Skip to content
  • Image
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Youtube
  • Podcasts
  • Email
  • Contact
  • Home
  • Opinion
  • News
  • Features
  • Comment
  • Store
The Arab Daily News

The Arab Daily News

Original news, features, opinions from Chicago to Jerusalem

  • About
    • About
    • Our Writers
    • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
    • Book Store
    • Contact
    • Submit Book Reviews, Press Releases
    • Advertise
    • Privacy Corrections Policy
    • Profile on Ray Hanania
    • Submit Press Release
  • Features
    • Food
    • Book Review
    • Humor
    • Movies
    • Travel
  • Arab Stores Targeted
  • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Heritage America resources
    • Directory
      • Groups & Organizations
      • Mosques, Churches
      • Restaurants
      • 2008 & 2014 Arab Media Directories
    • National Arab Heritage Month
    • Video: Chicago Arab History
    • Video: Photo Array of Chicago Arabs
    • Overview of Arabs in America
    • Hanania standup comedy
    • Arabs on the Titanic
    • Obituaries
  • Podcasts
    • Ray Hanania on Politics Podcast
    • Arab News Ray Hanania Radio
    • Arab Radio Podcast intro
    • Radio Baladi Detroit
  • Hanania on Tiktok
  • Subscribe to eNewsletter
  • Toggle search form
  • Mahnoor Ahmad Photo courtesy of her website at AhmadforCongress.com
    Muslim American woman challenges unresponsive Congressman Sean Casten in March 19 Democratic primary Activism
  • Committee to Protect Journalists website. Number of journalists killed in Gaza war now 50
    More than 50 journalists killed in Israel-Gaza war Arab World
  • AHRC Logo new Feb 2021
    On World Children’s Day, Israel has turned Gaza into a Graveyard for Children: American Arabs
  • Jewish Defense League members participated in the Washington D.C. rally supporting Israel Nov. 15, 2023. Photo courtesy of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
    Doctors Without Borders condemns deliberate deadly attack on convoy of staff and family members in Gaza Arab World
  • Palestinian protest land grabs by Israel's government from Palestinian Christians and Muslims. Photo courtesy of Peace Now
    Peace Now: Attempt for the Establishment of a New Settlement in the Armenian Quarter of the Old City Arab World
  • Palestinians walk around buildings destroyed during the Israeli bombardment in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip on October 29. (Photo: AP/Hatem Moussa)
    CPJ expresses grave concern over 4th communications blackout in Gaza Arab World
  • Comedian Ramy Youssef courtesy of his Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ramysfaceboo/
    Arab American Comedy Festival, 209th Anniversary National Tour returns to New York roots American Arabs
  • The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) and nearly 100 human rights, civil rights and civil liberties, immigrant rights, faith based organizations, and ADC’s Volunteer TPS/DED Lawyers Working Group sent a request to Secretary of State Anthony Blinkin and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas urging them to designate Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) and/or Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Palestinians present in the United States.  
    Nearly 100 Organizations Join ADC in Demanding TPS/DED for Palestinians American Arabs
  • Jewish Defense League members participated in the Washington D.C. rally supporting Israel Nov. 15, 2023. Photo courtesy of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
    Terrorist groups involved at pro-Israel demonstration in Washington D.C. American Arabs
  • Doctors without Borders calls for end to Israeli attacks targeting hospitals in Gaza Strip. Nov. 11, 2023
    Patients and medical staff trapped in hospitals under fire in Gaza Arab World
  • Attorney Sarah Gad
    2024 election battle among Arab Americans shaping up in Ilhan Omar’s Minnesota congressional district American Arabs
  • Palestinian civilians flee their homes as Israel continues its savage bombing and missile attacks against homes, neighborhoods and buildings destroying most of the buildings in most of the Gaza's cities. Photo courtesy of Adalah, The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights
    US Congress: Reject Bill to Support Forced Israeli Displacement of Palestinians to Third Countries  American Arabs
  • RMS Titanic departing Southampton on April 10, 1912. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia and Francis Godolphin Osbourne Stuart - http://www.uwants.com/viewthread.php?tid=3817223&extra=page%3D1
    Arabs on Titanic: Arabs share the pain but not the glory in ship’s tragic tale American Arabs
  • MedGlobal humanitarian appeal for Gaza violence victims
    Bombing of Al Ahli hospital in Gaza worst attack on healthcare this century  American Arabs
  • IDF soldiers and Israeli settlers (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
    Israeli Academic Institutions Persecute Palestinian Students for Social Media Posts Amid Offensive on Gaza Christian & Muslim

Trump, Golan Heights, This American, USS Liberty and Mordechai Vanunu

Posted on March 22, 2019March 22, 2019 By Eileen Fleming No Comments on Trump, Golan Heights, This American, USS Liberty and Mordechai Vanunu
SHARE ...
          
 
  

  • Tweet

Loading

On Thursday at Twitter President Trump overturned decades of US policy when he declared that America should recognize Israel’s authority over the occupied Golan Heights.


By Eileen Fleming

This American’s trip to the Golan Heights excerpted from the screenplay “This American and Israel’s Nuclear Whistle Blower Vanunu Mordechai” concludes this article.

Trump’s Golan Heights tweet is symbolic of his disregard for diplomacy and the rights of indigenous people.

Prime Minister Netanyahu called Trump to thank him after his Golan Heights tweet stating, “He did it again. The message that President Trump has given the world is that America stands by Israel.”

Netanyahu again praised Trump for moving America’s embassy to Jerusalem and for withdrawing the U.S.A. from the Iran nuclear deal.

Mr. Trump’s Israeli policies are popular in Israel and with his spineless core in Congress, but Trump’s moves have been globally condemned.

The United Nations rejected Israel’s occupation of the Golan Heights in 1967, after Israeli troops seized 400 square miles of highlands from Syria during The Six Day War.

Israel had planned on capturing the Golan Heights on 8 June 1967, but the USS LIBERTY got in their way; so Israel attacked the Liberty that day and invaded Syria the next.

It has been reported that Israel attacked the USS Liberty [America’s then premier surveillance ship] to prevent the USA from learning about Israel’s intentions to seize the Golan Heights and their preparations within Israel’s nuclear reactor facility at Dimona.

Next week Trump will host Netanyahu at an Oval Office dinner meeting. Bibi has campaigned for the release of convicted spy, Jonathan J. Pollard a former USA intelligence analyst. It has been reported that Trump is considering allowing the convicted spy to travel to Israel.

In 1987, Jonathan J. Pollard was convicted of spying and providing Israel with top-secret classified information. Pollard had been sentenced to life in prison for violations under the Espionage Act but was paroled in 2015 under a restricted travel ban.

Pollard is a heroic figure in Israel for spying on America while Israel’s nuclear whistle blower Mordechai Vanunu is demonized.

What follows is an excerpt from my first screenplay This American and Israel’s Nuclear Whistle Blower Vanunu,  regarding my trip to the Golan Heights.

FLASHBACK: INT. SMALL BUS TRAVELING THROUGH THE UPPER GALILEE TRANSPORTING THE OLIVE TREES FOUNDATION FOR PEACE/OTFFP GROUP AND TWO ISRAELI GUIDES. – DAY [EARLY AM JUNE 14 2005]

THIS AMERICAN is seated next to RACHEL the female Israeli guide, who is a friend of the Jewish American co-founder of the OTFFP, and in back of DAVID — who is tall and movie-star handsome.

THIS AMERICAN
So, tell me how a twentyfour-year-old from Nashville decides to move to Israel, where she knows no one. What made you do it, and how has it been these past seven months?

RACHEL
My friends got so tired of me complaining about my political frustrations over the last election; they said, ‘If you don’t like it here, just leave!’ I had already been considering joining the Peace Corps, and when I got turned down because of a medical problem, I explored the possibility of going to Israel. I learned about, Aliyah, which means ‘going up,’ and the deal was hard to pass by. I get fifteen hundred shekels or about thirty-six hundred dollars a year in increments to help with my expenses. I can apply for unemployment benefits after seven months, as long as I look for a job. I just completed Ulpan, which was five hundred hours of Hebrew language immersion studies that took five months, five hours a day, for five weeks. I get subsidized rent and just moved out of the Absorption Center Projects. All the new immigrants get room, utilities, and three meals a day for the first five months in Israel. We also receive free medical care and all the doctors here are dedicated. We can go to the university with 100 percent of the tuition paid by the government. College is much cheaper here; it’s about three thousand to four thousand dollars a year. Until I am thirty years old, I can receive up to three years of education for my master’s degree…

THIS AMERICAN [TO SELF]  If  I were a young American offered that opportunity I’d be nuts not to consider it.

DAVID
My mother is fourth-generation to this land and my father was born here while this land was still called Palestine. So, I am a forty-two-year- old Israeli-Palestinian secular Jew. In 2000, when Ariel Sharon went to the Al Aqsa Mosque and provoked the violent uprising, I cried, ‘Back off, man! Enough! It is enough already!’ When those young Palestinian innocents were killed, I knew I had to do something. I didn’t know what, but I began by knocking on doors throughout Rosh El Aim, a Christian- Arab community. I told them I just wanted to help. Mostly they thought I was crazy and many today think it too. I drove a three hundred mile radius, knocking on doors, offering to help… One day, I was sitting with a bunch of Bedouin kids, and I began tapping my fingers on my thigh. The next thing, all of these kids were imitating me, and I realized I could bring them drums. I have friends who are musicians and artisans, and they have all offered an open hand. Without any assistance from the Israeli government, we have established centers of peace/ shalom/salaam that offer tutoring, health care, folk dance, music lessons, and artistic projects to the least and easily forgotten. We have built community between Israeli Jews and Bedouins, and Palestinian Christians and Muslims. It’s been five years now, and I continue to make daily rounds all the way into the Golan Heights. Many others have joined in and are keeping the projects moving forward, as I take on new ones. I have a friend named Hagit Breittman, a Jewish woman who has done the unthinkable! She opened her home to Bedouin woman, and they get together weekly to sew and, more importantly, to be a community. Right now, we are building community here, for security comes from community, not walls and gates! We absolutely have hope that one-day; these Bedouin women will travel to America with their embroidery and weaving. Hagit also started up a daily lunch service for the poor in the community. She provides food and comfort for hundreds everyday, and has done it all without government assistance. Today, people are lost in a violent cycle without basic human rights and respect for the other. Forget co-existence, we must have basic existence, basic human rights. People need to be taught morals, boundaries, limits, and manners. Isn’t that the stuff Jesus taught?

THIS AMERICAN
You make a great point and are making me see Jesus as a social justice radically nonviolent Palestinian devout Jew who went through the Galilee offering free healings and love…

The group falls silent until they reach an elementary school in the Golan Heights where the OTFFP provided the funds for two thousand trees. A young slender smiling man emerges from the school just as the group emerges from their bus.

KHALED DIAB
This must be the founder of the Association for Improving and Developing the Family I have been working with…

MONEER SABAGH
Welcome America! We are grateful you arrived safely and anxious to show you around, so please stick close to me and come and see the trees you provided us… I am in a delicate situation. The Israeli government built our school, but the community here is occupied, and resentment runs high. I am trying to get the people to care about what we have and enrich it, so we can thereby enrich ourselves! Because they are occupied, they struggle with the question of how they can thrive under captivity. It is a difficult situation to understand–what life under occupation is about. I thank the Olive Trees Foundation for Peace for providing the two-thousand trees David brought to us. We needed oaks and pines for the school campus and they have made a difference in our atmosphere, in the air we breathe…

Read More stories from this American’s first journey to both sides of Israel’s Wall HERE 

 

This American’s second screenplay, This American and The USS Liberty: A Love Story is in process!


Eileen Fleming writes for TADN:

HERE

 

Eileen Fleming produced the UNCENSORED:
“30 Minutes with Vanunu”

 

Contact her HERE 

 

  • Author
  • Recent Posts
Eileen Fleming
Eileen Fleming
Senior Non-Arab Correspondent for TADN at The Arab Daily News
Senior Non-Arab Correspondent for The Arab Daily News
Producer "30 Minutes with Vanunu" who founded WeAreWideAwake.org in response to her first of 8 trips to both sides of The Wall in Palestine Israel.
In 2012, Eileen ran for US House of Representatives District 5, in Fl.
Read her FREE eBooks and more at:http://www.eileenfleming.org/
Eileen Fleming
Latest posts by Eileen Fleming (see all)
  • Vanunu still has more nuclear secrets to spill, Israeli court declares - December 29, 2021
  • 9/11 and a 20th Reflection of That Day - September 5, 2021
  • Mordechai Vanunu: Final Annual Update and this Writers Next Steps - June 19, 2021

  • Tweet

SHARE ...
          
 
  
 
          
 
 Tweet 
Arab World, Bloggers, Commentary, Eileen Fleming, Israel, Middle East, Opinion, Palestine & Jordan

Post navigation

Previous Post: Algerian Islamists: From Political Reality to Dialectical Crisis Identity 
Next Post: Cook County Board approves April Arab Heritage Month proclamation

Related Posts

  • Arab Daily News Journalist Masood injured by Israelis Arab World
  • USS Liberty Father, Son and the State of American Legion Resolution 40 in Our Union Arab World
  • Human Rights activist Vince Warren
    Israel rejects entry to human rights activists Arab World
  • Podcast: Larry Derfner of 972Mag.com on Israeli elections Arab World
  • From Joan Rivers to Vanunu and Iran by way of WMD Arab World
  • IDF soldiers and Israeli settlers (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
    Israeli Academic Institutions Persecute Palestinian Students for Social Media Posts Amid Offensive on Gaza Christian & Muslim

More Related Articles

Middle East Christians in extreme danger Gemayel warns Arab World
Trump and The Resistance American Arabs
Obama names Rob Malley as special adviser American Arabs
UAE names 83 terrorist groups including two from US American Arabs
Palestinian protest against Gaza embargo Arab World
Why American Arabs and Muslims need their own news blog Activism

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

  • OPINION COLUMNS
  • A child stands in front of an apartment building bombed by Israeli using an American made 2000 pound bomb.
    Hostages versus Prisoners: Israel war on Gaza is as much a war on weaponizing words
    December 1, 2023
  • Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib
    Americans rally to support Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib targeted by Islamophobic racism
    November 8, 2023
  • Palestinian parent and child seek refuge as American sanction terrorism by Israel spreads through Gaza Strip Oct 2023
    Some American legislators stand up for justice and against all violence
    October 15, 2023
  • Map of the Gaza Strip, courtesy of Wikipedia
    Israel-Palestine conflict as much about American hypocrisy as it is about violence
    October 11, 2023

Events

  • No events
  • NEWSWIRE
  • Palestinians walk around buildings destroyed during the Israeli bombardment in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip on October 29. (Photo: AP/Hatem Moussa)
    CPJ expresses grave concern over 4th communications blackout in Gaza
    November 18, 2023
  • Racist grafitti a Palestinian Cultural Center for Peace and Boston Islamic Seminary, one of a wave of acts of racism targeting Arabs and Muslims in the wake of Israel's war crimes in Gaza October 2023
    CAIR-MA Calls for Hate Crime Probe of ‘Nazi’ Vandalism Targeting Boston Palestinian, Islamic Sign
    October 11, 2023
  • American Middle East groups oppose granting Visa Waiver approval to Israel Sept. 27 , 2023
    American Middle East organizations protest against granting Israel Visa Waiver approval
    September 27, 2023
  • The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, announced Tuesday (Sept. 19, 2023) the filing of a lawsuit with a dozen plaintiffs seeking an end to the government’s secret watchlist that almost exclusively targets Muslims for harassment and humiliation when they travel.
    CAIR Announces Lawsuit in D.C., Mass., N.J., Mich. Seeking End to Secret Government Watchlist
    September 19, 2023

Creative Commons License
All work on this website is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Do not edit original work. Give credit to the original source.

  • 250-x-250-Ziyad-banner-Ad.jpg
  • NEWS
  • Mahnoor Ahmad Photo courtesy of her website at AhmadforCongress.com
    Muslim American woman challenges unresponsive Congressman Sean Casten in March 19 Democratic primary
    November 21, 2023
  • Committee to Protect Journalists website. Number of journalists killed in Gaza war now 50
    More than 50 journalists killed in Israel-Gaza war
    November 21, 2023
  • AHRC Logo new Feb 2021
    On World Children’s Day, Israel has turned Gaza into a Graveyard for Children:
    November 20, 2023
  • Jewish Defense League members participated in the Washington D.C. rally supporting Israel Nov. 15, 2023. Photo courtesy of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
    Doctors Without Borders condemns deliberate deadly attack on convoy of staff and family members in Gaza
    November 19, 2023
grab450

Recent Posts

  • Hostages versus Prisoners: Israel war on Gaza is as much a war on weaponizing words
  • Muslim American woman challenges unresponsive Congressman Sean Casten in March 19 Democratic primary
  • More than 50 journalists killed in Israel-Gaza war
  • On World Children’s Day, Israel has turned Gaza into a Graveyard for Children:
  • Doctors Without Borders condemns deliberate deadly attack on convoy of staff and family members in Gaza
  • BOOK REVIEWS
  • Interlink 2022 Cookbooks Make the Best Holiday Gifts
    Interlink 2022 Cookbooks Make the Best Holiday Gifts
    October 24, 2022
  • Stories My Father Told Me by author and artist Helen Zughaib, book cover. Photo courtesy of Cune Press
    Stories My Father Told Me by author and artist Helen Zughaib
    November 1, 2021
  • ENTERTAINMENT
  • Comedian Ahmed Ahmed at The Comedy Bar in Chicago June 9 - 11, 2023
    Comedian Ahmed Ahmed performs in Chicago June 9-11, 2023 at The Comedy Bar
    June 9, 2023
  • Ziyad Food item
    Essential recipes and ingredients during Ramadan 
    April 4, 2023
  • Hussam al-Mayman, The Mayman Show, podcast Arab News
    Arab News launches third season of The Mayman Show podcast
    December 15, 2022
  • Interlink 2022 Cookbooks Make the Best Holiday Gifts
    Interlink 2022 Cookbooks Make the Best Holiday Gifts
    October 24, 2022
  • Comedian Ramy Youssef courtesy of his Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ramysfaceboo/
    “Ramy” cable series melds Arab world reality with every day American life
    October 22, 2022
  • New-iTunes-1400-x-1400-The-Ray-Hanania-Show-Podcast-Icon-300-x-300.jpg
  • terroristbookcover-300-x-300.jpg
  • The-Kings-Pawn-Book-300-x-300.png
  • Podcast-iTunes-Logo-Chi-City-Hall-1985.jpg
  • powerpr300x300ad.jpg
Arab News Newspaper Logo
Read the Arab News, the leading English language newspaper in the MIddle East

Follow Ray Hanania at Gab.com, MeWe.com and IDobbinate.com, the alternatives to Facebook and Twitter Censorship.

Click here to get information on The Ray Hanania Radio Show and its podcasts

Copyright © 2023 The Arab Daily News.

Powered by PressBook Premium theme