The Corner Report

By Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON - For weeks, the U.S. public followed the biggest offensive of the Afghanistan War against what it was told was a "city of 80,000 people" as well as the logistical hub of the Taliban in that part of Helmand. That idea was a central element in the overall impression built up in February that Marja was a major strategic objective, more important than other district centres in Helmand.

It turns out, however, that the picture of Marja presented by military officials and obediently reported by major news media is one of the clearest and most dramatic pieces of misinformation of the entire war, apparently aimed at hyping the offensive as a historic turning point in the conflict.

Marja is not a city or even a real town, but either a few clusters of farmers' homes or a large agricultural area covering much of the southern Helmand River Valley.

"It's not urban at all," an official of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), who asked not to be identified, admitted to IPS Sunday. He called Marja a "rural community".

"It's a collection of village farms, with typical family compounds," said the official, adding that the homes are reasonably prosperous by Afghan standards.

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How much can a person take before snapping?

“If we don’t fight, we will suffer. If we do fight, we will suffer, but so will they.” -- Saeed Hotari. suicide bomber

By Stuart Littlewood – London

'The suicide bomber wrote that he began to live the day he came to know he was to die. Where did he get this passion to kill?' -- Mahesh Bhatt

Here in the civilised West we hate suicide bombers with a passion.

We’re taught that the proper way to blow fellow humans to smithereens is to do it from 40,000 feet.

Or failing that, send Apache helicopter gun-ships at street level firing their laser-guided missiles and 30mm cannon.

Or failing that, turn loose our main battle tanks to shred and vaporize the “enemy”, reduce their homes to rubble with DU shells and spread birth defects for generations to come.

Nowadays we don’t even have to leave home to do it. We can train our really brainy chaps to steer armed drones to the target from the comfort of an armchair.

B-52s, F-16s, Apaches, drones and tanks… that’s the ticket. Awesome hardware gives any murky mission a moral superiority that gets nods of approval from the governing élite in the drawing rooms of London and Washington.

What is not acceptable is delivering the high explosive in person, all the way to the target, and looking your enemy in the eye as you push the detonator. That simply isn’t cricket.

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A PICTURE IS WORTH 1,000 WORDS; TWO PICTURES ARE WORTH 2,000 WORDS

Joe Biden, the US vice-president, and Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, have held talks over the perceived threat posed by Iran and on reviving the Middle East peace process.

After the meeting in Jerusalem on Tuesday, Biden reassured Israel that the US stood alongside them in terms of security.

"Progress occurs in the Middle East when everyone knows that there is simply no space between the United States and Israel," he said.

"The is no space between the United States and Israel when it comes to Israel's security. And for that reason, and many others, addressing Iran's nuclear programme has been one of our administration's priorities."

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BWTHLEHEM --Israel's plan to build 1,600 new housing units in occupied East Jerusalem is "dangerous," and has the potential to thwart US efforts to restart peace talks, the Palestinian Office of the President said Tuesday.

The Israeli Interior Ministry's announcement came one day after it approved 112 housing units in the Betar Illit settlement in Bethlehem.

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Pulse

By M. Idrees

Hollywood — like the Democratic Party or the New York Times — is alleged to be liberal. When it comes to questions such as gay marriage or abortion, this is indeed the case. When it comes to the American relationship with the rest of the world it is about as liberal as the Democratic Party or the New York Times. That is to say, it subscribes to the notion of American Exceptionalism, and accepts prima facie a messianic view of the US role in the world. It is jingoistic, militaristic, and frequently racist.

This failure to see the contradiction between its domestic liberalism and its aggresssive and patronizing attitude toward the rest of the world has been a staple of its politics since the days when the legendary Hollywood director, producer, novelist, and Academy Award-winning screenwriter, Ben Hecht was able to combine his advocacy for progressive causes in the United States with his outspoken support for Zionist terrorism in Palestine (Indeed, he wrote an open letter praising the ‘terrorists of Palestine’, the Irgun Zvei Leumi).

Likewise, Marlon Brando could combine his support for American Indian rights with his vocal defense of Zionist crimes (although toward the end of his life he decried the ‘Jewish Hollywood’s’ inability to show to other ethnicities the same sensitivity that it demanded for itself).

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]
An Israeli settlement

Israel has given the green light for the construction of 112 new homes in a settlement in the occupied West Bank despite a moratorium on the expansion of settlements.

Israeli Environment Minister Gilad Erdan has declared that the new homes will be constructed in the Beitar Ilit settlement near Bethlehem, AFP reported.

In November, Israel announced a 10-month moratorium on new building permits for settlers' homes in the occupied West Bank but Tel Aviv has repeatedly disregarded it by approving plans for the expansion of settlements.

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By Jonathan Cook
Monthly Review

8 March 2010

An exclusive club of the world's most developed countries is poised to admit Israel as a member even though, a confidential internal document indicates, doing so will amount to endorsing Israel's illegal occupation of Palestinian and Syrian territories.

Israel has been told that its accession to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is all but assured when the 30 member states meet in May.

But a draft OECD report concedes that Israel has breached one of the organization's key requirements on providing accurate and transparent data on its economic activity.

The information supplied by Israel, the report notes, includes not only the economic activity of its citizens inside its recognized borders but also Jewish settlers who live in the occupied territories of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Golan in violation of international law.

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from Gilad Atzmon http://tinyurl.com/ylhgaw2

Israeli Occupation Forces chief will meet with US Adm. Michale Mullen, but first will face a massave anti-Israel protest outside the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in NYC. Photo by: IDF Spokesperson

By YAAKOV KATZ

Israeli Occupation Forces Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi headed to the US on Sunday night with a tight security detail amid reports that he will face massive anti-Israel protests during his trip.

See video here for details:

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ACTION ALERT from The Struggle

In the Palestinian town of Beit Sahour (next to Bethlehem) settlers and the Israeli Defense Force are defying Obama's call for a settlement freeze and are preparing seized land (Ush Ghrab) for a new Jewish-only settlement. Settlers have defaced a children's playground by drawing Jewish stars all over the facility. People of the Beit Sahour have held peaceful demonstrations to try to prevent the settlement.

One of the leaders of the popular committee in Beit Sahour doing work on this land grab is Dr. Mazin Qumisiyeh an officer of our Middle East Crisis Committee and formerly on the faculty of Yale and Duke universities. He left for a speaking tour of the U.S. on Feb. 28, but on March 2nd the streets around his Beit Sahour home was blockaded by the army at 1:30 in the morning. Army officers told his family that he must report to them. Fears are that he may be abducted by the army on his return to the West Bank The Israelis have a procedure called Administrative Detention, months of prison without charges or trial under grueling interrorgations and miserable conditions.

We can prevent his arrest if there's a MASSIVE publicty campaign about Ush Ghrab and plans to abduct Mazin Qumsiyeh, letters to the media, Congress, etc. etc.. Watch this space for further information. WE HAVE TO GET THIS CAMPAIGN IN FULL GEAR WITHIN A WEEK.

Who is Mazin Qumsiyeh?
BACKGROUND INCLUDING VIDEO
How to Help Mazin and Beit Sahour
How to sign the petition
CLICK HERE

Obama's caught in his own illusion and moving in any direction may trap himself.

By James Gundun - Washington D.C.

The White House probably didn't expect to cash its check so soon.

US envoy George Mitchell has landed in Jerusalem to oversee the Palestinian Authority's final review before entering “indirect negotiations” with Israel. Set to begin next week, if the green light is given, Mitchell will shuttle between Netanyahu’s envoy Yitzhak Molcho in Jerusalem and the PA’s chief negotiator Saeb Erekat in Ramallah.

Vice President Joe Biden will reinforce him on Monday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu eagerly welcomed his arrival, calling Biden, “a friend of Israel for many years and a personal friend for almost three decades... I am convinced that this important visit to our region will contribute to advancing the diplomatic process, and there are indications to this effect.”

There are - if America and Israeli’s illusion had worked. "Indirect negotiations" have been ongoing for months, what we're seeing is a re-branding to the frozen peace process. And to no surprise their facade has already cracked on the Temple Mount.

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Abbas, the Palestinian president whose term ended in January 2000\9, said the peace process has almost reached a dead end [EPA]

George Mitchell, the US envoy to the Middle East, has begun a round of meetings in the region aimed at re-launching negotiations.

The meetings that began on Saturday came as Mahmoud Abbas, the president of Palestine whose term ended in January 2009, said he feared the 20-year-old peace process with Israel was close to collapse.

Officials expect discussion on formats for the four months of "proximity talks" to which Abbas agreed last week after a year of demanding Israel end settlement building before negotiations could resume.

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The Palestinian Islamic resistance movement, Hamas, has slammed the Arab League's foreign ministers' decision to submit to an American proposal for Palestinians to hold indirect talks with Israel.

In a statement released on Wednesday, Hamas emphasized that the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian talks under current conditions grants Israel another chance to resume its settlement activities, especially whilst the Tel Aviv regime is moving ahead with its illegal plans and blatant violations.

It added that the regime's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not interested in peace and does not want any solution to the Jerusalem Al-Quds issue or the Right of Return for Palestinian refugees.

Hamas also criticized the acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas for attempting to gain 'Arab recognition' for his talks with the Israeli regime while Tel Aviv continues its settlement activities and military assaults.

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After the bloodshed of the Gaza invasion there is growing impatience in the UN with Israeli foot-dragging over accusations of war crimes. Khalil Hamra / AP photo

By Sharmila Devi, Foreign Correspondent

NEW YORK // Two unrelated diplomatic upsets have underlined growing impatience with the behaviour of the Israeli government among western countries that are traditionally supportive.

Backing from the European Union and Australia in the United Nations to sustain the issue of Israel’s alleged war crimes in Gaza more than a year ago has coincided with controversy over Israel’s apparent use of western passports in the assassination of Mahmoud al Mabhouh, a Hamas official, in Dubai.

Support for an Arab resolution last Friday at the UN – most EU countries voted in favour while others and Australia abstained – gave Israel and the Palestinians five more months to report back on progress in their respective investigations of war crimes alleged in a report by Richard Goldstone, a South African judge.

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Yesterday (March 4) the House Foreign Affairs Committee passed the Armenian genocide resolution. That is the bill, kicking around for years, that recognizes the Armenian genocide as precisely that - genocide. The Turkish government has always strongly opposed the resolution, arguing - unconvincingly, in my opinion - that the slaughter of the Armenians occurred in the context of war and was not an attempt at their intentional eradication.

I never understood why the Turks care so much. The current democratic Turkish Republic was not even in existence during the Armenian slaughter. It is the successor state to the Ottoman Empire under which the killing took place. The current Turkish government is no more responsible for the Armenian genocide than the current German government is responsible for the Holocaust.

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Hamas leader, Mahmoud Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai.

By James Petras

The principle propaganda mouthpiece of the Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations (PMAJO), the Daily Alert (DA), has come out in full support for Israel’s practice of extra-judicial, extra-territorial assassination.

In the face of world-wide governmental condemnation (except from the White House and US Congress), the PMAJO slavishly backs any brutal murder committed by the Israeli secret police anywhere in the world and at anytime. The recent assassination of Hamas leader, Mahmoud Mabhouh, in Dubai is a case in point. The PMAJO has defended all of Mossad’s criminal actions leading up to the murder, including extensive identity theft and the stealing or falsification of passports and official documents from several European countries, presumably allied to the Zionist state. Among the Mossad agents who entered Dubai to kill Mabhouh, twelve agents used stolen or forged British passports, three Australian, three French, one German and six Irish. These agents assumed the identity of European citizens in order to commit murder in a sovereign nation.

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Al Ahram

Despite how alarming the prospect of a nuclear Iran might be to Washington, enhancing sanctions or authorising pre-emptive strikes could lead to an all-out war the US might lose, writes Azmi Bishara

The Obama administration's reappointment of the Bush administration's secretary of defence, Robert Gates, reflects the growing involvement of the US military establishment in decision-making processes on matters of war and peace, and hence in US foreign policy in general. The primary catalyst in this development has been the dismal results of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan leading to attempts to reform the military establishment's modus operandi, which isn't directly affected by elections, a couple of years before the end of Bush's tenure. The new programming was scripted to a considerable extent in the Baker- Hamilton Report, submitted to Bush in December 2006. The most important recommendations of this report were, first, its call for a dialogue with countries neighbouring Iraq, including Syria and Iran, in order to persuade them to help promote stability in order to extricate the US from the Iraqi quagmire it created after having invaded that country and demolished its existing governing infrastructures, and second its call to renew efforts towards a political solution to the Palestinian cause, which is to say to revive the so-called "peace process".

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Palestinian demonstrators stand behind a wall with stones in their hand to throw at Israeli soldiers during clashes in a village near Ramallah

A Palestinian woman whose house is to be demolished stands at her home window in the Al-Bustan neighbourhood, East Jerusalem
(photos: AFP)

Israeli provocations, including annexing Islamic sites to an alleged heritage list, are creating a powder keg in the occupied territories, writes Khaled Amayreh in the West Bank

Palestinian officials have warned that recent Israeli provocations, including government-backed attempts by Jewish religious extremists to claim a foothold at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, are creating an incendiary situation in the occupied territories.

Visibly frustrated by Israel's utter disregard for Palestinian objections to Israeli encroachment on Muslim holy places in Hebron, Bethlehem and East Jerusalem, Palestinian Authority (PA) officials have been appealing to the international community, especially Israel's guardian-ally, the United States, to rein in the Israeli government.

"These provocations are killing the last hopes for peace. Israel is turning the occupied Palestinian territories into a powder keg. If these provocations continue, there can be no peace process, and the international community will have to bear the consequences," said the erstwhile chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.

Arguing that Israel is provoking the religious sensibilities of Palestinians, Erekat urged the Obama administration to stop Israel "before it is too late".

Similarly, Ismail Haniyeh, the prime minister of the Gaza-based Hamas-run government in the Gaza Strip has called for a new Intifada, or uprising, against Israeli provocations.

Haniyeh said it was unacceptable that Israel could seize Islamic holy places in the West Bank while the Palestinians watched passively.

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Al Ahram

Under American pressure, Abbas has agreed to indirect talks with Israel, with some Arab support and without preconditions, writes Dina Ezzat

"So that American efforts to revive the peace process succeed." This is how top Palestinian peace negotiator Saeb Erekat portrayed the decision of the Palestinian Authority to resume indirect talks with Israel despite the latter's unchecked construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian land.

During two consecutive days of Arab foreign ministers meetings, on Tuesday and Wednesday, a qualified green light was given to President Mahmoud Abbas signalling some collective Arab support for his decision.

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Salam Fayyad, the unelected, American-backed prime minister, opens a new football stadium near Ramallah on 11 February 2010. [MaanImages/Mustafa Abu Dayeh, Pool]

By Sam Bahour

A serious misconception is being propagated by the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah.

Media, international organizations, foreign governments and Palestinians-at-large are being coaxed into believing that the flurry of economic activity in the West Bank is economic development towards statehood.

The facts on the ground rip this argument to pieces, just as Israel continues to micromanage the economic pieces of the intended future state of Palestine toward systemic stagnation.

I can already hear the voices – “but be positive; we must start from somewhere; we are acting unilaterally toward statehood; but we had 7% GDP growth last year, etc, etc.” Being positive is one thing, but being delusional and acquiescing in a military occupation that controls every serious aspect of our lives, especially the economic ones, is unacceptable.

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OCCUPIED JERUSALEM -- Dozens of Palestinians were injured as Israeli forces entered East Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque compound following the weekly Friday prayers, firing tear gas, rubber-coated bullets and stun grenades.

At least 15 Israeli police officers were also injured by rocks thrown by Palestinians, Israeli news reports said. Some 200 police officers appeared on the scene, clashing with worshipers in the Haram Ash-Sharif, or noble sanctuary, which houses the mosque.

Forces were seen striking Palestinians with batons, injuring a number of elderly worshipers, and closed off gates into the Old City even before clashes erupted, preventing some worshipers from reaching the site.

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Gilad Atzmon's web site http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/why-it-takes-so-many-mossad-agents-to-kill-a-palestinian-wit.html

By Gilad Atzmon

While in Britain, France, USA and Argentina the Mossad enjoys the support of thousands of local Sayanim, Jews who are happy to betray their neighbours for their beloved Jewish state, when operating in Arab countries the Mossad has to schlep its very many assassins and their assistants using different fraudulent methods.

Yet one may wonder why does it take 26 Mossad agents to carry out a single murder of an unarmed Palestinian freedom fighter with a pillow*. I will try to throw some light on the puzzling question.

The Mossad is not just an ordinary intelligence agency run by boring gentiles. It is actually run by Chosen people and it is there to serve the interests of the Jewish state and the Jewish national project. In recent days we learned that more than two dozen Mossad agents have been identified so far by the Dubai police. One would expect that with such a varied and extended collective of Jewish murderers operating in an hostile Arab country at least one combatant Rabbi is needed just to keep the Kosher regulations, maintaining an open line with God and sustaining a revengeful Jewish spirit.

As much as food in Dubai is known to be amazingly delicious, not many kosher delicatessens are currently operating downtown. Hence, we also need a Jewishly trained expert that would purchase the fish for the gefilte and the chicken for the soup. We would need at least one chef who knows how to transform chicken and water into Jewish Power (chicken soup). You have to remember that from a Jewish perspective, food is of the essence. Unlike animals who kill only when they need to eat or are detecting an imminent danger, the Israeli kills for “ulterior motives” (democracy, pluralism, war ‘against terror’ etc’) and then prefers to do it when their belly is full.

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Gilad Atzmon's website
http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/bowing-to-jewish-pressure-by-gilad-atzmon.html

Thursday, March 4, 2010

By Gilad Atzmon

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has announced plans today to stop the issue of arrest warrants for foreign officials such as Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak and other Israeli war criminals who were forced to cancel planned trips to London after arrest warrants were issued against them. Under Brown’s proposals, the Crown Prosecution Service will take over responsibility for prosecuting war crimes and other violations of international law. Currently magistrates have to consider the case for an arrest warrant to be issued.

A warrant for the arrest of Ms Livni was issued by a UK court in December last year following Israel's massacre in Gaza over a year ago. She consequently cancelled a planned visit.

Mr Brown wrote in the Daily Telegraph: 'As we have seen, there is now significant danger of such a provision being exploited by politically-motivated organisations or individuals who set out only to grab headlines knowing their case has no realistic chance of a successful prosecution’.

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Abed Rabbeh in his cave holding his father's ID and court documents proving the land belongs to his family.
(Image by Nora Barrows-Friedman)

By Nora Barrows-Friedman writing from al-Walaja, occupied West Bank, Live from Palestine, 3 March 2010, posted on The electronic Intifada

"The Israeli police used a bullhorn and shouted 'death to Arabs!' toward me once," Abed Rabbeh remembers, his hands wrapped around a small ceramic cup of tea. "Another time, they tried to tell me that my grandfather was born in Dheisheh refugee camp and that I have no roots in this land." His face breaks into a wide smile. "However, I have documents that prove that my father, my grandfather and many generations before him, were born here, in al-Walaja village. Now, I'm the only one left here."

Rabbeh, a man in his late forties, is one of the last holdouts of al-Walaja's indigenous Palestinian population. Ethnically cleansed beginning in October 1948 by Israeli forces, most of al-Walaja village now remains a smattering of stone house ruins, destroyed wells and picnic areas frequented by ultra-orthodox settlers. The rest of al-Walaja's uprooted population and their descendants mostly live in Dheisheh today.

Across the road -- and a checkpoint -- is the Jerusalem Biblical Zoo, and nearby is the area of the destroyed Palestinian village of al-Malha, which today is the site of an enormous soccer stadium and an equally sizable shopping mall. The sprawling, constantly expanding city of Jerusalem continues beyond the horizon. For the past 15 years, Rabbeh has lived by himself on a gently-sloping hillside in al-Walaja that he has thickened with green vegetation and abundant, hand-planted crops of all kinds of edible produce. A well-built chicken coop is at the top of his land, and calm doves mingle with a dozen constantly clucking hens and a few white rabbits.

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"Don't mess with Mossad".

T-shirts with hard-hitting messages relating to the Israeli spy agency have been selling like hot cakes throughout Israel.

And the agency's official website has reported a "soaring" number of people applying to be agents.

The drastic increase in popularity follows the murder of a Hamas leader in Dubai, in which Mossad has neither confirmed or denied involvement.

Al Jazeera's Sherine Tadros reports from Israel.
Al Jazeera

By Khalid Amayreh

In a much-appreciated effort aimed at highlighting and exposing Israeli racism and terrorism against the Palestinian people, many university campuses around the world are marking Israel’s apartheid week.

Activities include lectures, demonstrations, films and other multi-media events as well as cultural performances and hearing testimonies from human rights activists and Palestinian victims of Israeli apartheid.

Speakers from many countries, especially occupied Palestine, will describe the deepening persecution of Palestinians which in many aspects has surpassed the worst measures ever adopted against the black majority by the defunct South African apartheid regime.

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A photo from an Israeli mapping website shows the Qatamon house where Ghada Karmi grew up. The original house was only the ground floor. The two upper levels, bought by The New York Times in 1984, were built around the late 1970s

Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada,

During an appearance at Vassar College in early February, controversial New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner was asked about the ongoing evictions of Palestinian families from homes in East Jerusalem which Israel occupied in 1967. Israeli courts have ruled that Jewish settlers could take over some Palestinian homes on the grounds that Jews held title to the properties before Israel was established in 1948.

Bronner was concerned, but not only about Palestinians being made homeless in Israel's relentless drive to Judaize their city; he was also worried about properties in his West Jerusalem neighborhood, including the building he lives in, partially owned by The New York Times, that was the home of Palestinians made refugees in 1948. Facts about The New York Times' acquisition of this property are revealed for the first time in this article.

"One of the things that is most worrying not just the Left but a lot of people in Israel about this decision is if the courts in Israel are going to start recognizing property ownership from before the State [of Israel was founded]," Bronner said according to a transcript made by independent reporter Philip Weiss who maintains the blog Mondoweiss.net.

Bronner added, "I think the Palestinians are going to have a fairly big case. I for example live in West Jerusalem. My entire neighborhood was Palestinian before 1948."

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We need to start realizing that Palestine is full of selfless and charismatic heroes.

By Tariq Shadid

Although people in our modern times have been educated to believe that having the 'right' ideas, methods or ideologies is what causes revolutions, history teaches us that drastic changes usually happen when the majority of the people rally behind a certain leader, more than behind an ideology. While Palestinian society continues to be torn apart by factional strife, and people increasingly see each other as adversaries based on differences of opinion or conviction, what they really need is not a new philosophy, but simply a truly charismatic leader.

We may idealize human intellect and enlightenment, but in practice, human social biology usually proves to be stronger than ideology. While most people today believe that their strength lies in the success of their perceived Utopian model of society, and that the ideas of a prominent persona are more important than his personal characteristics, their behavior is often indicative of the opposite. Being herd animals, changes usually happen when the majority of the human herd flocks behind a leader who is perceived as charismatic, strong, sympathetic and courageous.

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The RTP is not a talking shop. Far from it.

By Frank Barat

Today, the first session of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (RTP) will be held in Barcelona. The RTP is a peoples' tribunal focusing not on Israel's obligations under international humanitarian law (IHL) such as the Fourth Geneva Convention, but on the obligations of the international community of signatory states which sustain and enable Israel's continuous violations of international law.

Israel has violated more than 60 UN resolutions and countless legal and diplomatic calls to abide by international law in relation to the expansion of illegal settlements, denial of the right of return and the continuing occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and the Syrian Golan Heights. Dozens of reports, investigations and inquiries have produced evidence of alleged Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity, including massacres, collective punishment, home demolitions and extrajudicial killings on a cyclical scale over the past 62 years.

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Truthdig

Posted on Mar 1, 2010
By Chris Hedges

We owe Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney an apology. They were right about Barack Obama. They were right about the corporate state. They had the courage of their convictions and they stood fast despite wholesale defections and ridicule by liberals and progressives.

Obama lies as cravenly, if not as crudely, as George W. Bush. He promised us that the transfer of $12.8 trillion in taxpayer money to Wall Street would open up credit and lending to the average consumer. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), however, admitted last week that banks have reduced lending at the sharpest pace since 1942. As a senator, Obama promised he would filibuster amendments to the FISA Reform Act that retroactively made legal the wiretapping and monitoring of millions of American citizens without warrant; instead he supported passage of the loathsome legislation. He told us he would withdraw American troops from Iraq, close the detention facility at Guantánamo, end torture, restore civil liberties such as habeas corpus and create new jobs. None of this has happened.

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Pulse

By Jeff Halper

The Israeli attack on Gaza in December 2008/January 2009 was not merely a military assault on a primarily civilian population, impoverished and the victim of occupation and besiegement these past 42 years. It was also part of an ongoing assault on international humanitarian law by a highly coordinated team of Israeli lawyers, military officers, PR people and politicians, led by (no less) a philosopher of ethics. It is an effort coordinated as well with other governments whose political and military leaders are looking for ways to pursue “asymmetrical warfare” against peoples resisting domination and the plundering of their resources and labor without the encumbrances of human rights and current international law. It is a campaign that is making progress and had better be taken seriously by us all.

Since Ariel Sharon was indicted by a Belgian court in 2001 over his involvement in the Sabra and Chatila massacres and Israel faced accusations of war crimes in the wake of its 2002 invasion of the cities of the West Bank, with its high toll in civilian casualties (some 500 people killed, 1,500 wounded, more than 4,000 arrested), hundreds of homes demolished and the urban infrastructure utterly destroyed, Israel has adopted a bold and aggressive strategy: alter international law so that non-state actors caught in a conflict with states and deemed by the states as “non-legitimate actors” (“terrorists,” “insurgents” and “non-state actors,” as well as the civilian population that supports them) can no longer claim protection from invading armies. The urgency of this campaign has been underscored by a series of notable setbacks Israel subsequently incurred at the hands of the UN. In 2004, at the request of the General Assembly, the International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled that Israel’s construction of wall inside Palestinian territory is “contrary to international law” and must be dismantled—a ruling adopted almost unanimously by the General Assembly, with only Israel, the US, Australia and a few Pacific atolls dissenting. In 2006 the UN Commission of Inquiry concluded that “a significant pattern of excessive, indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force by the IDF against Lebanese civilians and civilian objects, failing to distinguish civilians from combatants and civilian objects from military targets.” together with the harsh criticism of the UN’s Goldstone report on Gaza accusing the Israeli government and military again of targeting Palestinian civilians and causing disproportionate destruction, has made this campaign even more urgent.

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Richard Falk, the UN's special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, criticized the bureaucratic process the Goldstone report has been going through.

A United Nations expert warns of efforts to "bury" a report by the world body's fact-finding commission on the Israeli offensive against the Gaza Strip last January.

Ahead of a Friday vote in the UN General Assembly on a proposed extension for Israeli and Palestinian authorities to investigate the Gaza war crimes charges, Richard Falk criticized the bureaucratic process the report has been going through.

"I think its part of the wider effort basically to bury the recommendations of the Goldstone report, unnecessarily delaying the implementation of its recommendations," the UN's special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories told Ma'an news agency.

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The son of Ethan Bronner, NYT's Jerusalem bureau chief, is serving in the Israeli army.

By Jonathan Cook

A recent assignment of mine covering Israel's presumed links to the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh provoked some more thoughts about the New York Times reporter Ethan Bronner. He is the Jerusalem bureau chief who has been at the centre of a controversy since it was revealed last month that his son is serving in the Israeli army. Despite mounting pressure to replace Bronner, the NYT’s editors have so far refused to consider that he might be facing a conflict of interest or that it would be wiser to post him elsewhere.

Last week, when suspicion for the assassination in Dubai started to fall on the Mossad, a newspaper editor emailed to ask if I could ring up my “Israeli security contacts” for fresh leads. It was a reminder that Western correspondents in Israel are expected to have such contacts. The point was underlined later the same day when I spoke with a leftwing Israeli academic to get his take on Mabhouh’s killing. I had turned to this Ashkenazi professor because he counts many veterans of the security services as friends. At the end of the interview, I asked him if he had any suggestions for people in the security services I might speak with. He replied: “Talk to Eitan Bronner. He has excellent contacts.” Naively, I asked how I could reach this expert on the veiled world of the Israeli security establishment. Was he employed at the professor’s university? “No, ring the New York Times bureau,” he responded increduously. Oh, that “Eitan”!

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NABLUS, (PIC)-- Tens of Israeli military vehicles escorted 500 Jewish settlers on an unwelcome visit to the Nabi Yousef or Joseph tomb in Nablus city at dawn Thursday.

The settlers offered prayers and left behind slogans in Hebrew after sabotaging a nearby school, locals reported.

Citizens feared that security militias loyal to Mahmoud Abbas, the former PA chief, had made a secret agreement with the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) to facilitate such visits.

They said that those militias disappeared shortly before arrival of settlers, which point to a certain kind of coordination with the IOA. They also noted that the Ramallah authority did not condemn such visits.

http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/en

Irish Foreign Minister Michael Martin

GAZA, (PIC)-- Irish foreign minister Micheal Martin arrived in Gaza Strip on Thursday on a brief visit during which he is scheduled to visit hospitals, schools and devastated areas.

The crossings department said that the minister, who is heading a 10-member delegation, was received on arrival by officials of the UN office in Gaza.

The minister in a terse statement on arrival noted that his visit to Gaza was the first of its kind across the Rafah crossing and that he wanted to tour Gaza to see for himself what the conditions in the Strip are.

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By Hasan Abu Nimah, The Electronic Intifada, 25 February 2010

The assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a Hamas official in Dubai, almost certainly by a death squad dispatched by Israel's Mossad, is by no means the first such aggression against the sovereignty of another state. While Israel has literally gotten away with murder thousands of times, was this one killing too far?

Israel has a long, bloody history of murder, sabotage and outright terrorism all over Europe, in Beirut, Tunis, Amman, Damascus and now Dubai. And that is just what we know about. All of this is allegedly in "self-defense" against "terrorism" even though the Zionist movement in Palestine invented the sort of modern terrorism for which the Middle East became known. It started with countless Zionist bomb attacks on Palestinian civilians from the 1930s, often in markets and cafes, the bombing of the King David and Semiramis hotels in Jerusalem in the 1940s claiming dozens of innocent lives, and the murder of UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte. These crimes, on top of the long history of massacres of Palestinians, Lebanese and other Arabs over the past six decades, were all worn as badges of honor by Zionist leaders including Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir who later became prime ministers.

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By George S. Hishmeh – Washington

There is increasing doubt in the Arab World and elsewhere that Israel is seriously interested in negotiating peace with its neighbors the Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. That doubt has once again emerged in the wake of its ill-conceived policies and bloody actions of late which Israel mistakenly believes will give it more security and longevity and offers it the chance of usurping additional Palestinian properties.

Every time the Palestinians and the Israelis seem ready to resume peace negotiations Israel takes advantage of the near-calm atmosphere in the region and undertakes some expansionist move that nip in the bud hopes of peaceful co-existence with the Arabs. That happened more than a year ago when it invaded the Gaza Strip while Syria was on the verge of opening peace negotiations with Israel under the auspices of the Turkish government, a long-time ally of the Israeli government led at the time by Ehud Olmert.

Again, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has just completed a colorless first year in office, towed the same line of his discredited predecessor. His only achievement has been in compelling a weak-kneed Barack Obama to abandon his demand for a total freeze on Israeli expansionist policies, a U.S. position conveyed privately to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. As a result, the Palestinian inhabitants of East Jerusalem are now being mercilessly evicted, and some 3,000 apartments in the occupied West Bank are being completed.

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Palestinian Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI)

Open Letter to the International Geographical Union (IGU)

As geographers, faculty, students, and people of conscience, we are profoundly dismayed by IGU’s decision to hold its July 2010 regional conference in Tel Aviv, in violation of the widely endorsed Palestinian civil society call for Boycott, Divestments, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel. We are equally troubled by IGU’s response [1] to the open letter issued by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), which urged the Executive Committee to relocate the upcoming regional conference out of Israel [2].

PACBI’s letter was a compelling reminder that Israel’s academic establishment (and geography in particular) is implicitly and explicitly complicit with the Israeli state’s colonial, discriminatory, and oppressive policies towards Palestinians. As important social institutions they advance, sustain, and provide the intellectual and moral justification for Israeli actions against Palestinian people and their representatives both within Israel and in the occupied Palestinian territories. It is noteworthy that “no Israeli university or academic union has ever taken a public position against the occupation, let alone against Israel‘s system of apartheid or the denial of Palestinian refugee rights.”[3] PACBI underlines the prevailing, and deeply disturbing role of Israeli Universities in developing the very weapons and military doctrines used against Palestinians. Moreover, they highlight the tragic irony of geographers holding a conference about “Bridging Diversity in a Globalizing World” in a country built on urban destruction and gradual ethnic cleansing, a state which defines itself as an exclusively Jewish state, not a state of all its citizens, one that continues to violate human rights with total impunity and stands accused of war crimes for its latest offensive in Gaza [4].

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By not challenging the Israeli foreign minister over the use of fake passports, Europe failed to lead him exactly where he wanted to go.

Europe and the US are more than willing to accuse Iran of developing a nuclear weapons programme with no proof, but hide behind the lack-of-proof excuse to avoid calling out Israel over forging passports and carrying out extra judicial assassinations.

By Marwan Bisharan

When Europe's blood pressure went up over the use of fake European passports in the assassination of Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, Avigdor Lieberman, the Israeli foreign minister, changed his line from ambiguity to deniability. There is no proof of Israeli involvement, he retorted. And that is that.

My guess is that Lieberman had to 'cut the ambiguity' because the government of Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, does not want to further exacerbate tensions with its European allies against the backdrop of continued illegal Jewish settlements and a deadlocked 'peace process'.

But Lieberman, the eccentric former nightclub bouncer, is dying to take responsibility for the assassination of Israel's "enemy combatant" to borrow from the Pentagon's dictionary.

Or, to paraphrase one of Hollywood's epics, A Few Good Men, " ... he's pissed off that he has to hide behind all this ... he wants to say that he made a command decision and that should be the end of it".

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Parents want case to highlight events that led to American activist's death under Israeli army bulldozer

Peace activist Rachel Corrie died while protesting in front of a bulldozer trying to destroy a Palestinian home in Rafah in March 2003. Photograph: Denny Sternstein/AP

By Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem

The family of the American activist Rachel Corrie, who was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer in Gaza seven years ago, is to bring a civil suit over her death against the Israeli defence ministry.

The case, which begins on 10 March in Haifa, northern Israel, is seen by her parents as an opportunity to put on public record the events that led to their daughter's death in March 2003. Four key witnesses – three Britons and an American – who were at the scene in Rafah when Corrie was killed will give evidence, according the family lawyer, Hussein Abu Hussein.

The four were all with the International Solidarity Movement, the activist group to which Corrie belonged. They have since been denied entry to Israel, and the group's offices in Ramallah have been raided several times in recent weeks by the Israeli military.

Now, under apparent US pressure, the Israeli government has agreed to allow them entry so they can testify. Corrie's parents, Cindy and Craig, will also fly to Israel for the hearing.

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Report, The Electronic Intifada, 22 February 2010

A fellow at Harvard University's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Martin Kramer, has called for "the West" to take measures to curb the births of Palestinians, a proposal that appears to meet the international legal definition of a call for genocide.

Kramer, who is also a fellow at the influential Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), made the call early this month in a speech at Israel's Herzliya conference, a video of which is posted on his blog ("Superfluous young men," 7 February 2010). [See video above]

In the speech Kramer rejected common views that Islamist "radicalization" is caused by US policies such as support for Israel, or propping up despotic dictatorships, and stated that it was inherent in the demography of Muslim societies such as Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip. Too many children, he argued, leads to too many "superfluous young men" who then become violent radicals.

Kramer proposed that the number of Palestinian children born in the Gaza Strip should be deliberately curbed, and alleged that this would "happen faster if the West stops providing pro-natal subsidies to Palestinians with refugee status."

Due to the Israeli blockade, the vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza are now dependent on UN food aid. Neither the UN, nor any other agencies, provide Palestinians with specifically "pro-natal subsidies." Kramer appeared to be equating any humanitarian assistance at all with inducement for Palestinians to reproduce.

He added, "Israel's present sanctions on Gaza have a political aim -- undermine the Hamas regime -- but if they also break Gaza's runaway population growth, and there is some evidence that they have, that might begin to crack the culture of martyrdom which demands a constant supply of superfluous young men." This, he claimed, would be treating the issue of Islamic radicalization "at its root."

The 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, created in the wake of the Nazi holocaust, defines genocide to include measures "intended to prevent births within" a specific "national, ethnic, racial or religious group."

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CAIRO — The Zionist Israeli occupation authorities have decided to place two historic mosques in the occupied West Bank on a list of alleged Jewish heritage sites, drawing immediate rebuke from Palestinians and Israelis alike, and setting off clashes in the Palesstinian city of Al Khalil (Hebron).

"This announcement is an act of aggression against the cultural and religious rights of the Palestinian people," Hamdan Taha, director of the Palestinian Tourism Ministry's Antiquities Department, told the independent Maan News Agency on Monday, February 22.

Hawkish Israeli Premier Binyamin Netanyahu announced Sunday, February 21, adding Ibrahimi Mosque in Al-Khalil (Hebron) and Bilal Mosque in Bethlehem to a list of 150 so-called Jewish heritage sites that would be renovated to reconnect Israelis to their history.

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GAZA, (PIC)-- The Movement of Hamas on Monday strongly denounced the Palestinian Authority (PA) for allowing some of its officials to sell Palestinian real estate in occupied Jerusalem to Israelis as treason against the Palestinian people.

Spokesman Fawzi Barhoum added that this treasonable act confers legitimacy on occupation in the Palestinian land and poses a real threat to the holy sites.

Barhoum stressed that this dangerous precedent entails an urgent move to confront those traitors who trade with Palestinian rights and constants.

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A damaged house in Beit Sahour, 2001.

A small piece of Palestinian land, targeted by settlers, highlights the main phenomena in the Israeli occupation.

Posted by Ben White. Feb. 21, 2010

In the Palestinian town of Beit Sahour, famous for its civil disobedience campaign against the Israeli occupation in the 1980s, a new struggle is taking place.

Ush al Ghrab ('Crow's Nest') is a small piece of land being targeted by a group of Jewish settlers and their allies. The area had previously served as a military base, before being evacuated in 2006. Since then, local Palestinians and international NGOs have sought to make the most of the space, in a community whose natural expansion is prohibited by Israeli colonisation. In recent times, right-wing Jewish settlers have targeted the area as a site for a possible new settlement ('Shdema').

Mazin Qumsiyeh is a professor, author, and Beit Sahour resident. He's also taking a lead in local non-violent resistance to the settlers' attempted takeover. "The Bethlehem area is now surrounded by settlements -- to take this area will be finishing off the district." Qumsiyeh's fears are borne out by the statistics: only a fragmented 13 per cent of the Bethlehem district is available for Palestinian use.

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Israel's foreign minister is likely to face tough questioning from his British and Irish counterparts in Brussels over the alleged use of forged European passports by men who murdered a Hamas official in Dubai last month.

Avigdor Lieberman will be in the Belgian capital on Monday as the UAE continues to point the accusing finger at Mossad, Israel's secret service, for deploying the hit squad that killed Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in a Dubai hotel on January 19.

Dubai police say at least 11 suspects in the killing of al-Mabhouh used altered British, Irish, French and German passports.

Britain, Ireland and France have already summoned Israeli diplomats to seek information on possible Israeli involvement.

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Aghanistan government officials say at least 33 civilians have been killed in a Nato attack on a convoy of vehicles in Uruzgan, a province in the country's south.

Nato confirmed that it fired on Sunday on a group of vehicles that it believed contained fighters, only to discover later that women and children were in the cars.

Isaf, Nato's force in Afghanistan, did not provide a figure of how many died.

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Netanyahu

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly authorized the assassination of senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh early January in Tel Aviv.

According to a report published by Times Online Netanyahu held a meeting with Mossad chief Meir Dagan in early January inside the briefing room of the headquarters of the spy agency where "some members of a hit squad" were also present.

Citing Mossad sources, the report said "as the man who gives final authorization for such operations, Netanyahu was briefed on plans to kill Mahmoud al-Mabhouh."

Sources said Mossad had received intelligence that the Hamas commander was planning a Dubai trip and they started preparing for an operation to assassinate him.

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