“This week, as the survivors of the Sabra and Shatila massacre remember their dead, Ariel Sharon, the man deemed ‘personally responsible’ for the massacre by Israel’s 1983 Kahane Commission, is planning an official visit to Holland. When Ariel Sharon steps off the plane, he will be treading not only on Dutch soil, but also on the bodies of the dead of Sabra and Shatila. Legally, the massacre and its victims remain unburied. It is Holland’s shame to assume that rolling out a red carpet of welcome can cover the corpses of Mr. Sharon’s victims, whose number continues to climb with each passing day.” EI co-founder Laurie King-Irani remembers a massacre that many prefer to forget. Read more about Unburied
Madonna - Esther, shalom, salaam, welcome. On behalf of Israeli Jews, and Palestinian or Israeli Christians and Muslims seriously opposed to your highly controversial visit, we ask you, with compassion, to reconsider the consequences of coming to Israel/Palestine in this context. This visit takes you to the heart of Occupied Territory in Bethlehem: a closed-off prison, a ghetto, whose civilians now have no work, no freedom, no life. They’ve finished their savings, live now on food handouts from foreign donor agencies. They’ve had their land taken, they have no justice through the courts, this entire city of ordinary folk trying to live a decent life, is imprisoned, while Israel calls the shots. Read more about Open letter to Madonna
If East Jerusalem had an unofficial mayor, it would be nuclear whistle blower Mordechai Vanunu. When the church bell rings at noon at the Anglican cathedral of St. George’s in East Jerusalem not far from Damascus Gate in the Old City, chances are it’s Mordechai Vanunu ringing the bell. From that vantage point, he looks down on the Jerusalem court house where he was originally sentenced to eighteen years in prison for divulging Israel’s nuclear secrets. Am Johal reports on Vanunu’s experience since prison. Read more about The Vanunu Epilogue
The recent visit of Mohandas K. Gandhi’s grandson, Arun Gandhi, to Palestine has sparked new discussion about the role of nonviolence in the Palestinian struggle for freedom. In a speech before the Palestinian Legislative Council, Gandhi called upon 50,000 Palestinian refugees to march back home en masse from their exile in Jordan, forcing the Israelis to choose between relenting to a wave of people power, or gunning the marchers down in cold blood. EI co-founder Ali Abunimah sorts the genuine efforts to energize the struggle with non-violent tactics from the spurious ones designed to shift the blame from the occupier to the occupied. Read more about The myth of Gandhi and Palestinian reality
“The situation fell out of control and it became difficult for me to do my job. It became difficult for the Ministry of Justice to operate, especially after the Palestinian Cabinet passed a ministerial decision that further limited our ability to work within our legal channels to implement law and order. Basically, the wording of the new orders was vague and didn’t clearly establish boundaries for different departments within the government to operate. It became impossible to work.” Palestinian Justice Minister Nahed al-Rayyes, who recently submitted his resignation, granted Samah Sabawi in Amman, Jordan this exclusive interview by telephone from his home in Gaza on 27 August 2004. Read more about Interview with Palestinian Justice Minister Nahed al-Rayyes
Anyone following mainstream media today couldn’t miss the news today. CNN reported that two suicide bombers set off almost simultaneous blasts on buses in Beer Sheva, killing 16 people in addition to themselves. At least 93 people were wounded. Usually, such attacks are followed with a wide range of condemnations. While mainstream media tend to portray suicide bombings as a return to violence after a “relatively quiet” period, at least 436 Palestinians have been killed since March 14. This month alone, Israeli forces killed 43 Palestinians and injured 285. This underscores the lack of evenhanded attention given to loss of life in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Read more about Israel killed 436 Palestinians in past 'quiet' six months
The “terrorist” charges against Shahawar Matin Siraj and James El Shafay of New York are nothing short of illegal entrapment. Regardless of what happens from this point on, their futures are ruined. Ironic that Siraj, a 21-year-old Pakistani immigrant who works longer hours than President Bush, in addition to attending night school, came to America for freedom and opportunity. His crime, as spelled out clearly in the complaint filed against him last weekend, was his “hatred of America.” In the coming days, the tabloid press will demonize Siraj and El Shafay, , while the moderate New York Times will dance around the digestible semantics of “Other” and the “anti-Americanist” template of Other’s mindset. Read more about New York Plays the Arab Card
The Israeli Ministry of the Interior has decided that I may not speak to the media. This attempt to silence me is not new; deportation and imprisonment for political reasons are the highest form of censorship. In this particular case the attempt to cut off my voice is part of a long term Israeli state attack on three vital narratives. The first is composed of international activists who act against the occupation. The second is that of the peace movement and refusniks, who take direct action against the occupation by refusing to serve in it and the third is that of the Palestinian people and the daily terror that they face. Read more about British journalist banned from speaking with the media
Here is my take on the Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal in the Pentagon. It is an echo of the one-two punch secretly planned by the pro-Likud faction in the Department of Defense. First, Iraq would be taken out by the United States, and then Iran. David Wurmser, a key member of the group, also wanted Syria included. These pro-Likud intellectuals concluded that 9/11 would give them carte blanche to use the Pentagon as Israel’s Gurkha regiment, fighting elective wars on behalf of Tel Aviv (not wars that really needed to be fought, but wars that the Likud coalition thought it would be nice to see fought so as to increase Israel’s ability to annex land and act aggressively, especially if someone else’s boys did the dying). Juan Cole comments. Read more about Pentagon/Israel Spying Case Expands: Fomenting a War on Iran
The Internet information service Yahoo! has omitted information about Palestine’s athletes competing in the 2004 Olympics at Athens. Yahoo! has extensive Olympics coverage, one of the features of which is a search engine that allows users to look up any athlete by name or to look up all the athletes representing a country — except that the athletes from Palestine are mysteriously missing. EI’s Ali Abunimah and Nigel Parry explain the problem and ask for action. Read more about Yahoo! Sports makes Palestine's Olympians disappear
