I have not blogged for 4 months for several reasons. One of them being that I got totally discouraged with the Obama "change" that did not happen. And when the opposite of positive change happens day after day, I had to get away from it for the time being.
However, I only could stay away from the daily doses of disgusting news for so long and decided that writing about what keeps me occupied is like a good dose of medicine every time I post my thoughts about the destruction we encounter every time we get onto the Internet. It does not matter if anybody reads these rants or whatever they are.
Four Months later, Nothing has Changed
Obama, the Messiah Orator, has been a total disappointment from day one, January 20, 2009, the day of his inauguration. The promise of real change that made believers of a lot of the feeble minded masses turned out to be a hoax and a nasty one for that. A short list of Obama created miracles:
1) We are leaving Iraq, but we are keeping at least 50.000 troops plus an unknown number of mercenaries in place to accommodate the proper and smooth takeover of Iraq's oil fields by the world's major oil companies.
2) We are "not" leaving Afghanistan, that is until we get thrown out of the place. In the meantime we will murder and torture as many Afghan people as we can.
3) We have extended our destructive behaviour in a major way to Pakistan where under our tutelage the Pakistani army has managed to kill scores of people in Waziristan and make up to 2 million people refugees in their own country. Another inhumane feat of US meddling in affairs we have no business meddling in. Our drones will continue to mass murder innocent women and children.
4) We are not sure when and who is going to teach Iran a lesson in humility by destroying their nuclear facilities, however you can bet your boots that it will happen while Obama is President and that Israel will be the main destroyer of human live (again) with the encouragement of the US Congress.
5) We have made sure that North Korea is on its way to make a few more nuclear bombs which eventually we will force them to use so we have an excuse to obliterate the place with our newest nuclear weapons.
6) The employment rate is soaring but we have decided that only banks and US automobile companies need massive taxpayer provided bailouts. The ordinary man or the "mob" as the elites see them do not need any help to self destruct.
7) We have bankrupted the country and it is only a matter of time when the rug will be pulled from under our manipulated and criminal financial system.
8) As a result we will feel obliged to rain more murder, torture and mayhem on the people that hate us because of our freedom.
9 We have become a fascist, totalitarian corporate owned state with a President as figurehead unable to change anything for the good of the common people. Greed rules, corruption is the standard and God bless America.
I will be back with more on both the American and Canadian political systems, the people who call themselves our leaders and the threat they present to the survival of humanity.
Hans Denee
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
The United States of America: the Bankruptcy of a Totalitarian Kleptocracy.
Six weeks into the Obama Administration's building on the legacy of criminality of its predecessor we are faced with the possibility of a total collapse of the integrity of society as a result of the ongoing destruction of the financial and economic systems by the government and its powerful insiders.
Hundreds of billions of dollars are doled out by the insiders (Geithner, Bernanke, Summers et al), without supervision, to the financial institutions controlled by the elites. A war "without end" in Iraq, a "bigger" war in Afghanistan and possible new wars/escalations in Pakistan and Iran. A trillion dollar Defense Dept. budget and a one and three quarter trillion budget deficit financed through the use of that great invention, the Printing Press. Renditions will continue and so will Torture, however this time around we promise to do a better job of hiding these criminal acts from the mob. Putting innocent people away in our world wide network of dungeons will continue and of course the right of habeas corpus will not apply to these so called terrorists. We will continue to be the lapdog of AIPAC, LIKUD and the extremists in the Israeli government. We will not talk to the democratically elected government in Gaza or to Hezbollah in Lebanon for that matter. Iran remains on the top of our "destroy" to do list because Israel and AIPAC say so.
We are an Empire now and we make our own realities on an as need basis. We are also on the road to our Economic Demise in the near future; a demise accelerated by hubris, greed, self delusion and economic collapse. We preach to the choir but are morally and ethically challenged and our hypocrisy does know no bounds. "Do as we say, not as we do", should be our national forehead sticker.
This may be a good time to reflect on our involvement in what is being done in our name by the power elites and the corporations that control what is now without a doubt a Totalitarian Kleptocracy in which "democracy" is managed as a way to subdue, dumb down and control the mob.
As the willing participants in this grand scheme of lies, manipulation and deception we should have anticipated the outcome that is now staring us in the face; moral, financial and economic collapse. Aggressive wars, the military industrial complex and Ponzi schemes is what is left of the American Dream; national bankruptcy will be next.
We are today confronted - close up - with the scheming elites who made our jobs disappear, stole our money and took over the government by corrupting the election process with the use of their lobbyists on K street. Their aim is to keep control over the government, our money and the mob, if necessary with the help of the armed forces and National Guard.
Call it Managed Democracy or a Managed Police State; it is all a matter of violation of humanity, you and me.
Hans Denee
Hundreds of billions of dollars are doled out by the insiders (Geithner, Bernanke, Summers et al), without supervision, to the financial institutions controlled by the elites. A war "without end" in Iraq, a "bigger" war in Afghanistan and possible new wars/escalations in Pakistan and Iran. A trillion dollar Defense Dept. budget and a one and three quarter trillion budget deficit financed through the use of that great invention, the Printing Press. Renditions will continue and so will Torture, however this time around we promise to do a better job of hiding these criminal acts from the mob. Putting innocent people away in our world wide network of dungeons will continue and of course the right of habeas corpus will not apply to these so called terrorists. We will continue to be the lapdog of AIPAC, LIKUD and the extremists in the Israeli government. We will not talk to the democratically elected government in Gaza or to Hezbollah in Lebanon for that matter. Iran remains on the top of our "destroy" to do list because Israel and AIPAC say so.
We are an Empire now and we make our own realities on an as need basis. We are also on the road to our Economic Demise in the near future; a demise accelerated by hubris, greed, self delusion and economic collapse. We preach to the choir but are morally and ethically challenged and our hypocrisy does know no bounds. "Do as we say, not as we do", should be our national forehead sticker.
This may be a good time to reflect on our involvement in what is being done in our name by the power elites and the corporations that control what is now without a doubt a Totalitarian Kleptocracy in which "democracy" is managed as a way to subdue, dumb down and control the mob.
As the willing participants in this grand scheme of lies, manipulation and deception we should have anticipated the outcome that is now staring us in the face; moral, financial and economic collapse. Aggressive wars, the military industrial complex and Ponzi schemes is what is left of the American Dream; national bankruptcy will be next.
We are today confronted - close up - with the scheming elites who made our jobs disappear, stole our money and took over the government by corrupting the election process with the use of their lobbyists on K street. Their aim is to keep control over the government, our money and the mob, if necessary with the help of the armed forces and National Guard.
Call it Managed Democracy or a Managed Police State; it is all a matter of violation of humanity, you and me.
Hans Denee
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Reflections on Pain and Desperation.
It took a long two years to elect Obama and a mere two weeks to come to the conclusion that nothing ever changes in the centers of power in this world.
The overwhelming pain that comes with denial and hope is a reminder of false promises and misplaced euphoria. The mind absorbs the pictures through a foggy lens of believe into the possibility that a better world can be reached if only the picture would get sharper and images of torture, murder and rape could be dissolved into a resolve to help the unfortunate and threatened multitudes that stare at us through our lens with that look of helplessness and angst. The burning of the images into our collective brains should stop us cold and make us reflect on our guilt of living a live of greed and excess and being unable to show or feel compassion for the dead, mutilated and raped. We have degenerated into a mirror image of the people we despised and who brought us Auschwitz, Gulags, Sabra, Shatila, Rwanda, Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon/06, Gaza/08/09, Zimbabwe, DR Congo, Ceylon, Yugoslavia and Darfur. We do not care about the people we rape, torture or murder and more often than not, we blame our victims for their demise and misery. The power elite's propaganda machine has turned us into willing objects of deceit and lies. To see and understand the reality of a world gone astray once again, is a possibility to be avoided at all cost in case the masses might get the wrong idea. Dumbed down and terrorised by our glorious leaders, we submit our "useless" selves to the manipulations of our chosen torturers.
We have all become desensitised to the crimes committed by our leaders in our name and prefer not to think about the consequences of our murderous actions in far away places, occupied by people who "deserve" what is coming to them. Our self righteousness and moral supremacy dictates that whatever we do to our perceived enemies is always good, but whenever those enemies defend themselves against our often illegal and criminal actions, they are in the wrong; we call them terrorists and worse. In our manipulated way of thinking - assuming we are still able to think at all - we are the ones who are defending ourselves against the evil of unknown foreign entities that are out to kill us. It will never occur to the masses that we are brain washed and terrorised into believing this fairy tale of permanent danger to the Homeland. It is really sad to observe the acquiescence of the American People to the demolition of their constitutional rights, together with a general approval of all forms of illegal government behaviour including the officially sanctioned use of torture on bought and renditioned people that are no threat to us. In our infinite stupidity and immorality we have become what we are afraid off, terrorists, rapists and murderers without a conscience or empathy. We do not longer protest the unjust actions of the power elites or for that matter the greed and criminality of the people that have wrecked the financial system, instead we stay quiet afraid to make a stir.
Silence is our way to approve of the crimes committed in our name.
Hans Denee
The overwhelming pain that comes with denial and hope is a reminder of false promises and misplaced euphoria. The mind absorbs the pictures through a foggy lens of believe into the possibility that a better world can be reached if only the picture would get sharper and images of torture, murder and rape could be dissolved into a resolve to help the unfortunate and threatened multitudes that stare at us through our lens with that look of helplessness and angst. The burning of the images into our collective brains should stop us cold and make us reflect on our guilt of living a live of greed and excess and being unable to show or feel compassion for the dead, mutilated and raped. We have degenerated into a mirror image of the people we despised and who brought us Auschwitz, Gulags, Sabra, Shatila, Rwanda, Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon/06, Gaza/08/09, Zimbabwe, DR Congo, Ceylon, Yugoslavia and Darfur. We do not care about the people we rape, torture or murder and more often than not, we blame our victims for their demise and misery. The power elite's propaganda machine has turned us into willing objects of deceit and lies. To see and understand the reality of a world gone astray once again, is a possibility to be avoided at all cost in case the masses might get the wrong idea. Dumbed down and terrorised by our glorious leaders, we submit our "useless" selves to the manipulations of our chosen torturers.
We have all become desensitised to the crimes committed by our leaders in our name and prefer not to think about the consequences of our murderous actions in far away places, occupied by people who "deserve" what is coming to them. Our self righteousness and moral supremacy dictates that whatever we do to our perceived enemies is always good, but whenever those enemies defend themselves against our often illegal and criminal actions, they are in the wrong; we call them terrorists and worse. In our manipulated way of thinking - assuming we are still able to think at all - we are the ones who are defending ourselves against the evil of unknown foreign entities that are out to kill us. It will never occur to the masses that we are brain washed and terrorised into believing this fairy tale of permanent danger to the Homeland. It is really sad to observe the acquiescence of the American People to the demolition of their constitutional rights, together with a general approval of all forms of illegal government behaviour including the officially sanctioned use of torture on bought and renditioned people that are no threat to us. In our infinite stupidity and immorality we have become what we are afraid off, terrorists, rapists and murderers without a conscience or empathy. We do not longer protest the unjust actions of the power elites or for that matter the greed and criminality of the people that have wrecked the financial system, instead we stay quiet afraid to make a stir.
Silence is our way to approve of the crimes committed in our name.
Hans Denee
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
It would be nice if .................
................................Stephen Harper would get a heart with brains attached so that he stops speaking his mind without checking his heart first.
1)In stead of blaming the Palestinians in the Gaza Ghetto for the death and destruction visited upon them by the IDF, he could have shown some empathy with the hundreds of children, women and men that were murdered by the Israelis in their so called act of self defense. The people of Gaza have been mistreated by the state of Israel since 1948, when the Jewish terrorist organisation Irgun, expelled the Palestinians from their lands in what is now called Israel and herded most of them into the Gaza strip. In the last two years the state of Israel has been slowly strangling, suffocating and starving the one and a half million inhabitants of the Gaza Ghetto. On November 4, 2008 Israel proceeded to kill 6 Palestinians and provoked a rocket response by Hamas. Hamas was prepared for a renewed cease fire, however Israel had been planning the onslaught on Gaza for months. Next time Mr Harper opines about the situation in Israel, the West bank and Gaza, he should show some balance, heart and spine, assuming he has these things.Stand up to the Israeli propaganda and call war crimes and murder of innocents for what they are, "CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY".
2)This would help the child soldier Omar Khadr who has been imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for the last 7 years to come home to Canada and receive the help he obviously needs. Every government in the western world, that had its citizens imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay, has pushed Washington to return their citizens, except the soulless Harper government. Omar Khadr was 15 years old when he was captured by the Americans in Afghanistan; he has been tortured by the Americans. Mr Harper and his judicial advisers know that everything that has happened to Omar Khadr is illegal under International laws and the Geneva Conventions. As a willing participant in the immoral and illegal schemes of the American government, the Harper government and Mr Harper in particular have shown us the immorality of Canada's Politicians.
3)It would also get us, as a country, out of Afghanistan in a hurry; a war we decided to fight instead of going into Iraq with the much maligned Americans. Canada has no business being in Afghanistan and has lost more than 100 soldiers there in the last 5 years. Canada's Afghanistan war is a war of aggression and interference in the internal politics of a country on the other side of the globe. It is a war that the United States with the help of NATO cannot win; the British twice and the Russians once tried to conquer, occupy and control Afghanistan without any success. With a mindless determination the Obama administration is slowly but surely extending the Afghanistan war into a war with Pakistan, blind to the consequences of antagonising one hundred and fifty million Muslims in that country. Canada will be sucked into this coming disaster, unless we decide to quit now, go home and become a peace keeping country again.
4)The economic disaster that has struck the world in early 2008 should have been recognized by these charlatans, before they were forced into retreat after an offensive October economic update, that ended in the prorogue of parliament until January 26, 2009. In order to save their collective behinds, they have been playing nice with the Canadian electorate and the opposition in order to come up with a budget that hopefully will stop the economic boogie man from wrecking the Canadian economy completely. The Harper government's partisan tactics in October, 2008 have resulted in the delay of preventive measures for the last three months.
Maybe, next time check your "warm" caring heart before using your "icy" self centered brains Mr Harper; we may even become to like you, if only a little.
Hans Denee
1)In stead of blaming the Palestinians in the Gaza Ghetto for the death and destruction visited upon them by the IDF, he could have shown some empathy with the hundreds of children, women and men that were murdered by the Israelis in their so called act of self defense. The people of Gaza have been mistreated by the state of Israel since 1948, when the Jewish terrorist organisation Irgun, expelled the Palestinians from their lands in what is now called Israel and herded most of them into the Gaza strip. In the last two years the state of Israel has been slowly strangling, suffocating and starving the one and a half million inhabitants of the Gaza Ghetto. On November 4, 2008 Israel proceeded to kill 6 Palestinians and provoked a rocket response by Hamas. Hamas was prepared for a renewed cease fire, however Israel had been planning the onslaught on Gaza for months. Next time Mr Harper opines about the situation in Israel, the West bank and Gaza, he should show some balance, heart and spine, assuming he has these things.Stand up to the Israeli propaganda and call war crimes and murder of innocents for what they are, "CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY".
2)This would help the child soldier Omar Khadr who has been imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for the last 7 years to come home to Canada and receive the help he obviously needs. Every government in the western world, that had its citizens imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay, has pushed Washington to return their citizens, except the soulless Harper government. Omar Khadr was 15 years old when he was captured by the Americans in Afghanistan; he has been tortured by the Americans. Mr Harper and his judicial advisers know that everything that has happened to Omar Khadr is illegal under International laws and the Geneva Conventions. As a willing participant in the immoral and illegal schemes of the American government, the Harper government and Mr Harper in particular have shown us the immorality of Canada's Politicians.
3)It would also get us, as a country, out of Afghanistan in a hurry; a war we decided to fight instead of going into Iraq with the much maligned Americans. Canada has no business being in Afghanistan and has lost more than 100 soldiers there in the last 5 years. Canada's Afghanistan war is a war of aggression and interference in the internal politics of a country on the other side of the globe. It is a war that the United States with the help of NATO cannot win; the British twice and the Russians once tried to conquer, occupy and control Afghanistan without any success. With a mindless determination the Obama administration is slowly but surely extending the Afghanistan war into a war with Pakistan, blind to the consequences of antagonising one hundred and fifty million Muslims in that country. Canada will be sucked into this coming disaster, unless we decide to quit now, go home and become a peace keeping country again.
4)The economic disaster that has struck the world in early 2008 should have been recognized by these charlatans, before they were forced into retreat after an offensive October economic update, that ended in the prorogue of parliament until January 26, 2009. In order to save their collective behinds, they have been playing nice with the Canadian electorate and the opposition in order to come up with a budget that hopefully will stop the economic boogie man from wrecking the Canadian economy completely. The Harper government's partisan tactics in October, 2008 have resulted in the delay of preventive measures for the last three months.
Maybe, next time check your "warm" caring heart before using your "icy" self centered brains Mr Harper; we may even become to like you, if only a little.
Hans Denee
Friday, January 23, 2009
Captive Nation; how Gaza became a Palestinion Prison.
January 26, 2009 Issue Copyright © 2009 The American Conservative
Captive Nation PDF
How Gaza became a Palestinian prison
By Avi Shlaim
The only way to make sense of Israel’s senseless war in Gaza is through historical context. Establishing the state of Israel in May 1948 involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians. British officials bitterly resented American partisanship on behalf of the infant state. On June 2, 1948, Sir John Troutbeck wrote to Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin that the Americans were responsible for the creation of a gangster state headed by “an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders.” I used to think that this judgment was too harsh, but Israel’s assault on Gaza and the Bush administration’s complicity have reopened the question.
I served loyally in the Israeli army in the 1960s and have never questioned the legitimacy of the state of Israel within its pre-1967 borders. What I reject is the Zionist colonial project beyond the Green Line. The occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the 1967 War had little to do with security and everything to do with territorial expansionism. The aim was to establish Greater Israel through permanent political, economic, and military control over the Palestinian territories.
With a population of refugees crammed into a tiny strip of land with no infrastructure or natural resources, Gaza’s prospects were never bright. Yet this is not an instance of economic underdevelopment but a uniquely cruel case of deliberate de-development. To use the Biblical phrase, Israel turned the people of Gaza into hewers of wood and the drawers of water—a source of cheap labor and a captive market for Israeli goods. Local industry was actively impeded so as to make it impossible for the Palestinians to end their subordination and establish the economic underpinnings essential for independence.
In 2005, Jewish settlers numbered only 8,000 compared with 1.4 million local residents. Yet the settlers controlled 25 percent of the territory, 40 percent of the arable land, and the lion’s share of scarce water resources. Cheek by jowl with these foreign intruders, the majority of the local population lived in unimaginable misery. Eighty percent still subsist on less than $2 per day. Living conditions remain an affront to civilized values, a powerful precipitant to resistance, and a breeding ground for extremism.
In August 2005, a Likud government headed by Ariel Sharon staged a unilateral Israeli pullout, withdrawing settlers and destroying the houses they left behind. Sharon presented the withdrawal as a contribution to peace based on a two-state solution. But the year after, another 12,000 Israelis settled on the West Bank, further reducing the scope for an independent Palestinian state. Land-grabbing and peace-making are simply incompatible.
The real purpose behind the move was to redraw the borders of Greater Israel by incorporating the main settlement blocs on the West Bank to the state of Israel. Withdrawal from Gaza was thus not a prelude to peace but to further Zionist expansion on the West Bank. It was a unilateral move undertaken in what was seen as the Israeli national interest.
Israel’s settlers were withdrawn, but Israeli soldiers continued to control all access to the Gaza Strip. The Israeli air force enjoyed unrestricted freedom to drop bombs, make sonic booms by flying low and breaking the sound barrier, and terrorize the hapless inhabitants.
Israel portrays itself as an island of democracy in a sea of authoritarianism. Yet Israel has never done anything to promote democracy on the Arab side and has done a great deal to undermine it. Israel has a long history of secret collaboration with reactionary Arab regimes to suppress Palestinian nationalism. Despite all the handicaps, the Palestinian people succeeded in building the only democracy in the Arab world with the possible exception of Lebanon. In January 2006, free and fair elections brought to power a Hamas-led government. Israel, however, refused to recognize the democratically elected government, claiming that Hamas is purely a terrorist organization.
America and the EU joined Israel in demonizing the Hamas government and trying to bring it down. A surreal situation thus developed with a significant part of the international community imposing sanctions not against the occupier but against the occupied.
Israel’s propaganda machine purveys the notion that the Palestinians are terrorists, that they reject coexistence with the Jewish state, that their nationalism is little more than antiSemitism, that Hamas is just a bunch of religious fanatics. But the truth is that the Palestinians are a normal people with normal aspirations. They want a piece of land on which to live in freedom and dignity.
Like other radical movements, Hamas began to moderate following its rise to power. From the ideological rejectionism of its charter, it moved toward pragmatic accommodation of a two-state solution. In March 2007, Hamas and Fatah formed a unity government that was ready to negotiate a long-term ceasefire. But Israel refused to negotiate with a government that included Hamas.
It continued to play the old game of divide-and-rule between rival Palestinian factions. In the late 1980s, Israel supported nascent Hamas in order to weaken Fatah, the secular nationalist movement led by Yasser Arafat. Now Israel began to encourage the corrupt and pliant Fatah leaders to overthrow their religious political rivals and recapture power. American neoconservatives participated in the plot to instigate a Palestinian civil war. Their meddling was a major factor in the collapse of the national unity government and in driving Hamas to seize power in Gaza in June 2007 to preempt a Fatah coup.
The war on Gaza is the culmination of confrontations with the Hamas government. In a broader sense, however, it is a war between Israel and the Palestinian people who elected it to power. The declared aim of the war is to weaken Hamas until it agrees to a ceasefire on Israel’s terms. The undeclared aim is to ensure that the Palestinians are seen by the world as a humanitarian problem, derailing their struggle for statehood.
As always, mighty Israel claims to be the victim of Palestinian aggression, but the asymmetry of power leaves little room for doubt as to who the real victim is. To be sure, Hamas is not an entirely innocent party. Denied the fruit of its electoral victory and confronted with an unscrupulous adversary, it has resorted to the weapon of the weak—terror. The damage caused by these primitive Qassam rockets is minimal, but the psychological impact is immense, prompting the public to demand protection from its government. Israel has the right to act in self-defense, but its response has been disproportionate. In the three years since the withdrawal from Gaza, 11 Israelis have been killed by rocket fire. In 2005 to 2007 alone, the IDF killed 1,290 Palestinians in Gaza, including 222 children.
Whatever the numbers, killing civilians is wrong. This applies to Israel as much as it does to Hamas—and Israel’s record is one of unremitting brutality toward the inhabitants of Gaza. Israel maintained the blockade after the ceasefire came into force, which in the view of Hamas leaders amounted to a violation of the agreement. During the ceasefire, Israel prevented any exports from leaving the strip. Officially, 49.1 percent of the population is unemployed. At the same time, Israel restricted the number of trucks carrying food, fuel, cooking-gas canisters, spare parts for water and sanitation plants, and medical supplies to Gaza. It is difficult to see how starving and freezing civilians could protect Israel. But even if it did, it would still be immoral, a form of collective punishment forbidden by international law.
The brutality of Israel’s soldiers is matched by the mendacity of its spokesmen. Eight months before launching the war on Gaza, Israel established a National Information Directorate. Its core messages are that Hamas broke the ceasefire agreements; that Israel’s objective is the defense of its population; and that Israel’s forces are taking the utmost care not to hurt civilians. But it was not Hamas but the IDF that broke the ceasefire, with a raid into Gaza on Nov. 4 that killed six Hamas men. Israel’s objective is not just the defense of its population but the eventual overthrow of the Hamas government by turning the people against their rulers. And far from taking care to spare civilians, Israel is guilty of indiscriminate bombing and of a three-year blockade that has brought the inhabitants of Gaza to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.
No amount of military escalation can buy Israel immunity from rocket attacks from the military wing of Hamas. Despite all the death and destruction that Israel has inflicted on them, they kept up their resistance. This is a movement that glorifies victimhood and martyrdom. The only way for Israel to achieve security is not through shooting but through talks with Hamas, which has repeatedly declared its readiness to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with the Jewish state within its pre-1967 borders. Israel has rejected this offer for the same reason it spurned the Arab League peace plan of 2002: it involves concessions and compromises.
Israel’s record over the past four decades makes it difficult to resist the conclusion that it has become a rogue state with “an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders.” A rogue state habitually violates international law, possesses WMD, and practices terrorism—the use of violence against civilians for political purposes.
Israel’s real aim is not peaceful coexistence with its Palestinian neighbors but military domination. It keeps compounding the mistakes of the past with new and more disastrous ones. Politicians are of course free to repeat lies and mistakes. But it is not mandatory to do so. __________________________________________
Avi Shlaim is author of The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World and Lion of Jordan: King Hussein’s Life in War and Peace. This essay is adapted from a piece that originally appeared in The Guardian.
The American Conservative welcomes letters to the editor.Send letters to: letters@amconmag.com
Captive Nation PDF
How Gaza became a Palestinian prison
By Avi Shlaim
The only way to make sense of Israel’s senseless war in Gaza is through historical context. Establishing the state of Israel in May 1948 involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians. British officials bitterly resented American partisanship on behalf of the infant state. On June 2, 1948, Sir John Troutbeck wrote to Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin that the Americans were responsible for the creation of a gangster state headed by “an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders.” I used to think that this judgment was too harsh, but Israel’s assault on Gaza and the Bush administration’s complicity have reopened the question.
I served loyally in the Israeli army in the 1960s and have never questioned the legitimacy of the state of Israel within its pre-1967 borders. What I reject is the Zionist colonial project beyond the Green Line. The occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the 1967 War had little to do with security and everything to do with territorial expansionism. The aim was to establish Greater Israel through permanent political, economic, and military control over the Palestinian territories.
With a population of refugees crammed into a tiny strip of land with no infrastructure or natural resources, Gaza’s prospects were never bright. Yet this is not an instance of economic underdevelopment but a uniquely cruel case of deliberate de-development. To use the Biblical phrase, Israel turned the people of Gaza into hewers of wood and the drawers of water—a source of cheap labor and a captive market for Israeli goods. Local industry was actively impeded so as to make it impossible for the Palestinians to end their subordination and establish the economic underpinnings essential for independence.
In 2005, Jewish settlers numbered only 8,000 compared with 1.4 million local residents. Yet the settlers controlled 25 percent of the territory, 40 percent of the arable land, and the lion’s share of scarce water resources. Cheek by jowl with these foreign intruders, the majority of the local population lived in unimaginable misery. Eighty percent still subsist on less than $2 per day. Living conditions remain an affront to civilized values, a powerful precipitant to resistance, and a breeding ground for extremism.
In August 2005, a Likud government headed by Ariel Sharon staged a unilateral Israeli pullout, withdrawing settlers and destroying the houses they left behind. Sharon presented the withdrawal as a contribution to peace based on a two-state solution. But the year after, another 12,000 Israelis settled on the West Bank, further reducing the scope for an independent Palestinian state. Land-grabbing and peace-making are simply incompatible.
The real purpose behind the move was to redraw the borders of Greater Israel by incorporating the main settlement blocs on the West Bank to the state of Israel. Withdrawal from Gaza was thus not a prelude to peace but to further Zionist expansion on the West Bank. It was a unilateral move undertaken in what was seen as the Israeli national interest.
Israel’s settlers were withdrawn, but Israeli soldiers continued to control all access to the Gaza Strip. The Israeli air force enjoyed unrestricted freedom to drop bombs, make sonic booms by flying low and breaking the sound barrier, and terrorize the hapless inhabitants.
Israel portrays itself as an island of democracy in a sea of authoritarianism. Yet Israel has never done anything to promote democracy on the Arab side and has done a great deal to undermine it. Israel has a long history of secret collaboration with reactionary Arab regimes to suppress Palestinian nationalism. Despite all the handicaps, the Palestinian people succeeded in building the only democracy in the Arab world with the possible exception of Lebanon. In January 2006, free and fair elections brought to power a Hamas-led government. Israel, however, refused to recognize the democratically elected government, claiming that Hamas is purely a terrorist organization.
America and the EU joined Israel in demonizing the Hamas government and trying to bring it down. A surreal situation thus developed with a significant part of the international community imposing sanctions not against the occupier but against the occupied.
Israel’s propaganda machine purveys the notion that the Palestinians are terrorists, that they reject coexistence with the Jewish state, that their nationalism is little more than antiSemitism, that Hamas is just a bunch of religious fanatics. But the truth is that the Palestinians are a normal people with normal aspirations. They want a piece of land on which to live in freedom and dignity.
Like other radical movements, Hamas began to moderate following its rise to power. From the ideological rejectionism of its charter, it moved toward pragmatic accommodation of a two-state solution. In March 2007, Hamas and Fatah formed a unity government that was ready to negotiate a long-term ceasefire. But Israel refused to negotiate with a government that included Hamas.
It continued to play the old game of divide-and-rule between rival Palestinian factions. In the late 1980s, Israel supported nascent Hamas in order to weaken Fatah, the secular nationalist movement led by Yasser Arafat. Now Israel began to encourage the corrupt and pliant Fatah leaders to overthrow their religious political rivals and recapture power. American neoconservatives participated in the plot to instigate a Palestinian civil war. Their meddling was a major factor in the collapse of the national unity government and in driving Hamas to seize power in Gaza in June 2007 to preempt a Fatah coup.
The war on Gaza is the culmination of confrontations with the Hamas government. In a broader sense, however, it is a war between Israel and the Palestinian people who elected it to power. The declared aim of the war is to weaken Hamas until it agrees to a ceasefire on Israel’s terms. The undeclared aim is to ensure that the Palestinians are seen by the world as a humanitarian problem, derailing their struggle for statehood.
As always, mighty Israel claims to be the victim of Palestinian aggression, but the asymmetry of power leaves little room for doubt as to who the real victim is. To be sure, Hamas is not an entirely innocent party. Denied the fruit of its electoral victory and confronted with an unscrupulous adversary, it has resorted to the weapon of the weak—terror. The damage caused by these primitive Qassam rockets is minimal, but the psychological impact is immense, prompting the public to demand protection from its government. Israel has the right to act in self-defense, but its response has been disproportionate. In the three years since the withdrawal from Gaza, 11 Israelis have been killed by rocket fire. In 2005 to 2007 alone, the IDF killed 1,290 Palestinians in Gaza, including 222 children.
Whatever the numbers, killing civilians is wrong. This applies to Israel as much as it does to Hamas—and Israel’s record is one of unremitting brutality toward the inhabitants of Gaza. Israel maintained the blockade after the ceasefire came into force, which in the view of Hamas leaders amounted to a violation of the agreement. During the ceasefire, Israel prevented any exports from leaving the strip. Officially, 49.1 percent of the population is unemployed. At the same time, Israel restricted the number of trucks carrying food, fuel, cooking-gas canisters, spare parts for water and sanitation plants, and medical supplies to Gaza. It is difficult to see how starving and freezing civilians could protect Israel. But even if it did, it would still be immoral, a form of collective punishment forbidden by international law.
The brutality of Israel’s soldiers is matched by the mendacity of its spokesmen. Eight months before launching the war on Gaza, Israel established a National Information Directorate. Its core messages are that Hamas broke the ceasefire agreements; that Israel’s objective is the defense of its population; and that Israel’s forces are taking the utmost care not to hurt civilians. But it was not Hamas but the IDF that broke the ceasefire, with a raid into Gaza on Nov. 4 that killed six Hamas men. Israel’s objective is not just the defense of its population but the eventual overthrow of the Hamas government by turning the people against their rulers. And far from taking care to spare civilians, Israel is guilty of indiscriminate bombing and of a three-year blockade that has brought the inhabitants of Gaza to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.
No amount of military escalation can buy Israel immunity from rocket attacks from the military wing of Hamas. Despite all the death and destruction that Israel has inflicted on them, they kept up their resistance. This is a movement that glorifies victimhood and martyrdom. The only way for Israel to achieve security is not through shooting but through talks with Hamas, which has repeatedly declared its readiness to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with the Jewish state within its pre-1967 borders. Israel has rejected this offer for the same reason it spurned the Arab League peace plan of 2002: it involves concessions and compromises.
Israel’s record over the past four decades makes it difficult to resist the conclusion that it has become a rogue state with “an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders.” A rogue state habitually violates international law, possesses WMD, and practices terrorism—the use of violence against civilians for political purposes.
Israel’s real aim is not peaceful coexistence with its Palestinian neighbors but military domination. It keeps compounding the mistakes of the past with new and more disastrous ones. Politicians are of course free to repeat lies and mistakes. But it is not mandatory to do so. __________________________________________
Avi Shlaim is author of The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World and Lion of Jordan: King Hussein’s Life in War and Peace. This essay is adapted from a piece that originally appeared in The Guardian.
The American Conservative welcomes letters to the editor.Send letters to: letters@amconmag.com
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Israel, a Wasteland of Criminals and Murderers.
As predicted, this little Olmert/Barak/Livni - for political reasons - war has ended just in time for the American masses to welcome their Messiah on this January inauguration day. Olmert claims they won and the stack of dead children's bodies was well worth it; it is now up to us (Israel) to decide how much, if any of the devastated areas in the Gaza Ghetto is going to be rebuild. In other words, as little as possible so we can make their (the Palestinians) lives even more miserable than before we started this evil little mas murder campaign. The murderers of more than 1,400 Palestinian children, women and men are gloating over their perceived victory over a defenseless people locked up in vast Ghetto. Their self congratulatory chest beatings are accompanied by a vast, world wide, Jewish propaganda network that hopefully convinces most of the uninformed Westerners, that this war was a just war, a war for self defense. The "real" story and history gets drowned out by the beat of the propaganda drums in Washington DC and most European Capitals; Israeli brain washing and intimidation techniques, that ensures that otherwise "reasonable" people like Merkel, Sarkozy, Brown and Obama unconditionally back the Israeli claims of a "JUST WAR" out of self defense. One just has to look at the votes in the Congress last week by these so called "honorable" men and women; 95 % plus, in favour of the war crimes committed by the Israelis in Gaza with American made weapons, so generously donated by generations of Washington DC war criminals. The cowards on both sides of the Atlantic dare not utter one word of disagreement with the actions of the gangsters in Tel Aviv; they know that the Jewish wrath will be swift and devastating if they object to the murderous actions of the State of Israel.
The problem for Israel, the USA, Canada and the Europeans is, that multitudes of informed people all over the world recognise atrocities when they take place on Al Jazeera English TV; we also know about Falluja in Iraq and all the other crimes perpetrated by the Americans in that devastated land, including the more than 500,000 dead children as the result of the UK/USA embargo since 1991. The propaganda that comes from our elected politicians and their helpers in the mainstream media is slowly becoming an obsolete tool. Most of us get our information from independent news providers, blogs and websites; we may still read news papers on line and visit different tv stations, but this is generally to affirm that our own research is the right way to go. The Israeli, American, Canadian and European propaganda machines are just that; trhough propaganda and terror the politicians want to control the thinking and beliefs of their citizens, citizens who assumedly are uninformed and not interested in getting objective information about events that take place through the actions of the corrupt politicians they elect.
These politicians and the power elites they represent, (unless they are able and willing take control of the Internet), will be lamenting their loss of control over big segments of the population when more and more of us refuse to be terrorised by their propaganda any longer and use our information to force these same politicians to abide by our rules and the laws of the country we all live in.
No matter how well organised the Israeli propaganda campaign may be after this devastating attack on the Gaza Ghetto, the world knows that they and our own politicians are lying to us. There can be no justification ever, for what happened in Gaza in the last three weeks, like there can be no justification for what happened in Lebanon in 2006, in Iraq since 2003, Afghanistan for more than seven years now and what may happen soon in Iran, Syria and Pakistan. Unjustified mass murder by an occupying country, be it Israel or the United States is considered "a crime against humanity" and war crime. Aggressive wars, and these are all aggressive wars, are also crimes against humanity. The "leaders" who instigate these war crimes and crimes against humanity should all be indicted and put on trial in the International Court in The Hague; these include members of the Bush and Olmert administration.
Only through massive pressure from below will corrupt politicians change their murderous and criminal behaviour; it is up to us to organise and create a future where "greed" is indeed a dirty word and murder, torture and rape as tools of the aggressor are abandoned for a peaceful coexistence. No more Empires please and no greater Israel for that matter.
Hans denee
The problem for Israel, the USA, Canada and the Europeans is, that multitudes of informed people all over the world recognise atrocities when they take place on Al Jazeera English TV; we also know about Falluja in Iraq and all the other crimes perpetrated by the Americans in that devastated land, including the more than 500,000 dead children as the result of the UK/USA embargo since 1991. The propaganda that comes from our elected politicians and their helpers in the mainstream media is slowly becoming an obsolete tool. Most of us get our information from independent news providers, blogs and websites; we may still read news papers on line and visit different tv stations, but this is generally to affirm that our own research is the right way to go. The Israeli, American, Canadian and European propaganda machines are just that; trhough propaganda and terror the politicians want to control the thinking and beliefs of their citizens, citizens who assumedly are uninformed and not interested in getting objective information about events that take place through the actions of the corrupt politicians they elect.
These politicians and the power elites they represent, (unless they are able and willing take control of the Internet), will be lamenting their loss of control over big segments of the population when more and more of us refuse to be terrorised by their propaganda any longer and use our information to force these same politicians to abide by our rules and the laws of the country we all live in.
No matter how well organised the Israeli propaganda campaign may be after this devastating attack on the Gaza Ghetto, the world knows that they and our own politicians are lying to us. There can be no justification ever, for what happened in Gaza in the last three weeks, like there can be no justification for what happened in Lebanon in 2006, in Iraq since 2003, Afghanistan for more than seven years now and what may happen soon in Iran, Syria and Pakistan. Unjustified mass murder by an occupying country, be it Israel or the United States is considered "a crime against humanity" and war crime. Aggressive wars, and these are all aggressive wars, are also crimes against humanity. The "leaders" who instigate these war crimes and crimes against humanity should all be indicted and put on trial in the International Court in The Hague; these include members of the Bush and Olmert administration.
Only through massive pressure from below will corrupt politicians change their murderous and criminal behaviour; it is up to us to organise and create a future where "greed" is indeed a dirty word and murder, torture and rape as tools of the aggressor are abandoned for a peaceful coexistence. No more Empires please and no greater Israel for that matter.
Hans denee
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
A World without Hope in a Time of unmitigated Disaster.
January 20 in Washington DC will not be a happy "Inaugural" day but more like an unhappy "Undertaker" day for the remnants of the United States Empire. Bankruptcy is not an option and Chapter Eleven not a way to a restoration of American morality and integrity; the creditors will have to take their losses as the corruption in politics and beyond has created an irredeemable polity of crooks, torturers and murderers. With the disappearance of the previous, devious, couple of Bush/Cheney, the scene is set for an oh so fake imaginary renewal of what we have been made to believe are age old US ideals; from shining city on the hill to Abu Ghraib in Iraq, Bagram Air force base in Afghanistan and Guantanamo in, the place we hate most of all, Cuba. Those are the places we identify with American "largesse" of torture and murder of often innocent people sold to the United States by greedy crooks in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan for an amount of money equal to the 30 pieces of silver Judas received for his treacherous behaviour as mentioned in the Bible. This American "largesse" extends to the millions of dead men, women and children in Darfur, Congo, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and many other places devastated by American influence gone wrong. That shining city on the hill looks today more like an extended dung hill straddling the world through more than 700 American bases, designed to deliver misery and disaster to the citizens who oppose them.
The incoming Obama/Biden regime with its promises of false hope will be defeated by the sheer size of the calamities that the previous owners have left behind; from lost wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to an economy completely wrecked by the greedy crooks of Wall Street and a national debt going into the stratosphere. This defeat will be swift and final; the damage done is to great to be repaired by anyone, least a cacophony of former Clinton officials who laid the foundation for all these disasters in the first place. Once it becomes clear, that no amount of "printed" money is going to save the place, desperation will force the power elites into new wars in order to keep the masses from taking up arms against the Washington criminals.
Who can still believe in "change" or for that matter salvation after we have been confronted with a list of Obama appointments that promises a continuation of the policies of the Bush/Cheney regime and most likely worse. With People like Rahm Emanuel and Hillary - I am a tough bitch - Clinton, Robert Gates and a whole assortment of more or less unsavoury characters that reminds one of the Mafia, the promised change will be a change for the worst. Not only in the United States itself, which by now is a nominal police state, but in particular for the denizens of the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and a score of dysfunctional African countries. The explosion of raw power as visited upon the people of Gaza and the West Bank by Israel today, will now reach many others who refuse to abide by the edicts of a "derelict" United States of America.
We too, may soon experience the depravity that the Iraqi and Palestinian people have tried to survive in the last 10 years; the depravity of the US and Israeli politicians and their armies of well trained torturers and murderers. We too, will have the experience of what it means when there is no escape from our torturers and live descends into the chaos of trying to survive without the means to do so. Gaza, the West Bank, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Darfur, Somalia, Zimbabwe; all places from where escape is impossible and the barbaric nature of humans is exposed as for what we truly are, inhumane monsters.
Hans Denee
The incoming Obama/Biden regime with its promises of false hope will be defeated by the sheer size of the calamities that the previous owners have left behind; from lost wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to an economy completely wrecked by the greedy crooks of Wall Street and a national debt going into the stratosphere. This defeat will be swift and final; the damage done is to great to be repaired by anyone, least a cacophony of former Clinton officials who laid the foundation for all these disasters in the first place. Once it becomes clear, that no amount of "printed" money is going to save the place, desperation will force the power elites into new wars in order to keep the masses from taking up arms against the Washington criminals.
Who can still believe in "change" or for that matter salvation after we have been confronted with a list of Obama appointments that promises a continuation of the policies of the Bush/Cheney regime and most likely worse. With People like Rahm Emanuel and Hillary - I am a tough bitch - Clinton, Robert Gates and a whole assortment of more or less unsavoury characters that reminds one of the Mafia, the promised change will be a change for the worst. Not only in the United States itself, which by now is a nominal police state, but in particular for the denizens of the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and a score of dysfunctional African countries. The explosion of raw power as visited upon the people of Gaza and the West Bank by Israel today, will now reach many others who refuse to abide by the edicts of a "derelict" United States of America.
We too, may soon experience the depravity that the Iraqi and Palestinian people have tried to survive in the last 10 years; the depravity of the US and Israeli politicians and their armies of well trained torturers and murderers. We too, will have the experience of what it means when there is no escape from our torturers and live descends into the chaos of trying to survive without the means to do so. Gaza, the West Bank, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Darfur, Somalia, Zimbabwe; all places from where escape is impossible and the barbaric nature of humans is exposed as for what we truly are, inhumane monsters.
Hans Denee
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