joseph massad writes in alakhbar 'obama the emperor against the Arab peoples'

"يقترح أوباما تأجيل المفاوضات على الاحتلال الإسرائيلي للقدس، لكنه يقترح في الوقت ذاته أن على إسرائيل الانسحاب إلى حدود ١٩٦٧، وهو بذلك إنما يظهر جهلاً شديداً أو سوء نية كاملة، حيث إن حدود ١٩٦٧، التي يتكلم أوباما عنها، تشمل القدس الشرقية، لكن يبدو أن أوباما استثنى المدينة مسبقاً من هذه الحدود، كأنها ليست جزءاً منها، على الرغم من أن القانون الدولي والأمم المتحدة يعدّانها جزءاً لا يتجزأ من الأراضي التي احتلتها إسرائيل في حرب ١٩٦٧. وهذا بغض النظر عن أن إسرائيل وسّعت بلدية مدينة القدس بطريقة غير قانونية على حساب أراضي الضفة الغربية، حيث أضحت مساحتها حسب بعض التقديرات تشمل عشرة بالمئة من مساحة الضفة (وقد كانت مساحة القدس عام ١٩٦٧ لا تتعدى ستة كيلومترات مربعة). أما ما يقترحه أوباما تحت تسمية «تبادل» الأراضي «المتفق عليه من الطرفين»، فهو ليس كذلك البتة. لقد اقتطعت إسرائيل أصلاً عشرة بالمئة أخرى من أراضي الضفة وراء جدار الفصل العنصري. أضف إلى ذلك المستوطنات وغور الأردن، التي تزعم إسرائيل أنها تريد تبادلها. أما ما يبقى للفلسطينيين بعد ذلك، فهو أقل من ستين بالمئة من الضفة الغربية، التي سيتمكن الفلسطينيون من إقامة ما سيسمى «دولة فلسطينية» عليها، لكن حتى هذه الدويلة ستكون «منزوعة السلاح» لكن، ويا للعجب، «ذات سيادة»، كما يعلمنا أوباما"

the new egypt?

"«كلُّه على رُكَبه» هكذا صاح أحد الضباط فى الشباب المصريين الذين تظاهروا أمام السفارة الإسرائيلية يوم الخامس عشر من مايو. أُطلق الرصاص الحى على الناس، وأُمروا أن يركعوا ويضعوا أيديهم على رؤوسهم كأسرى الحروب، وسَبّ الضابط أمهاتهم وأخواتهم وشرفهم، ثم أمروهم أن يزحفوا على بطونهم من مكان لآخر واعتقلوا منهم العشرات."

on the current crisis in lebanon

as'ad abukhalil writes about the government crisis in Lebanon (i read this on Saturday but due to my internet constrainsts I couldn't post it as soon, it's a great article and it deserves posting even though it's four days late)

"للأزمة اللبنانيّة الحاليّة بعدان لا ثالث لهما: البُعد الإقليمي، وبُعد «ويكيليكس». فضيحة «ويكيليكس» فضيحة صامتة. هي بلا مُنازع أكبر فضيحة في التاريخ اللبناني المعاصر، لكنها لم تحظَ (بعد؟) بتغطية صحافيّة واسعة على الإطلاق، لا بل إن تستّراً مقصوداً لحق بتسريباتها ومفاعيلها. ليس في الأمر لغز: جلّ الإعلام اللبناني يدور في فلك المال السعودي أو الحريري، وهو يتلقّى الأمر بالتغطية والتجاهل، بالمديح وبالشتم، بالهتاف والحداد. هذا هو ديدنه منذ هطل ما سمّاه العالم الفذّ حنّا بطاطو «الوباء النفطي» العربي على ثقافتنا وسياستنا وأديانكم (وأديانكنّ). أحرجت طبقة سياسيّة بحالها من التسريبات، فما كان منها إلا أن التزمت الصمت المطبق أو البيانات الركيكة أو المُخادعة: أيظنّ محمد جواد خليفة أن إبرازه لمحضر ـــــ من وضعه وتلحينه ـــــ للقائه مع جيفري فيلتمان يبطل مضمون وثيقة «ويكيليكس»؟ هل من المعقول أن خليفة ـــــ الذي أصبح مُشكّكاً هكذا فجأة في صحة وثائق «ويكيليكس» التي لم تشكّك فيها الحكومة الأميركيّة نفسها ـــــ كان سيدوّن بخط يده هجومه على حزب الله أو سخريته من أمينه العام ـــــ على ما جاء في الوثيقة؟"

one state initiative

a one state initiative, a document to be signed by people of consciousness

when you need to throw your shoe

"At 4:17pm GMT on Sunday, I threw a shoe at my television screen, aimed at US President Barack Obama, precisely at the moment he began to explain that the reference in his Thursday speech at the State Department to the 1967 borders was in accordance with the Israeli interpretation of these borders"

Zionist crimes against humanity this week

Two Palestinian children were killed in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.-The child who was killed in the Gaza Strip was mentally disabled and was killed by a shell fired by IOF. -A child in the West Bank sustained serious wounds by the explosion of a suspicious object left by IOF. IOF used excessive force against peaceful demonstrations commemorating the Palestinian Nakba-144 civilians were wounded in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.-The wounded include 47 children, 5 women and 4 journalists. IOF continued to target Palestinian fishermen at Gaza sea. IOF fired at Palestinian fishing boats, but no casualties were reported. IOF continued to use force against peaceful protests against the construction of the annexation wall and settlement activities in the West Bank.Three demonstrators, including a child and an international human rights defender, were wounded. IOF arrested 10 demonstrators, including 2 Israeli solidarity activists. IOF conducted 20 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank. IOF arrested 15 Palestinian civilians, including 3 children. IOF continued settlement activities and Israeli settlers continued their attacks in the West Bank. Israeli settlers continued their attacks against Palestinian civilians and property. IOF raided the Orphanage School in al-Thawri neighborhood of the occupied East Jerusalem and terrorized the students in the school. Israel has continued to impose a total siege on the Gaza Strip and tightened the siege on the West Bank. IOF arrested at least 4 Palestinians at military checkpoints in the West Bank. IOF imposed a total closure on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip on the anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba.

Source: Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, week of 12-18 May, 2011

marriage, capitalism and the state

"But I’m prepared to bet one thing. Princesses in horse-drawn carriages will find their true destiny—in the museum of reactionary fairy tales where they belong"

women's rights in the America of Laura and George Bush

So, now I understand. When Laura Bush was trying to save Afghan women from Afghan men, she meant that they should be able to do exactly this: "At Yale University—the US’s equivalent of Oxford or Cambridge—members of Delta Kappa Epsilon (George Bush’s former fraternity) marched round the campus last year chanting “No means yes! Yes means anal!” and “We love Yale sluts”. They stopped in front of the women’s centre with the intention of intimidating women students. "

liberal middle class lebanonese

I am just sick and tired of liberal middle class Lebanese. Their defeatest attitudes towards the uprisings of the Arab youth, and their neverending racism towards Syrians and Palestinians.
I was visiting the house of a neighbour when her husband comes along and argues against my going to Gaza. First, it was non of his chauvinist, phallocentric business where I went. Second, he blamed Palestinians in Gaza for the Israeli genocidal war launched against them! This narrative of blaming the victim is not only a Zionist one, but it was one used by Nazis in the process of scapegoating Jews and demonizing them, a most brutal and henious process of dehumanization.

Blogging constraints

Ghazzawiyya will be facing internet and PC constraints during the next few months and so blogging will be affected. Apologies to readers and followers!

Israelis shooting at protestors in Golan Heights and West Bank

This is the video.

Where are the names?

You will rarely find the names of the ten Palestinians who were killed by the Israelis in Maroun el Rass on Sunday in the mainstream Lebanese press. 'O, there were just Palestinians, no Lebanese killed' I heard several anti-Syrian and anti-Lebanese people say.

PS I visited the offices of Al-Binaa' newspaper in Hamra and tomorrow's issue deals with the funeral of one of the activists that was shot dead by the occupation

"Peace Demands Challenging Israel's Exceptionalism"

"John Mearsheimer, expert on the Israel lobby, explains, "The combination of Israel's strategic incompetence and its gradual transformation into an apartheid state creates significant problems for the United States. There is growing recognition in both countries that their interests are diverging ...." The head of the U.S. Central Command, Gen. David Petraeus, and Vice President Biden have both admitted that Israel's policies towards the Palestinian people are undermining U.S. security. Even the head of Mossad stated before Israel's parliament last year that "Israel is gradually turning from an asset to the United States to a burden."
I cringe every time I hear the word peace. I dislike it. Every time someone says peace, war happens. Every time they say peace after war, the casualties are forgotten. Every time they say peace and bring forth their nationalism and nationalist flags, the more sectarianist strife and racism emerge on the surface. Go peace yourself

the Egyptian revolution and Palestine: 'we are still waiting!'

"كان الشعب المصريّ، بقواعده وحركاته الشعبيّة ونقاباته واتحاداته، يشاهد بأسًى ومرارةٍ ما يحدث لأشقّائه الفلسطينيين في غزّة من أثر الحصار الذي وصفه المبعوثُ الخاصُّ للأمم المتحدة ريتشارد فولك بأنه "مقدّمة لإبادة جماعيّة" شارك فيها النظامُ المصريّ مباشرة. ولكن الشعب المصريّ كان أيضًا مبهورًا بصمود الشعب الفلسطينيّ ضدّ الهجوم والحصار. ولقد أسهم تواطؤ النظام المصريّ ومشاركته في هذه الجريمة في تغيير الوعي المصري تغييرًا نقديًا. كما أنّ الشعور بكرامة الفرد والأمّة كان في تنامٍ، مستوحيًا شعارَ الثورة السابقة بقيادة جمال عبد الناصر سنة 1952 ضدّ الملك الفاسد فاروق والاستعمار البريطانيّ: "إرفعْ رأسك يا أخي فقد ولّى عهد الاستعباد!"
ولا ننس أنّ فلسطين تُعتبر عند الشعب المصريّ جزءًا من النفسية الوطنيّة المصرية. ولو كانت القضيّة الفلسطينيّة مُسحتْ من الوعي المصريّ لكان ذلك قد حدث بعد أن وقّع أنور السادات سنة 1979 اتفاقيّة السلام مع إسرائيل. و منذ ذلك الوقت بدأ المسؤولون المصريون بإلقاء اللوم على الفلسطينيين واتهامهم بأنهم وراء مشاكل مصر المستعصية."

Nazi Israel

"The number of bombs Israel used against Palestinians is estimated to be 50 bombs or rockets to each Palestinian. The number of displaced Palestinians from their ancestral home in more than 415 villages and cities, due to the European Zionist invasion of Palestine, is about 5 million Palestinians. More importantly, without including the destruction of Palestinian villages, cities, homes and farms which can be measured, the psychological suffering and the social and cultural destruction including the destruction of the family bonds which Israel caused to Palestinians through three generations cannot be measured at all."

3 2 1

By Mohammad Sabaaneh

Rashid Khalidi on the Fatah-Hamas agreement

I don't agree that there will be more political freedom in Gaza and the West Bank, as he says. They are advocating independent bantustans and how can people be more free? This is worse than Oslo...and it will kill popular resistance in the Palestine.

Joseph Massad

An important article for Massad on discourse of 'Israeli rights': "Zionism and Israel are careful not to generalise the principles that justify Israel's rights to colonise, occupy, and discriminate, but are rather vehement in upholding them as subsets of an exceptional moral principle. It is not that no other people has been oppressed historically, it is that Jews have been oppressed more. It is not that no other people's cultural and physical existence has been threatened; it is that the Jews' cultural and physical existence is threatened more. This quantitative equation is key to why the world, and especially Palestinians, should recognise that Israel needs and deserves to have the rights to colonise, occupy, and discriminate. If the Palestinians, or anyone else, reject this, then they must be committed to the annihilation of the Jewish people physically and culturally, not to mention that they would be standing against the Jewish God."

hands of the NDP in Imbaba events

"وما يقال عن أن أحد ذيول الحزب الوطنى فى المنطقة كان وراء إطلاق شائعة احتجاز فتاة أشهرت إسلامها فى الكنيسة، يعنى أن النظام السابق يلعب بالورقة الأخيرة والأخطر على الإطلاق لمقاومة الثورة المصرية وإحراقها فى جحيم الفتنة الطائفية،"

demonstration in Egypt against the appointment of new Israeli ambassador

"أعضاء اللجنة التنسيقية للانتفاضة الفلسطينية الثالثة في القاهرة بطرد السفير الإسرائيلي يوم الجمعة المقبل خلال «تظاهرة مليونية» باتجاه مقر السفارة الإسرائيلية في منطقة الجيزة، فيما تصاعدت مطالب المتظاهرين خلال الفترة الأخيرة بوقف تصدير الغاز لإسرائيل وجميع أشكال التعاون الاقتصادي وكذلك مراجعة بنود اتفاقية «كامب ديفيد»."

Sanctions should not only be supported, we need to implement them

"Salmond's positions have been in sharp contrast to the London Government, which attacked and invaded Iraq and Afghanistan and endorsed every Israeli crime. David Miliband, for example, refused to condemn the Israeli attacks on boats to Gaza with humanitarian aid and David Cameron described himself as "a proud Zionist" supporting Israel, which acted with "great restraint" against Lebanese or Palestinian "terrorists"."

Arrogance, superiority, fascism...the face of the American Empire

"The killing of Bin Laden involved flying into a foreign airspace with no permission or warning to carry out the assassination. Imagine the response if another country flew helicopters into the US and landed in George Bush’s Texas ranch on a murder mission? We are told that the US’s actions are justified because they are in response to the “evil” of terrorism and attacks like 9/11. But in reality these acts are a response to oppression, not an expression of “evil”."

Chomsky comments on reaction to Bin Laden's killing in the US

"Same with the name, Operation Geronimo. The imperial mentality is so profound, throughout western society, that no one can perceive that they are glorifying bin Laden by identifying him with courageous resistance against genocidal invaders. It’s like naming our murder weapons after victims of our crimes: Apache, Tomahawk… It’s as if the Luftwaffe were to call its fighter planes “Jew” and “Gypsy.” "

Zionist crimes against humanity this week

Surely you will not find this on a tv screen, newspaper or radio near you.
Two Palestinian children were wounded when IOF moved into Bil'ein village, west of Ramallah. IOF continued artillery shelling in border areas in the Gaza Strip. Four Palestinian civilians, including two children and a woman, were wounded in the east of Gaza Valley village. A house was damaged. IOF continued to use force against peaceful protests in the West Bank. A child was wounded in Bil'ein’s protest, west of Ramallah. IOF arrested 8 international human rights defenders. IOF conducted 39 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank. IOF arrested 10 Palestinian civilians, including 4 children.The arrested Palestinians include a PLC member and a former Minister from Hamas. A Palestinian civilian from the Gaza Strip was arrested in mysterious circumstances. IOF continued settlement activities and Israeli settlers continued their attacks in the West Bank. IOF issued further house demolition notices. Israel has continued to impose a total siege on the Gaza Strip and tightened the siege on the West Bank. IOF arrested at least one Palestinian at military checkpoints in the West Bank. IOF maltreated a Palestinian worker and sniffer dogs bit him.
Source: Palestinian Centre for Human Rights week of 28 April- 4 May 2011

Rafah Crossing to Open?

"Egypt's foreign minister said in an interview with Al-Jazeera on Thursday that preparations were underway to open the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on a permanent basis." Even if there is a Fateh-Hamas reconiliation (which will bring nothing but 'independence' on less than 22% of the historical land of Palestine, normalization and neither justice nor accountability, it takes the Palestine issue back to 1967 as opposed to 1948--the Nakba-- and besides, Hamas and Fateh are NOT representative of the Palestinian people and they are incapable organizations, a new more representative, grassroots, resistance (popular and armed) is needed. Also, even if there is a ceasefire, that doesn't mean that resistance stops)