With the last Israeli maneuvers’ of tightening the siege imposed on Gaza, more life necessities vanished. The key power plant shut down 8 days ago and resulted in tremendous direful outcomes. More than 75% of the Gaza strip faces severe power cuts and some other areas completely plunged into darkness.

Power cuts and daily blackouts resulted in hindering of all facilities depending on power. The remaining power shares provided by Israel and Egypt are not enough to cover the whole costal strip. Pumped fresh water is not reaching all living places, farms and central water wells. Sewage and treatment water machines are halted. Additionally around 40 million tons of sewage water leaked into the Mediterranean contaminating it and damaging fish resources.

It was a due on Israel to open commercial crossings completely during the calm. But, Israel didn’t abide by that condition as she partially opened them. But within the last week; Israel totally closed them causing a huge humanitarian crisis. According to UNRWA, around 750,000 of its beneficiaries don’t get their devoted share of food parcels. With the Israeli ban on UNRWA aid, it is ensuring that a dire humanitarian crisis will occur within days. As UNRWA is also under siege from assisting Palestine in humanitarian causes, long time projects such as housing are halted to the loss of $350 million.

Yesterday, wheat and flour mills in Gaza announced inability of continuing work and feared starvation would be a factor in Palestine if the closure lasts much longer. Today, some hospitals partially stopped working due to power cuts and medical shortages. Tomorrow for sure will bring another crisis if closure lasts more.

The people of Gaza are outraged by the Israeli collective punishment. I spoke to some Gazan residents and I observed some differences amongst them. Mr. Muhammad who refuses to identity his full name said that this siege is unjust and it’s a way to pressure on people to give up their rights.

“We have been patient for 60 years now. We passed more cruel time than this. Thus, why to give up this year. We have to be adamant and patient and the siege will be lifted eventually.” Mr. Muhammad said.

I spoke to a jobless resident from Al Shati’ refugee camp. Mr. Khalil Barakat, who is in his mid 50’s, says he is outraged by this siege. “I’m fed up; bored I feel we are caged like animals in Gaza. If I could get a chance to immigrate to live my remaining years in peace, then I would love to.” He said with anger.

Accidentally, I met old friend of mine, Um Muhammad Abu Ouf; a mother in her twenties. It was good for me to explore her views about the siege as well. As a Mother and a female, her perspective is most important. We met at 6 pm at AL Omar al Moktar Street which was plunging into deep darkness.

She had her outstanding comments about siege. I asked: How badly you are affected by siege?

“Well, the siege became a daily nightmare midday and night. Electricity cuts off and that frightens my 11-month infant. It makes conditions unsafe for him. Further, I’m trying to get some fortified food for him. I went to many stores and shops but in vain. I could not find any food nor needed supplies for my son as there is a shortage in a lot of the basic products needed to care for infants’ such as milk, diapers and so forth”.

I spoke to Hatem Shurab; an International Relief Worker. Hatem is a siege victim who lost a scholarship of training in the U.S lately. Despite that, he seemed to be optimist in contrary to the majority here. Hatem is currently preparing a music concert along with his friends.

His view was quite interesting and brand-new, Hatem stated “I’m trying to highlight on people’s suffering through music. We try to end siege through our voices and to tell those who don’t like to watch news what’s going on. On the 27th of November they might know the suffering of Gazans through songs as we are doing a concert. Regardless of pain, we will sing for Gaza.” Hatem with smiling face said.

However, Hatem is somewhat worried about the current status of Gaza. He needs to have his concert on time and to give Gazan a glimpse of hope and some fun. His concerns rise up that more violence could ignite.

Israeli defense Ministry announced today that Gaza crossings would remain closed until further notice. Gazans are to expect more mayhem as time advances. Meanwhile, Om Muhammad is still desperate to have food for her baby, while Hatem is determined to have his music concert on time. But the decisive element for them would surely rely on the rival parts in the region.

Though the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is now immanent, Western media refrains from reporting about the emerging disaster. Apparently, there are far more interesting things to write about, much more interesting than millions of Palestinians who are being starved by the Jewish state.

However the press was kind enough to report that British foreign minister David Miliband spent some time in Israel this week. He had been very concerned with issues concerning the Avocado and other ethical grocery matters. He wanted to propose a clearer method of labeling food products that are sourced in the occupied west bank and sold to consumers in Britain.  This could as well be an opportunity for Britain and the EU to restrain Israel’s lethal enthusiasm, but Miliband failed short, far too short. At the end of the day, Miliband is what you may call a grocery humanist.  His ethical thinking is orientated around nutrition and ethical digestion. This is apparently the most deteriorated and probably the lowest form of left thinking. At least I really want to believe that left cannot go any lower than that.

Yet, Miliband is a dynamic person. Due to the escalation of violence in the region, he visited Sderot, accompanied by Israeli defense minister Barak.  Bluntly he supported the Israeli criminal policies by saying  “Israel should, above all, seek to protect its own citizens,” as if this is not enough, he continued, “I’m here today because Sderot has become the front line of Israel’s security. It’s very important that countries like mine and others show solidarity with the people of Sderot and that’s what I’m doing today.” Ostensibly, Miliband didn’t visit Gaza. He also didn’t mention that countries like his should show ‘solidarity’ with millions of dispossessed Palestinian refugees that are now shelled and starved to submission.  Though Miliband sincerely cares about Avocados and ethical nutrition, millions of Palestinians who are left to eat sand do not seem to concern him at all.

However, Miliband couldn’t stay in the region for too long, as he has to rush back home. In London he is supposed to meet no less than the Israeli President Mr. Shimon Peres, the elder politician who was the pioneer of the Israeli Nuclear project. The man who introduced WMD to the middle east, the man who has more blood on his hands than any other living Israeli politician (except vegetable Sharon).  Miliband should be in London in time so he can join President Peres and unveil a special plaque at the Foreign Office, honoring British diplomats who helped save Jews during the Holocaust.

I wonder how many British Diplomats will  be honored for saving a single Palestinian kid within the current Israeli inflicted Holocaust?  If there are any British politicians and diplomats, Clearly, Miliband  would not be one of them. Reading what he had to say to the people of Sderot, he is no less than an enthusiastic supporter of the Israeli institutional crimes against humanity.

Meanwhile, President Peres is having a good time in London this week. In the framework of his visit, he will hold a round of meetings with the Queen, Crown Prince Charles, Prime Minister Gordon Brown, David Miliband; and the leader of the opposition, David Cameron.

He will be awarded a Knight Grand Cross, the sixth-most senior award in the British system, used to honor individuals who have rendered important services in relation to foreign nations. Seemingly, in Britain, killing innocent Lebanese civilians and starving millions in Gaza must be considered as an “important service”. In Belgium, on the other hand, a very similar activity   is considered a crime against humanity.

President Peres will also receive an honorary degree from Kings College for his efforts  “furthering peace in the Middle East”.  I think that considering Peres’ usage of ballistic technology against innocent civilians, a PhD in physics may be more appropriate.

On the face of it, at the time the Jewish state is exercising the most devastating forms of crimes against humanity, the British Government, the British Parliament, the royal family and a major British academic institute are all caught together in bed with no less than a nuclear enthusiast butcher.

I am rather impressed.  More than ever I am proud to be British. Such an embracing openness towards wickedness is probably the ultimate form of British kindness and forgiveness. This is something I have never seen in my homeland.  Looking at Parliament, Miliband and the Royal family I must admit, I have much to learn about compassion before I become a genuine British subject.

See also: Sir Peres, Knight of the Body Bags on Auntie Ziona

This is precisely why his latest article, “Rahm Emanuel and Arab Perceptions” is so disturbing. In the piece, Zogby tries to calm the fears of Arab Americans about Barack Obama’s first appointment, Rahm Emanuel, to White House Chief of Staff. Zogby expressed shock and dismay that his constituency, once euphoric over the election of Obama, was now sending him angry and cynical letters. Zogby described the emails and calls to his office as “troubled and troubling—because much of the reaction was based on misinformation and because of what the entire episode reveals about the larger political dynamic.”

Zogby immediately followed up with what he calls “the facts” (i.e. a long list of Rahm Emanuel’s accomplishments), while conveniently leaving out any of his troubling positions related to the Middle East, namely that he was a staunch supporter of the war in Iraq and he has expressed hawkish pro-Israel views. The forcefulness of Zogby’s tone is elucidated in phrases such as “he knows how to get the job done” and “it’s as simple as that.” Right off the bat, Zogby informs his readers that if they don’t understand what a gem Emanuel is, they either cannot properly discern the facts, or their judgments are based on wild misinformation.

Zogby assumes that his constituency and the greater Arab American community are generally ignorant and know nothing of Emanuel (aside from the “myths”), and could not possibly come to a rational judgment on an individual who has been vocally pro-Israel, fought for Israel diplomatically, has supported Israeli militancy, and was an unabashed supporter of the war in Iraq. Zogby criticizes the Arab American community for ingesting defamatory myths, such as the claim that “he served in the IDF.” In fact, Emanuel did donate time during the Gulf War to repair IDF tanks; one could argue that, as an American, volunteering to help out a foreign occupying force is much worse than serving as an Israeli who is mandated to do so by law.

Another rumor that Zogby chastises Arab Americans for is the notion that Emanuel is an Israeli spy, which should make them “wary of the slanderous attacks smacking of anti-Semitism.” It is legitimate to debunk falsehoods, and it is right to hold any community to a proper standard, but to infer that Arab Americans should tread lightly or risk being consumed by anti-Semitism is an irresponsible way for an Arab American leader to silence dissent. There are a great many educated Arab Americans who are concerned about Emanuel’s record, and the notion that if you believe Emanuel served in the IDF, you are anti-Semite, is ridiculous. The falsehoods about Emanuel should be rejected, but they have absolutely nothing to do with anti-Semitism and to suggest otherwise is shameful.

Zogby then swerves in a bizarre direction by praising Emanuel’s involvement in the Oslo Accords. Emauel is the person who coordinated the shaking of hands between Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin on the White House lawn. The Oslo Accords (which Zogby endorsed) were a complete failure. During the Oslo years, illegal Israeli settlements doubled and the policy that emanated from the accords helped destroy the Palestinian economy. It is the equivalent of proclaiming that Emanuel was the ribbon cutter, unveiling the “bridge to nowhere.”  

Compounding his carelessness, Zogby incorrectly equates right wing allegations that “Barack Obama is a Muslim” with rumors that Emanuel served in the IDF. It is notable that in 2006, when MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell referred to Rahm Emanuel as someone who served in the Israeli army in an interview, Emanuel did not dispute the claim (if it was such a slanderous attack, one would think Emanuel, the “practitioner of hard-ball politics,” would have spoken up).

Making his frustration crystal clear, Zogby asserts, “that stories such as these have been circulating, and have taken hold, is as reprehensible as the ‘Barack Obama is a secret Muslim/Manchurian candidate’ tale, or the anti-Arab anti-Muslim canards to which I and many of my colleagues have been subjected over the years.” What Zogby fails to mention is the fact that there is nothing wrong with being a Muslim, yet there is something fundamentally wrong with the IDF illegally occupying 3.8 million Palestinian people, subjugating them to incessant collective punishment, and cordoning the people of Gaza into an open-air prison.

Ending his lesson on “the facts,” Zogby seems to contradict his own assertions. He contends that Arab Americans should understand the “political realities,” and that just about all members of Congress are pro-Israel. Is Zogby suggesting that Arab Americans just suck it up, sit on their hands, and get used to the status quo? What happened to the change Barack Obama was going to usher in?

It is strange that the man behind the Yalla Vote! campaign is using these tactics to push his constituency into giving Emanuel a free pass. Whether these appointments are to be expected or not, wouldn’t Arab Americans expressing their concerns be a good thing? Isn’t that part of the democratic process and the reason why they engaged in this election cycle to begin with: to bring change to Washington.

While Zogby wants us to be aware of the “political realities,” the actual reality for many Arab Americans is simple: this appointment represents more of the same—whether it is the hawkish policies of the Bush administration or the destructive Mideast policy that was wrapped in nicer packaging during the Clinton years. Americans worked tirelessly for two years to elect Barack Obama. Now is the time to work tirelessly to ensure that the change that he promised comes to fruition.

The mission statement of the AAI reads in part, “The Arab American Institute (AAI) represents the policy and community interests of Arab Americans throughout the United States and strives to promote Arab American participation in the U.S. electoral system.” Perhaps Zogby should reread his own organization’s mission statement.

Remi Kanazi is a Palestinian-American writer, poet, editor, and actor living in New York City. He is editor of the recently released collection of poetry, spoken word, hip hop and art, Poets For Palestine. For more information, visit www.PoetsForPalestine.com or Amazon.com.

Rahm Israel Emanuel:  Will Handle U.S. Domestic Policy for Israel

Dennis Ross:  Will Handle U.S. Foreign Policy for Israel

“Right and wrong are the same in Palestine as anywhere else. What is peculiar about the Palestine conflict is that the world has listened to the party that committed the offence and has turned a deaf ear to the victims.” 

 – Prof. Arnold Toynbee, British Historian   

“The nation which indulges towards another—a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. ..a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification …Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests.”

–President George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

“Our attachment to no nation on earth should supplant our attachment to liberty.”

–Thomas Jefferson: Declaration on Taking Up Arms, 1775. Papers 1:201

“I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent interests of the community.”

–James Madison, Federalist No: 10:  Warning of “Factions/Special Interests” acting against the National Interest 

Despite such warnings from our founding fathers against the corruptive influence of a minority “faction/special interest group”, our government has nevertheless surrendered, pandered, implemented, paid and died for the vital interests of a small foreign nation, Israel.   America has in effect “outsourced” its foreign policy and national interests to this foreign nation to the detriment of its own interests—political, economic, military, credibility, moral leadership, and friendly alliances around the world.

In effect, our Israeli shackled government would rather expend our treasury, our  military youth, sacrifice our economic interests around the world, than dare challenge, change, or have the moral and just courage to even allow a political debate on this destructive “special relationship”. a nation condemned and despised around the world as a rogue brutal military occupier of an entire people living under its American paid for boots, uniforms, rifles, tanks, bullets, missiles, rockets, cluster bombs fighter jets, access to our latest technology and spy satellites, bulldozers, fences, barbed wires, walls, and concentration camps.   The Nazism of Germany and the Apartheid of South Africa live in Israel’s policies with our government’s full knowledge, support, political protection, and funding.   Many courageous people, including compassionate humanitarian Jews in and out of Israel have made this comparison.   Israeli men and women like Uri Avnery, Professor Israel Shahak (deceased), Prof. Illan Pappe, Prof. Avi Shlaim, Israel Shamir, Journalists Amira Hass, Gideon Levy, and many others who work for peace and justice in the Holy Land.

“On the morrow of a persecution in Europe in which they had been the victims of the worst atrocities ever known… the Jews’ immediate reaction to their own experience was to become persecutors in their turn… In 1948, the Jews knew, from personal experience, what they were doing; and it was their supreme tragedy that the lessons learnt by them from their encounter with the Nazi German Gentiles should have been not to eschew but to initiate some of the evil deeds that the Nazis had committed against the Jews”

            –Famed British Historian Arnold Toynbee, “A Study of History”

“What do we have to do with apartheid? Does a separation fence constitute separation? Do separate roads for Jewish settlers and Palestinians really separate? Are Palestinian enclaves between Jewish settlements Bantustans? Roadblocks and inspections at every turn; licenses and permits for every little matter; the arbitrary seizure of land; special privileges in water use; cheap, hard labor; forming and uniting families by bureaucratic”

            –Yossi Sarid, Haaretz April 4, 2005, “Yes, it is Apartheid” (former Knesset Member)

“What is not so understandable, not justified, is what it (Israel) did to another people to guarantee its existence…Have our Jewish sisters and brothers forgotten their humiliation? Have they forgotten the collective punishment, the home demolitions, in their own history so soon? Have they turned their backs on their profound and noble religious traditions? Have they forgotten that God cares deeply about the downtrodden?….Somehow, the Israeli government is placed on a pedestal [in the US], and to criticize it is to be immediately dubbed anti-Semitic, as if the Palestinians were not Semitic..  People are scared in this country [the US], to say wrong is wrong because the Jewish lobby is powerful - very powerful”.

–Former South African Archbishop Desmund Tutu, “Apartheid in the Holy Land”, Guardian April 29, 2002

“Israeli Fascism is alive and kicking. It is growing in the flowerbed that produced the various religious-nationalist underground groups of the past: the group that tried to bomb the Muslim shrines on the Temple Mount, the underground that tried to assassinate the Palestinian mayors, the “Kach” gang, the perpetrator of the Hebron massacre Baruch Goldstein, the murderer of peace activist Emil Gruenzweig, the murderer of Yitzhak Rabin and all the underground groups that were uncovered at an early stage before their deeds could bring them to public notice”. 

–Uri Avnery, Counterpunch, “Prof. Ze’ev Sternhell’s Warning on the Growth of Israeli Fascism—It Can Happen Here (Israel)”, September 29, 2008

In launching his presidential campaign, Obama, like all his predecessors, knew that as a democratic candidate the path to the White House must first gain the support and approval of Jewish Americans.   Thus in January 2008 he showed his allegiance to the Star of David by writing a letter to U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Zalmay Khalilzad (a staunchly Pro Israel Neocon and pusher of the Iraq, Afghan Wars) asking him to vote against a U.N. Resolution condemning Israel’s catastrophic siege of Gaza, with 1.3 million Palestinians, an illegal collective punishment that’s depriving the population from food, water, medicines, fuel, education, and health care, in direct violation of the U.N. Charter and the Fourth Geneva Convention despite Israel’s signatory to both.  Obama wrote:

“All of us are concerned about the impact of closed border crossings on Palestinian families. However, we have to understand why Israel is forced to do this.   The Security Council should clearly and unequivocally condemn the rocket attacks… If it cannot bring itself to make these common sense points, I urge you to ensure that it does not speak at all”

Pander on Mr. President Elect to the right wing Jewish lobby that controls the very body you serve in, the Senate, as well as the White House.   AIPAC usually writes Congressional legislation and resolutions, did they write this for you?

The political, economic, academic, and media power of the Israel Lobby is unsurpassed in the history of America.  Jewish monies, amounting to fifty to sixty percent of contributions to the Democratic Party, in conjunction with AIPAC, a most powerful Israeli lobby, ensure that no debate or criticism of Israel ever surfaces. Any who dare challenge Israel’s illegal and brutal occupation and theft of Palestinian land pays a heavy price in smears, loss of credibility, employment, even receive death threats.

President Jimmy Carter, who gifted Israel with a peace agreement with Egypt, endured the vilest attacks by many Jews around the world, especially in Israel and its second homeland, America, for his book, “Palestine—Peace or Apartheid”, to the extent that the he was not invited to attend the Democratic Convention held in Denver.  

In a Los Angeles Times interview Carter said this:  

“A debate in America is an absolutely hopeless dream. “There is not a single candidate in America, for governor, for House of Representatives, for Senate or for president that would dare say anything that was not acceptable to Israel.”

Dual loyalty of Jewish Americans has always been a persistent question in political discourse (see Counterpunch article below).   

Your choice, Mr. Obama, of Senator Joe Biden was another pandering signal of your allegiance to Israel as he’s proudly proclaimed, “I’m a Zionist” in an interview with ShalomTV.  During his V.P. debate he proudly asserted that no one in the Senate is a better friend of Israel than him.   Speaking to the National Jewish Democratic Council on September 23, 2008, Biden sold his soul, Obama’s, and our national interest for Jewish votes and contributions. He said:

“I’ve spent 35 years in my career dealing with issues related to Israel. My support for Israel begins in my stomach, goes to my heart and ends up in my head. And I promise you, I guarantee you, I guarantee you. I would not have joined Barack Obama’s ticket as vice president were I in any doubt, even the slightest doubt, that he shares the same commitment to Israel that I share. I guarantee it. It’s that simple. That is a fact.”

            –Senator Joe Biden; Vice Presidential Candidate

 

“The Israelis control the policy in the Congress and the senate … somewhere around 80 percent of the senate of the United States is completely in support of Israel — of anything Israel wants….”

– Senator William Fulbright, Chairman Senate Foreign Relations Committee, October 7, 1973 on CBS’ “Face   the Nation”.

“I am aware how almost impossible it is in this country to carry out a foreign policy [in the Middle East] not approved by the Jews. [Former Secretary of State George] Marshall and [former Defense Secretary James Forestall] learned that….. Terrific control the Jews have over the news media and the barrage the Jews have built up on congressmen…. I am very much concerned over the fact that the Jewish influence here is completely dominating the scene and making it almost impossible to get congress to do anything they don’t approve of. The Israeli embassy is practically dictating to the congress through influential Jewish people in the country”

–Secretary of State John Foster Dulles in February 1957 quoted in Fallen Pillars , page 99, by Donald Neff

“I’ve never seen a president –I don’t care who he is– stand up to them [the Israelis]. It just boggles your mind. They always get what they want. The Israelis know what’s going on all the time. I got to the point where I wasn’t writing anything down. If the American people understood what grip those people have on our government, they would rise up in arms. Our citizens don’t have any idea what goes on.” –

–Admiral Thomas Moorer of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,  Washington Report 12/1999, p.124 quoting from Andrew Hurley’s book, “One Nation Under Israel”

– AFTER 9/11:  “Why do they hate us? Pentagon’s Answer

“Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights”

– US Defense Department’s Defense Science Board: (Christian Science Monitor: 11/29/2004). .

A Historic Election:

“In his speech, Obama intends to remove any doubts that the Democratic Party’s donors and constituents, many of whom are Jewish, may have about his support for Israel”.  (Haaretz, see link below)

To say that your election is a historical sentinel event is an under statement.    You rose in this nation to the highest office in the land upon the ashes of the millions of African slaves ripped from their land, transported like cattle, bought and sold as property, killed, abused, raped, and hung from gallows; yet in your victory speech you ignored the advocacy and struggle of African American organizations, primarily the NAACP, and civil rights leaders who paved your path to glory and who in tears thanked God that they lived to see the election of an African American, men like the Reverend Jesse Jackson, Representatives John Lewis and Charles Rangel, Ambassador Andrew Young, Ida B. Wells, Medgar Evers, Rosa Parks, W. E. B. Du Bois, Roy Wilkins, Julian Bond, and so many others who gave so much so that you can fulfill the dream and the promise of Dr. King’s America    Odd how in all your speeches you never mentioned Dr. King by name.

But you did mention and thank the two people (both Jewish) most responsible for your successful campaign: 

“To my campaign manager David Plouffe, my chief strategist David Axelrod…you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what you’ve sacrificed to get it done.” 

–President Elect Barack Obama’s Victory Speech November 4, 2008

Obama’s First Appointment: Rahm Emmanuel as Chief of Staff: “Son of a terrorist”. 

Will ensure a domestic policy supportive of Israel.

The appointment of Rahm Emmanuel as your Chief of Staff will have immediate negative repercussions in Congress and around the world.  Emanuel is a known hawk and Zionist.   His appointment will ensure that U.S. domestic policy will benefit Israel. damn U.S. interests.    He will be the gateway to all information that reaches you, thus America and the world will understand that only Pro Israel agendas need apply to the White House.

In an interview with the Israeli Hebrew paper, Ma’ariv 11/6/08, Rahm Emanuel’s father, Dr. Benjamin Emanuel, said this of his son’s influence on you.

“Obviously he will influence the president to be pro-Israel, Why wouldn’t he be? What is he, an Arab? He’s not going to clean the floors of the White House.”

Rahm’s father insults all Arabs in this statement but this hardly raises a hair in the media nor was it denounced by his son, nor more importantly by Mr. Obama.   Obama condemned and distanced himself from friends who came under deliberate smears and media attacks for “insulting” Jews, but Arabs are unworthy of his support, being the American untouchables.    What if this was an Arab insulting Jews, do you think you’ll ever be President?

You probably are aware that Dr. Benjamin Emanuel was a member of the Jewish terrorist group, Irgun (led by Menachem Begin) that was responsible for wide ranging terrorist attacks against both the British and Palestinians. Irgun famously massacred an entire village, Deir Yassin.  Menachem Begin even boasted of this terrorist massacre of the village in his book “The Revolt”. 

Rahm Emanuel served as a volunteer in the Israeli Army during the first Gulf War, protecting his beloved Israel, rather than serve in the U.S. military. 

In the Israeli paper, Haaretz (11/7/08 “U.S. Jews laud Obama pick of Rahm Emanuel for Chief of Staff”)

William Daroff, the director of the Washington office of the United Jewish Communities (UJC), an umbrella organization representing 155 Jewish Federations and 400 independent Jewish communities across North America was quoted as saying:  “Rep. Emanuel is also a good friend of Israel, coming from good Irgun Stock”.  

In the same article another Jewish American leader, Ira N. Forman, Executive Director of the National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC) said:  

“Obama made an outstanding selection (Rahm Emanuel)   His voting record and leadership in support of the U.S.-Israel relationship are outstanding.”

“Rahm Emanuel has a long history of militarist ideology behind him. His father was a member of the ultra-right-wing terrorist organization Etzel that killed British civilians as part of their anti-British struggle in Palestine in the 1940s. Emanuel, himself a citizen of Israel as well as the United States, has been one of several Congressional leaders enforcing the “Israel Lobby” consensus on the Democrats, in the process shutting out the peace voices that believe Israel’s security would be better served by the U.S. putting pressure on Israel to end the Occupation, move the Wall to inside the pre-67 boundaries, and remove the settlers from the West Bank or tell them to live there as Palestinian citizens.”

–Rabbi Michael Lerner, (barackobama.com) November 7, 2008, “Rahm Emanuel is no Reason for Hope or Celebration”, November 7, 2008***

DENNIS ROSS:  Will Ensure a Foreign Policy supportive of Israel as he’s done under Clinton and Bush.

Your campaign announced that Dennis Ross will be your top adviser on Israel and Iran.   Ross is now at the pro-Israel Washington Institute for Near East Policy (founded in 1985 by AIPAC’s Martin Indyk).  He is also the First Chairman of the newly established Jerusalem based think tank, The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, founded by the Jewish Agency.    He was a staunch supporter of the Iraq war.  His appointment will be a recurrent nightmare and devastating blow to peace in the Middle East,  especially to the Palestinians, doomed to occupation and refugee status as long as our Presidents and Congress have Israel as an albatross around their cowardly necks.

In addition to Ross, Obama’s Middle East policy advisors reads like a Who’s Who of Jewish Americans, all staunch supporters of Israel at any cost to this nation.

Obama’s other key Middle East Advisers include:

• Anthony Lake:  Served at Director of the National Security Council under Clinton
• Mara Rudman:  Former National Security Council Assistant to President Clinton.  Works on MidEast issues.
• Dan Shapiro and Eric Lynn:  Advisors and Liaisons to the Jewish community.  Lynn was an intern at AIPAC.
• Daniel Kurtzer:  An orthodox Jew appointed by Bush as Ambassador to Israel.
• Martin Indyk: Former research director at AIPAC, founding executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, AIPAC’s influential think tank.  Served under Clinton at the National Security Council on Arab-Israeli issues, Iraq, Iran and South Asia.  Served two terms as U.S. Ambassador to Israel. 
   
• Former Representative Mel Levine:  Served on House Foreign Affairs Committee, Former Board Member of AIPAC Board, and John Kerry’s former Top Mideast Advisor.  His Quote: “By every rating and criterion, [Senator] Kerry’s votes have shown 100 percent solid support for Israel. That’s well understood in his home state of Massachusetts, but not yet throughout the rest of the country.”
• Lee Rosenberg:  AIPAC treasurer and strong Obama supporter:  In an interview with Ynet.com (2/3/08) he was quoted as saying:  “Rosenberg says that the Security of Israel “is the global and policy issue that I care most about” and rejects claims that questioned Obama’s commitment to the Jewish Stat. . “He’s always been a strong supporter of the security of Israel,” he says.”

From Obama’s early political campaigns in Chicago, Jewish monies and support have been at the heart of his campaigns for which he expresses eternal gratitude for the “support of so many friends in the Jewish
 community, 
dating back to my first days in public life in Chicago”.

Mr. Obama, you’ve received the most sought after seal of approval in your run for the Presidency, an approval only given to the lucky few who’ve shown their true patriotic allegiance, no, not to America, but to Israel.   You’ve received the approval of AIPAC, a self identifying lobby group that has thumbed its nose on U.S. law requiring it to register as such.   How clever that the acronym, AIPAC, stands for the American Israeli PUBLIC AFFAIRS Committee, and not the American Israeli Political Action Committee.

“AIPAC has stressed
 that it is satisfied with Obama’s
 positions on the Middle East; a spokeswoman recently told the New Republic: “Like all the leading presidential candidates, the senator has a strong record on issues of importance to the pro-Israel community.”

During your presidential campaign you’ve adopted every Pro Israel/AIPAC policy toward the Palestinians, Iran, and the Middle East.  Among them.

1.      Among the first to support Israel’s devastating invasion of Lebanon in 2006 claiming that Israel was simply defending itself against terrorism.

2.      Lead sponsor in the Senate of Legislation promoting Divestment from Iran.

3.      Among sponsors of the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act of 2007.

4.      No negotiations with Hamas and  Hezbollah.

5.      No condemnation of Israel’s brutal two year siege of Gaza with 1.3 million people.

6.      No Palestinian “right of return”.

7.      Strong supporter of more aid to Israel.

8.      Jerusalem as an undivided eternal capital of Israel (slightly backtracked on this).

9.      While condemning Iran’s nuclear program (Iran signatory to Non Proliferation Treaty) supports Israel despite Israel’s 200 -300 nuclear weapons and a non signatory to the NPT).

Missing from your pandering speeches to AIPAC and Jewish organizations was any mention of the Arab Peace Plan, land for peace formula, occupation, illegal settlements, settler violence, Israeli human rights abuses, violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention, total siege of Gaza, thousands of Palestinian prisoners, including children, and just as importantly—Israel’s direct violation of Section 4 of the U.S. Arms Export Control Act that stipulates that American weapons can legally only be used for internal security or self defense.   Israel’s decades’ long bombing and killing of civilians by American weapons clearly violates this law, but no government has had the courage to challenge Israel.   History and experience say that like all your predecessors (with exception of Eisenhower) you won’t dare either.

In fact, Mr. Obama, I can guarantee that five days after your inauguration, January 27, 2009, you will join most of Congress and your administration officials in celebration of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day established by the United Nations in 2005 at the behest of the Bush Administration.  Perhaps you’ll be at the U.S. taxpayer built and funded Washington D.C. Holocaust Museum.   No other historical holocaust is so recognized and funded by us, the taxpayers. 

Your immediate abandonment of “CHANGE” soon after you were elected is already disturbing and bodes ill for your presidency.  You’re potential appointees are mostly recycled Clinton officials who are primarily Pro Business, and Pro Israel Jews who offer you protection from the fabricated “Jewish Problem” raised against you by right wing Jewish organizations and individuals.

According to the New York Times, “The New Team” (November 12, 2008) the Jewish Americans listed below, among others, are being considered for senior administration positions.   Each can have an important policy impact on MidEast policies, including the educational programs in American schools regarding the possible obligatory teaching of the Holocaust and the marginalization of programs on Arabic, Muslim culture, Islam.  

• Richard J. Danzig:  For a senior Pentagon position
• Joel Klein:   For Secretary of Education.  Klein was Superintendent of the New York City School System who succumbed to a ruthless Jewish lobbying group and Pro Israel media pressure to fire Debbie Almontasar, a Muslim educator and principle of a school slated to teach Arabic and MidEast culture.  The school was attacked as a “Madrassah” for Jihad, Holy War and militant Islam.  Klein replaced her with a Jewish principle. Danielle Salzburg.   What else will Klein as Secretary of Education succumb to under the powerful Jewish lobby and media?     
• James Steinberg:  For Director of the National Security Council

Due to your obvious intimidation by the Israel Lobby regarding the “Anti Israel” position of two Non-Jewish but prominent foreign policy experts, Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski and Mr. Robert Malley, both serving at your request on your foreign policy advisory team, you shamelessly dismissed Dr. Brzezinski’s role as your advisor, an honorable man who’s served this nation with high distinction while accepting Mr. Robert Malley’s resignation, a highly respected diplomat.

If this is how you respond to pressure from the Israeli Lobby during a campaign, how much of our national interest will you sacrifice to their demands?    

You’re being warned not to mess with Israel and its powerful Lobby given their domination of Congress, Israel’s second Knesset.

“Even if, in an impossible-to-imagine worst-case scenario, Obama wanted to fundamentally change the US-Israeli relationship, it is unlikely he would be able to do so”  Why?  In the article Eran Lerman, Director of the Israel and Middle East Office of the American addressed the issue by saying: “To do that, he is going to need to go to Capitol Hill and build coalitions. And coalition-building in Washington is good for Israel because Israel has many friends on the Hill”.

            –Jerusalem Post, November 7, 2008, Analysis: So, nu, can we?

“Will Obama be able to take the One-Jerusalem/Israel-first crowd for granted as he wheels around Jerusalem and Tehran? No. As my commenters point out, these elements are deep in American Jewish life; and we’re not talking about just voters, but the Jewish establishment, or to be precise the Zionist constituents of the American power structure, from the media to the think tanks to the big-money zip codes of 10022 and 90210….he apartheid conditions in the West Bank are destroying the Jewish state, and that the Israel lobby is standing in the way of progress…..Neo-conservatism really means “transfer.” Ethnic cleansing.

–Phillip Weiss (Phillip Weiss website), October 17, 2008

“He (Obama) will have to tell Israel a few home truths: that America can no longer remain uncritical in the face of Israeli army brutality and the colonisation for Jews and Jews only on Arab land. Obama will have to stand up at last to the Israeli lobby (it is, in fact, an Israeli Likud party lobby) and withdraw Bush’s 2004 acceptance of Israel’s claim to a significant portion of the West Bank. US officials will have to talk to Iranian officials – and Hamas officials, for that matter. Obama will have to end US strikes into Pakistan – and Syria”.

-Robert Fisk, U.K. Independent, Obama Has to Pay for Eight Years of Bush’s Delusions.  He will have to get out of Iraq, and he will have to tell Israel a few home truths, November 8, 2008

“The negative (Jewish) campaign glossed over Obama’s deep ties in the Chicago Jewish Community and how he has picked a preeminently pro-Israel foreign policy team.”

–Jewish Telegraphic Agency, November 5, 2008 

Mr. Obama, after your victory you called the leaders of nine nations among them Israel, naturally.   Yet despite our economic, energy, and credit crisis you did not see fit to call one Arab leader in the Middle East, the very region we and Europe called upon begging for increased oil production, their money and investments to shore up our banks and financial system.    Despite American, British, and Israeli bombs killing innocent Muslims, these cowardly pandering dictators called you.  While their banks are failing their priority is saving American banks.

America and the world have laid their anguished and frustrated hope in your hands for peace and prosperity after the hell Bush/Cheney/Neocons and Israel created around the world.  Yet you start with a hand sullied and biased toward special interests, both domestic and foreign, the very groups you promised to end their influence. 

Will you have the courage to be America’s president, a president of all Americans, Jews and Gentiles, a president for America’s interests, not Israel’s, a president who will heed the warnings of Washington, Jefferson, and Madison not to have a “passionate attachment” to any foreign nation, to avoid “foreign entanglements” that sabotage our interests, to end the influence of “factions”, i.e. special interests that dominate our national policies? 

I for one will go against the tide of Obamaphoria and predict that as far as foreign policy is concerned, especially in the Middle East, you will fail, for America is always ten steps behind the brilliant and inflammatory military and political machinations of Israel and its lobby.

As Ariel Sharon said: “The Arabs may have the Oil, but we have the matches”.

To pay for your domestic programs you will depend entirely on borrowed money.   Given the severe financial crisis, astronomical deficits, and debt of our government thanks to the influence of special interest groups, both domestic and foreign, you’ll have a very small window with which to maneuver to pay for a semblance of your domestic programs.

But rest assured, given the apathy and disinterest of our population, you can succumb to these special interest groups without a beep from our citizen spectators who put more thought into sales and football games than the future of their children.  

Let’s meet four years from now and you can prove me wrong.   In the meantime hundreds of thousands of innocent Muslims will continue to die at the hands of an Imperial Western-Israeli alliance—the true Axis of Evil.  Welcome to another Israel Apartheid Wall—The Washington D.C. Beltway.

Recall the words of the man most responsible for your election as an African American: 

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy”.  

–Dr. Martin Luther King, Strength to Love, 1963

Sources for Article:

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp

(George Washington’s Farewell Address 1796:  Warning of a “Passionate Attachment” to a Foreign Nation)

http://www.dailynewscaster.com/2008/08/24/joe-biden-i-am-a-zionist/ (

Joe Biden Video: “I am a Zionist”, September 23, 2008

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6640.shtml

“Obama Pivots Away From Dovish Past
Larry Cohler-Esses, The Jewish Week, 8 March 2007

http://www.forward.com/articles/14018/

“Obama Campaign Appoints Adviser To Coordinate Jewish Outreach”

http://www.harpers.org/archive/2008/10/0082187

(“Obama’s Jews”: Harpers; October 2008)

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/826665.html

“In his speech, Obama intends to remove any doubts that the Democratic Party’s donors and constituents, many of whom are Jewish, may have about his support for Israel”.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3513083,00.html

(Lee Rosenberg’s interview on Barack Obama’s commitment to Israel)

http://jeffreygoldberg.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/05/obama_on_zionism_and_hamas.php

“Obama on Zionism and Hamas”, May 12, 2008  (Interview with Jeffrey Goldberg)

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1211288137944&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

“Obama the Zionist”, May 21, 2008

http://origin.barackobama.com/issues/foreign_policy/#onisrael (Obama/Biden on Israel)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rahm_Emmanuel   (Rahm Emanuel Brief Biography)

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2008/04/israel-sittin-1.html (interview with President Carter)

http://www.counterpunch.org/christison09062004.html

“Dual Loyalties:  The Bush Neocons and Israel”

By KATHLEEN and BILL CHRISTISON

Former CIA political analysts

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/mear01_.html

The Israel Lobby  by Professors Mearsheimer and Walt: “For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread ‘democracy’ throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardized not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides.

Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical.”

http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2008/01/24/obama-gaza-siege-forced-on-israel/

“Obama’s Letter to U.S. Ambassador to U.N. “Gaza Siege “Forced on Israel”

http://jews4obama2008.wordpress.com/barack-obamas-breakfast-on-feb-24-2008-with-ohio-jews/

(SEE: Barack Obama’s Breakfast Speech on February 24 with Ohio Jews)

“He then said that he will carry with him to the White House “an unshakable commitment to the security of Israel and the friendship between the United States and Israel. The US-Israel relationship is rooted in shared interests, shared values, shared history and in deep friendship among our people … I  will work tirelessly as president to uphold and enhance the friendship
 between the two countries.”: Barack Obama



http://jta.org/news/article/2008/10/28/110913/mccainobamaadvisers

“A look at Obama and McCain advisers”, By Ron Kampeas, October 28, 2008

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=what_does_it_mean_to_be_the_proisrael_candidate

Article:  “”What Does It Mean To Be the Pro-Israel Candidate?”

“The major candidates in both parties seek the “pro-Israel” label. Now is the time to debate what it means to support Israel, so that a year from now, elected leaders will be able to refer to publicly recognized ideas to justify acting more sensibly”.

–Gershom Gorenberg | January 18, 2008

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/us/series/the_new_team/index.html

“Obama:  The New Team”

http://jews4barack.com/mythfacts/?cat=20

Joe Biden’s Speech to Jewish Americans.  Obama like me totally supports Israel

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/28/nyregion/28school.html

“Critics Cost Muslim Educator Her Dream School:  Role of Joel Klein, Superintendent of NYC Schools: now considered for Secretary of Education)

*** [Rabbi Michael Lerner is editor of Tikkun Magazine http://www.tikkun.org, chair of the Network of Spiritual Progressives http://www.spiritualprogressives.org, author of 11 books (most recently the 2006 national best-seller The Left Hand of God) and as a member of Rabbis for Obama recently debated Bill Kristol about how Jews should vote in the election.]

http://www.aipac.org/about_AIPAC/default.asp  (From AIPAC’s own website:  A Lobbying Group)

“As America’s leading pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC works with both Democratic and Republican political leaders to enact public policy that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship”.

http://www.newstatesman.com/200105140019

(Source for Ariel Sharon quote:  “Arabs may have the oil….)

–John Pilger: “The big threat in the Middle East is Israel, not Iraq: it could play the nuclear card to blackmail the Americans”, May 14, 2001 

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.

Mohamed Khodr is a political and human rights activist who writes frequently on Israel’s decades long illegal occupation and oppression of the Palestinians, on U.S. foreign policy, Islam, and Arab politics.

The Encyclopaedia is the first such work examining the anthropological, sociological, historical, economic, and scientific theories of race and racism in the modern era. The set delves into the historic origins of ideas of race and racism and explores their social and scientific consequences. Some of the nearly 400 articles address broad theoretical topics that have helped to shape modern ideas about race and racism; others address more specific subjects in the larger fields. Zionism is one of those racist ideas explored in this book. It was written by Dr. Noel Ignatiev^*.

In October 2008, the American Jewish Committee objected to the encyclopedia article on Zionism that Dr. Ignatiev wrote for “The Encyclopedia of Race and Racism“. In an effort to hide the truth behind Zionism, Zionist lobbies are now putting huge pressure on the publishing house to remove the article in which Dr. Ignatiev described Israel as a racial state, where rights are assigned on the basis of ascribed descent or the approval of the superior race and likened it to Nazi Germany and the Southern United States before the civil rights movement.

Action:

First, have a look at this entry on “Zionism” in the Macmillan “Encyclopedia of Race and Racism” (PDF File):

http://www.ccsu.edu/library/Bernstein/Zionism.pdf

Alternatively, you can read the 5 pages of this article by viewing the attached images (click to enlarge):

Page 1:

Page 2:

Page 3:

Page 4:

Page 5:

Now, you can guess where this is heading. You can see why the Zionists are going apoplectic - the article doesn’t just make the case for the Palestinian right of return but also quotes Lenni Brenner on Zionist collaboration with the Nazis. And much more.

Please sign the petition at:
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/urge-macmillan-to-retain-entry-on-zionism

And you can also send individual e-mail messages to the publishers via:
emea.enquiries@cengage.com

They can be reached at:

Phone: 1-800-877-4253
Fax: 1-877-363-4253 Monday-Friday 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. EST or visit:

http://www.gale.cengage.com/contact.htm

^* Noel Ignatiev is an American history professor at the Massachusetts College of Art best known for his call to “abolish” the white race. Ignatiev is the co-founder and co-editor of the journal Race Traitor and the New Abolitionist Society. He also has written a book on antebellum northern racism against Irish immigrants, How the Irish Became White.

By Sami Jamil Jadallah

As was expected, the Palestinian leadership sitting in Ramallah and around the world did not make a mention of or remembers the massacre of some 5,000 Palestinians civilians massacred in Tel-Zaatar on August 12, 1976. A massacre committed by the Lebanese Maronite militia, the Phalanges, Etien Saqr (Guardian of the Cedar) a coalition backed and actively supported by non other than Hafiz Al-Assad and his Ba’athist Party.

The fall of Tel-Zaatar came about after more than 100 days of siege laid by the Maronite militias and of course with very active support from the Syrian Army. More than 1,500 civilians were killed during one day. The Syrian regime set the stage for what to come later in Sabra and Shatilla this time, it is the Israelis who provided the active support and participation in the massacre that took place during 15-18 September 1982.

The sad thing about it, the fact very few people within the illustrious PLO and Fatah ever talk about Tal-Zaatar and the active Syrian role in such massacre and as expected Hamas leadership, would never dare mention Tel-Zaatar lest it anger its sponsors sitting in Damascus. As Arafat and his PLO left Beirut, and to save their behinds, never looked back at the hundreds of thousands left behind, let alone the thousands massacred under written guarantees from the US government.

While the massacre at Tel-Zaatar was a Syrian sponsored enterprise, the massacre at Sabra and Shatilla where some 3,000 were massacred was an Israeli sponsored enterprise.

According to news report, the planning for such a massacre took place at noon on Thursday, September 16, at the Israeli Command Post between Israeli Major General Amir Drori (later awarded a scholarship from Harvard toward his PhD) the commander of North Command, Fady Frem, the Lebanese Forces Chief of Staff, Elias Hobieka, the Lebanese Forces Intelligence Chief (later elected as member of the Lebanese Parliament and in 1990 was appointed by Syria as a minister and member of the Lebanese cabinet).

The day before, on September 15th the Israeli Occupation Forces secured the camps of Sabra and Shatilla to facilitate the massacre by sealing and controlling the entrances and exists to the camps and providing transportation to the would be killers and murderers. Not only that but the Israeli Occupation Forces making sure the massacre continue on during all hours provided night flares to facilitate the continued killings.

For 3 days the Lebanese Christian Forces had a field day, using guns, knives and hatchets slitting throats, axing bodies, shooting and raping, while the Israeli Occupation Forces was monitoring all the communication among the killers and making sure the massacre was in full view of members of its forces. The report of the massacre was sent to Tel-Aviv and was seen by at least 20 senior staff member. Not only that but the Israeli Chief Staff aware of what was going on, concluded the “operation” should continue.

The news of the massacre and the active support of the Israeli Occupation Forces shocked the Israeli and on September 26, more than 400,000 Israelis demonstrated in Tel-Aviv holding the largest ever demonstration to take place in Tel-Aviv.

To control the damage done to the reputation of its army, the Israeli cabinet on September 28th established a Commission of Inquiry headed by Supreme Court Justice Yitzhak Kahan.

The Commission finding concluded that the Israeli Army bears indirect responsibility while the well known war criminal Ariel Sharon “bears personal responsibility” and recommended the dismissal of the Director of Military Intelligence Yehoshua Saguy, the demotion of the Division Commander Amos Yaron for at least 3 years.

As it happens, Israel voters and with strong support from the US Jewish community, Ariel Sharon, the well known war criminal was awarded for his role in Sabra and Shatilla and was voted in as prime minister adding to the list of terrorists and war criminals who became prime ministers in Israel. Some Israeli and Jewish apologist went further by calling those who complained about Israel’s role in the massacre as “blood libel” and the Princeton historian Bernard Lewis complained the world media gave too much attention to the massacre and making too much fuss over such a killing. It seems that more than 400,000 Israeli Jews did not agree with the views of the Princeton professor. Surprisingly I did not come across statement made by Allan Dershowitz the Harvard professor.

While Israel at least took the measure to form a Commission of Inquiry and did make a serious attempt at investigating the massacre, while making sure that Israel is not held directly liable for such massacre, not Syria, not Lebanon and certainly not the PLO ever organized a similar commission of inquiry and of course for obvious reasons. All do not have the courage or the backbone to take such a step. In fact Syria awarded the number one killer, the commander of the Christian Forces with the position of a minister, while the Lebanese awarded such a killer and a murderer a seat in parliament.

It is so outrageous and so shameful of Arabs and Muslims that none of the massacres committed within the Arab and Muslim world ever earned the right of an investigation. The massacre of over 25,000 Syrian in Hama did not even earn a mention in the Arab media. The massacre of tens of thousands of Kurds by Saddam Hussein did not earn a mention in the Arab press; the killing of tens of thousands of Iraqi Shiite by Saddam and his Ba’athist Party did not earn a mention in Arab media. The killing and murder of over 400,000 in Darfur was totally ignored by the Arab press until such time the world media took up the case and exposed such genocide. Not to mention the more than 2 million killed in South Sudan, and the hundreds of thousands killed by the Talibans, all where totally ignored by the Arab press and as expected by Arab and Muslim governments

More troublesome is the total silence of the Palestinian leadership from the late Yaser Arafat to the present Mahmoud Abbas who until today never bothered to form an inquiry into both massacres. Even Palestinians NGO’s never bothered to organize and independent investigations, perhaps fearing they may lose some funding from the US or the European countries.

Surprisingly, the UN General Assembly on December 16, 1982 declared the massacre at Sabra and Shatilla as an act of genocide. As expected All Western Democracies used to committing such massacres abstained.

The US and as expected when it comes to Israel could never honor any of its commitments, even written ones, such as the one it gave in writing to non other than Yaser Arafat. The US guarantee Israel will not enter West Beirut and make sure that no harms will come to Muslim habitants. We know the value of such written commitment, and the fact remains when it comes to Israel; the US has no sense of honor toward its own citizens and sailors let alone toward others like the Palestinians. One has only to remember that the US gave on a quick base over one million cluster bomb so that Israel can drop them over innocent civilians in Lebanon. Perhaps it is time to bring charges against the PLO, Lebanese Phalange and the US, Syria and Israel for liability in the case of the massacre of Sabra and Shatilla.

Election day in the United States, 2008, will be remembered in most history books as the day Americans elected the first African-American as president. But it also deserves to go down in history for another reason. It was the first day when Americans rejected the instructions of their pro-Israel politicians and newspapers and instead voted for the principle that non-Jews should be equal with Jews under the law inside Israel, and not discriminated against as they are today in apartheid Israel.

The Somerville Divestment Project (SDP) placed Question 4 on the ballot in two state representative districts, one in Somerville and the other in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The question asked, “Shall the state representative from this district be instructed to vote in favor of a non-binding resolution calling on the federal government to support the right of all people, including non-Jewish Palestinian citizens of Israel, to live free from laws that give more rights to people of one religion than another?” The “Yes” votes outnumbered the “No” votes 9,100 to 5,542 in Somerville, and 9,637 to 3,650 in Cambridge. If Obama had won by this kind of a margin it would have been declared a Super-Landslide!

Not a single politician or newspaper supported Question 4. On the contrary, the Somerville Journal reported in its election week edition that, “The City of Somerville, including all city aldermen, does not support questions 4 and 5, said spokesman Tom Champion. The mayor of Somerville also opposed Question 4 and the so-called “Progressive” Democrats of Somerville were silent (apparently supporting equal rights is not part of the “progressive” agenda.) The only other Somerville newspaper, the Somerville News, editorialized, “The Somerville Divestment Project has divided Somerville residents by bringing up far-away, world conflicts in a municipal context. Reject the tactics of the Somerville Divestment project and vote no on Question 4.”

Apparently the voters saw things differently. In 2006 the SDP placed two questions (5 and 6) similar to Question 4 on the ballot in Somerville. One called for Somerville to divest from Israel and the other called for supporting the right of all refugees, including Palestinian refugees, to return to their homeland. In spite of intense “Vote No” campaigning by the Boston Globe, both Somerville newspapers and the Israeli Consul for New England, as well as Mayor Curtatone, Congressman Capuano, and both candidates for governor —Deval Patrick (now the Democratic Party governor) and Kerry Healy the Republican–featuring glossy mass mailings and signboards with photographs of all four politicians saying “We Stand With Israel, Vote No on Questions 5 and 6,” and despite the unanimity of all these “respectable” leaders making many voters wonder if perhaps the SDP’s ballot questions that seemed so reasonable on the surface might actually reflect some kind of bad hidden agenda, despite all this the “Yes” vote was 31% for divestment and 45% for supporting the right of return of Palestinians.

Tuesday’s vote was therefore not the first time voters rejected the  mainstream politicians to support human rights for Palestinians.

The law prohibits placing the same question on the ballot twice in a row, which is one reason why Question 4 focused on apartheid inside Israel this time. How Did Somerville Voters Respond to the Stance of Politicians and Editors?

Voters watched three presidential debates in which the two candidates offered unconditional support of Israel’s apartheid enterprise. Yet instead of towing the party line (both parties’ line!), voters looked at the facts, they read the SDP’s Question 4 brochure (we distributed 15,000 of them, reaching nearly every household in the Somerville district) that said “Apartheid Is Inside Israel, Not Just the Occupied Territories” and that presented copious examples of specific Israeli apartheid laws, and then they chose to side with justice and equality.

Somerville and Cambridge voters are to be congratulated for being the first voters in the United States to clearly stand up for equal rights for Palestinians and oppose Israeli apartheid.

The Significance of This Vote is Enormous

The significance of this vote is enormous. It demonstrates that Americans support the principle of equality, and believe that Israel is wrong in discriminating against non-Jews under the law. It shows that Americans do not want their government to support this discrimination inside Israel, regardless of whether Israel is “our ally” or a “Jewish state.” It shows, in other words, that when given a chance to choose between the principle of equality versus the Zionist principle of inequality (that Israel must be a “Jewish” state in which the sovereign authority is “the Jewish people” and not all citizens equally) then Americans chose equality, even when their politicians and newspapers tell them not to.

Pro-Apartheid Zionist Forces Tried to Block the Ballot Question in September

Zionist influence on the American public depends on preventing Americans from understanding clearly that Zionism conflicts with the principle of equality, and preventing them from ever having an opportunity to express their choice. This is why the pro-Zionist forces in Somerville hired a lawyer to try to keep Question 4 off the ballot. The lawyer wrote to the state’s Attorney General that the question was pretending to be just about equality but that it was really also criticizing Israel, and that to be “fair” the question should be split into two separate questions, one about equality and the other about Israel. The Attorney General rejected this argument and replied that the question upheld a general principle and merely stated that it also applied to Israel. What drives the Zionists crazy is that the SDP has successfully framed the debate about Israel as a question of being for or against the principle of equality. The Zionists know they can only win when the debate is framed as being for or against anti-Semitism. They are quite skilled at winning the latter, but incapable of winning the former.

Now that voters in Somerville and Cambridge have made it clear where the majority stands, pro-Israel forces are trying to put the best spin on it that they can, by denying the significance of the vote, saying things like, “Of course Question 4 won, it’s just ‘Mom and apple pie,’” as if affirming equality for non-Jews and Jews under the law in Israel did not constitute a scathing indictment of the entire Zionist enterprise.

Equality and Democracy are Inseparable

The SDP also placed Question 5 on the ballot in Somerville, in order to inject into the public discussion an opinion that many hold but few express out loud–that we do not have real democracy in the United States, because ordinary people have no real say in what the government does, and Big Money calls the shots. Question 5 asked, therefore, “Shall the state representative from this district be instructed to vote in favor of a proposal to amend the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to replace the state Legislature with 100 randomly selected adult residents of the Commonwealth, each serving a one year term, to be called the Commonwealth Jury and to have all the legislative and other powers of the current Legislature?” At first this might seem like a dramatic change, but consider that a recent University of Rhode Island poll found that 74% of Americans do not think their government should take the side of Israel in the Israel/Palestine conflict. Yet no American politician expresses this view, which illustrates just how unrepresentative our so-called “representative democracy” is.

When (and only when!) the spirit of Question 5 prevails at the federal level, and ordinary Americans shape U.S. foreign policy, will it stop giving unconditional support to Israel’s ethnic cleansing and apartheid laws. This is why the fight to turn around the pro-Israel foreign policy of the United States, and the fight to win real democracy in the United States, are inseparable.

The Somerville News, not surprisingly, wrote, “Vote no on Question 5 and reject this silly measure.” The Somerville Journal opted to scare people into voting “No” by writing, “Question 5 attempts to overthrow state government” (as if letting ordinary people make the laws amounted to overthrowing government.) Despite the novelty of the idea and the scare tactics of the press, and despite the fact that the people who think our “representative democracy” doesn’t really represent us are the people who are least likely to vote, Question 5 received a “yes” vote from 23% of the voters–3,468 people.

Why Do the Politicians and the Mass Media Defend Israeli Apartheid?

Before mass-distributing brochures for Questions 4 and 5, the SDP distributed thousands of copies of a leaflet titled, “Why Our Government Supports Israel’s Government, and Why We Shouldn’t” so that people would understand why all the politicians, Jewish or not and no matter what political party, support Israel and tell people to vote “No” on SDP questions. The reason, we explained, is that the politicians and the media are beholden to Big Money, which needs to keep ordinary Americans under their control lest they revolt in anger against what Big Money is doing: making our society dramatically more unequal and undemocratic. Big money is transferring trillions of dollars from ordinary Americans and good purposes–like health care, education, infrastructure and jobs that produce other useful products and services–to the pockets of a corporate elite for bad purposes–like enabling a small number of people to be billionaires and producing more and more weapons meant only to make the wealthiest and most powerful people around the world more secure. They are transferring these trillions of dollars by means of the new “bailout” of banksters and by means of the long-standing military-industrial-complex scam fueled by lies such as the infamous one about “weapons of mass destruction” but in fact dedicated to making the world safe for Big Oil and other huge corporations who fear losing their huge profits if real democracy ever “broke out” in the Middle East or elsewhere.

Big Money controls Americans with Orwellian wars of social control—today it is the “war on terror.” But the “war on terror” needs a credible enemy. To make us fear terrorists, our rulers tell us that Israel is “the only democracy in the Middle East” and that the anger of Palestinians and others against Israel is the anger of irrational hate-filled anti-Semitic terrorists who “hate our freedom” and will kill us unless we obey our leaders in every way and surrender whatever freedoms they say are necessary to dispense with so they can wage their “war on terror.”

What Next?

The SDP aims to help Americans throughout the nation understand that the principles of equality and democracy that they overwhelmingly support are the opposite of the principles of inequality and top-down control that our politicians and mass media defend by telling us lies about Israel and about Palestinians.

People from cities across the U.S. have already called in asking for information and help from the SDP so they can replicate what has happened in Somerville and Cambridge, and some have already begun planning campaigns. The SDP will certainly provide all the help to such people that we can.

Why the SDP Focuses on the Israel/Palestine Conflict

This relationship between Israel and the “war on terror” and its employment by America’s rulers as an Orwellian means of controlling Americans, is the reason why the SDP focuses on the Israel/Palestine conflict more than, say, the conflict between the Saudi Arabian government and the victims of its notoriously undemocratic and brutal regime that denies people the right to worship in any religion other than the state-approved one and even denies women the right to drive a car, or the conflict between the Iranian government and Iranian workers whom it arrests for simply going on strike to get wages they earned but were not paid, or other conflicts elsewhere in the world where brutal regimes kill innocent people in large numbers. As long-lasting and as horrible as the oppression of Palestinians by Zionists is, it is not the only example of brutal oppression. Some people, therefore, still wonder, “How come the SDP focuses on the Israel/Palestine conflict and not others?” Here is why.

We live in the United States, not some other country. In the United States, no other conflict is used by our rulers the way the Israel/Palestine conflict is used, to control Americans. Whenever people oppressed by the Saudi Arabian government–or the Iranian government, or the Egyptian or Syrian or Chinese government, or by any other foreign government besides the Israeli government–fight back, even violently, to protect themselves or resist oppression, they are hardly ever reported on by our mass media; and if their struggle is reported, it is not done so in a manner to persuade Americans that they are evil terrorists who would kill us if they could. But when Palestinians fight Israeli oppression, the American mass media cover up the truth about their oppression–the ethnic cleansing to make Israel a “Jewish state” and the apartheid laws that make life as difficult as possible for non-Jews who are Israeli citizens–and lie to us that their struggle is fueled by anti-Semitism and irrational hatred that supports terrorism against Americans because we defend “the only democracy in the Middle East.”

Related to this is the fact that, as Americans, we need to focus on what our government has chosen to focus on. If the U.S. government gave more military, economic and diplomatic support to the Saudi Arabian government than any other government, then it might make sense to focus there. But the United States government has chosen to give virtually unconditional diplomatic support (all those UN vetos!) and over-the-top economic and military support to Israel, not to any other government. (Egypt is the 2nd largest recipient of economic aid, but it comes with strings to prevent Egypt from opposing Israel; Israel’s aid has no strings to prevent it from opposing any of its foes.) Our government’s support of Israeli ethnic cleansing and apartheid is a beam in our own eye. The principle behind focusing on the Israel/Palestine conflict is simple, and was stated clearly a long time ago: “And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?”

Somerville Divestment Project

www.divestmentproject.org

P.O. Box 441259
Somerville, MA 02144
Phone: 617 230-2835
SDP opposes all attacks by anyone, anywhere, and at any time where unarmed civilian casualties are clearly likely, whether the attacks are aggressive or retaliatory. At the same time we support self-defense actions and armed resistance against individuals who use physical violence to oppress people.

The Translations collective Tlaxcala, www.tlaxcala.es has translated Leonard Cohen’s DEMOCRACY into seven languages. Enjoy the video, see a live version of it on Tlaxcala and read the fantastic Raja Chemayel’s thoughts on it.