The War of Ideas in the Middle East

And other news from Today in Palestine:

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The headline is intended to inoculate me against the immaturity charge. This is a picture of the head of the Shas party, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, at Angry Arab. It's getting passed around.

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I keep saying that if our journalists only described conditions in Israel and Palestine honestly, Americans would rise up. But they don't. Which makes all the more refreshing Joel Dreyfuss's piece at the Washington Post, explaining why a multiethnic society would not wish to emulate Israel's security methods at airports. At a time when many mainstream journalists are piping the line that Israel does it right, Dreyfuss recalls a trip to Israel five years ago. Dreyfuss, please go back and visit the West Bank and East Jerusalem and Negev and tell young Americans what's going down, gov't land theft carried out on a racial basis..:

"Are you Jewish?" he asked. I told him no, but that my grandfather had been. I didn't think it would be helpful to explain I was born into a racially-diverse family in Haiti and that I was Catholic. I had already noticed that the combination of my tan complexion and short mustache frequently drew suspicious looks during my stay, but I assumed my body language tagged me as a foreigner. On the flight back, when I raised the issue with a seatmate, she said, "Well, you look like you might be Arab."

Apparently, my security screener had the same impression. The next thing I knew, I was being directed to a very long line. Almost all the people on my line were Arabs or Africans. The much shorter, fast-moving line consisted mostly of white Americans and Europeans. Everyone on my queue was asked to open their luggage for inspection. When the security team got to me, they went through the books and magazines I had packed. A booklet from the Peres Center for Peace, which I had visited at the request of my publisher, seemed to raise alarm. The man searching my bag called a supervisor, who called his boss over. They asked me why I had visited the Peres center. "Because I'm a journalist," I replied. I must have said the magic word. "Journalist?" the boss repeated. Suddenly, my books were put back, my suitcase was snapped shut, and I was on my way home.

If Americans adopt Israel's approach to security, they should be prepared for racial and ethnic profiling, questions about their religious preferences, and careful examination of their reading material. Maybe full-body scans are a less intrusive after all.

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Happy Thanksgiving. How much more information do we need about the current Israeli regime? Where is Obama's outrage? Oh he can't muster any, doesn't have it in him. Remember Nir Rosen calling Israel a "rogue apartheid state"? What kind of people do this kind of thing? Reflect that the Jordan Valley, where many of these demolitions are happening, is the "security zone" Israel claims, unilaterally, endlessly expanding. Note too the military response to the popular committee members-- arrests for protesting landgrabs. Where are the American Jewish organizations rising up and saying, This must stop? From Joseph Dana's blog:

Israeli forces demolished Palestinian homes in the Jordan Valley and the South Hebron Hills today in what seems as a wave of demolitions following yesterday’s demolitions all across the West Bank. Non-violent leaders from Beit Ummar have also been arrested in night raids. Grassroots organizers Mousa and Yousef Abu Maria were arrested from their homes as harassment continues in Beit Ummar

After carrying demolitions in the villages of Qarawat Bani Hassan near Salfeet, al-Jiftlik in the Jordan Valley and Hizma near Jerusalem yesterday, Israeli bulldozers returned to the Jordan Valley today. At 6:30 this morning, Israeli Civil Administration bulldozers accompanied by soldiers and armored military jeeps entered the Jordan Valley village of Khirbet Yarza, east of Tubas, and demolished the village’s mosque, a houses and four animal shelters. The demolitions rendered eleven people homeless.

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They call us insane because we want the truth. They call us insane because they say we want too much. They say we are crazy because we do not settle for less. They say “take what you can get” as if we will be “getting” something.

If you ever defended the two state solution as a Palestinian, know that you are throwing away land. Know that land in the 48 borders was Palestine, and the only reason it is not today, is because of racism and greed.

For all the non Palestinian “activists” who believe the one state solution will not work, please, do not advise the Palestinians to leave what is lawfully theirs. If you want me to state why I think it is lawful and very legitimate, (other than the fact that it was taken forcefully, other than the fact that there are more than 4 million refugees waiting to go back, other than the fact that the one state solution is already in place along with a system of apartheid) the UN can explain it. The UN declaration of Human Rights article 13 states (I know this by heart)

“Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state, Everyone has the right to leave any country, including their own, and to return to their country.” The refugees have a right to return, no debate needed about that.

To Chomsky’s followers: I do not see Noam Chomsky as a leader on these issues, but as a Zionist, who supports and accepts Israel as an international Jewish state.

In an Israeli interview, Chomsky explains his stance: “Israel should have--should have--all the rights of a state in the international system, no more and no less.”

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