Edinburgh University Student Occupation

Edinburgh University students have occupied the George Square Lecture Theatre.  This is the 19th occupation (3rd in Scotland) in what has been described as a reawakening of the spirit of ’68. (Edinburgh Blog / Facebook).

Around 30 students of Edinburgh Unviersity are currently peacefully occupying George Square Lecture Theatre in protest at Israel’s actions in Gaza, and to encourage the University to accept a list of demands which were put to them in the form of a petition this morning. The petition has been signed by more than 300 students at Edinburgh University.

The demands are as follows:
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UK ZF: 2009 will be “the most active year”

The Jerusalem Post quotes Alan Aziz, the British Zionist Federation (ZF)’s chief executive, as saying 2009 will be  “the most active year” for the organization.”Now, more than ever, British Jewry needs to stand up against Israel’s enemies, especially those who demonize Israel and question its right to exist,” he said.

Former Mossad head Ephraim Halevy paid homage to Israel’s success during Operation Cast Lead earlier this week, saying it was incumbent on the Palestinians to draw the right conclusions from the defeat of Hamas and create a semblance of order.

Speaking at the annual dinner of the British Zionist Federation (ZF) at the Marriott, Halevy – who has previously advocated talking to Hamas – said that from a military point of view, Operation Cast Lead had been an “all-out success” and that Hamas had suffered a sustained and humiliating military defeat.

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The Boundaries of Civilization

Orientalism in a nutshell. Slavoj Žižek shows you the the actual physical dividing line between Oriental despotism and Western European enlightenment.

Israeli university welcomes “war crimes” colonel

For those thus far unconvinced of the reasons for the boycott of Israeli academics, Jonathan Cook reports about the recent appointment of Colonel Pnina Sharvit-Baruch, the IDF’s senior adviser on international law, to a teaching post at Tel Aviv University. Some of Col Sharvit-Baruch’s most notable achievements are “to have ‘relaxed’ the rules of engagement, approved widespread house demolitions and the uprooting of farmland, and sanctioned the use of incendiary weapons such as white phosphorus over the densely populated enclave [Gaza]”, in addition to having “offered legal justification for the targeting of buildings in which civilians were known to be located as long as they had been warned first to leave.”

See also Gideon Levy’s article about the silent complicity of Israel’s jurists in the IDF’s war crimes.

The Israeli government has moved quickly to quash protests over the appointment of the army’s senior adviser on international law to a teaching post at Tel Aviv University. Col Pnina Sharvit-Baruch is thought to have provided legal cover for war crimes during the recent Gaza offensive.

Government officials fear that recent media revelations relating to Col Sharvit-Baruch’s role in the Gaza operation may assist human rights groups seeking to bring Israeli soldiers to trial abroad.

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‘Screwing People Honestly’

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‘Porn Star for Senate‘, by Max Blumenthal

Sen. David Vitter’s phone number was found in the records of the notorious D.C. madam. Now he faces re-election (and massive karmic payback) against a sultry adult entertainer named Stormy. Max Blumenthal has an exclusive interview.

With 2010 midterm elections approaching, Louisiana Republican Sen. David Vitter is positioning himself as a leading conservative stalwart. In July 2008, Vitter joined accused bathroom-stall sex solicitor Sen. Larry Craig in co-sponsoring the anti-gay-marriage Marriage Protection Amendment, then addressed a massive antiabortion rally on the National Mall three days after Barack Obama’s inauguration. Vitter was also the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s lone vote against sending Hillary Clinton’s secretary of State nomination to the Senate floor.

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Glasgow University Student Occupation

glasgow universiy student occupation

Glasgow University students have entered into an occupation and have a facebook group and blog for keeping track of events.

Glasgow University students have entered into occupation

We are currently occupying the top floor of the Computer Science building in solidarity with the Gazan people, and in protest to the war crimes committed by the state of Israel against the Palestinian people, the University’s complicity in this via links to the arms trade, and the BBC’s refusal to show the DEC appeal.
If you want to join the occupation, or show your support outside, the Computer Science building is located behind the Queen Margaret Union, and opposite the Boyd Orr building.
In Solidarity,
The Occupying Students of Glasgow University

Kahane won

Gideon Levy in the Haaretz:

Rabbi Meir Kahane can rest in peace: His doctrine has won. Twenty years after his Knesset list was disqualified and 18 years after he was murdered, Kahanism has become legitimate in public discourse. If there is something that typifies Israel’s current murky, hollow election campaign, which ends the day after tomorrow, it is the transformation of racism and nationalism into accepted values.
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Dubai’s architecture is beyond crass

‘For all its extravagant novelties and its masses of petunias, Dubai is a city with neither charm nor character’, writes Germaine Greer. ‘From its artificial islands to its boring new skycraper, Dubai’s architecture is beyond crass’.

If Monaco is, in Jack Nicholson’s phrase, Alcatraz for the rich, what shall we make of Dubai? Dubai is a city built between the desert and the pale blue sea, that uses more water per capita than anywhere else in the world, and derives 97% of it from desalination, which means that it is the most expensive water in the world. Much of that water is being used to create a garden in the desert. All across the sprawling conurbation, labourers can be seen planting out millions, possibly billions, of bedding plants, into sand banks perpetually moistened by drip irrigation. Dubai has been built on the premise that nothing succeeds like excess.

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Student Occupations Reach American Academia

Spreading like wildfire, student university occupations in solidarity with the people of Gaza have finally reached the shores of American academia. Students at the University of Rochester, inspired by their peers in the UK, staged a sit-in and after only 9 hours marched out victorious having won all of their demands.

1. Divestment: We demand the University of Rochester to adopt the “UR-Peaceful Investing Initiative” which institutes a peaceful investment policy to the university’s endowment which includes divestment from corporations that manufacturer weapons and profit from war. (For example, the U of R invests in General Dynamics which manufactures weapons to maintain a 41-year occupation of the Palestinian territories and wars which slaughter Palestinian civilians by the 100s)

2. Humanitarian aid: We demand that the University of Rochester commit to a day of fundraising for humanitarian aid in Gaza within the next two weeks, as part of an ongoing commitment to provide financial support for the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

3. Academic aid: We demand that the University of Rochester twin with the devastated Gaza University and provide the necessary academic aid (e.g., recycled computers, books, etc. ).

4. Scholarships: We demand that the University of Rochester grant a minimum of five scholarships to Palestinian students every year.

Day 5: Growing Support for University of Manchester Occupation

Students at the University of Manchester have just entered their fifth day of occupying university premises.

Latest update:

Today [Saturday] at 2pm around 60 people from around Manchester and beyond came to a protest outside the occupied Simon Building in a show of support for us and the struggle of the people of Palestine. Both campaigners outside and students inside spoke on many subjects ranging from the situation in Gaza now, to the experiences we’ve had in our occupation. During the course of the protest a handful of the scores of messages of support we have received from around the world were read out. This included messages from Palestinian students, the UCU union and other students in Britain campaigning for Palestine. Today’s protest was a continuation of the widespread support that we have from all over.

See the students’ blog from inside the occupation for more information, list of demands and upcoming events.

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