The Holocaust and its Deniers
By Gilad Atzmon | August 2, 2018
In the aftermath of the Holocaust, some Jewish intellectuals and humanists expressed the thought that ‘after Auschwitz Jews have to locate themselves at the forefront of the battle for humanity and against all forms of oppression.’
This is a principled and heroic ideal, but the reality on the ground has been somewhat different. Just three years after the liberation of Auschwitz, the Jewish state ethnically cleansed the vast majority of indigenous Palestinians. Two years later, in 1950, Israel’s Knesset passed the Law of Return, a racist law that distinguishes between Jews who have the right to ‘return’ to someone else’s land and the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees that were expelled by force from their villages and cities.
In the seven decades since, the Jewish State has committed every possible human rights abuse. It made Gaza into the biggest open-air prison in human history and has repeatedly dropped bombs on the most overpopulated place on earth. Recently the Jewish State deployed hundreds of snipers against unarmed Gazans who were protesting at the border. Israel killed dozens and wounded more than 13,000 Palestinians, the majority severely, with over 1,400 struck by three to five bullets.
If the Holocaust left Jews with a mission to fix the world, the Jewish State has done the opposite. Its crimes against humanity can be seen as a complete denial of the Holocaust’s message.
Some Jews who survived the Holocaust did dedicate their lives to a universal battle for a better world. Among these heroes was Hajo Meyer, a Dutch Auschwitz survivor who, for the obvious reasons, saw the similarities between his own suffering and the Palestinian plight.
In 2003 Meyer wrote The End of Judaism, accusing Israel of usurping the Holocaust to justify crimes against the Arabs. He participated in the 2011 “Never Again – For Anyone” tour. He correctly argued that Zionism predated fascism, and he also reiterated that Zionists and Fascists had a history of collaboration.
Meyer exemplified the Jewish post-Shoah humanist promise. After Auschwitz he located himself at the forefront of the fight against oppression. He fought Israel.
On Holocaust Memorial Day 2010, Meyer was invited to an event at the British Parliament which included MP Jeremy Corbyn. At the event Meyer compared Israeli racial policy to the Nuremberg laws. At the same event, Haidar Eid, a Palestinian academic from Gaza, pointed out that “the world was absolutely wrong to think that Nazism was defeated in 1945. Nazism has won because it has finally managed to Nazify the consciousness of its own victims.”
Eid didn’t ‘compare’ Zionism with Nazism, he described an ideological continuum between Nazi ideology and Israeli policy. He maintained that the racial discriminatory ideology of the Nazis was picked up by the Jewish state and has been rife in the Jewish State since then.
Yesterday MP Jeremy Corbyn was attacked by the Jewish lobby for being present at that meeting that explored these universal ethical positions. Our Labour candidate for prime minister anemically recalled that at the event in question views were expressed which he did not “accept or condone.” Corbyn even apologized “for the concerns and anxiety that this has caused.” I wonder why my preferred candidate has to express regret for being in the presence of a humanist exchange. I wonder why our next PM feels the need to disassociate himself from people who advocate ‘for the many, not the few.’
The message for the rest of us is devastating. The battle for a better world can’t be left to Corbyn alone. Needless to say, the Jewish State and its Lobby haven’t located themselves at the forefront of humanity. It is actually the Palestinians who have been pushed to the front of that frustrating struggle. Not to see that is to deny their holocaust.
Senate passes $38 billion to Israel – next step House of Representatives
By Alison Weir | If Americans Knew | August 2, 2018
The Senate yesterday passed a bill to give Israel $38 billion over the next 10 years. The legislation, heavily promoted by AIPAC, was adopted in a voice vote. The bill is “S.2497 – United States-Israel Security Assistance Authorization Act of 2018.
This amounts to approximately $23,000 for each Jewish Israeli family of four.
The bill also mandates that NASA work with the Israeli Space Agency, despite accusations of Israeli espionage – In 2015 a Caltech scientist revealed that the Chair of Israel’s National Committee for Space Research had illegally acquired classified information.
Also yesterday, the Senate voted a Defense bill that provides $550 million to Israel.
While Israeli media have reported on the legislation, mainstream U.S. news media have failed to inform Americans about the money to Israel.
AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, issued a statement saying: “AIPAC appreciates the leadership of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Robert Menendez (D-NJ) along with the authors of the bill, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Chris Coons (D-DE).”
The bill is currently also making its way through the House of Representatives. If the House passes it, as expected, it will be sent to President Trump to sign into law.
[To take action regarding the bill go here]
From previous IAK reports:
It appears that giving Israel this money would violate several U.S. laws:
• It would violate two amendments to the 1961 Foreign Assistance Act, known as the the Symington and Glenn Amendments, that ban support for countries engaged in clandestine nuclear programs. (More information here.)
• It would violate the Leahy Law, which prohibits aid to countries guilty of human rights violations.
In the past Israel has used U.S. aid in ways that violated the Arms Export Control Act (AECA), which prohibits re-export of U.S.-origin defense and dual-use technology, which Israel has repeatedly done. Israel has also been charged with using U.S. weaponry illegally.
Despite this – and despite the fact that Israel has killed 150 and injured 16,000 Palestinian men, women, and children in the past four months – the aid bill has 71 co-sponsors: 36 Democrats and 35 Republicans.
The bill is being heavily promoted by AIPAC, which pioneered it, and other pro-Israel organizations.
Among the co-sponsors are some progressive Senators, including Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand, even though polls show that only 19 percent of liberal Democrats support Israel over Palestinians.
Despite the record breaking quantity of money, almost no mainstream U.S. media have informed Americans of the bill.
The aid package was first negotiated by the Obama administration, which largely submitted to Israeli demands. The Forward reported at the time: “When Yaakov Nagel, Israel’s acting national security adviser, was tasked with heading the team negotiating a new 10-year military aid package with the United States, Prime Minister Netanyahu set forth the guidelines: ‘If you reach $3.5 billion a year, you’ll get a gold medal,’ Nagel recalled Wednesday, hours before signing the agreement in Washington. ‘If you get $3.3 billion you’ll get a silver medal; and if you get $3.1 billion you’ll get the bronze.’”
Senate sponsors of the bill:
Sponsor:
Co-Sponsors:
Sen. Coons, Christopher A. [D-DE]*
Sen. Casey, Robert P., Jr. [D-PA]
Sen. Blumenthal, Richard [D-CT]
Sen. Cardin, Benjamin L. [D-MD]
Sen. Capito, Shelley Moore [R-WV]
Sen. Gillibrand, Kirsten E. [D-NY]
Sen. King, Angus S., Jr. [I-ME]
Sen. Bennet, Michael F. [D-CO]
Sen. Murphy, Christopher [D-CT]
Sen. Whitehouse, Sheldon [D-RI]
Sen. Cortez Masto, Catherine [D-NV]
Israel used excessive force to seize Gaza-bound ship in intl. waters: Captain
Press TV – August 2, 2018
Israel has violated international law by seizing a Gaza-bound humanitarian ship in international waters and using excessive force to arrest its crew and passengers, the boat’s captain says.
“We were arrested in international waters and we were closer to Egypt than Israel,” Herman Reksten, the captain of the Norwegian Karstein ship, said Thursday upon arrival at Oslo International Airport after being held for three days in an Israeli jail.
Captain Reksten said that the Israeli troops used tasers against the activists, adding, “I still have a headache from being hit in prison.”
A Norwegian government spokesman also said the country was yet to receive a clarification from Israel on why the 22 pro-Palestinian activists on board the boat were arrested.
Norway’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Frode Andersen said it had asked Israel to “clarify the course of events and on what basis they think they are entitled to intervene on the ship.”
According to the group Ship to Gaza Norway, which organized the shipment, all of the activists have been released and expelled or are about to be deported soon.
However, the fate of an ailing Canadian passenger was uncertain on Thursday.
The intercepted vessel was one of the four ships that made up the Freedom Flotilla, which intended to break Israel’s nearly 12-year blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Back in late May 2010, an Israeli raid on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, comprising six civilian ships, killed 10 Turkish activists in high seas and sent the Ankara-Tel Aviv ties into a tailspin.
Israel’s military raid against the civilian flotilla was met with global condemnation. The United Nations Security Council called for a prompt investigation into the incident and the United Nations Human Rights Council described the attack as “outrageous.”
Additionally, numerous attempts have been made throughout the years to draw the public attention to the ongoing siege of Gaza. From 2008 through 2016, international activists have sailed 31 ships and boats to challenge the Israeli naval blockade.
Following Israel’s participation: Glasgow pledges to reject military exhibits
MEMO | August 2, 2018
The city council of Glasgow, Scotland, has vowed not to sponsor any future military exhibitions in response to months of widespread protests against its decision to sponsor the Conference on Subsea Defence Technology. The city council also promised to “reconsider its guidelines” to ensure that they would reflect “Glasgow’s respect of human rights”.
This pledge came after the formation of a popular campaign to put pressure on the city council, a coalition that included the Scottish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (SPSC), the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), Scotland against Militarism, as well as the Anti-Arms trading Campaign.
The military exhibition, which included Israeli weapon manufacturers, was held in Glasgow in late July under the sponsorship of BAE Systems and Babcock, the two major arms companies responsible for renewing the UK’s Trident program for the development, activation, and sale of nuclear weapons despite Glasgow’s declaration of being a nuclear-free Council in December 2017.
The exhibition that the city hosted stated Israel Defence, a media organisation promoting the arms industry in Israel, as an official media partner. The presentation was nevertheless attended by the Israeli company DSIT Solutions, involved in the ongoing brutal Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip.
Israeli arms companies regularly market their weapons as “tested” and “field tested”, meaning that they are tested on the Palestinian people and then exported to facilitate the suppression of the army and police forces in the rest of the world.
The National Chairperson of the Scottish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (SPSC), Sofiah MacLeod, welcomed the city council’s statement and added that the campaign would work with other coalition members to ensure that the city council would implement its pledge.
MacLeod added that the popular pressure on Glasgow City Council and the House of Advisers would continue because the council still manages the Strathclyde pension fund known for its investment in arms factories and other companies that have been complicit in Israeli violations of Palestinian rights.
The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) National Committee welcomed the campaign’s success, according to its coordinator in Gaza, Abdul Rahman Abu Nahl. He said: “Such news increase our determination to step up our campaigns against companies involved in Israel’s human rights violations. What has been happening in local councils in Scotland, Ireland, Spain, and Italy is a new indication of the growing impact of the BDS movement around the world and the growing isolation of the occupation and apartheid Israeli state.”
The Scottish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (SPSC) continues to work with various groups such as the Unison Scotland and the Scottish Friends of Palestine, in the “Time to Divest” campaign to push local Scottish authority retirement funds to dispose of contracts of companies complicit in violations of Palestinian human rights. These banks include Hapoalim, the largest Israeli bank, which funds the construction of illegal settlements on usurped Palestinian lands, as well as companies like Hewlett-Packard (HP) and DXC.
Israel deports Freedom Flotilla activists
Ma’an – August 1, 2018
BETHLEHEM – Gaza’s National Committee for Breaking the Siege announced on Wednesday that the Israeli authorities began deporting several of the international solidarity activists, who were aboard the Al Awda ship of the Freedom Flotilla.
Gaza’s National Committee confirmed that the activists deportation back to their countries, comes two days after being detained following an attack by Israeli naval forces on the ship in international waters.
Zaher Birawi, head of the committee, said in a statement that a number of international activists have already been deported on Tuesday, including a Malaysian professor, Dr. Mohd Afandi Salleh, and on Wednesday the rest would also be deported.
Birawi stressed that many of the activists rejected to be voluntarily deported, preferring to delay it for more than 72 hours, the legal deadline for accepting voluntary deportation from the country.
Birawi continued that the activists are attempting to delay their deportation, in order to appear before an Israeli court to expose the unjust practices of Israeli naval forces who attacked the humanitarian ship in international waters, and to later prosecute Israel for its actions.
The committee quoted the testimonies of some of the activists as being exposed to “beatings and violence” including the ship’s captain, his assistant, and other solidarity activists.
Swedish human rights activist, Divina Levrini, who was among international detainees, said in a statement that she declares a hunger strike, as a form of protest against the treatment she received by Israeli forces and against the harsh conditions she is going through while being detained in the Israeli Givon prison.
Levrini had conducted an interview with Ma’an in July, while aboard the Freedom Flotilla ship, in which she discussed the Flotilla’s intention on raising awareness about the Israel-Gaza conflict and on breaking the illegal and inhumane Israeli blockade of Gaza.
In addition, two days prior, Israeli authorities already released two Israeli activists on bail. One of the released activists, Zuhr Chamberlain Regev, confirmed that several activists were beaten by Israeli forces before being dragged out of the ship to be detained. She continued by saying that “people on board were tasered and hit by masked Israeli soldiers. We did not get our passports or belongings before we got off the boat. Do not believe reports of peaceful interception.
Concerns over Freedom Flotilla activists ‘beaten, dragged’
Ma’an – July 31, 2018
Gaza’s National Committee for Breaking the Siege expressed its concern for the safety of international solidarity activists who were aboard the Al Awda Freedom Flotilla ship when it was attacked by Israel in international waters.
The Freedom Flotilla members were detained by Israeli naval forces on Sunday and are still being held in the Israeli Givon prison in al-Ramla in central Israel.
The National Committee confirmed that Dr. Swee Chai Ang, a British activist, author, and orthopedic surgeon, suffered injuries due to being assaulted on board by masked Israeli naval forces.
Sources also confirmed that several activists were beaten by Israeli forces before being dragged out of the ship to be detained.
Head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Zaher Birawi, said that this information contradicts Israel’s statements and claims that the detention of the activists was peaceful and that no one was harmed.
Birawi holds Israel fully responsible for the safety of the activists, pointing out that Israel must provide them with medical care and demanded Israel to immediately release them.
He stressed that Israel will be prosecuted for the “crime of kidnapping” the Freedom Flotilla ship and its activists, who did not impose a threat to Israel’s security.
Birawi requested Israel to also return media equipment belonging to journalists who were aboard the ship.
On Monday, Israeli authorities released two Israeli activists on bail, who were identified as Jonathan Shapira and Zuhr Chamberlain Regev, while the remaining 20 international activists were not given the option of release upon bail.
Regev said in a statement that “people on board were tasered and hit by masked Israeli soldiers. We did not get our passports or belongings before we got off the boat. Do not believe reports of peaceful interception.”
Israel charged both, Regev and Shapira, with attempting to enter Gaza and conspiracy before being released on bail.
In 2010, one of the Freedom Flotilla ships was attacked by Israeli naval forces in international waters. The ship, which was carrying aid to Gaza, was attacked while being unarmed, killing 10 pro-Palestinian activists and injuring dozens of other peaceful activists.
The Freedom Flotilla ship peacefully sailed towards the shores of Gaza, with aim to draw the world’s attention to the unjust siege and intending on breaking Israel’s nearly 12-year blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Zionist Inquisition in full cry
Their quarry: anti-racist Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn; their weapons: anti-semitism smears; their purpose: to oust Corbyn and replace him with a compliant pro-Israel stooge
By Stuart Littlewood | Dissident Voice | July 30, 2018
The row over anti-Semitism has erupted yet again in the UK Labour Party, as predicted a few months ago by Miko Peled, the Israeli general’s son, who warned that:
… they are going to pull all the stops, they are going to smear, they are going to try anything they can to stop Corbyn…. the reason anti-Semitism is used is because they [the Israelis] have no argument….
So Israel’s pimps at Westminster, never happy unless they’re telling everyone what to think and say, are frantically insisting that the Labour Party adopts the discredited International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism in its unedited entirety and incorporates it into the party’s code of conduct. Many party members believe they have blown up the matter out of all proportion simply to settle their long-standing score – as Peled says – with the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, a genuine anti-racist, champion of Palestinian rights and critic of Israel.
This is what the IHRA definiition says:
Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.
It includes these eleven “contemporary examples of anti-semitism”:
- Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion.
- Making mendacious, dehumanising, demonising, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.
- Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews.
- Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust).
- Accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.
- Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations.
- Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.
- Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.
- Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterise Israel or Israelis.
- Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.
- Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.
Jewish community leaders are furious that Labour’s ruling body, the National Executive Committee, disagrees with 4 of these examples and refuses to include them in the party’s new code of conduct. The NEC, of course, is mindful that the code must be enforceable across half-a-million members with differing opinions, many of whom are tired of the constant whining. An emergency motion orchestrated by the Jewish lobby, forcing the NEC to take on board the whole IHRA package with all its examples and humiliating Corbyn in the process, was supposed to be considered yesterday but is now postponed till September.
The NEC explains its omissions by saying accusations of dual nationality are wrong rather than anti-semitic. It strikes out altogether the idea that calling the state of Israel “a racist endeavour” is anti-semitic, no doubt for the simple reason that it is racist. Israelis have for decades practised apartheid, casting their non-Jew population as second-class citizens, and now it’s enshrined in their new nationality laws, in black and white. What’s more, Israel’s illegal occupation has denied Palestinians their right to self-determination for the last 70 years. The NEC also chooses not to forbid the use of symbols and images associated with classic anti-semitism and comparing Israeli policy to that of the Nazis unless there’s evidence of anti-semitic intent.
Sounds reasonable, you might think. But 68 rabbis have accused the Labour leadership of acting “in the most insulting and arrogant way” by leaving out or modifying those controversial bits. In a letter to The Guardian they say it’s not the Labour Party’s place to re-write it.
The arrogance is theirs, I think. Here’s why. The House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee recommended adoption of the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism subject to the inclusion of two caveats:
(1) It is not antisemitic to criticise the Government of Israel, without additional evidence to suggest antisemitic intent.
(2) It is not antisemitic to hold the Israeli Government to the same standards as other liberal democracies, or to take a particular interest in the Israeli Government’s policies or actions, without additional evidence to suggest antisemitic intent.
The Government agreed but dropped the caveats saying they weren’t necessary. Subsequently the IHRA definition has run into big trouble, being condemned by leading law experts as “too vague to be useful” and because conduct contrary to the IHRA definition is not necessarily illegal. They warn that public bodies are under no obligation to adopt or use it and, if they do, they must interpret it in a way that’s consistent with their statutory obligations and with the European Convention on Human Rights, which provides for freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.
IHRA definition of anti-Semitism is deeply flawed
Crucially, freedom of expression applies not only to information or ideas that are favourably received or regarded as inoffensive, but also to those that “offend, shock or disturb the State or any sector of the population” – unless they encourage violence, hatred or intolerance. Calling Israel an apartheid state or advocating BDS against Israel cannot properly be characterized as anti-Semitic. Furthermore, any public authority seeking to apply the IHRA definition to prohibit or punish such activities “would be acting unlawfully”.
The right of free expression, as Labour’s Zio- Inquisitors ought to know, is now part of UK domestic law by virtue of the Human Rights Act. Furthermore the 1986 Education Act established an individual right of free expression in all higher education institutions. Then there’s Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which bestows on everyone “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”. As always, such rights are subject to limitations required by law and respect for the rights of others.
So the IHRA definition is a minefield. It’s not something a sane organisation would incorporate into its Code of Conduct – certainly not as it stands. It contravenes human rights and freedom of expression. But when did the Israel lobby ever care about other people’s rights?
The whole fuss borders on the farcical when you ask what anti-Semitism means. Who are the Semites anyway? Everyone avoids this question like the plague. Why? It’s embarrassing. DNA research shows that most of those living today who claim to be Jews are not descended from the ancient Israelites at all and the Palestinians have more Israelite blood. So they are the real Semites. Research by Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, published by the Oxford University Press in 2012 on behalf of the Society of Molecular Biology and Evolution, found that the Khazarian Hypothesis is scientifically correct, meaning that most Jews are Khazars. The Khazarians converted to Talmudic Judaism in the 8th Century and were never in ancient Israel.
Probably no more than 2% of Jews in Israel are actually Israelites. So even if you believe the propaganda myth that God gave the land to the Israelites, He certainly didn’t give it to Netanyahu, Lieberman and the other East European thugs who rule the apartheid state.
As former Israeli Director of Military Intelligence, Yehoshafat Harkabi wrote: “It would be a tragic irony if the Jewish state, which was intended to solve the problem of anti-Semitism, was to become a factor in the rise of anti-Semitism. Israelis must be aware that the price of their misconduct is paid not only by them but also Jews throughout the world.”
Well, that tragic irony has come to pass. As has been suggested before, so-called anti-Semitism is a matter best resolved by the Jewish ‘family’ itself. There’s no reason to bother Corbyn or the Labour Party with it.
Palestinian student Ola Marshoud sentenced to 7 months in Israeli prison; female students receive arrest threats
Photo: Ola Marshoud, via Asra Media
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – July 30, 2018
Palestinian student Ola Marshoud, 21, from the Balata refugee camp in Nablus, was sentenced to seven months in Israeli prison by the Salem military court on Monday, 30 July, for her involvement in student activism on the An-Najah University campus. Marshoud has been detained since March, when she was summoned to interrogation at the military base near Huwwara. When she arrived, she was transferred the interrogation center at Petah Tikva.
She was accused in the military court of involvement in student organizing at An-Najah University. Active Palestinians involved in the student movement are repeatedly targeted for Israeli arrest, imprisonment and persecution, including Omar Kiswani, the student body president at Bir Zeit University. Statistics indicate that there are over 300 Palestinian university students imprisoned in Israeli jails.
This policy of colonial military repression of student activism is continuing; in the pre-dawn hours of Monday, 30 July, a number of families in al-Khalil reported that armed occupation forces posted notices on the walls of the area, particularly the homes of female students, threatening them against participating in student elections and activism with the Islamic Bloc on their campuses. Several young women’s family homes were raided and letters presented to their parents by occupation soldiers accusing them of participating in “illegal activities” through student activism.
One such letter, directed at students’ parents from Israeli occupation intelligence, said: “If you get this message, it means that you are the parents of one of the activists of the Islamic bloc, which is an illegal activity. We alert you that any such involvement may lead to the arrest of your daughter, damaging her academic life and future, wasting your money and causing concern and indignation in the hearts of your family. We turn to you to follow up on the activities of your daughter and lead her away from such actions. You have been warned of the consequences.”
Four journalists among 28 Palestinians seized by Israeli occupation forces
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – July 30, 2018
Israeli occupation forces seized 28 Palestinians on Monday morning, 30 July, including four Palestinian journalists who work for al-Quds TV: Alaa al-Rimawi, Mohammed Sami Alwan, Qutaiba Hamdan and Hassani al-Najas. Rimawi directs the al-Quds TV Ramallah bureau and his home in the al-Masayef neighborhood in Ramallah was raided by occupation forces, while Mohammed Alwan was also seized from his home.
Qutaiba Hamdan was seized from Beitunia and Husni Anjas from Kharbata Bani Harith, and his vehicle and work equipment were seized by the Israeli occupation. Quds News reported that Israeli occupation forces accused the four journalists of “incitement,” based on their reporting about the realities of Israeli colonization in Palestine. Just days ago, Palestinian writer Lama Khater was seized from her home in al-Khalil. Khater and the four journalists seized today make up some of the 29 Palestinian journalists imprisoned by Israel. These imprisoned journalists include student Istabraq Tamimi and a number of journalists detained without charge or trial, including Hammam Hantash, Abdullah Shatat and Abdel-Mohsen Shalaldeh., noted the Palestinian Prisoners’ Affairs Commission.
The Palestinians seized on Monday included the freed prisoners Mohsen Hardan Shreim, Bilal Maskawi, Nidal Nofal, Fadi Hourani, Khaled Wajih Sabri, Mohammed Wajih Sabri, Nour Daoud and Hussam Hatem Abu Libdeh in Qalqilya. In Bethlehem, occupation forces seized former prisoners Fahad As’ad and Atta al-Hreimi as well as Mohammed Ali al-Muti. In addition to the four journalists, they also seized Wassim Jadallah and Moataz Abu Rahmah from the Ramallah and el-Bireh area; Khaled Sidqi Daraghmeh and Nasr Mohammed Nasrallah Daraghmeh from Tubas; and Shadi Riyad al-Harb from Dura village in al-Khalil.
In addition, occupation forces raided a number of homes in al-Khalil, including the home of Nada Dweik, the daughter of Palestinian Legislative Council speaker and former prisoner Abdel-Aziz Dweik, ransacking it. They posted on the walls of houses in the city warning students against activism with the Islamic bloc on campuses.
20 Freedom Flotilla sailors still held in Israeli jail; Italian artists deported from Palestine
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – July 30, 2018
Twenty international solidarity activists on board the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza are being held in Israeli prisons, report the Freedom Flotilla Coalition. The first boat in the flotilla, “Al-Awda,” was hijacked by Israeli occupation forces in international waters on Sunday, 29 July. The next boat in the flotilla, the “Freedom,” is still on the approach to Gaza. The Flotilla aims to break the Israeli naval siege on Gaza, Palestine.
Two activists with Israeli citizenship on the boats, Zohar Chamberlain Regev and Yonatan Shapira, were released on bail and charged with attempting to enter Gaza and conspiracy to commit a crime. The 20 international solidarity activists remain detained in Givon prison and were scheduled to begin meeting with their lawyer on Monday.
The Freedom Flotilla Coalition noted that:
“Although the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) claim that the capture of our vessel happened ‘without exceptional incident’, eye-witness Zohar Chamberlain Regev reports that at the time of boarding: ‘People on board were tasered and hit by masked IOF soldiers. We did not get our passports or belongings before we got off the boat. Do not believe reports of peaceful interception.’ We urgently need to know the details of who was injured and how seriously, and what treatment they are receiving, if any. A military attack on a civilian vessel is a violent act and a violation of international law. Taking 22 people from international waters to a country which is not their destination constitutes an act of kidnapping, which is also unlawful under the international Convention of the Law of Sea.”
Mural on Apartheid Wall by artist Jorit Agoch.
In addition, two Italian artists, including well-known muralist Jorit Agoch, were ordered deported from Palestine on Monday, 30 July after they were seized by Israeli occupation forces for painting a large mural of Ahed Tamimi, 17, on the Apartheid Wall. The 13-foot-high painting was part of the celebration of Ahed’s release from over seven months in Israeli prison on Sunday, 29 July, along with her mother, Nariman.
The portrait was the focus of global media attention before the artists and the Palestinian driver who accompanied them were seized by occupation forces as they completed work on the portrait. The Palestinian man was reportedly released, as were the two artists, after their tourist visas were cancelled and they were ordered to leave the country within 72 hours. They were also banned from entering occupied Palestine for 10 years, much like other activists who have been denied entry to Palestine at Ben-Gurion airport or the Karameh/Allenby crossing.
How Israel Silences Palestine in EU Circles
By Issam Aruri | IMEMC | July 18, 2018
The Israeli propaganda machine works internationally to undermine the role of Palestinian NGOs which disclose Israeli violations of international law, and maintain the well-being of Palestinian people.
Imagine the following: a toxic op-ed is published that defames your organisation. You contact the website on which it features and are invited to publish a rebuttal.
The next day, you submit your article. As the editors are about to put it online, they are targeted by a sophisticated disinformation campaign.
More than a dozen people call the editors, seemingly on your behalf, and apply heavy pressure to publish the article. One of the callers even tries to bribe them to get it published.
This confuses and intimidates the editors, who have never experienced anything like it.
They fear that publishing under pressure may damage the independence and reputation of their website, which is a news magazine for the European Parliament.
The editors contact you and you clarify right away that none of these calls originated from your organisation. You urge them to publish your article, as they had promised. But despite your repeated requests, they don’t do so. They don’t even respond anymore to your phone calls and emails.
This is what recently happened to the Palestinian NGO network PNGO, which is an umbrella of 134 civil society organisations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The op-ed in question was mine, which I had submitted to a Brussels-based website called EP Today.
According to its own information, EP Today is “designed only” for policy opinions by members of the European Parliament. On 26 February, however, it published a slanderous op-ed by NGO Monitor that targeted PNGO.
NGO Monitor is an Israeli right-wing organisation that cooperates with the Israeli government in undermining NGOs that criticise Israel’s violations of human rights and international law.
It constantly attacks Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and dozens of other human rights and civil society organisations, including Israeli NGOs. PNGO is high on its target list.
In its article, NGO Monitor provided false and misleading information about PNGO’s mission and conduct.
While PNGO is a catalyst for a vibrant civil society in Palestine, NGO Monitor framed PNGO as a “ring leader” of a “gang” of NGOs that shrink Palestinian civil space.
Can’t be ignored
For a long time, we ignored organisations like NGO Monitor that provide cover for the Israeli occupation. But this time, we decided to submit a rebuttal to this toxic propaganda.
As mentioned above, EP Today violated its promise and didn’t publish our rebuttal. To make things worse, our article was apparently forwarded to NGO Monitor, which allegedly tried to prevent its publication.
An editor we spoke to implied this, with reference to one member of EP Today’s board of directors, who seems to have ties to NGO Monitor. This would constitute grave professional misconduct, calling into question EP Today’s independence and integrity.
In any case, we won’t be silenced. Our rebuttal of NGO Monitor’s propaganda, titled “What Europe can do to defend civil space: a response by the Palestinian NGO Network”, is now available for everyone, after we published it on our website.
Meanwhile, our real concern is not the article.
What troubles and burdens us is the big picture: the all-out attack that the Israeli government and its affiliated organisations such as NGO Monitor have launched against Palestinian human rights defenders.
Shrinking space for civil society is a global phenomenon. However, the threat it poses in Palestine has an extra dimension: Israel’s strangling military occupation, which began more than 51 years ago.
As a result of the occupation, Palestinians live without a sovereign government, without basic protection and in a fragile economy that heavily relies on international aid.
In this context, PNGO’s member organisations play a crucial and indispensable role in providing services and in preserving social cohesion.
Israel’s attack on us aims to neutralise NGOs that expose its violations of international law and to break the backbone of Palestinian society at large. The attack is meant to sustain and entrench the occupation.
Our reality
The reality in which we live is this: We face draconian digital surveillance and interference by Israel, which violates our fundamental privacy and obstructs our work.
I suspect this triggered the disinformation campaign described above (see AP’s article for more: “Covertly, Israel prepares to fight boycott activists online”).
Like NGO Monitor, the Israeli government engages in smear campaigns against Palestinian NGOs.
For example, on 1 July 2017, Israeli UN Ambassador Danny Danon branded our members Al-Haq and Al-Mezan as “supporters of terror”, based on false allegations that they have ties to Hamas and the PFLP.
Al-Haq and Al-Mezan are internationally renowned human rights organisations.
Most recently, the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs published a slanderous report that contains similar allegations and aggressively accuses the EU of funding Palestinian and European NGOs that sponsor terror and promote Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS – the Palestinian-led global campaign putting pressure on Israel to end its violations of international law).
Indeed, blocking EU funding to Palestinian NGOs is Israel’s declared goal.
In 2015 and 2016, the director and a staff member of Al-Haq received ongoing death threats.
In response to the threats against the staff member, who is based in The Netherlands and Al-Haq’s representative to the International Criminal Court, the Dutch authorities opened a criminal investigation.
While official results are pending, all indications point in Israel’s direction.
PNGO and the Palestinian Human Rights Organisations Council (PHROC) have compiled their concerns about the escalating campaign to silence, delegitimise and defund Palestinian civil society organisations and human rights defenders in a joint position paper, including recommendations to the EU.
For decades, the EU has invested into civil society organisations in Israel and Palestine that promote its core values “on the ground”. The support and protection of human rights defenders is a declared priority of the EU, as also displayed by the guidelines it adopted in 2008 to that end.
On 3 October 2017, in a comprehensive resolution, the European Parliament sounded alarm about the shrinking space for civil society and called “for continued and increased EU support and funding in creating a free and enabling environment for civil society.”
This is the time to act on these commitments.
We rely on the EU to shield us from Israel’s campaign to destroy Palestinian civil society, which has spread to Europe and is reinforced by organisations like NGO Monitor that are designed to shrink our space.
~EU Observer/Days of Palestine
Issam Aruri is the chair of the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations Network (PNGO), an umbrella of 134 civil society organisations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that promote the rights and well-being of the Palestinian people.
Freedom Flotilla Boat to Gaza, Al-Awda, hijacked by Israeli occupation forces
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – July 29, 2018
The motor vessel Al Awda (The Return), traveling in international waters towards Palestinian waters, 49 nautical miles from the port in Gaza City, has been contacted by the Israeli Occupation Forces navy and warned. The Israeli navy claims our ship is breaking international law and threatens that they will use “any measures necessary” to stop us. In fact, the only “necessary measures” would be to end the blockade of Gaza and restore freedom of movement for all Palestinians. At last news from on board, Al Awda maintains her course towards Gaza, where the crew and participants hope to arrive this evening around 21:00 local time.
A number of warships have appeared, so an attack, boarding and capture appear to be imminent, and we anticipate that all communications with the vessel will be lost shortly.
Al Awda is sailing under a Norwegian flag, carrying 22 people and a cargo of medical supplies, including #Gauze4Gaza. Passengers and crew on board are from 16 nations, including human rights supporters, journalists and crew, along with €13,000 worth of urgently needed medical supplies. The boat itself, a former fishing vessel from Norway, is a gift to Palestinian fishers in Gaza.
Four boats left Scandinavia in mid-May and have since stopped in 28 ports building support for a ‘Just Future for Palestine’, that demands Israel end its ongoing breaches of international law and the twelve-year blockade of Gaza, thereby enabling the only closed port in the Mediterranean to open and for people to have their right to freedom of movement.
Al Awda is being followed by the Swedish-flagged yacht, Freedom, which is also carrying medical supplies along with people from a number of nations. We anticipate that it will reach a similar area where the IOF attacked Al Awda within the next two days. Two smaller sailing boats that traveled from Scandinavia and sailed through the canal system in Netherlands, Belgium and France visiting inland ports, participated in the mission until Palermo.
“The Freedom Flotilla Coalition calls on the Norwegian Government, the national governments of those aboard Al Awda and the Freedom, other national governments, and relevant international organizations to act immediately” said Torstein Dahle of Ship to Gaza Norway, part of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition. “The international community must assume its responsibilities and demand that Israeli authorities ensure the safety of those on board, the speedy delivery of our gifts to the Palestinian people in Gaza, an end to the illegal blockade of Gaza, and to stop impeding our legal right of innocent passage to Gaza to deliver our gift of much-needed medical supplies”.
More information about the ‘Right to a Just Future for Palestine’ flotilla and the FFC:
Web: https://jfp.freedomflotilla.org/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FreedomFlotillaCoalition Twitter: @gazafflotilla
For US citizens, please call the US Department of State and demand that the State of Israel be held accountable for piracy–and demand that the medical supplies for Gaza on Al Awda be sent from Ashdod harbor to Gaza as provided by international law.
Call/email/tweet for release of US participant Joe Meadors
Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State
Tel: +1 202 647 4000 (ask for Israel & Palestine desk, and American Citizen Services, and/or Operations Center
Email: pompeom@state.gov
Website: http://state.gov
Twitter: @SecPompeo
Also call:
US Embassy in Israel
U.S. Embassy Jerusalem
14 David Flusser
Jerusalem 9378322, Israel
Phone: 02-630-4000 (ask for Ambassador, American Citizen Services and/or Duty Officer)
@usembassyjlm
Branch Office Tel Aviv
71 HaYarkon Street
Tel Aviv 6343229, Israel
Phone: 03-519-7575 (ask for Ambassador, American Citizen Services and/or Duty Officer)
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Book Review
Alarmist climate science as a textbook example of groupthink
By Paul MacRae | May 1, 2012
… Groupthink was extensively studied by Yale psychologist Irving L. Janis and described in his 1982 book Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes.
Janis was curious about how teams of highly intelligent and motivated people—the “best and the brightest” as David Halberstam called them in his 1972 book of the same name—could have come up with political policy disasters like the Vietnam War, Watergate, Pearl Harbor and the Bay of Pigs. Similarly, in 2008 and 2009, we saw the best and brightest in the world’s financial sphere crash thanks to some incredibly stupid decisions, such as allowing sub-prime mortgages to people on the verge of bankruptcy.
In other words, Janis studied why and how groups of highly intelligent professional bureaucrats and, yes, even scientists, screw up, sometimes disastrously and almost always unnecessarily. The reason, Janis believed, was “groupthink.” He quotes Nietzsche’s observation that “madness is the exception in individuals but the rule in groups,” and notes that groupthink occurs when “subtle constraints … prevent a [group] member from fully exercising his critical powers and from openly expressing doubts when most others in the group appear to have reached a consensus.”[2]
Janis found that even if the group leader expresses an openness to new ideas, group members value consensus more than critical thinking; groups are thus led astray by excessive “concurrence-seeking behavior.”[3] Therefore, Janis wrote, groupthink is “a model of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action.”[4]
The groupthink syndrome
The result is what Janis calls “the groupthink syndrome.” This consists of three main categories of symptoms:
1. Overestimate of the group’s power and morality, including “an unquestioned belief in the group’s inherent morality, inclining the members to ignore the ethical or moral consequences of their actions.” [emphasis added]
2. Closed-mindedness, including a refusal to consider alternative explanations and stereotyped negative views of those who aren’t part of the group’s consensus. The group takes on a “win-lose fighting stance” toward alternative views.[5]
3. Pressure toward uniformity, including “a shared illusion of unanimity concerning judgments conforming to the majority view”; “direct pressure on any member who expresses strong arguments against any of the group’s stereotypes”; and “the emergence of self-appointed mind-guards … who protect the group from adverse information that might shatter their shared complacency about the effectiveness and morality of their decisions.”[6]
It’s obvious that alarmist climate science—as explicitly and extensively revealed in the Climatic Research Unit’s “Climategate” emails—shares all of these defects of groupthink, including a huge emphasis on maintaining consensus, a sense that because they are saving the world, alarmist climate scientists are beyond the normal moral constraints of scientific honesty (“overestimation of the group’s power and morality”), and vilification of those (“deniers”) who don’t share the consensus. … Read full article
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- 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
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