Israel’s War Against Palestine: Documenting the Military Occupation of Palestinian and Arab Lands

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Salman Masalha: Whose imagination?

9 March 2011

For several months we have been witness to various and sundry Knesset bills that have turned Israeli legislation into a circus. First some religious conversion bill or another, then a bill regulating admission to “Jews-only” communities; next, a bill against foreign boycotts of the settlements, and a loyalty law whose purpose is to deny citizenship. And all this, with an air of arrogance. Which brings to mind the saying that the Arabs are gifted with a vivid imagination, intended not as a compliment to their literary skills but rather just the opposite.

Jonathan Cook: Global unpopularity wearing down Israeli government

9 March 2011

Yossi Alpher: “At this point it’s all spin designed to fend off pressures… The object of the exercise is to gain a day, or a week, or a month, before having to come up with some sort of new spin.”

Israel grouped with Iran, North Korea as world’s least popular countries

8 March 2011

BBC poll surveying 27 countries shows that Israel is viewed as having a negative influence in the world; negative opinions in US and UK increased over past year.

Leftist Israelis face masked policemen at East Jerusalem protest

7 March 2011

Israeli security service agents have obscured their identities in the past when confronting Palestinians, but this is a new phenomenon for Israeli citizens.

IOA Editor: No mask could possibly conceal Israeli Occupation crimes.

Amira Hass: The Israeli occupation echoes from Cairo

7 March 2011

The author is reminded that the Palestinians are under occupation when almost all Egyptians refuse to meet with her because she writes for an Israeli newspaper.

Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics: ‘Construction in West Bank settlements quadrupled since end of temporary freeze’

6 March 2011

According to data by Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, settlers began building over 114 houses during the 10-month settlement freeze, and began construction of over 427 houses since October 2010.

Roger Waters voices support for Israel boycott

6 March 2011

Roger Waters, founding member, vocalist and bassist of the iconic rock band ‘Pink Floyd’ has voiced his support for a cultural boycott of Israel.

Rashid Khalidi: The Arab Spring

6 March 2011

Suddenly, to be an Arab has become a good thing. People all over the Arab world feel a sense of pride in shaking off decades of cowed passivity under dictatorships that ruled with no deference to popular wishes. And it has become respectable in the West as well. Egypt is now thought of as an exciting and progressive place; its people’s expressions of solidarity are welcomed by demonstrators in Madison, Wisconsin; and its bright young activists are seen as models for a new kind of twenty-first-century mobilization.

Remi Kanazi: Poetic Injustice

3 March 2011

don’t mention Zionism
if you mention Zionism
they’ll call you anti-Semitic
and people will believe them

don’t cite Palestinian sources
no one will believe you
I won’t believe you
trust Israeli sources…

IOA Editor: It was a thrill watching Remi Kanazi in action last night at a Columbia University book release party for his latest book Poetic Injustice. It was poetry of defiance at its best. We wish him well, and know he’ll do well.

Stephen R. Shalom: Why we need to divest from the US-backed Israeli Occupation

3 March 2011

(1) The Israeli occupation and its policy of building settlements and displacing the local population are unequivocally illegal and unjustified. (2) The Israeli occupation has been a vicious one, in flagrant violation of international humanitarian law. (3) The Israeli occupation has been the most long-standing occupation in the world. (4) Our government, the US government, has made possible this sordid record of occupation and abuse.

Lia Tarachansky: Seven Deadly Myths (video)

1 March 2011

Seven Deadly Myths examines the concept of knowing and not knowing at the same time. Seeing and not comprehending what you see. It starts in the West Bank colony of Ariel where director Lia Tarachansky grew up. As she returns to the settlement, she discovers as though for the first time that it is surrounded by Palestinian villages, that the dispossessed are right next door, behind electrical fences, under watch towers, locked behind walls. But the Palestinians were not made invisible by accident.

IOA Editor: Highly recommended! And, this trailer will be removed this coming weekend – very few days left to watch it.

Folk music legend Pete Seeger endorses boycott of Israel

1 March 2011

Folk music legend Pete Seeger has come out in support of the growing Palestinian movement for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel as a program for justice for Palestinians and a route to peace in the Middle East.

MK Ahmed Tibi: Israeli Arab leaders who visited Libya didn’t back Gadhafi

28 February 2011

In Israel there is ethnic democracy: democracy for 80 percent of the public and exclusion and discrimination for 20 percent, and a regime of oppression and dictatorship in the occupied territories. I and my colleagues, my fellow Arab Knesset members, are sitting just a few meters away in the plenum hall from Israelis who have killed members of our people and are imposing a regime of occupation. Will anyone say this testifies to support for their deeds?

Jonathan Cook: An empire of lies

28 February 2011

The consequences are already tangible across the Middle East, which has suffered disproportionately under the oppressive rule of empire. The upheavals as Arab publics struggle to shake off their tyrants are also stripping bare some of the illusions the western media have peddled to us. Empire, we have been told, wants democracy and freedom around the globe. And yet it is caught mute and impassive as the henchmen of empire unleash US-made weapons against their peoples who are demanding western-style freedoms.

Israeli Panel: ’2002 hit of Hamas leader was justified, despite civilian casualties’

27 February 2011

While criticizing decision makers for underestimating the risk of civilian injuries, probe panel says Israel’s Gaza assassination of Salah Shehadeh was a necessary part of its war on ‘murderous terrorism.’

IOA Editor: This is a somewhat diluted version of the Hebrew original. The Haaretz original story points out that the committee found that while the IDF action was “preventative and legitimate,” the result of the bomb used by the IDF was found in retrospect as “disproportional.”

Needless to say, the “Investigation Committee,” appointed by former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert – himself responsible for Israel’s Gaza crimes – did not deal with the legitimacy of the use of any force as a means to prevent the Hamas violence. International law spells out in some detail when force can justifiably be used – generally only as a measure of last resort, after all other efforts have failed: clearly not the case here, and clearly not a concern of this committee.

Merkel chides Netanyahu for failing to make ‘a single step to advance peace’

25 February 2011

A crisis erupted between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. During a telephone call this week, Merkel told Netanyahu that he had disappointed her and had done nothing to advance peace.

Sen. Kerry, Syria’s Assad working to renew talks with Israel; Netanyahu opposes plan

24 February 2011

US Senator John Kerry and Syrian President Bashar Assad reportedly began drafting an unofficial position paper that would define the principles of negotiations with Israel.

Asaf Gefen: Let the generals rule

23 February 2011

The sigh of relief in Israel after it turned out that for the time being the Egyptian people are making do with military rule could be heard all the way to Cairo’s Tahrir square. The democratic threat had been removed from the agenda for the time being.

American and Israeli anti-missile system test is a success

22 February 2011

The US and Israel have successfully tested Israel’s Arrow 2 ballistic anti-missile system off the coast of California. The joint exercise between Israel Aerospace Industries and the US Missile Defense Agency involved firing a missile from an offshore platform inside a US Navy firing range to see if the Arrow 2 system would detect and destroy the missile.

Jonathan Cook: Israeli army will cash in on Egyptian revolution

22 February 2011

The main value of the 1979 Camp David treaty to the Israeli leadership has been three decades of calm on Israel’s south-western flank. That, in turn, has freed the army to concentrate on more pressing goals, such as its intermittent forays north to sow sectarian discord in Lebanon, its belligerent posturing towards first Iraq and now Iran in the east, and its campaign to contain and dispossess the Palestinians under its rule.

Libya’s Gaddafi could find refuge in Israel

21 February 2011

If the story told … is true, Gaddafi is entitled to immigrate to Israel as a Jew under Israel’s Law of Return. Even if every other country on earth refused him entry, Israel would be obligated by its own laws to take Gaddafi in.

IOA Editor: The evil deeds of mankind, and the ironic twists of history.

Indian Air Force purchases missiles from Israeli weapons manufacturer Rafael

21 February 2011

The Indian Air Force and the Israeli weapons manufacturer Rafael Advanced Defense Systems are set to sign a major contract in March 2011, which will outfit India’s Tejas fighter jets with Rafael’s Derby missile.

Bil’in marks six years of struggle with mass demonstration (video)

21 February 2011

Six years have passed since residents of Bil’in, together with their Israeli and international supporters, started regularly demonstrating against the Wall and the confiscation of more than half their land by it… The Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements declared this Friday a celebration of six years of struggle against the wall and the Occupation.

UN set to vote on settlement resolution; US set to veto

18 February 2011

US is the only Security Council member that opposes the resolution; though its wording does not conflict with Washington’s stance on settlements it fears that if the resolution passes it will be an obstacle to renewal of peace talks.

“The Genie Is Out of the Bottle”: assessing a changing Arab World with Noam Chomsky and Al Jazeera’s Marwan Bishara (video)

17 February 2011

Massive public protests continue to sweep the Middle East and North Africa in countries including Bahrain, Libya, Yemen and Iran—many being met with violent government crackdowns. Democracy Now! speaks to Marwan Bishara, senior political analyst at Al Jazeera English, and MIT Professor Emeritus Noam Chomsky.

Nada Matta: The Egyptian Uprising and Workers’ Grievances

17 February 2011

The scenes coming from Egypt in the last 18 days are testimony to peoples’ ability to overcome fear through collective action and organization. Against state intimidation and killings, popular self-organization was resilient and steadfast.

Gideon Levy: How school trips to Hebron resemble visits to Auschwitz

17 February 2011

Just as upon return from the state-sponsored trips to Auschwitz, Jewish students will come back from Hebron feeling more nationalist than ever before.

Shin Bet retracts claim that left-wing East Jerusalem protests are security risk

16 February 2011

Israeli Civil rights attorney Lea Tsemel: “The [activists] were focused and continue to be focused on legal, democratic and non-violent protest against settlement trends in East Jerusalem . . . the phrasing of the report suggests the Shin Bet view these activists as similar to terrorists . . . as individuals seeking to harm the security forces.”

IDF base to be built in East Jerusalem

15 February 2011

Although the Ministry of Defense [and] the Jerusalem municipality have claimed that the base will be within the green line, the document proves otherwise… Most of the area in which the base is to be built, however, appears to be on land that belonged to Jordan during the interwar [1948-1967] period. According to armistice agreements, it was a demilitarized zone and a small part of it was no man’s land between the two countries’ borders.

Barak: IDF soldiers may be called into Lebanon in the future

15 February 2011

During tour with new IDF chief along northern border, the defense minister said Israel taught Hezbollah a lesson during the Second Lebanon War, but it could soon be forgotten.

IOA Editor: Be Prepared – Israel is always ready for the next attack.

Al Jazeera/Empire: Pax Americana (video)

14 February 2011

Will the spread of democracy lead to a peaceful end to decades of autocratic rule in the Middle East or will the fear of Islamist extremism galvinise Washington’s resolve to reinforce Pax Americana? Marwan Bishara interviews Rashid Khalidi, a professor of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University; Seymour Hersh, a Pulitzer-winning author; and Thomas Pickering, the former US under secretary of state.

New West-Bank settlement map

14 February 2011

An updated map of Israeli colonization of the West Bank was released by Peace Now. It deserves careful study. Also note the graph on the left which shows clearly that colonization peaked during the so-called “Oslo Peace Process,” and again during the Camp David Peace charade hosted by US president Bill Clinton. This provides fresh evidence, if it were needed, that as far as Israel is concerned the negotiations were an exercise in deception and fraud.

Demand Al Jazeera in the US

14 February 2011

Al Jazeera English’s correspondent in Cairo, Ayman Mohyeldin, tells our American viewers that we appreciate your enthusiastic support. Largely unavailable through US cable and satellite providers, Al Jazeera has recently received a large amount of attention in the American media.

Lamis Andoni: The resurrection of pan-Arabism

13 February 2011

The era of using the Palestinian cause as a pretext for maintaining martial laws and silencing dissent is over. The Palestinians have been betrayed, not helped, by leaders who practice repression against their own people… Equally, it is no longer acceptable for the Palestinian Fatah and Hamas to cite their record in resisting Israel when justifying their suppression of each other and the rest of the Palestinian people.

Moustafa Barghouthi: Palestine Supports Egypt

12 February 2011

After the announcement that Hosni Mubarak would be stepping down, Dr. Moustafa Barghouti, the Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative congratulated the Egyptian people for achieving a political victory that will be remembered in history as a testament to the power of popular resistance.

Abe Hayeem: Help the campaign to save Lifta

11 February 2011

Lifta has become known within Israel and internationally as a quintessential Palestinian village, one of the few of the 500 villages that had not been completely destroyed by Israeli forces in the war of 1948. Lifta is celebrated as part of a beautiful landscape of ruins, loved by walkers and nature enthusiasts, but remembered primarily by its original inhabitants many of whom live nearby but have never been allowed to return.