السلطة توقف تعليق الجزيرة بالضفة

The Stooge Backs Down!


The Dayton Authority has reversed itself and now has decided not to close down Al-Jazeera's offices in the West Bank.

Go ........Al-Jazeera; You Rock!

Testimonials of Israeli Soldiers about the Invasion of Gaza (Operation Cast Lead)

Contributed by Blogreader

From BBC

PDF file (81 pages).

Al-Jazeera Video: Inside Story - Breaking the silence

"A group of soldiers who took part in Israel's assault in Gaza in December and January say widespread abuses were committed against civilians under "permissive" rules of engagement. Inside Story discusses whether Israel did commit war crimes and if it did, can those responsible be held accountable."

Free Gaza--and Palestine

A Great Piece

By Huwaida Arraf
The Nation

"Last month I led a group of twenty-one human rights workers on a boat from Cyprus to challenge Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip. We carried toys, medicine, olive tree saplings, toolkits, a fifty-kilo bag of cement and school supplies on our small converted ferry boat.

At 2 AM on June 30, almost eighteen hours into the 230-mile journey, a colleague awakened me. The Israeli Navy was calling our boat on the VHF radio. "You are navigating towards a blockaded area. You are hereby ordered to change your course. If you do not, we will be forced to use all necessary force to stop you.".....

Later, I learned that outside of my view, these government-sanctioned pirates pummeled Adam in order to wrest his videocamera from his grasp......

But like the rest of us, Adam insists on using nonviolent means to resist Israel's military occupation. And though in his widely hailed Cairo speech President Obama made an implicit call for nonviolence as the means to challenge the Israeli occupation, the Obama administration made no public statement on our behalf -- nor did it do so three months ago, when my dear friend Bassem Abu Rahme was killed while nonviolently protesting Israeli expansionism in the West Bank that threatens to destroy his village of Bil'in......

My colleagues and I invested time and energy in this difficult journey and put our lives at risk because for too long the international community has been complicit in Israel's crimes against the Palestinian people. For too long, diplomats and world leaders have paid lip service to Palestinian human rights. For too long, the Palestinian people have been told to wait -- wait in the checkpoint line, wait on the peace process, wait to have your rights recognized, wait for freedom

Perhaps we were politically inept. Had we sailed toward Iran to offer assistance to civilian protesters there, we would have been a cause celebre if the Iranian government had arrested us......

Most Palestinians in the occupied territories have not lived a day free of Israel's occupation, and Palestinian citizens of Israel continue to live as a discriminated-against minority. Just the other day, Israel's housing minister, Ariel Atias, declared, "We can all be bleeding hearts, but I think it is unsuitable [for Jews and Palestinians] to live together [in Israel]......

.....When Israeli naval boats become pirate ships -- boarding a vessel that poses them no threat, arresting and beating American citizens--it is ignored.

It is ignored and Israel continues to enjoy the patronage of the United States and to present itself as a moral beacon for the world. But my generation finds racist language like that of Atias'--and the actions that result from such outdated thinking--abhorrent......

The question facing the world now must no longer be about where to squeeze a Palestinian state. The only relevant question is how to advance the immediate freedom of ten million Palestinians. There can be no more waiting, no more prevaricating, no more negotiations on that simple, beautiful human concept--freedom......

We will be free. President Obama can expedite the process by putting pressure on Israel, or he can sideline himself and the process for the next eight years. Sooner or later, however, Israel's subjugation of us will be overturned......

So, yes, this was only one tiny humanitarian boat to Gaza. But Israel's heavy-handed action shows how much is at stake and how shaky Israel's grip over another people becomes when the world's citizens speak out and take action--even as governments fall short."

"Watch What We Do, Not What We Say"

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN
CounterPunch

""Watch what we do, not what we say,” was the famous advice Nixon’s first Attorney General, John Mitchell, gave the press at the onset of the Nixon presidency in 1969. It’s a handy piece of advice in the Age of Obama too, as we roll towards the end of his first six months in office. There’s the added difficulty that Obama likes to say two different things in the same speech, usually prefaced by his trade-mark “Let me be clear.”

“And let me be clear,” he told the Russians in Moscow, even as he presses forward with the Clinton/Bush policy of NATO expansion, ringing Russia with missile bases, “NATO seeks collaboration with Russia, not confrontation.”

You think “saying” and “doing” are far apart on that one? Try this gem, also delivered in Moscow: “Now let me be clear, America will not seek to impose any system of government on any other country, nor would we presume to choose which party or individual should run a country…. America will never impose a security arrangement on another country.”

The last guy in the White House to be that clear was in fact Nixon, who tossed in “perfectly” as a bonus.

Obama has been perfectly clear on so many pledges, such as restoring constitutional protections such as habeas corpus, respect for international treaties and covenants on torture and the treatment of prisoners, ending eavesdropping and, when you take even a quick glance at what he’s done, he’s been perfectly awful on so many fronts........."

The Johnny Procedure

A Very Good Comment

By Uri Avnery

".....WE SHALL not evade the hardest moral question of all: is it permissible to risk the lives of our soldiers in order to save the old people, women and children of the “enemy”? The answer of Assa Kasher, the ideologue of the “Most Moral Army in the World”, is unequivocal: it is absolutely forbidden to risk the lives of the soldiers. The most telling sentence in his entire essay is: “Therefore…the state must give preference to the lives of its soldiers above the lives of the (unarmed) neighbors of a terrorist.”

These words should be read twice and three times, in order to grasp their full implications. What is actually being said here is: if necessary to avoid casualties among our soldiers, it is better to kill enemy civilians without any limit.

In retrospect, one can only be glad that the British soldiers, who fought against the Irgun and the Stern Group, did not have an ethical guide like Kasher.

This is the principle that guided the Israeli army in the Gaza War, and, as far as I know, this is a new doctrine: in order to avoid the loss of one single soldier of ours, it is permissible to kill 10, 100 and even 1000 enemy civilians. War without casualties on our side. The numerical result bears witness: more than 1000 people killed in Gaza, a third or two thirds of them (depending on who you ask) civilians, women and children, as against 6 (six) Israeli soldiers killed by enemy fire. (Four more were killed by “friendly” fire.)

Kasher states explicitly that it is justified to kill a Palestinian child who is in the company of a hundred “terrorists”, because the “terrorists” might kill children in Sderot. But in reality, it was a case of killing a hundred children who were in the company of one “terrorist”.

If we strip this doctrine of all ornaments, what remains is a simple principle: the state must protect the lives of its soldiers at any price, without any limit or law. A war of zero casualties. That leads necessarily to a tactic of killing every person and destroying every building that could represent a danger to the soldiers, creating an empty space in front of the advancing troops.

Only one conclusion can be drawn from this: from now on, any Israeli decision to start a war in a built-up area is a war crime, and the soldiers who rise up against this crime should be honored. May they be blessed. "

24 Hours in Gaza

By Soozy Duncan
Viva Palestina

"Allowed only 24 hours in Gaza under threat of not being allowed to return to Egypt, the Viva Palestina convoy has been a whirlwind of activity since crossing the border at Rafah Wednesday night. Organizers have attempted to compress 3 days of planned activities into a single day.

Thursday started by watching a press conference featuring Gazan Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh with members of the Neturei Karta, an organization of anti-Zionist Rabbis from Munsey, New York, who traveled with the caravan. Haniyeh emphasized that the government and the people of Gaza take no issue with Jews, but rather with Zionism and the ongoing oppression and blockade by Israel. Rabbi Dovid Weissman concurred that Jews, Christians and Muslims had coexisted peacefully in Muslim countries for centuries prior to the birth of Zionism, and asked for the people of Gaza to join him in praying for the peaceful dismantlement of the state of Israel.

The group then drove around the Gaza Strip in buses to see the aftermath of the bombing onslaught 6 months ago before attending another press conference at the Legislative Assembly and traveling to Shifa Hospital in Gaza City to deliver the medical aid which was brought from the United States and gathered in Cairo. Finally, delegates met with families of some of the 11,000 prisoners being held in Israel at the Ministry of Prisoners in Tel Alhwa, where children of parents killed in December and January also addressed the group.

Fraser Gaspard of Denver, Colorado, said of seeing the devastation firsthand, “It really shows how effective the American weapons we give Israel are, and how deliberate Israel was in its attack from the spots that were hit, schools, hospitals, a cement factory, homes in refugee camps. You could see it was a war of terror against the Gazan people.” ........

Mohamad, a recent graduate from the Islamic University, volunteered to serve as an interpreter for the delegates. Asked about the current state of the people of Gaza, he said, “The children now are still suffering from psychological pain and suffering. Whenever they hear any sound they say ‘Bomb! Bomb’ and start crying. For adults it is almost the same.” Mohamad expressed excitement about the past Viva Palestina convoy from London and the plans for future caravans from Venezuela, Moscow, Beijing, and the next from the U.S. “They decrease the suffering among the Gazans. The convoys break the siege and bring us medical aid. The people of Gaza feel really grateful and proud. These convoys uplift our spirits and help us feel stronger and more steadfast.”......"

Iran: Israel Plotted to Assassinate Ahmadinejad

Al-Manar

"18/07/2009 Israel conspired with Iranian opposition figures in a plot to assassinate President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during last month's election campaign, Iran's intelligence minister said on Friday.

According to AFP, Intelligence Minister Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeie told state media in Iran that Israeli officials had met members of the People's Mujahedeen of Iran, an exiled opposition group, twice to plan Ahmadinejad's assassination.

"The Zionist regime had met with the (PMOI) on the sidelines of a meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt and in Paris to assassinate Mr. Ahmadinejad," Ejeie said.

The intelligence minister said the group agreed to cooperate on condition that it be removed from a U.S. "terror black list," according to AFP......"

Some lessons in sacrifice from Liverpool in two world wars

By Robert Fisk

"....Dr Bob was introduced as "inevitably controversial" – "controversial", I long ago realised, was one of those code words applied to Middle East correspondents if they have been abused by Israel's so-called supporters abroad – so controversial I intended to be.

I said that we should not be in Afghanistan, that we Westerners now have 22 times as many military personnel in the Muslim world than the Crusaders had in the 12th century (the great age of real Gothic cathedrals, of course) and that the Muslim lands did not belong to us. Send them our doctors and our teachers and our agronomists – but not our soldiers. They should be brought home. This was the week in which we had all seen the heartbreaking grief which greeted the return of another eight Brits from Afghanistan.

And to my astonishment, the burghers and their families, students and their mums and dads – hitherto silent in expectation of a soft homily – began to clap, a great wash of sound that spread through the chapels and aisles of Scott's cathedral. This was due to no Fisk eloquence (nor did everyone applaud). But something had been touched off. That very morning, The Guardian had assured us that an opinion poll showed the great British public remained "firm" in its support for our campaign in Afghanistan. Well, I thought, as the clapping echoed through the nave, I wonder...

That's what my Liverpool visit taught me. In a spiritual emporium, Brits showed that, even if their Government tried to convince them that Afghanistan was worth the bones of British grenadiers, they did not believe it. The Taliban are not on the Western Front or flying over Liverpool. In fact, the Taliban themselves have never bombed us – except in the land to which we have sent our soldiers. The clapping in Liverpool Cathedral last Wednesday had nothing to do with me. It had everything to do with a hopeless, lost military campaign in which we should never have become involved, whose casualties – yes, let's remember the thousands of Afghans here – are a mockery of the dead of two world wars......"

Al-Jazeera Cartoon

Beating the Drums of War

Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah's Speech on July 17. (1 hr. 12 min.)

السيد حسن نصر الله
17/07/2009
عملية الرضوان

Click Here to Listen

The Scoundrel!

By Naser Jafari

This is a good cartoon; it has a double meaning which will not be lost on those who speak Arabic.

Current Al-Jazeera (Arabic) Online Poll

This new poll asks:

Do you consider Al-Jazeera's coverage of Qaddumi's declarations biased?

With over 1,000 responding so far, 81% said no.

Israeli art students show up at interesting times

By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer

Jul 17, 2009

"The way the corporate media would have it believed is that Israeli “art students” who aggressively sell cheap art door-to-door, usually at federal office buildings and the houses of government employees, are merely traveling abroad after their military service in Israel to “see the world.” In fact, these “art students” are classic intelligence operatives who have appeared before and after major terrorist events and covert operations conducted by the Mossad......."

Obama, Foxman and Israel’s Purpose

By Tony Karon

"Having spent decades drumming home the idea that Israel is rooted squarely in the Holocaust experience, and should be viewed by the world as the state of the survivors, Israelis and some of their most fervent backers in the U.S. are suddenly insisting that this is a misleading, even hostile idea......

..... Ever since Obama’s Cairo speech, Foxman’s concerns have become more pronounced. It’s not that the Anti Defamation League president didn’t take heart from Obama’s insistence that Israel’s security is sacrosanct; or that “he made strong statements against anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.” No, his concern — among others — was that Obama should have “made clear that Israel’s right to statehood is not a result of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust.”

He’s not the only one who argues this, of course; many on the Zionist right have long insisted that the movement claimed sovereignty in Palestine not on the basis of the Holocauast, but claiming to represent the continuity of the Hebrews of Judea thousands of years ago......

Still, having told the world and the majority of Jews who live in it that Israel was the answer to the Holocaust and the inheritor of the mantle of the survivors (a contestable claim, to be sure, but you only have to look at the fact that Germany paid most of its “reparations” not to the survivors themselves, but to Israel), Foxman et al are going to have a hard time pivoting to the narrative of Biblical redemption. For starters, most of the world’s Jews don’t buy such bubbemeis. And you’re going to have a hard time getting American Jews and most Western countries to accept the idea that the Palestinians’ epic suffering has been inflicted simply in the name of a distortion of Biblical fantasy.

Essentially, the problem they face is that an ideological construct of their own making is no longer serving its purpose of ensuring a blank check for Israel’s endless dispossession of the Palestinians. The bad news, of course, is that justifying that dispossession on the basis of a Biblical narrative is going to get even fewer takers in America, of any persuasion. "

US Strategy of Total Energy Control over the European Union and Eurasia

Nabucco Turkey EU and Obama Geopolitics

by F. William Engdahl
Global Research, July 17, 2009

".....
Why Armenia?

The natural route to bring Iranian gas to Europe via Nabucco goes through Armenia, the small and fiercely independent nation sandwiched between Iran, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Turkey. In early 2007 a small pipeline opened bringing Iranian gas to Armenia. A second pipeline, if built, would potentially allow Iran to bring its gas via Turkey and Nabucco to European markets. This begins to explain why Obama made the issue of Turkish reconciliation of the long-standing tensions between Ankara and Armenia over the Armenian charges of genocide during World War I a priority in his April talks with Prime Minister Erdogan.

It seems Obama’s advisers are playing a far more subtle geopolitical game than did Cheney and Bush. By holding out several juicy financial carrots, to Turkey, to Armenia, even to Teheran if it were to abandon its nuclear ambitions, Washington hopes to throw a giant monkey wrench into the attempt of Moscow to retain a significant control over Eurasian energy supplies to the EU, a major lever to ensure more stable EU-Russian relations amid growing threats to Russia’s security from Washington’s misnamed missile defense shield being built in Poland and the Czech Republic.

Notably, on the latter point, it is worth noting that Obama refused to give an inch during the recent summit talks in Russia. That’s because Washington’s agenda of geopolitical control over the Eurasian Continent is the only lever of maintaining the hegemony of a failing American Century at this point. Full Spectrum Dominance or none seems to be the motto. "

Israel to drop Arabic names

Jonathan Cook
The National

July 17. 2009

"NAZARETH, ISRAEL // Thousands of road signs are the latest front in Israel’s battle to erase Arab heritage from much of the Holy Land, according to critics in both Israel and the wider Arab world.

Israel Katz, the transport minister, announced this week that signs on all major roads in Israel, East Jerusalem and possibly parts of the West Bank would be “standardised”, converting English and Arabic place names into straight transliterations of the Hebrew name.

Currently, road signs include the place name as it is traditionally rendered in all three languages.

Under the new scheme, the Arab identity of important Palestinian communities will be obscured: Jerusalem, or “al Quds” in Arabic, will be Hebraised to “Yerushalayim”; Nazareth, or “al Nasra” in Arabic, the city of Jesus’s childhood, will become “Natzrat”; and Jaffa, the port city after which Palestine’s oranges were named, will be “Yafo”.

Arab leaders are concerned that Mr Katz’s plan offers a foretaste of the demand by Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, that the Palestinians recognise Israel as a Jewish state......"

"Visit Palestine" says West Bank's growing alternative tourism industry

Ben White, The Electronic Intifada, 16 July 2009

"Palestine should not have problems attracting tourists, with its rich blend of history, religious significance, local culture, as well as the varied and breathtaking scenery. But of course, the political context of the Israeli occupation means that the vast majority of tourists in the "Holy Land" only see Palestinians through the window of a tour bus, as they dash in and out of Bethlehem for a couple of hours.

The occupation, however, has also attracted a different kind of visitor, the "alternative tourist," who comes to the West Bank (including East Jerusalem), occupied by Israel along with the Gaza Strip since 1967, in order to better understand the conflict, and deliberately go "beyond" the standard pilgrimage or mainstream tourist trip to Israel. These kinds of tourists are much fewer in number, and are typically already sensitized to some degree to the Palestinian situation. Virtually no tourists, if any, go to the Gaza Strip, which has been under Israeli-imposed closure for several years.....

Alternative tourism in the West Bank has definitely seen marked improvements and developments since it really began to get off the ground in the 1990s. The pioneers were the Alternative Tourism Group (ATG), based in Beit Sahour near Bethlehem, who in the aftermath of the first Palestinian intifada realized the positive potential for an infrastructure in Palestine to receive visiting foreigners looking to understand the local reality......."

EGYPT: Father Still Knows Best

By Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa Al-Omrani

"CAIRO, Jul 17 (IPS) - Speculation had been rife in recent months that parliament was on the verge of dissolution by order of the presidency. While the rumour ultimately proved unfounded, local analysts say it reflected a rift between the old and new guards of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) of President Hosni Mubarak......

The old guard, personified by Mubarak, represents the ideals of Egypt's 1952 revolution - in theory at least - which include a socialist-oriented economy and a foreign policy free of colonial influence. The new guard, embodied by Mubarak's 46-year-old son Gamal, favours a thoroughly globalised economy based on neo-liberal policies such as privatisation of state assets and strong foreign investment.

Gamal, who many believe is being groomed to replace his ageing father as president, is already both NDP assistant secretary-general and head of the party's supremely influential Policies Secretariat.

Another major point of difference lies in the fact that the old guard prefers a president with a background in the armed forces; the new guard, for its part, prefers one with a background in business. The younger Mubarak is an investment banker by profession......"

West Offering to Endorse Israeli Attack on Iran as Part of Settlement Deal

Israel Would Recognize Palestinian Land Claims

"The Times of London is citing unnamed Western diplomats as saying that the deal between Israel and the West on the issue of Palestinian statehood is taking shape, and that Western officials are offering to back an Israeli attack on Iran in return for certain concessions, including the recognition of some of the Palestinians’ land claims......."

Obama’s War Signals

Iran in the crosshairs

by Justin Raimondo, July 17, 2009

"Only Richard Nixon, whose political career was launched and sustained by an ostensibly militant anti-communism, could have traveled to China, and – with conservative support — effected a de facto strategic alliance with a country long considered an implacable enemy. This Nixon-to-China meme is regularly invoked as aphoristic evidence that we must expect the unexpected, and it comes to mind when considering the prospects of an impending military conflict with Iran: it occurs to me that only Barack Obama, who won the White House in large part due to his opposition to the Iraq war, could take us to war with Iran, and rally liberals and much of the left behind it.

Oh, I can hear the outraged howls of protest from the Obama cult, but consider.......

It remains to be seen, however, if this particular show ever gets out of summer stock. The American people are in no mood for another war – certainly not a war of the scope necessitated by a huge and populous nation such as Iran. It will take a sustained political and propaganda campaign by the War Party to pull this one off – and yet you shouldn’t doubt they have the resources and the will to do it.

You thought you were safe, now that George W. Bush is out of the White House, and the neoconservatives have gone back to their well-subsidized holes – but you were wrong. I would not be at all surprised if the Iranian "crisis" – and it will be declared a "crisis," complete with ticking clocks and lines in the sand, of that you can be sure – required a "delay" in our plans to withdraw from Iraq. At that point, the American people will either rise up and put an end to the nonsense – or else they’ll acquiesce, without much protest, to what seems like the inevitable. "

Al-Jazeera reporter imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay to sue George Bush

Sami al-Haj – freed in May 2008 after more than six years – to launch legal action against former US president

Gwladys Fouché in Oslo
guardian.co.uk, Friday 17 July 2009

(left) Sami al-Haj: 'Torture is continuing in Guantánamo'

"An al-Jazeera reporter who was imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay plans to launch a joint legal action with other detainees against former US president George Bush and other administration officials, for the illegal detention and torture he and others suffered at the hands of US authorities.

The case will be initiated by the Guantánamo Justice Centre, a new organisation open to former prisoners at the US base, which will set up its international headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, later this month.

"The purpose of our organisation is to open a case against the Bush administration," said co-founder Sami al-Haj, an al-Jazeera reporter from Sudan who was illegally detained by US authorities for over six years. He was freed in May 2008.

"We need to start our organisation first and then we will prepare a whole case. We don't want to do this case by case," said the 40-year-old reporter during a recent visit to Oslo......."

Syria: We Want Entire Golan

Al-Manar

"17/07/2009 Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem told visiting US official Frederic Hoff on Thursday that Damascus wants the Golan Heights back as part of any Middle East peace deal.
Muallem stressed Syria's wish to "recover Golan as far as the border of June 4, 1967," Sana official news agency reported.

The Syrian minister reaffirmed "his country's support for achieving a fair and global peace deal in the region in line with the principle of exchanging land for peace," the news agency said......."

Gaza and the Language of Power

By Ramzy Baroud
Palestine Chronicle

"....The tireless efforts of British MP George Galloway, and the courageous endeavors of the Free Gaza movement have managed to push Gaza back into the spotlight, even if momentarily and with political context which is lacking at best.

Aside from that, the three-week Israeli onslaught in Gaza, starting December 27 – and the catastrophic conditions endured there – have served the purpose of a footnote in many news reports.....

Only Israel can cleverly spawn a dependent, weak leadership, and accuse the Palestinians of not being a worthy peace partner; only Israel can murder thousands of Palestinians and demand security from its very victims; only Israel can caution of a Nazi past, yet cage Palestinians in concentration camps, punish them for recklessly subscribing to the wrong God, or foolishly falling into the wrong race.

It has six months since the unprecedented and savage war against Palestinians in Gaza, and here we are making the same argument, referencing the same deceit and quoting the same outrageous claims. During those same months, unsubstantiated Israeli accounts were countered with carefully composed reports by highly regarded organizations, such as the Red Cross, among others. Bombarded Gaza neighborhoods “look like the epicenter of a massive earthquake,” said a recent Red Cross report, entitled: “Gaza: 1.5 million trapped in despair.”.....

One must remember that Israel never heeds to statements, and is hardly moved by reports and random condemnations. Only pressure, constant and focused, will grab the attention of Israeli policymakers. Only the language of an international campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions will translate in Tel Aviv to a legible political language. As for Gaza, civil society must not wait for President Obama or any other to save the slowly starving population, but must take every possible and urgent effort to help an oppressed yet proud community to redeem its basic rights and freedom. "

الخوف من الجزيرة

عنصر الثقة- حصار الجزيرة- البعد القومي- السلطة تعلق عمل الجزيرة- الجزيرة هي الرابحة

منذ أن بدأت قناة الجزيرة الفضائية بثها وهي تتعرض لحملات متكررة من قبل الأنظمة العربية، وأحيانا من بعض الأشخاص هنا وهناك

تعرضت مكاتب القناة للإغلاق من قبل عدد من الأنظمة مثل النظام الأردني والمصري والسعودي والفلسطيني والمغربي، وتتعرض طواقمها للمضايقات والتهديد باستمرار، ومكاتبها للاعتداءات، وكان آخر الفصول قيام السلطة الفلسطينية بتعليق نشاطها الإعلامي. ولم تسلم الجزيرة من آثام دول أجنبية مثل الولايات المتحدة وبريطانيا.
.....
الصورة تبدو مظلمة أمام الأنظمة العربية عندما ترى أن الجمهور لا يشاهد القنوات الرسمية إلا بهدف مشاهدة مسلسل أو فيلم أو مباراة كرة قدم، ويتحول إلى قنوات أخرى على رأسها الجزيرة عندما يبحث عن الحقيقة
......
الإجراءات ضد الجزيرة ليست متزنة، ولا تعبر عن عقل راجح وناضج، وهي إجراءات الخائف أو المرعوب الذي يرى اللعنة تلاحقه فيحاول التواري
.....
من الوارد جدا أن السلطة الفلسطينية تستعمل تعليق أعمال الجزيرة كجزء من هروبها من مواجهة المعلومات التي أدلى بها القدومي
.....
"

Did Abbas, Dahlan plot to murder Arafat?

By Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank

"......Indeed, the recent killings in Qalqilya recently was a damning proof, if a proof were needed, that the PA regime is just another layer of the Israeli occupation.

This, coupled with the unmitigated inquisition of hounding, repression, arrest, dismissal from jobs, seizure and closure of institutions as well as the rampancy of torture which in many instances lead to cruel death demonstrates that the PA is working in concert with Israel to harm and undermine national Palestinian interests.

This alone, and irrespective of who poisoned Arafat, is sufficient to indict the present leadership in Ramallah for collaboration with Israel and treason."

ICRC: Israel Traps Gazans in Deprivation and Despair

A Palestinian ambulance bombed by Israel in Gaza.

by Stephen Lendman
Global Research, July 16, 2009

"Founded in Geneva, Switzerland in 1863, the International Committee of the Red Cross is an "impartial, neutral and independent organization whose exclusively humanitarian mission is to protect the lives and dignity of victims of armed conflict and other situations of violence and to provide them with assistance." It also tries "to prevent suffering by promoting and strengthening humanitarian law and universal humanitarian principles."........

In June 2009, it issued a report titled, "Gaza: 1.5 million people trapped in despair" that described the Territory as "look(ing) like the epicentre of a massive earthquake" in the wake of Operation Cast Lead and went on to detail how severely......

Trapped

ICRC states:

"People in Gaza are trapped. Because Israel has shut the crossing points, Gazans have scant opportunity for contact with relatives abroad or for further education or professional training." Palestinian staff members of international organizations, including ICRC, are also impacted.

The emotional fallout especially affects families whose relatives are imprisoned inside Israel. In June 2007, Israel stopped ICRC-supported visits of about 900 families and prevented spouses and children from staying close to their loved ones.

Students, professors, teachers, and health professionals also get no exit permission for education, training, seminars, and other skills and expertise-building methods.......

So do 1.5 million other Gazans - trapped in the world's largest open-air prison, under siege for over two years, getting way inadequate outside help, and none whatever from Western powers that support Israel's slow-motion genocide against a civilian population unable to stop it. "

What Economy?

There's Nothing Left to Recover

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
CounterPunch

"......Matt Taibbi describes Goldman Sachs as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentless jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” Look at the Goldman Sachs representatives in the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations. This bankster firm controls the economic policy of the United States.

Little wonder that Goldman Sachs has record earnings while the rest of us grow poorer by the day."

“They Dump the Sick to Satisfy Investors”: Insurance Exec Turned Whistleblower Wendell Potter Speaks Out Against Healthcare Industry

Democracy Now!
With Amy Goodman

"As the debate over healthcare reform intensifies on Capitol Hill, we spend the hour with a former top insurance executive who’s now exposing the industry’s dirty secrets. Wendell Potter once served as the head of corporate communications at CIGNA, one of the nation’s largest health insurance companies. We speak to Potter about his own transformation from industry mouthpiece to whistleblower, the healthcare industry’s extensive PR and lobbying machine, the campaign to discredit Michael Moore’s film Sicko, and the insurance industry’s most pressing task: the fight against a public option, let alone a single-payer system...."

Feeling the Hate in Tel Aviv : The Sequel

Clinton warns Iran: U.S. will protect its friends

NEW YORK - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton Wednesday gave Iran an ultimatum to accept the administration's offer for engagement and join the international community or to "continue down a path of further isolation." She urged Arab states to take immediate steps to improve their ties with Israel in order to bolster Mideast peace hopes.

"We remain ready to engage with Iran, but the time for action is now," she said. "The opportunity will not remain open indefinitely."

In a wide-ranging policy address to the Council on Foreign Relations, Clinton pledged that the U.S. will "not hesitate to defend our friends, our interests, and above all, our people vigorously and when necessary with the world's strongest military."

Obama's prizes for Israel are not "pressure"

Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada, 16 July 2009

"......This can hardly be described as anything other than a net gain for Israel, especially since the settlement project is reaching its natural conclusion. There are already 500,000 settlers in the West Bank, who with their infrastructure consume more than 42 percent of the land. Nothing Obama has ever said indicates he will deviate from his predecessors' policy of recognizing these facts and demanding that Palestinians agree to let Israel keep settlements already built.

While all the attention is focused on the freeze, Israel maintains its siege of Gaza -- despite Obama's calls to loosen it -- and continues to build the West Bank wall five years after the International Court of Justice ordered it torn down. The United States itself continues to undermine chances for intra-Palestinian reconciliation, and therefore credible negotiations, by fueling the smoldering civil war between US-backed Palestinian militias on the one hand and resistance factions led by Hamas on the other.

On the outside Israelis may be crying about US "pressure" but on the inside they must be quietly smiling."

vIDEO: Israeli soldiers' revelations from Gaza

Channel 4: Israeli soldiers claim that they were ordered to fire, regardless of the risk to civilians.


"By Alex Thomson. Israeli soldiers involved in the attacks on Gaza at the start of this year claim that they were ordered to fire, regardless of the risk to civilians. Alex Thomson reports. Israel banned journalists from its invasion of Gaza in December and January, making it hard to verify allegations of indiscriminate firing, the use of phosphorous bombs, and forcing Palestininas to be human shields. Now an Israeli human rights group has produced a disturbing account of what it says happened in Gaza, as told by soldiers."

If terror is the problem, we won't solve it in Afghanistan

Justification for the war on anti-terror grounds is largely specious

By Adrian Hamilton
The Independent

"So here we go again, in a war which half the population does not believe in, in which we are committing ourselves ever more deeply at the behest of the US and over which politicians display no real sense of purpose.

The most depressing aspect, once again, is just how hopeless the UK political system is in throwing up real debate. Instead of discussing objectives we have an increasingly bitter exchange of accusations about the availability of helicopters, the armoured protection of vehicles and the number of troops on the ground.....

The one thing we cannot do is to go on as we are, led by events and the despairing claim that "we cannot afford to lose this war". History is littered with the graves of the soldiers who died obeying that call."

How many more will die in vain before we withdraw?

The attempt to exploit soldiers' deaths to win support for the shameful war in Afghanistan thankfully isn't working

Seumas Milne
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 15 July 2009

"All week politicians, media and the military have strained every nerve to turn public sympathy over the deaths of British squaddies into support for the US-led occupation of Afghanistan. After a year of parades, a new Armed Forces Day and a stream of censored reports of derring-do from the frontline, the killing of 15 soldiers in 10 days has triggered a barrage of war propaganda. Having all but ignored the same number who died in Helmand province last month, every tabloid and Whitehall stop has been pulled out to capitalise on the emotions unleashed by the continuing sacrifice of British teenagers in an endless war......

The only way to end the war is the withdrawal of foreign troops as part of a wider political settlement negotiated with all significant Afghan forces on the ground, including the Taliban – and guaranteed by regional powers and neighbouring states: Pakistan, Iran, China and India.

Such a process is bound to take place eventually – whether or not the British government has the guts to follow the example of Canada and The Netherlands and announce plans to pull out earlier. But the assumption must be that a strategic US decision to accept the inevitable, turn its back on the wreckage of the war on terror and withdraw from Afghanistan is going to be a slow and painful process. In the meantime, many more people – mostly Afghans – will shamefully die in vain."

Shock of the new media

As Fatah shuts down al-Jazeera in the West Bank, other anxious administrations are cracking down on Middle East media

A Good Comment
By Brian Whitaker
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 16 July 2009

".... The Arafat conspiracy theorists were given a boost on Tuesday when Farouk Kaddoumi, secretary-general of Fatah's central committee, claimed to have minutes of a meeting in which two senior Palestinians – Mahmoud Abbas (who replaced Arafat as president) and security chief Mohammed Dahlan – supposedly sat down with the Israelis and Americans and discussed Arafat's impending murder.....

The reaction from Fatah's establishment has been entirely predictable. Instead of doing the sensible thing and challenging Kaddoumi to produce his evidence, they have banned al-Jazeera – one of several TV channels that broadcast his remarks – from operating in the West Bank. Apart from being an infringement of free speech, this can only reinforce the belief of conspiracy theorists that something is being covered up.

What we see here, though, is also part of a much wider Arab problem – of leaders who can't adjust to a new era of transparency in which their actions are liable to be scrutinised and questioned as never before. The banning of al-Jazeera in the West Bank is just one example over the last few days of rearguard actions by Arab governments against this loss of control.

On Tuesday it emerged that a virtually unknown amateur poet in Egypt had been sentenced to three years in jail for writing verses that "insulted" President Hosni Mubarak (one of the offending lines said: "You made people feel confused and lost").

....In Jordan, for instance, the main front-page "news" every single day is what the king did yesterday.

The Arab League has also sought to hold back the tide with its Satellite Broadcasting Charter. Issued last year, mainly at the instigation of Egypt and Saudi Arabia, it was widely viewed as a last-ditch attempt to assert control over the medium, and it will almost certainly fail.

Sooner or later, Arab leaders will have to recognise that they can no longer dictate what can or cannot be said in public. Increasingly, their actions and decisions will be held up to the light...... In some countries politicians manage to adapt, but for the current generation of Arab leaders the shock of the new media may prove just too much to bear."

Members of a delegation accompanying British parliamentarian George Galloway, one holding a U.S. and a Palestinian flag arrive in the Gaza Strip from Egypt through the Rafah border crossing , southern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, July 15, 2009. The delegation of about 200 activists arrived in Gaza to deliver medical aid, trucks and show their support for lifting a 2-year old Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the territory.(AP)

Senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh (R) gives a map of the region to U.S. members of Neturei Karta, a fringe ultra-Orthodox movement within the anti-Zionist bloc, during their visit to Gaza City July 16, 2009. About 200 international activists, among them the members of Neturei Karta, arrived in Gaza on Wednesday after passing though the Rafah border crossing from Egypt.(REUTERS)

A delegation of American ultra-Orthodox Jews accompanying British parliamentarian George Galloway arrive in the Gaza Strip from Egypt through the Rafah border crossing , southern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, July 15, 2009. The delegation of about 200 activists arrived in Gaza to deliver medical aid, trucks and show their support for lifting a 2-year old Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the territory.
(AP)

U.S. members of Neturei Karta, a fringe ultra-Orthodox movement within the anti-Zionist bloc, visit the destroyed American International School in the northern Gaza Strip July 16, 2009. About 200 international activists, among them the members of Neturei Karta, arrived in Gaza on Wednesday after passing though the Rafah border crossing from Egypt. (Reuters)

A group of U.S. ultra-Orthodox Jews, part of a delegation of activists who arrived in Gaza Wednesday, meet with Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the Hamas government in Gaza, at his office in Gaza City, Thursday, July 16, 2009. The delegation of about 200 activists arrived in Gaza to deliver medical aid, trucks and show their support for lifting a 2-year old Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the territory. (AP)

Israeli navy in Suez Canal prepares for potential attack on Iran

Times Online

"Two Israeli missile class warships have sailed through the Suez Canal ten days after a submarine capable of launching a nuclear missile strike, in preparation for a possible attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

The deployment into the Red Sea, confirmed by Israeli officials, was a clear signal that Israel was able to put its strike force within range of Iran at short notice. It came before long-range exercises by the Israeli air force in America later this month and the test of a missile defence shield at a US missile range in the Pacific Ocean.

Israel has strengthened ties with Arab nations who also fear a nuclear-armed Iran. In particular, relations with Egypt have grown increasingly strong this year over the “shared mutual distrust of Iran”, according to one Israeli diplomat. Israeli naval vessels would likely pass through the Suez Canal for an Iranian strike......."

“Israeli Warships in Suez Canal Prepare for Attack on Iran”

Al-Manar

"16/07/2009 Israel's recent deployment of warships across the Red Sea should be seen as serious preparation for an attack on Iran, an Israeli defense official told the Times of London on Thursday. It came before long-range exercises by the Israeli air force in America later this month and the test of a missile defense shield at a US missile range in the Pacific Ocean.

"This is preparation that should be taken seriously. Israel is investing time in preparing itself for the complexity of an attack on Iran. These maneuvers are a message to Iran that Israel will follow up on its threats," the official was quoted as saying.

Earlier this week, two Israel Navy gunboats openly sailed through the Suez Canal into the Red Sea.
The ships that passed through the Suez Canal on Tuesday were two Sa'ar 5 gunboats, the Hanit and the Eilat. This follows a similar incident in late June, when an Israeli Dolphin-class submarine passed through the canal, later returning the same way........"

Video: Viva Palestina aid convoy enters Gaza via Rafah Crossing

Press TV

Click Here to Watch Video

COMMENT: The Zionist Pharaoh in the end prevented all the aid vehicles and medicine from entering into Gaza. As George Galloway put it, "we had to walk through the Rafah crossing and leave the brand new vehicles we bought with our own money, in Egypt, behind!"

What a disgrace!

WE ARE IN GAZA!!!!

VIVA PALESTINA

Video: القدومي: وثيقة اتهام عباس صحيحة

"أكد أمين سر اللجنة المركزية لحركة التحرير الوطني الفلسطيني (فتح) فاروق القدومي صحة الوثيقة التي تحدثت عن تواطؤ محمود عباس ومحمد دحلان مع السلطات الإسرائيلية لاغتيال الرئيس الفلسطيني ياسر عرفات.

وقال القدومي في حديث للجزيرة إن الوثيقة التي كشفها قبل أيام أصلية وإن كل المعلومات الواردة فيها صحيحة، وإنه لم يتهم أحدا بالتورط في اغتيال عرفات بل اكتفى بعرض الوثيقة المذكورة، ودعا من يشك في صحة تلك المعلومات أن يثبت عكس مضمون الوثيقة.
وأضاف القدومي أنه حصل على الوثيقة في عام 2004، وتبين له لاحقا من خلال تصرفات الرئيس الفلسطيني محمود عباس والمسؤول السابق في الأمن الوقائي محمد دحلان أن مضمون الوثيقة صحيح.

وأشار القدومي إلى أنه كان يعتزم طرح الوثيقة خلال المؤتمر العام لحركة فتح في حال انعقاده في الخارج، لكنه اضطر إلى الكشف عنها عن طريق وسائل الإعلام عندما قرر عباس "بشكل انفرادي" عقد المؤتمر في الضفة الغربية في ظل الاحتلال الإسرائيلي.
......"

Click Here to Watch Video Interview with Qaddumi (in Arabic)

النص الكامل لحوار القدومي مع الجزيرة

We’re at Rafah Crossing finishing up bureaucratic requirements

Viva Palestina



(Click on picture to enlarge)

قنبلة القدومي ومؤتمر بيت لحم

"- اللجنة التحضيرية وعصا المارشالية
- اتجاهات اللجنة المركزية
- اتجاه الصابرين
- حيثيات عقد المؤتمر ببيت لحم
- الاحتمالات المتوقعة

في الوقت الذي ما زالت فيه أمور البيت الفتحاوي تشهد مزيدا من التعقيدات الداخلية، وقبيل التئام أعمال المؤتمر العام السادس لحركة فتح المقرر عقده يوم 4 أغسطس/آب القادم في بيت لحم، أطلق عضو اللجنة المركزية لحركة فتح وأمين سر لجنتها المركزية فاروق القدومي (أبو اللطف)، قنبلته المدوية التي كشف فيها ما أسماه وثيقة هي عبارة عن محضر اجتماع عقد قبيل رحيل الرئيس ياسر عرفات بتسعة أشهر وتسعة أيام.

وقد ضم ذلك الاجتماع كلاً من الرئيس الحالي محمود عباس ومحمد دحلان وأرييل شارون ووليام بيرنز، وذكر القدومي أن محضره وصله من الرئيس الراحل ياسر عرفات وأودعه لديه كأمانة تاريخية أولا، وثانيا كوثيقة تؤشر على ما كان يحاك ضد عرفات ومواقفه التي تلت قمة كامب ديفد الثانية في يوليو/تموز 2000 وصولاً إلى محاصرته في مقر إقامته وقيادته في المقاطعة وسط مدينة رام الله.

هذا وإن جاء كشف فاروق القدومي عن الوثيقة متأخرا قليلاً كما يشير صف واسع من الكوادر الفتحاوية، وبغض النظر عن مدى دقتها ودقة ما تقدمه من معلومات، فإنها ستترك آثارها على أعمال المؤتمر السادس لحركة فتح في بيت لحم، ولن تقف تفاعلاتها عند حدود ضيقة بل قد تتسبب في اشتعال كبير للنار داخل البيت الفتحاوي
......
الاحتمالات المتوقعة
إلى ذلك، فإن خيار عقد مؤتمر حركة فتح في بيت لحم وفقاً لقرار الرئيس عباس سيضع مصير الحركة أمام احتمالات عدة، منها أن

اللجنة المركزية في الخارج وتحديدا فاروق القدومي ومن معه سينظرون إلى المؤتمر على أنه عقد بحضور "أهل أوسلو" كما قال أبو اللطف في تصريحات أخيرة له، مضيفاً أن الذين سيشاركون في أعمال المؤتمر ببيت لحم سيعزلون في نهاية الأمر ويسقطون.

وهناك احتمالات قوية لعودة انفجار الأوضاع الداخلية وبشكل غير معتاد هذه المرة، وتحديدا بعدما أطلق القدومي الوثيقة الأخيرة المشار إليها في متن المادة.

ومنها احتمال خلق ازدواجية في الهيئات القيادية بين هيئات سيعاد انتخابها وبين هيئات مقاطعة موجودة في الخارج والداخل على حد سواء.

ومنها احتمال اندلاع اضطرابات في الداخل بين الأجنحة العسكرية لفتح وأجهزة أمن السلطة، حيث لوح عدد من أعضاء اللجنة التأسيسية لكتائب شهداء الأقصى بإمكانية الانشقاق عن قيادة محمود عباس لحركة فتح، وتشكيل لجنة مركزية ومجلس ثوري وأطر حركية كاملة عائدة لتنظيمهم، في حال عقد مؤتمر فتح في بيت لحم المحتلة
"

Britain must tell Obama: the alliance of denial has to end

Brown can salvage the diplomatic disgrace of Afghanistan if he acts as he is known to believe, and sets a withdrawal date

Simon Jenkins
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 14 July 2009

"....The idea of establishing a western-style democracy is dead. The dreams of Kabul's NGO groupies, to install technocrats or elevate women or eradicate poppies, have vanished in a morass of corruption and aid extravagance. The best hope is a series of regional deals and compromises, transferring power to warlords or Taliban coalitions, behind which military withdrawal can take place. The west failed to "build a nation" in Kabul, despite tipping billions of dollars into its underworld. Only colonialists build nations, and the will for empire was never present.

For progress to be made down this messy road, the gung-ho militarism of Petraeus and the British army must be countered. The hyping of British casualties is wrong, as it suggests any withdrawal will be defeat. The Canadians, who have suffered terrible losses, have shown their sovereignty by signalling their intention to leave in 2011. Why not Britain?

The denouement will come only from negotiation. For British generals and politicians to talk of fighting in Helmand "for decades" is absurd, not least as neither the British public nor the Taliban believe it. Like the Canadians, they should give a date for withdrawal, to stop wasting British lives and to isolate Obama in his wrong-headed policy......"

By Steve Bell, The Guardian.

Video: Israeli soldiers admit 'shoot first' policy in Gaza offensive

Anonymous testimonies collated by human rights group also contain allegations that Palestinians were used as human shields

Ian Black, Middle East editor
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 15 July 2009

CLICK HERE TO WATCH VIDEO

"Israeli soldiers who served in the Gaza Strip during the offensive of December and January have spoken out about being ordered to shoot without hesitation, destroying houses and mosques with a general disregard for Palestinian lives.

In testimony that will fuel international and Arab demands for war crime investigations, 30 combat soldiers report that the army's priority was to minimise its own casualties to maintain Israeli public support for the three-week Operation Cast Lead......"

Decolonizing Israel

The Boycott Century?

By SOUSAN HAMMAD
CounterPunch

"There is an echoing sentiment here in Ramallah that Israeli milk is more “tasteful” and “nutritious” than Palestinian milk. The same goes for wine, apples, dates, juice, and just about everything else…except for maybe olives. In fact, Palestinian shopkeepers even stock Israeli-made milk at the front of their store while Palestinian milk sits in a far-to-reach crate collecting dust in the corner.

Palestinians do this for two reasons: one is they truly believe their senses, the other, and possibly more understanding, is because selling Israeli products yield a much higher profit.

A recent study by the Swiss Development Center, an organization that aims to promote Palestinian products, found that Palestinians within the higher socioeconomic strata tend to buy more Israeli goods than those in the lower strata. In French colonial-Martinique, mothers would sing to their children in French instead of their native language because it was more “civilized” to speak the colonizer’s language......."

Jenin's Model of "Economic Peace"

Give Me Liberty ... or Day Shopping

By JONATHAN COOK
CounterPunch

Jenin.

"......But today Jenin, the first Palestinian city to be sealed behind Israel’s separation wall, is being feted -- at least by Israel -- as a successful experiment in peacemaking.

The Palestinian gunmen who once roamed the streets are gone, replaced, by day, by lightly armed Palestinian security forces trained in Jordan by a US general, Keith Dayton.

Israeli soldiers, meanwhile, have unfettered access to the city between midnight and dawn, though nowadays, say local people, the army rarely makes incursions.

For Mr Netanyahu, Jenin represents his best hope of persuading Washington that an “economic and diplomatic peace”, as he referred to it at the cabinet meeting on Sunday, rather than full statehood, will satisfy the Palestinians......

Shir Hever, an Israeli economist based in Jerusalem, said he was sceptical Jenin’s industrial park would ever open, or that the fruits of economic peace would be more than temporary.

“Netanyahu has no long-term plan for peace,” he said. “This is a delaying tactic and an attempt to improve Israel’s image internationally without making significant concessions.”

He added: “There is also a political message for Jenin and the rest of the West Bank in this policy. It says: remember you’re lucky not to be in the same situation as Gaza. Don’t resist or you’ll end up like them.”......"