The Peace People

News - Delegation to Jerusalem supports Mordechai Vanunu

25 April 2005

Raging Grannies support Vanunu at Dimona

Mordechai, Mordechai, sit quietly! (Don't want to.)
Shut your mouth! (Don't want to.)
Behave yourself! (Don't want to.)
OK, then back to prison! (I'm not afraid!)

The old reactor stands there,
Not shiny, like at first.
From old age it shakes there.
Like Chernobyl, it's apt to burst! (It will burst!)

Mordechai, Mordechai, keep away from the press! (Don't want to!)
It's stupid! Don't talk to them! (I want to!)
When will you learn to shut up? (Never!)
So the "SHABAK" will come and eat you up, ahmmmm!

Mordechai Vanunu - out of prison but still not free

Mordechai Vanunu, Israel's nuclear whistle-blower, remains a prisoner of Israel one year after he was officially released from prison in Ashkelon. An Irish delegation from the Peace People spent the week in Israel with international friends from various other groups and organisations to be with the whistle-blower on the first anniversary of his freedom-but-not-freedom in Israel. The report below is based on an eye witness account without detailed notes.

The Irish visitors were: Kevin Cassidy (Chairperson), Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Ann Patterson, Regina O'Callaghan and Justin Morahan.

Visit to Irish Embassy

Mairead, Kevin, Ann and Justin visited the Deputy Head of Mission, Mr Philip Grant, at the Irish Embassy in Tel Aviv on the 19th (the Ambassador was on holidays) and had a long discussion and briefing about Mordechai over a lunch hosted by Mr Grant.

The Deputy Head was courteous, sympathetic and as helpful as he possibly could be. However on the crucial issues of Ireland providing asylum for Mordechai or giving him an Irish passport, he has no power to play any significant role.

The Knesset Meeting

Mairead Corrigan Maguire attended this Committee meeting and addressed members there. It was a highly charged atmosphere. Uri Avnery who also attended as a former member of the Knesset wrote afterwards:

"In the course of the session, Knesset members cursed each other in the language of fishmongers (by which I mean no offense to fishmongers). Two Likud members, Ronie Bar-On (who once served for several hours as Attorney General before being ignominiously removed) and Yehiel Hazan shouted that Vanunu had no human rights, since he was not a human being. It should be mentioned in all fairness that the chairman of the committee, Michael Eytan, also a Likud member, strongly condemned these utterances".

The Committee eventually agreed to meet again to discuss the Vanunu issue.

Protests outside Departments in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv

On Tuesday members of the team protested outside the Department of Justice, Jerusalem, where Ernest Rodker was arrested briefly and David Polden was accompanied to the police station to view the regulations. That evening they held a candle-light vigil and sang "A dream of Peace" and other songs in Paris Park, Jerusalem, near the HQ of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. (Paris Park is the officially recognised protest spot for actions protesting against the Prime Minister, and Women in Black hold weekly vigils there on the Palestinian question). On Wednesday a protest outside the Department of Defence in Tel Aviv passed without incident. All actions were accompanied by leafleting, postering and Ben Inman on his new trumpet.

Honours bestowed on Mordechai

During the week, several honours were bestowed on Mordechai including the Right Livelihood Award and the Yoko Ono Lennon Award. On 21st April he was formally inaugurated in Glasgow as Rector of Glasgow University.

Report from Protest at Dimona

On Thursday, 21 April 2005 the international team travelled to Dimona nuclear reactor to protest against the renewal of restrictions on Mordechai Vanunu. Dimona is the location of Israel's nuclear reactor at which Mordechai worked and some of whose secrets he unlocked to the world nineteen years ago. Two minutes silence was observed in the scorching heat on the barren landscape facing Dimona's nuclear reactor Several speakers addressed the protestors, including Mairead Corrigan Maguire, (Ireland), Rayna Moss (Israel), Ryoko Noma (Hiroshima), Carmel Martin (London), Kathy Kelly (Chicago), Knesset member Issam Makhoul, Mati Shmuelov (Israeli poet)and Akiva Orr (Israel). Protestors scattered ashes on the site of their vigil within view of the Dimona reactor. Vanunu's poem "I am your Spy" was read by Justin Morahan in his new Irish translation, "Is Mise bhur Spiaire". Ben Inman provided music and The Raging Grannies (Israel) performed a number of animated songs of protest.

Letter to Sharon

On Friday, 22 April, at a morning vigil at the Paris Park, protestors held portraits of Mordechai Vanunu and signs that read "We are all Mordechai Vanunu" and "Wherever we are, Vanunu Is" along with the names of the places from which the delegates had come. The vigil was followed by a slow procession to the Sharon HQ where an attempt to hand in or read a letter was prevented by Mossad, Ann Patterson acting as negotiator. Police escorted the delegation back to the Park where Justin read the signed letter publicly. It was later posted to Mr Sharon in the post tray at the College of St George.

Mordechai's Thanks to his Supporters

On Friday evening, after a final meeting, Mordechai Vanunu thanked the international delegates for having come to Israel to be with him, one year after his official release. He thanked supporters everywhere and pledged that he would always oppose nuclear proliferation so that we would have a nuclear free world.

Other Events

Several other actions were initiated over the week, including a vigil outside the Knesset during the Committee hearing on Vanunu for which the Knesset had been especially re-convened. Mordechai's adoptive parents, Nick and Mary Eoloff, Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire, English actress Susannah York, Rayna Moss, Issam Makhoul, and others gave several interviews and made impassioned statements during press conferences; Embassies were visited by delegates and new private contacts were made with sympathetic groups.

A final meeting organized and chaired by Kevin Cassidy, with Kathy Kelly (Voices in the Wilderness) as secretary, succeeded in reviewing the week's work and drawing up a list of possible future actions at home.

Over and over again, at the various Press Conferences, speakers called on Israel to release Mordechai Vanunu. Mairead Corrigan Maguire also called repeatedly on the Israeli Government to submit to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and to send a delegation to the 2005 NPT Review Conference in United Nations, N.Y., next month. The human Family, she said, is demanding a world without nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction, and we wish to see not only a Middle East free of all w.m.d. but also America and the World. To this end we support the work of the 2005 Review Conference and place our trust in it to make the world safer for us all. Issam Makhoul told the parable of the chicken and the grain of wheat. (A man had the illusion that he was a grain of wheat and was afraid of chickens. After treatment, he no longer thought himself as such, but was still afraid of chickens. He explained to his psychiatrist that, while he knew he was not a grain of wheat, he wasn't certain that the chickens knew this). Issam called on Israel not to think of herself as a grain of wheat.

The five Peace People acted as a team in Israel, all giving the fullest possible commitment and support to Mordechai, to one another and to the international delegation.