EDITOR: Habemus Papam!
Yes, Israel has anew government, and it is so new, it resembles nothing we have seen before – it is so farfetched, it makes the last government look almost normal. Read below what good old Kobi Nov thinks about it. And right he is.
Government of the villa in the jungle: Haaretz
Ashkenazi secular men will occupy all four of the government’s senior positions.There is nary a Mizrahi, Orthodox Jew, Arab or woman among them.
Our new loves, the people we just voted into office after such careful consideration, are now building us a new home. But what kind of home will it be? Who will live on the top floor and who on the ground floor? Who will live separately, in the servants’ quarters? And who will be confined in the basement? Who will live outside in the yard, under the open sky? And who will live beyond the fence? And how impervious will that fence be? Will the neighbors be allowed to visit or only to peek in from behind the plants?
The demographic make-up of the new Israeli government is clear and unambiguous, correctly reflecting the outcome of the election. The heads of the five parties that make constitute it – Benjamin Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman, Yair Lapid, Naftali Bennett and Tzipi Livni – are all wealthy Ashkenazi Jews. Out of the five, four are men; only the adjunct is a female. Rich Ashkenazi secular men will occupy all four of the government’s senior positions (prime minister, foreign minister, defense minister and finance minister ). There is nary a Mizrahi, Orthodox Jew, Arab or woman among them. Out of the whole cabinet (which at this writing has not yet been finalized ), 100 percent are Jews, approximately 80 percent of the ministers are men, approximately 80 percent are Ashkenazi and approximately 80 percent are secular. No matter how you look at it, our newly elected government is dominated by the white (Ashkenazi Jewish ) man. It is an utterly colonial government, seemingly taken from the heart of the deepest darkness of centuries past and transplanted, in one fell stroke of the democratic sword, into the heart of the 21st century. It is disguised, impersonating – just the way its colonial predecessors did – enlightened European progress. A government of the villa in the jungle.
And as in every instance of colonialism, its policy will be simple and clear. The white rulers will have privileges – human rights, they call them these days – as if they were Europeans for all intents and purposes. Their taxes will be reduced, their income will rise, their garbage will be recycled, their education will improve, their culture will be subsidized, their women equalized, their gay people married, and a good time will be had by all.
The lower, inferior classes, those whose dark pigmentation impairs the purity of color and race, almost to the point of Arabness, or those whose skullcap and sidecurls are too black for the delicate culture of the enlightened ones, or who do not believe thoroughly enough in the good and beneficent god of capitalism – they will all, or mostly, be called upon and forced from now on, in the name of equality, to bear the burden. That is, to pay by the sweat of their brow and their daily wage for the privileges of the men and women of the pure, white, beautiful, justified upper classes.
Outside the fence, in the jungle behind the security wall, the main purpose of which is to conceal from us what we are doing to them, those whom we consider animals will continue to live. We will take care of them good and proper, by robbing, shooting, exploiting, expelling, thwarting and shooting them down, by curfew, stolen water, spoiled water, and all the other means that our Jewish brain can invent to make their lives deathly miserable. And once every two months we’ll send them Tzipi Livni, wearing a cork hat and armed with colored beads, to show the world what a great diplomatic process we have going on here.
And there we have it, a sacred new order, straight out of the 17th century.
EDITOR: US is staunchly Zionist
For my Palestinian friends who still expect and hope the US will resolve the conflict, this reading might be a sobering one. There is nothing for us to expect from that corner. We must concentrate on BDS and opposing Zionism in all quarters.
ABC poll: Most Americans want U.S. to stay out of Israeli-Palestinians talks: Haaretz
ABC News/Washington Post poll released on Monday also finds that 55 percent of Americans sympathize with Israel, compared to 9 percent that side with Palestinians.
Most Americans, regardless of political sympathies, believe the United States should cease its intervention in the Israeli-Palestinian talks, an ABC poll released on Monday reveals.
The poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates, shows that 55 percent of Americans sympathize with Israel compared to only 9 percent that side with the Palestinian Authority; the rest of those questioned were undecided. The ABC poll was released just days before Barack Obama’s first visit to Israel and the West Bank as president.
See full ABC News/Washington Post poll results here.
The ABC poll also found that seven in 10 of those questioned – regardless of which side they support – prefer to leave the negotiations to the Palestinians and the Israelis, rather than seeing the U.S. take a leading role.
The ABC News poll results emphasize that 66 to 70 percent of those questioned – regardless of religious and political affiliation – believe that the two sides should handle negotiations without U.S. intervention.
According to the ABC News poll, American support for Israel is illustrated by 34 percent saying the Obama administration has put too little pressure on the Palestinian Authority with only 8 percent polled responding that there is too much pressure.
In contrast, the split is about even concerning the question of whether the administration has put too much or too little pressure on Israel. About four in 10 Americans, think the U.S. has appropriately pressured each side in the conflict.
Religion is a factor in the poll’s results, with support for Israel being highest among evangelical white Protestants at 76 percent and falls to 55 percent among non-evangelical white Protestants and Catholics. Those who are not religiously affiliated have the least amount of sympathy for Israel with only 39 percent polled affirming support.
Republicans and conservatives alike show the most support for Israel among partisan groups – more than seven in 10. This number drops to about five in 10 moderates, independents and Democrats, and to just 39 percent of liberals, with more saying they favor neither Israel nor the Palestinian Authority.
Age is another influence on American public opinion about Israel, with two-thirds of seniors showing support. A little less than half (48 percent) of younger adults polled side with the Jewish state, and 57 percent of 40- to 64-year-olds. The majority of seniors also think the Obama administration is putting too much pressure on Israel and not enough on the Palestinian Authority.
The survey was produced for ABC News by Langer Research Associates of New York, N.Y., with sampling, data collection and tabulation by Abt-SRBI of New York, N.Y. Results have a margin of sampling error of 3.5 points, including design effect. Partisan divisions are 33-25-35 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents.
The ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone March 7-10, 2013, among a random national sample of 1,001 adults, including landline and cell-phone-only respondents.