Jeffrey Toobin says that he trusts foreign service officers more than Bradley Manning on what records to release. And he’s a journalist?
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Monthly Archives: July 2013
State Department official: ‘You are likely to see Israeli settlements continue’ during peace talks
Israel will likely build more settlements in the West Bank despite renewed peace talks, a State Department official said yesterday. The admission came the day before Israeli media outlets reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had struck a deal for more settlement building in order to stave off the collapse of his coalition.
Maureen Dowd joins Joyce Carol Oates as expert on gender relations of Arabs
Maureen Dowd on Saudi Arabia: “where women are treated worse by men than anywhere else on the planet.”
Netanyahu’s coalition partner says ‘I have killed lots of Arabs… and there is no problem’
Naftali Bennett, Netanyahu’s coalition partner, is not losing his job despite a comment in which he bragged about killing Arabs
Skeptical of peace talks, AP’s Matt Lee scoffs that ‘dreamers are realists’ and corrects Kerry on Coleridge
Matt Lee corrects John Kerry on English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge: you left out the part where “passion and party” blind people to historical events
Israeli settlers torch Hebron family’s property for eighth time
Land, property theft & destruction / Ethnic cleansing Video — Israeli settlers torch Hebron family’s property for eighth time Hebron, Occupied Palestine (ISM) 29 July by Khalil Team — On Sunday, July 28, Israeli settlers severely burned land belonging to Hani Abu Haikel and his family in Hebron. Occupation soldiers, though at first trying to […]
Video: Israeli soldier suffering ‘flashbacks’ brutally attacked Palestinian workers near settlement
An Israeli man has received a two-month sentence for an unprovoked assault on several Palestinian laborers, using an M16 rifle. Documented by security camera video, the assault took place in spring 2009 outside the settlement of Petzael in occupied West Bank. It shows the man, then 19 and a soldier, wantonly “wounding and inflicting grievous bodily harm” on Palestinian workers at an intersection. The soldier’s defense blamed “flashbacks” from the extreme violence he had witnessed during his service in the Territories.
Is the peace process a dangerous addiction?
In the Manning trial, the Times correctly chides the Obama administration for its “addiction” to secretive operations and surveillance. The Times is also correct when it speaks of Egypt’s “dangerous slide” into martial law and extremism. What happens, though, when the negotiating table becomes an addiction and a dangerous slide into final decisions that silence the questions of history, justice and equality? Shall we sit on the sidelines and hope for the best?
Bill Clinton is Weiner’s role model, not his boss
Anthony Weiner thinks he can tough it out, like Bill Clinton. But if the Clinton scandals had come out when Clinton was running, he wouldn’t have become president.
Bradley Manning faces 136 years in jail for exposing American war crimes
Bradley Manning, the military analyst who exposed U.S. foreign policy to the world, was found guilty on 19 counts. He was convicted of violating the Espionage Act and laws against theft and computer fraud. Manning’s disclosures to WikiLeaks led to front-page stories in major media outlets and an unprecedented look into U.S. foreign policy.
When racism isn’t a cause for shame
Public comments made by Israeli parliamentarians in the last 24 hours alone perfectly encapsulate the frightening lows that the country’s leaders have sunk to.
Negotiating away memories
Marc Ellis: In America, the Jewish community hunts Holocaust deniers. Would it support laws criminalizing remembrance of the Nakba?
If ending the conflict is so important, why did Kerry choose Indyk with a record of ‘failure’? asks AP’s Matt Lee
Matt Lee slams Kerry’s choice of Indyk and asks why “new blood” wasn’t considered: “Was there any thought at all given to putting someone in the – at the helm whose past history is not that of failure?”
Dispatch from the Negev: Bedouins brace for doom, under Prawer Plan
In the Negev there is a village called Hiran where Jewish-Israelis live in caravans in a wooded forest planted by the Jewish National Fund. It’s a familiar scene in the West Bank, but not so much here, inside Israel. Like settlers these villagers are not planning to stay in trailers for long. Willingly they took on a lifestyle more arduous than life in a house or an apartment because they are preparing to benefit from an expulsion. Nearby Bedouins residing in the village of Umm el-Hieran will be evicted soon under the Prawer Plan, a Knesset bill that is likely to evict more than 30,000 Bedouins from their villages. And the villagers of Hiran are hovering until that happens.
The American delusion with peace talks
Nathan Goldwag and Benjamin Lawrence of JVP: Some may accuse us of cynicism for this view, but the truth is, even if Netanyahu was sincere about wanting peace, there is no chance that it can emerge from these talks.
‘England out of Ireland’ — Ed Koch’s hypocrisy
At McSorley’s Old Ale House, the oldest Irish tavern in New York City, hangs an autographed portrait of the late New York Mayor Ed Koch. Koch inscribed a pro-IRA slogan: “England out of Ireland.”
Talks will keep Palestinians from seeking redress against occupation, news reports say– and Chris Matthews puts himself in Israel’s shoes
The New York Times quotes 3 members of the Israel lobby in its coverage of peace talks, and one Arab. While Chris Matthews puts himself in the shoes of an Israeli. Typical bias
Jewish success– is it ever a story?
Lawrence Summers and Janet Yellen are rivals to be the next Fed chairperson, succeeding Ben Bernanke. All three of these economists are Jewish, a sign of our presence in the US establishment.
The peace process meets Einstein’s definition of insanity, says Josh Ruebner
The United States keeps doing the exact same thing over and over again, and somehow expects that it’s going to lead to a different result, and it’s not, says author and analyst Josh Ruebner. Speaking on WBAI radio, Ruebner says the resumption of peace talks for the first time since 2010 will only do what the talks have always done, allow more Israeli colonization of the West Bank.
Martin Indyk arrives, saluting Kerry’s ‘noble endeavor to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace’
The White House and Secretary Kerry greeted Martin Indyk today as US Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations
After string of victories at York University, anti-apartheid group sees its student club status revoked
Loud, yet peaceful, protests should not be silenced, especially when students are fighting for social justice and universal human rights, says Students Against Israeli Apartheid, which lost its student organization status at York University due to a demonstration
Heinous charge against Bradley Manning — he gave 74,000 soldiers’ names to Osama bin Laden — is baseless
As verdict in Bradley Manning case is expected tomorrow, we review claim that NBC propagated, he gave soldiers’ names to Osama bin Laden
Conference: Self-Critique two decades after Oslo
On October 5-6 2013, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its ninth annual conference, Self-Critique Two Decades After Oslo.
Waiting for water in Qalandia refugee camp
Jovita Sandaite writes from Qalandia refugee camp: “First thing I do once I wake up in the morning – check the water tap. I do it before going to sleep too, but not even a drop falls. I close the tap and still unconvinced return to my room, where the plastic bottles with water supplies are aligned along the wall. I pick the closest one for my morning tea and a quick tooth brushing. And so my regular morning begins in the Qalandia refugee camp. Our water has been cut for more than two weeks now.”
Was it ‘jihad’ when Henry Crown smuggled plane parts to Israel?
Usually pugnacious Jeffrey Goldberg is incredibly respectful of Lester Crown, Chicago billionaire, in eliciting pro-Israel stories of gun-smuggling to the Jewish state