Clinton: Syria’s Provocations May Plunge Middle East into War

Clinton: Syria’s Provocations May Plunge Middle East into War

30/04/2010 Syrian President Bashar Assad is pursuing dangerous policies that could unleash war on the Middle East, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned on Thursday night.

In a speech to the American Jewish Committee in Washington, Clinton said that Syria’s transfer of weapons to Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon risks throwing the region into instability.

“We have spoken out forcefully about the grave dangers of Syria’s transfer of weapons to Hezbollah,” Clinton said. “We condemn this in the strongest possible terms and have expressed our concerns directly to the Syrian government.”

She added: “Transferring weapons to these terrorists – especially longer-range missiles – would pose a serious threat to the security of Israel. It would have a profoundly destabilizing effect on the region. All states must stop supplying weapons to terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas. Every rocket smuggled into southern Lebanon or Gaza sets back the cause of peace.”

Clinton’s reference to long-range weapons follows reports that Syria supplied Hezbollah with advanced Scud missiles capable of inflicting sever damage on Israel’s major settlements – a charge Damascus denies and Hezbollah refuses to confirm it.

She said: “President Assad is making decisions that could mean war or peace for the region.”

US officials have not confirmed Hezbollah’s possession of Scuds but say they are concerned about its growing arsenal of rockets and missiles.

Clinton went on to defend America’s recent decision to return an ambassador to Syria after a five-year absence. “We know [Assad is] hearing from Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas. It is crucial that he also hear directly from us, so that the potential consequences of his actions are clear. That’s why we are sending an ambassador back to Syria,” she said.

“There should be no mistake, either in Damascus or anywhere else: The United States is not reengaging with Syria as a reward or a concession. Engagement is a tool that can give us added leverage and insight, and a greater ability to convey strong and clear messages aimed at changing Syria’s behavior.”

In her speech, Clinton stressed America’s commitment to brokering Middle East peace, urging the Netanyahu government to stop building settlements and commit to peace talks – but also calling on the Arab world to begin normalizing relations with Israel.

“Arab states should reach out to the Israeli public, demonstrating that Israel’s isolation in the region is ending, and all sides should resume multilateral discussions on critical regional issues,” she said.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, addressing the same group later, made the same points as Clinton and said Israel was watching closely the situation with Hezbollah and Iran. He said Israel would hold the Lebanese and Syrian governments responsible for the introduction of any “balance-breaking weapons” to Hezbollah.

Barak said Israel is not interested in escalation, but is following the effort to change the balance of power in the region.

Earlier on Thursday Clinton warned Iran’s president that he will not get a warm welcome at UN nonproliferation talks next week if he seeks to sow confusion about Iran’s nuclear program.

The purpose of the meeting, which occurs every five years, is to recommit nations to the treaty’s three pillars: disarmament, nonproliferation and the peaceful use of civil nuclear energy, Clinton told a news conference.

“The mission of those of us going to New York to review, revise and reinvigorate the NPT regime is very clear. If that’s not his mission, then it won’t be a particularly useful or productive trip on his part,” she said.

Clinton said she did not know why President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wanted to come to the conference, claiming that Iran’s record of violating the NPT was “absolutely indisputable.”

Iran is a signatory to the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and denies Western claims it is developing civilian nuclear power as cover for an atomic bomb program. While Israel, which is believed to be the sole nuclear power in the Middle East with more than 200 nuclear heads, is not a signatory for this treaty.

“If President Ahmadinejad wants to come and announce that Iran will abide by their nonproliferation requirements under the NPT, that would be very good news indeed and we would welcome that,” she said.

“But if he believes that by coming he can somehow divert attention from this very important global effort or cause confusion that might possibly throw into doubt what Iran has been up to … then I don’t believe he will have a particularly receptive audience.”

A State Department spokesman said visa requests for the Iranian delegation were still being processed. As the host for the UN headquarters, the United States usually grants visas to foreign leaders who wish to attend UN events.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Why Mr. President? Open Letter to Mahmoud Abbas

What remains of the strategy seeking implementation of international law?

By Nidal Azza

(This open letter to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was first published in Arabic by Ma’an News, Palestine, in early March 2010.)

Since the adoption of the strategy of the “peace of the brave” which seeks to achieve Palestinian rights through negotiations, Palestinian officials have never missed an opportunity to raise the demand for the international community to intervene and ensure respect of its international law and UN resolutions. And while the Palestinian leadership had limited its own strategic options in the public relations battle around the peace negotiations, the demand for enforcement of international law preserved a certain “logic” in midst of the general deterioration, in particular the disintegration of the Palestinian political system.

However, what is puzzling in light of this strategy is the fact that Palestinian officials have recently challenged sincere international bodies and figures who have identified Israel’s regime as one that combines belligerent occupation with colonialism and apartheid. In other words, where is the logic in claiming a Palestinian strategy which demands enforcement of international law and UN resolutions, when Palestinian officials are the first to stand in opposition to strong international reports and resolutions which seriously aim to protect and promote Palestinian rights?

At the end of February 2010, Ibrahim Khreisheh, Permanent Representative of Palestine in the United Nations in Geneva, requested that the Human Rights Council postpone discussion of the report of the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory Professor Richard Falk. Prior to Khreisheh’s formal request, many Palestinian and international human rights organizations tried to persuade Palestinian representatives at various levels of the risks involved in such a decision for the interests of the Palestinian victims, Palestinian rights and human rights in general, and of its negative impact on the positions of UN member states, especially supportive members.

In response, Representative Khreisheh argued in an interview with al-Jazeera that the request for postponement was caused by the shortcomings in the Falk report, such as references to the responsibilities of Israel and Hamas and not the Palestinian Authority, and criticism of the Goldstone Report. He said that discussion of the report at this stage would be divisive and that there were other and more important reports to be debated than Falk’s.

Mirroring the Palestinian controversy preceding the vote over the Goldstone Report, the Palestinian Representatives again put forward a number of justifications which appear to be consistent with the strategy of seeking the implementation of international law and UN resolutions. Even more so, Mr. Khreisheh made sure to shape his arguments in a way that suggested that he was, more than anybody, else concerned to protect the “supreme national interest.”

Such arguments may mislead those unfamiliar with the content of the Falk report, in particular because Professor Falk has also been portrayed as “a Jew,” someone who attacks the Palestinian Authority and apparently sympathizes with Hamas, and has caused a scandal by giving credit to rumors according to which President Abbas initially withheld official Palestinian support of the Goldstone Report in exchange for Israel’s approval of the Wataniyah cell phone company’s business deal in which is son was allegedly involved. Alternatively, Khreisheh argued that from a practical point of view, Israel’s ban on Professor Falk’s entry into the country “will make it impossible for him to closely monitor the human rights situation in the occupied territory,” and that it was not convenient to cooperate with an expert who is considered an anti-Semite by Israel.

The question begging to be asked is: Where exactly is the supreme national interest in postponing the discussion of Falk’s report?

For lack of space, I first invite all concerned to actually read the report that Mr. Khreisheh requested to be removed from the U.N.’s agenda (we Palestinians know exactly that to postpone is tantamount to removal of the report and exclusion of the responsible author). The truth that must be said is that Professor Falk’s report is not less important than Goldstone’s and maybe even more so.

First, the report covers the period from July to December 2009; it cannot be considered incomplete, therefore, for not including events and Israeli violations that occurred afterwards, such as Israel’s listing of the Ibrahimi and Bilal Ibn Rabah mosques in Hebron and Bethlehem among its national, cultural and religious sites. In fact, the report points to serious Israeli violations of sacred and archaeological Palestinian sites. Doesn’t it address the issue of Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus? Also, doesn’t it address the attacks committed by Jewish settlers against Palestinians, especially during the olive harvest, and the protection afforded to them by the Israeli army? Mr. Khreisheh, where exactly is the shortcoming in all of this?

The Falk Report reaffirms the recommendations of the Goldstone Report and does not criticize them. Falk rather attempts to fill gaps in the investigation of Israel’s aggressive war on Gaza as conducted by the Mission led by Judge Goldstone. Where is the shame in Professor Falk stating that the Goldstone Mission should have investigated Israel’s violations of the temporary truce that preceded the war, such as the assassination of six Palestinians on 4 November 2008? What is wrong with emphasizing that the Goldstone Mission did not give enough attention to the impact of the protracted blockade of the Gaza Strip? Where is the flaw in saying that Israel is responsible for the failure of efforts to reach a lasting truce over the past decade? Where did Falk go wrong when he states that the Goldstone Mission gave more importance to the sole captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit than to the some ten thousand Palestinian prisoners and detainees, most of whom are civilians? Does any of this detract from the supreme national interest?

The Falk report also affirms the conclusion of the Arab League fact finding mission that Israel’s targeting of Palestinian civilians in the occupied Gaza Strip was not accidental, but rather intentional. What is the shame in affirming that the deliberate targeting of Palestinian civilians has been a systematic policy of Israel ever since the establishment of the state? Does any of this detract from the supreme national interest?

Falk’s report is critical of legal analysis which treats both parties (Israelis and Palestinians) as equals. Calling upon the international community to examine Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, he explains that despite Hamas’s International Humanitarian Law violations, such as the launching of rockets into civilian Israeli areas, this was a war carried out by one side. What is wrong with calling on international organizations, particularly the International Committee of the Red Cross, to formulate rules that would regulate state responsibility in situations of unequal warfare, especially if that state is an occupying power such as Israel? Is this something that would detract from the supreme national interest?

After reaffirming the Goldstone Report’s recommendations regarding universal jurisdiction over those responsible for serious human rights violations and war crimes in the Gaza Strip, the Falk report calls on states to take seriously these recommendations and implicitly criticizes states that evade their legal obligations. Where is the shame in criticizing third-party collaboration with Israel? What is wrong with criticizing the British government for seeking to change its universal jurisdiction laws for international crimes in order to help Israeli perpetrators escape accountability? Does this detract from the supreme national interest?

The Falk report boldly addresses Israel’s ongoing colonization of the occupied West Bank. It not only reports related numbers and statistics, but also refutes the allegations of Israeli leaders and emphasizes that the ultimate Israeli goal of settlement expansion is annexation of the West Bank. What is the shame in saying that settlement expansion in occupied East Jerusalem is not the result of “natural growth,” but of a policy intended to reduce the number of Palestinian Jerusalemites to less than 8%, in order to extinguish the possibility of Jerusalem ever becoming a Palestinian capital? What is wrong with saying that Jewish settlement expansion will lead, in practice, to the failure of efforts for Palestinian statehood? Does this detract from the supreme national interest?

The report also covers issues related to the Israel’s Wall, suppression of Palestinian resistance (even peaceful resistance), the continuing blockade of the occupied Gaza Strip, and the failure of the international community to impose its will and protect the Palestinian people. What is wrong with stating that the Human Rights Council has an obligation to exercise its authority by insisting that Israel ends its occupation and by intervening to stop its demolitions, forced evictions and settlement expansion in Jerusalem? Does this detract from the supreme national interest?

Notably, the report also tackles the issue of the Palestinian refugees and their right to return. Not limited to the ongoing forced displacement of Palestinians in the OPT, the report raises the need to implement UNGA Resolution 194 in order to facilitate return of the Palestinian refugees to their homes of origin, property restitution and compensation for damages and losses, which is the basis of achieving a just, comprehensive, and lasting peace. What is the shame in saying that remaining silent on refugee rights, especially 1948 refugees, is no longer acceptable? Does this detract from the supreme national interest?

In light of the inability of the international community to bring about a just solution to the Palestinian issue for the past sixty years, does Professor Falk’s call to adopt the civil society campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions contradict the supreme national interest?

It seems that the supreme national interest known to Mr. Khreisheh is different from the one we know.
Why, Mr. President, should Prof. Falk’s report be postponed when “indirect” negotiations with Israel are approved? And this while Israel just announced that the Ibrahimi and Bilal Ibn Rabah mosques in the occupied West Bank were “national” Jewish holy sites and the expansion of Jewish settlement continues?
How can the supreme national interest of the Palestinian people be achieved when the official Palestinian position towards Falk’s report is similar to the Israeli position?

Why, Mr. President, have we not received any response from you regarding the request of human rights organizations to stop this unreasonable postponement of Falk’s report?

In fact, the Palestinian position in the United Nations is in contradiction with the publicly declared Palestinian strategy at least since January 2009 [when the UN’s General Assembly convened to decide about ways to end Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip]. UN records from the General Assembly’s emergency session show that opposition to the draft resolution proposed by the GA President was shared by the representatives of Palestine and Israel. Western and Arab media described Israel at the time as the only state that enjoys having two permanent representatives in the General Assembly, one Israeli and one Palestinian! The draft resolution was submitted by Ecuador and supported by more than two-thirds of the member states. It was rejected by the representatives of Palestine and Egypt and opposed by the European Union and the United States. If adopted, the resolution would have condemned Israel and held it responsible for the war on Gaza; it would have called upon Israel to immediately halt the war, withdraw from and lift its blockade of the Gaza Strip; it would have recommended establishment of a special international tribunal to investigate and prosecute those responsible for war crimes and serious human rights abuses, as well as adoption of boycotts, divestment, and sanctions against Israel. Such a resolution, however, was found to be “very extremist” by the Palestinian representative. A letter was sent to the President’s office by a number of human rights organizations and networks, asking to investigate the occurrences in the United Nations. (It was not the first letter of its kind. A similar one was sent in October of 2008, requesting clarification of why the Palestinian representative to the United Nations was disturbed by NGO reports and “interference,” and why he insisted on excluding them from the work of the U.N. Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.)

Did you receive these letters, Mr. President? If not, why? If yes, why has there been no response?
The official Palestinian position and treatment of the Goldstone Report has been frustrating for all victims, human rights defenders and defenders of the rights of the Palestinian people. The justifications initially may have misled those unaware of the details. For NGOs present in the Human Rights Council, however, the situation was clear but they abstained from immediately going public. Instead, several human rights organizations and members of Palestinian national institutions submitted a memorandum to the President’s Office requesting scrutiny of the work of the Palestinian representatives to the U.N., as well as a firm stand against manipulation of U.N. protocol and titles, such as “Representative of the Palestinian Authority,” or “Representative of Palestine – PA,” which undermine representation of the Palestinian people in the United Nations.

Did you receive this memorandum, Mr. President? If not, why? If yes, then why has there been no follow-up?

Earlier this year, a letter was sent to the President by Palestinian human rights and civil society organizations and networks, requesting that he instruct the responsible specialized authorities to set up a mechanism for the domestic criminal investigation and prosecution required under the General Assembly Resolution endorsing the Goldstone recommendations. The letter urged for urgent action in order to prevent Israel from using a Palestinian shortcoming as a pretext for avoiding its obligations (which is indeed what happened). The responsible Palestinian authorities and officials, however, did not do what was required of them. The result was a finding by the U.N. Secretary General that both, the Israeli and Palestinian parties have fallen short equally so far in meeting their obligations.

Did you receive this letter, Mr. President? If not, why? If yes, then why has there been no reaction?
On 25 February 2010, more than twenty organizations appealed to the President to intervene as a matter of urgency and issue instructions to the Palestinian U.N. delegation in Geneva to drop the request for postponement of discussion of Prof. Falk’s report by the Human Rights Council, and to halt all personal attacks against the Special Rapporteur.

Did you receive this appeal, Mr. President? If not, why? If yes, why has there been no response?
As soon as Ibrahim Khreisheh, head of the Palestinian delegation to the U.N. in Geneva, had confirmed the request for postponement of the Falk report, numerous members of the PLO Executive Committee, leaders of Palestinian political groups and factions and the Secretary of the Legislative Council were contacted. All of them were briefed, provided with a copy of the letter to the President, and urged to take action in order to correct the mistake and avoid repetition of the frustrating experience with the Goldstone Report.
To this moment, we have not heard back from any of them!

What remains of the strategy seeking implementation of international law and U.N. resolutions? If the supreme national interest is a mystery which only the Palestinian representatives understand, then peace be upon our cause…

– Nidal Azza is the Coordinator of Badil’s Resource Unit, and Lecturer in Refugee Rights under International Law at al-Quds University. (This article was originally published in al-Majdal – www.badil.org/al-majdal – the English language quarterly magazine of the Badil Resource Center, Bethlehem, Palestine.)

No escape

No escape

 

In my heart dwells the pain of the oppressed

 

Rivers of their wounds pour down

 

Drenching the ocean of my sorrow

 

I am the voice of the voiceless

 

The howl of little ones as they fade away

 

My whispers shoot like bullets

 

In the ears of the wicked

 

My words explodes

 

Before his eyes

 

Muting his lies

 

 

He looks away

 

 

Pretending not to see

 

Not to hear

 

My murmurs pierce his bubble

 

My tortured shadow follows

 

No escape

 

 

He runs to bed

 

Covers his head

 

Sleep might rid him of me

 

My chopped limps chase his dream

 

He drowns in my tears

 

In my blood

 

Unable to breathe

 

Unable to cry

 

No escape

 

 

Time passes

…………………

 

……………………

 

……………………

 

Then he dies

 

……………………

 

…………………….

 

…………………….

 

Only to be greeted with my smile

 

He’d hoped he’d never see

 

As he was chained and dragged away

 

To meet his deeds

 

No escape

 

IOF troops fire at a peaceful demonstration

[ 30/04/2010 – 01:24 PM ]

RAFAH, (PIC)– IOF troops on Thursday fired at a peaceful demonstration, east of the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah, against the “security zone”, a 300-meter-wide area at the border with 1948-occupied Palestine which the Israeli occupation imposes on the Gaza Strip.

Dr. Muaweyah Hasaneen, the director of ambulance and emergency at the ministry of health, said that a young Palestinian man was injured by a rubber coated bullet and was treated on site.

IOF troops dispersed the demonstration by firing rubber coated bullets, stun grenades and teargas canisters at the demonstrators who numbered around 300 Palestinians and five international activists affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM).

Participants raised placards rejecting the security zone and affirming the rights of Palestinians to make use of their land, which at the moment they risk getting shot if they approach.

Coordinator of the popular campaign to resist the security zone, Ziad al-Sarafandy, said: “We will continue to demonstrate as long as the Israeli army continues to confiscate Palestinian land.”

Over the past three months Palestinians and international activists organised a series of demonstrations at the border to protest the “security zone” which eats up about 20% of the area of the Gaza Strip and consists mostly of agricultural land the owners of which have been denied the right of utilizing.

On Wednesday, a Palestinian teenager was killed by an IOF bullet participating in a such a demonstration near Nahal Oz crossing east of Gaza city.

Last Sunday, five Palestinians and a Maltese activists were wounded by IOF troops fire east of al-Mgahzi refugee camp.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Jerusalem’s secret land deals: video

Via Silver Lining

Posted on April 30, 2010 by realistic bird

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

USS LIBERTY: The Fifth Fleet Sacrifice – Why did it happen?

Via Payvand Iran News

By Debbie Menon

Truth and America’s honor were ignominiously sacrificed to provide cover for Israel’s transparent lies and despicable act of perfidy

-Phillip F. Tourney, President USS LIBERTY Veterans Association, June 8, 2007, Marriott Courtyard, VA.

We have long wondered, and conjectured, the “why” of the USS Liberty incident, as it has become known and referred to; “incident” being an easier event to push onto the back burner and forget while it simmers away harmlessly, unlikely to boil over and burn the stew.

It was obvious that the Israelis knew at the time what they were doing, who they were attacking and, long ago, I found from my research, sufficient evidence myself, to prove it to my satisfaction at least.

The Commander of the Torpedo Boat Squadron who led the attack and whose boat fired the torpedo which hit Liberty, Admiral Yomi Barkai, IDF (Navy) Retired, went on to become the Chief of the Israeli Defense Forces Navy, largely because of his excellent service in Motor Torpedo Boats, his program which developed the IDF fast MTB missile weapons systems, and his combat record in attacking USS Liberty.

Phil Tourney, who was on USS Liberty, and is obviously an interested commentator, postulates a very reasonable and credible answer to “why” Liberty was attacked.

Phil Tourney’s

speech, USS Liberty survivor, at the No More wars for Israel

“Black Flag,” in furtherance of international political intrigues, in which one ship in the US Navy and its crew, were selected and set-up for sacrifice to US/Israeli International intervention objectives and political ambitions. His “black Flag” is not the only creditable one which I have heard of in subsequent years.

I know… Israel, Israel, Israel… it’s becoming tiresome, turning up Israel under every stone. But, there they are! More and more of this stuff, and stuff like this, are appearing everyday.

It is like Grace Halsell says it was, “what we did not know, and were shocked to learn….” But, finding out and telling about it, are horses of different colors, uphill battles, seldom won, which she describes as part of the problem and amongst those things we “did not know.”

It is interesting that she wrote these years ago, during the Clinton Administration. And, that she was once a speechwriter for Lyndon Johnson of USS Liberty infamy!

A review of the USS Liberty story explains a lot of how and why we have arrived at the state and conditions in which we currently find America and its governance! Vis:

http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/18.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/dead_in_the_water.shtml

and this one: http://www.logogo.net/liberty.htm and finally:

http://www.gtr5.com/

The obvious incident is the deliberate Israeli attack on the USS Liberty in 1967, in which out of 200 American sailors and Marines 34 were killed and rest wounded, and rescue attempts by carrier-based aircraft were halted by McNamara & Johnson personally. I’m not sure most Americans would know all the details of this incident. Listen to the chilling accounts of survivors in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55Jy6EDI_z0

You may not know of a book on it, written by an officer who was on the ship when it was attacked. The book is Assault on the Liberty by James Ennes available from Amazon.com, and well worth reading.

Several hours of reconnaissance by Israeli aircraft of a US ship flying US flags and openly displaying its markings on the very distinctive ship color with which US Navy warships are painted, was attacked that immediately knocked out all of its radios (so the Israelis knew what ship they were attacking, and where those radios were located — the one radio that was used to send out a distress call was cobbled together from spare parts & usable pieces of the ones that had been destroyed), then the torpedo attacks, the casualties, AND THEN the US Navy carrier-based aircraft launched to its rescue — which could have saved many of those casualties from happening — were called back twice by McNamara & Johnson.

It is relevant that the crew, when told to keep quiet, did so. And, they were there and experienced the outrage first hand!

They were sailors, trained to obey, and subject to Military Law, and knew that if they disobeyed those orders that they would be sent to prison and kept there. And, they would not have been imprisoned for the true reasons given.

It is the same when troops commit war crimes at the command of seniors. It is the troops who get the blame, and never the seniors. It was senior command, beginning with the President of the United States, and trickling down from the Secretary of Defense, through the chain of command all the way to the Commander of the Sixth Fleet who betrayed these men.

Others, in previous wars, have been Court Martialled and shot for less.

Look up Operation Cyanide,

Remembering The USS Liberty – Four Decades Later

and the clandestine involvement of US Air Force pilots and bombers in providing aerial photo intelligence, and launching covert air strikes against Egyptian forces during that war, and the possibility discussed in a series of recently released BBC videos on the USS Liberty “incident”, in which the question of whether the entire attack was not a joint US/Israeli black flag operation, set up to look like an Egyptian attack on Liberty, which nearly provoked a retaliatory nuclear strike against Cairo.

That might answer the “Why did it all happen in the first place?” question.

Is this yet another cockamamie conspiracy theory?

If it is, it is one of the most far out I have come across yet. And I am one who believes that the first liar doesn’t stand a chance!

The USS Liberty Association has a Homepage at: http://www.gtr5.com/. These men have worked hard and long, and at risk, to gather information on this story. It was they whom we see speaking on the video link above.

Several Israeli motivations have been discussed over the years. The British said that at least one Israeli objective was to keep the US from warning off Jordan, which in those days was the only Arab country that had reasonably good relations with the US, and the Israelis dearly wanted to sucker Jordan into the war so they could more easily take the West Bank and East Jerusalem. (The Brits thought the Israelis would have attacked Jordan anyway, but they wanted it the other way around if they could manage it.) The French said it was to impress on all Arab countries that even then, only a decade after their decision to put AIPAC & company into high gear, Israel had the US (or at least its government) so firmly under its influence that it could even attack a US Navy ship and kill Americans, and get away with it. Personally I think both are correct, but the French argument probably cuts closer to the bone

The significant point Ennes and the Liberty Association makes is that the US Congress has never conducted an official hearing or investigation of the case, the only “investigation” which was conducted so far was the one Ward Bond and the US Judge Advocates Officer referred to as a “cover-up,” conducted under an inadequate deadline and which the evidence did not support the findings, and the originator was not asked to review before its release, and who found missing parts when he eventually got to read it.

It would be extremely important, today, to have a Congressional hearing, publicly, on TV with all the fanfare that we have become so accustomed to watching on American TV.

This incident is not an isolated piece of deception where a few men were sacrificed to “other interests.” A few thousand more American servicemen have just been sacrificed in the Middle East, along with nearly two million foreign civilians and defenders of their homes… not to mention the ongoing slaughter in Palestine.

Note in Ennes’ book his “theory” of why the attack, when he describes the assassination of hundreds of Egyptian prisoners of war! That was a war crime! Cut and dried, black and white, in an official war! They took prisoners out, made them dig their own graves, and shot them in the heads with an Uzi.

These are the people who are dropping bombs and launching missiles into civilian neighborhoods in Palestine, Lebanon and Iraq and threatening to obliterate Iran, if.

In 1947, before the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, His Majesty, the late King Abdullah of Jordan made an honest, truthful and wonderful appeal for understanding, sympathy and support to the American public

The Hashemites – As the Arabs See the Jews

Nothing has changed!

I do not see how we can discuss Middle East issues without considering the interests and influence of Israel, nor how we can discuss American politics and US domestic and foreign policy without considering the interests and the influence of AIPAC and other Zionist lobbies and organizations.

The Biden, Emanuel, Clinton, and older Clinton staff connections with Israel and Zionism are all too close for comfort. That is why I wonder, and question, just who is running America, American politics and American policy.

A “doubter” (or an ADL “defender”) asked the question, “But how could such a small percent of the US population assert such an influence in government and politics?”

I furnish an answer via this

URL: http://www.viewzone.com/dualcitizen.html. (Google “
Dual citizenship”) it is a list, and it treats the question of serving two masters (from the “proper” perspective according to Debbie) as well as how it is against US Law, but Israelis are exempted as unique cases. How about that?

It is but one of many answers. Many of the names were involved in the Clinton administration, and I suspect we shall see many of them arise again in the near future in positions strategic to Israeli interests first.

If the facts are true and accurate, then they are facts.

Factual lists of people who actually exist, and who hold important or influential positions in government at policy-making levels. This list doesn’t include US Ambassadors in countries of strategic importance to Israeli interests. Go figure!

Now, tell me again who runs America? And who frames US/Middle East Policies?

Given the ethnic, religious and economic group identities, how do they compare proportionally with their representation in the general public? I suspect they far exceed the normal distribution of ethnicity in the general public, as they do in the financial centers and Industry which has precipitated the current economic crisis which is destroying monetary and economic systems throughout the world.

I do not consider myself a racist, religious or a sexist bigot, and I certainly object to the Zionist charges that criticism of Zionism, Israeli politics or national policy is racist, anti-Semitic, or religious anti-Jewish bigotry. I recognize acute distinctions between Israel, Zionism, Jewry, and Semites which AIPAC and some of the other Zionist First and defense organizations recklessly ignore when they levy broad and general ad hominem attacks and charges of bigotry against any critics of Israeli political, national or jingoist policies, activities and meddling in US politics and national affairs.

There is no excuse or reason why any American politician who represents Americans first should campaign in Tel Aviv, and kowtow at conventions of foreign dominated and funded Political Action Committee conventions in the manner we have witnessed on the part of ALL of the recent candidates and, historically, during the Clinton administration as well as the recent campaigns.

I have serious doubts that Israeli interests are consistent with the best interests of America and the American people! They certainly do not make a solid platform for peace in the East, or anywhere else in the world.

When you look at everything which is happening in the Middle East, and most of the rest of the world, through these lenses, it all seems to make sense.

As Henry Ford said, it may all be a sham, but it sure describes accurately what has happened and is happening.

And, as Gilad Atzmon has said, “when you have all those people thinking alike, you don’t need a conspiracy.”

And Mahatma Gandhi said then, and I reiterate today:

“Journalism has become the art of “intelligent anticipation of events.”
Perhaps we may yet wake up the mainstream sheeple.

The Complete Manual for The British Jewish Voter by Gilad Atzmon

Friday, April 30, 2010 at 8:01AM Gilad Atzmon

With Britain’s three-way race for prime minister entering the final lap, many Brits are still wondering who to vote for. As if it makes any difference. However, if you are interested in my take on the subject, I would suggest you opt for Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats. If you want to know why, it is pretty simple – just because the Jews don’t like Clegg at all. This is at least the impression I gathered after reading the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA).

The JTA grasps that no single party is expected to capture a majority of the British parliament in the May 6 ballot. They realise, like the rest of us,  that the office of Prime Minister may go to whichever party leader is able to secure a coalition deal or win the support of another party. This is indeed horrible news for our relentless Zionist fundraisers. Usually they buy just one party. In fact, in this particular election, they already gambled on the Conservatives. As it happens, now they have to buy all three leading parties.

A few days ago the JTA published a manual for the British Jewish voter. As one might expect, the JTA and the Board of Deputies of British Jews (BOD), a rabid Zionist institute that claims to represent British Jewry, are convinced that British Jews are a top British political priority. “One thing is certain,” says Rosalind Preston of the BOD, “whoever is elected will have to deal with some very real and pressing issues, not only on the national and international level, but as they affect British Jews on the home front.”  British Jews, she said, are concerned with “boycotts of Israeli goods, the spike of anti-Israeli resolutions and speakers on university campuses.”

I myself would be far more optimistic if I knew that British Jewry were actually concerned with war crimes committed in their names by the Jewish state. This leaves us with a very clear picture, as much as a growing number of Brits try to resurrect Britain’s stand on humanism, the BOD and the JTA want this kingdom to continue to be subservient to the interest of one tribe only.

Nick Clegg, the Lib Dems leader is not exactly the favorite candidate as far as the BOD and the JTA are concerned. During the IDF’s 2009 genocidal attack on Gaza, Clegg penned an Op-Ed in the Guardian newspaper calling on the Labour Government to “condemn unambiguously Israel’s tactics” and demanded an “immediate arms boycott of Israel by Britain and the European Union”. As much as it is transparent that Clegg’s polite humanist stand is something the JTA disapproves of, Brits should start to identify just who promotes murderous regimes and ideologies in the midst of their politics and media.

Last December Clegg was also the lead signatory of a letter addressing the fact that Israel has 1.5 million Palestinian prisoners. In addition he wrote that the legacy of Israel’s operation in Gaza is a “living nightmare” for Gaza’s residents. Again, as much as the JTA is disgruntled about Clegg’s public stance, the Brits should be very proud to find such a voice of reason amid their overwhelmingly ‘Blue & White’ funded politics.
We also have the story of the adorable Lib Dems, Jenny Tonge who the Zionists despise. Tonge is a former member of Parliament who became a member of the House of Lords in 2005. In 2004, Tonge said she would become a suicide bomber if she had to suffer the indignities of the Palestinians. In 2006 she suggested that the pro-Israel lobby had “financial grips” on Britain and on her party. Last March she met with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Syria. Clearly the JTA doesn’t approve of Tonge’s sincere refreshing call for justice. Last February, Tonge requested an inquiry into the claim that the Israel Defense Forces’ earthquake relief teams in Haiti had harvested the organs of quake victims.  Obviously, this claim was reasonable, considering the Israeli share in the vast global market of organ trafficking.

Interestingly enough, Tonge’s remark prompted Clegg to fire her as the party’s spokeswoman for health in the House of Lords. In fact this act is something the Brits should take note of before giving their vote to the Lib Dems and Nick Clegg. Indeed, like the Conservatives and New Labour, the Lib Dems also have their ‘friends of Israel’. At the end of the day, it appears that all major British parties find it impossible to refuse the Zionist pound or shall I say the Shekel. To eliminate any doubt in the matter, the Lib Dems spokesman reassured the Jewish Chronicle that, ‘It was because they are friends of Israel that they will be candid and critical.’

As one might expect, Jews want to punish Labour for its failure to  comply with Jewish pressure. As the JTA reports, “Jews are upset with Labour’s failure to amend the universal jurisdiction law that permits private citizens to apply for the arrest of Israeli politicians for alleged war crimes while they are on British soil.” This shouldn’t take us by surprise. You cannot expect a ‘tribal’ operation to support ‘universal’ jurisdiction. Cameron (Conservatives) has said that he would rescind the law. Clearly with 50% of his shadow cabinet being members of the Conservative Friends of Israel, I expect the protocols of his cabinet to also be transcribed into Hebrew or at least Yiddish.

Brits may be shocked to find out that in the JTA’s review of the British election there is not a single word about British national interests. The article leaves the impression that Jews who live in Britain for generations have zero interest in their neighbours. All they are concerned with is the level of subservience of British politicians to what they regard as Jewish interests (Israel and Zionism).

But do not get the wrong impression. The JTA also has some positive news for its  readers. According to the rabid Zionist media outlet, some Jews also participate in the democratic game as equals amongst equals. “In the midst of this year’s extraordinarily tight race, candidates for Prime Minister and hopefuls in Jewish districts appear to be stepping up their pandering to Jewish voters.” Geoffrey Alderman, a historian of British Jewry, sees this as a positive development. “Appealing for a Jewish vote is a sign of a vibrant democratic state,” he said.

I hope British politicians might realise before it’s too late, that there are some other migrant communities in this country that deserve at least as much attention and care.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Female captive Qaherah al-Sa’di completes nine year in occupation jails

[ 30/04/2010 – 10:53 AM ]

NABLUS, (PIC)– Palestinian female captive, Qaherah al-Sa’di from the northern West Bank city of Jenin, who is serving a sentence of 3 life-terms plus 30 years in an Israeli occupation jail, has completed nine years in captivity.

Sa’di, who was arrested on 1 May 2001, told the lawyer of Tadamon for human rights that despite nine years in jail and her heavy sentence she still enjoys very high spirits and that she is certain of her liberation along with other fellow captives.

Sa’di has four children, Muhammad and Sandi are not allowed to visit her under security pretexts and Ra’fat and Dunia are allowed to visit. Her three brothers also are barred from visiting her because of security pretexts too.

She also told the lawyer about the conditions of 37 other female captives at the Damoun and Hasharon prisons who are not allowed to receive books, not allowed to get their hand work (such as embroidery) out of prison. The captives are denied meeting their captive husbands and are not accorded proper medical treatment.

Sa’di is one of five female captives serving life in Israeli occupation jails, the other four are: Ahlam al-Tamimi, serving 16 life terms, Amena Mona, Sana’ Shehada and Dua’a al-Jahhousi.

Israeli occupation bar 13 captives from completing their university education

[ 30/04/2010 – 11:26 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)– The Hadarim prison administration barred 13 Palestinian captives from completing their university education as a punishment for protesting occupation authority’s measures against prisoners and their families.

The Prisoners’ Studies Center quoted Tawfiq Abu Naim, one of prisoner leaders, as saying that the Hadarim prison administration was not satisfied with barring prisoners from taking secondary education exams, barring them from enrolling at Palestinian and Arab universities, limiting the numbers allowed to enrol at the [Israeli] Open University, barring entry of books and other hurdles in the way of the prisoners’ education, but it took the step of barring those already studying at universities from completing their education.

Abu Naim added that the Hadarim prison administration allowed only 25 prisoners to study at the [Israeli] Open University, but it has lately punished thirteen of them by denying them completion of their education including some prisoners who were only one term away from graduation.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Disturbing findings of toxic uranium levels in Gaza

Monday, 22 March 2010 11:30

EXCLUSIVE PICTURES – READER DISCRETION ADVISED, YOU MAY FIND SOME IMAGES DISTURBING

Studies conducted by a group of Italian researchers have revealed the presence of dangerous levels of toxins in the bodies of Palestinian victims of Israeli bombings during operation Cast Lead in 2008-2009. The results of tests conducted on a sample of 15 dead and wounded victims of the war on Gaza, in addition to another sample of 95 citizens, showed the presence of 30 toxic components, notably high levels of uranium. A senior Ministry of Health official in Gaza, Medhat Abbas, confirmed the findings during a press conference last Thursday.

According to Mr. Abbas, the study showed the presence of dangerous substances toxic to human embryos which distort and threaten infertility in men and women and affect genes. It was absorbed through the skin or the mouth during eating.

In a previous study, the same researchers emphasized that the soil of the Gaza Strip now contains toxic metals and carcinogens harmful to embryos. This was due, they claimed, to the absorption of materials used in the recent Israeli war on the Gaza Strip.

Gaza’s Health Minister, Dr Bassem Naim, said the study of the biological samples proved that the Israelis used internationally proscribed weapons against the Palestinians. He warned that the large percentage of toxic uranium in the territory would pose a real threat to future generations. Dr Naim added that his department will send the research findings to the relevant human rights authorities which are documenting Israeli war crimes in the territory.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Sayyed Nasrallah: Egypt Court Sentences Badge of Honor

29/04/2010

Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah said that the verdicts in Egypt against the freedom fighters who were offering support to the resistance in the Gaza Strip are politicized and unfair.

Speaking to the Kuwaiti Al-Rai television to be broadcast Thursday, Sayyed Nasrallah said that “when those brothers were arrested in Egypt, we stressed – and I’ve said this personally – that those are honest resistance fighters, not outlaws, criminals, and terrorists as the judge described them. They are honest people and their only crime is that they were supporting their brothers in Gaza and giving help to the legitimate Palestinian resistance which should be embraced by everybody. Those men were fulfilling their duty and everything beside this are mere fabrications to cover the measures that were taken against them.”

His eminence addressed the detained resistance men and their families: “When you chose the path of backing the Palestinian people, you knew that you could be arrested or maybe killed as martyrs at any time. What you have gone through in Jail and the sentences that have been issued today is a badge of honor on your chests.”

Sayyed Nasrallah added: “For Arab and Muslim peoples to know that we get detained and jailed because we believe that Allah is our God and we only abide by His order to support our brothers in Palestine and Gaza is something to be very proud of. I don’t see in this any loss for any Arab depth. On the contrary, this confirms the credibility of our position and commitment to the Palestinian people. Of course, we seek more support to them, but even this much backing is costing us. Yet, this is all under Allah’s eyes and for His sake.”

His eminence continued: “Of course the doors are not closed in Egypt, and we are surely not going to let those brothers in prison. We will follow up this case even if a sentence was issued, and we’ll seek to resolve the matter as we did in the past, through legal and judicial channels…This case is no longer a judicial matter, so perhaps the only available exits are political ones.”

The Hezbollah leader concluded: “We will seek, through political and diplomatic channels to resolve this issue, establish our brothers’ rights, and not letting them in prison.”

A Cairo court on Wednesday handed down jail sentences against 26 men it convicted of plotting attacks against ships in the Suez Canal and on tourist sites, among other charges.

The defendants said in a hand-written letter obtained by AFP that they never planned attacks in Egypt. They said they had tried to help the Hamas movement during Israel’s devastating December 2008-January 2009 offensive against the Palestinian territory.

Varying Prison Terms for Members of So-Called Hezbollah Cell

28/04/2010 Egypt’s State Security Court on Wednesday handed down sentences to 26 members of the so-called Hezbollah Cell that varied from six months to the maximum life term in jail.

The 22 accused who were in the dock, received jail terms of between six months and 15 years, despite calls from prosecutors for the death penalty to be imposed.

The four defendants who remain on the run, including the alleged head of the so-called Hezbollah cell Lebanese national Mohammed Qabalan, received life sentences.

Sentencing by the state security court, a tribunal of exception set up under Egypt’s three-decade-old state of emergency, was greeted by cries of “Allahu Akbar (God is Greater)” from the dock.

The 26 were convicted of plotting attacks against ships in the Suez Canal and tourist sites, among with other charges. They are two Lebanese, five Palestinians, one Sudanese and eighteen Egyptians. Most were detained between late 2008 and January 2009.

Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah had said after the arrests were publicized in April that he sent a senior commander, identified by his code name Sami Shehab, to Egypt to support Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip. His eminence said the cell comprised no more than 10 people and denied they planned attacks in the country.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Palestinians warn of judaizing Silwan

[ 29/04/2010 – 09:26 AM ]

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)– Palestinian figures addressing a press conference on Silwan town, in occupied Jerusalem, has warned that the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) aims at judaizing the entire town and the vicinity of the Aqsa Mosque.

The conference held under the title “And Silwan Abides” was organized by the Bustan suburb-Silwan committee, the Quds institution for development, and the Aqsa foundation for endowment and heritage at the sit-in tent in Bustan neighborhood.

Speakers at the conference declared absolute rejection of the IOA schemes and practices, affirming that the inhabitants of Bustan and Silwan would remain steadfast in their homes.

A documentary was screened at the start of the conference detailing the history of Silwan, saying it was founded 6,000 years ago and has a current population of 50,000.

Sheikh Raed Salah, the head of the Islamic movement in 1948 occupied Palestine, said in the film that the town was targeted by IOA confiscation of land, diggings, and settlement outposts.

Salah’s deputy Sheikh Kamal Al-Khatib told the conference that Silwan is the fence protecting Jerusalem and the Aqsa Mosque. He added that Silwan will remain a thorn in the way of those who want to confiscate its land.

Mumen Al-Abasy said in a speech on behalf of the national forces in Jerusalem that national unity was a must to enhance the steadfastness of the Jerusalemites.

Meanwhile, the IOA banned the entry of a shipment of Turkish glass into the Aqsa Mosque for maintenance purposes, Hebrew press reported.

It noted that the diplomats in the Turkish embassy expressed outrage at the IOA step.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

The Children of Gaza

By politicaltheatrics

Published: April 29, 2010

In December 2008, the Israeli Defence Force unleashed a campaign to destroy the ability of Hamas to launch rockets and mortars into Israel. Around 300 children were among the 1,300 Palestinians that were killed.

After the ceasefire, BAFTA-winning filmmaker Jezza Neumann arrived in Gaza to follow the lives of three children over a year.

Surrounded by the remnants of the demolished Gaza Strip and increasingly isolated by the blockade that prevents anyone from rebuilding their homes and their lives, Children of Gaza is a shocking, touching and uniquely intimate reflection on extraordinary courage in the face of great adversity.

Broadcasted on Channel4 Monday 15 March 2010

River to Sea
 Uprooted Palestinian

Yitzhar Settlers Vandalize Palestinian Homes, Torch Fields

Al-Manar

29/04/2010 Israeli settlers from the illegally constructed area known as Yitzhar south of Nablus rioted Thursday morning, destroying Palestinian property in the town of Huwwara, following the Israeli occupation military arrest of seven settlers.

Palestinians said settlers set fire to agricultural lands and vandalizing homes and kindergartens as dozens of right-wing setters gathered in the Huwwara Park.

According to the Palestinians, the settlers threw stones, shattered windows and destroyed the roofs of local Palestinian homes.

The Palestinians said Israeli occupation soldiers did not prevent the settlers from venting their rage.

According to an Israeli police spokesman, settlers were arrested for earlier vandalism and destruction targeting Palestinians, known by setters as a “price tag” policy, aimed at causing harm to Palestinians and making trouble for soldiers who one settler leaders told reporters were “out to get” the settlers.

“At least 60 or 70 settlers came down to the village and destroyed Muhammad el-Sabata’s home; then they entered a public garden and began torching olive trees and destroy trees. They burned at least 60 trees,” a Huwwara resident told Ynet.

Last week Nablus-area residents woke up to smashed and burning cars with the words “price tag” spray painted on torched vehicles.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Another great interview by George Kenny on Electric Politics : "Whither the Israel Lobby?"

vineyardsaker

George Kenny is clearly on a roll! Only a week ago he had a fantastic show about Bosnia (which I hope you all listened to) and now he follows up with yet another truly excellent interview with Jeffrey Blankfort on the topic of the Israel Lobby. Listening to these two interviews, I was reminded of the words of George Orwell “In a world of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act“. By this criteria, George’s “Electric Politics” clearly deserves the honor of being called a “revolutionary” podcast.

In this latest interview, George and Jeffrey Blankfort touch on a painful subject for many progressives, including myself: the fact that Noam Chomsky has a totally mind-boggling “blind stop” on two of the most important, I would even say *defining*, issues determining the nature and goals of the US Empire: the role of the Israel Lobby (or “Zionist Power Configuration” or ZPC as James Petras refers to it) and the truth about 9/11. In this interview, George and Jeffrey do not touch upon the issue of 9/11 (although George himself fully understands that 9/11 was an ‘inside job”), but only on the first ‘blind spot’ of Chomsky. Both George and Jeffrey Blankfort clearly have a great deal of admiration for Noam Chomsky, as do I, but they value the truth and the voice of their own common sense and conscience even more and they refuse to simply bow to Chomsky’s otherwise undeniable moral authority.

Interestingly, both George and Blankfort also clearly understand that the only a “One State” solution can truly bring piece to the Middle-East and that this means a total defeat of the Zionist ideology.

George Kenny is doing a fantastic job with his podcast and website. If you appreciate his work and if you can afford to, please drop by on his website and donate a little something (or a big something!) to support him and his work. And if you cannot, then send him a little note of gratitude and of support.

Fighting against empire is an often discouraging activity, and those who do have the courage to do so need all the kinds words and support we can give them!

The Saker

PS: Jeff Blankfort is a radio program producer with KPOO in San Francisco, KZYX in Mendocino and KPFT/Pacifica in Houston. He is a journalist and Jewish-American and has been a pro-Palestinian human rights activist since 1970. He was formerly the editor of the Middle East Labor Bulletin and co-founder of the Labor Committee of the Middle East. He was also a founding member of the Nov. 29 Coalition on Palestine. He won a sizable lawsuit against the Jewish Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in February 2002 for its vast illegal spying against him, as well as other peaceful political groups and individuals (including anti-Apartheid groups/activists). Blankfort sends out an influential annotated/commented emails of articles appearing mostly in the US press about Israel, Palestine, Middle East, Neocons, and the Zionist lobby. Many of his articles can be found here.

 

Posted by VINEYARDSAKER: at 7:34 PM 

Labels: George Kenney, Israel Lobby

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Israeli tourism maps annex Palestinian lands and omit Palestinian cities

Published by Daoud Kuttab

By Daoud Kuttab

Special US envoy George Mitchell has visited the area, armed with a special letter from President Barack Obama to the Palestinian president reiterating what seems to have been a US-Israel understanding that the proximity talks will take place soon.

The Palestinian side is keen this time not to waste time on talking for the sake of talking, or based on the idea of incremental negotiations. Palestinians are determined to tackle the issue of borders first and walk back from that to how to implement the establishment of the Palestinian state. In meantime the Israeli tourism ministry (in its most recent maps) has unilaterally annexed Palestine to Israel and has omitted he existence of any Palestinian community.

Until now Israel, which has been preventing the realisation of a Palestinian state, has given attention to symbolic issues. Why, Israeli propagandists asked, do Palestinians refuse to recognise Israel in the various images, maps and publications that they espouse? Why is their no demarcation showing the green line that separates the West Bank from Gaza? Why do maps of the areas west of the Jordan River never mention Israeli towns, such as Tel Aviv, while highlighting the nearby Jaffa? Why even when the West Bank is marked on the maps, the word Israel is not printed on the Israeli territory?

Palestinians have often responded by asking what the borders of Israel are. Do they include or exclude Jerusalem? Do the Israelis in fact accept Palestinian statehood at the same time that they are asking Palestinians for recognition of Israel? Yet despite the rhetoric, Palestinians quietly made the shift and followed the advice of their international friends to make changes on maps and especially in textbooks.

Since 1994, the Palestinian Authority had been replacing older textbooks and in 1999 and 2000, Nathan Brown, professor of political science at George Washington University, published a study on this subject.
Regarding the Palestinian Authority’s newer textbooks, he states: “The new books tell history from a Palestinian point of view, they do not seek to erase Israel, delegitimise it or replace it with the ‘state of Palestine’; each book contains a foreword describing the West Bank and Gaza as “the two parts of the homeland”; the maps show some awkwardness but do sometimes indicate the 1967 line and take some other measures to avoid indicating borders; in this respect they are actually more forthcoming than Israeli maps; the books avoid treating Israel at length but do indeed mention it by name.”

Despite these changes, the issue has continued to haunt Palestinians internationally. Almost all attacks can be traced back to “the work of a single organisation, the ‘Centre for Monitoring the Impact of Peace’,” which Natan Browns insists, relies “on misleading and tendentious reports to support their claim of incitement”.
In 2001, Armin Laschet, a member of the German delegation to the European Union Parliament, threatened to halt EU funding of Palestinian educational institutions “…until all the Palestinian textbook passages antagonistic to Israel are removed”.

The response to this threat did not come from Palestinians, but was delivered by Peter Hansen, at the time UNRWA commissioner general.He told the Palestinian daily Al Hayat Al Jadida: “We cannot expect a people under occupation to have textbooks which idealise, praise and express love for their occupiers.”
This statement caused outrage and fury in many circles. The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise answered to his response: “Israeli texts do not ‘idealise, praise and express love’ for the Palestinians, but they do not malign or disseminate hatred against them either.”

In 2002, the United States Congress requested the United States Department of State to commission a reputable non-governmental organisation to conduct a review of the new Palestinian curriculum.

The Israel/Palestine Centre for Research and Information (IPCRI) was thereby commissioned by the US embassy in Tel Aviv and the US consul general in Jerusalem to review the Palestinian Authority’s textbooks. Its report was completed in March 2003 and delivered to the State Department for submission to Congress. Its executive summary stated: “The overall orientation of the curriculum is peaceful despite the harsh and violent realities on the ground. It does not openly incite against Israel and the Jews. It does not openly incite hatred and violence. Religious and political tolerance is emphasised in a good number of textbooks and in multiple contexts.”

While the above should put an end to the continuous baseless accusations, few have asked the obvious: what the Israeli position towards Palestinians is and whether Israeli maps demarcate Palestinian territories.
A look at the most recent Israeli campaign to promote tourism to Israel is a strong answer to this. The 2009 Israeli ministry of tourism campaign eliminates any Palestinian presence. Stas Misezhnikov of the radical rightwing Yisrael Beiteinu (Foreign Minister Avigdor Leiberman’s party) is the current minister of tourism. This ministry, made up of extreme elements, has completely wiped the West Bank and any Palestinian areas from its materials. Mandatory Palestine is declared as Israel without any borders or demarcations. All maps included in the campaign omit Palestinian areas and towns. This includes the Palestinian town of Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus.

While many might say that this is a symbolic issue, there is no doubt that this particular symbolism runs counter to the two-state solution, which has been declared a strategic national interest of the United States and which the prime minister of Israel has publicly said he supported.

So while negotiations will soon begin, how about the international community making the simple request that Israel end ignoring Palestinians and Palestine, at least on the maps it officially produces?

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Israel at 62, a failed Zionist enterprise.

28 04 2010 http://www.jeffersoncorner.com/israel-at-62-a-failed-zionist-enterprise/

I am sure if Haim Weizmann, Theodor Herzl or David Ben Gurion were alive and were invited by Bibi Netanyahu to attend Israel’s 62nd birthday, they will be very disappointed with the State of Israel and wonder what wrong with the Zionist Enterprise? Not all “Diaspora Jews” are in and not all Arabs are out! Very disturbing facts for Zionism. The idea of an independent state for the “Jewish Nation” is not there, simple. I am also sure if the State of Israel was a “supermarket” or a “liquor store” or a “department store” owned by a savvy and smart Jewish owner he or she would have shut the store long time ago, too expensive to keep, and too ugly to be proud of.

It is true Israel as a Zionist Enterprise was able to defeat hapless, incompetent, poorly lead, corrupt Arab armies and leadership, and it is true that Israel was able to drive some 700,000 Palestinians into exile in 47-48 using terrorism and cold blooded murder and deliberate ethnic cleansing to drive them out. Israel succeeded in wiping off the face of the map some 600 Arab villages and replaced them with Jewish settlements Israel, but Israel was unable to change the nature of the country and make it “Jewish”. The landscape will always be a “Palestinian” notwithstanding all of the Jewish settlements, and the caravans on all of the hilltops.

It is true that Israel as a Zionist Enterprise was able to win all the wars it initiated in 48, in 56, in 67 and was able to win in 73 and was able to invade Lebanon in 82 and occupied its South for 20 years and was able to attack and destroy Iraq nuclear facilities and was able to bomb PLO head offices in Tunis, and of course was able to wage relentless wars against Lebanon destroying its infrastructures and dropping some one million cluster bombs (gifts from the government of the US to the people of Lebanon) and was able to attack Gaza and destroy its infrastructure leaving some 25,000 homes destroyed not to mentions scores of schools, hospitals and clinics and to commit the worst crimes in 21st century and yet it failed to subdue Lebanon or destroy the will to survive in Gaza. There is so much resilience among Arabs that all of the world “Jewish” psychologists will fail to explain.

However Israel as a Zionist Enterprise, with the 4th largest army in the world after China, US and Russia with an nuclear arsenal of some 300 nuclear bombs and an army that can defeat all Arab armies combined, only because of diplomatic cover from the US), and of course it has the best weapons that the US can provide it from the new F-22 to F-15, F-16, Apache, Copra’s, and of course an array of missiles not available in the Middle East. It simply failed to secure the peace. Israel also have the largest fleets of submarines in the Middle East, compliment and as gifts from the German people, submarines equipped to carry nuclear bombs and frigates stolen in the day light from under the eyes of the French. It also succeeded in having all of West Europe provide it with arms and weapons.

President Obama should have noted in his first conference on nuclear security that Israel was the first and only terrorist organization that succeed to steal ‘nuclear material” from all places the United States thanks to Israeli loyalists who were running the US nuclear facility. It is also true that Israel was able to continue with its occupation of the West Bank and Gaza for 43 years, thanks in large part to the continued legal, diplomatic and financial support from the US, and was able to send its “armed settlers thugs” to the West Bank to steal and rob the people from their homes and land and settle every hill tops and uproot hundreds of thousands of trees thanks to a very generous philanthropic American Jewish community, but it will not be able to drive All Palestinians out. It is also true that Israel was able with the active support from the American Jewish leadership and community and American Jewish Zionist policy makers to build and expand its settlements and build and expand its Apartheid Wall taking with it more and more Palestinian lands and depriving Palestinians the rights to their homes, farms and water wells, but it will not make All Palestinians disappear. It is also true that Israel was able to transfer and exile, ethnically cleans tens of thousands of Palestinians from their homes in East Jerusalem, and was able to destroy tens of thousands of homes under the pretense of “no construction permits” while allowing “Jews” not only to build hundreds of thousands of homes on stolen Arab properties but allow Jewish settlers to commit fraud in order to rob Palestinians from their homes, However Jerusalem will always look an Arab city.

It is also true that Israel and since 67 jailed over 800,000 Palestinians at one time or another with more than 95% of them under the laws of “administrative detention” which allows the state to jail people for an indefinite period of times without ever bring formal charges or opening legal proceedings to establish guilt. Yet it achieved nothing but full resentment and earned the hate of those jailed and their families and friends. It is also true that Israel was able to establish loyalty among substantial number of “Diaspora Jews” to serve its purpose, policies and undermine the political and economic integrity of certain countries encouraging and paying “ Jewish “ citizen from the US to commit spying and treasons against the US and was able to get a number of them to pass top secret materials to Israel which in turn it pass it on to countries deemed hostile to the US, but these acts again only create distrust and resentment among loyal Americans and sooner than later America will let go of Israel.

The day will come when there will be Israel without the USA. It is also true that Israel was able to attract “Diaspora Jews” to serve in its own army and shun military service in their countries of origin and was able to attract tens of thousands of “Diaspora Jews” to travel to Israel under a fully funded “ Birth Rights Israel” and was able to get tens of thousands of “Diaspora Jews” to donate and plant trees as part of the “Barmetzva” in parks established over destroyed Arab villages and stolen Arab land, and it was able to convince the Simon Wiesenthal Center of Los Angeles to build a Museum of Tolerance over an ancient Muslim cemetery in contrast to its own objections of desecration and destructions of “Jewish” cemeteries. Of course it is Ok to destroy an Arab cemetery and build a Museum of all things a Museum of Tolerance, how hypocritical of both Israel and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. It is also true that Israel has used the “Holocaust” as a cash machine, a milking cow and was able to fleece the German of some $120 billions in reparations for its crimes against the Jews during the Nazi regime and it continues to milk Germany under Markel of more and more money. It was also able to milk and fleece the US out of $1.6 Trillion dollars since 73 War and this is according to a consulting economist Thomas Stauffer a published article in the Christian Science Monitor published on December 9. 2002 and of course in addition to the more than $100 billions since then, not to mention the more than $ 50 billions donated by “Diaspora Jews” over the last 40 years or so. However in the words of Avi Shavit writing in Haaretz “The grace period granted the Jewish state by Auschwitz and Treblinka is ending. The generation that knew the Holocaust has left the stage. The generation that remembers the Holocaust is disappearing. What shapes the world’s perception of Israel today is not the crematoria, but the checkpoints. Not the trains, but the settlements” http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1164021.html

Now if we are to add up all of the money given to Israel, and all the weapons stolen or given to Israel and all the political, legal and diplomatic covers given to Israel for its war crimes, for its wars and for its occupation, Israel did not mature enough to be a country on its own. A country that does not need or live off the pouring of money from the US, Europe and Diaspora Jews. A country that can survive the abandonment of the United State or the lifting of its political and diplomatic cover not mention the stopping of financial and military support of the US. Israel is an army with a country and not a country with an army, and its is true that has a very powerful army, but this army certainly is made up of war criminals, war mongers, racists young recruits who enjoy killing for the hell of it “ born to kill”, enjoy humiliating Palestinians for the fun of it, and an army that at best can be described as the most criminal army in the world. If its leadership, its commanders and soldiers were Americans or British or French even Germans they all will be in jail and the defense minister will have to resign even the president or prime minister will be under so much pressure to disband such a criminal army. Its army make good use of civilians and children as human shields and use targeted killings to commit war crimes and liberal use of cluster and phosphorus bombs against civilian targets, and was able to commit war crimes in Qana 1 and Qana 2, in Qibya, in Jennin, in Sabra and Shatilla, in Nablus, and in Gaza. Even with blank check from Israel’s political and military leadership, its army simply failed to subdue unarmed civilian populations and failed to scare even young children from facing soldiers with tanks and machine guns with a “sling shot”. Israel with all the military power, all of the financial support, all of the cover for its war crimes and its continued crime of putting some 1.5 millions under siege for the last 3 years was unable to make the Palestinians to give up and simply disappear, notwithstanding the PLO collaborations with Israel as a manager of the Jewish Occupation.

Israel army simply failed to achieve peace and security for Israel. Israel failed at any given time from getting an exiled Palestinians to give up the hope and the “Right of Return”. I say Israel, as a Zionist Enterprise is a failure because it failed to gather All the Jews of the world, it failed ethnically cleanse and drive the Palestinians from historic Palestine West of the River Jordan; it failed to make Jordan an “alternative” Palestine. It failed to achieve an “engaging” peace with Jordan and Egypt with peace treaties nothing more than an “armistice “ agreements rather than peace and engagement between countries and people such as we saw between France and Germany, the US and Japan after WWII. Israel at 62 remains dependent on a very generous and an emerging resentful US, awaking from the sedation and drug fixes the Jewish Lobby injects members of Congress and senior members of the administration, the media, and academia.

Israel at 62 failed to have a viable agriculture and failed to make the desert bloom even with hundreds of billions donated and the free use of stolen land and water. With that kind of money, I am sure the people of Arizona will make the “Moon Bloom”. So there is nothing exceptional about Israel’s achievement in agriculture. Israel as a Zionist Enterprise was a disaster for Judaism, going further than Hitler in his attempt at wiping out the Jews. Israel was able to destroy and erode any and all “Jewish” values and any sense of human decency and respect for human lives that survived some 3000 years. Thanks to Israel, Judaism we know it no longer exists except within few strong willed communities that were able to survive the constant assaults of Zionism and survive some within Israel some within Belgium, certainly within the US. Yes, there are Jews in the hundreds of thousands who do not believe and subscribe to the Zionist Enterprise that is Israel. Israel may have one of the best enterprising technology centers and entrepreneur, but even these people for the most part have lost any sense of basic cultural and human commitments to the nation and their only concern is to make money. Ethan Bronner of the New York Times writes about the ugly mood in Israel. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/20/world/middleeast/20israel.htmlIsrael as 62 is a nation that has failed its “people” and failed to give them peace and security and sense of worthiness. Recent BBC survey put Israel as among the most despised nations along with Iran, North Korea and Pakistan. http://www.globescan.com/news_archives/bbc2010_countries/

Its greed that can match only a “Shylock” that can best describe Israel and its inability to give up the Occupation and its inability to give up the drug fix and habit of stealing land, building settlements, drug habit that will destroy it from within. Only the fools in Ramallah, and Washington believe in a two state solution. It will never happen. Israel’s good friends in Washington made sure of that. A two state solution could not happen with so many Israeli “facts” on the ground and the only way forward is a One State solution. Yes, my friends, Israel at 62 is a failed Zionist Enterprise and if Israel was a business, even and idiot will shut it down. If Communism could not survive so will Zionism. It is only a matter of time.

Israel finds allies in Europe’s Christian fundamentalists

David Cronin , The Electronic Intifada, 28 April 2010

Anti-Muslim firebrand Geert Wilders is among Israel’s right-wing friends in Europe. (Koen Van Weel/ANP)

Flip through any issue of a major newspaper from the past decade and it is a safe bet you will be confronted with a warning about the dangers of religious extremism. So how could the mainstream media have failed to notice the growing influence of fundamentalists on the European Union’s relations with one of its nearest neighbors: Israel? The explanation might lie in how the zealots in question are not Islamic but Christian.

Since September last year, the European Parliament’s official delegation to the Knesset has been headed by veteran Dutch politician Bastiaan Belder. This has meant that the chief interlocutor with Israel for the EU’s only directly-elected institution has been a man who makes Dick Cheney look moderate.

Belder belongs to the Political Reformed Party (known by its Dutch acronym SGP). Within the Netherlands, this Calvinist grouping has long been controversial because of its opposition to women’s suffrage. Even though it has been forced to reverse its male-only membership rule by a 2003 court ruling, it has not yet fielded a female candidate in an election.

The party’s literal interpretation of scriptures is especially pronounced in its policy on the Middle East. Adhering strictly to a Christian Zionist ideology, it views the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948 as the fulfillment of a Biblical prophecy. “For the SGP solidarity with the Jewish people is not negotiable,” one of its key documents on foreign affairs states. “Therefore, we are committed to a secure existence for Israel in the territory that God has assigned to the Jewish people. The Jews are the ‘beloved of the father’s will,’ to which the Lord assigned their country, as is written in the Old Testament.”

Intriguingly, the same document displays a profound anti-Semitic bias. It identifies Judaism as a heresy and argues that Jews must convert to Christianity if they are to evade damnation. Islam, meanwhile, is described as a threat that needs to be “countered” because it “keeps people away from salvation.”

In his 11 years as a member of the European Parliament (MEP), Belder has consistently defended Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians. Frequently, his rhetoric is indistinguishable from the propaganda peddled by the Israeli diplomats with whom he is in regular contact. During a visit to Jerusalem in February, he contended that Israel would have nothing to fear if it set up an “independent” investigation into the conduct of its attacks on Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009. “When you are convinced that you did everything to prevent civilian casualties, when you have the moral high ground, show it and no one can blame you,” he said.

Under Belder’s chairmanship, meetings of the Parliament’s delegation to Israel have generally been one-sided affairs. Last December, the main guest speaker at one such meeting was Emanuele Ottolenghi, then the Brussels representative of the American Jewish Committee, one of the most powerful pro-Israel lobby groups in Washington. Ottolenghi has penned a book (Under a Mushroom Cloud, published in 2009) and several pamphlets that make the case for waging war against Iran over its alleged efforts to develop nuclear weapons. By contrast, Ottolenghi has portrayed Israel’s nuclear capability as necessary for stability in the Middle East, claiming that Arab leaders sleep soundly under the shadow of Israels nuclear umbrella.

Fortunately, Belder has not had everything his own way. Last year the Parliament’s delegation to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) sought a discussion with him on how its work could be coordinated with that of his delegation. Initially, Belder turned down this request but when pressured by other MEPs, he agreed in the past few months that joint meetings between the two delegations could be held. Proinsias de Rossa, an Irish MEP who chairs the delegation to the PLC, said he had made “various overtures” to Belder and was “brushed aside for a long time.” However, Belder eventually accepted the principle that each delegation should be kept informed of the other’s activities and “we are now cooperating very well,” de Rossa added. Belder did not respond to my requests for a comment.

While only a handful of Dutch politicians espouse the same religious views as Belder, his unwavering support for Israel has been echoed by larger parties in the Netherlands. Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, a center-right Christian Democrat, will be garlanded as a “friend of Israel” in June when the American Jewish Committee presents him with an award. Verhagen has claimed that Israel “has no desire to see people in Gaza suffer.” His comments were made when he travelled to the southern Israeli city of Sderot last year; Verhagen refused to venture across the nearby border crossing into Gaza to see for himself if Israel was making its 1.5 million inhabitants suffer.

Without doubt, the Netherlands’ blood-splattered history helps explain some of the enduring attitudes towards Israel — 70 percent of the Dutch Jewry were wiped out in the Holocaust. “After World War II, there was quite a lot of enthusiasm [in the Netherlands] about the small State of Israel,” said Henri Veldhuis, a Calvinist theologian and a Palestine solidarity campaigner. “These new heroes fueled our faith. Some years later, there was guilt about the Holocaust and how most Jews in Holland were killed or deported. These deep feelings about faith and guilt are still quite strong in our churches.”

Veldhuis, whose work for Palestinian rights has led one of his co-religionists to dub him a “follower of Hitler,” says that the essential problem with the SGP and the like-minded ChristenUnie (the two parties contested last year’s European Parliament election as a combined force) is that they view their reading of the Bible as more important than international law. “For me, this is quite shocking,” he said.

A general election is scheduled to take place in the Netherlands in June after the Labor Party recently walked out of the government in protest at efforts to prolong the Dutch involvement in the war in Afghanistan. Many pundits expect the flamboyant anti-Muslim firebrand Geert Wilders to perform strongly in this summer’s poll. The electoral list that he leads includes several candidates who have previously worked for the pro-Israel lobby in the Netherlands. Among them are a former Dutch representative for Likud, the party of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Nonetheless, the increasingly brutal nature of the occupation of Palestine has caused some Dutch politicians to reconsider their support for Israel, according to Ghada Zeidan from United Civilians for Peace, a Utrecht-based human rights group. “People are outraged here,” she said. “Even some of the more conservative political parties like the VVD [one of the main opposition parties], who are seen in Holland as ‘friends of Israel’ are asking questions. I can see some movement at the moment but I also should say that the Israel lobby in general remains rather strong.”

It would be comforting if Belder could be dismissed as unrepresentative of mainstream Dutch or European society. Yet he has proven to be an astute networker at a time when Israel’s political establishment is eagerly courting allies in the Brussels institutions with a view to deepening its diplomatic and economic ties with the EU. His close links with Israeli officialdom indicates that he is appreciated as someone who slavishly defends Israel’s agenda in an assembly it frequently regards as hostile. However extreme he may be, it would be foolish to ignore him.

David Cronins book Europe’s Alliance With Israel: Aiding the Occupation will be published in November 2010 by Pluto Press.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Settler Sewage Ruins Palestinian Crops, Drinking Water

IPS

By Mel Frykberg

Vineyard in Beit Ummar village, flooded with sewage from nearby Israeli settlement.
Credit:Palestine Solidarity Project.

BEIT UMMAR, West Bank, Apr 28, 2010 (IPS) – Residents of this Palestinian village refuse to buy the idea that the flood of raw sewage from the adjacent Israeli settlement of Kfar Etzion, that destroyed vineyards and contaminated their drinking water, was an accident.

The Israeli Civil Administration, which administers the occupied West Bank, claims the spillage was the result of an accidental power malfunction which caused excess settlement sewage to overflow onto Palestinian land.

“This was no mistake,” says a British activist who has been documenting life in the village for several months. “The pipe was deliberately unscrewed by hand so that the sewage would spill over into Beit Ummar. That has nothing to do with an electricity cut,” he told IPS.

Villagers standing near a completely destroyed 70,000 sq m vineyard belonging to the Sabarneh family said they believe it was a deliberate act of sabotage and part of a concerted campaign by the settlers to harass their Palestinian neighbours and vandalise their property.

Beit Ummar has been the target of a number of Israeli military raids at night last month. Activists who have been organising non-violent protests against the expropriation of their land for the settlements have been arrested and the village blockaded.

In a similar incident last week the Palestinian village of Bruqin, in the northern West Bank, was flooded with sewage from the nearby Ariel settlement, causing contamination of underground water and springs and damaging crops.

These incidents are part of a larger problem of scarce water resources where a Palestinian population of 2.5 million survives on 17 percent of the West Bank’s main underground aquifer.

The remaining water is channelled towards the West Bank’s (including East Jerusalem) 500,000 Israeli settlers, and into Israel proper.

The water shortage is compounded by the lack of wastewater treatment plants and inefficient treatment of waste and sewage in the Palestinian territory which fouls its water sources.

Israeli rights group B’tselem released a study last year called ‘Foul Play: Neglect of wastewater treatment in the West Bank’.

According to the organisation, more than 90 percent of Palestinian wastewater is not treated while only 20 percent of Palestinian homes, primarily in towns and cities, are connected to sewerage systems.

Furthermore, only 81 of 121 illegal Israeli settlements are connected to wastewater treatment facilities. Over half of the settlements’ treatment plants are too small to treat waste effectively and are ill-equipped to handle the burgeoning settler population.

The result is continual technical breakdowns and sewage overflow. Most of the settlements are situated on ridges and hilltops so sewage flows down towards the Palestinian villages and towns in the valleys below, contaminating their drinking water supplies and destroying their crops.

The Israeli settlers are not affected by this as they are connected to Israel’s water supply.

The planning and building authorities in the settlements and Israeli industrial areas also ignore Jordanian building and planning laws which govern how wastewater is to be treated in the West Bank.

The B’tselem report further outlines the neglect of the territory’s water treatment plants by the Israeli Civil Administration during the decades of occupation and the current difficulties faced by Palestinian Authority (PA) water officials in trying to build new wastewater treatment plants or repair the old ones.

There is currently only one wastewater treatment plant operating in the West Bank in Ramallah. Three others have ceased to function and the PA has been unable to repair them or build new ones.

The West Bank is divided into Area A, which is under Palestinian control, Area B under joint Palestinian and Israeli control, and Area C which is under full Israeli control.

Area C comprises 60 percent of the West Bank. Areas A and B are mostly built up with little free land available.

However, in order to move around or build new wastewater treatment plants in Area C Palestinian officials from the PA Environment Authority require building permits from the Israeli Civil Administration.

B’tselem and PA officials complain of the delays these officials face in getting building approval if they get them at all.

“There is an enormous amount of red tape and bureaucracy that Palestinian officials have to overcome before they get the permits,” says Eyal Hareuveni, the author of the B’tselem report.

“The Israeli Civil Administration says that the Palestinians don’t provide the necessary detailed building plans as they have been instructed but I think the administration is being deliberately difficult,” Hareuveni told IPS.

Issa Moussa from the PA’s Environmental Authority denied that the PA provided insufficient details.

“We have the case of wanting to build a new wastewater treatment plant in Tulkarem in the northern West Bank. We provided absolutely everything requested but we were still waiting for a permit,” Moussa told IPS.xxxxx

Other difficulties facing the more efficient handling of wastewater are the restrictions placed on Palestinian movement in the West Bank by the Israeli military. This has led to increased costs for donors who support wastewater projects and who in turn have cut down on their expenditure.

A Joint Water Committee between Israel and the PA was established following the Oslo Peace Accord of 1993, to address water issues.

One of the disputes between the sides is the Israeli insistence that settlement sewage be connected to future Palestinian wastewater treatment plants.

The Palestinians reject this as this implies that the settlements are permanent and say their refusal to approve this condition is one of the reasons for approval being withheld on the construction of wastewater plants.

With no higher authority to settle the disagreement the situation will only worsen in the future.

“Neither side seems to be making the urgent issue of water and waste treatment a priority,” Hareuveni told IPS.

(END)
River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

The UN’s disgraceful failure to support Gaza and Palestine!

The Palestine Telegraph

Wednesday, 28 April 2010 08:55 Added by PT Editor maysaa jarour

0diggsdigg

UK, April 28, 2010 (Pal Telegraph, by Peter Eyre) – Since its inception the United Nations has failed the people of Palestine, especially those living in the Gaza Strip. It predecessor, the League of Nations, also had many failings which eventually led to its demise and collapse. It is obvious that the UN of today is clearly not working and in many cases has no strength or accountability. We frequently see a majority vote take place but then when it gets into the hands of the Security Council (the elite few) it fizzles out, either by someone abstaining or using their trump card, the dreaded veto.
Despite the vast sums of money injected into its structure it still does not represent the nations of the world. I could ask the question is this organization run and controlled by the nations that pay for its running costs or is it controlled by the puppets of the New World Order?

We frequently see the scheming and plotting going on behind the scenes that are carried out by the US, UK, France and Germany (what I call the G3.5). They try to manipulate or apply pressure to the UN, ahead of any proposed resolution in an attempt to influence a certain outcome. What’s even more amazing is the fact that Germany is not a member of the Security Council and therefore does not have any additional powers.
Could we possibly again see such an organization as the UN fail for a second time or is there a glimmer of hope that reform and restructuring will take place to make it become more effective to serve the nations it is supposed to represent?  It has almost become laughable to hear the Secretary General issue his feeble warnings to those that breach UN regulation or do not adhere to the resolutions that have been passed. What is the point in passing a resolution if there is no mechanism in place to enforce them?

Israel has ignored every resolution passed against it, which up to 1989 was 131, obviously the counting has now stopped has the total is now off the scale. What is ironic is that Iraq violated only one and the West went to war without justification….to this day that illegality still stands.

The Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations also wrote violations of human rights etc…..some of these are extremely serious but again nothing ever gets done. The last letter dated 10^th September 2009 added to the long list of 342 such letters and it would appear that Dr.Riyad Mansour, Ambassador, and Permanent Observer has ceased writing them…..one can understand why!

Israel is also in breach of the Oslo Accord in not allowing the fishing limits that were assigned to Gaza. As a result of their aggressive naval patrols they have decimated the fishing industry that was so vital to the people of Gaza.

The United Nations and Israel is also in breach of normal international protocol in regard to the legal maritime borders both on the Israel side and also on the Egyptian side. The seaward border is also illegal and should be extended to 24 nautical miles with a further extension so as to give Gaza (Palestine) its own Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
The United Nations and Israel are in breach of the theft of Gaza’s natural resources, despite the fact that the UN has already passed a resolution against Israel in this regard.

The United Nations is guilty of not carrying out a proper War Crimes Inquiry by not paying more attention to the severe violations of the Geneva Convention in relation to weapons used: White Phosphorous, Flechette, DIME and weapons containing uranium components. The Goldstone report is not worth the paper it is written on.
The United Nations has a special section for investigating Genocide under the control of Mr. Francis Deng…..what is happening in Gaza and West Bank amounts to genocide. I would also add that the IDF has consequently also contaminated itself as a result of the Yom Kippur War, The war with Lebanon, The Attack on Syria and more recently the attack on Gaza (Cast Lead) when such weapons were used including 4^th generation dirty bombs. These weapons are totally indiscriminate and therefore contaminate adjacent countries such as Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Jordon, Egypt, Qatar, UAE, Muscat and Yemen etc. The contaminated radioactive nano particles go far beyond the above countries and in actual fact circle the globe and yet the UN does nothing.

The United Nations have initiated the removal of bombed out building in Gaza for recycling and for crushing. Much of this stockpile will be re-laid by the UN to surface the roads and streets of the Gaza Strip. These bomb sites are considered to be contaminated and yet the UN has done nothing to test for such radioactivity and take appropriate precautions as per their own staff procedures. This action alone will generate secondary contamination in the Gaza Strip and also contaminate Israel and adjacent countries on a regular basis….this will be on going. This makes the UN guilty themselves of their duty of care and may also constitute a breach of the Geneva Convention.

The United Nations has the ability to override Israel and commence dealing with Palestine directly to free it of this blockade. UN Blue Cap peacekeepers are available and can be placed on all borders and within to establish peace and remove the blockade…in much the same way as they operate in Lebanon.
The United Nations can take additional measures outside of the UN Security Council to get the General Assembly to vote on this issue. It is within the UN constitution for them to carryout this action out and to enforce it.

The United Nations long standing operations in Gaza has been a false façade in trying to appear to be doing the right thing for the people of Gaza and Palestine. They, as the representatives for the UN in Gaza, have failed in their ability to address the real issues of Gaza and to insist that their superiors address all the demands as highlight above and more importantly to insist that the US stop supplying WMD’s to Israel and also to insist that Israel stop using them.

If the United Nations is to survive then it has to drastically restructure its policy and the way it is administered. Its current procedure is rather antique and needs new blood injecting into it otherwise it will fail like its predecessor the League of Nations.

We all have to understand that the United Nations is representative of all the Nations that pay for its upkeep. It is not a big boys club for the elite and it certainly should not be a puppet to the US, UK, France and that unknown entity Germany!

The people of Palestine have watched you all pontificate since the inception of Israel and yet you remain powerless, whilst at the same time Israel does exactly what it wants, when it wants…….I would strongly suggest a blockade of Israel and get them to pull in their heads and toe the line.

Your own leaders have in the past been extremely critical of your failings and yet you still continue to run an organization that borders of becoming a modern day Jurassic Park. One should view this video made by the outgoing President of the General Assembly, Father Miguel  d’Escoto. I thought his opinion of President Obama in another clip was absurd but his comments on Palestine were on target and very good!! –  Enough is Enough

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWSe4-rJ6A0&feature=channel

Maybe this article will attract some comments from Harry’s Place but maybe not….after all it is a little too sophisticated for an “Amateur Blog” to comment on……one can always live in hope!………If they do respond I am sure it will not be in the Palestine Telegraph comments section…..they don’t like going public and certainly don’t like others responding to their comments…..buy hey that democracy at its best!

Peter Eyre – Middle East Consultant – 26/4/2010

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Palestinian prisoners hunger strike for better treatment

Mohammed Omer, The Electronic Intifada, 28 April 2010

GENEVA (IPS) – Raed Abu Hammad, 27, was allegedly kicked to death by Israeli prison wardens on 16 April. This while Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails have been on hunger strike since 7 April to press for better treatment.

Palestinian minister for prisoner affairs in the United States-backed government in the West Bank, Issa Qaraqi, said at a press conference on Thursday that an Israeli autopsy showed that Hammad had been kicked hard in the lower back.

Qaraqi based his statement on a report he had received from a Palestinian doctor who was present at the autopsy.

However, spokesman for the Israel Prisons Service, Yaron Zamir, maintains that results from the autopsy were still awaited. “The claims made in relation to the prisoner dying after having been beaten are unfounded, untrue and misleading,” Zamir said in a statement.

Qaraqi, who spoke with IPS over telephone, said that his ministry would be making a formal complaint in the Israeli courts asking for an immediate, in-depth investigation into the cause of Hammad’s death.

17 April, the day after Abu Hammad was fatally kicked, is observed in the Occupied Palestinian Territories as “The Day of Palestinian Prisoners.”

The estimated total number of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and detention centers is 7,500. Among these are 330 children under the age of 18 years, 37 female prisoners and 15 members of the democratically elected legislative council and ministries.

The prisoners are distributed in more than 18 prisons and detention centers across Israel and the West Bank, the biggest are the Negev Desert Prison and Ofer Prison, or what was formerly Incarceration Facility 385, close to the Palestinian city of Ramallah.

Qaraqi said punishment measures meted out to Palestinian prisoners include solitary confinement, denial of visits by family members and limiting access to prison canteen food rations.

Israel also imposes a punishment of 100 US dollars to be collected for each prisoner on hunger strike or does not comply with prison regulations, according to minister Qaraqi.

It is to protest against these conditions that Palestinian prisoners have been on hunger strike since 7 April in what they call the “Empty Intestines Battle.” Exactly how many prisoners are participating in the hunger strike is unknown.

Demands include medical care for the “most seriously diseased prisoners,” an end to mistreatment of families during visits that includes forcing them to take off their clothes for strip searches.

A statement by the National Senior Committee for Supporting Detainees (NSCSD), that has been functional since the beginning of this year, mentions the increasing number of administrative detainees in Israeli jails.

According to Riad al-Ashqar, press officer with the NSCSD, the number of administrative detainees now stands at 290 prisoners, an issue which he considers a “humanitarian crime” since they are mostly being held without charges.

He mentioned a number of documented cases, including that of former minister of prisoners Wasfi Qabha from the former Palestinian National Government, whose prison sentence was extended six times. Qabha was, however, released this week and a huge reception was accorded him by his family and friends at the al-Dahireah checkpoint close to Hebron.

“Administrative detention is a model of psychological torture, where prisoners never know when he or she will be released, but instead are subjected to extended detention anytime,” al-Ashqar said.

Al-Ashqar also spoke of reports which lack information on the actual charges against these prisoners, but document violations of prisoners’ rights.

As of Palestinian Prisoners Day some 20 percent of Palestinian prisoners were in need of medical treatment or psychological support. The reports said 16 prisoners have cancer, 88 are diabetics needing stabilization, 25 have kidney failure and 23 have disabilities.

Hammad was physically fit although he had been “kept in solitary confinement for more than a year for breaking a TV monitor in the prison accidentally,” his mother said.

All rights reserved, IPS — Inter Press Service (2010). Total or partial publication, retransmission or sale forbidden. River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian