Not A Villa In The Jungle -- You're The Jungle In OUR Villa, Say Young Palestinians

Yaser Murtaja, a 30 year old photojournalist in Gaza. “He was killed doing his job: recording his people’s right to protest for their human rights,” commented Karl Schembri of the Norwegian Refugee Council, which hired Murtaja to record video footage of the protests.
Photo: Reuters/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa

Perhaps you are contemplating the mowing down of unarmed civilians, including journalists, at the Gaza border last week. Or, perhaps the corporate media blackout of information on those war crimes has kept it out of mind.

The "Great Return March" of the Palestinians confined in Gaza angered Israel mightily by calling international attention to their right as refugees to return. 

Here's how Google is helping to manage the flow of information about one of the victims, Yaser Murtaja, who was gunned down in his flak jacket with the word PRESS on it in big white letters. 

Perhaps you'd like to watch the video banned by YouTube in 28 countries -- mostly in Europe -- due to Israeli pressure on those governments. On this segment of teleSUR's Empire Files, Abby Martin interviews author Max Blumenthal about facts on the ground in the occupied West Bank. His characterization of unrest sometimes called the third intifada (uprising) is that a younger generation coming of age are expressing their rejection of the occupation that began when their grandparents were children. 



Blumenthal makes reference to Israel's steady annexation of lands and destruction of West Bank Palestinian infrastructure to establish what former PM Ehud Barak called "a villa in the jungle." Blumenthal notes that Palestinians coming of age now have grown up in a reality of "separation, exclusion" and "see little opportunity or hope... 

They watched a 51 day assault on the Gaza strip and felt helpless...

Two year old victim of Israeli bomb in Gaza with a fractured skull.

When young Palestinians enter the villa with knives, with rocks, with whatever they have, they are reminding Israelis, You know you're not a villa in the jungle, you're the jungle in our villa...You can't just put up a wall and pretend we're not here."

Corporate media puts up a wall so we can pretend Palestinians aren't there. It's up to us to scale the wall and look over at what they don't want us to see on the other side.

Then, get busy in the struggle for justice. #BDS