Al Nakba: Expelled from Native Lands but Not from History

Here on the slopes of hills, facing the dusk and the cannon of time Close to the gardens of broken shadows, We do what prisoners do, And what the jobless do: We cultivate hope' - Mahmoud Darwish

Rabble @ Common Dreams - When asked for a definition of "peace" during a CBC interview, Canadian scientist, educator and renowned activist Ursula Franklin stated: "Peace is not just the absence of war. It is the presence of justice and the absence of fear." This simple definition helps explain why there is still no peace in Palestine. The man-made Palestinian plight has been characterized by a lack of justice and driven by fear and greed, from the decision of colonialist powers to give away more than half of Palestinian land without a referendum -- including the valuable coastal strip -- to the ongoing immoral blockade of Gaza.

Palestinians around the world commemorate on May 15 their collective national trauma, the forced exodus from their homeland in 1948, or Al Nakba (Catastrophe) -- a historic injustice inflicted on some 750,000 unarmed civilian Palestinians. As they fled in fear, their properties were seized, their religious institutions destroyed, and close to 500 of their villages demolished or emptied. Read more.