“It is left for us, citizens of the world, to condemn Israeli atrocities and crimes against humanity. Dissociating ourselves from Israel’s brutal policies is the only nonviolent way now to avoid becoming complicit in the killing, the wounding and the maiming, and the robbing of Palestinians… [G]iven your longstanding, vocal commitment to justice, we cannot envision you cooperating with continued Israeli defiance of justice and morality; we cannot envision you playing a part in the Israeli charade of self-righteousness.”
Egyptian authorities invite local merchants to participate in auctions of goods confiscated before being smuggled into Gaza. Palestinians furious as they are paying for merchandise they will never receive… Egyptian business sources reported that most of the products offered in the auctions are food products, led by the rice, biscuits, beans, candy and salt. They are followed by household utensils and electrical appliances, including computer equipment.
Palestinian traders have had enough of seeing their merchandise rot in containers at Ashdod Port, call on international community to find urgent solution.
Twenty evacuated settlements are worth more than a thousand peace formulas, and 2,000 released prisoners will move the sides forward more than 10,000 words. If only Israel agrees to implement what it has agreed to, from the release of prisoners to a freeze on settlements.
“So the father of the Hamas movement told you he recognized the State of Israel? ’Yes. He was smart and brave. Cruel, but credible. He gave his life in the war for the freedom of his people. I tend to think that if we had tried for an agreement with him, we would have succeeded. He thought the reason the Israelis were dealing with [then PLO leader] Yasser Arafat is that they were very smart, because we knew we would get nowhere with him. In his opinion, Arafat was thoroughly corrupt.’”
The media was of course the main agent in removing the issue from our agenda. A rare, wall-to-wall coalition of the defense establishment, editors, writers, broadcasters, viewers, readers – especially viewers and readers – who do not want to write or read, hear or be heard, report or know, came together for the mission of removing the occupation from our world.
The separation barrier will receive its largest piece of graffiti yet when Dutch and Palestinian activists scrawl on it a 2,000-word letter by a South African scholar arguing that “Israeli apartheid” is “far more brutal” than Pretoria’s was.
Jawad Siam pulled out a brochure issued by the Jerusalem municipality heralding development plans for his place of residence, the village of Silwan in East Jerusalem. He pointed to the map in the brochure, where the neighborhood’s streets were marked. “You see this, Hashiloah Road?” he asked. “All these years, it was called Ein Silwan Street. ‘Ma’alot Ir David’ Street? That was Wadi Helwa Street. The street next to it, ‘Malkitzedek,’ used to be Al-Mistar Street.”
Jerusalem Police announced on Friday they would prevent the so-called Palestinian Culture Festival the Palestinian Authority plans to organize in the city on Saturday. The PA is planning to fly a glider plane painted in the colors of the Palestinian national flag over the walls of the Old City as part of the festival, which is meant to declare the city to be “the capital of Arabic culture for 2009.”
To carry out the strategy, the U.S. ought not beg the Israelis to accept this or that solution. Instead, the U.S., as the leader of the international community, must place a clear challenge to Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman, Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak, and all Israelis: set a date for the withdrawal of occupation forces and begin negotiating a responsible pullout. Two states or one is not the pressing issue. Rather, to paraphrase a presidential candidate who later became deeply involved in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, “It’s the occupation, stupid.”
The Israeli High Court of Justice (HCJ) yesterday issued its decision to dismiss the petition brought by the General Director of Al-Haq, Mr. Shawan Jabarin, challenging the arbitrary, indefinite and unconditional travel ban imposed on him by the Israeli military authorities.
A confidential EU report accuses the Israeli government of using settlement expansion, house demolitions, discriminatory housing policies and the West Bank barrier as a way of “actively pursuing the illegal annexation” of East Jerusalem.
BEITAR ILIT, West Bank – Boulders the size of compact cars are carved out here at a vast quarry near Bethlehem and pushed noisily through grinders, producing gravel and sand that go into apartment buildings in this rapidly growing Israeli settlement and all across Israel itself.
The $900 million pledged to the Palestinians in Sharm el-Sheikh should be seen as part of the regular American aid to Israel. As an occupying power, Israel is obligated to assure the well-being of the population under its control. But Israel is harming it instead, after which the United States (like other countries) rushes to compensate for the damage.
Despite the state’s formal commitment not to expand West Bank settlements, a government agency has been promoting plans over the past two years to construct thousands of housing units east of the Green Line, Haaretz has learned.
Arab and Israeli socialists have a special historical responsibility. A revolution does not happen by itself; and when it does break out it can take a disastrous turn if it is hijacked by regressive forces. In order to ensure that an Arab revolution can resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the benign way envisaged here (along with the other great problems of the region), we must start working and organising now in a democratic and non-sectarian way. We must closely coordinate our thinking, strategy and activity; and form organisational links on a regional scale, prefiguring the future in the present.
Israeli Army, the World is Watching Anti-Occupation activists protecting Palestinian farmers in the West Bank. Photographer unknown. If you know who the photographer is, or any further information about this photograph (location, date, etc.), please contact us so that we can include it and recognize the photographer. Please include any relevant links to the story [...]
Just four years ago, the defense establishment decided to carry out a seemingly elementary task: establish a comprehensive database on the settlements…
