(Update below regarding possible mistranslation from Hebrew~A.R.) Wading through all the chickensh*t over the last…
Israel has closed the Al Aqsa mosque. Lesson for us all? Religious rights – however regulated – cannot be sustained without political rights. Arguing for religious rights without pursuing political rights is hypocrisy – on all sides. So Mahmoud Abbas is wrong. Closing Al Aqsa is not Israel declaring war against the Palestinian people. That war was declared in the founding of Israel. Closing Al Aqsa is Israel’s continuation of the war against Palestinians.
The Gaza war and collapse of the peace process destroyed liberal Zionists’ cherished vision of an egalitarian Jewish democracy, forcing many of Israel’s defenders to embrace the raw Islamophobia of ex-AP reporter Matti Friedman’s Tablet essay that blamed coverage of Operation Protective Edge in the media on ant-Semitism.
“Exalted anti-Zionists” (as Shlomo Sand calls us with snark) are framing the new ideas about the conflict: You cannot have a “Jewish democracy.” Let’s choose democracy over ethnocracy. And Tom Friedman, Noam Chomsky, and liberal Zionists are all engaging these ideas.
Kristian Davis Bailey reports from this year’s Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) national conference which brought together the largest contingent of SJP members in the movement’s history. Over 500 student activists and SJP alumni came to Tufts under the theme “Beyond Solidarity: Resisting Racism and Colonialism from the US to Palestine,” which sought to embody our student movement’s continued commitment to joint struggle. Ahmad Abunzaid, the legal and policy director of the Dream Defenders, summarized the core message of the weekend during a conference workshop on Black liberation: “Our struggles are bound together and our liberation will be bound together.”
It is a well-established principle that public universities are bound by the First Amendment. You might not know this from talking to students who are speaking out for Palestinian rights. In the past eight months, Radhika Sainath has given 15 know-your-rights workshops to students from nearly 70 different universities. Despite her extensive conversations with SJPers, she continues to be surprised at the level of repression these students face from their administrations.
A radical Jewish fundamentalist who has pushed Jewish access to the Islamic sites in the Old City was shot in Jerusalem yesterday and Israeli police swiftly killed a Palestinian accused of the crime, and the Noble Sanctuary was closed for the first time since 1967
Melissa Parke (ALP, Freemantle WA) spoke in favor of a petition calling for BDS on the floor of the Australian Parliament on Monday night. John Salisbury writes: “Although her speech was a cri de coeur for common sense and common decency it was remarkable for its uniqueness. No Australian politician, except Parke, would deign to speak up for Palestinian suffering in Parliament. In Australia, as in the US, most politicians are just ventriloquist dolls for the pro-Israel lobby. . . But Monday night Parke walked into no man’s land. The brickbats will inevitably follow as our Australian versions of Haim Saban and Jeffrey Goldberg try to take her down. But Melissa, you don’t deserve the brickbats, you deserve bouquets.”
Netanyahu denounced the anonymous “attack” on him as being “chickenshit,” and said US and Israel have a “moral covenant.” Is he reaching out to American Jewish voters to defy Obama next week?
Malala Yousafzai should be celebrated and serve as a reminder for all as to how deprived today’s children are of basic human rights such as education. The point however is to consider that if Malala’s home was in the occupied West Bank or Gaza, or in the drone bombarded villages of Yemen, would she have been invited to the White House? Would her struggle make her a global icon? The chances would be slim, and few in the corridors of power would want to take notice.