What the... ?

I'd be very interested in knowing your reaction to the very first appointment made by Mr. Obama. I may sound a bit over the edge here, but forgive me if I'm a bit sceptical. Indeed I'm more than that: My blood was boiling and I was deeply frustrated to the announcement of Rahm Israel Emanuel as chief of staff. Yes! because I somehow secretly hoped that this guy (Obama) would deliver and that -as Jill pointed out in a recent comment- his public stance may be different from what he really thinks. The fact is that Obama appointed a man not only deeply involved in the financial crisis (he was member of the board of Freddy Mac at the time it went through serious trouble, " and recuses himself from any Congressional votes on the mortgage giant" according to time.com) but who also served in the Israeli army; therefore an Israeli citizen and a de facto Israeli officer, whose background suggests where he comes from as far as the Middle-East is concerned (His father was member of the Irgun: the infamous terrorist organization that killed women and children during the first half of the 20th century in the name of Zionism.)

So I'm deeply sceptical and profoundly frustrated. Where do we go from here?

The Case For Obama

From an Arab perspective, foreign policy is paramount as far as the next American president's intentions are concerned. Of course there is the ambivalent approach on Iran, the position on Israel (read this too), the condescending interventionist stance on Pakistan and all the rest of it. But let's face it: The question here for anybody who has the privilege to vote in this crucial election and who has primarily foreign policy in mind, is, to put it bluntly, to choose the less worse candidate.

Five Good Reasons

1. His experience with poverty first in Indonesia where he witnessed -reportedly- the effects of an ill advised American foreign policy, supporting an ugly dictatorship, then in Chicago where he preferred working as a community organizer and civil rights lawyer rather than choosing a promising and predictably lucrative career as a corporate lawyer, having just graduated from a prestigious law school.

2. He opposed the war on Iraq well before the illegal invasion started, then he advocated an early and phased withdrawal in concordance with the opinion of a crushing majority of the "international community" (meaning: ordinary people's).

3. Despite some early contradictory declarations, he generally seeks a renewed diplomacy with a more seasoned approach with Cuba, Syria and Iran. Of course, and as far as the middle-east is concerned, the pressure and the level of infiltration by the Israel lobby and by the Military industrial complex are such that it will be difficult in case Obama had the integrity, soundness and willingness to act as an honest broker, to overturn the flawed system in place. Of course Arabs have to walk the walk after having talked the talk, far from primitive and futile violence.

4. The power of symbolism. In other words: the simple fact of having a black, self-made, left-leaning (in American terms of course), charismatic and clearly smart American president (at least in comparison with the imbecile outgoing one) may in and of itself contribute to temper international relations, and inject hope an positive expectation not only amongst Americans but also to some extent, amongst young secular people over the world -literally.

5. He has met late Edward Saïd. This reason may sound childishly naive and senseless but this is a reason enough to me, if I were American, to vote for this guy, knowing that at some point of his existence, has been exposed to the reasonable discourse of a secular, exiled Palestinian intellectual explaining eloquently his plight and that of his people.

Now of course one could argue for hours about the nature of the political system in America, which is, as far as I'm concerned, more of an oligarchy that it is a democracy, but again an Obama president has the potential to change something of some size, to some extent positively to make the current status quo more viable.

The visionary dream of a compassionate pastor from Atlanta called King, nearly forty years ago may come soon true. Let us just hope that the man now about to achieve that dream will set about to also fulfill the other vision of Dr. King dreaming of a Revolution of Values.

Picture Courtesy of "Stevegarfield."

Last Man Standing

"One man with courage makes a majority." Andrew Jackson

Who said that all Jews are Zionists?
Who said that all Americans are brainwashed?
Who said that America has lost its soul completely?
Who pretends that no one American today dares criticizing Israel's crimes?

Judaism IS NOT Zionism...
Israel doesn't represent all Jews...
the Holocaust industry is a monumental fraudulous scheme (apart from the monumental crime itself) that serves justifying the unjustifiable and...

Norman G. Finkelstein is the living proof of the exception that, sadly, confirms the rule of a majority indeed opposing his clairvoyant and justice loving approach.

American Radical: A documentary coming soon in a theater near you, unless the hideous and insidious pro-Zionist censure decides otherwise.

Go and watch the trailer NOW!

Of Mice and Men, Part II

The US War on Journalists

If one wants to begin to understand the folly behind the abduction, torture and imprisonment of a man like Sami al-Hajj read this analysis of Amy Goodman, the host of "DemocracyNow," one of the few left independent news outlets in North America.

Of Mice and Men

After six years in an American gulag called Guatanamo, Aljazeera cameraman Sami al-Hajj has just been released according to an Aljazeera.net report.

"Rats are treated with more humanity", al-Hajj said to his Aljazeera colleagues.

"But we have people from more than 50 countries that are completely deprived of all rights and privileges.

"And they will not give them the rights that they give animals," he said, adding that inmate's "human dignity was violated."

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.

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!

Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité... Terms and Conditions Apply!

Paris, 3 days ago, the news dispatch from the AFP reads:

A French senior civil servant has been sacked for publishing a violent anti-Israeli diatribe on a web site, the interior ministry said. Bruno Guigue, deputy prefect of the south-western town of Saintes, wrote in an online column this month that Israel was "the only state where snipers shoot down little girls outside their school gates." The author of several books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Guigue wrote of the "Israeli jails where -- thanks to religious law -- they stop torturing on the Sabbath." Interior Minister Michele Alliot-Marie dismissed the official after learning of the column on Wednesday, the ministry said.

Bruno Guigue wrote the piece (fr) on a website, oumma.com, in which he criticized some French neocons and proIsrael advocates, who launched a frenzied campaign against the UN Council on HR. The article is a rare demonstration of eloquent courage. Refreshingly honest and quite significant given the rank and quality of the author.

[...] As for terrorism, the state of Israel can boast of unrivalled achievements. The awful attacks of september 11, 2001 have caused ten times less victims than the 1982 siege of Beirut by Tsahal. Western admirers of Israel must be mesmerized by an army capable of killing children using cruise missiles [...] wrote the author.

Guigue commented on the biased and openly defamatory campaign by a bunch of French intellos who proclaimed themselves contemporary defenders of French values, and paramount of all is of course the right to express one's self. The likes of Pascal Bruckner, Alain Finkielkraut (the equivalent in France of Norman Podhoretz), Claude Lanzmann, Elie Wiesel, Pierre-André Taguieff, Frédéric Encel, George Frêche, Robert Redecker (the gutter geek of French intelligentsia) and many others, most of whom open Islamophobes, periodically popping-up on screens to explain how it is important for France not to pander to "Islamofascists." They supported the publication of the Danish cartoons -fair enough- but they added that Western values are in big danger of being eroded by an ever growing Muslim population (some have even invented the term of Eurabia). Yesterday, I browsed over some prominent French newspapers and news websites, but haven't found a word from those same auteurs de la bien-pensance -or preachers of the well thinking as they are sometimes sarcastically called- who seem to consider that the freedom and values they are allegedly defending, exclude obvious offenders like Israel who has the money to buy out their bloody conscience.

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.

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)

Time to Use the F Word

And Part II.

Amy Goodman interviewing Naomi Wolf (November '07), best-seller author of "The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot," in which she explains how Fascism has been steadily creeping over America. Learn how in just ten steps, a democratic society can be literally shut down.

See Also:

> Democracy Now's Year in Review

Zeroes & Heroes

Many actors played different roles in shaping the ups and downs of last year events. Some usual suspects who left already their print in previous years have proven to be resiliently present in 2007. Others have emerged as new figures. Here are the makers and breakers who caught my eye in '07.

The Zeros

The gangster administration in Washington

Responsible for the killing (in a way or another) of well over one million Iraqis (according to the most conservative estimates) and the displacement of more than four million others, the Bush administration has persevered in manipulating the facts and succeeded in stirring up factional and sectarian divisions within Iraq. Divide and rule as the old adage goes. The puppet regime in Baghdad, a rubber stamp of what ever Washington decides has shown complete incompetence and subservience and proved to be completely disconnected from the Iraqi people. Although one can only be pleased by the relative decrease in the number of terrorist attacks (from whatever source they might come) and casualties among civilians, the fact remains that Iraq is still under occupation by a colossal number of foreign troops, backed by some hundred thousands mercenaries; and that its oil resources have now been de facto mortgaged by major American oil companies through the euphemistically called Production Sharing Agreements (PSAs).

The Apartheid regime in Israel

Israel has shown, yet again, to those who had a shred of doubt about its real -barely hidden- intentions, that it is not, had not and will not be prepared to pay the price of JUSTICE, the only and genuine road-map for PEACE. Its lobby and supporting "think" tanks have shown, beyond any reasonable doubt how influential they were in shaping American foreign policy towards the question of Palestine. Scholars have yet again been silenced and the systematic accusation of anti-Semitism has been brandished to all those who dared challenging the received wisdom about Israel branded as the "only democracy in region," when it is the only remaining apartheid state in the World. The Gaza concentration camp has been squeezed into a cruel embargo which is aimed at collectively punish the Palestinians for having democratically voted in the wrong way. A stooge government has been anointed: "the legitimate government of Palestine," effectively playing the role of the I'D'F in oppressing the occupied people in Palestine. Signed agreements (remember Annapolis?) have been dishonoured and more illegal settlements have been built up on equally illegal colonies planted on the land stolen from the Palestinians.

Arab despots and potentates (without exception, from the Atlantic to the Arabian-Persian sea)

At the very root of the complete tragedy experienced by Arabs and Muslims all over the world, the Arab regimes, 22 in total, managed to stay in power in large part because (or thanks to) the Western support. These are the most incompetent, backward, inept, power-obsessed and megalomaniac heads of states on the planet. Of course, the peoples have only the kind of government they deserve." This is true to a large extent, and one should not easily put all the blame on external conspirators, although the conspiracy is not all theoretical. Taha Hussein, the dean of contemporary Arabic literature and a pioneer of enlightenment in the Arab World (according to ArabWorldBooks.com) once said:

"We want to be free people in our countrie[s], free of foreigners such that they cannot oppress us or treat us unjustly, and free with respect to ourselves, such that no one of us can oppress or treat another unjustly."

Religious fanatics of all sides

Since 9/11, religious fanaticism has been thriving. Alqaeda found in the actions of the Bush administration, which has mainly gained the white house -especially in its second term-thanks to the very "generous" support of very influential Christian fundamentalists -most of them openly Zionists-, the more powerful recruitment argument for its campaign of terror and nihilist destruction. Extremes have always campaigned for each other!

The Heroes

President Hugo Chavez

The Venezuelan president has won more democratic and transparent elections, and more popular referenda than any other living leader. He is independent and pro-people, hence the hostility of the Western establishment towards him. More power to you Chavez!


Illan Pappé

The courageous Israeli historian has published at the beginning of this year, the English version of his book ""Ethnic Cleansing in Palestine." A refreshingly honest account of how Israel seeks, as it had always sought to, to systematically and methodically kill, harass, terrorise and push the Palestinians to the edge so that they lose hope and renounce their rights and eventually leave their homeland.


Norman Finkelstein

Another victim of the Israel lobby in America, forced to resign from his position for no reason other than being forensically objective about the realities of the middle east. Fascism is still alive and kicking!

John Pilger

Award-winning independent journalist and a renowned documentary film-maker. "The War on Democracy" is his latest opus. A startling reminder of the ravages that capitalism has already caused in Latin America, considered for decades to be the American (USA) preserve. Based on an arrogant imperial vision of the world and on the so-called Washington Consensus which theorized and underpinned the neo-liberal policies for the last two or three decades, successive American administrations made sure that no genuine democracy springs in the southern half of the continent: putting absolute potentates at the head of States, overthrowing democratically elected governments and sponsoring a class of plutocrats monopolizing their country's wealth at the expense of impoverished populations.

Aboubakr Jamaï

The founder of the most popular Moroccan magazine, Le Journal Hebdo, was forced earlier this year, to leave Morocco in order to avoid paying a record breaking fine of $350,000, that would otherwise bankrupt his magazine. He is one of the most popular and charismatic young journalists that the country has ever produced, and one who marked the recent Moroccan journalistic scene by bringing a revolutionary new style of professional investigative journalism. He openly challenged the monarchy and the military and literally paid the price. In November 2005, Jamaï wrote a ground-breaking open letter to Mohamed VI in which he urged the monarch to grab the opportunity of his political virginity and his capital of popular sympathy to put the country on the tracks of reform. The letter fell on deaf ears.

Happy new year to all.

Keep Walking America

A Reflexion on What Comes Next

Studying the rapacious behavior of US governments one after the other and in the face of the utter helplessness of most of the ordinary people to even beginning to curb or influence any of these American policies despite the -often- detrimental effects on these same people's lives, security, sovereignty and independence, many resort to a passive and fatalistic state of mind, considering that nothing, nobody, nowhere could ever affect in any effective way, shape or form the pervasive, imperialistic attacks on their lives; thinking that maybe taming the world's only superpower is the only way out.

There is indeed no reason to believe that a violent confrontation would produce any good, but rather reinforce the more fundamentalist, imperialistic and hawkish elements of the American establishment, giving them yet another pretext for more unthinkable adventures.

Non-violent decent, engagement and active progressive political involvement is -in my humble view- the way forward. And equally important is the sens of the "middle-way" as eatbees (definitely my favourite blogger, now taking some rest) very eloquently put it in his very moving and extraordinarily honest post when he reflected on the way and intensity with which he would try to change the world around him without having to lose his independence or his soul.

No reasonable mind can ever deny the huge benefits that America has brought to the world, but the same once-great nation is pushed by a sort of mad drive; a system that went out of control; a foreign policy led by so-called pressure groups and lobbies who only serve private rather than public interests; a consumerist model based on waste and futility that now threatens the survival of the species; a military-industrial complex always pushing for more blood and wars; powerful oil companies pressing for ever more invasions and mad military adventures; wealthy and influential religious fundamentalists who have decided that you're either with them, hence "good" or against them, hence "evil"; a political class that has sold its soul and pledged allegiance to the oligarchy, the real power holders.

Yet, the path in which America walks today has led nations before her to complete disasters and failures. Oppressive and dominating powers end-up corrupting their own people and dangerously corroding their morals.

As the new year looms at the horizon, one only hopes that the worrying dynamics now underpinning world politics will hopefully evolve to a situation where ideally the people of the world take matters into their own hands and a sort of global democracy takes place where the wealth produced is fairly distributed and where the governments are working for addressing the real needs of the people, as sustainably as they can, in full respect of the environment, rather that simply serving the wealthy influential oligarchy: the private tyrannies who are now running the world and leading us all to an inexorable disaster.

America must change course. Untill that happens, keep lying, keep manipulating, keep conspiring, keep vetoing... keep walking America untill you realize that you can no longer afford failing your own people, betraying the spirit of your own constitution, losing your soul and the World in the process.

Some are Beginning to Introspect...

Some Have Already Warned...

Is There Anybody Alive Out There?

Yes, the Boss is still alive and kicking. I bought Springsteen's latest album (perfectly titled): "Magic," which is only just that. Now I hate promoting anything or anyone, but that one Album is worth the publicity, I can tell you; and not just for the astounding songs quality but also for the power of the lyrics.

Wondering whether "there is still anybody alive out there" he only echoes (or at least that's the way I understood his lyrics... hope I'm not wrong!) my own concern and consternation about the lethargy that appears to have struck America, the UK and all of the Western world. People seem to have lost touch with the reality around them, blidingly trusting their leaders. Also a dreadful apathy seems to have infiltrated the so-far animated and inspired progressive blogosphere... which now sounds deafeningly silent.

The Bushies are preparing another illegal attack against Iran. The second phase of the Great Oil Robbery looks well under way and the world looks like it's sleep-walking towards, yet another disaster. This one though, may prove to be cataclysmic. More people will be sent to die for other people's interests. I hope someone is listening... if so: WAKE UP PEOPLE... I wanna hear some RHYTHM!

Here is some More... Rhythm!

Image courtesy of Backstreets.com

Bring Mehdi Back! (Part III)

Mehdi Ben Barka & the Tricontinental
(Final Part)

René Gallissot
October 2005
In Le Monde Diplomatique

[If you find this (paraphrasing) translation poor or inappropriate, you can read the original piece in full here (fr).]

There is little doubt that the Moroccan state (up to high ranking officers and officials) bears a heavy responsibility in the abduction and subsequent murder of Mehdi Ben Barka. The year 1965 starts with violent events that will further exacerbate the sensitivity of the state and eventually trigger a brutal repression: March 22 and 23, students demonstrate against the newly introduced schools admission quotas which they consider discriminatory. They are later joined in the streets by their parents. The demonstrations are repressed in blood by the infamous Gen. Mohamed Oufkir, the then-ministry of Interior. The state of emergency is decreed. Second phase: Hassan II (seemingly) offers an overture to Ben Barka by hinting to the possibility of accepting the idea of a national unity government. Ben Barka deplores the absence of the conditions for a genuine democratic transition and reiterates the views he previously exposed in the message-report he wrote in 1962 for his party's second congress, under the title: "Revolutionary Option in Morocco." In June the fake offer is retreated. Secret and frenzied concertations start between the palace and the secret services under the supervision (and that's an understatement) of United States officials (as it is now widely documented,) and the active "help" of the Mossad (Israel secret services.) In the meantime, Ben Barka dedicates himself to preparing the Tricontinental Conference, the preparatory committee over which he presides [...]

Ben Barka defines his objectives: helping national liberation movements notably in Palestine; intensifying the struggle against occupation -including armed struggle- on the three continents; supporting Cuba; getting rid of foreign military bases; opposition to nuclear weapons, to the Apartheid regime and to racial segregation. The end goal being "total liberation." In late September, Ben Barka visits Havana to finalize the arrangements and preparations for the upcoming Conference, scheduled in January 3th, 1966.

Eliminating Ben Barka was obviously becoming a major and pressing demand for those who wanted to put an end to mounting third-world insurrection. Already in June 1965, Ben Barka loses the Algerian support after Boumediène accessed power through a military coup. To make things even worse, President Sukarnu of Indonesia loses his power in September 30th, depriving the Tricontinental from one of its major bases.

To understand the motives behind the murder of Ben Barka, one needs only to examine the pattern of political assassinations and coup d'etat perpetrated during this sinister period: the Iranian Premier, Ali Mansour, is assassinated in January 21; Humberto Delguado, the leader of the Portuguese opposition, in February 13; Malcolm X, in February 21; the deputy defense minister of Guatemala, Ernesto Molina, in May 21, etc...

In October Mehdi is murdered; in 1967 Che Guevara is executed [in Bolivia under orders from Washington]; Martin Luther King is killed in April 1968; Amiclar Cabral (the major theorist of African liberation) in January 1973...

Thus, a kind of "world class warfare" was taking place in which those who wanted to reestablish a reactionary order used all means of violence, political assassinations, death commandos and imposed absolute dictators and awful regimes, fomenting conflicts and instigating wars of intervention.

Movements of liberation were pushed forward by their quest for a genuine emancipation and the Tricontinental tried to capture this progressive potential. Those who assassinated Ben Barka wanted to kill this perspective of world liberation.

Rest in Peace Mehdi.

The Kings Walked Past Here

Celebrating the Memory of Two Giants

This week many across the planet celebrated the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley. He was a hell of a performer. He set the world on fire like no other before or after him. Although he never wrote or composed his own songs, he boldly reached out to different communities across the world and most importantly, within the troublesome America he lived through. He had the guts to cross the railway tracks and reach out to the Black community in times of segregation and institutionalized racism. He also always acknowledged the Black roots of his music. "If I can Dream" was composed and performed during the darkest hours of civil rights struggle in America and is a clear homage to another great King: Dr. Martin Luther King Junior.

Last April was the 40th anniversary of a milestone speech delivered by Dr. King in which he marked a clear break with US's foreign policy. "America is the greatest purveyor of violence in the world" he noted. The speech, titled "Beyond Vietnam; A Time to Break Silence," was delivered at the heights of the Vietnam War and the actions of successive US administrations, have only confirmed the visionary words of Dr. King.

His Courageous analysis placed him at odds with the American Establishment and some other Black "leaders" of the time. He went on asking his followers:" [let us] rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter -but beautiful- struggle for a new World"

Here is an excerpt:

Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexed as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must move on...
...Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy's point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition...

Doctor King was assassinated exactly one year later.

The New French Cuisine

In the Menu: French Fries, a Lot of Lies and Some Missiles

Sarkozy has wasted no time in showing his contempt for democracy both at home and abroad. Acting as an elected dictator, he recently decided, without any consultation with the french parliament, to sell weapons to the Libyan despot Khaddafi. It's no secret that Sarkozy has very close links with French arms dealers like Dassot, Lagardère... who openly sponsored his presidential campaign.

The newly elected president capitalized on the recent release of the Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor who were held and tortured in Libyan prisons, and accused of deliberately infecting children with HIV in a grotesque attempt to coverup Libyan health system's own failures.

Sarkozy seized the opportunity to reward his good old chaps, offering them a deal worth US$400 million. Never mind the total absence of Human Rights in Libya, the systematic torture and imprisonment of political opponents... not to mention the psychopathic and totally unpredictable kind of nut, Khaddafi is.

One can only feel disgusted by the utter hypocrisy of most Western leaders' rhetoric on almost all topics ranging from Fair Trade to Darfur. A disguised propaganda aimed only at gaining always more markets, more money, even when that means empowering ruthless dictators. It's almost the resurrection of the good old Imperial ambition disguised in Humanitarian interventions or, as in the case of Sarkozy, openly dealing with the autocrats.

Jacques Chirac, the former French president, once said during an official visit to Tunisia that the "first of Human Rights is to EAT"(sic). If that was right, what made the French people revolt against their kings? what kind of madness stroke the British people to protest against the ruthless rule of their monarchs and spark a civil war? How crazy were the Russians to refuse their exploitation by their own emperors?...

Is History condemned to sway forever from blunders to redress... endlessly repeating itself?

(Picture by "Azrainman")

Logical Illogicality Number#2

Guilty of Honesty, Integrity and Defiance to the British Establishment, George Galloway Got Expelled From the House of C(omm)ons.

The Pro-Zionist, unelected "Commons [double-]standards and privileges committee" suspended the Respect member of Parliament for having brought (as they put it) the House into "DISREPUTE."
His crime: Political Dissent

He was expelled by a committee composed mainly of pro-war MPs and people who openly described themselves as "friends of Israel". Thrown out of a House that boasts for being the core institution of the "Mother of All Democracies"

For those who don't know him yet, George Galloway is the colourful and consistent peace and justice campaigner, the indefatigable and fearless defender of noble causes, great orator and leading anti-war activist.

He stood almost alone in the House against the war on Iraq, while the rest of the British political establishment supported the drive to an illegal and criminal war which caused and still is causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of Iraqis; not to mention the millions who lost their homes and hopes, having to leave their land.

So that's the price you pay when you have the guts to stand against the warmongers and pro-Israel supporters.

Often vilified and described in the mainstream media in Britain as "controversial", when real controversial war criminals and liars are offered standing ovations and treated like national heroes at the day of their departure.

George Galloway, in the day of his suspension, was interrupted by the speaker, and was denied the opportunity of making his full speech of defence against the allegations of the so-called committee. "At least the United States Senate gave me an uninterrupted hearing," reacted Galloway referring to his outstanding performance in front of an American senate committee in May 2005.

"It has come to something," he added "When the leading anti-war MP could get a fairer hearing in the Republican Senate than in the British House of Commons.

"I was thrown out of Parliament this evening just as I had given one example of the double standards that go to the heart of this matter. Anyone watching this would have seen Parliament plunged into disrepute as it absurdly decided - through agreeing my exclusion - that I am not permitted to point to those double standards or to criticise those who have produced this unjust report about me.

"We now have the absurdity in which the House of Commons has convinced itself, or at rather pretends that it has, that 10 MPs sat in a committee room somehow cease to be what they by definition are - highly political people who together constitute a political tribunal.

"The public know that is so; MPs, if they were being honest, know it; it's only in the chamber of the House of Commons that you are not allowed to say so.

"I had much, much more to say about the report and the overarching question of who it is in this Iraq affair who has brought Parliament into disrepute. Instead, by voting to throw me out, the MPs present this evening chose to conduct a kangaroo court in my absence.

"They may be happy to close their ears to the truth. Most people in Britain - and abroad - are not.

"They will be outraged at this sham in what is supposed to be the highest court of the land."

Galloway got an overwhelming support from people within the UK and across the World.

Support George Galloway here.

(GeorgeGalloway.com)
(Pictures respectively by "Fabbio" & "Mickal")

Remember the Summer of 1967

Forty years ago, the world was almost in a similar situation as today's. Except that the "enemy" at the time was: Communism. Vietnam was mourning its deaths as the US invasion continued to cause more and more horrors, while in the Middle East, Israel launched a war that would reverberate durably in the region, attacking its Arab neighbours causing deaths, huge movements of refugees and seizing Palestinian land, it still occupies today.

This climate of fear, deaths and uncertainty, added to hours upon hours of images of war and misery, mainly caused by the American foreign policy and that of its client states, created a growing antiwar feeling and an unprecedented wave of solidarity and peace activism.

In Parallel, the Hippie countercultural ideals of love, freedom, and unity, reached their momentum with an ever growing number of wonderfully talented and popular artists joining the movement.

Hundreds of thousands of young and less younger people from around the world and from all walks of life, converged to the city of San Fransisco. The attempt by the local authorities to stop the flow, added even more media interest.

Although the "experience" was tarnished by incidents of violence, drug abuse and many other problems, it produced a generation of "flower children" with new ideals and new views on the World and it inspired similar experiences in other parts of the world. But most of all, this summer sparked a new movement of worldwide solidarity. The peace movement was born.

What's more, this was an opportunity for so many unique artists to produce an inspiring new music genre, still influential today.

In the Internet age we're living in today, with an ever easy interconnection between different people from different parts of the world, the solidarity ideals are even stronger than they were back in 67; but one has to admit that the world has not become a safer place, quite the contrary. Extremists from all sides are fuelling each other's rhetoric and wars, while "moderates" (which I suppose are the majority) remain mostly ineffective in avoiding illegal wars of occupation and violence in all its forms.