Good afternoon. I thank you all for welcoming me here to this wonderful day dedicated to honoring and empowering the work of women around the world. I am honored to be a part of this, and am grateful for the opportunity to tell you a little bit about my cousin, Rachel Corrie.

It is fitting to talk about Rachel in this context, not simply because she was a woman, but because she was an international woman. That is, she was a woman who saw herself as an international, a world citizen  she was a woman who from a very young age identified with the suffering and struggles of people outside the boundaries of her neighborhood, city, state, and country.

If you will indulge me, I would like to show you what I mean.

[roll video clip] [Rachel: we have to understand that they are us, and we are them]

That speech was given in 1989, when Rachel was 10 years old, at the Washington State legislature, as part of a school project on world hunger that she was working on. She wrote the entire speech herself. At 10 years old, Rachel was convinced that we had to understand that they are us, and we are them. At 10 years old, Rachel was an international woman.

At 10 years old, Rachel was pleading for an end to world hunger by the year 2000. By the time she reached high school, Rachel was living with a family in Russia, learning about the devastating poverty that the fall of the Soviet Union had left in its wake. She also worked in Belize, and in the forests and mountains of her own Washington State. Throughout her life, and in between these projects, Rachel was surrounded by people from around the world, including the 6 or 7 exchange students from Latin America, Europe and Asia that lived in her house growing up. In other words, Rachel had not only a commitment to justice, but also an internationalist consciousness that allowed her to apply her love of justice anywhere in the world. It is thus no real surprise that Rachel should have ended up last year in a village called Rafah, in the Gaza Strip on the border with Egypt, perhaps one of the most forlorn, forgotten, devastated areas of the world. Once she learned from professors and activists at her college about the effects of the Israeli occupation and the need for internationals to come to Palestine to document and prevent human rights abuses, she went. She joined the International Solidarity Movement, a nonviolent, Palestinian-led human rights organization made up of people from around the world, who refer to themselves collectively as internationals, as if their other nationalities were inconsequential, as if it didnt really matter what country you came from, because you were all in it together. Rachel thus took on formally the identity of international woman when she entered Gaza in January of last year.

Rachel wrote of her dreams  for both herself and for the Palestinian people, and these dreams were the dreams of a woman committed to helping other women across borders. While in Rafah, she had begun to make connections between her hometown Olympia, Washington, and Rafah. She envisioned email exchanges between children in the two communities and between mothers. She was planning for handicrafts made by the women in Rafah to be sold at an Olympia fair trade store. She hoped that more people from Olympia would come to Rafah to witness as she was doing. She also hoped that our family would someday have the opportunity to meet the families from Rafah that she had grown to love.

In an email home she wrote:

I continue to believe that my home, Olympia, could gain a lot and offer a lot by deciding to make a commitment to Rafah in the form of a sister-community relationship. Some teachers and childrens groups have expressed interest in email exchanges, but this is only the tip of the iceberg of solidarity work that might be done. Many people want their voices to be heard, and I think we need to use some of our privilege as internationals get those voices heard directly in the US, rather than through the filter of well-meaning internationals such as myself. I am just beginning to learn, from what I expect to be a very intense tutelage, about the ability of people to organize against all odds, and to resist against all odds.

In September, when Rachels parents traveled for the first time to Israel, Palestine and Rafah, Fatima from the Gaza Union of Political Women proudly handed Rachels mother a copy of a note Rachel had left for her:

Dear Fatina,

I came to try to see you today for International Womens Day, but I think that I came too late or was confused about where to find you. I would like to talk to you more about the products you want to sell, and also about some mothers in the United States who would like to write letters to mothers in Palestine. Im really sorry I missed you. I am having trouble reaching you by phone. Please call me, or I will stop by again soon.

Sincerely, Rachel Corrie

That was almost exactly one year ago. On March 16th, 2003, only a few days later, Rachel was dead.

Although some of you may be familiar with what happened on that day, I thought it might be important to walk you through that day, as I understand it. I have taken this description from the eyewitness reports of ISM activists. On Sunday, March 16th, Rachel and her fellow ISM volunteers were confronting the drivers of two bulldozers who were in the process of razing Palestinian civilian land and homes. For two hours Rachel and other ISM activists followed the bulldozers, trying to block their passage and hamper their efforts at destruction. Rachel was clearly identifiable in a bright fluorescent orange jacket and was speaking through a bullhorn. While the bulldozer was still at least 10 meters away, Rachel sat down, a common practice used to signify her intent to remain in place. As the bulldozer came closer however, she got up and climbed onto a mound of dirt and rubble, in order to look the bulldozer driver in the eye. The driver continued to advance, and at some point Rachel fell under the weight of the dirt and rubble heaped on top of her. The driver ran over her, and then proceeded to back up, running over her a second time without lifting up the blade of the bulldozer, which scraped across her body and left a deep gash in her face. This 9-ton Caterpillar bulldozer  manufactured in the US and paid for by US tax dollars  crushed Rachel Corries body completely, and she died from multiple fractures and internal bleeding shortly thereafter. According to eyewitness reports, and from judging the photographic evidence, the driver, who was accompanied in the bulldozer by a commander, deliberately ran her over.

On that day, Rachels parents, Craig and Cindy Corrie, called for an independent investigation by the United States into her death. On March 17th, a spokesman from the State Department assured the Corries that Prime Minster Sharon had promised President Bush that the Israeli government would undertake a thorough, credible and transparent investigation and report those results to the United States. Although this would have been a good start, the Corrie family did not see an Israeli military report as a sufficient substitute for an independent US government investigation. On March 23rd, then, Congressman Brian Baird of Washington State, Rachels congressional representative, introduced House Concurrent Resolution 111, a resolution that calls on the United States government to undertake a full, fair and expeditious investigation into the death of Rachel Corrie. The resolution currently has 54 sponsors, but has not received enough support to leave its legislative committee. On May 23rd, 2003, the Israeli Military Police investigation was declared completed and the case closed. No charges were brought, and the Israeli Army declined to release its report to the US government or to the Corrie family. The Corries were later allowed to look at the report, although not to have their own copy, and the report was not only in contradiction to eyewitness reports as well as photographic and forensic evidence, but was also in contradiction with itself, raising more questions than it answered about the events of that day. To date, there has been no independent investigation, nor even any assurances from the US government that it will pursue one.

In the absence of any impartial, independent investigation, in the absence of any truly investigative and objective reporting on the part of the mainstream media, a hole has opened up, into which has been poured some of the most offensive and vitriolic criticism of Rachels character and actions, criticisms that attempt to discredit and silence her witness in order to avoid facing the true reality of the Israeli Occupation that has been revealed by her murder. And this criticism reveals some of the realities of what it means to be an international woman.

First, Rachels work, death and the response to her death reveal what it means to be international. Rachel has been criticized or dismissed as a naïve idealist who involved herself in a conflict she neither understood properly nor had any business being a part of in the first place. For many of her critics, particularly Americans, it is inconceivable that someone would leave their home country, a country of relative peace and prosperity, to join in a struggle that, in their view, has nothing to do with her or them. For anyone who knows anything about this conflict, however, we know that this conflict has A LOT to do with Americans. American taxpayers give the State of Israel at least 3-4 billion dollars a year in foreign aid, and that does not include the special requests for extra funding and loan guarantees asked of congress on a regular basis. And this sort of support has been going on for decades. Israel is a major client of American industries, particularly defense industries, and the American company Caterpillar sells armored bulldozers to Israel, which it uses to demolish the homes of civilians, in violation of the US laws explicitly prohibiting the export of products used against civilians. It was, of course, a Caterpillar bulldozer that killed Rachel, and it is American-made F-16 fighter jets that Israelis use to assassinate Palestinian militant leaders, usually taking out civilians in the process and it is American-made guns, tanks, bullets, and all other military products that are being used by Israeli soldiers to perpetuate human rights abuses against the Palestinians. OF COURSE this conflict had something to do with Rachel  it has something to do with EVERY American, and it has something to do with ALL of us who understand the fully global significance of this conflict. I came from Atlanta, GA, the home of Martin Luther King, Jr., who said that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. This is what it means to be international. We all have an interest in promoting justice in every part of the world, we all have an interest in finding a resolution to this conflict that will acknowledge the humanity and dignity of everyone involved. As Rachel said, we have to understand that we are them, and they are us.

Second, the response to Rachels death reveals what it means to be a woman in this international context. Rachel did something that is clearly outside the bounds of normal female behavior  she left her home, entered into conflict and violence and faced it courageously, and did it as part of a group of men and women working side by side as equals, not as someone on the sidelines supporting the work of charismatic men. Her actions and her death signify something threatening to many of her critics regardless of her gender  threatening because a brutal attack by an Israeli soldier on an unarmed civilian, a US citizen, reveals a reality that fundamentally jeopardizes the myth of Israel as the innocent victim and the US as the vigilant protector of its citizens. However, the fact that she was a woman elicited a response dripping in sexism. According to her critics, Rachel was brainwashed by the ISM, she was foolish and naïve to go somewhere where she knew it was dangerous; she provoked the soldiers who were only doing their duty; she misunderstood the nature of the conflict and was deceived by terrorists into thinking that they were innocent and needed her help. In short, she was either too stupid to know what she was doing, or, she was guilty of doing something that brought her death onto herself. Those are the criticisms that were printable. Of course, on the Internet, you can find even more blatant examples of the sexist nature of these criticisms, including character assassinations and name calling that I wont repeat, but that we have all heard before. One activist interviewed about the response to Rachels death made the astute observation that criticisms and evaluations of her case bore an eerie resemblance to the type of responses that rape victims elicit  that is, they blamed the victim, and focused entirely on her agency, ignoring the agency and culpability of the perpetrator of the crime.

Being an international woman means that you will be targeted by those who are threatened, both by the concept of international cooperation and a level of justice and compassion that knows no borders, and by the concept of women playing a major role, as equals working alongside men, in this movement. However, it also means that international women such as Rachel can and are making an impact  a positive impact  that knows no borders and empowers women and men equally. Although I have focused upon some of the criticisms of Rachel, I must pause to let you know about the astoundingly inspiring and gratifying responses to Rachels courage and sacrifice  responses that are, indeed, international. In Gaza City, there is a mental health center that now bears her name, and on which her parents serve as Board members. Throughout the Arab world, people are naming their daughters Rachel Corrie  an American name and traditionally Jewish name. In Italy, a group has dedicated a peace center in Rachels name. In Panama, citizens walk around the historic center of the city on the 16th of every month in honor of Rachel. Membership in the International Solidarity Movement, Rachels organization, has gone up worldwide. In San Francisco, there is a mural with a picture of Rachel alongside Caesar Chavez and Che Guevara. Around the world, people will be holding memorials for Rachel on the first anniversary of her death this month. Letters and songs and poems and plays and documentaries are being created and sent to Rachels parents daily.

The list goes on and on, but, as we pause to recognize International Womens Day, one response to Rachels death perhaps stands out most of all. In the city of Rafah itself, the place where the graffiti on the walls proclaim that it is the place where Rachel Corrie came to stop the bulldozers, there stands the Rachel Corrie Womens Empowerment Center, a place dedicated to supporting the women of Rafah as they seek to regain economic, political and psychological dignity and self-sufficiency. THAT I believe is what it means to be an international woman.

Rachel wrote in one of her emails from Gaza:

The international media and our government are not going to tell us that we are effective, important, justified in our work, courageous, intelligent, valuable. We have to do that for each other, and one way we can do that is by continuing our work, visibly. This conference is one way that we, as international women, can do this. Thank you for being here and thank you for inviting me.