Smile for Palestine

Sixty years after the Nakba the picture in Palestine is depressing, to say the least. But over the last decade or so, we've witnessed a dynamic of renaissance and awakening amongst the justice and peace camp, and the breaking down of some important taboos which served so far, helping Israel get away with its crimes against not only the Palestinian people but also against justice and History.


Many signs of hope are appearing. The shield of omerta and intellectual terrorism is cracking. More and more people are speaking out, and the cosy protection offered by the Israel lobby is fading away little by little.


We're entering a phase of History, I think, which is crucial for the Palestinian struggle. The bulk of Palestinian cause supporters are now much more mature, much more interconnected and experienced. Violence in pursuit of justice has shown its limits and new means with new horizons are emerging. Mustapha Barghouti called this week in an interview with Le Monde Diplomatique, for the revival of a "mass non-violent resistance against Israel." This is the next (and natural) phase in the liberation struggle against the Zionist state and all it represents. A battle that Israel shall not and can not win.

Other battles are set to be lost by Israel, like the demographic one. Sooner or later, the Arab (indigenous) population of Palestine will surpass the Jewish one, and the picture will become even clearer of a minority oppressing the majority. If some, carefully ignore this reality now, they will soon be unable to deny the obvious: Israel as Apartheid, settlers’ state.

There are many solid grounds for hope.

Well, call me naive. I'd answer by paraphrasing Harold Pinter:

The general thrust these days is: "Oh, come on, it's all in the past, nobody's interested any more, it didn't work, everyone knows what the Americans and Israelis are like, but stop being naive, this is the world, there's nothing to be done about it and anyway fuck it, who cares?" But let me put it this way-the dead are still looking at us, waiting for us to make justice.

You better keep hope and smile for Palestine!

P.S. : Another cause for smiling: check out the music of these three Palestinian guys. The band is called Le Trio Joubran, and they are really doing some wonderful stuff. They have been touring the US recently.

Need Some Breath of Fresh Air?

For those who need a break away from the ongoing chorus of sycophantic praise to the State of Israel throughout the mainstream media, here is what Uri Avneri remembered 60 years after the Nekba and the creation of the state of Israel, in an article relating his early commitment to Zionism (he even -surprisingly- participated at some point in attacking Arab villages, i.e. the early stages of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine) and utter disillusionment with what the whole entreprise led to. An article in which he describes Israel from within, as a country corrupted by war and occupation, tormented by what he called "the crusaders anxiety," and haunted by what I would call, the psychology of the thief.

Visit also alNakba.org which gathers testimonies about the "catastrophy," gives detailed informations about destroyed palestinian villages, recounts the chronology of the ethnic and cultural cleansing in Palestine.

Visit also The Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre website: The Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre foundation "is a non- governmental, non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of arts and culture in Palestine. The Sakakini Centre was founded in 1996, and is located in Ramallah."

History Written by Those Who Hanged the Heroes

"Honesty has a beautiful and refreshing simplicity about it. No ulterior motives. No hidden meanings. An absence of hypocrisy, duplicity, political games, and verbal superficiality. As honesty and real integrity characterize our lives, there will be no need to manipulate others."

Charles Swindoll

According to Electronic Intifada, the pro-Israel, gutter propagandist group, CAMERA, "[has been] orchestrating a secret, long-term campaign to infiltrate the popular online encyclopedia Wikipedia to rewrite Palestinian history, pass off crude propaganda as fact, and take over Wikipedia administrative structures to ensure these changes go either undetected or unchallenged."

It looks like the EI article has sparked a reaction from Wikipedia administrators and from Camera operatives who seem to have halted their activities.

Next time you look for a Wiki reference on Palestine (and that goes for me as well), please pinch you noses hard... it stinks lies, manipulations and canard there.

Spy Game: Who's Playing Whom?

Another American citizen arrested on "suspicion of passing classified defence information to Israel during the 1980s, according to the justice department." (Aljazeera.net).

This story far from surprising me, has yet again revived the old torturous question about who's playing whom? who's getting the upper hand in this supposedly "special relationship" between Israel and the US?

Many have read the paper by Mearsheimer and Walt who asked "why has the United States been willing to set aside its own security in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries is based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives. [H]owever, neither of those explanations can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the United States provides to Israel."

The courageous authors, who have been subjected to ad hominem attacks and an unprecedented campaign of character assassination have succeeded in breaking the taboo surrounding the intricate links between both America and Israel.

They argued that one of the reasons "to question Israel’s strategic value [to the U.S.] is that it does not act like a loyal ally."

Israeli officials frequently ignore U.S. requests and renege on promises made to top U.S. leaders (including past pledges to halt settlement construction and to refrain from “targeted assassinations” of Palestinian leaders). Moreover, Israel has provided sensitive U.S. military technology to potential U.S. rivals like China, in what the U.S. State Department Inspector‐General called “a systematic and growing pattern of unauthorized transfers.” According to the U.S. General Accounting Office, Israel also “conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the U.S. of any ally.” In addition to the case of Jonathan Pollard, who gave Israel large quantities of classified material in the early 1980s (which Israel reportedly passed onto the Soviet Union to gain more exit visas for Soviet Jews), a controversy erupted in 2004 when it was revealed that a key Pentagon official (Larry Franklin) had passed classified information to an Israeli diplomat, allegedly aided by two AIPAC officials. Israel is hardly the only country that spies on the United States, but its willingness to spy on its principal patron casts further doubt on its strategic value.

Of course there are those, like Chomsky, who argue that Israel is America's cop on the beat in the region. In other words it is (benevolently) doing America's dirty work in the ME, working as a client-state and providing the U.S. of all kind of subterfuges it needs, even to the detriment of Israel's own security. Hum...? But why would they have to spy on their protectors then? I agree with Mearsheimer-Walt on this one.

All Aboard!

Non Violent Initiative to Free Gaza

This may, marks the 60th anniversary of the Nakba (or the Catastrophe) which saw the creation of Israel on the land stolen from the Palestinians. This injustice engendered a permanent state of tension and violence which often spills over to other regions of the world. Sixty years of:

Insults, incursions, illegal and immoral occupation...

Slaughter, siege, settlements and segregation...

Rampage and racist institutionalization...

Apartheid and annexation...

Ethnic cleansing, extrajudicial executions and...

Lobby pressure and intimidations

The Free Gaza initiative has launched a campaign aiming at breaking the siege on Gaza by organizing a non-violent journey by sea and trying to reach the open sky concentration camp called Gaza. "We've tried to enter Palestine by land. We've tried to arrive by air. Now we're getting serious. We're taking a ship" says their website.

Yesterday, normanfinkelstein.com published an appeal by the group of activists calling for more volonteers and asking for financial help:

Dear Boat People:It is three and a half months until the launch of our boat project to Gaza. Those of us actively involved in boat procurement have been working hard at finalizing some of the details, and we can announce that we are negotiating for boats that will hold up to 40-45 people.

We won't stop looking for other boats (depending on funding), but we are confident that 40-45 people will be able to go in August on the maiden voyage to Gaza. Here, then, are the details

1. Twenty-five of us will assemble in Cyprus on August 1, 2008.
   
   
2. 15-20 people will go directly to Egypt on July 25 to help sail one or more boats to Cyprus. No experience required, but we also need a mix of backgrounds for this part of the project. Nonviolent training for this group will take place in Egypt. We will let you know more about these details, after we get a count of people who are interested in this part of the project. (Contact Paul Larudee for more details at Harmonicprogressive@gmail.com)

As well as telling us which of those two groups you want to join, we also need commitments for the following:An additional ground crew of 10-12 people willing to stay in Cyprus for the duration of the trip, field media opportunities, run training in nonviolent techniques, and then either be willing to be part of the second trip in mid-August or remain the ground crew. Some of you are already specifically interested in being just ground crew, so please reconfirm by contacting Bella at accessforpeace@riseup.net

We need feedback from all of you by the end of April, because there will be certain abilities, languages, countries and ages that will have primary consideration.

During the British mandate on Palestine, hundreds (around 4,500) of holocaust survivors, secretly packed by Zionist agents of the Haganah on an old steamer, the "exodus," succeeded in 1947 in breaking the British blockade on Palestine aimed at limiting the number of Jewish migrants. The whole thing was carefully orchestrated in order to provoke the inevitable bloody confrontation that ensued. The pictures of desperate European Jews, being forced to go back to war-torn Europe shocked the Western (mainly American) viewers and helped boost the Zionist project in Palestine.

The current Free Gaza initiative may be inspired by the "Exodus" story, but its aim is diametrically opposed to it. I have a feeling it's going to be hot in Gaza beach this August. Watch this space!

You've Had Enough of AIPAC? ... Here Comes J Street

"The world is pretty awful today, but it is far
better than yesterday."

Noam Chomsky

An interesting article was published yesterday on the New York based Jewish newspaper, The Forward, titled "For Israel’s Sake, Moderate American Jews Must Find Their Voice" by Jeremy Ben-Ami, executive director of the newly formed Jewish lobby group, J Street.

According to Antiwar.com, the movement, allegedly aimed at counterbalancing the influence of AIPAC as the major representative of Jewish-Americans, has already been joined by some prominent Jewish figures.

The author states that...

For the sake of Israel, the United States and the world, it is time for American political discourse to re-engage with reality. Voices of reason need to reclaim what it means to be pro-Israel and to establish in American political discourse that Israel’s core security interest is to achieve a negotiated two-state solution and to define once and for all permanent, internationally-recognized borders.

Ben-Ami goes on to explain his personal history and how his disillusions with what he calls "the extreme right" of the Jewish political spectrum came about, calling for a rupture.

Somehow, for American politicians or activists to express opposition to settlement expansion — or support for active American diplomacy, dialogue with Syria or engagement with Iran — has become subversive and radical, inviting vile, hateful emails and a place on public lists of Israel-haters and antisemites. For the particularly unlucky, it leads to public, personal attacks on one’s family and heritage. Enough. In early 21st-century America, the rules of politics are being rewritten, and conventional political orthodoxy is clearly open to once-inconceivable challenges. It is time for the broad, sensible mainstream of pro-Israel American Jews and their allies to challenge those on the extreme right who claim to speak for all American Jews in the national debate about Israel and the Middle East — and who, through the use of fear and intimidation, have cut off reasonable debate on the topic.

The author continues denouncing the incestuous alliances and strong ties that AIPAC has cultivated with right-wing Christian Zionists, such as John Hagee.

In our name, PACs and other political associations have embraced the most radically right-wing figures on the American political scene [...] all in the guise of being “pro-Israel.” In Washington today, these voices are seen to speak for the entire American Jewish community. But they don’t speak for me. And I don’t believe they speak for the majority of the American Jews with whom I have lived and worked.

All this sounds fair enough to me but I can't help being doubtful about the extent to which such initiative might lead or the real motives behind such a move, because throughout the article it is only a question really of who deserves to be considered pro-Israel. At times, the article sounds circumvallating around core issues like the notion of Justice, of negotiating with Hamas, the legitimate representative of the Palestinians, the question of the right of return, the question of Jerusalem... Sometimes the author who claims to be "moderate" (whatever the term might mean) refers with nostalgia to members of the Irgun (a terrorist Zionist organisation which helped form the first battalions of the Israel "Defence" Force) like Z. Jabotinsky, a notorious murderer.

But the author finally hints at an aspect of Israel's position, rarely evoked.

I also know in my heart that this is not just a matter of survival. What will it say of us as a people if at a rare moment in our communal history when we have achieved success, acceptance and power, we fail to act according to the values and ideals passed down to us over thousands of years when we were the outcasts, the minority and the powerless?

I might be doubtful about such initiatives but something that should bring comfort to many Justice and Peace activists is the fact that the lobby is definitely weakening by the day!

Chutzpah & Rekindling Hope in Obama

According to the Israeli TV and to Al-Quds Al-Arabi (as translated by the Missing Link and reported by eatbees), the Israeli cabinet has decided to forcibly evacuate northern Gaza. "[Defence Minister Ehud] Barak intends to plan for the removal of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the northern Gaza Strip, namely from the region that the resistance uses for the launch of these rockets, and to move them toward Gaza City and to confine them there," said the television report.

Chutzpah means shameless, arrogant audacity and effrontery in Hebrew, a feeling well known and "enjoyed" amongst Israelis those days. Contemptuous as they are, of the lives of hundreds of thousands they have destroyed, of the cry for reason and peace of millions who marched for justice around the world. This unmitigated effrontery, betrays in fact the levels of confidence Israel and its supporters have today, on their ability of taming most of international bodies and most importantly, the capacity to control US's foreign policy and dictate their own interests to the American decision makers.

Talking about American decision makers, I've had a protracted and interesting discussion with my friend eatbees, about the ability for someone like Sen. Barak Obama to force change in an already corrupt political system, deeply plagued by the anti-democratic influence of lobbies and pressure groups. And we evoked the relationship Obama has with the Israel lobby. The speech he gave in front of the AIPAC gathering last year, wasn't a straightforward neocon-style obsequious eulogy, but was nonetheless quite in favour of the Zionist state and it's recent actions, including its criminal destruction of neighbouring Lebanon, some mounts before. A support he reiterated in some of hes recent comments. Eatbees referred me to this article, in which I learned that the man had in 1998, attended a dinner keynoted by the late Columbia Professor Edward Said -that must be a first for a presidential hopeful,- and that one of Obama's colleagues at the university of Chicago was the Palestinian scholar at Columbia, Rashid Khalidi. George Galloway, the pro-Palestinian British MP and radio host, answered in favour of Obama when I phoned his program last year to quote parts of Barak's address in front of AIPAC. Galloway claims that Obama's body-language betrayed the feeling of unease he must have experienced in such sycophantic place, much to the dismay of many of Israel supporters who attended the speech. Obama was indeed attacked virulently recently by some prominent Israel lobby muggers, who clearly want to force him into the polemic.

Now, of course, I don't think that having dinner with Said is by any stretch of the imagination, a guarantee that a future Obama administration would at last play the role of the honest broker other administrations ought to have played for decades, but surely Obama comes at a time when many great taboos in American politics are collapsing. The lobby might have retained an enormous influence, but many analysts have decided not to succumb to its intimidations anymore and have began to expose its mafia-like machinery. What's more, the traditional fund-raising mechanisms which the Israel supporters have long dominated can now effectively be bypassed through the usage of Internet. Obama proved that to be efficient!

Will Obama be the providential emperor who will put an end to that damn Chutzpah? I prefer to wait and see.

The Politics of Sorcerer's Apprentices

At the Roots of Today's Catastrophy in Gaza is the Old-New American Doctrine: My-Enemy's-Enemy-is-My-Friend.

The Magazine Vanity Fair, publishes a reminder on how the American strategy of trying to topple the Hamas-led, though democratically elected government of Palestine has failed and eventually back-fired. "the White House cooked up yet another scandalously covert and self-defeating Middle East debacle: part Iran-contra, part Bay of Pigs." "With confidential documents, corroborated by outraged former and current U.S. officials," the author confirms what everybody, with eyes to see, knew already.

> Here is an interesting interview with the author.

Stating the Obvious

Amnesty International, CARE International UK, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Médecins du Monde UK, Oxfam, Save the Children UK and Trócaire - say that "Israel’s blockade of Gaza is a collective punishment of the entire Gazan civilian population of 1.5 million" and that "the Israeli government's policy of blockade is unacceptable, illegal and fails to deliver security for Palestinians and Israelis alike."

"The situation for 1.5 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is worse now than it has ever been since the start of the Israeli military occupation in 1967. The current situation in Gaza is man-made, completely avoidable and, with the necessary political will, can also be reversed."

> See Full report here.

(Picture Courtesy of Álvaro Herraiz)

Who Does He Think He's Fooling?

Change, We Can('t) Believe In!

For those who got mesmerized by Obama's speaking skills or his quite charming character, this is a reminder of what he pledged in march, last year in front of the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC):

[...] At the same time, we must preserve our total commitment to our unique defence relationship with Israel by fully funding military assistance and continuing work on the Arrow and related missile defence programs. This would help Israel maintain its military edge and deter and repel attacks from as far as Tehran and as close as Gaza. And when Israel is attacked, we must stand up for Israel's legitimate right to defend itself. Last summer, Hezbollah attacked Israel. By using Lebanon as an outpost for terrorism, and innocent people as shields, Hezbollah has also engulfed that entire nation in violence and conflict, and threatened the fledgling movement for democracy there [...]

Last week, Obama felt the need to recomfort his pro-Israel sponsors. on the NBC's Democratic Presidential debate, he said he has long been a "stalwart friend of Israel's," believing the country to be one of the United States' "most important allies in the region," and even going as far as to call the security of Israel "sacrosanct," (See Joshua Frank's piece on CounterPunch) adding: "Now the gravest threat ... to Israel today, I believe, is from Iran. There the radical regime continues to pursue its capacity to build a nuclear weapon and continues to support terrorism across the region [...] Threats of Israel's destruction can not be dismissed as rhetoric. The threat from Iran is real and my goal as president would be to eliminate that threat."

Any objections?

P.S.: on the same course, I fully recommend this truthful article on the Israeli psyche at times of aggressive and criminal wars, by the indefatigable peace activist Uri Avnery.

(Picture Courtesy of Joe Crimmings)

Gazan Holocaust Continues Whilst the World Doesn't Give a F...

The World is watching while Israel collectively punish the Palestinians... The dirty work of getting rid of Arab Untermenschen continues unabated. Concerning the visit of Condee to the region, I've come across this quite funny invective:

"Give all Arab Leaders a Visa, and Take them with you Misses Condoleeza"

Zionism in Action

A 24/7 Massacre-Courtesy of Aljazeera.

And in the mean time, what do you think Arab leaders might spend their Saturday night working at? Those incompetent, gutless jackasses wouldn't be able of finding their way out of a paper bag let alone defend the rights of the Palestinians. Arab leaders are guilty of dishonouring their function; guilty of letting us all down.

While the gangster called Mohamed Dahlan (as the 'AgryArab' rightly described him) and his protector, Abu Mazen, the puppet president chosen by the Israeli-American cabal to better tear the Palestinian body apart; while those two wait in the safety of the West Bank, their fellow Palestinians are being systematically massacred and executed in the Gaza concentration camp,under the noses of a somnolent 'international community' and a biased, complaisant western media.

We are being robbed (We: Arabs). In the same way Sykes and Picot robbed and fragmented the Arab World and manufactured regimes to rule the region and suit the superpowers of the time, in the same way Zionists came from nowhere and stole the Palestinian properties and land, Arab so-called 'leaders' today are stealing our hopes, our wealth, our future, our dignity.

Will it one day be possible to erase and rewind: looking back at the failures of the past, and the so-many missed opportunities, easy defeats, miscalculated policies... irrecoverable mistakes, you hope that the opportunity will be given one day to erase the frustrations and former disasters, fix the damage done and restore some of the dignity lost.

Arab leaders must be held to account... they must pay, for this calamity can not carry on forever!

This is what the late Edward Said wrote in a 2001 brilliant article of hes:

When our historians look back to the first 50 years of Israel's existence, an enormous historical responsibility shall rest damningly on the shoulders of the Arab leaders who have criminally -- yes, criminally -- allowed this to go on without even the most meagre and half-hearted response. Instead, each of them has fought each of the others, or has relied on the hopelessly self-serving theory that by trying to ingratiate themselves with the American government (even becoming clients of the US) they would assure themselves of longevity in power, regardless of whether Arab interests were being served or not. So deeply ingrained has this notion become that even the Palestinian leadership has subscribed to it [...] The average American hasn't the slightest inkling that there is a narrative of Palestinian suffering and dispossession at least as old as Israel itself. Meanwhile Arab leaders come running to Washington begging for American protection without even understanding that three generations of Americans have been brought up on Israeli propaganda to believe that Arabs are lying terrorists and that it is wrong to do business with them, let alone protect them [...]

Since 1948, Arab leaders have never bothered to confront Israeli propaganda in the US. All the immense amounts of Arab money invested in military spending (first on Soviet, then Western arms) have come to nought because Arab efforts have been neither protected by information nor explained by patient, systematic organising. The result is that literally hundred of thousands of lost Arab lives have gone for nothing, nothing at all. The citizens of the world's only superpower have been led to believe that everything Arabs do and are is wasteful, violent, fanatical and anti-Semitic. Israel is "our" only ally. And so $92 billion in aid since 1967 have gone unquestioningly from the US taxpayer to the Jewish state. As I said earlier, a total absence of planning and thought vis-à-vis the US political and cultural arena is hugely (but not exclusively) to blame for the astounding amount of Arab land and lives lost to Israel (subsidised by the US) since 1948, a major political crime which I hope the Arab leaders one day answer for.

[latest Update: according to The Independent, "An Israeli government minister warned yesterday that increasing rocket fire from Gaza would bring Palestinians a Shoah – the Hebrew word normally used to denote the Nazi Holocaust inflicted on Jews during the Second World War..." ... No comment!]

Meditations on Mary, Jesus and the Wall

If Mary was to give birth to Jesus Christ today, she would have to go through Israeli checkpoints and be harassed by I'D'F soldiers, only to find herself blocked by the apartheid wall from making her journey from Jerusalem to Bethlehem!

Merry Christmas to all, especially those living under occupation in the holy land of Palestine.

Sunlight at Midnight

News coming from Palestine those days are quite depressing. Nothing new one might argue, but the deepening divisions amongst the Palestinian society have made it painful for the so many supporters of the noble cause of liberation in Palestine to keep on fighting. So I was delighted to hear (a bit late I have to admit) about this play called "Sunlight at Midnight." Created by the Palestine Theatre in Motion group and supported by Amnesty International, the play commemorates the 25th anniversary of the brutal massacre of Palestinian refugees in the Sabra-Shatila camps. The cast include Najla Said, the daughter of the late Palestinian scholar Edward Said.

"A British Palestinian solicitor, Naji, lives in London doing his best to avoid involvement with the politics that affected his fellow Palestinians. He is successful, happy and assimilated into British society. On a night out celebrating his engagement to his long time girlfriend Alice, they hear a beautiful song by a young woman. Although he cannot understand much about the song, a few days later Naji comes back alone to the same restaurant to hear it again. His growing attachment to the young singer breaks the illusion of his carefully ordered life.

"Guided by the young singer's haunting voice and snippets of emails and articles, Naji follows the story of Hani, a 19 year old boy in from Shatila. It's 1982 and all Palestinian fighters have been allowed safe exit out of Beirut under a peace agreement. Hani bids his family goodbye not realizing it is not he but they who are in danger and that he will never see them again.

"Naji's interest in the past soon reveals more about his own feelings. Are his arguments with Alice over wedding arrangements merely cold feet or a deeper disquiet? Can he really escape the effects of what happened to his fellow Palestinians in Beirut 25 years ago?"

The Palestine Theatre in Motion website doesn't mention dates other than those planned in the UK. If anybody is listening and maybe aware of further presentations throughout Europe (especially in France) please let me know.

(picture credit: "FreePal")

Tutu Too?!

The Israel Lobby Goes Nuts on Desmond Tutu.

Supporters, within the United States, of the Apartheid regime in Israel have recently shown higher and unusual sensitivity toward academics, political commentators and world figures who dared criticizing the ongoing criminal actions of the Zionist State. The witch hunt campaign to stifle public debate and to muzzle journalists have been going on for years, but the recent and flagrant loss of subtlety shows how arduous it has become for the Lobby to keep on with the business of "intellectual terrorism."

The publication last year of the ground-breaking and courageous article "The Israel Lobby" by Mearsheimer-Walt (who since produced the book), has broken the omerta surrounding the issue of US-Israeli relationship. The authors (who are renowned and respected scholars), have been targeted by an unprecedented campaign of vilification; accused of being "anti-Semitic" and "unpatriotic." But their work had the effect of a psychotherapy on those (so many) who were spooked and terrorized by the fear of being labeled anti-Semites and subsequently running the risk of being ostracized.

Many prominent voices, including distinguished Jewish figures, in America and the wider Western world and within Israel itself, made their voices heard: people like Gilad Atzmon, Robert Trivers, Gary Leupp, Cindy Sheehan, Andrew Bacevich, Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein, Uri Avnery, Amira Hass, Ilan Pappé, Israel Shahak, Ed Hermann, Howard Zinn, Johnathan Cook, Bill & Cathy Christison, Jimmy Carter, Nelson Mandela, Norman Solomon, Ralph Nader, Jeffrey St. Clair, Robert Fisk, Alexander Cockburn, Gideon Levy, Scot Ritter... and so many, many others.

The most recent sortie of the Lobby deserves the Gold Prize for "Ludicrousness & Insanity." The charming, peace loving Desmond Tutu, Archbishop of Cape-Town and Nobel Prize laureate, was banned from speaking at St. Thomas University in Minneapolis because of his characterization (in a 2002 speech) of the occupation regime in the West Bank as an Apartheid-like regime. He was dismissed and "suspected" of being... guess what?... anti-Semitic!

Read this post from "Rootless Cosmopolitan" by Tony Karon.

(picture credit: "Salon.com")

Finkelstein or the Dangers of Criticizing Israel in Today's America - Part II

Interview with Riz Khan of Aljazeera- June 2007.

Since this interview, Pr. Norman Finkelstein has (as it has officially been formulated) reached a negotiated settlement with DePaul University allowing him to resign in exchange of the university recognizing that Finkelstein had met the University's tenure and promotion requirements.

In his departure statement Finkelstein declared:

"It is time for me to move on and hopefully find new ways to fulfill my own mission in life of making the world a slightly better place on leaving it than when I entered it."

Norman G. Finkelstein on September 5th, 2007

The following video is from DemocracyNow with Amy Goodman reporting on and hosting Pr. Finkelstein on the day of his departure from DePaul University:

On the science of the pervasive influence of the pro-Israel Lobby and how it works, the following video gives an unprecedented insight, based on the John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's ground-breaking article: "the Israel Lobby"

Armistice... Not Peace

Why Paying the Price of Peace When You Can Bully Arabs for an Unfair, Unjust Open-ended Ceasefire.

This week is the twenty fifth anniversary of the Sabra and Shatilla massacre, the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. I'm not going to go through the details and the usual Historical fact reminder, there is enough data out there (and fortunately so) for anyone interested. All one needs to know is that this mass murder was prompted, encouraged, incited and eventually executed by the Nazi-inspired Lebanese Phalangist militia under the plan, protection and supervision of the invading Israeli forces.

Twenty five years, and thousands of victims later, the basic philosophy underlying the Israeli policy in the region, the protracted, systematic and slow ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people, together with the "hatred machine" that the US neo-imperialistic vision of the middle east embodies, continue to yield even more frustration, bitterness and permanent demand for revenge.

The summer of hunger in the Gaza concentration camp continues unabated. Some might think that since the "mainstream" media has no "hot" news from the region to serve on the 24/7 display of horrors, things must be quite all right for the moment. Others might thing that the current course of action chosen by Israel and their American protectors to deal with the Palestinians since they've put the wrong party in the government, is working. In other words, Arabs are not the kind of people to talk to or trust and only coercion would force them to submit. Others also, might consider that this is an issue that has been chewed over enough, and it's maybe time to get over it.

One should always keep in mind that what Israel seeks is not peace, because it is not, has not, will not be prepared to pay the price. Armistice and status quo is much more convenient for the Zionist sate. It allows it to continue its expansionism on the lands stolen from the Palestinians, not to be bound by any negotiated agreement with its neighbours or with the Palestinians, and continue capitalizing on the ridiculously huge imbalance of power in its favor.

As for the argument that it is maybe time to get over it, I would wonder how to explain that to the Palestinian mother who lost her children in the struggle against the occupying forces, how to tell that to the Lebanese child who, last summer, had to flee with her family from their home, terrorised as they were by the American manufactured, Israeli dropped cluster bombs, how to put that to the hundreds of thousands of refugees driven out of their land and homes and denied any basic human right...

(picture credit: "D S O")

Put Them Face to Face and They'll Realize, They're All the Same

Palestine... Still in Our Hearts: Part II

A Very Nice Evening

It was probably the best Saturday night I spent for years (not for the reasons one might assume!).

We first gathered in a small and humble restaurant in downtown Le Havre (north-western France). About thirty (maybe less) people showed up. I first thought: that's not a good start... it seemed first that people had snubbed the gathering. The meeting was never meant to be pompous or formal in any way. It was organized by a handful number of Arab students based in the region who invited anybody interested in debating or just chatting about the Palestinian plight. We were not numerous, but what a breath of fresh air! I soon discovered the quality of people I was honoured to meet.

In the cold tempered Europe, and the individualistic Western societies within which we have the chance to live, often people don't know each other, interact very rarely and know scarcely anything about each other's political opinions. This meeting was a wonderful opportunity for me to find out how much empathy and sympathy for the Palestinian cause was out there. We talked about different issues ranging from the occupation to the (so-called) peace process. We debated the issue of anti-Zionism vs. anti-Semitism, the question of one-State vs. two-States solution.

The debate went on for the rest of the evening. Sometimes with passion, but with very little basic disagreement. The whole thing finished in a good and enthusiastic mood.

People who prompted the gathering never pretended to change the world but they certainly and positively changed mine -and I believe many others'- that evening.

I couldn't ever thank the organizers enough for the initiative and I'm already eager for the next one.

(pictures respectively by "Delayed Gratification" & "FreePal")

Palestine... Still in Our Hearts

While the protracted ethnic cleansing continues unabated in the West Bank, with settlements growing larger everyday, the squeezing of the other half of the Palestinian people living in the concentration camp called Gaza, continues to produce more misery and hardship.

Despite the fact that Western media has now shifted its focus from the Palestinian struggle -as it periodically do, hence playing in Israel's hands-, many peace activists in my region of stay and study in northern France, are organizing throughout this weekend an extended gathering around this issue. I hope I'll be meeting some interesting people and maybe going back here posting on the outcome.