Palestine: Occupied, Divided, Isolated, Oppressed and Unaided. By Stephen Lendman

Via: SteveLendmanBlog.

Imagine the following:

You’re ruthlessly oppressed in an occupied country under a system of institutionalized racism, affording rights solely to Jews. You have no recognized nation, no right of citizenship, no democratic freedoms or civil liberties, including no power over your daily life.

You live in constant fear, collectively punished, politically denied, and economically strangled in a continuing cycle of violence. Military orders deny free expression and movement, enclose population centers, close borders, and impose curfews, checkpoints, roadblocks, separation walls, electric fences, dispossessions, land seizures, and domination over all aspects of life under draconian military orders like the following:

– No. 92 giving Israel control of all West Bank and Gaza water;

– No. 158 stipulating that Palestinians can’t construct water installations without (nearly impossible to get) permit permission and those built will be confiscated or demolished;

– No. 1015 requiring Palestinians get permission to plant trees on their own land;

– No 128 authorizing the IDF to take over any Palestinian business not open during regular business hours;

– No. 107 prohibiting Arabic grammar, Crusades history and Arab nationalist publications;

– No. 101 banning gatherings of more than 10 people without advance notice with names of participants;

– Nos. 811 and 847 letting Jews buy land from Palestinian owners with or without their consent;

– No. 998 requiring Palestinians get permission to withdraw funds from their bank accounts;

– No. 818 authorizing how Palestinians can plant decorative flowers;

– No. 329 preventing the right of return; and

– Nos. 1649 and 1650 turning all West Bank residents (including native born ones) potentially into “infiltrators,” making them vulnerable to deportation, fines or imprisonment without IDF-issued permits.

Overall, your land is occupied, communities isolated, homes invaded, friends and relatives arrested, neighborhoods attacked, homes bulldozed, land stolen, fields uprooted and burned, businesses closed, and livelihoods denied. You’re impoverished, unemployed, starved, tortured, murdered, punitively taxed and fined, and demonized for being Muslims in a Jewish state. You endure it daily on your own unaided, yet you go on, hoping others later will do better.

BDS – Israeli Ships not Welcome in Vancouver

Via: VMC.

Dozens of activists set up an information picket at Deltaport this morning, designed to slow the transport of containers belonging to the Israeli shipping company Zim. Demonstrators gave truckers and passers-by information about the growing refusal by workers to unload and transport cargo from Israel or shipped by Israeli companies. Vancouver Media Co-op correspondents filed this report.

Film Festival’s Pro-Zionist Stance Displayed Again. By Dean Maloney

Via: Socialist Alternative.

The organisers of the Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) have disgraced themselves again. The festival counts among its sponsors the Israeli state – the very same state that is busy justifying the siege of Gaza, the demolition of Palestinian homes, the murder of peace activists and the ongoing ethnic cleansing of the original inhabitants of the land.

Last year, director Ken Loach withdrew his film “Looking for Eric” from the festival because of Israeli government sponsorship. He made it known that he was doing so in solidarity with Palestine. The festival organiser, Richard Moore, dismissed Loach’s request to drop Israeli sponsorship and Loach was accused by “respectable” opinion makers of everything from bullying to censorship – simply for standing on the side of the Palestinians.

In a jaw-dropping display of doublespeak, Liberty Victoria awarded MIFF and its organisers the Voltaire award for “outstanding contribution to free speech”. This “outstanding contribution” is alleged to be a “courageous stand last year against . . . the filmmaker Ken Loach… [B]y refusing to bow to the demand of Ken Loach that it reject a modest financial contribution from the Israeli Government”.

There’s nothing courageous about taking money from an apartheid state that is oppressing millions of Palestinians. Perhaps we can expect Liberty Victoria to give Pauline Hanson a medal next for “courageously” standing up to anti-racists?

Perhaps they will retrospectively denounce Don Bradman’s decision to ban the South African cricket team from touring Australia in 1971 as a spineless capitulation to anti-apartheid groupthink?

To stand with the Israeli state today is cowardice, and to invoke “free speech” to justify it is outright dishonest – this is a state where civil-rights activists are physically threatened in the parliament for speaking out against apartheid. As Loach said last year, “you either support the boycott [of Israel] or break it. For us the choice is clear.”

This year however, the film festival organisers have gone one step further. The producer of the joint Iraqi/Palestinian film “Son of Babylon” revoked any permission to show the film upon learning of the Israeli sponsorship, stating that the filmmakers “refuse to have any association with the state of Israel until they respect the human rights of the Palestinian people”.

Rather than praise the “Son of Babylon” film team for their stance, or even respect their wishes, MIFF ignored them. Moore, on behalf of the festival, first demanded money from the film makers and then proceeded to screen “Son of Babylon” despite the express wish of the director and producers.

Crisis. What Crisis? Profits Soar! By James Petras

Via: The James Petras Website.

While progressives and leftists write about the “crises of capitalism”, manufacturers, petroleum companies, bankers and most other major corporations on both sides of the Atlantic and Pacific coast are chuckling all the way to the bank.

From the first quarter of this year, corporate profits have shot up between twenty to over a hundred percent, (Financial Times August 10, 2010, p. 7). In fact, corporate profits have risen higher than they were before the onset of the recession in 2008 (Money Morning March 31, 2010). Contrary to progressive bloggers the rates of profits are rising not falling, particularly among the biggest corporations (Consensus Economics, August 12, 2010). The buoyancy of corporate profits is directly a result of the deepening crises of the working class, public and private employees and small and medium size enterprises.

With the onset of the recession, big capital shed millions of jobs (one out of four Americans has been unemployed in 2010), secured give backs from the trade union bosses, received tax exemptions, subsidies and virtually interest free loans from local, state and federal governments.

As the recession temporarily bottomed out, big business doubled up production on the remaining labor force, intensifying exploitation (more output per worker) and lowered costs by passing onto the working class a much larger share of health insurance and pension benefits with the compliance of the millionaire trade union officials. The result is that while revenues declined, profits rose and balance sheets improved (Financial Times August 10, 2010). Paradoxically, the CEO’s used the pretext and rhetoric of “crises” coming from progressive journalists to keep workers from demanding a larger share of the burgeoning profits, aided by the ever growing pool of unemployed and underemployed workers as possible “replacements” (scabs) in the event of industrial action.

The current boom of profits has not benefited all sectors of capitalism: the windfall has accrued overwhelmingly with the biggest corporations. In contrast many middle and small enterprises have suffered high rates of bankruptcy and losses, which has made them cheap and easy prey for buyouts for the ‘big fellows’ (Financial Times August 1, 2010). The crises of middle capital has led to the concentration and centralization of capital and has contributed to the rising rate of profits for the largest corporations.

Why We Boycott Israel. By Art Young

Via: Socialist Voice.

A REPLY TO THE U.S. SOCIALIST WORKERS PARTY

When Israeli commandos attacked the Gaza Freedom Flotilla in international waters on May 31, murdered nine humanitarian aid workers and seized the cargo of badly needed supplies for Gaza, they touched off an international storm of outrage that continues to this day. The widespread anger has galvanized the international movement in solidarity with the Palestinian people, drawing in new forces and producing new initiatives.

Following the attack on the flotilla, Palestinian civil society issued an appeal to progressive forces around the world to redouble their solidarity efforts and to strengthen the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign (BDS) against Israel. On June 7 the major Palestinian trade union federations appealed to dock workers to refuse to handle Israeli cargo. They said:

Gaza today has become the test of our universal morality and our common humanity. During the South African anti-apartheid struggle, the world was inspired by the brave and principled actions of dockworkers unions who refused to handle South African cargo, contributing significantly to the ultimate fall of apartheid. Today, we call on you, dockworkers unions of the world, to do the same against Israel’s occupation and apartheid. This is the most effective form of solidarity to end injustice and uphold universal human rights.[1]

Workers in a number of countries responded to this call.

Occupation by NGO. By Yves Engler

Via: CounterPunch.

The Humanitarian Invastion of Afghanistan

They’re called NGOs — non-governmental organizations — but the description is misleading at best, or an outright lie generated by intelligence agencies at worst.

In fact, almost all development NGOs receive a great deal of their funding from government and in return follow government policies and priorities. While this was always true, it has become easier to see with Stephen Harper’s Conservative Canadian government, which lacks the cleverness and subtlety of the Liberal Party who at least funded some “oppositional” activity to allow NGOs a veneer of independence.

The example of the NGO called Alternatives illustrates these points well. This group, which has ties to the progressive community in Canada and Quebec, has done some useful work in Palestine and Latin America. But, at the end of 2009 the Canadian International Development Agency failed to renew about $2.4 million in funding for Montreal-based Alternatives. After political pressure was brought to bear, Ottawa partly reversed course, giving the organization $800, 000 over three years.

Alternatives’ campaign to force the Conservatives to renew at least some of its funding and CIDA’s response tell us a great deal about the ever more overt ties between international development NGOs and Western military occupation. After the cuts were reported the head of Alternatives, Michel Lambert, tried to win favour with Conservative decision makers by explicitly tying the group’s projects to Canadian military interventions. In a piece claiming Alternatives was “positive[ly] evaluated and audited” by CIDA, Lambert asked: “How come countries like Afghanistan or Haiti that are at the heart of Canadian [military] interventions [and where Alternatives operated] are no longer essential for the Canadian government?”

After CIDA renewed $800,000 in funding, Lambert claimed victory. But, the CIDA money was only for projects in Afghanistan, Iraq and Haiti — three countries under military occupation. (The agreement prohibited Alternatives from using the money to “engage” the public and it excluded programs in Palestine and Central America.) When Western troops invaded, Alternatives was not active in any of these three countries, which raises the questions: Is Alternatives prepared to follow Canadian aid anywhere, even if it is designed to strengthen military occupation? What alternatives do even “leftwing” NGOs such as Alternatives have when they are dependent on government funding?

One important problem for Alternatives and the rest of the “progressive” government-funded NGO community is that their benefactor’s money is often tied to military intervention. A major principle of Canadian aid has been that where the USA wields its big stick, Canada carries its police baton and offers a carrot. To put it more clearly, where the U.S. kills Canada provides aid.

BDS in the USA, 2001-2010. By Noura Erakat

Via: Middle East Report.

Silent vigil on the Berkeley campus. (Riya Bhattacharjee/Berkeley Daily Planet)

On April 26, 2010, the student senate at the University of California-Berkeley upheld, by one vote, an executive veto on SB 118—the student body resolution endorsing divestment of university funds from General Electric and United Technologies, two companies that profit from the Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Proponents of the resolution needed 14 votes to override the veto and, as 16 senators had spoken in favor of doing so, it appeared a simple task.

But the vote in Berkeley had shifted the gaze of national pro-Israel organizations from Capitol Hill westward, begetting an unlikely alliance between the hawkish American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its self-proclaimed liberal rival, J Street. The two groups collaborated in lobbying efforts on campus to sustain the veto. Ultimately, two senators changed their votes and a third abstained, bringing the final count to 13 in favor of overriding the veto and five opposed. While adherence to student body procedure has blocked the divestment measure, the numbers indicate the strong support for divestment on Berkeley’s campus and can be regarded as a milestone in the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement.

The strident response to Berkeley’s resolution from off-campus groups reflects that the BDS movement is being taken more seriously by its opponents than ever before. Berkeley students have been at the forefront of BDS efforts since February 6, 2001, the day Ariel Sharon became Israeli prime minister. They erected a mock checkpoint on campus and unfurled banners exclaiming, “Divest from Israeli Apartheid.” Within the span of three years, this first university-based divestment campaign spread onto dozens of other American campuses as well as into churches and community organizations. Yet the movement did not gain international legitimacy and elicit serious treatment until a call for BDS came from Palestinian civil society in 2005.

Since then, and especially since the resounding failure of the international community to hold Israel to account for war crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead, the assault on Gaza in the winter of 2008-2009, the notion of extra-governmental tactics targeting Israeli human rights violations has permeated mainstream institutions. No longer the passion of idealistic students alone, BDS demands have reverberated within American retail stores, corporations and international multilateral organizations.

The Invention of the Jewish People. Book Review by Oliver Farry

Via: Irish Left Review (ILE).

Shlomo Sand, The Invention of the Jewish People (Verso, 2010).

Shlomo Sand, The Invention of the Jewish People (Verso, 2010)

Shlomo Sand’s The Invention of the Jewish People, an academically minded historical work that nonetheless spent nineteen weeks on the bestseller list in Israel, is a book that is much more incendiary than it ought to be. Sand’s basic thesis – that the Jews are a people whose identity was forged in modern times much like any other national group – is no more controversial than the theories fostered over two decades ago by Benedict Anderson in Imagined Communities, Ernest Gellner in Nations and Nationalism or by the various writers assembled by Hugh Trevor-Roper in the 1983 volume The Invention of Tradition. Nor is it a theory that would have seen as particularly dubious until recently enough.

What gives Sand’s book its notoriety – for such it is, among many of his compatriots, and probably more of the Jewish diaspora – is the implication by many that he is questioning the very right of Israel to exist. As Sand remarks in an afterword ‘A Reply to My Critics’, written for the English-language paperback edition, the assertion of denying the existence of the Jewish people is ‘often burdened with an evident and offensive accusatory slant that insinuates an equivalence with the outrage that is holocaust denial’.

Sand, a professor of history at the University of Tel Aviv, is sceptical that a pure, Jewish people, descended from the Tribes of Judea and Samaria, exists. For all his apparent radical background – he is a former member of the Israeli Communist Party but now describes himself as a social democrat – and his assertion that the land of Palestine was not the British Mandate’s to give away, Sand has no wish to see history rolled back and the Jewish citizens of Israel pushed out. He is not a supporter of a one-state solution, but only because he sees it as a pipe dream, and he is a passionate advocate of creating a state of Israel within its 1967 borders that is for all its citizens and not merely the Jews. This, of course, puts him in the front line of anti-Zionism, and makes him someone easy to dismiss for his opponents.

Taking Anderson and Gellner as references, Sand traces the roots of Zionism to 19th-century Mitteleuropa, and observes that, unlike the slightly older nationalisms of Western Europe (except Ireland) these nationalisms were shaped from outside, by the glacial heaves of declining imperial powers and the dynamism of Napoleon’s eastward match. Zionism had much in common with Slavic and Germanic nationalisms of the day, which were largely predicated on blood and ethno-territorial exclusivity. One of the nationalisms that it resembled most closely was the Völkish national cult fostered in Germany prior to Unification and after. With the levelling of the historical horizon that major events such as World War II and the Holocaust provide, such a parallel may seem perverse and even tendentiously offensive. But Jewish fascist groups existed in the 1930s (even if they were marginal) and on one particular occasion attempted to liaise with the Nazis to ‘export’ the Jews of Eastern and Central Europe as part of a mutually beneficial arrangement. This is not to load ever more opprobrium on the Zionist project but it is key to Sand’s idea that the creation of a Jewish people sharing the same bloodline is at best a fiction, at worst a fantasy.

Bourj el-Barajneh: Searching for Meaning in a Refugee Camp. By Ramzy Baroud

Via: The Palestine Chronicle.

A state of arrested development has defined this particular refugee camp. (IRIN)

Two young girls stood, as if frozen, starting below them at an ever vibrant Beirut. Their balcony, like the rest of their house and most of their refugee camp was of an indistinct color. It was dirty, as were their clothes. They, on the other hand, looked beautiful and bright, although their future didn’t.

Here in Bourj el-Barajneh, one of a dozen Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, time seems to have stood still for years. Generation after generation, children grow up in the same desperate reality, punished for crimes they did not commit, injured by a history not of their making. They stand on dirty balconies, cracked beyond repair, watching Beirut and the world go by.

The city is abuzz with life, politics, rumors, anticipation and intrigue. It remains perpetually divided between many worlds and contradictions, in a way that seems almost impossible to reconcile or bridge.

Bourj el-Barajneh has grown into a ‘municipality’ since its original inception as a ‘temporary’ accommodation for the Palestinian refugees who were expelled from their homes and land in Palestine between 1947 and 1948. The Palestinian physical share of the camp has largely remained the same, although the numbers have significantly grown. Influxes of Shia, Sunni, and more recently Iraqis have moved in and around the vicinity of the camp. Little was put in place to accommodate the natural growth, or to regulate the latter population influxes. Some self-servingly argued that allowing Palestinian refugees to improve their conditions would disconnect them from their homeland and sense of belonging. Therefore, suffer they must, with little work opportunity, no civil rights, and no cement or building material to repair their pitiful existence.

Release Mordechai Vanunu

Via: The Peace people.

CALL FOR FREEDOM FOR MORDECHAI VANUNU
ON NAGASAKI ANNIVERSARY, 9^th AUGUST, 2010

Many hundreds of people from around the World have signed an International Petition (http://humanrights.change.org/petitions/view/release_mordechai_vanunu), calling on President Obama, Prime Ministers Netanyahu and Cameron, and other world leaders, to ‘do all they can’ to gain the release from Israel of Mordechai Vanunu (the Israeli nuclear whistleblower).

Vanunu was released from Ramle Israeli Prison, on Sunday 8th August, 2010, after serving almost 3 months in solitary confinement under cruel, inhuman and degrading conditions. This further sentence was imposed on Vanunu for speaking to foreign media. Although now out of prison he is still not allowed to leave Israel. The draconian restrictions remain on him, and he is unable to speak to foreigners, foreign media, or move freely within Israel without Government permission.

Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate, who together with Gerry Grehan, Chair of the Peace People, launched the International Appeal for Vanunu’s release, said today:

“It is unacceptable that Vanunu continues to be punished by the Israeli Government for telling the world that Israel has nuclear weapons. After 18 years in prison (12 years in solitary confinement), and a further six living under severe restrictions, including the recent 3 month prison sentence, how much longer will Israel continue to punish Mordechai Vanunu for telling the truth?”

The people of the world can do something to help by signing the International Campaign online petition (http://humanrights.change.org/petitions/view/release_mordechai_vanunu) which calls on world leaders to act to ensure Vanunu’s right to freedom of speech and freedom to travel – basic rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and many other International Laws, which Israel continues to break and act with impunity.

August 10th, is the Anniversary of Nagasaki, the day on which we remember those who died in the second nuclear holocaust, which followed on the first nuclear holocaust of Hiroshima. We remember too all those who are working to rid the world of nuclear weapons and ensure “No more Hiroshima’s” “No more Nagasaki’s”. It is fitting we act to support Vanunu in his struggle for a nuclear free Middle East, and a nuclear free world. He has paid a high price in following his conscious and calling us to do the same. He has suffered enough, time to let him go free.

President Obama, who has expressed the wish (as Vanunu does) for a nuclear free world, has the power to help free Vanunu, who 24 years ago expressed and acted to fulfil such a vision.

Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate, Peace People, www.peacepeople.com
Tel: 028 90 66 34 65
http://humanrights.change.org/petitions/view/release_mordechai_vanunu

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Israel Releases Bogus Video to Implicate MK Zoabi. By Hanan Chehata

Via: Middle East Monitor.

Passengers on the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza have asked the Israeli authorities repeatedly for the return of their belongings and the release of the video footage they shot during the Jewish state’s attack on their boat, the Mavi Marmara, on 31st May. The Israeli assault took place over 10 weeks ago and yet it is only now that the authorities have released a 2 minutes 40 seconds video clip; but why now and why have the Israelis selected those couple of minutes from all of the hours of confiscated footage that they still have in their possession?

The Israeli authorities claim that the clip shows Knesset Member Haneen Zoabi in the presence of men from the charity group IHH armed with clubs, contradicting her claim that she did not see any flotilla members holding weapons. As a result of this video, there is now a call to investigate Ms Zoabi for her part in the violence that unfolded on board the Marmara.

However, in releasing this footage it looks as if the Israelis have shot themselves in the foot once again, because the film actually shows Israeli soldiers in a far worse light than Haneen Zoabi. In fact, it goes some way towards corroborating her version of events.

In the first of three short clips, Ms Zoabi is on screen for less than 10 seconds and she is simply in the distance walking towards the camera from the far side of the deck. There are more than 30 people milling around, only one of whom is shown for approximately six seconds holding what looks like a broomstick handle. The rest are tying on life jackets, filming the Israeli boats that are surrounding them and simply looking out to sea. At no point is Ms Zoabi seen anywhere near anyone with any kind of weapon.

Words without Borders “dialogue” violates Palestinian boycott call. By Haidar Eid

Via: The Electronic Intifada.

Words without Borders initiative does not explicitly oppose the many borders that exist for Palestinians under occupation. (Khaleel Reash/MaanImages)

An initiative recently launched by the prestigious online literature magazine Words without Borders entitled “Cross-Cultural-Dialogues in the Middle East,” rings alarm bells in light of the Palestinian civil society call for boycott divestment and sanctions (BDS) on Israel.

The initiators of this series of articles are Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi, who describes herself as being of Iranian Muslim background, and Chana Morgenstern, an Israeli fiction writer, who met as graduate students at Brown University in the United States. Van der Vliet Oloomi and Morgenstern are now in Jerusalem undertaking to travel around “crossing borders,” and opening “dialogue” with persons from many different cultural and political locations.

In their statement of purpose, Van der Vliet Oloomi and Morgenstern explain that: “We are hoping to gain a broader perspective on the ways in which contemporary Palestinian cultures negotiate the region’s complex and hybrid social landscape.”

They add, “The series, as we foresee it, will cover emerging guerilla poetry movements, collaborations between Israeli and Palestinian intellectuals and writers, interviews with international and local film makers, reviews of the Jerusalem Film Festival, as well as an overview of various grassroots cultural organizations in the West Bank” (“New Blog Series: Cross-Cultural-Dialogues In the Middle East,” 29 July 2010).

Though this statement of purpose may be intentionally vague, it is important for anyone who wishes to engage in serious “dialogue” in this area to be aware that a condition of utmost serious conflict exists between a colonial, apartheid occupying power — Israel — and the indigenous people. As part of a strategy for nonviolent resistance, the Palestinians have issued an international call for BDS against Israel until it complies with international law and respects the universality of human rights.

Briefly stated, the BDS call sets out the following demands: Israel must end its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantle the West Bank wall declared illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004; recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194 (“Palestinian Civil Society Calls for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel,” 9 July 2005).