Protesting the Hebron Fund, I remember a long afternoon at a segregated swimming hole
By Seán O’Neill | Mondoweiss | November 18, 2010
(Protesters in New York. Photo: Vanissa W. Chan)
Hebron Fund held its annual fundraiser in New York Tuesday night. A report from O’Neill, a former member of Christian Peacemaker Teams in the South Hebron Hills, who attended the protest:
I was just leaving Hebron’s Old City one day in August 2009 when a friend of mine, Hamzi, invited me to go swimming.
He and a few other guys were going for a dip in Abraham’s Well, an ancient spring located in Tel Rumeida, essentially the only neighborhood in the West Bank city where Palestinians and Israeli settlers physically encounter one another on a daily basis.
Whereas in the Old City a complex system of barricades, roadblocks, and checkpoints keeps Palestinians caged in and under the settlement pockets, in Tel Rumeida there is some level of mutual access, albeit unequal and under the watchful eye of Israeli soldiers.
It was a hot, sticky day, and the thought of taking a dip in the cool undeground waters of Abraham’s Well sounded superb. After a long circuitous route, unable to cross Shuhada St., Hebron’s main thoroughfare banned from use by Palestinians, we reached an olive grove just above the well. In our enthusiasm, we didn’t notice the four Israeli soldiers sitting above it until they came running, screaming at us, rifles aimed in our direction. Hamzi explained that we were just on our way down to swim. The soldiers replied that there were a couple Jewish girls there swimming, so we’d have to wait. We began to sit down in the shade of the olive tree next to the soldiers when a soldier began yelling again, shooing us with his free hand, indicating that we were too close.
“He acts like were dogs,” Hamzi muttered to himself as we moved back a few trees.
Occasionally we would crane our necks over the terraced rocks to see if the girls were leaving yet. Noticing this, the soldier berated us again, instructing us to face the other direction, so as not to offend the young women, who by now, done swimming, were having a picnic next to the well. Hamzi and the others stared for a moment, absorbing this latest humiliation, before turning away, powerless. We sat there for about an hour in the midday heat, sweating profusely, debating whether it was worth the wait. Finally one of us, sneaking a look, noticed the girls leaving. We jumped up happily and asked the soldiers if we could now swim.
“No,” one said. “There’s someone else coming.” Indeed, two young Jewish boys had now approached the well and began to disrobe.
“But we’ve been here over an hour,” Hamzi protested. “It’s a hot day. If we have to wait for every Jew in Hebron to swim we’ll never get a turn.”
“Maybe not,” the soldier said, matter-of-factly.
And so we left, hot and irritated. There wasn’t a physical attack or a home bulldozed. No one was arrested or tear gassed. Just another of the thousand daily humiliations that is apartheid Hebron. That was the last day I was in Hebron, and the last time I saw Hamzi, although I didn’t realize it at the time. Shortly thereafter I flew home for a visit and returning a month later discovered I had been banned from re-entry.
Tuesday night in New York was windy, cold and dark, a far cry from that blistering day in August. Strange in a way to think that the men and women in suits and gowns at Chelsea Piers making their way to a dinner cruise on the Hudson River had any connection at all to that conflicted place thousands of miles away. Hamzi and some 160,000 Palestinians in Hebron settled down to bed after celebrating another Eid al Adha in the grip of a suffocating occupation.
Here in New York husbands and wives and their families parked their cars and walked breezily past the indoor soccer fields to a feast of their own, making tax-exempt donations to bankroll Hamzi’s oppression. Tuesday night was the annual dinner of the Hebron Fund, founded in 1979 to raise money for the Hebron settlements. According to the Washington Post, the Hebron Fund and similar organizations have donated $33.4 million since 2004 to the settlement enterprise. Settlements, keep in mind, are illegal according to international law.
This year’s dinner, held on a boat, was styled as the Hebron Aid Flotilla, a perverse celebration of the murder of nine human rights activists by Israeli commandos on the flotilla to Gaza this past May.
The event, however, did not go unnoticed. A couple hundred people gathered at the piers’ entrance in not one, but two protests. On the one hand was a coalition of Palestinian, Jewish, and anti-occupation groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace, Veterans for Peace, Women in Black, Code Pink, and Adalah NY, among others. They stood in a mostly silent vigil with signs reading “End the Siege of Hebron”, “Remove the Settlers”, and “Free Gaza”.
On the other, about 40 feet away, was a protest staged by J Street U, the college branch of the advocacy group which styles itself as pro-Israel, pro-peace. They held Israeli flags and lamented the settlements as an obstacle to a two-state solution. A participant in the J Street protest, Moriel Rothman said of the two protests, “I think that we’re working in parallel. Ultimately we probably want similar things but have different tactics in how to get there.”
An attendee of the fundraiser, who chose to remain anonymous, brushed the protests off, saying, “If you look at the amount of energy that goes into protesting Jewish misconduct, it is disproportionate. The world holds Jews to a higher standard.” He added, referring to the Jewish protesters, “They are introspective. You very seldom see that amongst the Palestinians.”
My first thought at seeing the two different protests was one of dismay. Had the ideology of separation reared its ugly head even here, among the dissenters? On second thought however, in a context in which meaningful dissent has been muffled for so long, a bit of pluralism may not be bad. The groups didn’t agree on tactics, or symbols, or what a solution to the conflict will look like. However, if there is an emerging consensus that the Hebron settlements, at least, are beyond the pale, that on a hot summer day Palestinian residents shouldn’t have to navigate around Jew-only roads to find that the well is closed to Arabs, that just might be progress.
US activists face new repression as political prisoners fight for justice
Nora Barrows-Friedman and Maureen Clare Murphy, The Electronic Intifada, 15 November 2010
For decades the United States government has attempted to criminalize work in the Palestinian community in support of their national liberation cause. But in recent years this repression has increased dramatically. The Electronic Intifada spoke with the daughter of Sami al-Arian and the daughter of Ghassan Elashi — both political prisoners in the US — about the impact this repression has had on their families’ lives. And in an Electronic Intifada exclusive, Hatem Abudayyeh, an organizer and community leader whose home in Chicago was raided by federal agents on 24 September 2010, spoke to the press for the first time about his family’s story.
The Electronic Intifada spoke with al-Arian, Elashi and Abudayyeh as activists across the United States prepare for emergency demonstrations as the subpoenas for three anti-war and solidarity organizers to appear before a federal grand jury in Chicago are being reactivated by the Department of Justice.
The three activists are among the 14 who received subpoenas during and soon after coordinated FBI raids on homes and offices across the Midwestern US on 24 September. The government says that the raids and subpoenas are part of an investigation into “material support” of foreign terrorist organizations but it has not arrested or charged anyone.
A grand jury, no longer in use anywhere outside the US, is an investigative tool that allows the government to compel citizens to testify even if they are not suspected of any crime.
The 14 targeted activists are involved with various peace with justice groups, including the Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago, Students for a Democratic Society, the Twin Cities Anti-War Committee, the Colombia Action Network, Fight Back! newspaper, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization and the National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera. All the activists had submitted letters to the US attorney — the local Department of Justice prosecutor who convenes the grand jury — stating their intent not to testify; the Department of Justice had withdrawn the original subpoenas, but the grand jury was still convened.
The three activists receiving reactivated subpoenas are expected to be offered “immunity” — meaning that they face the choice of informing the government about the activities of other organizers or being jailed for the duration of the grand jury, and possibly facing further charges for criminal contempt of court.
“What [the US government] is doing is gathering political intelligence to indict people under this idea of providing material support for terrorism,” attorney Michael Deutsch, part of the legal defense team for the activists, told The Electronic Intifada. “The grand jury is not an independent body. It is controlled by the US Department of Justice and they decide who is subpoenaed and what the outcome of the grand jury investigation is. It is a tool of the FBI and the justice department to repress political activists.”
Deutsch wrote for The Electronic Intifada in 2008: “In the last forty years the government has used the grand jury as a tool of political inquisition subpoenaing and resubpoenaing activists the government knows will refuse to cooperate, stripping them of their constitutional right against self-incrimination and forcing upon them the choice of informing on their movement or going to jail for contempt.”
In an article contributed to the Mondoweiss site, Deutsch explains: “The search warrants and grand jury subpoenas make it quite clear that the federal prosecutors are intent on accusing public nonviolent political organizers … of providing ‘material support,’ through their public advocacy, for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colobmia” (“US Justice Department prepares for the ominous expansion of law prohibiting ‘material support’ for terrorism,” 10 November 2007).
The investigation’s legal basis is the bipartisan Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act passed under the Clinton administration in 1996 and expanded with the bipartisan Patriot Act enacted during the Bush administration. In June of this year the implications of the legislation — already used after 11 September 2001 to shut down major Muslim charities in the US — was broadened even further. According to Deutsch in Mondoweiss, in the decision Holder v. the Humanitarian Law Project, the US Supreme Court “decided that nonviolent First Amendment speech and advocacy ‘coordinated with’ or ‘under the direction of’ a foreign group listed by the Secretary of State as ‘terrorist’ was a crime.”
The “foreign terrorist organization” designation is unilaterally declared by the US Secretary of State and virtually impossible to challenge. The Center for Constitutional Rights describes “the government’s current fervor to use the label of terrorism as a brand for groups and organizations that are not toeing the line on US foreign policy” (“Factsheet: Material Support“).
At the height of the movement to bring an end to white supremacist rule in South Africa — the US was among the apartheid regime’s longest-standing supporters — the Reagan administration declared Nelson Mandela’s party, the African National Congress, a foreign terrorist organization. Critics observe that had these laws been enacted then, the entire anti-apartheid movement in the US, which took direction from the ANC, would have been criminalized for providing “material support to terrorism.”
According to the Center for Constitutional Rights fact sheet, “these material support provisions violate the First Amendment as they criminalize activities like distribution of literature, engaging in political advocacy, participating in peace conferences, training in human rights advocacy and donating cash and humanitarian assistance, even when this type of support is intended only to promote lawful and nonviolent activities.”
These laws have had a tremendously chilling impact on civil liberties and humanitarian and domestic political organizing in the US, particularly amongst the Palestinian, Arab and Muslim communities.
Hatem Abudayyeh
Hatem Abudayyeh was asleep on his parents’ couch the morning of 24 September after spending the night with his mother in the emergency room when his wife frantically called him to report that federal agents had raided their home. A Palestinian community leader and solidarity activist, Abudayyeh is also Executive Director of the Arab American Action Network, which provides social services to thousands of families in and around Chicago.
“I ran into my house, passed all the agents and grabbed my daughter and went into the bedroom with her and held her and made sure she was OK,” Abudayyeh told The Electronic Intifada. Abudayyeh, his wife and five-year-old daughter were mainly confined to their small living room while a multi-agency task force searched through all their belongings.
“I wanted to see what they were searching for and grabbing but they wouldn’t allow us to do that,” Abudayyeh said. “They basically grabbed everything that said ‘Palestine’ on it.” During the search that Abudayyeh said went on for more than three hours, the agents went through his wife and daughter’s personal belongings, the family’s library, CD and DVD cases and financial documents. Amongst the materials confiscated were home movies Abudayyeh’s wife had recorded during a family visit to Palestine this summer.
Abudayyeh eventually learned that the home of his friends Joe Iosbaker and Stephanie Weiner, a Chicago couple who are long-time union and anti-war activists, was raided as well. That same morning more than 70 federal agents raided and served subpoenas to prominent organizers in the Twin Cities and Michigan, and called and otherwise harassed activists throughout the country. The office of the Twin Cities-based Anti-War Committee — which led demonstrations against the Republican National Convention, one of the largest anti-war protests in the US in recent years — was raided as well.
“The most accurate assessment is that on the political level, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are not going so well for the administration. There are a lot of developments happening in Colombia and Palestine that are probably also not considered to be what the administration wants to see in those countries,” Abudayyeh said. “This attack on the anti-war movement is another example of the administration, whether Obama’s or Bush’s, trying to criminalize the activities of organizers in the US [working to change] foreign policy in Iraq, Palestine, Afghanistan and Colombia.”
Of the 14 activists targeted on 24 September, Abudayyeh is the only Palestinian or Arab (profiles of those targeted are currently available on stopfbi.net).
“The administration needs to put a local face on the enemy abroad and for many years that has been Arab and Muslim faces. It is interesting that in this case, I’m the only Arab. But the essential goal is the same — to criminalize anti-war activism and criminalize international solidarity activism in defense of a foreign policy that has gone awry and has caused the deaths of many thousands of American troops and many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans.”
Abudayyeh and others say there hasn’t been government repression of a social movement in the US on this scale since COINTELPRO — an FBI program implemented in the 1950s and 1960s to infiltrate and disrupt domestic political organizations, particularly the Black Panthers and other oppressed nationality movements.
“We all know what McCarthyism did in this country in the ’50s,” Abudayyeh said. “It’s pretty frightening and disconcerting that in 2010, this can still happen.”
Abudayyeh recognizes that he is hardly the first Palestinian in the US to be targeted for his political views and organizing. “People who are activists in the Palestinian, Arab and Muslim community — especially since 11 September, but for decades before than — have dealt with this government repression,” he said.
Abudayyeh referenced the case of seven Palestinian immigrants and a Kenyan — dubbed the LA 8 — who were subjected to 20 years of prosecution and deportation proceedings for their activities educating Americans about US policy towards Israel and the Palestinians. The US government arrested the eight in 1987 and accused them of organizing in support of a faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization. According to Abudayyeh, persecution of Palestinian activism began with the wave of Palestinian immigrants to the US after Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967.
“What they are targeted for is challenging US policy as it relates to Palestine,” Abudayyeh added. “Israel receives the largest amount of US foreign and military aid … which they use to occupy and oppress Palestinians in Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and they use that aid to threaten their neighbors, like Syria and Lebanon. Most of the leading activists around the war in Lebanon in 2006 in the US were Palestinians because we saw that as an extension of the war on the Palestinian people. We don’t separate the US occupation and invasion of Iraq from US support of Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people.”
However, Abudayyeh said, despite this repression the Palestine support movement in the US has only grown, and today’s generation of student activists are doing even stronger work than what was happening during his youth.
“It’s incumbent for us in the US and everywhere else to speak out against these policies … It is probably the main liberation and social justice issue in the world today. I may be the individual who is being targeted today, but this isn’t an issue of an individual or organizations I work for or are affiliated with; it’s a historical repression and attack on the Palestine support movement in the US.”
There have been several other high-profile cases against Palestinian, Arab and Muslim activists since 11 September 2001. Political prisoners continue to serve draconian sentences as the Department of Justice under the Obama administration enforces the policies of the Bush-era PATRIOT Act and the Clinton administration’s material support laws.
Michael Deutsch told The Electronic Intifada that former university professor and stateless Palestinian Dr. Abdelhaleem Ashqar remains in a federal prison in Petersburg, Virginia following his sentence of 135 months for refusing to testify to a grand jury and inform on the activities of other activists in the US and Palestine. Deutsch said that Dr. Ashqar’s legal defense is filing a habeas corpus petition challenging his sentence, arguing that his rights were violated at his trial.
The US government accused Dr. Ashqar and his co-defendant Muhammad Salah, a Palestinian American, of participation in alleged racketeering activity in support of Hamas after dropping initial material support charges. The government presented as evidence a confession Salah made while he was tortured for 80 days in an Israeli prison and the prosecution’s main witnesses were Israeli intelligence agents who were allowed to testify anonymously with severely restricted cross-examination.
Despite vast resources spent by the US government to convict the two, Salah and Dr. Ashqar were acquitted by a jury of all conspiracy and terrorism-related charges. But Salah was convicted of obstruction of justice for filing false answers to interrogatories in a civil case and was sentenced to 21 months in prison, a sentence he has served out.
“No amount of jailing by the court will compel me to testify against others struggling for Palestinian freedom,” Dr. Ashqar stated in an affidavit given on 12 July 2003 published on the Free Dr. Ashqar Committee website (“Case History – 2003 Affadavit of Abdelhaleem Ashqar).
But Ashqar’s 11-year sentence for refusing to testify to a grand jury is unprecedented in US history and contrasts, for example, with the mere 30-month sentence received by Lewis “Scooter” Libby, former chief of staff to US Vice President Richard Cheney who was convicted in 2007 for actively lying to a grand jury investigating the disclosure of classified information about CIA agent Valerie Plame. Libby served no time, however, as then President George W. Bush commuted the sentence on the grounds that it had been “excessive.”
Sami al-Arian
Meanwhile, Dr. Sami al-Arian, a former professor at the University of South Florida and a longtime political and civil rights activist, has been under house arrest for more than two years following nearly a decade of political prosecution by the federal government. In early 2003, the US government launched a much-publicized assault against al-Arian — then-Attorney General John Ashcroft declared that he was among one of the “most dangerous people in the world” — which led to his imprisonment in solitary confinement for 43 straight months during a five-year detention.
 |
Dr. Sami Al-Arian (Arab American News) |
In December 2005, a Florida jury acquitted al-Arian on eight of the seventeen counts, and deadlocked in favor of acquittal on the remaining nine. No guilty verdicts were returned. About five months later, in April 2006, Dr. al-Arian decided to accept a plea agreement from the US government in an effort to spare his family the process of another lengthy trial.
According to the case background, Dr. al-Arian plead guilty to violating a Clinton-era presidential executive order by providing “immigration services” in the 1990s “to persons associated with the PIJ [Palestinian Islamic Jihad], a Palestinian organization listed on the US forbidden organizations (terrorist) list” (“Case background in brief,” Tampa Bay Coalition for Peace). In return, al-Arian agreed to be deported from the US, despite having lived in the country for more than thirty years and despite the fact that he is a stateless Palestinian with no country to return to.
Despite lengthy trials, plea deals and hearings following the acquittals, the Bush administration refused to give up and placed Dr. al-Arian under house arrest in September 2008. After years in detention under deplorable conditions, Dr. al-Arian was convicted of criminal contempt charges relating to another case outside the one in which he had originally been involved. A leading prosecutor who — according to Sami’s daughter Laila al-Arian, has a history of making Islamophobic and anti-Arab comments — tried to force Dr. al-Arian into testifying against another Muslim organization in Virginia.
Laila al-Arian, an award-winning journalist and author, spoke to The Electronic Intifada days after a hearing was canceled at the last minute that could have finally decided whether her father could be released or put back on trial.
“My father refused to testify,” Laila al-Arian said. “If he refused to testify, he would be charged with criminal contempt. And if he did testify, he’d be charged with perjury. The prosecutor tried to put him in a catch-22 situation.”
According to al-Arian, the judge in this criminal contempt case, after reading the arguments, said that the very integrity of the justice department is at stake.
“She said that it was beginning to emerge that there was evidence that my father was misled and lied to by the Department of Justice,” al-Arian said. “Because when they signed a plea agreement with him in Florida in 2006, they told him that he wouldn’t have to cooperate or testify, or be forced to be involved in any other case other than his own. And that they would recommend the minimum sentence and that he would be released and deported. That of course never happened. The judge said if the justice department made this deal with my father then everyone in the justice department would be bound to that.”
The judge scheduled a hearing first in April 2009, but it was canceled. In September 2010, the prosecution asked the judge to reschedule a hearing for 29 October — and it was canceled again, with no reason given.
“It’s difficult to say what this all means,” al-Arian said. “It could be conjecture, but we’re hoping my father will be released and finally deported so that we can all move on with life. It’s been almost eight years since his arrest. Eight years is a very long time. We’re anxious for him to be able to move on. He’s lost so many important years already, and we want him to live as a free man. House arrest is not freedom.”
Because Dr. al-Arian is a stateless Palestinian refugee, it is still unknown to where he could be deported.
“Even if the judge rules in my father’s favor and he is released, he still doesn’t have a country to go to,” al-Arian said. “And we really hope that there will be a country that will open its doors to a persecuted political prisoner and a victim of the Bush administration, a victim of a wave of anti-Palestinian activism. It’s mind-boggling that in the 21st century, there is a group of people who don’t have a country. Hopefully someone will be able to adopt him. It’s one more battle we have to fight.”
Ghassan Elashi and the Holy Land Foundation
Similar to Dr. Sami al-Arian and his family, the founders of a US-based Muslim charity and their families are holding out hope that justice could prevail during a new appeals process.
In 2009, Ghassan Elashi, a Palestinian-American cofounder of the Holy Land Foundation (HLF), once the largest Muslim charity in the US, was sentenced to 65 years following a targeted campaign launched by the Bush administration after 11 September 2001. Based in Dallas, Texas, the HLF sent direct humanitarian aid to Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, as well as to Eastern Europe and across the US. The HLF established food banks on the East Coast, helped victims of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and provided assistance after floods and tornadoes devastated parts of Iowa and Texas in the 1990s.
As The Electronic Intifada previously reported, just months after the 11 September 2001 attacks, the US Department of the Treasury froze the HLF’s bank accounts as the executive branch of the US government shut down the organization under the auspices of the Patriot Act. Using the Material Support Law provision, the US State Department accused the five HLF founders — now dubbed the Holy Land Five — of providing “assistance” to designated “terrorist groups” (namely Hamas) in Palestine. The Bush administration immediately closed the organization and issued aggressive charges against the charity workers. The federal prosecution team was allowed to use secret evidence, and there was no hearing before the sentencing of the HLF’s cofounders in 2009.
On 27 October 2010, US Attorney General Eric Holder personally awarded the entire local, state and federal prosecution team involved in the HLF case with the second-highest honor in the justice department — the Attorney General’s Award for Distinguished Service.
Noor Elashi, Ghassan Elashi’s daughter, told The Electronic Intifada that the attorney general’s award comes as the defense team is preparing to argue an appeal in front of a three-judge panel on the grounds that the prosecution team violated the constitution at several instances, including the unprecedented use of an anonymous expert witness. If the panel agrees with just one of the arguments made, Elashi said, then that will invalidate all of the convictions, and the prosecution will have to re-try the case.
Another constitutional violation related to the HLF case was found by a federal judge in Dallas, Texas, on 7 November. Judge Jorge Solis ruled during an appeals process that the unsealing of a document which put 246 individuals and groups on a list of so-called “un-indicted co-conspirators” associated with the HLF violated the constitutional Fifth Amendment due process rights of the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT). In other words, the US government’s prosecution team’s release of this list condemned organizations such as NAIT to guilt by association without affording them their constitutional right to defend themselves in court. In the atmosphere of fear induced after 11 September 2001 such aspersions can be lethal to the reputation of any organization or individual.
However, West Bank-based Ma’an News Agency reported that “despite the Fifth Amendment violation … [Judge] Solis denied NAIT’s request, along with that of the Council on American Islamic Relations and the Islamic Society of North America, to have its name taken off the government’s list, finding ‘ample evidence’ linking it to Holy Land [Foundation]” (“US court ‘should not have publicly released’ co-conspirators list“, 8 November 2010).
“The whole appeals process typically takes a year to two years before an oral argument is made,” Elashi said. “We don’t expect to hear anything soon. It could take anywhere between a few months to a few years … But knowing the relentless nature of the prosecution team, they won’t stop. What’s happened to Sami al-Arian is a perfect example of that.”
For now, the Elashi family is anticipating being able to visit Ghassan in prison for the first time in 18 months. Ghassan is currently being held in a Communications Management Unit (CMU) prison facility in Illinois, a block within some prisons that are nicknamed “little Guantanamos” due to the overwhelming majority of Muslims and persons of Arab and Middle Eastern descent being held in them and the draconian detention conditions that are applied.
According to the Center for Constitutional Rights, people imprisoned in CMU facilities are systematically denied any physical contact with family members and are forbidden from hugging, touching or embracing their children, spouses or loved ones during visits. Phone calls are also severely limited. The center says that the CMU units are “an experiment in social isolation” (“CMUs: The Federal Prison System’s Experiment in Social Isolation“).
“There was a one-year visitation ban that was just lifted,” Elashi said. “On Thanksgiving weekend, my family and I are finally going to see my father. He’s become a ghost-like figure to me. When a loved one is being incarcerated, when the only communication is one 15-minute phone call every two weeks, they really start to sort of dissipate in your eyes. I am looking forward to seeing him.”
The Elashi family will be separated from Ghassan by a plexiglass wall, and they will only be able to communicate through a telephone receiver. The entire conversation, Noor Elashi said, will be live-monitored from the justice department in Washington, DC, and can be terminated at any moment.
“Even when you get to the prison itself, there is this sense that something may happen during the security process that may deny you entry,” Elashi added. “It’s sort of like being at [an Israeli-controlled] border crossing — for example, I’ve never been allowed into Palestine.”
Elashi said that although her family remains hopeful with the appeals process now underway, the widespread attacks on US-based activists and charity workers is increasingly troubling.
“I think that it’s finally hitting closer to home, and is becoming more apparent than ever in 2010 — nearly a decade after 11 September — that everyone’s at risk,” Elashi said.
“Not only people like my father, who founded a charity, but anybody,” Elashi added. “Even a former president of the United States, Jimmy Carter, is at risk of being prosecuted under the Material Support Law because he helped supervise Lebanese elections, and has associated with [Lebanese political movement] Hizballah. American newspapers are at risk, because they’ve printed op-ed pieces by Hizballah and Hamas officials, an act that could be argued that, under the Material Support Law, aids these people and these parties by furthering their goals and giving them a voice.”
Lives disrupted, movements at stake
Amidst the mounting reports of federal raids on the Somali community in the US, the conviction of four African-American Muslim men accused of plotting to bomb a synagogue in what critics say was a case of entrapment, and reports of FBI informants infiltrating the Muslim community in the US, there is a growing movement to fight back against what many view as repressive, racist policies.
Following the raids and subpoenas of the 14 anti-war and solidarity activists in September, emergency demonstrations were held outside of FBI and other federal buildings in at least 62 US cities. Thousands have called in to the offices of President Obama, Attorney General Holder and US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. Civil rights and liberties organizations, social justice and faith groups and trade unions have issued dozens of statements of solidarity. Ad-hoc groups have formed around the US to push back against what many view as a test case that will have repercussions for the wider social justice movement in the country. And the first national meeting of the Committee to Stop FBI Repression was held in New York City earlier this month.
“It’s definitely time for Americans, for all of us, to respond to this and join a massive campaign that would really approach Congress about revising the Material Support Law,” Elashi said. “It’s flawed. And it’s one that is responsible for [targeting] many innocent people — not only my father but activists all over the country whose only crimes are supporting the Palestinian cause, as well as causes in Colombia and other places.”
Laila al-Arian echoed this sentiment. “Unfortunately, we’ve seen that the Obama administration isn’t much better than its predecessor when it comes to American Muslims and civil liberties — and even anti-war activists,” she said. “Anyone who’s espousing views that are in any way controversial or unpopular can be a target. It’s just a way to stifle dissent and activism, which are completely lawful activities that are seen as unpopular. I just hope that people begin to make their voices heard when it comes to these kinds of crackdowns.”
Hatem Abudayyeh said that “National organizations like the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, the Arab American Institute, the National Network for Arab American Communities and other national organizations which have civil rights and liberties at the forefront of their agenda should leverage the relationships they have with the administration, the Department of Justice, the US attorney’s offices to put pressure … to drop this investigation and to end these grand juries.”
“We have powerful institutions and we have prominent individuals across the country from the Arab and Muslim community,” Abudayyeh added. “Those organizations have put their names on to sign-on letters, they’ve made phone calls to US Attorney General Eric Holder and the US attorney and the president, and we need to continue to put that pressure on.”
Meanwhile, the Elashi family prepares to see Ghassan for the first time in a year and a half, the al-Arian family awaits the deportation of Sami, and countless other families pay an unbearable price for their first amendment activity supporting the Palestine liberation struggle.
“In one sense I’m a bit luckier than others,” Abudayyeh said, “because there are some couples in which both partners have been subpoenaed and who have young children. So if they continue to refuse to testify and there’s a possibility they might be held in civil contempt, then they have really difficult decisions to make in terms of their children … I know that my daughter will be in good hands with her mother and my parents and my siblings and everyone else in the extended family providing support.”
Nora Barrows-Friedman is an award-winning independent journalist, writing for The Electronic Intifada, Inter Press Service, Al-Jazeera, Truthout and other outlets. She regularly reports from Palestine.
Maureen Clare Murphy is managing editor of The Electronic Intifada and an organizer with the Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago.
Teaching The Oppressed How To Fight Oppression
By Ramzy Baroud | Palestine Chronicle | 23 October, 2010
An American activist once gave me a book she wrote detailing her experiences in Palestine. The largely visual volume documented her journey of the occupied West Bank, rife with barbed wires, checkpoints, soldiers and tanks. It also highlighted how Palestinians resisted the occupation peacefully, in contrast to the prevalent media depictions linking Palestinian resistance to violence.
More recently, I received a book glorifying non-violent resistance, and which referred to self-proclaimed Palestinian fighters who renounced violence as “converts”. The book elaborated on several wondrous examples of how these “conversions” came about. Apparently a key factor was the discovery that not all Israelis supported the military occupation. The fighters realized that an environment that allowed both Israelis and Palestinians to work together would be best for Palestinians seeking other, more effective means of liberation.
An American priest also explained to me how non-violent resistance is happening on an impressive scale. He showed me brochures he had obtained during a visit to a Bethlehem organization which teaches youth the perils of violence and the wisdom of non-violence. The organization and its founders run seminars and workshops and invite speakers from Europe and the United States to share their knowledge on the subject with the (mostly refugee) students.
Every so often, an article, video or book surfaces with a similar message: Palestinians are being taught non-violence; Palestinians are responding positively to the teachings of non-violence.
As for progressive and Leftist media and audiences, stories praising non-violence are electrifying, for they ignite a sense of hope that a less violent way is possible, that the teachings of Gandhi are not only relevant to India, in a specific time and space, but throughout the world, anytime.
These depictions repeatedly invite the question: where is the Palestinian Gandhi? Then, they invite the answer: a Palestinian Gandhi already exists, in numerous West Bank villages bordering the Israeli Apartheid Wall, which peacefully confront carnivorous Israeli bulldozers as they eat up Palestinian land.
In a statement marking a recent visit announcement by the group of Elders to the Middle East, India’s Ela Bhatt, a ‘Gandhian advocate of non-violence’, explained her role in The Elders’ latest mission: “I will be pleased to return to the Middle East to show the Elders’ support for all those engaged in creative, non-violent resistance to the occupation – both Israelis and Palestinians.”
For some, the emphasis on non-violent resistance is a successful media strategy. You will certainly be far more likely to get Charlie Rose’s attention by discussing how Palestinians and Israelis organize joint sit-ins than by talking about the armed resistance of some militant groups ferociously fighting the Israeli army.
For others, ideological and spiritual convictions are the driving forces behind their involvement in the non-violence campaign, which is reportedly raging in the West Bank. These realizations seem to be largely lead by Western advocates.
On the Palestinian side, the non-violent brand is also useful. It has provided an outlet for many who were engaged in armed resistance, especially during the Second Palestinian Intifada. Some fighters, affiliated with the Fatah movement, for example, have become involved in art and theater, after hauling automatic rifles and topping Israel’s most wanted list for years.
Politically, the term is used by the West Bank government as a platform that would allow for the continued use of the word moqawama, Arabic for resistance, but without committing to a costly armed struggle, which would certainly not go down well if adopted by the non-elected government deemed ‘moderate’ by both Israel and the United States.
Whether in subtle or overt ways, armed resistance in Palestine is always condemned. Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah government repeatedly referred to it as ‘futile’. Some insist it is a counterproductive strategy. Others find it morally indefensible.
The problem with the non-violence bandwagon is that it is grossly misrepresentative of the reality on the ground. It also takes the focus away from the violence imparted by the Israeli occupation – in its routine and lethal use in the West Bank, and the untold savagery in Gaza – and places it solely on the shoulders of the Palestinians.
As for the gross misrepresentation of reality, Palestinians have used mass non-violent resistance for generations – as early as the long strike of 1936. Non-violent resistance has been and continues to be the bread and butter of Palestinian moqawama, from the time of British colonialism to the Israeli occupation. At the same time, some Palestinians fought violently as well, compelled by a great sense of urgency and the extreme violence applied against them by their oppressors. It is similar to the way many Indians fought violently, even during the time that Mahatma Gandhi’s ideas were in full bloom.
Those who reduce and simplify India’s history of anti-colonial struggle are doing the same to Palestinians.
Misreading history often leads to an erroneous assessment of the present, and thus a flawed prescription for the future. For some, Palestinians cannot possibly get it right, whether they respond to oppression non-violently, violently, with political defiance or with utter submissiveness. The onus will always be on them to come up with the solution, and do so creatively and in ways that suit our Western sensibilities and our often selective interpretations of Gandhi’s teachings.
Violence and non-violence are mostly collective decisions that are shaped and driven by specific political and socio-economic conditions and contexts. Unfortunately, the violence of the occupier has a tremendous role in creating and manipulating these conditions. It is unsurprising that the Second Palestinian Uprising was much more violent than the first, and that violent resistance in Palestine gained a huge boost after the victory scored by the Lebanese resistance in 2000, and again in 2006.
These factors must be contemplated seriously and with humility, and their complexity should be taken into account before any judgments are made. No oppressed nation should be faced with the demands that Palestinians constantly face. There may well be a thousand Palestinian Gandhis. There may be none. Frankly, it shouldn’t matter. Only the unique experience of the Palestinian people and their genuine struggle for freedom could yield what Palestinians as a collective deem appropriate for their own. This is what happened with the people of India, France, Algeria and South Africa, and many other nations that sought and eventually attained their freedom.
Related articles
- Residency Of 240,000 Palestinians Revoked By Israel Since 1967 (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Celebrating Palestinian Resistance and Resilience (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- The Taste of Freedom (thedailybeast.com)
Israeli Army Isolates the Village of Nabi Saleh to Prevent Commemorative Folk Festival
By Mays Al-Azza – IMEMC & Agencies – November 12, 2010
After the Fatah movement called the Palestinian people in Ramallah for a folk festival to commemorate late president Yasser Arafat, as a new step in escalating the popular resistance, the Israeli army imposed an intensive blockade upon the village of an-Nabi Saleh, northwest of Ramallah.
Israeli army personnel also erected military barriers to separate the villages of Beit Ramba and Kufr Aein, northwest Ramallah, and tightened measures and obstructed the passage of the vehicles through the Israeli checkpoint, Attara.
Muhammad Tamemi, an official in the media office in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlement Construction, stated that Israeli army personnel imposed a blockade upon the village and obstructed the passage of vehicles preventing international peace activists and journalists from entering the village. He pointed out that these measures had been carried out after the Israeli army entered the village at dawn threatening the villagers with harsh measures if the festival went ahead.
He added that Israeli army personnel closed all the entrances of the village and intensified the presence of the soldiers there in order to prevent the residents of the nearby villages from participating in the festival which is scheduled to be held at mid-day.
The Popular committee Against the Wall and Settlement Construction has called the Palestinians to go by foot to participate in the festival and face all the Israeli measures.
Major Dutch pension fund divests from occupation
Adri Nieuwhof and Guus Hoelen, The Electronic Intifada, 12 November 2010
The major Dutch pension fund Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn (PFZW), which has investments totaling 97 billion euros, has informed The Electronic Intifada that it has divested from almost all the Israeli companies in its portfolio.
PGGM, the manager of the major Dutch pension fund PFZW, has adopted a new guideline for socially responsible investment in companies which operate in conflict zones.
In addition, PFZM has also entered into discussions with Motorola, Veolia and Alstom to raise its concerns about human rights issues. All three companies have actively supported and profited from Israel’s occupation of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip.
Over the past few years, activists in the Netherlands have questioned the two largest pension funds PFZW and ABP about their holdings in companies profiting from the Israeli occupation of Palestine. In September 2009, the Norwegian State Pension Fund decided that it would no longer invest in companies that directly contribute to violations of international humanitarian law. By February 2010, ABP, the largest Dutch pension fund, informed The Electronic Intifada it had also divested from the Israeli company Elbit Systems. At the same time, PFZW confirmed that it held shares in Elbit Systems worth 1.6 million euros.
However, the pension fund was reevaluating its investments in Israeli companies. At the time, PFZW held shares in thirteen Israeli companies, including four banks, several telecommunication companies, construction companies and Elbit Systems. In November 2009, PGGM informed The Electronic Intifada that the fund would approach divestment decisions on “Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi and other [Israeli] companies” in a structural manner. This was based on a “new policy on how to deal with investments in companies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” That month, PGGM announced that PFZW was divesting from Africa-Israel for “technical reasons.” Owned by Lev Leviev, Africa-Israel has been involved in the building of illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank.
On 8 November, PGGM spokeswoman Diana Abrahams confirmed in a telephone conversation PFZW’s divestment from almost all Israeli companies. Abrahams could give no further details and referred to PFZW’s 2010 annual report, which will be published next year.
During this period, PGGM has also contributed to the development of guidelines for the United Nations Global Compact. The Global Compact is a strategic policy initiative for businesses that are committed to sustainability and responsible business practices which started in 2000. The initiative is endorsed by chief executives and seeks to align their operations and strategies with ten universally-accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labor, environment and anti-corruption. Last year PGGM was involved in developing a guideline for business operations in combat zones.
The decision by the Dutch pension funds to divest from Israeli companies is yet another indicator for the success of the international boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign. It is likely only a matter of time before these funds and others divest from the international corporations which profit from Israel’s occupation.
Adri Nieuwhof is a consultant and human rights advocate based in Switzerland.
Guus Hoelen, secretary of Werkgroep Keerpunt, involved in divestment campaigns in the Netherlands.
Speaking out on Kashmir and Palestine in the US
Yasmin Qureshi, The Electronic Intifada, 9 November 2010
The United States has become a battleground for both the struggles of the peoples of Palestine and Kashmir, for freedom from military occupation and for justice. Awareness amongst the US public is broadened as the repression of both struggles grows ever more violent, and meanwhile those wishing to stifle debate on these issues in the US resort to harassment and intimidation.
The same day that renowned activist and writer Arundhati Roy commented that “Kashmir was never an integral part of India,” for which her home was later attacked, I was subjected to harassment here in the US while I spoke about the human rights situation in Kashmir. Though not threatened in the way that Roy was, what we both experienced were attempts to silence us. Forces sympathetic to the same right-wing ideology as those who attacked Roy mobilized their ranks by putting out an alert stating: “An Indian Muslim Woman is speaking about azadi [freedom] of Kashmiris and we should protest.”
After my presentation at the main public library in San Jose, California last month, I was told by one member of the audience that “You are the very reason why we Hindus hate Muslims,” and that comment was followed by many that were worse. I was called an extremist and told “Your presentation is a lie; this is India-bashing.” The abuse I received will be familiar to those who have been on the receiving end of the backlash when speaking about the Palestinian cause.
Indeed, a week earlier, Palestinian author Susan Abulhawa was called an extremist by Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz at the Boston Book Festival after she presented well-established facts about Palestine. He resorted to name calling and ad hominem attacks.
Israel and India are often represented in US media as bastions of democracy in the Middle East and South Asia, respectively. Supporters of the policies of both governments delegitimize any resistance or criticism and discourage revelation of the truth through intimidation and personal attacks.
Kashmir is the most militarized zone in the world with close to 700,000 Indian troops. According to Professor Angana Chatterji of the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS), between the years of 1989 and 2000, “In Kashmir, 70,000 are dead, over 8,000 have been disappeared and 250,000 have been displaced … India’s military governance penetrates every facet of life. … The hyper-presence of militarization forms a graphic shroud over Kashmir: detention and interrogation centers, army cantonments, abandoned buildings, bullet holes, bunkers and watchtowers, detour signs, deserted public squares, armed personnel, counter-insurgents and vehicular and electronic espionage” (“Kashmir: A Time For Freedom,” Greater Kashmir, 25 September 2010).
Because she has spoken out, Chatterji has become a target of right-wing Hindutva groups — those espousing an exclusivist Hindu nationalist ideology in India that often denigrates and denies the legitimacy of non-Hindus in India. Hindutva groups in the US and India have attacked her because of her work tracking funding to Hindutva groups from the US after the 2002 pogrom of Muslims in Gujarat and more recently as co-conveyor of the International People’s Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Indian-administered Kashmir. Chatterji told me: “I was threatened with rape by Hindutva groups in 2005. Since announcing the Kashmir Tribunal in April 2008, each time I have entered or left India since, I have been stopped or detained at immigration.” Richard Shapiro, her partner and chair and associate professor at CIIS, was banned from entering India on 1 November 2010.
Hindutva groups try to scuttle any broader discussion about human rights violations in Kashmir, the conditional annexation by India in 1947 or right to self-determination by limiting it to the issue of the displacement and killings of the upper caste minority Kashmiri Hindu Pandits in the late 1980s and by insisting that Kashmir is not an international issue.
Similarly, Zionists seeking to draw attention away from Israel’s abuses of Palestinians’ human rights often focus exclusively on suicide bombings or the rule of Hamas. Their aim is to silence any discussion of the historic Palestinian demands for the implementation of the refugees’ right of return, an end to the military occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and equality for Palestinian citizens in Israel.
And the front line in the battle to influence US public opinion towards both the Kashmir and Palestine struggles can be found at the university campus.
“There is a well-orchestrated and funded campaign of intimidation and harassment by Zionist and Hindutva groups on campuses to target academics,” says Sunaina Maira, Associate Professor at the University of California, Davis campus. Zionist academics tried to pressure the University of California, Berkeley to cancel an event last month titled “What Can American Academia Do to Realize Justice for Palestinians,” organized by the Students for Justice in Palestine. In a letter to the school’s chancellor, the groups urged him to withdraw official university sponsorship of the event and publicly condemn the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israeli apartheid at the school’s campus.
A similar attempt was made in 2006 by Indian American members of AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel lobby, when they tried to cancel a panel titled “South Asian-Arab solidarity against Israeli apartheid” at Stanford University. The objective was to bring South Asians and Arabs together to take a unified stand against US imperialism and Israeli apartheid and speak up against the Zionist-Hindutva alliances. Despite the attempts by outside groups to stifle free speech, both these events eventually did take place on the campuses and were quite successful.
The attempts to silence those who speak out in the US are not the only thing that Kashmir and Palestine have in common. Both Kashmiris and Palestinians are struggling for justice and freedom against highly-militarized occupations. The recent protests by stone-throwing Kashmiri youth drew comparisons to the first intifada in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
And it is perhaps the linking of these struggles that those who stand in the way of freedom for oppressed peoples fear the most. Notably, Zionists and Hindutva advocates have adopted a similar Islamophobic language and worldview that considers any grievances or struggles by Muslims to be simply a cover for “jihadism” or “wahhabism” and thus justifies treating all such movements for justice — however they are conducted — as “terrorist.”
While the situations in Kashmir and Palestine are not completely analogous, in recent years India and Israel have fostered political and military links, including arms sales, joint intelligence, trade agreements and cultural exchanges.
Historically India has been supportive of the Palestinian struggle. But in 1992 India established diplomatic relations with Israel and ties were further strengthened in 2000 when India Home Minister L.K. Advani visited Israel; Advani is considered the architect of the rise of the Hindutva movement in the 1980s and ’90s. Today India is the largest buyer of Israel’s arms and Israel is training Indian military units in “counter-terrorist” tactics and urban warfare to be used against Kashmiris and resistance groups in northeast and central India.
The repressive governments of both India and Israel enjoy a warm relationship with the the US. Bilateral defense ties between US and India — based on the new strategic realities of Asia — is one of the objectives of US President Barack Obama’s current visit to India, according to the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR), a Washington-based think tank. The US also gives $3 billion in military aid to Israel annually.
Such alliances between states, which aim to perpetuate injustice and maintain regimes that are rejected by those forced to live under them, underscore the need for education and solidarity among supporters of those long denied their freedom, equality and self-determination.
Those in the US who defend the status quo may resort to tactics of intimidation. But just as state repression in Kashmir and Palestine has failed to quell those struggles for freedom, those of us in the US concerned with justice in Palestine and Kashmir — and the US government’s role in each — will not be intimidated into silence.
Yasmin Qureshi is a San Francisco Bay Area professional and human rights activist involved in social justice movements in South Asia and Palestine. Her article on Kashmir, “Democracy Under the Barrel of a Gun,” was published in June 2010 by CounterPunch and ZCommunications.
BDS and Israel’s Battle for Legitimacy
Do we want the rule of jungle to override the Declarations of Human Rights?
By Samah Sabawi | Palestine Chronicle | November 8, 2010
(Excerpts from a speech presented at the first National BDS Conference in Australia October 2010.)
Israeli propagandists attacking the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement often claim that pro-Palestinian activists hide behind words like International Humanitarian Law to promote a hidden agenda aimed at demonizing and deligitmizing Israel. But there is no hidden agenda. We are explicit and clear in what we say and what we call for. We don’t hide behind International Humanitarian Law we stand by it. This is precisely why Israeli propagandists have good reason to worry. Israel knows that its fight to legitimize its behavior cannot be won for as long as the BDS movement continues to expose its violations of IHL. So it is pushing back with its army of lawyers and experts in an effort to exonerate itself of accountability, redefine the rules of IHL and undermine international bodies and institutions. If Israel succeeds, Palestinians will not be the only ones to suffer. The implications of legitimizing Israel’s behavior will have far reaching affects on all citizens of this globe.
In calling on Israel to comply with its obligations under IHL, the BDS movement highlights the strength of the Palestinian cause. Palestinians don’t need to negotiate for rights they are already entitled to, they need to demand these rights. The right of return, the right to citizenship, the right to equality, the right to self determination, the right to live free from occupation, the right to education, the right to freedom of movement, the right to security the right to fair trials etc, these are all non-negotiable human rights Palestinians are already entitled to under IHL.
BDS activists and Palestinian solidarity groups have taken note of that, but we have to be aware that time is precious and we must move fast. Right now, Israel is fighting a ferocious battle, headed by its best lawyers, military experts, politicians and academics to redefine the rule of law. This is especially dangerous because of the close ties they share with countries fighting ‘the war on terror’ such as Canada, Australia, the US, Britain and others who have a vested interest in rolling back international law and eliminating any protection their non-state foes and the civilians they kill maybe entitled to.
Jeff Helper wrote about this in his article The Second Battle of Gaza: Israel’s Undermining of International Law where he identified some of the leading Israeli figures who feature prominently in this campaign. One of them is Asa Kasher, a professor of philosophy and “practical ethics” at Tel Aviv University who wrote in Haaretz in 2009 “We in Israel are in a key position in the development of law in this field because we are on the front lines in the fight against terrorism. This is gradually being recognized both in the Israeli legal system and abroad…What we are doing is becoming the law”.
Another prominent Israeli figure involved in this campaign is former head of Israel’s International Law Division in the Military Advocate General’s office, Daniel Reisner who told Yotam Feldman of Haaretz “International law develops through its violation… an act that is forbidden today becomes permissible if executed by enough countries”. Reisner gave an example of how Israel’s policy of targeted assassinations was initially viewed by most governments and international bodies as illegal; but now it is “in the center of the bounds of legitimacy.”
We see the laws changing in many western democracies as we adopt new ways of dealing with alleged ‘terror’ suspects and anti-war protestors. Recent examples include the FBI raids of homes of anti-war activists in the US, the Canadian Police brutalizing citizens during the G20 protests in Toronto and the WikiLeaks evidence of war crimes committed by the US in Afghanistan [the release of which normalizes the violations, aiding Israel in the process]. Our governments are violating our civil rights, and the rights of the civilians in the countries where they are waging war. Our world is changing. Kasher and the Israeli military establishment know this. The more often so called western democracies apply principles that originated in Israel in places like Afghanistan and Iraq as well as domestically under the cover of a ‘war on terror’ the more chance there is that these new principles will become valuable parts of IHL.
Today, Israel stands in violation of 65 UN Resolutions on issues related to Palestinians refugees, Jerusalem, its borders, its assaults on its neighbors; its violations of the human rights of the Palestinians, its building of illegal colonies and its refusal to abide by the U.N. Charter and the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War.
As the definition of ‘terror’ stretches, and as the ‘war on terror’ spreads Israel’s campaign to undermine IHL will have a terrible impact on the people of the world. We need these laws to protect us. They are not just some abstract notion that affects someone else in a faraway country. These are laws that touch our lives as civilians everywhere on this planet.
Make no mistake about it, oppression spreads. Powerful states are only too happy to allow Israel to redefine the rules of engagement so they too can practice impunity in their own wars. We the people of the world will be left to pay the heavy price. Do we want to be deprived protection as civilians in times of war? Do we want to be denied fair trials? Do we want to be robbed of our civil liberties? Do we want the rule of jungle to override the Universal Declarations of Human Rights? Do we want to legitimize Israel’s behavior? Today the BDS campaign is not only at the forefront of the battle for Palestinian rights, it is at the forefront of standing up for the rule of International Humanitarian Law.
– Samah Sabawi is a writer playwright and poet. She was born in Gaza and is currently residing in Melbourne Australia.
German people in unprecedented rebellion against government
1,000 injured in nuclear protests, police at breaking point
By Jane Burgermeister – November 8, 2010
Like the Roman legions vanquished in the Teutoburger Wald in Lower Saxony in 9 AD, the 17,000 police officers that marched into the woods around the nuclear storage facility in Gorleben in northern Germany on Sunday morning looked invincible. Police personnel from France, Croatia and Poland had joined in the biggest security operation ever mounted against protestors against a train carrying nuclear waste to a depot in an isolated part of Lower Saxony’s countryside. Helicopters, water canons and police vehicles, including an armoured surveillance truck, accompanied an endless column of anti-riot police mounted on horses and also marching down the railway tracks into the dense woods. Tens of thousands of anti riot police clattered along the tracks, their helmets and visors gleaming in the morning sun, and wearing body armour, leg guards and carrying batons.
But by Sunday night, those same police officers were begging the protestors for a respite.
Trapped in black, icy woods without supplies or reinforcements able to reach them because of blockades by a mobile fleet of farmer’s tractors, the exhausted and hungry police officers requested negotiations with the protestors. A water cannon truck was blocked by tractors, and yet the police still had to clear 5,000 people lying on the railway track at Harlingen in pitch darkness. The largest ever police operation had descended into chaos and confusion in the autumn woods of Lower Saxony, defeated by the courage and determination of peaceful protestors who marched for miles through woods to find places to lie down on the tracks and to scoop out gravel to delay the progress of the “the train from hell.”
The police union head Reiner Wendt gave vent to the general frustration when he issued a press statement via the DPA news agency last night saying the police had reached exhaustion point and needed a break. Behind the scenes, a battle seemed to be raging between the police chiefs, tucked up in their warm headquarters urging more action, and the exhausted officers on the ground.
The police on the ground won out. The Castor train – called a “Chernobyl on wheels” because it has been carrying 133 tonnes of highly radioactive waste to an unsafe depot – was stopped in the middle of the countryside and NATO barbed wire was placed around it. Lit by floodlights and guarded by a handful of police, the most dangerous train on the planet was forced to a halt after a 63 hour journey across France and Germany.
The defeat of the legions at Teutoburg marked the end of the attempt by the Roman empire to conquer Germania magna. And the failure of the biggest ever police operation two thousand years later in the woods of Lower Saxony to tame women, elderly people and school children protesting the government’s nuclear policy, could well also go down as a turning point.
The Berlin government can no longer rely on the discredited mainstream media to control the way people see issues. Too many people recognise it to be a tool of propaganda. The government now needs to resort to brute force to bludgeon through decisions that enrich corporations and banks and impoverish everyone else. But the police forces at its disposal are simply not sufficient given the scale of the protests now gripping Germany. Only 1,500 police reinforcements could be mustered on Morning from the entire territory to deal with road blockades by thousands of protestors aiming to delay the transport of the nuclear waste on the final leg of its journey.
The police officers were exhausted after shifts of 24 hours or more, often without any food or just a cappuccino and snack bar, and they had nothing to look forward to but more of the same drudgery after a night spent four to a room in a Youth Hostel.
http://newsticker.sueddeutsche.de/list/id/1065325
A leading figure in a German police police union Bernard Witthaut today even lashed out at the government for trying to drive through unpopular policies using the police.
“Whether in Stuttgart or in Wendland today my colleagues are simply not getting out of their anti riot gear because of the wrong decisions by the government,” he said.
Many police officers also expressed sympathy with the protestors’ aims.
The question now is: how long can the use of police to bludgeon protestors continue when the protests are reaching this scale? How long can Germany be governed by a semi authoritarian regime using brute force when the force at its disposal is so small? The German army cannot be deployed on this kind of mission without sparking even more outrage. A false flag terrorist operation will hardly wash when the people are so fed up with the government lies and the media lies. EU soldiers will find it hard to deal with the Germans. The German and EU secret police cannot infiltrate all of the protestor’s organizations when there are simply so many.
The German people as a whole are on the march.
“Citizens in rebellion,” shouted a TAZ headline.
“Civil war in Wendtand,” fumed Bild.
NGO chief Kersin Rudek spoke for many when she said:
“We have lost faith in the government until they prove that their politics is for the people and not for the corporations.”
She talked about the “anger” among people at the “arrogance of the political class.”
As in the Stuttgart 21 railway protests, it was people from all walks of life, a genuine grass roots movement, that arrived in Wendland to protest the decision by the CDU/CSU/FDP government to ignore a legally binding deadline to phase out nuclear power. Against the wishes of the majority, Bilderberg Chancellor Angela Merkel announced this autumn that 17 reactors would continue for another 12 years at gigantic cost to the tax payer in subsidies.
The tax payers of Lower Saxony even have to foot the bill of 50 million euro for the police operation to protect the nuclear waste – and not the electricity companies making a fortune from the extravagant energy source while the government keeps investments in ground-breaking new renewable energy technologies such as the third generation solar cells at a negligible amount.
As in Stutggart, the police used savage force against peaceful demonstrators reinforcing the impression of a government out of control and refusing to respect the basic democratic right of people to hold protests without being beaten to a pulp. Videos of the Castor transport on Sunday show police beating people with their truncheons, punching them and throwing them to the ground. Police also used tear gas, pepper spray and water canon.
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,727706,00.html
One clip shows a police officer using his fist to punch a man lying on the railway track in the head.
About a 1,000 people were injured, it is reported. 950 people are reported to have suffered eye injuries due to pepper spray and tear gas, according to a spokesperson of “Castor schottern”. Another sixteen protestors suffered broken bones. There were 29 severe head wounds. Two people had to be taken to hospital.
One person had to be taken by helicopter after suffering multiple bone fractures after being trampled by a police horse.
But as in Stuttgart, the people did not give up in spite of the risk of savage beatings at the hands of the police. They insisted on their civic right enshrined in the constitution to hold peaceful political protests.
More than 50,000 people from all parts of the country and all walks of life attended a rally on a field close to Dannenberg. Thousands then marched through the autumn woods, splitting into small groups to descend into the valley, break through police lines to chain themselves to the rails or remove gravel from the tracks to delay the train.
According to Spiegel, 7,000 people alone took part in the road and railway blockades.
An armoured police car was set on fire by masked men but it is not clear if this was an agent pravocateur acting to discredit the protestors. A video shows a man able to walk up to the armoured car and set it alight unhindered.
The overwhelming number of protestors were peaceful.
In spite of the sub zero temperatures and ground frost, up to 5000 protestors lay down on the railway tracks at Harlingen late in the evening and refused to move. Supplies of hot tea, food and blankets were brought to them by mobile kitchens. Fires were lit to help stay warm.
The police worked from midnight until 7 am to clear protestors blocking the track, dragging many to an open air “prison concentration camp” where people were forced to sleep in fields surrounded by police trucks.
This morning, the protestors have regrouped today and thousands are reported to be preparing to block the transport by road of the nuclear waste from Dannenberg to Gorleben.
The organisers of the protest kept journalists and the public informed using live tickers, press releases and at Infopoints so that the whole country could follow the events outside the mainstream media. Radio Wendland is also broadcasting updates on the incredibly heroic resistance of so many people. At great personal risk, tens of thousands of people gave an example of courageous and peaceful non-violent resistance that will surely go down in history.
If this is the resistance for Castor and Stuttgart 21, just imagine what will happen when Germans finally grasp the scale of the banking scam being carried out by their “elite.”
The CDU/CSU/FDP government has already hit record lows in the polls and after Sunday’s savage police operation against peaceful protestors, support for them is sure to plummet further.
The feudal lords without a feudal army to push through their agenda of robbery are facing the end of the road now that their media propaganda apparatus based on the Springer and Bertelsmann empire is falling apart and their strategy of divide and rule through a false left/right political paradigm is no longer working.
A new freedom and power was born in the woods of Wendland. And it belonged to the people who have had enough of the arrogant authoritarian political class.
See also:
German police battle nuclear train protesters
Germans protest to stop nuclear train
Press TV – November 6, 2010
Demonstrators in Germany have been met by riot police as they attempt to stop a train carrying 123 tons of radioactive nuclear waste from France into Germany.
Tens of thousands of people gathered at the north German town of Gorleben to protest the arrival of the highly-radioactive nuclear waste.
Meanwhile, police forces used truncheons and mace against an estimated 150 activists who were attempting to dig a hole under a railway track to prevent the shipment.
Some of the protestors threw stones at security forces, while others blocked the road using tractors.
Around 16,500 police officers have been sent to quell the unrest, DPA reported.
Other reports indicated that trains were delayed as the activists chained themselves to the tracks. According to AFP, they were eventually removed and arrested by the police.
“This nuclear convoy, the most radioactive ever, exposes the population to excessive risks. There is a risk to lives in the short term in case of an accident, but also a long-term risk to their health,” a spokesperson for the anti-nuclear group Sortir du Nucleaire (Get out of Nuclear) said.
The waste is being shipped from La Hague in France by the state-controlled nuclear engineering company Areva.
Chancellor Angela Merkel labeled the move by the activists as, “not a peaceful demonstration, but a criminal offence.”
The so-called Castor trains — cask for storage of radioactive material — have been met by mass demonstrations for the past 30 years. The protests began when they first started to dump nuclear waste at the Gorleben facility.
Eleven steel containers holding the nuclear waste are expected to reach their destination on Sunday.
The protests are also directed at Merkel’s center-right government, which recently passed legislation to extend the life span of Germany’s 17 nuclear power stations beyond the previous deadline of 2022.
Boycott victory: Africa Israel suspends settlement construction
The following press release was issued by Adalah-NY on 3 November 2010:
Africa Israel, the flagship company of Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev, announced this week that it is no longer involved in Israeli settlement projects and that it has no plans for future settlement activities. Africa Israel subsequently denied that this was a political decision. However, in the last few years numerous organizations, firms, governments and celebrities have exerted pressure and severed their relationships with Leviev and his companies over their involvement in settlement construction and other human rights abuses, in response to a boycott campaign initiated by Adalah-NY.
Israel’s Coalition of Women for Peace disclosed on Monday that in an official letter to the Coalition, Africa Israel stated “Neither the company nor any of its subsidiaries and/or other companies controlled by the company are presently involved in or has any plans for future involvement in development, construction or building of real estate in settlements in the West Bank.” In follow-up articles in the Israeli media on Monday, Africa Israel said that the statement was “a description of the business today” and that “Africa Israel builds for all the public in Israel, and does not deal in politics or any other policy.”
Ethan Heitner from Adalah-NY explained, “Following years of settlement construction, and pro-settlement statements and activities by Lev Leviev, the public announcement by Africa Israel that it has no plans to build Israeli settlements is clearly a result of pressure from the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement. This provides concrete evidence of the way in which the BDS movement can change companies’ behavior. But Africa Israel can’t speak out of both sides of its mouth and expect a clean bill of health. Africa Israel must unambiguously renounce settlement activity, and all other involvement in violations of Palestinian rights. And Lev Leviev needs to end his involvement in settlement construction through other companies like Leader Management and Development, as well as his support for human rights abuses in the diamond industry in countries like Angola and Namibia.”
Adalah-NY began a campaign to boycott the companies of Lev Leviev in November 2007 which has since gained support from allies around the world. As a result, the Norwegian, Swedish and Dutch governments have divested from Africa Israel, as have a number of major international investment firms. The British government, UNICEF, Oxfam and CARE have all severed ties with Leviev, and major celebrities have quietly disassociated themselves from him.
From 2000-2008, Danya Cebus, the construction subsidiary of Africa Israel, built homes in the settlements of Har Homa, Maale Adumim (two different projects), Adam and Mattityahu East on the land of the West Bank village of Bilin. In late December 2009, Africa Israel sold Anglo-Saxon Real Estate, a company that sold settlement homes. Another Leviev-owned company, Leader Management and Development, still owns and operates the expanding settlement of Zufim, built on the land of the West Bank village of Jayyous. In what is now Tel Aviv, Danya Cebus has supported Israeli efforts to erase Palestinian claims and heritage, by building projects on top of the remains of Palestinian villages like Sheikh Muwanis and Sumail that were ethnically cleansed by Israel in 1948. Leviev has also been a donor to two Israeli groups — the Land Redemption Fund and the Bukhara Community Trust — both of which have been involved in expanding Israeli settlements. Leviev has also been rumored to donate to Elad which is taking over the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan.
As recently as 2008 Leviev expressed strong support for Israel’s continued takeover of Palestinian land. In a March 2008 interview in Haaretz daily, reporter Anshel Pfeffer asked Leviev, “Do you have a problem with building in the territories?” Leviev responded, “Not if the State of Israel grants permits legally.” According to an English translation of the same Haaretz interview published in The Jewish Chronicle, Leviev explained, “For me, Israel, Jerusalem and Haifa are all the same. … So are the Golan Heights. As far as I’m concerned, all of Eretz Israel is holy. To decide the future of Jerusalem? It belongs to the Jewish people. What is there to decide? Jerusalem is not a topic for discussion.”
Modeled on the worldwide campaign against apartheid-era South Africa, the movement for BDS against Israel, which was called for in response to Israel’s many violations of Palestinian rights, has grown and achieved significant successes, particularly following Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip in 2009, which killed more than 1,400 Palestinians.
Education in Palestine in world spotlight
The impact of the Israeli occupation on Palestinians’ right to education has previously not received enough attention. (Khaleel Reash/MaanImages)
Eva Bartlett | IPS | October 31, 2010
GAZA CITY – The focus on people’s movements in Palestine continues to gain momentum with growing non-violent demonstrations in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem, and with a Palestine-wide call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel.
Years of the non-violent demonstrations throughout the occupied West Bank against Israel’s separation wall have finally generated some media interest in the issue of the wall and annexation of Palestinian land. Yet the behind-the- scenes work of Palestinian unions, Palestinian and international BDS groups, video conferences bridging Palestine to the outside world, and the struggle of Palestinian students to access an education continues largely unnoticed by the cameras.
In July, 2010, the United Nations IRIN news reported that roughly 39,000 Palestinian children from Gaza would not have schools to attend, following the destruction or severe damage of some 280 schools and kindergartens during the 2008-2009 Israeli war on Gaza, and the continued inability to repair or rebuild due to the severe Israeli-led siege on Gaza and lack of construction materials.
The UN also reports that 88 percent of UNRWA schools and 82 percent of government schools operate on a shift system as a result, still resulting in serious overcrowding.
On the heels of popular protests against the G-20 summit in Toronto, and branching from the annual World Social Forum (WSF), the first World Education Forum (WEF) in Palestine began Oct. 28 and in regions throughout historic pre-1948 Palestine. From Jaffa to Nazareth, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and the Gaza Strip, forums on education and Palestinian culture continued until Oct. 31.
Dubbed ‘Education for Change’, the forums included global points of focus on education – including adult literacy and gender equity in early education – but delved further into Palestine-specific topics: occupation and emancipation; the psychological needs of Palestinian students traumatised by occupation and war; keeping Palestine’s history and culture prominent in educational programmes; the physical and bureaucratic roadblocks to higher education within and outside of Palestine; and the innovative means Palestinians use to educate themselves under six decades of occupation.
“Education is not only a basic human right, one that cannot [be] postponed or neglected during conflict or emergency, but also has a key role to play in protecting and sustaining the lives of children and youths,” says Dr. Mazen Hamada of Gaza’s Al-Azhar University and one of the WEF Gaza organisers. “The effect of siege on Gaza Strip has exceeded the economical, agricultural, heath and environmental levels to reach also the educational sector. The academic achievements of the students at all levels has decreased after the last war on Gaza, and the number of students not attending their classes has increased.”
Hamada notes that the siege’s simple act of banning paper and educational materials needed for schools affects students’ ability to study. He adds, “Because of the siege, many parents are unemployed and are not able to cover the tuition of their children at universities and schools. And university students aren’t able to continue their studies abroad, nor are professors able to participate in international conferences or obtain further training outside.”
The WEF-Palestine, over its four days of forums and events addressed these problems, while reiterating the need to include Palestinian culture and history in curriculum and activities.
“When I was a student, we studied Egyptian history and geography, we never even saw a map of Palestine in school,” says Abu Arab, 30, of his studies in Gaza under Egyptian control. “Palestinian culture wasn’t a part of the education programme then, especially since the Israelis could censor any information they didn’t want studied.”
“Ironically, I learned more about Palestine when I was in prison,” says Abu Basel. “I was imprisoned by the Israelis when I was 16 and hadn’t yet finished high school. Since they kept me for nine years, I had to finish my studies in jail.”
Like many Palestinians, Abu Basel used his time in prison to study from others who had an education. “Some had finished university, some had their Masters, some had studied abroad. We’d study together, like workgroups. We also studied Palestinian history and learned about Zionism.”
Specific to the WEF-Palestine is the problem of access: with all of Palestine’s borders controlled by Israel and Egypt, other means of communication and participation are vital. With group participation from Japan, Canada, Latin America, Africa, and Europe, the WEF-Palestine included video conferences and live streaming on the Internet, as well as interactive workshops, visits to important areas and cultural sessions.
In Gaza, participants joined a popular demonstration in Gaza’s northern Beit Hanoun, as well as meeting fishermen whose livelihoods have been destroyed by the siege and by attacks from Israeli gunboats in Gazan waters.
For farmers living in the buffer zone, the need to enhance education and international understanding is not simply a question of their children’s futures but also of their livelihoods, routinely destroyed by Israeli invasions.
The Garrara elementary school in southeastern Gaza is but one of many schools suffering from multiple problems under siege and under attacks by Israeli soldiers along the border. “We are under one kilometre from the border and the students experience regular firing from Israeli soldiers,” says Umm Mohammed, teacher at the school. “Many of our students have classmates who were killed or injured by these attacks, and that affects their psychological state and ability to study,” she says.
The school itself is still in shambles after the Israeli war on Gaza, and many of the students study in tents year-round.
The WSF a decade ago set out to promote notions of sustainable development, fair trade, and social justice. The WEF-Palestine by virtue of necessity focuses on the urgent educational issues at hand, but likewise harnesses the knowledge of grassroots activists, civil society groups, and educators, citing education as means of resistance, for peace and equality.
Al Azhar’s Dr. Hamada is positive about the outcome. “The WEF is a good opportunity to exchange information and experiences between Palestinians and other international educational organisations towards improving the educational system and teaching methodologies in Palestine,” he says.
As the statement from WEF-Palestine reminds everyone, “Transforming the world and liberating humanity from colonialism, racism and exploitation requires a struggling and educated population. Therefore education is an indispensable tool for liberation.”
Free speech under attack in Canada
A TIME TO SPEAK OUT DAY OF ACTION TO DEFEND FREE SPEECH ON NOVEMBER 8
Independent Jewish Voices – October 30, 2010
The Harper government is sponsoring a conference of the ‘Inter-Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Anti-Semitism’ (ICCA) – the CPCCA’s international counterpart – in Ottawa on November 8 and 9. The CPCCA and ICCA have an agenda to attack free speech and to silence legitimate criticism of Israel by falsely conflating this with anti-Semitism.
Independent Jewish Voices, along with many other human rights, peace, union, and Palestinian rights groups, is deeply concerned about the threat to free speech and civil liberties posed by the Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Anti Semitism'(CPCCA). It is legitimate and ethically necessary for Canadians of conscience to criticize Israeli human rights abuses and to support non-violent remedies.
A NEW MCCARTHYISM
The Harper government has already slashed funding to NGOs that dared to express support for Palestinian rights, brutally attacked and abused G20 demonstrators, barred British MP George Galloway from entering Canada because of his aid to the people of Gaza, and attacked CUPE, CUPW, and Israeli Apartheid Week activities. The list goes on!
The CPCCA, with Minister of Censorship and Deportation Jason Kenney as one of the CPCCA’s driving forces, aims to entrench these attacks on free speech, for example, by changing hate crime legislation to include legitimate criticism of Israel, by criminalizing BDS campaigns, by pressuring schools to teach that criticizing Israel is anti-Semitic, and by pressuring universities to ban events critical of Israel. Already in France, people have been arrested for distributing pamphlets critical of Israel.
The CPCCA held hearings this past year to try to paint a veneer of credibility on its transparent intention to attack free speech in Canada. It ignored many critical submissions. Even the CPCCA’s own witnesses from Canadian universities and the police confirmed that there is no rise in anti-Semitism and called on the CPCCA to respect free speech.
The ICCA conference is intended to distract from this embarrassing result. At a cost of over $451,280 in federal funds, the ICCA conference is closed to the public and the media, and makes no pretence of unbiased research.
STAND UP, FIGHT BACK
1. Organize a day of action for free speech on Monday, November 8.
Local events could include press conferences, protests, teach-ins, or other creative ideas to build the movement to defend free speech. IJV will release a 10 minute video on Nov. 8, which will be posted on YouTube and the IJV web site. Contact Independent Jewish Voices at ijv@magma.ca if you’d like us to send you a copy.
2. Contact your MP and the federal party leaders and demand they stand up for the principle of free speech in Canada and reject any attempts to silence or criminalize legitimate criticism of Israel. You can get their contact info at: http://webinfo.parl.gc.ca/MembersOfParliament/MainMPsCompleteList.aspx?TimePeriod=Current&Language=E
3. Contact university presidents and human rights offices in your city and ask them also to issue a statement affirming the right of students and faculty to free speech.
4. Sign our Free Speech Petition at http://ijvcanada.org/sign-signez-petition-cpcca-hearings/ which will be released to the press and all MPs on Nov. 8.
5. Send a photo to ijv@magma.ca of yourself holding a sign saying “I support free speech” or an anti-CPCCA sign (perhaps with duct tape over your mouth). We will post it on line with a title “This is what Democracy looks like.”
6. Join Independent Jewish Voices: Go to www.ijvcanada.org.
Featured Video
Trump Announces Operation To Escort Ships – Fmr. CIA Analyst Larry Johnson
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
Israel’s recurring use of terror on civilians
By Bob Finch | January 26, 2009
Insanely disproportionate use of violence against unarmed civilians… continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- 1977 Influenza Pandemic Sequence Shows Signs of Laboratory Creation: Journal ‘Cell’
- China issues first prohibition order to safeguard international trade order under rule of law
- Iran rejects Trump’s ‘Project Freedom,’ warns US over Hormuz role
- TRUMP ANNOUNCES OPERATION TO ESCORT SHIPS – Fmr. CIA Analyst Larry Johnson
- A few observations on Iran’s latest proposal to Trump
- ‘I urged that our objective be regime change… so did Netanyahu’ – ex-Trump adviser on Iran
- “STAGED”: Conspiracy Theories Are Everywhere!
- NATO courts screenwriters to embed alliance messaging in film, TV
- Iran replaces UAE ports with Pakistan corridor to break US blockade
- Iran sets one-month deadline for end to US-Israeli war, blockade: Report
- If Americans Knew
- As Palestinians die, Ben-Gvir celebrates birthday with golden noose cake – Daily Update
- Israel’s New Ambassador to the ‘Christian World’ Served as Envoy to Azerbaijan During the Ethnic Cleansing of Christians from Nagorno-Karabakh
- US set to sell $1B “Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System” to Israel – Daily Update
- Israeli Strikes Kill at Least 32 Across S Lebanon, Including Children – Amid “Ceasefire”
- Israel to pour $730m into propaganda arm amid reputational crisis
- Real Cost of Iran War Likely Double the $25 Billion Figure the Pentagon Gave to Congress
- Israel conducts farthest-ever strike in long history of attacks on Gaza humanitarian aid flotillas
- In Gaza, Israel commits 10+ ceasefire violations a day – Daily Update
- US ships 6,500 tons of munitions, equipment to Israel in 24 hours
- A New Library in Gaza Rises From the Ashes of Destruction
- No Tricks Zone
- Another Study Links Warming To Cloud Forcing, Shortwave Radiation, Natural Atmospheric Circulation
- Wind Energy Is Toxic, Hazardous To Human Health, Scientific Review Shows
- Oversupply Of Volatile Solar Energy Leads To Record NEGATIVE Prices!
- New Study: Extreme Heat Records, Heatwaves, Extreme Cold Records Declining Across US Since 1899
- It’s The Cold, Stupid! Cold 20 Times More Lethal Than Heat, Multiple Studies Show
- European Institute For Climate And Energy: “Climate Debate is Seldom About Science”
- New Study: The Climate May Be 5 Times More Sensitive To Solar Forcing Than Commonly Assumed
- EV Industry Reached $70 Billion In Losses In 2024 Due To Delusional Green Ideologies
- Reality Check: Maldives Have Actually Grown In Size Or Remained Stable Over Recent Decades
- Abrupt Climate Change Also Occurred NATURALLY In The Past …25 Times During Last Ice Age
Aletho News 