Henry Siegman

Western governments and most of the Western media have accepted a number of Israeli claims justifying the military assault on Gaza: that Hamas consistently violated the six-month truce that Israel observed and then refused to extend it; that Israel therefore had no choice but to destroy Hamas’s capacity to launch missiles into Israeli towns; that Hamas is a terrorist organisation, part of a global jihadi network; and that Israel has acted not only in its own defence but on behalf of an international struggle by Western democracies against this network.

I am not aware of a single major American newspaper, radio station or TV channel whose coverage of the assault on Gaza questions this version of events. Criticism of Israel’s actions, if any (and there has been none from the Bush administration), has focused instead on whether the IDF’s carnage is proportional to the threat it sought to counter, and whether it is taking adequate measures to prevent civilian casualties.

Full story »

DetainThis

Image © IfAmericansKnew (enlarge.)

Yesterday's media critique — "Who needs hasbara when you have AP 'analysis'?" — exposed a few major but subtle tendencies in Associated Press Israel-Palestine coverage that should leave no doubt who is buttering AP's bread. But just in case, the following is a point-by-point critique of today's "analysis" under the same byline: Steve Gutkin, bureau chief for the W. Jerusalem bureau. The report, "Analysis: US, Israel could coax Hamas to moderate," [1] opens:

Postwar Gaza could become a test of President Barack Obama's inauguration speech offer to Muslims to "extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist."

Only, His Majesty wasn't directing that part of his collectivist hypocrisy toward "Muslims," as AP's own transcription shows:

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist. [2]

Apparently to Gutkin, Muslims in general don't deserve "mutual interest and mutual respect" because they all "cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent." This subtle if unintentional tinge of Gutkin's Zionist colors sets the tone for the balance of his hasbara-laden U.S.-Israeli policy paper disguised as news analysis.

Full story »

Stephen Lendman

For Palestinians, the Nakba "Catastrophe" is their "Holocaust" six-month slaughter and displacement before and after the May 1948 establishment of Israel. In December 1947, Jews in Palestine numbered 600,000 compared to 1.3 million Palestinians. David Ben-Gurion ordered them removed and for "Every attack....to end with occupation, destruction and expulsion."

He meant depopulation, destruction, mass slaughter, displacement, and erasing a proud people's history. Palestine was to become Israel. Most of the job was completed, more in 1967, and thereafter incrementally until total dispossession is achieved. Gaza is the latest battleground. More ahead is planned. The struggle for liberation continues.

Full story »

Arun Shrivastava

This is the first time I watched the inauguration of any US President. My interest was fired more because of an increasing network of very concerned American friends who want a more humane society: for themselves and for the rest of the world.

Watching from half a world away, the entire drama was worth a stock shot. Many people waving flags, some in solemn contemplation, and others with a ray of hope that better days are here again and bad old days are gone.

Obama was consistent. He turned out to be the epitome of a political class that has perfected the art of saying much without meaning anything serious. Perhaps, instead of Aretha Franklin and Yo Yo Ma, Gilad Atzmon could have done a better job with his gut wrenching 'Pizza On The Park' and added some realism to the grand US$170-million political opera. Solemn occasions demand soul and a bit of classical to pacify the troubled souls of the glitterati and the chatteratti. The democracy was shivering, and clapping to keep warm, while the soulless sociopaths were jingling their diamonds and pearls, whispering inanities to each other, for jobs consistently well done. Here was another.

Full story »

Noam Chomsky

On Saturday December 27, the latest US-Israeli attack on helpless Palestinians was launched. The attack had been meticulously planned, for over 6 months according to the Israeli press. The planning had two components: military and propaganda. It was based on the lessons of Israel's 2006 invasion of Lebanon, which was considered to be poorly planned and badly advertised. We may, therefore, be fairly confident that most of what has been done and said was pre-planned and intended.

That surely includes the timing of the assault: shortly before noon, when children were returning from school and crowds were milling in the streets of densely populated Gaza City. It took only a few minutes to kill over 225 people and wound 700, an auspicious opening to the mass slaughter of defenseless civilians trapped in a tiny cage with nowhere to flee.

Full story »

Chris Floyd

I'm not "writing Obama off" -- whatever that means. I'm just looking at what he is actually saying, his actual positions, and what he has actually done -- and not done -- in the U.S. Senate.

Yesterday, Arthur Silber pointed us to a most learned Theban with an observation apt for inauguration day:

You're living in a world of make-believe, with flowers and bells and leprechauns and magic frogs with funny little hats. -- Homer Simpson, Ph.D., M.D., Psy.D., D.O., D.S.W., Ed.D., D.C.M., D.Min., J.D., D.C.H., from his seminal work, Meditations on the Transmigrational Nature of Perambulating Observances (sometimes referred to more informally as, Don't Bullshit a Bullshitter.)

Full story »

Mary Shaw

Inauguration Day 2009 was almost perfect. I'm still moved by it all.

I was impressed by the fact that an African American became President of the United States of America in my lifetime.

I was impressed by the crowd of almost two million people who braved the brutally cold weather to stand for hours and hours in Washington, DC, to witness history in the making.

Full story »

Carolyn Bennett

In the Twenty-Fourth Day Al Jazeera is reporting “Israeli troops and tanks were on the move on heading away from some key points in Gaza towards the border but it remained unclear whether they would withdraw completely from the Palestinian territory: …The Israeli military says it will not draw up a timetable to leave until rocket fire ceases and will not have a deadline dictated to them by Hamas: … ‘The operation is not over. This is only a holding of fire’.”

Full story »

Joe Quinn

[This was written in Aug. 2007.] Cute, cuddly, harmless-looking, liberal Barack Obama. Now there's a guy to get the U.S. back on track! If he can just 'win' the primary (s)election process, and then the (s)election process after that, what's it called...oh yeah, the (p)residential (s)elections, he'll bring an end to the mindless massacring of innocent civilians for profit that has come to define the "war on terror", and the American people need never again be stirred out of their mind-numbing complacency by stories of small brown children being decapitated by a brave American teenager with a .50 caliber machine gun. I mean, Viet-nam and My Lai was containable, it was successfully pitched as an "American tragedy", but this Iraq business is getting out of hand! After all, the harsh realities of war 'over there' are meant to stay 'over there', not ooze out of the carefully manipulated American daily broadsheets and into the fragile mind of the average American. So Obama's the man to fix it all, right? He'll stop the Republican rot! Or am I missing something? Yeah, you guessed it, I'm missing something.

Full story »

Steve Amsel

You may have noticed that my Associate, Khalid Amayreh, has not posted on this Blog (Desert Peace) for the last few days. The following report will tell you why.

In collaboration with the occupational forces operating in the Palestinian territories, he has been arrested. His crime? Speaking out against injustice and corruption.

The following was just sent to me by one of my readers in Palestine….. I will report updates on this situation as they become available.

I am very disturbed by this news. We need an open, unequivocal condemnation of this Zio-imperial vomit called the Palestinian Authority (PA). I cannot express enough the rage I feel. This truly courageous Palestinian journalist/ patriotic voice is being abused and tortured in an attempt to silence him no doubt by the US-paid, US-armed, US-Arab stooge-trained Palestinian Security Apparatus/goons/ ‘Contras’ , under President Falafel/Abbas his Mafia crew and the unelected Fayyad-led Junta of collaborators, thieves and scum that have established a brutal police state with all that this means, without even the need of a state, not even a Falafel State/Bantustan/ ethnic people’s reserve or “warehouse for excess Arabs”. The PA is a Palestinian Judenrat in the service of Empire and the Zionist occupation of Palestine. It is composed of quisling, stooge Palestinians, implementing anti-Palestinian policy on behalf of the Zio-Nazi occupation and this occupation’s Master and regional partners. Palestinians are made to disappear wholesale but in practice, it is done, one at a time. This is a Palestinian that Palestine cannot afford to lose. Please advise as to what can be done to secure the release of this noble voice.

Full story »