IOF photographs minors amid night raids to identify stone-throwers

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[ 20/02/2011 – 11:19 AM ]

NAZARETH, (PIC)– The Israeli occupational forces (IOF) raided several homes in the village of Nabi Saleh near Ramallah since the year’s onset with the sole intent of waking minors living there and filming them, the Israeli B’Tselem organization said.

“Israeli forces enter the village’s homes at night to photograph minors,” B’Tselem said in a recent statement. ”The soldiers order that anyone over ten years of age is woken, then they take their images and leave.”

The organization said at least four such operations had taken place in January 2011.

“Israel uses the photos to later identify people who throw stones during demonstrations that take place every Friday. After that the minors are arrested from their homes at night.”

The organization said video taken by its volunteers documents that a 14-year-old boy was arrested and interrogated while his parents were prohibited from accompanying him. The clip reveals how the soldiers rudely treat the child’s parents and then proceed to carry out the arrest. The boy remains in detention upon three weeks of the incident.

Hundreds of Palestinian minors are held in Israeli jails in violation of human rights principles and international conventions.

• Ten citizens suffer breathing difficulties in clashes with IOF soldiers
• Israeli navy kidnaps three Palestinian fishermen

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

THE BIRTH OF THE NEW EGYPTIANS

>Via PI

19. Feb, 2011 

Muriel Mirak-Weissbach

The victory of the Egyptian revolution has not only forced out a hated regime but has ushered in a new culture for the nation and the region. Whatever develops now politically in the transition to democratic rule, it is important to examine the subjective factors in the process, to try to go inside the mind of those who organized the demonstrations nation-wide, and also penetrate the mindset of President Mubarak and his cohorts. In this way one can grasp the reason why there is no way of bridging the gap between the two, and can appreciate the profound revolution in thinking that has taken place.

The Beauty of the Revolution

The Arab revolution, ignited in Tunisia and now spreading through Egypt and beyond, is a world-historical event. The 18-day protest movement which led to the fall of Hosni Mubarak is the third greatest moment for Egypt in the last century, following the revolt against British rule which led to independence in the early 1920s, and the revolution under Gamal Abd al Nasser in 1952.

As Rami Khouri noted in a moving article (http//www.siasat.pk/forum/showthread.php?55640-The-Arab-Freedom-Epic-By-Rami-G-Khouri), it was in the 1970-80s that many of the Arab states born in the aftermath of the First World War were transformed into police states, run by autocratic rulers who enriched themselves at the expense of the common good. Now, the Tunisian and Egyptian movements have overthrown two such rulers, and the Arabs as a people have asserted their humanity and regained their dignity.

The economic-social motivations for such dramatic upheaval have been identified widely in the major media: high unemployment, especially among youth who make up the majority of the population, a widening gap between the very rich – those who have benefited from the despotic regimes, pocketing funds through IMF-directed liberalization and privatization programs – and the very poor — those living on less than $2 a day, or even less; dictatorial rule lasting decades, with emergency laws allowing for arbitrary arrests and lengthy detention without charges brought; torture of political prisoners, estimated to range in the tens of thousands;  and so forth.(1)

This wretched state of affairs had prevailed for decades without serious opposition. Then suddenly — or so it seemed to observers, and foreign intelligence services who had not done their homework — people took to the streets. But it was not so sudden. True, the revolution that erupted in January was triggered by events in Tunisia, but the opposition had actually been organizing itself in Egypt since 2000. Prof. Ala Al-Hamarneh, a Jordanian at Mainz University in Germany, summarized the chronology of events in a presentation to students on February 10: the second Palestinian Intifada and the Iraq war provoked demonstrations at the Cairo University between 2000 and 2004; in the following year, when parliamentary elections took place widespread fraud occurred. The Kifaya movement came into being, after former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed, on a visit to Cairo, told a press conference that he had resigned as Prime Minister because “22 years are enough.” “Enough” – Kifaya – became the name of a robust opposition movement.(2)  In 2006-2007 strikes broke out against IMF-dictated privatization, in 2006 demonstrators expressed solidarity with Lebanon and, in 2008, with Gazans from the Israeli aggressions. In 2008, the April 6^th youth movement came into being as a strike-support committee for workers opposing privatization programs. (3) Then, in 2010, when the issue of presidential elections appeared on the agenda, an “ElBaradei for President” movement emerged, along with the “We are all Khaled Said” movement, led by Wael Ghonim, – Khaled Said is the name of an Egyptian blogger who was brutally tortured and killed by Egyptian security services in June 2010. At the same time, so-called parliamentary elections took place, and were so thoroughly rigged that even the few token opposition MPs allowed to sit there found their ranks decimated.

Thus, the revolution that broke out in January may have appeared to be a sudden event, but it was actually the culmination of a long, slow, methodical process of organized opposition to the regime. To be sure, the timing of the revolt was catalyzed by the Tunisian revolution which succeeded in record time in ousting dictator Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, and ushering in a national interest government.

What triggered that event was highly symbolic. A Tunisian man, though fully equipped with a college diploma, had found no other means to support his seven siblings, than to sell vegetables on a cart. When the authorities halted Mohammad Bouazizi’s trade one day because he had no “license,” the man appealed to the governor’s office, but was rebuffed. He doused himself with gas and set himself on fire. What might be construed as the gesture of a desperate individual was in reality a tragic event that epitomized the plight of an entire population. It was the act of a man who decided to sacrifice himself to send a message to the powers that be, that, to preserve his dignity as a human being, he would rather die than submit to such arbitrary humiliation.

Bouazizi’s sacrifice will be remembered, just as the case of Jan Palach in the 1969 Prague spring is remembered. Or, to go back farther in time, to the American civil rights movement of the 1960s; there it was not suicides but principled stands by black Americans, even under death threats, that energized a movement. It was the decision of one Rosa Parks to defend her dignity as a human being rather than give up her seat on a bus to a white that catalyzed action.

Freedom or Death

What fuelled the Egyptian revolution was this moral/political issue raised by Bouazizi. Mohammad Seyyed Selim, an Egyptian professor friend and well-known intellectual, told me in the first days of the demonstrations that what mobilized Egyptian youth was not the economic misery per se that their generation has been suffered, but the social and psychological degradation that accompanied it. Egyptian youth, he told me, “can endure deprivation, but not humiliation.” He had forecast in an article in Al Arabi on January 23 that Egypt would follow the Tunisian course, because the two countries shared the same conditions. A similar phenomenon has been manifest in the various uprisings by Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, in the Intifadas: they were rejecting not only the Israeli occupation of their lands, but the theft of their dignity as human beings.

This is the decisive subjective factor in the revolution’s success: young Egyptians who launched the demonstrations first showed the courage to defy the regime and its police state apparatus. After the Tunisian events, they overcame the fear that had held them and their compatriots in captive passivity over decades. When the regime responded with police attacks, and the first reports of casualties appeared, the movement maintained the moral high ground. It did not respond with violence, but continued to expand the mobilization. Anyone who followed the developments through satellite television stations over the days and weeks  experienced something new on the Egyptian horizon. Young people were standing up for their rights and articulating their demands in unprecedented form. “Mubarak must go” was demand number one; then, the regime must go, the emergency laws must be repealed, a new constitution and new elections must follow.
These were the political demands. But the central factor in the statements made by the demonstrators was their willingness to put their lives on the line for the cause. What they told worldwide TV audiences via satellite stations, whether militantly or quite calmly, was: I will stay here in Tahrir Square until Mubarak leaves. I will stay here until I die if necessary. One young man looking straight into the camera said, “It’s a question of freedom or death.” He may never have heard of Patrick Henry’s famous utterance, “give me liberty or give me death.” But he transmitted the same message. He who is ready to die for a cause knows what it means to be human. As Martin Luther King put it, “If a man hasn’t discovered something he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.”

This constitutes a fundamental revolution in thinking. I have had the opportunity to visit Cairo many times over the last decades and to present lectures to students at the University of Cairo, students who have now made history. In all my encounters there with undergraduates, I was impressed by their seriousness, their intellectual and political curiosity, and at the same time their respect for authority. When I was there in 2008, during the U.S. primary election campaigns, I talked to them about the perspectives inside the Democratic Party, outlining the different policy approaches of then-primary candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. At the end of the lecture, the professor from the US Studies Department who hosted the event organized a mock election: he asked his students whom they would vote for. Out of about 150 students, 5 or so — mostly women — cast their votes for Hillary, whereas the rest were enthusiastically pro-Obama. After Obama was elected president, he travelled to Cairo in June 2009 and gave a speech which was supposed to redefine relations between the US and the Arab and Islamic world. Whatever one thinks of the US president, one has to acknowledge that at that time his words did fire up young Egyptians with enthusiasm. Although Egyptian and other Arab youth were rightly disappointed by the new US government’s unwillingness to force the issue on Israeli settlements, still it should not be overlooked that among the slogans sported by demonstrators in Tahrir Square, were placards saying, YES WE CAN, and others saying, YES WE DO, i.e. we are moving beyond potential to action. This is not to suggest that Obama inspired the movement that brought Mubarak down. In fact, in TV coverage after Mubarak’s resignation, students interviewed in Tahrir Square were adamant in stressing that they had not received impetus from the US for their revolution, and quite defiantly added that they did not need it in the future. “This is our revolution,” said one young man, “and we can handle it.” The reference to the echoes of Obama in their slogans is merely an indication of the gradual shift in thinking among student layers over the past years, from a state of passivity, if not outright demoralization, to one of active engagement.

History has shown in the American civil rights movement of the 1960s, or more recently in the peaceful revolution of the East German population in 1989, that when a people declares that it is ready to die for its cause, there is no weapon capable of defeating it – short of mass murder. The massacres of demonstrators in Tienanmen Square in 1989 gave one example of total, brutal repression. And it should be noted that in that bloodbath, — although reliable figures are not available – it is estimated that somewhere between 400-800 people died; in Egypt, it was more than 300 – and yet they did not desist. As one young man put it, “They can’t kill us all.”

If “freedom or death” captured the political and moral stance of the revolutionaries, their practical, logistical organization of the demonstrations displayed an extraordinary ability to lead millions of Egyptian protestors peacefully day after day in their demands for fundamental social-economic reform. From the first demonstrations, when tens and then hundreds of thousands of Egyptians flooded the Tahrir Square, and similar locations in Alexandria and so on, there was no chaos, no anarchy. When vandals and thugs deployed against them, they set up neighborhood watch committees to protect persons and property. Student demonstrators showed they could mobilize masses and provide for their immediate needs – be it toilets, or water, or food, or medical assistance. A sense of social solidarity reigned which, as Mohammad Selim noted, recalled the climate back in the 1960s.

After Mubarak’s resignation, the organizers put out the word that, following well-deserved celebrations, demonstrators should return to Tahrir Square the next morning to clean up the premises. And they did. Why? Because for the first time in their lifetimes, these youth consider Tahrir Square, Cairo, indeed all of Egypt, as theirs, and they are taking responsibility to keep it clean and orderly. They are proud of their country, a country which has just become theirs. “Tomorrow morning,” said one youth quoted in the Frankfurter Allegemeine Zeitung on February 13, “we’re going to go to Tahrir Square and clean up our city.” “We are also cleansing the square from the filth of the past,” said a bank employee cited by the FAZ on February 13, “we want a clean, modern Egypt. Yesterday,” he went on,” we were still demonstrating, from today on, we will build a new Egypt.”

This was not only a logistical question. Beyond the material solidarity was the unprecedented political and social solidarity: on Sunday Coptic Christians prayed together in Tahrir Square with Muslims, Muslim Brotherhood members joined hands with secularists in the demos. This was particularly significant, since the Coptic Christians had been brutally suppressed by the Mubarak regime. During the revolutionary process, it came out, in fact, that the former Interior Minister Habib el-Adly, had personally organized the deadly assault on a Coptic Church in Alexandria on New Year’s eve, which led to the death of 24 people.

The new Egyptians have been born in this historic process. They are people from all walks of life, all social strata, all religious faiths. What unites them is a revolutionary fervor to usher in a new system of government, based on democracy and the equal rights of all citizens before the law. The TV interviews with the youth document that they have assumed a new political, moral, and historical identity. They tell CNN and other satellite stations’ cameramen: “I want to have the same freedom that you have, and will fight for it to the death.” Others say: “I have lived for decades in fear and trepidation, now that is gone, and I finally know that I am a human being, with dignity and rights.” One of the loudest slogans to be heard on February 11, when Mubarak had left, was: “Irfa rasak, anta misri! – Hold your head high, you are an Egyptian!” Others shouted: “Freedom! Civilization!” Most striking is in fact their proud reflection on their civilization which stretches back thousands of years. I saw one young man on satellite TV extolling the glories of Egypt’s past, from Abraham (!) on down. And, after government-deployed thugs attempted during the demonstrations to plunder the National Museum, it was demonstrators who set up cordons to keep the thugs out and protect the nation’s immense archaeological heritage.

This is the real revolution that has occurred in Egypt. Not Mubarak’s ouster per se – although that was the precondition—but the revolution in thinking on the part of a population, especially the youth, who were depressed and passive. Anyone who has visited Cairo over the past ten years as I have can recall the images of depression and despair. In front of every shop or public building in Cairo sat an old man in a battered kaftan, sipping tea and earning his couple of Egyptian pounds per day by guarding the building. Serving him tea was a young Egyptian boy who should have been in school, but instead was earning a pittance by working as a sidewalk waiter. In front of banks, hotels, and other large buildings were soldiers, police, and their official vehicles. Whether it was the national television building or the headquarters of the Arab League, or any ministry, everywhere the police and military maintained a very visible and at times intimidating presence. Hotel personnel were often obsequious, fawning over guests in hopes of a decent tip. Street vendors, like bazaaris, descended upon foreign visitors like buzzards, intent on extracting whatever bounty there might be, while scrawny cats fought over tidbits fallen from a tourist’s table. All this has changed. Egyptian novelist Chalid al-Chamissi – one of the leading intellectuals who had foreseen the revolutionary ferment back in 2007 – provided a wonderful insight into the internal change that had occurred among many ordinary Egyptians. “I promise you,” one fifty-year-old man (whom he did not know) told him on the street, “that from today on I will no longer pay any bribes to anyone.” Another told him, “I swear to God, that from this moment on and for my whole life, I will never again offend a young girl or a woman.”

On the Other Side of the Moon

From the onset of the upheaval, the big question was: what will Mubarak do? For days he and his government did nothing. Why? Here was a president of the most important Arab nation, backed over decades by the US among others, being challenged by demonstrators in a central city square, and he could not utter any word. In hindsight, it was perhaps that silence over days that depicted the regime’s inability und unwillingness to deal with the reality that was unfolding in Tahrir Square and throughout the nation.
Mubarak’s response – following four days’ silence – must be clinically assessed. The man demonstrated his inability to face reality and a panicked attempt to escape. His thinking seems to have been: Well, if things are getting unruly in Cairo, then why not go somewhere else? Why not go to the seashore? This is precisely what the Egyptian president did. He departed for his Red Sea resort at Sharm al Sheikh, hunkered in, and hoped to wait it out.

In truth, Mubarak was living not in Sharm al Sheikh, but on another planet. He demonstrated no understanding whatsoever of what was unfolding in Cairo, Alexandria, and other cities, and could only issue orders to his interior ministry forces and their brutal police to attack the demonstrators. His successive televised statements showed a man tossing crumbs to the famished multitudes, a man who believed somehow that the mere fact that he, the great leader, was issuing statements and orders would suffice to stem the tide of protest. When the demonstrations expanded and gained wider popular support, he gave the order for forces, depicted in the German media as “apocalyptic riders” on camels and horses, to attack the protestors. And yet the ranks of the protesters swelled, reaching millions. Although confronted with an expanding protest wave, which crucial social and economic layers were beginning to support – like trade unions, lawyers, doctors, and so forth – Mubarak still stubbornly insisted on maintaining his power, with the threat: if  I step down now, then chaos will engulf Egypt. In short: après moi, le deluge.

An Egyptian journalist explained to me that Mubarak’s psychological “peculiarities,” so to speak, were well known and duly taken into account by the institutions and press. Journalists who understood the problem worked around it. Thus, if a certain political faction with its friends in the press wanted to promote a certain individual, then the journalists would launch vicious attacks against the man. Mubarak would then read the attacks as an indication that perhaps the man had something to offer, and would promote him. And vice versa: anyone praised in the press would be immediately held as suspect by Mubarak. Contrariness and stubbornness are his best known traits. His reasoning was: if they say he’s good, he must be bad, because who are they? They do not know what they are talking about; I am the only one who can judge.

The Old Man in Politics Syndrome

Mubarak’s behavior is not unique. The relevant psychological/psychoanalytical literature offers ample material on the syndrome that the Egyptian “pharaoh” manifests. The syndrome of the ageing political leader has been studied in depth. The work by renowned German psychoanalyst Fritz Riemann, Die Grundformen der Angst (4), lays bare both the symptoms and the sources of the malady.

Old men in political life have two alternatives: either they gracefully resign from office and allow others to assume responsibility through democratic processes, or they cling hysterically to power until nature takes its course. Malaysian Prime Minister Mohammad al Mahathir is a case in point. After 22 years in power, he decided to step down, and has enjoyed the position of respected senior statesman ever since. (And, in parenthesis, during the last 10 years of his reign, he transformed Malaysia from a developing country into a modern industrial nation.)

Mubarak was constitutionally incapable of grasping the fact not only that he was too old, but that he was no longer desired by his own people. In terms of Riemann’s analysis, his behavior displayed characteristics of the hysterical personality.

This personality type has a deep fear of anything that is final, inevitable, necessary, anything that is perceived to limit one’s freedom. Among those processes that are necessary in life is the ageing process; the hysterical personality yearns for eternal youth, and uses cosmetic means – be it plastic surgery or dyeing one’s hair (as Mubarak has done) – to achieve the goal.

Hysterical personalities, when under attack, tend to try to turn the tables on their attackers. Thus, as demonstrators turned out en masse against Mubarak, he and state media put out the line that it was outside agitators, foreigners, terrorists, etc. who were sowing discord. As Riemann writes, when an individual realizes his shortcomings and guilt, then “the enemy image is especially appropriate and one gets the impression that enemy images have to be discovered in order to exonerate one’s own sense of guilt”(p. 222).  As a form of defense, the hysterical personality will seek to glorify himself or herself, coming across as the “first violin,” and this tendency will increase as the insecurity and discrepancy between one’s real identity and one’s presumed identity becomes more evident (p. 196). Thus Mubarak’s emphasis on his unique role as “father of the nation,” as hero in the wars against Israel, etc. Riemann writes: “Position and rank are not seen so much as a duty … but as an opportunity to enhance the luster of one’s personality, which is the reason why orders and titles seem so attractive” (p. 225).

The last inevitable realities of our lives, writes Riemann, are old age and death. Hysterical personalities tend to close their eyes as long as possible in front of these realities. “They attempt to keep the illusion of eternal youth alive and the image of a future full of possibilities for them” (p. 225). “They have perhaps the greatest difficulty in understanding growing old with dignity, but have the ability to elevate their past and to live in memories, which they have adapted according to their desires and in which they play the leading role.” Think of Mubarak’s last speech, glorifying his past as a military leader.

This personality type also characteristically dreams of being able to solve critical problems through some extraordinary means: the person hopes to find solutions for absolutely hopeless situations – like the daily demonstrations in Tahrir Square – by dreaming one might be able to mobilize some magic capabilities.
Riemann’s study, which is a classic in psychological/psychoanalytical literature, provides precious insight by a professional, clinical analyst into the inner workings of a mind like that of Mubarak. But Mubarak is not alone. The syndrome can be observed in nearby Yemen, where President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has been in power for 32 years, is fighting for his political life. Algeria is another case in point, not to mention some of the Arab Gulf states, like Saudi Arabia, where the rules of succession tend to perpetuate the rule of octogenarians. (5) Those few political figures who dared to come out openly in support of Mubarak, like the hapless Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi, should also be seen from a clinical standpoint, of persons who are projecting: the no-longer-so-young Italian premier is under massive political and public pressure to step down, but he presents the same psychological traits of Mubarak; he swears it is all a conspiracy against him, and that he will never step down.

It is not infrequent that when such ageing leaders struggle hysterically to maintain their positions, they sacrifice their own followers and students in the attempt to maintain total control and assert their own undying authority. Riemann notes that hysterical personalities will often end close relations with friends or associates, a manifestation of their inability to maintain durable personal relations (p. 191). The case of Dr. Hassan al-Turabi in Sudan is a good example. Here, what is interesting is the erratic decision of the part of the Islamist leader to openly move against the political leadership layer that he himself had educated over many years. After having successfully brought his movement to power in Sudan, in 1999 he launched a political challenge against President Omar al– Bashir, one of his students, and thus challenged his former associates to take sides, either with him or with Bashir. His students refused his demand and stayed with the president. Turabi later joined the Darfur Justice and Equality Movement and endorsed a march of that group on Khartoum.
Riemann’s insight into the phenomenon of the hysterical personality provides a precious aid in understanding how and why Hosni Mubarak attempted, against all odds, to maintain his presidential authority even after millions of his citizens had defied police and other forms of state-organized violence, to demonstrate for their inalienable rights as human beings. Riemann’s study is particularly valuable because it presents the characteristic behavior patterns of a Mubarak – and of his contemporaries among the ageing Arab leadership caste – in the form of clinical studies. And, by contrast, one can better appreciate – and celebrate — the healthy winds of change brought in by the revolutionary movement – the new Egyptians.

Notes
1. The extent of poverty in Egypt is not generally known. Stories were circulating in Cairo about desperate Egyptian youth who sold body organs (kidneys) through a black market, to earn money to keep families alive. Other reports I received referred to impoverished Egyptian families who would sell a daughter to a rich Gulf sheikh who would “marry” her, keep her as a wife, and then, after she had become pregnant leave her to her own devices.
2. I had the opportunity to attend public meetings by Dr. Mahathir in Cairo in March 2005, and to interview him. His impact on the then-developing revolutionary movement in Egypt cannot be underestimated.
3. April 6: http://shabab6april.wordpress.com/shabab-6-april-youth-movement-about-us-in-english
4. Fritz Riemann, Grundformen der Angst, Ernst Rheinhardt, GmbH & Co KG, Verlag, Muenchen, 1961, 2006.
5. Much has been written about the domino effect of the Arab revolution, but one should keep in mind the profound demographic, economic, and social differences between the oil-rich Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuweit etc., on the one hand, and the countries of the Maghreb, Palestine, Lebanon, etc. The Gulf states have generally small populations, mainly linked to the ruling families, who enjoy a relatively high standard of living, plus foreign workers who have no rights whatsoever. So the social chemistry is not at all comparable to that in Tunisia, Egypt, Algeria, Palestine and so forth.

__________________________

Muriel Mirak-Weissbach is the author of  the book, “Through the Wall of Fire: Armenia – Iraq – Palestine: From Wrath to Reconciliation,”  edition fischer, 2009. She can be reached at mirak.weissbach@googlemail.com and www.mirak-weissbach.de

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

I want to tell the world

I want to tell the world a story About a home with a broken lantern And a burnt doll About a picnic that wasn’t enjoyed About an axe that killed a tulip A story about a fire that consumed a plait a story about a tear that couldn’t run down I want to tell a story about a goat that wasn’t milked About a mother’s dough that wasn’t baked About a wedding that wasn’t celebrated And a baby girl that didn’t grow up About a football that wasn’t kicked About a dove that didn’t fly I want to tell a story about a key that wasn’t used About a classroom that wasn’t attended About a playground that was silenced About a book that wasn’t read About a besieged lonely farm And about its fruits that weren’t picked About a lie that wasn’t discovered A story about a church that’s no longer prayed in And a mosque that no longer stands And a culture no longer rejoiced I want to tell a story about a muddy grassy roof About a stone that faced a tank And about a stubborn flag that refuses to lie down About a spirit that cannot be defeated I want to tell the world a story Now light a little candle for Palestine You can do it Light a candle One little candle Watch the darkness fade away Just try it out One ray of light Wipes away the gloomiest Jet-black nights As the dawn breaks Just observe Can you see that All the might of darkness In the world Cannot extinguish The faintest flicker Of a beam of light Light a candle One little candle Watch the darkness fade away You can do it Hey.. WORLD Did you hear me?

 

>Geert Wilders-Europe Leading Islamophob

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Friday, February 18, 2011 at 4:03PM Gilad Atzmon

He was once refused entry to Britain. He has called for the Qur’an to be banned and has proposed a tax on wearing headscarves. And he is also the first politician ever to stand trial on charges of ‘incitement to hatred’. Geert Wilders, instantly recognisable for his quiff of platinum blond hair, is one of Holland’s most controversial and well-known politicians and, some argue, Europe’s most dangerous man.

Bafta-winning filmmakers Mags Gavan and Joost van der Valk follow Wilders on his campaign trail during the recent Dutch elections, meet members of the international anti-Islamic network who support him, and find out about a conspiracy theory promoting the belief that Europe is being taken over by Islam.

With anti-Islamic, anti-immigration parties on the rise all over the European continent, why has Wilders, on the brink of real power in the Netherlands, become the poster boy for the far right?

Political science professor: Abbas and his entourage must leave

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[ 19/02/2011 – 07:57 AM ]

RAMALLAH, (PIC)– Dr. Abdul-Sattar Qasem, a professor of political sciences at the Al-Najah National University, called on Palestinian de facto president Mahmoud Abbas to step down from office, describing steps Abbas has taken to thwart West Bank settlement activity as ”worthless”.

“There is an attempt to disparage the people’s minds, ” Qasem told the PIC in an interview on Friday night. ”What is the value of a resolution from the United Nations regarding the illegality of settlement activity when there are already many resolutions stating settlement activity is illegal and not consistent with international law?”

Abbas has gone before the UN Security Council to pass a resolution condemning settlement activity, a move the US used its veto to thwart.

“Whether they go or do not go [before the UN] … nothing will change, and settlement activity will not be stopped,” Qasem said, adding that the PA has nothing left in its power.

An attention turner

Discussing marches Fatah called for Friday night in support of Abbas’s position, Qasem said: ”This is something trivial. Why are they gathering staff and security men and rallying them in marches similar to what Arab regimes that are beginning to fail have used to do?”

He said the move was designed to ”divert the attention” of movements in the Palestinian street which has rejected the concessions made by Abbas and Palestinian negotiators.

They must go

Qasem shed light on what is expected of the Palestinian Authority in coping with the current wave of change sweeping the region. ”What is required is that he (Abbas) leaves us along with his group. It is enough what they have engaged in throughout 23 years (in leadership).”

This is the demand of the general public throughout occupied Palestinian land especially the West Bank, he said. ”The Ramallah authority has insulted our people and made us a laughing stock and has caused havoc in the land and renounced our people’s rights and committed many acts our people are not pleased with.”

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

How Zionism infiltrated the US [EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW]

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MCS

– 20. Feb, 2011

Mark Bruzonsky, a Jewish, American Scholar and Journalist, has been a key member behind the scenes of the Israeli Palestinian peace initiative in the 1980s, meeting with Former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and with Palestinian officials.

Interview with Scholar and Journalist, Mark Bruzonsky

http://www.presstv.ir/player/player1.swf

In this exclusive interview with Press TV’s Autograph, Mr. Bruzonsky talks about the challenges and missed opportunities he witnessed first-hand, and how Zionist groups infiltrated American politics, US institutions and organizations.

He goes further to explain the specific time and day Obama sold out to the AIPAC (American- Israeli Public Affairs Committee) lobby, and how President Obama would never dare oppose the stronghold of the Zionist, Israeli Lobby in the US.

Press TV: In 1982, Mr. Bruzonsky, you authored the Paris Declaration- a breakthrough event that greatly contributed to political developments of the time. Please tell us about that.

Bruzonsky: In the 1980s, in a sense, a lot of us knew there was this political cancer; it was very bad, it was eating up the patient and needed to be dealt with and cured. I was in Paris sitting in a hotel room, a big event in my life, with four very important people – I was there to do the work and write the document.
These people were the former president of France – Pierre Mendis France; the founder of the World Zionist Organization and the World Jewish Congress – Nahem Goldman; his successor, who was the only Jewish leader in America who had ever been president of B’nai Brith and World Jewish Congress and Secretary of Commerce. The man who inspired it was the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s (PLO) Isam Sartawi, the head of the PLO in Europe. They signed this document called the Paris Declaration, I wrote it and it was on the entire front page of Le Monde newspaper; Arafat responded and that was on the front page also.

But then we ran out of steam. The organizations that had founded were not willing to even entertain a discussion on what they had signed; they disassociated themselves from the people who founded their own organizations.

So then the Donahue show asked me to be on their show. The Donahue TV show was the only talk show in America at that time, there was no other competition and I went on it after no other Jewish leaders would accept to go on the program. The timing of the show was pre-intifada, pre-apartheid and there were very few Israeli settlements on Palestine occupied land at the time and the discussion was all about how to bring peace to the region. The two-state solution (with ‘Solution’ emphasized) was in fact a possible solution – it wasn’t going to be totally fair, the Palestinians were going to get a small piece of territory compared to their homeland, but at least there was a lot of support from political people to make it happen. That world is gone. The two-state solution is now dead with the possible exception that you would have to roll back a tremendous number of things that have happened; that’s not going to happen.

The reason that is not going to happen is not because President Obama is not a smart man, not because he doesn’t know that cancer has gotten a lot worse; he knows all that. He also knows that politically he is totally blocked. There is no way in the world he can come up against the Israeli Jewish lobby and their great group of institutions, personalities and foundations – no way. He knows it.

So he continues to talk the language of two-state solution, but that’s largely to keep Abbas and the Palestinian Authority (PA) from being totally discredited.

Press TV: During his inaugural as US president reports were circulating that his administration was going to move away from the Bush doctrine of rejecting Hamas into talks. Where does Hamas stand in the equation? Can there even be talks with the Palestinians when Hamas is sidelined?

Bruzonsky: In my cable TV program that I ended in 2003 I interviewed Musa Abu Marsuk the No.2 leader in Hamas. He was in New York under arrest at the time. I think it was 1996 and the Israeli Jewish lobby got the congress to pass a law outlawing Hamas and so Abu Marsuk, who was living in America as a successful businessman, was imprisoned. I got permission to interview him and do three reality TV programs. I don’t think the Obama people ever said anything positive about Hamas; I think they did say they were going to re-invigorate the peace process – but those are just words, slogans, the devil is in the detail and all that meant was that we (the US) are going to say they have to stop building settlements.

Well, Obama made a joke and a fool out of himself. Didn’t anyone tell what was going to happen the moment he tried to get the Israelis to stop building settlements? There is a whole history that goes back to Camp David and US President Carter who also told the world that he had got the Israelis to agree to stop settlements and then the Israelis at that time made a fool out of that president by saying they had discussed freezing settlements, but only for 90 days. And then after that they escalated their program and we now live in the world we live in.

The story of how Obama became president, how he got support is important here. Obama is a different kind of president and we were all relieved. It was very embarrassing for eight years and more so for people throughout the world that suffered and were being killed by a US president who frankly (it’s not said in Washington and it’s not the kind of thing said at meetings, but many of us consider them as war criminals and we consider Chaney and Bush; they fit the definition of war criminals).

When Obama ran for president he stood for human rights, he was bright and principled, but then during the campaign certain things happened.
First of all the top financiers of the Democratic Party half of them are Jewish and almost all of those are quite Zionist and quite involved with the Israelis. At the time when Hilary Clinton and Obama were competing for support AIPAC had its annual convention. On that day Obama gave a speech and he gave more than what was expected. Lee Hamilton who was on Obama’s advisory board said to me that he went too far – he shouldn’t have said what he said about Jerusalem – we’re going to be correcting it. After the speech, behind the scenes, he was taken to meet the Board of Directors of AIPAC. Rahm Israel Emanuel, former White House Chief of Staff escorted him upstairs to the hotel room.

This is very unusual, presidency candidates don’t usually get interviewed by boards of directors like this, but AIPAC is different. The way the Israeli community signaled that they were going to support Obama, without actually announcing that they had even had a meeting with him, was to have Rahm endorse Obama. So a few hours later Rahm came out in public and did that, which was the signal to the rest of us that Obama had made his peace with this lobby and that he wasn’t going to be able to do anything they weren’t going to approve of.

Press TV: You mentioned that it was well-known to you that the Arab-Israeli conflict will be political cancer if it was not resolved, and at this point it has become the cancer that you mentioned. What has been the main obstacle of not reaching a solution?

Bruzonsky: America is the super power – American money; American arms; American UN vetos; American military support at critical times. The Israelis took a decision way back in the 1940s – and it goes back to the holocaust and back to Jewish impotence; there’s lots of factors it’s not black and white. It was a powerless community, I was part of it – born into a family that my mother and father would tell me we lost all of our relatives nobody knows where they are or they were all killed or maybe some escaped to what had become Israel.

The US has prevented a settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict because the Israelis set up such powerful institutions, lobbies, publications, personalities and control in various ways of political parties and of the media making it impossible for American leaders to do what they knew they should do to solve this cancer; and it goes way back to General Marshall the secretary of state. When President Truman told Marshall that he was going to accept a Jewish state, Marshall was going to resign saying it’s not in the interests of the US it is going to be war, which we won’t be able to end; it’s going to get worse; it’s going to unleash forces we won’t be able to control – he was exactly right.

At every critical moment since: Eisenhower tried to do things in the 1950s, carter tried to do things in the 1970s, but they were blocked. There are plenty of books and academic information about this.

The Israelis then realized since they had control of the US, and Sharon said it bluntly back in 2001, he and Peres had a little debate in a cabinet meeting and the word that leaked out from that meeting was that Peres said that we’ve got to be careful, the Americans aren’t happy with what we’re doing and Sharon said stop worrying about the Americans we control things in America, I’ll take care of things there don’t worry about it. – And he was right.

I’ve been watching all this. I did a lot of traveling for a lot of years through the Middle East while the US has been my home base; and it’s been outrageous.

Bruzonsky: I was a kid journalist just out of school. The Egyptian Embassy in Washington read something I had written. It was a movie review about a film called, “Children of Rage.” And they called me and said it was very interesting and asked if I would like to be the first Jewish journalist that has ever been invited by our government. Of course I said yes. So I went for three weeks and I met everybody: the Foreign Minister, the Minister of State, and then they said to me that they knew the three weeks were up but they wanted me to stay longer because the President wanted to meet with me. And they were so surprised when I said I could stay one more day, but I really have other places I have to go. So I said to thank him so much and it was a great honor and so nice to meet all of them, and I took off.

I went to Oman and then I went to Israel. There was going to be a big peace conference and you will see the connections in just a minute. There was going to be this big peace conference. So I get to Israel and I go to the new outlet magazine, which was sponsoring the conference and George Ball, the most important under Secretary of State, the man who helped resolve the Cuban Missile Crisis was going to be the speaker. And they said to me Mark where have you been. And I said I’ve just been to Egypt. I said I’m here because they wanted me to stay and meet the President but I’m at your peace conference. And they said oh my god don’t you know what has happened. And I didn’t because I had been traveling and it wasn’t like you could tune in to Al-Jazeera in those days. They said the President gave a speech and said he is willing to go anywhere and do anything to bring peace. They said you were supposed to have a meeting with him, and I said yes.

I was in Israel for about six hours. They gave me a whole bunch of cash and wrote a letter and said Mark go back to Cairo and meet the President and invite him to come to our peace conference. So later I’m sitting with the President of Egypt and am given him this invitation, and he was asking me about my three weeks in his country. So there I am and it’s a little hard for me to believe that I’m sitting with the President of Egypt all alone. Maybe forty to fifty feet away there is someone from the Minister of the Interior or somebody to protect, but he can’t even hear he was so far away. And I was so disappointed because at the end of the meeting which was very nice he said I’m very sorry but I will not be able to come to your peace conference. Then I suppose I was just looking sad. I don’t remember saying anything. But he said I have decided I will send a telegram to this conference. And I already knew that leaders in the Arab world do not send telegrams to Israel. I had never heard of such a thing. There wasn’t a procedure. I figured it was just his way of being polite to me. I literally had to leave on the first flight in the morning, and I went to a travel agent that was recommended to me, but at the moment I whispered Israel it was don’t say anther word about Israel.

We can’t talk about Israel and there is no way we can get you to Israel. He said first flight in the morning goes to Athens and that is all I can do. So I said okay and I’m on my flight to Athens. I’m dog tired and I’m half asleep. I traveled so much in those days the moment anybody asked me anything I would say orange juice and English. When I woke up on the plane, there was this newspaper in front of me, The Egyptian Gazette. And I wasn’t sure if was hallucinating or dreaming because as my eyes cleared I said good god that’s me. There is this big picture of me and Sadat on the front page at the top of the paper. But there was no story. It was just Journalist Mark Bruzonsky meets President Sadat. There was no story; no nothing. A day later I’m called aside by the Chairman of the conference. He said Mark in one hour there is a press conference and all the media will be here.

You have to come sit up front and you have to tell everybody about your meeting with the President. And I said what’s going on, what’s going on. He said you know the office is closed but we are all at the hotel. We sent somebody back to get some papers and under the door is this telegram. It wasn’t just oh, hope you had a nice conference. It was a whole page of the importance of peace to the region and what this conflict has done. It was a very long statement which I learned later was written for him. And for 24 hours I was the guy who met the President! It was I that had arranged this telegram and then on Thursday morning came the unbelievable announcement. The President of Egypt arrives to Israel on Shabbat (Saturday) as soon as the sun goes down. And it’s like something out of some dream, as people starting arriving within hours. A press center was set up in almost minutes. There were free phones. Anybody could pick up a phone and call anywhere. And on Saturday night he arrived and I went to the airport with the Egyptian press delegation. We all thought the world was going to change now.
The Israelis would feel accepted, the Palestinians would have their homeland, for at the time it was called a homeland and we weren’t even talking about a state. Then unfortunately everything started to deteriorate, and three years later Sadat was assassinated and it has been downhill ever since.

Press TV: So the postphonement on the decision on settlements led to the fact that it termed from an occupation issue in the eyes of the international community, and everyone who was observing the settlement issues thought it was a contested issue. At that point the issue of settlement could be contested after Oslo. Before that it was an occupation and it wasn’t even discussed.

Bruzonsky: Once the Israelis got the PA (Abbas was the man who actually signed the document) at the White House. Once that got them to sign this agreement and become their collaborating regime without having to agree to stop the settlements. That’s symbolic. If the Israelis weren’t going to stop enlarging the occupation, how could we possibly consider this a major step on the way to a peace settlement? So it was the symbolism of it. Not the actual settlement here or there. The Israelis never intended to stop the settlements.

Rabin in my judgment never attended for what he was signing to end up being a Palestinian state. For them it was autonomy we packaged under different names and they were hiring Arafat and his people to control the Palestinian people. That of course is the origin of the growth of Hamas because many non-religious people and many who had been supporters of Fatah and of more secular things decided we are going to support Hamas. At least they are honest and dignified. At least they have principals and are not corrupt. And Fatah has sold us out. That’s the origins of how in 2006 Hamas was elected.

Press TV: I’m going to dare ask this question to wrap up. Is there light at the end of the tunnel?

Bruzonsky: It’s a very long, dark tunnel now but hopefully saner, wiser policies will prevail down the road. And we can’t afford this anymore. Our own empire is collapsing financially, morally, and spiritually in terms of the credibility of American institutions. We don’t feel it so much in Washington, but around the country, the Tea Party and the other movements is representative of a feeling that our future is dissolving in our place in the world, and our standard of living and what we are providing for our children. There is big conflict here and we don’t have the resources to continue these policies even if you want to argue the policies are right.

Press TV: Mark Bruzonsky, thank you very much for joining us on the Autograph.

Bruzonsky: Thank you Susan.

NM/PKH
Mark Bruzonsky holds dual advanced degrees in international affairs and law from Princeton University and New York University where he was a Root-Tilden Scholar. He is a journalist and international affairs consultant and the publisher of MiddleEast.org as well as the now under development WashReport.  He writes and speaks frequently about world affairs, U.S. foreign policy, the Middle East, the underlying realities of policy-making in Washington, and U.S.-Israeli relations. [Read more]

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US vetoes UN vote on settlements

>Washington blocks resolution condemning Israeli buildings on Palestinian land as illegal and calling for quick halt.

The United States vetoed a UN resolution Friday that would have condemned Israeli settlements as “illegal” and called for an immediate halt to all settlement building.

All 14 other Security Council members voted in favour of the resolution.

British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant, speaking on behalf of his country, France and Germany, condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank. “They are illegal under international law,” he said.
 Palestine will join the United Nations as a new member state by September 2011.

The Obama administration’s veto is certain to anger Arab countries and Palestinian supporters around the world. An abstention would have angered the Israelis, the closest US ally in the region, as well as Democratic and Republican supporters of Israel in the American Congress.

Washington says it opposes settlements in principal, but claims that the UN Security Council is not the appropriate venue for resolving the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

US ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice told council members that the veto “should not be misunderstood to mean we support settlement activity.

“While we agree with our fellow council members and indeed with the wider world about the folly and illegitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity, we think it unwise for this council to attempt to resolve the core issues that divide Israelis and Palestinians,” she said.

Palestinians said the veto is counterproductive to the peace process, helps Israel maintain illegal buildings.
“The American veto does not serve the peace process and encourages Israel to continue settlements, and to escape the obligations of the peace process,” said Nabil Abu Rdainah, a close aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Pressure to drop resolution

Earlier, the Obama administration has exerted pressure on the Palestinian Authority to drop the UN resolution in exchange for other measures.

Abbas has refused Washington’s request to withdraw a UN Security Council resolution demanding Israel to freeze settlement expansion on occupied Palestinian land.

The decision was made unanimously by the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s executive and the central committee of Abbas’s Fatah movement on Friday, at a meeting to discuss US President Barack Obama’s appeal to Abbas by telephone a day earlier.

“The Palestinian leadership has decided to proceed to the UN Security Council, to pressure Israel to halt settlement activities. The decision was taken despite American pressure,” said Wasel Abu Yousef, a PLO executive member.

Obama, who had said Israeli settlements in territories it captured in a 1967 war are illegal and unhelpful to the peace process, says the resolution could shatter hopes of reviving the stalled talks.

In a 50-minute phone call on Thursday, he asked Abbas to drop the resolution and settle for a non-binding statement condemning settlement expansion, Palestinian officials said.

‘Goldstone 2’

“Caving in to American pressure and withdrawing the resolution will constitute Goldstone 2,” said a Palestinian official, speaking on terms of anonymity before the meeting.

He was referring to the wave of protest in October 2009 accusing Abbas of caving in to US pressure by agreeing not to submit for adoption a UN report that accused Israel and Hamas of war crimes during the invasion of Gaza two years ago.

Abbas maintains he insisted on submitting the report. A second Palestinian official, speaking before the decision was formalised, said it would be “a political catastrophe if we withdraw this resolution”.
“People would take to the streets and would topple the president,” he said, noting the wave of protest in the Arab world that swept out the Egyptian and Tunisian presidents.

The Palestinians say continued building flouts the internationally-backed peace plan that will permit them to create a viable, contiguous state on the 1967 land, after a treaty with Israel to end its occupation and 62 years of conflict.

Israel says this is an excuse for avoiding peace talks and a precondition never demanded before during 17 years of negotiations, which has so far produced no agreement.

The diplomatic standoff is complicated by the effects of Middle East turmoil on the Arab League, whose members backed the resolution. Egypt, a dominant member, and Tunisia are preoccupied with their transitions from deposed autocracies, and protests are flaring in Libya, Yemen and Bahrain.

Washington is trying to revive peace talks stalled since September over Israel’s refusal to extend a moratorium on settlement building and Abbas’s refusal to negotiate further until the Israelis freeze the illegal buildings.

‘Nothing to lose’

Obama initially pressured Israel to maintain the moratorium only to relent in the run-up to the 2010 US mid-term elections to avoid, some analysts said, alienating key voters.

Instead of the resolution, Obama told Abbas he would back a fact-finding visit by a delegation of the Security Council to the occupied territories.

One PLO official said the leadership was determined not to cave in “even if our decision leads to a diplomatic crisis with the Americans”, adding: “Now we have nothing to lose.”

Kristin Saloomey, Al Jazeera’s correspondent in New York, said that the US has been doing everything it can to stop this vote from happening, including incentives and threats.

“Apparently Obama threatened [on the phone to Abbas] that there would be repercussions if this vote actually came to the floor of the UN Security Council,” she said.

“Today secretary of state, Hilary Clinton, called president Abbas [to put on more pressure] but none of this is getting through to the Palestinians.

“Obama is facing intense domestic pressure not to support the vote. The US is in a tough position, they know that a veto is going to make them look very bad in the Arab world … and also the rest of the world is really in support of this resolution.

“All of the Security Council members are on the record saying they are going to vote for this resolution including US allies”.

Since 2000, 14 Security Council resolutions have been vetoed by one or more of the five permanent members — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. Of those, 10 were US vetoes, nine of them related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Radwan: American veto blatant bias in favor of Israel

[ 19/02/2011 – 09:50 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)– Dr. Ismail Radwan, a Hamas leader, has charged that the US veto against a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlement activity in the occupied Palestinian land reflected absolute bias in favor of Israel.

He said in a statement on Friday night that the veto also constituted a slap in the face of the Fatah-controlled authority in the West Bank that had wagered on the US.

He underlined that there was no more excuse for de facto president Mahmoud Abbas to continue in the frivolous settlement process.

For his part, Fawzi Barhoum, a Hamas spokesman, described the American veto as “shameful”, adding that it unmasked the American role that obstructs the international consensus on illegitimacy of Israeli settlement activity in the occupied lands.

He said in a press release on Saturday that the veto was an American reward for the Israeli occupation’s crimes and violations against the Palestinian people.

“The US administration was never honest in its patronage of any settlement project or peace process,” Barhoum said.

He urged Abbas and his authority to end all forms of negotiations with Israel and to solidify the internal Palestinian front in face of challenges.

The US on Friday vetoed a UNSC resolution to condemn Israeli settlement activity, which was approved by 14 members out of the 15-member council.

Helen Thomas: Jews didn’t have to leave Europe following Holocaust

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In CNN interview, veteran reporter refuses to call comments urging Jews to leave Israel and return to Europe insensitive, says Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians is the real insensitivity.

By Haaretz Service

The Jews did not have to leave Germany and Poland following the Holocaust since they were not being persecuted anymore, former White House correspondent Helen Thomas said in an interview on Thursday, adding that the Jews had no right to take other people’s land.

Thomas, 90, stepped down from her job as a columnist for Hearst News Service in June of last year after a rabbi and independent filmmaker videotaped her outside the White House calling on Israelis to get “out of Palestine.”

She gave up her front row seat in the White House press room, where she had aimed often pointed questions at 10 presidents, going back to Eisenhower.

Speaking of the controversial comments in an interview with CNN’s Joy Behar on Thursday, Thomas said she did not regret her comments, saying that the Jews did not have to go anywhere after the Holocaust.

“There hasn’t been persecution since that, since World War II. You don’t take other people’s land,” Thomas said in reference to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

When Behar asked Thomas if she realized that her comment regarding sending the Jews back to Poland and Germany were insensitive in view of the past the Jews share with those countries, the former correspondent said: “I also said Russia.”

“Well Russia, they had their share of anti-Semitic pogroms,” the CNN interviewer said, to which Thomas answered: “They also had 25 million who died in World War II…. More than that.”

“They didn’t have to go anywhere really, because they weren’t being persecuted anymore but they were taking other people’s land,” Thomas said, adding of the perceived insensitivity of her comments by saying: “Count how many Palestinians are in jails now, taken from their homes, a million refugees, is that sensitive?”

Responding to Behar’s question whether or not she considered herself to be anti-Semitic, Thomas said: “Hell no! I’m a Semite…of Arab background,” and saying of the Jews: “They’re not Semites. I mean, most of them are from Europe.”

Thomas also referred to the widespread uproar which her comments caused, saying she “didn’t realize it would ring that many bells, because they’ve [the Jews] been free ever since.”

When asked by Behar how would she revise her comments in view of the reactions they garnered, Thomas said: “Why do they have to go anywhere? They aren’t being persecuted! They don’t have the right to take other people’s land. Under international law occupied land should not be annexed,” Thomas said.

The former White House correspondent did, however, say she did not accurately gauge the backlash to her comments, saying that there was a change they got “me in trouble, but everything is distorted. But I don’t care. ”

“We have organized lobbyists in favor of Israel, you can’t open your mouth. I can call the president of the United States anything in the book, but you say one thing about Israel and you’re off limits,” Thomas said.

“I have regrets that everyone misinterpreted it and distorted it, and you have the Ari Fleshcer and the Abe Foxman distorting everything, so I certainly knew that and I should of kept my mouth shut, probably.”

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

From the Horse’s Mouth

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Friday, February 18, 2011 at 4:07PM Gilad Atzmon

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Justice For Palestine – Steve Biko Thomas

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Friday, February 18, 2011 at 4:54PM Gilad Atzmon

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

WINEP: Hezbollah … First & last.

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Via Friday-Lunch-Club.

“… Even as the Hizballah-led coalition prepares to take the reins of power, crowning the group as the dominant political force in Lebanon, a series of international criminal investigations have highlighted the organization’s illicit activities at home and abroad. From money laundering and narcotrafficking to the Hariri assassination, Hizballah’s track record of worldwide criminal activity may soon catch up with its political ambitions at home.
Conspiracy to Support the Taliban..
Trafficking Drugs and Laundering Money…
Prime Suspects in Hariri Assassination..
Hizballah is greatly concerned about the prospect of public indictments in the Hariri case, in large part because some of the group’s senior members have already been named in the media as potential suspects. These include Qassem Suleiman, Hajj Salim, Abdul Majid Ghamloush, brothers Hussein and Mouin Khreis, and, most significantly, Mustafa Badreddine. The latter is the brother-in-law of Imad Mughniyah — the assassinated chief of Hizballah’s external operations, known as the “Islamic Jihad Organization” (IJO) — and himself a senior IJO official….
Meanwhile, Hizballah regularly follows tribunal investigators on the ground in Lebanon and uses intimidation tactics against them. The group reportedly collects information on tribunal officials entering and leaving the country through airport surveillance, creating an environment in which investigators do not feel safe. The January 25, 2008, assassination of Lebanese Internal Security Forces captain Wissam Eid, who was detailed to the Hariri investigation, underscored those fears. According to a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation report, the investigation of Eid’s murder — which also falls under the tribunal’s jurisdiction — implicated two more senior Hizballah officials, Hussein Khalil and Wafiq Safa.….. In the meantime, Saad Hariri’s calls for massive protests in Beirut on March 14, coming on the heels of events in Egypt and Tunisia, could pose a more immediate political challenge to Hizballah — especially when it is already under the spotlight for operating less like a “resistance group” and more like a global criminal organization.

Posted by G, Z, or B at 1:48 PM

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HASBARA SPAM ALERT FEB.16 2011

>

by Richard Silverstein 

–  The Guardian –  9 January 2011

Via MCS

The hasbara brigade strikes again! You always hear about Israeli attempts at media manipulation. Everyone knows it’s going on but usually the process happens through cyber insurgents like those involved with Giyus (and its media monitoring software, Megaphone). Now, we know that the Israeli foreign ministry itself is orchestrating propaganda efforts designed to flood news websites with pro-Israel arguments and information.

A reader of my blog has received the following email which documents both the efforts and the agency that originated them. The solicitation to become a pro-Israel “media volunteer” also includes a list of media links which the ministry would like addressed by pro-Israel comments:

Dear friends,
We hold the [sic] military supremacy, yet fail the battle over the international media. We need to buy time for the IDF to succeed, and the least we can do is spare some (additional) minutes on the net. The ministry of foreign affairs is putting great efforts in balancing the media, but we all know it’s a battle of numbers. The more we post, blog, talkback, vote – the more likely we gain positive sentiment.
I was asked by the ministry of foreign affairs to arrange a network of volunteers, who are willing to contribute to this effort. If you’re up to it you will receive a daily messages & media package as well as targets.
If you wish to participate, please respond to this email.

My friend did so and received this official communique from the ministry with talking points about Operation Cast Lead which s/he was to use in her/his propaganda efforts. Among the links was was a Peter Beaumont Cif piece. The following were identified as “target sites”: the Times, the Guardian, Sky News, BBC, Yahoo!News, Huffington Post, and the Dutch Telegraaf. Also targeted were other media sites in Dutch, Spanish, German and French considered critical of the invasion.

Locally, here in Seattle, peace activists held a rally at our federal building attended by 500 protesters. In the foreign ministry communique issued the next day, activists were directed to comment in the Seattle Post Intelligencer’s article about the demonstration. The comment thread for the article is riddled with clear hasbara “plants” who distort the balance and tone of the discussion with their programmed arguments, making it much more favorable than it otherwise would be.

Here the foreign ministry’s coordinator describes a meeting he attended at the government’s offical office:

Hi all,
I had a meeting in the ministry of foreign affairs today, and was very happy to hear that their metrics show that Israel’s position in the internet is getting better every day. It means that you’re doing a good job! MFA are concerned with the biased public opinion in Europe. So please focus your efforts on European media.
What can you do to help?
– Identify internet battle-grounds in different languages, and let me know
– Comment/post/vote in the listed links and others; you can use the material attached below
– Write letters to authors and editors. Identify yourself as a local resident
– Have your friends join this activity

This message was meant to encourage the pro-Israel activists in their work:

World governments are still patient with Israel’s justified operation in Gaza. The [sic] public opinion, on the other hand, is impatient, to say the least. This gap will soon close – it always does.
It is our goal to shift the public opinion, as conveyed in the internet; avoiding, or at least minimising, sanctions by world leaders. We need to buy the IDF enough time to achieve its goals.

Besides the talking points provided by the foreign ministry to the pro-Israel web activists, they are offered online pro-Israel material to link to in their comments such as these:Bicom.org.uk/

Aish HaTorah’s What Really Happened in the Middle East

YouTube video: Amid Gaza violence, Israeli and Palestinian doctors save baby’s life –

CNN’s Amanpour interviews Tzipi Livni

Military incursion should be seen as part of War on Terror

Blog from Southern Israel, Morit Rozen

Remember when the defence department was paying public relations companies and Iraqi newspapers to insert articles praising the Iraq war? The companies also attempted to plant coverage favorable to the US military in US newspapers. There rightly was a media uproar about the manipulation. We’ll see whether the same happens over this.

The foreign ministry shouldn’t get a pass on this one. It may view such hasbara as maximising its efforts to “explain” Israel’s position in the world media. I view it as a cynical attempt to flood the web and news media with favorable flackery in a vain attempt to tilt public opinion toward Israel. Not only does it do Israel a disservice, it stains every legitimate effort that the ministry might make to explain Israel to the world, since no one will believe a word it says knowing it engages in such outright propaganda.

Not to mention that this is such cheap pennyante stuff. What do they gain by this? How effective can it be and how many can be convinced? By the way, I’ve even noticed the hasbaraniks in my own blog. You can see them a mile away because they’ve never published a comment before yet write something like: “I’ve enjoyed your blog for a long time, but anyone with a brain in their head knows that Hamas is out to destroy Israel blah, blah blah.” Pretty formulaic stuff. Also, you can Google a few phrases of the comment and if you find it appears elsewhere on the web you know you either have a hasbaranik or someone who has repetition compulsion.

In some instances, western media may intentionally or unintentionally fall victim to manipulation. Tony Karon points out that pro-Israel journalist-historian Michael Oren has published several stories since the Gaza incursion began in US media outlets like the New Republic and Los Angeles Times. He is also on active duty with the IDF in Gaza serving as a public affairs officer liasing with foreign media. You will find nothing noting this in the Los Angeles Times op ed. In effect, the media is allowing advocates like Oren to pass themselves off as disinterested experts when they are anything but. It behooves editors to do some due diligence when they publish any piece that advocates for one side or the other to determine whether there may be conflicts of interest or other unacknowledged factors influencing a commentator’s judgment.

It seems we are now well and truly in the world of Propaganda 2.0.

Richard Silverstein writes Tikun Olam, a blog dedicated to resolution of the Israeli-Arab conflict. He also contributed to the Independent Jewish Voices essay collection A Time to Speak Out.
River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Tawtin or Return: Divergent views from Lebanon, but one common goal

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Franklin Lamb

Shatila Camp, Beirut

Lebanese opponents of civil rights for Palestinian refugees often use less objective and more crude wording to define “tawtin” (“settlement”) than is normally employed in civil society discussions.

During last summer’s debate in parliament, which failed to enact laws that would allow the world’s oldest and largest refugee community the basic civil right to work and to own a home, the “tawtin or return” discussion took on strident and dark meanings, which were largely effective in frightening much of the Lebanese public from supporting even these modest humanitarian measures. Right-wing opponents of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon often define tawtin during public discussions as “implantation” (as in inserting a foreign malignant object or virus into Lebanon’s body politic), or “grafting,” “insertion,” “impalement,” “forced integration,” “embedding” “impregnation”, or “patriation”.

The concept’s varied meanings among a largely uninformed Lebanese public have by and large prevented a balanced consideration of the provision in the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative that includes “a just solution to the Palestinian refugee problem to be agreed upon in accordance with UNGAR 194.”

The discussion in Lebanon has centered on presumed Palestinian desires to stay in Lebanon at all costs, as opposed to returning to their country Palestine. The large anti-Palestinian political community has kept the discussion focused on the API’s language: “the rejection of all forms of Palestinian patriation [tawtin] which conflict with the special circumstances of the Arab host countries.”

The concept, indeed the very word “ tawtin” , was used in the summer of 2010 as an emotional bludgeon or cudgel embodying all manner of dire social predictions from the political parties representing the Phalange, Liberal Party, Lebanese Forces, and Free Patriotic Movement’s leader General Michel Aoun.

Virtually all opponents of Palestinian civil rights frequently claimed that tawtin would ruin Lebanon. This was arguably the main reason that there was a broad-based consensus in support of the parliamentary decision of August 17, 2011 to do essentially nothing to enact relief for Lebanon’s quarter million Palestinian refugees.

It was a spurious argument because very few in Lebanon, and even fewer in the Palestinian community, have any desire to see tawtin actually implemented.

One remarkable aspect of last year’s tawtin “debate” was that, in private discussions, few politicians publicly decrying its dangers really thought tawtin was a realistic threat to Lebanon.

Nonetheless, the chimera was used to maintain a power base in their own sect or community. These political leaders assumed that their supporters wanted no rights for Palestinians in Lebanon; tawtin was a useful political boogie man. This view was not only common in various Christian sects but also among many Druze and Muslims. Numerous politicians have explained in private that their supporters by and large still believed that the Palestinian refugees were the cause of Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war and many of Lebanon’s current woes and wanted them out of Lebanon as soon as possible.

Another political factor contributing to the false depiction of tawtin were widely-rumored American and Israeli plans to use tawtin to permanently settle thousands of Lebanon’s Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and thus take pressure off of Israel to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 194’s right of return mandate.

These suggestions by visiting US officials during last summer’s parliamentary examination of tawtin and return riled segments of the Lebanese public and provided grist for right-wing elements to politically, socially and economically squeeze Palestinian refugees yet again.

Palestinian refugees’ views regarding tawtin were unfortunately rather muted or not credited during 2010 discussions in Lebanon and parliament. Occasional statements by Palestine Liberation Organization leaders that Palestinian refugees were grateful for Lebanon’s hospitality and realized that they had overstayed their welcome, but that they had every desire and determination to return to Palestine, were largely ignored.

The fears of certain elements of Lebanese society about tawtin are unwarranted. The oft-expressed view that Palestinians secretly want to stay in Lebanon and abandon their right to return has been consistently refuted by Palestinian public opinion surveys, academic studies, and most compellingly by the statements of Lebanon’s camp residents themselves.

According to a recent survey, fully 96 percent of Lebanon’s Palestinian refugees living in 12 camps and more than 24 communities, insist on their full right of return to Palestine, eschew tawtin, and agree with the language of the API regarding 194.

Over the past few years, and one imagines even more since the events in Tunisia and Egypt, the demand for the full right of return has increased. The events at Tahrir Square raise hopes among Palestinians in Lebanon that return to Palestine may come sooner rather than later.

Tahrir Square reinforces the view that Palestine’s occupation could crumble faster than many have believed possible given the military and political power granted by the American and European governments.

Meanwhile, there exists in Lebanon near unanimity among the 18 sects and various Palestinian factions. Tawtin is not a desirable option.

Only justice for Palestine, including the right of return as restated in the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative will resolve the dilemma of tawtin or return for Lebanon and her Palestinian refugees.

First Published
16/2/2011 bitterlemons-api.org
Palestine Civil Rights Campaign-Lebanon

PLEASE SIGN HERE!

http://www.petitiononline.com/ssfpcrc/petition.html
“Failure is not an option for the Palestine Civil Rights Campaign, our only choice is success

Please check our website for UPDATES:
www.palestinecivilrightscampaign.org”
-15 year old Hiba Hajj, PCRC volunteer, Ein el Helwe Palestinian Camp, Saida, Lebanon

____________________________________________________

Dr. Franklin Lamb is Director of the Sabra Shatila Foundation. Contact him at: fplamb@sabrashatila.org. He is working with the Palestine Civil Rights Campaign in Lebanon on drafting legislation which, after 62 years, would, if adopted by Lebanon’s Cabinet and Parliament grant the right to work and to own a home to Lebanon’s Palestinian Refugees. One part of the PCRC legislative project is its online Petition which can be viewed and signed at: petitiononline.com/ssfpcrc/petition.html. Lamb is reachable at fplamb@palestinecivilrightscampaign.org. Franklin Lamb’s book on the Sabra-Shatila Massacre, International Legal Responsibility for the Sabra-Shatila Massacre, now out of print, was published in 1983, following Janet’s death and was dedicated to Janet Lee Stevens. He was a witness before the Israeli Kahan Commission Inquiry, held at Hebrew University in Jerusalem in January 1983

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Angry Arab,The Pandit and Me: On Hamas Immune to learning (Pumped)

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“I never expected much from Hamas in terms of military effectiveness, and I think that the Israeli-Egyptian-Saudi-Dahlan plan was based on a low estimation of Hamas’ military effectiveness.”

Angry Arab

On balance: Evaluation of the Israeli festival of slaughter and butchery in Gaza

From war to war (which is a title of a book by Nadav Safran), that is the context in which we need to evaluate our century-old conflict with Israel. You can’t isolate each chapter or war or slaughter and analyze it without the larger context of the conflict.

The press conference by the Israeli prime minister and his defense minister was remarkable: less triumphalist than usual, and certainly vague about goals and successes. Now we can evaluate the goals within the context of Israel’s declared goals, and within the context of Israel’s strategic plan.

For somebody of my age, I can say this at first: that from 1948 until the 1990s, every Israeli military success more smashing the one before: the 1973 was a different story because it was the only Arab-Israeli war that was initiated by the Arab side (remarkable when you think about the propaganda of the “beleaguered Israel”), and it was bungled by the Egyptian (Nazi) dictator, Anwar Sadat (Jimmy Carter’s favorite personality and friend), and Israel (contrary to present-day Arab states’ propaganda) wound up winning overall at the end.

So Israel’s strategic posture was predicated on intimidating

1) the armies of the enemy;

2) the population of the enemy.

Israeli psychological warfare succeeded for decades in convincing the enemy that Israel is way too mighty and way too invincible to be damaged by any military effort. Arabs reached a mood of defeatism that permeated the political culture, and helped in securing the survival and propaganda of the ruling regimes. Israel’s tactic was meant to discourage any political violence or even defense from the other side.

You also need to compare to the times when Israel faced non-state actors:

We have different episodes:

From Al-Karamah battle in 1968 (a crucial watershed in fida’iyyin recruitment), to the various chapters of Israeli invasions of Lebanon culminating in the 1982 invasion of Lebanon.

I am quite familiar and witnessed the responses to Israeli invasions of Lebanon. It is in that context that I find Gaza (under siege and cut off from the world with Egypt playing the role of the ally of Israel) to be an utter failure for the Israeli side.

I never expected much from Hamas in terms of military effectiveness, and I think that the Israeli-Egyptian-Saudi-Dahlan plan was based on a low estimation of Hamas’ military effectiveness.

In previous confrontations in the West Bank or in Lebanon in the 1980s, the Israeli military would bomb from the air for a day or two, and then advance swiftly. And that was exactly what happened in the invasion of Lebanon in the summer of 1982: now, the lack of stiff resistance back then had to do with many factors, including the lousy leadership of `Arafat (who cared about preserving his little empire more than about resistance and who is not dead enough as far as I am concerned, and may his grave deepen), the gap between people of the South and the resistance, and the financial regularization of the PLO’s fighting force, and the psychological factor that often curtailed the ability of the fighting force, all helped the Israeli plan. True, there was stiff resistance in some places: like Rashidiyyah and `Ayn Al-Hilwah but it was sporadic and disorganized.

Only in West Beirut, a strong fighting force was prepared and they were ready for a confrontation with Israel, and that is why Israel never invaded the city: it only waited until the evacuation of the fighters and then supervised the butchery of the women and children in the Sabra and Shatila camps–slaughter of women and children is a classic specialty of the Zionist forces even before the establishment of the state.

But Hamas performed far better than the expectations of its enemies and even of its leadership in Syria and Lebanon.

Israel would have succeeded if it achieved what it wanted: to achieve an unconditional surrender of Hamas.

That’s what it used to get from Fatah in the West Bank: Arafat would negotiate the terms of his surrender with third-parties and that would be that (like in Bethlehem).

Yet, Hamas defiance and the launching of rockets continued to the last day–in fact it continues as I write this from what I see on the screen. Hamas leaders did not leave as Fatah leaders and fighters would (in the era under Arafat-Dahlan-Rajjub in the West Bank bantustan after Oslo), but continued in stiff resistance and defiance to the very last end.

So Israel failed in

1) achieving a total surrender of Hamas;

2) in propping up the Dahlan-Abu Mazen gangs who are more discredited today than ever. Early in the campaign, Dahlan appeared on Al-Arabiyya and on Egyptian TV and was quite bombastic because he was expecting that the matter would be over in the first week. When that did not happen, he disappeared, and some say that he went back to Montenegro–his news base.

3) Israel failed in achieving a victory that it needed: a victory that would once and for all put to rest the humiliating defeat of Israel in 2006. Hamas new that its performance was extremely influential in possibly dramatically altering the image of the Israeli soldiers in the eyes of all Arabs: fighters and lay people alike, and it knew that expectations were in building on the performance on Hizbullah in 2006;

4) Israel failed in creating a rift between the Palestinian people and Hamas, just as it failed to create a rift between the population of the South and Hizbullah, its silly SMS messages notwithstanding;

5) Israel failed in putting an end to the rockets;

6) Israel failed in smashing Hamas;

7) Israel failed in creating a new psychological climate in the Middle East: it was expected that Israel would use more massive and indiscriminate violence than before, and that it would try to “shock and awe” more than before because it wanted to kill the image of its humiliation in South Lebanon. That was not accomplished despite the high number of casualties among the civilians.

8) Israeli prime minister today bragged about intelligence successes: but that was inflated. It is true the killing of two Hamas leaders (along with tens of innocent civilians but that is how Israel “assassinates”) was a success for Israel but there are other Hamas leaders. Plus, Israel policy of assuming that an organization would die by killing the leader has always been one of the many dumb Israeli miscalculations.

The most recent case was in 1992 when Israeli terrorist leaders killed Abbas Musawi (and his family) and they got…Hasan Nasrallah instead. I have no doubt that they probably now regret killing Musawi.

And Hamas now operates on the assumption that all leaders may die and they have most likely structured the organization on that assumption, unlike the centrally run, say, DFLP or Fatah under `Arafat.

9) Israel failed to build on the years-old Saudi policy of mobilizing Arab public opinion against Iran, instead of Israel. That clearly failed miserably. If anything, Arab public opinion is more mobilized against Israel than any other time in memory.

10) Israel failed to sell its slaughter as a legitimate contribution to the “war on terrorism”.

Clearly, the scenes of carnage offended public opinion around the world with the exception of the US and the UN embassy of Micronesia. But there are successes: if Israel was aiming to kill a very large number of women and children, that was achieved to a large measure.

Very knowledgeable sources in Beirut tell me that only 5% of Hamas’ fighting abilities were damaged in this war thus far, and there will be another round no doubt.

But think about Karamah battle. In Karamah: a lot of the lore was built by Arafat’s bombast and a unit of the Jordanian army fought with the Palestinian resistance.

This time around, Arab and particularly Palestinian public opinion will look with admiration at the performance of Hamas during this 22 days. It is commonly estimated that some 20,000 Palestinians volunteered in the resistance movement after Karamah, and I expect a region-wide campaign of recruitment to the benefit of Hamas.

Israel’s choice of Palestinian leadership (supported by Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt), i.e., Dahlan gangs, are discredited beyond repait. I mean, when I read in Saudi newspapers description of Dahlan as an Israeli stooge, you know how Palestinian opinion will regard him–and the fleeing of his men in their underwear did not help either.

From 1968 to 1978, the Fatah movement transformed from a band of fighters in Jordan to an army (badly run to be sure by Arafat) with all sorts of heavy weapons.

There is now a point of no-return:

Arabs are no more afraid of Israeli soldiers. From that loss, Israel shall never recover and it will expedite the inevitable process of the elimination of Zionism from Palestine.

The confrontation with Israel is cumulative, and this culmination is now not in the interests of Israel. Many Arabs now talk about the defeat of Israel: I rarely heard those sentiments before 2006.

Posted by As’ad at 2:20 PM

Comment:

I was never in agreement with Asaad when it comes to Hezbollah, Hamas, and Syria, but I always respected his hounesty. Here, we are on the same page. I agree with every word he wrote. I am glad that Assad finally realized how Hezbollah, then Hamas has spoiled the Israeli-Egyptian-Saudi-Dahlan plans, and paved the way for the defeat of Israel and the collapse of Zionism. I hope he will recognize that both victories were achieved with help of Syria and Iran.

Yesterday I commented under the Title: Its Time for a Resistant Government

“Since Day 1 of Gaza raid, I told many friends, that this war shall fail to destroy Hamas, instead it will expose and destroy both PA, and PlO.
Fath emerged as a resistance movement in 1965, but failed to seize PLO until Karama battle. As Karama battle was Fath passport to PLO leadership, the Battle of Gaza paved the Way for Mashaal to Doha. That’s how I read the appearance of Mashaal at Doha. “

“Yes its time to hand over the Leadership to Resistance. However, the change shall not be smooth as in 1967-1968.’

Yesterday I mocked the “Great” ANALYSIST of PP who mocked Hamas day and night and kept shocking his “Head” the last two years,

Looks like his head stopped shaking, but he don’t have the carraige to say: SORRY HAMAS, SORRY HANEYEH, Or at least follow the steps of the Angry Arab and say, “I never expected much from Hamas in terms of military effectiveness,..”

Today he wrote:

“First Was Hizbullah…..

Now Hamas……

Israel: The Resistance is Spreading! Your “Deterrence” is Toothless!
Some Arabs and Muslims Have Conquered Fear and Are Unbeatable!

# posted by Tony : 7:08 AM

Yes Ton TFUUUU, They, are the same Arabs and Muslims (Immune to Learning, Hot Air, Habilas, windbags) you mocked. Here is a sample;

“17 Killed in Gaza, TodayAnd Yet, Hamas “Massed” its Forces to “Confront” Tanks, Helicopter Gunships and Missiles……

Excuse Me, But This is Mass Suicide, Not Resistance

Damn It!

God Gave You a Brain; Use It!!”

TON TFUUUU concluded: “You ask, what can Hamas do? At a minimum hide, in the face of a superior force.”I am sure you shall recognize the smell, and know who did it..

Uprooted palestinian 03.03.08 – 4:11 pm #

15 months ago I told Tony;

“I am just wondering how a palestinian from Gaza would ignore the facts on ground and around the ground and continue whipping his great people, because they failed achieve victory over 90 years, ignoring that almost all the world are against them, ignoring that Zionism is collapsing.”

“A palestinian from Gaza should know that its Oslo/Fateh/ Abu-Ammar, not Hamas, who releaved Israel from its Liabilities as occupier.. “

“A palestinian from Gaza should be aware that Israel and its agents used guerrilla tactics of surprise against Paletinians, before Hamas acted as an established government; even before the birth of Hamas.”

“A nationalliberation force should be prepared to take all the liabilities, arrising after the withdrawal of occupier..I wonder What Our “General Gyab” may suggest, other than whipping Hamas for wearing Uniforms and acting as a government? Should Hamas apply for the return of Barak and or Dahlan to Gaza?? #

After Beit Hannon Massacre, I commented on Tony’s critisizing Hamas for massing its forces to confront IDF:

“Can’t you understand that dozens of Hamas fighters are confronting “Tanks, Helicopter Gunships and Missiles……” to prevent bringing “back the traitor Abbas on the back of an Israeli tank”.

Can’t you understand that calling Hamas to Hide is the shortest way to “bring back the traitor Abbas on the back of an Israeli tank”.

To invade or not Invade. Israel is facing this bitter option, and looks like obtained bush’s green light. Its could be a wide scale Jenin Massacre, Here I remeber what Uri Aveneri saw after Jenin, a longer que of “Palestinian Suicide bombers”

Again “Excuse Me, But This is the ultimate Resistance, This Hamas Karballa, die to keep the cause alive, “

One year ago I wrote at PP:

“Abbass, is NAKED, very NAKED, nothing may cover his treason. THANKS to the “SUICIDE MOVEMENT” for exposing him.”

Uprooted Palestinian 01.18.08 – 4:43 am #

Tony: Shame on you, It is them, Hamas, who Stoned the Zionist Iblees with Qassam, as they do evey year in MECCA.

Finally,

I HOPE YOU MAY CONQUER YOUR COWARDNESS AND STOP FEELING INFEARIOR.

Say HI to to your Jewiss MOLLY moderating your BLOG.

Sayyed Nasrallah: Resistance Might Have to Occupy Galilee- Netanyaho; You can’t !"

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Author: H.Assi

Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah said on Wednesday that the day of February 11 became the day of the collapse of two of the most important allies to the United States and Israel in the region: the Shah regime in Iran and the Mubarak regime in Egypt.

His eminence reiterated that the Resistance groups in the region never attacked anybody, stressing that they constitute alone the guarantee of stability and justice in the region.

Sayyed Nasrallah was speaking through a large TV screen in the ceremony held by Hezbollah at the Sayyed Shohada’a compound in Beirut’s southern suburbs (Dahiyeh) to commemorate the anniversary of the Resistance Martyrs’ Leaders.

Hezbollah’s Sami Shehab who was in the Egyptian jails before the regime was toppled attended the ceremony on Wednesday amid cheering crowds.

Each year, Hezbollah celebrates the anniversary of the Martyr leaders in Lebanon with a central ceremony being held in Dahiyeh in commemoration of the Islamic resistance leaders Sayyed Abbas Al-Moussawi, Sheikh Ragheb Harb and Hajj Imad Mughniyeh; who were martyred between Feburary 12 and 16.

Preparations across the Lebanese regions have been completed with banners being raised commemorating the martyrs and their sacrifices in the South and Bekaa towns. This year’s slogan was: “Martyr Leaders… A Triumphant Nation”.

Sayyed Nasrallah began his speech by saluting the souls of the martyrs, especially the Resistance Martyrs’ Leaders. His eminence said that the occasion was one of the most important events in Hezbollah’s Jihadist and religious life, while paying tribute to the families of the martyrs.

Sayyed Nasrallah also congratulated Muslims in the occasion of the birth of Prophet Mohammed (pbuh) and the Islamic Unity Week.

FEBRUARY 11… DAY OF COLLAPSE OF US, ISRAEL ALLIES

His eminence also pointed to the anniversary of the Iranian Revolution which coincided with the overthrow of the Egyptian regime of “tyrant” Hosni Mubarak and the victory of the Egyptian people. His eminence remarked that the day of February 11 became the day of the collapse of two of the most powerful allies to the United States and Israel in the region: the Shah regime in Iran and the Mubarak regime in Egypt.

While pointing to the other occasions of the month of February, Sayyed Nasrallah also pointed to the assassination of former Prime Minister Martyr Rafiq Hariri. His eminence noted that this crime had very dangerous and important effects on Lebanon and the region. “We’re still living this crime’s repercussions until this day,” his eminence said.

RESISTANCE… ONLY GUARANTEE OF STABILITY AND JUSTICE

Hezbollah Secretary General praised the Resistance’s martyrs. “When we commemorate their anniversary, it’s not to praise them but to learn from them and their Jihad. We renew with them our pledge to continue the path.” Sayyed Nasrallah noted that the common feature among the Martyrs’ Leaders is that they were founders of this Resistance. “They did not give up, they were not tired. They sacrificed their own lives for this Resistance. These leaders are the best interpretation of a 30-year stage in the history of our Resistance as well as the history of Lebanon and the region. Each one of them was a symbol in himself.”

Sayyed Nasrallah said that Hezbollah does not look at its martyrs and resistance as independent from the general situation in Lebanon and the region. “We’re a part and a continuation of the resistance leaders and the founders of the Lebanese leaders, at the top of whom comes Imam Mussa Sadr and others.”

His eminence said that the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon should be perceived as a part of the awareness movements in the regions, and also as part of the defiance movement. “Lebanon is affecting and is affected by the balance of power in the region,” Sayyed Nasrallah said.

Hezbollah Secretary General stressed, meanwhile, that the Resistance movements in the region are a normal response by the people in the region to aggression, occupation and hegemony schemes. “The Resistance movements in the region never attacked anybody or launched a war against anyone. Instead, they were attacked.”

Sayyed Nasrallah emphasized that the Resistance movements in the region constitute the only guarantee of achieving justice, stability and peace.

RESISTANCE MOVEMENTS… RESULT OF ZIONIST CRIMINALITY

According to Hezbollah Secretary General, the Resistance has always guaranteed justice and stability. His eminence explained that peace and stability in Lebanon or any other place in the world is conditioned by achieving justice. “Peace based on injustice, violation of rights cannot be a true peace, and will immediately collapse,” his eminence noted.

Sayyed Nasrallah, meanwhile, declared that the Resistance movements in the region were the result of Zionist criminality. “The major 60-year-old problem in the region is the creation of the Zionist entity in Palestine,” his eminence said, while describing the atrocities committed by this entity since its illegal creation.

US ADMINISTRATION FAR FROM JUSTICE

“Justice is about giving back rights and lands to their owners and the return of the millions of Palestinian refugees to their land,” Sayyed Nasrallah emphasized, addressing US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. “Justice also calls for punishing war criminals and those committing crimes against humanity,” his eminence went on to say.

“Only amid such justice, there would be stability in the region. However, seeking fake peace through failing negotiations offering furthermore concessions without returning any right to its owner cannot achieve peace,” Sayyed Nasrallah said.

“What is the US administration’s position from justice, establishing international tribunals, and trying criminals?” his eminence wondered. “The US administration is far from justice and punishing Zionist war criminals. Instead, it backs Zionists and changes laws to prevent punishing Israeli war criminals.”

“The US has driven the nation to a state of despair in achieving any victory,” Sayyed Nasrallah pointed out.

His eminence said that the major blow to the Resistance project was the Camp David agreement signed between the Egyptian regime and the Israeli enemy. “Then came the Islamic Revolution in Iran and its victory which cut the hands of the Americans from Iran and cut ties with Israel and turned from a strategic ally of Israeli to a strategic base to back Resistance.”

THANKS TO EGYPTIAN REVOLUTIONS, SAMI SHEHAB FREED

“(CNN) — A member of Hezbollah, who escaped from an Egyptian prison during the recent unrest there, made a surprise appearance Wednesday at a Hezbollah rally in Beirut.  The Hezbollah television network al Manar showed  Sami Shehab being greeted by rapturous applause as he took the stage at the rally in a southern suburb of Beirut to mark the group’s martyrs’ day…”

His eminence pointed to the latest developments in Egypt, in reference to the Egyptian Revolution, where one of the United States’ most powerfull allies fell. “There’s no doubt what happened in Egypt is huge and historical.”

Sayyed Nasrallah, who saluted the Egyptian nation and revolution, thanked the people of Egypt and their revolution that resulted in freeing ‘brother’ Mohamad Mansour, known as Sami Shehab, who was charged with silly accusations of seeking to overthrow Mubarak’s regime.

“Regardless of what will happen in Egypt, it is certain that it will represent an important development that differs from what used to take place under Hosni Mubarak’s regime,” Sayyed Nasrallah said.

His eminence said that the region entered a new stage. His eminence recalled that Mubarak’s regime played a role in the war on Gaza as well as the 2006 war on Lebanon, and concluded that the Israeli enemy is concerned with the overthrow of the regime.

BARAK’S STATEMENTS SIMILAR TO SOME LEBANESE

Addressing Israeli statements, Sayyed Nasrallah said that the Americans and Israelis are the main losers following the strategic change in the region. “All who linked their fate with the Americans will lose,” Sayyed Nasrallah said.

His eminence pointed to statements made by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak whose statements were similar to ones issued by some officials on the internal scene in Lebanon. “He’s claiming that the new government in Lebanon is the government of Hezbollah. “No, it is not a Hezbollah government.”

RESISTANCE MIGHT HAVE TO OCCUPY GALILEE

Sayyed Nasrallah noted to the statements made recently by the Israeli former chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazy concerning his “achievements” in the army and his pledge that the “failure” in Lebanon and Gaza war would not repeat themselves. “At least, he’s admitting there were failures. But now, there’s a discussion whether Hezbollah could occupy the Galilee region. Twenty years ago, Israelis were convinced that Hezbollah could not occupy any site in the north of the occupied territories.”

“The major achievement of the Resistance is that it complicated the possibility of Israel occupying Lebanon. Even more, today, Israel is concerned that Hezbollah might occupy Galilee.”

His eminence pointed to the latest threat made by Barak one day earlier, during his first military tour with new Israeli Chief of Staff Benny Gantz along the northern border, where he claimed that the Israeli occupation forces may be called into Lebanon in the future. “Hezbollah remembers the heavy beating they suffered from us in 2006, but it is not forever, and you may be called to enter Lebanon again,” Barak told the soldiers.

“I tell Barak, Ashkenazi and Gantz that the Resistance might have to occupy Galilee. I tell the resistance fighters to be prepared for the day when war is imposed on Lebanon. Then, the Resistance leadership might ask you to lead the Resistance to occupy the Galilee.”

I HOPE ISRAELIS WILL HAVE GOOD SHELTERS

“I tell Ashkenazi you are wrong in your estimations. You were wrong when you assassinated Sheikh Ragheb, Sayyed Abbas and Hajj Imad. You insisted in confronting a country and a nation determined to safeguard the blood of its people and resistance fighters.”

Sayyed Nasrallah noted that there are some realistic people within the Zionist entity. His eminence pointed that some Israeli experts have said that Hezbollah can close Israel’s airports, ports and strategic stations. “I hope Israelis will have good shelters,” his eminence went on to say.

IMAD MUGHNIYEH’S BLOOD WILL NOT GO TO WASTE

Sayyed Nasrallah then renewed the pledge to avenge the assassination of Hezbollah top military commander Imad Mughniyeh. “Our decision to avenge Martyr Imad’s assassination still stands and will be executed at the right time and the right place,” his eminence said.

“You will find out that killing martyr Imad Mughniyeh was a very stupid move,” Sayyed Nasrallah vowed. “I tell the Zionist leaders and generals to be careful wherever they are in the world because Imad Mughniyeh’s blood will not go to waste.”

MARCH 14 HAS NEVER ABANDONED ISSUE OF WEAPONS

Turning to the Lebanese internal issues, Sayyed Nasrallah noted that there were important challenges in the upcoming stage. “What remains of the March 14 camp is determined to bring up the issue of the Resistance’s weapons,” his eminence noted. “Actually, it has never abandoned it.”

While confirming that the issue of the weapons is an issue of national dispute, Sayyed Nasrallah said that the weapons are a detail and the main dispute lies in explaining the Resistance’s role. “There is no condemnation for the Resistance in this fact but to those who betrayed the Resistance.”

Sayyed Nasrallah also tackled the national dialogue over the defensive strategy of the country. “If your stance of the Resistance’s arms is finalized, then what’s the meaning of the national dialogue?” his eminence asked the mentioned forces.

Sayyed Nasrallah recalled that acceptance of the national dialogue was a concession for the country’s interest, while reiterating once again readiness for dialogue anytime.

INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL POLITICIZED

The international tribunal aimed at finding out and trying those behind the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri was also tackled by Hezbollah Secretary General who renewed commitment to truth and justice as a condition for stability. “But is the path of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon the right one?”

Sayyed Nasrallah renewed belief that the tribunal was politicized since the first day. “From day one, the investigation took on a certain direction and for a while now, they have taken it into a different one,” his eminence emphasized.

“We’re concerned as Lebanese, if we were committed to truth, to discuss this issue. There is another route to reach the truth which lies in discussing the issue, but you have wasted this opportunity.”

“You want to proceed with the STL that has ignored all possibilities and which is rife with false witnesses and politicization; then go ahead,” Sayyed Nasrallah said, addressing the other bloc.

COUNTRY CANNOT REMAIN WITHOUT CABINET

Hezbollah Secretary General, meanwhile, said that what the other camp has been subject to is the result of its mistakes, compliance with the American project in the region, and ties to Hosni Mubarak’s regime.

“Returning to the roots means admitting mistakes, the greatest of which is depending on the American project,” his eminence noted, while calling on them to reconsider their decisions and not waste time in pinpointing errors.

Sayyed Nasrallah condemned the attempts to pressure Prime Minister-Designate Najib Miqati and label the government as Hezbollah government. His eminence slammed the claims that Hezbollah was forming the government, saying that if this was the case, then the government would have seen birth in two days.

Hezbollah Secretary General, who stressed that the current majority is the real one and that the parliamentary majority has returned to the popular majority that was achieved in 2009, said that country cannot remain without a cabinet if the other camp does not take part in government.

His eminence recalled that the previous government functioned for a whole year achieving nothing and stressed that Lebanon was in need of a government that understands the people and whose army wages battle along with them. “Let a government that tackles the people’s concerns be established,” Sayyed Nasrallah concluded.

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“..I have news for you Nasrallah; You can’t !”

“…”[Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah announced today that he can occupy the Galilee, but I have news for you, he can’t,” the prime minister told a meeting in Jerusalem of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. …”

Posted by G, Z, or B at 4:05 PM

Leaked film exposes secret Israeli attacks in Syria, Iran

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[ 17/02/2011 – 08:15 AM ]

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)– A leaked video shown at a private ceremony for Israel’s General Staff admits for the first time ever to the Israeli Occupation Force’s involvement in attacks on Syria and Iran.

The film was shown at an honorary farewell ceremony for former Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and was meant to portray his accomplishments while in office.

According to Haaretz, it includes a clear-cut confession to the bombing of Deir ez Zor in Syria in September 2007 and last year’s cyber attack that crippled Iran’s nuclear program.

Israeli officials say the information could serve as a legal presumption for the Syrian government to take legal action against Israel over the attack.

In the attack in Iran, the Stuxnet computer worm developed by Israeli intelligence was used to sabotage a fifth of Iran’s nuclear centrifuges, an incident that attracted heavy media attention with Israel and the US as the prime suspects. Israel had abstained from commenting on accusations.

Sources say the Shin Bet has opened investigations to learn how the details leaked from the private ceremony where the video was shown.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

"… but in Syria, Bashar Assad is popular …"

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Via Friday-Lunch-Club

“… Tunisia had Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. Egypt had Hosni Mubarak. Other nations in the region have unpopular rulers and kings who typically have controlled their countries for decades. But in Syria, President Bashar Assad is popular ….Assad’s popularity derives from his foreign policy, particularly his tough stance toward the United States and Israel. If anything, economic sanctions and constant rebuke from the U.S. have helped him appear as the underdog fighting imperialist outsiders. Inside the country, as a cautious reformer who has to appease an old guard and a large military. “The only people who don’t like Bashar Assad are the people who want to be in his place,” said medical student Abodi Nova. “They’re not the people.”

 ‘I choose, …you choose’,… Where are they now?

That doesn’t mean the Syrian government isn’t watching other countries and taking steps toward change, however incremental they may be….  Like Egypt, Syria operates under an emergency law. The Syrian version, which began in 1963 — predating Egypt’s law by 18 years — is often employed for arbitrary detention, which circumvents clauses in the constitution guaranteeing freedom of expression. Most recently, the 20-year-old activist Almlouhi Tal was sentenced to five years in prison. A high court accused her of divulging information to the U.S., according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. She has a blog with poetry and opinions about Palestinian rights, but has stayed away from Syrian politics. Young people say they have a little more freedom than their parents’ generation did. When Assad came to power, he slowly opened up the economy, establishing ties with Turkey that have brought consumer goods and easier travel between the two neighbors. “Since Bashar took the presidency, we can talk more freely,” Nabhan said. “Our parents always taught us not to talk about politics. Now we are more open. Bashar Assad was the best for Syrians.”…..  A handful of figures with close ties to the government control a vast majority of business in Syria. Droughts have pushed farmers into urban areas, and the American-led invasion of Iraq drove a million refugees into the country. But on the streets of Syria’s two biggest cities, Damascus and Aleppo, one hardly gets the impression that the nation is beset by the kind of economic problems troubling Egypt. While the president’s minority Alawi sect holds several prominent positions in government, different groups and religions generally get along, at least on the surface. “I don’t think a revolution would accomplish anything,” Nabhan said. “Quite the contrary, it could cause a civil war. We’ve worked hard to get where we are.”

Posted by G, Z, or B at 9:00 PM

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Resistance Magician: He invented something different – Some of his biography

>We learned that when the Enemy advance, the resistance retreat, HIDE
Imad invented some new rules: It worked in July and War on Gaza

مرت على فلسطين من سنة 48 الى الآن ستون سنة، أي ستة أجيال ولدت، واستهلكت الكثير من الناس كشهداء أو نسيها أناس أو تجاهلوها، وكم استهلكت من أنظمة. وكم ستستهلك بعد؟ وأهم شيء أن عماد اخترع أحداً مختلفاً ليقاوم، وعمل شيئاً جديداً، ربّى أناساً لا يتراجعون عندما يتقدم العدو.

كنا نعيش على القواعد السابقة، أي أن العمل المقاوم يتراجع الى الخلف عندما يتقدم العدو. كان عندما يقال إن إسرائيل آتية يتوه الناس، لكن تغيّر هذا الآن.

اليوم، هناك أشكال جديدة للمقاومة استنبطها عماد…..هذا الشاب الصغير من طيردبّا من جنوب لبنان الذي شرب من الليطاني خرجت منه هذه الاختراعات الكثيرة، وطبعاً ليس وحده، فهناك دعم من سوريا وإيران، لكنني أعتقد أن عماد كان يقول لكل الناس تعالوا واخترعوا مثلنا

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Flashback:

“So when I hear Hamas declaring that it would stop an Israeli invasion of Gaza, I just shake my Head.” The Palestinian Idiot on  one of the problems of Arab culture.

And Yet, Hamas “Massed” its Forces to “Confront” Tanks, Helicopter Gunships and Missiles…… Excuse Me, But This is Mass Suicide, Not Resistance
Damn It! God Gave You a Brain; Use It!!

بعض من سيرة ساحر المقاومة

السيد حسن نصرالله والحاج عماد مغنية في لقاء مع  كوادر المقاومة عقد في التسعينات من القرن الماضي. (ارشيف المقاومة الاسلامية)

 في الذكرى السنوية لاستشهاد القائد العسكري للمقاومة الاسلامية الحاج عماد مغنية، تقدم «الاخبار» صورة موجزة عن واقع علاقته بالقضية الفلسطينية، منذ تعرفه على حركة «فتح» الى تواصله مع كل فصائل المقاومة حتى لحظة غيابه

ابراهيم الأمين

في حي «الجوار» بمنطقة الشياح في الضاحية الجنوبية لبيروت، أبصر النور عماد مغنية يوم 25/1/1962. والده فايز مغنيّة، وأمّه آمنة سلامة. وفي مدارس ذلك الحي، تلقّى علومه الابتدائية والإعدادية وعاش مع عائلته التي فقدت أيضاً الابنين الآخرين جهاد وفؤاد.

في نحو العاشرة من عمره، صار يرافق والده في العطل الأسبوعية والصيفية إلى مطعمه الصغير الكائن في شارع عبد الكريم الخليل أحد الشوارع الرئيسية في منطقة الشياح، وفي الأمسيات كان يقضي جلّ وقته في المسجد القريب من المنزل الذي كان يعرف بمسجد الشيخ القبيسي. وعندما بلغ الثالثة عشرة من العمر، قرر عماد المتأثر كثيراً بعلوم أمّه الدينية، التوجه إلى العراق حيث الحوزة العلمية في النجف الأشرف. لكن حصل في اللحظة الأخيرة ما عطّل الرحلة.

في 13 نيسان من عام 1975 اندلعت شرارة الحرب الأهلية في لبنان من ساحة «البريد» في عين الرمانه، على بعد 50 متراً من مطعم أبيه، وحينها بدأت حياته العسكرية.

تحوّل طريق «صيدا القديمة»، الفاصل بين الشياح وعين الرمانة، إلى جبهة ساخنة كثرت فيها السواتر الترابية والكتل الخرسانية والمتاريس. في عين الرمانة كان مقاتلو الكتائب والأحرار، وفي الجانب الآخر مقاتلو الحركة الوطنية والفصائل الفلسطينية. هناك تسنّى لعماد وهو بعمر الرابعة عشرة الاختلاط والتعرف إلى اليسار بفصائله وأفكاره المتنوعة.

صادق الشيوعيين وقرأ أفكارهم، وكان لافتاً اهتمامه بتروتسكي. واختلط بالقوميين السوريين الاجتماعيين فأعجبَهُ عمقهم وانضباطهم. لكن كل ذلك لم يدفعه للانتماء إلى أي من الأحزاب اللبنانية. وأمضى أيامه ولياليه، مثل كل الفتية في الشياح، يتنقّل من محور إلى محور، ولصغر سنّه اقتصرت مشاركاته على بناء السواتر الترابية لحماية المدنيين من نيران القناصة، ثم صار يشارك في الحراسات الليلية حيث تعرف إلى المقاتلين الفلسطينيين، وسمع منهم الحكايات عن بلادهم.

أما والدته، فكان لها نصيبها الليلي من المشقّة باحثةً عنه تتقفى أثره من محور إلى آخر، فتعيده الى المنزل ليلاً ليعود ويغادره صباحاً، ولا يعود إلّا برحلة تقفّي أثر جديدة للحاجة آمنة. تلك السيدة التي لم تكن تدرك ما سيأتيها لاحقاً. ففي حزيران من عام 1984 شيّعت الحاجة آمنة والحاج فايز ابنهما الأصغر، جهاد الذي استشهد في قصف مدفعي استهدف منزل العلّامة محمد حسين فضل الله في بئر العبد. وبعد عقد من الزمن شيعت الحاجة آمنة والحاج فايز ابنهما الأوسط فؤاد، الذي كان ضمن تشكيل المقاومة، وقد اغتالته الاستخبارات الإسرائيلية بعبوة ناسفة في منطقة الصفير بالضاحية الجنوبية. كذلك لم تدرك الوالدة ما خبأته لها الأقدار بشهادة ثالث أبنائها، بكرها الحاج عماد، عام 2008.

كان واضحاً أن للتربية الدينية أثرها في الفتى عماد، ومنها اهتمامه بفكر الإمام السيّد موسى الصدر، فشارك في أنشطة حركة المحرومين آنذاك مع أبناء منطقته. لكن الأمر الأوضح، أنه تشبّع أكثر بأفكار الثورة الفلسطينية ووجد نفسه أقرب إلى أكبر فصائلها في حينه، حركة فتح. وسرعان ما أتيحت له فرصة التدريب العسكري في مخيمات عدة، في بيروت وخارجها. وتأهّل عسكرياً ليكون في موقع آمر فصيل. لكن الدورة المفصليّة كانت في معسكر الزهراني «معسكر أبو لؤي»، المعسكر الذي تلقّت فيه الشهيدة دلال المغربي تدريباتها.

عماد وفتح

في مركزية فتح في الشياح، كان يقيم أبو حسن خضر سلامة (الشهيد علي ديب الذي اغتالته إسرائيل عام 1999)، وكان يعرف أيضاً بـ«أبو حسن البلاتين»، نسبةً إلى قضبان البلاتين المزروعة في أنحاء عدة من جسده نتيجة الإصابات المتكررة. أعجب الشاب اللبناني بعماد، ووجد فيه شاباً مناسباً للعمل المتطور. وفي وقت قصير، قرر أبو حسن تعيين عماد نائباً له.

بقي ضمن التشكيل حتى عام 1981. وسبب الخروج، عدم التزام عماد قرارات الحركة. ذلك أن الشاب المتديّن، تأثّر كثيراً بخطف الإمام الصدر.

وعندما تعرّض العلّامة فضل الله لمحاولة اغتيال على يد الاستخبارات العراقية في عام 1979، كوّن عماد وبعض رفاقه درعاً أمنية للسيّد محمد حسين فضل الله حيث سهروا على حمايته وإجراءاته الأمنية، ثم رافقه في رحلة إلى الحج في عام 1980. ومن حينها صار يعرف باسم «الحاج عماد».

وجاء استشهاد السيّد محمد باقر الصدر في العراق في نيسان 1980 منعطفاً في توجهاته. وجد نفسه أمام مسؤولية الوقوف في وجه البعث الخاضع لسلطة العراق. ويومها اتهم البعث باستهداف علماء الدين وقياديين في حركة أمل وما كان يعرف في ذلك الوقت باللجان الإسلامية. انخرط الحاج عماد في مواجهات مسلّحة مع البعثيين، ما أدى إلى انفصاله كلياً عن حركة فتح في النصف الأول من عام 1981.

الاجتياح الإسرائيلي

في حزيران من عام 1982 حصل الاجتياح الإسرائيلي للبنان وكان الحاج عماد في حينه يزور العتبات المقدسة في مشهد في إيران. فور سماعه النبأ، عاد الى سوريا ومنها الى لبنان، وفي الطريق اختطفته عناصر من الكتائب اللبنانية ثم أطلق سراحه بعد تدخّلات سياسية، ودخل بيروت ليلتقي مجدداً رفاقاً له من فتح وفصائل فلسطينية. وراح الحاج عماد يتنقّل من محور الى آخر، من خلدة الى كلية العلوم جنوب شرق بيروت، الى الكوكودي غرب الضاحية الجنوبية لبيروت، الى شاتيلا حيث أصيب في إحدى المواجهات بقدمه إصابة أقعدته في الفراش لفترة وجيزة، استأنف بعدها نشاطه مع الشهيد أبو جهاد (خليل الوزير) الذي كانت تربطه به علاقة وثيقة.

بعدما غادر القادة الفلسطينيون وفصائل الثورة الفلسطينية بيروت، تسنّى للحاج عماد معرفة مخازن أسلحة كثيرة. يومها، كوّن الحاج عماد مع رفاقه النواة الأولى لما بات يعرف لاحقاً بالمقاومة الإسلامية. وألّفت مجموعات للمقاومة في بيروت والبقاع الغربي والجنوب، بدأوا بشن سلسلة عمليات على دوريات للعدو، ونصب الكمائن وقنص الجنود وقصف التجمعات بالصواريخ.. إلى أن كانت باكورة العمليات النوعية للمقاومة الإسلامية بتاريخ 11/11/1982 حيث دمّر مقرّ الحاكم العسكري في مدينة صور في جنوب لبنان في عملية للاستشهادي أحمد قصير.

في تلك الفترة، لم ينقطع الحاج عماد عن أجواء الفصائل الفلسطينية، وبعد ترحيل قادة وكوادر ومقاتلين إلى تونس واليمن والسودان وانكفاء آخرين إلى سهل البقاع، بدأ الشرخ يبرز في العلاقات في ما بينهم، وشعر الحاج عماد بأنّ في مقدوره أداء دور توفيقي، فسعى إلى دفعهم نحو عمل مشترك بوجه إسرائيل فقط. وبحكم علاقته ومعرفته عن قرب بالكثير من المناضلين، قاد الحاج عماد عمليات مشتركة نفّذها مقاتلون من أحزاب لبنانية وآخرون فلسطينيون ومجموعات من المقاومة الإسلامية، وساهم الحاج عماد في تسليح العديد من فصائل المقاومة الوطنية والفلسطينية وتوفير الدعم اللوجستي لهم.

وعندما وقعت اشتباكات بين عدد من المخيمات الفلسطينية وحركة أمل، كان للحاج عماد دور يُشهد له في فض الاشتباكات وحل الإشكالات للحؤول دون تفاقم الأوضاع. وكثيراً ما تعرّض للمخاطر أثناء معالجة بعض الحالات الإنسانية الصعبة.

عام 1984 شهد أيضاً انفصال الحاج علي ديب (أبو حسن خضر سلامة) رفيق درب الحاج عماد عن حركة فتح، فانضمّ هو وتشكيلاته إلى المقاومة الإسلامية وكان سنداً للحاج عماد وذراعه اليمنى. تميّز أبو حسن بقلّة اهتمامه بالمناصب والمواقع التنظيمية. كان مشغولاً بالمهمات العملانية. وهو استمر كذلك حتى استشهاده في عام 1999 بتفجير العدو عبوة استهدفت سيارته في منطقة عبرا شرقي صيدا بعد محاولات عدة فاشلة لاغتياله.

مع أبو عمار وأبو جهاد

كان لشخصية الحاج عماد وقع محبّب ومكانة خاصة لدى الزعيم الفلسطيي الراحل ياسر عرفات، أبو عمار. حظي باحترامه وثقته رغم التباين الواسع في كثير من التوجهات والاقتناعات والرؤية في ما يتعلّق بأولويات الكفاح المسلح في مواجهة العدو. كان أبو عمار حريصاً على التواصل معه والوقوف على آرائه، وقد كان للحاج أبو حسن سلامة دور كبير في هذا المجال، إذ كان بمثابة الرسول بين الاثنين، فكان يلتقي بأبي عمار حاملاً رسائله الى الحاج، سواء أكان في تونس أم في اليمن أم في مصر، وكم كان يحلو لأبي عمار أن يخاطب الحاج عماد في رسائله «ولدي العزيز».

أمّا أبو جهاد، خليل الوزير، فلم تنقطع العلاقة بينه وبين الحاج عماد حتى تاريخ استشهاد أبو جهاد في تونس، وقد كان قناة ورسولاً خاصاً بينهما، ولا أحد يعرف متى يحين الوقت للحديث عنها.

يقول الحاج عماد: «كنت أعرف أنه لن يوافق على تسوية تطيح الحق الفلسطيني. وكلما كانت تطوّرات المواجهة بيننا وبين العدو تتقدّم صوب قرار إسرائيلي بالانسحاب من لبنان، كان «الختيار» يرسل الإشارات إلى الرغبة في الاستعداد لجولة جديدة من المواجهة مع الإسرائيليين في الداخل. صار أكثر اقتناعاً بالحاجة إلى استئناف العمل العسكري. أصلاً لم ينقطع التواصل معه. مرّت العلاقة بفترة عصيبة إثر اتفاقية أوسلو، لكننا كنا نعرف ماذا يجري من حوله، وكان هو يهتمّ بالاحتفاظ بصلة الوصل، كعادته، لم يكن يريد أن يقطع مع أحد. كان يقصد أحياناً شرح الموقف، وبعد انسحاب العدو من لبنان عام 2000، جاءت الرسالة الأساسية منه: أريد دعماً لوجستياً».

كان الحاج جالساً في مكتبه الخاص في قلب الضاحية الجنوبية عندما شرح لزائره أن حزب الله لم يكن يوماً عقبةً أمام أي نشاط لأي طرف في مجال المقاومة. سمع رأياً نقدياً وحتى اتهامياً بأن الحزب عمل مع سوريا على حصر المقاومة به. لم يكن الحاج انفعالياً، لكنه كان مستفَزاً في تلك اللحظة. سارع إلى شرح واقع الحال في لبنان والجنوب خلال فترة ما بعد توقف الحرب الأهلية. لم يكن يقبل بأي إشارة نقد إلى أي جهة أو فصيل له دور في المقاومة. كانت لديه معلومات تفصيلية عمّا فعله الآخرون من خارج حزب الله. لكنه شرح بالتفصيل، الواقع الذي دفع بكثير من القوى الأخرى إلى الانسحاب. لم ينف الظروف السياسية، لكنه قال بحزم: «تعرّضنا لكل أنواع القتل، والضغط، والحصار، والقطيعة، لكن قرارنا أولوية المقاومة وحمايتها كان فوق أي اعتبار آخر. ودافعنا بالدماء عن بقاء المقاومة».

بعد ذلك شرع الحاج رضوان بالحديث عن فلسطين. قال إن هدف حزب الله واضح، وهو إزالة إسرائيل. «ليس في الأمر جدل ولا مساومة، ونحن غير معنيين بأي قرار يتخذه أي طرف في العالم لمنح إسرائيل شرعية البقاء. ونحن لا نتحدث عن شيء غير واقعي. وإلى جانب اقتناعاتنا الدينية، لدينا الكثير من الأسباب العلمية التي تدفعنا الى الاقتناع أكثر، بأن زوال إسرائيل مسألة مرتبطة بما نفعله نحن، أهل فلسطين داخلها وفي محيطها وفي العالم العربي والإسلامي».

فجأة، وقف الحاج في مكانه، وشرع مع أحد مساعديه في البحث داخل خزانة عن مخطط لعمل استراتيجي. قال لزائره: «بعد التحرير عام 2000، وعندما تيسّر لنا التعرف أكثر إلى العدوّ وقدراتنا نحن، صار حلم تحرير فلسطين قابلاً للتحقق. لقد أنشأنا لجنة لإزالة إسرائيل. وفي المقاومة، عندنا، ثمة وحدة خاصة بفلسطين. نحن لا نقوم بالعمل عن الفلسطينيين، ولن نفعل ذلك. لكننا في موقع سياسي وأخلاقي وديني يوجب علينا توفير كل مستلزمات الدعم للمقاومين في فلسطين، ليس فقط لمساعدتهم على البقاء حيث هم الآن، بل لمقاومة الاحتلال ودفعه إلى الخروج ولو تدريجاً من الأراضي المحتلّة».

وللتوضيح أكثر، أشار الحاج رضوان، مع تنويه بأنه غير قادر على الإفاضة لأن تفاصيل كثيرة هي من أسرار العمل، إلى أن حزب الله لديه صلات قوية مع كل مجموعات المقاومة داخل فلسطين ودون أي استثناء. تحدث بقوة وودّ عن كتائب شهداء الأقصى، وقال إن «العلمانيين واليساريين في فلسطين كانوا من طليعة مَن عملنا معهم. لكن لدينا الآن تحالف استراتيجي مع حماس والجهاد الإسلامي ومع القوى الجدية في مقاومة الاحتلال». تابع: «نحن لا نقبل بأي شكل أن يقوم تنظيم في فلسطين يتبع لنا تنظيمياً أو إدارياً أو حتى دينياً. والذين اعتنقوا المذهب الشيعي، حاولوا معنا بقوة، العمل على إنشاء تنظيم أو فرع لحزب الله في فلسطين، فلم نقبل بذلك، ولن نقبل. نحن لم نجد في المقاومة خياراً للتحرير فقط، بل مكاناً تقتل فيه الفتنة، ويبتعد السجال المذهبي والطائفي والعقائدي، وتصبح الخلافات محصورة في كيفية تحقيق نجاحات على صعيد مقاومة الاحتلال».

الحضور الميداني في فلسطين

للحاج رضوان علاقة خاصة مع قيادات حماس والجهاد الإسلامي. كان حازماً في توفير الدعم المالي والإعلامي لانتفاضتي فلسطين ونسج علاقة متينة مع الشهيد الدكتور فتحي الشقاقي، الأمين العام السابق لحركة الجهاد. ثم ارتبط الحاج عماد بعلاقة وثيقة مع الدكتور رمضان عبد الله شلح الأمين العام للجهاد بعد الشقاقي، وبنى علاقات استثنائية مع قيادات حماس في الداخل والخارج، حتى إن البعض لا يعرف ربما، أن الحاج عماد، قبيل استشهاده بساعات، كان في اجتماع مع زعيم حماس خالد مشعل في حضور قياديين من الحركة في دمشق.

بعد استئناف التواصل مع أبو عمار، لم يغفل الحاج عماد الحاجة إلى حضور مباشر لمقاومين في الميدان. كان بالإضافة الى تعاون وثيق ومميز مع حماس والجهاد، يعمل على تأمين انتقال كوادر ومقاتلين من داخل فلسطين الى سوريا ولبنان وإيران لإخضاعهم لدورات عسكرية ومنحهم المعرفة والخبرة والدراسات اللازمة، ثم العمل على إعادتهم إلى الأراضي المحتلّة. وقد طوّرت قوى المقاومة في فلسطين آليات النقل هذه، برغم الحصار الذي كان النظام الأمني لحسني مبارك يفرضه عليهم.

وعندما كان الحاج عماد يشعر بالحاجة إلى الحضور المباشر، لم يكن يتردد في إرسال مَن يجب إرساله إلى الأراضي المحتلة. وقد نجحت إسرائيل، مرتين على الأقل، في كشف مقاومين من حزب الله واعتقالهم، سواء بجهود منها، أو بجهود عملاء لها داخل أجهزة أمن السلطة الفلسطينية، أو بسبب أخطاء واجهت المقاومين أنفسهم. لكن الحاج لم يكن يترك هؤلاء يعيشون لوقت طويل في السجون، وكان سعيه الدائم إلى تنفيذ عمليات أسر لجنود العدو، يقوى بحافز إطلاق هؤلاء الكوادر.

وقد مثّل تطور عمل حماس والجهاد داخل فلسطين المحتل، ونشوء العديد من التشكيلات النضالية والجهادية دافعاً مهمّاً للحاج عماد إلى التطوير، وتفرغ لإعداد الخطط والبرامج لدعم هذه الفصائل داخل فلسطين. وقد شرع في توفير مستلزمات مواجهة العدو تدريباً وتسليحاً ودعماً لوجستياً ومادياً، فأنشأ داخل المقاومة الإسلامية تشكيلاً خاصاً لفلسطين، وفّر له المستلزمات المطلوبة، وكان همّه تدريب الشباب الفلسطيني وإيصال السلاح إلى فلسطين، ولعله في داخله كان يردّ بعضاً من الجميل لرفاق الأمس الذين أمدّوه بالسلاح عند انطلاقة المقاومة الإسلامية في لبنان.

بعد توفير المقوّمات الأساسية للصمود العسكري على مستوى السلاح الخفيف والمتوسط لكل من حماس والجهاد وكتائب شهداء الأقصى واللجان الشعبية وكتائب أبو الريش وغيرها من الفصائل المقاومة، شرع الحاج عماد بتنفيذ قرار قيادة المقاومة الإسلامية توفير الدعم المفتوح للمقاومة في فلسطين. ووفّرت سوريا وإيران الدعم الإضافي والاستراتيجي، وشرع بتمكين المقاومين في فلسطين من إنتاج القدرة النوعية لمواجهة العدو سعياً إلى تحقيق توازن تكتيكي ونوعي مع العدو. ولم يكن يغفل عن بناء التشكيلات والتخصصات، كالمشاة وسلاح الهندسة والقناصة والوحدة المضادة للدروع والقوة الصاروخية، فضلاً عن بناء تشكيلات منظمة ونموذجية لخوض حرب عصابات مع جيش العدو. حتى إن قيادياً رفيعاً في كتائب عز الدين القسّام قال إن الحاج عماد كان شريكنا في حرب غزة.

لم يكن الحاج عماد يفرّق بين مقاوم وآخر. لم يدع سبيلاً الى فلسطين إلّا سلكه غير آبه بكل اللّاءات والممنوعات التي كانت تطوّق فلسطين قبل الأطواق المفروضة من العدو أسلاكاً وجدراناً، فلا عباب البحر ردّه ولا أمواجه العاتية، ولا وعورة الأرض والجبال والوديان حالت دون إيصال السلاح إلى فلسطين من فوق الأرض ومن… تحتها!

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مغنية في نظر مطارديه

في الثالث من الشهر الجاري عرضت القناة الثانية الإسرائيلية برنامج «عوفدا» وفيه تحقيق أعدّه «ساريت ماغِن» و«نعمه بيري» تشتمل تفاصيله على حكاية غير رسمية عن اغتيال الحاج عماد مغنية في دمشق، وفيه شهادات لعدد كبير من رجال الأمن البارزين في إسرائيل ومسؤولين وعملاء سابقين لوكالة الاستخبارات الأميركية، تحدّثوا عن مغنية ومواصفاته، والعمل على تعقّبه.

■ دافيد بركاي، مسؤول رفيع المستوى عمل سابقاً في وحدة الاستخبارات ينظر الى صورة مغنية ويقول: «هذا يخيفني بعض الشيء، وهو لا يزال يخيفني. لم يكن مغنية مخرّباً، بل كان استراتيجياً استخدم الإرهاب كجزء من استراتيجيته».

■ آمنون شاحاك رئيس هيئة الأركان سابقاً: «عماد مغنية كان جريئاً، وذكياً، ومثّل خطراً حقيقياً على دولة إسرائيل».

■ بوب بار عميل لـC I A في بيروت سابقاً: «فلنعترف بالحقيقة… مغنية كان عبقرياً. لا يمكن نفي هذا عنه. بالنسبة إليه لم يكن هناك شيء لا يستطيع الوصول إليه في لبنان… كل شخص وكل مكان».

■ ديفيد بار مسؤول سابق في الاستخبارات قال: «أحد الأمور المدهشة هو صوره التي ظهرت على مواقع كثيرة على شبكة الإنترنت. في الحقيقة هذه هي المرة الأولى التي أرى فيها الرجل يعرض نفسه لكاميرا، يرتدي نظارات حديثة، قصة شعر لطيفة، ولحيته مشذبة، وينظر إلى الكاميرا كأنه يقول: «أنا الآن شخص مشهور». وهذا لا يشبه أبداً «مغنية» الذي عرفته».

■ شبتاي شابيط الرئيس الأسبق للموساد: «لقد جمع بين الذكاء والمعرفة والقدرة المهنية والشجاعة والقدرة على التخطيط والاندماج في المنطقة، لذلك، فإنه من مستوى آخر، من مستوى مغاير. مغنية لم يكن مكشوفاً، لكن انعكاسه كان كأنه «ترومبلدور» (بطل يهودي) من مدة إلى مدة كان ينبثق فجأةً خبر ما بأنه هنا أو هنا أو هنا… هذا إضافةً إلى أنه نجح في تغيير مظهره».

■ «ط» ـــــ مسؤول سابق في المؤسسة الأمنية، كان هذا الضابط لا يتحدث عن «مغنية» فقط بل يعيشه، فقد طارده وكان ضمن الدائرة الضيقة جداً حين كانت عملية اصطياد مغنية في ذروتها، وقبل مدة أنهى عمله الناجح في أحد المناصب الرفيعة في جهاز الاستخبارات، و«مغنية» كان أحد آخر الملفات التي أقفلها»، وهو يقول عنه: «بالتأكيد، لقد عمل مع مجموعة صغيرة جداً من الأصدقاء الموثوق بهم، وكان رجلاً شديد الحذر بطريقة أساسية. أحياناً، فهمنا أن هذا الرجل هو رجل مركزي جداً، وأن المسّ به سيؤدي الى تضرر المنظمة نفسها والى جعله يدفع الثمن عن أمور كثيرة قام بها ضدنا».

■ دافيد بركائي، مسؤول كبير سابق في وحدة الاستخبارات: «لم يُسمع شيء عن الرجل، ولم يعلم أحد أين يقطن، ولم يعلم أحد أين سينام في اليوم التالي، كما لم يعلم أحد مع من ينام وأيّ دخان يدخن، وماذا يزعجه في الحياة».

Video: قصة ومراحل جهاد الشهيد عماد مغنية رحمه الله

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River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Wikileaks: Samir Geagea’: "Michel Sleiman is not a leader …& we are running out of money…we prefer Siniora, but Mikati would do"

>C O N F I D E N T I A L — BEIRUT

SUBJECT: LEBANON: MARCH 14 CHRISTIANS STILL FACE INTERNAL CHALLENGES

Classified By: Ambassador Michele J. Sison

3. (C) The Ambassador, accompanied by PolOff, met with Lebanese Forces (LF) leader Samir Geagea and his aides Elie Khoury and Joseph Nehme on April 16 at Geagea´s headquarters in Maarab. Ambassador remarked that the Embassy had commemorated earlier in the day the 26th anniversary of the April 18, 1983 Embassy bombing. Geagea recalled that on that day he had been surrounded by the forces of his then enemy,
now March 14 political ally, Walid Jumblatt, in the “War of the Mountains” in the village of Deir Qamar in the Chouf.

4. (C) According to Geagea, Jumblatt is firmly in the March 14 camp, but is “hedging his bets.” “Like all of us,” Geagea said, “Jumblatt feels the consequences of March 14 mismanagement.”

5. (C) Noting that the four March 14 leaders (majority leader Saad Hariri, former president and Kataeb leader Amine Gemayel, Jumblatt, and himself) had not met as a group since April 2, Geagea calculated that they have resolved “70 to 80” percent of their disputes in forming the candidates´ lists for the June 7 parliamentary elections. All of the conflicts between Kataeb and LF have been resolved, he said, adding “at our expense” under his breath, and now he is meeting with Saad to finalize the list for the northern district Akkar where, he argued, LF has a strong presence.

6. (C) The Ambassador urged Geagea to continue focusing on the big picture for March 14, rather than on individual party gains. Geagea requested that the Ambassador try to convince March 14 member and independent Chouf candidate Ghattas khoury (Ref A) to withdraw his candidacy because he was competing against the other March 14 candidates.(Geagea’ is a champion of ‘NO foreign interference in Lebanese affairs!)….

8. (C) Geagea said that Baabda was problematic because despite a “respectable March 14 list,” the Aounists and Hizballah supporters outnumber March 14 followers….

9. (C) Noting that his wife, MP Setrida Geagea, and LF member and Environment Minister Tony Karam have been encouraging Lebanese expatriates from North America, Europe, and the Gulf to vote in Lebanon, Geagea estimated that thousands will vote, particularly in key districts such as Zgharta, Zahle, and Batroun. He added that there are thousands of Sunni Lebanese living in Syria who would come to vote in the elections, but would likely “be influenced” by the Syrian regime. Geagea privately confided to the Ambassador that March 14 has run out of money. ….

10. (C) Commending the U.S. for its firm policy stance on Hizballah, Geagea suggested that the U.S. refrain from attacking March 8 in the lead-up to the elections, and instead aim to clarify that its position on Hizballah is not linked to the elections. Addressing clashes between the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) and the drug-related criminals in Baalbeck starting April 13, Geagea absolved Hizballah of all blame, commenting that despite its heavy presence in the area, Hizballah is staying out of the conflict.

11. (C) Geagea was unconcerned about the Syrian troop buildup along the border, saying that it was in support of the LAF´s action against the drug criminals. (Comment: This is a marked contrast from October 2008, when Geagea feared an imminent Syrian invasion after its troops deployed along the northern Lebanon border to fight smuggling, Ref B. End comment.)

12. (C) However, Geagea said, Hizballah violated Egypt´s state sovereignty by sending Hizballah members illegally into Egypt. Even if they were only intending to help the Palestinians, Geagea assessed, it was wrong. However, Egypt´s threat to arrest Hizballah SYG Hassan Nasrallah and his deputy Sheikh Naim Qassem was “a declaration of war” and would provoke some sort of response from Hizballah, he believed….

14. (C) Noting that President Michel Sleiman spoke about strengthening the role of the president, Geagea said Sleiman is “not a leader” and his proposal would not amount to anything because Sleiman would not secure a two-thirds majority in parliament required to amend the constitution…

16. (C) “We should not assume that (Speaker Nabih) Berri stays on as speaker, or that Saad is the next PM,” Geagea said with conviction. At a minimum, he proposed, March 14 should condition acceptance of Berri on certain points, such as requiring that parliament stay open…

17. (C) Geagea posited that March 14 members needed to discuss at length whether Saad is the best option for the next PM. He pointed out that March 14 could get concessions from March 8, such as no insistence on having a blocking third in the cabinet, if it agreed to name independent figure and former PM Najib Mikati as the next PM. (Comment: Geagea´s hesitation to support Saad´s premiership is not new; in May 2008, he lobbied hard to keep Siniora as PM, instead of Saad — Ref C. End comment.)

Posted by G, Z, or B at 10:39 AM

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

"..Hezbollah remembers the heavy beating they suffered from us in 2006 & you may be called to enter Lebanon again .."

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Via Friday-Lunch-Club

“…Hezbollah remembers the heavy beating they suffered from us in 2006, but it is not forever, and you may be called to enter [Lebanon] again,” Barak told the IDF soldiers..”

Posted by G, Z, or B at 11:58 AM