Marc Lamont Hill delivered an inspiring keynote address to a standing-room only celebration of radical organizing for Palestine as the organization Existence is Resistance celebrated its 10-year anniversary in New York City.
Palestinian cartoonist Mohammad Sabaaneh, who is developing an international reputation, explains why he supports boycotting Israel: “As long as we are under this occupation, and this atrocity, and brutality, I will not do any joint event with any Israeli artist or citizen. Because he is a soldier. Whatever his work– artist, doctor, engineer, journalist—he served in the IDF, or will serve in the IDF, or serves in the IDF.”
A new Amnesty International report titled “Destination: Occupation” examines how Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia, and TripAdvisor are “contributing to, and profiting from, the maintenance, development and expansion of illegal settlements, which amount to war crimes under international criminal law.”
A new book by former Carter aide Stu Eizenstat says that Barbara Walters boasted of love affairs with Israel’s foreign and defense ministers, Moshe Dayan and Ezer Weizman, in 1978-1979 while she was covering Camp David negotiations for ABC news.
The good news from the anti-BDS bill’s progress in the Senate yesterday, 76-22, is that progressive Democrats are standing up against AIPAC for the right to “peacefully” protest Israeli policies, and almost all the presidential hopeful Democrats voted against the legislation, even Kamala Harris and Cory Booker. And Chris Van Hollen said the bill will “strengthen” the boycott movement.
It is not the road to Tel Aviv that Chad and Mali are seeking, but rather the road to Washington itself. For African leaders who enjoy no democratic credence, a handshake with Netanyahu could be equivalent to a political life insurance, and a sure ticket to the Washington political club.
Three leaders of a new group aimed at preventing the Democratic Party from splitting over Israel–Jennifer Granholm, Peter Villegas, and Ann Lewis –are affiliated with the Israel lobby group AIPAC, which has been panicked by the possible splintering of political support for the Jewish state.
Activists Eyad Kishawi, Max Ajl, and Liliana Cordova-Kaczerginski applaud Jewish Voice for Peace’s recent statement outlining its “unequivocal opposition to Zionism,” but raise a critique that it gives credence to the idea that Zionism emerged from Jewish life, and was not a colonial ideology developed to expand western imperialism in Palestine. “Anti-Zionism is not merely criticism of current Israeli policies or even the idea of a Jewish nation-state,” they write, “It is a rejection of an imperially-imposed, racist, settler-colonial state.”
Like Israel’s former politician generals, from Yitzhak Rabin to Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon, Benny Gantz is being portrayed – and portraying himself – as a battle-hardened warrior, able to make peace from a position of strength. Gantz’s campaign slogans “Only the Strong Wins” and “Israel Before Everything” are telling. Everything, for Gantz, clearly includes human rights.
“We were forced out of our homes by the occupation when I was a boy, and now in my old age they are expelling me again,” 70-year-old Mohammed Sabbagh tells Mondoweiss. He and his extended family are fighting to stay in their home in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah while Israeli settler organizations are attempting to force them out. “It’s another Nakba,” Sabbagh says.