Committee for Peace in Israel/Palestine

$30 Billion in Aid to Israel?

2011-07-02T09:22:00.003-04:00

Our Federal government budget is awash in red ink and our national debt is exploding. State and local governments are unable to meet urgent needs and are reducing or eliminating important services. Millions of Americans are unemployed.

At the same time our Congress has pledged to give Israel $30 billion over a period of ten years. Could there be any better illustration of governmental insanity?

How is it possible that Israel's needs are seen to be more important than the needs of our own people?

A word about this blog

2011-05-18T08:30:00.003-04:00

This blog continues in the spirit and despite the absence of our late comrade Victor Teich.

Henry C. Clifford and Silvia Tennenbaum - co-chairs: The Committee for Peace in Israel / Palestine ( COPIP)

COPIP - This is where the terror begins

2011-05-12T08:02:00.000-04:00

Robert Fisk: An American Bribe That Stinks of Appeasement

2010-11-21T08:27:00.001-05:00

published 20 Nov. 2010. Copyright The Independent, UK

by Robert Fisk

In any other country, the current American bribe to Israel, and the latter's reluctance to accept it, in return for even a temporary end to the theft of somebody else's property would be regarded as preposterous. Three billion dollars' worth of fighter bombers in return for a temporary freeze in West Bank colonisation for a mere 90 days? Not including East Jerusalem – so goodbye to the last chance of the east of the holy city for a Palestinian capital – and, if Benjamin Netanyahu so wishes, a rip-roaring continuation of settlement on Arab land. In the ordinary sane world in which we think we live, there is only one word for Barack Obama's offer: appeasement. Usually, our lords and masters use that word with disdain and disgust.

... more

Palestinian official:we made a very serious mistake: to sit at the negotiation table while the Israelis continued to build settlements.

2010-11-18T06:09:00.001-05:00

from Bernard Avishai Dot Com *

"I tell you, any Palestinian will say that during those years we made a very serious mistake: to sit at the negotiation table while the Israelis continued to build settlements. But we had made a calculation, that within 6 months or 12 months, we would get our state and we would live in peace, we with you. Until we realized that this is a "process" and not "peace." So Palestinians have understood, that we are not going to make exactly the same mistake again.

...."

Dr. Sufian Abu-Zaida, a senior Fatah official, from an interview on an Israeli radio program.

* http://bernardavishai.blogspot.com/2010/11/coming-to-table-redux.html

From Gush Shalom: Uri Avneri "Racism is on the march!"

2010-11-18T05:49:00.001-05:00

From Jerusalem to Safed – Racism is on the march! *

photo gallery

For the second time within a month, hundreds of intellectuals, writers and artists gathered today (November 7, 2010) to protest against the wave of racism that is flooding the country. This time, too, the protest took place opposite the building where David Ben-Gurion announced the foundation of the State of Israel and read the Declaration of Independence, which promises freedom and equality to all citizens, “irrespective of religion, race and sex”.

In the non-party demonstration, the blue shirts of the members of the youth movements were very prominent.

Sefi Rachlevsky, one of the organizers, expressed the support of the protesters for the actors and actresses, who have refused to appear in tomorrow’s gala performance in Ariel.

Ex-minister Shulamit Aloni stated that the word ”Jewish” does not appear in any prayer – in all the prayers, only the “people of Israel” are mentioned. “This is an Israeli state, not a Jewish state,” she declared.

Professor Mordecai Kremnitzer, vice-president of the Israeli Institute for Democracy, said that more and more judgments of the Supreme Court are being ignored by the government – a fact that undermines the democratic system of the country.

The writer Yoram Kaniuk announced that next week he will go to the Interior Ministry and demand to be registered as “religion-less”, following the recently adopted law that allows only “religion-less” citizens to be wed in a civil marriage.

The speakers for the youth movements promised that their 100 thousand members would join the fight for democratic Zionism against the racist wave that is threatening to submerge the country.

Ex-member of the Knesset Uri Avnery recounted that as a child in Germany he witnessed the ascent of the racists to power and said: “I don’t want to see this happening again, and this time in the state which I have helped myself to create.” (text follows)

Translation of Uri Avnery’s speech:

*As a boy of 9, I witnessed the Nazi ascent to power.

There was nothing dramatic about it. Almost nothing changed overnight. Only slowly, little step by little step, racism started to enter the life of ordinary citizens.

“Don’t buy from Jews!” Don’t let them apartments! Don’t give them work!

In villages and towns, signs started to appear: “This place is Juden-rein!”

Then there came the Nuremberg laws that forbade Germans to marry Jews.

What happened after that is well-known.

In 1948, when, as a simple soldier, I took part in creating this state, I did not dream that I would witness again such a process, and this time in my own state.

Little step by little step, racism is entering our lives.

The Chief Rabbi of Safed forbids the letting of apartments to Arab students. We are paying the salary of this rabbi, and therefore we are responsible for what he says.

Rabbi Ovadia Jossef, the leader of hundreds of thousands, repeats this religious message.

The deputy mayor of Carmiel, too, called on the inhabitants not to let apartments to Arabs and requested to inform him of any such case. He also set up a municipal militia, a kind of civil guard, which is setting up checkpoints every evening to prevent Arabs from entering the town. Following our disclosure, he was kicked out of the municipal coalition, and a member of Lieberman’s party was installed instead. In Carmiel, Lieberman is a moderate.

A new law enables “admittance committees” to prevent Arabs from living in 700 Israeli localities. There is no need for signs “This place is Araber-rein”. No need to learn German to understand what’s happening in this country.

Every week now, new laws are being enacted that remind us of Nuremberg.

Our car is rushing down the slope. A car without brakes. There is no significant opposition in the Knesset. The Labor Party, which has long ago ceased to belong to the peace camp, is falling apart. The Kadima party is trying to out-flank Netanyahu on the right. Indeed, its members have signed the most outrageous racist bills.

But who are we blaming? We can accuse only ourselves!

Where is the peace camp? Where are the masses of Rabin Square? Where is the Israeli Left?

Words are important, but we cannot stop fascism with words alone. Action is needed.

The courageous actors who are risking their livelihood and refuse to appear in Ariel are a model. Every one of us must act, each one in his place, and all of us together.

If must create now a political force to combat racism and fascism, a force which will unite women and men, Jews and Arabs, Ashkenazis and Orientals. If we don’t, history will judge us harshly as accessories to the crime.

“Father, where were you?”

“Mother, where have you been?”

Here, in this building, the State of Israel was founded. Now we are called upon to save it!* /

_________________________

* http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/events/1289253309

Uri Avneri: Rosemary's Baby - the "one state solution"

2010-07-30T06:42:00.001-04:00

excerpt:

......We said above that it is impossible to “turn the triangle into a circle”. But the truth is that there is one way: ethnic cleansing. The Jewish state can fill all the space between the sea and the Jordan and still be democratic – if there are no Palestinians there.
_____________________________________________________________________________

Rosemary’s Baby

24/07/10

SINCE I witnessed the rise of the Nazis during my childhood in Germany, my nose always tickles when it smells something fascist, even when the odor is still faint.

When the debate about the “one-state solution” began, my nose tickled.

Have you gone mad, I told my nose, this time you are dead wrong. This is a plan of the Left. It is being put forward by leftists of undoubted credentials, the greatest idealists in Israel and abroad, even certified Marxists.

But my nose insisted. It continued to tickle.

Now it appears that the nose was right, after all.

THIS IS not the first time that a kosher leftist plan leads towards extreme rightist consequences.

That happened, for example, to the ugliest symbol of the occupation: the Separation Wall. It was invented by the Left.

When the “terrorist” attacks multiplied, leftist politicians, headed by Haim Ramon, offered a miracle-solution to the problem: an impassable obstacle between Israel and the occupied territories. They argued that it would stop the attacks without recourse to brutal actions in the West Bank.

The Right opposed the idea vehemently. To them it was a conspiracy to fix the borders of the state and promote the two-state solution, which they saw (and still see) as an existential threat to their designs.

But suddenly the Right changed its tune. They realized that the wall offered a wonderful opportunity to annex large tracts of West Bank land and turn them over to the settlers. And that is what happened: the wall/fence was not put up along the Green Line, but cuts deep into the West Bank. It takes away large areas of land from the Palestinian villages.

Nowadays leftists are demonstrating every week against the wall, the right is sending soldiers to shoot at them, and the two-state solution has been set back.

NOW THE rightists have discovered the one-state solution. My nose is tickling.

One of the first was Moshe Arens, former Minister of Defense. Arens is an extreme rightist, a fanatical Likud member. He started to talk about one state from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River, in which the Palestinians would be granted full rights, including citizenship and the vote.

I rubbed my eyes. Is this the same Arens? What has happened to him? But this apparent mystery has a simple solution.

Arens and his companions are faced with a mathematical problem that seems insoluble: turning the triangle into a circle.

Their aim has three sides: (a) a Jewish state, (b) the whole of Eretz Israel, and (c) democracy. How to combine these three sides into one harmonious circle?

Between the sea and the river there now live about 5.6 million Jews and 3.9 million Palestinians – a proportion of 59% Jews to 41% Palestinians (including the inhabitants of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem and the Arab citizens of Israel.) This number does not include, of course, the millions of Palestinian refugees who are living outside the country.)

Several “experts” have tried to dispute these numbers, but respected statisticians, including Israelis, accept them with tiny changes here and there.

The proportion, alas, is rapidly changing in favor of the Palestinians. The Palestinian population is doubling every 18 years. Even taking into account the natural increase of the Jewish population in Israel and the potential immigration in the foreseeable future, one can predict with almost mathematical precision when the Palestinians will constitute the majority between the Jordan and the sea. It’s a matter of years rather than decades.

The inescapable conclusion: one can reconcile between any two of the three aspirations, but not all three at once: (a) a Jewish state in the entire country cannot be democratic, (b) a democratic state in the entire country cannot be Jewish, and (c) a Jewish and democratic state cannot include the entire Eretz Israel.

Simple. Logical. One does not have to be Moshe Arens, an engineer by profession, to see this. Therefore the Right is looking for another logic that would allow the creation of a Jewish and democratic state in the entire country.

LAST WEEK Haaretz published a stunning sensation: prominent personalities of the extreme Right – indeed, some of the most extreme – accept the solution of one-state from the sea to the river. They speak about a state in which the Palestinians will be full citizens.

The rightists quoted in Noam Sheizaf’s article do not hide their reasons for adopting this line: they want to obstruct the setting up of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, which would mean the end of the settlement enterprise and the evacuation of scores of settlements and outposts throughout the West Bank. They also want to put an end to the growing international pressure for the two-state solution.

Among some leftists in the world, who advocate the one-state solution, the news was greeted with great joy. They pour scorn on the Israeli peace camp (leftists enjoy nothing more than deriding other leftists) and heap praise on the Israeli Right. What magnanimity! What readiness to break out of the box and adopt their opponents’ ideals! Only the Right will make peace!

But if these good people would read the texts, they would discover that it ain’t necessarily so. To be precise, it’s the very opposite.

ALL OF the six rightists quoted in the article are united on a number of points which deserve consideration.

First: all of them exclude the Gaza Strip from the proposed solution. Gaza will no longer be a part of the country. Thus, the number of Palestinians will be reduced by 1.5 million, improving the menacing demographic balance. (True, in the Oslo agreement, Israel recognized the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as one integral territory, but the rightists consider the Oslo agreement anyhow as the tainted product of leftist traitors.)

Second: the one state will, of course, be a Jewish state.

Third: the annexation of the West Bank will take place at once, so that the building of settlements can go on undisturbed. In a Greater Israel, the settlement enterprise cannot be limited.

Fourth: There is no way to grant citizenship to all Palestinian forthwith.

The author of the article summarizes their positions thus: “a process that will take from about a decade to a generation, and at its conclusion the Palestinians will enjoy full personal rights, but the state will remain, in its symbols and spirit, Jewish…This is not a vision of ‘a state belonging to all its citizens’ and not ‘Isratine’ with a flag combining the crescent and the Star of David. The one state still means Jewish sovereignty.”

IT IS worthwhile to listen well to the explanations provided by the initiators themselves (emphasis added by me):

Uri Elitsur, former director general of the Judea and Samaria Council (the leadership of the settlers, known as “Yesha”): “I speak of a Jewish state which is the state of the Jewish people, and in which there will exist an Arab minority.”

Hanan Porat, a founder of Gush Emunim (the religious settlers’ leadership, and the man who called upon the Jews to rejoice after the Baruch Goldstein massacre in Hebron): “I am against the automatic citizenship proposed by Uri Elitsur, which is naïve and could lead to grievous consequences. I propose the application of Israeli law to the territories in stages, first in the areas in which there is (already) a Jewish majority, and within a time-span of a decade to a generation in all the territories.”

Porat proposes dividing the Palestinians into three categories: (a) Those who want an Arab state and are ready to realize this by terrorism and struggle against the state – they have no place in Eretz Israel. Meaning: they will be expelled. (b) Those resigned to their place and to Jewish sovereignty, but not ready to take part in the state and fulfill all their obligations towards it – they will have full human rights, but no political representation in the institutions of the state. (c) Those who declare that they will be loyal to the state and swear allegiance to it – they will be granted full citizenship. (They will, of course, be a small minority.)

Tzipi Hutubeli, a Member of Parliament on the extreme fringe of Likud: “On the political horizon there must be citizenship for the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria…That will happen gradually …This process must take place over a long time, perhaps even a generation, in the course of which the situation on the ground will be stabilized and the symbols of the Jewish state and its character will be anchored in law…The question mark hovering over Judea and Samaria will be removed…First comes my deep belief in our right over Eretz Israel. Shiloh and Bet-El (in the West Bank) are for me the land of our ancestors in the full meaning of the term…At this moment we speak about conferring citizenship in Judea and Samaria, not in Gaza. Let it be clear: I do not recognize political rights of Palestinians over Eretz Israel…Between the sea and the Jordan there is room for one state, a Jewish state.”

Moshe Arens: “The integration of the Arab population (inside Israel) into Israeli society is a prior condition, and only afterwards can one speak about citizenship for Palestinians in the territories.” Meaning: Arens proposes focusing on the integration of the Arab citizens of Israel – something that has not happened in the last 62 years – and only afterwards thinking about the question of citizenship for the West Bank population.

Emily Amrussi, a settler who organizes meetings between the settlers and the Palestinians of the neighboring villages: “Don’t describe me as one pushing for the ‘one state’. In the end we may arrive there, but we are still very far from there. Let’s talk first about one country…We don’t talk about citizenship, but in terms like relations between neighbors… First let them become my good neighbors, and then we shall give them rights…In the far future, it will be necessary to move towards citizenship for everybody.”

Reuven Rivlin, Speaker of the Knesset: “The country cannot be divided…I oppose the idea of a state belonging to all its citizens or a bi-national state and am thinking about arrangements of joint sovereignty in Judea and Samaria under the Jewish state, even a regime of two parliaments, Jewish and Arab…Judea and Samaria will be a co-dominion, held jointly…But these are things that take time…Stop waving demography in my face.”

THE REGIME described here is not an apartheid state, but something much worse: a Jewish state in which the Jewish majority will decide if at all, and when, to confer citizenship on some of the Arabs. The words that come up again and again - “perhaps within a generation” - are by nature very imprecise, and not by accident.

But most important: there is a thunderous silence about the mother of all questions: what will happen when the Palestinians become the majority in the One State? That is not a question of “if”, but of “when”: there is not the slightest doubt that this will happen, not “within a generation”, but long before.

This thunderous silence speaks for itself. People who do not know Israel may believe that the rightists are ready to accept such a situation. Only a very naive person can expect a repetition of what happened in South Africa, when the whites (a small minority) handed power over to the blacks (the large majority) without bloodshed.

We said above that it is impossible to “turn the triangle into a circle”. But the truth is that there is one way: ethnic cleansing. The Jewish state can fill all the space between the sea and the Jordan and still be democratic – if there are no Palestinians there.

Ethnic cleansing can be carried out dramatically (as in this country in 1948 and in Kosovo in 1998) or in a quiet and systematic way, by dozens of sophisticated methods, as is happening now in East Jerusalem. But there cannot be the slightest doubt that this is the final stage of the one-state vision of the rightists. The first stage will be an effort to fill the entire country with settlements, and to demolish any chance of implementing the two-state solution, which is the only realistic basis for peace.

In Roman Polanski’s movie “Rosemary’s Baby”, a nice young woman gives birth to a nice baby, which turns out to be the son of Satan. The attractive leftist vision of the one-state solution may grow up into a rightist monster

Uri Avneri: A Government of Pyromaniacs Sets Fire To The Region

2010-05-31T15:24:00.001-04:00

Uri Avneri: is the founder of Gush Shalom / Israeli Peace Bloc

This night a crime was perpetrated in the middle of the sea, by order of the government of Israel and the IDF Command A warlike attack against aid ships and deadly shooting at peace and humanitarian aid activists It is a crazy thing that only a government that crossed all red lines can do

Read more......

Israeli Bernard Avishai "The occupation is ruining our lives"

2010-02-26T17:05:00.001-05:00

Bernard Avishai, Contributing Editor of Harvard Business Review, splits his time between Jerusalem and Wilmot, New Hampshire. He has taught at MIT and Duke.

He writes:"We know from everyday experience that Israel has the commercial and cultural resources to succeed brilliantly at global competition. At the same time, we know that, like all small countries networked to global realities, Israel cannot solve its diplomatic, economic, and environmental problems alone, that is, without the cooperation of other regional and global powers. Our economy cannot survive political isolation any more than our democracy can. The occupation is ruining our lives."

read complete article

Robert Fisk in The Independent (UK): Why does the U.S. turn a blind eye to Israeli Bulldozers?

2010-02-20T15:05:00.005-05:00

"Both the United States and Europe now stand idly by while the Israeli government effectively destroys any hope of a Palestinian state; even as you read these words, Israel's bulldozers and demolition orders are destroying the last chance of peace; not only in the symbolic centre of Jerusalem itself but – strategically, far more important – in 60 per cent of the vast, biblical lands of the occupied West Bank, in that largest sector in which Jews now outnumber Muslims two to one."

more...

General David Petraeus: Israel's policies foment anti-American sentiment and terrorism.

2010-02-19T22:10:00.002-05:00

In his report to the Armed Services Committee General David Petraeus stated: "The enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the AOR (Area of Responsibility). The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of US favoritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of US partnerships with governments and people in the AOR and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, Al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support. The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hisballah and Hamas."

Indian Country Today: Oglala Lakota traveler sees ‘deep parallels’ in Palestine:

2010-02-11T17:43:00.004-05:00

A native-American man who is also Jewish travelled to Cairo for the Gaza Freedom March and he visited the Dheisha Refugee Camp near Bethlehem, West Bank. He discusses the parallels between the Native tribes' and Palestinian experience. Full article with photos....

Amnesty International: The Day The Bulldozers Came

2010-02-11T07:18:00.001-05:00

West Bank farmer Mahmoud al-'Alam won't forget the day Israeli army bulldozers cut off his water supply... and destroyed his livelihood.

more....

Jeff Halper: Dismantling the Matrix of Control

2010-02-10T15:01:00.002-05:00

Almost a decade ago I wrote an article describing Israel’s “matrix of control” over the Occupied Palestinian Territories. It consisted then of three interlocking systems: military administration of much of the West Bank and incessant army and air force intrusions elsewhere; a skein of “facts on the ground,” notably settlements in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, but also bypass roads connecting the settlements to Israel proper; and administrative measures like house demolitions and deportations. I argued in 2000 that unless this matrix was dismantled, the occupation would not be ended and a two-state solution could not be achieved. more ....

My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza.

2010-02-10T14:57:00.000-05:00

On the 15th of January 2009, Sir Gerald Kaufman delivered the following speech to the British House of Commons:

My parents came to Britain as refugees from Poland. Most of their families were subsequently murdered by the Nazis in the holocaust. My grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came to her home town of Staszow. A German soldier shot her dead in her bed.

My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza. It is time for our government to make clear to the Israeli government that their conduct and policies are unacceptable, and to impose a total arms ban on Israel. It is time for peace, not the solution by conquest which is the Israelis' real goal but which is impossible for them to achieve. They are not simply war criminals; they are fools."

more ....

Wrong Since 1938

2010-01-01T21:43:00.000-05:00

All too often the proponents of war wrap themselves in the flag and denigrate any who advocate peaceful solutions. In his article, Foreign Policy Hawks: Wrong Since 1938, M.J. Rosenberg forcefully illustrates this truth.

The complete article ...