,"date":"2012-09-27T11:49:47","date_gmt":"2012-09-27T18:49:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=12967"},"modified":"2012-09-27T11:49:47","modified_gmt":"2012-09-27T18:49:47","slug":"the-death-of-rachel-corrie-in-rafah-is-not-an-unusual-occurrence-the-circumstances-are","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=12967","title":{"rendered":"The death of Rachel Corrie in Rafah, is not an unusual occurrence. The circumstances are."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>\u2018I can\u2019t cool boiling waters in Russia. I can\u2019t be Picasso. I can\u2019t be Jesus. I can\u2019t save the planet single-handedly. I can wash dishes.\u2019 Rachel Corrie, September 2003, before going to Gaza<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Nine years since Rachel\u2019s death \u2013 and little has changed in Gaza<\/strong><br \/>\nBy Noreen Sadik  &#8211; New Internationalist<\/p>\n<p>The death of Rachel Corrie in Rafah, in the Gaza Strip, nine years ago is not an unusual occurrence. The circumstances of her death are.  <\/p>\n<p>Rachel, a 23-year-old American pro-Palestinian peace activist, was volunteering for the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), when she was crushed by a US-made, Israeli-driven Caterpillar bulldozer almost two months after arriving to Gaza.  <\/p>\n<p>Rachel\u2019s parents filed a suit against the Israeli Ministry of Defense. All they asked for was a symbolic $1 for damages and legal expenses. Their search for accountability amounted to nothing when, contrary to witness reports, Judge Oded Gershon said the driver of the bulldozer did not see Rachel. He described Rachel\u2019s death as a \u2018regrettable accident\u2019, and concluded that Israel was void of responsibility.<\/p>\n<p>Many years have passed since Rachel died, and the verdict of \u2018not guilty\u2019 came out last month. So, you may ask, what is the point of writing this now? Well, over the years the world has seen many changes \u2013 political conflicts, environmental disasters, mass murders, economic disasters \u2013 but one thing that has not changed is life in Gaza.  <\/p>\n<p>Rather than experience the life endured by Palestinians through a television screen from the comfort of her home in the US, Rachel went to Gaza to protect Palestinian homes from being demolished.  <\/p>\n<p>According to the Israel Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), since 1967, Israel has demolished over 25,000 homes in the West Bank and Gaza, resulting in over 160,000 internally displaced Palestinians. During Operation Cast Lead, Israel\u2019s three-week war against Gaza in 2008-09, a staggering 6,268 houses and 186 greenhouses (and livelihoods) were destroyed.  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newint.org\/blog\/2012\/09\/27\/gaza-nine-years-after-rachel\/\" target=\"_blank\">&#8230;more<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"igit_tsb_button\" style=\"float: left; margin-right: 10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.crookedbough.com%2F%3Fp%3D12967&amp;text=The+death+of+Rachel+Corrie+in+Rafah%2C+is+not+an+unusual+occurrence.+The+circumstances+are.++&amp;count=horizontal&amp;via=\" style=\"\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u2018I can\u2019t cool boiling waters in Russia. I can\u2019t be Picasso. I can\u2019t be Jesus. I can\u2019t save the planet single-handedly. I can wash dishes.\u2019 Rachel Corrie, September 2003, before going to Gaza Nine years since Rachel\u2019s death \u2013 and little has changed in Gaza By Noreen Sadik &#8211; New Internationalist The death of Rachel <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=12967#more-'\" class=\"more-link\">more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247],"tags":[3553],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12967"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12967"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12968,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12967\/revisions\/12968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}