The Wild Wild Left - Recent Comments

Abbas hasn't yet figured out

aristeides — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:14:53 GMT

that the enemy of his enemy is not his friend.

Israel only tolerates him out of hope that he will kill the Hamas men so they won't have to.

He clings to the "peace process" like a drowning man clutches an anvil, threatening from time to time to shut down the talks but never actually doing it.

Abbas seems to be Israel's latest instrument of false hopes.

shergald — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 18:56:05 GMT

And pretty much that what Israel's strategy has been over the decades: give a hope for peace, then pull the rug, or the football, out from under, and claim one or another reason for "their" unwillingness to make peace.

One year of bullshit follows the next. The only alternative is to work for a breakdown of Israel's greatest cover of their continuing ethnic cleansing of the West Bank, the US. Israel fears US college campuses because a peace movement is likely to come from that sector of the public, than the mainstream. Likewise, the left wing blogosphere has become a nemesis to Israel, where people on many blogs, except maybe Daily Kos of late, can express the truths about the IP conflict.

Let's all of us just keep working at it.

Tips for rehabilitation of rogue nations ... (n/t)

Mentarch — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 18:37:06 GMT

Sari Nusseibeh

aristeides — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:14:22 GMT

has said that the EU should unrecognize the PA, as it only serves to perpetuate the Israeli occupation of the WB.

Thanks, Diane.

GreyHawk — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:27:10 GMT

So many folks just seem to prefer to accept the easier narrative -- the false one -- that this deadly fiasco was a success.

Thought for the day...

M_A — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:47:15 GMT

"The last superstition of the human mind is the superstition that religion in itself is a good thing, though it might be free from dogma. I believe, however, that the religious feeling, as feeling, is wrong, and the civilized man will have nothing to do with it. . . . [When the] shadow of religion disappeared forever . . . I felt that I was free from a disease."
-- Samuel Porter Putnam, My Religious Experience, 1891

Happy Birthday Samuel!

a Black Hole is not a bad metaphor for what others have gotten ourselves ...

proximity1 — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:38:46 GMT

into.

Before Bush and Cheney's Fabulous Iraq Adventure, I wrote, warning all who wouldn't listen,

"Listen, if Bush and Cheney take us on their fabulous Iraq Adventure, it will mean what it was, in the day of Julius Caesar, to "cross the Rubicon" or, in our own day, to leap thoughtlessly into a Black Hole. In Caesar's day, there were no known Black Holes, nor even any unknown known Black Holes or even known unknown known Black Holes. In Caesar's day, whenever someone had to jump thoughtlessly into a Black Hole, he (or she, as the case may be) had to go to the Rubicon, and cross it. A Rubicon is what the Romans had instead of our Neocons of today. Like Neocons, Rubicons, when employed, lead to the downfall of the empire---

Of course, our Empire should downfall, but, there's also the burning and the violin-playing that goes with it. And those parts are terrible.

So I said, back then, like Rubicon, there'll be burning and violin-playing and no getting out of it once we venture over the event horizon of this Black Hole Bush and Cheney are leading us into. No escape. Are you listening?

And someone pointed and shouted, "Hey! Look! He's not even wearing an American flag in his lapel!" And they started to come at me, with menacing looks.

And we were all sucked over the event horizon. And if that sounds funny to you, you have no idea how terrible things are and may yet become because of this incredibly insane act of Bush and Cheney, who remain at large, capable of inflicting more harm on us all.

It was Reagan

aristeides — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 04:24:11 GMT

who let most of these rats into the WH, where they began to grow and breed.

Here is a bit of hopefulness

aristeides — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 02:12:17 GMT

After today's copycat bulldozer attack, a mob of yeshiva students in Jerusalem tried to lynch a pair of Arabs. The Arabs ran for shelter into the home of a Jewish family who were sitting shiva. The father of the family sheltered and protected the Arabs from the mob.

According to eye witnesses, two battered and bleeding Palestinians barged into the yard of a family sitting Shiva [the Jewish week of mourning], followed by a raging mob.
The family in the house protected the Palestinians and repelled the mob, which was comprised of furious yeshiva students.
A member of the family said yeshiva students yelled at him from the balcony of the yeshiva, overlooking the house, calling to "kill Jews who protect Arabs."
The two east Jerusalem residents were taken to Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem for treatment.
The family that protected them remained mostly unscathed but one of its members was also attacked. "They would have killed me if they could," he said. The two men had told him the altercation began after an argument they had with a store owner drew some bystanders who within minutes intervened and started beating the Arabs.
Waiting for the fury to subside, the man and his son led the Arabs to an alleyway so that they could escape.
But then, the man recounted, hundreds of yeshiva students stormed after the two, beating them "to a pulp," the man said. Protecting them with his own body, he was confronted by two haredi men, one of whom was brandishing a 20 centimeter-long knife.
He was wounded in his abdomen, at which point the crowd began to disperse and large police forces arrived.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/S...

Here we have a least one Righteous Jew, willing to stand up against a mob of fanatics.

The duplicity that racism can result in.

shergald — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 01:44:10 GMT

Sad to hear things like this happening.

God, Iove you.

Diane G — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 01:40:12 GMT

And I love your tenacity on fighting the fuck-shits that cannot see the obvious.

How you be, woman?

Really?

Email me? I think its time we talked. I'll call on my dime.

This is about

asqv — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 00:46:35 GMT

enlightened minds at McDonald's corp taking teeny tiny baby steps to respect the civil rights of everyone.

Jebus help me, I shot off an email to headquarters lauding them for standing firm against the small minded bigotry.

Go order a salad, folks and show em' some love.

If they weren't in Israeli territory,

aristeides — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 21:24:07 GMT

what was the IDF doing there?

I fear that they will just bulldoze the houses again, as soon as they are built. And in East Jerusalem, they're talking about bulldozing houses again, to punish the families of terrorist attackers and anyone who might be called so, as long as they are Arab and not Jewish.

If the terrorist is Jewish, they send troops to protect him, after letting him out of jail.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/s...

And this:

aristeides — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:34:26 GMT

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/s...

Israeli official: U.S. intervention in minor Palestinian issues could damage ties
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent
Tags: Israel, Palestinians, U.S.
Senior officials in the U.S. State Department, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, have repeatedly complained to Israel recently over relatively minor Palestinian issues that it would have ignored until a few months ago, Israeli officials say.
Complaints about settlement construction or army operations that kill Palestinian civilians have always been the norm. But Israeli officials are worried by the State Department's new tendency to intervene in a much broader range of issues.
One such case occurred two weeks ago, when the daughter of Palestinian parliamentarian Hanan Ashrawi sought to visit Israel. At one time, she had lived in East Jerusalem and had permanent resident status, but after several years of living in the United States, her residency had lapsed.
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She therefore asked the State Department to intervene, which resulted in Israel giving her a laissez-passer to come here and arrange her status. However, she was warned at Ben-Gurion Airport that she had two weeks to do so.
Via her mother, a personal friend of Rice, the younger Ashrawi complained to the State Department again over this dictum. Within minutes, Israeli sources said, Assistant Secretary of State David Welch had phoned senior Israeli officials to demand they intervene. The surprised Israelis responded that these procedures are required by law.
Another case was Washington's demand that 10 Gazan Fulbright scholars be allowed to enter Israel for visa interviews at the U.S. consulate in East Jerusalem. However, Israel refused, saying they had been blacklisted for security reasons.
Rice personally intervened. In addition, an Israeli official said, the consulate leaked the story to the New York Times to embarrass Israel.
Israel suggested that the interviews be conducted at the Erez border crossing with Gaza, and Washington eventually agreed. Now, the students are waiting for the consulate to approve their visas.
Yet another case involved an eviction order issued to an East Jerusalem family over nonpayment of rent. Officials from the U.S. consulate visited the family and sent a telegram to Washington, and the State Department demanded that Israel prevent the eviction. The stunned Israelis responded that the eviction had been upheld by the High Court of Justice. Moreover, they said, this was an internal affair.
A senior Israeli official said that the person behind this growing American criticism is the U.S. consul in Jerusalem, Jacob Wallace. "Every week, he receives dozens of complaints from Palestinians and transfers them to Washington without examination," the official said. "He's really inflaming the atmosphere, causing public relations damage to Israel and even may damage our relations with the U.S."
An embassy spokesman responded that the embassy considers its relationship with the Foreign Ministry "excellent."

Looks like someone is actually doing their job, at last, and Israel doesn't like it.

This from Harretz:

Cheryl — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:18:10 GMT

Israel fears scathing U.S. report on its West Bank policies
By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff
The United States security coordinator for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, retired general James Jones, is preparing an extremely critical report of Israel's policies in the territories and its attitude toward the Palestinian Authority's security services.
A few copies of the report's executive summary (or, according to some sources, a draft of it) have been given to senior Bush Administration officials, and it is reportedly arousing considerable discomfort. In recent weeks, the administration has been debating whether to allow Jones to publish his full report, or whether to tell him to shelve it and make do with the summary, given the approaching end of President George Bush's term.
(bold mine)
snip
According to both Israeli and American sources, the envoy's conclusions about Israel are scathing. Israelis who met with Jones on his most recent visit here a few weeks ago, including Israel Defense Forces officers, said their impression was that the report would be "very harsh, and make Israel look very bad."
snip
The harsh criticisms contained in the executive summary are reportedly upsetting the Bush administration. Some senior U.S. officials are demanding that the full report not be published, so as not to create a storm in advance of the presidential elections in November. Jones, however, is apparently insisting that his full report be published,
just as the report he issued last year on the Iraqi security forces was.

I'm going to watch this closely. Jones' report MUST be available for all the world to see.