ZIONIST IMMORALITY IN TIME OF THE CORONA CRISIS

April 1, 2020 at 15:56 (Associate Post, Collective Punishment, Corrupt Politics, DesertPeace Exclusive, zionist harassment)

Through the global spread of the corona virus worldwide, the “Jewish state” has managed to brutally exploit the necessary restrictions on movement for illegal occupation measures. As an occupation state, the Zionist regime controls all movements of the occupied people and checkpoints. Under this pretext to limit the “spread” of the corona virus, the occupied West Bank and the Gaza concentration camp were totally sealed off.

A moral offer! 

By Evelyn Hecht-Galinski

 

After 50 former European top politicians have finally raised criticism and signed an appeal against Trump’s “Middle East Peace Plan”, it is noticeable that all these politicians no longer act as active politicians. After all, after strong criticism, they decided to take an open stance against this “peace plan” across Europe. When will active colleagues follow them to finally acknowledge the facts and take action against the “Jewish state” and enforce the sanctions which, if it were not for the “Jewish friends”, would have been taken long ago!

“Anti-Israel agitators”

Criticism from the “Jewish state” promptly followed in the person of “master lobbyist” Manfred Gerstenfeld from the BESA Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University in Tel Aviv. He defamed these 50 former top politicians and signatories as “anti-Israel agitators” and some of them as anti-Semites. It is precisely these infamous titles that have been used for decades by Jewish-Zionist chief strategists, and his unbearable explanations also contained a demand that exceeded the acceptable level. Gerstenfeld has virtually considered a “virtual pillory for immoral elite people” on which the names of these 50 former European top politicians are to be listed. (1)

Here are the names of the signatories:

Douglas Alexander , former Secretary of State for Europe and Secretary of State for International Development, United Kingdom

Ben Bradshaw , former Secretary of State for the Middle East, United Kingdom

Gro Harlem Brundtland , former Prime Minister, Norway

John Bruton , former Prime Minister, Ireland

Micheline Calmy-Rey , former Foreign Minister and President, Switzerland

Ingvar Carlsson , former Swedish prime minister

Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz , former Foreign Minister and Prime Minister, Poland

Daniel Cohn-Bendit , former Co-President of the European Greens – European Free Alliance in the European Parliament, Germany

Joe Costello , former Minister of State for Trade and Development and Chairman of the European Affairs Committee, Ireland

Willy Claes , former Foreign Minister and NATO Secretary General, Belgium

Massimo d’Alema , former Foreign Minister and Prime Minister, Italy

Teresa Patrício de Gouveia , former Foreign Minister, Portugal

Dominique de Villepin , former Foreign Minister and Prime Minister, France

Ruth Dreifuss , former Foreign Minister and President, Switzerland

Alan Duncan , former Secretary of State for Europe and America and Secretary of State for International Development, United Kingdom

Espen Barth Eide , former Foreign Minister, Norway

Jan Eliasson , former Foreign Minister and President of the United Nations General Assembly, Sweden

Uffe Ellemann-Jensen , former Foreign Minister and President of the European Liberals, Denmark

Benita Ferrero-Waldner , former Foreign Minister and EU Commissioner for External Relations, Austria

Sigmar Gabriel , former Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor, Germany

Peter Hain , former Secretary of State for the Middle East, United Kingdom

Lena Hjelm-Wallén , former Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Sweden

Trinidad Jiménez , former Foreign Minister, Spain

Tom Kitt , former Minister of State, Ireland

Bert Koenders , former Foreign Minister of the Netherlands

Martin Liedegaard , former Foreign Minister, Denmark

Mogens Lykketoft , former Foreign Minister and President of the United Nations General Assembly, Denmark

Sven Mikser , former Foreign Minister, Estonia

Per Stig Møller , former Foreign Minister, Denmark

Holger K. Nielsen , former Foreign Minister, Denmark

Andrzej Olechowski , former Foreign Minister, Poland

Marc Otte , former EU Special Representative for the Middle East Peace Process, Belgium

Chris Patten , former Vice President of the European Commission, United Kingdom

Hans-Gert Poettering , former President of the European Parliament, Germany

Jacques Poos , former Foreign Minister, Luxembourg

Vesna Pusić , former Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Croatia

Mary Robinson , former President and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ireland

Jacques Santer , former Prime Minister and President of the European Commission, Luxembourg

Karel Schwarzenberg , former Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Czech Republic

Robert Serry , former UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Netherlands

Javier Solana , former Foreign Minister, NATO Secretary General and EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Spain

Michael Spindelegger , former Secretary of State and Vice Chancellor, Austria Jack Straw, former Secretary of State, United Kingdom

Jack Straw , former Secretary of State, United Kingdom

Gareth Thomas , former Secretary of State for International Development, United Kingdom

Erkki Tuomioja , former Foreign Minister, Finland

Ivo Vajgl , former Foreign Minister, Slovenia

Jozias van Aartsen , former Foreign Minister of the Netherlands

Frank Vandenbroucke , former Foreign Minister, Belgium

Hubert Védrine , former Foreign Minister, France

Sayeeda Warsi , former Secretary of State for the United Nations, Human Rights and the ICC, United Kingdom

 

“The Dreifuss Affair”

Did Gerstenfeld think specifically of the former Swiss President and Jewess Ruth Dreifuss in this context? Does it make Jews particularly “immoral” when they criticize the “Jewish state” and its handling of international law and the Palestinians? Is it not exactly the other way around, and haven’t these 50 former top politicians made a “moral offer” by pointing out that this “peace plan” contradicts the internationally agreed parameters for a peace process in the Middle East? Doesn’t this example show how important it is to finally support the BDS movement and to issue sanctions against the “Jewish state”? (2)

Through the global spread of the corona virus worldwide, the “Jewish state” has managed to brutally exploit the necessary restrictions on movement for illegal occupation measures. As an occupation state, the Zionist regime controls all movements of the occupied people and checkpoints. Under this pretext to limit the “spread” of the corona virus, the occupied West Bank and the Gaza concentration camp were totally sealed off.

In this way, the virus enables the occupiers to finally annex the entire Palestinian country, at the request of the Netanyahu regime and the “Trump peace plan”. Jewish settlers can now attack undisturbed Palestinians because, although only a few hundred meters away from the incarcerated Palestinians, they live in their illegal settlements without any particular restrictions.

Under these circumstances, can one limit a pandemic that, if it spreads even faster and more rapidly in occupied Palestine, will lead to a catastrophe? What options do the Palestinians have to defy the virus? What about the almost non-existent healthcare system that made it impossible for cancer patients or chronically ill people to receive adequate treatment? As the Israeli human rights organization Betselem reported, officials of the Israeli civil administration and Jewish occupation soldiers destroyed a community clinic and emergency accommodation in the village of Khirbet Ibzig last Thursday. The Zionist occupiers seized poles and tarpaulins, which were intended for the construction of eight tents, two for a field clinic, two for a mosque and four emergency shelters for the people “evacuated” from their homes. Another “moral offer” from the unscrupulous Zionist occupiers, who rob the Palestinians of the last and simplest means of preparing themselves for the makeshift defense against the virus. Wouldn’t it be the duty of the German government and the EU to finally react and put an end to this inhumane and illegal activity? (3) to finally react and put an end to this inhumane and illegal activity? (3) to finally react and put an end to this inhumane and illegal activity? (3)

Epicenter of oppression

While around 3,500 infected cases have been registered in the “Jewish state” despite the strict measures, there are still relatively few, around 100, in the occupied Palestinian territories, with an increasing tendency. This virus, too, does not prevent the Zionist occupation authorities from expanding the Palestinian unlawful policy of sealing off and “collective punishment”. Jewish settlers are becoming increasingly uninhibited, such as in the area around Bethlehem, where Palestinians live under the strictest quarantine by uprooting their trees, destroying their crops and wreaking havoc, knowing that the Palestinians cannot defend themselves and are helpless to destroy them Have to watch livelihood. Under the protection of the Jewish occupation army, the settlers are up to mischief. As a thank you, they are building their own streets “only for Jews” and more and more new settlements are being approved on stolen land. You actually feel in the epicenter of oppression, the Covid-19 always allows new heights.

The Israeli prisons, with their inhumane conditions, are also true virus spreaders. The occupation authorities reported that four Palestinian prisoners were infected after being interrogated with an Israeli investigator infected with the corona virus. It is an untenable situation that more than 5,000 Palestinians, including women, children, adolescents and the sick, are being held in prisons in a dirty, overcrowded state, disregarding all hygiene regulations. All of these prisoners must be released immediately. The occupation regime is known for not only keeping Palestinians arbitrary in administration, but also in partially isolated solitary confinement, in dirty cells without windows and daylight, filled with music and noise, and not afraid of the worst torture, to extort “confessions”. All of this has been known for decades, but is tolerated and supported by the so-called western “values” community in the “fight against terrorism”. After all, the prisoners are “Arab-Palestinian-Muslims”, ie “potential terrorists” (4)

So the captured and occupied Palestinians have only a desperate fight on two fronts, against the corona pandemic and against the brutal military occupation by the “Jewish state”. We have to make sure that the current corona crisis does not completely obliterate Palestine and continue to counter the decades of desolate Palestinian conditions.

Emergency laws that lead to the end of the rule of law

Even the immense danger situation must not lead to the fact that total surveillance, if it is embedded in an “empowerment law”, is only introduced voluntarily and only for a limited time, but must not escalate into Israeli or Hungarian circumstances. So if Germany is planning a smartphone app to slow down the virus, every responsible citizen should ask whether he wants to participate voluntarily. However, in times of Facebook / Whatsapp disclosure of any privacy without thinking and understanding fewer and fewer citizens will be able to recognize this risk of total surveillance and assess its scope. Can we really be sure that this “provision” will be limited and not lead to an emergency regime like under Orban in Hungary, that Parliament has been disempowered and brought to an end to the rule of law? After all, Hungary is an EU member and it would have been time to slow down Orban. If Israel wants to go further now and use computer analysis to find possible carriers of the corona virus, and also use software produced by the spy company NSO, which the FBI is suspected of being US citizens and Hacking companies and gathering information about governments, as Reuters reported in January, is more than immoral and downright criminal. Do Germany and other EU countries still want to use the “Jewish state” as a role model? Isn’t this global crisis a wake-up call to separate the “chaff from the wheat” and to prove it as a democratic state, how to achieve citizen security without criminal emergency and empowerment laws? Just as Orban is a shame for Europe, it has been the Zionist occupying regime for decades, embedded in European contacts and contracts. (5) (6) (7)

The important struggle against Covid-19 must not lead dictators and tyrants of this world to continue their brutal repression under the pretext of the pandemic spreading that NO ONE is safe from. While the killing and death of children continues in Yemen, Saudi Arabia can produce itself as a summit leader among the G20 “colleagues”, the “genocidal re-education” of the Uyghur Muslims in China continues undisturbed, as does the persecution of the Rohingya -Moslems in Burma and the murderous pogrom in India against Muslims and the persecution of minorities in the “greatest democracy” in the world. This unites ethnocracy and the “only” democracy in the Middle East and the “largest”, because India was buying weapons from Zionist friends to fight Corona. (8th)

How long do we have to wait until the European states, especially Germany, finally come to their senses and give up their compliant policy towards the “Jewish occupying state” and come to a moral offer based on real “Christian values” for the time after Corona virus?

Footnotes:

(1) https://www.derstandard.de/story/2000115055526/50-ex-aussenminister-kritisieren-trumps-nahost-plan-weise-merkmale-auf

(2) https://www.infosperber.ch/Artikel/Politik/Trump-Peace-Plan-Palastina-Israel-Ruth-Dreifuss

(3) https://www.palestinechronicle.com/israeli-forcesdemolish-emergency-coronavirus-clinic-for-palestinians/

(4) https://www.btselem.org/statistics/detainees_and_prisoners

(5) https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200330-israel-to-use-computer-analysis-to-find-likely-coronavirus-carriers/

(6) https://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/news-ungarn-coronavirus-usa-markus-soeder-olaf-scholz-a-51098517-286e-447e-8a7e-2761270bebdf

(7) https://www.sueddeutsche.de/digital/coronavirus-smartphone-app-bluetooth-datenschutz-1.4862314

(8) https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/coronavirus-india-weapons-israel-covid-19-pandemic

 

Originally posted AT

2 Comments

ISRAEL HAS REACHED A LOW LOW

July 2, 2019 at 12:55 (Collective Punishment, DesertPeace Exclusive, zionist harassment)

The Israeli-Palestinian struggle has reached an all-time low. 

How much lower can one go?

The graves are empty as are the hearts of the mourners

Here is the name list of Palestinian casualties whose bodies Israel refuses to hand over

to their families for burial:

  1. Abdul Hameed Abu Srour, from Bethlehem1, his body held by Israel since 04.2016 .
  2. Muhammed Altariareh, Beni Neim, 30.6.16.
  3. Muhammed Alfaqeeh, Dora, 27.7.16.
  4. Rami Awratani, Nablus, 31.7.16.
  5. Musbah Abu  Sbeih, Jerusalem, 9.10.16.
  6. Fadi Alqanber, Jabal Almakaber – Jerusalem, 8.1.17.
  7. Adel Ankoush, Deir Abu Mishaal- Ramallah, 16.6.17.
  8. Usama Atta, Deir Abu Mishaal, 16.6.17.
  9. Baraa Ibrahim, Deir Abu Mishaal, 16.6.17.
  10. Ala’a Abu Arab, Gaza, 30.10.17.
  11. Shadi Al-Hamari, Gaza,10.17.
  12. Bader Musbeh, Gaza, 30.10.17.
  13. Ahmed Assabakhi, Gaza, 30.10.17.
  14. Muhammed Albuhasi, Gaza, 30.10.17.
  15. Ahmed Ismail Jarrar, Jenin, 17.1.18.
  16. Ahmed Nasser Jarrar, Jenin, 6.2.18.
  17. Abudul Rahman Beni Fadl, Akraba, 18.3.18.
  18. Musab Alsalul, Gaza, 30,3,18.
  19. Muhammed Alrabbayeh, Gaza, 30.3.18.
  20. Attayeh Alaamawi, Khan Younes, 30.4.18.
  21. Yusef Abu Jazer, Rafah, 30.4.18.
  22. Yusef Alamawi, Khan Younes, 30.4.18,
  23. Abdul Salaam Mussamah, Gaza, 6.5.18.
  24. Aziz Aweisat, Jerusalem, 20.5.18.
  25. Ramzi Najjar, Khan younes, 4.6.18.
  26. Khaled Abdul Aal, Rafeh, 2.7.18.
  27. Muhammed Tarek Dar Yusef, kobar, 26.7.18.
  28. Hani Almajdalawi, Gaza, 20.8.18.
  29. Waal Jabari, Hebron, 3.9.18.
  30. Atef Saleh, Jabalia, 9.9.18.
  31. The child, Imad Shaheen, Gaza, 5.11.18.
  32. Ramzi Abu Yabes, Deihesheh, 26.11.18.
  33. Saleh Albarguthi, Kobar, 12.12.18.
  34. Ashraf Nalwa, Fajr, 13.12.18.
  35. Muhammed Fawzi Adawi, Azzun Attameh, 21.1.19.
  36. Fares Barroud, Gaza, 6.2.19.
  37. Ameer Darraj, Khurbatha Almasbah, 4.3.19.
  38. Yusef Ankawi, Beit Sira, 4.3.19.
  39. Yasser Shweki, Hebron, 13.3.19.
  40. Omar Abu Liela, Azzawieh Fajer, 20.3.19.
  41. Omar Awni Younes, Kalkilieh – Sinirieh, 27.4.19.
  42. Yousef Wajeeh Sahweihl, Abween, 31.5.19.
  43. Muhammed Abdul Almunaam Abdul Fattah, Khirbet Qais, 3.4.19.

1 Comment

THE ZIONIST GRINCH THAT STOLE CHRISTMAS

December 19, 2018 at 13:48 (Collective Punishment, DesertPeace Exclusive, Gaza, zionist harassment)

Christmas is meant to be a time for family to get together but not if you’re a Palestinian living in Gaza

1 Comment

ISRAEL LOBBY LEAKS

September 17, 2018 at 08:59 (DesertPeace Exclusive, FaceBook, Israel's Shame, zionist harassment)

First see THIS post for background info …..

New leaked excerpts from censored Al Jazeera film reveal The Israel Project’s secretive Facebook influence campaign.

Leaked Clips from Censored Documentary on Israel Lobby Reveal Attacks on US Activists

Excerpts of the censored Al Jazeera undercover film on the Israel lobby in the US have started to be leaked. The Electronic Intifada’s Ali Abunimah and the Grayzone Project’s Max Blumenthal explain how these clips show the Israeli government backing attacks on American pro-Palestinian activists and Black Lives Matter.

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ZION USES FACEBOOK TO TARGET THE POETRY OF FREEDOM

September 12, 2018 at 16:13 (Cover Up, Deceit, FaceBook, Israel's Shame, zionist harassment)

 Facebook campaigns were run by professional Washington D.C. political operatives who work for a group called the Israel on Campus Coalition, according to promotional materials obtained by ProPublica and the Forward.

 

Pro-Israel Group Secretly Ran Misleading Facebook Ads To Target Palestinian-American Poet

Josh Nathan-Kazis and Justin Elliott/ProPublica

This story was co-published with ProPublica, the investigative journalism organization.

 

In 2016, as Palestinian-American poet Remi Kanazi performed at college campuses around the United States, his appearances seemed to spark student protests.

Before his visit to John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, a page called “John Jay Students Against Hate” appeared on Facebook with Kanazi’s face next to a uniformed cop, painting Kanazi as anti-police. When Kanazi crossed the country a few days later to visit San Jose State, a nearly-identical Facebook page popped up, this one called “SJSU Students Against Hate,” with Kanazi’s face superimposed over an image of military graves. Paid Facebook campaigns promoted both pages.

Despite their names, the Facebook campaigns were run by professional Washington D.C. political operatives who work for a group called the Israel on Campus Coalition, according to promotional materials obtained by ProPublica and the Forward.

In the materials, which the ICC distributed to its donors, the group describes each of the Facebook pages as an “anonymous digital campaign.” The group says it paid to promote the campaign, which reached tens of thousands of people.

The social media campaigns provide another example of how well-funded advocacy organizations are using deceptive strategies to promote their cause online. The ICC launched these campaigns during the 2016 election season, at the same time that entities linked to the Russian government bought misleading Facebook ads on a range of political issues.

The ICC didn’t respond to requests for comment. The group had a budget of $9 million in its fiscal year ending in June 2017, according to federal tax filings. Its funders include the foundations of billionaire Republican donor Paul Singer and philanthropist Lynn Schusterman.

Asked about the Israel on Campus Coalition pages, a Facebook spokesman said they “violate our policies against misrepresentation and they have been removed.”

In response to criticism of Russia-linked ads, Facebook recently created new rules requiring disclosure of who is paying for political ads on the site. How the company defines what is political remains murky.

Anonymous digital campaigns appear to be a central part of the ICC’s efforts to combat pro-Palestinian activism on U.S. campuses. This past spring, the ICC appears to have set up at least one anonymous website to oppose a George Washington University student government resolution that called on the school to divest its endowment from certain companies that students said were profiting from Israeli violations of Palestinian rights, the Forward reported.

The ICC’s leaders discussed their covert social media tactics in an unaired Al Jazeera documentary featuring hidden camera footage of Washington, D.C. pro-Israel advocacy officials.

“With the anti-Israel people, what’s most effective, what we found at least in the last year, is you do the opposition research, put up some anonymous website, and then put up targeted Facebook ads,” said the ICC’s executive director, Jacob Baime, in the Al Jazeera documentary, which was filmed in 2016. The film was viewed by ProPublica and the Forward.

Baime also said in the documentary that his organization’s work is based on a doctrine used to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban. “It’s modeled on General Stanley McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy,” Baime said. “We’ve copied a lot from that strategy that has been working really well for us, actually.”

McChrystal, who led the U.S. military’s special forces and the NATO war effort in Afghanistan in 2009 and 2010, emphasized so-called “offensive information operations” to embarrass and discredit violent insurgents.

The Al Jazeera documentary, in which a journalist went undercover as an intern for a pro-Israel advocacy group in Washington, has been the subject of months of international intrigue and has never been aired by the network. Decrying the undercover tactics, pro-Israel groups and members of Congress have pushed back against the documentary series and Qatar, which funds Al Jazeera. The network, which has faced public criticism from its own journalists for not airing the documentary, said in April it did not buckle under pressure from a pro-Israel group in deciding not to broadcast the program. A spokesman didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Footage in the documentary also shows ICC officials describing their working relationship with the Israeli government.

Baime says in the documentary that ICC officials “coordinate” or “communicate” with Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs, an Israeli government department that has become the hub of the Israeli government’s overt and covert efforts against the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement in the U.S. and around the world. A spokesman for the agency didn’t respond to requests for comment.

In the same hidden camera footage, Ian Hersh, the ICC’s director of operations, said that the Ministry of Strategic Affairs participates in the group’s “Operations and Intelligence Brief,” a regular strategy meeting.

In recent days, some aspects of the Al Jazeera documentary as well as a short clip have been posted on the website Electronic Intifada, a pro-Palestinian news site whose executive director, Ali Abunimah, appears as an interviewee in the film.

Baime and Hersh didn’t respond to requests for comment about the footage of them in the documentary.

The ICC’s online efforts against Kanazi, the Palestinian-American poet, began in November 2016 while he was touring college campuses to promote his book, “Before the Next Bomb Drops: Rising Up From Brooklyn to Palestine.”

According to the ICC’s donor materials, the group identified and worked with a non-Jewish military veteran and San Jose State University student to write a blog post critical of Kanazi. The precise nature of the group’s work with the student is unclear from the donor materials, and the student did not respond to requests for comment.

The ICC then created and paid to promote the “SJSU Students Against Hate” page, which linked to the blog post.

“Kanazi preaches hate on the campuses he visits,” the student wrote in the post, which appeared on the website Medium and has since been deleted.

Kanazi said that he does not recall being aware of the anonymous Facebook pages at the time. “These insidious tactics are part of a larger campaign to smear students, professors, and anyone who dares speak up for Palestinian human rights at universities,” he said in an email.

Here is but one example of Remi’s ‘threat to zion’

Remi Kanazi – Normalize This!

Comments Off on ZION USES FACEBOOK TO TARGET THE POETRY OF FREEDOM

A FATHER SPEAKS ABOUT HIS IMPRISONED DAUGHTER >>> MUST WATCH VIDEO

June 13, 2018 at 15:03 (Collective Punishment, Israel's Shame, Occupation, Palestine, zionist harassment)

‘Why Ahed slapped the soldier’ –an interview with Bassem Tamimi

This interview with Bassem Tamimi was recorded on May 4, 2018 in the occupied village of Nabi Saleh, by International Solidarity Movement activists.

His daughter Ahed Tamimi, 17, is serving an eight-month prison sentence for slapping an Israeli soldier on the family’s property on December 15 of last year, after Israeli soldiers shot her cousin in the face.

*

1 Comment

A MESSAGE TO THE FRIENDS OF THE IDF

April 25, 2018 at 13:41 (Collective Punishment, Israel's Shame, Palestine, Soldier Brutality, zionist harassment)

With ‘friends’ like these, do you really need enemies?

 

Israeli soldiers cheer after shooting Palestinian protester in the West Bank

Two weeks after Israel’s military opened a probe into soldiers who cheered on the shooting of an unarmed Palestinian protester in Gaza, a second video has emerged depicting a similar incident in the West Bank where soldiers applauded the targeting of a demonstrator and took delight in seeing journalists exposed to tear gas.

At around 2:00 P.M. on Friday afternoon, 13 April 2018, some thirty residents of the Palestinian village of Madama tried to remove a roadblock the Israeli military had placed at the eastern entrance to the village. About eleven soldiers then arrived on the scene. In the clashes that ensued, residents threw stones at the soldiers from a distance of 50-80 meters, and the soldiers fired stun grenades and rubber-coated metal bullets at the villagers. Seven residents sustained injuries from the rubber-coated metal bullets the soldiers fired: two were taken to a hospital in Nablus for medical treatment, and the other five were treated on the spot. Joyfully cheering about shooting a person trying to clear the access road to his home and calmly discussing other ways to hit him and the other people with him are part of the discordant soundtrack accompanying 51 years of occupation. 

1 Comment

“SENSATIONAL” INCITEMENT VIDEO REMOVED BY YOUTUBE

April 24, 2018 at 17:25 (Censorship, DesertPeace Exclusive, Gaza, YouTube, zionist harassment)

It is now  posted  on Vimeo.

Check out this stirring anthem to freedom in Gaza. It begins with a Palestinian child saying “We shall overcome” and an image of Martin Luther King Jr. and then in many still pictures of the “Great March of Return” conveys the strength of the unarmed resistance to the blockade–including the killing of Yaser Murtaja, the Palestinian journalist who was one of six Palestinian journalists shot by Israeli snipers on April 6.

‘Youtube’ removes video tribute to Yaser Murtaja and other Gaza victims as ‘sensational’ incitement

Who controls YouTube? …… DON’T LET THEM CONTROL YOU!

2 Comments

ISRAEL’S RIGHT CONTINUES ITS FIGHT AGAINST AHED TAMIMI VIA ‘NEW’ VIDEO

April 22, 2018 at 12:37 (Israel's Shame, Palestine, zionist harassment, zionist Media)

New it’s NOT ….. but here it is

Pretty pathetic I must say

Here’s the reason behind Ahed’s actions…

Here’s what the ‘wrongful right’ sees as new ….

Another Ahed Tamimi violence video revealed

Tamimi seen in video attacking soldiers and Border Police officers with fists and kicks.

The Ad Kann organization published a new video in which terrorist Ahed Tamimi is again documented attacking soldiers during operational activity less than a year ago in Nabi Salah.

At the beginning of the video Tamimi appears blocking a border police officer’s field of vision while he was taking aim from a prone position, and then attacking Border Policemen and IDF soldiers with pushes, fists, and kicks.

About two weeks after the documented incident, Ad Kann filed a complaint with Binyamin police against Tamimi demanding a criminal investigation: “In the video you can see Tamimi attacking Border Police and IDF soldiers again and again without the security forces stopping her, so she grew bolder and began to attack with fists and even kicks,” the complaint states.

“Tamimi’s criminal actions are getting worse, and the time has come to act on this matter. Therefore, we ask you to order the necessary measures against Tamimi and other persons involved.”

A plea bargain was recently signed according to which Tamimi would be sentenced to eight months’ imprisonment and fined NIS 5,000. After the deal, Ad Kann sent a request to the Military Advocate General to cancel the plea bargain.

“We were surprised to hear about the lenient plea arrangement that was presented today after contacts between the parties that were conducted in secret,” the organization’s request stated.”This organization has long been operating in radical organizations involved in violent riots and attacks on IDF soldiers. The plea bargain is puzzling and unacceptable, since unequivocal documentation was presented and the evidence speaks for itself.

“The Tamimi family and its supporters interpret enforcement authority indulgence in the wrong way. This was the case when Ahed attacked IDF soldiers over and over without intervention, and so it was in the courtroom, when one of her supporters attacked a military prosecutor in an unprecedented manner.”

Despite this, Ad Kann‘s request to cancel the plea bargain was rejected by the Military Advocate General.

The organization, which in recent years has exposed radical left-wing organizations, has launched a crowd-funding operation at the GiveBack website to continue its activities. “They have the money from Europe – we have you,” says the fundraising page.

Ad Kann Director Gilad Ach said: “For years anarchists and Palestinians who receive funding from them have been physically attacking IDF soldiers while the soldiers’ hands are tied and unable to respond. Beyond the attack itself, these incidents severely impair the IDF’s deterrent capability, the soldier’s morale, and the fighting spirit.

“A year ago, in May 2017, we filed a police complaint about Tamimi’s repeated attacks on IDF soldiers, but unfortunately the enforcement authorities chose to ignore it, which increased motivation among the attackers.

“A plea bargain serves the same trend and will only increase the attacker’s appetite and cause soldiers to deduce they have no backing, especially when all the evidence is clear and there’s no legal need for a plea bargain. The Military Advocate General Office’s response from recent days raises the fear that the State Attorney’s Office is not determined to bring the soldiers’ attackers to justice.”

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TWITTER STORM OVER TAMIMI SUPPORT

February 20, 2018 at 09:26 (Israel, Palestine, Twitter, zionist harassment)

It all started on February 16 when Silverman tweeted in support of Ahed Tamimi – the Palestinian teenager who was detained by Israel in December after she was filmed slapping an Israeli soldier. She has since become a global symbol of the Palestinian resistance movement.

Image by Carlos Latuff

Sarah Silverman Gets Furious Pushback For Supporting Ahed Tamimi

Allison Kaplan Sommer

Comedian Sarah Silverman is at the center of a Twitter storm after tweeting in support of detained Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi over the weekend.

Silverman, of course, is no stranger to controversy, politics or Israel. She has long been active in progressive Democratic politics – campaigning for Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders – and throws comic barbs at the Trump administration.

On the Israeli front, she has been a cheerleader for her sister Rabbi Susan Silverman’s activism on behalf of Women of the Wall, and her battle against the expulsion of African asylum seekers, and joined her last year in contributing to a Passover Haggadah for a group called Save Israel: Stop the Occupation, which advocated for an end to the occupation on its 50th anniversary.

But in recent days Silverman has plunged into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on an unprecedented scale.

It all started on February 16 when Silverman tweeted in support of Ahed Tamimi – the Palestinian teenager who was detained by Israel in December after she was filmed slapping an Israeli soldier. She has since become a global symbol of the Palestinian resistance movement.

Her tweet was intended to support the Amnesty International campaign lobbying against the 17-year-old’s detention (Tamimi faces five counts of assaulting security forces) and calls on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to release her.Predictably, Silverman’s pro-Tamimi tweet inspired an avalanche of responses – both praise from Tamimi supporters, and harsh criticism from pro-Israel advocacy groups chiding her for supporting Tamimi. Critics called Silverman “irresponsible,” told her to “stick to comedy and stay out of politics,” and charged that she is “unwittingly complicit” in Palestinians’ “child abuse.”

Among those replying to Silverman were Frimet and Arnold Roth – the parents of Malki Roth, who was killed at age 15 in Jerusalem’s Sbarro terrorist attack in August 2001.

They tweeted: “Entertainers exploiting their fame are often a poor choice for clarifying what’s moral or good. Sarah, did you stand up for our daughter Malki and the other 15 Jewish lives extinguished by Ahlam Tamimi, Ahed’s cousin and role-model-in-life? Do you stand with Ahed’s call to kill?”Ahlam Tamimi assisted the Hamas terrorists who carried out the attack on the pizza restaurant in 2001. She was arrested by Israeli authorities, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to multiple life sentences. However, she was released in 2011 and sent to Jordan as part of the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas.

In the spirit of her recent TV series “I Love You, America” – in which she meets citizens from across the political spectrum, in an attempt to prove that patriotism exists on both sides of the divide – instead of simply hitting back at her detractors and embracing her supporters, Silverman has been retweeting many of her critics, and responding with questions and comments.

In one exchange, conservative pundit Noah Pollak attacked her advocacy on behalf of Tamimi, He called it “narcissistic Hollywood political posturing at its vilest and most ignorant,” and added Silverman was “pimping for a notorious terrorist family. What a disgrace.”

Silverman responded: “Life is very black and white for you. It’s not for me. You’re easy with labels brother. But I don’t see you sticking your neck out. You judge from your perch. My family is in Jerusalem. My nephew in the IDF. Shits complicated. Peace.”

Last month, Silverman came under fire on social media after she posted an Instagram photo of her nephew Adar – her sister Susan’s 19-year-old son – in his Israeli army uniform, wishing him a happy birthday.

 

See related post HERE

 

2 Comments

A POEM THAT SHOOK THE FOUNDATIONS OF ZION

January 23, 2018 at 10:13 (Corrupt Politics, Israel's Shame, Palestine, Poetry, zionist harassment)

Poem by Yehonatan Geffen comparing Palestinian teen Ahed Tamimi to Anne Frank, Hannah Szenes and Joan of Arc infuriated Defense Minister Lieberman, who sought to then ban Geffen from all Army Radio broadcasts; AG Mandelblit said Lieberman had no legal standing to do so, an opinion Lieberman disavowed.

Yehonatan Geffen (Flash 90)

On Monday, Geffen published a short poem on his instagram account, comparing Ahed Tamimi to heroic underdogs throughout the generations, from David against Goliath to Anne Frank.

“A pretty girl 17 years old did a terrible thing

And when a proud Israeli soldier

Again invaded her home

She gave him a slap.

She was born into it and in that slap

Were fifty years of occupation and humiliation.

And on the day that the story of the struggle will be told

You, Ahed Tamimi,

The redhead,

Like David who slapped Goliath,

You will be in the same ranks as

Joan of Arc, Chana Senesh and Anne Frank.”

Ahed Tamimi Hadas Parush /Flash90

Israeli poet compares Ahed Tamimi to Anne Frank

Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman this morning (Tuesday) instructed Army Radio to cease playing the works of or interviewing Israeli poet and songwriter Yehonatan Geffen, after Geffen published a poem on his Instagram account glorifying a Palestinian Authority teen who slapped Israeli soldiers.

On December 15, Ahed Tamimi, her cousin Nour Tamimi and Ahed’s mother Nariman Tamimi confronted two IDF soldiers stationed in the PA town of Nabi Salih following the outbreak of riots in the area.

In footage of the incident that went viral, the Tamimis can be seen pushing, kicking, slapping, and shouting at the soldiers, who do not respond to the provocations.

Ahed Tamimi was later arrested on December 19, and was indicted on January 1. A total of 12 charges were included in the indictment against Ahed, spanning 6 different incidents. The charges include aggravated assault, interfering with army operations, incitement, making threats, and throwing stones.

“I instructed this morning the commander of Army Radio to cease playing or interviewing Yehonatan Geffen on all station broadcasts,” Liberman said in response. “The State of Israel will not grant a platform to a man who compares a girl who died in the Holocaust and a heroic warrior who fought the Nazi regime with the brat Ahed Tamimi, who attacked a soldier. Geffen’s headline-seeking is sickening and outrageous.”

 

Source

Another report HERE

4 Comments

#Israel’sShame ~~ OK TO RAPE FEMALE DETAINEES IF CAMERAS ARE TURNED OFF

January 18, 2018 at 15:35 (Associate Post, Civil Rights, Collective Punishment, Hate crimes, Israel's Shame, Palestine, zionist harassment)

A prominent Israeli journalist, Ben Caspit, has reportedly called for raping and sexually harassing Palestinian females detained in Israeli jails and interrogation centers.

Image by Latuff

Rape is but one war crime committed off camera

Israeli Journalist calls for raping Palestinian female detainees “but away from cameras”! Where is the outcry?

By Khalid Amayreh

*

A prominent Israeli journalist, Ben Caspit, has reportedly called for raping and sexually harassing Palestinian females detained in Israeli jails and interrogation centers.
 
“In the case of the girls, we should exact a price at some other opportunity, in the dark, without witnesses and cameras”, he wrote in Hebrew. See Link: https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/prominent-israeli-journalist-calls-rape-palestinian-women/
 
Although, the Hebrew article was published more than three weeks ago, it failed to generate any real outcry in the Israeli Jewish society or indeed among Israeli intellectuals, politicians and government officials.  The media treatment of the ghoulish remarks was minimal.
 
For several years, the Israeli Jewish society has been drifting to extreme chauvinism, jingoism and fascism as centrist and leftist political parties and organizations nearly disappeared from the public scene.
 
A few decades ago, a newspaper article encouraging rape would have landed its writer behind bars, and   turning him into a real pariah.
 
Now, with the fire of Jewish fascism spreading uncontrollably throughout Israel, racist and fascist-minded writers are looked upon as respectable role-models to be emulated rather than shunned or condemned.
 
Israel claims to be a democratic and civilized state. However, the fact that a prominent journalist can easily incite interrogators and security personnel to rape female detainees, and his call is treated just another piece of banal news, means that Israel has effectively entered the Nazi sphere.
 
This is why I feel I must appeal to all decent Jews to denounce, in the strongest terms, the obnoxious remarks attributed to Ben Caspit. Moreover, the American media, always shamelessly busy praising Israel, should condemn the hateful remarks reported. 
 
I won’t appeal to Netanyahu, Bennett and other Israeli leaders to confront this fascist trend, which really reminds us of the anti-Jewish discourse prevailing in Nazi German prior to the Holocaust. Indeed, Auschwitz, Bergen Belsen, Dachau, and  Treblinka didn’t really begin  in 1943 and 1944. They started much earlier, even before Kristalnacht, with the virulently racist anti-Jewish speech, which is very similar to what we hear and watch here in Israel today.
 
In the final analysis, Netanyahu and ilk are the paragons of fascism and racism. Hence, appealing to them to crack down on fascism in Israel would be as futile and pointless as having  urged Hitler, Himmler, Eichmann, and other Nazi leaders to stop the wave of hatred flooding Germany and much of Europe 80 years ago.
 
None the less, as it was clear then that not all Germans were Hitlers, Himmlers and Eichmanns, it is clear now that not all Jews are Netanyahus, Bennets and Liebertmans.
 
Needless to say, it is to these conscientious voices that I appeal to make a real stand against the wave of fascism now inundating Israel, an entity that falsely pretends to be Jewish and democratic.

5 Comments

IN TOONS ~~ FACEBOOK JOINS THE WAR AGAINST PALESTINE

January 11, 2018 at 15:00 (Associate Post, Cartoons, Collective Punishment, Corrupt Politics, Israel, Palestine, zionist harassment)

Facebook has been on a censorship campaign against Palestinian activists, deleting accounts at the direction of the US and Israeli governments.

Images by Carlos Latuff

The ‘War’ was started by the Israeli government issuing a blacklist …..

Omar Barghouti: “By waging an all-out war on the peaceful #BDS movement for Palestinian rights and by now banning international human rights organizations from entry, Israel’s desperate and brutal attempts to weaken support for BDS are already backfiring.”
More HERE

1 Comment

NOT ALL CARTOONS ARE MEANT TO BE FUNNY ~~ A SAD CHRISTMAS IN BETHLEHEM THIS YEAR

December 27, 2017 at 09:48 (Associate Post, Holidays, Occupation, Palestine, zionist harassment)

One day we WILL celebrate!

Comments Off on NOT ALL CARTOONS ARE MEANT TO BE FUNNY ~~ A SAD CHRISTMAS IN BETHLEHEM THIS YEAR

NEW ZIO APP VIRTUALLY DESTROYS THE DOME OF THE ROCK IN JERUSALEM

November 15, 2017 at 14:42 (Chutzpah, Israel's Shame, Just Plain Disgusting, zionist harassment)

A smartphone app promoted by a Zionist organization allows visitors to Jerusalem to virtually destroy the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa mosque and replace them with a Jewish temple.

Funded by Israel

New zio-app virtually destroys Al Aqsa Mosque

Israeli-funded app “destroys” Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque

Ali Abunimah

A smartphone app promoted by a Zionist organization allows visitors to Jerusalem to virtually destroy the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa mosque and replace them with a Jewish temple.

The app is offered as part of an Israeli government-funded exhibit that advances the agenda of destroying the Muslim holy sites at the al-Aqsa compound.

The site in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem is revered by Muslims all over the world and known to Jews as Temple Mount.

Last month, Rabbi Steven Burg tweeted an image of how the app visually transforms the site, erasing the existing buildings altogether. “One day soon …” he added, indicating he wants the image to become reality.

Burg is the director of Aish HaTorah, the Zionist religious group sponsoring the “Western Wall Experience” exhibit.

He is also a former director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the Los Angeles-based Israel lobby group notoriousfor building a “Museum of Tolerance” on top of one of Jerusalem’s oldest Muslim cemeteries.

As part of the Western Wall Experience exhibit, people can download an “augmented reality” smartphone app. When pointed towards the al-Aqsa mosque compound, it makes the Dome of the Rock disappear and replaces it with an image of a Jewish temple standing in its place.

This allows visitors to “to pose for a souvenir photograph” in an imagined landscape where the Muslim holy sites have been destroyed.

Wiping out churches and mosques

This fits into the broader agenda promoted by many senior Israeli politicians and clerics who advocate the construction of a Jewish temple in the place where the al-Aqsa mosque and the Dome of the Rock have stood for more than 1,000 years.

The chief rabbi of this so-called Temple movement is Yisrael Ariel, a religious extremist who has called for the wholesale destruction of churches and mosques unless Muslims and Christians “raise the flag of [surrender] and say, ‘From now on, there is no more Christianity and no more Islam,’ and the mosques and Christian spires come down.”

But it also includes government ministers and lawmakers from Israel’s ruling Likud and other parties.

Prominent among these is Likud lawmaker Yehuda Glick, who has forged a political alliance with neo-Nazi parties that have gained seats in recent elections in Germany and Austria.

Funded by Israel

Israeli government-funded extremist groups have already made detailed blueprints – complete with 3D computer animations – of what the new temple will look like once the Muslim holy sites have been destroyed.

Similarly, the ultimate aim of the designers of the Western Wall Experience is barely concealed: its website calls for “Laying the foundation” – presumably for the temple.

And Aish HaTorah also makes it clear that its indoctrination is not its initiative alone.

“The ministry of tourism and the State of Israel are significant funding partners for the construction of the Western Wall Experience,” the group states. “They will be making the Western Wall Experience a mandatory must-see for all visiting dignitaries to Israel, and will play an active role in raising awareness of the Experience.”

The al-Aqsa mosque compound is one of the most sensitive political and religious sites in Palestine. Israel has advanced false claims about the site at the UN cultural body UNESCO in an effort to secure international recognition for its occupation of Jerusalem.

Over the summer, Palestinians staged weeks of nonviolent civil disobedience against an Israeli effort to impose tighter controls on entry to the compound.

Despite Israel’s violent reaction to the peaceful protests, Palestinians prevailed, forcing the military occupier into a humiliating retreat.

 

See Tweets at SOURCE

4 Comments

ZION’S ATTEMPT TO CENSOR THE TRUTH // AGAIN

November 6, 2017 at 15:20 (Censorship, Israel, zionist created anti_Semitism, zionist harassment, zionist Slander)

The established Jewish community is reactionary on criticism of the Jewish state. It got that job 50 years ago. It’s wearing thin, and btw, efforts to shut down a movie only help the other side.

Jewish leaders seek to shut down anti-occupation movie in MA because it ‘sniffs of Nazism’

Philip Weiss 

Some good news. Three women at a Unitarian church outside Boston insist on showing a movie critical of Israel, even when the Jewish community tries to censor them. This story can only embarrass the organized Jewish community in the end, on free speech grounds, and serve the cause of Palestinians human rights.

The “Occupation of the American Mind” is a documentary about how and why Americans have such an uninformed view of the conflict. It features Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein, Yousef Munayyer, Rula Jebreal, Amira Hass, Rashid Khalidi and Steve Walt, among others, and has been endorsed by Deepa Kumar, Avi Shlaim, Neve Gordon, Medea Benjamin, etc. Doug Rushkoff says:

“A stunning exposé on how propaganda drives public opinion and, in turn, our understanding of reality. Here’s the story of how American perceptions of the Middle East — as well as resulting legislation and military strategy — are engineered: from focus group to talking points to mortar fire.”

The film is scheduled to be screened Sunday afternoon at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Marblehead and there’s a ton of resistance. A couple of rabbis along with people who work at a foundation dedicated to enhancing Jewish identity by creating connections to Israel have led a drive to have the screening cancelled. They got 158 signatures, mostly from the Jewish community, in opposition to the Occupation doc.

The three women from the church’s social action committee who booked the film are standing tall. But the resistance to the film has demonstrated the film’s theme. You try to speak fairly about the conflict in the U.S., and people get very angry, and do what they can to shut you down.

The Occupation of the American Mind, which is narrated by Roger Waters, has never been subject to such censorship forces before. That is also a good sign, probably. There has been some pushback at campus screenings, I’m told: the UCLA appearance drew hostile comments in the Daily Bruin, Breitbart and Jerusalem Post; and the Case-Western screening got letters in the paper. But the film has shown hundreds of times around the country without incident.

Here’s some of the hostile press, none of which describes the film or its message plainly. From the the Jerusalem Post:

“As Jewish people and non-Jewish people as well, we feel very strongly that it’s antisemitic and it sniffs of Nazism, which is very upsetting to Jewish people given our history,” [Lappin foundation head Robert] Lappin said.

Lappin said he does not dispute that people have the right to see the film and make their own decisions about its content, but he said it should not be shown at a church.

“People can see it online,” he said.

We will raise consciousness about the strength of the Palestinian case, if only Americans will stand up for it. One organizer stands tall, in the Marblehead Local:

Jane Casler, who serves on the [church’s Social Action] committee, said Monday the protest didn’t really surprise her.

“We didn’t know what to expect, but we were fairly certain it would be controversial,” she said. “We’re trying to answer everybody and deal with this as honestly as we can.”

Another organizer:

Carolyn Corzine, chairman of the Social Action Committee, said the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an issue that has long been on her mind, which is what led her to suggest showing the film.

While Israel appears modern, the West Bank is a very different world and it’s easy to see how unbalanced the perception is, she said, adding, “I think people will be surprised.”

There’s a lot of invective being thrown at the organizers.

Rabbi David Cohen-Henriquez, of Temple Sinai, said… “Having Roger Waters narrate the movie is like having a movie on race narrated by David Duke…”

Nuts. A more instructive metaphor comes from opponent Faith Quintero, who said that “she feels that inviting Israel supporters to a place that has conducted anti-Israel study groups is like inviting a runner to a marathon when the opponent has a 25-mile head start.”

Quintero created her own fact sheet to counter the film. Here are some assertions:

Before Israel’s separation barrier was built in 2000, Islamists set off bombs that killed Israeli civilians in pizza parlors, discos and buses. Until then, people in the disputed territories had free movement into Israel without the checkpoints that are there today.

Palestinians are marginalized throughout the Arab world, kept in refugee camps, prohibited from buying land and getting jobs

A third member of the social action committee is the church’s pastor. She points out that the pressure campaign is what the film documents:

[UUCM Pastor Wendy] Von Courter said given the pressure to cancel the showing, it seemed ironic that a central message of the film is that U.S. citizens are prevented from hearing more than a single narrative about the conflict.

The best part of this protest is the claim that that the film will set back the great peace process! The Lynn Item, a North Shore daily, cites the other local rabbi who opposes the film’s being shown. Rabbi Michael Ragozin, of Congregation Shirat Hayam in Swampscott, MA, said:

“The film takes not just a critical view of Israel, but it promotes lies and falsehoods and it’s that tactic of lies and falsehoods that ultimately promotes extremism and are detriments to democracy and detriments to ultimately any peaceful sort of resolution to the conflict in Israel…. When you have a film that is motivated by that type of mindset, it only serves that end, which is the elimination of the state of Israel and it doesn’t serve the idea of any peaceable solution.”

By the way, this is the reason that good liberals opposed the Goldstone Report, it would undermine the two-state solution. Pastor Von Courter responded calmly, saying

the church’s social action committee found the film was a good fit for its continued exploration of the road to justice for all people. She said some members of the committee have firsthand experience in the Middle East and the church’s larger congregation and denomination is quite familiar with the issue.

Here is the ad from the Marblehead Reporter.

Here’s a headline, in the Jewish Journal echoing that ad: Area Jews ask: “Why would a church show an anti-Semitic movie?” This article is very pro-Israel.

The movie makes vast assertions about the power of Israel to influence American opinion and alludes to a far-reaching conspiracy of anti-Palestinian reporting without evidence to back up that assertion. It lumps the “American media” into one bucket. Also, there is no mention of conflicting opinions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict within Israel, within the US or within the American Jewish community.

The movie’s review of the history of the conflict fails to mention that Israel was invaded by its neighbors in 1948. When discussing Gaza, the film does not mention the tunnel system that alarmed Israeli security interests. Nor does it discuss the Palestinian educational curriculum – which encourages children to hate Jews and Israelis, and does not recognize Israel in any of its textbook maps.

The onslaught is a reminder that in the most liberal communities, the pro-Israel exception is alive and well. As Barney Frank, who used to represent an adjoining district, told Jeff Halper years ago, I see what the settlements are doing, but I can only come out against them if you can give me 5000 Jews in my district who will support me on the move. Otherwise it’s political suicide.

The established Jewish community is reactionary on criticism of the Jewish state. It got that job 50 years ago. It’s wearing thin, and btw, efforts to shut down a movie only help the other side.

4 Comments

CENSORING PALESTINE ON CAMPUS

October 25, 2017 at 10:52 (Academic Freedom, Censorship, Israel, zionist harassment)

Israel lobby stalwart and retired Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz appears determined to use Columbia as a proving ground for censorship of dissent, especially from the left.

FaceBook is also guilty of censoring Palestine by censoring Latuff

First they censor Palestine …

Three students at Barnard College, which is affiliated with New York’s Columbia University, are facing punishment for protesting a speech earlier this month by a notorious white supremacist.

Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, the British Islamophobe and English Defence League founder who goes by the pseudonym Tommy Robinson, spoke to Columbia students via Skype on 10 October.

According to campus newspaper The Columbia Spectator, dozens of students interrupted Robinson’s speech and held up signs, while 250 more protested outside the venue.

Almost 5,000 people have signed a petition supporting the students, and mobilizations to defend them are being organized on campus.

“By attempting to silence protesters while providing space and funds for hate speech at Columbia, Suzanne Goldberg and other university administrators are demonstrating complicity with violent ideologues whose claims continue to actively harm historically marginalized students,” the petition states.

The petition quotes a mass email from Columbia vice-president Suzanne Goldberg that “it is foundational to Columbia’s learning and teaching missions that we allow for the contestation of ideas, as President Bollinger has often made clear.”

If Goldberg and university president Lee Bollinger “truly believed in open dialogue and the ‘contestation of ideas,’ they would not be threatening student protesters with disciplinary action,” the petition states.

Selective freedom

A few days after the protest, university provost John Coatsworth issued another mass email with the subject line “Statement on disrupting speakers.”

“As President Bollinger made clear in his Commencement Address last May, freedom of speech is a core value of our institution,” Coatsworth wrote. “The university is committed to defend the right of all the members of our community to exercise their right to invite, listen to and challenge speakers whose views may be offensive and even hurtful to many of us. It is the duty of every member of the community to help preserve freedom of speech for all, including protesters.”

Such arguments might be persuasive in a hypothetical world where elite universities actually provide equal access and support to all viewpoints.

But in reality, these increasingly corporatized institutions privilege speech by the powerful while marginalizing those who actually challenge orthodoxies and centers of power.

A glaring example of that is Harvard University’s decision in September to rescind a fellowship to Chelsea Manning, after an objection from CIA director Mike Pompeo.

Manning’s courageous and personally costly leaking of classified information brought to light some of the most brutal US war crimes in Iraq – crimes for which no one has yet been held to account.

Meanwhile, Harvard offers a comfortable retreat for all manner of miscreants, from Afghanistan and Iraq war general David Petraeus (convicted in 2015 of passing classified information to his girlfriend), to former Trump spokesperson Sean Spicer.

Harvard even has special programs to fund dozens of Israeli government officials to attend the university.

Alums include a host of senior officers of the Israeli military.

Censorship through “civility”

The Columbia crackdown on students protesting a white supremacist fulfills the prediction that censorship of campus speech related to Palestine – often under the banner of promoting “civility” – would be the test case later expanded to silence other forms of dissent.

“Using the Question of the Palestinians and Israel as the entry point to suppress dissent inside the walls of the academy is both tactical and strategic,” Columbia professor Joseph Massad wrote for The Electronic Intifada in 2014.

“It is tactical because once successful, it would take away key aspects of faculty governance and transfer them to neoliberal university administrations, and would set a precedent and an ensuing chilling effect on other, perhaps even more dangerous, kinds of dissent that command larger public support than do the Palestinians,” Massad added.

Massad was writing amid the protests over the University of Illinois’ firing of Steven Salaita over his tweets criticizing Israel’s attack on Gaza – tweets university administrators deemed “uncivil.”

As the frequent target of anti-Palestinian witch-hunters, Massad can speak from experience.

More than a decade ago, the university set up a committee to investigate bogus charges of anti-Semitism against Columbia faculty including Massad. Its mandate was “to identify cases where there appear to be violations of the obligation to create a civil and tolerant teaching environment.”

After the months of inquisition endured by Massad, the committee concluded that the allegations were unsubstantiated and there was no evidence of anti-Semitism. This did not stop the vilification of Massad by pro-Israel groups and media, nor did it prompt an outpouring of support for his free speech rights from liberal commentators.

Yet the same kinds of arguments and tactics rooted in a concern for civility are now being used by administrators to ensure that white supremacists and other bigots can appear on campuses unchallenged by students.

Not surprisingly, Columbia, which was founded from the profits of the slave trade, remains materially tied to the interests of white supremacists.

The university has been identified by liberal blog ThinkProgress as an investor in a hedge fund run by Robert Mercer, the co-owner of Breitbart and a major funder of white nationalists.

Those calling on Columbia to divest from white supremacy may however find themselves contending with the arguments and tactics honed for use against the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement for Palestinian rights.

Targeting “intersectionality”

Israel lobby stalwart and retired Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz appears determined to use Columbia as a proving ground for censorship of dissent, especially from the left.

In late September, Dershowitz, one of the most ubiquitous and high-profile media commentators, wrote an article in New York’s Daily News painting himself as an embattled “centrist liberal” who was scheduled to speak at the Columbia campus to share his “moderate” ideas.

Dershowitz cited “reports in the media” to claim that “radical students plan to disrupt my speech in an effort to prevent me from sharing my moderate ideas with Columbia students.”

“I expect that my speech will be protested not only by anti-Israel and anti-Semitic students and outsiders, but also by some radical feminists, gay rights activists, Black Lives Matter supporters and others who, under the false banner of ‘intersectionality,’ believe they must stand together against their common oppressors,” Dershowitz predicted.

To his apparent dismay, no such protests or disruptions materialized when he spoke on campus this week.

But in the Daily News article, Dershowitz had made clear what he demanded of the university: “I expect Columbia to assure not only my physical safety and the physical safety of those students who come to listen to me, but also my ability to communicate my views to open-minded students.”

In other words, Dershowitz wanted the university to discipline and punish the feminist, LGBTQ, Black Lives Matter and “anti-Israel” activists he hoped would show up.

As an authority for his position, Dershowitz also cited Columbia president Bollinger’s 2017 commencement speech.

Free speech for the powerful

Right-wing ideologues are championing a notion of “free speech” which means, in effect, unfettered platforms for the already powerful, while the marginalized who seek a voice can be silenced under the banner of protecting that “freedom.”

Bret Stephens, the virulently anti-Palestinian New York Times columnist is holding up University of Chicago president Robert Zimmer as a hero of this type of free speech.

The headline of Stephens’ recent column declares Zimmer “America’s best university president” because of his disdain for trigger warnings and his declaration that “we do not cancel invited speakers because their topics might prove controversial, and we do not condone the creation of intellectual ‘safe spaces’ where individuals can retreat from ideas and perspectives at odds with their own.”

What Stephens does not mention is the sheer hypocrisy of Zimmer’s statements. The University of Chicago does in fact create and condone “safe spaces” – but only for the powerful.

This is what it did when it banned media and imposed other severe speech restrictions for a university-sponsored lecture by Ehud Olmert in October 2009, weeks after a UN-commissioned independent inquiry found evidence of major war crimes in the December 2008 attack on Gaza Olmert had ordered as prime minister of Israel.

Faced with the university’s determination to provide Olmert with a privileged and unchallenged platform, dozens of people – including this writer – disrupted his speech.

We were not protesting Olmert’s opinions. We were protesting his actions, including the destruction of dozens of schools and universities in Gaza and the killing of hundreds of teachers and students.

But in the new concept of free speech promoted by universities like Columbia, the freedom of expression of racists and war criminals is to be cherished and protected far above the rights of their victims and those in solidarity with them to protest for their right not to be oppressed, exterminated or to have their history erased because of who they are.

In a stark example, the University of California at Berkeley was prepared to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to ensure that far-right demagogues could speak on campus.

In advance of a campus speech by right-wing anti-Palestinian pundit and former Breitbart editor Ben Shapiro last month, Berkeley’s city council granted police permission to use pepper spray against “violent” protesters.

The campus was put on virtual lockdown for Shapiro’s 14 September speech.

Barely a year earlier, UC Berkeley administrators had censored a student-taught course on Palestine.

The censorship to come

Censorship around Palestine serves as a reliable guide of what will likely come next.

Concern about “incivility” operates “as a primary policing mechanism of dissident academics,” Massad wrote in 2014.

“Achieving this, however, would not be easy in a university culture that values academic freedom and freedom of opinion. A weak link in the chain of academic freedom had to be found, one around which people could more easily mobilize – one that could set a precedent. Enter the Question of the Palestinians and Israel.”

Earlier this year, New York’s Fordham University refused to allow the establishment of a Students for Justice in Palestine chapter, claiming that the group would “encourage disruptive conduct” and contradict the college’s values of “civility.”

In April, students filed a federal lawsuit against Fordham, charging the private university with violating its own free expression policies and engaging in viewpoint discrimination.

The case has attracted little attention – at least none from the mainstream liberal and conservative pundits who chatter incessantly about free speech on campus while ignoring the pervasive censorship of views critical of Israel.

But much likely hangs on its outcome. If Fordham gets away with banning Students for Justice in Palestine, it won’t be too long before organizations challenging racism and white supremacy, police violence, mass incarceration or fracking could find themselves outlawed as well.

3 Comments

HOW THE ISRAELI LOBBY IS ASSAULTING OUR FREEDOM OF SPEECH

October 23, 2017 at 10:22 (Boycott Israel, Corrupt Politics, Free Speech, Israel, Palestine, zionist harassment)

The First Amendment squarely protects the right to boycott. Lately, though, a legislative assault on that right has been spreading through the United States –  designed to stamp out constitutionally protected boycotts of Israel…

The First Amendment is Under Serious Assault in Order to Stifle Anti-Israel Boycotts

Michael Krieger 

Assaults on freedom speech can be found in many aspects of American life these days, but one specific area that isn’t getting the attention it deserves relates to boycotts against Israel. Increasingly, we’re seeing various regional governments requiring citizens to agree to what essentially amounts to a loyalty pledge to a foreign government in order to participate in or receive government services.

I’m going to highlight two troubling examples of this, both covered by Israeli paper Haaretz. The first relates to Kansas.

From the article, In America, the Right to Boycott Israel Is Under Threat:

The First Amendment squarely protects the right to boycott. Lately, though, a legislative assault on that right has been spreading through the United States –  designed to stamp out constitutionally protected boycotts of Israel…

Over the past several years, state and federal legislatures have considered dozens of bills, and in some cases passed laws, in direct violation of this important ruling. These bills and laws vary in numerous respects, but they share a common goal of scaring people away people from participating in boycotts meant to protest Israeli government policies, including what are known as Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns.

Today, the ACLU filed a lawsuit challenging one of those laws — a Kansas statute requiring state contractors to sign a statement certifying that they do not boycott Israel, including boycotts of companies profiting off settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

We are representing a veteran math teacher and trainer from Kansas who was told she would need to sign the certification statement in order to participate in a state program training other math teachers. Our client is a member of the Mennonite Church USA. In response to calls for boycott by the church and members of her congregation, she has decided not to buy consumer goods and services offered by Israeli companies and international companies operating in Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. Our client is boycotting to protest the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians and to pressure the government to change its policies.

Earlier this year, our client was selected to participate as a contractor in a statewide training program run by the Kansas Department of Education. She was excited to use her skills to help train math teachers throughout the state, but when she was presented with a form requiring her to certify that she “is not currently engaged in a boycott of Israel,” she told the state that she could not sign the form in good conscience. As a result, the state refuses to let her participate in the program.

Kansas’s law, and others like it, violates the Constitution. The First Amendment prohibits the government from suppressing one side of a public debate. That means it cannot impose ideological litmus tests or loyalty oaths as a condition on hiring or contracting.

If this was the only example of such behavior, I suppose we could dismiss it as a one-off, misguided directive. Unfortunately, this sort of thing is far more common than any of us would like to admit.

Here’s another recent example, from the article, Houston Suburb Won’t Give Hurricane Relief to Anyone Who Boycotts Israel:

A Houston suburb will not approve grants to repair homes or businesses damaged in Hurricane Harvey if the applicant supports boycotting Israel.

The city of Dickinson’s application form for storm damage repair funding includes a clause stating that “By executing this Agreement below, the Applicant verifies that the Applicant: (1) does not boycott Israel; and (2) will not boycott Israel during the term of this Agreement.”

No other clauses about political affiliations or beliefs are included in the form.

The state of Texas passed a law in May banning state entities from contracting with businesses that boycott Israel. The law, one of 21 passed in states around the country in the past few years, has been criticized by the American Civil Liberties Union as unconstitutional.

This is totally insane. I don’t care what you think about Israel, the above is completely unacceptable in a free society and we should all be making a stink about it. Please share with friends and family.

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MINI KRISTALLNACHT IN JERUSALEM

October 15, 2017 at 08:39 (Collective Punishment, fascism, Israel, zionist harassment)

WHAT THE WESTERN PRESS DEEMS NOT WORTHY TO REPORT

Read about Kristallnacht HERE

My grandfather owned and operated a small shoe repair shop in Slovakia before the nazi invasion. One night nazi thugs came and destroyed the shop as well as beating the old man almost to death.

A few weeks later he and the rest of his Jewish community were shipped off to Auschwitz, where most perished….

Now THIS, right here in Jerusalem.

Never Again???? (or only sometimes to some?)

“Yesterday they came and started throwing objects at Ibrahim the worker and the three costumers sitting there. They started hitting them, broke everything and shouted death to all Arabs,” he said. “I don’t know why, but for some reason the police did not interfere and did not do anything.”

A vandalized shop in the Old City of Jerusalem, October 2017. (photo credit:Courtesy)

JEWISH WORSHIPPERS IN JERUSALEM ATTACK ARAB-OWNED SHOP

BY UDI SHAHAM

A shop located adjacent to Damascus Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City was vandalized, and its worker attacked late overnight on Wednesday by Jewish worshipers who were returning from the Western Wall.

It was reported that hundreds of individuals stormed the shop – the only one that was left open that night – and attacked the local worker, Ibrahim Hashelmon, who was lightly wounded and was subsequently taken to a hospital.

Talking to Channel 10 News, Hashelmon said that the police, which has a permanent post right next to the shop, did not approach and arrived at the scene only after the damage was done.

“They threw an ice-cream refrigerator at me… They hit me in the head… The broke the whole place, and spilled soft drinks all over the floor. They took a fire fire extinguisher and hit with it on my head,” he said.

“I became dizzy and then puked. Only at the very end some policemen came and said that they will call an ambulance. It took them a while before they started pushing people away,” he said.

Police addressed the incident as a “quarrel between young people.”

“During the night it was reported that a fight broke between young people on Gai Street in the Old City, in which stones were thrown,” a police statement reads.

“[During which] damage was done to a store, a motorcycle and a car parking nearby. The police intervened and separated between the two sides. An investigation was launched.”

Police told the Jerusalem Post that no arrests were carried out in this case so far.

Hatem Abu al-Daba’at, the owner of the shop told the Post that the place was completely ruined by the rioters.

“All of my equipment, and all the refrigerators were ruined, and the place needs a full restoration,” he said.

Abu al-Daba’at said that it was the first time that his shop suffers this kind of harsh violence and vandalism.

“It was that first time that such thing happened for us. We know that usually when prayer-goers come back from the Kotel during holidays, they shout and curse, but normally the police stop them before they do anything,” he said.

“Yesterday they came and started throwing objects at Ibrahim the worker and the three costumers sitting there. They started hitting them, broke everything and shouted death to all Arabs,” he said. “I don’t know why, but for some reason the police did not interfere and did not do anything.”

Left-wing organization Ir Amim criticized the police for not taking action.

“This is not the first time that the police is not doing its job to protect the Palestinian residents of east Jerusalem,” the NGO said in a statement. “If that is not enough, it added another wrongdoing by hurrying to put out a statement that hides they truth from the public about the assaulting of Palestinians.”

The vandalized car of an Arab shop-owner in Jerusalem’s Old City, October 2017 (credit: courtesy)

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WHAT JEWISH HOLIDAYS MEAN TO PALESTINIANS

October 3, 2017 at 08:31 (Collective Punishment, Israel, Occupied West Bank, Palestine, Poetry, zionist harassment)

Closures for Jewish and Israeli holidays are a routine procedure.

Israeli security forces at the Qalandiya checkpoint near Ramallah (Flash90)

Israel set to put West Bank, Gaza under 11-day closure for Sukkot

Exceptionally long closure comes after Har Adar attack; defense minister dismisses as ‘nonsense’ TV report he overruled army’s recommendation

JUDAH ARI GROSS

In a rare move, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman approved a plan to shut off the West Bank and Gaza Strip for 11 days for the Sukkot holiday and the following Shabbat, his office said Sunday.

An IDF spokesperson confirmed that this was the current decision. However, she stressed that the closure was subject to further assessments ahead of the holiday and could change.

Closures for Jewish and Israeli holidays are a routine procedure. However, in the past, Israel has shut down the West Bank and Gaza only at the start and end of week-long festivals like Sukkot, rather than for the entire holiday.

As the holiday ends on the evening of October 11 — a Wednesday — the closure is scheduled to last through the weekend, until midnight on October 14, for a total of 11 days.

Channel 2 news reported that Liberman’s decision went against a recommendation by the army and was due to pressure by Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, following the deadly stabbing attack at the Har Adar settlement last week in which a Palestinian terrorist shot and killed three security officers and wounded a fourth.

The defense minister’s office dismissed the unsourced report as “nonsense,” and the army similarly denied the claim.

According to both the minister’s and an army spokesperson, since the Har Adar attack, the IDF’s stance has been in favor of a closure for the entire holiday.

The military said that prior to the Har Adar terror attack, it did advocate closing the West Bank and Gaza for only the first and last days of the holiday, but that assessment changed after the attack.

Liberman’s spokesperson said that the new “recommendation was accepted by the defense minister.”

In general, the Jewish high holiday season, which began last week with Rosh Hashanah, is seen by defense officials as a time period of increased tension in the region, when the risk of terror attacks is higher.

Ordinarily, tens of thousands of Palestinians from the West Bank enter Israel and Israeli settlements for work each day. A far smaller number of Gaza residents also travel to Israel, mostly to receive medical treatment.

The IDF makes exceptions to the closures for humanitarian and other outstanding cases, based on assessments by the Defense Ministry’s Civil Administration.

West Bank and Gaza closures for holidays are intended both to prevent attempts at terror attacks in Israel during the holiday period and to allow the Israeli security officials who operate the crossings to celebrate the festival.

A similar closure was imposed on Friday and Saturday for Yom Kippur and last week, for Rosh Hashanah.

The above brings to mind a poem that I wrote 13 years ago ….

MY FAMILY IS DIVIDED  

By Steve Amsel 

 

A wall has been built,

I cannot see my neighbor

I know not when he needs my help

I know not when he is hungry.

 

My brother’s child cannot come for an afternoon snack

I cannot bring it to him

The wall is in the way

Dividing families and loved ones.

 

“They” told us the wall is for protection.

From what?

Must our children go hungry?

Must we be jobless?

 

“They” say we are the enemy.

Is going to work a crime?

Is going to school a crime?

Try to tell a child that hunger is a good thing.

 

If the wall stays up

There will be an enemy

Uneducation and hunger leads to resentment

Resentment will lead to revolt.

 

Learn from your history my friends

Learn that walls are not the solution

Learn that unity is strength

And learn that justice triumphs over evil always.

 

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