UPDATES: Lullaby for a Palestinian Child

ATTENTION JOURNALISTS AND CONCERNED:

This just in Sept 15 09: Center for Constitutional Rights CCR Recommendations of UN Report on Gaza - CCR Calls on Security Council to Adopt Recommendations of UN Report on Gaza Conflict - here

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The Middle East Institute and The Foundation for Middle East Peace

Invite You to a Talk entitled:
Who Speaks For the Palestinians at the Negotiating Table?

Featuring: Helena Cobban - Author and Journalist

Thursday, September 24
12-1 PM
MEI Boardman Room
1761 N Street NW
Washington, DC 20036

MEI is proud to host author and Middle East expert Helena Cobban to discuss the dilemmas of Palestinian representation in future peace negotiations. At a time when President Obama's Arab-Israeli peace diplomacy is widely expected to swing into high gear, Helena Cobban will be looking at the thorny issue of Palestinian representation in that diplomacy. In light of recent developments--both positive and negative--in intra-Palestinian politics, does Israel have a Palestinian negotiating partner that is both motivated to participate in the give-and-take of diplomacy and capable of closing on--and enforcing--a final peace agreement.

Ms. Cobban, a former columnist for, and longtime contributor to, The Christian Science Monitor, has been a close student of Palestinian internal politics since the mid-1970s. Her 1984 book The Palestinian Liberation Organization: People, Power, and Politics has been translated into several languages, including Arabic, and is used in universities both in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

She publishes frequently in the Boston Review, writes a weekly news analysis for Inter-Press Service and serves on the Board of Advisory Editors of the Middle East Journal.

Since 2003 Ms. Cobban has published a well-received blog called Just World News. Over the past year, many of her writings have been on Palestinian issues and have included interviews with PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, Hamas head Khaled Meshaal and a broad range of other Palestinian and Israeli public figures.

Sandwiches will be served

Because of the popularity of MEI programs and limited seating, MEI anticipates a capacity audience. MEI wishes to accommodate all registered guests but will give MEI members and supporters priority seating. We encourage you to become an MEI member if you wish to avoid sitting in the overflow room. Early arrival for all is encouraged.

You can register for this event online or write to rsvp@mei.edu and state your name and affiliation.
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Poem was sent by Akhtar Wasim Dar Sahib who said...

The tragedies in Gaza or in other parts of world due to atrocities are condemnable, I would like to share a poem of Faiz Ahmed Faiz here written long ago, about Palestine in seventies, thirty years hence the situation still persists. The poem was translated by Pakistan’s former Finance Minister, Dr. Mehboob ul Haq:

LULLABY FOR A PALESTINIAN CHILD

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
Your mummy has just dozed off
After crying for an eternity.

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
Your daddy has just taken leave
From a lifetime of anguished existence.

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
Your brother has left for an alien land
Chasing the elusive butterfly of his dreams.

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
Your sister has gone to a foreign land
Married to a never-ending future.

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
In your every courtyard
The dead sun has received its funeral bath
The dead moon has received its burial.

Don’t cry my child
Don’t cry,
Your mummy, daddy, brother and sister,
The cold sun and the buried moon,
They are all watching you from afar,
If you cry, they may make you cry some more,
If you smile, they may all come back one day,
And play with you in silent disguise.

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Although not at all for the weak of stomach or heart, sometime go through the following and share the anguish in your own deepest way...



Some of the photos are from these sites:
here

here


"... when the girl-child that was buried alive is asked for what crime she had been slain, ...on that Day every human being will come to know what he has done."~ The Qur'an, Sura 81~

Light a candle for a Palestinian Child and for Children everywhere suffering from war and violence