Australia’s ruling elite really don’t like having their Israeli Occupation latte spoiled by truth. The use of lawfare by the Israeli regime and its supporters to counteract BDS protest is yet another sign that BDS is working. These present repressive measures against BDS activists are likely to have the reverse effect than intended by those who support Israeli occupation and apartheid.
Such arrests which seek to deprive people of the right to freely go where they wish and to express their opinions freely escalates a legal question into a political act by police & government.
I have viewed the YouTube video of the protest at Max Brenner and there is no evidence of a blockade of customers or an act which prevents people from buying chocolates or coffee at the store.
The protesters actions were symbolic.
So for the police and/or courts to apply such restrictions using the bail act may itself be unlawful. This should be tested by civil liberties lawyers in court immediately especially if people have been refused bail and jailed while awaiting trial.
A broad-based international movement of people of conscience in support of human rights and justice , BDS is the call from Palestinian people themselves for equal rights, the end of apartheid and the recognition of their rights to return to their lands. All these demands are soundly grounded in international law.
Max Brenner, the operation which is being protested by BDS supporters, is owned by the Strauss group, which shamelessly aids the brutal Israeli military occupation and thus the deprivation of rights from Palestinian people.
The assault against BDS by the Australian elite is unlikely to succeed since it may criminalise consumer boycotts generally, which would prove unacceptable to a large proportion of the Australian community.
‘Greens MP Greg Barber said that if the investigation results in a prosecution it could have a chilling effect on other consumer boycott campaigns.
”I’m telling people to boycott Reflex Paper because it’s made from native forest woodchips, so maybe I’ll be next,” Mr Barber said.
But Mr Barber said he expected the investigation to fall over.
”For that matter a ‘Buy Australia’ campaign can fall foul of it, so Mr O’Brien might not get the result he’s looking for,” he said.
The Victorian Consumer Affairs Minister Michael O’Brien has named our organisation amongst
others for investigation by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) for
what he called our involvement in ‘secondary boycotts’ against Israeli-owned businesses in
Australia – namely Max Brenner.
For the record, Australians for Palestine took no part in the protests against the Max Brenner
stores, but we believe that Max Brenner and other Israeli owned businesses that support
violations of human rights are legitimate targets for the boycott call.
The boycotts target Israeli-owned institutions and businesses that have been instrumental in
supporting Israel’s violations of international humanitarian law and not “Jewish businesses”, as
Mr O’Brien alludes to in his comment to The Australian (8/8/2011).
“Minister O’Brien wants us to slowly erode our democracy and roll back our rights to freedom of
political thought, affiliation and freedom of protest” said Ms. Sabawi, Public Advocate for
Australians for Palestine. “This draconian move does not bode well for Australians to see our
government trying to intimidate its citizens who are critical of the actions of a foreign state.”
“Mr. Obrien needs to be reminded that taxpayer money should be spent on safeguarding our
democratic rights and values and not to be wasted on the pursuit of appeasing foreign powers and
special interest lobby groups at the expense of our own rights and liberties.” said Ms Sabawi
……………………………………………………………………………………….
MEDIA RELEASE Tuesday 9 August
BAILLIEU GOVERNMENT ESCALATES ATTACKS ON CIVIL LIBERTIES
Dawn raids see pro-Palestine activists arrested
Police demand activists be held in custody for weeks
Raids carried out at dawn this morning by police have seen several pro-Palestine activists arrested, in the most severe crack-down on civil liberties in decades. The activists are being targeted because of their involvement in protests against chocolate shop Max Brenner, a chain store with strong ties to the Israeli military. The protests are part of the worldwide Boycott Divestment and Sanctions campaign, which aims to draw attention to the ongoing genocide committed by the Apartheid regime in Israel against Palestinians.
Campaign organiser Omar Hassan:
“This crack-down on the right to protest should be of concern to all Victorians. The lengths to which the Baillieu government is going to eradicate criticism of Israeli Apartheid and criminalise dissent are unprecedented. We need to be clearly saying; demonstrating is not a crime. Taking action in support of Palestine is not a crime.”
The activists were arrested for breaching bail conditions imposed following arrests at a previous pro-Palestine protest at Max Brenner. The bail conditions, which prohibit arrestees going within 50 metres of a Max Brenner shop, are themselves a serious curtailment on the right to protest. The arrestees have been told they will be held until September the 5th.
As Hassan points out:
“Actions taken against South African businesses by anti-Apartheid protests were important in generating opposition to that racist regime. To outlaw similar actions today can only be motivated by a desire to protect the reputation of Israel, and represent an unacceptable attack on our right to express dissent and show solidarity with oppressed people around the world.”
For more information about the arrests and on-going BDS campaign, contact:
Arguing against any Zionist-organized BDS “counter” protest, Alhadeff writes: “It is important for the community to be aware that our response to BDS forms part of [a] coordinated national strategy. Furthermore, this strategy is endorsed by counterparts abroad and Israel’s Foreign Ministry.”
Alhadeff outlined this coordinated national strategy in response to BDS, stating that it “included, but is not limited to, engagement with civil society and politicians, patronage of boycotted outlets, cooperation with police, shop owners and center managers and exposure of the motives behind the BDS movement.” According to Alhadeff, Zionist policy in response to BDS should be one which seeks to “speak softly” but to also carry “a suggestion of a big stick.”
Why does Australia always vote against UN resolutions supporting the Palestinian people? Why did Labor get rid of Rudd, since Gillard is just the same or worse? Why didn’t Senator Mark Arbib lose his job, when he was outed as a US intelligence source?
‘The ACCC will investigate whether the protesters contravened section 45D of the Competition and Consumer Act, which prohibits a group from gathering with the intention of stopping a third person or company from doing business.
Until now, it has only been used to target trade union activity, but Melbourne University competition law professor Dr Caron Beaton-Wells said protesters might have a case to answer if protesters ”had the purpose or their actions had the effect of causing substantial loss and damage to the shop owner’s business”.
‘”This is an attempt by the Government to criminalise any protest against Max Brenner or other corporations that support the state of Israel, and support their offensive towards the Palestinian people, and in particular their support for funding for the Israeli military, which is the point of the protests.”‘
‘Munckton said: “The attempt to equate supporters of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign with anti-Semitism — in particular the campaign in Nazi Germany to boycott Jewish-owned businesses — is entirely unfounded.
“BDS campaign is a global campaign supporting justice for the Palestinian people. It does not target any company on the basis of religion or ethnicity.
“Even a cursory glance at the statements of organisations supporting BDS show that no business is targetted for being Jewish-owned.
“O’Brien’s threat is an attempt to silence those who support the rights of Palestinians. This is an attack on the rights of free speech.”’
‘The Australian on Monday reported that Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd recently met with Jewish Victorian federal Labor MP Michael Danby at the same Max Brenner store as the BDS protest.
“I don’t think in 21st-century Australia there is a place for the attempted boycott of a Jewish business,” Rudd was quoted as saying. “I thought we had learned that from history.”
“According to a statement put out by AIJAC, the BDS movement has been targeting businesses in Australia for no reason other than their perceived relationship with Israel.
“They have included cafes, skincare product stores and other companies with little or no political influence or direct involvement in the Palestinian/Israeli conflict,” the statement said.
Rubenstein said that “such discriminatory practices have no place in Australian society and, moreover, will only serve to intensify the Palestinian- Israeli conflict by promoting division and hatred.”
‘Why is it that the same areas always erupt first, whatever the cause? Pure accident? Might it have something to do with race and class and institutionalised poverty and the sheer grimness of everyday life? The coalition politicians (including new New Labour, who might well sign up to a national government if the recession continues apace) with their petrified ideologies can’t say that because all three parties are equally responsible for the crisis. They made the mess.
They privilege the wealthy. They let it be known that judges and magistrates should set an example by giving punitive sentences to protesters found with peashooters. They never seriously question why no policeman is ever prosecuted for the 1000-plus deaths in custody since 1990. ‘
“The government is deceased even if the obituary has yet to be published. The public understands that this government represents everything that is ugly from day one, its ministers and deputy ministers are redundant.
“Sowing fear of external threats, muzzling, an impervious government – for all these reasons we went out to the streets with one message and different reasons, for social justice and against Benjamin Netanyahu.”
20 of her 28 Kadima Knesset compatriots are supporting a fascist bill which ‘would make democratic rule subservient to the state’s definition as “the national home for the Jewish people.”‘
‘According to Elkin, the law is intended to give the courts reasoning that supports “the state as the Jewish nation state in ruling in situations in which the Jewish character of the state clashes with its democratic character.”
Elkin said: “The courts deal with this issue quite a lot, such as with the Law of Return as a discriminatory law.”
The bill redefines basic consensus regarding the character of the state. For example, it also proposes that Hebrew would be the only official language in Israel, as opposed to the present situation – based on current mandatory law, Arabic and English are also recognized as official languages.
The bill accords Arabic “special status,” and states that Arabic speakers “have the right to linguistic access to the services of the state, as determined by law.”
Jewish inspiration
Another clause states that Jewish law will be a source of inspiration to the legislature and the courts.
This would mean that MKs would be asked to legislate in the spirit of Jewish law, and courts to adjudicate by it in cases where no other express law exists. In the language of the bill: “If the court sees a legal question requiring a ruling, and finds no solution in legislation, custom or clear analogy, it will rule in light of the principles of freedom, justice, integrity and peace in Jewish heritage.”
The bill also calls on the state to “act to ingather the exiles of Israel and [further] Jewish settlement within it, and allocate resources to this end.”
As for other ethnic groups in Israel, according to the bill: “The state is permitted to allow a community, including people of another faith or nation, to maintain a separate community.”
Elkin says he is not concerned over the implications of the bill for the image of Israel internationally. “If we were talking about the world in which the United Nations equates Zionism with racism, there might be a problem. But today the world is ready to accept this,” he said.
As opposed to other Basic Laws, this one can only be changed by passing another Basic Law in its stead.
The bill was formulated on the initiative of, and jointly with, the Institute for Zionist Strategies, a conservative think tank.
Elkin and Rotem have supported a number of controversial pieces of legislation presented during the Knesset summer session. They include the successfully-passed Boycott Law, which calls for economic sanctions on people who boycott West Bank settlements; and laws restricting the activities of associations that oppose the existence of Israel and requiring political groups to reveal sources of funding they received from foreign countries. ‘
Kadima cannnot escape the fact that it too, along with Likud and the Labour parties, is mired in neoliberalism, a love for US hegemony, militarism and acceptance of the hideous Occupation. None of these parties can be trusted to adher to a platform based on real social justice.
The street protests are a broad-based movement with Palestinian rights represented at Tent No. 1948 which supports one state co-existence. Even the settler Yesha Council has been welcomed into the movement because of its ‘political influence’. Yet despite the high sustaining cost to the occupying Israeli entity and outrageously generous subsidies to illegal settlers by the state, a call for the end of the occupation is not one of the key demands of the tent protest. In Israel itself, Palestinians are particularly discriminated against in regard to housing.
All the residents are suffering from the price rises, but the Arab residents in particular feel as if they are being pushed out with nowhere to go.
“When the landlord heard me speak Arabic to my husband, he said, ‘Sorry, we don’t rent to Arabs,” said Wafa Abu Shamis, 37 and a mother of three, recalling a recent effort to check out an apartment. Those present confirm that such stories are common.
‘Had the protesters begun by hoisting signs against the occupation, they would most likely still be just a few people in tents. By removing the single most divisive issue in Israeli politics, the protesters have created a safe space for Israelis of all ethnic, national and class identities to act together. And by decidedly placing the occupation outside of the debate, the protesters have neutralized much of the fear-mongering traditionally employed in Israel to silence discussions of social issues.
But even as they call for the strengthening of Israel’s once-robust welfare state, the protesters are disregarding the fact that it is alive and well in the West Bank.’
The way many demonstrators are pitching it to me, these protests are an opportunity for coalition building, an opportunity to bring down the government’s current “security first, people second” policy and subsequently elevate the minority voices. But I have yet to see any of that happen on a concrete basis, and until I hear these demands making headlines as well, the protests will remain fundamentally flawed, at least in my eyes.’
‘Participants haven’t minced their words, which seem grandly aware that they are potentially making history. “We are broadcasting Revolution. We want a better Israel. We want Israel to be lived with a sense of justice, a State of love among all its citizens. Those of Beersheba and those from Raanana. These from Hebron and Tel Aviv. Jews and Arabs.”
…
A homeless single mother says “I’m here because I have no alternative. This is the tent of no choice. I ask for equal rights irrespective of degree, religion and nationality.”’
According to Joel Beinin, the inequitable spending by the Israeli government on illegal settlements is also out of focus.
‘The great majority of the protesters have insistently avoided linking the lack of investment in affordable housing to the vast sums invested to construct government-subsidized housing in Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, build the infrastructure to support the settlements and sustain the military apparatus to defend them. A provocative article by Yediot Aharonot’s economics correspondent Gidion Eshet, published on July 28, suggested that the subsidized apartments the protesters are seeking are in the West Bank and that ending Israel’s settlement policy would free capital for construction of affordable housing in Israel.’
Political writer, Emma Rosenthal, makes some insightful observations on the anomalous nature of this new Israeli ‘social justice’ movement and protests within settler colonial states:
This contradiction isn’t new to popular uprisings within settler colonial states. I can’t remember the last left action in the U.S. on any basic need – wages, baill outs, jobs, unemployment, access to education, etc., that had indigenous rights (either in the U.S. or as victims of U.S. foreign policy) as a key component of the demonstration. Maybe an afterthought, a few aztec dancers, etc. a t-shirt that said “I hate paying rent on stolen land”, but not as a core, central demand as part of a workers’ movement. though one could argue that in the U.S. there is very little that is left, politically.
It’s not uncommon for the working class of a settler colonial or neo-colonial entity (the U.S. is both, the former, domestically, the latter, internationally) to be concerned when their own entitlements are threatened – their homes, their schools, their jobs, and to ignore the larger social context.
Could this bring Israelis into greater contradiction with the Israeli ruling class? that has yet to be seen. Seeing as they willingly go into the military in mandatory service, it seems unlikely. and that these protests may provide the ruling class with even another wedge between the Israeli working class, the Palestinians and “guest” workers.
It’s the difference between fighting for justice, or just us. I have yet to see the israeli working class separate itself from the Israeli ruling class (a key feature of the settler colonial narrative, as in the U.S.), and identify with the Palestinians or the guest workers.
Forming ANY real left within a settler colonial entity is very difficult.
With the passing of the new Housing bill, Nutanyahoo is playing it cool, at present drenching the media with positive hasbara. No doubt he is considering all options to dispel protest and protect his power base – some commentators think this might include war, others consider the situation might impel him to make a grand gesture for ‘peace’ with Palestinians. Might he also consider annexation of the Palestinian territories which the rightwing settler movement covets, concurrent with the PA’s declaration of a fake state in September? or ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Israel? Nutanyahoo doesn’t seem concerned about a spill from Likud, despite the support by Likud members for the grassroots movement, and seems to be in hard sell mode.
In about six weeks, before the high holidays, Netanyahu will present a plan that will “change the face of the country,” the sources quoted him as saying.
Netanyahu said the plan’s main points were to break the monopolies that are preventing competition and to slash indirect taxes.
By the beginning of next week, Netanyahu will announce the makeup of a “dialogue team” to consist of ministers and economic experts. They will meet with the heads of the protest movement and hear their demands.
Netanyahu said he did not intend to meet with the protest leaders, who he believes are backed by leftist political parties and organizations. But he said he identifies with the grievances that are at the basis of the protest.
“This can be our great opportunity,” Netanyahu was quoted as saying. “No one can complain about the economy. The economy is working. But there are complaints, justified complaints, about the hardships of daily life, about the high cost of living.
“Everyone is asking me how I plan to deal with the political situation. My political strategy for the coming year is simple: Take real and serious care of these problems. My goal is not to dismantle the tents. They will not be dismantled. They are there to be there.”
Will Nutanyahoo’s gestures and machinations prove sufficient? will the social justice movement bring down the Likud government and install the other head of racist Israeli neoliberalism? or will the social justice movement create a party of its own with a winning platform for equal rights and justice for all? we’ll just have to wait and see.
‘Even us Anarchists couldn’t stay indifferent to the fact that the white middle class was rising up. To us, the housing protest is a great opportunity to bring Lyd, Jaffa, Ramle, Silwan and Al-arakhib to the forefront of middle-Israel, and try to connect occupation with habitation, appropriation with apartheid, and gentrification with genocide. The limits to this idea would soon be vividly illustrated to us, as our “Anarchists Against the Wall” banner and ActiveStills exhibition were torn down. We went back into our closet and came out as “Salon Mazal”, a radical info shop that somehow managed to find a way into the hearts of center-left Tel-Aviv, who were now boulevard residents.
Unfortunately, even though we were generally well-received, the most common question asked by the boulevard dwellers was “What do Arabs have to do with it?” ‘
“Governments who are led by a person that does not work for the good of the majority, but spends all their money on small segments of society – they generate complete distrust for the system”
But Livni takes care to reiterate the ever-present mantra that dictates zionism’s contradictions:
Livni took advantage of the opportunity to also attack the prime minister for his security policies. “Security and economy are connected. The protesters took to the streets because the country’s economic situation is good and the social situation is bad, and as the security situation worsens it will affect the economic situation.”
Aziz Abu Sarah, a Palestinian-Israeli journalist, points out in this vid the overspending the Likud government has been making on housing in the illegal settlements – 3 or 4 times that which it spends in Israel, the resentment this creates in Israel where the majority of people are against the occupation, but says people still haven’t made the connection between government policy, the occupation and economic inequality.
‘Titled “Guidelines for a new social and economic agenda,” the eight initial demands include a reduction in indirect taxes (in particular VAT); the investment of surplus tax revenues in social programs by way of the state budget; the disbanding of a commission aimed at speeding up construction, but which protesters believe would only enrich building companies; an increase in the budget for the Ministry of Construction and Housing’s mortgage and rental assistance programs; free education from the age of three months; an increase in medical supplies and infrastructure at health facilities across Israel; a halt to the privatization of welfare and mental health facilities; and a gradual cancellation of private-contractor- run construction projects in the public sector.’
Hamas, Hezbollah threaten our ports and oil rigs : According to Levi, Hezbollah’s model “is being copied today to the Gaza Strip. In the future, we will have to deal with missiles, torpedoes, mines, above-surface weapons and underwater ones, both in Gaza and Lebanon.” He added that Iran is a major player in the smuggling of naval weapons, and that “we assume that everything that Iran has can be brought to theaters closer to us.” ‘
‘In this interview firebrand grandmother Daniella Weiss, leader of radical settlers, appears to present the protesters as the modern version of the ten spies who famously gave the Children of Israel a negative report about the Land of Israel. The protesters’ negativity echoes the negativity of the spies, she claims. They “are lamenting, people are complaining, people see all the bad sides of life instead of seeing the prosperity of the Land of Israel.”’
‘But there is a very strong push against the protests in terms of the political debate. It’s not just the governments. It’s the entire elite that are pushing against these protests, and the more of a challenge they feel, the harder they’ll push.
…
I think the protests itself will disappear, but I also think that Netanyahu is coming to his showdown in September with the Palestinian leadership much weaker than he wanted. The entire world saw that he doesn’t have a consensus of Israelis behind him—I think that’s a pretty important achievement.’
For the last two weeks have seen greater delegitimization of Israel in the eyes of its supporters in the West than the last two years of the BDS movement. How will AIPAC and the Israel Campus Coalition spin this? That the protesters are not being shot at, like in Syria? But these are not protests that challenge the Israeli regime – these are protests that are asking for the government to do something.
‘It all began on December 7, 2006 when workers in the industrial city of El-Mahalla El-Kubra broke the country’s 20-year strike hiatus over the government’s failure to fulfill promises it had made about bonuses. For three days the strikers occupied a factory, calling for the government-backed Labor Federation to be dismantled. The government buckled under the pressure and gave in to the workers’ demands, but the event opened a Pandora’s Box of strikes and protests across the country.
The strikers were responding to the fast-track imposition of neo-liberal economic policies by a cabinet led by Ahmed Nazif, the then prime minister who relentlessly implemented the demands of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF). These measures included the privatisation of public factories, the liberalisation of markets, decreasing tariffs and import taxes and the introduction of subsidies for agri-businesses in place of those for small farmers with the aim of increasing agricultural exports.’
“This was also a surprise because the economy is in very good shape by every measure, with a low unemployment rate.
…
“There is a debt problem in the periphery. There has been in attitude to small countries; they are prepared to thinking about cutting debt in countries with very high debt. The Europeans can deal with the small countries, but it will be much harder to deal with larger countries if they face more serious problems. Growth forecasts for Europe are starting to be lowered. The current situation is even worse than we thought a few months ago.”
‘As for the housing shortage and increase in housing starts, Fischer said, “Things have begun to move. We’re building at a rate of over 42,000 apartments a year, but housing starts are not housing completions. We must wait for two years. We’re still at around 34,000 housing completions a year, but there is a supply response in the market, and that’s very important.” ‘
‘The protests went up a notch last night. Chants about high rents were rare. “The people demand social justice,” was the most common, followed by “Hoo ha, mi zeh ba? Medinat harevaha” (Who’s that coming? It’s the welfare state ). Socialism, today? Yes, with choked throats and emotional tones. The protest took flight last night. Forget the housing protest, it’s no longer alone. Those who feared that the protest was too narrow, too spoiled, yesterday watched it expand. Its goals are already way beyond a small rented apartment. ‘
‘The reality is the PA was built to be a governmental structure not a liberation movement. Its time is up. The government was supposed to be there to embrace a state. There is no state coming. Netanyahu has confirmed it, Obama has confirmed it and the maps speak for themselves.’
In terms of legitimizing discrimination and conferring discretion to the state, Israel has achieved far more than the apartheid regime could have hoped to accomplish.’
“Our aim is to empower women here with basic things. Bedouin women are at the lowest level of employment in Israeli society; 90 percent of Bedouin women living in recognized villages are illiterate. In unrecognized villages, that number is more like 100 percent. If a woman has education and economic empowerment, she can take more control, make decisions, be more useful to her society and her family.”
‘When will the world understand that the deterioration of the situation of women in Gaza over the past four years is not solely attributed to the Hamas control of the Strip, but because of the Israeli siege, which tends to be left out in such discussions.’
On Friday four people were injured and four arrested, as Israeli troops attacked anti-wall protests organized in a number of West Bank communities. Protests took place in the central West Bank villages of an-Nabi Saleh, Bil’in, and Nil’in in addition to al-Ma’ssara in the southern West Bank.
Three women, two local and one international, were injured and a journalist and three activists were arrested as Israeli troops attacked the anti-wall and anti-settlement protest in the village of an-Nabi Saleh. Villagers and their Israeli and international supporters marched to local farm lands Israel had taken to build a new settlement.
Troops attacked protesters with tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Then soldiers forced people back into the village and fired rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas at journalists and medics. The three injured women sustained moderate wounds as soldiers beat them up. The arrested journalist was identified as Moheeb al-Barghouthi who works for al-Ayam newspaper.
In the nearby village Bil’in, soldiers fired tear gas at the weekly protest there as internationals and Israeli supporters joined the villagers after midday prayers. Many were treated for the effects of tear gas inhalation. Joining the protest today were a group of supporters from the United Kingdom, Ireland and Scotland, who had reached Palestine by bicycles covering a distance of 7 thousand kilometers from London, to advocate and support the Palestinian popular resistance movements.
Also on Friday in the central West Bank, Israeli troops attacked the weekly anti-wall protest in the village of Nil’in, villagers were joined by Israeli and international supporters after the midday prayers and marched up to the wall. Troops fired tear gas at protesters causing many to suffer from tear gas inhalation.
In southern West Bank, one local organizer was injured, and many treated for the effects of tear gas inhalation as troops attacked the anti-wall protest organized in al-Ma’sara village near Bethlehem. Soldiers attacked protesters as they tried to reach land owned by local farmers Israel confiscated to build the wall. Mohamed Brijiyah, 35, a local organizer, sustained moderate wounds when soldiers beat him up.
Ankara strongly condemned Israel for approving the building of new homes in West Bank settlements a Turkish Foreign Ministry statement said.
The comments were in response to the Israeli Ministry of Housing and Construction’s publishing of tenders for 336 housing units in West Bank settlements last week.
“Israel’s illegal actions on the lands it has invaded are unacceptable,” the statement said. “This decision will deepen the suspicions of Israel’s sincerity in pushing the peace process forward. We stress that we don’t recognize the illegal steps Israel is taking, challenging international law,” the Turkish ministry statement said.
According to the tender, 294 new homes will be built in Beitar Illit settlement outside of Jerusalem and 42 units in Karnei Shomron in Samaria near Kfar Saba.
In April the Defense Ministry approved the construction of the homes in Beitar Illit.
Both West Bank settlements are located within the settlement blocs Israel believes will be included in its permanent borders once a final status agreement with the Palestinians is achieved.
All the perfumes of Brand Israel will not wash off Israel’s apartheid and brutal occupation. Despite, Yigal Caspi, deputy director general of media and public affairs at the Israeli Foreign Ministry explains the new soft sell approach (as if it hasn’t already been part of Israel’s dominant whitewashing strategy):
“This move doesn’t have a down-side… For a year we’ve been explaining our political policies and virtually ignoring everything else. I’m not sure that the first thing Europeans want to see when they open their morning newspaper is news about the conflict with the Arab world.”
“If we tell them about all the other interesting things here – about culinary and fashion, agriculture, innovations and high-tech – they’ll see us differently.”
Considering that the Foreign Minister of Israel is, in fact, a settler living in Noqdim, and that the state is addicted to building settlements while rent costs in major Israeli cities is causing nationwide protest, it is a safe bet that the interests of the state are in line with the settlers.
to move to outlying areas like Upper Nazareth, instead of demanding an apartment in “the state of Tel Aviv.” Speaking to Arutz 7, Sofer said “I would not build even one apartment in ‘the state of Tel Aviv,’ which extends from Hadera to Ashdod. Someone must tell the ‘yuppie youth’ that they should not bother fighting for an apartment there, because they will not get them.”
Sofer suggested instead that those seeking an apartment move to the south or the north. “If they all move to the periphery, the jobs will follow them. Pressure can be put on the billionaires who got rich off the rest of us to move their factories to these areas,” he said.
While Israeli hasbaraboffins plot and scheme their next apartheid-washing ad campaign, Israel is starving Gazan hospitals of fuel. Israel’s collective punishment of the people of Gaza centres again on those least able to defend themselves – the sick.
Bassam Barhum, who oversees ministry of health supplies in Gaza, said electricity generators would stop within a day or two if fuel was not delivered.
Every hospital in the coastal strip was vulnerable, Barhum said, adding that operation rooms had already closed in Gaza City’s Ash-Shifa hospital and the European hospital in Khan Younis due to the chronic energy supply shortage.
In 2011, the Ministry of Health in Gaza received less than 400 thousand liters of fuel, but the hospitals need 1.5 to 2 million liters, he said.
Barhum said Gaza hospitals received just 25.84 percent of required fuel in 2010, and more than 10 percent was unusable.
A critical shortage of medical supplies in the coastal strip led the Hamas-led authorities to declare a state of emergency in the medical sector in June, and doctors and nurses took to the streets to protest against the ongoing crisis.
While the specific content of the traditionalist beliefs and mores cherry-picked and melded into ‘new’ mythology is of lesser import, that the terrorist Breivik is racist, nationalist and rightwing is significant, orienting the political compass. In common with other proponents of fascism, Breivik syncretises disparate, contradictory elements – of the Crusades and Knights Templar, Freemasonry and modern expositions of conservative and reactionary thought – to mythologise a glorious ‘pure’ past. Fascism is better defined by its rightwing nature, its hatreds, ultraracism and ultranationalism, than the myths it recycles and from which its bankrupt political ‘philosophy’ is derived. The perpetual struggle is against perceived impediments – in Breivik’s pseudo-philosophy these are scapegoated Muslims, communists who tolerate them, feminists and the politically correct – if these results and proponents of multiculturalism can be removed or dealt with, the re-mythologised past can be transmuted into a glorious future. Did Breivik consciously attempt to resolve the contradiction between eternal warfare against the ‘Other’ and the achievement of a golden age described by Eco, by setting out specific tasks to be accomplished by certain times?
Whether harvesting from Christianity or Wobblythumpianism, fascists merge core cultural, political and religious themes into dissonant reactionary mythologies to galvanise an irrational political ideology tailored for the target society, forging Blut und Boden ultranationalism with selective populism in order to promote a militarist drive for power.
Other notable commonalities within existing and historic fascist ideologies and the Breivik dogma include newspeak – the epithet of his movement ‘cultural conservatives’, its ‘cultural marxist‘ enemies and ‘Eurabia’ are striking examples; the ends justifies the means, contempt for the weak, attack of intellectuals, communists and leftists; anti-capitalist and anti-democratic goals; social darwinism, sexual machismo; a cult of heroism, strength, unity and purity; militarism and violence; rejection of cultural pluralism and multiculturalism; xenophobia, ultra-racism, antisemitism, bigotry and prejudice; censorship of opposing ideas, disagreement is treason, strategic victimhood and sense of besiegement.
Although Breivik executed a spectacle which may reduce pressure for a time and is disowned publicly by those who similarly espouse extreme rightwing views (with the exception of the monstrous Glenn Beck, who likened Breivik’s victims to ‘Hitler youth’), Breivik’s essential nationalist, Islamophobic doctrine remains as yet unrepudiated and unexamined critically by these fellow travellers.
One of the features of racism is that its sufferers are oblivious to its symptoms. Yet, racism doesn’t grow in a vacuum. Breivik’s acts and doctrine cannot be separated from the substrate in which it arose in the specific contexts of permissiveness of racism and violence, fuelled by frustration with the hegemony of the ruling class, alienation, and major political events like 9/11 and leaders’ counter-productive, inflammatory reactions to them. While Breivik sees multiculturalism and its leftwing protectors as his primary obstructions, the destructive activities of the transnational ruling class which benefits from and promotes racist, nationalist division is obscured.
There is a larger organism with which Breivik is connected – from neofascist and islamophobic organisations, to fascist Israel, to the white supremacist, uncritical media and people who assumed myopically that the appalling carnage plotted and executed by Breivik couldn’t have been committed by a ‘white’ person, a rightwinger or in a ‘white’ culture. This political terrorist may not be defined as ‘mad’ (to diagnose and disparage is unwise as mentally ill people are no more violent than other community members) or adher to any one isolated belief system than his own concocted dissonance, yet be ‘possessed’ of a dangerous, familiar ideology which has taken root symbiotically in several polities, a toxic phenomenon to be cauterised, else there will be more spectacles, with successive liftings of the bar. The Norwegian Prime Minister has demonstrated deep wisdom in declaring that Norway’s response will be more democracy and respect, not more security and fear.
May kindness, universal human rights, reason and democracy, prevail over brutish dogma.
The killer has evidently absorbed the far right’s shift from the language of race to the language of culture. But what is most striking is how closely he mirrors the ideas and fixations of transatlantic conservatives who for a decade have been the meat and drink of champions of the war on terror and the claim that Islam and Islamism pose a mortal threat to Western civilisation.
Only months before he went on his murderous killing spree he exchanged several messages with EDL supporters using his internet pseudonym Sigurd Jorsalfare, the name of the 12th century King of Norway who led one of the Crusades.
One staple of post-9/11 discourse has been the consistent demand that all Muslims everywhere not only condemn terrorism — which almost all invariably do, if for no other reason than that they have been its chief victims — but also that Muslims denounce Muslim hate-mongers, the “enablers” of terrorism.
Yet here we are witnessing a furious attempt by Islamophobic politicians and pundits, as well as their apologists, to decouple themselves from Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian terrorist.
This despite the fact that Breivik himself repeatedly cites some of the leading European and American anti-Muslim crusaders to rationalize his anti-Muslim jihad. They, of course, do not advocate violence, while he is a mass murderer. The distinction is clear enough. But they influenced him and shaped his world view. His exaggerated sense of the danger posed by Islam, Muslims and multiculturalism is about the same as theirs.
Breivik said in his 1500-page manifesto that he attended the founding meeting of the Knights Templar Europe “military order” in London in 2002 where he met a “mentor” who used the pseudonym Richard – after Richard the Lionheart.
Paul Ray, who writes a blog under the name Lionheart, says he belongs to an anti Muslim group called The Ancient Order of the Templar Knights but denies ever meeting Breivik and says he was horrified by the mass killings in Norway on Friday. In a telephone interview with Associated Press, Ray said he was not at the 2002 London meeting that Breivik described in his manifesto.
“I’d like to express my deepest sympathy to the people of Norway and to the families who have lost children,” Ray said. “It’s a horrendous crime that has been committed by someone what goes beyond the realm of human understanding.”
Ray, who now lives in Malta, refused to say how many members were in his group but said he had had no contact with Breivik and had not heard of him before Friday’s attacks.
“It’s an idea,” he said of The Ancient Order of the Templar Knights. “It’s not like it’s a massive organization. It’s a belief.”
Ray, who was involved with the far right English Defence League before falling out with the leadership, said it appeared Breivik had drawn inspiration from some of his ideas and writings.
“It’s really pointing at us. All these things he’s been talking about are linked to us,” he said. “It’s like he’s created this whole thing around us.”
says the main ideological drivers for lone terrorists are white supremacy, Islamism, nationalism/separatism and anti-abortionism. …
Indeed, right-wing views are increasingly becoming political mainstream in Europe, and even moderate politicians have been moving to the Right and away from multiculturalism.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Prime Minister David Cameron in Britain have all recently declared an end to multiculturalism.
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Norway does not exist in a vacuum. Its right-wing scene is connected to the rest of Europe through internet forums, where hate-speech proliferates, and participation in right-wing demonstrations throughout Europe.
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The Norway attacks are a reminder for Australians of the need to monitor individuals with extreme right-wing views. They should not be allowed to join gun clubs, own guns or be able to buy quantities of explosive precursors.
“I can tell you, at this moment in time, we don’t have evidence or we don’t have indications that he has been part of a broader movement or that he has been in connection with other cells or that there are other cells,” said Ms Kristiansen, who heads the Norwegian Police Security Service.
She said she did not think Mr Breivik was insane, as his lawyer has suggested.
Instead, she described him as calculating and evil, and someone who sought the limelight.
Breivik is no loner. His violence was brewed in a specific European environment that shares characteristics with the specific American environment of Loughner: relative economic decline, a jobless recovery, middle-class anxiety and high levels of immigration serving as the backdrop for racist Islamophobia and use of the spurious specter of a “Muslim takeover” as a wedge political issue to channel frustrations rightward.
“What we’ve seen is an active extremist scene across European countries, including the UK,” Rob Wainwright, director of Europol, told the Guardian. “There are some signs the extreme right have been more active, especially on the Internet. They are more sophisticated and using social media to attract younger people.”
