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Concert in Jericho called off
By Associated Press
Pulblished in numerous websites,
here taken from News 1130
October 11, 2007
http://www.news1130.com/news/entertainment/article.jsp?content=e101176A


JERICHO, West Bank - A West Bank peace concert for supporters of a two-state solution to the conflict with Israel has been called off because of security concerns, the organizer said late Thursday.

The concert was to have been held simultaneously in a football stadium in the West Bank town of Jericho and in a park in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv on Oct. 18.

The New York-based One Voice organization said the concerts were aimed at bolstering its campaign to collect one million signatures of ordinary Israelis and Palestinians demanding that their leaders sit down and finalize an agreement on a Palestinian state living at peace with Israel.

The concerts were to have been free, but concertgoers would have been asked to sign the One Voice petition.

Organizer Daniel Lubetzky said he decided Thursday to call off the Jericho event. `Extremist ideologists have threatened our participants in Jericho, and we felt it is our responsibility not to play with their lives,` he said, but did not provide details about the threats.

Lubetzky said the Tel Aviv concert would go ahead. `It is now all the more important for the people in Israel to speak with twice as loud a voice,` he said. `We plan to continue representing the voice of moderate Palestinian and Israeli citizens who an end to the conflict through a two-state solution.`

Canadian singer Bryan Adams, who had a series of multi-platinum albums during the 1980s and mid-1990s, was to have performed at both concerts, along with Israeli artists in Tel Aviv and Palestinian performers in Jericho.

Nearly 600,000 people - Israelis and Palestinians in roughly equal numbers - have signed the petition so far, said Lubetzky, a New York-based businessman.

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Cancelling Jericho Event - official One Voice announcement

http://blog.onevoicemovement.org/one_voice/2007/10/cancelling-jeri.html

The OneVoice Movement regrets that the Jericho Summit that was to be hosted by OneVoice Palestine on October 18th as part of its One Million Voices campaign is postponed due to security considerations.

This is a serious setback to the 600,000 Palestinian and Israeli signatories to the OneVoice Mandate, and to the millions of moderates in the region and worldwide who recognize the imperative of ending the conflict through a two-state solution.

The global responsibility of amplifying voices of moderates to help them seize back the agenda for conflict resolution is only further highlighted by this development. The OneVoice Summit in Tel Aviv and echo events worldwide will continue as planned, as will the overall campaign, One Million Voices To End The Conflict, across Israel and Palestine.



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Following is the debate between Daniel Lubetzky and the ISM and PACBI, as posted on their respective websites

Daniel Lubetzky: The Bad Guys Uncovered…
October 4th, 2007
http://blog.peaceworks.net/2007/10/the-bad-guys-uncovered/



Per my prior blog post, I could have placed my bet on who is behind the “boycott” of the OneVoice Summit…

…No one other than the “International Solidarity Movement.”

This is a fringe movement of extremists that do not support the two-state-solution, of any kind. It is not an issue of 67 borders, or Jerusalem, or refugee rights. Don’t let them hide behind any of that - because all of those issues have answers the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians support, embodied in the Clinton Parameters - and also in the Taba talks that Arafat himself fully endorsed.

If any one doubts that the ISM and all those opposing the OneVoice Summit are just ultimately the very extremists we seek to expose, just confront them and ask them. You will get evasive politicized answers that only will confirm these people are the “false messiahs” that promise absolute solutions to the Palestinians, only to manipulate them and deliver nothing to them.

The “International Solidarity Movement” has been exposed and defeated at numerous college campus events. Before, they could hide under the mantle of Palestinian nationalism, out of the comfort of their homes in Virginia.

But when OneVoice Youth Leaders from Palestine, from Gaza to Jenin, who are living with the consequences tell the public that they want a two-state-solution, they help unmask intransigent groups that rather eternal warfare than a historic compromise.

The problem does not exist among Palestinian extremist circles alone, who covet “all of Palestine” and will not accept the existence of a Jewish State by their side. There are parallel Jewish groups that want a “Greater Israel” and will not recognize a Palestinian State by their side.

They too get unmasked by mainstream Israelis that are just fed up with absolutists messing their lives for far too long.

They will try to hide behind diatribe and formulations, but the bottomline question you must ask them to expose them is, do you recognize the right of both the Israeli and Palestinian people to live in freedom, dignity, and with security - for two states to co-exist side by side?

Anyone that does not accept this formulation is either uninformed or hiding their absolutism.

One-State-Solution may be beautifully-intentioned but both the Israelis and the Palestinians want a separate State of their own. Eventually after peace comes you could hope for a confederacy agreement between proud independent states, but the fact is that the ONLY solution out there is the Two-State-Solution embodied in the Clinton Parameters - and the OneVoice Pillars available at www.OneVoiceMovement.org/negotiate.

There are just no other answers out there and it is time that we come to terms with that and not allow violent extremists to derail the hopes and dreams of millions for an end to the conflict.

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ISM: Giving credit where credit is due
http://www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/10/10/giving-credit-where-credit-is-due/

October 10th, 2007

It seems ISM has been accused of being behind another conspiracy theory. This time the backlash to the One Voice Normalization event is the fault of ISM. In fact, the only thing ISM has done about the event is repost a call to boycott from PACBI. Below you will find a response from PACBI, and a response from a solidarity activist.

PACBI wrote:

Dear Mr. Lubetzky,

This is in response to your having uncovered the bad guys. The statement that has been calling for a boycott of the Jericho Tel Aviv One Voice event was initiated by PACBI, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel in collaboration with several Palestinian cultural centers, and organizations.

The call is not the first call for a boycott of a normalization event, or project, nor will it be the last (please refer to our website www.pacbi.org). It is supported by a general call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions endorsed by over 170 Palestinian civil society organizations, better known as the call for BDS.

Our main aim of the statement (www.palsolidarity.org/main/2007/10/03/pacbi-celebrating-peace-or-camouflaging-apartheid/) is to inform the Palestinian public, that might be unaware, that they are being lured into attending a so called “free concert” or festival, when in fact they are being required to “vote” on a ten point mandate that would be the basis for a negotiated Peace.

We believe that your organization’s mandate contributes to the confusion that has been perpetuated by the state of Israel, and its various lobbying efforts all around the world, that aim to blur the distinction between the victim, and the victimizer, the oppressor, and the oppressed, and presents Palestinians and Israelis as equal partners on a bargaining table, with no regard to Palestinian right to self determination, freedom, equality and justice.


An Activist wrote:

By portraying the conflict as balanced between equal sides with equal responsibilities, and by defining the root of the problem as violence and extremism while ignoring the context of displacement, dispossession, and occupation, in which this violence and extremism occur, you are misrepresenting the conflict in a way that damages the chances of ever achieving a just solution.

The concept of two states has been co opted by the American and Israeli administrations to mean apartheid. The Israeli state annexing the settlement blocs and the Palestinians living in Bantustans. The concept of a just solution for the refugees has been co opted to mean the refugees giving up the right of return for a right to return to Israeli controlled open air prisons. That is the “Peace” that you are supporting.


earlier article on this subject:
http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=22717


A.K.
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