Beyond The Fringe

For more from this presentation, please go here.

Palestinian rights advocate, Ali Abunimah makes mincemeat of Israeli strategist Mordechai Kedar, who froths with hateful racial supremacist fury.

Breaking the Thirst, Water Deprivation as a Means of Ethnic Cleansing from Alternative Information Centre on Vimeo.

The wailings and bleatings of Segev since the release of the Goldstone Report on the perfidious attack on the people of Gaza are a sure sign the Ziocolony is flustered and paranoid that it will be dragged into an endless mire of litigation. Already, the blustering Ziocolony is refusing to countenance an independent enquiry as recommended by Goldstone. It is unlikely, given the usual US veto used to prevent civilised censure of its favourite pet and collaborator in oppression, that the Ziocolony will be referred to the ICJ to account for its abominations. Furthermore, the Ziocolony does not assent to that court’s jurisdiction. The ICJ does have jurisdiction to investigate the Ziocolony’s crimes against humanity and breaches of the Geneva Conventions to which the Ziocolony is a signatory. Goldstone’s report details why the Ziocolony has committed the crime of persecution, a crime against humanity, against the Palestinian people.

Israel’s economic blockade of Gaza in the years before the war amounted to “collective punishment intentionally inflicted by the government of Israel on the people of the Gaza Strip”.

Israeli actions depriving Gazans of means of subsistence, employment, housing and water, and denying their freedom of movement, “could lead a competent court to find that the crime of persecution, a crime against humanity, had been committed”.

Even if Israel’s long awaited appearance at the international courts at Le Hague is stymied by its mutually parasitic unprincipled protector, the painstakingly prepared 574 page report appears to have laid rock solid grounds for a truckload of civil prosecutions.

The Goldstone Report is available for download from the UN Human Rights Council.

From Pulse:

The atrocities committed in the camps of Sabra and Shatila should be put in the context of an ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people. The MacBride report found that these atrocities “were not inconsistent with wider Israeli intentions to destroy Palestinian political will and cultural identity.” [17] Since Deir Yassin and the other massacres of 1948, those who survived have joined hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fleeing a litany of massacres committed in 1953, 1967 and the 1982 invasion of Lebanon, and the killing is still going on today. Thus were the victims and survivors of the Sabra and Shatila massacre gathered up in the perpetual nakba of the slaughtered, the dispossessed, the displaced and the discarded – a pattern of ethnic cleansing perpetrated under the Zionist plan to finally and forever extinguish Palestinian society and its people.

This is why we must remember Sabra and Shatila, twenty-five years on.

While Julia Gillard whoops it up with her apartheid hosts at the King David Hotel {!}, Israeli land thieves break Israeli and international law by selling absentee Palestinian properties to private buyers.

This is the original text of a letter to the editor published in the New York Times in 1948 signed by prominent Jewish intellectuals, including Albert Einstein.

Letters to The Times New York Times December 4, 1948

New Palestine Party Visit of Menachem Begin and Aims of Political Movement Discussed

TO THE EDITORS OF THE NEW YORK TIMES:

Among the most disturbing political phenomena of our times is the emergence in the newly created state of Israel of the “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut), a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization in Palestine.

The current visit of Menachem Begin, leader of this party, to the United States is obviously calculated to give the impression of American support for his party in the coming Israeli elections, and to cement political ties with conservative Zionist elements in the United States. Several Americans of national repute have lent their names to welcome his visit. It is inconceivable that those who oppose fascism throughout the world, if correctly informed as to Mr. Begin’s political record and perspectives, could add their names and support to the movement he represents.

Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.

The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide whatever to its actual character. Today they speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism, whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.

Attack on Arab Village

A shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (THE NEW YORK TIMES), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem. Most of the Jewish community
was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.

The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party.

Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model.

During the last years of sporadic anti-British violence, the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the
terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.

The people of the Freedom Party have had no part in the constructive achievements in Palestine. They have reclaimed no land, built no settlements, and only detracted from the Jewish defense activity. Their much-publicized immigration endeavors were minute, and devoted mainly to bringing in Fascist compatriots.

Discrepancies Seen

The discrepancies between the bold claims now being made by Begin and his party, and their record of past performance in Palestine bear the imprint of no ordinary political party. This is the unmistakable stamp of a Fascist party for whom terrorism (against Jews, Arabs, and British alike), and misrepresentation are means, and a “Leader State” is the goal.

In the light of the foregoing considerations, it is imperative that the truth about Mr. Begin and his movement be made known in this country. It is all the more tragic that the top leadership of American Zionism has refused to campaign against Begin’s efforts, or even to expose to its own constituents the dangers to Israel from support to Begin.

The undersigned therefore take this means of publicly presenting a few salient facts concerning Begin and his party; and of urging all concerned not to support this latest manifestation of fascism.

ISIDORE ABRAMOWITZ, HANNAH ARENDT, ABRAHAM BRICK, RABBI JESSURUN CARDOZO, ALBERT EINSTEIN, HERMAN EISEN, M.D., HAYIM FINEMAN, M. GALLEN, M.D., H.H. HARRIS, ZELIG S. HARRIS, SIDNEY HOOK, FRED KARUSH, BRURIA KAUFMAN, IRMA L. LINDHEIM, NACHMAN MAISEL, SEYMOUR MELMAN, MYER D. MENDELSON, M.D., HARRY M. OSLINSKY, SAMUEL PITLICK, FRITZ ROHRLICH, LOUIS P. ROCKER, RUTH SAGIS, ITZHAK SANKOWSKY, I.J. SHOENBERG, SAMUEL SHUMAN, M. SINGER, IRMA WOLFE, STEFAN WOLFE.

New York, Dec. 2, 1948

Source notes: Laura Nader gave a copy of the microfilmed NYT to Anne Lipow in April. (Nader has been using it in her class at UC). The copy was illegible in parts and the first column was cut off; Laura’s original was the same. Anne and UC Anthropology Librarian Suzanne Calpestri then tried to retrieve an electronic version of the letter. It
appears nowhere in its entirety on the Internet, and is not in any NYT electronic archive accessible to UC Librarians (i.e., it doesn’t exist). Suzanne made another copy from a different microfilm; it solved the mystery of the missing first column but this copy was also “dirty” in other areas. Neither copy was scannable using OCR,so I typed it in by hand exactly the way it appeared in the original, and have proofed it carefully. However, the spelling of some of the signatories was unclear in the microfilmed originals, so there may be a few errors in this rendition. It would be nice if someone were to annotate the list of signatories, so that those less-familiar names could be placed in
context. At any rate, this clearly belongs IN FULL TEXT on the web for distribution to as many people as possible. Please circulate this among anyone you think may be interested; I think it especially belongs in the hands of those friends and family members who are still reluctant to criticize the Israeli government.

source info: Jenny Lipow Berkeley, CA 22 May
2002

It’s instructive to contrast the above honest appraisal and abhorrence of Zionist ideology and its atrocious acts of terrorism against the indigenous people of Palestine with this letter by Barenboim et al to the New York Review of Books, which the Angry Arab rightly identifies as ‘a piece of trash’.

This is like asking a family that has been conquered and beaten and shot at and whose house has been occupied by a merciless killer to sign a statement to foreswear force once and for all.

…

And then they call on me to transcend the past? How cute is that? If the realities on the ground favor one side (the killers, the conquerers, the usurpers, the colonizers) then any call for transcending the past is a mere call for legitimizing and accepting not only occupation, but all t

A private chuckle emanates from the land of bananas – juxtaposing Chomsky, didact he is, with the visionary Gandhi and his words of 80 years ago is a minor recompense for the grinding realisation that Chomsky may well be right – US foreign policy is cynically fixed in the fifties still, remnants of the cold war stultifying change, recognition of universal human rights, law and pursuit of happiness other than for the privileged, paranoid, bigoted west. Why should they change? the Americans are asleep again, they didn’t know what hit them when 911 came, and have missed the message. Injustice breeds resistance and the more monstrous the injustice, as with the ignored Palestinian cause, the more likely history will repeat, unless the nascent global voice which is taking wing in boycotts, protests, twitters, facebooks and other extraordinary means circumvents the sluggardly grinding wheels of an unwilling political machine.

Here’s Noam anyway, since I’m collecting him of late – it’s a great piece, if depressing.

Barack Obama is recognized to be a person of acute intelligence, a legal scholar, careful with his choice of words. He deserves to be taken seriously – both what he says, and what he omits. Particularly significant is his first substantive statement on foreign affairs, on January 22, at the State Department, when introducing George Mitchell to serve as his special envoy for Middle East peace.

Mitchell is to focus his attention on the Israel-Palestine problem, in the wake of the recent US-Israeli invasion of Gaza. During the murderous assault, Obama remained silent apart from a few platitudes, because, he said, there is only one president – a fact that did not silence him on many other issues. His campaign did, however, repeat his statement that “if missiles were falling where my two daughters sleep, I would do everything in order to stop that.” He was referring to Israeli children, not the hundreds of Palestinian children being butchered by US arms, about whom he could not speak, because there was only one president.

On January 22, however, the one president was Barack Obama, so he could speak freely about these matters – avoiding, however, the attack on Gaza, which had, conveniently, been called off just before the inauguration.

Obama’s talk emphasized his commitment to a peaceful settlement. He left its contours vague, apart from one specific proposal: “the Arab peace initiative,” Obama said, “contains constructive elements that could help advance these efforts. Now is the time for Arab states to act on the initiative’s promise by supporting the Palestinian government under President Abbas and Prime Minister Fayyad, taking steps towards normalizing relations with Israel, and by standing up to extremism that threatens us all.”

Obama is not directly falsifying the Arab League proposal, but the carefully framed deceit is instructive.

The Arab League peace proposal does indeed call for normalization of relations with Israel – in the context – repeat, in the context of a two-state settlement in terms of the longstanding international consensus, which the US and Israel have blocked for over 30 years, in international isolation, and still do. The core of the Arab League proposal, as Obama and his Mideast advisers know very well, is its call for a peaceful political settlement in these terms, which are well-known, and recognized to be the only basis for the peaceful settlement to which Obama professes to be committed. The omission of that crucial fact can hardly be accidental, and signals clearly that Obama envisions no departure from US rejectionism. His call for the Arab states to act on a corollary to their proposal, while the US ignores even the existence of its central content, which is the precondition for the corollary, surpasses cynicism.

The most significant acts to undermine a peaceful settlement are the daily US-backed actions in the occupied territories, all recognized to be criminal: taking over valuable land and resources and constructing what the leading architect of the plan, Ariel Sharon, called “Bantustans” for Palestinians – an unfair comparison because the Bantustans were far more viable than the fragments left to Palestinians under Sharon’s conception, now being realized. But the US and Israel even continue to oppose a political settlement in words, most recently in December 2008, when the US and Israel (and a few Pacific islands) voted against a UN resolution supporting “the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination” (passed 173 to 5, US-Israel opposed, with evasive pretexts).

Obama had not one word to say about the settlement and infrastructure developments in the West Bank, and the complex measures to control Palestinian existence, designed to undermine the prospects for a peaceful two-state settlement. His silence is a grim refutation of his oratorical flourishes about how “I will sustain an active commitment to seek two states living side by side in peace and security.”

Also unmentioned is Israel’s use of US arms in Gaza, in violation not only of international but also US law. Or Washington’s shipment of new arms to Israel right at the peak of the US-Israeli attack, surely not unknown to Obama’s Middle East advisers.

Obama was firm, however, that smuggling of arms to Gaza must be stopped. He endorses the agreement of Condoleeza Rice and Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni that the Egyptian-Gaza border must be closed – a remarkable exercise of imperial arrogance, as the Financial Times observed: “as they stood in Washington congratulating each other, both officials seemed oblivious to the fact that they were making a deal about an illegal trade on someone else’s border – Egypt in this case. The next day, an Egyptian official described the memorandum as `fictional’.” Egypt’s objections were ignored.

Returning to Obama’s reference to the “constructive” Arab League proposal, as the wording indicates, Obama persists in restricting support to the defeated party in the January 2006 election, the only free election in the Arab world, to which the US and Israel reacted, instantly and overtly, by severely punishing Palestinians for opposing the will of the masters. A minor technicality is that Abbas’s term ran out on January 9, and that Fayyad was appointed without confirmation by the Palestinian parliament (many of them kidnapped and in Israeli prisons). Ha’aretz describes Fayyad as “a strange bird in Palestinian politics. On the one hand, he is the Palestinian politician most esteemed by Israel and the West. However, on the other hand, he has no electoral power whatsoever in Gaza or the West Bank.” The report also notes Fayyad’s “close relationship with the Israeli establishment,” notably his friendship with Sharon’s extremist adviser Dov Weiglass. Though lacking popular support, he is regarded as competent and honest, not the norm in the US-backed political sectors.

Obama’s insistence that only Abbas and Fayyad exist conforms to the consistent Western contempt for democracy unless it is under control.

Obama provided the usual reasons for ignoring the elected government led by Hamas. “To be a genuine party to peace,” Obama declared, “the quartet [US, EU, Russia, UN] has made it clear that Hamas must meet clear conditions: recognize Israel’s right to exist; renounce violence; and abide by past agreements.” Unmentioned, also as usual, is the inconvenient fact that the US and Israel firmly reject all three conditions. In international isolation, they bar a two-state settlement including a Palestinian state; they of course do not renounce violence; and they reject the quartet’s central proposal, the “road map.” Israel formally accepted it, but with 14 reservations that effectively eliminate its contents (tacitly backed by the US). It is the great merit of Jimmy Carter’s Palestine: Peace not Apartheid, to have brought these facts to public attention for the first time – and in the mainstream, the only time.

It follows, by elementary reasoning, that neither the US nor Israel is a “genuine party to peace.” But that cannot be. It is not even a phrase in the English language.

It is perhaps unfair to criticize Obama for this further exercise of cynicism, because it is close to universal, unlike his scrupulous evisceration of the core component of the Arab League proposal, which is his own novel contribution.

Also near universal are the standard references to Hamas: a terrorist organization, dedicated to the destruction of Israel (or maybe all Jews). Omitted are the inconvenient facts that the US-Israel are not only dedicated to the destruction of any viable Palestinian state, but are steadily implementing those policies. Or that unlike the two rejectionist states, Hamas has called for a two-state settlement in terms of the international consensus: publicly, repeatedly, explicitly.

Obama began his remarks by saying: “Let me be clear: America is committed to Israel’s security. And we will always support Israel’s right to defend itself against legitimate threats.”

There was nothing about the right of Palestinians to defend themselves against far more extreme threats, such as those occurring daily, with US support, in the occupied territories. But that again is the norm.

Also normal is the enunciation of the principle that Israel has the right to defend itself. That is correct, but vacuous: so does everyone. But in the context the cliche is worse than vacuous: it is more cynical deceit.

The issue is not whether Israel has the right to defend itself, like everyone else, but whether it has the right to do so by force. No one, including Obama, believes that states enjoy a general right to defend themselves by force: it is first necessary to demonstrate that there are no peaceful alternatives that can be tried. In this case, there surely are.

A narrow alternative would be for Israel to abide by a cease-fire, for example, the cease-fire proposed by Hamas political leader Khaled Mishal a few days before Israel launched its attack on December 27. Mishal called for restoring the 2005 agreement. That agreement called for an end to violence and uninterrupted opening of the borders, along with an Israeli guarantee that goods and people could move freely between the two parts of occupied Palestine, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The agreement was rejected by the US and Israel a few months later, after the free election of January 2006 turned out “the wrong way.” There are many other highly relevant cases.

The broader and more significant alternative would be for the US and Israel to abandon their extreme rejectionism, and join the rest of the world – including the Arab states and Hamas – in supporting a two-state settlement in accord with the international consensus. It should be noted that in the past 30 years there has been one departure from US-Israeli rejectionism: the negotiations at Taba in January 2001, which appeared to be close to a peaceful resolution when Israel prematurely called them off. It would not, then, be outlandish for Obama to agree to join the world, even within the framework of US policy, if he were interested in doing so.

In short, Obama’s forceful reiteration of Israel’s right to defend itself is another exercise of cynical deceit – though, it must be admitted, not unique to him, but virtually universal.

The deceit is particularly striking in this case because the occasion was the appointment of Mitchell as special envoy. Mitchell’s primary achievement was his leading role in the peaceful settlement in northern Ireland. It called for an end to IRA terror and British violence. Implicit is the recognition that while Britain had the right to defend itself from terror, it had no right to do so by force, because there was a peaceful alternative: recognition of the legitimate grievances of the Irish Catholic community that were the roots of IRA terror. When Britain adopted that sensible course, the terror ended. The implications for Mitchell’s mission with regard to Israel-Palestine are so obvious that they need not be spelled out. And omission of them is, again, a striking indication of the commitment of the Obama administration to traditional US rejectionism and opposition to peace, except on its extremist terms.

Obama also praised Jordan for its “constructive role in training Palestinian security forces and nurturing its relations with Israel” – which contrasts strikingly with US-Israeli refusal to deal with the freely elected government of Palestine, while savagely punishing Palestinians for electing it with pretexts which, as noted, do not withstand a moment’s scrutiny. It is true that Jordan joined the US in arming and training Palestinian security forces, so that they could violently suppress any manifestation of support for the miserable victims of US-Israeli assault in Gaza, also arresting supporters of Hamas and the prominent journalist Khaled Amayreh, while organizing their own demonstrations in support of Abbas and Fatah, in which most participants “were civil servants and school children who were instructed by the PA to attend the rally,” according to the Jerusalem Post. Our kind of democracy.

Obama made one further substantive comment: “As part of a lasting cease-fire, Gaza’s border crossings should be open to allow the flow of aid and commerce, with an appropriate monitoring regime…” He did not, of course, mention that the US-Israel had rejected much the same agreement after the January 2006 election, and that Israel had never observed similar subsequent agreements on borders.

Also missing is any reaction to Israel’s announcement that it rejected the cease-fire agreement, so that the prospects for it to be “lasting” are not auspicious. As reported at once in the press, “Israeli Cabinet Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, who takes part in security deliberations, told Army Radio on Thursday that Israel wouldn’t let border crossings with Gaza reopen without a deal to free [Gilad] Schalit” (AP, Jan 22); srael to keep Gaza crossings closed…An official said the government planned to use the issue to bargain for the release of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier held by the Islamist group since 2006 (Financial Times, Jan. 23); “Earlier this week, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said that progress on Corporal Shalit’s release would be a precondition to opening up the border crossings that have been mostly closed since Hamas wrested control of Gaza from the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority in 2007″ (Christian Science Monitor, Jan. 23); “an Israeli official said there would be tough conditions for any lifting of the blockade, which he linked with the release of Gilad Shalit” (FT, Jan. 23); among many others.

Shalit’s capture is a prominent issue in the West, another indication of Hamas’s criminality. Whatever one thinks about it, it is uncontroversial that capture of a soldier of an attacking army is far less of a crime than kidnapping of civilians, exactly what Israeli forces did the day before the capture of Shalit, invading Gaza city and kidnapping two brothers, then spiriting them across the border where they disappeared into Israel’s prison complex. Unlike the much lesser case of Shalit, that crime was virtually unreported and has been forgotten, along with Israel’s regular practice for decades of kidnapping civilians in Lebanon and on the high seas and dispatching them to Israeli prisons, often held for many years as hostages. But the capture of Shalit bars a cease-fire.

Obama’s State Department talk about the Middle East continued with “the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan… the central front in our enduring struggle against terrorism and extremism.” A few hours later, US planes attacked a remote village in Afghanistan, intending to kill a Taliban commander. “Village elders, though, told provincial officials there were no Taliban in the area, which they described as a hamlet populated mainly by shepherds. Women and children were among the 22 dead, they said, according to Hamididan Abdul Rahmzai, the head of the provincial council” (LA Times, Jan. 24).

Afghan president Karzai’s first message to Obama after he was elected in November was a plea to end the bombing of Afghan civilians, reiterated a few hours before Obama was sworn in. This was considered as significant as Karzai’s call for a timetable for departure of US and other foreign forces. The rich and powerful have their “responsibilities.” Among them, the New York Times reported, is to “provide security” in southern Afghanistan, where “the insurgency is homegrown and self-sustaining.” All familiar. From Pravda in the 1980s, for example.

Hillary Clinton once again espouses that which Chomsky alludes to – that Hamas must meet the unmeetable three conditions, before being included in negotiations. One wonders if she is aware of the impossibility of her demands and is being deliberately obtuse.

In the below video, Norman Finkelstein discusses Gandhi philosophy in relation to the Israeli occupation and oppression of Palestinians.

More recently, Finkelstein discusses Gandhi’s principles of non-violence in relation to the Obama administration.

From grassroots community action in Tescos in Wales as above to Preston Council voting to boycott Israel and CODEPINK’S visit to Gaza to meet with women’s groups and Hamas officials, ordinary good-hearted people are putting themselves on the line for peace and justice.

From Mondoweiss – US academics at last are making a stand too against Israeli apartheid:

Today we see writers from across the spectrum, Max Blumenthal, Glenn Greenwald, John Mearsheimer, Daniel Levy, Scott McConnell, Paul Craig Roberts–who have educated themselves and said, No thanks, we draw the line. They are making this movement.

Harvard Law Professor Duncan Kennedy strikes the liberation bell -

Just listen to Kennedy’s soft, persuasive voice. It’s a long excerpt. But important. First the Gaza bit:

Numerous observers have charged Israel with committing war crimes during the war. Without downplaying that aspect, I think it is important to understand the 1,300 Palestinian casualties, including 400 children as well as many, many women, versus 13 Israeli casualties, as typical of a particular kind of “police action” that Western colonial powers and Western “ethno-cratic settler regimes” like ours in the U.S., Canada, Australia, Serbia and particularly apartheid South Africa, have historically undertaken to convince resisting native populations that unless they stop resisting they will suffer unbearable death and deprivation. [Here Kennedy seems to agree with my law-and-order post of yesterday] Not just in 1947 and 1948, but also in Lebanon in 1982 and 2006, Israel used similar tactics.

Causing horrific civilian deaths is often perfectly defensible under the laws of war, which favor conventional over unconventional forces in asymmetric warfare. The outright “crimes,” like the My Lai massacre, Abu Ghraib, or Russian massacres in Afghanistan and then in Chechnya, are less important for the civilian victims than the daily tactics of air assault, bombardment, and brutal door-to-door sweeps, meant to draw fire from the resisters that will justify leveling houses and the people in them…

History bit:

In 1967, Israel preemptively attacked Egypt, Jordan and Syria, and occupied the West Bank and Gaza, largely populated by refugees of 1948, as well as East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and Sinai (later returned to Egypt). This generated another approximately 200,000 Palestinian refugees who were also forbidden to return. Since 1973, Israeli governments have gradually moved about 400,000 Jewish settlers into the West Bank and another 200,000 into East Jerusalem, appropriating about 50 percent of the land (when roads and other infrastructure are taken into account), taking over the water, and alternately exploiting and starving the West Bank and Gaza economies to the point where the Arab population is overwhelmingly dependent on the international “donor community” for subsistence.

Palestinian non-violent and violent resistance to the military occupation is fully legal under international law. On the other hand, many of the specific tactics, especially airplane hijacking, suicide bombing targeting civilians, including children and old people, and indiscriminate rocket attacks, have been widely denounced as criminal….

In his measured article at the Harvard Crimson, Professor Kennedy suggests:

Can this picture be right? If so, what is to be done? If not, what is to be done? If you are not already clear about what you think, it is crucial to try to find out for yourself. If the situation is as bad as I have painted, you might consider some small step, perhaps just a contribution to humanitarian relief for Gaza, or e-mailing the White House, or something more, like advocating for Harvard to divest.

In South Africa, dock workers are refusing to unload Israel ships.

In a Palestine Solidarity Committee news release, the Congress of South African Trade Unions’ decision to “strengthen the campaign in South Africa for boycotts, divestment and sanctions against apartheid Israel” is noted. Referring to workers’ commitment to “refuse to support oppression and exploitation across the globe,” the committee recalls the refusal by Durban dock workers last year to offload arms from China that were destined for Zimbabwe.

The release also says that workers will not allow South African ports to be used as “transit points for goods bound for or emanating from certain dictatorial and oppressive states such as Zimbabwe, Swaziland and Israel.”

The release continues: “We also welcome statements by various South African Jews of conscience who have dissociated themselves from the genocide in Gaza. We call on all South Africans to ensure that none of our family members are allowed to join the Israeli Occupation Forces’ killing machine.”

Calling on the South African government to sever diplomatic and trade relations with Israel, the Palestine Solidarity Committee announced a week of action under the banner “Free Palestine, Isolate Apartheid Israel.”

Turkish soccer player for Sivasspor, midfielder Ibrahim Dagasan, has planted a Palestinian flag in the middle of the pitch at a match in protest against Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

While the Western Australian Maritime Union of Australia support sanctions against Israel and the Sydney branch officials have signed a petition condemning Israel, the conservative AWU condemns boycotts.

Other local union leaders, such as Steve Dargavel from the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, have also attacked Israel’s “aggression” in Gaza

A new article “Why the West backs Israel – and how to make it stop” by Tony Itis makes good reading – Tony explains why the BDS movement can be effective in eliminating Israeli apartheid.

Maltese NGOs are pressuring the EU to annul its uncomfortable ’special relationship’ with the occupier state.

In view of the recent three-week premeditated campaign of bombing of the population of Gaza and its infrastructure by the State of Israel which came after a crippling, illegal two-year siege, we, 14 member organizations of SKOP, the Maltese national platform of development non-governmental organizations, call for a suspension of the EU-Israel Association Agreement. Freezing the upgrade of its relations with the State of Israel to make it a privileged partner, as the EU has done so far, is simply not enough. If the EU is truly committed to the pursuit of a just peace it must also act in a way that clearly dissociates it from war crimes, while helping to bring the perpetrators to justice.

UPDATE FEBRUARY 6

Students across the UK have mobilized in what are now almost two dozen university liberations, in protest against Israel, in solidarity with the people of Gaza, and seeking their universities’ divestment from companies doing business in Israel while doing more to support the victims of Israel’s war. These students have been tremendously courageous, as well as creative and inspiring.

Open Anthropology has an excellent post on the progress of Canadian and UK University protests against Israel, particularly the actions at Manchester University.

Mitchell has his plate full – Zionist land thieving in the form of settlements and outposts accelerated more rapidly in 2008 than in 2007 according to Peace Now’s latest report.

… there were 285,800 settlers living in the West Bank as of 2008, with 1,518 new structures built in the territories last year, including 261 outposts.

Sixty-one percent of the new structures were built west of the route of the separation fence and 39% were built east of it. A quarter of the new structures east of the fence were built in outposts.

At least 1,257 new structures were built in existing settlements, including 748 permanent buildings and 509 caravans compared to 800 structures in 2007 – a 60% rise. In addition the ground was prepared for the construction of 63 new structures.

…

Yesha Council said in response, “Once again we thank Peace Now for allocating the money they get from the European Union towards documenting the most important Zionist enterprise of our generation – settling in Judea and Samaria.”

The Council added that “some of the data are not exactly accurate. The number of settlers today according to official data stands at over 300,000 Israelis.

“Regarding the allegations of ‘taking advantage’ of the war to pave roads, all of Israel knows who took advantage of the war to demonstrate against IDF soldiers and who sent their sons to the front line to give their soul in defense of the State.”

Meanwhile, the Yesha Council plans to welcome American Envoy George Mitchell.

On Wednesday, settlers will put on a special presentation titled “A Palestinian state will blow up in our face”, in an attempt to illustrate the “dangers establishing a Palestinian state in Judea and Samara would pose on central Israel, following the lessons learned from the disengagement, the rockets on Beersheba, Gedera and the war in the south”.

NEWSFLASH!

On Friday 30th January at 10am Sydney time, Cameron Reilly of GDay World Podcasting will be organising a live Twitstream in conjunction with his show. Special guest is Antony Loewenstein, journalist, blogger and author, on the show to discuss the recent and current events in Gaza.

Visit GDay World for more information.

Israel is still proving intransigent and all too willing to wreak further collective punishment after their massacre of the Gazan people.

25th January 2009

On 6th January nearly 30 members of the Al-Samouni family were killed when a house was attacked by Israeli forces in the Hai Al-Zaytoun district of Gaza City. The area was inaccessible until Israeli troops withdrew about 2 weeks later, when rescue teams were able to recover the bodies and the full extent of the atrocity was revealed (see Al-Haq report: www.alhaq.org/etemplate.php?id=416).

Footage below contains an interview with 10 year-old Mona Al-Samouni, survivor of the massacre who lost both her parents in the attack and 13 year-old Shaima Al-Samouni. Photos show children from the Al-Samouni family and a destroyed chicken farm next to their home.

Interview with Mona Al-Samouni on 25th January
rcpt.yousendit.com/645858506/eb6a09c47983881592bc203b3edb…

Interview with Shaima Al-Samouni on 25th January
rcpt.yousendit.com/646271988/15fa9b1f2d7f9692842afa8c246e…

PS More:

Interview with Shaima Al-Samouni’s younger sister on 25th January:
rcpt.yousendit.com/646311674/2777e0f834af4942589ff5ea3553…

The BBC’s Jeremy Bowen follows Mona Al-Samouni on her first day back to school:
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7849376.stm

– Photo & text courtesy of Rafahkid

RAMALLAH, 27 January 2009 (IRIN) – Aid agencies have been protesting about their restricted access to Gaza since the 18 January ceasefire, stressing that the full opening of crossing points is crucial for the delivery of humanitarian aid.

“It is unacceptable that staff of international aid agencies with expertise in emergency response are still not given full access into Gaza, and that the crossings are not fully operational for humanitarian and commercial goods,” said Charles Clayton, chair of the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA), which includes 75 agencies.

A recent CARE survey found that 89 percent of Gazans had not received humanitarian assistance since 27 December, underscoring the clear need, according to CARE, for more aid and humanitarian workers in Gaza.

CARE officer Juliette Seibold in Jerusalem told IRIN by phone on 26 January that eight of their staff members were still waiting for permits to enter to Gaza.

“If the ceasefire is holding, then any blockage of humanitarian access is unacceptable,” said Clayton.

The Israeli authorities are permitting 100-120 trucks to enter Gaza per day, according to the head of UNRWA (the UN agency for Palestinian refugees) in Gaza, John Ging.

However, “to meet the daily needs, hundreds of trucks are required,” he said, adding: “This is the same approach that led to this conflict. We need a change of policy regarding the crossing points. If they remain closed it will lead to more violence.”

Construction materials and spare parts are vital to repair damaged schools, hospitals, water and sewage systems, and power lines, but “these commodities are not available on Gaza’s market,” Oxfam spokesperson Sara-Eve Hammond, based in Jerusalem, told IRIN by phone, “and the Israeli authorities are waiting for specific donor requests to allow their entry.”

Blockade

Hamas, which controls Gaza, has set lifting the blockade – imposed on the impoverished coastal territory by Israel and Egypt since Hamas took power in June 2007 – as a condition for an Egyptian-brokered truce with Israel.

“Hamas has called for a complete lifting of the blockade and an opening of all the crossings,” said Hamas spokesman Ayman Taha in Cairo.

“Hamas wants to avoid further Israeli military aggression in Gaza,” Hamas official Ghazi Hamad told IRIN by telephone. “People in Gaza are still bleeding.”

Israel, meanwhile, wants assurances that weapons smuggling into Gaza will stop.

Over 4,000 residences were completely destroyed and 17,000 were partially damaged, according to preliminary estimates by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.

Although Israel has continued to shell Gaza daily with its naval gunboats since it declared a unilateral cease-fire, it is blaming Hamas again for cease fire breaches. A bomb has exploded on the border, killing one IDF and wounding 3 others.

Although there was no claim of responsibility for Tuesday’s attack, Mushir al-Masri, a Hamas leader, said Israel was to blame for continuing to fire into Gaza. Al-Masri said his group had not agreed to a full cease-fire but only to a lull in fighting.

“The Zionists are responsible for any aggression,” he said.

Israel has warned that it would respond harshly to any violations of the cease-fire, which ended the Israel Defense Forces’ 22-day offensive against Hamas in Gaza.

Israeli army helicopters have also fired shells at resident homes located near Deir Al Balah town in the southern part of the Gaza Strip.

Witnesses said that Israeli troops also took over a house there which is near the Gaza Israeli borders.

Once again, Israel has closed all crossings - concentration camp gates are barred shut again.

YNetnews spews its devious version of the bomb event:

The attack on an IDF force patrolling the Gaza border earlier on Tuesday was carried out by a cell belonging to the Worldwide Jihad. An IDF tracker serving with the Gaza Division’s southern brigade was killed and three additional soldiers were seriously wounded. The name of the tracker, a Bedouin from Rahat, is being withheld at the request of his family.

An Islamist group affiliated with Al-Qaeda calling itself the ‘Jihad and Tawhid Brigades’ claimed responsibility for the attack. The group delivered the announcement to the Ramattan news agency, which distributed the footage.

An Islamist group affiliated with Al-Qaeda calling itself the ‘Jihad and Tawhid Brigades’ claimed responsibility for the attack. The group delivered the announcement to the Ramattan news agency, which distributed the footage.

The IDF believes that the cell behind the attack is an extremist pro-Iranian group, which espouses a militant ideology that surpasses even Hamas’ positions in its opposition to Israel. The group receives direct support from Tehran, but is connected in various ways to Hamas as well.

The army says that even though the attack was executed by this group, Hamas was involved and at the very least gave its consent to the plot.

Later in the afternoon the IAF targeted one of the perpetrators of the attack in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis. Hussain Abu Shamia, a prominent operative belonging to the Worldwide Jihad, was confirmed injured in the strike. However military officials believe that Israel must broaden its response to the attack in order to deliver a stronger message to Hamas that Israel will not tolerate such violations of the ceasefire.

The army has prepared a number of options for retaliatory action and is now waiting for a green light from the political echelon.

Military sources estimates that Hamas will continue using other organization to operate through in an effort to minimize Israel’s response against its ranks and infrastructure but rather only against the smaller armed groups in Gaza. Senior officials said on Tuesday evening that they see Hamas as solely responsible for the attack, and have no intention of playing along with its scheme to evade responsibility.

I checked the Ramattan site and could find no reference to the IDF allegations above.

The relevant story on the Ramattan site reads as follows:

Israeli soldier killed in explosion south of Gaza

Gaza, January 27, 2009, (Ramattan)- One Israeli soldier was killed and three others wounded on Tuesday in an explosive device east south of Khanyounis, Israeli sources told Ramattan.

Spokesperson of the Israeli army, Avechai Edrei, told Ramattan in a phone call that the Israeli soldiers was instantly killed and three others carried to hospital, one in critical case.

He pointed out that a shell was shot at Palestinian militants after the explosion which targeted an Israeli military vehicle.

Palestinian medical sources said that a Palestinian farmer was killed on Tuesday morning by the Israeli occupation forces in the southern Gaza Strip city of Khanyounis.

Nasir Hospital sources in Khanyounis told Ramattan that Anwar Al-Braim, was killed as he was hit in the head with a gunshot.

Witnesses said that the Israeli soldiers opened fire at Palestinian farmers near the borderline with Israel.

They added that an Israeli helicopter hovered in the area and fired bursts from machine gun.

and this story:

Gaza, January 27, 2009, (Ramattan)- A Palestinian farmer was killed on Tuesday morning by the Israeli occupation forces in the southern Gaza Strip city of Khanyounis, medics and witnesses said.

Nasir Hospital sources in Khanyounis told Ramattan that Anwar Al-Braim, was killed as he was hit in the head with a gunshot.

Witnesses said that the Israeli soldiers opened fire at Palestinian farmers near the borderline with Israel.

They added that an Israeli helicopter hovered in the area and fired bursts from machine gun.

The gunshot was heard after a huge explosion shaken the area near the borders.

Israeli army office told Ramattan that an explosive device blew up while an Israel patrol was combing the area.

No sign of any new ‘iranian militant group’ or ‘Jihad and Tawhid Brigades’ on Ramattan in English at least – perhaps in Arabic?

The Ynet story reeks of propaganda – for starters, Iranians are Shia, Al Qaeda is Sunni. More likely the Israeli propaganda machine is attempting to conflate Al Qaeda with Iran, Hamas and whoever else they can think up in order to demonise what was more likely an IDF jeep running over an unexploded IDF shell or IAF bomb.

Haaretz spins the ‘bomb’ another way:

A preliminary investigation revealed that the soldiers were patrolling an area that had not been patrolled for several weeks due to the fighting in the Strip. The regional brigade commander was apparently not apprised of the patrol, which was approved by the battalion commander. IDF sources said the Palestinians who planted the bomb did so Monday night, under cover of heavy fog.

The closure of the Gaza crossings is only the first stage of Israel’s response to the attack, Amos Gilad, who heads the Defense Ministry’s political bureau, said yesterday. “The equation in the Strip has changed,” he said during a lecture at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

From the ABC Australia:

Hamas spokesman Mushir al-Masri said Israel was to blame for continuing to fire into the Gaza Strip despite the ceasefire.

“We stress that the Zionist enemy has not stopped behaving aggressively in Gaza since the unilateral ceasefire. To have calm means lifting the siege and reopening all the border crossings, including the Rafah crossing. The Zionist enemy bears the full responsibility for any violent developments,” he said.

Associated Press nuances the bomb differently:

There was no claim of responsibility for the attack.

…

It was not clear if the bomb had been planted after the cease-fire took hold or whether it was an older device.

Israel has reverted to starving the Gazan people – how evil and cruel can Israel be before the world rejects it en masse?

Officials and volunteers in Egypt blame the Israelis, saying that even before the passage stalled Israel had allowed supplies to pass through for only 19 hours each week. Israeli officials said that Egypt had not done enough to coordinate the flood of aid coming to Gaza, and that they hoped a system would soon be in place to remedy the problem.

Israel broke their so-called unilateral cease fire just hours after declaring it.

GAZA CITY, Jan 26 — At 7.30 a.m. Jan. 22, five days after Israeli authorities declared a ‘ceasefire’ following their 22-day air, land and sea bombardment of the Gaza Strip, Israeli gunboats renewed shelling off the Gaza city coast, injuring at least six, including four children.

Mu’awiyah Hassanain, director of Ambulance and Emergency Services, reported more shelling in the north-western coastal area As Sudaniya the same morning. Five fishermen were injured in the attacks, he said.

About 9.45 a.m. that morning in Sheyjaiee district to the east of Gaza city, seven-year-old Ahmed Hassanian was outside his house with friends when Israeli soldiers fired from the eastern border. A bullet lodged in his brain, causing brain haemorrhage. Dr. Fawzi Nablusi, director of the ICU at Shifa hospital, says the boy is not expected to survive.

Three Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire and 15 injured, including the ten injured Jan. 22, according to both Mu’awiyah Hassanain and Dr. Hassan Khalaf.

Hours after the ceasefire was said to have come into effect Jan. 18, Israeli warplanes flew extremely low over areas of Gaza. Drones capable both of photographing and of dropping targeted missiles continued to circle overhead. At 8.30 am Jan. 18, one of these drones dropped two missiles in the Amal area east of Beit Hanoun, killing 11-year-old Angham Ra’fat al-Masri and injuring her mother.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) reports further violations of the ceasefire, including the killing of Maher abu Rjaila, 23, shot in the chest by Israeli troops at 10.40 am Jan. 18 as he walked on his land east of Khan Younis city.

Israeli soldiers fired on residents of Al-Qarara, near Khan Younis, at 1 pm Jan. 20, shooting Waleed Al-Astal, 42, in his right foot.

Speaking of hasbara, Regev appears to need a serious brush up course if he thinks the world will find his latest rubbish plausible.

One of my favourite in situ hasbara debunkers, Gideon Levy is characteristically scathing about the choice of political candidates offered to Israeli voters in their forthcoming Feb 10 elections.

“Ground Zero”
20th January 2009

Earlier this week, following the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Gaza Strip, residents returned to some of the areas which had become no-go zones during the attacks, such as Jabalia just outside Gaza City. On Tuesday 20th January, ISM Gaza Strip volunteers joined a university professor as he visited his house in the east of Jabalia. We were shown from room to room around the bombed-out shell of what had once been a beautiful home. When asked if he and his family would continue to live there, he replied calmly that it was their right to and that they would never leave their land.

As we made our way up the hill through the orange grove beyond the professor’s house, we encountered evidence of where tanks had been positioned – churned up ground, tank tracks, uprooted olive trees. At the top of the hill, from where the Green Line was clearly visible, we began to see homes which had been totally destroyed, several stories concertinaed. Families sat together on the rubble of their homes. Children collected firewood from the dismembered limbs of fruit trees.

At first it seemed as though it was ‘just’ a cluster of ten or fifteen destroyed houses, which would have been bad enough in its own right. However, as we continued walking it became apparent that the devastation extended into the next street and the next, more and more destroyed and damaged homes following one another. This entire neighbourhood on this easternmost edge of Jabalia had been virtually wiped off the face of the earth. It resembled the site of some massive natural disaster. However this ground zero was entirely man-made.

The gouged-out windows of some of the homes still standing were filled with dark green sand bags. This was a sign these houses had been used by the Israelis as sniper positions. One could barely imagine how the situation must have been in this neighbourhood when it was under attack.

We met a blind woman who had been held prisoner for 11 days in one room of her home, along with a paralysed man, whilst Israeli soldiers used it as a base. Terrified and expecting to be killed at any time, they were given water twice during their ordeal. When the Red Crescent evacuated them, the woman said she could finally breathe for the first time since the soldiers arrived. The walls had been daubed with Hebrew graffiti, empty plastic food trays were strewn around and the stairway stank of urine.

In the wake of a Gazan holocaust, thousands of people are finding themselves in truly desperate situations. A traumatized but resilient population is somehow beginning to pick up the pieces. Merely continuing to exist is a form of resistance.

– Photo & text courtesy of Rafahkid

This war unmasked Livni, the woman who had promised us “different politics.” She, who as foreign minister was supposed to show Israel’s sunny side to the world, chose to present an arrogant, violent and brutal face. During the war she boasted that Israel was acting “savagely,” threatened to let Hamas “have it” and announced that the cease-fire would come into effect “whenever Israel decides.”

As far as she was concerned, there was no world, no United States and Europe, no UN Security Council, and no bleeding and defeated other side – only Israel will decide. No foreign minister has ever spoken like this before.

In her pathetic attempts to assume a masculine, militaristic, even macho, posture of someone who would know what to say if the telephone rang at 3 A.M., Livni was exposed as a failed foreign minister, whose words and deeds are no different from those espoused by the radical militaristic men around her. No self-respecting voter who considers himself an upstanding centrist could vote for her. Whoever votes for Kadima will be voting for the right, which is eager to embark on any war and risk the accompanying crimes.

Voting for Labor also means voting for the war and its horrors. This war’s marshal, Ehud Barak, has forever deprived himself of the moral right to talk of coexistence, political arrangements and diplomacy. If he really believed in them, he would have given them a chance before going to war, not afterward. Barak took the army to war and Barak must pay for it, together with his “left-wing” party, which joined the most radical, far-right parties in supporting the move to outlaw Israel’s Arab parties.

Avigdor Lieberman, Netanyahu, Livni and Barak are one – they all voted in support of an undemocratic decision. And don’t be alarmed by Lieberman – he, too, only talks. But at least he does so honestly, while Barak fires off salvos and deceives.

Granted, these impostors still enjoy the support of world leaders, but for many people around the globe, they have become war-mongers and suspected war criminals. Their diplomatic immunity will protect them – but who wants those leaders, with their bloodied hands, to represent us?

No less severe is the fact that there are no ideological differences between the candidates. Let Barak and Livni step up and explain what the hell sets them apart. What ideological argument are they conducting, apart from bickering on who should be credited for the war?

Facing them is Netanyahu – what does he have to offer? “Economic peace.” After this war, which wasn’t enough as far as he is concerned, his doctrine sounds even more ludicrous than ever.

This is how we’re going into elections – with three leading parties that are hardly different from each other.

We always used to say, “There aren’t any moderates in the Arab world.” Now we are the ones who don’t have any. Vote as you will, but don’t fool yourself. Every ballot cast for Kadima, Labor and Likud is an endorsement of the last war and a vote for the next one.

Who are the *real* terrorists again?

No point in going through the obvious, beating round the bush – the sadistic criminally incompetent reprobate is gone at last. Obana is about to take the stage and the throne – Oogeroo Noonuccal’s poem is for him and everyone.

Obamicon by IntrepidTeacher

Song of Hope

Look up, my people,
The dawn is breaking,
The world is waking,
To a new bright day,
When none defame us,
Nor colour shame us,
Nor sneer dismay.

Now brood no more
On the years behind you,
The hope assigned you
Shall the past replace,
When juster justice
Grown wise and stronger
Points the bone no longer
At a darker race.

So long we waited
Bound and frustrated,
Till hate be hated
And caste deposed;
Now light shall guide us,
And all doors open
That long were closed

See plain the promise,
Dark freedom-lover!
Night’s nearly over,
And though long the climb,
New rights will greet us,
New mateship meet us,
And joy complete us
In our new Dream Time.

To our father’s fathers
The pain, the sorrow;
To our children’s children
The glad tomorrow.

Oogeroo Noonuccal