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Ecuador, South Africaand Turkey recalled their ambassadors and Nicaragua broke off diplomatic relations following the raid. Vietnam put off a visit by Israel’s president, Greece suspended a military exercise and Swedish dockworkers launched a weeklong boycott of Israeli ships and goods. Even the United States, Israel’s closest ally, criticized the raid and forced Israel to set up a panel with two foreign observers to investigate the raid.
Many in Israel, including in the country’s leadership, have concluded that the war over world opinion is lost, said Israeli commentator Ronen Bergman. He said the “siege mentality” mindset was dangerous, particularly for a nation seeking to rally world support against what Israel sees as an existential threat — Iran’s nuclear program.
Many in Israel blame the country’s public diplomacy mechanism for not explaining itself properly and for being outmaneuvered in the media, but Bergman said this largely misses the point. “The problem is not with the marketing. The problem is with the product and the product is damaged. You can’t market occupation,” Bergman said, referring to Israel’s 43 years of control over the Palestinians.
A small French cinema chain postponed a showing of an Israeli comedy and replaced it with a documentary about an American student crushed to death by an Israeli army bulldozer during a 2003 Gaza protest, drawing condemnations from some French newspapers and French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand.
Israeli singer Dana International was scheduled to perform at a gay pride parade in Spain, but saw her concert canceled due to pressure from pro-Palestinian organizations.
I [Ronen Bergman] discovered a case from 1954, of an Israeli suspected of selling secrets to an Arab country. He was kidnapped by Israeli agents in Paris, and on the flight home was given an accidental overdose of a sedative and died. His wife was pregnant, and was never told what happened. I was the first person to tell his son that the Mossad threw his father’s body from the plane into the sea. At first the Shin Bet and Mossad denied it, then said they didn’t have the file. Eventually, they admitted it and apologized.
Ronen Bergman has published numerous articles and academic papers on topics such as Israeli military history, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iranian-funded terrorism and is author of the book “The Secret War with Iran: The 30-Year Clandestine Struggle Against the World’s Most Dangerous Terrorist Power” (Free Press, 2008), which describes the three-decade intelligence struggle between Iran and the West.
WSJ: Siege Fatigue and the Flotilla Mistake by Ronen Bergman
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(The Forward) – Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein advised the High Court of Justice to refrain from enforcing jail sentences for the 22 ultra-Orthodox women charged with violating an order to send their Ashkenazi daughters to school with their Sephardi peers.
The mothers had appealed to the High Court after failing to show up for their two-week jail sentencing. The attorney general responded to the appeal by saying he supported the stance of welfare agencies that the women should remain at home with their children. Minister of Religious Services Yakov Margi (Shas) urges haredi restraint in Emmanuel ‘tragedy’.
An ultra-Orthodox father enters jail for ignoring a court ruling on segregated schools, Jerusalem, June 18, 2010
Thirty-five men, fathers to the Ashkenazi girls attending an illegally segregated school in the West Bank settlement of Emmanuel, arrived at the Ma’asiyahu prison earlier Thursday evening to serve a two-week sentence.
The High Court had been set to deliberate Friday regarding the 22 mothers and two fathers who failed to arrive for sentencing. The hearing has now been postponed to Sunday morning, despite the Israel Police’s efforts to seek these parents’ arrest.
The parents of Ashkenazi Haredim (European) descent at the all girls’ school have refused to let their daughters study with classmates of Middle Easten and North African descent, known as Sephardim.
The Ashkenazi parents insist that they are not racist, but want to keep the classrooms segregated – as they have been for years – on the grounds that the Sephardi families of are not religious enough.
The Supreme Court has rejected that argument and ruled that the 43 sets of parents who defied the integration efforts by keeping their daughters from school were to be jailed. The parents were required to either return their daughters to school and refrain from discrimination, or face jail time.
High Court to West Bank parents: Desegregate school or face jail time
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
WASHINGTON (The Forward) — Jewish groups, working with congressional leaders, are pressing to designate one of the main organizers of the humanitarian flotilla that sought to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza as a terrorist group.
With a boost from Senate leaders, the Jewish groups are lobbying the administration to sanction Insani Yardım Vakfı, the nonprofit sponsor of the ship Mavi Marmara.
Many questions about what happened on board the ship remain in dispute, and calls for an international investigation have led Israel to sponsor a panel with two international observers that will examine some aspects of the affair, though not what happened on the boat.
But meanwhile, New York-area Congress members and the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater New York are also urging the administration to deny visas to passengers on the Mavi Mamara who have been invited to speak in the United States about what they experienced.
“The people who were on that flotilla should not be allowed to come to the United States and spill their propaganda and hatred and terrorist rhetoric,” said Rep. Eliot Engel, a New York Democrat. Rep. Jerrold Nadler added: “It is the responsibility of our government to ensure that terrorists, and those who support terrorist activities, not be allowed to enter the United States.”
David Letwin, a spokesperson for Al Awda NY, which plans to bring three Mavi Mamara passengers to Brooklyn June 17 to speak publicly, denounced the effort to deny them visas as “a smokescreen.”
`This has nothing to do with terror,” he said. “It has to do with powerful politicians in this country trying to silence any criticism of what’s going on in Israel.”
The Anti-Defamation League, in a June 8 letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, pointed to both the IHH and a coalition of which it is a part, the Union of Good, as groups that should be viewed as terrorist entities alongside Hamas, Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda.
Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA)
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."The Supreme Court just ruled that anyone who materially or in manner helps an organization listed on the US State Department list of terrorist organizations, may be punished.
Will that include peace activists seeking to break the Gaza siege or bring needed materials to a starving population?
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See my earlier comments
Under U.S. law, it is a crime for any person to provide “material support or resources” to a designated FTO. Known as the “material support” law, 18 U.S.C. § 2339B has become a cornerstone in U.S. counter-terrorism efforts. Since 2001, the U.S. has charged approximately 150 defendants with violations of the statute, and to date approximately 75 people have been convicted.
The statute defines “material support or resources” as:
“any property, tangible or intangible, or service, including currency or monetary instrument or financial securities, financial services, lodging, training, expert advice or assistance, safehouses, false documentation or identification, communications equipment, facilities, weapons, lethal substances, explosives, personnel (1 or more individuals who may be or include oneself), and transportation, except medicine or religious materials” (emphasis added).
Just wondering when the Kach and Kahane Chai will be incriminated by the Patriot Act. (Designated as a FTO by U.S. State Dep’t)
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."When did Israel ever care about world opinion? It only cares about impression management in America, where the mainstream press pretty much repeats Israeli spun narratives, and possibly what is published in some EU countries.
In September, as Netanyahu promised, “we build again.” Israeli colonialism is unstoppable at this point, and I don’t think Israel gives a damn what anyone says. Besides, it would threaten the existence of Israel if it did not.
Cook paints a rather dismal picture in this article.
“ what Israel sees as an existential threat — Iran’s nuclear program.“
What utter rubbish! Israel knows very well that Iran is not an existential threat, with or without a nuclear program. This is just another of a long, long string of claims of existential threat used to keep up Israel’s image as the uber-heroic plucky little victim.
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Indeed one of many thoughtful articles one can find in Haaretz newspaper. In many of my diaries on the I/P issue I find support from Haaretz journalists and opinion writers. I imagine it’s political corruption and money flow from corporations and charities that surpass legal taxation bounds to hold Israelis captive. The single fact of using the Shoa as a PR piece across the western world keeps a false victimhood of today’s state of Israel and its government of thugs.
(Haaretz) – Israel is in thrall to a destructive, vicious cycle, like that of a drug addict or a violent man, which repeats itself (with some variations) at every turn. Each time the cycle becomes shorter, and a suicidal ending seems inevitable at the moment.
It happens like this: Israel uses immense force to attack an immeasurably smaller and weaker entity, which it perceives as nothing less than a dangerous enemy threatening its existence. By attacking, Israel inflicts huge damage to many people, among them the innocent or the presumed innocent, and causes itself enormous damage because the world is furious at it.
Israel once again feels threatened and defends itself by further entrenchment – physical, military and diplomatic. All proposals for change are seen as a threat, and Israel does its best to reject them.
The Jewish people in Zion has in the past been the victim of horrific violence. Israel today is captive to a false sense of victimhood, which goes together with both a sense of false omnipotence and guilt-cum-aggressiveness.
≈ Cross-posted from an earlier BooMan’s fp story — Some Thoughts on Israel ≈
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."“Israel today is captive to a false sense of victimhood, which goes together with a sense of false omnipotence.“
I do not know this writer, but that is an absolutely brilliantly concise and cogent description of Israel’s identity not only today, but throughout its history. In fact, the only word I would remove from that statement is “today”, since the false sense of victimhood and equally false omnipotence, although they have intensified throughout Israel’s history, are nothing new.
I must pay attention to this writer from now on.
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Just got this in my mailbox … I thought it was about green energy.
You can play a key role in stopping Ahmadinejad and Iran by helping to reduce the United States’ reliance on foreign oil.
Iran receives up to $100 million a day in oil revenues, which is an astonishing $1.8 trillion over the next forty years. That is $1.8 trillion that Iran can use to further their support of Hezbollah. $1.8 trillion that Iran can use in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. $1.8 trillion that Iran can use to threaten the region and meet its stated goal of eliminating Israel from the map.
It is an imperative that we act now! Join us in stopping Iran by shutting down the funding. Help us prevent Iran and other dangerous regimes from supporting terrorism and spreading the world’s most deadly weapons. Sign and circulate our petition today.
Signed:
Rabbi Steve Gutow
President, Jewish Council for Public Affairs
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
GAZA, Palestinian Territory (NY Times) – Three years after Israel and Egypt imposed an embargo on this tormented Palestinian strip, shutting down its economy, a consensus has emerged that the attempt to weaken the governing party, Hamas, and drive it from power has failed.
In its three years in power, Hamas has taken control of not only security, education and the justice system but also the economy, by regulating and taxing an extensive smuggling tunnel system from Egypt. In the process, the traditional and largely pro-Western business community has been sidelined.
This may be about to change.
“We need to build a legitimate private sector in Gaza as a strong counterweight to extremism,” Tony Blair, who serves as the international community’s liaison to the Palestinians, said in an interview. The views of Mr. Blair, a former prime minister of Britain, reflected those of the Obama administration as well. “To end up with a Gaza that is dependent on tunnels and foreign aid is not a good idea,” he said.
Businesspeople in Gaza say that by closing down legitimate commerce, Israel has helped Hamas tighten its domination. And by allowing in food for shops but not goods needed for industry, Israel is helping keep Gaza a welfare society, the sort of place where extremism can flourish.
“I can’t get cocoa powder, I can’t get malt, I can’t get shortening or syrup or wrapping material or boxes,” said Mohammed Telbani, the head of Al Awda, a cookie and ice cream factory in the central town of Deir al Balah. “I don’t like Hamas, and I don’t like Fatah. All I want is to make food.”
‘Yes to coriander, No to kassams’
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."