From an AIPAC fundraising letter, full text below, from Lee Rosenberg, who first brought Barack Obama to Israel in 2006 and whom the president calls Rosey:
"Israelis could be dragged into foreign courts and charged with human rights violations...nations could implement sweeping economic sanctions...the Jewish presence in east Jerusalem could come under severe international challenge."
Who'da thunk? The letter:
Your urgent action is needed
Please reply immediately
Dear Xxxxx:Next month, the Palestinian Authority plans to ask the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian state within the pre-1967 borders with east Jerusalem as its capital.
The United States has strongly objected to this approach, with Congress overwhelmingly passing resolutions threatening cuts in aid if the Palestinians continue to shun peace talks and go forward in their harmful efforts at the United Nations.
However, the Palestinians have not yet abandoned this path and more action is now needed to persuade them to change course and return to the negotiating table.
If America fails in this effort, the consequences could be immense: Israelis could be dragged into foreign courts and charged with human rights violations...nations could implement sweeping economic sanctions...the Jewish presence in east Jerusalem could come under severe international challenge.
That is why I am writing to ask for your help by joining the work of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee today.
In the coming weeks AIPAC and its members will be working with our leader in Washington to:
Ensure the United States makes clear to the Palestinians that it will veto any such resolution at the U.N. Security Council.
Urge our government to press the PA to return to the negotiating table with Israel.
Urge the United States to press foreign leaders to oppose Palestinian intransigence and support direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
By joining AIPAC today with a gift of $50, $75, $100 or more you will help AIPAC work with Congress and the administration to address these vital issues in the weeks leading up to the September meeting of the U.N. General Assembly.For nearly 60 years, AIPAC has worked to make Israel more secure by ensuring American support remains strong.
As an AIPAC member, you help us work year-round with both Democratic and Republican political leaders to enact public policy that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship.
Thank you for your support. Please watch for additional updates on the Palestinian U.N. bid in the coming weeks.
Onward Together,
Lee Rosenberg
AIPAC President
A little more honest appeal would have read thusly:
“Ensure the United States makes clear to the Palestinians that it will follow our dictates [and] veto any such resolution at the U.N. Security Council.”
Oh yes, God forbid that the Palestinians heightened status at the UNGA or by some act of God, statehood with the UNSC should give them the right to pursue all angles of legal recourse to retrieve what is legally theirs including their human rights, because Israel prefers Palestinians in “limbo status” where it can punish them indefinitely and do as it pleases; stealing from them and abusing their rights.
This has been a long time coming and the crime belongs to the entire world for not bringing Palestinians to the UN table and offering them what is the only decent and humane alternative sooner as opposed to forcing them to deal indefinitely with the scraps off the Israeli “peace” table.
Shut up Aipac!
I hope they raise billions cuz they sure as hell are gonna be losing it all in THREE WEEKS AND THREE DAYS.
Hey eee, gf, hophmi etc, why not donate your life’s riches and savings to the cause now when it needs you the most? It won’t be a risk, right? Cuz you guys just know you’re the predetermined ‘chosen’ winners in this conflict, right? Well what the heck you waiting for? Get yer check books out and give EVERYTHING you own to zionist israel.
“Israelis could be dragged into foreign courts and charged with human rights violations…nations could implement sweeping economic sanctions…the Jewish presence in east Jerusalem could come under severe international challenge.”
Procrastinating won’t save Israel from the day of reckoning. Ultimately it is all political and the politics have to change.
Return to negotiations yada yada. Palestine Papers, habibi. The game is up. The world is on the antizionist side. The holocaust card is null and void.
The gaza card replaced it.
Israel will eventually be hit with a lawsuit to compensate the Palestinians for 60+ years of dispossession and discrimination . And that will be it.
Exactly. In our lifetimes I can guarantee that a future government of Israel will be paying reparations to Palestinians. All Palestinians, no Zionist tricks with strings attached. Reparations just like they get from Germany for Holocaust survivors that likely require no proof other than being a WWII-ear Jewish European considering the substantial number of survivors receiving these reparations who are still alive.
Procrastination will just make the consequences even worse for Israel and all those who support it.
How much money was Iraq forced to pay Kuwait for its invasion and occupation which didn’t last very long? If Israelis are forced to pay Palestinians the same rate for over 40 maybe even over 60 years of occupation the bill Israel gets is going to be astronomical!
LOL. It’s funny you think this will happen. The Jews who were forced out of the Arab countries have better claims.
I don’t think they do! They have not been in occupation for over 40 years and many of them left voluntarily anyway. Iraq has paid Kuwait £20billion so far(and they are still required to pay them billions more). So that’s at least £800 billion £20billion for each year of occupation and that does not include 1948 claims!
That myth was invented in the 70′s by Yaakov Meron of the WOJAC (The World Organization of Jews from Arab Countries), who came up with the idea of “Jewish refugees” was.
“… Any reasonable person, Zionist or non-Zionist, must acknowledge that the analogy drawn between Palestinians and Mizrahi Jews is unfounded. Palestinian refugees did not want to leave Palestine. Many Palestinian communities were destroyed in 1948, and some 700,000 Palestinians were expelled, or fled, from the borders of historic Palestine. Those who left did not do so of their own volition.
In contrast, Jews from Arab lands came to this country under the initiative of the State of Israel and Jewish organizations. Some came of their own free will; others arrived against their will. Some lived comfortably and securely in Arab lands; others suffered from fear and oppression.”
It is well document, you can call it a myth all you want Shingo, but the reality is it will need to be addressed when we start talking about reparations.
It is well document, you can call it a myth all you want Shingo, but the reality is it will need to be addressed when we start talking about reparations.
If that’s the case, then why did Israel sign a peace treaty with Egypt and Jordan that didn’t mention the subject? FYI, the Palestinians can’t be held responsible for the internationally wrongful acts of other states and Israel can’t profit from its own.
I suppose it’s all about the Benjamins for AIPAC, and I’m not referring to Netanyahu. Any excuse to squeeze a buck.
The hypocrisy and dissembling is staggering. Back to the negotiating table? Pull the other one. Why do these people get away with lying so blatantly, all as if it was perfectly normal. We must put our hand in Americans pockets, so we can keep propaganda campaigns going, in order that they never know what is actually going on in our little apartheid state, where we have nuked civil rights and democracy.
I don’t know if it is dissembling. I think the para starting “If America fails…” makes clear the illegality of the Israeli expansionist enterprise and the fear of consequences once the ‘piece’ process is officially abandoned with the Statehood bid. With recognition, the almost total control of the territories would end, as would the ability to hide behind Aipac managed US skirts.
Yep, with recognition the house of cards falls. Period. When this can of worms is opened up, the US unconditional support for everything Israel will be questioned by the majority of Americans. Journalists will be forced to talk about it just like they’re being forced to acknowledge the existence of Ron Paul recently. AIPAC’s power will diminish. Politicians will start to fear backlash and criminal trials when this becomes public knowledge. New politicians will abandon the “Israel” card.
I wonder what Israel will do? Maybe Israelis will finally wake up and realize their leaders have been lying to them for over 63 years. I’m sure that a lot of Israelis will emigrate to the USA if there is truth to the reports of obtaining passports. Or maybe they’ll go on a murderous nuclear rampage. Part of me really thinks that nuclear blackmail plays a huge role in the unconditional support.
The value of the nuclear card is vastly overrated. It’s rock scissors stone. The Arab street behaving non violently as in Egypt beats Israel’s nuclear arms. What are they going to do against democracy in action ?
Say Israel’s GDP per head is $25,000 :
$2,000 of this is due to Arab dictatorship
$3,000is due to AIPAC
$5,000 is due to the occupation.
Israelis are living beyond their means and if they get hit by sanctions the standard of living is going to collapse.
“Report: $42 Million from Seven Foundations Helped Fuel The Rise Of Islamophobia In America”:
link to commondreams.org
In its 2004 Advisory Opinion the ICJ said that the Israeli occupation regime was illegally interfering with the exercise of the Palestinian right of self-determination. The Court said that all states were under an obligation to remove any impediments to the exercise of that right by the Palestinian people. The United States is obviously facilitating an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over another racial group, i.e. the crime of apartheid.
The AIPAC fund raising letter is proof that the US and Israel feel that they can commit crimes against the Palestinian community that international law would otherwise prohibit in cases involving another state.
It’s ironic that both the US and Israel once supported the doctrine that certain crimes result in individual responsibility under universal principles of international law whenever they are committed against any civilian community. See State of Israel v. Adolf Eichmann and Article 6 of the Nuremberg Charter.
link to avalon.law.yale.edu
link to ess.uwe.ac.uk
The majority of State Parties to the Montevideo Convention have decided that Palestine satisfies the criteria for statehood under the declarative theory. Palestine also satisfies the criteria under the constitutive theory. The majority of other existing states have decided to recognize and treat Palestine as a state with all of the rights and duties prescribed by international law.
In 1949 the International Law Commission discussed the danger of returning to the doctrine of ad hoc legitimism or the policy of non-recognition by which one group of States could virtually control the existence of another. That was particularly true in the case of a colonial territory seeking its own freedom and independence. The prohibition against denial of the right to a nationality was incorporated in the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid. It entered into effect in 1976. That was years after the ICJ decision in the 1970 Namibia case. The Court defined the policy of apartheid as a violation of the obligation under the UN Charter to respect the right of self-determination of another people. It’s outrageous that the US and Israel are openly violating their obligations under the Charter and international law, while encouraging other states to follow their example.
The tables are turning.
Or as my new hero Rania said yesterday “A sea change is happening”
“As an AIPAC member, you help us work year-round with both Democratic and Republican political leaders to enact public policy that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship.”
Yes the U.S.-Israel relationship is vital to the occupation and torture of children.
Just like the UK was vital to the near extermination of Indians in north America.
As an AIPAC member, you help us work year-round with right-wing leaders (Demopublicans) to enact public policy that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship…
The big brother Fox”News”-network is in big trouble. (AJ has real news and honest reporters).
And Bush probably regrets that he did not bomb Doha. And “Al-Reuters”
Q: that strengthens the vital U.S.-Israel relationship…
R: I think that should read: “strengthens the vital Israeli relationship…”, because whatever country will become a future ‘top-dog’ will be ‘vital’ to Israel’s existence.
Oh the irony in that quote.
That’s like a murder saying to his wife that they’ll lose everything if she turns him in. Yes statehood could and will lead to those things. That’s kind of the point.
AIPAC wants to get back to the negoatiating table, where the game is rigged, takes place behind closed doors and the referee is paid off.
Who wants a level playing field, where the world gets to watch?
Abbas has probably surprised even himself over the momentum this is gaining, and the level of gear it is generating in Tel Aviv.
“Abbas has probably surprised even himself over the momentum this is gaining, and the level of gear it is generating in Tel Aviv.”
He’s still the weak link in the process and not necessarily the one with the strongest urge to see it succeed. The momentum is no thanks to him but to the Israeli viciousness that keeps growing by the day.
“If America fails,” AIPAC wrote (not only revealing the idea that Israel bears no responsibility for being in its pickle), then of course in keeping with the related kind of comments one sees all the time amongst Israeli partisans for other things what we will see is same blaming America for “betraying” Israel or etc., and it will all be America’s sin and fault. (Once more leaving Israel blameless.)
Same as one commonly sees America damned for not stopping the Holocaust.
(Sooner, that is, without a molecule of appreciation for the fact that without us it wouldn’t have been stopped at all.)
You know, it’s one thing to be The Sucker. It’s another to then not just see a lack of gratitude for same, but instead get spit on for not having done more.
Such a deal…
AIPAC: American Idiots Promoting Another Country
Hahaha good one Dex!
“AIPAC: American Idiots Promoting Another Country”
A very good one indeed..
Small variation: American Ilk Promoting Another Country.
AIPAC, along with the Israeli govt, is s***ing their pants! And they should be considering this time there is no one to threaten, smear, or pay off to make this go away. The world has grown tired of Israel’s lies, deceptions, and insufferable arrogance.
Israel has proven itself utterly incapable of respecting international law and ridding itself of this immoral occupation, leaving no choice for the brave and resilient Palestinians but to go to the UN. BRAVO! It’s about time.
The issue that Israel tries to hide is that without the Massive Arab population movement in 1948/49, the number of Jews and Arabs in Israel would be approximate even. ie a Bi-National state.
Relevant facts:
– 6.2 million Jews in Israel today
– 1.5 million Arabs in Israel today
– 4.9 million Arabs registered with the UN
ie. Without the Arab population movement in 1948/49, there would be 6.4 million Arabs in Israel today.
This is the Issue that Israel continually tries to hide.
Best Wishes
The Zionist leadership was quite aware that without ethnic cleansing, Jews would have been a minority in the Jewish state carved out of Palestine within a decade or maybe even within 5 years.
Zionists lie when they claim:
In point of fact, simultaneously with accepting the November 1947 UN GA Partition Proposal, the Zionist leadership green-lighted the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population and put out a false story through Jewish gatekeepers and facilitators in the US and British newspapers.
From the names of the Zionist military operations, (e.g., biur hametz, burning of the [ritually impure] leaven), I believe mass murder of the native Palestinian population was intended.
While Palestinians remembering the Special Night Squads of the 30s organized defensively, Palestinian leaders, who were in exile or jail, were in no position to accept or reject the proposal (they did not get their act together until January), and the Palestinian population adopted a wait and see attitude because the Palestinian leadership had already accepted a 55% Palestinian 45% Jewish population ratio as Rafael Medoff, who is admirer of Jabtinsky as well as a modern Jabotinskian Zionist, points out on pp. 93-94 of his book entitled Baksheesh Diplomacy.
If all 300,000 Jewish DPs had joined the 600,000 Jews already resident, the Palestinian-Jewish division would have been a 57:43 ratio, with which Palestinians had no problem in a single democratic state.
Palestinians simply could not accept a partition of the country
1. that divided families and clans,
2. that separated farmers from their lands, and
3. that put so many Palestinians under the control of Zionists, who had a record of violent bloodthirstiness since the 19-naughts. (See Timeline.)
The Palestinian position was hardly unreasonable.
The commonly believed narrative of the Palestinian rejection of the UN Partition Proposal constitutes the Second Great Zionist Fraud.
This is significant– the US Palestinian Community Network, which has been very critical of the PA ( see link to mondoweiss.net
), issues this statement yesterday:
“We call on all Palestinian and Arab community associations, societies and committees, student organizations, solidarity campaigns, to reject fully and unequivocally the Statehood initiative as a distraction that unjustifiably and irresponsibly endangers Palestinian rights and institutions.”
link to uspcn.org
“We call on all Palestinian and Arab community associations, societies and committees, student organizations, solidarity campaigns, to reject fully and unequivocally the Statehood initiative as a distraction that unjustifiably and irresponsibly endangers Palestinian rights and institutions.”
The UN Charter and the Rome Statute contain protections against the illegal threat or use of force against the territorial integrity and political independence of any State. For Palestinians living under a brutal occupation regime, those legal protections are no distraction. This is just another example of the in-fighting that usually occurs between members of any group that has been targeted for occupation, eviction, apartheid, or genocide.
Israel has always been the beneficiary of Palestinian and Arab factionalism. Conquests have historically been cemented when one of the parties can “divide and rule” over the others. That is reflected by the trend in cases like Jorgic v Germany and Prosecutor v. Jean-Paul Akayesu in which Raphael Lemkin’s broader definition of genocide was employed. The physical destruction of the members of the group isn’t necessary, only the destruction of another nation as a social unit in its distinctiveness and particularity and its feeling of belonging together.
Arguments about the possible impact of a change in the PLO’s status at the UN are completely unpersuasive. The General Assembly has created dozens of subsidiary organs that deal with Palestine. Some of them catalog refugees, their property, and compensation claims. There are even organs that monitor the exercise of their inalienable rights – including the right of return. The General Assembly has taken on permanent responsibility for the Question of Palestine “until it is resolved in all its aspects in a satisfactory manner in accordance with international legitimacy” (General Assembly resolution 57/107 of 3 December 2002). In the meantime, the Palestinians need a State too, not just the PLO, in order to have locus standi in many international forums like the ICJ and ICC.
Lee Rosenberg
AIPAC President
Need I say more?