To Pay or not to Pay

That is the question

At the beginning of this year I started the option of choosing a paid subscription, where I would share my daily musings as I travelled - which started off well, but then I got so busy I was unable to keep up.

I am grateful for those of you who chose to financially support me - but it has always felt strange and a little uncomfortable, because deep down I wanted this space always to be freely available - and it no longer was. Yes, most of my posts were, and yes, most people that were contributing financially wanted to support me whether there was something extra or not.

But it has just hasn’t felt right.

So I have made the decision to make this site entirely free again. A MASSIVE thank you to every one of you that chose to pay and support me. I am grateful for your generosity.

Here is a reminder that my website can no longer be accessed by previous links… as I am no longer paying those bills because I refuse to pay an Israeli company when Israel continues to murder thousands of children injure and orphan many thousands more, demolish schools and kill, injure, arrest and ethnically cleanse teachers.

As a teacher, as a play activist, as someone who is concerned about the rights and well-being of children I cannot support any nation that indiscriminately kills, injures, orphans, displaces and deliberately incites fear into the lives of children.

The Original Learning Approach is deeply rooted in social justice - for everyone on this shared planet of ours. And I refuse to believe that one people’s safety is reason enough to make another people unsafe and unfree. I am, as a person against any form of occupation, exploitation and apartheid system and believe that those that are occupied have the right to seek freedom - and that the world has the responsibility to ensure freedom for all in order to prevent violence being a necessary act to seek freedom.

I believe it is the world’s failure to notice and do something about the needs of the occupied Palestinians who have been ethnically cleansed, their lands continually stolen, their freedom of movement controlled and limited (including the right to return to their homes) since before 1948 when Israel was first officially formed.

There is something fundamentally wrong about a coloniser land (UK) giving land to others to colonise without asking the people indigenous to the land. Things could have been done in a very different way that created a safe space for Jewish people fleeing Europe together with the Jewish, Christian and Muslim Palestinians that already lived there.

I also think the world needs to think long and hard about how to ensure Jewish people can feel safe throughout the world and not need a country to feel safe - which they clearly cannot feel safe in because they seem hell bent on getting more and more land by stealing it from Palestinians, Syrians, Egyptians and Lebanese (over the years that Israel has existed) and according to maps they have shown to the UN - future plans include these countries again plus Jordan and parts of Iraq in order to create “greater Israel” - this does not lend itself to peace and safety for Israeli citizens regardless of their religion.

I would like to make it absolutely clear - by advocating for Palestinian rights to live in liberty and with dignity I am not in any case advocating for a less safe space for Jewish people. Violence is never anything that I can get behind, I can sometimes understand it - and other times not at all - but I wish that it was never needed.

My demand for a ceasefire and social justice for Palestinians (and everyone in the area - hence the social justice) is a human and political demand/request/hope and has nothing to do with religion. I just don’t think any country in the world has the right to use illegal weapons, kill mostly civilians, starve a whole population, prevent aid coming in and other atrocity upon atrocity that violate international laws and our collective sense of humanity.

So maybe, one day, I will start paying for my wix web page. But not until there is peace and justice for everyone in the area - and not just for the occupying country!

https://saxel177.wixsite.com/interactimagine

A few photos from my time in Jenin and the surrounding area of Palestine.