How

Solidarity’s expanding activities entail mounting US residents may make a tax-exempt donation via the
costs. With more than 160 activists arrested, and New Israel Fund (NIF). Checks should be made
40 indictments pending (all for “illegal assembly”), payable to “New Israel Fund”. A note with the check

you
legal expenses alone are increasingly burdensome. should be marked donor-advised to The Democracy
In addition, transportation and printing expenses Defense Fund, ID# 50040.” f

are on the rise. All donations to the Solidarity

Movement go directly into on-the-ground activity: NIF Address in Washington: f NIF Bank details: f

can
no wages, no offices, no overhead.F New Israel Fund Citibank
Organize a speaking engagement in your P.O.Box 91588 Leesburg Pike 8516
community: .j Washington DC Vienna, VA 22182

help
contact us at info@solidarity.org.il 20090-1588 Account # 15411834
U.S.A ABA # 254070116
Donate: f SWIFT: CITIUS33
Online donations can be made at: Account Holder: New Israel Fund
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Growth
Checks in any currency can be mailed to the
Democracy Defense Fund, P.O Box 10393, Please send a note informing us of your donation to: info@solidarity.org.il
Jerusalem, 91103, Israel.d

Today, Solidarity is arguably the largest, most vibrant Bank transfers can be made to:t Haaretz senior political analyst Akiva Eldar:
and influential group in Israel arguing for democratic Democracy Defense Fund Ltd. (cc)
“the struggle over Sheikh Jarrah has become the
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renewal and peace. Many commentators in Israel and Bank Hapoalim (#12) f

around the world view Solidarity as the one chance to Branch 574 way to revive the Israeli left and build a bridge
rejuvenate the Israeli left. 38 apalmach Street, Jerusalem, Israel
d
H

Israeli Account Number: 12-574-254781

connecting Jews and Arabs.” Haaretz, 12/31/10
IBAN: IL56-0125-7400-0000-0254-781 The Solidarity Movement, which has grown from weekly
SWIFT: POALILIT protests in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, is a
grassroots organization working towards civil equality within
{Ido, Nisan & Sany}

Israel and an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. With

hundreds of activists, and a record of consistent, principled
resistance to violations of democratic values, Solidarity is the
Israeli left’s new voice.c

Background
The immediate context for Solidarity’s emergence was the forced
eviction of four Palestinian families from their East Jerusalem
homes in 2009, along with the imminent threat of eviction of
additional families. These Palestinians are all former refugees who
escaped their erstwhile houses during the 1948 war. Arriving in
then Jordanian ruled East Jerusalem, they waived their UN refugee
cards in exchange for the right to build houses on a vacant lot in
the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. f
After Israel’s occupation of East Jerusalem in 1967, Jewish organi-
zations claimed ownership over these houses by virtue of Ottoman
deeds dating back to the 19th century. The families, however,
were not allowed to regain ownership over their former properties
in Israel, though backed by similar Ottoman deeds. Indeed, while
Israel’s “Absentee Properties Law” officially strips Palestinians of
ownership rights over their pre-1948 properties, Jews are free to
reclaim possession of prewar assets. This inequality before the law
is responsible for the current crisis in Sheikh Jarrah. f
Bernard Avishai: “Solidarity is poised to become
a transformative movement. Its young leadership
instructs and inspires me. Here are the future
leaders of Israel’s global democracy.”
y
Activism
The struggle against injustice in Sheikh Jarrah quickly turned
into a vibrant political movement. Each Friday, hundreds of
protesters from all over Israel congregate in the small
neighborhood, standing shoulder to shoulder with local
Palestinians. Trying to suppress the protest, Israeli authorities
arrested more than 160 activists; yet the demonstrations only
grew in numbers and influence. F
In addition to hundreds of young activists, these
demonstrations have drawn leading Israeli public figures such
as author David Grossman, former Speaker of the Knesset
Avrum Burg, and Nobel Prize laureate Daniel Kahneman as well
as international luminaries such as President Jimmy Carter and
author Mario Vargas Llosa. On March 6th, more than 4,000
people descended on the neighborhood for one of the largest
and most inspiring Israeli-Palestinian rallies in recent history.
Sheikh Jarrah subsequently became a symbol and rallying call
for the struggle against occupation, discrimination and
dispossession in Israel and Palestine. D
Peter Beinart: “For several months now, a group
of Israeli students has been traveling every
Friday to the East Jerusalem neighborhood of
Sheikh Jarrah... Although repeatedly arrested for
protesting without a permit, and called traitors
and self-haters by the Israeli right, the students
keep coming, their numbers now swelling into the
thousands. What if American Jewish organizations
brought these young people to speak at Hillel?
What if this was the face of Zionism shown to
America’s Jewish young?” D
‘The Failure of the American Jewish
C
Establishment’, NYRB, May 2010
Novelist David Grossman: “We have something to Fight for
and something to struggle for. People have to understand
this and come here, because this is the place, more than any
other place today, to protest and confront the root of the
occupation, where you can identify with the motives and with
a just cause that can hardly be questioned.”F
Speech at Sheikh Jarrah, 4/9/2010
Beyond
Sheikh Jarrah
The distortions of four decades of occupation have
thoroughly pervaded Israeli society. Solidarity fights
oppression and discrimination on both sides on the
Green Line. We believe that democracy cannot coexist
with ethnic privilege. Solidarity activists work in both East
Jerusalem and Israeli-Arab towns and villages where
residents face evictions, house demolitions, and system-
atic discrimination. In addition to the Friday demonstra-
tions in East Jerusalem, weekly demonstrations are held
in the city of Lod, where demolition orders threaten more
than 1,500 Arab families. f
Solidarity also struggles for housing rights in the Arab city
of Taybeh, and in the Jewish city of Beit She’an, where
Jewish public housing tenants fight to hold on to their
apartments. The Movement’s student groups (in four
university and college campuses) focus on exposing
students to local struggles by initiating talks and discus-
sions, and, most importantly, field excursions.f