vjp-global

http://www.haaretz.com/mobile/1.629908 Bill doesn't include Israel joining U.S. Visa Waiver Program, something Netanyahu, pro-Israel lawmakers pushed for during almost two years of legislative wrangling. Congress approved legislation Wednesday deepening U.S.-Israeli cooperation after softening a push to grant Israelis visa-free travel rights to the United States even as Israel persists in blocking some Arab and Muslim Americans from its territory... Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/blacklisted-likening-israel?utm_source=Mondoweiss+List&utm_campaign=098e09c656-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b86bace129-098e09c656-398495333 Chris Hedges was invited to speak at the University of Pennsylvania. Then he likened Israel to ISIS, and got disinvited. Being banned from speaking about the conflict between Israel and Palestine, especially at universities, is familiar to anyone who attempts to challenge the narrative of the Israel lobby. This is not the first time one of my speaking offers has been revoked and it will not be the last. However, the charge of Belnavis and the International Affairs Association that I do not believe in coexistence between the Palestinians and Israel is false. I oppose violence by either party. I have condemned Hamas rocket attacks as war crimes. And I support Israel's right to exist within the pre-1967 borders … Here's a portion of Hedges's December 15th piec

http://972mag.com/how-two-israeli-and-palestinian-kids-ended-up-lighting-obamas-menorah/100577/ Just weeks after Jerusalem's Jewish-Arab school was attacked by arsonists, President Obama met with two students to light the Hanukkah menorah. Inbar Shaked Vardi talks about her whirlwind trip to Washington DC, and why she has decided to stay at the school despite the threat of violence... Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

Full report: http://nlginternational.org/news/article.php?nid=616 Snipper: "The report reviews the experiences and findings of the delegation, who observed Israeli military trials and met with human rights organizations, families of Palestinian prisoners, and former prisoners, among others. The report also details the delegation's observations on the construction of the oppressive "separation Wall," the expansion of Jewish-only settlements in the West Bank, and Palestinian popular protest." Posted by Sam Bryan. AIME member

Full article: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/1.628568 Snippet" "Durham County, North Carolina, has dropped an Israeli security company under fire from the BDS movement, prompting anti-occupation activists to claim victory. However, county officials were less equivocal about their reasons for searching for a new security provider, according to local newspaper The Herald-Sun." Here are some other articles covering this story: Durham Herald Sun:  http://www.heraldsun.com/news/x761894089/County-prepping-building-security-changes Mondoweiss   http://mondoweiss.net/2014/11/dropping-contract-occupation The  BDS website:  http://www.bdsmovement.net/2014/major-campaign-success-against-g4s-in-the-us-12869?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+bdsmovement+%28Palestinian+BDS+National+Committee%29 Posted by

http://www.haaretz.com/mobile/1.629908 [I believe that the US Campaign to End the Occupation played a role in waiver amendment.] Bill doesn't include Israel joining U.S. Visa Waiver Program, something Netanyahu, pro-Israel lawmakers pushed for during almost two years of legislative wrangling. Posted by Sam Bryan, AIME member

http://972mag.com/how-israel-stupefies-so-many-brilliant-jews/100418/   ...This thing that Israel has with Arabs, this need to forever keep them down lest they rise up and swallow us, combined with the need to forever justify this obsessive violence, has crippled so many otherwise brilliant Jewish minds, in Israel, America and elsewhere. This victim mentality, which brings with it an inability to admit any wrongdoing toward Arabs (who are misperceived as Israel's victimizers), has hobbled the thinking of so many otherwise highly intelligent Jews in Israel and the Diaspora. On every other subject under the sun, they're open-minded, they examine all sides, they try to weigh information objectively. But on the subject of Israel, they become propagandists. On Israel, they are literally stupefied by their need to proclaim this country's innocence and defend or at least excuse its violent domination of Arabs, which they wouldn't defend or excuse if it

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/acquiescence-israeli-positions?utm_source=Mondoweiss+List&utm_campaign=f774602439-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b86bace129-f774602439-398495333 ,,,[John Judis says that] "There is a looming split in that part of the Jewish community between an older generation that sees Israel entirely as a victim and any criticism of it as verging on anti-Semitism, and a new generation that goes from J Street to Jewish Voice for Peace to Open Hillel that believes that a commitment to Palestinian as well as Jewish rights is intrinsic to a Jewish ethical outlook," Judis writes. "What's at stake here is not simply artistic censorship, but the attempt to snuff out works of art that recognize that Jews and Palestinians share a common humanity." -     Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://972mag.com/palestinian-family-in-lod-faces-home-demolition/100336/ The Naqib family has been living on their land since before 1948. That, however, didn't stop the municipality from serving them with an arbitrary demolition order.  After a relative period of calm in which the local authorities have refrained from demolishing homes of Palestinian citizens of Israel, the Lydd ("Lod" in Hebrew, "Lydda" in English) Municipality has returned to threatening residents with demolition . The war in Gaza has ended, and now the authorities have returned to their day-to-day war against Arab citizens… Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://972mag.com/settlers-head-to-jail-for-price-tag-police-denied-access-to-lawyers/100360/   Two extremist settlers were sentenced to 30 months in prison on Sunday, in what is the first such conviction for a "price tag" attack against Palestinian civilians. Yehuda Landsberg and Yehuda Savir, both residents of the illegal Havat Gilad settlement outpost in the northern West Bank, were convicted of setting fire to Palestinian-owned vehicles with racist motives last year,  reported Shabtai Bendet of Walla! News … Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/21/opinion/sunday/roger-cohen-what-will-israel-become.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share&_r=0 ...Everyone in Gaza seems to expect another war. "We are dying slowly, so why not die quickly?" is a common refrain. People seem dazed. There is, quite literally, no way out. …Lutfi Harara, the younger brother of Mustafa, whose home was also destroyed, took me to see the little house with a corrugated iron roof he had cobbled together since the war. He showed me photographs of Haifa, his memories of the Israel where he used to work as an electrician before divisions hardened. From rockets and artillery shells found in the rubble of his home, he has fashioned lamps and a vase and a heavy bell dangling from an olive tree — his version of swords into plowshares, and the one hopeful thing I saw in Gaza… Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/17/opinion/thomas-friedman-this-israeli-election-matters.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share&_r=2   …The best approach I've heard comes from Amos Yadlin, Israel's former chief of defense intelligence, and the pilot who dropped the bomb through the roof of Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor. Yadlin, who now directs Israel's Institute for National Security Studies, argued to me that Israel's center needs to run on the core values of its founding prime minister, David Ben-Gurion. That is an Israel, he said, "that understands the limits of power of a small country," and is focused solely on building "a state that has a Jewish majority, a state that is democratic where all citizens are equal, a state that is secure even in a threatening environment and a state whose higher moral caliber is as valued as it was in the past." And that means a state w

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=747206   … "We want a clear and specific resolution for a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital, resolving all the final status issues, releasing all detainees and refugees and labeling settlement activity illegal and should be stopped immediately, including in Jerusalem," Erekat said… "There is a window of opportunity," said a European diplomat. "There is a willingness from the Americans to consider options at the UN."   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

12-12-2014 Review of Method and Madness: Israel's Rational Madness    - Alex Doherty Normanfinkelstein.com http://normanfinkelstein.com/2014/12/12/review-of-method-and-madness/ …Norman Finkelstein's new book, Method and Madness: the Hidden Story of Israel's Assaults on Gaza  is focused…on where the conflict has in recent years been most visible – the Gaza strip. The book details Israel's three 'wars' in Gaza [1] – Operation Cast Lead (2008-09) Operation Pillar of Defense (2012) and Operation Protective Edge (2014). The book includes substantial material on the 2009 report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict (more commonly known as the Goldstone report). And judge Richard Goldstone's partial retraction of its conclusions in April 2011. The book also provides analysis of the Israeli assault on the Mavi Marmara of the Freedom Flotilla in 2010. The 'Madness' of the title refers to Israel's deliberat

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/nightmare-brings-blumenthal?utm_source=Mondoweiss+List&utm_campaign=0959adf206-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b86bace129-0959adf206-398495333 US mainstream media begin to reflect the 'nightmare' of Greater Israel, from David Remnick's one-state reality to the Forward imagining a binational state to a Princeton student coming out for BDS. Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://forward.com/articles/210833/anti-bds-professors-launch-push-to-ban--far-right/ Zionist 'Third Narrative' Academics Target Naftali Bennett Scholars for Israel and Palestine (SIP) a group that describes itself as "pro-Israel, pro-Palestine, pro-peace" is asking the U.S. and EU governments to impose visa restrictions and to freeze the foreign assets of Economy Minister and Habayit Hayehudi leader Naftali Bennett, Housing Minister Uri Ariel, Likud MK Moshe Feiglin and Ze'ev "Zambish" Hever, a former Jewish Underground member who heads the Amana organization, which oversees the settlement enterprise, including illegal outposts.   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/is-it-right-to-compare-ferguson-to-gaza-reflections-from-a-jewish-protester The Magnes Zionist/Jerry Haber/Charles H. Manekin - whose writings I greatly respect - shared this on Facebook. It's by Shaul Magid and well worth your time to read whether you are of one of the Abrahamic faiths or another faith or of no faith. Submitted by Donna Hicks, AIME Member

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/09/world/middleeast/israels-nationality-bill-stirs-debate-over-religious-and-democratic-identity.html?mabReward=RI%3A11&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&region=CColumn&module=Recommendation&src=rechp&WT.nav=RecEngine&_r=0   …Now Israelis and Jews abroad are roiled by debate over whether Israel can continue to be both a Jewish homeland and the lone democracy in a region torn apart by ethnic and religious strife.   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member  

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/09/world/middleeast/palestinians-become-observers-at-meeting-on-international-criminal-court.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1 The Palestinians on Monday became an observer for the first time at the annual meeting of states that have joined the International Criminal Court , upgrading their status within the organization but not, crucially, coming under the court's jurisdiction. The change is symbolic but significant nonetheless, considering how elusive statehood has proved for the Palestinians in their prolonged conflict with Israel. Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/226347-state-departments-response-to-discrimination-by-israel-is Mike Coogan of the US Campaign to End the Occupation updates us on the visa waiver program legislation which has now passed in Congress. Submitted by Donna Hicks, AIME member

http://www.thedurhamnews.com/2014/12/05/4373527/kay-robert-volkwijn-palestine.html?sp=/99/586/928/941/1486/ Colleague Kay-Robert Volkwijn writes about Palestine and South Africa in this guess column in Sunday's 'The Durham News' section of the N&O. Submitted by Donna Hicks, AIME member

http://972mag.com/time-for-intl-community-to-hold-israel-accountable-heres-how/99583/ Resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is not impossible, but success requires bold measures and the courage to see them through. Following more than two decades of peace talks, the international community should give the law a chance. As a first step, the international community should act to clarify the legal obligations, not only of Israel and the Palestinian Authority, but also of third states…. Second, the international community should revisit policies that help perpetuate the occupation, establishing tangible incentives for bringing it to an end. .. Third, international assistance should be focused on reversing the fragmentation and stagnation in Palestinian political and economic life, by expanding Palestinian institutions' capacity to serve and represent Palestinians across the occupied territory (especially Area C and Jerusalem), as well as in the diaspora.

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/response-dershowitzs-movement Below, Dershowitz's ten reasons [Why BDS is Immoral] are written in bold, and my exhausted and sometimes snarky responses are written beneath… Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/netanyahu-barghouti-celebratory Why should Israel, a nuclear power that's still very powerful economically, be afraid of the nonviolent nuisance of BDS? Omar Barghouti asks at Columbia. Well, maybe because Zionist IQ is dipping, the movement has advanced faster than it did in South Africa, and is no[w] pushing on an open door. .. Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/americans-outcome-israelpalestine?utm_source=Mondoweiss+List&utm_campaign=366df7584f-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b86bace129-366df7584f-398495333 The number of Americans who want the government to push for one state in Israel and Palestine jumped 40 percent in the last year, to more than a third of respondents in a new poll. That group rivals the number who want the government to push for two states... Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://mondoweiss.net/2014/12/supporters-nonviolent-palestinian Ahmed Alkhateeb organized an academic panel at Harvard University to discuss the tactics of The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement as part of the Harvard Arab Weekend – the largest Arab conference in the United States. He says the event did not pass without being described by pro-Israel advocates as anti-Semitic and advocating the destruction of Israel. Instead of engaging directly in these debates, which carries with it the possibility of adjusting their stance on the occupation, settlements, and the Gaza blockade, pro-Israel groups only attempt to control who holds the microphone. Alkhateeb writes, "Pro-Israel students on US campuses should confront the systemic oppression of the Palestinians instead of sheltering themselves from it. Silencing 'the other' will only lead to misunderstanding and thus does not promote peace."… Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

Here's a 4-minute primer on the BDS movement - what it calls for, what it's accomplished, how to support its continuing work and to grow the movement. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UT3WMBLAVLQ&feature=youtu.be Submitted by Donna Hicks, AIME member

  http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/netanyahus-nation-state?utm_source=tny&utm_campaign=generalsocial&utm_medium=twitter&mbid=social_twitter   …No wonder that a vexed coalition, which includes not only Peres, but also the current President, Reuven Rivlin, a Likud member, have rejected the law, implicitly encouraging Yair Lapid and Tzipi Livni, centrist members of Netanyahu's cabinet, to ally themselves with Labor and stand their ground. If it comes to an election, it will be best for democratic forces to unify, not only around what Israel does, but what Israel is. Israelis not in the thrall of settler fanaticism need to decide whether they want to be part of the democratic Western world or not. The Jewish nation-state law puts the choice starkly: a globalist Hebrew republic or a little Jewish Pakistan.   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/12/02/better_off_with_bibi_israel_politics_elections Despite all the petty politics and infighting, there are still reasons we shouldn't be so quick to assume that elections -- and (possibly) a new prime minister -- will solve Israel's problems...   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/1.629770 If Belgium adopts the motion and recognizes a Palestinian state, it will become Europe's second country to do so, after Sweden's recognition of a Palestinian state in October... Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.timesofisrael.com/french-parliament-votes-to-recognize-palestinian-state/   Israel laments symbolic vote, which sees lawmakers urge government to recognize Palestine, with 339 in favor and 151 against… Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

mondoweiss.net/2014/12/Israel-going-crazy From legislation saying that Israel is the nation state of the Jews to bookburnings at a bilingual school to a racist song saying that Palestinians just want to kill Jews -- Israel's political culture seems to be cracking up. And no one at the top is trying to tamp down the demons...   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Israel-s-Jewish-state-bill-by-Jonathan-Cook-Israel_Israel-And-Palestine_Israeli_intransigence_Netanyahu-141129-557.html Netanyahu wants to 'upgrade' discrimination in Israel to help secure his rule in the occupied territories, say experts... … It is designed to demote Arabic -- spoken by the fifth of the population who belong to the country's Palestinian minority -- from its current status as an official language, and makes "Jewish tradition" and "the prophets of Israel" a primary source of legal and judicial authority. More specifically, it formally defines Israel as belonging to Jews around the world rather than to its citizens, which includes 1.5 million Palestinians…   Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME membe

http://972mag.com/author/dahlias/ Liberman's proposal to cure Palestinian citizens of their 'split personality' violates pretty much everything democracy stands for... Posted by Judith Ferster, AIME member