Khalid Amayreh - An evil state that will disappear one day

Occupied East Jerusalem
30 April, 2008

Just as Israel inaugurated its misbegotten birth with genocidal ethnic cleansing sixty years ago, the evil brat of Zionism is marking its 60th anniversary with yet another spate of bloodletting.

On Sunday, 27 April, the Israeli “Defense” Forces (a more appropriate appellation would be the Jewish Wehrmacht) murdered a mother and her four children in Beit Hanoun, a northern Gaza suburb.

The mother and her kids reportedly were having breakfast when an artillery shell fired from an Israeli Merkava battle-tank hit their home, killing them instantly and mutilating their bodies.

The graphic, blood-splattered images of the mutilated children and their mother raised no eyebrows among Israeli leaders and the Zionist-Jewish public opinion. After all, these Nazi-minded and Nazi-hearted Zionists have been doing this for more than sixty years. And the world seems to be coming to terms with these crimes as a fact of life. This is at least how Israel views world reactions to its crimes against the peoples of the Middle East.

Anyone familiar with the Zionist way of thinking would tell you that whenever a pornographic carnage is committed by the Israeli occupation army, Israeli leaders don’t indulge in soul-searching over the barbarian behavior they engage in. Instead, they just activate their hasbara machine in order to control the resulting public relations damage and help exonerate Israel of any wrong doing before the eyes of the world.

Thus, these evil child killers have told us that their victims were killed not by Israeli artillery shells, but rather by Palestinian explosives! Well, didn’t these wicked liars claim that Muhammed Durra was killed by Palestinian snipers in order to tarnish Israel’s image?

This is of course not the first time the Israeli army murders an entire family in order to inflict “shock and awe” on a people as bent on living and surviving as Israel is bent on killing and murdering. Israel’s history, after all, has been an uninterrupted concatenation of massacres and war crimes. In fact, one would exaggerate very little by saying that Israel itself is a crime against humanity, and for that matter a continuing crime against humanity.

The latest carnage in Gaza didn’t occur in isolation. The entire Gaza Strip has been languishing under a harsh blockade that has much in common with the Nazi blockade of the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland in 1943.

This is a truth that many people in Europe and North America can’t bring themselves to accept, at least openly, because it is not politically correct to do so. Well, does the West need to see a full-fledged holocaust in Palestine in order to cast the holocaust guilt off its shoulders? Must Palestinian children be slaughtered every morning and every evening in order to finally bring about the long-awaited recuperation of Europe from the holocaust complex?

As a result of barring the estimated 1.5 million Gaza inhabitants from accessing food, work, medicine and fuel, the vast bulk of the population has been forced into abject poverty and virtual starvation.

Ill people who can’t find the needed medicine and required medical care in local health facilities, are left to succumb to their illnesses. It is believed that more than 200 innocent Gazan patients have so far died as a direct result of the callous Nazi-like siege.

This happens as Israeli officials appearing on western TV screens keep assuring the mostly nonchalant or morally-apathetic western audiences that under no circumstances would Israel allow a “humanitarian crisis” to develop in Gaza. Well, what, apart from lies, do we expect from Zionism, a Godless, satanic ideology based on murder, theft and mendacity?

What do we expect from a state that sends its crack soldiers to raid and terrorize orphanages and boarding schools in Hebron in the dead of night?

What do we expect from a state that confiscates donated food for orphaned children whose parents had been murdered by the Israeli army…a state that orders its soldiers to raid inventory warehouses and steal shoes, clothes, even underwear, of orphaned children under ten years of age?

What do we expect from a state whose soldiers murder 12-year-old school kids, and then verify the kill by emptying 20 more bullets into the small victim’s body to make sure that the dead or dying little girl or boy doesn’t pose a threat to the security and safety of the heroic soldier?

What do we expect from a state whose army bulldozers crush peace activists to death and then tells the world that “ the bulldozer driver acted in accordance with outstanding instructions and did nothing wrong.”

Obviously, a sate as such is a Nazi state par excellence.

Well, I know that Israel has produced good scientists and built good hospitals and made impressive achievements in science, technology and other fields.
But this doesn’t mean much in moral terms. Nazi Germany, too, produced many good scientists, built many good hospitals and made impressive achievements in science and technology.

Besides, what is the point of inventing advanced electronic devices and then using the technology in murdering and maiming sleeping children and women and other innocent civilians?

Indeed, what is the point of building a prosperous state on a foundation of oppression, mass murder and ethnic cleansing?

Israel may appear modern, vigorous and democratic to much of the outside world. But for us, the Palestinians, Israel is and will always be a murderer, a thief and a liar.

Israel stole our country away from us, ethnically cleansed our people, destroyed our homes, bulldozed our towns and villages, poisoned our water wells lest we return, and then expelled the bulk of our people to the four corners of the globe…these are the very people Israeli leaders and spokespersons now shamelessly call “terrorists.”

Yes, Israel is militarily and economically powerful; it has a huge stockpile of nuclear weapons, and pro-Israeli pressure groups control the American government as well as much of the media and show business in the United States.

So what?

Evil states, like evil people, do not last forever. And Israel will be no exception.

Gilad Atzmon - Anthony Julius and a journey into the dark Zionist world

Anthony Julius is a prominent British lawyer and academic, best known for his actions on behalf of academic Nazi hunter Deborah Lipstadt. It was Julius who perpetrated the destruction of history revisionist David Irving’s career.

However, Anthony Julius is far more than just an academic and a lawyer. He is also a devoted Zionist who has established a reputation for his opposition to ‘new anti-Semitism’. Adding to the list of his accomplishments, he is also a founding member of Engage, the notorious British Zionist smear operator. On top of that he is also founder member of the UK based Neo-con think tank known as the Euston Manifesto.

A few days ago I came across a two part paper named ‘Jewish Anti-Zionism Unravelled: The Morality of Vanity’[1]. Apparently, it is a study made by Anthony Julius. It didn’t take me long to gather that Julius’s text should be read and understood. It must be scrutinised not because it is an important informative text, but because it serves as an invaluable document.

As one may guess, Julius is far from being stupid. He is by far more sophisticated, educated and eloquent than the average Zionist operators we come across on a daily basis. Thus, it is rather depressing to admit that his deconstruction of some large sectors of the Jewish political and ideological left is more than valid. As bizarre as it may sound, in places his criticism of his dissident anti-Zionists brothers and sisters is not far at all from the discomfort expressed rather often by Palestinians and Palestinian solidarity activists concerning Jewish anti-Zionism.

However, it should be mentioned that as much as Julius succeeds in exposing some serious inconsistency as well as a fundamental lack of integrity within the Jewish left discourse, his own study suffers badly due to his own lack of understanding of the intellectual foundation of anti-Zionist debate and the people who happen to carry this emerging discourse forwards.

From Politics to Humanism

The author’s biggest failure lies at the very premise of his study. Initially Julius tries to grasp the shift between the 'modern' and the 'contemporary' Jewish political anti-Zionism assuming that political anti-Zionism is still in place. Julius apparently fails to see the very obvious. Though pre WWII Jewish anti-Zionism had been largely politically orchestrated and ideologically orientated, contemporary anti-Zionism and Jewish anti-Zionism in particular is not at all politically leaning. If Julius would take a deep breath and view the list of 'contemporary' voices he himself had chosen to quote within his study (me included), he would notice that none of them are political activists. Neither Jacqueline Rose nor Tony Judt nor Ilan Pappe nor Oren Ben-Dor, nor Uri Davis nor myself are operating as politicians or within political cells. We all act as humanists, academics and artists. We write, we offer some critical thoughts, we compose music we make films and so forth.

The question that comes to mind is how is it that a prominent lawyer and an intellectual such as Julius fails to recognise such an obvious fact. The explanation is shockingly simple. It is actually called projection. Zionism is a form of blindness and Julius is apparently imbued in it. Julius is doomed to interpret his subject of research while employing his own tribal Judeocentric worldview. Because Zionist Jews operate constantly and solely within politically and racially orientated cells, they tend to believe that their dissident brothers must be operating within very similar settings.

Thus, rather than reading Julius’s study as academic scholarship, at times we should endorse some sceptical approach and take his different insights as a glimpse into the Zionist mindset. Julius’s paper is actually a glance or even a journey into the dark Zionist world.

Tribal vs. Universal

Once we manage to transcend ourselves beyond Julius’s Ziocentric limitations, we are left with a very interesting reading and eloquent exposure of some the fallacy entangled within Jewish anti-Zionism.

“Jewish anti-Zionism,” says Julius, “inaugurates a return for many Jews to some kind of Jewish identity.” But then what does he mean by Jewish identity? Who are the Jews, are they a racial group? Are they a cultural group?

In order to address the issue Julius elaborates and scrutinises the ideological message behind “Independent Jewish Voices” (IJV).

The IJV was launched on February 5 2007 by 150 prominent British Jews such as Nobel laureate Harold Pinter, historian Eric Hobsbawm, lawyer Sir Geoffrey Bindman and others. The organisation was there to refute “the widespread misconception that British Jews speak with one voice - and that this voice supports the Israeli government’s policies.” The IJV was there to shake the hegemony of the Zionist Board of Deputies of British Jews.

Though the IJV attracted a lot of media attention in early February 2007, it died soon after. A quick glance at the IJV website and its news page reveals the embarrassing fact that the IJV last news update happened on February 12 2007, just a week after its bombastic launch. In other words, the IJV is a dead political entity. It was set to create a media impression of Jewish dissidence and Jewish liberal pluralism. But as it seems, as far as the IJV is concerned, its dissidence is rather fictional.

I tend to believe that Julius is fully aware of the fact that the IJV is not active, however for some reason he decided to elaborate on the IJV’s message and its ideological teaching aiming at the exposure of the fallacy within Jewish anti-Zionism.

Julius cited the IJV opening document:

The “Independent Jewish Voices” (IJV) opening statement endeavoured to ‘reclaim the tradition of Jewish support for universal freedoms, human rights and social justice.’ ‘Judaism,’ it continued, “means nothing if it does not mean social justice And Moses’ instruction to Israel was cited, “Justice, justice shall you pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:20).

I assume that there is something both the IJV as well as Anthony Julius prefer to be very secretive about.

First, there is NO “Jewish tradition of universal freedoms”. Indeed, in the cathedra of the history of humanism more than just one Jew occupied a prominent seat. More than just one Jew taught us universalism and brotherhood, whether it was Christ, Spinoza, Marx or Simon Weil. But as sad as it may be, these provocative beings were brutally expelled and ostracised by their brothers.

Second, Moses’ reference to ‘Justice perusing’ (Deuteronomy 16:20) could have established a major ethical argument in favour of Jewish universal tradition. Yet this was the same Moses who just a few chapters earlier vowed to bring his people to the Promised Land where they are allowed to rob and loot the indigenous people. “A land with large, fine cities you did not build, houses filled with choice things you did not accumulate, hewn out cisterns you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves you did not plant – and you eat your fill.” (Deuteronomy: Six 10-11). Seemingly, the IJV’s Moses, who was presented as an icon of universal humanism, is in fact a (very) early Zionist invader as well as the mastermind behind the Israelite collective looting culture.

Anyhow, Julius truly notices that the myth of Jewish universalism and profound ethics is repeated by many of the IJV signatories. “As a Jew,” says one, “I feel a particular duty to oppose the injustice that is done to Palestinians.”

“The anti-Zionist,” says Julius, “is not just a Jew like other Jews; his dissent from normative Zionist loyalties makes him a better Jew. He restores Judaism’s good name; to be a good Jew one has to be an anti-Zionist.”

Though Julius is sharp enough to trace the obvious righteousness within the IJV call, he happens to miss a further severe logical flaw here. When a so-called ‘better’ Jew refers to himself as a ‘Jew’, what is it that he refers to? Is it his racial belonging? Is it biological determinism in play? Is it the ethnic identity or is it again the collective belief in the comforting qualities of chicken soup? It is clear that statements such as: “As a Jew I feel a particular duty” or in general, “as a Jew I feel X, Y or Z” exposes the IJV in a very non-flattering light. It bluntly and foolishly admits a certain level of Jewish dogmatic homogenous collectivism that defies the initial claim of independence.

It is therefore not very surprising that the IJV died a week or two after its launch. Intellectually it couldn’t hold more than a week or two. It failed to bridge the gap between Athens and Jerusalem or rather, between the universal and the tribal. It failed simply because this gap may be unbridgeable. Once a secular Jew insists upon operating as an ‘independent’ humanist, he becomes an ordinary human being leaving behind all traces of tribal particularities and privileges.

Julius continues, “There is the objection (to Zionism) ‘in the name of universalism’. The Jewish anti-Zionist would argue that the national project has debased the Jewish character by making it ordinary.” Seemingly, Julius himself fails to see how deep is the logical absurdity in such a statement. If there is indeed a ‘Jewish Character’ with some cosmopolitan characteristics as opposed to ‘ordinary’ nationalist traits, then gravely, we would have to admit that Jews can never join humanity as equals. Jews can never intermingle with the ‘ordinary’. As bizarre as it may sound, once again we notice that Jewish universalism appears to operate as a maintenance project of Jewish chauvinism and tribalism.

Julius continues, “the Jewish anti-Zionist says ‘Jewish particularism’ of every kind must be rejected; Jews should not cut themselves off from their fellow students, workmates, and neighbours. Jews should seek a ‘Jewishness not sealed behind walls of conviction’, but open to the infinite possibilities of tomorrow.” Again, the absurdity behind such a statement is mind blowing. On the one end it refers to Jews as an ideal lucid homogenous collective, yet in the same breath it insists upon making this collective characterless. The truth of the matter must be said here. As long as Jews regard themselves as a homogenous collective and operate as a collective they happen to install a barrier between themselves and the rest of humanity. False calls for humanism and employment of Marxist jargon can’t and won’t cover it up.

Though I am totally convinced that the majority of the IJV signatures are well meaning and genuine peace lovers, the philosophy they happened to succumb to is rather embarrassingly lame. However, this is not big news. This flaw at the heart of the IJV’s declaration failed in every form of Jewish tribal left thinking for over a century. It is this very basic fault that made ‘Jewish anti-Zionists’ (JAZ), the Bund and IJV look like the ‘Best universalists amongst tribalists’ or alternatively ‘the ultimate tribalists amongst the universalists.’

“In the IJV’s principles,” cites Julius, one of its foundations includes “putting human rights first; repudiating all forms of racism; and giving equal priority to Palestinians and Israelis in their quest for a better future… (these are) principles that unite people of goodwill…group or ethnic loyalty, by contrast, is not a principle - or not a worthy one, at least.” “It must be,” answers Julius with scorn, that it is “Jewish quality to have no qualities at all.” It is very sad to admit, but Julius has a point here. As much as I would prefer to support the well-intentioned IJV agenda, I have to confess that the cosmopolitan attitude expressed above is totally irrelevant and even counter-effective as far as the Palestinian national struggle is concerned. As much as Julius insists upon the right of Jews to celebrate their symptoms as Jews, it is the humanist duty to insist upon a similar right of Palestinians to celebrate their ‘group or ethnic loyalty’. It is rather shocking to admit that Zionist and Palestinian criticism of Jewish anti-Zionism is almost similar.

The Moraliser

At this point, Julius is ready to pour a rain of contempt over his dissident brothers. “These Jewish anti-Zionists claim to speak as the moral conscience of the Jewish people. They no longer assert, as their revolutionary forebears once did…they play the part of scourges of the Jewish State.” ‘The scourge’, explains Julius, is a kind of “moraliser, that is, a public person who prides himself on the ability to discern the good and the evil. The moraliser makes judgments on others, and profits by so doing; he puts himself on the right side of the fence. Moralising provides the moraliser with recognition of his own existence and confirmation of his own value.”

But Julius doesn’t stop just there, he continues, “a moraliser has a good conscience and is satisfied by his own self-righteousness. He is not a self-hater; he is enfolded in self-admiration. He is in step with the best opinion. He holds that the truth is to be arrived at by inverting the “us = good” and “other = bad” binarism.

Julius should have grasped that ‘self-loving’ and ‘binary opposition’ settings are exactly that which set any form of Jewish tribal left within the ever-growing rabbinical tradition. The real meaning of secularism within the Jewish tribal left discourse means the replacement of ‘God-loving’ with ‘self-loving’, The modern Jewish tribal leftist believes in himself. And the binary formula he adopts should be read as Us = kosher / Other = taref.

However, if Julius would spend some time looking in the mirror while contemplating over the issues of ‘binarism’ and ‘self-loving’ he may find out that he is falling into the exact same trap. The Euston neo-conservative think tank he himself founded is intellectually premised on the exact same parameters. It is based on white liberal ‘self-loving’ and ‘binary opposition setting’ in the shape of us/them, kosher/taref, West/the rest.

Once again we notice, that Julius’s study is fuelled by projection. Once again we see that as much as it is interesting to read what Julius has to say, it is far more interesting to ask why he says what he says. Every insight Julius provides us with stands as a revelation concerning the Zionist project and the Zionist mindset.

The Crypto Zionist’s Role

Only in the last part of his study, Julius reveals his true motivation. Apparently the British Zionist academic has some Judeocentric conspiratorial expectations from his fellow dissident brothers. He would like to see them fighting the anti-Semites in the Palestinian solidarity discourse. He would like to see them operating as Sayanim.

The development of his argument is rather interesting.

According to Julius, the Jewish anti-Zionist “wrongly assumes that group loyalty is inconsistent with the ethical life, and that universalist moral foundations cannot sustain a version of nationalism.”

This is indeed reassuring to see that Julius asserts the most radical form of right wing views. Seemingly, the man learned a lot from the revisionist historian he managed to defeat in court. However, the truth must be said. Julius is absolutely correct here. There is NO contradiction between group loyalty and the ethical life. Torah Jews prove it beyond doubt. This is why Torah Jews are far more popular amongst Palestinian solidarity campaigner than any other Jewish collective. Julius is also correct to argue that there is no contradiction between universalist moral foundations and nationalism. Again this insight is no different to the Palestinian critiques of the cosmopolitan Jew. A Palestinian would rightly say: ‘If you are a cosmopolitan Jew who opposes nationalism, how exactly do you plan to support my Palestinian national struggle?’

Julius correctly suggests that anti-Zionist Jews fall into contradiction when they hold that while dispersion is good for the Jews, it is bad for the Palestinians, and when they demand of the Jews that they disavow ‘nationalism,’ while valuing the Palestinians’ “continuing struggle for justice;” Julius obviously hit here on some severe level of lack of integrity within the Jewish left discourse.

In short, it seems as if Julius manages to establish a profound criticism of Jewish anti-Zionism. Seemingly, Jewish anti-Zionism is inconsistent to the bone. Due to the impossibility to bridge the gap between the tribal and the universal, Jewish anti-Zionism is doomed to fall either into inconsistency or lack of integrity.

But here is where Julius comes with some clear suggestions regarding the Jewish role within the left. Trotsky, according to Julius, wasn’t operating as a Jew, yet he could “smell anti-Semitism in others”. But Julius doesn’t stop just there. “Contemporary Jewish anti-Zionists,” he says, “have lost the sense for it.” It is clear beyond doubt that Julius expects his dissident brothers to keep up day and night tracing and fighting the anti-Semites. He expects the Jewish anti-Zionists to operate as Sayanim, people who are motivated to operate as Zionist agents due to Jewish tribal brotherhood.

As funny as it may sound, Anthony Julius describes here the exact role taken by the discredited UK JAZ group who for a while worked day and night fighting, smearing and lobbying against those whom they regard as anti-Semites. Bearing in mind that Julius is a Zionist who calls the anti-Zionists to fight anti-Semitism , it is impossible not to see JAZ (http://azvsas.blogspot.com/) as an integral part of the Zionist plot on the verge of Sayanim.
Julius continues, “Jewish anti-Zionist contributions to anti-Semitically inflected positions taken by non-Jewish anti-Zionists consist of the following: (a) to give cover to the holders of such positions by endorsing them ‘as Jews’ (b) to endorse those positions as true, with the all the authority of an ‘insider’ or ‘expert’.”

It is very clear that as far as Julius is concerned, anti-Zionist Jews are not exactly ordinary human beings. They are primarily Jews and must serve their tribal interests first. At large, Julius’s expectations from his fellow brothers fall short of fulfilment. Not a single prominent Jewish anti-Zionist has ever joined the Zionist hunting expedition. They obviously have far better things to do. Those who were and still are foolish enough to follow Julius’s instructions and become hunters of anti-Semites have managed to marginalise themselves within the anti-Zionist movement beyond repair. If they were acting as double agents at some stage, they are now exposed in a very unflattering light.

The reason is simple. Every genuine anti-Zionist realises that if Israel is the Jewish State and the crimes committed by this State are committed in the name of the Jewish people then we are bound to ask, ‘who are the Jews? What is Judaism? And what is Jewishness?’ There is no alternative than to question the Jewish lobby and the role of Jewish media. These are the parameters of contemporary anti-Zionism, this is what anti-Zionism is all about, and if this is what new anti-Semitism is all about, we have nothing left to admit to the hunters than being anti-Zionists means we are going to be hunted sooner or later.

Interestingly enough, the IJV collapsed because independent, assimilated intellectuals tend to operate independently, they do not and could not succumb to tribal concerns. Prominent independent voices could never operate in an atmosphere of a synagogue. The IJV collapsed because its prominent members were too independent to operate as a fig leaf for the Jewish national project.

Sadly, we would have to admit that as much as the Jewish left is inconsistent to the bone, as much as it loses its way between Athens and Jerusalem, Zionism is unfortunately a success story. It is consistent, it knows exactly where Athens is but it prefers the road to Jerusalem. Zionism is a proud tribal project, it gives a new dynamic contemporary meaning to Jewish existence. Unfortunately this meaning is oppressive and murderous on the verge of genocidal. Since Zionism is a monolithic voice of the Jewish people, the future of anti-Zionist discourse will inevitably address a scope of issues to do with the Jewish question.

As much as I do not agree with Julius’s prime agenda, I tend to agree with many points raised by him. Jewish anti-Zionism is a futile project. It leads nowhere, it is there to make Jews look nice and to dismantle a real debate about Zionism and Jewish nationalism in general. If secular Jews intend to resist Zionism genuinely rather than just gather a momentary sympathy to their cause, then the only way to do it is to join the human family and to act as ordinary people. Such an act would give the French revolution and emancipation a real new meaning.

[1] part one: http://www.z-word.com/z-word-essays/jewish-anti-zionism-unravelled%253A--the-morality-of-vanity-%2528part-1%2529.html
part 2 http://www.z-word.com/z-word-essays/jewish-anti-zionism-unravelled%253A-questioning-antisemitism-%2528part-2%2529.html

Auntie Ziona - here comes trouble!

Anti-Zionist Jews or Jewish Auntie Ziona?... We're starting to see double! Just when you thought the days of being the loudest, proudest Jewish Anti Zionist fighting like mad against any other anti-Zionist (especially if they were Jews) were long gone, a new blog pops up, and its name is hauntingly familiar... Auntie Ziona Against Auntie Simone at http://azvas.blogspot.com/

So who is that "New Kind on Ze Block?" It's a lady in her 60s from Golders Green, London, quite a gezunte Moid who loves tradition so much, she wears the same frocks her mother passed down (but she feels like a yefayfeyeh). From the looks of it, she doesn't pretend to be hip like the Real Cool and Very Hip folks at Jewdass. She doesn't party, much less does she think it's nice to spend money to buy Challa when she can make a ten kilo loaf herself, cut it into daily portions and store it in the freezer because she found out it's kashress. She doesn't claim to read every paper about Jewishness like the Real Intellectual and Very Modern folks at Jews Sans Frontieres. She seems to get all her information from relatives. She does like politics and does imagine she knows who all the bad guys are... those who "should know better", to quote a "famous" Palestinian page on a site. And in this, she is exactly like that tumler of her nephew that helped her set up a blog to look just like his, hoping it would increase his readership from three to ten so that he can get a Leftist Minyan going.

Auntie Ziona has the same obsession that her nephew does of stressing that when he talks, people listen because he is Jewish, she is proud of her tribe and decided to join the Ghetto of the Jewish Blogosphere to get her slice of the action. Also, because if you disagree with anything said, you get called Anti-Semite, and she likes that!

I don't know if I feel like challenging her worldview, but she seems to want comments. She even has polls set up. The woman wants to connect. I don't agree with her, but I hope she has better luck with the Blogger censors than I do. Freedom of speech and all that. So, Mazel Tov, Tante.

Legacy of Riad Hamad

Thanks very much to Colin for forwarding me this material. It tells us more about how important Riad was for his people and how his generosity changed the world for the better. He will live forever in the hearts of those whose lives he has touched.

Dear Friends and Colleagues.

A few months back I sent an email about Riad Hamad. He was the director of the Palestinian Children’s Welfare Fund and the email described how his home had been invaded and searched by the FBI and all his papers, documents and computers had been taken.

On Wednesday his body was found drowned in a Lake in Austin Texas.

Riad was one of the most generous people I have been honored to have known. Thousands of Palestinian children benefited by his work. But I want to focus on the story of a young family from Lebanon who were directly supported by Riad.

When I was living in Beirut I received a phone call from Riad asking if I would visit a family in Saida, south of Beirut for him. He was sure they needed some specific equipment to help look after their two handicapped children. He also wanted me to find out about the schools that would accept the children and how much the fees would be.

I visited the Palestinian family who were supported solely by Riad. (It is not possible for Palestinian refugees to get paid work in more than 72 professions in Lebanon. The father of the family drove a taxi but this provided little enough money to cover food costs.) The family were wonderfully grateful to Riad. We sat with them for a few hours and listened to them speaking about Riad as if he were a father to them all. It was very moving and I remember writing to Riad on my return to thank him for letting me see the direct effects of his generosity. Out of his own pocket by the way.

Thousands of children have lost a dedicated fighter for their cause. As we have lost a strong comrade.

Ahmad and his family have lost their father. I am hoping to raise some funds for Ahmad’s family in the memory of Riad Hamad. I will visit them in the last week of May and give them whatever donations I have managed to raise by then.

It may help them to continue until someone with the means and as generous as Riad can support them again.

Please if you feel you can give anything contact me or Wissam (my friend in Beirut who made all the visits to the family with me and has also put out an appeal in Lebanon in memory of Riad)

UK contact: Eliza Ernshire.
eliza.ernshire@gmail.com
0044 7506174080 (mobile)

Lebanon contact: Wissam Alsaliby
wissam@lb.reser.org
00961 3025832

In Peace,

Eliza Ernshire.

The following is an extract I received from a close friend of Riad’s and apparently one of the last people Riad spoke to:

Riad Hamad, 1952-2008

"Hi, Riad." I knew it was him from the caller ID, even though the phone had never been in his own name.
"Hey, Bolos. How you doin'?" He used the Arabic translation of my name.
"I'm good. How about you?"
"I'm OK." His voice didn't have the usual energy, but perhaps he was in a place where he couldn't speak loudly.
"I sent you a couple of email messages."
"Yes, I saw them." The messages were about my role in helping with his charitable work on behalf of Palestinians. There were a few things I didn't understand about the messages, so Riad cleared them up for me. "Now it makes sense," I said.
"OK. Well, that's all I wanted to tell you." Typical Riad. Always in a hurry to get off the phone.
"Wait, I've got some good news!"
"Oh yeah? What is it?" He sounded surprised.
"We're finally getting donations here. A check for a thousand came in today."
I had set up a nonprofit account to receive donations for Riad's work."Was it from __________?"
"Hang on a second."
"Well, it doesn't matter." Still anxious to get off the phone.
"What do you mean it doesn't matter? I've got the name right here. No, it's from ____________."
"That's nice. Well, gotta go."
"OK. Take care of yourself."
"You, too, Boulos."

Those were apparently Riad's last words, spoken from his car near Ladybird Lake in Austin, Texas. At the time I had thought it slightly odd that Riad was repeating what he had already told me by email. I think he just wanted to hear a familiar voice. The police found the phone and car keys on the seat of the unlocked car. Typical Riad. He was thinking of the person who would find the car.

I wish I had told him that the person who sent the check had also written a letter thanking him for the gifts of handmade Palestinian crafts and other items that Riad had sent as a thank you for a previous donation. He had also included handmade thank you cards from his two young daughters. The older daughter, age 11 had written, "Live in peace on the world. Everybody should LOVE! I am sad because people should be nice to you, but they are not."

The younger, age 8, had written, "I hope you start to live in peace."I would have read them to him over the phone if he hadn't been so anxious to end the conversation, but I decided to send them for him to read later, and enjoy the children's drawings. The father's letter was longer and more specific in his praise for Riad's tireless efforts on behalf of Palestinians and their rights.

"I have included 2 checks for the needs of Palestinian children. It is my hope that you will use it to create hope for those oppressed. As we both see the dollar's value sink, the value of life especially in the eyes of the Creator never loses value. I extend this help to you and these children as if they were my own. We have the misfortune in living in very dark times, but in that darkness hope, love, and peace shine like the sun. To those that plant hope, they shall harvest peace."
Harvest peace, Riad.
SHUKRAN for your work and support
Salamat

Activist Riad Hamad murdered - a letter he wrote to Bush in 2003

For the obituary: Annie's Letters. For a video.

To: George Bush,
President of the United States of America
Washington, DC

I was very amused last week when I was trying to get into my car in the morning on my way to work, when my neighbor across the street came out and asked me if we could talk. Although I was in a hurry since I was late, I listened to him since he said that the topic was important. My neighbor told me that he was approached by the FBI and was asked many questions about me and was asked to put a camera in his house to watch me. The request was denied, as my neighbor, who happened to be a Libertarian, did not trust the motives of the FBI. Also, my neighbor told him that, “Riad is my friend and I would not spy on him.” Apparently, the agent did not give up and told my neighbor that he would call on him again.

Although I knew and expected such activities by the FBI, I was surprised about their lack of professionalism and the absence of decency. I carry my Iraqi flags to every rally and I am always the loudest and the most obvious. Hundreds of people come and ask me about the flags as they do not know which countries the flags stand for, and I have to say, “These are the flags of the countries that your tax money is paying to occupy, kill and maim,” since not many of them knew the colors of the flags of Palestine or Iraq. For the FBI to have to go and knock on my neighbor’s doors is very unprofessional and illegal. Besides, the FBI has been harassing members of the International Solidarity Movement and monitoring their phone calls, e-mails and movements around the nation. I assume this is an effort to harass them, intimidate them, and scare them from going around the United States to expose your lies, and that of your administration, about the real situation in occupied Palestine.

I have lived, went to college, and worked in the United States for over 30 years. I have no criminal record and not even a suspicion of committing a crime, such as your cocaine addiction, drunk driving, and going AWAL during your National Guard duty in Texas. Also, I have never sold shares of a bankrupt company to the pension fund of Bahrain National Oil Company like you did, which is nothing but fraud and insider trading.

I work with a group of individuals around the globe called the Palestine Children’s Welfare Fund in association with the Holy Land Trust out of Bethlehem, Palestine. We bring olive wood and embroidery from Palestine and raise money in the United States for the women and the children of the refugee camps. We are non-political and non-religious, and our donors and supporters are Muslims, Christians, Jews, and others who know better than to believe your message of hatred and aggression. Every penny we receive is accounted for and every penny we spend is accounted for on our Web site that I am sure that you have monitored and observed. Also, we sponsor only civilians who are either orphans or not affiliated with any political or religious groups and their only crime is that they are Palestinians.

As a patriotic citizen of this country, and to make sure that I give you a hand in combating “terrorism,” I have posted a sign near in our neighborhood letting people know that we are under surveillance. And asking our neighbors and the passers by to inform the FBI of any suspicious activities and the sign and the pictures of the house with the sign is on the Web page link.

Over the past weekend, several of our neighbors came by and apologized for your stupidity and that of the FBI and other officials. One of them told me that, “I am ashamed to say that I am an American since George Bush became president.” Others tried to apologize, and I had to remind that I am also ashamed of you and your actions and that of your administration. I have not been outside the United States since you became president, to avoid showing my passport and avoid associating with you and your administration. Besides helping you monitor me by posting the sign near our home, I will help you find some terrorists that I know and I believe that they are threat to the safety and the security of the United States. You do not have to look far to find them and apprehend them, and if you do not soon, WE THE PEOPLE will some day soon. These terrorists are now in Washington and you see them every time you have a cabinet meeting and I am afraid you are one of them.

George,

Get the hell out of my life and take your FBI thugs from our neighborhood because they are not wanted.

Riad Hamad

Riad Esolh a martyr for Palestine. (by Adib S Kawar)

We were greatly shocked and saddened with the news of the murder of Riad Hamad Esolh. Riad's body was found floating in Lady Bird Lake in Austin after he was reported missing since the beginning of the week.

Riad was a dedicated man as chairman of the "Palestinian Child Welfare Foundation", he was helping disabled children in Palestinian refugee camps, and he used to ask for my help to contact these unfortunate children to hand them financial help for medical treatment, education and food. I am sure that these young people and families who had highly appreciated Riad's help and humanity shall be saddened and in tears with the dreadful sad news of Riad's murder. We are sure it is a murder, and not a suicide, for a man who dedicated his life to help the unfortunate to recover from their sickness, complete their schooling, and have enough food so as to live a decent life, even in their retched refugee camps, would not commit suicide. He was helping people to live, then how would he take his own life!!!

What shocked me was to hear that some security agents broke into his house and carried away with them his files and CDs and other things, I didn't know what happened after that, but I was sure that he would be accused of supporting some "terror organizations" or "white washing money"! This is a big joke that Zionists and those who collaborate with them would want to see even disabled Palestinian children helped to overcome the hardships Zionism had brought them.
We call on all those who are in a position to donate to Riad's fund so as his good work will be continued, not to hesitate in doing so. I am sure that with continuing the hard and honest work shall make his soul rest in peace.

Riad comes from a Beiruti and lived in Beirut not far from the Palestinian refugee camps that surround Beirut, which see first hand their hardships, for who he decided extend his help to enable his Arab compatriots practice their Right of Return to their homes and land.
God bless his soul.

A friend that I had never met face to face, but heart to heart.
Adib

Riad Hamad, PCWF, murdered

http://www.myfoxaustin.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=6333239&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=3.2.1

Go to link for news video

Body Found in Lake Lady Bird Is Austin Middle School Teacher
04/17/2008 -- A family spokesperson has confirmed that the body found floating yesterday in Lady Bird Lake is Riad Hamad. He was a teacher at Clint Small Middle School and President of the Austin Chapter of The Palestinian Welfare Fund. Police have not stated how he might have died.

See Video
Grief counselors on hand at AISD middle school
11:19 AM CDT on Thursday, April 17, 2008
KVUE News Staff reports
http://www.kvue.com/news/local/stories/041708kvueAISDteacher-cb.7215ba7a.html?npc#

Grief counselors were called to an Austin ISD middle school Tuesday.
AISD officials confirm that counselors are on hand at Clint Small Middle School on Monterey Oaks Boulevard in Southwest Austin.

AISD officials would not comment on the reason counselors were called to the school, but parents told KVUE News that they were informed Thursday morning a teacher had been killed. They also told KVUE the teacher is Riad Hamad who was the technology teacher at the school.

Parents said they did not know if a letter had been sent home about the teacher.

KVUE News questioned AISD officials about the information, but officials said they could not say anything more than counselors were at the school.

Body found in Lady Bird Lake (04/16)
Austin police investigators Thursday said a body found near Festival Beach in Lady Bird Lake is that of an Austin ISD teacher reported missing earlier this week.

Riad Hamad was the technology teacher at Clint Small Middle School on Monterey Oaks Boulevard in Southwest Austin.

APD Sgt. Joseph Chacon said they have not ruled out foul play, but they believe that Hamad, who is a peaceful activist for Palestinian causes, may have committed suicide. They do not believe his activism was related to his death.

Police say Hamad was seen walking from his car to the shoreline of Lady Bird Lake alone just before he was reported missing. Family members said Hamad was dealing with intense pressure and had been experiencing suicidal thoughts. His vehicle was found on the south shoreline.

In a statement to the media, representatives said his family and friends are devastated by their loss. They said Hamad had been an AISD educator for 10 years and that he was pursuing a graduate level degree in educational technology.

"He was a peace activist who worked tirelessly on behalf of those less fortunate than him and was loved and admired by many members of the local, as well as international community," the statement said.
Police are asking anyone who saw him to call them with information.

A student told KVUE News the principal of Clint Small Middle School announced Thursday morning that Hamad had been found dead. Grief counselors were on hand to talk to students.

Israeli "settler" in Italy's Parliament

By Meron Rapoport

Almost 50,000 people live in Jerusalem's Gilo neighborhood, one of the largest in Israel. Up until now, it had no representative in parliament. As of this week, it does. Fiamma Nirenstein, a neighborhood resident for 10 years, was just elected to the Italian parliament. If we stick to the definitions of the UN, which views Gilo, on the capital's southern edge, as a settlement, one could say that Nirenstein is the first settler to be a member of a non-Israeli parliament.

This week, in a series of phone calls to Rome, between the first reports of a close victory for the right-wing coalition, to which Nirenstein belongs, and the final reports of Silvio Berlusconi's sweeping victory, Nirenstein explained several times that she has not requested Israeli citizenship but that this bureaucratic fact does not affect her identity. "I feel as though I made aliyah," says Nirenstein in a conversation that fluctuates between Hebrew and Italian.

In the elections, Nirenstein did not hide her Israeliness. Her campaign was centered on the view that Israel is Western democracy's vanguard in the struggle against world terror. "I ran for a place in parliament as a representative of the Liguria district. I held rallies in Genoa and other cities in the region," she recounts. "But I didn't talk with the people about local problems. I told them that the most important thing for their Italian identity is to stand by Israel's side." Nirenstein called her most recent book "Israele Siamo Noi" ("Israel Is Us"). By "us," she was referring, of course, to Italians.

Even though Italy hasn't experienced much in the way of terror attacks and the number of Muslim immigrants there is small compared with other countries in Europe, the talk about the importance of the fight against Islamic terror, or simply of how to deal with Islam in general, is very much present in contemporary Italian discourse. Oriana Fallaci devoted the last years of her life to writing books in which she forthrightly pegged Islam as the source of all the world's evil. Berlusconi himself, the unquestioned leader of the Italian right for more than a decade, explained at one of his appearances a few days ago: "We must be conscious of the superiority of our culture, which gave prosperity to people in countries that adopted it and ensures respect for human rights and religion. This respect certainly does not exist in the Islamic countries."

Perhaps this is the reason why Berlusconi and Gianfranco Fini, Berlusconi's partner and the former head of the neo-fascist party, proposed that Nirenstein join their joint list, Il Partito della Liberta ("The Party of Liberty").

Nirenstein's father arrived in Italy during World War II, as a soldier in the Jewish Brigade. In Florence, he met her mother, who fought as a partisan against the fascist government and later against the Nazi regime. "I was born as a communist," she says. In her youth she was part of the 1968 generation, founded the first feminist journal in Italy and worked at leftist newspapers.

After the 1967 Six-Day War, a rift began to develop between her and her "communist comrades," who saw Israel as an occupying country. "I was confused for a long time," she says. "In 1982, I signed a petition against the First Lebanon War. Today I wouldn't sign it. What did Israel gain from the withdrawal from Lebanon?"

To the right of Netanyahu

Her first visit to Israel was as a reporter, and it was only after this initial visit that she returned in 1992 for the long term. For two years, she ran the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Tel Aviv, and after the Rabin assassination, she decided she had to stay in Israel. "I had the feeling that this was the most interesting place in the world, and I also felt that the reporting on Israel was biased." She did not obtain Israeli citizenship because she thought an Israeli passport would hinder her in her work, but aside from that, she also thinks that "every Jew in the world is an Israeli even if he's not aware of it. Anyone who doesn't know it is making a big mistake."

In terms of the reality of Israel's current political system, Nirenstein is located to the right of Kadima and Labor, and maybe even of Likud Chair Benjamin Netanyahu. She says she believes in the idea of two states for two peoples, but thinks the principle of "territories for peace" has been a failure. There's no point in discussing it, she explains, until the entire Arab world is capable of recognizing Israel. Negotiations with Hamas are absolutely out of the question.

But there are polls which indicate that a majority of Israelis are prepared to negotiate with Hamas.

Nirenstein: "The public supports a compromise with Hamas, so that it will stop firing on Sderot. But morally speaking, there mustn't be negotiations with Hamas, which thinks that Jews are the sons of monkeys and pigs. You can't negotiate with cannibals, who eat human beings."

It's hard to argue with Nirenstein. Not just because of the poor quality of the phone connection to Rome, but also because she thinks that Israel is a beacon that should serve as inspiration for the entire West. "Israel is the vanguard of all the democracies in the world, and the time has come for Europe to recognize that," she says.

But in the election campaign you met with Italians who barely know where Israel is. How did you persuade them that Israel is important to their lives?

"I said that Italy can learn a lot from Israel. It can learn what a true democracy is, how a democracy can survive in conditions of conflict, without forsaking its fundamental principles. Israel is a culture of life, a culture of people who are always seeking peace. Our problem in Italy is that sometimes we don't know who we are. You can know who you are if you know your enemy and your friend. Israel is Italy's friend."

In other words, Islam is the enemy?

"I'm not saying that all Muslims are terrorists, or that all Muslims are criminals. But Hamas has announced that it wants to conquer Rome, to make it the outpost from which it will conquer all of Europe."

And you think that Hamas really intends to conquer Rome?

"Rome is a very symbolic place in the eyes of radical Islam. Italy, with its Catholic culture, is an enemy in the eyes of Islam."

Obviously, this all touches on one of the central issues in Italy's recent election campaign: the immigrant issue. Fini, who is slated to be appointed parliament speaker in Berlusconi's new administration, frequently talks about the need to ban illegal immigration. Even the moderate Social-Democractic party, led by the former mayor of Rome, Walter Veltroni, devoted a good amount of attention to the subject.

"People feel that immigration is threatening their cities, their culture," Nirenstein explains. "Maybe it's exaggerated, but the residents of Florence, for example, think of their city as a temple for the works of art that were created there. When they see the steps of the Duomo filled with immigrants, they're in shock."

I lived in Florence. I remember Italy as a tolerant country.

"It's changed a lot. There are entire quarters that you can't enter at night. There's rape, there are assaults, there's drug dealing. There are schools for immigrants where they don't hang the crucifix. The immigrants have contempt for our culture. We gave them work and they scorn our values. There's a deep contradiction between the more radical Islam and Italy's values.

"The problem is that there is hardly any moderate Islam in Italy. Just the opposite. In Rome they built an enormous mosque. There are a lot of mosques in Italy, and very anti-Western madrasas operate in them. There's polygamy, there's wife-battering - it's very common. There's a father who killed his daughter for 'family honor.' It's logical that Italians would notice and that there would be reactions."

The straight-armed salute

In Nirenstein's books, you don't find the aggressive anti-Muslim sentiment that screams from every page of Fallaci's books. But while she isn't part of the wave of opposition to immigrants and Muslims that is sweeping Italy, she does belong to the new right that scored an impressive election victory this week. It seems that there is no such thing as a right way to be "right" in all of Europe: Berlusconi, the avowed capitalist and most avid pro-American in Europe, on the one hand, the Lega Nord (Northern League) with its wild incitement on the other, and then Fini and his former neo-facist party. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy almost seem like communists in comparison to this bunch.

Nirenstein does not "completely" accept this definition. To her, Berlusconi is a centrist who also received votes from the left, because he's "for the downtrodden" and wants to lessen their tax burden. Nirenstein sees herself as "a friend of the Northern League," which just wants to turn Italy into a federal state. She feels this is a legitimate ambition, even if some of the League's pronouncements are "unpleasant."

Her closeness to the former neo-fascist party caused Nirenstein some discomfort during the election campaign, particularly after one of Berlusconi's candidates for the Senate, Giuseppe Ciarrapico, proudly announced that he was and remains a fascist. According to Nirenstein, his candidacy "does not fit" with her candidacy as an avowed anti-fascist, a Jew and the daughter of a partisan, but she remained on the list nevertheless. "There's no such thing as a perfect list," she says.

Did you encounter people like Ciarrapico during the election campaign?

"At one of the election rallies I attended, in Genoa, someone gave the straight-armed salute. I went to the Allianza Nationale [the new name of the former neo- fascist party] people and asked who it was. I said that I protested, that I was stunned to see such a thing and that I did not want to see it again."

But Fini himself used to do the straight-armed salute at rallies in the 1960s, when everyone knew where fascism had led to.

"I don't know if Fini did that salute, maybe he did it in his youth. But I don't know what more he could have done than to kneel at Yad Vashem. Is he supposed to kill himself?"

He may not have been able to do more. But how did you, as a Jew, the daughter of a partisan, feel alongside a man who supported fascism as an adult?

"He was a fascist like I was a communist, when I was indifferent to what Pol Pot did, when I admired Che Guevara. I see him as someone who has since developed."

Post-election Italy, says Nirenstein, is a better place, a more stable place, a place without a radical left and a radical right. She doesn't know yet what she'll do in the new parliament. Nirenstein would like to deal with foreign affairs, but she knows she'll have to pay a price: For now she'll remain in Rome and bid good-bye to her good friends in Israel. She's not giving up the house in Gilo, though. It will wait for the return of the parliament member from Rome.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/976069.html

Mary Rizzo - "No We Can't", the collapse of the Italian left

Something totally unexpected happened in Italy last night. It officially became American. In a country that boasted hundreds of parties (too many, for sure) and political factions, our parliament has eliminated all elements of the left from the Parliament, including parties that existed from the founding moments of our Republic, and parties that, elsewhere in Europe, govern nations as large as Spain and Great Britain. There are no more Communists in the Parliament. Socialists are gone too. The Greens have faded to black. What we have is the stew of a party that copies in slogan and in fact the US Democratic Party. “Si può fare” was the slogan… “Yes we can”. Never catering to any kind of difficult analysis but being all smiles and handshakes, installing the idea of ‘change’ (but if they had governed for the past two years, what change were they asking us to believe in?) rather than in recognising that Italy is a country on the verge of collapse and if we don’t fix things quick, we are going to feel it painfully.

And, I’m not surprised the self-styled ‘radical’ left was excluded by the vote. They had no imagination to go beyond inserting their politicians here and there, making sure that they maintained their positions, without ever raising a self-critical voice to the positions they had adopted during the two-year reign in power, including allowing US colonisation in this country, from the enormous extension of the Dal Molin US military base to the ‘mission’ in Lebanon and the refinancing of the Afghan war effort. They succeeded in raising hospital costs and sticking the Union demands in a public offer to salvage Alitalia from certain bankruptcy and loss of jobs, all in the name of ‘protecting the National company’, as if we really need a national airline! They addressed a class that does not even exist, catering to the enormous category of State employees, taking advantage of social conflict between aspects of the disenfranchised, promising everything to everybody, from a minimum wage to a moveable salary scale that they can’t finance, to increase in pension funds. They certainly did not extend a cent towards the financing of my area of work, which is art conservation, because they believe they can get a lot of the work in ‘free training’ of college students. Unfair competition is what it is called, while they see it as the band-aid that is the only way Italy resolves its problems. They did not face the ecological and social disaster of waste disposal, and true to form, if there is anything that needs doing, from putting out the forest fires that are now the leitmotif of our summers and the feeding of the poor or aid to immigrants, it is all passed off to the enormous league of the millions of unpaid volunteers, which has always been something Italy excels in, having this solidarity resource that covers up all the holes that otherwise would send our beautiful country to the bottom of a pit, never to crawl back up.

There was more than enough to criticise them for, and they did not bother to look into this, therefore, losing millions of votes and consensus from their base. They never bothered to ask themselves what their base thought. From Parlato, the editor of the major leftwing newspaper, who supports the Israeli place of honour at the Turin book festival to Turco, the Health Minister, who let certain categories such as dentists run a totally free market service with no limit or no alternative provided by the State, to Bersani, the Economic Development Minister, with his new laws on selling property, which will do nothing but line the pockets of the ‘approved’ companies that inspect to update ‘standards’ and will freeze a real estate market that is already on its knees. The resolution of the conflict of interest in the mass media was not even on the agenda, and rather, we got the national outlets that stopped any kind of criticism of anyone. Everyone was democratic, every party got its 2 minute blurb on the news which was to state that the other parties were not right. A half hour of The Family Feud every evening would turn anyone’s stomachs, as there was no space remaining to honestly state that “we are mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it any more!” No, all of it became political salons and bla bla bla. And what is worse, the people most committed to social change abandoned the scene faster than anyone else.

I have always loved the fact that Italy had an enormous amount of major left parties and newspapers. Yet, in the two years the left was in power, it lost all sense of self-critique, and developed an idolisation of itself based on the assumption that people would trust that the politicians knew best. We stopped trusting a while back, as they betrayed us one day after the other. I am of course unhappy about the complete absence in my country of a formal institutional representation of the left. I am of course unhappy of the prospect of another Berlusconi term, and I am terrified of the implications on the foreign policy. I am unhappy that there was no internal mechanism of the left leaning parties that adjusted them to the sentiments of the people who are completely fed up with the governing left and miserable with the right. The minimum common denominator brought us the misery, and to be honest, it is not causing me pain as it did seven years ago. The failure of the system as a whole is the earthquake that perhaps we need to rebuild.
Mary Rizzo

I translate an article by a Christian Social group, from their newpaper “La Rocca”
THE GRIMACE - Raniero La Valle for n. 9 of Rocca (rocca@cittadella.org)

The blitz was a success. The Democratic party lost, but the left has been completely excluded from the Parliament. The operation in which an entire political area of the nation has been thrown out of the Parliament, for reasons of its proposals and even its name, is a classic operation that smells of regime, that as a matter of fact, not even Fascism, during its parliamentary phase, was able to do. Certainly the forced and litigious cohabitation within the Prodi coalition needed to be amended, but not through the massacre of political forces. The “incomplete democracy” of the “First Republic” meant that the Communist left would be excluded from government, which only provoked a lengthy torment and the aggregation outside the institutions of fringe groups active outside the parliament. The “simplified democracy” of the Pannellian and Veltronian two-party philosophy means that the left as a whole is pushed into the zone outside the institutions. And that is how we’ve ended up with the armed party, and now the risk is that the social, economic and cultural issues that are no longer admitted into parliamentary mediation will be shifted to other spheres of struggle, in the best of hypotheses to marches and demonstrations and in the worst to the casseurs that we saw in the Parisian peripheries.

This result is the outcome, without a doubt, of the total lack of realism of a left that has accepted to let itself be labelled as ‘radical’, ‘antagonist’ and ‘maximalist’, echoing those very terms in their own newspapers, and it even forgot that there can be no left in Italy if it does not in some measure also assume the culture and the political passion of a non-clerical Christianity. Yet, all of that would not have been enough to produce the results of 14 April, that is rather the effect, completely artificial (and therefore undemocratic), of three joint factors.

The first is that the electoral law established that there would be a limit of 4% of total votes at the lower representative branch and 8% at the Senate, in order to enter into Parliament, in a system that did not have as its goal to destroy the minor parties, but to force them to make coalitions with the major ones in order to overcome, together, the requested percentage restrictions. It is therefore the case that with the same electoral law of the precedent legislature, as much as it has been criticised, had each party represented within the Parliament.

The second factor is that the same electoral law hands out the premium of a minimum amount of 340 lower house representatives to assign to the winning list (and for the Senate, a regional premium), igniting in this way a heavy burden on the Parliament and seriously conditioning the electoral position of the parties, but at least the law dictated that the awarding of the premium would go to a coalition, not to a single party.

The third factor is that Veltroni, without waiting that this system was changed by democratic means, stripped it of its very nature, using the system against all logic and against the residual democratic character of the system, casting to the sea the coalition and praising his own self for being able to have shoved the allied parties out the door, from the Socialists to the Greens to Renewed Communists, while Berlusconi pretended to do the very same with his allies, however, keeping Fini (National Alliance and Northern League) close to his breast.

The result is that Berlusconi, ‘the old’, has won and Veltroni, ‘the new’ has lost, the Northern League is preparing to impose the breaking of constitutional equality between the North and South of the nation, Casini (Centre Union, Catholic party), saves himself a ‘forget me not’ position of a party that once was a recognisable Catholic presence and the left, uselessly united, abandons the Parliament, loses the public financing of their parties, will have a hard time keeping their headquarters and newspapers and even Vespa (television news conductor that praised bipolarism) today seems to show regret and even Fini laments that a lower house where these forces are not present is an ‘anomaly’. And, it is the height of absurdity that in this collapse, the losers are declaring victory, a victory of having set the foundations of an Anglo-Saxon and two-party system in Italy.

In reality, what has fallen in this earthquake is the illusion of a non-political Italy, where the problems that are pressing on us and the severe conflict of interests in a social sphere and in those of needs, can be resolved or ignored in the molasses of good manners. Faced head on with the winds of anti-politics, faced with the idiocy of the Ferrara’s (Abortion, No Thanks! Party) and the Jiminy Cricket Party, face to face with the accusation against the entire political ‘caste’, the winners were those who did the most ‘politics’, not whoever had taken refuge outside political games. Berlusconi played politics, because it is the maximum of politics to accuse all the others of being Communists; Veltroni didn’t even use the name of his adversary, maybe thinking that it wasn’t necessary to fight him, but to exorcise him. And in an Italy where we still have to fight for our right to bread, work, housing, health, he promised the ‘right to smile’, which we might interpret as sending the homeless and those with no job security to the dentist. Unfortunately, the smiles, on the night of 14 April, of millions of Italians have turned into a grimace, one of worry and pain.
Raniero La Valle

Kahlid Amayreh - Shame on Arab Petrodollars

Occupied East Jerusalem, 15 April, 2008

Is Arab oil more precious than Arab blood? This is a question that many Palestinians are asking these days in light of the oil-rich Arab states’ reluctance to help the Palestinians withstand the most ferocious onslaught ever being waged by Zionism against the Palestinian people’s very existence.

Today, four Arab states, (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and Qatar) produce nearly 20 million barrels of crude oil per day. Translated into dollars, these four states alone make more than $2 billion dollars per day, or $60 billion a month, nearly $720 billion a year.

Now how much of this colossal amount of money goes to prop up Palestinian steadfastness in the face of diabolical Zionism, which seeks to occupy, enslave and probably annihilate Arabs and Muslims in the Middle East and beyond?

How much of it is used to enable the 1.5 million Gazans to overcome Israel’s continuing Nazi-like blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has already killed and mutilated thousands and reduced the entire coastal enclave into a huge concentration camp?

How much of this money goes to help Palestinian college students stay in their country and not leave because they don’t have sufficient financial means to pay for their education at Palestinian colleges and universities?

The Arab Sheikhs, Emirs and Kings won’t have to sacrifice much of their oil and gas revenue for the sake of Palestine and its suffering people.

A day’s revenue of Arab oil and gas can solve all the Palestinian people’s financial problems. It can enable Palestinian authorities to pay for the salaries of all civil servants and help poor college students continue their education for an entire year. It can also serve to subsidize basic consumer products such as bread, sugar and cooking oil, especially for the most impoverished segments of society.

Needless to say, a sincere effort on the part of these rich Arab states would enable Palestinians to put up the most effective resistance to Israel’s ethnic cleansing designs without having to worry about providing a loaf of bread for one’s kids at the end of the day.

It would also save a lot of Palestinian blood since many Palestinians, desperately struggling to feed their children, often risk their lives by crossing into Israel in order to find work.

More to the point, a meaningful Arab solidarity with the Palestinians in their enduring plight would make it more difficult for the genocidal terrorist Israeli state to blackmail the hopelessly weak Palestinian Authority in Ramallah into surrendering to Israeli dictates and perpetuating the national rift between Fatah and Hamas.

This writer knows of many college students who had to quit college because they can’t pay their tuition. We are talking about intelligent young men and women who want to stay put in their ancestral homeland in order to consolidate and perpetuate Arab-Islamic presence in this land.

But in order to do so, they need a real helping hand from their supposed Arab and Muslim brothers, many of them are at a loss as to what to do with the billions of dollars they have amassed.

What value do Arab billions have if they can’t help preserve the Al-Aqsa Mosque from Israel’s nefarious designs?

What value do these billions or trillions of dollars have if they can’t shield a Palestinian child in Rafah or Khan Younis from the real specter of starvation, imposed by a Nazi state constantly emboldened by Arab betrayal of the struggling Palestinians who are made to pay in blood the price of Arab-Muslim weakness and subservience to an evil empire called the United States?

What value does Arab money have if they can’t develop a potent media machine to counter Zionist lies, propaganda and hasbara against Islam, Muslims, the Palestinians and the Arabs?

To be sure, the oil-rich Arab states can do a lot to help the Palestinians who are at the forefront of a historical confrontation against Zionist expansionism and regional hegemony.

The Saudis, for example, can easily resolve the nagging salary problem; the Kuwaitis can build three or four modern hospitals in Gaza and the West Bank, which would help save the lives of thousands of Palestinians who die of preventable illnesses and treatable injuries inflicted by Zionist terrorists.

The UAE can cover the college expenses of a few thousand university students in Gaza and the West Bank. Qatar, which has good open relations with Israel, can use its connections to help the Palestinians have their own power-generating plants. Qatar, probably in cooperation with other states, can pay Egypt to provide regular fuel and electricity supplies to the Gaza Strip, thus enabling the tormented Gazans to free themselves from constant Israeli blackmail.

And the four states combined can donate to Egypt the 1.5 billion dollars which the US uses to emasculate the collective will of 80 million Egyptians.

So, why can’t these rulers do it? Do they believe that their billions are more important than the blood and lives of Palestinian children? Or more sacred than Arab-Islamic dignity? Shame on them if they do.

Do they think that the Almighty will forgive them for betraying the Palestinians? They will die sooner or later and will be brought into account by the Lord of the Universe.

Perhaps the real problem has more to do with their inability and less with their willingness and inclination. But this is no excuse at all. In fact, it is an excuse that is more obscene than a sin, because then surrendering the national will to a foreign master borders on national and religious apostasy.

The Palestinian people may forgive these rich Arabs for their clarion failure to fight Zionism, the common enemy of Arabs and Muslims, for reasons known to everyone.

But the rich Arabs can never be forgiven for accepting enslavement by the evil American empire and for squandering their billions on trivialities and excessively lavish lifestyles while Arab children are starving to death in the Gaza Strip.

Shame on you. God will not forgive you, and history will not be kind to you.

Trust betrayed - Brides on Tour Tragedy

Italian artists Pippa Bacca and Silvia Moro decided to make an artistic statement about trust. They wanted to travel by autostop (hitchhiking) from Milano to Syria. They would do it dressed as brides. This was first of all to attract attention locally to those who were on the road, but also because the bride represents an idea of future and hope, and generally, in most cultures, especially our Mediterranean one, the bride is considered to be a vessel of purity and is respected.

Along the way, they wanted local women to add an embroidered element to their gowns, and after all of this was done, it would serve as a testimony of the meeting of cultures and communication between people. Most of all, they had decided that they would need to let go of fear and trust that others would carry them safely. It was to express a message that almost is difficult to articulate without sounding too Pollyanna.

The dream was shattered into pieces on Friday, as it was discovered that one of the women was raped, assassinated, stripped of her clothing and buried in a shallow grave by one of the persons who gave her a ride.

When I first heard of this artistic endeavour, I wasn't too keen on it. Especially because the radio speaker said they were to go as far as Tel Aviv. I later discovered they would go to Beirut and Damascus. I really hate it when there is a trend to call anything involving Israel for "peace". This is what happens here, as if there is some automatic connection of the two. Those of us who are not disinformed know how it is, but most people think Israel is fighting for peace in a hostile world, and this kind of propaganda is damaging mostly because it is a lie. But when I learned more about the trip, I thought it was very symbolic and intriguing.

Then, I heard that the two women had a disagreement and split. They decided to meet up in Ankara. Also, this was odd. If they are supposed to be a vehicle for dialogue, they themselves should be the first example, and not a lesser consideration, there is safety in numbers.

No one knows what lies in store, especially "on the road" and in a totally vulnerable position as is a hitchhiker. Who knows where you will be taken, who is driving you? Does that person deserve trust just because you want to give trust?

The unfortunate Pippa Bacca was assassinated while trying to demonstrate that trust was a beautiful thing. Her the conclusion to this propostion expressed as art was instead a demonstration that her thesis was wrong. Not because this happened in a foreign country, the same thing could and does happen on any street in any town you can name. There are sick and violent people everywhere and there are also those whose trust is more angelic than human.

Palestine is not a nation! Palestinians are part of the Arab Nation

by Adib S. Kawar

As a student of political science who had been involved in the protection of the interests of his nation all his life, I would like to clarify few points regarding the definition of what is a nation, a people or a political entity.

There is a vast difference between a people or a nation with a special inherited characteristics and political entities that quite often had been created by colonialist powers and invaders.

The Arab nation had developed through out long centuries to reach its present formation and characteristics.

The Arab nation's homeland had been the target of innumerable invasions by colonialist powers, and several political entities that were established on it's soil, or parts of it to serve the occupying power's interests, but with the expulsion of the colonizers the entity in question ceased to exist, but the indigenous people continued to exist and remained the same, Arab. Many a time a part or parts of a homeland were settled on a small or large scale, but they failed to change the character and ethnicity of its indigenous people. The so-called Crusaders colonized a large part of the Arab land but they failed to become its people. The Crusaders' occupation lasted for two full centuries, but at the end they had to pack up and return home after being defeated and expelled by Arab resistance.

Some remnants of the invading crusaders that settled in our land, for one reason or another were left behind and are still living in it, and were assimilated into its people, but although there are still families of Crusader's origin still carrying there old imported names, but they now consider themselves as part of the indigenous Arab people whose the Arab homeland is theirs. After thousands of years of movement of tribes and people settling among the indigenous population in other people's land and getting assimilated in them during in the history of the human race there is nothing called pure blood, but after centuries of development settlers in foreign lands become a part of its people if they chose to become so.

Central Asian tribes swept our part of the world and the Ottoman Empire was established on most of the land that formed the Byzantine Empire, namely the Arab homeland and beyond in Eastern Europe, but failed to change the ethnic characteristic of the land and its people. Eastern European peoples got liberated and mostly their national states were re-established on their national land. This also applies to the Arab homeland that was colonized by Ottoman Turks, who failed to enforce the Turkish nationality (meaning ethnicity) on their colonized subjects although they fell under the yolk Ottoman Turkish colonialism for 500 years of occupation Arabs were still Arabs and not Turks.

Before the dismantling of the Ottoman Empire western colonialism represented by the two victorious colonialist powers in WW II, France and Great Britain, were preparing themselves to inherit the Arab territories of the dying empire. They met and divided among themselves the Arab Fertile Crescent, and split it into small political entities that were not large enough to be strong enough to protect themselves, but still the nationality of these created states is still Arab. The Arab Fertile Crescent was divided into six states: Starting from east to west they established what is known now as Kuwait, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Trans Jordan and Palestine. Non of these as well as other parts of the Arab homeland, the Arabian Peninsula and all through North Africa, Egypt and Sudan up to Morocco had abandoned their Arab nationality in spite of decades of continuous colonialism, settling by colonialists and even as was the case with Algeria which was annexed by France and Libya that Italian colonialism called it the fourth shore of Italy, and still there are some Spanish controlled enclaves on the shores of Morocco, non of these Arab states abandoned their Arab nationality although they form independent political entities whether colonized or free.

Zionist propaganda among many other baseless justifications for colonizing Arab Palestine declared that, there was nothing called "Palestinian Nationalism" or a "Palestinian state". This is true, but this is a truth that is aimed to create a void. Palestine is not a whole nation, it is a part of the Arab homeland and Palestinians are a part of the Arab nation. Zionism adopted this justification to legalize their colonization of this Arab land, meaning that there are no legal owners of this land even though they exist(!!!); so a land without a people for a people without a land. Zionists tend to forget that there is no land on the surface of the earth without an owner even though very thinly populated. On the other hand and as per colonialist philosophy the white man is superior; so he has the right to invade other's land, annihilate its people, settle it and colonize it. A Zionist theorist said the "barbarian" peoples of this world are not fit to exist, so they have to give way to establish "democracies", like his saying "hadn't Red Indians been annihilated the great American democracy would never had been established". Does annihilation make democracy?

Colonialism of which is Zionism aimed at applying the theory of divide and rule. Colonialism splintered the Arab homeland into small state-lets that are not self-sufficient, and with the new colonialist/Zionist project to further splinter it as per their new colonialist project of the neo or greater Middle East, to eliminate its Arabic character and thus be the controlling power in it. Even the loose League of Arab States (note it is states and not nations) is not acceptable, simply for its name includes the word "Arab". The colonialist/Zionist coalition wants to be replaced with a more splintered organization in which they want to include in it the Zionist entity and Turkey, but not Iran as long as it is ant-Zionist and anti-colonialist. But had it been under the Shah it would have been more then welcomed because the Shah was an American puppet, thus against the interests of his people and other peoples of the targeted region. All of this is because they want to eliminate any thing that is called Arab nationalism. Arab nationalism threatens the existence of the Zionist entity. Arab nationalism is the only protection for the Arab nation's unity and liberty.

Do you believe in magic?

The other day, I posted a picture of Charlton Heston on this blog. The very next day, he met his maker.
Here's a picture of Olmert and Bush. Just for the heck of it.
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