Mr. wiesel can you explain the extraordinary lies about the Israeli conflict ,coming from the Arab and Palestinian world with the conflict of the world media ? the voices against the libels of Al Dura and Pallywood are very weak. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_B1H-1opys#IIfAj_eg2EE

Timothy Geithner has to Go.

He is a smooth salesman who got a Selling Job becasue of connections. Obama cannot tolerate him appearing alone in front of the Press.

Timothy Geithner is Henry Paulson, Jr.

My father was a physician during WW2-he was at DDay, Battle of the Bulge and the liberation of Buchenwald.
He said that upon liberation-there was no excitment by the inmates-very very quiet, since everyone was starving and weak. Unfortunately my father passed away just before I read “Night”. I wanted to tell him about Mr. Wiesel’s account of his experiences. I have his accounts on film and since whe was an avid photographer, I have photos of the “Camp”. He was also in charge of identifying the cause of death of many bodies that were buried or stacked. I appreiate Mr. Wiesel’s speaking out and sharing. It needs to be done-
Thank you.

I was very disappointed to hear Mr Wiesel’s position on the recent Israeli attack on Gaza. He simply repeated the standard talking points justifying Israel’s behavior. And this just minutes after saying that every time a child dies anywhere is a tragedy. What about the 3-400 Palestinian children recently blown to bits, crushed in their homes, burned alive, or shot to death by Israeli forces?

I expected more compassion and nuance from a man as eloquent as Mr Wiesel and who has endured the suffering that he has.

I greatly respect the Jewish people’s suffering before and during WWII. But compared to the others races in the world who also suffered genocide and the rest, the Jewish population seems to be the least able to let go of the past(I am not saying that we should not acknowledge and bring justice to the terrible atrocities) and move forward. For some reason, I always sense this kind of ” our suffering is more worthy than yours” mentality from many Jewish people that I came across.

I ask Tom Ashbrook to have Eli Wiesel on again sepcifically to discuss his idea of convening a group of Nobel Laureates to go to Gaza and witness the effects of the latest Israeli incursion.
I have trouble with how he, as a moral authority in the Jewish community, indeed the world, who experienced forced expulsion from his home and horrible atrocities can turn a blind eye to the explusion of so many Palestinians and their ongoing subjugations by the Israeli government right now?
How can he say he doesn’t believe in collective punishment when the whole population of Gaza and the West Bank is being collectively punished by the state of Israel ? We need him to speak out publically to the world, not just behind closed doors to the Israeli leadership. This could be the most daring, most truthful act of courage of his entire lifetime.

I’ve long heard of Mr. Wiesel, but have never read any of his books or heard him speak. He surprised me three times:

1 — He corrected a caller for calling him Mr. “W”eisel, rather than “V”eisel. Yet, in spite of living in the US for many decades, he frequently mispronounces English words starting with “W”

2 — Mr. Wiesel expressed that he couldn’t ever forgive Mr. Madoff, and wanted the harshest punishment possible for him. I guess $$ means a lot to Mr. Wiesel.

3 — Apparently no one has explained to Mr. Wiesel that Mr. Madoff personally has relatively little of the $50 billion that has been lost. Most of the $$ was paid as interest to investors like Mr. Wiesel himself.

I see nothing wrong with resorting to double standards. Another name for a double standard is taking your side and fighting for it. I am on the side of Israel, and not on the side of Hamas. Simple.

4allhumanrights . If you are a so called human right activist , you should genuinely investigate what is really going on in the pal/Israeli conflict . Of course Mr. Wiesel did not answer your question because you did not get the answer you wanted to hear . Mr. Wiesel is well aware of the media distortion against Israel . Can you tell me why you so called activists have never called into question the fabricated lies that the Palestinians have made with the Al Dura lying fiasco ,which went to court in France , (and there are many more ) which was the cause of many anti-Semitic incidents including the death of journalist Daniel Pearl who was decapitated on the Internet . The numbers that were given by the Palestinians so called killed in the last war in Gaza cannot be believed by people who lie and constantly inflate the number of dead in order to use and get the world attention to pity them . The Italian reputable newspaper “Corriere Della Serra” published an article disputing the numbers of death to 500 mostly were hamas fighters . You so called human right activists by perpetuating the lies of the Palestinians you are continuing the suffering of not only the innocent Palestinians but also the Israelis Jews and Arabs who are victims of terrorist conflicts . Why are you not outraged by Hamas using civilians as shields? ……They have absolutely no excuse for doing this. Mr. Wiesel said that Israel has a right to defend itself . So called human right activist If you don’t make an effort to educate yourself in this then you either don’t really care about all the innocent people caught up in this conflict or you are a fool. Listern to Mr. Landes History professor at Boston University talking about PALLYWOOD.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eww7BkkvFdo&feature=related

WBUR …..How about a show on the almost 1 million Jews (more than palestinians who left thinking jews were going to be massacred )kicked out of Arab countries all their possessions confiscated as they were made refugees in tents in Israel ? why has the United Nation and the world not want to recognise these refugees that make up 50% of Israeli population ……lets have a show on these “FORGOTTEN REFUGEES”

WHY IS THE MEDIA QUIET ON THIS WELL KEPT SECRET?

Dear Tom Ashbrook,

I am writing in regard to your radio show today with guest Elie Wiesel.

I find it absolutely unconscionable for Wiesel as a victim and writer
of Nazi oppression to justify Israel’s savage air and ground assault
on Gaza which left hundreds of civilians dead, including women and
children and police cadets and thousands of others wounded, count-
less homeless and Gaza’s infrastructure and lives in utter shambles.

Like, so many people around the world I have been in utter despair
looking at pictures and hearing about the devastation the Israeli army
inflicted on this defenseless population, whose members are over 50%
under the age of 17 years and already traumatized by years of the
Israeli Army’s occupation on their land. Here is Dr Alice Rothchild on
her visit to Gaza in 2005:

“We witnessed the devastating consequences for the civilian population
of years of Israeli military operations. The checkpoints, closures and the
severe restriction on movement and economic activity have contributed
to rising unemployment, poverty accompanied by unusually high rates of
infant mortality, acute and chronic malnutrition and inadequate outpatient
and hospital care.

At the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, Dr. Eyad el Sarraj spoke
of an entire population suffering from the symptoms of post traumatic
stress disorder, anxiety and depression, a consequence of high unemploy-
ment, extreme poverty and massive exposure to violence.

A recent study by the program of 10 to 19-year olds in Gaza found that two thirds have seen a friend or neighbor killed or wounded, more than one third have been tear-gassed and 82 percent suffer from moderate to severe PTSD We know that the more trauma and violence occur in a child’s youth, the more risk-taking and violence happen in later life.” http://www.vopjip.org/issues93.htm )

Indeed, I feel it was pure evil for the Israeli Army to attack such a fragile and young population and I hope the UN and the International Criminal Court will hold those Israelis involved guilty of the most atrocious war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Today, Elie Wiesel not only discredits himself as a Holocaust survivor but also
its victims. It’s immoral to side with oppressors and as the American internat-
ional law professor , Dr. George Bisharat recently pointed out in his Wall Street Journal editorial, Israeli officials and their commanders cannot justify their military action based on self-defense either:

“On June 19, 2008, Hamas and Israel commenced a six-month truce.
Neither side complied perfectly. Israel refused to substantially ease the
suffocating siege of Gaza imposed in June 2007. Hamas permitted spo-
radic rocket fire — typically after Israel killed or seized Hamas members
in the West Bank, where the truce did not apply. Either one or no Israelis
were killed (reports differ) by rockets in the half year leading up to the
current attack.

Israel then broke the truce on Nov. 4, raiding the Gaza Strip and killing a Palestinian. Hamas retaliated with rocket fire; Israel then killed five more Palestinians. In the following days, Hamas continued rocket fire — yet still
no Israelis died. Israel cannot claim self-defense against this escalation,
because it was provoked by Israel’s own violation.”
(http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123154826952369919.html )

In addition, I can’t see how Elie Wiesel can side-step Israel’s cruel and criminal blockade of the Gaza Strip as the root source of the rocket fire as Dr, Bisharat pointed out.

Even a small animal such as a bird will fight for its right to fly and be free.
Hence, it seems resistance to the will of others is ingrained in all the species
and Israel’s occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people is a disgrace
to the Human Race.

It’s little wonder the Rght to Resist an invading force or foreign force is lawful under international law and all the international Human Rights groups , includ-
ing the International Red Cross who have condemned Israel’s aggression and control of the Gaza Strip and territories as denying the Palestinian people the right to a normal and dignified life in their own land.

Indeed, a panel of fourteen justices at the International Court of Justice in the Hague ruled unanimously in 2004, Israel must remove its forces from the territories in accordance with UN Security Resolution of 1967, and it must dis-mantle and “void” all its structures which are in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Hence, Elie Wiesel is not only on the wrong side of history today with his apology for the colonial regime in Israel and the territories but he is also on the wrong side of the law and human rights as a result.

Doris Cadigan, Massachusetts

PS: To anyone considering replying to R.M.’s freakout, please don’t. As the saying goes, ‘don’t feed the trolls’.

to so called human being ..Do you really think for yourself ..do you really know what hamas stands for ? let me know the ways ……

R.M.
I don’t think it’s over the top to say that your comments shows how much you are one of those many millions of Jews who just simply wouldn’t not and couldn’t let go and forgive. By the way, even many well-known Jewish figures themselves have acknowledged the fact that the Holocaust has indeed become an industry and excuse for many who either experienced through it or NOT to truly forgive and let go. Being able to recognize this doesn’t make your a NAZI( and you should know, there are many around the world who are not of German ancestry still doing the same thing to torture and destroy as we speak). I wish there were more with the courage to point that out!!!

Mr. Wiesel speaks eloquently of his mission to sensitize himself to “the other” so as to understand and show compassion for the other’s suffering. Unfortunately, his desire to understand “the other” does not extend to millions of innocent Palestinian civilians who have suffered for years under a brutal Occupation.

He also says he believes that whenever a child dies anywhere in the world, we should not look into his pocket for an I.D.–that “a child is a child.” Again, I fear that his compassion does not extend to Palestinian children, else how could he not speak out against the deaths of so many children in the recent Israeli incursions into Gaza? I wish that he would address his own question–”Why kill children?–to the state of Israel.

Finally, he speaks of the need to teach Israeli children “how to find shelter in 20 seconds” to escape Hamas rockets. What, I would like to know, would he teach Palestinian children who don’t even have shelter to run to–to escape Israeli bombs?

Parsley ..”How would you know if I am Jewish or not ….you assume I am …..Do you know me ? I am pretty well aware of your pathetic”hero” Norman Finkelstein . Why do you quote others …. why don’t you say it yourself : “the holocaust has become an industry” . I think maybe you should tell the Arab who commit murder by suicide bombing to “forgive” Now that would be real Christian wouldn’t it ?…Have you ever seen a Jew kill Germans after and because of the holocaust ? No!!! …..And they had a real reason to do it ..No they just went and remade their broken lives wherever they could ..Now that’s forgiving ……….Why do you assume I am attacking , I am just answering your misinformation .like it or not that’s all it is …..maybe you take it as an attack ….that’s your problem…..

Some day American Jews may take a cold public look at the leaping and creeping theft of land by which Israelis have secured themselves a country. And under the moral cloak of the Holocaust too; which makes it doubly bad. But not yet…. Mr Weisel, a broad thinker, unaccountably passes up the big question to tit-for-tat over Gaza, whose residents (no, they’re not all gunmen) really got the short end of the stick.

Another hero with feet of clay. I’m depressed and disappointed. I guess I won’t be reading his books any time soon.

Thank you Mr Ashbrook, for your show. As always, it’s a learning experience.

Dear Mr. Tom Ashbrook;

I left a comment on this page before. If you are too busy to read my comment entirely, I suggest that you at least read parts No. 2 and 5.

Please feel free to contact me directly at the given email.

Thanks.

>> Ali

Rockets, Rockets, Rockets that fired from Gaza to Ashkelon – mentioned by Elie.

Let’s see the connection between the people in Gaza and the town of Ashkelon. Please read the area where it is explaning what happened around 1948-1950: http://www.HumanGenome.org/ashkelon.htm

And then ask yourself – what is Ethnic Cleansing?

hi

Yes RM, I’m glad I have Jewish friends too, some of the best people I could ever hope to meet, and lots of relatives. Some of them are also Holocaust survivors. None of them are supporters of what Israel has done, or is doing to the Palestinians. The Holocaust survivors do not support Israel at all.

I read Gideon Levy’s articles and other Israeli journalists at Haaretz, which give you a different view from the official American line. I recommend Avraham Burg’s book “The Holocaust Is Over: We Must Rise from its Ashes.” He’s a former speaker of the Knesset, who pretty much agrees with Normal Finkelstein (who by the way has been banned from Israel — some democracy!)

The connection you make between the Jewish holocaust and the holocaust of slavery is an odd one. Jews were not vicitimized by Palestinians, it’s the other way round! It wasn’t Palestinians who created the Holocaust it was Germans! and Israel has a very friendly relationship with that country. But one thing that’s rarely mentioned is that Israelis sometimes express a displaced rage against Palestinians, as though they were Germans. Jeffrey Goldberg, an American who chose to work as an Israeli prison guard, admitted this when he wrote about beating Palestinian prisoners as though he were venting his rage against Germans for the Holocaust.

To connect Israeli’s struggle with the Palestinians to the African American experience is totally misleading, and don’t forget many, if not most Blacks support the Palestinians as they can identify with their oppression.

Though they would have been fully justified, African Americans have rarely retaliated against the whites who enslaved and oppressed them for six centuries. But like Palestinians under the Occupation, they still await an honest admission of their history. There’s a recent article in Haaretz about the dishonest myths Israeli schoolchildren are being taught and how that’s turning them into little Avigdor Lieberman supporters.

Oops, that link didn’t parse correctly. Here is another:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Troll

Don’t feed them.

Dear Ali from Boston,

When I heard this show on NPR it was recorded from earlier in the day. I was pulling my hair out because I desperately wanted to call in and comment on Gaza and ask Mr Wiesel if he shares the opinion of Avi Shlaim, International Israeli scholar on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict who has harsh criticism for the Israeli govt. But since I am on the West Coast, I missed my chance.

I have been reading Dr Norman Finkelstein’s “Beyond Chutzpah” and I daily read Democracy Now by Amy Goodman and the plentyfull qualified people who have come out against the actions of the Israeli govt.

I was thrilled when you asked your question however was not surprised about Mr Wiesels commentary and difficulty of staying on topic.

His answer confirmed Dr Finkelsteins observations about Elie Wiesel and are giving great validity to this book “Beyond Chutzpah”

I posted the link to this interview on Queen Rania’s channel on YT and I also posted your commentary above with your name.

for all of you who believe everything you see :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfFWr8hxh3I

Lots antisemites attacking Wiesel because he don’t subscribe to their hateful views of Israel.

They want him to repeat their own Jew hating talking points.

Disgusting.

You people make me angry you have learned nothing from the Holcaust and are looking for the destruction of the only Jewish State in the world.

“I have been reading Dr Norman Finkelstein’s “Beyond Chutzpah” Maria from wherever

Have you also Read Drshowitz’ book? I doubt it.

Norman F is a lying Jew hater who has been fired from every teaching job he ever held.

his books have never been peer reivewed and he appeals mainly to antisemites like yourself.

(I wonder if this page made it to Megaphone or something similar?)

Susan, Sabato, and Robbins,

Being disappointed in Elie Wiesel’s apparent lack of empathy for Palestinian suffering is not antisemitic. Opposing the actions of the Israeli government and army is not antisemitic.

Antisemitism, like all forms of racism, is a real problem. Calling people you disagree with antisemitic diminishes real injustice.

Doris Cadigan you have posted a pack of antisemitic lies.

Do you expect people to believe that everyone in a soccer stadium chanted that song you made up?

Give me a break.

The rest of your obscene post is equally preposterous.

More on Gaza:

“Puzzled in Gaza”

Mar. 2, 2009

YVONNE GREEN

“I’m a poet, an English Jew and a frequent visitor to Israel. Deeply disturbed by the reports of wanton slaughter and destruction during Operation Cast Lead, I felt I had to see for myself. I flew to Tel Aviv and on Wednesday, January 28, using my press card to cross the Erez checkpoint, I walked across the border into Gaza where I was met by my guide, a Palestinian journalist. He asked if I wanted to meet with Hamas officials. I explained that I’d come to bear witness to the damage and civilian suffering, not to talk politics.

What I saw was that there had been precision attacks made on all of Hamas’ infrastructure. Does UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon criticize the surgical destruction of the explosives cache in the Imad Akhel Mosque, of the National Forces compound, of the Shi Jaya police station, of the Ministry of Prisoners? The Gazans I met weren’t mourning the police state. Neither were they radicalized. As Hamas blackshirts menaced the street corners, I witnessed how passersby ignored them.

THERE WERE empty beds at Shifa Hospital and a threatening atmosphere. Hamas is reduced to wielding its unchallengeable authority from extensive air raid shelters which, together with the hospital, were built by Israel 30 years ago. Terrorized Gazans used doublespeak when they told me most of the alleged 5,500 wounded were being treated in Egypt and Jordan. They want it known that the figure is a lie, and showed me that the wounded weren’t in Gaza. No evidence exists of their presence in foreign hospitals, or of how they might have gotten there.

From the mansions of the Abu Ayida family at Jebala Rayes to Tallel Howa (Gaza City’s densest residential area), Gazans contradicted allegations that Israel had murderously attacked civilians. They told me again and again that both civilians and Hamas fighters had evacuated safely from areas of Hamas activity in response to Israeli telephone calls, leaflets and megaphone warnings.

Seeing Al-Fakhora made it impossible to understand how UN and press reports could ever have alleged that the UNWRA school had been hit by Israeli shells. The school, like most of Gaza, was visibly intact. I was shown where Hamas had been firing from nearby, and the Israeli missile’s marks on the road outside the school were unmistakeable. When I met Mona al-Ashkor, one of the 40 people injured running toward Al-Fakhora – rather than inside it as widely and persistently reported – I was told that Israel had warned people not to take shelter in the school because Hamas was operating in the area, and that some people had ignored the warning because UNWRA previously told them that the school would be safe. Press reports that fatalities numbered 40 were denied….”

Read it all:

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1235898327903&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter

If people like good greif and the antisemite doris cadgian don’t want to listen to Wiesel they should listen to this guy:

“Giles Fraser: Why is the Left so anti-Jewish”

“Anti-Semitic attacks are rising again. The proximate cause seems to have been the Israeli action in Gaza. Since then, the Community Security Trust — the body that monitors these things — has noted an eight­fold increase in anti-Semitic incidents in Britain.

Perhaps I ought to make clear that I am no apologist for the Israeli action in Gaza. I have spent time with the children the Israeli jets were dropping bombs on. I have been shot at by the Israeli army in Gaza. Yet I still think that some (not all) of the criticism that Israel receives is criti­cism that is looking for any and every opportunity to express itself. This is not just criticism from Israel’s en­emies in the Arab world, or from right-wing racists, but also criticism from the Left.

The phenomenon of left-wing anti-Semitism is a puzzle to many. Indeed, some deny its very existence. Yet, from the origins of the Left, there have been those that have tapped into this most ancient of prejudices. Marx himself, though Jewish, bought into a wildly anti-Semitic caricature of the Jew as a greedy capitalist usurer.

Karl Kautsky, one of the leading exponents of orthodox Marxism, argued that: “We cannot say we have completely emerged from the Middle Ages as long as Judaism still exists among us. The sooner it disappears, the better it will be.”

Of course, no one on the Left would dream of saying such a thing these days, but many argue that this anti-Semitic prejudice has morphed into the rhetoric of anti-Zionism. An attack on the State of Israel is some­times code for an attack on Jews.

This is tricky stuff, for the state of Israel sometimes genuinely deserves criticism, just as other states some­times do. But the Left’s repeated attacks on Israel, and the specific targeting of Israeli actions whatever they are, add up to a form of socially acceptable anti-Semitism. And what no one, to my knowledge, has sug­gested is that one of the root causes of this is the blind spot of much of the Left concerning religion.

Like it or not, the very identity and existence of the State of Israel is bound up with Judaism. Israel makes no sense without the Hebrew scrip­tures. But, because a large part of the Left has so wedded itself to the belief that progress comes with secularisa­tion, it cannot accept a religious explanation for anything; so it immediately thinks of it as a form of prejudice. It is significant that Kaut­sky was a virulent anti-religionist, also writing a book condemning Christianity.

Of course, Christians invented anti-Semitism. But I suspect that unless the Left finds some accom­modation with religion, it will never escape the grip of this most ancient of evils.”

http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/content.asp?id=70749

This web site and this radio station is a perfect example of what Giles Fraser is talking about.

From a British web site that fights antisemitism.

On the humanity and inhumanity of Jews:

“Time to invoke Shylock in defence of Israel” – Eric Lee

“I call it “my Shylock moment” and it’s happening more and more. I’ve had the opportunity three times in the last few weeks to represent the Israeli point of view in public debates. As you can imagine, it’s not an easy task. The audiences — two British universities and at a TV studio in London — are overwhelmingly hostile.

The questions repeat themselves, as do my answers. And every time, there’s one person whose question is a little bit different; this is what triggers the Shylock moment.

The questioner will speak softly. Their face will show real concern, even pain. And what you’ll hear is not an accusation, but a real question, because the person is genuinely confused.

They will say something like this: “I’ve been watching the scenes from Gaza on TV. I’ve seen small children standing in front of the ruins of their homes. I’ve seen parents weeping over the loss of their children. And I can’t understand how you can see all this and still support Israel.”

Obviously when these words come from some propagandist for Hamas they’re designed to deceive. But sometimes it’s a genuine question and deserves a fair answer. When it happens, I find the whole room full of people disappears before my eyes and I focus directly on the person who spoke.

I pause for a moment, not for effect, but to think through what is probably the most important answer I will have to give in an evening full of difficult questions and more difficult answers.

What I need to explain to this person is not so much the tactics and strategy of the Israeli army, or the history of the conflict — I’ll have other chances to do this — but something far more difficult, something that is at the heart of the problem. I need to convince them, first and foremost, that we Jews are actually human.

I realize this sounds like a wild exaggeration — until you’ve come face to face with this kind of audience and this kind of question.

In Britain — particularly on university campuses — we are facing a rising tide of antisemitism. And antisemitism denies the humanity of the Jew. When we confront it, our job is first of all to establish our credentials as members of the same species as the audience.

We need to prove that we share their DNA.

I always begin my answer with a series of negatives. We are not monsters, I say. We do not lack empathy. We are no less horrified than you when we see the needless death and destruction in Gaza. We are not immune to the feelings that you feel.

And when I say these words, I look carefully at the face of the questioner. If I look around, trying to gauge audience reaction to my words, I stop.

I’m looking at one person and talking only to him or her. And I find that sometimes, if I get it right, I get a sign of recognition; a sense that my words are getting through.

Of course I am delighted that I can persuade some people that we Jews are not monsters, that — like them — we want to live in peace and we abhor war. In doing so, I’ve done my bit for Israel and can sleep well at night.

But I also feel like I’m re-enacting the most famous “defence” of being Jewish ever written — Shylock’s monologue in the Merchant of Venice.

I find myself telling student audiences in Britain in 2009 that we Jews are “fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons” as they are. And that if you prick us, we will bleed. And if you poison us, we will die. And it’s not just rhetoric – we really have bled and we really have been poisoned.

Appearing before hostile audiences in Britain today requires us not only to defend or explain certain Israeli actions, but to defend our very humanity. Just as Shylock was forced to do.

Yes, things really are that bad.”

http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2009/03/13/shylock/

One does not have to read these interminable posts and counter-posts (please, try to be succinct)to contemplate the basic inhumanity on both sides of the conflict. I refer to Hamas rockets fired into Israeli towns, and also to Israeli bombs dropped on innocent civilians.

The general tone and tenor of the comments recorded here simply underscore the basic fact that ‘On Point’ listeners, like politicians and pundits, either love or hate virtually everything Israel does. Moreover, neither side likes to hear what the other side is saying–because each side thinks it holds the truth.

So, where are we?

humanbeing , no one is saying you are an antisemite , its only what you are repeating that is antisemitic . what you don’t seem to see is that you are just repeating misinformation that others tell you instead of investigating for yourself . There are many lies being made as truth and history being rewritten . I suggest you watch this documentary : Road to Jenin by Pierre Rehov….
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3079049095214906504
The Palestinians are not as innocent as they pretend to be …

Doris Cadigan, Massachusetts

right on, dont let them try and silence u by calling u names to end debate about Israel’s actions.

let the truth ring in they hollow ears and what they wish not to admit.

and the truth shall set us free.

“It’s just that when someone disingenuously throws around ‘antisemite’, I stop reading their post.” Posted by A Human Being

So you are “human being” and those that disagree with you are what ‘human beens?”

Give me a break you know very well that much of the nonsense posted here by Doris Cadigan and ‘mike” is antisemitic trash.

I don’t care if you are an antisemite or not just have the guts to say so outloud.

Unless of course you are a moron and don’t know what you are saying.

“Dont believe me u can just google or youtube it and see old man, women, children. Along with israel indoctrinating its citizens into the military and fliers sent from rabies stating gazans where animals.” Mike

You are drooling, you Jew hating boob.
Callign Rabbis “rabies” this must be a Nazi talking point.

Most of the antiIsrael videos on you tube are fake were produced in order to defame Jews.

Why dont’ you link to some of these videos and let readers here see how fake they are?

You are a real prize mike.

To reach any kind of a meaningful consenus about Elie Wiesel’s defense
of Israel and its savage attack on Gaza and the anger/despair of the
Palestinian people (and those around the world today) one has to return
to the root cause of this conflict.

Both Thodore Herzl and later Ben Gurion expressed a desire to take hold
of the Palestinian peoples’ ancestorial homeland and make it their own.

““We should try to spirit the penniless Arab population across the
borders by procuring employ-ment for it in transit countries, while
denyin g it any employment in our own country.Both the process of
expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out
discreetly and circum-spectly.” Theodore Herzl , 1895

“We take now what the UN gives us, later we take the rest.” Ben Gurion,
1947 upon receiving the UN partition of Palestine.

Hence it was no accident but by sheer design that Zionist gangs took to
terrorizing Palestinians in their homes and villages prior to 1948 and
uprooted over 750,000 people from their homes and razed some 500
Palestinian villages and refused to allow them to return to “their homes”
as stated in UN Resolution 194. (A precondition of Israel’s membership in
the UN, the other accepting a full fledged sovereign Palestinian state.)

And by the way repeating this whole shocking scenario in 1967 when the
Israeli army invaded the territories and shot people on sight, burned them
out of their homes and confiscation land and declared martial law. However,
this time the Palestinian people decided to stay rather than flee. (please listen
to this awarding eye witness account by Salman Abu Sitta who was 10 yrs old
at the time and note how he says they “destroyed my life” ever since.
( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJrW-BhgMx0 )

Now the Palestinian people are being asked to accept this injustice and
recognize “Israel’s right to exist” on their land and I should add beyond
the 1947 partition line and indeed the Green line of 1967 while Israel
fails to recognize and respect the Palestinian peoples’ right to exist on
their own land.

Yet as the writer John V. Whitbeck notes the Palestinian people have
their pride and the current demands that they recognize the presence of
a colonial power right to exist is unprecedented in history. In addition,
he notes there is a big difference between asking the Palestinian people to “recognizing Israel’s existence” and “Israel’s right to exist.” Please note his following text:

“There is an enormous difference between “recognizing Israel’s existence”
and “recognizing Israel’s right to exist.” From a Palestinian perspective, the difference is in the same league as the difference between asking a Jew to acknowledge that the Holocaust happened and asking him to concede that
the Holocaust was morally justified. For Palestinians to acknowledge the occurrence of the Nakba – the expulsion of the great majority of Palestini-
ans from their homeland bet ween 1947 and 1949 – is one thing. For them
to publicly concede that it was “right” for the Nakba to have happened
would be something else entirely. For the Jewish and Palestinian peoples, the Holocaust and the Nakba, respectively, represent catastrophes and injustices
on an unimaginable scale that can neither be forgotten nor forgiven.

To demand that Palestinians recognize “Israel’s right to exist” is to demand
that a people who have been treated as subhumans unworthy of basic human rights publicly proclaim that they are subhumans. It would imply Palestinians’ acceptance that they deserve what has been done and continues to be done to them. Even 19th-century US governments did not require the surviving native Americans to publicly proclaim the “rightness” of their ethnic cleansing by European colonists as a condition precedent to even discussing what sort of
land reservation they might receive. Nor did native Americans have to live under economic blockade and threat of starvation until they shed whatever pride they had left and conceded the point.”
( http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0202/p09s02-coop.html_

Hence the hypocrisy of US & EU officials and those in the US Congress begins
to show its true colors. Yet, until Israel fully recognizes the Palestinian peoples’ rights on an equal footing with its own and that includes getting out of the territories, removing its troops & settlers and allowing the Palestinian people
to return ” to their homes” (at least those who wish too. I believe 10% do. ) and compensating others for their property.

Hence nothing the Palestinians people can do do whether Israel considers it
right or wrong will justify Israel’s “right” to defend itself.

Finally, I wish to add I recall in one of Elie Wiesel’s books how he said he was
“still afraid” as a Jew and I don’t doubt his fear for one minute especially with
the rage that’s in the world today over Israel’s appalling mistreatment of the
the Palestinian people.

Thus I urge him and other Jewish leaders to come together realizing Jews
have no right to promote themselves on the backs of the Palestinian people
and their ancestorial homeland as it is a receipe for another national disaster.

I am sorry to be so blunt. Doris Cadigan, Massachusetts

Doris cadigan , where do you get all your fabricated lies?….They are just too fantastic …..If the arabs are so badly treated and facing a genocide as you say ….why is the arab population growing rapidly and is now 20% of israel have the best education (for women also )and health care and safety net in the middle east? ..The mythology you continue to make is absurd …don’t you think its about time to face reality and to finally grow up ? how about telling me why 1 million jews were kicked out of arab countries and made refugees and no one cares……Why do you care about the Arabs and not the jews?

Good Grief What slurs are you talking about ? Its a question of justice . If you don’t really know what is going on , and just repeating lies coming from people with agendas then the lies have to be stopped . How about working for something that is real . How about Darfur . Don’t you not wonder why there were millions of people in the streets for 500 hamas fighter killed in Gaza and no one seems to care about the millions of killed and raped victims in Darfur ? Think about it :The arabs have a goood propaganda war and their financing is reaching every corners of the earth …To say that Israel is expansionist is laughable . Have you seen the size of Israel compared to Arab countries ? Israel the size of new jersey. To make peace with Egypt the Sinai desert was given back .For Gaza in reward for peace got thousands of rockets …..If you can’t see this you can’t see anything….or you don’t want to see anything….

Israeli leaders and Israeli Basic Law define Israel as a Jewish state. In 1947-8 and again in 1967 non-Jews who were born inside Israel’s Green line fled from their homeland and villages and became refugees. Millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants are stateless and many live in refugee camps. About 75% of the people in Gaza are such refugees from villages inside what is now Israel. The Palestinian refugees want the right to return to inside Israel proper where they were born (or where the parents or grandparents of the children of refugees were born).

This is an individual human right,which no third party can waive, and it is explicitly upheld in the 13th Article of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “Everyone has a right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” This individual human right has nothing to do with state borders or sovereignty. This right has nothing to do with whether a person left their country voluntarily or involuntarily. But Israel denies Palestinian refugees their right of return for one reason only–they are not Jewish. Nothing said so far is controversial among people who seriously examine the facts, whether they are pro-Zionist or not.

The anger of Palestinians and their fellow Arabs or Muslims is anger at what they quite understandably view as the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their homeland for the purpose of creating (in 1948) and maintaining (today) at least an 80% Jewish population in Israel. Denying people their human rights in order to ensure that the “right” ethnic group is a majority in a country is indeed the practice that the phrase “ethnic cleansing” denotes.

Israel is based on the principle that it is a Jewish state. A Jewish state that purports to also be a democracy, as Israel does, requires a large Jewish majority and that is why Israel is committed to doing whatever is required, even practicing ethnic cleansing, to ensure a Jewish majority. Israeli leaders give the following justifications for the ethnic cleansing:

1. Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism in 1897 said, and most Zionists today believe, that: “All gentiles are, latently if not overtly, anti-Semitic and therefore Jews cannot be safe living among and as the equals of gentiles, but must have a ‘state of their own’–a Jewish state, and this is more important than the human rights of non-Jews.” [Note that the stereotype of all gentiles being anti-Semitic is itself an ethnic stereotype, one that is false by the way, as a true reading of European history makes clear.]

2. “Since the Palestinians fled from their homes inside what is now Israel _voluntarily_, they waive their right of return. [Note that this is a racist argument, since those who make it would never apply the same logic to, say, Americans who leave the United States voluntarily to take a vacation in Europe. Do they forfeit their right to return? Of course not. Then why do Palestinians?]

3. “Jews fled Arab countries and they are not allowed to return, so it’s an even swap.” [Ever hear of "two wrongs don't make a right?" Besides, we are talking about _individual_ human rights, not "group" rights. What would those who make this argument say if Germany denied German Jews who fled the Nazis their right of return on the grounds that some Germans living in non-German countries were not allowed to return? I doubt they would say, OK, it's an even swap. But if an argument only applies to Palestinians and not to Jews, then it is a racist argument...again.]

4. “Palestinians do not accept that Israel has a right to exist.” [So what? Saying "Israel has a right to exist" is equivalent to saying that "A Jewish state in Palestine has a right to exist," which in turn is equivalent to saying that "The ethnic cleansing of non-Jews from Israel that is required to make Israel a Jewish state with its Jewish majority population is justified." Palestinians should no more agree that their ethnic cleansing is right, than Jews should have had to agree that their treatment by the Nazis was right because the "Aryan state" had a right to exist. Should slaves in the ante-bellum American South have had to agree that the slave-based Confederacy had a right to exist?]

Those who support Israel’s policy of denying Palestinians their right of return must address the moral issue of ethnic cleansing. The rightness or wrongness of ethnic cleansing has nothing whatsoever to do with a) whether the BBC is biased, or b) whether some Palestinians are terrorists. Just as the bias of newspapers in the U.S. in 1860 had nothing to do with whether slavery should have been abolished. Just as the question of whether Nat Turner’s slave revolt was “terrorism” in 1831 when it killed 40 innocent white children had nothing whatever to do with whether slavery was morally right or wrong.

Israel uses violence against Palestinians to protect something that does not deserve to be protected–the ethnic cleansing carried out to ensure that Israel’s population is at least 80% Jewish. If Israel granted Palestinian refugees the same right of return (with compensation for property stolen from them) that Germany grants Jews who fled the Nazis, then the conflict in Israel/Palestine would be end. Those few Palestinians who still wanted to target violence against Jews would be considered anti-social criminals by the vast majority of Palestinians, and they would never be able to carry out such violence. Jews would be able to live in peace for a change.

But then the Zionist leaders, the generals and billionaires who dominate ordinary Jews and drive down their living standards (as the American upper class is doing to ordinary Americans) would no longer have the “bogeyman” of “Arab terrorists” with which to frighten ordinary Jews into obedience. This is one reason that the commonsense approach to settling the conflict is never implemented by those with real power. They don’t want peace. They want social control and domination of “their own” people, and this requires keeping “their own” people frightened of a foreign enemy. The ethnic cleansing of non-Jews from Israel does not benefit ordinary Jews; on the contrary it benefits the upper class ruling elite of Israel who use the ethnic cleansing to foment a “Jew versus non-Jew” Orwellian war of social control.

–John Spritzler (www.NewDemocracyWorld.org )

“Finally, I wish to add I recall in one of Elie Wiesel’s books how he said he was
“still afraid” as a Jew and I don’t doubt his fear for one minute especially with
the rage that’s in the world today over Israel’s appalling mistreatment of the
the Palestinian people.”

Doris is one of those people who in the 1930′s would have been on the side of the German Nazis claiming that Jews were mistreating them.

She is obsessed with Jews.

Her claims of Jewish mistreatment of Palestinians is the BIG LIE of our times.

Here are some facts:

Let’s put the Arab Israeli conflict in some perspective:

“Despite the media’s obsession with the Mideast conflict, it has cost many fewer lives than the youth bulges in West Africa, Lebanon or Algeria.

In the six decades since Israel’s founding, “only” some 62,000 people (40,000 Arabs, 22,000 Jews) have been killed in all the Israeli-Arab wars and Palestinian terror attacks.

During that same time, some 11 million Muslims have been killed in wars and terror attacks — mostly at the hands of other Muslims.

In Arab nations such as Lebanon (150,000 dead in the civil war between 1975 and 1990) or Algeria (200,000 dead in the Islamists’ war against their own people between 1999 and 2006),”

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123171179743471961.html

This puts the obsession with Israel in perspective!

“No one in this thread has said anything antisemitic. What’s with the slurs, Israeli apologists?” Posted by Good Grief

Nonsense, bad grief, and you know it.

You sound like an apologist fro Hamas and Hezbollah the two most lethal Jew hating organizations in the world today.

You are an antisemitic propagandist and should post on David Duke’s site and not here.

Here is a lecture on the Gaza war that some people will find interesting, though I expect that Jew hating activists and Hamas supporters like Doris, Mike and good grief troll will want to stay away.

https://mediapilot.georgetown.edu/sharestream2gui/GT-Video.jsp?myname=0d21b6201f103fed011f423c5f5e01d3&cid=0d21b6201f103fed011f4208b74801be&windowSize=full&originalAspectRatio=false

You are right you are no one, not even a troll just a piece of machinery at wbur, waaaahhmbulance.

again sabato, and r.m attack, attack, instead of again debating whats going on there prefer to call names and try and use anti-semite to kill debate, there have been many others people that showed that most the stuff u said is questionable yet u still attack, and attack, is that u are racist towards non jews?,

Also to not many others holocaust survivors is against for the state of israel is doing are they too anti-Semite? Calling people Nazis are u serious, Nazis hate all accept there race there as some in israel that think there race is Superior and the true race along the same lines of the Nazi thinking. it makes no logical sense to call someone a nazi for trying to defend people who are being mistreated, abused, killed by israel.

but your comments looks to be more inline by the way of your post that if anyone could be close it would be both sabato and r.m. who show no sympothy for the suffering of others much like Nazi.

or is it that u cant handle the truth about the state of Israel? is it to tough to handle so u have to unwaveringly try and defend actions which cannot be?

so attack some more if u like it will only prove my point, that u hate non-jews and will blindly deny whats going on much like the Nazis.

as my statements the suffering of others and yours were that “israel is always right no matter what,and if u disagree than your a anti-semite”

As far as the lies and propaganda the comes out of the Arab media , two words: AL DURA

democracy is “freedom of press”(did not happen for objective reporting in gaza was not allowed),

“human rights”(abused and abused over and over again along with countless violations documented),which even the hardest of the right-wing israelie cant deny.

israel did win the war but are still taking land, name a country that still is taking land from the minority after UN law prohibits it. (besides Zimbabwe of course)

“basic equality” again israel fails to do.

your new or soon to be pm. is still for more settlements, and taking of arab jews rights for speaking against what happen in gaza

To Maria from Santa Barbara;

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and info.

I checked out the:
DemocracyNow by Amy Goodman at:
http://www.democracynow.org/
and found it a refreshing source of news which I had not seen in the US before.

I didn’t know about Dr Finkelsteins or his book (“Beyond Chutzpah”) before.

Now it seems to be a legitimate request/suggestion from/to Mr. Tom Ashbrook to balance the appearance of Mr. Elie Wiesel and his book introduction with airing a program with people such as:

- Dr. Finkelstein to introduce his “Beyond Chutzpath”,
- Mr. Charles Freeman to talk about his experience,
- Prof. Noam Chomsky to convey his expertise,

r.m. im done after this but countless people have given u facts, and all u replied with is there liers, anti-Semite and u give sources so one sided its not even funny.

please read your comment as i guess u dont, “facts are facts” and no matter what u do or sabato the truth will and is coming out about israel ethic cleansing and treatment to non-jews and there humans rights violations,

but u can go on and one with your fairly tale view of israel doing no wrong, and everyone is a wrong and is anti-semite if u point the truth out also found something to check out about pre-israel. I beat u cant say one good thing about muslim or the gazans?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CxlAmonz0A&feature=channel

u sir are the one whoses sippest the kool-aid and no futher reply to the needless garage u been spewing

Speaking of coolaid drinkers:

Mike says: “I beat u cant say one good thing about muslim or the gazans?”

Here is one good thing about Gazans.

You are not a Gazan. That’s something Gazans can be thankful for.

You alos can’t write, you can’t spell, you can’t think and you can’t reason or sift through historical evidence.

Mike you (and Doris) like all Jew haters you are a loser.

Hi Sabato i have no problem with jews but just people like yourself, who can only attack instead of being civil and debating.

Also,

1. you’re a fool
2. when u comment on someone spelling u should spell correctly yourself “You alos” is not a word.
3. you win noone over when u attack everyone with a different view than u.
4. again u could not say anything good about gazans or muslim so most people will see u as a muslim, christian hating jew.
5.history and evidence is against your twisted beliefs.
6. im not gazan but im American so i dont have to worry about IDF troops trying to shoot my family for being gazans.
7.all u did was prove you are a extremist.
8. being civil would help your cause then being a donkey.
9. try as u might but in the long run your going to fail.
10. if u dont understand read #1.

To Robbins,

who calls Dr Norman Finkelstein ( son of Holocoust survivors) a lier.

The fact is that his analysis on Elie Wiesel is right on! Mr Wiesels words during the interview and how he distorted Ali’s question are proof to me, Dr Finkelstein knows what he is talking about.

To add to this, my grandmother saved two Jewish people during WWII by hiding them in her house in Nazi occupied Holland. My grandfather was forced on transport to a Nazi workcamp and she stayed behind risking her life and that of her three children under the age of 5!

She did this not because these people were Jewish, but because they …………..were human!!!!!!!!

Mike, lives ot post here.

He is like a mechanical doll all wound up who has been programmed to say antisemitic things.

LOSER!

“To add to this, my grandmother saved two Jewish people during WWII by hiding them in her house in Nazi occupied Holland.”
Posted by Maria from Santa Barbara

I don’t believe you, got any proof?

Anyone can say anything here on line.

“She did this not because these people were Jewish, but because they …………..were human!!!!!!!!”

Of course they were human but they were also Jews. Just as you are human, I think, but like me you are also a woman.

You can be both, you know.

You guys are ridiculous, no one is reading this crap any more.

Fact: No ‘group’ has a monopoly on human suffering. Human suffering and oppression and injustice has occurred throughout history.

Jewish dissent on the Israeli govt is flourishing and readily available online for anybody to read.

In order to gain a more intellectual and informed opinion it does require an open mind and willingness to understand the universal human rights as recognized by the major human right organizations like Amnesty International.

It is intellectual dishonesty to not recognize that Elie Wiesel did NOT answer Ali’s very legitimate question where he pointed out that Mr Wiesels silence contributes to the fact that now Mr Ahmadinajad becomes the spokesperson for human rights violations in Gaza. With other words, if Mr Wiesel would speak out JUST LIKE Avi Shlaim ( leading ISRAELI scholar on the conflict) it would take away from the Ahmadinajads of the world.

An excellent read on the ‘divide and conquer’ technique of the Bush Adminstration on the Palestinian leadership is David Rose’s article “Gaza Bombshell”.

“In order to gain a more intellectual and informed opinion it does require an open mind and willingness to understand the universal human rights as recognized by the major human right organizations like Amnesty International.”

More general nonsense by maria from barbaria

Talk to Hamas about human rights, BIGOT!

Hamas has as its aim the extermination of Israelis. It’s in their charter.

“An excellent read on the ‘divide and conquer’ technique of the Bush Adminstration Rose’s article “Gaza Bombshell”. Maria from Santa Barbara

More crap from Maria. You sound like a reatrde leftist.

Here is a better article:

James Kirchick
“Downplaying Hamas: The persistence of rationalizing terrorism against Israel”

http://city-journal.org/2009/eon0218jk.html

“However it sounds like ‘holocaust denial’ to me just like Gaza massacre denial! Maria

If you really believe this than you are more of a moron than anyone here could have imagined, Maria.

There was no Gaza massacre and the burden of proof in on you to prove that there was one.

Here is very brave lady
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7bnSEYeQoY

A little lesson in debate!
Nobody here including myself has spoken in favor of Hamas. Nobody here, including myself has spoken against Jews.
It has become quite apparent that the ad hominem attacks are coming from people who refuse to be engaged in real dialogue. So here is a new concept for the crowd who has resulted to ad hominem attacks rather than ‘trying’ to debate disagreements.

An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: “argument to the man”, “argument against the man”) consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to a characteristic or belief of the source making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim.

The process of proving or disproving the claim is thereby subverted, and the argumentum ad hominem works to change the subject.

Ad hominem argument is most commonly used to refer specifically to the ad hominem abusive, or argumentum ad personam, which consists of criticizing or attacking the person who proposed the argument (personal attack) in an attempt to discredit the argument. It is also used when an opponent is unable to find fault with an argument, yet for various reasons, the opponent disagrees with it.

Other common subtypes of the ad hominem include the ad hominem circumstantial, or ad hominem circumstantiae, an attack which is directed at the circumstances or situation of the arguer; and the ad hominem tu quoque, which objects to an argument by characterizing the arguer as acting or arguing in accordance with the view that he is arguing against.

Ad hominem arguments are always invalid in syllogistic logic, since the truth value of premises is taken as given, and the validity of a logical inference is independent of the source making the inference. However, ad hominem arguments are rarely presented as formal syllogisms, and their assessment lies in the domain of informal logic and the theory of evidence.[1] The theory of evidence depends to a large degree on assessments of the credibility of witnesses, including eyewitness evidence and expert witness evidence. Evidence that a purported eyewitness is unreliable, or has a motive for lying, or that a purported expert witness lacks the claimed expertise can play a major role in making judgements from evidence.

Argumentum ad hominem is the inverse of argumentum ad verecundiam, in which the arguer bases the truth value of an assertion on the authority, knowledge or position of the source asserting it. Hence, while an ad hominem argument may make an assertion less compelling, by showing that the source making the assertion does not have the authority, knowledge or position it claims, or has made mistaken assertions on similar topics in the past, it cannot provide an infallible counterargument.

An ad hominem fallacy is a genetic fallacy and red herring, and is most often (but not always) an appeal to emotion.

It does not include arguments posed by a source that contradict the source’s actions.

A little lesson in debate! fro Maria.

Know what you are talking about Maria.

“Nobody here including myself has spoken in favor of Hamas.”

Wrong when you refuse to take into account the way hamas has murdered innocent Jewish civilians and had fired rockets at Israeli towns while condemning Israel for defending itself then you are taking the side of Hamas.

“Nobody here, including myself has spoken against Jews.”

Wrong again, in mocking Elie Wiesel and in comparing Gaza to the Holocaust you have spoken out against Jews.

“It has become quite apparent that the ad hominem attacks are coming from people who refuse to be engaged in real dialogue.”

What dialogue is possible with people who hate you? None!

Sabato “Wrong again, in mocking Elie Wiesel and in comparing Gaza to the Holocaust you have spoken out against Jews.”

AVI SHLAIM: President Bush described Ariel Sharon as a man of peace. I’ve done a great deal of archival research on the Arab-Israeli conflict, and I can honestly tell you that I have never come across a single scintilla of evidence to support the view of Ariel Sharon as a man of peace. He was a man of war, a champion of violent solutions, a man who rejected totally any Palestinian right to self-determination. He was a proponent of Greater Israel, and it is in this context that I see his decision to withdraw unilaterally from Gaza in August of 2005.

The withdrawal was officially called the unilateral Israeli disengagement from Gaza. I would like to underline the word “unilateral.” Ariel Sharon was the unilateralist par excellence. The reason he decided to withdraw from Gaza was not out of any concern for the welfare of the people of Gaza or any sympathy for the Palestinians or their national aspirations, but because of the pressure exerted by Hamas, by the Islamic resistance, to the Israeli occupation of Gaza. In the end, Israel couldn’t sustain the political, diplomatic and psychological costs of maintaining its occupation in Gaza.

And let me add in parentheses that Gaza was a classic example of exploitation, of colonial exploitation in the postcolonial era. Gaza is a tiny strip of land with about one-and-a-half million Arabs, most of them—half of them refugees. It’s the most crowded piece of land on God’s earth. There were 8,000 Israeli settlers in Gaza, yet the 8,000 settlers controlled 25 percent of the territory, 40 percent of the arable land, and the largest share of the desperately scarce water resources.

Ariel Sharon decided to withdraw from Gaza unilaterally, not as a contribution, as he claimed, to a two-state solution. The withdrawal from Gaza took place in the context of unilateral Israeli action in what was seen as Israeli national interest. There were no negotiations with the Palestinian Authority on an overall settlement. The withdrawal from Gaza was not a prelude to further withdrawals from the other occupied territories, but a prelude to further expansion, further consolidation of Israel’s control over the West Bank. In the year after the withdrawal from Gaza, 12,000 new settlers went to live on the West Bank. So I see the withdrawal from Gaza in the summer of 2005 as part of a unilateral Israeli attempt to redraw the borders of Greater Israel and to shun any negotiations and compromise with the Palestinian Authority.

Last but not least..

AMY GOODMAN: Israel calls Hamas “terrorist.” What is your definition of “terror”?

AVI SHLAIM: My definition of “terror” is the use of violence against civilians for political purposes. And by this definition, Hamas is a terrorist organization. But by the same token, Israel is practicing state terror, because it is using violence on a massive scale against Palestinian civilians for political purposes. I don’t hold a brief for Hamas. Hamas is not a paragon of virtue. Its leaders are not angels. They harm civilians indiscriminately. Killing civilians is wrong, period. That applies to Hamas, and it applies equally to the state of Israel.

But there are two points I would like to make about Hamas, and that is—the first point is that it was elected in a fair and free election in January 2006. It was an impeccable election, monitored by a number of international observers, including President Jimmy Carter. So it is not just a terrorist organization. It is a democratically elected government of the Palestinian people and the representative of the Palestinian people in Gaza, as well as the West Bank.

And the second point that I would like to make is that since coming to power, Gaza has moderated its political program. Its charter is extreme. Its charter denies the legitimacy of a Jewish state. The charter calls for an Islamic state over the whole of historic Palestine. The charter has not been revived, but since coming to power, the leadership of Hamas has been much more pragmatic and stated that it is willing to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with the state of Israel for twenty, thirty, forty, maybe even fifty years.

Thirdly, Hamas joined with Fatah, the rival group, the mainstream group, on the West Bank in a national unity government in the summer of 2007. That national unity government lasted only three months. Israel, with American support, helped to sabotage and to bring down that national unity government. Israel refused to deal with a Palestinian government which included Hamas within it. And shamefully, both the United States and the European Union joined in Israel in this refusal to recognize a Hamas-dominated government, and Israel withdrew tax revenues, and European Union withdrew foreign aid, in a shameful attempt to bring down a democratically elected government.

So, I do not defend Hamas, but I think that it hasn’t received a fair hearing from the international community, and Israel has done everything to sabotage it all along.

I do want to emphazise that Mr Asbrook did try to correct Elie Wiesel in answering Ali’s question the right way. And I apologize for posting excerpts of other news outlets on your channel.

Maria .No one here is interested or impressed by your little snobbish little rules ….S.N.O.B. .(Latin:sine nobilitate )
(french sans nobilite ) ….you seem quite quaint with yourself and your little lecture…do you now feel better after your little tantrum ?

This is for you my little maria …This is what happens to women all over the Muslim and arab world ……

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQQFjvcYefk&feature=related

educate yourself Maria :

http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=road%20to%20jenin&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wv#

Why would anybody expect peace in the Middle East be possible when people cannot even recognize the issues, refuse to educated themselves and conduct themselves as adults right here online?

How can the world expect sanity from 1-2 million people living on a 25 mile strip, locked up, deprived of running water and sewage, economically cut off etc etc?

Fact: July 2004 World Court advisory opinion on the legality of the wall Israel had been constructing in the West Bank.

The Court found that, based on ARticle 2 of the United Nations Charter and numerous U.N resolutions barring the acquisition of territory by force, Israel had no title to ANY of the territories it captured during the June 1967 war. ( Occupied Palestinian Territory).

From this it follows that EAST Jerusalem,which Israel also captured during the June 1967 war, IS NOT, as Israel proclaims, its eternal and undivided capital and integral part of Israel but INSTEAD, East Jerusalem IS Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Court RULED, recallng that U.N. Security Council and General Assembly resolutions had declared Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem illegal and null and void.

Finally , the Court cited U.N. Security Council resolutions that , based on Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israeli settlements have NO legal validity and constitute a FRAGANT VIOLATION of International Law, from which the Court itself concluded that Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories ( including East Jerusalem) have been established in breach of International Law.

Enough said!

“Why would anybody expect peace in the Middle East be possible when people cannot even recognize the issues, refuse to educated themselves and conduct themselves as adults right here online?”

Maria from Santa Barbara, you don’t sound like an adult yourself.

You spend all your days here posting bile and hatred in the name of “human rights.”

Go take care of your children and leave politics to sane people.

“Again, the term ‘Sharia Law’ is not correct and made up by the West.
It is either ‘Islamic Law’ or ‘Islamic Sharia’ as I have ponted out earlier.”
Maria from Santa Barbara,

who cares, Leila /Maria?

It’s an oppressive system no matter what you call it.

MARIA good question ….how can there be peace when millions are suffering all over the world and people like you concentrate on a tiny nation surrounded by 22 Arab countries who swear its destruction .Try going to a rally in those arab states lets see if you don’t disapear. Israel is transparent …No my dear peace cannot be constructed on top of a lie ….it will never work .You don’t want to see the reality of the problem because you are politically correct …. answer the question why the one million jews kicked out from arab countries and made refugees but never have been recognized by the United Nation?

And for the record since you do not appear to understand the dynamics, the tiny little country surrounded by the 22 Arab nations is under protection of the biggest military apparatus in the world called the United States Military!

True Torah Jews Against Zionism – Our Mission
The relatively new concept of Zionism began only about one hundred years ago and since that time Torah-true Jewry has steadfastly opposed the Zionist ideology. This struggle is rooted in two convictions:

Zionism, by advocating a political and military end to the Jewish exile, denies the very essence of our Diaspora existence. We are in exile by Divine Decree and may emerge from exile solely via Divine Redemption. All human efforts to alter a metaphysical reality are doomed to end in failure and bloodshed. History has clearly borne out this teaching.
Zionism has not only denied our fundamental belief in Heavenly Redemption it has also created a pseudo-Judaism which views the essence of our identity to be a secular nationalism. Accordingly, Zionism and the Israeli state have consistently endeavored, via persuasion and coercion, to replace a Divine and Torah centered understanding of our people hood with an armed materialism.
True Torah Jews is dedicated to informing the world and in particular the American public and politicians that all Jews do not support the ideology of the Zionist state called “Israel” which is diametrically opposite to the teachings of traditional Judaism.

We are concerned that the widespread misconception that all Jews support the zionist state and its actions endangers Jews worldwide.

We are NOT politically motivated. We are motivated by our concern for the peace and safety of all people throughout the world including those living in the Zionist state. We support and pray for peace for the people of the Zionist state but have no interest in and do not support the Zionist government.

We seek to disassociate Jews and traditional Judaism from the Zionist Ideology by:

Providing historical and supporting documentation that Zionism is totally contrary to the teachings of traditional Judaism through the words of our Rabbis, Sages, and Holy Scriptures which oppose the creation of a state called Israel.
Providing historical documentation on the ideaology and creation of Zionism, the supporters of Zionism and the negative impact of their actions on the Jewish people in the past hundred years, including their involvement in the holocaust up to the present day.
Publicizing the efforts of traditional Jews to demonstrate that all Jews do not support Zionism, which is being ignored by the mainstream media.
Convince the news media, politicians and the public to cease referring to the state of Israel as the “Jewish State” but to call it what it is: the “Zionist State”.
It is our firm belief that when the state of “Israel” is recognized for what it is, a Zionist state which is not guided by the teachings of the traditional Jewish faith, Jews worldwide will be able to live in peace.

“Amnesty International brings attention to the ‘millions suffering” Maria from Santa Barbara

Leila/Maria is lying again.

Amnesty International has been obsessed with Israel and had to apologize for making misleading statements about Israel recently.

They are led by a bunch of antisemites and are not a trustworthy organization any more.

The millions of people all over the world are not just suffering they are being butchered by your Arab friends in Darfur, in Algeria and in other Muslim countries.

But you don’t give a damn about that all you care about Hamas which is slaughtering its own Palestinian people.

“INCLUDING the 2 million on the 25mile strip called Gaza and INCLUDING the Israeli’s imprisoned for critizing their govt.”

More lies. Gaza shares a border with Egypt as well as Israel.

The international community imposed a boycott on support for your murderous friends of Hamas which rules Gaza.

As for population density, the Tel Aviv area in Israel is denser than Gaza so are places like Hong Kong. This doesn’t make these places “prisons.”

You are just repeating the antisemitic poison that Hamas and other Israel haters spout.

“True Torah Jews Against Zionism – Our Mission
The relatively new concept of Zionism began only about one hundred years ago and since that time Torah-true Jewry has steadfastly opposed the Zionist ideology. This struggle is rooted in two convictions” Leila/Maria

You are not a Jew and you don’t know what you are talking about.

Zionism has been around for two thousand years. It is the yearning of Jews to return to the land of Israel.

Moderns zionism was the attempt to save the Jews from your Nazi friends who tries to exterminate them.

These “Torah Jews” so called don’t know Judaism if they did they would know that Jews repeat the prayer next year in Jerusalem. Zionism is as Jewish as Torah.

Who is paying you to post these lying nonsense?

“The Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact
By Jennifer Rosenberg, About.com
See More About:nazi-soviet non-aggression pactworld war iiadolf hitlerjoseph stalin
A map that shows the territories agreed upon in the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact of 1939.

Map copyright About.com and Jennifer Rosenberg.In 1939, Adolf Hitler was preparing for war. Though he was hoping to acquire Poland without force (as he had annexed Austria the year before), Hitler was planning against the possibility of a two front war. Since fighting a two front war in World War I had split Germany’s forces, it had weakened and undermined their offensive; thus, played a large role in Germany losing the First World War. Hitler was determined not to repeat the same mistakes. So, he planned ahead and made a pact with the Soviets – the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact.

The Two Sides Meet

On August 14, 1939, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop contacted the Soviets to arrange a deal. Ribbentrop met with the Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov in Moscow and together they arranged two pacts – the economic agreement and the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact.

To the chancellor of the German Reich, Herr A. Hitler.
I thank you for your letter. I hope that the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact will mark a decisive turn for the better in the political relations between our two countries. .

J. Stalin*

The Economic Agreement

The first pact was an economic agreement, which Ribbentrop and Molotov signed on August 19, 1939.

The economic agreement committed the Soviet Union to provide food products as well as raw materials to Germany in exchange for furnished products such as machinery from Germany.

During the first years of the war, this economic agreement helped Germany bypass the British blockade.

The Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact

On August 23, 1939, four days after the economic agreement was signed and a little over a week before the beginning of World War II, Ribbentrop and Molotov signed the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. (The pact is also referred to as the German-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact and the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact.) Publicly, this agreement stated that the two countries – Germany and the Soviet Union – would not attack each other. If there were ever a problem between the two countries, it was to be handled amicably. The pact was supposed to last for ten years; it lasted for less than two.

What was meant by the terms of the pact was that if Germany attacked Poland, then the Soviet Union would not come to its aid. Thus, if Germany went to war against the West (especially France and Great Britain) over Poland, the Soviets were guaranteeing that they would not enter the war; thus not open a second front for Germany.

In addition to this agreement, Ribbentrop and Molotov added a secret protocol onto the pact – a secret addendum whose existence was denied by the Soviets until 1989.

The Secret Protocol

The secret protocol held an agreement between the Nazis and Soviets that greatly affected Eastern Europe. For the Soviets for agreeing to not join the possible future war, Germany was giving the Soviets the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania). Poland was also to be divided between the two – along the Narew, Vistula, and San rivers.

The new territories gave the Soviet Union the buffer (in land) that it wanted to feel safe from an invasion from the West. It would need that buffer in 1941.

Impacts of the Pact

When the Nazis attacked Poland in the morning on September 1, 1939, the Soviets stood by and watched. Two days later, the British declared war on Germany and World War II had begun. On September 17, the Soviets rolled into eastern Poland to occupy their “sphere of influence” designated in the secret protocol.

Because of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, the Soviets did not join the fight against Germany, thus Germany was successful it its attempt to safeguard itself from a two-front war.

The Nazis and the Soviets kept the terms of the pact and the protocol until Germany’s surprise attack and invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941.

* Letter to Adolf Hitler from Joseph Stalin as quoted in Alan Bullock, Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives (New York: Vintage Books, 1993) 611. “

see also

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molotov-Ribbentrop_Pact

Israelis criticizes their government all the time …that’s called democracy ….let’s see that in the Arab/Muslim countries show that kind of freedom of speech my dear ……Here is your glorious hamas freedom of speech :
http://www.repubblica.it/2006/05/gallerie/esteri/palestinese-esecuzione/2.html
You are deluding yourself if you think otherwise …The Palestinian are well funded …..ask yourself where the money is going ?Ask yourself why Arafat’s was on Forbes richest man and his wife suha is living like a queen in Paris ? Why do the Palestinian leaders have enormous beautiful mansions ,you armchair leftist living in glorious santa barbara would die for ? There are only about 14 million Jews in the world (it would be double if they had not been exterminated )Israel has a right to defend itself peopple like you, want all the Jews to be exterminated ….. They did not defend themselves during world war II , no they peacefully went into the ovens ……and no one cared …….well its not going to happen again ……what is it with you people ? jealousy ?

Ok more dissent from WITHIN Israel…

Inside Story: Jonathan Ben-artzi , Israelian Pacifist
His uncle is the hawkish former prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu. But Jonathan Ben-Artzi is a conscientious objector who has already spent months in prison for refusing conscription – and today faces a full court martial. He tells Chris McGreal why he will not fight.
Jonathan “Yoni” Ben-Artzi finally came to understand his objection as he wandered the acres of white crosses spawned by a war far from the one he is being ordered to fight. Defiant, if boyish and vulnerable, the 20-year-old physics student says that from the time he was old enough to understand about the army – which is pretty young in Israel – he has known he would never wear its uniform. But he did not really know why until he went to Verdun, where more than 700,000 men were sacrificed to futility in the first world war. “I always knew I wouldn’t go into the army but I came to realise why when I was 14. We visited France and some of the battlefields and I saw the rows and rows of graves,” he says. “Then I realised the stupidity of it. So many lives sacrificed and they didn’t really know what they were fighting for. They were never told the truth.”

For his views, Ben-Artzi has now spent more time in prison than any other Israeli conscientious objector. He is also the best known of the refuseniks because he is the nephew of Benjamin Netanyahu, the country’s belligerent former prime minister. Theirs is a family of Israeli war heroes. Ben-Artzi’s grandfathers were renowned fighters for Israel’s independence, and he shares a first name with a Netanyahu he never knew, who was killed during the daring raid on Entebbe in 1976 to rescue Jewish hostages from German and Palestinian hijackers in Idi Amin’s Uganda.

As one of 10 young men locked up for refusing to do three years’ conscription, Ben-Artzi has found courage of a different sort. He has spent more than 200 days in prison, punctuated by monthly appearances before a military court – that is longer than any soldier has been jailed in recent times for the “illegal killing” of an innocent Palestinian. Now the Israeli army is upping the stakes with a virtually unprecedented attempt to lock Ben-Artzi away for years when he faces court martial today. But it could yet backfire and force the military to recognise what it has so far refused to acknowledge; that there is such a thing as a Jewish pacifist.

Ben-Artzi and his fellow objectors stand apart from the several hundred older refuseniks who served their conscription fighting to the gates of Beirut or confronting Palestinians during the first intifada. Today, they refuse to do their call-up because they oppose the continued occupation of Palestinian land or the tactics of an army imposing its own brand of terror and collective punishment on the subjugated.

Ben-Artzi is different. His objection strikes at the heart of what Israel has become, and it clearly unnerves the army. “In Israel, the army is a kind of god and I was expected to worship it from as young as I can remember,” he says. “There were military activities in school. High school students go to army “fire shows”, to convince them to join. They are making a bid for these children, to recruit them to the paratroopers or engineering corps or whichever. They are guided down a mental corridor to the military. There’s a lot of social pressure from the principal, teachers, friends.”

The military has mythological status among many Israelis. Almost every man is identified by his army unit as much as his career. But while other schoolchildren chose essays on the heroics of Moshe Dayan, Ben-Artzi wrote about pacifism. He refused to take part in a judo class because it required the use of force, and he made no secret of his abhorrence of the militarisation of Israeli society.

“When I was 14, we had a trip to the Sea of Galilee through the occupied territories. I told the teacher I wouldn’t go because it’s not OK to have kids on a trip going through villages where [Palestinians] are trapped in their homes under curfew. I always had arguments in school. It just grew until my last year when I was 17 or 18 when the first orders came to be interviewed by officers. I came to everything they told me to come to and said I wouldn’t serve.”

Yet the army insists that Ben-Artzi is not a pacifist. Israeli law obliges every young man, except ultra-orthodox Jews, to serve three years’ conscription. Seven months ago, Ben-Artzi stood before Colonel Deborah Chassid at the army induction centre and told her he had no intention of signing up. He was not alone. A few days later, another teenager came before Chassid and made much the same arguments.

“I told her I object completely to killing,” says 19-year-old Uri Ya’akovi. “I can’t imagine myself being part of killing, even if it’s indirect. I told them this but they don’t listen. They just try to scare you. They tell you you will be raped in jail. They say you are a traitor. Other boys said they would also object, but after that only a few still make a stand and go to jail.”

Chassid sentenced both young men to a month in military prison number four, notorious for its life under canvas and harsh discipline.

Ben-Artzi exercised his right to see one of the “conscience committees” reluctantly set up by the government after it signed up to international human rights conventions. When he walked into the room he discovered every member of the committee was a serving military officer. “I was asked questions. I answered. Their decision was that I’m not a pacifist. It’s an automatic decision. No one has ever been accepted as a pacifist. Israel is the only country that officially declares there are no pacifists.”

The committee came to the remarkable conclusion that his persistent resistance to the army was evidence of the qualities of a soldier and therefore he could not be a pacifist. “It’s politics,” Ben-Artzi says. “The only type of conscientious objection they recognise is from the Jewish religion.”

There are other ways out of conscription. Every year, thousands of young men find a psychologist to declare them mentally unsound. Uri Ya’akovi’s father, Adam Keller, did that more than a decade ago. “I refused to do duty in Lebanon so they made me a dishwasher in a tank regiment. In 1988, at the beginning of the intifada, I went out one night and wrote on the tanks: ‘Soldiers refuse to be occupiers and aggressors. Don’t go to the occupied territories’.”

Keller scrawled the graffiti on 117 tanks before he was caught on the second night. “I did three months in prison for that,” he says. “When I was in high school, some pupils passed out leaflets on what was happening in the occupied territories. People said it couldn’t be that our soldiers would do such things. Now you read worse things in the mainstream media and people don’t care. We used to say that if only people know about it, it would stop. Now they know about it, and it hasn’t stopped.”

Eventually, Keller slipped out of the army by getting himself declared mentally unfit. “A psychiatrist asked me what was my motivation. I told him it was the people in history who fought for right that motivated me. Then he said: ‘Can we say you hear the voice of history?’ That’s how I got my discharge – he wrote on my report that I was hearing voices of history.”

Ten days ago his son, Uri Ya’akovi, finally decided to play ball with the army before a “competence committee”. “They told me they didn’t want to hear about pacifism or conscientious objection,” he says. “I said I didn’t want to be in the army because I don’t like the uniform. It’s half true, you know. I don’t like the uniform, but I made it sound bigger.”

The military’s official reason for getting rid of Ya’akovi was because his “low motivation and morale made him unfit for the army”, without conceding the pacifism principle.

Last week, Ben-Artzi was called in for a chat by a brigadier general. “I am not talking to you as a general to a draftee, but as Avi to Yoni, OK?” he said. The general had an offer. If Ben-Artzi agreed to enlist he would be granted “an easy service, without a gun, uniform or military training”. A job would be found for him in a hospital. Ben-Artzi replied that he would do three years’ service, but not in an organisation dedicated to killing. The army changed tack. It declared Ben-Artzi was already conscripted and ordered the first court martial of a conscientious objector in three decades. The maximum sentence is three years – the length of conscription. Although a model prisoner who made no attempt to escape during his first 200 days in prison, Ben-Artzi was handcuffed when he left his new cell. This one had no furniture and food was served without a knife or fork.

At the initial hearing, the military prosecutor described Ben-Artzi as “no better than any deserter or drug addict,” and said the young prisoner was not a pacifist because “the competent military committee has already reviewed his case” and decided he was not. He added that to let Ben-Artzi go would “undermine discipline in the army”.

Opinion is divided on whether Ben-Artzi is being singled out because of his uncle. Ya’akovi thinks so. “They think Yoni is the leader of this protest, that we’re all following him because his family is powerful. But it’s not true,” he says.

Ben-Artzi disagrees, and may be right. His absolute refusal to give an inch to the army has made him a uniquely awkward customer.

Netanyahu has not involved himself in the case, other than to say that he wishes his nephew would change his mind. Ben-Artzi seems unlikely to do so, and it may yet be that the army is the one forced to change. Today’s court martial opens the way to the supreme court where human rights lawyers believe the young refusenik will finally get to put his case before civilian judges – who are more likely to be persuaded that there is such a thing as a pacifist in Israel.

Miss NOra “Zionism has been around for two thousand years. It is the yearning of Jews to return to the land of Israel.”

Zionism is a movement founded by Theodor Herzl in 1896 whose goal is the return of Jews to Eretz Yisrael, or Zion, the Jewish synonym for Jerusalem and the Land of Israel.

The name of “Zionism” comes from the hill Zion, the hill on which the Temple of Jerusalem was situated.

Supporters of this movement are called “Zionists

So yes Ms Nora..Stalin ofcourse promoted zionism! Both Hitler AND Stalin did!

Theodor Herzl (1860-1904), the founder of modern Zionism, recognized that anti-Semitism would further his cause, the creation of a separate state for Jews. To solve the Jewish Question, he maintained “we must, above all, make it an international political issue.”[1]Herzl wrote that Zionism offered the world a welcome “final solution of the Jewish question.”[2]In his “Diaries”, page 19, Herzl stated “Anti-Semites will become our surest friends, anti-Semitic countries our allies.”

51 Documents:

Zionist Collaboration
with the NazisZionism was supported by the German SS and Gestapo.[3] [4] [5] [6] Hitler himself personally supported Zionism.[7] [8] During the 1930’s, in cooperation with the German authorities, Zionist groups organized a network of some 40 camps throughout Germany where prospective settlers were trained for their new lives in Palestine. As late as 1942 Zionists operated at least one of these officially authorized “Kibbutz” training camps[9] over which flew the blue and white banner which would one day be adopted as the national flag of “Israel”.[10]

The Transfer Agreement (which promoted the emigration of German Jews to Palestine) implemented in 1933 and abandoned at the beginning of WWII is an important example of the cooperation between Hitler’s Germany and international Zionism. [11] Through this agreement, Hitler’s Third Reich did more than any other government during the 1930’s to support Jewish development in Palestine and further the Zionist goals.

Hitler and the Zionists had a common goal: to create a world Jewish Ghetto as a solution to the Jewish Question.

The Transfer AgreementThe Zionist so-called “World Jewish Congress” declared war on the country of Germany,[12] [13] knowing that it would affect their Jewish brothers residing in that country who would be left without protection. When others tried to help them escape to other countries, the Zionist movement took actions which caused those countries to lock their doors to Jewish immigration (read more in the books, “Perfidy” and “Min Hametzer”). As a result of the Zionist influence five ships of Jewish refugees from Germany arriving in the United States were turned back to the gas chambers.

The fundamental aim of the Zionist movement has been not to save Jewish lives but to create a “Jewish state” in Palestine.

On December 7, 1938, Ben Gurion, the first head of the Zionist ‘state of Israel’ declared “If I knew it was possible to save all the children in Germany by taking them to England, and only half of the children by taking them to Eretz Israel, I would choose the second solution. For we must take into account not only the lives of these children but also the history of the people of Israel.”[14]

On August 31, 1949, Ben Gurion stated: “Although we have realized our dream of creating a Jewish State, we are only at the beginning. There are still only 900,000 Jews in Israel, whereas the majority of the Jewish people still remains abroad. Our future task is to bring all the Jews to Israel.”

Of the two and a half million Jews seeking refuge from the Nazis between 1935 and 1943, less than 9% went to settle in Palestine. The vast majority, 75%, went to the Soviet Union. In the mid-70’s, more people emigrated out of ‘Israel’ than came in. The only surges of immigration to the Zionist state have occurred during anti-Semitic threats and persecution in foreign countries.[15]

It follows that for the Zionist state to achieve its goal of a Jewish world ghetto anti-Semitism must be promoted and encouraged, and as we have seen, by acts of violence if necessary.

“To attain its practical objectives, Zionism hopes it will be able to collaborate with a government that is fundamentally hostile to the Jews”.[16]

The use of anti-Semitism as a tool to coerce immigration to the Zionist state continues to the present day:

Prime Minister Sharon has stated that anti-Semitism is on the rise and that the only hope for the safety of Jews is to move to Israel under the protection of the Zionist state. “The best solution to anti-Semitism is immigration to Israel. It is the only place on Earth where Jews can live as Jews,” he said.[17]

Those who continue to call the so-called “state of Israel” the “Jewish State” are not only promoting Zionism which is contrary to the beliefs of true Judaism, but also endorsing the promotion of worldwide anti-Semitism. In doing so they are endangering the lives of traditional Jews and denying their civil liberties and human rights.

When the British foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour (sponsor of the 1905 Aliens Act to restrict Jewish immigration to the UK), wanted the British government to commit itself to a Jewish homeland in Palestine, his declaration was delayed – not by anti-Semites but by leading figures in the British Jewish community. They included a Jewish member of the cabinet who called Balfour’s pro-Zionism “anti-Semitic in result”. In contrast, a great statesman like Secretary of State Colin Powell, a supporter of traditional Judaism, has the courage to separate Judaism from Zionism and to acknowledge that speaking out against the actions of the Zionist state is not “anti-Semitism”.

We call upon our leaders in Washington to disassociate the actions of the Zionist state from traditional Judaism by no longer referring to “Israel” as the “Jewish State” but as “the Zionist State” and to speak out against the Zionist actions which promote anti-Semitism

And here is an article that would have been a great question for Tom Ashbrook to ask Mr Wiesel and the ‘forgiveness’ issue

Opposition to Gypsies in Holocaust Museum
View Story On One Page Print This Story Share This Story January 2, 2007 | 8:50 a.m.
The Nazis’ extermination of Gypsies was nearly as complete, proportionally, as the Nazis’ extermination of European Jews. Yet the commemoration of Gypsy victims of the Holocaust has never come even close to the memorialization of Jewish victims. In her fine book on gypsy life, Bury Me Standing, Isabel Fonseca describes the resistance by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council to the inclusion of Roma, or gypsy, victims of the Nazis in the museum that the council supervises in Washington.

It was only after the 1986 resignation of President Elie Wiesel, the survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who had opposed Gypsy representation, that one Gypsy was invited onto the council…
I tended to judge Wiesel for this opposition, till a few days ago, when I read his book on his father’s murder in a concentration camp, Night (1958). In it, he describes his first night in Auschwitz, after saying goodbye to his mother and one of his sisters for the last time. He and his father are moved to a barracks where Gypsy inmates assisted the German guards, or kapos. His father is suffering from colic and approaches a Gypsy to find out where the bathroom is.
The gypsy looked him up and down slowly, from head to foot. As if he wanted to convince himself that this man addressing him was really a creature of flesh and bone, a living being with a body and a belly. Then, as if he had suddenly woken up from a heavy doze, he dealt my father such a clout that he fell to the ground, crawling back to his place on all fours… I did not move… Yesterday, I should have sunk my nails into the criminal’s flesh… I thought only: I shall never forgive [him] for that…
Night’s great theme is the son’s guilt at surviving while his father dies. It includes another scene of cruelty by Gypsies. I wish Wiesel could have gotten past his anger at Gypsies when he held a position of authority; and yet I find that I also excuse him.

R M “You are deluding yourself if you think otherwise …The Palestinian are well funded …..ask yourself where the money is going ?Ask yourself why Arafat’s was on Forbes richest man and his wife suha is living like a queen in Paris ? Why do the Palestinian leaders have enormous beautiful mansions ,you armchair leftist living in glorious santa barbara would die for ?”

Yes Yasser Arafat ( NObel Peace Price winner who should be stripped of his ‘prize’) took the money that was meant for the Palestinians !!!! That is WHY ( and here is another LOGICAL conclusion) the CORRUPT PLO turned FATAH with the corrupt leader of Mamoud Abbas,,,,,LOST elections from HAMAS which at the time was putting its money into schools and hospitals and communities.

So AGAIN….a logical explanation on HOW Hamas WON the elections from Fatah ( which was the continuation of a corrupt PLO under Yasser Arafat).

“Gaza Bombshell” by David Rose who’s article appeared in Vanity Fair will explain the divide and conquer techniqes used by the U.S.

Hot off the press

An Israeli military college has printed damning soldiers’ accounts of the killing of civilians and vandalism during recent operations in Gaza.

One account tells of a sniper killing a mother and children at close range whom troops had told to leave their home.

Another speaker at the seminar described what he saw as the “cold blooded murder” of a Palestinian woman.

The army has defended its conduct during the Gaza offensive but said it would investigate the testimonies.

The Israeli army has said it will investigate the soldiers’ accounts.

The testimonies were published by the military academy at Oranim College. Graduates of the academy, who had served in Gaza, were speaking to new recruits at a seminar.

The climate in general [was that] lives of Palestinians are much, much less important than the lives of our soldiers

Soldier testimony

Analysis: Operation Miscast Lead?
Gaza war crimes probes

“[The testimonies] conveyed an atmosphere in which one feels entitled to use unrestricted force against Palestinians,” academy director Dany Zamir told public radio.

Heavy civilian casualties during the three-week operation which ended in the blockaded coastal strip on 18 January provoked an international outcry.

Correspondents say the testimonies undermine Israel’s claims that troops took care to protect non-combatants and accusations that Hamas militants were responsible for putting civilians into harm’s way.

‘Less important’

The Palestinian woman and two of her children were allegedly shot after they misunderstood instructions about which way to walk having been ordered out of their home by troops.

“The climate in general… I don’t know how to describe it…. the lives of Palestinians, let’s say, are much, much less important than the lives of our soldiers,” an infantry squad leader is quoted saying.

FROM THE BBC WORLD SERVICE

More from BBC World Service

In another cited case, a commander ordered troops to kill an elderly woman walking on a road, even though she was easily identifiable and clearly not a threat.

Testimonies, which were given by combat pilots and infantry soldiers, also included allegations of unnecessary destruction of Palestinian property.

“We would throw everything out of the windows to make room and order. Everything… Refrigerators, plates, furniture. The order was to throw all of the house’s contents outside,” a soldier said.

One non-commissioned officer related at the seminar that an old woman crossing a main road was shot by soldiers.

“I don’t know whether she was suspicious, not suspicious, I don’t know her story… I do know that my officer sent people to the roof in order to take her out… It was cold-blooded murder,” he said.

The transcript of the session for the college’s Yitzhak Rabin pre-military course, which was held last month, appeared in a newsletter published by the academy.

Israeli human rights groups have criticised the military for failing to properly investigate violations of the laws of war in Gaza despite plenty of evidence of possible war crimes.

‘Moral army’

The soldiers’ testimonies also reportedly told of an unusually high intervention by military and non-military rabbis, who circulated pamphlets describing the war in religious terminology.
Palestinian civilians paid a heavy price during the three-week Israeli operation

“All the articles had one clear message,” one soldier said. “We are the people of Israel, we arrived in the country almost by miracle, now we need to fight to uproot the gentiles who interfere with re-conquering the Holy Land.”

“Many soldiers’ feelings were that this was a war of religion,” he added.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israel Radio that the findings would be examined seriously.

“I still say we have the most moral army in the world. Of course there may be exceptions but I have absolutely no doubt this will be inspected on a case-by-case basis,” he said.

Medical authorities say more than 1,300 Palestinians were killed during Israel’s 22-day operation, including some 440 children, 110 women, and dozens of elderly people.

The stated aim was to curb rocket and mortar fire by militants from Gaza. Thirteen Israelis, including three civilians were killed.

but i suppose u say the Israeli military college is anti-semite

WBUR …My comment is awaiting moderation all day why ? could it be because I wrote criticism on the BBC and asking why they have not published the Balen Report ? WBUR are you censoring me?

Another Jew who is reporting warcrimes by the Israeli govt.

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – A United Nations human rights investigator said on Thursday that Israel’s military assault on densely populated Gaza appeared to constitute a grave war crime.

Richard Falk, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, said the Geneva Conventions required warring forces to distinguish between military targets and surrounding civilians.

“If it is not possible to do so, then launching the attacks is inherently unlawful and would seem to constitute a war crime of the greatest magnitude under international law,” Falk said.

“On the basis of the preliminary evidence available, there is reason to reach this conclusion,” he wrote in an annual 26-page report submitted to the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Falk gave the same death toll from Israel’s offensive in December and January — 1,434 Palestinians, including 960 civilians — as the Palestinian human rights center.

Israel, which lost 13 people during the war, disputes the figures and has accused Hamas fighters in Gaza of using civilians as human shields during the conflict — an allegation which Falk said should be investigated.

He called the Israeli attacks a “massive assault on a densely populated urbanized setting” in which the entire civilian population had been subjected to “an inhumane form of warfare that kills, maims and inflicts mental harm.”

“As all borders were sealed, civilians could not escape from the orbit of harm,” he said.

This denial of people’s right to flee the war zone as refugees may also constitute a crime against humanity, he said.

WAR CRIMES PROBE

Falk called for an independent experts group to probe possible war crimes committed by both Israeli forces and Hamas. It should gather eyewitness testimony as well as explanations from Israeli and Palestinian military commanders.

Violations included Israel’s alleged “targeting of schools, mosques and ambulances” during the offensive, which lasted from December 27 to January 18, and its use of weapons including white phosphorus, as well as Hamas’s firing of rockets at civilian targets in southern Israel.

Falk said that Israel’s blockade of the coastal strip of 1.5 million people violated the Geneva Conventions and this suggested further war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity.

The aggression was not legally justified and may represent a “crime against peace” — a principle established at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals, according to Falk, an American law professor who serves as the Human Rights Council’s independent investigator.

Falk, who is Jewish, suggested the Security Council might set up an ad hoc criminal tribunal to establish accountability for war crimes in Gaza, noting Israel has not signed the Rome statutes establishing the International Criminal Court.

According to my records…you never had one! Namecalling and making ad hominem attacks are NOT conversation!

Here is more:

Hitler’s Mufti:

http://tellthechildrenthetruth.com/gallery/

http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2009/03/idf-being-smeared-over-cast-lead.html

Israel Matzav

Thursday, March 19, 2009

“IDF being smeared over Cast Lead shootings?”

“Thursday morning, there was a disturbing interview on Israel Radio with the head of the pre-military academy in Tivon and the head of an organization called ‘Breaking the Silence.’ The academy head described a post-mortem that he conducted with his former students after Operation Cast Lead in which the students claimed that there were cases of indiscriminate shooting of ‘Palestinian civilians’ in Gaza during the operation.

Some of the alleged testimonies have already been written up in two articles in Haaretz here and here. This is from the first article (picked up by Memeorandum here):
During Operation Cast Lead, Israeli forces killed Palestinian civilians under permissive rules of engagement and intentionally destroyed their property, say soldiers who fought in the offensive.

The soldiers are graduates of the Yitzhak Rabin pre-military preparatory course at Oranim Academic College in Tivon. Some of their statements made on Feb. 13 will appear Thursday and Friday in Haaretz. Dozens of graduates of the course who took part in the discussion fought in the Gaza operation.

The speakers included combat pilots and infantry soldiers. Their testimony runs counter to the Israel Defense Forces’ claims that Israeli troops observed a high level of moral behavior during the operation. The session’s transcript was published this week in the newsletter for the course’s graduates.

The testimonies include a description by an infantry squad leader of an incident where an IDF sharpshooter mistakenly shot a Palestinian mother and her two children. “There was a house with a family inside …. We put them in a room. Later we left the house and another platoon entered it, and a few days after that there was an order to release the family. They had set up positions upstairs. There was a sniper position on the roof,” the soldier said.

“The platoon commander let the family go and told them to go to the right. One mother and her two children didn’t understand and went to the left, but they forgot to tell the sharpshooter on the roof they had let them go and it was okay, and he should hold his fire and he … he did what he was supposed to, like he was following his orders.”
It gets worse from there.

In the second article, the Haaretz reporter grants the soldiers telling the stories 100% reliability.
It seems that what soldiers have to say is actually the way things happened in the field, most of the time. And as usual, reality is completely different from the gentler version provided by the military commanders to the public and media during the operation and after.

The soldiers are not lying, for the simple reason that they have no reason to. If you read the transcript that will appear in Haaretz Friday, you will not find any judgment or boasting. This is what the soldiers, from their point of view, saw in Gaza. There is a continuity of testimony from different sectors that reflects a disturbing and depressing picture.
Oh really? Let’s go back to the first article for a minute:
“I don’t think he felt too bad about it, because after all, as far as he was concerned, he did his job according to the orders he was given. And the atmosphere in general, from what I understood from most of my men who I talked to … I don’t know how to describe it …. The lives of Palestinians, let’s say, is something very, very less important than the lives of our soldiers. So as far as they are concerned they can justify it that way,” he said.
Not judgmental at all, eh?

But it gets worse. Jameel in the Muqhata reports the following:
Channel 2 TV Army correspondent Roni Daniel stated at 6:30 PM this evening, that he personally tracked down one of the soldiers interviewed for the Haaretz article. Apparently the soldier’s testimony to Haaretz wasn’t based on anything he personally saw or witnessed, rather based on rumors and hearsay he heard (and the soldier wasn’t even in Gaza!)
Where have we seen this before? Here’s a hint: ‘Breaking the Silence.’

Of course, this story is now all over the world’s media as uncontested fact (Jameel has a longer list). But when has that ever bothered Haaretz before? (For the record, I waited until after I heard the simulcast of Channel 1′s news magazine on the radio before writing this post, and there was no mention of Daniel’s finding in their report on this issue).

The IDF will investigate these stories and will likely find in some instances that ‘Palestinians’ were accidentally shot just like – as the head of another pre-military academy points out – there were some IDF troops accidentally shot. Those things happen in war. When they find widespread verified instances in which IDF troops shoot unarmed ‘Palestinian’ civilians (real civilians – not just people dressed in civilian clothes as the terrorists are wont to do), call me. Until then, the IDF is the most moral army in the World. Period.

By the way, the photo at the top is of IDF soldiers rescuing a smuggler from a tunnel”

WBUR how long does it take to look at a comment? are you afraid of the truth? and protecting the BBC from its anti-semitism? The truth will eventually come out in the end so you might as well be the ones to do it …..

http://www.bbcwatch.co.uk/reports.html and

http://www.honestreporting.com/

“Who spoke in a public address at a political Zionist meeting in Berlin and declared that “Germany… has too many Jews”? Was it Hitler or Goebbels? No, it was Chaim Weizman, later to become the first President of the State of Israel. This address was published in 1920, and, thus, four years before Hitler had even written Mein Kampf.”

I am not done posting on this BUT there is ONE major MISCONCEPTION about Humanity!

The notion that somehow good only belongs to one ‘group’ ( Religion, Nationality,Race etc) and evil to another is intellectual dishonesty.

My grandmother who helped save the Jewish couple during WWII by being part of a network of safe-havens during RAZZIA’S ( when the GErmans would go door to door in occupied Holland looking for Jews)tought me ONE LESSON!

There is NO such thing as one race, nationality or religion that is evil.There are good people among ALL and then there are those who will live at the expense of others, are misguided or have evil intent among ALL!

ANTI-SEMITISM BY POLITICAL ZIONISM

Although Zionists and others dispute it, the undeniable fact is that revolutionary secular and apostate elements in the Jewish community in Europe contributed greatly to hostility towards Jews after World War I. This aroused hatred of Jews in general among many non-Jews. While a prisoner in 1924 in the fortress of Lansberg on the River Lech, Hitler wrote his Mein Kampf. When he became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, he was assisted by Goebbels, Roseberg and Streicher. From them came the declarations, “The Jews of Germany caused the defeat of Germany in the 1914-1918 war; the Jews of Germany were responsible for the terrible conditions in Germany that followed the war; the Jews of Germany are foreigners and they wish to remain foreigners; they have no loyalty to the country of their birth; they are not human; they are filthy dogs; they have no right to intrude into Germany’s affairs; there are too many Jews in Germany.

As far as Zionism is concerned, the founder of Zionism and apostate, Theodor Herzl, sought to intensify hatred of the Jew in order to enhance the cause of political Zionism. Here are some of his “pearls”:

“It is essential that the sufferings of Jews. . . become worse. . . this will assist in realization of our plans. . .I have an excellent idea. . . I shall induce anti-semites to liquidate Jewish wealth. . . The anti-semites will assist us thereby in that they will strengthen the persecution and oppression of Jews. The anti-semites shall be our best friends”. (From his Diary, Part I, pp. 16)

Additional words from the vivid imagination of this dreamer, from p. 68 of Part I of his Diary.

So anti-Semitism, which is a deeply imbedded force in the subconscious mind of the masses, will not harm the Jews. I actually find it to be advantageous to building the Jewish character, education by the masses that will lead to assimilation. This education can only happen through suffering, and the Jews will adapt.

Hateful views of Jews as being subhuman did not have to be invented by Nazi theorists such as Hitler, Goebbels, Rosenberg and Streicher. This ideology was simply adapted from statements of political Zionists such as those found in the writings of the Zionist Yehezkel Kaufman in 1933.

In 1920 there were statements hostile to Jews expressed at Heidelberg University. These statements, arguing that Jews of Germany had caused the turmoil that followed the war; that the Jews of Germany had nothing in common with Germans, and that Germans had the right to prevent the Jews of Germany from intruding into the affairs of their volk were not made by Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf, but by Nahum Goldmann, who went in to become the President of the World Zionist Organization and head of the World Jewish Congress, and, indisputably, the most influential political Zionist in the world, second only to the Prime Minister of the State of Israel.

In 1921, Germans in Germany were told that:

“We Jews are aliens… a foreign people in your midst and we… wish to stay that way. A Jew can never be a loyal German; whoever calls the foreign land his Fatherland is a traitor to the Jewish people“.

Who spoke these vile words? It was Jacob Klatzkin, the second of two political Zionist ideologists in Germany at the time, where the Jews of Germany were enjoying full political and civil rights. It was he who had advocated undermining Jewish communities as the one certain way of acquiring a state. “They had no qualms concerning tearing down the existing Jewish communities.”

Who spoke in a public address at a political Zionist meeting in Berlin and declared that “Germany… has too many Jews”? Was it Hitler or Goebbels? No, it was Chaim Weizman, later to become the first President of the State of Israel. This address was published in 1920, and, thus, four years before Hitler had even written Mein Kampf.

How many Zionist Jews know of this vicious treachery uttered by these senior political Zionist leaders, these apostates from the Jewish People? At the Nuremberg Trials of Major War Criminals, Nazi propagandist, Julius Streicher testified: “I did no more than echo what the leading Zionists had been saying”, it is clear that he had told the truth.

In addition to Hitler, Rosenberg, Goebbels and Streicher, many other Nazi leaders used statements from Zionists to validate their charges against the Jews of Germany. Such are the efforts of Zionist leaders to this very day to maintain a high degree of anti-semitism in order to enable them, in feigned horror, to then point to anti-semitism to support their idolatrous and anti-Jewish cause. In 1963, Moshe Sharett, then Chairman of the Jewish Agency, told the 38th Annual Congress of the Scandinavian Youth Federation that the freedom enjoyed by the majority of Jews imperiled Zionism, and at the 26th World Zionist Congress, the delegates were told that the Jew is endangered by the easing of anti-Semitism in the United States “We are endangered by freedom” he declared.

As we stated earlier, Zionism thrives on anti-Semitism. Ben Gurion declared, “…not always and not everywhere do I oppose anti-Semitism”. Zionists regularly pull out their handy “anti-Semite” race card against anyone, Jew or non-Jew, who dares to speak out against the wickedness of Zionism.

During World War II, the Lehi organization, an offshoot of Begin’s Irgun that was headed by Yitzchak Shamir sought an alliance with Nazis! The following is a quote from the writings of the Lehi in their contact with the Nazis:

“The establishment of the historical Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis and bound by a treaty with the German Reich would be in the interests of strengthening the future German position of power in the Near East … The NMO in Palestine offers to take an active part in the war on Germany’s side … The cooperation of the Israeli freedom movement would also be in line with one of the recent speeches of the German Reich Chancellor, in which Herr Hitler stressed that any combination and any alliance would be entered into in order to isolate England and defeat it.”

To those who assume that Zionists have been on the side of freedom and equality, these words seem strange. However, to those who understand the root of Zionism, which is the transformation and eradication of the concept of the traditional Jew and Judaism, these statements are not strange at all. They are to be expected.

The Zionists agreed with Nazism in general, even prior to the advent of Nazism. They believed that Jews could not, and should not, live in harmony in any other society in the world, and that should be removed from those societies for the benefit of those societies. They believed that the new Jewish existence in its own State would remake the image of Jews as “useless” and “parasites.” These ideas existed long before Adolf Hitler!

There is a huge amount of literature, for instance , describing how the Zionists made it very difficult to save Jews during and after World War II. As various individuals and organizations were trying to arrange departures of Jews to western countries, the Zionists worked overtime to prevent this from happening. They expressed the opinion that building up the Jewish population of Palestine was more important than enabling Jews to go to third countries, and they insisted to western powers that Jews should not be accepted anywhere other than Palestine. Indeed, Yitzchak Greenbaum, a famous Zionist, proclaimed that “one cow in Palestine was worth more than all the Jews in Poland.” The infamous David Ben-Gurion said in 1938:

“If I knew it was possible to save all the children in Germany by taking them to England, and only half of the children by taking them to Eretz Israel, I would choose the second solution. For we must take into account not only the lives of these children but also the history of the people of Israel.”

Read about the brutal Zionist role in the Holocaust.”If I am asked, “Could you give from the UJA moneys to rescue Jews, ‘I say, NO! and I say again NO!”

Izaak Greenbaum — head of Jewish Agency Rescue Committee
February 18, 1943
Addressed to the Zionist Executive Council.

Chaim Weizmann, the first president of Israel, made this Zionist policy very explicit:
The hopes of Europe’s six million Jews are centered on emigration. I was asked: “Can you bring six million Jews to Palestine?” I replied, “No.” … From the depths of the tragedy I want to save … young people [for Palestine]. The old ones will pass. They will bear their fate or they will not. They are dust, economic and moral dust in a cruel world … Only the branch of the young shall survive. They have to accept it.

Chaim Weizmann reporting to the Zionist Congress in 1937 on his testimony before the Peel Commission in London, July 1937. Cited in Yahya, p. 55.

As late as 1943, while the Jews of Europe were being exterminated in their millions, the U.S. Congress proposed to set up a commission to “study” the problem. Rabbi Stephen Wise, who was the principal American spokesperson for Zionism, came to Washington to testify against the rescue bill because it would divert attention from the colonization of Palestine.

This is the same Rabbi Wise who, in 1938, in his capacity as leader of the American Jewish Congress, wrote a letter in which he opposed any change in U.S. immigration laws which would enable Jews to find refuge. He stated:

“It may interest you to know that some weeks ago the representatives of all the leading Jewish organizations met in conference … It was decided that no Jewish organization would, at this time, sponsor a bill which would in any way alter the immigration laws.”

2)SO HAMAS ARE NOT GUILTY?

But then Hamas (along with Yasser Arafat, one of the most vicious murderers of Jews since Hitler) appear to enjoy a certain degree of sympathy at the BBC, which throughout the past four years of Israeli-Palestinian violence has constantly tried to obscure the true nature of the group by using misleading language.

There are innumerable examples of this; they occur almost daily.

“Over the years, Hamas has been blamed for scores of suicide attacks on Israel,” says the BBC, thereby trying to suggest to listeners and viewers that Hamas has perhaps been wrongly accused of such attacks (even though Hamas itself has proudly and repeatedly claimed responsibility for them in mass celebratory rallies in Gaza, Jenin and elsewhere.)

Two Palestinian gunmen opened fire indiscriminately in the heart of the northern Israeli town of Afula, killing two young Israeli civilians and wounding over 50 others. They themselves were then shot dead by Israeli policemen. The headline on the BBC website read: “Four Die in Israel Shooting Rampage,” suggesting that four innocent people had died, possibly at the hands of the Israelis.

Again, when suicide bombers killed 26 Israeli civilians in attacks on Jerusalem and Haifa, the word “terror” was used by the BBC only when describing Israel’s retaliatory (and largely non-lethal) attacks on Palestinian military targets. (By contrast, the BBC didn’t hesitate to use the word “terrorism” last week, when one of its own correspondents, Frank Gardner, was shot and badly wounded by an al-Qaeda gunman in Saudi Arabia.)

Some of the foreign BBC staff are quite open about their sympathies for Hamas. The senior BBC Arabic Service correspondent in the Gaza Strip, Fayad Abu Shamala, told a Hamas rally on May 6, 2001 (attended by the then Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin) that journalists and media organizations in Gaza, including the BBC, are “waging the campaign [of resistance/terror against Israel] shoulder-to-shoulder together with the Palestinian people.”

The best the BBC could do in response to requests from Israel that they distance themselves from these remarks at the time, was to issue a statement saying, “Fayad’s remarks were made in a private capacity. His reports have always matched the best standards of balance required by the BBC.”

Indeed, today, three years later, the BBC is continuing to use Abu Shamala as much as ever. He was, for example, one of the BBC reporters in Gaza last month, who contributed to the BBC’s highly slanted reporting (on both the BBC English and Arabic services) of Israel’s operation to root out Hamas bomb-makers in Rafah in the southern Gaza.

4)DON’T MENTION LIMB AMPTUTATION

Those who dare criticize Arab extremism are dealt with somewhat differently by the BBC.

For example, Robert Kilroy-Silk – who does not appear on BBC news but hosted a daytime chat show – was immediately taken off air after he had the temerity to write in a non-BBC newspaper article in January that Arabs were “suicide bombers, limb amputators, women repressors.” He swiftly apologized and the newspaper in question acknowledged that he had written “Arab governments” and this was inadvertently changed to “Arabs” as a result of an editing error. But Kilroy-Silk was rapidly sacked by the BBC nevertheless.

However, Kilroy-Silk’s remarks – as many Arab moderates who welcomed them, such as the Egyptian human rights campaigner Ibrahim Nawar, have pointed out – were not technically inaccurate. Limb amputation and repression of women are enshrined in Saudi law, and suicide bombing of Israelis and Americans strongly encouraged by some in government circles.

And they were comments which may have had consequences. Just a few days later, after they were approvingly reported across the Arab world, several Israeli settlers were murdered, including five-year-old Danielle Shefi, slain as she screamed in her bedroom, leaving behind her Mickey Mouse sheets soaked in blood.

Kilroy-Silk – whose article appeared just a few days before Dr Tonge’s suicide bomb remarks – apologized. He said he “greatly regretted the offence caused” by his remarks. But this wasn’t enough to satisfy the BBC.

7)DID SOMEONE SAY DOUBLE STANDARDS?

Orla Guerin: One of the
BBC’s most partisan reporters
The BBC’s double standards are clear to almost everyone except, it seems, to the BBC itself and its sympathizers in the press. A BBC spokeswoman for example, told the Guardian (May 23, 2002) after the BBC was accused by British Jews of being a prime force in inciting renewed anti-Semitism in the UK, that “The BBC’s reporting about the Middle East is scrupulously fair, accurate and balanced.”

The official BBC line has not changed since then, even after the scathing criticism of the Hutton report. Such are the level of arrogance and the spirit of denial that permeate the BBC newsroom. Indeed, recent denials of political bias have been stronger than ever. Of course, the BBC would be in danger of losing its enormous public funding if they were admitted.

For a short while after the Hutton report was published in January, the BBC were a little more careful in their attacks on Israel. But recently they have returned to old ways, with at least four anti-Israeli TV documentaries airing in recent weeks. That makes a total of 20 major documentaries the BBC have made on Israel since 2001 (all but one attacking Israel.) That is three times more than the number of documentaries the BBC has made on any other single country, with the exception of Britain.

Meanwhile, to my knowledge, the BBC has made no documentaries about human rights abuses in the Arab world; or about Palestinian schoolbooks; or about the Palestinian Authority’s incitement of the Palestinian population; or about the Palestinian Authority’s funding of terrorism allegedly with the use of European Union aid funds.

The problem is not that every individual correspondent is biased. Whereas some, such as Orla Guerin, make almost no attempt at balance, others, such as James Reynolds in Jerusalem, do make a genuine effort to be fair. The problem is that the culture that permeates the BBC, a habit of thought that has become engrained throughout the network, allows only one worldview, in which the US and Israel are vilified well beyond any reasoned or justified criticism of anything these states have actually done.

Hiring practices reinforce this. Recently, Ibrahim Helal, editor in chief of the much-criticized al Jazeera TV network was hired by the BBC World Service Trust. The job the BBC wanted him for? To advise on balance in Middle East coverage, and head “media training projects,” i.e. to train BBC (and perhaps other journalists) into “understanding the Middle East better.”

9)A GLOBAL PROBLEM

The BBC’s Middle East problem is not just a British problem but an international one. The BBC pours forth its worldview not just in English but in almost every language of the Middle East: Pashto, Persian, Arabic, Turkish. Needless to say it declines to broadcast in Hebrew, even though it does broadcast in the languages of other small nations: Slovene and Slovak, Macedonian and Albanian, Azeri and Uzbek, Kazakh and Kyrgyz, and so on. (It doesn’t broadcast in Kurdish either; but then the BBC doesn’t concern itself with Kurdish rights or aspirations since they are persecuted by Moslem-majority states like Syria and Iran. We didn’t hear much on the BBC, for example, when dozens of Syrian Kurds were killed and injured by President Assad’s regime two months ago.)

Throughout the world the BBC enjoys exceptional influence. An article last month in the liberal Israeli daily Ha’aretz, for example, quotes a leading Lithuanian campaigner against anti-Semitism as saying that inflammatory and biased international BBC news coverage against Israel was helping to revive anti-Semitism in Lithuania against those few Jews remaining who were not murdered in the Holocaust.

The English-language version of the BBC seems to be just the tip of the iceberg. My friend Kamran al-Karadaghi, an urbane, moderate and thoughtful Iraqi, who was for a decade the political editor of the Arabic-language newspaper al-Hayat in London, and who until last week served as head of Radio Free Iraq, tells me that the BBC Arabic language service is not just far worse than the English language BBC. It is “even worse,” he says, than al Jazeera, in the vitriol it pours out against America and Israel.

Footnotes –
[2] For many other examples contrasting BBC coverage of Sharon and Arafat, see the well-compiled reports by London lawyer Trevor Asserson at http://www.bbcwatch.com

Hi WBUR this is a good point i found along with what happen on this thread.

‘Anti-Semitism’ As
A Political Weapon
By Lasse Wilhelmson
lasse.wilhelmson@bostream.nu
6-25-5

Criticising Israel´s mistakes is acceptable. But questioning whether Israel is a Jewish state with a racist apartheid system that renders non-Jews second rate citizens – that is not acceptable. It makes little difference whether the criticism is based on facts. Few people who cannot claim Jewish descent would dare to criticize publicly. They are afraid of being accused of “anti-semitism”.

There is much talk of disarming countries with nuclear weapons. Not the US and its allies, but the so-called ‘rogue states’, especially Iran, which doesn´t yet have any weapons. Israel is hardly ever mentioned as a nuclear power although it has been for a long time. In spite of its advanced plans to bomb Iran, Israel is not seen as a threat to the surrounding world. The media regularly criticizes severely various religions, especially Islam, but never Judaism. Catholic pressure through lobbying, or the Pope´s speeches on political issues are discussed and criticized. The fight in South Africa against the Boers involved a whole world. Not because they were a “race” with undesirable characteristics, but because they were the social group who in their own interests formed and administrated a racist apartheid system. The same sort of criticism was aimed at the followers of Cecil Rhodes in Rhodesia.

All types of social, ethnic and religious groups defend their own special interests. It is considered quite legitimate for their spokesmen to do their best to promote these interests; just as it is quite legitimate to criticize the same. But the moment Jewish spokesmen and their organisations are criticised, the legitimacy vanishes into thin air. The mention of “Jewish power” makes most people´s blood run cold, but it is quite alright to discuss “gypsy power” or rather the lack of it. “Jewishness” has become taboo. This applies particularly to the combination of “Jewish” and of “power” . All kinds of power can be examined and discussed, questioned or rejected – but not the Jewish kind which is generally presented as non-existent.

There is growing anxiety in the Palestinian movement in Sweden about using “Jewish” as a prefix to the settlements, the state of Israel or the apartheid system, albeit the use is quite correct. The settlements for example are “Jewish settlements” simply because only Jews are allowed to live there. They are not Israeli because non-Jewish citizens are forbidden access to them. Neither are they Zionist as many Zionists are not Jews. It has now got to the stage where a leading spokesmen for the Palestinians in Sweden denies that Jews and Palestinians have disagreements, despite the law giving Jews all over the world the right to return to Israel, thus making them potential enemies of the Palestinians. Having a Jewish mother gives the right to live in the country taken from the Palestinians. One would be hard put to find a more fundamental disagreement. The issue of blood-relationship renders it, moreover, racist.

A reluctance to discuss Judaism´s significance for Zionism in Israel of today makes it impossible to understand why Israel was not content with fifty per cent, later eighty per cent, of Palestine. Or why a social democratic prime minister ordered his soldiers to break the bones of children throwing stones? And how can one understand why Jews in Jerusalem throw their garbage onto the roads and back yards of their Palestinian neighbours, spit at them, or why masked Jewish settlers during the “cease fire” launched pogroms on unarmed Palestinian farmers, women and children? Or why the Israeli “peace movement” and “left” do not question the Jewish apartheid system? Just and lasting peace can never be achieved without its transformation. Few people think that all this is a result of the Jews being an “evil race”. But if it cannot be explained by any other means, the few risk becoming too many. A racially-based hate of Jews is helped along by the label of “anti-semitism” pasted on nearly all criticism of Israel, not to mention criticism of Judaism.

Zionism, through its Jewish organisations, is the dominant interpretation of Judaism today. This is a renaissance of national Judaism of the Middle Ages and the judicial system Halakha with its extreme animosity towards non-jews who were seen rather as subhuman. This revival is seen as very beneficial by most Jewish organisations worldwide. They demand of their members positive commitment to the state of Israel. This is the context in which the behaviour mentioned above can be understood. Most Jews in the diaspora are, however, “happily” unaware of this and are being used by their Zionist leaders and rabbis.

Politics and religion have merged in the state of Israel today. A person speaking out for a secular democracy to replace the Jewish state, is accused of, in fact, wanting to “drive the Jews into the sea”. Most Jews today identify themselves not with Israel but with Israel as a Jewish state. This creates a fundamental contradiction for many Jews: supporting the Jewish apartheid state while promoting democracy in the countries where they actually live. Denying or whitewashing Israel´s politics, becomes a way of keeping one´s identity intact. Violent, groundless attacks with “anti-semitism” as a weapon is the method used against any attempt to lay bare this contradiction. A well known example is how Israel´s former ambassador to Sweden vandalised the art installation Snow White last year.

The risk of being labelled “anti-semitic” if you are not a Jew or of “self-hatred” if you are, creates self-censorship among those who are critical of Israel´s policies or dislike the successful lobbying carried out by Jewish and Christian Zionists, influencing US foreign policy. The so- called Friends of Israel, most of them spokesmen for Jewish organisations, have taken it upon themselves to be the foremost interpreters of the term “anti-semitism”. Few question this role as they run the risk of being tainted themselves if they do. The term “anti-semitism” is taking on new nuances all the time. Of late the slightest implication, as in “almost anti-semitic” or an “anti-semitic point of in terest” has been enough to invoke self-censorship. The mention of these circumstances is often felt to be “dangerous” as it could lead to the growth of “anti-semitism”. All this in a western world where islamophobia is a considerably greater problem.

Jews are rightly proud of their success in almost all corners of society. In art and science and, not least, the media and politics. Israeli newspapers tell of the successful “likudification” of the Bush administration and delight in the fact that the Israeli minister for the diaspora is Bush´s new favourite author and pet in the White House. Russian oligarchs with Israeli citizenship take breakfast there. There is a culture of boasting about this among Jews. But should a critic of Israel point to these exact same circumstances, he would immediately be accused of spreading “anti-semite theories of conspiracy” and thus be barred from any further discussion.

The Jews have for many years had total entrepreneurship of “God´s chosen People” with a “biblical right” to Palestine. Zionism has been politically successful in reducing the Holocaust to Nazi war crimes against Jews. By presenting themselves as the major (the only?) victims in the history of humanity they expect to claim special moral rights. The method is used favourably to justify and cover up the genocide of the Palestinians. “Anti-semitism” is being used to stop criticism of Israel´s way onwards to achieve the Zionist goal of a Jewish state in the whole of Palestine. Before this goal can be realised, “peace” must be reached with the creation of a few Palestinian reservations on ten per cent of what was originally Palestine, walled-in and gradually wasting away. We are almost there now.

Tell me Mike does either bbc or any of your antizionist sources say anything positive about Israel?

Do they say anything critical about the Palestinians?

Story of Israel by Martin Gilbert

http://www.amazon.com/Story-Israel-Martin-Gilbert/dp/184732052X/ref=pd_sim_b_5

“Sir Martin Gilbert is the official biographer of Sir Winston Churchill and one of the world’s leading experts on Jewish history. He has written numerous books on the subject and been a visiting professor at both Tel Aviv and the Hebrew University.”

“Gilbert’s impassioned history adds immeasurably to our understanding of the forces that have shaped contemporary Israel. Digging up a wealth of primary source material and quoting liberally from letters, memoirs, eyewitness accounts, interviews, memoranda and diaries of David Ben-Gurion, Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan, Abba Eban, Shimon Peres, Teddy Kollek and dozens of ordinary people, the eminent British historian (The Holocaust) has produced a gripping epic. Gilbert’s extensive behind-the-scenes and on-the-battlefield coverage of Israel’s numerous wars with its Arab neighbors adds much new detail. While the narrative focuses predominantly on politics, high-level diplomacy and war, it also illuminates other topics, including the Jewish settlement of Palestine in the early years of this century, tensions between secularists and Orthodox Jews, Israeli military intelligence operations, the current impasse in negotiations with Palestinian Arabs and the ferment of Israeli society, which Gilbert portrays as a diverse mixture of immigrant peoples that embody many different strands of Judaism yet are united by Israeli culture.”

Hi Toby, no offense since u seem the rational of the 4. But nora has just proved my point. And see bbc does report positive things about israel when it occurs, like the crack down on prostitution in it.

But dude the stuff the israel government is doing in gaza, and Palestinian land is just wrong, and to censor it through name calling does not make it right. even in the iraq war americans protested about it.Unlike most areas of conflict the people in gaza was trapped and boxed in and with escape from the IDF

even a well known doctor that works in israel and is liked loss his children to them.

just a example

Palestinian gynecologist and peace advocate Dr. Ezzeldeen Abu al-Aish speaks to Democracy Now! producer Anjali Kamat and Jacquie Soohen of Big Noise Films in his home in Jabaliya, Gaza, where Israeli shells killed three of his daughters and a niece two months ago. Walking through his daughters’ room, he points out the remnants from the attack: blood-stained walls, books, clothes, hand-drawn pictures, gaping holes that were once windows, burned-out bits of computers, twisted pieces of metal, destroyed cupboards, shattered glass, and shrapnel. [includes rush transcript]

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to one of the better known tragedies from Israel’s attack on Gaza, a tragedy that partly unfolded live on Israeli television. Dr. Ezzeldeen Abu al-Aish is a well-known Gazan gynecologist, peace advocate, who has worked in Israeli hospitals for several years. He speaks fluent Hebrew, and during the war he was a rare Palestinian voice on Israeli television and radio, giving daily accounts of life and death inside Gaza.

Democracy Now! producer Anjali Kamat narrates the exchange that took place live on Israeli television a day and a half before the official end of what the Israelis called Operation Cast Lead.

ANJALI KAMAT: On January 16th, when Dr. Abu al-Aish called Shlomi Eldar of Israel’s Channel 10 TV News, Israeli tank shells had just struck his home. They killed his family, he says. “I think I’m a bit overwhelmed, too.”

He explains that Dr. Abu al-Aish is a physician at Tel Hashomer Hospital. He always feared his family would be hurt. His daughters were injured. “I want to save them, but they died on the spot, Shlomi. They were hit in the head.”

A visibly emotional Eldar explains that the doctor had unsuccessfully tried to get out for many days and was afraid to even raise a white flag. “A shell hit his home,” Eldar says. “And I have to tell you, I do not know how to hang up this phone. I will not hang up this phone call.”

The anchor calls on the Israeli Defense Forces to allow ambulances to get to the doctor’s family. Shlomi Eldar then excused himself from the show, took off his earpiece and rushed off the set to get help to Dr. Abu al-Aish.

AMY GOODMAN: But the ambulances never reached the doctor’s home, which was surrounded by Israeli tanks. It was too late to save his three daughters—twenty-one-year-old Bessan, fifteen-year-old Mayar, and thirteen-year-old Aya—as well as his niece Nour, who was age fourteen. They were all killed instantly by the shells.

JUAN GONZALEZ: The family says they walked a quarter of a mile carrying the dead and wounded through the streets, until they found an ambulance that took them to the closest hospital and then to the Erez crossing with Israel. Emergency vehicles organized by Israeli TV correspondent Shlomi Eldar awaited them at the border and took the doctor and his badly wounded sixteen-year-old daughter Shada to the Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv.

AMY GOODMAN: Two months after the tragedy, Democracy Now! producer Anjali Kamat and Jacquie Soohen of Big Noise Films visited Dr. Abu al-Aish at his home in Jabaliya, Gaza. He pointed out the remnants from that fateful day: blood-stained walls, books, clothes, and hand-drawn pictures, gaping holes that were once windows, burned-out bits of computers, twisted pieces of metal, destroyed cupboards, shattered glass, and shrapnel. He told his story late Monday night to Anjali Kamat, as he walked through his daughter’s room.

DR. EZZELDEEN ABU AL-AISH: We are standing in the scene of the tragedy, in the place where four lovely girls were sitting, building their dreams and their hopes, and in seconds, these dreams were killed. These flowers were dead. Three of my daughters and one niece were killed in one second on the 16th of January at a quarter to five p.m. Just a few seconds, I left them, and they stayed in the room—two daughters here, one daughter here, one daughter here, and my niece with them.

The first shell came from the tank space, which is there, came to shell two daughters who were sitting here on their chairs. And when I heard this shell, I came inside the room to find, to look. I can’t recognize my daughters. Their heads were cut off their bodies. They were separated from their bodies, and I can’t recognize whose body is this. They were drowning in a pool of blood. This is the pool of blood. Even look here. This is their brain. These are parts of their brain. Aya was lying on the ground. Shada was injured, and her eye is coming out. Her fingers were torn, just attached by a tag of skin. I felt disloved, out of space, screaming, “What can I do?”

They were not satisfied by the first shell and to leave my eldest daughter. But the second shell soon came to kill Aya, to injure my niece, who came down from the third floor, and to kill my eldest daughter Bessan, who was in the kitchen and came at that moment, screaming and jumping, “Dad! Dad! Aya is injured!”

The second shell, it penetrated the wall between this room to enter the other room. Look. This is the room with the weapons, where this room was fully equipped with weapons. These are the weapons which were in this room. These are the weapons. These are the weapons: the books and their clothes. These were the science handouts. There, you see, these are her handouts for the courses that she studies, which is stained with her blood. It’s mixed with her blood. These are the books. These are the weapons that I equipped my daughters with: with education, with knowledge, with dreams, with hopes, with loves.

I am a gynecologist who practiced most of my time in Israel. I was trained in Israel. And I devoted my life and my work for the benefit of humanity and well-being, to serve patients, not as someone else that you are delivering or helping choose. I am dealing with patients and human beings. We treat patients equally, with respect, with dignity, with privacy. Politicians and leaders should learn from doctors these values and these norms and to adopt them.

ANJALI KAMAT: Have you received an official response from Israel about why your home was targeted, about why your daughters were killed?

DR. EZZELDEEN ABU AL-AISH: What I received, that they admitted their responsibility about shelling my house and killing my daughters and my niece. That’s what I received. But other—the reasons behind that, you can’t ask them. They justified something which is not convincing, and it has many criticisms.

ANJALI KAMAT: What did they say?

DR. EZZELDEEN ABU AL-AISH: You know, they said there were—they think there were snipers on the roof of my building. It’s important to say the truth, and the truth lies here: only innocent civilian girls were in this room and this building and this surrounding. Nothing else.

ANJALI KAMAT: Doctor, you’re going to be traveling to the United States in a few weeks. What’s your message to the government of the United States, to the people of the United States?

DR. EZZELDEEN ABU AL-AISH: To judge things by two eyes and that the coin has two sides, and that there is a nation, a Palestinian people in Gaza, who are waiting to get their rights and their chances of living equally, as every nation in the world. And it’s important for the Obama’s administration to take the Israeli Arab file seriously and to deal with it seriously as soon as possible, because it’s a matter of saving lives. There is no need for delay. It’s important to start solving with the minimum justice that what are we looking for: respect human rights, equality, dignity and justice. And what they like for themselves, I want Mr. Obama to put himself in the position of the Palestinians and to defend the rights of the Palestinians, as he is in the position of the Israelis.

This is Mayar’s book. This is the math book. Mayar, who was fifteen years old in grade nine, who was dreaming to be a doctor and was happy that she will follow the same path as me. Mayar, she was the chairman of the students’ parliament at the school. She was elected. She was brilliant in mathematics, so genius. Even when I went to the school to see her friends, still they are remembering Mayar.

Yes, this is Aya. This is Aya’s notebook. Look. Read what it’s saying: “Excellent. God bless you. Well-organized.” This is what was written by her teacher. It was her dream to be a journalist. She was outspoken. She was a very lovely, very beautiful girl.

Bessan is a special girl, not [only] for me, for her uncles, for everyone who knew Bessan. She was twenty-one years old. She was about to graduate and get her BA from the Islamic University. She was a special girl. So humble, so wise, so beautiful.

What can I say about my daughters? It’s living with me. It’s part of me. I smell them. I taste them. I speak with them. When I’m speaking with you, I am speaking with my daughters. These are the good memories of my daughters, and it will follow me the whole of my life. And I will do my best, this memory, to be changed into positive actions, to establish a foundation under their name for only girls, to empower girls and women, who will achieve and seal, these girls, the dreams of my daughters.

You know, this invasion, from the beginning, I said it’s useless. It’s futile. No one is winning. The innocent civilians, the Gazans, civilians, paid the price of this invasion, no one else. And even the IDF, when they came here, the Israeli government, they said, “We want to teach the Gazans a lesson,” as if the Gazans are lacking teaching or education. Really, they succeeded in that, in educating the Palestinians, the Gazans especially, a lesson about strengthening animosity, hatredness, a bloodshed, and widening the gap between the two people in both sides. This is the only lesson. This is the only outcome of this invasion, nothing else. Anyone who is saying anything else apart from that, he is lying.

Military ways proved its failure. We should look for other ways to give each other its rights. We don’t want to speak about peace. Peace is—you know, this word lost its meaning. We should find something else: respect, equality, justice and partnership. That’s what we should look for.

I Just dont understand for a group who parents suffer so much, now does the same thing to others.

An Arab-made Misery.
by Nonie Darwish

International donors pledged almost $4.5 billion in aid for Gaza earlier this month. It has been very painful for me to witness over the past few years the deteriorating humanitarian situation in that narrow strip where I lived as a child in the 1950s.

The media tend to attribute Gaza’s decline solely to Israeli military and economic actions against Hamas. But such a myopic analysis ignores the problem’s root cause: 60 years of Arab policy aimed at cementing the Palestinian people’s status as stateless refugees in order to use their suffering as a weapon against Israel.

As a child in Gaza in the 1950s, I experienced the early results of this policy. Egypt, which then controlled the territory, conducted guerrilla-style operations against Israel from Gaza. My father commanded these operations, carried out by Palestinian fedayeen, Arabic for “self-sacrifice.” Back then, Gaza was already the front line of the Arab jihad against Israel. My father was assassinated by Israeli forces in 1956.

It was in those years that the Arab League started its Palestinian refugee policy. Arab countries implemented special laws designed to make it impossible to integrate the Palestinian refugees from the 1948 Arab war against Israel. Even descendants of Palestinian refugees who are born in another Arab country and live there their entire lives can never gain that country’s passport. Even if they marry a citizen of an Arab country, they cannot become citizens of their spouse’s country. They must remain “Palestinian” even though they may have never set foot in the West Bank or Gaza.

This policy of forcing a Palestinian identity on these people for eternity and condemning them to a miserable life in a refugee camp was designed to perpetuate and exacerbate the Palestinian refugee crisis.

So was the Arab policy of overpopulating Gaza. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, whose main political support comes from Arab countries, encourages high birth rates by rewarding families with many children. Yasser Arafat said the Palestinian woman’s womb was his best weapon.

Arab countries always push for classifying as many Palestinians as possible as “refugees.” As a result, about one-third of the Palestinians in Gaza still live in refugee camps. For 60 years, Palestinians have been used and abused by Arab regimes and Palestinian terrorists in their fight against Israel.

Now it is Hamas, an Islamist terror organization supported by Iran, which is using and abusing Palestinians for this purpose. While Hamas leaders hid in the well-stocked bunkers and tunnels they prepared before they provoked Israel into attacking them, Palestinian civilians were exposed and caught in the deadly crossfire between Hamas and Israeli soldiers.

As a result of 60 years of this Arab policy, Gaza has become a prison camp for 1.5 million Palestinians. Both Israel and Egypt are fearful of terrorist infiltration from Gaza — all the more so since Hamas took over — and have always maintained tight controls over their borders with Gaza. The Palestinians continue to endure hardships because Gaza continues to serve as the launching pad for terror attacks against Israeli citizens. Those attacks come in the form of Hamas missiles that indiscriminately target Israeli kindergartens, homes and businesses.

And Hamas continued these attacks more than two years after Israel withdrew from Gaza in the hope that this step would begin the process of building a Palestinian state, eventually leading to a peaceful, two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There was no “cycle of violence” then, no justification for anything other than peace and prosperity. But instead, Hamas chose Islamic jihad. Gazans’ and Israelis’ hopes have been met with misery for Palestinians and missiles for Israelis.

Hamas, an Iran proxy, has become a danger not only to Israel, but also to Palestinians as well as to neighboring Arab states, who fear the spread of radical Islam could destabilize their countries.

Arabs claim they love the Palestinian people, but they seem more interested in sacrificing them. If they really loved their Palestinian brethren, they’d pressure Hamas to stop firing missiles at Israel. In the longer term, the Arab world must end the Palestinians’ refugee status and thereby their desire to harm Israel. It’s time for the 22 Arab countries to open their borders and absorb the Palestinians of Gaza who wish to start a new life. It is time for the Arab world to truly help the Palestinians, not use them.

Mrs. Darwish, who grew up in Gaza City and Cairo, is the author, most recently, of “Cruel and Usual Punishment,” (Thomas Nelson, 2009).

Copyright – Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPYfHMT3KYc&NR=1

” But nora has just proved my point. And see bbc does report positive things about israel when it occurs, like the crack down on prostitution in it.”

I have done no such thing. And prositution in Israel isn’t as bad as in Europe or in the US and it doesn’t need the BBC to tout its handling.

Let the BBC talk about women trafficking by Brits.

Yet again u proved my point nora, i must thank u instead of rebuking my points u name call. even quoting me yet giving no concrete evidence that what the state of israel is doing is wrong.

silly girl.

“Yet again u proved my point nora,….”

You have only one point, “Mike” Israel is bad and the Arabs are right in wanting to exterminate the Jewish State.

That’s the upshot of all your posts.

Hi nora,

the state of israel policies are bad, and inhuman, if it was any other country the u.n. or u.s would have sanction it long ago. You do know israel has countless u.n. violated against it. yet they still proceed. and that gazan war you where so happy about, it is the first time in recent history where civilains could not flee or escape while it was happening which could be considered a war crime.

so yet again nora u have proven me right. Nice try trying to change the subject or attack me and r.m. your just a fool.

By your posting it shows me and many others see that u cannot defend the action the israel government have been doing. The only defense u have is everyone else is bad,except israel.

Stop acting that only isreal and jews are the superior race, we are all equal and maybe one day u can see that.

“exterminate the Jewish State” please, u must mean exterminate the muslim so israel has at least 80 percents jews right?

your bigotry knows no bounds.

haha, just u r.m. would say something that is contrary to everything u said before. U forget, even when i have noted this time and time again, i have no problems with jews or anyone just the state of israel policies and its thinking it is supior and suffered therefore it cant be criticized and has the right to do inhumane acts to non jews.

maybe if u follow your own religon a bit more u realize the actions of the state of israel is opposite to the action of its religion. At least one would hope. but the religion of 2k years ago the jews had was pretty scary and matches the actions of the israel government.

“when someone defends something or someone they know nothing about …that’s what I call a fool”
so therefore u admit your a fool or are u just blind to whats going on. since we have the internet i assume the first.

thank you for spewing garbage on this thread to show just how much a fool u are and not being able to debate what israel is doing as not wrong but wrong. And i wish not to join a religion that murders innocents and has rabbi supporting it and thinks nothing of it, be it Muslim or Judaism

Good day.

fyi
no civilized society the “question of ethical values”
is not valid when u kill innocents, illegal land grabs and discrimation.

therefore maybe the question should be is should israel re-think what they think as ethical when the world see it as morally,ethically,and in any way wrong.

Mike you can’t go back on what you said:
“Stop acting that only isreal and jews are the superior race”
you said it ……..”superior race” that says it all .That shows who you really are : a racist …
and …..again , I have never said I was jewish…….I rest my case …hahahahahah …

Israel was attacked again they won again ….get over it ….the propaganda out of the Palestinians and the Arab world is worse than the nazis .they lie and you swallow their lies because your weak brain cells are few ….hamas are fascists who kill and sacrifice their own people . they continue sending rockets because they don’t want peace … mamhoud Abbas wrote his dissertation on holocaust denying that shows what kind of people israel is dealing with …you are on the wrong side of history ….I think you need to watch Pallywood again ……
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_B1H-1opys#IIfAj_eg2EE

“the state of israel policies are bad, and inhuman, if it was any other country the u.n. or u.s would have sanction it long ago.”

Yea, like Russia in Chechnya, or China in Tibet, the Congo where millions are being murdered, or countless other countries where people are being killed with impunity.

You are fixated on Israel because you are an antisemite, Mike.

Be happy in your Jew hatred, bigot.

Your factoids about the conflict are selective and they are worthless. Here you are talking about deaths in a war started by Gazans firing rockets into Israel aimed at civilians, Mike. Talk about that.

Talk about Hamas wanting to exterminate the Jewish State, Jew hater, Mike!

“Palestinian militants’ advantage in Gaza?
The key there is a system of trap-doors and tunnels.”

By Don Duncan
from the March 20, 2009 edition

“Nahr alBared, Lebanon – The humanitarian focus in Gaza will soon begin to shift, thanks to the more than $4 billion in pledges that were made by international donors at the Sharm el-Sheik conference this month.

Among the emergency relief workers, the humanitarian workers, and medics flooding the strip, there will be some unexpected people trawling through the rubble before reconstruction starts.

A small army of architects and urban planners working with the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, are poised to make a bee-line to the half-standing buildings that remain in the strip. In the broken remnants of Gaza, they say, lie the clues as to what shape Israeli military practice is likely to take in the future.

One of the few tactical advantages Palestinian militants have in the face of Israel’s military might is an intimate knowledge and command of their own architecture and urban space. The maze-like streets, alleys, and thickly packed, high-rise buildings of the Palestinian refugee camps have played to the favor of militants in the camps in times of conflict.

This was made clear most recently in in 2007, when a small group of Islamic militants infiltrated the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon and used it as a base. Holed up there, the militants manipulated the architecture to their military advantage, much as Palestinian militants traditionally have. The Lebanese military was unable to negotiate the camp and it took more than three months of heavy shelling to topple the militant group that was estimated to number under 1,000.

“The [Palestinian] camp is an urban neighborhood but it is also a single building – it is contiguous,” says Eyal Weizman, an Israeli architect, academic, and author of “Hollow Land: Israel’s Architecture of Occupation.” He goes on to say, “This contiguity of the structure allows a certain movement across it that is not possible in other urban environments.”

When under attack, many Palestinian camps across the Middle East can deploy a system of trap doors, hallways, rooftops, and holes through walls, connecting apartments and buildings. The camp’s militants use this system to command full control of the camp from the inside, and advantage over the aggressor outside.

When the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) infiltrated the Palestinian refugee camp at Jenin in the West Bank in 2002 by breaking through walls and proceeding to dominate the camp internally, it was clear it had been taking notes.

So to keep ahead, the Palestinians have to innovate further. This has made warfare between Israel and enemies such as Hamas and Hezbollah a kind of tactical conversation.

“There is an asymmetry in power – fire power, political power, military power – and that asymmetry is always compensated by the ingenuity of the weak,” says Laleh Khalili, a professor of Middle East politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.

During the summer war in Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006, this ingenuity took the form of underground caches and bunkers where Hezbollah managed to withstand intense Israeli bombardment for 33 days. By the time Israel launched its attack on Gaza last December, the subterranean holdout had become the new front in the conflict.

“Hamas has disappeared underground and Israel controls the sky,” says Mr. Weizman. “The more dominance they have of the sky, the more the Palestinians master the subterranean.”

The permeability of the Palestinian camp, once a strong defense strategy for the Palestinians, has been effectively neutralized by the IDF’s appropriation of the tactic in their own ground offensives on camps.

So Palestinians have had to push the envelope to stay ahead and they have done this by extending what was once an above-ground network of passages beneath the surface of the camp.

The camps in Gaza have extended underground, not just in the form of the tunnel lifelines to Egypt at Rafah, but in a sophisticated network of bunkers, control rooms, and hideouts at inland camps like Al Shati and Jabilia. This is the latest puzzle the IDF has to solve in its ongoing cat-and-mouse game of war tactics with the Palestinian militants.

How close they are to solving it may become clearer once the architects and urban planners working with B’Tselem are allowed to reenter Gaza. The teams will undertake a “forensic” survey of the rubble, taking photos, discerning patterns of destruction, and creating 3-D reconstructions of areas and buildings.

The survey will result in a public report in the coming months, and its findings may offer some indication as to how Israel will adapt its game to the new subterranean Palestinian resistance. Since Israel has not yet developed technology to discern this logic, the Palestinian militants remain one step ahead – for now.

Don Duncan is a freelance reporter. His field work in Lebanon was supported by The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, in Washington D.C.”

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0320/p09s01-coop.html

Human Rights Watch is one of the most powerful organizations claiming to promote international morality and law, but along with Amnesty International and the United Nations, shares responsibility for the transformation of these principles into weapons aimed at Israel.

In the most recent example, HRW, headed by Kenneth Roth, initiated a campaign alleging that the IDF was using white phosphorus weapons unlawfully in the conflict in Gaza with Hamas. The organization issued a news release, followed by a more detailed publication, while officials gave press interviews to promote the allegations. Marc Garlasco, who claims the title “senior military analyst” (based on a short stint in the Pentagon), declared, “White phosphorous can burn down houses and cause horrific burns when it touches the skin… Israel should not use it in Gaza’s densely populated areas.”

In a few hours, the “white phosphorous” story was featured in dozens of newspapers, Internet blogs and television news programs. IDF officials, including Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gadi Ashkenazi, denied that Israel was using phosphorous in anti-personnel weapons, but this did not slow the viral spread of this story.

HRW’s “evidence” was based entirely on innuendo and unverifiable “eyewitness” reports. One report states that “[o]n January 9, Human Rights Watch researchers on a ridge overlooking Gaza from the northwest observed multiple air-bursts of artillery-fired WP that appeared to be over the Gaza City/Jabalya area. In addition, Human Rights Watch has analyzed photographs taken by the media on the Israel-Gaza border.” HRW does not name its researchers; it does not provide a detailed location of its observation, nor does it identify the photos it “analyzed” making independent verification of this “evidence” impossible.

INDEED, TWO days later, the International Committee of the Red Cross, which certainly cannot be accused of a pro-Israeli bias, issued a statement that backed the IDF statements. “Using phosphorus to illuminate a target or create smoke is legitimate under international law,” it said, adding that there was no evidence that Israel was “using phosphorus in a questionable way, such as burning down buildings or consciously putting civilians at risk.” (Flares assist search and rescue forces in saving the lives of wounded soldiers and preventing Hamas from snatching the bodies of dead soldiers. To claim that such operations are illegitimate is, in and of itself, immoral.)

But these points were secondary to the NGO ideologues – the important point was that the images fit the dominant narrative of Israel as always guilty of war crimes, and of the Palestinians (or, in the 2006 Second Lebanon War, Hizbullah) as innocent victims. In this campaign, HRW was joined by Amnesty International, B’Tselem and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights. The latter two are funded by the European Union, ostensibly to promote democracy and human rights. When Hamas launched a phosphorus shell into Israel, these organizations, including HRW, were silent, as has been the case regarding the use of human shields in Gaza and other real war crimes.

By the time the ICRC confirmed the IDF statements, the damage was done – the image of Israel as a serial violator of international law and human rights was reinforced – a major success for Hamas. CNN, the Times (London) and Christian Science Monitor ran major stories, embellished with quotes from doctors in Gaza, including propagandist Mads Gilbert, who claimed to have seen phosphorous burns. Gilbert also justified the 9/11 terror attacks, but this did not prevent the government-funded Norwegian Aid Committee from financing his incitement. (CNN quoted but then ignored Dr. Peter Grossman, a burns expert in California and unconnected with the conflict, who stated that “it is not possible to tell, based on pictures of burns, whether white phosphorus was responsible.”)

Based on these reports, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan repeated the false claim in an anti-Israel diatribe, thereby deepening the rift between Ankara and Jerusalem and increasing the sense of isolation in Israel.

THE FALSE white-phosphorous allegation is part of a pattern led by HRW that reflects the modern version of the blood libel. For the past year, HRW has been a leader in the use of international legal rhetoric such as “collective punishment,” to attack Israel. And in the July 30, 2006 Kana incident in the Second Lebanon War, Lucy Mair (HRW’s former researcher with a prior history of anti-Israel campaigning) disregarded the Red Cross on-scene estimate of 28 casualties (which proved to be the actual figure) in favor of a higher estimate of 54 provided by an alleged “survivor.” HRW’s false estimate was widely picked up by the media and further disseminated by HRW in an August 1, 2006 press release, sparking an international outcry and leading to a 48-hour halt in IAF operations, which extended the war.

Similarly, Marc Garlasco led HRW’s high-profile “investigation” into the Gaza Beach incident in 2006, repeating claims that “the evidence overwhelmingly supports the allegations that the civilians were killed by artillery shells fired by the IDF,” and ignoring details that did not fit his ideological “conclusion.” Garlasco was also among the authors of HRW’s “Razing Rafah” report of 2004, which contained many unverifiable and disputed claims, erased the context of terror and was used to justify HRW involvement in anti-Israel boycott campaigns.

In this way, HRW and other self-proclaimed human rights organizations have contributed a great deal to undermining the moral basis of morality and international law. Instead of repeatedly calling for “independent investigations” of Israel, the donors to HRW need to undertake an investigation of how this once-serious organization has been destroyed from within.

The writer is the chairman of the Political Science Department at Bar-Ilan University and executive director of NGO Monitor

Tuesday, 27 January 2009
More Nazi Rabbis – ‘there are no innocent civilians’

As I have already documented, Israel’s Orthodox Rabbinate has been in the forefront of providing the ideological and spiritual justification for the worst of the barbarities in Gaza. Former Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Mordechai Eliyahu and his son, Chief Rabbi of Safed, have justified any amount of war crimes by declaring that the civilian population of Gaza are equally guilty as the fighters. And that of course includes children.

Below is another article from Ha’aretz, this time on the Army Rabbis who performed a not dissimilar function to that of the Reich Church priests who accompanied German soldiers to the front in World War 2. They are the harbingers of death and destruction.

Note how reference is made to the myth that the Palestinians were recent immigrants that people like Joan Peter’s (From Time Immemorial) a plagiarised book that Alan Dershowitz plagiarised (& which Norman Finkelstein exposed in his ‘Abuse of anti-Semitism’.

‘The Palestinians claim they deserve a state here, when in reality there was never a Palestinian or Arab state within the borders of our country. Moreover, most of them are new and came here close to the time of the War of Independence.”

The ignorance of rabbis is well known but the death of innocent civilians can be traced directly to the lies of Israel’s propagandists.

Tony Greenstein

IDF rabbinate publication during Gaza war: We will show no mercy on the cruel
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent

During the fighting in the Gaza Strip, the religious media – and on two occasions, the Israel Defense Forces weekly journal Bamahane – were full of praise for the army rabbinate. The substantial role of religious officers and soldiers in the front-line units of the IDF was, for the first time, supported also by the significant presence of rabbis there.

The chief army rabbi, Brigadier General Avichai Rontzki, joined the troops in the field on a number of occasions, as did rabbis under his command.

Officers and soldiers reported that they felt “spiritually elevated” and “morally empowered” by conversations with rabbis who gave them encouragement before the confrontation with the Palestinians.
But what exactly was the content of these conversations and of the plethora of written material disseminated by the IDF rabbinate during the war? A reservist battalion rabbi told the religious newspaper B’Sheva last week that Rontzki explained to his staff that their role was not “to distribute wine and challah for Shabbat to the troops,” but “to fill them with yiddishkeit and a fighting spirit.”

An overview of some of the army rabbinate’s publications made available during the fighting reflects the tone of nationalist propaganda that steps blatantly into politics, sounds racist and can be interpreted as a call to challenge international law when it comes to dealing with enemy civilians.

Haaretz has received some of the publications through Breaking the Silence, a group of former soldiers who collect evidence of unacceptable behavior in the army vis-a-vis Palestinians. Other material was provided by officers and men who received it during Operation Cast Lead. Following are quotations from this material:

“[There is] a biblical ban on surrendering a single millimeter of it [the Land of Israel] to gentiles, though all sorts of impure distortions and foolishness of autonomy, enclaves and other national weaknesses. We will not abandon it to the hands of another nation, not a finger, not a nail of it.” This is an excerpt from a publication entitled “Daily Torah studies for the soldier and the commander in Operation Cast Lead,” issued by the IDF rabbinate. The text is from “Books of Rabbi Shlomo Aviner,” who heads the Ateret Cohanim yeshiva in the Muslim quarter of the Old City in Jerusalem.

The following questions are posed in one publication: “Is it possible to compare today’s Palestinians to the Philistines of the past? And if so, is it possible to apply lessons today from the military tactics of Samson and David?” Rabbi Aviner is again quoted as saying: “A comparison is possible because the Philistines of the past were not natives and had invaded from a foreign land … They invaded the Land of Israel, a land that did not belong to them and claimed political ownership over our country … Today the problem is the same. The Palestinians claim they deserve a state here, when in reality there was never a Palestinian or Arab state within the borders of our country. Moreover, most of them are new and came here close to the time of the War of Independence.”

The IDF rabbinate, also quoting Rabbi Aviner, describes the appropriate code of conduct in the field: “When you show mercy to a cruel enemy, you are being cruel to pure and honest soldiers. This is terribly immoral. These are not games at the amusement park where sportsmanship teaches one to make concessions. This is a war on murderers. ‘A la guerre comme a la guerre.’”

This view is also echoed in publications signed by Rabbis Chen Halamish and Yuval Freund on Jewish consciousness. Freund argues that “our enemies took advantage of the broad and merciful Israeli heart” and warns that “we will show no mercy on the cruel.”

In addition to the official publications, extreme right-wing groups managed to bring pamphlets with racist messages into IDF bases. One such flyer is attributed to “the pupils of Rabbi Yitzhak Ginsburg” – the former rabbi at Joseph’s Tomb and author of the article “Baruch the Man,” which praises Baruch Goldstein, who massacred unarmed Palestinians in Hebron. It calls on “soldiers of Israel to spare your lives and the lives of your friends and not to show concern for a population that surrounds us and harms us. We call on you … to function according to the law ‘kill the one who comes to kill you.’ As for the population, it is not innocent … We call on you to ignore any strange doctrines and orders that confuse the logical way of fighting the enemy.”

The Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din has called on Defense Minister Ehud Barak to immediately remove Rabbi Rontzki from his post as chief rabbi.

In response, an IDF spokesman said that: “Overall, letters that are sent to the chief of staff [such as the request for Rontzki's dismissal] are reviewed and an answer is sent to those who make the request, not to the media.”

And another Nazi Rabbi David Bar-Chayim

“I don’t believe that there are any innocent civilians.”

Rabbis: ‘Gazans Aren’t Innocent, Don’t Risk Soldiers’
“With operation Cast Lead ongoing, rabbis and legal scholars have taken the position that the Arabs who democratically elected Hamas are not innocent bystanders in the conflict. As seen on Arutz Sheva.” IsraelNN.com

Rabbi David Bar-Chayim says in this news bulletin:
“We’re talking about a society that is dedicated to murder and savagery and barbarism.”
“It is against the Torah, and for that matter against common sense and basic universal human morality that we should endanger even one of our soldiers when fighting such evil, the sole purpose of which is to destroy us.”

“‘When the evil are destroyed, there is rejoicing.’ … These people are evil. When such people are destroyed, we have no tears to shed.”
“I don’t believe that there are any innocent civilians.”
This is what Israelis watch, night after night, on their TV sets…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdrgleGA_-E

they your so far moral leaders

preaching in time of war one does not make a difference between enemy’s and innocents.

http://youngfoxredux.blogspot.com/2009/01/take-walk-through-gaza.html

here some proof showing your idf reports to be wrong

From 1967 to the end of 2007, Israel established 121 settlements in the West Bank that were recognized by the Interior Ministry as “communities”, even though some of them contain stretches of land on which the built-up area is not contiguous. 12 other settlements are located on land annexed by Israel in 1967 and made part of Jerusalem. There are additional 100 or so unrecognized settlements, referred to in the media as “outposts.” The 16 settlements built in the Gaza Strip and three settlements in the northern West Bank were dismantled in 2005 during implementation of the “disengagement plan.”

As part of the regime, Israel has stolen thousands of dunams of land from the Palestinians. On this land, Israel has established dozens of settlements in which hundreds of thousands of Israeli civilians now live. Israel forbids Palestinians to enter and use these lands and uses the settlements to justify numerous violations of Palestinian rights, such as the right to housing, to earn a living, and freedom of movement. The sharp changes Israel made to the map of the West Bank make a viable Palestinian state impossible as part of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.

The settlers, on the other hand, benefit from all rights given to citizens of Israel who live inside the Green Line, and in some instances, even additional rights. The great effort Israel has expended in the settlement enterprise – financially, legally, and bureaucratically – has turned the settlements into civilian enclaves within an area under military rule and has given the settlers a preferred status. To perpetuate this unlawful situation, Israel has continuously violated the Palestinians’ human rights.

Especially conspicuous is Israel’s manipulative use of the law to create a semblance of legality for the settlement enterprise. So long as Jordanian law assisted Israel in advancing its goals, it seized the argument that international law requires that an occupying state apply the law in effect in the territory prior to occupation, thus construing international law in a cynical and tendentious way. When Jordanian law was unfavorable for Israel, Israel did not hesitate to revoke it though military legislation and develop new rules to meet its ends. In doing so, Israel tramples on international agreements to which it is party – agreements which are intended to reduce human rights violations and protect people under occupation.

Because the very establishment of the settlements is illegal, and in light of the human rights violations resulting from the existence of the settlements, B’Tselem demands that Israel evacuate the settlements. The action must be done in a way that respects the settlers’ human rights, including the payment of compensation.

Clearly, evacuation of the settlements will be complex and will take time; however there are intermediate steps that can be taken immediately so as to reduce, to the extent possible, human rights violations and breaches of international law. For example, the government should cease new construction in the settlements – both the building of new settlements and the expansion of existing settlements. It must also freeze the planning and building of new bypass roads and must cease expropriating and seizing land intended for the bypass roads. The government must return to Palestinian villages all the non-built-up land that was placed within the municipal jurisdiction of the settlements and the regional councils, eliminate the planning boards in the settlements, and, as a result thereof, revoke the power of the local authorities to draw up outline plans and grant building permits. Also, the government must cease the granting of incentives to encourage Israeli citizens to move to settlements and must make resources available to encourage settlers to move inside Israel’s borders.

Human Rights Watch Accuses Israel of War Crimes

By Jim Lobe

08/02/06 “IPS” — – In systematically failing to distinguish between Hezbollah fighters and civilian population in its three-and-a-half-week-old military campaign in Lebanon, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have committed war crimes, according to a report released by Human Rights Watch Wednesday.

The 50-page report, “Fatal Strikes: Israel’s Indiscriminate Attacks Against Civilians in Lebanon,” detailed nearly two dozen cases of IDF attacks in which a total of 153 civilians, including 63 children, were killed in homes or motor vehicles.

In none of the cases did HRW researchers find evidence that there was a significant enough military objective to justify the attack, given the risks to civilian lives, while, in many cases, there was no identifiable military target. In still other cases cited in the report, Israeli forces appear to have deliberately targeted civilians.

“By consistently failing to distinguish between combatants and civilians, Israel has violated one of the most fundamental tenets of the laws of war: the duty to carry out attacks on only military targets,” according to the report.

“The pattern of attacks during the Israeli offensive in Lebanon suggests that the failures cannot be explained or dismissed as mere accidents; the extent of the pattern and the seriousness of the consequences indicate the commission of war crimes,” it concluded.

The report, which was based on interviews with victims and independent witnesses of attacks, as well as investigation of the sites where the attacks occurred, called for the United States to immediately suspend transfers to Israel of arms, ammunition, and other material credibly alleged to have been used in such attacks until they cease.

In addition, it called on United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan to establish a formal commission to investigate the alleged war crimes with a view to holding accountable those responsible for their commission.

Such a commission should also investigate Hezbollah’s rocket attacks against Israel which have been the subject of previous HRW reports. Since the onset of the latest round of fighting July 12, Hezbollah has launched some 2,000 rockets into predominantly civilian areas in Israel, killing at least 19 Israeli civilians and wounding more than 300 others. Given the inherently indiscriminate nature of the rockets, these attacks also constitute war crimes, according to the New York-based group.

The report, whose main conclusions about Israel’s failure to discriminate between civilian and military targets echo a statement by Amnesty International two days ago, was issued just hours after HRW released the preliminary results of its investigation of the July 30 Israeli air strike on an apartment building in Qana in southern Lebanon, which was initially reported to have killed 54 people, most of them children, who had taken refuge in the basement.

HRW, which took testimony from some of the nine survivors it identified, said that it had confirmed the deaths of 28 people, including 16 children, in the building and that 13 others remained missing and were believed to be buried in the rubble. It said that at least 22 people survived the attack and escaped the basement.

One of the survivors, Muhammad Mahmud Shalhoub, as well as a Qana villager who helped in the rescue effort, strongly denied initial Israeli claims that any Hezbollah fighters or rocket launchers were present in or around the home when the attack took place. HRW said its own on-site investigation, which took place July 31, as well as interviews with dozens of international journalists, rescue workers and international observers who visited Qana July 30 and 31, also yielded no evidence of any Hezbollah military presence in or around the building.

“The deaths in Qana were the predictable result of Israel’s indiscriminate bombing campaign in Lebanon,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, director of HRW’s Middle East and North Africa Division, who called for international investigation to determine what took place.

Israel has insisted that it has tried hard to avoid civilian casualties, although the great majority of the more than 500 Lebanese who have reportedly been killed by Israeli fire have been civilians. Israel has claimed that Hezbollah’s alleged practice of shielding its fighters and arms by locating them in civilian homes or areas and firing off missiles in populated areas – allegations which HRW said are the subject of ongoing investigations – has made civilian casualties unavoidable.

But the rights group said its own investigations of specific Israeli attacks, which included interviews with victims and witnesses, on-site visits, as well as corroboration, where available, by accounts by independent journalists and aid workers, had failed to uncover any evidence that Hezbollah was operating in or around the area during or before each attack.

“Hezbollah fighters must not hide behind civilians – that’s an absolute – but the image that Israel has promoted of such shielding as the cause of so high a civilian death toll is wrong,” according to HRW’s executive director, Kenneth Roth. “In the many cases of civilian deaths examined by [us], the location of Hezbollah troops and arms had nothing to do with the deaths because there was no Hezbollah around.”

He cited a July 13 attack which destroyed the home of a cleric known to be a Hezbollah sympathizer but with no record of having taken part in hostilities. The strike killed the cleric’s wife, their 10 children, the family’s Sri Lankan maid, as well as the cleric himself, according to the report.

In a July 16 attack on a home in Aitaroun, an Israeli aircraft killed 11 members of the al-Akhrass family, including seven Canadian-Lebanese dual nationals who were vacationing in the village at the time. HRW said it interviewed three villagers independently, all of whom denied that the family had any connection to Hezbollah. Among the victims were four children under the age of eight.

The report also assailed statements by Israeli officials and IDF commanders that only people associated with Hezbollah remain in southern Lebanon, so all are legitimate targets of attack. Israel has dropped leaflets in the region and even telephoned residents warning them that if they do not flee, they will be subject to attack.

But the report stressed that many civilians have been unable to leave because they are sick, wounded, or lack the means, such as money or gasoline, or are providing essential services to the civilian population that remains there. Still others have said they are afraid to leave because the roads have come under attack by Israeli warplanes and artillery.

Indeed, the report documents 27 deaths of civilians who were trying to flee the fighting by car and notes that the actual number of killings is “surely higher.” In addition, the report cites air strikes against three clearly marked humanitarian aid vehicles.

“The pattern of attacks shows the Israeli military’s disturbing disregard for the lives of Lebanese civilians,” said Roth. “Israeli warnings of imminent attacks do not turn civilians into military targets,” he added, noting that, according to the IDF’s logic, “Palestinian militant groups might ‘warn’ Israeli settlers to leave their settlements and then feel justified in attacking those who remained.”

Amnesty accused Israel of trying to convert southern Lebanon into a “free-fire zone,” which it said Monday was “incompatible with international humanitarian law.”

Copyright © 2006 IPS-Inter Press Service. All rights reserved.

Caterpillar Inc., the U.S.-based heavy-equipment company, should immediately suspend sales of its powerful D9 bulldozer to the Israeli army, Human Rights Watch said today. As Human Rights Watch documented in a recent report, the Israeli military uses the D9 as its primary weapon to raze Palestinian homes, destroy agriculture and shred roads in violation of the laws of war.

“Caterpillar betrays its stated values when it sells bulldozers to Israel knowing that they are being used to illegally destroy Palestinian homes,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Until Israel stops these practices, Caterpillar’s continued sales will make the company complicit in human rights abuses.”

In a letter to Caterpillar’s chief executive officer and board of directors, Human Rights Watch on October 29 called on the company to cease all sales to the Israeli military of the D9, as well as parts and maintenance services, so long as the military continues to use the bulldozer to violate international human rights and humanitarian law.

Caterpillar’s CEO James Owens responded to Human Rights Watch in a letter dated November 12 by saying the company did “not have the practical ability or legal right to determine how our products are used after they are sold.” This head-in-the-sand approach ignores international standards on corporate social responsibility and the requirements of Caterpillar’s own code of conduct.

Since 2003, the United Nations has begun to develop standards for corporations in the form of the U.N. Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights. This document states that companies should not “engage in or benefit from” violations of international human rights or humanitarian law and that companies “shall further seek to ensure that the goods and services they provide will not be used to abuse human rights.”

Caterpillar’s own code of conduct requires it to consider the broad impact of its business. The company’s Code of Worldwide Business Conduct states that “Caterpillar accepts the responsibilities of global citizenship.” The company’s commitment to financial success, the code says, “must also take into account social, economic, political and environmental priorities.”

Caterpillar makes the D9 to military specifications and sells the bulldozers to Israel as weapons under the U.S. Foreign Military Sales Program, a government-to-government program for selling U.S.-made defense equipment. Once exported to Israel, the bulldozers are armoured by the state-owned Israel Military Industries Ltd. Weighing roughly 64 tons, the armored D9 is more than 13 feet tall and 26 feet long with front and rear blades.

A Human Rights Watch report released last month, “Razing Rafah,” documented the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) systematic use of the D9 bulldozer in illegal demolitions throughout the occupied Palestinian territories. The IDF has demolished over 2,500 Palestinian homes over the past four years in the Gaza Strip alone, most of them without the military necessity required by international humanitarian law.

Nearly two-thirds of those homes were in Rafah, a town and refugee camp on Gaza’s southern border with Egypt. The Israeli military has used the Caterpillar bulldozer to raze the homes of more than 10 percent of the population in Rafah. The government plan to expand a “buffer zone” along the border would entail the destruction of hundreds more homes. In May, the IDF destroyed more than 50 percent of Rafah’s roads and damaged more than 40 miles of water and sewage pipes with a blade on the bulldozer’s back known as “the ripper.”

“We found no legal justification for the senseless destruction of infrastructure essential to the health of the civilian population,” Whitson said.

The IDF claims the destruction is militarily necessary to block smugglers’ tunnels from Egypt and to protect its forces, which regularly come under fire from Palestinian armed groups. Human Rights Watch found that the IDF has failed to use well-established methods of tunnel detection and destruction—like seismic sensors, electromagnetic induction and ground-penetrating radar—which would obviate the need for home demolitions. In terms of protecting its soldiers, the IDF completed construction of an 8-meter-high metal wall in 2003 but despite this extra protection, the rate of home demolitions in Rafah tripled in comparison with the previous two years.

A 23-year-old American activist, Rachel Corrie, was run over and killed last year by an armored D9 when she was trying to block the bulldozer from destroying a Rafah home. At least three Palestinians have been killed by the bulldozer and falling debris in the last two years because they could not flee their homes in time.

In April, a group of Caterpillar shareholders presented a resolution at the annual shareholder meeting that called on the company to investigate whether bulldozer sales to the Israeli military violated Caterpillar’s code of conduct. Jewish Voice for Peace, the largest grassroots Jewish peace group in the United States, announced today that it had resubmitted the resolution for the 2005 shareholders meeting.

The following organizations are active in the campaign to stop Caterpillar sales of its D9 bulldozer to the Israeli army:

The U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
http://www.endtheoccupation.org/

hi nora/r.m
the only reason i responded to your blatantly spin is because it is. u cannot white wash what is going on. so i will post information to inform others as well.

your footage shows nothing ….
.just the ordinary BBC bias and propaganda against Israel . No one is surprised ..Who can trust the BBC on anything they say around the world since they show definite proof of bias against Israel again and again and again ….Why won’t they publish the Balen report?
WBUR shame on you for not questioning it either ……

..Proof of United Nation involvement in helping Arabs against Israel.Can we really trust the UN?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRmYYSp0-B8&search=Hezbollah%20Media

Khaled Abu Toameh

“On Campus: The Pro-Palestinians’ Real Agenda

During a recent visit to several university campuses in the U.S., I discovered that there is more sympathy for Hamas there than there is in Ramallah.

Listening to some students and professors on these campuses, for a moment I thought I was sitting opposite a Hamas spokesman or a would-be-suicide bomber.

I was told, for instance, that Israel has no right to exist, that Israel’s “apartheid system” is worse than the one that existed in South Africa and that Operation Cast Lead was launched only because Hamas was beginning to show signs that it was interested in making peace and not because of the rockets that the Islamic movement was launching at Israeli communities.

I was also told that top Fatah operative Marwan Barghouti, who is serving five life terms in prison for masterminding terror attacks against Israeli civilians, was thrown behind bars simply because he was trying to promote peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

Furthermore, I was told that all the talk about financial corruption in the Palestinian Authority was “Zionist propaganda” and that Yasser Arafat had done wonderful things for his people, including the establishment of schools, hospitals and universities.

The good news is that these remarks were made only by a minority of people on the campuses who describe themselves as “pro-Palestinian,” although the overwhelming majority of them are not Palestinians or even Arabs or Muslims.

The bad news is that these groups of hard-line activists/thugs are trying to intimidate anyone who dares to say something that they don’t like to hear.

When the self-designated “pro-Palestinian” lobbyists are unable to challenge the facts presented by a speaker, they resort to verbal abuse.

On one campus, for example, I was condemned as an “idiot” because I said that a majority of Palestinians voted for Hamas in the January 2006 election because they were fed up with financial corruption in the Palestinian Authority.

On another campus, I was dubbed as a “mouthpiece for the Zionists” because I said that Israel has a free media. There was another campus where someone told me that I was a ‘liar” because I said that Barghouti was sentenced to five life terms because of his role in terrorism.

And then there was the campus (in Chicago) where I was “greeted” with swastikas that were painted over posters promoting my talk. The perpetrators, of course, never showed up at my event because they would not be able to challenge someone who has been working in the field for nearly 30 years.

What struck me more than anything else was the fact that many of the people I met on the campuses supported Hamas and believed that it had the right to “resist the occupation” even if that meant blowing up children and women on a bus in downtown Jerusalem.

I never imagined that I would need police protection while speaking at a university in the U.S. I have been on many Palestinian campuses in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and I cannot recall one case where I felt intimidated or where someone shouted abuse at me.

Ironically, many of the Arabs and Muslims I met on the campuses were much more understanding and even welcomed my “even-handed analysis” of the Israeli-Arab conflict. After all, the views I voiced were not much different than those made by the leaderships both in Israel and the Palestinian Authority. These views include support for the two-state solution and the idea of coexistence between Jews and Arabs in this part of the world.

The so-called pro-Palestinian “junta” on the campuses has nothing to offer other than hatred and de-legitimization of Israel. If these folks really cared about the Palestinians, they would be campaigning for good government and for the promotion of values of democracy and freedom in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Their hatred for Israel and what it stands for has blinded them to a point where they no longer care about the real interests of the Palestinians, namely the need to end the anarchy and lawlessness, and to dismantle all the armed gangs that are responsible for the death of hundreds of innocent Palestinians over the past few years.

The majority of these activists openly admit that they have never visited Israel or the Palestinian territories. They don’t know -and don’t want to know – that Jews and Arabs here are still doing business together and studying together and meeting with each other on a daily basis because they are destined to live together in this part of the world. They don’t want to hear that despite all the problems life continues and that ordinary Arab and Jewish parents who wake up in the morning just want to send their children to school and go to work before returning home safely and happily.

What is happening on the U.S. campuses is not about supporting the Palestinians as much as it is about promoting hatred for the Jewish state. It is not really about ending the “occupation” as much as it is about ending the existence of Israel.

Many of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas officials I talk to in the context of my work as a journalist sound much more pragmatic than most of the anti-Israel, “pro-Palestinian” folks on the campuses.

Over the past 15 years, much has been written and said about the fact that Palestinian school textbooks don’t promote peace and coexistence and that the Palestinian media often publishes anti-Israel material.

While this may be true, there is no ignoring the fact that the anti-Israel campaign on U.S. campuses is not less dangerous. What is happening on these campuses is not in the frame of freedom of speech. Instead, it is the freedom to disseminate hatred and violence. As such, we should not be surprised if the next generation of jihadists comes not from the Gaza Strip or the mountains and mosques of Pakistan and Afghanistan, but from university campuses across the U.S.”

http://www.hudsonny.org/2009/03/on-campus-the-pro-palestinians-real-agenda.php

there is a comic who says it all. (lewis black) yes jewish,

He said this about our prior administration and same goes for the israel administration as well. where he states the administration will walk up in front of u and take a big crap and look at u when u question it, they than said no i didnt and deny they did, than u show the evidence they still deny it and than say you lie. Like Israel is currently doing as such.

I must question that one thinks israel has done no wrong even in the face of some much evidences.

very odd indeed.

n Israeli civil rights group has said racism against Arab citizens of Israel has risen sharply in the past year.

In a report, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel said expression of anti-Arab views had doubled, and racist incidents had increased by 26%.

Christian or Muslim Arab citizens of Israel make up 20% of the population.

But the civil rights quoted polls suggesting half of Jewish Israelis do not believe Arab citizens of Israel should have equal rights.

About the same amount said they wanted the government to encourage Arab emigration from Israel.

In another poll, almost 75% of Jewish youths said Arabs were less intelligent and less clean than Jews.

‘Anti-Arab policies’

A prominent Israeli Arab politician, Mohammed Barakeh, said the poll results were the natural outcome of what he called the anti-Arab policies of successive Israeli governments.

We live in a democratic regime whose foundations are constantly weakening
Sami Michael
Association for Civil Rights in Israel

Anxiety over ‘enemy within’

Commenting on the findings of the report, the association’s president Sami Michael warned: “We live in a democratic regime whose foundations are constantly weakening.”

Official government spokesman Mark Regev responded that the Israeli government was “committed to fighting racism whenever it raises it ugly head and is committed to full equality to all Israeli citizens, irrespective of ethnicity, creed or background, as defined by our declaration of independence”.

Israel’s Construction and Housing Minister Zeev Boim said the rights group’s report was biased and without credibility.

Occupied territories

Part of the group’s annual report is dedicated to the situation in Gaza and the West Bank.

The report says: “Most of the human rights violations in the occupied territories are by-products of the establishment of settlements and outposts.”

Restrictions on the movement of Palestinians designed to allow settlers “free and secure movement”, have virtually split the West Bank into six separate parts, the report says.

The organisation says that the West Bank barrier “does not separate Palestinians from Israelis, but Palestinians from other Palestinians”.

The report also asserts that despite its withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, Israel retains “moral and legal responsibility” for the Palestinians there because Israel controls access to the coastal territory.

‘Marriage to an Arab is national treason’

Recent poll reveals steep rise in racist views against Arabs in Israel; many participants feel hatred, fear when overhearing Arabic, 75 percent don’t approve of shared apartment buildings
Roee Nahmias

Over half of the Jewish population in Israel believes the marriage of a Jewish woman to an Arab man is equal to national treason, according to a recent survey by the Geocartography Institute.

The survey, which was conducted for the Center Against Racism, also found that over 75 percent of participants did not approve of apartment buildings being shared between Arabs and Jews. Sixty percent of participants said they would not allow an Arab to visit their home.

Five hundred Jewish men and women participated in the poll, which was published Tuesday.

According to the survey, racism against Arabs in Israel has seen a sharp rise since a similar survey was conducted two years ago.

In 2006, 247 racist acts against Arabs were reported, as opposed to 225 one year prior.

About 40 percent of participants agreed that “Arabs should have their right to vote for Knesset revoked”. The number was 55 percent lower in the previous survey. Also, over half of the participants agreed that Israel should encourage its Arab citizens to immigrate from the country.

Over half of the participants said they would not want to work under the direct management of an Arab, and 55 percent said “Arabs and Jews should be separated at entertainment sites”.

‘Arab culture inferior’

Participants were asked what they felt when they overheard someone speaking Arabic. Thirty-one percent said they felt hatred, while 50 percent said they felt fear.

Over 56 percent of participants said they believed that Israel’s Arab citizens posed both a security and a demographic threat to the country.

When asked what they thought of Arab culture, over 37 percent replied, “The Arab culture is inferior.”

“The Center Against Racism has set itself a goal to monitor all racial incidents against Arab citizens, and to fight racism as much as possible under the law through public action,” the center’s annual report said.

Bachar Ouda, the center’s director, said the survey’s findings were worrisome, and urged the government to intervene in the situation.

“We call on the education minister to take the gloves off and deal with the issue seriously, because it is dangerous to coexistence. We call on the state prosecutions office, and the attorney general to take action,” Ouda said.

http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3381978,00.html

Here is a Video that shows the kinds of vilifications to which Israel is being subjected.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6p4QouJx98

Again u write off what u wish not to hear, i posted so much to so how much your full of crap and u cannot white-wash what is happening and has happen in the last 60 years to arabs living in those areas. to note Egypt and Jordan are no better.

Jews are legally forbidden to intermarry in Israel, unless one spouse converts to the other partner’s religion. If neither spouse will convert, the engaged interfaith couple must travel abroad to wed–ironically, Israel gives legal recognition to intermarriages taking place abroad.

By the way, there is no half Jewish. There are only Jewish and Non-Jewish.
Source(s):
http://www.interfaithfamily.com/arts_and…

When in the world has any government been right 100 percent of the time? answer none but from your posting it seemed that israel is the only one.

I along with about most of the world all know both sides have commited wrong and wish for peace, yet one side unfairly uses past wrongs to commit new ones,

committing the same crimes its once had done to them and laws that were set in place it now violates. It is u my arab hating bigot who does not understand. U act as if israel has done no wrong and anyone saying otherwise is wrong.

It is u who is a arab hater along with hating anyone who objects to your twisted point of view.U posted a article of a guy calling college students future terrorist.U are truly low

, along with r.m. nora, and sabato. it is you who denies what has happen in gaza, deny human rights abuses. and your only reasoning is everyone else is a lier or arabs bad, so we can.

I wish people did see this thread to see why we need the international community to stop israel war crimes. since arab hating, immoral people as yourself can be exposed by your often racist,smearful,deceitful spin on what has been happening i have yet once here u say anything israel has done is wrong, reasoning because you agree with it fully, u agree to innocents being killed as long is it is not jewish, your sick and should get some help.

Just as hamas is a terrorist organization so is israel both disregard civilian lifes and history goes back to israel promoting them as a counter to the PLO

The actions of israel does not win over other arabs, christians or the world why? u ask because most are wrong to anyone that does not have a islam phobia can see.

Im not defending how arabs treated jews in the past i think its wrong as well and should change. But u who seem not to have compassion for human life that is non jewish life cannot see the holes in your argument.

you vilify arabs being all bad, and evil, maybe in your twisted mind it is true, but just like anywhere in the world there is good and evil people of course this concept would not sink into your head. The state of israel policies have shown the later, just like pre-war iraq, and others places around the world yet most countries learn from their mistakes.

so your guise of defending israel cruelty as just will not work, far to much evidences to say the opposite. As well as lumping in every arab as a terrorist so if u kill them its okay will not work either. you racist bigot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=537cq4s9Ctk

Here is a video of Arabs killing Arabs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1EEpvXA23E

Hamas attacks civilians in Gaza Strip

BUT mike doesn’t care about that. He only cares about Jews defending themselves.

Again see how people like mike demonize Jews:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6p4QouJx98

This is what Israel is facing in the near future:

“Military clash with Iran

Tehran aims to create Gaza missile base that can cover whole of central Israel
Alex Fishman

Iran is in fact forcing a direct military confrontation upon Israel. We are not only talking about President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s exaggerated verbal passion or the Iranian nuclear project.

Thus far, Iran conducted a war of attrition against Israel via its emissaries: Hizbullah, Hamas, and other Palestinian groups. At this time, the war is reaching new peaks; it will be impossible to continue ignoring them while only engaging with the emissaries.

Based on foreign reports, the Air Force bombed about two months ago, in Sudan, a shipment of medium-range rockets with a range of 70 kilometers (roughly 40 miles,) apparently the Fajar 3 model.

This is not a small missile. In fact, it is a missile that the Iranians are manufacturing especially for the Gaza Strip, so that it can be dismantled to several pieces and smuggled in through the Gaza tunnels. This is also the way they produced the special Grad rockets for Gaza: Disassembled models, made in Iran, and designated for smuggling.

Making our life intolerable
The picture is becoming clearer: The Iranians are aiming to establish a rocket base south of Israel that would cover the entire Gush Dan area in central Israel from the south. This is not paranoia.

The “tight grip theory,” namely, clasping the State of Israel from both the north and south, turns Iran into a concrete enemy, rather than a theoretical one.

It would be impossible to keep blaming Hizbullah and Hamas all the time, sort of like looking for the money you lost under the streetlight because it is more convenient that way.

The Iranians are not only investing in the unconventional realm, but also in the conventional field, in order to eliminate the State of Israel or at least in order to make life here intolerable.”

http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3693195,00.html

also to watch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmRBIIW0laI&feature=related

your litle video shows what an immature brainwashed little twit you are .Its so obvious there is nothing original by what you say …….stop repeating what you hear…..one day you will be ambarassed by your stupidity …..grow up ….

“AJA=biased source” mike

this is funny coming from someone who posts nothing but comments from biased sources.

you are a malicious Jew hating twit, mike.

The so called “honorable United Nation” :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_niYYxEWNU

Is this why the music school was torched?

“Palestinian children sing for Holocaust survivors

Strings for Peace, youth orchestra from Jenin refugee camp, gives touching musical performance for Holocaust survivors in Israeli town Holon as part of Good Deeds Day. Zeid, one of musicians in group: Only people who have been through suffering understand each other
Associated Press

The Palestinian youths from the tough West Bank refugee camp stood facing the elderly Holocaust survivors Wednesday, appearing somewhat defiant in a teenage sort of way. Then they began to sing.

The choir burst into songs for peace, bringing surprised smiles from the audience. But the event had another twist: Most of the Holocaust survivors did not know the youths were Palestinians from the West Bank, a rare sight in Israel these days. And the youths had no idea they were performing for people who lived through Nazi genocide — or even what the Holocaust was.

Volunteering Day

Be part of a day that is all good / Ynetnews

Campaign launched by Ruach Tova, non-profit organization run by international businesswoman Shari Arison, aims to inspire volunteering spirit in Israelis in annual Good Deeds Day, March 25
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“I feel sympathy for them,” Ali Zeid, an 18-year-old keyboard player who said he was shocked by what he learned about the Holocaust, in which the Nazis killed 6 million Jews in their campaign to wipe out European Jewry.

“Only people who have been through suffering understand each other,” said Zeid, who said his grandparents were Palestinian refugees forced to flee the northern city of Haifa during the war that followed Israel’s creation in 1948.

The 13 musicians, aged 11 to 18, belong to “Strings of Freedom,” a modest orchestra from the hardscrabble Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank, the scene of a deadly 2002 battle between Palestinian militants and Israeli soldiers.

The event, held at the Holocaust Survivors Center in this tree-lined central Israeli town, was part of “Good Deeds Day,” an annual event run by an organization connected to billionaire Shari Arison, Israel’s richest woman.

First encounters for some
The two-hour meeting starkly highlighted how distant Palestinians and Israelis have become after more than eight years of bloody Palestinian militant attacks and deadly Israeli military reprisals.

Most of the Palestinian youths had not seen an Israeli civilian before — only gun-toting soldiers in military uniforms manning checkpoints, conducting arrest raids of wanted Palestinians or during army operations.

“They don’t look like us,” said Ahed Salameh, 12, who wore a black head scarf woven with silver.

Most of the elderly Israelis wore pants and T-shirts, with women sporting a smear of lipstick.

“Old people look different where we come from,” Salameh said.

Elderly Holocaust survivors listen intently to concert (Photo: AP)

She said she was shocked to hear about the Nazi genocide against Jews. Ignorance and even denial of the Holocaust is widespread in Palestinian society.

Amnon Beeri of the Abraham Fund, which supports coexistence between Jews and Arabs, said most of the region’s residents have “no real idea about the other.”

The youths said their feisty conductor, Wafa Younis, 50, tried to explain to them who the elderly people were, but chaos on the bus prevented them from listening.

The elderly audience said they assumed Arab children were from a nearby village — not from the refugee camp where 23 Israeli soldiers were killed, alongside 53 Palestinian militants and civilians, in several days of battle in April 2002.

Some 30 elderly survivors gathered in the center’s hall as teenage boys and girls filed in 30 minutes late — delayed at an Israeli military checkpoint outside their town, they later explained.

Some of the young women wore Muslim head scarves — but also sunglasses and school ties.

As a host announced in Hebrew that the youths were from the Jenin refugee camp, there were gasps and muttering from the crowd. “Jenin?” one woman asked in jaw-dropped surprise.

Younis, from the Arab village of Ara in Israel, then explained in fluent Hebrew that the youths would sing for peace, prompting the audience to burst into applause.

“Inshallah,” said Sarah Glickman, 68, using the Arabic term for “God willing.”

The encounter began with an Arabic song, “We sing for peace,” and was followed by two musical pieces with violins and Arabic drums, as well as an impromptu song in Hebrew by two in the audience.

Making a ‘small difference’
Glickman, whose family moved to the newly created Jewish state in 1949 after fleeing to Siberia to escape the Nazis, said she had no illusions the encounter would make the children understand the Holocaust. But she said it might make a “small difference.”

“They think we are strangers, because we came from abroad,” Glickman said. “I agree: It’s their land, also. But there was no other option for us after the Holocaust.”

Later, she tapped her feet in tune as the teenagers played a catchy Mideast drum beat. After the event, some of the elderly Israelis chatted with students and took pictures together.

The encounter was not absent of politics. Younis dedicated a song to an Israeli soldier held captive by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip — and also criticized Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.

But she said the main mission of the orchestra, formed seven years ago to help Palestinian children overcome war trauma, was to bring people together.

“I’m here to raise spirits,” Younis said. “These are poor, old people.”"

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3688276,00.html

People like MIke are on the side of those torrching schools in the name of “resitence.”

This is the kind of behaviour mike and the BBC are supporting and encouraging …..:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFe5YQGau3A&eurl=http://www.lepost.fr/article/2009/03/03/1442889_wafa-sultan-j-ai-decide-de-combattre-l-islam-la-video-en-version-francaise.htm

its so much easier to critizise Israel , this is for mike for that wonderful culture he protects :

http://crazzzynews.com/2009/02/23/the-female-face-of-shame-women-who-recurited-rape-victims-has-been-captured/

Arab media anti-Jewish propaganda:

“Those who are regularly left open-mouthed at the way in which the British media puts across an overwhelmingly Arab narrative about Israel and the Middle East, trasmitting lies and distortions as facts and reversing victim and victimiser to present Israel as the regional aggressor and the Palestinians as their targets, may well also scratch their heads at being told with monotonous regularity that ‘the Jews control the media’.

Well now Arab Media Watch lifts a curtain to show us the real lobby at work. It boasts:

Some 200 guests gathered at Kensington’s Royal Garden Hotel on 21 March 2009 to attend Arab Media Watch’s fifth annual fundraising dinner, and to mark its ninth anniversary. Among the guests were almost three-dozen senior journalists from the BBC, Al Jazeera English, Financial Times, Reuters, Daily Mail, Independent, Asharq Al Awsat, Al Quds Al Arabi, Al Hayat and others.

The evening began with a welcome speech by AMW chairman Sharif Hikmat Nashashibi, who outlined the extensive work done by the organisation during and since Israel’s invasion of Gaza, including:

- forcing the media to correct factual errors
- meeting with editors and journalists
- providing them with information
- being interviewed by them or arranging interviews for them
- getting letters and articles published
- being quoted and cited in articles
- publishing studies, press releases and Action Alerts
- organising and speaking at events
- helping university students and researchers

‘All this was done,’ Nashashibi reminded the audience, ‘while continuing our work on media portrayals of the entire Arab world, a huge but vital task undertaken on a budget that’s dwarfed by that of the pro-Israel lobbies.’ He added: ‘We’ve proven the sceptics wrong for the last nine years, establishing ourselves as a credible, professional, dynamic organisation with the recognition, respect and support of much of the British media, and high-level contacts in every news organisation…AMW is making a considerable and invaluable difference, and wants to continue doing so.’

Here are some of the ‘factual errors’ that on its website AMW has tried to correct:

The ‘myth that Hamas is out to destroy Israel
The ‘myth that Palestinian rockets are a grave threat to Israeli civilians’
The ‘myth that five Arab armies tried to wipe out Israel in 1948: ‘Strictly speaking, therefore, the Arab states did not launch a war against Israel, but undertook an armed intervention which was both lawful and justified.’
On and on its goes, lie after smear after brazen lie. And now just look at how, as AMW goes on to detail, the British media fawned over these purveyors of gross and inflammatory untruths:

Ian Black, the Guardian’s Middle East editor, was unable to speak at the dinner due to illness, but he wrote a statement of support that Nashashibi read out. ‘I’d like briefly to pay tribute to the work of AMW,’ the statement began.

‘For anyone in the British media writing about the Middle East or the wider Arab world, AMW – very ably run by Sharif Nashashibi – has become a force to be reckoned with. It has served notice that inaccuracy, misrepresentation, half-truths and prejudice are simply not acceptable – and has done much to monitor and combat them.’

Black continued: ‘AMW has played an especially important role on Iraq and Palestine. Its work on the Gaza war was both combative and effective. Its letters to editors, op-ed articles and complaints about biased or misleading coverage have become part of the landscape.’

He added: ‘To some extent AMW has filled the gap left by the failures of the Palestinians and Arab governments to state their case as effectively as they could and should’ve done. That’s especially true with regard to the Arab Peace Initiative, which surely remains the only workable basis for a just and comprehensive solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.’

Black concluded: ‘The work of AMW is necessary, courteous and professional. I commend it to you wholeheartedly.’

The next speaker was Barbara Serra, presenter for Al Jazeera English (formerly with the BBC, Sky News and Channel 5), whose introduction was followed by projected footage of her heated interview of Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev during the Gaza invasion.

‘It’s easy to forget, when one works closely with and in the Middle East, how little knowledge the general public across the world often has about the issues behind the continuing tensions, from the illegal occupation in the West Bank to the continuing expansion of settlements there,’she said.

‘That’s why the work of AMW is so invaluable. They don’t just fight against prejudice and distortion in the media, but also highlight inaccuracies which, if left unchecked, would only reinforce the misconceptions many hold towards the Arab world.’

A performance by comedian Ian Stone was followed by the presentation of AMW’s annual award for excellence in journalism to world-renowned reporter, author and documentary filmmaker John Pilger, whose daughter Zoe accepted the award and read out a statement by him.

‘This is an honour I very much appreciate, and I send warm thanks from Australia to all of you at AMW, ‘he wrote. ‘I pay tribute tonight to AMW, and to Al Jazeera, and to all the courageous Arab journalists who have brought us the truth…’ Attendees watched clips of Pilger’s documentaries ‘Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror’ and ‘Palestine is Still the Issue.’

A three-course dinner was then served, with Arabic music in the background, quotes from the night’s speakers projected on screen, and a raffle and auction which included five-star holidays, paintings by renowned Arab artists, and antique Arab furniture.

Peter Oborne, political columnist at the Daily Mail and contributing editor at the Spectator, was unable to speak at the dinner because he had to travel unexpectedly to Afghanistan, but he wrote a message of support that Nashashibi read out:

‘The most noble purpose of journalism is to tell the truth and expose falsehood. Too often, British journalism achieves the exact opposite. It tells lies and glorifies falsehood. That’s why the work of AMW is so important. It sets out to combat the climate of deception that dominates too much of our reporting.’

And here is more feedback from AMW’s grateful media client base:

‘Thank you…We did enjoy it.’ – Financial Times / Reuters

‘Many thanks for inviting me. I enjoyed it.’ – The Independent

‘I enjoyed the programme and the company of your nice guests.’ – BBC

‘Thank you very much for the invitation. I wish you all the success you deserve.’ – BBC

‘Thank you very much for the invitation. I really enjoyed the annual dinner. It was refreshing. It was, as before, perfectly organised…’ – BBC

‘Thank you so much for your generous invitation…The event was wonderful and the presentation was flawless…Best wishes for continued success…’ – BBC.”

http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/3484271/the-real-lobby-and-its-acolytes.thtml

R.M, Sabato and the like, GET A LIFE, WOULD YOU?

you people are just so typical,
the day the Jews learn not to get over themselves, there will be peace on earth

worth checking out for both sides

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MON2HL02mec

Finkelstein is a poor excuse for a scholar.Only children would take him seriously ……

after talking to some friends, it was agreed that we and should not like people like r.m. lie and silience critics. as for critizism about arabs, israel constanly flauts itself as the only democracy in the middle east so therefore the should be scuritnized as such.

israel new FM profile, and what his critic say about him, who is russian or was

Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the Yisrael Beiteinu party, has emerged as one of Israel’s most controversial politicians.

With polls predicting his party may eclipse Labour as Israel’s third largest in elections on 10 February, he has gone from being seen as a marginal political player to a potential kingmaker in the space of a decade.

His hardline policies on security and the country’s Israeli-Arab minority have grown in popularity amid a general swing to the right among an electorate strongly supportive of Israel’s recent military operation in Gaza.

The Moldovan-born politician advocates swapping swathes of Israeli-Arab populated territory in Israel with Israeli settlement blocs in the West Bank.

Under the party slogan “No loyalty, no citizenship”, Mr Lieberman also wants a law demanding Israeli-Arabs pledge allegiance to Israel as a Jewish state and committing them to some form of national service.

Fraud probe

And his blunt invective and the blatant disregard for political correctness have further raised concern internationally and on the Israeli left.

For example, he has said that Israeli-Arab MPs who met Hamas should be executed like Nazi collaborators after the Nuremburg trials.

Advertisement
A look at the career of Avigdor Lieberman

And according to the Jerusalem Post he said in January 2009 that Israel should “continue to fight Hamas just like the United States did with the Japanese in World War II” – widely interpreted as a reference to the dropping of nuclear bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

He is also under investigation for fraud, embezzlement and money-laundering, although he denies any wrong-doing and says the probe is politically motivated.

The Yisrael Beiteinu party – or “Israel my home” – draws much of its support from the one million Jews who came to Israel after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Settlers’ champion

Mr Lieberman – once a nightclub bouncer – became a major player in Israeli politics in March 2006, when his party won 11 seats.

This paved the way for him to become deputy prime minister (of which there are several in the government), and Minister of Strategic Affairs.

He did not immediately become part of the then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s government, led by the Kadima party.

But he joined in November 2006 to shore up the rickety coalition, which saw its ratings plummet following what many Israelis saw as the bungled war with Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006.

Kadima had dropped its main election pledge to withdraw from a number of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, opening the way for Yisrael Beiteinu, which opposed this policy, to join the coalition.

Mr Lieberman is a champion of the Israeli settlers and takes a tough line on unilateral withdrawals from Jewish settlements arguing that Israel gets nothing in return, particularly security guarantees.

He pulled out of that government in January 2008, however, refusing to back its peace talks with the Palestinians on core issues under the US-backed Annapolis process.

Mr Lieberman is strongly opposed to the concept of “land for peace” on which the proposed two-state solution is based.

He says it means “a state-and-a-half for one people and half a state for the other” – in reference to the fifth of the population of Israel who are Israeli-Arabs, descended from families that remained in what is now Israel after the state’s creation in 1948.

Opposed withdrawal

Mr Lieberman’s political career dates back to a stint as director general of the centre-right Likud Party from 1993-1996, followed by a year as head of the office of then Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Mr Netanyahu is now showing signs of concern that his party – expected to gain most seats in the upcoming elections – is losing votes to his former employee.

Mr Lieberman has served as an MK in the last three Knessets.

From 1999 to 2002, he served as minister of national infrastructure, and from 2003 to 2004 he served as minister of transportation.

But in 2004, he was sacked from the governing coalition after opposing former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to withdraw from the Jewish settlements in Gaza, which went ahead anyway in the summer of 2005.

Mr Lieberman was born in 1958 in Kishinev in the USSR (now Chisinau in Moldova) and moved to Israel at the age of 20, where he gained a BA in social sciences from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Israel’s former chief peace negotiator says the way the new government is talking shows it will not be a partner for peace with the Palestinians.

Tzipi Livni’s criticism follows the rejection by her successor as foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, of recent US-backed efforts towards a peace deal.

“What happened is that the government announced that Israel is not relevant, is not a partner,” she said.

New PM Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged to seek peace but has not detailed how.

Ms Livni’s centrist Kadima party came narrowly ahead of Mr Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud in the February election, but he was asked to form a coalition as right-leaning parties predominated.

From today, Israel has announced that it is not a partner

Tzipi Livni

In his speech on Wednesday, at a foreign ministry handover attended by Ms Livni, the ultra-nationalist Mr Lieberman said Israel was not bound by the Annapolis accords agreed with the Palestinians and the Bush administration in November 2007.

He said the only legitimate document was another US-sponsored deal, the Road Map peace plan of 2003, because he said it was ratified by the Israeli government and the UN Security Council.

First test

In an interview with Israeli army radio, Ms Livni said hardliners had avoided peace efforts in the past with the “pathetic excuse” that there had been no partner on the Palestinian side.

COALITION MEMBERS
Likud: 27 seats, 15 ministers
Yisrael Beiteinu 15 : 5 ministers
Labour: 13 seats, 5 ministers
Shas: 11 seats, 4 ministers
Jewish Home: 3 seats, 1 minister
United Torah Judaism: 5 seats

Analysis: Israel’s unwieldy government

“From today, Israel has announced that it is not a partner,” she said.

“The remarks do not represent Israel, the remarks hurt Israel,” she added, and urged Mr Netanyahu to disavow them.

Correspondents say Mr Netanyahu has softened his opposition towards the Palestinians since his last premiership in the 1990s.

However, they add, the appointment of Mr Lieberman has angered Palestinians and raised international concerns because of his hard-line positions on the peace process and his manifesto which was widely seen as racist against Arabs.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Mr Lieberman’s remarks were the first test for US President Barack Obama in the Middle East.

“He has slammed the door in the face of the US and the international community,” he said.

No land for peace

US state department spokesman Gordon Duguid would not be drawn into commenting on Mr Lieberman’s views when he briefed reporters in Washington.

Instead, he stressed Mr Netanyahu’s stated commitment to achieving peace and said the administration would work closely to advance that cause.

Analysts say the Road Map never got off the ground because both sides accused each other of failing to meet their obligations.

Israel said the Palestinian Authority had not clamped down on militants, while Palestinians said Israel ignored a freeze on settlement activity on occupied territory.

Annapolis was designed to get over that hump by jumping directly to final status talks on Palestinian independence.

However, Annapolis too got stuck and had made little apparent progress by its initial deadline of the end of 2008.

After his speech, Mr Lieberman went further in a TV interview, saying he also opposed withdrawal from the occupied Golan Heights as part of peace negotiations with Syria.

He said he was “very much in favour of peace with Syria – but only on one basis – peace in return for peace” and not, by implication, a land-for-peace deal.

Syria says the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel in 1967, must be returned in full if there is to be peace between the two countries.

thats what u say is a racist who does not want peace. along with him being under investigation as well.

and the smear against HR and aminesty is baseless, so the whole world has faith in it except u, haha dont make me laugh along with your talks about issue is the world u take the information from these sources u so debase.

if u wish to talk about terrorism than u can talk about the founders of israel who targeted arab women and children and displace over 750k arab people.

or talk about the support israel had for hamas against the plo as a counter-weight, than after elections systematically assainating its democratically elected leaders, and state sponsered kidnapping and torture.

or lets talk about all the jewish orgainazations who spoke out against what israel is doing.

If u wish to compare yourselfs to current day democracys be prepared to get critized like one.

haha, u talk about yourself so very well,

maybe u should actually investigate whats going on, since facts, pictures,videos,history, globally recognized human rights organizations, globally recognized news outlets, jewish people in israel and outside say otherwise.

israel even picked a guy whose against a 2 state solution and continuing to build internationally recognized as illegal settlement where all but one judge said it was and the one (u.s.) did not reject but refrain from,

along with his racist new FM who even Tzipi Livni thinks is a joke and will not bring peace.

so again if u think israel is so much better than the arab country in the middle east be prepared to have it get criticize like one unless u dont?

“Mr. Weissel is just monopolizising human rights”
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Display replies flat, with oldest first Display replies flat, with newest first Display replies in threaded form Display replies in nested form The Danger of Monopolizing Human Rights Mr. Weissel in a very vivid and emotional way do a fantastic job remembering us about all the horrible suffering of the holocaust’s victims; however Mr. Weissel stand on the Palestinian-Israeli tragedy is bias and support the oppressor and not the victims.For example, in the second volume of his 1999 memoirs, Mr. Wiesel admitted, “Indeed, I can say in good faith that I have not remained indifferent to any cause involving the defense of human rights. But, you may ask, what have I done to alleviate the plight of the Palestinians? And here I must confess:  I have not done enough.  Is an explanation in order?  In spite of considerable pressure, I have refused to take a public stand in the Israeli-Arab conflict,” According to Mr.weissel, “I have said it before:  since I do not live in Israel, it would be irresponsible for me to do so.” Mr. weissel’s indifference about the Palestinians’ human rights is a clear example of his double moral; Mr. Weissel do not live up to his own words