The Israeli military chases a protester in Bil'in. (Photo: Hamde Abo Rahma)
Hamde Abo Rahma sends this report on the latest protest in Bil'in:
Today’s demonstration marked the culminating event in the Fifth Bil’in International Conference for Palestinian Popular Resistance, which began on Wednesday, April 21 with a full line-up of speakers including politicians, leaders of Popular Committees, Israeli activists, and international solidarity activists. The conference continued through Thursday and Friday. After the final conference session on Friday morning, in which workshop groups reported on their conclusions in preparation for the conference statement, the conference participants gathered with scores of other Israeli, international, and Palestinians waiting at the mosque for the weekly demonstration.
Today’s demonstration was larger than normal in size, and lasted an especially long period of time. Serious injuries were sustained during the demonstration, and several were arrested. Present at the demonstration were local political figures, including Mustafa Barghouti, and international solidarity leaders such as Luisa Morgantini.
At 1:30pm the crowd of demonstrators processed to the site of the Wall, carrying posters and flags, and were immediately met by soldiers, sound grenades, and smoke bombs. Protestors encountered a line of soldiers who were hiding; these soldiers fired a wall of gas at the protestors in order to force the demonstrators into a second line of soldiers who were waiting to make arrests. Demonstrators reported that soldiers showed no discrimination with their firing, shooting directly at the faces of the protestors, and no discrimination in their arrests, trying to arrest even journalists.
Imad Rizka being led away from the protest. (Photo: Hamde Abo Rahma)
Several serious injuries were sustained. Imad Rizka, approximately 37 years of age, from Yaffa, was shot in the forehead with a tear gas canister. He was taken away immediately to Ramallah Hospital by ambulance. His condition is unknown at the time of writing. Rizka is well-known in Bil’in, as he comes to the village every Friday to demonstrate.
Soldiers fired a great deal of tear gas from both sides of the fence. Demonstrators were forced to retreat, but among those who remained, several were arrested. Soldiers crossed the fence and advanced well into the demonstrators’ territory, grabbing five demonstrators. Those arrested were a Palestinian journalist Muheeb Barghouti; an Israeli journalist, an elderly Palestinian man named Abu Sadi; Israeli activist Tali Shapiro; and two internationals from Liverpool, England, who were visiting Bil’in as part of a twin cities partnership. The soldiers took them away in between firing rounds of tear gas to drive the protestors back.
Additional injuries are as follows:
One demonstrator from Italy, struck in the back by a tear gas canister; an Italian demonstrator who was shot in the arm with a new type of weapon; an Israeli activist; Um Samarra, 45, from Bil’in, who was hit in the leg by a tear gas canister; Haitham al-Khatib, cameraman, who was slightly injured; a Palestinian woman from Bethlehem who sustained a leg injury; and a Palestinian journalist named Abbas al-Momni.
Today’s protestors showed great tenacity in the face of tear gas, injuries, and arrests, and an especially large number of demonstrators remained at the fence, facing the soldiers. The demonstration lasted an especially long period of time, as demonstrators refused to completely leave the area, and returned several times during lulls between waves of tear gas.
Update from the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee:
Emad Rezqa was hit in the forehead by an aluminum tear gas projectile shot directly at him by Israeli soldiers during the weekly anti-Wall demonstration in Bil'in earlier today. He suffered a fractured skull and brain hemorrhage. Rezqa is currently hospitalized at the Hadassa Ein Karem hospital in Jerusalem.
The demonstration Rezqa was injured in concluded the three-day International Bil'in Conference on Popular Struggle, and was attended by hundreds of people. Five demonstrators were arrested during the protest.
The march, which commenced at the village's mosque after the midday prayer, was attacked with tear gas some 30 seconds after reaching the gate in the Wall, despite the fact that it was entirely peaceful. The gas forced most of the participants to retreat back towards the village, but a smaller group managed to stay by the gate, chanting and shouting slogans.
A few minutes after, a group of soldiers began firing a second round of tear gas projectiles, this time directly at the demonstrators from a distance of about 30 meters. Rezqa was hit and quickly evacuated to the Ramallah hospital with blood gushing from his forehead. He was transferred to the Hadassa Ein Karem hospital after being x-rayed and diagnosed as suffering a broken skull.
Following Rezqa's injury, soldiers invaded Bil'in through the gate in the Wall and arrested four protesters who were staging a sit-in some hundred meters away from the Wall, as well as a journalist who was next to them.
Another demonstrator was similarly injured today during a demonstration in the village of Nabi Saleh. The protester was hit in the head with a tear gas projectile shot directly at him after the Army invaded the village even before the demonstration began.
In Ni'ilin, roughly 300 people demonstrated in solidarity with the villages political prisoners. The demonstration was attended by two PLC members from the Change and Reform party – Mahmoud Ramahi and Fadhel Saleh, who joined the protest today following Ramahi's statement in support of the popular struggle last Wednesday during the Bil'in conference.
Ramahi and Slaeh's participation is yet another sign of the recent expansion of the popular struggle and the momentum the movement is gaining in the Palestinian street.
The “only democracy in the ME” is oppressing non violent protests! The tyranny goes crazy even when non violent protest.
Aparisian writes: “The tyranny goes crazy even when non violent protest.”
Recall that the long-planned 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon (launched on a pretext) occurred afte3r the PLO KEPT a cease fire. The 2008/2009 fish-in-a-barrel invasion of Gaza, ditto. Israeli military-governmental-complex NEEDS violence (its own or others’).
more lies pabelmont. i am not even going to waste my time finding documentation on this one.
Convenient, isn’t it, that there isn’t any.
Are you quoting David Duke now?
Zionists: “Wheres the Palestinian Ghandi?”
Israel killed Bassem.
Maybe if Witty got hit in the forehead like Imad Rizka Witty might see the light. But I doubt it. Witty rather sleep, dreaming of being a northern civil rights worker hero in Georgia back in the early 1960′s.
You know, back when Jews were fighting rascist goyhim, rather than now, when if he had any integrity, he’d be fighting rascist Israelis and their AIPAC enablers here “in Vermont.”
Well, we already know that the US government couldn’t care less how many Americans — civilian or naval personnel — Israel attacks or kills.
Does the same apply to the European Union? I guess now we shall see.
Jeremy Scahill reports that a firm run by an Israeli special forces soldier wants contracts in the occupied territories, Iraq and Afghanistan.
link to rebelreports.com
By the way, the commenter “Avi” in the comments section is not me.
>> At 1:30pm the crowd of demonstrators processed to the site of the Wall, carrying posters and flags …
What the soldiers probably saw was a crowd of Jew-hating, maximalist cockroaches scurrying up to the wall, carrying death and violence with which to bludgeon Israel. Clearly, it’s an honest mistake. :-/
Yeah, I hear mistaking human beings for animals was a common problem in Nazi Germany. I mean, if we could tolerate that and refuse to hold war crimes trials in Nuremberg and legitimize Germany’s claim to half of Poland, it would be hypocritical for us to attack Israel for something similar, right?
I guess the protestors forgot to show themselves as “human beings” instead of “victims” or “aggressors” or animals. Shame on them.
Well, no point sitting around crying over spilled milk when there’s terrorist farmland to plow over. (Why is terrorist farmland always shown as a victim, rather than as a human being?)
One supposes the Israeli government might have to add a “Species” field to those color coded IDs they force on Palestinians to enforce which prison block they’re confined to. That might clear things up.
The IDF can spot a maximalist from a mile away.
Of course, even when they don’t spot one, they open fire anyway. You know, just to be sure. It’s not like Israelis are paying for the bullets and bombs themselves, after all.
LOL!!! this again, do tell about the color coded IDs, is it like the ‘color coded’ IDs we get from different states here in the US. your attempt to compare everything w/ nazi germany is twisted. your obsession w/ naziism is twisted.
Interesting article:
link to electronicintifada.net
Particulary interesting is this quote:
>> “Jordanian officials rebuffed criticism of the practice, saying it is used to counter any future Israeli strategy to transfer the Palestinian population of the Israeli-occupied West Bank to Jordan.”
Unfortunately, the article doesn’t really detail what that means.
If it quacks like a duck, waddles like a duck…
Yonira,
Jewish settlers in the West Bank have yellow license plates, the Palestinians have white ones. IDF soldiers routinely stop Palestinian cars with white plates while waving Jewish settlers through without stopping. Palestinian cars, with white plates, are not allowed on many roads, built on Palestinian land, that criss-cross through the Occupied West Bank. NONE OF THIS is equivalent to different state IDs in the US.
You act as if you care about truth here, but lately all I’ve seen from your posts is an overwhelming urge to spout “pro-Israel” falsities you’ve probably picked up from sites that have no interest in truth. Your insistence awhile back that higher education was banned for Palestinians under Jordanian rule was one of your more outrageous lies that I noticed lately. Wherever you picked up that ridiculous tidbit SHOULD be crossed off your list of sites to believe. You appear to be way too gullible in believing anything that allows you to cheer for your team, or mock the opposing team. I suspect that on one level, that is all you take this issue for, a chance to root for the “home team” of your chosen affintiy group. I sense a small bit of caring about the larger issue, but too often that just gets subsumed by your sports-team mentality.
My comment is directed at yonira.
I picked up that tidbit about higher education from a leading ME studies teacher @ the University of Minnesota, when I took his class on the I/P conflict. Where were are reading material included:
Pappe: A history of Modern Palestine
Khalidi: Iron Cage
W/M: The Israel Lobby
link to polisci.umn.edu
Email him if you have any questions.
West Bank Higher Education
link to en.wikipedia.org
Tree, the truth will set you free. I really like to know where you get YOUR information from?
From your Wikipedia entry:
As the Jordanian government did not allow the establishment of such universities in the West Bank, Palestinians could obtain degrees only by travelling abroad to places such as Jordan, Lebanon, or Europe.
Sorry, but maybe you have to stop believing everything you read in Wikipedia. Going to an university in Jordan DID NOT entail “traveling abroad” between 1949 and 1967 because the West Bank was a part of Jordan during that time. Simple logic should have clued you in to its falsity. There was no “prohibition” against students in the West Bank attending Jordanian universities as well as the 2 year colleges in the West Bank itself. And all Palestinians in the West Bank were granted Jordanian citizenship when Jordan annexed it. West Bank Palestinians turned the 2 year colleges into universities after the Israeli occupation because they were often prohibited from attending the Jordanian and other universities by the Israeli authorities after Israel occupied the West Bank. Note the difference here: Jordan annexed the West Bank and made all the Palestinian living there full citizens of Jordan. Israeli occupied the West Bank starting in 1967, expelled over 200,000 Palestinians and put the rest under a very long term brutal military occupation.
I find it quite funny that you you post a curriculum that includes Pappe and Khalidi but appear to be ignorant of anything they have written. It only confirms my belief that you have a desire to believe only those things that don’t put your your chosen team in a bad light.
According to UNESCO, Palestinians are one of the most highly educated groups in the Middle East despite very difficult circumstances imposed by the state of Israel. The literacy rate among Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (93,8%) is second highest in the region after Israel (97,1%). Not bad for an occupied people, huh?
Tree,
be entirely honest, does your explanation share any relevance with the use of shoulder patches by the Nazis in concentration camps?
do you think Chaos’ analogy is consistent w/ that explanation?
Reminds me of how jews got educated at the upper level of education in the USA before WW2, despite little help from the US government and the old WASP prejudice.
Yonira,
Most of it is from reading books, not the internet. Its too easy to get bad or incomplete info from the internet, and I always check sources. There are good sources on the internet too, but most of them are found in the more academic articles and sites.
I also have friends and acquaintances who are Israelis or ex=pats, and Palestinian friends, each of whom share with me their experiences.
If you’d like a reading list, I could put one together for you.
LOL,
whatever you say tree, stay in your fantasy world i guess. i don’t expect anything less of you.
you all are getting so boring.
no offense tree, but don’t waste your time.
YONIRA- In your response to tree, you mention picking up this “tidbit” from coursework at the University of Minnesota, from an unnamed teacher on ME studies. You then list several authors, apparently to provide gravitas to your “informed” opinion. I would be most interested in some sort of quote/reference to exactly where you obtained this information which tree indicates is bogus. Perhaps you would also care to provide the name of the “teacher” that promulgated these views. Was is Martin Sampson as referenced to your link? Any feel whether this “teacher” was a Zionist or otherwise biased? Was his involvement with the Mt Zion Temple an influence on his work? My personnel experience is that tree is a very knowledgeable and reliable source on these matters.
..does your explanation share any relevance with the use of shoulder patches by the Nazis in concentration camps?
I didn’t not see any reference to concentration camps in Chaos’s post. I think you are reading that into his post. I took him to be referring to the Yellow Star of David that all Jews were forced to wear in public in Nazi Germany after 1941. And yes, I see some relevance, since in both instances, the color sign was used to differentiate among people based on religion or ethnicity, and to allow the “other” to be treated as a lesser human being. Naziism was more than just the concentration camps, and the treatment of Jews in pre-War Nazi Germany bears many similarities to the treatment of the Palestinians in Israel and the Occupied Territories. They are not exactly the same, but it would be arrogant and foolish to deny the similarities.
Yes, this was one of his lessons. You should read his Curriculum Vitae on the website. He is anything but a zionist, much like the rest of the faculty @ the u of m.
i am sure his outreach program @ Mt Zion temple about israeli critical literature has anything to do w/ it. i don’t even believe he is jewish, i know he is not a zionist.
No offense taken, yonira. I figured it would be pointless, but I had to give you the chance. If you weren’t willing to read the assigned Pappe for your college course, I didn’t think that you would read something that I recommend, since you don’t respect my wiewpoint anymore than anyone else’s here.
who said i wasn’t willing to read it? i glossed the Israel Lobby, but read all of pappe.
And yet you were willing to offer up your falsity about higher education in Jordan, and insist that the “occupation” of the West Bank by Jordan was much worse than the Israeli occupation. I don’t think you really absorbed anything that you read from Pappe, or perhaps you wished not to believe it. Have you read Pappe’s “The Ethnic Cleanisng of Palestine” yet?
Show of hands! Who here buys this story that yonira actually attended a college course? You know, considering.
I do, Chaos. I don’t think that yonira is incapable of rational thought. He’s just young and wants desperately to feel like he belongs to a group, and having chosen his affinity group can’t get past the urge to support his team no matter what.
And besides, no offense to yonira intended, some of the most ignorant people I know have gone to college.
OK, fine, perhaps I should clarify. Who here believes yonira has stayed awake through a college course?
No I haven’t read that gem yet, I doubt I will. Much bigger fan of Segev or even Khalidi, i felt hope when reading the Iron Cage. I don’t feel any hope after reading Pappe.
How bout Benny Morris? Is he any good :)
I stand by my assertions of higher education and the brutality of the Jordanian occupation, especially following the assassination of King Abdullah.
LOL, good point Chaos.
sometimes you are pretty funny.
This part of some new “read it before you burn it” policy?
it was more of a burn it before i read it policy w/ the Israel Lobby ;)
What’s the matter, operating a lighter is beyond your nominal capacities?
my weed dealer can attest to my lighter skills, but only in front of a bong.
You do know that the West Bank Palestinians were given full Jordanian citizenship when Jordan annexed the West Bank, don’t you? And that as citizens they were given the same rights as other Jordanian citizens, including the right to vote? And that the Jordanian Parliament was evenly divided between seats from the West Bank and the East, since their populations were roughly equal? And that all this happened in the early 1950′s and stayed that way until 1987, when Israel occupied the West Bank. The fact that you even call it an “occupation” tells me that you aren’t engaging in a rational argument, but clinging to a belief that gives you some comfort. (i.e.,Jordanian “occupation” must have been worse than the Israeli one is, therefore Israel isn’t so bad….) The “brutality” of the Jordanian “occupation” would have no relevance even if true, but your insistent belief in something demonstrably false just illustrates your emotional attachments are more important to you than knowing the truth and understanding it.
Gotta run. See ya later.
YONIRA- You don’t provide a quote from any of the authors you post (why then post them, except to blow smoke?), but do acknowledge that you formed your opinion on Israel/Palestine in a course from Martin Sampson, who taught a course referencing Israeli authors on the Israeli-Palestine conflict at the Mt Zion Temple, and who is listed along with his wife Ellen as a “Jewish Community Action Member” for Minneapolis-St Paul (or is that another Martin Sampson?), but who you don’t believe is Jewish (so much for J-dar), and who you are sure isn’t Zionist, even though organized Jewry is overwhelmingly Zionist. Sorry I doubted you. Sounds like scholarship to me!
Why did the Jordanians totally bail on the WB after 1994 if these two communities were so intertwined?
Off hand, maybe because Israel has nukes and F-16s and an established record of invading and dropping bombs on the cities of their neighbors?
whatever u say Keith, i took the course and knew what he discussed, you weren’t there.
So a jew goes to temple and he is automatically a raving zionist, good to know you don’t stereotype at all.
We need to respect freedom of religion
Seriously, yonira, this is fantastic. You’re telling Palestinians and Jordanians that what they lived through didn’t happen? I’m friends with Palestinians who’ve lived in Jordan.
It still floors me that some white guy drools on a textbook and suddenly he knows more about the Middle East than people who have been living there.
Chaos, if Jordan cared so much of the WB explain why they denounced any part of it in 1994?
Good to see you UNIX
The Palestinians declared their intent to be independent, and the current Jordanian government and monarchy opted to respect that.
Seriously, this idiotic logic is like saying “If England cared so much about Canada, then why did they renounce their claim to it?”
Incidentally, look up “denounce” in the dictionary, you obviously don’t know what it means.
You know not everyone is in that part of the world just to get their hands on swindled real estate, yonira. That’s primarily a Jewish Zionist venture.
Thanks Yonira, I’m so glad you have been holding down the fort. It’s so important to fight for the equal rights of both Jews and Arabs.
I was concerned I was banned for saying that. It’s so interesting but it is claimed so many times on this website that it is ok to expel and hurt Jews One step ahead of the bulldozers if they step quickly
That joke was in poor taste, UNIX, considering this article
I’m not sure what you mean. Potsherd was the one that said that, implying that Jewish homes should be destroyed and Jews trampled if they don’t run fast enough.
I think that Jews have every right to live in Gaza, in fact in 2005 Jews were ethnically cleansed from Gaza.
So that we have this straight, you actively approve of Israeli bulldozers razing Palestinian farms and homes in Gaza?
not
My message is that we should not destroy Jewish homes and we should not destroy Arab homes.
In Gaza Jews were ethnically cleansed and their homes bulldozed. This was a terrible event that I never want to see again.
I hold that Gaza is Jewish land and that definitely zoning laws apply, houses should be build legally according to Israeli law, other than that I don’t justify the destruction of Arab homes unless they are illegal or the occupants belong to terror organizations or have committed acts of terror.
thanks for a coherent reply Chaos. I guess i am a little more skeptical about the political intentions of Jordan w/ that move.
That’s because you’re a racist, yonira. Sceeery sceeery Ayerabs!
Nice to see you and Mr. Bulldozer getting along well with the reunion.
So why don’t you take up arms against the evil government responsible for it? Go for it.
Chaos,
It seems as though it is you that should be referred as Mr. Bulldozer. The largest scale of ethnic cleansing in Israel in the past decades has been against Jews in Gaza, fully supported by bulldozers and you have not disavowed your support of that crime.
Would you like me to denounce the government responsible for that, UNIX? Alright, I have no qualms about that.
I denounce the Israeli government, wholeheartedly, and I disavow all of their heinous crimes, which include (but are not limited to) illegally moving their citizens onto occupied territory and illegally expelling native populations from the same, both of which constitute gross violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Do you denounce the expulsion of the Jews of from Gaza in 2005 commonly known as the expulsion or disengagement, which forcefully removed 10,000 Jews and destroyed their homes?
yes or no
It’s not the same thing. If a bunch of Jews or Christians or Muslims or Scientologists invaded and occupied my land, illegal of course – then their removal would be in accordance w/ the law.
It would not be an act of ethnic cleansing or ‘expulsion’ in the context you imply.
You’re a Jewish supremacist. Do you think we have forgotten the garbage you’ve spewed on this blog?
The other people who support you are also equally idiotic and only pollute the blog with inanely stupid equivocations, racism, sanctimony, etc.
Excuse me sir, but I am against the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Gaza, Jerusalem, and Hebron.
It is not supremicism to oppose that. In fact the opposite, it is supremecism to say that only Arabs can live in Gaza and that Jews must be made refugees, their homes, destroyed and taken over, to make the area Judenrein.
What forceful expulsion? It was illegal for Israel to transfer any number of its population to occupied territory.
How about yourself? Do you condemn the destruction of over five hundred Palestinians and the forceful removal of 750,000 native Palestinians?
You know BEFORE your racist little police state, UNIX, and the foreign terrorists who founded it, Jews lived just perfectly fine in all of those places.
I hold that Gaza is Jewish land and not occupied territory. It seems to be deflection that you are practicing. In any case we should all be supporting equal rights for both Jews and Arabs in the land of Israel. The fact is that the only group that has been cleansed from Gaza in decades en masse has been Jews.
Well, then, that puts you at odds with the entire rest of the world, UNIX.
Not so Chaos, even if I was in the minority, which I am not, I am entitled to my correct position. Jews are the legal, historical and and moral claimants tot he entire land of Israel.
That doesn’t mean I hate Arabs or wish them harm. I simply love Jews and wish to see them success.
Yes. And Poland belongs to the reinrassig, I’m sure.
It is not appropriate the bring up Nazis or the Holocaust any time an argument may seem to be lost.
Seems to be lost? Oh, indeed? Feel free to quote me the UN resolution or treaty that overturns the dozens of resolutions and international rulings condemning Israel’s continued (and brutal) occupation of Gaza (and the West Bank).
I consider the UN a biased organization.
I think it is ironic. I find that it is the haters of Israel and Jews that mainly bring up Holocaust issues.
“LOL!!! this again, do tell about the color coded IDs, is it like the ‘color coded’ IDs we get from different states here in the US. your attempt to compare everything w/ nazi germany is twisted. your obsession w/ naziism is twisted.”
Isn’t it ironicthdnghat Zionists propagandists got caught planting a similar story in the media about Iran legislating to have Jews wear cloth badges a few years ago Yoni?
get used to it UNIX, this is the crown jewel for any Israeli-hater’s argument, it’s like their “go to guy”. It backfires horribly outside of their own circles, but they don’t really understand that yet.
Those who perished are much like the Palestinians to them, they don’t necessarily care about them or even think of them as people, but they love to use them as fodder for their anti-Israel tirades.
Thanks for the heads up Yonira.
“cI find that it is the haters of Israel and Jews that mainly bring up Holocaust issues.”
No you don’t. This is one of many straw men you use to conglte the debate and avoidaddressing the topic, much like that other lie you use, claiming that people want to remove Jews from their homes.
Shingo,
It’s possible to deligitimize any argument by calling it a straw man, however that is evasive.
It is a fact that many commenters support the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Gaza, Hebron and Jerusalem, there are many written statements to that effect.
First, there is no law in Israel as far as the Palestinians are concerned, so the point of everything devolving to Israel law” which is merely oppression of the Palestinians is rank bullshit. Every institution in Israel is skewed by the murderous colonial settler occupation.
The ZIONISTS have no right to Gaza, nor any other place they have illegally ethnically cleansed. Just like you have no right lying like an ass here UNIX, just like you have done with other monikers in other places. You’re staying power days are numbered you consummate liar, and over time you will be out of here again if you keep this bullshit up.
It is not moral to say that Jews have no right in Gaza. Jews have every moral, ethical, and legal right to live, grow, and thrive in Gaza, Ramallah, Hebron and Jerusalem.
I have never broken the comments policy of this website. I am simply arguing equal rights.
It is not correct to ban or silence people because of their views.
“Jews have every moral, ethical, and legal right to live, grow, and thrive in Gaza, Ramallah, Hebron and Jerusalem.”
Again – why are you confusing jews and Israelis?
What do you have to offer other than “because i want it to be so” as proof of this legal right to settle in occupied territories?
Fayyad has signalled settlers will be free to remain in the Palestinian state and become Palestinian citizens, why even argue this point? With the stroke of a pen they’ll be transformed from illegal squatters to legitimate residents of their city of choice. That’s good right?
Israel is the Jewish state so there is no confusion.
Fayyad’s signals are a positive step in the right direction.
I think Fayyad is a genius.
yonira, compared to your standards, Justin Timberlake is a genius.
But then, you’re an asshat who chortles with glee right alongside UNIX whenever Israel sends its bulldozers to make yet another non-Jewish family homeless. More free land for you and yours! I’m sure your girlfriend is impressed by your mad ethnic cleansing skillz, huh.
no offense tree, but don’t waste your time.
yonira are you admitting to being purposefully obtuse?
If the ethnic cleansing in Israel was against Jews in Gaza, I guess Gaza is part of Israel. Why aren’t any of the people in Gaza allowed to vote in Israeli elections then? Surely, the Gazans are legitimate citizens of Israel, under the equal rights for both Jews and Arabs.
Absolutely, under the premise that Arabs and Jews have equal rights in Palestine/Israel, the “ethnic cleansing of Jews in Gaza” was a crime.
“Israel is the Jewish state so there is no confusion.
Fayyad’s signals are a positive step in the right direction.”
Unix you have not answered my questions:
1. why conflate jews and israelis? It’s not about religion – seems you are trying to ignore the settlers illegal status by suggesting their illegitimacy is a result of anti-semitism.
2. the legal right to settle in occupied territory. You’re welcome to provide a moral defence of settlements also if you like. I’m interested.
Jewish in this sense is not religious, but of a people, the Jewish people.
Jewish religion is the social code (from soup to nuts) that describes the law and recommendations as to how to live in a Jewish community.
The contradictions of taking that formerly community orientation to the level of a state, is part of the Jewish religion. Specifically, at the time after the conquer/settlement in Canaan, the community was judged/ruled by networks of decentral authoritative judges.
With the continuing harrassment and wars of surrounding violent contending non-Jewish tribes, the community insisted on the need for a king, for self-defense.
The transition to a state, from a network of settled utopian-like communities in the first waves of Jewish re-immigration to Israel/Palestine, came to the same realization of the need for a state.
A state, by definition, operates under specific laws, with specific basis and rules of citizenship. EVERY state is exclusive to its citizens in some respect, and EVERY state has a basis of determining who is and who is not a citizen. And MOST states have some ethnic basis of expedited citizenship, in addition to civil birth basis.
Israel is only slightly different than Lebanon for example (good and bad, including Lebanon’s exclusion of Palestinians from citizenship).
Among many Arab proponents of democracy in Israel/Palestine, there is a glaring and conspicuous double standard, of continuing their nationalist exclusive orientation (as somehow understood as consistent with democracy) while fundamentally condemning Israeli basis of nationalist orientation.
Again, prior to 1967, Palestine (then Jordan) was more thoroughly ethnically cleansed of Jews than Israel was. Similarly for other Arab countries that had allowed/encouraged/forced their Jewish citizens/residents to leave. Many of those Jews forced to leave were not allowed full citizenship or anything close to full civil rights in their prior host countries, because they were Jews.
Their immigration to Israel was the realization of democracy in that sense, an improvement in the degree of democracy in the world.
We Zionist Jews, DON’T see Palestinian solidarity activists and supporters of BDS and single-state, defending the civil rights of Jews in design of their proposal for a single state, nor in countries where Jews are still a minority.
For example, in Iran, they have had incidents of periodic show trials of Jewish “traitors”, with no transparency, no evidence, essentially based on their Jewishness and the “need” to firm up the control of the central government. When spoken of here, the left has dismissed the incidents, dismissed the concerns, dismissed the inquiry into the hypocrisy of “democracy for the selected”.
If the insistent vanguard defenders of democracy are so willing to ignore it when it applies to others than their chosen focus, who will. And if no one will defend Jews’ civil rights, then Jews must, and by association in a state.
The fact that I am not particularly threatened or even distrusted, for being a Jew in my liberal enclave near Amherst, MA, says nothing about the need to defend the rights of Jews to live, to assemble, to self-identify in all Arab countries, Iran, and anywhere in Europe where anti-semitism in any form has appeared.
When equal rights and justice is afforded to Jews elsewhere, when you conspicuously demonstrate that defense, then speak up, then earn your credentials to speak for justice.
On the judge -> kingdom process in early Canaan.
There was continuing tension between those that regarded the establishment of a kingdom, rather than regarding God as king, as a fundamental compromise, an idolatry.
There were wars (of the scale of the time) fought over that concept. Vehement prophecies, judges.
Some of the conflict possibly a conflict of power, that of prior judges prospectively losing their former status. Some of the conflict was the ideological confusion between a definition of “liberty” of association with independant communities and clans versus a more central administration and power.
I don’t know which was right ultimately, whether the anarchic goal of objection to central authority is better than the acceptance of central authority (with its inevitable blinders and arbitrary definitions that help some and hurt others).
Those here and elsewhere in the world that advocate for anarchy, or “progressive democracy” or Islamic justice as primary value or goal, don’t create the conditions by which anarchy is possible.
It is sought to be imposed, rather than constructed. It “should be”, rather than “I am determined to make it possible”.
So, that is what I see among those that advocate for a definition of what is justice that is consistent with a single-state. Two things. One is that they don’t create the conditions by which a single-state is possible, namely institutions of integration and politically of civilist (non-nationalist) political party. Second, that they ignore that their definition of inclusion vs exclusion, is similarly contradictory to their stated principles, as Zionism is to those stated principles (but in different ways).
…if Jordan cared so much of the WB explain why they denounced any part of it in 1994?
I guess you missed the day they covered that in class, eh? First off, Jordan didn’t “denounce any part of it”, but King Hussein did cede Jordan’s claim to the West Bank to the PLO as the “sole legitimate representative of the Palestininian people.” And he did that in 1988, not in 1994. At the time Israel was refusing to enter into talks with the PLO, preferring to involve Jordan instead. You are confusing the Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty in 1994, which followed Oslo, with Jordan’s earlier ceding of its territorial claim to the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
link to kinghussein.gov.jo
Israel is only slightly different than Lebanon for example (good and bad, including Lebanon’s exclusion of Palestinians from citizenship).
Actually, Israel and Lebanon are nothing alike when it comes to citizenship laws.
Lebanese citizenship is exclusively for those people who happen to be Lebanese nationals. Whether you are Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Druze, Greek Orthodox, Maronite, Protestant, whatever etc, your citizenship in Lebanon is based on whether or not you are a national of Lebanon. Likewise your rights (according to the law) as an individual are based around your “national” identity and not around your ethnic or religious identity.
Israel on the other hand bases your citizenship on whether or not your Jewish. It is a state for a specific type type of people, not a state of its citizens. It does everything in its power to discard the fact that roughly half the people currently under its jurisdiction are not Jewish (people that have ZERO rights under the law) and that 1/4 of the people with Israeli citizenship are not Jewish (and thus have fewer rights than their Jewish co-citizens).
Lebanon and most other countries in the region are countries based on national identity, not Muslim identity, not Christian identity, nor Jewish identity, but on national identity and have legal codes that grant equal legal rights to those within that national identity (just like the United States does).
Even a country like Pakistan (which some people compare Israel to) is not a country in which your citizenship is based on your religion. For example, a Muslim from Saudi Arabia cannot make “Aliyah” to Pakistan and obtain Pakistani citizenship just because they both happen to be Muslim (nor would this Saudi be able to steal indigenous land in the process =P).
Pakistani citizenship is reserved for those people who are Pakistani whether they are Sunni, Shia, agnostic, Baluchi, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashtu, or whatever. Pakistani citizenship is not reserved for the “Muslims of the world” despite the fact that Pakistan refers to itself as an “Islamic Republic” (while still largely adhering to the British Common Law legal code).
Only a Pakistani national can have Pakistani citizenship. Likewise a Pakistani national cannot hope to obtain automatic Saudi citizenship just because he happens to be Muslim either (he would most likely be denied citizenship or be forced to go through the extensive Saudi national process).
This is not the case in Israel.
Furthermore, Israel happens to rule over a large population of people whom are not Jewish (roughly half the people under Israeli jurisdiction at this moment are not Jewish). Thus demanding that the world recognize Israel as a Jewish state, (which would be preposterous even if Israel was 90% Jewish) is even more ridiculous considering that half the people that live under Israeli jurisdiction are not Jewish.
Now, Israel can call itself a “Jewish Republic” or a “Jewish Democratic Republic” and still be a nation of all its citizens. However, we all know that when Israeli leaders want Israel to be recognized as a “Jewish state” they mean that Israel must be an ethno-supremacist state in which Jews have de-facto privileges over non-Jews.
Unfortunately, this is the way Israel is today – it is a state in which a certain ethnic group have rights and privileges over other groups particularly groups that are indigenous to the land.
If any other state were to demand what Israel is demanding from the international community it would be called out for what it is – a racist apartheid state.
Pot, kettle, black.
James,
Israeli citizenship is now primarily based on birthplace and continued residence. To say that is based on being Jewish is a falsehood.
An Israeli national is a parallel definition to your “Pakistani national”. The method of determination vary, but the determination is made by the state in question.
It contrasts with Lebanon, which does not afford citizenship to Palestinians. Maybe you based that as just because Lebanon doesn’t consider Palestinians (even those families residing there for three generations) as Lebanese nationals.
It sounds odd to me. I get that you want to define some line on some reasoning that Zionism is an exception to nationalism, but it ain’t so.
Keep moving those exclusionary goalposts, Zionism! I suppose now that a lot the Palestinians who were born on Israeli land back before it was Israel are dead (and some of them even died of old age rather than raids and bombing runs on refugee camps!) it’s now safe for Israel to change the rules again.
“When equal rights and justice is afforded to Jews elsewhere, when you conspicuously demonstrate that defense, then speak up, then earn your credentials to speak for justice.”
If Richard Goldstone can’t earn his “credentials” to speak for justice in your silly rigged game RW, nobody can.
“Israeli citizenship is now primarily based on birthplace and continued residence. To say that is based on being Jewish is a falsehood.”
RW I’m tempted to believe you’ve been to Bil’in and have sustained brain injuries after being shot in the head with a high-speed tear gas canister.
Let us start from the beginning, things you know but wish to forget:
“The Law of Return (Hebrew: חוק השבות, ḥok ha-shvūt) is Israeli legislation, enacted in 1950, that gives Jews, those of Jewish ancestry, and their spouses the right to migrate to and settle in Israel and gain citizenship.”
link to en.wikipedia.org
Witty takes the white phosphorous shotgun approach to lying. Fire into the opposition and see what catches fire.
“Jews are the legal, historical and and moral claimants tot he entire land of Israel. ”
So bring your case before a fair and impartial judge. You will lose.
Again, why are you talking with a barking loon?
“Again, why are you talking with a barking loon? ”
Good question. I want to know if he’s older than 8. That seems to be his level of logical thinking. His (unix’s) verbal skills are a little higher (Witty’s verbal skills are mush.)
Witty, are you really denying that the state of Israel draws a distinction between jews and non-jews, even as to all its citizens, not to mention the people under its control in the OTs? And denying that rights and privileges are distributed accordingly? You do realize, as a standard, that US identity wallet documents do not, e.g.,
have a AW (American white) or AB (American black) letter stamped on them, right? And you do realize that the state of Israel calls itself the state of the Jewish people, the Jewish nation right? And that
the Israeli ROR uses the NAZI Nuremberg race laws to determine the rung on the ladder of rights of its citizens?
Anyone actually more informed know of the actual basis of Israeli citizenship?
My understanding was that for those Palestinians that remained in Israel after 1948, and their descendants that remain, that birthplace is the defining characteristic of citizenship.
Anyone have different information?
Anyone have any comments on the reality that Palestinians that have been born there for now three generations still are not afforded citizenship?
That was referring to Lebanon.
“you all are getting so boring”
And yet you are always here. You couldn’t stay away from Mondoweiss for one whole day.
That’s it, Yonira, blow your mind with drugs. You do know where the word “assassin” was derived.
The best reason to think Israel will fail is people like you. You don’t have what it takes to do the colonial settlement and crusader state thing. That takes real strength and stick-to-it-tiveness. You can’t do it if you’re stoned all the time.
To the foto subline: from my point of view, it looks like the “protester” being chased is a journalist. I can clearly see a camera. So what we see on this picture is part of Israels war against journalism.
War against truth
A camera does not a journalist make.
But a picture is worth a thousand words. We shouldn’t believe our lying eyes right UNIX?
Shingo I completely agree with that statement.
In which case, you definitely need medical attention.
Simply because a person carries a camera does not make them an accredited member of the press. Even accredited members of the press can be subversives as well.
No he does not Shingo, he is a pathological liar. They will regret his reinstatement here.
VR, it is not right to silence people that you do not believe in. I have never violated the comments policy on this website.
Just as you can comment on Jpost and other sites, I can comment on here.
I do not need to silence you UNIX, you will do a good enough job accomplishing that all by yourself. All I merely do is predict the inevitable, no matter how much faking you do and no matter how hard you try to present a caricature of the Jewish people you antisemitic fascist.
I disagree, I believe in fact the opposite, in that an antisemite is one that wishes suffering and expulsion for the Jewish people from their land in Gaza, Hebron and Jerusalem.
It is not faking in the least to point out to moral, legal and historical rights of the Jewish people to their land in Gaza and Ramallah
“It is not faking in the least to point out to moral, legal and historical rights of the Jewish people to their land in Gaza and Ramallah”
It wouldn’t be faking if they existed.
Well than you should intervene UNIX, take those Zionists that now live in luxury (compared to the Gaza dwellings), that were waiting for them after their big act (they should have been up for Oscars) of being “torn” from their beloved Gaza. Go now UNIX! Tell them to leave their luxury condos and beautiful homes in the occupied West Bank and return to Gaza…lol “Let my people go,” back to shacks in Gaza…LOL
Excuse me, because they do exist. Stripping Jews of the rights to their lands is not the right way to peace.
“Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country”
–Preamble, Mandate for Palestine (July 24, 1922)
VR, it is not moral to mock the Jewish refugees from Gaza. They have the right to return to their land in Gaza, not to build shacks but to build homes, even nicer than before.
Also it should be noted that not all Jewish refugees from Gaza live in Judea and Samaria many still suffer in temporary homes north of Gaza.
Yes, and the Attila the Hun had the right to all of China. Especially pronounced by colonial asses, colonialism loves company. They all shed a tear of nostalgia as Palestinians are murdered. Look UNIX, I know this is your wet dream to murder all “Arabs” (because you have said it under other monikers, like Sweden1975), and in the process you would like to vilify all Jewish people as murderous Zionist scum so they can also be exterminated – but your sentiments will not go far here. You are on a fast rail to expulsion, keep posting – I know you will not heed my warnings, and I am “heart broken” you kucker.
VR,
I have never had a Sweden name, I have heard you say that before and I would like to make that clear.
Jews are not colonialists since they are the native inhabitants of Israel.
Right, UNIX, and the pilgrims with their bibles and blunderbusses were the native inhabitants of America.
“Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country”
Ok, history points to there being a Jewish kingdom approximately 2000 years ago in what’s now Palestine. History also notes people of other religions inhabiting the place, before, during and after the Jewish kingdom, in many cases, the same peoples who converted from Judaism to Christianity or Islam. To establish a clear claim to “the land” please answer these questions:
Exactly who owned what plots of land in Palestine when it was under Jewish rule 2000 years ago?
Which Jews, living today can establish through legally recognized inheritance laws, or purchase from the recognized owners, their ownership of those plots of land? For the purpose of answering this question, just apply it to the land confiscated from Palestinian owners, or land historically used by e.g. Bedouins but not registered to anyone.
Are you asserting, given that most of the Jewish peoples of 2000 years ago in Palestine eventually adopted Christianity or Islam, that persons who convert from Judaism to another religion no longer have a legal right to land they own or live in their home or on their land? Because, that’s what you appear to be asserting.
Thanks for showing this. It’s really disgusting how their strategy is completely bankrupt.
@jvplive on Twitter is reporting that Eymad Rezqa sustained a broken skull and brain hemorrhage from the IDF’s latest terror attack on the peaceful protesters of Bilin. Meanwhile, Israel has its hand out to Congress for the next $3 billion installment of white phosphorus money.
Write your Congressional rep.
Better call your senator/rep. Gotta act quick. You can get the phone numbers you need by entering your zip here:
link to hq-salsa.democracyinaction.org
And when that doesn’t help, blame AIPAC and Jews for over reaching in the US. Because, you know, if you cannot convince your fellow Americans that is because:
1) Jews are corrupt and have corrupted Congress (cliff)
2) The Jews are over reaching (many)
3) Congress is stupid and easily manipulated by AIPAC which is a foreign organization (Citizen)
4) The main stream media is filled with Zionists who obscure reality (many)
5) Israel is working with the industrial-military conference to screw the American citizens
6) etc.
And when that still doesn’t help, obey eee, the Israeli, the proponent of anti-universal human rights, who lives in a world where it’s always necessary to sacrifice the children of the Other in order to insure the safety of your own. If you cherish Hobbes and Hitler, you will love eee!
… [then] blame …
—
6th word, and you left thinking for emotions already.
“1) Jews are corrupt and have corrupted Congress (cliff)”
I never said this, jackass.
When you see us talk about Zionists, it’s you who conflate w/ all Jews.
It’s you, and your pathological narcissism that is associating Zionism w/ Jewishness.
Go to hell, you fucking liar.
No eee, the “representatives” are plenty corrupt all by themselves, and they are doing their job protecting elite interest as they always have sine the founding of the USA. When American wake up there will be hell to pay, and the unleashed wrath of the people will not only rest on “the complicit Jews.” There will not be enough left for any settler colonial enterprise, nor any imperial thrust, and in fact there might not be much left standing at all. You’re attempt to try to paint this site as a right wing loony bin are laughable.
I Agree with eee
“I Agree with eee”
And eee agrees with you.
Also, eee, I never Congress was stupid. Everyone knows congress members and wannabees have as priority #1 reaching and keeping personal power; they do what they feel they have to–to keep their
campaign coffers full. Yes, I do agree, as JFK did, that AIPAC and its former parent, the zionist organtization, should have been, and should be registered as an agent of a foreign government. I am not alone; there is a formal recommendation filed last March in the appropriate federal agency now requesting once again that AIPAC be registered as the agent of a foreign government.
Correction: I never said or implied Congress was stupid.
Also, regulars here will remember the detailed discussion had on this blog delineating how AIPAC operates. They all know the nationally unpublicized standard AIPAC test congressional wannabees must take, and incumbents must adhere to, to sit in Congress.
BTW, triple e, 42% of US congress members are millionaires–this too is a result of US campaign finance system. There’s no incentive for congress to make any real reform of this system.
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When Israeli activists and international activists are among the marchers, the Israeli army tries to first separate the Israelis and internationals from the Palestinians so that they can commence using violent means against the Palestinians without risking harming an Israeli or a foreigner.
Now, what makes this incident unique is the fact that Emad Rezqa who was shot in the head with a canister is an Israeli citizen,
BUT
He is a Palestinian, not a Jew.
As an Israeli he may sue the army in court.
This demonstrates that the army and the state of Israel are not concerned with lawsuits stemming from army attacks on Israelis, but are discriminatory in their attacks on non-Jewish Israelis due to profound racism and bigotry.
Yep. Imagine if he had been a Jewish Israeli. What a scramble. Instead, business as usual.
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Try putting yourself in a pair of an “explainer’s” shoes and justify the photo: “Well, of course we have to aim directly for the head in order to spare innocent bystanders who chose to stay outside the protest, duh!” How’d I do triplee?
Report From Gaza: link to haaretz.com
Those are rifle bullets they are firing. Lethal force against unarmed, peaceful protest.
Israel can get away with murdering Americans, of course, but I think we’ll see a different story now that European Union citizens are taking fire.
Do you think so Chaos4700?
CAN YOU SAY DEJA VU?
Maybe I have too much optimism. :) But in recent years EU citizens have been successful in achieving a higher quality of life, better environmental practices and genuine democratic participation, overall. I don’t think this will blow over so easily in Europe this time.
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Yes, that picture of the Israeli Arab with the horrible wound in the forefront is shocking, but does it help towards the construction of dialog and understanding? No. It only creates RAGE.
While one doesn’t support censorship, one would hope for the media to show some restraint in the publication of graphic material that only helps to dehumanize the OTHER, while neglecting to properly analyze the context in which tired, stressed soldiers may fire a tear-gas canister towards a place where an Arab, be it Palestinian or an Israeli with full civil rights, may take advantage of the situation to interpose himself in the trajectory of the projectile to provide material for opportunistic photographers.
They let UNIX post again? Big mistake.
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