Talk Nation Radio for June 6, 2007
Marcy Newman joins us from the Shatila Refugee Camp in Beirut
Produced by Dori Smith at WHUS, Radio for the People, at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT http://www.whus.org
TRT: 29:29 (1:02 minutes of music fades at end)
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Scholar and humanitarian aid worker Marcy Newman discusses her organization’s emergency relief efforts for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. Some 250 families have arrived at the Shatila refugee camp in Beirut where, she says, ‘the poor are now helping the poor.’ More than half of the population of 35,000 Palestinian refugees in the Nahr el-Bared camp fled during fighting there as Palestinians mark forty years since the Six Day War with Israel.
Lebanese troops are bombing the camp and targeting the outside group that has take up residence there, ‘Fateh el-Islam.’ Marcy Newman stresses that this non Palestinian group brought the fighting to the camps but there is a lot more to the story. We hear about who they are, who has been supporting them and raise questions about a ‘proxy’ war as well as a ‘divide and conquer’ strategy involving state actors.
Marcy Newman is coordinator of the Nahr el-Bared relief campaign. She provides a web site Nahr El Bared Relief Campaign for those wishing to contribute to lifesaving aid efforts. The funds will be distributed through American University of Beirut where she is a professor.
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Music is by Fritz Heede.
Filed under: Human Rights, Lebanon, Media, Palestine, Refugees
I’ve just spent a half hour listening to your interview on radio. You are as facile and articulate in speech as you are on the printed page. However, I have come away with the impression that you should stick to what you do best — collecting aid, underwear and sanitary napkins for poor displaced persons. When you get into politics, you are capable of such distortion, logical somersaults, and “contextual” apologies so as to take my breath away. In your view, Hamas is multidimensional. They not only carry arms, they provide services and aid. In contrast, the US is utterly demonized. Any aid they provide is a “deal with the devil”. Their only purpose is pursue an evil scheme of divide and conquer. You mention the Harari’s twice, and cite Seymour Hersh (whose entire thesis is based on one unnamed source), in your descriptions of the origins of Fatah Al Islam. Yet Syria is mentioned once, and only in the “context” of describing the location of the camp as near its border, leaving out the fact that most Lebanese see them as the main mover behind this whole sad episode. Everything you say is one-sided. You push your ideas boldly forward with simple explanations and defensively take cover behind the “complexities” of the situation. Thank you for nailing down my prevailing idea that besides being brave and compassionate in the service of what you love blindly, you are basically an ideologue and a flake.
Arnie from NYC
Marcy, I admire so much the work you are doing and the important initiatives you have undertaken. Your kindness and generosity is so wonderful to see and certainly, if the public sphere did what you and your collaborators are doing on your own…..!!!!
Stay safe and strong.