EDITOR: Israel hit by Tsunami of isolation!
So, within one week, Israel has managed to following: Alienate Turkey to the point that it now plans to send its navy to protect boats top Gaza, and work with Egypt to isolate Israel; Too vacate its Cairo embassy after its personnel were saved by the Egyptian commando forces, with three protesters killed and over 1000 wounded by the army; In an Avaaz poll (see below), it became clear that over two thirds of the population of the three most important states in the EU – Uk, France and Germany – support the setting up of a Palestinian state, as well as the UN vote to make Palestine a full member.In the same week, the Israeli Foreign Minister has told the world that Israel plans to support what it hitherto called a terrorist organisation – the PKK – in its armed campaign against Turkey. And I may have left out some further successes…
Indeed, a great week for Israel!
The chickens are coming home to roost, and the Israeli government does not know where to turn. What a rotten summer it has been. First, most of the population of Israel makes clear what it thinks of Netanyahu and his government by building tent cities and mass demonstrations, and now this. Is there no end to antisemitism?… and this is even before next week, when the UN vote is to be taken!
No one should hold their breath about the 20th of September in the UN, of course. Over 125 states will vote to support the PA in its bid for statehood, and then the US will veto it in the Security Council. It is called democracy.
So anyone waiting for good news from that corner, can rest and relax – nothing good will come out of this, apart from the death and burial of the international charade called the “Two State Solution”. The Two State Solution is the solution supported by two states only – the US and Israel: More settlements, higher wall, more apartheid, more Palestinian land confiscated, more brutalities and murders, more hunger in Gaza! It is time that the TSS – the Two State Solution was exposed for what it has always been – a cover for Israel’s continuing aggression and war against Palestine and the Palestinians, and for the continuation of stealing their land while making noises about peace. What this meant is the trebling of the settlements since Oslo, the majoe increase in all measures of occupation iniquities. Israel can do all this because of the Two State Solution – the solution which is built on that other state, the US of A, the great defender of human rights in Chile, Pakistan, Iraq, Egypt and Afghanistan. Yes, and in Palestine, of course.
But, confused as the people of Europe are, in their support of what they think will bring some peace to the region, they are right to sense that Israel is the enemy of peace, of democracy in the Middle East, of normalising relations in the region. Israel thrives on conflict – it is the fourth largest arms exporter – it sells and promotes death and destruction at home and abroad, and benefits from the spread of terror and destruction, so that it can sell its ‘security’ products everywhere.
It seems that this poll by Avaaz is proving one point more than any other – the war Israel has declared on Palestine is also a war on the truth, a vast and expensive propaganda campaign in order to sway more and more people behind its blind alley politics and its offensive strategy of incendiary politics in the region, its anti-Arab, anti-Islamic drive, and its rampant racism. It seems, at last, that this has miserably failed, and that Europeans at least are coming to their senses, and understanding their need and duty to support Palestine. Of course, we cannot expect this of the US of A, a country where intelligence is qouted against one, and the few politicians with some pretence of an IQ are happy to renounce it in order to be reelected. But the rest of the world is turning, at last.
So the Two State Solution is the war of the Two States, US and Israel, against the rest. They may be supported by the fickle leaders of western Europe, who will vote out of fear of the US against the wishes of its own citizens. But this is probably their last stand on this – the public has spoken and will continue top shift towards rights for Palestine.
So, in the absence of a real TSS, which Israel has made impossible every day since 1967, what is left is the simple, old idea, which will win because all else has become impossible – one, secular democratic state in the whole of Palestine. It may sound far off, but it is much nearer than TSS! Anyone who speaks against it has to explain why a secular democratic state of all its citizens is bad, and a racist, ethnic autocracy based on religious exclusivity is good. Let them come forward and say so!
The people of Palestine, Arabs and Israelis – Moslems, Jews and Christians – will win, in the end, against the nationalism, colonialism and racism which Zionism has introduced and fostered for over six decades. The people shall win! They shall also win another place in the Middle East, as anew democracy amongst new democracies.
But let us hope that Zionism does not manage to start another massacre before its downfall.
Chavez : “Damn you State of Israel” (English subtitles): YouTube
UN recognition of a Palestinian state receives public approval in Europe: Guardian
Polls in France, UK and Germany show the majority of people back recognition of a Palestinian state by the UN
Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem
Portraits of youths pasted on the West Bank barrier show the flags of countries backing the Palestinian bid for statehood. Photograph: Darren Whiteside/Reuters
The majority of people in the UK, France and Germany want their governments to vote in favour of recognising a Palestinian state if a resolution is brought before the United Nations in the next few weeks, according to an opinion poll.
The three European countries are seen as crucial votes in the battle over the Palestinians’ bid for statehood at the UN, which meets next week. All three are pressing for a return to peace negotiations as an alternative to pursuing the statehood strategy, but they have not declared their intentions if it comes to a UN vote.
In the UK, 59% of those polled said the government should vote in favour of a UN resolution recognising a Palestinian state alongside Israel. In France and Germany, the figures were 69% and 71% respectively. Support for the Palestinians’ right to have their own state, without reference to the UN vote, was even higher: 71% in the UK, 82% in France and 86% in Germany.
The poll was conducted by YouGov on behalf of Avaaz, a global campaigning organisation that is conducting an online petition in support of a Palestinian state. It is planning to deliver more than 913,000 signatories backing what it describes as “this new opportunity for freedom” to the European parliament .
David Cameron must listen to the views of the public, said Ricken Patel of Avaaz. “The prime minister has a clear choice: stand with the British public and 120 other nations to support a Palestinian state and a new path to peace, or side with the US government, which continues to push for a failed status quo.”
The Palestinians appear to be assured of a majority if a resolution is put before the UN general assembly, whose annual session begins in New York next week. However, full membership of the UN requires security council approval, which the US confirmed last week it would veto.
The Palestinians may then seek “observer state” status at the general assembly, which is less than full membership but an advance on their current “observer entity” status.
The US, which is anxious to avoid wielding its veto and potentially incurring the wrath of Arab countries, is pushing for a return to negotiations – a move also supported by the EU, which is keen to avoid a damaging split among its 27 countries.
European foreign ministers are meeting in Brussels on Monday to discuss a common position on Palestinian statehood. Britain and France have said they would prefer to see meaningful negotiations on the basis of the pre-1967 borders with agreed land swaps, but have hinted they may vote for enhanced status for the Palestinians without such a prospect.
Germany is thought to be opposed the Palestinian plan, but on Friday the chancellor, Angela Merkel, said: “I am not going to disclose today our voting intentions, whatever they may be.” She added that Germany was wary of unilateral moves. “We are going to use the days that remain to perhaps achieve a few millimetres of movement,” she said.
The UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, backed the idea of a Palestinian state last week. “I support … the statehood of Palestinians, an independent, sovereign state of Palestine. It has been long overdue,” he said in Canberra.
Israel acknowledges that it has almost certainly lost the battle for votes at the general assembly. Ron Prosor, its ambassador to the UN, said last week: “This is a diplomatic endeavour against all odds … It is clear to me that we can’t win the vote.” Instead, Israel was concentrating on securing a “moral minority” of powerful countries, which it hopes will include the EU bloc.
• The Avaaz poll, carried out by YouGov in the UK and Germany, and Ifop in France, was conducted online, with 2,552 respondents in the UK, 1,017 in Germany and 1,011 in France.
Israeli actor refuses to perform in West Bank theater: JTA
September 12, 2011
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli actor Rami Baruch said he will not perform at a new cultural center in Kiryat Arba, a Jewish suburb of Hebron.
Baruch, who was scheduled to perform his play “Pollard” at the cultural center’s opening Sept. 19, announced his decision Sunday, saying that according to his contract with the Cameri Theater he does not have to perform in the West Bank.
“I made a decision, understanding that it could lead to financial ramifications and counter-boycotts,” Baruch said. “Kiryat Arba is where Baruch Goldstein and Kahane came from, and I asked myself what is my place in this whole story.”
Baruch in the play portrays jailed American spy for Israel Jonathan Pollard. Noam Semel, director of the Cameri Theater in Tel Aviv, said the theater would deal with the matter internally.
The center was built with public funds from three Israeli government ministries, as well as from private donations.
Theater professionals signed a petition a year ago stating that they would not perform in a new cultural center in the West Bank city of Ariel that was built with more than $10 million in public funds. The boycott spurred a controversial Israeli boycott law that would allow for civil lawsuits against individuals and groups calling for anti-Israel boycotts.
Meanwhile, opposition members in the Kiryat Arba City Council have called for a committee to approve the productions staged at the theater, including vetting the actors to make sure they have served in the Israeli military and requiring them to sign a loyalty oath to Israel.
Turkish-Egyptian alliance: Israel faces regional isolation: Guardian Editorial
Netanyahu can either prepare for another war or accept that Israel can no longer impose its will on its neighbours
Monday’s visit to Egypt by Turkey’s prime minister, Reccep Tayyip Erdogan, will be watched like no other. It comes just three days after thousands of Egyptians stormed the Israeli embassy in Cairo. Eighty-six Israelis inside fled, and six security guards trapped inside a strong room had to be freed by Egyptian commandos, but only after intervention from the White House. What those diplomats felt was the wrath of an Egyptian people humiliated by the killing of five soldiers at the Israeli border three weeks ago. A sixth soldier died at the weekend. Mr Erdogan will bring with him the support of a regional power and Nato member whose citizens were also killed by Israeli soldiers on the Gaza flotilla last year, and who is now threatening to send warships to protect the next one. If post-revolutionary Egypt and an economically resurgent Turkey make common cause against their former common ally – and there is every indication that they will – Israel’s isolation in the region will be profound.
The pace of events has surprised everyone. The pro-Palestinian sentiment of the thousands who thronged Tahrir Square was latent rather than explicit. Analysts then expected that major foreign policy changes would have to await domestic ones like elections and a new civilian government. Israel on the other hand found itself looking the wrong way, gearing up for protest on the West Bank and on its Syrian and Lebanese borders after the declaration of statehood at the UN later this month. No one expected the forces unleashed by the Arab spring to turn this suddenly on an Israeli flagpole in Cairo.
The popular wrath is a result of two factors. First, seven and a half months after the downfall of Hosni Mubarak’s regime, the Egyptian street is still the cutting edge of change in the country. Its ruling military council, with elements of the former regime, are playing a double game. Assuring continuity of the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty to some, and using the gradual breakdown of that treaty to reassert lost Egyptian pride and sovereignty in the Sinai to others. It may not have been accidental that during the weekend’s drama in Cairo no one in the White House could get the head of Egypt’s ruling military council, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, on the end of a telephone in an effort to rescue the trapped security guards. Second, Israel’s old alliances were with regimes, usually despotic ones, not their people. Now that popular opinion is once again making itself felt in the region, Egypt will never again stand quiet – as it did when Israel launched its military campaign against Gaza in 2008 – if another war breaks out.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu now faces a real choice. He must realise that humiliating Turkey by refusing to apologise for the deaths on the Mavi Marmara was a colossal error. The strategic consequences for Israel of a hostile Turkish-Egyptian alliance could last years. They far outweigh the advantages of a tactical victory in the UN Palmer report, which lasted exactly days. Israel needs to repair relations with Turkey and do it quickly. The price of such a rapprochement will have gone up in the last week, but it is still worth paying. The Israeli premier’s reaction on Saturday to events in Cairo was, by his standards, measured and moderate, so maybe even he now realises this.
The choice he faces is clear. He can either prepare for another war (Avigdor Lieberman’s response to Turkey was to suggest that Israel arm the PKK) or he can accept that Israel can no longer impose its will on hostile and weaker neighbours. For one thing, the neighbours are growing stronger. The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz put it more bluntly. In an editorial about the harassment of Israeli passengers on a Turkish Airlines flight in retaliation for similar treatment Israeli authorities meted out to Turkish passengers, it suggested that Israel needs humiliation in order to respect others. No one needs further humiliation, but respect of its neighbours is in short supply.
EDITOR: Netanyahu is over!
While the revulsion of Netanyahu is universal in wide circles in Israel, the article below shows that even liberals in Israel are deluded – the idea that the Labour Party, that diseased body which has built the settlements and directed Israel away from peace for over five decades, masquerading as left wing, is able or willing to bring just peace to the Middle East, is as barmy as the idea of supporting Mubarak was. Israel is unable, as society which has specialised in denial, to face the relaities in the Middle East. The best proof of this is its massive protest movement,a National Socialist movement, built on the Jewish Volk.
Netanyahu’s masquerade is over: Haaretz
Promises and words are tools, but in Netanyahu’s case, the masquerade is over, even for those who are addicted to false hopes; the man is dangerous.
By Sefi Rachlevsky
The government’s totally irresponsible decision to reject the convenient compromise with Turkey that was proposed by the United States did bring one benefit. A dilemma has been resolved. To the question of whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is an extremist leader to an unfathomable degree, or whether he is simply an opportunist, a waffler – a liar, we now have an answer: Netanyahu is no liar.
Of Caesar, one of the protagonists of Yaakov Shabtai’s novel, “Past Continuous” (“Zikhron Devarim” ), it was written that lies would simply trip off his tongue. But Caesar was not a pathological liar; his lies were simply dictated by his stubborn insistance on being with three women at the same time. Deception wasn’t part of his character, it was a tool to maintain an extreme situation.
That’s the way it is for an extremist leader, too. Nobody views the extremists who brought disaster on the first half of the 20th century as opportunistic con-men. Fraud and false impressions were the tools they needed. The extremist leader must use fraud to resolve the dissonance between his extremism and his leadership position, which requires a centrist image.
This is the adulterer’s method: “I have a weakness for women,” “She opened a button,” “I love you”; while to the others, he’ll say, “I’m going to leave her,” “When the boy is born. Grows up. Gets drafted.”
Promises, deceit and words are tools. But in Netanyahu’s case, the masquerade is over, even for those who are addicted to false hopes.
Among the octet leading us to disaster there was only one who opposed the American compromise. The defense, diplomatic and legal establishments supported it. The warning that if Turkey fell, our embassies in Egypt and Jordan would not survive, echoed loudly in the background. Ehud Barak, Dan Meridor and even Eli Yishai and Benny Begin supported the compromise. Avigdor Lieberman made it clear he could swallow the wording. Only Netanyahu remained ensconced in his extremism.
Like the other octet’s farces – a deal for Gilad Shalit is imminent, the extension of the settlement freeze is imminent, along with 20 stealth aircraft – the compromises aren’t evasive. It’s not Lieberman, it’s not “that woman,” whom he has fashioned into a false demon, it’s not fear of the son who opened a Kahanist Facebook page, and it’s not the father who has the same opinions; it’s Netanyahu’s own holy spirit.
Before the last elections, a warning appeared on these pages. It pretended to make known a shocking truth about one of the party leaders. But a real cautionary note must be issued regarding Netanyahu: The man is dangerous.
Yossi Ben-Aharon, the director-general of the Prime Minister’s Office under Yitzhak Shamir, said that to his right there was only a wall. But Netanyahu is beyond that wall. He’s in the place where the “with blood and fire we’ll boot out Rabin” demonstrations were organized.
People like Yehuda Bauer, and Yoram Kaniuk and myself who attended a meeting last week with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas experienced the disaster. Before us, they said, was a competent leader who had brought security and prosperity to the West Bank, someone who, in Israeli political terms, is positioned between Meretz and Hadash. In his moderation, he could be a member of Brit Shalom, an early twentieth-century group that preached Jewish-Arab coexistence in Palestine, a partner to the Jewish world that was destroyed in Europe. The epidemic of destructive propaganda turning Abbas into an “extremist” is of our own making.
Just over a week ago, half a million people protested – 10 percent of the population of protesting age. That’s equivalent to five million Britons or 25 million Americans, a number that in any democracy would lead to elections and a total change.
But here, under the most extreme Israeli leadership, the boots come to sweep away the tents as if they were dust, the finance minister gives them the finger, and Netanyahu rolls with laughter when Rabbi Ovadia Yosef tells him that the million, “have no chance against you.”
So in order for there to be a chance, every citizen must rise up – not with ugly text messages that tried to prevent the appointment of a chief of staff who would go along with the extremism, but openly. It’s not for nothing that a right-winger like former Mossad chief Meir Dagan warned of a looming disaster.
This is the responsibility of Barak, Meridor and Barack Obama. It’s also the responsibility of Labor voters to choose a leader who will draw voters from the right and from among those who don’t vote, and who will shout down the person who is leading a generations-old dream to an apocalypse.
US told: support Palestinian UN bid or risk ‘toxic’ reputation in Arab world: The Guardian
Ex-Saudi ambassador to Washington says US will jeopardise position with Arab allies if it votes against membership proposal
Chris McGreal in Washington
A US veto would end the ‘special relationship’ between the Palestinians and the US, says Turki al-Faisal. Photograph: Hassan Ammar/AFP/Getty Images
A former head of Saudi Arabian intelligence and ex-ambassador to Washington, Turki al-Faisal, has warned that an American veto of Palestinian membership of the United Nations would end the “special relationship” between the two countries, and make the US “toxic” in the Arab world.
The warning comes as Washington is scrambling to avoid a scenario where it alone casts a veto in the UN security council against the Palestinian bid for recognition of statehood, which is expected to be formally requested next week. The US is putting considerable pressure on the Palestinians not to submit the request, and on Britain – the only other permanent member of the security council that has not publicly supported the Palestinian request – to also exercise its veto if necessary.
Al-Faisal says in an article in the New York Times that the US will jeopardise its close ties with Saudi Arabia and further undermine its position in a changing Arab world if it again sides with Israel.
“The United States must support the Palestinian bid for statehood at the United Nations this month or risk losing the little credibility it has in the Arab world. If it does not, American influence will decline further, Israeli security will be undermined and Iran will be empowered, increasing the chances of another war in the region,” al-Faisal says.
“Moreover, Saudi Arabia would no longer be able to co-operate with America in the same way it historically has. With most of the Arab world in upheaval, the “special relationship” between Saudi Arabia and the United States would increasingly be seen as toxic by the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims, who demand justice for the Palestinian people.”
He adds: “Saudi leaders would be forced by domestic and regional pressures to adopt a far more independent and assertive foreign policy.”
Al-Faisal, a vigorous advocate of Palestinian statehood who has previously accused the US of bias toward Israel, said that the two-decade long Oslo peace process has not yielded results and should be replaced with “a new paradigm based on state-to-state negotiations”.
This is a view shared by some European nations, including France, which regard the Oslo process as a trap that has failed to deliver statehood for the Palestinians and is unlikely to do so in the near future.
“American support for Palestinian statehood is therefore crucial, and a veto will have profound negative consequences. In addition to causing substantial damage to American-Saudi relations and provoking uproar among Muslims worldwide, the United States would further undermine its relations with the Muslim world, empower Iran and threaten regional stability,” al-Faisal writes.
The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, has said he will submit a request to the security council for full membership of the United Nations when he is in New York for the opening of the general assembly next week. If that is vetoed by the US, the request will move to the general assembly, which has the power only to grant enhanced observer status, but where Israel concedes the Palestinians are all but certain to win.
The prospect has alarmed the Americans and the Israelis, who say the move would undermine peace efforts and lead to further violence. The Palestinians say there is no peace process to speak of.
But the diplomatic fallout is of principal concern to the US. It will be hard for Washington, and for Britain, if it backs the American position, to explain to newly liberated parts of the Arab world why they are prepared to go to war against Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and agitate against Bashar al-Assad in Syria but not support the Palestinian bid for statehood in the face of an intransigent Israel.
For Israel, the UN move comes as it is grappling with the collapse in relations with Turkey over the Israeli assault on the Gaza flotilla last year, in which Israeli forces killed nine Turks, and rising hostility in Egypt, which saw the Israeli embassy in Cairo ransacked last week.
Israel also looks to many as increasingly out of step with a changing region, in maintaining the occupation, expanding Jewish settlements in the West Bank and thwarting Palestinian independence in the near future.
The US has been pressuring the Palestinian leadership not to make the request, with promises to get peace negotiations going again. But Abbas said that the Americans came with no concrete proposals and the Palestinians have little confidence that the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, is seriously interested in ending the occupation.
George Mitchell, until recently Barack Obama’s Middle East envoy, said last week that he sees little chance of the US persuading the Palestinians not to submit the request.
The US Congress is also pressuring the Palestinians to withdraw the request by threatening to cut off funding. The House of Representatives is holding hearings this week on whether to continue financial aid to the Palestinian Authority. Its principal witnesses are among the PA’s strongest critics, including Elliot Abrams, a former assistant secretary of state and former deputy national security advisor.
Hamas distances itself from Palestinian statehood bid at UN: Haaretz
Speaking with Ma’an news agency, Hamas officials say planned move to garner recognition of Palestinian independence in General Assembly was undertaken without consulting the Gaza Strip-ruling group.
The Palestinian Authority’s push to achieve recognition of an independent Palestinian state in the United Nations has nothing to do with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Hamas officials said on Monday, adding that the campaign was launched without consulting Hamas leaders.
Speaking to the Palestinian Ma’an news agency on Monday, the leaders of several Palestinian factions voiced differing opinions on the Palestinian statehood bid at the UN, with both Hamas and Islamic Jihad representatives strongly opposing the planned vote.
Hamas Gaza strongman Mahmoud Zahar told the Palestinian news agency that the UN push did not represent the Hamas-ruled Strip, saying that no one “asked the people in Gaza to take to the streets showing solidarity with the so-called September bid.”
“If the Palestinian Authority calls for that, we will oppose it because they detain people in the West Bank. How can I give them the right to demonstrate in Gaza, while they do not give us that right in the West Bank?” Zahar asked.
Another Hamas official, Mushir al-Masri, called the bid that an “individual step taken by [Palestinian] President [Mahmoud] Abbas without consulting any faction.”
Last month, senior Fatah officials claimed that Abbas had chosen to cool off his recently signed unity deal with Hamas, citing Western opposition to the surprise turn in the factions’ long-standing feud.
“President Abbas was surprised by the international opposition to the reconciliation with Hamas, so he decided to slow down at least until September,” the Palestinian official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss official policy.
“Now, with all efforts focused on September, we want all voices to be with us,” he said. “We are not giving the Americans or anyone else a reason to shun us because of the reconciliation or anything else.”
The unity deal was struck in May after Palestinian youth, inspired by the revolts against entrenched Arab autocracies, took to the streets calling for unification of the dueling governments in the West Bank and Gaza.
Another dissenting voice to the PA’s campaign speaking with Ma’an on Monday came from Islamic Jihad spokesman Dawood Shihab, who said the “move needs to be studied to make sure it will not ignore major issues such as the right of return, and the future of the Palestine Liberation Organization as a umbrella for the whole Palestinian people.”
However, other Palestinian factions, such as The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and The Palestinian National Initiative, supported the PA-led move, saying it was the last chance for Palestinians to reach statehood with the failure of peace talks with Israel.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine has announced its support for the UN campaign.
“We support the Palestinian leadership’s plan to go to the UN because that is a natural right of the Palestinians and part of the political battle against Israeli occupation,” Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine strongman Kayid al-Ghoul told Ma’an.
Al-Ghoul also said that he felt the UN statehood bid would mark the end of peace talks with Israel, instead urging the formation of an international Mideast peace process conference.
“Regardless of the outcome, this step should be part of the political battle we fight against occupation. It will also be an opportunity to enlarge the circle of solidarity with the Palestinian people’s rights, and to expose Israel’s policies and the supportive US policy,” al-Ghoul told Ma’an.
Mustafa Barghouti, leader of The Palestinian National Initiative called the UN push “the last option for two states,” adding that the”time has come for an alternative. There is no space or place for talks.”
“We won’t be slaves to apartheid for the rest of our lives,” Barghouti added, saying, “If South Sudan could get statehood in 48 hours, then Palestinians should get it.”
Egyptian parties criticise attack on Israel embassy, as well as SCAF: Ahramonline
Many political groups condemned the actions of protesters in attacking the embassy, but lay the blame at the door of the ruling military council
Zeinab El-Gundy , Monday 12 Sep 2011
The storming of the Israeli embassy on 9 September and violent clashes that followed it between protesters and police have generated a huge reaction from political parties and movements across the Egyptian political spectrum.
The Israeli embassy crisis forced political groups to deal not only with national security and regional matters but also domestic issues, especially the decision taken by the ruling military council (SCAF) and the cabinet to revive the use of emergency laws.
Most political groups denounced the storming of the Israeli embassy apartment, including those that have long held official positions against Israel and its policies.
Even some groups which blessed the demolition of the wall in front of the embassy and the removal of an Israeli flag from the building made a point of distancing themselves from the violence that erupted on that day.
However, most political groups from liberal to Islamist criticised SCAF and the Egyptian government for their weak reaction against Tel Aviv following the killing of Egyptian soldiers by Israel at the border last month.
The Revolution Youth Coalition (RYC), which was among the youth movements that called for the 9 September demonstration which started in Tahrir Square before heading to the Israeli embassy, issued a short statement about the clashes.
RYC raised questions about the excessive use of violence by the police to disperse protesters that led to the death of three people.
It described the clashes that took place as an attempt by certain forces to divert the 9 September protest from its main goals of building opposition to military trials.
The coalition later launched an online campaign in solidarity with one of its members in Assiut, Ahmed Abdel Karim, who was arrested at the Israeli embassy and could face a military trial.
Both fronts of the 6 April Youth Movement denied any role in the Israeli embassy riots.
The 6 April Youth Movement “Ahmed Maher’s Front” stated on its official Facebook page that despite its support for demolishing the wall in front of the embassy, what happened afterwards was due to what it described as“emotional enthusiasm”.
The 6 April Youth Movement “Democratic Front” published a statement saying it left the 9 September protest at 7:30pm and was distressed to see the events that took place at the embassy.
El-Adl Party issued a statement on Saturday insisting that all political groups participating in the 9 September protest in Tahrir Square played no role in the clashes that took place at the embassy or at the Giza security directorate, and rejected all attempts to blame the violence on revolutionary youth. The party warned activists not to support or participate in any future childish or careless actions. This statement angered many party activists who thought the statement took the side of the ministry of interior and its violent crackdown against protesters.
El-Adl Party, along with other liberal and centrist parties, Al-Masreyeen Al-Ahrar, the Democratic Front, Al-Hadara Party and Masr Al-Hurreyya Party issued another statement condemning the violence that took place which they considered antithetical to the peaceful goals of the Egyptian revolution, despite their sympathy with public anger following the killing of Egyptian troops by Israel and weak government reaction.
At the end of the statement the five parties demanded SCAF and the government investigate the clashes and agree to the demands of the 9 September protest.
Unlike El-Adl, the Wasat Party, a leading Islamist group, issued a strong statement on Sunday criticizing SCAF for its slow reaction to the murder of Egyptian troops on the border with Israel and its slow response to the demands of the Egyptian people in general.
The position of Islamist parties and movements was surprising to some considering Islamists’ long standing record of opposing against Israel.
Al-Daoa Al-Salafiya issued a statement on Sunday describing the storming of the embassy as “irresponsible actions” that benefit Israel and weaken Egypt’s position in amending Camp David. The statement also condemned attempts to blame the police or SCAF for the clashes or criticise them for excessive use of violence.
The Muslim Brotherhood (MB), the country’s largest Islamist force, issued a statement on Saturday which directly criticised SCAF.
Brotherhood critics criticised the MB’s statement for being too short – one paragraph – and also for not defending the protesters strongly enough.
The MB’s statement said SCAF had delayed bringing about overall real change in the country and not reacted properly to the killing of Egyptian troops which caused the people to protest in this way. The Brotherhood demanded SCAF establish a timeline for a democratic transition to a civilian government.
Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya, a main Islamist group, reiterated its earlier rejection of all protests in Tahrir Square and reminded the public of how it had warned of chaos in a statement it issued on Sunday.
The group said the events were part of a plan to turn Ultras fans against the army and the police in order to provoke violent clashes that would lead in the end to a civil secular presidential council. The statement called on SCAF to announce the date of parliamentary elections and called on public and political powers to stand against any attempt to delay the elections.
The Socialist Party of Egypt blamed SCAF and the Egyptian government for increasing public anger because of their inability to bring about improvement in living standards, whch then led to the outbreak of violence on Friday night. The party issued a statement that said liberating Egypt from “shameful agreements” with Israel and its sponsor country the US will not come except through a long struggle. The party also attacked attempts by the media to equate thuggery and protesting.
Potential presidential candidates also reacted strongly.
Amr Moussa, Egypt’s former minister of affairs, cut short his visit to Switzerland and returned to Egypt to propose a road map for the democratic transition. He condemned the attack on the embassy as he believed it weakened Egypt’s position, despite his belief that the best answer is to face up to Israeli aggression on the borders. Moussa said the revolution’s coalitions and groups were not responsible for the clashes, according to a tweet he published on his official Twitter account.
Mohamed ElBaradei, a liberal former head of the UN atomic agency, also returned from abroad to suggest another road map to democratic transition, including a purge of the interior ministry and official media, and short term economic solutions. He did not comment directly about the Israeli embassy events or the revival of emergency laws.
Sheikh Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, an Islamist, was the most outspoken presidential candidate against SCAF. In a statement Abu Ismail said what happened was a charade, calling on youth revolution coalitions and political groups to coordinate with each other before any protest in the future in order to prevent any group spoiling the protests.
Hamdeen Sabahi, an Arab nationalist and former member of parliament, issued an official statement in which he supported and praised the demands of the 9 September protest in Tahrir yet condemned and rejected the attack on public institutions, including police stations and security directorates. He called on the government to restructure the ministry of interior. Sabahi demanded SCAF listen to public anger at the Zionist state and restore Egyptian dignity after the Zionist aggression on Egyptian territory.
Cheney: Israel would strike Iran to prevent it from achieving nuclear weapons: Haaretz
Former U.S. Vice President says his assessment comes from a number of conversations with Israeli officials, adds his belief that Israel ‘will do whatever it needs to guarantee its survival’.
Former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney believes Israel would attack Iran to prevent it from achieving nuclear weapons capacity, he said in an interview aired Monday.
When asked about the possibility of an Israeli preemptive attack against Iran, Cheney told Newsmax TV that “Iran represents an existential threat, and [the Israelis] will do whatever they have to do to guarantee their survival and their security.”
Cheney said his assessment did not come from consultation with a particular Israeli leader, but was rather a reflection of a number of discussions with Israeli officials. “I can’t attribute it to any one particular Israeli leader. I wouldn’t want to do that,” he said. Nevertheless, he added that he “had a number of conversations with a lot of Israeli officials, and I think they correctly perceive Iran as a basic threat.”
Last month, the New York Times reported that Cheney urged the U.S. to bomb a suspected Syrian nuclear reactor in June 2007, quoting excerpts from his book.
According to Cheney, former U.S. President George W. Bush refused his demands and opted for a diplomatic approach after other advisers expressed apprehension. Foreign reports indicate that the Syria reactor was later bombed by Israel in September 2007.
“I again made the case for U.S. military action against the reactor,” the New York Times quoted Cheney as writing about a meeting on the issue. “But I was a lone voice. After I finished, the president asked, ‘Does anyone here agree with the vice president?’ Not a single hand went up around the room.”
In Cheney’s autobiography, “In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir,” which is to be published by Simon & Schuster on Tuesday, he relates his experiences as Vice President to Bush, discussing his opinions on the United States’ nuclear weapons agreement with North Korea, his handling of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks – when Bush was away from Washington and hampered by communications breakdowns – and his stance on Bush’s approach to dealing with Iraq.
In Bush’s own memoir, published in 2010, he claims that in 2007, then-prime minister Ehud Olmert asked him to bomb a nuclear facility in Syria. Bush was given an intelligence report on the suspicious, well-concealed facility, and Olmert then asked him in a phone conservation to bomb the site, concerned that the Syrians were developing nuclear weapons with North Korean assistance.
End of the affair: Al Ahram Weekly
Relations between Turkey and Israel have virtually collapsed, reports Gareth Jenkins from Ankara
Long-running tensions between Turkey and Israel reached breaking point last Friday when Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) expelled the Israeli ambassador to Ankara, suspended military cooperation agreements between the two countries and vowed to take Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
The announcement followed the publication on the New York Times website late on Thursday night of a leaked copy of the UN report on the Israeli raid on the Turkish aid flotilla to Gaza on 31 May 2010. Nine ethnic Turks were killed when Israeli commandos boarded the flotilla’s flagship, the Mavi Marmara, while it was still in international waters. The brutality of the Israeli assault triggered a furious protest by Turkey and was widely condemned by the international community. In the aftermath of the attack, the AKP threatened to downgrade its diplomatic relations with Israel unless it apologised, paid reparations to the families of the slain and lifted the blockade of Gaza, all of which Israel refused to do.
Over the last 15 months, there have been several discreet diplomatic contacts between Turkey and Israel in an attempt to resolve the crisis. All failed. In recent months, Turkey had delayed taking concrete action against Israel pending the publication of the UN report, which it confidently expected to vindicate its position. AKP officials had even accused Israel of trying to delay the publication of the report for fear of its conclusions. But, contrary to expectations, the report was broadly supportive of Israel’s position. Although it condemned what it described as the use of “excessive force” by the Israeli commandos who boarded the Mavi Marmara, the report found that they had met organised, violent resistance. Most surprisingly, the report also upheld what it described as Israel’s right to enforce a naval blockade on Gaza and intercept vessels sailing towards the enclave on the grounds that they might be carrying weapons to anti-Israel militant groups based there.
The publication of the report’s findings was greeted with dismay and confusion in Ankara. On Friday morning, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu held a press conference to announce a series of sanctions against Israel.
Davutoglu announced that Turkey was downgrading its diplomatic relations with Israel to second secretary level and gave all Israeli diplomats above that rank five days to leave the country. He also declared that Turkey was suspending the military training and defence cooperation agreements with Israel first signed in 1996, that it would take the blockade of Gaza to the ICJ, and that it would support legal efforts by the families of the nine people killed on the Mavi Marmara to seek compensation from Israel. Most controversially, Davutoglu said that Turkey would take measures to ensure “freedom of navigation” in the eastern Mediterranean. He failed to give any details although Turkish officials privately reported that the AKP was considering providing naval escorts to shipping in international waters, although they refused to comment on whether this would include providing military support for another attempt to break the blockade on Gaza.
Turkish President Abdullah Gul subsequently announced that Turkey regarded the UN report as “null and void” and warned that more sanctions against Israel could follow. However, Turkish officials dismissed suggestions that these could include economic measures. Turkey currently enjoys a large surplus in its bilateral trade with Israel.
The downgrading of diplomatic ties is undoubtedly a major blow to Israel, which, though it dislikes and distrusts the AKP, had been anxious to reestablish a working relationship with Turkey. In practice, military training cooperation between Turkey and Israel had already come to a halt in the aftermath of Israel’s deadly military assault on Gaza in December 2008. The suspension of defence industry ties is likely to harm Turkey at least as much as Israel. In recent years, Israel had become an important partner for Turkey, upgrading Turkish tanks and warplanes and supplying Ankara with 10 Heron unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which now play an important role in intelligence gathering against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Turkey is also likely to face difficulties at the ICJ. In order for any decision of the ICJ to be binding, both parties to a dispute have to agree in advance to abide by the court’s decision, something that Israel is never going to do.
There are also likely to be mixed feelings in the region about some of the implications of the measures announced by Davutoglu. Turkey’s decision to downgrade its diplomatic relations will undoubtedly be welcomed by many in the region who have been exasperated by the failure of other countries to follow up condemnations of Israeli policies with concrete sanctions. However, Davutoglu’s announcement that Turkey will singlehandedly enforce freedom of navigation in the eastern Mediterranean will have reinforced concerns that AKP now regards the Middle East as constituting a Turkish sphere of influence, and further fuel accusations that its policy of engagement with the region is based on desire for neo-Ottoman domination rather than cooperation and equal partnership.
At the UN, the funeral of the two-state solution: The Electronic Intifada
Ilan Pappe, 12 September 2011
We are all going to be invited to the funeral of the two-state solution if and when the UN General Assembly announces the acceptance of Palestine as a member state.
The support of the vast majority of the organization’s members would complete a cycle that began in 1967 and which granted the ill-advised two-state solution the backing of every powerful and less powerful actor on the international and regional stages.
Even inside Israel, the support engulfed eventually the right as well as the left and center of Zionist politics. And yet despite the previous and future support, everybody inside and outside Palestine seems to concede that the occupation will continue and that even in the best of all scenarios, there will be a greater and racist Israel next to a fragmented and useless bantustan.
The charade will end in September or October — when the Palestinian Authority plans to submit its request for UN membership as a full member — in one of two ways.
It could be either painful and violent, if Israel continues to enjoy international immunity and is allowed to finalize by sheer brutal force its mapping of post-Oslo Palestine. Or it could end in a revolutionary and much more peaceful way with the gradual replacement of the old fabrications with solid new truths about peace and reconciliation for Palestine. Or perhaps the first scenario is an unfortunate precondition for the second. Time will tell.
A substitute dictionary for Zionism
In ancient times, the dead were buried with their beloved artifacts and belongings. This coming funeral will probably follow a similar ritual. The most important item to go six feet under is the dictionary of illusion and deception and its famous entries such as “the peace process,” “the only democracy in the Middle East,” “a peace-loving nation,” “parity and reciprocity” and a “humane solution to the refugee problem.”
The substitute dictionary has been in the making for many years describing Zionism as colonialism, Israel as an apartheid state and the Nakba as ethnic cleansing. It will be much easier to put it into common use after September.
The maps of the dead solution will also be lying next to the body. The cartography that diminished Palestine into one tenth of its historical self, and which was presented as a map of peace, will hopefully be gone forever.
There is no need to prepare an alternative map. Since 1967, the geography of the conflict has never changed in reality, while it kept constantly transforming in the discourse of liberal Zionist politicians, journalists and academics, who still enjoy today a widespread international backing.
Palestine was always the land between the river and the sea. It still is. Its changing fortunes are characterized not by geography but by demography. The settler movement that came there in the late 19th century now accounts for half of the population and controls the other half through a matrix of racist ideologies and apartheid policies.
Peace is not a demographic change, nor a redrawing of maps: it is the elimination of these ideologies and policies. Who knows — it may be easier now than ever before to do this.
Exposing Israel’s protest movement
The funeral will expose the fallacy of the present Israeli mass protest movement, while at the same time highlight its positive potential. For seven weeks, mostly middle class Israeli Jews have protested in huge numbers against their government’s social and economic policies.
In order to keep the protest as large a movement as possible, its leaders and coordinators do not dare to mention occupation, colonization or apartheid. The sources of evil for everything, they claim, are the brutal capitalist policies of the government.
On a certain level they have a point. These policies disabled the master race of Israel from fully and equally enjoying the fruits of Palestine’s colonization and dispossession. But a fairer division of the spoils will not ensure normal life for either Jews or Palestinians; only the end to looting and pillage will.
And yet they also showed skepticism and distrust in what their media and politicians tell them about the socio-economic reality; it may open the way for a better understanding of the lies they were fed about the “conflict” and their “national security” over so many years.
The funeral should energize us all to follow the same distribution of labor as before. Palestinians urgently need to solve the issue of representation. The progressive Jewish forces in the world have to be more intensively recruited to the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) and other solidarity campaigns.
Intifada at the proms
The recent disruption of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra performance at the prestigious BBC Proms in London shocked the gentle Israelis more than any genocidal event in their own history.
But more than anything else, as reported by senior Israeli journalists who were there, they were flabbergasted by the presence of so many Jews among the protesters. These very journalists kept depicting in the past the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and BDS activists as terrorist groups and extremists of the worst kind. They believed their own reports. To its credit, the mini-intifada at the Royal Albert Hall at least confused them.
Putting one state into political action
In Palestine itself the time has come to move the discourse of one state into political action and maybe adopt the new dictionary. The dispossession is everywhere and therefore the repossession and reconciliation have to occur everywhere.
If the relationship between Jews and Palestinians is to be reformulated on a just and democratic basis, one can accept neither the old buried map of the two-state solution nor its logic of partition. This also means that the sacred distinction made between Jewish settlements near Haifa and those near Nablus should be put in the grave as well.
The distinction should be made between those Jews who are willing to discuss a reformulation of the relationship, change of regime and equal status and those who are not, regardless of where they live now. There are surprising phenomena in this respect if one studies well the human and political fabric of 2011 historic Palestine, ruled as it is by the Israeli regime: the willingness for a dialogue is sometimes more evident beyond the 1967 line rather than inside it.
The dialogue from within for a change of regime, the question of representation and the BDS movement are all part and parcel of the same effort to bring justice and peace to Palestine. What we will bury — hopefully — in September was one of the major obstacles in the way to realizing this vision.
The author of numerous books, Ilan Pappe is Professor of History and Director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter.