After US Secretary of State John Kerry’s recent comment about “apartheid” one day potentially appearing in Israeli controlled Palestine, the reality today is that apartheid already exists. Two pieces from the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. An editorial: At a G-20 conference in Cannes in November 2011, then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy termed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a…
Showing all posts tagged Haaretz
Western hypocrisy over Russia
Brilliantly strong Gideon Levy in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz: Saddam Hussein has already been executed, and so has Osama bin Laden. But all is not lost for the enlightened West. There is a new devil, and his name is Vladimir Putin. He hates gay people, so the leaders of the enlightenment did not go to…
Palestinian culture of resistance grows due to Israeli oppression
Amira Hass in Haaretz: At a West Bank University, in a class on the writings of Michel Foucault, one student said that every time she goes through checkpoints, she presents her identity card to the soldiers upside down. She makes use of the little space she can to make the sovereign decision not to be…
What Mandela teaches Israel (but she isn't listening)
The great Gideon Levy in Haaretz (and one of the finest columns on the death of the great South African, though Jonathan Cook’s dissenting view is vital): South African President Nelson Mandela, in his address for International Solidarity Day with the Palestinian People on December 4, 1997, said: “We know too well that our freedom…
Humiliating Palestinians as Israeli policy
Amira Hass is a leading journalist for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. Two recent columns show the direct and daily assault on Palestinian lives that too rarely appears in the Western press. The Israeli agency that oppresses Palestinians ‘for their own good’: And this month’s George Orwell Prize for excellence in misleading language, for rose-colored ink…
Why BDS must be supported for justice in the Middle East
My weekly Guardian column is published today: The… boycott, divestment and sanctions… (BDS) movement,… a thriving Palestinian-led initiative… that attacks… institutional links… to Israel’s illegal settlements,… has been… gaining in popularity. In Australia, the movement has been slowly growing… as Israel continues to defy international law – and it now faces one of its greatest opportunities in the court of public opinion. Shurat HaDin…
Mossad-backed Israeli law group attempts to silence free speech over Palestine
As the Israeli occupation of Palestine worsens and Zionist racism against Arabs in general becomes far more known globally (examples here and here), Israeli groups are trying to stamp out dissent through dodgy legal means. One Israeli group, Shurat HaDin, is going around the world attempting to silence critics of Israel. In Australia, two academics…
While Zionist settlers thrive, Netanyahu talks about Arab "threat"
Welcome to “democratic” Israel. Last night here in Sydney distinguished international lawyer and UN expert Richard Falk explained how growing numbers of people globally are recognising the justice of the Palestinian cause and Israel’s continued belligerence. But we still a way away from holding the Jewish state to account. Here are two stories that highlight…
Use and abuse of the Holocaust to defend and support Israel
Interesting and necessary editorial in Haaretz: The flyby over the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp by three Israel Air Force planes 10 years ago was a significant event for the service. The air force’s commander, Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, still keeps the flight’s documentation close by in his office. Four air force commanders at different times were…
How Israel and the Gulf states maintain repression in the Middle East
The idea that the Western powers want freedom and democracy in the Middle East is a joke that’s not lost on the Arabs living there. Adam Shatz, writing in the London Review of Books, outlines brilliantly today’s messy region: One evening in January at a hotel bar in Manhattan, I tried to ingratiate myself with…