Showing all posts in June 2019
The very murky legal world when Australia wants to kill the “enemy”
My story in Crikey this week that alleged Australian soldiers are involved in the targeted killings of “terrorists” in Afghanistan and beyond has already drawn predictable hysteria from men who can’t think of anything better than a long and glorious “war on terror” against “them”. A more mature response has appeared by Ben Saul, Sydney…
Israel press take marching orders from Bibi’s office
A very interesting report in Israeli online magazine +972 on the terrible state of the Israeli media and its slavish following of the government line. Remind you of anywhere else? (here’s a clue; most Western countries): “Netanyahu’s office has an original technique for marketing its messages,” senior Yedioth Ahronoth columnist Nahum Barnea wrote in his…
Indonesian Jews learn traditions on YouTube
The idea of a small Jewish community in Indonesia pleases me and yet the blind adulation of an Israeli flag is sad. Is there knowledge how the Palestinians are being abused? A new, 62-foot-tall menorah, possibly the world’s largest, rises from a mountain overlooking this Indonesian city, courtesy of the local government. Flags of Israel…
Read this for possible Middle East near future (and it ain’t pretty)
This email was forwarded by Harvard Middle East expert Sara Roy. No real comment required: I pass this along without making any claims to verify its accuracy.… From a NYC-based Israeli source, who just returned from Tel Aviv, where he met with senior IDF and Likud figures, including Netanyahu.… He is one of the Likud…
US being beaten by a handful of bearded Afghans
The most powerful military in history with the brightest minds in the business. Or not: For months, the secret talks unfolding between Taliban and Afghan leaders to end the war appeared to be showing promise, if only because of the appearance of a certain insurgent leader at one end of the table: Mullah Akhtar Muhammad…
Wikileaks want to redefine “global history”
Stand by: The WikiLeaks website has announced it plans to publish nearly three million more secret US documents in its next mass release of confidential material, The Daily Telegraph learned. It would be seven times larger than its release last month, when it posted some 400,000 secret documents about the war in Iraq on its…
Hello, I’m an Australian politician/journalist and I’m desperate to be romanced by Israel
This site has previously reported on the upcoming visit to Israel by a number of senior Australian politician and journalists. The message? Warm, cuddly embrace of Israel in all its authoritarian ways. The following letter was sent yesterday by Australians for Palestine to all members of parliament: Dear Senator/Member of Parliament, The reported visit of…