Just how desperate is Obama to appease Israeli apartheid?
When there was no settlement freeze in the first place, now the world press continues the charade. Look, over there, the US is begging Israel to reinstate the non-existent colony freeze: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s seven-member inner cabinet will discuss Saturday an offer by the United States to reinstate a freeze on West Bank Settlement…
Skateistan, the movie
A stunning piece of work about a troubled land. Hope exists: To Live And Skate Kabul is a beautifully shot film that follows the lives of a group of young skateboarders in Afghanistan. Operating against the backdrop of war and bleak prospects, the Skateistan charity project is the world’s first co-educational skateboarding school, where a…
Damning Islam and not getting away with it in Palestine
Yet another taste of US-backed “democracy” in the West Bank. Armed, funded and backed by Washington and the international community. This is not a just Palestinian future: A mysterious blogger who set off an uproar in the Arab world by claiming he was God and hurling insults at the Prophet Muhammad is now behind bars…
Another company not happy to be complicit in Israeli crimes
Yes: The major Dutch pension fund Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn (PFZW), which has investments totaling 97 billion euros, has informed The Electronic Intifada that it has divested from almost all the Israeli companies in its portfolio. PGGM, the manager of the major Dutch pension fund PFZW, has adopted a new guideline for socially responsible investment…
What should reporters really be doing with human rights groups?
Many journalists often write too uncritically about NGOs and human rights groups, myself included. Philip Gourevitch argues in the New Yorker that this does a disservice to the organisations and the people they’re trying to help: What is to be done? I don’t pretend to have answers for the humanitarians. But surely at least we…
LA Times damns Israeli settlements and says time is running out
Los Angeles Times editorial that really speaks for itself. Nothing really controversial but note the growing anger from within the US mainstream towards Israeli arrogance. This is only going to get worse: Why, after all these years, are we still writing about settlements? This tiresome controversy has been raging ever since Israel captured the West…
Will more doctors really help Australia’s global war effort?
The real agenda behind this story may be two-fold. Firstly, is the implication that Australia could be even more deeply involved in US-led missions across the world if this issue was resolved? And secondly, which “military operations overseas” are we not able to lead? The Defence Force has conceded it is facing a shortage of…
More weapons, more profits, more death
The privatisation of war is a growing phenomenon across the world. It’s rarely examined (Jeremy Scahill is a notable and noble exception). And now here’s David Ignatius in the Washington Post on the brave new world of killing “terrorists” and not telling anybody about it: A new arsenal of drones and satellite-guided weapons is changing…
Afghan politician wants us gone
Here’s a rarity. An Afghan politician calling for the removal of foreign troops. Note the sneering dismissal of her calls for withdrawal by the “balanced” ABC journalist: MARK COLVIN: Not even the optimists claim the war in Afghanistan is going brilliantly. The NATO force of which Australia is a part is still there largely because…