International Day of Rage

[RLENT]

Yet the vast majority of Israeli Arabs will flat out refused to live under ANY other authority.

If your choice was "very, very bad" ... versus "even worse" ... which one would you choose ?

THE VAST majority of them lives too well under Israeli citizenship.

Or it could be that due to the "state" of Israel has made conditions so intolerable in the Occupied Territories that they know how bad it is in OT ... and that it will only get worse if Israel has its way ...

this is include BTW ALL of East Jerusalem residents.

East Jerusalem residents are being driven out and ethnically cleansed.

the ONLY rezone some East Jerusalem residents do not carry an blue identification is because of the immediate intimidation by the PA in near by Ramall'lah.

Uh-huh ...

How many people here do you figure there are HERE that KNOW once a East Jerusalem resident - who may be forced to go live in the West Bank by virtue of being dispossessed of their homes which are demolished - they will have their blue identification withdrawn/cancelled ... and then can never return ?

It's ethnic cleansing, plain and simple.

most of East Jerusalem's Arab resident do not wish to live under the PA jurisdiction.

Well, just because the "state" of Israel has made the Occupied Territories a living **** don't blame the PA - the Israeli's are the ones controlling the OT.

this have been proven over & over again,

Then surely it must have been documented in some manner - is there a study you can point us to ?

Got a link ?

yet many of them have family members in Ramalla'h. and are forced to say otherwise- to keep their love-ones alive.

Uh-huh ... righty-o !

Has this been documented and if so do you have a link ?

Here's (part of) the reality:

Israel brings Gaza entry restrictions to West Bank

In an echo of restrictions already firmly in place in Gaza, Israel has begun barring movement between Israel and the West Bank for those holding a foreign passport, including humanitarian aid workers and thousands of Palestinian residents.

The new policy is designed to force foreign citizens, mainly from North America and Europe, to choose between visiting Israel — including East Jerusalem, which Israel has annexed illegally — and the West Bank.

The new regulation is in breach of Israel's commitments under the Oslo accords to Western governments that their citizens would be given continued access to the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Israel has not suggested there are any security justifications for the new restriction.

Palestinian activists point out that the rule is being enforced selectively by Israel, which is barring foreign citizens of Palestinian origin from access to Israel and East Jerusalem while actively encouraging European and American Jews to settle in the West Bank.

US diplomats, who are aware of the policy, have raised no objections.

Additionally, human rights groups complain that the rule change will further separate East Jerusalem, the planned capital of a Palestinian state, from the West Bank. It is also expected to increase the pressures on families where one member holds a foreign passport to leave the region and to disrupt the assistance aid organizations are able to give Palestinians.

According to observers, the regulation was introduced quietly three months ago at the Allenby Bridge terminal on the border with Jordan, the only international crossing point for Palestinians in the West Bank. Israeli officials, who control the border, now issue foreign visitors with a visa for the "Palestinian Authority only," preventing them from entering Israel and East Jerusalem.

Interior ministry officials say a similar policy is being adopted at Ben Gurion, Israel's international airport near Tel Aviv, to bar holders of foreign passports who arrive via this route from reaching the West Bank. Foreign citizens, especially those with Palestinian ancestry, are being turned away and told to seek entry via the Allenby Bridge.

Gaza has long been off-limits to any Palestinian who is not resident there and has been effectively closed to Israelis and most foreigners since early 2006, when Israel began its blockade.

"This is a deepening and refinement of the policy of separation that began with Israel establishing checkpoints in the West Bank and building the wall," said Sam Bahour, a Palestinian-American living in Ramallah who heads a Right to Enter campaign highlighting Israeli restrictions on Palestinian movement.

"Foreign governments like the US ought to be up in arms because this rule violates their own citizens' rights under diplomatic agreements. So far they have remained silent."

The US consulate in Jerusalem is aware of the increasing restrictions on foreign passport-holders, according to its website, but claims to be powerless to help.

The Right to Enter campaign notes that 60 percent of all people turned back at the borders by Israeli officials are American citizens.

The consulate website notes both the denial of entry for many Palestinian-Americans at Ben Gurion airport, forcing them instead to use the Allenby Bridge crossing into the West Bank, and the issuing at the crossing of the "Palestinian Authority only" stamp, which excludes them from East Jerusalem and Israel.

"The Consulate can do nothing to assist in getting this visa status changed; only Israeli liaison offices in the West Bank can assist - but they rarely will," points out the website. "Travelers should be alert, and pay attention to which stamp they receive upon entry."

Bahour, 44, said the immediate victims of the new policy would be thousands of Palestinians from abroad who, like himself, returned to the West Bank during the more optimistic Oslo period.

Well-educated and often with established careers, they have been vital both to the regeneration of the local Palestinian economy by investing in and setting up businesses and to the nurturing of a fledgling civil society by running welfare organizations and teaching at universities.

Although many have married local spouses and raised their children in the West Bank, Israel has usually denied them residency permits, forcing them to renew tourist visas every three months by temporarily leaving the region, often for years on end.

Bahour said the latest rule change should be understood as one measure in a web of restrictions strangling normal Palestinian life that have been imposed by Israel, which controls the population registers for both Israelis and Palestinians.

In addition to the wall and checkpoints, he said, Israel regularly deported "foreigners," both humanitarian workers and those of Palestinian origin, arriving in the region; it denied family unification to prevent Palestinian couples living together; it often revoked the residency of Palestinians who study abroad for extended periods; and it confiscated Jerusalem IDs from Palestinians to push them into the West Bank.

He added that the US consulate appeared to have accepted Israel's right to treat American citizens differently based solely on their ethnic origin.

"While Palestinian-Americans are being denied entry to the region or excluded from Israel and East Jerusalem, Israel is actively encouraging American Jews to come and settle in the West Bank."

In early 2006 Bahour, who is married with two daughters, was affected by another rule change when Israel refused to renew tourist visas to Palestinians with foreign passports, forcing them to separate from their families in the West Bank.

After an international outcry, Israel revoked the policy but insisted that Palestinians such as Bahour apply for permits from the Israeli military authorities to remain in the West Bank.

"This latest rule, like the earlier one, fits into Israel's general goal of ethnic cleansing," he said. "Israel makes life ever more difficult to encourage any Palestinians who can, such as those with foreign passports, to leave."

Bahour said the new restrictions would further sever the West Bank from Jerusalem, the centre of Palestinian commercial and cultural life.

Overnight, he said, his Ramallah business consultancy had lost a quarter of its clients - all from nearby East Jerusalem - because he was now barred from leaving the West Bank.

He lost his limited privileges last month when he finally received a Palestinian ID. He said he had been forced to take the ID, which supersedes his American passport in the eyes of the Israeli authorities, to avoid the danger of being deported.

"The ID was bittersweet for me. It means I can't be separated from my family here, but it also means my American passport is not recognized and I am now subject to the closures and arrests faced by ordinary Palestinians."

Sari Bashi, a lawyer with Gisha, an Israeli organization that challenges restrictions on Palestinian movement, said the new policy was placing a severe obstacle in the way of humanitarian organizations, as well as foreigners working in Palestinian welfare organizations and academic institutions.

"Many of the aid organizations working in the West Bank have offices and staff in East Jerusalem and even in Israel, and it's difficult to see how they are going to cope with this new restriction."

She said staff of major international organizations such as the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, and its humanitarian division, OCHA, had been denied entry at Ben Gurion airport after declaring that they were working in the West Bank.

"When Israel prevents access to an area, it raises the question of what is happening there," she said. "What are we being prevented from seeing?"

Human rights groups are also concerned by the wording of the new restriction, confining foreign citizens to the "Palestinian Authority." The PA rules over only about 40 per cent of the West Bank. The groups fear that in the future Israel may seek to prevent foreigners from moving between the PA-controlled enclaves of the West Bank and the 60 percent under Israel control.

Guy Imbar, a spokesman for Israel's Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, said the phrase referred to the entire West Bank.

But Jeff Halper of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions warned: "Given Israel's track record, it is right to be suspicious that the restriction may be reinterpreted at a later date."

Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest books are Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East (Pluto Press) and Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair (Zed Books). His website is Jonathan Cook: Journalist reporting on Israel and Palestine.

Israel brings Gaza entry restrictions to West Bank

 

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The following article illustrates some of the mechanics of ethnic cleansing and dispossession:

1. Withhold municipal planning for years and years for an area that has an expanding population.

2. Withhold permitting for new building on the basis of No. 1

3. Leave the population - whose movements you control - no other choice than either to build illegally or remain in overcrowded housing ... and call those doing so "aggressive criminals" (ya couldn't make it up if ya tried ...)

4. Declare that any new structures that are built are "illegal" as a consequence of No.s 1 - 3 above.

5. Demolish the structures on the basis of No. 4, leaving the families affected with no housing whatsoever.

6. Then build new (government subsidized) housing for your preferred ethnicity on the newly cleared land.

7. Rinse and repeat.

Marked for destruction: Jerusalem neighborhoods brace for large wave of home demolitions

As Isam Hamad Ali, a civil engineer in the Shu'fat refugee camp in East Jerusalem, drove his silver sedan along a wide dirt road near Israel's Separation Wall, he pointed to every building he passed. The buildings he indicated – towering apartment complexes housing tens of families each – recently received notices from the Jerusalem municipality scheduling them to be destroyed in the largest wave of home demolitions ever proposed by the Israeli authorities.

On Thursday, October 31st, Jerusalem municipal officials affixed legal documents to residential buildings in the Ras Khamis and Ras Shahada neighborhoods near Shu'fat, the only Palestinian refugee camp in East Jerusalem. These notices stated that proceedings had been filed in the Jerusalem Local Court to request demolition orders for the houses, all of which were built without construction licenses.

The exact number of buildings and families affected is difficult to determine. Ronit Sela, head of the Human Rights in East Jerusalem project for the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), puts the number of families targeted by the notices somewhere between two and eight hundred. Jeff Halper, Director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, cites the possible destruction of 2,000 housing units covering 15,000 people in the area.

Sela told Mondoweiss that aid workers call the area "no man's land" because of the Jerusalem municipality's lack of data about the neighborhoods. The notices were addressed to "absent owners," meaning the municipality did not have information on the names of the homeowners.

"When you create a no man's land, there's chaos," says Sela, "and the facts and figures are very murky." Even the residents of the neighborhoods aren't certain whose houses were targeted. According to Sela, "some of it is just rumors… neighbors don't necessarily trust each other."

Getting a construction permit for a home can be difficult for Palestinians throughout East Jerusalem, but it's impossible in these neighborhoods, says Ronit Sela, because there hasn't been any urban planning done by the municipality since 1967. As a result, she says, "there's no way to get a permit; there's no regulations even that you need to follow."

"The lack of planning in East Jerusalem is a policy, is deliberate, and brings Palestinians to a place where they cannot build legally almost anywhere in the city," Sela says.

A psychologist working in a health center in Shu'fat affiliated with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, who requested anonymity for this report, spoke with Mondoweiss about the traumatic effects of demolitions on the families who lived in the houses. "After the home is destroyed," she says, "they are in shock…the meaning of safety disappears."

According to her, victims of the demolitions often turn to domestic violence or drugs – especially cocaine and heroin – in response to the stress and depression caused by the destruction. "They take them to forget," she explains. In another sign of psychological distress, she notes, after their homes are demolished, many families continue to live in tents or other makeshift structures beside the wreckage.

Ronit Sela doesn't believe that Israel would follow through on demolitions of this magnitude. "Most of us think it's hard to imagine the Israeli authorities coming in and demolishing so many buildings and making so many people homeless," she says.

The psychologist at the Shu'fat health center agrees. "Something terrible would happen," if all the orders were to be carried out, she says.

Isam Hamad Ali was one of the residents whose home, which is currently under construction, received a demolition notice on October 31. Isam, like other recipients of the notices, was given until November 30 to appeal the order in court. This deadline was subsequently extended by two weeks.

However, Isam has already spent 600,000 shekels ($170,000 USD) on building his home, and he says that hiring a lawyer for the appeal would be a considerable financial hardship.

Furthermore, he and other residents would have to claim ownership of the homes to appeal the orders, exposing themselves to potentially massive fines and taxes on the unlicensed properties that they have otherwise avoided because of the municipality's lack of information on the area's inhabitants.

"Nobody wants to go to court… but they are afraid," says Isam.

One theory proposed by the residents is that the threat of the demolitions is a strategy of the Israeli authorities to collect these fines by forcing homeowners in the area to identify themselves when they challenge the orders in court. "If they don't say anything, and if the Israelis are not serious about carrying out the demolitions, then that's a better scenario," says Sela.

Still, declining to appeal the court notice means living with the constant fear of the demolition orders being fulfilled. "If they don't step up," says Sela, "they have a future demolition hanging over their head."

None of Isam's family was home when the demolition order was delivered, but workers building the house who were present at the time say that approximately fifty soldiers arrived in the early morning to deliver the notice. A much larger force was stationed just on the other side of the Separation Wall, which runs about 20 feet from the back of Isam's house.

Isam expresses hope that the house demolitions in Shu'fat might affect the ongoing peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. "It's important for the negotiators to know about this," he says. UN statistics show that the rate of home demolitions in East Jerusalem has risen this year during the peace talks.

So far, however, there has been no public acknowledgement of the home demolitions during the negotiations. The Association of International Development Agencies released a statement on December 4 signed by 36 NGOs calling for an end to the demolitions and stating that 207 homes and other properties have been destroyed in the West Bank since the peace negotiations began in July.

"I wish it was more on the agenda in general – that there was some outcry," says Sela. "But I haven't seen any statements on it, the only thing I've seen is media reports."

The PA Ministry of Information did not respond to a request for comment on discussion of house demolitions during the peace talks.

Standing in front of his house, Isam speaks of his family's plans to resist the destruction of their home. "When [the soldiers] come," says Isam, "I and my two daughters will stand in front… of the bulldozers. We will try to stop them with our bodies. And we will die. That's all we can do."

"They have the arms," Isam continues. "They have the force."

"Just Allah is with us, nobody more."

Marked for destruction: Jerusalem refugee camp braces for large wave of home demolitions

 

[RLENT]

Although it isn't nearly as efficient as wholesale ethnic cleansing by housing demolition, targeted assassination by sniper fire - against children - by shooting them in the back, still works.

Moveover, such murders might comport with the "Torat Hamelech, a book that relied on rabbinical sources to justify the killing of gentiles, including infants "if it is clear that they will grow up to harm us.' "

Inside Torat Hamelech, the Jewish extremist terror tract endorsed by state-employed rabbis | Max Blumenthal

It is more than likely that the perpetrator in this case will receive no punishment whatsoever ... like in most cases of extra-judicial execution committed by the Israeli military.

'The Israeli sniper shot my son as if he hunted a bird'

 

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I, for once do NOT agree with the Wikipedia link you have provided. infact i calim it is flatout wrong.

Of course you do ... because it doesn't fit the narrative you are trying to follow ...

You may very well claim that "palestinians are a made-up people" as well ...

Doesn't make it true ..

your claim that 16.5% of the peopolatin of Israel are Palestinians is BASELESS.

Well that's very odd indeed ... since the source of that data is from the Statistical Abstract of Israel, 2001 2.50 ... which was published by the "state" of Israel ...

Do you not believe your own government ?

i know that, because, unlike what can be found on the Internet, i personally lived among them, and still visit them about once a year or so. so dose MANY of my personal freinds & Family.

Righty - O !

i can say with 100% acuracy that the Israeli arabs in large do not concider themselves Palastinians.

Well, that could very well be ... depending on how the question is framed ...

The fact of the matter is though, that unless Israel allowed some large immigration of Arabs - other than Palestinians - into Israel at some point or another that we're all unaware of, the people referred to as "Arab Israelis" are of Palestinian ethnicity and descent ...

Any attempt to deny this fact - and we're all well aware of how far Israelis will go to deny reality (witness the "Nakba Law" which attempted to criminalize the mourning of the Nakba) - is simply an effort to whitewash history and reality.

 

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Miss Zoabi is a CRIMINAL. and a traitor.

What crime is she guilty of ?

A traitor to what ... the oppressors of her people ?

How can someone be a "traitor" to something which they not only have never accepted, but in fact have explicitly rejected ?

M.K Member or not, an elected member of public service should be held to a higher standard.

That could be a very fruitful ground to explore ... although perhaps not in a manner you would really prefer ...

calling for the killing of Israeli soldiers should have revoke her amunity years ago.

I defy you to post a link to a major news organization reporting her making such a call ...

(I really don't know whether or not she did, but in light of some of your other assertions which have proven to demonstrably false, I'm not willing to just take your word for it.)

 

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Mr.Tibi is a traitor, & shell be jailed.

I wouldn't doubt that he would be jailed for political speech - such is reflective of the vibrant nature of "Israeli democracy"

And oh yes - he is clearly a most horrible individual:

Tibi continues to be considered controversial in the Israeli politics mainly due to his wide relations with Palestinian and Arab parties and his debatable speeches in the Knesset.

However, Tibi is also known for having pronounced a moving speech to commemorate Holocaust Day in 2010 at the Israeli Knesset. Yair Lapid reported on Israel's Channel 2 : "Knesset elders claim that it might have been the best speech ever given in the Israeli Parliament" ...

going to Ramalla'h and praising Jihad suicide bombers that kills Israeli citizens is not what an elected official should do.

Again: I defy you to post a link to a major news reporting this allegation you are making.

You know, your criticism of certain others which you disagree with politically might go a little better if your allegations weren't unsourced and undocumented ...

The fact that those 2 are allowed to keep their job speaks volume about the quality of democracy and freedom of speech in Israel.

The following also speaks volumes about the "quality" as well:

Haneen Zoabi: The largest threat to Zionism is democracy

Knesset member Haneen Zoabi 'democratically' stripped of parliamentary privileges

Court delays ruling on Tibi petition over travel limitations Israel News | Haaretz

Mostly what it says is that is that it isn't really a democracy at all, but rather an ethnocracy ...

 

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I do not consider those an "Occupied Territories" here's why. after the 6 days war, the area of Yehodah ve Shomron was placed under a disputed marshal law.

Moose,

I really don't understand what your inclination is in using terms that people here will not understand - unless it's just your intent to make people stupid by inducing a mental fog and confusion ...

You do know that "Yehodah ve Shomron" in the English language is "Judea and Samaria" right ?

You know: When in Rome ... (do as the Romans do)

As to the Occupied Territories:

The Israeli-occupied territories are the territories which have been designated as occupied territory by the United Nations and other international organizations, governments and others to refer to the territory seized by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967 from Egypt, Jordan, and Syria.

They consist of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem; much of the Golan Heights; the Gaza Strip, though Israel disputes this and argues that since the implementation of its disengagement from Gaza in 2005 it no longer occupies the territory; and, until 1982, the Sinai Peninsula.

The West Bank and Gaza Strip are also referred to as the Palestinian territories or "Occupied Palestinian Territory".

The Palestinian Authority, the EU, the International Court of Justice, the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council consider East Jerusalem to be part of the West Bank and occupied by Israel; Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its capital and sovereign territory.

The International Court of Justice, the UN General Assembly and the United Nations Security Council regards Israel as the "Occupying Power". The term "Occupying Power" has taken on a precise legal meaning following the International Court of Justice advisory opinion in July 2004 that Israel is occupying this territory in violation of international law. The Israeli High Court of Justice has ruled that Israel holds the West Bank under "belligerent occupation".

You see - even the High Court of Justice of your own nation has ruled that Israel is a "belligerent occupier" ... to say nothing of the other international bodies mentioned above ...

this was all done in agreement with UN mandate.

Uh-huh ...

Which UN Mandate are you referring to specifically ?

Because it sure ain't UNSC Resolution 242, which was passed in the aftermath of the 1967 war:

Israeli governments have preferred the term "disputed territories" in the case of the West Bank.

The first use of the term 'territories occupied' was in United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 following the Six-Day War in 1967, which called for "the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East" to be achieved by "the application of both the following principles: ... Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict ... Termination of all claims or states of belligerency" and respect for the right of every state in the area to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries.

the area was classified as a desputed area, and ever since there have been negotiation to resolve the issues on hand.

Uh-huh ... Israel-Palestine: the Disneyland of endless negotiations ... and continuous ethnic cleansing of the land of its indigenous inhabitants ...

Israel have NEVER consider it a part of Israel.

If Israel doesn't consider it to be part of Israel, then what is in dispute ?

If it ain't Israel, then why is Israel building illegal settlements there ?

Leaving aside the fact that doing so is a direct violation of international law, doing so is, in fact, a hostile and aggressive act ...

If it ain't Israel, then get out of it ...

Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem in 1980 (see Jerusalem Law) and the Golan Heights in 1981 (see Golan Heights Law) has not been recognised by any other country.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 declared the annexation of Jerusalem "null and void" and required that it be rescinded.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 497 also declared the annexation of the Golan "null and void".

Following withdrawal by Israel from the Sinai Peninsula in 1982, as part of the 1979 Israel–Egypt Peace Treaty, the Sinai ceased to be considered occupied territory. Israel unilaterally disengaged from Gaza in September 2005, and declared itself no longer to be in occupation of the Strip.

However, as it retains control of Gaza's airspace and coastline, it continues to be designated as an occupying power in the Gaza Strip by the United Nations Security Council, the United Nations General Assembly and some countries and various human rights organizations.

more so, since the Oslo agreement have been signed,

Oslo is a complete joke - mostly due to Israel's failure to live up to their end of the bargain ... but the PA bears responsibility as well for their own transgressions ...

Oslo was so lopsided (in favor of Israel) that it isn't even funny ... and the entire situation was already way lopsided in favor of Israel even prior to Oslo ...

97% of none Jewish pepulation is under Palastinians Authority jurisdictions, the rest of the peopulations future is yet to be determined, but Israel have NO claim in running their lives.

That (highlighted) is certainly true ... and yet Israel still does it ...

obviously current negotiations, if sucssesful, will resault in many people moving eleswhere.

Current negotiations are unlikely to be successful - because Israel isn't a partner for peace, only a partner for subjugation, domination, dispossession, theft, and ethnic cleansing.

Machmod Abbass already declared that no Jewish person will ever live inside the future Palastinian state.

As far as I know, that's an outright lie.

When are you going to learn that lying - particularly when it can be demonstrated so easily - doesn't help your cause ... it only hurts it ?

Here's what Abbas actually said:

"In a final resolution, we would not see the presence of a single Israeli -- civilian or soldier -- on our lands," Abbas told reporters during a visit to Cairo.

Mahmoud Abbas foresees Palestinian state with no Israelis - latimes.com

Please note that Mr. Abbas said "Israeli" ... not "Jewish" ... necessarily his statement would also include Muslims and Christians - since there are Israeli citizens who are Jewish, Muslim, and Christian (not to mention Druze and probably others)

Stop doing this sort of thing - because when you state lies as facts, it feeds into and gives credence to the anti-semitic trope that (all) "Jews are liars" ... or something ...

It is certainly true that there are Jews who liars - just as there are Muslims and Christians who are ... but it is not a generally accurate representation of any of these groups (IMO) ...

You are doing the functional equivalent of poking yourself in the eye with a sharp stick - stop it !

 

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An article on the Bedouins and Prawer Plan by the NY Times' Jodi Rudoren - who at least seems to be making an effort to present the Bedouin perspective of some the Bedouin affected who are not in agreement with the plan.

Some snippets from the article.

In an Israeli Plan, Bedouins See a Threat to Their Way of Life

Proponents of the project say that no state can abide people’s building where and what they wish without approval, and that it promises the Bedouins, by far Israel’s poorest sector, clinics, jobs, education and infrastructure that they sorely lack. Opponents call it insidious racism, ethnic cleansing or even apartheid; complain that the Bedouins were not consulted enough in the plan’s construction; and accuse Israel of a land grab that ignores their culture and traditions.It would be difficult to overstate the level of distrust underlying the dispute. But there is no denying the hardship that Bedouins face: Their infant mortality rate is seven times that in Tel Aviv, illiteracy and unemployment are rampant, and many live without water, electricity, phone and sewage services.

“They deserve more, and they can be given more,” said Clinton Bailey, an Israeli scholar who has studied the Bedouins for 45 years. “If the government just realizes that it has to think it out and decide what it can give them and specify it and then talk to people, they’ll find much less opposition than they have today.”

Israel has in recent years recognized 13 villages, legalizing dwellings long slated for demolition, but has moved slowly, if at all, to modernize them. There remain 35 unrecognized villages like Abdeh, with a total of 70,000 residents, who could face forced relocation.

“We are not against development,” said Thabet Abu Rass of Adalah, an advocacy group for Arab rights in Israel. “The question is why, whenever the State of Israel wants to develop the Negev, it’s always at the expense of the Bedouin.”

The Bedouins and their advocates say that they simply want to maintain their small agricultural villages, and have developed an alternative plan to put them on the grid, but that the government has ignored it.

Ami Tesler, who is promoting the plan for the prime minister’s office, said about a dozen such villages would probably be recognized, though he would not say which — the lack of specifics has infuriated the Bedouins.

Full article:

In an Israeli Plan, Bedouins See a Threat to Their Way of Life

In the interests of fairness, below is an article from Legal Insurrection, which critiques Rudoren's article and takes an opposing view. It includes a video of two Bedouin sheikhs which represent two villages as I understand it, who are in favor of the plan:

New York Times | Jodi Rudoren | Israel | Bedouin | Negev

The video is informative not only for what it says about their support ... but also for their willingness to go along with something which they haven't read and really don't appear to be fully informed about ...

 

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I do not understand the illusion Part, the Oslo agreement was signed 19 years ago.

You should learn more about the science and art of public relations - pointing out the fact that Oslo was signed 19 years ago does not help your overall case.

In colloquial parlance it's known as: ... shooting oneself in the foot ...

since then 97% of the Palastinians are living under FULL control of the PA.

Really great propaganda - assuming you can get the uninformed to believe it - but that's an outright lie:

Government

​

• Since the Arab-Israeli war of June 1967, Israel has been militarily occupying the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem (including the Old City), and the Gaza Strip, as well as the Syrian Golan Heights.

• In small areas of the West Bank the Palestinian Authority (PA), which was created under the terms of the supposedly interim Oslo Accords during the 1990s, exercises some governing responsibilities, however it exists under the auspices of the Israeli military. Ultimately, even those Palestinians who live in areas nominally under PA control are ruled by the Israeli military. Under Oslo, the West Bank is divided into three categories:
  • Area A: Under nominal civil and security control of the PA, however the PA operates at the discretion of Israel while the Israeli military makes incursions into Area A on a regular basis. Area A comprises approximately 19% of the West Bank and is where most Palestinians live.
  • Area B: Under nominal civil control of the PA with Israeli security control. Area B comprises approximately 21% of the West Bank.
  • Area C: Under full Israeli military and civil control. Area C comprises approximately 60% of the West Bank and is where most Jewish settlers live. See here for UN map of Area C, and here for UN fact sheet on Area C.
• Overall in the West Bank, Israel has instituted a dual system of laws for Jewish settlers and Palestinians. Jewish settlers are governed by the laws of Israel and are accorded the full rights of Israeli citizenship, including the right to vote, while Palestinians are ruled by Israeli military decree. According to a 2010 Human Rights Watch report entitled "Separate and Unequal: Israel's Discriminatory Treatment of Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories":
  
  "Palestinians face systematic discrimination merely because of their race, ethnicity, and national origin, depriving them of electricity, water, schools, and access to roads, while nearby Jewish settlers enjoy all of these state-provided benefits. While Israeli settlements flourish, Palestinians under Israeli control live in a time warp - not just separate, not just unequal, but sometimes even pushed off their lands and out of their homes."
  
  
  ​
• In Gaza, the Hamas movement maintains internal control over the tiny, crowded coastal strip, but Israel remains an occupying power despite the withdrawal of some 8000 settlers in 2005 because its military still controls what is allowed in and out of besieged Gaza, as well as its airspace and coastline. This meets the legal definition of "effective control" for an occupying power. (For more, see our reference sheet:Israel, Gaza & International Law.)

Barriers to Palestinian Movement in the West Bank
​

• At any given time, there are approximately 500 Israeli army checkpoints, roadblocks, and other obstacles to Palestinian movement within the occupied West Bank, an area smaller than Delaware.

IMEU: QUICK FACTS: The Occupied Palestinian Territories: An Overview

Your assertion of that "97% of the Palastinians are living under FULL control of the PA" is - as I stated previously - a lie ... and an utterly dishonest characterization of the situation ...

Besides the above, who controls access into and out of the Occupied Territories ?

Jst last year an Israeli offer was 'on the table' to allow the remaining 3% to choose if to become Israel's citizends. unfortunatly that plan did not materalized , maybe in near future?

If the offer you are referring to was an offer to Palestinians residing in East Jerusalem for Israeli citizenship, based on past history I think that becoming reality is dubious ... at best ...

If the above (East Jerusalem) is the case, then:

The East Jerusalem that Israel is illegally occupying, colonizing, and has annexed both de facto and de jure in violation of international law ?:

Jerusalem was to be an international city under the 1947 UN Partition Plan. It was not included as a part of either the proposed Jewish or Arab states.

The East Jerusalem where the majority of Palestinian residents have refused the Israeli offer of citizenship - since it would require them to acknowledge and accept the theft of their own land by an occupying state ?

This Jerusalem ?:

Both the Oslo Accords and the 2003 Road map for peace postponed the negotiations on the status of Jerusalem. Also during the last serious negotiations in 2008 with the Olmert government, Israel refused to talk about the Jerusalem question. Since 2009, when Netanyahu came into power, there has been no substantial peace process at all. Provocative statements by Israeli leaders, expressing plain rejection of negotiations on the status of East Jerusalem have become customary, notably variations of "Jerusalem is the eternal, united and indivisible capital of Israel", a vision also expressed in the Jerusalem Law. The 1997 Beilin-Eitan Agreement between the Likud block and Labor postulated that all of Jerusalem would remain under Israeli sovereignty and the "Palestinian entity" would never have its "governing center" within Jerusalem.
Israel is supposed to obstruct the negotiations by creating facts on the ground. Numerous UN resolutions have blamed the occupation and facts that change the status of Jerusalem are declared null and void. Obvious examples of such facts are the imposition of Israeli laws upon East Jerusalem, the integration into the Jerusalem municipality, the barrier in Jerusalem and an aggressive settlement policy, cutting off East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank.

East_Jerusalem

If you are not referring to East Jerusalem but rather to "Area C" (which comprises over 60% of the West Bank) that's a total hoot - it's nothing more an an effort to steal more land by offering not the Palestinian people something - but only a small subset of them something - in exchange for land that they are not the sole claimants to.

I hunestly think that a 2 state sulotion is coming, and that residents will be allowed to choose their future.

The two state solution is dead ... and it's rotting, stinking corpse is lying out in the open for all to see ...

While I don't necessarily agree with everything in the following article, it is informative from a number of respects:

Despite the current efforts by Secretary of State John Kerry to restart the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the possibility of an economically viable and sovereign Palestinian state alongside Israel is nil.

This is because the ever growing settlement movement has “captured” all of Area C that makes up almost 60% of the West Bank. The remaining Areas A & B exclude East Jerusalem; they are broken into more than 100 disconnected islands surrounded by Israeli controlled Area C.

The result is an area too small and isolated to form an economically viable state.

This situation exists because of a deliberate Israeli policy, stated and unstated since 1958, to block a Palestinian state. The Oslo peace process has led to failure, frustration and anger with renewed violence and diminished prospects for a Palestinian state.

The world will support a campaign for Palestinian citizenship in Israel

Bottomline: Israel broke it, so it will have to buy it ... and the world will force them to own it ...

May take a while ... but it is coming ...

And the likelihood is that Israel, as a consequence of its actions, will do nothing but speed it along.

 

[RLENT]

It's an Open forum, we are allowed to whatever FACTS we choose to, didn't you read the manual?

My apologies - you evidently don't understand: the saying "You are entitled your opinion but not your own facts" is an American colloquialism (saying or proverb)

What it means is that everyone has a right to an opinion (which may or may not be supported by facts) ... but facts are owned by no one (or potentially owned by all)

IOW, a fact is just a fact - it isn't exclusively yours or mine - either one of us may avail ourselves of it.

Further, it is also probably an illustration that attempting to pass off or assert opinion as fact is a dubious proposition, at best.

beside, when wikipedia is so out of touch, what is a fact anyway?

If you are unsure as to what a fact is, then lease avail yourself of the following link:

Fact - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

As to Wikipedia being "out of touch", anyone is certainly free to assert that is the case in general, or in a specific instance ... however they may be challenged to back up that assertion so it isn't just a case of "I say so" ...

o'h here's one. since 2001 30,000 Arab Palestinians inter-married with Arab Israeli's{and in some case Israeli Jews}, all because they wanted Israeli citizenship, with all the benefits that comes with it.

Really ?

What's the source of that data ? Got a link ?

So ... it was "all because they wanted Israeli citizenship" ?

Love played no part ?

I assume that in the case of non-Jewish/Jewish marriages, these marriages did not actually take place in Israel, since these type of inter-marriages are not by law allowed to take place inside Israel itself AFAIK (although I believe they are recognized by the government if they occur outside borders of Israel)

Problems, problems ... of a number of different types:

Trying to rationalize Israel's bar on intermarriage. No can do

If one wants to understand how whacked out tribalism can get, then scope this out:

Rivaling Iran as a 'grave' threat to Israel -- American intermarriage

Yeah, well ... okey-dokey ...

 

[RLENT]

Hey Moose ... about that Oslo thingie ...

You familiar with the little "Bibi home video" below ?

(FYI: it's entirely in Hebrew)

You wanna translate it ... and tell everyone what Bibi actually says in it - both about Oslo - and about what he really thinks of the United States ?

Or should I just go ahead post the translated (and annotated) transcript ?

#oops #israelisnopartnerforpeace​

 

[RLENT]

Here's the transcript - it is probably only partial, in that the any extraneous small talk isn't really what's newsworthy.

Hat tip to Dena Shunra (https://twitter.com/ShunraCat) for the translation.

djonesowens1 writes: At a point in the middle of the video Netanayhu asks the camera man to stop taping, but he continues... Netanyahu says what he really thinks for the first time: He brags about how easy is to manipulate the USA and he proudly explains how he sabotaged the Oslo process:

Bibi:...The Arabs are currently focusing on a war of terror and they think it will break us. The main thing, first of all, is to hit them. Not just one blow, but blows that are so painful that the price will be too heavy to be borne. The price is not too heavy to be borne, now. A broad attack on the Palestinian Authority. To bring them to the point of being afraid that everything is collapsing...



(rlent note: The PA is a non-military, civil institution - which was only supposed to last for 5 years while Oslo was implemented and peace concluded. But the Israeli's have managed to avoid a conclusion - in order to prevent a Palestinian State - so that they can continue their conquest of dispossession and ethnic cleansing.)

Woman: Wait a moment, but then the world will say "how come you're conquering again?"



Netanyahu: the world won't say a thing. The world will say we're defending.



Woman: Aren't you afraid of the world, Bibi?



Netanyahu: Especially today, with America. I know what America is. America is something that can easily be moved. Moved to the right direction.

Child: They say they're for us, but, it's like...



Netanyahu: They won't get in our way. They won't get in our way.

Child: On the other hand, if we do some something, then they...


Netanyahu: So let's say they say something. So they said it! They said it! 80% of the Americans support us. It's absurd. We have that kind of support and we say "what will we do with the..." Look. That administration [Clinton] was extremely pro-Palestinian. I wasn't afraid to maneuver there. I was not afraid to clash with Clinton. I was not afraid to clash with the United Nations. I was paying the price anyway, I preferred to receive the value. Value for the price.



In the following segment, Bibi boasts about how he emptied the Oslo Accords of meaning by an interpretation that made a mockery of them:

Woman: The Oslo Accords are a disaster.



Netanyahu: Yes. You know that and I knew that...The people [nation] has to know...



What were the Oslo Accords? The Oslo Accords, which the Knesset signed, I was asked, before the elections: "Will you act according to them?" and I answered: "yes, subject to mutuality and limiting the retreats." "But how do you intend to limit the retreats?" "I'll give such interpretation to the Accords that will make it possible for me to stop this galloping to the '67 [armistice] lines. How did we do it?



Narrator: The Oslo Accords stated at the time that Israel would gradually hand over territories to the Palestinians in three different pulses, unless the territories in question had settlements or military sites. This is where Netanyahu found a loophole.



Netanyahu: No one said what defined military sites. Defined military sites, I said, were security zones. As far as I'm concerned, the Jordan Valley is a defined military site.



Woman: Right [laughs]...The Beit She'an Valley.



Netanyahu: How can you tell. How can you tell? But then the question came up of just who would define what Defined Military Sites were. I received a letter -- to me and to Arafat, at the same time -- which said that Israel, and only Israel, would be the one to define what those are, the location of those military sites and their size. Now, they did not want to give me that letter, so I did not give the Hebron Agreement. I stopped the government meeting, I said: "I'm not signing." Only when the letter came, in the course of the meeting, to me and to Arafat, only then did I sign the Hebron Agreement. Or rather, ratify it, it had already been signed. Why does this matter? Because at that moment I actually stopped the Oslo Accord.



Woman: And despite that, one of our own people, excuse me, who knew it was a swindle, and that we were going to commit suicide with the Oslo Accord, gives them -- for example -- Hebron...



Netanyahu: Indeed, Hebron hurts. It hurts. It's the thing that hurts. One of the famous rabbis, whom I very much respect, a rabbi of Eretz Yisrael, he said to me: "What would your father say?" I went to my father. Do you know a little about my father's position?

...

He's not exactly a lily-white dove, as they say. So my father heard the question and said: "Tell the rabbi that your grandfather, Rabbi Natan Milikowski, was a smart Jew. Tell him it would be better to give two percent than to give a hundred percent. And that's the choice here. You gave two percent and in that way you stopped the withdrawal. Instead of a hundred percent." The trick is not to be there and be broken. The trick is to be there and pay a minimal price."


rlent comment: Negotiations in bad faith are no real negotiations at all ... they are only a pretext to continue something (the appearance of a "peace process") for some particular purpose (prevention of a Palestinian State and continued dispossession and ethnic cleansing of the indigenous people of the land)

 

[RLENT]

The bona fides of the translator, just in case anyone was wondering:

Shunra Media Inc. Hebrew Translation Service

 

[Ragman]

Not to fan the flames of a situation that has been going on for too long, and I would like to think most would agree with me that both sides have to share in the blame for it to continue much longer, my question is why nothing is said about the other parties involved in the middle east.

Egypt tunnel blockade takes toll on Gaza business

 

[RLENT]

Ragman,

Welcome ... and thanks for your input and participation in this thread.

You may well be a courageous individual ... for stepping where others apparently fear to tread ...

Not to fan the flames of a situation that has been going on for too long, and I would like to think most would agree with me that both sides have to share in the blame for it to continue much longer ...

That is certainly true (IMO) - but it then begs the question:

In terms of responsibility, what is a fair apportionment of it ?

my question is why nothing is said about the other parties involved in the middle east.

Egypt tunnel blockade takes toll on Gaza business

The current authoritarian military government of Egypt is certainly a factor.

From the view of the US Empire, this government is the preferred choice - as opposed to the one which was democratically elected by the majority of the Egyptian people. The reason for that, IMO, is that it is willing to subjugate the interests of the Egyptian people in favor of US and Israeli interests.

It is an unnatural situation ... and probably like Mubarak, will not endure forever.

In regards to your original question: It's largely a matter of where one hangs out - there is a good deal of discussion about it elsewhere.

The real question is, I guess: What are the actions and involvement of other parties a natural consequence of ?

To fully appreciate that, one has to be willing to look back at least 65 years or so ...

And further, one has to go outside of the MSM to find the relevant data to place things in proper context.

 

[RLENT]

A little more backstory on Bibi's special appearance on "Candid Camera" mentioned above:

"The world won't say a thing" - Netanyahu on ongoing Israeli expansion

 

[RLENT]

Breaking news - hot off the presses !

This just in:

Israeli cabinet likely to scrap controversial Bedouin relocation plan

Coalition whip says revelation that architect of the plan never presented the proposal nor received Bedouin approval mean there could no longer be majority support for the deal.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government is likely to drop the current version of its controversial plan to relocate thousands of Negev Bedouin into already recognized villages, after it emerged that community leaders did not consent to the proposal despite claims to the contrary.

Coalition chairman MK Yariv Levin believes that the current form of the Prawer plan for regulating Bedouin settlement in the Negev will be shelved. Due to the revelation that former MK Benny Begin, who drew up the plan, did not approach the Bedouin themselves with the plan and did not receive their approval, there is no longer a coalition majority supporting the plan, Levin said.

“There’s no chance of approving the second and third reading of the Prawer bill in its present form, because there is no justification to do so," he said.

Rest of the article:

Israeli cabinet likely to scrap controversial Bedouin relocation plan - National Israel News | Haaretz

So much for the idea that the "agreement" of "most parties" in any way included those that it affected the most ...

(BTW - the rest of the article is fairly dam*ing as to what was actually going on)

 

[RLENT]

From the Michigan Daily, the campus newspaper of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor:

Viewpoint: Dorm room demolitions (#UMMockEviction)

BY STUDENTS ALLIED FOR FREEDOM AND EQUALITY

Published December 9, 2013

If you do not vacate the premises by 13 DECEMBER 6 PM, we reserve the right to demolish your premises without delay. We cannot be held responsible for property or persons remaining inside. Charges for demolition will be applied to your student account.

Thousands of students at the University of Michigan awoke to this news yesterday morning. Fortunately, this news wasn’t real. The eviction notice was a tool of political satire intended to emulate a situation that thousands of Palestinians confront on a regular basis. While we attempted to parallel this situation onto our campus, it is impossible to understand the violent trauma that comes with the uprooting and displacement of entire families and neighborhoods. We can only begin to try to imagine the physical, emotional and psychological loss that happens when homes and communities — embedded with memory, dignity and livelihood — are reduced to rubble.

Since 1967, the Israeli government has demolished more than 27,000 Palestinian homes. Last month alone, Israeli authorities posted eviction orders on 200 residential buildings in East Jerusalem that will leave more than 15,000 Palestinians homeless. No alternative or compensation is provided for these soon-to-be displaced populations. While University of Michigan students who received the mock eviction notices can rest assured knowing that they will not be forcibly uprooted from their cozy quarters, they also will not be subjected to the $19,400 fine that Palestinian families are forced to pay if they refuse to demolish their homes themselves and leave the humiliating task to Israeli authorities.

Discrimination against Palestinian and Israeli Arabs in relation to their Jewish counterparts is starkly disturbing. While Palestinian homes are consistently and unlawfully demolished, illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and the West bank continue to erect and flourish. While Palestinians are forced to pay hefty fines if they do not demolish their own homes, Israelis are incentivized to live in illegal settlements through payment. In fact, most Israelis move to settlements not because of religious, ideological, or political reasons, but for the sake of economic convenience due to subsidies that make living in illegal settlements cheaper than in Israel.

Of course, all of this is in gross violation of universally-recognized human rights. Under the Geneva Convention, any forcible population transfer is strictly forbidden. But the Israeli government does not have to answer to international law or human rights. Its blatant disregard for human dignity and survival is supported and made possible by us — the United States — which has vetoed a total of 41 Security Council resolutions that indict Israel over its numerous war crimes.

So what now? The so called “peace process” has only proven as a way to buy time and protect the expansion of settlements that make any just resolution unlikely. Israeli settlements and their expansive network of checkpoints and segregated road systems fragment Palestinian land, break apart families, and take huge tolls on the Palestinian economy. What Palestinian state can we speak of when 82 percent of the West Bank is under Israeli military rule and 61 percent of it is under full Israeli control?

The miserable futility of the peace process is too evident by recent developments: While Secretary of State John Kerry tries to renew “peace talks”, the Israeli ministry has announced the building of 300 new settlement homes in East Jerusalem. The U.S. State Department described the move as“counterproductive”.

In view of Israel’s legal and political impunity and the absence of real and just dialogue, it is time for we as students at the University of Michigan to take the stand that our government has yet to make. In 2005, Palestinian civil society called for a global citizens’ response to these injustices by implementing boycotts, divestment, and sanctions against Israel until it complies with international law.

In doing so, Palestinian civil society has proposed a morally consistent, accountable, effective, and nonviolent tactic to resist the continued colonization and ethnic cleansing of their lands.

The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement has been endorsed by prominent figures including South African liberation leaders Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela and is beginning to develop into a truly global movement. Just last week, the American Studies Association passed a resolution to academically boycott Israeli institutions. Several American university student bodies, including University of California, Berkeley, have passed resolutions asking their universities to divest from all companies profiting from the illegal Israeli occupation.

At its core, BDS is about adhering and elevating human rights. It asks nothing controversial; only that we uphold our moral standards and practice what we preach. Divesting from Israel would mean divesting from companies that have explicit ties with and profit from the Israeli occupation — companies that engage in selling military technology that aids and facilitates violence against civilians, operating racially segregated bus systems, and providing services to illegal settlements.

Our university has an established and rich tradition of dissent and activism. This campus has historically been a space for students to raise their political and global consciousness and become harbingers of social change whether it was through prying open the doors of higher education to students of color, relentlessly protesting the war in Vietnam, or divesting from South African Apartheid in 1983. By remaining neutral on “Israeli apartheid”, we remain complicit in a system of oppression. Now is the time for us to join and support the BDS movement if we truly want to be a campus and student body that is socially just and conscious.

This article was written by members of Students Allied for Freedom and Equality.

Viewpoint: Dorm room demolitions (#UMMockEviction) - The Michigan Daily

 

[moose]

More land theft in an occupied "foreign" land and more Israeli lies:


Original article:

IOF confiscates 1500 dunums south of Nablus

This should've been done decades ago. better late then never. the residants of Itamar & Ginot Shomron have been terrorized on the old road by neighboring Arab villagers. like it have been done many times before, a new road is constructed to simply bypass the areas of attack.
residents of Aqrabe'h can only look themselves in the mirror when complaining.
IF they only stop KILLING Jews, their lives will be much more simple.

 

[moose]

From the Michigan Daily, the campus newspaper of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor:


Viewpoint: Dorm room demolitions (#UMMockEviction) - The Michigan Daily

Ironically this one Campus is notably home for some of the larges Muslim student group in N/A.
good Thing Muslims in America have Israel to Hate, once Israel is gone- guess whose next?
Map | Muslims in Michigan