Coming
in September
From AK Press
Featuring Essays by:
Edward Said, Robert Fisk, Michael Neumann, Shahid Alam, Alexander
Cockburn, Uri Avnery, Bill and Kathy Christison and More
Recent
Stories
August
5, 2003
Edward
Said
Orientallism: 25 Years Later
Website
of the Day
National Prayer Day
August 4, 2003
Bruce
K. Gagnon
Another Peace Activist Detained by
Airport Cops: My Story
David
Lindorff
Fear-Mongering About Social Security
Mark
Zepezauer
George F. Will: Descent into Self-Parody
James
Plummer
Tracking You Through the Mail
Mickey
Z.
Marriage Insecurity from Sharon to Bush
Bruce
Jackson
News that Isn't News: How the NYT's
Pimps for the White House
August
2 / 3, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
Meet the Real WMD Fabricator: Rolf
Ekeus
Tamara
R. Piety
Nike's Full Court Press Breaks Down
Francis
Boyle
My Alma Mater, the University of Chicago, is a Moral Cesspool
David
Vest
Sons of Paleface: Pictures from Death's Other Side
Neve Gordon
Nightlife in Jerusalem
Uri
Avnery
Their Master's Voice:
Bush, Blair and Intelligence Snafus
Robert
Fisk
Paternalistic Democracy for Iraq
Jerry
Kroth
Israel, Yellowcake and the Media
Noah Leavitt
What's Driving the Liberian Bloodbath: Is the US Obligated to
Intervene?
Saul
Landau
The Film Industry: Business and Ideology
Ron Jacobs
One Big Prison Yard: the Meaning of George Jackson
Thomas
Croft
In the Deep, Deep Rough: Reflections on Augusta
Amadi Ajamu
Def Sham: Russell Simmons New Black Leader?
Poets'
Basement
Vega, Witherup, Albert and Fleming
August
1, 2003
Joanne
Mariner
Stopping Prison Rape
Alex Coolman
Who Moved My Soap: Trivializing
Prison Rape
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Stan Goff
Injury and Decorum: The Missing Wounded in Iraq
Wayne
Madsen
Europe Unplugs from the Matrix
Robert
Fisk
Wolfowitz the Censor
Elaine
Cassel
Ashcroft Loses Big in Puerto Rico
Website
of the Day
Stop Prisoner Rape
July
31, 2003
Ray
McGovern
The Prostitution of Intelligence
Brian
Cloughley
Wolfowitz's Operative Statement
Sheldon
Hull
The RIAA's Jihad:
The Devil's Music (Industry)
Elaine
Cassel
The Next Time You Crack a Lawyer Joke, Think of These Attorneys
Sheldon
Rampton
and John Stauber
True Lies: Propaganda and Bush's
Wars
Hammond
Guthrie
Speculation Blues
Website
of the Day
Army of One?
July
30, 2003
David
Lindorff
Poindexter the Terror Bookie
Marjorie
Cohn
Why Iraq and Afghanistan? It's About
the Oil
Elaine
Cassel
How Ashcroft Coerces Guilty Pleas
in Terror Cases
Zvi
Bar'el
The Hidden Costs of the Iraq War
Lisa Walsh
Thomas
Killing Mustafa Hussein: Death of a Child, Birth of a Legend?
Sean
Carter
Pat Robertson's Prayer Jihad: God, Sodomy and the Supremes
ND Jayaprakash
India and Ariel Sharon
Steve
Perry
Bush's Top 40 Lies
Standard
Schaefer
Correction about Bloomberg and Outscourcing
Website
of the Day
Bring Them Home Now!
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
July
29, 2003
Jeffrey
St. Clair
"Journalist Spotted! Journalist
Dead!" Guatemala Bleeds; US Press Yawns
Thomas
J. Nagy
The Belligerent Dr. Pipes
Kurt Nimmo
Tom Delay Goes to Jerusalem
Chris
Floyd
Dead Reckoning: Bush Warriors Sign Off on War Crimes
Robert
Fisk
Another Botched Raid; Another Massacre
Jason Leopold
Did Chalabi Help Write Bush's State of the Union Address?
Conn Hallinan
Food Bully: Bush's Biotech Shock and Awe Campaign
Dan
Bacher
Sacramento's War on Free Speech
Ray
McGovern
Cheney Chicanery
Website
of the Day
Julie Hilden Caught on Tape
July 26 / 27, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
NYT's Screws Up Again; Uday and
Qusay Deaths Bad for Bush; Gen. Hitchens at the Front
Gary
Leupp
Faith-Based Intelligence
Saul Landau
A Report from Syria
Stan
Goff
Bring 'Em On Home, Now!
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Book Cooking at Boeing
Andrew
Cockburn
The Sons Are Dead; Now the Blood Feud
Begins
Jason Leopold
CIA Points the Finger at the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans
Robert
Fisk
The Power of Death
Joanne
Mariner
Monsieur Moussaoui
Standard
Schaefer
Joblessness and the Invisible Hand
M. Shahid
Alam
The Global Economy Since 1800: a Short History
Harry
Browne
Northern Ireland: the Other Faltering Peace Process
Fidel Castro
Moncada, 50 Years Later
Lula
Democracy Requires Social Justice
Edward
S. Herman
Refuting Brad DeLong's Smear Job on Noam Chomsky
Ron Jacobs
Guided by a Great Feeling of Love: a Review of Gordon's The Company
You Keep
Julie
Hilden
A Photographer, an Offer and Cameron Diaz's Topless Photos
Adam Engel
Man Talk
Poets'
Basement
Keeney, Witherup, Short, Nimba, Guthrie and Albert
Hot Stories
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
August
7, 2003
A Trilogy of Dysfunction
When
the Bully Whines
By
HANAN ASHRAWI
Whenever hard line Israelis and their American
apologists decide to discredit and discount Palestinian suffering
while exonerating the abuses and oppressive measures of the Israeli
occupation, the first charge levied against Palestinian spokespersons
is that of "whining."
How often have Palestinians seen Israeli
and American officials alike sigh in obvious exasperation, roll
their eyes in sheer ennui, and indulge in an obvious stage whisper:
"The Palestinians are whining again."
Hence the people under occupation are
not only supposed to "grin and bear it," but also made
to feel guilty and undeserving for seeking to give voice to their
suffering.
The opposite, however, is true of the
Israeli occupation.
As Israeli tanks roll through Palestinian
villages, towns, and refugee camps; as Apache gunships shell
homes and assassinate their human targets; as Palestinian land
is stolen and Israeli settlements are expanding; as Israeli prisons
swell with abducted Palestinians and the apartheid wall turns
all Palestinian areas into prisons and isolation cells; Sharon
whines incessantly.
He pleads "self-defense" and
runs to Washington with more demands: Iran after Iraq, Syria
(and Libya, if possible) at any time, the Palestinian factions
at all times, and more money, more settlements, more walls, more
facts on the ground.
When Sharon complains of Palestinian
violence ("terrorism"), it is presented as an act of
will and gratuitous cruelty, entirely unprovoked and totally
unrelated to the fact and brutal policies of the Israeli occupation.
When he addresses the requirements of
the Roadmap, Israeli "security" becomes the sole objective
and rationale of any initiative, while conditionality and forced
sequencing are imposed on the Palestinians who are constantly
on probation, constantly made to demonstrate "good behavior,"
and constantly denied as worthy of any form of "security"
or even human consideration.
Yet nobody tells Sharon to "stop
whining," and nobody rolls his/her eyes in exasperation
and exclaims in disgust: "here we go again!"
On the contrary, even with the American
presidency trying to maintain minimal compliance with the Roadmap,
some "holier than thou" American voices rush to Israel
and attempt to outdo Sharon and his extremists.
The Fifth Horseman
of the Apocalypse
Armed with more zeal than common sense,
with more messianic fervor than political wisdom, with more millenarianism
than moral values, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay gallops to
Israel on his high horse and threatens more fire and brimstone
should any Israeli dare to contemplate pursuing the path of peace
and reconciliation.
Heaven forbid! The only roadmap recognized
by born-again Christians and other heirs to the absolute truth
and divine dictates is the Old Testament and in the Book of Revelations
and other apocalyptic texts.
Palestinians (be they Christian, Muslim,
Jewish, atheists, or agnostics) are dispensable since they stand
in the way of the fulfillment of the prophecies.
Peace, however devoutly wished for or
sought by both Israelis and Palestinians, is not to be condoned
since it does not meet the requirements of Armageddon and other
doomsday scenarios.
Such a spirit of generosity_a willingness
to sacrifice the lives of countless Palestinians and Israelis
for the sake of a unique brand of Christian fundamentalism_is
one we can do without.
The most appropriate joint Palestinian-Israeli
response to the fanaticism of DeLay and his ilk is in a greater
commitment to a just peace and the requirements of inclusion
and tolerance.
Palestine has always been a pluralistic
land with a multiplicity of faiths and cultures and yet with
an authenticity of identity that never denied the other.
The solution to the Palestinian-Israeli
conflict must emanate from a spirit of tolerance and sharing,
not one of blind hatred and exclusion.
The doctrinal dictates of extremist evangelicals
and their brand of apocalyptic solutions do not belong to the
three monotheistic religions that saw the light in this part
of the world.
Rampant Racism
Exclusion and a unique type of racism
were recently exhibited by the Israeli Knesset in its mad drive
to create a "Palestinian-free" society in Israel.
The Bill preventing Palestinians who
marry Israeli citizens (mainly Arabs) from acquiring Israeli
citizenship or permanent residency was passed by a majority of
53 votes to 25.
The tragic humanitarian consequences
of such legislation would tear apart whole families and lead
to tremendous hardships of displacement and loss of domicile.
More significantly, the mentality of
racism and outright discrimination (the law does not apply to
Israelis who marry non-Palestinians) is quite ominous for Israel
as a state and for future relations between the two states: Israel
and Palestine.
Along with the snaking path of the apartheid
wall, the sinister plans of Effie Eitam, the Israeli minister
of housing from the National Religious Party, to increase settlements
in East Jerusalem and achieve a "demographic" shift
in the occupied city complete the racist circle.
Had these phenomena taken place elsewhere,
and had the "marriage bill" been passed by any other
country to exclude a specific minority, the world would have
been in an uproar.
It is time that Israel is treated like
any other state, made subject to a global rule of law, and its
actions scrutinized for such outrageous policies and practices.
Weekend Edition Features for August 2/3, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
Meet the Real WMD Fabricator: Rolf
Ekeus
Tamara
R. Piety
Nike's Full Court Press Breaks Down
Francis
Boyle
My Alma Mater, the University of Chicago, is a Moral Cesspool
David
Vest
Sons of Paleface: Pictures from Death's Other Side
Neve Gordon
Nightlife in Jerusalem
Uri
Avnery
Their Master's Voice:
Bush, Blair and Intelligence Snafus
Robert
Fisk
Paternalistic Democracy for Iraq
Jerry
Kroth
Israel, Yellowcake and the Media
Noah Leavitt
What's Driving the Liberian Bloodbath: Is the US Obligated to
Intervene?
Saul
Landau
The Film Industry: Business and Ideology
Ron Jacobs
One Big Prison Yard: the Meaning of George Jackson
Thomas
Croft
In the Deep, Deep Rough: Reflections on Augusta
Amadi Ajamu
Def Sham: Russell Simmons New Black Leader?
Poets'
Basement
Vega, Witherup, Albert and Fleming
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