By Richard Hugus | Aletho News | December 31, 2013
Drone aircraft, which we first heard of as weapons of war used by the United States in foreign lands, are now poised for a full-scale invasion of the skies above the US itself. On December 30, 2013 the US Federal Aviation Administration announced its choices for drone testing in six states around the country — Alaska, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Texas and Virginia. These six states may in turn do their testing in more than one location, For example, according to the Anchorage Daily News, drone testing centered in Alaska at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks will be called “the ‘Pan-Pacific Unmanned Aircraft Systems Test Range Complex.’ It includes six flight ranges in Alaska, four in Hawaii and three in Oregon.” According to the Honolulu Star Advertiser “the Pohakuloa Training Area on Hawaii island, the Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai and even the island of Niihau have been included in discussions of places where the testing could occur.” According to the East Oregonian, drone testing is likely to involve a former military base in Pendleton, Port of Tillamook, and Warm Springs. Likewise, the New York operation will be run from the former Griffiss Air Force base in Rome, NY and, according to the Cape Cod Times, will also include the former Otis Air Base on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The Times reports that “the Cape site had the support of the state’s congressional delegation, a statewide military asset commission and business leaders” and that “among the institutions involved in the bid are Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Rochester Institute of Technology.”
What this story reveals is the creation of a huge web of DOD-connected Universities, businesses, corporations, defense contractors, and former and current Pentagon facilities spread all over the country. Included in this web are the many and various chambers of commerce, their boosters in the press, and numerous comprador “officials” anxious to bring federal money into their districts, at the expense of all the other people who live in them. Almost no news coverage has appeared that would imply the FAA decision was anything but a boon for the economy and the advent of a wonderful and inevitable new technology.
There is little news about the down side to hosting drones in all these areas of the country, each with a populace that has simply not been consulted. Drones first came to our attention at the beginning of “the war on terror.” We learned of them first as weapons for highly illegal, cowardly, and indiscriminate “targeted killings” in foreign lands. These weapons have murdered countless innocent people in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia pursuant to “kill lists” drawn up every week by the CIA and Pentagon, and approved by the White House. These weapons fulfill the US Air Force’s fantasy of “death from above,” carried out by pilots working in the security and comfort of US bases who, acting as judge, jury, and executioner, destroy supposed enemies from computer consoles as if it were a video game. The cowardliness of wars of aggression being conducted against innocent people in dirt-poor lands by unseen “UAV pilots” in air-conditioned offices thousands of miles away cannot be over-emphasized. This is what unmanned aircraft have brought so far to the reputation of the United States – a new low in the entire universe of human ethics; murder abroad is but the advance of capitalism at home. Wedding parties in Afghanistan have been decimated so that Amazon can deliver CDs and smart phones to our door by drone.
Nor is there news about the introduction of drones domestically as yet another assault on privacy and the human right to be free from surveillance. Domestic law enforcement agencies are just as anxious to spy on the US population and target people they call criminals as the Pentagon and CIA have been to spy on the rest of the world and kill people they call terrorists. It isn’t enough that our phones and computers have been turned by the NSA into astounding instruments of surveillance, that everything we say and do on these instruments is being harvested and stored, and that surveillance cameras are mounted at almost every business and public space. Now the national security state wants to have remote-controlled cameras videotaping us full-time from the sky. The police hope to have drones able to fire “non-lethal weapons” at people they deem to be involved in criminal activity so that they too can play God. Without question, non-lethal weapons will soon become lethal weapons and the US will be trying and executing citizens at home as it has done elsewhere without even a hint of due process.
The domestic military bases which are being revived by this brave new technology originally went out of business because there was nothing for them to do in the fulfillment of their original purpose – defending the country. Otis Air Base, now called “Joint Base Cape Cod”, is a case in point. It used to patrol the skies for Russian aircraft along the northeast coast and ended up being a disaster for the community in which it was situated because it polluted the local groundwater and sole-source drinking water aquifer with untold gallons of dumped jet fuel and cleaning solvents. It sent fighter jets to intercept the two planes hijacked to New York on September 11, 2001, but ended up being part of a ploy to let those planes actually reach the twin towers before they got there. This base and many others have been parasites on the communities around them. They will continue in that role in their new incarnation as hosts to drone spying and drone warfare. The war has come home. The people orchestrating this war – the global elite — have no particular allegiance to the United States. From their point of view, its land and its people must also be brought under control, just like everywhere else. How sad it is to see the scramble to welcome them.
December 31, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Aletho News, Civil Liberties, Militarism | Alaska, Cape Cod, Federal Aviation Administration, Human rights, Nevada, New York, Surveillance, United States, Unmanned aerial vehicle, Virginia |
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BETHLEHEM – Conditions attached to the release of Palestinian prisoners prove that Israel is not serious about the peace process, the director of rights group Addameer said Monday as 26 Palestinians prepared to be freed from Israeli jails.
Israeli authorities are expected to release the veteran Palestinian prisoners after midnight in the third stage of a phased agreement to free 104 detainees in line with commitments to US-brokered peace talks, which began in July.
In October, Israel released a group of 26 Palestinians detained before the 1993 Oslo Accords, while a first group was freed on Aug. 13.
Sahar Francis, general director of rights group Addameer, said that while any release of prisoners is welcome, strict Israeli conditions on freed detainees undermine “hope” and “trust” in the peace process.
“Israel has showed it is putting conditions on prisoner releases and the US supports these conditions. Prisoners held before 1993 should have been released 20 years ago, and not today,” she told Ma’an.
Francis says that Israel restricts the freedom of movement of Palestinians freed as part of political agreements, with residents of East Jerusalem banned from visiting the West Bank or Gaza Strip following their release.
West Bank residents are banned from leaving their district for months, and in some cases up to a year, following a return to civilian life, while released prisoners are also prohibited from leaving the country for varying periods of time depending on their sentence, with some permanently banned.
Any involvement in political activities can be also grounds for rearrest and imprisonment by Israeli authorities.
“These practices show that the Israelis are not really seeking justice and a lasting peace with the Palestinians,” Francis said.
“If the Israelis really had good intentions to end the conflict and grant Palestinians basic rights under international law they should release all Palestinian prisoners and stop arresting Palestinians in the occupied territories.”
Israel treats Palestinians like ‘terrorists’
In past prisoner releases, Israel has rearrested dozens of ex-detainees under Military Order 1651, which Francis says violates the most “basic rights” of Palestinian prisoners.
The order, which was implemented in 2009, allows for an Israeli military committee to sentence detainees to serve the remainder of their previous sentence under secret information not made available to lawyers.
Francis says the order was implemented by Israel to prepare “legally” for the release of prisoners which Israel would be reluctant to free and to impose conditions which would allow them to be rearrested in the future.
Israel has also violated international law by stipulating that freed detainees be deported to the Gaza Strip, or abroad, as part of the conditions of their release, Francis said.
Both Samer Issawi and Ayman Sharawna were rearrested by Israel under Military Order 1651 after being freed in the 2011 prisoner swap deal between Israel and Hamas, with Sharawna eventually deported to Gaza for 10 years after agreeing to end hunger strike action.
Hana Shalabi was also rearrested under the military order and subsequently deported to Gaza for three years under the conditions of her release.
These new procedures represent “serious violations” of human rights and prove that the Palestinian community can see little hope in the future of the peace process, Francis says.
Furthermore, Israel continues its policy of daily arrests in the occupied West Bank, which has increased in recent months, and has never committed to stopping the mass arrest of Palestinians while negotiations are taking place, Francis says.
“Israel recognizes Palestinians as terrorists and not as people seeking their independence and self determination, and this makes the whole difference in the treatment of prisoners in the political channel.”
“We are happy that these 26 prisoners who spent years of their life in jail are being freed, of course the sadness is in thinking of the remaining 5,000 prisoners who are suffering behind bars.”
December 31, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | Ayman Sharawna, Hana Shalabi, Human rights, Israel, Palestine, Palestinian prisoners in Israel, Samer Issawi, West Bank, Zionism |
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Earlier this year, the Egyptian military overthrew the democratically elected Mohammed Morsi. Much has happened since the initial violent crackdown on Morsi’s supporters. The Muslim Brotherhood, which has been around some 80 years, has been labeled a “terrorist organization” by the Egyptian government, and now even bloggers who speak out against the military are being jailed.
Plenty of neocons cheered the military coup from the sidelines when it occurred. With all of their flap about the US “bringing democracy to the world,” this apparently was a case where a coup was necessary.
Now that 6 months has passed, and the Egyptian military continues to flex its iron fist, let’s not forget the neocons who cheered them into power:
John Bolton on July 3: “we needed the military to stop the Muslim Brotherhood, and I think this coup was the right thing.”
Jonathan Tobin on Aug. 8: “There is more to democracy than voting, and any solution that risks giving Morsi another chance to consolidate power would be a disaster for Egypt and the United States. Washington must be prepared to stick with the military no matter what happens in the streets of Cairo.”
Michael Rubin on Aug. 16: “So long as the Muslim Brotherhood seeks to turn back the clock, impose its hateful and intolerant ideology upon Egyptians of all religiosities and religions, and refuses to abide by the pathway to transitional elections, and so long as it continues to fight in the streets, then it should suffer the consequences of its actions. And if those consequences result in exponentially higher Brotherhood casualties than army casualties, then so be it. That is the truest path to peace.”
Peter Wehner on Aug. 20: “So from the perspective of American national security and morality, having the Muslim Brotherhood in power is considerably worse than having the Egyptian military in power.”
Remember the rule: If the winner of a foreign election is someone that the U.S. government approves of: “Democracy = Good”. However, if the U.S. government does not approve of the winner: “Roll in the tanks!”
December 30, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | Egypt, Human rights, John Bolton, Jonathan Tobin, Michael Rubin, Mohamed Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood, Peter Wehner, United States |
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The Shay Police Unit manage to avoid basic investigative actions – even while holding two suspects caught red-handed in custody
On July 26th, 2010, Israeli civilians – some of whom were seen coming from the direction of the settlements of Yizhar and Har Bracha – went on two rampages in the Palestinian village of Burin. In the first and more severe case, they attacked and destroyed property; when the owner, Ibrahim Eid, could no longer stand watching his property go up in flames and approached the scene, they hit him over the head with an iron bar. Eid lost consciousness and had to be treated in a hospital.
During the second rampage, Israeli civilians stoned the nearby home of Bashir Hamza Zaban. Unfortunately for the hoodlums, border policemen were on the scene and spotted them. The cops chased the attackers, detaining two of them. One of the detainees chose to hide a knife in his shoe. The two refused to identify themselves, but later were identified in the police station. The two maintained their right to remain silent during their interrogation. Zaban also managed to identify a third attacker, who – unlike the detainees – was not hooded.
On its face, this is an open and shut case. Yet lo and behold: even though two suspects were arrested, having been caught red-handed; even though one of them was carrying a concealed knife; and even though they refused to identify themselves – the police wouldn’t do the bare minimum, i.e. ask the victim to identify his attackers. Instead, the police closed the case, citing lack of evidence.
Hold on, the epic screw-up of this case is just beginning. Despite the fact that Zaban noted in his statement to the police that he was aware of the attack on Eid, and although he gave the police a disc containing photos of the attack on Eid, the police took their sweet time and summoned Eid for a statement in November of 2010, a mere five months after the incident. After all, we all know that the memory of witnesses just improves as time passes by.
We’re not done yet: Eid, in his statement to the police, noted the existence of the disc, containing quite clear images of the Israeli civilians who attacked him, who can be easily identified. Even so, the police – who had had the disc since July – didn’t bother summoning him to a lineup so he could point out his attackers; hence, it naturally did not summon any of them for an interrogation. And to top it all off, the police closed the case in December 2012 – after two years and five months of doing little investigative work – but only bothered to inform us, who represent the victims, in August 2013.
Such phenomenal incompetence, which would not surprise anyone familiar with the SJPD (‘Samaria and Judea’ Police Department), generally has two plausible explanations. The first is that the cops and their superiors are complete failures at their duties. The second is that they’re not that dumb, in fact they’re quite smart: we can assume they have a good reason to believe that if they do their jobs properly, they will be harmed. Some of them, after all, live among the population they’re charged with investigating. So they do a half-assed job, ignore evidence, silence nasty questions, and bullshit their way through the closing of a case, hoping no one pays attention.
Such a police force is the hallmark of dark regimes. The SJPD has been functioning this way for years. Anyone who thinks that these investigators, when re-posted within Israel proper, will not retain the work norms developed beyond the ‘separation’ wall, is deluding herself. As for us, once we lifted our jaws off the floor, we appealed the decision to close this case. We hope that the embarrassing negligence of the SJPD will force the prosecution to act. We’ll keep you informed.
December 30, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | Har Brakha, Human rights, Israel, Palestine, West Bank, Zionism |
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January 8, 2009
1) In the Middle East it is always the Arabs who attack first and always Israel that is defending themselves. This defense is called a reprisal.
2) The Arabs, Palestinian or Lebanese have no right to kill civilians. That is called “terrorism.”
3) Israel has the right to kill civilians. That is called “legitimate defense.”
4) When Israel kills civilians en masse, the western powers claim that it is more measured. This is called “reaction of the international community.”
5) The Palestinians and the Lebanese have no right to capture soldiers of Israel inside military installations with sentries and combat posts. This is called, “Kidnapping of defenseless people.”
6) Israel has the right to kidnap anytime and anywhere as many Lebanese and Palestinians as they want. Currently there are more than 10 thousand, 300 of whom are children and a thousand are women. No proof of guilt is needed. Israel has the right to keep kidnapped prisoners indefinitely, even if they are authorities democratically elected by the Palestinians. This is called “terrorist prisoners.”
7) When the word Hezbollah is mentioned, it is compulsory in the same sentence to contain the words “supported and financed by Syria and by Iran.”
8) When you mention “Israel” it is forbidden to make any mention of the words “supported and financed by the U.S.” This may give the impression that the conflict is uneven and that Israel’s existence is not in danger.
9) When referring to Israel, expressions that are prohibited: “Occupied Territories,” “UN resolutions,” “Violations of human rights” or “Geneva Convention.”
10) Both the Palestinians and the Lebanese are always “cowardly,” they are hidden among the civilian population, which does not want them. If they sleep in their homes, with their families, that gives them the name of “cowards.“ Israel has a right to destroy with bombs and missiles the neighborhoods where they are sleeping. This is called a “precision surgical action.”
11) The Israelis speak better English, French, Spanish or Portuguese than the Arabs. Therefore they and those who support them must be interviewed more and have more opportunities than the Arabs to explain the present Rules of the Editorial Staff (from 1 to 10) to the general public. That is called “journalistic neutrality.”
12) All those who are not in accordance with the Rules of Writing above are “highly dangerous anti-Semitic terrorists.”
(Text French, anonymous, from a reader of the Carta Maior blog)
Israel’s recurring use of terror on civilians
December 30, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular | Human rights, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Middle East, Palestine, Zionism |
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South East Asia–Middle East–Western Europe 4 (SEA-ME-WE 4) optical fiber submarine communications cable
The US National Security Agency (NSA) has collected sensitive data on key undersea optical fiber telecommunications cables between Europe, North Africa and Asia.
Citing classified documents labeled “top secret” and “not for foreigners”, German news magazine Der Spiegel reported on Sunday that the NSA spied on the so-called “South East Asia-Middle East-West Europe 4” also known as “Sea-Me-We 4” undersea cable system.
The German magazine said NSA specialists had hacked an internal website belonging to the operator consortium to mine documents about technical infrastructure including circuit mapping and network management information. “More operations are planned in the future to collect more information about this and other cable systems.” Spiegel quoted the NSA documents, dating from February, as saying.
According to the website of the project “the South East Asia-Middle East-West Europe 4 project is a next generation submarine cable system linking South East Asia to Europe via the Indian Sub-Continent and Middle East. The project aims to take these regions to the forefront of global communication by significantly increasing the bandwidth and global connectivity of users along its route between Singapore and France.”
Spiegel reports that “Among the companies that hold ownership stakes in it are France Telecom, now known as Orange and still partly government-owned, and Telecom Italia Sparkle.”
In March 2004, a consortium of 16 international telecommunications companies signed construction and maintenance agreements for the new optical fiber submarine cable system linking South East Asia to Europe via the Indian Sub-Continent and Middle East with Terminal Stations in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and France. The contract is being awarded jointly to Alcatel Submarine Networks, France and Fujitsu Ltd., Japan and the estimated project cost is of the order of $500 million.
The submarine cable system is approximately 20,000km long. It consists of the main backbone across the Eastern and Western worlds plus the extension links in various countries. The project seeks to support telephone, internet, multimedia and various broadband data applications.
It seems the method was employed by the NSA’s elite hacking unit (TAO) via incorporating routers and servers from non-NSA networks into its covert network by infecting these networks with “implants” that then allow the government hackers to control the computers remotely.
The document leaked by Der Spiegel proudly says that, on Feb. 13, 2013, TAO “successfully collected network management information for the SEA-Me-We Undersea Cable Systems (SMW-4).” With the help of a “website masquerade operation,” the agency managed to “gain access to the consortium’s management website and collected Layer 2 network information that shows the circuit mapping for significant portions of the network.”
The US government claims that its spying operations that are taking place both at home and abroad are vital for fighting terrorism.
A federal judge ruled Friday that the NSA’s bulk collection of millions of Americans’ telephone and Internet records is legal. US District Judge William Pauley also concluded that the operation is an important part of America’s effort to combat the threat of terrorism.
NSA spies on millions of telephone and Internet records that are routed through American networks on daily basis. According to some estimates, NSA spies on 380 million cellphones in the US.
Prior to Pauley’s ruling, another US District Court Judge, Richard Leon, had described the massive NSA spying program “Almost Orwellian”.
“I cannot imagine a more ‘indiscriminate’ and ‘arbitrary invasion’ than this systematic and high-tech collection and retention of personal data on virtually every single citizen,” Judge Leon wrote.
December 29, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Corruption, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, Middle East, National Security Agency, NSA, United States |
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Even after months of stories exposing the breadth and depth of National Security Agency (NSA) spying on Americans’ communications, the Obama administration insists federal courts should stop hearing cases challenging the agency’s warrantless surveillance on grounds that they might expose the existence of this spying.
Last week, federal lawyers asked a judge, Jeffrey S. White, in Northern California to dismiss cases that could lead to a ruling on the constitutionality of warrantless surveillance programs authorized during the George W. Bush administration.
The Obama administration contends the cases are just too dangerous to continue if they wind up jeopardizing state secrets.
“Disclosure of this still-classified information regarding the scope and operational details of N.S.A. intelligence activities implicated by plaintiffs’ allegations could be expected to cause extremely grave damage to the national security of the United States,” James Clapper Jr., director of national intelligence, wrote in one of the filings. In June, Clapper was exposed for having lied to Congress about the existence of programs that spied on Americans.
Cindy Cohn, legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is representing the plaintiffs in the cases, told The New York Times that the government’s assertion was “very troubling.”
She added that despite the revelations by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, the administration was essentially saying, “We can’t say whether the American people have been spied on by their government.”
The lawsuits in question were brought by Carolyn Jewel and Virginia Shubert, who claim the NSA’s spying violated their constitutional rights.
Jewel is suing on behalf of all AT&T customers, and Shubert is suing on behalf of all Americans.
The NSA has refused to confirm or deny that either plaintiff’s communications were targeted.
“The American people know they’re being surveilled,” Cohn told The Washington Post. “The government is trying to reset the clock in order to avoid an open judicial determination about whether that surveillance is legal.”
To Learn More:
White House Tries to Prevent Judge From Ruling on Surveillance Efforts (by Charlie Savage and David Sanger, New York Times)
U.S. Government Moves To Block Further Litigation In NSA Surveillance Cases (by Marc Ferranti, IDG News Service)
U.S. Reasserts Need To Keep Domestic Surveillance Secret (by Ellen Nakashima, Washington Post)
Jewel v. NSA (Electronic Frontier Foundation)
NSA Phone Data Collection Made No Difference to National Security (by Noel Brinkerhoff and Danny Biederman, AllGov)
Obama Asks U.S. Supreme Court for Stamp of Approval on Warrantless Cell Phone Searches (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
Should National Intelligence Director Clapper be Charged with a Felony for Lying in Sworn Senate Testimony? (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
December 26, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite | Human rights, United States |
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A Drone Survival Guide with hints and tips on how to thwart the “robotic birds” has been published on the internet. With over 30,000 drones expected to be flying over the US by 2030, the Guide urges readers to familiarize themselves with the craft.
In light of the growing number of drones, the Guide advises a number of techniques to evade and scramble drones. The document is available online and has been translated into 17 different languages.
“Our ancestors could spot natural predators from far by their silhouettes. Are we equally aware of the predators in the present-day?” writes the Guide.
It contains the silhouettes and measurements of all of the most widely-used drones, from the ‘Killer Bee’ to ‘The Sentinel’ as well as information on where they are currently operational. It goes on to detail ways you can hide from a drone.
“Most drones are equipped with night vision, and/or infrared vision cameras, so-called FLIR sensors. These can see human heat signatures from far away, day or night. However there are ways to hide from drones.”
Among the tactics it advices for eluding the aerial craft are: hiding “in thick forests,” wearing space blankets to confuse heat sensors, not using wireless communication, and the use of mannequins or human-sized dolls as decoys.
“Wait for bad weather. Drones cannot operate in high winds, smoke, rainstorms or heavy weather conditions.”
As well as avoidance strategies to escape from the craft, the document also gives advice on how to hack into a drone’s systems. The Guide gives the assurance that as long as a drone’s communications are not encrypted then they can be hacked. It describes how to intercept and interfere with the workings of a drone and also details a process called “spoofing”.
“Small, portable GPS transmitters can send fake GPS signals and disrupt the Drones navigation systems. This can be used, for example, to steer drones into self-destruction flight paths or even hijack them and land them on a runway.”
The US’ use of drones for surveillance as well as military strikes has drawn global recognition. Last week the Yemeni parliament passed an anti-drone motion because of the civilian lives lost in the US strikes on Al-Qaeda militants in the country. Pakistan has also condemned the US for its use of the craft, decrying the strikes as an affront to its sovereignty.
Moreover, the Obama Administration has come into the firing line for increasing the amount of drones operating in American air space.
December 26, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Timeless or most popular | Drones, GPS signals, Human rights, Sentinel, United States |
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Israeli soldiers beating a Palestinian journalist [June 2013]
Israeli occupation authorities arrested approximately 4,000 Palestinians, including parliamentarians, women, children and patients, in 2013. The vast majority of those arrested are from the occupied West Bank, with only a small number from the Gaza Strip.
Information published by the statistics department at the ministry of prisoners in the West Bank shows that no single day has passed without arrests. The average number of arrests each month was 323, which equates to about 11 arrests each day.
The arrest rate in 2013 is only one per cent higher than the rate in 2012; however, it is 17 per cent higher than 2011.
Regarding the geographical distribution of the 2013 arrests, 98 per cent (3,799) of those arrested are from the West Bank and two per cent (75) from the Gaza Strip.
According to the statistics, those arrested were from all social classes, without exception. The occupation authorities did not make any special exceptions for the elderly, disabled, children, women, parliamentarians, political leaders, academics and journalists.
All those arrested have been exposed to at least one form of torture. Some of them were tortured in front of their family members when they were arrested at their homes.
The statistics department stated that these arrests are in violation of international law. “Some of the torture cases amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity,” it added.
December 23, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | Human rights, Israel, Palestine, West Bank, Zionism |
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What Does Holocaust Denial Really Mean?
By Daniel McGowan | February 18, 2009
In April 2007 the European Union agreed to set jail sentences up to three years for those who deny or trivialize the Holocaust.1 More recently, in response to the remarks of Bishop Richard Williamson, the Pope has proclaimed that Holocaust denial is “intolerable and altogether unacceptable.”
But what does Holocaust denial really mean? Begin with the word Holocaust. The Holocaust2 (spelled with a capital H) refers to the killing of six million Jews by the Nazis during World War II. It is supposed to be the German’s “Final Solution” to the Jewish problem. Much of the systematic extermination was to have taken place in concentration camps by shooting, gassing, and burning alive innocent Jewish victims of the Third Reich.
People like Germar Rudolf, Ernst Zundel, and Bishop Williamson who do not believe this account and who dare to say so in public are reviled as bigots, anti-Semites, racists, and worse. Their alternate historical scenarios are not termed simply revisionist, but are demeaned as Holocaust denial. Rudolf and Zundel were shipped to Germany where they were tried, convicted, and sentenced to three and five years, respectively. Williamson may not be far behind.
Politicians deride Holocaust revisionist papers and conferences as “beyond the pale of international discourse and acceptable behavior.”3 Non-Zionist Jews who participate in such revisionism, like Rabbi Dovid Weiss of the Neturei Karta, are denounced as “self-haters” and are shunned and spat upon. Even Professor Norman Finkelstein, whose parents were both Holocaust survivors and who wrote the book, The Holocaust Industry, has been branded a Holocaust denier.
But putting aside the virile hate directed against those who question the veracity of the typical Holocaust narrative, what is it that these people believe and say at the risk of imprisonment and bodily harm? For most Holocaust revisionists or deniers if you prefer, their arguments boil down to three simple contentions:
1. Hitler’s “Final Solution” was intended to be ethnic cleansing, not extermination.
2. There were no homicidal gas chambers used by the Third Reich.
3. There were fewer than 6 million Jews killed of the 55 million who died in WWII.
Are these revisionist contentions so odious as to cause those who believe them to be reviled, beaten, and imprisoned? More importantly, is it possible that revisionist contentions are true, or even partially true, and that they are despised because they contradict the story of the Holocaust, a story which has been elevated to the level of a religion in hundreds of films, memorials, museums, and docu-dramas?
Is it sacrilegious to ask, “If Hitler was intent on extermination, how did Elie Wiesel, his father, and two of his sisters survive the worst period of incarceration at Auschwitz?” Wiesel claims that people were thrown alive into burning pits, yet even the Israeli-trained guides at Auschwitz refute this claim.
Is it really “beyond international discourse” to question the efficacy and the forensic evidence of homicidal gas chambers? If other myths, like making soap from human fat, have been dismissed as Allied war propaganda, why is it “unacceptable behavior” to ask if the gas chamber at Dachau was not reconstructed by the Americans because no other homicidal gas chamber could be found and used as evidence at the Nuremburg trials?
For more than fifty years Jewish scholars have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to document each Jewish victim of the Nazi Holocaust. The Nazis were German, obsessed with paperwork and recordkeeping. Yet only 3 million names have been collected and many of them died of natural causes. So why is it heresy to doubt that fewer than 6 million Jews were murdered in the Second World War?
“Holocaust Denial” might be no more eccentric or no more criminal than claiming the earth is flat, except that the Holocaust itself has been used as the sword and shield in the quest to build a Jewish state between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, where even today over half the population is not Jewish.
The Holocaust narrative allows Yad Vashem, the finest Holocaust museum in the world, to repeat the mantra of “Never Forget” while it sits on Arab lands stolen from Ein Karem and overlooking the unmarked graves of Palestinians massacred by Jewish terrorists at Deir Yassin. It allows Elie Wiesel to boast of having worked for these same terrorists (as a journalist, not a fighter) while refusing to acknowledge, let alone apologize for, the war crimes his employer committed. It makes Jews the ultimate victim no matter how they dispossess or dehumanize or ethnically cleanse indigenous Palestinian people.
The Holocaust story eliminates any comparison of Ketziot or Gaza to the concentration camps they indeed are. It memorializes the resistance of Jews in the ghettos of Europe while steadfastly denying any comparison with the resistance of Palestinians in Hebron and throughout the West Bank. It allows claims that this year’s Hanukah Massacre in Gaza, with a kill ratio of 100 to one, was a “proportionate response” to Palestinian resistance to unending occupation.
The Holocaust is used to silence critics of Israel in what the Jewish scholar, Marc Ellis, has called the ecumenical deal: you Christians look the other way while we bludgeon the Palestinians and build our Jewish state and we won’t remind you that Hitler was a good Catholic, a confirmed “soldier of Christ,” long before he was a bad Nazi.
The Holocaust narrative of systematic, industrialized extermination was an important neo-conservative tool to drive the United States into Iraq. The same neo-con ideologues, like Norman Podoretz, routinely compare Ahmadinejad to Hitler and Nazism with Islamofascism with the intent of driving us into Iran. The title of the recent Israeli conference at Yad Vashem made this crystal clear: “Holocaust Denial: Paving the Way to Genocide.”
“Remember the Holocaust” will be the battle cry of the next great clash of good (Judeo/Christian values) and evil (radical Islamic aggression) and those who question it must be demonized if not burned at the stake.
1) Associated Press, “EU approves criminal measures against Holocaust denial,” Haaretz, 19 April 2007.
2) Holocaust. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005.
3) Statements of Senator Hillary Clinton.
Daniel McGowan is a Professor Emeritus at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. Because of admonishment by the administration, it is hereby stated that the above remarks are solely those of the author. Hobart and William Smith Colleges neither condone nor condemn these opinions. Furthermore, the author has been instructed to use his personal email address of mcgowandaniel@yahoo.com and not his college email at mcgowan@hws.edu for those wishing to contact him with comments or criticisms. Read other articles by Daniel.
Source
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Article 19.
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
December 22, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | Elie Wiesel, European Union, Germar Rudolf, Holocaust, Human rights, Palestine, World War II, Zionism |
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BETHLEHEM – Israeli forces vacated the Bethlehem village of Arab al-Rashayida on Tuesday after conducting military drills in the area for several hours, locals said.
Fawaz al-Rashayida, head of the local village council, told Ma’an that 5,000 heavily armed Israeli soldiers arrived in the village at dawn on Tuesday.
Locals are used to Israeli forces performing drills on the outskirts of Arab al-Rashayida, but this is the first time they have raided homes and local institutions in the village, Fawaz al-Rashayida said.
The drills, which took place in between residential homes, caused damage to the village’s water grid, he added.
Israeli forces also issued demolition orders for six properties belonging to Ali Awda Mohammad Rashayid.
The population of Arab al-Rashayida is around 2,000 and the majority of residents live in cement houses, while others live in tents and dwellings made of steel and tin.
On Monday afternoon, Israeli forces deployed in a nature reserve east of Arab al-Rashayida known locally as al-Muteirda, displacing nearby families and declaring it a “closed military zone.”
During military drills, Israeli forces can enter Palestinian homes and involve Palestinian civilians in their operations without warning them that the raids are mere practice.
In November, Israeli human rights group Yesh Din said Israeli troops had been using a Muslim cemetery in Hebron as a location for military drills and practice.
Approximately 18 percent of the West Bank has been designated as a closed military zone for training, or “firing zone,” which is roughly the same amount of the West Bank under full Palestinian Authority control.
Over 5,000 Palestinians reside in the firing zones in 38 communities.
December 18, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Illegal Occupation, Militarism | Bethlehem, Human rights, Israel, Ma'an, Palestine, West Bank, Zionism |
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When Israel was established, its founders made sure to emphasize, in its Declaration of Independence, the universal values of Jewish tradition: “The State of Israel […] will promote the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; will be based on the precepts of liberty, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; will uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of race, creed or sex; will guarantee full freedom of conscience, worship, education and culture; will safeguard the sanctity and inviolability of the shrines and Holy Places of all religions; and will dedicate itself to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.” Later on, the Knesset voted to adopt the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Furthermore, Israel is in the habit of calling itself “the only democracy in the Middle East”, and since its earliest days, its leaders were partial to the term “a light unto the nations.” As we mark Human Rights Day, we should examine whether Israel stands by the high rhetoric of its founders, and whether it fulfills the Declaration of Human Rights.
As every person living in Israel knows, assuming their eyes are open and their hearts are not blocked, Israel and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights have a rocky relationship. In the beginning of 2010, Gideon Sa’ar’s Ministry of Education decided to stop teaching the Declaration at schools (Hebrew), since it informs tender children of their right to convert to another religion and even, heaven forbid, live somewhere other than Israel. However, this is just a minor problem; reading the text of the Declaration shows that the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories violates 15 of its articles. Given that there are only 30 of them, that’s quite impressive.
Let us begin. The first violation comes with the first operative article of the Declaration, Article 2. It states, “Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.” Only, as everyone knows, after “no distinction shall be made”, the text is irrelevant in the territories occupied by Israel. Article 2 is sort of an umbrella article; the following ones will note specific violations.
Article 3 of the Declaration states, “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” Except that those living under Israeli rule in the West Bank are entitled to none of the above. The indictment rate for Israeli soldiers who have killed Palestinian non-combatants is negligible. Since 2000, only seven soldiers were put on trial and convicted for crimes involving the death of Palestinians; the number of Palestinian deaths since 2000 is estimated at over 5,000. IDF soldiers need no warrant to break into Palestinian homes; they are authorized to arrest them without any explanation, and from time to time enforce curfews on Palestinian towns and villages.
Next. Article 5 of the Declaration states, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Anyone familiar with the way our security services operate, or with the fact that, on many occasions, IDF soldiers beat up Palestinian detainees, knows that this article is often violated. Furthermore, it’s hard to see the standard procedure of blindfolding prisoners as anything but “degrading treatment.”
The fourth violation of the Declaration comes with Article 7: “All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law.” Except, the whole essence of the occupation is creating two populations in the same region, with two different sets of rights and two different legal systems. Discrimination manifests itself not just in the laws themselves, but also through unequal enforcement. To put it mildly, the Jewish victim of a crime in the OPT is significantly more likely to see justice served than would a Palestinian living in a neighboring village. .
The fifth violation also comes from the legal world: “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile,” declares Article 7. Except for the fact that the occupation forces maintain the right to hold a person in administrative detention, that is, held without charges and deprived of the right to defend himself in court. It’s hard to imagine a more “arbitrary arrest or detention” than that. Furthermore, from time to time Israel exiles Palestinians – in the last few years mostly from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip, but it used to exile them to Lebanon and other countries, not to mention the internal displacement looming over South Hebron residents.
Article 10 of the Declaration states that “Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal.” But it’s doubtful whether you can call our military courts “an independent and impartial tribunal” with a straight face. Their conviction rate is 99.7%. The British courts in India used to take pride in the large number of Indians who served there as judges; in Israel’s military courts, Palestinians naturally have nary a chance of being sentenced by a Palestinian. Israel once recruited police officers from among the occupied population, but it never imagined allowing them to sit in judgment. Israel’s military courts are a foreman’s court, conducted in the foreman’s language.
As far as the military courts are concerned, Article 11 of the Declaration is also troublesome: it says that, “Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.” My emphasis. The military courts of Israel are notorious for allowing “secret evidence” presented to the judges by the prosecution, the content of which the defendant has no knowledge, nor is able to contradict. This means that the conviction of a defendant relies, at least in large part, on evidence that he has not had the opportunity to refute, and whose absurdities or lies he cannot expose. Such “secret evidence”, fabricated to the gills, was the crux of the Dreyfus Affair. The French court, when exonerating Captain Dreyfus, ruled that the admission of “secret evidence” is incompatible with the right of a person to a legal defense. Dreyfus would, in time, be decorated by the thankful Republic with its highest decoration, the Légion d’honneur, because “by defending his own honor, he defended the nation’s ” and prevented it from jailing an innocent man. It’s been almost 120 years since Dreyfus’ infamous court-martial, and the Israeli military courts are yet to absorb this simple lesson.
Article 12 states, “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation.” As noted above, Palestinians have no defense against arbitrary search of their homes. In fact, their houses sometimes serve as military training sites.
Onwards! Article 13 declares, “Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” However, Israel enforces a rigid “permit regime” in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and it operates checkpoints which cut the West Bank into fragments. Our colleagues at Gisha can tell you more about just how fastidious Israel is about the right of Palestinians to move from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip and vice versa. Some Palestinians are even barred from travel outside the West Bank at all. And of course, residents of East Jerusalem, which though Israel may have forgotten, is part of what the world views as occupied territory and is contiguous with the West Bank, risk losing their ability to return to their homes should they leave for a few years – say, for familial, economic or educational reasons – even if they only leave to the West Bank.
Article 15 declares plainly that “Everyone has the right to a nationality.” We shan’t belabor that point. Article 17 also seems to be so simple as to be self-evident: “No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.” It is, however, anything but. Ask the villagers whose land is slowly being devoured by illegal outposts; ask the residents of Dura al-Qara, whose land was confiscated in what the State now stammers is a “frozen military need”, and left unused.
While Article 19 states that “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers,” Israel has employed brutal censorship for years towards the occupied people/ The IDF responds harshly to protests across the West Bank, resulting in many of Yesh Din’s complaints of unwarranted injuries, and it still detains people from time to time for “holding inciting material.” The military orders in force in the West Bank effectively make every demonstration an illegal one. For this reason, Article 20 of the Declaration – ” Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association” – is dead letter in the West Bank.
Article 21 declares that “Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives. The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government.” Palestinians living in Areas B and C are effectively subjects of the Israeli government, which they never elected and which they have no way of electing or being elected to. Also, given that Israel forbids Hamas to participate in the Palestinian elections, which grant limited powers to a Palestinian government, and given that it maintains the right to detain Palestinian politicians as it sees fit, one can hardly speak of “the will of the people.”
But perhaps the most painful violation is that which should be most obvious: “Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection,” says Article 25. Anyone who has seen detained children, quite a few of them under the age of discretion; anyone who has compared the special rights given to accused minors in the Israeli system with the almost dearth of comparable rights granted to Palestinian minors in the military courts; and anyone who has observed our brave troops raiding a house at night, handcuffing a child and blindfolding him; and anyone who understands the psychological damage to children witnessing their parents brutally arrested at gunpoint at night in their beds knows just how the most obvious is anything but that in the territories under Israeli occupation.
Yet these many violations, we should remind you, are not a force of nature, do not stand of their own power; they are no ancient, unbreakable law; they are man-made, they are an act we fund, carried out by those we empower to act and whose actions we approve – admittedly, mostly by averting our eyes. But we can mend this; and we shall.
We shall overcome.
December 17, 2013
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | Gaza, Human rights, Israel, Palestine, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, West Bank, Zionism |
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