Note: The interview begins at 3:40.
Today on Flashpoints: Internationally-renowned Middle East reporter Robert Fisk talks to Dennis Bernstein about Afghanistan, Iraq and the recent attacks in Gaza and the way in which the Western press continues to fail in covering these stories
In mid-February Obama met with Jewish leaders to explain why the government had decided to participate in planning the “controversial” World Conference Against Racism. The Haaretz reported that:
The closed-door talks were led by the White House and the State Department, according to the JTA, and the content of the meeting was off-the-record.
The meeting was held after the State Department sent a high-level team to an informal preparatory session in Geneva this week, but declared that a “change in direction” was required before it could commit to full participation in the April meeting.
Continue reading “UN World Conference Against Racism and the Israel Lobby”
TruthDig: This is the text of a talk by Chris Hedges that will be read at anti-war gatherings to be held by The World Can’t Wait in New York’s Union Square, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Nashville, Louisville, Chicago and Berkeley on March 19 to protest the sixth anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq.
Barack Obama has shown that he is as capable of doublespeak as any other politician when he announced an end to the war in Iraq. Combat troops are to be pulled out of Iraq by August 2010, he said, but some 50,000 occupation troops will remain behind. Someone should let the Iraqis know the distinction. I doubt any soldier or Marine in Iraq will notice much difference in 19 months. Many combat units will simply be relabeled as noncombat units. And what about our small army of well-paid contractors and mercenaries? Will Dyncorp, Bechtel, Blackwater (which recently changed its name to Xe), all of whom have made fortunes off the war, pack up and go home? What about the three large super-bases, dozens of smaller military outposts and our imperial city, the Green Zone? Will American corporations give up their lucrative control of Iraqi oil?
Chris Hedges Interview (53:40): MP3
Cindy Sheehan speaks to Chris Hedges, author of the classic War is a Force that Gives us Meaning. (The actual interview begins at 6:30)
You won’t see anything like this on the BBC. The Al Jazeera show Empire on the US relationship with Israel. Interviewees include Stephen Walt, Jim Lobe, Avi Shlaim, Ilan Pappe, Anatol Lieven, Stephen Walt and Aaron David Miller. There is a hard hitting segment on AIPAC towards the end of the Part 1. However, despite the excellent contributions from interviewees, especially Lobe, Shlaim, Lieven and Stephen Walt, the host keeps imposing the tired old Leftist view of Israel as a ‘strategic asset’ to the US on the narrative. The program could have also done without the Egyptian idiot in the second part of the show.
In this episode of Empire, Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst, and his guests zero in on the special relationship between the US and Israel.
They explore who benefits from the special relationship and whether the status quo will prevail.
Warmongering president of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) Morton Klein believes that the ultimate goal of any Zionist is to live in Israel. Except of course for Christian Zionists, they don’t need to go to Israel for fulfilment “but you’re not a 100% fulfilled Jewish Zionist unless you live in the Jewish state. ”
There are other exceptions, such as Klein himself who says “many people tell me, rightly or wrongly, that I can really do more as one human being fighting for Israel from America – with our lobbying in Washington, our campus work, our work in the courts and with my writings in America and throughout the world – than I could if I were in Israel.”
Klein also reveals that Israel requested US permission to bomb Iran and that the Zionists in America are beginning to move towards the Likudnik belief that there is no “partner for peace”. One might wonder what his solution is then? Another Gaza massacre? Another ’48? The problem is that the Palestinians want a just peace, Klein does not.
Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) national president Morton Klein is not known for his optimism in the face of the Middle East conflict. Nor does he mince words when being critical of the “peace process,” or of the response on the part of many of his fellow Jewish activists to violations on the part of the Palestinians.
Continue reading “Interview with Morton Klein of the Zionist Organization of America”
Alexander Cockburn on the Israel lobby and the fate of Palestine recorded in San Francisco on September 29, 2002.
The Israel Lobby and the fate of Palestine (29:04): MP3
On May 2, 2002, barely two weeks after what has become widely described in the international press as a massacre in the Palestinian refugee camp at Jenin, the US Congress took an extraordinary vote.
Continue reading “The Israel lobby and the fate of Palestine”
Amnesty International released a report today detailing the indiscriminate use of weapons by Israel in the latest war on Gaza. Having found undeniable evidence of the IDF’s use of US-made weapons against civilians – hence war crimes – it is calling on the new Obama administration and the UN Security Council to impose “an immediate and comprehensive arms embargo” on Israel and Hamas. Here is The Guardian‘s brief summary of the report.
Detailed evidence has emerged of Israel’s extensive use of US-made weaponry during its war in Gaza last month, including white phosphorus artillery shells, 500lb bombs and Hellfire missiles.
In a report released today, Amnesty International detailed the weapons used and called for an immediate arms embargo on Israel and all Palestinian armed groups. It called on the Obama administration to suspend military aid to Israel.
Continue reading “Amnesty International Urges Immediate Arms Embargo on Israel”
In this interview, Noam Chomsky offers his views on the current global economic crisis, exploding many of the myths, double standards and hypocricies of mainstream media commentary.
SAMEER DOSSANI: In any first year economics class, we are taught that markets have their ups and downs, so the current recession is perhaps nothing out of the ordinary. But this particular downturn is interesting for two reasons: First, market deregulation in the 1980s and 1990s made the boom periods artificially high, so the bust period will be deeper than it would otherwise. Secondly, despite an economy that’s boomed since 1980, the majority of working class U.S. residents have seen their incomes stagnate — while the rich have done well most of the country hasn’t moved forward at all. Given the situation, my guess is that economic planners are likely to go back to some form of Keynesianism, perhaps not unlike the Bretton Woods system that was in place from 1948-1971. What are your thoughts?
NOAM CHOMSKY: Well I basically agree with your picture. In my view, the breakdown of the Bretton Woods system in the early 1970s is probably the major international event since 1945, much more significant in its implications than the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Continue reading “Understanding the Crisis – Markets, the State and Hypocrisy”
England set the precedent for the world. We at Strathclyde set a precedent for Scotland. And then it spread across the Atlantic. First it was Rochester, and now its NYU. This is historic.
NYU BUILDING TAKEOVER!!!
At approximately 10pm tonight (Feb. 18), students of Take Back NYU! took over the Kimmel Marketplace. They have blockaded the doors and declared an occupation! They presented their demands to the NYU administration. They read as follows:
DEMANDS
We, the students of NYU, declare an occupation of this space. This occupation is the culmination of a two-year campaign by the Take Back NYU! coalition, and of campaigns from years past, in whose footsteps we follow.
In order to create a more accountable, democratic and socially responsible university, we demand the following:
Continue reading “NYU students and other city students in solidarity have taken NYU”
P U L S E 