Last update - 01:44 16/03/2008
Tibetan exiles protest in Tel Aviv
By Ofri Ilani
For about a quarter of an hour yesterday, a few dozen Tibetan exiles stood in the plaza of the Tel Aviv Cinematheque and sang a lament in memory of their kinsmen who were killed in demonstrations in Tibet. A few brought Buddhist prayer books. Most of the participants, who are attending an agricultural training program in the Arava, have never stepped foot in Tibet. They were born in India, in refugee camps for Tibetans in the north and south of the country. Yesterday they came to Tel Aviv for an event organized by the Israeli Friends of the Tibetan People (IFTP) to mark the 49th anniversary of the March 10, 1959 uprising against the Chinese government.
The event was planned a few months ago, but the suppression of the demonstrations in Tibet lent it special significance. For Tibetan student Sunam Yangchen, the anniversary is connected to her family history. In 1958, the Chinese authorities arrested her grandparents and her family was forced to flee to India. "They crossed the border on foot," Yangchen related. "We wander from country to country but we don't forget our culture." Yangchen was born in southern India. She has never been to Tibet but has never given up her dream of returning to her homeland. "Everything I know about Tibet I learned from my parents. I'd like to go back there," she says.
For the past few years Yangchen has worked at Tibetan Buddhist Meditation and Study Center in Bangalore. Now she is training to become an agricultural counselor through the Arava Program. The program, operated in cooperation with IFTP, has trained more than 300 Tibetans so far.
Yangchen says that news about events in Tibet comes from international news outlets. "It is hard to get information from Tibet," notes Lobsang Yeshi, a Tibetan who lives in Tel Aviv with his Israeli wife and was the organizer of the prayer gathering. "Even if you manage to make contact by phone or through the Internet, you usually can only ask general questions, like 'How are you?.' The Chinese Internet police monitor communications," Yeshi said.
"The Olympic Games are the most shameful thing in the world," says Tenzin, another one of the organizers. "China enables genocide in Darfur, defends the oppression in Burma and beats down the Falun Gong," Tenzin says.
The IFTP was founded in 1994 by Israelis who sought to help Tibetan refugees after visiting Tibet and northern India. The organization has about 1,000 members. "As Jews, we feel a need and a duty to help oppressed peoples in other places," says Meira Abulafia, one of IFTP's leaders. "After Israel obtained international support for its independence, the time has came for it to offer support to other oppressed people. The likelihood of [Tibetan] political independence is very small, but we still believe there is a chance for cultural autonomy."