This coming Monday, March 16, will be the sixth anniversary of the murder of Rachel Corrie, the young woman from the United States who was in occupied Palestine on a solidarity trip and was killed by an Israeli Defense Forces bulldozer that was destroying Palestinian homes in Gaza. Rachel Corrie was protesting the destruction. She laid down in front of a bulldozer in a classic act of nonviolent civil disobedience. The bulldozer kept rolling. She was crushed to death.
There's nothing worse or more horrifying about Rachel Corrie's killing at the hands of the IDF than that of so many thousands of Palestinians, most of whose names we in this country never learn. But the fact that she traveled across the world and put her body on the line in an act of solidarity makes her worthy of honoring. And so Monday has been designated Rachel Corrie Remembrance Day.
The play My Name Is Rachel Corrie, based on her diaries and emails, has been performed to great acclaim over the world. In this country, any time anyone tries to mount it they face venomous, slanderous attacks from pro-Zionist forces. It takes tough stuff to push through with the production. I thought I'd heard recently that some brave producers were going to bring the play back to the New York stage this spring, but so far I can't find any trace of it. In lieu of that, here is Rachel herself, in a video interview not long before her death in Palestine.
