A female supporter of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad displays her hand painted with the Iranian flag, also used as a sign for his party (Photo: AP)
Media fantasies in Iran – Abbas Barzegar
It was only a matter of time before revolution in Iran, believed dissidents and media in the west. They were wrong
It’s not about the election, Ahmadinejad, or the even the protesters. The world has been captivated by the events in Iran because for many, Iran is to Islamism what the Soviet Union was to communism and presumably today we are somewhere near the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Mohammed Omer, the great Palestinian journalist and recipient of the Martha Gelhorn prize, sets the record straight about the torture ordeal he suffered at the hands of the Israeli Shin Beth torturers.
June 26, 2008 is a day I will never forget. For the events of that day irrevocably changed my life. That day I was detained, interrogated, strip searched, and tortured while attempting to return home from a European speaking tour, which culminated in independent American journalist Dahr Jamil and I sharing the Martha Gellhorn Journalism Prize in London — an award given to journalists who expose propaganda which often masks egregious human rights abuses.
Mohammed Omer receiving the Martha Gelhorn Prize together with Dahr Jamail
I want to address the denials from Israel and the inaccurate reporting by a few journalists in addition to requesting state of Israel to acknowledge what it did to me, prosecute the members of the Shin Bet responsible for it and put in place procedures that protect other journalists from such treatment.
Since 2003, I’ve been the voice to the voiceless in the besieged Gaza Strip for a number of publications and news programs ranging from The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs to the BBC and, Morgenbladet in Norway as well as Democracy Now! These stories exposed a carefully-crafted fiction continuing control and exploitation of five-million people. Their impact, coupled with the reporting of others served to change public opinion in the United States and Europe concerning the dynamics of Israel and its occupation of Palestine .
After receiving the Martha Gellhorn prize I returned home through the Allenby Bridge Crossing in the Occupied West Bank between Jordan and Israel. It was here I was detained, interrogated, and tortured for several hours by Shin Bet and border officers. When it appeared I may be close to death an ambulance was called to transport me to a hospital. From that day my life has been a year of continued medical treatments, pain — and a search for justice.
How can the supposed liberalism of Tel Aviv coexist with apartheid and occupation? In this excellent essay Yonatan Mendel considers the Israeli “fantasising project.” “It is the “positive, ‘normal’ and likeable characteristics of Tel Aviv,” Mendel argues, “that make it a paradigm of the moral and political blindness of Israeli society.”
At this very moment, long queues are probably forming outside Tel Aviv’s latest culinary thing: the yoghurterias. Even in the middle of the night you have to wait in line to get a cold and refreshing ice-cream yoghurt from the busy shop on Rothschild Boulevard. Springing up like mushrooms after the rain, the ice-cream parlours have allowed the ‘white city’ of Tel Aviv to experience the white revolution of the yoghurt. It is sweet and sour, made of natural ingredients, both healthy and tasty, with only 1.6 per cent fat, and topped with pieces of fresh fruit freshly cut up. Mangoes and pineapples, kiwis, strawberries, pomegranates, dates, melons and watermelons, red, yellow and green, are generously placed on top of the thick white yoghurt. A small cup of the local delicacy costs 18 shekels (about £3), a medium-size cup is 21 shekels, and a huge cup is 27 shekels. This is the best gastronomic response to the humidity that prevails in Israel’s ‘first Hebrew city’.
Al Jazeera’s Empire, with Marwan Bishara. The first short documentary is so bad that it could have been made by the BBC or CNN. Flynt Leverett is insightful as usual, but as much as I love and respect Hamid Dabashi, I think he adds little of value to the discussion.
He cared about them, and we all care about him. R.I.P brother.
Tell me what has become of my rights
Am I invisible because you ignore me?
Your proclamation promised me free liberty, now
I’m tired of bein’ the victim of shame…
I can’t believe this is the land from which I came
You know I do really hate to say it
The government don’t wanna see
But if Martin Luther was livin’
He wouldn’t let this be, no, no
Democracy Now’s important interview with Imran Khan on the recent drone attacks and the general failure of US policy in Pakistan. Khan is the chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (Pakistan Justice Movement), and is one of the very few politicians who dissented from the military operation in Swat which has now displaced more than 3 million people. (He is of course also a retired cricketing legend who led Pakistan to world cup victory in the early 90’s.) He offers a useful antidote to the otherwise unbroken parade of native informers who spew nonsense on mainstream media, progressive or conservative. Khan on the other hand provides useful context and realist alternatives to the present impasse. (Also see Pankaj Mishra’s excellent piece on the failed US policy that we ran here earlier).
The video clips for parts two and three and the transcript over the fold.
David “I am a Zionist” Cameron, leader of the opposition, said recently, at the Conservative Friends of Israel (CfI) annual business lunch, that his belief in Israel’s right to exist and to defend itself was “indestructible”. No surprises there. He did however refer to old supporters giving a special thank you to some of the party’s biggest donors and, more importantly, he welcomed new arrivals such as Victor Blank. Victor, former chairman of Llyods Banking Group and one of Gordon Brown’s favourite businessmen, is more commonly associated with Labour Friends of Israel (LfI) and this switching of sides seems to have prompted the Guardian podcast show Sounds Jewish to ask “are British Jews ending their affair with New Labour and returning to the Tories?”
Stuart Polak, director of Conservative Friends of Israel (13:35): MP3
The Iraq war was driven by the neo-conservative, Israel firsters, as the beginning of a plan to reshape the Middle East in Israel’s favour. In the Independent, Richard Ingrams explains that by having at least two Zionists, on a committee of five, the Iraq war inquiry is unlikely to explore this.
Sir Martin Gilbert, the allegedly distinguished historian who is one of those appointed to investigate the Iraq war, has let it be known that one day in the future Bush and Blair might be seen in the same light as Roosevelt and Churchill. A good example of the rule that when it comes to talking nonsense it’s hard to beat a historian.
TIME Columnist Joe Klein discusses his 10-day trip to Iran to cover the election. It is interesting to note that even mainstream journalists like Joe Klein are offering much more sober and nuanced analysis than people like Juan Cole (and Pepe Escobar who basically reproduces as original analysis whatever he reads on Cole’s blog) who have opted for partisan, emotive propaganda.
Naomi Klein, interviewed by Bob McChesney, on her book the Shock Doctrine with respect to the financial crisis. Klein goes on to explain her current project, writing a piece on America’s boycott of the UN Durban II review conference on racism, and is critical of the US anti-war movement for ignoring the Israel-Palestine conflict.
David “I am a Zionist” Cameron, leader of the opposition, said recently, at the Conservative Friends of Israel (CfI) annual business lunch, that his belief in Israel’s right to exist and to defend itself was “indestructible”. No surprises there. He did however refer to old supporters giving a special thank you to some of the party’s biggest donors and, more importantly, he welcomed new arrivals such as Victor Blank. Victor, former chairman of Llyods Banking Group and one of Gordon Brown’s favourite businessmen, is more commonly associated with Labour Friends of Israel (LfI) and this switching of sides seems to have prompted the Guardian podcast show Sounds Jewish to ask “are British Jews ending their affair with New Labour and returning to the Tories?”
Naomi Klein, interviewed by Bob McChesney, on her book the Shock Doctrine with respect to the financial crisis. Klein goes on to explain her current project, writing a piece on America’s boycott of the UN Durban II review conference on racism, and is critical of the US anti-war movement for ignoring the Israel-Palestine conflict.
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