Writing Life

This shocking state of affairs comes from Israel’s Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai. In a statement today he said (quoting from the Guardian article):

“The more Qassam [rocket] fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, they will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves,” Matan Vilnai, Israel’s deputy defence minister, told army radio.

Shoah is the Hebrew word normally reserved to refer to the Jewish Holocaust. It is rarely used in Israel outside discussions of the Nazi extermination of Jews during the second world war, and many Israelis are loath to countenance its use to describe other events.

The BBC noted that many of Mr. Vilnai’s colleagues have distanced themselves from this atrocious statement.

His words are disgusting on so many levels. Saying that a genocide on the magnitude of the Shoah is warranted is a violation of human decency. Genocide is never a valid policy or military option. After the Congo, Armenia, the Holocaust (Shoah), Cambodia, Rwanda and Darfur, to openly suggest another mass slaughter of a people is the inner chamber of the heart of darkness.

Further, to say that the Palestinians are bringing it upon themselves is an insult to those who have been massacred in previous onslaughts and an attempt to move the blame from the small subset of Palestinian killers and terrorists and place it upon the entire Palestinian community. This reeks of racism and hatred on such a scale. Collective punishment is illegal under Israeli and international law. It does not belong among the civilized nations of the world.

I would hope that Mr. Vilnai is removed from his position in the Defense Ministry and that the government quickly and firmly denounces his statement.

For more, see the BBC and Guardian stories.

And look who’s undermining new efforts to create peace between Palestine and Israel. It’s got to be those pesky Palestinians, right? They’re always the bad guy, never know what’s good, don’t know their place, right? Nope, it’s the Israelis.

The Israeli Government is trying to create yet more facts on the ground by building 300 or more homes in the disputed area of East Jerusalem. This shouldn’t be unexpected as Israel has been building homes, expanding settlements and confiscating Palestinian land for years. Recent US administrations have done nothing to stop this bold land grab that jeopardizes the foundations of a secure Israel and a stable and contiguous Palestinian state.

Palestinian negotiators have asked for a response from Secretary of State Rice and demanded this new project be stopped. Legacy-seekers Rice and Bush thought they could spend a few days of their time to pull together a peace process, only to see it undermined by their BFF Israel. And in about a week’s time! We shall see where this recent development leads, though it’s not looking too bright for the Palestinians and those who seek peace and prosperity for the region.

Many of you have probably been following the major unrest, or civil war, unfolding in the Occupied Territories of Palestine over the last week or two. The Islamic Resistance Movement, also called Hamas, won democratic elections in the West Bank and Gaza at the beginning of last year. This was seen as a shock in the West, since the secular Fatah party had always led Palestinians.

What many Western pundits missed, though, was that while Fatah had gained regional and international recognition, there was rampant corruption throughout the bureaucracy. Western powers thought nothing of this, likely seeing it as a way to control the nascent government. Or, their racist mindsets saw this as the only logical outcome of Palestinian self-rule. Whatever the case, Hamas saw things differently. While I despise their religious fanaticism, non-recognition of Israel and support for some terrorism, Hamas has reached out to the millions of Palestinians and provided many humanitarian services, including food, shelter, education and social life. These are all things that Fatah and the international community had failed to do. This is one of the major reason Hamas beat Fatah in 2006.

Unwisely, Europe and the U.S. proclaimed that they would isolate the new Hamas-led government until it recognized Israel and completed a laundry list of tasks assigned by these powers. The U.S. itself had called for these elections, demanded them in fact. The talking point was that elections bring democracy and that the U.S. would embrace the democratic victors. The unpublished talking point was the assumption that Fatah would win and the status quo would be maintained. The U.S. had precedent for this, having ignored and isolated President Arafat and waited until he died before seriously reengaging the Palestinians.

Under the Palestinian system, there is a president and prime minister. The president is the top elected official, and they appoint the prime minister. The prime minister represents the majority in the legislative branch, though they do not serve in the legislature themselves. After the 2006 elections, the prime minister was from Hamas and the president was from Fatah. The U.S. and Europe met with President Mahmoud Abbas, but refused to meet or talk with Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. Western powers have helped fund Fatah and funnel weapons to the Fatah-led security forces.

Withholding Palestinian-earned funds, such as tax revenue, and international contributions, the West sought to bend the Hamas-led government to its will. Over time, this led to the unrest and civil war we’ve seen break out in the Occupied Territories. As of now, President Abbas has dissolved the Hamas government and emergency appointed a new Prime Minister, an independent named Salam Fayyad. Mr. Fayyad is an internationally-known and respected economist. Hamas and Haniyeh do not recognize this action, and they effectively control Gaza, while Fatah controls the West Bank.

The West is now jumping for joy and has recognized the new leadership. In keeping with years of tradition, the West has worked to further alienate the average civilian in Palestine, playing games with the leadership to satisfy their geopolitical whims, not the daily needs of ordinary citizens. The West has further pushed Gazans into a potential theocratic state under Hamas since they refused to even speak with the former leadership.

I do not support Hamas’s beliefs; nor would I want to see the creation of a state that is ruled by religious law instead of secular law. However, that’s the dark lining of democracy. If people choose their leadership freely, shouldn’t that choice be respected? You can engage and try to change, by diplomacy, the views of a democratically-elected government that you disagree with, but to subvert the results of free elections for one’s own gain is hypocritical.

The diplomacy of the Bush administration has been to lecture and abuse one’s friends and ignore one’s enemies or those one doesn’t agree with. Now we see what comes from that type of policy.

I just finished reading Jimmy Carter’s controversial book on the Palestine-Israel conflict. It’s both fascinating and accessible. Everyone should read it, no matter where they stand on this divisive issue. President Carter, responding to some of the vitriol that surrounded his book tour, said that we need to have a discussion and his book opens up space to have that discussion. I heartily agree.

Carter provides much needed historical and political context to the problem, covering the issue not only from the dominant Israeli / US point of view but also from Palestinians, surrounding Arab nations and his own personal intersection with the region through his faith, his presidency and his work with The Carter Center. In the conclusion, he writes “voices from Jerusalem dominate in our media, and most American citizens are unaware of circumstances in the occupied territories” (Carter 2006:209). This book helps bring other pieces of information and experience to the table.

A common theme throughout the book is Carter’s insistence that the United States needs to talk to both its friends and its supposed enemies. Diplomacy is paramount. While you surely can talk to your friends, it’s imperative that you reach out to people with whom you disagree. The U.S. did that with its deadliest enemy, the Soviet Union, but in recent years and under the George W. Bush administration, it has failed to practice this fundamental tenet of international relations. Carter writes, “A major impediment to progress is Washington’s strange policy that dialogue on controversial issues is a privilege to be extended only as a reward for subservient behavior and withheld from those who reject U.S. demands” (Carter 2006: 202-203).

He also writes about how the White House and U.S. Congress have been less than vocal in response to illegal Israeli actions, partly due to the immense power of the Israeli lobby in the United States. This influence is strengthened by its practice of silencing dissent by labeling it anti-semitic. Let’s just be clear here, opposing Israeli state policy is not anti-semitic in and of itself; just as opposing Iranian state policy is not anti-Islamic.

Very near the end of the book, Carter reflects back on a remark he made to the Israeli Knesset in 1979 that still rings true in 2007: “The people support a settlement. Political leaders are the obstacles to peace” (Carter 2006:211). He meant leaders on both sides as well as international actors. It is sad that almost thirty years have passed, countless lives have been lost, millions have become refugees, and still our leaders cannot sit down, talk and settle this problem. Let’s hope this book kicks the process in the butt and gets it moving once again.

At the start of the 110th Congress, Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY 18) took the gavel of the State and Foreign Operations subcommittee of the powerful House Appropriations Committee. Moving from minority status, where she had little control under Republican rules, she now sits in control of funding for the State Department and many foreign affairs programs.

So, I was saddened to see her stall aid funds for Palestine. The US has put a stranglehold on Palestine for years and then wonders why this nascent state is having problems. I hope Rep. Lowey releases these funds, then takes a serious look at funding for Israel, the other “partner” in the fundamental crisis in the Middle East. Perhaps she’ll hold up some of the almost $3 billion in US taxpayer dollars sent to Israel until it answers questions as to why it’s stealing Palestinian land, building a wall isolating Palestinians from each other, surreptitiously using state funds to purchase Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem, and justifying its apartheid policies in the Occupied Territories. Treat both parties the same, Rep. Lowey. Please.

Jimmy Carter has a new op-ed in today’s Washington Post, responding to the critisism of his book Palestine Peace Not Apartheid. The harsh (and baseless) attacks on his book have ignored the situation he so clearly lays out and discusses. Many attacks have focused on his book’s title and knee-jerk support for Israel without ever listening to any other point of view. Let’s hope there’s movement forward on Palestine in 2007.

My friend wrote this piece that was published in the International Herald Tribune / Daily Star Egypt. It covers Israel’s end of year review. This piece lays out three recent developments: US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton’s resignation; the Iraq Study Group report on the greater crises in the region; and UN General Assembly’s condemnation of Israeli actions in the Occupied Territories. The author hopes that the confluence of these three actions might help Israel realize that it must change its course in 2007.

This was an amazing collection of articles edited by anthropologists Rebecca L. Stein and Ted Swedenburg. The 13 essays are broken up into four section, focusing on historical articulations, cinemas and cyberspace, the politics of music and regional and global circuits. With this collection, the authors sought to introduce a prime focus on popular culture when discussing politics and power in the Palestine-Israel situation. The authors seek to break away from traditional Palestinian-Israeli binaries and to crack open the mixing and heterogeneity of relations between and among these two groups. The editors also seek to reinscribe Israel within the Middle East, both geographically and politically (Stein & Swedenburg 2005: 11).

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