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The US Catholic Bishops come under fire for condoning the agreement that perpetuates the ongoing injustice for Palestinians.

By Kairos Palestine  |  IMEMC News  |   Sept 10, 2020

It would be a step towards peace if this accord were accompanied by the resolution of the core of the conflict: the Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian land.

A major Christian Palestinian group yesterday criticized a United States bishop for condoning the recent Israeli-UAE normalization agreement.

Kairos Palestine addressed an open letter to Bishop of Rockford and Illinois, David Malloy, who also serves as Chair of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on International Justice and Peace, criticizing him on showing satisfaction with the agreement and providing him with their observations on the issue.

“People who think that any mutual recognition between an Arab country and the state of Israel is a step forward towards peace are mistaken. It would be a step towards peace if this accord were accompanied by the resolution of the core of the conflict: the Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian land,” they said.

Continue reading “Kairos Palestine condemns US Bishop’s support for Israel-UAE normalization”

Reverend William Barber II places the struggle for justice in Palestine in the broad framework of global struggles against racism, colonialism and white supremacy.

By Rev. William J. Barber II  |  christianzionism.org  | Sept 1, 2020

The same philosophy that claimed black bodies and called it Christian now justifies the displacement of Palestinian families and calls it ‘pro-Israel.’

The Palestinian experience resonates with my own background. I didn’t grow up anywhere near Israel/Palestine, but the slave masters did treat my ancestors as property. What is required if we are to be human, even against the backdrop of colonialism? The colonial masters who said America was their property saw my native ancestors as savages. The ways some people talked about “God’s people” excluded me. They said it was their manifest destiny to subdue the land that was promised to them, no matter who was already there. The same philosophy that claimed black bodies and called it Christian now justifies the displacement of Palestinian families and calls it “pro-Israel.” But based on ancient Hebrew scripture in Leviticus: “You shall treat the stranger who sojourns among you as the native and you are to love them as yourself. You shall have the same law for the sojourner and the native, for I am the Lord your God who honor and loves all of creation.”

Often when I was young, I heard fellow Christians talk about the nation state of Israel–especially the TV preachers, but I never heard much about the Palestinian people who were already living on that land. I did know about a large number of European Jews who were fleeing terrible oppression who had settled in Palestine. But just as I never heard much about my people in many tellings of American history, I never heard about Palestinian people and their desperate need for equality in that land

Continue reading “We are all made in God’s image”

 

Both Republicans and Democrats head to the November elections with strong pro-Israel sentiments and outright support, completely ignoring the plight of occupied and oppressed Palestinians.

By Ramzy Baroud   | The Palestine Chronicle  |   Sept 2, 2020

“This is apocalyptic foreign policy in a nutshell,‘ …“Israel is not as a real country but a fantasyland, backdrop for Christian myth.’
— Gershom Gorenberg, Israeli commentator

t is difficult – and futile – to argue which American president has historically been more pro-Israel. While former President Barack Obama, for example, has pledged more money to Israel than any other US administration in history, Donald Trump has provided Israel with a blank check of seemingly endless political concessions.

Certainly, the unconditional backing and love declared for Israel is common among all US administrations. What they may differ on, however, is their overall motive, primarily their target audience during election time.

Both Republicans and Democrats head to the November elections with strong pro-Israel sentiments and outright support, completely ignoring the plight of occupied and oppressed Palestinians.

Continue reading “Israel’s Friends at the RNC: ‘Christian Zionists’ dictate the agenda of the Republican Party”

The UAE move provides political cover for other Arab states to make deals that would likely do nothing for Palestinians.

By Phyllis Bennis   | CounterPunch |  Sept 3, 2020

The Palestinians get what the Palestinians always get. Bupkes, as my grandma used to say. Yiddish for ‘nothing.’

In some ways, the U.S.-brokered plan for mutual recognition between Israel and the United Arab Emirates is big news. For more than a quarter of a century, only two Middle Eastern countries — Egypt and Jordan — had officially recognized Israel. None of the Gulf monarchies did.

So, it was a pretty big deal when the announcement was made. Except, actually, not so much.

Despite the UAE’s claimed adherence to a decades-long position that no Arab country should normalize relations with Israel until it ended its occupation of Palestinian land, ties between the UAE and Israel had been quietly underway for years. The same is true of many other Arab states.

Continue reading “The Israel-UAE deal isn’t about peace at all”

A look back at the history of settlements which prevent the prospects for Palestinian statehood under a negotiated peace agreement.

By Seth Eislund  |  J Street  |  Aug 27, 2020

‘In June alone, Israel demolished 30 Palestinian homes in the West Bank (not including East Jerusalem) – the same number demolished throughout the entire first five months of 2020.’
— Israeli human rights organization NGO B’Tselem Report

Creeping Annexation is a decades-long project
Since Israel took control of the West Bank following its victory in the Six-Day War of 1967, the Israeli government has supported settlement construction on captured, occupied territory. This policy commenced just months after the end of the war, with successive Israeli governments basing much of their settlement policy in the first decade of occupation around what was known as the ‘Allon Plan’, which envisioned the annexation of large parts of the West Bank.

The settlement movement had an even more expansive view of Israel’s right to the occupied territory, pushing for the government to support Israelis in building settlements — and displacing Palestinians — across the entire West Bank. With increasing encouragement from the government, the number of Israelis living in the West Bank has ballooned from just 1,500 in the early years of occupation to almost 430,000 in the broader occupied West Bank and 220,000 in occupied East Jerusalem.

Continue reading “How creeping annexation is strangling hope for Israeli-Palestinian peace”

Questions are being brought to light about American groups that receive Israeli government funds.

By Alison Weir |  Israel-Palestine News  |  Sept 1, 2020

Israel has been manipulating US policies – and some US organizations and politicians have been helping them, in what appears to be violation of US laws… Will the government investigate them and censure Israel, the way it did the claims of ‘Russian interference’? Or will Israel and its collaborators once again escape consequences?
— Aiden Pink, reposted from The Forward, “U.S. pro-Israel groups failed to disclose grants from Israeli government’

More than half of all American states have passed laws designed to combat the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. No advocacy group was more important to this push than the Israel Allies Foundation, an American non-profit that supports a network of pro-Israel legislators across the globe.

From Israel Allies Foundation (Israel Allies Foundation)

[Editor’s note: BDS is an international movement to oppose Israel’s systematic human rights violations. BDS upholds “the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity.”]

It was the IAF that in 2014 connected a South Carolina politician with an Israeli legal scholar who drafted the first bill to ban state agencies from contracting with entities that boycott Israel. [For details, see this.]

After that law passed in South Carolina in 2015, the IAF successfully lobbied for nearly-identical anti-BDS bills in 25 other states, including Florida, Pennsylvania and Arizona.

Continue reading “Evidence that U.S. pro-Israel groups may have violated U.S. laws”

The last months have seen Israel crack down on cultural figures and intellectuals in the occupied territories. Critics say the attacks are part of a larger strategy of suppressing Palestinian civil society.

By Robert Swift  |  +972 Magazine  | Aug 26, 2020

‘They don’t want Palestinians to be visible to the world; it’s difficult to dehumanize people playing classical music,’
— Suhail Khoury, Jerusalem Society for Music Teaching and Research

Suhail Khoury and Rania Elias were arrested last month by the Jerusalem Police. A married couple, they are, respectively, the Palestinian directors of the Jerusalem Society for Music Teaching and Research, and the Yabous Cultural Center — two East Jerusalem institutions that were simultaneously raided at the time of their arrests. The police accused them of tax avoidance and fraud, but have yet to present them with any charges in relation to the allegations.

Khoury and Elias were not the only prominent figures to be targeted by the Israeli authorities last month. A few days earlier, Palestinian astrophysicist Imad Barghouthi was detained at a checkpoint while traveling from Al-Quds University to his home in the West Bank; he has been charged with incitement and remains in custody. And in late July, Ahmad Qatamesh, a Palestinian author and academic, was released after being held for seven months in administrative detention — a procedure by which Israel holds detainees without due process.

Continue reading “From science to classical music, Israel clamps down on Palestinian culture”

Disappointment in Gaza over international reaction as Israeli airstrikes continue and civilians are caught in the middle.

By Yumna Patel  | Mondoweiss  | Aug 21, 2020

“We’ve been through this countless times, …But it’s harder now with a global pandemic and the whole world falling apart, no electricity and no water,’
— Omar Ghraieb, 33, a Palestinian journalist

Israel has been bombing Gaza for eight days straight, all as part of what Israel says is a response to incendiary balloons sent from Gaza into Israeli territory.

The night sky in Gaza has lit up in hues of red and orange every night for more than a week, with Thursday marking the eight consecutive night of Israeli airstrikes.

Despite reported efforts by Egyptian officials to mediate a cease fire, the cross-border tensions don’t seem to be stopping anytime soon, with the Hamas movement releasing a statement on Friday saying it “will not hesitate to wage a battle” with Israeli forces, “if the escalation, bombardment and siege [of Gaza] continues.”

Continue reading “Gaza’s health sector at risk as Israel’s week-long airstrikes continue”

The state is using a variety of means to create a perception that its policies vis-a-vis the Palestinians have been driven by security concerns.

By Jonathan Cook |   The National   | Aug 20, 2020

Israel’s archives are being hurriedly sealed up precisely to prevent any danger that records might confirm long-sidelined and discounted Palestinian history

When the Palestinian actor Mohammed Bakri made a documentary about Jenin in 2002 – filming immediately after the Israeli army had completed rampaging through the West Bank city, leaving death and destruction in its wake – he chose an unusual narrator for the opening scene: a mute Palestinian youth.

Jenin had been sealed off from the world for nearly three weeks as the Israeli army razed the neighbouring refugee camp and terrorised its population.

Bakri’s film Jenin, Jenin shows the young man hurrying silently between wrecked buildings, using his nervous body to illustrate where Israeli soldiers shot Palestinians and where bulldozers collapsed homes, sometimes on their inhabitants.

Continue reading “How Israel wages its war on Palestinian history”