The fine Israeli blog Promised Land discusses the concept of Neo-Zionism and its ramifications for the Jewish state: The settlers are by no means neo-Zionists. They represent the old fashion right wing, the one that still dreams of colonizing Eretz Israel Hashlema (the great land of Israel). Netanyahu was supposed to be their natural leader,…
Showing all posts tagged settlements
How the occupation sucks water from the void
Ta’ayush are a wonderful Israeli human rights group that spend most weekends in the West Bank protecting Palestinians from crazy settlers and complicit soldiers (see here). Last weekend this happened: In one of the most remarkable activities in recent time, Palestinians and Israeli activists succeeded this Saturday (alas, only for few hours) in breaking the…
Israel real peace threat
A revealing letter in today’s Melbourne Herald Sun, proving once again that public opinion towards Israel is far ahead of the political and media elite: Was there an elephant in the room at the recent meeting of the G20? So much time devoted to badgering Iran over its alleged nuclear ambitions and not a word…
Is Israel trying to provoke more trouble?
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights release a statement: The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) strongly condemns the Israeli government’s decision to allow Jewish settler groups to enter the yards of the al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem. … PCHR further condemns the use of excessive force by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) against Palestinian civilians…
The few Jewish Israelis who put human rights into action
During my recent visit to Israel and the West Bank I spent time with the wonderful Israeli group Ta’ayush as they protected Palestinian farmers from violent Jewish settlers and complicit IDF soldiers. Here’s a story, via Ta’ayush member Joseph Dana: September 22, 2009. Jerusalem District Court. Amiel and Eli It’s become a little too familiar,…
Talk is cheap when settlements grow by the day
As the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign against Israel gathers pace, the inevitable Zionist backlash is growing. Here’s the Forward editorial this week: Time was when a boycott demanded personal sacrifice as an expression of protest. That’s how the name first was coined, when Irish tenant farmers and tradesmen in the late-19th century refused to…
The mangling of truth when reporting the Middle East
Following the publication here in early September of a new SBS news directive that told journalists not to use the term “Palestinian land” to, er, describe Palestinian land, today’s Australian newspaper has some responses: Tzvi Fleischer, editor of Australia/Israel Review, which is put out by the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council, backed SBS’s position. “It’s…
God told them to settle Palestinian land
Just another day in the West Bank through the eyes of fundamentalist Jewish settlers.
How to ruin the chances of Middle East peace
Michael Shaik, from Australians for Palestine, writes in Murdoch’s Australian: In 1973, Ariel Sharon announced his intention to make a “pastrami sandwich” of the Palestinians by building strips of settlements across the West Bank, “so that in 25 years’ time, neither the United Nations, nor the United States, nobody, will be able to tear it…
Saree Makdisi: Obama won’t solve the Middle East crisis
My following article appears in today’s Crikey: After… Tuesday night’s Sydney Ideas lecture by Saree Makdisi, professor of English Literature at the University of California and nephew of the late Palestinian intellectual Edward Said, chief executive of the New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies, Vic Alhadeff, asked a question. He wanted to know why Makdisi…