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Asia became the largest importer of arms from 2007 to 2011, as international transfers of major conventional weapons rose 24 percent, research revealed Monday.

@ Global Times

Sun Wei and agencies contributed to this story.Bottom of Form

“What have you learned in school today, my son?”

“There was no school today. There is an emergency!”

“And what have you learned from that, my son?”

ACTUALLY, QUITE a lot.

This week’s “round”, as the army likes to call it, followed a well-established pattern, as formal as a religious ritual.

It started with the assassination (or “targeted elimination”) of a hitherto unknown Palestinian resistance (“terrorist”) leader in the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinians responded with a rain of missiles, which lasted for four whole days. More than a million Israelis around Gaza stopped working and stayed with their children near their shelters or “protected areas” (meaning nothing more than relatively safe rooms in their homes.) One million Israelis roughly equate to 10 million Germans or 40 million Americans, in relation to the population.

A proportion of these rockets were intercepted in their flight by the three batteries of the “Iron Dome” anti-missile defense. There were some Israeli injured and some minor material damage, but no Israeli dead.

Israeli manned and unmanned aircraft struck and there were 26 Palestinian dead in the Gaza Strip.

After four days and nights, both sides had had enough, and Egyptian mediators achieved an unwritten Tahdiyeh (Arabic for “Quiet”).

Everything as usual.

EXCEPT FOR the details, of course.

It all started with the killing of one Zuhair al-Qaisi , the General Secretary of the “Popular Committees”. He has been in this position for only a few months.

The “Popular Committees” are a minor resistance/terrorist group, the third by size in the Strip. They are overshadowed by Hamas, which did not take part in this round, and “Islamic Jihad”, which took up the cause of the “committees” and launched most of the rockets.

The number of launches was a surprise. During the four days, 200 rockets were launched – an average of some 50 per day. 169 fell in Israel. There was no sign that the Jihad was running out of stock. Hamas, of course, is a much larger organization, with a much bigger arsenal. In the Gaza Strip, one must assume, there are now huge quantities of missiles, almost all the more sophisticated ones provided by Iran. How they made the long journey can only be guessed.

One must assume that in Hizbollah-dominated South Lebanon, the stockpiles of missiles are even greater.

On the other side (ours) the Iron Dome has chalked up a huge success, a source of great pride for the contractor, the army and the country at large.

This is a sophisticated system, made in Israel, which initially evoked a lot of skepticism. For that reason, there are at this moment only three batteries in action, each protecting one city (Ashkelon, Ashdod, Beer Sheva). A fourth battery is scheduled to be provided soon.

The system does not intercept every rocket, which would be enormously costly. Instead, the system itself calculates whether a rocket would fall in open space (and could be ignored) or on a populated area (when the interceptor would be launched), all in seconds. Of these, more than 70% were intercepted and destroyed, a great success by any reckoning.

The sting is that one of the Palestinian rockets costs only a few hundred shekels, while one single Iron Dome missile costs 315 thousand shekels. During the four days, 17.6 million shekels’ worth of missiles was spent by the Israeli side. This apart from the very high price tag of the batteries themselves.

The Air Force sorties over the Gaza Strip cost another tens of millions – one hour of flight costs some 100 thousand shekels (almost 25 thousand dollars).

THE FIRST question to be asked was therefore: was the whole exercise worthwhile?

Israelis rarely ask themselves such questions. They believe that those in charge know what they are doing.

But do they?

It all hinges on the necessity to kill al-Qaisi, even for those who believe in such killings as a solution.

Al-Qaisi was in his position as leader of the “Popular Committees” only since the assassination of his predecessor in similar circumstances. A replacement will easily be found. He may be better or worse, but will hardly make much difference.

The Minister of Defense, Ehud Barak, gave a strangely convoluted explanation for the assassination: “(al-Qaisi) was one of the heads of Popular Committees who were, it seems, busy preparing a large attack. I cannot yet say whether this attack was averted.” It seems. I cannot say.

Unofficially it was said that al-Qaisi may have been involved in sending a group of militants from Gaza to the Egyptian Sinai, to attack Israeli territory from there. Last year there was such an attack near Eilat, with several Israeli dead, al-Qaisi’s predecessor was blamed for that and killed before an investigation had even started.

So was it worthwhile to endanger the lives of so many people, send a million people to the shelters and spend tens of millions of shekels on such grounds?

My guess is that al-Qaisi was killed because an opportunity presented itself to do so – such as information on his movements.

WHO MADE the decision?

Targeted assassinations are based on information received from the Shabak (aka Shin Bet). In practice, it is this security service that makes the decision to kill people – acting as gatherer of the information, the assessor of it, and the judge at the same time. No independent analysis of the information, no review, no judicial process of any kind. Questioning the Shabak almost amounts to treason, no politician and no journalist would dare to do so, even if he were so inclined- which he or she is not.

After the Shabak has decided to kill somebody, this is brought  to a tiny group of men: the Prime Minister, the Minister of Defense, the army Chief of Staff and perhaps the officer commanding. Nobody with an independent outlook.

Did any of these people ask the relevant questions?  I doubt it.

For example: Binyamin Netanyahu prides himself on his huge success in America, indeed in the entire world: he has managed to get everybody deeply concerned about the (not yet existing) Iranian nuclear bomb. The Palestinian issue has been completely wiped off the map. And here he sets in motion another round of fighting that reminds people everywhere that the Palestinian issue is alive and kicking, and that it may explode at any moment. Does that make sense even from the point of view of a Netanyahu or a Barak?

ANOTHER INTESTING political aspect of this “round” was the role Hamas played in it, or, rather, didn’t.

Hamas rules the Gaza Strip. The Israeli government does not officially recognize this rule, but somehow still considers Hamas responsible for everything that happens in the Strip, whether Hamas was involved or not.

Until now Hamas entered the fight whenever Israel attacked objects in Gaza. This time, it stayed outside the fray, and even emphasized this fact in telephone interviews on Israeli TV.

Why? Hamas is closely connected with the Muslim Brotherhood, which now dominates the Egyptian parliament. It is under pressure to create a unity government with Fatah in Palestine and join the PLO. Taking part in the armed fight against Israel at this moment would jeopardize this effort. The more so as the Islamic Jihad is closely connected with Iran, the rival of Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

ISRAELI TV correspondents have the annoying habit of concluding their reports with a disturbingly banal sentence. For example, a report about a fatal road accident will almost invariably end with the words: “…and he (or she) only wanted to get safely home.”

This week, almost all the final reports about the mess in the south ended with the words: “Quiet has returned to the South – until the next time!”

Everybody assumes that “next time” the rockets coming out of Gaza will have a greater range and perhaps reach the outskirts of Tel Aviv, and everybody in Israel hopes that the Iron Dome missile will become even more effective.

Until then, All Quiet on the Southern Front.

By Uri Avnery

17 March 2012

It looks like a classic case of gratuitous police witch-hunt and framing of innocents on dubious, unsubstantiated charges. The arrest of Mohammad Ahmad Kazmi, a Delhi based urdu journalist working for Iran’s state broadcaster IRNA, in connection with the recent attack on Israeli diplomat’s car in Delhi, clearly smacks of a sinister conspiracy. Kazmi was arrested by police on Wednesday, while returning to his home in Jor Bagh from India Islamic Cultural Centre, Lodhi Road. Police claims that he provided the executioner with the logistical support, but did not have knowledge about the entire plot. His family rubbishes the charges as baseless and concocted, alleging that he has been framed because he is an outspoken critic of US and Israel and appears on many TV channels regularly.

Looking at the overall picture, there seems to be more to it than meets the eye. It reminds me of the similar cases framed by Delhi Police against my own Kashmiris in Delhi, SAR Geelani (a teacher at Zakir Husain College, DU) and Iftekhar Gilani (Journalist), who were detained, interrogated and later acquitted.

The suspected bomber, who is the prime accused in the case, has already fled the country, claims police. Kazmi is accused of having been in regular touch with the main suspect, though he had no inkling about the whole ‘terror’ plot. Police claims that the conspiracy was hatched in January 2011, outside the country, and Kazmi was supposed to gather all the information about the diplomat’s car and pass it on to the executioners of plot. Police managed to track Kazmi via technical surveillance system.

Kazmi has been working with IRNA since 1988 and has earlier worked with DD and BBC also, having covered Iraq and more recently Syria as his major assignments. He is also a regular contributor for many prominent Urdu dailies and periodicals. He also volunteers to teach English to underprivileged children at India Islamic Cultural Centre. The journalists who have worked with Kazmi in the past have already expressed their outrage and indignation. He is a widely respected analyst and commentator on Middle East politics and minces no words in calling spade a spade. To my mind, in this case, he is merely a pawn in a rather sinister game.

This act by police is utterly vindictive, but not shocking. Delhi Police is notorious for it. However, it is sad that this time they chose to target a journalist from Urdu media. I wonder how the mainstream English media would have reacted had one of their own been arrested on such dubious charges. Some of his colleagues fear that he might have been on police radar since a week, when he appeared on a national television and blasted US and Israel for their paranoia. (link: http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/prime-time/video-story/223929)

In such a grim scenario where journalists are arrested, tortured and interrogated for expressing their views, which are not in sync with the official rhetoric, freedom of expression is bound to become a serious casualty. In this country, where dissent amounts to sedition and freedom of expression is often sacrificed at the altar of larger ‘national interest’, journalists and writers have to walk a tightrope. This is where Kazmi seems to have faltered. He has made enemies for not toeing the official line on US and Israel and hence has invited the wrath for it.

So far, only few odd voices from Urdu media have come out in his support, which is not surprising. The game has just begun. Media trail will start now. The likes of Arnab Goswamis and Praveen Swamis will go all out to manufacture charges against him. He will be attacked, interrogated, tortured, harassed, ridiculed and finally he will be set free. In the ensuing hullabaloo we may never hear the true story, because we will not be exposed to it, given India’s “strategic interests”. However, one thing is certain, and I can vouch for it: he is merely a pawn in a sinister game.

By Syed Zafar Mehdi

8 March 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

(Writer is a Delhi based Journalist.)

Key staff from Al Jazeera’s Beirut Bureau have resigned citing “bias” in the channel’s stance on the conflict in Syria.

Bureau Managing Director Hassan Shaaban reportedly quit last week, after his correspondent and producer had walked out in protest.

A source told the Lebanese paper Al Akhbar that Al Jazeera’s Beirut correspondent Ali Hashem had quit over the channel’s stance on covering events in Syria. “… his position [which] changed after the station refused to show photos he had taken of armed fighters clashing with the Syrian Army in Wadi Khaled. Instead [Al Jazeera] lambasted him as a shabeeh [implying a regime loyalist],” a source told Lebanese press.

Ali Hashem was also infuriated by Al Jazeera’s refusal to cover a crackdown by the King of Bahrain while twisting its Syria angle. “[In Bahrain], we were seeing pictures of a people being butchered by the ‘Gulf’s oppression machine’, and for Al Jazeera, silence was the name of the game,” he said.

The Beirut bureau’s producer also quit claiming Al Jazeera had totally ignored Syria’s constitutional reform referendum, which saw a 57% turnout with 90% voting for change.

Ghassan Ben Jeddo, who had been the head of the Beirut Bureau before resigning almost a year ago, said that Al Jazeera was biased in covering the Arab Spring, especially in Syria and Bahrain.

“I do believe that Al Jazeera and other channels were not balanced in dealing with the events,” he said. “For instance, with respect to the events in Syria and Bahrain, we started to invite guests from America who only criticize the regime in Syria and support the regime in Bahrain and persons who justify NATO intervention. This is unacceptable.”

Journalist and author Afshin Rattansi, who worked for Al Jazeera, told RT that, “sadly”, the channel had become one-sided voice for the Qatari government’s stance against Bashar al-Assad, having begun as the region’s revolutionary broadcaster.

“It is very disturbing to hear how Al Jazeera is now becoming this regional player for foreign policy in a way that some would arguably say the BBC and others have been for decades,” he said. “If Al Jazeera Arabic is going to take a war-like stance after [the] Qatari government, this would be very ill.”

“There is the courage of these journalists, however, in saying ‘Look, this is not the way we should be covering this. There are elements of Al-Qaeda in there,’” Rattansi concluded. “The way Al Jazeera Arabic has covered the story of Syria is completely one-sided.”

Journalists and anti-war activist Don Debar, who has also had Al Jazeera experience, confirmed that the station has been heavily guided by the Qatari government in its policies.

“That has been ongoing since last April of 2011,” Debar told RT. “The head of the bureau in Beirut quit, many other people quit because of the biased coverage and outright hand of the government in dictating editorial policy over Libya, and now Syria.”

­‘There’s a chill, they’re controlling things more at Al Jazeera’

­Former Al Jazeera English-language blogger Ted Rall recounted his own story of quitting the job. He said his blogs and columns were being rejected on a regular basis.

“For a long time I ascribed it to incompetence on their part because they weren’t very good at getting back very quickly, but over time I came to learn through various people there that the politics of the channel were changing,” he told RT. What he found out was that leftist and progressive voices such as his were not welcome anymore and that he no longer needed to submit anything.

Rall noted that this change in policy only took place recently.

“After September 11, Al Jazeera became a channel that could be counted upon for openness and transparency, certainly compared to most corporate broadcast media in the West, particularly related to the Middle East and Central Asia and South Asia but that has really changed in the last year or so,” he said “There’s a chill, they’re controlling things more.”

When Rall first went to work at Al Jazeera, he says he was surprised that it was actually owned by the Qatari government. He compared their past hands-off policy to that of Rupert Murdoch when he owned the Village Voice of New York City. But now, the “Qataris have decided to shape the picture of the news a little more than they used to.”

While he rejected the notion of objectivity, Rall did note that the media could try to present a more balanced view.

“What you really want to see is a broad marketplace of ideas, where lots of different ideas and stories are being told,” he summed up.

­When it was first set up, Al Jazeera English was intended to be a softer version of its Arabic counterpart. Since then, the situation has changed drastically, Middle East analyst Tariq Ali told RT. “The channel I think, was largely set up to please the west and its coverage showed that very clearly. There were few critical programs, compared to Arabic Al Jazeera, but it seems now both are working in tandem.”

By Rt.com

12 March 2012

Gilad Atzmon outlines a vision of Palestinian-Jewish reconciliation in Palestine where Jews, freed of their Zionist state and its ideology of oppression, exclusiveness, exceptionalism, and racial supremacy and segregation, live side by side with Palestinians as citizens of one state with equal rights and responsibilities.

I was asked to talk to you about the on-going dispute within our ranks between those who support the one-state to the Israeli Palestinian conflict, and those who advocate two states for the two people.

Interestingly enough, this is a topic I hardly comment on, and not because I am short of vision, opinion or ideas, but rather because I believe that the fate of the people in Palestine and Israel should be decided by the Israelis and the Palestinians themselves. I, for instance, fail to see what qualifies a New York City Jewish academic or activist to determine how people should live in Palestine or anywhere else. Furthermore, I have never seen a Palestinian trying to advise Western solidarity activists how to run their lives. I argue then, that our “interventionist” enthusiasm to preach to others on how they should live is actually slightly pretentious.

But the subject is obviously deeper: in spite of the fact Israel is an organic sovereign state – it is already recognized as one state by the [other] nations, it has a single sewage system, one power grid, one pre-dial international code –many Western leaders insist that it should actually be divided into two. Don’t you think that it is pretty unusual for the “international community” to blindly follow the Zionist ideology and draw a racially-inspired line between the two people on the land?

Zionism – a failed enterprise

So, rather than enter an endless and futile debate here, I propose that we should begin from a point at which we all agree: I presume that we all accept that Israel is currently one state but is dominated politically and spiritually by an ethnocentric discriminatory political system.

Israel defines itself as “the Jewish state” and the practical meaning of this is quite devastating. It is racially driven. Israeli laws favour the Jewish population over the indigenous people of the land. Israel is impervious to universal and ethical thoughts. It is basically there to serve one tribe at the expense of the people of the land.

I would insist that in order to tackle the issue of resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, we must first understand what is Israel is all about. We must ask what the Jewish nature of Israel entails. We should understand the relationship between Zionism and Jewishness.

Zionism presented itself initially as a utopian promise to bring to life a new “authentic, ethical and civilized Jew”; it promised to make Jews into “a people like all other people”. But the Israeli reality has proved to be the complete opposite of that aspiration. Zionism has totally failed. The Israelis have been proven to be the most unethical collective in the history of the Jews.

One may wonder why, where and when did it all go so wrong? Why did Zionism fail? If Zionism was a unique moment of Jewish reawakening and self-reflection, then why didn’t it live up to that promises?

I believe that the answer is devastating. Zionism was doomed from its very beginning, for in spite of its pseudo-secularist agenda, it was entangled with a quasi-religious ideology, and inevitably it transformed the Bible into a land registry and turned God into an estate agent. It was the Jewishness of the Jewish state, then, that prevailed over the early Zionist utopia. It is the Jewishness in Israel that has led to ethnic cleansing, segregation, isolation and, ultimately, the resurrection of the European ghetto walls.

In order to contemplate the prospect of a peaceful future, then, we must be able to understand the complicated relationship between Jews, Zionism, Israel and Jewishness, and we have to ask whether there is any lucid vision of peace within the Jewish ideological and cultural discourse.

But are we even allowed to ask these questions? I say certainly yes, we must. After all, Israel openly, consciously and even proudly defines itself as the Jewish state. Its aircraft drop bombs on densely populated Palestinian neighbourhoods while decorated with Jewish symbols. Surely, then, we are entitled to ask what Jewishness means and what is its role within the Jewish psyche and spirit.

Jewishness and the Jewish psyche

In my book The Wandering Who? I have attempted to untangle this knot. I have tried to understand what is Jewish identity politics all about. I have exposed the continuum between Zionism, Jewish anti-Zionism and some elements within the left. In the book I try to establish the meaning of Jewishness and how is it related to Jewish politics and Jewish political power?

In the last few pages of the book I elaborate on a fictitious peace scenario in which an imaginary Israeli prime minister who reaches the conclusion, pretty much out of the blue, that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be resolved with just a single statement.

In a news conference, the imaginary Israel prime minister announces to the world and his/her people that “Israel realizes its unique circumstances and its responsibility for world peace. Israel calls on the Palestinian people to return to their homes. The Jewish state is to become a state of its citizens, where all peoples enjoy full and equal rights.”

Though shocked by the sudden Israeli move, political analysts around the world are quick to realize that, considering Israel is the representative of world Jewry, such a simple Israeli peaceful initiative would not only resolve the conflict in the Middle East, but would also bring to an end to two millennia of mutual suspicion and resentfulness between Christians and Jews. Some right-wing Israeli academics, ideologists and politicians join the revolutionary initiative and declare that such a heroic unilateral Israeli act could be the one and only total and comprehensive fulfilment of the Zionist dream, for not only have Jews returned to their alleged historical home, but they have also managed, at last, to love their neighbours and be loved in return.

But don’t hold your breath: as thrilling as this idea is, we shouldn’t expect it to happen any time soon, for Israel is not an ordinary state and such a scenario doesn’t fit into its Jewish ethnocentric ideology that is driven by exclusiveness, exceptionalism, racial supremacy and a deep inherent inclination toward segregation.

The meaning of it is very concerning. For Israel and Israelis to fulfil the initial Zionist promise and become “a people like other people”, all traces of ideological superiority must be suppressed first. For the Jewish state to lead a peace initiative, Israel must be de-Zionized – it should first stop being the Jewish state. Similarly, in order for an imaginary Israeli prime minister to bring about peace, he or she must be de-Zionized first.

As things stand, the Jewish state is categorically unable to lead its people into reconciliation. It lacks the necessary ingredients needed to think in terms of harmony and reconciliation – at present, Israel can only think in terms of shalom, a term which, in reality, only means “peace and security for the Jews”.

World Jewry and Israel

But what about world Jewry: can they push their Israeli brothers towards reconciliation? I don’t actually think that they can.

I recently came across some devastating statistics gathered by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR). The poll studied “the attitudes of Jews in Britain towards Israel”. It revealed that “the vast majority of [British Jewish] respondents exhibit strong personal support for, and affinity with, Israel: 95 per cent have visited the country; 90 per cent see it as the “ancestral homeland” of the Jewish people and 86 per cent feel that Jews have a special responsibility for its survival”.

Though some “progressive” Jewish voices insist that diaspora Jews are drifting away from Israel and Zionism, the JPR report reveals the complete opposite: nine out of 10 British Jews feel close affinity to a criminal, ethnic cleansing, racist and discriminatory state.

But what about the one out of 10 Jews who openly opposes Israel? Is he or she going to speak out and help us to get the message of peace across? I am not so sure either. It is more likely that he or she are going to do whatever they can to prevent us from from talking about Jewishness and the fact that 90 per cent of their brothers identify with the Jewish state.

Ahead of my Toronto appearance, the organizers of tonight’s event were subjected to endless harassment by various Jewish “anti-Zionist” organizations and individuals. Like their Zionist brothers, most Jewish “anti-Zionists” are concerned largely with Jewish tribal matters – they will fight anti-Semitism, “Holocaust denial” or any attempt to understand Jewishness from a universal perspective. Yet, as the JPR poll reveals, they will achieve very little within their respective communities.

But the situation may not be totally grim. I am actually slightly optimistic. For more than a while I have been convinced that the only people who can bring peace about are actually the Palestinians, because Palestine, against all odds and in spite of the endless suffering, humiliation and oppression, is still an ethically-driven ecumenical society.

One or two states?

So what do we do for the time being: should we fight for one state or two states? I guess that you gather by now that I am a strong supporter of one state. I would love to see Israel being transformed into a state of its citizens. I would also openly admit that I do realize that this state won’t be a Jewish state. It will be Palestine. It is about time to say it openly: Israel belongs to the past. And yet, I contend that it is the facts on the ground that will determine the future of the region. And what we see on the ground is perhaps encouraging.

In spite of the pain, animosity and distrust between the two people, there is one principle both Israelis and Palestinian would agree upon, namely “Two peoples, one hummus”. It may sound frivolous, banal or trivial to say that, but it is actually far more profound than just a culinary suggestion. Israelis are gradually becoming the minority on the land. As I once heard the Palestinian ambassador to Britain, Manuel Hassassian, saying: “Israel has many lethal bombs, the Palestinians have only one bomb, the demographic one.”

Interestingly enough, when Israelis want to feel authentic, they do not speak in Yiddish or Aramaic; they actually swear in Arabic and eat hummus.

The meaning of it is simple: deep in their hearts the Israelis know that Palestine is the land and Israel is just a state. When Israelis want to bond with Zion they actually plagiarize the indigenous people of the land, for deep inside the Israeli knows that the sky, the sea, al-Quds, Mount Olive, the Sea of Galilee, the Wailing Wall, the Arabic language and the hummus belong to the land. They also grasp that oppression, exceptionalism, supremacy belong to the state – their own Jewish state.

“Two peoples, one hummus” is my image of peace and reconciliation. The land will stay forever; the failing Jewish state is already subject to historical research. The two people will dine together, and they won’t just share the hummus: they might even share the pita bread between them.

By Gilad Atzmon

28 February 2012

@ Redress.cc

Gilad Atzmon is an Israeli-born musician, writer and anti-racism campaigner.

A version of this article was presented as a talk by Gilad Atzmon to the Islamic Society of York, Toronto, Canada, on 24 February 2012.

Gilad Atzmon’s response to charges of racism and anti-semitism levelled against him by Palestinian writers and activists

Ali Abunimah & Co tend to present themselves as advocates of “One Democratic State in Palestine.” This leaves me puzzled: what kind of democracy do they have in mind, exactly? For by calling for my “disavowal,” they prove beyond a doubt that they cannot tolerate even some elementary cultural criticism—criticism that is endorsed and praised by some of the most respected thinkers within our movement and beyond.

In fact, I am pretty delighted with the outraged reactions to my thoughts. I guess it enables us to map the discourse and its boundaries—and means that those boundaries are now official. Not only has my latest book, The Wandering Who?, rocked the boat, but it also has managed to unite Alan Dershowitz and Abe Foxman with Ali Abunimah and Max Blumenthal. That is pretty encouraging: it means that peace may prevail after all.

However, I also have some bad news for my would-be silencers, Palestinian and Jewish alike. I do not have any plans to slow down or drift away. I am a jazz musician and an independent thinker. I am basically a free agent—I say what I think and think what I say. The popularity of my writing among Palestinians, solidarity activists and truth seekers is the direct outcome of my sincere approach to the subject matter.

Whether my detractors accept it or not, the strength of my arguments is grounded on the transparent truthful nature of my premises. Until now, not one of my opponents has been able to point out a single discrepancy within my argument or the facts I cite. For instance, I contend that since Israel defines itself as the Jewish State—its tanks and planes decorated with Jewish symbols—it is our duty to ask: Who are the Jews? What is Judaism? And what is Jewishness all about?

The fact that some activists shy away from asking those questions doesn’t mean that the rest of us also should behave cowardly.

In case my detractors—be they Zionists, Anti-Zionist Zionists or Palestinians—fail to realize it, Palestine is not alone anymore, and is no longer an isolated, remote discourse. Even as I write, AIPAC is publicly and relentlessly pushing America into a new global conflict. In Britain, 80 percent of Tory MPs are members of the Conservative Friends of Israel. What we are witnessing here is a clear Zionist shift from the discourse of a “promised land” to one of a “promised planet.” I’m convinced that calling a spade a spade could actually save the world, including Americans, Brits, Iranians and Palestinians. But it also can save the Jews from the grave potential consequences inflicted on them by the Jewish lobbies.

Sadly, Ali Abunimah has misrepresented my thoughts. Clearly there is no racism, anti-Semitism or Holocaust denial in my writing. As determined as my detractors are to find it, they have failed to identify a single bit of evidence of such tendencies in my work. Ali Abunimah says on my behalf that “one cannot self-describe as a Jew and also do work in solidarity with Palestine, because to identify as a Jew is to be a Zionist.” What a ludicrous interpretation of my writing, in which I go out of my way to define the issue in categorical terms. What I am obviously opposing is Jewish racial exclusivity. If Israel is in the wrong for being a Jews-only State, I argue, then its Jewish critics better fight it using an inclusive, universalist ideology and practice.

I am indeed critical of Jewish identity politics, Jewish culture and Jewish ideology. I am also critical of the Jewish cultural attitude toward history. I am critical of Jewishness and any form of Jewish exclusive political activism. And yet, I wonder, why should any person who seeks justice and peace object to my approach? Is Jewish culture or identity politics beyond criticism? Are Jews chosen after all.

I am sorry to disappoint my Palestinian and Jewish opposition league, but it seems as if their terminology is faulty and misleading: Zionism is not colonialism, for colonialism is defined as a material exchange between a Mother State and a Settler State. The fact that there is no Jewish Mother State suggests that Zionism doesn’t fit the colonial model.

Nor is Israel an Apartheid State, for Apartheid is defined by the exploitation of the indigenous residents. Yet the Jewish State prefers that the Palestinians simply and completely disappear. In other words, we are dealing here with a unique racially driven expansionist philosophy not very different from the Nazis’ Lebensraum.

Israel is not Zionism, and vice versa. Israel is the outcome of the Zionist project. If Zionism is a promise to establish a “Jewish National Home in Palestine,” Israel is its post-revolutionary product. Indeed, Israelis are barely familiar with Zionist thought and ideology. From their perspective, anti-Zionist ranting is a remote Diaspora discourse.

Shalom does not mean peace, reconciliation or harmony. Its accurate English translation is “security for the Jews.” Israeli culture lacks a clear notion of “peace” as we know it—i.e., harmony and reconciliation.

I suggest that my detractors spend some time and think this through, so they can understand that the issues involving this conflict and its resolution go far beyond mere political discourse.

I would like to take this opportunity to advise my opponents that their campaign is counterproductive. Those who are interested in my ideas realize that we are living in a post-political and post-ideological era. Like myself, they are interested in an ethical argument. They are not “party members,” and they are not taking “orders” from any sectarian group or ideology. Instead they listen to their hearts. Those pro-Palestinian organizations sponsoring my current U.S. book tour realize very well that my work galvanizes a demarcation line between truth and its enemies.

In spite of the relentless slander campaign against my writing, it has not achieved a thing except to expose a rigorous intellectual intolerance in our midst. If my opposition is concerned with my thoughts, it will have to learn to debate. Before we can proceed, I guess, my detractors may have to actually read my book and decide exactly what they are against.

By Gilad Atzmon

15 March 2012

@ Gilad.co.uk

Gilad Atzmon is an Israeli-born musician, writer and anti-racism campaigner..His New Book: The Wandering Who? A Study Of Jewish Identity Politics Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

Ayn Rand’s ideas have become the Marxism of the new right.

It has a fair claim to be the ugliest philosophy the post-war world has produced. Selfishness, it contends, is good, altruism evil, empathy and compassion are irrational and destructive. The poor deserve to die; the rich deserve unmediated power. It has already been tested, and has failed spectacularly and catastrophically. Yet the belief system constructed by Ayn Rand, who died 30 years ago today, has never been more popular or influential.

Rand was a Russian from a prosperous family who emigrated to the United States. Through her novels (such as Atlas Shrugged) and her non-fiction (such as The Virtue of Selfishness(1)) she explained a philosophy she called Objectivism. This holds that the only moral course is pure self-interest. We owe nothing, she insists, to anyone, even to members of our own families. She described the poor and weak as “refuse” and “parasites”, and excoriated anyone seeking to assist them. Apart from the police, the courts and the armed forces, there should be no role for government: no social security, no public health or education, no public infrastructure or transport, no fire service, no regulations, no income tax.

Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957, depicts a United States crippled by government intervention, in which heroic millionaires struggle against a nation of spongers. The millionaires, whom she portrays as Atlas holding the world aloft, withdraw their labour, with the result that the nation collapses. It is rescued, through unregulated greed and selfishness, by one of the heroic plutocrats, John Galt.

The poor die like flies as a result of government programmes and their own sloth and fecklessness. Those who try to help them are gassed. In a notorious passage, she argues that all the passengers in a train filled with poisoned fumes deserved their fate(2,3). One, for example, was a teacher who taught children to be team players; one was a mother married to a civil servant, who cared for her children; one was a housewife “who believed that she had the right to elect politicians, of whom she knew nothing”.

Rand’s is the philosophy of the psychopath, a misanthropic fantasy of cruelty, revenge and greed. Yet, as Gary Weiss shows in his new book Ayn Rand Nation, she has become to the new right what Karl Marx once was to the left: a demi-god at the head of a chiliastic cult(4). Almost one-third of Americans, according to a recent poll, have read Atlas Shrugged(5), and it now sells hundreds of thousands of copies every year.

Ignoring Rand’s evangelical atheism, the Tea Party movement has taken her to its heart. No rally of theirs is complete without placards reading “Who is John Galt?” and “Rand was right”. Ayn Rand, Weiss argues, provides the unifying ideology which has “distilled vague anger and unhappiness into a sense of purpose.” She is energetically promoted by the broadcasters Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Rick Santelli. She is the guiding spirit of the Republicans in Congress(6).

Like all philosophies, Objectivism is absorbed second-hand by people who have never read it. I believe it is making itself felt on this side of the Atlantic: in the clamorous new demands to remove the 50p tax band for the very rich, for example, or among the sneering, jeering bloggers who write for the Telegraph and the Spectator, mocking compassion and empathy, attacking efforts to make the world a kinder place.

It is not hard to see why Rand appeals to billionaires. She offers them something that is crucial to every successful political movement: a sense of victimhood. She tells them that they are parasitised by the ungrateful poor and oppressed by intrusive, controlling governments.

It is harder to see what it gives the ordinary teabaggers, who would suffer grievously from a withdrawal of government. But such is the degree of misinformation which saturates this movement and so prevalent in the US is Willy Loman Syndrome (the gulf between reality and expectations(7)) that millions blithely volunteer themselves as billionaires’ doormats. I wonder how many would continue to worship at the shrine of Ayn Rand if they knew that towards the end of her life she signed on for both Medicare and Social Security(8). She had railed furiously against both programmes, as they represented everything she despised about the intrusive state. Her belief system was no match for the realities of age and ill-health.

But they have a still more powerful reason to reject her philosophy: as Adam Curtis’s documentary showed last year, the most devoted member of her inner circle was Alan Greenspan(9). Among the essays he wrote for Ayn Rand were those published in a book he co-edited with her called Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal(10). Here, starkly explained, you’ll find the philosophy he brought into government. There is no need for the regulation of business – even builders or Big Pharma – he argued, as “the ‘greed’ of the businessman or, more appropriately, his profit-seeking … is the unexcelled protector of the consumer.”(11) As for bankers, their need to win the trust of their clients guarantees that they will act with honour and integrity. Unregulated capitalism, he maintains, is a “superlatively moral system”(12).

Once in government, Greenspan applied his guru’s philosophy to the letter, lobbying to cut taxes for the rich and repeal the laws constraining the banks, refusing to regulate the predatory lending and the derivatives trading which eventually brought the system down. Much of this is already documented, but Weiss shows that in the US Greenspan has successfully airbrushed this history.

Despite the many years he spent at her side, despite his previous admission that it was Rand who persuaded him that “capitalism is not only efficient and practical but also moral,”(13) he mentioned her in his memoirs only to suggest that it was a youthful indiscretion, and this, it seems, is now the official version. Weiss presents powerful evidence that even today Greenspan remains her loyal disciple, having renounced his partial admission of failure to Congress.

Saturated in her philosophy, the new right on both sides of the Atlantic continues to demand the rollback of the state, even as the wreckage of that policy lies all around. The poor go down, the ultra-rich survive and prosper. Ayn Rand would have approved.

By George Monbiot

5 March 2012

@ Guradin

www.monbiot.com

References:

1. In the spirit of Rand, I suggest you don’t pay for it, but download it here: http://tfasinternational.org/ila/Ayn_Rand-The_Virtue_of_Selfishness.pdf

2. The just desserts are detailed on page 605 of the 2007 Penguin edition.

3. The gassing and subsequent explosion are explained on page 621.

4. Gary Weiss, 2012. Ayn Rand Nation: The Hidden Struggle for America’s Soul. St. Martin’s Press, New York.

5. This was a Zogby poll, conducted at the end of 2010, cited by Gary Weiss.

6. To give one of many examples, Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, says that “the reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand.” This is a little ironic, in view of the fact that Rand abhorred the idea of public service. Quoted by Gary Weiss.

7. http://www.monbiot.com/2006/07/07/willy-loman-syndrome/

8. Gary Weiss, pp61-63.

9. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011lvb9

10. Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan and Robert Hessen (Eds), 1967. Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. Signet, New York.

11. Alan Greenspan, August 1963. The Assault on Integrity. First published in The Objectivist Newsletter, later in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.

12. As above.

13. From an article by Soma Golden in the New York Times, July 1974, quoted by Gary Weiss.

India has witnessed many an acts of communal violence. Starting from the Jabalpur riot of 1961 to the last major one of Kandhmal (August 2008). Many innocent lives have been lost in the name of religion. Amongst these the Gujarat carnage is a sort of marker. It came in the backdrop of massive Anti Sikh pogrom of 1984, the anti Muslim violence of post Babri demolition and the horrific burning of Pastor Graham Steward Stains in Kandhmal. It was a quantitative and qualitative departure from the other major carnages which have rocked the country.

To begin with the burning of Sabarmati S 6 coach was cleverly projected to be an act done by neighboring Muslims and in turn the violence was directed against the Muslim population of Gujarat, on the ground that the Hindu sentiments are hurt. The section of Hindu community was deliberately incited by the decision of state to take the burnt bodies of victims in a procession, against the advice of the collector of the city. The Bandh call given by VHP created the ground for violence. Here the social engineering was at its display, and dalits and Adivasis were mobilized to unleash the violence against the hapless innocent Muslims, accompanied by the propaganda which demonized the Muslim community as a whole. While in earlier acts of violence, the state police have been an accomplice and the silent onlooker to the violence, here a sort of active collusion of state machinery and the communal forces was on display.

The BJP ruled state Government had unrestricted run in the state as the Central Government was being ruled by BJP led NDA and the other allies of BJP were too enamored by the spoils of power to spoil the broth by speaking out. Modi had already instructed the officials to sit back when the Hindu backlash will take place. The leading light of socialist movement, George Fernandez, went to the extent of taking the violence against minority women in the stride by saying that rape is nothing new and it happens in such situations. What more was needed for the rioters to run amuck and to central BJP leadership to let the things go on. The pattern of violence against women was particularly horrific, targeting at their reproductive organs and shaming them to no end.

While the architect of Gujarat pogrom Narnedra Modi kept saying that violence has bee controlled in three days, and central BJP leadership patted him for this, the matter of fact was that violence went on and on painfully for a long time, uncontrolled and unrestricted. The attitude of the BJP controlled state was pathetic and showed the religious bias in relief and rehabilitation work. The compensations given to minorities were abysmally low, state quickly retreated from the refugee camps on the ground that the refugee camps are ‘child production centers’, hitting the minorities where it hurts most. The biases against them were on full display. The atmosphere was created by communal forces in such a manner that the riot victims could not go back to their houses as the people in their areas demanded a written undertaking from them, that they will withdraw the cases filed in the context of violence and that they will not file any cases. Most of the police as machinery either refused to file the FIRs or if registered they kept enough loopholes for the criminals to get away. It was in this atmosphere that the process of getting justice became a close to impossible task. The communalized state apparatus, the attitude of police and judiciary led the Supreme court to direct the shifting of cases away from Gujarat.

The investigation against Narendra Modi by the state police was an impossible task and so the Special Investigation team was constituted. Unfortunately, that also did not help the matters. Accompanying all this violence and attitude of state government the minorities started feeling extremely insecure. They were boycotted in trade and other social spaces. The result is the sprawling slum of Juhapura as the symbol of polarization of communities along the religious lines. The total dislocation of the monitories created multiple problems at the level of education and sources of livelihood for the minorities.

The religious polarization and section of media has created a Halo around Narendra Modi, while strictures against him are coming by, about his failure to protect places of religious worship of minorities, the malafide intentions of state in filing cases against social activist Teesta Setalvad, many another cases are still pending, crying for justice for the victims of Gujarat. Having consolidated the section of majority community behind him, assured of their ongoing support, Modi started the high profile propaganda about development and has been trying to distract the attention from the havoc which he has wrought in the state. The big capitalists are finding the state of Gujarat as a happy hunting ground for massive state subsidies, so the media controlled by them is singing praises and modulating popular opinion in his favor, creating a larger than life size image, development man, in order to suppress his role in the violence against minorities.

In this dismal scenario, there have been many an examples of victims and social activists standing for the cause of justice and doing the practically impossible task of getting justice for violence victims despite all the efforts to turn them hostile and protect the guilty of the communal crimes. While the massive propaganda and state policies are trying to turn the minorities into second class citizens, there are efforts which have gone on simultaneously to retrieve the democratic values in the face of such adverse intimidating situation created by the communal forces. Lately, apart from Court judgments, the civil society response has been picking up and the civil society is trying to overcome the stifling situation and trying to make its voice louder. While we are nowhere close to what should ideally be there in a democratic set up, the responses of civil society and social action groups are noteworthy in the matters of getting justice for victims and in the matters of recreating the liberal space which has been undermined by the communal forces. Times alone will tell if democratic values will be successfully brought in this ‘Hindu Rashtra in one state’

By Ram Puniyani

25 February 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Ram Puniyani was a professor in biomedical engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, and took voluntary retirement in December 2004 to work full time for communal harmony in India. He is involved with human rights activities from last two decades.He is associated with various secular and democratic initiatives like All India Secular Forum, Center for Study of Society and Secularism and ANHAD.