Roger Waters strongly worded letter to Bon Jovi who performed in tel aviv on 3rd Oct, despite calls to boycott. He chose the side of oppression when he could've chosen justice.

Often in the past I have written detailed, and sometimes even persuasive, letters to colleagues in the music business, encouraging them not to give succor to the Israeli government’s apartheid policies by performing in Israel. Having read Jon’s comments last week in Yedioth Ahronoth, I won’t waste my time drawing parallels with Apartheid South Africa and the moral stand that so many artists took then and that thousands are taking now in the face of decades of Israeli oppression of Palestinians.

So the die is cast, you are determined to proceed with your gig in Tel Aviv on October 3. You are making your stand.

You stand shoulder to shoulder

With the settler who burned the baby

With the bulldozer driver who crushed Rachel Corrie

With the soldier who shot the soccer player’s feet to bits

With the sailor who shelled the boys on the beach

With the sniper who killed the kid in the green shirt

And the one who emptied his clip into the 13-year-old girl

And the Minister of Justice who called for genocide

You had a chance to stand

On the side of justice

With the pilot who refused to bomb refugee camps

With the teenager who chose eight prison terms over army service

With the prisoner who fasted for 266 days until freedom

With the doctor banned from entry for saving lives

With the farmer who was cut down marching to the wall

With the legless child growing up in the rubble

And the 550 others who won’t grow up at all

Because of the missiles and tank shells and bullets we sent

The dead can’t remind you of the crimes you’ve ignored. But, lest we forget, “To stand by silent and indifferent is the greatest crime of all.”

Roger Waters

Come listen and join his call for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) against Israel to end the seige of Gaza and the occupation of Palestine

BRIEF INTRODUCTION of DR MADS GILBERT

DR MADS GILBERT was born in 1947. He is a Norwegian physician and humanitarian activist. He is a specialist in anesthesiology and head of the emergency medicine department at the University Hospital of North Norway. He is a professor of emergency medicine at the University of Tromsø.

Dr Gilbert has a broad range of experience in international humanitarian work. He has volunteered at a kibbutz (Israel), Angola, Myanmar, Cambodia, Lebanon etc. Since 1970s, he has been actively involved with helping the Palestinians. He has served as a doctor several times in Palestine for NORWAC (Norway Aids Committee)

His home city of Tromsø is the twin town of Gaza since 2001. Tromsø has sent more health workers to Palestine than any other in the world.

His 2009 book "Eyes in Gaza" on the Gaza War has been translated into several languages. Dr Gilbert has been lauded as a "hero" on social media for his work in Gaza.

Dr Gilbert was on emergency assignment for the Norwegian Aid Committee (NORWAC) with the surgeon Dr Erik Fosse to support the humanitarian effort at al-Shifa Hospital during the 2008–2009 Israel–Gaza conflict. During this period foreign journalists were barred from entering the Gaza Strip. As international media reported from outside the conflict zone, Dr Gilbert maintained frequent contacts with Norwegian media, CNN, BBC, ABC and Al Jazeera.

Dr Gilbert draws a clear distinction between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. “I’m a strong anti-racist, there is not a milligram of anti-Semitism in me. But I oppose apartheid and colonialism.”

He adds "This is not a difficult conflict, it is an illegal occupation – it continues, it expands and it costs thousands of innocent Palestinian lives. These people have the right to defend themselves, the right to resist. The right to resist implies also the right to resist with arms, if you’re occupied.”

The number of people who turned up to listen to Dr Mads Gilbert was overwhelming. People were sitting on the floor and standing at the back and the sides of the hall. His talk was an eye opener to many and some were not quite prepared to see and hear what he had to reveal.

As one of VPM committee member posted on her Facebook:

I saw men cry. When Dr Mads Gilbert played a video of a little boy screaming from his injuries I saw grown men cry. The injured, the scarred, the besieged people of Gaza were seen today. The dead were heard today. In a way that will haunt us for a long time. Maybe forever.

And yet he says, "Gaza is the cradle of humanity. It's where you should go if you wanna know what it's like to be human."

Dr Musa Mohd Nordin, Chairman of Viva Palestine Malaysia announces the delivery of two fully-equipped ambulances to the clinic run by Doctors World Wide – Turkey in Khan Younis city in central Gaza, this week.

The ambulances and medical equipment, jointly sponsored by VPM and Kia Ora Gaza, will greatly assist the work of the clinic treating the large number of patients maimed by Israel’s relentless attacks on Gaza.

The handover of the ambulances has faced lengthy delays due to the tight siege that Israel and Egypt imposes on the Gaza Strip.

We thank all those who generously supported our medical appeal, which will also help replace the dozens of ambulances that were destroyed during Israel’s brutal 50-day war on Gaza last year.

In conjuction with IMAM’s Silver Jubilee Dinner, we are organising a first ever ‘Bid for Gaza.’ The bid will be Azizulhasni Awangs famous “Save Gaza” gloves during the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

Click here to bid

Rules and regulations:
1) Online bidding closes at 5pm, 1st oct 2015.
2) Final bidding will continue at the 25th IMAM Silver Jubilee Fundraising Dinner.
3) Winner will be announced during the 25th IMAM Silver Jubilee Fundraising Dinner.
4) If the winner is uncontactable by 3 working days, the gloves will be given to next highest bidder. Please give LATEST and CORRECT contact details.
5) All payments must be settled by 3 working days.
6) Price not including postage.
7) IMAM has the right to make the final decision

**All proceeds go to Viva Palestina Malaysia.

BDS National Committee (BNC) address to the conference in Malaysia held on 12 September 2015.

The 3 Icons are - Anna Baltzer, a Jewish-American author and activist for Palestinian human rights, Ali Hassan Abunimah, Executive Director of The Electronic Intifada, an independent online news publication focussing on Palestinian affairs, and Samah Sabawi, a Palestinian-Australian-Canadian writer, commentator, author and playwright.

For majority in Gaza & West Bank, Eid ul Adha is one of the rare occasions they can eat meat!.

Alhamdulillah we raised RM300,000.00 from Malaysians. May you all be bountifully blessed.

We issued food vouchers for the poor families to buy their food needs. This youtube shows how it works in Gaza City.

Through project No. (01/2015) activities Viva Palestina Malaysia in cooperation with Rowad Society at Gaza Strip distributed new groups of loans for micro finance projects which run by poor and needy families in Gaza Strip in order to develop their economic situations to enable them depend on themselves on providing their life costs especially the families that consist of large of members.

Tens of Palestinian families applied for getting this chance to develop their micro projects, but after filtering all applications by depending on logical case studies and families situations, Rowad society selected 7 cases to be the beneficiaries from the project, since the amount of loan for one project not exceed USD 2500.

1. Clothes shops (USD 2500) - North of Gaza City.
2. Library for selling stationery (USD 2500) - Nusserat camp - Middle of Gaza Strip.
3. Small Shop (USD 2000) - North of Gaza City.
4. Small Shop (USD 2500) - North of Gaza City.
5. Small car for selling cleaning materials - East of Gaza City.
6. Small Shop (USD 2500) - Gaza City.
7. Bees small farm (USD2500) - Khanuness - south of Gaza Strip.

Viva Palestine Malaysia and Rowad Society signed an agreement for implementing project No. (39/2015) "Poor Families Box" in Gaza Strip.

Poor Families Box project aims to help Palestinian poor families in providing some of their urgent needs, since the economic situation for thousands of Palestinian families in Gaza Strip is very bad, and there no incomes sources for them, so as a result for that the poor families are prevented from paying for “Renting their homes, Buying medicine, Providing baby’s needs, Providing gas cans for cooking, Providing food or transporting costs for their students to go school and universities” , so by this project VPM in cooperation with Rowad Society will try to solve some of these problems by providing for poor families some of what they need from the poor families box which will be Implemented by Rowad Society and funded by VPM office in Malaysia.

Sheikh Abdul Rahman Aljamal of Dar Alquraan AL Kriam had suggested we hold the first ever competition in Gaza for blind people to memorize the Quran. We had expected children and youth to participate but Alhamdulillah many blind senior citizens also came forward after hearing the announcement on the radio.

The competition was funded by private donations channeled through Viva Palestina Malaysia.

Project No: (16/2015)
Project Name: Providing 2 units of Halothane Vaporizer
Funded By: Viva Palestina Malaysia.
Implemented By:Palestinian Orphans house association
In cooperation with:Yafa charity hospital
Project Description: the project aims to provide two units of Halothane Vaporizer to add for Anesthesia device in surgery operating room in Yafa hospital, this gas used in anesthetic children during the surgery operations. Yafa hospital is a charity hospital works on serving poor and needy families in middle of Gaza Strip governorate at medical sector, and it running costs depends on the donation from kind people, and the medical treatment give to beneficiaries in discounted prices reach to 100%.

Alhamdulillah, Great Thank to Viva Palestina Donors, May Allah accept from them, and bless their kind work.

Project No: (35/2015)
Project Name: Collective Iftar in Al Aqsa area.
Targeted Group: 500 of Al Aqsa visitors and prayers.
Funded By: Viva Palestina Malaysia.
Implemented By: Al Aqsa association for protecting and Maintenance of Islamic Waqf - Jerusalem.

1 July 2015

Project No: (33/2015)
Project Name: Ramadan Food Vouchers.
Targeted Group: 500 Families.
Targeted area: Ramallah & Hebron - West Bank.
Funded By: Viva Palestina Malaysia.
Implemented By: Islamic charitable society - Hebron.
In cooperation with: Ramallah Zakat committee.

1 July 2015

Project No: (37/2015)
Project Name: Distribution of Ramadan Food Baskets.
Targeted Group: 250 Families of Palestinian refugees in South of Turkey.
Implemented By: Hayat Yolu - Turkey.