What the persecution of Azmi Bishara means for Palestine

On Sunday, Bishara appeared on Al-Jazeera, after weeks of press speculation that he had gone into exile and would resign from the Knesset. He revealed that in fact he is the target of a very high level probe by Israeli state security services who apparently plan to bring serious “security” related charges against him. Censorship on this matter is so tight in “democratic” Israel that until a few days ago Israeli newspapers were prohibited from even mentioning the existence of the probe. They are still forbidden from reporting anything about the substance of the investigation, and Ha’aretz admitted that due to official censorship it could not even reprint much of what Bishara said to millions of viewers on television…
In practice this means that the Palestinian solidarity movement needs to fashion a new message that breaks with the failed fantasy of hermetic separation in nationalist states. It means we have to focus on fighting Israeli racism and colonialism in all its forms against those under occupation, against those inside, and against those in exile. We need to educate ourselves about what is happening all over Palestine, not just in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. We need to stand and act in solidarity with Azmi Bishara and all Palestinians inside the 1948 lines who have for too long been marginalized and abandoned by mainstream Palestinian politics. Support for the Palestinian civil society call for boycott, divestment and sanctions is particularly urgent (see http://www.pacbi.org/). In practice we need to start building a vision of life after Israeli apartheid, an inclusive life in which Israelis and Palestinians can live in equality sharing the whole country. If Sinn Fein’s Gerry Adams and hardline Northern Ireland Unionist leader Ian Paisley can sit down to form a government together, as they are, and if Nelson Mandela and apartheid’s National Party could do the same, nothing is beyond the realm of possibility in Palestine if we imagine it and work for it.
Azmi Bishara is the only Palestinian leader of international stature expressing a vision and strategy that is relevant to all Palestinians and can effectively challenge Zionism. That is why he is in fear for his life, safety and future while the quisling “president” Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah receives money and weapons from the United States and tea and cakes from Ehud Olmert.

By Ali Abunimah (Source: Electronic Intifada)

Encourage and Support Pelosi

House speaker Pelosi is under attack from the far right for speaking with the Syrian President, Al-Assad. This is despite the fact that she had Henry Waxman and Tom Lantos with her who are ardent Zionists and she still pledges allegiance to AIPAC.
It is time to nudge her from the other angles. Let’s ask her to challenge the WAR plans of the far right AND AIPAC.
Contact Nancy Pelosi at Office of the Speaker,
H-232, US Capitol, Washington, DC 20515,
(202) 225-0100
http://speaker.house.gov/contact/

Brave Heart

Can we call ourselves Men, look at this Palestinian lady and think what you’d do if you were in her shoes.
I think most of us will run instead of fighting this monster and its masters.

Child abuse in our schools

My Friend Haitham has brought an interesting issue on his blog, and I thought I should share it with you:

This is one of the most bizarre video clips I’ve ever seen.
Warning (PG): Parents, keep your kids away, trust me.
I have no clue where was this video clip taken. It is a classroom in one of our schools around the Arab world. The teacher’s accent sounds Syrian; however that doesn’t necessary mean that this toke place in a Syrian school. Teachers from all around the Arab world spread over many countries specially in the Gulf region.
Anyway, if anyone has any idea where this video clip was taken, please let me know. It would be great if someone knows the real ID of this teacher. I will be more than happy to file a court case against him and see him serving in prison (I would be happier to see him hanged from his balls, excuse my French!).
It’s a nightmare for parent to see such ill acts in classrooms. Of course child abuse and ‘torture’ is everywhere around the world, but it makes me feel worried about my own kids when I see such things. It could have been my kids or your kids anywhere around the world.
I highly respect teachers and value their mention, but let’s face the truth, child abuse is not something rare in our schools, and I’m now talking about schools around the Middle East. Personally I was lucky enough not to pass through any kind of abuse during my school time, however, I witnessed many case which I can’t describe now as less than ‘torture.’ Therefore, if we are unlucky enough to see this video clip today, I wonder how many case like this or worse takes place everyday around our children schools!
Video code can be downloaded from here or here!

Israeli historian on ethnic cleansing of Palestine

Listen to more information about the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 in these two lectures (sound files) of the Israeli historian Ilan Pappe, who did extensive research in the military archives of Israel. [Hat tip: Stan van Houcke]
On January 26, Israeli historian Ilan Pappe gave a lecture at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Pappe was in the Netherlands on invitation of United Civilians for Peace and Another Jewish Voice. On January 27 he presented his latest book “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” in ABC Treehouse Gallery and On January 28, he lectured at Desmet in Amsterdam.
Download his lecture here: Part 1 (MP3) Part 2 (MP3)
Pappe’s book shows that in 1948, the Zionist movement waged a war against the Palestinian people in order to implement its long term plans of ethnic cleansing. The Arab world tried to prevent this cleansing, but was too fragmented, self-centered and ineffective to stop the uprooting of half of Palestine’s native population, the destruction of half of its villages and towns and the killing of thousands of its people.

Palestine dying to live

One wise man once said:Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.In light of the injustices committed by the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza, concerned members of the advertising and media community in Jordan have produced a media campaign to mobilize public opinion, to open the world’s eyes to the various violations of basic human rights, in an effort to bring forth the plight of the Palestinians to the Western world, in a language they understand. As they say, the journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.Ours is this campaign, the fruit of the collective efforts of advertisers, graphic designers, writers, art directors, and web developers. It does not purport to spread confrontational, aggressive, graphic material, but rather to appeal to audiences’ human side.We are all volunteers and belong to no political party. We realize that running this campaign in major papers in the West is not only costly, but needs calculated strategic planning. But instead of waiting for that to happen, which could take months if not years, we have decided to “ride the momentum” and act now.As you will find out through our website, there are many high-resolution images that you can download for placement onto any medium you desire, be it newspapers, posters, or t-shirts.We provide you with the artwork and the message, and the rest is up to you. You may take this message and circulate it in your local community, your campus newspaper, or even your country club.In order to protect the integrity of the campaign we will not post our advertisements as downloadable files equipped for proper printing. However, if you are interested in printing the campaign and publishing it in your local newspapers, magazines, or on billboards and rooftops please contact us at info@dying2live.com and provide us with your contact information and what you have in mind, and we will guide you on how to obtain these images through the internet.As Martin Luther King once said:We shall have to repent in this generation, not so much for the evil deeds of the wicked people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.
Help us break the silence.
Help Palestine live in peace.

Apartheid in Israel

Michael Jansen
The latest report published by the UN rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories compares Israel’s policies there to those of South Africa during the apartheid era.
John Dugard, a South African law professor and former anti-apartheid campaigner, called upon the international community to give “serious consideration” to his recommendation that the International Court of Justice in The Hague issue an advisory opinion on Israel’s policies and actions.
In the 24-page document, posted on the council’s website, Dugard states: “The international community, speaking through the United Nations, has identified three regimes as inimical to human rights — colonialism, apartheid and foreign occupation” and accuses Israel of practising all three.
Of the three, Israel is most incensed by being accused of instituting apartheid in the occupied and colonised Palestinian territories.
Dugard says that Israel’s policies “certainly resemble aspects of apartheid”. He points out that Israel is committing many violations of the 1973 Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid and cites Israel’s restriction of Palestinian movement, construction of walls and fences to separate Israelis and Palestinians, building of Israeli settler only cities, towns and roads, and demolition of Palestinian houses built without Israeli permits. He compares Israel’s lists of security risks — 180,000 names long — who may not pass through the hundreds of checkpoints to South Africa’s notorious “pass laws” which obstructed the free movement of black Africans.
Dugard challenges Israel’s contention that West Bank checkpoints, barriers and blockades are intended to protect Israelis from attacks by Palestinian fighters and suicide bombers. He states: “It has become abundantly clear that the wall and checkpoints are principally aimed at advancing the safety, convenience and comfort of [Israel’s 430,000] settlers” who live in the West Bank in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Dugard singles out the example of the wall being constructed in East Jerusalem, characterising it as an “instrument of social engineering designed to achieve the Judaisation of Jerusalem by reducing the number of Palestinians in the city”. As proof, he states: “The wall is being built through Palestinian neighbourhoods, separating Palestinians from Palestinians, in a manner that cannot conceivably be justified on security grounds.”
He asks: “Can it seriously be denied that the purpose of such action is to establish and maintain domination by one racial group — Jews — over another racial group — Palestinians — and systematically oppress them?” He observes: “Such an intention or purpose may be inferred from the actions described in this report.”
Israel and its apologists angrily reject the apartheid accusation, charge those who make it with being anti-Semites and call upon Israel’s friends to refute the charge. Amongst those whom Israel has tried to censure or smear are former US president Jimmy Carter and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu, former Anglican archbishop of Cape Town and head of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Other figures making the charge include Arun Gandhi, grandson of the Mahatma Gandhi; Winnie Mandela, former wife of South African leader Nelson Mandela; Michael Ben Yair, who served as Israel’s attorney general from 1993-96; Ami Ayalon, a former admiral in Israel’s navy and head of Shin Bet, the country’s internal security agency; Tommy Lapid, head of Israel’s Shinui Party; and Meron Benvenisti, former deputy mayor of Jerusalem.
Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, warned that if a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict was not found, the two communities would be forced to dwell separately, with one living comfortably and the other in poverty. Brzezinski’s prediction has come true.
According to the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation, nearly half of the Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza have no food security. In a report issued this week, these two agencies say that Israel’s closures and blockades and the Western financial boycott of the Palestinian Authority are depriving Palestinians of essential nutrition.
Forty-six per cent of Palestinians are food insecure or vulnerable, in comparison to 35 per cent in 2004, even though during 2006, the WFP increased food aid by 25 per cent, providing for 260,000 non-refugees in Gaza and 400,000 in the West Bank. Meanwhile, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees expanded its rolls of refugees entitled to food aid to meet the needs of those who had been self-sufficient as far as food was concerned.
It is important for Israel to silence or smear anyone who compares Israel to apartheid South Africa. On the one hand, Israel argues that the Jewish state has a moral basis for existence: recompensing the Jews for centuries of Western persecution. While Israel’s founding fathers admitted that the creation of Israel involved the commission of injustices against the Palestinians, they argued that the Israeli option was the “line of least injustice”, a contention which Palestinians could never accept. To maintain the notion that it is a moral entity, Israel must prevent the international community from accepting the contention that Israel, like South Africa, has adopted apartheid to deal with its native population.
On the other hand, Israel seeks to evade punishment through sanctions for practising racial discrimination to the same extent as the apartheid South African regime. Many critics of Israel’s policies call for sanctions to be imposed on Israel until it ends its occupation of the territories conquered in 1967, halts settlement activities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and reverses the apartheid measures it has adopted. Amongst the prime movers on the sanctions front have been mainstream Protestant churches in the US. They have called for divestment in US and other companies providing Israel with bulldozers to build settlements and destroy Palestinian houses and orchards.
Some have suggested divesting from US and other Western organisations — like local pension funds — which have links to Israeli public institutions.
These attempts to punish Israel have raised a storm of protest from Israel and its friends and forced the churches to reconsider their positions. If divestment becomes widespread, Israel will be under considerable public pressure to end the occupation and its colonisation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Syrian Golan, and renounce apartheid. Oddly, Israel’s occupation and colonisation of Palestinian land, which is far more damaging than separation to Palestinian interests and threatens to deprive Palestinians of self-determination, does not raise the sort of emotional objections apartheid does even though apartheid is, in this case, an ineluctable consequence of occupation and colonisation.