Articles
Archives | Art | Articles | Background Books | Boycott | Cartoons Chemical War | Children | Contact Donate | Elections | E-mail Us Events | Film | Home | Letters Links | Maps | Mission | Music Videos | News | News Links Performance | Photos | Poetry Polls | Prisoners | Products Search | Take Action | The US Role The Wall | Together | Old Home Page
Recent News..                         News Headlines News & Articles in text format Headlines in text format News Archives Get daily News & Articles by e-mail         This webpage uses Javascript to display some content. Please enable Javascript in your browser and reload this page. This webpage uses Javascript to display some content. Please enable Javascript in your browser and reload this page.

The Ministry of Prisoners
Iqbal Tamimi, Palestine Think Tank 5/30/2008
     In the UK, where I am living, there is a Ministry of Justice, but in Palestine, where my home country is, there is a Ministry of Prisoners. Does this make any sense?
     Well, it seems that it does, after all, states create Ministries to solve the problems affecting a large sector of their citizens. It is common sense to have a Ministry of Education because almost half of the country will be students at different levels, and many people work in the education system. This sector faces many obstacles that need to be resolved, and that’s why there is a ministry of Education in every country. But why is Palestine is the only country in the universe that has a Ministry of Prisoners?
     When you read about a Ministry of Justice you will feel hope, it tells you that there is justice, and there are laws, and being requested to report there for any reason does not make you a criminal, it is just a system that investigates to find out the truth, there is even no indication of punishment when you read its name. more.. e-mail

Letter: Take 10 and give back 1 if the Palestinians behave, then repeat!
Zahir Ebrahim, Palestine Think Tank 5/30/2008
     The following follow-up comment, posted by Project Humanbeingsfirst here, to its article “Celebrating Israel’s 60th Birthday in the 60th year of the Nakba” may be of some interest to your think-tankers. Perhaps you can reprint it with the above title.
     “I happen to be a Zionist. I’m a Zionist by dint of the fact that I live here and constitute part of Hebrew culture, even if I am opposed to the present regime and criticize it harshly. … . For now, I’m on the losing side of this struggle, therefore I’m defined as anti-Zionist. So be it.”
     Thank you for that clarification - to both, the above commenter, and posthumously, to Prof. Baruch Kimmerling.
     And therein lies the quintessential component of “the endless trail of red herrings” that almost all on the proverbial “LEFT” in the West spin in support of Zion.
     The logical follow-up question to ask then, is to which past and future “regime” aren’t they opposed to in Israel in order to not be “defined as anti-Zionist”? Then we can further examine that regime and dismantle that too. more.. e-mail

At the eleventh hour
Editorial, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/29/2008
     The announcement in Ankara of Turkish-sponsored Syrian-Israeli negotiations didn’t come as a surprise. Since Syria disclosed that the Turkish prime minister conveyed that Israel was prepared to pull out of the Golan, things have been moving in that direction. Both Israel and Syria have reasons to talk, and Turkey is glad to act as the go-between.
     For a long time, Syrian-Israeli negotiations were consistently beset by developments on the Lebanese and Palestinian tracks of Arab-Israeli peace talks. This time, however, things may turn out differently. The negotiations are taking place in the last months of the Bush presidency and perhaps even during Ehud Olmert’s last days in office. With the Israeli prime minister under investigation for corruption, many in Israel have been calling for him to step down. There is a chance that Tzipi Livni, Israeli foreign minister, may take his place until early elections are held later in the year. After that, pollsters say, Binyamin Netanyahu, whose hardline policies on Syria are known to all, may emerge as Israel’s next leader. more.. e-mail

Carter’s second term
Gamal Nkrumah, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/29/2008
     All the crises that Carter faced -- fuel and food, the Middle East, general malaise -- are still crying out for solutions.
     In conventional wisdom, an aspiring American presidential candidate must court the omnipotent pro-Israel or Jewish lobby. So it came as no surprise that Senator Barack Obama has abruptly halted his acerbic public warnings about the need for drastic change in foreign policy concerns -- and especially when it comes to Israel, a country that has never been seen as a paragon of good government in this part of the world, but that has long been the sacred cow of the American political establishment.
     "My position on Hamas is indistinguishable from the position of Hillary Clinton and John McCain," Obama disclosed last week in an about-face on the prickly topic to The Atlantic. He also stressed his deep support for Israel when he spoke at a synagogue during a visit to Florida this week. The comments by the leading contender for the presidency of the Democratic Party raised eyebrows in Egypt and other Arab and Muslim nations. Was it a question of appeasement, wondered many an Arab pundit. After all, Obama has been on record advocating face-to-face talks with Iran and Hamas. more.. e-mail

Ending living reactively
Azmi Bishara, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/29/2008
     The tasks of Arab society predate the Nakba and at issue is Arab will, writes Contrary to the general impression, there is nothing new in Israel’s lavish celebrations of its so- called independence. The Israeli celebration of the Nakba, or calamity that befell the Palestinian people, is calculated according to the Jewish calendar, thereby creating a symbolic distance between the two events: the national independence of one people and the national dispossession of another.
     "Independence day" is one of those civil holidays intended to forge the new Israeli secular/ religious national faith, which is founded on a creed that fuses elements of biblical mythology, modern nationalist values, colonialist ethics and the legends of the founding fathers with militarism. It is immeasurably more extravagant than any equivalent Arab independence day celebration, which, in itself, has various ramifications on the question of the legitimacy of political entities in public eyes. The Israeli celebrations are popular events, not just official state occasions. People take their children to local fairs, festivals and parades. The media feature an endless deluge of special programmes, films and anthems, all contributing to implant a collective Israeli memory of the so- called "war of liberation" in 1948. People, on that day, visit army units in their camps and military museums and go out on nature hikes. Such are the religious/militaristic customs that have become annual institutionalised rites. One notable rite takes place the day before "independence day", when at the sound of a siren, Israelis throughout the country stand up for a moment of silence in remembrance of Israelis lost. Perhaps the only day that tops "independence day" in terms of popular participation is Yom Kippur, a religious not secular holiday, a day of fasting and atonement. more.. e-mail

Dancing around the wolf
Hassan Nafaa, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/29/2008
     From Qatar to Lebanon, Israel and Syria, the entire region is involved in an unpredictable dance. Only one thing is clear, and that is that it is no longer being choreographed by Washington.
     The sense of uncertainty and trepidation looming over the Middle East has been amplified in recent weeks by the eruption of violence in Lebanon in a manner that took the country to the brink of a civil war; the regional tour of President George Bush during which he made remarks that embarrassed even his closest allies; the success of Qatar, in cooperation with the Arab League, in bringing Lebanese parties to Doha for talks that defused the crisis; the success of Turkey in arranging and hosting a round of indirect talks between Syria and Israel that has broken the stalemate and paved the way for direct negotiations and the escalation of Egyptian efforts to defuse the situation on the Palestinian-Israeli front, lift the siege on Gaza, and hopefully bring about a truce.
     Searching for a common thread linking such seemingly disconnected events seems like a daunting task. But a common thread exists, and it is influencing the course of events in the region both directly and indirectly. This thread is the arrogance of the US administration. As Washington finds it increasingly harder to control the course of events in the region it has begun to act erratically, making life much harder for everyone else. more.. e-mail

Golan bluff
Basel Oudat, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/29/2008
     Is the resumption of Syrian-Israeli talks a political gimmick or a serious effort by two countries in dire straits?
     The announcement was made simultaneously in Syria, Israel and Turkey. Indirect talks between Syria and Israel were scheduled to start in Istanbul under Turkish auspices. Some news media acted as if the development was a big surprise, but it wasn’t. For the past two years, Syrian and Israeli leaders have been moving in that direction.
     In July 2006, Bashar Al-Assad said that Syria was seeking a resumption of negotiations with Israel in the hope of achieving a peace treaty. But he stipulated that Israel should promise first to withdraw from occupied Syrian land. Similar remarks were made by other Syrian officials since then. And the Syrian media often takes up the issue, always attempting to justify such efforts.
     Meanwhile, Ehud Olmert voiced his country’s willingness to hold negotiations leading to an agreement based on the understanding reached during the Madrid Conference; namely, the exchange of land for peace. Syrian politicians reacted by saying that Olmert’s statements satisfied Syrian demands and that the road to negotiations was wide open. more.. e-mail

Prescription for disaster
Lily Galili, Ha’aretz 5/30/2008
     There is nothing joyful about Peace Now’s 30th anniversary; the fact that it exists is proof that peace continues to evade us. Similarly, there is little reason to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Physicians for Human Rights (PHR): Its success should be measured, if anything, by a dwindling dependence on it.
     Instead of being marginalized by the advent of other successful health providers, PHR has only gained momentum, spreading to new destinations and communities - and not only those beyond the Green Line. The organization has never seemed so necessary.
     A pleasant hubbub surrounded the human-rights group this week as it moved to new offices in the heart of Jaffa. But the temporary signs put up in various rooms there were chilling: "Occupied Territories," "Israeli Residents Department," "Prisoners Department," "Migrant and Undocumented Peoples Department". more.. e-mail

Australian national radio discusses Palestine coverage in the media
Interview, ABC Radio Australia, Electronic Intifada 5/30/2008
     Palestinian-American journalist Ali Abunimah is our first guest as we examine visibility in the media and the preconceptions and stereotyping that tag some people as less than desirable and see others ignored altogether.
     Antony Funnell: Today’s program deals with presence and visibility in the media, and the way in which people are portrayed. Not all people of course. Those with power and money can actively craft or influence their media persona. But those with neither, well It’s a different story altogether.
     Our first guest today is a journalist and commentator who’s written articles for such publications as The Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times and The Christian Science Monitor. And he has a degree from Princeton University.
     Before I introduce him, I’d like you to try and get a picture of him in your head.
     Got that?
     Righ
     OK, what if I were to tell you that he’s a Palestinian journalist and that he’s the co-founder of a website called The Electronic Intifada? more.. e-mail

Eighteen years of Work Destroyed in Less than four Hours
Narratives Under Siege - PCHR, Palestine Think Tank 5/27/2008
     Nasser Jaber spent eighteen years building up his chicken farm in the southern Gaza Strip. Two weeks ago the IOF bulldozed his farm, killing 40,000 of his chickens, and destroying his business.
     "They came at four in the morning, with two bulldozers, and they left before 8am. I own this chicken farm with my three brothers, and we worked day and night for eighteen years to build up our business. The Israelis destroyed everything in less then four hours."
     Nasser Jaber’s chicken farm was bulldozed by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) ten days ago, in the early morning hours of May 16, while he was sleeping at home in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. He still looks stunned. Wearily he guides us round the ruins of his eighteen-year business. "This was a lifetime project for me and my brothers" he says as we clamber over rubble, wire, shattered sheets of metal and thousands of putrefying chickens. -- See also: Narratives under siege: Eighteen years of work destroyed in less than four hours more.. e-mail

Carter urges ’supine’ Europe to break with US over Gaza blockade
Jonathan Steele and Jonathan Freedland, Palestine Monitor 5/27/2008
     Ex-president says EU is colluding in a human rights crime - Britain and other European governments should break from the US over the international embargo on Gaza, former US president Jimmy Carter told the Guardian yesterday. Carter, visiting the Welsh border town of Hay for the Guardian literary festival, described the EU’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as "supine" and its failure to criticise the Israeli blockade of Gaza as "embarrassing".
     Referring to the possibility of Europe breaking with the US in an interview with the Guardian, he said: "Why not? They’re not our vassals. They occupy an equal position with the US."
     The blockade on Hamas-ruled Gaza, imposed by the US, EU, UN and Russia - the so-called Quartet - after the organisation’s election victory in 2006, was "one of the greatest human rights crimes on Earth," since it meant the "imprisonment of 1.6 million people, 1 million of whom are refugees". "Most families in Gaza are eating only one meal per day. To see Europeans going along with this is embarrassing," Carter said. more.. e-mail

Nuclear exposure on the River Wye
Reuven Pedatzur, Ha’aretz 5/28/2008
     Of all the places in the world, Jimmy Carter chose a book fair on the banks of the River Wye in Wales as the spot from which to put an official end to Israel’s nuclear ambiguity. One cannot exaggerate the importance of the former American president’s statement that Israel has 150 nuclear bombs. More than all the estimates and leaks about the Israeli nuclear program over the past five decades, Carter’s comments on Sunday give official cachet to Israel’s status as a nuclear power.
     This time the speaker is not another scientist basing his assessments on calculations of the output from the Dimona reactor, or a news report with an unclear source. Israel’s nuclear weapons arsenal is being revealed by a former American president, someone who, upon entering the White House, adopted the policy of covert American nuclear cooperation with Israel, which was formulated four decades ago.
     The principles of the nuclear understandings between Israel and the United States were agreed upon in 1969, when prime minister Golda Meir met with U.S. president Richard Nixon in Washington. That was the first time the United States officially accepted Israel’s status as a nuclear power, while agreeing not to publicly reveal details about its weapons. Israel committed not to carry out nuclear testing or declare that it has nuclear weapons. For their part, the Americans promised not to pressure Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. more.. e-mail

Adel Samara - Development by Colonialism: The Bethlehem Conference
Adel Samara, Palestine Think Tank 5/27/2008
     The huge propaganda machine went in parallel with the so-called "œBethlehem Investment Conference"� which has attracted more than 1400 participants from many places around the world. It is the first time since 15 years of siege that the holy town of Bethlehem enjoyed the chance to see the holy city of Jerusalem. Thanks to the few days that Israel lifted the blockades[1].
     But why not, when capital speaks, religion must fall on its knees. Those who want to pass from Bethlehem to Jerusalem are not Christian or Muslim pilgrims, they are capitalists. In his marketing speech of the conference, the PA"™s Prime Minister said (Al-Auds Daily May 22): "œThe main proof of the conference"™s success is the attendance of the PA"™s chairman Abu Mazen!"�
     It is not the first time that Palestinian people are being economically brainwashed. When the Oslo Accords were signed, which is "œpeace for capital"�, poor Palestinians were dancing in the streets dreaming that they will enjoy bread, freedom and independence. A lot of donations poured in, but a lot of fat-cats "œdeveloped. more.. e-mail

Growing up a refugee in Deheisha, never forgetting Beit Urtab
Kristen Ess, Palestine News Network 5/27/2008
     The day marking 60 years of Al Nakba has come and gone, but that does not mean that Palestinians do not still live a daily ’Catastrophe.’ On Tuesday, as 21 year old Ghassan Hamdan suggests from Deheisha Refugee Camp that all Palestinian refugees should gather and move together, as far as they can get toward their own villages until Israeli forces stop them, presents another great idea for the Palestinian nonviolent resistance which has been partially vibrant, yet often asleep, for years.
     Ghassan says that his grandmother, with the key that he and she now share, still works in the door of her original home in Beit Urtab Village in the Jerusalem area, was expecting the negotiations to work out, and that he himself is looking for a political solution, but as they stand now, negotiations are worthless.
     "I wanted to take action, but my grandmother wasn’t like that. She was still waiting for the negotiations of Arafat and then Abu Mazen to lead somewhere. All of the words are empty. I’m not with the governments or the negotiations, or anything. There is no peace. If they tell me there is peace, the first stone is the Wall." more.. e-mail

A change needs to come
Avigail Abarbanel, Electronic Intifada 5/26/2008
     Earlier this month I had the privilege of hearing Ali Abunimah speak at a dinner organized by an Australian pro-Palestinian activist group. Abunimah, an author and a co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, is a supporter of the one-state solution in Palestine/Israel, and so am I. One democratic and secular state for both peoples with a right of return for the Palestinian refugees is the only just solution to the long conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Abunimah is optimistic about what is possible. I would like to be as optimistic but am not so sure I can.
     Growing up as an Israeli provided me with an intimate understanding of Israeli-Jewish psychology. Ever since I can remember, we in Israel were told that Jews have nowhere else to go because the world didn’t like Jews. Seventeen years ago, when my former husband and I were about to migrate to Australia, most of the people we knew were dismayed by our decision. I was told by many that I was making a big mistake. My father’s heart surgeon for example, was in complete shock when he heard our news. He took me aside and said that he did not understand how I could leave; that he would never be prepared to live anywhere where there might be even one anti-Semite alive. Like many others he believed that Jews can only safely live in Israel. more.. e-mail

The Call is Palestinian, but the Decision is Israeli!
Nadia Hasan, Palestine Think Tank 5/26/2008
     The 60 years of Israeli Occupation of Palestine and other areas of the Arab Homeland puts constant pressure in a direct way upon the daily lives of the Palestinian people. Walls and fences, checkpoints and block roads, closure and siege are just some of the elements that exert devastating effect on the Palestinian economy. The major cause of the Palestinian economic crisis is closure "• the imposition by the Government of Israel of restrictions on the movement of Palestinian people and goods across borders and within the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, territory that Palestinians have "nominal"� control over.
     According to the UN Conference on Trade and Development, as much as $2.4 billion in United States currency has drained out of the economy of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip thanks to closures, mass unemployment, and the flattening and destruction of most infrastructure by Israeli tanks and helicopters.
     The report said that the damage is so extensive that it could prove impossible to fix, regardless of when - or whether - peace is restored. The profound changes that have taken place in the functioning of the economy are unlikely to be easily reversed even if stability is attained. Almost half the population is living on an income below the UN’s own poverty threshold of $2 a day. more.. e-mail

Salam Fayyad’s cynical party
Adri Nieuwhof, Electronic Intifada 5/26/2008
     The Palestine Investment Conference held from 21 until 23 May in Bethlehem has incited broad resistance from Palestinian popular organizations. In his invitation to investors appointed Palestinian Authority (PA) Prime Minister Salam Fayyad wrote, "We are throwing a party and the whole world is invited." The organizers performed a tour de force by putting "Revitalizing Gaza" on the agenda of the conference, explicitly excluding a debate on political issues. It is obvious that ordinary Palestinians, who are battling every day with the endless rigorous Israeli occupation, will find it hard to relate to this "festive occasion" heavily advocated by the Quartet and its Middle East envoy, Tony Blair, the Portland Trust and various other donors.
     For the occasion the (PA) deployed 2,000 security personnel in Bethlehem during the conference. According to the Alternative Information Center, based in Bethlehem and Jerusalem, the PA ensured that Fayyad and Blair’s party would not be spoiled by "the extensive Palestinian grassroots opposition and cynicism towards the conference. Local groups in the Bethlehem area were explicitly told to not organize protests or ’there would be problems.’ more.. e-mail

When it comes to Israel, Europe is hypocritical, submissive and obsequious
Khalid Amayreh in Ramallah, Palestinian Information Center 5/26/2008
     In comparison to the  madman in the White House, Europe may look less bellicose, less confrontational and less unreasonable in its overall approach to contentious international issues.
     However,  when the issue is the  Palestinian plight, the US and Europe look very much like tweedledee and tweedledum.
     In recent months and years, European leaders from Germany’s Merkel, to France’s Sarkozy, to Britain’s Brown and Italy’s Berlusconi  were shamelessly  pandering to Israeli savagery  to the extent of embracing relentless Israeli criminality against the Palestinian people , including the ongoing  genocidal ethnic cleansing in the occupied Palestinian territories, particularly in the Gaza Strip.
     True, the European tone of speech often sounds  less odious  especially when compared with the unmitigated saber-rattling coming from Washington. But, in the final analysis,   the outcome in both cases is similar. In fact, the US and Europe collaborate and even collude  to effect the same unethical  goals often by playing  the old game of Mutt and Jeff (good cop and bad cop), with their persecuted victims, whether in Palestine, Sudan or Iran. more.. e-mail

With Israel becoming key issue in US presidential and congressional campains, perhaps it is time to hold an 'Israel Primary Day'
Sami Jamil Jadallah, Palestine Think Tank 5/26/2008
     With US presidential candidates stumbling over each other to prove their loyalty to Israel and hence their worthiness to the Jewish voters, with McCain willing to commit the US to a 100 years war against the "infidels" in the Middle East and those who are at odd with Israel. With Hillary Clinton pledging to "obliterate" Iran out of the face of the earth in any war with Israel promising to use US nuclear arsenal to do that with subsequent and potential danger of causing the death of hundred of millions around the world.
     With Barak Obama prostrating so low to convince reluctant Jewish voters in Florida that someone with a name like Barak Hussein Obama with Black skin is not a "closet" Muslim and can be a solid friend of Israel and with Israel and support for Israel almost taken the priority in this elections, perhaps it is time for both the Republican .and Democratic parties to hold special “Israel’s Primary Day” to give Israel the priority it deserve while keeping America and American issues in mind. This way candidate can dispense with the issue of Israel and concentrate on other major issues facing American electorate. more.. e-mail

Peace Process: Has Annapolis Lost its Appeal?
Ben White, MIFTAH 5/26/2008
     They are a rare breed, but you can still find them, in positions of political power and newspaper opinion pages. Their motives are mixed, but they have one thing in common; they are optimistic about the Israeli-Palestinian Annapolis peace process. For some, their job requires them to paint a rosy picture about the international community’s ‘peace process’. For others, there is a blind naivety that perhaps this time, the speeches and announcements might actually amount to a positive change. Some of these optimists, desperate to protect Israel from critique and sanction, are compelled to suggest the ‘two sides’ are on the verge of a ‘breakthrough compromise’.
     Last week, there was an instructive lesson about the role of the international community (i.e. the US and the Quartet) in the peace process, as Israel celebrated 60 years of statehood and the Palestinians marked the Nakba. President Bush and Quartet Envoy Tony Blair both spoke publicly in Israel, the former in the Knesset, and the latter in less-trumpeted remarks to the media. By holding up the two together, a way of understanding the current peace process emerges. more.. e-mail

Escaping Forwards
Uri Avnery, Middle East Online 5/26/2008
     The Germans call it "die Flucht nach vorne" - escaping forwards. When the situation is desperate, attack! Instead of retreating, advance!
     When there is no way out, storm ahead!
     This method was successful in 1948. At the end of May, the Egyptian army was advancing on Tel Aviv. We - a very, very thin line of soldiers - were all that stood in its way. So we attacked. Again and again and again. We suffered heavy losses. But we stopped the Egyptian advance.
     Now Ehud Olmert is applying the same method. His situation is desperate. Most people in Israel do not doubt that he has received large bribes in envelopes stuffed with dollars. The Attorney General is liable to indict him any time, and this will compel him to resign.
     And lo and behold, at the most critical moment, just before the most damning details come out, a joint statement is issued simultaneously in Jerusalem, Damascus ... more.. e-mail

Meet the Lebanese Press: Deal struck in Doha
Hicham Safieddine, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/26/2008
     The Lebanese are deal-struck: in one day, their parliamentarians were to ratify decisions agreed upon in Doha, Qatar that will lead to the installment of a new president, the formation of a national partnership government, and the holding of parliamentary elections in one year’s time under a resurrected electoral law of the 1960s with some amendments. The speed and suddenness of the deal were a direct consequence of the change in the balance of power on the ground in the wake of the Hizballah military operation that exposed the weakness of the loyalist camp. While many issued a big sigh of relief that a return to Lebanon’s recent warring history had been averted, at least in the short run, big questions of the full implications of the Doha accord remain a subject of analysis and speculation in the press. The Doha settlement addressed little of the core issues at the heart of the conflict, namely the fate of Hizballah’s arms and the future policy of the country vis-a-vis the larger conflict in the Middle East between the pro- and anti-US camps.
     Instead, the accord was primarily yet another readjustment of the sectarian balance of power that takes place periodically in the country to accommodate the changing political strengths of the different sects, which is only possible under international consent (the fact that this Sunday’s "election" of the new president turned into an internationally-attended ceremony is testimony to that. more.. e-mail

Israel’s Game of Assassination
Stuart Littewood, MIFTAH 5/26/2008
     Some readers will remember the 1969 film The Assassination Bureau, a tongue-in-cheek romp based on Jack London’s unfinished novel. The setting is the turn of the century a hundred years ago, a fanciful time for regime change and the purging of corrupt monarchs and cruel tyrants. The Bureau’s hit team is for hire provided that Ivan Dragomiloff, founder and mastermind, deems the targeted killing "socially justifiable" and there’s proof of the candidate’s misdeeds.
     Eventually, however, the moral rectitude of the enterprise gives way to financial greed, and the day comes when the Bureau accepts a mission to eradicate an unnamed but prominent public figure. The fee is paid in advance, proof supplied, job accepted… then the name is revealed. The target is Dragomiloff himself. The Assassination Bureau cannot go back on its word and Dragomiloff finds himself pitted against the killing machine he himself created and perfected...
     Assassination is the targeted killing of persons usually for political or ideological (and often insane) motives. This is OK, but not OK. more.. e-mail

Olmert’s Peace Spin
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank 5/25/2008
     Yesterday Olmert assured Haaretz that the negotiation with Syria is nothing less than an ‘historic breakthrough’. He is absolutely correct.  It’s the first time in Israel’s history that a PM initiates a peace negotiation just to escape a police probe into his own unlawful doings. Apparently, Olmert is seeking a quick escape route that would bring the investigation of his corruption to an immediate halt. 
     The Israeli Knesset has always been a haven for Israeli criminals and Jewish gangsters who seek to take advantage of the immunity membership guarantees. This is nothing new, unlawful activity is rather common amongst Israeli leaders.
     The list of villains and convicts within Israel’s political world is endless. A few years ago an Israeli survey revealed that 60% of Israeli Knesset members had a criminal record. As we know the previous President of the Jewish State, Mr Moshe Katsav lost his prestigious post because he was charged for sex crimes, rape and sexual molestation, no less, as well as the more banal offence of wire-tapping. Sharon’s son Omri, Knesset member under both Likud and Kadima, has been indicted for bribery. Ariel the father was lucky enough to become a vegetable just in time to save himself the embarrassment of being thrown out of the PM office for involvement in the same criminal affair. more.. e-mail

A Declaration of US Independence from Israel: Chris Hedges
Chris Hedges, Palestine Think Tank 5/23/2008
     This is a talk given at the Nassau Club in Princeton by Chris Hedges, former New York Times ME bureau chief.
     Israel, without the United States, would probably not exist. The country came perilously close to extinction during the October 1973 war when Egypt, trained and backed by the Soviet Union, crossed the Suez and the Syrians poured in over the Golan Heights. Huge American military transport planes came to the rescue. They began landing every half-hour to refit the battered Israeli army, which had lost most of its heavy armor.
     By the time the war was over, the United States had given Israel $2.2 billion in emergency military aid.
     The intervention, which enraged the Arab world, triggered the OPEC oil embargo that for a time wreaked havoc on Western economies. This was perhaps the most dramatic example of the sustained life-support system the United States has provided to the Jewish state. more.. e-mail

Zionism’s bosom buddy
Khaled Amayreh, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/22/2008
     Bush at the Knesset revealed what most Arabs and Palestinians already knew: he is not an impartial broker.
     In his speech before the Israeli Knesset last week, President George W Bush proved once again that he is a Zionist par excellence. Indeed, the depth of his embrace of Zionism and the totality of his support for Israel surprised even his Israeli hosts. One Knesset member from a far right-wing party lamented that if only Israeli leaders showed similar commitment to Zionism, Israel would be in much better shape.
     It is not certain if Bush, a person of conspicuously shallow intellect and of manifestly inadequate moral rectitude, knew what he was saying or if he was merely parroting whatever his speech writers had prepared for him. At any rate, no educated observer having seen the speech would bet that this man would be willing to pressure Israel to end its 40-year-old occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, or come to terms with the legality and morality of the right of return for millions of Palestinian refugees uprooted from their ancestral homeland when Israel came into existence 60 years ago. more.. e-mail

Even the trumpets should have been ashamed
Yossi Sarid, Ha’aretz 5/23/2008
     The trumpets and applause have fallen silent, the slaps on the back have ceased, and yet the speech continues to resonate. Its echoes traveled this week here and mainly there, in America, from coast to coast.
     One newspaper reported from the Knesset that there were 14 standing ovations; another documented 18, no less. Elected officials and guests on the balcony were all aflutter; and all this, why?
     Because the Palestinians vanished into thin air; the ground opened up and swallowed them whole. Finally, the dream is coming true: "Bush’s vision," the "road map," a Palestinian state by December - all disappeared without a trace, along with the settlements and roadblocks. Never has Jerusalem been farther from Annapolis; never has the Knesset been farther from reality.
     The Knesset is a blue-and-white submarine, where oxygen is running low and the view of reality is blurring. In another 60 years, the speaker promises, life here will be good; why not stand up and applaud? more.. e-mail

Fantasy unravels
Dina Ezzat, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/22/2008
     The promise of an independent Palestinian state by the end of the year is all but falling apart.
     Despite careful and at times misleading upbeat wording, the World Economic Forum on the Middle East (WEF-ME) convening this week in Sharm El-Sheikh was a cold shower for many optimists. The establishment of an independent and viable Palestinian state by the end of 2008, as promised earlier in the year by US President George W Bush, is proving a challenge that not even all-powerful Washington can live up to.
     "I firmly believe that with leadership and courage, we can reach that peace agreement this year," President Bush told the conference. Bush’s statements on Sunday, Egyptian and Arab diplomats acknowledge, were aimed to appease Arab capitals angered by his statement before the Israeli Knesset last week. There, Bush failed not only to make reference to his promise to see an independent Palestinian state established before his second term in office ends this year, but provoked many by making positive reference to Zionist mantras like "Eretz Yisrael". more.. e-mail

Azmi Bishara: Time for change
Amira Howeidy, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/22/2008
     Azmi Bishara tells Amira Howeidy that Arab Nationalists have a lot to answer for and that Hizbullah had no other option but to take over west Beirut and parts of Lebanon
     Azmi Bishara, 52, a former Knesset member, commentator and novelist, was unanimously elected chair of the Arab National Congress’s (ANC) 19th round, held in Sanaa from 10-13 May. Bishara arrived in Sanaa from a conference in Abu Dhabi. He is very much in demand across the Arab world.
     When he left Israel in March 2007 Israel’s security services began to investigate him on charges of treason and espionage. In April 2007, Bishara submitted his resignation from the Knesset to the Israeli Embassy in Cairo and has remained in the Arab world ever since, based mainly in Doha, Qatar. His wife and children have had to move to Amman, Jordan, in order to see him.
     In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly in Sanaa, Bishara explained that the case against him remains "open". more.. e-mail

Nahr al-Bared: more questions than answers
Ray Smith, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/22/2008
     One year ago, on 20 May 2007, the fighting began between the Lebanese army and the militant group Fatah al-Islam in Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon. During more than three months of fighting between the army and the extremist group, more than 47 Palestinian civilians, 178 soldiers and at least 220 militants were killed. More than half a year after the battle came to an end, only a fraction of its residents have been allowed to return. Those who have come back to the camp do so only to find that most of their houses have been reduced to rubble.
     However, for most of the 30,000 Palestinians who once populated Nahr al-Bared, their return to the camp is still far off. As of late April, only between 1,500 and 2,000 families have been allowed to return to the so-called "new" camp that is located outside the core of Nahr al-Bared. The "old’" camp refers to the original site of Nahr al-Bared which is now completely destroyed and sealed off by the Lebanese army for, it states, "de-mining" purposes. more.. e-mail

'You can’t stop people from living'
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/22/2008
     The wide land of smooth hills and valleys burns in the forty-five degree heat. From time to time, a sole palm tree crops up and the long, empty streets curl their way through the beautiful wilderness. However, what could appear to be exciting freedom is actually a very tense atmosphere in one of the most complicated areas inside the occupied Palestinian Territories - the Jordan Valley.
     The Jordan Valley is a strip of land that is one hundred and twenty kilometers in length and fifteen kilometers in width, running from the northern part of the Dead Sea to the Green Line south of Beit She’an. Approximately 55,000 Palestinians live in this region, including the population of Jericho and innumerable small villages and Bedouin communities. Each Israeli government since 1967 has aspired to prevent the Occupied Territories from sharing a direct border with Jordan. Consequently, the area has been altered significantly, changing from a thriving province into the highly-constricted phase of "pre-annexation"�. Several research institutions, such as B’Tselem, have monitored this development. more.. e-mail

Israel at 60 - Business as usual, and homes for sale
Aaron Lakoff, International Middle East Media Center News 5/22/2008
     Haifa, Palestine - Standing on the beach of Haifa, on the coast of the Mediterranean sea in northern Israel, I had a very strange phone conversation.
     A friend and I were filming and photographing old abandoned homes. Many ofthese beautiful beach-front homes are still standing, although fenced offand sealed up. One such house had a large real-estate sign on the front,so I decided it might be interesting to ring up the number.
     On the other end of the line, I got a hold of a jolly man named Erez. Ibegan to ask him questions about the property, kind of feigning interestin actually buying it. He told me that the particular house we werestanding in front of had been sold for 3 million shekels (about $1 millionUS), and it was destined to be turned into a motel.
     He then proceeded to ask me if I was Jewish, to which I affirmed that Iwas, and then he began to enthusiastically tell me about all the otherbeach-front properties he could offer me in Haifa, pending how much money Iwas willing to invest. Going along with it, I asked him how old some ofthe buildings were. "Oh, they’re at least 60 years old," Erez replied."Very nice old arabic architecture. But they do need to be re-furbished abit." more.. e-mail

Fatwa: Right of Return is an Obligation
Kawther Salam, Palestine Think Tank 5/22/2008
     Sheikh Dr. Taysir Al-Tamimi issued a Fatwa (a religious edict) at the Mosque of Riverside, California, during his visit there and while participating in the activities commemorating Al-Naqbah by the Palestinian community at that location. Sheikh Al-Tamimi stated in his Fatwa that the Palestinian Right of Return is the base of the resolution of the conflict and it is a fundamental right to hold to the Right of Return for all Palestinians, and at the same time an obligation.
     The Sheikh also made clear in his Fatwa that the Palestinian victims of the Naqbah should be compensated for their physical, moral, mental and material suffering and for all their losses. This right to receive compensation is in addition to their Right of Return, and in no way replaces or diminishes their Right of Return.
     According to the Fatwa of Sheikh Dr. Al-Tamimi, it is possible that Palestinians settle in another place as an alternative conditional solution, but, according to the Quran, this conditional possibility can only be fulfilled in a place which must be near and around the Mosque of Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem, where the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) ascended to the heavens. This is the only possible home of the Palestinians according to our religion more.. e-mail

Mahmood Mamdani - on the Good Muslim, Bad Muslim
Riccardo StaglianÒ, Palestine Think Tank 5/22/2008
     Back in 2005, the Italian weekly magazine Il venerdì della Repubblica published an important interview with Columbia University Professor Mahmood Mamdani, upon occasion of the publication in Italian of his book Good Muslim, Bad Muslim. At the time, I translated the interview into English, as well as publishing on my blog a segment from another interview I found with the author. In the light of current events, I think it makes important reading and is worthy of republication, also for those who had missed it the first time.
     ....Mahmood Mamdani: Even when Bush speaks of ‘good’ Muslims and ‘bad’ Muslims, what he means by ‘good’ Muslims is really pro-American Muslims and by ‘bad’ Muslims he means anti-American Muslims. Once you recognize that, then it is no longer puzzling why good Muslims are becoming bad Muslims at such a rapid rate. You can actually begin to think through that development. If, however, you think of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Muslims in cultural terms, it is mind-boggling that in one week, you can have a whole crop of ‘bad’ Muslims - cultural changes do not usually happen with such rapidity! But if you have the aerial bombing of Fallujah and the targeting of civilian populations accused of hosting ‘bad’ Muslims, then you harvest an entire yield of bad Muslims at the end of the day, and the whole phenomenon becomes slightly less puzzling. This is connected to my claim that political identities are not reducible to cultural identities. Political Islam, especially radical political Islam, and even more so, the terrorist wing in radical political Islam, did not emerge from conservative, religious currents, but on the contrary, from a secular intelligentsia. In other words, its preoccupation is this-worldly, it is about power in this world. To take only the most obvious example: I am not aware of anyone who thinks of bin Laden as a theologian; he is a political strategist and is conceived of in precisely such terms. Of course, part of his strategy is employing a particular language through which he addresses specific audiences. more.. e-mail

Tidings from a leper
Doron Rosenblum, Ha’aretz 5/23/2008
     The term "deja vu" seems to have been invented especially for describing the ritual of "talks with Syria." Such talks reawaken periodically and have been a repeating pattern for 40 years, down to the last detail - from their sudden appearance as a subject at the top of the Israeli agenda (usually as a diversion from other matters) to the emergency gatherings for leaders of the Golan settlements, from hasty farewell trips to the region (undertaken a multitude of times) to the bumper stickers adamantly opposing Israeli withdrawal and the talk of eating hummus in Damascus and going to Europe by car. And then the ritual dissolves - until the next time around.
     Is it serious this time? Has a new record been set? The current announcement of talks with Syria came at such a crucial moment in the criminal investigation of the prime minister that one feels Ehud Olmert inherited from Ariel Sharon not only the ever-present can of worms, but also the thick-skinned brutality and mischievous sense of humor as well. Even Sharon might not have dared to produce such blatant, transparent and clumsy "spin," the announcement of the talks coinciding precisely, down to the minute, with the report of further incriminating evidence against the PM. Olmert’s move might attest to utter desperation or to profoundly serious intentions; in any case, it reflects his disavowal of any criticism, suspicion or mockery. Indeed, there are three things of which Olmert is not currently suspected: an excess of shame, innocence or integrity. more.. e-mail

Israel ’committing memorycide’
Ilan Pappe, Al Jazeera, Palestine Monitor 5/22/2008
     As part of ’s coverage of the anniversary of the creation of Israel and the Palestinian ’Nakba’, Israeli historian Ilan Pappe reflects upon the events of 1948 and how they led to 60 years of division between the Israelis and Palestinians.
     Between February, 1948 and December,1948 the Israeli army systematically occupied the Palestinian villages and towns, expelled by force the population and in most cases also destroyed the houses, looted their belongings and took over their material and cultural possessions. This was the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
     During the ethnic cleansing, wherever there was resistance by the population the result was a massacre. We have more than 30 cases of such massacres where a few thousand Palestinians were massacred by the Israeli forces throughout the operation of the ethnic cleansing.
     The Israeli army became a bit tired toward the end of the operation and the Palestinian villages became more aware of what was awaiting them and therefore in the Upper Galilee the Israeli army did not succeed in expelling all of the villages. This is why today we have what we call the Arab-Israelis or Israeli-Arabs. more.. e-mail

Critically ill patients from Gaza appeal to Israeli court
IRIN, Electronic Intifada 5/22/2008
     JERUSALEM, 22 May (IRIN) - Ahmed al-Baghdadi’s doctors said he must leave the Gaza Strip and travel to Israel to receive urgent life-saving medical care if he hopes to fight the tumours in his body. Rada al-Khadir, aged 22, needs to get treatment immediately, her Israeli doctor said, or her liver disease could prove fatal.
     Both patients have been denied permission to leave by the Israeli military. On 20 May -- along with 11 other Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in need of immediate medical care in Israel, the West Bank and Jordan -- they filed separate petitions to the Israeli high court, asking that they be allowed to leave the enclave and go to the relevant hospitals.
     In an affidavit obtained by Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR), Baghdadi said his egress was made conditional on his willingness to collaborate with the Israeli General Security Services (GSS). more.. e-mail

A Nakba inherited
Rami Almeghari writing from occupied Gaza Strip, Electronic Intifada 5/21/2008
     At the southernmost area of the Gaza Strip, where the Philadelphia route separates the coastal enclave from Egypt, there are scores of knocked down buildings. The destruction dates back to 2002, when Israeli army bulldozers demolished the houses of the Palestinian inhabitants of this border line.
     Among the houses that used to stand here was that of Ali Shaath, a 75-year-old Palestinian refugee from the Beer al-Saba’ village of historical Palestine, the current site of the Israeli town of Beer Sheva.
     Ali’s 39-year-old son, Marwan Ali Shaath, relayed the story of what he called "a Nakba [catastrophe] of my own, other than that my father had endured in 1948."
     "Lucky me, my father lived two Nakbas, but I only lived one, maybe because I am younger. Or maybe I will be forced to live one more Nakba, who knows," said Marwan satirically.
     "Our family house was placed exactly here before it was knocked down in 2002 by the Israeli army bulldozers," Marwan said, pointing at the ruins of a two-story building, home to all members of Ali’s family. more.. e-mail

Acknowledging the Tragedy
Raja Shehadeh, MIFTAH 5/22/2008
     I had always heard from my family that the reason my aunt, Mary Kawar, stayed in Acre in 1948 was because her youngest daughter, Amal, had contracted typhoid. However, 60 years later, I read a reference to a 1948 dispatch sent by the International Committee of the Red Cross from Palestine that described a sudden typhoid epidemic in Acre. It hinted at the likelihood that Jewish militias had poisoned the Acre water supply -- an early act of biological warfare in our region. It was then that I realized that my cousin’s illness was not a singular event.
     I grew up hearing about what my own family lost in Jaffa, the coastal city from which Jewish militias drove them in 1948. There were occasional references to Deir Yassin -- where more than 100 unarmed Palestinian villagers were massacred -- and the role it played in the psychological war against the Palestinians, who fled fearing for their lives.
     But, after the Israeli occupation of the West Bank in 1967 I began to block out that earlier tragedy. My energy was consumed by activism against the Israeli settlement project in the West Bank, where I live. It was only after reading the newly published material by Israeli historians -- using the recently-opened Israeli archives -- that a new cycle of confrontation with Palestinian history began for me. more.. e-mail

Israel’s Identity War
Caelum Moffatt, MIFTAH 5/22/2008
     This picture is one of many murals found painted on a wall close to theBeit Romano settlement in the Jewish H2 area of Hebron. The fresco isan integral part of a larger group that colorfully illustrates the historyand prospective future of the Jewish people from the perspective of the600-strong settler inhabitants in the ancient city, situated in the WestBank, and is the supposed resting place of Abraham – the father ofJudaism, Christianity and Islam.
     This particular decoration depicts a point in time when the third temple has been built and the people are overjoyed with peace and prosperity which subsequently has led to the manifestation of the Messiah. However, the most intriguing aspect of this prophetic visual display of art is the large character at the top, proudly waving what seems to be an Israeli flag but which is in fact the orange flag representing the settler element of Jewish society, a demographic of religious Zionists intent on reclaiming their biblical lands, increasingly frustrated with the secular Israeli government and any subtle insinuation that the West Bank settlements [Judea and Samaria] may be evacuated for the sake of a lasting peace with Palestinians. Instead, the crown in the middle of the Star of David on the flag signifies the Kingdom of Judea and its restoration. more.. e-mail

Ni’lin: Palestinians begin the long, non-violent struggle against the Wall
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/20/2008
     Israeli military responds with unprovoked aggression
     The road to peace is continually broken by walls.
     The Israeli military has commenced building a new section of the Wall through the town of Ni’lin, roughly eighteen kilometers west of Ramallah. Peaceful demonstrations halted construction on this portion of the Wall three years ago, but now the Israeli authorities have returned, pushing the proposed site of the Wall over a hill, further away from the town.
     Even though this newly-designated spot is some distance from the town, the Wall will still cut into Palestinian territory, some three kilometers inside the Green Line. Eighty percent of the Wall is being, and has been built inside the Green Line, slicing up to twenty-two kilometers into the West Bank in the case of the Ariel settlement fore example. more.. e-mail

On the Nakba
Ahmad Qurei, Middle East Online 5/20/2008
     Six decades have passed and the painful memory of the great historic transformational event, termed "the Nakba," recurs anew.
     We recall now, with deep sadness and agony, the sad memory of that major catastrophe, which befell the Palestinian people in 1948, committed by a premeditated Zionist scheme, with unlimited support and flagrant collusion by the colonialist powers which were in hegemony over the world at the time.
     Despite the passing of time, oblivion remains unable to accumulate over the grave historic event and incapable to dump that tragedy, the trails and repercussions of which are still haunting the Palestinian people to this very moment, without history stopping for a while to renew the bleeding wound in the body of this question, since then until now. more.. e-mail

IDF, Army of Shame
Sami Jamil Jadallah, Palestine Think Tank 5/22/2008
     Before there was the Israel Defense Forces "IDF" there were the Jewish terrorist groups in Mandated Palestine. Before there was state terrorism committed by an army of the state, IDF, there was Jewish terrorism and terrorists committing crimes and murder against Arabs, British and even Jews.
     Before the State of Israel became an independent state, Jewish terrorist organizations carried out a number of operations not so much different from those committed by so called Palestinian "terrorists". Moshe Sneh, the chief of Hagnah wrote a letter to Menachem Begin, head of the Irgun prompting him to carry out the bombing of the King David Hotel which took place on July 1946, killing 28 British, 41 Arabs, 17 Jews and 5 others. The terrorist walked in disguised as Arabs and unloaded 225 Kg of high explosive. more.. e-mail

Journalist Anthony Shadid discusses Qatar talks
Ola Hajar, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/22/2008
     As negotiations in Doha, Qatar take place between Lebanon’s political leaders in an effort to reach a settlement to the current internal conflict, Ola Hajar spoke with veteran journalist Anthony Shadid. Shadid spoke about the impact of US-driven policies in the Middle East within the context of the "war on terror" and their specific impact on Lebanon, and he also commented on the US position towards Hizballah’s role in Lebanese politics.
     ....Ola Hajar: Can you comment on the current situation in Lebanon and the political negotiations taking place in Qatar?
     Anthony Shadid: Lebanon’s current crisis connects not only to the war in 2006 but also dates back to the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. Political turmoil in Lebanon is always complicated, as the turmoil or the national crisis is so heavily linked to powers outside the country including Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, the US and France. more.. e-mail

Crises at Several Levels
Ghassan Khatib, MIFTAH 5/22/2008
     The recent statement attributed to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in which he declared his intention to resign at the end of this year if the current negotiations do not succeed in reaching agreement came as a surprise neither to the Palestinian people nor observers.
     In fact, the Palestinian leadership has been one of the main victims of the Annapolis process. This is because this process was designed to suit the political needs of the American and Israeli sides at the expense of the interests of the Palestinian leadership.
     US President George W. Bush--who proved in his recent speeches at the Israeli parliament and in Sharm al-Sheikh that he comes from a rather religious fundamentalist background--needed a political process to give the impression that he is trying to make peace in the Middle East. At the same time, however, it is clear that he is not actually interested in making peace, since that would require the kind of political pressure on Israel that he is simply not prepared to exert. more.. e-mail

Israeli and US Death Squads Infesting the World
Stuart Littlewood, Middle East Online 5/20/2008
     Stuart Littlewood considers the increasing use of assassination by the US and Israel, and reports that Israeli murder squads have been authorized to enter ‘friendly’ countries, including Britain, and kill enemies of the state of Israel. Some readers will remember the 1969 film, “The Assassination Bureau”, a tongue-in-cheek romp based on Jack London’s unfinished novel. The setting is the turn of the century a hundred years ago, a fanciful time for regime change and the purging of corrupt monarchs and cruel tyrants. The bureau’s hit team is for hire provided that Ivan Dragomiloff, founder and mastermind, deems the targeted killing "socially justifiable" and there’s proof of the candidate’s misdeeds.
     Eventually, however, the moral rectitude of the enterprise gives way to financial greed, and the day comes when the bureau accepts a mission to eradicate an unnamed but prominent public figure. The fee is paid in advance, proof supplied, job accepted, then the name is revealed. The target is Dragomiloff himself. The Assassination Bureau cannot go back on its word and Dragomiloff finds himself pitted against the killing machine he himself created and perfected. more.. e-mail

We fought apartheid; we see no reason to celebrate it in Israel now!
17 May 2008, Palestine Monitor 5/17/2008
     We, South Africans who faced the might of unjust and brutal apartheid machinery in South Africa and fought against it with all our strength, with the objective to live in a just, democratic society, refuse today to celebrate the existence of an Apartheid state in the Middle East. While Israel and its apologists around the world will, with pomp and ceremony, loudly proclaim the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the state of Israel this month, we who have lived with and struggled against oppression and colonialism will, instead, remember 6 decades of catastrophe for the Palestinian people. 60 years ago, 750,000 Palestinians were brutally expelled from their homeland, suffering persecution, massacres, and torture. They and their descendants remain refugees. This is no reason to celebrate.
     When we think of the Sharpeville massacre of 1960, we also remember the Deir Yassin massacre of 1948.
     When we think of South Africa’s Bantustan policy, we remember the bantustanisation of Palestine by the Israelis. more.. e-mail

The art of improving education
Jack Khoury, Ha’aretz 5/20/2008
     "It is forbidden to dance"; "it is forbidden to paint"; "it is forbidden to sing"; "it is forbidden to play an instrument." These statements were printed on signs displayed in mainly Arab neighborhoods in Haifa. The signs were hung as armor in the battle mounted by the Non-profit Organization for the Advancement of Arab Public Education in Haifa, to open a school for the arts to serve the city’s Arab sector. The organization also collected parents’ signatures in a petition that urges the Haifa Municipality and Education Ministry to reverse their positions and support the school, which would be the first of its type in the Israeli-Arab sector.
     In August last year, the organization filed an appeal to the High Court against the ministry and the municipality, demanding that the school be opened. Months later, while still waiting for the court’s ruling, the organization decided to launch the campaign. According to the organization, the school could staunch the flow of students to Haifa’s private schools and even boost the public education system in the city’s Arab sector. Organization members stress that a swift ruling by the court is vital, because the placement committee for the city’s special schools will soon complete its activities for the coming school year and the future of the school would rest in the hands of that committee. more.. e-mail

Film review: 'Territories'
Stefan Christoff, Electronic Intifada 5/19/2008
     Territory is a central theme in all political conflicts in the world, as national borders across the globe have consistently shifted. Territories is a new feature documentary by Montreal filmmaker Mary Ellen Davis that explores the photographic work and global journeys of Larry Towell, of the world-renowned photo agency Magnum, who travels along the world’s most conflicted border zones, from Latin America to the Middle East.
     Indigenous people across the world have been victims of borderlines drawn in bloody wars fueled by colonial interests, and it’s these too-often-untold stories that are found in the striking photos of Larry Towell. From the electric fences of the Mexico-US border to Israel’s concrete separation wall in Palestine, understanding the violence caused by borders is central to Towell’s work.
     "Land is the theme that has tied everything together that I have done as a photographer," Towell explains in the film. "The Palestinian case is a clear example of the way that the loss of land is the loss of culture and identity. We also see this reality here in Canada, Australia and across the Americas with indigenous people, who have waged rebellions, like the Palestinians, due to dispossession from land." more.. e-mail

After 6 years in Israeli prison, major armed resistance figure talks about the failures and future
Najib Farrag, Palestine News Network 5/19/2008
     Bethlehem -- Among the most prominent and important leaders of the Al Aqsa Brigades, Nasser Awais, has been in Israeli prison since 2002. He was sentenced to 14 lifetimes and is behind wire in the central Israeli prison of Hadarim. He told PNN that despite internal differences, the Al Aqsa Brigades remain the armed resistance wing of Fateh and was founded by the decision of the cadres along with the support of the leaders of the movement. They form its overall policy and have drawn criticism for what he referred to as "negligence" for their treatment of "its sons" and the resistance fighters in particular.
     PNN asked, "Over the past six years of your imprisonment how do you assess the condition of Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails?"
     Awais replied, "Since 2002, the prison authorities began to escalate their actions to undermine the achievements and gains of the prisoner movement, which coincided with the continuing aggression against our people, and attempts to destroy the Intifada and resistance. The occupation authorities and prisons have used a series of actions, first and foremost to separate sections within the same prison, with the aim of weakening the unity of the prisoner movement, and intensified this separation between the sections, especially between Fateh and Hamas prisoners, after the coup by Hamas in Gaza. They used the policy of solitary confinement on a large scale, with lengthy time periods. Some are in solitary for seven years.... more.. e-mail

The French Resistance in the Service of Palestine
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank 5/19/2008
     The commemoration events of 60 years of the Nakba have brought a very different type of Palestinian solidarity activism to my attention: it is young, vibrant, dynamic and creative solidarity campaigning.It’s a new form of struggle that goes far beyond the old dogmatic clichés, a fierce battle that aims at the exposure of the Jewish state for what it is: a racist, chauvinist apartheid state. Last Monday I saw it happen in Exeter University while watching and listening to the astonishingly eloquent Palestinian ambassador to Britain, Dr Manuel Hassassian. Last Friday I met the French resistance at a Euro Palestine event at the Parisian Librairie-Resistances bookshop.
     Librairie Résistances is one of those bookshops that makes you feel young again, those very exotic shops you hardly see anymore. A unique cultural thought-provoking fountain that makes resistance look like a valid praxis, as if liberation is awaiting just around the corner. At the back of the bookshop some space had been allocated for a cozy theatre which is used for concerts and performances promoting the Palestinian cause. more.. e-mail

Terror Most Imperial
Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich, Middle East Online 5/17/2008
     One of the more subtle tools of imperialism today is the use of value-laden language that seeks to define the Arab and Muslim world. With labels such as ‘terrorists’ and ‘Islamofascism’, they wish to establish an ‘Orientalist’ perspective of otherness, says Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich. For centuries the colonizers exploited and dominated the third world. Today, one of the more subtle tools of imperialism is the use of value-laden language that seeks to define the Arab and Muslim world. With labels such as ‘terrorists’ and ‘Islamofascism’, they wish to establish an ‘Orientalist’ perspective of otherness denoting barbarism as set apart from Israel and the West which represents admirable qualities. It is imperative to reject this imperial imposition of characterization and for each state, individually and collectively, to self-rule, foremost through self-definition.
     The case of Mojahedeen-e Khalg (MEK) showcases the ever present imperial influence of the West in defining the ‘other’ due to the ownership of language. The hypocrisy is stark given that the US with the help of her ally the British waged a ‘war on terror’ which has resulted in the death of over a million people to date. Yet, a certain Lord Corbett of Castle Vale, a member of the House of Lords from Gordon Brown’s ruling Labor Party, has coauthored an opinion piece with Congressman Bob Filner (D-CA), both of whom promote the terrorist organization of the MEK. In their opinion, these two argue that engagement with Iran would risk, among other things, a “support for international terrorism”[i]. more.. e-mail

In the wake of the Doha truce
Karim Makdisi, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/19/2008
     After the rout of pro-US March 14 militias at the hands of the Hizballah-led opposition forces in Beirut and Shouf mountains last week, a Qatari-led Arab League delegation sent to Beirut on 14 May succeeded in brokering a truce. The seven-point agreement reached includes the immediate resumption of national dialogue in Doha -- with the main aim of finally forming a national unity government, electing a president by consensus, and agreeing on the details of an electoral law -- and the pledge not to use force to settle political disputes. The airport, port and main border crossing with Syria, as well as schools and shops, were promptly re-opened as militias on both sides removed roadblocks and hid their weapons.
     With the army deployed throughout key areas, Lebanese citizens once again resumed their everyday activities under the more familiar conditions of a devastated environment, massive traffic jams, unregulated construction and urban planning, electricity and water shortages, state-sponsored theft or abuse of public lands and resources, rising poverty, inflation and unemployment, and one of the worst budget deficits per capita in the world. The illusion of normalcy, in other words, has returned for the time being but the real question is: for how long. more.. e-mail

'America Don’t Worry! Israel is Behind You!'
Nadia Hasan, Palestine Think Tank 5/19/2008
     I remember a few years ago walking through the wonderful narrow streets of the occupied Old city of Jerusalem, seeing a small shop managed by an old Palestinian man who was selling souvenirs to the tourists. I entered the shop, not because I wanted to buy something, I am not a tourist in my own land (despite the Zionist entity who is occupying my land allowing me to enter there just as a tourist) but because I was captured by the smell of fresh coffee that beckoned me from inside the shop. As I know my people, I knew that as soon as I set foot inside the shop I would be welcomed with this hot and stimulating beverage. I was right, after just a minute I was enjoying my drink and having a nice talk with the man. I made the rounds of his shop, looking at the hundreds small plates, pictures, colorful fabrics of all kinds of imaginative and very original T-shirts hanging on one of the walls. T-shirts with pictures of Jerusalem, with Holy Land slogans, with IDF motives (always wondering who might buy one of those!) and I saw one that scared me the most because of its realism. It was a simple T-shirt with the slogan: "America Don’t worry, Israel is behind you!" more.. e-mail

Israel’s Secret Fears
Haim Baram, MIFTAH 5/17/2008
     Israel marks its 60th birthday in a climate of increasing racism, intolerance, corruption and militarism. A nation that has long seen itself as one of the most misunderstood is now almost unable to understand the world beyond its borders. Fear and anxiety provide the mood music of the celebrations.
     The past decade has brought a sharp increase in anti-Arab sentiment, which finds many forms of expression, from sordid chants at sporting events ("Death to the Arabs") to blatant racism and attacks on Arab colleagues by right-wing pol iticians in the Knesset. In such an atmosphere, it is almost impossible for Arab citizens (or 1948 Palestinians) to identify with the state of Israel, despite the terms of their legal status. Indeed, it is increasingly difficult for them even to protect their civil rights and express themselves freely in public.
     Anyone who doubts the depth of anti-Arab feeling has only to scan the internet. On 8 May, I was commissioned by the popular news site Walla! (associated with the newspaper Haaretz) to write a short column about the Israeli national anthem, "Hatikva" (or Hope). Haaretz had asked another writer to support the anthem. I was commissioned to write against it and to suggest a more suitable one. more.. e-mail

Israelis are Talking to Hamas
Marc Gopin, MIFTAH 5/17/2008
     There are Israeli Jews who have been talking to Hamas for years, especially Rabbi Menahem Frohman. In fact, even more Israeli Jews – official and unofficial – would be talking not only to Hamas, but also to Syria and Iran were the White House not pressuring them against dialogue with enemies of Israel.
     This is unprecedented: a third party, supposedly mediating for peace, that forbids two parties from talking to each other.
     Sober intelligence analysts at the highest levels in Israel have been arguing the virtue of negotiation and a process of offers and counter-offers – not because they are nonviolence activists, but because they are realists seeking the path of least resistance to a more stable and safe Middle East.
     They have every intention of confronting the military threat from Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran, but through a subtle combination of approaches, not the least of which is negotiation.
     They understand very well that an offer to an inveterate enemy that does not recognize your existence is not a capitulation, but rather a test. It is a test that will put constructive pressure on radicals to come to the table, or split among themselves. All good news for realists. more.. e-mail

Economy of Occupation 101: Israel even expropriates foreign aid to Palestine
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/17/2008
     At a lecture given Wednesday at the Friends Meeting House in Ramallah, Palestinian businessman Sam Bahour and economist Shir Hever of the Alternative Information Center painted a grim picture of the effects of both occupation and aid on the Palestinian economy.
     Sam Bahour explained that the size of the average Palestinian business remains at roughly four employees - the same as it was in 1927. He also stated that the impact of Israel’s lockdown of the Palestinian economy from 2000 to 2002 was roughly twice as devastating as the two worst years of the Great Depression in the United States.
     Yet aid poured into the Palestinian economy by international donors to allegedly mitigate the impact of the occupation has not markedly improved the standards of living amongst Palestinians, nor has it created a sustainable and independent economy, commented Hever. "The amount of aid money coming in to Palestine is among the highest in the world,"� he said. "But I personally believe that aid is not just a matter of compassion, but one of political interests." more.. e-mail

Hebron is a ghost town where joggers carry automatic rifles
Ian Jack, Palestine Think Tank 5/17/2008
     For the settlers, subsidies and tax breaks have become as important a motive as Deuteronomy.
     At Birzeit University in Ramallah last week a young woman student in a headscarf asked how it was that Nadine Gordimer, the South African novelist and Nobel laureate, could agree to visit and speak in Israel. Hadn’t Gordimer fought apartheid for years - famously fought it in her writing and her actions? And now she was about to appear at the International Writers Festival in Jerusalem, a guest in one way or another of the Israeli government. What did we think of this? Weren’t these double standards? Wouldn’t we condemn her?
     The question was asked of Roddy Doyle and myself, both of us participants in another literary jamboree, the first Palestine Festival of Literature, whose six-day tour of the West Bank and East Jerusalem ended last Monday. more.. e-mail

Nahida Izzat - Alice in Holy-Land
Nahida Izzat, Palestine Think Tank 5/14/2008
     Alice was falling up, then rising down
     With a quantum leap, transcending
     Into a parallel universe
     Were every thing is upside down
     And nothing is what it seems to be
     In a forgotten land, once called Palestine
     In this land of wonders, Alice saw
     Murderers get Nobel peace prizes
     Thieves are the guardians
     Of peace and security
     War criminals are the law
     In this land of faith, Alice saw
     Strangers claiming that
     God gave them every thing
     For they are the chosen
     Above all others
     Despite the fact: most of them
     Don’t even believe in God
     In this land of pain, Alice saw
     Olive trees uprooted for having roots in the past
     Farmers beaten for harvesting their crops... more.. e-mail

Wael Al Saad - Justice Lost in the Age of Power
Wael Al-Saad, Palestine Think Tank 5/8/2008
     The Dimensions of Occupation, the Occupational Lobby and the Age After
     I am not a politician or a journalist or writer but I am thinking day and night, experiencing new dimensions of consciousness and seeking answers. How can we move forward strategically in our struggle for justice and peace?
     An Insight
     Looking into the current analyses that are making the rounds, I have yet to find a collective plan or process toward a plan that will enlarge our options or change the boundary conditions of our dilemma. It seems as if all the proposed alternatives are wrong.
     Most of the analysis is done with the same logic, based on "certainty" and generally focusing on the reality of the Zionist aggressions and the failing politics of formal institutions superficially, with little self-critique, nor encompassing review of tactics or philosophy. more.. e-mail

Talking to the Enemy
Avi Shlaim, MIFTAH 5/17/2008
     The conflict with the Arabs has cast a long shadow over Israel’s history. In the Declaration of Independence in Tel Aviv, on 14 May 1948, the founding fathers extended their hand in peace to all the neighbouring states and their peoples. Today, Israel is still at war with Syria and Lebanon and locked into a bitter conflict with the Palestinians of Gaza and the West Bank. The explanation that Israelis usually give for the failure to achieve peace in the Middle East can be summed up in two words: Arab intransigence. Israel’s image of itself is that of a decent, rational, peace-loving nation that resorts to military power in self-defence only. The image of the Arabs, on the other hand, is that of a fanatical, hostile enemy that understands only the language of force. The reality is more complex.
     The general picture that emerges of Israeli statecraft in the first 60 years of statehood is one of routine, often unthinking reliance on military force and a reluctance to engage in meaningful diplomacy to resolve the conflict with its neighbours. Another trait, common to Labour and Likud leaders alike, is a blind spot when it comes to the Palestinian people and a desire to bypass them by concluding bilateral deals with the rulers of the neighbouring Arab states. more.. e-mail

Palestine: Liberation Deferred
Rashid Khalidi, MIFTAH 5/17/2008
     The "Palestine Question" has been with us for sixty years. During this time it has become a running sore, its solution appearing ever more distant. Whether the events sixty years ago that created this question solved the previously perennial "Jewish Question" is once again open to debate. This is the case after many years when the apparent triumph of Zionism stilled doubts and drowned out the protests of those who argued that what purported to be the solution to one problem had created an entirely different one.
     It is considered by some to be a slur on Israel and Zionism, and indeed even tantamount to anti-Semitism, to suggest that these events sixty years ago should be the subject of anything but unmitigated joy. Commemoration, or even analysis, of what Palestinians call their national catastrophe, al-Nakba--the expulsion, flight and loss of their homes by a majority of their people sixty years ago--is thus considered not in terms of this seminal event’s meaning to at least 8 million Palestinians today (some estimates are over 10 million) but only because it is directly related to the founding of Israel. Palestinians presumably do not have the right to recall, much less mourn, their national disaster if this would rain on the parade of celebrating Zionists everywhere. The fact that the 1948 war that created Israel also created the largest refugee problem in the Middle East (until the US occupation of Iraq turned 4 million people into refugees) must therefore be swept under the rug. Also disregarded is the obvious fact that it would have been impossible to create a Jewish state in a land nearly two-thirds of whose population was Arab without some form of ethnic cleansing. more.. e-mail

Mazin Qumsiyeh - Palestinian Options as the Nakba turns 60
Mazin Qumsiyeh, Palestine Think Tank 5/17/2008
     We are 126 years after the practical initiation of Zionist project to colonize Palestine and we are 60 years after the realization of that vision in the form of a Jewish ethnocentric nationalistic state. These are very short periods in human histories (the crusader kingdoms lasted much longer). History teaches us that native people are not guaranteed victory but that they always have many options moving forward.In this essay, I explore the challenges and the many options open for Palestinians as we enter perhaps the most challenging period of our history.
     George Bush’s speech in front of the Israeli Knesset "celebrating" this ethnic cleansing of Palestine and the politicide that followed included this with no bit of irony:
     "The alliance between our governments is unbreakable, yet the source of our friendship runs deeper than any treaty. It is grounded in the shared spirit of our people, the bonds of the Book, the ties of the soul. When William Bradford stepped off the Mayflower in 1620, he quoted the words of Jeremiah: ‘Come let us declare in Zion the word of God.’ The founders of my country saw a new promised land and bestowed upon their towns names like Bethlehem and New Canaan. And in time, many Americans became passionate advocates for a Jewish state." more.. e-mail

Core Issues for Lebanon and Beyond
Rami Khouri, Middle East Online 5/17/2008
     BEIRUT -- The agreement among all the Lebanese political leaders to hold talks in Doha, Qatar, and keep meeting until they resolve their current political impasse will probably bring peace and quiet to Lebanon for a period of time -- certainly months and perhaps even years.
     Skepticism abounds, though, alongside signs of hope and maturity. Speaking for myself, this is the third time in my life that I have lived in Beirut -- 1958, 1975 and 2008 -- when the country has been scarred by internal fighting and the entanglement of foreign powers and troops.
     A complex matrix of issues defines the current situation. Local, regional and global power relationships all have to be sorted out, and the three levels are deeply intertwined. I see two core issues at stake here, and everything else is footnotes:
     1) If the central state does not meet its citizens’ needs, how does the state work out a credible balance of power with indigenous groups and powerful armed organizations like Hezbollah -- who do respond to citizen needs more efficiently?
     2) Is Lebanon mainly an Arab-Islamic-Middle Eastern society integral to Syrian and Iranian interests, or is it a more Western-oriented, liberal society that sits more comfortably in the American and French orbits? more.. e-mail

Siege hits Palestinians before they are born
Mohammed Omer, Electronic Intifada 5/15/2008
     GAZA CITY, 14 May (IPS) - The Israeli siege of Gaza that has restricted access to food, water and medicine is now beginning to hit unborn children and newborn babies.
     "Many babies are born suffering from anaemia that they have inherited from their mothers," Dr Salah al-Rantisi, head of the women’s health department at the Palestinian ministry of health in Gaza told IPS. And the mothers are becoming anemic because they do not now get enough nutrition through pregnancy.
     That in turn happens because the Israeli blockade has choked the supply of food and medicines.
     Dr. al-Rantisi also heads the women’s health unit at Nasser hospital, where about 30 to 40 children are born every day. Many suffer from anemia, he says.
     Anwaar Abu Daqqa, 30, has lost three babies prematurely. The fetuses were malformed as a result of lack of nutrition and medicine for the mother, Dr. al-Rantisi said. And in the last case she reached hospital late because she could not find transport.
     "Premature babies born dangerously underweight is a daily and increasing phenomenon in Gaza’s hospitals," he says. more.. e-mail

Sixty terrible years
Salama A Salama, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     While Israel celebrated 60 years since its creation, rolling out the red carpet for international dignitaries -- the likes of Bush, Sarkozy and Merkel -- who come to show support, the Palestinians were mulling over the memory of their loss, some of them now living in darkness after Israel cut off their fuel supply. Meanwhile, Arab countries were busy with the usual squabbles, their scene from Iraq to Lebanon and from Sudan to Yemen being one of bloodshed and despair.
     Over the past few decades, Israel grew bigger, carving off nearly 80 per cent of Palestinian land, along with the Golan. Having acquired nuclear arms as well as the latest defence and offence systems, Israel bullied the Arabs non-stop, while getting the world to equate resistance with terror -- a view now shared by many Arab countries.
     I am not interested in the success story of Israel. Suffice it to say that its success has been the outcome of collective efforts in which major countries, especially the US, played a prominent role. What interests me is to gauge the extent of change that happened in Egypt and the Arab world as a result of Israel’s creation. Once Israel, a foreign and cancerous body, was implanted in the region, a new dynamic emerged, one that exhausted the Arabs and stunted their political, social and economic growth. more.. e-mail

History lessons
Hassan Nafaa, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     If the six decades of the Arab-Israeli conflict should have taught us anything it is surely that it is time to think out of the box, writes The Nakba -- the war of 1948 and the founding of Israel -- may have occurred 60 years ago but the Zionist project is much older. It began over 110 years ago and it hasn’t finished yet. In other words, the Zionists started plotting and planning long before the Arabs were aware of their designs. By the time the Arabs did catch on the Zionists were better equipped for the clash that they had anticipated and, indeed, worked to bring about. It was only natural, therefore, that they beat us, seized our land and drove out our people.
     While we succumbed to depression and loss of confidence, their victory fed Zionist self-confidence and their determination to continue towards the realisation of a project the true aims and objectives of which we had not even begun to fathom. Every time another clash erupted, as was bound to happen, mostly at their instigation, we would be surprised afresh by the ferocity of their aggression. Then we changed tack and made peaceful overtures. Whether it was to ward off their wrath or devote ourselves to reconstruction and development is immaterial since they refused to believe us. Claiming they needed to put to rest any doubts about our intentions they insisted upon "confidence-building measures" beneath which rubric their demands increased and became more unreasonable by the day. Instead of digging in our heels and reproaching them for failing to honour mutually binding treaties and understandings we acted as though we had no alternative but to cave in to their demands. Whether this was out of fear of them or because of a desire to win the approval of their allies it gave them the opportunity to twist our arms and rub our powerlessness in our faces. Now here we are, more than a third of a century since we have begun to try to live peacefully with Israel, so in thrall to our fear of Zionist cunning that even our dreams of the future have been turned into nightmares. more.. e-mail

The Soviet hand in Israel
Rumy Hasan, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     While Balfour is usually blamed for the break up of Palestine, it was the Soviets that ensured the creation of Israel.
     As we approach the 60th anniversary of the creation of the state of Israel -- or the 60th anniversary of the Nakba (catastrophe) for the Palestinians -- one element in this conflict-ridden story that seems to be neglected is the role that the Soviet Union played.
     Western critics of Israel almost invariably think that the partition of Palestine was a product of the West, above all of the old imperial power, Britain, which held "mandate" Palestine, and the US, the dominant force after World War II. Given all the support that these two countries have given to Israel over the past six decades, and continue to give, this is perhaps an understandable assumption. Importantly, however, it is not a full, and therefore true, representation of what actually happened.
     Crucially, there are two curious, unexpected, twists to the tale concerning the superpower states that had just embarked upon their Cold War rivalry, the US and USSR. All those interested in this intriguing and surprising history would be rewarded in reading an enlightening paper by French historian Laurent Rucker, who utilises voluminous primary research from Soviet archives ("Moscow’s surprise: The Soviet-Israeli Alliance of 1947-1949", Woodrow Wilson Centre for International Scholars, Working Paper 46), the main points of which I elaborate upon, whilst drawing my own conclusions. more.. e-mail

Remembering the Nakba, 60 years later
Report, PCHR, Electronic Intifada 5/15/2008
     "I am not sure what year I was born. But it was around 78 years ago, in Palestine." Handuma Rashid Najja Wishah sits on the patio overlooking her large garden, recalling the turbulent story of her long life. "I am a Palestinian from the village of Beit Affa" she says, tucking her long white scarf under her chin. "It was a beautiful village and we had a good life there. There was a small Jewish settlement nearby, called Negba, and we had a good relationship with the Jews. Whenever we had weddings, we would invite them to come and celebrate, and we women all used to dance dabka (Palestinian traditional dance) together. The muktar (chief) of the settlement, was called Michael. He used to arrive at the weddings with a gift, like a goat, and we would cook it and share the meat between us."
     Beit Affa was a village of around 500 people in southern Palestine, 29 kilometers northeast of the Gaza Strip. Most of the villagers were farmers, but even those who did not solely earn their living from farming had, says Handuma, "an intimate relationship with the land." Like many of the local women, Handuma married young and stayed in her village. But in 1948, after the end of the British Mandate in Palestine and the declaration of the new State of Israel on Palestinian land, mass violence erupted. "The Zionists refused the division of the land into two states, and the massacres started" she says. "The first massacre was in Deir Yassin, where they slaughtered more than a hundred people."... more.. e-mail

Today marks 60 years of Al Nakba: growing up a refugee
Kristen Ess, Palestine News Network 5/15/2008
     In Deheisha Refugee Camp, 21 year old Ghassan Hamash is talking about returning to his village, with his grandmother and the key to their home. He said the soldiers let them pass because he was small and they were with a television crew from Al Jazeera. They asked his grandmother, "Where do you want to go? You want to look at your land?
     Ghassan says, "They let her pass to make fun of her, not so that she could be relaxed or breathe. It was so she could go and see that there was nothing she could do about her land, cry, and return to her camp. That was the point of the soldiers."
     Over 400 villages were destroyed by the invading gangs and armies in 1948 - 51, with a another couple of hundred emptied and resettled with Jews, says Dr. Nazmi of the Riwaq Center whose project is to preserve the cultural heritage of Palestine. Ghassan talks about his village.... more.. e-mail

Crossing the Line interviews author Phyllis Bennis
Podcast, Electronic Intifada 5/15/2008
     This week on Crossing The Line: Former US President Jimmy Carter met with the political head of Hamas in Syria while insisting that Hamas must be included in any future Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. The visit has drawn criticism from both the US and Israel which until now have refused to take part in any official negotiations with the Hamas government. What does Carter’s meeting with Hamas mean? Is it as "historic" as some are calling it? Host Naji Ali speaks with author on Middle East issues, Phyllis Bennis about Carter’s controversial visit to the Middle East.
     Next, the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, has suspended food shipments into the Gaza Strip as a result of fuel shortages brought on by the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza since June 2007. Ali speaks with UNRWA spokesperson in Gaza, Adn Abu-Hasna about the impact of the fuel shortages and aid to the people in Gaza.
     Last in the program, incarcerated Palestinian political prisoner Dr. Sami Al-Arian ends his 57-day hunger strike that he began to protest continued harrassment and abuse of power by the US Justice Department. Ali speaks with Dr. Al-Arian’s daughter, Laila, about his health and his family’s struggle to be reunited with their father. more.. e-mail

There is no alternative to the right of return
Statement, National Committee to Commemorate the Nakba at 60, Electronic Intifada 5/15/2008
     To the People of Palestine, Whether you live within the "Green Line," in Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza, or in exile, you shall return, there is no doubt that you shall return.
     Today the skies will echo as you state with one united voice: "There can be no alternative to our return," all sounds will melt away as your voice rises to say "There can be no peace without our return to our original lands and homes."
     You who shall return, raise your voices and say "This is our land, this sky is our sky, this rock, tree, moon, and sea are our country, it will always be our Palestine."
     You who shall return, 60 years ago on this day was our Nakba, and today after 60 years we confirm, that we have never let the banner of return fall to the ground, and that the hour of return to our original homes and lands has come. Today we do not commemorate so we can weep over what was lost, we come together to march forward; to march home. more.. e-mail

Clinton’s ‘Final Solution’ to the Persian Problem
Robert Weitzel, Middle East Online 5/14/2008
     “To misunderstand the nature and threat of evil is to risk being blindsided by it . . . An evil unchecked is the prelude to genocide.” - Dr. Mordechai: The Ezekiel Option.
     There are over 70 million human beings living in Iran, 17.5 million of whom are under the age of fifteen. Hillary Clinton vowed to attack Iran and “totally obliterate” the majority of the Persian race in a furnace of primordial fire should the Iranian government attack Israel with nuclear weapons, which they do not now possess or are likely to for some time—if ever.
     Hillary’s “final solution” to the Persian problem bests Adolf Hitler by a magnitude of ten.
     Missing in Clinton’s campaign trail pandering to America’s pro-Israel lobbies and the mushrooming evangelical Christian Zionist movement is the “inconvenient truth” that Israel has the most modern and most deadly army in the Middle East thanks to an annual $3.5 billion in American aid—one third of the US aid budget. more.. e-mail

No going back
Lucy Fielder, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Druze allegations and Hizbullah actions have shattered the tenuous calm
     "Lebanon in the dragon’s mouth", reads the headline of pro- opposition Al-Akhbar, the morning after west Beirut fell to Hizbullah and its allies. A week after a dramatic escalation between the government and Hizbullah plunged the country into its worst violence since the civil war, the landscape had been transformed, reports Lucy Fielder Prime Minister Fouad Al-Siniora’s government, forced to back down on the attempted clampdown on Hizbullah’s weapons, which prompted the crisis, looked weak and besieged in its Serail on the hill, with the usual chorus of Western support ringing hollow.
     Hizbullah was in indisputable control of Lebanon, having swept western Beirut with Shia ally Amal, subduing districts loyal to Sunni parliamentary majority leader Saad Al-Hariri and seizing strategic locations in Druze chieftain Walid Jumblatt’s Shouf mountain stronghold. more.. e-mail

Skirting the precipice
Ayman El-Amir, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Despite the sad sight of casualties, recent events in Lebanon may have sent tremors strong enough to break the current political deadlock.
     Last week, Lebanon marched briskly to the brink of civil war and then stepped back. The powerless government of Prime Minister Fouad Al-Siniora, backed by its Western allies and Arab moderates, attempted to de-claw the multi-sectarian coalition of Hizbullah but the coalition pushed back. It was more than a test of wills; rather a grim reminder of the 15-year long civil war of 1975-1990, of which no one wanted a replay. At the cost of several dozen victims in various sections of Beirut and Tripoli, Mount Lebanon and Al-Shoaf, the skirmishes may provide a breakthrough in the political stalemate that has gripped Lebanon for almost a year now. The Lebanese army is poised to play the role of powerbroker.
     It would seem that the crisis began when pro-West Druze leader Walid Jumblatt tipped off the Siniora government about a private fixed-line telecommunications network run by Hizbullah as part of its military defence system. Security cameras were also set up outside the airport to monitor traffic in a secure landing and take-off area of the airport. In addition, it was pointed out that the director of Beirut International Airport security, Wafik Shukair, was a Shia. The telecommunications network was in place before the Israeli offensive on Lebanon in July-August 2006. It played a key role in throwing back the invasion and has since become instrumental to the military capacity of Hizbullah. The impotent Siniora government suddenly "discovered" the existence of the network, the prime minister considered it a threat to state security and even went as far as stating that "Lebanon is an occupied country" by the same Hizbullah that defended Lebanon against the Israeli invasion two years ago. more.. e-mail

Twilight Zone / Home from the sea
Gideon Levy, Ha’aretz 5/15/2008
     It’s impossible to convey his heavy Southern accent on paper. "So help me God, man" appears in almost every sentence. He stands in the vegetable garden in his home, with the Hebron Hills in the background, wearing a wide-brimmed white hat and Ray-Ban sunglasses, planting olive trees. When he began to speak, I rubbed my eyes in amazement: Alabama in the South Hebron Hills? America in Palestine?
     In the remote village of Tarrameh, not far from the Adurayim army base, lives a U.S. citizen, a former sailor and diver, an electrical engineer who fought in Vietnam and whose son is serving in the U.S. Marines. His arms are tattooed all over and he lost three fingers on his left hand under circumstances he is not willing to reveal. Rumor has it that he lost them in Vietnam, but he is not willing to talk about Vietnam.
     Sayyal Ghanam left this village at the age of 12, after his parents died. He hitchhiked on trucks for three days to reach Aqaba and later convinced a Greek ship captain to allow him to join his crew. He was at sea for many years - a Palestinian sailor, who when he reached dry land worked as a shipbuilder in the shipyards of the U.S. Navy in Mobile, Alabama. He lived in Alabama for decades, was married to two American women in succession and had three American children. About six years ago, he decided to return to his native village and build himself a house. more.. e-mail

Because it is our right
Anayat Durrani, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Sixty years on
     against the occupiers wishes
     We Exist
     sons and daughters
     of Ramleh, Haifa, Nasira
     Jimzu, Imwas, Deir Yassin
     We Remember
     the villages destroyed
     towns stripped of Arab names
     manufactured, renamed, disguised
     our homes filled with Palestinian memories
     painted over with foreign colors
     a bridal shop in Ramleh
     selling strangers their happy dreams
     in my house on our land
     the house great grandfather Ali built
     We Continue... more.. e-mail

Project tabula rasa
Jonathan Cook, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     In the Galilee, Jonathan Cook hears how erasing all traces of Palestine and its people was the lynchpin of the Zionist agenda
     Amin Mohamed Ali (Abu Arab), 73, is a refugee from the village of Saffuriya, three miles northwest of Nazareth. The village, home to 5,000 Palestinians, was one of the largest in the Galilee and among the first to be bombed from the air, according to Israeli historian Ilan Pappe. It was occupied on 16 July 1948. Most of its refugees ended up in Lebanon, but some fled to nearby Nazareth, where they established a neighbourhood, Safafra, named after their village. Abu Arab’s home overlooks his family’s former lands, now farmed by a Jewish community called Zippori. His old home was destroyed, now covered by a pine forest planted by the Jewish National Fund. He is one of the founders of the Saffuriya Cultural Association and organised this year’s Nakba procession to Saffuriya.
     "It started at Iftar, the meal breaking the fast at the end of the day during the holy month of Ramadan, when two Jewish planes flew overhead dropping bombs. We ran outside to see what was happening and, afraid the houses would collapse on us, fled into the fields and nearby caves to hide. We thought it would be over in a few minutes and we could return, but the attack lasted two hours. I later heard that three people were killed by the bombs..." more.. e-mail

Storm clouds in Gaza
Saleh Al-Naami, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Egypt’s efforts at mediating have no chance as Israel prepares for more aggression.
     One of the policemen noted a pilot-less, Israeli reconnaissance plane in the sky, and they all rushed out of their headquarters into a nearby orange grove. Their headquarters is located on the coastal road connecting Khan Yunis and Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, and they acted on the basis of orders issued by their superiors. Five of their colleagues had been killed, and 10 others wounded, in an attack by such planes on two police headquarters in the same area at the end of last week. These security precautions, devised to deal with the Israeli military escalation, came as efforts to reach a truce between the Palestinian resistance movements and Israel climaxed. They also coincided with Egyptian General Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman landing in Tel Aviv to brief Israeli leaders on the details of the Egyptian truce proposal.
     Yet Israel did not only welcome Suleiman with a military escalation in the Gaza Strip. It also put forth new stipulations and insisted that the Egyptian initiative include other clauses, such as an Egyptian commitment to preventing arms smuggling to the Gaza Strip, which is seen as contributing to the military strength of Hamas. Another demand is that events in the Gaza Strip not be tied to the West Bank under any circumstances. more.. e-mail

Suleiman Returns with more Conditions
Caelum Moffatt, MIFTAH 5/15/2008
     Egypt’s Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman was made to wait two weeks to present his brokered peace proposal which bound Hamas with the other 12 politically-affiliated resistance groups operating in Gaza to an initiative for a “comprehensive and reciprocal period of calm to be applied progressively, first in Gaza and then in the West Bank”. Despite the escalation in violence and the initial perception of the agreement as “not serious”, Israel extended an invitation to the Egyptian mediator to present the proposal, but only after Israel had finished celebrating the 60th anniversary of their independence.
     Finally, Omar Suleiman arrived in Jerusalem to discuss the potential for a “period of calm” [tahdi’a] on May 12. As Egypt’s intelligence chief had been eclipsed by the commemoration of Israel’s independence previously, this time his meeting with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak occurred just two days before the arrival of President G.W. Bush. The incumbent US President “will come not as somebody who demands but somebody who encourages”. Instead, the president of the world’s sole superpower will be fully focused on marking 60 years of Israeli freedom and democracy. more.. e-mail

Resisting the Nakba
Joseph Massad, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     The viciousness of Israel is testament to its knowing that Palestinians will always remain steadfast and defeat its past and present attempts to erase them, writes One of the most difficult things to grasp in the modern history of Palestine and the Palestinians is the meaning of the Nakba. Is the Nakba to be seen as a discrete event that took place and ended in 1948, or is it something else? What are the political stakes in reifying the Nakba as a past event, in commemorating it annually, in bowing before its awesome symbolism? What are the effects of making the Nakba a finite historical episode that one bemoans but must ultimately accept as a fact of history?
     I will suggest to you that there is much at stake in all of this, in rendering the Nakba an event of the past, a fact on the ground that one cannot but accept, admit, and finally transcend; indeed that in order to move forward, one must leave the Nakba behind. Some have even suggested that if Israel acknowledges and apologises for the Nakba, the Palestinians would forgive and forget, and the effects of the Nakba would be relegated to historical commemorations, not unlike the one we are having this year. more.. e-mail

Memory for forgetfulness
Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Mahmoud Darwish was born in 1941 in the village of Birwe, in Upper Galilee. Birwe was destroyed in 1948 after its inhabitants were made to flee the village. The extract which follows is taken from a memoir Darwish wrote during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. In it, he remembers his first encounter with Beirut in 1948, before his family stole back into what has since become Israel, where Darwish remained until 1972 .
     The sky of Beirut is a huge dome made of dark sheet metal. All-encompassing noon spreads its leisure in the bones. The horizon is like a slate of clear grey, nothing colouring it save the playful jets. A Hiroshima sky. I can, if I want, take chalk in hand and write whatever I wish on the slate. A whim takes hold of me. What would I write if I were to go up to the roof of a tall building? "They shall not pass"? It’s already been said. "May we face death, but long live the homeland"? That’s been said before. "Hiroshima"? That too has been said. The letters have all slipped out of my memory and fingers. I’ve forgotten the alphabet. All I remember are these six letters: B-E-I-R-U- T. more.. e-mail

1948
Uri Avnery, Middle East Online 5/15/2008
     One day, I hope, a "Truth and Reconciliation Commission", on the South African model, will be set up here. It should be composed of Israeli, Palestinian and international historians, whose job will be to establish what really happened in this country in 1948.
     In the 60 years that have passed since then, the events of the war have been buried under layer upon layer of Israeli and Palestinian, Jewish and Arab propaganda. A quasi-archeological excavation is needed in order to expose the bottom layer. Even the eye-witnesses who are still alive sometimes have problems distinguishing between what they actually saw and the myths that have twisted and falsified the events almost beyond recognition.
     I am one of the eye-witnesses. In the last few days, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary, dozens of radio and television interviewers from all over the world have been asking me to describe what actually happened. Here are some of these questions and my answers to them. (If I repeat things I have already written about, I apologize.) more.. e-mail

Israel’s twilight years
Khaled Amayreh, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Palestinians are increasingly rejecting the crumbs of a two-state solution in favour of justice for all in a single state, Palestine, writes in Ramallah As Israel ostentatiously celebrates the passage of 60 years since its creation in Palestine in 1948, more than nine million Palestinians at home and in exile are commemorating the Nakba, the violent seizure of their ancestral homeland by Zionist Jews and the dispossession, expulsion and dispersion of the bulk of Palestinians to the four corners of the globe.
     This year, activities are taking place in many parts of the world where Palestinian refugees and expatriates reside, dreaming of and awaiting a return to their homeland that appears nowhere on the horizon of political reality.
     Palestinians, irrespective of their political affiliations, are not only reasserting the legal and moral status of their right to return to the homes and villages from which they were expelled at gunpoint, or otherwise made to flee 60 years ago, but are also emphasising to all who will listen, including their own leaders, that the right of return remains -- and will always be -- the heart, soul and centrepiece of the Palestinian issue. more.. e-mail

This state cannot survive
Saleh Al-Naami, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     A growing number of Israeli intellectuals believe their state may soon implode by force of its contradictions and failures.
     When Amnon Rubinstein speaks, many people in Israel listen. As an intellectual who has held the posts of minister of education and of justice, Rubinstein commands the respect of the Israeli elite regardless of their intellectual and political leanings. And yet Rubinstein surprised Israelis when in interview with Hebrew Radio in mid-April he anticipated that the Israeli state would not survive. Rubinstein is not the only person to have reached this conclusion. On the eve of the 60th anniversary of Israel’s establishment, Israeli intellectuals teemed with pessimistic predictions about the future. An increasing number of politicians and Zionists have begun to openly express the belief that the entity of Israel is on a path to oblivion.
     Since these predictions were made public, the Israeli press has dubbed them "visions of the end of time". They have gained weight because they undermine the appearance of confidence that Israel’s leaders are keen to convey at any opportunity, but also because their proponents have played important decision-making roles or have long been connected to the establishment and are not merely members of elite intellectual circles on the margins of society. These intellectuals explain that their conclusion results from three basic factors: external threat; lack of confidence in the state’s future; and severe polarisation among society’s components. Rubinstein holds that Israel has failed counter Arab threats, in particular failing to extinguish the desire of Palestinians to obtain their rights in struggle against Israel. more.. e-mail

Nakbah, 60 Years or Long Before?
Mohamed Kamel, Middle East Online 5/15/2008
     Most of us remember 1948’s catastrophe, The Nakbah; the days when almost 900,000 Palestinians were forced to flee their homes and become refugees, the worst refugee crisis in history. Citizens, that should have been refugees for a few days ended up being so for 60 years and amount to more than 4 millions.
     But this Nakbah did not start in 1948 it started long before; and it is well known to many of us but not to all.
     The Nakbah really started in 1825, in Arrarat, when Mordechai Emanuel Noah[i] purchased the Grand Island, near Buffalo New York, as a homeland for demoralized Jews.
     The Nakbah was renewed in 1890, with the scandal known as “The Dreyfus Affair” [ii]. That political scandal, with anti-Semitic overtones, is what divided France from the 1890s to the early 1900s. It involved the wrongful conviction for treason, in 1894, and the degradation and imprisonment on Devil’s Island, of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a young and promising French artillery officer who was in advanced training with the Army’s General Staff. more.. e-mail

We remain
Mustafa Barghouti, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Nothing can annul the legitimacy of the Palestinian struggle for justice and self-determination.
     Sixty years on what Palestinians refer to as the Nakba -- the catastrophe -- but what might be more accurately termed the inauguration of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, one is struck by a remarkable irony. Both Palestinians and Israelis appear engaged in a neck-and-neck contest to enter the greatest number of precedents in the Guinness Book of Records.
     Palestinians in Bethlehem created the largest key in the world, to symbolise the right to return, and the largest flag in the world, to symbolise the Palestinians’ thus far denied right to self-determination. And they wrote the longest protest letter ever, on behalf of thousands of Palestinian political detainees and in defence of the cause of freedom.
     The Israelis, meanwhile, cooked the largest ever dish of hummus, symbolising their resolve to appropriate Palestinian culture after having seized most of Palestinian land and appropriated Palestinian political rights. more.. e-mail

Nakba ongoing
Jonathan Cook in Nazareth, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/15/2008
     Unseen and unreported, Israeli police attacked children and parents who wished to remember the Palestinian national tragedy that is the flipside of the birth of Israel.
     It has been a week of adulation from world leaders, ostentatious displays of military prowess, and street parties. Heads of state have rubbed shoulders with celebrities to pay homage to the Jewish state on its 60th birthday, while a million Israelis reportedly headed off to the country’s forests to enjoy a national pastime: the barbecue.
     Click to view caption Palestinian refugee Mahmud Obied, 112, from the Dheisheh refugee camp holds the key of his former house near a huge 10-metre long iron key displayed at a workshop in the Aida refugee camp in the West Bank city of Bethlehem.
     But this year’s Independence Day festivities hid as much as they revealed. The images of joy and celebration seen by the world failed to acknowledge the reality of a deeply divided Israel, shared by two peoples with conflicting memories and claims to the land. more.. e-mail

Settlement stumbling blocs
Lara Friex, Ha’aretz 5/16/2008
     Last month, The Washington Post reported that the Bush administration had entered into a secret agreement with Israel to permit continued construction in areas of the West Bank popularly known as "settlement blocs." The story focused on the alleged agreement (the existence of which administration officials strongly deny), but missed the real point: Secret agreement or not, Israeli construction in and around "settlement blocs" has continued without pause throughout the tenure of President George W. Bush, and continues to this day, with only token opposition from the U.S. So, too, has relentless construction of roads and other infrastructure, to facilitate the expansion of those blocs and integrate them into Israel. So, too, has the entrenchment of a comprehensive "security" regime, sealing off the West Bank from these areas and isolating the Palestinians trapped inside them.
     "Settlement bloc" is an informal term. Israel has never formally defined the blocs. Neither the Palestinians nor the international community (including the U.S.) recognize settlements in blocs as having any special status, compared to other settlements. And construction in the blocs is clearly barred under Phase I of the road map, which states: "[The government of Israel] freezes all settlement activity (including natural growth of settlements..." more.. e-mail

When we returned back to Palestine
Salim Nazzal, Palestine Think Tank 5/15/2008
     While as a nation moving towards commemorating the Nakba day each Palestinian has a story about that day. Among the Palestinians in Lebanon in the sixties the tradition was to raise black flags to commemorate the 15th of May and people stay at home to tell new generations what happened to them in 1948.
     On the 14th of May teachers used to devote the last two hours to tell pupils about the events of that period and how they lived it. We the pupils of that period would hear many stories of how Zionist terror organizations attacked their villages and pushed them to move on foot until they reach the Lebanese borders. Teachers told us stories about the resistance which the villagers with their limited resources showed to the invading Zionist terror organizations, and also about the tragedy which occurred in various places in Palestine.
     There was a particular teacher whose account was particularly vivid. He was perhaps the only teacher who did not only tell of the brutality of the Zionist organizations but was critical of our ways of resisting the Zionist project. He went further and analyzed cultural and social patterns in the Palestinian culture in his efforts to understand what was wrong with us that we lost our homeland. Even though it was not always easy to understand what he said, he was the first teacher who told us not to be satisfied with the current culture which blames the Arab regimes alone for the failure of keeping Palestine. However from him I heard the first time the words that even if we are out of Palestine, Palestine is not out of us - words which I have repeated many times in my life. more.. e-mail

George and Laura wish Israel happy birthday
Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem, The Independent 5/15/2008
     It doesn’t get much cheesier than this. Certainly, not all Carole King fans will applaud the choice of her "You’ve Got a Friend" as the centrepiece of the entertainment provided for President George Bush last night at an event in Jerusalem to salute his unswerving support for the Israeli leadership over the past seven years. But the Israeli singer Adi Cohen’s rendition of it at the international conference hosted by President Shimon Peres set the seal on a day of relentless, high octane professions of mutual admiration to mark Israel’s 60th anniversary.
     On this, his second, and presumably last, visit to the Holy Land as the President of the United States, Mr Bush brought with him some "beautiful presents" for Mr Peres. But as Channel One’s reporter Ayala Hasson tantalisingly explained, the details could not be disclosed "for security reasons". What could this mean?
     True, the newspaper Yedhiot Ahronot had in the morning speculated that the US President would mark Israel’s 60th by transferring "goodies" negotiated between the two governments in the preceding weeks, such as "advanced types of armament, fighter planes, cruise missiles and new radar systems that will increase the early-warning time for surface-to-surface missile fire". But you had to hope that the mysterious gifts he brought to lunch at the Israeli President’s official residence yesterday were a little more, well, homely. more.. e-mail

Should we still view Israel as a ’special friend’?
Adrian Hamilton, The Independent 5/15/2008
     Yesterday was the day when, 60 years ago, Israel was launched as a new state by the UN. Today is the day the Palestinians mourn what they regard as Nakba, the "catastrophe". President Bush arrived in Jerusalem to attend the 60th Israeli anniversary dinner yesterday. Presumably he will not be attending any of the Palestinian Nakba functions today.
     Which really says it all about those six decades. Israel celebrates as Bush arrives to talk of a peace that almost all of its citizens say they want, but virtually none believe will actually happen. The Palestinians mourn, fobbed off with promises of economic assistance and the dream of a separate state, whilst knowing full well that when it comes to it, the West will always side with Israel in any fundamental quarrel with the Arabs.
     "Israel has never had a better friend in the White House than the 43rd President of the United States," Vice-President Dick Cheney told a Washington reception for Israel’s 60th birthday last week. Which is no more than the truth. Over the last five years, and particularly since 9/11, the US President and the Vice-President have accepted totally Israel’s view of its security needs, its insistence on expanded borders and its refusal to take back Palestinian refugees. more.. e-mail

Rethinking America’s Role
Joharah Baker, MIFTAH 5/14/2008
     Today, US President George W. Bush arrived in Israel for Israel’s 60th Independence Day celebrations. Israel has taken all the necessary precautions and elaborate measures to receive the president, including imposing a “closure” on the West Bank, banning Palestinians from entering Jerusalem or Israel while the president is here.
     The US President will partake in Israel’s “Facing Tomorrow” presidential conference along with several other world leaders including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Approximately 80 Jewish leaders from around the world will also travel to Israel to show their support.
     The fact that Bush is taking part in Israel’s independence celebrations is really no surprise. The United States has always been Israel’s strongest and most loyal ally and has never made a secret of its bias towards it. Over and above this general overview, there is the additional perk of George Bush’s personal affection for Israel. This staunch Republican does not candy-coat his positions, not only in the Israel-Palestine conflict but worldwide. We all painfully remember Bush post-September 11 when he addressed his nation – which essentially meant the world – and issued a treacherous warning. “You are either with us or against us in the fight against terror.” more.. e-mail

Gaza lives being put at risk
Report, PCHR, Electronic Intifada 5/14/2008
     As the grueling Gaza fuel crisis continues, so does the strain on local public transport services, including ambulances, across the Gaza Strip. Approximately 15 percent of local public services are operating across Gaza, whilst up to 90 percent of private cars remain off the roads, and all of Gaza’s 450 fuel stations remain closed.
     For ambulance drivers, the situation is particularly fraught, as demands for their services have soared over the last two months due to an almost complete lack of alternative transport to hospitals. The city of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, has a total of 15 ambulances serving a population of more than 175,000 people. At the local headquarters of the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), ambulance drivers say the fuel crisis is making their work difficult and miserable. Fawzi Abdul Hadi is head of the Rafah PRCS Ambulance Service, and says the fuel crisis is severely affecting the delivery of health services across southern Gaza. "We are managing to keep our ambulances on the roads, but we’ve been forced to limit our movements, and now we can respond only to urgent cases," he says. more.. e-mail

On a River Heading Home
Rami Khouri, Middle East Online 5/14/2008
     BEIRUT -- The fact that both Israeli independence and the Palestinian nakba (catastrophe) of 1948 are now acknowledged virtually simultaneously around the world is a great achievement for the Palestinians -- just as the creation of Israel was a miracle in the eyes of the world’s Jews. The two big stories 60 years after 1948 are the strength and vitality of the Israeli state, and the depth, vigor and relentless quest for life, land and liberty of the Palestinian people.
     We are almost equally matched in numbers -- about seven million each -- and in our indomitable spirit. We are both attached to the same land, for which we fight passionately, each having resorted to militancy, heroism in their own eyes, and terrorism in the eyes of the other. We have both suffered exile and disenfranchisement -- from Babylon to Burj el-Barajneh -- along with death, despair and denial. We each know what it means to be scapegoated, caricatured and abused. And we both entered the 21st Century with widespread international recognition and support. more.. e-mail

What the Israeli military does with the Palestinian property it steals
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/14/2008
     When Israeli soldiers stole USD 45,000-worth of equipment and materials from a Hebron orphanage on 1 May and piled the goods onto two huge flatbed trucks [1], workers at the orphanage wondered if they would ever see any of it again.
     Surprisingly, they did. But not in the way that they had hoped.
     Days later, it was discovered that the Israeli military had thrown everything it had stolen in the local dump, which lies just outside Hebron city.
     Textiles found by workers at the dump were identified as those which had been seized from the girl’s orphanage
     Eye witness reports confirm that an Israeli truck arrived at the city dump at 5.30pm on Thursday 1 May, and was met by more than 50 scrap collectors who proceeded to empty the truck of sewing machines, steam irons, dresses, tables, and chairs. [2]
     more.. e-mail

Remembering 1948 and looking to the future
Ali Abunimah, Electronic Intifada 5/13/2008
     This month Israel marks the 60th anniversary of its founding. But amidst the festivities including visits by international celebrities and politicians there is deep unease -- Israel has skeletons in its closet that it has tried hard to hide, and anxieties about an uncertain future which make many Israelis question whether the state will celebrate an 80th birthday.
     Official Israel remains in complete denial that the birth it celebrates is inextricably linked with the near destruction of the vibrant Palestinian culture and society that had existed until then. It’s not an unfamiliar dilemma for settler states. The United States, where I live, has found that even the passage of centuries cannot absolve a nation from confronting the crimes committed at its founding.
     As the noted Israeli historian and staunch Zionist Benny Morris put it in 2004, "a Jewish state would not have come into being without the uprooting of 700,000 Palestinians. Therefore it was necessary to uproot them." He went on, "there are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing." more.. e-mail

We owe the Palestinians a state
Bradley Burston, Ha’aretz 5/13/2008
     I was walking the dog in Jaffa early the morning after Independence Day when, contrary to all seasonal expectation, it began to rain. We took cover by the old Turkish government building, the Sarai. Beautiful as it surely is, though, it is barely skin deep.The Sarai is a freshly reconstructed false front.
     The facade is framed by two plaques, eloquent precisely for what they do not say. On the right, a somber, weathered howitzer-bronze tablet states that the building - less than 30 steps from Jaffa’s landmark Clock Tower - once served as a headquarters for "Arab rioters" and an Iraqi army expeditionary force.It adds with evident pride that on January 4, 1948, the Lehi Jewish underground drove a truck laden with explosives to the structure, and demolished it.
     The plaque says nothing about what happened next. "Dozens killed and wounded in explosion in Jaffa," read Haaretz’ front-page headline the next day. The blast was such that it also destroyed part of the adjacent Barclay’s bank and a number of homes and stores in the area. more.. e-mail

A Historic Compromise Under Threat
Ghassan Khatib, MIFTAH 5/13/2008
     With both Israelis and Palestinians commemorating 60-year anniversaries at this time, it is instructive to look at what the respective sides are remembering. For Israelis, 1948 brought independence and statehood. For Palestinians, 1948 brought only disaster, the forced displacement of between more than half of their number, a majority that was to be shoehorned into refugee camps across the Arab world.
     The different commemorations show the depth of the conflict and the conceptual chasm separating the two sides. But with the passing of time what Israelis used to call "the Palestinian narrative" is inexorably becoming undisputed and well-documented historical fact. Both Palestinian and Israeli historians are coming to the consensus that pre-state Jewish militias were in fact supported by the British Mandate authorities and in 1948 executed a pre-planned and systematic ethnic cleansing of the indigenous population of Palestine. This cleansing led directly to the establishment of Israel and the Palestinian refugee problem. more.. e-mail

Canada’s Ignorant Prime Minister
Khalid Amayreh, Palestinian Information Center 5/12/2008
     Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper recently made outrageously ignorant comments on the plight of the Palestinian people.
     He claimed that criticism of and opposition to the Israeli policies of ethnic cleansing and apartheid against the Palestinian people amounted to "anti-Semitism."�
     "Unfortunately, Israel at 60 remains a country under threat - threatened by those groups and regimes who deny to this day its right to exist,"� Harper said in a Toronto celebration marking the inauspicious anniversary of Israel’s birth.
     "And why? Look beyond the thinly veiled rationalizations; because they hate Israel, just as they hate the Jewish people."�
     Obviously, Harper was trying to curry favor with Jews by appearing more Israeli and more Zionist than many Israelis themselves are.
     But in truth, he is harming Jews, because it is not a sign of true friendship to encourage one’s friends to walk along the path of evil as Israel has manifestly been doing for decades.
     In fact, Israel and Jews in general need sincere friends who should tell them that the pornographic oppression being meted out to the Palestinians is wrong and ought to stop immediately. more.. e-mail

’Music gives me hope’
The Guardian, The Guardian 5/14/2008
     Conductor Daniel Barenboim, the sole Israeli citizen to bear a Palestinian passport, says he is ’living evidence’ that only a two-state solution can bring peace to the Middle East. Remembering his childhood, he explains why.
     There are photographs hanging on the walls of my dressing room in the Staatsoper Berlin; photographs that remind me of what I see when I look out the windows of my house in Jerusalem. They are slightly faded and here and there the paper is crumbling, but one can easily recognise the views. The old city, the Dome of the Rock with its shining cupola, the walls, the gates. Sometimes I sit in this room before a performance, looking at these pictures and thinking of Jerusalem, of Israel, my home. Before 1989, this room was supposedly a refuge of the East German Stasi, the state police; if I happened to be a sentimental person, that fact would surely help me to become unsentimental, but I am not a sentimental person. The situation in the Middle East is much too close to me, much too personal for me to be sentimental about it.
     Since 1952 I have owned an Israeli passport. Since I was 15 years old, I have travelled the world as a musician. I have lived in London and in Paris and I commuted for years between Chicago and Berlin. Before I had an Israeli passport, I had an Argentinian one; later I acquired a Spanish one. And in 2007, I became the only Israeli in the world who can also show a Palestinian passport at an Israeli border crossing. I am, so to speak, living evidence of the fact that only a pragmatic two-state solution (or better yet, absurd as it sounds, a federation of three states: Israel, Palestine and Jordan) can bring peace to the region. My answer to those who say I am naive, only an artist? That I am not a political person, even if I shook the hands of David Ben-Gurion and Shimon Peres as a child; not politics, but humanity has always concerned me. In that sense I feel able and, as an artist, especially qualified to analyse the situation. more.. e-mail

Gaza: The children killed in a war the world doesn’t want to know about
Donald Macintyre In Rafah, The Independent 5/13/2008
     Nayef Abu Snaima says his 14-year-old cousin Jihad had been sitting on the edge of an olive grove talking animatedly to him about what he would do when he grew up when he was killed instantly by an Israeli shell.
     He says he clearly saw a bright flash next to the control tower of the disused Gaza international airport, occupied by Israeli forces after Cpl Gilad Shalit was seized by militants on 25 June. "I went two or three steps and the missile landed," said Nayef, 24. "I thought I was dying. I shouted ’La Ilaha Ila Allah’ [There is no God but Allah]."
     When Jihad’s older brother Kassem, 20, arrived at the scene: "My brother was already dead. There was shrapnel in his head. Nayef was shouting ’Allah, Allah’. The missile landed about four metres from where Jihad had been standing. There was shrapnel in his body as well, his legs, everything." more.. e-mail

Our key still works
Kristen Ess, Palestine News Network 5/13/2008
     For the 60 year memorial of Al Nakba, I have been interviewing elderly refugees for months, people who remember their villages and towns, who talk about their old lives and the new ones they have etched out in the camps.
     However on Monday I sat in the bedroom of a 21 year old refugee named Ghassan. His walls are covered with the posters of the killed from Deheisha Refugee Camp, the imprisoned and dead leaders of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the leftist party of which he is a member.
     And there is a poster of the late President Yasser Arafat. I learn later that this is more out of the same type of reverence that most Palestinians hold in their hearts for Abu Ammar, not out of respect for his disastrous political negotiations such as Olso and Camp David.
     "My room here is full of the pictures of the martyrs from the camp. I lived with them, saw them, saw what they did, how they lived, how their situations were and their actions when they were still here. I saw how they were trying to send a message to the Israelis, to the Israeli people. This is a room of life and death. We love life, but we also say no when we see the martyrs. And when there was revolution and they were carrying guns and they stood in front of a tank and shot at it, I asked a question. ‘Why are you shooting at a tank? .." more.. e-mail

More Violence, Another History Suppressed
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/13/2008
     The historic grounds of Safuriyah are virtually indistinguishable from the surrounding countryside. In 1948, the village, which was then larger than Nazareth, was razed to the ground by Jewish soldiers, all of its residents displaced. On May 8, thousands of demonstrators gathered there to demand Palestinians’ internationally-recognized right of return.
     Cars and busses from all over the country lined the shoulders of Highway 79. Thousands of activists filed out of their vehicles waving banners and Palestinian flags. They marched up the grassy hill and converged near the wooded area at the top, chanting "No alternative to the right of return!"� The procession halted in a small clearing in the woods, which could barely hold the thousands of us present. A stage and a few dozen chairs had been set up there. As the speeches commenced, the voices of our orators were noticeably marred by the hum of a helicopter overhead.
     The crowd eventually began making its way back through the woods to the highway. A phalanx of riot police stood pompously along the asphalt, sunglasses donned, guns at the ready. Some rode horses up and down the file as though trying to measure up the adversary they were about to face. more.. e-mail

Shame, Sorrow and Revolt
Tariq Ramadan, Middle East Online 5/13/2008
     At the Turin Book Fair, Israel and freedom of expression are the victims. The Palestinians have ceased to exist, their oppression, their suffering erased. Gaza is being stifled, blockaded, transformed into an open-air prison, a ghetto; starvation stalks the land. What do we hear? Nothing.
     The Turin Book Fair opened, against a background of bitter dispute. Israel is this year’s guest of honor.
     We are told: “Culture and politics must not be mixed.” “To boycott the Fair is to deny Israel’s existence, to seek its destruction and disappearance.” We’ve heard it all before.
     In response to the boycott appeal, the President of Italy opened the Fair in person on Thursday, May 8. It was not a political but a cultural gesture, we are told. Of course! Meanwhile, the accusations fly, hot and heavy. Israel’s ambassador to Italy has saluted the President’s action as a refusal to knuckle under to the diktat of those who, in boycotting the Fair, “seek to deprive Israel of its legitimacy.” In posing as victim, the ambassador may well be the only one to grasp the true political implications of the President’s decision. Dark irony, indeed. more.. e-mail

Time is Running Out for Israel, Atzmon’s report of the Nakba commemoration event
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank 5/13/2008
     Something positive is happening, I would even call it a shift of awareness, a realisation that the Palestinian struggle is leading somewhere after all.
     Yesterday, at Exeter University, to a very crowded theatre, in an event of that was a commemoration of 60 years of the Nakba, I had a chance to listen to Dr Manuel Hassassian, the Palestinian Ambassador to Britain. I may as well say it, Palestinian eloquence cheers me up and fills me with hope and pride and Dr Hassassian has plenty of it.
     These days it is rather rare to hear or see a  PLO spokesman who lets his fierceness and rage be seen. The Ambassador was angry, he was furious, yet, at the same time, astonishingly measured and considered.
     "Enough is enough", was his message. He admitted that twenty years of negotiation with the Israelis led his people nowhere. America is not a true honest negotiator and this may not change in the near future. America and Israel have locked themselves into a Catholic marriage, they can have a spat, sometimes they do not talk for weeks but somehow, they always stay together. more.. e-mail

Gaza residents queue overnight for cooking gas
Rami Almeghari writing from occupied Gaza Strip, Electronic Intifada 5/13/2008
     As the Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip enters its 11th month, the population’s living conditions further deteriorate, with scores of people in different parts of the coastal region lining up in front of gas stations to receive provisions of cooking gas, a scarce commodity over the past four weeks.
     In eastern Gaza City at Abu Jebba station, one of the largest suppliers of cooking gas, 21-year-old Gaza resident Anwar Harazeen waited from 3:00 am until 11:00 am last Friday for his share of cooking gas while his 12-member family waited at home.
     "We have been living without cooking gas for more than a week now; we cook and heat tea and milk on wood-burning stoves. The situation is really miserable. I swear I have been waiting for my share of gas since three o’clock in the morning, while others have been here since 10 o’clock last night. What shall we do? We need a solution," said Harazeen wearily.
     Along with Harazeen were many adults and children sitting with their empty gas canisters with the hope they would return home with some gas for their needy families. more.. e-mail

Four Days of Transformation in Lebanon
Rami G. Khouri, Middle East Online 5/13/2008
     BEIRUT -- Events in Beirut and other parts of Lebanon continue to move erratically, with simultaneous gestures of political compromise and armed clashes that have left more than 20 killed in the past week. The consequences of what has happened in the past week may portend an extraordinary but constructive new development: the possible emergence of the first American-Iranian joint political governance system in the Arab World. Maybe.
     If Lebanon shifts from street clashes to the hoped-for political compromise through a renewed national dialogue process, it will have a national unity government whose two factions receive arms, training, funds and political support from both the United States and Iran. Should this happen, an unspoken American-Iranian political condominium in Lebanon could prove to be key to power-sharing and stability in other parts of the region, such as Palestine, Iraq and other hot spots. This would also mark a huge defeat for the United States and its failed diplomatic approach that seeks to confront, battle and crush the Islamist-nationalists throughout the region. more.. e-mail

New reality has taken over
Zvi Bar'el, Ha’aretz 5/13/2008
     "The army should enter the governmental palace and remove [Lebanese Prime Minister] Fouad Siniora," Wiam Wahab, a Druze member of parliament allied with Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, declared yesterday.
     "This demand is Hezbollah’s immediate goal, and it will not retreat from it," agreed an associate of Christian General Michel Aoun, another Nasrallah ally, in a conversation with Haaretz. "This government’s days are numbered. One can imagine 1,000 proposals for resolving the crisis, with involvement by the Arab League, religious scholars or anyone who wants to deal with this crisis, but Siniora’s removal, the establishment of a national unity government in which the opposition has a veto, and amending the election law are our [Aoun’s] and Hezbollah’s minimum demands."
     A few hours later, Aoun reiterated these demands publicly.The Christian general’s announcement came in response to a statement by former Lebanese president Amin Gemayel, head of a rival Christian party that belongs to the governing coalition: "Hezbollah must promise that it will never again aim its weapons inside Lebanon." more.. e-mail

Iran: ‘Biggest Single Threat’ to Mideast Peace?
Jalal Alavi, Middle East Online 5/13/2008
     What do Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran and Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel have in common? One thing is for certain: they are both true reflections of the neoconservative rise in US foreign policy, which itself was a result of the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, which razed the Twin Towers in New York and parts of the Pentagon. While the rise of Ahmadinejad to the presidency of Iran in 2005 was in many ways related to George W. Bush’s 2002 State of the Union Address, in which he labeled Iran a member of the “axis of evil” (thus effectively playing into the hands of Iranian extremists opposed to any sort of reform, democratization, or renewed relations with the United States), the potential rise of Netanyahu (a staunch opponent of the Peace Process and a campaigner for US military strikes on Iran) to the premiership of Israel (as a result of Ehud Olmert’s imminent resignation) will in major part be a result of the neoconservative bolstering of extremist factions in and outside Israel. Should this latter scenario be the actual outcome of Israel’s next general election, it will undoubtedly bring about not only the gradual isolation of the proponents of peace throughout Israel and beyond, but also the total failure of the Middle East Peace Process initiated by the collective efforts of Anwar Sadat of Egypt, Menachim Begin of Israel, and the Carter administration in September of 1978. more.. e-mail

Priority: Statehood
Daoud Kuttab, MIFTAH 5/13/2008
     In the spring of 1948, my father, George Kuttab, and his brother Qostandi fled Musrara, a Jerusalem neighborhood just outside the walled city, after their sister Hoda’s husband was killed in front of her and their children. When Dad used to tell us about the Naqba, the catastrophe that befell Palestinians in 1948, he never talked politics or hatred. He would laugh as he told us how his brother secured their home near Damascus Gate. To assure his mother and brother that the house (in what is now Israeli west Jerusalem) would be safe, my uncle joked that he had double-locked the door, turning the heavy metal key twice. He took that key with him to Zarqa, Jordan, expecting to be able to use it again one day.
     As Palestinians look back on the 60 years since they became refugees and Israelis celebrate the 60th anniversary of their statehood, it is important to take stock of Palestinian aspirations.
     Our family took refuge from the Arab-Israeli war in 1948, but only my uncle had a U.N.-issued refugee card allowing him rations. No one in my family lived in tents or refugee camps; even if we are technically refugees, I do not pretend to understand that particular part of the refugee tragedy. I do, however, understand the aspiration of Palestinians to return to their homes. Palestinians’ inalienable right to return is sacred and must be honored. How politicians implement this right is negotiable. But regardless of what terms are reached, the Palestinian public must be able to vote in a referendum on the proposed deal. more.. e-mail

Iqbal Tamimi - 'Get-the-BLOG outta here.' Obstacles facing women journalists
Iqbal Tamimi, Palestine Think Tank 5/13/2008
     I have been asked many times why I switched to blogging after slaving for many years in journalism in the Middle East.
     Many obstacles face women journalists in the Middle East, but on top of the list comes dedicated male efforts to exclude females from acquiring serious decision-making positions like that of Editor-in-Chief. Some still can’t swallow the idea of taking directions from a compass held by a woman.
     Should the miracle happen, and a woman has been assigned to a leading role "˜in showing the civilized world that we have contracted the virus of Globalization’; the pen of such a woman would be connected immediately by a thin transparent thread to the chair of a male, not necessarily qualified to direct a rain drop falling by the law of gravity. The female journalist would be the boss all right...but on paper only. This point might explain the 0% share in union leadership Algeria, Lebanon and Palestine for women. more.. e-mail

Jimmy Carter’s Mid East Lesson
Tommaso Di Francesco, translated by Diego Traversa, Palestine Think Tank 5/13/2008
     The diverging international reactions to former American President Jimmy Carter’s initiative in the Palestinian Occupied Territories and the attention it is receiving from the Arab and Muslim world underscores a fact that has been ignored in Italy and Europe.
     Indeed, what we’re facing is the arrival at an original and unique diplomatic crossroad, the only one that can by now let in some light in the dark Middle East night.
     Jimmy Carter, who was awarded with the Nobel Prize for his commitment in the Egyptian-Israeli peace process with the historical Camp David Accords in 1978, has wilfully decided to start working on a peace negotiation again through direct talks with Hamas, the Palestinian religious extremist and national movement which is opposed to any compromise with occupying Israel. more.. e-mail

Not even a drop
Yehezkel Lein, Musa Abu Hashhash, Hashem Abu Hassan, Palestine News Network 5/12/2008
     Israelis receive most of their water from two principal water sources: the Mountain Aquifer and the Jordanian Basin. Under international law, these sources are international water resources shared by Israel and the Palestinians. The division of water from these sources is patently unfair, in Israel’s favor. As a result, Palestinians in the West Bank suffer a permanent water crisis, making it impossible for them to meet their basic needs.
     The water crisis causes particularly great distress in towns and villages that do not have a network to households with running water. Two hundred and eighteen communities in the West Bank are not connected to a water network, compelling their approximately 197,000 residents to seek alternative water sources. The extensive restrictions on freedom of movement that Israel has imposed during the current intifada, together with the sharp deterioration of the Palestinian economy, impede Palestinians’ access to water and aggravate their already grave situation.
     In July 2000, B’Tselem published a position paper on various aspects of the water crisis in the Occupied Territories, which proposed guidelines for a permanent status arrangement concerning water that complies with human rights principles.1 This report briefly reviews the water problem in the West Bank, focussing on the hardship of residents in communities that are not connected to a water network. more.. e-mail

Falling from Heaven: the ethnic cleansing of Palestine
Kim Bullimore, International Womens’ Peace Service 5/12/2008
     Abu Zureyk, Al Abbasiyya, Abu Shusha, Ayan az Zaytun, Awlam, Azz Zema, AHaiqia, Balad ash Sheikh, Bayt Daras, Beer Sheba, Bi’ne, Burayr, al Dawayima, Dayr el Asad, Deir Yassin, Eilbourn, Haifa, Hawwassa, Husayniyya, Ilut, Ijzim, Isdud, Jish, al Kabri, al Khisas, Khibbyza, Lydda, Majd al Kurum, Mansura al Khayt, Nasir ad Din Khribet, Qazaza, Qisarya, Sa’sa, Safsaf, Saliha, Sha’b,Al Samiyya, al Tantoura, al Tira,Tel, Geze, Umm al, Shauf, al Wa’ra al-Sawda, Wadi ’Ara.
     Like the names of the dead, the names of these villages bring heartbreak to all Palestinians. Sixty years ago, last month, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine began.
     Sixty years ago, up to six weeks before the British mandate of Palestine was terminated and the state of Israeli was even declared, Zionist terror gangs began their forcible expulsion of more than 122 Palestinian villages and began carrying out military assaults on more than 270 other villages.[1]
     Sixty years ago on April 9, 1948, 254 unarmed Palestinian men, women and children were murdered in the village of Dier Yassin by Zionist terror gangs - the Irgun (aka as Etzel) lead by Menachin Begin (who was to become a later Prime Minister of Israel) and the Stern Gang (aka as the Lehi). More than 40 other Palestinian villages and towns were to suffer the same fate as Dier Yassin. -- See also: Version of the report with pictures more.. e-mail

Forget the two-state solution
Saree Makdisi, The Los Angeles Times, Electronic Intifada 5/12/2008
     There is no longer a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Forget the endless arguments about who offered what and who spurned whom and whether the Oslo peace process died when Yasser Arafat walked away from the bargaining table or whether it was Ariel Sharon’s stroll through the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem that did it in.
     All that matters are the facts on the ground, of which the most important is that -- after four decades of intensive Jewish settlement in the Palestinian territories it occupied during the 1967 war -- Israel has irreversibly cemented its grip on the land on which a Palestinian state might have been created.
     Sixty years after Israel was created and Palestine was destroyed, then, we are back to where we started: two populations inhabiting one piece of land. And if the land cannot be divided, it must be shared. Equally.
     This is a position, I realize, which may take many Americans by surprise. After years of pursuing a two-state solution, and feeling perhaps that the conflict had nearly been solved, it’s hard to give up the idea as unworkable. more.. e-mail

Palestinian right of return is not what’s holding up a peace agreement
Daoud Kuttab, Washington Post, Palestine News Network 5/12/2008
     In the spring of 1948, my father, George Kuttab, and his brother Qostandi fled Musrara, a Jerusalem neighborhood just outside the walled city, after their sister Hoda’s husband was killed in front of her and their children.
     When Dad used to tell us about the Naqba, the catastrophe that befell Palestinians in 1948, he never talked politics or hatred. He would laugh as he told us how his brother secured their home near Damascus Gate.
     To assure his mother and brother that the house (in what is now Israeli west Jerusalem) would be safe, my uncle joked that he had double-locked the door, turning the heavy metal key twice. He took that key with him to Zarqa, Jordan, expecting to be able to use it again one day.
     As Palestinians look back on the 60 years since they became refugees and Israelis celebrate the 60th anniversary of their statehood, it is important to take stock of Palestinian aspirations. more.. e-mail

350 Palestinian children are suffering inside Israeli prisons
Iqbal Tamimi, Palestine Think Tank 5/12/2008
     The Palestinian Prisoners’ Support and Human Rights Centre, ADDAMEER, declared that the Israeli Zionist forces have arrested almost 6200 Palestinians since the last Intifada started in September of 2000. 350 of those languishing in prison are children who, against international conventions, are still imprisoned in Israeli jails and detention centers.
     Those youngsters undergo severe punishment and mental stress, living an extremely horrifying health and mental situation. Being subjected to torture, interrogation, beatings, humiliation, insults, degradation, and regular terrorizing, "such conditions will affect their mental well being forever, and will accompany them through their adult life,"� the report said.
     The report published by the Palestinian centre on Friday 9 May 2008 revealed that hundreds of children were arrested while they were quite young, and detained in prisons. -- See also: ADDAMEER more.. e-mail

60 years on, refugees visit lost Jerusalem homes
Wafa Amr, Reuters, Palestine Monitor 5/11/2008
     JERUSALEM - Eighty-year-old Beatrice Habesch sobbed when she caught sight of her father’s house in Jerusalem on Sunday and remembered how it was taken over by Jews in 1948.
     "This is our house! This is my house!" she shouted as fellow Palestinians held her back from running towards the building.
     Some 300 Palestinians marked 60 years since Israel’s founding in May 1948 with a protest walk through affluent Jewish parts of west Jerusalem that were once home to many Arabs. They wore black T-shirts with "This is my House" printed on the back.
     The Palestinians said their families had owned houses in Talbiyeh, German Colony and other districts until Israelis drove them away or they fled in the Arab-Jewish fighting that accompanied the creation of the state of Israel.
     Habesch said her father, a merchant, had owned property in Talbiyeh and that he had had friendly relations with his Jewish neighbors, letting part of his property to them. more.. e-mail

Israel vs. South Africa: Reflecting on Cultural Boycott
Omar Barghouti, MIFTAH 5/12/2008
     In 1965, the American Committee on Africa, following the lead of prominent British arts associations, sponsored a historic declaration against South African apartheid, signed by more than 60 cultural personalities. It read: "We say no to apartheid. We take this pledge in solemn resolve to refuse any encouragement of, or indeed, any professional association with the present Republic of South Africa, this until the day when all its people shall equally enjoy the educational and cultural advantages of that rich and beautiful land."
     If one were to replace "Republic of South Africa" with the "State of Israel," the rest should apply just as strongly. Israel today -- 60 years after its establishment through a deliberate and systemic process of ethnic cleansing of a large majority of the indigenous Palestinian population (for an authoritative historical account of the "birth" of Israel, refer to Ilan Pappe’s The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine) -- still practices racial discrimination against its own "non-Jewish" citizens; it still maintains the longest military occupation in modern history; it still denies Palestinian refugees -- uprooted, dispossessed and expelled by Zionists over the last six decades -- their internationally-recognized right to return to their homes and properties; and it still commits war crimes and violates basic human rights and tenets of international humanitarian law with utter impunity. more.. e-mail

Denying the Palestinian Nakba: Sixty Years is Enough
Dr. Samah Jabr, MIFTAH 5/12/2008
     What is happening in Gaza today is not a humanitarian crisis; rather, it is another Nakba, another war. Israel will continue to escalate its atrocities and intensify its siege in the hope that Gazans will flee to Egypt—this time, once and for all. Israeli Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit has suggested annihilating a Gaza neighborhood in response to Qassam fire on Sderot. And he is considered a moderate compared to other Israeli ministers!
     This year Palestinians will mark 60 years since the beginning of the Nakba, the events of 1948 that resulted in the occupation of the Palestinian land and the expulsion of its people. But the Nakba is not simply an historical event of the past. It is a deliberate program, a process, of occupation, transfer and genocide of the Palestinian’s national identity to create an empty land to be populated by Jewish immigrants.
     In 1948, it was possible to attack unarmed Palestinian villagers in the night, to terrify, kill and rape. Today, in a century that pretends to be more civilized and in a more globalized world, the tactic of choice is to make the lives of Palestinians worse than death, by denying them water, electricity, food and medicine, so that they will be forced to “voluntarily” leave their homeland. more.. e-mail

The Ball of Violence in Lebanon is growing
Abdul Bari Atwan,Editor of Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Palestine Think Tank 5/12/2008
     Translated by Adib S. Kawar
     The last four days uncovered the reality of the balance of power in Lebanon, for when the pro-government leaders, such as Saad Al-Hariri and Walid Jumblatt find themselves under siege, and cannot leave their headquarters, and ask for the army’s protection, this means that there is one power in the country which has the strength to impose its will.
     We don’t think that those leaders are unaware of this fact, nor of the minutest details of the military power on the ground, which obliges us to ask what made them suddenly resort to escalation, and what made them take decisions that they can’t implement or enforce, such as the firing of General Walid Shukeir, the commander of the Beirut airport security, and the removal of Hezbollah’s telecommunications network and cameras, as they consider them illegal.
     The answer to this question and its ramifications, could be reduced to two subjects, it is either that the pro-government group is too naïve, which we don’t believe they are, or some external powers asked them to escalate, and provoke Hezbollah to pull their legs to indulge them in an internal civil war of attrition, which we consider more likely. more.. e-mail

Nadia Hasan - There is no civil war in Lebanon; there is a war against the resistance
Nadia Hasan, Palestine Think Tank 5/12/2008
     What is going on today in Lebanon is just an extension of the situation in the entire region. The US and its western allies are trying to show everyone that religion is the main factor of this dispute and they are trying to cover the political motivations and especially economic interests involved in the whole process. There are two main positions in Lebanon today, on one hand a colonialist project supported by the US and its principle ally in the region, Israel, whose spokesman is the Lebanese Government itself, and on the other, a project of sovereignty conducted by the resistance movement. In fact, it is a war between those who are simply patriotic and external agents. That is why both camps are composed of several currents simultaneously; religious, sectarian, ideological, and so forth. It is important to note that Michiel Aoun, the nationalist QS (Qornet Shehwan) and the Communist parties are in line with Hezbollah?
     The pro-imperialist western Lebanese government aims at pitting the National Army against the people and the resistance. Their goal is to hide behind the army because they lack popular support. It should be noted that the army establishment is still led by nationalists. more.. e-mail

The Guardian: Israel’s celebration remains a Palestinian catastrophe
Ahmad Samih Khalidi, International Solidarity Movement 5/12/2008
     As Israel celebrates the 60th anniversary of its establishment, an inescapable counter-reality lingers over the occasion that is inextricably twinned with it. It is the nakba or catastrophe, the 60th anniversary of the destruction of Arab Palestine in 1948.
     Despite a public discourse that often claimed the opposite, the Zionist movement set out to build a Jewish state in Palestine with a Jewish majority. This could only come about at the expense of the local inhabitants, the vast majority of whom were Palestinian Arabs - both Muslim and Christian. From this perspective, neither the Zionists’ intentions nor the reactions of the Palestinians are at issue: Israel could not have been built as a Jewish state except on the ruins of Arab Palestine.
     In 1948, about 750,000 Palestinians fled or were forcibly driven out of their homeland, creating what still stands today as the world’s largest and most longstanding refugee problem. The nakba created an entirely new politico-demographic reality. From a longstanding majority on their own soil, the Palestinians became a small, vulnerable minority and a tattered, broken nation living in exile or under foreign rule. more.. e-mail

Sea blockade sees dry patch for Gaza’s fishermen
Rory McCarthy in Gaza, The Guardian 5/12/2008
     Palestinian fishermen are in trouble as high fuel costs and an Israeli navy blockade makes finding profitable catches almost impossible - The sun had not long set into the Mediterranean and the fishing launch was motoring out into the rolling sea, only an hour into what was to be a long night spent in search of shoals of sardine.
     Without warning, a sudden burst of machine gun fire came rattling a few feet overhead, the red tracer bullets arcing into the night sky above the fishermen. Abdul Salam al-Hissi and his crew instinctively crouched to the deck.
     The high-speed Israeli naval ship, invisible in the darkness, shone its powerful searchlight and Hissi turned his boat around and headed briefly back inland. So began another night in the sea off Gaza, a night of brinkmanship between a Palestinian fishing fleet in rapid decline and searching in vain for a decent catch, and the Israeli navy that patrols these waters, and is intent on keeping the fishermen close to shore. more.. e-mail

Report: Ethnic cleansing continues in Jaffa
Report, Arab Association for Human Rights, Electronic Intifada 5/11/2008
     "The war that began in 1948 to purge Jaffa of its Arab residents has never ended and continues to this day. In 1948 it was waged by force, and today they use legal and economic means. The state claims that these are the rules of the market, in full knowledge that they will work against the Arab population." - Attorney Hisham Shabaita
     On 19 March 2007, Amidar Israel National Housing Company (Amidar) published a document entitled "A Review of the Stock of Squatted Properties in Jaffa -- Interior Committee, Israel Knesset." The document reviewed properties managed by the company in the Jaffa-Tel Aviv area. Section 5 noted that "the project includes a total of 497 squatters, constituting 16.8 percent of the total properties managed by Amidar."
     Section 5 of the document relates, in fact, to 497 orders received over the past 18 months by Palestinian families living in the Ajami and Jabaliya neighborhoods in Jaffa to vacate their homes or businesses. These homes are owned by the state and managed by Amidar in its name. The grounds for eviction range from "squatting" in the property to "building additions" to properties undertaken by the Palestinian tenants of these properties without approval from Amidar and without obtaining a permit from the planning and building authorities. more.. e-mail

The loathsome smearing of Israel’s critics
Johann Hari, The Independent 5/10/2008
     In the US and Britain, there is a campaign to smear anybody who tries to describe the plight of the Palestinian people. It is an attempt to intimidate and silence -- and to a large degree, it works. There is nobody these self-appointed spokesmen for Israel will not attack as anti-Jewish: liberal Jews, rabbis, even Holocaust survivors.
     My own case isn’t especially important, but it illustrates how the wider process of intimidation works. I have worked undercover at both the Finsbury Park mosque and among neo-Nazi Holocaust deniers to expose the Jew-hatred there; when I went on the Islam Channel to challenge the anti-Semitism of Islamists, I received a rash of death threats calling me "a Jew-lover", "a Zionist-homo pig" and more.
     Ah, but wait. I have also reported from Gaza and the West Bank. Last week, I wrote an article that described how untreated sewage was being pumped from illegal Israeli settlements on to Palestinian land, contaminating their reservoirs. This isn’t controversial. It has been documented by Friends of the Earth, and I have seen it with my own eyes. more.. e-mail

Our Cultural Heritage
Reham Alhelsi, Palestine Think Tank 5/11/2008
     As Palestinians all over the world commemorate the Nakba and 60 years of on-going zionist ethnic cleansing, murder and apartheid, there is one aspect of our Palestinian identity that survived despite all zionist attempts of elimination: our cultural heritage. The Palestinian cultural heritage is full of popular songs, poetry, sayings, stories handicrafts and other forms of folklore. They are the bridges that connect generations and unite Palestinians all over the world, binding us together and forming our cultural identity.
     Looking back, I think of both of my grandmothers (God rest their souls). They both survived the Nakba and were witnesses to it in their own way. My grandmother from my father’s side came from a Bedouin family and lived in the outskirts of Jerusalem. When they heard about the zionist attacks in other parts of Palestine, the men went to defend their homes while the women gathered the children and sought refuge in the nearby caves. Years later, my father, who was a kid himself at the time of the Nakba, took us kids to see these caves and told us about their daily life at that time. I remember how I looked around investigating these holes, and thinking that if we had our own state, this place would have been made into a museum.... more.. e-mail

For Some Palestinians, One State with Israel is Better than None
Richard Boudreaux and Ashraf Khali, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     Frustrated by years of on-and-off peace talks with Israel, Palestinians are losing hope for an independent homeland, and some are proposing a radically different cause: a shared state with equal rights for Palestinians and Jews.
     A "two-state solution" has been the basis for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations for nearly 15 years and remains the declared aim of both groups’ highest elected leaders and the Bush administration. But its advocates are increasingly on the defensive, and not just against militant Islamists and Jewish settlers who have long opposed partitioning the land.
     Majorities on both sides dismiss the current U.S.-backed peace talks as futile. And a small but growing number of moderate Palestinians contend that Israel’s terms for independence offer less than they could gain in a single democratic state combining Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
     As a result, the 60th anniversary this month of Israel’s birth is a time of insecurity and flux. Conventional wisdom about the long-standing formula for peace is being turned on its head. more.. e-mail

Middle East Peace Requires Forgiveness
Ghassan Rubeiz, Middle East Online 5/10/2008
     PALM BEACH, Florida—Peace requires forgiveness. Jimmy Carter’s meeting in Damascus last week with the leadership of Hamas has aroused strong emotions. If compromise of principles disqualifies parties from peace making, the Middle East is doomed forever. The Damascus visit involves five main parties: Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, Israel, the United States, and former President Carter. There is no uncompromised party among the five listed. Hamas compromised in violence, the Palestinian Authority in corruption, Israel in a harsh occupation, the United States in nursing erosion of justice, and Jimmy Carter in over-tolerance of Arab autocracy.
     I am a strong critic of Hamas for not recognising Israel and for not exploiting non-violent resistance—the most powerful weapon that Palestinians can muster for liberation from an oppressive Israeli occupation. But whether one supports Hamas or not, this grassroots movement did win the last parliamentary national elections. This historical election authorised Hamas to lead the government of the Palestinian communities – under Israel’s occupation – in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza. more.. e-mail

Young people, be fairies. Only a weak Israel can put us back on the right track
Benny Ziffer, Haaretz Hebrew Edition, Palestine Think Tank 5/11/2008
     On Sunday, one of my students (I am a lecturer in a course from four to six at Tel Aviv University) approached me after the class and told me that she was the producer of an alternative Memorial evening, which also takes into account cruelty to Palestinians, that would take place on the eve of Memorial Day at the Tmuna theatre. And they would be very honoured if I went. I went.It was filled to capacity with Tel Aviv leftists. There was a handful of Palestinians, activists from the Combatants for Peace organization. There was just a handful of them because the Occupied Territories are under closure and the others were not permitted to come. One of the female Palestinian activists from Combatants for Peace was filmed beside her house in Tul Karem and the film was shown in the Tmuna theatre. The evening had all the aromas of an evening of latte-sipping Sheinkin Street “beautiful souls”. Beside me sat a group of scary and aggressive masculine women of the type spoofed on the show “Eretz Nehderet”. But at the same moment I felt that I should not be finicky, as everyone in this camp of people must be in agreement at least to do this one simple thing, that is to share with our Palestinian neighbours the right to feel the pain of bereavement and loss.That is no small matter, because we have been taught from a tender age that for Arabs, life is not valued as much as it is by Jews. That lie was forcefully drilled into our heads in order to convince us, the Jews, that to kill Arabs is maybe not nice but on the other hand it is also not all that dreadful either. Because, after all, there are a whole lot of Arabs all of whom look alike, so what’s the difference if one or two or ten or a hundred of them get killed. In order to be cured of this lie we need a lot more than one evening a year. We need to travel to the Occupied Territories and meet Palestinian bereft parents, we need to knock down the walls that we have built in our minds. more.. e-mail

Bush should stay home
Akiva Eldar, Ha’aretz 5/12/2008
     If George Bush were a true friend of Israel, he would seize the investigation against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as an excuse to stay home tomorrow. Unless he has a rabbit in his hat, this will be the third time in the past half year that the U.S. president shows the Palestinians and the entire Arab world that they are wasting their time by trying to end the occupation by peaceful means. Not only have matters not improved since he troubled dozens of leaders from around the world to come to Annapolis in late November, 2007; since then, the occupation has been progressing, while the vision of two states has been receding. The number of new buildings erected in the settlements in the last few months rivals only the number of roadblocks that have been added since Bush last visited Jerusalem, in January.
     Bush is an accomplice to an offense far worse than all of the criminal offenses of which Olmert is suspected combined. Every speech made by the president is one more bit of exposure of the nakedness of the Palestinian circles who tied their collective fate to the Annapolis declaration, which pledged to "make every effort to conclude an agreement before the end of 2008." In light of the stasis in the negotiations, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) seems likely to resign even before Olmert does. more.. e-mail

The time zones of Lebanon
Rami Zurayk writing from Beirut, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/11/2008
     10 May 2008 This is what I have to say about the latest series of political speeches in Lebanon: Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah speaks as if there is no future, but March 14 government coalition leaders Walid Jumblat, Saad Hariri and Fouad Siniora speak as if there is no past. For Nasrallah, the past performance and actions of the Loyalists is the only reference point. The past (?) collusion of some of them with Israel, their current alliance with the US and the intersection of some of their positions with the Israeli agenda, as well as the incapability of the Lebanese state to liberate the south and to protect the resistance appear to be the only unit of measure.
     On the other hand, the trio Jumblat-Hariri-Siniora has been delivering speeches and addresses as if the past did not exist, as if the resistance was not under threat of physical elimination by the Loyalists’ very allies, as if members of the Loyalists had not destroyed Beirut many times and invited and supported the Israelis when they invaded it, as if there had not been a number of youth killed by the thugs of the Future Movement in Beirut’s Tariq al-Jadide and Ard Jalloul, as if there was no Future Movement militia in Beirut brought from the north (seen by many on TV and in the streets before the fighting) or Progressive Socialist Party (Jumblat) militia (which has murdered Druze political opponents in the mountains), and as if the state was all powerful, belonged to all its citizens, and capable of extending its authority onto the four corners of the country and to fend off Israeli agendas. When you start so far away from each other, the next stop is Xanadu, as my friend Anna would say. The first thing these guys should do is get into the same time zone. This is if they want to find a way out. more.. e-mail

Lebanon in crisis: an interview with editor Samah Idriss
Stefan Christoff, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/10/2008
     Lebanon is currently facing a major political crisis, as armed battles have erupted in multiple districts of Beirut between pro-government and opposition forces forces led the Lebanese resistance movement Hizballah. Hizballah-led opposition forces took control of West Beirut, and handed certain areas over to the Lebanese army as the political standoff in the country continues.
     Today Lebanon’s government has maintained a contested hold on official state power in Lebanon without representation from Hizballah since they withdrew their ministers over one year ago. This week the government declared illegal Hizballah’s independent communications network operating in Lebanon partly prompting the current crisis. Hizballah’s independent communications system is considered to be a critical element to the success of the Lebanese resistance group’s halting of Israel’s 2006 attack on Lebanon.The fate of Hizballah’s weapons is at the heart of Lebanon’s political impasse pitting the pro-US government coalition versus the opposition -- fitting into the larger polarized pattern in the region. more.. e-mail

Breakfast in Beirut
Rami Khouri, Middle East Online 5/10/2008
     BEIRUT -- As often happens in this strange world, it was my water turtle Jerry who brought home to me the tough choices we make in times of war. This happened on Friday morning, when bullets and rocket-propelled grenades were exploding all around our apartment near the Hamra area of west Beirut, during the latest episode in Lebanon’s long-running civil strife and political showdown.
     We went to bed Thursday night amid repeated rounds of automatic rifle and handgun fire, punctuated by the occasional roar of a loud explosion that was probably a rocket-propelled grenade. The fighting stopped around 1 a.m., soon after a serendipitous spring rainstorm engulfed Beirut.
     The fighting resumed in the early morning. One of our balcony window panes shattered just after we woke up at 7:30 a.m., pierced by a bullet or a ricocheting stone. A few minutes later, as we prepared coffee in the kitchen that we thought was shielded from the shooting in the streets below, a bullet hit the balcony above us. Shattered stones fell past our balcony to the street below. We ducked and quickly got out of the kitchen, but with our coffee in hand. more.. e-mail

Politics Aside, a Human Rights Crime is Happening in Gaza
Jimmy Carter, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     The world is witnessing a terrible human rights crime in Gaza, where 1.5 million human beings are being imprisoned with almost no access to the outside world by sea, air, or land. An entire population is being brutally punished.
     This gross mistreatment of the Palestinians in Gaza was escalated dramatically by Israel, with United States backing, after political candidates representing Hamas won a majority of seats in the Palestinian Authority Parliament in 2006. The election was unanimously judged to be honest and fair by all international observers, including a joint team I led from the Carter Center and the National Democratic Institute.
     Israel and the US refused to accept the right of Palestinians to form a unity government with Hamas and Fatah and now, after internal strife, Hamas alone controls Gaza. Forty-one of the 43 victorious Hamas candidates who lived in the Occupied West Bank are now imprisoned by Israel, plus an additional 10 who assumed positions in the short-lived coalition Cabinet. more.. e-mail

Israel Foreign Affairs Ministry: Lies are Truth
Mary Rizzo, Palestine Think Tank 5/10/2008
     The people in the press staff of the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry are talented science fiction writers. Almost nothing that they write has any bearing on reality, and it seems that they use Orwell’s 1984 as a guidebook for news dispatches. All that they need to do is look at the facts on the ground (terminology that was invented by the hasbara commission, more than likely, because it is something different than reality. It has a bit of the sense of imposition of a negative reality that cannot however be challenged by "ordinary" people), and turn them on their heads. War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength. That’s exactly how the Israeli PR staff represents reality with their warped mirror.
     I do suggest, for those who, like myself, find some pleasure in reading nonsense, to subscribe to their newsletter or to read it on their site. It is just about as absurd a thing one can find to read. The trouble with it is: it"™s taken seriously by the Big Mass Media and a lot of the dispatch services never verify any of the information that is released. If you wonder just why everyone is so wrong about Israel and Palestine, look no further. more.. e-mail

The historic wronging of Palestine
David Morrison, Palestine Think Tank 5/10/2008
     The state of Israel came into existence 60 years ago on 14 May 1948.  In the months before and after this declaration, Jewish forces drove around 750,000 Palestinians from their homes.  Over 500 villages were emptied of their Palestinian population and most of them were destroyed so that those expelled had no homes to return to.
     Anybody who doubts that ethnic cleansing took place on this scale should read The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Israeli historian, Ilan Pappe.  In it, he describes Plan Dalet (D in Hebrew), which set out the areas to be cleansed and the methods to be employed by Zionist forces in carrying out the cleansing.  Here is a sample of the latter:
     “These operations can be carried out in the following manner: either by destroying villages (by setting fire to them, by blowing them up, and by planting mines in their debris) and especially of those population centres which are difficult to control continuously; or by mounting combing and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the villages, conducting a search inside them. In case of resistance, the armed forces must be wiped out and the population expelled outside the borders of the state.” more.. e-mail

Post-Annapolis: The Palestinian Death Toll Keeps Rising
Yasmin Abou-Amer, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     The Annapolis Conference was held on November 27, 2007 under the auspices of US President George W. Bush and was aimed at restarting negotiations on a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.The conference ended with a joint statement issued by both parties.
     Following are excerpts from the text of the joint declaration by Palestinians and Israelis pledging to pursue a peace deal by the end of 2008.It follows:
     “We express our determination to bring an end to bloodshed, suffering and decades of conflict between our peoples ; to usher in a new era of peace, based on freedom, security, justice, dignity, respect and mutual recognition; to propagate a culture of peace and non-violence; to confront terrorism and incitement, whether committed by Palestinians or Israelis.
     “In furtherance of the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security, we agree to immediately launch good-faith bilateral [negotiations] in order to conclude a peace treaty resolving all outstanding issues, including all core issues without exception, as specified in previous agreements. more.. e-mail

Israel’s Half a Step Forward
George S. Hishmeh, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     The May cover of The Atlantic magazine, a respected monthly, was daring. The headline was unbelievable for an American publication: "Is Israel Finished?" The Star of David was larger than the characters on the cover which was adorned by the four colors of the Palestinian flag –– red, white, black and green.
     The author is Jeffrey Goldberg, who admits that he as "a young Zionist in the late 1980s ... was drawn to the idea that Israel represented the most sublime and encompassing expression of Jewishness," and so he moved there and joined the Israeli army.
     The article leads off with the rift between the discredited and beleaguered Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, and a grieving novelist, David Grossman, whose son was killed in the ill-considered Israeli war on Lebanon in 2006. But the author says the rift in fact "mirrors the division confounding Israel," especially whether it can "overcome its paralysis to make the hard choice necessary for its survival ....." more.. e-mail

Sixty years old, through Arab eyes
Zvi Bar'el, Ha’aretz 5/11/2008
     "The Zionist writers’ admissions of crimes committed against the Palestinians always come too late, as though they were intended, at best, to atone for the sin. However, in fact these are nothing but masks to hide the generation’s crimes."
     This is how author Yusuf Damara, a Palestinian writer who lives in Jordan, settled his historical account with Israeli writers in a piece published last week in the literary section of the London-based newspaper Al Hayat.
     A week earlier, Palestinian journalist Salah al-Na’imi analyzed the essence of Israel after 60 years. The work was published in the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat and on important Web sites like Islam on Line, which has tens of thousands of hits a day. A similar campaign was also started this year by the important Syrian commentator Subhi Hadidi, who ran an article entitled "Israel in its 60th year - changing positions among the rabbis, the generals and the secular," in January.4
     These three writers are not only very familiar with the names of Israeli politicians, writers and journalists, whose views they quote in a way nearly unparalleled by Israeli commentators, they are also exceptional in that they make an effort to "read" Israel, and not just Israelis. They are not always successful, and they usually have the standard agendas, but they seek to do so in a manner that is different from the abundant, run-of-the-mill writing. This writing deals mainly with the 60 years since the Nakba (the Palestinian "catastrophe" of 1948 - the founding of the State of Israel), Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians and even a report on the 60th anniversary celebrations. more.. e-mail

Israel at 60
Daniel Levy, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     I don’t often, or ever really, write about my own relationship to Israel or how I ended up there, but I’ll make an exception for the 60th anniversary.
     It happened for me at the time of the ‘good’ Iraq war, you remember – the one whose ambitions were limited to ensuring continued access to Kuwaiti oil – not the contemporary Iraq tri-fecta effort – own the oil, change the regime, and transform the region.
     ....The disconnect, I would argue, is that Israel has locked itself into a box of fear that is not only substantially self-generated and all-embarcing, but has also become a danger in itself, preventing Israel from taking urgently needed steps. Explaining that fear is easy – remember the Holocaust, look at how Israel is targetted – it does not though alter the fact that it has become utterly unhealthy and paralyzing, and ironically a reason to actually be concerned.
     Post 9/11 America knows a thing or two about the dangers of a policy and popular discourse that is driven by nurturing and abusing people’s fears and the disasters that it can produce. Now imagine living in a country whose self-understanding is that it is 3am all the time and that bloody red phone never stops ringing. Welcome to Israel – not the reality of Israel but the sense of self that has been formed. Every enemy is a potential Hitler, every threat an existential one, there is a fatalism and almost a desire to retreat into a ghetto and build a big wall (infact there is a wall, its called the seperation barrier). more.. e-mail

Mideast Change is Coming, and May Not be Pretty
Rami Khouri, MIFTAH 5/10/2008
     The convergence of six trends in the Middle East - the changing realities of food, energy, water, population, urbanization and security-dominated politics - is likely to create conditions that will be politically challenging, if not destabilizing, in many countries in the years ahead. The confluence of these trends is very similar to what happened in the region in the mid to late 1970s, when the current Islamist wave of social identity and confrontational politics was initiated.
     Things will be much more difficult this time around, and the consequences could be much worse, especially in view of the ripple effect of the war in Iraq, Iran’s growing influence, the continued stalemate in Palestine and the weakening of some Arab governments. It is difficult to predict exactly what will happen in the years ahead, but the stressful factors propelling change are already clear and we would be foolish to ignore them.
     Two critical basic needs - food and energy - are simultaneously becoming more costly, and a third - water - is likely to follow, given the high population growth rate and finite available water resources in the Middle East. Arab governments are scrambling to find stop-gap solutions to the problem of rising food and energy prices, which touch every household. more.. e-mail

The coming war
Fadi Abu Sa'ada, Palestine News Network 5/10/2008
     There is no doubt for anyone following the US media in general, and policy in particular, that the present American administration intends to foment public American opinion to be in favor of the coming war. Iran is the target, along with anything else in its way.
     This is in accordance with US interests, particularly with the beginning of the countdown of the end to the current US President’s reign. Bush will soon be out of the White House. With the current chatter about the timing, the countdown may begin after the "Israeli celebrations" of the Palestinian Nakba.
     Another indicator is what is happening with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, with a long line of corruption charges and scandals in his wake. In Israel they are accustomed to the process being that if the government is about to collapse, they use the army in an attempt to unify the domestic front. more.. e-mail

Realism from Riyadh
Ian Black, The Guardian 5/10/2008
     Leaked notes provide rare insight into Saudi Arabia’s trenchant but pragmatic approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict -
     Prince Saud al-Faisal has been the discreet voice of Saudi Arabian diplomacy for more than 30 years, and he spoke with unchallenged authority at the recent meeting of the Quartet of Middle East peacemakers, giving what turned out to be a bleak assessment of the current negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. The situation was "dire", he told the assembled dignitaries, including Condoleezza Rice, Tony Blair and Ban Ki-moon. "Many dangers loom. It seems we have reached a stage that I can only describe as a morass."
     Such pessimism is not big news, though Saud’s gloomy remarks were made, characteristically, behind closed doors at London’s Lancaster House. It is certainly hard to find anyone who harbours much hope that there is a way out of the current impasse.
     With Israel celebrating its 60th independence day, divided Palestinians marking their 1948 "nakba" or catastrophe and George Bush heading for what looks like yet another content-free visit to the region, prospects for the peace talks launched at Annapolis last November range from poor to non-existent. more.. e-mail

Swindler’s List
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank 4/11/2008
     It is a common trend amongst rabid Zionists and notorious Islamophobes to quote some isolated and mistranslated verses from the Qur’an for the purpose of collectively libeling Muslims and presenting Islam as a regressive and violent belief system.
     Needless to say, so far, such repetitive attempts have been found futile if not actually counter-effective. Not a single Western politician, Zionist campaigner or Neocon think tank has managed to establish a comprehensive case against Islam. The reason is rather simple, in spite of the clear fact that some devastating atrocities have been committed in the name of Islam and in the name of Jihad, these acts were performed by sporadic radicalized and isolated cells. As at it seems, in the eyes of the Western masses, it takes more than just a few random acts of a very few to undermine a humanist universal belief system and implicate its one billion followers.
     In order to incriminate Islam and to discredit its believers, a broad argument is needed, a conclusive undeniable proof that would establish a continuum between a given immoral religious text, a religious infrastructure and mass following movement of worshipers who behave immorally and accordingly. For the matter, a CIA-created mysterious character who allegedly hides in a cave for 7 years is not nearly enough.... more.. e-mail

Radical Reform: Ethics and Liberation
Tariq Ramadan, Middle East Online 5/9/2008
     In the contemporary debate over “reform” within Islam’s universe of reference, the status of the Quran is repeatedly stressed. It is as if no reform could actually take place if the status of the Quran itself, as the very word of God revealed to men, was not discussed or questioned. In many interreligious circles (for some of our Jewish and/or Christian interlocutors) as well as by a number of Muslim thinkers, this condition is more or less clearly stated, sometimes in outrightly radical terms: Islam and Muslims will not be able to “evolve”, to “reform” their religion and practices, unless they question the Quran’s being the absolute word of God, and then undertake a historical-critical reading and exegesis which alone will permit a real aggiornamento of Islam similar to the Protestant Reformation or Vatican II. This argument is highly successful in the West, and the answer one gives about the status of the Quran seems to have become the feature setting “true” reformers apart from “neo-fundamentalist” simulators.
     It is indeed important, when starting this general reflection about reform, to make a number of points clear and to discuss some ideas that are commonly accepted and yet highly disputable. At the heart of the Islamic creed (al-`aqîdah), among the six pillars of faith (arkân al-imân), lies the recognition of revealed books and the faith and belief that the Quran, the last Revelation, is the word of God (kalâm Allah) revealed to mankind as such in clear Arabic language (“lisânun `arabiyyun mubîn”[1]).... more.. e-mail

Anatomy of a Conditionally Unresolved Conflict
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank 5/8/2008
     According to Hegel, attaining ’self-consciousness’ is a process that necessarily involves the other. How am I to become conscious of myself in general? It is simply through desire or anger, for example. Unlike animals that overcome biological needs by destroying another organic entity, human desire is a desire for recognition.
     In Hegelian terms, recognition is accomplished by directing oneself towards non-being, that is, towards another desire, another emptiness, another ‘I’. It is something that can never be fully accomplished. "The man who desires a thing humanly acts not so much to possess the thing as to make another recognise his right. It is only desire of such recognition, it is only the action that flows from such desire, that creates, realizes and reveals a human, non biological I.” (Kojeve A., Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 1947, Cornell Univ. Press, 1993, p. 40). Following this Hegelian line of thinking, we can deduce that in order to develop self-consciousness, one must face the other. While the biological entity will fight for its biological continuity, a human being fights for recognition.
     In order to understand the practical implications of this idea, let us turn to the ‘Master-Slave Dialectic’. The Master is called the Master because he strives to prove his superiority over nature and over the slave who is forced to recognize him as a master. more.. e-mail

Deluded and deceived, Tel Avivians rejoiced
Gideon Levy, Ha’aretz 5/9/2008
     At the typically Israeli restaurant Lemon Grass, near Rabin Square, a shockingly noisy group of American-Jewish teenage boys sat and sang "Hineh Ma Tov U’ma Na’im," banging their fists on the tables. It was early evening, but the masses were already swarming to the square.
     It was also a holiday for the wretched: peddlers of ephemera - two glo-bracelets for five shekels, twinkle-light jubilee glasses - and the miserable bottle collectors. Everyone made a bundle, as they say.
     Mina Tomei, another typically Israeli restaurant, was crowded. At Lehem Erez there was a long line for skewers of grilled meat that spewed smoke over the street.
     Was Tel Aviv burning? The hawkers of the silly string that replaced the plastic hammers of our childhood also made a killing that night. Why is pestering thy neighbor a sign of independence and joy? That’s something we should ask ourselves sometime. more.. e-mail

The usual suspects
Tom Segev, Ha’aretz 5/9/2008
     In January 1949, about eight months after Israel’s establishment, the Israel Defense Forces’ canteens and cafeterias service (Shekem in the Hebrew acronym) issued a pamphlet entitled "Menu." It featured a poem, a story, a crossword puzzle, jokes, photos and all kinds of educational articles for soldiers. A story signed by Uriel Lev Ari describes the conquest of two Arab villages:
     "As I continued to lie along the road a bullet passed by my ear. I raise my head indifferently, look at it with a kind of ’What do I care’ attitude, but suddenly I am filled with anger and I turn to Izho, the machine gunner. ’Izho, that sniper is starting to bug me, he has to be finished off. Let’s do the same thing to him that we did to that nudnik at Tel a-Rish.’ He smiles, pleased. For him to kill an Arab is like a precept. The massacre the Arabs carried out on his class in the Ben-Shemen convoy made him tough and cruel, and since then he wants to kill every Arab..." more.. e-mail

Look what they’ve done to our dream
Yossi Sarid, Ha’aretz 5/9/2008
     The days between remembrance days fill with hot air and cliche. Independence Day itself generates its own share, and heads of state may exchange drafts of their speeches and nobody will know who is giving the speech, because they all sound the same.
     Cliches are but coins - some worn out, some counterfeit - that are no longer legal tender. The smaller the change the bigger the words. Those who have no message to sell us will float their words like balloons or fireworks so that people will look up in the sky and not see what is happening on earth.
     All the cliches pass by our heads like background noise and our ears no longer hear their muzak. Who still listens to "only here do we understand why Israel must be strong?" Really? Only there? Must we go all the way to the Valley of the Shadow of Death to understand? Some add, "We can depend only on ourselves," as though the might of the Jewish nation alone defeated Nazi Germany. True, the Allies didn’t go out of their way to save Jews, how shamefully inert of them, but they were the ones who subdued the devil and suffered tens of millions of victims. more.. e-mail

Opposition forces take control of Beirut
Mona Alami, Electronic Lebanon, Electronic Intifada 5/9/2008
     Opposition forces clash with pro-government forces in Beirut’s Cornish al-Mezraa neighborhood, 8 May 2008. ( Matthew Cassel BEIRUT, 9 May (IPS) - Men clad in black have roamed the streets of Beirut since Wednesday, their faces covered with ski masks or dark kaffiyeh (checkered scarf), as they wreaked havoc in the large avenues leading to the airport or dividing Sunni and Shia areas. As darkness loomed over Lebanon, the winds of discord seem to set the Lebanese capital ablaze.
     Since the assassination of former Sunni prime minister Rafiq Hariri 14 Feb 2005, allegedly through a Syrian conspiracy, the ruling anti-Syrian majority comprised of the Druze Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), Christian Lebanese Forces and Kataeb as well as the Future movement headed by Saad Hariri, son of slain prime minister Hariri, has been in conflict with the Syrian and Iranian backed opposition, dominated by Shia Amal and Hizballah movements.
     Tension between the two groups has been aggressively building up since Saturday 26 April, when French Socialist MP Karim Pakzad was detained by Hizballah. In the country to attend a two-day Socialist International conference in Beirut, Pakzad was detained and interrogated for four hours before being released while touring and taking pictures in an area considered the party’s stronghold. Pakzad’s host, Walid Jumblat, head of the PSP and a powerful figure in the governing majority, was clearly unhappy with the turn of events. more.. e-mail

Uncertainty in Beirut
Maureen Clare Murphy writing from Hamra, Beirut, Electronic Intifada 5/9/2008
     8 May 2008 7:00pm Beirut is exploding all around me. After Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah made his speech this evening, during which he accused the governing coalition of declaring war on the resistance, opposition and March 14 supporters started fighting each other and making their armed presence felt all over West Beirut, including my neighborhood of Hamra. The news reports stated that this morning Beirut woke up to new demarcation lines, referring to the points of battle during Lebanon’s long and bloody civil war, though there were no clear lines from my perspective.
     Everyone saw this crisis coming, but there is no way to really prepare for war or whatever we should call the conflict currently playing out in the streets.After the airport road was closed by opposition forces yesterday, and the roads in and out of and connecting the different areas of Beirut were shut by demonstrators, things quickly deteriorated and constantly trotted out in news reports was the old cliché that this was the worst internal crisis since the end of the civil war. more.. e-mail

Celebrating Evil
Khalid Amayreh, Palestine Think Tank 5/8/2008
     Normal nations, like normal people, don’t celebrate their days of infamy.  In fact, they struggle to forget them. Some countries with a troubled past try hard to deal with their shameful legacies, often by openly acknowledging their sins and apologizing to their victims and to their victims’ descendants.
     However, in Israel, which encapsulates evil and racism, ethnic cleansing is celebrated with utmost pride as a consummate national achievement and a glorious success story. "This is our manifest destiny,"� many Zionists would ostentatiously argue, with glee and deep satisfaction apparent in the tone of their voices.
     Sixty years ago today, one of the greatest thefts in history took place in Palestine: when armed Zionist gangs launched a massive campaign of murder and terror against the native Palestinians. more.. e-mail

Israel needs tough love
Jerome M. Segal, Ha’aretz 5/10/2008
     Now that a few weeks have passed, we are better able to assess the significance of former U.S. president Jimmy Carter’s report, subsequent to his meeting with Khaled Meshal, that "Hamas will accept any agreement negotiated by Mr. [Mahmoud] Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel, provided it is approved in a Palestinian referendum."
     This may sound significant, but neither the Olmert government nor the Bush administration responded to the news with cartwheels. They might explain their lack of enthusiasm in this way:
     Hamas has made similar declarations in the past, but has always said that a referendum must include the Palestinian diaspora worldwide, and it continues to say it will not recognize Israel and will insist on the right of return for refugees. So any Olmert-Abbas deal will be opposed by Hamas, and will likely lose in the referendum.
     Who is right here? Did Carter focus world attention on an overlooked but major opportunity to end the conflict? Or is this just more worthless, even dangerous, Hamas rhetoric? more.. e-mail

Hospital that heals division
Donald Macintyre, The Independent 5/10/2008
     Amid the ever-deepening separation of Israeli and Palestinian life, the Hadassah stands out - a clinic run by a Jewish organisation that is sworn to save lives regardless of the patient’s religion.
     If this were any family, there would be nothing remarkable about the way six-year-old Adham Takatka gently tickles the palms of his baby brother Mohammed before, unprompted, planting a kiss on one of his cheeks. But the bond between these two brothers will always be special. It isn’t everyone who can say his first achievement as a new-born infant was to save someone’s life, but Mohammed will certainly be able to make that unusual boast when he grows up.
     Today, Adham happily rides his fairy cycle round the family’s living room in the West Bank village of Marah Ma’ala. Eight months ago, he was lying in hospital in dire need of a bone marrow transplant. Samples had been taken from his siblings and five other relatives; none produced the match needed to save their firstborn’s life. "My nerves collapsed," recalls his father, Ahmad. "This is a deadly disease. If there was no transplant he was going to die." more.. e-mail

What is written
Kristen Ess, Palestine News Network 5/8/2008
     Many refugees from Tel Asafi first fled to Fawwar Refugee Camp in southern Hebron in 1948, thinking they would be gone just a week. They have ended up a lifetime in Bethlehem camps. Abu Yasser lives among the cement blocks of one of them. He is over 80 years old.
     On his office door he has written the exact day that he was driven from his village of Tel Asafi. It was a Thursday, the first day of Ramadan.
     "What is written is my memory of what happened in Tel Asafi, the day we left, the day Israel took it. I wrote 17 June 1948. We left without anything. We ended up in Bethlehem where we are living to this day and awaiting our return to Tel Asafi. It was t first day of Ramadan, Thursday, the 17th of April 1948. They had heavy weapons, we had no choice. But they said it would only be a week.
     "Maybe everyone knows that we want to go home, that we all want to return. Why not? We are tired of the injustice. It’s wrong. Human beings want to be free, to live in freedom. But this word, idea, isn’t happening. But we still hope." more.. e-mail

Orwell prize goes to lament for Palestinian landscape
Lindesay Irvine, The Guardian, Palestine Monitor 5/6/2008
     Britain’s most prestigious award for political writing, the Orwell book prize, has been won by Raja Shehadeh’s Palestinian Walks, a victory further distinguished by such strong competition that the judges felt the need to extend this year’s shortlist.
     The subtitle of Shehadeh’s book is Notes on a Vanishing Landscape, and it describes how over 40 years the West Bank he loves has been steadily taken over by Israeli settlements, and how the destruction of a beloved landscape mirrors the damage to Palestinian identity. Judges praised its combination of lyrical nature writing with understated political passion.
     The chair of the prize, Professor Jean Seaton, saluted Shehadeh’s command of detail.
     "One way of measuring the quality of your freedom is just to take a walk," she said. "Raja Shehadeh’s book records how brutalising the loss of a landscape is, both to the losers, and to the takers: there are no winners..." more.. e-mail

Arab-Israeli recalls ethnic cleansing in 1948
Mehdi Lebouachera, Daily Star 5/8/2008
     Agence France Presse - BIRAM, Israel: Standing on the roof of the old schoolhouse, Toomeh Maghzal looks over the green valley below at the ruins of the village of Biram, which Arabs were forced by the Israeli Army to abandon 60 years ago. "There used to be houses everywhere. We had orchards of olive trees, apple trees, vineyards," says Maghzal, an 81-year-old Maronite Christian from the village. "Today, it is all in ruins."
     Back on October 29, 1948, during the war that followed the creation of Israel, which marks its 60th anniversary on Thursday, the Israeli Army entered the village of Biram, which lies near the border with Lebanon.
     The 1,050 people residents, mostly Maronite farmers, were forced to flee to the neighboring village of Jish, but with the promise, never fulfilled, that they could eventually return to their homes.
     "They destroyed everything to wipe out our hopes of returning," says Maghzal, still spry and with vivid memories of the village and its Christian Arab population. more.. e-mail

Memories of a refugee
Khalid Mansour - Translated by Saed Bannoura, International Middle East Media Center News 5/8/2008
     I searched for him at his home but could not find him, his wife told me "you can find him west of the refugee camp, you will definitely find him sitting under an olive tree".
     It was sunset, I rushed there to find him before he returns to the refugee camp to conduct evening prayers at the local mosque. Indeed I found him there under an olive tree in an orchard not far away from the houses of the camp.
     There, I saw a man who is over eighty years old, the wrinkles of his face tell lots of suffering he encountered in his life, he was sitting there wearing his white Palestinian kofiyya on his head, and wearing his special traditional gown with a belt wrapped on his waist,
     He was sitting on the ground, busy ’rolling his own cigarette with local tobacco placed in a rusty from outside, old tobacco holder.
     You could clearly see his shaky hands but you could also see his determination to perfectly roll his tobacco. more.. e-mail

Sixty years ago in Battir (Part 2)
Hasan Abu Nimah writing from Amman, Jordan, Live from Palestine, Electronic Intifada 5/7/2008
     For a long time any discussion of the "Arab-Israeli conflict" has skipped one basic fact: Israel, whether one loves or hates it, was created at the expense of the Palestinians. An entire people and hundreds of communities that had lived for centuries in tranquility had to be ruthlessly and unjustly shattered to make room for the Zionist state. The story of my village, Battir, southwest of Jerusalem, is only one of hundreds.
     When I was growing up, hardly anyone in the village was aware, or needed to be aware, that our village traced its roots back to the second century. Generation after generation tilled the land, lived off its gifts and engaged in small trade. They adapted to the often harsh environment, brought up their children, interacted with their neighbors from villages near and far and lived their lives relatively happily and peacefully.
     Although Palestine had a large Christian population, the 1,200 people in our village were all Muslim -- though there was one German wife who was very popular and known for her kindness, and I believe she was Jewish, by the name of Lina Shaffer -- and lived in effect like a large extended family. Everyone in the village knew everyone else, and everyone shared happy and sad moments. The whole village knew if someone was getting married, got a job in the city, was caught up in a problem, was expecting guests, or even bought a new garment. -- See also: Part 1 more.. e-mail

Mental Barriers in Palestine
Mats Svensson, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     It is dry, it is hot. Black string bikinis descend the small steps meeting black flapping swimming trunks. They look naked thanks to the black mud. Both bodies entirely black, only the feet remain white. Salt easily penetrates the skin, making it soft and filled with wellbeing.
     The water is salty. I protect my eyes, protect myself. I feel that I am constantly protecting myself. Protecting myself from inner conflicts. Protecting myself from myself, from my own anxiety, my prejudices, stories, childhood, education, manipulation, songs, sermons… I’m filled with strong emotions when I look towards that powerful mountain, the mountain near the Holy City. Protecting myself from what I see, from what I feel, from what I hear.
     Eat a salad by the Dead Sea. I’m near, but far from, the conflict, the war. Carry a barrier, a mental barrier. Over there, there is war; here, there is peace. Peace behind a mud mask.
     We float around like corks in this Shangri-la on the shores of the Dead Sea. A sea that is disappearing and which will soon really be a dead sea, a sea without water, only salt. more.. e-mail

Gaza improvises under siege
IRIN, Electronic Intifada 5/7/2008
     JERUSALEM/GAZA, 6 Ma) - Intense political divisions in the Gaza Strip have split people on most issues, except one: the situation has never been worse, nearly everyone agrees.
     "I never remember Gaza being this bad," said one man in his early 40s. "Living here has become a game of survival." With fuel supplies nearly dry, many people no longer have cooking gas in their homes, leading some to search for alternative methods to make a meal.
     "People now are starting to look through the garbage to find combustibles," a Gazan who works for a large international aid organization told IRIN.
     "Even my colleagues have begun to search the garbage bins or the sides of the roads to find wood and plastics to burn so they can cook their food at night," he said, requesting anonymity so as to not embarrass his friends.
     To add to the woes of the needy, UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestine refugees, has said it has been forced to stop food distribution today and is cutting back on other services it normally supplies, owing to the lack of fuel supplies. This is the second time in two weeks it has done this. more.. e-mail

Talking to ’Terrorists’
Jimmy Carter, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     A counterproductive Washington policy in recent years has been to boycott and punish political factions or governments that refuse to accept U.S. domination. This policy deters the ability of revolutionary or uncooperative leaders to moderate their attitude and demands.
     A notable example is Nepal. About twelve years ago, Maoist guerillas launched an effort to modify or overthrow the monarchy and force changes in the nation’s political and social life. Although the United States declared the revolutionaries to be terrorists, The Carter Center agreed to help mediate the dispute among the three major factions: royal family, old-line political parties and Maoists.
     Six months after the oppressive monarch was removed from power, a cease-fire agreement was consummated. Maoist combatants lay down their arms and the Nepalese Army agreed to remain in barracks.
     Our Center continued its involvement and — except for the United States — other nations and international organizations began working with all parties to reconcile the dispute. Ultimately, the Maoists succeeded in achieving their major goals: abolishing the monarchy, establishing a democratic republic, and ending discrimination against untouchables and other groups whose citizenship rights were historically abridged. more.. e-mail

Linus Pauling Still Teaches Courage
Rami G. Khouri, Middle East Online 5/5/2008
     CORVALLIS, Oregon - Linus Pauling was one of the greatest scientists and most renowned peace activists of the 20th century: the only person ever to win two unshared Nobel Prizes (for chemistry in 1954, and peace in 1963).
     Normally his life and mine would not cross paths, especially because I still have not overcome the deep emotional trauma and psychological self-esteem scars I suffered in high school due to my total inability to comprehend anything that happened in classes of chemistry or physics, his fields of renown. But a few months ago, I was honored with an invitation to deliver the 25th annual “Ava Helen and Linus Pauling Memorial Lecture on World Peace,” at Oregon State University.
     This gave me the opportunity to learn more about his extraordinary life, which I write about today because it remains relevant for two reasons: first, that men and women of letters, science, business and the arts should courageously enter the world of politics and bring their knowledge and influence to bear on the policies of their governments; and, second, for pointing out the several ways in which the policies of global powers intersect with the affairs of smaller countries around the world. more.. e-mail

The ANZAC-Palestine connection
Sonja Karkar, Electronic Intifada 5/7/2008
     "ANZACS BACK AGAIN" was the front-page headline of Jerusalem’s Palestine Post on 13 February 1940. The ANZAC reputation for courage and daring was legendary after their victory at Beersheba in 1917. That was the Palestine Campaign that saw the celebrated charge of the 4th Light Horse Brigade on the unsuspecting Turks. It was a battle that turned the tide of that campaign and led to the subsequent end of Ottoman rule in Palestine.
     During World War II, Palestine was under a British Mandate and Australian and New Zealand soldiers were back helping the British army to stop the Germans from capturing Egypt and the Suez Canal. They fought alongside several Palestinian brigades enlisted into the British Army under The Palestine Regiment. That decisive offensive took place in 1942 at al-Alamein, Egypt, the first allied land victory of the war.
     Tragically, more than 2,000 ANZACS from both campaigns would never see Australia or New Zealand again. Over 600 lie in unknown graves with Muslim and Christian Arabs and Jews who also died trying to defeat the German army. Other ANZACS are buried in war cemeteries throughout Palestine, two of which can be found in Gaza -- one beautifully cared for in the Palestinian town of Deir al-Balah, and the other in Gaza City. The Beersheba Commonwealth War Cemetery has graves of some 175 Australian soldiers and lies on the edge of today’s sprawling commercial city that Israel has renamed Be’er Sheva.Our soldiers knew it as Beersheba with a largely Palestinian population. more.. e-mail

A Roadmap Collision Course
Joharah Baker, MIFTAH 5/7/2008
     On the five-year anniversary of the US-brokered roadmap for peace, there is not much to celebrate. According to plan, an interim Palestinian state should have been established and a final status agreement negotiated by now. Instead, like so many other agreements before it, the once-deemed optimistic and viable plan has traveled southward, circling the drain.
     It is no wonder, given that the United States is the “mastermind’ behind it. Any sensible onlooker will realize that the US, no matter how good intentioned it claims to be, can never be an honest and objective broker as long as it remains such a staunch ally of Israel.
     The roadmap was presented to the Palestinian Authority and Israel on April 30, 2003 by the United States in cooperation with the Quartet Committee. The goal-driven plan full of timelines and benchmarks required both sides to fulfill certain requirements as part of the first phase of the three phase plan.Five years later, the two parties are still squabbling over the obligations of phase one, each side accusing the other of breaching the agreement and shirking their responsibilities. In short, the Palestinians were required to halt violence and “terrorism” against Israelis everywhere while the Israelis were to freeze all settlement activity, retreat to positions prior to September 28, 2000 and take measures to improve the Palestinians’ humanitarian situation. more.. e-mail

US politics: you not electable if you are not pro-Israeli
Kristen Ess, Palestine News Network 5/7/2008
     It is not possible to get elected in the United States if one is not pro-Israel. The Israeli rhetoric in the US, the country which provides over three billion dollars per year to support the occupation, is nothing new.
     However, Barak Obama’s framed photo hung in the American Islamic Nation’s offices four years ago. At that time his position was clearly pro-Palestinian.
     Now there is new reggae song coming from the US that is calling for Barak Obama, saying he will return to his former pro-Palestinian position if elected to the US presidency. Several pundits are stating the same, but if he pulls a Clinton, former president Bill that is, and not his wife who is making her bid for the presidency now, Palestinians will still be in trouble.
     Bill Clinton, when he was president of the US, became popular in places likethe southern Gaza Strip’s devastated Rafah only because he visited there. Dozens of residents said in the early 2000’s that he was a “great man” because he simply paid attention to them, even if only for a short visit. more.. e-mail

Global Food/Energy Crises and the Middle East
Rami Khouri, Middle East Online 5/7/2008
     BEIRUT -- The convergence of six trends in the Middle East -- food, energy, water, population, urbanization and security-dominated politics -- is likely to create conditions that will be politically challenging, if not destabilizing, in many countries in the years ahead. The confluence of these trends is very similar to what happened in the region in the mid-to-late 1970s, when the current Islamist wave of social identity and confrontational politics was initiated.
     Things will be much more difficult this time around. The consequences could be much worse, especially in view of the ripple effect of the war in Iraq, Iran’s growing influence, continued stalemate in Palestine, and the weakening of some Arab governments. It is difficult to predict exactly what will happen in the years ahead, but the stressful factors pushing change are already clear and we would be foolish to ignore them.
     Two critical basic needs -- food and energy -- are becoming more costly simultaneously. (And a third -- water -- is likely to do so, given the high population growth rate and finite available water resources.) Arab governments are scrambling to find stop-gap solutions to the problem of rising food and energy prices, which touch every household. more.. e-mail

Time for National Turning Point
Alon Ben-meir, MIFTAH 5/6/2008
     As Israelis finalize preparations for their momentous 60th anniversary - a date marking 10 years of consistent economic growth and industrious expansion - there remains the underlying question that will go unanswered yet another decade: What will be done with the West Bank and Golan Heights? Despite all of its considerable achievements, cross-border violence persists and Israel’s existence remains fundamentally insecure. At the heart of this conundrum is the occupation of Palestinian and Syrian lands, a wound that if left unattended will produce a tragedy of scale we have not yet witnessed.
     On May 8, Israel has an historic opportunity to celebrate its monumental progress, but if it is to preserve any of these gains, it must ultimately free itself from the albatross around its neck and relinquish these occupied territories.
     During its 60 years, Israel has forged full-speed ahead to build a modern nation-state. It has absorbed nearly 3 million Jewish immigrants, developed modern city infrastructures such as Netanya and Herzliya, and built prestigious educational institutions. The nation has made tremendous strides in medicine, agriculture, biotechnology, and economic development and created democratic political institutions, all while manning its formidable military powerhouse. Yet with violence erupting daily and the regional death toll rising, Israel remains vulnerable as maintaining the occupation is sapping the country’s energy and resources. more.. e-mail

From darkness into light
Daphna Golan, Ha’aretz 5/7/2008
     Again we celebrated the holiday of freedom while Gilad Shalit remained in captivity. We spoke of going from darkness into a great light, but left the talks about releasing the abducted soldiers in the dark. We have become accustomed to let our future depend on Shin Bet people who negotiate covertly, and we have stopped asking what we could do to release the abducted soldiers.
     Why not talk with all our neighbors, Hamas, Fatah and Hezbollah, the presidents of Syria and Egypt and the Arab states, about releasing the abducted soldiers, about stopping the Qassam fire, about reconciliation?
     We boast of Israel’s democracy and freedom of information, but let the Shin Bet security service direct our reality, although they act in darkness. We have no idea what our future map is, but we have been asked for years not to ask too many questions.
     Since 1967, Israel has imprisoned more than 700,000 Palestinians, about one-fifth of the Palestinian population. According to the last United Nations report, Israel is holding behind bars more than 11,000 Palestinian prisoners, including 118 women and 376 children, who are incarcerated - in violation of international law - outside the occupied territories. The Shin Bet decides which prisoners are to receive visits and which family members will be barred from entering Israel. more.. e-mail

Sixty years of Naqba, 60 years of nothing
Bradley Burston, Ha’aretz 5/7/2008
     In a nation as coiled and embroiled as this, with a language fraught and zip-filed as the bible, it’s only fitting that a single daily newspaper headline will often say more than the thousands of words that follow.
     So it was, that on the day before Israel was to celebrate its independence, Maariv’s banner read, simply, "60 Years of Bereavement."
     In a narrow sense, the headline, stark white on a field of black, marked Israel’s memorial day for its war dead and its victims of terrorism.
     At the same time, the brief headline may have said more about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict - and about Israelis themselves, and Palestinians as well - than all of this week’s floodtide of 60th anniversary punditry put together.
     They are filled with dread here, these people, my friends, the Israelis and the Palestinians both. Part of the dread is the realization that, no matter what direction the conflict takes, the result will in no way justify the violent deaths since 1948 of more than 24,000 Israelis and uncounted thousands of Palestinians. more.. e-mail

As it turns 60, the fear is Israel has decided it can get by without peace
Jonathan Freedland, The Guardian 5/7/2008
     In the wee small hours on Israeli television, they show reruns of what was once a staple form of mass entertainment: kibbutz choirs - the men in pressed work shirts, the women in peasant skirts - singing Hebrew folk melodies exalting the Land of Israel, while a smiling audience joins in. The pictures were black and white, the sets cardboard, and the programmes interminable - a socialist-realist tableau of a simple farming nation engaged in wholesome, patriotic amusement.
     Visiting Israel last month, I sat transfixed when I stumbled across the public service channel that replays those old shows. Tonight the national celebrations will be more up to date, as Israel marks its 60th anniversary with street parties this evening and beach barbecues tomorrow. Yet if the world is watching, trying to understand the place Israel was and what it has become, it could do worse than start with those cheesy TV specials.
     For one thing, too many critics like to depict the establishment of Israel in May 1948 as little more than an act of western imperialism, inserting an alien, European enclave into the mainly Arab and Muslim Middle East. In this view, the Jewish Israelis of today, with their swimming pools and waterside restaurants, are no different from their counterparts in other settler societies - the whites of Australia or, more painfully, South Africa. A look at the faces of Jewish Israel is one easy rebuttal: the new nation that has formed by mixing Moroccan and Russian, Ethiopian and Kurd, is one of the most ethnically diverse in the world. But there is a more substantial counter-argument, one that can be picked up even on those old TV singalongs. more.. e-mail

Still far from economic independence
Nehemia Shtrasler, Ha’aretz 5/7/2008
     Israel’s economic data on the eve of its 60th anniversary are quite impressive. The economy is growing at a rate of about 5 percent, for the fifth year in a row; per capita gross national product has reached $25,000; unemployment has fallen to 6.5 percent; the shekel is appreciating against the dollar; interest rates are low; and we even have a balance of payments surplus. Does all this mean that we have achieved economic independence, and all of our socioeconomic problems have been solved?
     Not necessarily. Israel is still a highly unstable country, both internally and externally. It faces major security threats and numerous economic and social problems, and it is very dependent on the rest of the world, especially the United States. Therefore, we are still very far from economic independence.
     All it would take to upend our excellent economic situation would be for a U.S. president to murmur something like "I’m mulling my relationship with Israel." Banks would instantly cut off our credit lines, the dollar would soar against the shekel, inflation would surge, foreign investors would flee, the balance of payments surplus would become a deficit, and growth would be replaced by recession. After all, the world knows that without American support, tiny Israel would instantly resume its true proportions. more.. e-mail

A Strangled People
Sami Abdel-shafi, MIFTAH 5/6/2008
     It is a strange feeling: after working as a productive professional in Gaza for five years, I have become a black market junkie. I make several phone calls a day hunting for fuel for my car, diesel for the electricity generator waiting on standby to power the house, even cigarettes and vitamins. The only way to get hold of these things, to buy life-saving medicines, to purchase the essentials for a life of basic dignity, is through the black market, if at all. Today all Gaza suffers severe water shortages, with the fuel needed to pump and transport water (as well as sewage) dangerously scarce. The few cars seen on Gaza’s mostly empty streets today almost invariably run on used cooking oil due to the lack of diesel.
     That feeling of strangeness continued as I read the statement delivered by the Quartet in London yesterday. The four powers mediating in the Middle East - the United Nations, European Union, United States and Russia - spoke of "deep concern" and demanded "concrete steps by both sides". There was no sense, however, that they had properly grasped the depth of Gaza’s plight or the realities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. World politics seems to have morphed into a diplomacy of denial - a denial of how much more firm the international community must be towards the cause of an occupied and dying people. more.. e-mail

'You don’t know when they’ll come, but they’ll come'
Palestine Monitor, Palestine Monitor 5/6/2008
     With photos
     With the threat of an Israeli military closure order hanging over their heads, this is one of the maxims that the children and staff of the Islamic Girl’s Orphanage in Hebron have had to keep in mind every day.
     Issued on February 25, 2008 by General Gadi Shamni, the Israeli military commander of the West Bank, the order demands the closure of fourteen schools and orphanages in Hebron: eight funded by the Islamic Charitable Society and six belonging to the Muslim Youth Society.
     Since then, activists from the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT) have been joined by other internationals from Belgium, Britain, Canada, Germany, Holland, Scotland and the US in maintaining a permanent presence in the orphanage to deter the Israeli military from implementing the order.
     The first deadline for the closure of the orphanage passed on April 4 without incident, and although the children, staff and activists alike heaved a sigh of relief, they knew that the story was not over yet. more.. e-mail

PCHR: Narratives Under Siege
International Solidarity Movement 5/6/2008
     Gaza Region - Photos - In order to highlight the impact of the siege and closure of the Gaza Strip on the civilian population, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) is publishing a series of "Narratives Under Siege" on their website. These short articles are based on personal testimonies and experiences of life in the Gaza Strip, highlighting the restrictions, and violations, being imposed on the civilians of Gaza.
     Narratives Under Siege: Al Gherbawi Taxi office, Gaza city
     Early Monday morning in Gaza city: the streets are sunny and quiet. As men and women walk to work, a smattering of cars drive through the city, but the vast majority of Gazans are on foot. Pedestrians stroll past vehicles that are double, even treble parked against the broken side-walks, and the distinctive yellow Gaza taxis are few and very far between.
     Sa’ed Mohammed Al Gherbawi runs Al Gherbawi taxis, and is already behind his desk at the city centre taxi office. “My family has been running taxis in Gaza for forty years, and I’ve been working here since 1983", he says. “We have a good business, with fifteen cars and twenty drivers. But we cannot operate without fuel. When the benzin deliveries were cut in February, we started to rely on diesel; but in the middle of April the diesel supplies were cut too, and now we can only afford enough diesel to keep one of our cars running full time...” -- See also: View all the narratives on the PCHR website more.. e-mail

New factors both spur and stall ’secret talks’ for Israel and Syria
Riad Kahwaji, Daily Star 5/6/2008
     Describing the state of relations between Syria and Israel is not as easy a task as an average observer would think. Although the two countries regard one another as arch-foes and have fought four wars over the past 60 years, they nevertheless seem to have learned to coexist with one another, at least at the level of ruling parties on both sides of the border. The point of dispute proclaimed to be delaying a peace treaty between the two is the Golan Heights that Israel captured in the 1967 war. Neither side has been able to convince the other of the need to close a deal. The events that followed the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, up until the Syrian pullout from Lebanon in 2005, further complicated the situation between Syria and Israel.
     While official talks between the two sides were halted in 2000, non-official contacts between Israel and Syria at the level of experts and civil servants have continued almost non-stop. People who have attended track II behind-the-scenes meetings in Europe and some Arab capitals over the past few years have witnessed Israelis and Syrians meeting and talking. In listening to the two sides exchanging views one could come to the conclusion that Damascus has not been able to convince Israel that it must withdraw from the Golan. more.. e-mail

Don’t overstate the Syrian-Israeli track
Mahdi Abdul Hadi, Daily Star 5/6/2008
     Many contradicting trends and confusing political signals have been exchanged in recent months in the Middle East, making it a daunting task to untangle the intertwining motives in the region. The revelation of talks between Israel and Syria adds yet another twist in the political knot, and we are once again reminded that the fates of the Middle Easter states are connected. Syria has now opened important diplomatic and other fronts with Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Palestine and Israel. It is likely that the same concerns will be shared by all parties - namely, state and societal security within recognized borders, management of oil and water resources, economic cooperation, and protection of the rights of minority populations and the right of refugees to return to their homelands. Still, the question remains: Are the leaders in Syria and Israel genuine in their efforts toward normalization between their nations, and if so, are they up to the challenge.
     On the surface, it looks like Syria holds a strong hand in the politics of Middle Eastern conflict. President Bashar al-Assad has received high-level visitors like the speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, and former US President Jimmy Carter, each of whom came away convinced that the United States should invite the Syrians into the "peace process." Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki was also welcomed to Damascus on an official visit. Assad even managed to save an Arab summit in April that was threatened with collapse due to the absence of the Saudis, Egyptians and Jordanians. Syria’s relationships with Hizbullah, Hamas and Iran have proven to be lasting in the face of outside pressure, and Assad has opened an economic partnership with Turkey. To paint Syria as an important player in the region is an easy task when it has all of these elements working in its favor. Unfortunately for the regime in Damascus, its position is not as comfortable as it may seem. more.. e-mail

Too quiet in Gaza’s harbor
Mohammed Omer, Electronic Intifada 5/6/2008
     GAZA CITY, 6 May (IPS) - It’s been strangely quiet for some time at the port in Gaza. No clanging of hooks, no sounds of creaking cranes or of thumping of nets upon decks. Boat engines, normally puttering and spewing exhaust, lie entombed under covers.
     Of the 40,000 fishermen and others who make a living from the catch, only about 700 are still busy, according to the Fishing Syndicate in Gaza. The boats need oil, and Israel will not let the fishermen have it.
     "Gaza’s 3,000 fishermen need about 40,000 liters of fuel and 40,000 liters of natural gas a day to operate for this season from March until the end of May," says Nizar Ayash, director of the Fishing Syndicate. Now they get almost nothing.
     Jamal al-Assi, 37, attempts to look busy around his idle boat. "My boat feeds 11 families," he says. "What are we going to do? There is no hope when there is no fuel. We can’t work."
     "I have been laid off work for nearly two months due to shortage of fuel," says Nasser al-Amodi, 49, one of Gaza’s oldest fishermen. He began his career at age nine, working alongside his father. Later he inherited the business. more.. e-mail

Palestinian Festival of Dance – and Debate
Joshua Mitnick, MIFTAH 5/6/2008
     Though they were delayed eight hours at the Israeli border, dancers from Belgium’s Les Ballets C. De La. B. company eventually made their way to Ramallah’s Al Kasba Theatre where they writhed, staggered, and lunged across the stage.
     But the Israeli security restrictions on the contemporary dance company were only part of the headache for the third annual of the Ramallah Contemporary Dance Festival. For the first time, the festival has drawn fire from the religious authorities of Hamas – highlighting how the split between the Gaza Islamists and the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority (PA) has exacerbated a Palestinian culture clash.
     In an article published on Hamas’s website, the director general of the Islamic Waqf in Gaza, Saleh al-Rakab, called said that the festival "damages" the Palestinian cause and wastes money that should go to impoverished Gazans suffering from Israel’s economic blockade.
     "This festival is a black stain and a disgrace to everyone involved in it, Mr. Rakab wrote. While Hamas is immersed in "holy" work, the festival is "ridiculous and marginal.…Who has the head for something like this?" more.. e-mail

Bomb Squads: To Survive a Gaza Refugee Camp
Ramzy Baroud, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     The following are excerpts from Baroud’s upcoming book, "101 Ways to Survive a Refugee Camp."
     We waited breathless. Breathing heavily was hazardous under these somewhat exceptional circumstances. The army, my father often advised, was sensitive to the slightest movements or sounds, including a whisper, a cough, or God forbid, a sneeze.
     Thus we sat completely still. Muneer, my younger brother was entrusted with the mission of peering through the rusty holes in the front door. It bothered me that I was not the one elected for the seemingly perilous mission.
     My father explained that Muneer was smaller and quicker, he could negotiate his way back and forth, seamlessly, between the observation ground and the room where everyone was hiding. The house’s main door was riddled with holes; the upper half spoke of past battles between the neighbourhood’s stone throwers and Israeli soldiers.
     The holes on the lower half, however were not those of bullets, but rust and corrosion. These holes often served us well. Muneer would lie on his belly and peek through them; he followed the movement of the soldiers as their military vehicles often used the space in front of our house. They pondered their moves from there, and often used our house’s front step as a spot for lunch or tea. Worse, they often released their frustrations on the house’s helpless residents, that being my family. more.. e-mail

Y-net: We didn’t mean to kill them
B. Michael, International Solidarity Movement 5/5/2008
     Israel says it doesn’t mean to kill Palestinian children, yet they keep on dying.
     We really didn’t mean to do it. Again we didn’t mean to do it. We have never meant to do it. Yet as usual, even though we didn’t mean it – we hit them. We hit them 1,000 times already without meaning to do it. We have killed a total of 1,000 Palestinian children since the second Intifada broke out on September 29, 2000. A thousand.
     We already have a special procedure for cases where a Palestinian child dies as a result of a misfired missile, a misaimed shell, an unfocused helicopter, or a distracted sniper. At first, we deny a child even died. Later we argue that his own people killed him. Later we issue explanations and excuses and scenarios that only become dumber with the passage of time.
     Then comes the turn of the “investigating officer” (it will never be an investigating judge, a scrutinizing observer, or an inquisitive civilian. It’s always an officer) who proceeds to issue some nonsense that clears us of any wrongdoing. Ultimately, we declare that the evil Arabs are at fault, because they take cover among civilians. -- See also: Original Y-net article more.. e-mail

Israel’s Disregard for the Alternative
Caelum Moffatt, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     “We feel great remorse for every single citizen that is hurt, but we are also saddened by the fact that Israeli citizens have been getting injured for years. We feel remorse when a boy from Sderot must have his leg amputated. We feel remorse that Israeli citizens have had to live under a ceaseless terrorist threat from numerous groups, a threat that has disrupted their lives”.
     These seemingly emotion evoking words from Israeli Prime MinisterEhud Olmert came in response to the news that Miyasar Abu Muatak[40] and her children Rudeynah [6], Salah [4], Hanaa [3] and Musad [18months] were killed as they sat down for breakfast in the northerntown of Beit Hanoun on April 28.
     The fact that the investigation launched by Israeli southern commander Major General Yoav Galant absolved Israel from responsibility in the incident is irrelevant. Israel conducted the attack and should be held accountable for the results and denied the luxury of shifting blame.
     What is abundantly clear is that the number of innocent victims, who have perished in this ongoing Palestinian/Israel confrontation, displayed at funeral processions and resided to the increasingly inundated hollow grounds of Gaza cemeteries are becoming disturbingly more frequent. more.. e-mail

No holiday for Gaza’s labor sector
Rami Almeghari writing from occupied Gaza Strip, Electronic Intifada 5/5/2008
     "Closed because of the siege," a sign reads on the front door of the Al-Yazji factory on the main Salah al-Din road in Gaza City. Al-Yazji, the largest producer of soft drinks in the Gaza Strip, and numerous other manufacturers were forced to shut down due to the Israeli closure of the Gaza Strip since June 2007.
     In Gaza City, owners of 3,800 local factories recently established a symbolic cemetery for their devastated businesses. The graves do not contain dead bodies, but rather the remains of factories, canneries, workshops and other businesses.
     More than 33,000 of Gaza’s laborers have been laid off recently as industries are now working at around 20 percent of their normal capacity.
     "The garment industry, for example, used to employ more than 16,000 laborers, yet as long as the Israeli blockade goes on, the Palestinian garment sector won’t be able to convince any Israeli companies to weave clothes, thus the situation will remain worse for such a significant sub-sector", stated Amr Hammad, the executive director of the Federation of Gaza’s Industries. more.. e-mail

The Palestinian Rothschilds
Noam Ben Ze'ev, Ha’aretz 5/2/2008
     In 1929, a son named Abdel Mohsin was born to Hassan al- Qattan, a Jaffa man who made his living in the orange trade, and his wife, Asma, from a family from Lod (Lydd, in Arabic), who emigrated from Egypt, fleeing the forced-labor camps set up for construction of the Suez Canal. The parents, barely literate, made sure that their son received a good education, sending him first to the school of the renowned teacher Khalil Sakakini in Jerusalem and eventually to the American University of Beirut.
     But Abdel Mohsin al-Qattan’s plans changed when his father died and his mother, fearing the mounting attacks of the Haganah (pre-state Jewish militia), fled Jaffa with her younger children. He became the provider for his destitute family, and his search for employment led him to Beirut and later Kuwait, where he worked as a teacher, before going into business. Taking advantage of the surge of building in that country, he established a construction company. Business flourished; eventually, his company became one of the biggest in Kuwait, and al- Qattan grew rich.
     Omar al-Qattan, Abdel Mohsin’s youngest son, says his father liked to quote his own teacher, Sakakini, as saying: "Our fathers sowed and we reaped, now it is our turn to sow." That is why Abdel Mohsin al-Qattan decided in 1994 to establish a foundation supporting Palestinian culture and art. "Both of my parents were teachers," Omar al-Qattan explains, "and they were always obsessive when it came to culture and education. It was only natural for him to invest in this area. more.. e-mail

What’s next, Abbas?
Khaled Amayreh in Ramallah, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Spurned in Washington, can President Abbas defer any longer the imperative of re-establishing Palestinian national unity?
     A NEW ISRAELI OUTRAGE: The battered bodies of four Palestinian children killed by Israeli fire lay at a morgue in Beit Lahia, Gaza. The four children, aged one to five, and their mother were killed during Israeli military operationsThe obvious failure of Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas’s latest visit to Washington has been reverberating through Palestinian society, with many intellectuals and pundits advising Abbas to "quit" or at least stop acting at the US administration’s beck and call. Some critics have even called for dismantling the PA and abandoning the two-state solution strategy in favour of the one-state solution of a democratic state for all its citizens.
     Abbas, in a frank and daring admission, told reporters following his meeting with President Bush at the White House last week that he failed to obtain a commitment from the US administration to pressure Israel into halting its wave of Jewish-only settlement building in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. The intensive settlement expansion drive brazenly defies US-led peace efforts, including the Quartet-backed roadmap and last year’s Annapolis conference. more.. e-mail

Our leaders or our failures
Curtis Doebbler, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Gathered in Cape Town, and despite pressing needs and issues, the world’s parliamentarians had little to say beyond platitudes
     Just days after the Hamas-Fatah clash last June in Gaza, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas looked firm and composed as he shook hands with members of his new emergency government. He made sure his move appeared as legitimate as possible, issuing decrees that outlawed the armed militias of Hamas and also suspending consequential clauses in the Palestinian basic law, which had thus far served as a constitution.
     The basic law stipulates that the Palestinian parliament must approve of any government for it to be constitutional. Abbas simply decreed that such a clause was no longer valid, effectively robbing Palestinians of one of their greatest collective achievements -- democracy.
     This system, when truly representative, is indeed precious and meaningful. Considering the impossible circumstances under which Palestinian democracy in particular was spawned and nurtured (military occupation, international pressure, extreme poverty), it was also historic. Contrary to conventional wisdom that followed the US occupation of Iraq, Arabs showed themselves as eminently capable of conducting a democratic process. more.. e-mail

Sinkable Israel
Ayman El-Amir, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Next week Israel will celebrate the 60th anniversary of its declaration of independence in the presence of an enviable number of dignitaries and heads of state. One week later, on 15 May, the Palestinians will commiserate their Nakba -- the day they were driven from their homeland by Jewish paramilitary settlers who established the state of Israel. While Israel will be showered with words of admiration and congratulation, principally by those countries that helped create it, the Palestinians will be huddled together in exile or under military occupation, encircled by the Israeli wall of shame that was probably inspired by the Nazi wall that enclosed the Jewish ghetto in Warsaw in 1940. The only statements making reference to them will be the empty rhetoric of Arab officials calling for peace and the establishment of a Palestinian state, and probably maligning Hamas. Victors will continue writing history, at least as long as they remain powerful.
     At 60, Israel appears solid, focussed, constantly expanding and basking in the adulation of its powerful supporters and the resignation of its intimidated neighbours. By contrast, the Palestinians, evicted from their homeland, appear weak, divided, starved, vulnerable and spurned by most Arab leaders. Israel, a warrior state armed to the teeth with conventional and nuclear weapons, represents a success for the great powers in more ways than one. Their most important achievement was offloading the centuries old "Jewish question" on the Arabs. Ever since, Israel has proved a belligerent state bent on aggression and expansion, which was also useful to the powers that nurtured it. However, Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinians and other Arabs, and its extensive settlement under occupation of their land, makes it appear more like a giant on stilts than a peace-loving nation that lives by the norms of international law. more.. e-mail

Looking at the End of Israel?
Jonathan Power, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     Even Jimmy Carter, who single-handedly (without much Jewish appreciation) has done more to make Israel secure than any other living person, can’t change the march of demographics.
     Within the boundaries of the state of Israel and the occupied territories, there are 5.4 million Jews and 4.6 million Palestinians. The Palestinian birthrate is almost three times that of the Israelis. If anything, the Jewish population is starting to fall as an increasing number of Jews decides that Israel has no future for them and emigrate in significant numbers.
     The far-seeing Richard Nixon, when asked by Patrick Buchanan and his wife how he saw the future of Israel, turned down his thumb “like a Roman emperor at the gladiators’ arena”.
     Perhaps we are witnessing the death of Israel by a thousand cuts, the attrition of conflict and the attrition of population. Maybe after all, the rabbis of Vienna who were sent in 1897 on a fact-finding mission to Palestine to investigate whether it was a suitable place for Jewish settlement were right. They reported back that the “bride was beautiful but married to another man”. more.. e-mail

Celebrating Apartheid in Israel
Omar Barghouti and Haidar Eid, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     Open Letter to Nadine Gordimer
     In your response to our letters of concern and protest over your planned visit to Israel, to participate in a writers festival largely endorsed by the Israeli government, you brush off our criticism, citing the role of literature in "opening up the human mind" and claiming that "whatever violent, terrible, bitter and urgent chasms of conflict lie between peoples, the only solution for peace and justice exist and must begin with both sides talking to one another." So talking, in your opinion, has replaced resistance as the starting point for ending injustice and fighting apartheid and colonial rule? Is that what you and your fellow anti-apartheid colleagues did in your struggle in South Africa – talk to the “other side”?
     It is also worth reminding you that Palestinian writers in the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT), like all Palestinians under Israeli occupation, are denied their basic rights, including the “privilege” of freedom of expression which you -- and all of us -- so highly value. They are often denied their right to travel, sometimes even within the OPT; many are denied access to conferences and festivals where they can participate in a free exchange of ideas with their peers on an international level; and some are imprisoned, injured or killed by the occupation forces. By attending this conference you are helping to perpetuate this special form of apartheid that denies us our human rights. more.. e-mail

Israel’s Persecution of Christians
Dr. Elias Akleh, MIFTAH 5/5/2008
     Greek Orthodox Christian celebrations of Saturday’s Holy Fire and Sunday’s Easter in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem late April were violated and spoiled by aggressive interruptions of Israeli army and police. Instead of Christian worshippers, armed Israeli soldiers crowded the entrance to the Church. Instead of lighted candles, police batons were raised. Instead of musical bands playing their instruments, Israeli soldiers brandished their automatic weapons, and instead of celebrating, Palestinian Christians were confronted by Israeli police thugs, were beaten, and many were arrested.
     Since the early hours of the day hundreds of armed Israeli forces descended on the old city of Jerusalem, erected steel barriers closing its gates, established checkpoints within the city’s narrow streets leading to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and installed closed captioned video cameras to monitor worshippers. The Old City was, again, under occupation by Israeli military and police. Palestinian Christian worshippers from West Bank, from Gaza Strip, from 1948 occupied Palestinian cities, and even local Jerusalemite Palestinian Christians were denied access to the church of the Holy Sepulcher and to the St. Jacob Church to celebrate Easter. They were told that they had to obtain a military permit in order pray in the church. Many Christian worshippers, who insisted on performing their religious rights free from any military restrictions as they had done throughout the many past generations, tried to force their way through the Israeli barriers, but were met with savage beating, with tear gassing, and with arrest. more.. e-mail

There is hope in Gaza
Miko Peled, Electronic Intifada 5/5/2008
     Israel’s assault on the people of Gaza is so horrendous that it will not soon be forgotten. This vicious attempt by Israel to destroy an entire nation has tipped the scales for good and Zionism will forever be remembered as a blemish in the history of the Jewish people. The people of Gaza, however, give us hope and they will forever be remembered for their courage and resilience during these trying times.
     The people of Gaza, while being deprived of rights and resources, still find the inner strength and the belief in their destiny to send their children to school. There are close to 800,000 children living in Gaza; they make up more than half of the population. The mothers and fathers and teachers of Gaza are creating hope where others see none, and they are building a future where some would claim there is none. But the price of education in Gaza is dear as the number of children targeted by Israeli violence rises continuously.
     In a previous article, It’s time to visit Gaza, I quoted from journalist Charles Glass’ The Tribes Triumphant and I wish to do so again here. Glass, unlike CNN or any other news agency is not obsessed with violence but is impressed as we all should be by the children: "Thousands and thousands of children’s feet padding the dusty paths between their mother’s front doors and their schools ... Beautiful youngsters so innocent that they could laugh even in Gaza." One can only imagine the mothers preparing lunches for these children, and making sure their clothes are ready and clean as they send them off to school. But the road to school in Gaza is an uncertain one, and risk of death by Israeli death squads is imminent. more.. e-mail

Three Women from Haifa
Aaron Lakoff, International Middle East Media Center News 5/4/2008
     Palestinian women speak on suffering, displacement, and solutions.
     Sitting in the north of what is now called Israel, on the MediterraneanSea, Haifa is a tragically beautiful city. Cascading hills and apicture-perfect coast are juxtaposed with its history of violence anddispossession.
     Haifa was once a thriving Palestinian city. In 1945, the Palestinianpopulation of Haifa was over 85 thousand. On April 21, 1948, the Carmelibrigade of the Haganah (the Zionist armed forces) began their attack onHaifa, under what they called the Misbarayim, or scissors, plan. Thestrategy was to attack the Palestinian residents of Haifa from threesides, leaving only one side open for people to flee. Today, there areonly 25 500 Palestinian residents of Haifa, MAKING UP JUST 10% of thecity’s population.
     Israel often tries to promote an image of Haifa as a city of coexistence –a place where Jewish Israelis and Palestinian Israelis live tolerantlyside by side. However, many Palestinian residents of the city, those whosurvived the 1948 war and managed to stay, tell a different story than theIsraeli narrative. -- See also: Download or listen to these interviews and Radio Free Palestine at IMEMC more.. e-mail

Sewage in the streets of Gaza and flowing into sea
United Nations / OCHA, Palestine News Network 5/2/2008
     The following is the full report issued just days ago by the United Nations’ OCHA (Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) regarding sewage in the Gaza Strip due to the Israeli blockade.
     The bulk of the sewage being pumped out to the sea comes from Gaza City. Power is required to pump the Gaza City sewage up to the treatment plant which is located 36 metres higher than the city and its nine sewage pumping stations. Without power, sewage is likely to flood the streets if the station has no overflow capacity, which happened in the Zeitoun neighbourhood in Gaza City in January 2008.
     In addition to electricity, the CMWU relies on power supplying back-up generators to ensure the uninterrupted 14-day treatment process, and to operate its systems. It needs 100-150,000 litres of fuel per month to do this. During times of electricity cuts, CMWU’s fuel requirements increase to 250,000 litres per month. more.. e-mail

Sanctions era under Saddam looks better in retrospect
Ali al-Fadhily and Dahr Jamail, Daily Star 5/5/2008
     Inter Press Service - FALLUJAH: Amid widespread unemployment and impoverishment, Iraqis now face a cutting down of their monthly food ration - much of it already eaten away by official corruption.
     Iraqis survived the sanctions after the first Gulf War (in 1990) with the support of rations through the Public Distribution System (PDS). The aid was set up in 1995 as part of the UN’s "oil-for-food" program.
     The sanctions were devastating nevertheless. Former UN program head Hans von Sponeck said in 2001 that the sanctions amounted to "a tightening of the rope around the neck of the average Iraqi citizen." Von Sponeck said the sanctions were causing the death of 150 Iraqi children a day. Denis Halliday, former UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq who quit his post in protest against the sanctions, told IPS they had proved "genocidal" for Iraqis.
     During more than five years of US occupation, the situation has become even worse. The rationing system has been crumbling under poor management and corruption. From the beginning of this year, the rations delivered were reduced from 10 items to five. more.. e-mail

Journalists in the Line of Fire
Mel Frykberg, MIFTAH 5/3/2008
     While Palestinian journalists staged a sit-in in Gaza city to protest the killing of 23-year-old Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana and Lebanese journalists protested the killing in Beirut, Reuters Editor-in-Chief David Schlesinger called for an investigation.
     Shana was the latest victim of nine journalists killed by the Israelis in the West Bank and Gaza in the last decade. The cameraman was killed several weeks ago in central Gaza as he filmed Israeli forces exchanging fire with Palestinian gunmen.
     The Middle East Times recently visited the site where Shana had been filming which was at least several hundred meters away from where the fighting was taking place. A number of children walking past were also killed when a Merkava tank shell, filled with flechettes or darts, hit them.
     Shana’s vehicle was clearly marked with TV and media inscriptions, visible from a distance and from the air. This was not the first time he had been the target of Israeli soldiers. In 2006 he was wounded when a car in which he was traveling, marked as belonging to a media organization, was attacked by an Israeli plane. more.. e-mail

Message to the US Media
Jenka Soderberg, International Middle East Media Center News 5/3/2008
     If four Israeli children, ranging from one year old to six years old, were killed by a Palestinian bombing, it would likely make the front page of most major US newspapers. But four Palestinian children, killed in their home by an Israeli tank shell on April 28th, will probably not even make the back pages of the paper, let alone the front.
     Why is this? Are their lives any less valuable? Are the 986 Palestinian children who have been killed since 2000 any less important than the 119 Israeli children who have been killed in that same time period? It seems that the editors of the major US papers think so -- according to a study by If Americans Knew, the major media in the US reported on 100% of Israeli children’s deaths, and just 18% of Palestinian children’s deaths in the time period studied. more.. e-mail

Our Freedom on World Press Freedom Day
Fadi Abu Sa'ada, Palestine News Network 5/2/2008
     I wonder when we will get our freedom? While we are passing the 3rd of May of each year, World Press Freedom Day, I ask which freedom we are obtaining as our words are no longer audible even in Palestine.
     And who wants to hear us while Palestine is divided? Which freedom are we looking for when the stick has become the response to those who seek to express themselves freely?
     Despite it all there is a presence of hope in reaching the required freedom in Palestine through media initiatives to launch a public freedoms campaign in Palestine. This is beginning with a media truce between Fateh and Hamas. It is extended to allow Hamas newspapers and television stations to work in the West Bank, same for Palestine Television in Gaza, and also through media conferences such as the one held in Jericho by Amin Media Network. more.. e-mail

The attack on Jimmy Carter
Bill Fletcher, Jr, Electronic Intifada 5/4/2008
     Former US President James (Jimmy) Carter has the ability to appear almost out of thin air, landing in the midst of some of the most complex international crises. He has done it again, this time in going to meet with the Palestinian resistance group, Hamas. For reaching out to this significant section of the Palestinian movement, he is being demonized by both the Bush administration and the administration of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
     Former President Carter has crossed a line that George W. Bush and his Israeli allies have set, aimed at isolating and destroying Hamas. Despite the fact that Hamas won internationally-recognized elections in Palestine in 2006, Bush and the Israelis have been doing all they can to void the elections, isolate Hamas and destroy them. In fact, a blockbuster article in Vanity Fair revealed details of a plan hatched by the Bush administration along with an anti-Hamas Palestinian leader to carry out a coup against Hamas. The plot failed, leading to a Hamas preemptive strike against the forces of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, with the result being a Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip. more.. e-mail

To Trust the US is to Take a Big Risk
George S. Hishmeh, MIFTAH 5/3/2008
     Frankly, so far nothing has been achieved." This was the startling yet straightforward statement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas after his failure in Washington last week to have the US President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice exercise some arms-twisting in the stalled Palestinian-Israeli negotiations.
     Abbas, who is not known to be one who would spill the beans after putting all his eggs in the American basket, was particularly disappointed in a rare press interview (with the Associated Press) that the US has not exerted more pressure on Israel to stop expanding its illegal colonies, even those that Israeli leaders had agreed to dismantle as a first step in implementing the so-called roadmap.
     "This is the biggest blight that stands as a big rock in the path of negotiations," the Palestinian leader said. Without hiding his angry tone, he pointed out that "none of (the American leaders) talks about the 1967 border" which Israel crossed more than 60 years ago when it occupied the remaining Palestinian territories, known as the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and are only 22 per cent of Palestine. more.. e-mail

Rice is Right: Palestinian-Israeli Peace Talks are Losing Credibility
The Daily Star - Editorial, MIFTAH 5/3/2008
     US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice unwittingly demonstrated much of what ails the Palestinian-Israeli peace process on Tuesday. In a speech to the American Jewish Committee in Washington, she proffered a laundry list of reasons why time is running out for a two-state solution - and each of them is a direct result of failed US policy.
     Perhaps the most obvious example of this was her contention that Hamas and the Iranian support it enjoys are potentially insurmountable obstacles to peace. For all its controversial activities and positions, the same group has repeatedly issued offers of a cease-fire which Israel has summarily rejected, or tacitly accepted and then undermined via assassination and other forms of aggression. It remains to be seen whether the latest overture, brokered by Egypt and also endorsed by several other Palestinian resistance organizations, will be brushed aside or violated, but the Israelis’ track record on this score is not encouraging. more.. e-mail

The struggle for Syria
Hassan Nafaa, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Israel’s offer to return the Golan is a ruse betraying ulterior agendas.
     The Struggle for Syria is the title of Patrick Seale’s 1965 book in which he reviews internal and external Syrian developments from 1946 up to its merger union with Egypt that gave birth to the United Arab Republic on 22 February 1958. In retrospect, the book’s accounting of Syria’s regional situation and the modalities of its interaction with the surrounding international environment turned out to be nothing short of prophetic.
     The struggle for Syria, which started since World War II, has not ended. A pattern seems to exist in which Syria acts as the region’s tipping point. At crucial moments, Syria turns out to be in a position to call the shots and influence the direction and speed of events in the region. Those crucial moments have been recurring frequently of late. Even before the US invaded and occupied Iraq in 2003, Syria managed to become a main player amid power relations that evolved in the region following the Camp David Accords, the Iranian Revolution, and the Iran-Iraq war. more.. e-mail

Damascus ascendant
Mustafa El-Labbad, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Turkish approaches to Damascus confirm that diplomatically Syria is the lynchpin of the region.
     Syria once more took centre stage in regional events. A few days ago, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan brought to Damascus an Israeli offer to pull out of the Golan Heights in return for a peace treaty. His mission, following months of mediation, marked Turkey’s most remarkable foray into the Arab-Israeli conflict to date. Its outcome could be wide-ranging.
     When Erdogan went to Damascus he had more than mediation on his mind. For sometime now, Turkey and Iran have been seeking a major role in the region, one matching at least that of Israel. At a time when the Arabs have failed to offer anything new on the regional scene, other regional powers have decided to try their hand at regional power brokering.
     Since the 1950s, three Arab countries courted Syria: Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Egypt took Syria into a merger union. Saudi Arabia broke that merger. And Iraq’s Baathists briefly courted the Syrians before going off on their own pursuits. more.. e-mail

Life inside Gaza City
Kim Sengupta, The Independent 5/2/2008
     The home where Miyasar Abu Muatak died with her children is now just a pile of rubble. A mourning tent has been put up outside with photographs of the family. A steady stream of relatives, friends and neighbours come in to express their condolences.
     The home where Miyasar Abu Muatak died with her children is now just a pile of rubble. A mourning tent has been put up outside with photographs of the family. A steady stream of relatives, friends and neighbours come in to express their condolences.
     Three year old Hanaa, Salah, four, Rudeynah, six and Musad, 18 months, were killed along with their mother during a firefight between Palestinian militants and Israeli forces, the cause of their death remains in dispute. Local residents say an Israeli aircraft fired two missiles, collapsing the house with the family inside. The Israeli military insisted that the deaths had been the result of a “secondary explosion” caused when weaponry carried by militants exploded.
     The children’s father, Ahmed Abu Muatak, was on his way to the market when he heard the sound of the explosion and ran back. “It was my house, and I knew that everyone was inside, no one had escaped. What a black day, they have killed my family,” he said weeping as a neighbour put a consoling arm around his shoulders. more.. e-mail

No mercy
Najwa Sheikh writing from occupied Gaza Strip, Electronic Intifada 5/1/2008
     In their simple house made of metal sheets, Myassar Abu Me’teq was sitting next to three of her children having breakfast and holding her one-year-old baby in her arms. She listened to their daily complaints and loving quarrels, trying to comfort them and keep them away from the sound of the Israeli shelling close to their home in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip.
     This mother did not know that their clock would soon stop ticking, not by their creator but by their enemy. She did not know that it was the last breakfast she would prepare for her children. She did not know that it was the last time she would hold her baby. She did not know that she would no longer know her children and their future as they also would never know their mother as an old woman. Like any mother, she refused to leave her children alone on their trip. She did not want to let go of her baby and insisted on accompanying them as one family in life and in death.
     But like many others before her who were killed by Israel, she did not know that she would be the hero of a horror movie, and that she would be leaving this world with her four children, leaving behind two other girls with the bitter taste of loss and images of their mother and little sisters pigmented in blood and pieces of their bodies. An artillery shell -- "accidentally" as Israel officials said -- hit the family’s house and shattered the dreams of the little kids during their peaceful breakfast, ahead of a joyful afternoon. The shell killed them in a brutal way without any mercy for their tiny bodies or their baffled eyes. more.. e-mail

Blockade puts Gaza on brink of serious food crisis, says UN
Donald Macintyre in Gaza City, The Independent 5/1/2008
     Destitution and food insecurity among Gaza’s 1.5 million residents has reached an unprecedentedly critical level, according to unpublished UN findings that they now need "urgent assistance" to avert a "serious food crisis" in the occupied Palestinian territories.
     The report revealing that Gaza’s population has already passed the internationally-agreed threshold at which it needs concerted measures to prevent a "deterioration in their nutrition" has been drafted on the eve of a donors’ conference to discuss Palestinian political and economic prospects in London today.
     Showing that Palestinians are having to spend a higher and higher share of their shrinking incomes on food, the findings are that the proportion of Gazan incomes now going on food is 66 per cent – significantly higher than the 61 per cent recorded for Somalia. Seventy per cent of Gazans are at a "deep poverty" income level of $1.20 (60p) per head per day or less.
     The joint report from three UN agencies, the World Food Programme, the Food and Agriculture Organisation and the refugee agency UNRWA, points out that this proportion is a "key measure of destitution" because the poorest people in the world spend most of their incomes on food while the richest spend relatively little compared with spending on accommodation, healthcare transport and clothes." more.. e-mail

No reconciliation, no truce
Dina Ezzat, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Gaza is giving Cairo a headache
     As the window for a Palestinian-Israeli peace deal closes President Mubarak and King Abdullah of Jordan intensify coordination on a fall-back position Tomorrow, Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit and his Israeli counterpart Tzipi Livni are scheduled to meet in London. The encounter will be the first for Abul-Gheit and Livni since the latter expressed dismay over her working relationship with the top Egyptian diplomat.
     Beyond mending fences, Abul-Gheit and Livni must address two vital issues. The first is Israel’s laxity in moving forward in negotiations with the Palestinian Authority (PA). The second is the stifling blockade that Israel is imposing on Gaza.
     Egypt is very concerned about the negative consequences of the months-long continued siege coupled with failure to make any serious progress in talks aimed to set an outline for a final status agreement on Palestinian-Israeli peace. The obvious immediate consequence of this situation is a continued deterioration of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza -- Egypt’s immediate backyard -- and a further decline in the status of PA President Mahmoud Abbas. more.. e-mail

Further Colonization: A new Zionist settlement in Jerusalem
Palestinian grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign, Stop The Wall 5/1/2008
     The Civic Coalition to Defend Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem has reported that Occupation authorities aim to construct a new settlement in occupied East Jerusalem.
     From information obtained by the Mapping and GIS Department of the Arab Studies Society, it has been revealed that the new Ma’ale David settlement will be built on approximately 10 dunums of land and include 110 housing units for Jewish settlers. Occupation officials have used the Israeli legal code as justification for the project, despite the fact that Jerusalem is considered occupied territory, making construction of settlements in the city illegal under international law.
     According to the plans, approved buildings will be located in the centre of the Palestinian community and be as high as ten stories. The location is not accidental, according to Khalil Tukfaji of the Mapping and GIS Department of the Arab Studies Society, who recalled Sharon’s 1990 plans as Minister of Housing to build 26 so-called “gate” settlements inside Palestinian communities in East Jerusalem. more.. e-mail

Crossing the Line interviews journalist Mohammed Omer
Podcast, Electronic Intifada 5/1/2008
     This week on Crossing The Line: On 17 April 2008, Fadel Shana’a, a Palestinian camerman with Reuters news agency, was killed when he was struck by an Israeli tank shell in the Gaza Strip. Even though he was holding a camera and was clearly marked as a member of the press, both on his body and his vehicle, Shana’a was fired at by an Israeli tank less than a mile away. Host Naji Ali speaks with Mohammed Omer, a Palestinian journalist based in the Gaza Strip, about the dangers of reporting on Israeli violence.
     Next, Ali speaks with Joel Campagna, a journalist and human rights activist whose organization, Committee to Protect Journalists, defends the rights of reporters to work freely without fear of reprisal from governments and armed combatants alike.
     Listen Now [MP3 - 23.5 MB, 51:21 min] Crossing the Line is a weekly podcast dedicated to giving voice to the voiceless in occupied Palestine. Through investigative news, arts, eyewitness accounts, and music, Crossing the Line does its best to present the lives of people on the ground. more.. e-mail

Extremist Jewish organization resurfaces in Canada
Paul Weinberg, Electronic Intifada 5/1/2008
     TORONTO, 30 April (IPS) - Like an aging group of retro rocker musicians, the extremist Jewish Defense League (JDL) resurfaced in Toronto recently after a decade of dormancy, trying to look a little more mainstream.
     The group made its largest public foray in quite some time on 27 March, when it hosted a meeting of about 150 for Israeli politician Moshe Feiglin at the Shaarei Tefillah Synagogue on a stretch of Bathurst south of Wilson that conjures Jerusalem’s Mea Shirim with its black top hats, piety and peyes.
     Once targeted by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation as "domestic extremists" and linked to two banned anti-Arab racist groups in Israel, the JDL now considers Feiglin, leader of the hard-line Jewish Leadership faction of the already right-wing Likud party, its political mentor.
     Feiglin saved most of his bile at the meeting for Israel’s leadership, accusing them of caving in to the violence perpetrated by the enemy, namely the Palestinians, whom he referred to as simply "Arabs." more.. e-mail

A conditional calm
Amira Howeidy, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Twelve Palestinian factions met with Egypt’s General Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman in Cairo Tuesday and Wednesday and agreed, despite expressing reservations, to an initiative by Cairo to maintain a state of "calm" in Gaza. Suleiman is expected to take this initiative, now backed "conditionally" by all the Palestinian factions, to Tel Aviv by Sunday or Monday. Should Israel accept it, the calm, or ’ tahdia ’ in Arabic, will take effect.
     Originally presented as a "factions’ dialogue" similar to previous meetings hosted by Egyptian General Intelligence, this week’s meetings didn’t group the factions together and did not include either Fatah or Hamas.
     "Why talk to each other in Cairo when we’ve already done that in Gaza," Jameel Al-Majdalawi of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) told Al-Ahram Weekly. Instead, each delegation met with Suleiman separately in a series of brief, to-the-point meetings focussed on the Egyptian proposal. more.. e-mail

Truth or Neo-Consequences
Morgan Strong, Middle East Online 5/1/2008
     An obscure academic dispute – over whether Israeli archeology sought to obscure the land’s last two millennia of history and promote a continual Jewish claim of ownership – has shown again how tensions in the Middle East can reverberate in unlikely ways in the United States.
     The dispute centered on whether Barnard College should grant tenure to Nadia Abu El-Haj, an American-born scholar of anthropology who, in the 1990s, challenged the scientific integrity of what she saw as the Israeli use of archeology in a politically motivated way to justify Jewish settlements on territory that had belonged to Palestinians.
     Although the controversy wasn’t new – it had been argued out within archeological circles in Israel for years – El-Haj became a lightning rod because she was the first academic of Palestinian descent to publicize the debate in a 2001 book, Facts on the Ground: Archeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society. more.. e-mail

Twilight Zone / Last refuge
Gideon Levy, Ha’aretz 5/1/2008
     Welcome to Banana Land, the first Palestinian water park, the only place where people in the territories can sail in a boat. You can have your picture taken with a snake, dance with a parrot, swim with a life preserver and barbecue meat. If only you can cross the checkpoint.
     So where were you for Passover? And where will you be on Independence Day? We spent time this week in Banana Land. On the northern outskirts of dying Jericho, on a site with three natural springs, among the banana groves, the former mayor has opened the water park - the territories’ amusement park.
     An engineer from India built a fountain there that could rival the one on our own Dizengoff Square. They also brought in a mini-soccer field from Holon, pedal boats from Eilat, as well as snakes and parrots from Tel Aviv, so now thousands of families and schoolchildren from all over the West Bank come to wade in the cement canals and two tiny swimming pools. more.. e-mail

Why Inspector Denley cried
Tom Segev, Ha’aretz 5/1/2008
     From the viewpoint of Inspector John Denley, it began on April 21, 1946. He was in charge of the Ramat Gan police force. On that particular day he was away from the station. When he learned that members of the Irgun - the underground organization led by Menachem Begin - were attacking it, only one thought raced through his mind: His wife and two children were in their apartment on the floor above the station.
     The members of the gang, as Denley wrote years later, used a simple trick: They phoned the station to report a fight between Jews and Arabs. Most of the policemen rushed to the scene of the supposed fight, leaving the station almost empty. The assailants arrived in a stolen military vehicle. Half of them wore British uniforms and pretended to be taking in a group of Arab thieves. All of them burst into the station and started to clean out the arsenal, which was the reason for the operation.
     The attackers did not immediately put the wireless operator out of commission, and he managed to summon Denley from the Petah Tikva police station. When Denley arrived he saw the truck laden with munitions driving off, but before all the Irgun men had boarded it. One of the assailants emerged from the station after the truck had already left. Denley shot him in the face. It was Dov Gruner. more.. e-mail

Seeds of change
Nashwa Abdel-Tawab, Al-Ahram Weekly 5/1/2008
     Arab kids are in their own Never-Neverland fighting against Captain Hook, immersed in a political game without a full grasp of its rules, tools and implications.
     They are being brought up in an age of fiery disputes, sweltering wars and turbulent crises, denied their basic rights and made to inherit a miserable bulk of unsolved problems. Rather than having their childhood shielded, children in the Middle East region have been handed the baton early in the relay race -- they have become embroiled in politics at a young and critical age, on streets, at schools and on the net.
     Last month, several hundred school children from 20 schools took part in a Hizbullah-organised demonstration outside the UN headquarters in Beirut to protest against Israel’s deadly offensive in Gaza, where Israel’s incursions into the Hamas- controlled strip have killed more than 120 Palestinians in one week. The children presented a letter to a UN representative calling on the world body to take action. They held pictures of children killed during the Israeli operations. "Where are children’s rights?" asked a banner. "USA and Israel, the same face of terror," read another. more.. e-mail

To receive a once-daily e-mail digest of our News and Articles content, write to
OccupationNews-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or visit
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OccupationNews/join
See example: Occupation News

Disclaimer: The views expressed in the material posted on this site are the sole responsibility of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the webmaster or Vermonters for a Just Peace in Palestine/Israel.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.