4 killed, dozens injured as Israeli ordnance explodes in Gaza
Ma’an – August 6, 2015
GAZA CITY – At least four Palestinians were killed on Thursday and over 30 injured when an unexploded ordnance from last summer’s Israeli military offensive went off while clearing rubble from a destroyed house in the southern Gaza Strip, medics said.
Palestinian medical sources at the Abu Yousif al-Najjar hospital in Rafah said four bodies and multiple wounded Palestinians arrived at the emergency room.
The victims, who were all from the same family, were identified as Bakr Hasan Abu Naqira, Abdul-Rahman Abu Naqira, Ahmad Hasan Abu Naqira, and Hassan Ahmad Abu Naqira.
Medics said it is likely that the death toll will increase.
Over 7,000 unexploded ordnance were left throughout the Gaza Strip following last summer’s war between Israel and Palestinian militant groups, according to officials of the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the Palestinian territories (OCHA).
Even before the most recent Israeli assault, unexploded ordnance from the 2008-9 and 2012 offensives was a major threat to Gazans.
A 2012 report published by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said that 111 civilians, 64 of whom were children, were casualties to unexploded ordnance between 2009 and 2012, reaching an average of four every month in 2012.
Why Does Bernie Sanders Want the Saudis to Exercise MORE Influence?
By Sam Husseini | August 6, 2015
My colleague Norman Solomon has a piece published today: “Bernie Sanders should stop ducking foreign policy” in which he writes:
“After a question about ‘the military establishment’ and ‘perpetual war’ from a man who identified himself as a veteran for peace at a recent town hall gathering in Iowa City, Sanders’ reply was tepid Democratic boilerplate. He blamed Republican hawks for getting the U.S. into Iraq. He called for progress against waste and cost overruns at the Pentagon. And he said that in the war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the U.S. government should act jointly with regional allies such as Saudi Arabia and Turkey. (‘Those countries are going to have to get their hands dirty, it cannot just be the United States alone.’)
“When pressed for details on military intervention, Sanders has indicated that his differences with the Barack Obama administration are quite minor. Like many Democrats, he supports U.S. air strikes in the Middle East, while asserting that only countries in the region should deploy ground forces there. Sanders shares the widespread view among members of Congress who don’t want boots on the ground but do want U.S. air power to keep dropping bombs and firing missiles.
“Sanders has also urged confronting Russian leader Vladimir Putin over Ukraine. (‘You totally isolate him politically, you totally isolate him economically,’ Sanders said on Fox News last year.) Closer to home, the Vermont senator has championed the $1.4 trillion half-century program for Lockheed Martin’s F-35 beleaguered fighter jets. The Air Force is planning to base F-35s at the commercial airport in Burlington, his state’s largest city.”
I had actually asked Sanders about the F-35 when he was at the Press Club in March of this year and he ducked the question. It was part of what the moderator asked as a two parter and Sanders replied to the other part of the question and simply ignored the question about his backing the F-35. I’ve listed all the questions I submitted below.
However, the aspect of foreign policy as articulated by Sanders that has grabbed me the most is his stance on ISIS — where he points to the Saudis being the solution. He’s said this repeatedly. In February with Wolf Blitzer on CNN: “this war is a battle for the soul of Islam and it’s going to have to be the Muslim countries who are stepping up. These are billionaire families all over that region. They’ve got to get their hands dirty. They’ve got to get their troops on the ground. They’ve got to win that war with our support. We cannot be leading the effort.”
And in May, after the Saudi’s started bombing Yemen, also when interviewed by Wolf Blitzer, Sanders correctly noted as a result of the Iraq invasion “we’ve destabilized the region, we’ve given rise to Al-Qaeda, ISIS.” But then says: “What we need now, and this is not easy stuff, I think the President is trying, you need to bring together an international coalition, Wolf, led by the Muslim countries themselves! Saudi Arabia is the third largest military budget in the world they’re going to have to get their hands dirty in this fight. We should be supporting, but at the end of the day this is fight over what Islam is about, the soul of Islam, we should support those countries taking on ISIS.”
What? Why should the U.S. be backing Saudi Arabia? You’d think that perhaps an alleged progressive like Sanders would say that we have to break our decades-long backing of the Saudis. But no, he wants to double down on it. They’re not “pulling their weight” — they’re not exercising enough influence in the region. The Saudis have pushed Wahabism and have been deforming Islam, which actually give rise to ISIS and Al Qaeda. It’s a little like Bernie Sanders saying that the Koch Brothers need to get more involved in U.S. politics, they need to “get their hands dirty.”
But if your point is to build up the next stage of the U.S. government’s horrific role in the Mideast, it kind of makes sense. The U.S. government helped ensure the Saudis would dominate the Arabian Peninsula. In return the Saudis invested funds from their oil wealth largely in the West instead of the region. They buy U.S. weapons to further solidify the “relationship” and to ensure their military dominance. The Saudis and other Gulf monarchies deformed the Arab uprisings, which turned oppressive but minimally populist regimes that were potential rivals into failed states.
Perhaps most horrifically, Sanders continued this line of argument in May — after the Saudis started bombing Yemen in March. As far as I can tell, he continues making the argument.
But why? Is there a domestic constituency called “Americans for Further Expanding Saudi Power”? Well, yes and no. It would obviously play well in the general public to say: “We’ve got to stop backing dictatorships like the Saudis.” There’s no affront to any sense of U.S. nationalism there. There would seem to be no affront to the domestic constituencies obsessed with Israeli domination of the region. But the Israeli-Saudi alliance means that there is. It feels to me that Sanders is knowingly or not — I don’t know who his foreign policy advisers are — telegraphing to the Israel fanatic crowd that he’s on board in terms of Israel’s geo-strategic interests in the region. And to the U.S. establishment generally. It’s noteworthy that he’s made the case on Wolf Blitzer’s program, since Blitzer has long been a leading pro-Israel luminary.
The U.S.-Saudi alliance has been one of the plagues that has devastated the Mideast. There’s nothing “progressive” about doubling down on it.
The following are the questions I submitted to the Sanders event at the National Press Club in March. Other than the question about the F-35, which Sanders didn’t respond to, none were asked:
* You’re fond of saying “Wars drain investment at home” — MLK referred to
this in his “Beyond Vietnam” speech, the notion that wars drain the public treasury as a “facile” connection — and then listed several other reasons based on other moral grounds for opposing war. You rarely list other reasons for opposing war. Why is that?
* Why do you support the F-35 program?
* On Friday, CIA director John Brennan proposed a restructuring of the CIA to allegedly better confront current threats. Some former CIA analysts however charge that this restructuring will further politicize intelligence, so that “intelligence” will more likely come to “conclusions” that are politically convenient. Is this a growing threat?
* There’s apparently a gag order on acknowledging the Israel has a nuclear weapons arsenal, even as many in the US and Israel have charged Iraq and now Iran with having a nuclear weapons program. Do you acknowledge Israel has a nuclear weapons program? Will you change decades-long US policy that refuses to acknowledge this?
* Last summer, the Senate passed a resolution by unanimous consent backing Israel’s “defending itself” from Gaza in the conflict that left about 2,000 Palestinians in Gaza dead. Do you regret not objecting to that resolution?
* Noted historian Alfred McCoy recently wrote: “Under Obama, drones have grown from a tactical Band-Aid in Afghanistan into a strategic weapon for the exercise of global power. From 2009 to 2015, the CIA and the U.S. Air Force deployed a drone armada of over 200 Predators and Reapers, launching 413 strikes in Pakistan alone, killing as many as 3,800 people. ” Are you for or against the drone assassination program?
* You recently said: “I find it remarkable that Saudi Arabia, which borders Iraq and is controlled by a multi-billion dollar family, is demanding that U.S. combat troops have ‘boots on the ground’ against ISIS. Where are the Saudi troops?…With the third largest military budget in the world and an army far larger than ISIS, the Saudi government must accept its full responsibility for stability in their own region of the world.” Are you really wanting the Saudi regime, which has been accused of fomenting violence through the Wahhabi sect, to play a greater role in the region? Will you break with the decades-old alliance with the authoritarian Saudi regime?
* What issues do you agree with some, like Ron Paul, who are associated with the right wing? (Trade? Civil liberties? Cutting military budget? Cutting corporate welfare? Ending bank bailouts?)
Osama “Sam” Husseini is the communications director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. He’s also set up VotePact.org — which helps break out of the two party bind. He’s on twitter: @samhusseini
Nablus residents protest Israeli water supply cut-off
Ma’an – August 5, 2015
NABLUS – Dozens of Palestinian residents of the West Bank village of Kafr Qaddum staged a sit-in on Wednesday to protest the Israeli national water company cutting off its supply to the village, locals said.
Hamzeh Jumaa, the head of the village council, told Ma’an that the Israeli water company Mekorot cut off its supply on Sunday.
He said that the water supplies some 4,000 people living in Kafr Qaddum in Nablus, which he highlighted was an agricultural village.
He said that thousands of poultry birds had died due to a lack of water combined with extreme temperatures.
Jumaa said that they have not received any answer from Mekerot as to why the water was cut off or when it will be brought back.
The council head added that Mekerot provides water to all Palestinian villages and illegal Israeli settlements in the surrounding area.
Israelis, including settlers, have access to 300 liters of water per day, according to EWASH, while the West Bank average is around 70 liters, below the World Health Organization’s recommended minimum of 100 liters per day for basic sanitation, hygiene and drinking.
Kafr Qaddum has lost large swathes of its land to Israeli settlements, outposts and the separation wall, all illegal under international law.
According to the Applied Research Institute of Jerusalem, more than 10 percent of the village’s land has been confiscated for the establishment of the settlements alone — Kedumim, Kedumim Zefon, Jit, and Givat HaMerkaziz.
Residents of Kafr Qaddum stage regular protests, including a weekly Friday march, to protest land confiscations as well as the closure of the village’s southern road by Israeli forces.
The road, which has been closed 13 years, is the main route to the nearby city of Nablus, the nearest economic center.
Israeli forces regularly use violent means to suppress the protests.
Update on Photo of “Israeli Officer Being Shielded from Stone-throwing Settlers”
Popular Struggle Coordination Committee Facebook page
Video showing the actual story not apparent in the viral picture of RHR Field Coordinator Zakaria Sadah and Qusra Mayor… returning policewoman to prevent second officer from shooting Palestinians…
“The bottom line is that, while settlers are calling this an intentional publicity stunt, and some Palestinians are angry with Zakaria and the Qusara mayor for having helped an Israeli policewoman. (The residents of Qusara and the hundreds of additional Palestinians he has helped are not angry with him.)
The fact is that Zakaria may very well have saved Palestinian lives, as another police officer was preparing to shoot. Zakaria is a one person command center who is often the first person to get a call when something happens. He is hated by settlers in the area for having foiled many attempts to attack, threaten, invade and trespass.
On this particular day, he was with reporters in Douma (where he had also been the first to arrive early last Friday morning, and help evacuate the wounded) when he received the call to come quickly to Qusra, because Israelis had descended from the Eish Kodesh outpost and were trying to prevent Palestinians from developing land in Area B by shouting and standing in front of the equipment.
Although the army now acknowledges that this is Area B, where they have no authority to stop land development, when Zakaria arrived, the army seemed to be siding with the Israelis.
In another video posted on Ynet, you see a settler claiming that Palestinians had thrown stones at him. just before the portion of the video here, you see a police officer speaking with the Israelis. This officer, then, comes over and attempts to arrest Palestinians. Quickly he starts using a taser and, then, the Palestinains do start throwing stones.
The frightened policewoman froze, began to cry, and got caught in between the Palestinians, on one side, and security forces with Israeli citizens on the other. She wasn’t hurt, but rocks were falling near her from one side, and tear gas and stun grenades from the other.
Sensing that she was in danger, the police officer in a t-shirt, whom we see later extending his hand to take the policewoman, prepared to shoot at Palestinians.
You can hear Zakaria shouting “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”
You then see Zakaria and the Qusara mayor escorting the policewoman and the other officer extending his hand to draw her to him.”
http://rhr.org.il/eng/2015/08/the-context-behind-the-photo/
Updated from:
08/04/15 (Press TV/Al Ray) In this picture, which was posted on social media websites last week, two Palestinians can be seen protecting a female Israeli police officer from a group of stone-throwing Israeli settlers.
Shaul Golan, an Israeli photographer, took the picture during clashes between settlers and Palestinian farmers in the illegal Israeli settlement of Esh Kodesh in the West Bank on Saturday.
When Israeli police forces arrived on the scene to break up the clashes, the settlers started throwing rocks at them too.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, settlers frequently attack local Palestinian villages and prevent farmers from reaching their lands.
The Israeli regime maintains a defiant stand on the issue of its illegal settlements on Palestinian land as it refuses to freeze settlement expansion. Tel Aviv has come under repeated and widespread international condemnation over the issue.
Gaza: Our Child’s Shattered Face in the Mirror
By Gary Corseri | CounterPunch | August 4, 2015
When I received a copy of Gaza Unsilenced in the mail, about a week ago, the first thing that struck me was the amazing cover photo. Now, I think I’m as wary of judging a book by its cover as the next reader/reviewer; and I read through the entire book before ever thinking of starting a review in this way. Does the book justify this sort of cover? Most assuredly it does!
The face on the cover is that of a girl—somewhere between 10 and 13, I’d guess. She has a marred, but beautiful face, striking dark eyes, and she almost seems to be smiling, acknowledging, at once, the onlooker, the photographer, and her own resilience, her capacity to survive. It is a haunting picture because her face is pockmarked by shrapnel in dozens of places—perhaps caused by the illegal “flechette” dart-bombs used unsparingly in “Protective Edge”; or glass fragments, or chips of concrete?
The book tells a story that is almost impossible to tell: the victims’ view of the 51-day, 2014 War on Gaza, euphemistically called, “Operation Protective Edge” by Israel. One element that disturbed me at first, but which I came to appreciate, is the way the narative gyrates chronologically. Sometimes, we are at the beginning of the war, a few pages more and, with another narrator, we are surveying the rubble at the end of the war; a few more pages, and we’re back in the middle of the unfolding horrors.
And why wouldn’t this be the best way to render the way war shatters everything—even our sense of time? Here, this structure seemed especially appropriate; for, in reality, “Operation Protective Edge” was just the latest outburst of a war that began in 1948 with the “Nakba” (Catastrophe), with Israeli massacres in Palestinian villages like Deir Yassin, leading to the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes, their native land. As awful as things have been in the West Bank and other parts of Palestine, the situation has been most dire in Gaza—a strip of land about the size of Atlanta, Georgia, hugging the Mediterranean, with about 1.8 million people (Atlanta has about ½ million) who have been “under siege” for more than 8 years in a Sartre-like hell with “No Exit,” surrounded by impassable “buffer zones,” with 60% unemployment rates, a frazzled infrastructure, bombed-out hospitals and schools, and half the population children and/or students!
More than 2200 Palestinians were killed during the 51 days of bombardment and invasion. About 70 percent of those who died were unarmed, undefended civilians—mostly women and children.
This is an anthology unlike any I’ve read. An English major, I’ve read my share of literary anthologies; a professional-and-citizen-journalist, I’ve read and learned from collections of work by master-journalists and social and political commentators. The power of Gaza Unsilenced is that it is a symbiosis: “you-are-there” journalism (including “blogger” twitter notes), combined with piercingly beautiful, unforgettable, cherishable essays, poems and photos. (One of Yeats’ phrases ran through my mind as I read the book: “A terrible beauty is born.”)
Other words, phrases, ideas were reiterated: “resilience”; “complicity”; “betrayal”; “human shields”; “de-humanization.”
Several of the authors wrote about the resilience of these Gazans who have endured so much, but re-plant themselves, as they re-plant their olive trees in the dry soil. Resilience is undeniable, but two words they eschew are “heroism” and “victimhood.” They do not want to be depicted as “heroes” or as “victims” by a global media infected with reductionism, always reaching for the simplistic explanation. Certainly, there were many heroes among the dead and wounded—those who risked their lives and gave their lives to save and help others. The victimization will continue for lifetimes. One American doctor who visited Gaza some months after the last bombs fell and the last bullets were fired, described the people as living—not with PTSD, but with “continuous, traumatic, stress disorder.”
Editor/writer/educator Refaat Alareer writes unforgettably about the death of his brother, Mohammad, and how his brother’s 4-year old daughter has been so unnerved by her father’s failure to keep his promise to return to her, she has retreated into a fantasy world—talking to herself, imagining her father giving her presents.
There is that kind of pity-evoking work here, and it may be cathartic for thoughtful, sensitive readers to read it, animating them to learn more about this ongoing crisis. Several of the authors stress that, while Gaza, and Palestine in general, constitute humanitarian crises, we must understand the “deep roots,” the “political” nature of this conflict, of this imbroglio—if we are ever to untangle it.
“Betrayals” have occurred on many fronts, and there has been the “complicity” of the global mainstream media, and the political hacks in Israel, the United States, Europe, and in Arab states like Sisi’s Egypt as well, and even with the West Bank’s Palestine Authority where the default position is, invariably, to blame those who resist the Occupation, and the depredations of war: physical and psychological destruction.
Editors Alareer and Laila El-Haddad have done a masterful job compiling this book. “What else can we do?” the survivors of the onslaughts wonder when journalists and human-rights advocates inquire how they manage to continue, to rebuild. They are rooted to their land, like their olive trees, planted and re-planted for thousands of years.
But, considering these stories, these flashes of insight, these twittering reflections, superlative essays, poems, articles and photos…, and considering that shrapnel-pock-marked face of the child in the mirror we gaze at on the front of this book, we also wonder, “What else can we do?”
How much time we spend dehumanizing the Other! And we go to war, and pay our taxes like good, little citizens, so that those who pander in lies and delusions can advance themselves, gain power and privilege in their narrowly-scoped worlds, shutting us and the Other out!
Is there a way to “re-humanize,” editor Laila El-Haddad wonders in her final essay. “There are no easy answers, but the quest begins by asking the right questions and knowing where to look…. We hope to have provided you a starting point in this book.”
El-Haddad and Alareer, and the mighty contributors here, have provided truth-seekers and truth-tellers with much more than a starting point. They have provided us with a mirror of our shattered human family.
Statement from Palestinian Activist Amer Jubran on Being Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison by Jordan’s State Security Court
Amer Jubran Defense Campaign
On Wednesday, July 29, Amer Jubran was sentenced by Jordan’s State Security Court along with 8 other defendants. The rest of the defendants were given sentences of 2-3 years; for his refusal to cooperate, he was singled out for excessive punishment, and given a 15 year sentence (reduced by his lawyers to 10 years). The verdict comes after 15 months in detention–the first 3 months without charges.
He was able to get a call out of the prison where he is being held in Jordan to make a statement about his trial and sentencing. An audio recording is available at the following link:
https://archive.org/details/AmerStatement
We include a full transcript below:
“Last Wednesday on July 29, 2015, I was issued a verdict of 15 years in prison which was reduced to 10 years later. This verdict was issued by a military court, a martial tribunal court made of three judges. The trial lasted for about 1 year and over thirty sessions, through which my legal defense team has proven beyond doubt false charges of terrorism. There were 10 charges and our defense amounted to zero effect on the outcome of that trial, as I was given a maximum punishment, while everybody else in the group were given 2-3 year sentences. It is clear that I am being targeted as a person, and such decisions had completely put aside law and justice and replaced that with politics and vengeance.
During the interrogation period, I was told by the GID that any decision made about me is involving (quote) ‘our American and Israeli friends’ (end-quote). All started when I refused to be a sell-out and work against the Lebanese resistance. I was told then that I will be sent behind the sun for such a refusal. And frankly it is very easy for me to disappear behind the sun rather than to be well outside but a sell-out and traitor.
Please use this information to spread to everyone among our activist media who are interested. Especially media that is pro-resistance in Lebanon. And anybody you think is worthy to take this information to. Also please tell my love and my respect to everybody who stood by me among our friends and brothers and sisters where you are. And I thank you deeply from my heart and please do not forget Palestine.”
***
In conversation, Amer further clarified that all 10 of the original charges were disproved by his defense team, but a new charge was manufactured at the time of the verdict. He also clarified that his refusal to be a “sell-out and work against the Lebanese resistance” was a refusal to work as an infiltrator and informant.
We are releasing this statement along with a call for activists to renew pressure on the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Jordan’s Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al Hussein, demanding an independent review of Amer’s trial and the flagrant violations of human rights involved in his imprisonment. It is now 13 months since our initial open letter to the High Commissioner–an appeal that is still unanswered. (For the text of our letter, see: https://freeamer.wordpress.com/action-calls ).
It has been clear from the outset that Amer was targeted for his activism and political speech on behalf of Palestine. The lengthy proceedings before the State Security Court were a sham trial, before a court with no political independence, acting as a rubber-stamp for the GID (General Intelligence Directorate).
Amer’s statement confirms what many of us have suspected from the beginning: his arrest and detention–and now his sentencing to 10 years of imprisonment–have taken place in coordination with the US and Israel.
Please take the time to forward Amer’s statement. You can support justice for Amer by sending letters, faxes and e-mails over the next week (8/5/15-8/12/2015) addressed to Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al Hussein at the following address:
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Palais des Nations
CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland
Fax: (41 22) 917 0008 (If faxing from US: 011-41-22-917-0008)
E-mail: registry@ohchr.org
And please cc the following:
Prime Minister and Defense Minister
Abdullah Ensour
Fax number 962-6-464-2520 (If faxing from US: 011-962-6-464-2520)
e-mail: info@pm.gov.jo
Minister of Interior
Salamah Hammad
Fax number 962-6-560-6908 (If faxing from US: 011-962-6-560-6908)
e-mail: info@moi.gov.jo
Minister of Justice
Bassam Talhouni
Fax number 962-6-464-3197 If faxing from US: 011-962-6-464-3197)
e-mail: Feedback@moj.gov.jo
***
Our open letter is below:
Open Letter to Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al Hussein
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Palais des Nations
CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland
email registry@ohchr.org
August 3, 2015
Dear UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al Hussein:
We wrote to you in July of 2014 to ask you to intervene in the case Amer Jubran of Jordan.* Mr. Jubran at that time had been detained for two months without charges, and you, at that time, were the UN High Commissioner-Elect. Now you occupy that office, and Mr. Jubran has been convicted. On July 29, 2015 he was sentenced by the Jordanian State Security Court, a military tribunal, to ten years in prison on charges of terrorism. These charges were proven false by Mr. Jubran’s defense team, but a decision was made against him nevertheless.
We saw no sign that you acted to intervene in this case in 2014. Perhaps if you had this sham trial would not have proceeded. But now that it has come to its predictable conclusion we ask you again to intervene to question why such a harsh sentence could be handed down without evidence of any crime. As High Commissioner for Human Rights we believe it is your responsibility to act to review this case. Amer Jubran is an internationally known activist, speaker, and writer on Palestinian human rights, and a critic of US and Israeli policies in the Arab world. These are the reasons he was targeted, not for terrorism. Though Jordan is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the human rights violations of its General Intelligence Directorate and State Security Court are well known. This is a problem that, as a Jordanian and as Human Rights Commissioner, you have every reason to be concerned about. The unjust sentence against Amer Jubran should be overturned immediately.
We look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
The Amer Jubran Defense Campaign
defense@amerjubrandefense.org
*See our previous letter at https://freeamer.wordpress.com/action-calls/
cc:
Prime Minister and Defense Minister
Abdullah Ensour, e-mail: info@pm.gov.jo
Fax number 011-962-6-464-2520
Minister of Interior: Salamah Hammad, e-mail: info@moi.gov.jo
Fax number 011-962-6-560-6908
Minister of Justice Bassam Talhouni, e-mail: Feedback@moj.gov.jo
Fax number 011-962-6-464-3197
***
Amer Jubran Defense Campaign
freeamer.wordpress.com | defense@amerjubrandefense.org
Corbyn: the antidote to the Blairite ‘virus’ and Zionist snake-bite
Many certainly can see Jeremy Corbyn as Prime Minister – a very different and totally new style of PM. He’s astute and has a track record of honesty and openness, laced with a burning sense of justice.
By Stuart Littlewood – My Catbird Seat – August 2, 2015
Some polls are showing Jeremy Corbyn forging ahead in the Labour Party leadership race by as much as 20 points. The political Establishment is shaken and quite definitely stirred.
Dave Ward, general secretary of the 200,000-strong Communication Workers Union, is reported saying:
There is a virus within the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn is the antidote.
The grip of the Blairites and individuals like Peter Mandelson must now be loosened once and for all.
This has ruffled a good many feathers among Labour diehards.
Meanwhile, the four Labour leadership contenders recently attended a public meeting populated largely by members of the Jewish community and co-hosted by the Jewish Chronicle.
Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall, in supercharged suck-up mode, expressed avid support for Israel, leaving Jeremy Corbyn as the only critic.
Andy Burnham
“I’ve always been a friend of Israel and the Jewish community – that will never change.” If he becomes Labour leader his first overseas trip will be to Israel. He’s opposed to the “spiteful” boycott movement. He praises Israel as a “democracy that has a long history of protecting minorities and promoting civil rights” and says the Balfour Declaration, which is coming up for its centenary, represented “an example of British values in action”. He wants centenary celebrations in every school to show how the UK “played a role in the establishment of a democracy in the region”.
Yvette Cooper
“It’s hugely important that Labour continues to be a friend of Israel.” She says Labour must oppose the “counterproductive” BDS [the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement]. As for the Balfour Declaration, its 100th anniversary must be celebrated to “mark the pioneering role Britain played in [promoting] the rights of Jewish people to a homeland”.
Liz Kendall
She pledges to “always be a friend of Israel” and says the recent resolution passed in the Commons to recognise the state of Palestine on 1967 borders was irresponsible. She feels BDS is an initiative to “delegitimise Israel” and she’ll fight it with “every fibre of [her] being”. She ‘s proud of the role played by the UK in the establishment of Israel and believes it is a country which “respects gay rights, has a free media, and possesses a strong tradition of social democracy”.
Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Corbyn, who has visited Israel, the West Bank and Gaza nine times, calls for “robust discussion” on Israel’s siege of Gaza, the Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the mistreatment of Palestinian child detainees in Israeli prisons. He says he’ll support an arms embargo on Israel and a ban on produce from West Bank settlements viewed as illegal under international law. As for the Balfour Declaration, it was “an extremely confused document which did not enjoy universal support in the cabinet of the time…”
Actually, the Balfour Declaration of 2 November 1917 was merely a letter to Lord Rothschild from Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour expressing sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations:
His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine….
There was no promise of a Jewish state.
Who will heal the ‘running sore in the East’ ?
Later, Lord Sydenham famously remarked in a debate in the House of Lords:
The harm done by dumping down an alien population upon an Arab country… may never be remedied… What we have done is, by concessions, not to the Jewish people but to a Zionist extreme section, to start a running sore in the East, and no one can tell how far that sore will extend.
Balfour was one of history’s greatest chumps.
The idea that his fatal blunder should be celebrated – in schools – is preposterous. It should not even be mentioned without including a full history of the Holy Land since the mid-1800s.
Back to the meeting
The candidates were then asked whether it was appropriate for parliamentarians to host members of groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah. This was designed to embarrass Corbyn, who had referred to the resistance groups as “friends” when he hosted them in Parliament some years ago.
Burnham said that he would “sanction” any member hosting meetings that included Hamas and Hezbollah. “No MP in my Labour Party would do that.” However Burnham, in his haste to appease Israel, might find it hard to make such sanctions stick. Neither Hamas’s nor Hezbollah’s political wings are proscribed in the UK.
Corbyn defended his position by saying: “You don’t achieve progress by only talking to those who you agree with,” and that all parties must be engaged in the search for peace.
Critics in the Labour Party have slurred Jeremy Corbyn with claims that he’s not prime ministerial material and therefore not electable in a situation where winning power is all that matters. Others disagree. Labour must prove first itself an effective opposition if it is to win back public respect, as well as its own self-respect, and be considered fit for purpose. That is not likely to happen while the Blairite/Brownite rump continues to clog the upper echelons of the party. The unwelcome blockage includes stooges like Cooper and Burnham.
Corbyn is nothing like the Establishment-preferred smoothy from Eton and delinquent from the Bullingdon Club – the disconnected upper-class leadership formula that has driven Britain into deep debt and rendered it unpopular throughout the world.
He’s an ordinary product of Adams Grammar School in Shropshire, North London Polytechnic and the excellent VSO (Volunteer Services Overseas). He’s astute and has a track record of honesty and openness, laced with a burning sense of justice. Therefore, he’s much more representative of the people and much more their “cuppa tea”. Furthermore, he’s a trusted parliamentarian of 32 years’ standing.
Many certainly can see Corbyn as prime minister – a very different and totally new style of prime minister, to be sure – with open-neck shirt, a cloth cap on occasion and sleeves rolled up ready for grass-roots action. At least he’s a man to look up to and identify with – and a man who is not tempted by the Israeli shekel.
If any of Corbyn’s opponents lands the leadership Labour will remain under the yoke of Zionist ambitions and enslaved by the gangster regime in Tel Aviv. It’ll be looking for any excuse to gang up in death-dealing raids into countries the US and Israel don’t like. And it’ll continue to provide a safe haven to Israel’s war criminals.
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UK readers can help spoil the warmongers’ evil schemes and take a bold step down the path to peace. They can apply to become supporters of the Labour Party and qualify for a vote in the leadership election. But they must do it before 12 August.
The Case of Alison Weir: Two Palestinian Solidarity Organizations Borrow from Joe McCarthy’s Playbook
By Jack Dresser | CounterPunch | August 3, 2015
From the outbreak of the Second Intifada, Journalist Alison Weir has tirelessly investigated and reported on the history and realities of Israel’s dispossession and occupation of Palestine through her organization and website, If Americans Knew. Now, she has come under guilt-by-association attack by two umbrella organizations of the Palestinian Solidarity movement, Jewish Voice for Peace and US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, for granting interviews to “white supremacist, anti-Semitic” and “vile” radio shows, specifically Clayton Douglas and American Free Press. Judged as tarred by a common brush for not using her limited air time to challenge their objectionable ideologies, her offenses include being called a “patriot” by her defenders.
Alison’s politically incorrect policy has been to disseminate salient facts to anyone, anywhere to achieve the broadest possible reach among American citizens, without political discrimination. The expelling organizations undoubtedly fear that the knowledge will feed anti-Semitism. Maybe it will, but the appropriate remedy would be a collective demand by the Jewish diaspora to end the Zionist project, make reparations to its victims, and establish a democratic state, not to withhold information from people who might use it to make Jewish Americans uncomfortable.
The complaint itself is strongly bigoted against the presumptively “white” political “right-wing” of America and the evidence is extremely thin, so what might really – and so suddenly – be behind this? Unlike the two organizations attacking her, Alison has always taken an unequivocal and uncompromising position against the legality and morality of the entire Zionist project, focusing on the 1948 Nakba and UN-established right of return, not just the Israeli occupation. So-called “liberal” or “progressive” Zionists evade the former and pretend that the crimes began in 1967. Why this adamant denial of honest history and Palestinian human rights?
Fully honoring the right of return would threaten or eliminate Israel’s Jewish majority and any defensible claim to be a “Jewish state.” Survey data from Israelis and occupied Palestinians show this as the largest disparity between them and the most insurmountable obstacle to resolution. Hand-wringing Jewish Israelis and their US enablers see establishment of an integrated, multi-ethnic, Western-style constitutional democracy as an “existential threat” to be fought tooth-and-nail. Jeremy Ben-Ami of J Street says, “One-state is not a solution. One state is a dissolution.”
This is pure segregationist racism, not simply annoying discourtesies but the kind of racism that really counts, imposed by armed violence for 67 years upon helpless victims by a self-declared “Jewish state” with a Jewish religious symbol on its flag and emblazoned on the wings of its Hellfire missile-equipped, US-supplied F-16s murdering whole families in Gaza. How can this not inevitably generate some anti-Semitism? And how does it differ in spirit from the Jerusalem Cross of Crusaders that remains a mark of shame upon the history of Christianity? Emotional reactions are not finely parsed, however sometimes unfair to the innocent, and are less likely to be nuanced when Israeli atrocities remain uniformly unopposed by the 50+ Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Jews everywhere are put on the spot by Israeli arrogance and outlawry to collectively stand up, declare “not in my name,” take sides, and choose the side of international law and justice. If they don’t, they have themselves largely to blame. Given awareness – which is readily available, however ignored – silence becomes complicity.
And equally disturbing, it is our country that protects these outrages in violation of our declared principles and our own laws, so why should “patriotism” not be evoked? And why should American WASPs not be prominent among opponents of the government for which they are responsible? And why should organized and politically influential Jewish Americans who march in lockstep defending Israel, as well as those who remain silent, not be held accountable by all US taxpayers who involuntarily support this? And who are the USCEIO and JVP to tell Americans of any political persuasion what to think, to what information they are entitled, or what to conclude from the evidence? Until the righteous critics find effective ways to end Israeli oppression of people suffering under it daily, who are they to judge the attitudes or strategies or political outreach of others?
Those of us firmly supporting justice for Palestinians have observed JVP for many years as compromised by Zionist colonial sympathies but improving recently by endorsing the full BDS campaign. We also found ourselves suspicious a while back when USCEIO convened conference calls, highly controlled in format and content, concerned with “anti-Semitism” – the threadbare fallback complaint of Israel and its US lobby to change the subject and regain the offensive from attention to Israeli state crimes. Curiously, “Zionism” was omitted from their statement on racism while generically condemning “other racist or bigoted behaviors, practices and structures,” an undefined subjective net that could sweep up almost anyone deemed objectionable. Why were putative Palestinian human rights advocates echoing Israeli propaganda themes?
Setting aside the possibility of infiltration, both Alison-attacking organizations have mixed memberships of people scattered along the learning curve of knowledge regarding international law, human rights and documented history, and at different levels of readiness to give up attachment to Israel and its mythologies. Alison would inevitably make many of these members very nervous. And to make matters worse, she has been spreading inconvenient facts widely and very democratically, providing these, inter alia, to people from whom we “liberals” may choose to ideologically distance ourselves. But they too are voters, with a right to know how and where their tax money is spent, to draw their own conclusions, and to exert political influence. Political influence is what is desperately needed against AIPAC power, and many of our federal legislators who bow to AIPAC are also “right-wing.”
The timing of the excommunication is not random. I suspect that it is publication and Alison’s promotion of her book, Against Our Better Judgment, that has released long-stockpiled ammo against her, however flimsy – especially her revelations of arguably treasonous conduct by our first two, widely revered Jewish Supreme Court justices, both pledged to Zionism above loyalty to country as members of a secret Zionist organization, the Parushim. If Justice Louis Brandeis was instrumental, as the evidence suggests, in persuading President Wilson to betray his 1916 campaign promise and declare war on Germany (as a quid pro quo for the Balfour Declaration, with or without his knowledge) – a decision costing over 116,000 American lives (double those killed in Vietnam) – this is explosive information indeed. In addition, Alison’s research indicates that future Justice Felix Frankfurter was instrumental in preventing an early WWI peace treaty with the Ottomans that would have obviated the Balfour Declaration, terminating or seriously restricting the Zionist movement and the havoc that has followed. This information had been published elsewhere but remained obscure.
Some would like to keep it obscure. Blackening the reputation of Justice Brandeis in particular, an iconic figure with a university bearing his name, is undoubtedly intolerable in the realm of “Jewish identity politics” (the real criteria, it would appear, defining Alison’s “anti-Semitism”). It also drives another nail in the coffin of Israel’s proclaimed “right to exist” on land stolen from others. Alison had to be discredited and silenced.
These attacks are serious and malevolent, threatening both Alison’s influence and her livelihood, intended to reduce or extinguish her book sales and speaking engagements. Both expelling organizations are national in scope with many JVP chapters and USCEIO member organizations that may fear inviting her to their communities with her opposition now freshly armed to harass her events and their sponsors.
Readers wishing to oppose this muzzling attempt can endorse a petition supporting Alison here.
Jack Dresser, Ph.D. is National vice-chair, Veterans for Peace working group on Palestine and the Middle East and Co-Director of Al-Nakba Awareness Project in Eugene, Oregon
Israel opens pub on Islamic cemetery lands in Jerusalem
MEMO | August 3, 2015
Israeli authorities yesterday opened a new coffee shop and pub build on part of the land belonging to the historical Islamic cemetery of Ma’manillah in the old city of Jerusalem, Quds Press reported.
In a statement, Al-Aqsa Organisation for Waqf and Heritage said that an Israeli coffee network is running the new facility while the building is managed by the Israeli municipality in Jerusalem.
The group condemned the “violation” against the cemetery, noting that opening this pub and coffee shop came as part of a series of violations against this historic cemetery.
Only 20 of the 200 dunams of the original total area of the cemetery has not been destroyed, the organisation said. However, it reiterated that this area is desecrated on a daily basis.
Ma’manillah is a historic Muslim cemetery that contains the remains of figures from the early Islamic period. It includes several historic shrines and tombs. Muslims stopped using it in 1927 when the Supreme Muslim Council decided to preserve it as an historic site.
Freedom Flotilla: Eyewitness tells how Israel seized ship illegally, tasering and holding activists
By Richard Sudan | RT | August 2, 2015
Just a few weeks ago, an act of piracy took place on the high seas, whereby a group of international activists taking part in a humanitarian mission including a member of the Israeli parliament, were captured and detained.
The story didn’t attract much coverage in the MSM. Coverage elsewhere among alternative media outlets ranged from being accurate to downright disingenuous. At best, those taking part were described as what they were – aid workers, artists, journalists and politicians working toward a shared aim of reaching Gaza – and, at worst, were described as terrorists and “agitators.”
The illegally seized boat, the “Marianne,” was part of a convoy of vessels which had set sail from different destinations in European waters, with the aim of reaching Gaza in occupied Palestine.
Needless to say, a group of activists attempting to break an illegal blockade of a country occupied by one of the most powerful armed forces in the world can hardly be viewed as troublemakers.
Nevertheless, the Marianne was halted in its tracks, approximately 100 nautical miles from Gaza by the Israeli navy, which, operating without jurisdiction and in complete disregard of international law, boarded the boat, taking those on board prisoner.
These are the facts, and this is what happened. The wave of propaganda which consequently emanated from some Israeli press offices attempted to divert attention away from the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, to another equally tragic humanitarian crisis in Syria. In a letter presented to activists on board the Marianne after its seizure, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that the activists had gotten “lost” on their way to Syria.
Perhaps in reality it was the Israeli navy which had lost its sense of direction (and priorities) by taking control of a boat of civilians in international waters and by then taking them to the Israeli port of Ashdod.
One of the activists on board the Marianne, Charlie Andreasson, was held by the Israeli authorities in Ashdod for six days before finally being released.
I spoke with him recently and he gave me his account of what happened, which does not fit with the official line from Israel that says that the seizure of the Marianne was “uneventful” and non-violent.
I asked him what happened on the night the boat was seized.
“Early in the morning, at about 1:30 a.m., we were contacted by the IDF (Israeli Defence Force). Soon after, two big zodiacs came, but they were painted as the Coastguard without any national marks or flags,” he said.
“By then, we were 100 nautical miles from the coast of Israel, and the coastguard can only operate within 12 nautical miles from its shore. To board our ship was a clear act of piracy, There is no doubt of that, a violation against maritime law as well as international law. After some time with nonsense shouted from the false coastguard boats, telling everybody on board to gather in front of the boat so they easily could easily take control of our boat, as is routinely done to the Palestinian fisherman on an almost a daily basis, a group of Israeli soldiers suddenly were on board,” Charlie said.
“They came, and were not seen by anybody while they were doing so. Nobody would have tried to stop them anyway as we were committed to nonviolent resistance. However, there were four or five masked soldiers, heavily armed and even holding shields while they were approaching us. Somebody was also on top of the roof of the wheelhouse by then. But they were also scared, that we could see clearly in their eyes, and a group of scared young men with lot of guns is not a fun thing. I was the first one who was attacked, over and over again by two Taser guns at the time, and after I was down on my knees they continued with Tasers and also started to beat me with hands and by kneeing me. I started to bleed from my forehead but not much. Five of us were tasered altogether, and the captain was beaten and threatened by a gun if he did not cooperate. One commander came up to me and told me my name several times, just to make sure that I understood that they knew me.”
“It took them about 50 minutes to take control of the Marianne, but several hours before they had the engine running so they could take us to Ashdod. During the whole operation and while we were sitting in one place, watched by soldiers, they were constantly filming us. They were also taking the name Ship to Gaza away from the boat – I guess the name was too scary for them.”
“When it was light enough we could see three frigates, one patrol boat and nine smaller crafts including the white painted zodiacs. Those zodiacs were later pulled up on a frigate.”
Charlie’s account does not surprise me, but was there any resistance from crew members to the Israeli army? As I had been due to travel on one of the boats myself, I had along with others been given extensive ‘non-violent’ resistance training in how to react to the IDF.
“Everybody on board had training in nonviolent resisting, and we all knew what to do and where to be if we were boarded, and everybody stuck to our agreement. When I saw how scared they were when they approached me I declared to them, with a calm voice which surprised myself a bit, that they had nothing to be afraid of, that I had nothing in my hands (and showing my hands for them), that I not was going to touch them or throw anything on them, but also over and over that they were violating international law, that it was an act of piracy, and that they have to go back to their boats and let us continue our journey and that we were no threat for the state of Israel. I do believe that our training made us handle the situation professionally and calmed down the situation. I wasn’t for a moment afraid that any of us would give any excuse for the soldiers to open fire. But then again, you can never know what instructions they have or if any of them would freak out.”
We’ve all heard of accounts of the brutality lived daily by Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli authorities, but what was the treatment of those aboard the Marianne once the ship had been commandeered in international waters?
“Since they initially were so afraid it was clear that they were told by their commanders something that wasn’t true. It might be the reason why they used more violence than necessary as a result of that. They were also afraid of showing their faces, they were masked, and it is probably because they wanted to avoid any legal action when and if they go abroad. But some of them seemed to be a bit curious about us after some time, even if they were prohibited to talk. I guess they wondered what their mission was all about, since it became clear that we presented no threat whatsoever. And, of course, there was the constant filming and the constant lying from the commanders.”
The media has been pretty quiet on the treatment of those who were forcibly taken to Ashdod. What happened to the Marianne upon reaching Israel?
“Hundreds of soldiers and military officials were there, like a freak show and we were the freaks. We were taken one by one, they checked our belongings over and over again, stole my certificates that I need for my profession as a seaman, took our fingerprints, interrogation for two hours, some humiliation stuff, and then drove us to the prison of Givon.”
“We had no right to phone calls, but our lawyer and consul came. One hour a day, or two times 30 minutes, we could spend outside our cells,” Charlie said. “Even when we were sitting two in each cell we had to stand up and get dressed so they could count us several times a day.”
“During the interrogation it was clear that they had a lot of private information about us. The photos the soldiers had of us during the boarding were taken in Gothenburg just before we left for instance. They wanted to know how we got the money for the boat, the mission, how I could afford to join, to what countries I have been. [There were] a lot of lies about how well the Palestinians were treated by them.” Charlie added that it was strange to discuss that matter with them, since he spent a year in Gaza and was there during the 2014 war.
Luckily in this case Charlie and all the other activists were OK. The siege of Palestine continues, however, and while international law is made a mockery of, all efforts should be made to support initiatives such as the Freedom Flotilla and to bring the humanitarian crisis to the forefront of international attention.
Richard Sudan is a London based writer, political activist, and performance poet. He has been a guest speaker at events for different organizations ranging from the University of East London to the People’s Assembly covering various topics. He also appears regularly in the media, and has featured as a guest on LBC Radio, Colourful Radio and elsewhere. His opinion is that the mainstream media has a duty to challenge power, rather than to serve power. Richard has taught writing poetry for performance at Brunel University, and maintains the power of the spoken and written word can massively effect change in today’s world.
Israel denies West Bank-based football team entry to Gaza
Ma’an – August 3, 2015
JERUSALEM – The Israeli authorities on Sunday denied Palestinian footballers from the occupied West Bank visa permits to enter Gaza to face a rival team in the first leg of a cup competition, the Palestinian Football Association said.
The Israeli authorities denied the players and managers of Ahli al-Khalil, based in Hebron, visas to enter Gaza to play Ittihad al-Shujaiyeh at the Yarmouk stadium for the first leg of the Palestine Cup.
The PFA decried the move by Israeli authorities as “racist policies towards Palestinian sports.”
The entry permits were reportedly denied due to “security reasons,” the PFA added, without elaborating.
The match was scheduled for Tuesday and touted as a symbol of Palestinian unity after last year’s devastating conflict with Israel and months of political backbiting.
It would have been the first time the rival teams played each other in 15 years.
According to Gazan sports journalist Ashraf Matar, as many as 10,000 fans can pack into the Yarmouk stadium.
In May, PFA President Jibril Rajoub dropped a bid to suspend Israel from FIFA minutes before the bid was brought to the table.
The football governing body voted instead on an amendment proposing the formation of a committee to monitor the movement of Palestinian football players, Israeli racism, as well as the status of Israeli league teams based in illegal Jewish-only settlements in the West Bank.
The last minute bid changes left FIFA members looking on in confusion as the PFA and Rajoub had for months been saying they would not succumb to pressure to drop the bid.
The move was also widely criticized by Palestinian political factions and civil society, who called for Rajoub’s resignation.
Routine restrictions placed on Palestinian players by Israeli authorities under the pretext of security has long hindered the Palestinian National Football team’s ability to play.
Current and former players have spoken of hours held at checkpoints, being shot at with live Israeli ammunition, the ongoing restriction of their movement, and rampant racist verbal abuse at football matches that the Israel Football Association has ignored.
AFP contributed to this report.
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How Ukraine Tortured and Slaughtered Donbass
By Kit Klarenberg | Al Mayadeen | July 11, 2024
Almost immediately after the proxy war erupted, ISIS-tier footage of the torture and murder of Russians in Ukrainian custody emerged.
On July 6th, the New York Times published an astonishing investigation: In Ukraine, Killings of Surrendering Russians Divide an American-Led Unit. The article documents in grim detail how Chosen Company, an international volunteer battalion for Kiev, routinely executes Russian prisoners of war. It is the very first mainstream admission that this practice – a brazen breach of the Geneva Conventions, and a grave war crime – is widespread among Ukraine’s fighters, both foreign and homegrown. … continue
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