A. LOEWENSTEIN ONLINE NEWSLETTER

• Helpful hints for American reporters (Israel=bad, Arabs=bad)
• Sydney fund-raiser for the next Gaza flotilla
• “We must learn from the Nazi tactics”, says retired Israeli judge
• Where do oil companies pay a price for their criminality?
• Of course the Palestinian Authority loves Sri Lanka
• The fury of oppression is global
• Washington and Tel Aviv can’t speak honestly to each other
• Australians and Bob Hawke meet again
• Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman taking a stand for Palestine?
• Hamas is evil, Hamas is evil, Hamas is evil (repeat after me)

Helpful hints for American reporters (Israel=bad, Arabs=bad)Posted: 07 Jul 2010 Following the firing of a CNN journalist for daring to praise the recently deceased Lebanese religious leader Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, it’s clear that American corporate television allows anti-Arab statements to run 24/7, but dare say something that may upset the Zionist lobby or Israel, and you’ll be gone. Here’s (former AIPAC employee) CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, alongside Norman Finkelstein, from a debate in 1989. Israel is beyond criticism, didn’t you know?

Sydney fund-raiser for the next Gaza flotillaPosted: 07 Jul 2010

“We must learn from the Nazi tactics”, says retired Israeli judgePosted: 07 Jul 2010 As Zionists continue to wonder who is running Israeli PR, here’s a very helpful suggestion to keep the Jewish state front and centre in the world: “We must learn from the Nazi tactics,” Retired Israeli Judge Hadassa Ben-Itto said recently during a conference discussing ways to improve the State of Israel’s PR efforts in the world. The meeting, which was held last week in the English capital, was attended by some 150 senior Jewish legal experts. Ben-Itto said during the conference that Israel should adopt the tactics used by the Nazis after they distributed the Protocols of the Elders of Zion: Refusing to reach a compromise and continuing their battle in the courts although they had no proof of the protocols.  “I thought about it, about our ‘hasbara’, and nothing is working because our story is complicated and the world is used to a sound bite,” she explained. “I have reached the conclusion that we must use these tactics in courts worldwide, just like the Nazis – with all distinctions – used the courts to spread their message.”

Where do oil companies pay a price for their criminality?Posted: 07 Jul 2010 The culpability of BP in the Gulf of Mexico is clear. But further afield we find other major oil companies behaving very badly: To the list of Big Oil companies with p.r. problems add two more: Chevron and French energy giant Total. In a report published on Monday, the NGO EarthRights International accuses the firms of being implicated in human-rights violations in Burma, claiming that soldiers guarding Chevron and Total’s natural-gas pipeline in the country have murdered locals and forced others to do backbreaking, unpaid labor in order to keep the gas exports flowing smoothly. The report also holds that the revenues from the operation have been propping up the country’s oppressive military government for more than a decade, thus fostering harmful political outcomes that affect the entire country.

Of course the Palestinian Authority loves Sri LankaPosted: 07 Jul 2010 Ali Abunimah: Abbas PA loves the racist Zionist regime, so why wouldn’t they love the racist Sinhalese supremacist Sri Lanka regime? Here’s the story: Sri Lanka’s envoy to the Palestinian Authority was awarded honorary citizenship by the West Bank municipality of Beitunia on Monday, his office said. T Jayasinghe was awarded the certificate of citizenship by Mayor Arafat Khalaf at a simple ceremony attended by Municipal Council members and a few other guests. Jayasinghe thanked Mayor Khalaf for the gesture, which he said affirmed his country’s close ties to Palestine and encouraged solidarity activists in Sri Lanka.

The fury of oppression is globalPosted: 07 Jul 2010 What do these images of Kashmir remind us of?

Washington and Tel Aviv can’t speak honestly to each otherPosted: 06 Jul 2010 The Independent’s Patrick Cockburn explains that the power of Israel is declining but Washington is seemingly powerless to control its wild friend: Israel itself is getting politically and militarily weaker. The high point of Israel’s influence in the Middle East was after the peace agreement with Egypt in 1979 which freed it to invade Lebanon in 1982. But intervention in Lebanon turned into a prolonged guerrilla war ending with Israel’s final withdrawal in 2000. Military operations in Lebanon and Gaza in the following 10 years have uniformly failed to achieve their objectives. Meanwhile the head of Mossad, Meir Dagan, said that America’s need for Israel is less since the end of the Cold War. It may be in the interests of the US to restrain Israel but this is almost certainty not going to happen. The reason why is shown by the strange story of the attempt by General David Petraeus, now commander in Afghanistan, previously head of Central Command and America’s most prestigious general, to put on the record the fact that US support for Israeli actions in the Middle East was endangering the safety of US troops. He reiterated this in written testimony before Congress in March. But no sooner had General Petraeus done so than he was swiftly rowing back. The explanation for General Petraeus’s swift turnaround suggests that he wants to keep open the option of running for the presidency as Republican candidate in 2012 and does not intend to alienate Jewish voters or militant neocons. The episode illustrates the domestic constraints on any American political or military leader constraining or even criticising Israel. It is possible that President Obama privately took a tough line with Mr Netanyahu yesterday, but he is unlikely to take effective measures to pressure Israel for fear of increasing expected Democratic Party losses in the mid-term elections. No crisis in US-Israeli relations is likely, though this is the one thing that might make Israeli voters reject Mr Netanyahu.

Australians and Bob Hawke meet againPosted: 06 Jul 2010 I saw this poster near my home yesterday:

Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman taking a stand for Palestine?Posted: 06 Jul 2010 If true, a rather remarkable political act by two very mainstream actors (and one Jew): Hollywood actors Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman backed out of attending this year’s annual Jerusalem Film Festival, which is set to kick off this coming Thursday, following the international outcry over Israel’s attack on a Turkish-led flotilla that attempted to break the Gaza blockade on May 31, The Jerusalem Post learned Monday. According to Cinematheque associate director Yigal Molad Hayo, while neither gave the political climate as a direct reason for canceling their participation in the festival, “it became quite clear that this was the reason,” he said. “Meg Ryan was supposed to come here, it had all been closed with her people,” said Molad Hayo, adding “a day after the flotilla incident we got an email saying she was not going to attend, and although they claimed it was because she was too busy, it was clear to me that it probably had something to do with what had happened.”       In addition to Ryan, who has starred in such movies as Sleepless in Seattle, When Harry Met Sally and, more recently, Kate and Leopold, Molad Hayo said that the Cinematheque had also reached “advanced negotiations” with Jewish actor Dustin Hoffman. “We were very close to reaching an agreement with him, then the flotilla happened and correspondence was ended,” said Molad Hayo. Ryan and Hoffman are not the only high-profile names to decline participation in this year’s festival. Prince Albert of Monaco, son of legendary actress Grace Kelly, was also slated to attend. “I’d already made arrangements for a tribute to Grace Kelly to appear in the festival program,” said Molad Hayo, adding that he believed Prince Albert’s cancellation could have come from pressure in his own country not to make an official visit to Israel at this time. “I think they believed it could have been very negative for him and even dangerous,” he said.

Hamas is evil, Hamas is evil, Hamas is evil (repeat after me)Posted: 06 Jul 2010 Republican hack, pollster and Zionist Frank Luntz has some advice for his Israeli friends: If Israeli leaders would carry a copy of the Hamas charter with them, I’d say to you that is game set and match… If every American were to learn what was in the Hamas charter, Israel would never have to worry about public support ever again. That’s how important it is.”