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In memory of Rachel Corrie, I wrote this March 17, 2003, updated 2/16/04

Rachel Corrie was an incredibly good person. I mourn and am very saddened by her murder on Sunday, March 16th, 2003. She was killed by a bulldozer as the Israeli military ran over her as she was protesting the destruction of Palestinian homes in in the . I originally met her when she was a student in the Options program at Lincoln Elementary school in 1989. She was a friend of my son and played on the same YMCA basketball team as my daughter. Rachel and I talked a lot the last two years and marched together at various demonstrations, for example, May Day 2002. Rachel was a totally caring and gentle person who loved life and was outraged by oppression wherever it took place and had become very active working for social justice and peace. Rachel was a very modest, courageous and responsible person who was the heart and soul of the Olympia Movement for Justice and Peace, a group she had originally begun working with as part of her study in the Local Knowledge program taught by Anne Fischel and Lin Nelson at Evergreen.. Rachel was very active in opposing the U.S. "war against terror" and U.S. militarism. One project she threw her mind and body into was a September 11th, 2002 day of remembrance for the people killed at the World Trade center a year earlier and for the people killed by the U.S. military in Afghanistan over the following year. This event, at Percival Landing in downtown Olympia, also included a speak out against repression in the . She got a lot of elementary school kids and classes to participate. So it is very fitting that the vigil on Sunday, March 16th, against the war in Iraq and to honor and mourn Rachel, was at Percival Landing. Close to 1000 people attended.

Rachel was a very reflective person who constantly thought about how to link together various groups working for justice, e.g., the labor movement and the peace movement. She volunteered at the Labor Education and Research Center and played a major role in organizing a conference dealing with networking and strategies for justice and peace last spring, 2002. Another major concern of hers was to involve the local Olympia community that was not connected to Evergreen to the anti- war and economic and social justice issues and groups. Besides going to the Evergreen State College, Rachel also worked at BHR, a local mental health clinic and was active in her union local, 1199, a part of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

Justice for the Palestinian people was one of many issues Rachel felt deeply about. She strongly opposed the Israeli occupation and supported a Palestinian state. For Rachel, feeling deeply always meant also doing something about her concerns. She had studied at Evergreen and decided to go to the Gaza strip in occupied Palestine for winter quarter, 2003. Part of her reasoning was that it was important to have international observers there as Israeli aggression was likely to increase when the U.S. attacked, bombed and invaded Iraq. This has certainly been borne out in the 11 months since U.S. invaded Iraq, Rafah has been under continual attack as has been most of Gaza and the . Rachel strongly opposed the U.S. war against Iraq. She was aware of the dangers and risks of going to Gaza. Rachel loved life, she did not have a death wish. She loved life not only for herself but for all people and was committed to creating a world - 2 -

where all people had real possibilities for self-dignity and economic and social justice. She left Olympia in January, 2003 went to the West Bank and then Gaza, threw herself fully into human rights activism, learning from and solidarity with the Palestinian people. She volunteered with the International Solidarity Movement, people from around the world who have been witnesses to Israeli attacks on in the West Bank and Gaza and involve themselves in non-violent protest against the Israeli occupation. .

Rachel Corrie was killed by the Israeli military in Rafah. Let us all take a moment to reflect not only to reflect on her death and the death of thousands of Palestinians, but also on what each of us can do to carry on her legacy by doing a little more to oppose the U.S. war and occupation of Iraq, support a Palestinian state, and further justice, equality and peace in the Middle East, around the world and in the U.S. As we reflect on her legacy, and what we can do let us not make into her a saint although she was a very impressive person, ordinary and extraordinary at the same time, like so many others. We can carry on Rachel’s legacy by challenging U.S. foreign policy and militarism, and also the economic violence caused by groups such as the IMF and the proposed FTAA. As Rachel did in her short but productive life, we need to make connections between U.S. supported injustice abroad with the attacks on people in the U.S.; the Patriot Act, the obscene economic and social inequality, environmental destruction, the attack on labor unions and working people, the growing number of people in poverty and without health care, homelessness and the lack of affordable housing, the increase in college tuition that is making colleges increasingly out of the reach of the majority. Rachel made these connections in her daily activities and activism. Moreover, she saw the need to build social movements and organizations that crossed the town-gown divide, that respected working people and involved people in developing a political economic analysis that made sense of the causes of oppression at home and abroad, that confronted an unjust economic system and those who wielded power in it, and looked to alternatives to capitalism as necessary for liberation.

A few more words, 11 months after her murder 1.) The awareness of injustice against Palestinians by and the immoral U.S. support for Israeli policy has grown significantly in Olympia since Rachel’s murder. Rachel’s idea of developing relations between Rafah and the Olympia area has grown impressively as has support for Palestinians and challenges to U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. This is very important and impressive. It is sad that it took Rachel’s murder for this to happen. It is inspiring that she and her parents always put her life in the context of them any other people in Palestine who have been repressed. While we need to not allow anti-Semitism into our movements, this was a major concern of Rachel’s, we must not permit false charges of anti-Semitism to intimidate us in our support of the Palestinian struggle for self-determination and justice.

2) All of the issues that Rachel cared so much about-the end of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Jerusalem and Gaza, opposing U.S. militarism and the WTO, and low wages and bad working conditions, poverty and homelessness here are as pressing as they were a year ago. If each of us can be a little more active in working for justice, locally, nationally and internationally, in joining groups or forming them, we will see some - 3 - progress when we come back together in a year, two years. We need to be long-distance runners for human rights and justice not sprinters.

Le us raise these issues in the presidential campaigns not just do a lesser of two evils politics. Thank you,

Peter Bohmer faculty member, the Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA 360 867-6431