The Trump Declaration

A very comprehensive and insightful essay by Nada Elia on Trump's formal embrace of a Greater Israel. It hits just about every nail on the head:

"It is 'the morning after,' and the world, with few exceptions is denouncing Trump's declaration that the US recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. With those few exceptions, politicians globally are making vapid statements about the 'dangers' of that declaration, namely that it would lead to an escalation of violence, and jeopardize the 'peace process.' There seems to be little recognition of the relentless violence of Israeli settler-colonialism, and the complete violation of the Geneva convention and international law by both Israel and the US president.

"There is something to be said about Israel's deeply-seated need for 'recognition,' of its right to exist, its right to 'defend itself,' and its claim that Jerusalem is its capital city. That need betrays the (sometimes repressed) knowledge that Israel is a usurper, that Jews globally do not have a 'right' to become settlers, and that what Israel is 'defending' is an illegal occupation. Specifically, in the case of Jerusalem, the city is illegally annexed, with a clear system of apartheid privileging one socio-political ethnicity over the indigenous people. It is no wonder a president, Trump, who openly aligns himself with white supremacy as home, would naturally favour Jewish supremacy in historic Palestine. This is his 'Lord Balfour moment,' in which, in a gesture of imperial largesse, he presumes to hand over land that is not his, to another people. Britain's gambit did not work out so well 100 years ago, and neither will Trump's gesture. It may satisfy his own ignominious hubris, his ambition to conclude 'the deal of the century,' but it cannot bring about justice.

"And yet Trump's announcement does not jeopardize the peace process. This is because 'Oslo' was still-born, it just has not been buried yet. Rather, for the past 20 years, it has been on life-support, with no chance of survival. And there has been no 'peace' during the 'process,' only growing injustice, more disenfranchisement of the indigenous people, ongoing ethnic cleansing, and a genocidal siege on two million Palestinians in Gaza. This is the 'process' that led to two intifadas, and created the political context of global grassroots solidarity in the form of BDS.

"And still politicians continue to prop up this cadaver. The European Union, for example, holds on to the chimera of a two-state solution, and 'negotiations' that will determine the fate of Jerusalem. 'There is a UN resolution on this issue and the issue of Jerusalem must be raised in the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians,' the EU ambassador to Israel, Emanuele Giaufret, said as he announced that the EU will not be moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

"Trump's decision to declare Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has finally unplugged the useless apparatus. Whether the US embassy is moved or not - and that is yet to be determined, and cannot possibly be accomplished in under two to three years - what Trump has achieved is the formal recognition that the US has never been a fair mediator, a 'neutral broker,' but rather that it has always supported Israeli settler-colonialism, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid. Democrats have been more hypocritical about it, consistently increasing their financial aid to Israel even as they criticized the settlements as an obstacle to peace. Trump lacks any and all diplomacy, and if there is anything he is good at, it is his unabashed embrace of various oppressive systems. His national base is white supremacists, his global base is Zionism, another form of ethnic supremacy.

"The mask has come off. Both in the US as well as in Israel, which is open about its desire to keep on expanding. 'From the river to the sea' is not only the Palestinian dream of liberation, since all of historic Palestine is liberated, it is also the Zionist vision of Greater Israel, which the settlers have been slowly but surely making a reality, with the 'facts on the ground.'

"If any pain is felt today,and in the coming weeks, it is the pain that comes from removing a band-aid that has long covered up a festering wound. The wound will certainly heal better now. And the rage is an expression of the people's recognition that there seems to be no end to imperial hubris in sight. Yet now is not the time to glorify the 'sumoud narrative,' the pain, the rage, the outrage are too raw. Palestinians, especially in Jerusalem, will pay a very high price for for Trump's declaration. Yet we persist, because we must.

One of the earliest Zionist visionaries, Vladimir Jabotinsky, remains relevant today. In his 1923 treatise, The Iron Wall, where he laid out his vision for settler colonialism, he explains, with impressive foresight: 'It may be that some individual Arabs take bribes. But that does not mean that the Arab people of Palestine as a whole will sell that fervent patriotism that they guard so jealously, and which even the Papuans will never sell. Every native population in the world resists colonists as long as it has the slightest hope of being able to rid itself of the danger of being colonized. That is what the Arabs in Palestine are doing, and what they will persist in doing as long as there remains a solitary spark of hope that they will be able to prevent the transformation of 'Palestine' into the 'Land of Israel.'

"No, Trump's declaration has made clear that, just as with South Africa last century, the US government is on the wrong side of history today. And just as with apartheid South Africa, the people of the land, along with the global community, will determine the outcome. Apartheid, or one democratic state?

"Even in the searing pain of 'the morning after,' as we look around and see a clearly-demarcated strategy of resistance, and take in the multiple expressions of global solidarity with the Palestinian people, we know we will overcome, someday." (Trump's 'Lord Balfour moment' is formal recognition the US was never an honest broker, mondoweiss.net, 7/12/17)

Meanwhile, Back at the Peace Process...

"With no progress to show for months of effort in trying to get a new peace process going in Israel, diplomats say that the Trump Administration is increasingly 'fed up' with Israeli officials, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in particular.

"'They want us to implement confidence-building measures in relation to the Palestinians, and we say no to every request,' one Israeli diplomatic source was quoted as saying. He added the US had increasingly urged Israel to remove checkpoints or allow Palestinians more building rights on Palestinian soil, but that Israel keeps citing security concerns to refuse.

"Israel has also had a settler representative at every meeting, and they've objected to every US proposal. Given how desperate the Israeli coalition is for settler support, this always stops any US proposal dead in its tracks.

"The biggest problem, officials say, is how dismissive Netanyahu appears every time discussions of a Palestinian state, or making any progress at all, comes up. The expectation seems to be that Israel can keep delaying the process until the US gives up." (Diplomats: Trump 'fed up' with Netanyahu dismissing peace efforts, Jason Ditz, antiwar.com, 24/11/17)

Bill Clinton's Handshake Charade

However appalling, Trump is really only the tip of the iceberg of American ignorance and narcissism. Take our latest US visitor, for example, Clinton/Obama diplomat Dennis Ross, currently wowing them at Murdoch's Australian:

"Ross grew up in a non-religious Californian household, the son of a Catholic father and Jewish mother. At 19, inspired by the Six-Day War, he became religiously Jewish." (Long road to Israeli-Palestinian peace littered with broken deals and lost will, Brad Norington, 15/7/17)

Note that Ross was radicalised at 19. It seems that, in the US, such radicalisation, from all American boy to Zionist fanatic, is the perfect qualification and starting point for a career in US-style Middle East diplomacy. Sort of puts Jared Kushner in perspective, doesn't it?

And here's the pinnacle of that career, according to Norington:

"During an impressive career, Ross... helped facilitate the historic White House handshake between Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israel's Yitzhak Rabin."

Leaving aside discussion of the endless peace-process charade, and the preposterous, childish idea of Clinton's that this then (1993) 76-year-old colonial running sore could be solved by a cheap theatrical handshake, rather than by the hard yards of a decolonisation process and the rendering of justice to Palestine's dispossessed and occupied, let's just look at the minutiae of this supposedly "impressive" achievement, as described elsewhere by Ross himself.  Here he is interviewed by Jason M. Breslow of PBS's Frontline program (6/1/16):

Were you in the Rose Garden when [President Clinton] forged the handshake between [Yasser] Arafat and Rabin?

-Yes.

Tell me about that.

-There is an interesting back story to this... So we [Ross and Secretary of State Warren Christopher] get a call from Rabin... and he says, 'Look there's been a breakthrough with the PLO'... still... he's skeptical. He wants to know what our reaction to this is going to be. Well, our reaction is, this is a historic breakthrough between Israel and the PLO, two national movements competing for the same space, and for the first time they're prepared to recognize each other."

[Note here the false framing. The reality is otherwise. These are not two, long-resident communities living in one patch, in some kind of parity, but struggling to get along. This is the old story of a foreign, usurping settler-colonial movement vs an indigenous resistance movement trying to hold on to or reclaim its ancestral homeland.]

- Now [Israeli foreign minister Shimon] Peres tells us... that there should be a meeting at the White House to sign a Declaration of Principles, but it's too much for the Israeli public to see Arafat there. It's just too much to take.

[Yes, it's simply too much for the colons to stomach their PM meeting with the leader of the people they've been slicing and dicing for the past 76 years - eeeuw! What to do?]

- So it should be Peres and Abu Mazen [Arafat adviser, Mahmoud Abbas] who would come. We actually don't question this...

[Of course you don't, you've been a card-carrying Zionist since 1967 for Christ's sake! Those sniffy colons are your volk! Notice how, even in 1993, the Israelis had their eye on Abbas as a stooge?]

- ... but when we raise it with Clinton... he simply dismisses what we've told him, and immediately leaves the impression that if Arafat wants to come, he's welcome. And he's right... because his instinct is, the only way to bind the two leaders to this is to have this colossal event where they're kind of obligated before the world... We're telling him how uneasy Rabin is, first to even be there and secondly the idea that he's going to shake hands with this guy who, in Rabin's mind, is responsible for  all sorts of acts of terror that, for him, are just very hard to swallow. It's difficult for Rabin to overcome this.

[Notice the fact that Rabin's hands are covered in 76 years of Palestinian blood nowhere occurs to Ross as a possible difficulty for Arafat or the Palestinians? This is America's idea of honest brokerage.]

- Now Clinton kind of raises this in private with the two of them before they go out.

[Bill doesn't want anyone spoiling his show!]

So they both agree to kind of come, and they're hanging around the Oval Office?

- Well, you come in advance, before we go out.

OK

- To the last minute, Rabin is insisting that Arafat can't come in anything that looks like a uniform.

[And of course Ross cannot help but oblige. His Master's Voice after all:]

- We're telling Arafat, 'You can't come with a -- you don't bring a weapon.' You know, he always had a pistol. 'You don't bring a weapon to the White House.' So they come in, and the president talks to both leaders. He is already encouraging them...

[We wouldn't dare tell Rabin...]

Have they met before?

- No.

How are they with each other?

- Rabin is very uneasy. The idea of personally shaking hands with with this guy is physically difficult for him.

[With this guy...?!]

- He couldn't hide his feelings... So here is Clinton, who sees this guy give this remarkable speech on the one hand, and physically, it's hard for him to shake hands with this guy. So the iconic photograph - he literally envelops them with his arms. But he knows he has to create that image... to make peace, and how can you do that if you're not prepared to shake hands? (pbs.org)

Netanyahu Won. Now What?

A must-read from Avigail Abarbanel:

"So he won and I have to say I am relieved. There will be no more endless cycles of pointless 'negotiations' with Israel pretending that some day it will agree to a two-state solution while continually escalating both settlement (colony) building and the maltreatment of the Palestinians.Now everyone will see that the Palestinians were right all along and that Israel has never been a partner for peace.

"There is no real political Left in Israel, and if the other side got to form a government, all we would have seen is more of the same. Now we'll see if the EU has the decency and conviction to enact proper sanctions. Then of course there is the US. The US Administration might stall for a while, but we'll see if they have what it takes to do the right thing. Israel is no friend to the US and the sooner they realise it the better.

"Israel is on a slippery slope of its own making. Get your popcorn, sit and watch. Israel is becoming more radicalised than ever before. Certainly much more than when I was growing up there. Of course I could be wrong - and I hope I am - but I think Israel's pathological siege mentality will now become more pronounced and more evident to outsiders. Israel has for a long time been readying itself for when the time comes to bunker down, live with austerity and give up the fancy lifestyle the country has become increasingly accustomed to in the last 20-25 years. They can do this.

"Israel has always prepared itself psychologically and economically for being isolated. All that openness to the rest of the world that Israel has enjoyed increasingly in the last generation or so, and Israel's acceptance by others, have always been seen as temporary in the eyes of most Israeli Jews. They had always expected it to end, and had the mentality of 'let's enjoy it while it lasts and make the most of it while we can'.

"Fundamentally, Israeli Jews believe that the world hates them because they are Jewish (in their minds it has nothing to do with colonialism or the Palestinians). So although Israel has brought its own situation upon itself, that is not how Israeli Jews see it. They believe things are 'happening to them' for no fault of their own. They expect isolation and have dropped all pretenses of pandering to the West and are behaving more in line with their true nature.* Even less radical people will become radicalised now in Israel. There will be even more propaganda and more brainwashing than ever before.

"Netanyahu really does represent most Israeli Jews even though some of them do not like him. But the reasons they do not like him are not what you'd expect. Most Israeli Jews identify with Netanyahu's perception and understanding of what the rest of the world is like and of the world's relationship with Israel.** After all, Netanyahu is a product of Israeli society just like I was, and believe me, when you have that kind of psychology and that incredibly effective, powerful propaganda machine all around you, it is easy to believe that what you see is really how it is. Israeli Jews have always lived in a psychological ghetto and it's that ghetto that I got out of back in 1991.

"Life will get very difficult for Jews in Israel soon enough, and many with dual citizenship will abandon ship. Those who remain will be the diehard fanatics and zealots who are dangerous because they might have the psychology of murder suicide. I believe that before it is over, things will get really bad there and extremely dangerous. Israel will become much more fanatic and extremist than ever before with a lot less inhibitions.

"I am therefore worried about the Palestinians and wonder how much more of this they could possibly take and what they can expect in the next few months and years. Israel isolating itself is much more dangerous for the Palestinians because world public opinion will no longer be a moderating factor on Israel's behaviour. And believe it or not, it did have a moderating effect. What you have been seeing so far and what Palestinians have been experiencing is not yet the worst. Gaza gives you the idea of what Israel has in mind for all Palestinians.

"So the message to those of us who support the Palestinians is to get ready to escalate our support. It is about to get very very tough. With Netanyahu at the helm the end of colonialism and occupation is nigh, but it about to get a lot worse before it gets better." (mondoweiss.net, 18/3/15)

[*"Likud's poor polling promoted a surge of frenzied campaigning from Mr Netanyahu, including what many have interpreted as a 'paranoid' Facebook post in which he accused a conspiracy of foreign governments and left-wing parties of trying to topple his government. 'Leftist activists and the foreign and international media are conspiring to get Tzipi [Livni] and Buji [the nickname of Isaac Herzog] elected via illegitimate means, using innuendo and foreign money,' Mr Netanyahu wrote on his Facebook page. He warned: 'Those foreign organizations understand that if Tzipi and Buji are in charge, they will give up everything. They'll withdraw to the 1967 boundaries and they will divide Jerusalem'." (Benjamin Netanyahu plays the hardline settlement expansion card to capture right-wing votes, Ruth Pollard, Sydney Morning Herald, 17/3/15); **"Another Sderot local... says the possibility Iran will develop a nuclear weapon - the main issue that Netanyahu has focused on - could not be more important: 'I cannot sleep at night because of Iran and the ayatollahs who in every second sentence speak about their desire to destroy Israel... I will only sleep quietly when that threat is removed'." (Anger, fear for Israelis on the front line, Ruth Pollard, 16/3/15)]

Look, He's Actually Met Them, OK?

Who cares what Israel's political leaders actually say!

If Tony Abbott's Suppository of Wisdom, Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, foreign editor of The Australian, says they're OK, then dammit, they're OK, OK?

"Those [Arabs] who support Israel 'should receive everything; those against us... we must lift up an axe and behead them - otherwise we will not survive here'." (Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, in PA calls for arrest, trial of Lieberman for saying disloyal Israeli Arabs should be beheaded, Khaled Abu Toameh, The Jerusalem Post, 9/3/15)

On meeting Lieberman, Sheridan found him "charming in a rough, Russian way," and "more open to compromise than many Israelis." (Israeli right-winger redraws the battle lines, The Australian, 17/12/07)

Oh yes, and he's definitely "not an extremist." (Israeli leaders mislabelled by foes, The Australian, 9/4/09)

"In the situation created in the Middle East any territory that will be evacuated will be taken over by radical Islam and terrorist organizations supported by Iran. Therefore, there will not be any withdrawals or concessions. The matter is simply irrelevant." (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Netanyahu says his past support for Palestinian state 'simply irrelevant', Lahav Harkov, The Jerusalem Post, 8/3/15)

Sheridan, who met Netanyahu in 2003 and recorded him saying that "[w]e have to put an end to 'Arafatistan' next door,"* has since breezily opined that he "will be no barrier to peace," and that the Palestinians will get "all the land of the West Bank and Gaza except for the large Jewish settlement blocks [sic]." (There may be the will but not necessarily the way, The Australian, 5/2/09)

[*Matured Netanyahu is ready to rule, The Australian, 13/2/09]

The World's Most Dysfunctional Relationship

"A man whose partner stabbed him six times in a frenzied attack said he plans to marry his jailbird lover when she is released from prison... Belinda Van Krevel stabbed Marshall Gould... slashing him in the back of the neck, the leg and even severing an artery in his arm. Mr Gould did not immediately call an ambulance because he was fearful of getting the police involved and dragging up Van Krevel's criminal past... 'I laid down on the lounge to try and catch some of the football because it was Origin Night,' Mr Gould told A Current Affair. The attack almost cost Mr Gould an arm. But while it cost Van Krevel her freedom for three years, her partner... has carried on as though nothing has happened. 'I love seeing her every single time and it makes me happier every time I see her,' Mr Gould said about his partner with a dark and troubled past... 'Love is strange and you certainly don't choose love. Love is a feeling that comes over you,' he said. The couple are planning to get married when Van Krevel is released and already have each other's name tattooed on their ring fingers." (Man still loves jailed partner who stabbed him, ninemsn staff, 19/3/14)

Now that's a dysfunctional relationship by any standard. Unfortunately, these can also be found in the community of nations, that between the United States and Israel being the classic example.

Further confirmation of just how dysfunctional that particular relationship is came while reading Israeli journalist Nahum Barnea's Inside the talks' failure (ynetnews.com, 2/5/14), a must-read report on the failure of US Secretary of State John Kerry's recent effort to secure 'peace' between Israelis and Palestinians. 

One sentence of Barnea's in particular could have come straight out of the Gould/Van Krevel file.

But first, the context:

"The American version of why the current rounds of the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians failed is fundamentally different to the one presented by Israeli officials. The list of those to blame for this failure is also very different. From the US perspective, the issue of the settlements was largely to blame.

"Senior American officials involved in Secretary of State's John Kerry's peace push this week agreed to share with me their take on the talks' failure. They had one condition, in line with instructions they had received - that I didn't name them. But what they told me is the closest thing to an American official version of what happened.

"The American team will be disbanded in the coming days - most of it, or all of it. Kerry has yet to decide what he is going to do - whether he will wait several months and then try to renew his effort, or release the principles of an agreement formulated by the Americans..."

"Using advanced software, the Americans drew a border outline in the West Bank that gives Israel sovereignty over some 80% of the settlers that live there today. The remaining 20% were meant to evacuate. In Jerusalem, the proposed border is based on Bill Clinton's plan - Jewish neighborhoods to Israel, Arab neighborhoods to the Palestinians. The Israeli government made no response to the American plan, and avoided drawing its own border outline."

Now here's the sentence that prompted this post:

"The criticism against the Israeli government is presented in terms of wounds inflicted by a friend who could still be trusted: Israel is very dear to them, but the wounds are deep."

I rest my case.

Salt of the Earth vs Monosodium Glutamate of the Earth 1

PRESS RELEASE
Friday, 31 January 2014

Palestinians launch 'Melh Al-Ard' Campaign by Reviving Ein Hijleh Village in the Jordan Valley

"Hundreds of Palestinians announced today the launching of 'Melh Al-Ard (Salt of the Earth) campaign by reviving the village of Ein Hijleh in the Jordan Valley on land belonging to the Orthodox Church and St. Gerassimos Monastery. The campaign is launched in rejection of Israeli policies aimed at Judaizing and annexing the Jordan Valley.

"Campaign organizers and participants declared, We, the daughters and sons of Palestine, announce today the revival of Ein Hijleh village as part of the Melh Al-Ard campaign in the Jordan Valley. The action constitutes a rejection of the political status quo, especially in light of the current, futile 'peace' negotiations aimed at destroying the right of our people to liberate and reclaim their land.

"Accordingly, we have decided to revive an old Palestinian Canaanite village in the Jordan Valley next to so-called 'Route 90' linking the Dead Sea to Bisan. This action is just one step in an ongoing campaign against the Israeli occupation's plan to annex the Jordan Valley. It is an act of popular protest against Israel's oppression of the Palestinian people and the Judaization of their land.

"From the village of Ein Hijleh, we the participants, announce that we will never let go of our right to all occupied Palestinian lands. We reject US Secretary of State Kerry's plan to establish a mutilated Palestinian state and force us to recognise the Israeli entity as a Jewish state. Such a state would turn Palestinians living on lands occupied in 1948 into mere residents and visitors who can be deported at any time. We affirm the unity of our people and their struggle, wherever they are, for our inalienable rights.

"Ein Hijlah village is located in what is called 'Area C' in the Jordan Valley, which is threatened by annexation and Kerry's plan. We have therefore decided to take charge and call for a national action to protect the Jordan Valley and put an end to the constant Judaization of Palestinian lands.

"Based on our support for the Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) movement we call upon our friends and international solidarity groups to support the demands of the Palestinian people and boycott all Israeli companies, particularly Israeli factories and companies that operate in the Jordan Valley and profit from Palestinian natural resources.

"We ask you, for example, to boycott Mehadrin, the largest exporter of fruits and vegetables, some of which is grown in the Jordan Valley, and Hadiklaim, which exports dates produced by Israeli settlers in the Jordan Valley. We also call on you to boycott both Ahava and Premier, cosmetics companies that use Dead Sea minerals in their products.

"Our village is located near Deir Hijleh or St. Gerassimos Monastery, on land belonging to the Orthodox Church. It consists of a few abandoned houses and some palm trees. The soil is highly salty, and it is surrounded by Israeli settlements on confiscated land. An Israeli base separates the land from the monastery, which owns about 1,000 dunums, some of which has been taken by Israeli forces under the pretext of 'security.'

"The name of the campaign, Melh Al-Ard (Salt of the Earth), refers to a verse in the Bible (Matthew 13:5), which says, You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. The name of our village, Ein Hijleh, derives from the original Canaanite name and the spring (Ein) which is present there.

"We, the sons and daughters of Ein Hijleh, call upon our people to join the struggle to revive the village and protect our rights, our history, our culture and our land. Daughters and sons of Palestine, be the salt of the earth and stay steadfast on it."

MEDIA CONTACT: Diana Alzeer, 0592400300 or 0525339054

Shameless Israeli Propaganda at the WaPo

"US envoy Martin Indyk... told [Jewish leaders] that a final peace treaty [between Israel and the Palestinians] could provide for compensation to Jews forced out of Arab countries after the founding of Israel in 1948. That would give descendants of those refugees living in Israel a potential financial stake in a deal long assumed to also provide compensation for Arabs who left land in what is now Israel." (Proposal for Israeli borders, Anne Gearan, Washington Post/Sydney Morning Herald, 1/2/14)

Putting to one side, if you can, one's cynicism at the decades-old farce of an Israeli-Palestinian 'peace' process brokered by Israel's "true friend" (Obama's description), and focusing solely on WaPo journalist Anne Gearan's choice of words here, one is compelled to ask how she can be allowed get away with the following two grievous misrepresentations: "Jews forced out of Arab countries" and "Arabs who left land in what is now Israel"?

The truth, of course, is the very reverse. To write that "Arabs" simply "left" Palestine in 1948 is, of course, now standard fare for mainstream reporters who, for whatever reasons, bend over backwards to obfuscate the fact and extent of Zionist ethnic cleansing at the time.

But to top that with the fiction that the post-1948 Israeli government-engineered immigration of Arab Jews to Israel was an equivalent Arab ethnic cleansing is to enlist directly as a spear carrier in Israel's current propaganda campaign to undermine the legitimate claims of Palestinian refugees.

I've exposed this kind of dishonesty before, of course, and you need only click on the 'Arab Jews' label below for the details. For those interested, here are two more items on the subject which give the lie to Gearan's (& Indyk's) shameless partisanship:

"In January 1952, about half a year after the official conclusion of the operation that brought Iraq's Jews to Israel, two Zionist activists, Yosef Basri and Shalom Salah, were hanged in Baghdad. They had been charged with possession of explosive materials and throwing bombs in the city center. According to the account of Shlomo Hillel, a former Israeli cabinet minister and Zionist activist in Iraq, their last words, as they stood on the gallows, were 'Long live the State of Israel.' It would have been only natural for Iraqi Jews in Israel to have reacted with outrage to news of the hanging. But on the contrary, the mourning assemblies organized by leaders of the community in various Israeli cities failed to arouse widespread solidarity with the two Iraqi Zionists. Just the opposite: a classified document from Moshe Sasson, of the Foreign Ministry's Middle East Division, to Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett maintained that many Iraqi immigrants, residents of the transit camps, greeted the hanging with the attitude: 'That is God's revenge on the movement that brought us to such depths.' The bitterness of that reaction attests to an acute degree of discontent among the newly arrived Iraqi Jews. It suggests that a good number of them did not view their immigration as the joyous return to Zion depicted by the community's Zionist activists. Rather, in addition to blaming the Iraqi government, they blamed the Zionist movement for bringing them to Israel for reasons that did not include the best interests of the immigrants themselves." (From The Jews of Iraq, Zionist Ideology, & the Property of the Palestinian Refugees of 1948: An Anomaly of National Accounting, Yehouda Shenhav, International Journal of Middle East Studies, 1999, p 605)

"'It is far from the first instance of tampering with, exploiting, and deleting our history, but it is the straw that broke the camel's back, and so... we formed the Committee of Baghdadi Jews in Ramat-Gan.' That is how writer, poet and activist Almog Behar described a decision by a group of Jews from Arab and Kurdish backgrounds to speak out forcefully against renewed Israeli government propaganda efforts to counter Palestinian refugee rights by using the claims of Jews who left Arab countries for Israel in the 1950s. Israeli diplomats, Haaretz reported last week, 'have been instructed to raise the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries at every relevant forum. This part of a new international campaign to create parity between the plight of Jewish and Palestinian refugees, Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon announced on Monday.'

"'The way the Israeli establishment uses our history from the 1950s is not in order to give us our rights back, but in order to get rid of the rights of the Palestinians, and avoiding a peace agreement with them,' Behar wrote to The Electronic Intifada. The idea is that Palestinian refugee and property rights are negated by equivalent claims from Jews from Arab countries, thus absolving Israel of having to make any restitution to Palestinians. Jews who left Iraq and some other Arab countries in the 1950s for Israel were deprived of their property and citizenship. But in an extraordinary statement posted on Facebook last week, the newly-formed Committee of Baghdadi Jews in Ramat-Gan, of which Behar is a founding member, hit back: 'We are seeking to demand compensation for our lost property and assets from the Iraqi government - NOT from the Palestinian Authority - and we will not agree with the option that compensation for our property be offset by compensation for the lost property of others (meaning Palestinian refugees) or that said compensation be transferred to bodies that do not represent us (meaning the Israeli government).'

"The statement went on to demand an investigation of Israel's complicity in the departure of Iraqi Jews from their homeland including terrorist acts against Jews: 'We demand the establishment of an investigative committee to examine: 1) If and by what means negotiations were carried out in 1950 between Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri as-Said, and if Ben-Gurion informed as-Said that he is authorized to take possession of the property and assets of Iraqi Jewry if he agreed to send them to Israel; 2) who ordered the bombing of the Masouda Shem-Tov synagogue in Baghdad, and if the Israeli Mossad and/or its operatives were involved. If it is determined that Ben-Gurion did, in fact, carry out negotiations over the fate of Iraqi Jewish property and assets in 1950, and directed the Mossad to bomb the community's synagogue in order to hasten our flight from Iraq, we will file a suit in an international court demanding half of the sum total of compensation for our refugee status from the Iraqi government and half from the Israeli government.'

"The role of Israel and Zionist undercover agents in helping precipitate the departure of Jews from Iraq has long been suspected. Naiem Giladi, an Iraqi Jew who joined the Zionist underground as a young man in Iraq and later came to regret his role in fostering the departure of some 125,000 Jews from Iraq, wrote that 'Zionist propagandists still maintain that the bombs in Iraq were set off by anti-Jewish Iraqis who wanted Jews out of their country.' But 'the terrible truth,' Giladi said, 'is that the grenades that killed and maimed Iraqi Jews and damaged their property were thrown by Zionist Jews'." (From Iraqi Jews reject 'cynical manipulation' of their history by Israel, Zionists, writer Almog Behar tells EI, Ali Abunimah, electronicintifada.net, 17/9/12)

Gutless Wonders

"No country in the world accepts dictates from other countries about where it is allowed to build and where not." Housing Minister Uri Ariel, quoted in Settlement push on eve of peace talks, Isabel Kershner, New York Times/ Sydney Morning Herald, 13/8/13

US presidents come and go but those Israeli settlements just keep on going from strength to strength:

"Israel must persuade its Arab neighbors and the world community that Israel has no expansionist designs on their territory." - Lyndon B. Johnson, 1963-1969

"As a matter of policy, we do not provide assistance to the Israeli government for projects in the occupied territories." - Richard Nixon, 1969-1974

"This matter of settlements in the occupied territories has always been characterized by our government, by me and my predecessors, as an illegal action." - Gerald Ford, 1974-1977

"We consider these settlements to be contrary to the Geneva Convention, that occupied territories should not be changed by the establishment of permanent settlements by the occupying power." - Jimmy Carter, 1977-1981

"Indeed, the immediate adoption of a settlement freeze by Israel, more than any other action, could create the confidence needed for wider participation in these talks." - Ronald Reagan, 1981-1989

"My position is that the foreign policy of the United States says we do not believe there should be new settlements in the West Bank or in East Jerusalem. And I will conduct that policy as if it's firm." - George H.W. Bush, 1989-1993

"Because Israel believes when it comes right down to it America is the only big country that cares whether they live or die. That's why I can say, give up the West Bank. - Bill Clinton, 1993-2001

"Consistent with the Mitchell plan, Israeli settlement activity in occupied territories must stop, and the occupation must end." - George W. Bush, 2001-2009

"For more than 4 decades, Israeli settlement activity in territories occupied in 1967 has undermined Israel's security and corroded hopes for peace and stability in the region." - Barack Obama, 2009 -

US presidents always blink first.

NB: All quotes, except Carter's, from 10 Easy Pieces, Adbusters, July/August 2013

Say NO to Negotiations!

An important statement from Palestinian activists in North America (NoToNegotiations@gmail.com):

Palestinians in Shatat (Diaspora) Say NO to Resumption of Negotiations

We, the undersigned Palestinians and Palestinian organizations in shatat and exile, write today to express our firm opposition to the resumption of bilateral Israeli/Palestinian negotiations under US auspices in Washington DC, today, July 29.

For 20 years, the negotiations have not served Palestinian interests. Through countless sessions of futile negotiations, Israeli settlement construction has escalated, thousands of Palestinian political prisoners are held behind bars, and Palestinian rights - including Palestinian refugees' right of return - are no closer to implementation.

While the Netanyahu government is planning the massive dispossession of Palestinians in the Naqab via the Prawer Plan, the negotiations serve only to provide a thin veneer of legitimacy to the aggressive policies of Israeli occupation and apartheid. Our rights - the rights of the Palestinian people - and our land - the entire land of Palestine - are not for sale or bartering at the negotiating table.

That this process is presided over by the United States government, which provides $3 billion annually in military aid to Israel, and specifically by Martin Indyk, former research director at the infamous Israel lobby organization, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), only adds insult to injury and makes clear that these negotiations will bring nothing of value or benefit to the Palestinian people.

Today, we say: PA President Mahmoud Abbas does not represent us! Our rights cannot and will not be bargained away at a negotiating table in Washington, DC. Instead, we affirm that the Palestinian people are one people and our cause is one cause. Our people have struggled for 65 years in order to achieve the liberation of the land and people of Palestine and the implementation of the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes.

As Palestinians in shatat, we are not being represented here, and we demand to reclaim our voice and role. We do not accept these negotiations, and our rights, our people, and our land are not for sale!

'Quality Journalism' Alert

'Quality journalism' is a term that both wings of the corporate press love to trot out to describe just what it is that they are supposedly giving the reading public.

On July 27, it was Fairfax's turn to boast:

"The Herald believes Australians will always value quality journalism and keep supporting a business that has a long record in delivering it." (A proudly Australian voice will go on)

Then, the very next day, we're fed this undergraduate hahaha:

"The best minds in the past two centuries have worked their fingers to the bone to understand why the Middle East is such a hotbed of tensions. Master negotiators and highly respected diplomats have been unable to bring all the sides involved in the Middle East together at the peace table. The parties are like cats on hot tin roofs. Even President Obama and his high hat full of eloquence and white rabbits could not bring the sides together. Hostilities are at an all-time high. Earlier this year social scientists stumbled upon what could be the answer to the Middle East peace problem. The British Journal of Urology International published a research report that showed that circumcised men report less sexual sensitivity than their uncut counterparts... Suddenly, political and social scientists saw the underlying reasons for unrest and endless fighting in the Middle East. A solution was at hand to this unmade hotbed. Judaism and Islam use circumcision as part of their religious practices... Arabs and Jews are at each others' throats because, as the report revealed, uncircumcised men reported 'an average sensitivity score of 3.72 when they or their partner stroked the head of their manhood, compared to 3.31 among circumcised men'. Uncircumcised men reported more intense orgasms. It was little wonder why tempers flared so easily in the Middle East..." (Peace such a sensitive issue, Charles Waterstreet, The Sun-Herald)

Charles Waterstreet, Paul Sheehan, Gerard Henderson - quality journalism?  

Hahaha

Indyk the Enigmatic

"[The Yom Kippur War] was a kind of defining moment for me in terms of my search for identity. I sat up at night listening on my radio to the BBC reports of Henry Kissinger flying in to get the ceasefire and from that moment on I became absolutely obsessed about the idea that I too should play some role in trying to make Israel safe, because that would make me safe." (Leadel Interview, 'Martin Indyk', cited in Powerbase's profile of Indyk, powerbase.info)

The Australian's Cameron Stewart (rambammed: 2005) always gives good pro-Israel spin, but yesterday's effort, Indyk to lead new Mid-East effort, just blew me away.

First we got this revelation:

"[Indyk] is expected to play a pivotal role in efforts to kick-start the stalled Middle East peace process and broker a settlement between Israel and Palestine. Mr Indyk, 62, is tipped to head the US delegation to the new round of talks between the two states..."

So we already have a Palestinian state?! The fabled two-state solution's been there all this time and nobody noticed?!

I-N-C-R-E-D-I-B-L-E!!!

But back to Indyk.

Keep in mind that this particular gent was:

*a former American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) staffer
*a founding director of the pro-Israel think tank the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP)
*a director of the pro-Israel Saban Center for Middle East Policy
*a two-time US ambassador to Israel (1995-97; 2000-01)
*a key Clinton adviser (along with Dennis Ross) at the 2000 Camp David summit at which "Palestinian negotiators complained that they were 'negotiating with two Israeli teams - one displaying an Israeli flag, and one an American flag'."  (quoted in The Israel Lobby, Mearsheimer & Walt, lrb.co.uk, 23/3/06)

Yet all Stewart could manage was fluff like this:

"Martin Indyk once taught Middle Eastern politics at Sydney's Macquarie University... The son of a Sydney surgeon John Indyk was raised in the Sydney suburb of Castlecrag and educated at the University of Sydney and the Australian National University before moving to the US in 1982."

But the bit that really had the coffee all over the page was this:

"Although he has a reputation for even-handedness, reports of his likely appointment have received a mixed response, with Israelis and Palestinians fearing he may be too close to the other side. Mr Indyk is considered to be close to Israel and has long been a passionate advocate of the US's strong support for Israel. However, he has also made clear that he understands and is not opposed to Palestinian aspirations and interests."

So despite this bloke having been the director of more US Israel lobby shops than you can poke a stick at, lo and behold, he's now the proverbial riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma!

Quality journalism strikes again... but only in the Australian.

[For more QJ by Cameron Stewart see my posts Quality Journalism Alert (28/2/10); The Eyes Have It (16/8/11).]

Besotted Bob

The received wisdom is that Bob Carr has the hots for the US, but having just read an opinion piece of his in The Australian, I reckon it's really Israel that gets his juices going.

Now he's not talking here about just any old nation, right? He's talking about a right little minx whose criminal record is as long as your bloody arm - an occupying, genocidal, Jewish supremacist, apartheid state for God's sake! And yet, have you ever before read such an expression of tender concern for someone's welfare as this?

"As a friend of Israel, I can say there is another fundamental issue at stake [other than Hamas rockets vs Israeli settlement expansion]: the survival of Israel as a democracy. The durability of Israeli democracy requires the existence of a viable Palestinian state. Without it Israel will be trapped, governing a burgeoning Arab population to which it cannot grant full and equal civil rights and remain a Jewish state." (No Plan B for the Middle East, 3/7/13)

'What with all those Arabs breeding like rabbits, my dear, you might one day wake up and find you've lost your precious Jewish majority and then where will you be? No, trust me, it'd be better for you if the Palestinians had their own bantustan, or as we like to call it so as not to frighten the horses, viable Palestinian state.'

The man just doesn't get it. He just doesn't get what the rest of the world gets. All he sees is a sexy, if somewhat brazen and bumptious, young democracy.The little vixen's addled his brain.

You could point out to Carr till you're blue in the face that any democracy worth its salt is sect-neutral, and that 5 million Palestinians (consisting of 750,000 refugees and their descendents) were gerrymandered out of a vote at the point of a bayonet in 1948, but he's in so damn deep that he just doesn't want to know.

And please, don't be fooled by all that talk about the need for a Palestinian state. Carr is no more interested in Palestinian rights than he is in football. No, his only concern is that Israel will end up with the kind of terrible reputation that other little brazen hussy, white South Africa, had, and that'll reflect badly on him, considering he's been singing her praises ever since he set up that fan club back in the 70s - what was it called? Oh yeah, Labor Friends of Israel. For God's sake, he can't even bring himself to use the word 'apartheid' in the above paragraph. Probably because she'd scratch his eyes out if he did.

And how's this for special treatment?

"[T]he path to Palestinian statehood does not lie through UN resolutions." (ibid)

No, none of that nasty international law stuff for Israel! None of those scary UN resolutions like 242 and 194. Oh no, "Israel and the Palestinians should be nudged towards a return to direct talks." (ibid)

Nudged? Nudged? Israel? Is the man serious?

Still, you never know. After all, nudging seems to have worked a treat for George Bush:

"If you're asking me, 'am I nudging them forward', well, my trip was a pretty significant nudge because yesterday they had a meeting." (Bush:'I'm nudging' Israelis, Palestinians toward peace, cnn.com, 9/1/08)

Why Arafat Went Berserk

Instead of getting solidly behind the implementation of UN resolutions on the Middle East conflict without fear or favour, Western politicians have allowed themselves to be led up the garden path by the US-initiated, so-called peace process, which climaxed during the presidency of Israel luvvie, Bill Clinton. Embraced in one form or another by every subsequent incumbent of the White House, it goes without saying that the only beneficiary of the PP charade has been Israel, which has essentially used it to divert a gullible West while ramping up its colonization of the occupied Palestinian territories.

I was moved to reflect thus on the whole sorry PP business while flicking through The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History with the President (2009) by Taylor Branch. One passage in particular struck me. But let me first set the scene. The year is 2000. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat are shacked up with Clinton at Camp David and the matter of who gets what in Jerusalem is up for discussion:

"In hard negotiation, said Clinton, the Palestinians were willing to internationalize the walled Old City, but Barak baulked out of distrust of the United Nations. Israelis felt outnumbered and consistently mistreated in most world bodies, especially that one, and Barak floated his own proposal instead. Israel, while retaining formal sovereignty over the Old City, would concede a zone of Palestinian control through its Muslim quarter to the high stone plaza at the heart, known to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif ('Noble Sanctuary') and to Jews as the Temple Mount. In return Barak proposed a gesture to compensate religious Israelis. On specified occasions, Jews would be permitted to offer prayers on the Temple Mount for the first time in nearly 2,000 years, since Rome had destroyed Herod's Temple after a first-century Jewish rebellion. 'Arafat went berserk,' said the president, and his fellow Palestinians cried that Jews never before had dared such blasphemy. Even during the military occupation since 1967, Israeli police had prevented Jews from congregating to pray on the Temple Mount, where Muslims had managed continuous religious observance since the year 1187." (p 612)

Of course Arafat went berserk. He could see the thin end of a wedge making rapidly for his jugular. Anyhow, so Branch's story goes, Clinton decided to deploy what he thought would be a killer argument with the Palestinian president:

"To Arafat, alone, he pleaded for counterintuitive understanding of a vulnerability that coexisted with Israel's military dominance. Clinton and Arafat belonged to religious cultures fortunate to preserve many ancient shrines. Christians had the Vatican, Bethlehem and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, among others. Muslims revered the Kaaba in Mecca and the Tomb of the Prophet in Medina, plus the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque there on Jerusalem's Haram. Jews, lacking such treasures, centered their faith memories upon a fragment of the Western Wall beneath the destroyed temples of Solomon and Herod. Devout Israelis hoped one day to find their biblical Ark of the Covenant underneath by excavation. Such ruins and relics were all Jews had, but they meant no less than did two of the glorious places sacred to Muslims on that same central spot in the Old City. Surely, the negotiators could figure a way to honor differences born of the same yearning." (ibid p 613)

Now there's no mention in Branch's book of Arafat's response to Clinton. However, my guess is he went berserk - again. After all, he wasn't only hearing a reiteration of Barak's talking point, but as a Palestinian who'd heard it all before, was he perhaps also hearing an echo of one of Zionism's oldest and most enraging talking points. This is from 1946:

"Another line of argument that maddened the Palestine Arabs was what may be called the 'you have so much and I want so little' line. The Arabs had all the Arab world and the Jews only wanted Palestine, a small corner of that world. Was it so much to ask for? Could not the Arabs be generous and let them have it? Could not the Palestine Arabs find a home in Syria or Iraq? To understand how the Palestinian Arabs felt about this argument, it is only necessary to imagine how the people of Devon or Cornwall would greet a suggestion that they should surrender their part of England to the Jews and find a new home in Scotland." (An Arab Tells His Story: A Study in Loyalties, Edward Atiyah, p 202)

Zionising the Draft Modern History Curriculum 6

ACARA's 8th dot point reads as follows:

"The impact of significant individuals and groups both in working for and in opposing peace, with particular reference to David Ben-Gurion, Anwar Sadat, Menachem Begin, Yasser Arafat, Ariel Sharon, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, Hezbollah, Hamas, and 'Peace Now'."

Peace? What kind of peace? Tacitus' famous words in Agricola, quoting the Caledonian chieftain Calgacus, come to mind here. (For Rome, think today's imperial Israel.):

"These [Roman] plunderers of the world, after exhausting the land by their devastations, are rifling the ocean: stimulated by avarice, if their enemy be rich; by ambition, if poor; unsatiated by the East and by the West: the only people who behold wealth and indigence with equal avidity. To ravage, to slaughter, to usurp under false titles, they call empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace."

So what kind of peace are we talking about?

A mere absence of organised violence? The 'peace' of a nominally independent Palestinian bantustan? A peace predicated on millions of Palestinians remaining in exile while the likes of Wertheim can settle in any part of their former homeland, rebadged 'Israel', as they see fit? All, I'm afraid, deserts.

Recognising that peace without justice is no peace at all, I'd amend the above point by incorporating the term 'a just peace' or 'peace with justice', and let the apples fall where they may:

David Ben-Gurion's responsibility for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and his outright refusal to implement UNGA resolution 194, allowing the Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and lands, would be factored in.

Menachem Begin's role in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 and his 1982 invasion and occupation of Lebanon, which merely created new injustices and new enemies, leading to the creation of a Lebanese version of the Palestinian resistance, likewise.

Ditto for Ariel Sharon, whose 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip can in no way be legitimately spun as a milestone on the road to peace, given the memorable words of his adviser, Dov Weisglass:

"The disengagement is actually formaldehyde that's necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians... After all, what have I been shouting for the past year? That I found a device, in cooperation with the management of the world, to ensure that there will be no stopwatch here. That there will be no timetable to implement the [West Bank] settlers' nightmare. I have postponed that nightmare indefinitely... That is the significance of what we did. The significance is the freezing of the political process. And when you freeze the process you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and you prevent a discussion about the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package that is called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed from our agenda indefinitely. And all this with authority and permission. All with a presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of Congress." (Quoted in The Road Map to Nowhere: Israel/Palestine Since 2003, Tanya Reinhart, 2006 p 43)

On the Palestinian side, consideration would have to be given to the transition from Article 6 of the Palestinian National Charter of 1968 ("The Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians."), a position premised on the restoration of the demographic status quo which obtained in Palestine prior to the issuance of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, and therefore a demand for absolute justice, to the emergence of the concept of the secular democratic state in Palestine, accommodating the post-Balfour Declaration Jewish colons and their descendants on a one-man, one-vote basis, regardless of creed, through to the adoption of a two-state solution by the Palestine National Congress in 1988.

On the other side, consideration would have to be given to the Israeli colonisation drive in the West Bank (1967-2012) which has, absent a full withdrawal of all Israeli troops and settlers, effectively rendered the two state solution impossible and brought about the de facto bi-national (but still apartheid) state which is today's Israel, characterised by occupied Palestinians with no rights, Israeli Palestinians with only second/third class citizenship rights, and a stateless, exiled Palestinian diaspora kept on ice so that the Wertheim's of this world can add a second home to their existing one should they choose to do so. 

Israel's adamant rejection of a just peace would also need to incorporate its rejection of every relevant UN resolution under the sun.

Finally, as a "significant individual" working for peace with justice, I'd include the UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte, the author of  the UNGA's 'right of return' resolution 194, who strove for justice for Palestinian refugees only to be cruelly cut down by that penultimate form of Israeli rejectionism, the hail of bullets, in 1948.

ECAJ's Peter Wertheim seeks to pad the 8th dot point with Israeli leaders in order to take advantage of the Zionist-generated image of them as peacemakers:

"The eighth dot point concerning the impact of significant individuals and groups both in working for and in opposing peace should also include 'Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Ehud Olmert' and should refer also to 'grass roots efforts to build cross-cultural co-operation and relationships.'"

Note that Wertheim doesn't feel the need to argue the case for the inclusion of Rabin, Peres and Olmert in this section. Maybe because any mileage to be had from Rabin's division of the West Bank into Areas A, B and C, leaving Israel still in occupation of around 60% of the territory, is more than negated by the fact that between 1993 and 1996 the settler population increased by 48% in the West Bank and by 62% in the Gaza Strip, and Peres' fleeting tenure of 7 months as PM saw no particular advance in peace with justice for the Palestinians. As for Olmert... but I grow weary, as I know you do too. Those interested in this particular 'peace-maker' can look up my 30/11/09 post No Bull.

Finally, if Wertheim's "grass roots efforts to build cross-cultural co-operation and relationships," whatever those may be, is to be incorporated in 'The Struggle for Peace in the Middle East' unit, I'd suggest it go under a separate dot point to do with Israel propaganda and smokescreens. Colonisers have never, repeat never, been in the business of "building cross-cultural co-operation and relationships" with colonised people.

Zionising the Draft Modern History Curriculum 5

ACARA's 7th dot point reads as follows:

 "The attempts to settle conflicts between Arabs and Israelis, including: the 1949 Armistace, Security Council Resolution 242 (1967), Egypt/Israeli Peace Accords (1973), Camp David Accords (1978/9) and Camp David Summit (2000), and the role of the United Nations."

ECAJ's Peter Wertheim suggests the following corrections...

"The seventh dot point refers to the 'Egyptian/Israeli Peace Accords (1973), Camp David Accords (1978/9)'. There were no 'Egypt/Israeli Peace Accords' in 1973. In fact, Egypt and Israel fought a war against each other in 1973 and eventually signed a Peace Treaty in 1979. The Camp David Accords were signed in 1978 (not 1978/9). We suggest that the necessary corrections be made."

... and adds:

"Further, in this item, which is dedicated to 'the attempts to settle conflicts between Arabs and Israelis', the entire post-1993 Oslo process has been omitted, as has the Israel-Jordan peace treaty of 1994, the establishment of the Palestinian Authority under the Interim Agreement in 1995; Palestinian elections in 1996 and 2006; the Camp David Summit in 2000, the Taba Summit in January 2001, the Road Map of 2003 and the Olmert Peace offer of 2008. We suggest that these items be added."

Since Wertheim's referencing of the various highly mythologised milestones of the so-called peace (or Oslo) process (1991/1993-?) gives scope for students to be exposed to the false idea, peddled by the Zionist propaganda mill and uncritically broadcast in the ms media a thousand times since, that the process amounts essentially to a chronicle of missed opportunities by obdurate Palestinians unwilling to compromise, students need to be reminded of the following basics:

a) The Palestinian leadership's starting point was an acceptance of a Palestinian state on just 22% of their historic homeland, ie in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, a quite unbelievable concession (Edward Said saw it as a Palestinian Versailles);

b) The Israelis, on the other hand, have spent the past 20 or so years of the process arguing that the Palestinians should accept less than this 22% in order to accommodate their illegally-built settlements.

(To take but the best known and most mythologised 'peace process' milestone, the Camp David II Summit of July 2000 (often spun as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak's 'generous offer') amounted to offering the  Palestinians a capital in the village of Abu Dis (not in East Jerusalem); an Israeli insistence on an 'end of conflict' declaration, neutralising UN resolutions 194 and 242; the Israeli retention of its main settlement blocs in the West Bank;  allowing other Israeli settlements to remain in the Palestinian state with the option of living under Palestinian rule until further notice; ditto for Israeli assets in the Jordan Valley. With Israeli settlements, their lands, roads and defensive areas remaining in situ, the Palestinian mini-state would have become a mere parody of itself with only around 40-50% of the West Bank under its control. (See Israeli Rejectionism: A Hidden Agenda in the Middle East Peace Process,  Zalman Amit & Daphna Levit, 2011, pp 132-135))  

c) During this period, Israel's colonization of the West Bank with thousands upon thousands of settlers has proceeded apace, giving the lie to its international posturing as an earnest seeker after peace.

d) The US, which, under one Zionised administration after another, has facilitated the process, can in no way be described as an honest broker.

e) In short, what we are dealing with here is what Henry Siegman has correctly labelled "the most spectacular deception in modern diplomatic history."

I'd suggest, therefore, that ACARA's dot point be amended as follows: 'The attempts to settle conflicts between Arabs and Israelis, including: UN resolutions 194 (1948) [conveniently omitted by Wertheim] and 242 (1967), the 1949 Armistace, the Egypt/Israeli Peace Accords (1978), and the US-brokered (UN-sidelined) 'peace process' (1991/1993-?).'

Further, given that the process' oft-stated goal of a viable and contiguous Palestinian mini-state has been rendered  increasingly unattainable by Israel's escalating colonization of the occupied Palestinian territories, there should be included room for discussion of a one-state solution to the 'conflict' with all that that entails for the dismantling of Israel's apartheid legislation and the transition from a 'Jewish' supremacist to a genuinely democratic state embracing both its Jewish and non-Jewish populations, including the returned Palestinian refugees of 1948 and 1967.

Let Me Qualify That

From Obama's speech at the UN General Assembly (Full transcript, Haaretz, 21/9/11):

"Now, I know, particularly this week, that for many in this hall, there's one issue that stands as a test for these principles and a test for American foreign policy, and that is the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. One year ago, I stood at this podium and I called for an independent Palestine. I believed then, and I believe now, that the Palestinian people deserve a state of their own. But..."

BUT

"... what I also said is that a genuine peace can only be realized between the Israelis and the Palestinians themselves. One year later, despite extensive efforts by America and others, the parties have not bridged their differences. Faced with this stalemate, I put forward a new basis for negotiations in May of this year. That basis is clear. It's well known to all of us here. Israelis must know that any agreement provides assurances for their security. Palestinians deserve to know the territorial basis of their state. Now, I know that many are frustrated by the lack of progress. I assure you, so am I. But..."

BUT

"... the question isn't the goal that we seek - the question is how do we reach that goal?. And I am convinced there is no short cut to the end of a conflict that has edured for decades."

Hm... I wonder why it's endured for decades. Would unstinting US cash, military hardware and diplomatic backing have something to do with it?

"Peace is hard work."

Yeah, especially with the Israel lobby breathing down your neck. The more historically literate among the delegates would have perhaps recalled the famous words of President Harry Truman (who, incidentally, recognised the state of Israel in a mere 11 minutes after David Ben-Gurion's Declaration of Independence on May 14 1948): "I'm sorry gentlemen, but I have to answer to hundreds of thousands who are anxious for the success of Zionism: I don't have hundreds of thousands of Arabs among my constituents." And speaking of history, Obama himself must've had his mind wonderfully concentrated by the loss of historically Democratic Brooklyn and Queens to the Republicans the day before.

"Peace will not come through statements and resolutions at the United Nations - if it were that easy, it would have been accomplished by now."

Yeah, what's international law got to do with it? Or anything much these days?

"Ultimately, it is the Israelis and the Palestinians - not us - who must live side by side. Ultimately, it is the Israelis and the Palestinians - not us - who must reach agreement on the issues that divide them: on borders and on security, on refugees and Jerusalem. Ultimately, peace depends on compromise among people who must live together long after our speeches are over, long after our votes have been tallied. That's the lesson of Northern Ireland, where ancient antagonists bridged their differences. That's the lesson of Sudan, where a negotiated settlement led to an independent state. And that is and will be the path to a Palestinian state - negotiations between the parties."

It's funny - Palestine went from 100% in 1947 to 45% in November 1947 to 22% in 1948/9 to 0% in 1967. But there's still room for Palestinians to compromise. Right.

"We seek a future where Palestinians live in a sovereign state of their own, with no limit to what they can achieve. There's no question that the Palestinians have seen that vision delayed for too long. It is precisely because we believe so strongly in the aspirations of the Palestinian people that America has invested so much time and so much effort in the building of a Palestinian state, and the negotiations that can deliver a Palestinian state. But..."

And here's the biggest BUT of them all:

"... understand this as well: America's commitment to Israel's security is unshakeable. Our friendship with Israel is deep and enduring. And so we believe that any lasting peace must acknowledge the very real security concerns that Israel faces every single day. Let us be honest with ourselves: Israel is surrounded by neighbors that have waged repeated wars against it. Israel's citizens have been killed by rockets fired at their houses and suicide bombs on their buses. Israel's children come of age knowing that throughout the region, other children are taught to hate them. Israel, a small country of less than 8 million people, looks out at a world where leaders of much larger nations threaten to wipe it off the map. The Jewish people carried the burden of centuries of exile and persecution, and fresh memories of knowing that 6 million people were killed simply because of who they are. Those are facts. They cannot be denied. The Jewish people have forged a successful state in their historic homeland. Israel deserves recognition. It deserves normal relations with its neighbours. And friends of the Palestinians do them no favors by ignoring this truth, just as friends of Israel must recognize the need to pursue a two-state solution with a secure Israel next to an independent Palestine."

Then, for some strange reason, the following bit was omitted from the transcript: OK, OK. I can see you mongrels squirming in your seats. I can see your eyes rolling. I can hear you all groaning. (Not you of course, Australia and Canada. You go girls!) But I don't give a damn, OK? Cuz I'm Israel's bitch and I'm standing by my man and you bastards better get used to it! Seems you've all forgotten my performance of Stand By Your Man at the AIPAC shindig in May. Sit tight and I'll sing it again: "We know how difficult that search for security can be, especially for a small nation like Israel in a tough neighborhood. I've seen it firsthand. When I touched my hand against the Western wall and placed my prayer between its ancient stones, I thought of all the centuries that the children of Israel had longed to return to their ancient homeland. When I went to Sderot, I saw the daily struggle to survive in the eyes of an 8-year old boy who lost his legs to a Hamas rocket. And when I walked among the Hall of Names at Yad Vashem, I grasped the existential fear of Israelis when a modern dictator seeks nuclear weapons and threatens to wipe Israel off the map." (See my 27/5/11 post Obama: Feel the Love)

"That is the truth - each side has legitimate aspirations - and that's part of what makes peace so hard. And the deadlock will only be broken when each side learns to stand in the other's shoes; each side can see the world through the other's eyes. That's what we should be encouraging. That's what we should be encouraging. That's what we should be promoting. This body - founded, as it was, out of the ashes of war and genocide, dedicated, as it is, to the dignity of every single person - must recognise the reality that is lived by both the Palestinians and the Israelis. The measure of our actions must always be whether they advance the right of Israeli and Palestinian children to live lives of peace and security and dignity and opportunity. And we will only succeed in that effort if we can encourage the parties to sit down, to listen to each other, and to understand each other's hopes and each other's fears. That is the project to which America is committed. There are no shortcuts. And that is what the United Nations should be focused on in the weeks and months to come."

Zounds! Relationship counselling! Why didn't anybody think of this before? The man's a genius!

Israel's Win-Win at the UN

Palestinian-American academic Joseph Massad's essay, State of recognition (english.aljazeera.net, 15/9/11), is one of the best I've read on the Palestinian Authority's current bid for statehood through the UN.

He believes that whether the UN recognises a nominally PA-controlled but still Israeli-occupied Palestinian statelet or not, "either outcome will be in the interest of Israel."

Massad reminds us of the PA's dubious motives: "The ongoing Arab uprisings have raised Palestinian expectations about the necessity of ending the occupation and have challenged the modus vivendi the PA has with Israel. Furthermore, with the increase in Palestinian grassroots activism to resist the Israeli occupation, the PA has decided to shift the Palestinian struggle from popular mobilisation it will not be able to control, and which it fears could topple it, to the international legal arena. The PA hopes that this shift from the popular to the juridical will demobilise Palestinian political energies and displace them onto an arena that is less threatening to the survival of the PA itself."*

According to Massad, while the PA hopes statehood will better enable it to "challenge Israel internationally using legal instruments only available to member states to force it to grant 'independence'," the US would always use its Security Council veto to shield Israel from such challenges, something it has already done 41 times.

Moreover, Massad also believes that any new powers wielded by a PA-controlled, Israeli-occupied, UN-recognised 'Palestine' would come at an "enormous cost to the Palestinian people." He lists the negative implications of a successful UN vote as:

"(1) The PLO will cease to represent the Palestinian people at the UN, and the PA will replace it as their presumed state.

"(2) The PLO, which represents all Palestinians (about 12 million people in historic Palestine and in the diaspora), and was recognised as their sole representative at the UN in 1974, will be truncated to the PA, which represents only West Bank Palestinians (about 2 million people). Incidentally, this was the vision presented by the infamous Geneva Accords that went nowhere.

"(3) It will politically weaken Palestinian refugees' right to return to their homes and be compensated, as stipulated in UN resolutions. The PA does not represent the refugees, even though it claims to represent their 'hopes' of establishing a Palestinian state at their expense. Indeed, some international legal experts fear it could even abrogate the Palestinian right of return altogether. It will also forfeit the rights of Palestinian citizens living in Israel who face institutional and legal racism in the Israeli state, as it presents them with a fait accompli of the existence of the Palestinian state (its phantasmatic nature not withstanding). This will only give credence to Israeli claims that the Jews have a state and the Palestinians now have one too and if Palestinians citizens of Israel were unhappy, or even if they were happy, with their third-class status in Israel, they should move or can be forced to move to the Palestinian state at any rate.

"(4) Israel could ostensibly come around soon after a UN vote in favour of Palestinian statehood and inform the PA that the territories it now controls (a small fraction of the West Bank) is all the territory Israel will concede and that this will be the territorial basis of the Palestinian state. The Israelis do not tire of reminding the PA that the Palestinians will not have sovereignty, an army, control of their borders, control of their water resources, control over the number of refugees it could allow back, or even jurisdiction over Jewish colonial settlers. Indeed, the Israelis have already obtained UN assurances about their right to 'defend themselves' and to preserve their security with whatever means they think are necessary to achieve these goals. In short, the PA will have the exact same Bantustan state that Israel and the US have been promising to grant it for two decades!.

"(5) The US and Israel could also, through their many allies, inject a language of 'compromise' in the projected UN recognition of the PA state, stipulating that such a state must exist peacefully side by side with the 'Jewish State' of Israel. This would in turn exact a precious UN recognition of Israel's 'right' to be a Jewish state, which the UN and the international community, the US excepted, have refused to recognize thus far. This will directly link the UN recognition of a phantasmatic non-existent Palestinian state to UN recognition of an actually existing state of Israel that discriminatews legally and institutionally against non-Jews as a 'Jewish state'.

"(6) The US and Israel will insist after a positive vote that, while the PA is right to make certain political demands as a member state, it would have to abrogate its recent reconciliation agreement with Hamas. Additionally, sanctions could befall the PA state itself for associating with Hamas, which the US and Israel consider a terrorist group. The US Congress has already threatened to punish the PA and will not hesitate to urge the Obama administration to add Palestine to its list of 'State Sponsors of Terrorism' along with Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria."

All that will advance Israeli interests, says Massad, but so too will "a US veto, and/or the ability of the US to pressure and twist the arms of tens of countries around the world to reject the bid of the PA in the General Assembly, resulting in failure to recognise PA statehood." This will mean a return to "the unending 'peace process'," during which a stroppier US "will continue to push for PA and Arab recognition of Israel as a 'Jewish state' that has the right to discriminate by law against non-Jews in exchange for an ever-deferred recognition of a Palestinian Bantustan as an 'economically viable' Palestinian state - a place where Palestinian neoliberal businessmen can make profits off international aid and investment."

Massad concludes that "either outcome will keep the Palestinian people colonised, discriminated against, oppressed, and exiled. This entire brouhaha over the UN vote is ultimately about which of the two scenarios is better for Israeli interests."

[*"Israel has given approval for the PA to equip its security forces with riot-control gear, such as tear gas grenades and rubber bullets. The PA has approached Israeli firms to buy such equipment in advance of expected demonstrations on the West Bank around the Palestinian's request for UN recognition as an independent state." (Israel okays acquisition of anti-riot gear ahead of UN vote, Amos Harel, Haaretz, 15/9/11)]

What the Lamp Post Heard

Here's Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, setting us right on the terribly misunderstood inhabitants of the Middle East's only democracy:

"That Israel of the Western mind (and indeed of the Arab mind) is a hateful place: right-wing, militaristic, authoritarian, racist, ultra-religious, neo-colonial, narrow-minded, undemocratic, indifferent to world opinion, indifferent especially to Palestinian suffering. Yet the Israel I know is mostly secular, raucously, almost wildly democratic, has a vibrant left wing, having founded in the kibbutz movement one of the only successful experiments in socialism in human history. It is intellectually disputatious; any two Israelis will have three opinions and be happy to argue them to a lamp post. It is multi-ethnic, there is a great stress on human solidarity, there is due process. And I've never heard an Israeli speak casually about the value of Palestinian life. I've heard Israelis voice a desire to neutralise Hezbollah or remove Hamas from leadership in Gaza, but I've never in any context heard an Israeli express the view that the value of a human life is determined by race." (Israel still looks good, warts & all, The Australian, 6/5/09)

Now that lamp post he mentioned intrigues me. I got to wondering just what sort of intellectual disputations it was soaking up these days?

Could it be, perhaps, something like the following discussion, taken from the comment thread on the Netanyahu speech (quoted in my last post) over at the Israpundit website?

Two of Greg's vibrant Israeli leftists, Yamit82 and Elliot, are taking a short break from Building Socialism on Kibbutz Karl Marx, to engage in deep intellectual disputation (in the vicinity of said lamp post) on the best way to achieve peace in the area and whether their prime minister should maybe go the extra mile to get there. Their opinions, of course, are naturally extraordinarily varied, and it goes without saying that they ooze compassion with, and solidarity for, suffering humanity, particularly the Palestinians:

yamit82: I feel like vomiting over BB, the groveling ass kisser. Italy as we have learned is the largest violator of sanctions against Iran, except Germany. Not a word about the rise of antisemitism and anti-Israel boycotts in Italy. No mention of Shalit and Pollard's release as a precondition to even sit down with the maggots...

Elliot: So, Yamit, what exactly should your idea of a PM of Israel do? ... With all of the talk, Israel has been taken in by the talkers. The boundaries of discussion are only the terms of Israel's 'piecemeal surrender for false peace'. If war is the only way to reset the dialogue, then what strategy would you endorse? It's like finding oneself on a dark street with a gang of thugs coming to kill you. They taunt and threaten. Strategy A - Go for the biggest thug or the leader of the wolfpack and utterly destroy him. (Would that be Iran or Obama?) The followers will back down. Strategy B - Take out the closest perps (Hamas & Hezbollah) so that those further away will keep their distance. Strategy C - Wait long enough and let them attack one another. Strategy D - Repent and call upon the Lord of Hosts. Praying Psalm 83 for Israel. With Bibi entertaining the babblers they'll never see it coming! Like David among the Philistines Samuel 1:21. I'm not sure how and when we'll get there, but Micah 4:13 will happen in our day! 'Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass: and thou shalt beat in pieces many people: and I will consecrate their gain unto the L-RD, and their substance unto the L-RD of the whole earth'. Weakness incites the sons of Amalek. Weakness is lacking the means to destroy them, OR having the means, but lacking the will! Beware that Obama has been consistently inciting Israel's neighbours to expect land and ultimately all of a united Palestine sans Israel. It is a sad day for America when it falls into the hands of a wrathful G-d.

yamit82: My idea of a PM is one who is G-d fearing. He needn't be observant, but G-d fearing. That means he should fear G-d and not man. Diplomatically, he should accept negotiations, go to where they're held, say NO!!! and then return HOME!

Come Dance With Me

"Peace will only come from negotiations. It will be a negotiated peace. It cannot be imposed from the outside - not by any power and certainly not by one-sided UN resolutions. Peace requires negotiations. It requires mutual compromise. Palestinians compromise; Israel compromises; we both compromise. We're prepared to do so, but to do that, you need a negotiation. But a UN fiat, a UN declaration that is one-sided, would do several things. First it would violate the agreements between the Palestinians and Israel, but it would also harden the Palestinian position, because if the UN General Assembly adopts the Palestinian positions in advance of negotiations, why should they negotiate? So such a resolution, if backed by an overwhelming majority including the leading countries of the world, that could actually push peace back by hardening Palestinian positions, by pushing negotiations further away. So I think anyone who is interested in advancing peace will opt for direct negotiations and will oppose the attempt to impose a peace from the outside." (Benjamin Netanyahu, Joint press conference with PM Berlusconi of Italy, 13/6/11)

"Dominant male white Zionist Entity seeks partner for one-sided conflict resolution. I am powerful and fixated, yet profoundly complex and achingly poetic. You must be servile, desperate and repugnant to everyone. I love long, romantic walks on your land, sipping water from your aquifers, winter rain on a checkpoint, all-night talks about why I won't talk, reviewing combat errors and window-shopping. You adore construction and fruit-picking. Turn-offs - non-Jewish head coverings, non-Jewish falafel and non-Jews. Come, let's make a lasting arrangement with deep tunnels and soaring walls. Explore with me the small and crowded spaces that will be your home. We'll dance madly to Hatikvah as we say farewell! (Dov Weisglass* says, 'No fatties!)" (Circus Israel personals, circusisrael.blogspot.com, 5/3/08)

[* "The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet but not to make them die of hunger." Senior government adviser Dov Weisglass explaining Israel's stranglehold on Gaza following the election of a Hamas government there in 2006.]