Zionism

May 19, 2011December 11, 2020

University of London Union Senate Votes to Support BDS

With a 10 to 1 vote in favour of BDS, the University of London Union Senate just remade history. The ULU was the first student union in the UK to support boycott of white South Africa and the largest student union in Europe has now built on its laurels, being the first to support BDS against apartheid Israel.

Here’s the historic motion:

Union notes:

1) to boycott is to target products, companies and institutions that profit from or are implicated in, the violation of Palestinian rights

2) to divest is to target corporations complicit in the violation of Palestinian human rights, as enshrined in the Geneva Convention, and ensure that investments or pension funds are not used to finance such companies

3) to call for sanctions is to ask the global community to recognise Israel’s violations of international law and to act accordingly as they do to other member states of the United Nations

4) that in 2009 the The Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa released a report stating that Israel was practising a form of apartheid in the occupied West Bank, (http://www.hsrc.ac.za/Media_Release-378.phtml)

5) that Israel continues to build a 8 metre high “annexation” wall on Palestinian land inside the post-1967 occupied West Bank, contravening the July 2004 ruling by the International Court of Justice (the highest legal body in the world, whose statutes all UN members are party to) and causing the forcible separation of Palestinian communities from one another and the annexation of additional Palestinian land.

6) that within the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, Israel continues a policy of settlement expansion in direct violation of Article 49, paragraph 6 of the 4th Geneva Convention which declares “an occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into territories it occupies.” 6) that the Gaza Strip continues to face a suffocating siege from land, sea and air by Israel, and continues to suffer military incursions into the territory by the Israeli army

7) that Palestinians living in Israel continue to suffer third-class citizenship and are heavily discriminated against from healthcare, education, landownership and in many cases having ‘unrecognised’ villages completely demolished

8) that there continues to be millions of Palestinian refugees throughout the world who are racially discriminated against by not being allowed to return to their homes in Israel and the Occupied Territories, which is legally recognised under international law, including United Nations resolution 194.

9) that ULU and the NUS nationally adopted the call for BDS in the 1980s when it was called for by South Africans fighting racism and apartheid

10) that Ronnie Kasrils, the Jewish South African Minister of Intelligence said “The boycotts and sanctions ultimately helped liberate both blacks and whites in South Africa. Palestinians and Israelis will similarly benefit from this non-violent campaign that Palestinians are calling for.”

11) that the call for BDS has come from over 170 Palestinian civil society organisations, including student organisations, as well as organisations within Israel and across the global; and that the campaign is founded on the basis of anti-racism and human rights for all

Union Believes:

1) that unions should work to support the Palestinian people’s human rights and uphold international law

2) that BDS is an effective tactic, which educates society about these issues, economically pressures companies/institutions to change their practices and politically pressures the global community

3) that unions have a moral responsibility to heed the call of oppressed peoples, like we did so proudly during the BDS campaign to end South African apartheid

4) that the BDS movement has united human rights campaigners from different nationalities, races, religions and creeds across the world

Passed 10-1 in ULU – largest union in Europe, 20 universities and 130,000 students.

Union Resolves

(1) Institute thorough research into ULU contacts with investments and companies,including subcontractors, that may be implicated in violating Palestinian human rights as stated by the BDS movement

(2) Pressure University of London universities and affiliate students’ unions to divest from Israel and from companies directly or indirectly supporting the Israeli occupation and apartheid policies;

(3) Promote students’ union resolutions condemning Israeli violations of international law and human rights and endorsing BDS in any form;

(4) Actively support and work with Palestine solidarity organisations such as the BDS Movement, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Jews for Justice for Palestinians, British Committee for Palestinian Universities , Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions

(5) Affiliate ULU to the Palestine BDS National Committee and engage in education campaigns to publicize the injustice of Israel’s discriminatory policies against the Palestinians and its illegal occupation

Meanwhile, the National Union of Students in the UK has voted to support the principles of BDS.

Conference resolves:

1. To demand freedom for Palestine, calling for an end to the siege of Gaza and occupation of the West Bank and the right to return for all refugees.

2. To encourage unions to twin with universities in Palestine and to send an NUS delegation on future convoys to the Gaza strip.

3. To strongly condemn Israel’s siege on Gaza and actively campaign for it to be lifted in accordance with international law.

4. To support the Palestinians’ right to education by building links with students at the Islamic University of Gaza and other educational institutions in Gaza.

Related Links

ULU: Why We Voted for Boycott
London students see wave of anti-Israel activity – a lovely, satisfying zionist bleat in the JPost

In other dispatches, female human rights lawyer Meissa Irshaid, from the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, was assaulted and arrested by Israeli goons whilst advocating for protesters who had already been arrested. Such is Israel’s contempt for the rule of law.

Don’t miss the creative protest at the Lincoln Centre against the ethnic cleansing JNF.

Joseph Weitz, director of the JNF since the 1920s, said in 1940 with malice aforethought: ‘There is no way beside transferring the Arabs from here to the neighboring countries’. This vile zionist ethnic cleansing must end.

Boycott, divestments and sanctions action against Seacrets 14 may Perth 2011

Palestine / Israel Links

Sunday May 15, right of return protest at lebanese israeli border.
Jewish Donors Warn Obama on Israel : The sick US political system: Elite zionists remind Obama to cough up for the apartheid entity or his campaign funds will dwindle
Two brand-new videos from Palestinian march of return at Majdal Shams
New book shows how aid to PA ended up in Israel’s pockets
The “Slavery Law” and Beyond: New Bills Targeting Foreign Residents
Israel evicts two Palestinian families in Jerusalem – video
Nakba day: we waited 63 years for this : Karma Nabulsi : Like the rest of the Arab people who have taken their fate into their own hands – and in doing so provided lessons and models in the meaning of democracy and citizenship to the rest of the world for years to come – the Palestinians have demonstrated, quite perfectly and with great courage, what it is to be fully human, and how to hold on to one’s humanity in spite of more than six decades of violent oppression.
Israeli attaché expelled from Russia over spying allegations
Why Hamas has no need for Saatchi and Saatchi. :

Hamas leaders are neo-liberal capitalists, their economic policy no different from the orthodox economies of any other western nation. In fact Gazans’ ability to deal with enforced austerity and its resilient Big Society should be a model for the west. Ghazi Hamad, the Deputy Foreign Minister, delivered a message to Israelis – in Hebrew – calling for a truce after tensions rose dramatically in April. And in the last week Khaled Meshaal announced an acceptance of the 1967 borders – if that is not recognition of Israel, I don’t know what is – and yet another twenty-year Hudna (Arabic for truce).

Plans to erect 1,500 new settler homes in Jerusalem

WHO calls for

‘Israel to take down road blocks currently causing a shortage of medical supplies and treatment. The resolution also calls on Member States and NGOs to provide assistance to meet urgent health and humanitarian needs in the area.’
…
The treatment of Palestinians in Israeli jails was also mentioned, using several cases where men and women were denied medical treatment while in custody.

“The resolution calls for an end to the siege and a deconstruction of checkpoints, it calls for the provision of support for the Palestinian health sector from the international community, and it puts in place the framework for the Director-General of the World Health Organization to send a fact-finding mission to Palestine for a thorough investigation”

Obama to fund the Arab spring into neoliberal winter
Glenn Beck’s Absurd Jerusalem Rally: Why Religious Conservatives Are Obsessed With Israel
Netanyahu prepares Israelis for war Yossi Gurvitz looks at some worst case scenarios.
Racist zionist drivel in Haaretz: Palestinian refugees are a threat to Israel’s existence
Hasbaroids becoming desperate – cash grants, competitions and prizes presaged for new hasbara campaigns.
Full Text of Obama’s Middle East Speech
Making the Land of Israel Whole : Danny Danon
NPR at White House’s service in name of social media “conversation” on Obama speech

Other Links

Murderdoch’s minions bully Brown. Fair and balanced?
Osama bin Laden praises Arab Spring in posthumous message
New powers mean ASIO could spy on WikiLeaks

In the message released Wednesday, bin Laden referred to the revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, but made no mention of those in Libya, Syria or Yemen.

“There is a serious crossroads before you, and a great and rare historic opportunity to rise with the Ummah (Muslim community) and to free yourselves from servitude to the desires of the rulers, man-made law, and Western dominance”.

In Egypt:

‘People are blaming the revolution for new oil crises despite this is not the first time it happens , in fact some people tend to forget in the past few years of Mubarak we have even more worse crises. Where was the revolution when people were actually killing each other to get a loaf of bread during the time of Mubarak !?’

Neoliberal debt moves to fuel the second wave of Egyptian Revolution already scheduled for May 27?

Police open fire to disperse more protests in north Afghanistan

Mr Baillieu has a bridge he wants to sell you : spoke about the bridge yesterday during a live chat with visiting talkback radio host Neil Mitchell in the Hargreaves Mall…. then ‘WIRADJERI and Yorta Yorta elder Alf Bamblett receives an award from the State Government this week for his work on indigenous justice in Victoria. ‘

Acknowledgement of Country.

Firstly, if ‘Acknowledgements’ are not, never has been and shouldn’t be mandated, then why did Ted feel a need to bring it up? Why did he feel this of all issues was relevant to point out?

Is he so self-absorbed that the only Aboriginal issues that are of interest to him are those which directly affect him? Not surprising to those who saw Headlines in March that read ‘Aboriginal women from Lake Tyers staging a blockade to protest against the state government’s administration of their community’.

May 18, 2011December 11, 2020

BDS in Australia is Unstoppable!

Samah Sabawi, introduced by Reverend Dave, speaks on the case for BDS at Dulwich Hill, New South Wales on May 13.

Former Greens parliamentarian, Sylvia Hale, discusses the NSW Greens’ stand for BDS and the struggle around the Marrickville Council position.

Antony Loewenstein outlines the unstoppable trajectory of BDS demonstrated ironically by the desperation of efforts to stop it in Marrickville.

Palestine / Israel Links

Israeli Human Rights Record Slammed In Amnesty International’s Annual Human Rights Report –

the report, which described the human rights revolutions across the Middle East and North Africa as “inspirational”, has condemned Israel’s conduct in multiple areas including the justice system, the Gaza blockade, human rights accountability, housing demolitions and settlement activity, torture and excessive use of force, freedom of movement and freedom of speech.

Corporate Complicity in Israel’s Occupation : Evidence from the London Session of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine
Israeli Troops Shoot U.S. Student in Head with High-Velocity Tear Gas Canister
More despicable lawfare and greasy tactics by the ziolobby ‘Holland financing groups calling for Israel boycott’
Israel Police’s Facebook page rife with racist comments
Armed with lies, Nutanyahoo prepares for battle against Palestinians’ rights
The land theft continues : Israel turned the Nakba into a 63-year process – Amira Hass
Former Israeli soldiers break the silence on military violations
Israel actions “surpass barbarism of apartheid South Africa,” group says after Na’eem Jeenah deportation

Those of us who lived through and struggled against apartheid South Africa consider the actions of the Israeli state to surpass even the barbarism of apartheid South Africa. Isreal is already considered a pariah state in the eyes of most of humanity. It should be treated as such. We therefore support the BDS campaign wholeheartedly.

South Africa intervening to bring home Na’eem Jeenah after Israel deports him to Turkey without passport

Other Links

Journalist’s Facebook arrest: transcript of police interview

May 15, 2011December 11, 2020

Remembering Al Nakba 2

Dramatic video shows Palestinians, Syrians entering Israeli-occupied Golan Heights
RT @avinunu: Reminder: UN Sec Council Res 497 (1981) declares Israel’s annexation of Syria’s Golan to be “null & void” http://is.gd/4DDQQ5
Interactive map of Palestine villages destroyed in Nakba

The ethnic cleansing of Palestine by Zionist forces began in late 1947, so that by 15 May 1948, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians had already been expelled from their villages and cities before a single soldier from any Arab army had intervened. The exodus from, for example, Jaffa began in early 1948 after Zionist terrorists belonging to the Stern Gang set off a massive car bomb destroying the Jaffa municipality building on 4 January (this is all well-documented in books by right-wing Israeli historian Benny Morris, among others). Many villages in the north of Palestine were also depopulated around that time.

Rightwing group publishes Nakba denial booklet
Occupation & Nakba: Interview with Ariella Azoulay & Adi Ophir
New video shows Israeli soldiers firing as mass marchers enter Golan
Pro-Palestinian rallies turn deadly on Israel’s borders : the ABC Radio Australia should be ashamed of its bias toward the zionist entity in this zioshillery.
Zionists’ ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Haifa exposed
Plan Dalet: Master Plan for the Conquest of Palestine by Walid Khalidi

‘Looking at what was happening on the ground during December 1947-15 May 1948 was teh first track we followed in examining the Israeli version of the events of this period; the second track was to challenge the Israeli lie of evacuation orders head on. If the orders were broadcast as the government of Israel, its top leadership and the Kimches et al. insisted, and if these orders reached hundreds of villages and a dozen towns causing their evacuation by hundreds of thousands, surely some tract or echo of these orders should be on record. The obvious place to look was the back files of the Near East monitoring stations of the British and American governments (the BBC Cyprus listening post and the CIA-sponsored Foreign Broadcast Information Service), both of which covered not only all the radio stations in the Near East, but also the local newspapers as well. I therefore checked the BBC monitoring archives at the British Museum, London, and published the result in my article “Why Did the Palestinians Leave?” (Middle East Forum July 1959). Not only was there no hint of any Arab evacuation order, but the Arab radio stations had urged the Palestinians to hold on and be steadfast whereas it was the Jewish radio stations of the Haganah and the Irgun and Stern Gang which had been engaged in incessant and strident psychological warfare against the Arab civilian population.’

Cheering Netanyahu’s Intransigence
Excellent history of Herzl’s zionism and British scheming: Victor Kattan “From Coexistence to Conquest”
The Population Transfer Committee: November 1937
By the close of 1937, the JNF-linked Jewish Agency had established the Population Transfer Committee, and in 1940, director of the JNF Lands Department Yosef Weitz wrote:

It must be clear that there is no room in the country for both peoples.… If the Arabs leave it, the country will become wide and spacious for us … There is no room for compromises … There is no way but to transfer the Arabs from here to the neighbouring countries, to transfer all of them, save perhaps for Bethlehem, Nazareth and old Jerusalem. Not one village must be left, not one [bedouin] tribe … For this goal funds will be found … And only after this transfer will the country be able to absorb millions of our brothers and the Jewish problem will cease to exist. There is no other solution.[89]

Land Without a People – by Michael Palumbo

‘There is no hope that this new Jewish state will survive,
to say nothing of develop, if the Arabs are as numerous as
they are today.” So spoke Menahem Ussishkin, at 75, one of
the oldest and most respected Zionist leaders. His audience
on the afternoon of 12 June 1938 was the Executive Commit-
tee of the Jewish Agency, which was considering a plan by
the British administration to divide Palestine between
Arabs and Jews. For decades there had been strife between
the two ethnic groups in the mandate territory and now the
British administration was considering partition as the
best way to end the conflict between the Jewish colonists
and the indigenous Arab population. But partition would
leave over 200,000 Arabs in the proposed Zionist state, and
the leadership of the Jewish community in Palestine was
grappling with the problem of how best to get rid of them.

None of the members of the Executive disagreed with
Ussishkin when he stated: ‘The worst is not that the Arabs
would comprise 45 or 50 per cent of the population of the
new state but that 75 per cent of the land is owned by
Arabs.’ This land was desired for the waves of Jewish immi-
grants who would populate the Jewish state. There were many
other reasons why the Zionists wished to get rid of the
Arabs. Ussishkin claimed that with a large Arab population
the Jewish state would face enormous problems of internal
security and that there would be chaos in government. ‘Even
a small Arab minority in parliament could disrupt the
entire order of parliamentary life.’

The Partition of Palestine: Decision Crossroads in the Zionist Movement By Itzhak Galnoor

In late 1937, a Population Transfer Committee was established in the Jewish Agency to prepare material for the hearings of the Woodhead commision. The main document suggested two goals: reducing the Arab population in the territory intended for the Jewish state, and freeing agricultural land for Jewish settlement. I talso contained a detailed plan for the voluntary transfer of about 100,000 Arab farmers to the Gaza district, Transjordan, and Syria. The committee found it very difficult to reach clear recommendations and made do with the general declaration that “the transfer of Arab population on a large scale is a precondition for establishing the state.”

A Critique of Benny Morris by Nur Masalha

Video: Tel Aviv exhibit features testimony by Nakba perpetrators

The Common Archive aims “to create an audio-visual online archive of Jewish executor’s testimonies of the 1948 crimes with cross references to testimonies of Palestinian refugees and other historical visual data (maps, photos, etc).”

Palestine / Israel Links

Palestine Papers: Why I blew the whistle Ziyad Clot:

The “peace negotiations” were a deceptive farce, whereby biased terms were unilaterally imposed by Israel and systematically endorsed by the US and EU capitals. Far from enabling a negotiated fair end of the conflict, the pursuit of the Oslo process has deepened Israeli segregationist policies and justified the tightening of the security control imposed on the Palestinian population as well as its geographical fragmentation. Far for preserving the land on which to build a State, it has tolerated the intensification of the colonisation of the Palestinian territory. Far from maintaining a national cohesion, the process I participated in, albeit briefly, proved to be instrumental in creating and aggravating divisions amongst Palestinians. In its most recent developments, it became a cruel enterprise from which the Palestinians of Gaza have suffered the most. Last but not least, these negotiations excluded for the most part the great majority of the Palestinian people: the 7 million-Palestinian refugees. My experience over those 11 months spent in Ramallah confirms in fact that the PLO, given its structure, was not in a position to represent all Palestinian rights and interests.

Israelis attack Palestinian funeral
Palestinian & jewish voices speak at Sydney conference for BDS against Israeli occupation & apartheid
Israel is not an island : The Arab Revolution is knocking at Israel’s door
Australia, where ‘human rights’ festivals ban protest art against Israeli oppression
Bloody Sunday as Israel kills 21 in Palestine, Lebanon and Syria
Israeli author Yoram Kaniuk asks court to cancel his ‘Jewish’ status
Arab Spring headaches for Barack Obama : “When Israel kills demonstrators is that the same as when Syria or Libya does the same?”

Other Links

Australia is now in the business of turning away refugees.
The “dodgy dossier” : the truth will out –

A top military intelligence official has said the discredited dossier on Iraq’s weapons programme was drawn up “to make the case for war”, flatly contradicting persistent claims to the contrary by the Blair government, and in particular by Alastair Campbell, the former prime minister’s chief spin doctor.

In hitherto secret evidence to the Chilcot inquiry, Major General Michael Laurie said: “We knew at the time that the purpose of the dossier was precisely to make a case for war, rather than setting out the available intelligence, and that to make the best out of sparse and inconclusive intelligence the wording was developed with care.”

His evidence is devastating, as it is the first time such a senior intelligence officer has directly contradicted the then government’s claims about the dossier – and, perhaps more significantly, what Tony Blair and Campbell said when it was released seven months before the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The Minister for Indigenous Affairs needs to be Indigenous
Existence, Validity, Recognition :

Recognising Indigenous Australians as the first Australians is set to become next great debate on the national agenda. Acknowledged as a “Once in 50 year opportunity” by Prime Minister Julia Gilard it is with reserved optimism and nervous anticipation I, like many Indigenous and Non-Indigenous Australians await the 2011 government proposal and subsequent 2013 Referendum. With only 8 of the past 44 constitutional amendments being successful, it will take a movement at the ballot boxes reminiscent of the 1967 Referendum in which more than 90% of Australians voted in favor of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders being recognised as Australian citizens.

May 15, 2011December 11, 2020

Protest Against Australian Arms Trade with Israel

This demonstration at the Australian Defence Department below has received no Australian mainstream media coverage as far as I am aware.

A demonstration has been held outside of the offices of the Australian Defense Department to protest the Australian government’s arms trade with Israel.

A large part of Australia’s trade with Israel is made up of contracts to buy or sell military equipment, and the two countries also share military technologies, the Press TV correspondent in Sydney reported during the on Friday.

“On the subject of boycotting the arms trade with Israel, Minister for Defense Jason Clare recoiled in horror and said, ‘That will cost jobs.’ But they are prepared to lose a thousand jobs from their own defense department, civilian jobs, to support the arms trade,” Denis Doherty of the Australian Anti-Bases Campaign told the protesters.

In 2010, then Prime Minister Kevin Michael Rudd’s government signed a $300 million purchase with the Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit. These purchases were for BMS, or Battle Management Systems, complex electronics that permit integration of modern warfare technology.

Elbit claims that it provides similar technology to 20 countries worldwide.

Elbit subsidiary companies provide security systems for illegal West Bank settlements and Israel’s illegal apartheid wall. They are also the provider of the Israeli drones that are used by Britain, Canada, Australia, and many other NATO countries.

“Australia should not be trading arms with Israel, in either direction, because the two countries have fundamentally different attitudes towards the protection of civilians in warfare,” said Professor Jake Lynch from the University of Sydney.

“The reports about Israel’s attack on Gaza in 2008 and 2009 found there were multiple instances in which Israel failed to observe the principles of discrimination and proportionality, i.e., you adequately protect civilians’ bystanders. And that is linked with Israel’s refusal to adopt the principle which Australia and 80% of the international community have roughly accepted in the additional protocols to the Geneva Conventions,” he added.

Protesters argue that the Australian government should not buy from or sell military equipment to countries that implement apartheid policies toward populations under their control, occupy or wage war with neighboring nations, maintain illegally acquired and undeclared nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, and carry out summary executions and collective punishment.

The protesters are demanding that the Australian government implement an arms embargo on Israel until it complies with international law and human rights conventions.

“For Australia to continue an arms trade with Israel or to cultivate it, it will be one of many things Australia does, unfortunately. It is based on an overly-narrow conception of Australian interests,” Professor Lynch stated.

Australian Defense Department and Elbit Australia have refused to comment on the issue.

Source

May 14, 2011December 11, 2020

Remembering Al Nakba

At Tahrir Square, Cairo:

Rally for Palestine – remembering al-Nakba
5pm Brisbane Square
top of Queen St mall (outside Casino)
Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.

Related Links

nakba (n) 1. the “disaster” or “catastrophe”, occurred when approximately 725,000 Palestinians were expelled from
or fled their homes in 1947 and 1948 under attack from Zionist militias before and after Israel declared statehood.
As the day dies, tens of thousands still throng Tahrir Square chanting for “Solidarity with the Palestinian Intifada” and “National Unity.”

Palestine / Israel Links

Pressure mounts on Pizzarotti following Deutsche Bahn decision
BBC under fire for ‘censoring’ Palestine lyric
‘In March, China’s Culture Ministry said in a brief statement that an agreement to have Dylan sing in the country came with the proviso that he perform “the approved content”.’ Dylan sells out human rights – no wonder he’s playing for the apartheid zionist entity.

Other Links

Nick Dyrenfurth – Murdoch’s man of the ‘left’