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Saturday, October 31, 2015

"What is so special about the Journal of Palestine Studies is our commitment to academically rigorous content that is also accessible to non-academics, to anyone interested in Palestine. I want to make sure Palestinian non-academics who crave this information and history can enjoy the Journal as much as a scholar in Middle East studies." Nehad Khader, managing editor of The Journal of Palestine Studies

"As managing editor of the Journal of Palestine Studies, I have a responsibility to other scholars and a responsibility to be true to the history of the Palestinian people." Nehad Khader
"... The thing I value the most about the Journal is our independence, though. There’s no one who steps in at any point to tell us what content we can or cannot publish. We have full independence, and that’s rare. Unless it’s bad scholarship, at no point does anyone stop us and say “that topic is too controversial” or “this is unacceptable because it might upset so-and-so.” When I started working here, I was surprised to discover that nobody would be looking over the Journal team’s shoulder. Our articles are meticulously fact-checked, well researched, and peer reviewed by experts, but never censored. JPS is so trusted and highly regarded for a reason, and I know how important that legacy is..."

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine (&  America...etc...)]

http://blog.palestine-studies.org/2015/10/07/1879/

I know you’re an integral member of the Journal team now, but when did you first learn of the Journal of Palestine Studies?

I first found out about the Journal of Palestine Studies when I was in high school exploring a used bookstore in Philadelphia. Even as a young person I was drawn to these bound archives documenting the latest conversations and shifting fate of my homeland. My family is originally from Haifa, so growing up in Philadelphia I was ecstatic to discover a window into my own history through the Journal.

I kept these first few issues that I found in high school and they have a special spot in my office in DC today. One of them is Issue 41, from 1989, the 10th anniversary issue of the Journal of Palestine Studies.

When I brought them home my parents recognized the names of renowned Palestinian academics and scholars inside the cover—at the time, such as Professor Walid Khalidi and Hisham Sharabi. We sat around the kitchen table exploring this treasure that I happened upon. I couldn’t have imagined then that one day I’d get to work side by side with these incredible scholars to make the Journal possible. ...READ MORE

Bright & beautiful Karmah Elmusa in Elle Magazine.... "I'm Longing for Palestine While Living the American Dream" Oct 30, 2015

"Throughout my life, I've felt a constant longing emanating from my father, a sort of melancholy incompleteness. At some point his displacement became an essential part of my and my younger brother Layth's identities. Perhaps we felt the tension of being Palestinian-American more acutely as time went on, and it presented us with a choice: hide that part of ourselves or wear it like a badge. So we embraced our Palestinian-ness—​and our ethnic names—​and never looked back. By now, we know what's coming: unrest. And we brace ourselves for the status quo: American politicians will dismiss dead Palestinians as "terrorists," while respectfully mourning each lost Israeli life. We live with the guilt that we are here, not there. The guilt that we can come and go as we please, while Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza are barricaded into their homes, neighborhoods, or cities. Israel is flanked by water, but many Palestinians will never see the sea."

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine (&  America...etc...)]
http://www.elle.com/culture/career-politics/a31572/essay-on-being-palestinian-american/

I'm Longing for Palestine While Living the American Dream

My father was born in Palestine and raised in a refugee camp; I was born and raised in our national's capital. Who does that make me, exactly?

by  Karmah Elmusa
After living under occupation their whole lives, and with no prospect of political resolution on the horizon, Palestinian youth have taken to the streets this month in protest. As I sit and watch the polarizing coverage—​now considered to be at near-"catastrophic" levels— ​from afar, disparate emotions dart around inside me like pinballs, striking chords and hitting nerves. There's the sadness, of course–​the sadness that I always feel when I think about Palestine—​that is now pulled to the surface and sharper than usual. Sadness that so many of today's young people are lost to a struggle that is decades old. Sadness that it feels like it may continue for decades more... READ MORE

BDS calls for culinary boycott of Israel: After cultural and academic boycotts, movement urges top international chefs to 'take apartheid off the menu' and cancel their participation in November's Round Tables event in Tel Aviv.

"While  the  Round  Tables  event  is  presented  as  a  “fruitful  dialogue  about  culture, economy,  and  social  issues,”  it  is  instead  an  appalling use  of  the  time honored  tradition  of  sharing  culinary  experiences  as  a  means  for  whitewashing  widespread  violation  of  Palestinian  fundamental  rights,  including  the  right  to food. "



"  ...according  to  United  Nations  reports,  only  35  per  cent  of Palestinians  living  under  Israeli  occupation  are  food  secure [6] with  Israel's  illegal  wall  and  settlements  appropriating  large  swathes  of  land  for  Israelis  whilst  ghettoizing  Palestinians  and  denying  them  livelihoods [7].

Palestinian  citizens  of  Israel,  which  make  up  20  per  cent  of  the  population,  hardly  fare  any  better.  Palestinian  communities  are  being  forced  off  their  land  as  part  of  Israel’s  ongoing  ethnic  cleansing.  Israel  refuses  to  recognize  176  Palestinian  towns  and  villages  within  its  internationally recognized  borders,  many  predating  the  creation  of  the  state,  denying  them  even  the  most  basic  of  services  such  as  water and  electricity.  Israeli  bulldozers  regularly  demolish  entire  villages  leaving  families  homeless.

And  though  you  will  have  no  problem  traveling  to  Tel  Aviv,  roughly  7  million  Palestinian refugees  and  internally  displaced  persons  resulting  from  Israel’s  ongoing  ethnic  cleansing  are denied  the  right  to return  to  their  lands  as  guaranteed  under  International  Law"

....READ MORE
https://www.stopthewall.org/sites/default/files/Letter%20-%20Take%20Apartheid%20Off%20The%20Menu.pdf


ACTION ALERT: Tell these food chefs to cancel their Round Tables with Apartheid! - See more at: http://www.bdsmovement.net/2015/action-alert-tell-these-food-chefs-to-cancel-their-round-tables-with-apartheid-13492#sthash.3jbWcyvq.dpuf
ACTION ALERT: Tell these food chefs to cancel their Round Tables with Apartheid! - See more at: http://www.bdsmovement.net/2015/action-alert-tell-these-food-chefs-to-cancel-their-round-tables-with-apartheid-13492#sthash.3jbWcyvq.dpuf

Friday, October 30, 2015

#JeSuisBDS... "Anti-Israel" Activism Criminalized in the Land of Charlie Hebdo and “Free Speech”

Oct. 27 2015, 10:34 a.m.

"Indeed, an outstanding Washington Post op-ed this week by a former IDF soldier, Assaf Gavron, documents how such attacks on Israel critics now extend to Israeli citizens themselves. Gavron describes how “the internal discussion in Israel is more militant, threatening and intolerant than it has ever been,” and “those few dissenters who attempt to contradict it — to ask questions, to protest, to represent a different color from this artificial consensus — are ridiculed and patronized at best, threatened, vilified and physically attacked at worst.”

Israel defenders love to equate “criticism of Israel” with “anti-Semitism” and then sanctimoniously deny that anyone does that. But criminalizing BDS advocacy — threatening people with large fines and prison terms for protesting the polices of the Israel government — is as clear of a case as it gets. As Haaretz put it, “The dragnet has also swept up BDS protesters whose actions have targeted Israel, not Jews.”

Ponder how pernicious this is. It is perfectly legal to advocate sanctions against Iran, or Russia, or Sudan, or virtually any other country. Indeed, sanctions and boycotts against those countries are not only frequently advocated in the West but are official policy. But it is illegal — criminal — to advocate boycotts and sanctions against one country: Israel. It requires sky-high levels of authoritarianism, even fascism, to abuse the criminal law to outlaw advocacy of policies and activism when it involves one country, and one country only..."

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine (&  France & Canada & America...etc...)]

The post-Charlie Hebdo “free speech” march in Paris was a fraud for multiple reasons, as I wrote at the time. It was led by dozens of world leaders, many of whom imprison or even kill people for expressing prohibited views. It was cheered by many Westerners who feign upset only when free speech abridgments are perpetrated by Muslims, but not — as is far more common — by their own governments against Muslims.

Worst of all, the march took place in a country that is one of the most hostile to free speech rights in the West, as France quickly demonstrated in the days after the march by rounding up and prosecuting Muslims and other anti-Israel activists for the political views they expressed. A great, best-selling book by French philosopher Emmanuel Todd released this year argues that these “free speech” marches were a “sham,” driven by many political sentiments — nativism, nationalism, anti-Muslim bigotry — that had nothing to do with free speech.

The absurdity of France’s celebrating itself for free expression was vividly highlighted by this week’s decision from that nation’s highest court, one that is a direct assault on basic free speech rights. The French high court upheld the criminal conviction of 12 political activists for the “crime” of advocating sanctions and a boycott against Israel as a means of ending the decades-long military occupation of Palestine. What did these French criminals do? This:
The individuals arrived at the supermarket wearing shirts emblazoned with the words: “Long live Palestine, boycott Israel.” They also handed out fliers that said that “buying Israeli products means legitimizing crimes in Gaza.” ...READ MORE

Thursday, October 29, 2015

National Geographic: A Photographer Captures Joy in Gaza ... From days at the beach to party preparations, Tanya Habjouqa offers a different look into life during conflict.

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine (& America)]

 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/10/151009-gaza-palestinian-photos-tanya-habjouqa/

Khalid Zir and his five daughters take in the ruins of their home in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan.

"....She’s done her share of hard-news photography, but since 2009, she’s also been taking photos for her "Occupied Pleasures" series. A book of them will be published in December. Habjouqa says she doesn't want to trivialize her subjects’ difficulties by showing them in carefree moods, but those moods are real too.

"The humor, the sadness, the suffering, fear," she says. "It is one giant cocktail here. Fluctuating in seconds.""

"When the work was first published, I was flooded by emails from Palestinians in diaspora who would sometimes simply write, "Thank you." Or occasionally expand and say, "Thank you for showing us as we are, for allowing us to recognize ourselves." Tanya Habjouqa

 READ MORE

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Concrete tent embodies contradictions of Palestine refugee life 2015

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine (& America)]

A newly constructed concrete tent in the Duheisha refugee camp south of Bethlehem in the West Bank. (MaanImages/Alex Shams)
By: Alex Shams
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Bethlehem’s Duheisha refugee camp on Friday officially became home to a new community center housed in an unexpected but albeit quite familiar structure for local residents: a refugee tent constructed entirely out of concrete and mesh.

The concrete tent is located in the Edward Said Garden of the al-Feniq cultural center near the camp, and has been dubbed by its creators as a “gathering space for communal learning.”

The design pays homage to the history of camp’s 15,000 residents by recalling their ancestors’ struggle after they were forced to flee their homes in villages west of Jerusalem in 1948 by Zionist militias, a part of the total of approximately 750,000 Palestinians who were forced from their homes in what many historians have called “ethnic cleansing.”

At the same time, however, the structure challenges the idea of the temporariness of refugee camps, highlighting their increasing permanence and the importance of the camp’s history of struggle and resistance since 1948 by “embracing the contradictions of an architectural form that emerges from exile.”

To do so, the structure’s creators insist, does not detract from refugees’ right to return to their original villages inside what is now Israel.

Instead, they say, it emphasizes the strength of the community and culture that have been formed as a result of nearly seven decades in exile, as well as their continued insistence on reclaiming their stolen homes and land.

Children run outside of the concrete tent in the Duheisha refugee camp south of Bethlehem. (Campus in Camps/Sara Anna)
'It reveals the contradictions in which we live'

The concrete tent is the brainchild of Campus in Camps, a year-long “experimental education program” for refugee youths from across the West Bank that focuses on issues related to urbanism, space, and lived experience in the refugee camps. The project is affiliated with DAAR, the Decolonizing Architecture Art Residency based in nearby Beit Sahour.

Ishaq Albarbary, a participant in Campus in Camps from Bethlehem’s Duheisha refugee camp, told the crowd assembled at the structure’s inauguration after a collective iftar on Friday that the concrete tent was a result of three years of “discussion, reflection, and of challenging ourselves.”

“The nature of our work at Campus in Camps is to connect the practical and the theoretical,” he said. “At the same time, we don’t want the discussion to always be internal between ourselves, and so we decided to something material to open a space for discussion about and for the society in which we live.“

The concrete tent is not being presented as a solution. On the contrary, it reveals the contradictions we live in,” he added, noting that they hoped it would be used for meetings, discussions, and leisure.

Construction of permanent structures in the refugee camps is an ideologically-charged issue for Palestinians, as many refugees see any hint of permanence in their surroundings as a tacit admission that they will not return to the villages their families were expelled from.

Since the camps’ humble start as a collection of UN-donated tents in the late 1940s and early 1950s, however, they have been dramatically transformed. In the years after the establishment of the camps, residents slowly began building mud walls and later adding cinder blocks and eventually...READ MORE

My letter to the Baltimore Sun RE Politically incorrect statues provide teachable moments by Alexander E. Hooke

Swans Reflecting Elephants, 1937 by Salvador Dali
Baltimore, MD -- 6/10/15 -- Confederate Generals Robert E. Lee (right) and Stonewall Jackson are depicted on horseback in a monument near the Baltimore Museum of Art. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)

Artists Rebuild Destroyed Buddha Statues With Ghostly 3D Projection
RE Politically incorrect statues provide teachable moments
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bs-ed-confederate-lessons-20151027-story.html

Dear Editor,

I applaud and totally agree with the very wise philosophy professor at Stevenson University, Alexander E. Hooke's thought provoking column "Politically incorrect statues provide teachable moments"

I like how Hooke calmly connects the dots between Salvidore Dali, Buddhist Statues, and Confederate symbols.  But I think he missed one crucial point... we human beings are not perfect. None of us. Every individual is a unique blend of good, bad and indifferent.

Public art depicting a hero is made to celebrate what many at the time see as someone to celebrate.  This is who we are, we have a complicated past created by real people, products of their time, who thought they were doing the right and necessary thing. Sometimes our predecessors were very right, sometimes they weren't. 

I'd rather live in a world that appreciates, generates and preserves art and artifacts, than a world where art and artifacts are pulverized by political and/or religious campaigners and task forces set up to decide which elements of our collective history and art should be condemned and destroyed figuratively or literally.

I'd rather live in a world where we the people are encouraged to stop and think. To individually reassess our own assumptions: A world where we are free to educate ourselves and maybe even carefully explore difficult conversations and topics. A world where there are teachable moments.  A world with more diplomacy- and less war.

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab

My letter to the NYTimes RE Thomas Friedman Telling Mideast Negotiators, ‘Have a Nice Life’

RE Thomas Friedman Telling Mideast Negotiators, ‘Have a Nice Life’
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/opinion/telling-mideast-negotiators-have-a-nice-life.html?ref=international

Dear Editor,

Stop and think: In calling for negotiations to end the Israel-Palestine conflict do we really want to fight for a sovereign modern nation state's "right" to persecute, impoverish, destroy and displace targeted indigenous others?  

Israel's "Jewishness" is a comfortable and familiar fantasy for many people, but that fantasy has a dark side with horrifying ramifications including the myopic inclination to shape conversations as well as peace processes that hand a heavily armed Jews-preferred Israel more time and more ways to harass and further impoverish more Palestinian individuals, demolish more Palestinians homes, and usurp more Palestine land.

Sovereign nation state Israel's long term and flagrant rejection of international law and The Universal Declaration of Human Rights when it pertains to Palestinian men, women and children predates and heavily influences today's Israel-Palestine conflict.  Obfuscations of that basic fact mislead many people into failing to see what is really going on- what is hiding in plain sight:  Israel can and should immediately vacate all its Jewish-only settlements in the illegally occupied territories.

There is little Israeli support for vacating Israel's Jewish-only settlement projects in the illegally occupied territories because Israel generously subsidizes its Jewish citizen settlers, providing them with affordable housing on usurped Palestinian land, where individual Israelis are lured into foolishly investing their earnings, savings, and excuses into further entrenching Jews-preferred Israel's divisive and discriminatory policies. 

Modern man made Israel is called "The Jewish State" and Israel does constantly empower its preferred religious scholars and schemes with taxpayers' money, but is Israel really Jewish?   What about all the many native non-Jewish people and the intentional systemic Israeli destruction of Palestinian homes and villages? What about the Palestinian refugee crisis- the forced exile, continued impoverishment, persecution and displacement of Palestinians both in what is called Israel proper, as well as all through out the West Bank and Gaza?

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab

NOTES

STAY CONNECTED... Given the U.S. commitment to religious freedom, and to the international covenants that guarantee it as the inalienable right of every human being, the United States seeks to: Promote freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countries

Unclench your fist... Live by the Golden Rule...

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Words to Honor: The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 1.
    All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Monday, October 26, 2015

My letter to the Guardian RE "A galaxy" of "Star authors call for Israeli-Palestinian dialogue rather than boycotts"

The voice that connects things (Mahmoud Darwish ) Reading Room 2010 Sculptures and installations made by using books as the main production material by Pierre Lionel Matte of Norway..." To counterbalance the black/white descriptions of culture and identities I chose poems by Palestinian writer, Mahmoud Darwish." 
RE "A galaxy" of "Star authors call for Israeli-Palestinian dialogue rather than boycotts"
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/22/star-authors-jk-rowling-hilary-mantel-israel-palestinian-boycott-guardian-letter

Dear Sir,

Not too long ago a huge galaxy of star citizens (as well as regular folk and many a nobody) through out all the world thought slavery and the slave trade was a normal part of life. Excuses abounded, even religious texts were deployed to bully everyone into subserviently accepting a totally toxic and cruel situation. 

I suspect there were many dialogues and "negotiations" between masters and slaves.  Perhaps some dialogues and "negotiations" even made life a teeny tiny little bit easier for an individual slave or two- but all in all slavery continued on as a very cruel status quo and toxic situation...   Just as America's southern plantation owners saw no reason to end slavery, Israel sees no reason to stop usurping Palestine land, resources, and life.

Israel, a fully sovereign and free nation state, sees no reason to end its divisive and discriminatory anti-Palestine/anti-Palestinian policies. 

Israel sees no reason to respect international law; no reason to live by The Golden Rule - Do unto others as you would have them do unto you- and no reason to honor and uphold The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world"  http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/

What a huge shame that Harry Potter's brilliant creator is using her fame and popularity to help perpetuate the very real plight and suffering of the native non-Jewish population of historic Palestine.

The global information age is here: Modern day boycott campaigns focused in on advocating a nonviolent way to bring attention to a very cruel status quo and toxic situation are a natural response, and boycott campaigns are bound to grow more popular and more pervasive as more and more people world wide figure out that Israeli propaganda has been very misleading: Let's start with the fact that there really is such a thing as a Palestinian.

One of my favorite Palestinians is the poet Mahmoud Darwish born in Palestine March 13, 1941 - died August 9, 2008. His words live on ... "About Darwish’s work, the poet Naomi Shihab Nye has said, “Mahmoud Darwish is the Essential Breath of the Palestinian people, the eloquent witness of exile and belonging, exquisitely tuned singer of images that invoke, link, and shine a brilliant light into the world’s whole heart. What he speaks has been embraced by readers around the world—his in an utterly necessary voice, unforgettable once discovered.” https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/mahmoud-darwish

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab

NOTES
Smithsonian has a fascinating article on slavery in America, disclosing shocking facts- and once common words- that I never knew until this week.  "Retracing Slavery's Trail of Tears" by tells of hidden history such as "A coffle of slaves being marched from Virginia west into Tennessee, c. 1850." ..."It took four months to assemble the big “coffle,” to use a once-common word that, like so much of the vocabulary of slavery, has been effaced from the language."



"First they came for Palestinians... "

Sunday Dialogue: The Media Gap

After years of peaceful [Palestinian] protest, Hebron activist dies in tear gas

Palestinians need hope, not calm

President of Palestine to address special meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council October 28, 2015

635 flying checkpoints have been imposed between Palestinian towns, Refugee camps and cities #Palestine

“EXTREMELY VOLATILE SITUATION ACROSS THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY” – UNITED NATIONS EXPERT EXPRESSES GRAVE CONCERN

Tit-for-tat violence is ‘new normal’ in occupied territory..."The emerging “new normal” – characterised on the Palestinian side by spontaneous acts of violence mainly by youths, and on the Israeli side by settler vigilantes and trigger-happy soldiers – is yet another reminder that the status quo is neither manageable nor containable." Hussein Ibish

The ugly order of free-for-all killings in Israel-Palestine By Rami G. Khouri in the Jordan Times

Ex-U.N. Official John Dugard: Israel’s Crimes are "Infinitely Worse" Than in Apartheid South Africa

Sam Bahour: Palestinians must not fall into this trap, again!  "To cover up its crimes, Israel needs to feed all the western stereotypes of Palestinians as violent and subhuman rather than hungry for freedom and equal rights."


Artists got ‘Homeland is racist’ Arabic graffiti into the latest episode of ‘Homeland’


STAY CONNECTED... Given the U.S. commitment to religious freedom, and to the international covenants that guarantee it as the inalienable right of every human being, the United States seeks to: Promote freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countries

Unclench your fist... Live by the Golden Rule...

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Words to Honor: The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 1.
    All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
***

My letter to CSM RE "Can surveillance cameras ease the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?"

Jerusalem
RE Can surveillance cameras ease the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2015/1024/Can-surveillance-cameras-ease-the-Israeli-Palestinian-conflict

Dear Editor,

Kudos to Jordan's king, who like his father and his mother, conscientiously makes it a priority to use diplomacy to advocate for freedom, justice and peace for the men, women and children of Palestine.

Extremists, religious fanatics, nay sayers and a large assortment of various propagandists, agent provocateurs, war mongers, and myopic pundits make it very hard to have a sensible conversation about Israel-Palestine.  Basic facts get obscured and lost.

The most basic basic fact is that Israel is sovereign, Palestine is not.  The next most relevant basic fact (and tragically for all) is that Israel's Jewish citizens and supporters continue to be brainwashed to believe that Israel's survival and well being depends on displacing and erasing the native non-Jewish population of historic Palestine.  

A fully secular, fully sovereign two state end to the Israel-Palestine conflict is the only way to prevent Palestine (both the dream and the reality) from being a series of prison camps, holding cells, and torture chambers for the native non-Jewish population: Sovereign nation state Israel must stop its discriminatory policies which have generated multiple long term and flagrant violations of international law and the Palestinians' human rights.

Far too many passionate fools on both sides would rather build a case to demonize and erase the "other" than empower golden rule thinking, the rule of fair and just laws, and true respect for 1948's Universal Declaration of Human Rights " Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world"

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab
American homemaker & poet

NOTES
Sunday Dialogue: The Media Gap

After years of peaceful [Palestinian] protest, Hebron activist dies in tear gas

Palestinians need hope, not calm

President of Palestine to address special meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council October 28, 2015

635 flying checkpoints have been imposed between Palestinian towns, Refugee camps and cities #Palestine

“EXTREMELY VOLATILE SITUATION ACROSS THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY” – UNITED NATIONS EXPERT EXPRESSES GRAVE CONCERN

Tit-for-tat violence is ‘new normal’ in occupied territory..."The emerging “new normal” – characterised on the Palestinian side by spontaneous acts of violence mainly by youths, and on the Israeli side by settler vigilantes and trigger-happy soldiers – is yet another reminder that the status quo is neither manageable nor containable." Hussein Ibish


The ugly order of free-for-all killings in Israel-Palestine By Rami G. Khouri in the Jordan Times

Ex-U.N. Official John Dugard: Israel’s Crimes are "Infinitely Worse" Than in Apartheid South Africa

Sam Bahour: Palestinians must not fall into this trap, again!  "To cover up its crimes, Israel needs to feed all the western stereotypes of Palestinians as violent and subhuman rather than hungry for freedom and equal rights."

Artists got ‘Homeland is racist’ Arabic graffiti into the latest episode of ‘Homeland’


STAY CONNECTED... Given the U.S. commitment to religious freedom, and to the international covenants that guarantee it as the inalienable right of every human being, the United States seeks to: Promote freedom of religion and conscience throughout the world as a fundamental human right and as a source of stability for all countries

Unclench your fist... Live by the Golden Rule...

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Words to Honor: The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 1.
    All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
***


"First they came for Palestinians... "

http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/1428_leunig.jpg

"For decades now, Israel has been strangling East Jerusalem denying its Palestinian inhabitants freedom, opportunity, dignity, and hope, with devastating impact. Before Israel closed Jerusalem off from the rest of the West Bank in 1994, the city had served as the hub of Palestinian life." James Zogby



Strangling Jerusalem

  President, Arab American Institute; author, 'Arab Voices'
Posted:

We have been witnessing an epidemic of violence in Jerusalem. There have been killings and near fatal attacks in Israel and elsewhere in the occupied Palestinian lands, but it is Jerusalem that has been the epicenter of the violence. This tragedy has been compounded by the fact that most US analysts and political leaders have been dead wrong in their simplistic, myopic, or, at times, even bigoted assessments of what is happening and why.

For example, The Atlantic's Jeffery Goldberg says the violence has been caused by Palestinian "paranoia" and their refusal to acknowledge "the national and religious rights" of Jews. Bret Stephens, writing in the Wall Street Journal, accuses the Palestinians of "blood lust". For their part, Members of Congress have been jumping all over each other to see who can issue the harshest denunciations of the Palestinian Authority for incitement and/or not doing enough to control the situation.

In reality, the roots of the violence in Jerusalem are deeper and far more complex. For decades now, Israel has been strangling East Jerusalem denying its Palestinian inhabitants freedom, opportunity, dignity, and hope, with devastating impact. Before Israel closed Jerusalem off from the rest of the West Bank in 1994, the city had served as the hub of Palestinian life. Not only was the city important for its religious role, all of the major Palestinian economic, social, cultural, educational, medical, and service institutions were located in the city.

Jerusalem was Palestine's heart, and the flow of people in and out was its lifeblood. Jerusalem's people and its businesses and institutions were sustained by Palestinians from the West Bank who entered daily to work or shop, to visit or take advantage of the services it provided. And Palestinians from the rest of the West Bank were, in turn, nourished by all that the city had to offer. The choking impact of the closure was felt almost immediately. It became so difficult and humiliating to pass through checkpoints to get into Jerusalem... READ MORE