2nd Anniversary of Arafat's Death

It is November 11th.
When I woke up this morning there was excitement racing all through Ramallah.
Buses were pouring in from all over the West Bank full of people singing and flags being flying out the windows.
There were processions, parades, boy scouts, dancing, music, speeches, the works... for this the second anniversary of Arafat's death. (Thankfully they did not allow any weapons into the muqata. It is always so annoying when people shoot into the air and someone always gets killed accidently. )

I am not sure why it was SO HUGE. Last year really wasn't anything compared to this! The streets were jam packed - almost looked like the day when he came in from Egypt in helicopter for his funeral and burial.

Foolish Abbas strung up posters all over the city with an image of himself sitting next to Arafat. How transparent...

I am not sure why but I felt hopeful and excited today when I saw all of us in the streets - there was an amazing energy in the air.

Anyways just sending you 2 news articles about today and a short little video clip I shot inside the muqata during the events.

This video is for the person who wrote to me from Beirut today and told me they cried when they watched Arafat's funeral on tv today.
I wanted to send you some lightness of being, some joy, some hope.

Tributes to President Arafat on the second anniversary of his death
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=17036

Thousands of Palestinians commemorate two-year anniversary of Arafat's death
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/786475.html