Does Israel’s Zionist Project Require the Destruction of Palestine?

Interview with Gregory Harms

Global Research
Kourosh Ziabari

American journalist and scholar Gregory Harms believes that the recent 8-day Israeli war on the Gaza Strip might have been waged to distract public attention from the internal socioeconomic crises and problems the Israeli regime faces, especially ahead of the January 2013 legislative elections. He believes that launching airstrikes on Gaza may serve to give Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud party a secure vote in the upcoming elections.

“[P]ushing the Gaza button focuses Israelis on matters of security. The population in Israel is highly manipulated and taught to be fearful… Israel’s isolation is bad for the country and its people; it cultivates a very unhealthy national psychology. As a result – and quite similar to Americans – the public is easily turned around. When things are too calm, the people begin focusing on domestic issues and the economy. This has been a serious issue in Israel, with massive protesting occurring over housing costs and income disparity. Israel’s economy is better than most, but there are serious grievances, and when the Arab Spring took hold of North Africa and the Arab Middle East, its effects were felt in Jerusalem, Haifa, and Tel Aviv,” he said in a recent interview with me after the announcement of ceasefire between Hamas and Israel on November 21.

Gregory Harms is an independent scholar specializing in U.S. foreign policy and the Middle East. He lectures, keeps a blog on Facebook, and publishes articles on CounterPunch, Truthout, and Mondoweiss. Harms has traveled throughout Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, and has been interviewed on BBC Radio.

His first book “The Palestine-Israel Conflict: A Basic Introduction,” 3rd ed. (Pluto Press, 2012) is brief and general summary of the history of Israeli-Palestinian conflict since the establishment of the Israeli regime in 1948.

I conducted an interview with Gregory Harms a few days after the conclusion of the Operation Pillar of Defense which claimed the lives of at least 170 Palestinians and caused serious damages to the infrastructure and civilian buildings in the besieged Gaza Strip. Following is the text of the interview.

Kourosh Ziabari: Ceasefire has now been declared between Hamas and Israel, but through the eight-day attacks and air-strikes of Israel against the Gaza Strip, some 180 Palestinians, many of whom innocent civilians, have been killed. Why do you think Israel renewed its assaults on Gaza?

Gregory Harms: The question of why is a matter of speculation; but we can make some reasonable guesses. It’s hard to imagine that the upcoming January elections in Israel are not a factor. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is likely looking to focus the country on security issues as well as consolidate Likud’s coalition in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. He and Likud are the expected victors, but the elections are too near for this not to be a consideration.

Another possible factor is Hamas’s increased regional prestige. Because of the new leadership in Cairo under President Mohamed Morsi, the strong presence of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egyptian politics, and Hamas’s severing of ties with its former sponsor in Damascus, relations between Hamas and Cairo have progressed. Hamas’s growing ties with Qatar and Turkey also signal the Islamist organization’s increased status. Israel’s strategic take on this is difficult to discern, but if this development did factor in the recent violence, it is Tel Aviv acting on its longstanding impulse of using the military first. One possible benefit, from Israel’s perspective, is that now that Morsi and company have played a key role in achieving a truce, Gaza has been pushed closer to Egypt. For Tel Aviv, the best-case scenario is that Gaza becomes Cairo’s problem altogether, as it was before 1967.

Iran could very well be a possible motive. If Tel Aviv plans on attacking Tehran’s nuclear facilities anytime soon, it will want Hamas’s weapon supplies diminished. If this is indeed a rationale, it raises the question of Hizballah’s caches and preparedness in Lebanon. Whether Iran is a factor is difficult to say. The Obama White House has to-date shown no interest in direct armed intervention in Iran, which in turn makes a unilateral Israeli operation an unpopular notion among the majority of Israelis. Furthermore, Iran is a very large country that can fight back, automatically making it a less likely candidate for US-Israeli action.

There is also the fast-approaching bid on the part of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas to seek nonmember observer-state status for Palestine at the United Nations. By roughing up Gaza, there might be a hope of getting the Palestinian Authority to shift course. Israel’s foreign ministry has already talked of removing Abbas from power in the event the PA makes headway at the UN General Assembly – which is almost guaranteed. As stated in a foreign ministry paper, quoted in the Guardian (Nov. 14),

Gaza and the Politics of “Greater Israel”

Global Research
Nile Bowie

“The Bible finds no worse image than this of the man from the desert. And why? Because he has no respect for any law. Because in the desert he can do as he pleases. The tendency towards conflict is in the essence of the Arab. He is an enemy by essence. His personality won’t allow him any compromise or agreement. It doesn’t matter what kind of resistance he will meet, what price he will pay. His existence is one of perpetual war. Israel’s must be the same. The two states solution doesn’t exist; there are no two people here. There is a Jewish people and an Arab population... there is no Palestinian people, so you don’t create a state for an imaginary nation... they only call themselves a people in order to fight the Jews.” [1]- Benjamin Netanyahu

The Israeli bombardment of Gaza being perpetuated under ‘Operation Pillar of Defense’ comes at an interesting time. Under the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak, the expansion of illegal Jewish settlements into Palestinian lands has increased at unprecedented rates. Netanyahu’s administration has approved the construction of 850 settler homes in the occupied West Bank in June 2012, even after the Israeli parliament rejected a bill to retroactively legalize some of the existing homes in the area. [2] The number of Jewish settlers in the West Bank has almost doubled in the past 12 years, with more than 350,000 residing illegally under international law. [3] While Israel’s Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman asserts Tel Aviv’s unwillingness to permit Palestinians any right to return to their lands, emphasizing, “not even one refugee,” apartheid enforced on ethnic and religious lines has become a ratified part of Israeli government policy. [4] Far-right political discourse that was once considered extremism is now the status quo in Israel.

While Netanyahu publically announced support for a Palestinian state on the West Bank, his government has threaten to end the Oslo Accords if the United Nations General Assembly granted Palestine with non-member observer state status. [5] A panel of Israeli jurists assembled by Netanyahu’s government to determine the legal status of the West Bank concluded that there is “no occupation” of Palestinian lands and that the continued construction of settlement outposts are entirely legal under Israeli law, despite critical international opinion. Netanyahu’s far right-conservative Likud party was established on the philosophy of Ze’ev Jabotinksy, who called for the establishment of a ‘Greater Israel,’ a concept embraced by Israeli historian Benzion Netanyahu, the father of today’s Prime Minister. Under his fathers influence, Benjamin Netanyahu was indoctrinated in the ideological foundations of Revisionist Zionism, which promote Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria (Palestine) and the full biblical land of Israel by contemporary Jews, an oil rich landmass extending from the banks of the Nile River in Egypt to the shores of the Euphrates.

As rocket fire hits Tel Aviv for the first time since the Gulf War, the ongoing siege of Gaza must be seen as what it is – a premeditated component of Israeli expansionism. Netanyahu was a zealous supporter of former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s 2008-2009 sieges on Gaza known as ‘Operation Cast Lead,’ which killed over 1,400 Palestinians, while Israel suffered only 13 causalities. [6] On November 14, 2012, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) launched an offensive into the Hamas-controlled Gaza strip and began announcing their progress through an official Twitter account. IDF forces assassinated a prominent Hamas military commander, Ahmed Jabari, who was allegedly in possession of a draft copy of a permanent truce agreement with Israel. [7] The agreement included mechanisms for maintaining the cease-fire in the case of future military exchanges between Israel and the Hamas-led political factions of the Gaza Strip. Militants from the armed wing of Hamas in Gaza retaliated by firing rockets into Israeli territory, a large percentage of which were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system.

Benjamin Netanyahu used this retaliation to claim the moral high ground by warning that he will take “whatever action is necessary” to stop further rocket fire from Gaza into Israel. [8] IDF officials have called on 30,000 reservists to prepare for a possible extended ground incursion into Gaza, as IDF forces indiscriminately kill civilians attempting to strike Palestinian aerial and naval targets. [9] The Obama administration has condemned Hamas for perpetuating violence, while Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood government led by Mohamed Morsi recalled Egypt’s ambassador from Tel Aviv. Egyptian Prime Minister Hesham Kandil arrived in Gaza after the second day of Israeli attacks in a show of support for Palestine. Through ‘Operation Pillar of Defense,’ Israel is targeting the military foundations of Hamas, while attempting to portray itself as a victim in the international media. IDF forces dropped thousands of Orwellian leaflets over Gaza, urging citizens to take responsibility for their own safety, due to Hamas “once again dragging the region to violence and bloodshed.” [10]

Despite Israel targeting the elected Hamas government of Gaza, an article in the Wall Street Journal titled, “How Israel Helped to Spawn Hamas,” cites a former Israeli official who claims that Israel encouraged the formation of Islamist groups to counterbalance secular nationalists affiliated with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The Israeli government even officially recognized a precursor to Hamas called Mujama Al-Islamiya as a charity group, allowing it to build mosques and an Islamic university. [11] Israel cooperated with the influential Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was opposed to secular Palestinian activists, as he spearheaded the Sunni Islamist movement that became Hamas. In late October 2012, Gaza’s Hamas government received Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar, for an official visit. As part of an aid development package, Al-Thani granted Hamas $400 million, at least $150 million of which will go towards a housing project in southern Gaza – it would be reasonable to assume that large portions of that aid would be invested in defense. [12]

The support given to Hamas by Qatar must be understood through the context of its engagement in Syria. The New York Times articled titled, “Rebel Arms Flow Is Said to Benefit Jihadists in Syria,” states that the arms being shipped to Syria by Saudi Arabia and Qatar are being used to bolster jihadists and al-Qaeda affiliated groups attempting to topple the government of Bashar al-Assad. [13] Qatar has held numerous meetings of US-backed Syrian opposition leaders and hosts a critical American military air base at Al-Udeid, west of the capital, Doha. Qatar has also allowed the establishment of a Brooking Institute center on its territory. Brookings’ Saban Center for Middle East Policy published “Saving Syria: Assessing Options for Regime Change” in March 2012, and the directives described in the report have ostensibly become the policy of allied Western and Gulf countries aiming to topple the Syrian government. The Saban Center that published the report was established in 2002 when Israeli-American mogul Haim Saban pledged nearly $13 million to the Brookings Institution in an attempt to influence pro-Israeli policy. [14]

Despite paying lip service to the Palestinian cause, Qatar is supporting policy engineered to give Israel a pretext to consolidate its power. Both Qatar and Saudi Arabia have cooperated with the United States and Israel by exporting the Salafist ideology that is so prominent among radical rebel fighters in Hamas and the Free Syrian Army, and using their enormous oil wealth to fund and arm these movements. An unapologetic Op-Ed written by Israeli columnist Guy Bechor titled, “Dangers of a Palestinian state,” bemoans the possibility of an independent Palestine, in fear of the nation becoming a hub for extremist violence:

“A sovereign Palestinian state will immediately absorb 700,000 Palestinians who are living in terrible conditions in Syria, another 750,000 Palestinians who currently live in Lebanon and hundreds of thousands of others who will flock to the new state from all over, because to them the West Bank and Israel are America – just ask the African infiltrators. Due to the ‘Arab Spring,’ Syria and Lebanon would gladly kick the Palestinians out, and the Palestinian state would welcome them with open arms in order to change the demographic reality on the ground. Qatar and Saudi Arabia would fund the entire exodus.

The Invasion of Gaza: Part of a Broader US-NATO-Israel Military Agenda. Towards a Scenario of Military Escalation?

Global Research
Michel Chossoduvsky

On November 14,  Hamas military commander Ahmed Jabari was murdered in a Israeli missile attack. In a bitter irony,  barely a few hours before the attack, Hamas received  the draft proposal of a permanent truce agreement with Israel.

“Hours before Hamas strongman Ahmed Jabari was assassinated, he received the draft of a permanent truce agreement with Israel, which included mechanisms for maintaining the cease-fire in the case of a flare-up between Israel and the factions in the Gaza Strip.”(Haaretz, November 15, 2012)

The targeted assassination  of  Ahmed Jabari was followed by an extensive bombing campaign under Operation Pillar of Cloud.  The latter consists of a carefully planned military endeavor.

F-16 fighter planes, Apache helicopters and unmanned drones were deployed. Israeli naval forces deployed along the Gaza shoreline were  involved in extensive shelling of civilian targets.

Israel’s defense minister Ehud Barack has confirmed a scenario of military escalation, blaming Palestine for having committed acts of aggression:

 “[t]he provocations we have suffered and the firing of rockets to the southern settlements within Israel have forced us to take this action. I want to make clear that Israeli citizens will not suffer such actions. The targets are to hit the rockets and to harm the organization of Hamas.”

The Israeli attacks were followed by the firing of dozens of rockets by Hamas against Israel.

Palestine’s response was known to Israeli war planners. The resulting Israeli civilian casualties are now being used to justify military escalation on humanitarian grounds.
What we are dealing with is a carefully planned operation, a clear act of provocation. The deaths of Israeli civilians (envisaged and foreseen by IDF military planners) are being used to muster the support of the Israeli  public.

Meanwhile, the Israeli attack is casually portrayed by the Western media as part of a legitimate counter-terrorism agenda.

The Obama administration is blaming the victims of Israeli atrocities. The victims are portrayed as “terrorists”.  According to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney:

“Hamas [is] a U.S.-designated terror group, which governs the Gaza strip, that is instigating the violence. … Attacking Israel on a near daily basis does nothing to help Palestinians in Gaza or to move the Palestinian people any close to achieving self-determination.” (ABC News, November 15, 2012)

A scenario of military escalation has already been announced. Reports confirm that Israeli is contemplating a ground war, including an invasion of Gaza:

There are also reports that Israel may be preparing for a ground operation as it moves troops near the border. A ground incursion by Israel into Gaza could signal the beginning of an all-out war. (Ibid)

The Broader Middle East War

The attack on Gaza must be understood in relation to the broader Middle East war. The Israeli attack was approved by president Obama. It  has a direct bearing on US-NATO-Israeli war plans pertaining to Lebanon, Syria and Iran.

The timing is of utmost significance: one week following the US presidential elections.
Operation Pillar of Cloud is a deliberate act of provocation, intended to lead to military escalation.

The Israeli public is firmly opposed to a broader Middle East war including the conduct of Israeli surgical strikes directed against Iran’s  nuclear facilities.

Is the attack on Gaza  a trigger mechanism which could lead the World into a broader Middle East war?

We are not dealing with an isolated event. The invasion of Gaza is part of the broader US-NATO-Israel military agenda.

Back-flash to December 2008. Operation Cast Lead

It is also important to understand Israeli’s current plans to invade Gaza in relation to the December 2008 bombing and ground invasion of Gaza under Operation Cast Lead.  (See below)

Michel Chossudovsky, November 15, 2012
________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Invasion of Gaza: “Operation Cast Lead”, Part of a Broader Israeli Military-Intelligence Agenda

by Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, January 4, 2009
The aerial bombings and the ongoing ground invasion of Gaza by Israeli ground forces must be analysed in a historical context. Operation “Cast Lead” is a carefully planned undertaking, which is part of a broader military-intelligence agenda first formulated by the government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 2001:

“Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas.”(Barak Ravid, Operation “Cast Lead”: Israeli Air Force strike followed months of planning, Haaretz, December 27, 2008)

It was Israel which broke the truce on the day of the US presidential elections, November 4:

“Israel used this distraction to break the ceasefire between itself and Hamas by bombing the Gaza strip.  Israel claimed this violation of the ceasefire was to prevent Hamas from digging tunnels into Israeli territory.
The very next day, Israel launched a terrorizing siege of Gaza, cutting off food, fuel, medical supplies and other necessities in an attempt to “subdue” the Palestinians while at the same time engaging in armed incursions.
In response, Hamas and others in Gaza again resorted to firing crude, homemade, and mainly inaccurate rockets into Israel.  During the past seven years, these rockets have been responsible for the deaths of 17 Israelis.  Over the same time span, Israeli Blitzkrieg assaults have killed thousands of Palestinians, drawing worldwide protest but falling on deaf ears at the UN.” (Shamus Cooke, The Massacre in Palestine and the Threat of a Wider War, Global Research, December 2008)

Planned Humanitarian Disaster

On December 8, US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte was in Tel Aviv for discussions with his Israeli counterparts including the director of Mossad, Meir Dagan.
“Operation Cast Lead” was initiated two days day after Christmas. It was coupled with a carefully designed international Public Relations campaign under the auspices of Israel’s Foreign Ministry.

Hamas’ military targets are not the main objective. Operation “Cast Lead” is intended, quite deliberately, to trigger civilian casualities.

What we are dealing with is a “planned humanitarian disaster” in Gaza in a densly populated urban area. (See map below)

The longer term objective of this plan, as formulated by Israeli policy makers, is the expulsion of Palestinians from Palestinian lands:

“Terrorize the civilian population, assuring maximal destruction of property and cultural resources… The daily life of the Palestinians must be rendered unbearable: They should be locked up in cities and towns, prevented from exercising normal economic life, cut off from workplaces, schools and hospitals, This will encourage emigration and weaken the resistance to future expulsions” Ur Shlonsky, quoted by Ghali Hassan, Gaza: The World’s Largest Prison, Global Research, 2005)

“Operation Justified Vengeance”

A turning point has been reached. Operation “Cast Lead” is part of the broader military-intelligence operation initiated at the outset of the Ariel Sharon government in 2001. It was under Sharon’s “Operation Justified Vengeance” that  F-16 fighter planes were initially used to bomb Palestinian cities.

“Operation Justified Vengeance” was presented in July 2001 to the Israeli government of Ariel Sharon by IDF chief of staff Shaul Mofaz, under the title “The Destruction of the Palestinian Authority and Disarmament of All Armed Forces”.

“A contingency plan, codenamed Operation Justified Vengeance, was drawn up last June [2001] to reoccupy all of the West Bank and possibly the Gaza Strip at a likely cost of “hundreds” of Israeli casualties.” (Washington Times, 19 March 2002).

According to Jane’s ‘Foreign Report’ (July 12, 2001) the Israeli army under Sharon had updated its plans for an “all-out assault to smash the Palestinian authority, force out leader Yasser Arafat and kill or detain its army”.

Decision bombing? Israel's 'election attack' triggers Gaza war spiral

Russia Today

A Palestinian youth walks amid destruction following an Israeli air strike
on a residential neighbourhood in Gaza City in the
early hours of November 15, 2012.

Israel is bombarding Gaza for a second day, with 13 Palestinians killed, including four children, and over 100 injured. The attack’s timing is under question with a looming Israeli election, as is the precision of airstrikes which kill civilians.

­Israel’s military operation started on Wednesday with a strike killing Hamas military leader Ahmed Jabari. Since then, reports say, the IDF has struck around 200 targets in Gaza. Furthermore, Israel is threatening to go as far as initiating a ground operation, sparking fears of a repetition of the Cast Lead scenario.

The Israeli Defense Force (IDF), which has engaged in a Twitter showdown since the very beginning of the strikes, said it targets only “terror sites”. However, this has been questioned by witnesses on social media who point out that only four people of the 13 so far killed by Israeli airstrikes were Hamas militants, while the rest were civilians, including women and children. 

Civilian casualties included the baby of BBC Arabic journalist Jihad Masharawi, who lost his 11-month-old son, along with his sister-in-law. He also has a brother wounded by a strike.

A Palestinian boy pushes his bycicle through the rubble in an area
targeted by an Israeli air strike in Gaza City in the early hours of November 15, 2012. 

­Israeli strikes have led to a spiraling escalation of conflict, with Hamas already saying it is now in a state of “open war” with Israel and threatening to send in suicide bombers.
The IDF stated that more than 130 rockets were fired from Gaza at locations in Israel during the last 24 hours. Three people have been killed on the Israeli side.

The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, has announced it is launching “Operation Shale Stones” in response to Israel’s “Pillar of Defense”.

These kinds of statements call into question how long the conflict is actually going to last and spark fears of even further escalation which would draw more civilian casualties.

Palestinians check their damaged house after Israeli air strikes in
Gaza City November 15, 2012. (AFP Photo / Suhaib Salem)

­

‘Timing of attack no coincidence’

Meanwhile, experts are starting to question the timing of the Israeli attack on Gaza which is not viewed as accidental. Israel will hold a general election on January 22 and conservative Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged to retaliate harshly against Hamas.

Eric Draitser, a geopolitical analyst for Stop Imperialism sees the attack as fitting in with the pre-election campaign to influence Israel's general election.

“The timing of the attack is not a coincidence. Even though Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seen as the only option, he was also pushing hard for Romney to win,” Draitser told RT. “And now this attack could be one of the ways Netanyahu is trying to exercise his own power in the country, showing that Israel is not weak and that the administration will push forward with this imperialistic agenda no matter who won the US election.”

Palestinians watch the funeral of Hisham Ghalban in the southern Gaza Strip,
on November 15, 2012. (AFP Photo / Said Khatib)

­Freelance journalist Lior Sternfeld has drawn a direct parallel between the pre-election November 2012 attack on Gaza and the 2008-2009 pre-election attack.

Even though Netanyahu does not face much opposition, “he knows that the way to ensure his victory in the upcoming elections will be by diverting the public discourse from demands of social justice to existential threats imposed on Israel by the bogeyman – Hamas,” Sternfeld argues in his column for Informed Comment.

He also believes that Hamas’ retaliatory response was predictable and even more so, encouraged.

“With the 2013 elections just months away, Israel decided to break a ceasefire and assassinate the Hamas senior military persona, Ahmed Jabari,” Sternfeld writes. “And as expected Hamas responded with firing rockets on Israel’s southern regions and a full-scale war is being evolved.”

Palestinians inspect a destroyed building in an area targeted by an Israeli air
strike in Gaza City in the early hours of November 15, 2012. (AFP Photo / Mahmud Hams)

­

War rhetoric, civilian casualties, anti-war protests

Israel’s National Security Minister Avi Dichter stated that “we have no intention to end this round of fighting and suffer more hits in the next.”

But Israeli civilians are already suffering. Three people were killed by a rocket strike from Gaza on Thursday, and there are dozens of injured including three children.
There have also been reports of Israeli residents experiencing panic attacks from Hamas rockets that were sent back in retaliation.

All schools within a 40km range of Gaza have been closed. People living within a 7km range of the Gaza border are not allowed to leave their homes and gatherings of over 100 people in one place are prohibited, Yeshiva World News reports.

About 100 people protested outside Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s apartment in Tel Aviv Wednesday night following the start of the offensive on Gaza. The activists were shouting “Money for welfare, not war," thus indicating that they see the operation as an attempt to distract people’s attention from Israel’s own internal problems.

A Palestinian man sits amid the rubble in his bombed house
following an Israeli air strike on Gaza City on November 15, 2012. (AFP Photo / Mahmud Hams)

­Palestinian protesters also marched in the West Bank city of Ramallah in support of the people of the Gaza Strip and against Israeli airstrikes.

“It is killing children and women; it is injuring scores of people. The way it tries to assassinate military targets is illegal because it is using indiscriminate and reckless amounts of force,” documentary maker and activist Harry Fear, who is currently in the region, told RT.

“Tomorrow Israel expects to launch the ground incursion of the Gaza Strip, including central parts of Gaza City. International reporters and activists on the ground believe this is the beginning of another full-scale war similar to the one in 2008-2009,” he added.

Canada says UN official who called for Israel boycott should quit

Editors Note: Join Richard Falk in attracting the ire of Canada!  Boycott Israel.

Toronto Sun
David Akin

OTTAWA - Canada joined the United States and Israel late Thursday night in calling for the resignation of a United Nations official charged with monitoring and reporting on human rights in the Palestinian territories.

That official, Richard Falk, the UN's special rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories, called for a worldwide boycott earlier Thursday of companies tied to Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

That recommendation was immediately condemned by the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who called Falk's call to action "irresponsible and unacceptable," and said it would "poison the environment for peace."

A spokesman for Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, Rick Roth, said Falk's intervention was "offensive and unhelpful but not overly surprising."

In the past, Falk, a professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, once compared the state of Israel to Nazi Germany, the Associated Press reported.

He also once wrote on his blog that there was "an apparent coverup" by the U.S. over the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. He also once posted an anti-Semitic cartoon on his blog, though he later removed it.

"Richard Falk has a long history of making outrageous statements, and frankly, has only tarnished the reputation and integrity of the United Nations," Roth said.

Falk listed 13 companies that ought to be boycotted -- including Volvo, Caterpillar Hewlett Packard and Motorola -- in his report to the UN General Assembly

"Mr. Falk has not only done a disservice to the United Nations, but also to the Palestinian people," Roth said. "Canada calls on Mr. Falk to either withdraw this biased and disgraceful report - or resign from his position at the United Nations."

Caterpillar said in a statement that Falk's report was inaccurate and misleading, and "reflects his personal and negative opinions toward Israel." The company said it sells products to the U.S. government, which are then sent to Israel.

Hewlett Packard said Falk was "far from an independent and unbiased expert in this matter," and that the company has a strong human rights policy and complies with the highest standards in every market in which they operate.

-- With files from Reuters http://www.davidakin.com

Operation Cast Lead: It's Zionese for Burning People

We Hold These Truths

Charles E. Carlson

"Zionese" is the unofficial spoken language of the State of Israel. Most Israelis learn and use the Zionese language, but one need not be Jewish to speak it; today it is also the language that’s spoken in many Judeo-Christian and Messianic churches in America, often without church leaders realizing it.

 The first cab driver I rode with in Israel pointedly called the Philistines "animals" in the course of polite conversation...that’s Zionese. He was cautioning me to keep away from Palestinians while in Israel. "They will kill you in there," he told me, when he learned I was going into Gaza. More Zionese.

Zionese is not a language of letter, syllable, and punctuation. It is the delivery of a few so-called "truths" that must be learned and repeated forcefully without reservation. The trick is in the delivery. Zionese is the art of telling a story that most will reject, and repeating it as if most believe it.

The teller must not worry about being thought a liar by most, so long as there are listeners who will believe because they think others believe. Common Zionese statements are "our warfare is self-defense", "they hit us first (usually with “rockets"), "they are animals," and "Israelis are holocaust survivors." Zionese paints all Arabs as inferior. It is a language of racist superiority, and it is no stretch to call it verbal brutality.

At Israel’s behest, woman removed from Air France flight for not being Jewish

Electronic Intifadah
Ali Abunimah

French activists protesting European airlines canceling flytilla passenger flights, 2011.

Air France demanded to know the religion of a passenger on a flight from Nice to Tel Aviv and removed her because she is not a Jew.

The 15 April incident, confirmed by an Air France official, may violate international and European law by subjecting prospective passengers to illegal religious discrimination.

Over the past few days, Israeli authorities have reacted to an effort by hundreds of European travelers to visit the occupied West Bank at the invitation of Palestinians by stationing hundreds of armed police and soldiers at the main international airport at Lydd, detaining and expelling travelers, and ordering European airlines to prevent boarding of travelers that Israel has placed on a political blacklist.

Several European airlines meekly complied with these Israeli orders, canceling tickets of those arbitrarily blacklisted by Israel.

The revelation that passengers are being subjected to religious tests takes this complicity with Israel’s apartheid policies to shocking new levels.
“Are you Jewish?”

The passenger’s account was published by the website of CAPJPO-Euro-Palestine and I have translated the following passage:

A young woman, Horia A., was allowed to check-in normally and then board the aircraft. But a few minutes before take off, a flight attendant arrived at Horia’s seat and asked Horia to come with her. Isolated in a corner of the aircraft, the embarrassed flight attendant asked her a first question:

“Madame, do you have an Israeli passport?”

Horia: “No.”

“She said no,” said the flight attendant into her walkie-talkie to the ground crew.

Flight attendant: “And now, are you of Israe.. um, are you Jewish?”

Horia: “no.”

Flight attendant into walkie-talkie: “Also, no”

During the next few minutes, Horia could see interactions and comings and goings among Air France personnel, before the flight attendant confirmed to her that she was forbidden to fly, citing “a very complex situation.”

Hague: Palestinian Authority Has No Standing

Arutz Sheva
Gabe Kahn

The prosecutor for the International Criminal Court says the PA cannot file complaints against Israel because it is not a state.

Operation Cast Lead

The Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court in The Hague announced Tuesday that he rejected a complaint filed by the PA against Israel for alleged war crimes during "Operation Cast Lead" in Gaza in 2009.

The prosecutor explained that only states can file a complaint with the International Criminal Court. "The Palestinian Authority is only an observer at the United Nations and not a member state.

The prosecutor's office noted that, for its purposes, the recognition of "Palestine" by 130 countries and several international organizations, including UN organizations, was immaterial.

The decision brings an end to a PA bid launched on 22 January 2009 to gain defacto recognition by the ICC by granting the Hague jurisdiction over “the territory of Palestine.”

The PA's declaration purported to invoke Article 12 (3) of the Rome Statute, which specifically enables "a state which is not a party to this Statute" to request that the ICC exercise its jurisdiction on an ad hoc basis with respect to an alleged crime in that state’s territory, or involving its nationals.

The Foreign Ministry responded to the decision, "Israel notes the decision of the Prosecutor International Criminal Court, that it does not have jurisdiction to hear complaints from the PA at this time."

"Israel made it clear from the beginning that the ICC had no jurisdiction to hear such complaints and welcomes the prosecutor’s decision to that effect,” it added.

ICC authority is derived from the Rome Statute. In 2002, both the United States and Israel, "unsigned" the Rome Statute, indicating that they no longer intend to become states parties and, as such, they have no legal obligations arising from their signature of the statute.

Israeli officials have stated they have "deep sympathy" with the goals of the ICC, but are concerned that political pressure on the Court would lead it to reinterpret international law or to "invent new crimes."

It cites the inclusion of "the transfer of parts of the civilian population of an occupying power into occupied territory" as a war crime as an example of this trend, while at the same time disagrees with the exclusion of terrorism and drug trafficking.

Israel sees the powers given to the prosecutor as excessive and the geographical appointment of judges as disadvantaging Israel, which is prevented from joining any of the UN Regional Groups.
In other words, the PA's declaration to the Office of the Prosecutor amounted to an official request to confirm that the PA can be considered a state for purposes of ICC jurisdiction.

Turkish PM: Israeli attacks on Gaza are ‘state terror’

End the Lie

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made some quite heated statements in condemnation of the most recent Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip in a speech Tuesday, calling the attacks a “massacre.”

A cease fire between Gaza militants and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) went into effect Tuesday but there have been reports of rocket attacks despite this agreement.
Thus far, according to Israeli news outlet Haaretz, almost 200 rockets have hit Israeli territory since the most recent outbreak of violence began on Friday.

The Israeli Air Force has conducted some 37 airstrikes on targets in the Gaza Strip, 19 of which supposedly targeted rocket launchers while 18 allegedly targeted weapons warehouses.

These attacks have resulted in 26 Palestinian deaths, 22 of which were allegedly militants while four were civilians who had no hand in the rocket fire.

In a speech to the Turkish parliament, Erdogan called on Israel to “stop the brutal attack against Palestinians and stop the massacre and bloodshed.”

He also called the Israeli airstrikes on Palestinians “state terror,” adding that the Turkish people have an obligation to “remember that Gazans are our brothers, and will always remain so.”

Erdogan has made some similarly strong comments in regards to the Israeli actions in the past, even going as far as to say that any further flotillas which intend to break through the Gaza blockade would be accompanied by Turkish vessels after the massacre on the Mavi Marmara, in addition to claims that Turkey was going to seek legal retribution for the murders.

Even considering his fiery words, Erdogan tends to fail to actually follow through, and I honestly doubt that he will take any action against the Israeli attacks.

During the speech Erdogan also took the opportunity to address Syria, saying that “the window of opportunity was closing following the massacres taking place daily in the country,” while also saying that Turkey “was making every possible effort to prevent further escalation in Syria.”

Syria: Rogue Elements Rampant

Global Research
Felicity Arbuthnot

"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists." (J.EdgarHoover, 1895-1972.)

Smelt any proverbial rats, lately? If not, you have not been paying attention, there are plenty about.

Consider for instance this: "Assad must halt his campaign of killing and crimes against his own people now" and "must step aside ...” Hilary Clinton (Asia Times, 9th February 2012.)

“I strongly condemn the Syrian government's unspeakable assault  ... and I offer my deepest sympathy to those who have lost loved ones.  Assad must halt his campaign of killing and crimes against his own people now.  He must step aside ...” said President Barack Hussein Obama. (i)

Yet responsibility for US victims, in their hundreds of thousands, spanning Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, in Guantanamo, Bagram, Abu Ghraib and elsewhere, are wholly unaccountable – and uncounted..

Responsibility for tyrannicide (including the horrific, state sponsored assassinations of Osama bin Laden and others, Libya’s Head of State, Colonel Quaddafi, have, seemingly entered a Presidential memory hole.)

"This (Syria’s) is a doomed regime as well as a murdering regime. There is no way it can get its credibility back either internationally or with its own people”, Britain’s little Foreign Secretary, William Hague, chimed in obediently, from the Washington script, on Sky News.

“Because the regime is so intransigent, because it is conducting ten months unmitigated violence and repression – more than 6,000 killed, with 12,000 or 14,000 in detention and subject to every kind of torture and abuse – it is driving some opponents to violent action themselves”, concluded Hague.

Hypocrisy reigns supreme. Walking distance from Hague’s office: “living in style and protection”, is Bashar Al Assad’s Uncle Rifaat, under whose Defence Brigades onslaught killed up to perhaps thirty thousand people in the city of Hama, which was also partially destroyed, Falluja style. The thirtieth anniversary of  a truly terrible event is commemorated today, 25th February. (See Robert Fisk, Independent, 25th February 2012.)

Of Libya, in March 2011, Obama stated: "Going forward, we will continue to send a clear message: The violence must stop. Muammar Gaddafi has lost legitimacy to lead, and he must leave. Those who perpetrate violence against the Libyan people will be held accountable. And the aspirations of the Libyan people for freedom, democracy and dignity must be met.”(ii.)

An anomaly (apart from the script similarity): In Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya,  deaths resultant from US-UK and “allied” actions are: “impossible to verify”, by Washington and Whitehall.

Indeed, this month, the (UK) Parliamentary Select Committee on Defence, issued a Report, after an Inquiry in to operations in Libya, stating that: “Britain has no way of knowing how many civilians died in the Libyan conflict as a result of Nato bombing.” (iii)

Back in March 2011, however, the exact figure of Quaddafi’s victims was “known.” Coincidentally, it was also exactly 6,000, stated a “political analyst” - using remarkably State Department-similar phraseology.(iv)

As under Saddam Hussein in Iraq (with no diplomatic presence) in Libya and now little in Syria - with no point of contact bar, seemingly, a satellite dish fitter, in Coventry, England, alleged to be the “Syrian Observatory for Human Rights” - exact death and casualty figures are always miraculously available.

A new nemesis appears on the horizon – or “Arab street”- and precise numbers are trumpeted. Yet when Western forces, “Viceroys”, “Intelligence” services, “mentors” and myriad, general meddlers, mercenaries and marauders pitch up, murder and occupy, none are available.

Of course no proposed invasion (sorry, “humanitarian intervention”) regime change and accompanying mass  slayings would be complete without forces of a wicked tyrant switching off electricity to babies incubators.

For anyone who has forgotten the details, the (1990-1991) Iraq model went like this: vast US government employed PR agency, Hill and Knowlton (“we create value by shaping conversations: we start them, we amplify them, we change them. We can connect seamlessly with all of your audiences...”)produced a fifteen year old girl called “Nayirah”, a “Kuwaiti with first hand knowledge of ... her tortured land.”

“I volunteered (tears) at the Al Addan Hospital .. I saw the Iraqi soldiers ..with guns, they took fifteen babies out of incubators, left them on the cold floor and took the incubators.”

Strangely, no one asked why she didn't pick them up and wrap and tend to them, or checked who she really was.

She was the daughter of Saud al Sabar, the Kuwaiti Ambassador to US. The incubators story of course, was a complete fabrication.

Shoes For Ki-Moon Because Eggs And Tomatoes Are Expensive

 

Today Thursday February 2 2012, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon arrived in the besieged Gaza concentration camp, coming through the Beit Hanoun (Erez) crossing in the northern border of the Gaza Strip

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon arrived in the besieged Gaza concentration camp, coming through the Beit Hanoun (Erez) crossing in the northern border of the Gaza Strip.

Ban Ki-moon was welcomed in a very special way at the border of Gaza, where dozens of Palestinian families of prisoners and victims of the Israeli genocide and war crimes who lost their loved ones, among them children and members of their families during the continued Israeli invasions on Gaza.

Also present were a number of Palestinians deported to Gaza by the Israeli occupation from Bethlehem and the West Bank. They all blocked the passage for the convoy of Ki-moon and hurled shoes, sticks, stones, chairs at him as an expression of their anger for the visit and his refusal to meet with them and listen to their humanitarian problems, in the same way as met during a previous visit to Israel with family of war criminal Gilad Shalit.

According to the Palestinian protesters: "eggs and tomatoes are very expensive in Gaza, therefore we were not able to buy them to throw them at the convoy of the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban ki-Moon. The protesters only had their shoes and other things to throw. After they threw their shoes, they collected them and put them on". They said "Sorry Mr. Ban Ki-moon, the economic situation in Gaza under the blockade is very much deteriorated, and eggs and tomatoes are not available".

Abdullah Kandil, the spokesperson of the of prisoners families, stated that "the Palestinians sit-in blocked the convoy of Ban Ki-moon for some time in protest against the immoral and inhumane position of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who refused to meet with the families of prisoners languishing in the jails of the Israeli occupation."

Kandil said in his statement that "the protesters threw chairs, stones and shoes at the convoy Ban Ki-moon, holding signs that read 'Enough of Ban Ki-moon bias for Israel’, 'Where is the United Nations since the blockade of Gaza’ and 'Where is the United Nations when the the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) members are kidnapped??".

Mr. Abed El-Nasser Ferwana , a former Palestinian prisoner and a well known specialist in
prisoners affairs said "the Palestinian protest is a symbolic message to Mr. Ban Ki-moon that Palestinians from Gaza want to have the right to visit their children and loved ones at Israeli jails". He added: "Ban ki-Moon should make more efforts to release the Palestinian prisoners". He wondered why Mr. Ban ki-Moon, always when he visits Gaza, avoids the meeting with the families of Palestinian prisoners.

The Palestinian protesters raised the pictures of a number of prisoners, especially the Palestinian leadership of the "Fatah", among them Marwan Barghouti and Palestinian Legislative Council Speaker Aziz Dweik, who were kidnapped by the Israeli occupation.

Ismail Ibrahim al-Thawabta, Palestinian journalist from Gaza, forwarded me an Arabic letter titled: "بان كي مون لا أهلا ولا سهلا", what means in English "Ban Ki-moon you are not welcome in Gaza", where he expresses his deep anger and concern about the double standards policy of the UN Secretary General . He wrote: "We can not understand what kind of irresponsible policy Ban Ki-moon works by, and why previously he sat with the family of the Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit who was captured while he was carrying a rifle to hunt the Palestinian children in the Gaza refugees camps. Ki-moon expressed his deep hope for the release of Shalit, while he ignores over 6.500 Palestinian prisoners at Israeli jails, among them hundreds of children and the sick people?!"

He added: "The United Nations policy of marginalization towards the Palestinian prisoners and detainees at the Israeli prisons, where they are denied the most minimal humanitarian rights, visits, medical treatment, where they are routinely tortured,  does not express a sincere, logical and humanitarian policy of the UN, but it clearly serves the dictator criminal regime of the Israeli occupation, the israeli executioners, at the expense of prisoners and Palestinian refugees".

Mr. Thawabta continued: "The clear message which must be understood by Ban Ki-moon is that he should be ashamed of his blood, that he is called to respect his age and position as UN Secretary General, and that therefore he has to stop selling out to inhuman political decisions against Palestinians in the favour of Israel. It is quite simply, the thousands of prisoners and their grieving families are human beings, and it is time to stop the policy of double standards of the UN and to look at the facts with impartiality, with respect and according to the International laws and treaties which deal with the Israeli occupation".

Twisted logic of using violence to achieve peace

Gulf News
Ramzy Baroud

Three years after the deadly war on Gaza, there are few indications that Tel Aviv has in any way altered its attitude

Sooner or later, there will be no escape from conducting a significant operation [in Gaza]," said Israeli army Chief of Staff Lieutenent General Benny Gantz on December 27, the third anniversary of Operation Cast Lead.

Gantz's chillingly casual remarks were cited as just another nonchalant declaration of war against a besieged, impoverished, overcrowded and routinely bombarded stretch of land. From the Israeli military and political point of view, Gaza merely exists as an opportunity for the Israeli army to test its latest weapon technology and send political messages to Israel's foes in the region.

As if to validate Gantz's logic, the ardently rightwing Israeli Jerusalem Post elaborated on December 28: "The Israel Air Force, working with the Shin Bet [Israel Security Agency], fired a missile at Gaza terrorists [fighters] involved in recent attacks on Israel, killing one and injuring two others." They were ‘terrorists' because Israel has designated them so. There was no due process and none was expected. When it comes to reporting on Israel/Palestine, corporate media largely relies on Israeli lies and propaganda. And one moral crisis begets another. The Israeli propaganda is predicated mostly on racism, not just in its view of Palestinians in Gaza, but of all Arabs.

Let's examine the curious logic of Yuli Edelstein, Israel's Propaganda and Diaspora Minister. In a recent talk in Or Yehuda, the man laid out his understanding of how peace can be achieved. "As long as the Arab nation continues to be a deplorable nation, which continues investing in infrastructure for terrorism, education to hate, and welfare for the families of shaheeds [martyrs], there will be no peace," he said, according to Yossi Gurvitz in +972 online magazine.

Gurvitz further wrote: "I phoned the minister's office for comment, and asked his spokesman: ‘Are you aware of the fact there are some 80 million Arabs in the world, from Sudan to Syria?' He replied: ‘Yes, there are — and the minister meant them all.'"

I must admit that cogent political analysis becomes difficult when a country's foreign policy and military strategy are constructed on unabashed racism, ignorance and a reproduction of 19th century Orientalism. How is one to forecast the possibilities of a just peace in Palestine when a well-regarded Israeli minister places a condition on the ‘Arab nation' to become less deplorable? How can Gaza avoid another ‘Operation Cast Lead' if its fate has already been sealed, with the ambiguous timeframe of ‘sooner or later'?

Ethnic cleansing
 
It is particularly frustrating to hear Israeli politicians berating Palestinians for not being a deserving ‘peace partner' when all that the Israeli government has to offer is one war of choice after another. Israel is increasingly ruled by the kind of fundamentalism and militancy that would not be tolerated anywhere else in the world. It is telling that Gantz's ‘sooner or later' remarks were followed by another interesting statement: "Gantz said that in certain circumstances and during non-official military events, the Israeli army would be prepared to exempt religious soldiers from participation if they are uncomfortable hearing women sing" (Jerusalem Post).

On (Im)Balance and Credibility in America: Israel/Palestine

Richard Falk

            I could not begin to count the number of times friends, and adversaries, have give me the following general line of advice: your views on Israel/Palestine would gain a much wider hearing if they showed more sympathy for Israel’s position and concerns, that is, if they were more ‘balanced.’ Especially on this set of issues, I have always found such advice wildly off the mark for two main reasons.

            First, if the concern is balance, I am not the place to begin, but the absurd pro-Israeli balance that pervades the response to the conflict in Washington, in the Congress, at the White House and State Department, among Beltway think tanks, as well as in the mainstream media. There is a serious problem of balance, or I would say distortion, that undermines diplomatic credibility. Such a toxic imbalance here in the United States makes the American claim to mediate the conflict and provide neutral auspices futile, if not ridiculous, or at best a reliance on geopolitical ‘justice’ in place of legal justice (based on rights). When the Goldstone Report is rejected before it has been read or the World Court’s near unanimous Advisory Opinion (14-1) condemning as unlawful the separation wall constructed in occupied Palestinian territory is repudiated without offering a serious critical argument, it is clear that bias controls reason, making the resulting imbalance a willing partner in crime.

            But what of the imbalance that sides with the evidence, with the law, with the ‘facts on the ground’ to arrive at its findings and conclusions? What of the continuous expansion of settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the denial of Palestinian refugee rights of return, of the apartheid legal structure of occupation, of discrimination against the Palestinian minority living as Israeli citizens, of the appropriation of scarce Palestinian water reserves, of the abuse of prisoners and children, of the long siege imposed on the people of Gaza as a sustained collective punishment? What of the continuous defiance of international law by Israeli reliance on excessive and disproportionate uses of force in the name of security? In light of this record, is not such imbalance, particularly in the inflamed American atmosphere, the only possible way for truth to speak to power?  Or stated more strongly, is not a circumstance of imbalance written into the fabric of the conflict, and exhibited in the daily suffering and thralldom of the Palestinian people whether living under occupation, in refugee camps in neighboring countries, in exile, and as a subjugated minority?

             Finally, the idea of balance and symmetry should also ‘see’ the structures of life that describe the contrasting conditions of the two peoples: Israelis living in conditions of near normalcy, Palestinians enduring for an incredible period that stretches over six decades a variety of daily hardships and abuses that is cumulatively experiences as acute human insecurity. To be structurally blindfolded and blind is to adopt a common, yet deforming, appearance of ‘balance’ that perpetuates an unjust ‘imbalance’ between oppressor and oppressed.

             In relation to self-determination for Palestinians and Israelis I favor a stance of ‘constructive imbalance,’ which I believe is the only truthful manner of depicting this reality. Truth and accuracy is my litmus test of objectivity, and as such, knowingly defies that sinister god who encourages the substitution of balance for truth!