In this clear and concise piece in The Electronic Intifada, Jeff Halper (you know how highly I rate him) explains the significance of last week’s announcement of the settlement of E-1, the corridor connecting Jerusalem to the West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim: “it seals the fate of the Palestinian state”. The settlements to the [...]
Following a previous report, also from a rightwing source, this on the same theme is from the Jerusalem Post. Notice the use of children as the attackers – something for which Palestinians are often bitterly criticised. Full story: (text, pdf)
Big event today – Chomsky spoke in the McEwan hall (extraordinarily grand and impressive but with lousy acoustics). He spoke not once but twice – the first time at an activists’ meeting sponsored by the Palestince Solidarity Campaign amongst others (including Scottish Jews for a Just Peace), the second time as Gifford Lecturer for the [...]
The Sasson Report on the Unauthorized Outposts has been published. This official Israeli government report will shed some light on the process by which most of the settlements have been started. I will write more about it soon. For the moment, here are a couple of sentences, chosen by me at random from page 34 [...]
Abuna Elias Chacour spoke on Thursday at the Edinburgh International Festival of Middle Eastern Spirituality. I didn’t really know what to expect, given that he is a priest in the Melkite Church, an obscure (to me) Byzantine church in communion with Rome. In fact he spoke very well, with a lot of humour and sympathy [...]
Amira Hass writes about transportation in the West Bank: There is one system of roads for the natives, and it is winding, narrow, long, bumpy, sown with military checkpoints and frequently closed. And there is the system of road for “Whites,” that is, Israelis, or all kinds of people who have been whitened – diplomats, [...]
“Hebron Horrors” won’t surprise anyone who has been following what happens there. What’s interesting about it is that it appeared in the very pro-settlement Israel Insider, and is written by the director of a Washington “pro-Israel think-tank” and former AIPAC staffer, so it can’t be dismissed as the usual left-wing propaganda. Don’t read the comments [...]
The New Israel Fund campaign launch for 2005 last night was quite a smart affair, set in the rather grand surroundings of the Royal Aeronautical Society. It kicked off with their campaign film, which showed the good work being done by many NIF partners. The film was impressive and reinforced my belief that NIF does [...]
I’m in London this week, so last night I went to a debate entitled “Boycotting Israeli Academia: Right or Wrong?” at the LSE, between Steven Rose and Geoffrey Alderman. I had never heard either speaker before, so it was quite interesting on that account, but I can’t say that I came out greatly enlightened on [...]
According to its official policy, the JNF does not purchase lands beyond the Green Line, so you can be sure that your donations are not going to help set up illegal settlements. Clear? Well, not quite. JNF has a subsidiary company called Himnuta, which operates in great secrecy. The man who until recently was head [...]
A military committee appointed by the IDF Chief of Staff has recommended stopping the policy of punitive house demolitions. This is more than three years after the start of the second intifada, and after hundreds of house demolitions – all representing collective punishment, all contrary to the Geneva Convention, and all known to be ineffective. [...]
Brian Klug is coming to Scotland next weekend to speak in Edinburgh and Glasgow. He will be talking to the Edinburgh Jewish Literary Society on Sunday 27th February on “The Other Balfour: Recalling the 1905 Aliens Act”. See the Lit website for details. On Monday 28th at 7.30pm he will be speaking at the Glasgow [...]
The Scotsman reports that MI5 is to open its first official Scottish station in Glasgow, part of a huge expansion in their activity since September 11. A major cause for concern is that the extra spies will bring a 50 per cent increase in the numbers actively engaged in Britain’s war against terror – more [...]
Jeff was terrific – I was completely absorbed as he spoke for over an hour and a half, logically and patiently explaining the situation in Israel-Palestine in terms anyone could understand. Even this long post hardly begins to capture what he said. For more, see his many articles on the Internet and on the ICAHD [...]
Jeff Halper, co-ordinator of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD) , is speaking in Edinburgh on Saturday morning. ICAHD do great work in exposing the use of house demolitions in controlling the Palestinian population, especially in they way that they are used to enforce highly unfair planning rules. Jeff is an excellent speaker, and [...]
From Ha’aretz: Israel says it cannot release political prisoners who “have blood on their hands.” The IDF officer who shot in cold blood Iman al-Hamas, a 13-year-old girl, has recently been exonerated and returned to the same unit. Full story, a powerful piece by Amira Hass. Jonathan Freedland wrote in the Jewish Chronicle on 3rd [...]
Attorney General Menachem Mazuz has overruled a decision by the Ministerial Committee on Jerusalem Affairs – which Sharansky chairs – that the Absentee Property Law should apply to East Jerusalem. What’s that about, you may ask. If you haven’t heard of the Absentee Property Law, you should have. To quote from Ha’aretz The Absentee Property [...]
The Forward reports that Israel’s attorney general ruled last week that one of the fundamental tenets upon which the Jewish state was built – acquiring and reserving land for Jews to live on – is discriminatory and should not continue with state assistance. Attorney General Menachem Mazuz was responding to a Supreme Court case involving [...]
Yesterday evening (Sun. Jan. 30) Israeli Supreme Court judge Elyakim Rubinstein has published his decision to accept the state’s appeal to overturn the District Court Justice Zvi Gurfinkel’s ruling that Tali Fahima be “released” from prison and placed under house arrest until the end of legal proceedings in her trial. Her next hearing is on [...]
