The Israeli media maffia close or block our blogs all the time! They dont like free speech! They dont like that people write and netcast videos about what is all about and what is happen in Gaza!
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
World outrage continues over Israeli war crimes and Washington’s complicity. Gazans are now immortalized. Hamas is more popular than ever and remains resolute despite everything the IDF threw against it.
Democrats and Republicans share equal guilt. They fund Israeli state terror, are partnered in its aggression, and have collaboratively planned, supported, and/or agreed to it for the past 41 years. Continuity under Obama is assured. The current Gaza carnage is the worst since 1967. In spite of its “unilateral” ceasefire, sporadic Israeli attacks continue. The IDF merely redeployed. Gaza remains under siege, and human suffering is overwhelming and unrelieved.
Since December 27, Israel conducted terror bombings, tank and naval vessel shellings, and assault troop slaughter on the ground. Illegal weapons were used. Neighborhoods are burning and in ruins. Horrific wounds are reported. Civilians were willfully massacred. They comprise 80 – 90% of the casualties according to human rights organizations and medical authority reports. All 1.5 million Gazans were targeted. They still are. There’s no place anywhere to hide.
Sporadic fighting continues after Israel’s January 17 announcement. Earlier, Israeli Radio reported that more reservists were activated and that IDF operations were in “phase three.” Forces on the ground pushed deeper into Gaza where they remained up to now. Attacks on neighborhoods and refugee camps intensified. Death and injury tolls mount. They approach 7000 but exclude potentially hundreds of unidentified bodies under rubble.
A Brief History of Israeli Terror Killings Since 1946
Gaza is full-scale war but just the latest bloodstained episode in Israel’s six-decade reign of terror against Palestinians. This section reviews others since 1946, two years before the establishment of a Jewish state. The list is long, way-incomplete, very disturbing, and shows what Palestinians have endured for over 60 years. Their ordeal continues in the West Bank and Gaza under siege, still attacked, and, as always, betrayed by the dominant media. Read more »
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
MORE ON THE HAMAS-ISRAEL CONNECTION
A UPI article by Richard Sale offers more on the connection between Israel and the Hamas organization.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, speaking of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas recently described it as “the deadliest terrorist group that we have ever had to face.” Active in Gaza and the West Bank Hamas wants to liberate all of Palestine and establish a radical Islamic state in place of Israel. It has gained notoriety with its assassinations, car bombs and other acts of terrorism.
But Sharon had left something out.
Israel and Hamas may currently be locked in deadly combat, but, according to several current and former U.S. intelligence officials, beginning in the late 1970s, Tel Aviv gave direct and indirect financial aid to Hamas over a period of years.
Israel “aided Hamas directly — the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO,” said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic Studies.
Israel’s support for Hamas “was a direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO by using a competing religious alternative,” said a former senior CIA official.
According to documents obtained from the Israel-based Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT) by UPI, Hamas evolved from cells of the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928. Islamic movements in Israel and Palestine were “weak and dormant” until after the 1967 Six Day War in which Israel scored a stunning victory over its Arab enemies.
After 1967, a great part of the success of the Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood was due to their activities among the refugees of the Gaza Strip. The cornerstone of the Islamic movements success was an impressive social, religious, educational and cultural infrastructure, called Da’wah, that worked to ease the hardship of large numbers of Palestinian refugees, confined to camps, and many of whom were living on the edge.
“Social influence grew into political influence,” first in the Gaza Strip, then on the West Bank, said an administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
According to ICT papers, Hamas was legally registered in Israel in 1978 by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the movements spiritual leader, as an Islamic Association by the name Al-Mujamma Al Islami, which widened its base of supporters and sympathizers by religious propaganda and social work.
Funds for the movement came from the oil-producing states and directly and indirectly from Israel, according to U.S. intelligence officials. The PLO was secular and leftist and promoted Palestinian nationalism. Hamas wanted set up a transnational state under the rule of Islam, much like Khomeini’s Iran.
What took Israeli leaders by surprise was the way the Islamic movements began to surge after the Iranian revolution, after armed resistance to Israel sprang up in southern Lebanon organized by an Iran-backed movement called Hezbollah that bore similitaries to Hamas, these sources said.
“Nothing stirs up the energy for imitation as much as success,” commented one administration expert.
A further factor of Hamas’ growth was the fact the PLO moved its base of operations to Beirut in the 1980s, leaving the Islamic movements to strengthen their influence in the Occupied Territories “as the court of last resort,” he said.
When the intifada began, the Israeli leadership was further surprised when Islamic groups began to surge in membership and strength. Hamas immediately grew in numbers and violence. The group had always embraced the doctrine of armed struggle, but the doctrine had not been practiced and Islamic groups had not been subjected to suppression the way groups like Fatah had been, according to U.S. government officials.
But with the triumph of the Khomeini revolution in Iran, with the birth of Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorism in Lebanon, Hamas began to gain strength in Gaza and then in the West Bank, relying on terror to resist the Israeli occupation.
Israel was certainly funding the group at that time. One US intelligence source who asked not to be named, said that not only was Hamas being funded as a “counterweight” to the PLO, Israeli aid had a more devious purpose: “to help identify and channel towards Israeli agents Hamas members who were dangerous terrorists.”
In addition, by infiltrating Hamas, Israeli informers could listen to debates on policy and identify Hamas members who “were dangerous hardliners,” the official said.
In the end, as Hamas set up a very comprehensive counterintelligence system, many collaborators with Israel were weeded out and shot. Violent acts of terrorism became the central tenet, and Hamas, unlike the PLO, was unwilling to compromise in any way with Israel, refusing to acknowledge its very existence.
Even then, some in Israel saw some benefits to be had in trying to continue to give Hamas support: “The thinking on the part of some of the right-wing Israeli establishment was that Hamas and the other groups, if they gained control, would refuse to have anything to do with the pace process and would torpedo any agreements put in place,” said a U.S. government official.
“Israel would still be the only democracy in the region for the United States to deal with,” he said. All of which is viewed with disapproval by some former U.S. intelligence officials.
“The thing wrong with so many Israeli operations is that they try to be too sexy,” said former CIA official Vincent Cannestraro. Former State Department counter-terrorism official Larry Johnson told UPI: “The Israelis are their own worst enemies when it comes to fighting terrorism. They are like a guy who sets fire to his hair and then tries to put it out by hitting it with a hammer.They do more to incite and sustain terrorism than curb it.”
Aid to Hamas may have looked clever, “but it was hardly designed to help smooth the waters,” he said. “It gives weight to President George W Bush’s remark about there being a crisis in education.”
Cordesman said that a similar attempt by Egyptian intelligence to fund Egypt’s fundamentalists had also come to grief because of overcomplication.
An Israeli Embassy defense official, asked if Israel had given aid to Hamas replied: “I am not able to answer that question. I was in Lebanon commanding a unit at the time, besides it is not my field of interest.”
Asked to confirm a report by U.S. officials that Brigadier General Yithaq Segev, the military governor of Gaza, had told U.S. officials that he had helped fund “Islamic movements as a counterweight to the PLO and communists,” the Israeli official said he could confirm only that he believed that Segev had served back in 1986.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Dear President-elect Obama
January 12, 2009
Open Letter
Editor’s note: The following is a letter addressed to US President-elect Barack Obama calling for the United States to change its policies vis-a-vis the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, especially in light of Israel’s current onslaught against the Gaza Strip. It was signed by more than 900 academics, most of them based in the United States, and made available to The Daily Star by the campaign’s organizers.
Once, in what was perhaps an unguarded moment, you stated that: “Nobody’s suffering more than the Palestinian people”. After days of relentless Israeli bombing in the Gaza strip that has already killed over seven hundred people, most of them civilians or policemen, and injured over three thousand, many of whom may yet die for lack of medical supplies and facilities, your words have never rung more true. And yet, so far, your signal response to this latest assault on the Palestinians, that the UN Secretary General diplomatically calls “disproportionate”, has been to defend Israel’s right to respond to rocket attacks that, while rightly condemned, are mere pinpricks in comparison to the horrific consequences of Israeli bombardment and of the ongoing blockade on Gaza.
Does this mean that on the long way to the White House you have trimmed your sails and, for the sake of securing the power you will soon assume, fear now to speak truth to power? Does this mean that, unlike Dr. King, your sense of justice is adjustable for the sake of political expedience? Those who supported you from the early days of your primary campaign did so not on account of your response to economic crisis, but because they believed in your sense of justice and your commitment to put an end to business-as-usual in Washington, and because they believed in your genuine desire to shape a new and different world order.
In 1981, while you were an undergraduate at Occidental College, you were among the first of a courageous group of students and faculty who, while the cause was still unpopular or unheard of, spoke out for divestment from the apartheid regime in South Africa. You knew then that it was imperative to place pressure on a racist regime which shamefully oppressed a black and coloured population that was discriminated against, subject to pass laws and control of its every movement, parceled into Bantustans, and subject to detention, torture and extra-judicial execution. When the black population protested, like the school children of Soweto, they could be summarily shot down by police or army. The ANC, under Nelson Mandela, was proscribed as a terrorist movement, its leaders were imprisoned, tortured or killed, its guerillas faced the overwhelming power of the South African army, equipped and trained in part by the United States and its European allies. A regime that was so unafraid to use violence in the defense of its discriminatory and racist regime, and so unashamed to do so in the face of international condemnation, could only understand the language of force. The divestment movement in which you so actively participated understood that the euphemistically and cynically named policy of “constructive engagement” was a moral and practical failure and that only the non-violent force of a financial boycott on the South African regime had any hope of bringing an end to apartheid without an horrific bloodbath.
Public figures as diverse as Bishop Desmond Tutu and President Jimmy Carter have recognized that Israel too maintains an apartheid regime, in practice if not in name. South Africa, now a functioning multi-racial democracy, was a white state for a white people. Israel is a Jewish state for a Jewish people. Its non-Jewish, mostly Palestinian Arab citizens are discriminated against in numerous ways, economically and civilly. The dispossessed and ethnically cleansed Palestinian populations, dispersed in the diaspora and in the refugee camps of Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon, are denied the internationally recognized right of return. They have had their lands and homes taken from them by armed and “legal” force, are subject to collective punishment, prolonged states of siege, the absolute and deliberately destructive control of their daily movements. Where South Africa instituted the pass laws, the checkpoints that have proliferated all over the West Bank and at the exits from Gaza prevent students from reaching their schools and hospitals, workers from reaching their places or work, keep farmers from their fields, the sick from the few hospitals that survive to serve them. The illegal settlements, that in contravention of all international laws regarding occupation have proliferated across the West Bank, are designed to be permanent “facts on the ground” and have divided recognized Palestinian territory into segmented islets, into besieged Bantustans, with the intent of preventing a contiguous Palestinian state. A so-called security wall, illegally built, as even the Israeli Supreme Court recognized, on Palestinian territory, has cut farmers from their lands and turned formerly prosperous villages into isolated prisons. Regular Israeli military incursions into Palestinian cities and refugee camps, and bombings from the air, have killed innumerable civilians, many of them children. Since the election of Hamas, in fair and open elections, Israel has subjected the civilian population of Gaza to a prolonged state of siege, designed to suffocate them into submission, depriving them at will of water and power, medical supplies and food, and of access to the outside world. The most recent, all-out assault on Gaza, the disproportionate and bloody use of excessive force, is no act of self-defense, but the dramatic extension of an insidious policy of extermination of a people that refuses to disappear.
Every one of these acts is a crime against humanity. In their ensemble, they constitute one of the most massive, ethnocidal atrocities of modern times. Almost alone among nations, Israel acts in flagrant violation of international law and UN resolutions and does so with impunity. That it can do so is in large part the consequence of the uncritical support offered to Israel by a succession of American administrations. Without the military and economic aid of the United States, which amounts to more than a third of all US foreign aid, Israel could not have mounted its violent offensives against the Palestinians or Lebanon, could not maintain its security apparatus, could not afford the illegal settlements that seek to expand Israel into what remains of Palestinian territory. The United States has supplied the F-16s that are bombarding the Palestinians, their schools, police stations and mosques, and the cluster bombs that continue to kill and maim children and farmers in southern Lebanon. America continues to support Israel to the tune of billions every year at the expense of US taxpayers and at the expense of its moral standing in the world.
You will continue to do so, according to your own web page, because “our first and incontrovertible commitment in the Middle East must be to the security of Israel, America’s strongest ally in the region.” You and your Vice-President, Joe Biden, not only “defend and support the annual foreign aid package that involves both military and economic assistance to Israel”, but moreover “have advocated increased foreign aid budgets to ensure that these funding priorities are met.” In doing so, you lend your support, in the name of the United States, to a regime no less criminal in its acts and in its policies towards its own minority population and its dispossessed Palestinian neighbors than South Africa was in the 1980s. Then, it was argued, South Africa was our strongest ally in the region, a bulwark in the war against communism, a crucial supplier of uranium and other minerals, a prosperous Western-style democracy, if not the only democracy on the continent. To bring down the South African apartheid regime, it was argued, would be to create chaos in southern Africa, unleash a bloodbath in which whites and blacks alike would suffer, and pave the way for a communist or dictatorial postcolonial regime. The divestment movement, a non-violent coalition of students and academics, union members and churches, came together in the spirit of the Civil Rights movement to challenge those self-serving assumptions. It changed the direction of US foreign policy, disgracing its support of a racist regime, and placed effective pressure on the apartheid regime to begin serious negotiations with the ANC. Through a combination of diplomacy and divestment, we did end apartheid, making way for a functioning multi-racial democracy that confronts its challenges, indeed, but has not dissolved into chaos or tyranny.
It is time for the United States to place a similar pressure on Israel. That Israel has been America’s beneficiary, unchallenged in its war crimes and in its acts of terror, uncontested for its racist civil constitution and illegal occupations, has not been to the United States’ advantage. On the contrary, such unquestioning support of Israel has fuelled the legitimate anger of the Islamic world, supplied the justification for terrorism, and continually tarnished the United States’ reputation among the democracies of the world. That the United States has stood so often alone in defending Israel before the court of world opinion in the United Nations is not a sign of its virtue, but of the obstinacy and arrogance of its stance. But it is not for the sake of the reputation or advantage of the United States that you should take a new path in relation to Israel. It is in the name of justice. It is not just to support the territorial ambitions, realized settlement by settlement, of a Zionist minority in the region. It is not just to continue to supply Israel with the most advanced weapons and the most deadly arms in order that it may murder civilians, children and policemen. It is not just that we should support Israel with all our diplomatic force and financial aid, while leaving Israel’s victims to die slowly for lack of food, medicine, water and power. It is not just that we should sacrifice a dispossessed people for the security of a state that discriminates and expropriates, continually and violently ignores UN resolutions and international appeals, collectively punishes those whose right to resist occupation is recognized in international law.
There is no road to peace through such injustice. It may be that the compromise in the end will be the establishment and security of two separate states. Almost certainly, the only hope of a lasting solution is a single state in Israel/Palestine, committed to the civil and human rights of all peoples within its boundaries, irrespective of religion or ethnicity. That is, after all, the standard to which we hold all other states in the world, Israel alone excepted. But no solution at all will be possible until we hold Israel accountable for its criminal violence and its illegal acts, until we cease to supply it with the means to pursue a course of domination and expansion, with arms and warplanes, with finance and diplomatic support. In wake of the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, your recent expression of “deep concern” is not enough. It is time for constructive disengagement from Israel, financial, diplomatic, military. What worked in the case of South Africa, divestment and pressure, may finally work in the Middle East.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Among many important points made in the statement, focusing on justice, it states:
“Almost certainly, the only hope of a lasting solution is a single state in Israel/Palestine, committed to the civil and human rights of all peoples within its boundaries, irrespective of religion or ethnicity. That is, after all, the standard to which we hold all other states in the world, Israel alone excepted.”
Who said there was no hope in the US civil society? This is perhaps one of the most promising statements to come out of the US in response to Israel’s atrocities in Gaza and, in fact, to its 60-year-old, multifaceted injustice against the indigenous people of Palestine.
Omar
January 12, 2009
Open Letter
Editor’s note: The following is a letter addressed to US President-elect Barack Obama calling for the United States to change its policies vis-a-vis the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, especially in light of Israel’s current onslaught against the Gaza Strip. It was signed by more than 900 academics, most of them based in the United States, and made available to The Daily Star by the campaign’s organizers.
Once, in what was perhaps an unguarded moment, you stated that: “Nobody’s suffering more than the Palestinian people”. After days of relentless Israeli bombing in the Gaza strip that has already killed over seven hundred people, most of them civilians or policemen, and injured over three thousand, many of whom may yet die for lack of medical supplies and facilities, your words have never rung more true. And yet, so far, your signal response to this latest assault on the Palestinians, that the UN Secretary General diplomatically calls “disproportionate”, has been to defend Israel’s right to respond to rocket attacks that, while rightly condemned, are mere pinpricks in comparison to the horrific consequences of Israeli bombardment and of the ongoing blockade on Gaza.
Does this mean that on the long way to the White House you have trimmed your sails and, for the sake of securing the power you will soon assume, fear now to speak truth to power? Does this mean that, unlike Dr. King, your sense of justice is adjustable for the sake of political expedience? Those who supported you from the early days of your primary campaign did so not on account of your response to economic crisis, but because they believed in your sense of justice and your commitment to put an end to business-as-usual in Washington, and because they believed in your genuine desire to shape a new and different world order.
In 1981, while you were an undergraduate at Occidental College, you were among the first of a courageous group of students and faculty who, while the cause was still unpopular or unheard of, spoke out for divestment from the apartheid regime in South Africa. You knew then that it was imperative to place pressure on a racist regime which shamefully oppressed a black and coloured population that was discriminated against, subject to pass laws and control of its every movement, parceled into Bantustans, and subject to detention, torture and extra-judicial execution. When the black population protested, like the school children of Soweto, they could be summarily shot down by police or army. The ANC, under Nelson Mandela, was proscribed as a terrorist movement, its leaders were imprisoned, tortured or killed, its guerillas faced the overwhelming power of the South African army, equipped and trained in part by the United States and its European allies. A regime that was so unafraid to use violence in the defense of its discriminatory and racist regime, and so unashamed to do so in the face of international condemnation, could only understand the language of force. The divestment movement in which you so actively participated understood that the euphemistically and cynically named policy of “constructive engagement” was a moral and practical failure and that only the non-violent force of a financial boycott on the South African regime had any hope of bringing an end to apartheid without an horrific bloodbath.
Public figures as diverse as Bishop Desmond Tutu and President Jimmy Carter have recognized that Israel too maintains an apartheid regime, in practice if not in name. South Africa, now a functioning multi-racial democracy, was a white state for a white people. Israel is a Jewish state for a Jewish people. Its non-Jewish, mostly Palestinian Arab citizens are discriminated against in numerous ways, economically and civilly. The dispossessed and ethnically cleansed Palestinian populations, dispersed in the diaspora and in the refugee camps of Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon, are denied the internationally recognized right of return. They have had their lands and homes taken from them by armed and “legal” force, are subject to collective punishment, prolonged states of siege, the absolute and deliberately destructive control of their daily movements. Where South Africa instituted the pass laws, the checkpoints that have proliferated all over the West Bank and at the exits from Gaza prevent students from reaching their schools and hospitals, workers from reaching their places or work, keep farmers from their fields, the sick from the few hospitals that survive to serve them. The illegal settlements, that in contravention of all international laws regarding occupation have proliferated across the West Bank, are designed to be permanent “facts on the ground” and have divided recognized Palestinian territory into segmented islets, into besieged Bantustans, with the intent of preventing a contiguous Palestinian state. A so-called security wall, illegally built, as even the Israeli Supreme Court recognized, on Palestinian territory, has cut farmers from their lands and turned formerly prosperous villages into isolated prisons. Regular Israeli military incursions into Palestinian cities and refugee camps, and bombings from the air, have killed innumerable civilians, many of them children. Since the election of Hamas, in fair and open elections, Israel has subjected the civilian population of Gaza to a prolonged state of siege, designed to suffocate them into submission, depriving them at will of water and power, medical supplies and food, and of access to the outside world. The most recent, all-out assault on Gaza, the disproportionate and bloody use of excessive force, is no act of self-defense, but the dramatic extension of an insidious policy of extermination of a people that refuses to disappear.
Every one of these acts is a crime against humanity. In their ensemble, they constitute one of the most massive, ethnocidal atrocities of modern times. Almost alone among nations, Israel acts in flagrant violation of international law and UN resolutions and does so with impunity. That it can do so is in large part the consequence of the uncritical support offered to Israel by a succession of American administrations. Without the military and economic aid of the United States, which amounts to more than a third of all US foreign aid, Israel could not have mounted its violent offensives against the Palestinians or Lebanon, could not maintain its security apparatus, could not afford the illegal settlements that seek to expand Israel into what remains of Palestinian territory. The United States has supplied the F-16s that are bombarding the Palestinians, their schools, police stations and mosques, and the cluster bombs that continue to kill and maim children and farmers in southern Lebanon. America continues to support Israel to the tune of billions every year at the expense of US taxpayers and at the expense of its moral standing in the world.
You will continue to do so, according to your own web page, because “our first and incontrovertible commitment in the Middle East must be to the security of Israel, America’s strongest ally in the region.” You and your Vice-President, Joe Biden, not only “defend and support the annual foreign aid package that involves both military and economic assistance to Israel”, but moreover “have advocated increased foreign aid budgets to ensure that these funding priorities are met.” In doing so, you lend your support, in the name of the United States, to a regime no less criminal in its acts and in its policies towards its own minority population and its dispossessed Palestinian neighbors than South Africa was in the 1980s. Then, it was argued, South Africa was our strongest ally in the region, a bulwark in the war against communism, a crucial supplier of uranium and other minerals, a prosperous Western-style democracy, if not the only democracy on the continent. To bring down the South African apartheid regime, it was argued, would be to create chaos in southern Africa, unleash a bloodbath in which whites and blacks alike would suffer, and pave the way for a communist or dictatorial postcolonial regime. The divestment movement, a non-violent coalition of students and academics, union members and churches, came together in the spirit of the Civil Rights movement to challenge those self-serving assumptions. It changed the direction of US foreign policy, disgracing its support of a racist regime, and placed effective pressure on the apartheid regime to begin serious negotiations with the ANC. Through a combination of diplomacy and divestment, we did end apartheid, making way for a functioning multi-racial democracy that confronts its challenges, indeed, but has not dissolved into chaos or tyranny.
It is time for the United States to place a similar pressure on Israel. That Israel has been America’s beneficiary, unchallenged in its war crimes and in its acts of terror, uncontested for its racist civil constitution and illegal occupations, has not been to the United States’ advantage. On the contrary, such unquestioning support of Israel has fuelled the legitimate anger of the Islamic world, supplied the justification for terrorism, and continually tarnished the United States’ reputation among the democracies of the world. That the United States has stood so often alone in defending Israel before the court of world opinion in the United Nations is not a sign of its virtue, but of the obstinacy and arrogance of its stance. But it is not for the sake of the reputation or advantage of the United States that you should take a new path in relation to Israel. It is in the name of justice. It is not just to support the territorial ambitions, realized settlement by settlement, of a Zionist minority in the region. It is not just to continue to supply Israel with the most advanced weapons and the most deadly arms in order that it may murder civilians, children and policemen. It is not just that we should support Israel with all our diplomatic force and financial aid, while leaving Israel’s victims to die slowly for lack of food, medicine, water and power. It is not just that we should sacrifice a dispossessed people for the security of a state that discriminates and expropriates, continually and violently ignores UN resolutions and international appeals, collectively punishes those whose right to resist occupation is recognized in international law.
There is no road to peace through such injustice. It may be that the compromise in the end will be the establishment and security of two separate states. Almost certainly, the only hope of a lasting solution is a single state in Israel/Palestine, committed to the civil and human rights of all peoples within its boundaries, irrespective of religion or ethnicity. That is, after all, the standard to which we hold all other states in the world, Israel alone excepted. But no solution at all will be possible until we hold Israel accountable for its criminal violence and its illegal acts, until we cease to supply it with the means to pursue a course of domination and expansion, with arms and warplanes, with finance and diplomatic support. In wake of the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, your recent expression of “deep concern” is not enough. It is time for constructive disengagement from Israel, financial, diplomatic, military. What worked in the case of South Africa, divestment and pressure, may finally work in the Middle East.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Dear President Elect Obama,
On his third day in office President Grant revoked two pardons that had been granted by President Andrew Johnson. President Nixon also undid a pardon that had been granted by President Lyndon Johnson. There may be other examples of this, as these two have somewhat accidentally come up in a discussion focused on numerous examples of presidents undoing pardons that they had themselves granted, something the current president did last week. (See http://pardonpower.com ). In 2001, President George W. Bush’s lawyers advised him that he could undo a pardon that President Clinton had granted.
Much of the discussion of this history of revoking pardons deals with the question of whether a pardon can still be revoked after actually reaching the hands of the pardonee, or after various other obscure lines are crossed in the process of issuing and enforcing of the pardon. If President Bush issues blanket pardons to dozens of criminals in his administration for crimes that he himself authorized, he will probably — with the exception of Libby — not even name them, much less initiate any processes through which they are each formally notified of the pardons. He will be pardoning people of crimes they have not yet been charged with, so the question of timing is something you are unlikely to have to worry about (except perhaps with Libby).
Virtually none of the discussion of these matters ever addresses the appropriateness or legitimacy of the pardons involved or of the revoking of them. The history would appear to establish that you will have the power to revoke Bush’s pardons. I want to stress that you will also have a moral responsibility to do so and a legal requirement to do so. Morally and legally, you have no choice in this matter. When you take the oath of office, you will be promising to faithfully execute the laws of the land. Through Article VI of our Constitution, the Geneva Conventions and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment are the supreme laws of this land. Those laws bind you to prosecute violations, including torture and other war crimes of which Bush, Cheney, and their subordinates are guilty and which Bush is likely to try to pardon.
Bush’s pardons will not be like other past pardons. Even when his father pardoned the Iran-Contra criminals, he was pardoning crimes for which President Reagan, not he himself, held ultimate responsibility. Here we are facing the unprecedented outrage of a president pardoning crimes that he openly admits having authorized. The closest thing to this in U.S. history thus far has been Bush’s commutation of Scooter Libby’s sentence, to which he is expected to add a pardon. Libby was convicted of obstruction of justice in an investigation that was headed to the president. Evidence introduced in the trial, including a hand-written note by the vice president, implicated Bush, and former Press Secretary Scott McClellan has since testified that Bush authorized the exposure of an undercover agent, that being the crime that was under investigation.
The idea that the pardon power constitutionally includes such pardons ignores a thousand year tradition in which no man can sit in judgment of himself, and the fact that James Madison and George Mason argued that the reason we needed the impeachment power was that a president might some day try to pardon someone for a crime that he himself was involved in. If impeachment was created to handle the abuse of pardoning a crime the president was himself involved with, how can we imagine that the pardon power legitimizes such abuse, much less the pardoning of crimes authorized by the president, much less the pardoning of obstruction of an investigation into a crime committed by the president? In fact, all such pardons are themselves obstruction of justice, as well as violations of treaties requiring the president to prosecute the types of crimes involved.
The problem is not preemptive pardons of people not yet tried and convicted. The problem is not blanket pardons of unnamed masses of people. Both of those types of pardons have been issued in the past and have their appropriate place. The problem is the complete elimination of any semblance of the rule of law if Bush pardons his subordinates for crimes he instructed or authorized them to commit. We elected you to restore the rule of law, and you will soon have the opportunity to either do so or to place a final nail in its coffin. Bush is likely to attempt to pardon torture, warrantless spying, all sorts of war crimes, fraud and aggressive war, and the various abuses of the politicized Justice Department.
We will call on the courts to challenge these pardons and on Congress to reject them. We will demand that Congress reject any nominee for attorney general who accepts such pardons as legitimate. But we are also asking you for leadership. We’ve elected you for it. We strongly encourage you to uphold your oath of office and faithfully execute the laws, not the illegal decrees of your criminal predecessor. If you do this for us, if you help ensure that government of, by, and for the people does not indeed perish from the earth, we will commit to working with you in the years ahead as you advance the eternal project of improving our democracy.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Or The World Order lead by the US and the rule of International Law will definitely fall apart
The Attack by Israeli forces to the populated Gaza strip and the silence of the world could mean the end of the structures and institutions created after the Second World War. If a new order emerge of the chaos in the international relations when the old rules are been used discretionary by the world powers and the United States loses definitely its position is still not clear. Shall Russia, China and Europe work together a new framework or are we heading to a time of disorder and chaos? Obama has the historical opportunity to revive at least the illusion of an international order respected by everyone. He can choose now if his administration will be a respected one by showing leadership or will continue the path of G. W. Bush and further destroy the US reputation.
The passivity in the blooded attack by military Israeli forces to an enemy with almost nothing to put against in military terms and the bombardment of cities with huge numbers of civilian causalities can be compared with the worst crimes perpetrated in times of war in the past. Here are Guernica, Warszawa Ghetto, Dresden, Faluya, Leningrad and Gaza in the same shameful company.
To clarify my opinion that we are heading to the total disintegration of the World Order can we take some recent events in the international arena.
Georgia attacked the South Ossetian capital last year in order to recover what they considered was Georgian territory from the separatist that wanted being included in the Russian Federation. Russian reacted with unexpected force sending a large contingent of tanks and military aircraft to “punish the aggressor” and “save lives of Russian Citizens”. The Russian military power crashed in a few days the Georgian army and bombed a few small towns in Georgia. The situation bring the world to the edge of a bigger war when the USA send war ships to the black sea and the NATO made sharp statements against Russia. The press in the West condemned Russia without exception. The Russian opinion could not understand why the West could see what was happened there, but the Russians government retired relatively quickly from Georgia due to the international press ion. Now, the question is: Do you thing that Russia shall doubt to bomb anybody that treat their citizens in the future when Israel can do that without punishment? The relation of forces involved in the two cases can not be different in any realistic timeframe.
We can compare too how the so called “International Community” i.e. The US and the EU treated the conflict between Serbia and Kosovo and how they treated Israel-Palestine. It is obvious that despite the great similarities in the two conflicts the reactions are very different.
Serbia send the army to take control of the historical Serbian region of Kosovo that was claiming independency and carried out armed attacks to the Serbian population and government institutions in the region. The population of Kosovo was mainly emigrated Albans that had become majority. The West reacted with unrestricted support to the Kosovo rebels and together with the US bombed Serbia in order to stop the Serbian military operation in the region that was classified as “Ethnic Cleaning” by human right defenders in the West.
In Palestine have we a people that had been displaced from their properties, houses and soil during more that 60 years by now. All attempts to resist this crime have been declared as terrorism, despite that the UN: s foundation chart gave the right to every people in the world to resist foreign occupation by any means. We have to have in mind that the Nazis also called terrorists to the resistance fighters in France, Norway, Greece, Italy, Russia and many others places.
However when the Palestinian people resist the “Ethnic Cleaning” of Palestine and Israel react as Serbia did when Kosovo Albans claim Serbian soil, West react completely different, despite that Kosovo was Serbian from the beginning meanwhile Palestine had been Palestine for more that thousands years now. Here nobody talk about an independent Palestine, About a Palestine State, about to bomb Israel in order to put a stop to the killing of the Palestinians as they did to save the Albanian population from Serbian retaliation. Instead The West recognises Kosovo as an independent state and gave the power to a narco-terrorist organisation in Kosovo.
When Israel react harder than Russia did in Georgia to the attacks of the Islamic resistance in Gaza nobody send wars ship to the coasts of Israel as they did with Russia. Not Russia that take note of the situation and surely glad can cons ate that there is not such a thing as international law. The governments and free press of the West have not condemn Israel as they did with Russia and surely they are not going to treat with broken commercial and military cooperation as they did with Russia.
We see the end of the World leaded by the West.
If the US chose the wrong way this time nobody will hear what they have to say in the future. Not Russia, Not China, Not South America, Nobody. Maybe is better in this way. Why maintain in artificial life something that does work anyway. The Chairman of the UN General assembly seems to think in similar terms when he said last week that the Security Council is in practice dead and called to the General Assembly to treat the siege and bombardment of Civilians in Gaza. The Result was 142 votes in favour of the condemnation of Israel, 4 against (of which one vote was against because Venezuela demanded harder measures and the others 3 were the US, Israel and a little Island in the Pacific) and 8 abstentions. This shows a broad international consensus about what the world feels and what the US supports.
Barak Obama has one time opportunity to initiate his period with justice and restore some credibility to the damaged image of the US. In a time in which the US is heading to an economic meltdown and thereby further loose of its influence in the international relations will be sound and wise to adhere to the rest of the World and stop being the eternal opponent to the will of the community of nations. We can wait and see what Barak Obama will do but not so long time. He has at most 6 month to begin deliver concrete changes in the right direction. After that the disillusion will growth exponentially in the US and around the world.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Or The World Order lead by the US and the rule of International Law will definitely fall apart
The Attack by Israeli forces to the populated Gaza strip and the silence of the world could mean the end of the structures and institutions created after the Second World War. If a new order emerge of the chaos in the international relations when the old rules are been used discretionary by the world powers and the United States loses definitely its position is still not clear. Shall Russia, China and Europe work together a new framework or are we heading to a time of disorder and chaos? Obama has the historical opportunity to revive at least the illusion of an international order respected by everyone. He can choose now if his administration will be a respected one by showing leadership or will continue the path of G. W. Bush and further destroy the US reputation.
The passivity in the blooded attack by military Israeli forces to an enemy with almost nothing to put against in military terms and the bombardment of cities with huge numbers of civilian causalities can be compared with the worst crimes perpetrated in times of war in the past. Here are Guernica, Warszawa Ghetto, Dresden, Faluya, Leningrad and Gaza in the same shameful company.
To clarify my opinion that we are heading to the total disintegration of the World Order can we take some recent events in the international arena.
Georgia attacked the South Ossetian capital last year in order to recover what they considered was Georgian territory from the separatist that wanted being included in the Russian Federation. Russian reacted with unexpected force sending a large contingent of tanks and military aircraft to “punish the aggressor” and “save lives of Russian Citizens”. The Russian military power crashed in a few days the Georgian army and bombed a few small towns in Georgia. The situation bring the world to the edge of a bigger war when the USA send war ships to the black sea and the NATO made sharp statements against Russia. The press in the West condemned Russia without exception. The Russian opinion could not understand why the West could see what was happened there, but the Russians government retired relatively quickly from Georgia due to the international press ion. Now, the question is: Do you thing that Russia shall doubt to bomb anybody that treat their citizens in the future when Israel can do that without punishment? The relation of forces involved in the two cases can not be different in any realistic timeframe.
We can compare too how the so called “International Community” i.e. The US and the EU treated the conflict between Serbia and Kosovo and how they treated Israel-Palestine. It is obvious that despite the great similarities in the two conflicts the reactions are very different.
Serbia send the army to take control of the historical Serbian region of Kosovo that was claiming independency and carried out armed attacks to the Serbian population and government institutions in the region. The population of Kosovo was mainly emigrated Albans that had become majority. The West reacted with unrestricted support to the Kosovo rebels and together with the US bombed Serbia in order to stop the Serbian military operation in the region that was classified as “Ethnic Cleaning” by human right defenders in the West.
In Palestine have we a people that had been displaced from their properties, houses and soil during more that 60 years by now. All attempts to resist this crime have been declared as terrorism, despite that the UN: s foundation chart gave the right to every people in the world to resist foreign occupation by any means. We have to have in mind that the Nazis also called terrorists to the resistance fighters in France, Norway, Greece, Italy, Russia and many others places.
However when the Palestinian people resist the “Ethnic Cleaning” of Palestine and Israel react as Serbia did when Kosovo Albans claim Serbian soil, West react completely different, despite that Kosovo was Serbian from the beginning meanwhile Palestine had been Palestine for more that thousands years now. Here nobody talk about an independent Palestine, About a Palestine State, about to bomb Israel in order to put a stop to the killing of the Palestinians as they did to save the Albanian population from Serbian retaliation. Instead The West recognises Kosovo as an independent state and gave the power to a narco-terrorist organisation in Kosovo.
When Israel react harder than Russia did in Georgia to the attacks of the Islamic resistance in Gaza nobody send wars ship to the coasts of Israel as they did with Russia. Not Russia that take note of the situation and surely glad can cons ate that there is not such a thing as international law. The governments and free press of the West have not condemn Israel as they did with Russia and surely they are not going to treat with broken commercial and military cooperation as they did with Russia.
We see the end of the World leaded by the West.
If the US chose the wrong way this time nobody will hear what they have to say in the future. Not Russia, Not China, Not South America, Nobody. Maybe is better in this way. Why maintain in artificial life something that does work anyway. The Chairman of the UN General assembly seems to think in similar terms when he said last week that the Security Council is in practice dead and called to the General Assembly to treat the siege and bombardment of Civilians in Gaza. The Result was 142 votes in favour of the condemnation of Israel, 4 against (of which one vote was against because Venezuela demanded harder measures and the others 3 were the US, Israel and a little Island in the Pacific) and 8 abstentions. This shows a broad international consensus about what the world feels and what the US supports.
Barak Obama has one time opportunity to initiate his period with justice and restore some credibility to the damaged image of the US. In a time in which the US is heading to an economic meltdown and thereby further loose of its influence in the international relations will be sound and wise to adhere to the rest of the World and stop being the eternal opponent to the will of the community of nations. We can wait and see what Barak Obama will do but not so long time. He has at most 6 month to begin deliver concrete changes in the right direction. After that the disillusion will growth exponentially in the US and around the world.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Obama has to support the International Tribunal for War Crimes against Israel…
Or The World Order lead by the US and the rule of International Law will definitely fall apart
The Attack by Israeli forces to the populated Gaza strip and the silence of the world could mean the end of the structures and institutions created after the Second World War. If a new order emerge of the chaos in the international relations when the old rules are been used discretionary by the world powers and the United States loses definitely its position is still not clear. Shall Russia, China and Europe work together a new framework or are we heading to a time of disorder and chaos? Obama has the historical opportunity to revive at least the illusion of an international order respected by everyone. He can choose now if his administration will be a respected one by showing leadership or will continue the path of G. W. Bush and further destroy the US reputation.
The passivity in the blooded attack by military Israeli forces to an enemy with almost nothing to put against in military terms and the bombardment of cities with huge numbers of civilian causalities can be compared with the worst crimes perpetrated in times of war in the past. Here are Guernica, Warszawa Ghetto, Dresden, Faluya, Leningrad and Gaza in the same shameful company.
To clarify my opinion that we are heading to the total disintegration of the World Order can we take some recent events in the international arena.
Georgia attacked the South Ossetian capital last year in order to recover what they considered was Georgian territory from the separatist that wanted being included in the Russian Federation. Russian reacted with unexpected force sending a large contingent of tanks and military aircraft to “punish the aggressor” and “save lives of Russian Citizens”. The Russian military power crashed in a few days the Georgian army and bombed a few small towns in Georgia. The situation bring the world to the edge of a bigger war when the USA send war ships to the black sea and the NATO made sharp statements against Russia. The press in the West condemned Russia without exception. The Russian opinion could not understand why the West could see what was happened there, but the Russians government retired relatively quickly from Georgia due to the international press ion. Now, the question is: Do you thing that Russia shall doubt to bomb anybody that treat their citizens in the future when Israel can do that without punishment? The relation of forces involved in the two cases can not be different in any realistic timeframe.
We can compare too how the so called “International Community” i.e. The US and the EU treated the conflict between Serbia and Kosovo and how they treated Israel-Palestine. It is obvious that despite the great similarities in the two conflicts the reactions are very different.
Serbia send the army to take control of the historical Serbian region of Kosovo that was claiming independency and carried out armed attacks to the Serbian population and government institutions in the region. The population of Kosovo was mainly emigrated Albans that had become majority. The West reacted with unrestricted support to the Kosovo rebels and together with the US bombed Serbia in order to stop the Serbian military operation in the region that was classified as “Ethnic Cleaning” by human right defenders in the West.
In Palestine have we a people that had been displaced from their properties, houses and soil during more that 60 years by now. All attempts to resist this crime have been declared as terrorism, despite that the UN: s foundation chart gave the right to every people in the world to resist foreign occupation by any means. We have to have in mind that the Nazis also called terrorists to the resistance fighters in France, Norway, Greece, Italy, Russia and many others places.
However when the Palestinian people resist the “Ethnic Cleaning” of Palestine and Israel react as Serbia did when Kosovo Albans claim Serbian soil, West react completely different, despite that Kosovo was Serbian from the beginning meanwhile Palestine had been Palestine for more that thousands years now. Here nobody talk about an independent Palestine, About a Palestine State, about to bomb Israel in order to put a stop to the killing of the Palestinians as they did to save the Albanian population from Serbian retaliation. Instead The West recognises Kosovo as an independent state and gave the power to a narco-terrorist organisation in Kosovo.
When Israel react harder than Russia did in Georgia to the attacks of the Islamic resistance in Gaza nobody send wars ship to the coasts of Israel as they did with Russia. Not Russia that take note of the situation and surely glad can cons ate that there is not such a thing as international law. The governments and free press of the West have not condemn Israel as they did with Russia and surely they are not going to treat with broken commercial and military cooperation as they did with Russia.
We see the end of the World leaded by the West.
If the US chose the wrong way this time nobody will hear what they have to say in the future. Not Russia, Not China, Not South America, Nobody. Maybe is better in this way. Why maintain in artificial life something that does work anyway. The Chairman of the UN General assembly seems to think in similar terms when he said last week that the Security Council is in practice dead and called to the General Assembly to treat the siege and bombardment of Civilians in Gaza. The Result was 142 votes in favour of the condemnation of Israel, 4 against (of which one vote was against because Venezuela demanded harder measures and the others 3 were the US, Israel and a little Island in the Pacific) and 8 abstentions. This shows a broad international consensus about what the world feels and what the US supports.
Barak Obama has one time opportunity to initiate his period with justice and restore some credibility to the damaged image of the US. In a time in which the US is heading to an economic meltdown and thereby further loose of its influence in the international relations will be sound and wise to adhere to the rest of the World and stop being the eternal opponent to the will of the community of nations. We can wait and see what Barak Obama will do but not so long time. He has at most 6 month to begin deliver concrete changes in the right direction. After that the disillusion will growth exponentially in the US and around the world.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 20, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Obama has to support the International Tribunal for War Crimes against Israel…
Or The World Order lead by the US and the rule of International Law will definitely fall apart
The Attack by Israeli forces to the populated Gaza strip and the silence of the world could mean the end of the structures and institutions created after the Second World War. If a new order emerge of the chaos in the international relations when the old rules are been used discretionary by the world powers and the United States loses definitely its position is still not clear. Shall Russia, China and Europe work together a new framework or are we heading to a time of disorder and chaos? Obama has the historical opportunity to revive at least the illusion of an international order respected by everyone. He can choose now if his administration will be a respected one by showing leadership or will continue the path of G. W. Bush and further destroy the US reputation.
Posted in Uncategorized on January 19, 2009 by freepalestinenow2009
Nu när anklagelserna om krigsbrott verka ha fått fart måste man gå tillbaka och se vad Israel säger. Israels propagandister (betalda och icke-betalda) argument att de höga civila offren berodde på att Hamas gömde sig bland civila kan lätt avfördas med lite rätt tankegång och rätt fakta.
För den första vad skulle ni tycka om man hade fått ett tips om en mycket farlig person beväpnat med kniv i en galleria en lördagsförmiddag, alltså full med folk, och man skickade dit den nationella insatsstyrka full och tung beväpnat och de började skjuta urskillningslös inne i galleria med den kanske giltiga avsikt att skjuta ihjäl den farliga brottslingen innan han skadar någon? Skulle Ni tycka att polisen gjorde ett bra jobb? Alla rättänkande människor inser att det är jävlig fel metod utom några korkade fanatiker som stödde detta i Sveriges tidningar och TV-kanaler.
För den andra har alla folk som lever under ockupation rätt att göra motstånd med alla tillgängliga medel enligt FN stadgar, art. 51. Nu är det så att palestinierna inte har tillgång till flygplan, artilleri, pansarvagnar, eller andra vapen som en självständig stat skulle kunna anskaffa. Då tar dem vad som finns till hands, inklusive mycket dramatiska åtgärder.
För den tredje Palestina har inte heller en armé. Det finns inga förläggningar där militära enheter är samlade eller regemente. De har miliser, alltså vanliga civila med mer eller mindre militär utbildning och organisation. I fallet Hamas har de troligen någon form av officerskår med lön och dessutom en polisstyrka som också är vanliga anställda. Men största majoritet av de 15-20 000 medlemmar är folk som bor bland de andra. För att jaga dem måste man söka eller bomba i princip allt, för det vet man inte säkert var de sover, äter eller uppehåller sig. Detta visste Israel eller så är dem helt korkade.
Att Hamas inte byggde skyddsrum för den civila befolkningen är nästan skrattretande och visar också på vilken intellektuellt nivå ligger dem som försvarar den oförsvarliga. Gaza har under nästan två år varit belägrade, vilken i sig är en krigshandling, så att nästan ingen mat, inga mediciner, inget material kom in och inga pengar heller. Hur i helvete skulle man bygga skyddsrum när folk inte ens har mat eller vanliga bostäder! Belägring stöddes av USA och genomfördes av Israel i syfte att störta Hamas som kom till makten tack vare den enorma inkompetensen, stupiditeten och fanatismen i Washington och Israel.
En annan vidd spridd uppfattning är att Israel har en av världens bästa armé och soldater. Denna myt har också tagit skadad när de istället för att skicka in dessa ”rambo” valde att bomba på avstånd utan urskillning med tungt artilleri rakt in i en urban miljö. Om de hade varit så bra som de påstår sig att vara kunde de gå in och bekämpa milismän på gatorna, man mot man så att säga. Dessa 10-15 000 israeliska soldater valde fegt istället att hålla sig på avstånd och gjorde enstaka strandhugg in i städerna och alltid gick dem in med stridflyg och pansar som jämnade marken framför dem. De drogs sig snabbt tillbaka när deras förluster började stiga (deras förluster kan ligga på minst det dubbla de anger). Av de 22 dagar långa slakten, gick IDF in endast de 5-6 sista dagarna och när de insåg till sist att det var en omöjlig uppgift inledde de en vapenvila. Det pratas naturligtvis inte om det med faktum kvarstår att dessa speciella trupper och elitförband sket på sig när det gällde att slå på mer eller mindre jämlika villkor. Alltså om det var fegt av Hamas att inte gå ut på den öppna fälten för att bli utplånade med artilleri och stridsflyg, var det tveklös fegt av IDF att inte skicka deras infanteri för att slå ut Hamas milisen. De var helt enkelt för fega för det!
På den militära planen har Israel som var väntat inte lyckas med något. Det visar deras ofattbara inkompetens. Enligt en säkerhetskälla i Israel finns tunnlarna kvar eller kan byggas på nytt relativt snabbt, raketer avfyrades medveten efter den ensidiga vapenvila i en klar signal att de fortfarande finns, av de 15 000 Hamas milismän kanske 300-400 miste livet, kravet på att lyfta belägring har fört fram från tunga politiker, vilken är ett enormt nederlag för Tel-Aviv som håller på att förlora det starkaste kortet de hade för att få Hamas på fall: hunger i Gaza, Mubarak och Abbas har förlorat folkligt stöd p.g.a. sin agerande och nu försöker Mubarak rädda det som räddas kan, och sämst av allt: Nu har världen börja adressera grunden för konflikten: den illegala ockupationen! Notera hur Israels propaganda apparat försöker med alla medel tysta den frågan! Det förlorade dem också!
Att tro att man kan gå in tättbefolkade orter och skjuta vild med massiv eldgivning gav endast världens avsky för det stora antalet civila offer. Det sägs att andelen civila offer ligger runt 50 % men detta därför att man räknar som civila endast kvinnor och barn. Andelen borde ligga på ca 60-70 %. Alltså efter att ha lagt städer i ruiner så att folk inte kan leva där lyckades dem bli av med ca 300 milismän av en total på ca 15 000. Nu är det så att kanske VAR målet att lägga städerna i ruinerna. Alltså en gigantisk och brutal etnisk resning som överträffar många gånger om vad Serbien någon gång gjorde i Kosovo. Den gången bombades Serbien till återhållsamhet och Kosovo fick självständighet. I detta fall kan vi inte hoppas på något liknande om inte Ni sätter er i grunderna för konflikten och bloggar vidare om det. Tystnaden är bruten. Nu är det hög tid att föra fram vad det här handlar om. Ockupationen!
Mediakrig: Mediekonglomerat mot infoguerrilla
Israel fick vika sig denna gång för den massiva informationskampanj från tusentals bloggare, yuotubare, skribenter och demonstranter som trots den mediala blockaden lyckades föra fram sanningen och tvinga deras regeringar att agera. Detta är en triumf för det fria ordet och för de nya mediernas demokratiseringseffekt. Nu kommer dem att intensifiera deras försök att kontrollera Internet med olika lagar och deras säkerhetstjänster kommer att skanna det för att hitta de obekväma åsikterna. Det öppna nätet är ett stort hot mot deras monopol på ”sanningen”.
Ett annat misstag med den här slakten, som i medierna kallas Gazakriget, är att Israel har genom att bomba skolor där civila sökte skydd, sjukhus och otaliga civila bostäder och nu senast bomba Gaza stad med stridflyg och tungartilleri med otaliga civila offer öppnar dörren för alla slags vedergällningar mot sin egen befolkning. Det betyder att våldets spiral kommer att fortsätta och de barn som ser det kommer att bli framtidens krigare på båda sidor.
Om det hade varit vilken annan stat som helst som hade gjort sig skyldiga till detta skulle hela världssamfundet varit beredd att bomba förbrytaren. Varför ingenting händer i detta fall är ett klart tecken på hyckleriet i den officiella diskursen om terrorism, mänskliga rättigheter, ”skurkstater” och ”Ondskans Axel”. Allt detta blir en tom prat när man bombar en hel stad utan att någon höjer rösten. Inte de vanliga röster i alla fall som fördömde skarpt Ryssland, Serbien och andra när de utförde operationer i samma riktning. Den internationella lagstiftningen blev därmed också allvarig skadad.
Den internationella opinionen kan inte acceptera något annat än en totalt tillbakadragande från alla de ockuperade områdena i Palestina till 48 eller 67 års gränser, skapande av en sammanhängande palestinsk stat och skapande av säkra gränser för båda stater för att på en gång på alla sätta slut för den 60 åriga slakten. Israel och palestinierna måste pressas ekonomisk och politisk genom allmänhetens bojkott och klagomål. Regeringar i världen kommer inte att göra något åt saken. Det måste vara folket runt om i världen som bojkottar den starka parten, i detta fall Israel, att dra sig tillbaka till de erkända internationella gränserna och på så sätt möjliggöra en palestinsk stat som kan leva i fred med Israel inom erkända gränser. Innan Israel drar sig tillbaka kommer ingen fred att vara möjligt. Utan en palestinsk stat kommer alla möjliga desperata grupper och tendenser från ett förtryckt folk sedan 60 år till uttryck. Också åtgärder som ett folk i frihet, suveränitet och verklig demokrati inte skulle tillgripa.
Gaza kan inte fortsätta att vara belägrade av den sionistiska regeringen! Hamnarna, det territoriella vattnet utanför kusten och dess gasfyndigheter på bottenhavet måste vara i palestiniernas händer och så gränserna till alla frisinnade stater runt omkring så de kan föra in mat och allt vad de behöver för att leva som ett fritt folk.
Så småningom ska hela det palestinska området nå fullständigt självständighet. Det är den enda vägen till varaktig fred! Det finns ingen annan väg. Allt annat är bluff som inte leder någonstans! Vi måste komma ihåg att den nuvarande situationen har stort del av sitt ursprung i den långvariga belägringen av Gaza och mer grundläggande i den illegala ockupationen av Palestina sedan 60 år tillbaka.
Låt inte missledas av Hamas tjatet. Om det inte är dem kommer andra i deras ställe. Orsaken ligger i ockupationen så dess lösning! För den delen ska palestinierna själva välja sina ledare när de blir fria på riktigt och det måste omvärlden respektera. Det finns ingen demokrati utan verklig suveränitet och frihet!
En fri Palestina är den enda lösningen så vi slipper mer blod på båda sidor. Lämna alla ockuperade områdena, lämna alla bosättningar, kompensera de som har blivit bestulna på sina hus och mark, låt de som vill återvända till Palestina göra det! Kräv ömsesidig erkännande! Att Palestinierna erkänner Israel räcker inte. Israel måste erkänna Palestina som en fri stat också!
Kriget i Palestina inte över tills de stulna områdena återlämnas. Enda vägen till en varaktig fred är en totalt återlämnande av de ockuperade områdena i Palestina till FN- godkända gränser! Nu när världens folk har lyft sina blickar mot den här 60-årig lång konflikt är det tid att kräva att Israel drar sig tillbaka till de internationella erkända gränserna.
“Bandits with planes …
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children’s blood.”
(Pablo Neruda’s poem About the Nazis raids in Spain)
Läs också mitt tidigare inlägg from den 9 januari:
Nobody likes thieves
Nobody likes thieves. It is about time people started calling a spade a spade. True, Jews were incinerated in ovens in Nazi Germany (so they say six million of them, or however many) in 12 years. 26 million Soviet citizens died in 4 years. True, Hamas fired rockets at Jewish settlements set up on the former homes of Palestinians, taken away from them by Israelis. True, Israeli civilians were killed in the process. But how many innocent civilians has Israel massacred?
True, Hamas fired rockets at Jewish settlements set up on the former homes of Palestinians, taken away from them by Israelis. True, Israeli civilians were killed in the process. But how many innocent civilians has Israel massacred? And then it claims it is the eternal victim?
Nobody likes thieves. And why is it that every time one places an article which places in question the policy of Tel Aviv, that an army of cyber hackers appears, sending viruses to forums and news sites which “dare” to claim that Israel is not in the right? Is this freedom of speech? Is this freedom of expression?
Nobody likes thieves. It is about time there was an open and free and fair debate about the entire Middle East question and let us launch this debate, once and for all.
For a start, nobody is being anti-Semitic in bringing into question the policies defended by Tel Aviv, the more so because the word “Semitic” refers to the languages spoken in the Middle East region, including Arabic, and therefore any such accusation is as ludicrous as it is inaccurate, so let this be the end to the “anti-Semitic” accusation once and for all.
Nobody likes thieves. It is about time Israel ’s sheer hypocrisy and idiotic stupidity were outed, once and for all. How can this country claim any right and reason is on its side when it is flouting international law with every second that passes? The United Nations Organization set out a very clear definition as to what Israel is and the territory that Israel occupies today has nothing whatsoever to do with the area constituted by international law, therefore Israel is in violation of international law while it occupies territories that do not belong to it. Israel is a thief. Nobody likes thieves.
No occupation, no problem
No occupation, no problem. Why is it that Israel does not understand the simple precept that it has no right whatsoever to occupy lands which do not belong to it? Giving up the Gaza strip does not equate the building of colonies on the West Bank .
Nobody likes thieves. Until Israel moves back to the territories designated as “Israel” when the country was set up, carved out of Palestinian lands by an international community shocked by Nazi humanitarian crimes against this ethnic group, among many others (who mentions the Negro holocaust – slavery – for instance, in which tens of millions of Negroes were slaughtered?) how can it expect to claim the moral high ground? No occupation, no problem.
And regarding “atrocities”, so long as Israeli forces slaughter 250 children in two weeks, any claims that Israeli civilians are victims to Hamas rockets must surely fall on deaf ears. And what are the Palestinians supposed to do? Sit back, watch their lands be taken over, place their hands on their hearts and sing “Hallelujah”? No occupation, no problem. Nobody likes thieves.
War crimes
The UN High Commissioner on Human Rights declared on Friday that war crimes may have been committed by Israeli soldiers in Gaza . War crimes were already committed in Palestinian territories and in the Lebanon by Israeli forces, without the international community raising an eyelid. Yet these days, practically everyone outside Israel agrees that enough is enough. The sad thing is that Israel ’s policies give rise to those who claim that Hitler was right and to who question why the Jews have been thrown out of everywhere, practically, during the last five thousand years of history.
Of course war crimes were committed by Israelis in Gaza . Bombing a UN school for a start is called what? Self-defence? And 250 children in ten days? Is this what Tel Aviv calls an Act of God? Or Yahweh?
The way forward
Israel exists, period. But Israel means the original boundaries drawn up by the UNO. Until Israel respects the norms of international law, it cannot claim full rights as a member of the international community. Firstly, Israel must leave the lands it occupies illegally. Nobody likes thieves. No occupation, no problem.
Secondly, the international community has to decide upon the status of Jerusalem. It does not belong to Jews, or Arabs. It belongs to everyone. Therefore why not constitute an international city there, set up the UNHQ in Jerusalem and make it an international forum for debate?
As we see, the solution is perfectly simple. Until then, there will be problems. Nobody likes thieves. No occupation, no problem.
Israeli TV airs telephone call to father after children killed -English
New Israeli strike kills 40 in UN school (DemocracyNow report)
-Israel spokesperson admits Israel broke the cease fire agreement
500 Citizens of Sderot Contradict the Israeli Government
http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/Voices.php/2009/01/15/500-citizens-of-sderot-contradict-the-is
*DN och SVD blockerad bloggar som skriver mot Israels politik. Där har Ni dessa “freedom fighters” ;=) MEN hur lång tid det tar att öppna ett nytt blogg? 5-10 min!! Idioter!!
