Israel’s major opposition party leader Tzipi Livni has no issue with Israeli policies, she merely doesn’t want to be seen as weak by the Arabs. Seriously. What vision. Meanwhile, back in reality, one of Israel’s senior writers, Yediot’s legal affairs editor, Judge (ret.) Boaz Okon, writes that there is “growing evidence of the lack of…
Showing all posts tagged United States
Jews in North Carolina say no to Israeli occupation
Jews for a Just Peace-NC set up a “Palestinian house demolition” tableau in front of the Durham Performing Arts Center to protest an American Dance Festival performance by the Israel-based Inbal Pinto & Avshalom Pollak Dance Company on June 17, 2010. The protesters exposed the fact that Israel’s cultural exports have become a tool to…
Leading IDF lawyer explains how Israel justifies its action
My following article appears in today’s Crikey: On Tuesday lunchtime the Australian Human Rights Centre and the UNSW International Law and Policy Group (with assistance from the Israeli embassy) hosted a seminar on “The Fight against Terror: Practical Dilemmas in applying the Laws of War.” The two speakers were Professor Abraham Bell of Israel’s Bar-Ilan…
Can we have a mature discussion about the war in Afghanistan?
An aide to General Stanley McChrystal (currently in the firing line for making disparaging comments about Barack Obama over Afghanistan) tells journalist Michael Hastings that, “if Americans pulled back and started paying attention to this war, it would become even less popular.” This story isn’t about McChrystal’s criticisms but about the futile war in Afghanistan…
Bush explains how war has helped the US prosper
Former Argentine president Néstor Kirchner reveals in the new film by Oliver Stone, South of the Border – about the rise of socialism in Latin America – something very revealing of George W. Bush: NÉSTOR KIRCHNER: [translated] I say it’s not necessary to kneel before power. Nor do you need to be rude to say…
Only US-friendly terror groups are welcome
The latest decision by the US Supreme Court seems highly problematic, not least because America backs terrorists group every day (hello Afghanistan and Iraq, as two recent examples) yet wants to tell its citizens that they can only back groups that speak in lovely, warming tones about the super-power: The US supreme court has upheld…
Get used to the growing isolation
Israeli historian Tom Segev: This is something Israelis know: that they very, very much depend on both America and Germany, or in the larger sense, Europe. And there’s nothing they fear more than being alone in the world.
Afghan warlords thank the coalition for its kindness
A timely reminder of what the West is actually doing in Afghanistan (removing one dictatorship and helping establish another): The U.S. military is funding a massive protection racket in Afghanistan, indirectly paying tens of millions of dollars to warlords, corrupt public officials and the Taliban to ensure safe passage of its supply convoys throughout the…
The earth is bleeding thanks to BP
Naomi Klein, one of the finest journalists in the world today, reports extensively on the Gulf of Mexico disaster and finds a disturbing human-led arrogance to try and manage an environment that continues to refuse taming: John Wathen, a conservationist with the Waterkeeper Alliance, was one of the few independent observers to fly over the…
Those who love some commerce after a US occupation
A grimly fascinating tale in the New York Times about an enterprising Lebanese man who has opened a flash restaurant in Baghdad: Mr. Hage, 51, is the most updated version of an old Lebanese story, that of a diaspora known for its willingness to follow commerce where it leads. Simply put, for a decade, he…