Articles

Makers of deadly Agent Orange keep claiming innocent
June 22, 2011
USA
NOVANEWS   After their product Agent Orange has crippled millions of lives in Vietnam from the Vietnam War and onward, ...Read more
Lies, Damn Lies, and Liberating Wars
June 22, 2011
USA
NOVANEWS by Stephen Lendman     America’s imperial wars are for wealth, power, and unchallenged dominance, never for humanitarian concerns or ...Read more
United States False Flag Forecast, Summer 2011
June 22, 2011
USA
NOVANEWS "Meet the new boss/Same as the old boss" -- Who won't get fooled again? By Captain Eric H. May, ...Read more
Antisemitism and "antisemitism"
June 22, 2011
Politics
NOVANEWS Just a couple of things I noticed whilst browsing. Antony Lerman has a piece on Yale's decision to replace ...Read more
Mondoweiss Online Newsletter
June 22, 2011
Middle East
NOVANEWS   U.S. Flotilla to Obama: Protect Us From Israel Israel approves the expansion of 2,000 settlement homes in East ...Read more
A. Loewenstein Online Newsletter
June 22, 2011
Middle East
NOVANEWS Censorship is fine for anybody who dares challenge Zionist apartheid Rapper Lupe Fiasco tells Fox that Obama is a ...Read more
Zio-Nazi army Begins Dismantling the Wall in Bil'in
June 22, 2011
ZIO-NAZI
NOVANEWS   press release 21 June 2011 Israeli army Begins Dismantling the Wall in Bil'in Six years into the weekly ...Read more
Zio-Nazi UN ambassador tells U.S. Jews: Prepare for September vote on Palestinian state
June 22, 2011
ZIO-NAZI
NOVANEWS   Ron Prosor urges leaders at closed session of the Conference of Presidents of major Jewish American Organizations to ...Read more
Former Zio-Nazi Prime Minister Olmert denies storing funds in a ‘secret safe’
June 22, 2011
ZIO-NAZI
NOVANEWS   Indictment says Zionist Olmert hid Talansky funds, in cash, in a safe in Attorney Uri Messer’s office; Olmert ...Read more
Obama tells Jewish donors that U.S.-IsraHell disagreements are only ‘tactical’
June 22, 2011
USA
NOVANEWS Pro-Zionist U.S. President reaffirms his country’s bond with IsraHell is ‘unbreakable.’ Haaretz U.S. President Obama told a group of ...Read more
Naziyahu: IsraHell needs to separate from the Palestinians
June 22, 2011
ZIO-NAZI
NOVANEWS Zio-Nazi racist prime minister tells Nazi cabinet that it’s more important to ‘preserve a solid Jewish majority inside the ...Read more
US citizens to join 12-ship flotilla to Gaza Strip
June 22, 2011
Gaza
NOVANEWS     New York – Organizers of a US boat that will join a humanitarian flotilla trying to break ...Read more

Makers of deadly Agent Orange keep claiming innocent

NOVANEWS

 

After their product Agent Orange has crippled millions of lives in Vietnam from the Vietnam War and onward, the US producers have continued to avoid taking responsibility and blame it on the US government instead.

A parade calling for justice for Agent Orange victims in New York in February 2008

As the Sai Gon Giai Phong tried to contact offices of the US-based Monsanto Thailand, Ltd. and Dow Chemical International in Ho Chi Minh City last May, the offices said their heads had left for missions abroad and any questions can be sent to the companies, which would forward them to authorized people.

Then a question from the paper was sent to the companies, asking if they have ever made any moves to ease the pain of Agent Orange victims in Vietnam, given that the US government has partly admitted their responsibility.

Yet as of mid-June, there’s only one response coming from Dow Chemical. The company said joining the war was a wrong and regretful choice made by the US government and that Dow was only one of several companies assigned by that government, under the US’ Defense Production Act, to produce the weed killer serving the war.

A similar response from Monsanto was sent to Len Aldis, Secretary of the Britain-Vietnam Friendship Society (BVFS), in 2009.

Aldis, who is a keen Agent Orange activist, said those were ploys to shun confrontations over the deadly chemical the companies had produced.
In an email to the Sai Gon Giai Phong before Dow’s response, Aldis said the companies would never admit their responsibility but always pass the buck to the US government.

The activist said at the moment when Agent Orange was produced, the producers were aware that the process would produce the deadly chemical dioxin but they deliberately buried the information. Thus the producers including Monsanto and Dow Chemical cannot act irresponsible for the damages AO left on Vietnamese people, Aldis said.

He accused the companies of hiding facts from the public, saying it’s unacceptable that the companies, after causing so many miseries to millions of Vietnamese people, now reject their responsibility.

The producers of AO now have to join with the US government to compensate for the damages the chemical left on Vietnamese people, Aldis said.

In 1984, US veterans from the Vietnam War were announced to win US$184 million of compensation from Monsanto and other producers of AO, who were found guilty during a trial of causing negative impacts on the health of the soldiers and their children.

Aldis said Monsanto, Dow and other US chemical manufacturers can avoid their responsibility for now but not forever.

Sooner or later they will have to take responsibility for the brutal and immoral things they had done to millions of Vietnamese people, he said.

Monsanto and Dow Chemical were among seven companies producing more than 15 chemical compounds used during the Vietnam War including napalm for bombs and Agent Orange, according to contracts they signed with the US government in 1965. The two companies started operation legally in HCMC in 2007.

Many companies had ended their contracts after waves of boycott and disagreement from the public. Only Dow Chemical continued with the business until 1969.

Lies, Damn Lies, and Liberating Wars

NOVANEWS
by Stephen Lendman

 

 

America’s imperial wars are for wealth, power, and unchallenged dominance, never for humanitarian concerns or liberation, notions Washington contemptuously spurns.

Yet rhetorical posturing claims otherwise. In April 1986, Ronald Reagan arrogantly said US air and naval forces “launched a series of strikes against (Gaddafi’s) headquarters, terrorist facilities, and military assets, (carefully) targeted to minimize casualties among the Libyan people with whom we have no quarrel. From initial reports, our forces have succeeded in their mission.”

Wrong! The BBC reported “at least 100 people died after USA planes bombed targets in” Libya. In fact, over 100 were killed, mostly civilians, including Gaddafi’s infant daughter when his personal compound was bombed, trying to kill him.

In addition, dozens were wounded, including two of Gaddafi’s young sons. The French, Swiss, Romanian and Iranian embassies were damaged. So were Japanese and Austrian diplomatic residences. Dozens of residential buildings were also damaged or destroyed. Libya’s Central Hospital reported up to 100 people needing treatment for serious injuries, including infants.

Planned months in advance, the mission was one of many Reagan war crimes. Moreover, it succeeded only in arousing mass anger according to an April 17, 1986 Los Angeles Times report, saying:

Washington’s attack “sparked worldwide protests….that erupted into violence as demonstrators burned American flags and effigies of President Reagan in Pakistan and attacked US facilities in several capitals.”

Today, Obama is attacking Libya, committing far greater war crimes than Reagan, yet arrogantly claimed last March that he:

“ordered our armed forces to help protect the Libyan people from the brutality of (Gaddafi with an operation of) limited scope and specific purpose,” adding “it’s in our national interest to act. And it’s our responsibility.”

In fact:

  • – it’s lawless aggression;

  • – the supreme crime against peace;

  • – targeting another nonbelligerent country;

  • – the same criminality committed against Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and other nations attacked to advance America’s imperium globally.

Its longstanding goal is conquering, colonizing, dominating, terrorizing, and exploiting nations politically, economically and militarily – America’s real “national interest.”

Obama is just the latest hired hand, furthering Washington’s rogue agenda – pressuring, intimidating and/or terror bombing countries to comply, slaughtering civilians to protect them, destroying their countries for their own good, while lying about America’s good intentions that, in fact, seek only to make the world safe for capital, not people.

As a result, many outraged Americans and others globally denounce him, including Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan in a stinging June 15 indictment, saying:

“Why….is NATO….using (UN) Resolution 1973 as a pretext to assassinate (Gaddafi) and create regime change….NATO and America are trying to recolonize Africa through AFRICOM….Look at the arrogance of Hillary Clinton (in) Addis Ababa, the capital of the African Union. That’s some gall, to go right to us and tell us like children what she wants us to do.” Calling NATO a “coalition of demons,” he accused member countries of lawlessly promoting regime change in Libya.

Earlier, Farrakhan said America lacked moral authority to attack Libya, denouncing Obama’s hypocrisy, asking:

“Who in the hell do you think you are” deciding who may or may not lead Libya or any other country. Growing numbers worldwide agree, including Hugo Chavez last March, accusing Washington of “imperial madness,” saying:

“We don’t support invasions or massacres, or anything like that no matter who does it. A campaign of lies is being spun together regarding Libya. The US government is behind the campaign to remove Gaddafi. They are the masters of war….They want to seize Libya’s oil. The lives of Libya’s people don’t matter to them at all….It is deplorable (that) the United Nations” supports the “warmongering….Yankee empire, (inflicting) more suffering for the people, more death.”

In fact, four months of terror bombing caused mass casualties and destruction, including at least nine civilians and two infants, murdered on June 19 when a three-story Suq Al Juma residential structure was destroyed.

On June 1, Reuters reported that “NATO’s bombing campaign has killed 718 Libyan civilians, government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said on Tuesday.” Another 4,067 were wounded, 433 seriously. The figures were current through May 26.

With intensified terror bombing continuing day and night, the total may now approach or top 1,000 killed and thousands more injured, the same civilians Obama promised to protect.

NATO, of course, denied the accusation, insisting care is taken only to strike military targets, when, in fact, it’s bombed schools, a university, a hospital, other medical facilities, a medical factory, civilian ports, airports, basic infrastructure, and residential areas, knowing non-military targets were struck.

On June 15, the London Telegraph headlined, “Libyagate: Rabid NATO Bombed Benghazi Civilians, 90 Killed,” saying:

“Now that NATO has bombed Benghazi, there is no possible way that the organization can be allowed to continue its pretense of protecting civilians from the Libyan forces. The organizers of the bombing have displayed symptoms of rabies.”

In fact, another 100 were wounded, 20 seriously. According to one resident:

“(Was) this an execution or a terrorist act? The killings by NATO are so many that no definition is possible. NATO is performing the most degrading and perverse role I never thought it could do, no respect for anything or anyone. History will never forget this mass murder nor (its) perpetrators….”

“One has to ask how has it come to this, where the terrorists occupy the seats of government in the western world?”

Terror weapons are also freely used, including killer drones, low-flying attack helicopters, depleted uranium, so-called “mincer” anti-personnel missiles containing 80 5-inch-long flechette steel darts (able to penetrate to the bone and cause horrific injuries), and perhaps others yet to be identified.

In all its wars, America tests new weapons in real time against real targets, including innocent civilians to learn how many mass casualties or destruction can be caused per strike.

On June 17, Reuters said thousands rallied in Tripoli for Gaddafi waving green national flags. Video, in fact, showed massive Green Square crowds, expressing solidarity and support, while denouncing NATO’s terror bombing.

Earlier in June, journalist/activist Lizzie Cocker reporting on the ground from Tripoli said:

“One million people marched in support of Brother Leader Colonel Gaddafi in Tripoli in response to Al Jazeera reports that there would be anti-Gaddafi protests after Friday prayers. Their aims were:

1. To show the world that the Libyans are against the invasion.

2. To show that the Libyan people support their legitimate government, legitimate power of the tribes and their leader Moammar Gaddafi.

3. To show support for the Libyans living in Benghazi,” being terrorized by mercenary cutthroats, murdering anti-NATO residents and gang-raping women for sport, what Western media won’t report.

Speaking for many, one angry Libyan said:

“Who are these countries to dictate who our leader should or should not be. We will pick our own leader. We ask for a vote. Let us vote and then you will see who should be our leader,” adding Libyans won’t tolerate NATO dictating to them, imposing their puppet leader, and plundering the country of its resources and material wealth.

America’s Next Imperial Target?

Planned months or years in advance like all US imperial wars, Washington, Israel, and several regional allies armed mercenaries to destabilize Syria since January, mainly since mid-March when uprisings escalated. In fact, in mid-June, US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said:

“We started to expand contacts with the Syrians, those who are calling for change, both inside and outside the country.”

On May 19, America’s global Voice of America propaganda arm headlined, “Obama Tells Syria’s Assad to Lead Transition or Leave,” saying:

“In his Middle East policy speech,” he told him either to initiate change or get “out of the way. The comment came a day after the US administration imposed sanctions on the Syrian leader and key aides,” one of its many imperial policies, dictating how other leaders should govern, demanding they obey or leave, and arrogantly asserting Washington’s right to impose its will globally, backing it up with an iron fist.

At the same time, America and other NATO allies are provocatively conducting Black Sea naval exercises off Ukraine’s coast near Russia’s Sebastopol Black Sea Fleet headquarters. As a result, Russia’s Foreign Ministry expressed concern about the USS Monterrey’s presence, an Aegis class attack ship equipped with sophisticated SM-3 interceptor (offensive) missiles, as well as powerful computers and tracking radar for first-strike capability.

An official Moscow statement said:

“While leaving aside the unsettled issue of a possible European missile shield architecture, Russia would like to know, in compliance with the Russia-NATO Lisbon summit decisions, what ‘aggravation’ the US command meant by moving the basic strike unit of the regional missile defense grouping being formed by NATO in the region, from the Mediterranean to the East?”

“We have to state that our concerns continue to be ignored and under the guise of talks on European missile shield cooperation, efforts are under way to build the missile shield configuration whose consequences are dangerous and about which we have numerously informed our US and NATO partners.”

This provocation accompanies Western intervention in Syria, perhaps heading for more war against a Russian ally, home for its Tartus Mediterranean port naval supply and maintenance facility, being modernized to accommodate heavy warships after 2012.

As a result, Russia (and China) won’t support anti-Syrian Security Council resolutions, perhaps facilitating war the way Resolution 1973 initiated Libyan terror bombing. The Syrian base is Russia’s only Mediterranean location, important to protect for its Black Sea Fleet.

At the same time, Washington, Israel, and their regional allies plan regime change to delink Syria from Hezbollah, Hamas and Iran by replacing Assad’s regime with a pro-Western one. The familiar strategy involves armed insurgents killing civilians and security forces. Assad’s military and police responded the way Gaddafi did in Libya, Washington accusing him of initiating conflict America and its allies began.

Syrian expert Joshua Landis said the Bush administration sought an Assad replacement, “hop(ing) to end Syrian influence in Lebanon, gain (its) support for its occupation of Iraq, and extend its agenda for ‘Reform of the Greater Middle East.’ ”

Specifically, they wanted an Alawi ruling minority general to oust Assad “while maintaining stability.” Today, Syrian opposition leaders and perhaps Washington and other Western powers believe dividing Alawis is key to regime change.

Syrian intellectual Bassma Kodmani, in fact, said:

“Alawite leaders have sought to establish contacts with Sunni imams to seek guarantees for the community in return for abandoning the Assad regime. This, rather than defections in the army, could herald” its unraveling.

Author/poet Mohja Kahf also believes that “four of the seven major Alawite clans (Nuwaliya, Kalbiya, Haddadiya, and Khayyatiya) issued statements dissociating themselves from the Assads.”

Landis, however, disagrees, saying on June 1:

“This cannot be true….I don’t know where (Kahf) would have gotten this intelligence. Alawite tribes hardly have any integrity anymore and don’t have ‘leaders’ who can speak for ‘the clan’ in order to dissociate them from the Assads.”

In fact, there’s no Nuwaliya tribe or clan. “She undoubtedly means the Numaylatiya” one. It has no known leader. For generations, “tribal affiliation has become quite weak among many Alawis….” It’s also unclear “whether an Alawi ‘clan’ could be an operative social unit in today’s political climate.”

What is clear are Washington’s imperial ambitions to gain an unchallenged chokehold on the Mediterranean Basin and beyond from North Africa through the Middle East into Central Asia, as close as possible to Russia and China’s borders, then perhaps target them for regime change.

Post-9/11, America’s longstanding 1990s plan was launched, first against Afghanistan, then Iraq and Pakistan, now Libya and Yemen besides covert campaigns in Somalia, Sudan, and elsewhere, heading for confrontations with Syria, more against Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, as well as Iran to remove all independent threats to Washington’s dominance. Israel’s also as the sole regional hegemon.

Though many Syrians want change, large masses support Assad as evidenced by a March 29 rally Reuters said included “tens of thousands.” Others also show internally divided feelings about an authoritarian regime, one, in fact, avoiding sharp social inequality and poverty, unlike Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Tunisia, Jordan, and other regional states.

Not Libya, however, because Gaddafi shared its oil wealth with his people, providing generous social services and jobs for everyone able to work, the reason millions support him against Western intervention.

Assad also provides mostly free health care, education, and housing assistance, as well as socially just labor laws based on solidarity, not exploitation. In addition, unlike Lebanon and Jordan, Palestinian refugees have full citizenship rights, including access to the same social services.

As a result, despite legitimate grievances among many, today’s turmoil is externally generated to oust him for allying with other anti-imperial regional governments. Washington wants them replaced by internal subversion, financial, or military conflict, facilitated by international media manipulation, misreporting events through malicious disinformation, including The New York Times, withholding and distorting facts to misinform readers.

On June 17, its latest editorial foray headlined, “Syria’s Nightmare,” contemptuously saying:

“With thousands of Syrians being slaughtered, jailed or forced to flee their country, (Obama) and other leaders need to….punish and isolate (Assad) and his cronies.”

In fact, who empowers Washington anywhere, and by what authority do Times editors demand it, as well as backing Washington’s extremist domestic and foreign agenda.

Nonetheless, says The Times, “(Obama) should make clear that the Syrian strongman has lost all legitimacy (and with) his cronies (must) pay a high price for their abuses….The only way to end Syria’s nightmare is for (Assad) to go.”

In fact, Washington caused North African/Middle East/Central Asian “nightmares,” reigning terror throughout the region. In contrast, Assad attacked no one. Neither did Gaddafi.

Only America and its complicit allies wage wars, ones The Times and America’s major media wholeheartedly support, no matter how much death, destruction and human misery they cause.

Expect no editorial mea culpas, now or ever. Instead they endorse perpetual conflicts globally to satisfy Washington’s insatiable imperial appetite.

Moreover, America’s entire major media establishment is culpable. They not only betray loyal readers and viewers, they’re complicit in America’s worst crimes of war and against humanity by misreporting or silence on what everyone most needs to know.

How else can America literally get away with murder against one nation after another endlessly, maliciously mischaracterizing leaders threatening no one.

United States False Flag Forecast, Summer 2011

NOVANEWS

“Meet the new boss/Same as the old boss” — Who won’t get fooled again?

By Captain Eric H. May, Iconoclast Intelligence and Abu Salem sofyan, Islamic Intelligence

SUNDAY, 6/19/11 — The New American Century, with its radioactive warfare, genocide and unnatural disasters, is killing as many people as the Thousand Year Reich, with which it shares many characteristics.

In both cases law-abiding citizens of the aggressor nations were told that they were facing an insidious Semitic foe who danced in celebration when he terrorized nations and started wars. This is what the Germans said about the Jews in the Thousand Year Reich. It is what the Jews say about the Arabs in the New American Century. It’s what the Arabs say about the Jews in Occupied Palestine — adding that the Jews are the new Nazis.

Friday we published the introduction of our 2011 Summer False Flag Forecast, a short explanation of what we are writing and why we are writing it. Within hours Islamic Intelligence came under cyberattack. Our mission is serious, as our enemies have learned, not erroneous, as our friends have been taught by our enemies. It is neither easy nor safe, so we strengthen ourselves with the belief that we please God by fighting devils like the terrorist tyrants and merchants of menace who run the Global War.

Both of us have lived in various levels of the underground, from using noms de guerre to going into hiding. We both know agents and agencies that don’t like us and our work. In their bizarre reality, our efforts to alert the internet in order to avert a false flag attack constitute a threat to national security. We’re far down the road to being labeled terrorist alarmists, it we’re not there already.

Three Top Targets


Chicago is the most likely terror target in the United States.

The Al Qaeda scarecrow got a new face Thursday, with bin Laden lieutenant Zawahiri reported as its new leader. The media programming of 9/11/2B, the next 9/11, intensified accordingly. Al-Qaeda’s new leader could launch ‘big’ attack on the West:

“Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al-Qaeda’s new leader, could launch a ‘big’ attack on the West as he tries to stamp his authority on the embattled movement, according to counter-terrorism experts: ‘He will focus on attacking the West in a big way, to avenge bin Laden’s death, but also to make himself even more effective and relevant.’”

This ominous story line has been under development since the Chicago FBI announced in late March that it had received nuclear terror threats. After the reported bin Laden death the nuclear menace was renewed with reports that Al Qaeda was planning a nuclear revenge attack.

In the background many federal agencies and military units are rehearsing weapons of mass destruction attacks, including mass casualties, mass deaths and mass burials. In mid-May it was National Level Exercise 2011 (NLE 11); in early June it was Red Dragon; last week it was Point Defender; and this week it will be Eagle Horizon, in which thousands of emergency officials will react to a simulated U.S. nuclear terror attack.

In 2008 military intelligence operatives CDR Brian Klock and LTC Gordon Fowkes posted a Houston 9/11/2B attack on a billboard, telegraphing false flag plans.

The U.S. is at high risk of a nuclear false flag attack this summer, and the most likely targets are those which have been set up for attacks in the past. For quick reference, we offer the imperiled public a list of times and places when and where there have been false flag attacks or attempts. Each item is well documented by mainstream and alternative media, and in every case an ad hoc internet coalition mounted a public affairs campaign to counter the threat. Detection is the best protection!


United States False Flag Attacks and Attempts
(in reverse chronological order)

  1. 6/3/11 – 6/11/11: Chicago Red Dragon false flag attempt

  2. 11/26/10, Portland, OR, “Tree Bomber” false flag attempt

  3. 11/6/10 – 11/10/10:  USA, Biden/Netanyahu nuclear reactors false flag attempt

  4. 7/31/09 – 8/14/09: Ft Leavenworth false flag attempt on Kansas City

  5. 7/30/09: Bryan, TX, El Dorado Chemical fire — (1) alert (2) analysis

  6. 2 /16/09 – 2/17/09, Chicago, IL, Stimulus Bill false flag attempt

  7. 10/18/07 – 10/19/07: Portland, OR, TOPOFF-4 false flag attempt

  8. 10/18/07: Port Arthur, TX, Dow Chemical explosion

  9. 7/19/06: Beirut, Israeli false flag attempt on the Orient Queen

  10. 7/2/06: Baytown, TX, Exxon Mobil refinery explosion — the alert

  11. 5/3/06: Sears Tower, Chicago, IL, false flag attempt

  12. 2/1/06, Morganton, NC, Synthron Chemical explosion

  13. 1/31/06: Texas City, TX, BP refinery false flag attempt

  14. 7/28/05: Texas City, TX, BP refinery explosion

  15. 9/26/04: New Caney, TX, pipeline explosion – the alert

  16. 4/19/04: Sears Tower, Chicago, IL, false flag attempt

  17. 3/30/04: Texas City, TX, BP refinery explosion

In conclusion, the three most likely U.S. targets this summer are CHICAGO, HOUSTON and PORTLAND, the same three detailed in the prototype of this article, False Flag Prospects, 2008 — Top Three US Target Cities.

A 10-kiloton fallout prediction for Portland, ground zero for two nuclear terror exercises in the summer and fall of 2007, Noble Resolve and TOPOFF-4. Between them, a planeload of nukes went missing in a highly suspicious Minot-to-Barksdale flight.

Recommended Resources:

Ephesians, Chapter 6, Verse 12

“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

This article is dedicated to my father, Harry H. May, who is hospitalized while recovering from surgery.

Happy Father’s Day, Daddio!

 

Antisemitism and "antisemitism"

NOVANEWS
Just a couple of things I noticed whilst browsing.
Antony Lerman has a piece on Yale’s decision to replace the Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism (YIISA) with a more in-house Yale Program for the Study of Antisemitism (YPSA):

When the axing of YIISA was announced, after Yale’s faculty review committee concluded that its research and publications were not of sufficiently high quality, the Yale authorities indicated at the time that they would find some other means to continue serious research on antisemitism at the university. In the stampede to condemn Yale, its critics either ignored this message or dismissed it. Now that it looks certain that a new venture, headed by a Yale faculty member with excellent scholarly credentials, is to be set up, I wonder whether those who wildly accused Yale of all manner of nefarious reasons for closing YIISA will now withdraw their accusations and apologise? I’d advise Yale not to hold its breath.

Well, turning to Engage, we see that Antony Lerman was right to advise Yale not hold its breath.
Engage reports without comment the advent of the new programme and follows it with a piece from the Executive Director and founder of YIISA, Charles Asher Small. There is no link provided but it seems to have first been published on the Israel advocacy site of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East.

“Recently, Yale University officials informed us of their precipitous decision to close YIISA, The Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism.
It became evident that YIISA and Yale University have different visions and approaches to the study of antisemitism. YIISA, like Yale, believes in the necessity to publish in top tier journals. YIISA scholars, its graduate and post-doctorate research fellows, esteemed senior visiting professors, and scholars associated with YIISA have done so at a high caliber and with success.

I don’t know why they centre their writing. Maybe it looks more dramatic.
But, whilst acknowledging the establishment of the new programme, Small’s piece doesn’t resemble an apology and misrepresents the reason for the termination of the discredited YIISA. It was academically below par but Small won’t hear of this.

YIISA, however, is committed to critical engaged scholarship with a broader approach to the complex, and at times controversial context of contemporary global antisemitism.
It is this mission that my colleagues at YIISA so eloquently and with a sense of integrity engaged. This was reflected, for example, in the conference, “Global Antisemitism: A Crisis of Modernity”. Held in August 2010 it was the largest academic conference on the study of antisemitism ever.

Now let’s quickly turn to Antony Lerman’s announcement of the closing of YIISA:

YIISA’s approach was fully exposed when it announced its first major conference, ‘Global Antisemitism: A Crisis of Modernity’, to take place in August 2010. A huge, 3-day jamboree, with 4 breakout sessions twice-a-day and 3 or 4 keynote lectures/plenary events each day, the conference was attended by many genuine scholars of antisemitism presenting bona fide academic papers, but a full panoply of participants attesting to the ‘new antisemitism’ agenda of YIISA was present. In May Small had already confirmed that ‘The largest number of papers, and therefore reflecting the greatest concern, address contemporary antisemitism and the demonization of Israel and those associated or made to be associated with Israel.’

There was a whole session devoted to the bogus concept of Jewish self-hatred, a keynote lecture by Itamar Marcus, a leader of the settler movement on the West Bank, titled ‘The central role of Palestinian antisemitism in creating the Palestinian identity’ and the conference opened with a speech by the Director for Combating Antisemitism at Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The demonization of left-liberal Jewish critics of Israel and of Palestinians, the promotion of a Zionist-centric approach to antisemitism, the distortion and exaggeration  of Arab and Palestinian sympathy for antisemitism, the presence of presenters from NGO Monitor, Palestinian Media Watch and MEMRI – all of these elements of the ‘culture’ of the programme fundamentally undermined YIISA’s claim to academic respectability.

Sometime in between the closure of YIISA and the announcement of YPSA, Engage’s Dr Hirsh had an article in the Jewish Chronicle, that seemed to suggest that the closure of YIISA was an example of “a menacing zeitgeist”, ie, antisemitism, even in America. Here is the conclusion:

There were things wrong with YIISA but they should have been put right rather than mobilised as reasons to close it down. An interest in contemporary antisemitism is increasingly regarded as an indicator of vulgarity, dishonesty and selfish Jewish nationalism. Yale should have resisted this menacing anti-intellectual zeitgeist, not lent its own reputation to it.
Sometimes Americans have thought of the “new antisemitism” as an overseas phenomenon of degenerate Europe. Some American Jews, who had felt safe from antisemitism, will now be hurting.

But for some reason, the JC didn’t publish his whole article. Here’s the piece on Engage:

[This following passage was cut by the JC – DH] Robert Fine, Moishe Postone, Brian Cheyette, Lars Rensmann, David Seymour, Annette Seidel-Arpaci, Michael Waltzer, Catherine Chatterley, David Feldman and Martha Nussbaum all went to YIISA, radical antiracist scholars, who understand that critical theory was forged in the crucible of the struggle against antisemitism.  Dovid Katz, expert in the antisemitism which is portraying Holocaust perpetrators as anticommunist partisans; Deborah Lipstadt and Anthony Julius, scholars first, and heroes of the struggle against Holocaust denial; Jeffrey Herf, Esther Webman and Matthias Kuntzel who unearthed the evidence connecting Nazism to Islamism; Nora Gold and Phyllis Chesler who experienced and analyzed the back-stab of antisemitism in the feminist movement; the heavyweights of German anti-antisemitism; experts in Muslim, Islamist and Iranian antisemitism; veterans of Durban; the chroniclers of today’s British antisemitism, Shalom Lappin, Paul Iganski, David Cesarani, Michael Keith, Barry Kosmin and Mike Whine.

Just google at random some of those names. One or two, maybe more, might be genuine scholars of antisemitism but I wonder why the JC left out that piece of the article, even on-line. And I notice Hirsh doesn’t mention Itamar Marcus, a leader of the settler movement on the West Bank, in his list of great scholarly heroes or his “keynote lecture….titled ‘The central role of Palestinian antisemitism in creating the Palestinian identity’”.
But anyway, there is more on “antisemitism” as distinct from, even opposed to antisemitism. Engage has a resignation letter from a zionist philosophy professor from Birkbeck called David-Hillel Ruben to the Universities and Colleges Union:

As a life long socialist and a member of the AUT/UCU for almost 42 years, I could not have imagined that anything could have made me resign from the union. I have grown accustomed to the UCU’s annual adoption of illegal Israel boycott motions. But my imagination was obviously limited: the official UCU rejection of the European Union Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) working definition of anti-Semitism has accomplished just that. It has brought about my resignation from the union.
One part of that working definition rejected by the union stands out: it is anti-Semitic to ‘deny the right of the Jewish people to self-determination’, within some borders, unspecified as what they might be. It is hard for me to comprehend how anyone could consider this relatively anodyne claim as unacceptable, let alone reject it as a current form of anti-Semitism, which it most certainly is.

This represents a slipping of the mask. Advocates of the EUMC working definition of antisemitism have long argued that all the fears of the working definition’s opponents have been groundless by reference to a little preamble to the section aimed at protecting Israel from criticism and condemnation. Let’s see the that bit again:

Examples of the ways in which antisemitism manifests itself with regard to the state of Israel taking into account the overall context could include:

• Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, for example by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour.
• Applying double standards by requiring of it a behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.
• Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (for example claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterise Israel or Israelis.
• Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.
• Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.

The EUMC Definition goes on to state that criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.

Israel advocates, and only Israel advocate, argue that this is simply a good faith way of establishing that if you say any of those things in a certain environment or discussion then, the could and context caveats would suggest that a given statement was not antisemitic whereas in another context the same thing would be antisemitic. So in what context could it not be considered antisemitic to hold Jews collectively responsible for the actions of a colonial settler state based on ethnic cleansing, segregationist laws and relentless violence? I can’t think of any. I understand that it could well be construed as antisemitic to make the perfectly reasonable statement that the State of Israel simply has no right to exist or that Jews are simply not a legitimate case for self-determination but to make such statements directed at Jews because that would be holding all Jews collectively responsible for the establishing and maintaining of the State of Israel and, presumably all of the aforementioned behaviours required to establish and maintain said state. But I’m suspicious of whoever proposed and whoever supports this bogus definition. I want to know when or where they accept that it is not antisemitic to advocate the abolition of Jewish statehood.
Which brings me back to David-Hillel Ruben’s letter, posted on Engage without criticism:

As a life long socialist and a member of the AUT/UCU for almost 42 years, I could not have imagined that anything could have made me resign from the union. I have grown accustomed to the UCU’s annual adoption of illegal Israel boycott motions. But my imagination was obviously limited: the official UCU rejection of the European Union Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) working definition of anti-Semitism has accomplished just that. It has brought about my resignation from the union.
One part of that working definition rejected by the union stands out: it is anti-Semitic to ‘deny the right of the Jewish people to self-determination’, within some borders, unspecified as what they might be. It is hard for me to comprehend how anyone could consider this relatively anodyne claim as unacceptable, let alone reject it as a current form of anti-Semitism, which it most certainly is.

I know some people play all sorts of games with the concept of self-determination but the working definition makes it clear that “claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour” is an example of “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination”. And Professor Ruben cannot “comprehend how anyone could consider this relatively anodyne claim as unacceptable”. Because it involves ethnic cleansing, stupid!
But this isn’t about the stupidness of a professor, it is about the way antisemitism is being redefined not to protect Jews from racism but to protect a form of racism, zionism. The professor and Dr Hirsh have blown the gaff here. The assertion of a specifically Jewish right to self-determination is a red line that, among other things, the working definition insists must not be crossed. This line in the list exposes the caveats of “could” and “context” as the sham that they are and should arouse suspicions in any fair minded people being called upon to adopt the working definition as part of any anti-racist policy.
The Engage post goes on to highlight the refusal of the UCU to investigate “why people were resigning from the union citing antisemitism as a reason”. But what’s to investigate if they have made their reasoning clear, even if their reasoning is extremely unreasonable? There are or were people in the UCU who don’t want solidarity with the Palestinians and don’t want Israel criticised. They also want a working definition of antisemitism that is clearly aimed at stifling criticism of Israel to be adopted as policy by the union and possibly as law by states. Again I ask, what’s to investigate?

 

Mondoweiss Online Newsletter

NOVANEWS

 

U.S. Flotilla to Obama: Protect Us From Israel

Jun 19, 2011

Ira Glunts

The United States flotilla group, US to Gaza, reacting to Israeli threats of violence,sent a letter to President Barack Obama informing him that:

As U.S. citizens we expect our country and its leaders to help ensure the Flotilla’s safe passage to Gaza – as our country should support our humanitarian demand that the Gaza blockade be lifted. This should begin by notifying the Israeli government in clear and certain terms that it may not physically interfere with the upcoming Flotilla of which the U.S. boat—The Audacity of Hope — is part.

The group asks that people call the White House (202-456-1111) in order to express their support for the international nonviolent protest and to tell the President that they “expect [him] to take action to uphold the rights of peaceful citizens to safe passage on the seas.”

I have little hope that Mr. Obama would respond to a call to protect Americans from an Israeli assault. He has failed to do this in the past. But isn’t it a wonderful irony that the name of the U.S. boat is a phrase closely associated with the President? Although Obama is not on board, maybe there are groups and individuals who have not publicly supported the flotilla movement in the past that would, at least, demand strongly that the IDF refrain from using violence against citizens who are obviously peaceful demonstrators.

Isn’t nonviolent protest one of the tenets of activism for American liberals and progressives? So how about Americans for Peace Now, Netroots or JStreet? How about Peter Beinart or Rachel Maddow? Is anyone asking these groups and individuals to speak up?

Gideon Levy had a good piece in Ha’aretz today. He is in Stockholm speaking with Swedish participants and organizers of the upcoming Gaza flotilla. Levy says that he fears that the Israelis will violently attack the activists.

I told members of the group that Israel is determined to attack. One of them has already purchased a bulletproof vest. Israel well understands that these are people [who] are not threats, and that no weapons will be smuggled on the boats. Nonetheless, Israel makes threats, and the IDF naval commandos train for the flotilla’s arrival.

Also there is a report in Ha’aretz that in addition to the Mavi Marmara not participating in the flotilla, there will be fewer than the ten boats and 1000 protesters that had previously been announced. According to an unnamed source, the flotilla will be comprised of from five to eight boats and 300 participants.

The pressure  flotilla organizers face has been enormous. Their perseverance is a testament to their dedication and resourcefulness. The Israelis have enlisted the help of various governments, the Secretary General of the United Nations, and have intimidated shipyards and boat sellers. The Israeli/U.S. pressure on the Turkish government to stop the Mavi Marmara from returning to Gaza was immense.

All those who are sailing to Gaza at the end of this month deserve our admiration, support and prayers for a safe journey. The attention that they have brought to the Israeli siege has already shown that the flotilla has been a great success.

Update: On Sunday, Israeli Admiral Eliezer Marom declared the participants on the Gaza aid boats to be part of a “hate flotilla” whose only goal is provocation.

The Navy has prevented and will continue to prevent the arrival of the ‘hate flotilla’ whose only goals are to clash with IDF soldiers, create media provocation and to delegitimize the State of Israel,” Marom cautioned, speaking during the Israel Navy Divers’ Course concluding ceremony.

Israel approves the expansion of 2,000 settlement homes in East Jerusalem; Barak: ‘there is no real way to announce an end to construction’

Jun 19, 2011

Kate

Israel approves expansion of 2,000 settler homes
JERUSALEM (AFP) 19 June — Israel’s Jerusalem municipality approved the expansion of 2,000 homes in the settlement district of Ramat Shlomo in occupied East Jerusalem on Sunday, allowing each Israeli home to add an additional room, a council press statement said. The announcement of new settlement activity came as Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak told France 24 television that, “there is no real way to announce an end to construction. There’s half a million people living there.” Palestinian Authority officials were quick to condemn the statement.
4 girls arrested for ‘price tag’ violence
Ynet 19 June —  Police have arrested four female right-wing activists — three of them minors — on suspicion they torched Palestinian vehicles last month in Hebron. Officers suspect the girls have carried out a number of acts as part of the settlers’ ‘Price tag policy’, and believe that their arrest will restore relative calm to the West Bank. The Jerusalem Magistrates’ Court remanded by three days the arrest of one suspect, 20-year old Yaska Weiss of Kiryat Arba. Police first began suspecting the girls when a Palestinian vehicle was torched early one morning near Hebron. An ensuing investigation led to the arrests of two 15-year old girls and a 17-year old — all of whom reside in Jerusalem and the area. Weiss was arrested on Sunday. The investigation has revealed a number of other crimes related to an unofficial revenge policy upheld by right-wing extremists, termed ‘Price tag’, police say. Two of the minors were released under house arrest while the third remains in custody. Officers are planning additional arrests … The girls are being represented by Attorney Naftali Wertzbiger, who told Ynet this was one way teens relieved stress nowadays.

And more news from Today in Palestine:

Israeli undercover agents boast of killing Palestinians on TV
JERUSALEM (Ma‘an) 19 June — Undercover Israeli intelligence officers appeared on national television Saturday to talk about assassinating Palestinians in a program broadcast on Israel’s Channel 10. Oren Beaton presented a photo album of Palestinians he killed during his time as a commander of an undercover Israeli unit operating in the northern West Bank city of Nablus. Beaton explained that he kept photos of his victims. “This is a photo of a Palestinian young man called Basim Subeih who I killed. This is another young man. I shredded his body, and the photo shows the remnants of his body,” he said … The report was filmed in the Palestinian territories, and showed agents wandering around the streets of Ar-Ram in occupied East Jerusalem with handguns under their shirts, illustrating that the agents were still operating in Palestinian cities.

The agents, who speak fluent Arabic, are shown surrounded by masked Palestinian collaborators secretly deployed to the area to protect them … The report explained that officers conducted surveillance before an assassination, investigating the target’s friends and classmates … In this way, agents would put together an image of the target’s behavior and routine. Agent “D” said officers would then “seize the target and wait until the commander arrives to confirm his identity. Then we shoot him.” This confirms previous accounts from Palestinians who have said they witnessed Israeli agents shooting Palestinians at point-blank range.
link to www.maannews.net
‘Major ordered Palestinian run over’
Ynet 19 June — An IDF major was indicted Sunday on charges of overstepping authority and putting a life at risk by ordering a soldier to run over a 20-year old Palestinian with an army jeep. In another case, a lieutenant and infantry commander was indicted on charges of vandalism with malicious intent for torching Palestinian vehicles with his soldiers.
link to www.ynetnews.com
Israeli forces shoot, injure man near Qalqiliya
QALQILIYA (Ma‘an) 19 June — Israeli forces shot and injured a young man near a military base east of Qalqiliya on Sunday afternoon, accusing the man of running at soldiers with a knife. Eyewitnesses said the man was shot and detained by soldiers.
link to www.maannews.net
Israeli forces enter Tulkarem
TULKAREM (Ma‘an) 19 June — Israeli forces entered the northern West Bank city of Tulkarem Sunday and searched students at the Kadoorie Technical University. At least four jeeps were stationed at the entrance to the university and Israeli officers inspected students’ ID cards around the campus, witnesses said. A Ma’an cameraman was among those stopped. He said some students were detained for more than 30 minutes and subjected to body searches.
link to www.maannews.net
Land, property, resources theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Settlers
Cabinet votes to curtail Barak’s power to veto West Bank settlement construction
Haaretz 19 June — The cabinet voted on Sunday to curtail Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s authority to supervise construction in West Bank settlements. The proposal revokes Barak’s right to veto West Bank construction by the World Zionist Organization’s Settlement Division. The division budgets NIS 25 million a year for this purpose.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/cabinet-votes-to-curtail-barak-s-power-to-veto-west-bank-settlement-construction-1.368517
IOA serves demolition notices to citizens in Jordan Valley
JORDAN VALLEY (PIC) 19 June — The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) delivered demolition notices to Palestinian citizens in northern Jordan Valley on Sunday, locals said. They told the PIC reporter that the IOA warned four families in Hadidiya area that they should tear down their tents and tin houses within a period of one month and a half and leave the area at the pretext that their land is in the proximity of an army training field. About 110 Palestinians inhabit the area under severe deprivation of simplest human rights especially after a Jewish settlement was established on their land with only 35 individuals inhabiting it. The settlers blocked all routes leading to Hadidiya and prevented its inhabitants from passing through the gate erected by those settlers to separate them from nearby Palestinian cities such Tobas and Tamon.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bc
Live ammunition in Baten al-Hawa
Silwan, Jerusalem (SILWANIC) 19 June — Live ammunition was fired by Israeli troops in Baten al-Hawa district of Silwan last night, say eyewitnesses. Live fire was reported to be coming from the military occupied-roof of a Palestinian home. Fireworks were said to have been let off by local Palestinian youth. No injuries were reported, but a state of tension pervaded the neighborhood. The home was occupied under an Israeli military order. Troops use it as a strategic point to monitor movements of locals near Beit Yonatan settlement.
link to silwanic.net
Molotov cocktails thrown at settler guard jeep
Silwan, Jerusalem (SILWANIC)  19 June — Molotov cocktails were thrown at a settler guard’s armoured jeep in Bir Ayyub district of Silwan last night, say eyewitnesses. The cocktails were reportedly thrown at the jeep as it drove from Baten al-Hawa to Wadi Hilweh through Bir Ayyub, setting the vehicle alight. The guards stopped the jeep and extinguished the fire, and no injuries were reported.
The guards, whose salaries are paid by taxpayers through the Israeli Ministry of Housing have a reputation for violence in the village. Thirty-four-year-old Silwan resident Samer Sarhan was shot dead by a settler guard last September, and 17-year-old Milad Ayyash of Baten al-Hawa district was reportedly shot by a settler guard several weeks ago during clashes.
link to silwanic.net
Israel letting chaos rule in Palestinian villages / Amira Hass
Haaretz 19 June — Palestinian police are unable to operate in the area around Abu Dis, but Israeli forces don’t appear interested in stopping the villages from becoming a breeding ground for drug dealers and crime … The artificial division of the West Bank into Areas A, B and C, and to areas of authority and responsibility that are divided between the PA on the one hand and the Israel Defense Forces and the Civil Administration on the other, was supposed to come to an end in December 1999. Years later, Israel is very meticulous about fulfilling this paragraph of the second Oslo Accords, which limits the activity of the Palestinian police to a minimum
link to www.haaretz.com
Nablus village months without water
NABLUS (Ma‘an) 19 June — With both the Palestinian Authority and Israel’s Civil Administration abdicating responsibility, local officials say parts of a Nablus-area village have been without water for months. While drought is common in the mid-summer, many of the residents of Salem village have been purchasing high-priced water from local companies, or carrying buckets from municipal wells since the end of April … It is not just Salem village with problems, Ishtayeiyah told Ma’an, explaining that each month, Salem and the three surrounding villages are allocated 50,000 cubic meters of water. Salem’s share, he added “does not exceed 5,000, though we have 6,000 residents and need at least 18,000 cubic meters of water a month … “The village depends on raising livestock, they have to be fed and watered,” the official worried. Ishteiyah said the village council had appealed to both the Palestinian Authority and Israel’s Civil Administration, but had received no solutions to the shortage.
link to www.maannews.net
Gaza
Passports for all in Gaza? / Mohammed Omer
AJ 19 June — Some 30,000 Gazans have been denied passports in rift between Hamas and Fatah — In Ramallah, the Palestinian Authority recently decided to remove 141 Palestinians from the passport blacklist of 30,000 names. The move sparked a protest held by scores of Gazans who had been denied a Palestinian passport – and consequently had their mobility in or out of the Gaza Strip prohibited. Prior to June 2007, when Hamas routed Fatah from the Gaza Strip following internecine fighting, the majority of Palestinian passports were printed, and issued by, the Ministry of Interior in Gaza City. However, since then, the Fatah-backed government – based in the West Bank – has demanded that Palestinians who wish to renew their passports send their documents to Ramallah, where the passport administration is located. Some believe this was a bid to undermine Hamas – regardless of the fact that it was ordinary Gazans who would suffer, not Fatah’s political rival. The decision to ban many Gazans – who have documented Palestinian nationality – has included Hamas activists and officials of the de-facto government in Gaza, as well Fatah activists and other citizens who have no known affiliations to any political parties..
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/06/2011615112156348594.html
‘Silent war’ for attracting Gaza teens between Hamas, UNRWA summer camps starts
Gaza (Xinhua) 18 June — As the summer vacation has begun in the Gaza Strip, the UNRWA and Hamas, which rules the coastal enclave, established hundreds of summer camps, as usual, for Gaza Strip’s schoolchildren and teenagers to entertain them this summer. However, the “silent war” of attracting Gaza teens between the two sides appears to be even more fierce this year with respective strategies of two in dealing with local children, who aspire for spending their summer vacation at seaside of the poor and densely Palestinian enclave … Hamas’ summer camps focus on teaching the Holy Quran (Islam Holy Book) as well as teaching the real Islamic values and principles, while UNRWA focuses on the entertainment in the camps which it promote as “the summer games.”
link to news.xinhuanet.com
Israel to allow limited goods into Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 19 June — Israeli authorities will allow limited deliveries of goods and humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip on Sunday, Palestinian officials said.
link to www.maannews.net
Hamas: Rafah opening will not clear Israel of responsibility
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 19 June — The opening of the Rafah crossing should “improve relations with our brothers in Egypt,” Hamas politburo Osama Hamdan told Ma‘an on Thursday. Speaking with Ma‘an radio, the official said that regardless of the improvements made to life in the coastal enclave via the Rafah terminal, “we do not want to clear the occupation of its responsibility towards Gaza.”
link to www.maannews.net
Flotillas
Israel has no right to stop Gaza aid flotillas / Gideon Levy
Haaretz 19 June — Israel cannot be hurt by any imaginary danger the ships pose. Here from Sweden comes a final appeal to those who would block the flotilla: Please, just once, act with prudence, and abide by international law and simple justice.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/israel-has-no-right-to-stop-gaza-aid-flotillas-1.368463
Israeli navy commander: ‘Hate flotilla’ to Gaza must be stopped
Haaretz 19 June — Israel Navy commander Adm. Eliezer Marom issued a stark warning on Sunday for the organizers of the Gaza flotilla intended to set sail at the end of the month. “The Navy has prevented and will continue to prevent the arrival of the ‘hate flotilla’ whose only goals are to clash with IDF soldiers, create media provocation and to delegitimize the State of Israel,” Marom cautioned during a graduation ceremony of the Israel Navy’s submarine fighters.
link to www.haaretz.com
Gaza: Cradle of killing — Americans too / Ray McGovern
OEN 18 June — … I also have been cautioned by a source with access to very senior staffers at the National Security Council that not only does the White House plan to do absolutely nothing to protect our boat from Israeli attack or illegal boarding, but that White House officials “would be happy if something happened to us.” They are, I am reliably told, “perfectly willing to have the cold corpses of activists shown on American TV.” I mention this informal warning for the benefit of anyone who may have harbored hope that the U.S. government would do something to protect us American citizens from the kind of violence used by the Israelis against last year’s flotilla. It seems best to be up front and realistic about what to expect.
link to www.opednews.com
Detention
Israeli investigators assault minor in bid to elicit confession
RAMALLAH (PIC) 19 June– Israeli investigators in Etzion interrogation center severely assaulted a 16-year-old Palestinian boy from Hussam near Bethlehem in order to elicit a confession, the Palestinian Prisoner Society has reported. The boy, Osama Mahmoud Shousha, was beaten for forty minutes and then transferred to an investigation room where he was charged with throwing stones, PPS’s lawyer said. In an attempt to elicit a confession, the investigator threw Shousha on the ground while he was bound and blindfolded and placed his foot on his neck and then turned him upside down. He was also beaten on the head several times causing him to lose consciousness on separate occasions.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bcO
Israel wants freed prisoners sent to Gaza
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 18 June — Israel is objecting to the release of dozens of Palestinian prisoners with life sentences to their homes in the occupied West Bank in exchange for a captured Israeli soldier, Ma‘an has learned. Under a new proposal to arrange a prisoner swap of hundreds of Palestinian detainees in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, Israel wants certain prisoners to be released to Gaza instead of the West Bank. Israel’s Channel 2 television, meanwhile, has unveiled new details of the involvement of international mediators trying to arrange the swap.
link to www.maannews.net
Egypt: Shalit will disappear unless Israel compromises with Hamas
Haaretz 18 June — New Israeli negotiator reportedly told Egyptian intelligence officials that if Hamas did not agree to latest deal for prisoner swap, there would be no deal at all … Egyptian security officials involved in the talks told Haaretz over the weekend that the approach by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new envoy to the talks, David Meidan, could scuttle the negotiations and lead to Shalit’s “disappearance.”
link to www.haaretz.com
Activism / Solidarity / BDS
Protest organizer jailed by Israel for one year
RAMALLAH (Ma’an) 19 June — The Ofer Israeli military court sentenced popular protest coordinator Naji At-Tamimi to one year of imprisonment and a fine of 10,000 shekels ($2,914), his colleagues said. Naji and Basem At-Tamimi were taken by Israeli forces from their homes in April and held without charge. Naji was charged with inciting and participating in rallies and organizing demonstrations against Israeli land confiscation and settlement building. Israel has declared such demonstrations illegal.
link to www.maannews.net
Beit Ummar farmers barred from lands
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 19 June — Beit Ummar residents said Saturday that a protest demanding access to lands was quashed, and harassment from the Israeli military has continued throughout the week, as construction of a fence around part of the town was completed. The town, adjacent to the illegal Israeli-only settlement of Karmi Zur, stages weekly protests against the land confiscation, and has been a recent flashpoint with teenagers throwing stones at frequent military patrols. There has also been an increase in overnight detention campaigns by Israeli forces. Tear-gas canisters were launched at the residents, who marched from the city center toward the confiscated lands, with a local spokesman saying the hot canisters set fire to agricultural lands belonging to Ahmad Saleh Abu Ayyash and Hashem Fawzi Abu Ayyash. Local coordinator Yousef Abu Maria said a Swedish and an Israeli activist both suffered tear-gas inhalation, while Yatta residents and anti-confiscation rally supporters Rateb Yousef lA-Jbur and his son Luay were both beaten by soldiers during the protest.
link to www.maannews.net
Beit Ommar ‘in defiance of instruction’
ISM 19 June — On June 18 2011 the weekly Beit Ommar demonstration proceeded towards a fence which encircles the nearby settlement of Karmei Tzur and separates the village from some of its land. A number of protesters reached the fence and planted a Palestinian flag. Local women walked home across the land “in defiance of instruction” made by the occupational forces.   During the ensuing army response an Isreali protester and an international protester were detained and later released, and other protesters were hit.
link to palsolidarity.org
Dozens injured in violent crackdown on protesters in ‘Iraq Borin
NABLUS (PIC) 19 June — Dozens suffered breathing difficulties after Israeli occupation forces cracked down Saturday on continued marches in ‘Iraq Burin west of Nablus in the northern West Bank. The soldiers used rubber bullets and tear gas also injuring a 25-year-old Palestinian man in the hand. He was later treated at the local hospital. The IOF has declared the village a closed military zone and has blocked the entry of supporters
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2b
Video: Gaza Island
the global BDS (Boycott Divestment Sanctions) movement is calling on Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Laurie Anderson and Kiri Te Kanawa to cancel their 2011 Israel concerts and get on the boat!
link to vimeo.com
Political / Diplomatic / International news
Abbas, Mash‘al meeting postponed
RAMALLAH (AFP)  19 June — Talks between President Mahmoud Abbas, who heads Fatah, and Hamas chief Khalid Mash‘al on a new Palestinian cabinet have been postponed, a Fatah official said Sunday. The two senior political figures were due to meet in Cairo on Tuesday to discuss the make-up of an interim government of independents called for by a unity deal which rival factions Hamas and Fatah signed in Egypt last month. The talks have reportedly stalled on the issue of the Prime Minister who will head the transitional government, with Abbas championing his current Prime Minister Salam Fayyad despite objections from Hamas.
link to www.maannews.net
Resheq: Fatah asked for postponement of Tuesday meeting
DAMASCUS (PIC) 19 June — Political bureau member of Hamas Ezzet Al-Resheq has said that Fatah faction had asked for postponing the meeting in Cairo next Tuesday which was supposed to be attended by Fatah and Hamas leaders. Resheq told Quds Press on Sunday that Fatah chief delegate Azzam Al-Ahmed phoned Hamas and asked for deferring the meeting because Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas was still insisting that Salam Fayyad should be the premier of the next unity government, a thing that Hamas refused.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bc
Barghouthi urges speedy conciliation
GAZA CITY (Ma‘an) 19 June — Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative Mustafa Barghuthi met Sunday with leaders of Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip, saying the effort came in a bid to promote unity. Announced after Hamas officials in Gaza made clear that a proposed meeting between rival faction leaders Mahmoud Abbas and Khalid Mash’al would be postponed for at least a week, the Independent political leader Barghouthi issued a statement from Gaza, urging a speedy implementation of a unity deal inked on 4 May in Cairo.
link to www.maannews.net
Hamas: Mash‘al, Zahhar feud ‘behind us’
Bethlehem (Ma‘an) 19 June — A spat between Hamas officials in Gaza and Damascus “is behind our backs,” Hamas politburo Osama Hamdan told Ma’an on Thursday … The leader in exile had given Hamas approval for peace talks to continue under Fatah and PLO auspices, as the unity agreement was implemented and the PLO restructured. Az-Zahhar made statements shortly after the speech saying Mash‘al did not have the authority to speak for Hamas, a statement refuted by leaders in Damascus.
link to www.maannews.net
Peres: Time is running out on a Palestinian-Israeli peace deal
Haaretz 19 June — President Shimon Peres warned Sunday that time is running out on a peace deal with the Palestinians, saying the need for an agreement is “urgent.” Haaretz reported Friday on Peres’ concerns that Israel may become a binational state due to the continued freeze in peace talks. He was quoted as saying that Israel is “galloping at full speed toward a situation where Israel will cease to exist as a Jewish state.” In Sunday’s interview with CNN, Peres also said he does not see much significance in the Palestinians’ attempt to seek recognition of statehood in the United Nations in September.
link to www.haaretz.com
PA condemns Barak statements on settlements
RAMALLAH (Ma’an) 19 June — …In an interview conducted with France 24 TV network, Barak said “there is no real way to announce an end to construction. There’s half a million people living there.” The PA immediately issued a condemnation, saying it “considers such a statement unacceptable, as it ignores the fact that settlement construction is illegal under international laws.
link to www.maannews.net
Hamas ‘not involved’ in Dahlan dismissal
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) 19 June — Hamas was not involved in Fatah’s decision to oust former Gaza strongman Muhammad Dahlan from its ranks, Hamas politburo member Osama Hamdan told Ma‘an on Thursday. Hamdan told Ma‘an Radio that the Dahlan affair was an “internal Fatah issue.
link to www.maannews.net
Fatah officials visit Armenia in UN bid for statehood
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 19 June — A Fatah delegation arrived in Armenia on Sunday to strengthen support for the recognition a Palestinian state … In addition to Armenia, Shaath will also visit Moldova, the Philippines, Mexico, and Colombia in order to boost a UN bid for statehood in September.
link to www.maannews.net
Other news
Barcelona gay leaders say humiliated at Israeli airport
Haaretz 19 June — Foreign Ministry slams airport security personnel for ‘abusing’ the pair of leaders, who were officially invited to participate in Tel Aviv’s gay pride parade.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/barcelona-gay-leaders-say-humiliated-at-israeli-airport-1.368505
IDF holds drill simulating mass missile attacks across Israel
Haaretz 19 June — Home Front Command launches fifth major drill to prepare civilians in case of attack; sirens to sound across country on Wednesday, when citizens will be requested to retreat to nearby shelters.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/idf-holds-drill-simulating-mass-missile-attacks-across-israel-1.368482
‘Discovery of spy ring shocked Hezbollah’
Ynet 19 June — Kuweiti newspaper claims members of alleged espionage ring discovered among Shiite group’s ranks infiltrated top position within organization; had ‘unimaginably’ close ties with Israel
link to www.ynetnews.com
Report: Israel offers prisoner exchange for Ilan Grapel
Haaretz 19 June — Jerusalem authorities offer to release three Egyptians in Israeli prisons in return for Ilan Grapel, who is accused of spying on Israel’s behalf, according to an Egyptian news website.
link to www.haaretz.com
Former Mossad chief asked to return diplomatic passport
Haaretz 19 June — Channel 2 reports that Meir Dagan was asked to forgo passport after he publicly criticized Netanyahu and Barak for their stance on Iran.
link to www.haaretz.com
Analysis / Opinion / Interviews / Reviews
Haaretz editorial: Netanyahu is dooming Israel to live eternally by the sword
17 June — By declaring the conflict insoluble, Netanyahu is leaving no opening for reconciliation and understanding with the Palestinians and the Arab and Muslim world. — Author Etgar Keret, on assignment from Haaretz, accompanied the prime minister on his trip to Italy this week and reported on Benjamin Netanyahu’s perceptions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “This is an insoluble conflict because it is not about territory,” Netanyahu said. “It is not that you can give up a kilometer more and solve it. The root of the conflict is in an entirely different place. Until Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] recognizes Israel as a Jewish state, there will be no way to reach an agreement.” On Wednesday, Netanyahu reiterated this position in the Knesset.
link to www.haaretz.com
Interview: Alice Walker on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and the struggle for justice
EI 17 June — Celebrated American author and poet Alice Walker will later this month be among 38 people aboard the Audacity of Hope, the ship sponsored byUS Boat to Gaza as part of an international effort to break Israel’s maritime siege of Gaza. In a conversation with Ali Abunimah, Walker speaks about her thoughts on the eve of the trip and the parallels between the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and the Freedom Rides during the US Civil Rights movement when black and white Americans boarded interstate buses together to break the laws requiring racial segregation. The Freedom Riders were met with extreme violence — including bus burnings, attempted lynchings, jail and torture.
http://electronicintifada.net/node/10090
Video: A Gaza story
Egypt Reports 18 June — The statistics of Israel’s brutal 22-day assault on Gaza have been well-documented. Between December 28th, 2008 and January 18th, 2009 up to 1,400 Palestinians were killed, more than half of them civilians, including over 300 children. One of those children was Ibrahim Baraka, an 11-year-old schoolboy who was fatally wounded on December 29th, 2008 when Israeli warplanes bombed his house. His father, Suleiman Baraka, a Palestinian astrophysicist, was in the United States at the time working at Virginia Tech with NASA. Suleiman immediately left the US to be with his son, who had been evacuated to Cairo for medical treatment. On January 5th, 2009, Ibrahim died of his injuries … On our recent trip to Gaza, we visited Suleiman and his family in Bani Suheila. They were building a new house on the same site the Israeli military had bombed two and half years earlier. They had a new addition to the family, a baby boy, Idris, born in late 2009 – the same year Ibrahim died. Suleiman and his family hosted us for lunch and we were received with legendary Palestinian hospitality. Afterwards, Suleiman talked to us about his life, his work and his hopes.
link to egyptreports.net
No savior / Nathan Brown

FP 17 June — The West’s lofty expectations for Salam Fayyad went far beyond what he was ever able to deliver — If Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad’s political career came to an end today, he could still proudly claim to be Palestine’s most accomplished prime minister ever. The problem is that all of his predecessors — Ahmad Hilmi, Mahmud Abbas, Ahmad Qurei, and Ismail Haniyya — were impotent, transitory, or frustrated occupants of the post, and collectively set a very low bar … Neither the sunny nor the cynical view of Fayyad is fair. His optimistic smile obscured an impossible situation: Fayyad’s main achievement has not been to build the structures of a Palestinian state, but to stave off the collapse of those structures that did exist.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/06/17/no_savior
How can we get young Jews to hate Arabs in only 10 days? / Antony Lowenstein
Send them on the Birthright trip. Here’s an interesting feature in the Nation on the countless number of Jews who are sent on a short propaganda trip to Israel in an attempt to convince them that Arabs are terrorists and the occupied Palestinian territories are in fact Zionist land: Birthright’s boosters seem strangely unaware of the tribe’s more visible woes, the forty-four-year illegal occupation of Palestinian lands and the racism and legal discrimination that underpins Israel’s ethnocracy.

If the former was kept nearly invisible on my Birthright trip, the latter was laid uncommonly bare. Our guide was Shachar Peleg-Efroni, a second-generation secular kibbutznik. Several times a day he said things like, “Arabs are those who originated from Saudi Arabia.” Everything we saw out the tour bus window was “in the Bible,” reinforcing Zionist claims to the land. He used “Palestinian” interchangeably with “terrorist.”
link to antonyloewenstein.com
groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi (listserv)
www.theheadlines.org (archive)

Report from a police holding cell

Jun 19, 2011

Gideon Spiro

At 11 AM on Monday 6 June, a policeman knocked on my door and gave me an “invitation to report to the police for questioning” by 11:30!!! I was asked to meet with the investigator Shahar Weiss at the police station in the heart of Tel Aviv on Dizengoff Street. The invitation slip was signed by a police officer with the rank of chief inspector, named Osnat Peleg-Shvili, personal number 1027242. In a telephone conversation with Ms Peleg-Shvili I asked why I was invited for questioning, but she refused to go into details.

At 11:45 I was already in the station and looked for the investigator Weiss. He was not in his office. I waited in the corridor until a man in civilian clothes came along, and I asked him, “do you know Shahar Weiss?” “It’s me,” he replied. “I have been invited for questioning with you,” I said. “Wait, I’ll call you.”

A few minutes later I entered the interrogation room, and there I learned the reason for the investigation. An extreme right-wing group, some of them settlers, calling itself the “Judicial Forum” had filed a complaint of “incitement to violence” because of my “Red Rag” column called “Heart-rending scenes.”

My lawyer Avissar Lev pointed out that according to the twisted logic on which the complaint is based, the Ten Commandments are incitement to murder, lying and adultery. Just omit the words “thou shalt not” from the commandment, “thou shalt not murder”, and you have a commandment to commit murder.

I explained very patiently, and in basic Hebrew that would not be hard for the investigator to understand, that not only did the article not call for violence, it opposed it. The article dealt with an issue that is a legitimate part of the political discourse in Israel: are armed settlers part of the Occupation force, or are they innocent civilian passers-by?

My answer: armed settlers are indeed part of the Occupation force, even if they wear civilian clothes, and the struggle against them by the occupied people is not the same as attacking peaceable civilians. Towards the end of the article I wrote that, as a member of the occupying nation, it would be arrogant of me to presume to give the Palestinians guidance on how they should conduct their struggle against the Occupation; but if they asked me, I would say that I prefer non-violent struggle of the type being conducted in the villages of Bil’in and Ni’lin, which spares human life and moreover is often more effective. I do not know if the investigator reproduced my statement accurately. I did not read what he wrote.

Upon the conclusion of the questioning I was taken to the office of the officer Peleg-Shvili, and she said, “I am arresting you. What do you have to say?” “This is a scandal,” I replied. I have the right to notify a lawyer, so I called the Attorney Michael Sfard, the lawyer for human rights defenders, and Dan Yakir, the legal counsel for the Association for Civil Rights in Israel. They had difficulty believing what they heard. Ms Peleg-Shvili did not tell me exactly what I was being arrested for, but to her it didn’t matter, because it is not every day that a junior police officer [1] has a chance to ingratiate herself to the settlers. Then began the procedure for arresting a person who is suspected of having committed a serious crime. I was asked a series of questions (for example: “do you have suicidal tendencies?”). Some questions I answered, others I refused to answer. I refused every request to sign a piece of paper. I had the impression that the officer was surprised that I did not ask for mercy and beg for my life.

At the end of the questioning stage, a policewoman ordered me to go with her, and I was taken to the police holding-cell. The jingle of keys and the creaking of the hinges of the metal doors sounded very much just like in crime movies. The policeman responsible for processing new detainees ordered me to empty my pockets, the contents of which were put in an envelope. In the detention cell there were seven Palestinians from the Occupied Territories who had been caught while looking for work to get a little bread for their families. (In the language of abbreviation: “Shabahim”, which is the acronym for the Hebrew words meaning people illegally present in the country [2]). The cell was small, quite malodorous, with several places to sit. The ventilation was bad. The Palestinians were understandably a bit nervous, so they constantly smoked and the cell was full of cigarette smoke. Those who didn’t smoke, suffered.

The arrest of a journalist because of what he wrote, moreover at such an early stage in the investigation, and throwing him into a detention cell, is unprecedented in Israel. Especially when it involves a 76 year old man. The officer who decided that I should be arrested (it is not clear if it was her initiative or orders from above) sentenced me to death. Because for a man my age to land in a detention cell without advance preparation could lead to a fatal event, such as a stroke or heart attack.

Half an hour later I was called back to the chief inspector’s office. It turned out that they had forgotten to take a DNA sample from me. I’m a dangerous criminal, after all. I tried to refuse, but I was told that under the law I had no right to refuse, and if I insisted, the sample would be taken by force. Moreover, refusal would increase my sentence by half a year. They gave me the opportunity to consult with a lawyer and he confirmed that this is in fact the law.

A policewoman with surgical gloves took the sample and I was returned to the detention cell. Meanwhile more Palestinian detainees had been put in the cell, and it was more crowded.

Looking back, it seems that nothing was coincidental. After the death penalty by means of a health-related event was not carried out, there was a need to implement plan B. Not by coincidence was I put into a cell full of angry Palestinians. They were supposed to take revenge on me, so the police could then say, “see? Those Palestinians hate all Jews, right-wingers or left-wingers, it makes no difference to them.” There was just one problem: the Palestinians did not cooperate with the police. They did not take the hint. They treated the new detainee who joined them with complete collegiality. They offered me a cigarette, and I helped them get a lighter. It’s true that I suffered from the smoke, but in jail the rules are different.

What does a man think about when he is put into a detention cell for the first time in his life at age 76? He suddenly gets the familiar symptoms of one condemned to death, for indeed he could turn into a corpse at any moment. Your life passes in front of you like a film. What you accomplished, where you succeeded, where you failed, what will you leave behind? I was still lost in my thoughts when I heard the policewoman yelling to the jailer, “take the older man out.” The iron door was opened, I got my belongings and went up to the chief inspector’s office. My friend and lawyer Avissar Lev was already waiting outside. It turns out that the lawyer Michael Sfard did not rest, and he talked to everybody and his brother to secure my release on self-bail and bail from a third party. We went out onto the city streets, drank a cup of coffee and tried to understand what the meaning of all this was.

Beyond personal harassment – and years ago I was fingered by the settlers and the Israeli Right as an enemy of the nation, and I have received telephone threats more than once – my arrest had another objective unconnected to me personally, for after all even the most clueless settler must assume that a 76 year old man cannot be changed or intimidated. It was a message to young people: be careful, don’t express yourselves, and if you cross the line beyond what the Right will tolerate, you will end up in a prison cell. The norms of the violent and dictatorial settlers’ state are penetrating more and more into the State of Israel.

Settlers who complain about incitement to violence are like a man who murders his parents and then asks for the court’s mercy on the grounds that he is an orphan. An Orwellian phenomenon. The tyrannical pigs were insulted. The settlers, who are the refined expression of Israeli violence in the Occupied Territories, have suddenly become so sensitive that they ask for police protection from Gideon Spiro, whose only crime is that he does not join in the festival of killing Arabs, expulsion, burning mosques and stealing lands.

My message to the Judicial Forum is short and sharp: you are a bunch of thieves in the sense that you steal understanding. (The Hebrew expression genivat da’at means deceit or false pretences. Literally it means “theft of understanding” or “theft of knowledge”) You are immersed in Mussolini’s sauce. You support and endorse a regime of war crimes in the Occupied Territories. Your very being is incitement to violence. I despise you, and you will not succeed in silencing me. And if the decision is made to press charges against me, it will not be me who is on trial, but you and the Occupation. Even if you lodge a thousand complaints with the police, I will continue to say and write what is in my heart.

For years I have been telling Palestinians with whom I am in regular contact, when they ask my opinion, that I do not disagree that they have the right to resist and to revolt against the Occupation. Attacking an armed settler is not the same thing as attacking a peaceable civilian, but nevertheless it is better to conduct a non-violent struggle, for there is no such thing as a sterile armed struggle. It always harms the non-combatant civilian population as well. You should not take your inspiration from the Irgun, which threw bombs at markets and slaughtered civilians, but from Martin Luther King, who did not cooperate with the racist authorities. Moreover, in your present geo-political situation, faced as you are with an Occupation army that is armed to the teeth, along with its auxiliary settler army, the Palestinians have no chance in an armed struggle.

Therefore, there is no substitute for mass unarmed struggle. It is both the need of the moment and more just in principle. There is no force in the world that could contend for long with a hundred thousand Palestinians from Nablus, a hundred thousand from Ramallah, a Hundred thousand from Hebron and a hundred thousand from Bethlehem marching towards the settlements in a pincer movement, putting them under a siege of humanity with one demand: leave our land, and return to us what you stole.

I also had moments of satisfaction. After I was released I got many calls, most of which expressed encouragement and support. Human rights organizations condemned my arrest and demanded that the attorney general, the state prosecutor and the police commissioner launch an inquiry into the arrest, which the Association for Civil Rights in Israel characterised as illegal. Physicians for Human Rights, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Amnesty International, Knesset Member Zehava Gal-On and “Keshev” – the Centre for the Defence of Democracy in Israel, headed by the journalist Yizhar Be’er all demanded that the governmental authorities and the journalists’ association investigate how it happened that a junior officer blatantly violated freedom of expression by throwing a journalist in jail. In effect, this was state terror.

It seems fitting to conclude with the letter of the general secretary of Amnesty International Israel, Rachel Benziman, to the attorney general and the state prosecutor:

9 June 2011

To: Attorney Yehuda Weinstein, attorney general, and Attorney Moshe Lador, state prosecutor
Fax: 02-6467001 and 02-6467006

Dear Sirs,

The subject: the arrest of Amnesty International member Gideon Spiro – a grave violation of the right to freedom of expression.

Amnesty International has the honour of addressing you in order to request the immediate convening of an inquiry into the circumstances under which the decision was made to invite Mr. Gideon Spiro for questioning about an article he had published and on the decision to arrest him upon the conclusion of the questioning.

Mr. Gideon Spiro serves as a member of the audit committee of Amnesty International Israel, and he is a well-known veteran journalist and human rights activist. The interrogation of Mr. Spiro about an article he wrote, which to the best of our understanding and command of the Hebrew language constituted no grounds for an accusation of incitement to violence, raises a red flag regarding the set of considerations that guide the judicial authorities in the State of Israel.

Moreover, the decision to arrest Mr. Spiro at the end of the interrogation is even more serious. To the best of our understanding, there is no provision in the law that can justify the arrest of Mr. Spiro, who is 76 years old and a respected and law-abiding citizen who presents no danger to the public. There were certainly no grounds to fear that he would compromise the conduct of the investigation or flee justice.

The impression that emerges from the decision is that the central status of the right to freedom of expression in a democratic regime is not clearly understood by the investigating authorities in the Israel Police, and that the duty to uphold human rights is unknown to them. The arrest of a man for having expressed an opinion, who is moreover a journalist, is not only an attack on him personally, but is also likely to be understood among human rights activists and journalists as a “warning” that the police in the State of Israel are not obliged to defend their right to struggle for human rights in this country and in the world.

In the year 2011 Amnesty International documented attacks on freedom of expression, on journalists and human rights defenders in 89 countries in the world. The arrest of journalists is a practice that is characteristic of shady regimes, and the State of Israel must not make itself resemble them by adopting such practices.

In your positions of responsibility for the enforcement of the law in the State of Israel, we urge you to enact measures to ensure that incidents like this one are not repeated and that human rights are appropriately defended in Israel.

Faithfully yours,

Attorney Rachel Benziman
Acting secretary general
Amnesty International Israel

Translator’s notes

1. The word “officer” is used here in the military sense: i.e. the holder of a position of authority in a uniformed service. Hence although as a “chief inspector” she is a high-ranking policewoman, as a member of the police officer corps she is junior, because there are six “officer” ranks above her.

2. Shohim Bilti Huqiyim: literally “illegal stayers”.

Gideon Spiro is a veteran Israeli journalist, human rights activist, and a founding member of the Israeli refusers organization Yesh Gvul. This article was translated from Hebrew by George Malent and originally appeared in Occupation Magazine.

‘The truth is not easy to tell’: The story of Palestinian women in Israel

Jun 19, 2011

Eleanor Kilroy

Fatma Kassem was required to delete the word Nakba from her Ph.D. research proposal by Professor Yigal Ronen, former dean of the Krietman School of Advanced Graduate Studies at Ben-Gurion University in Israel; he also sent it to the university’s legal advisor for an opinion. It was only when the new dean convened an examination committee to consider the proposal that it was accepted without this erasure of the history of Palestinian women – the subject of her doctoral research. “When a Jewish Israeli scholar makes a critique of Zionist history, contemporary state policy or ideology, s/he is practising the freedom of research as evidence of Israeli democracy. However, a Palestinian researcher who addresses similar topics is accused of being a traitor or an anti-Semite”, writes Kassem in the book based on her research, Palestinian Women: Narrative histories and gendered memory (Zed Books, 2011). Her experience has also taught her that Palestinian women scholars are less valued than their male counterparts.

In a chapter, ‘The researcher’s story’, Kassem describes in detail the approval process for her proposal entitled ‘Between Private and Collective Memory: The Case of Palestinian Women from Lyd and Ramleh’. After initial approval by her supervisor, it was sent to the Krietman School, headed by Professor Ronen. In a meeting with Kassem, Ronen raised four main objections, the first of which was to the term she had used to define the purpose of her research: “he ‘could not accept that an Israeli citizen refer to our Independence Day as the Nakba’…. Professor Ronen reproduces in the Israeli academy the same denial of responsibility exhibited at the official state level in Israeli society for what happened to the Palestinians in 1948, especially those who became Israeli citizens.” The second objection was to her use of the term, ‘Hebraizing’ for the names of cities and villages after the creation of Israel in 1948; he insisted that all the names go “back to their Jewish origins” and if she refused to change the term, she should erase any sentences referring to this theme. Towards the end of the meeting, Ronen assured Kassem that he was “left wing politically”.

One 70 year-old potential interviewee responded by phone to Kassem that she would not tell her own story and, giving the author the name and contact details of women and men from Lyd and Ramleh, warned her: “you should know that they won’t tell you the truth. The truth is not easy to tell”. Another elderly woman said, “What is there to tell, about the huge extortion that happened to us. I’ll give you a clue if you understand: we used to say Yaffa-Tel Aviv, now we say Tel Aviv-Yaffa.” The women feared their ‘dangerous knowledge’ of 1948 might cause them trouble as Palestinian citizens of Israel.

The researcher found that another factor that silences women is the view of people that the independent voice of a woman is not perceived as deserving of academic inquiry. One interviewee, Um Fathi said: “I don’t have a life story. I don’t know how to talk like my husband. I only want to tell you the story of when we got lost.” When the Israelis expelled the Palestinians from Ramleh in 1948, Um Fathi and her 8 year-old brother became separated from their family and slept in wheat fields for a week until they were found and expelled to Khan Younis.

Ramleh appears on the road sign in both Arabic and Hebrew as ‘Ramla’, which is its Hebrew spelling, but this form has not been assimilated in the language of the city’s residents, according to Kassem. In a June 2006 article in Haaretz, the mayor of Ramleh, Yoel Lavie, proposed to change the name of the city to a Hebrew name. He argued: “The root of the word ‘Ramleh’ means sand… This name does not mean anything to the 12,000 immigrants from the Soviet Union and the 5,000 Ethiopians living in the city. It also means nothing to the large population of Ashkenazi Jews in this city. The name has no value, no uniqueness.” Palestinian resident (and director of the New Israel Fund Shatil’s Mixed Cities project), Buthaina Dabita, claimed at the time that, “The name change proves that Lavie feels he has not finished the occupation of Ramleh yet.”

Before and after the Zionist invasion of Ramleh and Lyd, many Palestinians sent female family members away or hid them in their homes. In a chapter entitled ‘The Body’, Kassem recounts that some women testified to covering their bodies with dirt or animal excrement to avoid being raped by Jewish soldiers. An interviewee, Um Usif, insisted to her, “You’ve heard about the village Deir Yassin, where there were lots of bad incidents. Rape. Murder of a child in his mother’s lap… I heard about Deir Yassin before we migrated.

That’s why our mother pressured our father to migrate. If my mother could have, she would have gone much further than Ramleh.” In the same chapter, the author states that today Palestinian women’s bodies continue to be oppressed and discriminated against in two ways: “First, Palestinian patriarchy seeks to actively control and supervise women’s bodies, and women consequently experience a range of violence, including ‘honour killings’. Second, their bodies are regarded as a source of the demographic threat that increasingly concerns Israeli authorities – that is their capacity to reproduce represents a threat in itself.”

Many women Kassem interviewed moved rapidly back and forth between contemporary reality, events of 1948 and the ‘Day of the Arabs’, which pre-dates 1948. Most stories include the demolition of either their family home or those of relatives. Salma recounts that following the earthquake in 1927, families who could afford to built new homes outside the old city, which meant the houses were relatively new in 1948: “They didn’t allow us to come back to our homes. We lived in the house of other Arabs, and Jews took our house. [Later] they destroyed it… I don’t understand why they destroyed the houses! They were new and in good condition… They [Israelis] left us nothing in the house near the mosque… Until this day, we did not go back to it.” Those Palestinians who did not leave, and those who returned, were never allowed to live in their original family homes. Their struggles for entitlement to their homes continue to this day, with women commonly describing living in the ‘ghettos’ of Lyd and Ramleh.

Kassem cites Israel academic, Haim Yacobi’s research into the origins of the term ‘ghetto’ amongst Palestinians, “originally used by Jews to mark out Palestinian territory in the city and simultaneously clear it of its ‘primitive’ Palestinian past in order to turn the space into a ‘modern’ Jewish city.” Salma describes her life in the ghetto to the author: “The people lived in the old houses and they [Jews] put a wire around them.

They were not allowed to go out from this area… If they wanted to bury a dead person they needed a permit… And there were old men [allowed to go out to bury the dead], so it was hard for them to carry the corpse a long distance, so they would bury them [in the nearby cemetery]… After two or three years, they [Palestinians] started to go out to buy and sell… If a man collected olives, they imprisoned him and hit him. They did not allow us to collect our own olives… The Jews patrolled with tractors on the land… What can we do? [We were stealing] from our own olive groves.” Another interviewee describes the Palestinians’ initial unfamiliarity with the term ‘ghetto’, and her eventual knowledge that historically in Europe ghettos were used by the Nazis to enclose, control and humiliate the Jewish people.

Language is important: when Kassem started writing up her research, the Hebrew editor kept changing the way she wrote ‘Palestinian’ to ‘Philistine’; Bible stories describe the Philistines as barbaric invaders of the land of Israel: “Reference to Palestinians as Philistines is also present in academic articles, Israeli television subtitles, and popular forms of writing”. It is a shame that the English editors of this edition did not ask an Arabic speaker to read the final proofs – where the original language of a term is included, the script is broken and back to front.

Palestinian Women by Fatma Kassem is a powerful historical document of the Nakba; her book examines the narratives of ordinary women who became involuntary citizens of Israel after witnessing the events of 1948, and whose subversive accounts have often not been heard outside the home. The women survived the expulsion from their homes during the Nakba, but continue to endure miserable circumstances. Recent demolitions of seven homes of the Abu Eid family in Lyd left over 50 members homeless.

Alex Kane reported in January that during the December 2010 demolitions, Israeli police brutalized the family: “Police hit them with batons and kicked women and children, including a pregnant woman”. In April, the Electronic Intifada attended the weekly demonstration against the demolitions and spoke to Suhad Bishara, senior attorney with Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, who said “what’s happening in Lydd and Dhammash is similar to building restrictions imposed on Palestinian neighborhoods across Israel and in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. The process of obtaining building permits is very difficult. People are trapped, because they need to build homes, but the authorities won’t give them permits. All claims related to the history of these families who have been in the area… it almost doesn’t play a role [in the legal procedures],” she said.

A. Loewenstein Online Newsletter

NOVANEWS

Censorship is fine for anybody who dares challenge Zionist apartheid

Posted: 21 Jun 2011

 
Index on Censorship highlights an apparent case of free speech being only acceptable to some (and as for criticising saintly Israel…):

The US State Department has withdrawn an invitation to Palestinian Majed Badra to attend a government-sponsored international exchange program for political cartoonists after deciding that some of his work was “anti-Semitic.”
The program, part of the International Visitor Leadership programme, brings to the United States for several weeks at a time emerging foreign leaders in business, government, media, education and the arts. Badra was originally invited last year to participate in a program specifically for political cartoonists from North Africa and the Middle East.
Programme literature says the exchange is designed to “explore constitutionally guaranteed press freedoms in the United States, and the accompanying principles of editorial expression” and to “illustrate the diversity of viewpoints held by Americans and how this diversity–reflected in political cartoons–contributes to a dynamic and pluralistic political system.”
Badra told the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press that his editorial cartoons are meant as a commentary against the Israeli occupation, not the Jewish people themselves. He said:
“I just wanted to express that I’m against the Israeli occupation, settlements, killing, siege and injustice, and how much we want democracy, human rights, freedom and two states solution. I’m open-minded, and I carry all the respect to people in the world regardless of their gender, religion, race or color.”
Badra said he was told his visa had been canceled on June 10, just days after it was first granted and more than a year after he had been nominated and accepted into the programme. He told RCFP that he took down his web site after US officials encouraged him to delete controversial cartoons to ensure consideration for future programmes.
The irony of the situation — exercising his freedom of speech cost Badra the chance to participate in a program championing freedom of speech — was not lost on the cartoonist.
“I just draw what surrounded me,” he told RCFP. “I draw the truth. We live in a difficult situation.”

Rapper Lupe Fiasco tells Fox that Obama is a terrorist

Posted: 21 Jun 2011

Surely all rather uncontroversial:
 

Nakba denial is an ugly thing

Posted: 21 Jun 2011

But Daniel Pipes has no hesitation leading the charge:

…The building of Israel represents about the most peaceable in-migration and state creation in history…Israelis should hold their heads high and point out that the building of their country was based on the least violent and most civilized movement of any people in history. Gangs did not steal Palestine; merchants purchased Israel.

Lockheed Martin loves rock and killing civilians

Posted: 20 Jun 2011

 
Sigh.

Zio-Nazi army Begins Dismantling the Wall in Bil'in

NOVANEWS

PSCC Logo
 

press release

21 June 2011

Israeli army Begins Dismantling the Wall in Bil’in
Six years into the weekly protests and nearly four years after the high court declared the path of the Barrier illegal; the army began dismantling the Wall in the village of Bil’in. But even according to the new path 435 acres of village land will remain behind the fence.

This morning army bulldozers began work to dismantle the Barrier in Bil’in. As early as 2007, after two years of weekly protests in the village and following a petition filed by the residents, Israeli high court declared the path of the Barrier illegal. The court ruled that the route was not devised according to security standards, but rather for the purpose of settlement expansion. Despite the high court’s ruling four more years of struggle had to elapse for the army to begin dismantlement. During these years two people were killed in the course of the weekly protests and many others injured.

Yet even according to the new path, sanctioned by the high court, 435 acres of village land will remain on the “Israeli” side of the Barrier.

Mohammed Khatib of the village’s popular committee said in response “On the ground, nothing has changed yet. All we know is that although the Israeli court officially pronounced our claims to be just, the army continued to protect the original route shooting and arresting protesters, thereby completely ignoring the ruling. We will continue to struggle until all the land is returned to our people and until we see an end to the Israeli occupation.”

For more information: Jonathan Pollak +972-54-632-7736

Although on 4 September, 2007, the high court ordered the state to come up with an alternative path for the existing Barrier in Bil’in within a reasonable period of time, many months elapsed and no new plan was offered. On the 29.05.08 the residents filed a petition to hold the state in contempt of the court due to this delay. In response to the petition, the state offered an alternative path. However, the plan failed to comply with the high court’s ruling as the proffered path left a large area designed for settlement expansion on the “Israeli” side of the Barrier. The only difference between the two paths being that the latter offered to award 40 acres of land back to the residents.

A second petition claiming the alternative path not in accordance with court ruling was then filed. On 3 August 2008 the court declared that the first alternative path indeed fails to adhere to the ruling. The court ordered the state to come up with another alternative path.

On 16 September 2008 the state offered a second alternative path. This path also left a large area designed for settlement expansion on the “Israeli” side, offering to return a100 acres of village land to the residents. A lawyer for the residents asked that the state be held in contempt of the court for violating a court ruling for the second time.

On 15 Decemebr 2008 the high court ruled that the second alternative path was not in accordance with the original court ruling.

In April 2009 the state offered a third alternative path which left most of the area destined for settlement expansion on the “Palestian” side of the Barrier, thereby returning to the village 150 acres of 490 acres annexed by the original path.

Zio-Nazi UN ambassador tells U.S. Jews: Prepare for September vote on Palestinian state

NOVANEWS

 

Ron Prosor urges leaders at closed session of the Conference of Presidents of major Jewish American Organizations to use connections to stop upcoming UN vote.

Haaretz

Israel’s new ambassador to the United Nations Ron Prosor urged Jewish American leaders on Monday to form a clear and operational plan ahead of the United Nations vote in September regarding unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state.

During a closed meeting of the Conference of Presidents of major Jewish American Organizations in New York, Prosor said that talk was not enough at such a crucial time, and that the U.S. Jewish community must prepare a clear operational plan.

In an unconventional appeal for unity, the new ambassador, who started serving as Israel’s UN envoy less than a week ago, urged the Jewish leaders to work together despite their differences ahead of the September vote.

Prosor stressed before the Jewish leaders that they must take advantage of the Jewish community’s connections with decision makers in order to get results.

Prosor also said that regardless of the outcome of the UN vote, a Palestinian state will not be created and added that the UN is not authorized to dictate borders between countries. He stressed that a unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state will bring about another cycle of violence that will only lead to a dead end.

Least week Prosor said that the September vote was at the center of the Israeli delegation’s life.

“The mission regarding the unilateral declaration is one heck of a challenge, but I believe the chances of the declaration to succeed are actually very small. It will only bring things back and take nothing forward; I say that as the director general of the Foreign Ministry during the disengagement from Gaza. Unilateral moves are not constructive,” Prosor said after his first day on the job, emphasizing that there was still time to act before the vote.

Former Zio-Nazi Prime Minister Olmert denies storing funds in a ‘secret safe’

NOVANEWS

 

Indictment says Zionist Olmert hid Talansky funds, in cash, in a safe in Attorney Uri Messer’s office; Olmert says description of the safe as ‘secret’ is unfounded.

Haaretz

Former Prime Minster Ehud Olmert denied on Tuesday the clause in the indictment against him that states he stored funds in his friend Attorney Uri Messer’s office in a “secret safe.”

The indictment states that “between the years 2003 to 2006, during the defendants’ term, among others as the Industry, Trade and Labor Minister, Olmert kept a ‘secret safe’ by means of his confidant Attorney Messer.”

Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during his corruption trial at the Jerusalem District Court on June 2, 2011.

The indictment goes on to state that large amounts of dollars, in cash, given by Morris Talansky were stored in the safe, as well as dollars belonging to Olmert which he had received from unknown sources.

In response to the accusation Olmert said “I unequivocally reject the argument as it appears in the indictment sheet. I did not keep a secret safe in any way or form. The claim in unfounded.”

Olmert strongly denied the term used to describe the alleged safe, saying “whether it appears in quotation marks or not, the term aims to claim that there was a conspiracy, hidden, and that it involves corruption, and I strongly deny the entire matter.”

The former prime minister concluded the first part of the testimony in his corruption trial on Thursday regarding the Rishon Tours affair, and started his testimony on the Talansky affair on Thursday.

As part of his corruption trial, Olmert was expected to respond to three main charges – Rishon Tours, the Talansky affair, and improperly interfering in decisions at the Industry Ministry’s Investment Center.

Olmert added that the manner in which the indictment presents the affair “is part of a pathetic and methodic effort” and said that the cash was “political money for funding my continuous activity between elections.”

Olmert added, however, that he was surprised to hear that Messer kept the money in cash. “In retrospect, I was surprised when I was told that it was in a safe. But there is nothing wrong with that. If the funds are legitimate, then keeping them in a safe is legitimate. What shocked me was the description of covert funds in a secret safe.”

Obama tells Jewish donors that U.S.-IsraHell disagreements are only ‘tactical’

NOVANEWS

Pro-Zionist U.S. President reaffirms his country’s bond with IsraHell is ‘unbreakable.’

Haaretz

U.S. President Obama told a group of his Jewish supporters in Washington on Monday night that “there may be tactical disagreements” in terms of how to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, but added that everyone shares the goal of achieving peace where kids can go to bed at night and not worry about missiles falling on them.

Obama also said to the group of Jewish donors that his most important message was that the U.S. and Israel “will always be stalwart allies and friends” and the bond between the countries is unbreakable. However, the U.S. President warned that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict needs a fresh approach, otherwise the results won’t be different than before.

President Obama took part tonight at two Democratic fundraisers at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington, DC, for the Obama Victory Fund. The first was a dinner with Americans in Support of a Strong U.S.-Israel Relationship. The second was dinner with the Mid-Atlantic Finance Committee, for about 100 participants.

If there were worries that Jewish donors would get cold feet this elections season, they were unfounded. The fundraiser was sold out, with about 80 participants with tickets that range from 25,000 to the highest possible, for an Obama Victory fund event of 35,800.

One of the hosts of the first fundraising event, National Jewish Democratic Council Chairman Marc Stanley told Haaretz in an earlier conversation that he “absolutely disagrees” that these elections will be more difficult with regard to Jewish donors.

“Key donors are much more savvy than Republicans would have you believe and have taken a much more critical eye towards Republican attempts to lie about the President’s record,” he said.

“I couldn’t understand why Haim Saban is news,” he said. “Saban did not give to Obama’s campaign in 2008. But, that does not mean Haim Saban has an issue with the President on Israel. In fact, he went on the record to the Washington Post to say that President Obama wasn’t anti-Israel and that using Israel as a wedge issue is wrong.”

Naziyahu: IsraHell needs to separate from the Palestinians

NOVANEWS

Zio-Nazi racist prime minister tells Nazi cabinet that it’s more important to ‘preserve a solid Jewish majority inside the State of IsraHell’ than holding land home to a Palestinian majority.

Haaretz

“”It does not matter to me whether there are half a million more Palestinians or less because I have no wish to annex them into Israel. I want to separate from them so that they will not be Israeli citizens. I am interested that there be a solid Jewish majority inside the State of Israel.”

The PM made these statements during a discussion on a report by the Jewish People Policy Institute on demographic changes among Jews and Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank.

Members of the institute presented the demographic data of Prof. Sergio DellaPergola, which show that, in a number of years, the demographic trends will result in a Palestinian majority between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

Ministers Limor Livnat and Uzi Landau were surprised by the data and asked that the data of other experts be presented – for example, the data of Yoram Ettinger, who is affiliated with the right. The right argue that the demographic threat to the State of Israel is not so serious.

The prime minister cut short the discussion and surprised those present with previously unspoken sentiments about the future Israeli presence in the West Bank.

“The debate over how many Jews and how many Palestinians will be between the Jordan and the sea is irrelevant,” Netanyahu said. “It does not matter to me whether there are half a million more Palestinians or less because I have no wish to annex them into Israel. I want to separate from them so that they will not be Israeli citizens. I am interested that there be a solid Jewish majority inside the State of Israel. Inside its borders, as these will be defined,” Netanyahu explained.

Aides of the PM realized how politically explosive his statements were and asked all those present in the room to avoid disseminating the details.

The Prime Minister’s Office did not brief the media on the statements and refused to respond to questions on the issue or provide any quotes about the statements of the PM.

US citizens to join 12-ship flotilla to Gaza Strip

NOVANEWS
 

 

New York – Organizers of a US boat that will join a humanitarian flotilla trying to break the Israeli sea blockade of the Gaza Strip said Monday they were only allowed to bring letters of friendship to Palestinians with them under US law.

A total of 36 US citizens and four crew members will assemble in Athens in coming days to board the US-flagged boat, The Audacity of Hope, and then join other ships in the high seas before sailing toward Gaza, possibly by the end of the week.

The organizers said the US government prohibitedthem from bringing humanitarian and medical assistance to Gaza, which is headed by Hamas.

Thus they said they will carry 3,000 letters to the Palestinians, but other ships may carry relief supplies.

The UN is opposed to the flotilla and has called on organizers to use land routes to bring relief to the Palestinians in order to avoid any confrontation with Israel.

The name of the US boat, The Audacity of Hope, is taken from President Barack Obama’s second book.

The organizers expect the flotilla to face the challenge of the Israeli Defence Forces, which in May, 2010 stopped a three-ship fleet that attempted to break the blockade. A clash aboard the Turkish Mavi Marmara resulted in nine people aboard the ship killed by Israeli commandos.

Leslie Cagan, the US boat organizer, called for Israel to end the blockade and for the US government ‘to play a positive role’ in the removal of the blockade, which Israel said was necessary to prevent arms smuggling by Hamas.

‘We are on a peace mission,’ Cagan told a news conference announcing the US participation in the flotilla. ‘We are unarmed, on a mission that is unambiguous and clear.’

Robert Naiman, the policy director of Just Foreign Policy, a private think tank who will be aboard the US boat said he and other US participants want to demonstrate their personal freedom and as peace activists.

‘We’re sailing to break the blockade on Gaza, which has subjected 1.6 million people to collective punishment in violation of international humanitarian law, as the Red Cross, Amnesty International, and Oxfam have stated,’ said Naiman said, who is a Jewish American from Urbana, Illinois.

The organizers said their boat will join the 12-ship flotilla and if logistics permit, it will sail to Gaza later this week. They said other countries taking part the flotilla include ships from Algeria, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Britain, France, Greece and Norway.

The Turkish ship Mavi Marmara has decided not to join the flotilla this time.