Author: tali99

With a Shield or Upon It – Impressions from the Spartan State

With a Shield or Upon It
When Spartan men went to war, their wives (or another women of some significance) would customarily present them with their shield and say: "With this, or upon this", meaning that true Spartans could only return to Sparta either victorious (with their shield in hand) or dead (carried upon it).

Sometimes I toy with he idea of suing my government in international court. If you take a good look at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, you reach a firm conclusion that, inherently, conscription is in fact illegal (I skip articles 1, 2, 28, 29 and 30, as they are unavoidably violated if any of the others are):

  • Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person. [Art. 3]
  • No one shall be held in slavery or servitude [Art. 4 – a conscripted soldier earns the equivalent of $0.026 an hour (the army does provide certain services at the time of service, but I’ll leave it to you to refute this as slavery)]
  • No one shall be subjected to… degrading treatment… [Art. 5]
  • (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement… within the borders of each state.
    (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own… [Art. 13 – a conscripted soldier must be at base at designated times, otherwise considered “absentee”, which is an offense punishable by prison time]

    Continue reading “With a Shield or Upon It – Impressions from the Spartan State”

The Self-Righteous Among Nations

Dr. Neve Gordon’s latest op-ed in the L.A. Times brought on the usual mind-boggling logical fallacies. Since Gordon wrote a book on the issue and many op-eds, that never received so much attention and public termination threats, for a moment there I thought that maybe – just maybe – this tempest in a teapot would turn into a tornado. My umbrella’s still dry, and again, the Israeli media forgot about the Boycott and returned to threatening Sweden.

Abusing Freedom of the Press to Further the Fascist Zionist Agenda
The Ha’aretz website published two articles on the matter, by Barak Ravid, both pretty much identical, both doing what they can to delegitimize Gordon, both missing the scoop again (a.k.a “Israeli dissent”). Let’s take a look at the titles: Continue reading “The Self-Righteous Among Nations”

Media Mis-focus – Perpetuating the Zionist Narrative, for Better or Worse

Media Mis-focus

Good propaganda isn’t constructed on lies, but rather half truths. Missing context, however, is not the only component the Israeli media employs to distort the Israeli mind. Another subtle trick is what the media focuses on. Three stories were revealed to me this week. They have little in common but a lesson on the effects of media focus.

The Irrelevance of an Israel-Born Fatah Member to the Zionist Narrative

Thank god for alternative media, because I could have completely missed this fantastic fact:

Loud applause broke out Saturday evening as it was announced that “brother” Dr Uri Davis had been elected to the Fatah movement’s largest governing body.

Continue reading “Media Mis-focus – Perpetuating the Zionist Narrative, for Better or Worse”

Sleeping with the Enemy – Zionism and Nazism and Other Kinky Collaborations

Sleeping with the enemyOn one of my blog post’s comment sections, a mini-debate ensued about the good ole’ Mufti’s meeting with Hitler, in which I pointed out to a link, involving Zionists with The third Reich, written by the Institute for Historical Review. It was later pointed out to me that the Institute for Historical Review is headed by someone who’s written for neo-Nazi publications. I’ve made the correction on the comment section, but I was definitely dissatisfied with the simplistic shelving of a source- even if I’m disgusted by its motives- as I felt there was academic merit to it. The world is far from black and white, and just as the Zionist Benny Morris’ work is regarded in academic discussion of Palestinian history, so can the writings of the Institute for Historical Review teach us about Zionist history. The rule of thumb would be, in these cases, to tread carefully and consider only the facts and not the conclusions.

Continue reading “Sleeping with the Enemy – Zionism and Nazism and Other Kinky Collaborations”

Recapping the Twilight Zone Media

TwilightZoneI have to admit, I’ve lost touch with the Israeli mainstream media. I’ve found so many alternative medias online that there really isn’t any point to turning on the telly, or buying a newspaper. But one must travel into the alternate universe known as Israel every so often. So I put on my goggles and nose plug and sink my hands deep into Ha’aretz’s front page, knowing this is as left as the mainstream media gets down here. What does the Israeli mind preoccupy itself with while the international boycott movement is growing and Israeli citizens are turned refugees right under its upturned nose?

USA Support
The number one obsession in Israel is US support, or rather the eating-our-cake-and-having-it-too notion of what we can get away with and still have US support.

Continue reading “Recapping the Twilight Zone Media”

Free Palestine- Free Yourself

I’ve probably told this story — orally — hundreds of times in the past nine months. It’s a story I find fascinating, and I ask it of every Israeli I meet: How did you become a dissident?

A Zionist Upbringing

I was born and raised in Israel. A daughter to “Atheist Jews”, secular Zionists, white collar, upper middle class, capitalists, Neo-Liberals, who “built this country”. I’ve had many internal struggles with these values and identity labels. Always self aware, at some point I decided to just accept that I will never be in the mainstream, and to accept the “rebel without a cause” label I’ve been given by my family.

Through the Zionist thicket of my own family’s education, school, and the Israeli media, I found myself rootless, alone, but most of all numb. It seems to me that the biggest achievement of Zionist propaganda is to make the majority of Israelis numb and confused. I would despise school (which I often described as “oppressive”), my army service (“jail with better visiting conditions”), and national ceremony (“disgusting solidarity”).

Continue reading “Free Palestine- Free Yourself”

An Unholy Alliance

New York Activists urge Cohen to cancel his concert in Israel

I always talk about Israeli pacifists and their inability to see the barriers they place on the Palestinian road to justice, dignity, and human rights. Today I’d like to talk about a much more appalling occurrence; Amnesty International supporting Leonard Cohen’s breach of the boycott of Israel.

The Leonard Cohen Myth
Personally, it’s hard for me to understand the disillusionment of pro-Palestinian Leonard Cohen fans. In the history of his involvement with Israel, Cohen has always sided with Israel, or made statements of officially taking no sides, when his side was rather obvious:

I don’t want to speak of wars or sides … Personal process is one thing, it’s blood, it’s the identification one feels with their roots and their origins. The militarism I practice as a person and a writer is another thing. … I don’t wish to speak about war.

In case I’m misconstruing my information, I’ll repeat the quote I’ve embedded on my front page and have, personally, had no choice but to live by:

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. (Desmund Tutu)

Continue reading “An Unholy Alliance”