OMNI
ISRAEL-PALESTINE ANTHOLOGY#17.
FROM UPRISING 2021TO HAMAS BREAKOUT OCTOBER 7, 2023, TO MURDER OF HAMAS LEADER 2024.
August 10, 2024
Compiled by Dick Bennett FOR A CULTURE OF PEACE, JUSTICE, and
ECOLOGY
(#1 Feb.
22, 2011; #2 Feb. 16, 2012; #3 March 1, 2012; #4 May 18, 2012; #5 August 13,
2012; #6 October 29, 2012; #7 Dec. 17, 2012; #8 March 29, 2013; #9 Oct. 21,
2013; #10 April 28, 2014; #11, July 1, 2015; #12, June 21, 2016; #13, August
13, 2016; #14, May 15, 2021; #15, May 17, 2021; #16, May 25, 2021)
CONTENTS
Rabbi
Arthur Waskow. “…One More Murder.” An important “Hamas” distinction; three tasks.
Julia Frankel. The Unprecedented Death Toll.
George
Yancy. Reporting Judith Butler’s Call
for Ceasefire.
Ahmad Abuznaid,
USCPR. Cease Fire!
LTE on Fida Jiivis’ Stranger in My Own Land.
As’ad AbuKhalil. Rev. of Rashid
Khalidi’s book, The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine.
You
Tube. Speech in Irish Parliament.
Three Views
of Oslo Accords from WRMEA.
Seven Views
of Breakout from WRMEA.
Philip
Weiss. American Anthropological Assoc. Votes
to Boycott Israeli Academic Institutions.
Ramzy
Baroud. Murdered Palestinian Children.
Nada Al
Kahlout. Death of a Palestinian Child.
Palestine
Chronicles. “Save the Children” Report.
Musafa
Sheta. “Assault on Jenin.”
Chris
Hedges and Asa Wistanley on Weaponizing Anti-Semitism v. Jeremy Corbin.
Jeremy Kuzmarov. Israeli Attack on US Ship Remembered.
People’s
Dispatch. Nakba Is Every Day.
SOURCES
I occasionally
list my sources, to support the argument of Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky in Manufacturing
Consent, that the propaganda function of the mass or mainstream media is to
mobilize bias in support of special interests that dominate the state by
controlling news choices. My sources
originate outside the propaganda machine.
The list is not complete: Note Julia Frankel’s six sources.
Answer
Coalition
Chris Hedges Report
Consortium News
Counterpunch
Covert Action Magazine
Julia Frankel’s 6
sources
Mondoweiss (several
articles)
Palestine Chronicle
People’s Dispatch
Sanction Israel Campaign
Syria Direct
The Shalom Report
Truthout
US Campaign
for Palestinian Rights US CPR
Washington
Report on Middle East Affairs (several articles)
You Tube
TEXTS
Except for
two,, all of the essays were published 2021-2023.
I fell behind, not in
collecting good articles, but in editing them for publication. I have now enough for several
Anthologies. When this morning I
received the following essay by Rabbi Waskow, I decided to catch up a little by
reaching back to the last Israel/Palestine Anthology I was compiling in 2023, full
of the horrific killing, with his 2024 essay offering important clarifications
as an introduction.
The
following important letter is addressed to Jewish people everywhere, but I have
had the good fortune of being on Rabbi Waskow’s mailing list for a decade or
more. Always, like this letter, he
speaks to all people for peace. Let us
heed his call to non-Jewish allies to share in an ecological world. Dick
Ismail
Haniyeh, head of the political wing of the Hamas Party, murdered by Netanyahu,
was seeking peace.
The Shalom Report, The Shalom Center
“Ten Haftarahs, One (More) Murder.” 2024.
Dear companions,
We
are in the season when the sacred Jewish calendar ends the year with ten
haftarot. There are three before Tisha B’Av, three of rebuke to prime the
People for accepting that the Temples were destroyed to punish us for our sins.
Then come seven more, moving from the Shabbat after Tisha B’Av to Rosh
Hashanah, the haftarot of comfort and consolation.
But in fact, all ten share a basic understanding of the world. It is a zero-sum
understanding. In the first three haftarot, the Godwrestling people is miserable
because it has sinned against YHWH, and the other nations are triumphant. In
the last seven, Israel is triumphant because it has reconciled with YHWH, and
the other nations are defeated and miserable.
There is very little suggestion that all humanity could be joyful together:
That Israel and all other nations could share triumphantly in walking different
but complementary paths. That YHWH, the Breath of all life, could fit our
differences together to make up the jigsaw puzzle of peace and justice for us all.
I think this zero-sum assumption is a basic mistake. It comes out of a
world-view that is hierarchical. Somebody must be top dog. It can be YHWH,
heard as the Breath of mostly-Jewish iife, telling us what to do. And right
beneath is the people Israel, obeying YHWH and telling everybody else what to
do — except when we sin and others trample on us.
But there is an alternative basic view of the world: it draws deeply on
ecology, and it takes the biological outlook in which all species give life to
each other, into a broader way of thinking in which all cultures and all
polities within the human community also share. From their very differences
they share, they live, and they flourish.
There are a number of passages from the classical Hebrew Prophets that would
express this world-view. There are also a number of passages from prophetic
figures whom we should anoint as true Prophets. From them we can find a far
better series of ten haftarot for this season of the year.
Actually opening the sacred scroll to new Prophets should be one important
project in creating a new Diaspora Judaism.
Now why did I add “one more murder” to the title of this letter
to you?
During the last week, the week when we are supposed to listen to our own
failings as pointing toward our own disasters, the Netanyahu government of
Israel assassinated — that is, murdered — Ismail Haniyeh. Most of the mass media called him a Hamas
leader. Fewer media named him the leader of the political
wing of Hamas.
And that's the crucial difference. Calling him just “Hamas” invites the public
to think of him as one of the villains who planned and carried out the
atrocious October 7th attack on Israeli civilians. But in fact, as the
leader of the political wing of Hamas, he had been doing a lot of planning
toward peace with Israel. He was the key chief Palestinian negotiator for a
ceasefire and return of the captives kidnapped by the military wing on October
7th. And the political wing for months has been trying to work out how
they could join with a transformed Palestinian Authority on the West Bank to
create a broader and peace-oriented Palestinian governing body that could
negotiate a peace between two self-governing peoples, in two states or
confederation. The murder of Haniyeh has made the task much harder.
Why was he murdered by the Israeli ultra-right-wing government led by Mr.
Netanyahu? Because they rejected peace with the Palestinian people, just as the
military wing of Hamas rejects peace with the
Israeli people. Both de-facto governments are obsessed with greed for land,
greed to increase their own power, and the zero-sum “game” that says each of
them must be top dog.
There are three tasks that face the American Jewish community:
(1) Working with non-Jewish allies toward a US government that sees
Israelis, Palestinians, and others as sharing in an ecological world where the
sum of the energy is far greater than zero. Where both peoples can govern
themselves with internal democracy and external peace.
(2) Moving as much as possible of both what we may call the Jewish
Establishment and what we might call Insurgent Jews, to exert their own energy
in direct contact with Israelis and Palestinians of all communities to achieve
a peace between two self-determining peoples.
(3) Inviting American Jews who seek the union of Spirit and Politics for the
pursuit of Justice to join in creating a coherent yet decentralized New
Diaspora Judaism.
For me, that is the future I hope to see for The Shalom Center and many
partners. I welcome your comments on that vision.
With blessings of shalom, Arthur
.
The Shalom Center , 6711 Lincoln
Dr , Philadelphia, PA 19119-3119
Julia
Frankel. “The staggering toll of death +
Palestinians are not ‘regarded as people’ by the rulers of Israel and the U.S.” Nov. 5, 2023.
Forwarded Sonny San Juan via uark.onmicrosoft.com
These
numbers show the staggering toll of the Israel-Hamas war
[The stark difference in the conditions facing displaced
Palestinians and Israelis is not mentioned…the former struggling to survive in
the open air or in camps that are still bombed, the latter protected in safety
and relatively good conditions.]
JERUSALEM
(AP) — The latest Israel-Hamas war has quickly become the deadliest
and most destructive of the five wars fought between the sides since
Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in 2007 from the Palestinian Authority. The fighting erupted on Oct. 7 when
Hamas carried out a surprise attack in southern Israel. Since then, Israel
has relentlessly pounded the Gaza Strip with airstrikes that have
wrought unprecedented destruction, flattening entire neighborhoods. Here’s a look in numbers at the toll of the
war as of Nov. 5, sourced from the Gaza Health Ministry and Israeli
officials, as well as international observers and aid groups: https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-death-toll-numbers-injured-5c9dc40bec95a8408c83f3c2fb759da0?user_email=ba0b200971400943548535de476a7aae1ecc8efec9795edbb54d1547866c36d1&utm_medium=Morning_Wire&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_campaign=Morning%20Wire_6%20November_2023&utm_term=Morning%20Wire%20Subscribers
. . . 200,000 The number of residential units
destroyed in Gaza.
Sources:
Associated Press reports, Gaza Health Ministry, Israeli military, U.N. Office
for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Palestinian Red Crescent.
George Yancy. “Judith Butler. Palestinians Are Not Being “Regarded as
People” by Israel and US.” TRUTHOUT, October 31, 2023.
Judith Butler calls for immediate ceasefire, Palestinians’
right of return, and the dismantling of colonial structures.
What’s happening in Gaza is genocide. The bodies keep falling,
piling up. This is happening under our collective watch, our moment in history.
Israeli forces have now killed more than 8,300 people in Gaza,
including at least 3,400 Palestinian children, and tens of thousands more face
an acute risk of death as the Israeli military continues to prevent people in
Gaza from accessing adequate food, clean water
and functional medical care.
The U.S. State Department has reportedly estimated that
30,000 babies under 6 months of age with barely formed immune systems are
currently drinking contaminated water in Gaza. I dread to imagine the colossal
ways in which illness and starvation wrought by conditions like these may soon
push the death toll exponentially higher, even as Israel continues expanding
its ground attacks under the cover of the ongoing communications blackout
caused when Israeli forces severed Gaza’s phone and internet systems.
Since October 7 — when Hamas militants killed over 1,000 people in
Israel and took hundreds of hostages and Israel began its ongoing campaign of
mass murder — I have been in a state of profound grief. I am sick to my stomach
in the face of so much death, so much destruction, so much displacement,
oppression and genocide faced by so many Gazans. When I look at my own beloved
children, I imagine with horror the over 3,400 Palestinian children who have
been murdered, their tender and vulnerable bodies torn apart and buried under
rubble. They are not terrorists! They are just as precious as any other
children around the world. In my eyes, they are just as precious as Israeli
children. . . . https://truthout.org/articles/judith-butler-palestinians-are-not-being-regarded-as-people-by-israel-and-us/
A prominent U.S. philosopher, Butler is distinguished professor in
the Graduate School of the University of California, Berkeley, and holds the
Hannah Arendt Chair at the European Graduate School. Butler is the author of
numerous influential books, including The Force of Nonviolence, Gender
Trouble, Precarious Life, Notes Toward a Performative
Theory of Assembly, and most recently, What World Is This? A
Pandemic Phenomenology. Butler is
also an advisory board member of Jewish Voice for Peace who
recently sent an open letter to
President Joe Biden publicly declaring their “opposition to what the Israeli
government is doing with American assistance” and calling on the U.S.
government “to seek an immediate ceasefire.”
“NO
CEASEFIRE, NO VOTES! Welcome to USCPR Action.”
Ahmad Abuznaid, US Campaign for
Palestinian Rights. (USCPR) January,
2024
Dear Dick,
In the past 75 days of this genocide, millions of Americans
have taken action for Palestinian rights, pouring into the streets to protest
and making the phones in Congress ring off the hook.
This much is clear: The people support Palestinian rights. Breaking
poll numbers yesterday from Quinnipiac showed that, for the first time
ever, a strong majority of Democrats, 58%, support our demand to stop
arming Israel. A shocking 1 in 3 Democrats dropped their previous support
for weapons to Israel over the past two months.
Yet the majority of Congress, out of touch with the public, have
shamefully dragged their feet on calling for a ceasefire—killing hundreds of
Palestinian people every day.
It is our people power and advocacy that stopped Biden’s deadly deal
with $14.3 billion of weapons to Israel, currently stalled in the Senate
until January, and now we must go bigger.
As we head into the 2024 election year, I’m proud to announce that the US
Campaign for Palestinian Rights is launching our advocacy and political
arm, USCPR Action. . .
. MORE
Want to get involved, Dick? Sign up to receive future email
alerts from USCPR Action so you can take action with us in real-time.
Packed with news and
views of Palestinians.
LTE “Praise for Fida
Jiiyis’ book Stranger in My Own Land.“ What the establishment of Israel meant to
Palestinians—in Israel, the occupied territories, Lebanon, and in the
diaspora. “…it is difficult to
understand how our history has allowed us to repeat racism, violence, torture,
imprisonment, kills of civilians. . . .”
Review: The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine.
Editor. mronline.org (9-21-23).
Historian Rashid
Khalidi’s concise and at times personal take on a
century of colo
nial conquest and resistance in Palestine is
a highly accessible read that focuses on key events and themes.
Originally published: Consortium News on September 18, 2023 by As’ad AbuKhalil (more
by Consortium News) | (Posted Sep 20,
2023)
Culture, Ideology, Movements, WarMiddle East, PalestineNewswire, ReviewDiya’ Al-Khalidi, Husayn Khalidi, Khan Yunis, Lloyd George, Oslo Accords, PLO, Rashid Khalidi, The Hundred
Years’ War on Palestine, Theodore Herzl, Winston Churchill, Yasser Arafat
There is a plethora of books on the Arab-Israeli conflict and
yet those of us who teach the subject on college campuses are desperately
looking for new ones to use as textbooks on the Palestinian question. Rashid
Khalidi’s new book, The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of
Settler Colonial Conquest and Resistance, 1917-2017, takes a fresh new
approach.
Even among the good informative books on the conflict, like Sami
Hadawi’s Bitter Harvest or Charles D. Smith’s Palestine
and the Arab Israeli conflict, the tendency is to produce an overly
detailed, blow-by-blow account of wars to introduce students to the origins and
evolution of the conflict.
In his book, Khalidi refreshingly avoids presenting a tedious
descriptive chronology and opts for a highly selective account of the conflict,
dividing the book into themes and events.
He also adds personal details, regarding himself or his family,
or even other members of the extended Khalidi family, giving the book a more
interesting and accessible take. The historian was my advisor at the American
University of Beirut at undergraduate and graduate levels.
Sudden refugees forever, Palestine Nakba 1948. (Hanini, CC BY
3.0, Wikimedia Commons)
He wrote his own PhD dissertation under Albert Hourani,
entitled British Policy Toward Syria and Palestine and knows
the history inside out. He also participated in Middle East negotiations as an
advisor to the Palestinian delegation in Madrid and later in Washington D.C.
Not surprisingly, Khalidi has written prolifically about Palestine, including a
book on the formation of Palestinian identity.
Damning Account of Balfour Declaration
By avoiding the production of a chronology, his book focuses on
key events and personalities. His account of the Balfour Declaration is concise
but damning about the cunning British policy, a theme he had dealt with in his
PhD dissertation.
He also
includes correspondence at the very end of the 19th century
between prominent Ottoman politician
Diya’ Al-Khalidi and Austro-Hungarian political activist Theodore Herzl,
considered the father of modern Zionism. The correspondence puts to rest the
notion that Herzl, or early Zionists in Europe, simply did not know that
Palestine was already inhabited or that the Palestinians did not fear very
early on a grave danger from the Zionist project, which intended to steal their
land, and subsequently their entire, ancestorial homeland.
Khalidi cites the words of Herzl himself, who wrote in his
diary:
We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the
border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries… .Both the
process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out
discreetly and circumspectly.
Colonial Myths Dispelled
Herzl is still treated in the West as a humanist dreamer. He
surely dreamt of the forceful wholesale expulsion of the native population. It
is a racist mindset that led people like Herzl to assume Palestinians were too
backward politically to manifest national attachment to their homeland and to
fight for its retention.
The notion that ethnic cleansing of the natives happened as an
accident is belied by the evidence contained in the early writings of Herzl.
The entire Zionist project was predicated on the principle of creating a new
Jewish homeland over the ruins of an existing Palestinian homeland, where the
majority of the population was not Jewish and where Jews and non-Jews had lived
side-by-side for centuries. It is Zionism that poisoned this relationship.
Khalidi does not fill the book with numerous facts and events,
but selects the most important to give the reader a good view of the overall
picture. He, for example, informs us that in the Arab Revolt of 1936-39, 10
percent of the adult Arab population was “killed, wounded, imprisoned or
exiled”. This in itself shows how the British acted as the midwife for the
crime of erasing the Palestinian homeland to make room for a new homeland
intended solely for Jewish immigrants from Europe. Local Jews were initially
opposed to Zionism.
Khalidi also dispels the myth that Palestinian and Arab
societies were in a state of stagnation. He points out that “thirty-two new
newspapers and periodicals were established in Palestine between 1908 and 1914,
with even more in the 1920s and 1930.” He builds on his previous work on
Palestinian identity to show Palestinians forged a national identity not
different from modern national identities of other groups.
Lord Peel and Sir Horace Rumbold, chairman and vice chairman of
the Palestine Royal Commission, leaving their offices in Jerusalem during the
Arab Revolt in 1936. (Creative Commons/Public Domain)
Responding to the Zionist notion that Palestinian nationalism
only emerged in response to Zionism, Khalidi points out that Zionism itself was
shaped in response to antisemitic hatred in Europe.
British Trickery and Deception. . . .MORE
Bob Billig sent me a rousing speech
given in the Irish Parliament, below. It’s
inspiring. It’s about Israel/Gaza. A lot of people around the world
are calling for fairness for the Palestinians. – Art https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f7fMYRJpglM
watch address by Matt Carthy TD on
Palestine
OSLO ACCORDS
“”Three
Views: The Oslo Accords Killed Palestinian Dreams for Independence.”
Farah
Najjar. “’Olive Branches, Victory
Signs’: How the Oslo Accords Failed the Palestinians.”
Miko Peled. “Understanding Oslo Is
Crucial for Moving Forward.”
Yara
Hawari. “Palestinian Authoritarianism
Has Its Roots in the Oslo Accords.”
Washington Report on Middle Eastern
Affairs (Nov-Dec 2023).
The
Break out from the Gaza Prison October 2023
“Seven Views: Operation
Al-Aqsa Flood Changes Everything.”
Ramzy
Baroud. “A Day to Remember: How ‘Al-Aqsa
Flood- Altered the Relationshiop
Between
Palestine and Israel Forever.”
Gordon Levy. “Israel Can’t Imprison 2
Million Gazans without Paying a Cruel Price”.
Ali
Abunimah. “Biden Lied about Seeing
Photos of Beheaded Israeli Children.”
Tareq
Hajjaj. “Palestine Letter: Israel Is
Impoising a Blackout on Gaza to Hide a Massacre.”
Mohammed
R. Mhawesh. “Why Bomb Schools? Gaza Families Have No Safe Place.”
David
Rovics. “The Gaza Ghetto Uprising.”
Dale
Sprusansky. “The Perilous Future of
Palestinian Solidarity Activism.”
A
few notes about Rovics’ essay. He lives
in Portland, OR; is a touring singer and pundit;
article
was first pub. in CounterPunch; his
website is davidrovics.com.
Within the parallel context of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising during WWII 1943,
Rovics condemns the Western mainstream media failure to explain the motives and
methods of Hamas in rising up againstan
occupation army. –D
“American Anthropological Association endorses
academic boycott of Israel.” Editor. mronline.org (7-27-23).
Originally published: Mondoweiss on July 24, 2023 by Michael Arria (more by Mondoweiss) | (Posted Jul
26, 2023). Mondoweiss describes itself
as a liberal, progressive Jewish media org.
Education,
Empire,
Movements,
State Repression, StrategyAmericas,
Israel,
Middle
East, Palestine, United
StatesNewswireAcademic
Boycott, American Anthropological Association (AAA)
Members
of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) have overwhelmingly
endorsed a resolution to boycott Israeli academic
institutions. 71% of the members who voted backed the measure while just 29%
opposed it.
Philip
Weiss. “Biden, Jayapal, and liberal Zionists rush to prop up
the Israel lobby for 2024.”Mronline.org (7-21-23).
Originally published: Mondoweiss on July 18, 2023 (more by Mondoweiss).
Empire, Ideology,
State Repression, StrategyAmericas,
Israel,
Middle
East, United StatesNewswire2024
Election
Liberal Zionists rushed to affirm their
support for Israel and hatred of anti-Zionism in the wake of the Pramila
Jayapal "racist state" comment because they are afraid the Israel
lobby will abandon the Democratic party.
Ramzy Baroud (Posted Sep
09, 2023)“The twisted Israeli logic of
murdering Palestinian children, and what can we do to stop it?” Editor. mronline.org (9-10-23).
The problem for Palestinians is not just that
of Israel’s violence, but also the lack of international will to hold Israel
accountable.
Originally
published: Palestine Chronicle on September 6, 2023 (more by Palestine Chronicle).|
Human
Rights, Inequality, State
Repression, StrategyGaza,
Israel,
Middle
East, PalestineNewswireInternational
Law, Israeli Occupation, Palestinian
Children, West Bank
Israel kills Palestinian children as a matter of policy. This
claim can easily be demonstrated and is supported by the latest findings of a
Human Rights Watch report.
The question is: why? When the police or
military shoot a child anywhere in the world, though utterly tragic, it can be
argued, at least in theory, that the killing was an unfortunate mistake. But when thousands of children are killed and
wounded in a systematic, ‘routine’ and comparable method within a relatively
short period of time, the killing of children must be deliberate.
In
a recent report, entitled ‘West Bank: Spike in Israeli
Killings of Palestinian Children’, HRW reaches a strong conclusion based on an
exhaustive examination of medical data, eyewitness accounts, video footage, and
field research—the latter pertaining to four specific cases. . . .MORE
“Caged, stripped, beaten: Latest ‘Save the Children’
report on Palestine makes chilling read.” Editor. mronline.org (7-13-23).
According to a
just-released report by the international rights organization, Save the
Children, four out of five Palestinian children in the Israeli military
detention system are beaten and 69 per cent are strip-searched.
Originally published: Palestine Chronicle on July 10, 2023 by The Palestine Chronicle, MEMO
(more by Palestine Chronicle) | (Posted Jul
12, 2023).
Empire,
Human Rights, Inequality, WarIsrael, Middle East, PalestineNewswireabuse, Detention Center, Israeli Military, Save the Children
The research found that nearly half—42 per cent—are injured at
the point of arrest, including suffering gunshot wounds and broken bones. Worse, some report violence of a sexual
nature and some are transferred to court or between detention centers in small
cages, the child rights organization said.
New
Evidence
The
new research comes as the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human
rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 presents evidence
today to the Human Rights Council on Palestinian children in detention. It is estimated that there are between 500
and 1,000 children held in Israeli military detention each year. . . .MORE
“‘Beautiful Dreams’: The 5-year-old Palestinian kindergartener who died of fear.” Editor. Mronline.org (5-25-23).
Mohammed is still grieving, and he cannot
help thinking about what life would have been if Tamim was still alive,
disassembling and reassembling his toys, his head filled with beautiful dreams.
Originally published: Palestine Chronicle on May 22, 2023 by Nada Al Kahlout (more by Palestine Chronicle) | (Posted May
24, 2023).
Culture,
Human
Rights, Inequality, WarIsrael,
Middle
East, PalestineNewswireGaza
Strip, Mohammed Daoud, Tamim
In their home in the western Gaza Strip, Mohammed Daoud, 36, was
finally able to calm his 5-year-old son, Tamim, and convince him to go to sleep
despite the sounds of Israeli missiles falling around them. Mohammed did not know, at that moment, that
Tamim would eventually fall asleep on his lap, though never to wake up. . .
.MORE
“‘The gravity of the situation cannot be overstated’:
an eyewitness account from the Israeli assault on Jenin.” Editor. Mronline.org (7-7-23).
As the
occupation relentlessly tightens its grip on the Jenin refugee camp, the
message is crystal clear–punish the stronghold of popular resistance. But they
will not succeed and will only breed a new generation to carry the torch.
Originally published: Mondoweiss on July 3, 2023 by Mustafa Sheta (more
by Mondoweiss) | (Posted Jul
06, 2023)
Human
Rights, Inequality, State
Repression, WarIsrael,
Middle
East, PalestineNewswireIsraeli
Military, Jenin, Palestinian Resistance
Today,
Monday, July 3, 2023, I stand before you to share my personal account of
the events that unfolded in Jenin refugee camp early
this morning. The Israeli military operation commenced with an aggressive
assault on sites believed to be affiliated with the Palestinian resistance.
They claimed these locations as their targets, launching three missiles that
resulted in the loss of innocent lives and left many wounded.
Soon
after, a full-scale invasion ensued, with an overwhelming presence of military
forces. Jeeps, armoured vehicles, and military bulldozers stormed into Jenin,
asserting their dominance over the ground. The skies above were not spared
either, as a multitude of drones hovered ominously. . . . MORE
To criticize the apartheid state of Israel and defend the rights of Palestinians means being viciously attacked in orchestrated smear campaigns as an anti-Semite, even if you are Jewish. Listen · 30M
When the
socialist Jeremy Corbyn became the leader of the Labour Party in Britain in
2015 and mounted a grassroots campaign in 2017 to become the British Prime
Minister the ruling corporate elites, along with the war industry, panicked.
They conspired with the Israel lobby to mount a vicious campaign of character
assassination against Corbyn and his supporters, accusing them, even if they
were Jewish, of anti-Semitism. Corbyn has been a long-time champion of
Palestinian rights. The media did its part to crucify Corbyn as a bigot while
Labour party officials ruthlessly purged the party of Corbyn supporters. Corbyn
was eventually driven out of the party in 2020 after the snap election loss
against Boris Johnson. The neutralization of Corbyn is an ominous precedent.
The purging of Corbyn and his supporters effectively emasculated the left
within the Labour Party. This was its goal. The unholy alliance between Israel,
the war industry and the corporatists raise the question of whether it is
possible in Britain or the United States to reform the system from within.
Joining me to discuss these issues is Asa Winstanley an associate editor and
reporter with the website Electronic Intifada and the author of “Weaponizing
Anti-Semitism: How the Israel Lobby Brought Down Jeremy Corbyn”. . . .
MORE
Asa Winstanley. Investigative
journalist and podcaster. Author of Weaponising Anti-Semitism: How the
Israel Lobby Brought Down Jeremy Corbyn, out now from OR Books: https://www.orbooks.com/catalog/weaponising-anti-semitism/
Jeremy Kuzmarov. “State of
Israel and Lyndon B Johnson Deliberately Murdered 34 American Sailors in 1967,
Fabricated Massive Cover-Up Still in Effect After 55 Years.” Covert Action Magazine. June 8, 2023.
Evidence suggests that the Israelis were
ordered to attack the ship as part of a false-flag operation aimed at provoking
a U.S. invasion of Egypt that was to result in the overthrow of Gamal Abdel
Nasser. The Johnson administration then planned to carry out a nuclear first
strike with the aim of “clobbering Russia,” and securing unfettered global
hegemony. READ MORE →
“Israel is built on the ruins of hundreds of
Palestinian villages.”
Peoples
Dispatch. Mronline.org
(5-13-23).
The International People’s Assembly (IPA)
organized an online event to mark 75 years of the Nakba and the Palestinians’
continued resistance against the Zionist colonial apartheid occupation of
Israel
By Peoples Dispatch (Posted May
12, 2023)
Originally published: Peoples Dispatch on May 11, 2023 (more by Peoples Dispatch) |
Ideology, Inequality, Race, State RepressionIsrael, Middle East, PalestineNewswireInternational Peoples’ Assembly (IPA), Nakba
Today’s Israel is built over the ruins of hundreds of
Palestinian villages which were destroyed by Zionist militias during Israel’s
formation in 1948, said professor and historian Ilan Pepe. He emphasized that
the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their lands and
homes was nothing but ethnic cleansing carried out by Israeli armed forces. Professor Pepe was speaking during an online event called
“75 years of Nakba, 75 years of people’s resistance,” organized by
the International People’s Assembly (IPA) on Wednesday, May 10, ahead of the
Palestinian Nakba Day which is commemorated annually on May
15.
Thousands
of Palestinians were killed and hundreds of thousands (according to some
estimates around 750,000 to 800,000) were forcefully expelled by Israeli forces
from their lands and villages inside the historic Palestine during the months
leading up to Israel’s creation in 1948. Each year, Palestinians commemorate
their forceful expulsion and dispossession as the Nakba, or the
“great catastrophe” in Arabic.
Apart from Professor Pepe, Bassam al-Salhi, a member of the
executive committee of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO),
Palestinian journalist Mariam Barghouti, and Mehdi Salhi from the Belgium
Workers Party also spoke during the event moderated by Georgia Gusciglio of IPA
Belgium.
The
occupation is unleashing Nakba every day
All
the speakers underlined the fact that Nakba was not a one-time
event and that Palestinians continue to face Israeli oppression, atrocities,
discrimination, killings, and forceful displacement on a daily basis. . . .MORE
“AJC is panicked by United Church of Christ’s
solidarity with Palestinians under settler-colonialism.” Editor. Mronline.org (8-29-21).
The United
Church of Christ resolution calling Israel’s continued “oppression” of
Palestinians a “sin” has alarmed the American Jewish Committee and for good
reason: Other Protestant churches are sure to follow, with measures that pose a
real threat to apartheid.
Originally published: Mondoweiss on August 24, 2021 by Mark Braverman (more
by Mondoweiss) | (Posted Aug
27, 2021).
Culture,
Ideology,
Inequality,
RacePalestine,
United StatesNewswireAmerican Jewish Committee, American Jewish Committee CEO David Harris, Apartheid,
Protestant
church, the United Church of Christ (UCC)
American
Jewish Committee CEO David Harris is scared. Earlier this month he sounded the alarm about
the “antisemitic leftwing tide that is sweeping up vulnerable Jews.” Harris’
over-the-top warnings (young Jews on campuses are being “picked off” by
antisemites!) illustrates how panicked the Jewish establishment is about the
erosion of support for Israel, not only among young Jews but with long-time,
reliable allies in the mainline churches. . . . MORE
“Police are trying to stifle our
solidarity with Palestinians. Help us make sure this backfires.” Rachel,
World BEYOND War 5-25-21.
Dear Dick,
The last few days have been a rollercoaster — let me tell you a bit about it.
Over the past two weeks, like so many people around the world, I
couldn’t tear myself away from the terrible violence against Palestinians. I
couldn’t stop scrolling through the images and videos of families being
massacred by airstrikes, worshippers being attacked in one of the holiest sites
for Muslims in the world, children being arrested, entire residential buildings
being bombed to the ground, tens of thousands being forced from their homes,
hundreds of people killed, and thousands wounded.
Last week in Toronto I organized fellow Jewish community members and allies
to stand up with me in solidarity with Palestinians. We felt a need to
respond not only to the Israeli government’s militarized violence but also to
the Canadian government’s complicity in it — through its diplomatic support,
the Canada-Israel arms trade, and allowing the Israeli embassy to go so far as
to illegally recruit Canadians to join the Israeli military.
It felt like the type of rare moment where everyone was seeing the horrific violence
of a military superpower for what it was and we had to drop everything to take
action.
On Friday we gathered outside the Israeli consulate in Toronto and
spilled a river of blood (washable paint) from the building’s doors right down
to the street. We made the bloodshed from Israel’s brutal occupation,
military attacks, and ethnic cleansing in Gaza and across historic Palestine
visible right on the consulate’s doorstep.
We knew we had made a powerful statement but we did not expect the deluge of
media. Our protest was covered in dozens of local, national, and
international outlets, and translated into many languages. In this CTV
news article Israel’s
Consul General was even forced to go on the defensive and answer to why a river
of blood was coming out of her office. On
Friday night an interview with me was broadcast on the evening TV and radio
news by Canada’s national public broadcaster. Here’s a clip.
And right when things were starting to calm down on Saturday evening, we found
out the Toronto police were pressing charges on Rabbi David Mivasair. I was honoured to stand beside Rabbi
David on the steps of the Israeli consulate on Friday morning as this longtime
solidarity activist and member of Independent Jewish Voices powerfully shared
how his Judaism is a part of his resistance (watch this clip filmed live at the
consulate). The coverage of his arrest has put the story of our
solidarity action all over the media again. . . .MORE
Rachel Small
Canada Organizer, World BEYOND War
World BEYOND War is a global network of volunteers, chapters, and
affiliated organizations advocating for the abolition of the institution of
war.
Donate to support our
people-powered movement for peace.
Should giant war-profiteering corporations decide what emails you don’t want to
read? We don’t think so either. So, please stop our emails from going into
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World BEYOND War | 513 E Main St #1484 | Charlottesville, VA 22902 USA
“Syrians
Stand In Solidarity With Palestine!” By Walid Al Nofal.
Syrians stand in solidarity with
Palestine in the face of Israeli aggression (Photos) – Syria Direct
SYRIA DIRECT May 19, 2021.
AMMAN — Although the war machine of the Bashar
al-Assad regime and its allied Russian and Iranian forces continue to take the
lives of Syrians and forcibly disappear thousands in detention centers, Syrians
demonstrated in support of the Palestinian people facing Israeli aggression in
occupied East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.
Many cities and towns in the provinces of Hama,
Aleppo, Idlib, Daraa and others—as well as the Palestinian refugee camps in
Syria—have witnessed demonstrations and protests denouncing Israeli
hostilities.
This coincided with pro-Palestinian stances from
Syrian opposition political bodies and figures. In an Eid al-Fitr message
posted to social media, the National Coalition for Revolutionary and Opposition
Forces wrote, “We affirm that the Syrian people stand
alongside our brethren in occupied Palestine,” adding that “we stress the need
for serious global action to stop the occupation’s aggression against the holy
al-Aqsa Mosque and all Palestinian cities, especially Jerusalem and Gaza, and
an end to the hateful occupation policies against the Palestinians.”
Photos of the demonstrations are seen at: Syrians stand in solidarity with
Palestine in the face of Israeli aggression (Photos) – Syria Direct
“Thousands
on way to DC for May 29 national march for Palestine.” ANSWER
Coalition via uark.onmicrosoft.com. 5-28-21.
Dear Dick,
ANSWER Coalition organizers, activists, and volunteers are coming to Washington
DC tomorrow from all over the country to participate in the national march for
Palestine. The demonstration tomorrow was initiated by a coalition of Muslim
American organizations, and hundreds of other organizations, including the
ANSWER Coalition, are endorsing and building for the action. We have been
working tirelessly—night and day—organizing, mobilizing, and building
solidarity actions with the people of Gaza and all Palestinian people in cities
and towns across the U.S. during the last three weeks. We want to thank
everyone who has given their time, energy, and have made a financial
contribution in this nationwide effort for the U.S. government to end all aid
to apartheid Israel. We look forward to meeting everyone tomorrow, May 29,
at Lincoln Memorial at 3PM. If you cannot join, but still want to show your
support, you can make an urgently needed
donation to help us defray transportation costs involved in bringing people to
DC for the national march.
We have reached a
turning point. The steadfastness and determination of the Palestinian people
and the growing global solidarity movement are pointing to a new day. Just as
the apartheid government in South Africa was ended by international solidarity,
so too will the apartheid government of Israel.
Thank you again, and we
will see you at the Lincoln Memorial tomorrow. Free Palestine! In solidarity,
Brian Becker, National Director, ANSWER Coalition
Nation of Change (5-31-21)
Jessica
Corbett. “ DC March for
Palestine demands Biden and Congress ‘hold Israel accountable for its war
crimes in Gaza’.”
The #March4Palestine was a
part of the new national #SanctionIsrael campaign urging the Biden
administration and members of Congress to sanction Israel. Read more →
Mondoweiss <dave@mondoweiss.net> 5-28-21 (the
following 7 items)
Support our independent journalism / View in your browser
News / Opinion / Activism / Culture / Media Analysis
“Now it’s
‘antisemitic’ to say that Israel practices ‘apartheid’.”
Israel lobbyists have opened a new front in their effort to
characterize Palestinian solidarity as “antisemitic.” Now that two House
members and leading human rights groups have said Israel practices “apartheid,”
Israel’s friends want to shut down the discussion. It’s a good battle to have,
as even mainstream groups say the shoe fits Israel. READ MORE
“San Francisco teachers union endorses BDS movement.”
The United Educators of San Francisco has become the first
American K-12 public school union to endorse the BDS movement. READ MORE
“What
archives teach us about Instagram infographics and solidarity with Palestine.”
If our commitment as social media users is truly to solidarity
and allyship, then we must move past virtue signaling through shares and
actually engage with like-minded users in the real world to work towards
collective action. READ MORE
“This
country has no future living by the sword: an interview with Angela
Godfrey-Goldstein.”
Michael Winship interviews Angela Godfrey-Goldstein on
Jerusalem, Gaza and the evolution of her activism from South Africa to Israel. READ MORE
“The fall
and rise (and fall?) of apartheid.”
Apartheid in South Africa ended in part due to sanctions and
pressure from the international community. It is once again on the
international community to ensure that international law is upheld and
apartheid sees its demise -- this time in Palestine.
“Over 600 artists worldwide sign MusiciansForPalestine
letter.”
Over 600 musicians, including Belly and Anwar Hadid, Black
Thought and Questlove from The Roots, Cypress Hill, NARCY, NoName, Patti Smith,
and Run the Jewels, have signed a statement demanding justice, dignity and the
right to self-determination for the Palestinian people, and calls on artists to
refuse to perform at Israel’s complicit cultural institutions. READ MORE
“Palestinians welcome Ireland’s ‘historic’
condemnation of Israel’s ‘de facto annexation’ of Palestine.”
In a unanimous vote, the Irish parliament, the Dáil, passed a
motion calling Israel’s ongoing settlement expansion in the occupied
Palestinian territory as “de facto annexation.” Palestinian human rights
organization Al-Haq praised the motion on Wednesday, saying “Ireland stood up
in defense of human rights and became a beacon for the world to follow.” READ MORE
CONTENTS:ISRAEL-PALESTINE
NEWSLETTER #16
http://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2021/05/omni-israel-palestine-newsletter-16-may.html
CURRENT
EVENTS MAY 2021
Prashad, Israel Attacks
Occupied Palestinian Territory OPT
Omar and Tlaib v. US
Weapons to Israel, Common Dreams
AFSC and FCNL
Mondoweiss Coverage May
12-22
Abby Martin, Israeli
Assault on Gaza
HISTORY
Bazian’s Book on
Settler Colonial Occupation of Palestine
Israel Demolishes West
Bank Village, The Guardian
BDS Movement 12 Years
Old, Anna Baltzer
J Street Perspective:
Defend the 2-state solution, stop the demolitions, build peace.
Book by Chomsky and
Pappe, On Palestine
Book by Pappe, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine
Islamophobia
Book by Wajaht Ali, Fear, Inc.: The Roots of the Islamophobic Network in America
Balfour Declaration
Levine and Mossberg in Tikkun
Two Articles in Washinton Report on Middle East Affairs
Film by Independent Jewish Voices
Israeli Lobby
Articles by Hanan Ashrawi and John
Mearsheimer
Interview of Grant Smith, author of Big Israel