The « promised land »

For example (political pictures)...

1. Gaza, New Year 2009 and November 2012 - see also UNICEF (2009) and UNICEF (2012)

As if the attacks on Lebanon (2006) had never existed, and as if Gaza hadn't been sufficiently destroyed by illegal phosphorous bombs and high-explosive shells in 2009 (1,300 civilian deaths, 30% of them children) , the extremist Israeli government is at it again (November 2012), ‘defending’ their promised land ―Jehovah must be turning in his/her/its grave!―, bombarding a densely populated Arab area by air and from the sea, reducing homes and schools to rubble and killing countless civilians. It’s David the Philestine versus Goliath the Israelite to the power of n. The Israeli forces seem hell bent on perpetuating terrorism, because, once again, they’re themselves using terror to encourage the most predictable response —retaliation— from their victims. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist or a Hamas rocket launcher to work out that, without high-tech weaponry, the obvious response to the Israeli attacks will be more home-made rockets, more suicide bombings, more airline hijacking and similar low-tech acts of destruction. Add to all this the alienation Israeli actions are causing among its previous friends and allies and it seems quite possible that these events will turn out to be the beginning of the end of the nation state of Israel. Congratulations, if that's what you want!

To find out what's going on in Gaza go to The Guardian on line, to UNICEF, or here.

A woman is evacuated by a paramedic after an Israeli air raid on a sports centre in Gaza City (Nov. 2012). Photograph: Marco Longari/AFP/Getty Images	Palestinians carry the body of a child belonging to the al-Dalo family during a mass funeral in Gaza City. Nine members of the Dalo family, including four children, were killed in an Israeli strike on their house on Sunday 18 Nov. Photograph: Mohammed Salem/Reuters

Montage from January 2009 Israeli bombing of Gaza	Israeli TV Channel 10's military correspondent Alon Ben David showing the score: "Death toll: Israel: 0, Gaza: 25", November 2012. Photo: nana10.co.il
Palestinian land loss 1946-2010	Palestinians search through the debris in the aftermath of Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip, 18 November 2012. Photograph: APAimages / Rex Features

Looking to do something constructive right now?
• Donate to UNICEF Children of Gaza Fund •

Before you start accusing me of anti-semitism please stop knee jerking, step back and remember that:
   1.  Most Arabs, like many Jews, are Semitic.
   2. A large proportion of Jews, both inside and outside the state of Israel, are against the violence committed in their
        name by Zionists.
   3. If I’d been living in the 3rd Reich I’d be Jewish enough by birth to end up in an extermination camp.
   4. AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the ‘Jewish’ or ‘Israeli’ lobby) purchases US elections.
   5. None of the people, most of them Jewish, in these videos present a flattering picture of Zionism.

space for more	space for more

Gaza body count 15 January 2009: 1,105 killed, 5,100 wounded.

13 innocent people were killed in Israel by Hamas rockets in early 2009. Over 1,300 Gazans were killed by Israeli attacks between 27 December 2008 and the end of January 2009. That's 100 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli victim.

How many Palestinian kids died as a result of the illegal blockade of Gaza before 27 December 2008?
How many more will have to die this time around (November 2012)?

Road blocks, concrete walls, systematic apartheid and illegal occupation on the West Bank, all against UN resolutions and international law, then 1½ million people living in a tiny prison of blockaded and often occupied territory... Why do you think Hamas won the Gaza elections? Are you surprised they’re firing their erratic rockets at Israel?

I am appalled by Hague and Obama and their knee-jerk apportioning of blame on to the Palestinians. Not only does it make no sense. In my view it's also hypocritical, immoral, ill-informed, stupid and destructive. I'm ashamed by what I see as the moral sloth, stupdity, historical ignorance and cowardice of the governments in nations where I have lived. How can they support the overthrow of repressive régimes in Libya and Egypt, denounce bombardments by Assad's well-armed forces in Syria against an ill-equipped opposition and then claim the present horrors in Gaza are the fault of Hamas and the Palestinians? That's a rhetorical question with a very shameful answer. It is scandalous.

I’m also the father of a much loved child. I can hardly start to imagine how this Palestinian Dad is feeling, along with hundreds like him.

2. Mahmoud Salah

Ten eyewitnesses saw Israeli forces execute 23-year-old Palestinian Mahmoud Salah (right, below) on an open street in early March, 2002.

‘He was arrested on the street and immediately handcuffed. Then the policemen raised his arms and through him against my car’, said 56-year-old Yehiya Al Waari (see pictures, below)..

‘A policeman had put his foot on his neck. Another was holding his legs. All the neighbours and myself saw from our windows how he was executed half an hour after his arrest. Members of the special units who executed Salah were repeating “Let’s kill him”.’

Why did the Israeli forces stand right by Salah for half an hour if if he was loaded with explosives? He obviously wasn’t even carrying any weapon at all.

My opinion?

Madman George Bush II and his lapdog Blair used to rant on about the ‘Axis of Evil’ and quote UN resolutions about the wrongdoings of Sadam Hussein. Now (November 2012) Hague and Obama apportion blame on to the Palestinians but seem to ignore 50 years of UN resolutions about the Palestinians’ right to their own homeland. That's not only hypocritical in my view. Until justice is done towards the Palestinians and until we take a stand to stop Israeli government thugs from committing the kind of brutality currently going on in Gaza we can expect to live in an insecure world.

Another story about the 3 pictures

In August 2002, my immediate line manager at the Université de Montréal, where I had just taken up a job, asked me, quite politely, to withdraw the pictures, shown next, from my website, in order to avoid offending certain individuals with Zionist sympathies..

The death of Mahmoud Salah

Since I was new in the job and the city, I felt obliged to comply, but with increasing knowledge of the real causes of the atrocities in New York on 11 September 2001, I decided to re-post he pictures. The reasons for this decision are:

[1] this is my personal website which can in no way be seen to represent the ideas, policies or opinions of anyone else, let alone those of my employers;

[2] given the amount of propaganda for the war in Iraq and for the Israeli régime’s actions in the occupied territories, a different view, presented by one individual on a personal website, can hardly be regarded as a major threat by those denying Palestinians the right to their own homeland; just look at how land has been stolen from the Palestinians between 1948 and 2010;

[3] Zionism is incompatible with the basically humanistic character of Judaism; therefore, opposing the actions of the Israeli occupation forces and the ideology of Zionism ought to be seen as pro-Jewish. For a clear historical explanation of the cardinal differences between Judaism and Zionism, check out these ten simple points.

[4] to appease those who want to confirm their belief in the unjust world order we suffer under, I have included a barrage of anti-communist propaganda on this site;

[5] I still have the right to express my opinion publicly, as long as it is not racist or anti-human.

'Collateral damage' in Gaza, January 2009



Young men in Gaza learning about the free world in January 2009
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