Tag Archives: Ethnic cleansing of Palestine

Guest Column: The Israel Lobby

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Time for a second edition
By Paul Craig Roberts [full original column here]

A decade ago in 2007 John J. Mearsheimer, the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science and codirector of the Program on International Security Policy at the University of Chicago, and Stephen M. Walt, the Robert and Renee Belfer Professor of International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and Academic Dean of the Kennedy School from 2002-2006, published The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. The publisher was the prestigious publishing house, Farrar, Straus and Giroux. The authors made a convincing case that Israel operating through its American lobbies, which are not registered as foreign agents, succeeds in using US foreign policy in Israel’s interests. The authors conclude that the use of US foreign policy in Israel’s interests is damaging to both America’s national interests and to Israel’s long-term security.

Many were pleased that two distinguished experts had breached a taboo issue. But the Israel Lobby was not among them. Instantly, the authors and the book were denounced as anti-semitic. The demonstration that Israel had influence was misrepresented as the claim that Israel controlled the US government. The authors were denounced for their “extremism” which some alleged could result in a new holocaust.

Other critics took a different approach and claimed that there was no difference between Israeli and US interests and that anything that served Israel also served America. Some evangelicals added: “and also serves God.” Continue reading →

Donut Whole: Sauce for the Gander

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Proposed language for bill that goes the Israel Anti-Boycott Act (S.720) one better:
The Anti Israel-Zionist Boycott Act
Satire by Brian R. Wright

A lot of talk in the media and on Capitol Hill these days in support of the so-called “Don’t Mess with Israel” bill, which would abrogate the United States Constitution in no uncertain terms and apply draconian penalties for standing on one’s First Principle rights when it comes to disrespecting our ally-supremo, the model-benevolent state of Israel. To my way of thinking, this Senate bill S.720, formally ‘Israel Anti-Boycott Act,’ doesn’t go far enough. In fact, using the same template as S.720, l have formulated a more thorough gutting of the Bill of Rights via an S.720 countermeasure, and suggested it to my august federal legislators…

The modifiable Libre Office document lies here. And below lies the html version for your consideration and, I hope, wide circulation:

The Anti Israel Zionism Boycott Act

[Congressional Bills <TBD> Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[<#TBD_Anti_Israel-Zionist_Boycott_Act> Introduced in either house]

<TBD> CONGRESS
<#TBD_Anti_Israel-Zionist_Boycott_Act>

To prohibit any support or expression of support for the state of Israel or the political philosophy/movement of Zionism by any individual or group within the United States and by any public official of the United States. Continue reading →

Brian’s Column: Dis Israel, Lose $250K… or Worse!

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Oath-breaking federal legislators cave into Israeli foe against our First Principles

That’s right. Immediately before our eyes. Please read, at least, the following first two paragraphs of this recent article from The Intercept: http://bit.ly/2tzyWiW_Israel_Anti-Boycott_Act:

The criminalization of political speech and activism against Israel has become one of the gravest threats to free speech in the West. In France, activists have been arrested and prosecuted for wearing T-shirts advocating a boycott of Israel. The U.K. has enacted a series of measures designed to outlaw such activism. In the U.S., governors compete with one another over who can implement the most extreme regulations to bar businesses from participating in any boycotts aimed even at Israeli settlements, which the world regards as illegal. On U.S. campuses, punishment of pro-Palestinian students for expressing criticisms of Israel is so commonplace that the Center for Constitutional Rights refers to it as “the Palestine Exception” to free speech.

But now, a group of 43 senators — 29 Republicans and 14 Democrats — wants to implement a law that would make it a felony for Americans to support the international boycott against Israel, which was launched in protest of that country’s decades-old occupation of Palestine. The two primary sponsors of the bill are Democrat Ben Cardin of Maryland and Republican Rob Portman of Ohio. Perhaps the most shocking aspect is the punishment: Anyone guilty of violating the prohibitions will face a minimum civil penalty of $250,000 and a maximum criminal penalty of $1 million and 20 years in prison.

In essence, a Senate bill, S. 720, has been endorsed by dozens of senators and Congressmen that would criminalize any individual’s support for boycott of the state of Israel (e.g. the BDS sanctions). Such support includes speaking in favor of a/the boycott, putting a bumper sticker on one’s car, telling a friend that you don’t like what Israel is doing to its Palestinian prisoners, seeking to bring Israel before the International Criminal Court for apartheid or for the USS Liberty attacks… anything that can be construed by a sadistic government as ‘supporting a boycott’ of Israel. Continue reading →

Guest Column: What Kind of People…

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… would look the other way in the presence of gross injustice?
Post by Thomas Are via Paul Craig Roberts [Original here]

What kind of people would enjoy a sumptuous meal in front of a starving child and simply say, “Go away kid, you bother me.”?  None that I know.  What kind of people would deliberately withhold food and destroy the means of growing food in the context of abundance surrounded by children reaching out for crumbs from the table and simply say, “I don’t care?” I don’t personally know anyone so calloused because I don’t personally know any Israeli Zionists.

Next month, Israel will be celebrating its 50th anniversary of occupying the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza [and the June 8, 1967, deliberate, unprovoked attack on the USS Liberty… AND decades of ethnic cleansing and apartheid —ed.].  Is that something of which to be proud?

Since the Six Day War (and war crime attack on the Liberty) Israel has:

  • Demolished over 48,000 homes in the West Bank and Gaza
  • Confiscated over 586,000 acres of Palestinian land the West Bank
  • Created 300,000 Palestinian refugees
  • Colonized the West Bank with over 600,000 Jewish settlers
  • Enacted over 50 laws that discriminate against Israel’s Arab minority
  • Established an apartheid legal system with civil courts for Jewish settlers and separate military courts for 4.5 million Palestinians, including indefinite detention without trial and a conviction rate of over 99%.[1]

Continue reading →