Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters talks to Riz Khan about his passionate campaign for the rights of the Palestinian people and why, more than 30 years after he wrote the globally-acclaimed album ‘The Wall’, he is focusing on another wall – the Israeli separation barrier in the West Bank.
Category: Palestine
A new beginning? — Tariq Ali on the Arab uprisings
Our good friend Tariq Ali on the Arab uprisings and the US response. You can ignore the neocon Uncle Tom who appears afterwards.
A new report by Who Profits exposes: SodaStream misleads consumers by labeling settlement products as ‘Made in Israel’
The company, based in Mishor Edomim Industrial Park, an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, markets its devices and bottles under a ‘Made in Israel’ label. By doing so, SodaStream (also known as Soda Club), world leader of home beverage carbonating devices, misleads consumers in Europe and the United States.
SodaStream misleadingly markets its devices and bottles under the Made in Israel label while in fact these products were manufactured in the Mishor Edomim Industrial Park, an illegal settlement in the occupied West Bank.
The company has recently faced a ruling by the European Court of Justice, stating that goods produced in settlements should not be considered as made in Israel and enjoys the tax exempt of the EU-Israel Association Agreement.
The report was published by Who Profits from the Occupation, a research project of the Coalition of Women for Peace. The project investigates Israeli and international corporate involvement in the Israeli occupation.
Philip Weiss on the Arab Revolt
This is as good as talk radio gets. Our friend, the great Phil Weiss on Radio Open Source with Chris Lydon to discuss the implications of the Arab revolt and the changing discourse in the American Jewish community.
US vetoes UN resolution on Israeli settlements
Al Jazeera English — Despite receiving the backing of 14 out of 15 members of the United Nations’ security council, an Arab-sponsored UN resolution branding Israeli settlements illegal was vetoed by the United States.
Meanwhile AIPAC is pleased with the Obama administration’s budget proposal for the next fiscal year which slates 5.6 billion US tax dollars for Israel, 3.1 billion of which will be military aid.
That same budget proposal continues US military aid for Egypt, but with room for alterations depending on developments…
America’s Wars in the Muslim World
Nir Rosen is the finest frontline reporter the US has produced in decades. He has just resigned from his position at the New York University after he came under fire from Israel lobby attack-dog Jeffrey Goldberg for making light of the recent attacks on CBS propagandist Lara Logan (comments for which he has since apologized). Following is a talk he gave recently at LSE about his new book Aftermath. (Also, don’t miss Ali Gharib’s excellent profile on Rosen.)
US, the Arab Revolt and al-Qaida
M. Shahid Alam
On December 24 2004, I wrote an essay, “America and Islam,” for which I received much heat from Zionist and right-wing bloggers in the United States.
The article made the point that the leaders of al-Qaida believe that they have to carry their war to the home ground of the ‘far enemy’ – the United States, Israel and Western powers – in order to free the Muslim world from foreign domination. This anyone can verify from the numerous communiqués of al-Qaida.
To say this is not to endorse the terrorist methods that al-Qaida employs. This was my moral position then: and it is my moral position now. At the same time, we should not shrink from recognizing that the total wars waged by many states, including the United States, since WWII differ from the methods of al-Qaida only in the infinitely greater scale of the destruction they wreak upon civilians.
The article made another critical point. It argued that al-Qaida, in some measure, reflects the political and moral failings of Muslim societies. If Muslims had shown more spine in resisting local tyrannies through non-violent means, their courage would have scotched the violent extremism of groups like al-Qaida.
Thus Alone, and Always, Have People Resisted Tyranny: Remembering Faiz on his Birth Centenary
Today is the first birth centenary of Faiz Ahmed Faiz: one of South Asia’s most beloved radical Urdu poets. Today is also, just two days after Mubarak’s resignation as a result of the inspiring revolution in Umm al-Duniya, Mother of the World, Egypt; and almost a month after Tunisia’s courageous revolution. How ecstatic would Faiz have been today?!
by Huma Dar
Today is the first birth centenary of Faiz Ahmed Faiz: one of South Asia’s most beloved radical Urdu poets. Today is also, just two days after Mubarak’s resignation as a result of the inspiring revolution in Umm al-Duniya, Mother of the World, Egypt; and almost a month after Tunisia’s courageous revolution. How ecstatic would Faiz have been today?! Faiz, who had lived in Beirut, in exile from Pakistan — when ruled by the US-bolstered military dictator, General Zia-ul Haq. Faiz, who wrote a beautiful lullaby for a Palestinian child, and a poem for those who were martyred outside their beloved Palestine. Faiz, whose poem commonly mis-titled, “Ham Dekhenge,” is a battle-song for people fighting for social justice from Sindh, Pakistan to Kashmir to Chhattisgarh, India.
The title of this particular poem of Faiz is in Arabic: “Wa Yabqaa Wajhu Rabbika.” It is most often brushed aside as it does not fit the simplistic profile of the “avowed atheist” assigned to Faiz. Being a socialist does not preclude belief in Islam, but this nuance is lost on many who cannot easily imagine Faiz being a Muslim, leave alone leading a prayer in the mosque of his ancestral village, especially given the subtle Islamophobia that pervades élite political and literary discourses, both within and without South Asia. For some, even more difficult “to reconcile [is] the glowing tribute [that Faiz wrote] to Muhammad Ali Jinnah,” but this has to do with the rigorous demonology of Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, in Indian historiography, and the hegemonic status of India and Indian academics, even those who vigorously critique nationalisms of all kinds, within South Asian Studies.
Saeb Erekat Resigns
Al Jazeera English — Saeb Erekat, the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s chief negotiator, has resigned from his post after an investigation showed his office was the source of a leak.
Israel chooses Suleiman
In an excellent piece on Al Jazeera, Lisa Hajjar notes that ‘Suleiman has long been favoured by the US government for his ardent anti-Islamism, his willingness to talk and act tough on Iran – and he has long been the CIA’s main man in Cairo.’
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