Antony Loewenstein

Guess which war criminal said this?

It is understood by all that we carried out this great humanitarian operation only to eliminate terrorism. We left no room for even one bullet to be fired against ordinary citizens. Our armed forces comprise those who went into battle carrying a gun in one hand, the declaration of human rights the other, as well as taking food for the liberated people of the north and full of human kindness in their hearts.

Sri Lankan President? Israeli Prime Minister? George W. Bush?

Rupert Murdoch, a media man with lashings of journalistic principles:

A doctor accepted “substantial” libel damages at the high court today over false allegations in the Sun linking him to terrorism.

Dr Mohammed Asha, who is based in the Midlands, launched legal action after the Sun carried a front page article last August under the heading “Terror case doc works in casualty”.

Leo Dawkins, the solicitor representing Dr Asha, told Mr Justice Eady in the high court in London today that the allegations were that “there were very strong grounds to suspect that the claimant would be involved in the future in terrorist bomb plots and was, therefore, an ongoing threat to national security”.

He added: “There is no truth in these allegations whatsoever. The article complained of was published to millions of people and has been devastating for the claimant, causing him immense damage both personally and professionally.”

Dawkins said the defendant, News Group Newspapers, the News International subsidiary that publishes the Sun, “accepted that the allegations complained of were entirely false and without foundation”.

The Washington Post, when reporting on Israel’s non-lifting of the Gaza siege, calls the major opposition Kadima party “centrist”. Lawmaker Yoel Hasson offers a view that shows how extreme the country has become:

The easing of the closure is a victory for terror. Netanyahu’s campaign slogan of ‘strong against Hamas’ today became empty words. The absence of a clear diplomatic strategy is leading Israel to international isolation while ending Hamas’s isolation.

We will not forget:

As Aung San Suu Kyi prepares to celebrate her 65th birthday tomorrow, confined in the house in which she has spent most of the past two decades, a confidante of the Burmese opposition leader has made a simple but passionate appeal to those in the West to use their freedom to help his country achieve the same.

In a hand-written letter smuggled out of Burma and passed to The Independent, U Win Tin writes: “I want to repeat and echo her own words – ‘please use your liberty to promote ours’. I want to add more to it. Please bring more and more liberty to us, to our country, Burma. We are starving for it and we are waiting for someone or some institutions or some countries to bring it to us.”

The plea from Ms Suu Kyi’s friend and senior political ally, who himself spent almost 20 years in solitary confinement, comes at a desperately difficult time for the opponents of Burma’s military junta.

The Independent editorialises with appropriate contempt for a man Australian television still regards with respect:

Tony Blair… whose period as Quartet envoy has been notable for its failure to achieve anything of real substance, especially regarding Gaza.

Here it is:

Antony Loewenstein has been writing for newmatilda.com about the Middle East since the beginning. He lobs 20 Questions back our way

Antony Loewenstein started writing for newmatilda.com pretty much at the beginning and has been a regular contributor on the Middle East since. His articles, particularly on Israel-Palestine, have provoked heated debate on the site. We’re proud to have been able to give coverage to perspectives on the Middle East which have been largely neglected in other Australian media outlets. Antony writes, “various editors over the years have provided a supportive and nourishing relationship. I’ve deeply admired the publication’s interest in asking important questions over Israeli crimes in Palestine and stood firm in the face of predictable Zionist attacks. If only more media outlets believed in truth, not appeasing Jewish lobby groups.”
1. Who is your favourite newmatilda.com writer?
Mustafa Qadri, because he’s in the field, he knows Pakistan and the Middle East very well and he refuses to simply reprint government spin. A good journalist, in other words.

2. What’s your favourite newmatilda.com article?
Too many to count, but this recent interview with William Dalrymple, by Shakira Hussein, really stimulated. He’s a fascinating man, Western but curious, questioning and pro-Palestinian.

3. When did you first start reading newmatilda.com?
From day one: in the days before Twitter, Facebook and the birthpangs of YouTube.

4. Were you surprised when you heard the news?
Saddened, yes, but not shocked. I’ve long believed that news should always be free, to give as greater access as possible, but as a journalist and author I also want to get paid to sustain my caviar addiction.

5. Fill in the blank in this sentence: “I’m sad that newmatilda.com has hit the skids because their articles occasionally stuck it to the ___ and those people give me the creeps.”
Pompous and conflicted commentators who think they own the media space.

6. What was the newmatilda.com headline you always wanted to read but never happened?
One Man’s Freedom Fighter Is Never A Terrorist.

7. Do you subscribe to any on-line content? What? Why, or why not?
Crikey, Democracy Now! and many others. Good content takes time and resources and somebody has to pay. Rupert shouldn’t be the only benefactor.

8. If you could pick one public figure to deliver live commentary on Election Night, who would it be?
David Marr, who’d bring wit and insight.

9. Name your favourite lovable loon and rate their threat to public safety.
American politician Ron Paul, who for all that he holds some less than savoury views on race, actually wants to disentangle America from permanent occupation of the Middle East. Threat to public safety? His son is a Tea Party politician with a bright future. Beware.

10. Do you have any secret political crushes you’d like to share with our readers?
Apart from the obvious Kate Ellis (oh so predictable, I know), I respectfully decline to discuss my feelings towards Bronwyn Bishop.

11. Favourite retired Australian politician.
I wish Paul Keating would remain out of the public spotlight until he asks for forgiveness over his incestuous relationship with Suharto. It’ll never happen.

12. What do you see as the most important issue in the upcoming federal election campaign?
Australian foreign policy and our need to follow Washington’s lead on pretty much everything. Let’s discuss the US alliance, the why, how and why not.

13. What subject should be compulsory in primary schools?
The history of the Middle East.

14.What’s the one thing you’ve always wanted to know about Australian politics but were afraid to ask?
Why most politicians are so willing to follow party lines on key policy issues.

15. When was the first time you changed your mind on something important?
Started to understand the need to eat less meat and appreciate the pain suffered by animals for my enjoyment.

16. What annoys you about journalists?
That most corporate journalists seem themselves as players, not reporters. Want to be close to power not seriously challenge it. Like to receive sanctioned “leaks” and not spend the time actually digging deeply. Afraid to offend powerful interests.

17. What politician and journalist combination would you like to see stuck in a lift recording a long interview?
Tony Abbott with a Palestinian journalist asking why he believes the Jewish state should be allowed to bomb refugee camps and occupy another people for decades.

18. What’s the one question you’d like both Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott to answer?
Wouldn’t you use a people smuggler if your life was in danger in Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Iran or Iraq?

19. Is the Australian media getting better, worse, or staying the same?
More diverse in a way but overall less questioning of establishment power. And why aren’t there far more reporters of ethnic background? Fewer white Anglos, please.

20. What question would you like to ask us?
Will you miss being abused in Parliament by the Federal Member for Israel, Michael Danby?

How the Zionist lobby (in this case The Israel Project) tells its little minions to sell Israel (via Richard Silverstein):

Subject: In the “messages that fail” department, please see this…
Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2010 13:36:40 -0400
From: Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi
To: Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi

As to research on saying that there isn’t a “humanitarian crisis” in Gaza and that no one is starving, we will have that on what Luntz and Greenberg are testing next week. But you don’t need that data to know it is a complete dead-end of a message. Reporters and leaders all over Washington are complaining about this and some say they see Israel and cold and heard hearted.  Given that 6 more flotillas are headed to Israel (including one of Jews from Germany and one of Jews from the UK) we need to make sure we understand this well.

Watch this from Jon Stewart. Watch to the end and listen to how they react to when Krauthammer uses the message…ouch!

http://vimeo.com/12350665

Clearly we need to be saying that “While no one is starving in Gaza because Israel delivers so much aid, there IS suffering in Gaza. We want the suffering to stop. That is why Iran-backed Hamas must stop using supplies for rockets and Hamas must release Gilad Shalit. Hamas must be accountable for their actions and for the suffering they are causing their OWN people.”

On a good note, the topic in the US tonight will shift to energy. Alternative energy is obviously a great topic for Israel as Israel has much to say that could help on this.

Thanks!

Jennifer

This is the state of public Zionism. J Street founder Jeremy Ben-Ami and Atlantic writer Jeffrey Goldberg talk in New York this week and fear the “demographic challenge” to the Jewish state. Yes, polite language for Palestinians campaigning for one person, one vote.

On the more paranoid side, the Jerusalem Post’s Caroline Glick says that America has abandoned Israel and joined the side of terrorists:

Led by US President Barack Obama, the West has cast its lot with Hamas. It is not surprising that Obama is siding with Hamas. His close associates are leading members of the pro-Hamas Free Gaza outfit.

The new law of the Middle East; the harder you’re hit by Israel the more popular and resilient you’ll become:

Hezbollah has opened its first permanent museum atop a wooded hill here that was strategic territory in a 2006 war with Israel, the latest step in the group’s evolution from a band of militants to an established political force in Lebanon.

Since its birth in 1982 as an Islamic militia fighting Israel’s invasion of the country, Hezbollah has transformed itself into a powerful military, political and social organization. It controls a large swath of southern Lebanon, much of the Bekaa Valley and the southern suburbs of Beirut.

…

Now, in addition to significant political leverage, Hezbollah also has a sprawling 15-acre, $4 million tourism complex. Hezbollah opened the park in late May, marking the 10th anniversary of Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon.

A walking trek called “the Path” is the centerpiece, winding along a what was once Hezbollah’s front line against Israel during the occupation. It is peppered with artillery shells of various sizes, along with mockups with mannequin Hezbollah fighters crouched, glaring out through the brush, or receiving medical treatment.

From inside a 600-foot-long tunnel, visitors can peer through glass at some of Hezbollah’s former underground hideouts. The fortifications were closely guarded secrets until recently, and key to some of Hezbollah’s recent operations, including its fight with Israel in a brief 2006 war along the southern border.

To manage the new museum and other planned sites, Hezbollah is creating its own museum department, adding to its other divisions, which include radio and TV stations.

“It shows that the resistance is more stable,” said Muhammad Kawtharani, director of Hezbollah’s arts foundation and a spokesman for the Mlita museum project. “You’re seeing a secret that is a secret no more.”

Yiron Festinger, in Israel’s major paper Yediot, offers some increasingly comical Israel Derangement Syndrome:

Prime Minister Netanyahu should not be envied over the challenge posed by the most hostile president in US history; a president who makes the anti-Semite Jimmy Carter look like a Righteous Gentile. However, we should be calling a spade a spade and informing the public of the truth, even if this truth is disturbing, painful, and bitter. We must make it clear to our many supporters in the US that this president, by viewing America and its ally Israel as the reason for all the world’s problems, threatens our very existence here.

Such generosity to get the world off Israel’s back. It may work but it shouldn’t. Note what is now being allowed into Gaza. Take towels, that massive security threat. Collective punishment with Western support:

Israel’s security cabinet voted Thursday to ease its land blockade of the Gaza Strip, following its deadly raid on a humanitarian aid flotilla bound for the Hamas-ruled territory.

“It was agreed to liberalize the system by which civilian goods enter Gaza [and] expand the inflow of materials for civilian projects that are under international supervision,” the government said in a statement after the meeting.

The new Israeli-approved product list included all food items, toys, stationery, kitchen utensils, mattresses and towels, said Raed Fattouh, the Palestinian coordinator of supplies to the enclave.

The decision does not affect Israel’s sea blockade of the coastal strip or its ban on the private import of building materials, vital to widescale reconstruction after the December 2008-January 2009 war in the Gaza Strip. Hamas called the Israeli measures “media propaganda”.

The Arab world has tolerated Palestinian refugees for decades but often treated them with contempt; this must change and soon. Here’s a possible shift:

Despite some contentious rhetoric in Parliament on Tuesday, a turning point appears to have arrived in a decades-long battle to secure sufficient political backing to approve key civil rights for Palestinians here, a number of officials and analysts told The Daily Star on Wednesday.

Parliament on Tuesday debated bills that would allow Palestinians to own property, get work permits in any profession and receive social-security payments; deputies decided to send the draft laws to a committee for further discussion, but MPs from across the political spectrum expressed their support for Palestinians’ human rights, although some Christian legislators warned against the naturalization of the refugees.

In spite of the undying bogeyman of naturalization fears, Parliament will likely soon ratify an expansion of Palestinians’ civil rights, said Hilal Khashan, who teaches political studies at the American University of Beirut and is of Palestinian descent.

“We’re witnessing a period where a breakthrough is in the making,” he said. “The time has arrived now for such an action. They might water it down, but the momentum is there.”