Israel-Gaza conflict - Summary of Cease Fire Demands

Summary of demands:
Which seem more reasonable?

By Israel:
- No fighting (well, you can't attack us, but we can attack you)
- We continue to cut off all your trade and travel by water and land with Israel and the rest of the world (except for through Egypt) (but we can continue to trade with and travel to and from the rest of the world)
- You are allowed to get no more weapons (but we can continue to increase our military might)
- We will continue to assassinate your members of parliament (which may include deaths of other civilians in the area)

By Gaza/Hamas:
- Allow us to trade
- Stop assassination bombings
- stop continual raids
- stop attacking our fishermen

See:

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4308099,00.html

Aid blackmail in Palestine

Aid blackmail in Palestine - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
Excerpt:

Once again, Palestinians are being punished for daring to exercise a choice.

It happened before in 2006, when they took part in what was deemed to be the wrong kind of democracy and picked the wrong (Hamas) government. That mistaken execution of free will caused the international community to close its funding tap - cutting Palestinian aid and salaries.

Now, there are penalties for taking another 'wrong' turn, despite repeated threats and warnings: US congress is blocking US $200 million intended for the Palestinian Authority (PA), which persisted with its UN statehood bid in the face of US disapproval.

Few things typify international complicity in stalling Palestinian aspirations like this on/off money switch. The current cut in cash will affect health and social projects - but not, it is said, the PA's security commitments (coordinated with Israel). In other words, the pinch is designed to cause Palestinian suffering - but is calibrated so as not to upset Israeli concerns, or totally derail the stagnating status quo. ...

How Israel takes its revenge on boys who throw stones

Let Freedom Rain: How Israel takes its revenge on boys who throw stones

A side of the story you won't read in the Canadian media. Heartbreaking account of Israeli 'torture' of Palestinian kids. Stephen Harper must be so pleased.

Why Boycott Israel?

Why Boycott Israel?

Excerpt:
Author and history professor Mark LeVine speaks with sociologist Lisa Taraki, a co-founder of the Palestinian campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.
Mark LeVine: What is the "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" movement and how is it related to the academic and cultural boycott movement? How have both evolved in the past few years in terms of their goals and methods?

Lisa Taraki: The BDS movement can be summed up as the struggle against Israeli colonisation, occupation and apartheid. BDS is a rights-based strategy to be pursued until Israel meets its obligation to recognise the Palestinian people's inalienable right to self-determination and complies with the requirements of international law.

Within this framework, the academic and cultural boycott of Israel has gained considerable ground in the seven years since the launching of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) in 2004. The goals of the academic and cultural boycott call, as the aims of the Palestinian Civil Society Call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions issued in 2005, have remained consistent: to end the colonisation of Palestinian lands occupied in 1967; to ensure full equality of Palestinian citizens of Israel and end the system of racial discrimination; and to realise the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN Resolution 194.

The logic of the BDS movement has also remained consistent. The basic logic of BDS is the logic of pressure, not diplomacy, persuasion, or dialogue. Diplomacy as a strategy for achieving Palestinian rights has proven to be futile, due to the protection and immunity Israel enjoys from hegemonic world powers and those in their orbit.
Second, the logic of persuasion has also shown its bankruptcy, since no amount of "education" of Israelis about the horrors of occupation and other forms of oppression seems to have turned the tide. Dialogue between Palestinians and Israelis, which remains very popular among Israeli liberals and Western foundations and governments that fund the activities, has also failed miserably. Dialogue is often framed in terms of "two sides to the story", in the sense that each side must understand the pain, anguish, and suffering of the other, and to accept the narrative of the other.
This presents the "two sides" as if they were equally culpable, and deliberately avoids acknowledgment of the basic coloniser-colonised relationship. Dialogue does not promote change, but rather reinforces the status quo, and in fact is mainly in the interest of the Israeli side of the dialogue, since it makes Israelis feel that they are doing something while in fact they are not. The logic of BDS is the logic of pressure. And that pressure has been amplifying.

Click the top link to read the rest

US Congress to Palestinians - You do not exist

Congress to Palestinians: Drop dead - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
by MJ Rosenberg, Senior Foreign Policy Fellow at Media Matters Action Network.

If anyone had any doubt about whether the Palestinians would declare a state in September, they can't have them now.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu delivered a speech to
Congress that essentially was a series of insults to Palestinians and
every insult was met by applause and standing ovations.

In fact, Netanyahu's appearance itself was an insult.

In the entire history of the United States, only four foreign leaders have addressed joint sessions of Congress more than once.

Prime
Minister Winston Churchill, America's great ally, addressed Congress
three times during World War II. President Nelson Mandela was honored
for destroying apartheid and freeing South Africa. Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin was recognised for opening negotiations with the
Palestinian people.

And now Netanyahu. For what?

In his
entire term in office he has done nothing but reject every request by
the United States that he take some action (like freezing settlements)
to promote Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. In the history of Israel,
there has been no prime minister as hardline on Palestinian rights and
as indifferent to the wishes of the United States as Netanyahu.

So why was he invited to address a rare joint session?

He
was invited because the new Republican leadership of the House of
Representatives wanted to demonstrate, loudly and clearly, that Congress
will not support President Barak Obama in the event that he tries to
achieve an Israeli-Palestinian agreement.

And that is exactly
what the Netanyahu appearance today did demonstrate. The prime minister
unambiguously stated that he had no intention of making peace with the
Palestinians.

He began by saying that, in point of fact, there is
no occupation, stating, that "in Judea and Samaria [the term Israeli
right-wingers use for the West Bank], Israelis are not foreign
occupiers" but the native inhabitants. (He cited Abraham and Isaiah from
the Bible!)

He said he might consider giving up some of that
land but not an inch of Jerusalem. Additionally, he said that Israel
would retain most settlements and insist on a military presence in the
Jordan Valley (thereby ensuring the any State of Palestine would be
locked in on both sides by Israel).

He said that Israel would
never negotiate with a Palestinian government that included Hamas,
whether democratically elected or not. He declared that not a single
Palestinian would be allowed to return to Israel; not even a symbolic
return would be acceptable to him.

There is little reason to
elaborate. Netanyahu today essentially returned to the policies that
Israel pursued before Yitzhak Rabin and Yasir Arafat agreed on mutual
recognition and the joint pursuit of peace.

And the worst part
is not the appalling things Netanyahu said, but how Congress received
them. Even Netanyahu's declaration that there is no Israeli occupation
was met with thunderous applause with the Democrats joining the
Republicans in ecstatic support. Every Netanyahu statement, no matter
how extreme, was met with cheers.

Netanyahu was also applauded
wildly when he invoked Palestinian terrorism over and over again, even
seeming to lump his former "partner," President Mahmoud Abbas with
people who "educate their children to hate, [who] continue to name
public squares after terrorists. And worst of all continue to perpetuate
the fantasy that Israel will one day be flooded by the descendants of
Palestinian refugees."

His bottom line, which Congress fully
bought, was that all Palestinians are terrorists who haven't earned a
state. And probably never will.

Congress cheered and cheered and when Netanyahu was finished, they climbed over each other to touch the hem of his garment.

It
was as if Congress thought that no Palestinians or other Arabs (or
Muslims) would be watching. It was as if it believes that it can shout
its lungs out for Netanyahu (and thereby secure those campaign
contributions from AIPAC), without any consequences to US policy and
national interests in the Arab world.

But Congress is wrong. The
message it sent to the Middle East today, to the whole world, in fact,
was that Palestinians cannot count on the United States to ever play the
role of "honest broker" between Israel and the Palestinians. Even if
President Obama was inclined to, Congress would stop him. And AIPAC,
using the leverage its campaign contributions gives it, would hold
Obama's feet to the fire too. As far as Congress is concerned,
Palestinians do not exist. They have no rights, to a state least of
all. 

And that is why Palestinians have no choice but to
unilaterally declare a state in the fall. They cannot count on America.
As David Ben Gurion understood when he went to the General Assembly to
achieve recognition of Israel, a small, powerless people must take its
destiny into its own hands.

The good news is that, although
Congress is in Netanyahu's pocket, the Obama administration isn't.
Netanyahu insulted the President at the White House last Thursday and
then again in the halls of Congress by eliciting support for policies
Obama rejects. And the administration is furious.

That means that
although Palestinians can and should ignore Congress, the White House
and State Department are still in play. Yes, they will both go along
with Netanyahu, but, probably, without much enthusiasm.

And they
can send a signal to our allies that although the United States cannot
openly oppose Bibi's policies because of Congress - and AIPAC's control
of it - the allies can. The Palestinians should not give up on Obama or
on Secretary of State Clinton either who cannot abide Netanyahu and made
sure she was out of the country to escape being present for his speech.


And so we can look forward to a unilateral declaration of
statehood in September. The Israelis who refuse to negotiate with
stateless Palestinians will have no choice but to negotiate
with the state whose land it is occupying. And those negotiations,
state to state, may produce peace and the "two states for two peoples"
that most Palestinians and Israelis aspire to. In any case, it's the
only hope.

Palestinians should thank Prime Minister Netanyahu
and, even more, the United states Congress for making their choice so
much easier. Together they helped create the Palestinian state today.
And that is a very good thing.

As for Americans, we should be deeply ashamed of our Congress. It has been sold to the highest bidder.

Netanyahu and the one-state solution

Netanyahu and the one-state solution - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
Excerpt:

At this new intersection, there are two signs. The first points
towards the west and reads "viable and just two-state solution", while
the second one points eastward and reads "power sharing".

The first sign is informed by years of political negotiations (from
the Madrid conference in 1991, through Oslo, Camp David, Taba, and
Annapolis) alongside the publication of different initiatives (from the Geneva Initiative and the Saudi Plan
to the Nussaiba and Ayalon Plan), all of which have clarified what it
would take to reach a peace settlement based on the two-state solution.
It entails three central components:

1. Israel's full withdrawal to the 1967
border, with possible one-for-one land swaps so that ultimately the
total amount of land that was occupied will be returned.

2. Jerusalem's division according to the
1967 borders, with certain land swaps to guarantee that each side has
control over its own religious sites and large neighbourhoods. Both
these clauses entail the dismantlement of Israeli settlements and the
return of the Jewish settlers to Israel.

3. The acknowledgement of the right of
return of all Palestinians, but with the following stipulation: while
all Palestinians will be able to return to the fledgling Palestinian
state, only a limited number agreed upon by the two sides will be
allowed to return to Israel; those who cannot exercise this right or,
alternatively, choose not to, will receive full compensation.

Israel's continued unwillingness to fully support these three
components is rapidly leading to the annulment of the two-state option
and, as a result, is leaving open only one possible future direction:
power sharing.

The notion of power sharing would entail the preservation of the
existing borders, from the Jordan valley to the Mediterranean Sea, and
an agreed upon form of a power sharing government led by Israeli Jews
and Palestinians, and based on the liberal democracy model of the
separation of powers. It also entails a parity of esteem - namely, the
idea that each side respects the other side's identity and ethos,
including language, culture and religion. This, to put it simply, is the
bi-national one-state solution.

Many Palestinians have come to realise that even though they are
currently under occupation, Israel's rejectionist stance will
unwittingly lead to the bi-national solution. And while Netanyahu is
still miles behind the current juncture, it is high time for a Jewish
Israeli and Jewish American Awakening, one that will force their
respective leaders to support a viable democratic future for the Jews
and Palestinians living between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean
Sea. One that will bring an end to the violent conflict.

Did the Israeli army have the right to shoot?

Did the Israeli army have the right to shoot? - Features - Al Jazeera English
On Sunday, Israel's disputed northern frontier saw the first deadly clashes between civilians and the Israeli army since 1974.
 
Hundreds
of protesters from Syria and Lebanon marched south toward the two
countries' disputed borders with Israel to mark the "Nakba" - or
"catastrophe" - on the date Palestinians mourn their uprooting as a
result of Israel's founding in 1948.
 
What began as a mass march
by unarmed Palestinian refugees and activists soon turned bloody, with,
reportedly, 14 killed and hundreds wounded.
 
There has been much
controversy over the justifiability of the Israeli military's use of
force in the event of border transgressions.
 
But experts say
there is a fundamental difference between Israel's use of force in
disputed border regions on the one hand, and military action in the
occupied Palestinian territories on the other.
 
The distinction
lies in whether a boundary constitutes an agreed or internationally
recognised border between two countries - or whether it is a de facto
border through disputed territory occupied by one of the two states
separated by that border.
 
In light of the first violence in 36
years on territories under dispute by three countries, which involved
two state armies and large mobs of civilians, legal experts ask if the
IDF had the right to shoot civilian protesters from Lebanon and Syria.
 
Click the link to read the rest of the article.

The rights of Israel

The rights of Israel - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
Excerpt:

The Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, now entering their twentieth
year had been hailed from the start as historic, having inaugurated a
"peace process" that would resolve what is commonly referred to as the
"Palestinian-Israeli conflict". For the Palestinians and the
international community, represented by the United Nations and the
myriad resolutions its Security Council and General Assembly issued
since 1948, what was to be negotiated were the colonisation of land, the
occupation of territory and population, and the laws that stipulate
ethnic and religious discrimination in Israel, which, among other
things, bar Palestinian refugees from returning to their land and
confiscate their property. In their struggle against these Israeli
practises, Palestinian leaders, whether in Israel, the Occupied
Territories, or the diaspora, have always invoked these rights based on
international law and UN resolutions, which Israel has consistently
refused to implement or abide by since 1948. Thus for the Palestinians,
armed by the UN and international law, the negotiations were precisely
aimed to end colonisation, occupation, and discrimination.

On the other hand, one of the strongest and persistent arguments that
the Zionist movement and Israel have deployed since 1948 in defence of
the establishment of Israel and its subsequent policies is the
invocation of the rights of Israel, which are not based on international
law or UN resolutions. This is a crucial distinction to be made between
the Palestinian and Israeli claims to possession of "rights." While the
Palestinians invoke rights that are internationally recognised, Israel
invokes rights that are solely recognised at the national level by the
Israeli state itself. For Zionism, this was a novel mode of
argumentation as, in deploying it, Israel invokes not only juridical
principles but also moral ones.

click the link to continue reading the article.

Israeli soldiers open fire on Palestinian protesters marking Nakba Day

Palestinians killed in 'Nakba' clashes - Middle East - Al Jazeera English
Several people have been killed and scores others wounded in the Gaza
Strip, Golan Heights, Ras Maroun in Lebanon and the Israeli-occupied
West Bank, as Palestinians mark the "Nakba", or day of "catastrophe".

The Nakba is how Palestinians refer to the 1948 founding of the state
of Israel, when an estimated 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled
following Israel's declaration of statehood....

Israel's new laws promote repression

Israel's new laws promote repression - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
Excerpt:

There is a clear logic underlying this spate of new laws; namely, the Israeli government's decision to criminalise alternate political ideologies, such as the idea that Israel should be a democracy for all its citizens.

Hence, one witnesses an inverse trend - as the Arab citizens in the region struggle for more openness and indeed democracy, toppling dictators and pressuring governments to make significant liberal reforms, the Israeli book of laws is being rewritten so as to undercut democratic values.

Israelis celebrating the state's 63rd birthday should closely examine the pro-democracy movements in Tahrir, Deraa and across the Arab world. They might very well learn a thing or two.

Democracy in Israel is in real danger

The death of Israeli democracy - Features - Al Jazeera English
What little democracy there is in Israel is in further danger of erosion.

Excerpts from the article (link above):
"A country that must force people to call it democratic, on pain of imprisonment, is not a democracy."

the Knesset is debating one of a slew of anti-democratic bills. Some of
the legislation targets Palestinian citizens of Israel - people like
this man and his wife, who is quick to offer me coffee and her opinions.

If
the Admissions Committee law passes, for example, this young couple and
their three children could find themselves barred from living in
certain communities and villages, even those built on public land. If
the Nakba Bill is approved, organisations that commemorate the 1948
expulsion of Palestinians will be ineligible for public funds. This is a
"watered down" version of the bill. The original version sought to
imprison anyone who publicly marked the Nakba Day. Other legislation
aims to silence individuals and groups that criticise the government.

The
Israeli Democracy Institute (IDI) says that such bills pose "serious
threats" to the country. Explaining that the death of democracy is "a
gradual process," the IDI, a non-partisan think-tank based in Jerusalem,
warns: "People who are concerned but are waiting for the 'moment of
real danger' to abandon their routines and take steps to defend
democracy are making a mistake. The moment of real danger is now."
...
Some critics might say that Israel was never a democracy in the true
sense of the word. Arab citizens of the state were under martial law
from 1949 to 1966. A year later, the decidedly undemocratic occupation
of Palestinian territories began.

Knesset member Dov Khenin, of
the Jewish-Arab party Hadash, puts it like this: "In Israel there is a
specific democratic space. It's not big, and in connection to the topic
of Arabs, it's even smaller. But the space is important to us because
it's the space we're standing in."

He gestures to the room in
Jaffa, where he is giving a talk under the banner of "The Danger of
Fascism". There are about 20 people present - a sad number considering
what is at stake.

"What has happened in recent years - and it's a
process that's very dangerous - is that the space is being attacked and
clamped down upon," Khenin continues.

"One of the attacks is coming in the form of racism," he says.

He explains that while Arab Knesset members have always been regarded with suspicion - the vicious verbal assault Haneen Zoabi faced in the Knesset
after she participated in the flotilla comes to my mind - the
government is "now attacking not just the Arab Knesset members but all
the Arab population".

"The process is spreading," Khenin adds.
"And if we look at the past two years, it's not just the Arab
population, [the government is] also attacking Jews who think
differently."
...
The Anti-Incitement Bill criminalises those who publish anything that
denies Israel's Jewish and democratic character. Because I have authored
articles calling for a bi-national democracy, this one could land me in
jail. (And, if I'm already headed for the clinker, I might as well
state the obvious: A country that must force people to call it
democratic, on pain of imprisonment, is not a democracy).

And the
Knesset is considering the creation of committees that will investigate
the funding of left-wing civil and human rights organisations - most of
which are critical of the Israeli occupation. Critics have likened the
move to a political witch-hunt as right-wing groups will not be
investigated. They also point out that such an investigation, which is
the responsibility of the legal branch, would exceed the Knesset's
power.

So the question remains: Will Israel become out-right fascist?
...
'Sliding towards fascism?'

At an October protest
against legislation commonly referred to as the loyalty oath - a bill
that would require non-Jews seeking Israeli citizenship to pledge
allegiance to a "Jewish and democratic" state - Gavriel Solomon, a
prominent academic and peace activist, likened Israel to Nazi Germany,
circa 1935.

That was the year that the Nuremberg Laws - racist
legislation that led to the systematic and deadly persecution of Jews -
were created.

"There were no [concentration] camps yet but there were racist laws," he said. "And we are heading towards these kinds of laws."

Speaking
to Al Jazeera by telephone, Solomon softened his message, remarking
that: "The question was really if we are not sliding towards fascism."

"Even
though we very clearly have people like [Avigdor] Lieberman [the
foreign minister] who are not sensitive to the issue ... there [are]
enough people on the right not to allow such Lieberman laws to go
through," he says, pointing to members of Likud like Dan Meridor.

But Haaretz
recently revealed that right-wing activists are working in Jewish
settlements to recruit Likud voters who would push Meridor out of the
Knesset.

And rightists are taking other moves to silence dissent. Haaretz reports that they have successfully shut down the Facebook pages of several left-wing groups.

Depending
on how these right-wingers spin their projects - are they trying to
silence dissent or are they taking necessary measures for Israel's image
and security - the Israeli public may be willing to march lockstep with
them.

A recent poll, conducted by the Geocartography Knowledge
Group, found that more than half of Jewish Israelis are willing to limit
press freedom if the media poses a threat to the state's image. And
nearly two-thirds would clamp down on freedom of speech for the sake of
security.
...
"We need to understand that fascism isn't an expression of power, it's an expression of weakness."

Khenin
points out that not long before Netanyahu became prime minister he
called Palestinian citizens of Israel a demographic threat. "And now
he's head of the government," he adds.

And because the death of
democracy is tied up with the occupation, "a people who oppresses
another people cannot be free," Khenin says, paraphrasing Friedrich
Engels.

Israel deliberately starves residents of Gaza

Let Freedom Rain: So, Israel really did nearly starve the residents of Gaza
Excerpts:
The documents are even more disturbing, say human rights activists, when
one considers the fact that close to half of the people of Gaza are
children under the age of eighteen. This means that Israel has
deliberately forced the undernourishment of hundreds of thousands of
children in direct violation of international law and the Fourth Geneva
Convention.
...
Gisha's director, in relation to the release of documents, said, "Israel
banned glucose for biscuits and the fuel needed for regular supply of
electricity – paralyzing normal life in Gaza and impairing the moral
character of the State of Israel. I am sorry to say that major elements
of this policy are still in place."

Harper government plans on making ANY criticism of Israel's government's policies illegal

Dawg's Blawg: Push comes to shove

Excerpts:
Criticism of Israel will shortly become illegal in Canada.

That's the message of the "Ottawa Protocol"
agreed to behind closed doors this week by a group of international
parliamentarians calling themselves the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition to
Combat Anti-Semitism. The Canadian wing, of course, is the Canadian
Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Anti-Semitism.

Here is what is about to descend upon us:

[The
Ottawa Protocol] aims to implement a series of measures to put an end
to hateful propaganda in places like universities. In particular, the group aims to stop the growth in the criticism of Israel and its policies that, it says, is increasingly a vehicle for anti-Semitism. [emphasis added]

It's
what some of us have been arguing all along--and we've been denounced
as paranoid for doing so. But you don't get a group of parliamentarians
deliberating for months and holding hearings if legislation isn't in the
works.
...
So now
Israel will achieve a status in Canadian law that no other nation
possesses. It will be shielded even from the silly commentary that is so
much a part of popular culture. You'll continue to be able to say "Bomb
Iran," but possibly go to jail if you say "Bomb Israel." The Toronto Sun can
still use the phrase "lock and load" in reference to a boatload of
Tamils, but a similar injudicious remark directed against Israeli
settlers on the West Bank would become a criminal matter.

Make no
mistake, this thing is a slam-dunk. When (not if) the Conservatives
introduce legislation to outlaw criticism of Israel, likely when a
federal election is in the offing, the Liberals will tamely go along,
not wanting to fight accusations of anti-Semitism in the thick of an
electoral contest.

No doubt the legislation will pretend to draw a
non-existent distinction between "legitimate" and "illegitimate"
criticism--non-existent, because the concepts are purely subjective. To
some, in fact, there simply is no "legitimate" criticism of Israel. The
legislation will, in word and in practice, be "very inclusive."

Such
legislation would quite possibly not withstand Charter scrutiny. But
that's small comfort at this point. It's on its way, and I, for one--who
have fought genuine anti-Semitism for decades, on the Internet and on
the ground--can feel a cold wind blowing. So should we all.


Read the whole post at the link above

See also:
CBC - Updated For The Record: The full text of the Ottawa Protocol

Harper on Israel: Is the Prime Minister mentally sound?

Harper on Israel: Is the Prime Minister mentally sound? | rabble.ca
Excerpt:

Watching and listening to Stephen Harper's bizarre and unnerving
speech about anti-Semitism and Israel raises the question as to whether
or not the man is mentally fit to be prime minister.

In effect, Harper has taken the position of being Israel's defender
no matter what -- in other words, this commitment comes before his duty
as prime minister, before his duty to represent Canada's interests
abroad, before his role of elected representative. Harper is a defender
of Israel no matter the consequences for Canada. He stated:

"[As] long as I am Prime Minister, whether it is at the United
Nations, the Francophonie, or anywhere else, Canada will take that stand
whatever the cost. I say this, not just because it is the right thing
to do, but because history shows us, and the ideology of the
anti-Israeli mob tell us all too well if we listen to it, that those who
threaten the existence of the Jewish people are a threat to all of us."

His dedication to that country supersedes his commitment to his own.
That would be disturbing enough if Harper were merely a private citizen.
But as prime minister it is beyond the pale and it isn't much of a
stretch to suggest it borders on the betrayal of Canada and certainly
Canadian interests. For what does it mean that Harper will defend Israel
no matter the consequences for Canada?

Harper referred in his speech to "the anti-Israeli mob." I have to
presume here that he is referring to all the Arab and Muslim countries
which regularly criticize Israel at the UN. But, of course, not only
them. UN resolutions criticizing Israel are regularly supported by
virtually every country with the exception of Israel, the U.S. and --
sometimes -- El Salvador. Is the whole of the UN membership part of the
"mob"?

...

Israel's bad policies continue to result in loss of allies

Israel shedding allies as government goes ‘from bad to worse’ - The Globe and Mail
“Since then, your government has gone from bad to worse,” he told Mr.
Schorr. He cited “the resumption of the illegal building on the West
Bank,” and the matter of an oath of loyalty to the “Jewish state” the
government proposes to administer to all non-Jews who seek to become
Israeli citizens (primarily directed at people who marry Arab Israelis).

Israeli News Updates - Lashes for singing, execution of 13 year old girl, rabbi calls for death of all Palestinians

The Disaffected Lib: A 13-Year Old Girl - Shot 17 Times - Of Course He's Not Guilty, She Was Palestinian, The Shooter an Israeli Army Captain
An Israeli army captain gunned down an innocent 13 year old school girl who was not threatening anyone (including confirmation-of-kill execution shots at close range).

Abbas, Palestinians should die: Israeli rabbi
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – An influential Israeli rabbi has said God should
strike the Palestinians and their leader with a plague, calling for
their death in a fiery sermon.

'Sinner' singer given 39 lashes by rabbis
A singer who performed in front of a “mixed audience” of men and women was
lashed 39 times to make him “repent,” after a ruling by a self-described
rabbinic court on Wednesday.

G8 Roundup

G8 leaders criticise Gaza blockade - Americas - Al Jazeera English
The leaders of the G8 Summit decided on the following:
- The would like to see Israel ease the blockade of Gaza
- They would like the Afghan government to make progress within 5 years of looking after it's own internal security, and for a reduction of corruption and drug production and trafficking, and an improvement to human rights and basic services
- They would like Iran to hold a transparent dialogue over its nuclear enrichment program
- Noted the efforts of Turkey and Brazil to broker a deal with Iran over its nuclear program
- Condemned the attack on the attack on the South Korean vessel, the Cheonan, which was allegedly perpetrated by North Korea
- They agreed that economic global recovery is still fragile
- They pledged $5 billion in aid over 5 years to reduce deaths among mothers and newborn children in Africa (5 years ago, the pledge was to increase this aid up to $50 billion by 2010)

G20:
Will focus mainly on economic issues, either to cut or spend to economic recovery.
The USA supports continued stimulus. European countries are leaning towards cutting.

Middle East News Update - June 23, 2010

Iranian Ship Sails To Gaza Sunday
... Abdul-Rauf Adibzadeh stated during a press conference on Tuesday that
the ship, dubbed the Children of Gaza, will be sailing Sunday carrying
1100 tons of humanitarian aid to Gaza, including 500 tons of medical
supplies and food.

The ship is privately owned and will only carry 10 persons; 5 crew
members and five Iranian Red Crescent workers. ...

Israeli court begins trial against Palestinian official for 'illegally praying' at Al-Aqsa Mosque
... The mosque is considered the third-holiest site in Islam, but many
Muslims are prohibited by Israeli authorities from praying there.
Israeli authorities control access to the Mosque and its grounds, which
are located in the Old City of Jerusalem.

Palestinians who try to pray in the Mosque face off with Israeli
soldiers every Friday at East Jerusalem checkpoints, and very few are
allowed to enter Jerusalem to pray at the mosque. ...

Settlers target 'shared cities'
Jewish settlers storming the garden of an elderly Palestinian woman
may seem like something you would expect to happen in Hebron, not
cosmopolitan Tel Aviv. But that is exactly what happened to Zeinab
Rachayel, an Arab resident of Tel Aviv's mixed suburb, Yafo.

Rachayel was in her courtyard on a Sunday afternoon when several
buses full of settlers from the West Bank arrived, parking nearby. Armed
with Israeli flags, young men lined the sidewalk outside her home
chanting "this is our land". One by one, they entered her garden, until
Rachayel was confronted by dozens of settlers in their late teens and
early twenties.

"Another one entered and he said, 'Listen, you're not staying here.
Yafo is just for Jews. Get out of Yafo,'" Rachayel says. The men
continued to threaten and intimidate her, repeatedly saying that the
Arab presence in Yafo is only temporary.

A cultural hub

Yafo was once Jaffa - the cultural and economic hub of Palestine.
Battered during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, the conflict that surrounded
the creation of the Jewish state, Jaffa's population plummeted as
residents fled or were expelled from their homes.

Jewish
immigrants quickly took their places and in 1950, the Tel Aviv
municipality swallowed Jaffa, renaming it Yafo. 

Today, some 60 years later, the twin forces of settlers and
gentrification means the area's Palestinian community are again facing
an existential threat. ...

Israel launches a new spy satellite

Israeli organization places ad for volunteers to attack solidarity ships

U.N Human Rights Council Approves International Committee To Probe Flotilla Attack
The United Nations Human Rights Council voted for forming an
international committee to probe the deadly Israeli attack against the
Freedom Flotilla on May 31, leading to dozens of casualties among human
rights activists. Israel is demanding the shelving of the investigation. ...

The Human Rights Council named the officials who will be investigating
the Israeli attacks and alleged violations of international law. The
investigation committee includes lawyers, experts in international law,
and experts in human rights law. The committee will be presenting its
findings in September....

The European Campaign Against the Siege stated that the International
Committee will contact Israel, Greece, Turkey, the Freedom Flotilla
coalition, and will also be visiting Gaza.


The group added that the investigation committee will ask Israel to
cooperate with the investigation, and should it refuse to do so, the
committee would continue its investigation and will mention in its
report that Israel refused to cooperate....

Russia Demands Israel To Lift The Siege On Gaza

Israel Drumming For Ware Against Hezbollah

Washington Asks for Clarifications Regarding Demolition Orders In Jerusalem
Israeli sources reported that senior U.S. officials asked Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for clarifications regarding Israel’s
decision to demolish 22 Palestinian homes in Silwan neighborhood in East
Jerusalem, in order to replace them with an “Archeological Garden”. ...

U.S. officials told Israeli counterparts that the United States would
issue “strong and clear statements condemning the demolishing of Arab
homes”....

Soldiers Kidnap 21 Palestinians In Hebron
Israeli soldiers kidnapped on Tuesday 21 Palestinians in the southern
West Bank district of Hebron, after invading several areas and breaking
into dozens of homes, local sources reported. ...

Norman G. Finkelstein - photo comparisons of Nazi Germany and Occupied Palestine
At what point does it become too close for comfort?

Gaza Roundup 19
Protesters in Oakland,
California! They held up the unloading of a Zim cargo ship from
Israel to raise awareness of the Freedom Flotilla and the apartheid
Palestinians must face every day as they are being driven from their
lands and homes to make room for more Israeli occupiers. (Here's Mondoweiss's
take on the story, and here's that of the local paper, the Oakland
Tribune.)
...

Pasta Yes, People No

What should we make of Israel's change in strategy towards the Gaza blockade?

It really depends on what you see as the aim - saving face amidst
intense international (Turkish and US) pressure or allowing people in
Gaza to live a normal life. 

Not only is it clear that it is the former not the latter (otherwise
why not let people leave the Strip?) but through a change in semantics,
Israel has managed to checkmate the world. ...

Road shipments to Gaza begin

Middle East News - June 15, 2010

Film footage of the Raid on the Freedom Flotilla made public
Over one hour of unedited, uncensored film footage of the Israeli raid on the Freedom Flotilla of aid and aid activists is now available.
Over one hour of unedited, uncensored video from Israel’s raid on the Mavi Marmara Gaza Flotilla is now in the public domain, thanks to the efforts of Brazilian filmmaker Iara Lee.

Lee posted the video on the website Cultures of Resistance, the umbrella advocacy organisation housing her media production company, Caipirinha Foundation.

Lee, who has lived in the United States for many years, screened the video for journalists on Thursday at the United Nations, but has now posted the raw video online for viewing by anybody who is interested.

Lee was on the Mavi Marmara with a film crew shooting a documentary about the voyage.

She says after the raid, Israeli soldiers confiscated thousands of dollars of her video equipment and media, but that she smuggled out the images contained on a memory card hidden underneath her clothes.

Lee wrote an opinion piece in the San Francisco Chronicle titled ‘What’s happening to us is happening in Gaza.’

Here is a link to a 15 minute clip
Here is a link to the ~1 hour film

More Aid Ships On Their Way
2 Iranian ships are now on their way to Gaza now, bringing aid - construction material, food and toys for children.


Israeli Turkel Commission to 'investigate' the raid on the Freedom Flotilla
Israeli peace movement, Gush Shalom, is appealing to the Israeli supreme court over the appointment of the Turkel Commission, by the Benjamin Netanyahu government to investigate the raid on the Freedom Flotilla. Gush Shalom states that the terms of reference of the commission exclude all the points that need to be investigated.

The commission will NOT be looking into the following key points:

• The decision making process that resulted in the raid and those responsible for ordering the raid
• What actually happened on the boats during the raid. They will not be allowed to interview any of the soldiers. And, they most likely will not interview the passengers either. They are going to take the Israeli military's report as fact (without investigating).
  

See also: A Cover-Up Commission, Toothless and Powerless

The commission is comprised of 3 Israelis - retired Supreme Court Justice Jacob Turkel, 75, will head the commission, and the other two are Amos Horev, 86, a retired major general, and Shabtai Rosen, 93, a professor of international law. The outside observers, who will have no vote on the commission and who will also most likely be denied access to information, are David Trimble, 65, an Irish Nobel Peace Prize winner; and Ken Watkin, 55, former judge advocate general of the Canadian military.

Background on the 2 outside observers chosen by Netanyahu:

David Trimble - Protestant Unionist leader from North Ireland – expressed his allegiance just two weeks ago by joining a "Friends of Israel" group established by Netanyahu loyalist Dore Gold. In addition, Trimble is a veteran member of the Henry Jackson Society, an international organization linked with the American "neo conservative" circles and which advocates the "spreading of democracy" by way of military incursions and invasions. At Trimble's side, this society's membership includes such people as Richard Perle, who under the Bush Administration was among the main initiators of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, as well as William Kristol who is the main neo-conservative ideologue.

Ken Watkin - a retired Canadian Army general and until recently Judge Advocate General. Watkin's name is associated with a sensational affair in Canada, regarding cases of Canadian forces in Afghanistan transferring dozens of prisoners to the custody of the Afghan government's security service – where they were tortured and some extra judicially executed. Watkin refused to testify to the Canadian Parliament regarding the advice he had given to the military commanders on this issue, arguing that there existed between him and the Canadian government a privileged attorney–client relationship. This behavior does not bode well for Watkin 's willingness or ability to participate in exposing facts which might prove embarrassing to the Government of Israel.

What questions would a real inquiry ask? See Who is afraid of a real inquiry? - 81 questions that get to the heart of the matter.

French passengers of the Freedom Flotilla to sue the state of Israel for war crimes
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak cancelled a trip to an arms trading fair in France after French passengers of the Freedom Flotilla attacked two weeks ago said they plan to file a lawsuit against the state of Israel for war crimes.

The French humanitarian aid activists said they will file the lawsuit against Israel in the International Court of Justice in the Hague for the actions of Israeli forces which boarded and attacked ships in international waters on a humanitarian aid mission, killing nine. They demanded that French police have Barak arrested at the airport upon his arrival in the country.

Norwegian Port Union Boycotts Israeli Ships
... The workers will not be loading or unloading Israeli ships docking in their ports.
The decision came coherent with the stances of ports workers, while polls in Norway revealed that nearly half of the Norwegians support this act.
... Workers Unions in Palestine welcomed the stances of Norwegian, Swedish, Greek, British, Canadian and South African unions in rejection and denouncing the Israeli attack against the Palestinians and the activists, and the ongoing illegal Israeli siege on Gaza.


More News on Gaza
Red Cross: Gaza Blockade Illegal

Q&A: Why Israel's Siege Is Illegal

Time to end, not 'ease' the siege

Abuse of Palestinians 'widespread'

Hebron child hospitalized after being attacked by Israeli Soldiers

Middle East News - June 9, 2010 Update

Egypt to keep Gaza border open
After three years of cooperating in the Israeli blockade of Gaza, Egypt said Monday that it will leave its border with the Palestinian territory open indefinitely for humanitarian aid and restricted travel. With international pressure building to ease the blockade, an Egyptian security official said sealing off Hamas-ruled Gaza has only bred more militancy.
...

Noam Chomsky on Israel and the Gaza Flotilla Attack: "Sheer Criminal Aggression, with no Credible Pretext"

Unlike the rest of the world, about half of Americans blame the flotilla raid on the aid activists. This goes to show the extent of the pro-Israeli propaganda in the U.S.

The Truth Behind the Israeli Propaganda - by Robert Fisk

Instead of allowing much needed medical and construction materials into Gaza, Israel has decided to allow snacks and soft drinks in.

The UN Mine Action Team removes the last of the white phosphorus ordnance from the Israeli invasion of Gaza 1.5 years ago

Calling a Spade a Spade: A Case of Piracy and Kidnapping

Israel condemned at Turkey summit
21 member states of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia, a bloc of 22 Eurasian states, condemned Israel's raid on the aid flotilla, at the conclusion of the recent summit in Istanbul.

A New Middle East Triangle?
The rapprochement between Iran, Turkey and Syria is creating a new regional axis that, for all practical purposes, could replace the diminished Arab triangle of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Syria and transform the region in the process.