NOVANEWS
Dear Friends,
I found it interesting that the international press, some 12 newspapers (from England, Scotland, the US, and Al Jazeera) said nothing about either the flotilla or Israel’s present doings, there was nothing. I mean nada. Most of the news is about Syria, Greece (its financial state and the protests), and Libya. Nothing of interest about Israel. The reason that I was scanning these papers was to see if they report anything about the upcoming flotilla and/or what I feel is happening here: Israel is preparing us, its citizens, for war. At least that’s what the local TV and radio reports do. We hear over and over again about the huge training exercises for police and military in preparation for the hordes of unarmed individuals who will invade it in September, To that was added today the fact that there is an enormous new bomb shelter in Tel Aviv that can hold a large number of people when the missiles start flying. If one listens to such reports, the ultimate sense that I get out of this is that Israel is preparing for war—one that Israel is likely to incite, while pretending to be preparing for an onslaught. May I be proven wrong, very wrong.
The 4 items below do not reflect my feelings on this issue. The first is a request to fill in a form that will be sent to Jello Biafra to ask him not to perform here but rather to observe the cultural boycott of Israel,
Item 2 is a press release informing us that the military used live ammo at a protest today and injured 2 people with it.
In item 3 Swedish author Henning Mankell wants to know who is masquerading in his name on facebook and in emails. He reveals why he participated in the past flotilla and why he plans to go on the upcoming one. And he reveals his feelings about the situation here.
Item 4 would be amusing were it fiction. Unfortunately it is not. The long and the short of it is “Netanyahu says there’s no solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “ Sad. No?
That’s it for this evening. I find things depressing now, and more so because no one else seems to. I’m sure that there are others who share my concerns, but they are so few, relatively speaking, that their voices hardly count.
Dorothy
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1. A request from Deppen. All you have to do is to fill out the form. I did, and hope you will consider doing so, too so as to ask Jello Biafra to observe the cultural boycott of Israel
http://www.freepalestinemovement.org/jello.html
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2.Press release
Wednesday, 15 June 2011
Two Protesters Injured by Live Ammo in Deir Qaddis
Demonstrators disrupted construction of a new neighborhood in the adjacent settlement of Nili. Israeli soldiers responded with baton charges, tear-gas, rubber-coated bullets and live ammunition. One organizer was arrested.
Two Palestinian youths in their twenties were hit by live ammunition today, during a demo against settlement expansion in the village of Dier Qaddis. One, a 24 year-old, was shot twice – in the pelvis and in the shoulder, and the second, a 22 year-old, was shot in the back of his thigh and will require an operation. Mohammed Amirah, a member of the Ni’lin popular committee, was arrested, apparently for incitement.
Media contact: Jonathan Pollak +972-54-632-7736
Residents of Deir Qaddis, accompanied by Israeli and international supporters, marched to their lands today in order to stop the construction of a new neighborhood in the settlement of Nili on their lands.
As the protesters advanced towards the bulldozers, Israeli soldiers and Border Police officers first fired a few rounds of live fire in the air and very quickly moved on to shoot tear-gas and rubber-coated bullets directly at the protesters. Despite the attack, demonstrators managed to reach the bulldozers and disrupt construction for half an hour.
As protesters retreated, soldiers followed them to the edge of the village, where clashes ensued and where the two were shot. In addition to the two hit by live ammo, six more were struck by rubber bullets.
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3.Haaretz ,
June 15, 2011
·
Will the real Henning Mankell speak up?
The best-selling Swedish author, who was part of last year’s aid flotilla to the Gaza Strip , ponders why someone has seized his identity.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/will-the-real-henning-mankell-speak-up-1.367761
By Henning Mankell
I am fascinated by all the new technology that creates places for us to meet in what is called cyberspace. I understand what it must have meant for the rebellions in the 19th century, especially in 1830 and 1848, when the mass circulated newspaper became so important for the spreading of information. I realize that Facebook today is a global success with more than 600 million users worldwide. But I also understand, maybe a bit sadly, that it is not for me. Perhaps it is because I am a bit too old? Or perhaps it is because I am more interested in exploring the epic text, which I have lived with for all my life. And that there is not enough time for me to be interested in everything that is new.
It was, therefore, a surprise to me when, in May, I discovered that there was a fake Henning Mankell on Facebook. Someone was posting strange, but most of all, untrue political statements in my name. On the fake Facebook profile it was posted, for instance, that I defended statements made by the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah. I had to do something. What would happen to my credibility if people started to believe that I supported Hezbollah? I declared to the Facebook organization that an impostor had kidnapped my identity and that the profile had to be removed. I also contacted the Swedish police and filed a report.
The fake profile disappeared. But a couple of days later it was back up. Then I told Facebook that they had 24 hours to remove the fake profile. Facebook removed it once again. And now they did it in such a way that it would now be impossible even for me to open a Facebook account in my own name. Fine with me.
Fake emails too
But a few days after that someone started sending emails in my name. In those emails it said that I did not want any Israelis to be able to read what I write in the future – neither my novels, nor anything else. This text, that I am writing here for Haaretz, obviously proves that the aforementioned email was false.
Who is behind all this? I can only establish a few things: that the impostors – I suspect it is not a single individual – were not entirely stupid. The emails were sent using Gmail, which makes it impossible to track, unless you file a police report – something I am contemplating. The perpetrators know French and Spanish. But on the other hand, the English, which is used in the emails is very bad and nothing is written in Swedish. (However, that could be an attempt to mislead me.
I do not know who is behind all this. But I can ask one question: Who would benefit from discrediting me? I can link this with the article that Haaretz published on Nov. 28, 2010 in which it was reported that the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs had sent out an urgent request to the embassies in London, Rome and Berlin, among other cities, to assemble a list of at least 1,000 “allies” in each country. Those allies should, through media and various forms of manifestations, be prepared to do what could only be labeled as PR for the Israeli regime.
Obviously I cannot and will not claim that it is either the Israeli regime or the Israeli embassy in Sweden that is responsible for my kidnapped identity and the attempts to spread lies in my name. But the question remains: Who would benefit from this?
And obviously it is only with the utter most contempt that I regard these people – their cowardly act of not telling me who they are, their pathetic and desperate will to discredit and lie instead of engaging in an open dialogue.
That this is not a “school prank” is obvious. It is a deliberate campaign directed against me, and it will not succeed. And the reason is that lies are not a useful democratic tool.
As I am writing this I am thinking about what probably takes place at the meetings where the Israeli military is trying to decide what strategy to use in order to stop the new flotilla. I am guessing that the fatal attack that was launched last year, in which nine people were murdered, will not be repeated. Israel cannot afford that. (That Ban Ki Moon has decided to alter his opinion completely and now thinks that the flotilla will be “an unnecessary provocation” is both sad and pathetic. He is determined to try to be re-elected and fully understands that to make that happen he will have to express the voice of his master, the United States, instead of saying what he really thinks. )
An act of solidarity
My participation in last year’s flotilla and my decision to join the upcoming flotilla are acts of solidarity with a single purpose: to try to participate in ending the illegal blockade of Gaza. Nothing else. This should be regarded as an honest attempt to contribute to a reasonable dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians. Moreover, the illegal settlements should be stopped and demolished at the same time. Then it is up to Israelis and Palestinians to decide what kind of future they want. One state? Two states? They should decide that. Not me, nor any one else. If the Israelis could only understand that what I am doing is in line with the most basic manual in solidarity. Non-violence, true humanism. Exactly what they themselves have, through history, asked for. And got – even from me.
One thing is certain: It cannot continue like this. An oppressed people will always rise. What is happening in North Africa is proof of this. And I notice that more and more Israelis in Israel talk to me about the political developments in their own country and how unbearable it is. They protest against the fact that the Palestinians are treated like second class citizens in their own country. Not everyone is narrow-minded. That hand in hand with this development there is also growing conservatism in Israel is not strange. Desperation leads to both reason and its counterpart.
As a writer, I am an intellectual. I believe in the ideals of the Enlightenment, I believe in the written word, in dialogue and in truth. I hate lies more than anything else. Most of the time I react by writing. But sometimes I believe that other kinds of manifestations are crucial. Like this flotilla. Its aim is peaceful. No weapons will be transported. Perhaps there are one or two knives in the kitchen of each ship to make it possible to cook. Or a masked commando soldier can show me one of my disposable razors – like last year – and tell me that it is a weapon.
The road to reason’s triumph can be long. And often unnecessarily so. But sooner or later the Israeli regime will be forced to realize that the Palestinians cannot be treated as second class citizens in their own country.
One last note: Last year, after I had been deported from Israel, I had a few literary events scheduled in Germany. I was happy to see that they were sold out everywhere. But I was also told that that were to be demonstrations outside the event, by groups protesting against my involvement in the Freedom Flotilla. I naturally went out to talk to these people. And I can assure you that there was no shouting or screaming. We managed to have a serious dialogue. Naturally we did not agree, but we listened and we talked. That is the way it must be done.
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4, Haaretz,
June 15, 2011
Netanyahu says there’s no solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
The prime minister’s trip to Italy does little for Israel’s prospects for peace with the Palestinians.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/netanyahu-says-there-s-no-solution-to-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict-1.367759
By Etgar Keret
The flight to Rome leaves in the middle of the night. When I finish packing my small travel suitcase, my wife gives me a scrap of orange notepaper. It isn’t meant for me; it’s for the prime minister. It reads: “Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu, I beg you do everything in your power to bring peace, for the sake of the future of our children and yours. Thank you, Shira.”
Explore the rest of the Haaretz 2011 Writers Edition, or head over to the Haaretz.com Facebook page to share your thoughts on this special feature. Kindle readers will be able to download the entire special supplement in the coming days.
I find this amusing, and she is offended. “What are you thinking?” I ask her. “That Bibi is like the Western Wall? That you can stick a note into a crack in him somewhere, pray a little and he’ll bring peace?”
“So forget the note,” she says. “Tell him something. Argue. Do something that will get him out of his bunker.”
“People don’t change their views that quickly,” I say. “Certainly Bibi doesn’t.”
“So you won’t succeed,” she says. “What do you have to lose? That you’ll look like a fool, the way I did with the note? So look like a fool, or like a pest. But at least try.”
At the hotel in Rome, Tal (the photographer) and I join the rest of the diplomatic reporters, who had arrived a day earlier. They tell me about their flight to Rome on the prime minister’s plane, which from their stories sounds like a real piece of jun They call it “the drainpipe,” saying the seats don’t lean back and have no legroom. They say they’re jealous of me and Tal because we came on a commercial flight.
We’re supposed to be taken from the hotel lobby to a joint press conference by Netanyahu and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. I ask them if they think anything interesting will happen there − some kind of new initiative, a headline, something that could help jump-start the negotiations with the Palestinians. It takes me only a few seconds to understand they don’t really believe anything exciting will happen here.
Army Radio, for instance, sent its economic reporter. If this had been a trip to Washington, the diplomatic correspondent would almost certainly have gone. But for trips like these − the kind that have to be covered but no one expects to produce any drama that would require the reporter to use his sources and connections in the prime minister’s entourage − even a reporter from a different field will do.
“You know,” one of them tells me, “seven years ago we were in Rome for a similar meeting, something utterly routine. And suddenly, in the middle of the night, [Special Assistant to President Bush] Elliott Abrams arrived − here, in this very lobby − and [Ariel] Sharon informed the Americans that he had decided on the disengagement” from the Gaza Strip.
“However,” the reporter hastened to reassure me, “Netanyahu isn’t Sharon. So there’s no chance anything will happen.”
At the press conference, we wait together with dozens of Italian reporters for Netanyahu and Berlusconi to arrive. Everyone is amazed by the blue-and-white tent the Italians have set up. It’s truly beautiful. I’m particularly impressed by the giant painting behind the speakers’ dais. In it, you see something reminiscent of David playing his harp and, beside him, something that looks like the severed head of Goliath the Philistine − what one might call the roots of the conflict.
When I ask about the picture, the Israelis have no answers, but they’re happy to accompany me to one of the Italian officials. To my question about who did the painting, the Italian answers, with a sly smile, “A good one.” Then he waves his hands helplessly and explains that “Berlusconi likes nice things.”
But after an AP correspondent, who has grown curious about the throng, asks the same questions, the official calls someone to find out. The complete answer will be given to the journalists later, from the dais, when Berlusconi will say he heard that people were interested in the painting. And, after giving the artist’s name and when it was painted, he will add that it depicts a 19th-century bunga bunga party.
At that moment, it will be possible to hear more than 100 journalists laughing in relief. Thanks to Silvio, they will leave here with a headline after all.
Even before Netanyahu and Berlusconi start speaking, one of the people in Netanyahu’s delegation volunteers to explain to me − with somewhat surprising agreeableness and sincerity − how the whole thing works: The Italian reporters will ask two questions and the Israeli reporters will ask two questions. The questions are known ahead of time.
I try to find out whether the reporters will then be able to raise their hand and ask something spontaneous. He says no, and explains: “Bibi and Berlusconi have important messages to convey and this is, in fact, their shared platform for conveying them. To put a leader in an empty studio in front of a camera feels too totalitarian, so they build an event like this where they can go up on stage prepared and transmit in front of the cameras the messages on which they have decided to focus. These bilateral meetings always have the phase of the friendly slaps on the back, followed by the getting down to business, and then comes the phase I call the fax phase…” the man explained.
Netanyahu and Berlusconi go up on stage. They begin with their speeches and then take questions from reporters. It goes just like the man from the delegation explained. The messages are sharp and clear: The problem is not the settlements; the root of the conflict is the fact that the Palestinians refuse to recognize the existence of the Jewish state. What the countries of the world have to do is expose the true face of the Palestinians and force them to recognize Israel not only as just any country, but as a Jewish state.
Berlusconi, who had warmly complimented Netanyahu and Israel from the stage, nods every time he hears one of the messages, and from time to time − before Netanyahu issues some powerful statement, along the lines of the Arab spring turning into the Arab winter if Iran gets an atom bomb − he preempts it by a second and gestures toward Netanyahu like a magician finishing a particularly difficult trick and waiting for the cheers of the audience.
After the press conference, we go back to the hotel for an intimate briefing for Israeli political correspondents with the prime minister. Before we enter the hotel room where we are to meet Netanyahu, we undergo a thorough security check. They X-ray my bag three times. It has a small metal object that could be a weapon. After a long search of my bag, they discover it’s my laptop plug.
The Israeli journalists take their seats around the table and wait for the prime minister. One of them suggests not letting it run too long; if it finishes quick enough, there will be time for a little stroll around the Piazza Navona before the PM’s(peole use the Hebrew abbreviation PM a lot, with its vaguely military feel) junk heap of a plane takes us back to Israel.
Netanyahu’s team is very friendly and attentive. They agree that, at the end of the briefing, Tal will take my picture with Netanyahu at the request of the newspaper, even though photographers have been banned from the briefing and the shot had not been coordinated ahead of time
I try to take advantage of their willingness a bit more and ask if I can ask Netanyahu only two questions after the briefing ends. The spokesman wants to know ahead of time what questions I plan on asking. I’m not surprised. In the few hours I’ve spent here, I already realize that in a dialogue between a journalist and a prime minister who feels persecuted by the media, there is great fear of an inappropriate question, almost as if I had managed to get into the weapons room.
I present my question. It’s not too difficult, but it’s still one for which the answer is not the need to expose the true face of the Palestinian leadership or, alternatively, that the Iranian nuclear program is not only a danger to Israel but to the whole world.
The spokesman tells me we’ll see at the end of the briefing if there’s time. And although he is very nice, it’s still clear to both of us that it will not happen and I realize that if I’ve made up my mind to try to speak to Netanyahu and look like a fool, I will have to do it in front of all the other journalists.
Netanyahu comes in and the briefing begins calmly and with smiles. The reporters and Bibi complain about the plane. It’s too narrow and the seats don’t tilt back. They took it because Netanyahu had, in the past, been raked over the coals by the newspapers for being ostentatious and wasteful and here we see things come full circle like every good morality tale; the people who wrote about the wastefulness now feel how unpleasant this frugality is for their back. Afterward we talk a little about the Iranian threat and a bit about Syria and how the Italians know how to put on an event, and how in Israel it will take 200 years to learn.
The briefing is already drawing to a close and I half push in and stutter a question. I travel a lot in the world, I say, and hear a lot of people who talk about Israel. Some love it and some hate it. But they all describe Israel as bogged down and passive. The Palestinians can initiate a flotilla one day and a declaration to the United Nations on another, while Israel, it seems, has no plan and can only react.
The prime minister objects and says these are the kind of statements that appear in the newspaper I’m writing for, but that does not yet mean it is true and that Israel actually has a great many friends, although we like to say it’s isolated. I nod and say that without reference to the issue of our friends, it is important for me to know what the government’s peace initiative is and what the plan is that we are promoting to end the conflict with the Palestinians.
The reporters around the table convey to me mixed feelings of empathy and impatience. They look at me the way I looked at my wife 14 hours before when she asked me to give Netanyahu a note from her. I feel as if they like this strange attempt of mine to get a pertinent answer from Netanyahu to my question, but for some of them at least, it’s a shame to waste valuable time on this empty move, especially when the clock is ticking and the Piazza Navona awaits.
The only person who treats the whole thing with patience and seriously is Netanyahu. “This is an insoluble conflict because it is not about territory,” he says. “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 recognizes Israel as a Jewish state, there will be no way to reach an agreement.”
The reporters around the table convey to me mixed feelings of empathy and impatience. They look at me the way I looked at my wife 14 hours before when she asked me to give Netanyahu a note from her. I feel as if they like this strange attempt of mine to get a pertinent answer from Netanyahu to my question, but for some of them at least, it’s a shame to waste valuable time on this empty move, especially when the clock is ticking and the Piazza Navona awaits.
The only person who treats the whole thing with patience and seriously is Netanyahu. “This is an insoluble conflict because it is not about territory,” he says. “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 recognizes Israel as a Jewish state, there will be no way to reach an agreement.”
Netanyahu made similar comments at a press conference a few hours earlier, but then it sounded like lusterless, recycled spin. Now that he was sitting across from me, looking me in the eye and explaining the same thing with endless patience, it suddenly sounded like the truth. Well, not my truth, but his truth.
I continued to nudge him, saying that even if all that was right, I still didn’t understand what pragmatic plan would come out of that conclusion. Netanyahu told me right away that the practical plan for advancing the peace process is to reiterate this at every opportunity.
“You have to see the effect it has on people,” he said, smiling. “You say it and they just remain slack-jawed.”
Just that day, he said, during a conversation with local politicians, he saw it happening before his eyes. Another writer at the table pointed out that we’ve said it more than once and it hasn’t convinced most countries. Netanyahu nodded and said the Palestinians have been spreading their lies for more than 40 years, and lies that have become so deeply entrenched cannot be uprooted quickly.
During the conversation the prime minister also mentioned an article he read about Ireland, which said more than 25 years had to pass before those who had been fighting England were able to moderate their position and become flexible enough to end the conflict. When I asked whether there wasn’t anything else that could be done for the peace process aside from reiterating the truths he announced to the world, the prime minister smiled a fatherly smile and said that sometimes we have to liberate ourselves of the feeling that everything is in our control. After all, it’s impossible to build an agreement on a lie, and until the Palestinians agree to accept Israel − not just as a country, but as the Jewish state − it will be impossible to move forward.
The meeting ended and we made way for the photographer ushered in by the spokesman, as Netanyahu, despite his busy schedule, willingly made time for the photo op. I watched from as close as I could. At Berlusconi’s press conference, I still saw in Netanyahu that slew of cliches that people typically attribute to him: scared opportunist wielding slogans just so he can hold on to his seat. But now, from a distance of just 20 centimeters, he looked like an obstinate and resolute man with an uncompromising, and very threatening, world view. I try to smile, but after this conversation I just can’t summon a smile, or hope. Just despair.
pk.
