Palestine

By Stephanie Westbrook

Upon returning home from Gaza, a friend commented, "It must have been horrifying seeing all the destruction." And it was. The 22-day Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip laid waste to an already ravaged territory.

The landscape is dotted with piles of rubble of bombed out buildings, the twisted iron and aluminum of destroyed factories, once green fields reduced to sand and dirt by Israeli tanks, apartments with 2 meter holes in the walls and toppled minarets of mosques turned to ruins.

But as devastating as bearing witness to the destruction was, it was the absurdities of the siege, the total blockade of Gaza imposed by Israel and Egypt, that really affected me. Gaza itself remains frozen in time; for nearly five months after the ceasefire, aside from a few rare cases in which cinder blocks have been used to fill gaping holes in the sides of buildings, no reconstruction whatsoever has begun. The blockade keeps the necessary

Bound, blindfolded and beaten – by Israeli troops
By Ben Lynfield | Independent.co.UK

Two Israeli officers have testified that troops in the West Bank beat, bound and blindfolded Palestinian civilians as young as 14. The damaging disclosures by two sergeants of the Kfir Brigade include descriptions of abuses they say they witnessed during a search-and-detain operation involving hundreds of troops in Hares village on 26 March. The testimonies have been seen by The Independent and are expected to add fuel to the controversy over recent remarks by Colonel Itai Virob, commander of Kfir Brigade, in which he said violence against detained Palestinians was justified in order to accomplish missions.

Both the soldiers, from the Harub battalion, highlighted the tight tying of the plastic hand restraints placed on detainees. "There are people who think you need to tighten the restraints all the way, until no drop of blood will pass from here to there," one soldier said. "It doesn't take much time until the hands turn blue. There were a lot of people that you know weren't feeling anything."

He said about 150 Palestinians, some as young as 14, were bound, blindfolded and detained at the village school during the operation, which lasted from 3am to 3pm. He was told it was aimed at preventing village youths throwing stones against nearby settler roads. It was clear many of the people detained had done nothing wrong, but they were held to gather intelligence, he said. Read more.

By CODEPINK/Linda Milazzo

The women inspired peace group, CODEPINK, in alliance with Israeli feminist group, Coalition of Women For Peace, will host continued human rights protests from June 8th through June 14th at Erez Crossing checkpoint at the Gaza Border in Israel.

EREZ, ISRAEL -- More than three dozen Americans and Israelis rallied today at the border checkpoint here into Gaza, hoping to be let through into the war-torn area with playground building materials, food and other products to delivered to the Gazan people, after Israel authorities barred them from entering.

Obama's Outreach to Muslims: Empty Rhetoric, Same Old Policies
By Stephen Lendman

As well as anyone, Edward Said understood the West's long-standing antipathy to Islam - reflected in Samuel Huntington's "The Clash of Civilizations" article in the summer 1993 issue of Foreign Affairs and later a 1996 book.

He wrote that future conflicts won't be "primarily ideological or primarily economic. The great divisions among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be cultural....the principal conflicts of global politics will occur between nations and groups of different civilizations. The clash of civilizations will dominate global politics. The fault lines between civilizations will be the battle lines of the future" - demagogically suggesting a benevolent, superior West confronting a belligerent, hostile, inferior Muslim world. In other words, good v. evil.

Israel facing hundreds of war crime lawsuits | Press TV

Israel could soon be charged with hundreds of war crimes as Palestinian lawyers file 936 lawsuits against the Israeli military five months after its three week war on Gaza.

Head of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) Iyad al-Alami, says the cases will soon be heard in Spain's National Court under universal jurisdiction, the pro-Israeli magazine Der Spiegel reported on Saturday.

The legal department of the PCHR in Gaza City is gathering evidence for the cases which include a wide range of instances of unarmed civilians - including children - being shot from close range or burned by white phosphorus shells, ambulances being attacked and civilian houses being deliberately destroyed. Read more.

US delays embassy transfer to Jerusalem | Press TV

President Barack Obama has decided to delay the transfer of the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem (al-Quds) amid a heightening row between the US and Israel.

Sources in the White House revealed on Friday that the US policy towards Israeli-Palestinians issue had not been changed and that the US embassy would remain in Tel Aviv for at least six more months.

The US Congress ratified the Jerusalem Embassy Act in October 1995, which states that Jerusalem be recognized as the capital of Israel. The act also states that the United States had to move its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem no later than 31 May 1999.

However, the decision has been delayed every six months due to the Palestinian-Israeli row over the city.

The status of Jerusalem has been among the thorny issues in the stalled peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, with the Israelis claiming the city as their "eternal, undivided capital" -- a position not recognized by the international community. Read more.

On June 6, 2009, a spirited solidarity rally in support of the people of Occupied Gaza was staged by human rights activists in front of the Israeli Embassy, in Washington, D.C. The protest action demanded: "End the Siege of Gaza!" June 6th marks the 42nd anniversary of the Israeli" seizure of Gaza." The demonstration was sponsored by the ANSWER Coalition, among other groups.

Click here for featured speakers and organizations.

Changing the Discourse: First Step toward Changing the Policy?
By Phyllis Bennis | Institute for Policy Studies

President Barack Obama's much-anticipated Cairo speech reflected a significant shift away from the ideological framework of militarism and unilateralism that shaped the Bush administration's war-based policy towards the Arab and Muslim worlds. His "not Bush" focus was perhaps most sharply evident in his public denunciation of the Iraq War as a "war of choice." Obama's call for a "new beginning" based on "the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition" was followed by a move to shift the official U.S. discourse towards something closer to internationalism - particularly by pointing to parallels between historical (and some contemporary) grievances and treating them as equivalent. This included his reference to the U.S. "role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government" along with Iran's "role in acts of hostage-taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians."

Certainly, the equivalences were limited. Equating Palestinians and Israelis as "two peoples with legitimate aspirations, each with a painful history..." doesn't reflect the reality that Israel is an occupying power with specific obligations under the Geneva Convention, while Palestinians living under occupation are a protected population under international law. But in the context of decades of U.S. privileging of Israelis as the only ones who have suffered, equating the two was a major step forward.

As expected, Obama focused first on the historic contributions of Arabs and Muslims to global civilization and to U.S. culture and history. His articulation of U.S. policy - and particularly U.S. active obligations - on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were addressed only in broad strokes, although there was more detail regarding Iran.

The shift in discourse, away from justifying reckless imperial hubris, unilateralism and militarism and towards a more cooperative and potentially even internationalist approach was potent. The actual policy shifts were much smaller. It remains the work of mobilized people across the U.S. - starting with the millions who mobilized to build a movement capable of electing Barack Hussein Obama as President - to turn that new language into new policies - reversing the escalation and moving towards ending Obama's war in Afghanistan and Pakistan, ending the occupation of Iraq immediately rather than years from now, ending U.S. military aid to Israel and creating a policy based on an end to occupation and equality for all, launching new negotiations with Iran not based on military threats, implementing U.S. nuclear disarmament obligations, and more.

That's the next step.

By David Swanson

Illustrated by Michael Parenti

Kevin Ovenden contacted me. He works with British MP George Galloway -- yes, this hero. Ovenden is currently in the United States helping to put together a convoy of, hopefully, hundreds of vehicles and people to bring medical aid to the besieged people of Gaza.

Americans are invited to take part. The cost of a plane ticket, a hotel for two nights in Egypt, and other expenses is required. I told Ovenden I'd like to go if I can raise the money. If you'd like to read, hear, and see my reports from Gaza at http://AfterDowningStreet.org please go to that site and contribute. If $2,000 comes in, I'll go. If that total isn't reached, I'll use your contributions in our work for peace and justice.

But this is not just about me. I want YOU to contact Kevin and join the convoy yourself. Here's what Kevin says about the trip:

We will fly out from the US to Cairo on July 4 (message being that Palestinian independence is as worthy as US independence) where we will cohere the convoy, aid and vehicles and head off aiming to enter Gaza on July 12. We organized a similar operation from Britain in February - driving for 23 days with 107 vehicles, 255 people and approx $2 million worth of aid through France and Spain, and then across the Maghreb.

Support for the convoy is already taking off. Ron Kovic is the co-leader of the convoy alongside George. As in Britain, the climate post the December/January offensive against the people of Gaza has turned markedly. There is a renewed confidence around this issue - notwithstanding the shocking verdict and sentencing in the retrial of the Holy Land Foundation people.

We are taking strictly medical aid and have gone to great lengths to meet the stringent requirements of the US authorities on charitable contacts with organizations operating in Gaza. We want the convoy to show the world - particularly the Middle East - a different face of the US, that something other than the US Marine Corps can come from these shores.

We hope that it will play a part in continuing to shift US public opinion on the issues surrounding Israel/Palestine and the wider region. A changed public opinion is a precondition for a changed and more just foreign policy.

Amnesty: Israel repeatedly breached rules of war in Gaza
By Yossi Melman | Haaretz

Amnesty International has accused Israel of repeatedly violating the rules of armed conflict during its recent offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

"Israeli forces repeatedly breached the laws of war, including by carrying out direct attacks on civilians and civilian buildings and attacks targeting Palestinian militants that caused a disproportionate toll among civilians," the human rights watchdog said in its annual report.

The report states that 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the offensive - including 300 children - and that 5,000 people were wounded. The Israel Defense Forces, however, says 1,166 Palestinians were killed, the vast majority of whom were Hamas militants.

The report mentions Israel's stated goal in the 3-week campaign: The desire to stem rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian militants on southern Israel. The report goes on to note that three Israeli civilians were killed during the operation, which was in December 2008 and January 2009, in addition to the seven Israeli civilians who were killed by Qassam rockets and other Palestinian attacks launched from Gaza in 2008.

According to the report, the hostilities erupted after suffering the consequences of an Israel-led blockade on the Gaza Strip for a year-and-a-half.

"The blockade throttled almost all economic life and led growing numbers of Palestinians to become dependent on international food aid; even terminally ill patients were prevented from leaving to obtain medical care that could not be provided by Gaza's resource- and medicine-starved hospitals," Amnesty said. Read more.

Visit Joe's page.

Human Rights Situation in Occupied Palestine
By Stephen Lendman

On March 15, 2006, the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly 170 to 4 (with only the US, Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau against) "to establish the Human Rights Council (HRC), based in Geneva, in replacement of the Commission on Human Rights, as a subsidiary organ of the General Assembly....responsible for promoting universal respect for the protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms for all, without distinction of any kind and in a fair and equal manner."

HRC "is an inter-governmental body within the UN system made up of 47 states responsible for strengthening the promotion and protection of human rights around the globe."

Palestinians rescued from Gazan tunnel | Press TV

Three Palestinians have been rescued after spending five days under the rubble of a tunnel in Rafah which was targeted by Israeli aircraft.

The tunnel which links the Gaza Strip to Egypt was hit by Israeli warplanes on Tuesday, and the three had to struggle to survive until Saturday when they were saved by Egyptian rescue workers.

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, which has been under a crippling Israeli blockade for almost two years, use the tunnels -- also known as Gaza feeding tubes -- to import food, medical and vital supplies into the enclave.

In addition to the blockade, Israel launched a three-week war against the Gaza population in late 2008 and early 2009, killing 1,330 Palestinians and inflicting at least USD 1.6b in damages to the infrastructure and facilities along with residential buildings.

Read more.

Gaza suffocation puts medics on hunger strike | Press TV

Nine medics seeking entry into the Gaza Strip on a humanitarian mission have gone on a hunger strike after being denied entry into the blockaded ghetto.

Three of the medical doctors, all British nationals say they have been denied access to the Palestinian territory at the Rafah crossing since the beginning of May.

They aimed at establishing a cardiac surgery unit at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, which currently lacks such a facility, the Guardian reported on Tuesday.

The group also seeks to "train medical students and junior doctors there", the report adds.

One of the medics identified as Omar Mangoush, a cardiac surgeon at Hammersmith hospital in London, told the British newspaper that the group had arrived at the crossing in Egypt on May 4 only to be told they did not have permission to enter.

"We are on hunger strike until they let us through," he said. Read more.

Netanyahu: Israel Ready to Speak to Syria, Palestinians | By VOA News

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he told U.S. President Barack Obama that Israel is willing to immediately open peace talks with Syria and the Palestinians.

But Mr. Netanyahu says he also made it clear to Mr. Obama that any peace deal must address Israel's security needs.

Read more.

The Israeli prime minister frustrated President Clinton's peace efforts; the new president must do better.
By Mustafa Barghouthi, LA Times

Icannot recall a more important meeting between an American president and an Israeli prime minister than today's meeting between President Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Will the Obama administration have the courage to challenge Netanyahu, or will all the talk of change dissolve in the face of a concerted one-two punch from Netanyahu and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?

I am increasingly convinced that if Obama fails to speak out now, it will doom the two-state solution forever. Further fiddling in Washington -- after eight years of it -- will consign Jerusalem, the West Bank and the two-state solution to an Israeli expansionism that will overwhelm the ability of cartographers to concoct a viable Palestinian state.

Two cheers for President Obama.

President Obama, at the press conference yesterday with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu:

Now, Israel is going to have to take some difficult steps as well, and I shared with the Prime Minister the fact that under the roadmap and under Annapolis that there's a clear understanding that we have to make progress on settlements. Settlements have to be stopped in order for us to move forward.

The Russell Tribunal on Palestine
By Stephen Lendman

After two years of "underground" work, it was launched with a "successful press conference" and announcement that:

"The Russell Tribunal on Palestine seeks to reaffirm the primacy of international law as the (way to settle) the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." Its work will focus on "the enunciation of law by authoritative bodies. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), in its opinion on the (Separation Wall in Occupied Palestine, addressed relevant) "International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law, as well as dozens of international resolutions concerning Palestine."

This Tribunal will "address the failure of application of law even though it has been so clearly identified." It begins where the ICJ "stopped: highlighting the responsibilities arising from the enunciation of law, including those of the international community, which cannot continue to shirk its obligations."

Netanyahu Visits the White House: Change We Can Believe in for U.S.-Israeli Relations?
By Phyllis Bennis | IPS

Meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Obama has the chance to make good on real change in U.S. policy in the Middle East.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is coming to Washington on May 18, for his first official visit with President Obama. If President Obama is serious about achieving a two-state solution in his first term, and therefore serious about bringing real pressure to bear on Israel, there will be no better time to do so. *

Obama, who has strongly supported the idea of a two-state solution since his campaign, has yet to articulate whether or not he is actually prepared to spend some of his massive political capital to exert serious pressure on Israel towards that end – for example by conditioning (even some) of the currently committed $30 billion in U.S. military aid to Israel, on a complete Israeli settlement freeze in the West Bank. If he means it, this could be the moment. Netanyahu’s campaign rejection of the two-state solution, his rejection of continuing the current Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy and instead limiting negotiations to economic issues, and his extreme racist Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman all serve to make a serious U.S. effort towards Israeli accountability not only timely, but less politically costly than ever.

Anna Baltzer

Host: Basima Farhat

Showtime: Tuesday, May 12, 2009 - 8:00pm-9:00pm Eastern
Listen Live on BBSRadio or you may also join us live in our virtual auditorium!
 

Anna Baltzer is a 28-year-old Jewish American Columbia graduate, Fulbright scholar, and the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors. She is a three-time volunteer with the International Women’s Peace Service, where she documented human rights abuses in the West Bank and supported the nonviolent movement against the Occupation. She has spent most of the past few years in Palestine or on tour with her book, Witness in Palestine: A Jewish American Woman in the Occupied Territories. Anna Baltzer presents: LIFE IN OCCUPIED PALESTINE: EYEWITNESS STORIES & PHOTOS
 
 
 

Anna Baltzer is touring the United States with a presentation and book describing her experiences documenting human rights abuses in Palestine and supporting nonviolent resistance to the Occupation.

Providing photographic documentation and critical information often misrepresented or ignored in the Western media, Baltzer’s presentation covers checkpoints, settlements, demonstrations, Israeli activism, the 1948 war & refugees, censorship, the Separation Wall, and more.

For further information about Baltzer’s work and tour, please visit

http://www.AnnaInTheMiddleEast.com

'Go back and die in Gaza'
By Stephanie Doetzer | al Jazeera

Since Israel's closure of the Gaza Strip in 2007, only severely sick Palestinians have been allowed to seek medical attention elsewhere provided they receive authorisation and security clearances from the Israeli authorities.

However, getting the special permit that allows patients to leave Gaza for medical treatment is a bureaucratic hassle and, many Gazans say, comes with strings attached.

It’s Springtime for AIPAC! The mega-Israel Lobby convenes annually in Washington, D.C. at the convention center. AIPAC sucks out over $3 billion a year from our fast fading treasury for Israel with little or no dissent from the fakers in the U.S. Congress. (See links in "Read more" below).

When, Where the Pope Inspires No Hope
By Nicola Nasser - Bir Zeit, West Bank | Palestinian Chronicles

Pope Benedict XVI is scheduled to be the third pontiff to visit the Holy Land from 8-15 May, following in the footsteps of Paul VI in 1964 and John Paul II in 2000, on a mission officially described as a “pilgrimage” and one of “peace and reconciliation.”

However, the Pope will be stepping into “a diplomatic minefield,” where the Catholic highest spiritual authority will be unmercifully scrutinized by the protagonists of the one hundred year old Arab-Israeli conflict for the Holy Father’s every step, word and handshake, which would force him into the defensive in an impossible balancing act that will rule out any hope his presence is supposed to inspire, especially among the down-trodden Arabs of Palestine, whether those who are “Israelis” living as second class citizens since 1948 or those Palestinians living under the Israeli military occupation since 1967.

Even the pontiff’s own Catholic diminishing flock in the Holy Land seems in controversy over the timing and the itinerary of his pilgrimage. "We will ask him why he came, what he intends on saying … and why he isn't coming to Gaza," Father Manuel Mussalam, the pastor of the only Catholic church of about 300 believers in Gaza, out of 3000 Christians in the Israeli besieged Mediterranean strip, was quoted by AFP as asking. "We'll tell him that this is not the right moment to come and visit the holy places, while Jerusalem is occupied," Mussalam added.

Palestine's Holocaust Museum
By By Dania Yousef in Ni'lin, occupied West Bank | al Jazeera

In a small anonymous home in the West Bank, a Palestinian academic has set up a project which is almost unheard of in the Occupied Territories.

Hassan Musa is the curator of a museum exhibition dedicated to the Jewish Holocaust in Europe.

The cracked white walls of this makeshift museum in the village of Ni'lin are covered from floor to ceiling with images of people forced out of their homes, tortured, imprisoned, starved and murdered.

In addition to the pictures depicting the Nazi brutality against Jews in Europe, there are also images of the Palestinian Nakba (catastrophe) following the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 and the violence in Palestine since.

On one wall, there is a picture of a scared Jewish boy holding up his hands as Nazi soldiers look on; the caption reads: "Make your final account with Hitler and the Nazi Germans, not with the Palestinians."

Israeli proxy gets busy to silence Americans | Press TV

An American academic is to be prosecuted for drawing parallels between the plight of Gazans and that of the Jews who suffered under Nazi rule.

Jewish Sociology and Global Studies Professor William Robinson of the University of Santa Barbara in California sent the electronic post entitled 'Parallel photos of Nazis and Israelis' to 80 students in his class, Ynet reported on Thursday.

There have been hints in the press that the Obama Administration has been considering conditioning U.S. aid to Israel on a real freeze of Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank. There's a conventional wisdom that suggests that doing this would touch a "third rail of politics." But the conventional wisdom might not have been accurate; if it once was accurate, it might not be accurate any more.

WorldPublicOpinion.org has just released a poll showing that three-quarters of Americans oppose Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank. This number is up 23 points from 2002.

Even among respondents who say they sympathize with Israel more than the Palestinians, 64% say Israel should not build settlements in the West Bank.