Israel

Netanyahu's Israel

by Stephen Lendman

He's made Israel more unfit to live in than any of his predecessors. Palestinians have no rights whatever. Israeli Arabs have few. Most Jews are losing theirs incrementally.

Neoliberal harshness plans destroying Israel's safety net entirely. Budget cuts target housing, healthcare, education, employment and welfare. 

Eman El-Hawi, a smart and perky 24-year-old business student from Gaza got teary when she told our delegation about what she witnessed during the eight days that Israel pounded Gaza. “I saw the babies being brought into the hospital, some dead, some wounded. I couldn’t believe Israel was doing this again, just like four years ago. But at least this time,” she said with pride, “we struck back.”

Corruption in Israel

by Stephen Lendman

Israel ranks among the world's most ruthless states. It qualifies for rogue state status. 

It spurns the UN Charter, major treaties, and other international law. It violates its own. It gets away with murder because world leaders mattering most do nothing.

Israel: Heading for a Political Cliff?

by Stephen Lendman

Middle East expert Patrick Seale knows the region well. He's covered it for over four decades. On December 4, he said:

Israel Gives Chutzpah New Meaning

by Stephen Lendman

The Yiddish word derives from the Hebrew hutspa. It means insolence or audacity. The Urban Dictionary adds "unmitigated effrontery or impudence."

By Dooler Campbell

Since the ceasefire was put into effect on Thursday, 22 November 2012, 29 fishermen have been arrested while out at sea, including 14 fisherman arrested on Saturday, 1 December 2012. An announcement was issued by the Hamas government stating that the maritime boundaries had been extended from three to six nautical miles under the terms of the recent ceasefire. International standards set the limit at 12 miles, while the Oslo Accords granted Gaza fishermen 20 miles in 1995. However, this limit was reduced to three miles in January 2009 after the attacks of Operation Cast Lead.

In late January 2009, when fishermen returned to the sea after Operation Cast Lead, they were viciously attacked. Boats were completely destroyed, and many fishermen were shot, with serious injuries. Some were even shot in the back as they attempted to return to the shore.

Israeli Settlement Construction Fallout

by Stephen Lendman

Netanyahu's E1 Ma'aleh Adumin settlement construction announcement drew considerable flack. What it means remains to be seen. Palestinian rights have been spurned for decades. Expect little change now.

Secret US Construction in Israel

by Stephen Lendman

Washington and Israel partner in jointly planned imperial wars and related activities. 

Walter Pincus reports on national security issues for the Washington Post. He's been at it many years. In late December he'll turn 80.

Israel's Genocidal War on Palestine

by Stephen Lendman

Longstanding Israeli policy reflects slow-motion genocide. Non-Jews aren't wanted. Israel considers them subhuman.

Peace, nonviolence, diplomacy, human and civil rights, as well as fundamental rule of law principles are systematically spurned. That's now rogue states operate.

CHICAGO, IL - In response to the ongoing humanitarian crisis there, and to answer calls for a solidarity presence from some of its humanitarian organizations, several delegations of international activists and grassroots journalists are now in the Gaza Strip, meeting and working with survivors of Israel’s recent bombing campaign.  

Travelers include Kathy Kelly, Johnny Barber and Joshua Brollier of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, who left for Cairo on Thursday, November 22 and passed through the Rafah border crossing into Gaza on Monday, November 26. The activists aim to complete their Gaza itinerary whether or not the current ceasefire holds.

Kathy Kelly, who witnessed Israel’s “Cast Lead” campaign 4 years ago, has been interviewing survivors of the current, much briefer, campaign.  “This was worse than 2009 because of the intensity of the bombing,” reported one doctor. “Bombs fell so frequently, morning, noon, and night, and it felt like there was no place safe to hide.” 

The delegates spoke with EMT workers excavating a leveled 4-story building in Jamaliya, then met with farmers at a buffer zone protest at Khan Younis, whose acreage on the Gaza side of the border fence has been inaccessible due to long-standing Israeli policy of firing on those who approach the fence. Later, they met with a water specialist who reported that no desalinization plants are currently working.  At one site neighbors grieved a family of 14 lost under the ruins of a three-story building thought to be a safe place to hide from the bombing.

Josh Brollier and Johnny Barber interviewed fishermen on the Gazan seashore – “Youth don’t want to leave their homeland but can’t see how they will have any future here.”  They talked to teenagers whose fishing boat was boarded by by Israeli troops for working more than three miles from shore.  They had refused an order to strip naked in their boat and then acted to prevent the customary destruction of their boat’s motor by gunfire. “I grabbed the motor,” reported one youth, “and said ‘you can put the bullet here [indicating his head] but I will not do what you ask me to do.”

Delegates will post on twitter (info_from_vcnv), facebook and the Voices website, vcnv.org

Please contact Voices co-coordinators in Chicago, Buddy Bell and Gerald Paoli, for updated information and cell phone numbers for the activists in Cairo and Gaza.

Voices for Creative Nonviolence (www.vcnv.org) has deep, long-standing roots in active nonviolent resistance to U.S. war-making. Begun in the summer of 2005, Voices draws upon the experiences of those who challenged the brutal economic sanctions imposed by the U.S. and U.N. against the Iraqi people between 1990 and 2003.

Israel Signals Hardline Policy Intentions

by Stephen Lendman

Observers thinking Palestinians gained from Pillar of Cloud might think again. 

Nothing changed. Hardline Netanyahu policies continue. Expect worse ahead. Palestinian peace, reconciliation and unity advocates are murdered or arrested.

Netanyahu Plans More War

by Stephen Lendman

He admitted it. He's not finished. He has lots more killing and destruction to do. He "will not hesitate to do what is necessary to defend our people," he said. 

In other words, he'll ignore memorandum of understanding ceasefire terms, maintain Gaza's siege, manufacture pretexts to eliminate Israeli enemies, and kill Palestinian civilians he calls threats.

Righteous Condemnation of Israeli Mass Murder

by Stephen Lendman

Media scoundrels feature pro-Israeli supporters. Doing so makes them complicit with Israeli crimes. 

CHICAGO, IL.- In response to the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza and to answer calls for a solidarity presence from Gaza-based organizations, international activists and grassroots journalists are forming delegations headed to the Gaza Strip.  

Travelers include Kathy Kelly, Johnny Barber and Joshua Brollier of Voices for Creative Nonviolence who will be leaving for Gaza via Egypt on Thursday, November 22^nd. 

“We travel in opposition to the United States government’s callous silence about continued Israeli war crimes happening in Gaza.  The United States supplied Israel with approximately 3.1 billion dollars in military aid in 2012 alone. We have a moral obligation to speak out when this money is used to kill Palestinians in Gaza,” says Joshua Brollier.  At least 130 Palestinians and 5 Israelis have been killed since Operation Pillar of Defense began 9 days ago.

Israel's military has in recent days attacked the Gaza strip with drones and F-16s, and has apparently been preparing for a possible ground war. Israel is using weaponry provided by the United States at the expense to U.S. taxpayers of $3 billion per year. Veterans For Peace member Doug Rawlings addresses the following statement to members of the Israeli military:

"I have been to where you are going. From my heart, I beseech you not to join me. In 1969, I was sent to Vietnam as a reluctant soldier, a draftee, who did not have the courage of my convictions. I chose to follow the orders of my government rather than to follow the dictates of my conscience. It’s been over forty years now, and I still remember the faces of the Vietnamese people who were victimized by my lack of moral autonomy. I became one of Pharaoh’s army, and, to this day, I have been wading through the miasma of that murderous indecisiveness. Had I heeded Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. instead of General William Westmoreland, I would have refused to serve as a pawn in my government’s immoral invasion and occupation of Vietnam.

"Westmoreland was one of many who appealed to some kind of base sense of national self-righteousness that relegated a whole people – the “enemy”-- to a form of sub-human existence. He, too, heard from chauvinist generals like yours who demanded that we '…bomb the Vietnamese people back to the Stone Age.' Dr. King, on the other hand, was imploring us to not exploit others, to recognize the sacredness of all people, and to not 'trample over others with the iron feet of oppression.' He recognized that '…peace is not merely a distant goal we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal. We must pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means.'

"You, my friends, have become the means of your government, and it is up to you to say that you would rather be warriors for peace than serve in Pharaoh’s legions. Follow the lead of the Dr. Kings of the world, not the generals who are willing to use the blood of others to seek some kind of political goals. Rejoin the 'beloved community' of world citizens who recognize the sanctity of all human life. Reject the immoral orders of those who would send you to do their bloody bidding. Refuse orders to attack Gaza. The world is waiting for the first army of peace-makers to turn back the tide of war. Why not start with you?"

Veterans For Peace is a national organization, founded in 1985 with approximately 5,000 members in 150 chapters located in every U.S. state and several countries. It is a 501(c)3 non-profit educational organization recognized as a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) by the United Nations, and is the only national veterans' organization calling for the abolishment of war.

Israeli Aggression: Dress Rehearsal for Iran?

by Stephen Lendman

Longstanding US and Israeli policies call for regime change in Iran. Replacing its independent government with a pro-Western puppet one is planned.

cross posted from AcronymTV.com

Setting aside the statistically significant portion of those who would defend Israel’s Rumsfeldian named “Pillar of Defense” who think that the Old Testament is a real estate deed, those attempting to answer the question of whether Israel should be considered a terrorist state fall into roughly 3 categories:

Did Israel Overstep This Time?

by Stephen Lendman

Rogue states get away with murder only so long. Eventually their crimes catch up with them. Israeli policies are self-defeating. How long can killing civilian men, women, children, infants, and the elderly be called self-defense?

By MAIREAD MAGUIRE, NOBEL PEACE LAUREATE, www.peacepeople.com

It is with the greatest sadness, mixed with frustration, and a sense of helplessness, that many people around the world, myself included, watched on television the horrific scenes of death and destruction perpetrated, yet again, by the latest Israeli military assault on Gaza and its besieged, mostly young population.

The question on many people lips is; ‘When is the Israel government going to stop
this bombing and continual wars and threat of war, against the Palestinians, and its neighbours, admit that there will be no military solution to the Palestinian Occupation, and begin to talk seriously with their enemies, in order to solve the problems for the sake of the Palestinians, Israelis, and indeed the whole of the middle east and world!’?

Watching Israeli bombs landing on Gaza and hearing the death toll rise to fifteen

Targeting Civilians: Israel's Specialty

Bullies choose easy adversaries to pummel. Equal fights are shunned. It's the same in schoolyards or battlefields. 

America and Israel operate this way. They avoid foes able to give as much as they take. Rogue governments never say they're sorry.

Media Cover for Israeli Crimes

by Stephen Lendman

The pattern playing out in Gaza is one Israel followed many times before. Provocations target adversaries. Multiple ones usually occur before targets respond.

Blame the victim follows. Israeli aggression is called self-defense. Legitimate defense is called terrorism. Media scoundrels support Israel in lockstep. It plays out the same way every time.

By Elizabeth Murray, Consortium News

In early 2010, one of Washington DC’s most prestigious think tanks was holding a seminar on the Middle East which included a discussion of Israel’s December 2008-January 2009 assault on Gaza which killed about 1,300 Palestinians. When the death toll was mentioned, one expert on the panel smiled enigmatically and intoned: “It’s unfortunate, but every once in a while you have to mow the lawn.”

The remark, which likened killing hundreds of men, women and children – many of them noncombatants – with trimming the grass, was greeted with a light tittering around the room, which was filled with some of Washington’s most elite, highly educated and well-paid Middle East experts. Not a single one objected to the panelist’s black humor.

By John Grant

Using one of those overarching dramatic titles we have come to expect in mainstream media news coverage, John Stewart summed up the Petraeus story as “Band of Boners.” It's the sort of thing that may be inevitable when so much power is given so much free reign by so much secrecy.

Naked Israeli Aggression

by Stephen Lendman

Since 1948, Israel waged varying intensity war on Palestine. Crimes of war, against humanity, and genocide are committed regularly. World community inaction lets Israel get away with murder.

Operation Pillar of Cloud (aka Cloud Column/Pillar of Defense) is Israel's latest naked aggression.