Antony Loewenstein

Following my article in yesterday’s Crikey about Sydney Morning Herald journalist Peter Hartcher taking a free trip to Israel, today his entire answers are published (sent to me a few days ago and quoted extensively in my original piece):

Antony Loewenstein, thanks for putting the questions to me and for giving me a chance to respond.

I don’t intend to debate the minutiae of how I do my job. Please allow me to make five points:

1. I have accepted paid travel to a number of countries over the years. I have always disclosed the fact when I have written anything as a result. It is routine for journalists to take paid travel. The question is not so much whether journalists take paid trips; it’s whether they disclose the fact. This allows readers to take this into account in forming a view.
2. I am not a partisan in any war. Indeed, a Crikey survey of the Australian political “punditocracy” found that there was no more balanced commentator in Australia.
3. Every paid trip always has an inbuilt viewpoint. The journalist’s job is to take information from a trip, assess it in the usual way, and to draw on it as one input among many, as we do with every subject, every day.
4. My column, on the Opinion page, does not purport to be an encyclopaedic treatment of the history of the conflict between Israelis and the Palestinians. It presents, as it says in its opening, a view from within Israel, with an explanation of the Australian Government’s position, and a comment from the Palestinian delegation. I should have thought that to be self-evident. There is no hidden agenda.
5. You, by contrast, are a declared partisan in the conflict. You are not in any position to act as a neutral analyst or objective commentator. If you critique my piece, you should disclose your interest, as I have mine.

The New York Review of Books has a blog and David Shulman weighs in on the UN Goldstone report, rejecting the criticism that the wider context of the occupation be forgotten:

…The report’s attempt to link whatever happened in Gaza with what has been going on in the West Bank for the last forty-two years is wholly justified. The political background to the report is, before all else, a cultural and moral one. I do not believe that a society can disenfranchise, dispossess, and effectively dehumanize large numbers of people living between Jenin and Hebron without this process influencing the way it conducts a war in Gaza. No one who regularly visits the Palestinian territories controlled by Israel has to speculate about whether or not Israel is engaged in the routine abuse of human rights.

Such abuse is the very stuff of the occupation—a daily reality exacerbated above all by the endless hunger for more land and the ever-expanding settlement project. That reality has been amply documented by Israeli human rights organizations such as B’Tselem and, more recently, Yesh Din (which offers legal aid to Palestinians), as well as by a large corpus of writings produced by firsthand witnesses, including those discussed in my 2007 book Dark Hope.

Since then, the situation on the ground has markedly deteriorated. Here is one relatively minor example: the imposition of Closed Military Zones by local Israeli commanders in the territories has had the effect—and, quite likely, the intention—of keeping Palestinian villagers and Israeli peace activists away from Palestinian fields. Establishing these zones has become standard practice; we encounter them nearly every week in the south Hebron hills. Palestinian lands that are not cultivated for three years automatically revert to state ownership; Palestinian farmers and shepherds are frequently chased off their lands at gunpoint by Israeli settlers and sometimes gain access to these fields or grazing grounds only when accompanied by Israeli activists.

The Israel Supreme Court ruled in 2004 that it is illegal for the army to declare Closed Military Zones as a routine practice, especially if this means distancing Palestinian farmers from their lands. But the court’s writ, backed up by a directive issued by the army’s own legal adviser for the territories, doesn’t have much practical effect. Just four weeks ago, I spent a day in detention at the Qiryat Arba’ police station together with seven other activists precisely because we protested when a local commander declared the fields of the village of Samu’a, which border on the “illegal outpost” of Asahel, a Closed Military Zone.

Israeli peace groups and human rights activists often challenge the actions of the Israeli army, the border police, the Civil Administration, and other government authorities in court or in nonviolent protests in situ, with occasional successes; mostly, however, we fail, as we did recently in East Jerusalem, where large-scale settlement projects, including the expulsion of Palestinian families from their homes, are now in progress. There is, no doubt, something to be said for the fact that these matters are at least freely discussed in the Israeli press and are adjudicated by a still functional legal system—although the record of Israeli courts in matters relating to the occupation and, above all, the settlements is, in my view, a dismal one.

For decades now, the courts have allowed the settlement enterprise to proceed unimpeded by significant legal constraints, despite its evident criminal nature under international law. The courts have failed to stop the large-scale expropriation of private (also communally owned) Palestinian lands. They have let rampant violence by settlers throughout the territories, and very conspicuously in the city of Hebron, go largely unpunished. They have sanctioned the fencing off of Palestinian villages into tiny, discontinuous enclaves cut off from markets, schools, hospitals, and workplaces. The list of such failures by the courts could easily go on and on.

At least somebody in Israel acknowledges the profound legal discrimination between Jews and Arabs in the country:

An Israeli judge made an historic ruling last week when he decided that an Arab teenager needed “protection” from the justice system and ordered that he not be convicted despite being found guilty of throwing stones at a police car during a protest against Israel’s attack last winter on Gaza.

Prosecutors had demanded that the juvenile, a 17-year-old from Nazareth in northern Israel, be convicted of endangering a vehicle on the road, a charge that carries a punishment of up to 20 years’ imprisonment, as a way to deter other members of Israel’s Arab minority from committing similar offences.

But Judge Yuval Shadmi said discrimination in the Israeli legal system’s treatment of Jewish and Arab minors, particularly in cases of what he called “ideologically motivated” offences, was “common knowledge”.

In the verdict, he wrote: “I will say that the state is not authorised to caress with one hand the Jewish ‘ideological’ felons, and flog with its other hand the Arab ‘ideological’ felons.”

He referred in particular to the lenient treatment by the police and courts both of Jewish settler youths who have attacked soldiers in the West Bank and who violently resisted the disengagement from the Gaza Strip in 2005, and of religious extremists who have spent many months battling police to prevent the opening of a car park on the Sabbath in Jerusalem.

Abir Baker, a lawyer with Adalah, a legal group for Israel’s 1.3 million-strong Arab minority, said the ruling was the first time a judge in a criminal court had ackowledged that the state pursued a policy of systematic discrimination in demanding harsher punishments for Arab citizens.

“We have known this for a long time, but it has been something very hard for us to prove to the court’s satisfaction,” she said. “Now we have a legal precedent that we can use to appeal against convictions in similar cases.”

Gaza, land of ruin:

Tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza living in tents and damaged homes face a wet, cold and miserable winter as Israel’s blockade of the coastal territory continues to prevent the importation of building and reconstruction material.

During the last few weeks Gazans were given a brief reprieve from the oncoming winter as an unseasonal snap of warmish, sunny weather held off winter rain and plummeting temperatures.

But, during a tour of northern Gaza last week, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, Maxwell Gaylard, and the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA) called on Israel to open its border crossings immediately to avert a further deterioration in the humanitarian situation on the ground.

“With winter rains and cold weather now imminent, the people of Gaza are even more desperately in need of construction materials such as cement, roofing tiles and glass to build and repair homes destroyed and damaged during the Israeli military offensive of 2008/2009,” said Gaylard.

During Israel’s intensive bombing campaign in December/January Gaza’s infrastructure was heavily targeted leading to the destruction and damage of thousands of homes.

“Gaza urgently requires 268,000 square meters of glass for windows and 67,000 square meters of glass for solar water heaters or enough glass to cover more than 30 football pitches. More than 500 children are still living in tents,” Mike Bailey from Oxfam told IPS.

Damage caused to Gaza’s water, sanitation and electricity systems, exacerbated by Israel’s crippling blockade which forbids the import of most essential spare parts and fuel, has further limited the ability of aid agencies to supply essential services.

The lack of concrete water storage tanks means that fresh water can only enter water pipes when there is electricity to power water pumps. Backup generators — which rely on fuel — are needed to ensure power cuts do not lead to water shortages and pollution of water.

“The humanitarian situation is going to deteriorate if something doesn’t give,” Gaylard told IPS during a tour of the Ezbt Abbed Rabbo area of the northern Gaza Strip.

Finally, the American government can solve the Middle East crisis:

According to State Department officials, the violently clashing peoples of Israel and Palestine have agreed to resume small talks this week in an effort to move toward eventually having a discussion about the weather. “Our goal is to achieve a preliminary open dialogue about the weather that will be mutually beneficial for all involved,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, adding that the small talks would likely touch upon other issues, such as how the nations’ kids were, and whether or not the other government had seen the game last night. “They may not see eye to eye on every point, of course, but the most important thing now is for both nations to just sit down and say that, yes, it looks like rain, and that, man, the traffic out there sure was a nightmare this morning, wasn’t it?” At press time, officials were trying to find the easiest way for representatives from Israel and Palestine to bump into each other at the grocery store.

The Palestinian town of Nil’in has been the place of countless acts of weekly resistance against Israel’s “security” wall.

Here’s some raw footage of a protest on 13 November (thanks to Joseph Dana):

Andrew Sullivan on le Sarah Palin “phenomenon”:

Let’s face it: if Palin looked like Golda Meir, there’s no chance McCain would have picked her. And no one would currently give a damn. She is the Carrie Prejean of politics; and like the Ailes-tested fembots on Fox News. Women are not so dumb as to buy it. Men: well we all know what our weak spot is. We do not always think with our heads.

Jerusalem Post writer Khaled Abu Toameh – a man with a serious case of Stockholm Syndrome – continues his case that “pro-Palestinian” activists are on the wrong track:

If anyone is entitled to be called “pro-Palestinian,” it is those who are publicly campaigning against financial corruption and abuse of human rights by Fatah and Hamas. Those who are trying to change the system from within belong to the real “pro-Palestinian” camp.

These are the brave people who are standing up to both Fatah and Hamas and calling on them to stop killing each other and start doing something that would improve the living conditions of their constituents.

Instead of investing money and efforts in organizing Israel Apartheid Week, for example, the self-described “pro-Palestinians” could dispatch a delegation of teachers to Palestinian villages and refugee camps to teach young Palestinians English. Or they could send another delegation to the Gaza Strip to monitor human rights violations by the Hamas authorities and help Palestinian women confront Muslim fundamentalists who are trying to limit their role to cooking, raising children and looking after the needs of their husbands.

The issue of illegal, Jewish settlements in the West Bank are getting a lot of press recently.

First, Sarah Palin in a media interview for her newly released book (an utterly deluded affair, writes Andrew Sullivan, and a woman thrust on the world by a group of neo-conservatives, something we should never forget):

I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don’t think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand.

There are many Jews on their way to Israel? That’s news to me. Even J Street has responded to Palin’s comments.

Then we have this:

An influential Jewish community leader and Democratic State Assemblyman from New York is currently heading a mission of about 50 Americans through the West Bank and East Jerusalem to promote home purchases in the area and to protest U.S. President Barack Obama’s Middle East policy.

…

“People buy properties in different places, and I can’t think of any reason why people dedicated to the land of Israel shouldn’t own something here, whether they will use it or use it as an opportunity for young families to live in that particular home,” the politician told Haaretz yesterday in Elon Moreh, an Israeli settlement in the Samarian Hills.

I thank Mondoweiss for drawing attention to this interesting exchange at the US State Department yesterday between spokesman Ian Kelly and Associated Press journalist Matt Lee (though a few other people are involved). They are discussing the news that Israel has approved 900 more homes in occupied territory:

MR. KELLY: Well, I think, Michel, you’ve heard us say many times that we believe that neither party should engage in any kind of actions that could unilaterally preempt or appear to preempt negotiations. And I think that we find the Jerusalem Planning Committee’s decision to move forward on the approval of the – approval process for the expansion of Gilo in Jerusalem as dismaying.

This is at a time when we’re working to re-launch negotiations, and we believe that these actions make it more difficult for our efforts to succeed. So we object to this, and we object to other Israeli practices in Jerusalem related to housing, including the continuing pattern of evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes.

And – just to repeat what we’ve said all along, our position on Jerusalem is clear. We believe that the – that Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved through negotiations between the two parties.

QUESTION: Can you tell us, did this come up in Ambassador Mitchell’s meetings in London yesterday? Apparently, we were told that he met an advisor to Netanyahu, asked them to not permit these new buildings, and then that request was flatly turned down.

MR. KELLY: Yeah. Andy, I just don’t want to get into the substance of these negotiations. They’re sensitive. I think you’ve seen the Israeli – some Israeli press reports that did report that this was raised in the meetings. This is – I mean, these kinds of unilateral actions are exactly the kind of actions that we think that both sides should refrain from at a time when we’re trying to start the negotiations again. But I don’t want to get into the substance of the discussions yesterday in London.

QUESTION: Would you steer us away from not believing the Israeli press reports?

MR. KELLY: I just don’t want to get into the substance. I’m not going to steer you one way or the other on it.

QUESTION: Where’s Senator Mitchell today?

QUESTION: How long is the U.S. going to continue to tolerate Israel’s violation of international law? I mean, soon it’s not even going to be possible – there’s not going to be any land left for the Palestinians to establish an independent state.

MR. KELLY: Well, again, this is a – we understand the Israeli point of view about Jerusalem. But we think that all sides right now, at this time when we’re expending such intense efforts to try and get the two sides to sit down, that we should refrain from these actions, like this decision to move forward on an approval process for more housing units in East Jerusalem.

QUESTION: But should U.S. inaction, or in response to Israel’s actions, then be interpreted as some sort of about-face in policy – the President turning his back on the promises he’s made to the Palestinians?

MR. KELLY: You’re – okay, you’re using language that I wouldn’t use. I mean, again, our focus is to get these negotiations started. We’re calling on both parties to refrain from actions, from – and from rhetoric that would impede this process. It’s a challenging time, and we just need to focus on what’s important here, and that’s –

QUESTION: Well, what actions (inaudible) the Palestinians taken recently that would impede progress?

MR. KELLY: Well, as I say, we would discourage all unilateral actions, and I think –

QUESTION: Fair enough. But the Palestinians –

MR. KELLY: We talked yesterday –

QUESTION: — don’t appear to be taking any unilateral actions. It seems to be (inaudible).

MR. KELLY: Well, we did talk yesterday about the – and I want to make sure I get my language right here – about the – discouraging any kind of unilateral appeal for United Nations Security Council recognition of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. That would fall in that category of unilateral actions.

QUESTION: Okay. So the Palestinian call for this, which was rejected by both the EU and yourself yesterday, you’re putting that on the same level as them building – as the Israelis building –

MR. KELLY: No, I’m not saying that. You just said that, Matt. I’m not saying that. I’m just saying that –

QUESTION: Well, you’re saying you’re calling on both sides to stop doing these things.

MR. KELLY: We are.

QUESTION: Yeah. But the rhetoric from the –

MR. KELLY: I’m not saying they’re equivalent.

QUESTION: — Palestinians is not actually constructed in a –

MR. KELLY: I’m not saying they’re equivalent. I’m just saying that we – they – we have to treat these things as sensitive issues.

QUESTION: You said a little bit earlier that we understand the Israeli point of view on Jerusalem. Can you explain what you mean by that?

MR. KELLY: Well, you have to ask – I’m not going to stand up here and characterize the Israeli point of view on –

QUESTION: No. I’m just asking you, if you understand the Israeli point of view on Jerusalem, why are you saying that this is not a good thing?

MR. KELLY: I’m not saying we support the Israeli point of view. We understand it.

QUESTION: Right. And then, last one on this, you characterized this decision by the planning commission as dismaying.

MR. KELLY: Yes.

QUESTION: You can’t come up with anything stronger than “dismaying”? I mean, this flies in the face of everything you’ve been talking about for months and months and months.

MR. KELLY: It’s dismaying.

QUESTION: Yeah, you can’t offer a condemnation of it or anything like that? (Laughter.) I mean, who is in charge of the language here.

MR. KELLY: I have said what I have said, Mr. Lee.

Yeah.

QUESTION: Would you say, though, that your own envoy has – does he have any leverage at this point, given the fact that the Israelis not only refuse, but blatantly have ignored his wishes on this?

MR. KELLY: Well, let’s take a step back and let’s also recognize that both sides agree on the goal, and that goal is a comprehensive peace. That goal is two states living side by side in peace and security and cooperation. So that is why we continue to be committed to this. That is why Special Envoy Mitchell meets with both sides at every opportunity, and why we are continuing to expend such efforts on this. So let’s remember that, that we do share a common goal.

QUESTION: Well, where’s Senator Mitchell today?

MR. KELLY: I believe Senator Mitchell is on his way back today.

QUESTION: Could you give us just a brief synopsis of the progress that Senator Mitchell has made in his months on the job?

MR. KELLY: Well, I think we have – we’ve gotten –

QUESTION: Yeah, maybe if the –

MR. KELLY: — both sides to agree on this goal. We have gotten both sides –

QUESTION: Ian, they agreed on the goal years ago. I mean, that’s not –

MR. KELLY: Well, I think that we – this government –

QUESTION: You mean you got the Israel Government to say, yes, we’re willing to accept a Palestinian state? You got Netanyahu to say that, and that’s his big accomplishment?

MR. KELLY: That is an accomplishment.

QUESTION: But previous Israeli administration – previous Israeli governments had agreed to that already.

MR. KELLY: Okay, all right.

QUESTION: So in other words, the bottom line is that, in the list of accomplishments that Mitchell has come up with or established since he started, is zero.

MR. KELLY: I wouldn’t say zero.

QUESTION: Well, then what would you say it is?

MR. KELLY: Well, I would say that we’ve gotten both sides to commit to this goal. They have – we have – we’ve had a intensive round or rounds of negotiations, the President brought the two leaders together in New York. Look –

QUESTION: But wait, hold on. You haven’t had any intense –

MR. KELLY: Obviously –

QUESTION: There haven’t been any negotiations.

MR. KELLY: Obviously, we’re not even in the red zone yet, okay.

QUESTION: Thank you.

MR. KELLY: I mean, we’re not – but it’s – we are less than a year into this Administration, and I think we’ve accomplished more over the last year than the previous administration did in eight years.

QUESTION: Well, I – really, because the previous administration actually had them sitting down talking to each other. You guys can’t even get that far.

MR. KELLY: All right.

QUESTION: I’ll drop it.

MR. KELLY: Give us a chance. Thank you, Matt.

Yeah, in the back.

QUESTION: It seems Senator Mitchell is focusing in his meetings on the Israeli side. Is he – does he have any plans to talk with the Palestinians, or there is no need now for that?

MR. KELLY: Well, he, as I say, he had meetings yesterday with the Israelis. He’s coming back to the U.S. now. He always stands ready to talk to both sides. There are no plans at this moment to meet with the Palestinian side.

Aluf Benn of Haaretz speaks to Benjamin Netanyahu, and apart from believing the Israeli leader’s supposed sincerity towards peace with the Palestinians, shares this gem:

It appears that Netanyahu is preparing for war against Iran and Hezbollah in the coming spring, when the snows melt and the clouds clear. Evidence of this is the additional defense budget and the home front’s preparations for a confrontation.

The ongoing saga of the Sydney Morning Herald’s Peter Hartcher and his propaganda trip to Israel continues with this letter in the paper today:

The blowback your Peter Hartcher is copping (Letters, November 18) from the anti-Israel set, furiously punching keyboards to expose a Zionist conspiracy, is a wonder to behold.

Meanwhile the leaders of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies copped a serve on Tuesday night at a Deputies meeting. Why? For the alleged misuse of community dollars by funding a representative of the much derided anti-Israel Fairfax press ie the Herald and Peter Hartcher.

So is the Herald a Zionist front or part of the battalion of Jew-hating anti-Israel propagandists?

Andrew Casey Roseville