Leftist lights torch for Fatah commander at alternative ceremony
Tali Fahima lights torch at Yesh Gvul alternative Independence Day ceremony in Jerusalem, in honor of Jenin's Al-Aqsa Brigades commander
Fahima, along with some 2,000 other people, was participating in an alternative torch-lighting ceremony for Independence Day led by the Yesh Gvul (There is a Border) movement, in front of the prime minister's office in Jerusalem.
Just like in the formal state ceremony, 12 torches were lit. In this case, they were meant to serve as a reminder of "violence and occupation" as well as the "injustices against the 'other' in Israel".
As in the past ten years, the ceremony took place at the spot where 'Peace Now' member Emil Greenzweig was killed during an anti-war demonstration in 1983.
Among the torch-bearers at the alternative service were Prof. Kelman Ettleman - a member of Israel's communist party, Johannes Bayu – the director of African refugee development, peace activist Anat Hoffman, human rights lawyer Gaby Laski, and women's rights activist Lakia Yardeni.
Bayu called on Israel to accept African refugees, stating that centuries of Jewish persecution had created an Israeli obligation to help others. "If Israel will not protect persecuted people, who will?" he said.
Another torch-bearer Tamir Foster, who had refused his call to reserves during the second Lebanon war, was told by his father prior to the ceremony: "Tali Fahima will be speaking before you; you'll be speaking after a corruptor of Israel."
Fahima, while lighting her torch, spoke in honor of, "Palestinian captives, political prisoners who are Israeli citizens, Lebanese captives in Israel, and the Israeli captives in Lebanon and Gaza." She also referred to the rocket-plagued residents of Sderot and the Western Negev as "captives of the Israeli government's destructive policy."
Fahima said that "Israel calls Palestinian political prisoners 'security prisoners' and uses this categorization as a tool to ignore the issue of the Palestinians' struggle for liberty.
"I call on anyone who wants in their own life liberty, mutual respect and equality to use their body as a human shield to stop Israel's violence in the territories, which is becoming crueler, and thus, tightening around our necks like a noose," she said.
Fahima served time in jail for contact with a foreign agent, transferring information to the enemy, and refusal to obey legal orders after her connections to Zubeidi were revealed. She was released in early 2007 on the condition that she is not allowed to leave the country or enter the Palestinian territories.
Regarding her connection with the al-Aqsa commander, Fahima said at the ceremony that "true friendship does not fall apart in a storm…The Shin Bet cannot destroy the strong connection between us or the hope that we have built."
