Pen Thoughts

Remi Kanazi is an Palestinian-American performance poet and human rights activist based in New York City. Born 1981 in United States of America. He published "Poetic Injustice: writings on resistance and Palestine" a book that illustrate the struggle of Palestinian people enduring the Israeli occupation. In his new book "Before the Next Bomb Drops", Kanazi wrote "A Grin Behind the Tears", a poem expressed by Samir, a young Palestinian who has experienced the brutality of occupation. it goes like this: "No matter how tight Israel thinks its grip is the bullets, the bombs, the checkpoints the UN vetoes, the congressional applauding these children are more powerful than F-16s more assured than U.S. military aid they will climb walls, skirt roadblocks, dodge teargas they will unravel injustice by their very existence in every breath they take, every wedding that's held every newborn they bring into this world, ...

Written by Oswaldo De Rivero From the book:  The Myth of Development The non-viable economies of the 21st century "The social exclusion of human beings is not the same thing as the natural depredation occurring in a food chain, where one animal species preys on another species, as is the case with lions and zebras. The human groups that are preyed upon are not from a different species, and do not always behave like zebras. A human group that feels permanently excluded from the bare necessities of existence, preyed on by the market and by modernity, will finally turn upon its predators, resorting to varied forms of treatment ranging from delinquency to terrorist fanaticism." "The law of the jungle cannot continue to be applied among men without serious consequences for the whole community. Our genes, which are programmed for survival in society, begin to protest that we are being excluded, that our family or social group is in danger. Then, when we reach ...