NOT MUCH, BUT ALL MINE

While We Bring Freedom With Bombs, Gaza Burns..

2011-03-22T09:15:00.000-07:00

Just another day in the life. Coalition allies bomb the crap out of Libya for reasons that personally escape me. I've yet to hear a clearly defined explanation that even hints of honesty, considering we seem to pick and choose those we 'help' based on the amount of oil they sit on top of. In the meantime, Israel retaliates for the murder of a settler family, by a person or persons unknown, though last I heard, an Asian worker was the prime suspect.

I don't for a second deny that there have been rockets and mortars fired from Gaza into Israel, but really, what can you expect when Israelis persistantly poke caged lions? That they'll just take it, without swatting back? I think not.

No matter how you may look at it, in clear conscience you can't possibly believe that the use of heavy artillery and F16 fighter bombers in a confined space such as Gaza, where there is no means of escape, is acceptable. In reality, it's completely unacceptable, inconceivably brutal, and utterly criminal.

I'm Back..

2011-03-05T08:33:00.001-08:00

With so much going on in the world, I feel the time is right to resurrect Not Much, But All Mine.. Abe, I see you're still lurking.. Lonely? So you should be, the likes of you are becoming more ostracized every day now, and your cries of 'anti-semite', 'neo-nazi' and the like aren't working so well anymore are they? See the light and give it up man! Zionism's time is going the way of the dodo, thankfully, and the world is starting to realize and understand the bitter truth of zionist's aryan nation-like delusions.. You don't honestly believe that you are any better than anyone else, do you?! Must really suck to know that so many of those who practice Judiasm are starting to turn on Israel, too..

My advice to you and those like you Abe, whether you want it or not: Pssssstttt, the neighbourhood is changing, perhaps you should too before you get your asses kicked really hard.. Mind you, Israel and it's zionist masters are still soon going to have to answer for the blatant human rights abuses and atrocities it's committed for 62+ years, but some serious heartfelt apologies and conceding defeat may soften the blow, just a leeeetle bit..

I'm Done..

2010-02-02T23:52:00.000-08:00

I'm done. Thththththththat's all folks.......

Trip Like I Do...

2010-01-26T18:11:00.000-08:00

This is probably the most amazing BDS video you'll ever see!! Please watch and share as far and wide as possible.

The Bitter Taste Of Reality......

2009-11-10T20:06:00.000-08:00

It's been a busy year. So, with that said, here's my message to those whom I've made so much effort to piss off and have tried to shed the light of truth on for so damn long:

Take that you dirty neo-Zionist sons-of-bitches! You've managed to hide behind your self-serving, manipulative guilt tactics since the Nakba but you're about to find out what happens when liars, cheats, thieves, murderers and just plain fucking bastards get what they have coming to them! How long did you think it was going be before you were unmasked in front of the eyes of the world and exposed for what you are? Forever? Your reign of tyranny is oh so tantilizingly close to reaching its inevitable sorry end.

The Palestinian people are finally letting you reveal your true nature by not retaliating to the brutish bullying and oppression, exposing you for the charlatans you are. Did you think that if you continually persisted in making their lives a living hell, just as you have for the last 60+ years, they'd start suicide bombing and firing the heavy artillery at you again? Then you could bring out that tired old refrain "Poor Israel!" and have the world weeping for you? Obviously they're a lot smarter than you are. Pretty hard to whine about being the victim when you arrogantly continue to behave like a pack of rabid Nazis without even having the brains to try to hide it, isn't it. The world is turning against you all of a sudden, without a shot being fired from the side of those you've tried so hard to destroy! That's how it's done you pricks, I hope you choke on the taste of bitter reality.

There, I feel better now. I despise with every fibre of my being those who promote and feed off hate, no matter who or what they are and I can honestly say that I have never been one of them. It's been a long haul, sometimes frustrating, occasionally frightening, and more often than not rewarding. I've "met" some amazingly creative, talented, brave, inspiring people and give them my thanks and appreciation. I've also had interaction with some outright nut-jobs, a few quacks, racists of from all tribes, sheeples, haters and even one who suggested I was better off dead. Thank you all for showing me the best and the worst that the human race has to offer. All in all I think the good outweighs the bad.

Just for you, Raphael. :)

Rage And What To Do With It............

2009-10-17T20:04:00.000-07:00

Apparently I can't post on Facebook this evening and as anyone who actually reads this blog knows, I like to post lately. :D So there's more than one way to skin a cat and here I am back at blogger.

It's good to know there are so many people out there in the world who are willing to throw themselves onto the gears of the machine. Most of the people on my favourites list, and a whole lot of people on facebook. :D Lot more than 4,000. That's all I wanted to say.:) ♥ ♥ ♥

cindysheehansoapbox.blogspot.com

There's A Name On Every Bullet.....

2009-09-21T08:50:00.000-07:00

Disgrace in The Hague - Haaretz - Israel News

There’s a name on every bullet, and there’s someone responsible for every crime. The Teflon cloak Israel has wrapped around itself since Operation Cast Lead has been ripped off, once and for all, and now the difficult questions must be faced. It has become superfluous to ask whether war crimes were committed in Gaza, because authoritative and clear-cut answers have already been given. So the follow-up question has to be addressed: Who’s to blame? If war crimes were committed in Gaza, it follows that there are war criminals at large among us. They must be held accountable and punished. This is the harsh conclusion to be drawn from the detailed United Nations report.

For almost a year, Israel has been trying to argue that the blood spilled in Gaza was merely water. One report followed the other, with horrifyingly identical results: siege, white phosphorous, harm of innocent civilians, infrastructure destroyed - war crimes in each and every report. Now, after the publication of the most important and damning report of all, compiled by the commission led by Judge Richard Goldstone, Israel’s attempts to discredit them look ludicrous, and the empty bluster of its spokespersons sound pathetic.

So far they have focused on the messengers, not their messages: the researcher for Human Rights Watch collects Nazi memorabilia, Breaking the Silence is a business and Amnesty International is anti-Semitic. All cheap propaganda. This time, though, the messenger is propaganda-proof. No one can seriously claim that Goldstone, an active and ardent Zionist, with deep links to Israel, is an anti-Semite. It would be ridiculous.

Although there were some propagandists who actually tried to use the anti-Semitism weapon against him, even they knew this was farcical. One had to hear the moving interview that Goldstone’s daughter Nicole gave to Razi Barkai on Army Radio Wednesday, to understand that he is in fact a lover of Israel and its true friend. She spoke, in Hebrew, of the mental anguish her father experienced and of his conviction that, had he not been there, the report would have been much worse. All he wants is an Israel that is more just, she explained.

Neither can anyone doubt his legal credentials, as a top-level international jurist with an impeccable reputation. The man who found out the truth about Rwanda and Yugoslavia has now done the same regarding Gaza. The former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague is not only a legal authority, he is also a moral authority; therefore complaints about the judge won’t hold water. Instead, it is time to look closer at the accused. Those responsible are first and foremost Ehud Olmert, Ehud Barak and Gabi Ashkenazi. So far, incredibly, none of them has paid any price for their misdeeds.

Cast Lead was an unrestrained assault on a besieged, totally unprotected civilian population which showed almost no signs of resistance during this operation. It should have raised an immediate furor in Israel. It was a Sabra and Chatila, this time carried out by us. But there was a storm of protest in this country following Sabra and Chatila, whereas after Cast Lead mere citations were dished out.

It should have been enough just to look at the horrendous disparity in casualties - 100 Palestinians killed for every Israeli - to shake the whole of Israeli society. There was no need to wait for Goldstone to understand that a terrible thing had occurred between the Palestinian David and the Israeli Goliath. But the Israelis preferred to look away, or stand with their children on the hills around Gaza and cheer on the carnage-causing bombs.

Under the cover of the committed media, and criminally-biased analysts and experts - all of whom kept information from coming out - and with brainwashed and complacent public opinion, Israel behaved as if nothing had happened. Goldstone has put an end to that, for which we should thank him. After his job is done, the obvious practical steps will be taken.

It would be better for Israel to summon up the courage to change course while there is still time, investigating the matter genuinely and not by means of the Israel Defense Forces’ grotesque inquiries, without waiting for Goldstone. Olmert and Tzipi Livni must be brought to pay for their scandalous decision not to cooperate with Goldstone, although at this point that is spilled milk. Now that the report is on its way to the ICC and arrest warrants could soon be issued, all that remains to be done is to immediately set up a state inquiry commission in order to avert disgrace in The Hague.

Perhaps next time we set out to wage another vain and miserable war, we will take into account not only the number of fatalities we are likely to sustain, but also the heavy political damage such wars cause.

On the eve of the Jewish New Year, Israel, deservedly, is becoming an outcast and detested country. We must not forget it for a minute.

I should imagine that your mother told you at some point in your life not to nag. Now is the time to put that life lesson aside and nag for all you are worth.

With the advent of the internet, this has become much easier to do. Years ago, an activist had only snail mail and newletters to rely on and the process was painfully slow, but now support and rallying can be nearly instantaneous. So, with that said, anyone who feels that Israel and her supporters should be held accountable for their crimes, nag at your governments, nag at your family, nag at your friends. Make your voice heard and refuse to be silenced even when you become tired and frustrated. When we speak together from the heart as one, we are an unstoppable force.

Israel is feeling the pinch of a stirring global outcry and experience has shown me that this works. Don't give up because it seems that you aren't being heard because believe me, you are.

Renewing The Call To Boycott 729.....

2009-08-13T11:02:00.000-07:00

Surprised? You shouldn't be. Consumers with conscience can check the bar code of the goods they buy to ensure that they are not purchasing Israeli products. Here's an example of the one you shouldn't touch with a ten foot pole:

If you're shocked by the piece from RealNews, you'll be disgusted by these:

The following also have strong ties to Israel and its Apartheid regime:

To purchase product from or financially support any of the aforementioned companies in any way makes you complicit in crimes against humanity, therefore you are equally as guilty.

Do I Dare Be Optimistic?.....

2009-08-08T22:23:00.000-07:00

:-)

"There are people in US and Israeli politics who ideologically oppose Obama, and are willing to sacrifice the special relationship between the two countries in order to advance their political agenda."

"The "atmosphere of confrontation", he warned, was alienating the US public and putting the Jewish community in a difficult position."
Memo by Nadav Tamir

The poor bastard's going to be roasted over the coals now.

Onward to Victory!.....

2009-08-07T07:05:00.000-07:00

I know, it's supposed to be Only the Good Friday, but if you truly examine this post, despite all the grief there is something very good in the works. I have applied to Okanagan University College for this September and if I can manage to get in, I will attempt to organize a delegation representing the school. Look out OUC, here I come!

Ghandi would be proud.

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.....

2009-08-04T21:02:00.000-07:00

"Our sovereignty over it is unquestionable". Ah, the smug arrogance smells particularly foul today.

"provocative" and "unacceptable". And now they object?!?!.

“illegal” and “unacceptable.” No shit!

refrain from provocative actions. They couldn't get much more provocative.

Israel continues with it's crimes against humanity, undeterred yet sternly tisk, tisked.

Ah, The Smell Of Desperation.....

2009-07-20T09:10:00.000-07:00

Reaction to Breaking Silence Report

They sound as desperate as they should be. The bastards are well and truly caught yet they’re still attempting to convince the world that there’s no evidence, and claiming their investigations are impartial. Who the hell do they think they’re kidding? Bloggers and civilian reporters, putting their lives on the line reporting live at the time via cell phones and laptops all over the Internet, and the Zionazi propaganda machine still have the balls to claim innocence?!?!

I myself am going to stay optimistic this time. There’s just too much evidence for Israel to simply sweep it away and hope the world forgets all about the atrocities they’ve committed. A global economic collapse doesn't hurt either, it's pretty hard to fund the propaganda machine with no money. My advice to them is to start figuring out how they’re going to explain the last 60+ years. Millions of people globally are beginning to remove the rose colored glasses that have been blinding them to the truth, and they’re realizing who the real terrorists have been. It must really suck to have their arrogant, self-righteous assuredness rammed right back down their throats.

I can hardly wait until the Zionazi rats start jumping the sinking ship and claiming that they, their fathers and perhaps even their grandfathers knew nothing, or were simply following orders.

BBCNews Interview With Israeli Spokeswoman

The Thought Police Are On The March.....

2009-05-27T13:59:00.000-07:00

Yup, me, Steve, the Palestinians, Hamas ect., ect., have just had our opinions of Israel totally justified and can now simply say "I told you so". If this law passes, people like Steve will face jail time. It seems that most of the members of the Knesset and the people who voted for them are completely and totally out of their freaky minds.

MK Haim Oron (Meretz) attacked the proposal, saying "this insane government, what exactly are you doing? Creating a thought police? Have you run off the rails?"

I appreciate Mr. Oron's attempt to question the sanity of the members, but run off the rails is an understatement. This and the other bizarre bills proposed recently are the culmination of 61 years of a people suffering mass hysteria and paranoid delusions. Batshit crazy.

Big City Weeds Infesting Country Living…..

2009-05-27T11:35:00.001-07:00

I was talking with a friend the other day and she told me that her new boss , who is a recent transplant from the Fraser Valley, spends most of her time discussing her new community with a disgusted tone in her voice and belittling the people who live here. So, my question is: Why the hell did she move here in the first place?

I’ve lived in Enderby and the surrounding area for almost 20 years, and like most who run away from the big city mayhem, the gang wars, the brazen break and enters, brutality, and rampant drug abuse, I arrived not knowing anyone and had a full-blown “I’m better than you, you country bumkin” attitude. The difference between then and now is that there were very few like me around and I learned quickly to integrate myself to survive. These days it’s very different. The old timers are giving up the farms, their kids are moving on to bigger and better wealth, homes are getting larger and more obnoxiously flamboyant, the newbies have far more money, cars, motorized toys and immensely condescending demeanours. With the influx of Alberta oil money and Vancouver wealth in the last few years it’s positively overwhelming, and that which they are running from is being brought with them.

I have an absentee neighbour who thinks it’s perfectly acceptable for his family and friends to arrive on the July 1st long weekend and run amok. Speed boats and jet skis ripping up the river and its shoreline, fireworks, bad ‘80’s hair music blasting all day and night for three days straight, drunks in expensive cars speeding up and down this little dead-end road killing any critter who gets in their way, screaming and yelling, you name it they do it. This guy is a so-called businessman from Vancouver, and the fact that he hid out up here for nearly three months at the height of the gang shootings and arrests down there kinda makes me wonder exactly what kind of a “businessman” he is. Nobody seems to know even though from what I’ve been told he grew up here. Sigh……

I know it won’t make any difference, but I’ll feel a little better for perhaps a minute just putting it out there and venting, so here goes. To all those who feel they need to bring their shit-for-brains lifestyles with them when they come here: Take your obnoxious, rude, arrogant, ignorant selves, along with your over-stimulated, over-indulged, disgusting children, shove your toys up your asses then go back to where you came from and stay there. Screw your money, we’ll find a better way to make a buck than rely on the likes of you, you damn scum!

Aaaaahhhhh………..

Peacemaker.....

2009-05-20T07:32:00.000-07:00

Hopes and dreams on the Gaza coast
Every day, as the sun sets on the coast of Gaza, people make their way to the coffee shop-lined beaches and the pot-holed streets that run parallel to its coastline.

On the terrace of the famed Al Deira Hotel, patrons jostle for position, sipping sweet Arabic coffee as the sounds of legendary Arab musicians delicately waft through the air, mingling with the aroma of flavoured tobacco.

They all share one aim - to gaze out into the Mediterranean Sea as its turquoise waters transform into blue, then purple and then disappear into the moonlit night.

Another day has passed in Gaza.

For the few minutes where the sun and water meet and the sky glows warm, people here are moved by a deep beauty and for those few minutes, the beaming smiles of children frolicking in the sand, the laughter of friends and the line of fishermen setting out into the horizon suspend Gaza's seemingly eternal suffering.

It is that time of year again, when temperatures rise and where the coast of Gaza takes on a whole new different meaning.

"In this tiny territory caged in by Israel on two sides, north and east, and by Egypt to the south, Gaza's west coast becomes its gateway to a world of possibilities"

In this tiny territory caged in by Israel on two sides, north and east, and by Egypt to the south, Gaza's west coast becomes its gateway to a world of possibilities and a painful reminder of its limited realities.

Gaza's shoreline is a deceptive one. Its long, white sandy beaches are the ideal location for luxury hotels, trendy cafes, a vibrant nightlife, boutique shops, a palm-tree lined promenade for the health-conscious jogger, the inspired artist seeking to capture its beauty or the local street vendor selling traditional Palestinian handicrafts.

With its year-round, perfect Mediterranean weather, rich history at the crossroads of continents and civilisations and Arab hospitality, Gaza should be a tourist haven and entrepreneur's dream.

Businesses, corporations and financial towers should be vying for this prime real estate.

Instead, today its 41km-long poorly paved corniche road is marked with potholes. Sections of it have been destroyed by Israeli air raids over the years.

A journey from its northern border to the south can take hours to travel, as you zig-zag through the destroyed stretches of road and the rubble of buildings levelled during Israel's recent war.

Refugee camps

All along the coastal stretch, crowded and dirty refugee camps edge closer to the water, squeezing every inhabitable inch available.

The drive along the coast is marked by the smell of raw sewage spewing out into the sea at various points. The coast's most underdeveloped stretches are the scars from where Israel maintained its military outposts and illegal settlements that were a chokehold on the Gaza Strip.

When the Israeli military and settlers pulled out in 2005, they left behind the land and the coast but left Gaza in ruins, caged in and cut off from the outside world.

Since 2006, when Hamas won democratic elections that were recognised by international observers as free and fair, Israel has imposed an increasingly stifling siege on Gaza, restricting everything that comes in and out of the strip.

The vast majority of the 1.5 million Palestinians living here have not been allowed to leave this territory, which is approximately 360sq km in size.

Every facet of life in Gaza has been restricted beyond imagination by Israel, crippling the economy and increasing the psychological pressure on the territory's people.

Nowhere else in Gaza is the economy more visibly in tatters then along its coast. Its hotels, once buzzing with vacationing Palestinians from the diaspora and the sounds of wedding parties during the summer, are a faint echo of their past.

A pyramid-shaped building on Gaza's northern shore was supposed to be the Movenpick Hotel. But it, like Gaza, never realised its full potential. Today it stands nearly complete but hollow, scarred by war yet towering over the pristine sands of the sea.

Gazan fishermen are forbidden to travel more than three nautical miles from the coast

For centuries, generations of Gaza's fishermen set sail from its port cities, earning a livelihood for their families, feeding hundreds of local restaurants and giving the territory a distinct fish flavour to its food.

In Rafah, fishermen annually prepared for the sardine harvest this time of the year. This would have been peak season for them. Today, these fishermen are not allowed to exceed three nautical miles off the coast, far short from what is legally permissible by international law.

When they do try to fish beyond the imposed limits, they are harassed, shot at and detained by the Israeli navy, which patrols Gaza coast ferociously.

Gaza City's fish market was known for its colourful array of seafood, from crabs to shrimps, sharks to local catches. The fish market at the port was so renowned that it was the preferred market for Israeli Jews, whose own coast dwarfs the length of Gaza's.

Back then, as it is today, Gaza was under Israeli military control but unlike now, Palestinians and Israelis were allowed to move freely between the two territories.

Gaza's gateway to the world was through its port. The blueprints had been already drawn up. The Gaza City Port was to be transformed into a modern day commercial trading hub, bringing cargo vessels from Europe, Africa and Asia across the Mediterranean Sea.

But that, too, never materialised. Today, empty vessels and rusted and decrepit dinner-boats encrust the port.

Besides the economic potential – or lack thereof - the coast has also come to symbolise something immeasurable.

At a time when the Palestinian people are under a siege that has prevented them from exercising their most basic rights and freedoms, the Gaza coast has become an important psychological tool.

Escapism

It has become a vehicle to escape their daily struggles.

Anyone who approaches the coast and stares aimlessly out at the horizon is forced to dream. Dream about what, it's up to them, but they find themselves thinking about what lies beyond their immediate physical limitations.

One simply cannot look at its beautiful waters and not imagine what lies beyond. Your brain begins to race with endless possibilities about the rest of the world. You immediately ask yourself "what if"?

What if Gaza was not under siege? What if I could take a ferry to Cyprus? What if Gaza was free to pursue its economic potential?

A few minutes staring at the coast and one suddenly realises the people are thinking about everything and anything that has nothing to do with Gaza. When people are thinking about Gaza - it is not about Gaza as it is, but what it could or should be.

As a good friend of mine who regularly frequents the Al Deira Hotel terrace put it: "Typical of the melancholy and pride of living in Gaza, its sea not only inspires unending spirit and wonder but it also, often times, instills a sense of sorrow as one sees this great symbol of freedom one is unable to touch.

But Gaza's sea will continue to inspire freedom no matter the circumstances."

So it is that, as the sun sets on its shores and the light merges with nightfall, days become weeks and months become years, Gaza's besieged coast becomes an outlet to nothing but hope for its people.

Israeli warplanes bomb Hamas target, Gaza tunnels
GAZA (Reuters) – Israeli warplanes bombed a Hamas security outpost and tunnels by the Gaza border with Egypt on Tuesday, after a rocket fired from the coastal territory struck an Israeli town, Israeli and Hamas sources said.

Palestinian medics said a woman in Gaza suffered moderate wounds from one of several air strikes against tunnels Israel says are used to smuggle weapons into the coastal territory.

Another raid targeted a Hamas outpost near a border fence with Israel, a Hamas source said. It was the first time Israel has attacked the Islamic militant group since a January 18 ceasefire went into effect after an Israeli offensive.

An Israeli military spokesman confirmed the air raids saying Israel targeted four border tunnels and two sites in Gaza where weapons were produced, in response to rocket and mortar fire aimed at Israel from the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.

Earlier a rocket fired from Gaza damaged a home in the southern Israeli town of Sderot, causing no injury. None of the militant groups in Gaza claimed responsibility for the attack.

The rocket was the first to strike inside an Israeli town in several weeks. Rocket fire from Gaza had previously dropped since the Israeli offensive against Islamic militants in the coastal territory four months ago.

The Israeli spokesman said 175 mortars and rockets have been fired at Israel since the campaign ended, while there were at least 500 such attacks aimed at Israeli towns during the 22 days of fighting.

An Israeli air strike responding to mortar fire from Gaza killed two Palestinians on May 2. That attack also targeted tunnels beneath the Gaza-Egypt border.

Natural Growth - The Casual Lie.....

2009-05-17T22:16:00.000-07:00

The perpetuation of lies old and new seems to be an Israeli national pastime. Holy crap in a bucket, how much longer are the citizens of the world going to put up with this backward little state before we start reacting to it appropriately? If any other state or nation tried to pull half the crap Israel does, they'd be invaded.

Peace Now: 'Natural growth' - Israel's trick for West Bank expansion
Figures released recently by the Central Bureau of Statistics cast doubt on government officials' claims of housing shortages for young couples living in West Bank settlements - the central argument Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intends to present to U.S. President Barack Obama against freezing settlement construction.

Figures for 2006-07 reveal that the housing shortage in settlements stems largely from "migration" from Israel proper to communities beyond the Green Line, as well as the addition of new immigrants from abroad.

The data show that in 2007, natural growth accounted for 63 percent of settlement population growth, whereas internal migration accounted for 37 percent. The previous year, they show an addition of roughly 5,600 residents (which accounted for those who arrived minus those who had left) across West Bank settlements. For every 10 residents leaving settlements that year, 15 others arrived.

President Shimon Peres told Obama in their meeting earlier this month that "It is unacceptable that children born in Judea and Samaria will not have a place to live. We can't put them on the roofs." Similar remarks were made to U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell when he headed the fact-finding commission examining the causes for the outburst of the Second Intifada. In the report he submitted to then-president George W. Bush in 2001, Mitchell rejected Jerusalem's assertion that Jewish construction in the West Bank was aimed merely at housing natural population growth.

Instead, the commission largely accepted the Palestinian claim that there is no difference between the creation of new settlements and expanding existing ones, and determined that Israel should cease all building in the settlements, even that intended for what Israeli officials described as "natural growth."

That demand was contained in the Road Map, an outgrowth of the Mitchell Report, presented to Israel in 2003. A letter sent from Dov Weisglass, then-prime minister Ariel Sharon's diplomatic adviser, to Bush that same year includes an explicit commitment to freezing settlement building, particularly in those outside the "settlement blocs" or east of the separation fence.

U.S. diplomats said their government rejected the argument that Israel must allow every young couple raised in the settlements to find suitable housing in the West Bank.

The diplomats said they had obtained a copy of a classified Defense Ministry report compiled by IDF Brig. Gen. (Res.) Baruch Spiegel attesting that unauthorized building had occurred at about 75 percent of settlements, and that significant infrastructure projects had been initiated at more than 30 of them - including roads, schools, synagogues, yeshivas and even police stations - on privately-owned Palestinian land.

At a press conference last week, the chair of the Yesha council of West Bank settlements, Danny Dayan, and council secretary Pinhas Wallerstein said every year a "quiet eviction" was taking place in the West Bank of young couples raised in settlements who were unable to find housing there. They said 1,600 young couples of the 2,100 who marry annually are forced to find accommodations outside of the communities in which they grew up. Dayan and Wallerstein called on Netanyahu to change construction policy to allow such young people to erect homes in close proximity to those of their parents.

Most legal analysts around the world, including U.S. State Department jurists, view the construction of settlements in the West Bank as a violation of international law relating to war and conquered territories. The Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits states from moving their own citizens into conquered land.

A response from Peace Now to the remarks made by the Yesha council officials, said the "bluff of natural growth is just one of the tricks the government is using to keep it from fulfilling its obligation to freeze settlement building. It is a shame that the president is perpetuating that lie."

AIPAC - Scorrrrrrre.....

2009-05-03T18:49:00.001-07:00

Wiretap Recorded Rep. Harman Discussing Aid for AIPAC Defendants

Rep. Jane Harman denies wiretap report

Harman defiant at AIPAC

Last but not least, and what a f-----g suprise:

U.S. drops spy charges against two ex-AIPAC officials

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Israel's Independence Day.....

2009-04-29T14:52:00.000-07:00

In honor of Israel's 61 years of independence, might I suggest you read the following article and then run out to the library and check out Ilan Pappe's book before you pass judgement on Palestinians.

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

For anyone who possesses a strong stomach and an equally strong desire to know the truth, I strongly recommend Israeli historian Ilan Pappe's new book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine", which makes painstakingly and painfully clear the extent to which the expulsion of the great majority of Palestinians from their homes and homeland between 1947 and 1949 (an expulsion absolutely essential to create a "Jewish state" in a country where, in 1947, the population was still 70% Muslim and Christian and these non-Jews still owned 94% of the land) was meticulously planned, programmed and documented, ruthlessly carried out and, thereafter, efficiently covered up, sanitized, erased from minds and memories and, to the extent necessary, denied. Pappe also makes clear that the cleansing spirit and cleansing practices have continued ever since, with public discussion in Israel of the "demographic threat" posed by those Palestinians still remaining in Palestinian never more openly conducted and with a recent poll showing 68% of Israeli Jews in favor of expelling all Palestinian citizens of Israel.

Unfortunately, this book, published in England (and available from amazon.com), is highly likely to go unreviewed and largely unnoticed in the United States, a country where objective historical truth is much less popular than "revealed truth" and pure fantasy and where the Israel-First Lobby starts with a distinct home-field advantage in pursuing its successful efforts to convince American public opinion that American interests and values are identical to Israeli interests and values and to make American foreign policy and America's wars indistinguishable from Israeli foreign policy and Israel's wars.

While most of mankind, being comprised of peoples who have themselves been the victims of colonialism and racism, views racial-supremicist settler-colonial states founded upon the genocide or ethnic cleansing of an indigenous population as an abomination, Americans, exceptionally, are favorably inclined toward such states. The reason is simple. Until very recently, America was itself such a state, and the official Israeli narrative replicates the widely accepted American narrative of brave pioneers bringing civilization and economic advancement to a backward and savage land.

Furthermore, notwithstanding its history, America, as a nation, appears to have no regrets and to be troubled by no sense of national guilt. While, for reasons having less to do with bearing universal witness against man's inhumanity toward his fellow man than with justifying one particular instance of such inhumanity, there is a Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, there are no museums there devoted to the genocide of the Native Americans, to slavery or to the century of legalized segregation which followed abolition.

In addition, a significant proportion of the American population embraces a perverted interpretation of Christianity which ignores the humane message of Jesus Christ and the Golden Rule and focuses the devotions of its adherents not on God but, rather, on "God's Chosen People", through whose success in ethnically cleansing Palestine and provoking cataclysmic warfare these so-called "Christians" hope to achieve their personal, selfish "rapture" and "salvation".

Still, even in America, where Nakba denial is as obligatory as Holocaust denial is condemned, objective historical truth is available in Professor Pappe's book for anyone who cares.

Source

Retrospection And Introspection…..

2009-04-29T12:37:00.001-07:00

I received an email from my best friend of 37 years the other day. She and her two children are heading for Vancouver Island, where the kids will be spreading the ashes of their father who chose to commit suicide recently. I’d known Steve for many years, longer than Jan had actually, and he chose an unvarying path to his destiny long before his children where even born. Daniel and Angie, there was nothing you could have ever said or done to prevent what happened, it was his choice and his alone, nothing is your fault. That goes for you too my friend, though I think you fully understand and accepted that many years ago.

I’ve spent a lot of my spare time thinking since getting this news. About my life, my circumstances, my choices. Like most other people these days, I’m overwhelmed and underpaid, wondering how I can pay the bills at the end of each month while doling out little bits and pieces to my creditors, hopefully keeping them quiet for another 30 days. I’ve been dirt poor for the last 5 years, and this current economic downturn with massive cost of living increases has completely consumed any financial security I thought I may have had. With that said, I realise I’m incredibly happy and amazingly fortunate.

I’ve experienced many things in my life, both good and bad, but I now know I wouldn’t trade away a single one of them. From minor involvement with drugs and a well known biker gang to being a fairly accomplished equestrienne. From choosing to give up a child for adoption to the thrill of being a thoroughbred racehorse groom and exercise rider. From being married, not once but twice to being a single parent of a teenager, who now seems to be growing up to be a fine young man. From moving to the middle of nowhere, leaving family and friends to managing a ranch and succeeding in a man’s world, gaining the respect and friendship of those who have been ranching for a lifetime. From having a nervous breakdown to overcoming and learning to deal with PTSD.

I’m a survivor. I taught myself to start my own seeds, organically garden and preserve what I grow years ago. I can fish and yes, I clean what I catch. I’ve butchered steers and cut the meat correctly so it isn’t ruined. I’m not afraid of getting dirty and hard physical labour and at 50, I must say, I’m pretty damn fit. I am a jack of all trades and a master of none, which suits me just fine. My life is incredibly good and I wouldn’t trade a minute of it. I sincerely hope that anyone reading this can say the same.

Who's The Enemy Here.....

2009-04-27T07:58:00.000-07:00

I received the following email yesterday from Jewish Voices for Peace. As you can see, the government of Israel is killing freedom of speech, expression, and association.

This latest state action reminds me of what used to happen to dissedents in the U.S.S.R., and anyone over the age of 40 should remember the outrage expressed by the outside world over that. Yet, our governments still fully support Israel without as much as a reprimanding word. Do any of you still have any questions as to who's really in control of our elected representatives, 'cause here's a newflash for you, it ain't us!

You might want to start asking yourself how the tiny little State of Israel can get away with atrocities that other much larger and apparently more powerful nations would be condemned for.

Dear Fiona,

Let me cut down to the chase. We have just learned that a number of Israeli peace activists have had their computers confiscated, have been called for interrogations, and have only been released upon signing agreements not to contact their political friends for 30 days. We are asking you to contact the Israeli Attorney General to demand an immediate stop to this harassment.

The activists targeted are members of New Profile, a group of feminist women and men daring to suggest that Israel need not be a militarized society. They are being wrongfully accused of inciting young people--like the shministim--not to enlist in the army. The charge is not true. While New Profile does not tell youngsters not to enlist, they certainly support those who do not: pacifists, those who oppose the occupation, and others. New Profile informs them of their rights and gives them legal support when necessary. But Israel is a country that does not acknowledge the basic human right to conscientious objection.

The government's accusation against New Profile is not new. It has been out there for some time, as a source of harassment. Today's police actions tighten the screws considerably. We've seen how international pressure has helped get many shministim out of jail. Now it's time to put as much pressure so that Israeli peace activists can do their work free of intimidation.

I leave you with a note from New Profile: "These recent acts confirm what we have been contending for many years: the militarism of society in Israel harms the sacred principles of democracy, freedom of expression and freedom of political association. One who believed that until now criminal files were conjured up "only" for Arab citizens of Israel saw this morning that none of us can be certain that s/he can freely express an opinion concerning the failures of society and rule in Israel."

Do you know the enemy?

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well, gotta know the enemy

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well, gotta know the enemy

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well, gotta know the enemy

Violence is an energy
Against the enemy
Violence is an energy

Bringing on the fury
The choir infantry
Revolt against the honor to obey

Overthrow the effigy
The vast majority
Burning down the foreman of control

Silence is the enemy
Against your urgency
So rally up the demons of your soul

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well gotta know the enemy

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well gotta know the enemy

The insurgency will rise
When the bloods been sacrificed
Don't be blinded by the lies
In your eyes.

Violence is an energy
From here to eternity
Violence is an energy
Silence is the enemy
So gimme gimme revolution

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well gotta know the enemy

Do you know the enemy?
Do you know your enemy?
Well gotta know the enemy

Overthrow the effigy
The vast majority
Burning down the foreman of control

Silence is the enemy
Against your urgency
So rally up the demons of your soul

Yup silence is the enemy, so for those who are now silenced, I'm speaking up LOUD and CLEAR!

Only The Good Fridays…..

2009-04-24T08:47:00.001-07:00

Al Wabra Wildlife Preservation

The Al Wabra farm is an oasis of green areas, palm trees and many rare wild animals from allover the world. Powered by Sheikh Saoud Bin Mohammed Bin Ali Al Thani’s passion for nature, an international team of expert vets, biologists and keepers are dedicated to the care and conservation of the rare and mostly endangered animals that can be found on the farm.
History

Founded as a hobby farm by his Father, Sheikh Saoud is now transforming the Al Wabra farm into a “state of the art” breeding and research center for endangered wildlife. Traditionally Antelopes and Gazelles have been kept here for a long time and remain a specialty together with the more recent additions of Cats, Parrots and Birds of Paradise.
The Facility

The Al Wabra Wildlife Preservation is not a zoo and many areas are closed and marked with “no access” signs for visitors not to disturb sensitive animals and even the remaining enclosures are made mostly for the animals and not for visitors. This makes the Preservation to a unique place with a high success rate in breeding difficult and sensitive animals. The more than 2500 animals in more than a hundred different species enjoy the latest in know how for their comfort and well being. This includes excellent veterinary care, laboratories, food-kitchens, orphan-nurseries, the best in natural and imported foods, air conditioning, artificial rains and involvement in international breeding programs.
Education, Research and Conservation

In the future Al Wabra Wildlife Preservation aims to continue with setting the standards in its field. More effort will be invested in educating especially young people in wildlife and nature. Thereby help to increase the public’s awareness in environmental issues. A special education and visitors area is planned for just this purpose.

Location

Located on a 2.5 square kilometer large area close to the town of Al Shahaniyah in central Qatar. The farm is not open to the public.

Compassion, caring and conservancy: They're doing it right.

His Name Was Basem…..

2009-04-23T10:38:00.001-07:00

His name was Basem, which means smile, and that is how he greeted everyone. But we all called him ‘Pheel’, which means elephant because he had the body the size of an elephant. But Basem had the heart of a child.

He loved everyone, and because of his sweetness and ability to make us laugh, everyone loved him. Basem was everyone’s friend: the children talk about how he would play with them, scare them and then make them laugh. He would tend the garden in the playground and bring toys and books to the kindergarten. The old ladies in the village talk about how he used to visit, to ask after them and see if they needed anything. In the village, he seemed to be everywhere at once. He would pop in to say hello, take one puff of the nargila, and be off to his next spot. The morning he was killed he went to the house of Hamis, whose skull had been broken at a previous demonstration three months ago by a tear gas canister projectile - the same weapon that would kill Basem.

Basem woke Hamis and gave him his medicine, then off he went to visit another friend in the village who is ill with cancer. Then a little girl from the village wanted a pineapple but couldn’t find any in the local stores. So Basem went to Ramallah to get a pineapple and was back before noon for the Friday prayers and the weekly demonstration against the theft of our land by the apartheid wall. Pheel never missed a demonstration; he participated in all the activities and creative actions in Bilin. He would always talk to the soldiers as human beings. Before he was hit he was calling for the soldiers to stop shooting because there were goats near the fence and he was worried for them. Then a woman in front of him was hit. He yelled to the commander to stop shooting because someone was wounded. He expected the soldiers to understand and stop shooting. Instead, they shot him too.

People came to his funeral from all the surrounding villages to show Basem that they loved him as much as he had loved them. But those of us from Bil’in kept looking around for him, expecting him to be walking with us.

Pheel, you were everyone’s friend. We always knew we loved you, but didn’t realize how much we would miss you until we lost you. As Bil’in has become the symbol of Palestine’s popular resistance, you are the symbol of Bil’in. Sweet Pheel, Rest in Peace, we will continue in your footsteps.

Source: http://www.bilin-village.org/english/articles/different-look/His-name-was-Basem

This was a caring human being who gave of himself to all those around him. It’s the people like the fine gentle soul you have just read about who inspire me to do what I do.

Yes, Pheel, rest in peace now. I too will attempt to continue in your footsteps. Though yours are very big shoes to fill I promise I will never give up.

Odd Squad Productions, Even The Boss Is On Board….

2009-04-23T09:24:00.001-07:00

Sometimes it’s just far to easy to be critical of the Vancouver City Police Department, and we forget that most of the guys and gals who are members are there because they believe they can make a difference.

Caring; they’re doing it right.

http://oddsquad.com/

Odd Squad Production (OSP) is a non-profit society which was created in 1998 by seven Vancouver City Police officers.

OSP developed a unique approach to community policing, crime prevention, and public education that addresses some of the major social problems affecting our community. Odd Squad’s approach to tackling these issues is accomplished by using reality-based/documentary video imagery as an educational tool. Having a close connection to the streets of the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver (DTES) has given OSP access to the real life and often tragic stories that are at the core of the productions. OSP ascribes to the notion that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The goal of OSP is to educate and inform ‘at-risk’ groups throughout our province on the dangers of substance abuse and other anti-social and criminal behavior.

Although the expertise regarding the drug problems has arisen for the most part through the extensive beat work in the Downtown Eastside (DTES), an area tragically beset with social problems, it is the development and distribution of video materials and documentary productions that has thrust OSP primarily into the drug prevention and education fields. In addition to producing documentaries, OSP has developed program tools and services such as audio-visual presentations to community and educational institutions.

Since its inception, Odd Squad Productions has been involved with production of award-winning educational films for youth. OSP’s first partnership was with the National Film Board of Canada for the documentary film Through a Blue Lens (1999). This continues to be one of the most popular drug-education films for high school classrooms across Canada. It has become the most successful film in the history of the NFB. In 2007, Odd Squad produced four educational films that address issues regarding the use and consequences of illicit drugs amongst the junior and high school student population.

For Every Action.....

2009-04-18T11:22:00.000-07:00

"For every action there is a positive or negative reaction." So, apparently I do remember some of my high school physics lessons after all.

Below you'll find some fine examples of this basic principle, if you dare to see beyond what you've been led to believe:

How Somalia's Fishermen Became Pirates: Ever since a civil war brought down Somalia's last functional government in 1991, the country's 3,330 km (2,000 miles) of coastline — the longest in continental Africa — has been pillaged by foreign vessels. A United Nations report in 2006 said that, in the absence of the country's at one time serviceable coastguard, Somali waters have become the site of an international "free for all," with fishing fleets from around the world illegally plundering Somali stocks and freezing out the country's own rudimentarily-equipped fishermen. According to another U.N. report, an estimated $300 million worth of seafood is stolen from the country's coastline each year. "In any context," says Gustavo Carvalho, a London-based researcher with Global Witness, an environmental NGO, "that is a staggering sum."

'Toxic waste' behind Somali piracy: The ransom demand is a means of "reacting to the toxic waste that has been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years", Januna Ali Jama, a spokesman for the pirates, based in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, said.

"The Somali coastline has been destroyed, and we believe this money is nothing compared to the devastation that we have seen on the seas."

You are being lied to about pirates: "Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy to Somalia, tells me: "Somebody is dumping nuclear material here. There is also lead, and heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury – you name it." Much of it can be traced back to European hospitals and factories, who seem to be passing it on to the Italian mafia to "dispose" of cheaply. When I asked Mr Ould-Abdallah what European governments were doing about it, he said with a sigh: "Nothing. There has been no clean-up, no compensation, and no prevention."

Yo ho ho and a bottle of uranium.

Playing For Change.....

2009-04-17T21:03:00.000-07:00

Below are three of my favorite videos from Playing For Change. Believe that we can change the world and enjoy.

The New Kid On The Block

2009-04-13T12:44:00.001-07:00

Congratulations Sameh and staff, the http://www.paltelegraph.com/ is really starting to take shape as a reliable source, adding another voice to changing the world. The aesthetic presentation looks pretty good, too.

Israeli Scholar Disputes Founding Myth…..

2009-04-13T12:14:00.000-07:00

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/041109b.html

Mmmm hmmm. Like I’ve always said.

My favourite paragraph is this one:

In other words, Bartal, like some other critics, is not so much disputing Sand’s historical claims about the Diaspora or the origins of Eastern European Jews, as he is contesting Sand’s notion that Zionists concocted a false history for a cynical political purpose.

So, apparently the only thing critics are disputing is the fact that Zionists lied. Mmmm hmmm.

'Only The Good Fridays'.....

2009-04-03T10:49:00.000-07:00

In honor of Betmo, I present my three favorite youtube videos:

I hope everyone has a good Friday.

Ladies And Gentlemen, I Give You - Avigdor Lieberman....

2009-04-02T10:44:00.000-07:00

Israel's new foreign minister dismayed the international community today with a rancorous analysis of the peace process and an announcement that the new government favours aggression rather than concessions to the Palestinians.

In his first speech since taking office, the rightwinger Avigdor Lieberman dismissed the last round of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, arguing that Israeli concessions made in a bid to secure peace had all been fruitless.

"Those who want peace should prepare for war and be strong," he said. "There is no country that made concessions like Israel. Since 1967 we gave up territory that is three times the size of Israel. We showed willingness. The Oslo process started back in 1993, and to this day I have not seen that we reached peace."

Speaking to what the Associated Press describes as a roomful of "cringing diplomats", the new foreign minister said Israel was not bound by the Annapolis peace talks. These were initiated in November 2007 to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and involved around 40 countries.

"The Israeli government never ratified Annapolis; nor did [the] Knesset," said Lieberman, promising to honour only the US-initiated "road map" of 2002, which has long been in stalemate amid accusations from both sides.

Lieberman's speech is in stark contrast to remarks made by the incoming prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, who both said the new government would pursue peace on every front.

During a recent visit to the Czech Republic, the Israeli president said the new administration had promised: "We shall continue the negotiations with the Palestinians. We shall negotiate with each of our neighbours ... and see what can be done in terms of peace on the regional level." And a week before taking office, Netanyahu vowed to engage in peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.

Their comments came in reaction to growing international concern that the new Israeli government would not be committed to a two-state peace process.

In today's speech, Lieberman was more amiable towards Egypt, which he described as an "important element in the Arab world". This is an improvement on a few weeks ago, when he said the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, could "go to hell".

The Guardian

This wanker is trouble, and if you had any false notions of peace being possible anytime in the near future, guess again. With Lieberman at the helm of Israeli Foreign Affairs, expect to see Zionist hate and settler violence against the Palestinian people to rise dramatically.

A Fine Gentleman Speaks The Truth....

2009-04-02T10:03:00.000-07:00

This article, written by Khalid Amayreh and posted at DesertPeace is the best piece I have come across in a long time. As I read, I felt a lump in my throat and a stirring in my heart. I wish I could express myself as eloquently as this fine gentleman does. Khalid, you are a treasure to humanity.

By Khalid Amayreh

This is a rejoinder to my ‘Shame on us’ article.

—————————————————————-

Israeli-occupied Jerusalem

Zionist massacres-1948 Zionist massacres-2008-9

I have been under fire of late from two diametrically opposite quarters. First, the fanatical, self-worshiping Zionists who think that non-Jewish suffering should never ever be compared with Jewish suffering.

Needless to say, this psychotic attitude stems from deep-seated convictions that a Jew is a special creature whose life is worth more than the rest of humanity. Haven’t we noticed, for example, how Israel has made “Gila’ad Shalit”, the Israeli soldier imprisoned by Hamas, a household name all over the world, while next to nothing is mentioned about the estimated 10,000 Palestinian political and resistance prisoners languishing in Israeli dungeons and concentration camps?

And, Second, some pro-Palestinian activists who believe that I should avoid invoking the holocaust in my writings lest this help legitimize the Zionist narrative and inadvertently justify Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people.

To our pro-Palestinian activists, I, with all due respect, would like to say the following. I sincerely believe that we would be walking in the path of immorality if we denied or belittled other people’s suffering. Indeed, it is imperative that we retain our humanity and moral fabric in the course of this legitimate struggle against the evil state. We must never imitate or emulate their ways and tactics. This would be self-defeating, self-destructive and immensely demoralizing.

Moreover, we must refrain from saying or doing things that would make others portray us as inherent enemies of Jews, because we are not.

We also need to be constantly vigilant and cautious about what we say and how we say it, lest we inadvertently besmirch the legitimacy of our just cause.

Israel is so manifestly criminal and ugly that we don’t need to deny anyone’s suffering to prove this plain fact.

In short, we don’t have to shoot ourselves in the foot. It is wrong and it hurts us a lot.

Obviously, the Zionists’ “arguments” are motivated, as always, by ill-will and a malicious desire to silence critics of Israeli criminality whose phantasmagoric expressions we all witnessed recently in the Gaza Strip.

The subject of contention this time has been an article I published a few days ago, entitled “Shame on us,” in which I strongly criticized efforts by some dubious “peace activists” to bamboozle some innocent Palestinian children from some impoverished localities into playing music before “holocaust survivors.”

This is what happened last week when a dozen young musicians from the Jenin Refugee Camp, in the northern West Bank, were taken surreptitiously to Tel Aviv where they were made to play a serenade before some elderly Zionists , some of whom veterans from the many criminal wars Israel had waged on our people. And as I said in the article, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine was not carried out by UFOs but by the very people our children are now being asked to cheer up.

Understandably, the not-so-innocent event left many Palestinians infuriated by the cheap exploitation of these kids for Israeli hasbara purposes. As one who lost three uncles in one day to Zionist murderers in 1954, I felt deeply wounded and humiliated by that event.

I am actually not against reconciliation between Palestinians and Jews. I don’t and never will view Jews as our inherent enemies. Some Jews are actually among the most effective supporters of our national cause. Those we salute for their honesty and morality.

However, it is obvious that true reconciliation in this part of the world requires that the slate be made thoroughly clean. Usurped rights must be returned to rightful owners, and wrongs must be rectified. This I say to honest and conscientious Jews who are genuinely interested in justice and peace.

But to the Zionists I would like to say that the following: the latest point of contention is not about music or even peace. This is first and foremost about human dignity of which the children of the holocaust and their children and grand children and great grandchildren have been trying to rob us.

And whether you like it or not, for us, at least, you represent the real Wehrmacht, the real SS and real Gestapo. You are the Nazis of our time. This is what we see from our vantage point. This is what much of the world sees. This is what many honest and conscientious Jews see.

You stole our country, you murdered our people, you destroyed our homes, and you expelled and dispersed the bulk of our people to the four corners of the world. And after all of this, you have audacity to dupe our children to sing and play music to you? This is simply beyond, far beyond, Chutzpah.

Some of you habitually babble the word “hatred” whenever a Palestinian asserts his people’s humanity and dignity.

Well, you are really sick to the bone if you think Palestinians must sacrifice their dignity in order to become a hate-free people according to the Zionist lexicon. We will not pay tribute to the killers of our children, we will show respect to our grave-diggers.

Besides, who do you think you are anyway to lecture us on hatred? After all, you represent and embody hatred in its ugliest form. The extirpation of a people from its ancestral homeland from time immemorial is a satanic act par excellence. The destruction and obliteration of hundreds of Palestinian towns and villages to fulfill Jewish nationalism is diabolical act of the highest order.

Your recent blitzkrieg in Gaza during which your Nazi-like army ganged up on a helpless, unprotected civilian population, exterminating them with bombs and missiles and incinerating their children with White Phosphorus proved once again that you are no better than the hateful Nazis you curse day and night for what they did to you sixty years ago.

Well, try to get yourselves out of this cocoon of self-denial. The Palestinian people don’t hate music nor do they teach their kids to hate Jews or non-Jews, it is your evil and murderous actions that generate hatred against you not only among Palestinians and Muslims but among many other people around the world.

Just look at your ugly faces in the mirror.

"And whether you like it or not, for us, at least, you represent the real Wehrmacht, the real SS and real Gestapo. You are the Nazis of our time. This is what we see from our vantage point. This is what much of the world sees. This is what many honest and conscientious Jews see."

This is what I see. To think that my father and both uncles died far too young and the Zionist Israel we see today is the end result of their sacrifice is beyond heartbreaking.

They Gave Me The Right To Question...

2009-03-31T16:26:00.000-07:00

For anyone who may actually read this blog and wonders why I should be so focused on Israel and its misdeeds, may I bring your attention to the following:

Declaration of Intent Between the Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness of Canada and the Ministry of Public Security of the Government of the State of Israel

Israel delegation returns from official visit in USA and Canada

The Canada-Israel "Public Security" Agreement Ottawa & Tel Aviv collaborate in counter-terrorism & Homeland security

Mmmmm hmmmm, I think the above gives me every right to hold both Israel and Canada accountable for what they do or don't do.

I have personal reasons for my dedication to the cause of peace and justice for all those in Israel's neighborhood, but that's a story for another day. Suffice to say, it's all about compassion and nothing to do with hate, that would just be silly and I'm no self-hater.:)

No, No, Moto.....

2009-03-31T13:35:00.000-07:00

Not just your average cellphone manufacturer:

Motorola developed with Aeronautics Defense Systems a perimeter defense system called Stronghold, to be used in the West Bank.

Since 2005, a Motorola radar detectors' system has been installed around some 20-47 Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including in Hebron, Karmei Tzur and Har Bracha. In some cases, the radar stations were erected on private Palestinian land, preventing Palestinian movement near the Israeli settlements.

The company has developed and provided the "Mountain Rose" communication system to the Israeli army, which is a specifically designed mobile system for field conditions, and it is being used by soldiers in the occupied West Bank.

Involved in:

Services to the Settlements

SpecializedEquipment and Services

Motorola Israel is a full subsidiary of the US-based Motorola Inc. (NYSE:MOT).

Motorola Inc. also holds about 6% of the shares of Afcon Industries. Israeli subsidiaries: MIRS Communications, Beeper Communications Israel, Taldor Communication, European subsidiaries of Motorola Inc. managed by Motorola Israel: Uni-Net (Poland) and SetKomNet (Turkey).

Hang up on Motorola.
Demand that Motorola and its fully-owned subsidiary, Motorola Israel:

-end its production and sales of fuses for all Israeli weapons
-end its sales of communication devices to the Israeli military, including all radar detection devices
-end its sales of all products that aid and support Israel's illegal settlements

Earth Hour.....

2009-03-28T10:46:00.000-07:00

Celebrate earth hour tonight. Will it kill you to turn your lights, computer, t.v. ect. off for just one hour?

Hopefully this year the neighbors will remember to turn off their damn outside yard lights so I can enjoy the lack of light pollution and see the stars as they're meant to be seen. Even though they're shrouded by our filth and dirty air now, I can try to imagine what it used to look like. Now, if everyone would just stop driving for the designated hour I might be able to experience the true, glorious sounds of nature without all the human cacophony, too.

Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream....

2009-03-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

I won't give up on the dream.

My thanks to lennybruce over at Thru Other Eyes.

Theodore Bikel is a Zionist, albeit a moderate one but a Zionist nonetheless. I've read many of his speeches, including the one he gave during the 35th World Zionist Congress which aroused passionate response including boos and jeers from those gathered there. Though he is a peace loving man at heart, one still gets the sense he feels Zionists are superior to all others. Such a shame.

OPPOSITION, by Rashid Hussain

I am against my country’s revolutionaries
Wounding a sheath of wheat
Against the child
Any child
Carrying a hand grenade
I am against my sister
Feeling the muscle of a gun
Against it all
And yet
What can a prophet do . a prophetess
When their eyes
Are mad to drink
The sight of the raiders’ hordes ?
I am against boys becoming
Heroes at ten
Against the tree flowering
Explosives
Against branches becoming scaffolds
Against the rose-beds turning to trenches
Against it all
And yet
When fire cremates my friends
My youth
And country
How can I
Stop from poem becoming a gun ?

How A U.S. Tax Deduction Aids Israeli Settlements.....

2009-03-27T09:12:00.000-07:00

For many years, the United States has had a policy against spending aid money to fund Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which successive administrations have regarded as an obstacle to peace. Yet private organizations in the United States continue to raise tax-exempt contributions for the very activities that the government opposes.

There's nothing illegal about the charitable contributions to pro-settlement organizations, which are documented in filings with the Internal Revenue Service. They're similar to tax-exempt donations made to thousands of foreign organizations around the world through groups that are often described as "American friends of" the recipient.

But critics of Israeli settlements question why American taxpayers are supporting indirectly, through the exempt contributions, a process that the government condemns. A search of IRS records identified 28 U.S. charitable groups that made a total of $33.4 million in tax-exempt contributions to settlements and related organizations between 2004

"This is an issue that has not gotten the attention it deserves," said Ori Nir, a spokesman for Americans for Peace Now, a lobbying group that opposes settlements. "I don't know how many people, including in the U.S. government, realize the extent of private American funding to settlements. . . . Every dollar that goes to settlements makes Middle East peace that much harder to reach."

The Obama administration had an early confrontation over settlements when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Israel this month. She criticized Israeli demolitions of Palestinian homes in a largely Arab area of Jerusalem known as Silwan, just below the walls of the Old City. "Clearly this kind of activity is unhelpful," she said. Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat responded that Clinton was mistaken and that the Palestinian houses had been built illegally.

One of the Israeli organizations that has led the way in developing this area of East Jerusalem is called Ir David, or City of David. Like other pro-settlement groups, it has an active fundraising effort in the United States. According to Form 990s filed with the IRS, Friends of Ir David raised $8.7 million in 2004, $1.2 million in 2005 and $2.7 million in 2006.

The group's primary tax-exempt purpose, according to the IRS filings, is: "To create a charitable fund to provide financial aid & other reasonable assistance to benefit the Jewish people of the Old City of Jerusalem. To teach about the history and archeology of the biblical city of Jerusalem. To offer aid & assistance for education, housing & the rehabilitation of distressed properties."

A senior Jordanian official argued in an interview this week that Israeli pro-settlement groups such as Ir David are seeking to transform the demographic character of East Jerusalem so that a two-state solution with Jerusalem shared by Israeli and Palestinian governments will be impossible.

Hebron is another controversial area where settlements have received substantial tax-exempt gifts from America. According to IRS records, the Hebron Fund donated $860,637 in 2005 and $967,954 in 2006 for "social and educational well-being"; the fund's online mission statement makes clear this is for Israeli settlers inside the city. The Hebron settlement of Kiryat Arba received $730,000 in 2006 from a group called American Friends of Yeshiva High School of Kiryat Arba.

Often the U.S. charities will specify that their gifts are going to charities in Israel, even though the recipients are in the West Bank, which the United States regards as occupied territory. American Friends of the College of Judea and Samaria, for example, said its donations were "to provide for the expansion and furtherance of the needs of educational institutions in Israel," even though the college is in the settlement of Ariel. Similarly, other filings speak of gifts to "Elon Moreh, Israel," "Gush Etzion, Israel," "Karnei Shomron, Israel," "Efrat, Israel," and "Bat Ayin, Israel," even though those settlements are all in the West Bank.

A 2005 report by the Congressional Research Service stated: "The United States stipulates that U.S. aid funds cannot be used in the occupied territories." The issue came to a head during a 1992 dispute over the use of U.S. loan guarantees. A Jan. 25, 1992, story in the New York Times said that Secretary of State James A. Baker had cautioned Israel's ambassador "that the administration was not going to underwrite Israeli policies that fundamentally contradict its own principles and long-stated policies."

U.S.-Israeli friction over settlements is likely to increase as Israel forms a new conservative government under Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu. Indeed, the man he has selected as Israel's next foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, lives in the West Bank settlement of Nokdim, just east of Bethlehem.

Source

I've yet to find out how the Canadian version of this scam works, but I will.

This Idiotic Ban Shames Canada....

2009-03-22T09:20:00.000-07:00

Canada bans outspoken British MP
Here's a quote from the above article, made by our Immigration Minister:

"In this case, I believe folks that are supporting and promoting and helping terrorist organizations are not needed to visit Canada."

More links to this story:

The Ottawa Citizen:Banned Brit hurls insults at Canada’s immigration minister

Globe and Mail:Kenney bunk

The Toronto Star:Banning British MP a clumsy, dangerous move

The Toronto Star:Silly ban on British MP

AFP:Canada bars Galloway over Hamas support

The New York Times:Canada: Antiwar British Lawmaker Is Barred

BBC:MP Galloway to fight Canada ban

So, if the asshole believes that Mr. Galloway is a national security threat, and shouldn't be allowed to visit Canada, I wonder what sort of grief I'm in for.

This sham shames Canada indeed, and is more evidence of which lobbyists in Ottawa really control the politicians and our foreign policy in this so-called democratic nation of ours. Free speech is dead. With this sort of bullshit becoming an everyday occurrence in my once proud "true north strong and free" I'm beginning to wonder how long it will be before they try to come after me and any other blogger who dares to oppose Israeli policy regarding Palestine.

This is how the pro-Israel lobby is going to try and attack us, is it. Rather than coming after us individually and taking down our blogs or calling us anti-semitic, islamofacists, or self-hating Jews, among other things, they're going to try to use our government to shut us up and shut us down.

I will continue to support the people of Palestine and I will continue to be an anti-war activist no matter how the bastards try to shut me down. One way or another, my voice will not be silenced.

Israel Troops Admit Gaza Abuses.....

2009-03-20T08:36:00.000-07:00

But They’re Not Human Beings, They are Not People, They are Arabs! Or as my dear old mother used to say: Never trust an Arab. More fine examples of bullshit spewing from the mouths of the ignorant.

An Israeli military college has printed damning soldiers' accounts of the killing of civilians and vandalism during recent operations in Gaza.

One account tells of a sniper killing a mother and children at close range whom troops had told to leave their home.

Another speaker at the seminar described what he saw as the "cold blooded murder" of a Palestinian woman.

The army has defended its conduct during the Gaza offensive but said it would investigate the testimonies.

The Israeli army has said it will investigate the soldiers' accounts.

The testimonies were published by the military academy at Oranim College. Graduates of the academy, who had served in Gaza, were speaking to new recruits at a seminar.

The climate in general [was that] lives of Palestinians are much, much less important than the lives of our soldiers
Soldier testimony

Analysis: Operation Miscast Lead?
Gaza war crimes probes

"[The testimonies] conveyed an atmosphere in which one feels entitled to use unrestricted force against Palestinians," academy director Dany Zamir told public radio.

Heavy civilian casualties during the three-week operation which ended in the blockaded coastal strip on 18 January provoked an international outcry.

Correspondents say the testimonies undermine Israel's claims that troops took care to protect non-combatants and accusations that Hamas militants were responsible for putting civilians into harm's way.

'Less important'

The Palestinian woman and two of her children were allegedly shot after they misunderstood instructions about which way to walk having been ordered out of their home by troops.

"The climate in general... I don't know how to describe it.... the lives of Palestinians, let's say, are much, much less important than the lives of our soldiers," an infantry squad leader is quoted saying.

In another cited case, a commander ordered troops to kill an elderly woman walking on a road, even though she was easily identifiable and clearly not a threat.

Testimonies, which were given by combat pilots and infantry soldiers, also included allegations of unnecessary destruction of Palestinian property.

"We would throw everything out of the windows to make room and order. Everything... Refrigerators, plates, furniture. The order was to throw all of the house's contents outside," a soldier said.

One non-commissioned officer related at the seminar that an old woman crossing a main road was shot by soldiers.

"I don't know whether she was suspicious, not suspicious, I don't know her story… I do know that my officer sent people to the roof in order to take her out… It was cold-blooded murder," he said.

The transcript of the session for the college's Yitzhak Rabin pre-military course, which was held last month, appeared in a newsletter published by the academy.

Israeli human rights groups have criticised the military for failing to properly investigate violations of the laws of war in Gaza despite plenty of evidence of possible war crimes.

'Moral army'

The soldiers' testimonies also reportedly told of an unusually high intervention by military and non-military rabbis, who circulated pamphlets describing the war in religious terminology.

"All the articles had one clear message," one soldier said. "We are the people of Israel, we arrived in the country almost by miracle, now we need to fight to uproot the gentiles who interfere with re-conquering the Holy Land."

"Many soldiers' feelings were that this was a war of religion," he added.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israel Radio that the findings would be examined seriously.

"I still say we have the most moral army in the world. Of course there may be exceptions but I have absolutely no doubt this will be inspected on a case-by-case basis," he said.

Medical authorities say more than 1,300 Palestinians were killed during Israel's 22-day operation, including some 440 children, 110 women, and dozens of elderly people.

The stated aim was to curb rocket and mortar fire by militants from Gaza. Thirteen Israelis, including three civilians were killed.

Source: BBCNewsworld

There you go. From all accounts, what we have here is fanatic religious wingnuts stirring up hate and discontent to further they're self-serving cause and giving justification to those who hate Arabs, giving them a Godly excuse. They're God must be so proud.

The Tide Is Turning.....

2009-03-19T09:18:00.000-07:00

In honor of all those who remain brave and never give up, such as the groups and individuals mentioned in the following post:

I used to think the world was flat
Rarely threw my hat into the crowd
I felt I had used up my quota of yearning
Used to look in on the children at night
In the glow of their Donald Duck light
And frighten myself with the thought of my little ones burning
But ooh, the tide is turning
The tide is turning

Satellite buzzing through the endless night
Exclusive to moonshots and the world title fights
Jesus Christ imagine what it must be earning
Who is the strongest, who is the best
Who holds the aces, the East, or the West
This is the crap our children are learning
But ooh, the tide is turning
The tide is turning
Ooh, the tide is turning

Now the satellite's confused
'Cos on Saturday night
The airwaves were full of compassion and light
And his silicon heart warmed
To the sight of a billion candles burning
Ooh, the tide is turning
Ooh, the tide is turning
The tide is turning Billy

I'm not saying that the battle is won
But on Saturday night all those kids in the sun
Wrested technology's sword from the hand of the
War Lords
Ooh, the tide is turning
The tide is turning Sylvester

The tide is turning.

Six Years Without Rachel – We Still Demand Justice.....

2009-03-19T08:39:00.000-07:00

Every year we remember 16th March. We remember a kind, insightful, talented person committed to the plight of the Palestinian people, who genuinely had the courage of her convictions. Her name was Rachel Corrie. This year, the anniversary of her death comes in the wake of Israel’s massive assault on the Gaza Strip. We believe Rachel would want the world to remember the 1,400 Palestinians killed before she is remembered herself. Now, six long years after her death, the situation in Gaza is even more desperate than when Rachel bore witness to it. Six years on we still demand justice. We still demand that the international community hold the Israeli military and government responsible for the murder of Rachel and so many Palestinian civilians. We also demand that the US justice system holds responsible the Caterpillar company which continues to provide the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) with the military D-9 bulldozers, which killed not only Rachel but a number of Palestinians and have demolished thousands of Palestinian homes.
It wasn’t possible for ISM volunteers to enter the Gaza Strip for several years due to the clampdown of the Erez crossing, so today was the first time ISM activists managed to commemorate the anniversary in Gaza itself. Some of the activists who volunteered with ISM Rafah in 2003 were able to compare the situation then and now. Different facets of occupation are manifest in 2009 - the oppressive wall along the Rafah border with Egypt has been cut down but has been replaced by siege and blockade; the brutality endured by the residents of Rafah’s border areas has now touched every single person throughout the Gaza Strip. From 2002 to 2005 over 3,000 Palestinian homes were bulldozed in Rafah. Now, in just 22 days, thousands more were destroyed throughout the entire Gaza Strip. 100,000 Palestinians have been left homeless by air missile strikes and shelling with many families now living in tents on the rubble of their homes.

This is a highly poignant day for us, so to mark it in a positive and inspiring way, we joined five young Palestinian artists to create a mural on one of the few remaining sections of the Israeli wall on the Rafah-Egypt border strip. The same wall whose construction saw the creation of a buffer zone hundreds of metres deep, which gnawed away at vast swathes of residential neighbourhoods, including the one Rachel died trying to safeguard. The same wall from where fellow ISM activist, Tom Hurndall, was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier from a watchtower less than a month after Rachel was killed. The same wall that for years was intended to imprison Palestinian people. The same wall that was finally destroyed by the Palestinian people.

As the artists began painting the wall, enlivening it with colourful symbols of defiance, Israeli F-16 fighter jets were heard flying over Rafah. Despite Israel’s announcement of a “unilateral ceasefire” on 18th January, the Israeli Air Force continues to unilaterally bomb Rafah and other areas in the Gaza Strip almost daily.. Most of the international journalists have left and the international community considers the war as being over, but Palestinian civilians are still being killed and injured by Israeli attacks on a regular basis. Fortunately, today we weren’t bombed by Israeli aircraft. Maybe because we were protected by the “Palestinian Air Force”. Palestinian children from the Lifemakers Center along with kids from the nearby al-Barazil refugee camp responded to the Israeli military flying F-16s by flying kites! 14 kites were flown in memory of the 14 hundred Palestinians killed recently in Gaza. Another kite sent our love to Rachel.

This was also a symbolic action against the crippling Israeli-Egyptian blockade. Gaza has been under siege for nearly two years now and can aptly be described as the world’s largest open-air prison with over 1.5 million people locked in by land, sea and air. After the Free Gaza Movement voyages challenged the blockade by sea last year, followed by the Viva Palestina convoy challenging the siege by land last week, Palestinian children symbolically broke the control of Gazan airspace today.

A delegation from Code Pink also succeeded to gain entry recently and celebrated International Women’s Day with the courageous women of Gaza on 8th March. Rachel’s parents, Cindy and Craig Corrie joined them, commenting on their visit, “Despite the pain, we have once again felt privileged to enter briefly into the lives of Rachel’s Palestinian friends in Gaza. We are moved by their resilience and heartened by their song, dance, and laughter amidst the tears.”

Maybe the soaring kites were seen by some of the internationals protesting today on the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing, against the Egyptian authorities’ denial to allow them access to Gaza. They included Jordanian parliamentarians and Greek engineers aiming to assist reconstruction efforts in Gaza. However, all of this is not enough. We must call again on the international community to mobilise against the genocidal siege on Gaza.

The Israeli Occupation Forces attempted to kill another American ISM activist, Tristan Anderson, three days ago in the stalwart West Bank village of Ni’lin. Tristan, our thoughts and prayers are with you. Just as today we stood at the destroyed wall of Rafah, commemorating the sacrifice of Rachel, one day we will stand together with Tristan at the destroyed wall of Ni’lin to commemorate the sacrifice of Ahmed Mousa (10), Yousef Amira (17), Arafat Rateb Khawaje (22) and Mohammed Khawaje (20), the four civilian martyrs of Ni’lin. Despite the murders of Rachel Corrie and Tom Hurndall, despite the attempted assassinations of Brian Avery and Tristan Anderson, despite the injuries, abductions, illegal deportations and denials of entry that we suffered, we are back. ISM is still here, and will continue to support Palestinian non-violent resistance.

Today, six years after the martyrdom of Rachel; three days after the shooting of Tristan; two months after the Palestinians ousted the IOF from the Gaza Strip; 42 years after the occupation of West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip; 61 years after the Naqba; we still say free Palestine! End the occupation! Peace with justice and dignity! We should remember Rachel and all that she stood for. Similarly we must never let the world forget all the innocent Palestinian souls who perished without mercy. Their fate is already slipping from the collective memory of the international community, fading from the headlines of a fickle corporate media. It is time this manufactured catastrophe ends so that Rachel’s death and the deaths of countless Palestinians were not in vain.

International Solidarity Movement

Israeli Foreign Minister, Gakkk....

2009-03-16T11:11:00.000-07:00

We have an idiot for an Immigration Minister, but check out this piece of garbage, the new Foreign Minister of Israel:
Police: Lieberman's transgressions ongoing

Yisrael Beiteinu Chairman Avigdor Lieberman

Mazuz orders to speed up Lieberman probe

Ex-bouncer Avigdor Lieberman muscles his way into Israeli politics

A Jewish Hitler?

As for the following piece, No Shit!:
Rightist gov't in Israel may damage peace talks

This confirms it, the leaders of this backward little state are completely out of their minds, are completely of touch, have no desire for peace, and in closing, if they wanted to prove to the world that Hamas, Hezbollah and many more are right, they may have just achieved their goal. Idiots.

Suppression of Criticism of Israel.....

2009-03-16T10:19:00.000-07:00

Perhaps that asshole of monumental proportions should give this a read, and reconsider his recent idiotic statements. It's not hard to tell whose Zionist hands are padding the wallets of these bastards, too: This statement was rejected by both the Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail (as an op-ed).

Please help this important statement get into broad circulation - pass it on to your networks (faculty, community, MPs, university presidents, unions etc.). You may also wish to write to the Star and Globe editorials and express your dismay that they have chosen not to publish it.

Over 150 Jewish Canadians have signed a statement expressing their concerns about the campaign to suppress criticism of Israel that is being carried on within Canada. The signatories include many prominent Canadians, including Ursula Franklin O.C., Anton Kuerti O.C., Naomi Klein, Dr. Gabor Mate, and professors Meyer Brownstone (recipient of Pearson Peace Medal), Natalie Zemon Davis (former president of the American Historical Association), and Judy Rebick.

The signatories are particularly concerned that unfounded accusations of anti-Semitism deflect attention from Israel's accountability for what many have called war crimes in Gaza. They state that B'nai Brith and the Canadian Jewish Congress have led campaigns to silence criticism of Israel on university campuses, in labour unions and in other groups. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney and Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff unquestioningly echo the views of these particular Jewish organizations.

The signatories strongly state that they are against all expressions of racism. While firmly committed to resisting any form of prejudice against Jewish people, their statement explicitly states that these spurious allegations of anti-Semitism bring the anti-Communist terror of the 1950s vividly to mind. The statement underlines the immeasurable suffering and injustice to the Palestinian people due to the severe poverty, daily humiliations, and military invasions inflicted by the State of Israel.

Statement: Jewish Canadians Concerned about Suppression of Criticism of Israel

We are Jewish Canadians concerned about all expressions of racism, anti-Semitism, and social injustice. We believe that the Holocaust legacy "Never again" means never again for all peoples. It is a tragic turn of history that the State of Israel, with its ideals of democracy and its dream of being a safe haven for Jewish people, causes immeasurable suffering and injustice to the Palestinian people.

We are appalled by recent attempts of prominent Jewish organizations and leading Canadian politicians to silence protest against the State of Israel. We are alarmed by the escalation of fear tactics. Charges that those organizing Israel Apartheid Week or supporting an academic boycott of Israel are anti-Semites promoting hatred bring the anti-Communist terror of the 1950s vividly to mind. We believe this serves to deflect attention from Israel's flagrant violations of international humanitarian law.
B'nai Brith and the Canadian Jewish Congress have pressured university presidents and administrations to silence debate and discussion specifically regarding Palestine/Israel. In a full-page ad in a national newspaper, B'nai Brith urged donors to withhold funds from universities because "anti-Semitic hate fests" were being allowed on campuses. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney and Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff have echoed these arguments. While university administrators have resisted demands to shut down Israel Apartheid week, some Ontario university presidents have bowed to this disinformation campaign by suspending and fining students, confiscating posters, and infringing on free speech.

We do not believe that Israel acts in self-defense. Israel is the largest recipient of US foreign aid, receiving $3 million/day. It has the fourth strongest army in the world. Before the invasion of Gaza on 27 December 2008, Israel's siege had already created a humanitarian catastrophe there, with severe impoverishment, malnutrition, and destroyed infrastructure. It is crucial that forums for discussion of Israel's accountability to the international community for what many have called war crimes be allowed to proceed unrestricted by specious claims of anti-Semitism.

We recognize that anti-Semitism is a reality in Canada as elsewhere, and we are fully committed to resisting any act of hatred against Jews. At the same time, we condemn false charges of anti-Semitism against student organizations, unions, and other groups and people exercising their democratic right to freedom of speech and association regarding legitimate criticism of the State of Israel.

Signatories:

Abigail Bakan
Adam Balsam
Sharon Baltman
Julia Barnett
Lainie Basman
Jody Berland
Sam Blatt
Geri Blinik
Anita Block
Elizabeth Block
Sheila Block
Hannah Briemberg
Mark Brill
Meyer Brownstone
Eliza Burroughs
Smadar Carmon
Gyda Chud
Charles P. Cohen
Nathalie Cohen
David Copeland
Natalie Zemon Davis
Eliza Deutsch
James Deutsch
Judith Deutsch
Abbe Edelson
Jack Etkin
Elle Flanders
Danielle Frank
Ursula Franklin
Dan Freeman-Maloy
Miriam Garfinkle
Alisa Gayle
Jack Gegenberg
Mark Golden
Brenda Goldstein
Sue Goldstein
Cy Gonick
Marnina Gonick
Rachel Gotthilf
Amy Gottleib
Kevin A. Gould
Daina Green
Lisa Frances Greenspoon
Ricardo Grinspun
Cathy Gulkin
Rachel Gurofsky
Deboran Guterman
Yesse Gutman
Freda Guttman
Judy Haiven
Michael Hanna-Fein
Jean Hanson
Jan Heynen
Maria Heynen
Adam Hofmann
Jake Javanshir
Jeannie Kamins
Marylin Kanee
Howard S. Kaplan
Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta
Mira Khazzam
Bonnie Sher Klein
Mark Klein
Martin Klein
Naomi Klein
Joshua Katz-Rosene
Ryan Katz-Rosene
Judy Koch
Anton Kuerti
Jason Kunin
Aaron Lakoff
Michael Lambek
Natalie LaRoche
Richard Borshay Lee
Andy Lehrer
Gabriel Levin
Gabriel Levine
Joel Lexchin
Kim Linekin
Abby Lippman
Lee Lorch
Martin Lukacs
Audrey Macklin
Elise Maltin
Richard Marcuse
Wayne Mark
Gabor Mate
Arthur Milner
Anna Miransky
Dorit Naaman
Joanne Naiman
Neil Naiman
Michael Neumann
David-Marc Newman
David Noble
Clare O'Connor
Robin Ostow
Andre W. Payant
Jenny Peto
Simone Powell
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein
Fabienne Presentey
Yacov Rabkin
Diana Ralph
Naomi Rankin
Judy Rebick
Ester Reiter
Jillian Rogin
Richard Roman
Joseph Rosen
Herman Rosenfeld
Martha Roth
Marty Roth
Ruben Roth
E.Natalie Rothman
B. Sack
Ben Saifer
Miriam Sampaio
Jacob Scheir
Fred Schloessinger
Alan Sears
Shlomit Segal
Edward H. Shaffer
Noa Shaindlinger
Ray Shankman
Eva Sharell
Elliot Shek
Sid Shniad
Max Silverman
Samuel Singer
Elizabeth Solloway
Susan Starkman
Greg Starr
Jonathan Sterne
Jeremy Stolow
Rhonda Sussman
Vera Szoke
Joe Tannenbaum
Howard Tessler
Marion Traub-Werner
Ceyda Turan
Sandra Tychsen
Cheryl Wagner
Jon McPhedran Waitzer
David Wall
Naomi Binder Wall
Kathy Wazana
Karen Weisberg
Barry Weisleder
Paul Weinberg
Judith Weisman
Suzanne Weiss
Abraham Weizfeld
Ernie Yacub
B.H. Yael
Yedida Zalik
Melvin Zimmerman

For more information contact:
James Deutsch, M.D., Ph.D.
Phone: 416-363-3751 Ext 2011
Email: concernedjewishcanadians@connexions.org

Judith Deutsch, M.S.W., R.S.W.
Phone: 416 929-8180
Email: concernedjewishcanadians@connexions.org

Miriam Garfinkle, M.D.
Phone: 416-897-0008
Email: concernedjewishcanadians@connexions.org

Source

Why Would This Happen?.....

2009-03-15T15:22:00.001-07:00

Israel apparently feels it should be immune. No, I'm not intending to blame the victim, I send my condolences to the families of those who died.

Israel is the champ of making excuses for it's atrocious behavior by telling the world that only they have the right to exact revenge. I don't think so many people are going to be quite so sympathetic toward Israel this time. Israel is going to have to sit down with all representatives of the Palestinian people and negotiate a fair, equitable and lasting peace. The government is going to have to deal with the illegal settlements, blatant land grabs, right of return, and the deliberate baiting of Palestinians by the Israeli government, it's armed forces, and many of the country's populace.

Israel's Rafael goes Bollywood.....

2009-03-15T15:09:00.000-07:00

Israel's Rafael goes Bollywood.
This is the weirdest thing I've seen in a long, long, time. Jesus H. Jumped-Up Christ!

West Bank.....

2009-03-15T14:37:00.000-07:00

Masua
Israeli police
West Bank shooting
Moghniyeh Group
near the other illegal West Bank settlement of Ariel

The Professional Whore Who Supports War.....

2009-03-15T09:47:00.000-07:00

After the unfortunate use of language by CAF’s President who quoted Jewish American author Dr. Norman Finkelstein and described the Minister as a “professional whore who supports war", Prime Minister Harper's little pro-Israel lackey, our very own Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has declared war against the Canadian Arab Federation.

Kenney is an Israeli ass-kissing little prick, and after watching this interview, I agree with the two Jewish university professors who wrote this article.

It's true, he is nothing but a professional whore who supports war but I also have to wonder whether he may have something financial to gain from his doe-eyed support of the Apartheid State of Israel. I truly hope the Ethics Commission finds his character lacking and recommends he looses parliamentary privileges. I would like to think this whole affair could lead to a deeper understanding by the Canadian public for the unwavering support of the Criminal State of Israel by our government. I wonder how much Zionist money lines the pockets of our parliamentarians?

I Feel Fine.....

2009-03-14T11:24:00.000-07:00

International Women's Day In Gaza.....

2009-03-13T10:43:00.000-07:00

HOPE
You and I come from different worlds
But living under one big sky
We’re not so different, you and I

Don’t you think it’s quite absurd
That we keep fighting over nothing
Always pushing, always shoving

But you see, together we’ll be
Stronger than you, stronger than me
Cause we’ll always be
The hope we’re losing
The hope we’ll always need
The hope for you and me

And you know, it’s not too late
Life is only what we make it
Sometimes fate can use some help

Lost Generation.....

2009-03-13T09:34:00.000-07:00

Taking a page from my friend Betmo's book, I decided to post for a "good" Friday. This video is definitely worth the time to watch and it's not a bad idea to contemplate it for a little while afterward. I believe it's even more relevant now than when it was made in 2007. Commitment to belief in changing the world, ain't it grand!

Join the Global BDS Action Day, March 30th....

2009-03-11T10:27:00.000-07:00

In December 2008, Israel decided to mark the 60th anniversary of its existence the same way it had established itself – perpetrating massacres against the Palestinian people. In 23 days, Israel killed more than 1,300 and injured over 5,000 Palestinians in Gaza. The irony of history is that Israel targeted those Palestinians – and their descendants - whom it had expelled from their homes and pushed into refugee-hood in Gaza in 1948, whose land it has stolen, whom it has oppressed since 1967 by means of a brutal military occupation, and whom it had tried to starve into submission by means of a criminal blockade of food, fuel and electricity in the 18 months preceding the military assault. We cannot wait for Israel to zero in on its next objective. Palestine has today become the test of our indispensable morality and our common humanity.

We therefore call on all to unite our different capacities and struggles in a

Global Day of Action
in Solidarity with the Palestinian people and
for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel
on March 30th.

The mobilization coincides with the Palestinian Land Day, the annual commemoration of the 1976 Israeli massacre of Palestinians in the Galilee in struggle against massive land expropriation, and forms part of the Global Week of Action against the Crises and War from March 28 to April 4.

We urge the people and their organizations around the globe to mobilize in concrete and visible BDS actions to make this day a historic step in this new anti-apartheid movement and for the fulfilment of the rights and dignity of the people and the accountability of the powerful. In our March 30th BDS actions, we will particularly focus on:

* Boycotts and divestment from Israeli corporations and international corporations that sustain Israeli apartheid and occupation.
* Legal action to end Israel’s impunity and prosecute its war criminals through national court cases and international tribunals.
* Cancelling and blocking free trade and other preferential agreements with Israel and imposing an arms embargo as the first steps towards fully fledged sanctions against Israel.

The time for the world to fully adopt and implement the Palestinian call for boycotts, divestment and sanctions is NOW. This campaign has to become an urgent part of every struggle for justice and humanity, by adopting widespread action against Israeli products, companies, academic and cultural institutions, sports groups, international corporations supporting Israeli policies of racism, ethnic cleansing and military occupation and pressuring governments for sanctions. It must be sustained until Israel provides free access to Gaza, dismantles the Apartheid Wall and ends its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands; recognizes the right of the Arab Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and respects, protects and promotes the rights of the Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties.

For more information see: www.bdsmovement.net
For information on how to join the action day and how to develop BDS action in your country, organization and network, please contact the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) at: info@bdsmovement.net

Global BDS Action Call Spanish.pdf
Global BDS Action Call Italian.pdf
Global BDS Action Call English.pdf
Global BDS Action Call French.pdf

In Celebration Of International Women's Day.....

2009-03-08T08:54:00.000-07:00

March 8
Gaza City

Today we arrived in Gaza. It is very hard to believe and it is very hard to describe how I am feeling. We left Al Arish this morning around 9a.m. and made the 40 minute drive to Rafah. This morning Medea and the group told us that at their meeting last night with the Red Crescent, they received greetings from the wife of President Mubarak and an assurance that we would be getting into Gaza today. This was really hard to imagine since so many have been waiting for days to get in and humanitarian aid is rotting at the border. It is obvious that the Egyptian government does not want the negative attention that would come from not letting our group in. Our group is full of journalists and activists that would be sure to get the message out that a humanitarian mission is being denied entrance into Gaza. It is hard enough to get a sheet of paper into Gaza and we got not only 59 people but a bus as well.

When we arrived at the border, there was a lot of confusion as to what would happen exactly. We were out of the buses waiting when in true CODEPINK fashion we started singing songs of peace. There are a lot of talented people with us and we actually sounded pretty good. We had our large pink banners out. Inside the terminal took a lot of time – passports were taken and counted and stamped- misplaced, found, more confusion……..and finally after many hours we were on the buses and on our way to Gaza City.

Once we cleared the Egyptian side, we were greeted by the mayor of Rafa, journalists and other Palestinians. They told us of how the bombs destroyed their infrastructure and that there is nothing to rebuild with. They told of us how many women and children were killed. They told of the civilian men that were killed. They greeted the Corries warmly and with much enthusiasm. Rachel Corrie is truly a hero in Palestine. We heard actual bombing nearby during this period. The mayor talked about the tunnel s and said that without them, they would have nothing. He said it is so sad that they have had people die in the tunnels but it is the only way that they can survive. He said that no other country has had to live under a siege of this magnitude or for this duration – now it is almost 2 years.

Seeing my first bombed out buildings, flattened homes, destruction…..was shocking and horrifying. Can you picture a building destroyed beside a playground that still stands. Police stations, government buildings, offices, homes…….destroyed. This is only what we saw on our short drive to Gaza City. I cannot even imagine how much more we will see in days ahead. I hope that we have the strength and the wisdom to hear the stories, witness the devastation and be able to bring these stories home with us. The children walk without joy, there is an obvious sadness in their eyes….I could see it on the bus. They didn’t return our waves or our smiles. I am so anxious to meet women and children over the coming days and especially tomorrow on International Women’s Day.

Our UN orientation was quick and simple. The UN representatives have worked hard to arrange our itinerary and our accommodations. We were warned not to walk in the rubble. We were warned about unexploded ordinance – warned about the dangers of white phosphorus that burns to the bone in seconds. The UN employees are in a Level 4 state which means they cannot be out after dark, they have to call before moving locations, they have to travel in armed cars and this is the final level before evacuation. We also had a question and answer period with 2 Palestinian men about the political situation. I am now in the Al Quds hotel in Gaza City and this will be my home for 4 days. I have a wonderful roommate from Tacoma, Washington near Seattle

Source
Congratulations everyone, perseverance and determination pays off, yet again. What an amazing way to celebrate International Women's Day. I'll be wearing my Code Pink ribbon around my neck today at work in celebration and honor of all those amazing women out there who have and will make a difference in this world. Get your boots on girls!

Faces of Hope....

2009-03-05T22:33:00.000-08:00

Faces of Hope

A Campaign Supporting Nonviolent Resistance and Refusal in Israel and Palestine

Courageous Israelis and Palestinians need wider support and visibility to strengthen their efforts to end the Israeli military occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Join our network of people living in the United States who support these nonviolent activists, and help to end U.S. support for Israeli occupation.

Contact the closest AFSC office to learn more about
Faces of Hope:

National Office
Atlanta, GA
Chicago, IL
Des Moines, IA
Los Angeles, CA
Providence, RI
San Francisco, CA
International Programs

שטח סגור | Closed Zone | منطقة مغلقة

2009-03-05T09:04:00.001-08:00

שטח סגור | Closed Zone | منطقة مغلقة

New Short Film from the Animation Director of "Waltz with Bashir": Gaza Is "Closed Zone"

Closed Zone

Despite declarations that it has "disengaged" from the Gaza Strip, Israel maintains control of the Strip’s overland border crossings, territorial waters, and air space. This includes substantial, albeit indirect, control of the Rafah Crossing.

During the past 18 months, Israel tightened its closure of Gaza, almost completely restricting the passage of goods and people both to and from the Strip.

These policies punish innocent civilians with the goal of exerting pressure on the Hamas government, violating the rights of 1.5 million people who seek only to live ordinary lives – to be reunited with family, to pursue higher education, to receive quality medical treatment, and to earn a living.

The effects of the closure were particularly harsh during the military operation of Dec. 2008 - Jan. 2009. For three weeks, Gaza residents had nowhere to flee to escape the bombing.

Gisha - Legal Center for Freedom of Movement calls on the State of Israel to fully open Gaza's crossings and to allow the real victims of the closure - 1.5 million human beings - the freedom of movement necessary to realize their dreams and aspirations.

I'm pleased to say that my son and I had the honor of seeing "Waltz With Bashir" two weeks ago. Even in our little backwater community we have a yearly international film festival. If you get the opportunity, see it. A very thought provoking, powerful piece regarding the effects on the people who fight wars, particularly illegal, immoral and illegitimate ones.

Gangs Gone Wild......

2009-03-04T07:54:00.000-08:00

Gang wars rage in Denmark
Off the beaten track this morning, I'm going to post about something different. Like most people, in my much younger years I did things I'm certainly not proud of but have since learned to consider them growth experiences. One such incident took place when I was 17 and involved with these dregs of humanity as the girlfriend of one of their low level drug dealers. This relationship lasted only six months, but in that time I learned to understand very quickly exactly how their system works.

These wars have nothing to do with racism, they're about power, money, and control. Interlopers into the drug, prostitution, and porn industries are dealt with accordingly.

Canadian gang violence linked to Mexico drug wars
No shit! For 33 years that I'm personally aware of, and it only becomes news when it turns into a shooting war!?!? I guess it's hard to bury your head in the sand when there's a gang hit right outside your door now, isn't it. The Angels, along with their Mexican friends, and the Asian gangs are embroiled in an all-out war for territory and control now folks, so you'd better duck and cover.

Will the pictures of known gang members ever be published publicly so people may know who their neighbors are? Oh hell no. That would be an infringement on crime syndicate members civil liberties. Another fine example of a really fucked up system. Muslims, brown folks, and anyone an with an open mind and opinion can be profiled at airports, but known criminals mustn't be exposed. Bullshit.

Are we all ready to get angry now? Are we fed up enough to take back our neighborhoods and streets? Will we have the courage to speak up and take action? Highly unlikely. Fear is the ruler in this day and age, and cowardliness is the norm.

Viva Palestina Convoy Is Almost There.....

2009-03-01T09:38:00.000-08:00

EGYPT WILL ALLOW CONVOY INTO GAZA.

They are in their thousands in the Green Public square of Tripoli attending a big rally to welcome the Viva Palestina humanitarian Gaza convoy. This is the first of many planned in Libya.

Ambassadors, dignitaries, representatives from the Gadaffi Foundation as well as the children of Palestine have spoken of the horrors and the tragedy of Gaza.

Gift bags containing caps, T-Shirts, books have been given to members of the convoy as a gesture of thanks and admiration for their efforts to get the aid to the destitute people of Gaza.

This morning,it was announced at the rally thet Egypt has agreed to let the convoy through to Gaza to the cheers of all the people and to the relief of our convoy members. It will be one less matter to worry about and to only concentrate on the noble goal they set out to achieve when their vehicle rolled from the UK on the 14th February.

Up to 100 Libyan trucks are joining the convoy starting with the Tripoli contingent today including ambulances and a fire engine. The Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation (GICDF) is sending a considerable quantity of medical aid.

After drinks and sandwiches, they will head for the city of Misrata passing and possibly stopping in Khums.

Farid Arada

Useful links for those with the desire to do something positive instead of wallowing in the negativity that's so pervasive in this world these days:

Better World Links

Bolton Viva Palestina

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament

Facebook for Viva Palestina

Friends of Al-Aqsa

Greater Manchester Respect

Help Initiative

Human Appeal International

Interpal

Islamic Relief

Liverpool Friends of Palestine

Muslim Association of Britain

North Manchester Against Wars

Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Respect

Salam

Stirling Aid

Stop the War Coalition

Viva Palestinanola - sister site in New Orleans, USA

Friendship and Caring.....

2009-03-01T08:21:00.000-08:00

Betmo has honored me as a friend. Thanks so much Bet, right back at you girl.

"These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.”

There are many wonderful, caring people in this world of the blog and I wish I could award them all with a hug, so a virtual one will have to do. If I don't include you in the following list, it doesn't mean I've forgotten you or don't care. It's hard to narrow my choices down to only eight, but here are some of the bloggers whom I am honored to call friends:

Granny, Worried and Gadfly
Betmo
Joe
Desert Peace
Ben Heine
Marty
DeW Nada
Sameh Akram Habeeb

International Women's Day.....

2009-02-27T19:43:00.000-08:00

March 8, International Women's Day, is a time when people around the globe focus on the needs and contributions of women. This year, on Sunday, March 8, 2009, women and men worldwide will commemorate the day by highlighting the plight of the women of Gaza and sending an international delegation to Gaza to hand-deliver humanitarian aid. See list below of CODEPINK-supported groups in Gaza.

The women of Gaza are living with grace and resilience under incredibly stressful and dangerous conditions; for $10, you can brighten their day and remind them that the women of the world are with them in solidarity. Your $10 gift basket, designed to be both utilitarian and "pampering", will contain contain vitamins, first-aid materials, and food items, but also sweet-smelling soaps and shampoos, a beautiful pink head scarf, sweets and tea.

In honour of International Women's Day visit my sisters over at Code Pink and Donate to Have Humanitarian Aid Delivered to the Women of Gaza. Please show the women of Gaza that you care.

What The Colors Mean......

2009-02-20T09:36:00.000-08:00

Green is for the land of Palestine,
White is for the peace in which the Palestinian people lived before they were made refugees,
Red is for their blood spilled trying to liberate their land, and
Black is for their life under occupation.

The Palestine Telegraph:

"We will change your world"

Silwan and Bulldozers.....

2009-02-16T21:22:00.000-08:00

Jerusalem – Ma’an – The Israeli army harshly put down a demonstration by Palestinians in East Jerusalem protesting land destruction near the Al-Aqsa Mosque, witnesses told Ma’an.

The Israeli army had bulldozed four dunoms of land belonging to the Al-A’bbasi family in the Al-Bustan neighborhood of Silwan, near Jerusalem’s Old City, sources said, leading to riots.

Israeli municipality staff and police responded to the scene, threatening the oweners of the land with arrest for not evicting the protesters, themselves. Israeli police also refused to show official documentation, neither a warrant for entering the property nor a demolition notice for destroying the privately owned land, witnesses said.

The army was backed by heavy military vehicles when it bulldozed the land in Silwan, near the Al-Aqsa Mosque-area illegal settlement of David City, itself adjacent to Al-Mughrabi Gate into East Jerusalem’s Old City. Follow this link for the source and the rest of the story.

For photographs of this and much more, see ActiveStills.

About ActiveStills:

We are a group of documentary photographers acting for social change, convinced in the power of photography as a vehicle of change through awareness. We seek to bring awareness to issues and situations that we believe create social injustice, through images that question the society in which we live in.

We believe in the capability and obligation of photography and all arts in general to make a statement and to stimulate conscience. Photography is a channel of self expression. The camera is the mouth. The picture is the scream.

The group was integrated during the current year out of the belief that mutual work may serve the personal statement of each member and similarly make a conjoined statement that will echo from afar. Our first project was related to the situation of the Palestinian village of Bilin and the High Court of Justice 's decision regarding the trace of the Separation Wall. This work was the fruit of a year of working in the village, and the choosen format was a street exhibition that was displayed in several public spaces in Tel Aviv.

We have chosen the common space as a platform for presenting our works. Using the walls of the city as an open gallery is derived from the will to create a communication with the surrounding. Art as we grasp it shouldn't be locked in galleries, but open to the wide public. We address the people on the street, whom we like to influence, the ones in which the power to make real social changes is latent.

ActiveStills operates in Israel and Palestine and focuses on social and political documenting, projects production, publications and open exhibitions at topics in which the public is not exposed in its daily informative routines, managed by the established media.

Bendib.....

2009-02-15T19:25:00.000-08:00

Oh, how true!.

Bush In Cow Town.....

2009-02-13T23:42:00.000-08:00

Send send them all the dirtiest, smelliest shoes you can find. Preferably covered in cow shit.

Israel - No Bravery.....

2009-02-12T13:58:00.000-08:00

In honor of the Israeli national elections:

Everyday Hazards Of Parsley Farming.....

2009-02-10T17:54:00.000-08:00

Israeli soldiers again opened fire on Palestinian farmers and international Human Rights Workers (HRWs) on Thursday 5th February, as they attempted to harvest parsley in agricultural land near the Green Line.

Returning to farm-land of Al Faraheen village, in the Abassan Jedida area, east of Khan Younis, where soldiers had opened fire on Tuesday 3rd February, farmers and HRWs were able to harvest the parsley crop for only half an hour, before soldiers again began to shoot. A number of shots were fired into the air, before the soldiers started to aim in the direction of the farmers and international accompaniment. Bullets were heard to whiz past, close to people’s heads.

The soldiers continued to shoot on the group, despite the fact that many members of the group had their arms in the air and were wearing fluorescent vests to make them highly visible, and identify them as Human Rights Workers; had erected a banner indicating that the farmers and accompaniment were civilians; contact had been made with the Israeli army to advise them that Palestinian civilians and internationals would be working in the area; the various international embassies had been advised of the planned accompaniment; and the internationals were announcing their presence via a megaphone - demanding that the soldiers stop shooting on unarmed civilians.

“We are unarmed civilians! We are farmers and international Human Rights Workers! Stop Shooting!”

With internationals acting as human shields, the farmers - after initially lying down to avoid being shot - attempted to continue harvesting. After a few moments, however, the shooting intensified and farmers decided to leave the area, rather than be killed. Internationals announced on the megaphone that the group was leaving the area - asking that the soldiers halt their fire. Instead, as the group started to leave, the shooting further intensified in rapidity and proximity. Even after the group had taken refuge in a house, approximately 1km from the Green Line, the soldiers continued to shoot at nearby houses that were demolished during the recent Israeli Operation Cast Lead.

This behaviour on the part of the Israeli soldiers was an almost exact repeat of their response to the presence of the farmers and internationals, in the same area of farm-land, two days before. On the Tuesday, however, the group was able to harvest for two hours before soldiers began to shoot. Whilst farmers had hoped to be able to wait-out the shooting, in order to continue harvesting, it quickly became clear that the situation was too dangerous for that to be possible.

The farmers of Al Faraheen are particularly aware of the level of danger they face when entering farm lands that are within 1 km of the Green Line - after watching their friend and colleague, 27 year old Anwar Il Ibrim, from neighbouring Benesela, killed by a bullet to the neck while he was picking parsely in the same area, just one week before.

The owner of the land, Yusuf Abu Shaheen, commented after Tuesday’s gun-fire “If you [internationals] hadn’t been with us today, the soldiers would have killed us all”.

Whilst it has become increasingly dangerous for farmers to enter their lands near the Green Line, especially since the recent Israeli attacks, for farmers like Yusuf, there is an economic imperative to harvest his crops. Yusuf explains that just to plant the crops and keep them watered and fertilised, costs him $2000 each month - money that has already been spent. There is the additional factor of a lack of water that increases the sense of urgency to harvest crops planted in the vicinity of the Green Line. Israeli forces broke the pipes for the area one week before their war on Gaza began. The parsley in the most dangerous areas, with water, could very well have been left for another week or two without harvesting - in the hope that the soldiers might become less aggressive over time. Without water, the plants are becoming increasingly tough, sweet and salty. If they are not harvested soon, they will become worthless.

The workers, who are employed by Yusuf to harvest the crops, also put themselves in mortal danger every time they enter the lands close to the Green Line. Like most in the Gaza Strip, they too are compelled by economic concerns to risk their lives for the meager sum of 20 shekels ($5)/day. With an unemployment rate of 40%, and almost two-thirds (900 000) of Gaza’s residents reliant on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the levels of poverty existing in Gaza mean that, for many families, money earned by sons and farmers risking their lives near the Green Line, might be the only money they have.

Anwar’s mother explains that her son hadn’t worked in the Al Faraheen area for 6 months - not since a large-scale Israeli incursion into the area in May 2008, and the following Israeli military aggression, made agricultural work in the area extremely dangerous. Anwar, the only son in the family, felt compelled to try to earn whatever he could to support the family - in particular to buy medicine for his ailing and paralysed father.

The ability of farmers to earn money from these lands is not only being threatened by the daily shooting from the Israeli army, however, but also by the inability to irrigate the crops. On Tuesday, Yusuf took the opportunity to remove expensive connecting valves from the irrigation pipes. On Thursday, an elderly farmer was pulling up all of the irrigation pipes themselves - now useless as it is impossible to get water to the area. This crop the farmers have spent two days trying to harvest, seems likely to be the last that will be planted there for some time.

Such actions - shooting at farmers trying to work their lands; and destroying irrigation systems - are part of the wider, systematic economic oppression of Palestinians. Along with sanctions and a siege that prevents Palestinians from importing and exporting goods; and denies freedom of movement to work in other countries, Israeli military forces also attempt to prevent Palestinians from deriving income from other methods, such as fishing and farming - through extreme levels of military force. Indeed, throughout the 23-day war on Gaza, the Israeli military, along with demolishing approximately 10,000 homes, and damaging many thousands more to the extent to which they are uninhabitable, intentionally killed hundreds of thousands of livestock, and bulldozed thousands of dunums of agricultural land.

In order to stand in solidarity with farmers in their struggle against this economic oppression, international HRWs will continue to accompany farmers to dangerous lands - challenging Israeli military imposition of “closed military zones” in areas that they claim to no longer occupy.

Source

Petro Mustn't.....

2009-02-07T19:21:00.000-08:00

Petrocant, the home page of the Pekisko Project. Fueling Fears.

No more!

Manipulative Lies Become An Art Form.....

2009-02-01T09:55:00.000-08:00

Israel: Hezbollah planning February attack to avenge Mughniyah assassination.

Ya, sure. I'm so skeptical about anything coming out of Israel these days, I suspect they'll stage something themselves and use it as an excuse to invade Lebanon again. Israeli politicians, military personnel, intelligence agents, and those Jews who thrive on perceiving themselves as always being victims are so good at manipulative lies they've turned it into an art form. The lengths politicians will go to to win an election is mind numbing.

Deviant Art.....

2009-01-31T22:12:00.000-08:00

Zionism Vs Nasizm =No-More-Ignorance on deviant ART

Forgive Them, They Know Not What They Do.....

2009-01-28T18:00:00.000-08:00

IDF: Hamas didn't carry out attack – but is responsible. Need I say more.

Here's a little info about The Army of Islam. Hamas and Fatah have both shunned them for quite some time now, but Israeli officials apparently don't have to consider that. Any excuse will do, and if you haven't figured that out by now, well what can I say.

France summons Israeli ambassador. France has summoned Israel's ambassador, after Israeli troops fired warning shots when European diplomats were blocked at a Gaza border crossing. I guess Palestinians aren't enough, they're going after those pesky Frenchmen now, too.

Now for this bit of happy news: Israel bombs southern Gaza. Read this story closely. It looks like Fatah is in it now.

I'm thinking Israel's goose is about to be cooked. Can't say I'm sorry, and one day I will be able to forgive this backward little nation, but for now I will feel very, very sorry for it. Like so many corrupt, brutal regimes in the past along with the societies that have supported them, the state of Israel is likely going to pay for its atrocious actions.

What The BBC Doesn't Think You Should See.....

2009-01-27T09:08:00.000-08:00

This is the appeal that the BBC and Sky have chosen not to air in fear of appearing biased. The video does not address who is right or wrong, it is about alleviating human suffering. We can go on forever about the whys and the wherefores, but this is the reality on the ground and if you have any compassion whatsoever you will put that behind you and do the right thing.

The DEC Gaza appeal, courtesy of ITNNews:

The Poor Mouth: Forgiving Mengele

2009-01-26T11:13:00.000-08:00

The Poor Mouth: Forgiving Mengele

On Forgiveness.....

2009-01-26T11:04:00.000-08:00

On forgiveness: My dream for the world is that more of our Jewish brothers and sisters become capable of the same, then perhaps the world picture will look very different. Follow the link in the above post.

Thru Other Eyes.....

2009-01-25T18:51:00.000-08:00

Please take the time to read this post, no matter who you are, what you believe in or where you live. We could all learn something from this:

Victims No More?! - An Open Letter To My Jewish Brothers And Sisters

BBC Denies Disaster Emergency Committee Air Time.....

2009-01-24T20:21:00.000-08:00

Original post - Jan. 22:
The Disaster Emergency Committee includes these groups: Action Aid, the British Red Cross, Cafod, Care International UK, Islamic Relief, Oxfam, Save the Children and Tearfund, among others. To breach an agreement which is now 46 years old confirms that the BBC is firmly wedged up Israel's ass. Very well then, I now add the British Broadcasting Corporation on my personal boycott list and strongly recommend everyone else to follow suit.

Here is the text of the complaint email which I have sent to the BBC:

"I am extremely disappointed with your decision not to broadcast the appeal by the DEC for the Gaza crisis appeal. I can not fathom for the life of me how you can claim that by broadcasting a humanitarian appeal, you will compromise public confidence. On the contrary I have now lost all confidence in the corporation, and wonder whether I can trust the BBC to be unbiased."

Here's the web address if you care to send them your own views:
www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/

The BBC has refused to broadcast a national humanitarian appeal for Gaza, leaving aid agencies with a potential shortfall of millions of pounds in donations.

The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), an umbrella group for 13 aid charities, launched its appeal yesterday saying the devastation in Gaza was "so huge British aid agencies were compelled to act".

But the BBC made a rare breach of an agreement dating to 1963, saying it would not give free airtime to the appeal. Other broadcasters followed suit. Previously, broadcasters had agreed on the video and script to be used with the DEC, to be shown after primetime news bulletins.

The BBC, which has been criticised in the past over alleged bias in its coverage of the Middle East, said it did not want to risk public confidence in its impartiality. A BBC spokesperson said: "The decision was made because of question marks about the delivery of aid in a volatile situation and also to avoid any risk of compromising public confidence in the BBC's impartiality in the context of [a] news story."

The DEC's chief executive, Brendan Gormley, said: "We are totally apolitical ... this appeal is a response to humanitarian principles. The BBC seems to be confusing impartiality with equal airtime."

DEC appeals have recently raised £10m for the Congo and £18m for Burma.

An ITV spokesman said the broadcasters, after assessing the DEC's needs, had been unable "to reach a consensus necessary for an appeal".

Sky said: "By convention, if all broadcasters do not carry the appeal, then none do. The decision was effectively made for us."

Source

Edit #1 - Jan. 23:
I'm now almost pleased to edit this post. There is a small DEC appeal on the right hand side of the article, halfway down this page on BBC News. Careful, if you blink, you'll miss it.

Edit #2 - Jan.24:
The BBC remains steadfast in it's denial about being impartial regarding their broadcast standards. By refusing to air the DEC appeal, they are sending a message to us all that when it comes to the BBC, Israel and her supporters sensibilities trump humanitarian crisis and reality. Fools, they don't seem to mind in the least that they've offended everyone with a heart and a conscience. At least ITV and Channel 4 have seen the light.

Edit #3 - Jan. 25:
Bless you Tony Benn.

Tony Benn defies the channel bosses and broadcasts the DEC appeal himself!

Donations can be made via the DEC website www.dec.org.uk ,
24 hour credit card line 0370 60 60 900

cheques made payable to
"DEC Gaza Crisis"

send to:
DEC Gaza Crisis Appeal
PO Box 999,
London EC3A 3AA.

Donations can also be made at high street banks and post offices.

"I'm sorry but I'm a human being" -- Tony Benn

The Earth Is Closing In On Us.....

2009-01-24T10:32:00.000-08:00

"The Earth is Closing on Us"
Mahmoud Darwish

The earth is closing on us,
pushing us through the last
passage, and we tear off
our limbs to pass through.

The earth is squeezing us.
I wish we were its wheat so
we could die and live again.
I wish the earth was our mother.
So she'd be kind to us.
I wish we were pictures on the
rocks for our dreams to carry
As mirrors. We saw the faces of
those to be killed by the last of
us in the last defense of the soul.

We cried over their children's feast.
We saw the faces of those who'll
throw our children. Out of the
windows of this last space.
Our star will hang up mirrors.

Where should we go after the
last frontiers? Where should
the birds fly after the last sky?

Where should the plants sleep
after the last breath of air?
We will write our names with
scarlet steam.

We will cut off the hand of the
song to be finished by our flesh.

We will die here, here in the last
passage. Here and there our
blood will plant its Olive tree.

To Edom - The Prophesy....

2009-01-23T08:33:00.000-08:00

The Boss Has Gone Mad

169 YEARS before the Gaza War, Heinrich Heine wrote a premonitory poem of 12 lines, under the title “To Edom”. The German-Jewish poet was talking about Germany, or perhaps all the nations of Christian Europe. This is what he wrote (in my rough translation):

“For a thousand years and more
We have had an understanding
You allow me to breathe
I accept your crazy raging
Sometimes, when the days get darker
Strange moods come upon you
Till you decorate your claws
With the lifeblood from my veins
Now our friendship is firmer
Getting stronger by the day
Since the raging started in me
Daily more and more like you.”

Zionism, which arose some 50 years after this was written, is fully realizing this prophesy. We Israelis have become a nation like all nations, and the memory of the Holocaust causes us, from time to time, to behave like the worst of them. Only a few of us know this poem, but Israel as a whole lives it out.

In this war, politicians and generals have repeatedly quoted the words: “The boss has gone mad!” originally shouted by vegetable vendors in the market, in the sense of “The boss has gone crazy and is selling the tomatoes at a loss!” But in the course of time the jest has turned into a deadly doctrine that often appears in Israeli public discourse: in order to deter our enemies, we must behave like madmen, go on the rampage, kill and destroy mercilessly.

In this war, this has become political and military dogma: only if we kill “them” disproportionately, killing a thousand of “them” for ten of “ours”, will they understand that it’s not worth it to mess with us. It will be “seared into their consciousness” (a favorite Israeli phrase these days). After this, they will think twice before launching another Qassam rocket against us, even in response to what we do, whatever that may be.

It is impossible to understand the viciousness of this war without taking into account the historical background: the feeling of victimhood after all that has been done to the Jews throughout the ages, and the conviction that after the Holocaust, we have the right to do anything, absolutely anything, to defend ourselves, without any inhibitions due to law or morality.

WHEN THE killing and destruction in Gaza were at their height, something happened in faraway America that was not connected with the war, but was very much connected with it. The Israeli film “Waltz with Bashir” was awarded a prestigious prize. The media reported it with much joy and pride, but somehow carefully managed not to mention the subject of the film. That by itself was an interesting phenomenon: saluting the success of a film while ignoring its contents.

The subject of this outstanding film is one of the darkest chapters in our history: the Sabra and Shatila massacre. In the course of Lebanon War I, a Christian Lebanese militia carried out, under the auspices of the Israeli army, a heinous massacre of hundreds of helpless Palestinian refugees who were trapped in their camp, men, women, children and old people. The film describes this atrocity with meticulous accuracy, including our part in it.

All this was not even mentioned in the news about the award. At the festive ceremony, the director of the film did not avail himself of the opportunity to protest against the events in Gaza. It is hard to say how many women and children were killed while this ceremony was going on – but it is clear that the massacre in Gaza is much worse than that 1982 event, which moved 400 thousand Israelis to leave their homes and hold a spontaneous mass protest in Tel-Aviv. This time, only 10 thousand stood up to be counted.

The official Israeli Board of Inquiry that investigated the Sabra massacre found that the Israeli government bore “indirect responsibility” for the atrocity. Several senior officials and officers were suspended. One of them was the division commander, Amos Yaron. Not one of the other accused, from the Minister of Defense, Ariel Sharon, to the Chief of Staff, Rafael Eitan, spoke a word of regret, but Yaron did express remorse in a speech to his officers, and admitted: “Our sensitivities have been blunted”.

BLUNTED SENSITIVITIES are very evident in the Gaza War.

Lebanon War I lasted for 18 years and more than 500 of our soldiers died. The planners of Lebanon War II decided to avoid such a long war and such heavy Israeli casualties. They invented the “mad boss” principle: demolishing whole neighborhoods, devastating areas, destroying infrastructures. In 33 days of war, some 1000 Lebanese, almost all of them civilians, were killed – a record already broken in this war by the 17th day. Yet in that war our army suffered casualties on the ground, and public opinion, which in the beginning supported the war with the same enthusiasm as this time, changed rapidly.

The smoke from Lebanon War II is hanging over the Gaza war. Everybody in Israel swore to learn its lessons. And the main lesson was: not to risk the life of even one single soldier. A war without casualties (on our side). The method: to use the overwhelming firepower of our army to pulverize everything standing in its way and to kill everybody moving in the area. To kill not only the fighters on the other side, but every human being who might possibly turn out to harbor hostile intentions, even if they are obviously an ambulance attendant, a driver in a food convoy or a doctor saving lives. To destroy every building from which our troops could conceivably be shot at – even a school full of refugees, the sick and the wounded. To bomb and shell whole neighborhoods, buildings, mosques, schools, UN food convoys, even ruins under which the injured are buried.

The media devoted several hours to the fall of a Qassam missile on a home in Ashkelon, in which three residents suffered from shock, and did not waste many words on the forty women and children killed in a UN school, from which “we were shot at” – an assertion that was quickly exposed as a blatant lie.

The firepower was also used to sow terror – shelling everything from a hospital to a vast UN food depot, from a press vantage point to the mosques. The standard pretext: “we were shot at from there”.

This would have been impossible, had not the whole country been infected with blunted sensitivities. People are no longer shocked by the sight of a mutilated baby, nor by children left for days with the corpse of their mother, because the army did not let them leave their ruined home. It seems that almost nobody cares anymore: not the soldiers, not the pilots, not the media people, not the politicians, not the generals. A moral insanity, whose primary exponent is Ehud Barak. Though even he may be upstaged by Tzipi Livni, who smiled while talking about the ghastly events.

Even Heinrich Heine could not have imagined that.

THE LAST DAYS were dominated by the “Obama effect”.

We are on board an airplane, and suddenly a huge black mountain appears out of the clouds. In the cockpit, panic breaks out: How to avoid a collision?

The planners of the war chose the timing with care: during the holidays, when everybody was on vacation, and while President Bush was still around. But they somehow forgot to take into consideration a fateful date: next Tuesday Barack Obama will enter the White House.

This date is now casting a huge shadow on events. The Israeli Barak understands that if the American Barack gets angry, that would mean disaster. Conclusion: the horrors of Gaza must stop before the inauguration. This week that determined all political and military decisions. Not “the number of rockets”, not “victory”, not “breaking Hamas”.

WHEN THERE is a ceasefire, the first question will be: Who won?

In Israel, all the talk is about the “picture of victory” – not victory itself, but the “picture”. That is essential, in order to convince the Israeli public that the whole business has been worthwhile. At this moment, all the thousands of media people, to the very last one, have been mobilized to paint such a “picture”. The other side, of course, will paint a different one.

The Israeli leaders will boast of two “achievements”: the end of the rockets and the sealing of the Gaza-Egypt border (the co-called “Philadelphi route”. Dubious achievements: the launching of the Qassams could have been prevented without a murderous war, if our government had been ready to negotiate with Hamas after they won the Palestinian elections. The tunnels under the Egyptian border would not have been dug in the first place, if our government had not imposed the deadly blockade on the Strip.

But the main achievement of the war planners lies in the very barbarity of their plan: the atrocities will have, in their view, a deterrent effect that will hold for a long time.

Hamas, on the other side, will assert that their survival in the face of the mighty Israeli war machine, a tiny David against a giant Goliath, is by itself a huge victory. According to the classic military definition, the winner in a battle is the army that remains on the battlefield when it’s over. Hamas remains. The Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip still stands, in spite of all the efforts to eliminate it. That is a significant achievement.

Hamas will also point out that the Israeli army was not eager to enter the Palestinian towns, in which their fighters were entrenched. And indeed: the army told the government that the conquest of Gaza city could cost the lives of about 200 soldiers, and no politician was ready for that on the eve of elections.

The very fact that a guerrilla force of a few thousand lightly armed fighters held out for long weeks against one of the world’s mightiest armies with enormous firepower, will look to millions of Palestinians and other Arabs and Muslims, and not only to them, like an unqualified victory.

In the end, an agreement will be concluded that will include the obvious terms. No country can tolerate its inhabitants being exposed to rocket fire from beyond the border, and no population can tolerate a choking blockade. Therefore (1) Hamas will have to give up the launching of missiles, (2) Israel will have to open wide the crossings between the Gaza Strip and the outside world, and (3) the entry of arms into the Strip will be stopped (as far as possible), as demanded by Israel. All this could have happened without war, if our government had not boycotted Hamas.

HOWEVER, THE worst results of this war are still invisible and will make themselves felt only in years to come: Israel has imprinted on world consciousness a terrible image of itself. Billions of people have seen us as a blood-dripping monster. They will never again see Israel as a state that seeks justice, progress and peace. The American Declaration of Independence speaks with approval of “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind”. That is a wise principle.

Even worse is the impact on hundreds of millions of Arabs around us: not only will they see the Hamas fighters as the heroes of the Arab nation, but they will also see their own regimes in their nakedness: cringing, ignominious, corrupt and treacherous.

The Arab defeat in the 1948 war brought in its wake the fall of almost all the existing Arab regimes and the ascent of a new generation of nationalist leaders, exemplified by Gamal Abd-al-Nasser. The 2009 war may bring about the fall of the current crop of Arab regimes and the ascent of a new generation of leaders – Islamic fundamentalists who hate Israel and all the West..

In coming years it will become apparent that this war was sheer madness. The boss has indeed gone mad – in the original sense of the word.

Uri Avnery - Gush Shalom

I Love Refuseniks.....

2009-01-21T08:56:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I may come across as despising Israel. No, I don't. I despise the narrow-minded, racist, immoral behavior of a backward little state that has used denial and guilt trips as its excuse for atrocious behavior for far too long. I admire any of those Israeli's who are willing to step into the future instead of wallowing in the past. The refuseniks are just a few of those Israelis I have the utmost respect and regard for.

I had just returned to Tel Aviv from a demonstration in the West Bank village of Ni'lin last July, when I caught word that the Israeli military had shot 11-year old Ahmad Musa in the head during a protest against the separation wall. Twenty minutes later, three Israeli anarchists and I were speeding back to the West Bank to see what had happened.

Soon we were again in the West Bank, where Israeli suburban-like settlements interrupt Palestinian farmland and villages. Apart from the occasional phone call by the activists to spread the word, we drove mostly in a stifling silence of despair.

As we were waved through a military checkpoint by an Israeli soldier with an M16 dangling carelessly around her neck, activist Yonatan Pollack kicked the glove compartment. "Fucking child killers," he spat out.

On November 7, Haaretz reported that the army had requested that the Shin Bet - Israel's domestic spy network and internal security service - provide information on left-wing Israeli activists traveling to the West Bank.

The stated goal was to make it easier for the army to issue restraining orders to prevent the activists from entering.

Since the beginning of the anti-wall campaign in Ni'lin last May, village residents have been joined by Israeli and international activists in non-violent attempts to block the army's bulldozers.

At the same time, the youth in the town have responded to the army's use of tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition with stone throwing. Their collective effort has created heavy delays in construction, and the wall - scheduled for completion last June - is still unfinished.

The struggle has not only generated robust participation by Israel's small radical left, it has also regalvanized the military refusal movement after two years of relative quiet.

Inspired by the resistance of Ni'lin villagers and horrified by the brutality Israel has used to repress the village uprising, the "refuseniks" - as they are locally known - are back in the news.

"If the army backs off in Ni'lin it will be an example to the refusal movement and Israeli society. It will show that the army can't break us," explains Omer Goldman, a Ni'lin solidarity activist who went to military prison this past September at age 19 for refusing to enlist on her conscription date.

Because military tribunals usually hand out numerous consecutive small sentences for refusal rather than dealing with drawn out public trials, Goldman received a second sentence immediately following her first.

Army service is compulsory for all 18-year-old Jewish and Druze Israelis, with men serving three years and women two, and it has long been seen as a sacred cow in Israeli society. The refusenik movement first emerged during Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 and was re-launched at the height of the second Intifada with a refusal letter of 200 high-school graduates in 2001.

The refuseniks have now been thrown back into the national spotlight following the imprisonment of five Israeli draft dodgers - including Goldman last August and September. The jailings began after an open letter from graduating high school students refusing to enlist was published in the August 15 edition of Yedioth Aharonoth. Over 60 high-school students signed the letter, declaring their intention to evade conscription, once again taking aim at Israel's 41 year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

"Our refusal comes first and foremost as a protest of the separation, control, oppression and killing policy held by the State of Israel in the occupied territories," reads the published letter that was also sent to both IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

"We cannot hurt in the name of defense or imprison in the name of freedom; therefore we cannot be moral and serve the occupation," concludes the letter.

Goldman, whose father was a deputy head of the Mossad foreign intelligence agency, echoes the sentiment. I first met her hiding out in a Ni'lin medical clinic as the army invaded the village spraying live bullets.

As we sit in a trendy Tel Aviv cafe talking about both her political influences and activist experiences, it becomes clear that what drives the admirer of the 1968 Paris student revolt is both philosophical and visceral: she refuses to participate in what she has seen the military do in Ni'lin and rejects what the army represents.

"Ni'lin's [struggle] is a window that shows an example of Israeli-Palestinian solidarity," Goldman explains.

It is a perspective that grinds against the Israeli mainstream. For Defense Ministry spokesman Sholomo Dror, the issue of military refusal is one of a small minority of Israelis breaking the law and not fulfilling their national obligations.

Dror argues that Israelis have a "democratic" responsibility to serve in the state's armed forces.

"If you want to oppose the government's policies, then serve in the army and oppose the policies afterwards," he says in a phone interview from his Tel Aviv office. "I don't think serving in the army is violating people's rights."

According to Dror, refuseniks represent a fringe movement that poses no real threat to the military or challenge to Israeli society. "We have more people volunteering for elite unit enlistment being turned down," he says.

Despite this claim, Defense Ministry statistics show that 25 percent of Israeli's avoided military service in 2007. While 11 percent of those were exempt for religious reasons, the majority falls into what is commonly referred to as "grey refusal." This category refers to those exempt for mental or physical health reasons, or marriage, in the case of women.

In response to these statistics, Defense Minister Barak and IDF Chief Ashkenazi called for a "war on draft dodging" - an operation to publicly shame those avoiding service.

A vigorous television and billboard campaign was launched across Israel last year, under the slogan "A real Israeli doesn't evade the army."

The ads featured a group of Israelis on a post-army tour of India - a rite of passage so popular it has almost become a social institution - trying to impress a group of Swedish travelers with tales from the battlefront. The Israeli who avoided military service is the one who doesn't end up with a beautiful blond.

Following publication of high school refusenik's open letter, Attorney General Menachem Mazuz last September launched a criminal investigation into the New Profile organization - which provides support and information for people planning on or actively refusing military service.

Haaretz reported then that the inquiry into whether the organization was guilty of "incitement to draft dodging" was launched in the wake of a February request by the military.

The "incitement to draft dodging" law has never before been investigated, but New Profile organizer Haggai Matar said the group is careful to ensure that all its work is legal.

"We are trying to offer an alternative to Israel's security discourse, to ask who's secure and whose security we are talking about," he explains. "We argue that perhaps we should talk about a different kind of security - social security, equality and security from needing."

During our chat after a refusenik demonstration at a Tel Aviv military base, Matar talks about the importance of the support he received from New Profile during his own army refusal in 2001. The bushy-bearded, strawberry blond radical was a leader in the first high school refusal letter of the Second Intifada, faced a high profile public trial for rejecting enlistment and spent two years in jail as a result. The case is now taught as precedent in law schools across Israel.

"New Profile helped me a lot when I was refusing, and therefore, all I can do is offer the support that I got," Matar smiles.

He is part of a small minority of the 25 percent of Israelis who avoid the draft by publicly opting out. Public refusal continues to receive prominent national attention and vicious social backlash.

Like Goldman and Matar, refusenik, Sahar Vardi, received national media coverage when she was jailed for the first time on August 25 for refusing her military induction.

"I'm going to tell the recruitment officer that I'm not serving because of the occupation," Vardi said, just before entering the Tel Aviv military base for new conscripts. "I've seen Palestinian kids get shot and beaten by the army in the West Bank and this is something that I'm not going to be a part of." She seemed calmed and defiant, wearing a "courage to refuse" t-shirt with the graphic of a broken M-16.

In spite of facing both jail time and public backlash for their actions, refusenik activists are headstrong in their determination.

On December 18, the refuseniks rallied in front of Defense Ministry base in Tel Aviv - which also serves as a central army base - to present to Barak 20, 000 letters of international support calling for the release of jailed draft dodgers and commending their actions.

The action was organized by a coalition of Israeli and American anti occupation groups supporting military refusal, with most of the letters coming from supporters in the United States.

The crowed of 150 chanted "from Iraq to Palestine, choose refusal, stop the crimes," while several draft dodgers attempted to deliver the 20,000 letters. They were stopped by police, at the gate of the base.

"They're the army, they don't deal with these sort of things," said a police officer preventing the delivery of letters.

Since the beginning of Israel's offensive on Gaza three weeks ago, the refuseniks have been furiously organizing anti-war action, demonstrating at army bases and joining in mass demonstrations demanding an end to the war.

For many Palestinians, especially activists in Ni'lin, Israeli military refusal is an important act of solidarity for joint struggle against occupation.

"Despite being a small part of Israeli society, [the refuseniks] give us hope that even inside Israel there are people who are really rejecting occupation," says Hindi Mesleh, an energetic 25-year old activist with Ni'lin's popular committee who regularly engages with Israeli solidarity activists. His family is currently fighting to save their own farmland from being confiscated by the separation wall.

Mesleh speaks about the refuseniks with same glint of the admiration that comes out when discussing Palestinian prisoners. "It's hard for Palestinians to conceive of someone serving on a checkpoint one day and going to demonstrate in Ni'lin the next," he explains, two weeks after Musa's death.

According to eyewitness reports, Musa was fatally wounded by an M-16 sticking out of a rifle slit at the back of an Israeli jeep, as he turned to flee troops. His corpse in the Ramallah morgue, with his skull split diagonally in two on the cold metal table, corroborate his cause of death.

The anger that arose in response to the shooting was exacerbated at his funeral the next day when 17-year old Youseph Amira was killed by two rubber bullets to the head during a checkpoint clash.

That day in July, as we arrived in Ni'lin on the eve of Musa's funeral, Pollack jumped out of the car and walked towards the barricade lines, hugging the store front walls to avoid the army's rubber bullets.

Evaluating the situation, he turned to group of local children, and asked them in Arabic what needed to be done.

Jesse Rosenfeld is a freelance journalist based in Ramallah and Tel Aviv.
Source

We Must Mean What We Say, Yes We Must.....

2009-01-20T22:40:00.000-08:00

Israel, your stench permeates the air we breathe.

I've attempted to respect the sensibilities of my American friends and allow them to bask in the glow of their Obama moment, but it's time to get back to work.

President Obama, rein in your best new buddy Israel. The ball's in your court now, and the world isn't going to hold its breath while you dick about and play nicey nice with war criminals, so bring them to heal where they deserve to be! We're starting to tentatively respect and trust America once more, so don't let us down and encourage us despise your country all over again. World opinion does matter, and you damn well know it.

Hell On Earth.....

2009-01-20T14:55:00.000-08:00

Please help. UNRWA.

Business As Usual For Israel On The West Bank.....

2009-01-20T13:55:00.000-08:00

What is the matter with you, Abbas? Where are you, yet again, and what do you have to say about this? I see red just reading about it, so I can't imagine how it makes those you're supposed represent and who are suffering this indignity feel. Woof, woof you useless, irrelevant, slobbering lap dog. All this for a bunch of kids throwing rocks?!?!

Palestinian sources in Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank, reported on Tuesday at dawn that Israeli soldiers invaded Toura Al Gharbiyya village, west of Jenin, and kidnapped 10 Palestinian youths.

The sources stated that soldiers closed all entrances of the village and placed sand barriers on its western entrance before imposing curfew barring the residents from leaving their homes.

Eyewitnesses reported that soldiers interrogated dozens of youths, cuffed and blindfolded ten before taking them to an unknown destination.

Saed Qabha, a resident of the village, told the Palestine News Network that Israeli soldiers surrounded several neighborhoods, broke into and searched dozens of homes before dragging dozens of youths and children from their homes and interrogating them in the center of the village.

The army claimed that soldiers were searching for youths who hurled stones at soldiers located behind the annexation wall surrounding the village.

Fatima Abady, another resident of the village, said that dozens of soldiers broke into her home, and violently searched it causing excessive damage to the furniture and property.

She added that soldiers detained her for several hours while searching dozens of nearby homes.

Farid Qabha, headmaster of Toura School, said that soldiers closed all schools in the village and ordered the students to head to a club in the village center for interrogation. Later on, soldiers kidnapped ten students and took them to an unknown destination.

Qabha was also detained and interrogated at the school for several hours.

One of the reporters of the Al Quds newspaper, said that soldiers forced local and international reporters out of the village and claimed that it is a closed military zone.

Source

Without Us, They Are Nothing.....

2009-01-20T13:27:00.001-08:00

Thanks for the link Fourth Reich....Israel.

Palestinian Mothers - Women are 50 % of the world and gave birth to the other half... we are the world. How right you are, sisters. It's time to wake the men up to that fact! Without us, they are nothing......

Dear America.....

2009-01-19T21:44:00.000-08:00

It's the eve of Barak Obama's inauguration as President of the United States of America. It's also Martin Luther King day. Israel continues to justify what it's done while feebly attempting to claim the moral high ground, and Hamas jumps up and down proclaiming victory. The reality is that there are 1300 dead in Gaza with that number rising as more remains are pulled from the rubble. I'm emotionally drained and am unable to come up with a single cohesive sentence which satisfactorily describes how I feel. Here is an article which comes close.

Barack Obama’s inauguration coming as we celebrate of Martin Luther King Day predictably draws linkages between the two. Many use Obama’s election to claim a realization of the “dream.” Others mumble something about a post-racial America. I suspect that King, if alive, would reject such nonsense. Although when asked “who he thought King would support” in the 2008 primary campaign Obama made a good case for answering “Nobody,” it is possible that King may have supported Obama.

King was a politician of sorts, although not so much at the time of his assassination. We love King now, but at the end of his life he wasn’t so popular. Younger activists criticized him and called him names such as “Da Lord” - mocking his once high place in civil rights politics. President Lyndon B. Johnson and a host of government officials, local and national, condemned him when he spoke out against the Vietnam War. King was not universally cheered when he marched, to his death, with the garbage workers in Memphis striking for fair wages and respect. Truth be told, he was jeered, even by some blacks.

Sure, we love King now, but there was a time when people turned their back on him and his message.

It has always been troubling to witness King’s mission and message reduced to “I have a dream” in the popular culture. It’s taught to kids in kindergarten, and they carry it with them all their lives. But all dreams are not equal. They can be interpreted in a number of ways. And some dreams are nightmares, or turn into nightmares for other people.

Before it became a "quagmire" the war in Vietnam was a dream of the American political establishment. Exactly one year before his assassination, King, setting aside the grave danger it brought to him, challenged his government and broke with American imperial policy. At New York City's Riverside Church on April 4, 1967, King linked the domestic exploitation of African Americans with "the deadly Western arrogance that has poisoned the international atmosphere for so long."

In his speech, "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence”, King said, "A time comes when silence is betrayal..," And, "I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today - my own government."

King’s charge is just as true today as it was 40-plus years ago.

America is still the greatest purveyor of violence in the world. Silence is still betrayal. But let’s take it a step beyond silence. Non-action is the other betrayal. Change isn’t just about an election in November and a celebration in January. It’s about doing something measurable to usher in a more peaceful world. Sure it’s good to change one’s perspective and way of looking at things. But the trick is to make your actions match what’s on your mind.

There is an arc. People and events are linked on the arc.

So, this year we should honor King in an active sense. We should commit ourselves to organize against the American policy of violence and empire. The anti-war movement should apply pressure on Obama to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan. And, just as important, particularly amid the horror that has been visited on the people of Gaza; a broader peace movement must also build real economic and political pressure against Israel’s immoral and criminal acts against the Palestinians. This King Day should mark the beginning of an organized push for American divestment from Israel.

When you think about it, US foreign policy toward Palestine has been a segregationist or apartheid policy. In his 2006 book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, former President Jimmy Carter likened Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and its repression of Palestinian people, both within Israel and in the occupied territories, to the state of apartheid, which existed in South Africa prior to the early 1990s. Apartheid means ‘separateness.’ And there is little debate that Zionism, the official ideology of Israel, is predicated on religious and ethnic separation or segregation. A self-described Jewish state -- that is, a state that operates of, by and on behalf of a single group of people -- cannot also be a secular, democratic state where persons of all religious and ethnic backgrounds are treated equally. A Jewish state that has never declared its borders, that has annexed and occupied territories, flouting international law and subjecting the indigenous population to poverty, indignity, theft, torture and death, is not only a colonialist outlaw state; it is also racist. As one Palestinian gentleman remarked to me, “While blacks in America were once considered subhuman, Palestinians are not considered humans at all."

And Israel could not have pursued any of these policies without the steadfast financial and political support of the United States. It is no secret that Israel is the largest recipient of U.S. aid in the world. It receives more than $15 million every day from the United States, or $30 billion a year by most estimates. The F-16 fighter jets and Apache helicopters that have dropped hundreds of tons of bombs and missiles on Gaza are made in the United States and provided to the Israeli government. Every American taxpayer underwrites Israeli-style apartheid.

Divestment may be at odds with the position of many elected black leaders (the Congressional Black Caucus included), but it’s not at odds with what King spoke of and died for. It is not at odds with those he championed. He championed the locked out and oppressed.

Throughout my life, black politics has lined up with oppressed people in other nations. Malcolm X stood with Fidel Castro and the Cuban people following the 1958 ouster of US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista, and with him the organized crime and American corporatist mobsters who exploited the Cuban people. Harlemites greeted Castro with affection as they gathered to welcome him during his stay at the Hotel Theresa in 1960 because he wanted to be “among the workers.”

Muhammad Ali is a “national treasure” now. But he wasn’t when he dropped the name Cassius Clay and said “Ain’t no Vietnamese ever called me nigger.”

Americans love Nelson Mandela, now. But he was a “terrorist” while he was heading "Spear of the Nation” – the armed wing of the African National Congress. That’s why he was locked up at Robben Island. Mandela’s name was only recently – during the 2nd part of the Bush Administration - removed from the State Department’s “terrorists list.” In the days of Ronald Reagan it was America and Israel that supported South Africa when the rest of the world said “enough.”

But black Americans remembered the hundreds of kids who died in Sharpesville Massacre in the 60s. We were in solidarity with those who took part in the Soweto uprising of 1976. We cried and protested when the South African police killed Steve Biko in 1977.

What’s happening in Palestine is not fundamentally different from what occurred in apartheid South Africa. Kids are being killed. People have been herded into the (more deadly) equivalent of bantustans. Political leaders are targeted for assassination. Most recently Hamas Interior Minister Said Siam was killed along with nine others, when Israeli warplanes bombed a home in the Jabalya refugee camp.

Israel’s behavior demands the same response from the world human rights community as was mustered against South Africa.

The facts are clear. The citizens of Gaza live in a virtual prison. They are surrounded by water, walls, fences and watch/gun towers.

In the latest assault, at least 1,133 Palestinians have been killed, including 346 children and 105 women; at least 5,200 have been injured. People talk about "suffering on both sides," but there is no proportion in weaponry or force, which is why 100 Palestinians have died for every one Israeli.

The Palestinian people live under Israel’s apartheid blockade where even humanitarian aid is not allowed through – where citizens can get food, medicine and even goats, in addition to guns and weapons, only through tunnels.

Not just in Gaza but throughout all the occupied territories, Palestinian water rights along with their land and human rights have been stolen. Fundamentalist Jewish immigrants from Brooklyn have automatic citizenship and automatic civil and property rights, while the indigenous Palestinians lose and lose some more. Most often, it is Palestinian land that the migrants have settled on, with the blessings of Israel and the financial support of the United States via the Israeli government – in the face of international and United Nations' resolutions against such settlements. It is Palestinian land, stolen for Israeli settlements, that the Palestinians have been firing mortars onto; Palestinian land that is bisected by Israeli-only roads and a wall that exceeds the Berlin Wall in size and cruelty. (No German had his farm or homestead cut in two by the wall.) They are Palestinian orchards that have been bulldozed; Palestinian homes that have been demolished; and American-made bulldozers that have done the job. A Caterpillar bulldozer crushed 23-year-old American peace activist Rachel Corrie to death when she stood in front of a doctor's house in Gaza trying to prevent its demolition on March 16, 2003. And the same bulldozers have taken everything from Palestinian families year after year for decades.

Throughout the latest assault on Gaza, those blindly supportive of Israel raise a straw man argument asking, “Who struck the blow?” Or, “Fired the first shot?” Or, “Launched the first mortar.” Their answer to the question is almost always certain to be, "Hamas." Before the days Hamas came to power, the same straw man was raised and knocked down as the answer back then was sure to be, “Fatah” - led by PLO leader Yasser Arafat.

Supporters of Israel never mention the blockade on Gaza or political assassinations or the wall or the poverty and despair. Instead, they label Hamas or anyone opposing occupation as “terrorists” and lamely apologize for the civilians killed calling them “collateral damage,” or they claim that the women and children killed in the school or hospital or UN facilities were “being used as human shield.” No one calls the Jewish settlers human shields, though their incursions into occupied territory has been both a provocation and an excuse since 1967.

Just take a look at a map of the territory lost by the Palestinian people since 1948 and at an inexorable pace since 1967. Then answer the question, “Who stuck the first blow?”

Throughout the latest attack on the Palestinian people I have heard a few people openly make the bloodthirsty suggestion that “they (the Israelis) should kill them all.” But the most common thing one hears is something similar to what Obama said on a visit to Israel in the summer 2008 that "If somebody shot rockets at my house where my two daughters were sleeping at night, I'd do everything in my power to stop them.” The new president’s comment was one of the first things that came out the mouths of various spokespersons for the Israeli government as the Christmastime onslaught on Gaza began. But what of the Israeli rockets and bombs and bullets and bulldozers that for years have hit the homes where Palestinian children were sleeping?

Now Israel has called a cease fire in Gaza, if only for a moment. Still, we must organize and protest in an effective way beyond the moment. We have our work cut out for us. The Palestinians have few friends in high places. By a vote of 404-1 the House recently signaled its support for Israel’s apartheid regime and literally condemned the Palestinians right of self-defense. The only member of Congress to take a stand with the Palestinians was and is Ohio’s Dennis Kucinich.

On the campaign trail at a conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Obama declared himself a “Zionist,” and upon being elected chose Rahm Emanuel, a dual citizen of the US and Israel, as his chief of staff. The Israeli paper Ha'aretz (6 Nov. 2008) said it all: Obama's first pick: Israeli Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff. Some say that Emanuel “has a track record on Israel well to the right of George Bush.” This includes signing a 2003 letter justifying Israel’s policy of political assassinations and criticizing George Bush for not supporting Israel enough. Emanuel backed a resolution supporting Israel's bombing of Lebanon in the summer of 2006 and he called on the US government to cancel a planned speech to Congress by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki because he had condemned Israel’s actions in Lebanon.

As president, where will Obama stand? More important, what is the moral stand, and what must we do to press the government to take it?

First, we must see Israel with the same eyes as we saw South Africa in the apartheid years – as a racist nation deserving of international isolation and sanctions. Second, we must demand that the United States end its $30 billion a year military support to the country. Third, we should organize, confront and demand that public bodies such as universities, local and state governments divest their portfolios from companies that do business in or with Israel. Fourth, we should identify and boycott those companies that do business with and in Israel. Fifth, we should call for a cultural boycott of Israel, and boycott those artists who perform in the country.

As for the new president we should continue to pressure him (1) to establish a fair involvement with the disputing parties, recognizing their equal humanity, not take the one-sided, Israel-first position of his predecessors; (2) to pressure the Israeli government to allow unimpeded access of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip; (3) to call for an investigation into Israel's misuse of U.S. weapons, to include the use of white phosphorous and urge the UN weapons inspectors to determine if Israel is using depleted uranium-tipped missiles on the Palestinians. This would be a first step toward ending arms transfers to Israel.

All people have a right to exist – Jews and Palestinians. The way to peace is for each side to respect the other's right to live.

But America must be a fair player in what is now a continual catastrophe with our country on the wrong side of history. We must remember that “where you spend your money is a political act.” Putting pressure on business and government is a means to force change. By “getting in their pockets” we can say no to the violence. We can say, “Not in our names.” That’s what I think Dr. King would say and do at a time like this.

Almost 40 years ago, Martin Luther King warned that "the problem of racism, the problem of economic exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated." Those "triple evils" of racism, economic injustice and militarism are what we must fight – the dream of King’s was the defeat of the “triple evils.”

As we celebrate his day, let’s do it in solidarity with the dispossessed. As Vice-President Joe Biden was saying his farewell to the Senate he quoted King saying, “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.” I believe Biden is right as King was right. But there’s a strong magnetic pull that has the needle still pointed on injustice. The injustice of being the “greatest purveyor of violence in the world.” We can help move the needle toward just by insisting that our country sees a Palestinian life having as much value as an Israeli life.

Source

From Vancouver, With Love.....

2009-01-18T11:46:00.000-08:00

From Vancouver, with Love: a prayer for Gaza from Elders of the Coast Salish Territory

Slave Revolts And Passionate Evasions.....

2009-01-18T09:13:00.000-08:00

By all definitions, the Palestinian residents of Gaza and the West Bank are slaves, no matter what their religious affiliations, color, or ancestry. The links below lead to articles that require thorough reading and not simply quick scans.

Once you've absorbed what the authors are saying, then you may attempt to argue with me regarding the justification of Israel's actions. Both the following pieces have been written by Jewish academics and authors who have a much clearer, and less emotional reaction to Israel's policies regarding the Palestinian people than I could ever have. Please educate yourselves:

-Hamas and Gaza: slave revolts and passionate evasions
-Seeing through the lies

"The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it." - Occupation Magazine

Couldn't Say It Better.....

2009-01-17T19:37:00.000-08:00

Israel Declares Ceasefire In Gaza......

2009-01-17T16:29:00.000-08:00

Israel is to halt its three-week military offensive against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said.
He said Israel had achieved its aims and the unilateral ceasefire would start at 0200 (2400 GMT). But he said troops would remain in Gaza for now.

What does all this mean? Nothing, nadda, bupkis, zilch. A bunch of bullshit and bravado that's as transparent as glass. There's been no formal agreement so this is just business as usual for Israel. Make a meaningless declaration and when so much as a rock is thrown over onto the Israeli side, the F-16's will fly, the tanks will roll, the bulldozers will demolish, and the white phosphorous will burn.

Are you opening the crossings? Are you relieving the mental and physical trauma you've inflicted on Gaza for years? Will you keep a tight rein on the little fucks from your state who make a sport out of harassing old men, women and children day after day? Are you going to control your radical fundamentalists who appear to be completely nuts, and who at times make Bin Laden look sane? Will you even attempt to treat the Gazans with some form of respect you pricks, or will you continue to treat them like lower life forms? Will you ever hold yourselves accountable?

No, I didn't think so. Fuck you, Olmert and company.

Abbas, Olmert, and Bush.....

2009-01-17T12:31:00.000-08:00

The three stupidest bastards on the planet, right here, right now:

Mouin Rabbani, a contributing editor to the Middle East Report magazine, talks to Al Jazeera about what Israel's war on Gaza means for Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and his Fatah faction, and what its wider repercussions may be.

Q: If the Israeli bombardment stops, what will be the most prominent political battle for the Palestinians?

The most difficult battle that is going to be waged within the Palestinian political system once this war subsides is going to be Mahmoud Abbas's fight for political survival.

He has been under tremendous pressure and growing widespread criticism all along for the absolute failure of each and every one of his strategies since he assumed the presidency in November 2004.

Does it matter if he is president or somebody else in the same mould as him?

Many Palestinians increasingly say it does matter if he continues as president and that it is increasingly important to replace him with a leader who can, more authentically, represent his people.

It is interesting that in the last 10 years Fatah, the movement which (despite the ascendency of Hamas) is the spinal chord of the Palestinian national movement, has become increasingly bitter and divided.

[Fatah's factions] have united only once in the past 10 years - that was in November 2004 to appoint Mahmoud Abbas as a successor to the late Yasser Afarat.

Since then, they have been at war with each other. The movement is disintegrating.

We now begin to see a situation where these various, competing power centres find it necessary to unite once again.

Will the incoming US administration attempt to identify a person for that role?

No, because that is what they did last time. The appointment of the Palestinian leadership needs to be a Palestinian national decision. Full stop.

My view is that we are seeing an increasingly wide gap between Abbas and his leadership circle on the one hand, and the rank and file of the Fatah movement on the other.

We may see a situation emerging in which Fatah's rival power centres are able to unite once again, this time to jettison Abbas overboard before he takes them down with him in the sinking ship which is his presidency.

If Israel decides to stop its war, will it have done so to prevent Hamas from having the satisfaction of hammering out an international agreement?

That is not exactly what the Israel decision will be.

I have argued all along since this war began that if a key objective of Israel is to delegitimise Hamas, it does not make sense, from an Israeli perspective, to be part of a ceasefire agreement in which Hamas is also a party.

It would be more logical, again looking at this from an Israeli perspective, to make a unilateral statement: We stop the bombing as of today or Monday or whatever; Here are the new rules; if so much as a coke can is thrown over the Israel-Gaza border, we send in an F-16 - there is no ceasefire that restrains us, so if we get intelligence that a particular Hamas leader is in a particular house, since there is no ceasefire, we send in the missiles.

You have, more or less, a situation of open-ended conflict, but the main offensive will have ended. You will have a situation very much like what we have had since 2002 – the big Israeli invasion in the West Bank at the time.

Is Israel making its decision now so it will give more weight to the Saudi-Egypt talks rather than legitimise what happened here in Qatar when Hamas was given centre stage?

It is quite likely that that is part of their calculations.

That Israel may well announce a unilateral cessation of the offensive, as opposed to a unilateral cessation of hostilities, prior to Kuwait's meeting.

That will also, they hope, take the wind out of the sails of the Kuwait meeting which would then be able to argue that the mere threat of convening a "real Arab summit" stopped Israel dead in its tacks and, therefore, there is no real need to take serious decisions at that meeting.

So, in other words, Israel will be providing some ammunition to the so-called axis of moderation and pragmatism.

We are told the "memorandum of understanding" - the deal between the US and Israel - is about stopping arms being smuggled into Gaza. Is there more to this than meets the eye?

Yes. This is George Bush's parting gift to Israel and the US administration that has incinerated four countries in less than a decade: Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon and now Palestine.

It is giving the US a direct role in Israel's war against Hamas.

The Americans will not even publish the details of this agreement.

Some reports say there is also a Nato role but, basically, preventing the rearmament and resupplying of Hamas is not just an Israeli problem, it is an international problem.

Source

Israel's War Crimes - Been There, Done That.....

2009-01-17T09:23:00.001-08:00

Criticism of Israel's war crimes mounts.

Criticism by international watchdog groups over the increasing death toll in Gaza mounted this week as the first legal actions inside Israel were launched accusing the army of intentionally harming the enclave's civilian population.

The petitions -- over attacks on medical personnel and the shelling of United Nations schools in Gaza -- follow statements by senior Israeli commanders that they have been using heavy firepower to protect soldiers during their advance on built-up areas. "We are very violent," one told Israeli media.

There is also growing evidence that Israeli forces have been firing phosphorus shells over densely populated areas in a move that risks violating international law by inflicting burns on civilians.

Demands grow for Gaza war crimes investigation

Israel is facing growing demands from senior UN officials and human rights groups for an international war crimes investigation in Gaza over allegations such as the "reckless and indiscriminate" shelling of residential areas and use of Palestinian families as human shields by soldiers.

Please excuse me if I don't get too excited and optimistic about this, been there, done that: The following is from the Amnesty International report for 2004.

Amnesty International has accused Israel of committing war crimes in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The rights group's report for 2004 says Israeli forces have killed some 700 Palestinians - including 150 children - mostly in unlawful circumstances.
The report lists "reckless shooting, shelling and air strikes in civilian areas... and excessive use of force".
It also condemns the killing of Israeli civilians by Palestinian militants and violence by Jewish settlers.
"Certain abuses committed by the Israeli army constituted crimes against humanity and war crimes," Amnesty's report says.
"The deliberate targeting of civilians by Palestinian armed groups constituted crimes against humanity," it adds.
An Israeli opposition MP has requested an urgent parliamentary debate on the report.
But an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman denied the charge of war crimes and said Amnesty's analysis appeared "one-sided".
The report says Palestinian armed groups killed 109 Israelis, including 59 civilians and eight children, in suicide bombings, shootings and mortar attacks.

How about this one from 1999:

Israel/Occupied Territories: Demolition and dispossession: the destruction of Palestinian homes
This report investigates the pretexts and implications of the Israeli policy of house demolitions, focussing particularly on the period after the beginning of the peace process in 1993. It describes the problems for Palestinians of getting permits and the related Israeli policies on land including zoning, land confiscations and Israeli settlement-building of the occupied territories. Download the full report: here.

Human Rights Watch, dated 1998:

Israel's Record of Occupation.

On July 15 and 16, 1998 Israel presented its initial report to the United Nations Human Rights Committee, the U.N. body of independent experts responsible for monitoring implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and its two Optional Protocols. Already more than five years overdue, the 369-page report should have included detailed information on the measures Israel had adopted to give effect to the rights recognized in the covenant, and on the progress made in the enjoyment of those rights. Instead, as Human Rights Watch argued in its submission to the Human Rights Committee, Israel's report failed to give sufficient information on the implementation of the covenant in practice, left out any discussion of Israel's implementation of the covenant in the territories it controlled in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and South Lebanon, and misrepresented Israeli practice on important issues including torture and administrative detention.

I could go on all day, but I think you get the hint. Like I said, I'm not going to get too excited about any complaints and actions against Israel until I see them come to fruition.

President Obama, are you going to hold your new bestest friends accountable? Whether you want them to be your buddies or not doesn't matter, it comes with the territory you just inherited. I'll be keeping a close eye on you sir, and hopefully so will a whole lot of other people. More eyes will be on you than any other president before you, so you'd better get it right the first time.

Israel: Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions......

2009-01-16T20:06:00.000-08:00

It's time. Long past time. The best strategy to end the increasingly bloody occupation is for Israel to become the target of the kind of global movement that put an end to apartheid in South Africa.

In July 2005 a huge coalition of Palestinian groups laid out plans to do just that. They called on "people of conscience all over the world to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era." The campaign Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions--BDS for short--was born.

Every day that Israel pounds Gaza brings more converts to the BDS cause, and talk of cease-fires is doing little to slow the momentum. Support is even emerging among Israeli Jews. In the midst of the assault roughly 500 Israelis, dozens of them well-known artists and scholars, sent a letter to foreign ambassadors stationed in Israel. It calls for "the adoption of immediate restrictive measures and sanctions" and draws a clear parallel with the antiapartheid struggle. "The boycott on South Africa was effective, but Israel is handled with kid gloves.... This international backing must stop." Read the rest of Naomi Klein's article here.

Global BDS Movement

We Will Not Go Down.....

2009-01-16T11:43:00.000-08:00

I'm dedicating this song to a young mother, student, Photoshop fanatic, and fellow blogger DeW Nada. I hope with all my heart that you and yours are safe and well, DeW. I'm so sorry I couldn't do more to stop this.

Thank-you Michael Heart.

Defiance.....

2009-01-16T09:01:00.001-08:00

One Man's Freedom Fighter Is Another Man's Terrorist!

Palestine Forever!

Here's a trailer from the movie Defiance, being released today. Sadly, the movie doesn't tell of the reported murders of 128 Polish farmers among other things, committed by these freedom fighters.

Fat Chance Any Ceasefire Will Hold.....

2009-01-15T18:59:00.000-08:00

Mainstream media is busy insinuating that a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is getting closer. Pardon me for not getting excited by this news. I've heard it all far too many times before, since the mid 1980's when I grew up and started paying attention. I've repeatedly written letters on behalf of the Palestinian people to government officials, both as a member of various human rights organizations and as a private citizen. I've requested that mainstream news outlets do basic, unbiased, investigative reporting regarding the West Bank and Gaza. For the past few years I've blogged about the atrocities committed repeatedly by Israel, as it viciously harasses the caged Palestinian people until they retaliate. Israel then uses this as a convenient excuse to attack while the rest of the Islamophobic, ignorant world looks on tsk tsking about terrorists and crying "Poor Israel".

Do you think a cease-fire is going to hold while Israel does as it pleases? Doing as it pleases, by the way, doesn't include giving a shit about the Palestinian people and their rights, let alone about what the rest of us may think of it's actions. Same old same old bullshit.

Patients and refugees evacuated as Al-Quds hospital burns

The army at the door

Who Owns The Gas?....

2009-01-13T09:47:00.001-08:00

This has to be one of the best posts I've read lately regarding Israel/Gaza from a different perspective. It's about the gas, stupid! Excellent.

Come on, don't be lazy or apathetic, now. After all, the death, mutilation, destruction and elimination of the obstacle is most likely all for you and your creature comforts, let alone the vast amounts of money to eventually be lining the pockets of the already rich. Take a moment to read the article I've re-posted below, and decide whether all those dead Palestinian children you've been seeing pictures of on the Internet and your T.V. from the comfort of your nice warm house are worth it.

War and Natural Gas: The Israeli Invasion And Gaza's Offshore Gas Fields

The military invasion of the Gaza Strip by Israeli Forces bears a direct relation to the control and ownership of strategic offshore gas reserves.

This is a war of conquest. Discovered in 2000, there are extensive gas reserves off the Gaza coastline.

British Gas (BG Group) and its partner, the Athens based Consolidated Contractors International Company (CCC) owned by Lebanon's Sabbagh and Koury families, were granted oil and gas exploration rights in a 25 year agreement signed in November 1999 with the Palestinian Authority.

The rights to the offshore gas field are respectively British Gas (60 percent); Consolidated Contractors (CCC) (30 percent); and the Investment Fund of the Palestinian Authority (10 percent). (Haaretz, October 21, 2007).

The PA-BG-CCC agreement includes field development and the construction of a gas pipeline.(Middle East Economic Digest, Jan 5, 2001).

The BG licence covers the entire Gazan offshore marine area, which is contiguous to several Israeli offshore gas facilities. (See Map below). It should be noted that 60 percent of the gas reserves along the Gaza-Israel coastline belong to Palestine.

The BG Group drilled two wells in 2000: Gaza Marine-1 and Gaza Marine-2. Reserves are estimated by British Gas to be of the order of 1.4 trillion cubic feet, valued at approximately 4 billion dollars. These are the figures made public by British Gas. The size of Palestine's gas reserves could be much larger.

Who Owns the Gas Fields

The issue of sovereignty over Gaza's gas fields is crucial. From a legal standpoint, the gas reserves belong to Palestine.

The death of Yasser Arafat, the election of the Hamas government and the ruin of the Palestinian Authority have enabled Israel to establish de facto control over Gaza's offshore gas reserves.

British Gas (BG Group) has been dealing with the Tel Aviv government. In turn, the Hamas government has been bypassed in regards to exploration and development rights over the gas fields.

The election of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 2001 was a major turning point. Palestine's sovereignty over the offshore gas fields was challenged in the Israeli Supreme Court. Sharon stated unequivocally that "Israel would never buy gas from Palestine" intimating that Gaza's offshore gas reserves belong to Israel.

In 2003, Ariel Sharon, vetoed an initial deal, which would allow British Gas to supply Israel with natural gas from Gaza's offshore wells. (The Independent, August 19, 2003)

The election victory of Hamas in 2006 was conducive to the demise of the Palestinian Authority, which became confined to the West Bank, under the proxy regime of Mahmoud Abbas.

In 2006, British Gas "was close to signing a deal to pump the gas to Egypt." (Times, May, 23, 2007). According to reports, British Prime Minister Tony Blair intervened on behalf of Israel with a view to shunting the agreement with Egypt.

The following year, in May 2007, the Israeli Cabinet approved a proposal by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert "to buy gas from the Palestinian Authority." The proposed contract was for $4 billion, with profits of the order of $2 billion of which one billion was to go the Palestinians.

Tel Aviv, however, had no intention on sharing the revenues with Palestine. An Israeli team of negotiators was set up by the Israeli Cabinet to thrash out a deal with the BG Group, bypassing both the Hamas government and the Palestinian Authority:

"Israeli defence authorities want the Palestinians to be paid in goods and services and insist that no money go to the Hamas-controlled Government." (Ibid, emphasis added)

The objective was essentially to nullify the contract signed in 1999 between the BG Group and the Palestinian Authority under Yasser Arafat.

Under the proposed 2007 agreement with BG, Palestinian gas from Gaza's offshore wells was to be channeled by an undersea pipeline to the Israeli seaport of Ashkelon, thereby transferring control over the sale of the natural gas to Israel.

The deal fell through. The negotiations were suspended:

"Mossad Chief Meir Dagan opposed the transaction on security grounds, that the proceeds would fund terror". (Member of Knesset Gilad Erdan, Address to the Knesset on "The Intention of Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to Purchase Gas from the Palestinians When Payment Will Serve Hamas," March 1, 2006, quoted in Lt. Gen. (ret.) Moshe Yaalon, Does the Prospective Purchase of British Gas from Gaza's Coastal Waters Threaten Israel's National Security? Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, October 2007)

Israel's intent was to foreclose the possibility that royalties be paid to the Palestinians. In December 2007, The BG Group withdrew from the negotiations with Israel and in January 2008 they closed their office in Israel.(BG website).

Invasion Plan on The Drawing Board

The invasion plan of the Gaza Strip under "Operation Cast Lead" was set in motion in June 2008, according to Israeli military sources:

"Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago [June or before June] , even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas."(Barak Ravid, Operation "Cast Lead": Israeli Air Force strike followed months of planning, Haaretz, December 27, 2008)

That very same month, the Israeli authorities contacted British Gas, with a view to resuming crucial negotiations pertaining to the purchase of Gaza's natural gas:

"Both Ministry of Finance director general Yarom Ariav and Ministry of National Infrastructures director general Hezi Kugler agreed to inform BG of Israel's wish to renew the talks.

The sources added that BG has not yet officially responded to Israel's request, but that company executives would probably come to Israel in a few weeks to hold talks with government officials." (Globes online- Israel's Business Arena, June 23, 2008)

The decision to speed up negotiations with British Gas (BG Group) coincided, chronologically, with the planning of the invasion of Gaza initiated in June. It would appear that Israel was anxious to reach an agreement with the BG Group prior to the invasion, which was already in an advanced planning stage.

Moreover, these negotiations with British Gas were conducted by the Ehud Olmert government with the knowledge that a military invasion was on the drawing board. In all likelihood, a new "post war" political-territorial arrangement for the Gaza strip was also being contemplated by the Israeli government.

In fact, negotiations between British Gas and Israeli officials were ongoing in October 2008, 2-3 months prior to the commencement of the bombings on December 27th.

In November 2008, the Israeli Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of National Infrastructures instructed Israel Electric Corporation (IEC) to enter into negotiations with British Gas, on the purchase of natural gas from the BG's offshore concession in Gaza. (Globes, November 13, 2008)

"Ministry of Finance director general Yarom Ariav and Ministry of National Infrastructures director general Hezi Kugler wrote to IEC CEO Amos Lasker recently, informing him of the government's decision to allow negotiations to go forward, in line with the framework proposal it approved earlier this year.

The IEC board, headed by chairman Moti Friedman, approved the principles of the framework proposal a few weeks ago. The talks with BG Group will begin once the board approves the exemption from a tender." (Globes Nov. 13, 2008)

Gaza and Energy Geopolitics

The military occupation of Gaza is intent upon transferring the sovereignty of the gas fields to Israel in violation of international law.

What can we expect in the wake of the invasion?

What is the intent of Israel with regard to Palestine's Natural Gas reserves?

A new territorial arrangement, with the stationing of Israeli and/or "peacekeeping" troops?

The militarization of the entire Gaza coastline, which is strategic for Israel?

The outright confiscation of Palestinian gas fields and the unilateral declaration of Israeli sovereignty over Gaza's maritime areas?

If this were to occur, the Gaza gas fields would be integrated into Israel's offshore installations, which are contiguous to those of the Gaza Strip. (See Map 1 above).

These various offshore installations are also linked up to Israel's energy transport corridor, extending from the port of Eilat, which is an oil pipeline terminal, on the Red Sea to the seaport - pipeline terminal at Ashkelon, and northwards to Haifa, and eventually linking up through a proposed Israeli-Turkish pipeline with the Turkish port of Ceyhan.

Ceyhan is the terminal of the Baku, Tblisi Ceyhan Trans Caspian pipeline. "What is envisaged is to link the BTC pipeline to the Trans-Israel Eilat-Ashkelon pipeline, also known as Israel's Tipline." (See Michel Chossudovsky, The War on Lebanon and the Battle for Oil, Global Research, July 23, 2006)

It's Raining Willy Pete.....

2009-01-13T09:21:00.001-08:00

The use of Willy Pete in the world's largest open-air prison.

It's raining WP over gaza.

ToxFAQs™
for
White Phosphorus
(Fósforo Blanco)

CAS# 7723-14-0

This fact sheet answers the most frequently asked health questions about white phosphorus. For more information, you may call the ATSDR Information Center at 1-888-422-8737. This fact sheet is one in a series of summaries about hazardous substances and their health effects. This information is important because this substance may harm you. The effects of exposure to any hazardous substance depend on the dose, the duration, how you are exposed, personal traits and habits, and whether other chemicals are present.
HIGHLIGHTS: White phosphorus is a waxy solid which burns easily and is used in chemical manufacturing and smoke munitions. Exposure to white phosphorus may cause burns and irritation, liver, kidney, heart, lung, or bone damage, and death. White phosphorus has been found in at least 77 of the 1,416 National Priorities List sites identified by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

What is white phosphorus?

White phosphorus is a colorless, white, or yellow waxy solid with a garlic-like odor. It does not occur naturally, but is manufactured from phosphate rocks.

White phosphorus reacts rapidly with oxygen, easily catching fire at temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above room temperature.

White phosphorus is used by the military in various types of ammunition, and to produce smoke for concealing troop movements and identifying targets.

It is also used by industry to produce phosphoric acid and other chemicals for use in fertilizers, food additives, and cleaning compounds. Small amounts of white phosphorus were used in the past in pesticides and fireworks.
back to top
What happens to white phosphorus when it enters the environment?

* White phosphorus can enter the environment when it is made, used in manufacturing or by the military, or accidentally spilled during transport and storage.
* It can be found in the water and bottom sediment of rivers and lakes near facilities that make or use it.
* In the air, white phosphorus reacts rapidly with oxygen to produce relatively harmless chemicals within minutes.
* In water, white phosphorus reacts with oxygen within hours or days.
* In water with low oxygen, white phosphorus may degrade to a highly toxic compound called phosphine, which eventually evaporates to the air and is changed to less harmful chemicals.
* White phosphorus can build up slightly in the bodies of fish that live in contaminated lakes or streams.
* In soil, white phosphorus may stick to particles and be changed within a few days to less harmful compounds.
* In deep soil or sediments with little oxygen, white phosphorus may remain unchanged for many years.

How might I be exposed to white phosphorus?

* Breathing contaminated air near a facility that is using white phosphorus.
* Eating contaminated fish or game birds from sites containing white phosphorus.
* Drinking or swimming in water that has been contaminated with white phosphorus.
* Touching soil contaminated with white phosphorus.
* If you work in industries that use or manufacture white phosphorus or munitions containing white phosphorus.

How can white phosphorus affect my health?

Little information is available about the health effects that may be caused by white phosphorus. Most of what is known about the effects of breathing white phosphorus is from studies of workers. Most of what is known about the effects of eating white phosphorus is from reports of people eating rat poison or fireworks that contained it.

Breathing white phosphorus for short periods may cause coughing and irritation of the throat and lungs. Breathing white phosphorus for long periods may cause a condition known as "phossy jaw" which involves poor wound healing of the mouth and breakdown of the jaw bone.

Eating or drinking small amounts of white phosphorus may cause liver, heart, or kidney damage, vomiting, stomach cramps, drowsiness, or death. We do not know what the effects are from eating or drinking very small amounts of white phosphorus-containing substances over long periods of time. Skin contact with burning white phosphorus may burn skin or cause liver, heart, and kidney damage.

We do not know whether or not white phosphorus can affect the ability to have children or cause birth defects in people.
back to top
How likely is white phosphorus to cause cancer?

The EPA has determined that white phosphorus is not classifiable as to its carcinogenicity in humans. There are no studies available in people or animals that suggest white phosphorus causes cancer.
back to top
Is there a medical test to show whether I've been exposed to white phosphorus?

There is no medical test that shows if you have been exposed to white phosphorus. However, the above health effects may lead your doctor to suspect that you have been exposed if you have a history of exposure.
back to top
Has the federal government made recommendations to protect human health?

The EPA has listed white phosphorus as a Hazardous Air Pollutant. The EPA requires that spills or accidental releases into the environment of 1 pound or more of white phosphorus be reported to the EPA.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) have all set the inhalation exposure limit for white phosphorus in the workplace during an 8-hour workday at 0.1 milligram of white phosphorus per cubic meter of air (0.1 mg/m³).
back to top
Glossary

Carcinogenicity: Ability to cause cancer.

CAS: Chemical Abstracts Service.

Evaporate: To change into a vapor or gas.

Milligram (mg): One thousandth of a gram.

Sediment: Mud and debris that have settled to the bottom of a body of water.
back to top
References

Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR). 1997. Toxicological Profile for white phosphorus. Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service.
back to top
Where can I get more information?

ATSDR can tell you where to find occupational and environmental health clinics. Their specialists can recognize, evaluate, and treat illnesses resulting from exposure to hazardous substances. You can also contact your community or state health or environmental quality department if you have any more questions or concerns.

For more information, contact:

Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry
Division of Toxicology
1600 Clifton Road NE, Mailstop F-32
Atlanta, GA 30333
Phone: 1-888-4... (1-888-422-8737)
FAX: (770)-488-4178
Email: ATSDRIC@cdc.gov
Source

Finally, Someone Speaks Up.....

2009-01-08T07:46:00.000-08:00

Of course it would be Dennis, the only American politician with anything resembling morality, integrity and guts.

Radio interview with Sameh Habeeb from Gaza

Harrassing Palestinians Is Sport For Some.....

2009-01-07T17:45:00.000-08:00

If you think this doesn't happen all the time, you've either had your head squarely up your ass, or you haven't bothered listening to the Palestinians and wondering if there might be some truth in what they have to say. The info's out there folks, just go find it like I've been doing for the last few years. No, it's not terrorist propaganda, it's the raw facts of everyday life for many Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza. The difference between the two areas is Fatah rolled over and plays dead, doing exactly as they're told by the U.S. and Israel nice and domesticated-like; Hamas, well I think we know by now how they react.

A drunk settler threatening British film crew:

Settler taunting caged Palestinians:

Avi Shlaim.....

2009-01-06T16:48:00.000-08:00

Oxford professor of international relations Avi Shlaim served in the Israeli army and has never questioned the state's legitimacy. But its merciless assault on Gaza has led him to devastating conclusions

The only way to make sense of Israel's senseless war in Gaza is through understanding the historical context. Establishing the state of Israel in May 1948 involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians. British officials bitterly resented American partisanship on behalf of the infant state. On 2 June 1948, Sir John Troutbeck wrote to the foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, that the Americans were responsible for the creation of a gangster state headed by "an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders". I used to think that this judgment was too harsh but Israel's vicious assault on the people of Gaza, and the Bush administration's complicity in this assault, have reopened the question.

I write as someone who served loyally in the Israeli army in the mid-1960s and who has never questioned the legitimacy of the state of Israel within its pre-1967 borders. What I utterly reject is the Zionist colonial project beyond the Green Line. The Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the June 1967 war had very little to do with security and everything to do with territorial expansionism. The aim was to establish Greater Israel through permanent political, economic and military control over the Palestinian territories. And the result has been one of the most prolonged and brutal military occupations of modern times.

Four decades of Israeli control did incalculable damage to the economy of the Gaza Strip. With a large population of 1948 refugees crammed into a tiny strip of land, with no infrastructure or natural resources, Gaza's prospects were never bright. Gaza, however, is not simply a case of economic under-development but a uniquely cruel case of deliberate de-development. To use the Biblical phrase, Israel turned the people of Gaza into the hewers of wood and the drawers of water, into a source of cheap labour and a captive market for Israeli goods. The development of local industry was actively impeded so as to make it impossible for the Palestinians to end their subordination to Israel and to establish the economic underpinnings essential for real political independence.

Gaza is a classic case of colonial exploitation in the post-colonial era. Jewish settlements in occupied territories are immoral, illegal and an insurmountable obstacle to peace. They are at once the instrument of exploitation and the symbol of the hated occupation. In Gaza, the Jewish settlers numbered only 8,000 in 2005 compared with 1.4 million local residents. Yet the settlers controlled 25% of the territory, 40% of the arable land and the lion's share of the scarce water resources. Cheek by jowl with these foreign intruders, the majority of the local population lived in abject poverty and unimaginable misery. Eighty per cent of them still subsist on less than $2 a day. The living conditions in the strip remain an affront to civilised values, a powerful precipitant to resistance and a fertile breeding ground for political extremism.

In August 2005 a Likud government headed by Ariel Sharon staged a unilateral Israeli pullout from Gaza, withdrawing all 8,000 settlers and destroying the houses and farms they had left behind. Hamas, the Islamic resistance movement, conducted an effective campaign to drive the Israelis out of Gaza. The withdrawal was a humiliation for the Israeli Defence Forces. To the world, Sharon presented the withdrawal from Gaza as a contribution to peace based on a two-state solution. But in the year after, another 12,000 Israelis settled on the West Bank, further reducing the scope for an independent Palestinian state. Land-grabbing and peace-making are simply incompatible. Israel had a choice and it chose land over peace.

The real purpose behind the move was to redraw unilaterally the borders of Greater Israel by incorporating the main settlement blocs on the West Bank to the state of Israel. Withdrawal from Gaza was thus not a prelude to a peace deal with the Palestinian Authority but a prelude to further Zionist expansion on the West Bank. It was a unilateral Israeli move undertaken in what was seen, mistakenly in my view, as an Israeli national interest. Anchored in a fundamental rejection of the Palestinian national identity, the withdrawal from Gaza was part of a long-term effort to deny the Palestinian people any independent political existence on their land.

Israel's settlers were withdrawn but Israeli soldiers continued to control all access to the Gaza Strip by land, sea and air. Gaza was converted overnight into an open-air prison. From this point on, the Israeli air force enjoyed unrestricted freedom to drop bombs, to make sonic booms by flying low and breaking the sound barrier, and to terrorise the hapless inhabitants of this prison.

Israel likes to portray itself as an island of democracy in a sea of authoritarianism. Yet Israel has never in its entire history done anything to promote democracy on the Arab side and has done a great deal to undermine it. Israel has a long history of secret collaboration with reactionary Arab regimes to suppress Palestinian nationalism. Despite all the handicaps, the Palestinian people succeeded in building the only genuine democracy in the Arab world with the possible exception of Lebanon. In January 2006, free and fair elections for the Legislative Council of the Palestinian Authority brought to power a Hamas-led government. Israel, however, refused to recognise the democratically elected government, claiming that Hamas is purely and simply a terrorist organisation.

America and the EU shamelessly joined Israel in ostracising and demonising the Hamas government and in trying to bring it down by withholding tax revenues and foreign aid. A surreal situation thus developed with a significant part of the international community imposing economic sanctions not against the occupier but against the occupied, not against the oppressor but against the oppressed.

As so often in the tragic history of Palestine, the victims were blamed for their own misfortunes. Israel's propaganda machine persistently purveyed the notion that the Palestinians are terrorists, that they reject coexistence with the Jewish state, that their nationalism is little more than antisemitism, that Hamas is just a bunch of religious fanatics and that Islam is incompatible with democracy. But the simple truth is that the Palestinian people are a normal people with normal aspirations. They are no better but they are no worse than any other national group. What they aspire to, above all, is a piece of land to call their own on which to live in freedom and dignity.

Like other radical movements, Hamas began to moderate its political programme following its rise to power. From the ideological rejectionism of its charter, it began to move towards pragmatic accommodation of a two-state solution. In March 2007, Hamas and Fatah formed a national unity government that was ready to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with Israel. Israel, however, refused to negotiate with a government that included Hamas.

It continued to play the old game of divide and rule between rival Palestinian factions. In the late 1980s, Israel had supported the nascent Hamas in order to weaken Fatah, the secular nationalist movement led by Yasser Arafat. Now Israel began to encourage the corrupt and pliant Fatah leaders to overthrow their religious political rivals and recapture power. Aggressive American neoconservatives participated in the sinister plot to instigate a Palestinian civil war. Their meddling was a major factor in the collapse of the national unity government and in driving Hamas to seize power in Gaza in June 2007 to pre-empt a Fatah coup.

The war unleashed by Israel on Gaza on 27 December was the culmination of a series of clashes and confrontations with the Hamas government. In a broader sense, however, it is a war between Israel and the Palestinian people, because the people had elected the party to power. The declared aim of the war is to weaken Hamas and to intensify the pressure until its leaders agree to a new ceasefire on Israel's terms. The undeclared aim is to ensure that the Palestinians in Gaza are seen by the world simply as a humanitarian problem and thus to derail their struggle for independence and statehood.

The timing of the war was determined by political expediency. A general election is scheduled for 10 February and, in the lead-up to the election, all the main contenders are looking for an opportunity to prove their toughness. The army top brass had been champing at the bit to deliver a crushing blow to Hamas in order to remove the stain left on their reputation by the failure of the war against Hezbollah in Lebanon in July 2006. Israel's cynical leaders could also count on apathy and impotence of the pro-western Arab regimes and on blind support from President Bush in the twilight of his term in the White House. Bush readily obliged by putting all the blame for the crisis on Hamas, vetoing proposals at the UN Security Council for an immediate ceasefire and issuing Israel with a free pass to mount a ground invasion of Gaza.

As always, mighty Israel claims to be the victim of Palestinian aggression but the sheer asymmetry of power between the two sides leaves little room for doubt as to who is the real victim. This is indeed a conflict between David and Goliath but the Biblical image has been inverted - a small and defenceless Palestinian David faces a heavily armed, merciless and overbearing Israeli Goliath. The resort to brute military force is accompanied, as always, by the shrill rhetoric of victimhood and a farrago of self-pity overlaid with self-righteousness. In Hebrew this is known as the syndrome of bokhim ve-yorim, "crying and shooting".

To be sure, Hamas is not an entirely innocent party in this conflict. Denied the fruit of its electoral victory and confronted with an unscrupulous adversary, it has resorted to the weapon of the weak - terror. Militants from Hamas and Islamic Jihad kept launching Qassam rocket attacks against Israeli settlements near the border with Gaza until Egypt brokered a six-month ceasefire last June. The damage caused by these primitive rockets is minimal but the psychological impact is immense, prompting the public to demand protection from its government. Under the circumstances, Israel had the right to act in self-defence but its response to the pinpricks of rocket attacks was totally disproportionate. The figures speak for themselves. In the three years after the withdrawal from Gaza, 11 Israelis were killed by rocket fire. On the other hand, in 2005-7 alone, the IDF killed 1,290 Palestinians in Gaza, including 222 children.

Whatever the numbers, killing civilians is wrong. This rule applies to Israel as much as it does to Hamas, but Israel's entire record is one of unbridled and unremitting brutality towards the inhabitants of Gaza. Israel also maintained the blockade of Gaza after the ceasefire came into force which, in the view of the Hamas leaders, amounted to a violation of the agreement. During the ceasefire, Israel prevented any exports from leaving the strip in clear violation of a 2005 accord, leading to a sharp drop in employment opportunities. Officially, 49.1% of the population is unemployed. At the same time, Israel restricted drastically the number of trucks carrying food, fuel, cooking-gas canisters, spare parts for water and sanitation plants, and medical supplies to Gaza. It is difficult to see how starving and freezing the civilians of Gaza could protect the people on the Israeli side of the border. But even if it did, it would still be immoral, a form of collective punishment that is strictly forbidden by international humanitarian law.

The brutality of Israel's soldiers is fully matched by the mendacity of its spokesmen. Eight months before launching the current war on Gaza, Israel established a National Information Directorate. The core messages of this directorate to the media are that Hamas broke the ceasefire agreements; that Israel's objective is the defence of its population; and that Israel's forces are taking the utmost care not to hurt innocent civilians. Israel's spin doctors have been remarkably successful in getting this message across. But, in essence, their propaganda is a pack of lies.

A wide gap separates the reality of Israel's actions from the rhetoric of its spokesmen. It was not Hamas but the IDF that broke the ceasefire. It di d so by a raid into Gaza on 4 November that killed six Hamas men. Israel's objective is not just the defence of its population but the eventual overthrow of the Hamas government in Gaza by turning the people against their rulers. And far from taking care to spare civilians, Israel is guilty of indiscriminate bombing and of a three-year-old blockade that has brought the inhabitants of Gaza, now 1.5 million, to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.

The Biblical injunction of an eye for an eye is savage enough. But Israel's insane offensive against Gaza seems to follow the logic of an eye for an eyelash. After eight days of bombing, with a death toll of more than 400 Palestinians and four Israelis, the gung-ho cabinet ordered a land invasion of Gaza the consequences of which are incalculable.

No amount of military escalation can buy Israel immunity from rocket attacks from the military wing of Hamas. Despite all the death and destruction that Israel has inflicted on them, they kept up their resistance and they kept firing their rockets. This is a movement that glorifies victimhood and martyrdom. There is simply no military solution to the conflict between the two communities. The problem with Israel's concept of security is that it denies even the most elementary security to the other community. The only way for Israel to achieve security is not through shooting but through talks with Hamas, which has repeatedly declared its readiness to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with the Jewish state within its pre-1967 borders for 20, 30, or even 50 years. Israel has rejected this offer for the same reason it spurned the Arab League peace plan of 2002, which is still on the table: it involves concessions and compromises.

This brief review of Israel's record over the past four decades makes it difficult to resist the conclusion that it has become a rogue state with "an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders". A rogue state habitually violates international law, possesses weapons of mass destruction and practises terrorism - the use of violence against civilians for political purposes. Israel fulfils all of these three criteria; the cap fits and it must wear it. Israel's real aim is not peaceful coexistence with its Palestinian neighbours but military domination. It keeps compounding the mistakes of the past with new and more disastrous ones. Politicians, like everyone else, are of course free to repeat the lies and mistakes of the past. But it is not mandatory to do so.

• Avi Shlaim is a professor of international relations at the University of Oxford and the author of The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World and of Lion of Jordan: King Hussein's Life in War and Peace.

Source

Gazabama.....

2009-01-06T14:13:00.001-08:00

The New Ten Commandments - Make That Eleven.....

2009-01-06T11:04:00.000-08:00

I could even believe in these. Click on the pic and zoom. I tend to like number eleven best as it's probably the best thing that could happen to this poor old planet.

Israel Bombs The U.N. - Again.....

2009-01-06T08:19:00.000-08:00

This is how Israel deals with anyone who speaks out against her or gets in her way:

Gaza – Ma’an – Forces killed at least 42 Palestinians at a UN school housing displaced people in Jabaliya Refugee Camp in the northern Gaza Strip late on Tuesday afternoon, medical officials confirmed.

According to initial reports, the school was destroyed, collapsing on top of Palestinians who took shelter inside from the intense bombardment by Israeli air and ground forces.

According to another report, broadcast by Al-Jazeera television, Israeli tank shells hit the front gate of the school.

Ma’an’s reporter said that dozens more, all civilians, were injured in the attack on the Al-Fakhoura School. The death toll is expected to rise as a number of the wounded are said to be in critical condition. Ambulances have been unable reach the site of the killing.

Children are also said to be among the dead. Hundreds of people were reported to be in the area of the school at the time of the shelling.

The school is operated by UNRWA, the UN's agency for Palestinian refugees. UNRWA has been using its schools to house some of the 15,000 Gazans who have fled their homes due to Israel's ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, which began on Saturday.

Jabaliya Refugee Camp has been the site of some of the most intense fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters.

Earlier on Tuesday, the United Nations confirmed that three refugees had been killed at 11:30 on Monday night when Israeli forces fired directly on a UNRWA school in Gaza City. Another UNRWA school also came under fire in the city of Rafah.

"There's nowhere safe in Gaza. Everyone here is terrorized and traumatized," said John Ging, the top UN official in Gaza, blaming the international community for allowing the Israeli invasion to continue.

"I am appealing to political leaders here and in the region and the world to get their act together and stop this," he said, speaking at Gaza's largest hospital. "They are responsible for these deaths."

Source

Remember Quana and this?

They Are Bombing 1.5 Million People In A Cage.....

2009-01-05T17:51:00.000-08:00

CBS News broadcasts an interview with a Norwegian doctor, on the scene in Gaza.

Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian doctor in Gaza, tells Sky News that the number of civilians injured and killed in Gaza proves that Israel is deliberately attacking the population.

I take back every rude thing I've said about CBS News lately. They have redeemed themselves in my eyes for their recent lack of journalistic integrity. My thanks again to CBS for having, as Stephan Colbert would say: Balls.

Bloggers In Gaza, Jan. 5/09.....

2009-01-05T17:06:00.001-08:00

Eva's posts:

It's Really Hard To Post From Here

Every time I manage to make it back to Gaza to write for a period, a new calamity.

“They’re shelling Awda hospital,” in Jabaliya, the news reports. Our internationals there at the moment report it was two shells at a police post next to the hospital, one hospital worker getting shrapnel to the head, but surviving.

The numbers slaughtered and injured are so high now –521 and 2,700 as of this morning, Gaza time — that sitting next to a dead or dying person is becoming normal. The stain of blood on the ambulance stretcher pools next to my coat, the medic warning me my coat may be dirtied. What does it matter? The stain doesn’t revolt me as it would have, did, one week ago. Death fills the air, the streets in Gaza, and I cannot stress that this is no exaggeration.
Read the full post

Bombing The News

the building i was in was just bombed. from the 10th floor news studio where i’d had an interview, a series of strikes against the building, housing numerous TV stations, threatened to bring down the walls, bring down the building. the journalists i was with say it was 7 hits, it’s hard to say really because it happened very quickly, very suddenly.
Read the full post

I'll Tell You How He Died

A good, brave, and very funny man was killed yesterday as he loaded the body of a civilian twice-killed into an ambulance. Emergency medical workers, Arafa Hani Abd al Dayem, 35, and Alaa Ossama Sarhan, 21, had answered the call to retrieve Thaer Abed Hammad, 19, and his dead friend Ali, 19, who had been fleeing the shelling, when they were themselves hit by an Israeli tank’s shell.
Read the full post

Sharon's Post:

Jabalia 4 Jan 6pm - 5 Jan 5pm

6pm: To Al Awda hospital, run by the Union of Health Work Committees. It normally has a 50 bed capacity but has been stretched to 75. E and Mo interview Ala’a, the medic from Jabalia RC who was injured when Arafa was killed yesterday.

The story goes as follows:

It was about 8.30 am Saturday morning in Jabalia. Five teenagers found themselves under shell attack and tried to get away. Three escaped. One, Tha’er, 19, had his foot blown off. His friend Ali, also 19, tried to pick him up and carry him to safety, but was shot in the head and killed. It took 75- 90 minutes before a Jabalia Red Crescent ambulance could reach them. Medic Arafa, 35, and Ala’a, 22, carried Tha’er to the ambulance, and then went back for Ali’s body. As they closed the van door, they were shelled.
Read the full post

Sameh's Post:

Day 10 Of Israeli War In Gaza

Random shelling and Compulsory Migration For Thousands in Gaza Strip

By: Sameh A. Habeeb

Note: I migt stop reporting either if I die or I flee my home. Shells
rain down beside my house now. Pray for me…Pray for Me….
Read the full post, it may be his last

Just Do It.....

2009-01-05T07:18:00.000-08:00

Jordan 'reconsidering Israel ties'

Jordan's prime minister has said his country may review its diplomatic ties with Israel in the wake of the offensive in Gaza.

"Jordan will look into all options, including reconsidering relations with Israel," Nader Dahabi told legislators on Sunday.

"There is no way we would remain silent when this threat affects the security of the entire region."

Jordan and Egypt are the only two Arab states to have normalised relations with Israel. Amman also has strong ties with the US.

But with public criticism mounting, the government is facing pressure to rethink those diplomatic links.

Earlier thousands of students from universities across Jordan marched to the parliament in Amman demanding the freezing of diplomatic relations with Israel and the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador.

Jordan is home to nearly three million Palestinian refugees, the majority of whom have been naturalised as Jordanian citizens but who remain strongly attached to their homeland.

One female student protester told the Reuters news agency that "we'll continue taking to the streets, otherwise we'll be like Egypt that is doing nothing".

The protesters said they would stay on the streets until their demands were met.

Jordanians have held street protests and rallies nationwide since the Gaza offensive.

On Friday around 60,000 protesters, with some chanting "No Jewish embassy on Arab land", answered an opposition call for a show of support for Hamas.

Security forces have been bracing for violence but have largely allowed demonstrations to proceed.

Riot police did, however, fire teargas and make arrests as they pushed back hundreds of protesters marching on the Israeli embassy after Friday prayers.

Source