Winds of Change in the Middle East?

Dan

2006-08-20T20:13:00.000-04:00

Dear all,

Just a brief message to let you all know what's been going on. I'm not Dan, I'm his friend. Updating the blog on his behalf. He has occasional access to my laptop and the internet but he doesn't feel inclined to blog atm. He's at a hospital in the south, and is recovering from the moderate injuries he sustained in the fighting there. Must also add that he now has an amazing wife, A., and their first baby is on the way. :) He had been living in Srifa for some time, and he and his wife were planning on buying a plot and building a house. That will have to wait, but thank goodness the storm has been weathered. I will leave the rest to him, hopefully soon he will give in to my nagging and accept to post though I understand he wants to focus on his health & family for the time being. :)

You may direct your inquiries to me at written_on_the_wall at hotmail dot com.

2006-04-13T16:36:00.000-04:00

Execution. Lebanon. Some time during the war.

Am I disillusioned??

2006-02-10T16:51:00.000-05:00

I don't know, really. I made my way back to Lebanon because I felt that I needed to do something: find my dad. I don't know if I am disillusioned or what, maybe I should give up on it and accept reality. But what is reality?? I am not sure I believe that my dad was killed. I just hope that he wouldn't be in one of those mass graves that are being found occasionally - or those that will never be found. It's so difficult to go about getting information. I feel like I'm going nowhere. I don't have anything to start from.

Forgive me for this personal post, this blog is not meant to be a personal one. But I just felt like ranting.

Blogging the Middle East

2006-02-07T17:17:00.000-05:00

My friend (well, best friend, it's almost as if we're shadows of each other), who wishes to be identified only as "Freedom", has started a blog. The bad part is that it's not on blogger. The good part is that it's not as controversial and extremist as mine. ;) Anyway, just thought I'd do my bit and advertise the blog. Feel free to pass on the link, I suppose. She has a *gasp* moderate take on the Muhammad cartoons. Anyway, not to spoil the fun, go read it.

As for me, I'm sorry, I keep saying I will update the blog but I get lazy. I think it's in the air or something. Or maybe it's the water. I don't know. Maybe being stoned is a prerequisite for blogging the Middle East.

2006-02-07T15:06:00.000-05:00

Interesting debate about the Danish cartoons / Muslim reaction here.

2006-02-06T04:22:00.000-05:00

Cartoon by Emad Hajjaj, Al-Ghad Newspaper, Jordan

In support of freedom of speech

2006-02-05T08:20:00.000-05:00

Visit this blog (brought to you by the Arab European League) and see it all for yourself. Let's see if those "conservative" Danes who published those cartoons will come out and express their solidarity for "freedom of speech"! About time someone exposed the hypocrisy of the West.

The following explanation was made available on the Arab European League website:

After the lectures that Arabs and Muslims received from Europeans on Freedom of Speech and on Tolerance. And after that many European newspapers republished the Danish cartoons on the Prophet Mohammed. AEL decided to enter the cartoon business and to use our right to artistic expression.

Just like the newspapers in Europe claim that they only want to defend the freedom of speech and do not desire to stigmatise Muslims, we also do stress that our cartoons are not meant as an offence to anybody and ought not to be taken as a statement against any group, community or historical fact.

If it is the time to break Taboos and cross all the red lines, we certainly do not want to stay behind.

Israeli Journalism

2006-02-04T07:32:00.000-05:00

I am officially done with my first semester of graduate school, and so I can now take a deep breath and dedicate some time to making some observations about the Middle East (never really stopped doing that, only that I didn't do it online). But first I must apologize for the mysterious silence (just going through some rough financial and personal problems). Anyhow, I have taken a keen interest in Islam lately, and I might end up converting one of these days. And that's all I will say on the personal front.

The Palestinian elections are interesting to say the least. I was actually hoping for a Hamas win, because the Palestinians deserve accountability after years of corruption that they have suffered from. And it seems that they made the right choice, at least when it comes to internal politics. As for external politics (and relations with Israel), people have been marketing the Hamas win as a tragic ending, but allow me to ask, what has Fatah done so far?? What has Mahmoud Abbas done so far?? Except for maintaining the status quo, that is, under the guise of "sitting at the negotiations table"? Moreover, why is a Likud win hailed as democratic elections while a Hamas one is not, having in mind that Likud has had a history of racism, hatred, and mass murder (note: not that Labour does not have such a history as well!)? I forget, Israelis are supposed to be democracy-loving while those backwards Arabs and Muslims only understand the language of violence... And I will not even attempt to demolish the American position because it's not worth my time, really. Maybe when the U.S adopts a position more worthwhile to be talked about I will consider discussing it.

Moving on, I have been following Israeli reports of the Qassam attack that hit a caravan in a kibbutz, supposedly causing critical injuries to a 7-month-old baby boy. Well, after reading that report (on all three major Israeli news websites, Ha'aretz, JPost, and Yediot Achronot) I got curious so I ran a search on Yahoo News Photos, and here's what I found. Here's the picture of the baby in a "critical" condition:

I suppose the Israeli definition of "critical injuries" excludes life-threatening condition, blood, and loss of consciousness, and includes crying and absence of visible injuries... JPost was kind enough to publish my criticism of the wording in the talkbacks; unsurprisingly, there were calls for censorship, because apparently any criticism of false reporting (in favour of the poor, oppressed, persecuted Israelis) is ... anti-Semitic. There was also someone who actually wondered what difference terminology (critical /moderate / light) made... You can experience the glory of idiocy first-hand by clicking here. And where's MEMRI when you need it??

Update: I just got banned from the Harirists' forum for being "unsecular". I kid you not. That was the message I received from the administrator before I got banned. Perhaps Mr. Administrator would like to check out the LF-ers on the forum who are defending the crusaders. Not to mention that more than half of the people at the "demonstration" today were Harirists... Mr. Administrator might also like to check out how hypocritical he is when he seems to be justifying the cartoons by pointing to "freedom of speech". I call on people to respect and practice freedom of speech! But shhh, don't tell anyone, I neither believe in it nor practice it.

Reshuffling in the Middle East: destroying the Tehran-Baghdad-Damascus-Beirut railway

2005-12-13T10:25:00.000-05:00

Gibran Tueni is dead (Allah Yer7amo). I was never a fan of the guy, and I don’t see what the big deal is about his guts. When he received information from the American and French intelligence services present IN LEBANON about threat to his life, he fled to Paris, and then he was told by the same intelligence services to return. Could it be that Mr. Tueni was merely a tool in the hands of the intelligence services of the Americans and French? After all, if the Syrians had wanted to kill him, they had quite a lot of time to do so, when the spotlight was not on them as it is now. Moreover, if the Syrians were so deep in the hole that they are to be held responsible for his assassination, could they not have massacred his family to hurt him? And then of course we have people accusing HezbAllah & Amal of staging fake attacks (the one on Sheikh Yazbek) to get sympathy and cover up on the assassination that was to take place. These people forget to mention that using this logic, we can argue that Walid Jumblatt was the one who placed the 4 rockets (3 American, 1 Russian) on the main Chouf road, with the same purpose in mind. HezbAllah & Amal of course condemned the assassination of Tueni, but it seems to me that no matter what they say or do, they will always be accused. It appears that the Sunni za’imship is determined to isolate the Shi’ites of Lebanon and topple the Alawite regime in Syria, and replace it with a Sunni regime, to make up for the loss of Sunni hegemony in Iraq. It is highly possible that the assassination of Hariri was planned and executed by the Americans so as to bring about these changes, with the hope of dealing with the Sunni insurgency in Iraq. Could it be that Tueni’s timely murder was an American reminder to the international community that there should be sanctions against Syria? In fact the Sheikh Yazbek assassination attempt and today’s explosion in Nabatiye could be interpreted as an American message to HezbAllah and Amal that the changes planned will take place no matter what, and the best they can do is remain quiet. This of course was met by HezbAllah & Amal ministers by a refusal to be subdued, as seen in their withdrawal from the Cabinet meeting yesterday. I think it would be foolish to dismiss the quagmire in Iraq as a possible source of change in Lebanon. It’s also interesting to see how Basshar al Assad will react to the expected changes in the region. I think that if the situation goes on long enough there is a big chance that his regime will survive, because the Americans can’t stay in Iraq forever and Iran (maybe) has the ability to go nuclear, which would draw a Shi’ite line all the way from Tehran to Beirut (which would be interesting, because it can also lead to the desire to continue the line all the way to Shi'ite Baku, passing through Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh). Saddam was getting a bit out of control, so America replaces him with a regime shared between long-oppressed Shi’ites and Kurds, and in return topple the Assad regime of Syria and give the Sunnis there and in Lebanon something to be happy about. The complete disregard of the Sunnis on the political scene in post-Saddam Iraq is the equivalent of the planned disregard of the Shi’ites and Alawites in post-Assad Syria and the Shi’ites in post-Feb.14 Lebanon. But keep in mind that Lebanon is a unique case since the Shi’ites there are the biggest sect, whereas the Shi’ites in Syria and the Sunnis in Iraq are not. Of course, any such lines, whether Shi'ite or Sunni is perceived as a threat by both USA and "Israel", which is why we can see the two opt for reshuffling the cards and dealing a different hand to soothe the growing resentment towards the West that the current oppressive system has given rise to.

Words and their meanings

2005-10-21T09:35:00.000-04:00

I wonder why Ha'aretz changed the wording in its news story on a Palestinian teenager killed for throwing Molotov cocktails from "IDF kills Palestinian suspected of throwing Molotov cocktails at Israeli cars" to "IDF kills Palestinian suspected of fire-bombing Israeli cars". I guess bigger words justify bigger measures... I wonder what the next change in wording will be...

In other news, "Israeli officials call for changes in Syrian rule" (here some explanation from those who insisted that "Israel" had nothing to gain from toppling Assad's regime would prove helpful).

I will post most of the article, for fear that our beloved left-wing (sic) Ha'aretz might change the wording (call me a conspiracy theorist but I will still not take any chances, this is not an article to be missed). My comments are in red. Read on, fellow sheep (at least USA and "Israel" assume that that's what ALL of us without exceptions are):

Israeli politicians from the left and right on Friday called for changes in the Syrian leadership, after a United Nations probe concluded that the plot to assassinate former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri must have had the approval of Syrian security officials, backed by the collusion of their Lebanese counterparts. If you fail to notice the newly-found love from the innocent, dovish Israelis towards the Lebanese, then you are, beyond any doubt, an anti-Semite, as the ADL and Simon Wiesenthal Centre would rush to conclude.

...

"I think there needs to be change in Syria," said Vice Premier Shimon Peres, adding that the United States and France should take the lead in deciding on an international response to the findings. Guess what, Israelis love the Syrian people too, and don't want to see the people suffer under Assad's regime!

Referring to Syrian President Bashar Assad and his relatives in positions of power, Peres told Israel Radio: "If it is true that the government is involved in the murder, this will shake up the rule of the Assads." He added that it is "not natural or acceptable" for a family representing a small minority to rule Syria in what he said was a brutal fashion. On the other hand, of course, it's OK for the representatives of "a majority to rule [the Occupied Territories]" (including pre-1948 Palestine) in a "brutal fashion".

The UN report stopped short of pointing a finger at Assad or his inner circle [so there "needs to be regime change in Syria"], but accused Syria of failing to cooperate [yeah, I guess that's a crime far worse than "Israeli" human shield practice, to name on example...] and said the plot to kill Hariri in a car bomb must have had [why exactly??! Because Syrian intelligence services are beyond a doubt more sophisticated and better functioning than CIA and Mossad...] the blessing of Syrian security officials. The report includes a single reference to Assef Shawkat, Assad's brother-in-law and the Syrian intelligence chief.

According to one witness, Shawkat forced a man to tape a claim of responsibility for Hariri's killing 15 days before it occurred. And of course, we can't find out who this "one witness" might be.. The precaution goes under "protecting" the individual (from the alleged Syrian ghosts roaming the country). Let's just say that there is "one witness" and according to him Assad's brother-in-law forced a video-taping... Does anyone notice that this sounds just as cheesy as the "Jund el Sham" videotape...

...

Likud MK Yuval Steinitz, chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, called for regime change in Damascus.

"As far as I am concerned... and here I have a dispute with some of the people in the security establishment, it is not just an American interest but a clear Israeli interest to end the Assad dynasty and replace Bashar Assad," he said. And of course, that interest excludes USA and "Israel" from the list of suspects, because logically speaking, the Hariri assassination worked against the idea of ending the Assad dynasty...

Ephraim Halevy, former chief of the Mossad espionage agency, said it was not necessary to prove a direct involvement by Assad. But it's anti-Semitic to argue that "Israel" is responsible for Hobeika's [or some other figure's] assassination without any proof. When it's about "Israel" there ought to be proof, otherwise it's anti-Semitic. The Syrians must now be wishing that they were Jews...

"The head of the Syrian pyramid is Bashar Assad," Halevy told Army Radio. "I don't think... there is any doubt that this was an extensive and coordinated operation that was planned for many months. Lots of people from the Syrian elite were involved." Halevy seems to know more than that "one witness" knows. Maybe he would like to volunteer some information. Or could it be that he has the Jews-know-it-all-and-are-always-right-and-if-you-disagree-then-you're-an-anti-Semite complex?

The rest of the article is full of unsignificant regurgitations, so I will not post it for reasons of time and space.

The True Nature of Anti-Americanism in the Muslim World

2005-10-12T20:13:00.000-04:00

The True Nature of Anti-Americanism in the Muslim World
By Ghanim Khalil

Very recently, President Bush sent Karen Hughes to tour Muslim nations in the Middle East for a bid to combat anti-Americanism 1. That she has failed miserably is no surprise to anyone with a mild knowledge of her two predecessors under the same administration who also failed (Charlotte Beers and Margaret Tutwiler). We hear the term Anti-American all the time when the issue is the Middle East and the wider Islamic/Muslim world. But what does the term really entail? The assumptions of this term include an ideological hatred of the United States of America. Those who remind us that this irrational ideology is growing to alarming rates often express the sentiment “were damned if we do and damned if we don’t”. But this tells us very little about today’s nature of anti-Americanism in the Muslim world, other than that “they” hate “us” and “we” must deal with “them”.

The relationship between the Muslim world and the US is a one way highway where power injects from West to East, North to South and no matter how much the East and South complains of the most evident forms of exploitation visible today (military/political/economic) they will be perceived as nothing more that mobs of monolithic ingratitude towards the superior “developed” nations who want only to fix their problems and enlighten their minds. Fixing and enlightening the Muslim world is the main goal, we are told, of the US quest in the Middle East where combating anti-Americanism is only one element. It comes as a shock to many Americans that such noble aspirations of the most powerful nation in the world is everyday being rejected by “them” when it seems “they” need it more than anyone else. Worse than their ingratitude is their irrational abhorrence to America and what she stands for.

Certainly, the shock itself is also displayed on the one way highway alongside power, from West to East, North to South and no matter how many Eastern and Southern scholars, intellectuals, human rights advocates, politicians and religious leaders point out that it’s not Western (read American) ways of life that causes them to rise up in opposition but Western (read American) foreign policy towards them, they will still be called “irrationally” anti-American. The foundations of the American myth being that not only are “they” inferior to “us” but “they” are also ungrateful and irrational towards “us” and this is how “we” can explain “their” hatred for “us”. This is the cultural thesis we hear about all over the media, pulpits, and political offices of the US.

What is overlooked, and with important reasoning, is that the “underdeveloped” status projected on “them” by Westerners has its roots in Western colonialism and imperialism, realities of the “ancient history” as Carter called it that many Americans could care less about. The important reasoning mentioned above, from the point of view of those in power here, is that it does no good for them to talk of the “root causes” of anti-Americanism in the Muslim world from a historical point of view. Instead they concentrate on it from a cultural point of view and posit “root causes” which ignore Western exploitation (military/political/economic) and emphasize racial/cultural Eurocentric mythologies from the 19th century. “They” hate “us” because of “our” values. “They” hate “us” because “they” hate our freedom.

After the military failure of unifying Iraq and the diplomatic failure of Karen Hughes, President Bush had no choice but to declare that “we” are fighting an anti-American enemy he calls a soon to be “Islamic Empire” lead by Muslim extremists.2 This myth, workable only on the gullible and ignorant, is the new form of self-aggrandizement necessary to protect the cultural myths for the purposes of American exploitation (military/political/economic). The absurdity of such a myth being adopted sincerely by many Americans despite the fact that it is truly irrational is astounding. That the Muslim world, itself plagued by extremist violence and hopelessly divided politically, economically, militarily, and religiously, is somehow supposed to constitute a potential (but in Bush’s mind certain) empire of terror, is revealing in the scope of its imagination and dangerous in its scope of hatred for the Muslim “Other”. Many Americans will incorporate this imaginary demon into their fearful worldview and swallow the xenophobic attitudes and assumptions it carries, all while portraying Muslims as nothing less than seeds of the irrational forces of evil.

Many of the politicians, religious ideologues, alarmist media personalities, and military-intelligence analysts in the US who speak of the growing anti-Americanism in the World (the most psychologically crucial being the Muslim world) speak with already embedded assumptions relating directly to the humanity of the “Others”, and in this case, the Islamic “Other”. The truth about the nature of anti-Americanism really depends on which angle you chose to look at the issue (historical or cultural). However, the fact is that many people in America use the label to repel healthy criticism of American foreign policy in the world. The dilemma arises when we find out that Muslims also eat McDonalds and drink Coke, are increasingly mimicking Western/American styles of fashion, are more versed in Western thought than Westerners are in Islamic thought (they know the West from their own works), absolutely love American television game shows and sitcoms, and recognize the West (and America specifically) as hubs of economic opportunity. Despite the many myths Muslims also have about the West and America, it becomes clear that Muslims cannot be generalized and placed into a category (anti-Americanism) without being engaged and heard. When they are engaged and heard, as Hughes’ recent experience can testify, they will all say the same things, “we don’t hate America, we hate American foreign policy.” Not surprisingly, they are not alone in expressing this obvious point about American-Muslim relations. This is what the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group formed by ex-U.S. intelligence officials, wrote to President Bush on February 8, 2003:

It is widely known that you have a uniquely
close relationship with Israeli Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon. This presents a strong disincentive
to those who might otherwise warn you that
Israel's continuing encroachment on Arab territories,
its oppression of the Palestinian people, and its
pre-emptive attack on Iraq in 1981 are among the
root causes not only of terrorism, but of
Saddam Hussein's felt need to develop the means
to deter further Israeli attacks.3

Along similar lines another group of former diplomats and high ranking retired officers (DMCC – Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change) released a statement in June of 2004 stating: “The United States suffers from close identification with autocratic regimes in the Muslim world, and from the perception of unquestioning support for the policies and actions of the present Israeli Government. To enhance credibility with Islamic peoples we must pursue courageous, energetic and balanced efforts to establish peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and policies that encourage responsible democratic reforms.”4 A most interesting argument against the cultural “they hate our freedoms” thesis is the following two statements of the Defense Science Board from within the Pentagon itself. In a 1997 DSB study experts found that “Historical data show a strong correlation between U.S. involvement in international situations and an increase in terrorist attacks against the United States.”5 Three years after 9-11 another report by the DSB stated: “Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies… The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the long-standing, even increasing, support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states… Thus, when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy.”6 This is far closer to the truth than what many Americans believe.

The true nature of anti-Americanism can only be historically explained. The cultural arguments are nothing more than veils meant to keep Americans from thinking for themselves and thus promoting the American empire out of ignorance and fear. Therefore, the real problem is what is expressed in a very important book written by Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies titled, Why Do People Hate America? The authors write that,

It was one of our central arguments that at
the heart of relations between America and the
rest of the world stands a problem of knowledge.
In precise terms, we call it the problem of
‘knowledgeable ignorance’: knowing people, ideas,
civilisations, religions, histories as something
they are not, and could not possibly be, and maintaining
these ideas even when the means exist to know differently.
Knowledgeable ignorance is a term applied to the Western
view of Islam and Muslims in particular.
It refers to more than general negative attitudes
and ideas; it defines the way in which such
attitudes are built into an approach to knowledge,
a body of study and expertise called Orientalism.7

Knowledge about the Islamic “Other” is crucial in reversing the tide of cultural superiority expressed in moral terms and political threats. Only after you know a people can you truly face them and speak your piece. Otherwise you are speaking your piece to an imaginary “them” created in your mind. One requires a single example to put things in a better perspective. If America had undergone Muslim colonialism and imperialism and then experienced national freedom only to realize that they are free only up to a certain degree, that neo-imperialism of a Muslim empire now overshadows them, watching their every move and placing upon itself the “right” to intervene in any changes that take place which it doesn’t approve of, would Americans stand for this balance of power? What if they then opposed the Muslim empire in various ways (peaceful and not) and were labeled all sorts of things from ungrateful to irrational, would Americans accept this logic? What if extremist groups from amongst an exploited America then started to terrorize Muslim countries and peoples all over the world, would Americans who are neither extremist nor approving of the Muslim empire then capitulate to the argument of a Muslim leader who announces that you’re “either with us or against us”? If the tables were turned, no American would stand for what Muslims have undergone for the past few centuries under Western dominance. No manner of the Muslim empire’s cultural explanations of why Americans oppose them would be acceptable. Americans would do what many Muslims are doing today and that is exposing the historical roots of the problems between Muslims and America. Enter the true nature of anti-Americanism.

Other Sources besides the footnotes:

Anti-Americanism according to Wikipedia.org (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Americanism); Norman Daniel’s Islam and the West (Oxford: One World, 1993); Edward Said’s Covering Islam: How the Media and Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World, (Vintage Books, US, 1997); William Blum’s Killing Hope (Common Courage Press, U.S., 1995); Andrea Lueg’s The Next Threat: Western Perceptions of Islam (Pluto Press, U.K., 1995); Rene Guenon’s The Crisis of the Modern World (Suhail Academy, Pakistan, 1999); Ziauddin Sardar’s Postmodernism and the Other, (Pluto Press, London, 1998); John Esposito’s The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? (Oxford, 1995); Bruce Lawrence’s Shattering the Myth: Islam Beyond Violence (Princeton, 1998); Ahmed S. Moussalli’s Islamic Fundamentalism: Myths and Realities (Ithaca Press,1990); Joseph E. B. Lumbard, The Decline of Knowledge and the Rise of Ideology, in his edited: Islam, Fundamentalism, and the Betrayal of Tradition, (World Wisdom Inc., U.S., 2004); Noam Chomsky’s Deterring Democracy, (Hill and Wang, New York, 1992).

Joseph G. Rahme, Ethnocentric and Stereotypical Concepts in the Study of Islamic and World History, The History Teacher, Vol. 32, No. 4 (August 1999): 473-474; Robert Jervis, Understanding the Bush Doctrine, Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 118, No. 3, Fall 2003; Scott McConnell, Among the Neocons, The American Conservative, April 21, 2003. (www.amconmag.com/04_21_03/cover.html); Robert D. Crane, The Muslim Challenge in America and the World, Islamic Inst. for Strategic Studies, U.S., 2000; Norman Podhoretz, In Praise of the Bush Doctrine, Commentary, September 4, 2002.

1Dan Murphy, US begins new pitch to Muslim World, Christian Science Monitor, September 28, 2005
2Tom Raum, Bush Warns Militants Seek to Establish Empire, AP, October 6, 2005
3Memo for President Bush, Feb 8, 2003,
4Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change, Statement, June 16, 2004
5‘Response to Transnational Threats’, Defense Science Board, DoD, 1997
6‘Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Strategic Communication’, Defense Science Board, DoD, 2004 or see:
7Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies, Why Do People Hate America?, Disinformation Company Ltd., New York, 2002, p. 11- 12. The phrase ‘knowledgeable ignorance’ was taken from Norman Daniel’s Islam and the West (Oxford: One World, 1993).

Ghanim Khalil is an author, activist, former U.S. Marine and National Guardsman, and is a current student majoring in History

2005-10-09T04:36:00.000-04:00

"Israel also has a large stake in the success of a democratic Palestine. Permanent occupation threatens Israel’s identity and democracy [????? I guess "temporary" occupation is OK....]. So the United States continues to challenge Israeli leaders [by increasing aid] to take concrete steps [like building the wall and increasing aid in response to settlement activity] to support the emergence of a viable, credible Palestinian state. As there is progress towards security [of "Israel" only], Israel forces need to withdraw fully to positions they held prior to September 28, 2000 [of course, the '67 war was started by Arabs]. And consistent with the recommendations of the Mitchell Committee, Israeli settlement activity in the occupied territories must stop [so let's increase "aid"...] As violence subsides [for "Israel"], freedom of movement should be restored, permitting innocent Palestinians to resume work and normal life [but it is permissible that those same innocent Palestinians be shot while hanging laundry or playing on the roofs of their houses, and it is permissible that they rot in the camps with little water and food, while "Israel continues to turn parts of the West Bank into resort towns and tourist centres, and other parts into waste dumps...]. The United States can play a crucial role but, ultimately, lasting peace can only come when Israelis and Palestinians resolve the issues and end the conflict between them [yup, pure genius]."

Source: The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, Sept. 2002.

Media Bias

2005-09-25T13:28:00.000-04:00

Again, this one too is in favour of "Israel" and other enemies of Lebanon (need I name them? No, I shall not; I will leave that to individuals' tastes).

Jerusalem Post and Ha'aretz immediately (both at 6:03 pm ) reported on the explosion, even before Al Jazeera (I wonder how that works... Do the two "Israeli" newspapers have reporters or offices in Lebanon? Or perhaps they publish information provided to them by "unnamed sources"?)

Even more disturbing is how these people (add BBC to the list) used this sick assassination attempt to advance their anti-Syrian propaganda.

Jerusalem Post puts it this way:

"A prominent journalist working for an anti-Syrian television station was seriously wounded Sunday when a bomb placed under her car exploded, Lebanese security officials said."

Continuing,

"The explosion recalls a similar one on June 2, when anti-Syrian journalist Samir Kassir was killed by a bomb placed under the seat of his car."

(How about the explosion reminding us of similar bombs planted by "Israeli" pure-of-arms "defense" forces in Beirut, or ones planted by "Israel's" proxy militias with the explosives provided by none other than the pure-of-arms "Israelis"?)

And lest we forget, Jerusalem Post concludes this "journalistic" report with the following reminder:

"LBC, a Christian TV station, is among the most prominent of anti-Syrian media outlets."

I see, I see. We have the verdict before trying the suspect. Must be fun. Reminds me of the first rain (sic) in Gaza... And lest we forget, calibrating weapons by firing them on Gaza is, indeed, one of the "usual practice[s] of refraining from harming civilians." Orwell is turning in his grave.

2005-09-25T06:31:00.000-04:00

Quoting from Ha'aretz:

The prime minister said that israel had embarked on "an ongoing operation, whose aim is to hit terrorists, and not to relent from this. All means are fit for this. Apart from our usual practice of refraining from harming civilians, all means should be used to halt this phenomenon."

Yup (no more comments from me).

Occupying Forces Planting Bombs and Blaming it on the Sunni Resistance

2005-09-21T16:24:00.000-04:00

The US and British occupiers of Iraq want a civil war to happen, this is the only way they can maintain their occupation and keep the Iraqis divided. The US occupatoin is now siding with the Shia political leadership and acting like they are protecting them against the Sunnis. The US is playing the typical colonialist method of divide and conquer. All of the attacks that happen in Iraq are being blamed on the sunnis, the resistance, the ghost Zarqawi, sometimes Syria but we do not really know who are carrying out these attacks and the only group that benefits from these attacks are the occupiers of Iraq, i'm not saying attacks on occupying forces and collaborators are benefiting the occupiers but attacks against shia civilians are definitely benefiting the occupation and keeps the sunni and shia Iraqis divided and mistrustful of each other that is why it is very much possible that the US, Britain and the Mossad are carrying out these attacks. The US is trying to do the same thing in Lebanon, the US wants the Sunni and Shia Lebanese to fight each other. The US is not counting on the maronite political leadership anymore because they know there is no winning in Lebanon if a civil war happens between muslims and christians like before, so the US is trying to create civil strife and mistrust between the sunnis and shia of Lebanon but Hizballah is a smart organization and is not falling for the sectarian divide. Israel will benifit tremendously if the Lebanese shia and sunni fight each other because it will distract the Lebanese resistance in the south and it will weaken the resistance but Lebanon is not Iraq, the sunni and the shia of Lebanon have not oppressed each other in the past and have fought together in the past and the sunni of Lebanon highly respect Hizballah and all of its accomplishments, it has made all Lebanese proud.

Fake Terrorism Is a Coalition's Best Friend
Iraqi police recently caught two terrorists with a car full of explosives. Would it surprise you to learn they were British Special Forces?
By Matt Hutaff Sep 20, 2005

The story sounds amazing, almost fantastical.

A car driving through the outskirts of a besieged city opens fire on a police checkpoint, killing one. In pursuit, the police surround and detain the drivers and find the vehicle packed with explosives – perhaps part of an insurgent's plan to destroy lives and cripple property. If that isn't enough, when the suspects are thrown in prison their allies drive right up to the walls of the jail, break through them and brave petroleum bombs and burning clothes to rescue their comrades. 150 other prisoners break free in the ensuing melee.

Incredible, no? Yet this story took place in the southern Iraqi city of Basra recently. Violence continues to escalate in the breakout's aftermath... just not for the reasons you think.

You see, the drivers of the explosive-laden car were not members of an insurgency group – they were British Special Forces. Their rescuers? British soldiers driving British tanks.

That's right – two members of the British Armed forces disguised as Arab civilians killed a member of the Iraqi police while evading capture. When the people of Basra rightfully refused to turn the murderers over to the British government, per Coalition "mandate," they sent their own men in and released over 100 prisoners in the process.

Winning the hearts and minds, aren't we?

Sadly, this story is really not all that surprising. After hearing countless accounts of using napalm and torture against innocent civilians in addition to the other daily abuses dished out by American overseers, the thought of British scheming seems perfectly reasonable.

So what we have here is a clear instance of a foreign power attempting to fabricate a terrorist attack. Why else would the soldiers be dressed as Arabs if not to frame them? Why have a car laden with explosives if you don't plan to use them for destructive purposes? Iraq is headed towards civil war, and this operation was meant to accelerate the process by killing people and blaming others. Nothing more, nothing less. That the British army staged an over-the-top escape when it could rely on normal diplomatic channels to recover its people proves that.

Such extreme methods highlight the need to keep secrets.

There have been a number of insurgent bombings in Iraq recently. Who really is responsible for the bloodshed and destruction? The only tangible benefit of the bombings is justification for Coalition forces maintaining the peace in Iraq. Who benefits from that? Certainly not the Iraqis – they already believe most suicide bombings are done by the United States to prompt religious war. After reading about this incident, I'm not inclined to disagree.

http://www.thesimon.com/magazine/articles/canon_fodder/0961_fake_terrorism_coalition_best_friend.html

Why is it that we and America wish civil war on Iraq?

2005-09-15T22:22:00.000-04:00

The Independent
Thursday, 15th September 2005, by Robert Fisk

There will not be a civil war in Iraq. There never has been a civil war in Iraq. In 1920, Lloyd George warned of civil war in Iraq if the British Army left. Just as the Americans now threaten the Iraqis with civil war if they leave. As early as 2003, American spokesmen warned that there would be civil war if US forces left.

What the imperial, colonial powers will not learn - let us use their real names - and cannot learn, is that Iraq is not a sectarian state but a tribal nation. Iraqi men and women marry by religion rather than by affiliation.

A year ago, I sat by a doctor whose brother had just been killed by gunmen, killers who, I had no doubt, were Shias enraged that the brother had objected to the building of a Shia mosque at the end of his road. I turned to the brother at the funeral lunch and asked if there would be a civil war in Iraq.
"Why do you and the Americans want us to have a civil war?" he asked. "I am a Sunni married to a Shia woman. "Do you want me to kill my wife?"

There are plenty of journalists and writers and White House spokesmen who would like to threaten Iraq with civil war. But why? Two years ago, the official US spokesman made just such a threat. "Al-Qa’ida’," he said - he meant Sunnis, of course - wanted a civil war. But the Shias declined to provide the Americans with their civil war and Iraq remained unhappily quiescent. Why? Why on earth did they decide not to have a civil war? Because the Imam Ali once told his people that "when you see another man, he is either your brother in religion or he is your brother in humanity".

In Lebanon, it’s easy to symbolise civil war. The Sunnis and Shias fought against the Christian Maronites - the conflict was Maronites versus the rest - and the Americans, Israelis, Syrians and others came in on whichever side they wished. Even now, the US government warns of the dangers of civil war again - as if the Lebanese need it. Alas, the Lebanese have endured a civil war at a cost of 150,000 dead. The Iraqis do not need that terrible conflict. Why do we wish it upon them?

"Some war crimes" and selective HUMANity (Jew-only)

2005-09-15T13:43:00.000-04:00

On "Israel's" relations with "black African countries that were in the process of gaining independence from colonial rule", Avi Shlaim, supposedly the scholar of the "left", writes:

"The fact that Israel was a small and young state, untainted by the brush of colonialism, made it more acceptable to other Third World countries." (The Iron Wall, p. 197)

Mr. Shlaim, the darling of "Israelis" who claim they are leftists (note the difference between claiming one is a leftist and actually being one; not that I am particularly fond of such vague divisions as "leftist" and "rightist"..) believes that "Israel" has not been tainted by the brush of colonialism. Well, he could be right. After all, if the coloniser is the colonised then the coloniser is not really a coloniser... Well, let's give Mr. Shlaim the benefit of the doubt, shall we? Let us suppose that his statement was of an innocent nature rather than a revisionist one.

Then Mr. Shlaim applies simple "Israeli" logic (sic) to the history of other countries in the region (as written by the revisionist "Israeli" scholars [sic]), and comes up with this impressive sentence:

"Israel's links with the Maronite community [of Lebanon] stretched back to the pre-Independence period, and after independence Israel continued to encourage the trend toward Christian separatism and Christian hegemony in Lebanon." (The Iron Wall, p. 342)

Wait wait, wait! Did I read that right? Israel existed before Lebanon's independence? And continued to encourage separatism after Lebanon gained its independence? According to Lebanese records and general knowledge, Lebanon gained independence in... 1943. That's some 4 and a half years before there was even the term "State of Israel"... Surely Mr. Shlaim knows what the hell he's talking about? After all, he's the "Israeli" left's (sic) darling historian (sic).... But no, that's not all. There is still some more. Ready? Read on...

Apparently some war crimes are despicable, inhumane, immoral, and others are... well, "some war crimes". Or so says Mr. Shlaim:

"This was not one of the IDF's more effective military engagements. Most of the PLO fighters fled to the north and the civilian population bore the brunt of the Israeli invasion. Villages were destroyed, some war crimes were committed, and thousands of peaceful citizens fled in panic from their homes." (The Iron Wall, p. 370)

Right, some war crimes were committed... now can we move on? It's high time the past be put behind us... (but surely not the [one and only] Holocaust) Brilliant, Mr. Shlaim. Absolutely brilliant. And of course, cheers to the "Israeli" left (sic)!

Of course, Mr. Shlaim feels that he shouldn't end it then and there. Oh no, he has to go on and insert the mother of all statements:

"Begin did have a spark of conscience and humanity in him, at least when it came to Jewish lives, and the burden of guilt finally overcame him." (The Iron Wall, p. 419)

Pray, Mr. Shlaim, would you be so kind as to tell me how you arrived to the impressive idea that one can have humanity in them, but not towards all human beings.... only towards... Jews. Should that not be called "Jewanity" (or something of the sort, I admit I am not as creative as your superior [oh yes, I am one of the goyim] Jewish kind when it comes to naming and terminology)?

Mr. Shlaim then notes, at the beginning of his 4-page "Operation Grapes of Wrath 101" (in which the author did not condemn - in any way or to any extent, however tiny - the Qana massacre perpetrated against Lebanese civilians. He only writes that "[t]he unwritten rules brokered by the United States in July 1993 stipulated that Hizbullah would not launch missiles into Israel and that Israel would not strike civilian target beyond its security zone." (The Iron Wall, 559).

Of course, Mr. Shlaim makes no Chomsky-esque sarcastic remarks about the ironic statement that "Israel" would not strike civilian targets. Wait, someone has apparently forgotten about the Geneva Conventions.... Who might that be, I wonder? Any chance it's the so-called non-existent "Israeli" left, with the leadership of such "historians" (aka revisionists in "Israeli" dictionaries) as Avi Shlaim?

Oh, and Mr. Shlaim, will you please be kind enough to read up on the difference between the word "Islamic" and "Islamist"? Thanks.

Double Standard and Racism Exposed in Israel

2005-08-31T18:53:00.000-04:00

Israel has exposed itself and how it treats its non-jewish citizens, mainly Palestinian or Arab citizens of Israel. An Israeli terrorist killed four Palestinians who are citizens of Israel and the defence minister says it is not terrorism, only when Jews are attacked, the attack is considered terrorism but when Arab citizens of Israel are victims of Jewish terrorism it is not counted. So to all those zionist who say there is equal rights to all citiznes in Israel, your defence minister has proven you wrong and has proven that Israel is a racist nation that doesn't believe in equal rights and justice for all its citizens.

Arabs lose Israeli terror stipend

Families of Israeli Arabs shot dead on a bus in Galilee are not considered terrorism victims because their killer was Jewish, the defence ministry says.
Under Israeli law, only attacks by "enemies of Israel" are considered terrorism, the ministry said.
The ruling means families of the four victims will not be entitled to the lifelong monthly payments given to Israeli victims of Palestinian attacks.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4198754.stm

The Real Map of the Middle East

2005-08-24T21:40:00.000-04:00

The Whole of Israel is a Settlement

2005-08-24T20:08:00.000-04:00

Now don't get me wrong, i'm very happy that these Jewish european and Jewish american settlers are leaving Gaza, but we cannot allow the media and the zionist propagandist let us believe that this is the only problem and that only these settlements in Gaza and the West Bank are illegal, when in fact the whole of Israel is one big illegal settlement that should be dismantled.

This is a victory to the Palestinian resistance, whether it is the resistance that directly kicked them out or not, the resistance played a major role in this decision.

Many people are happy and shocked that this is happening but the gaza strip is a very small part of historic Palestine. Besides the fact that the media is ignoring that the rest of Israel is also based on settlers and settlements it is protraying these settlers in Gaza with too much sympathy. These settlers should be condemned and criticized for their fanaticism, racism and colonialism. They don't belong in Palestine period not just in the Gaza strip, and that goes for 90% of Israel and Israelis, they are foriegners, mainly european and american and have not one single right to be in Palestine.

2005-08-22T04:23:00.000-04:00

"Do you get that? An Arab is going to be sleeping in my house," yells a female settler at a female soldier.

My comment (mourning): Oh NO! How criminal is that?! Of course, Jews never slept in houses of Arabs who were forced to leave their homes in what was PALESTINE.... But I can't imagine how criminal it would be for an inferior Arab to sleep in a superior Jew's house. And they say there's justice in this world?

Sadness, pain and tears mixed with more than a little racism in Atzmona: one resident approaches the brigade commander, Brigadier General Aviv Kochavi, and requests in a whisper that only a Jewish officer, "God forbid a non-Jew," be allowed to evacuate him from his home. Kochavi does not respond. Atzmona's residents never made such demands when Druze and Bedouin soldiers and officers guarded them. But today, everything is revealed and everything is permitted.

My comment (mourning): Oh yes - the settlers are peaceful, loving people. They are not racist. How can they ever be - they are, after all, Jews, and as we all know Jews can never be racist because of, you know, the (one and only, unique) Holocaust™. So come, my friend, let us mourn the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Gaza Strip, which really ought to be free of those inferior Arabs. Sharon is the devil - not because he was the mass-murderer of Sabra & Shatila - but because he expelled Jews from the land we had rightfully stolen from those inferior Arabs. Now how can we live with the fact that Arabs are going to be sleeping in our homes? How?!? Ahh yes, let me go and kill some more Arab citizens of the state of Israel (instead of the devil Sharon who is the one who initiated the ethnic cleansing of Jews - let me don the yellow Jude star), because they deserve to die; after all, this is a state for Jews not Arabs.

Finally someone says it like it is

2005-08-20T14:40:00.000-04:00

This post is worth reading. I will not say more about it. Read it. I highly recommend the blog and have added it to my links section.

2005-08-20T14:31:00.000-04:00

Never saw an "Israeli" soldier hug a Palestinian or even an "Israeli Arab" before destroying his/her house... THIS is "Israel" - the Middle East's Only Democracy™.

Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh Album

2005-08-19T05:40:00.000-04:00

You can now see some of the photos from my 2-month stay in Armenia & Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) by clicking here.

2005-08-17T02:15:00.000-04:00

Would this moment have come without the Intifada? One could try to spread the propaganda that "Israel" did not withdraw because the losses far outweighed the gains (as was the case with South Lebanon [NOT North Israel, thanks to Hezballah]), but the two instances of armed resistance prove that the zionists/"Israelis" don't understand anything other than force (which is ironically the argument that zionists made about the Arabs). The times, oh how the times have changed...!

On a personal note, I shall be landing at BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL Airport at 11 pm tonight.

"Jews can never be xenophobic"

2005-08-16T06:51:00.000-04:00

Captioned by PalestineToday: Mohammed al-Mahdi, 37, formerly named Michael Sharovsky leads Palestinian prayers at his house in the West Bank city of al-Khalil (Hebron). Mohammed al-Mahdi was born Jewish in Azerbaijan, immigrated to Israel and lived as a Jewish settler in the nearby Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba for nine years. In 1998 he converted to Islam and continued living in the settlement, where the Jewish settlers did not like him living amongst them. Al-Mahdi returned to Azerbaijan as he married a Moslem woman and had four children before returning to al-Khalil this week- Photo by Nayef Hashlamoun.

2005-08-12T07:48:00.000-04:00

A UEFA Cup match between Banants (Armenia) and Dnipro (Ukraine) at the Vazgen Sargsyan (Republican) Stadium in Yerevan, Armenia. Dnipro won the game 4-2. The stadium was packed with fans of Banants as well as non-fans who were cheering for the Armenian side. Contrary to the Mika (Armenia) vs. Mainz (Germany) match, which had a rather visible presence on the part of the Mainz fans, there were very few Ukrainian fans in the stadium (I only saw one, who was sitting in the same section as I, and waving a tiny Ukrainian flag).

The disengagement game

2005-08-11T06:31:00.000-04:00

Sharon and the Roadblockers. The ultimate disengagement game.

2005-08-10T04:52:00.000-04:00

Wild West Bank. The game.

2005-08-09T05:56:00.000-04:00

Zangezur (Syunik region), Armenia

Response to Anne's defenders (or Anne)...

2005-08-07T05:56:00.000-04:00

Uh oh, Anne has decided to ban the IP of the internet cafe I use regularly, so I guess I won't be able to comment on her blog (what a loss - I say I shall mourn it in the same way Anne and her spoiled "settler" brothers & sisters are mourning the handing over of a tiny piece of land to its real owners... I say, let me get out the orange ribbons and all, set up tents, and whine and whine and maybe the world will give me the attention that I crave for...). Wait, scratch that. I didn't say that.

Anyway, dearest Anne, I shall put my response to your defendents on my blog since you decided to ban me in the spirit of the freedom of speech that you and your buddies in Occupied (and soon to be liberated) Gaza and elsewhere in Occupied Palestine (not just the West Bank) seem to be preaching... So here it is:

Rick, yes I did read the word, but that doesn't mean anything given that Anne denies that it was "terrorism". Murder is disgusting and reprehensible, but it doesn't justify substituting the word that applies to this case with a word that reduces its moral implications.

Maurice,
The Jews could've lived in Gaza and anywhere in the West Bank with the Palestinians, except that they chose to throw the majority of Palestinians out of their homes and deny even their very existence. Now they are being treated in the same way. It's backfiring on them. You don't like it? You shouldn't have done it to others, or at least thought about the possibility of it coming back to haunt you in the future. You deserve it all. Gaza shall be Judenrein, and it will be so for a good reason. You defend the idea that we should ask why this Jewish terrorist did what he did yet you don't want to accept any sort of looking into WHY Gaza (and soon the West Bank) shall be Judenrein. "Israel" exists only as a double standard. For me there is no such thing as "Israel" or an "Israeli". Anyone who defends "Israel", its existence or its colonialist past, present, and possibly (?) also future is fair game in my opinion.

2005-08-06T06:03:00.000-04:00

The ultimate crime in "Israel" - being found to be in possession of a banner saying "Let my people be free".

Why he did what he did...

2005-08-05T01:41:00.000-04:00

Jewish TERRORIST kills four "ISRAELIS" who happened to be non-Jewish, in the Middle East's Only Democracy™, and Anne complains that the Jerusalem Post called him a terrorist "without first knowing why he did what he did." I guess we're supposed to mince words, go into the etymology of terms, etc. when a Jewish terrorist murders innocent people. I suppose Anne believes that the targetting of only Arabs by a Jew (who happens to be a member of Kach) happens to be a random act by a man who needs psychiatric / psychological help, rather than an ideologically and/or politically driven one... I guess Anne also forgot to pay enough attention to the word "often" in the definition of terrorism that she provided...

Anne thinks that the disengagement can justify such a terrorist attack, but the monstrous treatment of Palestinians by Jews can never justify terrorist attacks (against both Jews and Arabs in "Israel").

So while Anne goes on yet another round of yelling "anti-Semitism!", allow me to point out that while this Jewish terrorist's and other Jewish terrorists' (e.g. Baruch Goldstein, the hero of many Jews, if I may add) targets were solely Arabs/Palestinians/Muslims and therefore motivated by intense racism and xenophobia, Palestinian suicide bombings have targeted all sorts of people and while murderous, cannot be identified as specifically "anti-Semitic". They are driven by ideology not by racism, unlike those of Jewish terrorists we have seen so far.

And allow me to copy and paste my comment on Anne's blog before she deletes it:

Oh so when a Jewish TERRORIST kills innocent Arabs (if they exist, in your
books) he must've had a good reason and we should sympathize with whatever
reasons he had, but when an Arab terrorist kills innocent Jews (apparently in
your book Jews are always innocent, even the "terrorist" kind..) there is no
questioning that he was an anti-Semite, hateful, bloodthirsty terrorist... I
see. I know you won't like this comment and will probably delete it. But it goes to show the moral low you and your kind have attained.

Peace in Jerusalem indeed. But not with the existence of your (and yours) kind, dearest Anne. Your kind is only good at writing the following on tombstones of Jewish terrorists: "Here lies the saint, [insert name here], blessed be the memory of the righteous and holy man, may the Lord avenge his blood, who devoted his soul to the Jews, Jewish religion and Jewish land. His hands are innocent and his heart is pure. He was killed as a martyr of God on the [insert date here]."

I wonder if OneFamily Fund will list the victims on its website, or the Jerusalem Post on its tribute page for victims of terror, for that matter... I guess we shall see.

2005-08-04T06:18:00.000-04:00

Just as you had thought there couldn't be more things to laugh at Lebanon and the Lebanese for, you come across a party that calls itself the "Aramaic Democratic Organization". These people are actually not joking. You would want to take my word for it.

Can you see the irony?

2005-08-03T07:21:00.000-04:00

The solution according to "Israel"

2005-07-28T02:37:00.000-04:00

The "poor Jewish state in a sea of Muslims" has made a significant discovery: the key to Palestinian democracy is banning Hamas from taking part in elections.

Meet "the only democracy in the Middle East."

As a sidenote, you might find the following excerpt from Turkish Foreign Policy in an Age of Uncertainty of interest: "Israel strongly supported Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh war and relations have warmed considerably since then. Cooperation in the intelligence field has intensified and there are some indications that Israel may have supplied arms to Azerbaijan" (119).

The last sentence is ironic, given Azerbaijan's constant whining about possible Russian arms supplies to Armenia.

Madame loves Geagea

2005-07-27T08:40:00.000-04:00

I had to post this. It was too hilarious not to be posted.

Credit goes to Eve.

2005-07-27T08:10:00.000-04:00

غدا إنفجار جديد
"Tomorrow another explosion..."

The question is: where?

Photo: Al Balad Daily
Idea: Dan Marsden

2005-07-26T06:10:00.000-04:00

My thoughts exactly.

Websites worth checking out

2005-07-22T05:25:00.000-04:00

I've been too busy to post a long (or rather, any) piece of comment on the current situation in Palestine and "Israel", despite the fact that the hysteria around the disengagement is very tempting to comment on. But I do have something for you (and it might not be much, as it's quite possible that you've seen it before) - some interesting links:

Al-Nakba (PNA)
PLO Negotiations Affairs Department
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PNA)
Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the UN
Badil - Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights
Palestinian Curriculum Development Center (Ministry of Higher Education)

Do check out the textbook section on the curriculum development website. For those of you who know how to read Arabic, check out this grade 9 history textbook; pay special attention to the material on pages 72-76 of the book (78-82 in the e-book), or this grade 10 history textbook (pages 60-64), then let me know if you think there is any "incitement" in it.

The ironies in Lebanon continue to baffle me

2005-07-13T05:03:00.000-04:00

You only have to read this (among others) to see what I mean.

So yes, "Israel" was asked to help in the Hariri "probe". And what was the justification? Here it is: "You would want to know who crossed the borders and so you would ask neighboring countries what their customs records show."

The U.S ambassador to the UN would also argue that it makes sense to ask Al Qaida for information as to who crossed the Afghanistan borders, right?

Right. I am impressed by the logic that abounds in this region, which - if I may add - is all the more democratic after the U.S liberated Iraqis....

As a sidenote, I might be starting to work on a new dictionary... the Zionist-Lebanese Dictionary. I believe my first entry would be "Lebanese Refugees in Israel". If you don't know what I'm talking about, you might want to read more about the SLA. Actually, SLA would itself be a separate entry in that dictionary. It's actually the NIA (North Israel Army)...

Loving the land

2005-07-07T04:44:00.000-04:00

Can't you tell how much they (i.e. those oh-so-innocent "settlers") love the "historically Jewish" land? I am happy to announce that my Zionist-English Dictionary now has more than a 1000 entries.

On another note, "The Widening Gap Between Rhetoric and Reality in EU Policy Towards the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict" is an interesting read.

If you're not interested in the Karabakh conflict, you don't have to read the rest of this entry. If you are, you might be interested in a policy brief on the June 19 Karabakh elections that I finished writing yesterday (for a NGO that does policy research, analysis, and recommendations here in Armenia):

Conflict of Interest

On the occasion of the parliamentary elections in the self-declared Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, which were held on June 19, 2005, yet another round of political meddling and bickering was in the works, with statements from leaders of countries - in the region as well as outside it - that have an interest in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, either literally or figuratively. The elections were not only monitored by governments, but also non-governmental organizations and media personnel from different countries, including ones that are notorious for keeping mum on violations of the rights of ethnic minorities in their respective countries. Herein lay the problem: it is not in the roots of the conflict per se, but in the reasons for the stalemate on its resolution. One could argue that the entire region is kept hostage to the struggle for power and worldwide control raging between superpowers. Thus, arguing that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is simply regional in nature is a gross underestimation of the manner in which one conflict results in the perpetuation of another. The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the outbursts on the recent elections are but one example in a large bag of conflicts, one of the most significant of which is the ongoing battle for Palestine. Were the elections in Nagorno-Karabakh fair and free? The Central Electoral Commission of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh affirms that this was indeed the case, as do representatives of NGOs who monitored the elections. The more important question, however, is whether or not the results of the elections will favor the prospects for the settlement of the conflict and peace in the long run. It seems that the reality of the situation has been lost on the many NGOs and governments that have shown interest in the elections, be it positively or negatively.

Democratic Elections, and then?

An argument has been circulating in the geopolitical realm that given the reality of democratic elections in Nagorno-Karabakh there should be renewed hope for the peaceful settlement of the conflict. However, little has been said about the press release issued by the Foreign Ministry of Russia, which aimed to show Russia’s support for “Azerbaijan’s territorial wholeness”, or the statement issued by the Turkish Foreign Ministry, terming the “elections held by Armenians” in “occupied” Nagorno-Karabakh “illegal”, or even more importantly the rejection of the idea of holding elections by the Central Election Commission of the Republic of Azerbaijan. What, then, is the implication of these “democratic elections”? Surely democracy is desirable and beneficial for citizens of any state (be it internationally recognized or not), but neither the observers of the elections who talked about the positive effects of the latter on the settlement of the conflict, nor the United States and Russia have so far elaborated on what the next step should be for the Republics of Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan. It is therefore safe to conclude that while the former group is unable to find any solutions and has decided to be simply optimistic about the future, the two superpowers have decided that it is in their respective interests to prevent any settlement to the conflict in the near future.

“A Revolution a Day Keeps Russia Away”

To carry on with the game, the United States has introduced a new approach: changing regimes by engineering revolutions and attempting to shift loyalties by giving military “aid” to the three republics in the South Caucasus. Meanwhile, Russia has found itself on the losing end and has been trying to consolidate its grip on Armenia and Azerbaijan – Georgia being out of the picture as a result of the “Rose Revolution” – by playing the role of the parent who is genuinely interested in the settlement of the conflict between his/her two children, and therefore makes statements that are sometimes supportive of one (Armenians) and at other times of the other (Azerbaijanis). While the United States has taken a daring approach, Russia’s stance has been significantly reserved and careful, for fear of upsetting the delicate “balance” and further pushing Armenia and Azerbaijan onto the lap of its arch-enemy. And while the two superpowers talk about their allegedly genuine interest in democracy and freedom, settlement of conflicts and peace in the region, we are left wondering what color the next revolution will be, which country it will hit first, how it will affect the region, and whether or not there will be any real revolutions to counter the world order imposed by the United States and to a smaller extent Russia. Real democracy is not simply about holding elections; it is about the real will of the people, untainted by external pressures and never bowing to the interests of groups that are in no way connected to the country (and by extension region) in question. It is a self and even regionally-interested democracy that Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Nagorno-Karabakh need, rather than one that is defined by the standards set by superpowers or the pressures of countries that boast of influential lobbying bodies (e.g. Israel and its lobbying services for the denial of the Armenian Genocide). It will remain to be seen whether the elections in Nagorno-Karabakh are absolutely (rather than relatively) democratic, and if so how they will impact the peace process.

The Final Battle: Propaganda versus Realism

It is important to note that while the elected individuals might represent the will of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, it does not follow that the program for peaceful settlement would coincide with the demands of the government of Azerbaijan, even if the latter were also democratically elected. Elections are not a guarantee for peace per se. The media outlets that argue to the contrary must realize that their deception is detrimental to the very process that they claim to show genuine interest in. Propaganda that aims to mislead the public is never the first step in the settlement of any conflict. It is a step or two in the opposite direction, as it was and still is in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The first and healthy step is to inject a dose of realism into the equation and hope that it would dispel the myths plaguing the settlement process. The heart of the case is whether or not the two sides of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict (Armenians and Azerbaijanis) are willing to receive this antidote. That, too, remains to be seen.

Where were your Grandparents born?

2005-07-06T23:08:00.000-04:00

Where were your Grandparents born?
By Ayman El-Sayed

Many people do not know who the Palestinian people really are, nor who are what they refer to as "Israelis." In fact, it seems that most people believe that the colonialists and settlers in Palestine have "always been there," and that Israelis are indigenous to the land of Palestine. This article aims to shed light upon the obscured history and demographics of Occupied Palestine, or the colonial apartheid state of Israel.

Demographics - the characteristics of a population - is an important issue both for Palestinians, the indigenous inhabitants of Palestine, and for the Zionists who have sought to eradicate Palestinian Arab identity and existence from Palestine. The indigenous people of the land of Palestine are the Palestinians, while the majority of Israeli citizens are from Europe, the United States and other countries outside Palestine; the majority of the people who constitute the Israeli people and state are foreign to Palestine, and came to Palestine as colonizers of indigenous Palestinian land. Like the French colonizers of Algeria, and the British colonizers of India, they are European colonialists who have no inherent "right" to be there, occupying Palestinian land.

This issue is too infrequently addressed and researched despite its importance. Recognition of the indigenous stature and rights of the Palestinian people is a key point in rejecting the dangerous and defeatist "two-state solution," and in rejecting the so-called "right" of Israel to exist as a state on stolen Palestinian land.

While some "Israeli" Jews in Palestine today migrated to Palestine from other Arab countries and a small minority of Jews lived in Palestine amongst the other Arab Palestinians long before the advent of Zionism, most "Israeli" Jews in Palestine today are not indigenous to the land of Palestine, nor descendants of indigenous Palestinians.

In fact, the majority come from Europe or the United States, and it is these who dominate the Zionist political arena.

According to the CIA World Fact Book, the ethnic group breakdown of the Zionist state is as follows:

"Jewish 80.1% (Europe/America-born 32.1%, Israel-born 20.8%, Africa-born 14.6%, Asia-born 12.6%), non-Jewish 19.9% (mostly Arab)."

The majority are European- or American-born; even the 20.8% designated as "Israel-born" include a large number of those who are descendants of the earlier Zionist colonial settlers in Palestine - who also were not born in Palestine and are not indigenous to Palestine. The rest were also born outside of Palestine in Asia and North Africa; they as well as European Jews have no "right" on the basis of religion or ethnicity to settle in Palestine, and occupy Palestinian land.

According to About.com's statistics on the Zionist state, immigration (or, more accurately, colonization), is the basis of the "Israeli" population:

"Since the nation was formed a total of 2,894,094 people immigrated to Israel: 454,100 from Asia, 519,700 from Africa, 1,761,196 from Europe and 258,000 from America."

Again, the vast majority come from Europe. Jews who are not of European descent also face discrimination in Israel; the non-European Jewish communities have had revolts and protests against the Israeli state, which is mostly dominated by Ashkenazi European Jews.

According to the MSN Encarta Encyclopedia:

"The two main groupings of Jews are Ashkenazim and Sephardim. The Ashkenazim, whose tradition was centered in Germany in the Middle Ages, now include Jews of Central and Eastern European origin. The Sephardim, whose tradition grew in Spain in the Middle Ages, now include Jews with ancestry from the Middle East, North Africa, and the Mediterranean region. Historically the groups differ in religious rite, pronunciation of Hebrew, and social customs. Ashkenazic Jews, who formed a majority at the time of Israeli independence, continue to dominate political life as well as the upper levels of employment and education. Sephardic Jews immigrated rapidly to Israel in the decades after independence. The new state's lack of resources to handle this flood, combined with cultural differences between the new immigrants and the Ashkenazic establishment, resulted in separate and usually poorer Sephardic communities. The Sephardim continue to struggle for greater economic and political influence."

This indicates the domination of Ashkenazi European Jews in political life - a domination that extends not only to discrimination and oppression targeting the Palestinian people, but also against non-European Jews.

However, this discrimination recedes in comparison to the oppression and suffering of the Palestinian people and the occupation of Palestinian land.

According to Noam Chomsky in Safundi, the Journal of South African and American Comparative Studies, the majority of the Jews that lived in Palestine before the creation of the state of Israel were anti-Zionist:

"Well, there was a small Jewish community that was mostly anti-Zionist. There was a traditional Orthodox Jewish community in Jerusalem and a few other places, but before the European settlers started coming in it was strongly anti-Zionist, and their descendants are still anti-Zionist. This is by now a marginal, small group. They were Orthodox Jews who wanted to pray in Jerusalem, and they even called on Jordan to take over Jerusalem again so they could have religious freedom, which they feel they don't have under Israel. But they are a separate story, you know. That's also not one-hundred percent of them. There was a pro-Zionist element among them, too, but the majority of them—before what's called the Aliyah, meaning "rising to the land," the arrival of Europeans—were anti-Zionist."

Even the Jewish Virtual Library, proud Zionists, exhibit population statistics that clearly demonstrate that the Palestinian Arab people were a huge majority of the population until they were massacred and expelled by European Zionists in 1948.

Before 1947, Jews owned less than 10% of the land of Palestine; despite that, the United Nations partition plan, passed in that year, sought to designate 55% of Palestine as a "Jewish state." Most of these colonial settlers are European, and have no right to claim Palestine as their country; even those Jews from Arab countries and North Africa who entered Palestine as occupiers have no right to claim Palestine as their own, at the expense of the indigenous Palestinians.

In contrast, the Palestinian people are indigenous to Palestine; they do not come from Europe, America, North Africa or other Arab countries. They were expelled from their land by European Jews, the colonial settlers who created the state of Israel. The Palestinians should be the ones who have a state on the land of Palestine, and the Jews should be citizens of that state. Whatever land that Jews owned before 1948 is rightfully theirs, and the land and property that Palestinians owned before 1948 is rightfully Palestinian.

It should be returned - but the Israeli state is forcing the Palestinians to struggle to get it back by force. The Palestinian people do not want to be fighting right now; they want to work, make money, build homes, educate their children and have food on the table like everyone else - but they are the victims of Zionism and the creation of the state of Israel, a crime that continues today.

The aims of the Zionist colonial settler project could not be achieved merely by owning the land that had been purchased prior to 1948. Instead, they kicked out the Palestinians; they needed to steal the land and forcibly get rid of the Palestinians in order to accomplish their goals. The Zionist leaders knew what they were doing and were, at times, frank in their admissions of their goals and methods.

According to Chomsky in his book "The Fateful Triangle", the future Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, was one who spoke frankly:

"In 1936-9, the Palestinian Arabs attempted a Nationalist revolt…David Ben-Gurion, eminently a realist, recognized its nature. In internal discussion, he noted that 'in our political argument abroad, we minimize Arab opposition to us,' but he urged, 'let us not ignore the truth among ourselves.' The truth was that 'politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves… The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country, while we are still outside'… The revolt was crushed by the British, with considerable brutality."

However, it is rarely necessary to research deeply in order to realize who is indigenous to the land and who is not. In fact, it is often very simple. Go to any Palestinian, anywhere in the world, in Palestine or in exile, and ask them where their grandparents were born; they will tell you the village or area in Palestine.
Do the same to the Israelis; ask any Israeli where their grandparents were born, and the vast majority will tell you - Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Germany, and America, anywhere but Palestine.

The so-called "Israelis," then, are mostly European; not only were their grandparents born in Europe, many of today's "Israelis" were also born in Europe themselves. Over 1 million Europeans from the former Soviet Union alone have settled in Palestine in the fifteen years since the end of the Soviet Union, while Palestinians who were forcibly expelled from their land by European Zionist settlers are denied the right to return to their homes, and the occupation of Palestine continues until today.

The state of Israel has no right to exist on stolen Palestinian land. The only solution to the conflict is to allow the Palestinians who were expelled from Palestine to return to their homes and properties, which are rightfully theirs, and to allow the indigenous Palestinian people to build a state in all of historic Palestine where those Jews who live there now can be citizens of this Palestinian state, enjoying equal rights. Whoever is unwilling to recognize the rights of the Palestinian people to return and to self-determination can leave and return to the land of their grandparents.

Those who are unwilling to accept justice should leave Palestine; they are not indigenous, they are foreign colonizers - even those who claim to not intend to be colonizers and settlers still, in reality, are exactly that. To suit the interests of justice and reduce the possibility of conflict for centuries to come, these colonizers must accept the rights of Palestinians to their land. It is deeply unfair that any Jew, anywhere in the world, can become a citizen of Israel and make a claim to Palestinian land - while the millions of Palestinian refugees in exile are not allowed to return, and the Palestinians who live in Palestine are abused, murdered, tortured, occupied, discriminated against, denied statehood, denied an identity and denied equal rights. It is up to the indigenous Palestinian people to determine the future of Palestine's European settlers, for them to return to the nations from which they came, or to integrate them into one Palestinian state.

NGOs in Armenia.

2005-07-05T07:56:00.000-04:00

I'm finally able to update. I am alive, although not doing as great as I could be. I've been very busy with work. I'm working with two NGOs here in Yerevan (NGOs have a rather influential presence here, and I'm starting to think that starting one in Lebanon would be a good idea). The first focuses on regional development and policy-building and collaborates with NGOs in Georgia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan. I will be meeting with people in the government, journalists, and analysts, and writing policy briefs for the center. I have a meeting with Vartan Oskanian on Thursday as well. If you have any questions that you would like me to ask him, feel free to post here no later than Thursday morning, and I will try to forward them to him. The other NGO that I am working with focuses more on Armenian society and the impact of honesty on the political and economic life in the country. I will be in Artsakh (Karabakh) over the weekend. That's all for now.

Good news, but how good is it really?

2005-06-28T02:31:00.000-04:00

Palestinians born in Lebanon will finally be able to seek employment - but not in professional fields... I guess the "opposition" has changed its long-held position and prefers Palestinian workers to... Syrian ones. Because the Lebanese are simply too good to work as garbage-collectors and construction workers... I guess I should also thank Bush & co. for pushing their agenda (and one wonders how that agenda was pushed...) of settling the Palestinians in Lebanon rather than having them return to Palestine. I don't know if Palestinians should laugh or cry... I guess they could smile for now.

Longer Update from/on Armenia

2005-06-22T01:32:00.000-04:00

I haven’t been following up on the situation in the ME lately (although I did read about the assassination of George Hawi and the train crash in “Israel”), but I have decided to post on the situation (economic and otherwise) in Armenia. My first impressions were definitely NOT good. When I landed at Zvartnots Airport I was given a lot of trouble for something that made no sense: apparently they didn't like the fact that my passport had an "old" picture of me (the picture was taken some 6 years ago, and the expiry date of the passport was extended twice [legally of course]). The passport expires in July 2006, which is a good year away from now. The airport official asked me about the picture and I told him the passport was valid, and that I didn't see what the problem was (I was given U.S and Canadian visas with that photo...). He then asked me why I hadn't changed the picture on the passport. From there on, you get the picture. After much trouble and waiting for more than an hour, with no clue who took my passport and where it was taken, I was given a 21-day visa (another note: I got a 2-year U.S visa with that same picture...) which is a standard (but also stupid) procedure, thanks in no small part to 2 Russian military women deployed in the airport. Now, the first impression was NOT good, I can tell you. Not good at all. The airport was quite old and small and confusing, but I managed to find my way out, and miraculously didn't have my luggage opened. My guess is that I was given so much trouble because they saw I had Canadian and U.S visas, and figured that if they gave me enough trouble I'd just give them money... Or maybe it was my accent - I don't know. But I was the only one who was held for that long, although there was also another woman who was questioned about her photo and was given her passport back without any delays...

Going on to the economic situation in Yerevan, it's not as bad as people think. Houses and apartments are usually old, but a significant majority of the people always dresses well, goes to the opera (which is mighty cheap, I must add!), theatres, cafes, etc. To be sure there is a lot of poverty in the city, but it's not too visible except in certain areas. I get the feeling that most of those who have lived through the Soviet regime and survived the tough years following the independence, although keenly interested in the "outside" world (e.g. USA, Canada, UK, France, etc.), prefer to live in the city/country if economic and other conditions allow them to. In fact, one thing that struck me as very interesting was the questions they asked to diasporan Armenians and foreigners. For example, I met a man from Kotayk a few days ago who asked me where I was from, and when I said Lebanon, his face immediately brightened up and he said, "so you took part in the revolution?" The way people talk about revolution here is quite indicative of their aspirations. They want to remain in Yerevan but they would like to get rid of the corrupt government and for once have a government that is sincerely interested in the welfare of its citizens. Sure they are fooled by the propaganda of "revolutions" going on around them, but I think that their want for a revolution stems from the utter need for change in the country. The country has adapted to the post-Soviet era quite well I must say, and I must give some of the credit to diasporan Armenian volunteers and repatriates (most of whom are from the Middle East). There is surely a lot to be changed, but I was expecting much less, and was actually impressed.

Most people converse in Armenian, as opposed to Russian, which I am told was used a lot in day-to-day dealings in the Soviet era. The level of knowledge of English needs a lot of improvement: most people don't know English, some people are at an intermediate level, and a very low number (mainly those who attend the American University of Armenia) are quite fluent. I must admit, though, that I was not too impressed by the attitude of locals towards speakers of Western Armenian (the dialect that I use). Yesterday I went to an Advanced course in Eastern Armenian, and I was told that the spelling and grammar I used were WRONG. Mind you, Western Armenian has a much more correct spelling than Eastern Armenian does, and at some points it is also cleaner in the spheres of grammar and vocab. I don't want to get into a childish back-and-forth "debate" about which came first and which is more correct, but let's just say that I was not impressed when I was told I was WRONG (as opposed to, say, "that's how WE say/write it). Another interesting aspect of Yerevan is transportation. The metro (subway) system is pretty awesome (metro stations have pretty artistic designs I must add! They're not your regular Toronto subway stations) and there are also minibuses, which are very crowded. I would prefer to take the metro, except that my location doesn't favour that option, so I am obliged to take the minibuses, which are quite fun when you get used to them. People in the minibuses are quite nice and thoughtful of others (most people share their seats so that others wouldn't get tired because of standing up in an awkward position for so long. I wonder why they don't use bigger buses, but that's for me to discover (hopefully soon). I haven't started full-time work yet, so I've had the chance to do some walking-discovering around the city. Yesterday I went to a food store called "Aleppo". The owner is a repatriate from Aleppo, and his store had everything from the A to Z of Aleppo food products (olives, olive oil, cheese, etc.).

Locals are generally VERY helpful and hospitable. I've stopped a few people on the street and asked them for directions in broken Eastern Armenian (I don't like speaking Western Armenian around here for some odd reason) and they've been quite understanding and courteous.

Last but not least, I would like to share a few photos:

The Opera house

View from a hill in Khor Virab

Khor Virab Monastery

Republic Square, Armenia

2005-06-20T06:07:00.000-04:00

Things are great here in Armenia. Just wanted to do a quick update with a photo.

Armenia

2005-06-15T12:34:00.000-04:00

I'm leaving for Armenia in a few hour's time. I will be posting as much as I can from there, most probably less about the situation in Lebanon and more about the situation in the Caucasus (and of course "Israel's" latest violations of human rights). On the good side, the interview went so great that I was given the job immediately (of course, I will be starting upon my arrival). So I will have a steady income which can help me pay for my grad studies - that's if I am accepted to LAU (which I have my doubts about, as it doesn't seem to be any different from AUB).

I'm off for now.

Mount Lebanon

2005-06-11T15:36:00.000-04:00

It's official: Mount Lebanon has gone totally mad. I am serious. As for me, I'll be leaving the country on Wednesday, thank goodness. I hope to receive a job contract on Wednesday (I have a meeting / "job interview" just hours before my scheduled flight). I've added some pictures of Lebanon to my gallery. You can check it out here. More pics to come before I leave the country.

Did I say I'm glad I'm leaving the country temporarily? I'm quite sick of seeing all those morons tearing each other apart just for a freaking seat in the parliament. That's right - Aoun is included on that list. I'm only sad my flight wasn't a week earlier.

Yup, that's an accurate picture of me, given the hysteria surrounding the selections in Mount Lebanon.

Quote of the day

2005-06-10T02:40:00.000-04:00

"Lebanon is, at last, free of Israeli, and now Syrian, occupation but not yet of Syrian murderers, as last week's assassination of anti-Syrian journalist Samir Kassir showed." - Toronto Star, June 9, 2005

I guess I missed something.

Hariri's House

2005-06-07T08:41:00.000-04:00

Today I went to LAU (Lebanese American University) to pick up an application for graduate studies (M.A in International Affairs) and talk with the Director of Admissions. Now I do know the area around AUB, but I didn't know where exactly LAU's Beirut campus was located, so I had to ask around. Below is an excerpt from a conversation I had:

Me: Hey, could you tell me how to get to LAU?
Man: You know where martyr Rafik Hariri's house is, right?
Me: Umm, no I don't...
Man: What do you mean you don't?
Me: I mean I don't know where Hariri's house is.
Man: Are you kidding me?
Me: What do you mean?
Man: You really don't know where his house is?
Me: OK look mister, I don't care who Hariri is, let alone where his house is. Now are you going to tell me where LAU is located, other than in relation to Hariri's house?

Uhuh.

By the way, today someone asked me if the orange colour on my blog had anything to do with Aoun's LFPM. I didn't know Aoun had a monopoly on orange. (Orange is incidentally ?? also the colour that anti-"disengagement" "activisits" in "Israel" use).

More on elections

2005-06-04T15:27:00.000-04:00

Just a quick update. I know things have been rather slow on this blog lately; I hope I'm not boring you to death with my silence. I have been following the news on TV and it's even more boring than it seems. One thing I can say, though, is that Hezballah made a big mistake by allying itself with Hariri, Inc and Walid beik. It now seems very clear that the Hariri assassination affair and all that followed it was a project of regime change most probably launched by none other than USA. Hariri, Inc, Walid beik, & co are very much aware of this. In fact, I am surprised that they have taken such a stance, being the most outspoken "opposition" "leaders" if there was ever such a thing as leadership there. Politics is a dirty career, but I hadn't imagined it to be an arrogant one in its low attitude of the general population's ability to perceive the significance of events around them. In fact, the very reason for the declining support for the so-called "opposition" (now even more "so-called" than ever before) is that the people have been left behind by the politicians (who they believed would realise the dream of a "new Lebanon") in such a degrading way that they have finally come out against family continuity in politics as practised by the Hariri, Jumblatt, Gemayel, etc. clans. Now you will say that these are fair elections and that Hariri's folks won fair and square, but it is not so. In fact, one clear pointer to the unfairness of these allegedly "internationally monitored" elections is the fact that the Ministry of Interior Affairs has ~~randomly~~ decided to move the poll centers in Bourj Hammoud (which is mostly populated by Armenians - supporters of the Tashnag party that boycotted the elections in Beirut, that is) elsewhere. I believe - and feel free to correct me on that one - that we are still awaiting an outburst by the international "monitors" of the elections about this clear violation of electoral rules.

Wake me up when the monitors say something about Bourj Hammoud.

الانسحابات اللبنانية

2005-05-29T12:39:00.000-04:00

Welcome to internationally-"supervised" "democracy"... in Lebanon. I shall call it الانسحابات اللبنانية or the Lebanese... withdrawals. The Tashnags (having more than 80% of popular support among Armenians) have boycotted the elections, and so has war criminal and hypocrite Michel Aoun. Reason: Both oppose selections by the Hariri circus (Sa'adeddine being the leading clown). Voter turnout has been very poor all day long, with predominantly "Sunni areas" registering higher percentages (maximum being 44% at Mazra'a), while "Christian areas" registered 17% at most, with some areas like Mdawar having as low as 4% turnout. And of course, Sa'adeddine, who has absolutely no ability whatsoever to understand what political talk is all about, claims the elections are "very fair" and "very democratic because there are international monitors". This was in an interview with a BBC correspondent. Sa'adeddine, the spoiled son of Rafik Hariri who had no clue about politics suddenly jumped onto the stage and is now being called "The Opposition Leader". And I am laughing out loud at this so-called "opposition". Allow me to say, ha-ha-ha-ha! Democracy - the Hariri / Saudi / U.S way! I guess the good news is, "Israel" is no more "the Middle East's ONLY democracy". Congratulations, Lebanon, on the 28% voter turnout in Beirut! You may now be called "the Middle East's second democracy".

And allow me to say one more time: Gibran Tuweini makes me want to throw up.
Hey, I voted too! I voted that rollerblading was much more productive than casting a ballot.

Finally in Lebanon

2005-05-27T12:58:00.000-04:00

Sorry for not posting anything these past 2 days. I was recovering from jetlag yesterday and today. But I arrived at BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT in one piece, so that's good. :P I have some pics, but I took them while in the car and the window wasn't exactly clean. I will take more pics soon, upload them, and post a link to the gallery.

Did I say MEA (Middle East Airlines) sucks big time? My flight was with Air France, but my connection flight to Beirut was operated by the MEA. Oh, and kudos to the airport personnel (passport checking) at BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, they really did their jobs quickly and spared newly arrived passengers (at least me!) some major pain in the arse that we are routinely honoured with when traveling to the States. This has been my best flight ever, even though I literally had to run to my gate at Charles de Gaulle to reach my flight in time...

What can I say... Lebanon is.. unchanged. Same old, same old. Beautiful as ever, the gap between the rich and the poor even bigger, though. On the trip from the airport, passing by the refugee camps was a grim reminder of the injustice that the majority of Lebanese and "aliens" live through, and the vain luxuries that the minority of rich, spoiled Lebanese blindly and stupidly enjoy. I had the honour to see it all in person. I am very dismayed at what I'm seeing in Lebanon, and even though I'm glad I'm back, every minute since my landing has been painful. It's sad, I tell you. Very sad. But today for the first time in my life, I was in West Beirut (never mind the jetlag! :P ) on a Friday, and I saw Muslim Lebanese going to prayers, and heard the verses (? or is that call to prayer?) from the Qur'an being recited from the top of the mosques. It was amazing to tell you the truth. I mean, I HAVE heard it before in Lebanon, but I've never done so in West Beirut, never done so without having my mom tell me that I'm not supposed to go to West Beirut because there are "too many Muslims there" (I guess it's OK when there are "too many Christians"...). I passed by the site of Hariri's assassination. I also went to my childhood school in East Beirut, saw my elementary teachers there (who amazingly did remember me - I was either too quiet or too quarrelsome), went to AUB to check on my admission stats (but with no luck, since they were on lunch break). It was a good day. Given that I woke up at 3 am anyway. Hah. My hours are pretty screwed at the moment, but I didn't (and don't) care one bit about that. I was very restless; I HAD to get out and do something.

Surprisingly, I didn't feel much when I landed at Beirut Int'l Airport. I was thinking I might get really upset (for many a reason), but I didn't feel anything. Maybe I just didn't have the time to think about it. After all, I had too many luggages to think about. :)

Walla, I'm happy, but not as happy as I thought I'd be. And I'm upset, but not as upset as I thought I'd be - well, at least not about the things I thought I'd be upset about.

I am staying at our condo at the moment. I finally got my hands on my dad's camera - actually, make that plural - he also has a USSR-make Zenith camera (my mom bought it for him when she was in Moscow). ;) I also got my hands on 2 ancient books/scripts. One is more than 1000 years old. It belongs to my family - or it came into my family's possession at some point in time in the past 200 years. It's amazing I tell you. Simply amazing. The other one is something like 400 years old. I really don't know anything about how to maintain them, so I might give them to a museum for free or sell it (if it brings in a considerable sum - although I'm very much reluctant to sell items that belong to my family, especially over the course of so many years). I HAVE taken photos of those. I had once posted about one of the books on my other online journal. One is a prayer book by Krikor Naregatsi. It's rather big and heavy, with black leather cover, which has round circles on it. Those circles have a story to them. They were once filled with gold. You see, those books survived the Armenian Genocide. But the gold was taken out by the mercenaries who perpetrated the massacres.

The other book (the 1000-year-old one) was kept in a HONEY JAR because whatever the mercenaries could lay their hand on they would destroy or steal immediately. In fact, some PEOPLE survived that way too.

Will update soon. Did I say that dial-up here simply costs too much (and wireless of course has to be "for those who can afford it" i.e. the rich, because they want to feel... unique. After all, that's the only thing that gives meaning to their otherwise miserable lives and ideologies - if they have any. "Israelis" ring a bell?)?!?!? Well, the phone line does, not the ISP.

And yes, I have decided against voting on Sunday.

Leaving in an hour

2005-05-25T14:04:00.000-04:00

I'm leaving for Lester B. Pearson Int'l Airport in an hour's time. I will be arriving at BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT at 3:45 pm (GMT +2) on Thursday. Anyone who wants to welcome me to Beirut after 4 years' absence, feel free to do so at BIA. I will be the geeky guy with a laptop. OK, no eyeglasses YET, but I'm working on it.

BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, here I come!

2005-05-23T23:28:00.000-04:00

Hezballah is the only militia in Lebanon. Yup. Look at 'em, they're just... scouts for Christ's sake! One person killed in "clashes" between Phalange and SSNP. I guess this is the "free" Lebanon Bush & co. were dreaming of - where Phalangist fascists can go around killing people without being punished.

Update

2005-05-21T16:11:00.000-04:00

OK, just a quick update - I haven't been posting lately because I was getting ready for my flight (actually, more like a complete move) to Lebanon. To add to that, I am having a hard time with an injury and can't walk at the moment (hopefully nothing permanent). I will try to update before I leave for Lebanon.

Loyalty check

2005-05-18T17:17:00.000-04:00

American Jews in Jerusalem demand that traitor Jonathan Pollard be "freed". Those same people did not demonstrate when Mordechai Vanunu was imprisoned. So where exactly is "American Jews' " loyalty?

And of course, USA should forget about its own interests and follow those of its ~~ally~~ enemy. Yup. And surely USA "owes" "Israel" millions of dollars in "development aid" for the Negev and the Galilee. USA also "owes" "Israel" a cover-up on the USS Liberty terrorist case. After all, "Israel" is supposed to be the one that matters (center of the world?). Even for USA.

A trumped up card

2005-05-13T01:22:00.000-04:00

There is an article on the Jewish so-called refugees from Arab countries. It's worth checking it out. Here's why:

"In Iraq, Jews owned 100,000 square kilometers of land. Israel itself is only 20,000 square kilometers. How much land could the Palestinians have left behind?"

No kidding???? 100,000 sq km??! Does the interviewee know how much of Iraq that is? 23%. So what "professor" Heskel Haddad is saying is that 150,000 Jews (source: Jewish Virtual Library), that's 3% of the population of Iraq in 1948, owned 23% of the country?

Now let's make some simple calculations. Let's take a hypothetical example: if Jews comprised 66% of the population (which is the % of Palestinians living in Palestine in 1947) and assuming that the same 3%:23% ratio is to be maintained, then the Jews would have owned... 506% of Iraq. Of course, we also have to keep in mind that if the Jewish population were as high as 66% the property-ownership rate might have dropped, but even if the numbers are lowered, Jews would still have ownership of pretty much the entire country. The numbers are therefore impossible. Yes many Iraqi Jews had succcessful businesses, but they were nowhere close to being, all of them, millionaires, which is what is required if we are to arrive at a 3%:23% population:ownership ratio.

"This is one of Israel's best trump cards, and it must not be wasted", concludes "professor" Haddad. My, my, and what a trumped up (sic) card it is!

"Freedom-lovers" censor

2005-05-13T00:52:00.000-04:00

Well, here's an interesting entry on a blog run by a Jewish supporter of "the Middle East's only democracy". I had posted about Anne and her blog before, and frankly I am not surprised by the bigoted statements that she makes in that entry. After all, her hobby is bashing Arabs and criticising Islam (and its "worrying" trend of increasing / spreading demographics). But for the sake of entertainment, I posted a comment on her blog, only to visit the same entry a few hours later and find that comment gone. Could it be a glitch in the system I wonder? Or perhaps it's an Islamic conspiracy of takeover or something. I mean, "[j]ust think about it, there are already more Muslims in France than there are Jews in Israel. Hmm." I guess Anne thinks such statements are OK when aimed at Muslims but not OK when aimed at Jews. After all, anyone who talks about the increase in the number of Jews in Europe using such terminology and implications would be immediately labeled an anti-Semite and a neo-Nazi. Anne apparently found such a criticism (which made no mention of Nazis, by the way, so you can't really say I made baby Godwin cry this time!) too ~~anti-Semitic~~ true for her tastes, so she deleted it. In case my second comment disappears too and the curious among my readers would like to know what I wrote, here it is: "Tsk tsk, Anne, I thought "Israelis" and their supporters were all for freedom of speech and all that... What happened? Why did you delete my comment? Was it too critical of your racism?"

Long live "the Middle East's only democracy" and its supporters!

Edit: I believe that the photo in the previous entry will give Anne something to cheer for. As a sidenote, though, I wonder why Anne did not post this pic on her blog since she loves posting pics of Palestinian children with ~~real~~ TOY guns.

2005-05-12T11:18:00.000-04:00

Yup - real guns. Meet the "poor, oppressed, acting-in-self-defense Jews"!

A genuine mistake

2005-05-11T23:52:00.000-04:00

A rocket hit the "Israeli" town of "Shlomi" today. The Lebanese Army dismissed it as an operational... mistake. (Just kidding)

The IDF, however, felt the need to offer its superior ~~facts~~ opinion: "The Lebanese government is responsible for all incidents which take place in Lebanese territory, including these attacks, which are conducted by terror organizations". At the same time, the IDF insists that the shells fired at Southern Lebanon BEFORE the ~~attack on~~ mistaken shelling (just kidding) of Shlomi were not the responsibility of the "Israeli" government, since the latter does not consider itself responsible for any incidents which ~~take place in "Israeli" territory~~ are carried out by Jews. In fact, as the "state of the Jewish people everywhere", "Israel" has the moral duty to defend them. Because, after all, if the ~~Jewish~~ zionist state does not protect those Jews from the ~~bloodthirsty~~ retaliating gentiles, who's going to do it, G-d?

The Jerusalem Post and other "Israeli" papers report (parroting information provided to them by the government of "Israel" - so much for the freedom-loving country that "Israel" allegedly is) that "[i]t is uncertain if the two incidents are related." Yes indeed, those terrorists are the provocateurs! We must go and carpet-bomb Beirut (again)!

By the way, if the firing of the shell at Southern Lebanon were a genuine mistake, how on earth could the "Israeli" army (oh sorry, the "Israeli" "Defense" Forces - recall the phrase "those poor oppressed Jews always acting in self-defense" and the justification for mass-murder: "see, we're being forced to kill"), given that it is not INSIDE Lebanese territory (well, other than Shebaa, that is), determine so quickly that the shell "fell in an open area, causing no damage or casualties"? Sounds like they already had their facts straight and immediately scrambled to announce it... Oh wait, this could just be it. A provocation on the eve of "Israel's" celebration of "Independence Day" to show the world that after 57 years "Israelis" are still the poor victims coming under fire.

More on timing

2005-05-09T11:31:00.000-04:00

I said in the entry below that the Hariri assassination and the recent events could be interpreted in terms of the withdrawal from Gaza. Now I'm having mixed feelings about this, because of shells fired into Lebanon (allegedly mistakenly, but we all know what "Israeli" mistakes are all about). I am not sure how to interpret this. The first is to interpret it as a genuine mistake on the part of the IDF. I think I will need to dismiss that interpretation. The second is to interpret it as a clear intimidation of Hezballah, or a test of waters at the least. The intimidation by the IDF, if successful in sucking Hezballah into action along the border, will backfire on the latter (again, due to the state of affairs in Lebanon), since "Israel" will insist that the shells were indeed fired mistakenly and Hezballah used this as a pretext to shatter the ceasefire. The third possibility is that the IDF is attempting to re-start skirmishes on the northern border to halt (temporarily or permanently) the "disengagement". Of course, this third explanation branches out into two: 1) the possibility that this is solely the doing of some elements in the IDF that sympathise with the "settlers'" cause/"plight" 2) the possibility that this was a pre-planned, "state-sponsored" action. Whatever the case, I admire Hezballah's reaction: silence and not taking the bait (at least for now).

Edit: United Press International (via Washington Times) reports that "Israeli" jets violated Lebanese air space at the same time that the shells were fired. Well, that eliminates possibility #1, although Ha'aretz, JPost, Yediot Achronot, and Arutz Sheva (different names, same shit) all report it as an "accident".

Timing

2005-05-09T00:41:00.000-04:00

Well, I was thinking about the timing of the Hariri assassination and the "cedar revolution" that followed it, and I couldn't help but think about the possibility that the events in Lebanon have been planned and executed specifically at this moment because it also coincides with "Israeli" preparations for departure from the Gaza Strip. Increasing political tensions in Lebanon and a constant spotlight on Hezballah will ensure that in the case of 'incidents' in "Israel" and Palestine by right-wing settlers and their supporters, Hezballah would think twice about opening the northern front against "Israel" and liberating the Shebaa Farms which currently provide "Israel" with a lot of water. In fact, any such action on the part of Hezballah will most probably, through USA's proxies in Lebanon, be countered by attacks against Shi'ite targets, which would further escalate the tensions and possibly result in the outbreak of civil war, or at least a battle (and a time-out). This could also give the "Israelis" a pretext for re-invading Lebanon, and with all the warlords loose in the country, it sure as hell will give the "Israelis" something to cheer for, and the Americans something to hide behind (while they commit their war crimes in Iraq). This is Bush's message to Hezballah: A war in "Israel" and any attempts to liberate Shebaa when the opportunity arises will mean a war in Lebanon, and possibly a fall from grace of the widely-supported resistance and liberation movement Hezballah.

On the occasion of his return

2005-05-07T17:12:00.000-04:00

From Robert Fisk's Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon:

I had met Aoun during his 1983 battles at Soukh al-Gharb, but when I saw him again in 1989 he seemed much smaller. His shell-proof bunker used to be part of the presidential palace's underground carpark. A short man in American combat fatigues moved towards me, right hand outstretched in an artificial, slightly embarassed way. There were dark bags under his eyes. He had been directing his artillery all night. His face was white and unhealthy -- he had already been living in his bunker for six weeks -- and he had the appearance of a mole emerging from a long sleep, his eyes bloodshot and blinking. There were loyal aparatchiks everywhere, in blue suits and ties, murmuring 'Monsieur le président' in Aoun's ear. The Napoleon of Lebanon was about to speak from his underground garage.

It was part monologue, part history lesson. Aoun wanted a westernized Lebanon, 'like France, like America' [1]. He could not see why this might not appeal to the Muslims, whom he also claimed to represent. When I suggested that his 'war of liberation' against Syria would turn into a disaster, he lectured me on how not one war of liberation had ever been lost. 'History shows this,' he said with a gleam of satisfaction. 'Look at the French Marquis in the Second World War. Look at the Algerian resistance to te French, look at the Vietcong.' So what were his plans, I asked? 'Plans? What plans?' Well, plans for the war, for the future of Lebanon. Aoun was frowning now. 'I am a soldier. I want the liberation of my country.'

Yet his war was to bring the death of at least a thousand men and women. No 'liberation' was to be vouchsafed to anyone. Moreover, Aoun himself was to rule his tiny, dangerous fiefdom with growing dictatorial powers [2], prohibiting Lebanese newspapers which disagreed with his policies, banning journalists who did not write what he wanted to read, acquiescing in the public humiliation of the head of the Maronite Church in Lebanon; the old patriarch, Nasrallah Sfeir, was forced to kiss the general's portrait by dozens of jeering Aoun supporters [3]. Aoun remained silent when the homes of Lebanese MPs who opposed him were blown up with explosives. Life in east Beirut was becoming more like life in Baghdad than a 'free' Lebanon. (p. 633-34)

When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait on 2 August, Aoun was one of the few personalities in the Arab world to remain silent. Neither condemnation nor approval issued from his bunker. But he continued to criticize America's interference in Lebanese affairs; his supporters had long ago forced the US embassy in east Beirut to close. [4] (p. 643)

1 Well, following the "opposition's" logic, he ought to have moved to USA or France right then, without even being forced to.

2 People tell me "well, that was so many years ago, maybe he's changed". But in Lebanon that's easier said than done. The country might change but the people never do. The nature of the Lebanese is a sad affair to be honest.

3 Hooligans?

4 I wonder why ~~Mr. Aoun~~ Monsieur le président never criticised Iraq's interference in Lebanese affairs; I wonder why he He (the God that Patriarch Sfeir should've worshipped) doesn't criticise America's interference in Lebanese affairs NOW. Perhaps because he's a hypocrite?

Opinion piece, Nov 2004

2005-05-06T23:44:00.000-04:00

I was looking through my files, and I came across this opinion piece I had submitted to Excalibur, York University's newspaper, back in November 2004 (friendly warning: some my views on the "conflict" have since changed). The piece was not published. To add insult to injury, the Opinions Editor, self-proclaimed "leftist" Jewish "pro-Palestinian activist" Dan Freeman-Maloy, chose to ignore it instead of replying to acknowledge receipt of the article and inform me that they would not print it. I guess my article was too critical of Jews for Mr. Freeman-Maloy's tastes. I think that my argument about the "Israeli" "left" extends to the Jewish "left". Both are stillborn. The article below has been altered at a few places.

Israel: Apartheidic, Undemocratic, Unjust, and Denialist

Distressed as I am at the number of articles I have encountered in the past two months or so attempting to make truth-claims about Israeli democracy and justice and to void all comparisons with apartheid South Africa, I am glad that both sides have the opportunity to express their beliefs - something that is often not possible in Israel, at least not without grave consequences. Unless you are Jewish. Unless you are the “right kind” of Jew - politically, religiously, and racially. It is an undeniable fact that there is much discrimination in Israel, not only against Arabs, but also against non-Ashkenazi Jews. It has been established that Arab schools do not receive the proportional funding that they are entitled to. One only need look at reports condemning such intentionally designed differences in order to realise that Israel is one of the most unjust, racist, and undemocratic states in the Middle East.

I am speaking as an English-Armenian citizen of Lebanon. I am speaking as someone whose great-grandparents were given refuge by Kurds, Bedouins, Syrians, and Lebanese, during and after the Armenian Genocide that was planned and perpetrated by the Turkish government and army during WWI. I am speaking as a person who has lived in Lebanon almost all his life and not once treated differently or unequally, heard any racist statement, let alone being physically threatened. It seems a bit odd to me, given all the facts mentioned above, that Israel can be called a democratic, non-racist, even non-apartheidic state by the children or grandchildren of those who went through a similar fate as my great-grandmother. And here I am not even talking about the large number of apartheid-supporting, massacre-endorsing Israelis who have sold their conscience to bigotry. If you follow Israeli news, you must have heard of the Israeli officer who was reprimanded for having thrown his yarmulke on the ground after a soldier had said that “he would be willing to wipe an entire Palestinian village off the face of the Earth in order to save one Jewish life” (Ha’aretz, Nov. 17, 2004). Granted that the view of one person should not be taken as the view of an entire group of people, but the real issue here is not what was said, but what was done; in other words, who was reprimanded by the Israeli institution and who was not (and this would then give us an idea as to whether or not Israel is a racist state capable of adopting apartheid policies). The soldier who uttered that statement was not reprimanded. On the contrary, it seems to me that Israel encourages such statements by reprimanding those who argue against it on the grounds of morality as well as religion.

Does Israeli conscience apply only to Jewish suffering? Are we to divide the suffering of each group of people, thereby taking them out of the realm of “human suffering” and placing them into the realm of “racial suffering” or “religious suffering”? Wouldn’t this be the equivalent of neo-Nazist terms of superiority and inferiority: whether one group deserved to suffer and the other did not? Is Jewish suffering somehow more pressing and important than Palestinian suffering? Are Jews more human than Palestinians? Should Israelis be over and above any criticism no matter what they do (by virtue of their Jewish identity) - even if that is ethnic cleansing as ascertained by world opinion and various human rights organisations and in fact many Jews as well? Should we excuse the Israeli denial of the Armenian Holocaust? Would or should Armenia get away if it denies the Jewish Holocaust for “diplomatic and economic ties” with the enemies of Israel? Of course, Armenia does not deny the Jewish Holocaust. There is a level of morality that the Armenian government has adopted, one that is surprisingly (or should I say unsurprisingly, given the acts of ethnic cleansing and apartheid that Israel has been committing for the past 56 years) not adopted by Israel. To quote Shimon Peres (acting Foreign Minister of Israel at the time), “we reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegations. Nothing similar to the Holocaust occurred. It is a tragedy what the Armenians went through, but not a genocide.” In other words, Mr. Peres is arguing that if it is not similar to the Holocaust, then it is not genocide. Should we see gas chambers, execution squads, deportation trains, and liquidation camps simultaneously in order to call it genocide? That seems to be a very narrow (and even Jew-centric) definition of genocide, given that almost everyone agrees that genocide is not about gas chambers, but about an attempt to wipe out an entire race or ethnicity. Statements such as the one by Peres are uttered by the Israeli government without any reserve. After all, isn’t Israel above the law, above any and all criticism? How dare we criticise Israelis, for they are supposed to have higher moral standards due to what their parents went through during WWII. However, such “higher moral standards” we are yet to see from Israel. In fact, proofs abound that the contrary is true - that Israel is an undemocratic, unjust, denialist, and apartheid state. Its constant denial of its racist policies and its massacre of Palestinian civilians is proof that something is horribly wrong.

There is something wrong with the Zionist Israeli or pro-Israeli conscience. This certainly isn’t the “Jewish state” that anyone had in mind. It has been Nazified. Jewish Palestinian (or Palestinian Jew) Uri Davis argues that Zionism has been transformed from the idea of a bi-national state with Jewish identity into an apartheid state; now this state lives off its “solutions” to the “demographic threat.” And doesn’t the latter term sound horribly similar to the “final solution”... But for Jewish Israelis and the Jewish supporters of the state of Israel, such terms are part of the daily reality and the essentials of survival for the “Jewish state” (and doesn't the idea of "living space" for Jews sound horribly similar to Hitler's "lebensraum", "living space" for Germans? Sadly, this is a reminder that moral codes and the terms that contain them are written by the victors, rather than being a product of an objective, absolutist attitude that does not differentiate between the mass murder of one ethnicity and that of another); it does not “ring a bell.” It does not make them realise that they have descended so low that many feel the need to call them the Nazis of the 21st century. A large part of the Jewish conscience has been devoured by this Nazified Zionism (but it could be argued that Zionism has always contained elements of fascism and racism). Granted that many Jews inside and outside of Israel have bravely stood up and said “not in our name,” protested in support of human rights and against the murderous regime of the Israeli government and Israeli Defense Forces, a large part of the Jewish population identifies with Israel’s actions, failing to realise that Israel’s existence is one thing, its actions are another, and in no way does the latter ensure the former - in fact, it works against it.

Yes, Israel is an apartheid state. Yes, Israel is undemocratic. Yes, Israel is unjust. Yes, Israel is denialist. No, majority and morality are not equivalent (and the Armenian and Jewish Holocausts are proof of this). Yes to peace between Palestinians and Jews. The myth of the apartheid wall being necessary for peace is a lie. Jews and Palestinians have lived together peacefully for many decades without an apartheid wall, and it is still possible. There is still a turning point; lives can be saved on both sides when a just, equal solution is implemented, and that is the one-state solution. One state for Jews and Palestinians. It is the only way to sow the seeds of tolerance. If Jews and Palestinians cannot live side by side peacefully in one country, how can they live side by side peacefully as two separate countries?

A Tale of Three Bulldozers

2005-05-02T22:09:00.000-04:00

We already knew one of the bulldozers by name. Also known as "man of peace", Ariel Sharon is responsible for the deaths of thousands of Palestinians in Palestine as well as in Sabra & Shatila and elsewhere in Lebanon, the demolition of thousands of Palestinian homes, and the notorious apartheid wall (also known as "the security fence" in "Israeli" circles).

Less known, however, are two other bulldozers. Perhaps the lack of knowledge is due to the fact that these last two are a new model on the market: designed, approved, and marketed by the State of "Israel".

The first model has been named "Abu Mazen" (otherwise known as Mahmoud Abbas). It was decided that the name would be shortened, in an effort to minimise the troubles of the future Palestinian generations (at least 2 generations, following the Arafat legacy) who will be lucky to utter his name (since they are alive). This is the new kind of democracy (thanks to Bush's doctrine of "no elections possible under occupation"); but the Palestinian people have been reassured by "Abu Mazen" himself that his presidency would be very easy on them, à la Arafat regime.

The product ("Abu Mazen") comes with the following specifications:

• Readily bulldozes beachfront homes [of Palestinians] to prove to "Israel" that he's on the right track.
• Makes no mention of the Right of Return [of Palestinians] to prove to "Israel" that he's on the right track.
• Speaks the language of defeatism to prove to "Israel" that he's on the right track.
• Fires [Palestinian] security chiefs to prove to "Israel" that he's on the right track.
• Promises to do "Israel's" dirty work (arresting would-be [?] "terrorists" without warrants, destroying arms smuggling tunnels, 'mistakenly' killing children, and so on; an upgrade for the "Abu Mazen" model is to be released soon, which would also enable him to conduct assassinations [also known as "extrajudicial killings" in so-called "leftist" circles]).
• Limited warranty; the marketers disclaim any liability for special, incidental or consequential damages. In the case of defects, the marketers will replace him with a new one. No proof of election necessary for a replacement.

The second model has been named "Irineos I", and a sample of that model and make currently serves as the Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church. Marketers have been receiving complaints about this product as of late, but they would like to reassure new buyers and previous owners alike that there is nothing wrong with him, and that their disappointment is due to the fact that their expectations of the product were probably too high. "Irineos I" is a lot cheaper than "Abu Mazen", but also has less features:

• Sells [Palestinian] land to prove to "Israel" that he's on the right track.
• Plays games with his owners (also known as followers of the Greek Orthodox Church): "yes no yes no yes no yes no. I don't know. I didn't mean to. I wasn't told. I had to do it. I didn't know."
• "Irineos I" is not equipped with Aritificial Intelligence at the moment, and the producers have said they do not plan on introducing that to the model any time soon. He does, however, come with a pre-programmed set of phrases and statements, as stated above.
• Limited warranty; includes police protection, as is the case for all loyal servants of G-d's chosen people. Please keep in mind that the police protection feature is conditional and can vary from 90-day to 1 year warranties, depending on degree of loyalty.

The three bulldozers, "Abu Mazen", "Irineos I", and their godfather Ariel "Bulldozer, Man of Peace" Sharon have joined hands in the fight against... anti-bulldozers.

On another note, do check out this excellent summary of the current state of affairs in Lebanon by Prof. As'ad Abu Khalil.

2005-05-01T23:35:00.000-04:00

The irony: Denier of a Holocaust in a Holocaust Museum. Turkish PM at the Yad Vashem.

D.R.A.F.T.

2005-05-01T21:10:00.000-04:00

I don't usually post one-liners, but I found this pretty funny, and I thought I'd share.

Hear the song & view the animation

Thanks to my friend Anathema for the link.

Haifa Unbecoming*

2005-04-30T16:10:00.000-04:00

In today's Ha'aretz, there is an interesting article on a case that is quite similar to the Columbia affair. Except that since the winds of change haven't touched the media, our beloved ~~left-leaning~~ Ha'aretz points out that instead of one real version that is clearly anti-Arab (similar to the manner in which the Columbia affair was deciphered as being "anti-Semitic"), "[t]here are two versions of what happened in the classroom, and they are mutually contradictory and divided along the lines of national origin: the version of two Arab students and, pitted against it, the opposite version propounded by the lecturer and the Jewish students." Do not be fooled. This is not simply a case of Ha'aretz being the unbiased newspaper that it has claimed to be for the longest time. In fact, it was Ha'aretz that printed Sharansky's "Jews of silence" argument over the Columbia affair, and also that of Guy Spigelman. Here's one sentence from the first article:

For their part, the professors insist the allegations stifle their freedom to express pro-Palestinian views, with one calling it a campaign against critics of Israel.

Notice the wording: "Insist"? Does this mean that the author believes that the allegations are true and that the professors only "insist" that they are not? "Pro-Palestinian"? Since when is speaking out against occupation and for human rights the equivalent of being "pro-Palestinian"? The very term in this context suggests that there is some sort of bias against "Israelis" based on their ethnicity, and that therefore we must take the side of the poor, oppressed, "pro-Israeli" students who are a tiny minority against an army of "pro-Palestinians" (who apparently support suicide bombings by the very vice of their "pro-Palestinian" views). "Calling it"? So the author does not believe that it is indeed a campaign against critics of "Israel", and that it is only the professors who insist on calling it that? How very unbiased of Ha'aretz to be publishing this. But even better is the following passage, excerpted from the second article:

By relentlessly attacking Israeli policies and our right to defend ourselves, unions, academics and politicians around the world are doing a disservice to the cause of peace, as it weakens the left camp in Israel. "Where is the solidarity for our suffering?" I challenged the union's secretary general.

Defend? Peace? Left camp in "Israel"? Suffering? Did I miss something here? At any rate, let's give the author of this article the benefit of the doubt; in fact, let us extend that benefit to Ha'aretz too, and say that Ha'aretz prints articles from both sides of the spectrum. When was the last time you saw an article by Amira Hass appearing on Ha'aretz? Previously there were at least 2 per week. I just ran a search, and the last article by Hass is on March 29, 2005. That's a month, folks. And during that time, Ha'aretz has printed more than a hundred extreme-right articles. Even if I am mistaken and for some reason missed an article or two by Hass, the more than a dozen right-wing articles per week clearly make Ha'aretz a right-wing newspaper regardless of the few "other" articles it prints.

Let's get back to the Haifa affair, then. The professor, a Mr. David Bukay, "is convinced" that one of the students who complained of anti-Arab incitement in the classroom, Fadi Abu Yunes, who was enroled in the course (unlike many of the Jewish students in Prof. Massad's classroom), "came to the course with the deliberate intention of interfering and of vilifying him." Mr. Bukay, however, fails to realise that the student, a Palestinian, barely had the money to enrol in the course (which resulted in his late enrolment, as we are told). His argument that Abu Yunes took the course simply to interfere in the lecture or to vilify him is therefore ridiculous. Mr. Bukay argues, "He was sent and I know who sent him. He was a provocateur." So who sent him? Pray elaborate, "Professor" Bukay.

In fact, let us look at the coverage that Ha'aretz gives to the events in the classroom: "From the moment Abu Yunes crossed the threshold of Dr. Bukay's lecture hall, the atmosphere turned volatile. He started to ask questions and make comments, shouting out while Bukay was speaking, usually without asking permission."

Compare this to what Ha'aretz did not say in the article on the Columbia affair: "[t]here is ample evidence of [Massad’s] willingness -- as part of a deliberate pedagogical strategy -- to permit anyone who wished to do so to comment or raise a question during his lectures. For many students this approach itself became problematic because it allowed a small but vociferous group of fellow students to disrupt lectures by their incessant questions and comments." (Section IV, Ad Hoc Grievance Committee Report, Columbia University)

In fact, as Prof. Massad argues, many of those students were not registered in his classes. In his response to the Ad Hoc Grievance Committee Report, he says, "The class did however include a number of auditors (I found out they were unregistered during the last week of class) who would consistently harass me with hostile ideological questions that ignored all the readings. Students complained about the disruption this caused the class. I tried to emphasize to the auditors that their questions must be relevant to the subject at hand and that they must do the readings. They never did and I continued to answer their questions until the end of the semester to avoid creating a tense atmosphere in the classroom."

None of this Ha'aretz mentions, not even in passing.

In fact, Ha'aretz talks about the fact that "[Jewish students] confirm that Bukay cited the very small number of Arab Nobel laureates as proof of the Arabs' backwardness and that he said that the Arabs in the Middle Ages mainly preserved the achievements of the Greeks and the Romans and hardly developed anything of their own, apart from algebra [1]", without even taking a position on the racist remarks (and I don't know what is racist if not talk of "Arab backwardness"). Keep in mind that Ha'aretz has always expressed its views on anti-Jewish incidents, including the alleged anti-Semitic affair at Columbia University. All that Ha'aretz does in this case is question if Bukay is indeed racist: "As part of his efforts to prove his argument, did Bukay cast aspersions of a racist character?" The author continues, "It is difficult to know for certain [2], but it is clear that what he said was not easy for an Arab student to listen to." No kidding? I would like to see you write the same sentence when the culprit is an Arab and the victims are Jews. Would you even question if it is racist?

Ha'aretz, in an attempt to defend Mr. Bukay, does the typical thing; cite the support of an Arab student. In fact, we don't know if such a student even exists. But let's give Ha'aretz the benefit of doubt once more, and look at the statement: "Dr. Bukay constitutes a dominant factor in shaping my personality. He is the only one who taught me that I must recognize the fact that my culture, the Arab culture, is corrupt, repressive, violent and anti-democratic." Now how did Mr. Bukay arrive to this conclusion? Would he be so kind as to educate us on the steps he followed to arrive to this supposedly non-racist (or as Ha'aretz probably would like us to believe, anti-racist) conclusion?

The whole story turns even more ridiculous. The democracy and freedom-loving Bukay "decided to expel Abu Yunes from the course." (I hope he gave him full refund and did not steal his money as his kind have stolen land from Palestinians for more than 57 years).

But wait, it gets even better. Even the author of the article, at this point, is confused about whether to accuse Bukay of racism or to place him in the "controversial but not racist" list. I will not post the "interview", but I will mention the sentence that made me chuckle: "Sania Hamady, David Pryce-Jones and Raphael Patai - look in the index under `lie' - go to Bernard Lewis." Bernard Lewis, the notorious liar and denier of the Armenian Genocide. Mr. Bukay's hero, apparently. Go read the whole exchange. Go.

This is what I call academia gone... nuts. At University of Haifa, which is currently being boycotted by the AUT. Now you know why.

Notes:

Italics in all of the above are mine, and are used for emphasis.

* Or, "Haifa and Ha'aretz Unbecoming"

1 Perhaps "Professor" Bukay, who insists on his "scientific" attitudes later on in the article, would like to attend a lecture or two on the importance of algebra and algorithms in our times? That is, before he starts citing the achievements of "Israelis" in the field of modern technology... Perhaps his fellow "Israeli" "professors" would like to inform him that without algorithms (named after Al Khawarizmi, a Persian mathematician who wrote his works in Arabic - "Professor" Bukay fails to make a distinction between Persian and Arab, but by his standards of who is an Arab, he is wrong in dismissing the contribution of Al Khwarizmi for being insignificant compared to the contributions of Jews), none of that would exist, and the "Israelis" would be *gasp* nothings in the field of technology that they boast of being the leaders of in the Middle East and even the world?

2 But apparently not so in the Columbia affair; after all, Jews never lie, only Arabs do.

Winds of change haven't touched the media

2005-04-29T23:18:00.000-04:00

I am sure many of you heard or read about the "kidnapping" of two supposedly "Israeli" citizens from the supposedly "Israeli" village of Al Ghajar. I was curious today (as always), so I ran a search on Google News and came up with 3 links on that report, the first from ~~the left-leaning~~ Ha'aretz, the second from Jerusalem Post, and the third from The Daily Star. If we are to believe the three mentioned articles, Al Ghajar village is located in "Israel"-proper. After all, none of the three papers, not even the Lebanese one, mentions that Al Ghajar is a village in the occupied Golan Heights. According to these unbiased and freedom-loving newspapers (the last bastions of truth and freedom in the Middle East) - at least when it comes to the self-proclaimed ~~left-leaning~~ Ha'aretz and the freedom-loving (and therefore [???] "opposition"-supporting) Daily Star - Golan Heights belongs to... "Israel". Let us trumpet that one more time, folks. Yes, Golan Heights has historically belonged to the children of Zion. Hey Bush, read the Bible. Home at last, we shall not be moved. I guess no winds of change for the media, then.

Map source: BBC

What was Libanpost thinking??

2005-04-28T23:10:00.000-04:00

Obviously they don't have the brains to think. The Daily Star reports,

"Earlier this week, dozens of Sidon residents reported receiving registered envelopes through Libanpost which contained a poster bearing the signature of a British firm offering a $10 million reward to any person who offers credible information regarding Arad's fate.

Sources told The Daily Star that many Sidon residents headed directly to the national post service's headquarters. Libanpost's administrators immediately reported the issue to security officials."

I wonder why the "Israelis" are pursuing this at this particular moment, knowing full well that the situation in Lebanon is quite volatile. I wonder if they actually understand the phrase "NOT now"?

Meeting Robert Fisk

2005-04-27T21:08:00.000-04:00

I recently found out that I had been linked to on a number of blogs, the most striking being the following. Well I am impressed (especially with the last of the 3 links). And I must add, very surprised. I didn't expect to be linked to on so many blogs. I guess I'm getting notorious around here... :) Anyway, I was looking at that blog, and I found something interesting. 4th & 5th pictures. Yes, that's Robert Fisk. THE Robert Fisk. I'm jealous. I mean, I do have some issues with his articles lately, but, and that is a BIG but, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon was simply too good a book to be overshadowed by a couple of not-so-good articles by Fisk. You should all (no ifs, buts, and maybes) BUY that book. Forget Thomas Friedman, especially that you now have a guide to writing your very own Thomas Friedman op-ed column. Happy? I am sure Prof. As'ad will love this - that's if he hasn't seen it already (the guy sure gets around the web!). Anyway, back to Robert Fisk. I would like to meet him one day. Now, I know he wouldn't say no to free dinner, so I might actually stand a chance. ;) Anyway, I would like to meet him for a few reasons, one of them being that I absolutely loved his book, another being that I would like to personally thank him for his heroic reporting from Lebanon, another for his report on Qana massacre, and finally to ask him if he knew (or had met) my dad by any chance. I doubt it but it wouldn't hurt to ask.

Yes, that's my dream. Meeting Mr. Fisk. Do I sound pathetic? :)

IAF to continue intimidation

2005-04-27T18:30:00.000-04:00

It was decided that the "Israeli" Air Force would continue its intimidation by flying its jets over Lebanon until the Lebanese government follows its orders to disarm Hezballah.

Shalom!

"Drama ... but not a genocide"

2005-04-26T15:39:00.000-04:00

Turkish Jewish businessman Jak Kamhi, the founder and chairman of Profilo, a large electronics and appliance manufacturing company [...] counts various U.S. presidents and Israeli prime ministers among his friends. Speaking in his cavernous Istanbul office, which is furnished with toffee-colored leather chairs and couch, Kamhi says he has helped the fight against the Armenian claims out of a sense of duty to the memory of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust. "[Countering] the so-called genocide is more important for the Jews in the Diaspora and Israel than the Turks," Kamhi says. "It is not something you can compare to the Holocaust and the genocide that happened in Europe. You can speak about a drama, about many other things, but not about a genocide. That happened in Europe."

The Jerusalem Report, May 2005 issue

Syria out, and first fight already

2005-04-25T16:48:00.000-04:00

Supporters of LF and FPM clash in Martyrs' Square

Yup, and this is the beginning of the end, folks. The end to the so-called "unity", that is. The first pointer to it was this, and now my doubts have been confirmed. But, an Antoinette Geagea dismissed the incident: "Why is the media making such a big deal of this? It is just a childish argument by some boys aged 16-17 whom I doubt know what is really happening between the political parties."

Well, dearest Antoinette Geagea, it takes as little as 16-17 year olds to start a civil war in Lebanon.

Back from Ottawa

2005-04-25T01:12:00.000-04:00

Alright, I am back. It was a long day for me. I had to get up at 5 am and get some stuff sorted out, then had to rush to the ակումբ (Armenian community centre) to catch the bus. And on top of that, it was raining like it's never rained before. There were overall 4 buses taking off from Toronto (more were supposed to come but for some reason the company let the organisers down). Took off at about 6:30 am. We had a half-hour service stop halfway to Ottawa, and then continued for another 2 hours or so. We arrived around 10:30-10:45 am if I remember correctly. Soon after that, the Montrealers arrived, and they were not as many as we expected them to be. They were saying that in previous years there used to be 20 buses (??!) from Montreal alone. Well there's no way there were 20 buses in total, let alone only from Montreal.

When we got to Ottawa there were a few people there already who had set up the audio system. The media was not there, which was a big relief to me after seeing all those flags of the Republic of Armenia. The "ceremony" was organised by the ARF (Armenian Revolutionary Federation) / ARFYOC (Armenian Revolutionary Federation Youth Organisation of Canada). I was expecting that they would bring flags, but I was hoping that they would at least make it different this year, it being the 90th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide... Boy was I mistaken! Actually, it was different. Yes indeed it was. There were more flags. Now don't get me wrong, I have always liked the ARF better than other Armenian parties, including the Ramgavars (due to the fact that I grew up in an ARF-supporting home and community), but lately I've been growing increasingly cold towards it, thanks in no small part to a revision of my political opinions (I've been looking into the Hunchak party ideologies). But I think my dislike of the ARF is also due to the fact that they are very unrealistic if not anti-realistic. Yesterday's speech by the representative of the Կեդրոնական Կոմիտէ (central committee) of the ARF was disgusting. Not only did he not have good command of the Armenian language (which most of the "ceremony" was in), his constant references to "Greater Armenia" did not appeal to my tastes. When I say unrealistic, I mean it. Those ARF-supporters who stayed at home due to "bad weather" (rain) rather than coming out in their thousands to Ottawa would not, in a thousand years, move to those lands even if they are given back to Armenians. In fact, they are not even moving back to Armenia-proper, which I dare say has better infrastructure and is much more developed than most areas of eastern Turkey that are included in the "historical western Armenia" map. They talk about the brave Armenian martyrs and the need to take up arms and fight for our lands, but they would not even stand under the rain without umbrellas. The majority of the supporters of such talk were not even present (as mentioned above). What do they expect from non-Armenians if they, as Armenians (and probably grandchildren of genocide survivors), didn't care about filling that field in front of the Turkish Consulate? Where were they? Glued in front of their TVs, or whining about the necessity of getting back their ancestors' lands? Or singing «Ատանայի Կոտորածը» (Massacre of Adana) and forgetting all about «Մենք Պէտք Է Կռուենք» (We must fight) and its lyrics: «Ամօ՛թ այն հային եւ բիւր նախատինք, Որ ազգի սիրոյն չի գործում բարիք:» (Shame and scorn on the Armenian who does not do good for his nation). Shame indeed. A big shame on the ARF for turning the Armenian Genocide into a nationalistic agenda, thereby giving ammo not to the Armenians, but to the Turkish government and the deniers on its payroll.

Do I regret going there yesterday? Yes and no. Yes because it was very disappointing and frustrating, and because I supported them in a way (by being there), and moreover got counted as belonging to the ARF crowd. No because I was a witness to it so I could report on their idiocy and their use and abuse of my great-grandparents' memory to further their so-called "nationalistic" / "patriotic" goals. The ARF and its supporters must realise that waving the flag of Armenia does not make one an Armenian. And for Christ's sake quit talking about the "white genocide" when you don't even speak Armenian with your children at home.

Well, that's all I wanted to say (this entry has a soft-ish tone because I find myself unable to put into words the extent of my anger and frustration). You can check out the photos from the "ceremony" here. For photos of a REAL demonstration and commemoration, check out this and this and this (thanks Armen from Iran for the links). Not a flag to be seen - I bet that takes away from the validity of the demonstration/commemoration. OK, I'm starting to sound sarcastic, so I will end this here.

2005-04-23T17:00:00.000-04:00

Lebanese Army? Hezballah fighters? Syrian loyalists? No, they are the real Lebanese. Maronites, that is. Christian supporters of... the Lebanese Forces... and of course the disarmament of all militias...

Remembering the Armenian Genocide

2005-04-22T19:07:00.000-04:00

I will be going to Ottawa on Sunday, so I will be unable to post something on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

Well I don't have much to say on the occasion. My dealings with the issue of the Armenian Genocide have been both personal [indirectly of course] and political/historical. I will talk about both. But first, the personal: The Armenian side of my family originally came from Sasun. Most of them did not survive the genocide. In Sasun: The Turks gathered the Armenian women and children, lined them up, and started killing them one by one. My grandmother's father's mother could not bear to see her son killed in front of her eyes; she begged a Kurdish man to take him and do whatever he wanted with him; raise him as a Kurd, anything he wanted. The man, after a moment of hesitation, took the boy. No one knows what happened to his mother [most probably murdered]. The Kurdish man took the boy and raised him as his own son. He became a shepherd. Every day he would write the Armenian alphabet on the sand, so as not to forget it. Years later, the man wanted him to get married to a Kurdish girl. He ran away. He made his way to Syria. Meanwhile, his future wife (my grandmother's mother) had made it to Mosul (Iraq), where she remained in hiding for a while. All her children (she was married before) except for one daughter saved by a Kurdish man (whom she paid to have her back), had been massacred or had died of starvation on the long walk. Along with her daughter and sister (who had also survived but had lost all her children) they made their way to Aleppo. There she met my grandmother's father, and they got married. My grandmother was born in 1923. She's still alive and tells me that her father had written a book in Armenian about his experiences. The handwritten book was preserved for a long time, but got lost during the Lebanese war. Sometimes I get angry with my grandmother for having lost such a precious book. But it's of no use now. It's gone, never to be seen again.

The political: One of the things that baffle me is how Jews of all people can deny the Armenian Genocide. I was reading Yair Auron's The Banality of Denial: Israel and the Armenian Genocide a while back, and he made the distinction between passive and active denial. A sidenote: I do respect Auron for taking a dissenting stance on the issue, but he is too much of an apologist for the "State of Israel" for my tastes. Later on in this entry I will explain why I accuse him of that. But for now two reasons why I mentioned Auron. The first is the issue of passive vs active denial. The second is the text of a lecture he gave back in February 2003.

On the passive vs active denial, in a recent article on the Jerusalem Post (which seems to be doing its best lately to debunk the claim that most Jews - including individuals as opposed to the myth that the culprits are the "Jewish and/or "Israeli" politicians* and lobbyists* not the Jewish people" - do deny the Armenian Genocide), a Larry Derfner says, "What does the State of Israel and many of its American Jewish lobbyists have to say about it, about this first genocide of the 20th century? If they were merely standing silent, that would be an improvement. Instead, on the subject of the Armenian genocide+, Israel and some US Jewish organizations, notably the American Jewish Committee, have for many years acted aggressively as silencers."

The article starts out strongly but in the end yo-yos between [supposed] criticism of "Israel" and denier Jews, and covering up on the [inevitable and logical but unmentioned] conclusion that if it's an issue of "fair enough" in response to the argument that "it's a matter for historians [not politicians] to decide", "revisionists" [of the Jewish Genocide] should be able to say the same. Thus, the very premise of the author's argument is based on double standards rather than support for a universal method of dealing with this issue, and as such provides further ammo for the war of double standards that the same Jewish deniers he has supposedly set out to criticise have been waging for decades.

The final point I will address is Auron's lecture, which I mentioned above. In it he says, "The headlines of the Turkish Daily News, the influential English daily, on April 10, 2001, were clear: "Peres: Armenian Allegations are Meaningless." The newspaper interviewed Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres on the eve of his official visit to Turkey. Peres claimed in it that it is for historians to deal with such historical issues. The claim may seem feasible, and is sometimes used by governments - including the American and the Israeli - who wish to avoid the dilemma. Nevertheless, it is very well known that this denial tactic is practiced manipulatively by the Turks and their supporters."

A few paragraphs ago I accused Auron of being an apologist for the Jewish and "Israeli" deniers. I will now (briefly) explain why. Pay special attention to his wording. An eloquent writer no doubt, but that is the point. Eloquent writers are eloquent because they are equipped with the ability to imply things in subtle ways or leave their readers wondering what they really meant. My argument? The American and "Israeli" governments are not examples of "wish[ing] to avoid the dilemma". Both governments - especially the latter - have adopted policies of active denial rather than passive non-recognition. On to the second point: this denial tactic is not practised at all by "the Turks", let alone manipulatively. The Turkish government denies that there is even a "dilemma". Moreover, Auron talks of but does not name "supporters" of the Turks. This is a practise typical of apologists who use vague terms and refrain from bluntly naming those whom they are, according to their claims, criticising.

As a final note, do check out this article (thanks umkahlil). And here are some photos of the Armenian Genocide.

I am afraid this is all I had to say. I could go on for pages about my family's wanderings around the world after the genocide, and how I can barely hold back tears when I think of what I would do if and when I visit the birthplace of my great-grandparents or the tiny country that we have never set foot in (I've visited Armenia, but I was 1.5 years old at the time) but are supposed to love... But that would be getting too personal about it. Hopefully one day I would be posting *my* photos of Sasun on this blog. But that won't happen any time soon.

So I will end this entry on a bitter note.

Notes:

* And we all know that they are immune to criticism of any sort from any direction, so naturally they would be the ones to take the blame for denying the Armenian Genocide (or to use the more politically correct phrase, "not recognising it"), and the world watches and ... laughs. Note that there is a huge difference between non-recognition (most of the time passive, sometimes active) and outright denial (active). I for one do not care about "Israel's" non-recognition, as I do not recognise "Israel" as a legitimate entity to begin with. But I do take issue with the Jewish denial of the Armenian Genocide.

+ Notice the capitalisation. In contrast, the word "holocaust" is mentioned 8 times in the same article, and an "H" rather than an "h" is used in all 8 mentions.

Highlights of the day (Special Feature: Dan vs Jarrod)

2005-04-21T21:01:00.000-04:00

"I have no doubt that most of the Israelites will immediately recognize the Genocide if asked", says "Professor" Yehuda Bauer.

If asked?!?!?!?!?!?!?! But I thought it was all about "never again" and "the duty of the Jewish people to speak out against genocide".

Meanwhile in Germany, as reported by Berliner Zeitung:

BERLIN. Der Bundestag wird heute einen Antrag der CDU/CSU-Fraktion beraten, in dem das Parlament aufgefordert wird, der Vertreibung und Ermordung von 1,5 Millionen Armeniern durch die Türken zu gedenken. Der Begriff Genozid wird in dem Text allerdings vermieden. Trotzdem hatten fast alle türkischen Vereine in Berlin die geplante Parlamentsdebatte kritisiert.

Rough translation: The Bundestag will today discuss a resolution sponsored by the Christian Democratic Union, which addresses the issue of the deportation and massacres of 1.5 million Armenians by the Turks. The term genocide is avoided in the text. Nevertheless, nearly all Turkish associations in Berlin have criticised the parliamentary debate.

But that's not about it. While I was reading through the comments at Blogrel, I "met" a Jarrod who lives in Germany. Apparently, he has decided he wants an ... "intelligent debate" on ... the Armenian Genocide. Indeed, I am not surprised. The political climate, after all, encourages such arguments, because they help to lead the battle for the de-legitimisation of the factual and well-documented Armenian Genocide.

Jarrod tries to be logical (I mourn the loss of logic - the future of humanity does not look bright) and poses the question, "With the Ottoman empire falling apart, having lost a great deal of land over the 40 years before WWI and on the brink of losing WWI, does it make sense that they would suddenly decide for a “Final Solution” or genocide against a people they long lived completely peacefully with? Out of the blue?"

Well, going by your "facts" and your sense of "making sense", the answer would be, no. But such hatred that leads to genocide (or massacres or "so-called genocides", if you prefer to call it that) does not make sense either, don't you think? That does not mean it does not happen, does it? Moreover, you will have to do slightly better than that with your "facts". The premise of your argument is actually false to begin with, which means that your conclusions, even if valid, stand no chance of being sound. I will clarify. The Turks did not live peacefully with the Armenians. I recommend that you look into the racist and even *gasp* murderous policies of the Ottoman Empire against its Armenian citizens. Things like double taxation and if you will excuse my bluntness (as it might offend your pro-"intelligent debating" self) massacres (long before WWI).

Mr. Jarrod then says, "Aren’t the events rather heavy handed tactics by a regime scared of losing power than anything remotely racist?"

Of course. Because the deportation, murder, and forced conversion of all Armenian citizens of Turkey [but not of Muslim Turks or Kurds] is about "a regime scared of losing power than anything remotely racist". Yup. And can you imagine how scary a foetus in an Armenian woman's belly is?! Poor regime. Must've been really scared. :-(

But then Mr. Jarrod concludes, "Massacre Yes. Genocide No."

Dare I cite (or will I be accused of being anti-Turkish and *gasp* anti-Semitic [for taking away the "uniqueness" of "The Holocaust"] if I do that?) Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide?

Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The Armenians went through ... definitely not (a) [too inhumane to have happened], definitely not (b) [hmm?], most certainly not (c) [and I don't even know why I was thinking about the long marches in deserts, one of them being Der el Zor, where human remains are still being found], unthinkable to argue that they went through (d) [cutting a woman's belly and pulling out the foetus being the most humane act in the world] , and of course, not (e) either [because it makes no sense that the Turkish government would have done that!]

To end this entry - despite the title (Dan vs Jarrod), I would like to add that I refuse to debate this, either intelligently or non-intelligently. I am not in the least interested in debating the facts of the Armenian Genocide. That is for you to read about, and not for me to prove. So if anyone can prove that the evidence of the Armenian Genocide are fake, all the more power to you. Until then, I would say that you should not hide behind “let’s have an intelligent debate”, because I am not about to take the bait.

"Big Lie"

2005-04-20T23:38:00.000-04:00

With a hint of bitterness, he shows the remains of posters detailing the Armenian genocide glued to walls along the street and torn down, he says, by passing Jews.

"Sometimes they write 'big lie' over them," he says.

We want the truth!

2005-04-20T19:46:00.000-04:00

Lebanese policemen stand guard at a street-side cafeteria after an explosion in Beirut, Lebanon, late Wednesday, April 20, 2005. A bomb exploded in a street-side cafeteria frequented by low-income laborers, wounding at least three people. The bomb, apparently a hand grenade, was thrown from a car in the Muslim neighborhood of Cola.

Of course, this is not reported on any news agency websites (where are those unbiased sources such as CNN, Washington Post, Reuters, BBC, etc.?). Sources inform me that the grenade was hurled at a "cafe" frequented by Syrian labourers. 2 Syrians and 1 Lebanese were injured. We want the truth! Syria was behind it. One "opposition" and LFPM (Lebanese ~~Free Patriotic~~ Movement) supporter in fact said, "many parties+ in Lebanon still dont believe in Lebanon as an independent country, they consider it a part of Syria, maybe those parties are too sad that the syrians are almost gone and they started to act like lost kids." Yeah. You hit the nail right on the head. I mean, because the Lebanese* are such angels it's impossible to even think of them as holding guns let alone hurling grenades...

The above photo was taken from the Yahoo photo slideshows page. I do~~n't~~ know why they don't have any news reports on it (I came across it only when I searched "Lebanon grenade" rather than "Lebanon" - beats the purpose if you know that there was a grenade hurled in Lebanon, doesn't it?)... And I wonder why it says "low-income labourers" instead of bluntly saying "Syrian labourers".

And where are those news reports on the supposedly unbiased search (& destroy?) engine Google? The Google news page that lists news reports on Lebanon was updated 1 hour ago (edit: now 49 minutes ago), and still no trace of this or this or this. But, google Google News NOW with the following key phrase: "lebanon grenade". Beats the purpose, doesn't it? Gee, thanks Google and Yahoo! ! Such unbiased search engines indeed! Or maybe they were just innocently removing anti-Semitic content from the sensitive public eye... Yup, that's it, folks. I finally found the explanation to the mystery.

Edit 1: Check out Al Jazeera's report on the "incident". "The grenade was thrown by an unknown assailant after a parking dispute between three people in the Kola district, police said." Unknown??! What? You mean you didn't follow him?! How pro-Syrian of you! Shame shame. And parking dispute? Since when do Lebanese hurl grenades at one another based on a parking dispute? I haven't heard of such a thing taking place in Lebanon ever since the war (supposedly) ended. And then, "[o]ne hour later, 200 grams of TNT in a plastic bag exploded in an empty field in the Mamora neighbourhood [yup, it's definitely a parking dispute], a mainly Shia area on the outskirts of Beirut's southern suburbs, police sources said." I suppose that gives the Shi'ite Lebanese the right to set up "vigilante" groups and hawajez (checkpoints)? Notice how the police didn't even mention that the targets are Syrians (or even implied that those [literally] poor Shi'ites were being targeted - but we did see everyone whining about "Christian areas" being bombed and all those [figuratively] poor Christians fearing for their lives). Ahh, the winds of change indeed!

Edit 2: Interesting that not even Ha'aretz's article on the grenade was added by Google, when it has used it as a source on political developments in Lebanon before (for example, this one). Of course, Google finds nothing wrong in citing... Arutz Sheva on the ... ~~massacre~~ bombing of Qana.

Edit 3: In response to my sarcastic remarks that went as follows, "We want the truth! It was the Baath! It's OBVIOUS! Only Baath are able to commit such crimes!", a LFPM supporter said, "Baath? As in the party? It could be them or it could be others, it doesn't really matter." To which I replied, "Absolutely. But the Hariri bombing was ... definitely planned and executed by... "loyalists". Yup. Besides, it doesn't really matter."

Edit 4: Conclusion: Hezballah must be disarmed!

+ Probably referring to the SSNP (Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party)
* Does not include Hezballah as they are not Lebanese

And they wonder why...

2005-04-19T19:29:00.000-04:00

Members of the so-called "opposition" (read: majority Christian supporters of the racist LF, tyrant Aoun, and terrorist Bush) wonder why Hezballah and other Lebanese reject 1559. They ask, what is wrong with USA interfering if that would guarantee that we would be free of Syrian control? Some of them argue USA might not have "other" plans for Lebanon after all, that we should stop seeing conspiracies in every small thing. They accuse us of using that simply as an excuse for maintaining Syrian control over Lebanon. They accuse us of abandoning the Lebanese and their cause and supporting another country - namely Syria. They say we are traitors. Most of the time I don't reply to these accusations and smear campaigns. This time around, however, I will explain why *I* (I don't claim to be the spokesperson of the anti-"opposition" camp) don't support the "opposition".

On the question of Hezballah's status, Bush said: "There is a reason why we've put Hizbullah on a terrorist list. They've killed Americans in the past." He then thought it would be appropriate of him [as the defender of the "opposition"] to add: "You can't have a free country if a group of people are like an armed militia." Mr. Bush forgets that even before the Hezballah killed Americans, U.S "peacekeepers" had effectively taken sides (always with the side that supported "Israel") and occasionally fired on Chouf villages. Will the real Druze please stand up? Now you will accuse me of trying to break the so-called unity and sow sectarian hatred (as if it somehow disappeared), but I will tell you that I am not. I am the last person to be interested in sectarian issues; I am, after all, an atheist. I simply don't care about religion. Period. The reason I address the Druze is that I still have some hope that they would stop being so blind and realise that their leader Walid beik is deceiving them about what it means to be supportive of the "opposition". I have no such hope from the Maronites. I've "washed my hands off" the Lebanese Christians. Do you know, some advocate federalism and the transfer of Christians to the "Christian side" and Muslims to the "Muslim side" under that plan. Others hate the Palestinian refugees so much (as if they are not oppressed enough by them already) that they would not hesitate to deport or massacre them (again). Still others claim Lebanon should be "clean" of all "foreign" elements, including its very own citizens who happen to be of Armenian (Christian) background. I suppose they are bitter that the Armenian community (there were individuals who joined - my current neighbour being one of them) refused to join the Phalangists. In fact, there were fierce battles waged and massacres perpetrated by the latter against the former for that very reason, until, that is, the Armenians took up arms and took control over the defense of their "areas". So I have no hope in this matter from Lebanon's Christians as a whole.

Moreover, Bush said that if Lebanon failed to force Hezballah to disarm, it would provide assistance. What do "opposition" supporters think about this? Is it sovereign enough for them? Or is there enough lack of interference by a "foreign power" in its affairs? Are the so-called patriots not angered and humiliated by such statements? How can they ever be silent to, no, rather, supportive of, such a thing? Moreover, how can they support such a thing at one moment then yell "freedom, independence, sovereignty!" at another? Are they that blind so as not to realise that their double standards are rendering them the laughing-stock of anyone sane (and not subscribing to American propaganda) out there? I say sane because it is most certainly insane to be a member of this hypocritical group that calls itself "the opposition" and assumes the title of patriotism. And I do not intend to attach to this the statement "so that is why you should support the anti-"opposition" side" - that would be a false dichotomy fallacy, one that is unfortunately put to use all the time in Lebanon). Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and the purity of its heart." This is too true. Think about what has been done in the course of history in the name of patriotism, of king and country, of clergy and religion. You don't have to look further than Iraq and the police state the United States itself has become to see how true this is. Many, many wrong things have been done, and much blood has been shed in the name of liberty, patriotism, sovereignty, and independence. At the end of the day we must at least question if not outright reject these social constructs (or at least the manner in which they are [mis]represented) that have plagued us for millenia. For me freedom might sound and feel true, for others that same freedom might mean quite the opposite, even death. Political absolutism, this adopted child of successive U.S governments, possesses the power to oppress dissenters and become that which it claimed to be rebelling against: a defender of oppression, corruption, and dare I say it, un-patriotism.

So for the sake of humanity, please drop this destructive concept of yours and stop weaving a web of arguments with it. The sooner you stop, the better. Now you see what my problem with the "opposition" is. You have your concept of patriotism, and I my own. But let us stop thinking about and more importantly planning on imposing our personal views on each other. In fact, when I say "us", I am giving you the benefit of the doubt and treating you as an equal when it comes to the use and abuse of that term. I for one do not use it to drive my point home. The only time I ever take the word patriotism in my mouth is when I point to the fact that you are using it and abandoning it at the same time. At least when you decide on a concept stick to it rather than yo-yo-ing back and forth between the two positions.

On another note, I wonder how big Bush's "aid" package to the "opposition" will be in return for the settling of the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon.

Another day, another revolution

2005-04-18T20:43:00.000-04:00

What colour should the next revolution be represented by? I think we will soon be out of colours; because it appears that the winds of change (sic) are spreading faster than was previously predicted... Must be that the Cedar (or was it Gucci?) Revolution inspired the wave of revolutions in the Middle East. Yup, those "young, Westernised, technology-savvy activists" (thanks for the link, Angry Arab) are simply irresistible. And you know, I was thinking, maybe the revolution in Saudi Arabia will be given the honorary title of the Rainbow Revolution and its colour would be... the colours of the rainbow?

Woman at Point Zero

2005-04-18T17:00:00.000-04:00

I just started reading this book. It's a short one, 108 pages long, and I got through the first 50 pages in a single sitting. This book was a required reading for one of the courses I was taking 2 years ago, and while I had bought the book, I never had the time to read it. Seeing as it was short and I was in the mood to read (it's not easy for those of us suffering from ADHD to be in that kind of mood), I took it up. I must say that I am amazed by how touching it is. I got goose bumps while reading it. I would argue that it would sound even better in the original (Arabic), as the translation (by Sherif Hetata) seems to be overly simplified. The novel is, so far, very poetic. But the plot unfolds very quickly, which is what makes it a page-turner.

Those of you who are wondering what the book is about, here's what the back cover says: "From her prison cell, Firdaus, sentenced to die for having killed a pimp in a Cairo street, tells of her life from village childhood to city prostitute. Society's retribution for her act of defiance - death - she welcomes as the only way she can finally be free."

It is a feminist novel. It is also quite political (outside of feminism, that is). For example, here's a passage: "When they pronounced the word 'patriotism' I could tell at once that in their heart of hearts they feared not Allah, and that at the back of their minds patriotism meant that the poor should die to defend the land of the rich, their land, for I knew that the poor had no land" (28).

I can't wait to resume reading the book, but I had to do a search on google before continuing. So I did, and it turns out that she has a website. On digging through the site in search of her political opinions especially on the Middle East, I noticed an interesting article on terrorism. Quite articulate I must admit, especially with the following:

These measures envisioned as effective ways in the fight against terrorism, are they not in themselves of a "terrorist" nature, a reflection of a "terrorism" imposed by the State, by the rulers of the United States in the name of their "war against terrorism"? Perhaps that is why they are meeting with a mounting opposition from law makers in the Republican and Democratic parties, from political and academic institutions, from peoples organizations and associations for whom issues related to democracy and the loss of civil liberties are becoming a growing concern.

If the policies being implemented by the United States administration are shot through with an increasing violence against the American people said to be needed in order to ensure their "protection against future terrorist attacks" and maximize "internal security" would it be surprising if the violence exercised against other poorer, weaker peoples in the world is reaching the proportions we are witnessing today in the so called "war against terrorism" and the "spread of democracy"?

I keep wondering how the military intervention and occupation first of Afghanistan, then of Iraq can further "the fight against terrorism for humanity." How the increasing death and destruction meted out to the Afghani and Iraqi people can quell the fires of hatred or, dissipate the desperation which helps to fuel the loss of faith in collective, democratic action. I wonder why the killing of Palestinian men, women, and children by a regular technologically, nuclear, laser equipped army continues to be qualified as self defense, why military invasion and mass massacres by "coalition troops" are not described as "terrorism" but as civilizing, democratizing missions meant to free our world of the "Bin Ladens" who have arisen, and continue to arise in different parts of the world.

Yes, very eloquent. I highly recommend that you pick up this book. If not buy it, then get it from the library. I promise that it will neither harm you nor waste your time. On the contrary, I think that it will raise a lot of awareness of the struggle of women in the Middle East, not only in terms of bombs, war, and death, but also in terms of corrupt, sexist regimes, the very regimes that never tire of propagandasing the cause of freedom from occupation. What about the occupation that women live in? It's time that men in the Middle East (and this is directed not only at Muslims as most of you will think, but also at Christians and Jews - there is A LOT of sexism in the last two, but it is not talked about as much - thanks to the media and the glorification of those religions and the denigration of Islam) open their eyes and realise that their patriarchal systems need to be dismantled and a new system of equality and mutual respect should take their place.

Edit 1: Does anyone know how I can wrap text around the photo?!?
Edit 2: I finished reading the book last night. Wow. Just wow. Read it.

2005-04-18T13:38:00.000-04:00

An "Israeli" boy watches mixed Palestinian-"Israeli" teams play during a soccer match in Herzilya. The tournament is hosted by "The Peres Center for Peace", an oxymoron if there is any. Mr. Peres, in his address to the Knesset on the "Grapes of Wrath" said:

"'Grapes of Wrath' is an operation which has no time limit, but is explicit in its objectives. These objectives are to ensure a long period of quiet for the communities of the north, to stabilize the situation in southern Lebanon [by killing 100+ civilians, half of them children], and to halt the firing of Katyushas [by firing artillery shells], thereby enabling a resumption of the peace process. The operation relies on the use of sophisticated and precise weapons [very precise indeed]. It accords expression to the IDF's advantage in human [human quality? oh wow, how very non-supremacist of you] and technological quality [yes, I suppose that is true - after all you're the one that receives billions in military "aid", not Lebanon - and despite that, your arses got handed over to you by Hezballah. I guess they are of a superior human quality then?], in mobility, and intelligence, and in precise and accurate hits [yes, I can tell]."

Letter to the Editors of Ha'aretz

2005-04-18T10:20:00.000-04:00

Re: Ha'aretz plays hide & seek

I sent the following letter to the editors of Ha'aretz:

Dear Editors,

I am writing this e-mail with regards to the article that appeared on Ha'aretz yesterday (April 17, 2005) titled Waiting for the denial to end (Dalia Shehori). I noticed the link to it on the main page of the English version of Ha'aretz but it was removed shortly thereafter. Not even the search engine could find the article. I happened to have bookmarked it and could show it to family and friends.

I am not sure why the link was removed in such a hasty manner. I would like to think that it was not due to external pressures, or even worse, internal ones. When I saw the article, I was impressed that Ha'aretz had posted something that went "against" government policy in what is one of the most shameful denialist acts by the very people who are supposed to be against such denial. Unfortunately, that didn't last long, as the article was removed shortly after I noticed it.

I would like to know why it was removed, and I sincerely hope that Ha'aretz would do the right thing and put it back up. I, too, am waiting for the denial to end. Not only the government's denial, but also the denial by many independent institutions in Israel as well as in many Jewish communities worldwide.

Sincerely,

Dan Marsden

Qana Massacre

2005-04-18T00:21:00.000-04:00

"A man was lying in two pieces. There was a woman who was pregnant and I could see the arm and leg of her unborn baby poking out of her stomach. There was a man who had shrapnel in his head. He was not dead but you could see a piece of metal in his neck, like he'd had his throat cut. He told his daughter to come to help him and lift him up. And I heard her say: 'Wait a minute, I'm trying to put my brother together -- he's in two pieces.' There was another brother holding a child in his arms. The child had no head..." - Fawzieh Saad, survivor of the 18th April 1996 Qana massacre

(Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon, p. 669)

When Peres had launched this latest war -- 'Grapes of Wrath' was its malign name -- we were treated to the usual nonsense about a war on 'terror', a war against 'international terror', about Israel 'not sitting idly by'. Terrorists, terrorists, terrorists; the same brainwashing that had so affected the Israeli soldiers who invaded Lebanon 14 years earlier. The Israelis firing the shells into Qana were probably schoolboys in 1982. But they still believed the same fantasies. On the very first day of the bombardment, the Israelis fired a missile at the 'Hezbollah terrorist headquarters' in Beirut. But they missed the Hezbollah's offices and the rocket beheaded a little girl in a neighbouring apartment. Then they fired at a car carrying a 'terrorist' to Beirut. But there was no 'terrorist'. Their missile killed the driver -- a young woman -- as she stopped to buy a sandwich at a shop opposite the Jiye power station.

Then just five days before the Qana massacre, another Israeli Apache helicopter pilot fired a missile into an ambulance south of Tyre. It was carrying 'terrorists', the Israelis announced. But it was not. The vehicle was packed with families fleeing their shelled village, obeying the instructions to leave which they had heard over the Israeli-run militia radio station. Two women and four young children were killed in the ambulance. I would later identify and meet every survivor. None was a member of Hezbollah. [...] But the Israelis went on claiming that 'terrorists' were in the car. They never apologised.

(Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon, p. 672)

The Hezbollah had by [the evening of April 16] fired exactly 120 Katyusha rockets over the border. Israelis along the border spent nights in shelters. By contrast, Israel was firing 3,000 shells a day into Lebanon while its air force were launching 200 missile raids every 24 hours and 400,000 Lebanese civilians were straming up the roads to Beirut, often under fire from two Israeli gunboats that cruised the shoreline, firing at vehicles on the coastal highway -- because, of course, the 'terrorists' were using the roads.

(Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon, p. 673)

I spoke to hundreds of UN troops about the story of the mysterious videotape. Did it exist? And if so, why had it not surfaced? Why hadn't the UN publicised it? Then I learned that the film existed, but that it had been given to General van Kappen and that the soldier had been instructed never to give it to anyone. I heard, too, that the UN's final report on the massacre would be kept secret under what was described as American pressure on the UN Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros Ghali.

(Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon, p. 681)

Then two days [after the mass funeral of the massacre victims at Qana], I was sitting at home in Beirut when my mobile phone rang. A voice gave me a map reference and added: '1300 hours.' I ran to the front room where I kept my files on southern Lebanon, tearing open the large-scale map of the region. The reference was to a crossroads near Qana. I have never driven so fast to southern Lebanon. And at 1300 hours, I saw in the rear-view mirror a UN jeep, pulling up behind me.

A soldier in battledress and blue beret walked up to me, shook hands and said: "I copied the tape before the UN took it. The plane is there. I have made a personal decision. I have two young children, the same age as the ones I carried dead in my arms at Qana. This is for them." And from his battledress blouse he pulled a video-cassette and threw it on the passenger seat of my car. It was, I think in retrospect, the most dramatic individual personal act I have ever seen a soldier take. The mighty powers may try to cover up, but the little people can still sometimes win.

I drove at speed back to Beirut and slammed the cassette into my recorder. Zooming into the smoke over Qana, the amateur cameraman caught the explosion of shells above the camp. From the distance the film was taken, it was still possible to make out the individual shellbursts. Norwegian troops can be seen close to the camera. Then one of them looks into the sky and the camera pans up. There is a buzzing sound and into focus comes the 'drone', trailing smoke from its engines, flying low over the base. As it moves, the sound of explosions can still be heard and a UN radio in the background can be heard. On it, Commandant Smyth is passing on the message that "Fijibatt headquarters is under fire". The camera zooms again and there is the conference room, burning like a torch. So it was all true.

I made stills of the crucial pictures. The UN had no idea I had the film. Nor had the Israelis. But if The Independent printed all the details -- with photos from the tape -- then the UN would be forced to publish its report. There could be no denying these images. [...] At the same time, and at no profit, we arranged to distribute copies of the tape to every television station which requested it -- British, American, French, Arab, and Israeli, all of whom showed the sequence of the 'drone' over Qana during the shelling. The UN, mainly on the basis of the film -- of which they had, of course, all along had a copy -- concluded that the slaughter was unlikely to have been caused by an error, a gentle way of saying it was deliberate. The Israelis, confronted with the film by van Kappen, then changed their story. "In their eagerness to cooperate with the United Nations," they said, they had given wrong information to the major-general. There was indeed a 'drone' over Qana, they said, but it was not photographing the camp. It was on 'another mission'. The Israelis did not say what this 'other mission' was. They also said that the pilotless aircraft with its live-time television cameras only arrived after the shelling had ended -- a claim the videotape clearly shows to be untrue.

What followed was predictable. The UN was accused by some Israeli lobby groups in the United States of 'anti-Semitism'. American reporters at the press conference held to publish the UN report asked hostile, almost insulting questions of UN officials, often implying racist motives behind the report's conclusions. A New York daily told its readers that the UN had been insensitive to ask the Dutch general to write the report because Holland had allowed its Jewish population to be sent to Auschwitz in the Second World War. Once more, the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis were being employed to protect Israel's misdeeds.

(Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon, p. 682-683)

This is what I love Robert Fisk for. When he's not getting all involved in politics and instead doing his job as a journalist, he is amazing. I decided to share these excerpts (for educational purposes only - buy his book if you want to read the entire thing) because I thought that no matter what *I* wrote, it wouldn't be the same. He effectively demolishes the myth of "Jewish purity of arms". As for the officer who handed the video to him, whoever he is, wherever he is now, he is my hero. Thank you.

Edit: Here is "Israel's" response to the UN report on Qana.

Ha'aretz plays hide & seek

2005-04-17T23:57:00.000-04:00

If you can find a link to this article on Ha'aretz's main page or using the search engine, I will reward you by adding you to the list of contributors to this blog.

The article was there just this morning along with a rather big flag of Turkey, and I was lucky enough to catch it, as it was removed shortly afterwards (for some ~~odd~~ reason). It seems to me that some people (albeit a quite powerful group - powerful enough to assert their will on the so-called "left-leaning" Ha'aretz) were not satisfied with the article as it has the potential to undermine the so-called uniqueness of the Jewish genocide...

Will the real Jewish left please stand up?

2005-04-17T22:52:00.000-04:00

Michael Neumann, a Professor of Philosophy at Trent University, has an interesting article on CounterPunch about the ~~Jewish left~~. Here's an excerpt:

In short, all these people who weep for the Palestinians, all these activists who put their bodies on the line, all the eminent figures and eloquent writers who condemn Israel's vile actions--none of these people actually request, let alone demand, any remotely serious action against Israel. And there are only ugly explanations for this bizarre behaviour. Are Jews still better than Palestinians? Did the Nazi era confer on them an unlimited licence to plunder and murder? Is being Jewish so sacred, so wise, so humanitarian, so warm and cuddly that a Jewish state couldn't "really" do much harm, or deserve more than a good scolding?

Via umkhalil.

Also check out my and Here and There's posts on the Jewish and/or "Israeli" left.

Moving

2005-04-17T16:35:00.000-04:00

Due to numerous complaints about problems viewing the old blog, I decided that it was time I moved it to a better location. All the posts and comments have been transfered to the new location. Hopefully this will be the last time we're moving. Please update your bookmarks. I apologise for the inconvenience.

Breaking News

2005-04-16T21:13:00.000-04:00

The Lebanese Health Ministry (or what is left of it) has reported that there has been a rapid escalation of symptoms (but not a spread of the bacterium itself) of what they call the Hariri flu. The bacterium has been named in honour of the late ex-PM Rafik Hariri, who gave everything to Lebanon, never taking anything away from its sons and daughters (except for 99.9% of the ownership of downtown Beirut - but since he's dead now and a ~~hero~~ tool for the "opposition", he is excused - in fact, the airport should now be renamed in his honour - because the "opposition" is apparently for uniting all sides instead of imposing their heroes on others, etc. Yup, very united of them). Officials (or whoever is left of those after the peaceful revolution of accusations of "loyalism" to Syria sweeped through the entire population+) have released a list of symptoms they believe will help identify and honour such cases. That's right, for the first time in history, bacteria are being embraced rather than shunned and battled against.

+ Only 40% of the Lebanese being real Lebanese.

The official list of symptoms:

1-Excessive paranoia
2-"The opposition is peaceful"
3-"We are not militias, only vigilantes"
4-"We don't have weapons, only Hezballah does"
5-"If you're not with us, you're.... pro-Syrian or a Syrian"
6-"Ka3k vendors are mukhabarat"
7-"Najib Mikati is pro-Syrian"
8-"The Truth, we want the Truth! Syria was behind it!"
9-"We're not against Syrians, only the Syrian government. The Syrian people have suffered under the Ba'athist regime just like we have." *stabbing some more Syrian workers*
10-"War? Never again!" *stabbing some more "Syrian-looking" Lebanese workers*
11-"Palestinians? We support their right of return!" (Meanwhile at home: "When will those filthy Palestinians leave our country?")
12-"We're not pro-Israel!" (Meanwhile at rallies: "Disarm Hezballah! Apply 1559 fully!" [because we want to do "Israel's" job])
13-"Zoom Out & Count, 100% Lebanese" (A photographer mistakenly zooms in and here is a lady with her uniformed Sri Lankan maid, and there are two Sri Lankan maids with Lebanese flags, 100% Lebanese indeed)
14-Owns at least 1 Hariri mask
15-Can't utter one sentence without mentioning Hariri's name at least twice, and the rest of the sentence being a mixture of French, English, and Lebanese (See next point)
16-"Lebanon is not an Arab country and the language we speak is not Arabic but Lebanese" (Breaking news for linguists!)
17-Tururuttuttut, General!
18-"You should be happy to kiss General's feet"
19-"The opposition is not sectarian" (Walid Beik not sectarian, ~~Patriarch~~ Politician Sfeir not sectarian, hmm, who else..?)
20-"LFPM is a secular movement that is open for all" (95% of its members are... Christians)
21-"Bring only a Lebanese Forces flag, and never ever talk to Palestinians or Syrians"
22-"We are patriotic and united! See, we wave Lebanese flags, not the flags of the parties we support!" (Meanwhile the "opposition" had to ask its supporters not to bring party flags the NEXT time so as to further the propaganda of "Revolution made for TV" and "A movement for all Lebanese" and "We are united")
23-"Sheb3a farms is not Lebanese; besides, even if it is, it's just a strip of land, why does it matter?" (Meanwhile on "opposition"-supporting "discussion" boards, there are hundreds of members who have 10,425 in their usernames, user titles, avatars, or signatures)
..
..
..
n-Unfortunately, the Health Ministry has so far been unable to count and record all the symptoms of the Hariri Flu. We are working on it 'round the clock. Please stay tuned for more. We will release a statement as soon as we come up with more information necessary to honour the bacteria and attempt to spread it around. We apologise for the inconvenience.

The masks are not enough

2005-04-16T21:04:00.000-04:00

As if the Hariri masks were not enough, there is a petition circulating around that calls for renaming Beirut International Airport guess what... Rafik Hariri International Aiport. I kid you not. Apparently this was suggested by who else but the supposedly "moderate pro-Syrian" Najib Mikati. Yup. I can tell Mikati is quite the pro-Syrian!

I am afraid I must go and throw up now.

2005-04-16T18:09:00.000-04:00

New masks are now being sold in Lebanon. Yup. And guess what? It's of the same guy who owned, err umm, 99.9% of downtown Beirut (I suppose the 0.1% would be the St. Georges) and was hated, yup, hated for it. Meet the hero of the "opposition". And the new heroes of Lebanon (the all new version of fascist Maronites) - alas the photo shows only one - ~~wearing~~ hiding behind his mask.

2005-04-16T02:51:00.000-04:00

A pro-"opposition" caricature. Translation: "We will hold the elections as quickly as possible" (on the shell is written "the government"). What I don't understand, though, and I hope someone could explain this to me, is how the "loyalists" would benefit from postponing the elections?? If anything it would boost the position of the "opposition". But perhaps the "opposition" is simply trying to score some cheap propaganda points off this??

A Tale of Two Infiltrations

2005-04-15T17:34:00.000-04:00

We must, of course, put "Israel's" case first, since the lives of its (Jewish) citizens are more valuable and important than the lives of, for example, Lebanese civilians, and in particular the "wrong kind" (according to the peace-loving "opposition") of them (Shi'ites). Here's what Ha'aretz (the supposedly+ left-leaning newspaper) reports:

The Israel Offense* Forces will investigate how a Fatah militant managed to infiltrate into a military base on the Golan Heights from Syria on Friday morning.

The man was captured after a shootout with IOF* troops, security sources said.

In a rare flare-up in the normally quiet Golan, the gunman penetrated the border fence and opened fired on the IOF's* Tel Hazeka outpost, northeast of Katzrin.

+ See *
* Necessary corrections made

The other case, and of course the less important one (since we all know that Lebanon is always the initiator of aggression) is the following incident, reported on both Daily Star and JPost but ~~surprisingly~~ not on Ha'aretz:

Lebanese authorities have captured two dogs that crossed the border from Israel, checking whether they were booby-trapped or carried electronic implants that could be used for spying, Lebanese security officials said Friday.

The two dogs, Shylo-type, "infiltrated" Lebanon on Thursday through an opening in the barbed wire fence that separates the Kfar Kila village in Southern Lebanon from the northern Israeli town of Metulla.

I am sure that in retaliation of this grave aggression by Lebanese authorities, "Israel" was FORCED to respond by flying its airplanes over Southern Lebanese towns...

Shalom!

2005-04-15T10:04:00.000-04:00

Map showing the countries that were sent samples of a flu virus. The UN's health agency revealed that some of the samples appear to have gone missing on their way to two of their destinations in Lebanon and Mexico. JOY! So will the opposition breathe a sigh of relief over Hezballah's weapons now that they have bio-terror weapons handy? What do you mean they already had weapons??? Can't be! The opposition is peaceful!

"Lebanese Forces", "Kata'eb", and "FPM": Same shit, different names?

2005-04-14T13:55:00.000-04:00

Jubilant crowds have stormed and ransacked the Baath Party offices in Zahleh and attempted to do the same with Karim Pakradouni's Katayeb branch after Syria pulled out its intelligence apparatus from the largest Catholic-populated city in the Middle East, An Nahar reported Thursday.

The two-pronged attack came amid festive celebrations in the streets of Zahleh staged by activists of Samir Geagea's Lebanese Forces, ex-President Amin Gemayel's Katayeb Corrective Movement and of Gen. Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement.

Read more...

So much for the so-called graph that Mustapha of Beirut Spring has designed for us:

(Notice the distance between the FPM and "Christian Mainstream" in that graph, and then start thinking if they're that far from one another in reality, and also whether or not the "Christian Mainstream" is supposed to be placed in the middle of the graph as opposed to the far right).

3 more resolutions against "Israel"

2005-04-14T11:46:00.000-04:00

GENEVA - The United Nations Commission on Human Rights on Thursday condemned Israel's use of force against Palestinian civilians and called on Israel to stop building settlements in the occupied territories.

The 53-member state body, at its annual session, easily adopted three resolutions on Israel presented by Arab countries.

The United States and Australia were alone in voting against both the resolution on settlements and one on the Golan Heights.

Britain, Canada, Germany and Italy were among those joining the United States in voting against a text condemning Israel for use of force, including executions, and "continued systematic violations" in the West Bank and Gaza Strip occupied since 1967.

Continue reading...

Massacre in Jenin

2005-04-14T02:34:00.000-04:00

An "Israeli" soldier covers his nose from the overwhelming smell of death in the Jenin refugee camp. Zalmon Shoval, Ariel "Man of Peace" Sharon's adviser, argues that what happened at Jenin was justifiable since "Israel [with no less than 200 nuclear warheads] was fighting for its life". Shoval also said, "Mr [Terje Roed] Larsen (UN Middle East envoy) has no business whatsoever to tell us what is right or wrong".