Tony Karon, one of the few journalists in the mainstream media who writes sensibly and intelligently about Palestine/Israel, has an interesting article on the “peace process” over at Time. According to Karon, Abbas believes that one of Netanyahu’s demands will be that the “… ‘framework agreement’ reached in the current process … [be] … implemented over a 20-year period [!]” Not surprisingly, Mahmoud Abbas, who is already reeling from Obama’s el foldo on the settlement freeze, is not amused by this ploy.

Rumors are that Abbas will make a declaration about the negotiations this week at the upcoming Arab Summit in Libya. Since the Palestinian president’s only source of authority derives from U.S. and European political, financial and military support, he rarely, if ever, contradicts American policy. Thus it is assumed that the only relevant independent statement he is able to make is to announce his own resignation, and mean it this time.

Karon uses the term “framework agreement” as synonymous with “peace treaty.” This is a mistake which is common among both journalists and politicians, one that is usually not discouraged by members of the president’s peace team. However, Special Envoy George Mitchell stated explicitly in a news conference at the start of the present round of talks in early September that a framework agreement is not a treaty. Actually, according to Mitchell, it is a long way between a framework agreement and anything meaningful. Answering a question from Major Garrett, Mitchell volunteered this startling definition:

And as I said – and I think this ought to be made clear because there has been a good bit of misunderstanding or not a full meeting of minds publicly regarding a framework agreement – a framework agreement is not an interim agreement. It’s more detailed than a declaration of principles, but is less than a full-fledged treaty. Its purpose is to establish the fundamental compromises necessary to enable the parties to then flesh out and complete a comprehensive agreement that will end the conflict and establish a lasting peace.

Did he say it is more detailed than a declaration of principles? What a meaningful comparison! That is what the Oslo Agreement was called and look how that worked out. Maybe someone should have yelled out at this point, “Shut off the peace processor, please.” Mitchell’s definition of a framework agreement is what is called in diplomacy, “creative ambiguity.” In other words, we can mean anything we say we mean, at any time, with no limits on how often what we say changes - so can the Israelis, so can the Palestinians. But in the end who cares what the Palestinians think?

Karon writes that

Still, it's unlikely that any U.S. offer to Netanyahu on that issue [supporting an Israeli military presence in the future Palestinian state] was cleared with the Palestinians, who bring no leverage to the table except their ability to walk away [see Abbas’ possible resignation, above] and shatter the illusion of progress in a peace process that Obama has defined as a U.S. national security priority.

I wonder if Karon means that Obama has defined the peace process as a U.S. national security priority; or does he mean the President aspires to the illusion of a peace process. I personally believe that Dennis “Israel’s Lawyer” Ross has convinced the president that a negotiated two-state solution which creates a Bantustan for the Palestinians can be forced upon Abbas and Prime Minister Salam “America’s Man” Fayyad, and the Americans have the muscle to help the Palestinians enforce Obama’s Pax Americana. After all, why build an empire if you can’t use it?

The surprise is that even the idea of a Palestinian mini-state, with limited sovereignty and ability for self-defense, which has been the goal of many “enlightened” Israeli politicians from such divergent camps as Yossi Beilin and Ariel Sharon in his final years in office , may now be actually off the table.

In other peace processor news coverage: When an Obama supporter like M.J. Rosenberg is critical of the President’s attempt at getting the Israelis and Palestinians into meaningful negotiations, you know that the process has gone seriously awry. M.J.’s calling Netanyahu’s treatment of our president “humiliating” will irritate and surprise the JStreeters who consider M.J. to be in their pro-Israel, peace, Obama corner.
 

Nora Barrows-Friedman, The Electronic Intifada, 4 October 2010

Controversy has arisen after Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s comments to the United Nations’ General Assembly on 28 September. During his address the leader of the ultra-right wing Yisrael Beiteinu party outlined his proposal for a “population and territory swap” in the context of establishing an ostensible Palestinian state during this current round of US-brokered direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

His plan, which he first announced in 2004, includes a re-drawing of the borders — moving Palestinian towns and villages currently inside the state to within the confines of a separate Palestinian entity “Avigdor Lieberman: Olmert’s newest colleague,” Institute for Middle East Understanding, 12 November 2006 . This move would be in return for evacuations of some, but not all, settlements in the occupied West Bank. Settlements in occupied East Jerusalem would not be but would be annexed to the State of Israel under Lieberman’s plan. Lieberman, a settler himself, lives in the illegal West Bank settlement of Nokdim.

If the plan is implemented, Palestinians in these areas would immediately become citizens of a Palestinian state, and would be stripped of their Israeli citizenship unless they move to other cities inside an Israeli state. If they decide to move elsewhere within the state, they would be forced to sign a draconian “loyalty oath” — a pledge to protect the “Jewish and democratic” nature of the State of Israel.

“A final agreement between Israel and the Palestinians has to be based on a program of exchange of territory and populations … We are not talking about population transfer but about defining borders so as best to reflect the demographic reality,” Lieberman told the UN.

However Lieberman may try to verbally understate his plan’s intentions, many Palestinians consider proposals such as these to be a continuation of ethnic cleansing policies in place since Israel’s establishment in 1948.

“The Palestinian people will not accept, after all [their] sacrifices, to be another victim of injustice,” Dr. Jamal Zahalqa, parliament member and chairman of the National Democratic Assembly bloc, told The Electronic Intifada.

“There are two systems [inside the State of Israel] — one for Palestinians and one for Jews,” he said. “We [the Palestinians inside the state] are challenging the Israeli state in its definition of democracy, and exposing this contradiction between Zionism and democracy. When we say that the state should represent all its citizens, Israeli leaders claim that it’s a Jewish state, that it belongs to one part of the population. We should make a counter-attack against what Israel is demanding — Israel demands of the Palestinians and the Arab world to recognize it as a Jewish state.”

Recently, Palestinian members of the Knesset, or Israel’s parliament, have decried the resumption of US-brokered direct talks between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority. They are protesting the state’s systematic policies of discrimination towards all Palestinians inside the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, and those who are citizens of the state itself.

“The current balance of power and the dictates of the United States will make the negotiations a disaster for the Palestinian people,” Raja Aghbarieh of the Abna al-Balad movement told Al-Jazeera Arabic on 9 September “1948 Palestinians: the save Israel“ .

At the same time, there has been a substantial uptick in political arrests of Palestinian human rights activists and leaders around the state fighting the entrenched policies of legalized discrimination espoused by Israeli lawmakers such as Lieberman.

The Electronic Intifada spoke with several Palestinian citizens of the state, and asked them for their reactions towards Lieberman’s plan and the general situation inside their communities.

Raneen Jiries, coordinator of oral history projects at Zochrot, a Tel Aviv-based organization dedicated to raising awareness of the ethnic cleansing of 1948 amongst the Jewish Israeli public, said that she’s glad Lieberman made his comments to the UN last week.

“The policies of the Israeli government haven’t changed since 1948 until today,” Jiries told The Electronic Intifada. “All the racism we see, all the various ethnic transfer plans, the persecution of our leaders, the killing, the confiscating of land, the ongoing expulsions — it’s nothing new. People are not surprised by Lieberman’s suggestions of a population transfer. Israeli officials have always tried to hide this sentiment from the world, and now [Lieberman] came out and said it clearly so everyone can hear it.”

“Now, what do we do?” Jiries added. “Palestinians inside the state, we keep fighting for our rights, as usual. We raise awareness within our community. We go out and demonstrate. We tell the truth about what’s happening in the West Bank and Gaza and inside Israel.”

Asmaa’ Azaizeh, a radio and television reporter from Haifa, told The Electronic Intifada that Lieberman’s statements shouldn’t be a shock.

“I personally think that we shouldn’t take Lieberman’s speech so seriously,” Azaizeh said. “And I assume that many people and political activists and political parties agree with this approach. In fact the idea of transfer is a mental charade that Lieberman leads. It’s not practical. Historically, [former Israeli Prime Minister] Golda Meir and other Zionist politicians have announced the same plan, and it’s never happened — because it can’t.”

“The existence of Palestinians inside Israel is the obstacle in front of officially defining Israel as an apartheid state,” Azaizeh said. “It’s easier for Israel to pretend it is a democratic state — Palestinian citizens get to vote and be in the Knesset. But if a population transfer is committed against us, the international community would immediately recognize Israel as an apartheid state. It already is, in practice — look at what’s happening in the West Bank and Gaza. But the only obstacle in front of Israel as being defined as an official apartheid regime is our existence here, as Palestinians.”

Lieberman’s plan could be a way to psychologically threaten Palestinians inside the state, Azaizeh said, to make them afraid to “commit to the struggle, to call for our rights, and also remain part of the entire Palestinian population and society, connected to the West Bank and Gaza Strip.”

“Lieberman is not the most racist politician, and he’s not the most extreme right-wing,” she said. “He’s just the mouth of the state mentality.”

Samieh Jabbarin, a political activist and artist living in Jaffa, was put on house arrest for nearly ten months after he organized protests in his hometown of Umm al-Fahem during the winter 2008-09 attacks on Gaza. Umm al-Fahem is one of the towns that, under Lieberman’s plan, would become part of a separate Palestinian entity.

“I think there are some elements that we need to talk about to understand what’s going on for Palestinians here,” Jabarrin told The Electronic Intifada. “The Olso accords ignored the Palestinians inside ’48 [what is now called "Israel"]. It was a historical shock for us. The bourgeoisie leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization turned to the right, and took a stand with the imperial powers and the Zionists in order to split Palestine into pieces and control it.”

Jabbarin said that Palestinian political consciousness within the state “connects inherently and organically to both sides of the green line [the internationally-recognized armistice line between Israel and the West Bank]” ten years after the beginning of the second intifada.

“Today, we still connect ourselves to Palestinians inside the West Bank and Gaza,” he added. “Our participation in the second intifada wasn’t just a show of solidarity. We showed that there was a political effect against the Oslo agreements.”

Jabbarin said that the current direct talks are leading the general Palestinian population to a similar response. “It’s urgent for people to go out and demonstrate daily,” he said. “The demonstrations that take place here are much more massive, and happen more often than in the West Bank. I think that politically, the energy is here in the ’48 territories. And the next big political or militaristic uprising would be a two-headed enemy: it would struggle against the Vichy government of the Palestinian Authority, and against Zionism itself. And from inside the state, we will help lead the resistance of Palestinians everywhere.”

For his part, Dr. Zahalka said that the responsibility towards justice lies with the international community to recognize the intentions of the Israeli government — and Zionism itself — through these policies. “If the politicians say that it’s an internal matter to describe itself as a Jewish state, this is something that is against even the international values which say that racism is never — in any case — a domestic issue,” he told The Electronic Intifada.

“One of the lessons of the struggle against South African apartheid is very simple: racism should be defeated, not compromised,” he said.

Nora Barrows-Friedman is an award-winning independent journalist, writing for The Electronic Intifada, Inter Press Service, Truthout and other outlets. She regularly reports from Palestine, where she also runs media workshops for youth in the Dheisheh refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.

You can be damned sure this video is already making its way across the Islamist world and that scores of new adherents have been recruited as a result. Who says that the lack of a solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict doesn’t fuel radical Islam and terror? Of course it does. This video is a perfect example. Imagine yourself a member of a society in which such sexual insult is considered a killing offense, in which it induces crazed hatred for the perpetrator. That’s what you have here. It’s as bad or worse than Abu Graibh because here a devout Mulism woman is sexually degraded before the camera. And some idiot IDF soldier thought this was humorous and should show the world. Excuse me while I am sick. And this isn’t just a physical sickness, it’s a soul sickness as well. I am disgusted and sickened by this.

This being said, I don’t blame the slimy soldier who did this so much as the system itself. Given the Occupation and its norms, these acts are to be expected. Even the finest Israeli soldier might fall prey to such power-mad abuse in the right circumstances. The key thing to remember is that Occupation corrupts and absolute Occupation corrupts absolutely.

As I wrote in an earlier post about a similar incident, I ask anyone watching this who supports the Occupation or current Israeli policy: how can you do so?

Dimi Reider [correction: my apologies Dimi for getting your first name wrong...again!] has written about this the most eloquently:

One thing you can’t say about our army is that it ever rests on its laurels. Having first rattled its fans with the Hebron dancing video, and then rocked them with a soldier girl’s posing with Palestinian prisoners bound to accompany her on “the best time of her life,” the boys in green now introduce an integrated product. Yes, it has a woman. Yes, it has soldiers. But now the woman is Palestinian, tied up, and the soldiers are dancing a belly dance in front of her, rubbing their superior force and, according to “friends” of Israel, superior morals, in her face. Pretty literally.

…The woman is religious, which makes the humiliation all the worse; forget also the obvious point about these soldiers being powerdrunk kids with guns raised in a violent conflict.

Two points: First, this video finally debunks one of the most persistent Israeli myths – that ours is the only occupying army in history that does not sexually abuse the women of the occupied nation. Second, its about as stark proof as it gets that the IDF cannot…monitor itself if it could, the soldiers would be in prison, de-ranked and de-mobbed before the video even hit the web . We need international law tribunals to rout out the cancer of impunity – and at least so long as we don’t have truth and reconciliation committees, this applies to everyone, from corporal to chief of staff and defense ministers. To borrow from said boys in green, deterrence must become a top priority.

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" Our officials also know that Israeli military systems captured by the Syrians or Lebanese during various clashes were quickly handed over to Moscow. ....

After Russia approved the sale of its Yakhont missiles to Syria, some questions emerged in Israel that should have emerged much earlier. Indeed, the enthusiasm shown by Israel’s defense industries in selling products to foreign nations already led to problematic situations in the past. This was the case with South Africa, with China, and also with Iran during the Shah’s rule..... the Russians are working on various fronts: While they are trying to purchase military systems and know-how from Israel, they continue to supply arms to Israel’s worst enemies.

The Russians are selling arms to Syria, building nuclear reactors in Iran, and are looking into Tehran’s requests for advanced weapons systems. The Russians are motivated by two objectives: Filling the state coffers with dollars, and boosting their global influence. Officials in Jerusalem must reassess the drone sale. Moscow is only operating in line with its own interests; Israel should do the same."

IDF soldiers convicted of using 11-year-old as human shield in Gaza 03 Oct 2010 The southern command military court convicted two Israeli soldiers on Sunday of using human shields during Operation Cast Lead, Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip, in the winter of 2008-2009. The soldiers were convicted of offenses including inappropriate behavior and overstepping authority for ordering an 11-year-old Palestinian to search bags suspected to have been booby trapped. The conviction is the first such conviction for what is termed in the Israel Defense Forces "neighbor procedure" - the use of human shields during searches and pursuits, which has been outlawed.

Nobel Peace laureate Maguire stands before the MV Rachel Corrie before sailing for Gaza AP

In a ruling that should bring shock and disdain on Israeli jurisprudence throughout the world, the Supreme Court ruled that the intelligence services and Interior Ministry were right in excluding Nobel Peace laureate, Mairead Corrigan Macguire from Israel as punishment for her sailing on the Rachel Corrie in order to break the Gaza blockade.

In effect, Israel’s highest court has implicitly ratified the blockade as a legal act under Israeli law, a view contrary to international law. It has also ratified the blatant security policy of excluding political undesirables merely because they criticize Israeli government policy. Interestingly, a significant minority of Israeli society shares those same views, but because they are citizens the security services do not yet have the power to exclude them.

For those who enjoy debating my views, I should make clear that Israel and other countries have every right to exclude anyone they wish from their countries. They usually don’t have to give rhyme or reason. But in rejecting entry of some of the world’s most distinguished intellectuals, peace activists, and clowns from Macguire to Chomsky to Finkelstein to Ivan Prado, Israel betrays to the world its shrinking from democratic values, free debate, and political diversity for God’s sake..afraid of a Spanish clown??? . In other words, the nation shows its true colors to the world and can no longer argue it is what most know it isn’t: a democratic society which values free speech for all.

Laughably, the court suggested that the authorities should have allowed Maguire to enter the country using a 48 hour visa to attend the conference she was planning to address. In that case, I wish the Supreme Court judges who rendered this stupid ruling were instead lowly immigration officials so they could’ve acted sensibly in place of the stupid decision made to exclude her.

Also laughably, the court suggested that the proper route would’ve been for Maguire to protest her exclusion by the Interior Ministry before attempting to enter Israel. Why should she honor an unjust and corrupt system by engaging in such a charade? Everyone knows she would be denied, and once denied and after appealing her denial, she would still be rejected; and if she THEN attempted to enter Israel the court would STILL have ruled against her finding a different ground on which to do so. Once again, I make the point that even Israeli highest court is loathe to second guess security decisions even those having no rhyme, reason or justification in democratic values or common sense. It is, as Israel’s media have also pointed out, a rubber stamp for the security apparatus.

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Maguire had participated in three expeditions to break the seige on Gaza by sea, and received two previous deportation orders which also banned her from returning to Israel for the next ten years.

A panel of three Supreme Court justices said they did not believe Maguire was unaware of the ban.

Israel’s state attorney convinced the Supreme Court that Maguire should have appealed the matter through Israel’s Interior Ministry rather than just flying to Israel and showing up at the airport.

According to Haaretz on Monday night, “In its ruling, the panel of Justices wrote that the Irish peace activist should have first opted for the legal option available to her, which was to turn to the Interior Minister against the ban on her entering the country, and only then challenge the Interior Ministry’s decision in court. ‘When the appellant opted to take the law onto her own hands and come to Israel in spite the ban on her entry, she is not entitled to the [legal] aid she is now asking, and this on the basis of the ground rules which we apply our Judicial discretion’, the Justices wrote”. This report is published here.

YNet reported Monday night that “the judges argued that because Maguire entered Israel while being aware of the deportation order issued against her, the court cannot give a legal seal of approval, and the decision remained in the hands of the government … The justices argued their ruling was based on the belief that Maguire was aware of the deportation order issued against her, and noted that she should have acted through a legal framework, by returning to Ireland and appealing to the Ministry of Interior to reverse the order from there. ‘Once Maguire decided to take the law into her own hands and visit Israel, despite the entry ban issued against her, she is not eligible for the assistance she is requesting, according to the basic laws that guide our legal judgment’, the justices wrote. In their ruling, the judges emphasized the interior minister’s ability to exercise broad judgment vis-à-vis granting entry into Israel in general, and particularly in this case, due to its political consequences. However, the judges noted, the State of Israel should have accepted their proposal and allowed Maguire to complete the remaining 48 hours of her scheduled visit, while releasing her on bail and obliging her to leave the country at the end of the allotted timeframe”. This is posted here.

The Jerusalem Post reported that “Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch and Justice Asher Grunis made it clear that they did not believe Maguire’s claim that she did not know she was barred from the country. Despite that, they suggested allowing her to remain in Israel until Wednesday, without rescinding the deportation order. Grunis said at one point, ‘She knew [she was prohibited from entering Israel] and came here deliberately, as a provocation. Her arguments are baseless. Nevertheless, we should take broader considerations into account that are beyond the level of the state prosecution’. Beinisch said the same. ‘I am prepared to assume that she did not come here in good faith and with friendly aims’. She, too, suggested that Maguire be allowed to stay but that ‘the deportation order should not be canceled. If she wants to challenge it, let her do so from abroad’. The state’s representative, attorney Hani Ofek, said Maguire should not have been allowed access to the courts in the first place, because she did not first go through the proper administrative channels to have the deportation order canceled, specifically the Ministry of Interior, which issued the deportation orders. It was only because she had arrived in Israel as a fait accompli that she was able to obtain a court hearing, said Ofek. ‘We cannot allow her to obtain an advantage just because she took the law into her own hands’, she continued, which would be a violation of Israeli sovereignty. Ofek agreed to Beinisch’s request to consult with her superiors regarding the court’s proposal, but said she doubted that they would agree because of the sovereignty issue”. This can be read in full here.

So, are we waiting to see if the government will accept the Court’s suggestion to let Maguire stay in Israel and the West Bank for the next 48 hours?

Yair Naveh: next IDF deputy chief of staff Daniel Bar On

Defense Minister Ehud Barak today appointed as new IDF deputy chief of staff, Maj. Gen Yair Naveh. Naveh is notorious for ordering targeted assassinations of unarmed Palestinian militants in defiance of a Supreme Court ruling, then lying about it. His command also observed such slipshod security arrangements that Anat Kamm easily managed to copy several hundred secret documents which she passed on to Uri Blau. In most other self-respecting western militaries, Naveh would have faced disciplinary charges for such a lackadaisical approach. Finally, Naveh has been director general of the Jerusalem light rail project, who polled Jerusalem residents about their interest in practicing gender segregation on the new mass transit system. When the poll came to light, Naveh defended the notion:

“The train was built to serve everyone,” Naveh said in defense of his proposal, adding, “I think it is necessary to create alternatives for everyone.” In his view, “It is not a problem to declare every third or fourth car a mehadrin [super-kosher] car.”

Now, can we say that this surprises us given the IDF’s record of wholesale violation of Supreme Court rulings and Palestinian human rights? No. Barak himself is a willing participant in this system and has personally murdered unarmed Palestinians in their beds himself. But I must say it does give one pause. Is this the image that Israel wishes to project to the world? Of naming to a top command someone who is a cold blooded killer and law-breaker, who practices virtually non-existent security procedures in his own office, and who is willing to violate the civil rights of women to curry favor with the ultra-Orthodox who make up a significant portion of Jerusalem’s population?

I look forward to a time when Naveh is brought before the Hague and perhaps Barak will be joining him there along with Palestinian militants who’ve killed Israeli civilians in cold blood. They deserve each other.

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"... There hasn't yet been any response from the Israeli government to the news out of this weekend's Syria-Turkey meeting, but don't expect any encouragement.

It's worth adding some additional pessimism to all of this. Even when the Turkish mediated negotiations were going well, the closest Damascus and Tel Aviv ever came to success was nearing an agreement to sit down for direct talks. Once that happened, who knows how far those negotiations would have gone, but probably not far. Syria remains, at least rhetorically, committed to getting the Golan Heights back from Israel, which has been occupying the territory since 1967. Netanyahu has said unequivocally that Israel "will never withdraw from the Golan," as has his foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman.

With Israeli-Palestinian peace talks on the precipice of collapse after only a month, it's hard to imagine why anyone else in the region would choose to sign up for more ill-fated negotiations."

“It is a matter of instinct and conscience,” writes Costello, in an open letter on the cancelation of a concert in Israel this summer. “There are occasions when merely having your name added to a concert schedule may be interpreted as a political act that resonates more than anything that might be sung and it may be assumed that one has no mind for the suffering of the innocent.” – MORE

Transcript

Artists play a galvanizing role in shaping popular opinion on the defining issues of our time.

Historic struggles for justice are often remembered at a grassroots level not by campaign slogans or political speeches but via artistic symbols. Art can capture both the human emotion and political energy of critical moments in history, etching cultural expression into our collective social conscious.

Gaza’s humanitarian crisis is alarming the world and accordingly many artists are standing with Palestine in unprecedented ways, including poet and musician Gil Scott-Heron.

A foundational figure to hip-hop culture, Scott-Heron marks contemporary artistic history as a rap innovator but also as a wordsmith, capturing the essence of critical fault lines in America via ruff poetics. Heron’s recent cancellation of a planned concert in Tel Aviv, “until everyone is welcome there,” words directed at the apartheid nature of Israel, is a historic development.

Other artists, like Elvis Costello, are also sounding an artistic alarm on Palestinian suffering, pointing to a fast approaching watershed moment in the global arts movement for Palestine.

“It is a matter of instinct and conscience,” writes Costello, in an open letter on the cancelation of a concert in Israel this summer. “There are occasions when merely having your name added to a concert schedule may be interpreted as a political act that resonates more than anything that might be sung and it may be assumed that one has no mind for the suffering of the innocent.”

Artistic solidarity from Johannesburg to Jerusalem

Today, artists are increasingly backing the global boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign targeting Israel’s apartheid policies, not the first time artists stand on the frontlines of an international movement.

Artistic advocacy for freedom in Palestine builds on historical relationships between groundbreaking culture and struggles for social justice. Co-ordinated global artistic support for Palestine today is echoed in recent history by the critically important role artists played in confronting apartheid in South Africa from the 1960s until 1990, when Nelson Mandela walked free after 27 years as a political prison, symbolizing an end to apartheid.

“Freedom is a privilege, nobody rides for free,” sang artists in Sun City, including Scott-Heron, Jimmy Cliff and Bruce Springsteen, lyrics easily meaningful today as Gaza remains under siege. Sun City, a global hit in 1985, projected a pledge in song from celebrated artists to boycott apartheid in South Africa onto pop radio airwaves, propelling Artists United Against Apartheid into the international spotlight.

Decades prior to flashy music videos featuring Miles Davis and Bono, the American Committee on Africa signalled the first efforts to build an artistic movement for equality in South Africa, in sponsoring a 1965 declaration against apartheid, signed by cultural personalities, reading “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.”

Now it is widely acknowledged that artistic advocacy for freedom in South Africa, after decades of persistent campaigning, played a key role in isolating the apartheid regime. Artists took action on South Africa as politicians in Washington and London played politics of complicity, in refusing to perform under apartheid, international artists offered a critical moral boost to South African resistance movements fighting for equality on the ground.

Turning art toward Palestinian freedom

The historical arc of justice that pointed in recent history toward the South African struggle for freedom has shifted toward Palestine.

Over generations Palestinian artists have built a powerful cultural narrative, expressions on exile and resistance. Artists like author Ghassan Kanafani, assassinated in 1972 by Israel in Beirut, or the late national poet of Palestine, Mahmoud Dariwsh, to contemporary artists like Annemarie Jacir and poet Suheir Hammad, all symbolizing a steadfast artistic heart guiding the global cultural shift toward Palestine today.

“Rooted in a century of Palestinian civil resistance, and inspired by the anti-apartheid struggle,” writes Omar Barghouti, co-founder of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel — PACBI, the boycott campaign “present[s] a comprehensive approach to realising Palestinian self-determination: unifying Palestinians inside historic Palestine and in exile in the face of accelerating fragmentation.”

Critically important to appreciating the growing boycott campaign is a simple fact, that it is Palestinians who created and continue to guide the international movement.

On the ground PACBI presents a critical Palestinian-led framework on the artistic mobilization for Palestine and now cultural workers globally are taking up the call. Determined boycott campaigning in recent years has contributed to Palestine’s emergence as focal point within global justice movements, a focus also increasingly represented in popular culture today.

As Manu Chao calls out against global injustice in the track Rainin’ in Paradize, towards Palestine the signing chant is aimed, “In Palestinia, too much hypocrisy, this world go crazy, it’s no fatality,” sings Chao, a vocalization on the emergence of the Palestinian struggle for justice within celebrated music today.

Ongoing Israeli military catastrophes in recent years, from the 2006 bombardment of Lebanon, to the IDF military attack on Gaza, and most recently the Israeli navy raid on the Gaza freedom flotilla, have triggered a sense of urgency within progressive artistic networks globally to support the Palestinian liberation struggle.

Montreal artist declaration

Internationally artists are increasingly supporting Palestinian freedom and key developments in this major shift are occurring at local levels around the world, all pieces to the cultural foundation of a global artistic movement for Palestine.

In Montreal artists are uniting under the banner Artists Against Apartheid, a shout out to the South African struggle. Thousands have attended the ongoing Artists Against Apartheid concert series in the city featuring many key cultural figures.

“Montreal’s vaguely socialist and communitarian politics,” outlines a feature in the New York Times, “has produced plenty of opportunities for new and challenging music to find an audience.” Beyond music that explores the edges of art, Montreal also encourages an active engagement between culture and struggles for social justice.

Concerts for Palestine in Montreal have highlighted a diversity of sounds, featuring many musicians who put Montreal on the map for contemporary culture, from experimental jazz, to folk, to hip-hop.

Celebrated Montreal hip-hop artists from the multilingual Nomadic Massive and Iraqi artist the Narcicyst performed along side Palestinian rap crew DAM at Artists Against Apartheid.

Palestinian rappers DAM, first illuminated in the award winning film Slingshot Hip-Hop by Jackie Salloum, project a hip-hop reference point from the ground in Palestine.

“When we fight for justice we are called terrorists, so we are using hip-hop music to tell the world about Palestine,” outlines Tamer Nafar, a founder of DAM.

Performances by DAM throughout North America have worked successfully to cement bonds of solidarity on Palestine between key points in grassroots hip-hop networks globally that shape future directions of hip-hop culture.

As celebrated Algonquin hip-hop artist Samian from Quebec takes the stage for Palestine, or members of iconic rock band Arcade Fire perform at Artists Against Apartheid, a significant shift on Palestine in both popular culture and opinion is clearly blowing in the wind, via hip-hop and beyond.

Last winter 500 artists from Montreal published an Artists Against Israeli Apartheid declaration for Palestine, marking the first time hundreds of artists in one city have collectively backed the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign. Key cultural figures added their support to the Montreal declaration for Palestine, including Quebec cultural icon Richard Desjardins, a celebrated songwriter and filmmaker.

Montreal’s late Lhasa de Sela performed at an Artists Against Apartheid concert last year during the Suoni per il Popolo festival in Montreal and was one of the first artists to support the Montreal declaration. Lhasa is celebrated globally for beautifully haunting music that crosses cultural and linguistic borders, widely listened to around the world, internationalist music from a striking artist who in life consistently spoke out for social justice.

“I am someone who feels a very strong need for freedom and to not allow anyone to be backed into a corner,” reflected Lhasa, today those words ring true toward Palestine, words speaking to a basic human bond of solidarity with the oppressed.

To support or get involved in Artists Against Apartheid or for any questions concerning the five-hundred artist letter from Montreal please write to info[at]tadamon.ca

Stefan Christoff is a journalist, community organizer and musician working with Tadamon! collective in Montreal and regularly contributes to rabble.ca. Stefan can be found on Twitter.

PRESS RELEASE

• In light of the resumption of settlement construction, two thirds 66% of the public want the Palestinian side to pull out of the direct negotiations while 30% say it should not pull out of the talks. The percentage of those who demand a pull out of the talks reaches 62% in the Gaza Strip and 68% in the West Bank.

• 63% support and 32% oppose the decision of the government of Salam Fayyad to withdraw government cars from senior civil servants. Support for the decision is higher in the West Bank 68% than in the Gaza Strip 54% .

• 11% describe conditions in the Gaza Strip as good or very good and 70% describe them as bad or very bad. By contrast, 33% describe conditions in the West Bank as good or very good and only 34% describe them as bad or very bad.
• 70% say there is corruption in the PA institutions in the West Bank while only 60% say there is corruption in the institutions of the dismissed government in the Gaza Strip.
• 58% say there is, or there is to some extent, press freedom in the West Bank and 32% say there is no such freedom in the West Bank. But only 36% describe conditions of democracy and human rights in the PA under President Mahmud Abbas as good or very good and 33% say they are bad or very bad. Moreover, only 30% say people in the West Bank can criticize the Palestinian Authority without fear while 65% say people cannot do that without fear.
• By contrast, 42% say there is, or there is to some extent, press freedom in the Gaza Strip while 43% say there is no such freedom in the Gaza Strip. Moreover only 24% say people in the Gaza Strip can criticize the authorities in Gaza without fear and 66% say people cannot do that without fear.
  Perceptions of safety and security are almost identical: in the Gaza Strip, 60% say they feel safe and secure in their home these days and only 40% do not feel safe and secure. In the West Bank, 61% say they feel safe and secure and 39% do not.
• Positive evaluation of the performance of the PA public institutions in the West Bank reaches 43% and negative evaluation reaches 26%. By contrast, positive evaluation of the performance of the public institutions of the dismissed government in the Gaza Strip reaches 30% and negative evaluation reaches 31%.
• 29% say that political, security, and economic conditions force them to seek immigration to other countries. The percentage of those seeking immigration reaches 37% in the Gaza Strip and 24% in the West Bank.
• Positive evaluation of the performance of the dismissed government of Ismail Haniyeh reaches 36% and negative evaluation reaches 27% while positive evaluation of the performance of the government of Salam Fayyad reaches 43% and negative evaluation reaches 25%.
• Percentage of satisfaction with the performance of President Abbas reaches 51% and dissatisfaction reaches 45%. Satisfaction is higher in the West Bank 53% than in the Gaza Strip 49% .
• 26% say the government of Haniyeh is the legitimate Palestinian government and 30% say the Fayyad government is the legitimate one. 30% say both governments are illegitimate and 9% say the two governments are legitimate. These results are almost identical to those obtained last June.

• If new presidential elections are held today, and only two were nominated, Abbas would receive the vote of 57% and Haniyeh 36% of the vote of those participating. The rate of participation in such election would reach 61%. Last June Abbas received 54% and Haniyeh 39%. In the Gaza Strip, Abbas receives 59% and Haniyeh 37% and in the West Bank Abbas receives 55% and Haniyeh 35%.
• If the presidential elections were between Marwan Barghouti and Ismail Haniyeh, the former would receive 65% and the latter would receive 30% of the participants’ votes. The rate of participation in this case would reache 70%. In the Gaza Strip, Barghouti receives 67% and Haniyeh 32% and in the West Bank Barghouti receives 64% and Haniyeh 28%.
• Most popular figures selected by the public as possible vice presidents from a list of five provided to respondents are Marwan Barghouti selected by 30% of the public , Ismail Haniyeh 18% , Salam Fayyad 13% Mustafa Barghouti 11% , and Saeb Erekat 6% .
• If new legislative elections are held today with the participation of all factions, 69% say they would participate in such elections. Of those who would participate, 26% say they would vote for Hamas and 45% say they would vote for Fateh, 12% would vote for all other third parties combined, and 17% are undecided. These results are identical to those obtained in June. Vote for Hamas in the West Bank 27% is higher than the vote it receives in the Gaza Strip 24% and vote for Fateh in the Gaza Strip 53% is higher than it receives in the West Bank 41% . Percentage of the undecided in the West Bank reaches 19% and 14% in the Gaza Strip.

• In light of the latest Damascus meeting between Fateh and Hamas, the public is not optimistic about the future of unity between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip: 30% say the split is permanent, 51% say unity will return but only after a long time, and only 14% say unity will return soon.
• Responsibility for the continued split between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is placed on Hamas by 15% of the respondents and on Fateh by 11% and on both together by 66%.
  But when asked about the future of the unity of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip if Hamas wins new elections, 49% say such a win would consolidate the split. But if Fateh wins, only 25% say its win would consolidate the split. Only 17% say a Hamas electoral victory would consolidate unity while 34% say a Fateh electoral victory would consolidate unity. While the West Bank and the Gaza Strip are similar in believing that a Hamas victory would consolidate the split, a major difference between respondents in the two areas emerges regarding the future of the split in the case of a Fateh victory: 25% of West Bankers say such a victory would consolidate unity while 49% of Gazans think it would consolidate unity.
• Moreover, findings show that if Hams wins the next presidential and legislative elections, a majority of 86% believes this would lead to the consolidation of the siege and boycott on the Palestinian government or would keep things as they are today. But if Fateh wins the next elections, 37% believe this would lead to the tightening of the siege and blockade or would keep conditions as they are today. 56% believe that a Fateh victory would lead to the lifting of the siege and boycott and only 9% believe a Hamas victory would lead to the lifting of the siege and boycott.
• In this regard, what worsens conditions for Hamas is the public belief that the two issues of national unity and ending the siege should be two of the most important Palestinian priorities. In an open question about the main problems confronting Palestinians which should be the top priorities of the PA, 26% mentioned the absence of national unity due to the split, while 15% mentioned the siege and the closure of the Gaza border crossings, 28% mentioned poverty and unemployment, 16% mentioned occupation and settlement activities, and 11% mentioned corruption in some public institutions.

• When asked who is behind the wave of burning and destruction of summer camps and tourist installations in the Gaza Strip, 19% said Hamas groups were the culprit, 11% said it was groups that have split from Hamas, 18% said it was radical Islamist groups from outside Hamas. Only 5% said Fateh groups were behind the wave of attacks while the rest said they do not know or selected other groups such as Israel 7% or collaborators 5% .

• 49% believe that Hamas’s motivation behind its latest attack on settlers near Hebron was to derail the Washington launch of the direct Palestinian-Israeli negotiations. 39% believe the motivation was to resist occupation and settlers. The attack led to the death of four settlers. A majority of 51% supported the Hamas attack and 44% opposed it. Support for the attack is greater in the Gaza Strip 61% than in the West Bank where only a minority of 44% supported it. Public support for the PA security crackdown on Hamas in the aftermath of the attack did not exceed 20% with 76% opposing it.

• In an open question about the regional country most supportive of the Palestinians, Turkey was selected by 25% of the public, remaining the most popular among respondents, followed by Egypt with 17%, Syria with 8%, and Iran and Saudi Arabia with 7% each. These results indicate a reduction in the percentage of those who selected Turkey from 43% last June and an increase of those who selected Egypt from 13% during the same period. It is worth noting that Egypt came first in the Gaza Strip with 30% selecting it.
  _________________________________________________________

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

As Israeli citizens, we are concerned by the policies of the Israeli governments, policies which violate international law, violate the basic human rights of Palestinians under occupation and serve to instigate instability, violence and suffering in the Middle East. We are also concerned by the double standards applied by some countries in the international community, especially the developed countries, towards Israel’s violations. Such double standards imbue violent and blatantly illegal Israeli policies of land theft, torture and physical abuse of civilians with an aura of legitimacy.

We believe that only when the international community makes Israel accountable for its actions, can we hope to see a change in Israeli policies.

As Israeli citizens, we wish to emphasize our strong support of the calls of numerous Palestinian and international organizations addessed to OECD countries. Please note that these calls also refer to the racist policies towards, and discrimination against, those Palestinians who live under Israeli control in Jerusalem. For background info on this please see:

“Unsafe Space: The Israeli Authorities’ Failure to Protect Human Rights amid Settlements in East Jerusalem”"

http://www.acri.org.il/eng/story.aspx?id=763

“Human Rights in East Jerusalem: Facts and Figures 2010″

http://www.acri.org.il/pdf/eastjer2010.pdf

Rewarding Israel for severe human rights violations will neither bring peace nor justice !

In view of the above, we are asking you: Please Do Not Attend the OECD Conferences in Apartheid Jerusalem Until Israel Abides by International Law !

Sincerely

Rachel Giora

Ofer Neiman

Tal Shapira

On behalf of Boycott! supporting the Palestinian call for boycott divestment and sanctions BDS from within

http://boycottisrael.info/

The BNC strongly supports the fast-growing and inspiring campaign initiated by Jewish Voice for Peace JVP 1 and widely endorsed by US solidarity and just peace advocacy groups and coalitions, including the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation2 and Adalah-NY3, aimed at pressuring TIAA-CREF to divest from companies profiting from Israel’s occupation and violation of international law. We urge all groups working on boycott, divestment and sanctions BDS campaigns in the US, especially on university campuses, to endorse this campaign and join it, whenever possible, to amplify its reach and impact across the US.

Investing in companies that profit from Israel’s multi-tiered oppression of the Palestinian people is a form of complicity in this oppression. Israel is methodically and routinely violating international law and Palestinian rights as part of its system of apartheid, colonization and occupation.4 Israeli colonial settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, continue to grow relentlessly, destroying lives and livelihoods. These settlements are all illegal according international law, as most recently confirmed by the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice ICJ in July 2004.5 The construction of Israel’s Apartheid Wall has isolated and put at risk of displacement over 250,000 Palestinians from over 75 communities.6 The immoral and illegal siege of Gaza continues, and the 2008-2009 military aggression campaign known as Operation Cast Lead has been condemned by a UN fact finding mission as constituting war crimes and possible crimes against humanity “in furtherance of an overall and continuing policy aimed at punishing the Gaza population”.7 Palestinian citizens of Israel face “institutional, legal and societal discrimination,” condemned even in US State Department reports.8 Over six million Palestinian refugees, the majority of the Palestinian people, are denied their UN-sanctioned right to return to their homes and receive reparations.

Through its investments in companies complicit in Israel’s violations of international law, TIAA-CREF directly profits from and is in turn accountable for these violations of international law:

- Holdings worth $19.24m in Veolia,9 a company that profits from the construction and expansion of illegal Jewish-only settlements by operating a landfill in the West Bank,10 collecting rubbish from illegal settlements11 and being a key partner in a light rail system linking West Jerusalem and illegal Israeli settlements, described by the UN Human Rights Council as a “clear violation of international law”.12

- Holdings worth $1.69m in Elbit Systems,13 Israel’s largest arms manufacturer which provides unmanned aerial vehicles used in the massacre of Palestinian civilians in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead and has been integral in the creation of the Apartheid Wall across the West Bank14 that has been ruled illegal by the ICJ.

- Holdings worth $91.75m in Motorola,15 a provider of equipment and components for military checkpoints, that serve a humiliating and integral part of Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian Territory, and the Israeli occupation forces.16

- Holdings worth $199.06m in Northrop Grumman,17 a vital supplier of military equipment to the Israeli occupation forces.18

- Holdings worth $236.85m in Caterpillar,19 who supply bulldozers routinely used to demolish Palestinian homes and in the construction of illegal Israeli settlements and supply unmanned bulldozers specially designed for urban warfare that were used in Operation Cast Lead. 20

Investments do not exist in isolation from the actions they fund. As holders of pension schemes with TIAA-CREF, over 3.5 million21 academic, medical, cultural and research practitioners throughout the United States are unwittingly profiting from violations of international law. Israeli impunity relies on the economic and political support gained by such investments; so did apartheid South Africa’s impunity. The BNC was pleased to learn that TIAA-CREF no longer owns shares in Africa-Israel,22 a company heavily involved in settlement construction.23 However, the BNC urges TIAA-CREF to ensure that its actions consistently reflect its own public statements about its commitment to “influence positive social change”24 and to ensure it sells its holdings in all companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory and infringement of Palestinian rights.

In the face of the failure of the international community to hold Israel to account for its violations of international law and its denial of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, and in harmony with the 2005 BDS Call issued by the overwhelming majority in Palestinian civil society, individuals of conscience, trade union and diverse institutions have engaged in campaigns to boycott and divest from companies complicit in Israeli violations of international law.

TIAA-CREF is an institution of great significance and weight and must take its responsibilities seriously. An organisation that professes to lead the field in ethical investment and hold progressive principles cannot bankroll and politically bolster Israeli aggression. Nor should individual pension scheme holders have their hard-earned savings ethically tarnished by their investment in Israeli violations of international law. The BNC looks forward to hearing that TIAA-CREF has ended its active complicity with Israeli contravention of Palestinian rights and calls upon board of TIAA-CREF to:

- Immediately divest its shares in all companies actively involved in the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory.

- Take steps to ensure that such investments cannot be allowed to re-enter its portfolios.

- Inform all companies whose shares it holds that it will not tolerate involvement in Israeli aggression of any kind.

The BNC also calls upon individuals of conscience, international solidarity groups and academic, labour and student groups in particular to:

- Work closely with JVP, Adalah-NY and the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation to support, enhance and ensure the success of the campaign against TIAA-CREF’s unethical investments.

- Raise awareness of TIAA-CREF’s investments in Israeli violations of international law in their communities, work places and educational establishments.

The BNC views this campaign with utter interest, as it is well justified, well though-out, as well as has every potential to succeed and, as a result, to play a key role in bolstering divestment campaigns across the US. Such prospects should not be taken lightly, given the undeniably great role played by divestment of international banks and corporations, especially the US-based ones, from apartheid South Africa in supporting the struggle for freedom and justice there.

1 http://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/campaigns/tiaa-cref-divest-occupation
2 http://www.endtheoccupation.org/article.php?list=type&type=203
3 For more information on the successful Adalah-NY campaign to secure TIAA-CREF divestment from Africa Israel see: http://campaigns.adalahny.org/tiaa-cref
4 For an in-depth analysis of Israel’s regime over the Palestinian people constituting occupation, colonization and apartheid see: http://bdsmovement.net/files/English-BNC_Position_Paper-Durban_Review.pdf
5 http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index.php?pr=71&code=mwp&p1=3&p2=4&p3=6&case=131&k=5a
6 http://stopthewall.org/activistresources/1633.shtml http://www.stopthewall.org/downloads/pdf/ThreatenedvillagesFS.pdf http://www.stopthewall.org/downloads/pdf/ThreatenedvillagesFS.pdf
7 http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/8B74CCCA633569BC8525763200528D40
8 http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2009/nea/136070.htm
9 Official TIAA-CREF records cited at https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-Veolia.pdf
10 http://whoprofits.org/Company%20Info.php?id=581
11 http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=3514
12 http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/262DD94458BA4CA2852576F000701580
13 Official TIAA-CREF records cited at https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-Elbit.pdf
14 http://www.stopthewall.org/downloads/pdf/Elbit-fc.pdf
15 Official TIAA-CREF records cited at https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-Motorola.pdf
16 http://www.whoprofits.org/Company%20Info.php?id=544
17 Official TIAA-CREF records cited at https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-NG.pdf
18 https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-NG.pdf
19 Official TIAA-CREF records cited at https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/images/Profiles-CAT.pdf
20 http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2004/11/21/israel-caterpillar-should-suspend-bulldozer-sales http://www.whoprofits.org/Company%20Info.php?id=601
21 http://www.tiaa-cref.org/public/about/press/about_us/releases/pressrelease274.html
22 http://www.tiaa-cref.org/public/about/news/articles/gen0909_185.html
23 http://adalahny.org/land-developer-bds/land-developers-bds/page-4 http://whoprofits.org/Company%20Info.php?id=447
24 http://www.tiaa-cref.org/public/about/how-we-invest/sri/index.html

From Ynet, quoting Avigdor Lieberman, the Israeli Foreign Minister:

"During my recent visit to the US I learned that Washington is planning to force a permanent agreement on Israel – two states for two peoples along the 1967 borders, plus-minus 3 or 4% of the territory exchanged," Lieberman said. "This is the objective of a continued freeze – to give the US and the international community two months to come up with a solution that will be forced on Israel."

According to the FM, in two months' time "The US, along with the Quartet, the Arab League and the Palestinians will tell Israel, 'This is the solution, take it or leave it. If you don't, there is a price – a confrontation with the international community'.

Question: Why does the US want a two-month extension of the settlement freeze--what happens in the next two months that Obama is trying to get past?

In the National Interest, Paul Pillar, former CIA analyst, looks at the recent Indian judicial ruling on the Ayodhya site, sharing it between Muslims and Hindus, for both of whom it is holy, as a departure point for a meditation on Why Israel, unlike India, is so intolerant of its minority? Note that the url for this post includes the words, "the-lobby-must-not-be-named." Part of his very intelligent answer, which only obliquely mentions the lobby:

Hindus... constitute the majority in India just as Jews do in Israel. Hindus were conquered by foreign Muslims beginning in the 13th century and became oppressed subjects in their own homeland. And India is the only place that, notwithstanding substantial Hindu communities in other countries, could ever be considered the homeland of Hindus. Some on the Indian political right have wanted to run with that concept and turn India into something closer to Hindustan, the land of the Hindus. Given the Hindus' difficult history, it would be very easy to sympathize with that idea. But the dominant political ethos since independence—still voiced by the Congress Party, the principal governing party at present—sees India instead as a multi-confessional and multi-ethnic commonwealth, one in which Muslims become Bollywood film stars or even the president of India. And this is the case even though Hindus are an even larger majority in India 81 percent than Jews are in Israel 76 percent , with Muslims being proportionately a smaller minority in India than in Israel.

There are several reasons that the Jews of Israel and the Hindus of India have taken such different paths, despite both having their versions of miserable and bloody histories. Leadership surely is one; there has been no Israeli equivalent of Mohandas Gandhi, whose approach to pursuing a cause was the antithesis of might-makes-right.  While Gandhi was shaking off British rule in South Asia through mass marches and other nonviolent tactics, future Israeli prime minister and Likud Party leader Menachem Begin was shaking off British rule in Palestine through terrorist violence such as blowing up the King David Hotel.  Another reason is the talent and resourcefulness of the Israeli people, who have had the skill not only to make the desert bloom but also to develop with American help the military power that makes it possible to achieve goals not through compromise but through force. Whatever the combination of reasons, the flicker of hope from the court ruling about Ayodhya and most Indian responses to it suggests that there is a better path.

 

"... author, Odd Karsten Tveit, covered the Middle East for many years and served in the United Nations Interim Force inLebanon, whose members – according to the book "Goodbye Lebanon – Israel's First Defeat", helped the prisoners escape from the al-Khaim Prison in southern Lebanon.

The incident took place in 1992. According to the book, the Norwegian forces feared that two prisoners who managed to escape from the detention facility would be tortured or executed in Israel if caught by the IDF or South Lebanon Army, and decided to help them out.

Tveit says that the soldiers dressed the detainees in UNIFIL uniform and included them in a UN convoy which left southern Lebanon through roadblocks set up by the Israeli forces.

Last week Rich Siegel, a New Jersey musician, resigned from his union local, the Associated Musicians of Greater New York, in part over its failure to publish letters critical of the Israeli occupation in its members' magazine, Allegro. He lately learned that Allegro wouldn't print his resignation letter. So Siegel wrote to the president of the local Tino Gagliardi, and the two vice presidents, John O'Connor and Jay Blumenthal.

Hello Mr. Gagliardi, Mr. O'Connor, and Mr. Blumenthal:

I have been informed by Mikael Elsila of your decision to refuse to publish my letter of resignation as I had requested. 

I don't think that you are considering the ramifications of such a decision, or of your previous decision to disallow any mention of Israel in your letters to the editor section.

When you have an organ like Allegro which, as Mr. Gagliardi pointed out in the June issue, has a tradition of open discourse on political issues, and you disallow discourse on just one issue, you are not avoiding taking a stand. On the contrary, this is an expression of a stand taken.

Particularly when this is in response to an organized effort on the part of a member to have people write in demanding to shut down all mention of this issue in the paper. I am aware that this is exactly what member Aaron Minsky has done.

I understand that this is an extremely heated and divisive issue. I understand that allowing even one letter brings more letters and so there will be letters on this issue on an ongoing basis. So what? Clearly local 802 can go about doing its business while there is a controversial topic being addressed in the letters section of its paper. Clearly your office doesn't have to erupt in heated debate, causing the functioning of the local to fall into neglect. It's HEALTHY to allow open discourse- Mr. Gagliardi implied this in his comments referred to above.

Asking you to publish my letter, and also to continue the tradition of open discourse in your paper, is not the same thing as asking the local to take a stand on the issue. Local 802 SHOULD take a stand on the issue. You endorse candidates and take stands on issues frequently. But you're not. Too bad. Then how about allowing members to express themselves? How about allowing this one member to express himself on the occasion of his resignation after 26 years of membership?

Are you so afraid of offending Jewish members that not only won't you take a stand, but you won't even allow letters to be printed? What does that say about your values? Are you willing to just trash free speech when it results in some Jewish members getting angry? Are you that afraid of losing a few Jewish members? 

So, good for you, you have lost this Jewish member. Mikael Allegro editor , good guy that he is, wrote to me that he hopes I will re-join local 802. As a professional musician I may find myself in a position where membership is required, as I have worked jobs in the past where this is the case. If and when that happens it will be a touch decision. Because I'm completely disgusted with you. I think the position you're taking here is a disgrace. 

Sincerely yours, -Rich Siegel, formerly member S-11171.

"..... the negotiations that will determine the outcome of the latest minicrisis will be those that both parties conduct with the U.S.

The Obama Administration appears to have assumed that having the two sides at the table in direct talks would somehow create self-sustaining momentum toward a peace agreement. The President has reportedly offered Netanyahu a raft of unprecedented measures of U.S. political backing for Israel's negotiating positions and direct military support, .... The underlying assumption of that offer appears to be that the two sides will agree within two months on where to draw the border between Israel and a future Palestinian state, which would allow Israel to continue building in those settlements it would keep and permanently freeze construction in those on the wrong side of that future border. That's a wildly optimistic assumption, according to many veteran observers of the Middle East peace process....... Abbas was "alarmed" to hear that Netanyahu envisaged any "framework agreement" reached in the current process as being implemented over a 20-year period.

A key element of the offer Obama reportedly made to Netanyahu in order to coax just 60 more days of moratorium out of him was U.S. support for Israel's long-standing demand to keep its own troops in control of the border of a future Palestinian state for a long-term "transitional period." The fact that Netanyahu has inclined to turn it and the host of additional security guarantees and new weapons sales down suggests that the Israeli leader believes he is in a strong position vis-á-vis his American negotiating partner. To be sure, Obama will be aware that a difficult midterm election is not an auspicious moment to be tussling with the Israelis.

The Palestinian camp rejects the principle of Israeli troops remaining in a future state, although they're open to the presence of a third-party security force. Still, it's unlikely that any U.S. offer to Netanyahu on that issue was cleared with the Palestinians, who bring no leverage to the table except their ability to walk away .....Abbas will, no doubt, be dangling that threat in the hope of extracting new concessions of his own from the Americans...

The Administration appears to have overestimated what can be achieved by having the two sides in the same room, given the obvious gulf between their expectations and bottom lines. The Palestinians had to be strong-armed into showing up at all, believing that Netanyahu's refusal to implement the complete settlement freeze demanded last year by the Obama Administration simply confirmed their suspicion that he has no intention of concluding a credible peace deal. Netanyahu is happy to talk, but on his own terms, and is under no domestic political pressure to cut a deal with the Palestinians. Rather than generating momentum toward a self-sustaining process, the current talks appear to see both sides going through the motions in order to strengthen their case in their own negotiations with Washington. And over the past decade, that's a negotiation in which the Israelis have fared far better than the Palestinians...."

And more news from Today in Palestine:

[if gte mso 9]>--> Land/Property/Resource Theft and Destruction/Ethnic Cleansing
Settlers blamed for mosque blaze
Prayer rugs and Quran copies burnt in a West Bank mosque, in fire said to have been started by Israeli settlers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocrCzco0Z5g&feature=youtube_gdata

Settlers Torch Mosque, Copies of the Holy Quran, Near Bethlehem
A group of fundamentalist Israeli settlers broke into a mosque, on Sunday at night, in Beit Fajjar, near Bethlehem, and set it ablaze.
http://www.imemc.org/article/59537

Occupation bulldozes lands in the village of Takku
BETHLEHEM, PIC -- Eyewitnesses said that Israeli occupation bulldozers started on Friday morning to bulldoze Palestinian lands close to a Jewish settlement built on confiscated Palestinian land belonging to the village of Takku to the south east of Bethlehem.Local sources believe that the work of the bulldozers in their land is a prelude to confiscation of the land to build more settlement units to expand the present settlement.  Local sources also said that settlers placed a number of caravans to the east of Masha area east of Bethlehem in preparation for its confiscation.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/en/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k

10 dunums of olive trees in Awarta burned by settlers
Oct 1, 2010-- two settlers of Itimar settlement burned, approximately 10 dunums of an olive grove. The fires were North East of Awarta village, in the South Nablus district.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/2369.shtml

Zionist settlers block Palestinian villagers from harvesting olive crop
Zionist settlers stormed the village of Al-Mughir in northern Ramallah on Sunday and wreaked havoc in olive fields, cutting trees, and stealing the harvest.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7

Israel to compensate settlers for construction freeze losses
So far the defense establishment's complaints committee has reached a decision on 45 of 109 compensation claims.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/israel-to-compensate-settlers-for-construction-freeze-losses-1.317006?localLinksEnabled=false

Netanyahu Places News Conditions For Extending Freeze
Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that he agrees to extending settlement construction freeze for a number of months, but in return he wants guarantees that it will not be asked for a further extension.
http://www.imemc.org/article/59539

Israeli ministers oppose fresh moratorium: report AFP
AFP - Attempts by Washington to entice Israel into extending a settlement moratorium look set to meet fierce opposition from coalition hardliners, a newspaper poll of cabinet ministers showed on Monday.
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/mideast/*http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101004/wl_mideast_afp/israelpalestinianspeacepolitics

Activism/Solidarity/Boycott, Sanctions & Divestment
Occupation Forces supress Al-Masara weekly demonstration, Firing teargas on the children’s circus on the Apartheid Wall
Oct 1, 2010-- Tens of activists and children suffered from tear-gas inhalation fired at them by the Occupation Forces during the weekly demonstration against the Apartheid Wall in Al-Masara.
http://stopthewall.org/latestnews/2370.shtml

The trial of Ameer Makhoul enters a new phase
The campaign to free Ameer Makhoul, a Palestinian citizen of Israel and political and human rights activist falsely accused of espionage, has achieved significant advances. Makhoul’s attorneys challenged the legality of the circumstances of his arrest and undermined the prosecution’s core allegations against him on September 16th in the Haifa District Court. State Prosecutors admitted that no evidence of espionage had been found in any of the computers and cellular phones seized from Makhoul’s home and office. Nor was any evidence of espionage found, they admitted, in the transcripts of thirty thousand wiretapped telephone conversations.
http://josephdana.com/2010/10/the-trial-of-ameer-makhoul-enters-a-new-phase/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-trial-of-ameer-makhoul-enters-a-new-phase

Supreme Court: Maguire not here on friendly visit
Nobel Peace Prize laureate fails to convince court she was unaware of deportation order issued against her following her participation in May's Gaza-bound aid flotilla.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3963724,00.html

Architects against Israeli occupation | Abe Hayeem
With the settlement freeze over, international architects must take action to end illegal construction in the West Bank.  In deciding to back the boycott of Ariel theatre in the West Bank, Frank Gehry, the Canadian-American architect of Guggenheim fame, joins a growing body of professionals who are making a stand against the illegal settlements. Ariel, a quintessential illegal settlement, is continually expanding to fit the over-generous boundaries staked out over Palestinian land, choking the development of Palestinian villages nearby. Its new state-funded cultural centre, 20 years in the construction, is due to open in November.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/oct/04/architects-settlement-freeze-israel

#BDS: Methodist Preacher to Sue Church Over Anti-Israel Boycott
A Methodist preacher is planning to sue his own British-based church over its anti-Israel policies. Pastor David Hallam, 62, said he has asked attorney Paul Diamond to fight a resolution passed this summer by the Methodist Church -- the fourth-largest Christian denomination in Britain -- promoting a boycott against Israeli goods produced in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.  The resolution was heartily supported by Palestinian Authority Christians.  The British Board of Deputies, which represents the country's Jews, broke off all contact with the leadership of the Methodist Church over the issue.
http://youthanormalization.blogspot.com/2010/10/bds-methodist-preacher-to-sue-church.html

#BDS: Artists breaking the silence on Palestine
Artists play a galvanizing role in shaping popular opinion on the defining issues of our time.  Historic struggles for justice are often remembered at a grassroots level not by campaign slogans or political speeches but via artistic symbols. Art can capture both the human emotion and political energy of critical moments in history, etching cultural expression into our collective social conscious.
Gaza's humanitarian crisis is alarming the world and accordingly many artists are standing with Palestine in unprecedented ways, including poet and musician Gil Scott-Heron.
http://youthanormalization.blogspot.com/2010/10/bds-artists-breaking-silence-on.html

The Siege Gaza & West Bank /Humanitarian/Restriction of Movement/Human Rights/Racism
Goods – Needs Vs. Supply – Sep 5 – Oct 2
http://www.gazagateway.org/2010/10/goods-needs-vs-supply-sep-5-oct-2/

School By Day, Prison By Night, Palestine Monitor
Most students catch the bus to campus, other come in cars, Mohammed is escorted from his cell to the university gates by soldiers. At the end of a day's studying, while his peers go off to smoke argeela water pipe and shoot pool in the cafes around town, he is escorted back to his cramped cell. His story represents the wider tale of denial and disruption of education enacted by the Israeli occupation.
http://www.palestinemonitor.org/spip/spip.php?article1557

Strangled By Aid, Palestine Monitor
A two-day conference at Birzeit University last week assembled scholars from around the world to discuss one of Palestine’s most complex problems: aid.  Dr. Sara Roy, the keynote speaker, claimed aid has depoliticised the root causes of Palestinian suffering. By focusing exclusively on the humanitarian aspects of the occupation, donors effectively deprive Palestinians of their voices and right to self-determination. Recognising the detrimental effects of aid, including dependency issues, the participants sought alternatives to a system failing despite large budgets.  The Occupied Palestinian Territories OPT are among the largest recipients of aid per capita in the world. In 2008, $1.8 billion of went to the Palestinian Authority PA , $700 million to specific projects, and $500 million to humanitarian aid, according to statistics from French consulate in Jerusalem.
http://www.palestinemonitor.org/spip/spip.php?article1556

Gaza power cuts reduced
GAZA CITY Ma'an -- Two generators in Gaza's sole power station are now operational, reducing power cuts in the Strip, an energy official said Sunday.  Spokesman for the Gaza Energy Authority Jamal Ad-Dardasawi said fuel deliveries had facilitated the operation of the second generator increasing the plant's productivity to 60 mega watts. A new schedule could now be implemented, under which power would be cut for eight hours a day for two days, followed by two days without power cuts, he said.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320561

Israel to allow 30 more cars into Gaza
GAZA CITY Ma'an -- Israeli authorities will be partially open one Gaza crossing on Monday for the entry of 30 new cars, a Palestinian crossings official said.  Raed Fattouh said six trucks transporting the new cars would be permitted entry through the Kerem Shalom crossing in southern Gaza, marking the third time in under a month that vehicles have been allowed into the Strip since 2007.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320602

Violence/Aggression & Provocations
Palestinian Worker Shot Dead By Israeli Policeman Near Jerusalem
A Palestinian laborer was shot and killed, on Monday at dawn, by an Israeli policeman, who reportedly shot him at point blank range in occupied East Jerusalem. The policeman was placed under house arrest for five days.
http://www.imemc.org/article/59538

Worker dies of heart attack during army chase
HEBRON Ma'an -- A Palestinian worker died of a heart attack on Monday after being chased by Israeli forces as he tried to enter Jerusalem from Hebron, medics told Ma'an.  A source with the Palestine Red Crescent Society said Shahda Muhammad Hussein Karja, 55, from Halhul, likely sustained a stress-induced heart attack during the chase. The source also said Karja had inhaled tear gas deployed by forces during the pursuit.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320663

Palestinian struck by car driven by settler
HEBRON Ma'an -- A Palestinian was hospitalized Sunday after he was hit by a car driven by an Israeli settler near Hebron, witnesses said.  Samir Abu Merya was struck on the Beit Ummar junction north of the West Bank city and transferred to hospital, onlookers said.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320567

Settlers clash with Jerusalemite family, settler runs over youth
Israeli settlers attacked Al-Qarsh family in Al-Sa'diya neighborhood in occupied Jerusalem and tried to remove their furniture from their house. The settlers claim they own the house.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq

IOF troops advance into eastern Gaza during funeral of minister's wife
Israeli occupation forces IOF mounting tanks advanced into eastern Gaza city on Sunday during the funeral procession of the wife of Palestinian health minister Basem Naim.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2b

Detainees
Human rights groups demand release of political detainees in WB
Two Palestinian human rights groups on Sunday demanded the immediate release of Sheikh Khader Adnan, an Islamic Jihad leader, and all political detainees in the West Bank jails.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bcO

IDF bars Arab teen's lawyer from abuse testimony
Military Police refuses to allow a lawyer to attend as 15-year-old Palestinian gives account of alleged attack on him by Israeli soldiers.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/idf-bars-arab-teen-s-lawyer-from-abuse-testimony-1.317010

Report: Israel arrested 485 Palestinians last month
A report issued by Palestine’s supreme national committee to support prisoners said Israeli occupation forces have ramped up in this last month of September arrest campaigns against Palestinians.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2b

Minister pledges support to boy under Israeli house arrest
HEBRON Ma'an -- Minister of Prisoners Affairs Issa Qaraqe was received on Friday by the family of a 13-year-old Hebron boy on Friday, days after the child's release from Israeli prison.  Karem Khaled Da’na, from the Wad Al-Bustan neighborhood in the West Bank city of Hebron, was taken from his family home by Israeli forces on 22 September, who said he had thrown stones at settlers on his way home from school.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=319811

Israeli military court releases minor on bail
HEBRON Ma’an -- An Israeli military court in the Ofer detention center in the central West Bank district of Ramallah released a minor on Monday on bail of 5,000 shekels.  Layers for the Prisoner Society in Hebron the military prosecution originally delayed the release of Sayil Ribhi Abu Qweidary 72 hours to file an appeal against the court's decision. Abu Qweidar was detained on 27 September, days after 13-year-old Akram Da'an was detained by Israeli forces and tried for throwing stones at troops.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320691

In photos: Palestinians call for prisoner release
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=320272

War Crimes
Filmmaker Ken Loach, writer Arundhati Roy and Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire Read from the Goldstone Report
Goldstone Facts-Chapter 10, Indiscriminate Attacks by Israeli Armed Forces
http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/filmmaker-ken-loach-writer-arundhati-roy-and-nobel-laureate-mairead-maguire-read-from-the-goldstone-report/

"Peace" Talks/Political Developments
Lieberman 'key' to cabinet vote on settlement freeze
Netanyahu must win backing from skeptical foreign minister to push through decision to prolong West bank building ban, top officials say.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/lieberman-key-to-cabinet-vote-on-settlement-freeze-1.317004?localLinksEnabled=false

Lieberman: Obama trying to force agreement on Israel
FM tells fellow Yisrael Beiteinu members US wants two-month settlement freeze to draft peace deal that would mean two states for two people along 1967 borders. On controversial UN speech: I wanted to tell the world the truth as I see it.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3963557,00.html

Yesha chair: US' offer is poisonous pill
Danny Dayan says he hopes Prime Minister Netanyahu will withstand US' pressure over settlement freeze; adds conceding will put Israel in clear disadvantage for duration of peace talks
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3962806,00.html

Other News
Palestinians invest $2 billion in Jericho to celebrate its 10,000th birthday
The idea of celebrating the 10,000-year anniversary of the city arose after the millennium celebrations in 2000, which focused primarily on tourist sites connected to Jesus.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/palestinians-invest-2-billion-in-jericho-to-celebrate-its-10-000th-birthday-1.316997

Police mishandled probe into Israeli Arab riot deaths, report finds
Three cases against police officers who shot dead Israeli Arabs in riots in October 2000 were improperly closed, Israel Democracy Institute claims.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/police-mishandled-probe-into-israeli-arab-riot-deaths-report-finds-1.316999?localLinksEnabled=false

MK wants Neturei Karta classified as terrorists
After being attacked by sect members in Mea Shearim, National Union chairman Yaakov Katz promotes bill aiming to classify Sikrikim as members of terrorist organization for their activities against state institutions.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3960241,00.html

After France, Israel considers 'banning the burqa'
All clothing that covers the face in a public place would be banned, but the proposed law would affect mainly Muslim women.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/features/after-france-israel-considers-banning-the-burqa-1.316726

Obama uses Weekly Address to lobby for Israeli firm BrightSource, Ali Abunimah
But in light of the fact that BrightSource is effectively based in Israel -- and that's where all the R&D happens -- the president's claim to be supporting 'American innovation' is at best disingenuous. Obama is scaring Americans about "handing the competitive edge to China" while quietly giving it to Israel.
http://aliabunimah.posterous.com/obama-uses-weekly-address-to-lobby-for-israel#more
    
Israel mulling enlisting Facebook for the home front in future battles
JERUSALEM, Oct. 4 Xinhua -- Israeli army officials say they are planning to use the Facebook social networking site in order to alert and inform the Israeli public during future conflicts.  The idea is to immediately alert people of possible threats, including missile strikes.  An Israel Defense Forces' home front command population department official confirmed the report to the Ha'aretz newspaper, although a final decision has not yet been made over using the widely popular website.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2010-10/04/c_13542515.htm

Video: The Palestinian Oktoberfest 2010
Ramallah – PNN – on Saturday the Palestinian Oktoberfest 2010 started in the small village of Taybe in central West Bank.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWE3azKRQoY&feature=player_embedded

Analysis/Opinion/Human Interest
Israel’s Arab Citizens Are Not a Negotiating Chip,  Jonathan Cook
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, has insisted from the launch of the current peace talks that the Palestinians set no preconditions, while making his own precondition the centerpiece of negotiations. Netanyahu has said talks are futile unless the Palestinians and their leader, Mahmoud Abbas, first recognize Israel as a Jewish state. “I recognized the Palestinians’ right to self-definition, so they must do the same for the Jewish people,” he told American Jewish leaders recently.  Netanyahu, of the right-wing Likud Party, is not the first Israeli leader to make such a requirement of the Palestinians. His predecessor, Tzipi Livni, the leader of the centrist opposition, wanted the same recognition. Barak, the defense minister and head of the supposedly left-wing Labor Party, also supports this position. The consensus on this matter, however, masks a reluctance by Israeli politicians to clarify what exactly is being expected of the Palestinians and why recognition is so important.
http://original.antiwar.com/cook/2010/10/03/israels-arab-citizens-are-not-a-negotiating-chip/

'We were supposed to enter quietly - instead we threw grenades', Amira Hass
IDF soldiers speak out about the climate of fear during their West Bank service.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/we-were-supposed-to-enter-quietly-instead-we-threw-grenades-1.317038?localLinksEnabled=false

Yalla! Let's build,  Akiva Eldar
Instead of suspending construction for Jews, let's resume construction for all West Bank residents.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/yalla-let-s-build-1.317041

Josh Ruebner: Obama's Misplaced Missive
As the clock ticks closer toward an ignominious end to the Obama Administration's ill-conceived gambit to reconvene direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, President Obama appears desperate to keep the talks alive, as revealed on Wednesday in accounts of a letter he purportedly sent to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-ruebner/obamas-misplaced-missive_b_747578.html

speaking of that broken Israeli culture, Max Ajl
6,000 Israeli Arabs marched today amidst a call for a general strike in commemoration of 13 boys who Israeli police officers murdered in October 2000. They marched from a town in the Galilee, Kfar Kanna. MK Ahmed Tibi said that "Failure to put the criminals on trial is like making sure the victims are really dead," and added that Israeli racism has mounted since October 2000: it has now reached what he calls "frightening levels"--structural and cultural racism has practically suffused Israeli society, while the left is mostly silent, in retreat and disarray. A few weeks ago, I had some unkind words for Bernard Avishai's polemic against Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions. I think extended intellectual disquisitions arguing against BDS should be dissected and countered for the simple reason that there is nothing else for activists to do internally or externally right now. Without something to do, we fall quiescent or fall into ineffectiveness. Maybe more weirdly, we call for Palestinian non-violence and have cat-fights about its efficacy and the appropriate level of nuance to integrate into such a call, as though we have absolutely anything to do with Palestinian society's ability-or-not to mount a non-violent Third Intifada.
http://www.maxajl.com/?p=4211&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+http%2Fwwwmaxajlcom%2Ffeedrss2+%28Jewbonics%29

The Extraordinary Rendition of Palestine, Mazin Qumsiyeh
It has been a rather bizarre week in the Middle East.  Let me just cite a few examples:  The International Atomic Agency IAEA succumbed to pressure from the US and other western countries and thus failed to make any explicit or even implicit request of Israel to join the nonproliferation treaty.  One of the excuses given is that there is a delicate peace process going and we do not want to upset the situation i.e. upset Israel .
http://alternativenews.org/english/index.php/blogs/mazin-qumsiyeh/2889-the-extraordinary-rendition-of-palestine-

Israel keeps moving the goalposts
From children playing soccer in the street, to the superstars playing in the Champions League final, everyone accepts that one should not play the game if the other side keeps moving the goalposts.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=17&article_id=119966

Lebanon
Syria Seeks Arrests Over Hariri Probe - General
BEIRUT Reuters - A Lebanese general held for four years over the killing of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri said Sunday a Syrian judge had issued arrest warrants for 33 people over false testimony to investigators.
http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=5a5c64c37dcea519e4a0165d3e20dab4

Iraq
Iraqi cameraman killed in bomb attack near Baghdad
BAGHDAD, Oct. 4 Xinhua -- An Iraqi cameraman working for a U. S.-based television was killed in a bomb attack west of Baghdad on Monday, while a senior police officer was wounded by a separate bomb attack in Baghdad during the day, the police said.  Tahreer Kadhem, a cameraman of the al-Hurra Arabic language American satellite channel, was killed when a sticky bomb attached to his car detonated while he was driving near a bridge in Garma area near the city of Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, a local police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2010-10/04/c_13542474.htm

Bomb hits Iraqi minister's convoy
Bodyguard killed and seven people injured in bombing apparently targeting deputy minister, who escaped unharmed.
http://english.aljazeera.net//news/middleeast/2010/10/20101047561492898.html

US War Crimes in Fallujah, Steve Lendman
On August 31, declaring an "end to the combat mission in Iraq," Obama disgracefully said: "Through this remarkable chapter in the history of the United Stated and Iraq, we have met our responsibility," infamously displaying his culpability as a war criminal, matching the worst America ever produced. Daily he proves it in Iraq, Afghanistan, and by reckless global marauding.
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/10/us-war-crimes-in-fallujah.html

Iraq oil reserves overtake Iran's AFP
AFP - Iraq reported on Monday a sharp rise in proven oil reserves that saw it leapfrog Iran into third place worldwide, as the war-battered country seeks to rebuild its crude-dependent economy.
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101004/wl_mideast_afp/iraqenergyoilreserves

Water sports popularity rise in Baghdad
The Iraqi capital Baghdad has often been associated with explosions and violence. At one point, the Tigris river that runs through the city was used as a dumping area for dead bodies. But now it's becoming popular with water-sport enthusiasts. Al Jazeera's Rawya Rageh reports from Baghdad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91f2Hh3JXiE&feature=youtube_gdata

Iran
Israel scrambles to prevent Ahmadinejad's Lebanon visit
BEIRUT: Israel is urging international diplomats to push Lebanon into canceling next week's visit by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, media reports said on Sunday. Ahmadinejad is expected to arrive in Lebanon on Wednesday, October 13 for his first official visit to the country since assuming office in 2005.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=119960

The Listening Post - Ahmadinejad's media blitz
On The Listening Post this week we look at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's media blitz in New York: there were interviews, press conferences and photo-ops but back in Iran the media remain tight lipped and under pressure. We also explore the challenges of reporting in Japan in an interview with Jake Adelstein, an American journalist who has made Tokyo his turf for the past 20 years.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ux4KssmjW4&feature=youtube_gdata

IRAN VERSUS SANCTIONS, Part 1 : A history of failure
Three decades of United States-led sanctions against Iran have failed to bring the country to heel even as they have benefited politicians and others in Tehran who are supposed to be subdued by US policy. Given the history of sanctions, that should be of little surprise to Washington. - Hossein Askari
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/LJ05Ak01.html

U.S. and other world news
Afghan civilians killed in NATO raid-police
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Oct 3 Reuters - At least three Afghan civilians were killed in a NATO air strike targeting senior Taliban commanders in southern Helmand province at the weekend, the provincial police chief said on Sunday.  The spreading insurgency has made this year the bloodiest in Afghanistan since it began, after the Taliban were overthrown in late 2001. Civilians are increasingly caught up in the violence as victims of both sides.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/SGE692013.htm

Thousands of liberals rally in US
Labour unions, civil rights activists and others gather to show support for Democrats and counter Tea Party rallies.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/10/2010102205537639879.html

Harry Belafonte: Iraq & Afghanistan Wars Are "Immoral, Unconscionable and Unwinnable"
"The President’s decision to escalate the war in that region alone costs the nation 33 billion dollars," the legendary musician, actor and activist Harry Belafonte said at Saturday’s "One Nation Working Together" in Washington. "That sum of money could not only create 600,000 jobs here in America but would even leave us a few billion to start rebuilding our schools, our roads, our hospitals and affordable housing. It could also help to rebuild the lives of the thousands of our returning wounded veterans."
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/10/4/harry_belafonte_iraq_afghanistan_wars_are

Justice in the US
"In 2005, 15-year-old Ashley was facing trial in Manhattan Family Court for lying to police after she told officers she didn't know who had assaulted her on the way to school.  As she waited in the court's holding area for her court appearance, juvenile counselor Tony "Tyson" Simmons came up to the handcuffed girl, took her in an elevator to the building's basement, and raped her.  Moments later, Ashley -- who's withholding her last name for fear of reprisal -- was in the courtroom being sentenced to 12 months in prison for filing a false police report. This week, Simmons was sentenced to 10 years' probation for the sexual assault on Ashley and two other teens."
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2010/10/justice-in-us.html

Saudi women fight in court for control of their marital fates
RIYADH: Women in Saudi Arabia are fighting back against tribal traditions that make them hostage to the whims of their fathers and male guardians who alone can decide who their future husbands will be.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=119941

www.theheadlines.org