Reclaiming the Great Mosque of Beersheva

Electronic Intifada has an article, issued yesterday, on the struggle of local Muslims in Beersheva to reclaim the Great Mosque of the city, which was stolen from the Muslims as the Palestinian population was driven out of the town in 1948. (Link here)

There's also an older article in Haaretz.

Article on Uri Davis' election to the Fatah RC

His presence on the 120-member council, sometimes referred to as the Palestinian parliament, is unlikely to make a significant difference to Fatah's policies, which will continue to be largely dictated by Mahmoud Abbas, the president, and his inner circle. But it does have huge symbolic significance.

His polling in the 31st place for one of 80 seats contested by more than 600 Fatah members, he said in an interview, challenged Israel’s suggestion that the Palestinian people and its leaders regard the Jews as their enemies.

Or as one local Palestinian pundit noted of the vote's message: "It is not Judaism that Palestinians are fighting, it is Zionism."

It also finally puts Dr Davis in a position from which he hopes to shake up the complacency that has bedevilled the Fatah leadership and the PLO in their neglect of supporters outside the Palestinian fold.

"In my view [Fatah] is conducting a struggle with one hand tied behind its back," he said, sipping Arabic coffee in the garden of St George’s cathedral in East Jerusalem.

"The PLO represents a democratic alternative for all, including the current coloniser people, the current perpetrator of war crimes and crimes against humanity," he said in reference to Israel and its Jewish population. "In the 25 years since my joining the Fatah and PLO, this message has been marginalised. The mainstream went another direction, the Oslo accords direction."

[...]

His chief task, he said, will be to push Fatah to become a broad-based resistance movement modelling itself on the African National Congress, which brought down apartheid in South Africa.

The reference to South Africa is not unexpected. Dr Davis started describing Israel as an apartheid state in the early 1980s, long before it had become fashionable even on the far left.

His most recent book is Apartheid Israel: Possibilities for the Struggle Within, published in 2003, in which he argues that discrimination against Palestinians is embedded in Israeli law and sets out what he regards as the four classes of citizenship established by Israel's parliament.

full text at Ramallah Online

On the Durban II boycott

One of many European rightwing politicians to call for boycott of the Durban II conference in Geneva is Danish far-right leader Pia Kjærsgaard. In a statement, she meant that

"The purpose of the conference is to fight racism - a phenomenon that, honestly speaking, is rather marginal in Europe and the Western world today"

('Konferencens egentlige formål er bekæmpelse af racisme – et fænomen, som hånden på hjertet formentlig er temmelig marginalt i Europa og den vestlige verden i dag').

Kjærsgaard's statement clarifies an important point, namely that there is a convergence between the defense of Israel and rejection of any serious discussion on the actual problems of discrimination and marginalization of minorities in Europe. In a way, Ahmadinejad's speech is just a pretext to avoid facing the actual issues at hand.

Enhedslisten (a leftwing party) politician Asmaa Abdol-Hamid sharply criticizes Kjærsgaard's positions on Durban II. In a comment to Politiken, she says that

"Pia Kjærsgaard rejects the notion that there is racism in Europe. Obviously there is racism, and of course it should be fought. The statements of DF [Danish People's Party, Kjærsgaard's party] are living proofs of that."

Newslinks: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

State-sponsored ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem

Copy-pasted from Maan;

Jerusalem – Ma’an – Dozens of Israeli settlers backed by police took over a Palestinian house in the Old City of Jerusalem.

Ma'an’s correspondent observed settlers raiding the house of Naser Jaber, in the As-Sa'diyeh neighborhood of the Old City. A scuffle took place between the owner and the settlers before police intervened, allowing the settlers to take control of the house and sending the owner away.

Israeli police then imposed a neighborhood lock down, prohibiting residents from entering or leaving their homes. Several youth were seized during ensuing clashes in the tense half hour between the arrival of the settlers and the total-closure of the area.

Jaber went immediately to the court to put forward his case, saying he was going to demand the removal of the settlers from his residence, which is home to eight. Jaber noted that the small area of the Old City is home to seven other families and said there had been a repeated settler presence in the area over the past months.

Blogs: Kildén & Åsman

Ian Paisley launches 'Northern Ireland Friends of Israel'

Unsurprisingly, when colonialism and occupation are challenged in Palestine, the sentinels of colonial oppression and occupation rise in solidarity with the Israeli occupation policies.

In Northern Ireland, there have been massive solidarity work for Gaza in the past months and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions has supported the call for boycotts against Israel. In response, the hardline Unionist politician and veteran hate-monger Ian Paisely has founded the 'Northern Ireland Friends of Israel'.

Interestingly, Sir Ronald Storrs, the first British military governor of Jerusalem, had claimed that the Zionist "enterprise was one that blessed him that gave as well as him that took, by forming for England 'a little loyal Jewish Ulster' in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism." The Zionists would be the Orangemen of Palestine, a settler population safe-guarding imperialist influence in a region set for de-colonisation.

Source: JPost

On racism and apartheid in Israel

Clearly there is no full legal equality between all citizens of the State of Israel. And when Israeli progressives and Arab citizens of Israel raise demands equality for all citizens, the Zionist rightwing comes out in protest. See video below;


Quote of the commentary of one of the demonstrators interviewed,

"Israel is a Jewish state, not a dual national state, not a state of all its citizens"

On the prospects of Israeli overseas voting

Haaretz online version carries an editorial "Don't let Israelis vote abroad". The editorial is written in reaction to a proposal raised by the incoming governing partners Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu.

Whilst the underlining motifs behind the proposal are sinister electoral calculations (the rightwing is hoping to score more votes if out-of-country-voting is established) and racism (hoping to diminish the Arab influence in Knesset), the Haaretz rebuttal also raises some questions. If the Zionist concept that Israel is the national home of all Jews around the world is to be upheld, wouldn't overseas voting be a logical consequence?

Different countries have different legislations of overseas voting, some have no such mechanism (Denmark) whilst others have rather elaborate overseas voting mechanisms (Italy, Ecuador). Generally speaking, states which put emphasis on diaspora relations tend to have more generous rules to allow non-resident citizens to vote. In the Italian electoral system, there are even four extraterritorial parliamentary constituencies; North America, South America, Europe and Africa-Asia-Australia. There are parties uniquely based in the Italian diaspora in South America, and Italian parliamentary elections are preceded by intense election campaigning amongst the Italian communities in countries like Argentina. Considering the Zionist discourse on the link between the Jewish diaspora and the State of Israel, the fact that Israel is one of the states that doesn't allow overseas voting is a bit odd. From a Zionist perspective, that is.

It's not really my task to decide on internal Israeli matters, and I suppose the proposal will pass through various stages of wrangling before becoming a reality. As per the diminish Arab influence, the problem shouldn't be overrated. In the racist order of Israeli politics, the Arab parties are a pariah in Knesset and are never included in governing coalitions anyway. I'm not a full-fledged expert on Israeli domestic politics, but are there any cases were proposals raised by Arab parties have been passed as legislature? As per the prospect of Avigdor Lieberman doing his campaign work in Minsk or Moscow rather than the streets of Tel Aviv, that would just contribute to illustrate the non-link of Lieberman and his party colleagues to the lands of the Middle East.

But the debate on overseas voting in Israel should also be noticed on the Palestinian side, especially as there are reforms in the PLO. The PLO is the para-statal organization representing the entire Palestinian people. But its institutions are dominant and its leadership is appointed by agreements of political factions, not general elections. The creation of the Palestinian National Authority after Oslo has led to the side-lining of the PLO and creating cleavages between the Palestinians living under occupation and those in exile. In order to have a leadership fully representative of the entire Palestinian people, there the Palestinian National Council ought to formed through elections, be it in Jerusalem, Nablus, Gaza and the refugee camps across the Arab world. That would create a PLO that could negotiate with the enemy on more equal terms.

More about the hypocrisy on the issue of 'recognition of Israel'

In an earlier post, I pointed at the hypocrisy of Western politicians/media demaning that Hamas recognizes Israel whilst no such demands at levelled against Israeli political parties. Go to the Kadima website. In the lower left side, you'll see a map with links to info about local candidates. The map shows West Bank, Gaza and the Golan heights as parts of Israel.

On the website of Likud, you'll see a small map in the left part of the headline, including the occupied Gaza, West Bank and Golan heights as parts of Israel.

The small Green Party differs somewhat, leaving out Gaza, showing West Bank in a different shade than 1948 Israel but including the Golan heights.

Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu, on the rightward side of the Israeli political spectrum, advocates repression against Arab 'enemies', classic fascist discourse. The party also seeks limit the possibilities for Arabs to retain their Israeli citizenships.

One-sided?

Some might argue that this blog is one-sided. In order to face such accusations preemptively, i present the following must-see video from NY (thanks to esbati.blogspot.com for the tip);


se också, artikel i Dagen.se.