When Uri Avnery, founder of Gush Shalom (or The Peace Bloc, an old peace activism group in Israel), won the Carl-von-Ossietzky-Prize in 2002, honoring the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who was murdered by the Nazis, he stated:
"I shall accept this honor on behalf of all the Israeli peace fighters, who continue their struggle in these dark times, at great risk, with full confidence in the victory of peace, human rights, and democracy in our country."
In the citation the jury said: "Avnery’s life work in the fight for peace, human rights, and democracy follows in the footsteps of von Ossietzky." Two months earlier, a Swedish jury awarded him the "Alternative Nobel Prize," together with Gush Shalom and Rachel Avnery, and before that, four other international prizes: the Erich-Maria-Remarque Peace Price ("All Quite on the Western Front"), the Aachen Peace Prize, the Lower Saxony Price (awarded by Gerhard Schroeder) and the Austrian Kreisky Prize.
Uri Avnery and Gush Shalom’s solution for bringing peace to Israel and Palestine would seem somewhat obvious to most progressive-liberal Democrats, who still represent the traditional post1964 American Left. Jimmy Carter recently voiced the same path in his controversial book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.
Uri Avnery has spent decades in Israel trying to convince the Israeli public to turn away from the treacherous path their right wing politicians have been steering them for the past 40 years that Israel has been sustaining a military occupation of the Palestinian people, while it colonizes their lands.
His solution is encapsulated in the various bumper stickers published and available on the Gush Shalom site:
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/...
Crossposted at Eternal Hope: http://eternalhope.blog-city.com/