I have yet to finish the entire report, but recommend Human Rights Watch’s Fatal Strikes: Israel’s Indiscriminate Attacks Against Civilians in Lebanon for a view of Israel’s, well, indiscriminate attacks against civilians in lebanon… It can’t be said any better than that.
By consistently failing to distinguish between combatants and civilians, Israel has violated one of the most fundamental tenets of the laws of war: the duty to carry out attacks on only military targets. The pattern of attacks during the Israeli offensive in Lebanon suggests that the failures cannot be explained or dismissed as mere accidents; the extent of the pattern and the seriousness of the consequences indicate the commission of war crimes.
Emphasis mine
War crimes. That sounds about right.
Yet people continue to defend, protect, and attempt to turn our attention away from Israeli atrocities in the region. These come not just from the government, the Israeli lobby and the mainstream media, but from some on the left. While many on the far left (including myself) continue to recognize war crimes as they are regardless of the perpetrating nation, a significant number have shied away from the usual criticism of illegal and immoral use of force by Israel against Lebanon in the recent war. These are largely the same people who have demonstrated against wars in Iraq but refuse to add “Justice for the Palestinians” to the never-ending lists of demands for these marches.
I’ve recently noticed two opposing trends in the activist scene recently. First, the recent mobilization of oppressed populations. As witnessed around the country on May Day as millions of Hispanic men, women and children marched to protect their rights as humans and on August 12th in DC as a crowd of 15,000 mostly Muslim-American demonstrators encircled the White House demanding justice for Lebanon and Palestine, those with the most to lose are standing up to the bigots, the Zionists and the racists. More than being a welcome development, this is a long-overdue moment. (There are, however, no congratulations to our white selves in order for achieving something we should have done long ago.) The importance of the affected, abused and oppressed populations standing up to their abusers and oppressors themselves cannot be understated. A movement or party is in fact nothing without the involvement of the people it claims to represent. It’s worthwhile to spend a moment discussing August 12th in DC. Largely ignored by the media, the demonstration possessed an the energy that had been severely lacking in almost all of the recent anti-war events. Palestinian and Lebanese flags waved everywhere, and people stuck “I heart Beirut” bumperstickers on whatever part of their body was most visible. Chants condemning Israel and the United States came out loud and clear in English and Arabic. There was a militant vibe throughout the entire event across all participants. And to reiterate, many Muslim Americans came out, some from mosques, some from local groups, some just with their families and friends.
The second, and more dismaying trend, is the loss of certain activists to the Democratic party line. This is especially notable here in Connecticut, where Greenwich millionaire Ned Lamont recently defeated incumbent Joe Leiberman in the primary. (Leiberman, claiming to know better than the party he supposedly represents and the people who voted against him, is running as an Independent.) In the passionate movement to get Leiberman out of his Senate seat, the CT Democrats jumped on the Lamont bandwagon. Details and all other issues be damned, they wanted something other than the “stay the course” mentality of the current Senator. He talks of beginning the planning for the troops to “start heading home,” not withdrawing immediately from Iraq. He claims Iran is a threat to the United States, which is no more true now than it was for Iraq in March 2003. Far from being a true “peace candidate” Lamont has begun hinting at his own Kerry-esque “better war on terror” without analyzing the historical and material contributions to the current world conflicts. Where a true Peace Candidate would condemn war crimes - especially those supported and financed by his own country - Lamont says “I believe that when Israel's security is threatened, the United States must unambiguously stand with our ally to be sure that it is safe and secure.” Even his issues page on Iraq claims, “Today… Israel is no safer”
Through a respectable though misguided fervor to stand up to the President and other neoconservatives on Iraq, Connecticut activists have taken Lamont’s stance on Israel and silenced any criticism they may have had. In many otherwise-leftist circles, the very mention of Israel draws the rolling of eyes and heavy sighs. The question must be dealt with, and it is hypocritical to claim that support of Israel’s terrorism in Palestine and Lebanon is justifiable when the United States’ own terrorism in Iraq has drawn so many millions to the streets over the past three years. If the security of Israel is a concern, then why not the security of Lebanon?
Coming up in part 2 - A delicate balance: Should we demonstrate at Zionist organizations?
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Reading to get done before the summer's over. 1/3 business, 1/3 personal, 1/3 mixed.
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I love mixing my two loves... Just got this in my Inbox.
some veterans are boycotting because the owner has a sign in the window that's a parody of a recruiting poster. He wants the troops home and he won't back down. He seems a nice fellow and he appreciates the support. (BTW the sign is tiny, maybe 3" by 4" tops) He's supplemented it by a picture of "W" saying something like "Send my girls, no way". It's a small store opposite the train station on River Street.
Would like to get in touch with Milford area peace activists about the possibility of leafletting at the Milford Oyster Festival and about things in general.
Here's the original:
Maybe I'm just fired up because Ned beat Joe, but when I read today's front-page New Haven Register article about the Milford package store owner whose business is being threatened with a boycott by veterans because he put an anti-Iraq War poster in his window, I got an idea. . .
Let's B-U-Y-cott!! If you drink alcoholic beverages (even if you don't -- you know someone who does) --consider taking the 12-mile, 20-minute drive from New Haven to Milford to patronize his shop. I went this afternoon, met this charming, 'controversial' guy (a veteran himself!), and called a friend in NYC for whom I bought two bottles of wine. Okay, I also got a small bottle of ginger brandy to soothe the last of my summer cold symptoms . . .
Tom Jakubisyn, owner of TJ's Package Store, 43 River St., Milford (by the railroad bridge near the Green), has had his tiny package store for decades. In his "aw-shucks-what's-all-the-fuss-about" way, he told me of several visits by CT media and many calls (ALL supporting him) by well-wishing strangers, as well as reading his favorite 'don't let the powers that be keep you from thinking for yourself about war' quotes.
Go. Buy for yourself and/or other. Talk with Tom ('TJ'). Think for yourself. Forward this email quickly and widely.
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...Until the US has been in Iraq longer than in World War II.
And what have we accomplished? Oh yeah, more people hate our government now.
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Well, that was painfully easy. Tracking down a bug in an AppleScript I came to this test case:
property tagName : "aTag"
tell application "Adobe InDesign CS2"
set theTag to first XML tag of document 1 whose name is equal to tagName
set theElement to first XML element of document 1 whose markup tag is theTag
every text frame of document 1 whose associated XML element is theElement
end tell
Which promptly causes InDesign CS2 to crash every time. It doesn't like "first text frame of..." either.
Bug submitted.
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This is going to drive me crazy until the answer is posted. “What is the name of the pin on the back of the LCIII that was not enabled on the LCII?” I’ve tried plenty of variations on PDS, LCPDS, LC-PDS, LCIII-PDS, DIN-8, DIN-9, etc, to know that it’s not any of those.
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Almost forgot to post this earlier. Too busy with organizing lease returns. This email came out from the president earlier today. I unfortunatley have to block out the brand names, but let's just say that at least one is alcohol.
To celebrate our two, new business wins, let?s all gather outside at 4pm sharp.
We’ll all do a shot of .... followed by an .... chaser.
We’ll all do a shot of .... followed by an .... chaser.
Well, that was fun.
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Everyone seems to be worked up about the Connecticut Democratic primary tonight. Even the BBC is reporting on it. MSNBC, Fox and CNN all have reporters in the state, and volunteers called to action by the “netroots” blogs like DailyKos and MyDD have gone all-out in the state.
A few people at work, knowing my past political experiences, asked if I voted. Honestly, if I didn't subscribe to the DailyKos RSS feed for that occasional piece of interesting news about the administration's failings, the primary wouldn’t have crossed my mind more than once today. The winner doesn’t matter. No, really.
Lamont claims to be anti-war now - that’s anti-Iraq-war- and pro-people (whatever that means from a politician). Ralph Ferucci and Charlie Thornton were both at Saturday’s demonstration in New Haven demanding and end to Israeli atrocities in Lebanon and Gaza. Lamont, on the other hand, spent quality time defending Israel’s “right to defend itself.”
I don’t like Lieberman either, of course. Elections, especially in a two-party, money-based election system, are choices between the lesser of two evils.
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While sitting at work, eating a lunch of falafel and other assorted foods with the team, CNN showed some video of Condoleeza Rice. The caption read, “Rice in the Middle East”.
Honestly, it seemed funnier at the time.
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I comment not to detract or counter your assertions, because I agree. Israel's actions can only be called atrocious. But you hit on the opposite of what I was reading in an article in the Economist this morning. It is hypocritical to claim justifiable supporting Israel's terrorism, but equally to claim support of Hamas & Hizbullah's. Which is not what you are doing, as anyone who's not...a Republican...okay haha. Anybody with his/her eyes open should know that Hizbullah, tho' popular isn't (all of) Lebanon, just as Hamas isn't (all of) Palestine.
The Catch-22 is that both groups employ the same highly effective guerilla tactics. Not merely acting as small independent cells, but blending in with civillian sympathizers. Israel claims greater civility in that it employs a large professional military. But that doesn't hold up when they keep resolving that their only recourse is to indiscriminately blow the shit out of everyone and everything. Killing a fly with a cannon as it were.
Anyway, I can't look at the situation and say everyone's at fault. But more than any of the obvious players, I'd say more than anything, those at fault are the nations that rammed the state of Israel down the throats of the Palestinians. Way to go Allies.
I still think Ibn Saud had a good idea. "Give them the choicest lands of their German oppressors." Or as my colleague Tim Butler opined one afternoon "Why didn't we just give them upstate NY? I can imagine them all kibbutzing around up there!"
With the warning that I'm not able to be as careful or precise as I wish with what I'm about to say, here are my thoughts.
I'm not a fan of Shariah law or of theocracy, but to the extent that they are resistance and relief organizations for Palestine and Lebanon, I support Hezbollah and Hamas. While not supporting much of their respective politics, I cannot express anything but admiration for the way they continue the struggle. It's not a simple case of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," but instead a support for the resistance against 150 years of unjustified aggression towards the native populations of the land.
We could blame the Allies for much of the trouble in the Middle East - including the first Gulf War, as Kuwait was created to keep Iraq from having unfettered access to water - and that's an important historical fact to keep in mind when analyzing the situation. The first Zionist settlement was created in 1882, long before the Israel was added to the mix.
The problem isn't where to put them - with "them" being either the Israelis or the Arabs. They can and have lived together for centuries in relative peace. None but the most militant in Hamas are demanding Israel's destruction in any serious way. (Iran and Syria could have done it years ago.) The "them" to worry about is the aggressors in the government, and their supporters here. It's futile to try to get any original land rights settled; in the same way, we cannot figure out with any scientifically recognizable level of accuracy those who claim family heritage from the area. What we can note is that Israel routinely steals land from Palestine, tries to steal from Lebanon, and treats Jewish Arabs worse than Jews of European descent.
What I'm trying to get through here is that there is a large difference between Israel's acts of aggression and Hezbollah/Hamas's acts of resistance. Violence is not a desirable tool, but sometimes becomes necessary in the act of liberation.