I am traveling with other American and Israeli peace activists to Palestine to plant olive tree saplings early this February. You can read all about the trip at http://pdamerica.org/articles/news/2008-01-14-07-40-04-news.php.
If you want to purchase a tree for planting in Palestine by donating on line please use the following funds collection link https://salsa.wiredforchange.com/o/1285/t/755/shop/custom.jsp?donate_page_KEY=1911 or by sending a check for $10.00 or more per sapling to Plant Healing, P.O. Box 2712, Orleans, MA 02653.
In solidarity, with love, B.
PDA is partnered this February, 2008 with the Trees of Reconciliation project of Jewish Voice for Peace, Plant Healing, and the Olive Tree Movement in Israel and Palestine to plant olive tree saplings on land in West Bank villages where Palestinian farming families have been denied access to their orchards by the Israeli government's separation/apartheid wall.
Literally thousands of Palestinian farmers have not been allowed to work their ancestral farms and fields because, by Israeli decree, if land in Palestine remains uncultivated for three years the Israeli government claims it as unused. Planting olive tree saplings on such seized land, therefore, is not merely a symbolic action, but one with immense practical significance, one in which your contribution actually creates and maintains olive tree groves that provide sustainable incomes for Palestinian families and helps Palestinians keep their land.
Please help make a real difference in Palestine today by going online to purchase a tree for planting in Palestine, or send a check for $10.00 or more per sapling to Plant Healing, P.O. Box 2712, Orleans, MA 02653. PDA's goal is to plant a grove of at least 150 trees this February.
PDA's Israel Palestine Working Group co-chair, Bruce Taub, will personally be going to coordinate PDA's olive tree planting efforts in Ja'ayus, an ancient Palestinian village of about 650 households, where over 400 of 650 heads of households have been denied access by the Israeli authorities to their farm lands. And, although Ja'ayus lies fully six kilometers on the Palestinian side of the long-recognized Israel/Palestine border, the Green Line, the Apartheid Wall the Israelis have constructed runs right through the heart of the village, separating the farmers from their lands, isolating 8,600 dunums (75% of Ja'ayus' land) from the villagers, and making it virtually impossible for farmers to attend to their trees. During construction of the Wall alone, over 4,000 trees were uprooted in Ja'ayus. Multiply this by hundreds of Palestinian villages to get a true sense of what is going on in Palestine, where agricultural experts estimate over one million olive trees have been uprooted and destroyed by Israel since its creation in 1948, almost half of those trees during the past 7 years.
Olive trees are not only symbols of peace, they are part of the very life blood of the Palestinian people. Plant an Olive Tree sapling in Palestine this February. Bruce assures us he will keep track of every contribution received and will report back to you personally where and when your trees were planted.
