Mondoweiss Online Newsletter

NOVANEWS

• Zuckerman turned on Obama over Israel. ‘WSJ’ refuses to say so

• Is Occupy Wall Street anti-Semitic?

• Palestinian activist serves 9-month Israeli ‘exile’ from his family, returns home to occupied E Jerusalem

• Bill Kristol: ‘We need to hear’ that Obama has gone to war on Iran

• Oren rationalizes Israel’s isolation (then rants about Abbas denying 4000 years of Jewish homeland)

• Lionization of Edw Said at Boston Palestine Festival signals new moment of American Palestinian recognition

• Mohammad Bouazizi is the reason why Occupy Wall Street is happening

Zuckerman turned on Obama over Israel. ‘WSJ’ refuses to say so

Oct 16, 2011

Philip Weiss

This is crazy. The Wall Street Journal runs a long piece on Mortimer Zuckerman’s disaffection with Barack Obama and goes on and on about Obama’s economic policies, but says not a word about Israel. This is irresponsible and deceptive.

The record is clear. Zuckerman is a giant Israel lobbyist who fell out with Obama over Israel.Here he attacked Obama for his “betrayal” of Israel. Here he attacked Obama for playing the Middle East “game” all wrong by pushing on settlements. In this screed, Zuckerman wrote of “the hostility President Obama has shown to Israel from the start,” praised Netanyahu as a peacemaker and bashed Obama for even mentioning the ’67 borders. WSJ’s James Freeman:

A longtime supporter of the Democratic Party, Mr. Zuckerman wrote in these pages two months ago that the entire business community was “pleading for some kind of adult supervision” in Washington and “desperate for strong leadership.” Writing soon after the historic downgrade of U.S. Treasury debt by Standard & Poor’s, he wrote, “I long for a triple-A president to run a triple-A country.”

His words struck a chord. When I visit Mr. Zuckerman this week in his midtown Manhattan office, he reports that three people approached him at dinner the previous evening to discuss his August op-ed. Among business executives who supported Barack Obama in 2008, he says, “there is enormously widespread anxiety over the political leadership of the country.” Mr. Zuckerman reports that among Democrats, “The sense is that the policies of this government have failed. . . . What they say about [Mr. Obama] when he’s not in the room, so to speak, is astonishing.”

Is Occupy Wall Street anti-Semitic?

Oct 16, 2011

David Sheen

Are the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations anti-Jewish? That is what the Emergency Committee for Israel is claiming in a new video (below). The video features clips of Democratic politicians expressing sympathy for the OWS protesters, followed by clips of some protesters alleging a Jewish conspiracy controls the banking cartels that exploit the American people.

Of course, the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations are not anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish. That is to say, some of the participants are surely anti-Semitic, just as some are surely anti-Black, some are surely anti-Asian, and some are surely anti-Gay. All of these haters are probably found at OWS in more or less the same proportion as they appear in the rest of the population.

The attempt by the Emergency Committee for Israel to paint the entire
Occupy Wall Street movement as anti-Semitic when its messages are only
representative of an extreme minority and condemned by a large majority is a shoddy, sloppy example of how right-wing elements in the Jewish community cynically smear their ideological, and now their economic, opponents.

What the Emergency Committee for Israel has actually done by producing this pathetic piece of propaganda – as has Commentary magazine and other outlets, by uncritically re-broadcasting this disingenuous disinformation – is revealed that they are card-carrying 1%-ers. They are choosing sides against the exploited 99%. They should have the integrity to do so honestly.

But when they try to scare off other Jews from supporting the OWS protesters with obviously false claims of pervasive anti-Semitism, they are engaging in the lowest form of cowardice. As the 99% finally rises up, the 1% knows they will soon receive their comeuppance. So these modern-day slave-masters, the 1%, are trying to hide behind the skirt of American Jews, the 2%.

They are also stupid for not doing their homework; upwards of 88% of Israelis support the July 14th Movement, the ‘Israeli Summer’ that predated the ‘American Autumn’. Most Israelis agree that the wealthiest 1% are responsible for their economic woes. And here, it’s not just some CEOs that are Jewish, it’s almost every single one. Does that make nearly all Israelis anti-Semitic, as well?

David Sheen is a reporter and content editor at Haaretz Newspaper in Israel and has authored award-winning blogs on ecological sustainability and social justice. His website iswww.davidsheen.com

Palestinian activist serves 9-month Israeli ‘exile’ from his family, returns home to occupied E Jerusalem

Oct 16, 2011

annie

I can’t remember how I started following @sarahonline but it was one of my first days on Twitter. She generally posts events from Wadi Hilweh Information Center in Silwan in occupied East Jerusalem. Sometimes I imagine how every single violation deeply impacts one person or one family or one neighborhood and it sends rings of ripples like a pebble in water until it reaches me and I call back..I can hear you. Tonight I read how 11 year old Muhammad Abbasihad been abducted by ‘Israeli forces’…and other news.

This is just one of those stories.

Exiled activist Adnan Ghaith returned to Silwan on Wednesday 12 October after serving a 9 month ban sentence from his home town. Ghaith’s exile was extended by one month after serving the original 8 month sentence, when he was arrested and removed from Jerusalem the day that he finally returned home last month. The order was enabled on the strength of an old military order from the Mandate era in Palestine.

Ghaith has frequently been targeted by Israeli officials for what they deem “illegal activities” – Ghaith’s role as a local activist in the Popular Committee and his position as Secretary-General for Fatah in Silwan. Ghaith has been arrested and detained many times in recent years, including a 6-month administrative detention sentence.

Everyday Sarah and Kate and Seham bring us lists, how many can we even absorb?  Someday justice will come to Palestine. Welcome home Adnan Ghaith.

Bill Kristol: ‘We need to hear’ that Obama has gone to war on Iran

Oct 16, 2011

Philip Weiss

Bill Kristol writing at the Weekly Standard. Remember, Kristol is the voice of the neoconservative bloc in the establishment. Kristol and Robert Kagan and Bill Bennett wrote 10 years ago that George Bush should attack Iraq because “Israel’s fight against terrorism is our fight.” And Kristol got his way. This is the one reason I have sympathy for Obama on his capitulation to Netanyahu; he is doing everything to stave off the powerful forces that are calling for war against Iran. His saber-rattling in response to the kooky car-salesman plot is Obama’s way of propitiating a powerful constituency inside the Democratic Party too; on Fox News today Dianne Feinstein said, “The question is, Do we want to go to war with Iran at this time?” and though she said, No, our hands are full, she is obviously part of the problem. Kristol:

It’s long since been time for the United States to speak to this regime in the language it understands—force.

And now we have an engraved invitation to do so. The plot to kill the Saudi ambassador …

So we can stop talking. Instead, we can follow the rat lines in Iraq and Afghanistan back to their sources, and destroy them. We can strike at the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and weaken them. And we can hit the regime’s nuclear weapons program, and set it back. Lest the administration hesitate to act out of fear of lack of support at home, Congress should consider authorizing the use of force against Iranian entities that facilitate attacks on our troops, against IRGC and other regime elements that sponsor terror, and against the regime’s nuclear weapons program…

The next speech we need to hear from the Obama administration should announce that, after 30 years, we have gone on the offensive against this murderous regime. And the speech after that can celebrate the fall of the regime, and offer American help to the democrats building a free and peaceful Iran.

Oren rationalizes Israel’s isolation (then rants about Abbas denying 4000 years of Jewish homeland)

Oct 16, 2011

Philip Weiss

This is a landmark piece in the Washington Post, in which Israeli ambassador Michael Oren argues that If Israel stands alone, well, it ain’t so bad to be standing alone. It is a landmark because it reflects the news conventional wisdom even in the American mainstream that Israel has isolated itself (and isolated America with it). Note the defensive tone:

Isolation, of course, is not automatically symptomatic of bad policies…. Israel is not alone. And we have a great many friends, especially in the United States

Significant too, because Oren’s string of hasbara lies is now so tiresome that it reads like chewed over Soviet propaganda:

The settlements are not the core of the conflict. Arabs attacked us for 50 years before the first settlements were built. Netanyahu froze new construction in the settlements for an unprecedented 10 months, and still the Palestinians refused to negotiate. Settlements are not the reason that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signed a unity pact with Hamas in May, or why, in his address to the U.N. General Assembly last month, Abbas denied the Jews’ 4,000-year connection to our homeland. As Abbas wrote in the New York Times in May, the Palestinian attempt to declare a state without making peace with Israel was about “internationalization of the conflict . . . to pursue claims against Israel” in the United Nations, not about settlements.

 

Lionization of Edw Said at Boston Palestine Festival signals new moment of American Palestinian recognition

Oct 16, 2011

Philip Weiss

I need to take a breath and say that we are in an amazing moment in the United States where the racism against Palestinians is at last beginning to crumble. For that prejudice is the heart of the 64-year American failure on this issue: our racism against Palestinians, and our refusal to grant them the right of self-determination. That racism is ending.

Why am I hopeful? Because of Nicholas Kristof’s qualified endorsement of one-state in the New York Times, a democracy in which Palestinians could be a majority. Because of Mahmoud Abbas’s amazing speech at the U.N. that so elevated the Palestinian image in dignity and cooperation and international law at a time when Netanyahu and Obama look like thugs. Because of the Arab spring that is convulsing international politics and rocking our thinktanks.

And finally because of an email I got this morning “Homage to Revolutions Past and Present” about the Boston Palestine Film Festival. Look at the events. They’re at prestige Boston institutions. The Museum of Fine Arts, Berklee College of Music. Edward Said is a lion in these events. The Last Interview… And there is tons of stuff about Gaza. Gaza is entering American liberal culture. Our world is changing.

Mohammad Bouazizi is the reason why Occupy Wall Street is happening

Oct 16, 2011

Seham

Yesterday in Times Square (Photo: Twitter)

Protesters in Lisbon surround parliament
LISBON, Oct 15 (Reuters) – About 40,000 people marched in Portugal on Saturday as part of a global day of protest against the financial elite and hundreds broke through a police cordon around the parliament in Lisbon to occupy its broad marble staircase. It was one of the biggest turn-outs in any country and followed the centre-right government’s announcement on Thursday of a new batch of austerity measures.

‘Indignant’ protests to sweep across world
MADRID — “Indignant” activists, angered by a biting economic crisis they blame on politicians and bankers, vow to take to the streets worldwide on Saturday in a protest spanning 71 nations. It is the first global show of power by the movement, born May 15 when a rally in Madrid’s central square of Puerta del Sol sparked a protest that spread nationwide, then to other countries. As governments cut deep into welfare spending to try to trim huge sovereign debts, the protests have grown and this weekend’s demonstrations are being organised in Madrid, New York and around the world.

Dozens arrested in anti-Wall Street protests
Arrests come after protesters in New York celebrated cancellation of flashpoint park clean-up.

Occupy Times Square: Occupy Wall Street Protesters Swarm Midtown (PHOTOS)
NEW YORK, Oct 15 (Reuters) – Thousands of anti-Wall Street protesters rallied in New York’s Times Square on Saturday, buoyed by a global day of demonstrations in support of their monthlong campaign against corporate greed. Inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement, protests on Saturday started in Asia and rippled through Europe back to the United States and Canada. Protesters fed up with economic inequality took to the streets in cities from Washington, Boston and Chicago to Los Angeles, Miami and Toronto.

NYPD arrests Occupy protesters, non-protester at Citibank branch
Video has surfaced of NYPD police arresting Occupy Wall Street protesters for allegedly removing their money out of a Citibank branch. In addition, an arrest of a non-protester is shown in the video yelling, “What are you doing, what are you doing” as police took her into custody. WATCH: Video from Youtube, which appeared on October 15, 2011.

‘Occupy Wall Street’ protesters march on Chase Bank in NYC
Thousands of protesters marched in New York and Washington on Saturday as part of a global day of “outrage” against corporate greed that has seen rowdy demonstrations in dozens of countries. In New York, the protesters headed to Chase Bank in support of around 14,000 workers sacked by the lender in the wake of cutbacks made after a government bailout totaling $94.7 billion. Students, families with strollers and trade unionists, minded by a large police presence, then walked towards Wall Street carrying placards, stating: “We are the 99 percent,” “We are the people” and “Mr Obama we need you support.”

Chicago protesters hold ‘die-in’ at Bank of America
Approximately 30 protesters affiliated with Stand Up Chicago staged a “die-in” at a Bank of America on Thursday before complying with police orders to leave. “We are told in our baptismal vows and our ordination vows to resist evil,” one protester said before the event. “And I think the corruption and special interests that are going on in our country are evil. I’ve meet several dozens of people out here who have been foreclosed upon, dozens and dozens — hundreds perhaps — who are unemployed. And I think it’s quite evil when they sit in their homes, and their about to lose their homes, and while other people have many homes.”
link to www.rawstory.com

 ‘Occupy’ Protest Moves To Walnut Creek
With protest signs and chants ringing through downtown Walnut Creek, an “Occupy” group Wednesday evening expressed its frustration with inequities and corporate ties to the country’s political elite. Clyde Rich of Rossmoor decried “a toxic politics that is not only destroying the economy but the government and the American dream.”

Occupy Wall Street Protest Lands In Palo Alto
The Peninsula Peace and Justice Center organized a protest in front of a Bank of America on El Camino Real in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protests.
link to www.huffingtonpost.com

Protesters disrupt hearing on U.S. defense spending
WASHINGTON — Protesters disrupted a congressional hearing Thursday on US defense spending, with one demonstrator shouting “You are murdering people!” as police dragged him out of the room. Eight people were arrested, said Capitol Police spokeswoman Kimberly Schneider, including seven for disruption of Congress and one for simple assault. Stop the Machine, an anti-war coalition occupying Freedom Plaza in downtown Washington since last Thursday, said seven had been arrested, including Leah Bolger, vice president of the Veterans for Peace organization.

Occupy Redding: Ralliers decry greed; Marchers focus anger on JP Morgan Chase bank this time

Poll: ‘Occupy Wall St.’ much more popular than Obama, tea party

A poll by Time released Thursday, which asked participants’ opinions on President Barack Obama’s job performance, the impact of the tea party and views of “Occupy Wall Street,” contains a startling revelation that the national press hasn’t quite pieced together yet: the “Occupy Wall Street” protesters have a higher approval rating than President Obama.

Land, property theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing / Apartheid / Restriction of Movement

The Jerusalem Observer organizes a seminar entitled “the right of prohibition in Jerusalem and C areas
The Jerusalem observer for Human rights in cooperation with Beit E’nan forum organized a legal seminar entitled with the right to prohibition right in Jerusalem and the C area. under the international conventions’ Umbrella. Mr. Zaid Tubassi al Ayoubi the head of Jerusalem Observer for human rights  spoke and addressed the significance of the prohibition rights in the international treaties within occupation. The head of the observer presented the responsibilities of the Israeli occupation in Jerusalem and the West Bank  as an occupied territory, especially according to the fourth Geneva Convention, and Lahay treaty in 1967 which banded Israel as an occupation state to harm civilians and their homes and properties , insuring that all the occupation procedures particularly, evacuation and demolish ones that are carried out in Jerusalem and the C  areas , all these are considered flagrant violations for the Human International law. He also stressed at the end of the seminar -which has the   University students participants and a number of locals from Biet E’nan – on the necessity to activate the tools of the International law specifically , on the level of the international criminal court according to   its basic system  for the year 1988 which says  all of what the Israeli Authority does , are considered crimes against humanity, and war crimes ,especially , the operations of evacuation, the compulsory  immigration and house demolishing. The head of Jerusalem observer demanded at the end of his seminar the international organizations to hold their responsibilities concerning the Palestinians  protection from the scheduled and mannered  violations , in addition to bringing the Israeli leaders  who  are responsible for such crimes to the International Justice.

link to silwanic.net

UN: New e. Jerusalem construction plans ‘unacceptable’
Israel’s plan to build 2,600 housing units in Givat HaMatos detrimental to Quartet’s efforts to restart peace talks, UN chief says.

Red Cross slammed for silence over arrest of Palestinian lawmaker