Showing posts with label Palestine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Palestine. Show all posts

January 20, 2011

INDIGNEZ-VOUS (translated) MUST^ MUST^ READ !

What compels the French to lash out - and they, and we, ought ....

I am publishing the whole thing just in case it disappears.  Be sure to go to the link above and read the commentary ...


With your patience begged for the quality of the translation (its the best Google could do) still I thought I'd post this.  Human translators are working on the original feverishly as I type, have no doubt. 


Perhaps there's as much reason to hope as I'd wanted to believe there was....

INDIGNEZ-VOUS 
 by

Stéphane Hessel, 93.  

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Much the very last step. The end is not far away. What chance to take this opportunity to recall what has served as base my political engagement: years of resistance and the program developed there are sixty-six years by the National Council of Resistance! C ' Jean Moulin is that we, through this Council, the meeting of all components of occupied France, the movements, parties, trade unions, to proclaim their adherence to the Fighting France and only leader it is recognized: the General Gaulle. London where j ' had joined General de Gaulle in March 1941 I learned that this Council had developed a program, ' had adopted March 15, 1944, proposed for a set of liberated France principles and values underlying modern democracy our country 1 . These principles and values, we have TODAY ' Today more than ever need. It behooves us all together to ensure that our society is a society in which we are proud of: not of this company undocumented, expulsions, suspicions against immigrants, not this society where challenges pensions, acquired Security social, not this society where the media are in the hands of the wealthy, all things that we would have refused to endorse if we were the true heirs of the National Council of Resistance. From 1945, after a terrible tragedy, it is an ambitious resurrection which engage the forces present in the Council of Resistance. Remember, then what is created Social Security Resistance as he wished, as the program stated: " A comprehensive plan for Social Security, to ensure that all citizens

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livelihoods, in all cases where they are incapable of the available through work "," a retreat to the old workers end their days with dignity. "The sources ' energy, electricity and gas, coal, the major banks were nationalized. C ' this is what program called again, "the return to the nation of the major means of monopolized production, produced by common sources of energy, wealth of the subsoil, insurance companies and large banks; " the establishment of genuine economic democracy and social involving the eviction of large feudal economic and financial the direction of the economy. " The public interest must prevail over the ' interest Specifically, the fair sharing of the wealth created by the world of work override the power of ' money. Resistance offers " rational organization of the economy to ensure the subordination special interests to the public interest and free from the dictatorship introduced to the professional image of fascist states, and Provisional Government of the Republic it is over. A real democracy needs a free press, and the Resistance knows required by defending "The press freedom, honor and independence with respect to the state, the power of money and foreign influences. That is what turns further orders on the press in 1944. Yet that is what is now in danger. Resistance in calling for "an effective opportunity for all children French to benefit from the instruction the most developed, "without discrimination, yet the reforms proposed in 2008 to go ' against this project. Young teachers, I support the ' action, were up ' to refuse to apply them and they saw their wages amputees as a punishment. They were outraged, have "disobeyed" found these reforms too far from the ideal of the republican school, too service company

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money and not enough developing the creative and critical thinking. C ' is the base of the social conquests of the Resistance is TODAY ' hui questioned 2 . The pattern of resistance is the outrage. We dare say that ' State can no longer cover the costs of these civic action. But how can he miss today's money to maintain and extend these achievements while production of wealth has increased considerably since the Liberation period l ' Europe was ruined? Otherwise, because the power of ' money, so fought with the Resistance, n ' has never been greater, insolent, selfish, with his own servants into the highest echelons of the ' State. Banks are now privatized first show of their conscious dividends and high salaries of their leaders, no interest General. L ' gap between the poorest and richest has never been important, and the race for money, competition, much encouraged. The basic pattern of resistance was indignation. We veterans of resistance movements and fighting forces of Free France, we call the younger generations to live, transmit, inheritance Resistance and its ideals. We say take over, indignant you! The political, economic, intellectual and all Company shall not resign or be intimidated by the current international dictatorship of financial markets that threatens the peace and democracy. I wish you all, to each of you to have your design indignation. Is invaluable. When something as unworthy you j ' I was outraged by the Nazis, then one becomes an activist, strong and committed. We joined the stream of history and the mainstream of the ' history must be continue through each. And this trend is towards more justice, more freedom but not this freedom of uncontrolled fox in the henhouse. These rights, including the Universal Declaration drafted the program in 1948,

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are universal. If you meet someone ' No one who ' will not receive, pity him, help him to conquer them. Two visions of the ' History When I try to understand what caused fascism, which caused we have been invaded by him and by Vichy, I tell myself that the wealthy, with their selfishness, have been terribly afraid of the Bolshevik revolution. They have been guided by their fears. But if TODAY ' Today as Then, a vocal minority stands, this will suffice, we will leaven so that the dough rises. Admittedly, ' experience ' a very old like me, born in 1917, differs from the experience of young people today. I often asks college teachers the opportunity to intervene to their students, and I tell them: you don ' not have the same reasons obvious committing. For us, resist, c ' was not to accept l ' German occupation, the defeat. It was relatively simple. Simple as what followed, decolonization. Then the war Algeria. It was that Algeria became independent, it was obvious. As for Stalin, we all applauded the victory of the Red Army against the Nazis in 1943. But even if we had knowledge of the great Stalinist trials of 1935, and even whether to keep an ear open counterbalance to communism for American capitalism, the need to oppose this intolerable form of totalitarianism s ' was an obvious move. My long life has given me a succession reasons to be indignant. These reasons are born less than an emotion will d ' commitment. The young that I Normale ' was there was very marked Sartre, a senior classmate. Nausea, The Wall, not L ' Being and None were very important in shaping my thinking. Sartre taught us to say: "You are responsible as Indira- viduals. "He was a libertarian message. The responsibility for ' man can s ' in hand or power or a god. Instead, we must

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engage on behalf of its responsibility as a human. When I went to the École normale rue d'Ulm, Paris, in 1939, I entered it as a fervent disciple of the philosopher Hegel, and I followed the Seminar Maurice Merleau-Ponty. His teaching explored concrete experience, that of the body and its relationship with the meaning, singular plural great deal of sense. But my natural optimism, which means that everything that is desirable or possible, I was rather to Hegel. L ' Hegelianism interprets the long history of humanity as having a meaning: c ' is freedom of ' man progressing step by step. History is made of successive shocks is taken into account of challenges. The history of society progresses, and after, the man having reached its full freedom, we have the democratic state its ideal form. There are of course another conception of ' history. Progress made by freedom, competition, the race "ever", this may be experienced as a destructive hurricane. Thus represents a friend of my father, the man who shared with him the task of translate into German In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust. C ' is the German philosopher Walter Benjamin. He pulled a message pessimistic ' an array of Swiss painter Paul Klee's Angelus Novus where the figure of ' angel opens his arms as if to contain and repel a storm that ' he identified with progress. Benjamin who committed suicide in September 1940 to escape Nazism, the sense of history is the irresistible path of disaster in disaster. Indifference: the worst attitude True, the reasons may seem to be indignant TODAY ' Today less net or the world too complex. Who controls, who decides? It is not always easy to distinguish between all the currents that we govern. We no longer dealing with a small elite that we clearly understand the actions. C ' is a vast world,

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we feel that it is interdependent. We live in an inter connectivity as yet none has ever existed. But in this world, Some things unbearable. To see this, we must look, search. I tell young people: Looking for a bit, you'll find. The worst attitude is indifference, saying "I n ' There can not, I'm doing. " By having this, you lose one of the components which is essential in humans. One of the essential components: the Faculty of outrage and commitment that is the consequence. We can already identify two major challenges: 1. L ' huge gap between the very poor and very rich and which continues to grow. This is an innovation of the twentieth century `and` XXI. The very poor in the world today earn just two dollars per day. We can not let that gap widen further. This statement alone should generate commitment. 2. Human rights and the rule of the planet. I had the chance after Liberalisation of being involved in drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations, 10 December 1948 in Paris at the Palais de Chaillot. It's under Chief firm Henri Laugier, Assistant Secretary General of the UN, and Secretary of the Commission on Human Rights ' man j ' ai, with ' others, been induced to participate in the drafting of this declaration. I can not forget, in its development, the role of René Cassin, curator National Justice and Education, Government of Free France, in London in 1941, which was Nobel peace in 1968, nor that of Pierre Mendes France in the Economic and Social Council to whom the texts that we developed were subjected before being considered by the Third Committee of the ' General Assembly, responsible for matters Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee. She had fifty-four Member States at the time, UN, and I assured the secretariat. René Cassin is that we have the term "rights

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universal "and not" international "as suggested by our friends Anglo-Saxon. For there is much at stake at the end of the War World: emancipate themselves from the threats posed to Totalitarianism humanity. For s ' by emancipate must ensure that the Member States United Nations undertakes to respect these universal rights. It is a way defeat the argument of full sovereignty that a State may assert while engaging in crimes against humanity on its soil. This was the If Hitler considered himself his own master and allowed to cause genocide. The Universal Declaration owes much to the revulsion Universal against Nazism, fascism, totalitarianism, and even, by our presence, the spirit of the Resistance. I felt the need to quickly, do not be fooled by the hypocrisy there was in the ' Membership proclaimed by the victors in these values that not all had intended to promote fair, but we were trying their impose 3 . I can not resist the urge to quote Article 15 of the Declaration Universal Human Rights, ' Rights: "Everyone has the right to nationality "and Article 22:" Everyone, as a member of the society has the right to social security and is entitled to the satisfaction of economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for dignity and the free development of his personality, thanks to the efforts National and international cooperation, taking into account the ' organization and resources of each country. And if this statement has a scope declarative, not legal, it has nevertheless played a role powerful since 1948, we saw colonized s ' in their grasp independence struggle, she has stocked in their minds for battle freedom. I note with pleasure that ' in recent decades have increased non-governmental organizations, movements social as ATTAC (Association for the Taxation of Transactions

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financial), FIDH (International Federation of Human Rights) Amnesty ... who are acting and performing. It is obvious that to be effective TODAY ' Today, we must act in a network, take advantage of all means modern communication. For young people, I say look around you, you will find themes that justify your outrage - the treatment made to immigrants, undocumented migrants, Roma. You will find situations concrete that lead you to give play to strong citizen action. Seek and ye shall find! My indignation about Palestine Today, my biggest outrage for Palestine, the band Gaza, the West Bank. This conflict is the source of indignation. He must read the report of September 2009 Richard Goldstone Gaza, in which the South African judge, Jewish, Zionist who even said, accuses Israel of committing "acts amounting to war crimes and perhaps in some circumstances, crimes the cons ' humanity "during its operation" Cast Lead " which lasted three weeks. I myself returned to Gaza in 2009, where j ' I was able to enter with my wife through our diplomatic passports in order to ' study firsthand what the report said. The people who accompanied us n ' have not been allowed into the Gaza Strip. There and in the West Bank. We also visited the Palestinian refugee camps set up in 1948 by ' UN agency, UNRWA, where more than three million Palestinians from their land by Israel are waiting for a Return increasingly problematic. As for Gaza, c ' is a prison open for a million and half Palestinians. A prison where they s ' organize to survive. More than the physical destruction like the Red Crescent hospital in Cast Lead is the behavior of Gazans, their patriotism, their love of the sea and beaches, their constant concern for the welfare of their children,

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countless, laughing, that haunt our memory. We were impressed by their clever way to deal with all shortages imposed on them. We saw them make the fault cement bricks to rebuild thousands of homes destroyed by tanks. We confirmed that there had been four miles hundred dead - women, children and old included in the camp Palestinian - during this operation " Cast Lead "by Israeli army against only fifty wounded Israelis. I sharing the findings of South African judge. That Jews could commit themselves to war crimes, it is unbearable. Alas, l ' History gives little ' Examples of people who learn from their own history. I know that Hamas won the recent parliamentary elections n ' has unable to avoid being sent rockets on Israeli towns in response to the situation of isolation and blockade in which Gazans are. I obviously think that terrorism is unacceptable, but we must recognize that when you are busy with military means infinitely superior to yours, the popular reaction can not be non-violent. Is it used to Hamas ' send rockets on Sderot ? The answer is no. It does not help its cause, but we can explain this gesture by ' exasperation of Gazans. In the concept of exasperation, he need to understand violence as a regrettable conclusion unacceptable situation for those affected. So we can that terrorism is a form of ' exasperation. And that frustration is a negative term. It should not be asper former, it be es-operate. The exasperation is a denial of hope. It is understandable, I would almost say it is natural, but so far it did ' is not acceptable. Because that ' it does not provide the results that may eventually produce hope.

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Nonviolence, the path we must learn to follow. I am convinced that ' future belongs to non-violence, reconciliation of different cultures. This is the way that humanity must cross the next step. And, I agree with Sartre, we can not excuses for terrorists who throw bombs, they can understand. Sartre wrote in 1947: "I accept that violence in any form it manifests itself is a failure. But it is an inevitable failure because we are in a world of violence. And it is true that the use of violence is violence that is likely to perpetuate it is true c ' is ' the only way to stop 4 . "What j ' would add that non-violence is a safer way to stop it. We can not support terrorists as Sartre ' made on behalf of this principle Algeria during the war or during the attack on the Munich games in 1972, committed against Israeli athletes. This is not efficient and Sartre himself eventually wonder at the end of his life on the meaning of terrorism and to question its rationale. Say "violence is not effective, "c ' is far more important than whether we should condemn or not those who s ' to deliver. Terrorism is not effective. In the concept efficiency, we must hope nonviolent. If there is a hope violent is in the poetry of Guillaume Apollinaire: "What hope is violent "no politics. Sartre, in March 1980, three weeks his death, said: "We must try ' explain why the world Now, that is horrible, is a long time in the develop- historical development, that ' Hope has always been a strength Dominant revolutions and insurgencies, and how I feel yet the ' hope like my conception of the future 5 We must understand that violence turns his back on hope. He must be prefer the ' expectancy, the ' expectancy of non-violence. C ' is the path we must learn to follow. From either side of

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oppressors of the oppressed, we must come to a negotiation to remove the ' oppression; c ' is thereby no longer have terrorist violence. Therefore we must not let accumulate too much hate. The message ' Mandela a, d ' a Martin Luther King finds its relevance in a world which has exceeded the comparison of ideologies and totalitarianism conqueror. This is a message of hope in modern societies' capacity to overcome conflicts by mutual understanding and patience vigilant. To so, it must be based on rights, violation of which, what that ' in is the ' author, should provoke our indignation. There is not compromise on these rights. For a peaceful uprising J ' have noted - and I'm not the only - government response Israel faces the fact that every Friday citizens Bil'id will, without throwing stones without using force, to the wall against which they protest. The Israeli authorities have called the march of "non-violent terrorism." Not bad ... It should be Israel to a terrorist nonviolence. It is especially be embarrassed by the efficiency of non-violence that is committed to ensuring it raises the support, understanding, support of all those who in the world are the enemies of oppression. Productivist thinking, driven by the West, led the world in a crisis that we must avoid a radical break with the headlong rush of "growing" in the financial field but also in science and technology. It is high time for the sake of ethics, justice, sustainable balance become prevalent. For the most serious risks we face. They can put an end to the human adventure on a planet that ' it can make it uninhabitable for ' man.

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But it remains true that d ' Important progress has been made since 1948: decolonization, the end of apartheid, the destruction of the Soviet empire, the fall of the Berlin Wall. For cons, the first decade of XXI e century were a period of decline. This fall, I explained in part by the U.S. President George Bush, September 11, and disastrous consequences as ' have drawn the United States, as this military intervention in Iraq. We had this economic crisis, but we did not further initiated a new policy development. Similarly, the Copenhagen summit the cons No global warming ' no permit ' engage in genuine policy for protecting the planet. We are at a threshold between the horrors of the first decade and opportunities following decades. But hopefully, always hope. The previous decade, the 1990s, had been of great progress. The UN has been able to convene conferences like those of Rio on Environment in 1992, that of Beijing on Women in 1995 and in September 2000, at the ' initiative of Secretary General United Nations, Kofi Annan, the 191 member countries adopted the statement on the "Eight Millennium Development" by which they undertake to halve poverty in the world ' 2015. My great regret, c ' is that neither Obama nor l ' EU has so far been manifested with what should be their contribution to a constructive phase, s ' pressing the values fundamental. How to conclude the call to s ' indignant? Recalling further that, the occasion of the sixtieth anniversary of the National Programme Resistance, we said March 8, 2004, we veterans Resistance movements and fighting forces of Free France (1940-1945), although that "Nazism was defeated, thanks to the sacrifice of our brothers and sisters of the Resistance and the UN against barbarism

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Fascist. But this threat n ' has not totally disappeared and our anger the cons ' Injustice is still intact 6 . No, this threat has not disappeared completely. Also, call us always "a real insurrection against the peaceful means mass communication that do not offer a horizon for our Youth that mass consumption, the contempt for the weakest and culture, ' generalized amnesia and excessive competition of all against all. " To those who will make the twenty-first century, we say with our affection : "CREATE is to resist. RESIST IS TO CREATE. "

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NOTES Created a clandestine May 27, 1943 in Paris by representatives of eight major resistance movements, the two major unions Pre-war: the CGT, CFTC (French Confederation of Workers Christians) and the six main political parties of the Third Re- public including the PC and the SFIO (Socialist), the National Council of Resistance (CNR) held its first meeting on 27 May under the chairmanship Jean Moulin, de Gaulle's delegate who wanted to establish this Council to make more effective the fight against the Nazis, strengthen its own legitimacy against allies. De Gaulle instructed the board to develop a government program in anticipation of the release of France. This program was the subject of several back and forth between the CNR and Government of Free France, both in London and Algiers before to be adopted March 15, 1944, in plenary session by the NRC. This program is solemnly handed to General de Gaulle by the CNR August 25, 1944 at the Hotel de Ville in Paris. Note that the Ordinance press was promulgated on 26 August. And one of the main Editors of the program was Roger Ginsburg, the son of a rabbi in Alsace , So under the pseudonym Pierre Villon, he was Secretary General of National Front for the independence of France, resistance movement created by the French Communist Party in 1941, and represents what movement within the CNR and its permanent office. 2 According to union estimates, we went from 75 to 80% of income as the amount of pensions to about 50%, this being an order of magnitude. Jean-Paul Domin, lecturer in Economics at the Uni- University of Reims Champagne-Ardennes, in 2010, writes for the Institute European Waged a note on "complementary health insurance shut up. " He reveals how access to additional quality now a privilege due to the position in employment, as most

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brittle fault waive care insurance and complementary l ' importance of remaining unpaid, and that the problem is to have salary is more support for social rights - the central point of orders of 4 and 15 October 1945. They enacted the Social security and its management placed under the dual authority representatives of workers and the state. Since the reforms Juppe 1995 imposed by ordinance, then the law Douste Blazy (Doctor training), 2004, is the only state that handles Social Security. It eg the Head of State appoints by order of the Chief the National Insurance Fund (NHIF). They are no longer as the aftermath of the liberation of trade unionists who are head of primary funds, but the county government, through the prefects. Workers' representatives take no more than a role advisor. 3 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted on 10 December 1948 in Paris by the UN General Assembly by 48 states out of 58 members. Eight abstained: South Africa, to because of apartheid that the statement of fact condemned; Saudi Arabia, even, because of gender equality; Union Soviet Union (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus), Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, saying in turn that Statement did not go far enough in taking into account the rights economic and social rights and the issue of minority rights, we Note however, that Russia in particular objected to the proposal Australia to create an International Court of Human Rights responsible for examining petitions addressed to the UN; must here noted that Article 8 of the Declaration introduced the principle of using individual against a state for violation of fundamental rights; this principle would find its application in Europe in 1998, with

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 creation of a European Court of Human Rights permanent guarantees the right to appeal to more than 800 million Europeans. 4 Sartre, J.-P., "State of the writer in 1947 o, in Situations II, Paris Gallimard, 1948. 5 Sartre, J.-P., "Now the hope ... (III) "in Le Nouvel Observateur, 24 March 1980. 6 The signatories of the Appeal of March 8, 2004 are: Lucie Aubrac Raymond Aubrac, Henri Bartoli, Daniel Cordier, Philippe Dechartre Guingouin Georges, Stéphane Hessel, Maurice Kriegel-Valrimont, Lise London, Georges Seguy, Germaine Tillion, Jean-Pierre Vernant, Maurice Voutey.

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POSTSCRIPT Stéphane Hessel was born in Berlin in 1917 to ' a Jewish father writer translator, Franz Hessel, and a painter mother, music lover, Helen Grund, a writer herself. S parents ' set in Paris in 1924, with their two children, Ulrich, the eldest, and Stephane. Through the middle family, both attending the Parisian avant-garde, including Dada Marcel Duchamp and the American sculptor Alexander Calder. Stéphane entered the ' ENS Rue d'Ulm in 1939, but the War interrupted his studies. French citizen since 1937, it is mobilized and knows the phoney war, Marshal Petain sees the sell off French sovereignty. In May 1941, he joined the Free France of General de Gaulle in London. He works in the Office of cons-espionage, Intelligence and Action (BCRA). By night's end of March 1944, he was landed clandestinely in France under the codename "Greco" with mission to contact the various networks in Paris, of find new places ' radio show to go to London information collected for the Allied landings. July 10 1944, he was arrested by the Gestapo in Paris on denunciation: "We do not pursue someone ' one who spoke under torture, "he wrote in a memoir, Dancing with the century in 1997. After interrogation under torture - the ' test including the bathtub, it destabilizes her torturers in their speaking German, language native - he was sent to Buchenwald, Germany, August 8 1944, so only a few days of the liberation of Paris. On the eve of being hanged, he succeeds in extremis to exchange his identity against that of a French died of typhus in the camp. Under its new name, Michel Boitel, milling business, he was transferred to Camp Rottleberode near the ' plant undercarriage of German bombers, the Junkers 52, but fortunately - his eternal luck - it is paid the accounting department. He escaped. Recaptured, he was moved to Camp

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Dora, where are made the V-1 and V-2 rockets with which the Nazis are still hoping to win the war. Assigned to the penal company, he escaped again and this time for good; Allied troops move closer to Dora. Finally, it goes back to Paris, his wife Vitka - the mother of his three children, two boys and a girl. This life returned, it had to incur, "wrote the former of Free France, in his memoirs. In 1946, after passing the entrance examination to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Hessel became a diplomat.His first job was at the UN where, that year, Henri Laugier, Assistant Secretary General of the UN and secretary of the Commission on Human Rights, offered him to be his cabinet secretary. It is for this reason that Stéphane Hessel joined the commission to develop what will be the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is considered that its twelve members, six have played a more vital role: Eleanor Roosevelt, widow of President Roosevelt died in 1945, committed feminist, she chairs the Committee; Dr. Chang (China Chiang Kaïchek and not Mao):Vice-Chairman of the Committee, he stated that the Declaration should not only be a reflection of Western ideas, Charles Habib Malik (Lebanon), Rapporteur of the Commission, often described as the driving force, "with Eleanor Roosevelt, René Cassin (France), jurist and diplomat, president of the Consultative Commission on Human Rights with the Quai d'Orsay, we owe him the writing of several articles and have been able to cope with the fears of some states, including France to see their colonial sovereignty threatened by this statement - it was a challenging and interventionist conception of Human Rights, John Peters Humphrey (Canada), lawyer and diplomat, a close associate of Laugier, he wrote the first draft of a document 400 pages; finally Stéphane Hessel (France), a diplomat, chief of staff of the Laugier, the youngest. We see how the spirit of FrancePage 1919 blew open on this committee. The Declaration was adopted December 10, 1948 by the United Nations at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris. With the influx of new staff, many of whom covet a job that pays well, "isolating the marginal seeking ideal 'by own review of Hessel in his memoirs, he left the UN. It is assigned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to represent France at international institutions, the opportunity to recover temporarily, as such, New York and the United Nations. During the war in Algeria, he argues in favor of Algerian independence. In 1977, with the complicity of the Secretary General of the Elysee, Claude Brossolette, son of Pierre, formerly head of the BCRA, he was offered by President Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the post of ambassador to the UN,Geneva. He does not hide that, of all French statesmen, that he 's feeling is the closest Pierre Mendes France, known in London at the time of Free France and returned to the United Nations in 1946 in New York, where it represents France in the Economic and Social Council. He will have his consecration as a diplomat "this change in the government of France, he writes, is that the arrival of François Mitterrand at the Elysee," in 1981. "She was a diplomat rather narrowly specialized in multilateral cooperation, reached two years of his retirement, Ambassador of France. He joined the Socialist Party. "I wonder why? First response: the shock of the year 1995. I did not imagine the French rather imprudent to bring Jacques Chirac to the presidency. "With now a diplomatic passport, he went with his new wife in 2008 and 2009 in the Gaza Strip and returning shows on the painful lives of Gazans. "I'm always on the side of the dissidents, said he at the same time. "It is well that one who speaks here in 93 years.

Be seeing you.





November 21, 2010

This video REALLY gets me. Today remember children in Palestine, eh?



One can go mad trying to figure out "Why?" or one can decide to cut to the chase and DO something.  I choose the DO.

August 03, 2008

Some Middle East news (NO WAR WITH IRAN, Plz)

Working for International Dialogue and Peace

U.S. sent envoy to Geneva talks to avoid pressure: Chomsky

by Noam Chomsky (source: Mehr News) August 3, 2008

"The Bush administration is under severe international and domestic pressure to rein in its radical extremism, which has led to catastrophes everywhere, and might bring about even worse ones" the American lecturer noted. "Sending a non-participant observer is a way to avoid negotiations and diplomacy while trying to fend off criticism," Chomsky commented. ››read more


Arabs don’t view Iran’s nuclear program as a threat

(source: Mehr News) August 3, 2008

Amr MoussaAmr MoussaTEHRAN, Aug. 3 (MNA) – Arab League chief Amr Moussa has called for a diplomatic solution to Iran’s nuclear standoff with the West. Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement foreign ministers in Tehran on Wednesday, Moussa said the Arab league is opposed to any military attack against the Islamic Republic. ››read more


Americans protest war with Iran

by Jihan Hafiz (source: Press TV) August 3, 2008

On a US national day of protest against any military attack on Iran, tens of thousands marched on Saturday 2 August across America and Canada against the Bush Administration. View a video of the protestors in DC here. ››read more


The New York Times: Making Nuclear Extermination Respectable

by Prof. James Petras (source: Global Research) August 2, 2008

What does the publication by the New York Times of an article, which calls for the nuclear incineration of 70 million Iranians and the contamination of the better part of a billion people in the Middle East, Asia and Europe, tell us about US politics and culture? For it is the NYT, which informs the ‘educated classes’ in the US, its Sunday supplements, literary and editorial pages and which serves as the ‘moral conscience’ of important sectors of the cultural, economic and political elite. ››read more


Iran accuses U.S. of double standards

(source: Reuters) August 2, 2008

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has accused the United States of double standards following a nuclear deal with India, state television said on Saturday, just before a deadline set by the West in a dispute over Tehran's own atomic ambitions. ››read more


Stop War on IRAN: Mass March in NYC & across the U.S.

(source: Stop War on Iran) August 2, 2008

Across the U.S. - in more than 87 cities - Response to the Emergency Call to Action has been enormous and in addition to the regional action in New York City, there will be protests, rallies, and other events in more than 87 cities, from Hawaii to Boston. ››read more


Nukes and Holocausts

by Gordon Prather (source: AntiWar.Com) August 2, 2008

Everyone, most especially the Israelis, realize they can not "take out" all the IAEA Safeguarded facilities in Iran with conventional weapons. But they could make a start, and then come to us with this threat – "either you finish the job for us, or we will, with nukes". ››read more


Want Lower Gas Prices? Lift AIPAC's Sanctions on Iran

by Robert Naiman (source: Huffington Post) August 1, 2008

Here's a first step: don't let AIPAC drive up gas prices even more. Ask Congress to reject AIPAC's resolution seeking to ban Iran's gas imports. ››read more


Oil Rises $3 on Israeli Comments About Iranian Nuclear Program

by Margot Habiby (source: Bloomberg) August 1, 2008

Oil price riseOil price riseAug. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil rallied more than $3 a barrel after Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz said that Iran is on a path toward a ``major breakthrough'' in its nuclear weapons program which he called ``unacceptable.'' ››read more


A Vote For Military Force Against Iran? AIPAC’s House Resolution, H. Con. Res. 362

by Ira Glunts (source: Inybay.org) August 1, 2008

naval blockadenaval blockadeDespite the expectation of easy passage, AIPAC’s controversial resolution is stalled in committee. The efforts of antiwar groups who mobilized messages of protest proved fruitful, but the debate over the use of military force in Iran is just beginning. ››read more


Candidate who wants Olmert's job once 'sought deaths of 70 Palestinians a day'

by Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem (source: The Independent ) August 1, 2008

Shaul MofazShaul MofazA leading candidate [Shaul Mofaz] to be Israel's next premier called for a death toll of 70 Palestinians a day when he was head of the military during the second intifada, according to a best-selling book by two Israeli journalists. ››read more


Editor's note: Shaul Mofaz, Israel's deputy prime minister, told local daily Yedioth Ahronoth on June 6 that the sanctions against Iran were ineffective and therefore "there will be no choice but to attack Iran to halt the Iranian nuclear program." He reiterated this threat against Iran in July.

New view on Mideast needed

by Yousef Munayyer (source: Chicago Tribune) August 1, 2008

The U.S. insists on the prevention of a nuclear Iran, when the Arab public is well aware that the world's largest per capita nuclear arsenal is in Israel. Further, the American position has largely been to not negotiate with Iran before it suspends its nuclear program. Yet the U.S. pushes the Palestinian Authority to negotiate while Israel continues settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank. ››read more


Interview with Soltanieh: NAM moves in support of nuclear Iran

by Ali Asghar Soltanieh, interview with Saman Kojouri (source: Press TV) August 1, 2008

Ali Asghar SoltaniehAli Asghar SoltaniehA new parameter in the NAM statement is that the ministers have welcomed Iran's willingness to enter negotiation with all countries of the Non-Aligned Movement and also the countries in the region. This sends a strong and positive signal to those who are saying that Iran is isolated. Iran is not isolated. Almost all world countries have sent their ministers and representatives to this country to say that they support Iran's peaceful nuclear activities. ››read more


Deadline ultimatum eases for Iran in nuclear showdown

(source: AFP) August 1, 2008

Gary SickGary SickWASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States and its European allies have pulled back from setting Saturday as a firm deadline for Iran to reply to the latest international offer of incentives for a freeze in its nuclear drive. ››read more


Germany defends export of gas equipment to Iran

(source: M & C) August 1, 2008

Berlin - Germany rejected Thursday criticism from Israel over a deal to export gas-liquefaction equipment to Iran.
››read more


US forces Statoil to hold back from Iran operations

by Ed Crooks in London (source: FT) August 1, 2008

StatoilHydro, the Norwegian national oil company, has become the latest big western energy group to commit against investment in Iran following pressure from the US. ››read more


Why Are Neocons Attacking Turkey?

by Avni Dogru (source: Just Foreign Policy) August 1, 2008

Some neoconservatives in Washington are obsessed with attacking Iran before President Bush leaves office at the end of this year. Hence, they have been pushing the Bush administration for increased economic and political isolation of Iran in order to weaken its current regime. Crucial to this plan is the support of Turkey, a traditional U.S. ally and an increasingly critical player in the region. ››read more


To Provoke War, Cheney Considered Proposal To Dress Up Navy Seals As Iranians And Shoot At Them

(source: Think Progress) August 1, 2008 Iranian Boat
Iranian Boat

July 30, 2008

Israel's Olmert to resign over corruption investigation

Israel's Olmert to resign over corruption investigation

By Dion Nissenbaum | McClatchy Newspapers


JERUSALEM — Embattled Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced Wednesday That he'll resign as prime minister in September, setting the stage for a successor to take over as early as the following month.

Olmert made it clear that he was reluctantly stepping aside because a deepening political corruption investigation was making it increasingly difficult span for him to serve effectively.

The timing of his resignation is keyed to a meeting of his ruling Kadima Party, which will choose a new leader in mid- or late September. Olmert, who took office early in 2006, could remain in power as a caretaker prime minister As late as January. he decision will make it much more difficult for Olmert to cement a historic legacy by securing groundbreaking peace deals with Syria or the Palestinians

Before he leaves office.
"He's a lame duck, and this curtails his ability to do anything really dramatic in the areas of war and peace,"
said Yossi Alpher, a former Israeli Intelligence official who now serves as a co-director of the political Web site Bitterlemons.org.

Instead, Olmert is more likely to wind down his term by stepping up his fight against the corruption investigations. The impact of the investigations on Olmert and his decision was clear when he delivered his surprise announcement from an enclosed garden at his Jerusalem home.

"As soon as I was elected I found myself in a wave of investigations, examinations and criticism,"
he said in a televised address.
"From almost my first day in office as prime minister I had to parry these attacks, even as I was making fateful decisions regarding Israel's security and existence."

Most of the allegations failed to affect him seriously until this summer.

Calls for Olmert to step aside increased after American businessman Morris Talansky told Israeli police that he'd given the Israeli leader tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars in cash over the last 15 years.


New allegations surfaced earlier this month that Olmert had double-billed companies and nonprofit groups for his expenses when he traveled to speak to them, then used the money to pay for family vacations.

In his address, Olmert admitted that he'd made unspecified "mistakes" during his political career, and he apologized.

He expressed confidence that he'd be cleared of any wrongdoing, but made clear that the investigations had become an unwelcome diversion.

"What's more important?"
Olmert said.
"Justice for me or the good of the public?"


Olmert's party is scheduled to hold its first vote to choose a new leader on Sept. 17, with a second round set for a week later. The new party leader would have up to 42 days to establish a new coalition. If the attempt fails, Israel would be thrown into elections within three months.

Olmert's most likely successors in Kadima are Tzipi Livni, the Foreign Minister, and Shaul Mofaz, the more hawkish transportation minister.

Kadima Party voters currently favor Livni in the polls, but it's thought that Olmert favors Mofaz.

July 16, 2008


Gaza Journalist Assaulted by Shin Bet (By Sara Price)

Posted: 15 Jul 2008 09:42 PM CDT

I want to thank Sara for this report on Mohammed Omer. She put a lot of work and effort into doing this. Unlike AP who copied and pasted parts rather than taking the time to do some investigative reporting and getting the facts from those involved .

Tuesday, July 15, 2008
By Sarah Price
The Independent Monitor, July 2008

The last words in his acceptance speech were, I can’t wait for the day I retire as a war correspondent. Then he came home to a whole new battle.

This was originally going to be a profile of young Palestinian journalist Mohammed Omer, called “Gaza’s Best Hope.” I was going to write about his rise from the poverty-stricken refugee camps of the Gaza Strip to international readership and acclaim; the murder and maiming of family members and demolition of his home by the Israel Occupation Forces that have only served to fuel the fire of his mission: to get the word out about the truth of life in Occupied Palestine; and of his peaceful nature, despite years of tragic loss – his own and that of his homeland. He wants peace on both sides, and admonishes violence toward Israeli citizens as much as he does that toward Palestinians. He made a choice, in his words, “not to pick up a gun, but to pick up a camera,” because he knew the only solution was to document the truth of what is going on, and he has done so diligently for the last seven years.

But since the events of June 26, 2008, the focus has changed.

On Saturday, May 17, I received an excited e-mail from Mohammed: he had won the prestigious Martha Gellhorn Prize, an award given “for journalism that exposes establishment propaganda,” and would be sharing it with his friend, Dahr Jamail, an American journalist celebrated for his independent reports from Iraq. He had just received the news from John Pilger, an Australian-born, UK-based journalist and former war correspondent who sat on the judging panel, and had come to admire Mohammed for his work. At age 24, he would be the youngest journalist ever to have won it.

He was due some good news. He was still recovering from the loss of two close friends one month earlier: Gazan Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana, who was killed by an Israeli tank shell on April 16; and Palestinian rights activist Riad Hamad, the news of whose suicide circulated a day later. The previous four months had been hell for Gaza, in general. An Israeli siege hit the small strip of land in January, two months after peace talks had begun between Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Over 120 Palestinians were dead – most of them civilians, and dozens of them children, and several hundred more injured. A small number of their most critical cases were being sent to Egypt for treatment, but only about one-third were being granted entry. “The rest of the cases,” said Dr. Medhat Abbas, Director of Crisis Management at the Gaza Ministry of Health, “will continue receiving the new formula of PFU in Gaza (‘pray for us’).”

Mohammed had been working constantly through fear, fatigue, and close calls on his own life to keep up with his reports about the siege for the number of publications for whom he writes: The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs (WRMEA) in Washington, DC, New Statesman in the UK, Inter Press Service (IPS) in Italy, and several publications throughout Europe, for whom his articles are translated into various languages, as well as maintaining his own website, RafahToday.org, named for his hometown, located on the Egyptian border. He also regularly works to help patients who can’t get the treatment they need in Gaza, to get out and get what they need from Israeli hospitals – an almost impossible feat that he attempts for one patient after another, taking each case personally. He supports his parents and six siblings, and has done so since the beginning of his father’s 12-year imprisonment in an Israeli jail. He found work in a factory, which he would do every day after school, and late into the night. He would come home around 11pm, exhausted from school and work, sleep until about 5am, and get up and do it all again, still barely making enough to feed his family. And he was six years old.

His dream growing up had been to work as an interpreter for the International Red Cross. He loved languages, and even in grade school, taught himself new words in English when he came across them, getting so far ahead of his classmates that they accused him of having an American mother. By his mid-teens, he was already taking courses in international public relations, photography and journalism, and translation. In 2006, he graduated from the Islamic University of Gaza with a BA in English.

But by the time he was 17, his dream of being an interpreter had been replaced by what he saw as an obligation to become a journalist. He was seeing bloodshed on a daily basis – his town being bombed; people being shot by soldiers in the street; and the homes of his relatives and friends being bulldozed with no warning in the middle of the night. And yet, there seemed to be no coverage of this anywhere in the press. No one else is documenting this, he thought, so I need to. He started with just a notepad, writing every day what he saw. After a while, he put together a website, documenting with his words and photographs, life in Gaza.

In 2003, he began keeping a journal regularly on RafahToday. But he was not yet aware of the terrible year he was soon to document.

In January, Israeli forces destroyed two water wells and demolished more than 50 homes in the last week alone, in order to make room for a wall between Rafah and Egypt, its neighbor to the south; between March and May, peace activists Rachel Corrie and Tom Hurndall, and filmmaker James Miller were killed by Israeli forces in Rafah. In March, his own home was demolished by an Israeli bulldozer, with his mother and sister inside. They managed to get out through the kitchen window as the walls and roof fell in, but his mother still suffers from the leg injuries she sustained from her escape.

But by November, things were much worse.

In late September, Mohammed’s younger brother Issam was shot in the leg, which had to be amputated; and on October 18, his younger brother Hussam was shot seven times and killed by an Israeli sniper. Trying to bring his body out of the street, their next door neighbor was also killed, and trying to save her, her husband was injured – all in full view of their small children. “The moments can't be described when my mother got the news of the murder of my brother,” he wrote. “They were the worst in my whole life.”

But through it all, he persisted. Within a year, he was contributing to WRMEA, Morgenbladet newspaper in Norway, Agence France Presse, and the BBC, as well as several newspapers across Europe. In November 2006, he was awarded his first journalism prize, New America Media’s Best Youth Voice Award, but because of the difficulties getting permission to leave Gaza, he missed the ceremony, but was able to embark on a 15-city tour of the US, to give his presentation of life in Gaza, Gaza on the Ground, to thousands of people. Six months later, he was doing the same thing in Europe, but he had updated it, calling it Welcome to Hell. Days earlier, just before his 23rd birthday, he had survived an encounter with militants in Gaza who had cornered him on a dark street when he was trying to make his way home to Rafah from his work in Gaza City. The three gunmen surrounded him, discussing with each other where to shoot him, and whether or not to just kill him. He talked to and pleaded with them until they tired of him and let him go.

But with great struggle and work has come great admirers. The growing popularity of his writing spread to include international dignitaries and well-known writers. Soon, he was in touch with the likes of Noam Chomsky and Norman Mailer, who, before his passing in November 2007, was helping Mohammed write a book about his life; and had more requests from Europe and the United States for personal appearances. But the ongoing siege in Gaza made leaving even more difficult, so the news of his award in May was tempered with caution – he wanted to combine his visit to receive the award in London on June 16 with the opportunity to accept the invitation to speak to press and parliament members in Greece, Holland, France, and Sweden, and address the House of Commons in London, but didn’t know if he would make it out. The Dutch Foreign Ministry stepped in on his behalf, but Israel was making it very difficult to get the green light. Mohammed had been frustrated in Gaza for some time and was desperate for a chance to get away from the death and destruction he not only had to see every day, but as a journalist, had to seek out. By the end of May, he felt certain he would not get to go. “I am rejected and imprisoned in this hell,” he wrote.

But then the call came that he had been granted exit, and he rushed to get ready to go.

The three-week whirlwind tour of Europe was a great success. The opportunity to meet and speak with so many government and press representatives energized him, and gave him new contacts and notes for future articles. In his acceptance speech on June 16, he thanked his supporters, but said that he looked forward to the day that he could retire as a war correspondent.


Mohammed with co-recipient Dahr Jamail (left) and John Pilger in London,

June 16

(Photo: Paul de Rooij)

In trying to get him permission to leave, they had been careful to do everything correctly, so that getting back in would not be a problem. He was trying to get back to Gaza for his brother Fadi’s wedding, and expected to be home on Sunday, June 22. But upon his arrival in Amman, Jordan, he received the news that Israel was not granting him re-entry. Between Saturday, June 21, and Wednesday, June 25, the Dutch Foreign Ministry worked frantically to convince Israeli officials to let him cross back home to Gaza. John Pilger urged Mohammed to go to the press, but he preferred to handle it diplomatically, and failing that, would go public. But he wanted to see if they could do it quietly first. He was concerned about his status, because upon returning from his US tour in December 2006, he had been stuck in Cairo, trying to get back in, for three weeks, and he had already met people in Jordan who had been stranded there for months. But he hoped that since he had more diplomatic help this time, it wouldn’t take too long. On Wednesday, they finally got word that he would be allowed back in the next day. “Why can’t I go today?” he asked. “We don’t know,” was the response. “They just said tomorrow.” The answer made him suspicious and nervous.

He passed through the Jordan side of the Allenby Bridge crossing early the next morning, but when he came to the Israeli, there was trouble right away. He gave his passport to the woman at passport control and she asked where he was going. When he answered, “Gaza,” she asked “what?” in Hebrew several times as he tried to make her understand. Finally, he answered her in Hebrew, “Azzah.”

“Oh,” she replied. “Actually, according to my computer, you have no coordination.”

He did have coordination, he protested, but she told him to wait at the side, where he stayed for the next 90 minutes, until someone came to get him and told him to bring his bags. He had been through x-ray by this time, and his bags had already been searched and were ready to be picked up. He was made to wait at the Shin Bet office, and could see that there were two cameras on him, on either side. Then he saw two Palestinian men coming out from other offices and they were dressing themselves. He knew then that these were rooms for strip-searching, and that he was probably in trouble.

A young blond Shin Bet agent told him to come with him, collecting his bags from the holding area, where they had been searched already, and demanded his cell phone. Mohammed was going through the Allenby Bridge crossing under diplomatic escort from the Dutch embassy, as he had left, and asked if could call his escorts to let them know what was happening. The young man barked at him that no, he could not.

After a few minutes, another agent, an investigator in his forties referred to as “Avi” by the other agents, entered and started going through all his belongings, along with another interrogator who had joined him. After searching through everything and dumping all his notes, cell phone, and memory cards into a box, they demanded to know where the money was. He wasn’t sure what they meant, but told them what traveling money he had on him – various amounts in British pounds, Euros, Israeli shekels, and Jordanian dinars. They demanded he put it all on the table, which he did, thinking maybe this was a shakedown – they would take the money he had and then let him go. But they were still dissatisfied. They asked again about the English pounds he had, and he realized then that they were looking for the prize money. The Martha Gellhorn Prize, since it was shared, would come out to roughly $5000 USD. But he had felt it safer to have it transferred to his bank, rather than carry it with him. When he told them this, he said, they were visibly irate and called him a liar.

By this point, the room had filled with more agents and he was outnumbered eight-to-one. They were angry and wanted money he didn’t have. And they were armed. When he repeated that he had shown them everything he had on him, Avi escorted him to an empty room.

“Take off your clothes,” he ordered him. Mohammed refused. He had already been through x-ray, and a pat-down would have revealed anything he might have been hiding.

“Take off your clothes,” he demanded again. So, he stripped down to his underwear.

“Take off everything,” he pressed. Mohammed refused again. “I am a journalist,” he said, “and I have an escort from the Dutch embassy waiting for me. Call them and tell them what’s happening and that you want me to take off my clothes.”

Avi retorted that he knew all this, and insisted again that he take off his underwear. By this time, Mohammed was frightened. “Why are you treating me this way?” he asked.

“This is nothing compared to what you will see now,” Avi replied, putting his hand on his revolver, pressing his weight against Mohammed’s hip and forcibly pulling it off. He then patted his body down, “up one side and down the other,” Mohammed said later, and he was subjected to a cavity search. He then demanded he move to the left and right, in some kind of dance. When Mohammed refused, Avi pulled him left and right.

He had held his composure as long as he could, and started to cry. Avi backed off at that point.

“He looked satisfied,” he said. “He just wanted to humiliate me. He didn’t care about what I had. The intention was not to bring me to Gaza.”

He ordered him to get dressed and come back into the other room, where another of the intelligence officers was still going through his belongings.

The agent shook his head at Mohammed. “You are a crazy man,” he said. “I can’t understand why someone who has traveled to Sweden, Holland, Greece, London and Paris is coming back to Gaza. Gaza is a dirty place with dirty people. I thought the dream of those people is to leave Gaza and live in Europe. Why do you want to go to Gaza? There’s nothing in Gaza – no food, no fuel, no clean water. There is darkness. Go live in Paris; it’s beautiful there. Or do you like to be around the Hamas system in Gaza?”

Goading him, and not really looking for a response, he continued: “Aren't you ashamed to have your name and reputation associated with such a dirty place as Gaza?”

Mohammed answered, “No, I want to be there because I want to be a voice for the voiceless. I want to get the truth out. I have no affiliation with Hamas; I don’t even think they like me.”

“Then you choose to suffer.”

“No,” Mohammed said, “I choose to tell the truth.”

They continued to go through his luggage, taunting him about various items he had come home with:

“What are the perfumes for?”

“My friends and family, people I love.”

“Oh, you have love in your culture?”

“Of course.”

“What is this?” they asked, referring to a trophy he was given by the Greek Union of Journalists. When he told them, Avi replied that Greece was not a friend of Israel, only of the Palestinians.

“I don’t know,” Mohammed responded, wondering how Greece would feel about that, “it’s not my business.”

He had been standing for quite some time by then and had been without food, water, or a toilet for several hours. The stress and abuse caused him to feel faint, and he vomited and collapsed. A doctor said later that he had suffered a nervous breakdown. He was unconscious for nearly an hour and a half on the floor, he estimates, but could hear what they were saying, and feel what they were doing to him.

“They didn’t believe I had really passed out,” he said, “so they were out to make me react to their pressure.”

One agent dug his nails into the skin under his eyes and behind his ears, pinching him. Another pressed his shoe hard enough against his neck, that Mohammed could feel the outline of it. Another used two fingers to press into the space between his neck and chest, cutting off his airway. Mohammed remembers feeling himself choking. The damage to his trachea was so severe that even weeks later, he could not swallow anything but liquids. Finally, another pressed his hands into his chest with all the weight of his body, which eventually resulted in several fractured ribs, and breathing problems. They also continued to taunt him, saying, “Come on, Mohammed, we’re going to take you to Rafah now!,” expecting that would cause him to suddenly recover.

They eventually realized the severity of the situation and began to panic, calling for an ambulance, and an Israeli doctor checked his heart and performed an EKG. He was still unconscious in the ambulance, but Shin Bet agents continued trying to revive him – calling his name, forcing open his eyes, and spraying a sort of smelling salts into his face. But the efforts were not out of concern for his health: they needed him to sign a waiver, releasing them from all responsibility. Fortunately, the Palestinian ambulance driver, Mahmoud Taraira, intervened. He cannot sign that, he protested, he’s unconscious. He added that anything signed in that state of mind is non-binding.

They finally made it to the Palestinian doctors in Jericho, who were reassuring him he would be OK now.

At last able to call his escorts, after at least five hours, he found his cell phone amongst his belongings, but then he noticed his mobile was acting strangely – it was dialing numbers and sending messages by itself. The agents had told him earlier to give it to them and take out the battery. He believes that they used that opportunity to put something in it to track him. For days, it would only work off and on. Sometimes people could get through, others times, not at all. So he borrowed a phone and called the Dutch embassy to come get him. He arrived home safely, but by the next day, he was back in the hospital with breathing problems and chest pains. Due to the damage to his trachea, he couldn’t swallow, and spent six days in European Hospital in Khan Younis, being fed and medicated through an IV drip.

He discovered later that although all the money had been returned, an expensive watch and some other items had not.

In his bed at European Hospital in Khan Younis, in the Gaza Strip
(Reuters)
Israel’s immediate responses ranged from being completely unaware of the incident to washing their hands of the actions of Shin Bet.

Lisa Dvir, from the Israeli Airport Authority (IAA), the body responsible for controlling Israel’s borders, told IPS, “We would like to know who Omer spoke to in regard to receiving coordination to pass through Allenby. We offer journalists a special service when passing through our border crossings, and had we known about his arrival this would not have happened.”

The truth is that Palestinian journalists have been targeted for some time.

Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana, 23, had shown up at the site of an air strike on April 16, 2008, to film the outcome of the incident, when he was killed by an Israeli tank shell, filled with small metal darts called flechettes, in full view of the soldiers operating the tank. His car was clearly marked “TV” and “Press,” as was his bullet-proof vest. The blast also injured his soundman, and killed two children in the area instantly, and two more from their injuries days later. He was filming the tank when they fired at him. The tape from his destroyed camera shows the shell coming at him.

Al-Aqsa TV cameraman Imad Ghanem, 21, was shot while he filmed a clash between Palestinian militants and Israeli soldiers on July 5, 2007. As he fell to the ground, he held up his camera to show he was unarmed, but a tape filmed by a colleague shows that he continued to be fired upon. He survived, but lost both legs.

On July 8, 2006, photojournalist Mohammed al Zanoun, 20, was shot by a helicopter as he documented Israeli attacks in Gaza City. As paramedics rushed to save him, he pleaded with them to save the camera, so that what he saw would be documented. He has sustained permanent damage to his head and chest.

Omer had recently reported, after Shana’s death, that “journalists have long been targeted in the region. Since September 2000, Israeli forces have killed nine journalists, and have wounded at least 170 others.”

The news of Mohammed’s attack started to spread on Friday, June 27, as friends and colleagues were in touch with him from his hospital bed.

Hans van Baalen, a member of the Party for Freedom and Democracy in the Dutch parliament, who had been personally responsible for arranging his exit from Gaza both for this European tour and his previous one, in June 2007, said, “I cannot understand it because Israel wanted him to travel through Israel. The Dutch embassy escorted him a year ago and this time, so they should have known he is decent journalist and should have treated him in a decent way, they should also treat other innocent Palestinians and other travelers decently. But this did not happen.”

He filed a protest with the Israeli government and asked that Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Maxime Verhagen do the same, demanding “an investigation with public conclusions.”

“We will monitor this,” he said. “If we don’t like [the results of the investigation], we will speak out.”

Harry Kney-Tal, the Israeli ambassador to the Netherlands, assured them that if the claims were accurate, that this act was not according to official procedure. In response to a claim reported by Reuters that an Israeli official said that no rules were breached and that Omer had fallen somehow on his own, breaking his ribs, Kney-Tal said that was not the official response, and that there was a full investigation in progress and he expected results shortly.

However, on July 9, The Israeli Government Press Office released a statement on the incident, discrediting Omer. In it, they claimed that he and his baggage were searched, “due to suspicion that he had been in contact with hostile elements and had been asked by them to deliver items to Judea and Samaria.” (“Judea and Samaria” is a phrase commonly used by the Israeli right wing to dismiss the existence of the West Bank and to claim the area as exclusively Israeli), although he had been x-rayed and his baggage searched before the interrogation occurred. The press release went on to point out several points in Omer’s claim that they said contradicted their investigation, but it failed to cite the sources of their research, and often quoted him out of context.

When the Dutch Press Office became aware of the press release, they were surprised, said spokesman Robert Dekker, and they confronted Ambassador Kney-Tal about it. “He confirmed that this is not the official report, and that it is still expected in the next few days,” he said.

News of Omer’s attack spread quickly across the blogosphere and alternative news sources, as well as media outlets across the Middle East, but getting into the mainstream media in the West has been difficult. Concerned friends and colleagues deluged CNN, BBC and AP offices with requests that they cover the story, to no avail. When it was mentioned by the BBC and the New York Times, it was to say that Israel was denying the charges. But when Karin Laub, from the AP Jerusalem bureau published an article also disputing Omer’s claims, yet also failing to cite sources, it was the story that spread across American news websites. While she was interviewing him, Omer said later, she continually cut him off while he tried to give her his account of the incident, and although in her article she stated that strip-searching was not the norm in Israeli security procedure, when he was telling her about his, she said that that was normal.

More respected writers in the US have also had trouble getting the US press to pay attention.“I've been following it closely, signing petitions, joining in protests,” said author and political activist Noam Chomsky. “I've brought it to the attention of the very few journalists with whom I still have contact. It will, I'm afraid, be very hard to get the US media to pay any attention, or even to believe the facts.”

Omer’s Martha Gellhorn Prize co-recipient Dahr Jamail has also faced difficulty in getting the news published.

“I'm doing all I can to get it out,” he said. “Nada in the US mainstream, which is no surprise. The only response I got was an email from someone at CBS asking to be removed from my dispatch list when I sent out the press release about his torture. Doing all I can....but of course we know that they will censor this the best they can.”

Omer’s editors at the Washington Report circulated a petition protesting the abuse, which they planned to hand-deliver in a meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, garnered approximately 2500 signatures; Israeli civil rights group New Profile also circulated a petition calling for the just treatment of journalists, citing Omer as one of many recent abuses, which had an additional 1000, and British Member of Parliament Colin Breed brought a measure to the Parliament House Assembly, calling on an official criticism of Israel’s torture of Omer, and for Israel to compensate him for his medical costs.

But despite the efforts, Omer is not optimistic. They have committed one crime after another that they have not had to explain or pay for, he says, and he doesn’t believe his case will be any different.

In his article for the Guardian, John Pilger quoted former Dutch ambassador Jan Wijenberg, who said: "This is by no means an isolated incident, but part of a long-term strategy to demolish Palestinian social, economic and cultural life ... I am aware of the possibility that Mohammed Omer might be murdered by Israeli snipers or bomb attack in the near future."

Omer has no doubt that could happen, but is not letting it deter him.

"The Israelis were trying to punish me for the work I am doing and getting the message out," he told IPS from his hospital bed. "But they won't break me. As soon as I am better, and my limbs are working properly, I will be back on the beat and reporting what is happening. They have made me more determined than ever."

Mother Teresa once said, “I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn’t trust me so much.” It would not be surprising if the same thought crossed Mohammed Omer’s mind once in a while. With his astonishing rise from poverty and tragedy to success and acclaim in his short 24 years, he may very well be Gaza’s best hope. Not merely because of his success, but because of what it took to get it – diligence, hard work, and a daily show of courage that most will never be forced to display; but above all, a belief in his fellow human beings that keeps him going – through the imprisonment of his father, the murder and maiming of his brothers, the demolition of his home and the loss of everything he had, and the brutal attempts to silence him. Gaza’s best hope is that there is still hope.

Barely out of the hospital, still on a liquid diet and unable to breathe comfortably yet, Mohammed is already hard at work, writing again.

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