Thursday, January 08, 2009
What Most US Media Isn't Telling You
Israel invaded Gaza on the ground to compliment its aerial bombardment. The Palestinian death toll has reached 660. The official Israeli death toll is up to 5, of whom 4 were civilians. Attacks on civilians, no matter who they are, is criminal.
Yet the US government, public relations officials, and mainstream media—unlike those of almost every other country in the world—continue to criminalize Palestinian violence while absolving Israel (the undisputed party in power) of almost any responsibility of its own. The official position seems clear: Israel can do as it likes until Hamas stops all violence.
The underlying assumption here is that Palestinians' human rights depend on the actions of their leaders. This is false. Palestinians do not have to earn the human rights inalienable to every person on Earth. Human rights are non-negotiable. Likewise, Israelis do not have to earn their human rights.
Israeli state terror notwithstanding, it would be criminal to bombard the entire population of Israel (in which, as in Gaza, fighters live alongside their families in civilian areas) for the crimes of its government. But this is exactly what Israel is doing in Gaza with US weapons before a seemingly impotent international community.
Every day the carnage unfolds on CNN-International (different from CNN-US—the United States is the only country in the world with domestically customized international news coverage): a mother and her 4 kids killed instantly; a 7-year-old shot twice in the chest (I'm not sure how that happens accidentally, but does that even matter?); more than 40 policemen in training obliterated (even Israel does not claim the Palestinian police orchestrates rocket attacks); TV stations and places of worship successfully destroyed; a mortuary out of room for bodies.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, "sewage water is pouring into the streets in Beit Hanoun, following damage to the main pipeline between Beit Hanoun and the Beit Lahiya wastewater treatment plant." Save The Children reports that newborn baby Gazans are battling hypothermia due to power cuts and freezing winter winds.
Some of the worst news comes from the doctors. Can you imagine a hospital functioning without electricity? According to the mainstream British newspaper The Guardian, medics are working around the clock and running out of anesthesia. There is no more gauze so doctors are using cotton, which sticks to wounds. Nurses are forced to draw blood with the wrong sized syringes and without alcohol. The Guardian article was entitled, "The injured were lying there asking God to let them die." Many have gotten their last wish, dying as they wait in the emergency rooms.
Medical workers themselves have also been under fire, with at least 4 killed as they tried to reach victims. Ambulances are not safe, nor are the schools:
When I woke up yesterday a UN school had just been bombed, killing 3 of the civilians who had come to the school seeking shelter. Watching the news later in the evening, I learned the same UN school had been bombed again (twice in one day), killing 40 more. The British director of the school, having lost his usual calm, was irate and imploring the world to understand that nowhere in Gaza is safe anymore—there is nowhere left to go.
Yet reading the Washington Post and watching the nightly news you might believe that Israel's is in fact the most virtuous army in the world, going as far as sending text messages to and dropping leaflets in Palestinian areas explaining that unless civilians leave, they will be attacked. Reported alone, this might sound reasonable, but quickly
becomes absurd if you know that Gazans have no place to go to! Nowhere inside the strip of land is safe and there is no way to leave it, since the borders are sealed.
The bombing and invasion have clearly heightened the threat against Gazans' lives, but they did not start it. For the 18 months preceding the invasion, the average Gazan could not reliably go to school, make a living, contact the outside world, divert their sewage, heat their homes, drink clean water, or eat. This was due to the enclosure summed up in the words of the United Nations Special Reporters on Human Rights: "Gaza is a prison and Israel seems to have thrown away the key." This was the reality of Israel's "ceasefire."
The closure pushed Gaza's humanitarian crisis to a new low, with poverty reaching 80%. Any attempt to counter poverty was thwarted. Gaza students dependent on transportation could not reach their schools, and those accepted at foreign universities in America, Europe, and the West Bank were denied permits to leave. Without enough fuel, industrial businesses were either shut down or running below 20% capacity, resulting in the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.
Contrary to Israeli court order, the Israeli army allowed just 15% of fuel needed for generators, wells, and transportation, resulting in garbage piled high in the streets while up to 15,000,000 gallons of raw or partially-treated sewage flowed into the sea every day. This was the reality of Israel's "ceasefire."
On November 4th and 5th, Israel broke the "ceasefire" by killing at least 6 Palestinians in Gaza, reported on CNN-International but unlikely by CNN-US. Of course, there was no ceasefire to begin with, since the main requirement on Israel was to sufficiently unseal Gaza's borders, a requirement that was consistently ignored. By the end of the "ceasefire," 262 had Gazans died due to lack of access to proper medical care during the blockade.
Hamas should be condemned for its attacks on civilians, but it is naïve to expect that they would renew a truce that Israel had never adhered to. Whether or not it would cease cross-border attacks in exchange for Israeli reciprocity—as Hamas continues to offer—is something we cannot know, since Israel has never given the offer a chance.
Know I ask you what did the Palestinians do to the Americans for some to go as far as saying they DESERVE IT, they have never attacked or harmed any Americans were on the flip side our biggest alias stole spayed killed Americans(intentionally) and sold our weapons to our potential anomy’s(China & Iran) so I say WWJS
Israel invaded Gaza on the ground to compliment its aerial bombardment. The Palestinian death toll has reached 660. The official Israeli death toll is up to 5, of whom 4 were civilians. Attacks on civilians, no matter who they are, is criminal.
Yet the US government, public relations officials, and mainstream media—unlike those of almost every other country in the world—continue to criminalize Palestinian violence while absolving Israel (the undisputed party in power) of almost any responsibility of its own. The official position seems clear: Israel can do as it likes until Hamas stops all violence.
The underlying assumption here is that Palestinians' human rights depend on the actions of their leaders. This is false. Palestinians do not have to earn the human rights inalienable to every person on Earth. Human rights are non-negotiable. Likewise, Israelis do not have to earn their human rights.
Israeli state terror notwithstanding, it would be criminal to bombard the entire population of Israel (in which, as in Gaza, fighters live alongside their families in civilian areas) for the crimes of its government. But this is exactly what Israel is doing in Gaza with US weapons before a seemingly impotent international community.
Every day the carnage unfolds on CNN-International (different from CNN-US—the United States is the only country in the world with domestically customized international news coverage): a mother and her 4 kids killed instantly; a 7-year-old shot twice in the chest (I'm not sure how that happens accidentally, but does that even matter?); more than 40 policemen in training obliterated (even Israel does not claim the Palestinian police orchestrates rocket attacks); TV stations and places of worship successfully destroyed; a mortuary out of room for bodies.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, "sewage water is pouring into the streets in Beit Hanoun, following damage to the main pipeline between Beit Hanoun and the Beit Lahiya wastewater treatment plant." Save The Children reports that newborn baby Gazans are battling hypothermia due to power cuts and freezing winter winds.
Some of the worst news comes from the doctors. Can you imagine a hospital functioning without electricity? According to the mainstream British newspaper The Guardian, medics are working around the clock and running out of anesthesia. There is no more gauze so doctors are using cotton, which sticks to wounds. Nurses are forced to draw blood with the wrong sized syringes and without alcohol. The Guardian article was entitled, "The injured were lying there asking God to let them die." Many have gotten their last wish, dying as they wait in the emergency rooms.
Medical workers themselves have also been under fire, with at least 4 killed as they tried to reach victims. Ambulances are not safe, nor are the schools:
When I woke up yesterday a UN school had just been bombed, killing 3 of the civilians who had come to the school seeking shelter. Watching the news later in the evening, I learned the same UN school had been bombed again (twice in one day), killing 40 more. The British director of the school, having lost his usual calm, was irate and imploring the world to understand that nowhere in Gaza is safe anymore—there is nowhere left to go.
Yet reading the Washington Post and watching the nightly news you might believe that Israel's is in fact the most virtuous army in the world, going as far as sending text messages to and dropping leaflets in Palestinian areas explaining that unless civilians leave, they will be attacked. Reported alone, this might sound reasonable, but quickly
becomes absurd if you know that Gazans have no place to go to! Nowhere inside the strip of land is safe and there is no way to leave it, since the borders are sealed.
The bombing and invasion have clearly heightened the threat against Gazans' lives, but they did not start it. For the 18 months preceding the invasion, the average Gazan could not reliably go to school, make a living, contact the outside world, divert their sewage, heat their homes, drink clean water, or eat. This was due to the enclosure summed up in the words of the United Nations Special Reporters on Human Rights: "Gaza is a prison and Israel seems to have thrown away the key." This was the reality of Israel's "ceasefire."
The closure pushed Gaza's humanitarian crisis to a new low, with poverty reaching 80%. Any attempt to counter poverty was thwarted. Gaza students dependent on transportation could not reach their schools, and those accepted at foreign universities in America, Europe, and the West Bank were denied permits to leave. Without enough fuel, industrial businesses were either shut down or running below 20% capacity, resulting in the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.
Contrary to Israeli court order, the Israeli army allowed just 15% of fuel needed for generators, wells, and transportation, resulting in garbage piled high in the streets while up to 15,000,000 gallons of raw or partially-treated sewage flowed into the sea every day. This was the reality of Israel's "ceasefire."
On November 4th and 5th, Israel broke the "ceasefire" by killing at least 6 Palestinians in Gaza, reported on CNN-International but unlikely by CNN-US. Of course, there was no ceasefire to begin with, since the main requirement on Israel was to sufficiently unseal Gaza's borders, a requirement that was consistently ignored. By the end of the "ceasefire," 262 had Gazans died due to lack of access to proper medical care during the blockade.
Hamas should be condemned for its attacks on civilians, but it is naïve to expect that they would renew a truce that Israel had never adhered to. Whether or not it would cease cross-border attacks in exchange for Israeli reciprocity—as Hamas continues to offer—is something we cannot know, since Israel has never given the offer a chance.
Know I ask you what did the Palestinians do to the Americans for some to go as far as saying they DESERVE IT, they have never attacked or harmed any Americans were on the flip side our biggest alias stole spayed killed Americans(intentionally) and sold our weapons to our potential anomy’s(China & Iran) so I say WWJS
Labels: Were should we go after the last sky
Saturday, January 03, 2009
Obama's deadly silence
*Barack Obama is presented with a t-shirt by Sderot mayor Eli Moyal*
*Barack Obama is presented with a t-shirt by Sderot mayor Eli Moyal*
"I would like to ask President-elect Obama to say something please about the humanitarian crisis that is being experienced right now by the people of Gaza.
“Former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney made her plea after disembarking from the badly damaged SS Dignity that had limped to the Lebanese port of Tyre while taking on water. The small boat, carrying McKinney, the Green Party's recent presidential candidate, other volunteers, and several tons of donated medical supplies, had been trying to reach the coast of Gaza when it was rammed by an Israeli gunboat in international waters.
But as more than 2,400 Palestinians have been killed or injured -- the majority civilians -- since Israel began its savage bombardment of Gaza on 27 December, Obama has maintained his silence. "There is only one president at a time," his spokesmen tell the media.
This convenient excuse has not applied, say, to Obama's detailed interventions on the economy, or his condemnation of the "coordinated attacks on innocent civilians" in Mumbai in November.
The Mumbai attacks were a clear-cut case of innocent people being slaughtered. The situation in the Middle East however is seen as more "complicated" and so polite opinion accepts Obama's silence not as the approval for Israel's actions that it certainly is, but as responsible statesmanship.
It ought not to be difficult to condemn Israel's murder of civilians and bombing of civilian infrastructure including hundreds of private homes, universities, schools, mosques, civil police stations and ministries, and the building housing the only freely-elected Arab parliament.
It ought not to be risky or disruptive to US foreign policy to say that Israel has an unconditional obligation under the Fourth Geneva Convention to lift its lethal, months-old blockade preventing adequate food, fuel, surgical supplies, medications and other basic necessities from reaching Gaza.
But in the looking-glass world of American politics, Israel, with its powerful first-world army, is the victim, and Gaza -- the besieged and blockaded home to 1.5 million immiserated people, half of them children and eighty percent refugees -- is the aggressor against whom no cruelty is apparently too extreme. While feigning restraint, Obama has telegraphed where he really stands; senior adviser David Axelrod told CBS on 28 December that Obama understood Israel's urge to "respond" to attacks on its citizens.
Axelrod claimed that "this situation has become even more complicated in the last couple of days and weeks as Hamas began its shelling [and] Israel responded."The truce Hamas had meticulously upheld was shattered when Israel attacked Gaza, killing six Palestinians, as The Guardian reported on 5 November.
A blatant disregard for the facts, it seems, will not leave the White House with George W. Bush on 20 January. Axelrod also recalled Obama's visit to Israel last July when he ignored Palestinians and visited the Israeli town of Sderot. There, Obama declared: "If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that.
I would expect Israelis to do the same thing."This should not surprise anyone. Despite pervasive wishful thinking that Obama would abandon America's pro-Israel bias, his approach has been almost indistinguishable from the Bush administrations.
Along with Tony Blair and George W. Bush, Obama staunchly supported Israel's war against Lebanon in July-August 2006, where it used cluster bombs on civilian areas, killing more than 1,000 people. Obama’s comments in Sderot echoed what he said in a speech to the powerful pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, in March 2007. He recalled an earlier visit to the Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona near the border with Lebanon which he said reminded him of an American suburb. There, he could imagine the sounds of Israeli children at "joyful play just like my own daughters." He saw a home the Israelis told him was damaged by a Hizballah rocket (no one had been hurt in the incident).
Obama has identified his daughters repeatedly with Israeli children, while never having uttered a word about the thousands -- thousands -- of Palestinian and Lebanese children killed and permanently maimed by Israeli attacks just since 2006. This allegedly post-racial president appears fully invested in the racist worldview that considers Arab lives to be worth less than those of Israelis and in which Arabs are always "terrorists."The problem is much wider than Obama: American liberals in general see no contradiction in espousing positions supporting Israel that they would deem extremist and racist in any other context.
The cream of America's allegedly "progressive" Democratic party vanguard -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Howard Berman, New York Senator Charles Schumer, among others -- have all offered unequivocal support for Israel's massacres in Gaza, describing them as "self-defense.
"And then there's Hillary Clinton, the incoming secretary of state and self-styled champion of women and the working classes, who won't let anyone outbid her anti-Palestinian positions.
Democrats are not simply indifferent to Palestinians. In the recent presidential election, their efforts to win swing states like Florida often involved espousing positions dehumanizing to Palestinians in particular and Arabs and Muslims in general. Many liberals know this is wrong but tolerate it silently as a price worth paying (though not to be paid by them) to see a Democrat in office. Even those further to the left implicitly accept Israel's logic.
Matthew Rothschild, editor of The Progressive, criticized Israel's attacks on Gaza as a "reckless" and "disproportionate response" to Hamas rocket attacks that he deemed "immoral." There are many others who do nothing to support nonviolent resistance to Israeli occupation and colonization, such as boycott, divestment and sanctions but who are quick to condemn any desperate Palestinian effort -- no matter how ineffectual and symbolic -- to resist Israel's relentless aggression.
Similarly, we can expect that the American university professors who have publicly opposed the academic boycott of Israel on grounds of protecting "academic freedom" will remain just as silent about Israel's bombing of the Islamic University of Gaza as they have about Israel's other attacks on Palestinian academic institutions. There is no silver lining to Israel's slaughter in Gaza, but the reactions to it should at least serve as a wake-up call:
When it comes to the struggle for peace and justice in Palestine, the American liberal elites who are about to assume power present as formidable an obstacle as the outgoing Bush administration and its neoconservative backers.
But as more than 2,400 Palestinians have been killed or injured -- the majority civilians -- since Israel began its savage bombardment of Gaza on 27 December, Obama has maintained his silence. "There is only one president at a time," his spokesmen tell the media.
This convenient excuse has not applied, say, to Obama's detailed interventions on the economy, or his condemnation of the "coordinated attacks on innocent civilians" in Mumbai in November.
The Mumbai attacks were a clear-cut case of innocent people being slaughtered. The situation in the Middle East however is seen as more "complicated" and so polite opinion accepts Obama's silence not as the approval for Israel's actions that it certainly is, but as responsible statesmanship.
It ought not to be difficult to condemn Israel's murder of civilians and bombing of civilian infrastructure including hundreds of private homes, universities, schools, mosques, civil police stations and ministries, and the building housing the only freely-elected Arab parliament.
It ought not to be risky or disruptive to US foreign policy to say that Israel has an unconditional obligation under the Fourth Geneva Convention to lift its lethal, months-old blockade preventing adequate food, fuel, surgical supplies, medications and other basic necessities from reaching Gaza.
But in the looking-glass world of American politics, Israel, with its powerful first-world army, is the victim, and Gaza -- the besieged and blockaded home to 1.5 million immiserated people, half of them children and eighty percent refugees -- is the aggressor against whom no cruelty is apparently too extreme. While feigning restraint, Obama has telegraphed where he really stands; senior adviser David Axelrod told CBS on 28 December that Obama understood Israel's urge to "respond" to attacks on its citizens.
Axelrod claimed that "this situation has become even more complicated in the last couple of days and weeks as Hamas began its shelling [and] Israel responded."The truce Hamas had meticulously upheld was shattered when Israel attacked Gaza, killing six Palestinians, as The Guardian reported on 5 November.
A blatant disregard for the facts, it seems, will not leave the White House with George W. Bush on 20 January. Axelrod also recalled Obama's visit to Israel last July when he ignored Palestinians and visited the Israeli town of Sderot. There, Obama declared: "If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that.
I would expect Israelis to do the same thing."This should not surprise anyone. Despite pervasive wishful thinking that Obama would abandon America's pro-Israel bias, his approach has been almost indistinguishable from the Bush administrations.
Along with Tony Blair and George W. Bush, Obama staunchly supported Israel's war against Lebanon in July-August 2006, where it used cluster bombs on civilian areas, killing more than 1,000 people. Obama’s comments in Sderot echoed what he said in a speech to the powerful pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, in March 2007. He recalled an earlier visit to the Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona near the border with Lebanon which he said reminded him of an American suburb. There, he could imagine the sounds of Israeli children at "joyful play just like my own daughters." He saw a home the Israelis told him was damaged by a Hizballah rocket (no one had been hurt in the incident).
Obama has identified his daughters repeatedly with Israeli children, while never having uttered a word about the thousands -- thousands -- of Palestinian and Lebanese children killed and permanently maimed by Israeli attacks just since 2006. This allegedly post-racial president appears fully invested in the racist worldview that considers Arab lives to be worth less than those of Israelis and in which Arabs are always "terrorists."The problem is much wider than Obama: American liberals in general see no contradiction in espousing positions supporting Israel that they would deem extremist and racist in any other context.
The cream of America's allegedly "progressive" Democratic party vanguard -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Howard Berman, New York Senator Charles Schumer, among others -- have all offered unequivocal support for Israel's massacres in Gaza, describing them as "self-defense.
"And then there's Hillary Clinton, the incoming secretary of state and self-styled champion of women and the working classes, who won't let anyone outbid her anti-Palestinian positions.
Democrats are not simply indifferent to Palestinians. In the recent presidential election, their efforts to win swing states like Florida often involved espousing positions dehumanizing to Palestinians in particular and Arabs and Muslims in general. Many liberals know this is wrong but tolerate it silently as a price worth paying (though not to be paid by them) to see a Democrat in office. Even those further to the left implicitly accept Israel's logic.
Matthew Rothschild, editor of The Progressive, criticized Israel's attacks on Gaza as a "reckless" and "disproportionate response" to Hamas rocket attacks that he deemed "immoral." There are many others who do nothing to support nonviolent resistance to Israeli occupation and colonization, such as boycott, divestment and sanctions but who are quick to condemn any desperate Palestinian effort -- no matter how ineffectual and symbolic -- to resist Israel's relentless aggression.
Similarly, we can expect that the American university professors who have publicly opposed the academic boycott of Israel on grounds of protecting "academic freedom" will remain just as silent about Israel's bombing of the Islamic University of Gaza as they have about Israel's other attacks on Palestinian academic institutions. There is no silver lining to Israel's slaughter in Gaza, but the reactions to it should at least serve as a wake-up call:
When it comes to the struggle for peace and justice in Palestine, the American liberal elites who are about to assume power present as formidable an obstacle as the outgoing Bush administration and its neoconservative backers.
Labels: The Zone where the natives live
Thursday, January 01, 2009
But first, a word to my readers. Today is New Year's Eve. I pray for a better year to come, when both peoples, Israeli and Palestinian, live in dignity and peace. This year, as usual, there is no peace for either side -- but only one side robs the other side of its dignity, and dictates to it the terms of co-existence. This is not a war in Gaza; it is an assault on a the sovereign right of the Palestinian people to determine its destiny, and it began when one side refused to recognize the results of democratic elections.
Only when the Israelis view the Palestinians as equals – as possessing no less a right to a state, no less a right to security, no less a right to self-defence as they have – will there be the possibility of peace.
Happy New Year
Remy
This unnecessary war, which has claimed so many lives already, and which has kept two populations in terror (but only one in constant suffering) can be ended quickly. The cease-fire conditions are clear: ending the rocket fire from Gaza, ending the siege on Gaza, new elections in the West Bank and Gaza, which will be recognized by Israel. Beyond that, serious negotiations could be commenced for the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Israel should not make the cessation of weapons smuggling a condition for a cease fire, or for indirect relations with Hamas. I am sorry to see that Meretz USA, which came out with a fine statement otherwise, has called for "the verifiable termination of weapons smuggling into the Gaza Strip" as a condition for a cease-fire.
I have no problem with that, provides that it calls for an arms embargo on Israel as well. Jews smuggled weapons to Palestine before there was a Jewish state, and the idea that Gaza and the West Bank should be left at the mercy of Israel, or NATO, or whatever, is immoral as well as stupid – immoral, because it says that one side has a right to self-defence and the other does not, stupid, because it reinforces the Israeli narrative that the Palestinians are the aggressors, which plays into feelings of Palestinian resentment, and which encourages extremists. Had Hamas not smuggled – and used – weapons, would Meretz USA be calling today for an end to the siege on Gaza?
Beyond that, the Palestinians have to get their act together, and stop their own internal fighting. That means democratically-conducted elections whose results are accepted not only by Israel, but by the world. If Hamas runs Palestine, fine – but a condition for their joining the community of nations will be behaving like one – ditto for Israel.
Hamas has already laid out the conditions – reasonable conditions, I might add – for its living in peace with Israel: withdrawal to 67 boundaries and a just solution to the refugees. Hamas doesn't recognize the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state. Big deal. Israel doesn't recognize Hamas, or a Hamas-led Palestinian Authority, either. Lots of states don't recognize other states. For years Egypt and Jordan didn't recognize Israel. Did that mean that Israel did not conduct indirect negotations with them?
The world's policy of isolating Hamas has failed. If the world believes in a two-state solution, it will have to get used to the possibility that Hamas will be running the Palestinian state – not permanently, of course, because the Palestinians, like Israelis, will periodically throw the bums out.
But another solution -- a "one state" or "federal" solution, may provide a better answer to the fundamentalists on both sides. There would be no fear of the Palestinian state being dominated by Hamas because the Palestinians wouldn't have their own state, but they would share it with the Israelis. With the Israelis overwhelmingly secular (and with the Palestinians "traditionalists" who could go either way), a one-state solution, with a constitution that would take into account the various factions, may be the better way to go.
Of course, it is not the way that either Israel or Palestine will go. The day may not be too long when Hamas wins control of the West Bank. Israel seems bent on doing everything it can to ensure that possibility. It will then be able to go to the world and say, "What do you want from us; we have terrorists on both our sides."
It won't be pleasant living in Gaza or the West Bank. But it won't be pleasant living in Israel, either.
Labels: Alex Trebek........What is PEACE
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