Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
On a more personal note, this is an article by/about one of the groups I work for, Staat van Beleg (State of Siege). We record all the violations we can find in all kinds of (written) media and boringly log them in a database. We all do about 3 days a month and then some do the graphics etcetera obviously.
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Quote:
In strictly legal terms, the Jewish Nation-State Bill offers limited changes. Since its founding in 1948, Israel has defined itself as a state of the Jewish people rather than of all the country's citizens, including its Palestinian minority.
The Law of Return of 1950 allows only Jews to immigrate to Israel and receive citizenship. Adalah, a legal rights group, has documented dozens of laws that explicitly discriminate against Palestinian citizens.
But the new legislation is significant for reasons beyond its immediate legal implications.
Not least, it gives Israel's self-definition as the nation-state of the Jewish people something akin to constitutional standing, observed Ali Haider, a human rights lawyer and former co-director of Sikkuy, an organisation lobbying for equal citizenship rights.
The bill, if passed, will join a handful of Basic Laws intended to provide the foundation for any future constitution. Such laws take precedence over ordinary laws and are much harder to repeal.
"This is a very dangerous step because it makes explicit in a Basic Law that all Jews, even those who are not citizens, have superior rights in Israel to those citizens who are Palestinian," he told Al Jazeera.
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Quote:
With Israel’s war against BDS getting ever more desperate, we can expect it to get more and more extreme. As long as Israel faces no consequences from Western governments for its human rights violations and war crimes, such dirty tricks campaigns will only intensify.
The Reut-ADL report shows us that while Israel’s global anti-Palestinian war is still dangerous, it has nothing new to propose. However, the lobbyists can’t see the wood for the trees; their loyalty to the rogue Zionist state blinds them to the reality that the only way to bring BDS to an end is for Israel to halt its abuses against Palestinians; end its brutal military occupation; allow refugees to return to their land; and grant full equality to all citizens. All of these are required by international laws and conventions; BDS activists are not asking for anything unsavoury or illegal, unlike their opponents in Reut, the ADL and their ilk, which tells us a lot about the people involved on both sides.
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
One of my colleagues is Jewish, and lived for a time in Israel. Once or twice I've made the mistake of suggesting in her presence that not everything the Israeli government does is necessarily admirable -- or even legal.
Her response can be summed up as: "I lived there, and I know from personal experience that the Palestinians hate us with every fiber of their beings and want every Jew dead -- for no other reason than because we're Jewish. They are the aggressors, not us, and absolutely anything we do in response to their aggressions is more than justified."
I've learned not to touch the subject in her presence, even when she brings it up (as she often does), because it inevitably leads (and very quickly) to this otherwise calm and rational woman snarling: "You don't get to tell me that anything Israel does is illegal or unjustified!"
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
They have managed to make money on the occupation in many ways. The EU picks up a lot of the tabs for infrastructure and services that Israel is obliged to provide under international law. Plus they pocket most of the Aid to the Palestinians: 72 Percent Of Aid To Palestine Ends Up 'In Israeli Hands'
But this is probably the most cynical way they make money off it:
Quote:
But why are security companies in Israel, as opposed to any other country, so coveted?
“All of the Israeli companies would immediately answer the question: We have actual experience, and we have tested these weapons on human beings,” said Shir Hever, an Israeli researcher and author of the book The Political Economy of the Occupation.
The family feared that the Israeli authorities would take away his body away after armed police stormed into the hospital, while Israeli officers began hurling tear gas into crowds outside the hospital.
Similar scenes were posted online of the body of Mohammed Mahmoud Sharaf, aged 17, shot dead by a settler, being carried by hundreds to his grave.
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Blocking an 'Israeli Arab' (i.e. uncleansed Palestinian who has Israeli citizenship) member of parlement from entering al-Aqsa, when they parade armed settlers around there about every week, really rubs it in how you can sit in parlement but you are still just an Arab...
The outrageous bill of particulars for the Al Aqsa Intifada keeps mounting. Two days ago a Palestinian doctor was taking his nieces and nephews on a trip to Jerusalem’s main downtown street, Jaffa Road, when a Jewish passerby saw something he didn’t like in the face of one of the man’s nephews, a 14 year-old boy. The “Good Samaritan” immediately went to a light rail security guard and reported the “terrorist” in their midst. At which point the guard ran to the scene and commenced beating the boy senseless without warning or provocation.
The doctor then threw himself physically on top of his nephew to prevent the beating from doing serious damage to his charge. Then other passersby joined in the fray and began shouting racist slogans at the Palestinian family. Many of them had pistols, which they brandished threatening to shoot him.
I'm hoping this'll bring him down, but I'm under the impression he's survived things like this before. Still, I regard it as good news.
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Cēterum cēnseō factiōnem Rēpūblicānam dēlendam esse īgnī ferrōque.
“All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” -Adam Smith
Only Sanders and Leahy (sort of) willing to offer comment (both mildly negative). Leahy's comment suggests the possibility of consequences, but obviously given the response of his colleagues that's unlikely to happen.
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
American evangelical pastors Robert Jeffress and John Hagee say they've been invited to pray at the new US embassy in Jerusalem on Monday. Both pastors are known for making inflammatory comments about other religions, including Judaism and Islam. https://t.co/kMdYwcN4bt
In 2008, John McCain disavowed Hagee when it came to light that he'd called Hitler a "half-breed Jew" sent by God as a "hunter" meant to drive all Jews to “the only home God ever intended for the Jews to have-Israel.” https://t.co/zdxFTOabck
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Them Dominionists are really stoked for this whole death cult of theirs with the Lamb of God fursona to come murder lots of people and usher in this hallucinatory fevered dream of some bronze age dude.
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Peering from the top of Mount Stupid
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Reza Aslan's account of intimidation, threats, and harassment from Shin Bet in Apartheid Israel, when he entered the country on a recent visit.
Quote:
“Why do you hate Israel?” She asked.
“I don’t hate Israel,” I replied.
“But you hate our Prime Minister.”
“I’m sorry is your Prime Minister Israel?”
...>snip<...
“You don’t think Israel should exist yes?”
That’s absurd. I’m against the occupation not Israel.
Then the police state part began in earnest
...
Write down names of Palestinians you know
Write down names of journalists you associate with
Write down names of Palestinian organizations you support
And constantly, repeatedly, this threat: “if you don’t cooperate it will be a long time before you see your kids again.”
...
I tried to cooperate the best I could. It was 104 degrees. My wife, my two 6yr olds, my 3yr old, and I my two elderly in-laws had been waiting for me in the sun for hours.
But (again the police state tactic): every answer I gave she told me was lie.
“Stop lying!” She’d yell.
...
The questions got dumber and more surreal:
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
This isn't Israeli state activity (or at least not directly) but I think it fits our late lamented friend watser?'s theme nicely. And it is off the WTF-scale ...
Re: The generic "Look at what Israel's doing now" thread
Further to our late lamented friend's plug for "The Lobby" documentary about Israeli state interference in British politics, I'm hearing reports that its sequel, the one that covers the US side of the story, was completed two years ago but has yet to be broadcast while unspecified "editorial and legal issues" are dealt with. The rumour is that it has been buried on the insistence of the Qatari government for fear of an Israel sponsored backlash from Trump's White House.
Unverified reports of Russian interference with the US election have been whipping through the British media like a hurricane. Fully authenticated reports of Israeli subversion of British Democracy can be heard like the faintest breeze in a distant forest. Labour Party calls for a Government investigation have been ignored. Scandalously the Labour Party is not calling for an internal investigation into the deep penetration of its own structures.