Mairead Maguire[1][2]
Mairead Maguire, July 2009
Born	Mairead Corrigan (1944-01-27) 27 January 1944 (age 68) Belfast, Northern Ireland[3]
Other names	Mairead Corrigan Maguire
Alma mater	Irish School of Ecumenics
Organization	The Peace People, The Nobel Women's Initiative
Known for	International social activist
Influenced by	Jesus, Gandhi, Tolstoy, Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Thich Nhat Hanh, John Dear[4]
Religion	Christian
Denomination	Catholic[3]
Spouse	Jackie Maguire (m. 1981–present)[5]
Children	2 (5)[1][5]
Relatives	Anne Maguire (sister)
Awards	Nobel Peace Prize (1976) Norwegian People's Peace Prize (1976)[6] Carl von Ossietzky Medal (1976)[7] Pacem in Terris (1990)

Mairead Maguire (born 27 January 1944), also known as Mairead Corrigan Maguire and formerly as Mairéad Corrigan, is a Northern Irish^[8] peace activist. She co-founded, with Betty Williams and Ciaran McKeown, the Community of Peace People, an organisation dedicated to encouraging a peaceful resolution of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.^[9] Maguire and Williams were awarded the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize.^[10] Maguire has also won several other awards.

In recent years, she has criticized the Israeli government's policy towards Gaza, in particular to the naval blockade. In June 2010, Maguire went on board the MV Rachel Corrie as part of a flotilla that unsuccessfully attempted to breach the blockade.

Early life (1944–1976)[link]

Maguire was born into a Roman Catholic community in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the second of seven children – five sisters and two brothers. Her parents were Andrew and Margaret Corrigan.^[11][12] She attended St. Vincent's Primary School, a private Catholic school, until the age of 14, at which time her family could no longer pay for her schooling. After working for a time as a babysitter at a Catholic community center, she was able to save enough money to enroll in a year of business classes at Miss Gordon's Commercial College, which led her at the age of 16 to a job as an accounting clerk with a local factory. She volunteered regularly with the Legion of Mary, spending her evenings and weekends working with children and visiting interns at Long Kesh prison. When she was 21 she began working as a secretary for the Guinness brewery, where she remained employed until December 1976.^{[13][14][15][16]}

Northern Ireland peace movement (1976–1980)[link]

Maguire became active with the Northern Ireland peace movement after three children of her sister, Anne Maguire, were run over and killed by a car driven by Danny Lennon, a Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) operator who had been fatally shot by British troops while trying to make a getaway. Danny Lennon had been released from prison in April 1976 after serving three years for suspected involvement in the PIRA.^[17] On 10 August, Lennon and comrade John Chillingworth were transporting an Armalite rifle through Andersonstown, Belfast, when British troops, claiming to have seen a rifle pointed at them,^[18] opened fire on the vehicle, instantly killing Lennon and critically wounding Chillingworth. The car Lennon drove went out of control and mounted a pavement on Finaghy Road North, colliding with Anne Maguire and three of her children who were out shopping.^[19] Joanne (8) and Andrew (6 weeks) died at the scene; John Maguire (2) succumbed to his injuries at a hospital the following day.^[20]

Betty Williams, a resident of Andersonstown who happened to be driving by, claimed to have witnessed the tragedy and accused the IRA of firing at the British patrol and provoking the incident.^[21] In the days that followed she began gathering signatures for a peace petition from Protestants and Catholics and was able to assemble some 200 women to march for peace in Belfast. The march passed near the home of Mairead Maguire (then Mairead Corrigan) and, joining it, she and Williams thus became "the joint leaders of a virtually spontaneous mass movement."^[22]

The next march, whose destination was the burial sites of the three Maguire children, brought 10,000 Protestant and Catholic women together. The marchers, including Maguire and Williams, were physically attacked by PIRA members. By the end of the month Maguire and Williams had brought 35,000 people onto the streets of Belfast petitioning for peace between the republican and loyalist factions.^[23] Initially adopting the name "Women for Peace," the movement changed its name to the gender-neutral "Community of Peace People," or simply "Peace People," when Irish Press correspondent Ciaran McKeown joined.^[24] In contrast with the prevailing climate at the time,^[25] Maguire was convinced that the most effective way to end the violence was not violence but re-education.^[26] She received the Nobel Peace Prize with Betty Williams in 1977 (the prize for 1976) for their efforts.^[10] 32 at the time, she was the youngest Nobel Peace Prize laureate until Tawakel Karman`s peace prize in 2011.^[27]

After the Nobel Prize (1980–present)[link]

Though Betty Williams resigned from the Peace People in 1980,^[28] Maguire has continued her involvement in the organisation to this day. It has since taken on a more global agenda, addressing an array of social and political issues from around the world.

Jackie and Mairead Maguire

In January 1980, after a prolonged battle with depression over the loss of her children in the 1976 Finaghy Road incident, Mairead Maguire's sister Anne finally committed suicide by slashing her wrists and throat.^[29][30][31] A year and a half later, in September 1981, Mairead married Jackie Maguire, who was her late sister's widower.^[32] She has three stepchildren and two of her own, John Francis (b. 1982) and Luke (b. 1984).^[11]

In 1981 Maguire co-founded the Committee on the Administration of Justice, a nonsectarian organisation dedicated to defending human rights.^[11][33]

She is a member^[when?] of the pro-life group Consistent Life Ethic, which is against abortion, capital punishment and euthanasia.^{[34][Third-party source needed]}

Maguire has been involved in a number of campaigns on behalf of political prisoners around the world. In 1993 Maguire and six other Nobel Peace Prize laureates tried unsuccessfully to enter Myanmar from Thailand to protest the protracted detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.^[35] She was a first signatory on a 2008 petition calling for Turkey to end its torture of Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan.^[36] In October 2010, she signed a petition calling for China to release Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo from house arrest.^[37]

Maguire was selected in 2003 to serve on the honorary board of the International Coalition for the Decade, a coalition of national and international groups, presided over by Christian Renoux, whose aim is to promote the United Nations' 1998 vision of the first decade of the twenty-first century as the International Decade for the Promotion of a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World.^[38][39]

In 2006, Maguire was one of the founders of the Nobel Women's Initiative along with fellow Peace Prize laureates Betty Williams, Shirin Ebadi, Wangari Maathai, Jody Williams, and Rigoberta Menchu Tum. The Initiative describes itself as six women representing North and South America, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa who decided to bring together their "extraordinary experiences in a united effort for peace with justice and equality" and "to help strengthen work being done in support of women's rights around the world."^[40]

United States[link]

Mairead Maguire is an outspoken critic of U.S. and British policy in the Middle East, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan. She has also been personally critical of U.S. President Barack Obama’s leadership. Her activism in the U.S. has occasionally brought her into confrontations with the law.

Iraq and Afghanistan[link]

Following Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 661, imposing various economic sanctions on Iraq in order to compel it to withdraw its troops from Kuwait. In January 1991, after Iraq’s refusal to comply with Resolution 678, the United States and Britain led a coalition of thirty-four nations to war, with the goal of expelling Iraq’s troops from Kuwait and liberating it by force. Though the Gulf War officially ended in March 1991, the economic sanctions continued until May 2003 and are believed to have resulted in hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths.

Mairead Maguire voiced strong opposition to the U.N. sanctions, calling them "unjust and inhuman," "a new kind of bomb," and "even more cruel than weapons."^[41] During a visit to Baghdad with Argentinian colleague Adolfo Perez Esquivel in March 1999, Maguire urged then-U.S. President Bill Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to end the bombing of Iraq and to allow for the U.N. sanctions to be lifted. "I have seen children dying with their mothers next to them and not being able to do anything," Maguire said. "They are not soldiers."^[42][43]

In the aftermath of al-Qaeda's attacks on the U.S. in September 2001, as it became clear that the U.S. would retaliate and deploy troops in Afghanistan, Maguire campaigned against the impending war. In India she claimed to have marched with "hundreds of thousands of Indian people walking for peace."^[44] In New York, Maguire was reported to have marched with 10,000 protesters, including families of 9/11 victims, as U.S. war planes were already en route to strike Taliban targets in Afghanistan.^[45]

In the period leading up to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, Mairead Maguire campaigned vigorously against the anticipated hostilities. Speaking at the 23rd War Resisters' International Conference in Dublin, Ireland in August 2002, Maguire called on the Irish government to oppose the Iraq War "in every European and world forum of which they are a part."^[46][47] On 17 March 2003, St. Patrick's Day, Maguire protested the war outside the United Nations Headquarters with, among other activists, Frida Berrigan. On 19 March, Maguire addressed an audience of 300 people in a chapel at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y. "Armies with all their advanced weapons of mass destruction are facing the Iraqi people who have nothing," she told the crowd. "In anybody's language, it's not fair."^[48] Around this time, Maguire held a 30-day vigil and began a 40-day liquid fast outside the White House, joined by members of Pax Christi USA and Christian church leaders. As the war got under way in the days that followed, Maguire described the invasion as an "ongoing and shameful slaughter." "Daily we sit, facing Mecca in solidarity with our Muslim brothers and sisters in Iraq, and we ask Allah for forgiveness," she said in a statement to the press on 31 March.^[49][50][51] Maguire would later remark that the media in the U.S. distorted news from Iraq and that the Iraq War was carried out in pursuit of American "economic and military interests."^[52] In February 2006 she expressed her belief that George W. Bush and Tony Blair "should be made accountable for illegally taking the world to war and for war crimes against humanity."^[53]

Criticism of President Barack Obama[link]

Maguire expressed disappointment with the choice of U.S. President Barack Obama as winner of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. "They say this is for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and co-operation between peoples," she said, "and yet he continues the policy of militarism and occupation of Afghanistan, instead of dialogue and negotiations with all the parties to the conflict. [...] Giving this award to the leader of the most militarised country in the world, which has taken the human family against its will to war, will rightly be seen by many people around the world as a reward for his country’s aggression and domination."^[54]

After declining to meet with the Dalai Lama during his visit to the U.S. in 2008, citing conflicting travel schedules,^[55] Obama shirked a visit with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader again in 2009. Maguire condemned what she considered Obama's deliberate refusal to meet with the Dalai Lama, calling it "horrifying."^[56]

Speaking at the Carl von Ossietzky Medal Award Ceremony in Berlin in December 2010, Maguire imputed criminal accountability to President Obama for violation of international law. "When President Obama says he wants to see a world without nuclear weapons and says, in respect of Iran and their alleged nuclear weapons ambitions, that 'all option [sic] are on the table,' this is clearly a threat to use nuclear weapons, clearly a criminal threat against Iran, under the world court advisory opinion. The Nuremberg Charter of August 8, 1945 says the threat or use of nuclear weapons is criminal, so officials in all nine nuclear weapons states who maintain and use nuclear deterrence as a threat are committing crimes and breaking international law."^[57]

Confrontations with the law[link]

Mairead Maguire was twice arrested in the United States. On 17 March 2003, Maguire was arrested outside the United Nations compound in New York City during a protest against the Iraq War. Later that month, on 27 March, she was one of 65 anti-war protesters briefly taken into custody by police after penetrating a security barricade near the White House.^[58][59]

In May 2009, following a visit to Guatemala, immigration authorities at the Houston Airport in Texas detained Maguire for a number of hours, during which time she was questioned, fingerprinted and photographed, and consequently missed her connection flight to Northern Ireland. "They insisted I must tick the box in the Immigration form admitting to criminal activities," she explained.^[60] In late July that same year, Maguire was again detained by immigration authorities, this time at the Dulles International Airport in Virginia, on her way from Ireland to New Mexico to meet with colleague Jody Williams. As in May, the delay resulted in Maguire missing her connection flight and she was forced to seek overnight accommodations in Washington.^[61]

Israel[link]

Mairead Maguire first visited Israel at age 40^{[year needed]}. She came then as part of an interfaith initiative seeking forgiveness from Jews for years of persecution by Christians in Jesus' name. Her second visit was in June 2000, this time in response to invitations from Rabbis for Human Rights and the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. The two groups had taken upon themselves to defend Ahmed Shamasneh in an Israeli military court against charges of illegally constructing his home in the West Bank town of Qatanna, and Maguire came to observe the court proceedings and support the Shamasneh family.^[62][63]

Maguire has at times been fiercely critical of the State of Israel, even calling for its membership in the United Nations to be revoked or suspended.^[64] She has accused the Israeli government of "carrying out a policy of ethnic cleansing against Palestinians...in east Jerusalem"^[65] and supports boycott and divestment initiatives against Israel.^[66][67] Concomitantly, Maguire has also said that she loves Israel^[68][69] and that "to live in Israel for Jewish people, is to live in fear of suicide bombs and Kassam rockets."^[70]

Mordechai Vanunu advocacy[link]

Mairead Maguire has been a vocal supporter of Mordechai Vanunu, a former Israeli nuclear technician who revealed details of Israel's nuclear defence program to the British press in 1986 and subsequently served 18 years in prison for treason.^[71] Maguire flew to Israel in April 2004 to greet Vanunu upon his release^[72] and has since flown to meet with him in Israel numerous times.

Maguire has described as "draconian" the terms of Vanunu's parole – including a special order prohibiting contact with foreign journalists and a refusal to allow him to leave Israel – and said he "remains a virtual prisoner."^[73] In an open letter addressed to the Israeli people in July 2010, after Vanunu was reincarcerated for violating the terms of his parole, Maguire urged Jews in Israel to petition their government for Vanunu's release and freedom. She praised Vanunu as "a man of peace," "a great visionary," "a true Gandhian spirit," and compared his actions to those of Alfred Nobel.^[74]

Remarks in reference to the Holocaust[link]

At a joint press conference with Mordechai Vanunu in Jerusalem in December 2004, Maguire compared Israel's nuclear weapons to the Nazi gas chambers in Auschwitz. "When I think about nuclear weapons, I've been to Auschwitz concentration camp." She added, "Nuclear weapons are only gas chambers perfected ... and for a people who already know what gas chambers are, how can you even think of building perfect gas chambers."^[75]

In January 2006, close to Holocaust Memorial Day, Maguire asked that Mordechai Vanunu be remembered together with the Jews that perished in the Holocaust. "As we, with sorrow and sadness, remember the Holocaust Victims, we remember too those individuals of conscience who refused to be silenced in the face of danger and paid with their freedom and lives in defending their Jewish brothers and sisters, and we remember our brother Mordechai Vanunu – the lonely Israeli prisoner in his own country, who refused to be silent."^[76]

In a speech delivered in February 2006 before the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation in Santa Barbara, California, Maguire again invoked a comparison of Israel to the Nazis. "Last April some of us protested at Dimona Nuclear Plant, in Israel, calling for it to be open to UN Inspection, and bombs to be destroyed. Israeli Jets flew overhead, and a train passed into the Dimona Nuclear site. This brought back to me vivid memories of my visit to Auschwitz concentration camp, with its rail tracks, trains, destruction and death."^[77]

Maguire firmly denied comparing Israel to Nazi Germany in an interview with Tal Schneider of Lady Globes in November 2010. "I have for years been speaking out against nuclear weapons. I am actively opposed to nuclear weapons in Britain, in the United States, in Israel, in any any country, because nuclear weapons are the ultimate destruction of humankind. But I have never said that Israel is like Nazi Germany, and I don't know why I am quoted like that in Israel. I also never compared Gaza to an extermination camp. I visited the death camps in Austria, with Nobel Prize laureate Elie Wiesel, and I think it is terrible that people did not try to stop the genocide of the Jewish people."^[78]

Palestinian activism[link]

On 20 April 2007, Maguire participated in a protest against the construction of Israel's security fence outside the Arab settlement of Bil'in. Being that the protest was in a no-access military zone, Israeli forces used tear-gas grenades and rubber-coated bullets in an effort to disperse the protesters, while the protesters hurled rocks at Israel's troops, injuring two Border Guard policemen. One rubber bullet hit Maguire in the leg, whereupon she was transferred to an Israeli hospital for treatment. She was also reported to have inhaled large quantities of tear gas.^[79][80][81]

In October 2008, Maguire arrived in Gaza aboard the SS Dignity. Although Israel had insisted that the yacht would not be permitted to approach Gaza, then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert ultimately capitulated and allowed the ship to sail to its destination without incident.^[82] During her stay in Gaza, Maguire met with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. She was photographed accepting an honorary golden plate depicting the Palestinian flag draped over all of Israel and the disputed territories.^[83]

In March 2009 Mairead Maguire joined a campaign for the immediate and unconditional removal of Hamas from the European Union list of proscribed terrorist organisations.^[84]

Huwaida Arraf and Maguire, 2009

On 30 June 2009, Maguire was taken into custody by the Israeli military along with twenty others, including former U.S. Congress member Cynthia McKinney. She was on board a small ferry, the MV Spirit of Humanity (formerly the Arion), said to be carrying humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip,^[85] when Israel intercepted the vessel off the coast of Gaza. From an Israeli prison, she gave a lengthy interview with Democracy Now! using her cell phone,^[86] and was deported on 7 July 2009 to Dublin.^[87]

In May–June 2010, Maguire was a passenger on board the MV Rachel Corrie, one of seven vessels that were part of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, a flotilla of pro-Palestinian activists that attempted to bust the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the Gaza Strip. In an interview with BBC Radio Ulster while still at sea, Maguire called the blockade an "inhumane, illegal siege."^[88] Having been delayed due to mechanical problems, the Rachel Corrie did not actually sail with the flotilla and only approached the Gazan coast several days after the main flotilla did. In contrast with the violence that characterised the arrival of the first six ships, Israel's takeover of the Rachel Corrie was met only with passive resistance. Israeli naval forces were even lowered a ladder by the passengers to assist their ascent onto the deck.^[89] After the incident, Maguire said she did not feel her life was in danger as the ship's captain, Derek Graham, had been in touch with the Israeli navy to assure them that there would be no violent resistance.^[90]

On 28 September 2010, Maguire landed in Israel as part of a delegation of the Nobel Women's Initiative. She was refused an entry visa by Israeli authorities, citing that she had twice in the past tried to run Israel's naval embargo of the Gaza Strip and that a 10-year deportation order was in effect against her.^[91][92] A legal team filed a petition against the order with the Central District Court on Maguire's behalf, but the court pronounced that the deportation order was valid. Maguire then appealed to Israel's Supreme Court. Initially, the Court proposed that Maguire be allowed to remain in the country for a few days on bail despite the deportation order; however, the state rejected the proposal, arguing that Maguire knew prior to her arrival she was barred from entering Israel and that her conduct amounted to taking the law into her own hands. A three-judge panel accepted the state's position and upheld the ruling of the Central District Court. At one point during the hearing, Maguire reportedly burst out and declared that Israel must stop "its apartheid policy and the siege on Gaza." One of the judges scolded her and rejoined, "This is no place for propaganda." Mairead Corrigan-Maguire was flown to the UK the following morning, 5 October 2010.^[93]

As preparations for a second Gaza flotilla got underway in the summer of 2011, expected to include the Irish MV Saoirse among its ships, Maguire expressed her support for the campaign and beseeched Israel to grant the flotilla passengers safe passage to Gaza.^[94]

Personal philosophy and vision[link]

Mairead Maguire is a proponent of the belief that violence is a disease that humans develop but are not born with. She believes humankind is moving away from a mindset of violence and war and evolving to a higher consciousness of nonviolence and love. Among the figures she considers spiritual prophets in this regard are Jesus, Francis of Assisi, Gandhi, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Fr. John L. McKenzie, and Martin Luther King, Jr.^{[96][97][98][99]}

Maguire rejects violence in all its forms. "As a pacifist I believe that violence is never justified, and there are always alternatives to force and threat of force. We must challenge the society that tells us there is no such alternative. In all areas of our lives we should adopt nonviolence, in our lifestyles, our education, our commerce, our defence, and our governance."^[96] Maguire has called for the abolition of all armies and the establishment of a multi-national community of unarmed peacekeepers in their stead.^[100]

Awards and honours[link]

Maguire has received numerous awards and honours in recognition of her work. Yale University awarded Maguire an honorary Doctor of Laws degree in 1977.^[101] The College of New Rochelle followed suit in 1978, awarding her an honorary degree, as well.^[102] In 1998 Maguire received an honorary degree from the Roman Catholic Jesuit Regis University in Denver, Colorado.^[103] The University of Rhode Island awarded her an honorary degree in 2000.^[104] She was presented with the Science and Peace Gold Medal by the Albert Schweitzer International University in 2006, for meaningfully contributing to the spread of culture and the defence of world peace.^[105]

In 1990 she was awarded the Pacem in Terris Award, named after a 1963 encyclical letter by Pope John XXIII that calls upon all people of good will to secure peace among all nations. The Davenport Catholic Interracial Council extolled Maguire for her peace efforts in Northern Ireland and for being "a global force against violence in the name of religion."^[106] Pacem in Terris is Latin for "Peace on Earth."

The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation honoured Maguire with the Distinguished Peace Leadership Award in 1992, "for her moral leadership and steadfast commitment to social justice and nonviolence."^[107]

Criticism[link]

Nobel Prize decision and Peace People movement[link]

Referring to the decision to award Mairead Maguire and Betty Williams the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize, journalist Michael Binyon of The Times commented, "The Nobel committee has made controversial awards before. Some have appeared to reward hope rather than achievement." He described as sadly "negligible" the two women's contribution to bringing peace to Northern Ireland.^[108]

Alex Maskey of Sinn Féin charged that at the time of the Troubles, the Peace People movement was hijacked by the British government and used to turn public opinion against Irish republicanism. "For me and others, the Peace People and their good intentions were quickly exploited and absorbed into British state policy," Maskey opined.^[109]

Belfast correspondent for The Guardian Derek Brown wrote that Maguire and Betty Williams were "both formidably articulate and, in the best possible sense, utterly naive." He described their call for an end to violence in response to the will of the people as an "awesomely impractical demand."^[110]

In his extensive study of the Peace People movement, Rob Fairmichael found that the Peace People were seen by some as being "more anti-IRA than anti-UDA," i.e. less loyal to republican factions than to loyalist ones. "Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan were beaten up numerous times and at times the leaders were threatened by a hostile crowd," Fairmichael noted, as examples of forms that some of the extreme negative reactions took.^[111]

Prize money controversy[link]

While most Nobel Prize laureates do keep their prize money,^[112] it is not uncommon for prize winners to donate prize money to scientific, cultural or humanitarian causes.^[113] Upon announcing their intention to keep their prize funds, Maguire and Williams were severely criticised.^[114] The move angered many people, including members of the Peace People, and fuelled unpleasant rumours about the two women.^[115] Rob Fairmichael writes of “gossip of fur coats” and concludes that the prize money controversy was perceived by the public, in the context of the Peace People’s eventual decline, as specifically problematic.^[116]

Jewish and Israeli reactions[link]

In the wake of the 2009 Gaza flotilla, Ben-Dror Yemini, writer of a popular column for the Israeli daily Ma'ariv, wrote that Maguire was obsessed with Israel. "There is a lunatic coalition that does not concern itself with the slaughtered in Sri Lanka or with the oppressed Tibetans. They see only the struggle against the Israeli Satan." He further charged that Maguire chose to identify with a population that elected an openly antisemitic movement to lead it – one whose raison d'etre is the destruction of the Jewish state.^[117]

Deputy head of the Israeli foreign mission to Canada, Eliaz Luf, has argued that Maguire's activism plays into the hands of Hamas and other terrorist organisations in Gaza.^[118]

Chairman of the Canada-Israel Committee Pacific Region, Michael Elterman, warned that Maguire's actions, though probably motivated by good intentions of endeavouring to help the Palestinian people, have been promoting an agenda of hatred and antisemitism.^[119]

In an October 2010 editorial, the Jerusalem Post called Maguire's comparison of Israel's nuclear weapons to the gas chambers of Auschwitz "outrageous." Maguire was accused of "undertaking actions that undermine Israel's ability to defend itself" and of trying "to exploit charges of a 'humanitarian crisis' in Gaza in order to empower Hamas terrorists."^[120]

However, Jewish and Israeli opinion is not all negative. Following the June 2010 Gaza flotilla raid, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was careful to distinguish between Mairead Maguire's nonviolent resistance aboard the Rachel Corrie, which he referred to as "a flotilla of peace activists – with whom we disagree, but whose right to a different opinion we respect," and the conduct of the activists aboard the other six vessels, which he described as "a flotilla of hate, organized by violent, terrorism-supporting extremists."^[121] Gideon Levy strongly defended Mairéad Maguire in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz in October 2010, calling her "the victim of state terror" after Israel refused to allow her to enter the country and kept her detained for several days.^[122]

See also[link]

• List of female Nobel laureates
• International Fellowship of Reconciliation

References[link]

External links[link]

• Peace People
• Mairead Corrigan Maguire Peace People
• International Fellowship of Reconciliation
• Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Mairead Corrigan Peace Heroes
• Mairead Corrigan – Curriculum Vitae Nobel Prize
• Irish Nobel Prize winners The Best Question
• Nobel Women's Initiative

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (April 2011)

Tommy Adrian Sands (born August 27, 1937^[1]) is an American pop music singer and actor.

Early life[link]

Born into a musical family in Chicago, Illinois, Sands' father was a pianist and his mother a big-band singer.^[1] While still young, he moved with his family to Shreveport, Louisiana. Sands began playing the guitar at age eight and within a year had a job performing twice weekly on a local radio station.^[1] He was only 15 when Colonel Tom Parker heard about him and signed him to RCA Records.

Career[link]

Sands' initial recordings achieved little in the way of sales but in early 1957 he was given the opportunity to star in an episode of Kraft Television Theatre. He played the part of a singer who was very similar to Elvis Presley, with guitar, bouffant hair, and excitable teenage fans. On the show, his song presentation of a Joe Allison composition called "Teen-Age Crush" went over big with the young audience and, released as a 45 rpm single by Capitol Records, it went to No.3 on the Billboard Hot 100 record chart.^[1] His track, "The Old Oaken Bucket", peaked at #25 in the UK Singles Chart in 1960.^[2]

Sands' sudden fame brought an offer to sing at the Academy Awards show and his teen idol looks landed him a motion-picture contract to star in a 1958 musical drama called Sing, Boy, Sing. About this time, he also appeared on an episode of The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford. Sands' pioneering contribution to the genre has been recognized by the Rockabilly Hall of Fame.

Acting[link]

Sands performed in several films including Mardi Gras (1958),^[1] Babes in Toyland (1961), The Longest Day (1962), Ensign Pulver (1964), and None But the Brave (1965), playing a Marine Second Lieutenant, but both his singing and film career had faded by the 1970s. Sands later had a guest role in the 1968 episode No Blue Skies of the police drama Hawaii Five-O.

Personal life[link]

In 1960, Sands married Nancy Sinatra. He was divorced from Sinatra in 1965 and has a daughter from another relationship.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Tommy Sands at the Internet Movie Database
• Interview with Tommy Sands
• Tommy Sands Interview at Elvis2001.net

Rachel Aliene Corrie (April 10, 1979 – March 16, 2003) was an American member of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). She died while attempting to intervene the demolition of a Palestinian home in Gaza.^[1] Some witnesses state that she was caught underneath a bulldozer, while the IDF investigation reported that she died after being struck by falling debris.^{[1][2] [3]} Furthermore, while the investigation reported that the driver of the bulldozer could not see her, witnesses maintain that there was nothing to obscure the driver's view. At the time of her death, Corrie was a student at the Evergreen State College in Washington.

Early life[link]

Corrie was born on April 10, 1979, and raised in Olympia, Washington, United States. She was the youngest of the three children of Craig Corrie, an insurance executive, and Cindy Corrie. Cindy describes their family as "average Americans—politically liberal, economically conservative, middle class".^[4][5][6]

After graduating from Capital High School, Corrie went on to attend The Evergreen State College (TESC), also in Olympia, where she took a number of arts courses. She took one year off from her studies to work as a volunteer in the Washington State Conservation Corps; other volunteer work included making weekly visits to patients with mental disorders for three years.^[6] In her senior year, she proposed an independent-study program in which she would travel to Gaza, join protesters from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), and initiate a "sister city" project between Olympia and Rafah.^[7] Before leaving, she also organized a pen-pal program between kids in Olympia and Rafah.^[8]

Activities in the West Bank and Gaza[link]

After flying to Israel on January 22, 2003, Corrie underwent a two-day training course at ISM West Bank headquarters, before heading to Rafah to participate in ISM demonstrations.^[5][7] During her training, Corrie studied tactics of direct action. Basic rules about avoiding harm were given, which a later article on the Corrie incident summarized as: "Wear fluorescent jackets. Don't run. Don't frighten the army. Try to communicate by megaphone. Make your presence known."^[7] On January 27, 2003, Corrie and William Hewitt (also from Olympia), traveled to the Erez checkpoint and entered the Gaza Strip.^[7]

Corrie with Israeli bulldozers in background

While in Rafah, Corrie acted as a human shield in an attempt to impede house demolitions carried out by the IDF using armored bulldozers.^[9] On Corrie's first night there, she and two other ISM members set up camp inside Block J, often a target for Israeli gunfire. Israeli troops fired bullets over their tent and at the ground a few feet away. Deciding that their presence was provoking the Israeli soldiers, not deterring them, Corrie and her colleagues hurriedly dismantled their tent and left the area.^[7]

Qishta, a Palestinian who worked as an interpreter, noted that: "Late January and February was a very crazy time. There were house demolitions taking place all over the border strip and the activists had no time to do anything else."^[7] Qishta also stated of the ISM activists: "They were not only brave; they were crazy."^[7] The confrontations were not without harm to the activists; a British participant was wounded by shrapnel.^[7]

Palestinian militants expressed concern that the "internationals" staying in tents between the Israeli watchtowers and the residential neighborhoods would get caught in crossfire, while other residents were concerned that the young activists might be spies. Corrie worked hard to overcome this suspicion, learning a few words of Arabic, and participating in a mock trial denouncing the "crimes of the Bush Administration."^[7] With time, the ISM members were taken into Palestinian family homes, and provided with meals and beds. Even so, in the days before Corrie's death, a letter gained wide circulation in Rafah, casting suspicion again on the ISM members. "Who are they? Why are they here? Who asked them to come here?" it asked.^[7] The letter caused the activists to be preoccupied and frustrated, and on the morning of Corrie's death they planned ways to counteract its effects. According to one activist, "We all had a feeling that our role was too passive. We talked about how to engage the Israeli military."^[7]

On March 14, 2003, during an interview with the Middle East Broadcasting network, Corrie said:

"I feel like I'm witnessing the systematic destruction of a people's ability to survive ... Sometimes I sit down to dinner with people and I realize there is a massive military machine surrounding us, trying to kill the people I'm having dinner with."^[7]

Water well human shielding efforts[link]

According to a January 2003 article by Gordon Murray, in the last month of her life Rachel "spent a lot of time at the Canada Well helping protect Rafah municipal workers," who were trying to repair damages to the well incurred by Israeli bulldozers. Built in 1999 with CIDA funding, Canada Well, together with El Iskan Well, had supplied more than 50% of Rafah's water before being damaged, and the city had been under "strict rationing (only a few hours of running water on alternate days)" since. Murray writes that ISM activists were maintaining a presence there since "Israeli snipers and tanks routinely shot at civilian workers trying to repair the wells." In one of her reports, Corrie relates that despite having received permission from Israeli District Command Office, and carrying "banners and megaphones the activists and workers were fired upon several times over a period of about one hour. One of the bullets came within two metres of three internationals and a municipal water worker close enough to spray bits of debris in their faces as it landed at their feet."^[10] According to Murray, the Canadian government refused to "officially protest or denounce the Israeli army actions", yet "quietly agreed to help fund the estimated $450,000 repair costs".^[11]

Controversy over protest against 2003 invasion of Iraq[link]

While in Gaza, Rachel took part in a demonstration as part of the February 15, 2003 anti-war protest against the invasion of Iraq. She was photographed burning a mock US flag.^[7][12] Robert Spencer criticized Corrie for having burned the flag in front of children, writing that she was “fostering... hatred” of the United States.^[13]

After her death, International Solidarity Movement ("ISM") and Corrie's parents wrote about the circulated picture of the incident:

"Trying to use this picture to somehow indicate that Rachel deserved to be run over by a bulldozer is an appalling act of demonization that infers that forms of protest which include flag burning are capital offences. In the words of Rachel's parents: 'The act, while we may disagree with it, must be put into context. Rachel was partaking in a demonstration in Gaza opposing the War on Iraq. She was working with children who drew two pictures, one of the American flag, and one of the Israeli flag, for burning. Rachel said that she could not bring herself to burn the picture of the Israeli flag with the Star of David on it, but under such circumstances, in protest over a drive towards war and her government's foreign policy that was responsible for much of the devastation that she was witness to in Gaza, she felt it OK to burn the picture of her own flag. We have seen photographs of memorials held in Gaza after Rachel's death in which Palestinian children and adults honor our daughter by carrying a mock coffin draped with the American flag. We have been told that our flag has never been treated so respectfully in Gaza in recent years. We believe Rachel brought a different face of the United States to the Palestinian people, a face of compassion. It is this image of Rachel with the American flag that we hope will be remembered most.'"^[14]

Corrie's e-mails from Gaza to her mother[link]

Rachel Corrie sent a series of e-mails to her mother while she was in Gaza, of which four were later published by The Guardian (on page 2, comments and features section, March 18, 2003^[15]) and in January 2008 in a memorial book entitled Let Me Stand Alone by W. W. Norton & Company, along with her other collected writings.^[16][17][18] Yale Professor David Bromwich stated, Rachel left "letters of great interest" and she had studied methods of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King with care.^[19] Corrie wrote to her mother, "The vast majority of Palestinians right now, as far as I can tell, are engaged in Gandhian nonviolent resistance."^[16] Her letters later formed the basis of the theatre play My Name is Rachel Corrie, and some parts of the letters were also used in the cantata The Skies are Weeping.

Corrie's death and subsequent controversy[link]

On March 16, 2003, an IDF operation in the land between the Rafah refugee camp and the border with Egypt was engaged in clearing brush, which the IDF says is necessary to destroy guerrilla hideouts and smuggling tunnels.^[20] Corrie was part of a group of seven ISM activists (three British and four US) attempting to disrupt the actions of Israeli bulldozers. Corrie, who had positioned herself in the path of a Caterpillar D9R armored bulldozer, was fatally injured. She was transported to a Palestinian hospital. Accounts vary as to whether she died at the scene, in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, or at the hospital.^[21]

An armored Caterpillar D9R Bulldozer used by the IDF.

The events surrounding Corrie's death are disputed. ISM eyewitnesses assert that the Israeli soldier operating the bulldozer deliberately ran Corrie over while she was acting as a human shield to prevent the demolition of the home of local pharmacist Samir Nasrallah.^[22][23] The ISM said she was interposed between the bulldozer and a wall near Nasrallah's home, in which ISM activists had several times spent the night.^[7] The Israeli Government and the IDF denied that version of events and described Corrie's death as an accident. The official Israeli response stated that Corrie was killed by debris pushed over by the bulldozer, that the operator did not see her, and that the bulldozer was clearing brush and not engaged in a demolition when Corrie blocked its path. This was the conclusion reached in June 2003 by a military investigation by the Israel Defense Forces Judge Advocate’s Office. “The driver at no point saw or heard Corrie,” an army source told the Jerusalem Post. “She was standing behind debris which obstructed the view of the driver and the driver had a very limited field of vision due to the protective cage he was working in.” Other reports say the Israeli government alleged that the house being demolished contained a tunnel used for smuggling weapons from Egypt.^[24]

The major points of dispute are whether the bulldozer operator saw Corrie, and whether her injuries were caused by being crushed under the blade or by the mound of debris the bulldozer was pushing. An IDF spokesman has acknowledged that Israeli army regulations normally require that the operators of the armored personnel carriers (APCs) that accompany bulldozers are responsible for directing the operators towards their targets, because the Caterpillar D9 bulldozers have a restricted field of vision with several blind spots.^[25] However, the Israeli army commander of the Gaza Strip said in an interview broadcast on Israeli television that on the day of Corrie's death, soldiers had to stay in their armored vehicles and were not able to direct the bulldozer or arrest the protesters, because of the threat of Palestinian sniper fire. He also said that Israeli soldiers may have been handling other ISM activists instead of watching over the bulldozer.^{[citation needed]} In a statement issued the day after Corrie's death, the ISM said that, "When the bulldozer refused to stop or turn aside she climbed up onto the mound of dirt and rubble being gathered in front of it... to look directly at the operator who kept on advancing."^[26]

The IDF produced a video about Corrie's death that includes footage taken from inside the cockpit of a D9. It makes a "credible case", Joshua Hammer wrote of this video in Mother Jones, that "the operators, peering out through narrow, double-glazed, bulletproof windows, their view obscured behind pistons and the giant scooper, might not have seen Corrie kneeling in front of them."^[7]

In April 2011, during the trial in the civil suit brought by Corrie's parents, an IDF officer testified that Corrie and other activists had spent "hours" trying to block the bulldozers under his command. On that day, they were only clearing "vegetation and rubble", and no houses were slated for demolition. He went on to say that it was "a war zone where Palestinian militants used abandoned homes as firing positions" and exploited foreign activists for cover. He shouted over a megaphone for the activists to leave, tried to use tear gas to disperse them and moved his troops several times. "To my regret, after the eighth time, (Corrie) hid behind an earth embankment. The D9 operator didn't see her. She thought he saw her," he said. An operational log submitted to the court showed that the officer reported a grenade thrown at his troops about 40 minutes before Corrie's death.^[27]

ISM and other eyewitness accounts[link]

Joe Carr, an American ISM activist who used the assumed name of Joseph Smith during his time in Gaza, gave the following account in an affidavit recorded and published by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR):

Corrie in the aftermath of the incident

Still wearing her fluorescent jacket, she knelt down at least 15 meters in front of the bulldozer, and began waving her arms and shouting, just as activists had successfully done dozens of times that day... When it got so close that it was moving the earth beneath her, she climbed onto the pile of rubble being pushed by the bulldozer... Her head and upper torso were above the bulldozer’s blade, and the bulldozer operator and co-operator could clearly see her. Despite this, the operator continued forward, which caused her to fall back, out of view of the driver. [sic] He continued forward, and she tried to scoot back, but was quickly pulled underneath the bulldozer. We ran towards him, and waved our arms and shouted; one activist with the megaphone. But the bulldozer operator continued forward, until Rachel was all the way underneath the central section of the bulldozer.^[28]

On March 18, 2003, only two days after Corrie's death, Joe (Smith) Carr was interviewed by British Channel 4 and The Observer reporter Sandra Jordan for a documentary that was aired June 2003 on Channel 4 titled The Killing Zone. He stated, "It was either a really gross mistake or a really brutal murder."^[29]

According to the Seattle Times, "Smith, who witnessed Sunday's incident, said it began when Corrie sat down in front of the bulldozer. He said the operator scooped her up with a pile of earth, dumped her on the ground and ran over her twice."^[30] Smith also commented: "We were horribly surprised. They had been careful not to hurt us. They'd always stopped before."^[21]

British ISM activist Tom Dale, who was standing yards away from Corrie, told journalist Joshua Hammer, Jerusalem bureau chief for Newsweek:

The bulldozer built up earth in front of it... She tried to climb on top of the earth, to avoid being overwhelmed. She climbed to the point where her shoulders were above the top lip of the blade. She was standing on this pile of earth. As the bulldozer continued, she lost her footing, and she turned and fell down from this pile of earth. Then it seemed like she got her foot caught under the blade. She was helpless, pushed prostrate, and looked absolutely panicked, with her arms out, and the earth was piling itself over her. The bulldozer continued so that the place where she fell down was directly beneath the cockpit... The whole [incident] took place in about six or seven seconds.^[7]

An individual giving the name Richard, who stated that he witnessed Corrie's death, as recorded by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz:

There's no way he didn't see her, since she was practically looking into the cabin. At one stage, he turned around toward the building. The bulldozer kept moving, and she slipped and fell off the plow. But the bulldozer kept moving, the shovel above her. I guess it was about 10 or 15 meters that it dragged her and for some reason didn't stop. We shouted like crazy to the operator through loudspeakers that he should stop, but he just kept going and didn't lift the shovel. Then it stopped and backed up. We ran to Rachel. She was still breathing.^[31]

British ISM activist Richard Purssell gave the following account, in an affidavit made in a manner similar to Carr's:

As the bulldozer reached the place where Rachel was standing, she began as many of us did on the day to climb the pile of earth. She reached the top and at this point she must have been clearly visible to the operator, especially as she was still wearing the high visibility jacket ["orange fluorescent... with reflective strips"]. She turned and faced in my direction and began to come back down the pile. The bulldozer continued to move forward at [5–6 mph]. As her feet hit the ground I saw a panicked expression on her face... The pile of earth engulfed her and she was hidden from my view.^[28]

Some eyewitness accounts indicate that when Corrie slipped and fell, the operator may have been looking behind him.^[32]

The bulldozer operator, a Russian immigrant to Israel, was interviewed on Israeli TV and insisted he had no idea she was in front of him:

You can't hear, you can't see well. You can go over something and you'll never know. I scooped up some earth, I couldn't see anything. I pushed the earth, and I didn't see her at all. Maybe she was hiding in there.^[7]

Autopsy[link]

Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon, promised President Bush a "thorough, credible, and transparent investigation."^[7] Later, Capt. Jacob Dallal, a spokesman for the Israeli army, called Corrie's death a "regrettable accident" and said that she and the other ISM activists were "a group of protesters who were acting very irresponsibly, putting everyone in danger—the Palestinians, themselves and our forces—by intentionally placing themselves in a combat zone."

An autopsy was conducted on March 24 at the Israel's National Center of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv. The final report was not released publicly, but in their report on the matter Human Rights Watch asserts a copy was provided to them by Craig Corrie, with a translation supplied by the U.S. Department of State. In the report they quote Professor Yehuda Hiss, who performed the autopsy, as concluding that "her death was caused by pressure on the chest (mechanical asphyxiation) with fractures of the ribs and vertebrae of the dorsal spinal column and scapulas, and tear wounds in the right lung with hemorrhaging of the pleural cavities."^[33]

Military investigation[link]

According to a correspondent for Gannett News Service, the IDF document, "The Death of Rachel Corrie" made no mention of the pathologist's conclusion, though, according to Corrie's parents, the entire document has not been released.^[34]

On June 26, 2003, the Jerusalem Post quoted an Israeli military spokesman as saying that Corrie had not been run over and that the operator had not seen her:

"The driver at no point saw or heard Corrie. She was standing behind debris which obstructed the view of the driver and the driver had a very limited field of vision due to the protective cage he was working in... The driver and his commanders were interrogated extensively over a long period of time with the use of polygraph tests and video evidence. They had no knowledge that she was standing in the path of the tractor. An autopsy of Corrie's body revealed that the cause of death was from falling debris and not from the tractor physically rolling over her. It was a tragic accident that never should have happened."

The Israeli army's report [seen by The Guardian], said:

The army was searching for explosives in the border zone when Corrie was "struck as she stood behind a mound of earth that was created by an engineering vehicle operating in the area and she was hidden from the view of the vehicle's operator who continued with his work. Corrie was struck by dirt and a slab of concrete resulting in her death ... The finding of the operational investigations shows that Rachel Corrie was not run over by an engineering vehicle but rather was struck by a hard object, most probably a slab of concrete which was moved or slid down while the mound of earth which she was standing behind was moved," (The Guardian, April 14, 2003).^[35]

Howard Blume told that IDF stated:

"[a bulldozer with 2 crews] was engaged in "routine terrain leveling and debris clearing," not building demolition. Quoting from the IDF report, Corrie died "as a result of injuries sustained when earth and debris accidentally fell on her ... Ms. Corrie was not run over by the bulldozer", he added, IDF also claimed she was possibly "in a blindspot for the bulldozer operators and "behind an earth mound," so they did not see that she was in harm's way."^[36]

In later IDF operations, the house was damaged (a hole was knocked in a wall) and was later destroyed. By that time, the Nasrallah family had moved into a different house. It was reported in 2006 that the house that Corrie was trying to protect was rebuilt with funds raised by The Rebuilding Alliance.^[37]

A spokesman for the IDF told the Guardian that, while it did not accept responsibility for Corrie's death, it intended to change its operational procedures to avoid similar incidents in the future. The level of command of similar operations would be raised, said the spokesman, and civilians in the area would be dispersed or arrested before operations began. Observers will be deployed and CCTV cameras will be installed on the bulldozers to compensate for blind spots, which may have contributed to Corrie's death.

The IDF gave copies of the report, entitled "The Death of Rachel Corrie," to members of the U.S. Congress in April 2003, and Corrie's family released the document to the media in June 2003, according to the Gannett News Service.^[38] In March 2004 the family said that the entire report had not been released, and that only they and two American staffers at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv had been allowed to view it. The family said they were allowed to look at the report in the Consulate General of Israel to the Pacific Northwest in San Francisco.^[39] The ISM rejected the Israeli report, stating that it contradicted their members' eyewitness reports and that the investigation had been far from credible and transparent.^[40]

Reactions and subsequent events[link]

A Palestinian memorial

The Ramallah municipality in the Palestine region dedicated a street to Rachel Corrie

Corrie's death sparked controversy and led to international media coverage, in part because she was an American, and in part because of the highly politicized nature of the conflict itself.

Political reactions[link]

U.S. Representative Brian Baird introduced House Concurrent Resolution 111 in the U.S. Congress on March 25, 2003, calling on the U.S. government to "undertake a full, fair, and expeditious investigation" into Corrie's death. The House of Representatives took no action on the resolution.^[41] The Corrie family joined Representative Baird in calling for a U.S. investigation.^[42] Baird, though reelected in 2004, 2006, and 2008, has not reintroduced the resolution in the Congress.

Yasser Arafat offered his condolences and gave the blessings of the Palestinian people to Corrie.^[26] Arafat promised to name a street in Gaza after Corrie (see image at right). According to Cindy Corrie, Arafat told Craig Corrie, "She is your daughter but she is also the daughter of all Palestinians. She is ours too now.” on the phone.^[43]

On March 21, 2003, Green Party of the USA, called an investigation for "murder of American Peace Activist Rachel Corrie by Israeli Forces".^[44]

Former New Democratic Party Member of the Parliament of Canada Svend Robinson nominated ISM for 2004 Nobel Peace Prize, praising Brian Avery, Tom Hurndall and Rachel Corrie for their attempts.^[45]

Human rights organizations' reactions[link]

Amnesty International USA called for an independent inquiry, with Christine Bustany, their advocacy director for the Middle East, saying that "U.S.-made bulldozers have been 'weaponized' and their transfer to Israel must be suspended."^[46]

In 2005, Human Rights Watch published a report titled Promoting Impunity: The Israeli Military's Failure to Investigate Wrongdoing, raising several issues related to the impartiality and professionalism with which the Military Police investigation was conducted. Among them were what Human Rights Watch described as the investigators' lack of preparation; "hostile," "inappropriate," "mostly accusatory" questions they asked witnesses; omitting to get witnesses to draw maps or identify locations on a map of how it occurred; and their asserted uninterest in reconciling soldiers' testimonies with those of other eyewitnesses. The report was not limited in scope to Corrie's death; it described a number of similar instances in which one-line summary findings were reported to the media after closed investigations in which neither non-military witnesses nor victims or their families were involved.^[47]

In the news[link]

Rachel Corrie memorial vigil at Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC March 18, 2003

There were reports that because she was an American, her death attracted the kind of attention that the deaths of Palestinians fail to garner. The Observer wrote that: "On the night of Corrie's death, nine Palestinians were killed in the Gaza Strip, among them a four-year-old girl and a man aged 90. A total of 220 people have died in Rafah since the beginning of the intifada. Palestinians know the death of one American receives more attention than the killing of hundreds of Muslims."

A Hamas activist told the newspaper: "[Corrie's] death serves me more than it served her. Going in front of the tanks was heroic. Her death will bring more attention than the other 2,000 martyrs."^[25]

Corrie's photograph has been carried during protests against Israel's actions in Gaza and the West Bank. On July 15, 2003, the Chicago Tribune reported that: "To the people of Rafah, Rachel Corrie will always remain a very special martyr, their American martyr."

In 2006, Haaretz political columnist Bradley Burston, asserted Corrie's death was accidental, yet "incidental killing is no less tragic than intentional killing", he criticized both the pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli sides for excessive rhetoric, noting that:

"Of all of the tragedies and casualties of the intifada, in which more than 4,000 people were killed over five years, the case of Rachel Corrie still stands apart, the subject of intense world interest and fierce debate. ... Part of it starts with us. "They had no business being there" is no excuse for what the Pentagon long ago christened collateral damage. We've learned much. But we're still not there. We should have saved Rachel Corrie's life that day, either by sending out a spotter or delaying the bulldozer's work. Right now, somewhere in the West Bank, there's an eight-year-old whose life could be saved next week, if we've managed to learn the lesson and are resourceful enough to know how to apply it."^[48]

Criticism of Corrie's actions[link]

According to The Boston Globe, "Corrie... has been praised as a heroic martyr and denounced as a misguided, ill-informed naïf."^[49] In a review of Simone Bitton's documentary Rachel, Salon noted that Corrie was subjected to "shocking verbal abuse" on right-wing bulletin boards and Web sites, including "grotesque sexual fantasies and elaborate conspiracy theories".^[50]

Journalist and Middle East commentator Tom Gross has referred to "the cult of Rachel Corrie." In an article called "The Forgotten Rachels" republished on his website, Gross refers to six other women called Rachel, Jewish victims of the Arab-Israeli conflict whose deaths, he wrote, received little, if any, coverage outside Israel.^[51] Gross went on to argue that "Partly thanks to the efforts of Corrie and her fellow activists, the flow of explosives from Egypt into Gaza continued – and were later used to kill children in southern Israel." The article prompted a National Review editorial arguing that "Corrie’s death was unfortunate, but more unfortunate is a Western media and cultural establishment that lionizes 'martyrs' for illiberal causes while ignoring the victims those causes create."^[52]

In March 2003, the University of Maryland, College Park's campus newspaper The Diamondback published an editorial cartoon by Daniel J. Friedman, depicting Rachel Corrie sitting in front of an approaching bulldozer, with two definitions of the word "stupidity" from the American Heritage Dictionary, along with an additional self-created third line "sitting in front of a bulldozer to protect a gang of terrorists," resulting in student sit-ins and protests at the University of Maryland the Wednesday after the cartoon appeared.^[53] The group Palestine Media Watch published the e-mail addresses and phone number of Diamondback editors, urging readers to contact the newspaper to secure an apology,^[54] and thousands of e-mails and hundreds of phone calls were received by the paper in protest. Describing the cartoon as "indecent and anti-American," over 60 student protesters staged a sit-in at the newspaper's offices (with 10 staying overnight), demanding that the paper apologize and "publish an article honoring Corrie's life".^[55] The newspaper refused to apologize, "though many staff members objected to the cartoon's viewpoint" while "the newspaper had received thousands of e-mails and hundreds of telephone calls protesting the cartoon", citing the First Amendment. While Friedman did not return the telephone call and e-mail by The Associated Press, editor-in-chief Jay Parsons (who had initially objected to the cartoon when it was first submitted) commented, "The decision was about freedom of speech, and that made the decision easy."^[53]

Criticism of the International Solidarity Movement's role[link]

Joseph Smith (aka Joseph Carr) acknowledged in an interview that the International Solidarity Movement knowingly put its activists' lives at risk. Per Making of a Martyr by Sandra Jordan, "'We knew there was a risk,' Smith said, 'but we also knew it never happened in the two years that we (the ISM) have been working here. I knew we take lots of precautions so that it doesn't happen, that if it did happen it would have to be an intentional act by a soldier, in which case it would bring a lot of publicity and significance to the cause.'"^[56] The Electronic Intifada reported that the activists continued to interact with the bulldozers despite at least one close call earlier in the day: "In the instance pictured, the bulldozer did not stop and Rachel was pinned between the scooped earth and the fence behind her. On this occasion, the driver stopped before seriously injuring her. Photo by Joseph Smith (ISM Handout)."^[57] George Rishmawi is quoted thus in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle: "“When Palestinians get shot by Israeli soldiers, no one is interested anymore,” Rishmawi said. “But if some of these foreign volunteers get shot or even killed, then the international media will sit up and take notice.”"^[58] And Joseph Smith has said: "The spirit that she died for is worth a life. This idea of resistance, this spirit of resisting this brutal occupying force, is worth anything. And many, many, many Palestinians give their lives for it all the time. So the life of one international, I feel, is more than worth the spirit of resisting oppression."^[59]

Activities of Corrie's parents[link]

Craig and Cindy Corrie at an End the Occupation rally, 2007

Since their daughter's death, Corrie's parents, Cindy and Craig, have spent time trying to "promote peace and raise awareness about the plight of Palestinians," and continue what they believe to be her work.^[60][61] The Corries have worked to set up foundations, launch projects in memory of their daughter, and advance investigation into the incident, approaching the US Congress and the courts for redress.^[62]

Corries' parents have several times visited the region since their daughter's death,^[63][64] and have twice visited Gaza.^[65] Following their daughter's death, they visited Gaza and Israel, seeing the place where Rachel died, and meeting ISM members and Palestinians whom she had known.^[62] They also visited Ramallah in the West Bank, where Arafat met them and presented them with a plaque in memory of their daughter.^[66] On March 28, 2008 they addressed a demonstration in Ramallah at which Craig Corrie said: "This village has become a symbol of nonviolent resistance. I call for solidarity with the people of Palestine in resisting the conditions imposed by the Israeli occupation to prevent the establishment of their state."^[67]

The Nasrallahs, the Palestinian family whose home Rachel believed she was preventing from destruction, joined the Corries on a cross-country tour in the United States in June 2005. The aim of the trip was to raise funds to rebuild the Nasrallah home, and other homes destroyed in Rafah with the cooperation of the Rebuilding Alliance. The 22-city, 7 state tour made stops in Iowa and California among other locations.^[60][68][69]

Lawsuits[link]

Corrie's family and several Palestinians filed a lawsuit against Caterpillar Inc. alleging liability under various Federal statutes over the death of Corrie in connection with the bulldozers, alleging Caterpillar supplied them to the Israelis despite having notice they would be used to further "a policy plaintiffs contend violates international law." The case was dismissed by a Federal judge in November 2005 for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, citing, among other things, the political question doctrine. The judge found, alternatively, that the plaintiffs' claims failed on the merits.^[70]

The ruling was appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On September 17, 2007, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the dismissal on political question grounds, and did not reach the merits of the suit. The Court found that as the bulldozers were paid for by the U.S. Government as part of its aid to Israel, that the Judicial Branch could not rule on the merits of the case without ruling on whether or not the government's financing of such bulldozers was appropriate, a matter it felt was not entrusted to the Judicial Branch.^[71]

A lawsuit was also filed against the Israel Defense Forces and the Israeli Defense Ministry.^[72] In February 2010, after pressure from the USA, Israel gave entry visas to four ISM witnesses so that they could testify. However it refused entry permission to the Palestinian physician from Gaza who had examined Corrie's wounds on the scene, and also rejected an application for him to testify by video link.^[73] The case began in Haifa on March 10, 2010.^[74]

Kidnapping attempt controversy[link]

During a visit in January 2006, two Palestinians, one armed, entered the home of Samir Nasrallah, the Palestinian pharmacist whose former home Rachel Corrie had been trying to protect when she was killed.^[7][63] Corrie's parents were staying overnight there, and it was reported that the gunmen had tried to kidnap them,^[75] but had abandoned their plans when told who his guests were.^[63] According to Nasrallah, the gunmen were seeking Americans as bargaining chips to secure the release of Alaa al-Hams, a Palestinian militia leader arrested by Palestine intelligence on suspicion of ordering the abduction of British human-rights activist Kate Burton and her parents.^[75][76][77]

The ISM issued a statement asserting that the actual targets whose home the gunmen came to were three Americans staying nearby, and that the Corries helped talk the men out of their plan. By the ISM's account, "the Corries were never threatened with kidnapping, nor did gunmen burst into the house where the Corries were staying."^[78] The Jerusalem Post reported Craig Corrie as saying: "There was never a threat made against us and the gun was never pointed at anyone." According to the Post, Craig Corrie said that when he entered the room and saw the man with the gun, he feared it might be a kidnapping attempt, but that the situation was never described to him that way by his host. Corrie added that the media accounts over-dramatized the incident.^[79]

Memorial events[link]

Vigil in Olympia, WA

Immediately after her death, posters and graffiti praising Corrie were posted in Rafah, with one graffiti tag reading, "Rachel was an American citizen with Palestinian blood." To most Palestinians, everyone killed by the Israeli army is considered a shaheed (martyr),^{[citation needed]} and hundreds of local residents came to express their condolences.^[11] The day after Corrie died, about thirty American and European ISM activists with 300 Palestinians^[80] began protests during the public memorial service over the spot where she was fatally injured in Rafah, Jordan states that IDF sent a representative to the memorial as the service "got under way". However, Murray asserts that the same bulldozer that killed Corrie, identified by its army serial number 949623, suddenly appeared at the memorial. According to Jordan, "A bizarre game of cat-and-mouse began as the peace activists chased the tank around", with protesters covering the tank with posters of Corrie and throwing flowers on it. In response, it is alleged that "Israeli soldiers inside threatened, in return, to run them down", a tank sprayed the mourners with tear gas and later armored personnel carriers [APC] fired guns along with percussion bombs. Murray further stated that IDF fired "concussion grenades, tear gas, warning shots" over the protesters while they were choking on diesel smoke. The escalating danger caused the memorial service to be halted.^[11][25]