Ilan Pappe on Al Jazeera’s Frost over the World, discussing the prospects for a future Palestinian state and the means to achieve it. (The interview begins at 9:00 and is followed by an interview with the insufferable Mark Regev)
Category: Israel
Nato: Going Global
From Al Jazeera’s excellent Empire with Marwan Bishara.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is the largest military force ever assembled, with a potential armed force of more than seven million. But as its original enemies, communism and the Soviet Union, were defeated two decades ago, what is the alliance’s new identity or new role?
Israel demolishes mosque
Israeli forces have demolished a mosque and several other buildings in the northern Jordan valley. They say the structure was built without a permit but residents say the mosque was built before 1967 and was recently renovated. The Palestinian government has condemned the action as state destruction, while Israel continues to fight for Israeli settlers.
Al Jazeera’s Nour Odeh reports from the Jordan Valley.
Amira Hass Eqbal Ahmad Memorial Lecture
The brave and gifted Israeli journalist Amira Hass, daughter of Nazi Holocaust survivors and a past resident of Gaza (she authored a book about Gaza in 2000), was a featured lecturer at this year’s Eqbal Ahmad Memorial hosted by Hampshire College.
Catch the London Russell Tribunal on Palestine Live
Watch the Russell Tribunal on Palestine London Session live on November 20/21. Find more information here. Video by Leah Borromeo.
Miral
It will not come to a threatre near you soon; it might if you insist.
Our friend Adam Horowitz thinks it has the potential to become this generation’s Exodus.
Helen Thomas on Her Resignation and Middle East
Brave and outspoken: the great Helen Thomas.
Thomas: Israel should get out of Occupied Territories; White House Correspondents Association were out of line.
Virginia standing up to the Fifth Column
IMPORTANT: Pro-Palestine activists and ordinary Americans who want their country back have an ideal opportunity to strike against Israel and its fifth column in the United States. Rep Eric Cantor recently promised the Israeli government that he would do everything in his power to undercut his own president on behalf of Israel, statements which are demonstrably felonious under the Logan Act of 1799. Even the rightwing Examiner was moved to write that
Cantor’s comments take away from American prestige, and set a dangerous precedent for future United States foreign policy. Cantor and his Republican colleagues have every right to support the nation of Israel, but their ultimately loyalty should be to the United States and not the country of Israel. If Israel’s interests conflict with that of the United States, the Israeli government should theoretically not be able to call on Republicans in Congress to “check” the foreign policy of the Obama administration.
Should someone take this case to court, it will be an open and shut case. Veteran journalist and blogger Helena Cobban is already rallying Virginians to confront Cantor. If you are one, this campaign could really use your support.
The following two posts are a must read, one by Helena Cobban and the other by Glenn Greenwald.
Continue reading “Virginia standing up to the Fifth Column”
Robin Yassin-Kassab: Too late for two states
Reporting for Al Jazeera, writer and PULSE co-editor Robin Yassin-Kassab writes:
I saw Haneen al-Zoabi giving a lecture. She is the knesset member who sailed with the Gaza Flotilla and was so shabbily abused while attempting to give her account of events to Israel’s parliament. In Nablus, she spoke emotionally about the situation of Palestinian-Israelis, the descendants of those few who escaped ethnic cleansing in 1948.
Citizens but not nationals of the state (nationality is for Jews only), Palestinian-Israelis receive a fraction of the services offered to Jews, are forbidden from teaching Palestinian history in schools and are as likely to be victims of land confiscation as fellow Palestinians in the West Bank. Ninety-three per cent of Israel’s land is off-limits to non-Jews and half of Palestinian-Israeli families live below the poverty line.
I heard Jamal Hwayil speak. He was the leader of the Fatah-affiliated al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in Jenin at the time of Israel’s 2002 massacre there and now he is an independent member of the Palestinian parliament. He took a clear position on Palestinian division: “Political arrests are wrong. Wrong in Gaza and wrong in the West Bank. Political arrests have no place in a liberation struggle.”
A little later he added: “There can be neither meaningful negotiations nor productive armed resistance so long as the political leadership is divided.”
Read all of Yassin-Kassab’s “Too late for two states” here.
Valley of the Wolves: Palestine
Israel-Turkey relations may survive the Flotilla flap, but lets see if they can survive this. Kurtlar Vadisi is the immensely popular Turkish series which was first turned into a Rambo-style big budget film attacking the US occupation of Iraq (at a time when relations between the US and Turkey were otherwise cordial). In the forthcoming film, the same Turkish team infiltrates Israel (or Palestine, as the film’s hero insists on calling it) to exact revenge for the flotilla murder. Here’s the trailer:
P U L S E 