NEWS: News Updates

Humiliation by checkpoint June 16th, 2013 Every infringement of the freedom of Palestinians is enforced by Israeli agencies in the name of security. Israeli security. A party of visitors from American universities sees instead policies to humiliate Palestinians and force them into the slow restricted lanes which an apartheid state demands. Freedom of movement is a universal right.

Attack on JNF’s theft of names and land June 15th, 2013  Here's a peculiar thing about the JNF (Jewish National Fund). It always claims to be acting in the interests of the environment, or in honour of various Others, from Herzl to countries to individual ambassadors. Having gained its funds from thousands of humble Jewish homes it can thus bestow on its grandiose schemes and land seizures the simple idealistic hopes of many ordinary people. Two articles of protest.

Israel’s pyrrhic victory of 1967 June 15th, 2013  Uri Avnery, an MK in 1967, looks back at the reasons for Israel's preemptive strike against (a blustering and unprepared) Egypt, the hysterical triumphalism at the ease of his country's victory - and the terrible curse that has handed down to both Palestinians and the younger Israelis who can't imagine an Israel without its colony of defeated Palestinians.

BBC bias raised again by vanishing programme on myth of Jewish exile June 14th, 2013 The programme 'Jerusalem: An Archaeological Mystery Story' made by Israeli director Ilan Ziv, was pulled from the schedule at the last minute last April. The BBC said it did not fit editorially with its archaeology season. Although it is true that archaeology is a politically loaded subject in Israel/Palestine, the BBC knew this before it commissioned the film. Presumably someone higher-up had a fit of panic on actually seeing it. PSC leads the charge against the BBC. JfJfP signs the letter asking the BBC to explain its decision.

From Israel’s place of magical thinking there was no terrified boy June 14th, 2013  The image of a terrified Palestinian boy, cowering behind his father, has gone round the world - and done the work of making Israel a pariah state says Gal Beckerman. Even if all the witnesses - Mohammed al-Dura's father, Palestinian cameraman and French Israeli director- are all lying, those iconic images cannot be destroyed.

British Rabbis campaign against eviction of Bedouin June 14th, 2013  British friends of Rabbis for Human Rights have sent a letter, signed by 65 rabbis from judaic communities in the UK, to PM Netanyahu protesting against his government's plan to move Bedouin from the Negev and disperse them in towns. They have also produced a petition (see post) to be sent to Netanyahu.

Sand goes over the top June 13th, 2013  It is testament to the impact Shlomo Sand's rewriting of Jewish history has had that reviews are being written and reposted five years after the first volume of his trilogy was published (albeit pegged to the second volume). Richard Kuper and Daniel Lazare applaud his vigorous dismantling of religious-nationalist myth; but both question what he erects on flimsy evidence, sometimes just to fit his own iconoclasm.

Commons queries sales of equipment that Israel could use for attack June 13th, 2013  Widely picked up and recirculated this week, a story that Britain's Department of Business, Innovation and Skills has issued a report showing it had turned down many licences for 'security' equipment that the IDF wanted to buy. Well, not exactly. A spokesperson for BIS tells JfJfP that it has issued no such report but thought some clever person had logged into their website and trawled the data. We can't compete with that level of industry, so here are a few excerpts from a compendium of reports from four committees responsible for scrutinising arms exports.

Breaking up Palestinian life so Israelis can live comfortably June 13th, 2013 Despite its apparent promise of offering a much-needed 'gender perspective' of the occupation, Katharine Natanel's article doesn't provide one. Rather she says how useful it would have been in a rare American radio programme that explores how Israelis succeed in keeping control of Palestinian life. That is done by continuously observing, disrupting and fragmenting Palestinian life while maintaining a satisfactory normalcy of life for Israelis.

Campaign to drive Richard Falk from his post June 12th, 2013  Two completely different events are taking place in Geneva this week. One is the Special Rapporteur's report to the Human Rights Council which the EU 'slams', causes the US's ambassador to the UN and the British Foreign Office, to demand he be sacked.The second was a well-received report by most members of the HRC in Geneva who congratulated Richard Falk on his difficult job, which is to speak for the human rights of Palestinians in the oPt and NOT to act as an Israeli/Palestinian mediator. We publish the materials to help you decide how these events intersect.

Don’t kid yourselves says Dayan. We have the ground, we’re keeping it. June 11th, 2013  The publicity Dani Dayan has received this week for saying, in a meretricious and self-serving opinion piece, that there will never be two states is surprising. It is hardly news that this view has spread from right-wing settlers like himself to a large chunk of Israeli opinion. What is surprising is that committed two-staters have come up with nothing more forceful than asking Netanyahu, politely, to engage in negotiations with Palestinians.

I turned into a monster, I can’t look myself in the eye. June 11th, 2013  In order to enforce their control over Palestinian lives and land the Israeli state has to send thousands of its young people to do the dirty work. Though the aim may be to humiliate and diminish Palestinians the effect is also to degrade and corrupt the Israeli soldiers who, interestingly, all seem surprised by what they see and what they are expected to do to maintain their 'superiority'. Three women testify to what they saw and felt.

Thanks be to Superland for showing us what we are June 10th, 2013  The news that the Superland playpark on the Israeli coast segregates its child visitors so that Orthodox Jews, other Jews and Arabs did not come within whistling distance of each other seems to have shocked many Israelis. What did they think was going on in their country? Throughout Israel deprivation and separation are raging says Gideon Levy, but the 'the only place we want it to disappear is on the carousel'.

Hard questions about where to take the BDS movement June 10th, 2013  From the few reports available the Palestinian BDS conference held at Bethlehem university on June 8th was a packed and lively affair. It had successes to celebrate (Veolia, G4S), arguments to press - controversially, against 'normalisation' and dropping the term 'occupation' in favour of 'apartheid' - and strategic decisions to be made. How far BDS can be made THE national resistance campaign of Palestinians is also on the table.

Abbas’s man – part-time technocrat with right connections is new PM June 10th, 2013  President Abbas has appointed as his new Prime Minister an academic little-known outside university circles. Abbas hopes Rami Hamdallah will be a safe and honest pair of hands for the western donors on which the PA relies. Although Hamas and Fatah had agreed on the need for a government of technocrats, Abbas did not consult Hamas on the appointment which they are denouncing as illegal and an act of bad faith.