“A man without a country,” is what Judge Maryanne Trump Barry called the hapless stowaway, Salim Yassir, who was born in Palestine, exiled to Libya, and jailed in the USA. Four years after foiling Yassir’s 2000 attempt to enter the USA, immigration authorities were still claiming they should keep him in jail while they looked for a country that would take him. But Judge Barry (Donald Trump’s older sister) put an end to that legal purgatory in 2004 when she ruled that a man without a country has rights, too. Yassir could just as easily live outside jail while authorities pursued their executive agendas. Read more about Children without a Country: Maryam Remains in Texas Jail
JOHANNESBURG, Jan 26 (IPS) - A call from a South African trade unionist for national supermarket chains to stop importing avocado from Israel could ultimately lead to the banning of all imports from the Jewish state, if unions and human rights activists have their way. Katishi Masemola, secretary general of the Food and Allied Workers’ Union (FAWU), told South Africa’s supermarket chains earlier this week that Israel produces avocado under “slave-type conditions”. He says the International Labour Organisation (ILO) forbids the use of child labour which, he claims, Israel is employing on avocado farms. Read more about Avocados, Diamonds at Core of Israel Boycott Trade Campaign
Democrats in Congress have moved quickly — and commendably — to strengthen ethics rules. But truly groundbreaking reform was prevented, in part, because of the efforts of the pro-Israel lobby to preserve one of its most critical functions: taking members of Congress on free “educational” trips to Israel. The pro-Israel lobby does most of its work without publicity. But every member of Congress and every would-be candidate for Congress comes to quickly understand a basic lesson. Money needed to run for office can come with great ease from supporters of Israel, provided that the candidate makes certain promises, in writing, to vote favorably on issues considered important to Israel. Read more about The hidden cost of free congressional trips to Israel
Steven Friedman and Virginia Tilley25 January 2007
It may seem odd that many people working hard for a stable peace in Israel-Palestine find veteran Israeli activist Uri Avnery so immensely irritating. The reason stems from his moral contradictions, all too common to liberal Zionism: that is, while taking an unflinching moral stand against racist abuses of Palestinians, he somehow drops the same principles in assuming that Israel itself has a right to preserve its “Jewish character” at the expense of Palestinian rights. Read more about Taken for a Ride by the Israeli Left
President Jimmy Carter angered Israel and its friends by describing “the abominable oppression and persecution in the occupied Palestinian territories, with a rigid system of required passes and strict segregation between Palestine’s citizens and Jewish settlers in the West Bank.” Now, The Electronic Intifada has obtained an Israeli Ministry of Defense Powerpoint presentation which provides a frightening glimpse into the mindset of the bureaucracy of apartheid. The first page of the document bears the name “Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories” as well as the acronym “COGAT” at the bottom of each page. Read more about EI EXCLUSIVE: Leaked Israeli document gives frightening glimpse of apartheid
Fourteen members of the Carter Center Board of Councilors resigned on 11 January to express their dismay over President Jimmy Carter’s book, Palestine Peace Not Apartheid. Their criticisms are petty and inaccurate and say much more about them than about President Carter. They fail to grapple in the letter with Israel’s subjugation of the Palestinians and with President Carter’s call for substantive peacemaking. EI contributor Michael F. Brown responds with the following point-by-point rebuttal to the resignation letter. Read more about A rebuttal to the Carter Center Board of Councilors resignation letter
When Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas flew to Damascus last weekend to meet with Khaled Mishaal, the head of the Hamas politburo, he took with him many expectations. It was hoped that this meeting could put an end to the political infighting that has been going on ever since Abbas’ Fatah movement refused, with Western-backing, to accept the result of the elections one year ago that gave Hamas a sweeping majority of seats and the right to form a Cabinet. With both parties nominally committed to a “national unity government”, it was also hoped that an agreement would put an end to the US-Israeli-EU siege and boycott of the Palestinian Authority that has brought an occupied people to unprecedented levels of suffering and misery. Read more about Mockery and deception continue
In the past, the media have habitually reported Palestinian attacks against Israelis, so it is not strange today for news-consumers that the Palestinians, just like the Iraqis, have tipped over into civil war, as if this were the most natural thing in the world, the logical, inevitable consequence of the politics and, as likely as not, the character of Arabs and Muslims — that is to say, backward, when compared with Western politics and culture, which, by definition, are advanced and democratic. What these reports habitually fail to report is the role of those Western governments in the political situation of the Middle East. Read more about Palestine and the long arm of the Occupation
Most twelve-year-old boys in the United States spend their days thinking about video games, sports, school work, and maybe that cute girl in homeroom. If their father is a store owner, chances are they have no other concerns, since money is not a problem. In Elizabeth Laird’s novel A Little Piece of Ground (Haymarket Books, 2006), the twelve-year-old boys that serve as the story’s protagonists also spend a lot of their time on the aforementioned concerns. However, they also live in Palestine under occupation. Read more about Football, Twelve-Year-Old Boys, and Military Curfews: Elizabeth Laird's "A Little Piece of Ground"
WASHINGTON, Jan 22 (IPS) - As U.S. President George W. Bush puts the final touches on his State of the Union Address, an unusually broad group of Middle East specialists here is hoping that he will make his proposed two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a centrepiece of both his speech and his last two years in office. Despite the political weakness of both Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, the group, the Campaign for American Leadership in the Middle East (CALME), believes that the current moment offers a major opportunity for a breakthrough in the 60-year-old conflict. Read more about Bush Urged to Make Israeli-Palestinian Peace Now
