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Hamas to introduce death penalty in Gaza for drugs

2009-12-03T12:01:17Z

Hamas rulers in the Gaza Strip plan to introduce the death penalty for gangs getting rich off smuggled narcotics.
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Leon T. Hadar: Assessing Obama's Foreign Policy: Guess Who Is Small Now?

2009-11-30T17:00:29Z

"You used to be big," says the B-movie hack screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) when he meets the faded and aging silent film star Norma Desmond (portrayed by Gloria Swanson) in her decaying mansion in Billy Wilder's classic film-noir Sunset Boulevard (1950). "I am big. It's the pictures that got small," responds the bristling Desmond/Swanson. To which the sneering Gillis/Holden replies: "I knew there was something wrong with them."

Some of the criticism of President Barak Obama's foreign policy coming from the neoconservatives on the right -- and occasionally also from progressives on the left -- remind me of Norma Desmond's famous lines. America is still the world's "only remaining superpower," the detractors argue. And yet under the current administration, this supposedly great power is being pushed around by China, disrespected by Russia, dismissed by Pakistan, ignored by Iran, and manipulated by Israel.

If Americans are the Masters of Pax Americana why can't we talk the Chinese into revaluing their currency; induce the Russians to impose sanctions on Iran; compel the Pakistanis to end their support for the Jihadis; bully the Iranians into ending their nuclear-military program; and get the Israelis to stop building new Jewish settlements on the West Bank? That America is still the Big Boy on the global block and that Washington has failed to use that enormous power to deliver results suggest to the critics that the problem lies in the White House, in a weak president that just does not have what it takes to lead America in this world. America is big. It's the president who got small.

Indeed, while conservatives who are not satisfied with the new Afghanistan strategy insist that Obama should be sending more troops to Hindu-Kish, critics on the left fault the White House for not getting rid of Hamid Karazi, the politically corrupt leader of that country, and for failing to make Pakistan into a non-failed state.

Then there was Obama's decision to abandon a planned missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic as part of an effort to "reset" U.S. relationship with Russia. So why is Washington still waiting for a clear pledge from Moscow to support economic sanctions against Iran if it refuses to work out a nuclear deal with the international community? And why should Americans wait for a green-light from Vladimir Putin to allow Georgia and Ukraine into NATO?

And apropos of Iran; where are the diplomatic rewards America should have been receiving from Iran in return for Obama's stated willingness to engage with the Ayatollahs in Tehran? As the neoconservatives see it, only the threat of military power will bring an end to Iran's drive to develop nuclear weapons.

If anything, both right-wing and liberal critics seem to share the view that Washington should 'do something" to assist the pro-democracy movement in Iran. And the members of a similar right-left coalition have slammed Obama for refusing to meet with the Dalai Lama before leaving for his trip to China and for not raising China's human rights violations and its protectionist economic approach (by tying the value of the renminbi to that of the U.S. dollar) during his meetings in Beijing.

When it comes to the Middle East, Obama is being challenged by his political supporters who expected him to revive the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and in particular, to pressure Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu to stick to his commitment to freeze the buildup of Jewish settlements; while right-wing detractors accuse the president of "abandoning" Israel in order to "appease" the Arabs.

On the issue of the Middle East as well as on other foreign policy challenges, Obama has to deal with the wide gap between the realities of the global politics and economics and the expectations that he may have created upon entering office. Many of his fans on home and abroad had assumed that Obama's multiculturalist persona and cosmopolitan disposition, not to mention his charisma and star qualities would help him win the hearts and minds of publics and elites around the world.

There is no doubt that through his personality and life-story, coupled with the manufactured media events, friendly gestures and cool style, Obama has been able to start changing America's global brand name. But that his media image and style of foreign policy have failed to produce any dramatic foreign policy success does not reflect a breakdown of presidential leadership, an ineffective decision-making process, a lack of moral authority or some sort of personal intellectual deficiency. Obama is certainly not a small-time president.

In order to understand the constraints operating on Obama as he tries to pursue his foreign policy agenda one should reread the U.S. National Intelligence Council report which had been issued in November 2008, in the same month in which Obama was elected as president. It predicted continued U.S. economic and military decline, the rise of a multi-polar system in which America will have to share power with China, India and other players. "By 2025, the U.S. will find itself as one of a number of important actors on the world state, albeit still the most powerful one," it concluded.

While the financial meltdown and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may have accelerated this process of American decline, the elites in Washington have been unwilling to accept that reality and assume that American could still "do something" to impose its interests and values worldwide. At the same time, the political right seems to be operating under the delusion that a Republican president a la Reagan - and unlike Obama -- would be able revive and even strengthen American global power.

But even a Roosevelt, a Truman, a Kennedy or Reagan would have no choice but to deal with the reality that is facing Obama, in which domestic resistance and rising global challenges make it more and more difficult for Washington to secure its military and economic hegemony on its own - to continue being the Big Number One --- and necessitate working together with other powers to contain threats to the international system while trying ensure that the United States is at least, a first among equals. Unfortunately, many in Washington are going to look at the mirror and assert that, "We're Big. And it's the guy in the White House that makes us look small."

Report: Security beefed up at Gaza-Egypt border ahead of Shalit transfer

2009-11-28T05:16:05Z

Voice of Palestine radio quoted Egyptian sources on Saturday as saying that in an unusual move, security around the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt

Read more: Gaza, Egypt, Palestine, Home News

Daoud Kuttab: Palestine After Abbas

2009-11-26T23:36:23Z

RAMALLAH - A political leader's decision not to seek re-election usually triggers fervent discussion about potential heirs. Yet, President Mahmoud Abbas's withdrawal from the presidential election scheduled for January 24, 2010, has produced nothing of the kind in Palestine - not because of a dearth of leadership or a reluctance to mention possible successors, but because the presidency of the Palestinian Authority has become irrelevant.

Abbas's withdrawal comes at a time when Palestinian frustration with the political process has rendered suspect the entire rationale behind the PA, established in the mid-1990's, following the Oslo Accords. The main component of the PLO's agreement with Israel was a five-year interim period during which negotiations were expected to lead to an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Sixteen years later, it has become clear that the Israelis have made no effort to come to terms with Palestinian national aspirations - and that no effective effort has been made to convince them. The number of illegal Jewish settlers in Palestinian areas has doubled, leaving Palestinians increasingly convinced that negotiations are a waste of time. Many recall the preferred strategy of former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir: "I would have conducted negotiations on autonomy for ten years, and in the meantime we would have reached a half-million people in the West Bank."

Initially, the five-year interim agreement called for the election of a Palestinian Legislative Council and an executive leader whom the Israelis wanted to call a "chairman," spurning the word "president." Because Arabic makes no distinction between chairman and president, the Israelis accepted use of the Arabic word rayyes in the official English text.

Palestinian refugees in exile and other Palestinians living in the diaspora were not allowed to vote. East Jerusalem Palestinians were allowed to vote only at the post office or at booths outside the city limits.

Abbas's withdrawal merely confirms the obvious. Another such election in the near future, including the one set for January, is unlikely to occur, mainly owing to the continuing rift between the PLO and Hamas, which controls Gaza.

Hamas participated in the 2006 legislative elections, which followed Israel's military withdrawal from Gaza. But for years Hamas and other radical Palestinian groups have rejected the Oslo process, on the grounds that free elections under Israeli occupation would be absurd. Hamas has the power to stymie the vote and has indicated that it would do so.

Moreover, Abbas has not given up his positions as head of the PLO and leader of its biggest faction, Fatah, which remains in control in the West Bank. Abbas cannot resign from his post for the foreseeable future, lest the Hamas-backed speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council take over. At the same time, no PLO official is likely to seek the presidency without Abbas's approval, which he will withhold until a new mechanism for ending the occupation is found.

The PLO will likely gain much from Abbas's decision, because it de-emphasizes the status of the PA president and raises the profile of his post as chairman of the PLO's executive committee. That shift, in turn, clears the way for a generational change in leadership - and, more importantly, a transition to post-Oslo politics.

The PLO's old guard - men like Yasser Arafat and Abbas, who led the liberation organization from exile and returned home with the Oslo Accords - dominated the Palestinian political landscape up to now. After they depart the scene, Palestinian leaders who were born under occupation and spent time in Israeli prisons will most likely fill the vacuum.

The most prominent such figure is Marwan Barghouti, the leader of the student movement at Birzeit University in the 1980's and one of the main organizers of the First Intifada, resulting in his deportation by Israel in the late 1980's. In 2002, he was arrested and sentenced to a long prison term on charges that he led the Second Intifada, which had begun two years earlier, and ordered some of its military attacks.

Despite being imprisoned, Barghouti was recently elected to Fatah's central council, and a number of others who spent time in Israeli prisons will join him. One is Jibril Rajoub, imprisoned for 19 years and deported in the First Intifada, only to return to lead one of the security services after the PA was established. Another is Mahmoud Dahlan, also an ex-prisoner and former security official, although the loss of Gaza to Hamas, for which many Palestinians hold him partly responsible, has dimmed his leadership prospects.

Finally, there is Nasser al-Qudwa, the former PLO representative at the United Nations. Qudwa is a dark-horse candidate to succeed Abbas - a possible compromise figure who has never been directly involved in security or military activities. For many Palestinians, Qudwa, a soft-spoken, multi-lingual nationalist (and Arafat's nephew), presents an acceptable face for Palestine locally and internationally.

The coming months will reveal whether we are, indeed, witnessing the dawn of the post-Oslo era in Palestinian politics, and whether a new leader, with new supporters, will be required to revive the Palestinian cause. Whoever emerges on top will have to present an effective strategy to end four decades of military occupation and bring about a truly independent state that a majority of Palestinians can embrace.

Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2009.
www.project-syndicate.org

Andy Borowitz: Palin Issues Thankfulnesses List

2009-11-24T22:11:18Z

WASILLA (The Borowitz Report): One day before Thanksgiving, Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin today issued the following "thankfulnesses list":

This being my list of the thankfulnesses I'm tapping into this year...

I have thankfulness that we have a President who is learning to celebrate our American holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas also, even though he didn't have either of those days when he was growing up in Kenya.

I have thankfulness that we live in a country where we have the freedom to speak, even though Todd has never done so actually.

I have thankfulness that little Falcon was found safe and sound in that box, being that I was worried sick about him flying around in that balloon.

I have thankfulness for all of those Jewish settlements on the West Bank, seeing that Jewish people will be flocking to the Holy Land to celebrate Thanksgiving.

I have thankfulness also for the new drapes I installed in my house to keep the Russians from peeping in.

I have thankfulness that Levi posed in Playgirl, and I'm sure all the gay men who read Playgirl have thankfulness for that also.

I have thankfulness also that Levi's mom has been put in prison so I don't have to worry about her selling drugs to Willow or Piper.

And finally, I have thankfulness for all of the good people who read my book, and for the person who wrote it also. More here.

Read more HuffPost Thanksgiving coverage and commentary

Adam Shapiro: Selling Out in Congress

2009-11-24T15:42:19Z

One year ago, I watched election results coming in for Virginia's
Fifth Congressional District, where my friend and colleague Tom
Perriello was challenging incumbent Virgil Goode, Jr. CNN kept
flipping the winner because the vote was close. Finally, Tom emerged
with a 727-vote victory. I was elated, because I knew Tom and knew
his deeply rooted principles. And daring to accept that there might
be something to this overall atmosphere of change and hope espoused by
the President-elect, I felt encouraged by the seemingly new direction
and new leaders the country was embracing.

Two years earlier, I met Tom in Afghanistan when he arrived as a
consultant with the United Nations to explore transitional justice
possibilities for the country. I was already working for a human
rights organization, promoting rule of law, women's rights and
transitional justice. Tom had done similar work in Liberia helping
launch a truth and reconciliation commission.

We quickly saw eye to eye on the work and became friends over
discussions about the role of law in achieving justice in extremely
difficult conflict and post-conflict circumstances. I took Tom hiking
in the hills overlooking Kabul and we strategized on how to strengthen
the justice sector in Afghanistan. Of course, my work on Palestine
came up and Tom usually brought the discussion to the role of
international law and the need for accountability on all sides -
considerations that clearly help protect civilians, particularly
Palestinians living under occupation.

A year later, back in the US, Tom invited me to join a group of
dynamic young social entrepreneurs for a strategy/brainstorming
meeting that led to the creation of Avaaz - a kind of MoveOn.org for
the international community to organize for human rights, the
environment and other progressive causes. One of the first campaigns
launched by Avaaz was to call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza in
January 2009 and for a robust international response to assure the
lasting cessation of violence.

Shortly after that founding meeting of Avaaz, I received an email from
Tom explaining that he was going to run for Congress in a long-shot
attempt to unseat a conservative Republican. It was a surprise, but
Tom was insistent he was going to retain his principles and values if
he won. He was excited about the prospect of making real change if
Obama became President. I shed my typical cynicism and encouraged
friends to contribute to his campaign.

Fast forward one year, to the present, and I have been shocked and
disappointed to learn that my friend Tom - a staunch supporter of
international law, human rights and equality for all - has voted as a
Congressman in favor of apartheid. On the face of it, House
Resolution 867 "Calling on the President and the Secretary of State to
oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the
'Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza
Conflict' in multilateral fora" was a typical AIPAC-inspired (or even
written) resolution to push the US Congress to support Israel when it
got into hot water internationally. Already the White House and State
Department have rejected the Goldstone Report, named for preeminent
South African justice Richard Goldstone, a well-known Zionist and
staunch supporter of Israel. Human rights organizations around the
world support the report, and the credentials of the commission were
outstanding. Judge Goldstone himself has repeatedly pointed out that
the report also calls to task Hamas for violations of international
law.

So why did Tom vote in favor of H.Res. 867 and how is this apartheid?

I believe Congressman Perriello's vote resulted from the
almost-obligatory fealty to AIPAC displayed by members of Congress -
and perhaps his desire to get reelected.

Incumbents have learned over the years not to cross AIPAC if
re-election is important to them. This is not a tangential
correlation - ask former Rep. Cynthia McKinney, former Senator Charles
Percy and former President George H.W. Bush what happened to them when
they took stands helpful to securing Palestinian rights. So the logic
behind his vote is pretty simple.

But is winning everything? Even when it means voting for apartheid?
Where do accountability to self and the bedrock principles we
discussed in the Kabul hills enter the equation?

If the Goldstone Report concerned any other country than Israel as the
main perpetrator and any other people as victims than the
Palestinians, there is no doubt that the Report would be fully
endorsed in Congress and perhaps there would be House Resolutions
praising the work of the commission, supporting the role of the UN in
investigating war crimes, and affirming the need for the US government
to take action to support implementing the findings. That this
resolution was introduced against the Report because the primary
victims were Palestinian is an extension of Israel's policies of
discrimination that set Palestinians apart as a people with inferior
rights. Voting in favor was akin to a stamp of approval that
Palestinian lives are not equal: yes, they were killed, but so what,
their deaths are not worth investigating. Such blatant disregard for
a specific people's humanity and human rights in favor of another
people's superior rights and privileged standing can only be
understood as apartheid. Congressman Perriello and his colleagues
have turned their backs on international law and human rights. They
failed to offer a word of support for Palestinian freedom and the
lives of the more than 300 Palestinian children killed by Israel in
the winter war.

President Obama, unlike a well-trained and increasingly sycophantic
Congress, has set out to change America's image in the world. This
image is not undermined because of our relationship with Ireland,
Thailand or Chile - or even by North Korea, Iran, Pakistan or
Afghanistan, despite the seeming inadequacy of US policy to meet these
challenges. No, the consistent lack of US credibility in the world
spans Democrats and Republicans and is a consequence of our
relationship with Israel and the exceptionalism applied to an occupier
nation foisting apartheid on the Palestinians. Most of the world
grasps immediately the hypocrisy of the Congress when it votes against
the carefully documented work of Judge Goldstone, who has devoted his
life to fighting racism and apartheid.

When my friend Tom told me he was trying to become a Congressman, he
assured me that he would maintain who he was. The man I knew was
someone who fought for justice, who worked tirelessly to promote
international law and human rights, and who was aware of the reality
of Congress but determined to be different. Congressman Perriello, I
am afraid, has become like so many of his colleagues, a mere tool of a
hard-right AIPAC agenda that has no business dictating American
policy. He has become part of an American dog wagged by an Israeli
and AIPAC tail.

Voters are again disengaging because they continue to see too much
business as usual. Tom is just the latest manifestation of a
politician abandoning core beliefs.

What is most disappointing, perhaps, is not that my friend Tom is
missing in this incarnation of Congressman Perriello - who seems
willing to trade fundamental human rights for political expedience -
but that in the end I was right to be cynical.

Eric Trager: Obama's "Dangerous" Mideast Analysis

2009-11-24T07:49:53Z

Last week during a press conference in Beijing, President Barack Obama endorsed one of the most propagandized of pop theories regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. When asked about Israel's plan to build 900 apartment units in Gilo - a Jewish neighborhood of southwest Jerusalem beyond the Green Line - Obama remarked:

I think that additional settlement building does not contribute to Israel's security. I think it makes it harder for them to make peace with their neighbors. I think it embitters the Palestinians in a way that could end up being very dangerous.

In other words, Israeli settlement-building causes Palestinian terrorism.

It is worth pointing out that this idea is so widely discredited that even Jimmy Carter - after initially including it in his controversial book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid - has rejected it. Of course, the main problem with this theory is that it is morally outrageous: the notion that anything justifies targeting and killing innocent civilians is repugnant to decent people.

But more importantly, the theory is flat out wrong. After all, terrorism is typically an organizationally coordinated activity, in which the costs associated with attacks (acquiring materials, building a bomb, arranging transportation, etc.) are often too high for any individual - no matter how "embittered" he might be - to bear. Moreover, terrorist organizations - like other political players - are strategic actors: they strike when the strategic environment permits them to do maximal damage, and not merely when developments on the ground make them angry.

Recent developments reinforce the extent to which strategic realities - and not Israeli construction - determine Palestinian terrorists' decision-making. This past weekend, Hamas announced that it would halt rocket attacks on Israel from Gaza, with one Hamas official acknowledging that the group wanted to prevent another round of Israeli retaliation. Indeed, given the strategic environment, Hamas fears further destruction in Gaza much more than it wishes to avenge new apartment units in Gilo.

None of this should be surprising to President Obama, whose supposedly "realist" outlook should give him an appreciation for the precedence that strategic interests take over emotional ones. On the other hand, a strange pattern seems to be emerging in the President's foreign policy prescriptions: realist principles take a hiatus whenever he is dealing with the Middle East.

Israeli Aircraft Strike Gaza Targets, Seven People Wounded

2009-11-22T12:37:25Z

JERUSALEM — Israeli aircraft attacked two suspected weapons-making factories and a smuggling tunnel in the Gaza Strip early Sunday in what the military said was retaliation for Palestinian rocket fire into southern Israel.

The airstrikes, which wounded at least seven people – including one seriously – came despite an announcement by Gaza's Hamas rulers that the territory's military factions had all agreed to stop firing rockets. The Hamas announcement came late Saturday, after the rocket attack.

Ray Hanania: Re-Energizing The Two-State Solution To Israeli-Palestinian Peace

2009-11-20T17:10:59Z

Yes, I am running for President of Palestine in the next election, if there is one. No, I don't expect to win. But then, many long shot candidates who don't expect to win, actually find themselves winning.

Still, my goal isn't to win office but to help re-ignite the peace process between Palestinians and Israelis not by pushing the leaders to do their jobs and stop putzing around but by reaching out to the grassroots Palestinian and Israeli publics.

I figure the leaders are hemming and hawing and violating past agreements because they believe the public doesn't care any more and that things have gotten so bad that conflict seems like a better alternative. Conflict is never a better alternative.

So I threw my political hat in the proverbial election campaign ring, and I am tossing my tongue in my stand up comedian cheek, too, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, the publics of both people can return to a place of sanity and end the blame game.

Here's my campaign platform and I think it's doable because Israelis and Palestinians are already responding positively:

I support two-states, one Israel and one Palestine. As far
as I am concerned, I can recognize Israel’s “Jewish” character and Israelis
should recognize Palestine’s “non-Jewish” character.

I oppose violence of any kind from and by anyone. I reject
Hamas’ participation in any Palestinian government without first agreeing to
surrender all arms and to accept two-states as a “final” peace agreement. But I
also reject allowing Israeli settlers to carry any weapons and believe Israelis
must impose the same restrictions on them.

I can support some settlements remaining – given the reality
of 42 years of time passing -- in a dunum-for-dunum land exchange. If Ariel is
500 dunums with a lifeline from Israel, then Israel gives Palestine 500 dunums
in exchange.

Jerusalem should be a shared city and Palestinians should
have an official presence in East Jerusalem. The Old City should be shared by
both permitting open access to the city to all with a joint Palestinian-Israeli
police presence.

Palestinian refugees would give up their demand to return to
pre-1948 homes and lands lost during the conflict with Israel. Instead, some
could apply for family reunification through Israel and the remainder would be
compensated through a fund created and maintained by the United States, Israel,
Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the United Nations.

I also think Israelis should find it in their hearts to show
compassion and offer their apologies to Palestinians for the conflict.

I support creation of a similar fund to compensate those
Jews from Arab lands who lost their homes and lands, too, when they fled.

I think the Wall should be torn down, or relocated to the
new borders. I have no problem separating the two nations for a short duration
to help rebuild confidence between our two people.

All political parties, Palestinian and Israelis, should
eliminate languages denying each other’s existence, and all maps should be
reprinted so that Israeli maps finally show Palestine and Palestinian maps
finally show Israel.

A subway system should be built linking the West Bank
portion of the Palestine state to the Gaza Strip portion of the Palestine
State. Palestine should be permitted to build a seaport access to strengthen
its’ industry, and an airport to permit flights and too and from the Arab and
Israeli world.

I would urge the Arab World to renew their offer to
normalize relations with Israel if Israel agrees to support the creation of a
Palestinian State.

And I would ask both countries to establish embassies in
each other’s country to address other problems.

While non-Jewish Palestinians would continue to live in
Israel as citizens, Jews who wish to live in settlements surrendered by Israel
could become Palestinian citizens and they should be recognized and treated
equally.

If Jews want to live in Hebron, they should be allowed to
live in Hebron and should be protected, just as non-Jews. In fact, for every
Jewish individual seeking to live in Palestine, a Palestinian should be
permitted to live in Israel. In fact, major Palestinian populations in Israel
could be annexed into Palestine (like settlements).

Another concept is to have non-Jews living in Israel
continue to live there but only vote in Palestinian elections, while Jews
living in Palestine would only vote in Israeli elections. A special citizenship
protection committee could be created to explore how to protect the rights of
minorities in each state.

Israel and Palestine should create joint-governing and
security agencies working with the United States to monitor the peace, and
establish an agency to pursue criminal acts of violence.

You tell me who has a better campaign platform that makes more sense among Israel's and Palestine's leaders?

Everyone knows what the answer is, we just need to find people with courage to start saying it. But Palestinians and Israelis don't have to wait until their leaders suddenly see the light and stop pandering to the extremists.

Enough is enough! Yalla Peace!

My campaign web site is www.YallaPeace.com. Join in this movement, not to make me president, but to give our children a better future than the nightmare of a past and present we now have.

Ashley Rindsberg: UN's Goldstone Sent 13-Year-Old Boy to Prison for Protesting Apartheid

2009-11-19T14:16:47Z

Richard Goldstone is one of today's most renowned names in human rights jurisprudence and international law concerning war crime. Already well known in human rights circles by the time he served as chief prosecutor for the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the mid-1990s, Goldstone's esteem only increased as he carried out his role as a UN prosecutor.

But prior to his work for the international court, Goldstone cut his judicial teeth on the bench of South Africa's Supreme Court under the apartheid regime. During this period between 1980 and 1989 -- some of apartheid South Africa's most violent years -- Goldstone ruled on cases which pitted human rights against South African statutory law, legal precedence, and judicial convention.

In the most poignant case, Goldstone ruled against the 1986 appeal of a 13-year-old boy who had been sentenced to jail for disrupting school as a protest against apartheid and increasingly draconian "emergency laws" used to preserve order and squelch opposition to the government. Goldstone, according to The New York Times, provided no comment to his decision to uphold the sentence of the lower court.

In a similar case that year, Judge Goldstone ruled against two appellants who had been convicted for possession of a cassette tape that had a recording of an interview with Oliver Tambo. Tambo, along with Nelson Mandela, was a founding member of the ANC Youth League and later served Secretary General of the ANC itself.

The case, brought before the Transvaal Provincial Division of the Supreme Court, on which Goldstone sat, centered on whether the two young men had attempted to disseminate the tape on behalf of the ANC, thereby violating the Internal Security Act No. 74 of 1982 -- a piece of legislation that some human rights scholars have called a crucial weapon in the regime's "arsenal of terrorism legislation."

Goldstone commented in that case that Mr. Tambo's opening words on the recording indicated "beyond a reasonable doubt that the cassette in question was published or disseminated under the direction or guidance or on behalf of the African National Congress," -- a fact that, in Golstone's opinion, was sufficient basis to uphold the convictions of the two young men.

According to the Supreme Court ruling on the case, other key subversive phrases made by the ANC leader on the recording included an encouragement to the people of South Africa to resist the apartheid regime, and Mr. Tambo's call to "let us change our own country into the kind of society we want it to be."

Goldstone's comment that the two young men had acted as agents of the ANC was later cited by the higher appellate court as reason to once again uphold the convictions.

The case of the 13-year-old boy Goldstone ruled against came in the context of a wave of national protests and school disruptions by South Africa's black youth against apartheid and the brutal emergency laws. Authorities responded with mass detention of children who participated in the protests, or were suspected of doing so. By the fall of 1985, at least 800 students had been detained. By December of 1986, South African security officials admitted to having detained more than 1,800 teenagers, while reports surfaced that policemen routinely whipped children at their school desks if they were suspected of supporting the anti-apartheid protests.

Goldstone was slammed by South African human rights organizations for his 1986 ruling against the boy. In a later interview with The New York Times' Bill Keller (who called Goldstone a "cross between King Solomon and Ghostbusters"), the South African judge said about his ruling against the boy that the emergency laws left him "no way out."

But criticism of Goldstone has not been limited to decisions made during his tenure on the bench of apartheid South Africa's Supreme Court. South African journalist and historian R.W. Johnson wrote in an October, 2009 piece that Goldstone had made serious ethical breaches in his capacity as chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia (ICTY).

During preparation for the trial against former Yugoslavian military commanders, according to Johnson, Goldstone was informed by higher-ups that if he did not secure an indictment by November, 1994, he would not receive budgetary funding for the following year. Goldstone quickly moved to indict the only person there was evidence against, even though Goldstone admitted that the defendant "wasn't an inappropriate first person to indict."

Johnson, in his piece, "Who Is Richard Goldstone," noted that the indictment "was so inappropriate that the judges in The Hague passed a motion severely censuring Goldstone."

Goldstone has become the center of controversy in recent months regarding his report to the UN Human Rights Council following a fact-finding mission he led into Israel's 2008 Operation Cast lead, later known as the Gaza War. The report, which has been praised by some but heavily criticized by others, is being considered by the UN Security Council.

Israel Angers U.S. With Plan To Build New Homes In The West Bank

2009-11-17T18:42:49Z

WASHINGTON — The White House rebuked Israel with heavy criticism Tuesday after the Jerusalem city government moved toward the construction of 900 additional housing units in a Jewish neighborhood in East Jerusalem, which Palestinians claim for the capital of their future state.

President Barack Obama has made restarting peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians a top foreign policy goal. To that end, he has demanded that Israel cease building new or expanding existing Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

Palestinians To Appeal To UN For State, As Peace Talks Stall

2009-11-15T23:12:20Z

JERUSALEM — A Palestinian drive to ask the U.N. Security Council to endorse a state unilaterally, put forward by a top negotiator Sunday, appeared more an expression of frustration with U.S. and Israeli policies and stalled peace talks than a real effort to go it alone.

A resolution for a Palestinian state could face a veto from the U.S., Israel's main ally. But if the Security Council approved it, consequences could be even more severe.

Palestinian push for an independent state causes Israeli alarm

2009-11-15T19:15:24Z

Palestinian leaders from President Mahmoud Abbas down have alarmed Israeli ministers by swinging their weight behind a planned effort to secure UN backing for a unilaterally declared independent state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Israeli Troops Kill Palestinian Along Gaza Border

2009-11-13T09:55:47Z

JERUSALEM (Associated Press) -- Israeli troops killed a Palestinian man along the Gaza Strip border early Friday, both sides said, but the circumstances of the incident were unclear.

The Israeli military said soldiers opened fire at a group of five men who "appeared to be planting explosive devices" along the tense frontier. One man was killed, another was taken for medical treatment in Israel and three others were taken to Israel for questioning, the military said.

But it could not confirm the men were armed and said an investigation was under way.

A Palestinian official at Gaza's central Shuhada al-Aqsa hospital said troops fired on a group of four civilian men who were bird hunting. One was slightly wounded and taken to the hospital, and the other three were taken into Israel by Israeli troops, he said.

The military later returned the body of one of the men to the hospital, he added. The official did not identify the deceased, describing the body as that of a man his 20s.

The hospital official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information. By mid-afternoon, none of Gaza's militant groups had claimed the dead man as its member.

Young Gazans often hunt birds in the late fall with nets and traps.

Gaza has been largely quiet since Israel's offensive against Hamas early this year, but there has been sporadic violence along the border.

'War criminal go home,' Brazil protesters shout at Peres

2009-11-13T00:31:08Z

Dozens of protesters in Sao Paulo demonstrated Thursday against President Shimon Peres' visit to Brazil and Israel's actions in Gaza.
...

Read more: SãO Paulo-Brazil, Brazil, Gaza, Israel, Home News

Dozens in Brazil demonstrate against Peres visit

2009-11-12T19:16:17Z

Dozens of protesters in Sao Paulo demonstrated Thursday against President Shimon Peres' visit to Brazil and Israel's actions in Gaza.
...

Read more: SãO Paulo-Brazil, Brazil, Gaza, Israel, Home News

Goldstone: Peres attack on me was 'specious,' ill-befitting his post

2009-11-12T16:31:15Z

South African jurist Richard Goldstone lambasted President Shimon Peres on Thursday for a personal attack on him, which the president launched in response to a damning report he compiled on the Israel's winter offensive in Gaza.
...

Ahmed Shihab-Eldin: Celebrating Berlin While Enabling Israel's Apartheid Wall

2009-11-11T17:23:32Z

The 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall highlights both the inherent thirst for freedom and proclivity to hypocrisy ingrained in the human condition.

As people across the world are joining to celebrate the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989, there is reason for joy and despair.

In Berlin, celebrations included the stacking and subsequent toppling of 1,000 8-ft tall foam domino tiles along the path where the wall once stood.

In the US, the German Embassy coordinated a campaign with the motto "Freedom Without Walls" to promote awareness of the historic day in an event intended to target college students across the country.

And In the town of Qalandiya in the West Bank, a group of masked Palestinian activisits united to tear down a two-meter cement block of today's Berlin Wall - Israel's ever-expanding "separation fence" which has divided families from each other, Jews from Muslims and Israelis from Palestinians.

Israel began building its "barrier" -- which stands at twice the height of the Berlin Wall and more than four times the length -- in 2002, citing security reasons.

Berlin's wall ran for 155 kilometers. Israel's is expected to reach at least 650. The average height of the Berlin Wall was 3.6 meters. The fenced portions of Israel's wall reach 6 meters, and the cement portions reach 8.

As world leaders converged on the German capital to celebrate the anniversary, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the courage of East Germans.

"Many played a role. But it would not have been possible without the courage of the people in the former East Germany," she said.

But in the West Bank the courage that spurred the 100 protestors that broke through the wall at a military checkpoint in Qalandiya was obscured by tear gas grenades launched from the Israeli Army and silence among Western leaders.

If there is anything to be learned from Berlin, it would be that walls do not protect, they divide; they do not prevent, but incite. If western policy makers would muster a fraction of the courage that the protesters in Qalandiya displayed and challenge Israel's misguided rerunning of history by implementing resolutions made by the International Court of Justice to dismantle the "illegal" wall, a practical and productive step towards a just peace would be within reach.

Anything short of that is for show, rather than for shalom.

Last summer, President Obama stuck a note on another famous wall in Israel, the Wailing Wall. Among the few sentences he had included was, "Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just."

But it may be wiser in this instance to turn to history rather than to God to know what is right and just.

As George Bernard Shaw famously concluded, "If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience."

Dutch FM: Israel, Hamas must probe Gaza war crimes charges

2009-11-11T13:16:39Z

Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen urged Israel and Hamas to investigate war crimes allegations stemming from the Gaza conflict earlier this year.
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Lloyd Greif: Israel Stands Alone

2009-11-10T22:10:40Z

Eight months into President Barack Obama's administration, his Middle East peace "road map" is crystal clear.
First, he dialed down the pressure on Iran, whose nuclear weapons program presents an existential threat to Israel.
Second, he shifted the blame for Islamic extremism to Israel and solely blamed it for the Palestinian's plight. Then
he unilaterally ratcheted up the pressure on Israel to cease building settlements and to ease its self-defense blockade
of Gaza. Now, Obama has upped the ante even further, framing lasting peace in the Middle East as requiring Israel
to retreat to its 1967 borders. Although he blandly claims that there are "no preconditions" to relaunching
negotiations, in truth he has doomed the peace talks before they even start. Obama has set up Israel as the fall guy
for negotiations that will ultimately fail and is the architect of that failure.

When Obama was elected -- with 78 percent of the Jewish vote -- there was concern about what his
administration would mean for the 60 years of unwavering support America had provided Israel. Unlike his
Republican opponent, John McCain, or his predecessor, George W. Bush, both longstanding supporters of Israel,
Obama had no such track record and was championing a different course, one of détente with such hard-line
regimes as Iran and Syria. Jews took heart when then-President-elect Obama selected a Jew, Rahm Emanuel, as his
chief of staff, and Hillary Clinton, previously a staunch supporter of Israel from her days as senator from New York,
as his secretary of state.

An examination of the first 250 days of President Obama's administration convincingly demonstrates that the
earlier concerns were well founded and the mitigating cabinet appointments mere window dressing. From his first
telephone call as president to a head of state -- Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian National Authority
-- and his first one-on-one television interview with any news organization -- Al Arabiya TV -- to his bowing to
Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, then embracing the Muslim world at Cairo University and, most recently,
rebuking Israel in an address to the United Nations General Assembly, Obama has shown far more concern for
strengthening ties with authoritarian regimes on the Arabian Peninsula than to maintaining the historically close
alliance with the region's only true democracy.

His Cairo speech scaled back his support of Israel in favor of establishing new diplomatic channels in the Arab
world. He also equated the suffering of the Palestinians with the loss of 6 million Jewish lives in the Holocaust.
Worse yet, Obama's affirmation of the Arab propagandist idea that Israel was created as a response to the
Holocaust greatly undermined its legitimacy as a state and ignored Jews' forced diaspora and Judaism's historical
ties to the Middle East that predate all other religions.

Instead of seeing Israel as the oasis and model for democracy that it is in the Middle East, Obama views the country
and its conflict with its neighbors as "this constant wound ... this constant sore, [that] does infect all of our foreign
policy." It is as if the president has blinders on: in effect repeating the red herring that blames the atrocities of 9/11
on America's support of Israel, in July 2008, Obama stated:

The lack of a resolution to this problem [the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict] provides an excuse for anti-American militant jihadists to engage in inexcusable
actions, so we have a national security interest in solving this.

Sound familiar? Former President Jimmy Carter,
author of the canard, "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," asserts, "lack of progress in the Middle East is one of the main causes for animosity, hatred and even violent acts against America." Both presidents conveniently neglect the
fact that Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, perpetrators of multiple attacks on America, never cared or linked any of
their actions to the Palestinian cause until after 9/11. Islamic extremists are at war with the spread of Western
culture, and the United States is the chief exporter of Western beliefs, so it is a pipe dream to assume that America
can achieve détente with "anti-American militant jihadists" by, in effect, offering up Israel as a sacrificial lamb.

In his United Nations address, Obama called for Israel to establish "a viable, independent Palestinian state with
contiguous territory that ends the occupation that began in 1967." Like Bush before him, Obama referred to the
territories Israel won in the Six-Day War -- a preemptive defensive strike against armies from nine Arab countries
massing on its borders -- as "occupied territory" but, unlike Bush, Obama's proposal has Israel retreating from its
own land, returning to indefensible 1967 borders and trusting in the peaceful intentions of its neighbors. Bush
didn't go nearly that far, citing in his 2004 "road map" that "in light of new realities on the ground, including
already existing major Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status
negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949."

Obama went even further, linking
America's continuing support for the Jewish state's very security with his demand that it surrender the territory,
stating, "The United States does Israel no favors when we fail to couple an unwavering commitment to its security
with an insistence that Israel respect the legitimate claims and rights of the Palestinians." Of all the countries in
history that have won wars, only Israel is being denied the fruits of its victory in 1967.

Obama appears to have adopted as policy the controversial agreement Carter reached with Hamas last year to
establish a Palestinian state in the territories won by Israel 42 years ago. Additionally, and again in sharp contrast
to the Bush Administration, which opposed a Palestinian national unity government, Obama has communicated his
support, through Special Envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell, for the formation of a Hamas-Fatah coalition
government. Obama has even gone so far as to request Congress amend the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009
to enable the United States to continue to provide financial aid to any Palestinian government if the President
determines that it is in the interests of national security.

As the United States, the European Union and other countries have classified Hamas as a terrorist organization,
America under Obama would appear to have strange new bedfellows. Perhaps the president has forgotten that
Hamas' charter (Article 7) advocates the killing of all Jews by Muslims, its leaders are Holocaust deniers, that his
own FBI director, Robert Mueller, in testimony before the U.S. Senate, cited "the FBI's assessment that there is a
...threat of a coordinated terrorist attack in the U.S. from Palestinian terrorist organizations, such as Hamas," that
Hamas has never accepted Israel's right to exist and is committed to "obliterating" it (preamble to Hamas charter),
and that, according to Defense Secretary Robert Gates last January, Hamas and another terrorist organization,
Hezbollah, have joined with Iran in fomenting "subversive activity" in Latin America. Or perhaps he believes
America's stated policy of not negotiating with terrorists -- established by President Ronald Reagan in 1981 and
reaffirmed by Obama as a presidential candidate in April 2008 -- should be scrapped.

The United States is proving to be a fair-weather ally, abandoning Israel in the face of an impending existential
threat from a nuclear Iran. Obama's self-declared "evenhanded" approach to solving the Middle East "problem"
would appear to consist of continually pressuring Israel to give up its secure borders while simultaneously enabling
grave threats to Israel's very existence, refusing to engage the United States in taking action to halt Iran's nuclear
weapons program. Last May, the president connected the dots thusly:

To the extent that we can make peace...
between the Palestinians and the Israelis, then I think it actually strengthens our hand in the international
community in dealing with a potential Iranian threat.

This idealistic view misses the point -- Iran isn't interested
in a two-state solution. In the words of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, "Israel must be wiped off the
map," is a "stinking corpse," "is on its way to annihilation" and "has reached the end like a dead rat." Not a lot of
room to negotiate there.

Nor is there room to negotiate Iran's nuclear weapons program. As Obama belatedly acknowledged on Sept. 26
regarding the country's newly disclosed nuclear power facility, "the size and configuration of this facility is
inconsistent with a peaceful program." Iran desires global power and to spread the religious and political ideology
of the Islamic Revolution, so what's left to negotiate? Access to nuclear energy for peaceful uses isn't on Iran's
shopping list.

Iran and Syria rank as the leading state sponsors of terrorism, yet the president has removed a longstanding export
ban on American technology to Syria, allowing the transfer of spare aircraft parts, information technology and
telecommunications equipment, all material that could also benefit the air force of Syria's close ally, Iran. At the
same time, Obama actually suspended the sale of military equipment to Israel -- holding up the shipment of
Apache helicopters after Israel moved to defend its citizenry against daily Hamas-enabled rocket barrages earlier
this year -- equipment necessary to safeguard Israel's security against overwhelming odds. Syria, an unrepentant
state supporter of terrorism, was exempted by Obama from the longtime ban on the sale of sensitive, dual-use
technologies. Yet, it is only Israel that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the United States as America's most
important and dependable ally in combating terrorism. Can the president see the difference?

Obama spoke eloquently to the United Nations about having compassion for "the Palestinian boy in Gaza who has
... no country to call his own." Where's his concern for the 3,000-year-old Jewish communities in Arab lands that
were ethnically cleansed between 1948 and the early 1970s? Commencing with Arab League retaliation for the
declaration of the State of Israel, 1 million Jews were forcibly removed from their homes and personal property,
forfeiting 62,000 square miles of land (nearly five times Israel's 12,600 square miles) and assets worth approximately $300 billion. What of their "right of return?"

By tying the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to improving Muslim-U.S. relations, Obama has forced Israel into the
position of answering for U.S. failures in the Muslim world and making the sacrifices necessary to mend that
relationship. Obama has placed immense pressure on Israel to halt settlement building. Where is the equal pressure
on the Palestinian Authority to ensure Israel's security? Obama's far greater pressure on the Israelis has
emboldened Arab intransigence and moved the Middle East farther away from the prospect of peace.

Case in point:
Last weekend, Mohamed ElBaradei, the Egyptian chairman of the United Nations' International Atomic Energy
Agency, asserted that Israel's nuclear weapons program, not Iran's, is "the number one threat" to Middle East
peace. In the words of Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, "Israel seeks Iran's recognition; Iran seeks Israel's
destruction. So of course it is Israel that poses a threat." Obama's strong-arm policies toward Israel have created
the opening Arab countries have long sought to solve "the Jewish problem" once and for all.

President Obama's new, "evenhanded" policy in the Middle East is anything but fair and balanced. His policies
increasingly endanger and isolate Israel. At the United Nations, Obama forcefully stated that "the United States of
America will never waiver in our efforts to stand up for the right of people everywhere to determine their own
destiny," that is, of course, unless the people are Israelis. Without the Jewish state of Israel as a standard bearer for
Western ideals of democracy in the Middle East, the world will be a far more dangerous place. Then it will be
America's turn to stand alone as "Public Enemy No. 1" for Islamic fundamentalists.

This article originally appeared in the Jewish Journal.

Christian Avard: Mothers and Soldiers: Healing the Bonds Destroyed by War

2009-11-10T20:30:26Z

The bonds established between mothers and children are sacred. Mothers provide unconditional love, caring and support, and they teach their children to live in the world with a sense of purpose. But life circumstances oftentimes get in the way of relationships and affect the outcomes for better or for worse. In times of war, the bonds between mothers and children can change in the blink of an eye. Strong relationships that took years to develop can be wiped out when a loved one is killed by enemy fire and other circumstances beyond their control. Many families in America have experienced this. So have many others in the Mideast.

Susan Galleymore is the author of Long Time Passing: Mothers Speak About War & Terror. Galleymore, co-founder of Courage to Resist, made international headlines as she traveled to Iraq to visit her son stationed in the Sunni Triangle. The more Galleymore learned about the military, the more she learned about how war affects mothers at home and mothers in Iraq. Her journey continued as she met with mothers in other war zones such as Israel and the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Afghanistan and the U.S.. I spoke with Galleymore about her new book and how war affects mothers and children, communities and cultures, veterans, and current service members.

They say time and time again that "information is power"' and books can be used as an effective tool for social change. Upton Sinclair's The Jungle and Rachel Carson's Silent Spring are two good examples. What role do you believe books play in effecting social change? Do you see Long Time Passing: Mothers speak out About War & Terror as a book to be used in the same means as Sinclair's or Carson's?

Galleymore: The goal of the book is to create a larger story around the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's not just something that's happening here in the U.S. but that the ripple effects are occurring all over the world and we are really interdependent. I think Rachel Carson was trying to get at that as well. There are interdependencies that we're not really recognizing. If anything, my book is trying to do something like that by using a story format. In this case, every single story is exactly the way it was told to me. I didn't impose my own cultural values or understandings on it. So I'm trying show these human beings have stories that are really enrichening to not only people in the United States, but to the larger picture of what war does.

What life-changing experiences did you have in your travels to the Mideast? What myths were shattered?

Well, I come from another country where we've seen the effects of war. My grandparents were immigrants after the Second World War to South Africa and we experienced a war against the indigenous people, if you could call it that. I came to the United States as a young woman and had my son born here the first year I arrived. I never understood how the American military works but I also think it has changed, certainly in the last 30 years. I never understood there was such a push to recruit young people. That's particularly true now that we have a volunteer military. There's a lot about how things function in American culture that I, as an outsider, didn't know. But I've come to realize that people who actually live in this country for generations don't understand either how the American military works. That was a huge learning experience.

Once I realized that my son had been sucked up into the military, believing all the cultural values from the movies, such as what a hero is, what a man is, etc., I had this urge that I had to talk with him about it. Once I got to Iraq, I recognized that this was a much larger story. The first Iraqi woman I talked to said her whole family was essentially wiped out by American troops on a couple of Humvees. They just shot up the whole car, killing her husband and three kids. She survived, she was pregnant, and her eight year-old daughter survived. So there was a story to be told. We can't imagine being in America and having that happen.

I also lived in Israel during the mid-1970s and I came from apartheid South Africa. So I was very comfortable in Israel at the time because it reflected a lot of the values that I came from. Of course it is an apartheid system (in Israel). Anyone who knows anything about how systems function realize that Israel is an apartheid system.

One of the things I learned about Israeli and Palestinian boys is Israelis are socialized to join the military to defend the homeland. Palestinian boys are pigeonholed to be suicide bombers because they'll be seen as martyrs. Did you encounter this in your travels? How difficult is it for Israeli and Palestinian boys not to go down this path? Are there any efforts being done to raise boys not to pick up a gun or strap on explosives? What roles do mothers play in shaping their sons?

One of the mothers I interviewed lost her son in a suicide bombing while two other of her sons were in the Israeli Defense Forces. Now this is a family that came from a 'left perspective' and her sons have become Refusniks and they are very active in a group called Combatants for Peace. Combatants for Peace works with former Israeli soldiers working with former Palestinian prisoners. They always work together, they make joint statements, and there were many other groups in Israel doing joint work. It was fascinating because sometimes I would talk to people who say 'I'm a Zionist and I work in this particular group' (not necessarily for Combatants for Peace). But there's a lot of complexities in these issues. It's fascinating because it's kicking up the level of thinking. Americans need to do about how complex the situation is.

It's also hard to be a man, especially in American culture. There's no ritual for it. I think that's partly what brings a young man into the U.S. military, but in Israel there is (a ritual). In Palestine, it's much more of a male dominated society and the ritual there has been so disturbed by the Israeli invasion of the culture. Everything is on shaky ground there and people are really struggling to hold on to their culture.

In the book, you try to understand the tension between individualist American culture and the complex communities of family and residence that typify much of the Middle East. What were some of the things you learned when two different cultures came face to face like this?

It's interesting. In America, we're taught that the best thing you can do is become independent and self-sufficient as soon as possible. In the Middle East, that's not the case. It's a collectivist-based culture. What I find is, unless you understand that the basic assumptions are very different, you're going to have conversations that are meaningless. A person from an individualist culture who is talking to a person from a collectivist culture are going to have a conversation that's not grounded in a similar reality. It's very difficult for Americans to understand that people in the Middle East (if I can generalize) don't want to be Americans. They're proud of their culture, history and heritage. Americans tend to think everyone wants to be like us, because we've been told "we're the greatest, the best, the most powerful", etc. It's very difficult for people to conceptualize that it may not be the case. I think we're seeing that in Afghanistan right now. The Afghan people are saying "leave us alone! We don't want you or your democracy!" The Afghans have their own traditions of democracy and we're not allowing them to surface very much.

I know current service members have told me time and time again "we don't get to choose which wars we get to fight in. We go where our president and Congress wants us to go to." But they do have voices. They should speak and think for themselves.

Another discussion that needs to happen is, what is a volunteer? We often say, "These soliders volunteered to do this." Well, they didn't volunteer to go off and kill Iraqi and Afghani civilians. They went out to promote what they heard was the message of their country, which is, "we are about freedom and democracy." When they get over there, they discover it's about opening corporate markets. There's a tremendous element (of) trauma they begin to feel. What are the troops going over there to do? What does a volunteer actually mean and what rights do they have? If you're a volunteer, it should also mean you should be able to not be a volunteer when you've had enough or when you've decided to get out. That's not the case.

Today is Veterans' Day. What do your book and your experiences add to this national holiday? What did you learn about our soldiers and the wars they fight in, that would be appropriate for people to know on this holiday?

The stories of the troops are extremely important to hear and to make connections with other war or combat events the U.S. has perpetrated. There are books on Vietnam where atrocities were par for the course. We need to recognize that atrocities are par for the course in war, no matter which one. If you put a young person who's 18- or 19-years old in situations that are completely terrifying they're not at all like the movies. I hear a lot of that from the troops. Then you bring them back home and you do not allow them to tell their stories. As long as we shut our troops and veterans up, as long as we do not want to hear what they have to say, we're going to continue to have the devastation of our young people that we're seeing. There is battle fatigue, shell shock, and general trauma. That is the result of war and that is what our veterans are going to deal with. We, as their families, need to understand what we're asking them to do and we need to respect what they tell us.

Every Memorial and Veteran's Day, it's very difficult for groups like Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Military Families Speak Out, and others to have their voices heard. What kinds of obstacles are they up against in order to be heard?

That's a good question. The average American is very resistant to know what is being done in their name. There is a lot of resistance to know what our veterans bring back to our country when they return from war. Veterans trying to speak out about atrocities, the immoral wars, etc. are shut up by other veterans. It's this thing that if we talk about the kinds of things we are generally silent about, then what does it mean about who I am? What does it mean about what I did over there? What does it mean about who we are as a country? It's not just accepting some new information. It's really reconfiguring your whole reality and that's a very difficult thing to do. That's what needs to happen and I think that's why there's so much resistance. You'll see the Veterans for Peace or the IVAW with antiwar banners, and you really see other veterans coming down really heavily on them! It's about that, "don't share the secret, don't tell!" We saw what happened to John Kerry when he ran for president. He was swift-boated. What was that about? That was about not wanting to hear the reality of war and I think some of that has to do with the enormous profits made in war.

You mentioned the stigma and attacks soldiers face from other soldiers for speaking up against war and occupations. Could you elaborate on that?

I think the most commonly known example of this is the Swift Boat Veterans' effort to discredit John Kerry during his presidential bid. As you know, Kerry came out against the Vietnam conflict, supposedly throwing his medal over the White House fence after participating in the very first Winter Soldier Hearings. It turned out it was really only his ribbons, not the actual medals. As you probably recall the Swift Boat Vets piled on Kerry, denigrating his service, his courage, etc. These days, when groups such as Veterans for Peace or IVAW parade (or even apply to participate) they are often roundly scorned from the sidelines or refused permission to participate officially. I see this as stemming from a complex set of issues: an inability to distinguish between "the war" and "the warrior"; a refusal to admit how terrifying and confusing combat is, for "we" are "men" and so don't admit fear etc. If "we" talk about what happens in war, we'll let the cat out of the bag and have to re-examine some basic cultural concepts and if one decent person (say a service person) admits to war atrocities, it raises the spectre of other decent people being capable of the same- the "we're all painted with the same brush" syndrome when something shameful comes to light. These are the sorts of complexities inherent in how war is sold and consumed.

Despite all the trauma mothers experience and share in the book, you said that despite it all "the basic humanity of people shine through." What examples stand out for you the most?

What has become much clearer to me is that the human heart is a vibrant living entity and that underneath all the collective and individualist categories we have, that the human heart wants to reach out and make contact. I found tiny villages in south Lebanon where people would say 'Oh, you're an American. Weren't those people hostile to you?' That was never the case. It was more, "Come in! Who are you? Yes, we can share our story with you. Yes, please tell people about us." I would say my faith in human beings has become much deeper and become more determined to surface; that reality that we want to make contact with one another.

Noura Erakat: Delusional Self-Defense, Delusional Congressional Vote

2009-11-10T17:43:13Z

By Jimmy Leas and Noura Erakat

The 344-36 House vote last week condemning the Goldstone Report, which encourages Israel and Hamas to conduct "credible" independent investigations of war crimes committed in Gaza, may help Israeli leaders avoid prosecution in the short-term. However, the House vote and the negative US votes at the UN will have long-term detrimental effects both on Israel and on the U.S.'s moral authority.

Consider that within the General Assembly, 110 nations endorsed the Report, while the U.S. was among the minority of 18 nations that voted against the endorsement. The Congressional vote will increase the likelihood of a worldwide campaign to push the UN General Assembly, the International Criminal Court, or other countries, under universal jurisdiction, to hold Israel to account for war crimes committed in Gaza.

Self-defense is of utmost concern because self-defense was a central element of Israel's ongoing argument for the war and is the heart of the U.S.'s rejection of Goldstone. Israeli officials have featured that claim in every forum leading up to Operation Cast Lead's pummeling strikes. It was Israel's justification in its letter to the UN Secretary General when Israeli State officials announced the war on December 27, 2008. It was the main theme of Netanyahu's recent speeches to the General Assembly and to the Knesset. It was the main theme of the most recent House Resolution. It will be the U.S.'s main reason to veto the forthcoming Security Council vote. The self-defense claim is not just a matter of public relations; it is essential. Absent self-defense, political and military officials in Israel are subject to charges that go beyond those in the Goldstone Report, including, but not limited to, the crime of war of aggression.

However, the self-defense claim propagated by Israeli and U.S. politicians since the initiation of Operation Cast Lead is inconsistent with both the facts and the law. Within weeks of entering into the Egyptian-brokered ceasefire agreement, Hamas rocket fire had come to a halt. According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the ceasefire was so successful that it brought "normal life and "calm" back to Israeli towns near Gaza. In an article posted on July 27, 2008, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs even lauds Hamas, stating:

Publicly, Hamas leaders have stated time and again that the lull is a Palestinian national interest. On several occasions, Hamas members have arrested Fatah operatives who were involved in firing at Israel and confiscated their arms.

Calm prevailed for four months until Israeli forces broke the ceasefire agreement on November 4, 2008. While the world's gaze turned to one of the U.S.'s most historic elections that day, Israel launched an armed incursion into Gaza, accompanied by aerial bombing, killing six Hamas members and catapulting the region into a renewed wave of violent hostilities. Hamas rocket fire immediately followed the Israeli attack. Two weeks later Israel's largest circulation paper quoted Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak admitting that "the recent waves of rocket attacks are a result of our operations, which have resulted in the killing of twenty Hamas gunmen." Barak's admission, consistent with the fact that Israel broke the ceasefire, makes Israel's self-defense claim baseless.

Still, Hamas offered to reinstate and extend the ceasefire a month later on December 23, 2008. Israel refused, ducking the chance to reach a diplomatic agreement that would have again ended rocket fire and brought the security desired by Israel. Instead, Israel chose massive escalation and four days later launched a gruesome aerial offensive against Gaza.

On the Offensive's 17th day, Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni boasted that Israel was "going wild-and this is a good thing." The targeting of civilians described in the Goldstone Report seems to corroborate this Israeli attitude as Israeli forces attacked targets in Gaza that had nothing to do with Israel's stated military objective of stopping rocket fire. Israeli forces targeted schools, hospitals, factories, agricultural land, the only flour mill in Gaza, an egg farm, thousands of private homes, government buildings, and Palestinian civilians.

The Goldstone Report concluded:

While the Israeli Government has sought to portray its operations as essentially a response to rocket attacks in the exercise of its right to self-defence, the Mission considers the plan to have been directed, at least in part, at a different target: the people of Gaza as a whole.(Goldstone par. 1883)

A central element of the law of self-defense, as well as the laws regarding the conduct of war once started, is one unequivocal standard around which no controversy exists: the prohibition on targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure. As demonstrated not only by the Goldstone Report, but also in reports by Israeli soldiers who participated in Operation Cast Lead and reports by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, and the National Lawyers Guild, Israeli forces directly targeted civilians and civilian infrastructure during its 22-day offensive. Even if Israel had not itself broken the ceasefire, its legal argument for self-defense would therefore be ineffective. Israel's only rebuttal to these charges was a military investigation conducted by the Israeli Army itself. But that self-serving investigation was nearly unanimously condemned as lacking independence and impartiality (see PDF).

Thus, neither the facts nor the law support an Israeli self-defense claim. Rather than condemn Israel's act of aggression and its ongoing occupation and blockade of the Gaza Strip, Congress added its name to a pungent piece of manipulative delusion: that Israel's onslaught of Gaza constituted an act of self-defense. The House is now on record disavowing international law and international accountability mechanisms. People around the world will be persuaded that protests, boycotts, and divestment campaigns are all the more necessary, and they will look to places outside the US political establishment for justice.

Noura Erakat is a Palestinian-American attorney and James Marc Leas is a Jewish-American attorney, and both participated in the National Lawyers Guild delegation to Gaza in February.