Craig and Cindy Corrie

Cindy and I are very pleased to see that the third annual Rachel Corrie Memorial Ramadan Football Tournament will be held again this August, insha’Allah.

The organizers – Rachel’s friends, who are now our friends – deserve all the support we can give them as they bring players and fans to Unity Field for friendly games of soccer. Last September, we were delayed for two days at the Gaza-Egyptian border and missed the final game of the 2009 tournament; but we had the pleasure of joining in the stands for the closing youth day festivities. Of all the ways to break the siege, sending in a bit of fun that fosters community may be one of the most important.

Please join our family in supporting the 2010 Rachel Corrie Memorial Ramadan Football Tournament.

You can support the Tournament with an online donation here.

Or send your tax-deductible check, made out to “Rachel Corrie Foundation” to:

Rachel Corrie Foundation
203 East Fourth Ave., Suite 307
Olympia, WA 98501
(Please indicate “Soccer Tournament” in the memo line.)

- Craig Corrie, for Rachel’s family

From the organizers
It’s that time of year again. Ramadan is right around the corner and that means the folks in Rafah, Gaza are busy planning the 2010 Rachel Corrie Ramadan Soccer Tournament!

Join us as we reach over the high walls surrounding Gaza and break the siege by supporting this great community-developed Ramadan event.

Its success depends on us. Please consider helping us meet our fundraising goal of $10,000 by making a donation today.

For all the details please visit GazaLife.org.

With deep appreciation,
Adnan Abu Al Sa’ud
Khaled Nasrallah
John Harvey
Andrew Ford Lyons
Tournament Coordinators

The Third Annual Rachel Corrie Ramadan Soccer Tournament 2010

What: A community football tournament at the Unity Youth Field, in the Yebna neighborhood of Rafah, Gaza.

Why: Cut off from the world by a brutal siege, the people of the Gaza strip live with hunger, massive unemployment and frequent attacks by the Israeli army. Extreme vulnerability and insecurity, coupled with bleak prospects for the future, feeds hopelessness and rage, with the youth being particularly vulnerable. This innovative, community-developed football tournament gives neighbors a chance to strengthen bonds and relieve the stress caused by the dire situation.

When: The month of Ramadan, the 11th of August through the 9th of September.

Fundraiser Target: $10,000 U.S.

Fundraiser Ends: August 15th

Financial oversight provided by: The Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice

This Year’s Event Includes:

• Kids Day: Races, Prizes, Under 13 match
• Youth Tournament: Ages 16 -17
• Adult tournament: Ages 18- 40

Magan Wiles portrays Rachel Corrie

St. Louis’ Blue Rose Stage Collective launched their staging of My Name Is Rachel Corrie to excellent reviews. The group performs the play Thursday July 15 – Saturday July 17 with discussions following each performance. For more information, contact the Collective: 314-779-4148, bluerosestage@gmail.com.

“My Name is Rachel Corrie,” which makes its St. Louis debut with the new troupe Blue Rose Stage Collective, is neither boring nor preachy. It’s the rare one-actor show that manages to be engaging and thought-provoking from start to finish.
- Gabe Hartwig, St. Louis Today

Whether your political views favor one side or the other in the continuing conflict between Israel and Palestine, you’re sure to find Blue Rose Stage Collective’s debut presentation of My Name is Rachel Corrie to be a provocative and compelling piece of theatre.
- Broadway World, St. Louis

When: Saturday, May 8th 2010, 6 – 10PM
Where: The Mural Site, Corner of State & Capitol

For more information visit http://olympiarafahmural.org/
To volunteer please email: hilhack4paz@gmail.com

This event is free of charge and open to the public! We will be gathering in front of the mural and are looking forward to this being a bridging of communities!

Evening’s Agenda
6:00pm: Gathering at the Mural
Food & Beverages
DJ Turtledove

7:00pm: Grupo Quetzalcoatl de Olympia!

7:30pm: Live Music
Southern Skies (Olympia)
AudioPharmacy (San Francisco)

8:30pm: The Mural Speaks!

An Introduction to the Mural Audio Components
With Live performances by Project Participants

• Books to Prisoners
• Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES)
• Garden Raised Bounty (GRuB)
• Gateways for Incarcerated Youth
• Indigenous Youth Delegation to Palestine (San Francisco)
• Industrial Workers of the World (Wobblies)
• Inmigrantes Unidos
• Movimiento Estudantil Chicano de Azatlan (MEChA)
• Olympia Movement for Justice & Peace (OMJP)
• Parents Organizing for Welfare & Economic Rights (POWER)
• SafePlace
• Stonewall Youth
• The Rachel Corrie Foundation
• The Olympia Rafah Sister City Project
• AND MORE!

10pm: Possible surprise guests!

The Mural Speaks event will be the finale to The People’s Assembly: Collaboration, Networking and Solidarity, a gathering of Olympia’s grassroots organizers to discuss the US Social Forum and other strategies moving forward in the struggle for social justice. For more information, visit http://omjp.net.

The Olympia Rafah Mural tells a tale of two cities linked through tragedy – Olympia WA and Rafah Palestine and is expected to be the largest public art project highlighting the experiences of the Palestinian people under Israeli occupation. The ultimate goal of the Olympia-Rafah Solidarity Mural Project (ORSMP) is to use art, culture and technology in innovative ways to increase the strength and visibility of the movement for social justice not only in Palestine and Israel, but also in the U.S. and throughout the world.

The 4,000 square foot mural/interactive project is the collective effort of Olympia locals, as well as over 150 artists, activists and social justice organizations from Olympia to the Bay Area, across the USA to the West Bank and Gaza in Palestine. Viewers can use a cell phone to call and hear a specific artist/group introduce themselves and talk about the meaning of their contributions to the mural. Some artists have included poetry and/or music to add cultural favor to the image and the audio soundscape.

The Olympia-Rafah project has successfully articulated the importance of creating cross-movement partnerships and highlighted the impact of transgressing boundaries. The project continues, and with each completed phase, more fully illuminates and strengthens a shared quest for justice and equality across continents, cultures and causes.

Ta’anit Tzedek – Jewish Fast for Gaza has begun a new initiative: “Resisting the Siege: Conversations With Gazans.” On each monthly fast day (the third Thursday of every month) we will convene a conference call featuring a Gazan Palestinian who will discuss his/her experience of life in Gaza, the effects of the siege, and how we can best support efforts to lift the blockade.

Our next conference call will take place this Thursday, March 18, at 1:00 pm and will feature Sami Abdel Shafi, an independent political analyst and writer who lives in Gaza. In addition, we will hear from Cindy and Craig Corrie whose daughter Rachel was killed by an Israeli bulldozer in 2003 as she tried to protect a Gazan Palestinian home from demolition.

In an article he wrote for The Guardian last December, Mr. Abdel Shafi wrote eloquently about the nature of the crisis facing Gaza:

Almost nothing has been more deceitful than casting Gaza as a humanitarian case. This is becoming exponentially more problematic a year after the war. Gaza urgently needs far more than merely those items judged by the Israeli military as adequate to satisfy Gaza’s humanitarian needs. This list of allowable items is tiny compared to people’s needs for a minimally respectable civil life.

Gaza is not treated humanely; the immediate concerns about the situation have clearly given way to long-term complacency, while failed politics has now become stagnant. The humanitarian classification conceals the urgent need to address this. Moreover, many in the international community have conveniently resorted to blaming Palestinians for their political divisions, as though they were unrelated to Israel’s policies – most notably Gaza’s closure after Israeli disengagement in 2005.

I also encourage you to read this piece, in which Abdel Shafi discusses the challenges facing the Palestinian Authority during this latest incarnation of the peace process.

The Corries will be joining our call from Haifa where they are currently participating in the hearing of a civil suit they have brought against the Government of Israel. Following Rachel’s death, the Israeli government promised the Bush administration a thorough, credible and transparent investigation of Rachel’s killing. Now seven years later, no such investigation has taken place.

On a recent interview with Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman, the Corries spoke at length about their seven year quest in search of justice and accountability for their daughter’s death:

This is a culmination, really, of seven years of our family searching for some sort of justice in the killing of Rachel. And we’ve tried to do that through diplomatic means, and we’ve asked for a US-led investigation into Rachel’s killing. We also understand that the Israelis, through Prime Minister Sharon, promised President Bush a thorough, credible and transparent investigation of Rachel’s killing. But, by our own government’s measure, that has not happened. So we’re left with simply a civil lawsuit.

So, we’re accusing the state of Israel of either intentionally killing Rachel or guilty of gross negligence in her killing seven years ago. And so, we’re seeking—the only thing you can seek in a civil case is damages. You know, so it’s really a very small part of the story that’s gone on in our lives. But it’s critical to have our time in court.

Our motivation for that was largely that it is an avenue which we understood we would be able to pursue and get information. So, through the discovery process, we were hoping to get a good deal of information. We have gotten some, but they’ve used sort of secrets of state to keep us, block us, from getting other evidence into court. But we’re going forward, and we’re very hopeful that we will get a fair trial.

Today is, in fact, the seventh anniversary of Rachel Corrie’s death. I strongly encourage you to check The Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice website to learn how you can honor her memory. We might also heed the words of Craig Corrie (again, from the Democracy Now interview):

(One) other very specific thing that people could do, and I’m calling for people to do—the US government has come out against the blockade or the continued occupation and siege on Gaza. The children that were behind the wall that Rachel stood in front of are still under a state of siege. And I think that, very specifically, people around the world and certainly in this country could write, call or fax the White House and say, not only should we be working to have the Israelis lift that siege, but if they continue to be unwilling to do so, then the United States should come in there, work out a way that they could come in and—the Berlin airlift, it sent a message to the world about our ability to protect people around the world and our willingness to do so. If we did something similar by sea to the Gaza Strip, it would change the view of Americans around the world for maybe another fifty years. It is something that’s doable, and it’s something that the people out, your fans, could actually physically do and ask the White House to do that.

To participate in the conference call:
Dial-in Number: 1-517-417-5200 (caller pays any phone charges)
Participant Access Code: 860453
Questions for Conference Call: If you would like to suggest a question for Mr. Abdel Shafi or for Cindy or Craig Corrie, please email your question to rabbrianwalt@gmail.com or ravboaz@comcast.net no later than Wednesday night.

Join us at The Urban Onion Ballroom on March 16th at 6:30pm.

We will begin the evening with a community potluck, please bring a dish to share and enjoy with others. Beverages, utensils and plates will be provided. The potluck will be followed by an overview of the journey seeking justice for Rachel’s killing over the past seven years and an update on the civil court case that Cindy and Craig Corrie, Rachel’s parents, have filed in Israel seeking accountability for Rachel’s killing. The Corrie’s will be in Israel during this time and we will get an update on the proceedings taking place. We will also hear from our friends at the Rachel Corrie Youth and Cultural Center in Rafah and learn about their activities and remembrance of Rachel on this day. The evening will close with music by Olympia native Afrok and accompanying band.

Please join us!

Download the flyer: Seeking Accountability, Seeking Justice: Rachel Corrie Seven Years Later Flyer (pdf, 1.1 MB)

Contact
Serena Becker, The Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice

Phone: 360.754.3998

Email: serena@rachelcorriefoundation.org

Co-Sponsored by:
Fellowship of Reconciliation
Islamic Circle of North America
Greater Seattle chapter of Veterans for Peace

Craig and Cindy Corrie

A talk by Cindy and Craig Corrie
Gaza and US Policy Flyer (pdf, 111.07 KB)

What is the current situation in Gaza and the U.S. responsibility in it? How can we, as U.S. citizens, take a constructive role in creating a foreign policy in line with universal human rights?

Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by an Israeli military bulldozer while protecting the home of a Palestinian family. Her parents, Cindy and Craig Corrie, founded the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice to continue the work their daughter began. They have visited Gaza four times, twice in 2009, and work to support human rights in the Middle East. Their deep personal connections with Gaza provide the human context for looking at what the U.S. has done, and at what we should expect and demand of our policy-makers.

Sunday February 28th
Maui Community College
Ka Lama 103 – 4:00 pm
Free – Public Welcome

Ali Abunimah, co-founder of Electronic Intifada, to speak at South Puget Sound Community College / Photo: 3arabawy

Ali Abunimah, author and co-founder of the online publication “Electronic Intifada,” will speak. Abunimah is a Palestinian-American journalist, a graduate of Princeton and the University of Chicago, and the author of One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. South Puget Sound Community College, March 8 7pm. SPSCC Building 26, Room 105. It is free to the public and is sponsored by The Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice, BRICK, Islamic Circle of North America, and People for Peace, Justice and Healing .

For more information, please visit www.rachelcorriefoundation.org, www.spsccbrick.org, or call (360) 754-3998.

In attendance at the screening will be many current and former Olympians who knew, loved, and worked with Rachel Corrie, including her parents. This screening will be a special event that you do not want to miss.

Click here to purchase tickets.

Trailer:

The play relates the story of Rachel Corrie, a student at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, who went to Gaza to work for Palestinian human rights and was tragically killed there on March 16, 2003. Rachel was a vital young woman driven by her need to make a positive difference in the world. Inspired by her story, and with permission from her family, Rickman and Viner edited Rachel’s diaries, journals, and e-mails to create this fascinating and moving portrait of this dynamic young woman. Newsweek said the play is “theater that not only stirs our hearts but sticks in our heads.” Time Out (London) said of the original production that it had “extraordinary power” and was funny, passionate, bristling with idealism, and luminously intelligent. The London Guardian reported that when theater is as “good as this,” it will “send us out enriched by other people’s passionate concerns.” USA Today noted that the play was “deeply, authentically human.” Rachel Corrie’s story has moved audiences around the world and there have been productions throughout the United States.

The role of Rachel will be performed by Elizabeth Helman, director of the 2009 Bard in the Quad’s Twelfth Night and faculty member in Theatre Arts at Oregon State. The play is directed by Charlotte Headrick and design is by George Caldwell. Cassandra Kornman is stage manager for the production.

Due to the design of the Lab Theatre, latecomers cannot be admitted. The play is performed without intermission. Box office opens at 6:15 PM on nights of performance and at 1:30 PM for the Sunday matinee. This play contains language and situations that are not suitable for young audiences.

For further information on the production, contact the director at cheadrick@oregonstate.edu or 737-4918 or David McMurray of the Department of Anthropology mcmurrad@oregonstate.edu at 737-4515.

Preshow talks are in Withycombe Hall 62 (the Green Room) and are listed below:

Wednesday, October 21st, 6:30 PM
Theresa May, Theatre Arts, University of Oregon
Radical Theater versus Theater about Radicals:
Thoughts on My Name Is Rachel Corrie
Play follows at 7:30 PM in Withycombe Lab Theater.

Thursday, October 22nd, 6:30 PM
Steve Niva, Government and International Studies, The Evergreen State College
Student Activism and Rachel Corrie
Play follows at 7:30 PM in Withycombe Lab Theater.

Friday, October 23rd, 6:30 PM
Smadar Lavie, Anthropology, University of Virginia
Israel, Palestine, and Rachel Corrie
Play follows at 7:30 PM in Withycombe Lab Theater.

Saturday, October 24th, 6:30 PM
Joel Beinin, History, Stanford University
Historical Context of My Name Is Rachel Corrie
Play follows at 7:30 PM in Withycombe Lab Theater.

Sunday, October 25th, 1:00 PM
Craig and Cindy Corrie (Rachel¹s parents)
Olympia, Washington
Continuing Rachel¹s Work in the Gaza Strip
Play follows at 7:30 PM in Withycombe Lab Theater.