For perhaps the first time in the history of Palestinian solidarity activism in the US, the majority of organizations working against the occupation are coming together around a single long-term campaign.

For decades the Caterpillar Corporation has supplied bulldozers to the Israeli military for use in home demolitions, as well as the construction of settlements on Palestinian territory and more recently of the Apartheid Wall.

1969. The Bogside. Occupied County Derry, Ireland. Barricades are erected by the Bogside residents around their community to defend against violent police raids, loyalist attacks, and recently re-deployed British occupation forces. The area inside the barricades is declared “Free Derry,” a no-go area for police and British troops and a direct affront to the authority of the Stormont Parliament.

Free Derry challenged the sovereignty claims of the British government and their ability to occupy and control the six counties. Graffiti was scrawled on the gable wall of a House that read, “You Are Now Entering Free Derry.” That defining sign was later turned into a monument that would remain forever at the entrance to the Bogside.

An internet search of the words “disengagement” and “Gaza” yields over 600,000 hits. Yet there is so little published information about the genesis of this unilateral Israeli action or its intended result. Upon re-election in February 2003, Sharon stated vaguely that his new government would remove Arafat and “end terrorism.” Since Israel had killed nearly 1500 Palestinians the year before, many wondered what he would do. The same year the US government attacked Iraq and sent congress requests for $9 billion in “loan guarantees” for Israel and $1 billion in additional direct aid.

By promising confidentiality to the occupying and imprisoning powers the International Committee of the Red Cross monitors the fate of prisoners of war that no other organization can reach — from Guantanamo Bay’s Camp X-ray, to Abu Ghraib and even the many Israeli detention centers in occupied Palestine. Here, Rafeef Ziadah questions whether the ICRC’s monitoring efforts help prisoners or protect those who violate prisoners’ human rights.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was founded in 1863 to help the wounded and other victims of war. In the Geneva Conventions the ICRC is given exclusive rights to investigate prison conditions in war situations.