Diana Buttu in Newsweek: Trump's "Peace" Plan Risks Setting Fire to Israel, Palestine—and International Legal Order As We Know It

Diana Buttu

"Beyond just Palestinians, many in the international community are deeply alarmed by the Trump/Kushner plan. As a precedent, it threatens to do away with the international legal system as we know it, including the idea that countries should not be allowed to acquire territory by force, replacing it with a system in which "might is right." The dangers beyond Palestine/Israel are obvious, including legitimizing Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea."  Diana Buttu 

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https://www.newsweek.com/trump-peace-plan-risks-israel-palestine-international-law-1484721?fbclid=IwAR0gLlVi1AzTWDVOggJiIJnHwgZ7_i_lIVopRXHlMkVesCGi_m-Oga0N09o

"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." Sam Bahour: Palestinians must not fall into this trap, again!

Palestinians must not fall into this trap, again!

Sam Bahour 14 October 2015

 

"Israel has a single gamebook against the legitimate Palestinian struggle for freedom and independence, that of using their well-oiled military machine to squash any Palestinian who attempts to resist occupation. Israel since 1948 and 1967 has routinely used war and violence to seize more land, all the while pushing Palestinians to either turn violent or emigrate."

[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)]

https://opendemocracy.net/arab-awakening/sam-bahour/palestinians-must-not-fall-into-this-trap-again

 

Sam Bahour ‏@SamBahour 2h2 hours ago

Palestinians mustn't fall into this trap, again http://972mag.com/palestinians-mustnt-fall-into-this-trap-again/112765/ … via @972mag #Palestine #Israel

Palestinians must not fall into this trap, again! @SamBahour http://bit.ly/palestinians-must-not-fall-into-this-trap … #alshabaka #Palestine #Israel  

 Sam Bahour serves as a policy adviser to Al-Shabaka, the Palestinian Policy Network, and is chairman of Americans for a Vibrant Palestinian Economy. He blogs at ePalestine.com.

My Letter to the NYTIMES RE Israel’s Iran Dilemma op-ed by Roger Cohen & NYTimes Editorial Getting to Yes With Iran & Israeli Leaders Denounce Geneva Accord news report & Public Editor's Journal: Photo of Palestinian Mother Was the Wrong Choice by Margaret Sullivan

Today's News highlighted by ATFP 11-25-2013: Teaching the Holocaust in Palestine... Of all countries, Holocaust education in Palestine is most difficult due to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

RE Israel’s Iran Dilemma op-ed by Roger Cohen & NYTimes Editorial Getting to Yes With Iran & Israeli Leaders Denounce Geneva Accord news report & Public Editor's Journal: Photo of Palestinian Mother Was the Wrong Choice by Margaret Sullivan
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/26/opinion/cohen-israels-iran-dilemma.html?ref=international
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/25/opinion/getting-to-yes-with-iran.html?ref=international
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/25/world/middleeast/israeli-leaders-decry-iran-accord.html?ref=middleeast
http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/19/photo-of-palestinian-mother-was-the-wrong-choice/

Dear Editor,

America needs a reliable and trustworthy fourth estate for our democracy to function, and to help shape foreign polices that will promote peace and justice through out the world, and better investments for everyone's sake.

Today's NYTimes barrage of Israel-centric fuss about Iran ignores Israel's own ongoing blatant violations of international law... as well as Israel's refusal to sign The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

Reading the NYTimes news & opinion coverage of the Middle East and Iran, I am sincerely concerned about blind spots and either a willful or an unintentional negligence to accurately report and analyze Middle East news in context.  I am concerned about America, and I am concerned about the Israel-Palestine conflict and all the many negative ramifications including escalating religious extremism and violence inspired by that conflict.

I am also concerned about the future of a newspaper that is worth saving from becoming a joke beyond the Zionist circles which convince your public editor to apologize about one photo of a Palestinian: Public Editor's Journal Photo of Palestinian Mother Was the Wrong Choice November 19, 2013

Iran's nuclear bomb aspirations are speculation- meanwhile real olive trees being uprooted right now by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the illegally occupied territories, real people are being harmed, harassed and impoverished by Israel's anti-Palestine policies: Since 1967, 800,000 Palestinian olive trees have been uprooted by Israelis in the occupied West Bank " resulting in a loss of around $55 million to the Palestinian economy."

Yes the NYTimes did publish a more informative and balanced article recently by a Palestinian: Plan B for Palestine: Zone C .... but it was quickly lost an a storm of Israel-centric opinion and news coverage, [riddled with blind spots and] spun with phrases to help empower Israel's ongoing violations of international law and the Palestinians basic human rights. Creating that Israeli-centric storm, you make America into a tiny little teacup rather than an admirable bastion of real freedom and justice and telling news worth noting.

Sincerely,
Anne Selden Annab

NOTES
Tel Aviv, not Jerusalem, is capital of Israel recognized by The United Nations

ATFP (American Task Force on Palestine) offers a very helpful daily World Press Roundup: Middle East News, stream or sign up for email news http://www.americantaskforce.org/world_press_roundup  ... ATFP provides an independent voice for Palestinian-Americans and their supporters and advances human rights and peace. It categorically and unequivocally condemns all violence against civilians, no matter the
cause and who the victims or perpetrators may be.

Bible scholars: Zionists have 'weaponized' scripture: "One bad (theological) interpreter is worse than 100 terrorists..."

Israeli soldiers destroy 60 olive trees near Bethlehem... IT ADDS UP: Since 1967, 800,000 Palestinian olive trees have been uprooted by Israelis in the occupied West Bank

NGO: Israel okays 829 new settler homes in West Bank

Destruction and Appropriation of Palestinian Heritage .... Palestine & UNESCO Protecting heritage and reasserting sovereignty : The first installment of a two-part policy brief from Al-Shabaka, the Palestinian Policy Network.

UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon: JFK left indelible imprint on me

The Office of International Religious Freedom ( http://www.state.gov/j/drl/irf/)   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

Why Muslims should love secularism: Though secularism is widely misunderstood as anti-religious and iconoclastic, all it means is the neutrality of the state on religious affairs ...  "Muslims must recognize secularism as the only real path to religious freedom, rather than confusing it with an attack against religion." Hussein Ibish

Israelis and Palestinians must refrain from undermining renewed talks... Settlement plans threaten renewed hopes for Israeli-Palestinian peace, UN envoy warns

It is widely accepted that under international law, the Jewish settlements in the territories occupied by Israel in 1967 are illegal. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the protection of civilian persons... "The occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own population into the territories it occupies." BBC News

Poll: Oslo brought 'political normalization' but no benefits "83.3 percent of the respondents believe that settlement construction increased “unprecedentedly” in the Palestinian territory as a result of the Oslo Accord."

Palestinians cast first-ever vote in U.N. General Assembly "It's a symbolic (step)," he [ chief Palestinian U.N. observer, Ambassador Riyad Mansour] said. "But it is an important one because it reflects that the international community, particularly the General Assembly, is hungry and waiting for the state of Palestine to become a full member of the United Nations."

Israeli Settlers uproot 26 Palestinian olive trees in Nablus village... IT ADDS UP: Since 1967, 800,000 olive trees have been uprooted by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, resulting in a loss of around $55 million to the Palestinian economy

Hollande: France urges 'full and complete halt to settlement'

Jewish mob attacks Palestinian man in Jerusalem

Israel's policy of erasure : A path to peace between Israelis and Palestinians requires not simply dealing with settlements but with the whole complex of displacement, suffocation and erasure.

"Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world." Eleanor Roosevelt

Welcome to Bethlehem, Secretary Kerry: A call for humanity by Bethlehem Mayor Vera Baboun

UNITED NATIONS 2013: The nations of the world call on Israel to comply with its obligations under international law, the 2004 advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice concerning the apartheid wall and all UN resolutions.

2013: Palestine refugees’ properties and their revenues ...Recalling its resolutions 194 (III) of 11 December 1948 and 36/146 C of 16 December 1981 and all its subsequent resolutions on the question

"The direct threat to Israeli and Palestinian existence — and, in fact, to the existence of all peoples in the region — is the absence of peace in Palestine." Ahmad Y. Majdoubeh in The Jordan Times

Palestinian Refugees (1948-NOW) refused their right to return... and their right to live in peace free from religious bigotry and injustice.

Christians are being driven out of regions around the world where they are a minority

Palestinian villages subject to Israeli mock raids not told they are exercises: Israeli military rejects complaints by Israeli human rights group Yesh Din over 'training' arrests of Arabs and raids on homes

Washington Post 2013: Israeli hard-liners eye West Bank

Israeli Settler Violence Map

'It is where religious freedom is most dishonored or repressed that the forces of violent religious extremism are likely to thrive.' Katrina Lantos Swett, vice chairwoman of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom: JFK's call for religious freedom can transform...

The 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.

The Golden Rule... Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

Live by the Golden Rule

Dear President Obama... Let Freedom Ring

194

Globalizing Martin Luther King, Jr.

This Week in Palestine: In Palestine we have no physical control over our borders, and therefore have no say in how anyone could be treated at any given moment in time. But what we do have control of is the Palestine we write about, describe, and photograph in the folds of this issue’s pages.

PBS Newshour: Poet Naomi Shihab Nye: 'Telling a story helped us figure out who we were'

A quest to preserve Palestinian heritage in the digital stacks: Sami Batrawi's struggle to open an online Palestinian Library of Congress is part of a broader effort to recover lost Palestinian intellectual heritage.

U.S. 'working tirelessly' to restore UNESCO funding... UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova: "This is not only about financing. This is about values. This is the 'smart power' that is in such need today, to lay the foundations for lasting peace and sustainable development,"

U.S., Israel lose voting rights at UNESCO over Palestine row

UNWRA ... a crucial lifeline for Palestinian refugees

Dr Zogby: Focus on Palestinians’ Rights

At ATFP Gala, White House Reaffirms Commitment to Palestinian State, Opposition to Settlements and Settler Violence

"The only way to honor our tragic histories is to create a future for our children free of man-made tragedy. This means making peace fully, completely and without reservation, between Israel and Palestine." ATFP's Ziad Asali: To honor a tragic history, we must work for peace

Pomegranates in season along the path!

The Arab Peace Initiative

1. Requests Israel to reconsider its policies and declare that a just peace is its strategic option as well.

2. Further calls upon Israel to affirm:

I- Full Israeli withdrawal from all the territories occupied since 1967, including the Syrian Golan Heights, to the June 4, 1967 lines as well as the remaining occupied Lebanese territories in the south of Lebanon.

II- Achievement of a just solution to the Palestinian refugee problem to be agreed upon in accordance with U.N. General Assembly Resolution 194.

III- The acceptance of the establishment of a sovereign independent Palestinian state on the Palestinian territories occupied since June 4, 1967 in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital.

3. Consequently, the Arab countries affirm the following:

I- Consider the Arab-Israeli conflict ended, and enter into a peace agreement with Israel, and provide security for all the states of the region.

II- Establish normal relations with Israel in the context of this comprehensive peace.

Jordan's King Abdullah II explains that extremism has "grown fat" off of the longstanding conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.

"Legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Paine: "Of all of the tyrannies that affect mankind, tyranny of religion is the worst."

The Charter for Compassion is a call to restore the Golden Rule to the center of religious, moral and civic life. The path to a just economy and a peaceful world requires listening, understanding and treating all others as we wish to be treated ourselves.

We Need to Talk... Ziad Asali has proven that Palestinian-Americans can work within the system as first-class American citizens and Washington has paid attention: The status quo is clear: occupation. Asali's mission is to change that status quo.

Freedom for Palestine - OneWorld

Obama urges world to take risks for Mideast peace...

"All of us must recognize that peace will be a powerful tool to defeat extremists, and embolden those who are prepared to build a better future," he said.

"So let us emerge from the familiar corners of blame and prejudice, and support Israeli and Palestinian leaders who are prepared to walk the difficult road to peace."

[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]

 http://news.yahoo.com/obama-urges-world-risks-mideast-peace-035322051.html

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - President Barack Obama urged the global community to cast aside old prejudices and take the risks needed to help reach a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.
Two years after Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas made a powerful plea to the UN General Assembly to grant his people statehood, Obama said the United States remained "determined to resolve a conflict that goes back even further than our differences with Iran."

"The time is now ripe for the entire international community to get behind the pursuit of peace," Obama told this year's UN summit in New York.

"Already, Israeli and Palestinian leaders have demonstrated a willingness to take significant political risks."

The Middle East peace process was relaunched in July ending almost three years of stalemate, after US Secretary of State John Kerry spent months doggedly shuttling back and forth to coax the two sides back to the negotiating table.

With the guidance of newly appointed US special envoy Martin Indyk, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have been meeting in private to hammer out some of the thorniest issues standing in the way of a deal to create two states, living side-by-side.

In September 2011, Abbas handed over a formal request for statehood to UN chief Ban Ki-moon, and triggered wild applause as he addressed the General Assembly, vowing that the Palestinians were ready to return to peace talks if Israeli settlement activities cease...READ MORE

Crowdsourcing Peace: By going over the heads of Israeli and Palestinian leaders, Obama is demanding that their people step up.

BY HUSSEIN IBISH | MARCH 21, 2013

 [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]

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/03/21/crowdsourcing_peace_obama_israel_speech?page=full 

U.S. President Barack Obama's speech in Jerusalem was without question the strongest ever made by a senior American politician on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was plainly designed to speak directly to the Israeli and Palestinian peoples over the heads of their political leaderships. It was an exercise in public diplomacy par excellence, intended to change the tone and atmosphere, and public perceptions of Obama himself, presumably as an adjunct to actual diplomatic efforts to lay the groundwork for eventually resuming negotiations.

The psychological, communication and political skill that was marshaled to give the speech its maximum impact with public opinion was quite extraordinary, and stands in contrast to some miscalculations Obama made about Israeli and Palestinian perceptions during his first term. By systematically downplaying expectations for his trip, Obama made the power of his speech and the boldness of some of the language and positions he staked out -- particularly regarding the realities Palestinians face under Israeli occupation -- surprising and therefore all the more striking.

Obama made the first day of his trip an extended exercise in telling the Israeli public everything it could possibly want to hear from an American president, ranging from "undying bonds of friendship" to robust reiterations of security commitment and a much yearned-for acknowledgment of the long Jewish history in the land. In retrospect, it's clear that what looked like public outreach bordering on pandering was, in fact, designed to transform Israeli perceptions of Obama himself in order to prepare them for some of the hard truths he was preparing to deliver the next day.

What Obama has done is to reassure and challenge Israelis and Palestinians alike. To Israelis, he reiterated America's undying support and commitment to Israel's security. But he confronted them with the fact that "the only way for Israel to endure and thrive as a Jewish and democratic state is through the realization of an independent and viable Palestine." He reassured Palestinians that the United States is not walking away from the effort to create an independent Palestinian state. But he told them they must recognize that "Israel will be a Jewish state" and challenged them, and the rest of the Arab world, to begin to normalize their relations with Israel...READ MORE

Jerri Bird (Jerine Bettybea Newhouse b 1926): "A viable, independent Palestinian state would be a step in the direction of two peoples in the same land living harmoniously"

Family Photo - Jerri Bird, an activist for Middle East peace, died Dec. 13 at her home in Washington. Pictured are, from left, Jerine "Jerri" Bird, her children, and her husband Eugene Bird, in Jerusalem in 1956.

In her activism, Mrs. Bird often confronted the argument that a Palestinian state would jeopardize Israel’s security needs... “Israel is already the one of the most modern military forces in the Middle East, and this has not protected it against violence,” she wrote in a 2002 letter to the editor published by the New York Times. “Israeli human rights violations against Palestinians guarantee continued violent resistance. A viable, independent Palestinian state would be a step in the direction of two peoples in the same land living harmoniously. The only alternative is endless bloodshed.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/jerri-bird-dedicated-activist-for-middle-east-peace-dies-at-86/2012/12/19/ee78d382-493d-11e2-ad54-580638ede391_story_1.html

Jerri Bird, ‘dedicated’ activist for Middle East peace, dies at 86

By Adam Bernstein, Published: December 19

Jerri Bird spent three decades accompanying her husband on his Foreign Service assignments throughout the Middle East during the Cold War. They witnessed ethnic and religious tensions that often spiraled into extremist violence and lured generations into a cycle of terror, grief and the desire for retribution.

“An eye for an eye has turned into twelve for one or better,” she wrote to her parents in Oregon at the start of the 1956 Suez Canal crisis. At the time, she and her husband were stationed in East Jerusalem... READ MORE

Jimmy Carter: The Unchanged Path to Mideast Peace

" For more than three decades, Israel’s occupation of Arab land has been the key unresolved issue. Stated simply, Israel must give up the occupied land in exchange for peace. There has never been any question regarding the occupied territory in international law as expressed through United Nations resolutions, the official policies of the United States, nor those of the International Quartet (the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia)." Jimmy Carter

The Unchanged Path to Mideast Peace

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/26/opinion/26iht-edcarter26.html