- Millions worldwide demand it. So does the Arab League,
according to an Al Jazeera June 13 report quoting Amr Moussa, Arab League
secretary-general, saying:
-
- "This blockade....must be lifted and must be broken
and the Arab League decision is very clear in this regard."
-
- On June 13, Moussa commented after visiting Gaza for
talks with Hamas Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, Haaretz reporting he's
the highest Arab official to do so since Hamas' 2006 election, after which
an Israeli/West embargo followed, then the June 2007 siege.
-
- Moussa entered through Rafah after Egypt reopened it
following the Freedom Flotilla massacre, saying it will continue indefinitely.
-
- According to Haaretz:
-
- "Palestinian and Arab League officials said (his)
visit (aimed to give) momentum to reconciliation talks between Hamas and
Fatah."
-
- Hamas Health Minister Basim Naeem said it indicated that
"the boycott between Gaza and the Arab nation was broken, (and that
the trip would) be the start of a practical plan to lift the blockade....once
and for all, in a complete and comprehensive way."
-
- Mousa said he didn't come to support one political faction
over the other, but to meet Palestinians and end their suffering, conditions
in what UNRWA Commissioner General, Filippo Grandi, calls the "largest
open-air prison in the world."
-
- An outrageously different view came from New York Times
writer Ethan Bronner in his June 11 article, headlined "Gaza Through
Fresh Eyes," saying:
-
- "For some, it's the relative modernity....For others,
it's the endless beaches with children whooping it up. But for nearly everyone
who visits Gaza, often with worry of danger and hostility, what's surprising
is the fact that daily life, while troubled, often has the staggering quality
of the very ordinary."
-
- Human rights activists and 1.5 million Gazans know otherwise
- decades of occupation misery, worsened by the humanitarian crisis under
siege, what none of them call "ordinary," what no legitimate
journalist would ever say. None report for the major media, specializing
in disinformation and "junk food news," why Project Censored
highlights a "truth emergency," especially about Occupied Palestine
or Israeli criticism, censored and not allowed.
-
- Mahmoud Abbas Wants It Both Ways
-
- On June 10, Haaretz quoted him contradicting himself
in two separate reports, first saying (after meeting with Obama at the
White House) he's against lifting the siege because it would bolster Hamas,
then reversing himself, saying:
-
- The Palestinians' main demand is "to end the blockade
on Gaza," adding he believes that "the entire world stands with
us....I don't have a passport or nationality. I want my grandson to live
a normal life. This week I spoke by phone with one of Hamas' leaders. Elections
will be part of the reconciliation" process, one he's used his position
to subvert as a willing Israeli-Washington agent against his own people.
-
- After Israel's June 2007 siege, Tel Aviv and Washington
armed him to control the West Bank, supplant Hamas in Gaza, and act as
Israel's enforcer. As a result, suspect everything he says about reconciliation
after years of confrontational opposition. His roots aside, he's no Palestinian
friend. He's a quisling president, a duplicitous self-serving liar, in
office months beyond his term, refusing to step down or call elections
until "we (Fatah and Hamas) sign an agreement," then he'll "immediately"
set a date, he says, what he's avoided so far without authority.
-
- ICRC Condemns the Gaza Siege
-
- Saying it violates Fourth Geneva on June 14, the ICRC
harshly criticized Israel's siege for causing "acute hardships,"
saying:
-
- "The whole of Gaza's civilian population is being
punished for acts for which they bear no responsibility. The closure therefore
constitutes a collective punishment imposed in clear violation of Israel's
obligations under international humanitarian law."
-
- ICRC's Gaza health coordinator, Eileen Daly, said "The
state of (its) healthcare system....has never been worse."
-
- The organization's West Asia head, Beatrice Megevand-Roggo,
explained the siege "is having a devastating impact on the 1.5 million
people living in Gaza," adding that Israel's security concerns aside,
"Palestinians (have a) right to live normal, dignified lives,"
what Israel willfully denies them.
-
- ICRC also condemned the Flotilla massacre and Israel's
preventing Gaza's economic development.
-
- Resisting the Occupation and Siege
-
- Activists worldwide demand it, including the International
Solidarity Movement (ISM), committed to "nonviolen(ce), direct-action
methods and principles." Co-founded by Huwaida Arraf and Adam Shapiro
in August 2001:
-
- "ISM aims to support and strengthen the Palestinian
popular resistance by providing the Palestinian people with two resources,
international solidarity and an international voice with which to nonviolently
resist an overwhelming military occupation force."
-
- Words alone won't work, only popular direct action -
steadfast, redoubtable, international, and strengthened by growing numbers
worldwide in a nonviolent struggle for "freedom, self-determination
and human rights," demanding the major media report it accurately,
spreading the word on their own, and offering hope to a beleaguered, long-suffering
people.
-
- "The belief that non-violent direct action can successfully
challenge (Israel's) apartheid is a cornerstone of our philosophy and message
- we see, we hear and we are with you," committed to liberation, peace
and self-determination, asking others to join them.
-
- The Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSM) is ISM's student
arm, "an umbrella group of Palestine-related groups, primarily on
campuses, across North America." Its aims include support for boycott,
divestment and sanctions (BDS), Palestinian self-determination, the Right
of Return, and ending US aid to Israel, most for its military to wage war
on the region and Palestine, funded with US taxpayer dollars.
-
- Dark Forces Against ISM and PSM
-
- Stop the ISM.com is one, a pro-Israeli front group, calling
them terrorists like the PLO under Arafat, the Popular Front for the Liberation
of Palestine (PFLP), Hamas, and others like them - resistance groups struggling
for liberation, not bogusly labeled terrorists.
-
- The group calls Huwaida Arraf and Adam Shapiro "two
of the most disgusting human beings who would condone murder while claiming
they are 'peace activists.' "
-
- Accusing them of "wish(ing) to see Israel destroyed,"
it labels Shapiro a product of his "dyed-in-the-wool Stalinist parents....raised
on a steady diet of Israel hatred at home."
-
- Acting as ISM "spokewoman," Arraf is accused
of "control(ling) propaganda media reports....endorsing and assisting
Palestinian terrorists in their anti-Israeli endeavors...organiz(ing) demonstrations
around the West Bank, (and) frequently lectur(ing) and recruit(ing) in
the United States at fundraisers and at anti-Semitic, anti-Israel conclaves."
-
- The group also says ISM activists "serve as human
shields for armed Palestinian terrorists, (act as) couriers for terrorists,
and smuggl(e) explosives and bomb-making materials into Israel for the
PLO," the same type propaganda Israel and Washington generate, dutifully
echoed in major Western media reports.
-
- Stop the ISM.com calls the "totalitarian Arab world's
educational system (a) cesspool of hate brought to American culture and
shores via our colleges and universities," saying ISM uses them to
"recruit every anti-American pervert and malcontent it can find....in
solidarity to destroy Israel and in the long run America too."
-
- They also attack the Middle East Children's Alliance
(MECA), a former US senator, attorney general, Oakland mayor, Edward Said,
and two current congresspersons among its founding advisors - a dedicated
organization providing aid to regional families, including food, medicine,
medical supplies, clothes, books, school supplies, and toys, part of its
charitable work, including scholarships for Palestinian students.
-
- Stop the ISM.com calls them a "terrorist-supporting
enterprise....claim(ing) to be raising money for 'charity' or children,
then sen(t) to America's and Israel's enemies to protract the War on Terror....MECA
collects and launders money for pro-PLO and (other) groups all over the
USA by taking in checks made out to 'ISM-USA.' "
-
- Sadly, many people believe it and support the group's
extremists, its site not naming them, apparently out of shame. They also
ignore horrific conditions in Gaza, a frequent topic this writer addresses
accurately in articles and on air.
-
- On June 14, the Gisha Legal Center for Freedom of Movement
provided a snapshot of a "paralyzed economy" under siege:
-
- -- before imposed, over 4,000 items entered Gaza freely;
-
- -- after recent Israeli softening, only 114, hundreds
of basic ones prohibited;
-
- -- "a large Israeli (or Western) supermarket carries
10,000 - 15,000 items;
-
- -- among ones Israel bans are vinegar, toys, cocoa, chewing
gum, paper and musical instruments, and hundreds more common ones;
-
- -- before closure, about 10,400 truckloads of goods monthly
entered freely, now down to about 2,300 carrying fewer goods;
-
- -- before closure, 70 trucks a day carried Gazan exports;
since June 2007, only 259 left the Strip, less than earlier exports in
four days;
-
- -- daily, about 30,000 trucks enter Manhattan for a population
slightly larger than Gaza;
-
- -- for lack of power, 80 million liters of raw or partially
treated sewage are dumped daily into the Mediteranean;
-
- -- over 90% of Gaza's aquifer water is polluted;
-
- -- Israel, admittedly, conducts "economic warfare"
against Gaza;
-
- -- as a result, 80% of the population is aid-dependent
under conditions of extreme poverty, unemployment, depravation, and no
wonder, given Israel's extremist government headed by a very unstable man.
-
- Netanyahu on the Couch, Out-of-Control
-
- On June 8, author and dissident historian Michael K.
Smith headlined a Legalienation News Bureau article, "Psychiatrist
of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Commits Suicide," explaining:
-
- "Moshe Yatom, a prominent Israeli psychiatrist who
successfully cured the most extreme forms of mental illness (schizophrenia)
throughout a distinguished career, was found dead at his home in Tel Aviv
yesterday from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. A suicide note
at his side explained that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who
ha(d) been his patient for the last nine years, had 'sucked the life right
out of me.' I can't take it anymore," he wrote and continued in Orwellian
doublespeak, saying:
-
- "Robbery is redemption, apartheid is freedom, peace
activists are terrorists, murder is self-defense, piracy is legality, Palestinians
are Jordanians, annexation is liberation, there's no end to his contradictions.
Freud promised rationality would reign in the instinctual passions, but
he never met Bibi Netanyahu. This guy would say Gandhi invented brass knuckles."
-
- Yatom very likely was overwhelmed by his "waterfall
of lies, self-serving rationalizations, (and) a black hole of self-contradiction(s),"
causing him to become depressed. A series of strokes followed - the first
after Netanyahu said the 9/11 attacks "were good," the second
when he compared Iran to Nazi Germany, and the third after he called its
nuclear program "a flying gas chamber, (and that all Jews) lived permanently
in Auschwitz."
-
- Elaborating in a diary, Yatom explained the emotional
toll it took failing to change such extremism, saying:
-
- "The alibi is always the same with him. The Jews
are on the verge of annihilation at the hands of the racist goyim and the
only way to save the day is to carry out one final massacre."
-
- Below is an except from Yatom's unfinished book on Netanyahu
from a chapter titled, "Psychotic on Steroids:"
-
- "Monday, March 8. Bibi came by at three for his
afternoon session. At four he refused to leave and claimed my house was
actually his. Then he locked me in the basement overnight while he lavishly
entertained his friends upstairs. When I tried to escape, he called me
a terrorist and put me in shackles. I begged for mercy, but he said he
could hardly grant it to someone who didn't even exist."
-
- Throughout its history, Israel has been belligerent,
lawless, and out-of-control, reigning terror on Palestine and the region.
Under Netanyahu, the danger is global, given its nuclear and missile delivery
system capability, and stated intention to use them if threatened, now
under an extremist, very unstable leader if Yatom's analysis is accurate.
If he and Obama escalate regional or global war, the Flotilla massacre,
by comparison, will look inconsequential.
-
- A Final Comment
-
- On June 14, Reuters headined, "Who's who on Israel's
committee on the Gaza flotilla raid," exposing it as a Washington-endorsed
sham, not acknowledged in the report.
-
- Called an Independent Public Commission, Netanyahu said
it will demonstrate clearly "to the entire world that the state of
Israel acts according to law, transparently and with full responsibility."
-
- In his released statement, White House press secretary
Robert Gibbs endorsed the announcement as an "important step forward,"
saying "the structure and terms of reference of Israel's proposed
independent public commission can meet the standard of a prompt, impartial,
credible and transparent investigation."
-
- The administration was silent after the May 31 massacre,
only saying it regretted the loss of life, its usual boilerplate cover
for Israeli belligerence, partnered with our own globally.
-
- Commission Members
-
- Former Israeli Supreme Court Justice, Jacob Turkel, will
head it, described as a conservative jurist with little experience in inquiry
commissions, but a great deal handling military court appeals always ruling
for Israel, virtually never for victimized Palestinian plaintiffs.
-
- Amos Horev is Israel's other member, an 86-year old retired
major general and prominent military-industrial complex figure, active
in its nuclear and high technology programs.
-
- Two non-voting foreign observers are:
-
- David Trimble, head of Northern Ireland's Ulster Unionist
Party, First Minister of the Good Friday Agreement's power-sharing government,
and current Conservative Party life peer, a man Sean McPhilemy discussed
in his book titled, "The Committee," explaining:
-
- He was involved (on a sinister level) in the unionist
ferment, aligned with a tightly organized group of (Ulster's) most powerful
Protestant businessmen and professionals, along with with loyalist death
squads and Royal Ulster Constabulary killers (RUC), until the Police Service
of Northern Ireland replaced it in 2001. Together, they murdered republicans
and others considered a threat to union with Britain under Protestant Northern
Ireland rule, often killing people for being Catholic.
-
- For this, he won the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize, given to
war criminals, not peacemakers, past winners including Henry Kissinger,
four Israeli warlord prime ministers, and Barack Obama, at the same time
he escalated war in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen, and threatens
more in other regions.
-
- General Ken Watkin (ret.) is the other observer, former
head of Canada's military judiciary and legal advisor to a Canadian military/civilian
board of inquiry investigation into the Canadian Airborne Regiment Battle
Group's early 1990s Somalia atrocities, its resolution absolving high-ranking
officers and top government officials, the ones always most guilty.
-
- Like past Israeli and Washington commissions, whitewash
is assured this time, the bogus investigation to produce lies, distortion,
omissions, false conclusions, and exoneration of cold-blooded murder, ordered
by top government and military officials who'll walk away scot- free, no
matter that world public opinion knows it and acknowledges their guilt,
but they have no voting authority. With it, justice would finally be served,
what can't come a moment too soon.
-
- Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com
and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the
Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays
at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs
are archived for easy listening.
-
- http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/.
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