The Zionist entity seems to engage into a new kind of war: the electronic war against the "anti-Zionist" websites.
In this context, the Immigrant Absorption Ministry announced on Sunday it was setting up an "army of bloggers," to be made up of Israelis who speak a second language, to represent the Zionist entity in "anti-Zionist blogs" in English, French, Spanish and German.
"During the war, we looked for a way to contribute to the effort," the ministry's director general, Erez Halfon, told Israeli daily Haaretz. "We turned to this enormous reservoir of more than a million people with a second mother tongue." Other languages in which bloggers are sought include Russian and Portuguese.
Halfon said volunteers who send the Absorption Ministry their contact details will be registered according to language, and then passed on to the Foreign Ministry's media department, whose personnel will direct the volunteers to Web sites deemed "problematic."
Meanwhile, hackers managed to take over the Web site of Israeli Radio on Sunday. Clicking on one of the Website's tabs brings up a message condemning the war in the Gaza Strip and calling for Israel's destruction. The message is decorated by the image of a burning combined Israeli and U.S. flag, and pictures of Palestinian children injured during the war.
Tuesday 20 January 2009
Israel 'can be tried for war crimes'
Human rights group Amnesty International accuses Israel of war crimes, saying its use of white phosphorus shells in Gaza was indiscriminate.
"Such extensive use of this weapon in Gaza's densely populated residential neighborhoods is inherently indiscriminate," Donatella Rovera, a Middle East researcher with Amnesty International, said in a statement on Monday.
"Its repeated use in this manner, despite evidence of its indiscriminate effects and its toll on civilians, is a war crime," she charged.
The statement was released after British weapons expert Chris Cobb-Smith found widespread evidence of the use of the incendiary material in an on-the-ground study on Sunday.
"We saw streets and alleyways littered with evidence of the use of white phosphorus, including still-burning wedges and the remnants of the shells and canisters fired by the Israeli army," he said in a statement.
"It is highly incendiary, air burst and its spread effect is such that it should never be used on civilian areas," he explained.
While international law permits the use of white phosphorus as an obscurant to conceal troop movement and prevent the enemy from using certain guided weapons, its use remains controversial, as white phosphorous can burn through flesh to the bone or cause liver, kidney, heart, lung or bone damage and even lead to death.
Amnesty is not the first group to accuse Israel of using white phosphorus during its three-week onslaught on Gaza -- Human Rights Watch and the United Nations are also among the international bodies that charged the Israeli army with using such munitions.
Israel's shelling of the UN Relief and Works Agency headquarters in Gaza on Jan 15 left the UN compound among the places worst-affected by the use of the controversial chemical, Amnesty said.
The attack plunged Israel's relations with the world body to a new low with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon demanding an investigation into the shelling.
According to medical experts, white phosphorus -- also known by the military as WP or Willie Pete - is not the only controversial weapon used against Gazans.
After working for 10 days at the Shifa Hospital in the war-torn Palestinian territory, Doctors Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse -- members of a Norwegian triage medical team in Gaza -- said the Palestinian territory is now being used by Israel "as a test laboratory for new weapons."
The Norwegian doctors said the kinds of injuries they had witnessed proved that Dense Inert Metal Explosives (DIME) was being used in the embattled territory.
Survivors close to the lethal range of the DIME weapon may have their limbs amputated as their soft tissues and bones are shredded to pieces. The victims may also subsequently contract cancer from the micro-shrapnel embedded in their body tissue within just four to six months.
Statistics released by the Palestinian bureau of statistics further prove the humanitarian crisis in the region, as it shows that some 4,100 homes were totally destroyed and 17,000 others damaged in the three-week war.
After 22 days of intense Israeli military operations in Gaza, and the death of nearly 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis, Tel Aviv declared a unilateral ceasefire late Saturday, but added that its forces would remain in place for the time being.
Hamas later on Sunday announced a ceasefire in Gaza and gave Israel a one-week ultimatum to completely withdraw its troops from the Palestinian territory.
Analysts believe the Israeli military operation has imperiled the so-called two-state solution of the Middle East peace process.
PRESS TV!
"Such extensive use of this weapon in Gaza's densely populated residential neighborhoods is inherently indiscriminate," Donatella Rovera, a Middle East researcher with Amnesty International, said in a statement on Monday.
"Its repeated use in this manner, despite evidence of its indiscriminate effects and its toll on civilians, is a war crime," she charged.
The statement was released after British weapons expert Chris Cobb-Smith found widespread evidence of the use of the incendiary material in an on-the-ground study on Sunday.
"We saw streets and alleyways littered with evidence of the use of white phosphorus, including still-burning wedges and the remnants of the shells and canisters fired by the Israeli army," he said in a statement.
"It is highly incendiary, air burst and its spread effect is such that it should never be used on civilian areas," he explained.
While international law permits the use of white phosphorus as an obscurant to conceal troop movement and prevent the enemy from using certain guided weapons, its use remains controversial, as white phosphorous can burn through flesh to the bone or cause liver, kidney, heart, lung or bone damage and even lead to death.
Amnesty is not the first group to accuse Israel of using white phosphorus during its three-week onslaught on Gaza -- Human Rights Watch and the United Nations are also among the international bodies that charged the Israeli army with using such munitions.
Israel's shelling of the UN Relief and Works Agency headquarters in Gaza on Jan 15 left the UN compound among the places worst-affected by the use of the controversial chemical, Amnesty said.
The attack plunged Israel's relations with the world body to a new low with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon demanding an investigation into the shelling.
According to medical experts, white phosphorus -- also known by the military as WP or Willie Pete - is not the only controversial weapon used against Gazans.
After working for 10 days at the Shifa Hospital in the war-torn Palestinian territory, Doctors Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse -- members of a Norwegian triage medical team in Gaza -- said the Palestinian territory is now being used by Israel "as a test laboratory for new weapons."
The Norwegian doctors said the kinds of injuries they had witnessed proved that Dense Inert Metal Explosives (DIME) was being used in the embattled territory.
Survivors close to the lethal range of the DIME weapon may have their limbs amputated as their soft tissues and bones are shredded to pieces. The victims may also subsequently contract cancer from the micro-shrapnel embedded in their body tissue within just four to six months.
Statistics released by the Palestinian bureau of statistics further prove the humanitarian crisis in the region, as it shows that some 4,100 homes were totally destroyed and 17,000 others damaged in the three-week war.
After 22 days of intense Israeli military operations in Gaza, and the death of nearly 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis, Tel Aviv declared a unilateral ceasefire late Saturday, but added that its forces would remain in place for the time being.
Hamas later on Sunday announced a ceasefire in Gaza and gave Israel a one-week ultimatum to completely withdraw its troops from the Palestinian territory.
Analysts believe the Israeli military operation has imperiled the so-called two-state solution of the Middle East peace process.
PRESS TV!
Arabs fail to reach consensus on Gaza
Arab countries have failed to reach an agreement over the Gaza Strip following a three-week long Israeli offensive against the region.
At the end of a two-day Arab economic summit which was held in Kuwait City to set out "practical steps to stabilize the ceasefire" in the Gaza Strip, the Arab foreign ministers failed to reach consensus on a final statement on the battered region.
"Unfortunately, we didn't reach a final result because of time limits and because some are entrenched in their positions," Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told Kuwait Television Tuesday, according to The Associated Press.
"Under these circumstances, it is supposed that all should make concessions for the sake of Arab reconciliation ... Efforts are still being made to hammer out a united position," said Zebari.
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal al-Meqdad also said: "Realistically speaking, there are differences among Arab brothers."
Arab nations have been at loggerheads over the Israeli offensive which according to Tel Aviv was launched to halt Palestinian rocket attacks into Israel.
Israel launched Operation Cast Lead on December 22 but halted the bloody campaign after failing to reach its goals after 22 days. Israel's military campaign has so far killed at least 1,300 people including women and children.
The conflict injured about 6000 others many of them in critical conditions.
Palestinian rockets kept hitting Israeli cities until the last day of the war.
PRESS TV!
At the end of a two-day Arab economic summit which was held in Kuwait City to set out "practical steps to stabilize the ceasefire" in the Gaza Strip, the Arab foreign ministers failed to reach consensus on a final statement on the battered region.
"Unfortunately, we didn't reach a final result because of time limits and because some are entrenched in their positions," Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told Kuwait Television Tuesday, according to The Associated Press.
"Under these circumstances, it is supposed that all should make concessions for the sake of Arab reconciliation ... Efforts are still being made to hammer out a united position," said Zebari.
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal al-Meqdad also said: "Realistically speaking, there are differences among Arab brothers."
Arab nations have been at loggerheads over the Israeli offensive which according to Tel Aviv was launched to halt Palestinian rocket attacks into Israel.
Israel launched Operation Cast Lead on December 22 but halted the bloody campaign after failing to reach its goals after 22 days. Israel's military campaign has so far killed at least 1,300 people including women and children.
The conflict injured about 6000 others many of them in critical conditions.
Palestinian rockets kept hitting Israeli cities until the last day of the war.
PRESS TV!
Obama feels for us Israelis: Netanyahu
Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu says Barack Obama is silent on the issue of Gaza because of his understanding of the "distress" of Israelis.
In his comments on Tuesday, the Israeli opposition leader strengthened the widely held belief in the Middle East that the US president-elect's silence on the Israeli war on Gaza shows his tacit agreement with President George W. Bush's stance toward the issue.
The United States, which blocked a UN Security Council resolution in the opening days of the recent war on Gaza, claims that Israeli military operations have been carried out in self-defense against the homemade missiles launched into Israel by Hamas as part of its "resistance to occupation".
"I took away the impression that Barack Obama understood our distress very well as well as the cruelty of the enemies we face," said Netanyahu, who has been tipped in the polls to become the next prime minister.
The remarks were made after the devastating 23-day Israeli incursion left nearly 1,340 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead.
Israel embarked on its military campaign at a time that was widely believed to have been determined by "political expediency".
With Israel's general election scheduled for February 10, all the main contenders were seeking an opportunity to prove their "hard-line stance".
Three weeks of operations against Gaza, which have caused acute human suffering, secured Kadima's Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak a rise in polls.
Yet the scandal-hit Kadima is still lagging behind Netanyahu, popularly known by his childhood nickname, "Bibi".
Hours ahead of Obama's inauguration, the polls' favorite Likud Party leader pushed forward the Israeli agenda and repeated allegations against Iran's nuclear program.
"He (Obama) also understands the dangers that Iranian nuclear armaments would represent," Netanyahu said.
Israel, considered as the Middle East's sole nuclear power, along with the US and its European allies accuse Iran of having military objectives in pursuing its enrichment program and claim that the amount of UF6 at the country's disposal is "enough for a bomb".
This is while the UN nuclear watchdog conceded in its November report that Iran has managed to enrich uranium-235 to a level "less than 5 percent" -- a rate consistent with the development of a nuclear power plant. Nuclear arms production requires an enrichment level of above 90 percent.
In the opening days of the war on Gaza, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton said the Israeli offensive would ignite a multi-front war which could lead to a military attack on Iran over its nuclear program.
"So while our focus obviously is on Gaza right now, this could turn out to be a much larger conflict," the hawkish US official told FOXNews, adding, "We're looking at potentially a multi-front war."
Amid widespread speculation that the conflict in the Palestinian territory could spill over to other parts of the Middle East, Bolton added that there is "the possibility of the use of military force possibly by the United States, possibly by Israel," on Iran after the Gaza war.
Netanyahu, who threw his support behind the Gaza offensive, is to decide how to face "a growing threat from Iran" as the likely incoming Israeli prime minister.
PRESS TV!
In his comments on Tuesday, the Israeli opposition leader strengthened the widely held belief in the Middle East that the US president-elect's silence on the Israeli war on Gaza shows his tacit agreement with President George W. Bush's stance toward the issue.
The United States, which blocked a UN Security Council resolution in the opening days of the recent war on Gaza, claims that Israeli military operations have been carried out in self-defense against the homemade missiles launched into Israel by Hamas as part of its "resistance to occupation".
"I took away the impression that Barack Obama understood our distress very well as well as the cruelty of the enemies we face," said Netanyahu, who has been tipped in the polls to become the next prime minister.
The remarks were made after the devastating 23-day Israeli incursion left nearly 1,340 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead.
Israel embarked on its military campaign at a time that was widely believed to have been determined by "political expediency".
With Israel's general election scheduled for February 10, all the main contenders were seeking an opportunity to prove their "hard-line stance".
Three weeks of operations against Gaza, which have caused acute human suffering, secured Kadima's Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak a rise in polls.
Yet the scandal-hit Kadima is still lagging behind Netanyahu, popularly known by his childhood nickname, "Bibi".
Hours ahead of Obama's inauguration, the polls' favorite Likud Party leader pushed forward the Israeli agenda and repeated allegations against Iran's nuclear program.
"He (Obama) also understands the dangers that Iranian nuclear armaments would represent," Netanyahu said.
Israel, considered as the Middle East's sole nuclear power, along with the US and its European allies accuse Iran of having military objectives in pursuing its enrichment program and claim that the amount of UF6 at the country's disposal is "enough for a bomb".
This is while the UN nuclear watchdog conceded in its November report that Iran has managed to enrich uranium-235 to a level "less than 5 percent" -- a rate consistent with the development of a nuclear power plant. Nuclear arms production requires an enrichment level of above 90 percent.
In the opening days of the war on Gaza, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton said the Israeli offensive would ignite a multi-front war which could lead to a military attack on Iran over its nuclear program.
"So while our focus obviously is on Gaza right now, this could turn out to be a much larger conflict," the hawkish US official told FOXNews, adding, "We're looking at potentially a multi-front war."
Amid widespread speculation that the conflict in the Palestinian territory could spill over to other parts of the Middle East, Bolton added that there is "the possibility of the use of military force possibly by the United States, possibly by Israel," on Iran after the Gaza war.
Netanyahu, who threw his support behind the Gaza offensive, is to decide how to face "a growing threat from Iran" as the likely incoming Israeli prime minister.
PRESS TV!
The Unilateral People
Gilad Atzmon
They withdraw unilaterally
They ceasefire unilaterally
They invade unilaterally
They win unilaterally
They destroy unilaterally
They massacre unilaterally
They bathe in blood unilaterally
They spread white phosphorus unilaterally
They kill women and children unilaterally
They drop bombs unilaterally
They live on stolen land unilaterally
They support their homicidal leaders unilaterally
They love their ‘Jewish Only State’ unilaterally
Their democracy is unilateral
They love themselves unilaterally
They are the unilateral people.
Living behind walls of concrete, hatred and arrogance
They are still united and lateral failing to love their neighbours
After Sderot, Will President Barak Obama Visit Gaza?
"...Someday America will wake up and discover perhaps a little late that Israel is a clear and present danger to America and Americans and the source of all of America's ills and hate around the world..."
WRITTEN BY SAMI JAMIL JADALLAH
Candidate Barack Obama visited the southern Israeli city of Sderot to express his support to the town’s people. Sderot has been marketed by the powerful Jewish media machine in the US as suffering a great deal from Hamas’ ballistic and nuclear missiles. I wonder if President Obama will make a similar visit and see for himself what America's real missiles, real jets and real bombs and rockets did to Gaza and the people of Gaza. Candidate Obama on his visit to Sderot was reaching low to win A few more Jewish votes. Would President Obama reach as high and reach the hundreds of millions around the world who condemned the war crimes committed in Gaza?
Candidate Obama expressed great support for the residents of Sderot and appreciated that the people could not have peaceful nights and could not enjoy quiet dinners with wine and music. Now that Israel has leveled Gaza, destroying its entire infrastructure, killed more than a thousand and injured several thousands and made homeless hundreds of thousands, using the latest weapons American could muster. Would President Obama visit Gaza to express his support for the hundreds of thousands of the people and visit the graves of all of the children and women deliberately killed by Israel? Witness devastation and total destruction, victims of a criminal partnership between Israel and the US. During his visit to Sderot, candidate Obama was accompanied by Israel's Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak and Avi Dichter. Perhaps President Obama will be accompanied during his tour of Gaza by the parents of all those who lost their loved ones, by the doctors who treated the tens of thousands, by the UN relief workers who witnessed the cold blooded murder of women and children as they sought shelter.
Candidate Barack Obama went further by recording a special YouTube message to the people and residents of Sderot. Candidate Obama declared during his visit, "I think no country would accept missiles landing on their citizens". Barack continued to say," I came to Sderot with commitments to Israeli security. Israel has the right to defend itself. Peace should not undermine security." I wonder what would President Obama says to the people of Gaza as he surveys the total destruction of Gaza and witnesses the destruction of hospitals, schools, mosques, stadiums, food supplies centers, UN relief depots, the deliberate targeting of children and parents as they sough shelter from one place to another? Would President Obama express the same rights for the people of Gaza, that they too have every right to be free, every right to be safe, every right to be secure and every right to have enough food to have 3 meals a day, to have cooking oil, to have gas and heat, to have water, to have access to their sea and to connect to the outside world. The people of Gaza may not need wine for their dinners; they only need to be alive to have dinner.
I wonder what kind of YouTube message President Barack Obama would send to the people of Gaza as they see the "only democracy" in the Middle East commit one war crime after another, using with generosity the free weapons supplied by the "greatest democracy in the world" such as; F-15s, F-16s, Apache and Cobra helicopters and phosphorous bombs destroying and killing everything in Gaza. I am sure he will see and appreciate the difference between the ballistic missiles of Hamas and the paper missiles of Israel.
Israel, for many years since its creation, is a terrorist state that has been committing war crimes and terrorism, and has used death and destruction as a way of life, part of the cultural and religious value system that does not respect the human life of others. It has a value system and culture that has nothing but contempt for the lives of others, especially the Palestinians who simply refuse to go down and let go of their rights in Palestine. Israel’s history of war crimes and terrorism is long and well documented; Deir Yassin, Qibya, Souk Albaqar school, Sabra and Shatilla, Qana 1 and Qana II, Jenin, Nablus, Hebron and the list goes on and on. If war crimes qualify for Nobel Prizes, Israelis will win 9 out of 10 such prizes.
Israel is unlike any other country in the world, it has no respect and no value for human lives, especially the lives of others. It has no respect for international organizations; in fact it has nothing but contempt for the UN. Bombing and destroying a UN compound at the very moment Pank Ki Moon arrived in Israel. Israel is the only country that never respected any UN resolutions and has no respect for anyone in the world. It is a country and people unlike any thing we have seen in the last few centuries.
Someday America will wake up and discover perhaps a little late that Israel is a clear and present danger to America and Americans and the source of all of America's ills and hate around the world. America and President Obama may discover and hopefully sooner rather than later that America's total and unconditional support for Israel is wrong politics and that the views and the joy, dancing in the streets of New York City by American Jews and unconditional support by our Congress does not express the anger felt across America against Israel and its war crimes in Gaza. Perhaps President Obama and American should redefine its definition of terrorism making sure that Israel's state terrorism is terrorism even if its instruments are not explosive belts but jets, tanks, helicopters, and cluster bombs. That terrorism includes not only Palestinians attacks against restaurants and buses but Jewish terrorism directed against schools, hospitals and UN compounds.
WRITTEN BY SAMI JAMIL JADALLAH
Candidate Barack Obama visited the southern Israeli city of Sderot to express his support to the town’s people. Sderot has been marketed by the powerful Jewish media machine in the US as suffering a great deal from Hamas’ ballistic and nuclear missiles. I wonder if President Obama will make a similar visit and see for himself what America's real missiles, real jets and real bombs and rockets did to Gaza and the people of Gaza. Candidate Obama on his visit to Sderot was reaching low to win A few more Jewish votes. Would President Obama reach as high and reach the hundreds of millions around the world who condemned the war crimes committed in Gaza?
Candidate Obama expressed great support for the residents of Sderot and appreciated that the people could not have peaceful nights and could not enjoy quiet dinners with wine and music. Now that Israel has leveled Gaza, destroying its entire infrastructure, killed more than a thousand and injured several thousands and made homeless hundreds of thousands, using the latest weapons American could muster. Would President Obama visit Gaza to express his support for the hundreds of thousands of the people and visit the graves of all of the children and women deliberately killed by Israel? Witness devastation and total destruction, victims of a criminal partnership between Israel and the US. During his visit to Sderot, candidate Obama was accompanied by Israel's Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak and Avi Dichter. Perhaps President Obama will be accompanied during his tour of Gaza by the parents of all those who lost their loved ones, by the doctors who treated the tens of thousands, by the UN relief workers who witnessed the cold blooded murder of women and children as they sought shelter.
Candidate Barack Obama went further by recording a special YouTube message to the people and residents of Sderot. Candidate Obama declared during his visit, "I think no country would accept missiles landing on their citizens". Barack continued to say," I came to Sderot with commitments to Israeli security. Israel has the right to defend itself. Peace should not undermine security." I wonder what would President Obama says to the people of Gaza as he surveys the total destruction of Gaza and witnesses the destruction of hospitals, schools, mosques, stadiums, food supplies centers, UN relief depots, the deliberate targeting of children and parents as they sough shelter from one place to another? Would President Obama express the same rights for the people of Gaza, that they too have every right to be free, every right to be safe, every right to be secure and every right to have enough food to have 3 meals a day, to have cooking oil, to have gas and heat, to have water, to have access to their sea and to connect to the outside world. The people of Gaza may not need wine for their dinners; they only need to be alive to have dinner.
I wonder what kind of YouTube message President Barack Obama would send to the people of Gaza as they see the "only democracy" in the Middle East commit one war crime after another, using with generosity the free weapons supplied by the "greatest democracy in the world" such as; F-15s, F-16s, Apache and Cobra helicopters and phosphorous bombs destroying and killing everything in Gaza. I am sure he will see and appreciate the difference between the ballistic missiles of Hamas and the paper missiles of Israel.
Israel, for many years since its creation, is a terrorist state that has been committing war crimes and terrorism, and has used death and destruction as a way of life, part of the cultural and religious value system that does not respect the human life of others. It has a value system and culture that has nothing but contempt for the lives of others, especially the Palestinians who simply refuse to go down and let go of their rights in Palestine. Israel’s history of war crimes and terrorism is long and well documented; Deir Yassin, Qibya, Souk Albaqar school, Sabra and Shatilla, Qana 1 and Qana II, Jenin, Nablus, Hebron and the list goes on and on. If war crimes qualify for Nobel Prizes, Israelis will win 9 out of 10 such prizes.
Israel is unlike any other country in the world, it has no respect and no value for human lives, especially the lives of others. It has no respect for international organizations; in fact it has nothing but contempt for the UN. Bombing and destroying a UN compound at the very moment Pank Ki Moon arrived in Israel. Israel is the only country that never respected any UN resolutions and has no respect for anyone in the world. It is a country and people unlike any thing we have seen in the last few centuries.
Someday America will wake up and discover perhaps a little late that Israel is a clear and present danger to America and Americans and the source of all of America's ills and hate around the world. America and President Obama may discover and hopefully sooner rather than later that America's total and unconditional support for Israel is wrong politics and that the views and the joy, dancing in the streets of New York City by American Jews and unconditional support by our Congress does not express the anger felt across America against Israel and its war crimes in Gaza. Perhaps President Obama and American should redefine its definition of terrorism making sure that Israel's state terrorism is terrorism even if its instruments are not explosive belts but jets, tanks, helicopters, and cluster bombs. That terrorism includes not only Palestinians attacks against restaurants and buses but Jewish terrorism directed against schools, hospitals and UN compounds.
Name and Shame British Friends of Israel
By Redress Information & Analysis,19 January 2009
Redress Information & Analysis names and shames members of Israel’s network of stooges in the British Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democratic parties; it calls on its readers to challenge these stooges and to help it expose apologists for Israeli murder by supplying it with verified information about other Friends of Israel.
In the 23 days of the Israeli war on Gaza that began on 27 December 2008, 1300 Palestinians have been killed by the Zionist war machine, including 417 children and 108 women, and a further 5320 have been injured. In the same period, 13 Israelis were killed. That is a ratio of 100:1, excluding the injured.
In the meantime, Israel’s network of stooges in the British Parliament have been fighting a rear-guard action to justify the slaughter of Palestinians. You will find them justifying Israeli crimes at every opportunity and prevaricating to avoid action against Israel, such as sanctions in the wake of Israel’s targeting of United Nations compounds in Gaza, for example. They are apologists for murder.
Israel’s stooges in Britain are spread far and wide and can be found at every tier of the British establishment. They include Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Foreign Secretary David Miliband, former Prime Minister Tony Blair and many other serving and former holders of political office.
At the core of Israel’s network of stooges are the “Friends of Israel” groups in the three main political parties:
- Labour Friends of Israel
- Conservative Friends of Israel and
- Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel.
Below is a list of officials of the “Friends of Israel” groups in the Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democratic parties. It is by no means exhaustive. Conservative Friends of Israel, for example, say that about 80 per cent of the party’s MPs and MEPs belong to the group.
Labour Friends of Israel
Chair
Andrew Gwynne MP
Vice Chairs
Andrew Dismore MP
Louise Ellman MP
Gary Titley MEP
Policy Council
Stephen Byers MP (Chair)
David Blunkett MP
Lord Foster of Bishop Auckland
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Adam Ingram MP
Denis MacShane MP
Alun Michael MP
Don Touhig MP
Convenor
Anne Snelgrove MP
Parliamentary Executive
Fabian Hamilton MP
Sharon Hodgson MP
Joan Humble MP
Eric Joyce MP
Ashok Kumar MP
Stephen Ladyman MP
Andrew Miller MP
Dan Norris MP
Nick Palmer MP
Terry Rooney MP
Dari Taylor MP
Chair (House of Lords)
Baroness Ramsay of Cartvale
Peers
Lord Archer of Sandwell
Lord Clarke of Hampstead
Lord Clinton-Davis
Lord Davies of Coity
Lord Glenamara
Lord Haskel
Lord Janner of Braunstone
Lord Macdonald of Tradeston
Lord Mitchell
Lord Turnberg
Professor Lord Winston
Lord Wedderburn of Charlton QC
Conservative Friends of Israel
Director
Stuart Polak
Political Director
Robert Halfon
Projects Director
Stephanie Leven,
Research Manager
Nathalie Tamam,
Secretary
Julie Tamir,
Membership Secretary
Charlotte Polak,
Parliamentary Group
Chairman
James Arbuthnot MP
Vice Chairmen
Sir John Butterfill
James Clappison MP
Secretary
David Amess MP
Officers
Alistair Burt MP
Lee Scott MP
Theresa Villiers MP
Chairman of Conservative Friends of Israel Europe
Timothy Kirkhope MEP
Honorary Officers
President
Baroness Shephard of Northwold
Vice Chairmen
Jeremy Galbraith
Betty Geller
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
Stanley Cohen
Michael Heller
Vice Presidents
Sir Timothy Sainsbury
Lord Lane of Horsell
Sir Michael Latham
Lord Sanderson of Bowden
Lord Steinberg
Lord Thomas of Gwydir
Executive Board
Richard Harrington (Chairman)
Lance Anisfeld
Lorraine da Costa
Jonathan Gough
Andrew Heller (Hon. Treasurer)
Steven Kaye
Edward Lee
Howard Leigh
Stephen Massey
David Meller
Jonathan Metliss
Gary Mond
Stephan Shakespeare
Barry Welck Hilda Worth
Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel
President
Sir Alan Beith MP
Chair
Cllr Monroe Palmer
Vice-Chair
Gavin Stollar
Secretary
Matthew Harris
Treasurer
Alexander Gilbert
We call on our readers to do the following
-->Contact the above-mentioned Friends of Israel and ask them to justify their support for Israel’s murder of Palestinian civilians, its occupation of Palestinian territory, its blockade of Gaza in order to bring down the democratically elected representative of the Palestinians, Hamas, and its continuous colonization of occupied territories with American, European, Russian and other Jewish settlers. You can find out the contact details of MPs by going here http://www.writetothem.com or here http://www.theyworkforyou.com
-->Be prepared with facts, figures and arguments – read our website to remind yourself; be succinct and try not to be emotional, aggressive or rude.
-->Name and shame the above-mentioned Friends of Israel, and other Friends of Israel not listed here, by exposing them to your local media, your friends, colleagues and other contacts – and urge them to expose these apologists for murder to their friends, colleagues and other contacts, and to ask why these agents of a foreign power hold positions of political influence in Britain.
-->Help us to name and shame other Friends of Israel not listed here by letting us know who they and how you found out that they are Friends of Israel.
How long will people allow Israel and its elaborate network of stooges in the “Friends of Israel” lobby groups to morally blackmail them into silence over Israel’s crimes by abusing the memory of the Holocaust?
As the Irish philosopher and political scientist Edmund Burke said, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
Do not let evil triumph.
http://www.redress.cc/global/redress20090119
In Memory of Martin Luther King
"...Today, it is the much-sought- after equality, freedom, and morality in policy that are glaringly missing in the US political system, particularly towards the Palestinians. It is a policy driven by the same racism and greed that enslaved Africans and segregated against them, obliterated Native Americans, interned Japanese Americans, nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and conquered so many around the world. For there to be "Hope", and for the incoming president to assume the moral position set forth by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it is incumbent upon him to rise to the challenge of those who swept him into office - the millions of shoulders injured by colonial bigotry and hate – who especially today continue to challenge that same hate as it destroys the lives of the Palestinians in the most vicious manner..."
Yousef Abudayyeh
Today, as the Palestinian people continue to search for their dead in the Gaza Strip and bury their scorched children, mothers, and fathers, the United States as whole, the very custodian of Zionist bigotry and colonial malice, is recognizing a champion of civil rights, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This is a man that the US imprisoned, beat, accused of treason, and ridiculed before it celebrated, and only after he was assassinated. He is a preacher of a people whose churches were firebombed and burned to the ground, just like Palestinian mosques and churches; and against whom the US segregated, on whom it set vicious dogs, beat with batons, rifles and fire hoses. This is a people whose leadership and everyday activists in the struggle for equality were shot at, assassinated, and indeed, lynched by mindless mobs supported by public policy. They are a people whose history is relegated to the margins, whose art and cultural expressions robbed by others, whose youth remain subject to the combined brutalities of poverty, wretch racism, and police powers.
In the context of the amplified suffering of the past 23 days and in recognition of the proud resilience of the Palestinian people, sadly yet proudly, the likeness to the Palestinian struggle is enormous. Be it African American or Palestinian, geography is perhaps the only difference.
Today, on Tuesday, January 20, and as displaced Palestinians continue to return to homes bombed by US Apaches and F-16 fighter jets, these same United States will be inaugurating the first African American president. The US will do so as it hangs a faulty façade to hide away the long and brutal legacy of slavery, butchery, and institutional bigotry – perhaps in an attempt to wish it all away, if only for a day, lest it is remembered by its recipients. But make no mistake about it, this is a president who stands squarely and totally on the immeasurable dignified shoulders of all those who braved the viciousness, cruelty, institutional racism and overt bigotry of Jim Crow, Joseph McCarthy, J. Edgar Hoover, George Wallace, and so many more like them, including George W. Bush - just as the Palestinians today brave the cruelty imposed by the institutional racism and system of Apartheid that constitute the very essence of Zionism.
For President Obama to stand on these dignified shoulders, he now has an obligation to do what is right – to take even the smallest steps in that direction, all while he remembers that "yes, he can". This is not a choice in any way. Obama has an obligation to place equality in morality; and to place morality in public policy, both foreign and domestic. And when he finds out that the US system of government and geopolitical interests do not allow him so, he must make the change he championed. To this day, he has been a follower not a leader on these critical issues.
Today, it is the much-sought- after equality, freedom, and morality in policy that are glaringly missing in the US political system, particularly towards the Palestinians. It is a policy driven by the same racism and greed that enslaved Africans and segregated against them, obliterated Native Americans, interned Japanese Americans, nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and conquered so many around the world. For there to be "Hope", and for the incoming president to assume the moral position set forth by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it is incumbent upon him to rise to the challenge of those who swept him into office - the millions of shoulders injured by colonial bigotry and hate – who especially today continue to challenge that same hate as it destroys the lives of the Palestinians in the most vicious manner.
Today and tomorrow, the Palestinians will be burying their dead with endless tears and anguish, but they too will also be celebrating their journey - for they will continue to rise from the ashes of a firebomb, hurled by Zionists or the KKK – it is all the same - to continue their march forward to liberation. And the remains of the dead will undoubtedly evolve into a monument of steadfast and a memorial of emancipation for generations to come.
The Destruction:
At the conclusion of 22 days of a murderous campaign in the Gaza Strip by the Zionist army paid for by US tax dollars, the Zionist polity announced a "unilateral cease fire." Utilizing a diplomatic cover by the US, Arab regimes, and Western Europe, the defeated Zionists are setting a trap and are spreading a dangerous lie. Having achieved not even one of its goals, the Israeli leadership is opting for a change in tactic.
As of today, at least 1,300 Palestinians have been murdered and more than 5,500 have been injured, with a minimum of 500 in very critical conditions, including severe phosphorous burns. The number of killed Palestinians is expected to continue to rise as more decomposed and dismembered bodies of family members are uncovered from under the destruction, similar to the 100 bodies already uncovered yesterday. Children comprise at least 420 of the murdered and 2,000 of the injured, many are infants and toddlers. Many families were wiped in their entirety, as they were huddled together to escape the indiscriminate bombings.
More than 20,000 buildings have been damaged with over 4,000 fully destroyed. Mosques, churches, schools, hospitals, UN compounds, most streets, sport clubs and stadiums, ports, and the Gaza beach were shelled with high impact conventional explosives and white phosphorous bombs. At least 50 UN facilities sustained damage. The UN alone is currently operating 50 emergency shelters for more than 50,000 displaced people. The actual number of displaced is unknown as many are with families, or have refused to go to shelters lest they are attacked. Gaza City's wastewater treatment facility was shelled, causing the lagoon that holds 2 million liters of sewage to leak to surrounding agricultural and other sensitive areas.
In 22 days, at least 2,500 air strikes were carried out, not including the continuous sea and land artillery shelling from gunboats and tanks, with no less than 1,000 tons of explosives dropped on a tiny area of land. This estimate is certain to be revised upward once an investigation is completed in the sort of firepower used. It is estimated that no less than $1.6 billion would be needed to bring the Gaza Strip to an operating minimum.
The Cease Fire:
Astonishingly enough, the Israeli Zionist leadership did exactly what was expected: attack a civilian population for 3 solid weeks, pull back when it can't go forward due to a solid resistance, and race to declare victory despite defeat. Never mind that not only none of its goals were met, not one, but also the reversal actually occurred.
Victory of what, we ask? The resistance forces are that much stronger politically, and that much more supported nationally and internationally. The ability of the resistance remains fully intact, albeit affected by the assault. The Palestinian people embraced rather than turn against the resistance, with an unbelievable display of solidarity, dignity and order even in the face of destruction. In fact, while the Israelis and Abbas were hoping for looting, robbery, and chaos following the attacks, the exact opposite took place – mutual solidarity and popular support on a scale not seen before. The Arab regimes are increasingly weak and embarrassed and are no longer able to sustain the mandated obedient functionary role. The US is at odds with its Arab allies, particularly Egypt. Monarchs are racing to pump financial support. Resistance parties occupied center stage at a major emergency Arab Summit while Abbas would not dare to attend. Mahmud Abbas has been made much weaker. His henchmen are nearly disappearing. And his ability to speak of the Oslo package is significantly challenged. Nations have begun to cut relations with the Israeli polity, and war crime charges are about to fill courts on an unprecedented scale.
Consider the Economic Summit held in Kuwait yesterday which was supposed to include those with allegiance to the US. The Israeli polity had expected that the participants of that summit would go to political and economic war against the participants of the Qatar emergency Gaza Summit, which featured the resistance parties, Syria, and Iran. Nothing of the sort took place. The two flanks of the Arab political spectrum announced that they are unified, and the Saudis even started speaking of withdrawing the Arab Initiative. Essentially, Zionist brutality is embarrassing Arab despotic regimes to a point that they could no longer go on with business as usual without some movement to absorb the boiling popular anger. At this point, one of the main areas where the Israeli atrocities precipitated a major loss for the Zionist is the end of the normalization process on a popular level. For many years, Arab regimes, namely Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority under Abbas, have attempted to implement a long term Zionist normalization process on all levels, including economic, political, cultural, and security. This process is now faced with major challenges making it impossible to implement.
On a military level, the Israeli invading forces could not once display areas and instances where they have captured prisoners, confiscated arms, or imprisoned leadership. There was no surrender by anyone. There were no scenes of defection. There were no scenes of capture of command centers. The only scenes were of massive destruction and murdered children, elderly and families. While the leadership of some of the resistance forces sustained casualties in terms of injury and death, such did not impact the level of resistance to a point that until the day Israel announced its cease fire, the Palestinians were responding at the same level. The resistance movement never accepted any conditions, regardless of who delivered or attempted to market these conditions, be it Egyptian intelligence officers or otherwise. It never accepted to cease responding to the brutality and suffocation of the Israeli Zionist polity.
Even the agreement between the US and Israel on joint control of the Palestinian- Egyptian border was rejected by the Egyptian regime, which found itself fully humiliated and marginalized. This was to a point that the Egyptian regime had to hold its own summit with European powers and the Jordanian monarch to salvage whatever it had left of credibility as the prime obedient functionary of the region. Another sign of the defeated Zionist forces, as these summits and meetings serve to provide Arab regimes and the Israeli political establishment with a means to unilaterally quit the campaign using some forum of political cover, never mind the fact that none of the intended goals were achieved
So we ask: What victory? It is a Zionist defeat if there was ever one, similar to that in Lebanon in 2006. Gone forever are the days when the Israeli army was seen as unbeatable. Gone are the days when those beating the drums of surrender could be heard or even entertained for a moment. Gone are the days when it was thought that savagery of attacks would ever bring the Palestinians and Arabs to their knees. This is a time of dignity and resilience, not of capitulation and surrender. What Zionist victory, we ask? It is a defeat if there was ever one!
Here, the FPA is clear that the so-called cease fire is nothing but a charade to allow future assaults to take place under the guise that it is the Palestinians who are violating the terms of the so-called cease fire. Let it be clear to all that the blockade and siege were not lifted. The starvation and suffocation continue. The imprisonment of 1.5 millions has not changed, and the crossings were not opened. Lest some are misguided by the announcements by Israel - no, the occupation was not ended. A political discourse has not been set in place to allow for a realization of liberation, return, and independence. In that regards, the cease fire amounts to an attempt by the Zionists to regroup for a come-back at a later day. We are under no illusion that this will not be the last massacre, so long as Zionist armament remains aimed at the Palestinian people. The tanks pulled to the boundary of the tiny Gaza Strip of 365 square kilometers, ready to return for another failed attempt, just as they have done in the past in South Lebanon.
Once again, we remind all that the same areas that were bombed by the Zionist army were also bombed and destroyed in the early seventies. Yet, the Palestinians remained strong. In fact, the people at the receiving end of this latest assault are the same ones that were expelled first in 1948 from their homes, then again in 1967, and later attacked in the early seventies and into the eighties and beyond.
This latest cease fire exposed the failure of the US-Israeli-Arab regime axis in destroying the Palestinian resistance, just as it failed in 1948, then in 1970 in Jordan, in 1978 and 1982 in Lebanon, during the eighties and early nineties during the 1987 Intifada, and throughout the years of the most recent Intifada into the Janine and Gaza massacres. Hence, while colonial projects kept creeping onto the Palestinians, the conscience of the people and their ability to withstand massive destruction has been monumental. It continues on!
To this day, 60 years into conquest and the Zionist polity is unable to extract the national belonging of the Palestinian Arab people, especially within 1948 borders. This is true to a point that recently the Zionist polity had to ban Arab parties from running in Israeli parliamentary elections, hence once and for all dropping even the feeble fig leaf the Zionists once had. This occurred as a testament to the sharpness of the dichotomy between the Zionist movement and the Palestinian liberation movement – A dichotomy that has reached an apex and is headed to a new beginning.
Of major concern is the price of the financial support the Saudis and other Gulf countries will attempt to extract from the resistance. As has always been the case, despotic Arab regimes never act in favor of freedom and liberation, only in favor of sustaining their ability to rule. It is critical at this stage not to be fooled by promises and side deals with dictators and functionaries. The Palestinian resistance has the upper political hand and must materialize that into real political power. The Palestinian people cannot barter their freedom for political expediency.
For instance, the need for humanitarian relief should be recognized as an obligation on the part of the Arab and international community. It is not a substitute for the political national demands that could dangerously transform the Palestinian national liberation movement into a humanitarian crisis campaign needing pity and aid. This is very dangerous. Many organizations are already falling in that trap, and are being leveraged for the purpose of marginalizing the recently achieved political victory in favor of a campaign of pity and humanitarian aid. This should be rejected by all of us.
The Palestinian movement is not about a group of dispossessed refugees seeking food and shelter. It is about a movement for liberation by a people robbed of their land and who are determined to emerge victorious against their colonists. The Palestinian people do not need handouts. We reject them and return them to the sender. We demand and expect solidarity and reciprocate it in kind.
What Now?
This is the time to translate political victory to organizational gains. The Palestinian and Arab people must seize this opportunity to reorganize and position the movement on its proper track. For one thing, this is not the time to sweep under the rug the "political garbage" that has helped the Zionists over the past several years. They must be exposed and expelled from the Arab collective. All those who have stood in favor of surrender and normalization, those who have not stopped denigrating Arab resistance, and those who have become enablers for the Zionists, must be exposed in every locality and every area. They are the rot that is destroying what our people build. They exist in every realm. They are regimes and they are organizations. They are writers and they are activists. You know them from their slogans, and from their opportunistic behavior and political positions. Their discourse is a danger to our youth and to our future.
This is also the time for the Palestinian left to examine its ranks. It is time to self-clean. Those who have given cover to the PA and who enjoy the political comfort of their relationship with the likes of Abbas and his henchmen should not be setting policy for the left. Clearly, they are a failure like their sponsors. They have damaged the Palestinian left enough. The egalitarian and revolutionary perspective that is rooted in a democratic pan-Arab alternative should remain as the unifying slogan for the Palestinian left.
This is the time to strengthen our movement by giving it a program of solidarity that involves boycotts, divestment, and sanctions. This is the time for war crime tribunals to be enacted everywhere, and for war criminals to be apprehended and brought to justice. This is a time to expose the sadistic nature of the weaponry used by the Zionist, paid for by US taxpayers. This is a time to end all support to Israel, in every way, to properly position it as the Apartheid regime of today, and to isolate it economically, culturally, and diplomatically. This is a time to once and for all recognize that Zionism is nothing but a colonial ideology rooted in racism and hate.
In essence, we can build on this victory and the steadfast of the Palestinian people, by building on our own small victories in our workplace, towns, and universities.
The Free Palestine Alliance
January 19, 2009
Yousef
Please visit
http://wewillreturn.blogspot.com
Yousef Abudayyeh
Today, as the Palestinian people continue to search for their dead in the Gaza Strip and bury their scorched children, mothers, and fathers, the United States as whole, the very custodian of Zionist bigotry and colonial malice, is recognizing a champion of civil rights, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This is a man that the US imprisoned, beat, accused of treason, and ridiculed before it celebrated, and only after he was assassinated. He is a preacher of a people whose churches were firebombed and burned to the ground, just like Palestinian mosques and churches; and against whom the US segregated, on whom it set vicious dogs, beat with batons, rifles and fire hoses. This is a people whose leadership and everyday activists in the struggle for equality were shot at, assassinated, and indeed, lynched by mindless mobs supported by public policy. They are a people whose history is relegated to the margins, whose art and cultural expressions robbed by others, whose youth remain subject to the combined brutalities of poverty, wretch racism, and police powers.
In the context of the amplified suffering of the past 23 days and in recognition of the proud resilience of the Palestinian people, sadly yet proudly, the likeness to the Palestinian struggle is enormous. Be it African American or Palestinian, geography is perhaps the only difference.
Today, on Tuesday, January 20, and as displaced Palestinians continue to return to homes bombed by US Apaches and F-16 fighter jets, these same United States will be inaugurating the first African American president. The US will do so as it hangs a faulty façade to hide away the long and brutal legacy of slavery, butchery, and institutional bigotry – perhaps in an attempt to wish it all away, if only for a day, lest it is remembered by its recipients. But make no mistake about it, this is a president who stands squarely and totally on the immeasurable dignified shoulders of all those who braved the viciousness, cruelty, institutional racism and overt bigotry of Jim Crow, Joseph McCarthy, J. Edgar Hoover, George Wallace, and so many more like them, including George W. Bush - just as the Palestinians today brave the cruelty imposed by the institutional racism and system of Apartheid that constitute the very essence of Zionism.
For President Obama to stand on these dignified shoulders, he now has an obligation to do what is right – to take even the smallest steps in that direction, all while he remembers that "yes, he can". This is not a choice in any way. Obama has an obligation to place equality in morality; and to place morality in public policy, both foreign and domestic. And when he finds out that the US system of government and geopolitical interests do not allow him so, he must make the change he championed. To this day, he has been a follower not a leader on these critical issues.
Today, it is the much-sought- after equality, freedom, and morality in policy that are glaringly missing in the US political system, particularly towards the Palestinians. It is a policy driven by the same racism and greed that enslaved Africans and segregated against them, obliterated Native Americans, interned Japanese Americans, nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and conquered so many around the world. For there to be "Hope", and for the incoming president to assume the moral position set forth by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it is incumbent upon him to rise to the challenge of those who swept him into office - the millions of shoulders injured by colonial bigotry and hate – who especially today continue to challenge that same hate as it destroys the lives of the Palestinians in the most vicious manner.
Today and tomorrow, the Palestinians will be burying their dead with endless tears and anguish, but they too will also be celebrating their journey - for they will continue to rise from the ashes of a firebomb, hurled by Zionists or the KKK – it is all the same - to continue their march forward to liberation. And the remains of the dead will undoubtedly evolve into a monument of steadfast and a memorial of emancipation for generations to come.
The Destruction:
At the conclusion of 22 days of a murderous campaign in the Gaza Strip by the Zionist army paid for by US tax dollars, the Zionist polity announced a "unilateral cease fire." Utilizing a diplomatic cover by the US, Arab regimes, and Western Europe, the defeated Zionists are setting a trap and are spreading a dangerous lie. Having achieved not even one of its goals, the Israeli leadership is opting for a change in tactic.
As of today, at least 1,300 Palestinians have been murdered and more than 5,500 have been injured, with a minimum of 500 in very critical conditions, including severe phosphorous burns. The number of killed Palestinians is expected to continue to rise as more decomposed and dismembered bodies of family members are uncovered from under the destruction, similar to the 100 bodies already uncovered yesterday. Children comprise at least 420 of the murdered and 2,000 of the injured, many are infants and toddlers. Many families were wiped in their entirety, as they were huddled together to escape the indiscriminate bombings.
More than 20,000 buildings have been damaged with over 4,000 fully destroyed. Mosques, churches, schools, hospitals, UN compounds, most streets, sport clubs and stadiums, ports, and the Gaza beach were shelled with high impact conventional explosives and white phosphorous bombs. At least 50 UN facilities sustained damage. The UN alone is currently operating 50 emergency shelters for more than 50,000 displaced people. The actual number of displaced is unknown as many are with families, or have refused to go to shelters lest they are attacked. Gaza City's wastewater treatment facility was shelled, causing the lagoon that holds 2 million liters of sewage to leak to surrounding agricultural and other sensitive areas.
In 22 days, at least 2,500 air strikes were carried out, not including the continuous sea and land artillery shelling from gunboats and tanks, with no less than 1,000 tons of explosives dropped on a tiny area of land. This estimate is certain to be revised upward once an investigation is completed in the sort of firepower used. It is estimated that no less than $1.6 billion would be needed to bring the Gaza Strip to an operating minimum.
The Cease Fire:
Astonishingly enough, the Israeli Zionist leadership did exactly what was expected: attack a civilian population for 3 solid weeks, pull back when it can't go forward due to a solid resistance, and race to declare victory despite defeat. Never mind that not only none of its goals were met, not one, but also the reversal actually occurred.
Victory of what, we ask? The resistance forces are that much stronger politically, and that much more supported nationally and internationally. The ability of the resistance remains fully intact, albeit affected by the assault. The Palestinian people embraced rather than turn against the resistance, with an unbelievable display of solidarity, dignity and order even in the face of destruction. In fact, while the Israelis and Abbas were hoping for looting, robbery, and chaos following the attacks, the exact opposite took place – mutual solidarity and popular support on a scale not seen before. The Arab regimes are increasingly weak and embarrassed and are no longer able to sustain the mandated obedient functionary role. The US is at odds with its Arab allies, particularly Egypt. Monarchs are racing to pump financial support. Resistance parties occupied center stage at a major emergency Arab Summit while Abbas would not dare to attend. Mahmud Abbas has been made much weaker. His henchmen are nearly disappearing. And his ability to speak of the Oslo package is significantly challenged. Nations have begun to cut relations with the Israeli polity, and war crime charges are about to fill courts on an unprecedented scale.
Consider the Economic Summit held in Kuwait yesterday which was supposed to include those with allegiance to the US. The Israeli polity had expected that the participants of that summit would go to political and economic war against the participants of the Qatar emergency Gaza Summit, which featured the resistance parties, Syria, and Iran. Nothing of the sort took place. The two flanks of the Arab political spectrum announced that they are unified, and the Saudis even started speaking of withdrawing the Arab Initiative. Essentially, Zionist brutality is embarrassing Arab despotic regimes to a point that they could no longer go on with business as usual without some movement to absorb the boiling popular anger. At this point, one of the main areas where the Israeli atrocities precipitated a major loss for the Zionist is the end of the normalization process on a popular level. For many years, Arab regimes, namely Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority under Abbas, have attempted to implement a long term Zionist normalization process on all levels, including economic, political, cultural, and security. This process is now faced with major challenges making it impossible to implement.
On a military level, the Israeli invading forces could not once display areas and instances where they have captured prisoners, confiscated arms, or imprisoned leadership. There was no surrender by anyone. There were no scenes of defection. There were no scenes of capture of command centers. The only scenes were of massive destruction and murdered children, elderly and families. While the leadership of some of the resistance forces sustained casualties in terms of injury and death, such did not impact the level of resistance to a point that until the day Israel announced its cease fire, the Palestinians were responding at the same level. The resistance movement never accepted any conditions, regardless of who delivered or attempted to market these conditions, be it Egyptian intelligence officers or otherwise. It never accepted to cease responding to the brutality and suffocation of the Israeli Zionist polity.
Even the agreement between the US and Israel on joint control of the Palestinian- Egyptian border was rejected by the Egyptian regime, which found itself fully humiliated and marginalized. This was to a point that the Egyptian regime had to hold its own summit with European powers and the Jordanian monarch to salvage whatever it had left of credibility as the prime obedient functionary of the region. Another sign of the defeated Zionist forces, as these summits and meetings serve to provide Arab regimes and the Israeli political establishment with a means to unilaterally quit the campaign using some forum of political cover, never mind the fact that none of the intended goals were achieved
So we ask: What victory? It is a Zionist defeat if there was ever one, similar to that in Lebanon in 2006. Gone forever are the days when the Israeli army was seen as unbeatable. Gone are the days when those beating the drums of surrender could be heard or even entertained for a moment. Gone are the days when it was thought that savagery of attacks would ever bring the Palestinians and Arabs to their knees. This is a time of dignity and resilience, not of capitulation and surrender. What Zionist victory, we ask? It is a defeat if there was ever one!
Here, the FPA is clear that the so-called cease fire is nothing but a charade to allow future assaults to take place under the guise that it is the Palestinians who are violating the terms of the so-called cease fire. Let it be clear to all that the blockade and siege were not lifted. The starvation and suffocation continue. The imprisonment of 1.5 millions has not changed, and the crossings were not opened. Lest some are misguided by the announcements by Israel - no, the occupation was not ended. A political discourse has not been set in place to allow for a realization of liberation, return, and independence. In that regards, the cease fire amounts to an attempt by the Zionists to regroup for a come-back at a later day. We are under no illusion that this will not be the last massacre, so long as Zionist armament remains aimed at the Palestinian people. The tanks pulled to the boundary of the tiny Gaza Strip of 365 square kilometers, ready to return for another failed attempt, just as they have done in the past in South Lebanon.
Once again, we remind all that the same areas that were bombed by the Zionist army were also bombed and destroyed in the early seventies. Yet, the Palestinians remained strong. In fact, the people at the receiving end of this latest assault are the same ones that were expelled first in 1948 from their homes, then again in 1967, and later attacked in the early seventies and into the eighties and beyond.
This latest cease fire exposed the failure of the US-Israeli-Arab regime axis in destroying the Palestinian resistance, just as it failed in 1948, then in 1970 in Jordan, in 1978 and 1982 in Lebanon, during the eighties and early nineties during the 1987 Intifada, and throughout the years of the most recent Intifada into the Janine and Gaza massacres. Hence, while colonial projects kept creeping onto the Palestinians, the conscience of the people and their ability to withstand massive destruction has been monumental. It continues on!
To this day, 60 years into conquest and the Zionist polity is unable to extract the national belonging of the Palestinian Arab people, especially within 1948 borders. This is true to a point that recently the Zionist polity had to ban Arab parties from running in Israeli parliamentary elections, hence once and for all dropping even the feeble fig leaf the Zionists once had. This occurred as a testament to the sharpness of the dichotomy between the Zionist movement and the Palestinian liberation movement – A dichotomy that has reached an apex and is headed to a new beginning.
Of major concern is the price of the financial support the Saudis and other Gulf countries will attempt to extract from the resistance. As has always been the case, despotic Arab regimes never act in favor of freedom and liberation, only in favor of sustaining their ability to rule. It is critical at this stage not to be fooled by promises and side deals with dictators and functionaries. The Palestinian resistance has the upper political hand and must materialize that into real political power. The Palestinian people cannot barter their freedom for political expediency.
For instance, the need for humanitarian relief should be recognized as an obligation on the part of the Arab and international community. It is not a substitute for the political national demands that could dangerously transform the Palestinian national liberation movement into a humanitarian crisis campaign needing pity and aid. This is very dangerous. Many organizations are already falling in that trap, and are being leveraged for the purpose of marginalizing the recently achieved political victory in favor of a campaign of pity and humanitarian aid. This should be rejected by all of us.
The Palestinian movement is not about a group of dispossessed refugees seeking food and shelter. It is about a movement for liberation by a people robbed of their land and who are determined to emerge victorious against their colonists. The Palestinian people do not need handouts. We reject them and return them to the sender. We demand and expect solidarity and reciprocate it in kind.
What Now?
This is the time to translate political victory to organizational gains. The Palestinian and Arab people must seize this opportunity to reorganize and position the movement on its proper track. For one thing, this is not the time to sweep under the rug the "political garbage" that has helped the Zionists over the past several years. They must be exposed and expelled from the Arab collective. All those who have stood in favor of surrender and normalization, those who have not stopped denigrating Arab resistance, and those who have become enablers for the Zionists, must be exposed in every locality and every area. They are the rot that is destroying what our people build. They exist in every realm. They are regimes and they are organizations. They are writers and they are activists. You know them from their slogans, and from their opportunistic behavior and political positions. Their discourse is a danger to our youth and to our future.
This is also the time for the Palestinian left to examine its ranks. It is time to self-clean. Those who have given cover to the PA and who enjoy the political comfort of their relationship with the likes of Abbas and his henchmen should not be setting policy for the left. Clearly, they are a failure like their sponsors. They have damaged the Palestinian left enough. The egalitarian and revolutionary perspective that is rooted in a democratic pan-Arab alternative should remain as the unifying slogan for the Palestinian left.
This is the time to strengthen our movement by giving it a program of solidarity that involves boycotts, divestment, and sanctions. This is the time for war crime tribunals to be enacted everywhere, and for war criminals to be apprehended and brought to justice. This is a time to expose the sadistic nature of the weaponry used by the Zionist, paid for by US taxpayers. This is a time to end all support to Israel, in every way, to properly position it as the Apartheid regime of today, and to isolate it economically, culturally, and diplomatically. This is a time to once and for all recognize that Zionism is nothing but a colonial ideology rooted in racism and hate.
In essence, we can build on this victory and the steadfast of the Palestinian people, by building on our own small victories in our workplace, towns, and universities.
The Free Palestine Alliance
January 19, 2009
Yousef
Please visit
http://wewillreturn.blogspot.com
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