Last updated on

28th October 2008

 

 

 

 

 

(More about Stein and that quotation HERE)

 

 


 

 

 

See Archive about Amnesty's latest campaign

 

 


 

 

Links to interesting websites

 

HERE

 

 


 

 9-minute audio (3.7 MB in mp3 format) of Johann Hari at the day-long 1st International Conference of the Council of ex-Muslims of Britain (at Conway Hall on Oct 10).


The audio extract is from Part two - Plenary 2: Sharia Law and Citizenship Rights; Chair: Andrew Copson; Panellists: Mahin Alipour, Roy Brown, Johann Hari, Maryam Namazie, Ibn Warraq


Download
 

Johann_Hari_midquality.mp3

 

or

http://tinyurl.com/58s6sa

 

 

Videos of the all-day event are at
http://www.ex-muslim.org.uk/indexEvents.html


 

 


 

 

 

 


 

 

 

Musicweaver Archive - recent posts here

 

 

 


 

 

The time in the UK is now

 

 

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The Google translator is here:
 
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A day in the life of a Gazan Fisherman. All footage was taken from one Gazan fishing boat on 5th October 2008, as it fished in Gazan territorial waters. The furthest it ventured from shore was approximately 4 miles.

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/gaza-news-231008!OpenDocument

 

 

23-10-2008  News release 08/193 

 

Gaza: Disruption of medical services hampers treatment

 

Geneva/Jerusalem (ICRC) – The situation of several hundred seriously ill patients in the Gaza Strip who cannot obtain urgently needed medical treatment is extremely worrying, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said today.
 

 

In recent weeks, because of a standstill in cooperation between Palestinian authorities in Ramallah and Gaza, imports of essential medical supplies have been reduced to a trickle, thus aggravating an already critical situation.

"This is having a serious impact", said Eileen Daly, the ICRC's health coordinator for Gaza. "For example, children suffering from cystic fibrosis, a serious lung disease, have not had access to proper medication for the past week. They need to take the medication every day, or their condition will deteriorate rapidly."

A strike of Palestinian health workers that has been under way since the end of August is also having an effect on the ability of hospitals to offer adequate care. Surgical operations have decreased by 40%, and hospital admissions are down 20%.

Yet another cause for concern is that the number of seriously ill patients referred for specialized treatment to hospitals in Israel, East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Jordan has dropped by half in recent months. Those affected include cancer and cardiac patients, who will suffer from a gradual deterioration of their condition if they do not receive the necessary medical attention outside Gaza.

To help hospitals cope with the most urgent needs, the ICRC regularly provides medical facilities with drugs, medical supplies and spare parts, mainly for emergency rooms and operating theatres. In the current situation, however, humanitarian aid alone is not enough.

The ICRC calls on the Palestinian health authorities both in Ramallah and Gaza to take urgent measures to ensure that suitable medical supplies are available in Gaza in sufficient quantity. It also calls on the Israeli authorities to facilitate timely deliveries of medical supplies and equipment to the Strip.

"Health issues should not to be politicized," said the ICRC head of mission, Katharina Ritz. "Pragmatic solutions need to be found, because many lives are at stake."

 

For more information, please contact:
Dorothea Krimitsas, ICRC Geneva, tel: +41 22 730 25 90 or + 41 79 251 93 18
Anne Sophie Bonefeld, ICRC Jerusalem, tel: +972 52 601 91 50 or +972 2 582 88 45
Nadia Dibsy, ICRC Jerusalem, tel: +972 52 601 91 48 or +972 2 582 88 45
Iyad Nasr, ICRC Gaza, tel: +972 59 960 30 15
Yael Segev-Eytan, ICRC Tel Aviv, tel: +972 35 24 52 86 or +972 52 275 75 17

 

See uruknet.info immediately below

 

 

 

Gaza hospitals suffering from lack of medicine

Nidal al-Mughrabi

 

[Original from Reuters - see link below.  BR]

 

Mon Oct 27, 2008 3:48pm GMT

GAZA (Reuters) - The nearly empty corridors of Gaza's main Shifa Hospital on Monday testified to the ailing state of health care in the Hamas-controlled territory.

A crisis-level shortage of drugs and spare parts for medical equipment and a two-month-old strike by health care workers have combined to add more misery to the lives of the 1.5 million inhabitants of the impoverished Gaza Strip.

At Shifa Hospital, kidney patient Ibrahin Ghosha waited in vain for a technician to fix a dialysis machine.

"It's all about luck. One time you come and the machine is working, the other time, it is out of order," Ghosha said.

Last week, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said virtually no medical supplies were reaching the Gaza Strip, putting the lives of several hundred seriously ill patients at risk.

The number of surgical operations has fallen by 40 percent in the territory's hospitals, while admissions were down 20 percent, the ICRC said.

It blamed a "standstill in cooperation" between Palestinian authorities in the West Bank, where President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction holds sway, and Hamas for imports of medical supplies having slowed to a "trickle."

The ICRC also urged Israel, which tightened a blockade of the territory after Hamas seized control from Fatah in June 2007, to facilitate timely deliveries of medical supplies and equipment.

Hussein Ashour, Shifa's director-general, said the hospital's reserve of up to 90 kinds of drugs had run out, including those needed to treat cancer patients.

Most of the hospital's medical scanning equipment was not functioning and patients were being asked to go to private health centres instead, he said.

"We even lack the paper -- the official forms -- so we sometimes write on the back of used paper or turn school copybooks into prescription pads," Ashour said.

HEART SURGERY

Doctors said Shifa had suspended heart operations for the past year because of a lack of spare parts to repair equipment needed for surgery.

Antoine Grand, the ICRC's chief representative in the Gaza Strip, urged rival Fatah and Hamas authorities to cooperate and "make sure the health sector does not suffer."

Grand said the ICRC continued to provide hospitals with what he called "life-saving" assistance but could only partially alleviate the crisis.

Eyad El-Sarraj, head of the Gaza Mental Health Programme, said Gazans' mental health also was suffering due to unemployment and poverty deepened by Israel's blockade.

He said his office had invited dozens of foreign physicians and mental health experts, including Israelis, to the Gaza Strip to discuss the problem but Israel denied them passage into the territory.

"The mental health situation is quite serious in Gaza and we fear for future generations of children who are brought up today in such an environment of deprivation, despair and hopelessness," Sarraj told Reuters.

(Editing by Michael Roddy)

:: Article nr. 48302 sent on 27-oct-2008 22:49 ECT

www.uruknet.info?p=48302

Link: http://uk.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUKTRE49Q56F20081027

:: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this website.

 

 


 

 

YES we are coming

From: The Free Gaza Movement

 

For Immediate Release
October 26, 2008

Contact: Greta Berlin, Cyprus: +357
Angela Godfrey Goldstein, Jerusalem: +972
Huwaida Arraf: Cyprus +357 [Phone nos. redacted - BR]

On Saturday, October 25, 2008, the Free Gaza Movement sent our formal
notice to Israel, the Occupying Power in the Gaza Strip, that we intend
to enter the port of Gaza City on October 29. We expect no interference
from the Israeli authorities. Although our message acknowledges Israel's
control over Gaza, we do not accept Israel's right to prevent us from
sailing into the Gaza Strip. [See attachment for text of the letter].

As part of the message, we invited Aharon Abramovitz, Minister of
Foreign Affairs and/or Ehud Barak, Minister of Defense, to join the
voyage to witness first hand the devastating effects of Israel's illegal
policies on the occupied civilian population of the Gaza Strip (Please
leave your weapons at home, we are nonviolent).

Huwaida Arraf, a spokesperson for the Free Gaza Movement said, "Israel
is committing war crimes by imposing collective punishment on the 1.5
million people in Gaza. Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Conventions
prohibits their actions. However, since Israel is the Occupying Power
and maintains effective control of the area, we have put them on notice
that we're coming. Since they grossly abuse their power, we are not
asking them for their permission."

Israel continues to exert behind-the-scenes pressure on many of the
people who have been assisting the Free Gaza Movement, hoping they can
stop the boat before it leaves port. Despite their massive pressure,
threats and intimidation last August, Israel ultimately admitted to the
world that we were nonviolent and did not constitute any kind of
security threat, and our boats sailed safely into the port of Gaza, the
first boats filled with Internationals to arrive there in 41 years.
Israel is at it again, this time trying to stop us before we leave the port.

"It's ridiculous that Israel is so frightened of us. We are carrying
doctors and human rights activists, including Nobel Peace Prize winner
Mairead Maguire. We also have medical supplies on board our boat; there
is absolutely no reason why they should stand in our way this time
either," said organizer Greta Berlin.
 
Official Notification of Intent to Enter (Attachment sent by email and fax)
October 25, 2008

To: The Israeli Ministry of Defense, Fax: 972-3-697-6717
To: The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Fax 972-2-5303367

---

From: The Free Gaza Movement

This letter serves as a formal notification to you as the Occupying
Power in the Gaza Strip that on October 28, 2008, (weather permitting)
we are navigating a vessel from the Port of Larnaca to the port of Gaza
City.  Our vessel will be flying the flag of Gibraltar, and, as such,
falls under the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom.

We will be sailing from Cypriot waters into international waters, then
directly into the territorial waters of the Gaza Strip without entering
or nearing Israeli territorial waters.

We are carrying 6 cubic meters of urgently needed medical supplies in
sealed boxes, cleared by customs at the Larnaca International Airport.
There will be a total of 26 passengers and crew on board, among them
several physicians.  Our boat and cargo will also have received security
clearance from the Port Authorities in Cyprus before we depart.

As it will be confirmed that neither we, nor the cargo, nor any of the
boat's contents, nor the boat itself constitute any threat to the
security of Israel or its armed forces,  we do not expect any
interference with our voyage by Israel's authorities.

We hereby extend an invitation to Aharon Abramovitz from the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs or Ehud Barak from the Ministry of Defense to join us on
board so that they can witness the draconian effects of Israel's
policies on the civilian population of the occupied Gaza Strip.

The Steering Committee of the Free Gaza Movement


--
Greta Berlin
Media Team
Free Gaza Movement
357
www.freegaza.org http://www.freegaza.org

www.anis-online.de/office/events/FreeGazaSong.htm

http://www.anis-online.de/office/events/FreeGazaSong.htm

www.flickr.com/photos/29205195@N02/
 

 

 

See immediately below

 

 

 

 

From "Free Gaza Song Contest"

 

 
(Note from Anis: The word "contest" in "The Free Gaza Song Contest" was not meant very seriously from the beginning. The more authentic original works I receive the more meaningless becomes this concept "contest".)
 
Link to song: (3.15 MB)
 
 
 
 
 
 28.09.2008 :: "Gaza Don't Lose Hope", by Ofek
 
From the Galilee comes the following contribution. The song is called "Gaza Don't Lose Hope" (mp3) and it is composed and performed by Ofek who translated the lyrics into English. The original lyrics in Hebrew for the song are by Symon Jester http://symon_jester.tripod.com
 
Ofek's website is www.ofek.com

 

 
Here are the lyrics: [From the FreeGaza website]
 
gaza gaza don't lose hope / the occupation has to stop / every protest people cry / but nothing seems to signify //
 
bombers return to your skies / in your streets tanks mobilize / your defenders die again / your children are in cold blood slain //
 
the subjugator again comes in / again they beat, they shoot, they ruin / now and then we cry against it / and your blood just spills on dirt //
 
beit laheeya dir el-balakh / el-shati bet khanun and rafakh / once again they're trampled by / the feet of those they must defy //
 
stand up gaza on your feet / shake those bigots off your streets / wipe your tears off and sustain / the morning sun will shine again
 
===
 

 

 

 

 


 

 

From the British Medical Journal

 

 

Note: A medical colleague friend has queried why the BMJ chose to publish this picture of the Hamas police over an article about Israeli actions.

Published 22 October 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a2225
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a2225

News

Israel denies access to doctors planning to attend conference in Gaza

Lynn Eaton

1 London

Attempts to organise an international annual conference on mental health in Gaza later this month have been stymied by the Israeli authorities, which, the organisers say, have stopped delegates from overseas entering the territory.

Mahmoud Abu Aisha, who is organising the conference, the fifth such, said that the Israeli authorities had initially "promised to study this issue positively," although they hadn’t actually given the go ahead. On 17 October the official decision came to deny the participants permission to attend.

The conference, entitled "Siege and Mental Health ...Walls vs Bridges" and which is partnered by the World Health Organization, was due to begin on 27 October to discuss the effects of siege situations on mental health and human rights. A total of 120 delegates from universities around the world were to attend the conference, 25 of whom were scheduled to present papers and original research.

The conference’s aim was to establish a forum to discuss issues concerning the Gaza siege and "to build bridges for dialogue, mutual acknowledgement and peace," says a statement from the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme, the group organising the conference. "The main themes of the conference are addressing professional, mental health and human rights matters," it adds.

The Israeli authorities’ decision "represent a profound blow to the rights of academic freedom, free speech, education, and cultural dialogue," said the organisers. "We view this action as an action to block communication [and to] distort the platform for mutual acknowledgement, understanding, and admitting the suffering of others. Once again, and unlike what is claimed, Israel—as an occupying power—is proving that it is controlling the Gaza Strip, preventing . . . entry or exit."

The conference organisers have said that the meeting will still go ahead. Delegates who have been denied access to the Gaza Strip will take part by video link from Ramallah in the West Bank.

The Israeli Embassy in London said it could not comment on the decision before the BMJ went to press as a two day holiday in Israel meant it was unable to contact the relevant officials.

Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a2225

See immediately below

 

 

 

 

 

120 academics, physicians and health professionals from around the world, invite you to attend a

 

PRESS CONFERENCE

 

Sunday, 26th of October, 10am

The Ambassador Hotel, East Jerusalem

 

We, the conference participants, protest the decision of the Israeli authorities to deny the entry of 120 international experts into the Gaza Strip for the purpose of attending the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme 5th International Conference, in cooperation with the World Health Organisation, on the subject of “Siege and Mental Health, Walls vs. Bridges,” scheduled to take place in Gaza City between the 27th and the 28th of October 2008.

 

Representative speakers:

Prof. Alice Rothschild, Harvard Medical School, USA,

Prof. Dr. W.H.G. Wolters, the Netherlands,

Prof. Federico Allodi, University of Toronto, Canada,

Dr. Ghada Karmi, University of Exeter, UK,

Prof. James Deutsch, University of Toronto, Canada,

Judy Deutsch, psychiatric social worker, Toronto, Canada,

Dr. Eyyad Sarraj, Gaza (by telephone).

 

We protest this last-minute decision by the Israeli authorities and regard it as a deliberate attempt to stop professional communication and exchange between the international medical community and Gaza medical professionals.

 

In the course of the conference information will be provided about the decision-making process by the Israeli authorities, the position of the participants on this decision, and the impact of the ongoing siege policy on health and mental health in the Gaza Strip.

 

 

 

To confirm participation / for further details:

Dr. Alan Meyers, Prof. James Deutsch, or Prof. Alice Rothschild

 

 

 

Background

 

 

28th of September - request for entry submitted: The World Health Organisation (WHO) representative office in Gaza submitted a request for an entry permit to the Israeli authorities at Erez Crossing, on behalf of 80 experts, mental health professionals and other health professionals, from numerous countries, including USA, Holland, Italy, UK and Canada, for the purpose of attending the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme 5th International Conference, hosted this year in cooperation with the World Health Organisation, and scheduled to take place in Gaza City between the 27th and the 28th of October 2008. 40 other academics had requested entry via other avenues.

 

The conference, titled “Siege and Mental Health, Walls vs. Bridges,” aims to describe and assess the wider mental health and health effects of the ongoing siege policy imposed by the Israeli government on the 1.4 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip. Many of the participants had prepared presentations on their own work on violence, social stress, and poverty, as well as the mental health of children.

 

 

13th of October – request denied: The Israeli military authorities at Erez Crossing informed the WHO representative that all requests had been refused. No reason was given for the decision, and no specific security or other consideration was cited.

 

 

Response: The intended conference participants, who had already paid for their flights and arranged for their travel, decided to arrive in the region despite the prohibition, and to express protest and solidarity with their professional colleagues and with the 1.4 million inhabitants of Gaza by gathering for a rally at Erez Crossing, as well as participating in the conference through long distance video conference facilities, from the city of Ramallah in the West Bank.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the current JfJfP newsletter there's a link to an essay which I very much recommend if you want to understand some of the fury raging within various Jewish communities over the abusive term "self-hating Jew".   The essay is by the admirable Antony Lerman, Director, Institute for Jewish Policy Research and is published in Jewish Quarterly, entitled ‘Jewish Self-Hatred: Myth or Reality’.   It's 6 pages and I've taken some quotes from it in case you don't have time to read the full article, copied at the end of this email with a link to the full article, beneath the following piece, which is also by Lerman.
 
The piece immediately below is from Global Researcher http://www.jpr.org.uk/downloads/Global%20Researcher.pdf  which is:
 

 

At Issue:

Is anti-Zionism a cover-up for anti-Semitism?

 

ANTONY LERMAN – No *

DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR JEWISH POLICY

RESEARCH

WRITTEN FOR CQ GLOBAL RESEARCHER, JUNE 2008

 

http://www.jpr.org.uk/downloads/Global%20Researcher.pdf

 

 

Anti-Zionism and hostility to Israel can be anti-Semitic if

they are expressed using the symbols of the anti-Semitic

figure of the Jew or of Jewry as a whole. For example,

if Zionism is characterized as a worldwide Jewish conspiracy, or

a plan straight out of the forged, anti-Semitic “Protocols of the

Learned Elders of Zion,” that is anti-Semitism.

 

But to believe that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are one

and the same ignores the history of Zionism.

 

For decades Zionism was supported only by a minority of

Jews. The rest were either indifferent or manifestly opposed to

the whole idea of the establishment of a Jewish state. Anti-

Zionism was therefore a perfectly respectable position to hold,

and one that continues to be held today by hundreds of

thousands of strictly orthodox Jews and many secular Jews

with left-liberal perspectives.

 

Equating anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism — what has become

known as the “new anti-Semitism” — fundamentally subverts

the shared understanding of what anti-Semitism is, built

up painstakingly through research and study by scholars over

many years: It drains the word anti-Semitism of any useful

meaning. The advocates of the concept of a new anti-Semitism

argue that it is anti-Semitic to either criticize Israeli policies or

deny Israel’s right to exist, even if one does not hold beliefs

historians have traditionally regarded as an anti-Semitic view:

hatred of Jews per se, belief in a worldwide Jewish conspiracy,

belief that Jews created communism and control capitalism, belief

that Jews are racially inferior and so on.

 

Those who argue that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are

one claim they don’t say criticism of Israeli policies is illegitimate.

However, in practice this view virtually proscribes any

such thing.

 

As the Oxford academic Brian Klug has written, anti-Zionism

and hostility to Israel — if based on a political cause or moral

code that is not anti-Jewish per se — is not anti-Semitic. And

arguing that it is harms the all-important struggle to combat

anti-Semitism. If people feel unfairly stigmatized as anti-Semitic

simply for speaking out about the plight of the Palestinians and

the Israeli government’s role in causing their suffering, they

could become cynical and alienated whenever the problem of

anti-Semitism is raised.

 

At the same site is a Yes answer from Ben Cohen, Associate Director, Dept. on Anti-Semitism & Extremism, American Jewish Committee, Editor, www.z-word.com

 

------------

 

The article by Antony Lerner published in Jewish Quarterly is at:

 

http://www.jfjfp.org/background7_antisemitism/lerner_Jewish-self-hatred_JQ.pdf  which as you can see is at the JfJfP website.  The shorter link is:

 

http://tinyurl.com/5vc3k6

 

Here are the extracts I've chosen to give an idea of what's in the full 6-page article

 

 

ESSAY

 

Jewish Self-Hatred: Myth or Reality?

Antony Lerman contextualises the time-worn accusation.

 

Antony Lerman is the director of the Institute for Jewish Policy

Research and is writing here in a personal capacity.

 

 

 

"... The self-hatred accusation, now

commonly applied, has moved beyond writers

to embrace whole classes of people whose one

common denominator is their alleged hatred

of Israel or their willingness to connive in its

delegitimisation out of a misguided sense of guilt

for what Jews have done to the Palestinians. ...

 

"... The touchstone for being a ‘good Jew’ has

increasingly become passion for Israel. But it seems

that there is a right and a wrong passion. Essentially,

caring about Israel can only mean approving

of its policies. Disapproval is synonymous with

self-hatred.

 

"[But when founder of modern political Zionism Theodor]

Herzl ... painted the weak ghetto Jew ... as the bad Jew

who speaks with a Yiddish accent, a ‘scamp’,‘a distortion

of the human character, unspeakably mean and repellent’,

interested only in ‘mean profit,’ he was

using anti-Semitic attributes — and some accused

him of self-hatred. The writer Karl Kraus, himself

Jewish (and also branded as a self-hating Jew),

attacked Herzl for ‘creating another antisemitic

movement’. Far from being the antithesis of Jewish

self-hatred, some argue that Zionism was actually

a display of it....

 

"... [The concept self-hatred involves two sets of assumptions]:

that there is a correct manner and degree to which people

should express their Jewish identities in public; and

that there is a set of core values and institutions

which one should favour. It is also assumed that

Jewishness ‘is or should be a primary identity’ and

therefore rejecting it or criticising it is somehow

unnatural and wrong.

 

" [For some Jewish writers] quoted earlier, Zionism and

Israel are core Jewish values, and rejecting them is a

pathological act consonant with deliberate estrangement

from the group. But there has never been a time when all

Jewish denominations and groups have accepted

Israel and Zionism as core values. Today, hundreds

and thousands of strictly Orthodox Jews, many of

whom live in Israel, utterly reject the notion that

the modern state of Israel and the political ideology

of Zionism have anything to do with Judaism. The

venom of the ‘self-hatred’ accusers is reserved for

those labelled ‘progressive’, ‘left-liberal’, ‘left-wing’,

for whom Israel and Zionism do not play the

role in their Jewish identity which their accusers

determine it should do. Some, motivated by the

values of social justice which are central to their

Jewishness, may well feel that their sense of Jewish

identity is affirmed by opposition to the policies

of the Israeli government. But to the self-hate

accusers there are no legitimate differences of

opinion among Jews on key elements of Zionism

and Israel.

 

"The concept of the ‘self-hating Jew’ strengthens

a narrow, ethnocentric view of the Jewish people.

It exerts a monopoly over patriotism. It promotes

a definition of Jewish identity which relies on

the notion of an eternal enemy, and how much

more dangerous when that enemy is a fifth

column within the group. It plays on real fears of

anti-Semitism and at the same time exaggerates the

problem by claiming that critical Jews are ‘infected’

by it too. And it posits an essentialist notion of

Jewish identity.

 

"Could the widespread and increasingly

indiscriminate use of the self-hatred accusation

be a sign of desperation on the part of the

accusers? Dissenting voices on Israel have certainly

strengthened and multiplied in recent years. Twenty

years ago in Britain there were one or two rather

small groups promoting a left-wing non-Zionist or

anti-Zionist approach, who were regarded as hate

figures by the Jewish establishment. Today there are

more than a dozen critical groups. Some encompass

the views of many hundreds, if not thousands; some

are not left-wing. How much easier to dismiss

their arguments by levelling the charge of Jewish

self-hatred than by engaging with them.

 

"It is too much to hope that by revealing just

how bankrupt a concept ‘Jewish self-hatred’ is,

discourse among Jews on Israel and Zionism could

become more productive, both for Jews themselves

and for the sake of achieving justice in the conflict

between Israelis and Palestinians. Too much is

currently invested in this demonising rhetoric. But

if we could edge it closer to the rim of the dustbin

of history, we’d be making a start."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

Click on image below for full interview with

 

Norman Finkelstein

 

 

Finkelstein: If we are serious about trying to resolve the conflict, we should not get sidetracked by abstract ideological questions. We should take Zionism as an ideology out of the debate. Rather, we should focus on political issues. The right question is not, “Are you now or have you ever been a Zionist.” The questions should be, “Do you support the demolition of homes and torture?” “Do you support Jewish-only roads and Jewish-only settlements?” “Do you support a political settlement embraced by the entire world apart from the U.S., Israel and some South Sea atolls?”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

In view of recent articles about Prof Shlomo Sand (or Zand)

of Tel Aviv University, concerning his thesis that, in the words

of Ha'aretz, "attempts to prove that the Jews now living in Israel and other places in the world are not at all descendants of the ancient people who inhabited the Kingdom of Judea during the First and Second Temple period. Their origins, according to [Sand], are in varied peoples that converted to Judaism during the course of history, in different corners of the Mediterranean Basin and the adjacent regions", I thought it worth copying this extract from John Rose's fascinating and very readable 2004 book, The Myths of Zionism

 

 

Extract from “The Myths of Zionism” by John Rose (Pluto Press, 2004).   Chap 1, “The Bible is our Mandate”, pages 22 – 25.


[John McCarthy, former hostage, met teams of] archaeologists, like the one led by [Israel] Finkelstein [one of Israel's leading archaeologists], who had also been looking for [‘Ancient Israel’] in vain. McCarthy became so fascinated that he decided to make a television documentary about it: It Ain't Necessarily So. Now his producers must have panicked at its radical content because the six half-hour transmissions were given a mid­night slot with minimum publicity and hardly anyone watched them.

A flavour of the devastating impact of the documentary is given by the translation from the prophet Jeremiah, which opens the narrative of each half-hour programme: 

“God's Bible? Look at it - it was made as a lie by the false pen of scribes. (Jeremiah VIII. 8; Sturgis 2001: 186)”

 Rather like the Philistines, Jeremiah has had a very poor press over the last two millennia and dismissed as the prophet of doom — ­another example of the way the Bible and its prejudices haunt the modern imagination.

 Actually, it is possible that Jeremiah may have been a very honest witness in the tiny city-state of Judah (about which more in a moment), at the time when some books of the Bible were possibly taking written form.

 McCarthy based his series on the work of Israeli archaeologists like Finkelstein and his colleague, Professor Ze'ev Herzog. In October 1999, Herzog summarised their discoveries in a sensational article in the magazine of the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz ('Deconstructing the Walls of Jericho', Ha'aretz Magazine, 29 October 1999: 6-8). In the article, Herzog described how what he calls the 'crisis stage' in Israeli archaeology has matured in recent years. He described it as nothing less than a scientific revolution. It is a process well known to all research scientists familiar with the dynamic of scientific break­through:

“A crisis stage is reached when the theories within the framework of the general thesis are unable to solve an increasingly large number of anomalies. The explanations become ponderous and inelegant, and the pieces do not lock together... 

“This is what archaeologists have learned from their excavations in the Land of Israel: the Israelites were never in Egypt, did not wander the desert, did not conquer the land in a military campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes of Israel. Perhaps even harder to swallow is the fact that the united monarchy of David &: Solomon described by the Bible as a regional power, was at most a small tribal kingdom... (Ha'aretz, 29 October, 1999)” 

In other words, no Abraham, no Moses, no Joshua; David and Solomon at best pagan tribal chieftains. He goes on: ‘And it will come as an unpleasant shock to many that the God of Israel,  Jehovah, had a female consort ...'. Her name is Ashera and she has her own programme in John McCarthy's series. As Matthew Sturgis, who wrote the book accompanying McCarthy's series, explains:  

 

“Asherah is identified as another Canaanite deity. She was a fertility goddess and the recognized consort of the chief god El (and later of Baal). Many small figurines representing her have been found at Canaanite sites. The statuettes, with their large breasts and well defined sexual organs, are closely related to those found at the slightly later Israelite sites. It is a relationship that has led scholars to suggest that Israelite fertility figurines may represent Ashera too.  (Sturgis 2001: 186).”   

Notice how archaeology is now compelled to shake off significant distinctions between Canaanite and Israelite sites. At some point +after+ the biblical fiction known as the United Monarchy of David and Solomon, perhaps about two centuries later, very roughly 800-700 BCE, a historical entity called Israel did emerge, though in its first incarnation it was distinctively pagan, with a pagan god, Jehovah, and goddess, Asherah.  Furthermore, Jerusalem was not its spiritual centre.

In the late 1960s, the archaeologist Bill Dever discovered Asherah, in inscription form, written in ancient Hebrew, when he was carry­ing out excavations at- Khirbet el-Kom near Hebron. On the wall of a late Iron Age tomb, dating from the mid- to late eighth century BCE, he discovered a bold drawing of what appeared to be a hand together with an inscription that ran: 'Blessed... by Yahweh [Jehovah] ... and his Asherah.'  Dever recalls: 

When I first discovered it, I didn't really want to publish it, as a young scholar. It was too controversial. But then in the 1970s a second site was found by Israeli archaeologists - also in the eighth century in Sinai. And you have the same expression: 'may X be blessed by Yahweh and his Asherah'. (Sturgis 2001: 173) 

This discovery was made at Kuntillet Ajrud, in northeastern Sinai. The inscription, written in ink on an old storage jar, was accompa­nied by a drawing of two curious figures, one apparently male, the other female, and both crowned. As Dever remarks, 'It seems that Yahweh did have a consort, like all the other gods of the ancient Near East - at least in the minds of many Israelites.' 

Like all the other gods of the ancient Near East ...      

As Herzog has argued, the discovery of inscriptions in ancient Hebrew that mention pairs of gods, Jehovah and Asherah, much later than the United Monarchy period, throws wide open the ques­tion of exactly when monotheism was adopted. And it seems likely that the small tribal kingdoms of David and Solomon, if they existed at all, worshipped polytheistic pagan gods. 

Now, archaeologists like Herzog and Finkelstein are not particu­larly politically minded, but they are very conscious of the implica­tions of their research for modern Israel's ideological claims to the biblical past. 

Herzog reports that the Israeli public are trying to ignore the find­ings despite the fact that they have been known for decades. He goes on: 

“Any attempt to question the reliability of the biblical descriptions is perceived as an attempt to undermine 'our historic right to the land' and as shattering the myth of the nation that is renewing the ancient Kingdom of Israel. These symbolic elements constitute such a critical component of the construction of Israeli identity that any attempt to call their veracity into question encounters hostility or silence ... The blow to the mythical foundations of the Israeli identity is apparently too threatening, and it is more convenient to turn a blind eye. (Ha'aretz, 29 October 1999)”

 

How progressive Israeli archaeologists like Herzog and Finkelstein are now beginning to explain the origins of the Bible is beyond the scope of this book. But one intriguing irony deserves further comment. They argue that the 'real' Ancient Israel was a pagan state, with Samaria its 'capital' or spiritual centre. Readers will be familiar with the modern Zionist claim on Judaea and Samaria on Palestine's West Bank. Less well known is the explosively bitter religious feud between Judaea and Samaria, or rather to use their biblical names, Judah and Israel. 

Herzog and Finkelstein argue that it is this feud that partly lays the foundation for the Bible stories and for the real birth of Judaism. It is a feud in which Judah, or Judaea, its Roman name, became the ultimate victor. Samaria (the real 'Ancient Israel') became an out­cast. By the first century CE, Samaria, with its own temple far away from Jerusalem and home to the 'Good Samaritan' of Gospel fame, was considered not properly Jewish at all by the priestly authorities at the Temple at Jerusalem in Judaea. In other words, 2,000 years ago, the century of the great Jewish revolt against Rome, the 'real' Ancient Israel was not considered Jewish. 

In the next chapter we will explore the damaging implications of this for modern Zionist claims on Palestine when we look at the Jewish Diaspora in the Roman Empire. But we should not leave this chapter before we have paid our unqualified respects to the great Jewish Bible writers of ancient times. The Bible is most certainly not a mandate for modern Jewish chauvinist claims on the land of Palestine, but, with Finkelstein and Silberman, we can most certainly agree that it is a

    “sacred scripture of unparalleled literary and spiritual genius ... an epic saga woven together from an astonishingly rich collection of historical writings, memories, legends, folk tales, anecdotes, royal propaganda, prophecy and ancient poetry... the literary masterpiece would undergo further editing and elaboration (so that it would) become a spiritual anchor ... for communities all over the world. (Finkelstein and Silberman 2002: 1-2)”

 

 

 


 

 

 

Click on image for freegaza.org site

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

WORDS

Apartheid - Nishul - Hafrada

 

The Afrikaans word apartheid has often been used to describe the situation obtaining in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and often within Israel itself.  From the point of view of campaigning, there have been problems with the use of this word in the Israeli-Palestinian context: its descriptive accuracy has been called into question¹ and to use it can end up letting apologists for Israeli brutality employ diversionary tactics, expressing outrage at the use of a word whilst ignoring or denying, certainly obscuring the very real Palestinian sufferings to which the word refers.

Apartheid may well, despite Machover's warnings and objections, be the appropriate word to use, but sometimes it's not enough to be right:  in campaigning, as in diplomacy, you often have to be right in the right way.  We want to persuade people with the words we use, not make them stop up their ears in some sort of defensive conditioned reflex.

I am therefore grateful to Deborah Maccoby² for reminding me that at his recent talk in London, Jeff Halper of ICAHD 'mentioned that he has met South Africans who object to the phrase "Israeli apartheid", not because what's going on doesn't resemble South African apartheid, but because they think the word "apartheid" was specific to their own situation and they think a specifically Israeli word should be used to describe the Israeli/Palestinian situation'.  (Email communication.)

I am also grateful to Richard Kuper, who clarified for me that the word Jeff used was nishul - dispossession (variant spelling, nishool). A related Hebrew word is hafrada, which, like the Afrikaans word "apartheid", means literally separation. These are the words used by the Israeli government to describe its own policies.  (By email.)

These words could become just as highly charged, and with the same results, as did the Afrikaners' own word to describe their policies.  If we started to use them at every opportunity in our own campaigning, they could hardly be challenged for accuracy, since they're the Israeli government's own terms, and they would deny our opponents the chance of time-wasting obfuscatory tactics.

 

¹ See Moshe Machover, Is it Apartheid? in Jewish Voice for Peace, 10 Nov 2004

² See report of London meeting here

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)

 

SEE LATEST GOOD NEWS ON THIS PROJECT HERE (CLICK)
 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

Sources of information

Websites:
Physicians for Human Rights – Israel
- www.phr.org.il


“Holding Health to Ransom: GSS Interrogation & Extortion of Palestinian Patients at Erez Crossing” as well as articles on health care and the use of torture in Israel
Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions – www.icahd.org


“An Israeli Jew in Gaza: A Statement by Jeff Halper”
“Born to Demolish” & article on the Matrix of Control


B’Tselem - www.btselem.org
The Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories


Council for Arab-British Understanding www.caabu.org
See education – Israel/Palestine fact sheets


Palestine Solidarity Campaignwww.palestinecampaign.org
See About Palestine – PSC fact sheets and booklets


Medical Aid for Palestinians www.map-uk.org
See Resource Room


United Nations Relief & Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near Eastwww.un.org


Gaza Community Mental Health Programmewww.gcmhp.net

See Palestinian International Campaign to End the Siege
Al-Haq – Palestinian Human Rights organisation founded by Palestinian lawyers – www.alhaq.org


Amnesty International www.Amnesty.org
Learn about human rights – select Palestinian Authority


The Foundation for Al Quds Medical Schoolwww.fqms.org


Wiam – Palestinian Conflict Resolution Centre – Bethlehem http://alashah.org/presention.ppt


Machsom Watch - Women against the Occupation and for human rightswww.machsomwatch.org/en


Palestine Medical Relief Society www.pmrs.ps


Public Committee Against Torturewww.stoptorture.org.il/en


Defence for Children International – Palestine Section - www.dci-pal.org


UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairswww.ochaopt.org
See latest publications and weekly reports – maps


The Medical Committee for Boycott of the Israeli Medical Associationwww.boycottima.org


Articles
On the Occupied Territories, two articles by Richard Horton on the New York Review of Books, 2007
: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19974  and http://www.nybooks.com/articles/20281

McGirk about Gaza published on the Lancet in February 2008, can be found on Rete ECO's website: http://www.rete-eco.it/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1110:gazas-humanitarian-crisis-deepens&catid=35:riflessioni&Itemid=35 )

 http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673608601853/fulltext

Amnesty "Gaza: A Humanitarian Implosion" published by Amnesty International; Catholic Agency for Overseas Development (AI); CARE (CAFOD); Christian Aid; Médecins du Monde; Oxfam; Save the Children Alliance; Trócaire on 6th March 2008. http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/downloads/oxfam_gaza_lowres.pdf
International development Select Committee have just published their report assessing the UK position on aid etc to the OPTs
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmintdev/522/522i.pdf


Books
The Iron Wall – Avi Shlaim (Penguin Books)
The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine – Ilan Pappe (Oneworld Publications)
The Question of Palestine – Edward Said (Pantheon)
An Israeli in Palestine: Resisting Dispossession, Redeeming Israel – Jeff Halper (Pluto Press)
Obstacles to Peace – Jeff Halper (ICAHD)
Blood & Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish & Democratic State – Jonathan Cook (Pluto Press)
Israel & the Clash of Civilizations – Jonathan Cook (Pluto Press)
Israel & Palestine: Competing Histories – Mike Berry & Greg Philo (Pluto Press)
Bad News from Israel – Mike Berry & Greg Philo (Pluto Press)
Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict – Sara Roy (Pluto Press)
The West Bank Wall: Unmasking Palestine – Ray Dolphin – (Pluto Press)

DVDs
The Iron Wall – Mohammed Alatar (available from www.icahduk.org)
Jerusalem – East Side Story – Mohammed Alatar (available from www.palestinecampaign.org)

For advice on travelling to Israel and the Occupied Territories
See the Foreign and Commonwealth Office - www.fco.gov.uk/travel

 

 

 

 

 


 

Note:  In many ways I regard the DISCUSSION about a boycott as being

probably of more importance than any actual moves to implement

such a move.  I think that some of the ways in which the discussion has

been held to date have actually not been helpful in terms

of securing justice for all involved in the Israel-Palestine conflict.

 

Certainly the Israeli Medical Association needs to be sure that it

has fully investigated the claims made by groups such as

PHR-I, B'tselem, Amnesty and others, and acted in full

accordance with medical ethics.

                                                        -- Brian

See an interesting pros-and-cons discussion from a contra position (from 2007) here:

http://www.workersliberty.org/system/files/wl3-12.pdf

 

Email from Dr Derek Summerfield

Thu 31/07/2008 15:05

Dear colleagues

Thanks to the efforts of Dr David Halpin and his friend Bill we now finally have a website to serve as point of reference for people who are concerned about health and human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and about medical ethics — in particular the systematic complicity over years of the Israeli Medical Association and of individual Israeli doctors with torture as an instrument of state policy, and with violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention which guarantee a civilian population in a conflict zone unfettered access to services vital to life (including health services) and guarantee health professionals and facilities immunity from military action.  On this account, and with the ‘normal’ channels having long since shown to be blocked, we have called for a boycott of the IMA and its suspension from the World Med Assoc, as well as allying ourselves with the academic boycott campaign spearheaded by the British Committee for Universities in Palestine (BRICUP). There is further material to be added of course.


Please publicise as widely as possible or if circumstances present consider submitting material for possible posting up.


The site is: boycottima.org

Best wishes Derek