Remembering Rachel - I'm here because I care

Rachel Corrie

10 April 1979 - 16 March 2003

We have got to understand that they dream our dreams and we dream theirs.
We have got to understand that they are us. We are them.

Tomorrow, 16 March, will mark the day seven years ago that Rachel Corrie, an American peace activist, was brutally crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer while opposing the bulldozing of a Palestinian home in Rafah.

She was an extraordinary human being who realised her life task from a very early age. Her compassion and deep love for humanity remain an inspiration to us all.

An exerpt from Rachel's 5th grade speech at a Conference on World Hunger in 1990:

"I’m here for other children.
I’m here because I care.
I’m here because children everywhere are suffering and because forty thousand people die each day from hunger.
I’m here because those people are mostly children.
We have got to understand that the poor are all around us and we are ignoring them.
We have got to understand that these deaths are preventable.
We have got to understand that people in third world countries think and care and smile and cry just like us.
We have got to understand that they dream our dreams and we dream theirs.
We have got to understand that they are us. We are them.
My dream is to stop hunger by the year 2000.
My dream is to give the poor a chance.
My dream is to save the 40,000 people who die each day.
My dream can and will come true if we all look into the future and see the light that shines there.
If we ignore hunger, that light will go out.
If we all help and work together, it will grow and burn free with the potential of tomorrow."

In an e-mail sent to her parents from Rafah, Palestine shortly before her death, she wrote about the suffering of the Palestinian people under the Israeli occupation:

"This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don't think it's an extremist thing to do anymore. I really want to dance around to Pat Benatar and have boyfriends and make comics for my co-workers. But I also want this to stop. Disbelief and horror is what I feel. Disappointment. I am disappointed that this is the base reality of our world and that we, in fact, participate in it. This is not at all what I asked for when I came into this world. This is not at all what the people here asked for when they came into this world. This is not what they are asking for now. This is not the world you and Dad wanted me to come into when you decided to have me."

Ramallah to name street after U.S. activist Rachel Corrie

Rachel Corrie Street sign in Ramallah, dedicated on March 16, 2010. (Photo: RCF)

The parents of American activist Rachel Corrie, who was killed by an Israel Defense Forces bulldozer in Gaza, took part in a ceremony in Ramallah on Tuesday, where a street is being named after Rachel.

The ceremony was attended by Palestinian anti-fence protesters as well as members of the International Solidarity Movement, the organization to which Rachel Corrie belonged...

Read in full here.

Related links

>> YouTube clip of 10-yr old Rachel giving her speech at the conference on world hunger in 1990

>> Rachel's life and legacy - Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice

>> Photostory: Israeli bulldozer driver murders American peace activist

>> Ramallah names a street after Rachel Corrie

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