Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

The grotesque scenes of violence being inflicted on the Palestinians are heart-wrenching. There were four, screamed a distraught Palestinian father who lost all his children in an Israeli missile attack targeting civilian apartment buildings in Gaza.

This ongoing monstrosity only grows more appalling with media outlets like the BBC, CNN and France24, aiding and abetting the structures of power and narratives that dehumanize Palestinians.

And, just as ugly, are the ways in which they obfuscate reality and peddle falsehoods to paint Israel as the victim.

In his first TV interview since the Israeli onslaught, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu twisted facts in his typical unabashed, pretentious and phony way.

This was a struggle, he wailed, of law and those that disregard it. What makes this even more incredulous is that he speaks of law while violating the Geneva Conventions and the Charter of the United Nations.

Unsurprisingly, the Narendra Modi-led Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in India has wholeheartedly supported the Israeli assault on Palestinians as BJP Islamophobes describe Kashmir and Palestine as front lines in the war against Islam.

In fact, the parallels between Hindutva, the predominant form of Hindu Nationalism, in Kashmir and Zionism in occupied Palestine are plenty. Yet, the most disingenuous and carefully orchestrated strategy both fanaticisms deploy is to pursue the contradictory, irreconcilable policy of seeking sympathy from abroad while recklessly endangering the lives of the people under their occupations.

This duplicitous policy has been described in Hebrew as "yorim ve bochim" or "shooting and crying."

It is operationalized in Israel by right-wing settlers and in India by murderous, far-right paramilitary Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) thugs.

Both aim to pulverize Palestinians and Kashmiris, then bemoan their suffering and say "we gave them a chance for peace, if only they took it."

Nowhere is this hypocrisy more clear than in the unprovoked, brazen Israeli attack on Palestinian worshippers while in prayer that started the entire new crisis and in India as it weaponizes the pandemic to recklessly endanger Kashmiris by limiting medical supplies and encouraging mass Hindu pilgrimage.

Firstly, Modi's interpretation of the "shooting and crying" policy entails the emotional weaponization of sympathy for India, especially during the current catastrophic COVID-19 outbreak, to wreak havoc on Kashmiri life and liberty by facilitating the spread of the pandemic.

Prior to this, the emergence of the pandemic provided Modi with the cover he needed to impose a lockdown within a lockdown.

Now, with the escalating COVID-19 cases in Indian-occupied Kashmir, the BJP-led Indian government is planning on holding the Amarnath Yatra Hindu pilgrimage.

Imagine that? At a time when at least three deaths occur a minute, India wishes to facilitate a massive superspreader event while knowing full well the role the religious Kumbh Mela festival played in exacerbating Indias pandemic woes.

It is not without reason the respected medical journal The Lancet has condemned Modis pandemic response.

The annual Amarnath Yatra aims to facilitate upwards of 600,000 Hindu devotees participating in the annual Amarnath Yatra pilgrimage a cave shrine housing an ice stalagmite.

Despite the apocalyptic coronavirus ravaging India, the Indian government has stated that the pilgrimage will take place as scheduled from June 28 through Aug. 22, 2021.

Unquestionably, facilitating Hindu devotees to visit the Amarnath cave shrine, perched 3,880 meters (12,730 feet) above sea level in the Himalayas, will result in a devastating wave of the coronavirus in Kashmir, which already has severely under-equipped health care facilities.

This Amarnath Yatra needs to be immediately stopped and the Indian government must be compelled to prevent this crime against humanity from occurring.

The consequences of such actions will lead to grave breaches of the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions including inhumane treatment and willfully causing great suffering or serious bodily injury.

By allowing the Amarnath Yatra Hindu pilgrimage, the Modi government aims to weaponize the pandemic, recklessly endanger lives and further entrench the military occupation of the disputed territory to enforce homogenization.

What could be more catastrophic than facilitating a superspreader event in the disputed territory of Kashmir?

Secondly, in occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, Netanyahu's "shooting and crying" strategy is being operationalized as never before.

The current state of affairs arose when Palestinian worshippers in Al-Aqsa Mosque were brazenly attacked while in the midst of their morning prayers.

Western media outlets and Israeli apologists who deflect the focus on Hamas and its crude, retaliatory strikes against Israeli cities have managed to almost entirely lose the truth of the situation.

In total, in the occupied Palestinian territories, there have been more than 230 deaths. Over 75,000 Palestinians are displaced due to the bombings, as the U.N. reported.

Palestinians are being pummeled because they dare to resist and then cursed for doing so. The tyrant hates nothing more than the resistance of the oppressed that exposes his cruelty to the world.

Despite international calls for an immediate halt of all hostilities, including from U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Netanyahu pledged the offensive will continue as he needed to restore calm in the state of Israel.

Again, another clear instance of deliberate misleading, Netanyahu claims to seek peace, while ruthlessly bombing Gaza.

This is eerily familiar to what Israel's former Prime Minister Golda Meir once scathingly wrote on why Israelis can never forgive the Arabs for forcing our children to learn to kill their children.

Finally, after 11 days of grotesque bombardment, Israel has capitulated and agreed to a cease-fire.

In the killing fields of occupied Palestine and Kashmir, a tragic lesson is being learned that bodes ill for the future of our globalized world.

Terror begets the same. If the brazen war crimes being committed, dispossession, land appropriation or outright murder are not enough to compel the international community to act, then others will.

These last 11 days of hideous violence upon the Palestinian people should serve as an eye-opener. As South Africa's late former President Nelson Mandela, who is a symbolic name in the fight against the apartheid system, wisely wrote: when a man is denied the right to live the life he believes in, he has no choice but to become an outlaw.

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The Zionist and Hindutva playbook: Shoot then cry | Daily Sabah - Daily Sabah

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

All reasonable people agree that anti-Semitism is bad, but when they say this they usually refer to anti-Semitism in its past forms, particularly of the 1930s. Anti-Semitism, however, is always evolving: it adopts new language and imagery, often to disguise its real meaning. If one understands the mechanism by which it subtly implants itself into a society, we can identify and expose anti-Semitic meaning even where it has been expertly disguised.

It begins, always,by creating a collective designation for the Jewish people, which distinguishes them from the general population. In Christian Europe, the group was simply known as Jews. In secular 19th and 20th century Europe, the same group became known as Semites (and that designation was never intended for anyone but Jews). In the Soviet Union, which could not afford to be associated with the Nazi version of anti-Semitism, the group became designated at once as Zionists and rootless cosmopolitans. Today, in the West, the same group is designated as pro-Israel Jews and Zionists.

The mechanism then projects onto this designated group the qualities that society finds most loathsome at the specific time. In Christian Europe, Jews collectively bore the sin of killing Christ. For Nazis, the Semites were an impure race. For Soviets, Zionists were capitalists and imperialists. And today, Israel is described as born in sin and Zionists and the State of Israel as the ultimate violators of human rights.

The vilification and subsequent persecution is justified by appealing to the respected authority of the given era. In Christian Europe it was the Church. For secular Europe it was science. For the Soviets it was the Communist Party, and in our own era it is human rights.

The appeal to the power of the highest authority bestows an aura of rationality and respectability on the presentation of Jews or Semites or Zionists as uniquely evil. Today, while it is socially unacceptable to be overtly or obviously anti-Semitic, many in the West are deeply convinced that Israel, pro-Israel Jews, and Zionists are the greatest violators of the sacred values of human rights. Jews again are cast as uniquely evil and a threat to the well-being of humankind.

Yet, when Jews sense the looming danger, the anti-Semitic mechanism lures them into dropping their own defences by convincing them that, by opting out of the collective, they will be spared. In Nazi Germany, Jews were told initially that if they were the good kind of Jew for example, those who fought for Germany in World War One they would be spared. They were not.

Today, in the West, Jews are being told that they will be spared if they join the anti-Zionist accusations. Jews are lured into giving up their own defences, which includes the state of Israel itself, in favour of a binational state, which in short order would become a Palestine From the River to the Sea where Jews are the minority.

So-called human rights advocates demand to know why Jews cannot simply co-exist with the Arabs even in the face of the simple fact that binational states, everywhere and certainly in the Middle East, ultimately and inevitably descend into bloody mayhem. All that is needed for this beautiful utopia to be realised is for the Jews to forgo their bizarre insistence on having their own state where they control their destiny and defences.

Anti-Zionists try to convince the world that the fact that the targets of this latest form of virulent hatred Jews bear a striking resemblance to those who were targets in previous times also Jews is sheer coincidence. Also sheer coincidence is that the charges against Zionist Jews appear strikingly like variations on the ancient themes of anti-Semitism cosmic evil, bloodthirst, conspiracies of money operating behind the scenes.

Even as anti-Zionists relentlessly campaign against Israel, they will claim to fight anti-Semitism. But it will be the old, easy to identify kind, that comes from neo-Nazis and Right-wing nationalists, which is already commonly acknowledged as bad.

Anti-Zionism is merely the new, shiny, innocent-looking, incarnation of the ancient Jew hatred, anti-Semitism. And if the anti-Semitic mechanism is allowed to reach its full scope, what will happen is that which has happened repeatedly in the past.

If Israel is somehow eliminated in favour of a Palestine from the River to the Sea, and Jews rendered defenceless, the world will look back once more on its actions in horror, hang its head and wring its hands and ask itself how this could have happened, and will vow Never Again. Again.

Dr Einat Wilf is a former Labor Party and Independence member of the Israeli Knesset and co-author of The War of Return: How Western Indulgence of the Palestinian Dream has Obstructed the Path to Peace

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Anti-Zionism is just the new, innocent-sounding incarnation of an ancient Jew hatred - Telegraph.co.uk

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

Last weekend saw some truly sickening displays of antisemitism on the streets of London.

At a protest against the current conflict between Israel and Hamas in central London on Saturday, widely circulated footage on social media showed antisemitic imagery, chants celebrating and calling for the death of Jews, and even the logo of a proscribed terror group.

The following day, a convoy of cars travelled through parts of north London deliberately targeting the Jewish community. From one of the cars a megaphone blared explicit, offensive language including shocking calls for the rape of Jewish children.

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This vile hate crime was compounded by the fact that many Jewish Londoners will have been out in their local communities preparing for the festival of Shavuot.

We welcome the fact a number of arrests have now been made by the police, but, as we said in our letter to the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police on Sunday, there must be an investigation into how this convoy was able to travel through London and incite violence and sexual assault without being stopped by the police.

Stephen Crabb

Let us be clear. Much of the language involved in these incidents goes well beyond what can reasonably be considered as free-speech and those who seek to intimidate, incite violence, and damage social cohesion, cannot be allowed to hide behind that defence.

It is also clear that the weekends events are part of a wider picture of rising antisemitism. At the end of last week, the Community Security Trust reported a three-fold increase in the number of incidents compared to the previous week. As the CST said, this increase in response to events in Israel is both depressingly familiar and completely inexcusable.

It is, of course, the responsibility of the police to both investigate criminal behaviour, enforce the law and, as they have done, step up patrols to deter antisemitic incidents and help ensure the safety of the Jewish community.

Steve McCabe

However, the fight against antisemitism is not one for the police to wage alone.

Whatever their views on the causes of the tragic violence in Israel and Gaza, politicians and those in the public eye should not use inflammatory language which stokes tensions. They should also exercise caution so as to avoid sharing misinformation or highly misleading information on social media.

It is also time to end the myth that there is no connection between extreme anti-Israel rhetoric, which seeks to demonise and delegitimise the worlds sole Jewish state, and antisemitism.

Instead, we have to recognise the inextricable link between anti-Zionism and anti-Jewish racism. People have the perfect right to criticise and protest against the actions of any government in the world. But the obsessive focus on Israel and the manner in which that criticism is voiced has to change.

That is why we strongly support public and private institutions, including universities and local authorities, adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism.

It protects the right to free speech on Israel while making clear the kind of language for instance, drawing comparisons between contemporary Israeli policy and that of the Nazis and holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel which crosses the boundary into antisemitism.

Finally, antisemitism has to be combatted at both the national and an international level. Through its funding of terror groups, such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, the government of Iran poses a clear and present danger to Jews both in Israel and around the world. But we shouldnt forget Tehrans equally pernicious role as the chief propagator of antisemitism globally.

No other country has, for instance, staged disgusting state-sponsored Holocaust cartoon competitions which, as UNESCOs former director-general, Irina Bokova, argued, can only foster hatred and incite to violence, racism and anger.

Nor do the leaders of any other country openly spout Holocaust denial and sabre-rattling threats to destroy the State of Israel.

At this difficult time, we must show our support for, and solidarity with, the Jewish community here at home. But British Jews should expect and demand more than just warm words from politicians. Instead, those words must be combined with action to root out antisemitism in all its ugly and dangerous forms.

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OPINION: End the myth there's no link between extreme anti-Zionism and Jew-hate - Jewish News

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

As someone who chose to attend Bates primarily because of its tradition of egalitarianism, I am deeply troubled by the antisemitic graffiti on campus recently. In my years at Bates and in all the years since, including nearly a decade coming back to campus as I served on the Alumni Council and as the vice president and president of the colleges alumni association, I never experienced antisemitism or heard that anyone else had. Never. Not even a whiff.

That changed when I saw media reports of graffiti that stated F*** Zionist Israel. Aside from the lazy use of profanity, criticizing a Zionist Israel is, at its core, antisemitic language. Anti-Zionism seeks to deny an ethnic group/religion the right to a homeland, particularly after that group has faced millenia of systemic racism, oppression and attempts at eradication. Targeting Zionism targets Jews. It targets Jews in Israel, including those who work for peace. It targets Jews around the world. It targets Jews in the United States. And, it targets Jewish students on an egalitarian Bates campus.

Political speech aimed at Israel and its policies is absolutely fair game. I am no fan of Benjamin Netanyahu or Likud. No fan at all. His policies stand in the way of a peaceful two-state solution. But by trying to deny the Jewish diaspora a homeland when needed, those who graffitied the campus are no better than those who would deny Palestinians the right to a homeland. Of course, the tricky thing is that the land at issue here the ancestral land of Jews and Palestinians is largely the same land. That is precisely why a negotiated two-state solution is needed. What is not needed is antisemitic language from Bates students. Perhaps the students who graffitied the campus forgot what an egalitarian Bates stands for. Perhaps they never knew.

In the meantime, I hope the administration takes action and sends a strong message that political speech is always welcome on campus, but hate speech never is.

Michael Lieber is a member of the Class of 92.

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Letter to the Editor: Anti-Zionist Graffiti is inherently Antisemitic - The Bates Student

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

Words are not sufficient to describe the horrors of what Israel (and the U.S. as an enabler) have done in the last two months around al-Aqsa, Sheikh Jarrah and across Palestine, and then Gaza for almost two weeks.

The price paid for the shift in worldwide perceptions about what the Israel actually is (a rabid Apartheid state!) has been horrendous for Gaza and across Palestine. Gazans celebrated a possible pyrrhic victory of sorts because not only were the Zionists forced to call a ceasefire but there have been profound changes in public perceptions even in the U.S. about how insidious and out of control Zionism has become and long been.

But it has not solved the problem because as soon as a ceasefire went into effect Netanyahu had managed to stay in power with the cancellation of a possible new government, avoided the resumption of his trial on corruption charges and worse has continued doing the very things that prompted a rain of bottle rockets over Israel with a resumption of military and police raids on al-Aqsa, hundreds of arrests including murders and further efforts to ethnically cleanse Sheikh Jarrah of Palestinians with other Palestinian neighborhoods in Jerusalem lined up for the same treatment eventually. And Biden and Blinken did almost nothing about the carnage: they let it continue for a while until the demanded ceasefire went into effect.

For now, despite alleged promises by the U.S. to help rebuild the bombed infrastructure damaged in Gaza, Secretary of State Tony Blinken is headed to Israel and other countries for what? In the West Bank he is going to consult Mahmoud Abbas for one thing (who if not an outright quisling hardly gives Palestinians effective leadership and is the wrong person to talk to about anything). Blinken ought to be trying to go to Gaza, too.

As for Hamas in Gaza now, they literally cannot respond to the same Israeli moves that caused this most recent war on Gaza because they are probably running low on those home-made rockets even if the organization has managed to garner some modest praise and support across the world. Moreover, the Zionist defense establishment and Netanyahu has proclaimed that it will hit Gaza even harder if Hamas does anything now. Also, in Israel, the government has done nothing to reign in the right-wing mobs of settlers who now are openly calling for the razing of the lovely al-Aqsa shrine, Islams third holiest site. If al-Aqsa ever did fall, one would probably be looking at complete war in West Asia. All those settlers, including many Americans, would flee, cowards that they are looking for freebies in the West Bank with U.S. support.

If there has been any kind of victory for Palestinians, it resides solely for now in the awakening of public perceptions about Zionist Apartheid everywhere which may, in time, have an impact. The BDS campaign is bound to expand mightily and the ICC is definitely going to charge Israel and its craven leaders with numerous war and others crimes. But the court in The Hague has been way too slow mounting its prosecutions.

But there is another aspect of this crazed situation.

The two million Palestinians in Gaza have long ached for relief from the siege (and their martyrs abound, including almost 70 children slaughtered by IDF bombs this month). Real relief, however, is not likely to arrive anytime soon even if there are repairs to the damage done, but if it ever arrived, consider or imagine what Gaza might become if the siege were lifted.

This is something that the Zionists fear and despise and actually, prospectively, are extremely jealous of ever seeing. Gaza, if it could revive its port and repair its airport and other assets, could become a prosperous relative heaven for Gazans and for curious tourists from all over the world wanting to understand better Palestine and its people and history while enjoying Arab hospitality which the Gazans could deliver like few others. Its not hard to imagine even Americans wanting a taste of the Middle East and especially a look at a (then former) victim of Zionist aggression (that stood tall despite the Israelis). If travelers had to choose between visiting a discredited Apartheid regime and an inexpensive beachfront Gaza, even if only for purely educational purposes, Gaza would be the place to go.

But the Zionists above all want to crush the Palestinians if not eliminate them altogether and give them no quarter for what could be a magnificent revival given their own creativity and industrious ways that have existed for generations.

The sole hope for now that has any chance for success is a burgeoning condemnation worldwide of Apartheid and its aggressions. One day, perhaps, even candidates aspiring to become a part of the U.S. Congress will be judged in part on their postures towards Zionism.

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Imagine what Gaza could become if the siege were lifted - Tehran Times

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

One person was burned when two fireworks were thrown from a car amid an altercation with anti-Zionist protesters in a heavily Jewish New York City business district, according to police.

The fight came on Thursday evening, on what appeared to be the final day of the conflict between Hamas and Israel, before a ceasefire that took effect overnight. Additional videos circulating on social media appeared to show other physical altercations between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrators in New York City earlier in the day.

According to the Anti-Defamation League, there has been an increase in antisemitism in the United States both online and on the ground during the conflict, which has seen large pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the country. As of Thursday, the ADL tallied 193 incidents of antisemitic incidents in the week since the conflict began, compared to 131 the previous week.

The fight in New York City occurred around the same time as a pro-Israel demonstration on Thursday in New York City that also attracted pro-Palestinian counter-protesters. It took place in the Diamond District, a midtown Manhattan street with many Jewish-owned businesses.

In two videos posted to Twitter on Thursday, a group of men wearing the colors of the Palestinian flag can be seen yelling fking Zionist and similar expletives while holding a Palestinian flag. At the beginning of one of the videos, someone appears to be lying on the ground.

Later in that video, one of the pro-Palestinian protesters shoves a man. A crowd of pro-Palestinian protesters wearing scarves on their heads then walks down the middle of the street, guided by police.

In another brief video from 47th St., a bang can be heard along with a flash of light and smoke as people scramble. The chronology of the two videos is unclear.

The NYPD told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that two commercial fireworks were thrown from a car, and one person sustained a minor burn. The police forces Arson Investigation Squad and a detective squad are investigating the incident.

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One person burned in N.Y.C. amid clashes with anti-Zionist protesters - Haaretz

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

Weve said repeatedly that Israel suffered a P.R. disaster in the last Gaza attack: western media for once openly questioned the reasoning and morality behind yet another murderous onslaught on an imprisoned population, the fifth in the last 12 years.

Some observers speak of a sea change in the American discourse, and of course point to the Congressional Democrats who are willing to challenge the Israeli narrative, with Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez echoing Human Rights Watch and charging apartheid. And though Bernie Sanders hasnt gotten that far, he is demanding a halt on the next $735 million in bombs for Israel. And most Democratic voters support such sanctions.

Israel-apologists are now pushing back, with the claim that any sharp criticism of Israel is antisemitic. Bret Stephens says in The New York Times that it is antisemitic to say that Israel takes Gazans land and leaves out the fact that many Gazans are refugees. On the News Hour, Jonathan Greenblatt of the ADL says it is antisemitic to say that somehow the Jewish state is systematically slaughtering children, when Israel just killed 66 Palestinian children. (And killed 500 in 2014. And how many young people in 2018 lets forget about all of that.) No doubt there are antisemitic attacks taking place in America now, some associated with leftwing demonstrations, a source of concern that I share; but the rhetoric from the pro-Israel crowd is aimed at making the Gaza atrocities go away.

Pro-Palestinian commentary is now everywhere; and my aim here is to add up some of the small victories in the media. Surely this is a reflection of a revolution in U.S. public culture brought about by the murder of George Floyd a year ago, but even The New York Times seems to be experiencing glasnost. The Times ran a very long piece detailing the misery of six Palestinian families under the occupation that (while it left out the apartheid charges) covered important conditions that the Times has never been that interested in before.

There was also this splendid op-ed piece in the Times by Basma Ghalayini, a Palestinian translator in Britain, explaining that the issue is not Hamas, its about Israel taking away Palestinians homeland, including the homes of the refugees. Ive never read such a forthright explanation of the importance of the right of return in the Times:

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians live inrefugee camps, many elsewhere in the Middle East, often forgoing citizenship rights in that second country and passing on their statelessness to their children and grandchildren in the name of one thing. Home. No elected Palestinian government at this point is going to forget that and simply roll over just because some wannabe international peacemaker wants them to, for their career-boosting photo op in the Rose Garden. Thats been done already

The other astonishment was when Ghalayini asserted that Palestinians have the right to violently resist.

[T]he right to self-defense against Israels continued aggression belongs to all Palestinians; legitimate resistance cannot be a right only for those Palestinians who believe exclusively in nonviolent self-defense not in the face of the violence we endure. We, Palestinians, are in this together.

For others to pretend that Israel is waging a war against Hamas, rather than against all Palestinians, is what allows the kinds of attacks and crimes of recent days to be repeated every few years.

This follows Yousef Munayyers sharp op-ed of a week ago saying the two-state consensus is over and Palestinians have moved on to a struggle for equal rights that international leaders are also embracing.

[T]he Palestinians who can most shape the future now are in the streets and squares, speaking to one another and the world directly, and making clear that the green line that divided Israel and the occupied territories was an instrument of division, not liberation.

The energy of this moment represents an opportunity to wed Palestinian aspirations with a growing global consensus.

Id note (as James North does here too) that Slate ran a long article this weekend by Aymann Ismail documenting the traditional suppression of Palestinian views by top editors at a variety of mainstream outlets, most of them unnamed. But the Times was singled out.

[W]hen the big escalation happened in summer of 2014, and they were massacring civilians in Gaza, the NYT coverage, as usual, violated all the basic principles that they insist on sticking to for just about every other story, [former Times staffer identified as Layla] told me. The thing that really killed me was this rocket tracker. She was referencingthis graphic-driven articlethat charted the number of rockets fired from Gaza alongside the cumulative number of deaths, the vast majority of them Palestinians.

It was a depressive couple of weeks of crying in the restroom, she said. I also had a close ally in the opinion department who was forwarding me all the responses those editors were having about pitches. And the sheer racism and dehumanization from rank-and-file opinion editors when talking about Palestinians was just jarring.

Those days are over, imho. As Layla says, Black Lives Matter has changed the American discussion. Michelle Goldberg at the Times now endorses the apartheid charge against Israel (in a column focused on antisemitic attacks as an emergency).

This seems to be happening everywhere. Up in Syracuse the local paper [Syracuse Post-Standard] had three pieces in the opinion section all sympathetic to the Palestinians with none supporting the Israeli position,Donald Johnson writes to me.

Israels defenders are getting harder to find. Bari Weiss left the New York Times op-ed page a year back because she saw the left taking over. Jeffrey Goldberg used to be a pugnacious defender of Israel in the U.S.; he now keeps his voice down, as Atlantic editor, surely because he knows its out of sync with opposition to American nationalism. And Chuck Schumer has been AWOL or anyway, hes singing in Brooklyn somewhere.

Observing these dramatic changes from the right is Andrew Silow-Carroll, the editor of the Jewish Week, who says that the Overton window of what is officially discussable has shifted decidedly to the left in recent years, especially in Congress. Where once Israel could count on solid bipartisan support for all it did, Democrats are now more willing to question its governments policies. Until five minutes ago, he says, conditioning U.S. aid was off-limits. Now it isnt.

The Jewish community is going wobbly, Silow-Carroll says.

[N]ew red lines are being crossed: Some self-described Zionists have spoken openly about their support for a one-state solution or supporting at least a limited boycott of goods produced in the settlements.

Some Jewish liberals are losing the stomach to defend Israel after years of right-wing governments, while IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace are shifting the margins of Jewish discussion.

[A] growing cohort of young Jews can barely relate to assertions about Israel being the only democracy in the Middle East or a brave survivor of seven decades of Arab belligerence and rejectionism

In another sign of the times, the New Yorker has a glowing profile of Peter Beinart, heralding his embrace of a one-state outcome. Titled, A Liberal Zionist Moves Left on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, the article by Benjamin Wallace-Wells highlights Beinarts embrace of the Palestinian right of return this year:

This summer, he was praying during Tisha BAv, a holy day during which Jews are invited to imagine themselves leaving Jerusalem when it was in flames, and to imagine hoping to redeem it through return. The experience made him think of how hypocritical it seemed for a Jew to tell a Palestinian to give up on returning home. On the one hand you had the temple, on the other thenakba. In Gaza, no one needs to cast his mind thousands of years into the past to imagine himself as a refugee. Beinart said, Theres just something kind of absurd about the idea that we think so little of Palestinians that we dont think that they know how to teach their children to remember things...

Beinart concedes that Palestinians have been talking about their right to return for 73 years: Im not writing anything about the conflict or the situation that many, many Palestinians have not been writing about for a really long time. But hes trying to reach an American Jewish audience.

The best moment in the piece is when Beinart comments on Biden aides Tony Blinken and Jake Sullivan hedging on Palestinian rights.

I dont know whether they wrestle with this or whether they feel guilty. I do think that, one day, they will be judged harshly for helping to keep Palestinians oppressed.

The Atlantic is fighting back. Matti Friedman has an angry piece (that we should just be happy isnt in the New York Times) where he laments that Palestinians have now become a cause even in elite opinion, and then says that Americans are projecting our own sins as to racial injustice on to Israelis. He says its antisemitism: distant Jews have become an embodiment of the American evil, racial oppression. As if what Israel has done to Gaza is not evil.

This is how the momentary honesty in the press is going to be shut down, Donald Johnson tells me. I still think most politicians and a big chunk of the press will be happy to go back to normal and will do what they can to make it happen. I think that chunk will try, but they wont succeed.

h/t James North, Adam Horowitz, Michael Arria, Dave Reed, Kate Casa.

So where are the Palestinian voices in mainstream media?

Mondoweiss covers the full picture of the struggle for justice in Palestine. Read by tens of thousands of people each month, our truth-telling journalism is an essential counterweight to the propaganda that passes for news in mainstream and legacy media.

Our news and analysis is available to everyone which is why we need your support. Please contribute so that we can continue to raise the voices of those who advocate for the rights of Palestinians to live in dignity and peace.

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'NYT' runs an op-ed justifying violent resistance, and some Zionists abandon pr duties Mondoweiss - Mondoweiss

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

TAMPA Tax protests have spiraled into wide-ranging demonstrations and harsh government crackdowns in Colombia, frustrating immigrants in Tampa Bay who were seeing signs of hope for improvement in their troubled nation.

Many have turned their anger toward the government of President Ivan Duque over the deaths of dozens of protesters, the injury of thousands more, the disappearance of countless Colombians and reports of sexual assaults against women in police custody.

As a Colombian, I feel powerless seeing so much injustice in so many cities, said Laura Bohorquez, 32, of Town N Country, a mother of two from the state of Tolima who fled drug violence in Colombia. The least we can do from here is offer a show of union to raise our voice.

Colombia seemed to be moving beyond decades of devastation from the drug trade and rebel uprisings, even agreeing last month to grant legal status to 1 million refugees fleeing their own social disintegration in neighboring Venezuela.

But then Duques government moved to raise taxes to fill a $6.3 billion gap brought on in part by the coronavirus. That touched off protests in late April that have expanded into broader demands centered on the plight of the most vulnerable Colombians including indigenous and Afro Latino people.

Protesters also see a link to demonstrations of November 2019 on a host of issues: earlier tax increases, the murder of social leaders, official corruption, and a peace agreement that led to the 2016 demobilization of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish acronym FARC.

The government places the number of deaths during the new round of protests at 42 with more than 2,000 injuries. Activists say the casualties are far higher.

Colombias troubles resonate across Florida, home to about a third of the nearly 1 million Hispanics of Colombian origin living in the United States, according to the Census Bureaus 2010 American Community Survey.

Hopefully, a way out can be found without the need for more deaths, Bohorquez said.

No progress can be made toward the larger goals of the protest without an end to clashes between young protesters and the national anti-riot squad known as ESMAD, said Fernando Falquez, 80, from Barranquilla, who lives in Oldsmar and is president of the nonprofit Colombian Volunteer Ladies of Tampa Bay.

Mistakes have been made at the government level for a long time, said Falquez, whose organization supports charities in Colombia. All this is perhaps a consequence of problems we have dragged along from the past.

Michelle McIlrath, 36, of Brooksville, finds it especially frustrating that a country as rich in natural resources as Colombia faces such strife. Colombia has the third or fourth-largest economy in Latin America. The same incongruity confronts oil-rich Venezuela.

Duque is wasting those resources with reforms that help wealthy interests within the country and internationally, said McIlrath, originally from Cauca state in southwest Colombia. Meantime, the poor face a new round of oppression.

It hurts me immensely the violations of human rights perpetrated by ESMAD and the police, McIlrath said. Many of us had to flee out of fear because of constant threats. We have to end this from the root.

More than 42 percent of Colombians live below the poverty line, up from 36 percent just two years ago, according to the countrys National Administrative Department of Statistics.

Colombia is falling victim to widespread corruption and mismanagement of public funds, said Juan Jos Posada, 40, a Colombian journalist who has lived in Tampa since 2016. The country needs to pull back, he said, from socialist leanings inspired by former leaders Fidel Castro of Cuba and Hugo Chvez of Venezuela.

Young people are the ones who will surely shape the destiny of Colombia, said Posada, who was a press adviser to former Colombian president lvaro Uribe.

They are the ones who will decide whether to continue strengthening the Castro-Chavismo discourse, or to unite all the parties to move on a path of democracy.

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Ripples of unrest in Colombia reach Florida, home to a third of U.S. diaspora - Tampa Bay Times

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

This photo taken on May 14, 2021, shows Tejender Singh Gopa, head of Gurdwara Kalghidhar Sahib, a Sikh temple in New Delhi, receiving oxygen cylinders sent from Guru Nanak Darbar Tokyo. (Photo courtesy of Gurdwara Kalghidhar Sahib/Kyodo)

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Indians in Japan have rallied to the aid of their homeland as it faces a raging resurgence of the novel coronavirus, with individuals, religious groups and businesses sending donations including prized cylinders of oxygen to different parts of the country with which they have connections.

"We want to go to India and help, but it is impossible in these circumstances. We cannot bear our country's pain and want to do as much as we can from afar," said a representative of Guru Nanak Darbar Tokyo, a Sikh temple in Japan's capital that has collected about 5.2 million yen ($48,000) from Indians and Japanese.

The temple has used the money to send a total of 20 oxygen cylinders and five oxygen concentrators to Gurdwara Kalghidhar Sahib, a small Sikh temple in New Delhi that -- like many places of worship as well as educational sites in India -- has turned into an ad-hoc medical facility as hospitals find themselves overwhelmed in many parts of the country.

Guru Nanak Darbar Tokyo has also sent aid to another Sikh temple in the capital and a small hospital in the western state of Gujarat, and is planning to send aid to other states such as West Bengal in the east and the northern state of Himachal Pradesh.

Many hospitals in India have reported shortages of oxygen to help COVID patients breathe as the country battles its massive second wave, which has made it the second-worst affected country in total cases after the United States.

Two Tokyo-based groups associated with early 20th-century Indian social reformer Babasaheb Ambedkar have contributed 700,000 yen to set up a temporary medical center in the city of Nagpur in the western state of Maharashtra.

"It is a free-of-charge center and we are focusing on poor people who cannot afford expensive treatment in private hospitals," said Linson Wasnik, a volunteer who was involved in setting up the facility. He said there are also plans to build a permanent hospital in Nagpur to cater to medical support for the poor.

For individuals, sending direct aid to India can involve a number of obstacles, as a group of friends found out in late April when they decided to try to ship oxygen concentrators, which are in high demand as a substitute for oxygen cylinders.

Natasha Gupta, 29, who works at a pharmaceutical company in Tokyo, said issues such as arrival delays and voltage differences between the two countries eventually meant they had to procure supplies locally in India.

She felt a strong urge to do something after the father of a close friend passed away as the virus moved from India's towns and cities to its villages.

"Many friends (back in India) were trying to find plasma and oxygen cylinders for their relatives on social media, and I felt really helpless that I cannot do much from here. We knew that something had to be done as cases in villages were only going to increase henceforth."

After donating concentrators to five organizations, the friends' next move is to help Indian families back home who are trying to buy concentrators from Japan but must overcome the language barrier.

"Some people are desperate to get concentrators from here, so we are providing information to them that is only available in Japanese," Gupta said.

The Embassy of India in Tokyo, which Gupta said guided their efforts, has also been assisting Indian business associations as well as Japanese companies on how to offer aid or make donations.

"We did hand-holding for some firms that are willing to offer support and gifts of donation to India, while others did it using their local offices," said Ambassador Sanjay Kumar Verma.

"Every country has a limit when it comes to dealing with such a crisis, and at such times international cooperation is required," he said. "We are grateful for all the help, Japan-India partnership on the pandemic is moving forward very well."

The Japan India Industry Promotion Association, for example, has collaborated with Time World Co., a Japanese manufacturer of oxygen devices, to deliver an oxygen concentrator and an oxygen chamber, which can assist about eight people to breathe at one time.

"We talked with our business connections and came up with this. We wish to help our people in any possible way," said 42-year-old Prashant Godghate, chairman of the association, who lost his elder brother to the pandemic last month, about sending the aid to Maharashtra.

Among other individuals coming forward is Bindu Varma, a resident of Japan since 1984, who started a fundraising drive among her compatriots despite her concern at how mass events were allowed to be held in recent months just as India's second wave of viral infections built.

"Initial feelings were mixed, given the irresponsible manner in which events like the Kumbh Mela (a Hindu festival) and (national parliamentary) elections were held across the country, but the desire to help in any possible way took over," said Varma, 60, adding that "family and friends' support has been tremendous."

Eight oxygen concentrators are on their way to a small medical facility in the southern state of Tamil Nadu run by a young physician couple, who are treating patients at subsidized rates.

"Usually we have to travel around 30 kilometers to get oxygen cylinders filled while having to stand in a queue for eight hours. Each and every minute is important for patients with hypoxia, so these concentrators" save lives, said S.K. Pradhyum, who runs the facility with his wife Swati.

The couple was set to return to Germany where they work but decided to remain in India to help fight the pandemic. "It's like a war going on, so we decided to stay and do justice to our profession," Pradhyum said.

Oxygen, however, is not the only resource the country craves. Many people from rural areas who lost their jobs amid the health crisis are finding it difficult to manage to eat, and some Indian residents of Japan have not turned a blind eye.

Raghavendra Jain, an artificial intelligence engineer working in Tokyo, sent money to a school in a small village in Uttar Pradesh where children of the poor are educated for free. The school uses donations to set up small businesses for parents who had been working in big cities but lost work.

"I follow some people on social media who are involved in social causes and Mr. Ajit Singh (who runs the school) is one of them. Such calls are mostly made from Facebook and Whatsapp groups, and everyone I know has helped in their capacity since the outbreak," said Jain, whose whole family back in India caught the coronavirus but have now recovered.

"They recovered thanks to doctors, self-discipline, and lots of good luck. Still, with several variants appearing, their well-being has been a continuous source of anxiety," the 34-year-old added.

Like other Indians living in Japan -- a community numbering close to 40,000 people, according to Japanese Justice Ministry data -- he is hoping for a swift end to the pandemic ravaging his homeland.

"We wish normalcy resumes soon," he said.

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Indian diaspora in Japan comes together to aid homeland - The Mainichi - The Mainichi

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Posted By admin on May 27, 2021

"We are excited to partner with Gallery Guichard and to transform One Two Pru's lobby into an engaging cultural experience for tenants and visitors as we all begin to emerge from the pandemic," said Andy Gloor, CEO of Sterling Bay. "Sterling Bay is a proud supporter of the arts and incorporates works from local and global artists in a creative and meaningful manner across our commercial spaces. Through our collaboration with Gallery Guichard, we are hoping to expand representation and exposure for Black artists and celebrate the diverse, dynamic cultures that define our city."

The collection at One Two Pru will feature 20 collage and acrylic mixed media pieces created by artists including Chicago native Adam Guichard, Nigerian artist Stephen 'Sayo' Olalekan, and Detroit native Judy Bowman, as well as Gallery Guichard co-owners Andre Guichard and Frances 'Marlene Campbell' Guichard.

"The installation at One Two Pru provides a new and exciting space for us to display pieces from our collection and expose Chicagoans from around the city to the incredible talent of some of today's leading Black artists," said Gallery Guichard Co-Owner, Andre Guichard. "We appreciate Sterling Bay's partnership with us on this project and look forward to showcasing this installation to tenants, neighbors and visitors throughout the summer."

A self-taught painter, Andre Guichard has been an artist for over 25 years. His visionary works can be found in more than 2,500 corporate and private collections globally, and in 2011, six of his original paintings were featured on canvas totes in 7,000 stores nationwide as part of the Walgreens Community Corner initiative. Andre has also commissioned paintings for the Chicago Urban League and late music legend Prince.

Frances Guichard began painting in 2004 under the pseudonym Marlene Campbell. Her works include her Great Migration series paintings, "In Motion I" and "In Motion II," among others featured at Gallery Guichard. In addition to painting, Frances serves as the business manager of Gallery Guichard where she works alongside co-owner Stephen Mitchell to showcase a wide range of emerging and mid-career multicultural artists specializing in the African Diaspora.

"The African diaspora has a rich and flourishing culture that is too often underrepresented in the fine arts scene," said Frances Guichard. "We are excited to give One Two Pru's tenants a chance to experience art they may not have been exposed to before, and a new appreciation of African and Black culture."

ABOUT STERLING BAYSterling Bay is a Chicago-based real estate investment and development company with expertise spanning all aspects of real estate ownership. Known for creating world-class urban campuses for companies such as Google, McDonald's, Glassdoor, Pinterest, Dyson and Tyson Foods, Sterling Bay is consistently recognized for award-winning projects that transform space, enhance communities, and strengthen a company's culture and brand. Sterling Bay's team of more than 250 professionals is responsible for a portfolio exceeding $5 billion, and a development pipeline in excess of $10 billion. For more information, visit http://www.sterlingbay.com

ABOUT GALLERY GUICHARDLocated on the first floor of the Bronzeville Artist Lofts, Gallery Guichard features a rotating collection of works from numerous global artists including, Abiola Akintola, Stephen 'Sayo Olalekan, Pearlie Taylor, Marlene Campbell, Andre Guichard and many others. A gallery commanding as much respect as Michigan Avenue in the Bronzeville community, the largest art district in the country, owners Andre Guichard, Frances Guichard and Stephen Mitchell, opened the gallery in 2005 with the mission to expose patrons to multicultural artists specializing in the African Diaspora. Through fine art exhibitions, experiential events, and art tours, Gallery Guichard gives emerging underrepresented talent and mid-career artists an opportunity to develop their imagination and creativity. For more information, visit http://www.galleryguichard.com

SOURCE Sterling Bay

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Sterling Bay Partners With Gallery Guichard To Showcase Art Of The African Diaspora At One Two Pru - PRNewswire

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