Tag Archives: Israel

Zionism and ethnic cleansing in Gaza

Sderot July 21 2014

There never was a hay day for Zionism; from it’s inception it stunk of racism & supremacy. And not just ethnic supremacy but that based on gender & class. This obscene spectacle we see today on the hills of Sderot, where Israelis sit back in easy chairs to cheer ethnic cleansing, is not a degeneration but the full flowering of Zionist theoretics–if you want to call the tripe written by its founder Theodor Herzl theory.

In his plan for establishing Israel either in Palestine or Argentina he said, “The emigrants standing lowest in the economic scale will be slowly followed by those of a higher grade. Those who at this moment are living in despair will go first. They will be led by the mediocre intellects which we produce so superabundantly & which are persecuted everywhere.” The “mediocre intellects” must have comprised the paramilitary death squads whose leaders became eventual leaders of Israel–like Shimon Peres & Ariel Sharon.

Was it Herzl or another early Zionist thinker (using the word loosely) who said ‘When I see my first Israeli prostitute, I will know that Jews are free’? Real visionaries, these guys!

Many European Jews, beleaguered by pogroms & exhausted by the holocaust, must have hoped a state of their own could give respite from persecution. They paid a high price for credulity & falling for the hucksters of Zionism.

The ethnic cleansing of Gaza reflects a crisis in Israel which they’re trying to solve on the backs of Palestinians. Meanwhile Zion crumbles & millions around the world now know the vision of a Jewish-only, hermetically isolated state was rancid coming out the gate. It must be said: in the long run the Israeli state will have to be dismantled because it is built on hatred & supremacy. Herzl once used to exhort that a Jewish-only state was not a pipe dream; he probably didn’t know it would become a nightmare generating social hatred.

Palestinian intifada has offered the only solution that is a vision & a possibility: a democratic secular state where Jews & Palestinians can live together as brothers & sisters.

Support that vision by boycotting all Israeli products (barcode beginning 729); supporting the cultural boycott of Israel; & joining the growing international solidarity movement demanding “Stop the massacre in Gaza!” “No military aid to Israel!”

(Photo by Jack Guez/AFP/Getty Images)

“Whosoever buyeth Zionist propaganda has to have their head examined,” saith the Lord.

You don’t have to be a military strategist to know Israel isn’t dropping thousands of tonnage of bombs on cities, & invading with thousands of tanks & infantry just to take out a handful of Hamas rocket launchers. The Wall Street Journal, who it goes without saying, supports the genocide, said “Israel launched a ground invasion of Gaza, accompanied by a heavy air bombardment, after sending out widespread warnings to Palestinian residents.” “After sending out widespread warnings to Palestinians”? By carrier pidgeon or bullhorn, since there is no functioning electricity in most of Gaza? And what were Palestinians supposed to do when they got the warnings? Hide in their homes which were being targeted as sniper nests? Or run to the streets where they would be open targets?

Media will not tell the truth because they all support this genocide. It isn’t a case of singing for their supper or sucking up to power. In many places, like the US, media is owned by those with a vested interest in Israel & Zionism. And we are not speaking of Jews but of capitalist corporations.

The only way truth can be told & heard is through massive public opposition to Israeli genocide & in support of Palestinian justice. There are hundreds of rallies scheduled all over the world demanding “Stop the massacre in Gaza!” If you can not find a rally to join, call one. If you cannot join one, support the boycott of Israeli products (barcode beginning 729) & support the cultural boycott of Israel.

Palestinians huddle in terror after Israeli air strikes on their houses   while Israel continues to claim it is targeting the tunnels used by Palestinians to smuggle in foods & medicines banned by the Israeli blockade. Are Palestinians not only harboring rocket launchers but also tunnel entrances in their closets?

Show us the rocket!

Ashdod, Israel rocket damage July 17 2014

Once again in the interests of journalistic integrity (an antiquated, romantic notion taught in high school journalism courses but found inconvenient to media), we post this photo of alleged rocket damage in Ashdod Israel, about 23 miles north of the Gaza border. We say alleged because we can see no evidence of any damage whatsoever.

These guys are from Homefront Command, a division of the Israeli military, & the caption says they’re cleaning up rubble from a Hamas rocket in this front yard. Now let’s get real: if there was significant damage in Israel, it would be all over the front pages to counter the impact of the hundreds of photos of massive destruction in Gaza. And if there was any real damage in this front yard, they wouldn’t stick soldiers in front to obscure it; they’d have the family out there weeping over their lost flower bed. Is it that those home-made jobs coming out of Gaza are no match for that multi-billion dollar Iron Dome system? Or are there really not that many rockets to contend with?

Why is it that every photo of Hamas rocket damage in Israel (out of four or five that exist) are taken from long distance & never actually show the rockets? Is this another version of people in Sderot cowering in bomb shelters when cameras show them sitting in lawn chairs watching ethnic cleansing like a ball game?

There is one reported death in Israel, allegedly from a Hamas rocket, but the deceased was serving as an adjunct to Israeli troops at the Gaza border; he was operating in a war zone. It should be noted, there isn’t a single other soldier death reported in this slaughter because the military aggression goes entirely one way.

When Israel claims it bombs mosques, disabled rehab centers, homes, apartment complexes, schools in congested areas because they’re harboring Hamas rocket launchers, they turn propaganda into farce. One doesn’t have to know squat about rocket launching & military operations to know you cannot launch long-distance rockets from a studio apartment or prayer room & expect it to get past other buildings obscuring its path.

Protests in defense of Gaza continue around the world. If you cannot join a picket, join the economic boycott of Israeli goods (barcode beginning 729); support the cultural boycott of Israel; demand “No military aid to Israel!”

(Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

No civil rights for Israeli Palestinians

Israeli soldiers in West Bank July 7 2014

This scene is from Ar’ara, described as an Arab Israeli town in northern Israel. Check out the arsenal those soldiers are packing against unarmed Palestinian protesters. There is no news coverage about Palestinian protests within Israel except this photo & another showing a protester being arrested. Zionist mythology claims Palestinians within Israel have civil rights & as we can see from this photo, they use the military to make damn sure Palestinians don’t exercise them.

Ar’ara is a contentious region because of its concentration of Palestinian towns & its proximity to the border between Israel & Palestinian bantustates. After the establishment of Israel in 1947, the government began confiscating Palestinian land in Ar’ara without notifying the owner. In 1954 an Israeli court ruled that Israeli law (which they were likely extemporizing on the spot) did not require the owner to be notified & excluded even the possibility land owners could contest confiscations in court. So all that mythology about civil rights for Palestinians in Israel is nothing but hogwash & hasbara.

Support civil rights for Palestinians; boycott all Israeli products (barcode beginning 729); support the cultural boycott of Israel; demand “No military aid to Israel!”

(Photo by Oded Balilty/AP)

Israeli ethnic cleansing in Gaza

A Palestinian boy & man here seek shelter in a car damaged in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City on Monday. The airstrikes began Saturday in southern Gaza & moved north to Gaza City. There are no international voices of outrage while Israel pummels everything that moves with bombs. Israel claims the airstrikes are retaliation for rockets from Gaza but they aren’t able to produce a single shred of evidence for such attacks. Providing press releases from the Israeli military or setting off air raid sirens in Israel are not evidence.

No one yet knows who kidnapped the three boys from one of the illegal Zionist settlements in the West Bank though Israel is blaming it on Hamas. We don’t make light of the abduction or consider it an acceptable strategy to target children (as Israel does Palestinian children)–& neither do most Palestinians. But the fate of those boys is really not what concerns Israel or it would be negotiating for their safe return, not provoking the situation by terrorizing the West Bank with thousands of jackboots & arresting Palestinians in an indiscriminate dragnet.

The fear on this small boy’s face tells us what we have to do: support Palestinian justice by boycotting all Israeli products (barcode beginning 729); support the cultural boycott of Israel; & demand “No military aid to Israel!”

 

Pope says three Hail Marys and makes a good act of contrition for Israeli apartheid

Pope Francis May 25 2014

Call me ungrateful, but I think the Pope Francis trip to Palestine & Israel is a mixed bag of symbolic gestures–like visiting Mahmoud Abbas & the West Bank, praying at the apartheid wall, & visiting Al-Aqsa mosque. Like all symbolic gestures, these are not meaningless but what they signify are evasions of Palestinian justice. They’re a political dog & pony show. What matters is that he is promoting a bantustate solution, is not calling for the right of return for Palestinian refugees, & not denouncing the West Bank occupation or siege of Gaza.

So what if he says a prayer at the apartheid wall!? It may rile Israel but it won’t advance Palestinian justice one iota. Pope Francis isn’t a rookie to politics & neither are his Vatican advisers. Millions of people around the world are outraged by Israeli apartheid & ethnic cleansing & the pope can get away with a wimpy-assed prayer & be lauded for it?

Some may call that incremental progress toward justice for Palestinians. Let’s call it what it is: a shameful deference to Zionism & maybe collusion.

Tear down that apartheid wall! No military aid to Israel! Support Palestinian justice by boycotting all Israeli products (barcode beginning 729), & supporting the cultural boycott of Israel.

(Photo by Ariel Schalit)

Nakba 2014 commemoration: 66 years of Israeli ethnic cleansing

May 15 marks Palestinian Nakba (Catastrophe) day. In 1948, over 780,000 Palestinians were forcibly driven from their homeland by Zionist paramilitary terrorist squads under the protection of the British. Over 500 Palestinian villages were depopulated & destroyed. Nakba day follows the day Zionists celebrate as Israeli “independence” day. That is a linguistic deceit to mask the political barbarism of Nakba.

More than 7 million Palestinian refugees, one of the largest refugee communities in the world, continue to live in exile & in refugee camps, while 5 million Palestinians are living in Gaza, called “the world’s largest open air prison.”

On the 66th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba, join the campaign for Palestinian justice & say no to Israeli apartheid, colonialism, & occupation. Support the Boycott, Divestment, & Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel by boycotting Israeli products (barcode beginning 729); support the right of return for all Palestinian refugees, the end of the military occupation of the West Bank, & the end of the siege of Gaza; support the cultural boycott of Israel; demand “No military aid to Israel!”

(Photo of Nakba in 1948 from http://rehmat1.com/)

The betrayal of the Oslo Accords

For anyone holding out high hopes for the new detente between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (under the leadership of Mahmoud Abbas) & Hamas, we only need look at the monstrosity of the Oslo Accords brokered between the PLO & Israel. The Accords legitimized Israeli military occupation & divided the West Bank into three administrative zones labeled Areas A, B, & C, depending on the level of Israeli military control.

You can parse that jurisdiction until the cows come home but it all comes down to whether the West Bank is controlled directly by the Israeli military or indirectly using the Palestinian Authority (run by Abbas) as enforcers of Israeli apartheid.

Area C was designated for full Israeli military control which allows massive Zionist settlement expansion, restrictions on Palestinian building (including of residences), & Israeli exploitation of natural resources. Does this differ from outright colonialism in any discernible way?

There are dozens of refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon, & Syria established when Zionist terrorist squads drove them from Palestine. Hundreds of thousands of people have been living in them since 1948 since they have no place else to go. Al-Aroub refugee camp near the West Bank city of Hebron is one of those camps where 13,000 Palestinians still live. Parts of the camp are considered within Area C. Construction permits for building or renovation of Palestinian homes are “virtually impossible” to obtain (according to the World Bank), demolition of Palestinian homes are accelerating, & Zionist settlers now outnumber Palestinian residents & occupy 62% of Area C. Israeli politicians are discussing abandoning the shell game of the Oslo Accords & outright annexing Area C.

This Palestinian man is sitting on the rubble of one of two homes in Al-Aroub bulldozed by the Israeli military on April 30th because Israeli officials claim they were built without the required permits. When angry Palestinians converged at the site to prevent the demolitions, Israeli soldiers used tear gas, grenades, & rubber bullets against them. According to Palestinian witnesses, the bulldozers also destroyed olive, grape, & fig trees in the camp & prevented ambulance crews & journalists from accessing the area.

Support Palestinian justice by boycotting all Israeli products (barcode beginning 729), supporting the cultural boycott of Israel, & demanding “No military aid to Israel!”

(Photo by Ammar Awad/Reuters)

Defense case for Israeli conscientious objector

Uriel Ferera May 5 2014

This is the defense case of Uriel Ferera, a young Israeli man jailed & placed in solitary confinement for refusing to serve in the Israeli military because he opposed discrimination against Palestinians within Israel & the occupation of Palestinian lands.

Ferera is a harbinger, part of the advance guard among Israeli youth turning against the fortress of Zionist apartheid. Active solidarity with him is imperative. It serves first to protect him from worse punishment by the Israeli regime & secondly, to strengthen resolve among other Israelis who object to apartheid but are afraid to stand up because of punishment & ostracism. We should never underestimate how terrifying such commitment to justice can be; it proved hard enough for antiwar soldiers in the US Army whilst there was a massive antiwar movement & much more so in a militarized society like Israel with very weak antiwar opposition. Simple acts of solidarity show them they do not stand alone.

This link suggests several easy ways to extend support to Ferera. Please take a moment to send an email voicing your objections to his incarceration, putting the Israeli regime on alert that their conduct toward him is being watched, & expressing your support for this courageous, principled, & admirable young man.

(Photo is of Uriel Ferera from his FB wall)

http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/politics/israeli-sosaciety/8014-act-demand-freedom-for-israeli-co-uriel-ferera

Chinese betrayal of the Palestinians

It may still be uncertain where China is headed politically since linking its fortunes to the barbarities of neoliberalism but this picture shows its headed fast in the wrong direction. Chinese president Xi Jinping invited Israeli president Shimon Peres for a three day state visit which began today. There are no reports on why Peres was invited or what they will be negotiating but it doesn’t fare well for Palestinians that in welcoming oratory, Xi encouraged Israel in the phony Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. The talks have long been dead as a doornail & all attempts to slap them into life only make them look more politically obscene. You cannot bomb people & wrest their farms & cities from them while talking peace. You are either completely stupid or corrupt as hell to claim otherwise. Though in Xi’s case, he’s likely sucking up to Israel to get a better deal on military technology like the $1 billion surveillance equipment they once bought.

In cringe-worthy rhetoric, Xi said the Chinese & Jewish people have always gotten along, especially during WWII when they commonly opposed fascism & militarism. Of course the falling out came after WWII with the establishment of Israel on Palestinian lands in 1948. Until Mao’s death in 1976, China’s foreign policy was based, at least rhetorically, on opposing colonialism & championing the oppressed. Diplomatic relations with Israel were not established until 1992 but Israel had a long, secretive military relationship with China since at least 1979, but probably earlier. It now has what is called a “pragmatic, flexible diplomatic strategy” in the Middle East–a term that covers a multitude of betrayals of the oppressed, & not just the Palestinians.

The Jerusalem Post, a conservative Israeli newspaper, reported a few years ago that the Chinese were “allured by Israeli military prowess & by “Jewish genius” exhibited in men such as Karl Marx & Albert Einstein.” We don’t know about Einstein but we’re certain Marx would roll over in his grave at such a statement. He may have been an imperfect man, but he had no truck with such elitist ethnic chauvinism & would never have betrayed the oppressed. If there is such a thing as “Jewish genius” you sure wouldn’t know it from the Zionist propaganda machine which has been stuck on one note shrieking “antisemite” since its inception.

Any extant Maoists should try to explain this disgraceful scene where innocent Chinese children are hauled out to wave flags for a country shamed before the world for its violence toward Palestinians.

(Photo of Peres at the welcoming ceremony by Alexander F. Yuan/AP)