Remember Rachel Corrie Today At Demo

I was at an Israel day rally in NYC last year and someone on the Zionist side of the street was yelling "pancake Corrie!" It was disgusting. I am very supportive of Israel but would never make such an insensitive comment. I prefer to let the "other side" be rude and obnoxious.

BFUU at Cedar and Bonita tonight is an event remembering her with D Bernstein, Brian Avery, etc. 7pm.

Last update - 18:47 16/03/2004

Background / Rachel Corrie and Israel's army - a death in vain?

By Bradley Burston, Haaretz Correspondent

It is one year to the day that Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old peace activist from Olympia, Washington, was demonstrating against house demolitions in Rafah, southern Gaza, when she was crushed to death in the slow advance of a mammoth IDF armor-plated bulldozer.

In Israel her name has been all but forgotten, but Rachel Corrie is still viewed by many leftists abroad as a symbol, even a saint. Cited by some as a Joan of Arc facing danger shorn of arms and armor, her portrait appears on a wall mural in San Francisco beside that of Che Guevara.

One eulogy, a commentary entitled "Heroine of the Palestinian Struggle" in Kenya's Daily Nation newspaper, likened her to Anne Frank.

Corrie was the first foreign activist to be killed and wounded in protests early last year against army operations in Gaza.

Was her death in vain? Viewed from the perspective of a year, the answer may well be yes.

On March 16, 2003, Rachel Corrie was carrying a bullhorn and wearing a fluorescent orange vest to make clear that she was an activist, as she climbed a mound of earth to bar the path of the immense Caterpillar D9 bulldozer.

The incident was witnessed by a number of Corrie's colleagues in the International Solidarity Movement, a pro-Palestinian group in which foreigners demonstrated alongside Palestinians. Corrie had been one of four Americans who had come with four Britons to protest against the demolitions.

They later said that the bulldozer driver could clearly see Corrie as he continued in her path, mortally injuring her. He then began backing up, dragging the huge blade for a second time over her body, one activist said. Their conclusion was straightforward: the killing was deliberate.

The IDF Military Police Detective Unit, or "Metzach," was ordered to investigate Rachel Corrie's death. The case file was closed more than four months later, after investigators ruled the death accidental.

The investigators said that from the slit sight ports and compromised vision of the armored bulldozer cab "it was not possible to see her or to hear her voice." Further, they maintained that the death had been caused by rubble and earth falling on her as she climbed the mound, not as a result of a direct action by the bulldozer or by its running her over."

While expressing sorrow for the death, the panel said that "illegal and irresponsible" actions of the ISM had "contributed to the tragic and distressing results of this incident".

-- The issues raised, the IDF responds

The deaths of ISM activists, that of Rachel Corrie and of Britons Tom Hurndall and James Miller, both fatally injured by IDF fire, along with the wounding of Brian Avery of New Mexico, shot in the face, brought world attention to the focus of their protests - the IDF drive to raze Palestinian houses overlooking the Philadelphi Route, the army patrol highway built on the narrow border that divides the southeastern base of the Gaza Strip from the Egyptian Sinai peninsula.

But what effect did their activism, and their deaths have on the conduct of IDF policy?

If the pace of house demolitions can be taken as an appropriate measure, the effect appears to have been negligible.

"House demolitions have proceeded at the same pace, before and after" the deaths, says Haaretz territories correspondent Arnon Regular.

The operations have changed somewhat in character, but not in result, he continues. "At first, there were constant shooting incidents and gun battles" involving Palestinian gunmen and the army.

"When the shooting began, the families who were living in the houses would flee. The army would then announce, 'We have demolished an abandoned house.'"

Following Rachel Corrie's death, the army's tactics changed. The result did not. Commanders opted for large-scale operations, in which dozens of tanks, armored personnel carriers and bulldozers would suddenly appear, level some 10 structures, then abruptly pull out.

Until the demolition campaign was launched in Rafah at the beginning of 2003, houses in the area's thickly populated network of refugee camps were built up to the very border line demarcated by Philadelphi.

Row by row, bulldozers knocked down and cleared away houses along the border. As Palestinian gunmen continued their attacks from the remaining structures, the line of razed houses became wider and wider, such that at present, the closest houses to the border are now 200-400 meters from the line, along its entire length.

A total of at least 300 houses have been have been demolished thus far, Regular says, adding that the figure represents a conservative estimate.

In fact, with respect to Israeli policy, the primary tangible consequence of Rachel Corrie's death, was a crackdown on foreign activists.

Officials at all ports of entry into Israel, including Ben-Gurion Airport and the Allenby Bridge crossing on the Jordan River, were instructed to be on the lookout for foreign nationals whose intention in entering Israel appeared to be protest. A number of activists were turned away.

The army, meanwhile, sought to keep activists out of the territories. "This policy is difficult to enforce in the West Bank, but in Gaza, with the exception of the personnel of international humanitarian organizations and the like, no one can cannot gain entry," Regular notes.

Last year, the Israeli campaign to curb foreign activism received reinforcement from an unexpected source. Among those who attended an ISM memorial for Rachel Corrie on the fortieth day after her death, it later developed, were two British nationals who, shortly thereafter, traveled to Tel Aviv to carry out a Hamas-launched suicide bombing at the seaside Mike's Place bar.

At present, ISM activity is all but unfelt in the Gaza Strip. "I can count the number of foreign activists in Gaza on 10 fingers," says Regular. "Foreigners are still arriving, but in much, much smaller numbers, and their activism is directed in protests against the West Bank security fence, not in Gaza, and, in fact, very little in the West Bank."

Even at the height of the activism, prior to the killings, the numbers were relatively small. "At any given time, there were between 30-50 foreigners active in the territories," Regular says.

"In my view, after the army began shooting at people, the activists became frightened to continue to encourage others to come," feeling responsibility for their safety.

-- IDF probes the deaths

In the wake of the deaths, the military was widely criticized for failing to take seriously and adopt non-lethal methods of dealing with demonstrators.

It was also scored for the conduct of its investigations of the incidents. In all of the incidents, save that of the shooting death of British activist Tom Hurndall, army inquiries ruled against bringing the soldiers involved to trial.

Israel has also resisted international diplomatic pressure for independent inquiries.

In recent months, protests against the West Bank wall have grown in intensity, with demonstrations bringing together Israeli leftists and anarchists, Palestinians ranging from pacifists to stone-throwers to gunmen, and a sprinkling of foreign activists.

The deaths of Rachel Corrie and the others notwithstanding, the army has not substantially altered its response to demonstrators, Regular maintains.

"In principle, nothing has changed at all. The only change toward foreign activists has been administrative, preventative. At Ben-Gurion airport, anyone who is suspected of being one, is simply not allowed in."

The IDF response to crowd control continues to be deadly in some cases, such as that of a demonstration in the village of Bidu, just over the Green Line from Jewish suburbs west of Jerusalem. At least four Palestinians died in a recent protest, in which Israeli forces fired rubber-coated bullets and, Palestinians maintain, live ammunition as well.

Restraint was also little in evidence during a prior demonstration, in which Israeli protester Gil Na'amati was shot and seriously wounded by troops ordered by higher-ups to open fire on persons "threatening the fence" itself, rather than the troops guarding it.

Observers have noted that where Na'amati was concerned, the army's investigation was considerably more superficial than in the earlier killings of the foreign nationals.

"Paradoxically, in the case of Gil Na'amati, someone who himself served in the army, the military investigation, if you can call it that, turned out to be much less serious than in the cases of James Miller, Tom Hurndall, or Rachel Corrie," Regular concludes.

"The army investigated the others as a result of diplomatic pressure applied by the British and the Americans, and Metzach was called in. Regarding Gil Na'amati, it was hardly an investigation at all. It began with the commanders in the field, and that's where it ended."

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