HEY ELTON
by John Greyson
HEY ELTON from John Greyson on Vimeo.
Palestinian civil society has called on Elton John to respect its boycott call and cancel his June 17th concert in Tel Aviv. If he does so, he’ll be joining Santana and Gil-Scott Heron, who recently cancelled their spring concerts in Israel. This video suggests six reasons why Elton should join the BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) movement.
For more info, please visit:
bdsmovement.net
BNC (Palestinian BDS National Commitee)
pacbi.org
PACBI (Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel)
bricup.org.uk
BRICUP (British Committee for Universities for Palestine)
quaia.org
QUAIA (Queers Against Israeli Apartheid)
EDITOR: New Heights of Israeli Chuzpah
After refusing to meet with the Elected (and unelected) representatives of Palestine for over a decade, Israel now discovered that indirect talks, that US invention on which they counted to delay a resolution forever, may not be successful after all, and the pressure may be too much for them to bear. So now they demand what they vetoed all along – direct talks. You couldn’t make it up!
The next demand will be that the talks be held in Yiddish, no doubt.
When the direct talks will fail, then Netanyahu can demand a return to indirect talks, and the cycle can start again.
Netanyahu: Mideast peace deal impossible without direct talks: Haaretz
PM echoes U.S. call to see proximity negotiations lead to direct contacts as soon as possible.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel expected the upcoming indirect negotiations with the Palestinians to lead to direct talks.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, U.S. envoy George Mitchell and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are preparing to enter indirect Middle East negotiations.
Senior U.S. officials have told their Palestinian counterparts that Washington also believes direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians must begin as soon as possible.
The Obama administration has informed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that it will not unveil mediation proposals or a Middle East peace plan before the start of direct, substantive talks between the two sides on final-status issues, a high-level Israeli official said.
On Saturday, the PLO Executive Committee announced that it had given the green light to Abbas to begin indirect negotiations with Israel. Abbas also met with U.S. special envoy George Mitchell to discuss the manner in which the so-called proximity talks would be conducted.
The United States welcomed the PLO’s decision as an important step in the peace process. “It is an important and welcome step,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. Mitchell will meet with Abbas again Sunday in Ramallah before returning to Washington.
Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said Saturday after a meeting in Ramallah between Abbas and Mitchell that the discussions would be held over the four months allotted to address final-status issues such as borders and security arrangements. “The issues of Jerusalem and the settlements are part of the 1967 borders, so they will be discussed and negotiated,” Erekat said.
Erekat said that during their meeting, Abbas gave Mitchell a letter outlining the Palestinian Authority’s position on proximity talks and the issues it wants to discuss. Abbas would head the Palestinian negotiating team himself, Erekat said, adding that the Palestinians view the talks as aimed at “The end of the occupation and creation of a Palestinian state alongside the State of Israel along the 1967 borders.”
The talks appear to represent a U.S.-brokered compromise that meets both the Palestinian demand to address the issue of borders, and Israel’s condition to discuss security arrangements. Both Palestinian and Israeli negotiators recognize that the two issues are intimately linked, and that any proposal or statement on either matter is likely to significantly influence any resolution on the other.
Israel welcomes PLO decision
Prime Minister Netanyahu welcomed the decision to resume peace talks, urging that they be held unconditionally and lead swiftly to direct negotiations between the two sides.
A statement from Netanyahu spokesman Nir Hefetz said the prime minister “welcomes the resumption of peace talks.”
Quoting Netanyahu, Hefetz added that “Israel’s position was and remains that the talks ought to be conducted without preconditions and should quickly lead to direct negotiations.”
Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that the U.S. administration expects Israel to do its part in facilitating U.S. efforts to advance the stalled peace process. “An essential condition for improving relations with the U.S. is taking steps that prove Israel is seriously committed to making decisions on the Palestinian issue once they reach the negotiating table,” Barak said at a conference at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot.
“That will be judged by deeds, not by how much we smile at the White House. A comprehensive peace plan is needed, one that Israel stands behind. I’m not sure that that is possible with the current government,” Barak said.
“Without an agreement, we will be subject to international isolation, and we will suffer a fate similar to that of Belfast or Bosnia, or a gradual transition from a paradigm of two states for two peoples to one of one state for two peoples, and some people will try to label us as similar to South Africa. That’s why we must act,” Barak said. If both sides are willing to make brave decisions, he said, “it will be possible to get to direct negotiations and a breakthrough toward an agreement.”
In talks last week with Netanyahu and Barak, Mitchell asked that Israel make confidence-building measures over the next few weeks, both to build up PA institutions and encourage the Palestinians to shift more quickly to direct talks.
A senior official in Jerusalem said Israel would take such steps in the coming weeks, probably including the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, the removal of additional checkpoints and the transfer of certain West Bank areas to PA security control.
Yasser Abed Rabbo, a member of the PLO Executive Committee and veteran peace negotiator, said the Palestinians had received assurances from the U.S. concerning “settlement activities and the necessity to halt them.” He said the Obama administration had also promised to be tough in the event of “any provocations,” and guaranteed that all core issues would be put on the table.
The PLO decision came despite warnings from the rival Palestinian group Hamas, which said Friday that the move would only legitimize Israel’s occupation, Palestinian media reported.
“Absurd proximity talks” would only “give the Israeli occupation an umbrella to commit more crimes against the Palestinians,” Hamas reportedly said. “Hamas calls on the PLO to stop selling illusions to the Palestinian people and announce the failure of their gambling on absurd talks.”
Mid-East indirect peace talks ‘under way’: BBC
Indirect peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians have begun, the Palestinian chief negotiator has said.
Saeb Erekat spoke after a meeting between US Middle East envoy George Mitchell and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Mr Mitchell will mediate in the talks between the two sides.
The start of so-called “proximity talks” in March was halted after a row over the building of new Israeli homes in East Jerusalem.
Palestinians broke off direct peace talks after Israel launched a military offensive on Gaza in late 2008.
“The proximity talks have started,” Mr Erakat said in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
The talks went ahead a day after receiving the backing of leaders of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.
The PLO’s Executive Committee decided to back the talks after a three-hour meeting in the West Bank.
Has the IDF become an army of settlers?: Haaretz
When the time comes for disengagement, perhaps the state may decide to temporarily redeploy regular troops to the Border Police. It is doubtful whether it will be possible once again to rely on the IDF for that job.
By Amos Harel
Israel’s left may have already missed the opportunity to reach a permanent agreement with the Palestinians. A considerable part of the blame for the failure falls with the Palestinians, but during the missed years – the critical years since the Oslo Accords – something important happened on the Israeli side: The Israel Defense Forces underwent a change.
The army plays a critical role in carrying out an agreement (in withdrawing from territory and evacuating settlers ), but also in ensuring security stability after the agreement is reached. The trouble is that the IDF of 1993 is not the IDF of 2010. Here is what happened in the officers’ course for the infantry corps, the spearhead of the combat units, during that period: In 1990, 2 percent of the cadets enrolled in the course were religious; by 2007, that figure had shot up to 30 percent. And this is how the intermediate generation of combat officers looks today: six out of seven lieutenant colonels in the Golani Brigade are religious and, beginning in the summer, the brigade commander will be as well. In the Kfir Brigade, three out of seven lieutenant colonels wear skullcaps, and in the Givati Brigade and the paratroopers, two out of six. In some of the infantry brigades, the number of religious company commanders has passed the 50 percent mark – more than three times the percentage of the national religious community in the overall population.
This is a generation of commanders committed to its missions, the IDF and the state. It simply has roots in different areas than previous generations. If you glanced at the lists in the company commanders’ offices 20 years ago, you could have seen considerable numbers of fighters from the greater Tel Aviv area and coastal plain. This is of course a generalization that unfairly overlooks the exceptions, but the number of such soldiers today is negligible. A few years ago, a Golani battalion commander found that only one of his soldiers was a resident of Tel Aviv. Today, in a different capacity, a number of Tel Aviv residents serve with him – but all of them live “south of the Dolphinarium line,” referring to the city’s lower-income neighborhoods.
In terms of manpower, long-term processes have been set in motion. The decision by left-wingers and members of kibbutzim to abandon Training Base 1 (where officers’ courses take place ) in the wake of the first Lebanon war and the first intifada can be felt today among the brigadier generals, who are knocking at the doors of the General Staff in 2010. Many complain about how colorless the senior brass is today, something that can be partially explained by the fact that in the mid-1980s many recruits with potential waived their assignation to officers’ courses.
It is an open secret that in the IDF a certain sector of the population is divided mainly between Unit 8200 of Military Intelligence, the pilots’ course, the reconnaissance units and sometimes – with a world of difference – those who get a psychiatric exemption from service. These people will hardly ever go to Golani or Kfir. The abandonment of the combat infantry units will also be noticeable in the next 15 years in the General Staff.
The IDF has made mistakes in the territories and continues to do so, especially in the silent assistance it has given the illegal outposts over the years. But describing it as an army of occupation troops is foolish and overlooks the truth. The secular left-wing fell asleep on the job. The empty ranks it left in its wake have been filled by others. Even those who believe there is no choice other than a massive evacuation of the settlements should know that it will be extremely difficult to do this after the disengagement from Gush Katif.
In 2005, the evacuation was carried out because Ariel Sharon did not bat an eyelid and the military acted accordingly. The battalion commanders, for the most part, will obey orders next time as well, but it is hard to see how the company commanders who come from the settlements of Tapuah and Kedumim will answer the call to remove Jews from their homes. It is no surprise that the top IDF brass is so fearful of such a scenario.
When the time comes for disengagement, perhaps the state may decide to temporarily redeploy regular troops to the Border Police. It is doubtful whether it will be possible once again to rely on the IDF for that job.