Gazan students ask Canadian author not to go to Tel Aviv
Photographs from the Islamic University of Gaza
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The following open letter to Canadian author Margaret Atwood was issued by the Palestinian Students’ Campaign for the Academic Boycott of Israel on 4 April 2010:
An Open Letter to Margaret Atwood from Gaza: Don’t Stand on the Wrong Side of History
Besieged Gaza , Palestine April.4.2010
Dear Ms. Atwood,
We are students from Gaza representing more than 10 academic institutions therein. Our grandparents are refugees who were expelled from their homes in the 1948 Nakba. They still have their keys locked up in their closets and will pass them on to their children, our parents. Many of us have lost our fathers, some of us have lost our mothers, and some of us lost both in the last Israeli aggression against civilians in Gaza. Others still lost a body part from the flesh-burning white phosphorous that Israel used, and are now permanently physically challenged. Most of us lost our homes, and are now living in tents, as Israel refuses to allow basic construction materials into Gaza . And most of all, we are all still living in what has come to be a festering sore on humanity’s conscience—the brutal, hermetic, medieval siege that Israel is perpetrating against us, the 1.5 million Palestinians of the Gaza Strip.
Many of us have encountered your writing during our university studies. Although your books are not available in Gaza —because Israel does not allow books, paper, and other stationary in—we are familiar with your leftist, feminist, overtly political writing. And most of all, we are aware of your strong stance against apartheid. You admirably supported sanctions against apartheid South Africa and called for resistance against all forms of oppression.
Now, we have heard that you are to receive a prize this spring at Tel Aviv University. We, the students of besieged Gaza , urge you not to go. As our professors, teachers and anti-apartheid comrades used to tell us, there was no negotiation with the brutal racist regime of South Africa . Nor was there much communication. Just one word: BOYCOTT. You must be aware that Israel was a sister state to the apartheid regime before 1994. Many South African anti-apartheid heroes, including Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, have described Israel ’s oppression as apartheid. Some describe Israeli settler-colonialism and occupation as surpassing apartheid’s evil. F-16s, F-15s, F-35s, Apache helicopters, Merkava tanks, and white phosphorous were not used against black townships.
Ms. Atwood, in the Gaza concentration camp, students who have been awarded scholarships to universities abroad are prevented, every year, from pursuing their hard-earned opportunity for academic achievement. Within the Gaza Strip, those seeking an education are limited by increasing poverty rates and a scarcity of fuel for transportation, both of which are direct results of Israel ’s medieval siege. What is TAU’s position vis-à-vis this form of illegal collective punishment, described by Richard Falk, the UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian Human Rights in the Occupied Territories , as a “prelude to genocide?” Not a single word of condemnation has been heard from any Israeli academic institution!
Participating in normal relations with Tel Aviv University is giving tacit approval to its racially exclusive policy towards Palestinian citizens of Israel . We are certain you would hate to support an institution that upholds so faithfully the apartheid system of its state.
Tel Aviv University has a long and well-documented history of collaboration with the Israeli military and intelligence services. This is particularly shameful after Israel’s bloody military assault against the occupied Gaza Strip, which, according to leading international and local human rights organizations, left over 1,440 Palestinians dead and 5380 injured. We are certain you would hate to support an institution that supports a military apparatus that murdered over 430 children.
By accepting the prize at Tel Aviv University , you will be indirectly giving a slight and inadvertent nod to Israel ’s policy of ethnic cleansing and genocide. This university has refused to commemorate the destroyed Palestinian village on which it was built. That village is called Sheikh Muwanis, and it no longer exists as a result of Israel ’s confiscation. Its people have been expelled.
Let us remember the words of Archbishop Desmund Tutu: “if you choose to be neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” As such, we call upon you to say no to neutrality, no to being on the fence, no to normalization with apartheid Israel , not after the blood of more than 400 children has been spilt! No to occupation, repression, settler colonialism, settlement expansion, home demolition, land expropriation and the system of discrimination against the indigenous population of Palestine, and no to the formation of Bantustans in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip!
Just as every citizen knew that s/he had a moral responsibility to boycott apartheid in South Africa after the Sharpeville massacre, Gaza 2009 was the world’s wake-up call. All of Israel ’s academic institutions are state-run and state-funded. To partake of any of their prizes or to accept any of their blandishments is to uphold their heinous political actions. Israel has continually violated international law in defiance of the world. It is illegally occupying Palestinian land. It continues its aggression against the Palestinian people. Israel denies Palestinians all of the democratic liberties it so proudly, fictitiously flaunts. Israel is an apartheid regime that denies Palestinian refugees their right of return as sanctioned by UN resolution 194.
Attending the symposium would violate the unanimously endorsed Palestinian civil society call for Boycotts, Divestments, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel . This call is also directed towards international activists, artists, and academics of conscience, such as you. We are certain that you would love to be a part of the noble struggle against the apartheid, colonization and occupation that the Palestinian people have been subjected to for the past 61 years, a struggle that is ongoing.
Ms. Atwood, we consider you to be what the late Edward Said called an “oppositional intellectual.” As such, and given our veneration of your work, we would be both emotionally and psychologically wounded to see you attend the symposium. You are a great woman of words, of that we have no doubt. But we think you would agree, too, that actions speak louder than words. We all await your decision.
The Palestinian Students’ Campaign for the Academic Boycott of Israel (PSCABI) Endorsed by The University Teachers’ Association in Palestine
Illinois Rep. Kirk has to hide his Israel love away
By Jeffrey Blankfort on April 5, 2010
Here is a what appears to be a very strange situation, but is not so strange after all. This link is to Illinois Rep. Mark Kirk’s page for Jewish voters, replete with Hebrew, which makes it appear that he is running for the Israeli Knesset and not the US Congress. Now this link is to his Senate campaign home page, where I was unable to find any link to his pro-Israel page (oh, wait, you can find it when you click on National Security issues).
Lawsuit challenges Israel’s discriminatory citizenship definition
By Jonathan Cook, The Electronic Intifada, 6 April 2010
A group of Jews and Arabs are fighting in the Israeli courts to be recognized as “Israelis,” a nationality currently denied them, in a case that officials fear may threaten the country’s self-declared status as a Jewish state.
Israel refused to recognize an Israeli nationality at the country’s establishment in 1948, making an unusual distinction between “citizenship” and “nationality.” Although all Israelis qualify as “citizens of Israel,” the state is defined as belonging to the “Jewish nation,” meaning not only the 5.6 million Israeli Jews but also more than seven million Jews in the diaspora.
Critics say the special status of Jewish nationality has been a way to undermine the citizenship rights of non-Jews in Israel, especially the fifth of the population who are Arab. Some 30 laws in Israel specifically privilege Jews, including in the areas of immigration rights, naturalization, access to land and employment.
Arab leaders have also long complained that indications of “Arab” nationality on ID cards make it easy for police and government officials to target Arab citizens for harsher treatment.
The interior ministry has adopted more than 130 possible nationalities for Israeli citizens, most of them defined in religious or ethnic terms, with “Jewish” and “Arab” being the main categories.
The group’s legal case is being heard by the high court after a district judge rejected their petition two years ago, backing the state’s position that there is no Israeli nation.
The head of the campaign for Israeli nationality, Uzi Ornan, a retired linguistics professor, said: “It is absurd that Israel, which recognizes dozens of different nationalities, refuses to recognize the one nationality it is supposed to represent.”
The government opposes the case, claiming that the campaign’s real goal is to “undermine the state’s infrastructure” — a presumed reference to laws and official institutions that ensure Jewish citizens enjoy a privileged status in Israel.
Ornan, 86, said that denying a common Israeli nationality was the linchpin of state-sanctioned discrimination against the Arab population.
“There are even two laws — the Law of Return for Jews and the Citizenship Law for Arabs — that determine how you belong to the state,” he said. “What kind of democracy divides its citizens into two kinds?”
Yoel Harshefi, a lawyer supporting Ornan, said the interior ministry had resorted to creating national groups with no legal recognition outside Israel, such as “Arab” or “unknown,” to avoid recognizing an Israeli nationality.
In official documents most Israelis are classified as “Jewish” or “Arab,” but immigrants whose status as Jews is questioned by the Israeli rabbinate, including more than 300,000 arrivals from the former Soviet Union, are typically registered according to their country of origin.
“Imagine the uproar in Jewish communities in the United States, Britain or France, if the authorities there tried to classify their citizens as ‘Jewish’ or ‘Christian,'” said Ornan.
The professor, who lives close to Haifa, launched his legal action after the interior ministry refused to change his nationality to “Israeli” in 2000. An online petition declaring “I am an Israeli” has attracted several thousand signatures.
Ornan has been joined in his action by 20 other public figures, including former government minister Shulamit Aloni. Several members have been registered with unusual nationalities such as “Russian,” “Buddhist,” “Georgian” and “Burmese.”
Two Arabs are party to the case, including Adel Kadaan, who courted controversy in the 1990s by waging a lengthy legal action to be allowed to live in one of several hundred communities in Israel open only to Jews.
Uri Avnery, a peace activist and former member of the parliament, said the current nationality system gave Jews living abroad a far greater stake in Israel than its 1.3 million Arab citizens.
“The State of Israel cannot recognize an ‘Israeli’ nation because it is the state of the ‘Jewish’ nation … it belongs to the Jews of Brooklyn, Budapest and Buenos Aires, even though these consider themselves as belonging to the American, Hungarian or Argentine nations.”
International Zionist organizations representing the diaspora, such as the Jewish National Fund and the Jewish Agency, are given in Israeli law a special, quasi-governmental role, especially in relation to immigration and control over large areas of Israeli territory for the settlement of Jews only.
Ornan said the lack of a common nationality violated Israel’s Declaration of Independence, which says the state will “uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of religion, race or sex.”
Indications of nationality on ID cards carried by Israelis made it easy for officials to discriminate against Arab citizens, he added.
The government has countered that the nationality section on ID cards was phased out from 2000 — after the interior ministry, which was run by a religious party at the time, objected to a court order requiring it to identify non-Orthodox Jews as “Jewish” on the cards.
However, Ornan said any official could instantly tell if he was looking at the card of a Jew or Arab because the date of birth on the IDs of Jews was given according to the Hebrew calendar. In addition, the ID of an Arab, unlike a Jew, included the grandfather’s name.
“Flash your ID card and whatever government clerk is sitting across from you immediately knows which ‘clan’ you belong to, and can refer you to those best suited to ‘handle your kind,'” Ornan said.
The distinction between Jewish and Arab nationalities is also shown on interior ministry records used to make important decisions about personal status issues such as marriage, divorce and death, which are dealt with on entirely sectarian terms.
Only Israelis from the same religious group, for example, are allowed to marry inside Israel — otherwise they are forced to wed abroad — and cemeteries are separated according to religious belonging.
Some of those who have joined the campaign complain that it has damaged their business interests. One Druze member, Carmel Wahaba, said he had lost the chance to establish an import-export company in France because officials there refused to accept documents stating his nationality as “Druze” rather than “Israeli.”
The group also said it hoped to expose a verbal sleight of hand that intentionally mistranslates the Hebrew term “Israeli citizenship” on the country’s passports as “Israeli nationality” in English to avoid problems with foreign border officials.
B Michael, a commentator for Yedioth Aharonoth, Israel’s most popular newspaper, has observed: “We are all Israeli nationals — but only abroad.”
The campaign, however, is likely to face an uphill struggle in the courts.
A similar legal suit brought by a Tel Aviv psychologist, George Tamrin, failed in 1970. Shimon Agranat, head of the high court at the time, ruled: “There is no Israeli nation separate from the Jewish people. … The Jewish people is composed not only of those residing in Israel but also of diaspora Jewries.”
That view was echoed by the district court in 2008 when it heard Ornan’s case.
The judges in the high court, which held the first appeal hearing last month, indicated that they too were likely to be unsympathetic. Justice Uzi Fogelman said: “The question is whether or not the court is the right place to solve this problem.”
Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel.
Kyrgyz protesters seize government office
Daily News with wires | April 6, 2010
BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan – Angry protestors burst through police lines and storm government offices in a remote regional center in the northwest of ex-Soviet Kyrgyzstan. A series of nationwide rallies is planned for Wednesday and analysts said they believe the unrest could spread
Hundreds of protesters angry over rising heat and power prices stormed a government building Tuesday and clashed with troops after trying to seize a regional governor in the impoverished former Soviet nation of Kyrgyzstan.
A series of nationwide rallies is planned for Wednesday and analysts said they believe the unrest could spread. The government warned of “severe” repercussions and the main opposition party said U.S. and Russian diplomats should call on the government to refrain from violence.
Police reportedly fired warning shots to disperse the crowds, which overran offices in the regional center of Talas, a day after the main United People’s Movement, or UPM, opposition group promised nationwide protests.
Human rights worker Shamil Murat, speaking to AFP by telephone from inside the administration building, said the protesters had announced their own replacement to the local governor. “Opposition supporters have appointed their own regional governor, Koysun Kurmanaliyev, and are not going to accept the regional administration heads appointed by the president,” he said.
Crowds assembled in Talas early Tuesday to protest the utility tariff increases and to call for the resignation of regional governor Bolotbek Beishenbekov, town residents told The Associated Press by telephone.
The protesters encircled Beishenbekov who was outside the building, planning to take him hostage, but he was freed by elite army troops, said Shamil Murat, an activist with the rights group For Democracy and Civil Society.
Firm line vowed
A correspondent for the local affiliate of U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Talas said one person was shot with a rubber bullet fired from inside the police precinct.
The Interior Ministry said a drunken mob had entered the regional government office and later left, and police were taking measures to ensure stability and public safety.
Prime Minister Daniyar Usenov vowed to take a firm line against the people behind the troubles in Talas.
“I urge the organizers of these actions to desist from what they are doing. For those that do not listen, measures will be severe,” Usenov said.
Signs of unrest in the country will likely be closely monitored by the United States, which maintains an airfield near the Kyrgyz capital to transport troops and supplies to support coalition operations in Afghanistan.
Since coming to power on a wave of street protests in 2005, President Kurmanbek Bakiyev has ensured a measure of stability, but many observers say he has done so at the expense of democratic standards.
Over the past two years, Kyrgyz authorities have clamped down on free media, and opposition activists say they have routinely been subjected to physical intimidation and targeted by politically motivated criminal investigations. Anti-government forces have been in disarray until recently, but widespread anger over soaring utility bills has galvanized the fractious opposition.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Saturday repeatedly criticized Kyrgyzstan for human rights problems, a strong rebuke to the country once regarded as former Soviet Central Asia’s “island of democracy.”
Kyrgyz protesters storm provincial government office
Another Orange Revolution Hits the Skids
Press TV – April 6, 2010
Protesters scuffle with police in Talas, Kyrgyzstan on April 6.
Protesters have stormed a provincial government office in Talas city, Kyrgyzstan, demanding the resignation of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Talas Governor Beishen Bolotbekov had been taken hostage when demonstrators seized a local government office, Reuters quoted local opposition leaders and witnesses as saying.
However, Prime Minister Daniyar Usenov told reporters in the capital Bishkek that the governor had not been captured and vowed to use force to prevent any further unrest.
Discontent in the former Soviet republic has been on the rise due to what the opposition says is growing public frustration with corruption, nepotism, and high [utility] prices.
The unrest is of particular concern to the US, which operates an important air base in Kyrgyzstan supporting operations against the Taliban in nearby Afghanistan.
The leader of the Ata-Meken opposition party stated that military bases have become more active.
“Helicopters and planes are taking off and landing all the time,” Omurbek Tekebayev said. “We do not rule out that the government may use military force against civilians,” he added.
Tekebayev said that Ata-Meken vice chairman Bolot Sherniyazov was arrested on Tuesday morning, creating a wave of protests.
The protesters demanded that Sherniyazov be released and soon the authorities were forced to acquiesce to their demands.
BISHKEK, March 17 (Reuters) – Thousands of Kyrgyz protesters threatened on Wednesday to oust President Kurmanbek Bakiyev if he failed to accede to their demands within a week, five years exactly after violent protests propelled him to power.[…]
Chanting “Down with Bakiyev!”, more than 3,000 protesters rallied in the capital Bishkek to express their discontent with his rule, in the biggest street protest in about three years.
“The authorities don’t listen to us. If they continue to ignore us … we will seize power,” opposition leader Omurbek Tekebayev told the roaring crowd, as some waved flags and shouted “We have to oust this government”.
At the rally, the opposition gave Bakiyev until March 24 to “release political prisoners”, “stop repressions”, abolish high utility fees and conform with a range of other demands.
Failure of attempts to discredit the Goldstone report and its authors
April 6, 2010 | Dr. Hanan Chehata
There has been a prolonged and concerted campaign to discredit anyone who is brave enough to speak out against the Zionist policies of Israel. The list of academics, lawyers, activists, politicians and private citizens who have been lambasted by Zionists for daring to speak out against Israel is absurdly long and is growing every day. It is becoming almost comical how one can predict the tag of “anti-Semite” being flung at anyone who dares even raise a minor point of concern over Israel’s growing list of human rights abuses and breaches of international law.
It’s not really Colonel Travers but the Goldstone Report which is essentially under attack.
Colonel Desmond Travers is one such individual who has recently found himself subject to a flurry of completely unjustified attacks on his person simply because he has been brave enough to demand that Israel be held to account for its crimes in accordance with international law. Colonel Travers (a retired Colonel in the Irish Army with a distinguished military career spanning over 40 years and member of the board of directors for the Institute of International Criminal Investigation in The Hague) is one of the four co-authors of the landmark Goldstone Report who has recently been subjected to a barrage of completely unjustified abuse from Zionist apologists. If you look at the substance of the complaints levelled against him however, you will see that each criticism is completely unfounded and does not in any way relate to Colonel Travers as an individual but is merely in response to his association with and defence of the Goldstone report. His very association with the report has been enough to make him a target of the Zionist lobby.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has himself said that Israel has three main enemies Iran, Palestine and Goldstone. It seems that many Zionists have taken those comments to heart and are trying to defeat what is perceived to be one of the biggest threats to Israel, namely the Goldstone Report. This has also spilled over to include viewing anyone associated with the report as an enemy of Israel as well, which is grossly unfair considering the unbiased nature of the individuals involved as well as the fact that the report was the result of a desperately needed UN sanctioned fact-finding mission into a major, illegal, military attack on the civilian population of Gaza.
The report itself has been attacked as flawed, misguided and biased. However, to any objective person who has actually taken the time to read it, it is clearly an exceptionally well crafted and well researched report and the criticisms of it are generally the unfounded rantings of supporters of Israel who refuse to hear a single word said against their beloved state, no matter how well founded the criticisms of Israel may be. Like many others therefore, Travers is simply an innocent casualty standing too close to indiscriminate Israeli fire.
But let’s look at some of the recent criticisms levelled against him anyway.
Hamas rockets were an “excuse” not a justification for Operation Cast Lead
One of the criticisms that keeps coming up and which Zionists are attempting to use to discredit Colonel Travers are his comments in an interview with the Middle East Monitor relating to Hamas rocket fire. Colonel Travers was asked whether Israel’s claim of “self-defence” justified their attack on Gaza during Operation Cast Lead. After remarking, quite rightly, that every country has an inherent right to self-defence, he then again, quite rightly, pointed out that this justification did not apply in the case at hand. He explained that, as everyone knows, there had been a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas since June 2008, brokered by Egypt, which Hamas had scrupulously observed. For four months (between July and October) Hamas had not fired a single rocket into Israel, and no Israelis were killed. This is something that even Israeli spokesperson Mark Regev has himself admitted to, live on air. However, Israel then broke that ceasefire on November 4th 2008 when they killed 6 Palestinian men. It is only following Israel’s breach of the ceasefire therefore, that rockets started to be fired into Israel once again. It is a testimony to the strength and control of Hamas that throughout the ceasefire period they managed to ensure that their people, as well as most other Palestinian groups, adhered to the agreement. It is especially impressive considering the fact that Israel has kept Gaza under an illegal siege for years now, preventing access to food, medicine, humanitarian aid, clean water and so on. As such, Hamas’ success at restraining Palestinians who have been imprisoned by Israel and preventing them from retaliating in the only way that they can, by firing off a few homemade rockets cobbled together in a dusty basement somewhere, was a feat indeed.
However, while it is true that immediately following Israel’s breach of the ceasefire there was an increase in the number of rockets fired towards Israel, as Travers said, that does not make it directly attributable to Hamas. It must be borne in mind that just because a rocket is fired into Israel from Gaza does not mean that it was Hamas that fired it. Many breakaway factions exist in Gaza, in addition to Fatah supporters, as well as undercover Israeli agents.
If Israel really is interested in defending itself, perhaps it should stop attacking Palestinians. Can Israel really expect to be able to breach a ceasefire agreement, kill Palestinians, and then when there is retaliation claim that their next act of violence is in self-defence? That is in abuse of the very term. You can not provoke a reaction and then use self-defence as a justification for a new attack.
It is hard to understand why this line of argument has come as such a shock to some people. Colonel Travers is by no means the first or only person to point out the fact that Israel initiated the violence by breaching the ceasefire. Professor Avi Shlaim from Oxford University, for example, has similarly pointed out that,“the home-made Qassam rockets fired by Hamas militants from Gaza on Israeli towns were only the excuse, not the reason for Operation Cast Lead”. Regarding the ceasefire, as Prof. Shlaim says, “contrary to Israeli propaganda, this was a success: the average number of rockets fired monthly from Gaza dropped from 179 to three. Yet on 4 November Israel violated the ceasefire by launching a raid into Gaza killing six Hamas fighters…”
The Pro-Israel Lobby in Britain
In a report by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA) they complain that in the MEMO interview, Colonel Travers made the remark that “Britain’s foreign policy interests in the Middle East seem to be influenced strongly by Jewish lobbyists.” By making this statement, they assert,“Travers implies that British Jews have interests that differ from Britain’s own national interests and that Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s government is influenced by these considerations. This statement, unless corrected, places Travers in a position in which his views are suspect of being motivated by anti-Semitic prejudices.”
Apparently you do not have to say very much at all to be branded as an anti-Semite then. The mere observation that Britain’s foreign interest policies “seem” to be “influenced” by pro-Israeli lobbyists is apparently enough to get you into the club. This should reassure the countless others who have been unjustly branded as such that they are not alone. Furthermore, you would probably be hard pressed to find any right thinking individual who did not agree with Colonel Travers statement.
In any event, what really seems to be the problem with the comments Colonel Travers has made with regards to the pro-Israel Lobby? Why are the Zionists so defensive? Are the critics really trying to deny that such a lobby exists? In a world where a lobby exists for almost anything, from the gun lobby in America to the fox hunting lobby in the UK, are they trying to suggest that one does not exist for Israel? Surely Israel, the lauded masters of PR spin, has a lobby too. I can’t imagine that anyone is really trying to suggest that they do not. That would just be a facile position to try and maintain.
Instead then, are they objecting to the strength and influence which is being attributed to the pro-Israel lobby in British politics? Again, I find it hard to believe that they would agree that they do have a pro-Israel lobby but that it is a weak and feeble lobby with no real significance, influence or power. Surely that is not what they want us to believe either, which is good, since it is literally unbelievable. So what are the critics objecting to? They do not make that clear. Apparently just alluding to the very existence of a pro-Israel lobby is enough to raise their hackles; but why?
The pro-Israel lobby hardly operates under the radar anymore; what with the Labour Friends of Israel; the Conservative Friends of Israel; Gordon Brown’s 2007 appointment as Patron to the Jewish National Fund UK; the funding and wooing of politicians as uncovered by Peter Oborne’s “Inside Britain’s Israel lobby“ documentary on Channel 4; it would be hard to argue that the lobby did not exist.
One need only look at the state of British relations with Israel to see the presence and influence of the Israel lobby lurking in the foreground. For instance, who is behind Britain’s refusal to abide by its international legal obligations to pursue and arrest Israeli war criminals? Give us one good reason why Britain is risking its international reputation to protect Israeli war criminals? The pressure being brought to bear on British politicians to change the law to accommodate such offenders and protect them when they visit our shores is surely coming from one primary source; the pro-Israel lobby.
In one of the many on-line attempts to mar the character of Colonel Travers a posting on Wikipedia1 said, under the heading “controversy”, that “when asked about his controversial statement about the influence of “Jewish lobbyists” at the London School of Economics on 8th March 2010, Travers chose not to answer the question or make any comment, even when urged to do so repeatedly by an audience member.”
However, what the “critic” failed to explain was who that audience member was. The question was raised by Jonathon Hoffman who is a vice-chair of the Zionist Federation in the UK and he has recently been banned from attending public events as a result of his aggressive anti-social conduct at public events. In July last year for instance, War on Want’s Executive Director John Hilary told the Jewish News that Hoffman had been banned from an event because of fears that he would ‘disrupt’ activities, saying:
“It has been advised to us by fellow organisers of similar events that Jonathan Hoffman attends these functions strictly to disrupt proceedings. When he applied to attend the meeting, we informed him he would not be permitted, as we want to ensure the event is not hijacked by people who cannot act respectfully.”
In the weeks surrounding Colonel Travers’s excellent talk at the LSE Hoffman was removed by Parliamentary police on at least two occasions following him disrupting speakers as they delivered talks on Israel and Palestine, one of which was during a talk by Ilan Pappe and Ronnie Kasrils. Hoffman has become notorious for his rude heckling of guest speakers who in anyway criticise Israel. When the wikipedia1 critic therefore says that Travers did not answer a question “even when urged to do so repeatedly by an audience member”, that comment has a little more meaning when viewed in the light of who was asking the question and the rude manner in which the question was asked. In any event, it is ridiculous to assert, as the JCPA do, that Travers’s reference to a pro-Israel lobby in the UK “places Travers in a position in which his views are suspect of being motivated by anti-Semitic prejudices.” The leap that they have made from his mere observation, to them branding him an anti-Semite is one more feeble attempt to discredit him and through him the Goldstone Report; one that, as usual, looked at closely, holds no weight at all.
The term Anti-Semitism is being abused by Zionists
Jews have a right to be very upset with Israel right now and indeed many of them are. Israel is committing atrocious acts of violence and barbarism and is daily committing gross violations of human rights in their name.
Even President Obama has been accused of being anti-Semitic, (by Netanyahu’s own brother in law, Dr Hagi Ben-Artzi no less) and this is despite his country giving billions of dollars to Israel, supplying them with weapons, supporting them in the UN, and being their closest ally. If Obama has been branded as anti-Semitic then how can Colonel Travers, or indeed anyone else, expect to fair any better?
It has been said that Travers avoided the “difficult question of anti-Semitism.” It is not a difficult question however. It is an easy one. Criticism of Israel does not equal anti-Semitism. It is as simple and easy as that. Amidst all of their spurious allegations of anti-Semitism there has not yet been a single statement of his in which Travers reveals even the slightest hint that he holds any ill will, prejudice or hostility towards Jewish people. Therefore, either his critics are sadly misinformed as to the true meaning of the words anti-Semitic or their claims are false. There is not a shred of evidence of any anti-Semitism on his part. He is merely being branded, as so many other critics of Israel have been, in the hope that this will cast doubt as to his true motivation in taking part in the Goldstone Report and consequently in the hope that, in this way, the report itself might lose credibility. It will not however, as at each turn critics of the report are failing. Following months and months of scrupulous nitpicking and dissection if what is out there so far is the best that critics can come up with, the soundness of the Goldstone report has been demonstrated. It has stood up remarkably well to assaults from every angle and it still stands.
Lastly, the JCPA state that Travers “clearly emerges as an individual who is not qualified to take part in any serious fact-finding mission and the U.N. should not seek his services in the future. Given his statements, Justice Richard Goldstone should repudiate Col. Travers and completely reject the conclusions that he reached as a result of his work.” Again this is baseless. The charges laid against him are flimsy at best and merely attempts to divert attention away from the larger picture; Israel’s actions itself. In what has been referred to as a tactic of “distraction” Israel and its supporters try to deflect attention away from its own offences and attack the messengers instead. By complaining that Colonel Travers has dared to allude to a pro-Israel lobby in the UK or by complaining that he would not answer every single question of a well known Zionist heckler in a university lecture, they are trying to draw attention away from Israel’s crimes. But no amount of distraction will make us forget that the IDF killed some 1,400 Palestinians, including 300 children, and hundreds of other unarmed civilians, including more than 115 women and some 85 men aged over 50 during Operation Cast Lead.
Nothing will make us forget that Gaza has been under a virtual lock-down – siege – for over one thousand days now; that children are dying from lack of medical care; mental health is deteriorating; malnutrition is common place; 95% of the water in Gaza is unfit for human consumption; thousands of Palestinian homes have been illegally destroyed; Israel’s use of illegal weapons have left children mutilated and orphaned. These are the matters that must stay in focus. We will not be hoodwinked by Israel’s tactics of distraction. Colonel Travers is just one messenger and the Goldstone is just one message and we will not let Israel shoot the messenger or destroy the message. Support the Goldstone report and all those who support it.
Rounded Up: Artificial Terrorists and Muslim Entrapment after 9/11 :: Book Review ::
(Image: The Troy Book Makers)
By Mirza A. Beg | December 16, 2009
In the wake of 9/11, the Bush Justice Department arrested almost 1,200 Muslims throughout the United States. They were ordinary American immigrants, mostly of Arab origin. The evidence at best was flimsy based on someone’s vendetta or in some cases neighbor’s paranoia.
Within a week the Justice Department unveiled the infamous “USA Patriot Act”. Congress passed it in early October 2001 over the objection of many thoughtful Americans. The word USA PATRIOT is an acronym designed to pull at American heart strings. It stands for ‘Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism’
None of the arrested were ever brought to trial; although a few were summarily deported at the slightest irregularity in their immigration documents. Many were tortured. Exactly how many were tortured and how badly is a secret under the aegis of the “Patriot act”. Perhaps some day it will come out.
Overnight Muslim organizations became suspect. FBI undercover operations were taken in stride by most Muslims as a part of the job of the FBI to protect the citizens. But what unfolded in many cases was incitement and entrapment by implanted agent Muslim provocateurs with shady pasts, in trouble with the law.
On August 5, 2004, the lead national news was that two Muslims associated with the Albany Mosque were arrested in a terrorist plot. There names were Yassin Muhiddin Aref and Mohammed Mosharref Hossain.
The book, Rounded Up: Artificial Terrorists and Muslim Entrapment after 9/11, is written by Dr. Shamshad Ahmed, a professor of Physics, who established the Masjid As-Salam in 1980 and serves as its president. He knew the two victims of entrapment to be honest decent people. It is essentially a short account of Yassin Muhiddin Aref, an immigrant from the Kurdish part of Iraq and Mohammed Mosharref Hossain from Pakistan, their background and how were they entrapped by the FBI.
Why they were entrapped is best known to the government or perhaps it is not even known to them. It is just possible that because they could not convict any of the 1,200 arrested, they tried random entrapment under the “one percent Cheney doctrine”, that is if the law enforcement authorities suspected someone of having a 1% chance of supporting terrorism, America would treat him as if he were 100% a terrorist. Once the process was in motion, the Justice Department did not back down because the conviction was under the Kafkaesque “Patriot Act”.
The chapters are generally arranged chronologically from the day of the FBI raid on the Mosque (Masjid) on the 5th of April 2004, with a few flash back chapters describing the establishment of the mosque and how the author met the two victims of the FBI sting.
Dr. Shamshad in this book exposes the “Catch 22” nature of the infamous “Patriot Act”. One would expect that by planting an informer, the FBI had a clear case. No, the case lasted three years, and all the delays were by the FBI asking extensions to prepare their case. The defense was kept in the dark even about the exact charges. Every piece of information had to be pried out after lengthy court petitions. Occasionally when they succeeded, the information was so redacted to be almost useless. Even the judges ruling, why the information was classified, was classified and the defendant was denied access. In essence the “Patriot Act” renders the justice of a Kangaroo Court, so well described by Franz Kafka in his dark novel “The Trial”.
Parts of the transcribed taped evidence by the Pakistani informer that were procured after long court battles are in the Appendixes of the book. They clearly show, it was the informer who kept on badgering the victims to say and do things that could be construed as illegal. At times the victims objected to his proposals as immoral and un-Islamic. He persisted, and on occasions the victims appear to be humoring the informer. The case rested on Musharraf Hossain being induced to take a loan from the informant at very favorable terms. The fact that the informer could launder his money and perhaps buy Chinese made rockets Hussain did not condone. Though the informant wanted the loan to be unrecorded, Hossain insisted on the propriety of it being recorded .The only crime for which Yassin Aref was roped in at the time was that as a friend he acted as witness to that loan.
Aref’s command of English was not very good. It often appears that he was not quite clear about the tenor of the conversation. The conversations with Hossain were often in Urdu and the FBI’s paid translator intentionally mistranslated taxes to terrorist. In 2005, a raid on a Kurdish camps in Iraq yielded a tape recording where someone seems to refer to Aref almost ten years earlier by a word in Kurdish that translates as elder brother. But if one wanted to stretch the meaning, it could be commander. Only this nebulous translation was presented to the jury to prove that he was a militant.
Dr. Shamshad Ahmad presents a very cogent account of the atmosphere in Albany during the publicity and the trial of the two defendants. On the one side the right-wing talk radio was in overdrive demonizing the Muslim and Arab community as has become very familiar nationwide. The politicians such a Governor Pataki also took advantage of the situation. But the author also very lucidly portrays the support they got from thoughtful Americans, including some in the clergy in the best of American traditions. They not only joined the vigils in support of the defendants but gave material help and wrote petitions.
The balanced and thoughtful reporting of the Albany Times Union was exemplary. The author has included many of the incisive cartoons by John deRosier castigating the bizarre nature of the case. Those cartoons are indeed worth the proverbial thousand words.
The lawyers worked assiduously towards an impossible task of defending the accused where parts of the charges, the evidence and even the rationale judge’s rulings are reminiscent of a Kangaroo court without the clowns. Stephen Downs who voluntarily joined the case pro bono and has written the forward to this book worked especially hard in the best tradition of the American legal system.
In the introduction of the book Dr. Ahmad has described his own conservative education in a Madarsa where he learned his basic values of Islamic decency and caring. From his short narration of his background, it becomes clear that one can be conservative in the best sense of the words as well as a progressive with liberal values as well. He has dedicated this book to the peace and justice loving humanitarians, and the proceeds from this book go to help the victims of the justice system gone awry in the shadow of the unpatriotic, “Patriot Act”.
US-led raid kills 4 civilians in Afghanistan
Press TV – April 6, 2010
A US-led air strike has killed at least four civilians including two women and a child in an incident the US military described as an attack against suspected militants in southern Helmand province.
“Insurgents were using the compound as a firing position when combined forces, unaware of the possible presence of civilians, directed air assets against it,” the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said in a
statement.
The statement went on to say that once the US-led forces were able to enter the compound, they found four dead civilians, two women, an elderly man and a child inside.
The Monday botched attack in the Nahr-e-Saraj district of the southern province of Helmand is the latest incident the alliance has described as a mistaken strike and threatens to further strain relations between the NATO powers and President Hamid Karzai’s administration.
Karzai has previously tearfully denounced The US for killing civilians and the issue has provoked deep resentment among Afghans.
Gandhi’s grandson in Al-Khalil supports Palestinian just struggle
Palestine Information Center – 05/04/2010
AL-KHALIL — Israeli occupation forces (IOF) have tried to obstruct the tour of Rajmohan Gandhi, the grandson of Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, and his wife Usha in Al-Khalil city on Sunday.
Local sources said that the IOF soldiers tried to prevent the couple, who were accompanied by Palestinian MP Mustafa Al-Barghouthi, from reaching the settlement outposts erected in the vicinity of the Ibrahimi Mosque and detained a number of journalists who were covering the visit.
Gandhi, after touring the Old City and the Ibrahimi Mosque, told a press conference that the Palestinian people were entitled to freedom and independence.
He said that the electronic gates installed in front of the Ibrahimi Mosque were an insult to humanity, and a humiliation that the Israeli occupation should stop.
The Israeli repression in the city of Al-Khalil was obvious including the confiscation of civilian homes and attacking citizens, he said, expressing absolute support for the Palestinians’ popular struggle.
Gandhi said that the world community was fast asleep and was not moving to amend the situation, promising to convey what he saw to the world so that it would wake up and act.
Iran rejects US claim of arms aid to Afghan militants
Press TV – April 5, 2010
Iran has rejected accusations by the top US military commander that it is providing weapons to the militants in Afghanistan.
The US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen claimed in a Kabul news conference that Iran has shipped arms to Taliban militants in Kandahar.
In a statement released on Monday, the Iranian Embassy in Kabul rejected the charges as “recurring allegations” and a sort of “fabrication” by the US in order to justify its defeat in Afghanistan.
The statement added that Washington is attempting to “deceive the public opinion” by accusing other countries of sending weapons to militants in the war-torn country.
It urged the US to “find more logical ways to fight terrorism rather than accusing others” of providing arms to the militants.
“Iran always supports the nation and the government of Afghanistan,” the embassy statement added.
The United States has frequently accused Iran of supplying aid to the Taliban militants in Afghanistan. Such claims come in face of the fact that the Taliban, which follow the radical Wahhabi sect, have opposed Iran since long ago and have murdered eight Iranian diplomats when they took over most of Afghanistan in the 1990’s.
“Iran is working to increase its influence in the area. On the one hand, that’s not surprising; she is a neighbor state, a neighbor country. On the other hand, the influence I see is all too often negative,” Mullen told a news conference during a visit to Kabul on Wednesday.
“I was advised last night about a significant shipment of weapons from Iran into Kandahar, for example,” Reuters quoted Mullen as saying.
Obama Policy Retains Right to Nuke Iran
By Jason Ditz | April 05, 2010
Much has been made in the past few weeks of the Obama Administration’s plan to issue a new nuclear weapons doctrine, replacing the Bush Doctrine that included the possibility of using nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states.
But while the Obama Administration formally renouncing that option on the surface and claiming its arsenal is for “deterrence” only, it appears that the doctrine will include an enormous loophole that will mean the nominal policy shift will ultimately mean very little.
The loophole will insist that the only non-nuclear states free of preemptive nuking are those which are “in compliance with their nonproliferation obligations.” This would, at least from the administration’s perspective, leave open the possibility of attacking Iran with nuclear weapons.
Iran would certainly argue that they are in compliance, of course, but exactly what these obligations are is never altogether clear to the public (the IAEA safeguards agreements are not made public) and President Obama has made clear that he believes Iran is not.
At the end of the day this policy is only a guideline anyhow, and if the president decided to nuke Iran the after the fact argument of if they were really non-compliant will likely be very much beside the point. But while the president still claims to have a goal of a nuclear-free world, the manufacture of such a deliberate loophole for a nuclear first strike is beyond troubling.
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Aletho News 