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An extraordinary row has broken out between Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust survivor, author and Nobel peace prize winner, and a group of Jewish residents of Jerusalem over who speaks for the future of the disputed city.

Wiesel prompted the argument with an open letter to Barrack Obama appealing for him not to “politicise” differences over Jerusalem by pressing Israel to stop Jewish settlement construction there. In a reflection of the divisions that sometimes exist between Jews who live in the city and those who idealise it from afar, 100 Jewish residents have responded with their own open letter expressing “outrage” at Wiesel’s call, and accusing him of sentimentality and falsely claiming that there is no discrimination against Jerusalem’s Arab population.

Wiesel, who lives in the US, made the appeal to Obama in adverts in American newspapers last month.

“For me, the Jew that I am, Jerusalem is above politics,” he wrote. “It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city; it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that remains hard to explain. When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time; it is a homecoming. The first song I heard was my mother’s lullaby about and for Jerusalem. Its sadness and its joy are part of our collective memory.” He went on to appeal to Obama not to press Israel on the issue of Jerusalem.

“Pressure will not produce a solution. Is there a solution? There must be, there will be. Why tackle the most complex and sensitive problem prematurely?” he asked. “Jerusalem must remain the world’s Jewish spiritual capital, not a symbol of anguish and bitterness, but a symbol of trust and hope.”

The 100 Jewish Jerusalemites, who include academics and political activists, responded in a letter in the New York Review of Books this week that expressed “frustration, even outrage” at Wiesel’s claims and at being “sacrificed for the fantasies of those who love our city from afar”.

“We cannot recognise our city in the sentimental abstraction you call by its name,” they wrote. “Your Jerusalem is an ideal, an object of prayers and a bearer of the collective memory of a people whose members actually bear many individual memories. Our Jerusalem is populated with people, young and old, women and men, who wish their city to be a symbol of dignity – not of hubris, inequality and discrimination. You speak of the celestial Jerusalem; we live in the earthly one.”

The writers accused Wiesel of being blind to history and the realities of life in Jerusalem today, including systematic discrimination against the Arab population and the efforts of “crafty politicians and sentimental populists” frantically trying to Judaize the Arab areas of the city “in order to transform its geopolitics beyond recognition”.

“Your claim that Jerusalem is above politics is doubly outrageous. First, because contemporary Jerusalem was created by a political decision and politics alone keeps it formally unified. The tortuous municipal boundaries of today’s Jerusalem were drawn by Israeli generals and politicians shortly after the 1967 war,” they wrote.

The writers added that by grabbing Palestinian land and villages and incorporating them into a greatly expanded Jerusalem, the Israeli government created “an unwieldy behemoth” larger than Paris.

“Now they call this artificial fabrication ‘Jerusalem’ in order to obviate any approaching chance for peace,” they said. The writers tartly noted that Wiesel chooses not to live in the city he claims such attachment to.

“We prefer the hardship of realizing citizenship in this city to the convenience of merely yearning for it,” they said.

Last month, a former Israeli cabinet minister, Yossi Sarid, responded to Wiesel with an open letter in which he said the author had been “deceived” into believing that all the city’s residents live freely and equally. He took Wiesel to task for claiming that Arabs were free to build anywhere in Jerusalem. The city’s Arab residents face routine obstacles to obtaining planning permission to build in the east and almost never receive authorisation for the west. “Not only may an Arab not build ‘anywhere’, but he may thank his God if he is not evicted from his home and thrown out on to the street with his family and property,” Sarid wrote.

He pointed to Arabs forcibly removed to make way for Jews.

“Those same zealous Jews insist on inserting themselves like so many bones in the throats of Arab neighbourhoods, purifying and Judaizing them with the help of rich American benefactors, several of whom you may know personally,” Sarid wrote. “Barrack Obama appears well aware of his obligations to try to resolve the world’s ills, particularly ours here. Why then undercut him and tie his hands?”

Extract from open letter to Obama from Elie Wiesel

“For me, the Jew that I am, Jerusalem is above politics. It is mentioned more than six hundred times in Scripture – and not a single time in the Koran. Its presence in Jewish history is overwhelming.

“Today, for the first time in history, Jews, Christians and Muslims all may freely worship at their shrines. And, contrary to certain media reports, Jews, Christians and Muslims ARE allowed to build their homes anywhere in the city. The anguish over Jerusalem is not about real estate but about memory.”

Extract from open letter from 100 Jewish Jerusalemites to Wiesel

“Your letter troubles us, not simply because it is replete with factual errors and false representations, but because it upholds an attachment to some other-worldly city which purports to supersede the interests of those who live in the this-worldly one.

“We invite you to our city to view with your own eyes the catastrophic effects of the frenzy of construction. You will witness that, contrary to some media reports, Arabs are not allowed to build their homes anywhere in Jerusalem. You will see the gross inequality in allocation of municipal resources and services between east and west.”

by Chris McGreal in Washington

12 May 2010

guardian.co.uk

In a recent public letter to President Obama, Elie Wiesel urged the President not to “pressure” Israel to cease settlement activity in Jerusalem. According to Wiesel:

For me, the Jew that I am, Jerusalem is above politics. It is mentioned more than six hundred times in Scripture—and not a single time in the Koran. Its presence in Jewish history is overwhelming…. To many theologians, it IS Jewish history…. It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city; it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that remains hard to explain. When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time; it is a homecoming…. Contrary to certain media reports, Jews, Christians and Muslims ARE allowed to build their homes anywhere in the city. The anguish over Jerusalem is not about real estate but about memory.

The views expressed by Wiesel are not shared by a growing movement of Israelis who oppose the continued expansion of settlements and who have been protesting the eviction by the Israeli government of Palestinian residents of the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. These Israelis have responded to Mr. Wiesel in the following letter. Among the one hundred signers are Israel Prize Laureates Avishai Margalit and Zeev Sternhell, former Knesset Speaker and Jewish Agency Chairman Avrum Burg, Professors David Shulman and Moshe Halbertal, former Knesset member Zehava Galan, and other Jerusalemites, many of whom are prominent intellectuals and academics.[1]

—Avner Inbar and Assaf Sharon

Dear Mr. Wiesel:

We write to you from Jerusalem to convey our frustration, even outrage, at your recently published letter on Jerusalem. We are Jewish Jerusalemites—residents by choice of a battered city, a city used and abused, ransacked time and again first by foreign conquerors and now by its own politicians. We cannot recognize our city in the sentimental abstraction you call by its name.

Our Jerusalem is concrete, its hills covered with limestone houses and pine trees; its streets lined with synagogues, mosques, and churches. Your Jerusalem is an ideal, an object of prayers and a bearer of the collective memory of a people whose members actually bear many individual memories. Our Jerusalem is populated with people, young and old, women and men, who wish their city to be a symbol of dignity—not of hubris, inequality, and discrimination. You speak of the celestial Jerusalem; we live in the earthly one.

For more than a generation now the earthly city we call home has been crumbling under the weight of its own idealization. Your letter troubles us, not simply because it is replete with factual errors and false representations, but because it upholds an attachment to some otherworldly city that purports to supersede the interests of those who live in the this-worldly one. For every Jew, you say, a visit to Jerusalem is a homecoming, yet it is our commitment that makes your homecoming possible. We prefer the hardship of realizing citizenship in this city to the convenience of merely yearning for it.

Indeed, your claim that Jerusalem is above politics is doubly outrageous. First, because contemporary Jerusalem was created by a political decision and politics alone keeps it formally unified. The tortuous municipal boundaries of today’s Jerusalem were drawn by Israeli generals and politicians shortly after the 1967 war. Feigning to unify an ancient city, they created an unwieldy behemoth, encircling dozens of Palestinian villages that were never part of Jerusalem. Stretching from the outskirts of Ramallah in the north to the edge of Bethlehem in the south, the Jerusalem that the Israeli government foolishly concocted is larger than Paris. Its historical core, the nexus of memories and religious significance often called the “Holy Basin,” makes up a mere one percent of its area. Now the government calls this artificial fabrication “Jerusalem” in order to obviate any approaching chance for peace.

Second, your attempt to keep Jerusalem above politics means divesting us of a future. For being above politics is being devoid of the power to shape the reality of one’s life. As true Jerusalemites, we cannot stand by and watch our beloved city, parts of which are utterly neglected, being used as a springboard for crafty politicians and sentimental populists who claim that Jerusalem is above politics and negotiation. All the while, they frantically “Judaize” East Jerusalem in order to transform its geopolitics beyond recognition.

We invite you to our city to view with your own eyes the catastrophic effects of the frenzy of construction. You will witness that, contrary to some media reports, Arabs are not allowed to build their homes anywhere in Jerusalem. You will see the gross inequality in allocation of municipal resources and services between east and west. We will take you to Sheikh Jarrah, where Palestinian families are being evicted from their homes to make room for a new Jewish neighborhood, and to Silwan, where dozens of houses face demolition because of the Jerusalem Municipality’s refusal to issue building permits to Palestinians.

We, who live in Jerusalem, can no longer be sacrificed for the fantasies of those who love our city from afar. The Jerusalem of this world must be shared by the people of the two nations residing in it. Only a shared city will live up to the prophet’s vision: “Zion shall be redeemed with justice.” As we chant weekly in our vigils in Sheikh Jarrah: “Nothing can be holy in an occupied city!”

By Avner Inbar & Assaf Sharon

27^th May 2010

Israel: “94% voted for the attack on Gaza” – Jerusalem Post

(LONDON) – Talking about anti-Semitism, and the accusation of anti-Semitism, is to many people a very sensitive issue. Nevertheless, I feel the need to highlight some points: As a Palestinian and as a Muslim, with firsthand experience of racism, whether here in UK or in occupied Palestine.

I do understand what it means to be subjugated to it; thus, I deeply empathise with those who suffer from the menace of racism and discrimination, those who are abused verbally, physically, emotionally, or otherwise for no other reason than the fact that they are “different”.

And I also do understand the awful feeling and dreadful sensation of being subjugated to subtle racist looks or remarks, only felt by you and not the people around you.

However, I do see a huge difference between a racist remark directed at a person or a group for their beliefs, race, or whatever that which makes them different, and between a snarl, a sneer or sarcasm against an occupying criminal entity called “Israel” and its people, for their CRIMES.

One must not fail to distinguish between the rage and fury caused by watching helplessly for decades the grim unstoppable crimes go unpunished year after year, and the racist blind hatred that might still exist among a tiny minority who, by nature, would be hating anything and anyone who is different anyway.

Furthermore, this occupying entity called “Israel” (a word that I myself detest to even pronounce and generally avoid to use) is not a theoretical being, nor does it operate in a vacuum; it’s neither an abstract concept nor a conjectural void it’s an entity run by PEOPLE.

It is an entity of PEOPLE, 94% of whom voted for the attack on Gaza – Overwhelming Israeli support of Gaza op – Jerusalem Post

It is an entity of PEOPLE, 71% of whom want U.S. to strike Iran – Haaretz Poll: 71% of Israelis want U.S. to strike Iran if talks fail

It is an entity of PEOPLE who violated and assaulted ALL neighbouring countries.

It is an entity of PEOPLE who live on a STOLEN land for over six decades, with no signs of shame, remorse, awakening of conscience, or willingness to neither admit nor right the wrongs they’ve committed.

Every normal person with some compassion would make a grimace of disgust and revulsion when hearing about such an entity or such a people who commit such despicable horrors…

Now, I find it difficult to be persuaded that such a reaction to such horrific crimes -when hearing the name “Israel” or “Israeli”- is an act of racism (anti-Semitism). On another note; we – Palestinians- do not have any responsibility whatsoever for the crime of the holocaust, nor do we carry the burden of European racism against Jewish people.

Furthermore, I do not see a difference between any kinds of racism including racism directed against Jewish people known as anti-Semitism. If we accept racism against Jewish people as being different, then it implies that we accept the racist absurdity of “Jewish exceptionalism”.

Racism is racism, many causes same consequences.

Thus, I do not see the suffering of Jewish people (horrible as it was) as a unique kind of suffering which must be revered and viewed as essentially and fundamentally different from other human suffering; the same way that I do not see our suffering as Palestinians as unique or different from any other.

Questions come pounding: Why is it that we –Palestinians- are constantly reminded of the horrors of the holocaust, when we had nothing to do with it?

Why is it that we Palestinians, are to suffer the same fate as the victims of the holocaust by the hands of those who brag worldwide to act for “never again”?

Why would the UN want to enforce the study of the history of our oppressors and occupiers -holocaust- upon our children who are languishing in refugee camps –who themselves along with their parents, and grandparents were victims of ethnic cleansing, planned and executed by those whom they are supposed to feel sympathy with?

Why is it that we are persistently bogged down by the fixation on anti-Semitism, while for sixty years (a century rather), we are the ones who are relentlessly suffering from a most vile evil racism (ethnic cleansing gradually becoming a form of “final solution”) perpetrated by a whole population of racist Zionists? (with all honesty, I must tell you that sometimes I imagine it would’ve been easier and less painful to us to be gassed and killed immediately rather than this policy of excruciating slow death that we have been going through for over a century).

How could the world keep asking us to recognize the “humanity” of a settler, who comes with his wife and children armed to his teeth, and at gun point evicts a Palestinian family, throws their entire belongings out, and moves in? What kind of “humanity” is this?

And most importantly, why is it that we are continuously been asked to feel compassion towards our tormentors who relentlessly murder and humiliate us, who attempt to annihilate us and our history and why, to what purpose, are we asked to feel their “humanity”, while their knife still piercing deep in our hearts?

Finally, I cannot speak on behalf of all the Palestinians, but as for myself, I must admit, the recent assault on Gaza was the last straw that broke the camel’s back; before that, I used to think that there is hope, those PEOPLE would wake up to their “humanity” one day, and regret the evil that they’ve done, unfortunately, the more I see of them, the more I realize that this hope and dream was an illusion.

Over the past few years, I have been reading and debating with many of those “soft” Zionists in the so called “peace camps”, all I found is an extremely arrogant groups of people, who are incapable of recognising, admitting, or willing to rectify the crimes they’ve done.

They are only interested in “peace” to protect their interests and to further secure their grip hold on the stolen land.

Moreover, very recently, and by sheer accident, I stumbled upon some honorific information that reveals the severity of decay of morality and lack of humanity amongst those RACIST Zionists – whose ideological bigotry and chauvinism surpasses all other- that left me in a state of shock for days; crying, shaking, suffocating with palpitations and suffering from severe panic attacks.

Undoubtedly, the world community should leave it to the victims to decide how to deal with those criminals in the future. Only the victims can investigate the fragile alleys of forgiveness or punishment. The victims should have the last say irrespective of what their judgment might be, they should not be vilified, indicted or moralized with, for they have suffered more than enough the emergence of forgiveness and reconciliation requires certain conditions:

None of these conditions are ever considered as an option amongst that mighty sick racist Zionist society.

As for me, I have no authority to talk in the name of all Palestinians, but I can state with all honesty, I DO NOT wish the Zionist murderers, those of whom were directly or indirectly involved in massacres, theft of land, subjugation and oppression, to remain in Palestine after its liberation from the occupier.

–except of course for the very few good people amongst them, as no soul should carry the liability of another-

I do not wish the invader, occupier and criminal racists to stay in Palestine, the land that they incessantly raped, destroyed and disfigured, nor do I desire them to be my neighbours.

They have shown no respect, no appreciation, and no love to this land or to her people They do not deserve to live there But these are only my own feelings, and I know that the decision is not mine.

More on anti Semitism

There are some more points that I would like to draw attention to:

1. “Israel” calls itself a Jewish state, and claims to be acting for all Jewish people, by Jewish people. It is still enjoying the moral and financial support of the majority of Jewish communities worldwide. The absence of a huge uproar of denunciation and disassociation by the majority of world Jewry, makes it hard for people not to blame Zionist Jews who live outside occupied Palestine for their guilt of complicity, active alliance or passive complacency by either silence or aiding and sustaining the criminals

2. “Israel” still enjoys the protection of the “Security Council” with its US vetoes on any UN resolution sanctioning “Israel’s” endless list of ongoing crimes and infractions of international law, and the “Israeli” criminals still roam with impunity, free from prosecution by any jurisdiction. This intolerable situation inevitably foments further rage and fury against the double standard and special treatment granted to the “Jewish” state

So, a sincere advice from a heart that cares, to all my Jewish friends who are really interested in preventing the re-emergence of real “anti Semitism”, and to those “Israelis” with some humanity left; I would say:

1. Instead of wasting time searching for the “humanity” within “Israeli” criminals, focus your energy on fighting and revealing “Israeli” crimes and exposing its inhumanity

2. Disassociate your selves completely from such an entity and proclaim this annulment loud and clear

3. Let go of the idea that anti Semitism is a “special” case of racism; treat all racism with the same degree of unambiguous condemnation

4. Try to look at the situation from the standpoint of non Jewish people, who will not accept or understand the insistence on the uniqueness of the Jewish suffering, whereas the world has seen since the end of WW2 the massacres of millions and millions of non Jews. The world is now inflamed by hatred against Muslims, not against Jews.

5. With love in my heart, with sincere and pure feelings, I would appeal to you to look inwards and search for reasons, as to why you feel that the world should accept racism against you as somehow worse or different, and as to why you feel that your suffering is unique and unlike others’, because this is not how the world sees it. All suffering has the same value to those who go through it, and all racism has the same consequences and must be ostracized with the same ferociousness

6. Those of us who are involved in the support of Palestinian cause are inevitably going to be accused of anti Semitism, that does not make us in any shape or form anti-Semites, for we know very well that we are not; hence, false labels, and bogus allegations should not frighten or deter us, distract us or hinder our determination of doing what we think is right

7. And finally, please, do not freak out when people point out to certain aspects of Judaism and the Jewish culture that they might not like or find incompatible with humanity, equality, or fairness, after all assessment and criticism have always been accepted by other religions, belief-systems and cultures, and this is what freedom of thought and freedom of speech are all about, people have the right to look at different ideologies, scrutinize them, criticize them and sieve out what appears to be hindering the human moral development, as long as all this is done in a non offensive manner, without slander or abuse, but rather in a respectful, academic, genuine and good-intentional search for truth2

PS:

I know that what I have said might appear too strong, unfamiliar, or painful to hear, but I can only speak of what’s in my heart, as I believe that only through openness and honesty that trust can be built

We have a saying in Arabic; “sadeequka man sadaqak, wassaddaqak”

صديقك من صدَقك و صدّقك

“Your true friend is that who is honest with you and who believes you”

Arabic word for honesty: sidq

And for friend: sadeeq

Both friend and honesty share the same root: sa-da-qa= told the truth

I am a Jerusalem-born Palestinian refugee living in exile for over 42 years. I was forced to leave my homeland, Palestine at the age of seven during the six-day war. I am a mathematician by profession. I started writing about three years ago when my friends insisted I should write about my memories, experiences, and feelings as a Palestinian. I did… but it all came out -for some strange reason- sounding -as I am told- like poetry! So I self published two books (I Believe in Miracles, and Palestine, The True Story. Write to me at :nahidaexiledpalestinian@gmail.com

By Nahida Izzat

Chris Hedges is one of the best, one of the most morally useful, writers we have. He’s free of loyalty to political party or dogma. He knows war first hand and describes it without flinching. He’s an almost ideal gadfly to our corporatocracy. But he has a hangup on religion that holds him back.

Hedges will tell you that he has no use for fantasies about life after death. He’ll profess no interest in gods or prayer or a divine plan or anything of the sort. He’s perfectly aware of what lies on the negative side of the balance sheet for religion (or what he would call institutional religion), how it trains blind obedience, how it diminishes the value of life before death, how it shifts responsibility from people to imaginary beings, how it divides groups of people who kill in its name. But when you ask what, then, lies on the positive side of the account for religion that justifies supporting it, Hedges’ answers range from slim to silly.

One answer he gave me was that there are mysteries in the world, including emotions like love. Well, of course there are. But, I told him, I make no claim to having plumbed the depths of every emotion and having perfectly understood it, I just have no use for god or heaven. Does one have to claim omniscience to be an atheist? I thought only God claimed that!

But Hedges will tell you that it’s wiser to be an agnostic than an atheist because you just don’t know. But, of course, no one who says this means it quite that simply. If I were to be “agnostic” on whether the world is secretly run by demons dwelling in the livers of antelopes and every other imaginable lunacy, I wouldn’t have time to do any substantive being of an agnostic. I could just say “I’m an agnostic on all fantastical BS” and leave it at that. But when it comes to whatever it is that Hedges and others reluctant to fully part with religion mean by “religion,” they want to see some agnostical activity going on, specifically lamentation of the passing of religion. I don’t think engaging in such activity tends to make one more or less arrogant or humble.

Hedges’ latest article is called “After Religion Fizzles, We’re Stuck with Nietzsche.” He opens with five good paragraphs on damage done, both by major religious institutions and by religiosity in general. Then he writes:

“But I cannot rejoice in the collapse of these institutions. We are not going to be saved by faith in reason, science and technology, which the dead zone of oil forming in the Gulf of Mexico and our production of costly and redundant weapons systems illustrate. Frederick Nietzsche’s Übermensch or “Superman” — our secular religion — is as fantasy-driven as religious magical thinking.”

Setting aside the dubious idea that U.S. culture today is driven by anything resembling Nietzsche’s Übermensch, how in the world did we leap from the collapse of religion to “faith in reason, science, and technology”? Of course, we have too much of that as well, but it’s not all we have or all we could have. We aren’t limited to religion or THAT. And it’s not the central explanation of the oil spill or the wars, given that a majority of us oppose the policies that have led to both. We have allowed our “leaders” to act against our interests, as if they knew best, a habit encouraged by religion, not science.

Of course, we need to be respectful of nature. Of course, we need to be humble in the face of ecosystems (and emotions) that we do not begin to understand. Of course, we need to stop trying to conquer the world and behaving as if we were its gods. We need to outgrow “faith in reason, science, and technology” just as we need to outgrow faith in religion. And we are doing so. Suggesting that we must choose one catastrophic course or the other, religion or scientific domination, does not help our progress. I’m not making an argument about whether we should be optimistic or pessimistic — I think either, in so far as it distracts from action, is morally inexcusable. I’m suggesting that if we want to progress or even survive it will be through overcoming both religion and faith in technology.

In his final address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Martin Luther King Jr., said:

“There is nothing wrong with power, if power is used correctly. You see, what happened is that some of our philosophers got off base. And one of the great problems of history is that the concepts of love and power have usually been contrasted as opposites, polar opposites, so that love is identified with a resignation of power, and power with a denial of love. It was this misinterpretation that caused Nietzsche, who was a philosopher of the will to power, to reject the Christian concept of love. It was this same misinterpretation which induced Christian theologians to reject the Nietzschean philosophy of the will to power in the name of the Christian idea of love. Now, we’ve got to get this thing right. What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”

I imagine Hedges agrees with that. But he should notice that King is suggesting a choice other than science or religion, one just as available to an atheist as to an agnostic or to a religious believer like King. All being agreed on the wisdom of such a course, the question of whether or not to keep dragging the vestiges of religion down through the centuries becomes a separate question, to be decided based on whether religion does more harm or good.

Hedges goes on to say that there are “religiously motivated people toiling in the inner city and the slums of the developing world” and that they “remain true to the core religious and moral values ignored by [religious] institutions.” What values? Hedges lists “individual responsibility” and “compassion, especially for the weak, the impoverished, the sick and the outcast.” But, of course, most people who have been responsible and compassionate have been religious for the same reason that most people who have been servile and cruel have been religious: most people, period, have been religious. In fact, polling on political questions at least begins to suggest that the most responsible and compassionate Americans today, on average, are atheists. We’re less likely to support injustices like wars and torture. Whether we’re more responsible and compassionate through all aspects of our lives, I do not know, but I haven’t seen any evidence that we’re less so — just antiquated fear mongering about how morality will disappear if religion does.

Hedges continues his effort to equate the loss of religion with moral decline:

“We are rapidly losing the capacity for the moral life. We reject the anxiety of individual responsibility that laid the foundations for the open society. . . . The great religions set free the critical powers of humankind. . . . [R]eligious thinkers were our first ethicists. . . . These religious institutions are in irreversible decline. . . . But don’t think the world will be a better place for their demise. As we devolve into a commodity culture, in which celebrity, power and money reign, the older, dimming values of another era are being replaced. . . . We live in the age of the Übermensch who rejects the sentimental tenets of traditional religion. The Übermensch creates his own morality based on human instincts, drive and will. We worship the ‘will to power’ and think we have gone ‘beyond good and evil.’ We spurn virtue. We think we have the moral fortitude and wisdom to create our own moral code.”

And here is where religion holds Hedges back. We must, of course, find the moral fortitude and wisdom to create our own moral code to address our own moral circumstances. We will find most of that wisdom in lessons from the past, of course, and most of it from past religious observers. But we will be hindered by keeping alive almost anything we meaningfully refer to as religion, anything suggesting deference to a greater authority than the accumulated wisdom of humanity. We must be free of that if we are to envision what we need to become. For all of his failings, this is what Nietzsche attempted to do, and to some degree succeeded in doing. Hedges knows that Nietzsche condemned all the undesirable traits of modern culture that Hedges himself laments. But Hedges lays the blame, nonetheless, at Nietzsche’s doorstep as an enemy of religion.

And there’s something wrong with the timing of Hedges’ tale of woe. The cultural damage he describes is all current, while the loss of religion that he fears will cause it is substantially in the future. The vast majority of Americans today are more religious than Hedges himself is. We can’t fix their shortcomings by making them religious. Instead, we have to make them — and ourselves — more responsible and compassionate in a way that, indeed, moves beyond existing ways of thinking.

Without religious beliefs, we might still have violence, but Germans would not have made the worst of Nietzsche in Nazism. Without religious beliefs we might still have oil drilling, but we wouldn’t have senators telling us they don’t care because it is the next life that matters. And if Afghans and Iraqis did not belong to a different religion than most Americans, we wouldn’t bomb them and burn their babies with fire bombs and white phosphorous. Whether you agree with the views of the religious “extremists” or not, you have a moral choice: will you condemn the basis of their thinking or provide respectable cover for it?

By David Swanson

Does it have to be that an entire country and it’s innocent civilians have to be punished after the failed New York Times Square bomb attempt by one person? It seems to be that way. Maybe another false flag operation was planned to issue stern warnings to Pakistan that should there be a successful attack next, there might even be a “boots-on-the ground” US presence on Pakistan as reported by the New York Times, a Zionist mouthpiece, on Saturday May 9, 2010 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/world/asia/09pstan.html. After the unsuccessful bomb attack by US citizen Faisal Shehzad who was captured by US authorities on board a flight to Pakistan via Dubai, the US administration has started issuing threats to Pakistan.

The first threat came on May 5, 2010 from Fareed Zakaria, author and host of CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” in which he reported that “Pakistan is the epicentre of Islamic terrorism” and that “..It’s worth noting that even the terrorism that’s often attributed to the war in Afghanistan tends to come out of Pakistan, to be planned by Pakistanis, to be funded from Pakistan or in some other way to be traced to Pakistan…”. Zakaria was a favored student of Dr. Huntington the celebrated author of “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World Order”. Zakaria has also been noted to be involved with George Bush and Paul Wolfowitz in pushing for the war on Iraq.

Why would Zakaria use the words “Islamic Terrorism” rather than Muslim terrorism? In my article, The Winds of Change, published by Countercurrents on May 4, 2010 I’d written that since the war cannot be waged on Islam, the next best is to wage it on its adherents to weaken them. The strategy is working. The affluent group of Muslims are being weakened as they pursue materialistic objectives whereas the poorer Muslims are being intimidated through wars waged on them. One group fears the loss of wealth and the other fears loss of lives, not their own maybe but of their families.

On May 7, 2010, US military commander in Afghanistan General Stanley McChrystal met with Pakistan’s military commander General Ashfaq Kiyani in Islamabad to clearly issue a stern warning that Pakistan must immediately begin a military offensive against the Taliban and al-Qaeda in North Waziristan. US ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson also met with Pakistani president Asif Zardari and used “forceful” language to convey the American point that the Pakistanis had to move more assertively against the militants threaded through the society. As if that is not enough, pressure mounted from Hillary Clinton on May 7, 2010 that it faced “very severe consequences” if a terror plot like Times Square bombing were traced to Pakistan. US officials have even admitted that if there is a successful attack, the US will have to act. Maybe there is a successful attack being planned by the US either on its soil or on some European, Indian or Israeli soils. If the unsuccessful bomb attack is so politically successful, one would wonder how successful will be a successful bomb attack.

The answers to the question why US has urged Pakistan to launch a military offensive in the northern areas is very clear. It is to create more fear and terrorism, more suicide bombings, ensure more terrorists are bred, continue and further increase drone attacks and, demoralize and weaken the military through exhausting the hardware in its arsenal such that if a joint US-Indian-NATO attack is launched on Pakistan in the near future, it’ll not be able to sustain the war. Nuclear deterrence against an enemy already on its soil is pointless.

The one thing that most Muslim leaders severely lack is diplomacy and negotiation skills, more so a nuclear state like Pakistan than any of the others who’ve no strong and viable defences. Pakistan could easily retaliate to threats from US or India but being an indebted nation whose leaders are corrupt to the nth degree and who have families overseas, they’re unable to demonstrate diplomacy or use language that would remove threats so they submit to threats. Zardari is a known state criminal and the US has all the scoops on him to blackmail him should he not relent to US demands.

It is now obvious that the US has military intentions towards Pakistan. India and Israel but more so the latter would like to see Pakistan denuclearized. Pakistan is also of significant geo-political importance as it would serve as a corridor for land-locked Afghanistan and the former Soviet satellites. 9/11 led to the occupation of Afghanistan, WMDs led to the occupation of Iraq and its becoming obvious that the relentless pressure of terrorism might lead to Pakistan’s occupation and subsequent denuclearization. The Zionists have mastered the art of fabrication without being challenged. They’ve not only fabricated 9/11, WMDs and other false flag operations but they’ve also fabricated an economic culture leading to rewards for the obedient servants and slavery for the masses throughout the world.

Much as the US, France, Germany and UK would like to bomb Iran to the rubble because of its oil and gas, Russia and China have not been supportive of actions against Iran in the United Nations. The next best target is therefore Pakistan as the US needs not secure UN, Russian or Chinese support for actions against it. The excuse of containing the epicentre of “Islamic terrorism” is sufficient. Pakistan is in the pressure cooker with the lid on and the stove flame on high.

By Gulam A. Mitha

More than 90 per cent of the world’s energy comes from non-renewable sources – and its decline can be projected on a Hubbert bell curve.

It’s just that we are more familiar with the concept of peak oil. After all, oil is the world’s largest source of energy, and the size and immediacy of the problem tends to overshadow debate on the remaining energy sources. But Hubbert’s model proves versatile, as the exploitation of any non-renewable resource – from oil to uranium – follows similar patterns.

Experts in the fields of coal, natural gas and nuclear power are beginning to talk of vastly inflated reserves figures and pointing to resource depletion within the next two decades. This, if it comes about, would involve all our main sources of energy declining drastically, all within a relatively short timeframe.

But first, some background. Using heavily rounded figures, global energy supply can be broken down as follows: oil supplies 36 per cent of our needs, coal 28 per cent, natural gas 24 per cent, nuclear 6 per cent and hydroelectric 6 per cent. (Solar and wind are less than one per cent so don’t figure in this kind of broad-brush approach – the aim here is to establish the ratios.)

Meanwhile, global demand for all energy sources is growing. Rising energy use is inextricably linked to rising GDP, which is essential both for developing nations to improve their quality of life and for our debt-based economies to function. According to the US Energy Administration Information’s (EIA) International Energy Outlook 2009, “total world consumption of marketed energy is projected to increase by 44 percent from 2006 to 2030.” (From 472 quadrillion Btu in 2006 to 678 quadrillion Btu in 2030.)

Looking at this by fuel, in order of importance:

Peak oil

The beginning of 2010 has seen a slew of reports pointing to the immediacy of peak oil. It saw the British government meeting to discuss the predicted energy crunch that’s five years away, and the US Joint Forces command report suggesting that the military needs contingency plans as surplus oil production capacity could disappear within two years, with serious shortages by 2015. Meanwhile, the “massive reserves” of unconventional oil are not living up to their hype. Reports are indicating that the Canadian oil sands are falling well behind projected outputs, and deepwater drilling is emerging as the risky, expensive venture we’ve always suspected, following the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico. The fact that we are so desperate to find reserves itself speaks volumes about the reality of peak oil (Al Gore likened the oil sands to the last vein the junkie finds in his big toe).

Even a rogue slide from a 2009 US Energy Information Administration PowerPoint presentation has recently become an internet sensation. The diagram, World’s Liquid Fuels Supply, projects oil output peaking in 2012 and immediately declining sharply – falling away from a line showing rising demand. The distance between the two is marked ‘unidentified projects.’

According to the projection, by 2016 there will be a gap between supply and demand of 10 million barrels per day. And the EIA has absolutely no idea how that shortfall will be met.

Peak coal

A 2008 New Scientist article, The Great Coal Hole, written by David Strahan tackles the commonly held belief that “coal is generally seen as our safety net in a world of dwindling oil.” Unfortunately, like oil, coal reserves seem to have been routinely inflated, he finds. However, global coal consumption “rose 35 per cent between 2000 and 2006,” particularly in China and India. He observes: “China is by far the world’s largest producer of coal, but such is its appetite for the fuel that in 2007 it became a net importer.”

Energy Watch, a group of scientists led by the German renewable energy consultancy Ludwig Bölkow Systemtechnik (LBST) produced a 2007 report stating commonly accepted coal reserves are unreliable, notes Strahan:

“As scientists we were surprised to find that so-called proven reserves were anything but proven,” says lead author Werner Zittel. “It is a clear sign that something is seriously wrong.”

Since it is widely accepted that major new discoveries of coal are unlikely, Energy Watch forecast that global coal output will peak as early as 2025 and then fall into terminal decline. That’s a lot earlier than is generally assumed by policy-makers, who look to the much higher forecasts of the International Energy Agency, which are based on official reserves. “The perception that coal is the fossil resource of last resort that you can come back to when you run into problems with all the other is probably an illusion,” says Jörg Schindler of LBST.

We constantly read that the world has enough coal for centuries of “dirty power,” with environmentalists warning that more and more carbon will be released into the atmosphere as the world struggles to come to terms with declining oil supplies. This may not be the case. An item in Walrus magazine, an inconvenient talk, written by Chris Turner states:

A Caltech engineer named David Rutledge, meanwhile, applied the same methods used in peak oil prediction to the coal question, and he discovered a paucity of supply so great that he now argues it will be impossible to create the worst-case scenarios in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s reports, because there are simply not enough economically viable coal reserves left on earth to cloud the atmosphere with more than 460 parts per million of carbon dioxide.

Research in 2009 from the University of Newcastle in Australia concluded that global coal production “may well peak as soon as 2010.” Overall, it concludes, production will most likely peak “between 2010 and 2048.”

Peak natural gas

In an article titled The Future of the Oil and Gas Industry: Past Approaches, New Challenges, Exxon Mobil director and executive vice president Harry J. Longwell writes that most global natural gas resources were discovered “between roughly 1960 to about 1980,” and that discovery rates have subsequently been declining. He continues:

In the recent past, we have seen increasing demand for oil and gas, but generally decreasing discovery volumes. . .

It’s getting harder and harder to find new oil and gas. Industry has made significant new discoveries in the last few years. But they are increasingly being made at greater depths on land, in deeper water at sea, and at more substantial distances from consuming markets.

According to an interview in Walrus magazine, Canadian hydrocarbon geologist David Hughes predicts a global peak of natural gas reserves by 2027. Hughes, an expert in calculating how natural gas might someday be mined from coal bed methane deposits, includes “unconventional” gas reserves in his calculations:

Gas is looking unlikely to be the “bridge fuel” that saves us from declining oil.

Peak uranium

Like the hydrocarbons mentioned above, uranium is a finite resource. A 2006 report by the Energy Watch Group, Uranium Resources and Nuclear Energy, suggested that proved uranium reserves will be “exhausted within the next 30 years at current annual demand.” It states:

Eleven countries have already exhausted their uranium reserves. In total, about 2.3 Mt of uranium have already been produced. At present only one country (Canada) is left having uranium deposits containing uranium with an ore grade of more than 1%, most of the remaining reserves in other countries have ore grades below 0.1% and two thirds of reserves have ore grades below 0.06%. This is important as the energy requirement for uranium mining is at best indirect proportional to the ore concentration and with concentrations below 0.01-0.02% the energy needed for uranium processing – over the whole fuel cycle – increases substantially.

The proved reserves (=reasonably assured below 40 $/kgU extraction cost) and stocks will be exhausted within the next 30 years at current annual demand. Likewise, possible resources – which contain all estimated discovered resources with extraction costs of up to 130 $/kg – will be exhausted within 70 years.

It concludes that “In the long term beyond 2030 uranium shortages will limit the expansion of nuclear power plants.”

This is currently being reflected in the market. A March 2010 report in Bloomberg Businessweek, with the straight-talking headline Uranium May Have ‘Hyper’ Price Run, Uranium Energy Corp Says, interviews key personnel at Uranium Energy Corp:

Prices may jump to $100 a pound from about $40 a pound now, Amir Adnani, president and chief executive officer of the U.S. – based company, said today in interview in Hong Kong, without giving a timeframe for the target price. Prices may average about $75 a pound in the next 5 to 10 years, he said.

Nuclear power is clearly not the answer to peak oil.

Conclusions

Many peak oil proponents suggest oil either is about to peak, or has already, and that production will fall below demand sometime before 2020.

In addition, many independent researchers believe the world’s natural gas, coal and uranium are likely to peak during the following decade. This is based on current usage, and does not consider what will happen to demand once we hit peak oil, and the price of oil goes high enough to push the market to find alternatives.

When oil peaks, and the price rises, it may well cause our fragile, debt-ridden economies to collapse. But the worst will be yet to come. When other energy sources subsequently peak, we will be left with no affordable “bridge fuel” to carry us to a sustainable, renewable future. In addition, whereas oil is mainly used in transportation, natural gas and coal together account for the generation of 60 per cent of our electricity, according to EIA figures. If the grid goes down, modern life is over.

(Abridged from the page Global hydrocarbons peak.)

By Matthew Wild

Those who defend economic growth often argue that only rich countries can afford to protect the environment. The bigger the economy, the more money will be available for stopping pollution, investing in new forms of energy, preserving wilderness. Only the wealthy can live sustainably.

Anyone who has watched the emerging horror in the Gulf of Mexico in the past few days has cause to doubt this. The world’s richest country decided not to impose the rules that might have prevented the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, arguing that these would impede the pursuit of greater wealth. Economic growth, and the demand for oil that it propelled, drove companies to drill in difficult and risky places.

But we needn’t rely on this event to dismiss the cornucopias’’ thesis as self-serving nonsense. A new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences calculates deforestation rates between 2000 and 2005 in the countries with the largest areas of forest cover. The nation with the lowest rate was the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The nation with the highest, caused by a combination of logging and fire, was the United States. Loss of forest cover there (6% of its own forests in five years) was almost twice as fast as in Indonesia and 10 times as fast as in the DRC. Why? Because those poorer countries have less money to invest in opening up remote places and felling trees.

The wealthy nations are plundering not only their own resources. The environmental disasters caused by the oil industry in Ecuador and Nigeria are not driven by Ecuadorian or Nigerian demand, but by the thirst for oil in richer nations. Deforestation in Indonesia is driven by the rich world’s demand for palm oil and timber, in Brazil by our hunger for timber and animal feed.

The Guardian’s carbon calculator reveals that the UK has greatly underestimated the climate impacts of our consumption. The reason is that official figures don’t count outsourced emissions: the greenhouse gases produced by other countries manufacturing goods for our markets. Another recent paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that the UK imports a net 253m tonnes of carbon dioxide, embodied in the goods it buys. When this is taken into account, we find that far from cutting emissions since 1990, as the last government claimed, we have increased them. Wealth wrecks the environment.

So the Dark Mountain Project, whose ideas are spreading rapidly through the environment movement, is worth examining. It contends that “capitalism has absorbed the greens”. Instead of seeking to protect the natural world from the impact of humans, the project claims that environmentalists now work on “sustaining human civilization at the comfort level which the world’s rich people – us – feel is their right”.

Today’s greens, it charges, seek to sustain the culture that knackers the planet, demanding only that we replace old, polluting technologies with new ones – wind farms, solar arrays, wave machines – that wreck even more of the world’s wild places. They have lost their feelings for nature, reducing the problem to an engineering challenge. They’ve forgotten that they are supposed to be defending the biosphere: instead they are trying to save industrial civilization.

That task, Paul Kingsnorth – a co-founder of Dark Mountain – believes, is futile: “The civilization we are a part of is hitting the buffers at full speed, and it is too late to stop it.” Nor can we bargain with it, as “the economic system we rely upon cannot be tamed without collapsing, for it relies upon … growth in order to function”. Instead of trying to reduce the impacts of our civilization, we should “start thinking about how we are going to live through its fall, and what we can learn from its collapse … Our task is to negotiate the coming descent as best we can, whilst creating new myths which put humanity in its proper place”.

Though a fair bit of this takes aim at my writing and the ideas I champion, I recognize the truth in it. Something has been lost along the way. Among the charts and tables and technofixes, in the desperate search for green solutions that can work politically and economically, we have tended to forget the love of nature that drew us into all this.

But I cannot make the leap that Dark Mountain demands. The first problem with its vision is that industrial civilization is much more resilient than it proposes. In the opening essay of the movement’s first book, to be published this week, John Michael Greer proposes that conventional oil supplies peaked in 2005, that gas will peak by 2030, and that coal will do so by 2040.

While I’m prepared to believe that oil supplies might decline in the next few years, his coal prediction is hogwash. Energy companies in the UK, as the latest ENDS report shows, are now beginning to deploy a technology that will greatly increase available reserves. Government figures suggest that underground coal gasification – injecting oxygen into coal seams and extracting the hydrogen and methane they release – can boost the UK’s land-based coal reserves 70-fold; and it opens up even more under the seabed. There are vast untapped reserves of other fossil fuels – bitumen, oil shale, methane clathrates – that energy companies will turn to if the price is right.

Like all cultures, industrial civilization will collapse at some point. Resource depletion and climate change are likely causes. But I don’t believe it will happen soon: not in this century, perhaps not even in the next. If it continues to rely on economic growth, if it doesn’t reduce its reliance on primary resources, our civilization will tank the biosphere before it goes down. To sit back and wait for what the Dark Mountain people believe will be civilization’s imminent collapse, without trying to change the way it operates, is to conspire in the destruction of everything greens are supposed to value.

Nor do I accept their undiscriminating attack on industrial technologies. There is a world of difference between the impact of windfarms and the impact of mining tar sands or drilling for oil: the turbines might spoil the view but, as the latest disaster shows, the effects of oil seep into the planet’s every pore. And unless environmentalists also seek to sustain the achievements of industrial civilization – health, education, sanitation, nutrition – the field will be left to those who rightly wish to preserve them, but don’t give a stuff about the impacts.

We can accept these benefits while rejecting perpetual growth. We can embrace engineering while rejecting many of the uses to which it is put. We can defend healthcare while attacking useless consumption. This approach is boring, unromantic, uncertain of success, but a lot less ugly than the alternatives.

For all that, the debate this project has begun is worth having, which is why I’ll be going to the Dark Mountain festival this month. There are no easy answers to the fix we’re in. But there are no easy non-answers either.

By George Monbiot

George Monbiot is the author of the bestselling books The Age of Consent: a manifesto for a new world order and Captive State: the corporate takeover of Britain. He writes a weekly column for the Guardian newspaper. Visit his website at www.monbiot.com

11^th May 2010

© 2010 Guardian News and Media Limited

The nuke-powers and the would-be-nuke-powers searched ways for nabbing would-be-nuke-arms-thieves. As if a naughty rat is disturbing a mighty lion. Was the lion sleeping? Or, was the rat the lion’s friend? Who the villain and who the hero are in this tragicomedy?

States, and as a whole the present world system, now being haunted by the specter of forces it patronized, thus showed inner-weakness, limitations in handling contradictions, the contradictions generated by self-actions, and the contradictions within itself. This contradiction is not with the forces aiming change in the property relationship the states safeguard. The forces aiming change in property relationship do not aim at stealing nuke arms as science teaches them that terror is not a social force, terror does not bring in socioeconomic changes, it not even facilitates or accelerates or heralds the changes, and social forces, not terror, are capable to make changes in property relationship.

The US sponsored nuclear security summit was also part of geopolitics of the metropolis of the present world system.

The conference, offered few specifics other than the US, Canada and Mexico agreed to work together to convert the fuel in Mexico’s research reactor from highly enriched uranium to a lower-enriched fuel that would be much harder to use in the manufacturing of a nuclear weapon. Mexico further agreed to get rid of all its highly enriched uranium (HEU) once the fuel is converted. Ukraine announced that it would ship all its HEU to protected storage either to Russia or the US by 2012. Canada announced plans to ship spent nuclear fuel to the US for safe keeping. Chile recently shipped about 40 pounds of enriched uranium to the US. A White House spokesperson said that the American people would “feel far more secure knowing that that material is under safe lock and key and guarded in this country…” In India, the invading British army, as Marx commented, degraded itself to police after completing the conquest. Now, the superpower has turned the keeper of nuclear safe.

The summit addressed the problem that Obama framed as a “‘cruel irony of history’ — nuclear dangers on the rise, even after the end of the Cold War and decades of fear stoked by a US-Soviet arms race”. “The single biggest threat to US security … would be the possibility of a terrorist organization obtaining a nuclear weapon,” Obama said. Nuclear weapons smuggling is a more than 60-years old issue in the Cold War context. Now, the non-state-actors are creating possibility of nuclear blackmailing! So, the conference was an attempt to halt the theft, etc. of nuclear bomb ingredients – “nuclear terrorism”, as Hillary Clinton told ABC television. “We don’t believe the threat from nuclear terrorism comes from states. Our biggest concern is that terrorists will get nuclear material. The threat of nuclear war … has diminished. The threat of nuclear terrorism has increased,” she said.

It seems an evolution of possible-nuclear-mushroom-cloud. Non-state-actors now threaten the all powerful imperialism, their past-patron, in terms of nuclear arms. The relationship, it seems, has evolved: persons armed to bleed a foe – the former Soviet Union – and to counter the forces for progressive change have now turned against former friend. The world has not forgotten the CIA-supplied shoulder held anti-aircraft missiles aiming Soviet helicopter gunships on the Afghan sky and a photograph – dangling dead body of a vanquished regime’s leader swaying with wind for days from a pole in a Kabul crossroad who was hanged but was assured international protection – one of the many epitaphs imperialist civility has erected in countries conquered. Now, those operatives are threatening the sole superpower. Does it echo Mao’s assertion made in 1946 during discussions with the American journalist Ms. Strong, and in 1958: Imperialism is paper-tiger? Mao had a different logic behind the assertion. The non-state-actors with shadowy state backing, it seems, are following the dictum of their class enemy, Mao, and are in duel with their former master. It is not evolution, despite the appearance, but a manifestation of the path – vi et armis, by force of arms – imperialism has embarked on, and it tells: incedis per ignis suppositos cineri doloso, you walk on fires covered with treacherous ash (Horace, Odes).

By Farooque Chowdhury

[Farooque Chowdhury, a freelancer from Dhaka, contributes on socio-economic and geopolitical issues. He edited the book Micro Credit, myth manufactured. The Age of Crisis is his latest book.]

Hugo Chavez Interviewed by Cindy Sheehan

Cindy Sheehan: President Chavez, thank you for allowing the truth to be told about Venezuela, and about you and your revolution. Before the revolution, Venezuela was a nation ruled and used by the oligarchy. How did the revolution begin and how has it remained relatively peaceful?

President Hugo Chavez (HC): Thank you Cindy, for your efforts to find out our truth, we wish you luck in your struggles, which we share, against war, for peace, for justice, for freedom and equality, against imperialism. We accompany you in those struggles, you and the people of the US. The bourgeoisie of Venezuela dominated the country for more than 100 years, with force, with violence, through persecution, assassination, forced disappearances. Unfortunately the history of Venezuela is a history with a lot of violence. Violence of the strong against the weak. In the 20th century in Venezuela, dominated by the oligarchy and the bourgeois state, a reverse miracle happened. Venezuela was the top exporter of oil from the 1920s until the 1970s, and one of the largest producers of oil in the world throughout all of the 20th century. But when the century ended, Venezuela had more than 70% poverty and 40% extreme poverty, misery. That generated a violent explosion — all explosions are violent. An explosion of the poor to liberate themselves. We were just remembering the anniversary of Caracazo a few days ago, on February 27; you were there with us, with our people. Twenty-one years ago the people awoke and arose in a big explosion. And us in the military were used by the bourgeois state to massacre the people — women and children — and that awoke a consciousness and a pain in the military, and led us to join with the people. We later led two rebellions. Our revolution isn’t exactly peaceful. It’s relatively peaceful.

The violence of the revolution appears to have come from the counterrevolution. The Bolivarian Revolution has transferred power and wealth to the people and has been an inspiration and at the same time has been relatively peaceful.

HC: Yes, we got to power in a peaceful way. And we have been able to maintain it, relatively. We’ve never used violence; the counterrevolution has used it against us. So the central strategy of our peaceful, socialist revolution is to transfer power to the people. I’m sure you’ve been able to see some of it with your own eyes in the neighborhoods of Caracas. We are engaging in immense efforts to help the people be sovereign. When we talk about power, what are we talking about, Cindy? The first power that we all have is knowledge, so we’ve made efforts in education, against illiteracy, to promote the development of thought, study, analysis, in a way that has never happened before. Today, all of Venezuela is a giant school. Children and senior citizens, all of us are studying and learning. Then there is political power, the capacity to make decisions — Community Councils, Communes, People’s Power, grassroots movements. We have economic power, transferring economic power to the people, distributing the wealth to the people. That is the principal force that guarantees the Bolivarian Revolution will continue to be peaceful.

Why do you think the Empire makes such a concerted effort to demonize you?

HC: There are several reasons, but I have come to the conclusion that there is one major reason. The Empire is afraid. The Empire is afraid that the people of the US will find out the truth and something could erupt in their own territory — a Bolivarian movement, a Lincoln-esque movement. A movement of citizens, conscious citizens that seek to transform the system. Imperial fear killed Martin Luther King, Jr. The only way to stop him was to kill him. Then, they repressed the citizens of the US. So, why do they demonize us? They know the truth, but they fear the truth. They fear the contagious effect. They fear a revolution in the US. They fear an awakening in the US.

One of the biggest names they call you in the US is dictator. Can you explain why you are not a dictator?

HC: I am against dictatorships. I’m an anti-dictator. From a political point of view, I’ve been elected four times by popular vote. In Venezuela, we have elections all the time. Once, Lula, the President of Brazil, said that in Venezuela there is an excess of democracy! Every year there are elections, referendums, popular consultations, elections for governors, mayors — right now we are starting campaigns for elections in the National Assembly. In 2012, there will be presidential elections. What dictator is elected so many times? What dictator calls for elections all the time? I’m an anti-dictator. I’m a revolutionary. A democratic revolutionary.

You’ve announced your candidacy for the 2012 elections. You’ve come a long way but there’s still a long way to go. What do you think still needs to be accomplished in Venezuela?

HC: To tell you in a mathematical way, with everything we’ve done in education, healthcare, infrastructure, housing, employment, social security, etc., and in the context of everything we want to do, we’ve achieved about 10%. It’s been 200 years of abandonment. The people have been abandoned. And all the wealth of the country was in the hands of the oligarchy. So, we have to work really hard. There is still a lot to do to achieve Bolivar’s dream. Simon Bolivar taught us that the best government is one which gives the people the largest amount of happiness. That is our goal.

A couple of weeks ago in the US, a man flew his airplane into a tax building in Austin, Texas. Did you hear about that? There’s a lot of that frustration in the US, but instead of flying planes into buildings we should find each other and organize. The US is a system for the elite, ruled by the elite, a coporacracy. Can you give us some words of inspiration to help us have the courage to make true revolutionary change?

HC: We were the same, dominated, persecuted, and there was a lot of desperation, just like that man who flew the plane into the building. There was a lot of that, a lot of suicidal tendencies, but that’s not the path, the path is consciousness, an awakening of consciousness. We had our own experiences, a lot of us died as well, and went to prison. That’s why what you are doing is the right thing. The path is not to fly a plane into a building, it’s to create consciousness, and then the rest will come on its own.

I’d like to take this moment to say hello to the people of the US. We in the South have a lot of faith that the people of the North are going to wake up, just like you have awoken. We can do great things in the US, make great changes, and in a peaceful way, I hope. Because the future of the world depends on what happens in the US.

I think that despite everything, the people of the US, in the depth of their hearts, know how to appreciate the difference between truth and lies. They call us anti-US leaders, but we’re not! We’re anti-imperialist. We love the people of the US, we love humanity.

Translation and transcription by Eva Golinger. This interview was first published in the 19 March 2010 issue of Orinoco International; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes.

 Cindy Sheehan

We live in an era of psychological warfare and mass hysteria generated by mass communication that already led us to the catastrophic first and second world wars.  And after the US dropped nuclear bombs on civilian cities in Japan, all gloves were off instead of people being horrified enough to forsake war all together.  Over 100 major conflicts in the last 60 years costing tens of millions of lives.  It is even getting worse as wars are started by a few special interest groups, a few rich media owners can push for them, and a few soldiers can execute them via remote control and pilot-less planes that butcher thousands at the push of a button. The maddening era where sanctions on Iraq were introduced to satisfy a special lobby caused the death of over a million Iraqi civilians and then a war and occupation in which a million more have been killed.  Many claim a clash of religions or of ‘civilizations’ to justify these abominations when excess greed can explain it better.  But humans also fail to learn the lessons of history or to reexamine our own dogmatic beliefs that allow greedy people to exploit us and take us into wars in the name of ‘nation’ or ‘religion’ or ‘ideology’.  Here in Palestine, at every turn we are inundated with messages about conflicting religious and/or political beliefs; group think that seems hard to dispel.

When religion enters into it, it becomes extremely volatile.  By religion, I do not mean the original teachings of the prophets, but that which has been hijacked by the greedy for profits.  Mohammed and Jesus had far simpler messages of truth mostly dealing with personal behavior towards God and the needy people in society.   Here in these hills of Palestine Jesus told the truth to the many different groups of people that inhabited this multi-ethnic and multi-religious society.  His message of reform and logic was not directed only to the tribalistic Hebrew Judeans but to all people.  Some rejected the message precisely because they could not claim it for their tribe or advance their social status using the message.  He spoke plainly to both tribalistic Judeans who believed that they are better than the goyim and to the Roman officials who believed they were civilized superior democrats.  He spoke to Idumeans, Jebusites, Hebrews, Ammonites, Samaritans, and others and taught that all are equal before God.  He advocated a truly universal brotherhood and sisterhood of humanity. The same can be said of the original teachings of Mohammed as inspired by his God.   The five Pillars of Islam are rather simple and include profession of faith, prayers, fasting, giving of alms to the needy, and pilgrimage to Mecca if possible. No more and no less. Shi’ Islam recognizes similar things and adds things like leadership of the 12 imams and Adl (justice).  If one is to follow the basics of the monotheistic traditions and not all the literal (mis)interpretations, politicians would never be able to use religion in their endless wars.

Jesus prayed to get strength from his God (the father of us all) on the Mount of Olives in Ur-Salem (Jerusalem), the Jebusite Canaanitic town that remained a small town highly fought over by greedy people who used religion to justify conquest.  He prayed in the Aramaic language, a beautiful language that predated Hebrew and Arabic (and whose alphabet gave rise to both alphabets).  This language is still spoken by a Christian community in Palestine and other parts of Bilad Al-Sham.  He spoke truth to entrenched power of Pharisees and Romans who are in the same kind of allegiance that Israel and the US are today.  He told them that they are deluded, they are hypocrites.  He did not mince words.

Those with different agendas watched as his original message spread among disenfranchised communities even during massive repression and persecution for over 300 years.  Finally, unable to destroy it, and to fill an ideological vacuum, the Roman Empire decided to re-brand itself as the “Holy Christian Roman Empire.”  Powerful Popes were created and the story of Jesus was changed to suit an agenda that is in many aspects the opposite of what he really said (1).  How else can one reconcile the idea of Jesus ‘give to God what is to God and to Rome what is to Rome’ (separation of religion from politics) with the welding of religious and political power in Europe for hundreds of years? The ‘Christian’ cross was thus changed from a symbol of a persecuted people of principles to a symbol for crusaders and colonizers.  In parallel, the Pharisees went on to also change the ancient Hebrew religion.   Rabbinical Judaism was concretized in a Talmud written 300 years after Christ and was in many ways a reaction to the success of Christianity among Jews and non-Jews alike.  The Safad and Babylonian texts of Rabbinical Judaism have negative things to say about Jesus and about ‘goyim’ while emphasizing the notion of Jews as a “people” separate, unique, and chosen.  It was an understandable (over) reaction to maintain the old ways in the face of a changing world.  The history of ideas always pits conservative versus more liberal ideas.  For example, we saw a retrenchment and strengthening of catholic doctrine as the more liberal Protestant traditions developed.

The new religions under the names of ‘Christianity’ and ‘Judaism’ became varied and many.  Large segments of Berbers in North Africa and much of the population of Khazaria converted to the Pharisee traditions of Judaism resulting in large Ashkenazi and Sephardi “Jewish” communities (2). Beautiful cultures unfortunately destroyed in the frenzy of Zionism. Most of the rest of Europe had converted to the form of Christianity preached by Paul (himself a converted Judean) which was later adopted by the Roman Empire.  Other forms spread in Western Asia and North Africa.  But even the Roman church split into Western and Eastern branches as the empire it was wedded to also split (Rome and Byzantium).   The orthodox and the catholic branches had to then contend with the new protestant evolution.  In the 7th century, the daughter religion of Islam spread, shedding many of the rituals and authority vested in Rabbis and Priests but also having to adapt to existing cultures and norms in different countries.  Its success was largely due to the way in which entrenched authoritarian rulers bickered and fought among themselves ignoring the needs of the people.  Millions took up Islam willingly as a liberating religion.  As Europe descended into the abyss in the Middle Ages, the Islamic civilization rose and prospered developing sciences, laws, forms of government, philosophy and much more.  The secret to its success was the liberal traditions and openness that allowed Muslim scholars to collaborate with other scholars and to write books that question just about everything.  Unlike today, reading and writing books was a key feature of our world.  Islam itself was to undergo reformation and transformation becoming different sects and communities (Sunni, Shi’ a, Druze, Sufi, Baha’i, Alawaites etc).

Evolution of these monotheistic religions and their connections to each other should not blind us to their connections to earlier traditions.  The stories of slavery and redemption, floods and revival, death and resurrection and many more are stories found in earlier pagan traditions (3). Today’s Hindu, Buddhist, Confucian, and other traditions are all connected in similar ways (4).

So here we are today.  Last week, a psychologist who lived in Israeli society for 27 years, Avigail Abarnable described it as follows: ‘I think Israel is like a cult that happened to get its own country. It really is bizarre. It took a long time for me to free myself from the strange belief system I grew up with and the way I used to see the world’ (5). But Zionist Jews are not the only ones living in a make-belief world of group think and thus acting in highly destructive ways (to others and to self). As noted above, this has happened before and we who followed other religious traditions were not immune.  The shameful history stretches from crusaders to ‘manifest destiny’ colonization of the ‘new world’ to Afrikaners creating an apartheid regime as ‘ordained by God’.   But it all starts at the individual level.  How many of us are able to free our minds from self-imposed shackles?  What percentage of the human population drops the beliefs that parents and a childhood education burn into malleable minds. My father’s side of the family followed the traditions of the Eastern Church (Greek Orthodox). With paternalistic and hierarchical structures that are hard to reconcile with the ministry of Jesus.  It was the mixed marriage in our family that thankfully gave me a bit of leeway.  So I actually admire more those who do not have that and are still able to break free.  This includes the Catholic Workers movement and liberation theology advocates who went back to live and work among the poor and disenfranchised people. This includes Jews who are anti- or post-Zionist who connect with fellow human beings to work for equality instead of racism.  This includes the Muslims I see here every day linking hands with other human beings to resist colonial oppression in their villages (Al-Ma’sara, Al-Walaja, Bil’in, Ni’lin etc.).

In the past few days, the deluge of Orwellian news continued.  Settlements continue to be built even as the US, Israel, and the Palestinian elite leaders and the media spinners claim otherwise.  The apartheid wall is being built around Palestinian towns (it was deemed illegal by the International court of Justice and described as part of the illegal settlement activities).  Settlers driven by the mythologies of Zionism regularly harass Palestinians and destroy agricultural lands and property.  Arab rulers who long ago sold Palestine for assurances about their thrones give a green light for more negotiations that are divorced from International law and human rights.  1.5 million people (most of them refugees) get a trickle of food and supplies in their open air prison through tunnels. Israeli leaders openly brag that this inhuman act to an entire people is a collective punishment (6). By International law, this is actually defined as state terrorism and crimes against humanity. And Jerusalem remains under attack (7). Yet the International community only utters feeble voices while continuing to shield and protect the apartheid state. Europeans give funds which they know go to aid the occupation but they hope by designating it as Palestinian humanitarian aid, it would be good public relations.

And what are Palestinians doing?  With very few exceptions, we are not rising to the existential challenge facing us when we know that in the 1920s and 1930s our grandparents did rise to the challenge. The cheap and easy roads are taken today. Many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) both in Palestine and abroad are now run by single individuals (usually males) who worked to drive out any serious challenge to their ‘leadership’ (even when those they drove out were the most productive individuals). The situation also extends to political leadership whether in the many factions or in the Palestinian ‘authority’ (both in Gaza and the West Bank). A tradition strengthened by a history of authoritarian rule and cronyism. But of course this discourse is also true of Israeli NGOs and political leaders.  Corruption there is rampant and the amount of money laundered is many folds that among Palestinians. Bribes in the millions were paid just for one housing project in West Jerusalem called ‘Holy Land.’ Israeli NGOs are run by those who scare Jews around the world to keep donating so that these self-appointed “leaders” can continue their life style of ‘leadership’ and self-import (e.g. the racist Nadia Matar of ‘Women in Green’).  Any act of hatred to Jews big or small, fake or real, is used to keep the cash flowing.  The victimization cash machine never stops. Business is business.

Gilad Shalit, who is a soldier in a terrorist colonial army, is described as ‘victim’, ‘kidnapped’ and ‘held illegally’ while 10,000 Palestinian political prisoners whose rights are denied daily remain nameless and faceless in Israeli and Western media.  Millions were raised to support residents of ‘Sderot’ in the name of victimhood.  But this Israeli town was built on the land of Najd, one of hundreds of destroyed Palestinian villages ethnically cleansed to create the ‘Jewish state’. The individuals who shot these home-made projectiles come from a community of refugees ethnically cleansed and looking over the fence at their empty lands.  They were left to rot in refugee camps and then bombed and besieged to starvation.   Would you expect them to toss flowers at the usurpers?

British candidates regurgitate notions of Jewish victimization and need to support Israel to court the elite rich self-appointed British Zionists.  The latter represent less than half of the British Jewish population, itself less than 0.5% of the population; there are 3% Muslims.  Instead of welcoming Elie Wiesel, a racist tribalist, President Obama should receive real ethical Jews (8).  Ben Gurion’s cult credo of “better feared than loved” is reaching a dead end especially since lies can no longer be covered by taking advantage of the suffering during WWII (9). The boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement is forcing people to rethink and reflect on how their governments were hijacked and their people’s interests were sacrificed at the altar of the new idol of Zionism.  Zionists will continue to try to stoke anti-Jewish feelings (misnamed ‘anti-Semitism’), chauvinism (of and against Jews or gentiles), fear, conflict, and war around the world to serve their self-perceived interests.  Iran, like Iraq before it, is now in the cross hairs. But the world is finally beginning to wake-up.

Here we are 2000 years later still awaiting miracles from outside instead of believing that we can effect change as Jesus taught.  The 1960s civil rights movement had a saying: ‘free your mind and your ass will follow’.  Time will tell how many people (Westerners and Arabs, Christians, Muslims, or Jews) will run like scared lemmings over the cliff and into the abyss before enough people finally stand-up and free their minds. How many can speak truth to power without worrying about offending (new) Pharisees or (new) Roman authorities or worrying about material riches?  As Jesus taught ‘What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). In the Qur’an it is stated: ‘God does not change what is within a people until they change what is within themselves’.  The savior is not coming back on a cloud this year and the answer lies within us not with the sermons of Rabbis, Priests, or Imams.  The choices are clear.

“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.” Arundhati Roy

By Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD

6^th May 2010