Palestine
Monitor April 3, 2004Israeli troops
seek to erase memory of Rachel Corrie EARLY this week four Israeli
jeeps, 16 tanks and two bulldozers invaded the
highly populated area in the Al-Salam neighborhood
in the city of Rafah, along the Egyptian border of
the Gaza Strip, an area constantly under continuous
firing. They headed straight towards Dr. Samir
Nasrallah's home, the very house Rachel
Corrie died in front of a year ago while
trying to prevent its destruction. Corrie was the
23-year-old American peace activist from Olympia,
USA, killed by an Israeli army bulldozer which ran
over her while nonviolently trying to prevent the
demolition of yet another Palestinian house in the
city of Rafah. Corrie and other pro-Palestinian
activists based in Rafah had frequently spent the
night in Nasrallah's house, acting as human shields
against the Israeli tanks and bulldozers clearing a
security zone around the border. For a while Nasrallah's abode had stood alone in
a sea of sand and debris. Almost every other
structure in the area has been knocked down in
recent months. Dr. Nasrallah, a Palestinian pharmacist, lived
in the house with his wife and children. " When I
returned to the site of my house I was in shock:
they not only demolished the house, but all the
rubble and dust were totally removed and gone." In
this operation also some trees were uprooted and
the surrounding landscape was totally razed. Locals are convinced that this targeted
demolition took place as one more attempt to erase
the memory of crucial events that took place in the
area and to cover the crime of the assassination of
Rachel
Corrie, since the place used to attract many
journalists and members of various solidarity
groups and activists, who would visit the place and
gather with the family. |