In the last few days we have been in Beirut, as volunteers for Operazione Colomba. We are working alongside young people who gathered in solidarity networks in order to bring food, medicines, and assistance to those who have been left alone in the reconstruction process.
Let’s support them!

“This area was the blossom of the city, a blossom in the heart of Beirut. And now, look at it…”
Those are the words of a man from Tripoli who is not seeing his family since one year, since he moved down to Beirut to work in the construction site where he also lives.
The site was right in front of the place where we met him; now he’s sitting next to a small coffee  shop and stares at the building. It is still standing but it is quite damaged and nobody knows when the works will start again.

We first met Mussab on a long and troubled day. He was at the hospital in one of the poorest and most marginalized districts in Tripoli, a town in the north of Lebanon.
It took us a very long time, many efforts and strong determination, but in the end Mussab was granted the possibility to come to Italy, in Genoa, to cure his serious disease. This was possible thanks to a network of solidarity composed by dozens of people and organizations. This is a story of courage, strong will, and change. What we share with you here is another chapter of this wonderful story…

Today Muss, as we now call him, has ended his career at the lower secondary school with an online presentation in front of us, his teachers, who had tailored the questions to suit him. He held the presentation in such a brilliant and involving way that we were really moved and were left speechless, so that we felt unable to say goodbye at the end.
The title of his presentation was “No more wars” and it started with a quotation from an Italian song “C’era una volta la mia vita, c’era una volta la mia casa, c’era una volta e voglio che sia ancora” (Il mio nome è mai più, Jovanotti, Pelù, Ligabue) .
We were his teachers for 2 years, and these were 2 special years for us.

Only a pandemic could bring “doves”, the volunteers from Operazione Colomba (Operation Dove), back to Italy. We were forced to interrupt our physical presence with the people we share our life with, which was a painful and unexpected split we could have never thought of.

We have tried in every possible way to transform this pain in hope by being near to the people we usually accompany and protect in the conflicts around the world, we have kept giving them a voice in their nonviolent protest for peace and justice. After all, we are “doves” everywhere we go, and a “dove” cannot simply stare at the needs of the weak, whether they are victims of war, poverty, or of a virus. That is why so many of us chose to act in a different way. We can build peace through solidarity, community bonds and an answer to the urgent matters of a wounded humanity.

Now we have decided to share with you what being a “dove” during Covid19 felt like: people acted in different ways and different contexts, but we were all united by our shared experience on the ground as a Nonviolent Peace Corps.

This is our first story, by Christopher and Anna. The following stories will be published on our Facebook page.

Mario Paciolla was a young man whom we knew since he was involved in the Peace Brigades International’s Project in Colombia until 2018 and then in the United Nations Verification Mission in Caquetà, Colombia.
On July 15th, he was found dead in his apartment in circumstances yet to be clarified, even though it was initially stated as a suicide. Mario had a ticket to come back to Naples on July 20th and, for more than a week, he kept on saying to his mother that something really worried him. He was afraid and he wanted to return to Italy.
He was a sociable, committed, loved young man and, above all, a lover of truth and justice. Whatever happened we want to ask for an independent investigation which clarifies the facts. This is why we invite you to subscribe to the truth-seeking request promoted by the Rete Accademica Europea per la Pace in Colombia (Europaz):  https://www.europaz.org/verita-per-mario-paciolla/

Settlers’ vandalism of Palestinian properties

Jaber is near his tractor on the top of the hill.
The sun has just risen but, unlike the other mornings, Jaber is not appreciating the dawn.
In front of him, there is his olive grove, which belonged to his family from generation. A land that until yesterday was alive, full of life and resistance, and now is just a devastated field: most of the trees are broken, the centenary trunks cut, the branches broken.
The grief he feels is nearly physical, so strong enough to feel his heart broken.