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Google in privacy policy changes across its services

2012-01-25T09:31:00.000Z

Google has changed its privacy policy, streamlining it across its multiple services including search, email, video and social networking sites.

More than 60 different policies will be combined into one that will go into effect 1 March, the company said.
Google said the new policy will give people more relevant search results and help advertisers find customers.
Google has previously faced criticism over the sharing of users data.
"We're rolling out a new main privacy policy that covers the majority of our products and explains what information we collect, and how we use it in a more readable way," said Alma Whitten, Google's director of privacy, product and engineering.
The single privacy policy will apply to Google search, Gmail, YouTube and Google+, its social networking site.
The main change applies to users who have Google accounts.
"If you're signed into Google, we can do things like suggest search queries, or tailor your search results, based on the interests you've expressed in Google+, Gmail and YouTube," the company said, explaining the changes.
The revision comes after Google's previous attempt at social networking, Buzz, was shut down.
The company was criticised for inadvertently revealing users' most e-mailed contacts to other participants through the Buzz platform.
Last year, Google and the Federal Trade Commission reached a settlement to prevent Google from misrepresenting how it uses personal information and from sharing a user's data without approval.
Google said it had been in touch with regulators over these latest changes to its privacy policy, which will apply globally, according to the Associated Press news agency.

Shoichi Yokoi, the Japanese soldier who held out in Guam

2012-01-25T09:23:00.000Z

By Mike Lanchin BBC World Service

It's exactly 40 years since a Japanese soldier was found in the jungles of Guam, having survived there for nearly three decades after the end of World War II. He was given a hero's welcome on his return to Japan - but never quite felt at home in modern society.

For most of the 28 years that Shoichi Yokoi, a lance corporal in the Japanese Army of world War II, was hiding in the jungles of Guam, he firmly believed his former comrades would one day return for him.
And even when he was eventually discovered by local hunters on the Pacific island, on 24 January 1972, the 57-year-old former soldier still clung to the notion that his life was in danger.
"He really panicked," says Omi Hatashin, Yokoi's nephew.
Startled by the sight of other humans after so many years on his own, Yokoi tried to grab one of the hunter's rifles, but weakened by years of poor diet, he was no match for the local men.

Shoichi's story

Born in 1915 and conscripted in 1941 to serve in Manchuria, before being sent to Guam in 1944
On his return to Japan he expressed embarrassment at having returned alive, rather than dying in the service of the emperor
Japan had changed utterly during his three-decade absence - some found his stoicism and loyalty inspiring, others found it absurd
He married in 1972, within months of his return and died in 1997, aged 82
He longed to meet Emperor Hirohito - in the end he was granted an audience with Emperor Akihito in 1991

"He feared they would take him as a prisoner of war - that would have been the greatest shame for a Japanese soldier and for his family back home," Hatashin says.

As they led him away through the jungle's tall foxtail grass, Yokoi cried for them to kill him there and then.
Using Yokoi's own memoirs, published in Japanese two years after his discovery, as well as the testimony of those who found him that day, Hatashin spent years piecing together his uncle's dramatic story.
His book, Private Yokoi's War and Life on Guam, 1944-1972, was published in English in 2009.
"I am very proud of him. He was a shy and quiet person, but with a great presence," he says.
Underground shelter Yokoi's long ordeal began in July 1944 when US forces stormed Guam as part of their offensive against the Japanese in the Pacific.

Yokoi's eel trap was one of his prize possessions

The fighting was fierce, casualties were high on both sides, but once the Japanese command was disrupted, soldiers such as Yokoi and others in his platoon were left to fend for themselves.
"From the outset they took enormous care not to be detected, erasing their footprints as they moved through the undergrowth," Hatashin said.
In the early years the Japanese soldiers, soon reduced to a few dozen in number, caught and killed local cattle to feed off.

The last holdouts

Second Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda led a guerrilla task force on the Philippine island of Lubang for many years after the end of the war. He doggedly refused to lay down his arms until formally ordered to surrender. Repatriated March 1974.
Private Teruo Nakamura, a conscript from Taiwan, was found growing crops alone on the Indonesian island of Morotai in December 1974. He was repatriated to Taiwan where he died in 1979.

But fearing detection from US patrols and later from local hunters, they gradually withdrew deeper into the jungle.

There they ate venomous toads, river eels and rats.
Yokoi made a trap from wild reeds for catching eels. He also dug himself an underground shelter, supported by strong bamboo canes.
"He was an extremely resourceful man," Hatashin says.
Keeping himself busy also kept him from thinking too much about his predicament, or his family back home, his nephew said.
Return to Guam Yokoi's own memoirs of his time in hiding reveal his desperation not to give up hope, especially in the last eight years when he was totally alone - his last two surviving companions died in floods in 1964.

Yokoi demonstrating the handmade loom he used in the jungle

Turning his thoughts to his ageing mother back home, he at one point wrote: "It was pointless to cause my heart pain by dwelling on such things."
And of another occasion, when he was desperately sick in the jungle, he wrote: "No! I cannot die here. I cannot expose my corpse to the enemy. I must go back to my hole to die. I have so far managed to survive but all is coming to nothing now."
Two weeks after his discovery in the jungle, Yokoi returned home to Japan to a hero's welcome.
He was besieged by the media, interviewed on radio and television, and was regularly invited to speak at universities and in schools across the country.

Find Out More

Omi Hatashin was interviewed for the BBC World Service programme Witness
Witness airs every weekday, and tells history through the eyes of the people who were there

Listen to the programme

Hatashin, who was six when Yokoi married his aunt, said that the former soldier never really settled back into life in modern Japan.

He was unimpressed by the country's rapid post-war economic development and once commented on seeing a new 10,000 yen bank note that the currency had now become "valueless".
According to Hatashin, his uncle grew increasingly nostalgic about the past as he grew older, and before his death in 1997 he went back to Guam on several occasions with his wife.
Some of his prize possessions from those years in the jungle, including his eel traps, are still on show in a small museum on the island.

UPDATE: Samsung keylogger is false alarm

2011-12-01T23:01:00.000Z

Part 1 – The Discovery

Security Strategies Alert By M. E. Kabay and Mohamed Hassan Mohamed Hassan, Network World
March 30, 2011 12:07 AM ET

[UPDATE: After a thorough investigation by Peter Stephenson, it was determined that no keylogger was found and an apology has been issued.]

[UPDATE: Samsung has launched an investigation into the matter and is working with Mich Kabay and Mohamed Hassan in the investigation. Samsung engineers are collaborating with the computer security expert, Mohamed Hassan, MSIA, CISSP, CISA, with faculty at the Norwich University Center for Advanced Computing and Digital Forensics, and with the antivirus vendor whose product identified a possible keylogger (or which may have issued a false positive). The company and the University will post news as fast as possible on Network World. A Samsung executive is personally delivering a randomly selected laptop purchased at a retail store to the Norwich scientists. Prof. Kabay praises Samsung for its immediate, positive and collaborative response to this situation.]
[UPDATE 3/31/11: Samsung has issued a statement saying that the finding is false. The statement says the software used to detect the keylogger, VIPRE, can be fooled by Microsoft's Live Application multi-language support folder. This has been confirmed at F-Secure and two other publications, here and here.The headline on this article has been changed to reflect this new information.]
[UPDATE 3/31/11: GFI Labs, the maker of VIPRE, has issued an explanation and apology for generating the false positives that led to these articles: "We apologize to the author Mohamed Hassan, to Samsung, as well as any users who may have been affected by this false positive."]
[UPDATE 3/31/11: Mich Kabay writes: A Samsung executive personally flew from Newark, N.J., to Burlington, Vt., carrying two unopened boxes containing new R540 laptop computers. These units were immediately put under seal and details recorded for chain-of-custody records. At 17:40, Dr Peter Stephenson, Director of the Norwich University Center for Advanced Computing and Digital Forensics, began the detailed forensic analysis of the disks. We expect results by Monday.]

Android handsets secretly logging keystrokes, SMS messages?

2011-12-01T22:59:00.000Z

by Don Reisinger November 30, 2011 6:43 AM PST

A look at some of the actionable data Carrier IQ collects, including location information of a single device user.

(Credit: Carrier IQ)

Your Android-based smartphone could be watching just about everything you do, Android security researcher Trevor Eckhart argues in a video posted earlier this week.
In the nearly 20-minute video clip, Eckhart shows how software developed by mobile-device tracker Carrier IQ logs each keystroke and then sends them off to locations unknown. In addition, when Eckhart tried placing a call, Carrier IQ's software recorded each number before the call was even made.
Eckhart started making waves across the privacy community earlier this month after he dug into software developed by Carrier IQ that, he said, runs behind the scenes in Android-based devices to track what users are doing. Eckhart called the software a "rootkit," due to its ability to access device data while concealing its presence.
As one might expect, Carrier IQ took offense to Eckhart's claim, saying that its software is a "diagnostic tool" for companies to "improve the quality of the network, understand device issues, and ultimately improve the user experience." The company also sent Eckhart a cease-and-desist letter and demanded he issue an apology for calling its software a rootkit.
Just days later, Carrier IQ did an about face after the Electronic Frontier Foundation responded to its cease-and-desist letter, saying that Eckhart's comments and research are protected under the Copyright Act's fair use provision.
"Our action was misguided and we are deeply sorry for any concern or trouble that our letter may have caused Mr. Eckhart," the company said in response to the EFF's letter. "We sincerely appreciate and respect EFF's work on his behalf, and share their commitment to protecting free speech in a rapidly changing technological world."
However, Carrier IQ also took the opportunity to clarify what its software doesn't do, including record keystrokes, provide tracking tools, or inspect "the content of e-mails and SMSs." The company also argued that its software does not "provide real-time data reporting to any customer."
But Eckhart's new video seems to refute at least some of those claims. In one part of the clip, he shows how an entire SMS message--"hello world"--was recorded by Carrier IQ's software. In another example, he demonstrates how a Google search, his location, and other key information is recorded by Carrier IQ's application, even though he was on Wi-Fi and a page secured by HTTPS.
"The Carrier IQ application is receiving not only HTTP strings directly from browser, but also HTTPs strings," Eckhart wrote in a blog post. "HTTPs data is the only thing protecting much of the 'secure' Internet. Queries of what you search, HTTPs plain text login strings (yuck, but yes), even exact details of objects on page are shown in the JS/CSS/GIF files above--and can be seen going into the Carrier IQ application."

"The Carrier IQ application is embedded so deeply in the device that it can't be fully removed without rebuilding the phone from source code."

--Trevor Eckhart, Android security researcher

Perhaps most troublesome is that users don't know where their information is going or how it's being used. Earlier this month, Sprint told CNET that it's a Carrier IQ customer, but rejected any notion that it's peering into users' personal data.
"Carrier IQ provides information that allows Sprint, and other carriers that use it, to analyze our network performance and identify where we should be improving service," Sprint told CNET. "We also use the data to understand device performance so we can figure out when issues are occurring."
"We collect enough information to understand the customer experience with devices on our network and how to address any connection problems, but we do not and cannot look at the contents of messages, photos, videos, etc., using this tool," Sprint continued.
But for many handset owners, that might not be enough. So, surely they can turn off the software and stop the tracking, right? Think again, says Eckhart.
"The Carrier IQ application is embedded so deeply in the device that it can't be fully removed without rebuilding the phone from source code," he says. "This is only possible for a user with advanced skills and a fully unlocked device. Even where a device is out of contract, there is no off switch to stop the application from gathering data."
Although Eckhart's data comes from Android devices, it's worth noting that Carrier IQ's software is running on over 130 million mobile devices worldwide, including those made by Nokia and Research In Motion.
Carrier IQ declined CNET's request for comment.

'I'm sorry!' Jeremy Clarkson finally apologises for saying all strikers should be SHOT after BBC gets 4,700 complaints (and even the PM says he was 'silly')

2011-12-01T22:52:00.000Z

'I'm sorry!' Clarkson forced to apologise for saying strikers should be shot in live TV jibe

David Cameron tells the Top Gear presenter it was a 'silly thing to say'
Ed Miliband says the comments were 'disgraceful and disgusting'
Union official says presenter's comments were 'almost like Colonel Gaddafi'

By Daniel Martin

Last updated at 10:37 PM on 1st December 2011

Comments

Apology: Jeremy Clarkson at Heathrow today following the outcry over his comments

Jeremy Clarkson was forced to apologise last night after a joke he made about executing public sector workers for going on strike triggered a political row and thousands of complaints.
The outspoken TV presenter faced a storm of protest after saying public sector strikers should be ‘executed’ in front of their families.
In a day of extraordinary overreaction to what was clearly meant as a joke, one union official threatened to report him to police, while another said his comments were worthy of Colonel Gaddafi.
Even the Prime Minister, a friend of Mr Clarkson, was dragged into the row, describing the remarks as ‘silly’, while Ed Miliband said they were ‘disgusting’.
By yesterday evening, when Mr Clarkson was finally forced to issue an apology, the BBC had received almost 5,000 complaints about the interview on Wednesday night’s edition of The One Show.
The row erupted after millions saw the Top Gear host asked for his views on the day’s nationwide strikes.
He started by saying he liked the strikers, because the industrial action had meant there was no traffic on the roads.
But after insisting he had to be balanced as he worked for the impartial BBC, he launched into a satirical rant.

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He said: ‘Frankly, I would have them shot. I would have them taken outside and executed in front of their families.’
Later in the show, he also complained about people who commit suicide by throwing themselves on railway lines, saying trains should not stop for them.

Scroll down for video

Controversial: Mr Clarkson said he wanted to see strikers shot when he appeared on the One Show last night

Awkward: Presenters Matt Baker and Alex Jones squirmed as Mr Clarkson made his comments on the live programme

Strike storm: Jeremy Clarkson today at Heathrow airport with fellow Top Gear presenter James May (rear) kissing a woman's hand

Fury: Union boss Dave Prentis has said Jeremy Clarkson, pictured today at Heathrow, should be sacked from the BBC

Yesterday, the Prime Minister, whose ‘Chipping Norton Set’ of friends includes Mr Clarkson, former News of the World and Sun editor Rebekah Brooks and PR man Matthew Freud, was forced to disassociate himself from the comments.
Asked about them on ITV’s This Morning show, Mr Cameron said it was ‘a silly thing to say – I’m sure he didn’t mean it’.
Labour leader Mr Miliband said the remark was ‘absolutely disgraceful and disgusting’, adding: ‘He obviously does not understand the lives of the people who were going out on strike yesterday.’
The unions exploded in fury, with Unison calling on the BBC to sack the presenter and even contacting lawyers to consider whether he could be reported to the police for inciting violence.
Dave Prentis, Unison’s general secretary, said: ‘The One Show is broadcast at a time when children are watching: they could have been scared and upset by his aggressive statements.
‘While he is driving round in fast cars for a living, public sector workers are busy holding our society together: they save others’ lives on a daily basis, they care for the sick, the vulnerable, the elderly.
‘They wipe bottoms, noses, they help children to learn, and empty bins – they deserve all our thanks – certainly not the unbelievable level of abuse he threw at them.’
The union’s health spokesman Karen Jennings went so far as describing the comments as ‘almost like Gaddafi’.

Thousands of public sector workers joined pickets and marches across the country today as they staged a one day strike over pensions and cuts

Bob Crow, leader of the RMT union, said Mr Clarkson was a ‘man who bleeds a fortune out of the licence-payer for poncing around the world driving luxury cars’.
‘Clarkson’s incitement to violence, and the refusal of David Cameron to roundly condemn it, is grossly offensive to all public sector workers but even more so to our members on the Royal Fleet Auxiliary who were on strike on Wednesday and who risk their lives in trouble spots around the world servicing the Naval fleet,’ he said.
Bert Schouwenburg, of the GMB union, said: ‘Jeremy Clarkson’s vile and offensive comments are insensitive in the extreme.

Chipping Norton Set: David Cameron today said Clarkson, pictured here with near neighbour Alex James, had been 'silly'

'A silly thing to say': David Cameron condemns Jeremy Clarkson's remarks as he is interviewed on This Morning

Awkward: One Show presenters Matt Baker and Alex Jones were forced to apologise for Clarkson's comments

PLAIN SPEAKING, OR JUST PLAIN RUDE?

Jeremy Clarkson's remarks about wanting to shoot strikers are the latest in a long line of controversial comments that are likely to add to his ever-increasing list of enemies.
In February 2009, he famously called then Prime Minister Gordon Brown a 'one-eyed Scottish idiot' and in November the previous year, the BBC received almost 2,000 complaints when he joked about lorry drivers murdering prostitutes.
More recently, in October, it emerged he had taken out an injunction to prevent allegations about his private life being published.
Back in September 2005, he had a custard pie thrown in his face by green campaigners after picking up an honorary degree at Oxford Brookes University.
Also that year, he offered some 'handy hints' to cyclists, saying: 'Do not cruise through red lights. Because if I'm coming the other way, I will run you down, for fun.'
In November 2004, conservationists accused him of ruining virgin hillside during an off-road test of a Land Rover for the motoring programme.
And in February 2004, the BBC paid £250 compensation to Churchill Parish Council in Somerset after Clarkson drove a 4x4 Toyota pick-up truck into a 30-year-old horse chestnut tree to test the vehicle's strength.

‘GMB works with trade unions representing employees on banana and pineapple plantations in Latin America where activists have met exactly the fate that Mr Clarkson describes.’
By 5pm yesterday, the presenter had issued an apology.
When Mr Clarkson was asked for his reaction before flying out of the country, he said: ‘See what I actually said and then judge.
'I didn’t for a moment intend these remarks to be taken seriously – as I believe is clear if they’re seen in context.
'If the BBC and I have caused any offence, I’m quite happy to apologise for it alongside them.’
The BBC said: ‘The One Show is a live topical programme which often reflects the day’s talking points. Usually we get it right, but on this occasion we feel the item wasn’t perfectly judged.
'The BBC and Jeremy would like to apologise for any offence caused.’
Last night Tory MP Douglas Carswell called for a sense of perspective.
‘We shouldn’t rise to the bait on this,’ he said. ‘This is politicians causing mischief.’
Clarkson’s comments have regularly landed him in hot water.
Earlier this year, an item on Top Gear led to a complaint from the Mexican ambassador over ‘vulgar’ insults about Mexicans.
He called the then prime minister Gordon Brown a ‘one-eyed Scottish idiot’ and triggered 2,000 complaints when he joked about lorry drivers murdering prostitutes.

David Owen: If Britain stands firm, it may yet tame Iran The solution lies in selective sanctions – not being sucked into military conflict .

2011-12-01T22:49:00.000Z

Iranian protesters make their point about Britain, the US and Israel Photo: REUTERS

By David Owen

8:36PM GMT 01 Dec 2011

In Iran, the hardline Islamists call Britain “the little Satan”. This is in contrast to the United States, which they call “the Great Satan”. To some extent, the attack on our Embassy in Tehran is part of that positioning: they see us as a serious enemy and think we deserve this deliberate action, because the UK along with the US and Canada has recently cut its banking links with Iran.

The European Union yesterday agreed new sanctions to target people and companies selectively, including the freezing of assets and travel bans. But these were not linked to the storming of the British Embassy on Tuesday. They have postponed (until January) decisions aimed at severely affecting the Iranian financial system, and the energy and transport sector. It is very important that they bring forward these decisions more quickly and also take tough diplomatic measures to demonstrate that an EU member state cannot be picked off.

William Hague is right to try to keep open formal relations in international bodies, even though the two countries’ embassies are closed. It is also very important that we find other ways of keeping open the dialogue with the opposition inside Iran: for it is from the people that fundamental changes will stem. That is the lesson from Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Syria.

Some believe that military action can settle the Iranian problem. We know the Israeli government was threatening, a few weeks ago, to act unilaterally and take pre-emptive military action by launching a bombing raid on Iranian nuclear installations. Such an overt action would immediately unite all Iranians, the internal opposition included, against Israel and her allies. It is reassuring that the bombing of Iran was opposed by senior military and intelligence figures in Israel: hopefully they have been listened to, and Israel is instead taking clandestine measures. It is significant that in Isfahan on Monday there was a blast on the edge of the city that struck a uranium enrichment facility, the second such incident in a month. It is possible that Israeli intelligence is involved and it is almost certain that Iranian citizens were.

The Israelis took pre-emptive action in Iraq in 1981 over the Osirak reactor and in Syria in 2008 over a reactor supplied by North Korea. These precedents, however, are not remotely comparable with Iran. Both were taken by Israel safe in the judgment that any reaction to their attack would be containable both politically and militarily. Both actions were taken when Turkey was still Israel’s strategic ally. And that is no longer the case.

Let us assume, however, that the recent IAEA report is broadly accurate and that Iran is intent on acquiring nuclear weapons. It is undoubtedly true that if President Ahmadinejad were to control a nuclear weapon, it would pose a serious threat to Israel. But remember this: Israel was not the reason Iran started to pursue a nuclear weapons programme. Key leaders in today’s Iranian opposition supported developing a nuclear deterrent when they were fighting off a pre-emptive Iraqi attack, which lasted for eight years in the 1980s.
The US military has “war-gamed” an Israeli attack on Iran. The conclusion of these exercises is that even attacks that don’t involve flying over Iraq lead inexorably, within a few days, to the involvement of US forces in the air and at sea against Iran to keep the Straits of Hormuz open. This was part of the reasoning behind President Bush’s decision to refuse point blank the Israeli request in 2008 to overfly Iraq and supply equipment to bomb Iran. Bush helpfully made this decision public before President Obama took office.
The UK is now seen as the hardliner on Iran and this gives us the opportunity to make our position clear, preferably publicly, that we do not intend to be sucked into overt military action against Iran by Israel. If the US president eventually were to decide to take pre-emptive military action against an Iranian nuclear weapons programme, that would be a serious option which any UK government would be bound to study with great care; but there should be no presumption that we would act jointly with the US. It will depend on many factors, not least what happens in the UN Security Council and the reaction of key Nato allies, in particular in this case, Turkey. We will also need to gauge the reaction of the elected Iraqi government.
A favourable negotiating opportunity with regards to Iran’s nuclear programme may present itself, particularly when Ahmadinejad’s presidency comes to an end. Until now, President Obama has wisely chosen a combination of dialogue, negotiation and sanctions with Iran. He has had some success with sanctions, mainly by resetting US relations with Russia. Meanwhile Iranian opposition leaders want the US, EU and the UN to be relentless against human rights abuses and to develop tougher but more selective sanctions.
Britain’s strategy must remain one of acting within the UN Security Council and of involving Russia and China in progressive sanctions to stop Iran proceeding to the stage of acquiring nuclear weapons. It is devilishly difficult to deliver, as it means accepting Iran’s right to develop a programme of civil nuclear-powered reactors to produce electricity while seeking to prevent, through tougher sanctions, the simultaneous development of a nuclear weapons programme. Yet this hard-nosed strategy is the one that the UK should not abandon now or in the immediate future.

Kentucky churchgoer tells of deep hurt after interracial marriage ban

2011-12-01T22:47:00.000Z

Stella Harville not welcome at Gulnare Freewill baptist church after ex-pastor votes to ban couples of different races

Ed Pilkington in New York
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 December 2011 18.59 GMT

Stella Harville and Ticha Chikuni. Harville said she knows the nine people who voted in favour of Thompson's motion. Photograph: AP A small baptist church in eastern Kentucky has voted to ban interracial couples from joining the congregation and from taking part in all church functions other than funerals.
The vote to ostracise couples of different races was held at the Gulnare Freewill baptist church last Sunday. It has prompted a bitter dispute in the local Pike County and thrown up hatreds and antagonisms that had been hidden beneath the surface of the community for years.
The vote was held on a motion brought by the former pastor of the church, Melvin Thompson. He proposed that people in interracial marriages should not be "received as members, nor will they be used in worship services and other church functions – with the exception being funerals".
His motion added that it "was not intended to judge the salvation of anyone, but is intended to promote greater unity among the church body and the community we serve".
Thompson's move originated from a church service in June attended by Stella Harville, aged 24, and her black fiance Ticha Chikuni, 29. Harville, a keen pianist, accompanied Chikuni as he sang the hymn I Surrender All at the service.
On 7 August, Thompson, still pastor at that point, approached Stella's father, Dean Harville, who holds office as the secretary and treasurer of the church. "Thompson told me that Stella and her boyfriend were not allowed to sing in the church any more," Dean Harville said.
Stella's mother, Cathy Harville, confronted Thompson and asked him who precisely had a problem with the couple. "I, for one, do," Thompson replied. "The best thing that Stella can do is take her boyfriend back to where he came from."
Chikuni is originally from Zimbabwe. He has lived in the US for 11 years, having come to Kentucky to study, and now works as a student advisor at Georgetown College.
Thompson stepped down as pastor in August, citing health problems, but continued to press his case against the couple. When his motion was put to the vote on Sunday, nine members registered in favour of it and six against, with about 25 parishioners abstaining by leaving the church before the ballot was called.
Stella Harville, who is taking a master's degree in Indiana, said she was in shock. She has been attending the church since she was a baby and knows the nine people who voted for the motion personally.
"They are my church family," she said. She added that she had also been deeply hurt by the 25 who had abstained as they had failed to take a stand against bigotry.
"It's embedded in our culture, especially in certain areas, that interracial marriage is wrong. Some of them have tried to invoke the Bible to support their argument, but anyone who reads the Bible knows there is no scripture saying this," Harville said.
Dean Harville said that the ban had given "a black eye to the church, a black eye to our community and a black eye to God. The way I look at it, it's a slap in God's face to say something like this."
Thompson, who runs a hardware store, was not available for comment. He told a local radio station: "I do not believe in interracial marriages, and I do not believe this will give our church a black eye at all."
Relationships between white and black people, particularly white women and black men, were a running sore in the days of segregation in the US. Interracial marriage was only made fully legal in 1967.
Polls show that disapproval of the practice has faded with every generation, with up to 97% of younger Americans now having no issue with it. But pockets of resistance remain in places like Alabama, where 41% voted against removing a ban on mixed-race marriages from the state constitution as recently as 2000.
Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center said he was astounded that the Kentucky church had openly moved to bar mixed-race couples. "It shows there are a large number of people who still absolutely oppose these relationships".
Under federal law, discrimination on grounds of race is unlawful, but religious groups are exempt.
A meeting of the regional conference of Free Will Baptists churches has been called for Saturday. It is expected to censure the Gulnare motion, though it has no authority to overturn the ban.
Dean Harville intends to bring the matter to another vote this Sunday in the hope of removing the ban. Even if it is rescinded Stella Harville says the damage has been done.
"Who knows, I might go back to the church, but it will take a while to get over the hurt," she said.

Israel faces legal challenge over block on Palestinians exiting Gaza to sue state

2011-12-01T22:44:00.000Z

Human rights body says those seeking damages for actions of Israeli military are refused entry to the country to appear in court

Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 December 2011 19.34 GMT

Israel says it does not have a legal obligation to allow Gaza residents to cross the border, pictured during the January 2009 war. Photograph: Uriel Sinai/Getty Images

An Israeli human rights organisation has launched a legal challenge to the state's policy of denying Palestinians permission to leave Gaza to pursue claims for damages resulting from military action, which has led to dozens of cases being dismissed by the Israeli courts.
The petition follows a supreme court ruling in 2006 that Palestinians were entitled to sue the state of Israel for compensation for damages caused to civilians by the military outside of "acts of war". Lawsuits were filed for death, injury, house demolitions, torture and cruel or inhumane treatment.
However, plaintiffs and witnesses have been refused permission to enter Israel to appear in court, give evidence and complete necessary legal processes, such as signing affidavits witnessed by their lawyers, for their cases to proceed. Israel tightly restricts entry from Gaza which it says is necessary on security grounds.
Adalah, a human rights and legal action centre, cites a case in 2009 where the judge concluded "there is no option other than to dismiss the lawsuit".
The plaintiffs, he said, "live in Gaza City and are unable to enter Israel. Therefore, they cannot hold meetings with their lawyer or sign various documents in front of him. They cannot stand before the court to give their testimony, to prove their case … The situation cannot be expected to change in the foreseeable future."
The petition, filed by Adalah on behalf of 13 plaintiffs from Gaza plus lawyers and human rights groups, must be heard by the end of February.
The cases include that of Mohammed Asad Mohammed Alloh, disabled after being shot in the head from an Israeli military helicopter at the age of 13 in 2004. He was refused entry to Israel to undergo medical examination by an expert witness, as required by the court. His lawyer, Hussein Abu Hussein, was forced to withdraw the case in 2010 after a five-year battle.
Hassan Lutfi Saed al-Bishawy was taking his pregnant wife to hospital with her sister and a neighbour in January 2005 when their car came under fire from Israeli soldiers. The neighbour was killed and Bishawy was shot in his thigh and hand. None of the nine plaintiffs and four witnesses in the case have been permitted to enter Israel to testify. The case is still pending.
Kamla Saleh Suliman Abu Said and her niece were shot dead while working in fields near the Gaza-Israel border. The case was dismissed in 2009 after five years of legal battles because three witnesses were not permitted to enter Israel to appear in court. A second case is now pending, but the witnesses are still being refused access to Israel.
"In all these cases, there is a good chance to prove the liability of the state of Israel," said Fatmeh El-Ajou, a lawyer for Adalah. "This is the way the state is trying to avoid accountability. The plaintiffs are banned from exercising their rights. And in this way [the state] is turning the supreme court ruling into a dead letter."
Under Israeli law plaintiffs must also deposit a sum of money‚ "usually around 30,000 shekels (£5,000)‚" to guarantee the costs in case they lose their claim. The sum is forfeited if the case is dismissed. "This is another obstacle to the plaintiffs," said El-Ajou.
Israel's ministry of justice referred the Guardian to a letter it sent to Adalah prior to the petition being filed. The ministry said there was no legal obligation on the state of Israel to allow the entry of residents of Gaza.
It said there was "an armed conflict between Israel and the Palestinian terror organisations which are active in the Gaza Strip … Since June 2007 [when Hamas took control of Gaza] there exists alongside this conflict a terror government, which, as a result of a violent revolution which it carried out, which had turned the Gaza Strip into a "hostile territory' for the state of Israel". Claimants "have a wide array of methods to establish contact with their lawyers, among others, through telephone calls, faxes, and emails".

Carrier IQ: More privacy alarms, more confusion

2011-12-01T22:41:00.000Z

Controversy over a mobile data-logger called Carrier IQ escalated today, with a U.S. senator raising an alarm and Apple and Verizon distancing themselves, even though it's still unclear how the software works.
An Android developer, Trevor Eckhart, reported last month that Carrier IQ software phoned home with details about how the phone was being used and where it was. Earlier this week, Eckhart posted a video elaborating on his claims, which was followed by another report that the software has been found on iPhones.
Apple responded today by saying it hasn't used Carrier IQ since it released iOS 5 last month and will remove it entirely from its products "in a future software update," the company said in a statement reported by GigaOm:

We stopped supporting Carrier IQ with iOS 5 in most of our products and will remove it completely in a future software update. With any diagnostic data sent to Apple, customers must actively opt-in to share this information, and if they do, the data is sent in an anonymous and encrypted form and does not include any personal information. We never recorded keystrokes, messages or any other personal information for diagnostic data and have no plans to ever do so.

BlackBerry maker Research in Motion also said it has neither pre-installed Carrier IQ on its devices nor authorized carriers to do so, according to a statement it provided to All Things D.
Smartphone manufacturer HTC went further, saying that Carrier IQ is "required on devices by a number of U.S. carriers," and directed users to the carriers themselves. Verizon spokesman Jeffrey Nelson said on Twitter today that "Carrier IQ is *not* on" the company's phones.
For its part, Sprint circulated a statement denying that it uses Carrier IQ to look at the "contents" of communications, a important legal point, but didn't provide specifics of how the software is configured:

Carrier IQ provides information that allows Sprint, and other carriers that use it, to analyze our network performance and identify where we should be improving service. We also use the data to understand device performance so we can figure out when issues are occurring. We collect enough information to understand the customer experience with devices on our network and how to address any connection problems, but we do not and cannot look at the contents of messages, photos, videos, etc., using this tool. The information collected is not sold and we don't provide a direct feed of this data to anyone outside of Sprint.

Al Franken, who heads a U.S. Senate panel on privacy, sent a letter (PDF) today to Carrier IQ asking pointed questions, including what data are logged, what data are transmitted, and whether the company believes its software complies with federal privacy laws that prohibit wiretapping. Franken, a Minnesota Democrat, asked for a response by December 14.
Carrier IQ, based in Mountain View, Calif. has not responded to a series of questions that CNET posed this week. A spokeswoman said today that she is "only one person and have been unable to respond to the thousands of incoming requests."
What remains unclear is exactly what is transmitted, a key point that will determine whether Carrier IQ is a privacy and security threat (and, secondarily, if anyone has been lying).
Security researcher Dan Rosenberg posted a note saying that he's reverse-engineered Carrier IQ and found "no evidence that they are collecting anything more than what they've publicly claimed: anonymized metrics data." There's "no code in CarrierIQ that actually records keystrokes for data collection purposes," he said.
If Rosenberg is correct, it wouldn't be the first time that there was a widespread Internet panic over false or unverified accusations. It happened earlier this year when Samsung was cleared of false allegations lodged by a security specialist in a now-deleted NetworkWorld article that claimed keylogging software was installed on two of the company's laptops.

Hungary outlaws homeless in move condemned by charities

2011-12-01T15:21:00.000Z

A new legal regulation has come into force in Hungary making homelessness punishable by a fine of around $600 (£384) or prison.

MPs from the ruling conservative party proposed the regulation, on the grounds that Budapest could not cope with the large number of people on the streets.
Critics, including charities for the homeless, say it is unenforceable and that hostels lack sufficient places.
The Hungarian capital is said to have some 10,000 homeless people.
According to an amendment to the local government act, passed by a strong majority in parliament last month, those found sleeping on the streets will first receive a warning.
They can subsequently be imprisoned or ordered to pay the fine.
'Stretched to the limits' The move has provoked widespread criticism, including from Hungary's human rights ombudsman, the BBC's Nick Thorpe reports.
Miklos Vecsei, deputy head of the Hungarian Maltese Charity Service, said the law had not been passed on the basis of any rational or professional criteria but because the public were fed up with the homeless.
Budapest's capacity had been stretched to the limits but deep poverty needed to be cured, not banned, he argued.
The author of the law, Mate Kocsis, is an MP from the ruling Fidesz party and a district mayor in the city.
He argues that local councils should take responsibility for tackling homelessness, and points to new schemes and places in homeless hostels.
Homeless charities argue that this will still leave between 1,000 and 3,000 homeless people without shelter.
A series of demonstrations against the new law is planned.

Should animals be stunned before slaughter?

2011-12-01T15:17:00.000Z

BBC News, Amsterdam

In today's Magazine

The slaughter of conscious animals was widely abandoned in the 20th Century and is now practised mainly in the Jewish and Muslim communities. Consumers increasingly expect animals to be stunned before death - but would banning other slaughter methods be an unacceptable violation of religious rights?

The sound of pistons and mechanics fills the air as the last calf of the day steps into a holding box.
A device the size of a hand-held drill is brought to the animal's head, a trigger pulled and a four-inch bolt shot into its brain, causing it instantly to collapse. The unconscious calf is hoisted upside down and slaughtered seconds later with a massive cut to its throat, showering the floor with a torrent of crimson blood.
"Killing animals is never friendly," says Paul Meeuwissen, director of the Vitelco abattoir in the central town of s'-Hertogenbosch, "but what we do is done in the most animal-friendly way possible."

Religious slaughter

Jewish method called shechita
Muslim method called dhabiha
Stunning prohibited in Jewish law, which says animals must be healthy and uninjured at the time of slaughter
Islamic law also says animals must be uninjured, but some authorities allow a form of stunning (in the UK, dhabiha usually involves stunning)

Viewpoints: The right way to slaughter?

The plant - the second-biggest veal abattoir in Europe - has used stunning on all its calves - some 300,000 a year - since 2008. Before then it performed some religious slaughter without stunning for the Jewish and Muslim communities, but changing public attitudes towards animal welfare forced a rethink.

The Federation of Veterinarians of Europe took the position in 2002 that "the practice of slaughtering animals without prior stunning is unacceptable under any circumstances", and the issue has gradually become more central for animal welfare campaigners, and for politicians.
"We decided to stop 'ritual' killing because the idea didn't fit us," says Mr Meeuwissen. "My customers are very critical on how we produce our meat, and the large supermarket chains no longer want any meat which is produced ritually."
In the Netherlands and elsewhere, most of the remains of an animal slaughtered by the Jewish method (shechita) end up on supermarket shelves as regular meat products, because parts of the carcass are forbidden to Jews under their dietary laws.

Marianne Thieme, Party for Animals: 'If you have humane techniques you should use them'

But if these parts of the animal are not sold, the operation becomes less economically viable.
Later this month, a bill that would effectively ban the slaughter of unstunned animals goes to the upper house of the Dutch parliament.
Sponsored by the Party for the Animals, it has already been approved in the lower house, where it was backed by the anti-Islamic Freedom Party and opposed only by the Christian parties, which took a stand in defence of religious freedom. Most observers expect it to become law.
'Friendly for humans'
Jewish and Muslim leaders see a worrying global trend, with the Netherlands a critical test case.

They are fighting a battle on two fronts - to dispel the idea there is anything inhumane about their traditional methods of slaughter, and to defend their right to live according to their religious beliefs.
Both faiths put great emphasis on animal welfare, and adhere to a one-cut method of slaughter, intended to ensure the animal's rapid death.
Under Jewish and Islamic law, animals for slaughter must be healthy and uninjured at the time of death, which rules out driving a bolt into the brain - though some Muslim authorities accept forms of stunning that can be guaranteed not to kill the animal.
"What I think is that stunning is friendly for the human being and our way of slaughtering is friendly for the animals," says Motti Rosenzweig, Holland's only Jewish slaughterer (shochet).
Under shechita, the animal's neck is cut with a surgically sharp knife, severing its major arteries, causing a massive drop in blood pressure followed by death from loss of blood. Supporters say unconsciousness comes instantaneously - the cut itself stunning the animal. A similar procedure is used in Islamic slaughter, or dhabiha.
"In one second - maybe two if it's a bull - the animal is gone," says Mr Rosenzweig, who trained for years in Israel and now slaughters once a week, under the observation of a state veterinary official, at the Amsterdam Abattoir.
"In my opinion [conventional] stunning is torture. Just because it can't say 'moo' or move anymore, it's very nice for the human eye, but the animal is alive and the scientists don't actually know if it's suffering or not. If I have to make my choice, my choice is clear."

Chief Rabbi Benjamin Jacobs: 'I believe our method of slaughter is friendlier to animals'

A Dutch Muslim umbrella group, the Contact Body for Muslims and the Government (CMO), accused the Party for the Animals of leading an "emotional" campaign based on misleading information which "wrongly created the impression that Muslim and Jewish methods of slaughter are barbaric and outdated".
"They use the words 'ritual slaughter' but there's nothing ritual about it," says Dutch Chief Rabbi Benjamin Jacobs.
"It's not dancing around a cow, it's a method, but by using the word 'ritual' a lot of people are getting very upset."
Scientific dispute
Positions on religious slaughter vary around the world - in the US, for instance, it is specifically defined as a humane method in the Humane Slaughter Act (1958) - but elsewhere several countries have already restricted or banned slaughtering unstunned animals.

Moves on stunning in 2011

Dutch lower house passes bill against non-stunning - upper house to vote on issue
European Parliament starts considering mandatory labelling of meat from unstunned animals, so consumers know when they are eating it
US court rejects suit claiming religious slaughter unconstitutional
New Zealand ban on religious slaughter without stunning suspended pending legal challenge
Australian agriculture ministers considering removing exemption allowing slaughter without stunning in Victoria

Stunning has been obligatory in the European Union since 1979 in order to spare animals "avoidable pain or suffering", though most member states make exceptions for religious communities.

A study of the issue commissioned by the Dutch government in 2008 concluded that "ritual slaughter has a number of negative aspects for the animals when compared to conventional procedures where a stun is performed prior to slaughter".
Its findings were mirrored in a 2010 report by a consortium of scientists for an EU-funded project, which concluded that "it can be stated with the utmost probability that animals feel pain during the throat cut without prior stunning".
It said research showed most cattle seemed to lose consciousness between five and 90 seconds after the cut, and were sometimes subjected to "potentially painful manipulations", including follow-up cuts, while still conscious.

“Start Quote

There are some scientists who are unconvinced, but they haven't done the research”

Dr Bert Lambooij Wageningen University

Both reports, though, have been dismissed as flawed by Jewish and Muslim groups, who argue that the research was done by scientists opposed to religious slaughter to begin with.

"It is still unproven that slaughtering with stunning is a better method," says CMO chairman Yusuf Altuntas.
In the case of shechita, Jewish authorities say no investigations of the issue in Europe have actually involved the first-hand study of animal slaughter by a trained shochet using a chalef (shochet's knife), which differs from an ordinary abattoir knife in shape, length and sharpness.
"One has to assume that these people have a political agenda and it comes through time and time again in Europe," says Dr Joe Regenstein, an animal slaughter expert at Cornell University in the USA, who is preparing a report for the Dutch Jewish community to challenge the slaughter bill.
"They are going in there with what I'd call a scientific enlightened secular religion that says stunning must be better than unstunned slaughter."

Stunning of livestock

Introduced in England in 1929 with mechanically operated humane stunner device
Mandatory in EU since 1979, but member states can grant exemptions for religious slaughter
Method enables abattoirs to process animals more quickly
Mis-stuns involving captive bolt occur "relatively frequently", according to 2004 European Food Safety Authority (Efsa) report - which leaves the animal conscious and in pain
Animals can also regain consciousness

In contrast, Dr Bert Lambooij of Wageningen University, a co-author of the Dutch report and consultant in the EU-backed project, says the evidence against religious slaughter is clear.

"There are some scientists who are unconvinced, but they haven't done the research," he says.
One scientist who has observed closely the work of trained shochets is Dr Temple Grandin of Colorado University, a renowned expert on the humane treatment and slaughter of livestock.
Her verdict is that conventional slaughter with preliminary stunning, and religious slaughter without stunning, are both acceptable when conducted properly.
"There's good and bad stunning but the research shows very clearly that when you stun an animal properly with a well-maintained captive bolt, unconsciousness is instantaneous - it's like turning off a light switch," she told the BBC.
"Similarly when I've seen shechita on a cow done really right by a really good shochet, the animal seemed to act like it didn't even feel it - if I walked up to that animal and put my hand in its face I would have got a much bigger reaction than I observed from the cut, and that was something which really surprised me."
Religious fears
Animal rights groups see the Dutch bill as a stepping stone towards further bans on religious slaughter.
"The Netherlands is a very important example, but for us it's just a battle, not the war," says Dr Michel Courat of Eurogroup for Animals, a federation of animal protection groups.
"We need to win lots of other battles after this one to make sure more countries stop this practice."

This is the big fear among Europe's Jewish and Muslim communities.

Campaigners' views

"We fully respect everyone's right to practise their religion but this should not extend to permitting the use of slaughter methods assessed as inhumane by scientific research." Peter Stevenson, Compassion in World Farming
"The vast majority of Halal meat in the UK is pre-stunned. In the Jewish community, in a small number of cases, animals are stunned immediately after the cut, which reduces the animal's suffering. We think stunning should take place before the cut, but it is better afterwards than not at all." Julia Wrathall, RSPCA

"We're afraid that other countries in Western Europe will follow the Dutch example," says Mr Altuntas.

"We heard from our Muslim council partners in Germany, Belgium and France that parties there are watching it closely and are preparing to take a position."
If the Dutch bill becomes law, Jewish and Muslim leaders say they will fight it in the European Court of Human Rights, arguing that it is a violation of the right to freedom of religion.
"If the Party for the Animals proposed a law which said there shouldn't be any slaughtering of animals any more and everyone should be vegetarian, I could understand it better," says Rabbi Jacobs.
"But it's a vote against religion. The new religion is anti-religion and people get fanatical about this. What worries me is what might come next."

RELIGIOUS SLAUGHTER RESTRICTIONS
Policy	Country

Non-stunning allowed only under certain conditions	Australia (Victoria, S Australia) Austria Denmark Estonia Slovakia
Non-stunning banned	Australia (bar Victoria, S Australia) Finland Iceland Latvia New Zealand (suspended pending legal challenge) Norway Sweden Switzerland

Source: Dialrel; Eurogroup for Animals

Legal row over Carrier IQ 'surveillance' app claims

2011-12-01T15:13:00.000Z

A hidden application found on millions of smartphones can log almost everything a user does, claims a US security researcher.

Trevor Eckhart unearthed the Carrier IQ application that runs largely unseen on Android, Nokia and Blackberry handsets.
Mr Eckhart said the software could log locations, websites visited, key presses and many other parameters.
Carrier IQ denied its code was spying. It threatened Mr Eckhart with legal action but later backed down.
Advanced skills Mr Eckhart said he found Carrier IQ via work he had done on a security program, called Logging Test, which spotted which apps were running on an Android phone.
His analysis revealed that Carrier IQ could be set up to record almost anything and everything done on a smartphone.
The code has been found on Nokia, Blackberry and Android smartphones and tablets. A cut down version has also been seen running on some Apple phones.
In response, Carrier IQ defended its software, saying it was not spying on users.
It said the code was used by mobile operators as a diagnostic tool to spot what was causing calls to drop, texts to go astray and battery power to be drained.
Mr Eckhart claimed Carrier IQ was buried deep in the core code for a smartphone to prevent it being found and, on some phones, was customised to prevent users changing what it logged. In some cases, he said, only those with "advanced skills" would be able to find it.
He put a video on YouTube which showed Carrier IQ logging button presses, search queries and locations. Much of the data had been grabbed without consent, he said.
Fair use The expose led Carrier IQ to start legal action against Mr Eckhart in the form of a "cease and desist" letter which demanded the removal of its training manuals and product information from his website.
This led to the intervention of digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) which agreed to represent Mr Eckhart in the legal spat.

In April 2011, Apple was accused of logging users' locations without their consent.

In its response, the EFF said: "We have now had a chance to review your allegations against our client, and have concluded that they are entirely baseless."
It said Mr Eckhart's work was "sheltered by both the fair use doctrine and the First Amendment".
Soon after, Carrier IQ withdrew its legal action and said it was "deeply sorry for any concern or trouble" it had caused.
"We sincerely appreciate and respect EFF's work on his behalf, and share their commitment to protecting free speech in a rapidly changing technological world," it said in a statement.
It reiterated that its software was used for diagnosis and disputed Mr Eckhart's claim that it had logged keystrokes and had tracked where people went.
It said it looked forward to a "healthy and robust" discussion with EFF and Mr Eckhart about its software and the uses to which it had been put.
Senate hearing The news is the latest in a series of reports by security researchers flagging up different smartphone applications that keep an eye on users.
In April, Alasdair Allan and Pete Warden found that Apple iPhones and tablets running iOS4 regularly recorded a phone's location.
Apple denied it was tracking users and said the data was uploaded to phones to help locate nearby wi-fi and cell phone towers.
In addition, Google played down claims that phones running its Android system were logging locations. It said it gave people a clear choice about whether the information should be gathered.
Both firms were summoned to appear before the US Senate to explain their actions.

Action Comics Superman debut copy sells for $2.16m

2011-12-01T15:08:00.000Z

Action Comics No 1 sold originally for 10 cents

A copy of the first issue of Action Comics, featuring Superman's debut, has become the world's most expensive comic, fetching $2.16m (£1.4m).

It was auctioned online for a starting bid of just $1, with a reserve price of $900,000.
The buyer or seller's name was not disclosed, but there is speculation it was owned by actor Nicolas Cage.
It is the first time a comic book has broken the $2m barrier. The issue was published in 1938 and cost 10 cents.
About 100 copies of Action Comics No 1 are thought to be in existence, and only a handful of those are in good condition.
Another copy of the same issue sold for a then record-breaking $1.5m in March last year.
But that one was not in as good condition as the copy that sold on Wednesday through New York-based ComicConnect.
It is said to have been stolen in 2000 and was thought lost until recovered in a California storage shed in April this year - just like an issue owned by Nicolas Cage.
The Hollywood star - who has a son called Kal-El, the Man of Steel's birth name - bought his copy of Action Comics No 1 for $150,000 in 1997.
Connoisseurs of the comic world say this type of investment has become popular during troubled economic times because rare collectibles hold their value more reliably than property or shares.

Concerns over rising settler violence in the West Bank

2011-11-18T01:42:00.000Z

By Jon Donnison BBC News, West Bank

Palestinians in Awarta say their olive trees have been deliberately destroyed by settlers

Palestinian UN membership bid

"These trees are holy to me. They're so old you can't put a value on them," says Nidam Qaraweq, a Palestinian olive farmer from the West Bank village of Awarta.

He pokes at the blackened, and gnarled trunks which are hundreds of years old. A large piece of what is now charcoal breaks off in his hand.
"They're all dead," he says angrily.
Last month, around 20 of Mr Qaraweq's olive trees were destroyed by fire.
He says Jewish settlers from the adjacent settlement of Itamar deliberately set his fields alight in an arson attack.
Some of Mr Qaraweq's other olive groves lie in land that has been taken over by the Itamar settlement as it expanded.
A high metal fence surrounds the settlement and Israeli soldiers patrol the gate denying Palestinians entry.
Mr Qaraweq says the land has been stolen.
Each olive harvest, the Israeli army escorts Palestinian farmers into Itamar to allow them to pick their olives for a few days.
When this happened in October, the Palestinian say settlers attacked them with sticks.
Israeli soldiers had to intervene and the Palestinians were forced to leave.

There's been a big rise in Jewish Settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.

The situation around Awarta is especially tense after two Palestinian teenagers from the village were convicted of murdering a family of five settlers including two children and a baby in March this year.
But the broad picture is that settler violence is on the increase across the West Bank.
'Shameful' inaction The United Nations says the number of attacks by extremist Jewish settlers on Palestinians resulting in either injury or damage to property has roughly tripled since 2009.
The UN says so far in 2011 around 10,000 Palestinian-owned olive trees have been destroyed or damaged in attacks by settlers.

There were clashes between Itamar settlers and Palestinians during the annual olive harvest

"They've made life very difficult for Palestinians in the West Bank," says Ramesh Rajasingham, Head of the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
"You have settler attacks on Palestinian property, on shepherds. In some cases, they attack kids going to school."
In June this year, I visited a mosque in the Palestinian village of al-Mughriah near Ramallah, which had suffered an arson attack.
Burning tyres had been thrown into the mosque and the walls had been sprayed with graffiti in Hebrew.
The imam told me he believed settlers were almost certainly to blame.
It has been just one of several attacks on mosques in the West Bank this year.
The UN says in 90% of complaints filed to the Israeli police by Palestinians against settlers, nobody is ever indicted.

UN statistics:

Weekly average of settler attacks resulting in Palestinian casualties and property increased by 40% in 2011 compared to 2010, and by over 165% compared to 2009
In 2011, three Palestinians have been killed and 167 injured by Israeli settlers
One Palestinian has been killed and 101 others injured by Israeli soldiers during clashes with settlers in 2011
Eight Israeli settlers have been killed and 30 injured by Palestinians in 2011. In the same period in 2010, five were killed and 43 injured

Full UN report

"For a country such as Israel which has such excellent capacities in terms of rule of law, this level of inaction is really shameful," says Ramesh Rajasingham.

"If you have this level of impunity, people will free to do it. If people feel they can get away with it then they have all the opportunity to continue such attacks."
Revenge attacks Some attacks by settlers are referred to as "price tagging".
This is a policy of revenge carried out by Jewish extremists if any action is taken by the Israeli government or security forces against settlement expansion.
Typically price tagging happens after the Israeli authorities move to dismantle settler "outposts", small Jewish communities build on occupied Palestinian land which even the Israeli government regards as illegal.
Usually it is Palestinians or their property which are attacked in revenge but occasionally action is taken against Israel's security forces.
In October, an Israeli army patrol was surrounded and assaulted by a group of extremist settlers in the West Bank.

Extremist settlers have set fire to West Bank mosques and daubed their walls with graffiti

The attack on the soldiers came after a Jewish teenager was arrested on suspicion of carrying out an arson attack on a Palestinian mosque.
In clashes between settlers and Palestinians it is the Israeli army who have to intervene, often using tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse stone throwing Palestinian youths.
But some soldiers express frustration at the more extremist settlers.
"Both sides are as stupid as the other," an exasperated looking Israeli commanding officer told me as his troops stepped in to stop fighting between settlers and Palestinians near Nablus last month.
The man who recently left his post as Israeli army commander of the West Bank, Nitzan Alon, went much further.
Brigadier General Alon said not enough had been done to tackle Jewish extremism referring to price tag attacks as "terror".
"These acts not only should be condemned for their folly and wrongdoing but we should also have done more to prevent them and to arrest the perpetrators," he said in his outgoing speech.
'Exaggerated' reports However many settler leaders say he is wrong.
"I think that Commander Alon is exaggerating. He's making a mistake, not being careful with his words," says David Haivri, a settler and spokesperson for the Shomron Regional Council in the West Bank.
Mr Haivri says Nitzan Alon went too far with his accusations and argues there is not as much tension between settlers and Palestinians as people make out. He says the United Nations figures on settler violence are wrong.

Israeli soldiers are brought in to stop clashes between settlers and Palestinians

"It seems that so-called human rights organisations are bouncing numbers off each other, building up statistics that don't reflect what I see in the area where I live. There have been much more tense years than this one," says Mr Haivri.
Around 500,000 Jewish settlers live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, land that has been occupied by Israel since 1967.
Settlements are illegal under international law although Israel disputes this.
Many settlers believe they have a religious right to the land.
The vast majority of settlers are non-violent but some within the Israeli government acknowledge a growing problem with extremists.
This month, the Israeli Education Minister, Gideon Saar, strongly condemned the "price tag" policy conducted by extremist settlers.
"The price tag gangs that harass innocent people, damage property, attack Israeli soldiers and security forces, burn mosques and terrorise political opponents are a violent and dangerous cancerous growth that must be uprooted," he said.
Mr Saar was speaking at a memorial service for the former Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated in 1995 by a Jewish extremist opposed to the Oslo Peace Accords that Mr Rabin had signed with the Palestinians two years earlier.
Settlement growth For Palestinians, settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem is an obstacle to peace. They say it makes a future Palestinian state less and less viable.
The United States, the European Union and virtually the entire international community feels the same.
The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas refuses to return to peace talks with Israel until settlement expansion stops completely.
The Israeli government disagrees with his position and says settlement growth is a symptom of the Palestinians' refusal to engage in talks.
The survival of the right wing coalition government is, at least to some extent, dependent on political parties that draw much of their support from people who favour settlement expansion on occupied Palestinian territory.
But if ever there is to be a Palestinian state, both Israeli and Palestinian leaders know that tens of thousands of settlers would have to be removed from their homes.
That would not happen easily and the number of settlers and their influence over Israeli government policy is growing by the day.

Unwrapping the ancient Egyptian animal mummy industry

2011-11-18T01:39:00.000Z

By Jane O'Brien BBC News, Washington

Jane O'Brien looks around the Smithsonian's collection of mummified animals

The ancient Egyptian animal mummification industry was so large it put some species in danger of extinction. But as a new exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC shows, the Egyptians believed they were doing the animals a great honour.

Egypt in the 7th Century BC was not a healthy place to be if you were a cat or a dog.
Puppy farms and other animal breeding programmes were a huge industry - not to produce pets, but to provide a stock of animals to be killed and mummified.
The Egyptians believed that animals held a unique position in the afterlife. They could keep the dead company, they represented the gods, and they were well received as offerings by the gods, Egyptologists say.
Millions mummified Such was the enthusiasm for animal slaughter that experts say it contributed to the extinction in Egypt of at least one bird species. The Sacred Ibis were mummified in the millions because they were sacred to Thoth, the god of wisdom and writing, says Selima Ikram, professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo.

Many baboon mummies were actually forgeries - no animal harmed

Others, including hawks and falcons, saw their populations dwindle.
"It's easier to say which animals the Egyptians didn't mummify," says Prof Ikram, who helped curate the Smithsonian's largest mummy exhibition to date.
"There are no mummified pigs as far as we know, no mummified hippos, and I think that's about it - because almost every other creature at some time or another has been mummified."
At the exhibit, visitors can see a range of mummified animals, including the Sacred Ibis, and gain an insight into the industry that became a driving force of the economy of ancient Egypt.
When animals in the wild started dying out, extensive breeding programmes were launched by the temples and surrounding villages.
'Obsessed with life' The programmes began as early as 3,000BC and peaked from 650BC to 200AD, when the mummification industry was "phenomenally large", says Prof Ikram.

Cats were bred not as pets, but for ritual mummification

Mummification represented a culture of life, not of death, says exhibition curator Melinda Zeder.
"The ancient Egyptians weren't obsessed with death - they were obsessed with life," says Ms Zeder. "And everything they did to prepare for mummification was really looking at life after death and a way of perpetuating oneself forever.
"The priests would sacrifice the animal for you, mummify it and then place it in a catacomb in your name. So this was a way of obtaining good standing in the eyes of whatever god it was."
While many animals were bred specifically to be killed on demand, others were worshiped as deities themselves.
The museum has a rare bull mummy which, as a manifestation of the sun god Re, would have been allowed to live out its life in luxury.
During its life the bull would have received daily massages and paraded through adoring crowds while priests studied its movements and tried to divine messages from the gods.
When the bull died of old age - probably after 20 years - it was mummified, placed in an immense sarcophagus and put into a catacomb.
"Some might have died of heart attacks because they were overfed by the priests," says Prof Ikram.
Other animals did not fare even that well.
Another species killed to the point of extinction in Egypt was the baboon.
When none were left, the Egyptians manufactured fake baboon offerings, creating mummies that looked real on the outside but which CT scans have recently revealed to be elaborate forgeries.
"If you wanted to have a baboon as an offering, you make it look like a baboon - and if you say it is a baboon, then it magically becomes a baboon," says Prof Ikram.
"The real ones were very expensive and hard to come by and that's why the whole genre of fake mummies started."
Animal lovers today might be appalled that such large scale slaughter took place in the name of religion and ritual burials.
But Egyptologists say the ancients believed it was a great honour for the animals involved: They were bred for a higher purpose and would spend eternity with the gods.
"They believed there were going on to a better life," says Prof Ikram, "although their short term life might not have been fantastic."

Myth that antibiotics cure coughs and colds still rife

2011-11-18T01:36:00.000Z

Antibiotics "will not cure viruses"

A quarter of people wrongly believe antibiotics work on most coughs and colds, a Health Protection Agency survey has found.

However antibiotics cannot treat viruses, which cause most respiratory tract infections.
The HPA poll of 1,800 people in England also found one in 10 people keep leftover antibiotics - and many would self-medicate next time they got ill.
A leading GP said antibiotics were not a "cure all".
The HPA's Dr Cliodna McNulty said self-medicating was unsafe and could fuel drug resistance.
Dr McNulty, head of primary care for the HPA, said: "The majority of people can treat themselves at home using over-the-counter medicines to relieve symptoms."
Of those polled, 500 had been prescribed antibiotics in the previous year, with 11% reporting they had leftovers and 6% saying they might take them if they had future infections.
Speaking on European Antibiotics Awareness Day, Dr McNulty said that while the numbers might appear small, they could translate into large numbers given that 30% of people take antibiotics every year.
She said: "There is evidence that the more antibiotics you have, the more likely you are to develop resistance. And you're also more likely to develop antibiotic-related diarrhoea."
But 70% were aware of the problem of antibiotic resistance in hospitals, and a similar number were aware that they or their family could be affected.
'Not a cure-all' The HPA says health professionals must learn to resist demands from patients for treatments they know have little or no effect on coughs and colds. It found 97% of those questioned said that the last time they had asked their GP or nurse for an antibiotic, they were prescribed one.

TOP TIPS FROM THE HPA

Most coughs and colds get better on their own - antibiotics will not speed recovery
Talk to your GP about whether you need them
Coughing up phlegm on its own is not a reason to need an antibiotic - even if it is yellow
A sore throat plus runny nose with phlegm suggests the infection is less likely to respond to antibiotics
A high temperature, red throat and feeling really ill means you probably need an antibiotic
If you feel able to stop taking them early, you may well not have needed them
Always take all doses for as long as instructed
Never keep any leftovers - what's prescribed for one infection might not work for the next
GPs can give a delayed antibiotic prescription for you to take only if things get worse
In cases of severe illness, antibiotics can save lives

Dr McNulty added: "Despite many years of public health campaigns advising people that antibiotics don't work against coughs, colds and flu, our research results show that these myths prevail.

"We understand people feel very unwell with coughs, sore throats, flu and colds, but for the majority of people these symptoms are unpleasant but short-lived."
The Department of Health issued fresh guidance on antibiotic prescribing in hospitals on Friday, with doctors and nurses being urged to "think twice" before offering them to patients.
Dr Clare Gerada, chair of the Royal College of GPs, said: "Antibiotics are a wonderful thing when used properly, but they are not a cure-all for every condition, and should not be seen, or used, as such.
"The opposite is often true and, when used excessively or inappropriately, they can actually do more harm than good - reducing a patient's immunity to illnesses, or building up an immunity to antibiotics, both of which can have negative consequences for good health."
Writing in the Lancet medical journal, Prof Laura Piddock of the school of immunity and infection at the University of Birmingham warned there were global implications from the misuse of antibiotics, and drug companies' failures to develop new ones.
She warned: "The demise of antibacterial drug discovery brings the spectre of untreatable infections."

Pakistan telecoms authority to block 'obscene' texts

2011-11-18T01:32:00.000Z

The list has caused confusion and amusement among many Pakistani mobile phone users

The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) has told mobile phone companies to begin blocking text messages containing "obscene" words.

Mobile phone companies Telenor Pakistan and Ufone confirmed to the BBC
that the PTA has sent them a "dictionary" of banned words and expressions.
The PTA has reportedly ordered operators to begin screening text messages by 21 November.

Ufone say they are now working on how to block the offending words.
A letter dated 14 November, apparently written by Muhammad Talib Doger, an official at the PTA, has been leaked to Pakistani media.

It states that mobile phone operators should begin screening the words, provided on a list attached to the letter, within seven days.

"We have received both the dictionary and the memo and we're discussing a way forward," said Anjum Nida Rahman, corporate communications director for Telenor Pakistan.

Some of the allegedly banned words

Athlete's foot
Flatulence
Jesus Christ
Monkey crotch
Back door
Bewaquf (foolish)
Bakwaas (nonsense)
Wuutang (a presumed reference to American rap group the Wu-Tang Clan)

The ban is a reaction to consumers' complaints of receiving offensive text messages, Mohammad Younis, a spokesman for the PTA, told The Guardian newspaper.

"Nobody would like this happening to their young boy or girl," he said. He added that the list was not finished and that the authority would continue to add to it.
'What am I missing?' An unconfirmed version of the PTA's list is being circulated online, containing hundreds of words and expressions in both English and Urdu.
According to this version, the entries range from those too obscene to repeat to the bizarre.
Some of the choices on the list have baffled Pakistani mobile phone users, many of whom have taken to Twitter to ridicule the move.
Syed Adnan Yousuf, tweeting as @AdnanWhy, asked: "Why is 'head lights' banned? What am I missing here?"
Some people have suggested bypassing the ban by replacing words with their number on the PTA's list.
Pakistan has seen a big increase in mobile phone use in recent years - 100m Pakistanis are now estimated to be mobile phone users.

Middle-aged man attacks boy over Call of Duty video game

2011-10-02T20:33:00.000Z

A MIDDLE-aged man carried out a real-life revenge attack on the teenager who killed his character in an online video game.
Mark Bradford, 46, saw red when the boy gloated after gunning him down while playing Call of Duty: Black Ops.
A court heard how Bradford stormed out of his bedsit and assaulted the 13-year-old who was playing the war game at a friend’s home nearby.

The pal’s mum had to come to the terrified boy’s rescue after Bradford marched into the front room and grabbed the boy’s throat with both hands.
The lad, who cannot be identified, said last night: “I was just sat playing. We’d had a bit of a joke and then he stormed in and grabbed me. I didn’t know what was going on.”
Jobless Bradford and the teenager had been playing the violent game on PlayStations and were talking to each other on microphones over the internet.
Plymouth magistrates heard that the dad-of-three walked away without saying a word after the attack in July. The victim was left with a scratch. His mum, 33, said last night: “It’s pathetic that a grown man would attack a defenceless child like this.
“If you can’t handle losing to a child then you shouldn’t be playing games.
“I know Mark and went straight round when I found out what had happened. I was fuming. But rather than have it out with him I got the police involved.”
Bradford, of St Budeaux, Plymouth, admitted assault and was freed on bail to be sentenced on October 24.
He said yesterday: “I’d been playing the whole day and he was baiting me and just would not shut up.
“I just lost it. In a moment of madness I went round to the house. I didn’t know what I was going to do.
“It wasn’t malice. I just grabbed him. I’ve seen him since and apologised. The injuries weren’t that bad but I do regret it.”

'I'd like to axe Human Rights Act,' declares Home Secretary as she risks explosive rift with Lib Dem colleagues

2011-10-02T20:26:00.000Z

By David RichardsLast updated at 1:07 PM on 2nd October 2011

Theresa May risked angering Liberal Democrat Cabinet colleagues today by throwing her weight behind calls for the Human Rights Act to be scrapped.

In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, the Home Secretary said she would 'personally' like to see it go because of the problems it has presented the Home Office.

Her comments, on the eve of the Conservative Party conference in Manchester, will endear her to many Tories infuriated by its use by foreign criminals to avoid deportation.

But senior Lib Dems, including Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Energy Secretary Chris Huhne, have pledged that the Act will stay.

Ms May said: 'I'd personally like to see the Human Rights Act go because I think we have had some problems with it.'

She added: 'I see it, here in the Home Office, particularly, the sort of problems we have in being unable to deport people who perhaps are terrorist suspects. Obviously we've seen it with some foreign criminals who are in the UK.'

Mr Clegg promised Lib Dem delegates at his party's conference last month that the Human Rights Act, which enshrines the European Convention on Human Rights in UK law, was 'here to stay'.

Mr Huhne suggested the issue, if forced, could topple the coalition.

'If Conservative backbenchers persist in wanting to tear up the European Convention on Human Rights, then I can foresee a time when this party would be extremely uncomfortable in coalition,' he said.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of human rights organisation Liberty, said: 'Modern Conservatives should think again about human rights values that were truly Churchill's legacy.

'Only a pretty "nasty party" would promote human rights in the Middle East whilst scrapping them at home.'

David Cameron said he and the Home Secretary shared a concern that the Commission would work 'more slowly' than the Tories wanted.

But he said action was already being taken to help end the 'chilling culture' which the Act had fostered among people fearful they would fall foul of it.

Speaking on BBC1's Andrew Marr Show, Mr Cameron cited the recent example of a prison van driven nearly 100 miles to transfer a defendant the short walk to a court.

'I agree that it would be good to replace the Human Rights Act with a Bill of Rights. I think that is the right thing to do.'

There was a concern however that it would 'go more slowly than Theresa and I would want'.

Shadow justice secretary Sadiq Khan accused Mrs May of 'pandering to the Tory right' and said Government policy on the Human Rights Act was 'a shambles'.

Mr Khan said: 'Theresa May's comments show just how two-faced and weak this Government's commitment to human rights is.

'The Human Rights Act is the most significant defence for ordinary people against state power ever passed into law.

'Simply scrapping it is a lazy and incoherent position to hold. Two weeks ago the Deputy Prime Minister said of the Human Rights Act: 'It is here to stay'.

'Now the Home Secretary is saying his words aren't worth the paper they were written on. Government policy is a shambles.

'Someone in the Government now needs to be clear exactly what the policy is. Either the Deputy Prime Minister has been overruled, or this is another fantasy policy from Theresa May.'

UN Gaza Flotilla Report Gravely Flawed

2011-09-17T16:25:00.000Z

Michael Ratner: Palmer report wrongly states Israel's Gaza blockade is legal

Harassment by Israeli navy hurting Gaza fisherman

2011-09-17T16:22:00.002Z

UN Report Lauds Palestinian State Building Achievements

2011-09-15T00:29:00.001Z

JERUSALEM, September 14, 2011 (WAFA) - A United Nations report to a key donor forum has lauded Palestinian Authority (PA) state building achievements but warned of a dramatically widening gap between far reaching institutional progress and a stagnant political process, Wednesday said a United Nations press release.

The report entitled, ‘Palestinian State Building: an achievement at risk’, has been prepared by the office of Robert Serry, UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process (UNSCO), for the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee (AHLC) meeting in New York scheduled for September 18.

It follows previous UN reports to the AHLC which have assessed the PA’s state building progress, and described the situation on the ground in the occupied Palestinian territory.

The current report states that 'The PA has completed what it set out to achieve two years ago to prepare its institutions to be able to assume the responsibilities of statehood. This is a considerable achievement which should be recognized, preserved, and built upon.”

The report consolidates the conclusions of UNSCO’s April 2011 report, which found that in six areas where the UN was most engaged- governance, rule of law and human rights; livelihoods and productive sectors; education and culture; health; social protection; and infrastructure and water - 'government functions are now sufficient for the functioning government of a state.'

The current report notes further progress increasing the breadth and scope of PA improvements in institutional readiness.

However, the report warns that these achievements may not be sustainable in the absence of far-reaching political progress.

Commenting on its conclusions, Serry said, “I am very worried about the disconnect between what the PA has achieved on the ground, and where the political process stands. The reality is that there is only so much that can be done in conditions of prolonged occupation, unresolved final status issues, no serious progress on a two state solution, and a continuing Palestinian divide. Further achievements in state building require that the politics catch up with the impressive progress on the ground. People should realize that if we do not meet this challenge, the achievements the Palestinian Authority has realized will be increasingly at risk.'

Reviewing conditions on the ground, the report notes that despite earlier and welcome progress in reducing obstacles in the West Bank, restrictions on movement and access continue and have a serious impact on Palestinian lives and the economy.

There was also a significant increase in settlement activity which took place in the West Bank, in particular in East Jerusalem, since the AHLC last met.

In Gaza, Hamas remains in de facto control and the security situation remains fundamentally fragile. The government of Israel continues to implement a policy of closure despite some important easing measures.

The report echoes concerns widely expressed by other institutions and warns of an immediate fiscal shortfall facing the Palestinian Authority.

'I hope that this Sunday's meeting also brings renewed focus on the necessity of immediate donor support to ensure that PA financing needs are met through the end of 2011,' Serry commented. 'There's a $300 million shortfall for recurrent financing.'

Noting the need to enable socio-economic development amidst continuing institutional consolidation, the report welcomes the Palestinian Authority's National Development Plan for 2011-2013, and stresses in particular the importance of continuing improvements in the social sector.

But the report stresses the need for an enabling environment, which Serry has said is essential to ensure further progress: 'In addition to the political issues which cannot be delayed, I call for far-reaching steps by Israel to roll back measures of occupation which continue to stifle Palestinian economic growth. We saw good steps in this regard during 2009 and 2010, but we haven't seen bolder steps since then. If the weight of the occupation is not being lifted, all the achievements to date will be increasingly difficult to sustain.'

The Ad Hoc Liaison Committee (AHLC) is a 15-member committee that serves as the principal policy-level coordination mechanism for development assistance to the Palestinian people. It is chaired by Norway and cosponsored by the European Union and the United States.

In addition, the United Nations participates together with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The AHLC seeks to promote dialogue between donors, the Palestinian Authority and the government of Israel.

M.S.http://english.wafa.ps/index.php?action=detail&id=17353

Saudis to US: You’re sleeping on the couch tonight

2011-09-14T23:49:00.001Z

by Paul Mutter on September 14, 2011

Prominent Saudi officials have been wagging their fingers at the U.S. since 9/11, trying to convince Washington that Riyadh is as indispensable to the U.S.'s Middle East status quo as Tel Aviv is. One such prominent Saudi official, Prince Bandar, has gone so far as to compare the arrangement between Saudi Arabia as a "Catholic marriage," i.e., periods of separation are allowed but divorce is not. He is, by U.S. standards, an exasperating partner because of his proclivity to make statements along the lines of “the U.S. shouldn't be counted on to restore stability across the Middle East" and to go around the U.S.'s back in conversations with Pakistani, Emirates and Malaysian officials.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, a former Saudi ambassador and intelligence chief (one of the main silent partners in the U.S.-led campaign to arm the Afghan mujahideen in the 1980s) is suggesting the stubborn U.S. will soon be seeing some unwelcome papers from his lawyer. He warns the U.S. that it's recalcitrance over the Palestinian Authority's effort at the UN will force the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to reconsider its ties with Washington. From the New York Times:

"The United States must support the Palestinian bid for statehood at the United Nations this month or risk losing the little credibility it has in the Arab world. If it does not, American influence will decline further, Israeli security will be undermined and Iran will be empowered, increasing the chances of another war in the region."

"Moreover, Saudi Arabia would no longer be able to cooperate with America in the same way it historically has. With most of the Arab world in upheaval, the “special relationship” between Saudi Arabia and the United States would increasingly be seen as toxic by the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims, who demand justice for the Palestinian people."

"Saudi leaders would be forced by domestic and regional pressures to adopt a far more independent and assertive foreign policy. Like our recent military support for Bahrain’s monarchy, which America opposed, Saudi Arabia would pursue other policies at odds with those of the United States, including opposing the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in Iraq and refusing to open an embassy there despite American pressure to do so. The Saudi government might part ways with Washington in Afghanistan and Yemen as well."

Considering that the Saudis have long been our partners in making Afghanistan, Yemen and Bahrain what they are today, their newfound "unhelpfulness" would certainly undermine U.S. interests in those countries - if it actually comes to pass.

Saudi statements about Israel today essentially amount to (hypocritical) bluster. Saudi Arabia is no sudden human rights champion, however much the royal family goes on about Palestinian refugees and self-determination. And in foreign policy, there is far too much at stake for both Riyadh and Washington to have a falling out.

Nor can the Saudis realistically expect to get a better deal in Iraq than the one they currently have in the form of the U.S.-backed al-Maliki, since a different government might be more willing to work with Iran, the Saudis' archenemy and "populist" theocratic rival (though Tehran today is about as authentically populist as Rick Perry).

In Yemen and Bahrain, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia basically have the same interests: marginalize Iran and supress popular dissent under the banner of counterterrorism. The Saudis also cannot expect to easily switch out military suppliers and consultants when it comes to their armed forces, as U.S. intel and equipment dominates the Saudi defense apparatus.

Most likely, there will be a flurry of diplomatic snubs ("Emirates, please tell the U.S. to pass the salt."), but little more than that - you cannot say the Saudis are going to undermine aspects of U.S. policy in retaliation because, well, Saudi officials have done that on a regular basis in both good times and bad, in sickness and in health, for rich or for . . . rich.

It's a turbulent marriage, to be sure, but remember, divorce is not permitted! And while you can annul a Catholic marriage, neither the U.S. government nor the Saudi royal family will be annuling theirs, whatever happens in Israel and the Occupied Territories from here on out.http://mondoweiss.net/2011/09/saudis-to-us-youre-sleeping-on-the-couch-tonight.html

1948 LEST WE FORGET – Palestine and the Nakba

2011-09-14T19:33:00.000Z

The Zionist Project

“Were I to sum up the Basel Congress in a word…it would be this: ‘At Basel, I founded the Jewish State. If I said this out loud today [1897] I would be answered by universal laughter. If not in 5 years, then certainly in 50. Everyone will know it’ “. Theodor Herzl Diaries 1987.

Herzl missed his goal by only 1 year.

Zionism emerged as a national movement in Eastern Europe in the 1880’s. Its founder, Theodor Herzl (1860-1904), a Hungarian Jew, dreamt of establishing a Jewish State in the land of Palestine, a dream which was to be realised through colonisation and land acquisition. According to Zionist archives, the leadership of early Zionism believed that the native population of Palestine, as a result of this colonisation, would simply “fold their tents and slip away” or, if they resisted, they would be “spirited across the borders”.

It all started in a small way as the first Zionist settlement in Palestine was founded with the financial help of Edmond James de Rothschild (1845-1934), a French financier who assisted a small group of the Russian Bilu Jewish Society to immigrate to Palestine in 1882. This Philanthropist sponsored a few more tiny settlements at the time such as Gai Oni, Roch Pina, Zichron-Ya’acov (which he named after his grandfather) and Rishon Letzion with settlers from around Eastern Europe.

The single aim of all these settlements and their planners who envisioned them was to slowly and secretly transfer, drive out and ethnically cleanse Palestine of its indigenous people.

This concept of transfer of the local population was held dear by almost every member of the Zionist leadership in Europe. At their first official Zionist Congress in Basel in 1897, they called already for “the establishment of a publicly and legally secured home in Palestine for the Jewish people”.

20 years later, the Balfour Declaration threw them a lifeline.

To secure support for this project, Israel Zangwill (1864-1926), an Anglo-Jewish writer and a powerful leader of British Zionism, coined the phrase: “a land without a people for a people without land”. Little did he and all his colleagues in the Zionist leadership realise (or wished to remember) that there were almost 410,000 Palestinians (Muslims and Christians) living in Palestine around the early 1890’s.

Chaim Weizmann (1874-1952) who was to become Israel’s first president, said once: “…there is a country which happens to be called Palestine, a country without a people…and there exists the Jewish people and it has no country. What is left is to fit the gem into the ring…”

The Zionist leadership did not actually mean that there were no people in Palestine. They meant that there were no people in Palestine worth considering as a people.

The Zionists truly believed that the Land of Israel belonged exclusively to the Jewish people. Theodor Herzl wrote in June 1895: “We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border…and both the process of expropriation and removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly...”

Israel Zangwill followed by saying that “if we wish to give a country to a people without a country, it is utter foolishness to allow it to be the country of two peoples…”.

Zionism’s idea of transfer was even tested within a wider Arab framework where Zionist leaders would offer Arab leaders financial incentives, expertise and international influence in exchange for acquiescence in the expansion of the Yishuv (the Jewish community in Palestine). In January 1919, for example, Chaim Weizmann and the Hashemite Emir Faisal who was aspiring to the leadership of the Arab Nationalist Movement, concluded an agreement under British auspices whereby Faisal would support Jewish immigration into Palestine in return for economic support for the future state Faisal was hoping to create.

As Palestinian resistance to the expansion of the Yishuv was growing, so was the Zionist determination to implement the doctrine of separation between the Jewish community and the Palestinian population in preparation for the eventual establishment of a Jewish state.

Yishuv leaders such as David Ben-Gurion (1886-1973), born in Poland as David Gruen and who arrived in Palestine in 1906 at the age of 20 and later became the first prime minister of Israel, strongly advanced the idea of transfer and saw the link between the separation of the Palestinians and of the Jews and the plan for the eventual transfer of the Palestinians out of Palestine.

When the Palestinian Revolt took place (1936-39), the Zionists saw a chance and a reason for the strengthening of their underground forces and the expansion of their military infrastructure. It was becoming clear to the Yishuv that the solution to the Palestinian demographic problem can only be achieved through military threats.

Ben-Gurion declared in 1936: “…What can drive the Arabs to a mutual understanding with us?…Facts, only after we manage to establish a great Jewish fact in the country will the precondition for discussion with the Arabs be met”.

Vladimir Jabotinsky (1880-1940), born in the Ukraine-USSR, was a member of the World Zionist Organisation and later founded the Zionist-Revisionist movement, which was the central ideological component of the Likud (now Ariel Sharon’s Kadima party), always believed that the creation of a Jewish state meant imposing the will of Zionism on the Palestinian population. He stated:

“…colonisation can continue and develop only under the protection of a force independent of the local population – an iron wall which the native population cannot break through…this is our policy towards the Arabs and to formulate it in any other way would be hypocrisy…The Jewish question can be solved either completely or it cannot be solved at all. We are in need of a territory where our people will constitute the overwhelming majority…and one must not be afraid of the word ‘segregation’ ”.

Jabotinsky believed that only ‘an iron wall of bayonets and Jewish armed garrisons’ would be able to secure Jewish sovereignty on both sides of the Jordan River. Like Weizmann and Ben-Gurion before him, he had only contempt for the indigenous Arabs. He once said: “we Jews, thank God, have nothing to do with the East. The Islamic soul must be broomed out of Eretz Yisrael”. This ideology found expression in two military terrorist organizations:

The first was the Irgun formed in 1935 by Menachem Begin (1913-1992) a Polish Jew who became prime minister in 1977 (and about whom A lbert Einstein in a 1948 letter to the New York Times said that he and his party were “closely akin in their organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties”).

The second was the Stern Gang led by Itzhak Shamir (born Icchak Jaziernicki in Rozana, Poland in 1915) which was responsible for many terrorist acts including the assassination of Count Folke Bernadotte. Shamir, of course, became Israel’s Prime Minister not once but twice: from 1983-84 and again from 1986-1992.

This Shamir described the Arabs as “beasts of the desert, not a legitimate people”. In a memorandum to UNSCOP in 1947, his Stern Gang called for the compulsory evacuation of the entire Palestinian population from Palestine, preferably in the direction of Iraq. As the sale of land by absentee landlords increased so did the bitterness of the Palestinian farmers who worked on them and who were now forced to leave by their new land owners. For this purpose, Chaim Weizmann established the Jewish Agency Executive to promote the idea of Palestinian transfer from newly acquired land. At the same time, Jewish immigration increased and the number of Jewish immigrants jumped from 30,000 in 1933 to 61,000 in 1935 (representing 29.5% of the total population).

The Concept of Transfer

With Palestinian riots erupting in 1936, Britain decided to dispatch a commission to investigate the causes for the riots and the clashes taking place between Jews and Arabs. The Royal Commission, known as the Royal (Peel) Commission arrived in Palestine in November of that year led by William W Peel, 1^st Earl Peel (1867-1937). It interviewed Zionist and Arab leaders before it made its recommendations suggesting in a nut shell that “sooner or later, there should be a transfer of land and, as far as possible, an exchange of population”.

Lord Peel arriving in Mandate Palestine

The Commission’s recommendations were seen as the first official indication of a plan to partition Palestine and to transfer its population, an idea credited to one of the Peel Commission members, Reginald Couplan, who was considered Zionism’s greatest friend on the Royal Commission.

So the transfer concept was slowly tied to the idea of partitioning and became the central core of all Zionist lobbying efforts that followed.

Moshe Shertok (1894-1965), who, like Jabotinsky, was born in the Ukraine, (and later became the 2^nd Prime Minister of Israel), was elected as the head of the political department of the Jewish Agency. He was crucial in formulating policies on the question of transfer. In a speech to the Zionist Actions Committee in April 1937, he stated:

“The proposed Jewish state would not be continuous. The frontier line would separate villages from their fields…the Arab reaction would be negative [to the partition idea] because they would loose everything and gain almost nothing…they would loose the richest part of Palestine…the orange plantations, the commercial and industrial centres…most of the coastal areas…and [they] would be driven out into the desert. As for now, we must not forget who would have to exchange the land? Those villagers who live more than others on irrigation, on orange and fruit plantations, in houses built near water wells and pumping stations, on livestock and property and easy access to markets. Where would they go? What would they receive in return? This would be such an uprooting, such a shock the likes of which had never occurred before and could drown the whole thing in rivers of blood”.

This 70-year old speech, could have been made today as it would reflect exactly what is happening to the Palestinian territories now. The fear amongst the Palestinian people was that the Peel Commission was taking one step towards turning the Balfour Declaration of a ‘Jewish National Home’ into a Jewish State.

Although Ben-Gurion admitted that he could forsee enormous difficulties “in uprooting by foreign force some 100,000 Arabs from the villages in Galilee which they have inhabited for hundreds of years”, he was, nevertheless, determined that “we must be prepared to carry out the transfer…we must expel Arabs and take their place, and if we have to use force…the we have force at our disposal…Our strength will exceed theirs [the Arabs] and we will be better organised and equipped because behind us still stands…the whole younger generation of Jews from Europe and America”.

This is from a terrorist who became the first Prime Minister of Israel.

Eliezer Kaplan (1891-1952), born in Minsk, Belurussia, was appointed head of the Finance and Administrative Department of the Jewish Executive (and later became the Finance Minister in Ben-Gurion government). He declared that “the question here is not one of expulsion, but of organised transfer from Jewish territories to another place”.

Other Zionist leaders were even worried that such a transfer to neighbouring countries would actually jeopardize future expansion of the Jewish state [into these neighbouring countries]!

One of the leaders of the Mapai Party, Yosef Baratz (1890-1968), born in the Ukraine but moved to Palestine against his parents’ wishes, was initially doubtful whether it would be possible to transfer 300,000 Palestinian Arabs. Yet, he confidently remembered that: “…dind’t we transfer Arabs from D’Aganiya [the first Zionist communal settlement in Palestine where he lived and married] , Kenert, Merhavya and Mishmar Haemek? I remember the nights on which Shmuel Dayan [Moshe Dayan’s father] and I were called to help Hashomer [a Zionist terrorist organization] carry out Arab evacuation. What was the sin in that?”.

Years later, Moshe Dayan (1915-1981) was born in a kibbutz to Jewish immigrants from the Ukraine. He later became Israel’s defense minister between 1953-1958. He spoke of the effect of the Zionist transfer policy on the Palestinian landscape [as quoted in Haaretz in April 1969]: Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages [in Palestine]. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist; not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not either. Nahlal [Dayan’s own settlement] arose in the place of Mahlool; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; Kefar Yehushu’a in the place of Tal Al-Shuman. There is not one single place in this country [Israel] that did not have a former Arab population”.

The records of the Protocol of the 20^th Zionist Congress on 9 August 1937, show that the idea of transfer was heavily debated: “in Dr Weizman’s opinion, it would be possible to transfer100,000 Palestinians in 20 years, i.e., 5,000 per year. He [Weizmann] told of a plan to set up a fund for a large [Arab] re-settlement. The Jews will contribute to this the amount of1 million Palestinian pounds, and another 2 million pounds will be given…from the savings of the Mandatory treasury”.

Menachem Ussishkin (1863-1941), born in Imperial Russia and elected chairman of the powerful and influential Jewish National Fund, advocated the transfer of Palestinians not only to Transjordan, but to Iraq [the farther the better, he apparently thought]: “the Arab people in Palestine have immense areas of land at their disposal. Our people have nothing. We demand that our inheritance, Palestine, be returned to us”.

Another character, Dr Selig Soskin (1872-1959), Director of the Land Settlement Department of the Jewish National Fund, had extensive knowledge of land issues and means of transferring people form one place to another. He advocated the idea of total transfer of Palestinians as a condition for the establishment of a Jewish state. With the help of the Land Fund set up to purchase Arab land, he argued that the transfer must be carried out with the greatest speed possible: “The transferring of the Arabs by such numbers in a long period shall not have the desired effect of freeing the country from the heavy burden of a second class citizen and from cheap producers. Besides, the small numbers suggested by the Peel Commission will be made up by the natural increase in numbers through their economic development under Jewish rule”. He estimated that 40,000 Palestinian families or 250,000 Palestinian Arabs will have to be transferred from the proposed Jewish state. The cost of this transfer, he estimated, would be about £P200 per Arab family.

Britain’s Zionists Prepare the Ground

Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) British Prime Minister from 1874-1880 once said: “The Lord deals with the nations as the nations deal with the Jews”.

On 31 October 1917, a British army contingent numbering 150,000 soldiers led by General Allenby attacked the Turkish garrison town of Beer Sheba (Beer Al-Sabe') near the Gaza Strip and raised most of its buildings to the ground. This crucial victory laid the Palestine landscape beyond open to the invading British forces.

Within hours of that victory, Allenby shot a telegram to London informing the government of the great news. Months earlier, Chaim Weizman leader of the World Zionist Organisation (WZO) and Arthur J Balfour (1848-1930), a Conservative politician and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, had been conducting secret negotiations the aim of which was the establishment in Palestine of 'a national home for the Jews'. When Allenby's telegram arrived on the 1st of November, Balfour pulled out, on the very next day, 2 November 1917, a secret document which had been agreed with the WZO, and known ever since, as The Balfour Declaration and issued it in the form of a letter addressed to Lord L Walter Rothschild (1868-1937) a British banker and member of the wealthy Rothschild financial dynasty.

It read:

This Declaration came about after extensive lobbying from the Zionist leadership whose spokesman and tireless lobbyist Weizmann never missed an opportunity to prepare the grounds to secure this Declaration. For instance, in one letter he wrote to a friend in December 1914, he said:

“I saw Balfour on Saturday [mid December 1914] and the interview lasted one and a half hours. Balfour remembered everything we discussed 8 years ago [1906] and I gave him a brief summary of what has happened over these years…He listened for a long time and was very moved - I assure you, to tears - and he took me by the hand and said that I had illuminated for him the road followed by a great suffering nation [the Jewish nation], and expressed his opinion that the question of Palestine would remain insoluble…until there was a normal Jewish community in Palestine. He asked me whether I wanted anything practical at present. I said no, [but that] I would like to call on him again…when the roar of the guns had stopped [meaning, WW1]. He saw me out into the street, holding my hand in silence, and bidding me farewell said warmly:

'Mind you come again to see me, I am deeply moved and interested, it is not a dream, it is a great cause and I understand it'“.

Arthur Balfour (1848-1930) Walter Rothschild (1868-1937)

The Declaration then followed 3 years later.
This Declaration may be considered the most extraordinary document of any government. What makes it extraordinary is the fact that, in the words of Arthur Koestler (Jewish novelist 1905-1983), "one nation solemnly promised to a second nation the country of a third". Even more extraordinary is the fact that this third country (Palestine) was still part of the empire of a fourth (Turkey).
Britain had no business offering the nation of one people to the people of many nations.

In a curious comment, which smacks of typical colonial arrogance, Balfour said:

"...in Palestine, we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country. The four great powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, of far profounder impact than the desires of the 700,000 Arabs who now inhabit this ancient land".

Henry Cattan (1906-1992) a renowned international jurist and writer, once observed that the Balfour Declaration was "legally void [it did not obtain the consent of the indigenous people of Palestine], morally wicked [because Britain solemnly promised to a second nation the country of a third] and politically mischievous [because it planted he seeds of conflict between Jews and Arabs who had lived together in peace and harmony for many generation]".

But to give it an international seal of legitimacy, the Balfour Declaration draft text was submitted to President Woodrow Wilson of the United States who approved it prior to its publication. On the 14^th February and 9^th May 1918 respectively, France and Italy publicly endorsed it.

Fighting with the Turks ended in victory for the Allies on the 28^th June, 1919. The League of Nations Covenant was also signed at this time. Article 22 of the Covenant prescribed that the wishes of the people formerly belonging to the Turkish Empire be a principal consideration in the selection of the Mandatory. According to the surveys conducted at the time, it was privately reported that the Arabs had opted for the United States to be their supervisory body. The Zionist leadership opted for the trusteeship of Great Britain over Palestine and when Turkish rule formally ended under the Treaty of Sevres on 10 August 1920, the Zionists ensured that the famous Balfour Declaration was embodied in it under Article 22.

The embodiment of this Zionist dream within the League’s Covenant sealed the fate of Palestine at this early stage of the Mandate. If there was any doubt in anyone’s mind about this linkage, it was dispelled by Article 4 of the Mandate which stated:

“An appropriate Jewish Agency shall be recognised as a public body for the purpose of advising and cooperating with the Administration of Palestine…as may affect the establishment of the Jewish national home and the interests of the Jewish population in Palestine…The Zionist Organization shall be recognized as such agency…and shall take steps in consultation with His Britannic Majesty’s Government to…assist in the establishment of the Jewish national home in Palestine”.

Winston Churchill (1874-1965) twice British Prime Minister between 1940-45 and 1951-55, endorsed it officially in a letter he wrote in 1920 which said that “it has fallen to the British Government, as a result of the conquest of Palestine, to have the opportunity and the responsibility of securing for the Jewish race all over the world a home and a centre of national life. The fiery energies of Dr Weizmann leader of the Zionist project, supported by the full authority of Lord Allenby, are all directed to achieving the success of this inspiring movement. Of course Palestine is far too small to accommodate more than a fraction of the Jewish race, but if there should be created in our lifetime by the Banks of the Jordan a Jewish State under the protection of the British Crown, which might comprise 3 or 4 million Jews, an event would have occurred in the history of the world which would be especially in harmony with the truest interests of the British Empire”.

In this atmosphere of promises and deceptions, the Mandate for Palestine was formally allotted to Great Britain at the Peace Conference of San Remo on 25 April 1920.

The borders of Mandate Palestine were drawn up in the secret Sykes-Picot Agreement in San Remo by Great Britain and France between 15-16 May 1916. This agreement was seen by many as a turning point in Western-Arab relations, as it negated promises made earlier to the Arabs for a national homeland in exchange for their help in defeating the Ottoman Empire. Here is what Item 10 of that Agreement stated:

"10. The British and French Governments, as the protectors of the Arab State, shall agree that they will not themselves acquire and will not consent to a third Power acquiring territorial possessions in the Arabian Peninsula, nor consent to a third Power installing a naval base on the east coast or in the Red Sea..." All the promises made to the Arabs for independence and sovereignty once the war was over, have been broken. To add insult to injury, their land was cut up and Palestine was promised to the the Jews 18 months later via the Balfour Declaration.

Sir Mark Sykes (1879-1919)

The British, as the Mandatory power in Palestine, therefore, were confronting the contradiction of two irreconcilable aims: assisting Palestine to advance towards and to achieve independence under the Mandate Charter, and the commitment, under the Balfour Declaration, to a future Jewish Home in Palestine.

Article 22 of The League of Nations Covenant stated that the right of “those colonies and territories which, as a consequence of the late war, have ceased to be under the sovereignty of the States which formerly governed them and which are inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves…there should be applied the principle that the well being and development of such people form a sacred trust of civilisation and that the securities for the performance of this trust should be embodied in this Covenant”.

Continued illegal Jewish immigration and the purchase of Palestinian land by the Jewish National Fund reached record levels in the 1930’s with Hitler in Germany, and Mussolini in Italy, advocating the expulsion of Jews from Europe. By the mid 1930’s the Jews in Palestine formed one third of the total population enjoying the blessing of the Balfour Declaration.

Arab resistance escalated from delegations and emmisaries, petitions and declarations to demonstrations and strikes. This culminated in the first Palestine Riots in 1929 forcing the British Government to issue The Passfield White Paper in November 1930 calling for a limitation on Jewish immigration into Palestine. But with Zionist pressure mounting to allow more Jews into Palestine, the registered figures show that such immigration reached ‘invasion’ proportion in just 4 years: from 9,553 Jews in 1932 to 30,327 (1933) to 42,359 (1934) to 61,854 (1935) totalling 144,093. In the same period, the equivalent number of Jewish immigration to the USA was only 14,118. The Palestinian Arabs now braced themselves up for a national revolt.

The Palestinian Arab Rebellion of 1936 lasted for 3 years and forced Britain to send yet again one of its time-honoured commissions to Palestine. Led this time by Lord Peel, it concluded that the two objectives of Article 2 of the Mandate (eventual independence for the indigenous population and the establishment of a Jewish National Home in Palestine) could not be reconciled, The Peel Commission recommended that Palestine be partitioned. The Palestinians, of course, were horrified at this conclusion which granted the Jews 40% of Palestine when Jewish land ownership at the time did not exceed 5.5%; the cruellest provision of all was that there should be, if necessary, a “forcible transfer of Arabs” out of lands allotted to the Jewish state (see later sections).

The Peel Commission (November 1937)

Arab revolt and resistance to this policy was more than equated by fierce British repression against the Palestinians. More than 5,000 were killed and over 15,000 wounded out of a population of 1 million (the equivalent at the time of 200,000 British and 1 million Americans killed and 600,000 British and 3 million Americans wounded). The number of detainees was over 5,600 in 1939 alone. All of this was accompanied by the terrorisation and murder of Arab villagers by special British-trained Jewish squads and underground terrorists.

The Zionist leadership in the persons of Weizmann and Ben-Gurion, were of course jubilant at the Peel recommendations, for this was the first time that the “Jewish National Home” was being officially and publicly equated with a “Jewish State”. It was also being pronounced by a great power, Britain, which was itself the Mandatory.

Ben-Gurion, although grateful for the Peel recommendations, stated soon afterwards that “The Jewish state now being proposed to us is not the Zionist aim. But this will be a decisive step in bringing about the great Zionist aim. In the shortest time possible, it will build the real Jewish strength that will carry us to our historic objectives”.

The Palestine Arab Revolt evoked the sympathy and support of Mahatma Gandhi who wrote in 1938: “Surely, it would be a crime against humanity to reduce the proud Arabs so that Palestine can be restored to the Jews partly or wholly as their National Home”.

As the clouds of WWII were gathering and as the threat of international crisis was looming, the British Government called for a Round Table Conference attended by Arabs, Palestinians and Zionist representatives. Malcolm Macdonald, the new Colonial Secretary was the driving force behind it. The inconclusive conference issued its White Paper on May 17, 1939 which indicated a sudden change of heart from the British Government about the recommendations of the previous Peel Commission. Perhaps this is because the British government began to realise that Palestine could never become the solution for the Jewish problem and that the development of a National Home for the Jews in Palestine can be achieved only as a result of the wholesale eviction of the existing indigenous population. The White Paper of 1939 stated the following:

1. “The proposal of partition recommended by the Royal Commission, namely the establishment of self-supporting independent Arab and Jewish states within Palestine, has been found to be impracticable.

2. His Majesty’s Government now declares unequivocally that it is not part of their policy that Palestine should become a Jewish state.

3. The object of His Majesty’s Government is the establishment within 10 years (i.e., by the end of its Mandate) of an independent Palestine State…in which Arabs and Jews share in government in such a way as to ensure that the essential interests of each community are safeguarded”.

The Zionists rejected the White Paper outright and, with the increasing influence of David Ben-Gurion on Zionist strategic thinking, began to shift their base of political lobbying and influence from London to Washington leading up to 1947. The events taking shape during this period sounded the death knell for Palestine. The Zionist link between Palestine and the Holocaust was forged.

The Population Transfer Committee: November 1937

On the heel of the Peel Committee recommendations, the Jewish Agency created the Population Transfer Committee with an impressive list of executive members, one of whom was Dr Kurt Mendelson from Holland considered to be ‘the expert on the question of population transfer’. He would divide the Palestinian Arabs into 3 categories to be cleared in the first stage of the Transfer Plan:

1. Tenant farmers.
2. Landless villagers working as agricultural labourers.
3. Farmers who owned less than 3 dunums per capita.

To resettle these people, the Transfer Committee calculated that 1.15 million dunums would have to be purchased in Transjordan and that it would take nearly 10 years to complete the transfer.

Ben-Gurion opted instead for a total evacuation of Arabs from the proposed Jewish state. He said that he looked at the Jewish part only as a provisional solution “on the basis that after we build a strong force following the establishment of the state, we will abolish the partition of the country and we will expand to the whole Land of Israel”.

One executive member of the Jewish Agency concurred: “...we will not achieve this by preaching sermons on the mount, but by machine-guns which we will need”. Some Committee members even opposed the idea of partition itself and argued for a single state for the Jewish people: “We cannot begin the Jewish state with a population of which Arabs constitute almost half of the population…Such a state cannot survive even for half an hour”.

Fearing moral backlash from world opinion against forced expulsion of the Palestinian population, the debate considered ways of how to contain such a possible backlash. But this did not deter one Committee member to volunteer: “If you ask me whether it is moral to remove 60,000 families from their place of residence…I will say to you that it is moral. I am ready to come and defend the moral side of it before the Almighty and the League of Nations”.

Ben-Gurion closed the debate: “I support compulsory transfer. I do not see anything immoral in it.

Surprisingly, the British Government decided that all this transfer talk would not wash. It sent a new commission to Palestine in April 1938, called the Woodhead Commission chaired by Sir John Woodhead. It was to examine the recommendations of the Peel Commission for the partition of Palestine.

It issued The White Paper 1939, also known as the MacDonald White Paper, which was in essence an internal policy paper in which Britain unilaterally abandoned the Mandate’s goals of establishing a ‘Jewish homeland in Palestine’ in favour of an independent bi-national state governed jointly by Palestinian Arabs and Jews. However, this Paper was later rejected by the League of Nations to whom the Mandatory Authorities had to answer and which had to approve every change to British policy in the Mandate.

Meanwhile and behind the scenes, a New York-based Jewish Multi-millionaire by the name of Edward A Norman (1900-1955) was devoting much of his fortune to supporting the Yishuv (the Jewish population in Palestine). He established what later became the American-Israel Cultural Fund which supported all cultural institutions of the Yishuv in Palestine and later in Israel. Part of his plan evolved around the transfer of Palestinian Arabs to Iraq. Norman estimated that the cost of settling one family would be in the region of $300. He hoped that the Palestinian families would be ‘bought out’ and be induced to leave, starting with those in the coastal plain where land is suitable for agriculture. Later in February 1937, he was to revise his figure to $1,800 per Palestinian family of 6 persons. This cost would be partly covered by money earned from the sale of Palestinian land to immigrant Jews.

Norman presented his scheme to British Colonial Office officials when he visited London in early 1938. He was relying on the fact that Britain would rather have the support of a future majority Jewish population in Palestine than an Arab one aspiring to an independent nation. He wrote articles in the London Times in the spring and summer of 1938 promoting Palestinian transfer to Iraq. He discussed these ideas with Weizmann and Ben-Gurion. Weizmann and Norman even lobbied the American Government to accept the idea of transfer to Iraq as a necessary means for producing foodstuff by Palestinian labourers to help war efforts by the allies in the various theatres of war at the time.

This scheme, mercifully, came to nothing as Britain’s Labour Party came to power.

For the next few years and for the duration of WW2, the Zionist leadership began to shift their priorities and looked away from Britain for alternative sponsors: the United States of America.

Although the idea of transfer was not in the foreground of all Zionist discussions, it was believed that as a result of WW2, shifts in populations in Europe and in Palestine would eventually take place. Weizmann, the energetic Zionist that he was, intended to discuss his plan for a Jewish state in Palestine with American President Roosevelt. He would propose that the Palestinians would be evacuated from the proposed state to allow room for 3-4 million Jewish immigrants from Europe.

In New York, on May 6, 1942, a small group of Zionist leaders (including Weizmann, Ben-Gurion and Nahum Goldman, chairman of the Jewish Agency) together with 6000 American Jews gathered at the Biltmore Hotel in New York to formulate their official demand for a Jewish state in all of Palestine. Their declaration, known as the Biltmore Programme, reiterated the following aims:

1. The fulfilment of the original purpose of the Balfour Declaration

2. The total rejection of the White Paper of 1939

3. That Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth integrated in the structure of the new democratic world.

It is worth noting here that what Ben-Gurion meant by ‘Jewish Commonwealth’ was neither ‘a national home in Palestine’ (Balfour Declaration), nor ‘a Jewish state in Palestine’ (the Peel Partition Plan), but the undisputed control by the Zionists of immigration of Jews into Palestine and the extent of land acquisition in the country. (At this time, it is worth remembering, Jewish land ownership stood only at 5.9% of the total area, and the Jewish community at only 31.2% of the total population. This Biltmore Programme wielded President Wilson’s name for the benefit of the American people, and confirmed Washington as the new centre of gravity for decision making on Palestine.

Jewish Land Ownership in Palestine

On the other side of the Atlantic, in December 1944, the British Labour Party issued its Conference Resolution supporting Zionist ideas for Palestinian transfer from Palestine. This resolution was drafted by Hugh Dalton, an ardent supporter of Zionist maximalist aims for the establishment of a Jewish state on both sides of Jordan River and the Sinai Peninsula.

In 1945, another transfer plan was formulated by a close friend of Jabotinsky. His name was Eliahu Ben-Hurin, editor of of Yishuv’s Hebrew paper Doar Hayom. His campaign reached as far as the American White House where, in 1943, he had convinced Herbert Hoover to lend his support for transfer of Palestinians to Iraq. Hoover’s support came in the form of a proposal published in the New York World-Telegram paper in 1945 where he called the transfer ideas as ‘a sane and practical solution’. As an engineer by profession, Hoover stated that he wished to achieve an ‘engineering solution’ to the Palestine conflict.

The full impact on the Palestinian people of the transfer policy can be confirmed by the following statistics:

Percentage of Palestinian population drop vs rise in Jewish land ownership

As the Palestinian Nakba was taking place in 1948, Harper’s Magazine published an article by Ben Horin entitled ‘From Palestine to Israel’. The Editor of the magazine noted that “Now, with thousands of Arab refugees facing a dismal future, the transfer idea appears to be a likely bet…in view of Mr Ben Horen’s earlier judgement and prophecies, we can bank on his words about present-day Israel: ‘It works’ “.

The Link: Palestine and the Holocaust

The main Zionist efforts and objective now concentrated on the abrogation of the White Paper. With the White Paper out of the way, and with world public sympathy aroused as a result of Nazi barbarism against the Jews in Europe, the Zionists could move to present this abrogation of the White Paper as the one available solution to move Europe’s Jews to Palestine. This was the main call at the Biltmore Conference in New York (see later) which stated: “The policy of the White Paper is cruel and indefensible in its denial of sanctuary to Jews fleeing from Nazi persecution”.

This statement is inexplicable in terms of logic and equity. The Allies were victorious in the war against Germany. Nazism had been crushed. Jewish survivors were moved into relief centres which were supervised and protected by Allied troops and Palestine Jewish Brigades. The plight of these Jewish survivors was a scar on the conscience of the Western world which possessed the resources and the ingenuity to provide them with a secure future. But to exploit the plight of the Jewish refugees for the political purpose of tearing the White Paper of 1939, itself the end result of two agonised decades of Palestinian struggle for national survival, is to throw into question the motive of the American endorsement.

Moved by the plight of Jewish Holocaust survivors, no less a person that the US President Harry S Truman was endorsing the Biltmore declaration. He asked the British Government in August 1945 to allow the immediate immigration of 100,000 Jews from Europe into Palestine while declaring to his constituents (as he ran for election in 1948) that the US would ‘alone’ bear the brunt of the 300,000 refugees moving into the US. This secured for him the support of the Zionist leadership in America and alienated the Arab world from the West. Truman told his assembled American diplomats from Arab countries: “I am sorry, gentlemen, but I have to answer to hundreds of thousands who are anxious for the success of Zionism; I do not have hundreds of thousands of Arabs in my constituency”.

At war’s end, the international environment suffers from general fluidity and is therefore vulnerable to territorial surgery. World public opinion has been saturated by the Holocaust tragedy and its sympathy for Zionism peaked regardless of what it understood Zionism to be. The corollation between the Zionist doctrine and its aims in Palestine and the Holocaust tragedy itself became clear. The political solution for the Jewish problem had to be at the expense of the humanitarian one.

The staunchly pro-Zionist Ernest Bevin (1881-1951), British Secretary for Foreign Affairs, established a joint Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, made up of 6 ‘non-official citizens’ of Britain and USA, to look into the Palestine question.

It set out for Europe and Palestine in 1946 an event which marked the beginning of a diplomatic struggle between the Palestinians and the Zionists for the sympathy and understanding of world public opinion through its new forum, the United Nations which was only 1 year old.

It is worth noting that the Committee of Inquiry first toured the Jewish concentration camps in Europe before travelling to Palestine, a critical success by the Zionist lobby to impact committee members with the Holocaust events. Many camp dwellers, initially not wishing to immigrate to Palestine, were influenced by Jewish organisations to adopt a pro-Zionist line when interviewed by Committee members and to request that they be moved to Palestine.

Consequently, when the Committee of Inquiry reached Palestine, it was warmly welcomed by the Jews and their leaders but and immediately boycotted by the Arab High Committee. The Committee was already leaning towards the view that the Jewish situation in Europe had to be linked with Jewish migration to Palestine. This link proved to be a vital factor in understanding the role played by the Holocaust in the creation of the state of Israel.

On 30 April 1946, the Committee concluded its work by recommending that 100,000 Jews from Europe be allowed admission into Palestine and the establishment of a bi-national state under a UN trusteeship with equal rights for both communities. These proposals were rejected by the British Government on the basis of Clause 76 of the UN Charter which protects the right to independence through majority rule for any nation desiring it.

In 1947, and despite mass illegal Jewish immigration into Palestine, the Palestinians still constituted 65% of the population of Palestine: that is, 1,350,000 Palestinians vs 650,000 Jews (of whom 253,700 were born in Palestine and the rest were alien immigrants).

With the Mandate coming to an end, fierce Zionist operations against the British in Palestine forced the British to submit the Palestine problem to the United Nation, which in February 1947, was only 2 years old with little experience in solving regional conflicts. With 5 permanent members and 6 non-permanent members, The Security Council began its crucial deliberations which, as we shall see, sealed Palestine’s fate and squashed its hopes of becoming an independent nation.

UNSCOP: The United Nations Special Committee On Palestine

Following the British example, but not learning from it, the Security Council decided to establish the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) to be made up of 11 members, none of them permanent members of the Council, and many of them having very little knowledge of the Middle East, let alone of Palestine. The Committee members represented the following nations: Australia, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Guatemala, India, Iran, The Netherlands, Peru, Sweden, Uruguay, Yugoslavia.

Before UNSCOP reached the shores of Palestine, the British, in a desperate attempt to ease Jewish immigration into Palestine, asked the US government to take up an initiative by Congressman William Stratton in April 1947 to allow a one-off immigration, from Europe to USA, of some 400,000 Jews. This was categorically rejected by the US Administration.

UNSCOP’s arrival in Palestine coincided with the arrival of the Jewish refugee ship The Exodus. The British decision to capture and return it to Germany reinforced the link in the minds of UNSCOP Committee members of the survival of European Jews with their eventual settlement in the land of Palestine.

It is in this emotional atmosphere that UNSCOP was conducting its enquiries and discussing the fate of the Palestinians. The Arab Higher Committee was becoming convinced that the independence of Palestine was not UNSCOP’s main priority. Interestingly, we now know that the Jewish Agency provided UNSCOP in May 1947 with a map of Palestine which showed a future Jewish state in over 80% of Palestine. This is equivalent to the land Israel has so far claimed today.

Jewish Agency Proposal - August 1946 (copyright George Kirk)

It took UNSCOP exactly two and a half months to complete its task. It met in Geneva in the conference room on the first floor of the Palais des Nations where they signed the official Report on the last hour of the last day of August 1947, just minutes before its term of office expired.

Its Report was presented to the UN General Assembly on 1 September 1947. The fate of Palestine was formally sealed.

The Road to Partition

UNSCOP’s report included a partition plan which divided Palestine into two independent states: a Jewish one to include Eastern Galilee, the coastal strip along the Mediterranean (excluding Jaffa and the coastal strip down to Gaza) and the Negev. The Palestinian State included Upper and Western Galilee, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The City of Jerusalem and its environs were to be an international enclave with autonomous rights for both communities.

The Palestinians were allocated 38% of Mandatory Palestine when they made up 63% of the total population. The Jewish state was to include 498,000 Jews and 407,000 Palestinians.

Mandatory Palestine was made up of 16 districts, nine of which were to be allocated to the Jewish state. None of them had either a Jewish majority or land owned by a Jewish majority.

This demographic imbalance was to be solved by settling the displaced Jews from Europe in the Jewish part of partitioned Palestine.

The two states were required to eventually conclude a 10-year treaty of economic union as a condition for their promised independence.

Whilst the Jewish Agency decided to exert all its diplomatic energy to assure the acceptance of the partition of Palestine, the Arabs expressed a total rejection. For Britain, a neutral position was the only choice left. UN Resolution 181 was set in motion.

Resolution 181: The Partition Resolution of 29 November 1947

On the 23^rd day of September 1947, the General Assembly assigned the question of partitioning of Palestine to its Ad Hoc Committee. Another sub-committee was to study the proposal of establishing a unitary State in Palestine in which the Democratic Constitution would guarantee the human rights and fundamental freedom of all its citizens without distinction as to race, language or religion. The two reports were submitted and after prolonged discussions, there was great pressure from the United States and Soviet Delegations to adopt the Resolution to Partition Palestine.

It was on 25 November 1947 that the world became acquainted for the first time with the final draft of the partition resolution: Resolution 181. The General Assembly refused a resolution to submit the Palestine question to the International Court of Justice to determine whether the UN had any jurisdiction to recommend the partition of Palestine or any other country.

For a draft resolution to become an official one, UN procedures required a two-third majority of its ad hoc committee. As two votes were lacking for such a majority, the draft was handed to the General Assembly. Both Zionist and Arab delegations were now in a race against time. Other delegates who had originally favoured the partition proposals, but now seemed to be wavering, were pressured and guided by the White House to ensure that a favourable outcome is secured. Concerted and remarkable lobbying by the Zionist lobby ensured at the last moment that those 8 wavering and doubtful votes, were swung into the partition lobby. The strength of the Jewish/Zionist lobby in Washington had been a revelation.

Zionist politicians did not waste time to recruit and lobby wavering delegates. Intensive efforts were made by the Zionist leadership around the world to gain crucial votes: the French altered their position from abstention to supporting the resolution; Liberia, as a result of economic promises, offered support; the direct lobbying of President Truman and pro-Zionist senators and congressmen secured the votes of 12 out of 20 Latin American countries.

On Saturday morning, 29 November 1947, and against the will of the Palestinian people, the General Assembly in New York voted for the partition of Palestine and accepted Resolution 181. It was supported by 33 votes with 13 opposed and 10 abstentions including Britain, whose prime minister Clement Attlee saw to it that Britain's Commonwealth partners voted for it.

The United Nations had no business offering the nation of one people to the people of many nations. Its General Assembly had neither the legal nor the legislative powers to impose such a resolution or to convey title of a territory; Articles 10, 11 and 14 of the UN Charter bestows the right on the General Assembly merely to recommend resolutions.

The UN Partition of Palestine

Palestine was thus divided into 3 parts: a Jewish part, a Palestinian part and an internationally administered zone to include the city of Jerusalem as a Corpus Separatum to be administered by the United Nations. After 10 years, a referendum would be held to seek the views of the city’s residents. Today, that Referendum is dead history. It has been replaced by continued Zionist expulsions of the indigenous Palestinian people of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem as "Corpus Separatum" under the UN Partition Plan

The Arab League rejected the plan to partition Palestine by any outside power and declared its intention to wage war against the implementation of this resolution. The stage was thus set for the Zionists to make their dream a reality. They brought out the map they showed to UNSCOP in May 1947 and decided it was time to act. But they faced the problem of having 1 million Palestinians in the part of Palestine allocated to them in the Partition plan. But, since the 1880’s, the Zionists had been preparing for such an eventuality.

Palestine was not partitioned. It was destroyed.

Once adopted, the execution of Resolution 181 was referred to the Security Council. The Arabs rejected it outright while the Jews celebrated its adoption. The Palestinians rebelled as the Zionist underground forces attacked Palestinian villages and towns in order to secure more than their portion of Palestine allocated to them by the Partition Plan. The United States admitted around March 1948 that the partitioning of Palestine could not be carried out in a peaceful manner and proposed that Palestine be placed under a temporary UN Trusteeship. This plan and calls for a ceasefire fell on deaf ears. The Jewish forces exerted all military efforts to achieve maximum land gains as the British prepared to end their Mandate in Palestine. By April 1948, they had achieved a military superiority and set in motion all political machinery to declare their Jewish State. Herzl’s prediction to establish a Jewish State in Palestine within 50 years was missed by only 1 year.
On the afternoon of May 14, 1948 the Jewish State of Israel was proclaimed just as the Sabbath began at sunset that day. At 6:11pm Washington time, U.S. President Harry Truman authorised the recognition of Israel. Truman's decision to recognise the new State was not shared by many of his high ranking advisors, such as Dean Rusk, Dean Acheson, Secretary of Defence James Forrestal and Secretary of State George Marshall (read details of White House showdown leading to this recognition by Truman).
The British mandate ended the next day on 15th May 1948 at noon.
In this process, most of Palestine’s indigenous population were expelled and, together with their descendents, became numbers in an UNRWA register. Today, they total about 5.5 million people living in miserable refugee camps in Lebanon (12 camps), Syria (10 camps + 3 unofficial sites), Jordan (10 camps) West Bank (19 camps) and Gaza (8 camps). These Palestinian refugees hold the record of being the longest suffering and largest refugee population in the world. Yet, even within these camps, they remain dignified and determined that, through the application of international law, their right to return to their homes will be upheld.
Where did the refugees go?

Partition and The Law

In front of Congress on January 1918, US President Woodrow Wilson proposed 14 points for a Programme of Peace. The 5^th and 12^th points of this Programme related to territories which were placed under the Mandates systems.

Point 12 stated: “The Turkish portion of the Ottoman Empire [now Turkey] should be assured a secure sovereignty….the other nationalities which are under Turkish rule, should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous developments…”.

In February of the same year, President Wilson addressed Congress thus: “Peoples and provinces are not to be bartered about from sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were chattels and pawns in a game. National aspirations must be respected; people may be dominated and governed ONLY by their consent. Self-determination is not a mere phrase. It is an imperative principle of action, which statesmen will henceforth ignore at their own peril”.

In July of the same year, he formulated the following: “The settlement of every question, whether of territory, of sovereignty, of economic arrangement or of political relationship, [must be] upon the basis of the free acceptance of that settlement by the people immediately concerned and not upon the basis of the material interest or advantage of any other nation or people which may desire a different settlement for the sake of its own exterior influence or mastery”.

After the end of WW1, at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 (PPC), the principles of nationality and self-determination of peoples was advocated by President Wilson with two dozen other world leaders marking the beginning of the end of Colonialism. It proclaimed that no new territories should be annexed by the victors, and that such territories should be administered solely for the benefit of their indigenous people and be placed under the trusteeship of the mandatories acting on behalf of the League of Nations, until the true wishes of the inhabitants of those territories could be ascertained.

The PPC decided to recognise the territories under the mandatory system as “provisionally independent nations subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand by themselves”. It follows from this phrase that the mandatory mission is not intended to be prolonged indefinitely, but only until the peoples under tutelage are capable of managing their own affairs.

Class A mandates (Syria, Palestine, Iraq, Lebanon and Transjordan) recognised the peoples of these territories to have reached advanced stage of development and their independence could be recognised once they have achieved a capacity to govern themselves. It is universally and legally accepted that sovereignty in the mandatory territories lie in the inhabitants of the territory in question (Article 22 of the Covenant of The League of Nations).

Under International Law, Palestine, throughout the Mandatory period, was to receive administrative assistance and advice from the Mandatory to help it set up its own government. Already, Palestine had its fixed boundaries, its government institutions, its own currency and, in 1934, its national anthem.

Palestine’s legal position under International Law was clear: it was a provisionally independent state receiving administrative assistance and advice from the Mandatory. The sovereignty was vested in the people of Palestine. It was a dormant sovereignty exercised by the Mandatory power on behalf of the people of Palestine.

Article 28 of the Mandate stipulated that at the end of the Mandate, the territory of Palestine would pass on to the control of ‘the Government of Palestine’. The termination of the Mandate on 15 May 1948 was to signal the birth of a free and sovereign Palestine in fulfilment of Paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations. It was supposed to pave the way for the establishment of an independent and sovereign government in Palestine without the intervention of either the United Nations or any other foreign government for that matter.

It was under the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923 that Turkey finally renounced its administration of the Middle East territories after nearly 500 years of occupation. Britain was the Mandatory power in Palestine and the guardian and the trustee of Palestine. Its duty was to guarantee the interest and well-being of the country’s inhabitants until the termination of the Mandate and the assumption by Palestine of its independence as a sovereign nation. When that happens, the newly independent nation would then be admitted to the League of Nations. This was the case with Iraq, Lebanon and Syria. They became sovereign nations . Indeed, this was Britain’s intention in Palestine when it issued its White Paper in 1939.

But that was not to be the fate of Palestine.

The UN had no right in 1947 to even debate the idea of partitioning the country or to dispose of any part of it, or deprive the majority of its indigenous population of their territory or to transfer it to the exclusive use of illegal immigrants. The General Assembly had no right or jurisdiction to destroy the territorial integrity of Palestine or to propose its partition. The British Government, perhaps under the weight of its guilt for abusing the trust the League of Nations had bestowed upon it to protect, guide and assist Palestine achieve its independence at the end of its mandatory period, opted, when it was time to vote, to abstain from voting.

The United Kingdom did not own Palestine and had no relationship whatsoever with it in 1916 when it agreed with Zionist leaders to issue the Balfour Declaration in November 1917. This Declaration remains illegal, invalid and inapplicable even though it was injected into the Mandate for Palestine through power politics.

The International Law Digest defines a state as “ a people permanently occupying a fixed territory, bound together by common law, habits, and customs into one body politic, exercising, through the medium of organised government, independent sovereignty and control over all persons and things within its boundaries”. In the area labelled Israel today, the majority of the people, at the time of the Balfour Declaration and later when Palestine was partitioned in 1947, were indigenous Palestinians. In International Law, the territory of any state must belong to the people of that state. The possession of the territory must be a legitimate possession and could not have been acquired by war, conquest or through annexation.

BUT:

It was at the Paris Peace Conference that Chaim Weizman put forward Zionist claims to Palestine calling for the imposition of the Mandate over all of Palestine including areas up to the Litani River in Lebanon (to the north) and to the Hijaz Railway line which is well east of the Jordan River. He then famously declared his wishes for a Palestine to be “as Jewish as England is English”.

A declared state should have a sovereign government but waht existed in the so-called Jewish state in 1948 were illegal immigrants from Europe and Russia, and three Zionist terrorist organisations: the Irgun, the Hagana and the Stern gang. They could not be considered a government. They were military organisations supported by western funds and left to roam the land and dispossess its people of their right to live there.

Despite this miscarriage of justice, the so-called State embarked on a massive military project to ensure the total and final expulsion of the Palestinians from their homeland.

To achieve this objective, they had their Village Files ready.

The Village Files
In pursuit of their aims to take over the land of Palestine, the Zionist leadership founded the Jewish National Fund (JNF) in 1901 whose sole aim was to provide funds for the pupose of purchasing Palestinian land to settle Jewish immigrants. Incidentally, this role continues up to this day with other 'charitable' activities assigned to it to camouflage its aggressive aims.

The activities of the JNF were closely associated with those of the Zionist Settlement Department whose main priority was to facilitate the eviction of Palestinian tenants from Palestinian land bought by the JNF from absentee Palestinian landlords. The tenants came with the land, but, in Zionist eyes, they did not have the right to stay on it.

The brain behind the JNF was a Ukraine-born Zionist called Yosef Weitz (1890-1972) who came to Palestine in 1908 at the age of 18. Under his tutelage, the 'Village Files' were compiled. These files comprised aerial photographs of Palestinian villages, topographical maps and detailed records of their inhabitants. They took years to collate and were nearly complete in the late 1930's. They contained information on the quality of the land in the village, the water sources, the names of its inhabitants, their political and religious affiliations, their ages and their marital status, etc.

Names associated with the Village Files project included the following people who were the core of The Consultancy Council: Ezra Danin (1903-1985), a Syrian-born Zionist who played a key role in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Moshe Pasternak (1920-1976) from Poland, Yaacov Shimoni, Yehoshua Palmon, Tuvia Lishanski, Eliyahu Sassoon, Yohanan Ratner, Fritz Eisenshtater, Yaacov Tahon and an Anglo-Jewish professor of chemistry, Sasha Goldberg who conducted experiments in biological weapons in what became later The Weizmann Institute. Later, this project was developed further under the directorship of a physical chemist called Ephraim Katzir (born Ephraim Katchalsky on 16 May 1916, died on 30th May 2009) who became the 4th president of Israel (in office from 24 May 1973 to 19 April 1978). Special units in the service of the Village Files project were trained and recruited in the Zionist youth village of Shefeya in Upper Galilee. It is from here that they went out on reconnaissance missions of Palestinian villages gathering detailed information from village elders whose traditional hospitality they abused.

'Most Wanted' lists were compiled with names of young Palestinians who, after a village had been occupied by Zionist forces, would be lined up, identified, taken away and shot on the spot. Many names belonged to Palestinian National Movement fighters who were fingered out by masked collaborators. As the villages were invaded and later occupied, the pattern of ethnically cleansing them became efficient, direct and swift.
Yigael Yadin (1917-1984) who later became Israel's second Chief of Staff, admitted once that it was the detailed information gathered on these villages (i.e., the Village Files) which enabled the Zionist undeground forces in November 1947 to sweep through the Palestinian landscape with such speed and efficiency and with little resistance from the 'Arab side'. In fact, it was not 'Arab resistance' that they feared. It was the British forces. Had it not been for the British presence, Yadin declared, the Palestinian resistance to the Partition Plan would have been quelled in one month. He knew what he was talking about.

Plan Dalet and The NAKBA

Zionist operations outside the UN designated Jewish part of Palestine

Terrorist operations were first introduced in Palestine by the Jewish underground to demoralise the British Army. These operations were carried out by those Jewish elements trained by the British Army in North Africa as an adjunct to their WWII effort against the Nazis. By 1939 this Jewish auxiliary force numbered 20,000 strong.

This force, which was given the innocuous name of The Jewish Settlement Force, employed terrorist tactics (the first to be carried out in the Middle East) against British troops inside Palestine supplemented by terrorist operations carried out by their underground brethren throwing bombs in bus stops, cafes and marketplaces. These bombs were hidden in milk cans, fruit baskets and similar daily objects. Parallel with these operations, terrorist innovations included the kidnapping of British officers, whipping them, hanging them and booby-trapping their hanging bodies which made shocking headlines back home in the UK.

In the last year of the British Mandate, the ratio of British officers dead to Jewish terrorists killed was 4 to 1 - a very high ratio even in today's standards. No wonder Britain wanted out of Palestine.

The Zionist plan to transfer Palestinians out of their land was headed by no lesser character than David Ben-Gurion himself. He plotted these schemes in his own home aided by a small ad hoc group of people referred to as The Consultancy. Its aim was to plot and carry out the disposession of the Palestinian people. As early as February 1947, when the British Cabinet voted to pull out of Mandatory Palestine, the Zionist leadership knew that the road ahead was clear for their aims to be achieved. The Consultancy first met (according to Ben-Gurion's diary) on 18 June 1947 and continued to meet regularly during the months leading to October 1947 when it transpired that the UN will now issue its Resolution 181 to partition the land of Palestine.

The Zionist leadership and its Consultancy group also knew that the Palestinians and the Arab leadership in general would reject the Partition Resolution. The Consultancy realised that this is the time not only to forge forward their plan to clear the Palestinian population from the UN-designated future Jewish state, but also from the areas accorded to the Palestinian state.

Prior to 1947, the Zionist agenda concentrated on building a political, ideological, cultural and economic enclave within historic Palestine. Now, during these crucial months leading to UN Resolution 181, it was decided that the time has come to translate these ideologies into realities on the ground. The Zionist leadership openly declared that it intended to take over the land of Palestine and to expel its indigenous population.

Just before the UN voted to partition Palestine in November 1947, Ben-Gurion secretly mobilised Jewish groups inside and outside Palestine and dispatched them to Europe to purchase massive quantities of arms for the next phase: the military plan to conquer as many Palestinian villages and to expel their inhabitants.

Their plan was called Plan D better known as Plan Dalet, (Dalet being the fourth letter in the Hebrew alphabet) which was launched nearly six weeks prior to the end of the British Mandate in Palestine. It is worth noting that Plan D had been preceeded by Plan A (February 1945), Plan B (May 1947) and Plan C (November 1947). There is no mistaking their intention: the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

March 1948: two months before the so-called Declaration of Independence, the Zionist leadership gathered in Tel Aviv and agreed and embarked on their Plan. Over 13 military underground operations were carried out (according to The History of the Palmach archives released in full in 1972) before the Arab forces entered the areas allotted to the Palestinians by the UN in their Partition Plan. Both Menachem Begin and David Ben-Gurion wrote extensively about their underground military campaigns to cleanse Palestinian villages of their indigenous inhabitants.

At the onset of Plan Dalet in April 1948, Jewish immigration into Palestine had exceeded 600,000 (compared to 56,000 in 1917). With that many immigrants, the Zionist leadership was able to deploy an army of 65,000 well armed and well trained soldiers, (a number that increased to 120,000 in early 1949, amounting to 20% of the total Jewish population of the newly declared State). This is an unprecendented percentage when compared to 1%-2% for a typical country at the time.

As the execution of Plan Dalet proceeded with clockwork precision, the Haganah created a 'Committee for Arab Properties in Villages' the purpose of which was to register and take possession of all Palestinian properties in the villages the Zionist forces had conquered. Similar committees were established in major Palestinian cities like Haifa, Safad, Yafa and Tabariyah.

All this was taking place BEFORE Israel even existed! The claim that Arab forces invaded Israel is hog-wash. When the Zionist leadership unilaterally declared their so-called state of Israel on 15 May 1948, they purposefully avoided declaring its boundaries to keep their options open for future expansion. That expansion has now covered the whole of historic Palestine.

At the end of Plan Dalet, the Haganah set up "The Committee For Abandoned Arab Property" – The CFAAP – which was entrusted with the disposal of all Arab possessions into Yishuv hands. The intention was to obliterate any sign of ‘life’ in the abandoned Palestinian homes and villages.

By June 1948, approximately 370,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes, and by the end of that year the number was nearer 780,000. Josef Weitz declared, at a cabinet meeting chaired by Ben-Gurion on 18 August 1948, that 286 villages had been cleared or evacuated and about 3 million dunums had been left behind by their Palestinian owners as they fled the Zionist terror. The last of the villages to be cleared was Al-Majdal (later renamed Ashkelon by Israel).

Within 6 months, Zionist terrorist organizations went on a rampage expelling and murdering Palestinians and destroying their homes and villages. They expelled 452,780 Palestinians men, women and children from the areas allocated to the Jews in the Partition Plan, and a further 347,220 were uprooted from areas beyond the allocated boundaries. All in all, a total of 800,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes, 530 of their villages destroyed and 11 of their urban neighbourhoods were emptied. Massacres, like that at Deir Yaseen, spread fear and terror in the hearts of Palestinian families and forced them to take flight.

In November 1948, Israel completed the occupation of the most fertile and populated areas of Palestine, and by December, it issued "the Emergency Regulations Relative to Property of Absentees". This was followed by yet another discrimanatory law called the "Law of The Acquisition of Absentee Property", (Absentees Property Law, 4L ST. Israel 68, 1949-1950). This law effectively classified all Palestinian refugees as "absent" and immediately transferred the control of their private properties to a Custodian who has the sole discretion to determine whether any Arab Palestinian is "absent' and to confiscate his/her property. This arbitrary definition was applied, not only to those who were expelled beyond the 'Armistice Line', but was extended to Palestinians who remianed in Israel.

Those who remianed in Israel, but were not in the specified place on a particular date (i.e., they may have been in the next village or away for a day or so), were declared "absent". Since these people, thus declared, eventually became Israeli citizens, they were dubbed as "present absentees", an ironical but accurate description of this Israeli fictitious legislation.

The Palestinian Exodus was one of the largest in post war history, and the reasons for it were confirmed by IDF intelligence as follows: Haganah operations (55%), operations by Irgun (15%) and whispering campaigns of psychological warfare (14%).

Chaim Weizmann later commented that this Palestinian Exodus had been “a miraculous clearing of the land: the miraculous simplification of Israel’s task”.

And so it was: the Zionist dream of transfer and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine came to fruition with the Palestinian Exodus of 1948 when more than 80% of the inhabitants of what became Israel were expelled and became refugees until this day. Some 140,000-150,000 Palestinians had remained behind in what became Israel and were allowed to stay. The borders of this new state, remain unrecognised and unofficial, since they have been expanding through military conquest from the 55.5% of Mandatory Palestine (under the Partition Plan of November 1947) to 78% of historic Palestine (at the time of the 1949 Armistice Agreement). Of course, the conquests continued in 1967 when Israel swept through and occupied the whole of historic Palestine.

The Massacres
In their drive to gain control of not only the part of Palestine allocated to the Jewish State under UN Resolution 181, but also land allocated to the Palestinian State, the Zionist forces committed the following massacres:
Al-Tira December 1947
Haifa Oil Refinery December 1947
Balad el-Sheikh December 1947
Yehiday Massacre December 1947
Khisas Massacre December 1947
Qazaza Massacre December 1947
Jaffa Massacre January 1948
Semiramis Hotel Massacre (Jerusalem) January 1948
Cairo-Haifa Train Massacre March 1948
al-Lajjun Massacre April 1948
Deir Yasin Massacre April 1948
Qaluniya Massacre April 1948
Ayn el-Zaytoun Massacre May 1948
Abu Shusha Massacre May 1948
al-Tantura Massacre May 1948
Beit Daras Massacre May 1948
Lydda Massacre July 1948
al-Dawayima Massacre October 1948
Saliha Massacre October 1948
Eilaboun Massacre October 1948
Hula Massacre October 1948…
For a chronology of key events in the history of Palestine which led to these massacres and to the Palestinian Nakba, please log on to:
http://www.alnakba.org/chronology/chronology.htm

The Declaration of Independence of the so-called State

David Ben-Gurion declaring the birth of Israel

Having carried out their massacres and having expelled over 725,000 Palestinians from their homes, and while the UN General Assembly was considering the Trusteeship Plan for Palestine, 37 Zionist leaders representing Zionist parties worldwide hurried to meet at 4:00 PM on Friday, May 14, at the Tel Aviv Museum on Rothschild Boulevard in Tel Aviv to sign what they called a “Declaration of Independence”.

Of these 37 Zionists, the oldest was 82, the youngest not yet 30. Three became prime ministers, one became president, and 14 became cabinet ministers. Of these 37 zionists, only 1 was born in Palestine. Of the remaining 36 Zionists, 13 were born in Russia, 11 in Poland, 2 in Romania, 2 in Germany, 2 in Latvia, 2 in Lithuanian, 1 in Austria, 1 in Hungary, 1 in Denmark and 1 in Yemen. Most of them migrated to Palestine between 1920 and 1940. One of them came to Palestine only in 1947.

We name 35 of the signatories to give credence to this project which started back in 1898:

David Ben-Gurion (1886-1973), Daniel Auster (1893-1962), Mordekhai Bentov (1900-1985), Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (1884-1963), Eliyahu Meir Berligne (1866-1959), Perez (Fritz) Bernstein (1890-1971), Rachel Cohen (1888-1982), Eliyahu Dobkin (1898-1976), Rabbi Wolf Gold (1889-1956), Meir Grabovsky (Argov) (1905-1963), Abraham Granott (Granovsky) (1890-1962), Yitzhak Gruenbaum (1879-1970), Rabbi Kalman Kahana (1910-1991), Eliezer Kaplan (1891-1952), Sa'adia Kobashi (no dates available), Moshe Kol (Kolodny) (1911-89), Rabbi Yitzhak Meir Levin (1894-1971), Zvi Lurie (1906-1968), Rabbi Yehudah Leib Maimon (Fishman) (1875-1962), Golda Meir (Myerson) (1898-1978), Avraham Nissan (Katznelson) (1888-1956), Nahum Nir-Rafalkes (1884-1968), David Zvi Pinkas (1895-1952), Moshe David Remez (1886-1951), Berl Repetur (1902-1989), inhas Rosen (Felix Rosenblueth) (1887-1978), Zvi Segal (1901-1965), Moshe (Hayyim) Shapira (1902-1970), Mordechai Shattner (no dates available), Moshe Sharett (Shertok) (1894-1965), Behor Shalom Shitrit (1895-1967), Ben-Zion Sternberg (1894-1962), Meir Vilner-Kovner (1918-2003), Zerah Warhaftig (1906-2002), Aharon Zisling (1901-1964).

Most of Israel’s elected prime ministers, past and present, belonged to, or are known to be members of terrorist organisations in their heyday.

Their Declaration was dressed up with legal and civilised phrases to give it legitimacy. It said that “the state of Israel will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations”.

On that eventful day, 14 May 1948, at 11:00am local time, the new state was recognised by the United States of America followed by the USSR 3 days later.

As Ben Gurion and his Zionist colleagues were issuing that declaration, their underground forces were sweeping the Land of Palestine conquering villages and expelling Palestinians from their homes. The previous Section documents the massacres perpetrated by these gangs in pursuit of that goal. As they swept eastward, they attacked west Jerusalem which surrendered at 16:36 on Friday, 28 May 1948.
It must not be forgotten that the crimes committed in Palestine and which paved the way for the creation of the so-called state of Israel, were the work of over 3000 zionist and Israeli leaders since 1939. In the words of Dr Issa Nakhleh, author of the massive 'Encylopedia of the Palestine Problem', "these zionist and Israeli leaders were all members of the Hagana, Palmach, Irgun Z'vai Leumi, the Stern Gang, the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund. Many of them became presidents, cabinet ministers, generals, officers of the armed forces...and occupied high positions in Israeli society. They are still at large enjoying the fruits of their crimes, and are referred to as heroes. Many of them are [today] being honoured as heads of state, Prime Ministers, cabinet ministers, and scholars of an allegedly democratic state...The victims of their crimes are called terrorists, murderers and criminals, and the real terrorists and war criminals are being received as respectable representatives of a democratic society".
As these fateful events were engineered in such a relatively short span of time, culminating in one people expelling another and taking over their land, they exposed a well orchestrated and carefully executed Zionist project with the blessing and connivance of major world powers and a huge amount of financial muscle. The Holocaust tragedy was injected into this project to silence any opposition to its swift and perfect execution.

The Right of Return

The UN emissary, Count Folke Bernadotte (1895-1948) arrived in Palestine in May 1948 to mediate a cease fire. The recently proclaimed Israeli government consented to his appointment because, as president of the Swedish Red Cross, he saved 15,000 Jews from the Nazi Camps during WW2. Now in Palestine, having witnessed the expulsion of the Palestinians from their home, he called for the unqualified return of all Palestinian refugees expelled as a result of the conflict. He declared:

“It would be an offence against the principles of elemental justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to return to their homes, while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine”.

For this, he was assassinated by Jewish underground terrorists on 17 September 1948.

It was partly as a tribute to Count Bernadotte that the UN General Assembly issued its Resolution 194 on 11 December 1948 calling for:

1. Return of all expelled Palestinians (Art. 11)
2. Protection of and free access to the Holy Places (Art. 7)
3. Demilitarization and UN control over Jerusalem (Art. 8)
4. Free access to Jerusalem (Art. 9)

Only the day before, on 10 December 1948, The UN published The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 13 of that Declaration states that every person has the right to return to his/her home. To prevent that person from returning. no matter what the reason for his/her exodus, is a war crime.

The right of the refugees to return to their homes is not only a sacred and legal right, but also a possible one. Studies show that 80% of Jews live on 15% of historic Palestine. The remaining 20% of Jews live on 85% of land that belongs to Palestinians.

The Right of Return is an inalienable right scaredly held by all refugees and entitles them to return at any time to their homes. This Right can never be diminished by the passage of time or by any treaty unless the rfugee himslef/herself, declares otherwise, and forfeits that Right, but under no duress of any kind.

The expulsion of the Palestinians in 1948

One year after their expulsion... and the same family 60 years later

We repeat: The right of return is an inalienable and non-negotiable right. Period.

International Law considers agreements between occupiers and occupied as null and void if they deprive civilians of their right to return to their homes, their right to repatriation and their right to restitution.

Acceptance and implementation of Resolution 194 was made a condition for Israel’s entry into the United Nation. No surprise, then, that the Zionist leadership quickly welcomed it. But Resolution 194 has never been implemented despite its reaffirmation by the UN on more than 130 occasions. Despite this miscarriage of justice, Israel was admitted as a member of the UN on 11 May 1949 “as a peace loving State which accepts the obligations contained in the Charter and is willing to carry out those obligations”. This peace loving State has defied more UN Resolutions than any other member state of the UN.

Resolution 194 remains the major legal foundation on which the Right of Return is based. It states that the General Assembly “resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live in peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at their earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return…”

A number of international conventions including the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Articles 9, 13 and 30, the UN Resolution 242 passed in 1967 and many others, call on Israel to permit the return of Palestinian refugees to their homes. It must now be forced to do so. Or be expelled from the UN.

One of the many Palestinian refugee camps

Copyright 1996-2004 The Palestinian Return Centre

They Shall Return...Homeland Is Not For Sale.
For a chronology of key events in the history of Palestine up to The Nakba, please log on to:
http://www.alnakba.org/chronology/chronology.htm

THE ROLE OF ZIONISM IN THE HOLOCAUST

2011-09-14T19:27:00.000Z

"Spiritually and Physically Responsible "

Children of the Birkenau Death Camp

From its' inception, many rabbis warned of the potential dangers of Zionism and openly declared that all Jews loyal to G-d should stay away from it like one would from fire. They made their opinions clear to their congregants and to the general public. Their message was that Zionism is a chauvinistic racist phenomenon which has absolutely naught to do with Judaism. They publicly expressed that Zionism would definitely be detrimental to the well being of Jews and Gentiles and that its effects on the Jewish religion would be nothing other than destructive. Further, it would taint the reputation of Jewry as a whole and would cause utter confusion in the Jewish and non-Jewish communities. Judaism is a religion. Judaism is not a race or a nationality. That was and still remains the consensus amongst the rabbis.
We were given the Holy Land by G-d in order to be able to study and practice the Torah without disturbance and to attain levels of holiness difficult to attain outside of the Holy Land. We abused the privilege and we were expelled. That is exactly what all Jews say in their prayers on every Jewish festival, "Umipnay chatoenu golinu mayartsaynu" - "Because of our sins we were expelled from our land".
We have been forsworn by G-d "not to enter the Holy Land as a body before the predestined time", "not to rebel against the nations", to be loyal citizens, not to do anything against the will of any nation or its honour, not to seek vengeance, discord, restitution or compensation; "not to leave exile ahead of time." On the contrary; we have to be humble and accept the yoke of exile. To violate the oaths would result in "your flesh will be made prey as the deer and the antelope in the forest," and the redemption will be delayed.

(Talmud Tractate Ksubos p. 111a).

To violate the oaths is not only a sin, it is a heresy because it is against the fundamentals of our Belief. Only through complete repentance will the Almighty alone, without any human effort or intervention, redeem us from exile. This will be after G-d will send the prophet Elijah and Moshiach who will induce all Jews to complete repentance. At that time there will be universal peace.
All of the leading Jewish religious authorities of that era predicted great hardship to befall humanity generally and the Jewish People particularly, as a result of Zionism. To be a Jew means that either one is born to a Jewish mother or converts to the religion with the condition that he or she make no reservations with regard to Jewish Law. Unfortunately there are many Jews who have no inkling whatsoever as to the duties of a Jew. Many of them are not to blame, for in many cases they lacked a Jewish education and upbringing. But there are those who deliberately distort the teachings of our tradition to suit their personal needs.

It is self understood that not just anyone has the right or the ability to make a decision regarding the philosophy or law of a religion. Especially matters in which that person has no qualification. It follows then that those individuals who "decided" that Judaism is a nationality are to be ignored and even criticized. It is no secret that the founders of Zionism had never studied Jewish Law nor did they express interest in our holy tradition. They openly defied Rabbinical authority and self-appointed themselves as leaders of the Jewish "nation". In Jewish history, actions like those have always spelled disaster. To be a Jew and show open defiance of authority or to introduce "amendment" or "innovation" without first consulting with those officially appointed as Jewish spiritual leaders is the ideal equation to equal catastrophe. One can not just decide to "modernize" ancient traditions or regulations. The spiritual leaders of contemporary Judaism better known as Orthodox rabbis have received ordination to judge and interpret matters pertaining to the Jewish faith. These rabbis have received their rights and responsibilities and form a link in the unbroken chain of the Jewish tradition dating all the way back to Moses who received the Torah from Almighty G-d Himself. It was these very rabbis who, at the time of the formation of the Zionist movement, foresaw the pernicious outcome that was without a doubt lined up.

Grand Rebbe Teitelbaum, zt'l

It was a man possessing outstanding Judaic genius, and a level of uncontested holiness who enunciated the Jewish stance regarding Zionism. This charismatic individual, the Rebbe of Satmar, Grand Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, did not mince any words. Straight to the point he called Zionism "the work of Satan", "a sacrilege" and "a blasphemy". He forbade any participation with anything even remotely associated with Zionism and said that Zionism was bound to call the wrath of G-d upon His people. He maintained this stance with unwavering bravery from the onset of Zionism whilst he was still in Hungary up until his death in New York where he lead a congregation numbering in the hundreds of thousands. Grand Rabbi Teitelbaum, scion to a legacy of holy mystics and Hassidic Masters unfortunately had his prediction fulfilled. We lost more than six million of our brothers, sisters, sons and daughters in a very horrible manner. This, more than six million holy people had to experience as punishment for the Zionist stupidity. The Holocaust, he wept, was a direct result of Zionism, a punishment from G-d.
IT IS COMMON KNOWLEDGE THAT ALL THE SAGES AND SAINTS IN EUROPE AT THE TIME OF HITLER'S RISE DECLARED THAT HE WAS A MESSENGER OF DIVINE WRATH, SENT TO CHASTEN THE JEWS BECAUSE OF THE BITTER APOSTASY OF ZIONISM AGAINST THE BELIEF IN THE EVENTUAL MESSIANIC REDEMPTION.

Auschwitz

But it doesn't end there. It wasn't enough for the Zionist leaders to have aroused the wrath of G-d. They made a point of displaying abysmal contempt for their Jewish brothers and sisters by actively participating in their extermination. Just the idea alone of Zionism, which the rabbis had informed them would cause havoc, was not enough for them. They made an effort to pour fuel on an already burning flame. They had to incite the Angel of Death, Adolf Hitler. They took the liberty of telling the world that they represented World Jewry. Who appointed these individuals as leaders of the Jewish People?? It is no secret that these so-called "leaders" were ignoramuses when it came to Judaism. Atheists and racists too. These are the "statesmen" who organized the irresponsible boycott against Germany in 1933. This boycott hurt Germany like a fly attacking an elephant - but it brought calamity upon the Jews of Europe. At a time when America and England were at peace with the mad-dog Hitler, the Zionist "statesmen" forsook the only plausible method of political amenability; and with their boycott incensed the leader of Germany to a frenzy. Genocide began, but these people, if they can really be classified as members of the human race, sat back.

"No Shame"

President Roosevelt convened the Evian conference July 6-15 1938, to deal with the Jewish refugee problem. The Jewish Agency delegation headed by Golda Meir (Meirson) ignored a German offer to allow Jews to emigrate to other countries for $250 a head, and the Zionists made no effort to influence the United States and the 32 other countries attending the conference to allow immigration of German and Austrian Jews.
[Source]
On Feb 1, 1940 Henry Montor executive vice-President of the United Jewish Appeal refused to intervene for a shipload of Jewish refugees stranded on the Danube river, stating that "Palestine cannot be flooded with... old people or with undesirables."
[Source]
It is an historical fact that in 1941 and again in 1942, the German Gestapo offered all European Jews transit to Spain, if they would relinquish all their property in Germany and Occupied France; on condition that:
a) none of the deportees travel from Spain to Palestine; and
b) all the deportees be transported from Spain to the USA or British colonies, and there to remain; with entry visas to be arranged by the Jews living there; and
c) $1000.00 ransom for each family to be furnished by the Agency, payable upon the arrival of the family at the Spanish border at the rate of 1000 families daily.
The Zionist leaders in Switzerland and Turkey received this offer with the clear understanding that the exclusion of Palestine as a destination for the deportees was based on an agreement between the Gestapo and the Mufti.
The answer of the Zionist leaders was negative, with the following comments:
a) ONLY Palestine would be considered as a destination for the deportees.
b) The European Jews must accede to suffering and death greater in measure than the other nations, in order that the victorious allies agree to a "Jewish State" at the end of the war.
c) No ransom will be paid
This response to the Gestapo's offer was made with the full knowledge that the alternative to this offer was the gas chamber.
These treacherous Zionist leaders betrayed their own flesh and blood. Zionism was never an option for Jewish salvation. Quite the opposite, it was a formula for human beings to be used as pawns for the power trip of several desperadoes. A perfidy! A betrayal beyond description!
In 1944, at the time of the Hungarian deportations, a similar offer was made, whereby all Hungarian Jewry could be saved. The same Zionist hierarchy again refused this offer (after the gas chambers had already taken a toll of millions).
The British government granted visas to 300 rabbis and their families to the Colony of Mauritius, with passage for the evacuees through Turkey. The "Jewish Agency" leaders sabotaged this plan with the observation that the plan was disloyal to Palestine, and the 300 rabbis and their families should be gassed.
On December 17, 1942 both houses of the British Parliament declared its readiness to find temporary refuge for endagered persons. The British Parliament proposed to evacuate 500,000 Jews from Europe, and resettle them in British colonies, as a part of diplomatic negotiations with Germany. This motion received within two weeks a total of 277 Parliamentary signatures. On Jan. 27, when the next steps were being pursued by over 100 M.P.'s and Lords, a spokesman for the Zionists announced that the Jews would oppose the motion because Palestine was ommitted.
[Source]
On Feb. 16, 1943 Roumania offered 70,000 Jewish refugees of the Trans-Dniestria to leave at the cost of $50 each. This was publicized in the New York papers.
Yitzhak Greenbaum, Chairman of the Rescue Committee of the Jewish Agency, addressing the Zionist Executive Council in Tel Aviv Feb. 18 1943 said, "when they asked me, "couldn't you give money out of the United Jewish Appeal funds for the rescue of Jews in Europe, I said NO! and I say again, NO!...one should resist this wave which pushes the Zionist activities to secondary importance."
On Feb. 24, 1943 Stephen Wise, President of the American Jewish Congress and leader of the American Zionists issued a public refusal to this offer and declared no collection of funds would seem justified.
In 1944, the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People called upon the American government to establish a War Refugee Board. Stephen Wise testifying before a special committeeof Congress objected to this proposal.
[Source]
During the course of the negotiations mentioned above, Chaim Weizman, the first "Jewish statesman" stated: "The most valuable part of the Jewish nation is already in Palestine, and those Jews living outside Palestine are not too important". Weizman's cohort, Greenbaum, amplified this statement with the observation "One cow in Palestine is worth more than all the Jews in Europe".
And then, after the bitterest episode in Jewish history, these Zionist "statesmen" lured the broken refugees in the DP camps to remain in hunger and deprivation, and to refuse relocation to any place but Palestine; only for the purpose of building their State.
In 1947 Congressman William Stration sponsored a bill to immediately grant entry to the United States of 400,000 displaced persons. The bill was not passed after it was publicly denounced by the Zionist leadership.
[Source]
These facts are read with consternation and unbearable shame. How can it be explained that at a time during the last phase of the war, when the Nazis were willing to barter Jews for money, partly because of their desires to establish contact with the Western powers which, they believed, were under Jewish influence, how was it possible one asks that the self-proclaimed "Jewish leaders" did not move heaven and earth to save the last remnant of their brothers?
On Feb. 23, 1956 the Hon. J. W. Pickersgill, Minister for Immigration was asked in the Canadian House of Commons "would he open the doors of Canada to Jewish refugees". He replied "the government has made no progress in that direction because the government of Israel....does not wish us to do so".
[Source]
In 1972, the Zionist leadership successfully opposed an effort in the United States Congress to allow 20,000-30,000 Russian refugees to enter the United States.
Jewish relief organizations, Joint and HIAS, were being pressured to abandon these refugees in Vienna, Rome and other Europiean cities.
[Source]
The pattern is clear!!! Humanitarian rescue efforts are subverted to narrow Zionist interests.
There were many more shocking crimes committed by these abject degenerates known as "Jewish statesmen", we could list many more example, but for the time being let anyone produce a valid excuse for the above facts.
Zionist responsibility for the Holocaust is threefold.
The Holocaust was a punishment for disrespecting The Three Oaths (see Talmud, Tractate Kesubos p. 111a).
Zionist leaders openly withheld support, both financially and otherwise, to save their fellow brothers and sisters from a cruel death.
The leaders of the Zionist movement cooperated with Hitler and his cohorts on many occasions and in many ways.

Zionists Offer a Military Alliance with Hitler

It would be wishful thinking if it could be stated that the leaders of the Zionist movement sat back and ignored the plight of their dying brothers and sisters. Not only did they publicly refuse to assist in their rescue, but they actively participated with Hitler and the Nazi regime.

Mass Grave at Auschwitz

Early in 1935, a passenger ship bound for Haifa in Palestine left the German port of Bremerhaven. Its stern bore the Hebrew letter for its name, "Tel Aviv", while a swastika banner fluttered from the mast. And although the ship was Zionist owned, its captain was a National Socialist Party (Nazi) member. Many years later a traveler aboard the ship recalled this symbolic combination as a "metaphysical absurdity". Absurd or not, this is but one vignette from a little-known chapter of history: The wide ranging collaboration between Zionism and Hitler's Third Reich.
In early January 1941 a small but important Zionist organization submitted a formal proposal to German diplomats in Beirut for a military-political alliance with wartime Germany. The offer was made by the radical underground "Fighters for the Freedom of Israel", better known as the Lehi or Stern Gang. Its leader, Avraham Stern, had recently broken with the radical nationalist "National Military Organization" (Irgun Zvai Leumi - Etzel) over the group's attitude toward Britain, which had effectively banned further Jewish settlement of Palestine. Stern regarded Britain as the main enemy of Zionism.
This remarkable proposal "for the solution of the Jewish question in Europe and the active participation on the NMO [Lehi] in the war on the side of Germany" is worth quoting at some length:
"The NMO which is very familiar with the goodwill of the German Reich government and its officials towards Zionist activities within Germany and the Zionist emigration program takes the view that:

Common interests can exist between a European New Order based on the German concept and the true national aspirations of the Jewish people as embodied by the NMO.

Cooperation is possible between the New Germany and a renewed, folkish-national Jewry.

The establishment of the Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis, and bound by treaty, with the German Reich, would be in the interest of maintaining and strengthening the future German position of power in the Near East.

"On the basis of these considerations, and upon the condition that the German Reich government recognize the national aspirations of the Israel Freedom Movement mentioned above, the NMO in Palestine offers to actively take part in the war on the side of Germany.
"This offer by the NMO could include military, political and informational activity within Palestine and, after certain organizational measures, outside as well. Along with this the "Jewish" men of Europe would be militarily trained and organized in military units under the leadership and command of the NMO. They would take part in combat operations for the purpose of conquering Palestine, should such a front be formed.
"The indirect participation of the Israel Freedom Movement in the New Order of Europe, already in the preparatory stage, combined with a positive-radical solution of the European-Jewish problem on the basis of the national aspirations of the Jewish people mentioned above, would greatly strengthen the moral foundation of the New Order in the eyes of all humanity.
"The cooperation of the Israel Freedom Movement would also be consistent with a recent speech by the German Reich Chancellor, in which Hitler stressed that he would utilize any combination and coalition in order to isolate and defeat England".

(Original document in German Auswertiges Amt Archiv, Bestand 47-59, E224152 and E234155-58.

Complete original text published in: David Yisraeli, The Palestinian Problem in German Politics 1889-1945 (Israel: 1947) pp. 315-317).
On the basis of their similar ideologies about ethnicity and nationhood, National Socialists and Zionists worked together for what each group believed was in its own national interests.
This is just one example of the Zionist movements' collaboration with Hitler for the purpose of possibly receiving jurisdiction over a minute piece of earth, Palestine.
And to top it all up, brainwashing!
How far this unbelievable Zionist conspiracy has captured the Jewish masses, and how impossible it is for any different thought to penetrate their minds, even to the point of mere evaluation, can be seen in the vehemence of the reaction to any reproach. With blinded eyes and closed ears, any voice raised in protest and accusation is immediately suppressed and deafened by the thousandfold cry: "Traitor," "Enemy of the Jewish People."
Source for paragraphs marked "[Source]":
The Wall Street Journal December 2, 1976

Ten questions to the Zionists

2011-09-14T19:26:00.000Z

by Rabbi Michael Dov Weissmandl ZT"L
Dean of Nitra Yeshiva

IS IT TRUE that in 1941 and again in 1942, the German Gestapo offered all European Jews transit to Spain, if they would relinquish all their property in Germany and Occupied France; on condition that:
a) none of the deportees travel from Spain to Palestine; and
b) all the deportees be transported from Spain to the USA or British colonies, and there to remain; with entry visas to be arranged by the Jews living there; and
c) $1000.00 ransom for each family to be furnished by the Agency, payable upon the arrival of the family at the Spanish border at the rate of 1000 families daily.
IS IT TRUE that the Zionist leaders in Switzerland and Turkey received this offer with the clear understanding that the exclusion of Palestine as a destination for the deportees was based on an agreement between the Gestapo and the Mufti.
IS IT TRUE that the answer of the Zionist leaders was negative, with the following comments:
a) ONLY Palestine would be considered as a destination for the deportees.
b) The European Jews must accede to suffering and death greater in measure than the other nations, in order that the victorious allies agree to a "Jewish State" at the end of the war.
c) No ransom will be paid
IS IT TRUE that this response to the Gestapo's offer was made with the full knowledge that the alternative to this offer was the gas chamber.
IS IT TRUE that in 1944, at the time of the Hungarian deportations, a similar offer was made, whereby all Hungarian Jewry could be saved.
IS IT TRUE that the same Zionist hierarchy again refused this offer (after the gas chambers had already taken a toll of millions).
IS IT TRUE that during the height of the killings in the war, 270 Members of the British Parliament proposed to evacuate 500,000 Jews from Europe, and resettle them in British colonies, as a part of diplomatic negotiations with Germany.
IS IT TRUE that this offer was rejected by the Zionist leaders with the observation "Only to Palestine!"
IS IT TRUE that the British government granted visas to 300 rabbis and their families to the Colony of Mauritius, with passage for the evacuees through Turkey. The "Jewish Agency" leaders sabotaged this plan with the observation that the plan was disloyal to Palestine, and the 300 rabbis and their families should be gassed.
IS IT TRUE that during the course of the negotiations mentioned above, Chaim Weitzman, the first "Jewish statesman" stated: "The most valuable part of the Jewish nation is already in Palestine, and those Jews living outside Palestine are not too important". Weitzman's cohort, Greenbaum, amplified this statement with the observation "One cow in Palestine is worth more than all the Jews in Europe".

There are additional similar questions to be asked of these atheist degenerates known as "Jewish statesmen", but for the time being let them respond to the ten questions.
These Zionist "statesmen" with their great foresight, sought to bring an end two two-thousand years of Divinely ordained Jewish subservience and political tractability. With their offensive militancy, they fanned the fires of anti-Semitism in Europe, and succeeded in forging a bond of Jew-hatred between Nazi-Germany and the surrounding countries.
These are the "statesmen" who organized the irresponsible boycott against Germany in 1933. This boycott hurt Germany like a fly attacking an elephant - but it brought calamity upon the Jews of Europe. At a time when America and England were at peace with the mad-dog Hitler, the Zionist "statesmen" forsook the only plausible method of political amenability; and with their boycott incensed the leader of Germany to a frenzy. And then, after the bitterest episode in Jewish history, these Zionist "statesmen" lured the broken refugees in the DP camps to remain in hunger and deprivation, and to refuse relocation to any place but Palestine; only for the purpose of building their State.
The Zionist "statesmen" have incited and continue to incite an embittered Jewish youth to futile wars against world powers like England, and against masses of hundreds of millions of Arabs.
AND THESE SAME ZIONIST "STATESMEN" HEEDLESSLY PUSH THE WORLD TO THE BRINK OF ANOTHER TOTAL WAR - REVOLVING ENTIRELY AROUND THE HOLY LAND.
What may befall the Jewish inhabitants of Palestine, of the Arab crescent, Europe, or the USA; is of no concern to these Zionist leaders. The rising anti-Semitism in the Western World is the product of their "statesmanship".
Under the guise of "love of Israel", the Zionist "statesmen" seduced many Jews to replace devotion to the Torah and its Sages with devotion to the scoundrel who founded Zionism. It is of no little significance that Herzl originally sought conversion of the Jews as a solution to the problems of the Diaspora. When he realized that this was not acceptable to the Jewish masses, he contrived Zionism as a satisfactory alternative!
A look into history reveals that this very same type of "statesmen" opposed the call of Jeremiah the prophet to yield to the minions of Nebuchadnezzar at the destruction of the first Temple. Five centuries later, Rabbi Yochonon Ben Zakai appealed to the people to surrender to Titus the Roman to avoid bloodshed. The "statesmen" rejected this appeal, and the second Temple was destroyed by the Romans. --- And now for the past fifty years, the Zionist "statesmen" rebuff the leadership of our Sages; and continue in their policy of fomenting anti-Semitism. When will they stop?? Must every Jew in America also suffer?? - Even the Nazi monsters had more sense, and gave up their war before all Germany was destroyed. The Zionist "statesmen" ridicule the sacred oath which the Creator placed upon the Jews in the Diaspora. Our Torah, in Tractate Ksubos, folio 111, specifies that the Creator, blessed be He, swore the Jews not to occupy the Holy Land by force, even if it appears that they have the force to do so; and not rebel against the Nations. And the Creator warned that if His oath be desecrated, Jewish flesh would be "open property", like the animals in the forest!! These are words of our Torah; and these concepts have been cited in Maimonides' "Igeres Teimon", "Be'er HaGola", "Ahavas Yehonosson", and in "Toras Moshe" of the Chasam Sofer.
IT IS COMMON KNOWLEDGE THAT ALL THE SAGES AND SAINTS IN EUROPE AT THE TIME OF HITLER'S RISE DECLARED THAT HE WAS A MESSENGER OF DIVINE WRATH, SENT TO CHASTEN THE JEWS BECAUSE OF THE BITTER APOSTASY OF ZIONISM AGAINST THE BELIEF IN THE EVENTUAL MESSIANIC REDEMPTION.
Yidden - merciful sons of merciful fathers - how much longer must holy Jewish blood continue to be shed??
The only solution is:
The Jewish people must reject, outright, a "Jewish State".
The Jewish people should accept the US compromise.
We must depose the atheist-Zionist "statesmen" from their role as Jewish leaders, and return to the faithful leadership of our sages.
We beseech the Nations to open all doors to immigration - not only the doors of Palestine.
Peaceful, non-Zionist religious personalities in Palestine, (particularly from the native population) and their counterparts in the Diaspora, should engage in responsible, face-to face negotiations on behalf of the Jewish people, with the British and the Arabs; with an aim of amicable settlement of the Palestine issue.

Every Jew is obliged to pray to the Blessed creator, for in Him lies all our strength. Let us bear in mind that our prayers be forthright. One should not entreat the Creator to provide a banquet on Yom Kippur, and one can not perform a ritual ablution with a dead bug in his hand. Similarly, we should avoid the untenable position of the robber who prays for Divine help in carrying out his crime. We should pray that Zionism and its fruits vanish from the Earth, and that we be redeemed by the Messiah with dispatch.
A prisoner is released only when he has served his time, or if he is pardoned by the President for good behavior. If he attempts escape and is apprehended, his term is lengthened, besides the beating he receives when he is caught.
Faithful Jews- for over three and one-half thousand years, in all parts of the world, through all trials, our grandfathers and grandmothers marched through seas of blood and tears in order to keep the Faith of the Torah unswervingly. If we have compassion for ourselves, for our women and children, and for the Jewish people, we will maintain our golden legacy today. We have been sentenced to exile by the King of Kings because of our sins. The eternal blessed be He, has decreed that we accept the exile with humble gratitude until the time comes, or until we merit His pardon through repentance if we seek to end the exile with force, G-d will catch us, as our sages have forewarned, and our sentence becomes longer and more difficult.
Many times in the past have segments of our people been defrauded by false messiahs - but none of the false messiahs has been as fallacious and delusory as the lie of Zionism. With our historical experience as our guide, no retribution has been or will be greater than the retribution for giving credence to Zionism. If we wish our exile-sentence commuted, we must appeal through repentance; and through total physical and spiritual observance of the Sabbath, laws of family purity, and study of Torah.
Let it be clearly understood that never in Jewish history (even in the time of Jeroboam or Achav) have such hostile atheists stood at the helm of the Jewish people as today.
How can we plead to the Almighty for mercy while we tolerate these vile, "wicked" leaders as spokesmen! Beloved brothers - let us cleanse our ranks and cleanse our midst; let us entreat the Almighty through prayer, repentance, and fulfillment of mitzvos that He alone redeem us, immediately.
Read Except from his book MinHametzar

WHY ORTHODOX JEWS ARE OPPOSED TO A ZIONIST STATE

2011-09-14T19:25:00.002Z

First some introductions:

1) What is "The People of Israel" ?

The People of Israel have existed for thousands of years.
They have their own particular, essential nature.
The Torah is the source of their essential nature.
Without Torah and Faith there is no People of Israel.
Whoever denies the Torah and the Faith is no longer part of the People of Israel.
The purpose of the People of Israel in this world is Divine Service.
Their salvation is occupation in Divine Service.

2) What is Zionism?

Zionism is a relatively new thing.
It has only existed for a century.
Zionism redefines the true essential nature of the People of Israel, and substitutes for it a completely contradictory and opposite character - a materialistic worldly nation.
Their misfortune is lack of what other nations possess, i.e. a state and army.
Their salvation is possession of a state and army etc.
This is clearly spelled out in the circles of Zionist thought, and among the leaders of the Zionist State, that through changing the nature and character of the People of Israel and by changing their way of thinking they can set before the People of Israel "their salvation" -- a state and an army.

The People of Israel oppose the so-called "State of Israel" for four reasons:

FIRST -- The so-called "State of Israel" is diametrically opposed and completely contradictory to the true essence and foundation of the People of Israel, as is explained above. The only time that the People of Israel were permitted to have a state was two thousand years ago when the glory of the creator was upon us, and likewise in the future when the glory of the creator will once more be revealed, and the whole world will serve Him, then He Himself (without any human effort or force of arms) will grant us a kingdom founded on Divine Service. However, a worldly state, like those possessed by other peoples, is contradictory to the true essence of the People of Israel. Whoever calls this the salvation of Israel shows that he denies the essence of the People of Israel, and substitutes another nature, a worldly materialistic nature, and therefore sets before them, a worldly materialistic "salvation," and the means of achieving this "salvation" is also worldly and materialistic i.e. to organize a land and army. However, the true salvation of the People of Israel is to draw close to the Creator. This is not done by organization and force of arms. Rather it is done by occupation to Torah and good deeds.

SECOND -- Because of all of this and other reasons the Torah forbids us to end the exile and establish a state and army until the Holy One, blessed He, in His Glory and Essence will redeem us. This is forbidden even if the state is conducted according to the law of the Torah because arising from the exile itself is forbidden, and we are required to remain under the rule of the nations of the world, as is explained in the book VAYOEL MOSHE. If we transgress this injunction, He will bring upon us (may we be spared) terrible punishment.

THIRD -- Aside from arising from exile, all the deeds of the Zionists are diametrically opposed to the Faith and the Torah. Because the foundation of the Faith and Torah of Israel is that the Torah was revealed from heaven, and there is reward for those who obey it and punishment for those who transgress it. The entire People of Israel is required to obey the Torah, and whoever doesn't want to, ceases to be part of the congregation of Israel.

FOURTH -- Aside from the fact that they themselves do not obey the Torah they do everything they can to prevent anyone they get under their power from fulfilling the commands of the Torah, the claims to freedom of religion are lies. They fight with all of their strength to destroy the Faith of Israel.

The Zionists claim that they are the saviors of Israel, but this is refuted by twelve things:

FIRST -- If one contemplates the two thousand years of our exile, take any hundred years even the hardest, one will not find as much suffering, bloodshed, and catastrophes for the People of Israel in the period of the Zionists, and it is known that most of the suffering of this century was caused by the Zionists, as our Rabbis warned us would be the case.

SECOND -- It is openly stated in books written by the founders of Zionism that the means by which they planned to establish a state was by instigating anti-Semitism, and undermining the security of the Jews in all the lands of the world, until they would be forced to flee to their state. And thus they did - They intentionally infuriated the German people and fanned the flames of Nazi hatred, and they helped the Nazis, with trickery and deceit, to take whole Jewish communities off to the concentration camps, and the Zionists themselves admit this. (See the books Perfidy, Min Hameitzor, etc.). The Zionists continue to practice this strategy today. They incite anti-Semitism and then they present themselves as the "saviors". Here are two replies given by Leaders of the Zionists during World War II, when they were asked for money to help ransom Jews from the Nazis. Greenbaum said "One cow in Palestine is worth more than all the Jews in Poland." (G-d forbid).
Weitzman said, "The most important part of the Jewish people is already in the land (of Israel) and those who are left, are unimportant" (May we be spared).

THIRD -- We see that most of world Jewry lives in security and under good physical conditions, and have no desire to go live in the Zionist State. Whereas many people have left the Zionist State to live under better conditions in other lands.

FOURTH -- The Zionists make a great deal of propaganda to induce people to immigrate to their state. If their state is so beneficial why do they have to make so much propaganda.

FIFTH -- Because nobody wants the Zionists to "save" them. The only way they can get immigrants is by promising poor people material benefits, and even then very few people respond.

SIXTH -- The Zionist State is always threatened by the dangers of war. Whereas the rest of world Jewry live in peace and security, (Except in a few places where the Zionists have undermined their security and fanned the flames of hatred)

SEVENTH -- The Zionist State could not continue to exist without economic support from Jews living outside of the Zionist State.

EIGHTH -- The Zionist State is on the verge of economic collapse, and their money is nearly worthless.

NINTH -- The Zionist State persecute all Jews who are loyal to their Faith.

TENTH -- They start wars that endanger the Jewish People, for the sake of their own political interests.

ELEVENTH - According to the Torah the path of safety is following ways of peace not starting fights with other nations, as the Zionists do.

TWELFTH -- Even if the Zionists could and would provide physical security it would be at the expense of our Faith and Our Torah the true People of Israel prefer death rather than life at such a cost.

It is therefore clear that Zionism is not the savior of the people of Israel. Rather it is their greatest misfortune.

Even though there are some observant Jews and rabbis, who approve of the Zionists, this is not the opinion of the Torah.

The Zionists have enough control over the American news media to make sure that only their side of the story is heard.

They make it look like all Jewry and their rabbis are Zionists, but this is false propaganda.

The most important Rabbis and the majority of religious Jewry are opposed to Zionism, but their voice is not heard because of Zionist control of American news media.

The Zionists terrorize everyone who speaks out against them.

That part of the Jewish masses which is fooled by Zionist propaganda puts pressure on their Rabbis not to speak out.

Between the terror and the pressure of the masses most of the Rabbis are prevented from speaking out.

We bring three testimonies of the true opinion of the Torah.

1) In the past two thousand years of the dangers and sufferings of exile not once did any of the Sages of Israel suggest that we make a state to protect ourselves. In every generation we had thousands of Sages well versed in the Torah.

2) We have thousands of legal work of Torah law that have been handed down to us by the Sages of all generations. Not once do we see a word suggesting the establishment of a state. What we do find is warnings against it.

3) The founders of Zionism were all atheists who denied the Torah. All the Torah Sages of that time opposed them and opposed Zionism, saying that Zionism would lead only to destruction.

However the true People of Israel will never change their nature or give up their Faith because of the strength the Creator gives them.

Zionism is a foreign growth in the body of the Jewish People. The end will be that it will rid itself of this foreign growth and remain pure.

Zionism has overcome the Jewish people by force, fraud and terror, but none of this will help them because the truth will always remain with the help of the Creator.

Zionism will not replace the Jewish People. The Jewish People will remain strong in their faith and the Zionist State will cease to exist.

It is therefore, our demand that the State that calls itself ISRAEL, should cease to exist. Since this won't be done, we demand that they cease to call themselves "Israel", because their entire being is in complete opposition to the true People of Israel. The true People of Israel deny them permission to call themselves by that name. The Zionist leaders have no right to set themselves up as the representatives and spokesmen of the true People of ISRAEL.

Since we know they will not fulfill this demand either we feel that at least we cry out the truth. The truth will always remain the truth. By no means or force can the truth be changed. Even if all the world would say that one and one is three, the truth will remain that one and one is two.

Let the truth be declared. The use of the Name "ISRAEL" by that State is a complete falsification. The People of Israel have nothing to do with that State. Zionism and its State have no share and no part in the true ISRAEL.

Anti-Semitism – Zionist myth vs truth and reality. By Alan Hart

2011-09-14T08:21:00.002Z

Via: Redress.
There are two definitions of anti-Semitism in its Jewish context. One was born in real history and represents a truth. The other is part and parcel of Zionist mythology and was invented for the purpose of blackmailing non-Jewish Europeans and North Americans into refraining from criticizing Israel or, to be more precise, staying silent when its leaders resort to state terrorism and demonstrate in many ways their absolute contempt for international law.

A tale of two anti-Semitisms

Anti-Semitism properly and honestly defined is prejudice against and loathing and even hatred of Jews, all Jews everywhere, just because they are Jews.
Anti-Semitism as defined by Zionism, the colonial, ethnic cleansing enterprise of some Jews, has come to mean almost all criticism of Israel’s policies and actions, in particular its oppression of the Palestinians, and, also, criticism on the basis of revelations from the documented truth of history which expose Zionism’s propaganda for the nonsense it is. Put another way, anti-Semitism as defined by supporters of Israel right or wrong is anything written or said by anybody that challenges and contradicts Zionism’s version of events. In effect Zionists say, “If you disagree with us, you’re anti-Semitic”.
As a blackmail card to silence criticism of Israel and prevent informed and honest debate about who must do what and why for justice and peace in the Middle East, Zionism’s false charge of anti-Semitism has worked wonderfully well to date. Why? In the long (and still present) shadow of the obscenity of the Nazi holocaust, a European crime for which, effectively, the Arabs were punished, there are few things Westerners in public life, politicians and media people especially, fear more than being accused of anti-Semitism.
Unable to refute the substance of documented and objective messages of challenge and criticism, Zionism’s policy always was, and still is, to shoot the messengers with false charges of anti-Semitism.

Zionism – myth and reality

For a complete understanding of what anti-Semitism is and is not, it’s necessary to know what Zionism is and is not.
Zionism claims to be the nationalist movement of the Jews, all Jews everywhere. If this were so, the assertion that anti-Zionism is almost by definition a manifestation of anti-Semitism might appear to have a degree of credibility. But this Zionist claim does not bear examination.
As I document in detail in my book Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, the truth is that from Zionism’s foundation in 1897 until the Nazi holocaust, its colonial enterprise was endorsed and supported by only a tiny minority of the world’s Jews and was opposed by many of them.
Also true is that from Israel’s unilateral declaration of independence in 1948 until the final countdown to the 1967 war, most Jews of the world had no great affinity with Israel. That changed when most Jews believed – because they were conditioned by Zionism and the mainstream Western media to believe – that poor little Israel was in danger of annihilation. In that light Israel’s stunning victory was a source of great pride for most Jews of the world.
Though most Jews didn’t and still don’t want to know it, the truth was different. The Arabs did not attack first and were not intending to attack. The 1967 war was one of Israeli aggression.
Today much of what supporters of Israel, right or wrong, claim to be anti-Semitism is actually anti-Israelism, which in my view is best described as anti-Zionism. And contrary to the assertions of Zionism’s spin doctors, anti-Zionism is not by definition anti-Semitism.
Short or long, any discussion of anti-Semitism should include the fact that Zionism needs it. The first to acknowledge this was none other than Theodore Herzl, Zionism’s founding father. In one of his diaries, not published until 1962, Herzl wrote the following:

Anti-Semitism is a propelling force which, like the wave of the future, will bring Jews into the promised land. Anti-Semitism has grown and continues to grow – and so do I.

He was right. Without the anti-Semitism unleashed by Adolf Hitler in his Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe, Zionism’s colonial enterprise would have been doomed to failure for lack of enough Jewish support.
Today Zionism needs anti-Semitism or what it can present as anti-Semitism to go on justifying its policies and actions.

Zionism – a catastrophe for Jews

Any discussion of anti-Semitism should also take note of the words of Yehoshafat Harkabi, Israel’s longest serving director of military intelligence. In his book Israel’s Fateful Hour, he wrote: “I believe it was a damaging error on Menachem Begin’s part to insinuate that criticism of Israel is a manifestation of anti-Semitism.” In the same book Harkabi gave this warning:

Israel is the criterion according to which all Jews will tend to be judged. Israel as a Jewish state is an example of the Jewish character, which finds free and concentrated expression within it. Anti-Semitism has deep and historical roots. Nevertheless, any flaw in Israeli conduct, which initially is cited as anti-Israelism, is likely to be transformed into empirical proof of the validity of anti-Semitism. It would be a tragic irony if the Jewish state, which was intended to solve the problem of anti-Semitism, was to become a factor in the rise of anti-Semitism. Israelis must be aware that the price of their misconduct is paid not only by them but also Jews throughout the world.

From the early 1980s when those words were written, Israel’s “misconduct” has been the prime cause in the rise of what Zionism presents as anti-Semitism but which is actually anti-Israelism/anti-Zionism. Today the biggest danger to the Jews of the world is, as Harkabi warned, that anti-Israelism/anti-Zionism will be transformed into anti-Semitism, with the consequence at some point of another great turning against Jews.
My own view is that such a catastrophe will happen unless the citizens of the mainly gentile Western world, among whom most Jews live, are made aware of the difference between Judaism and Zionism. As I have previously written and never tire of repeating, knowledge of this difference is the key to understanding two things.
One is why it is perfectly possible to be passionately anti-Zionist (opposed to Zionism’s still on-going colonial enterprise) without being in any way, shape or form anti-Semitic.
The other is why it is wrong to blame all Jews everywhere for the crimes of the hardest core Zionist few in Israel.
In my analysis, the day when citizens of the Western world understand those two things and what anti-Semitism is and is not, is the day that will mark the beginning of the end of Zionism’s freedom and ability to impose its will on the Palestinians, the whole of the Arab world and the governments of the major Western powers, and to remain above and beyond international law.

Alan Hart is a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent who covered wars and conflicts wherever they were taking place in the world and specialized in the Middle East. Author of Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews. He blogs on www.alanhart.net and tweets on www.twitter.com/alanauthor.

Destroying Schools, Destroying Hope in the West Bank

2011-09-14T02:39:00.002Z

Monday, September 12, 2011

From time to time, the Palestine Center distributes articles it believes will enhance understanding of the Palestinian political reality. The following article by Peter Blair was published by The Huffington Post on 8 September 2011.

"Destroying Schools, Destroying Hope in the West Bank"

By Peter Blair

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestinian refugees recently published a worrying story about the proposed demolition of Khan al Ahmar in the West Bank. The 180-person community is slated for demolition to make way for the expansion of settlements in the Ma'ale Adumin area, and the expansion of the West Bank separation barrier - both of which are illegal under international law.

What struck me most about this story was that the plans include the destruction of the Khan al Ahmar Jahalin School - which provides the only primary education to 70 children in the area. When a school is destroyed, often so is the community - leading to displacement and plunging people further into poverty. This is one tiny example of what is happening across the West Bank as land is increasingly partitioned and swallowed up, but if repeated elsewhere it has the potential to create a huge problem for the future of both Israel and Palestine. If we create a generation of Palestinian children who have no access to education, what are their other options?

One of the reasons that the recent attempts at Middle East peace have floundered may be that none of the personalities have changed over the last three decades, yet strangely none of the debate has been about the young leaders who are going to replace the old guard. Already the possibilities for compromise are slipping away as young moderates get sidelined, and on top of that Israel now risks creating a huge up swell in the number of uneducated Palestinian youth. The brutal symbolism of closing schools will not be lost on young Palestinians - as has been evidenced by declarations of support from four UNRWA schools in Jordan in the last week.

In Northern Ireland schools were one of the few places where parents could send their children to be safe at the height of the Troubles. They were also one of the first places that a lot of Protestant and Catholic children met each other, and learned that other children were not so different from them. As young minds began to expand and learn how to solve arguments with words instead of violence, the old hardliner generation began to be replaced by a new generation - a generation more interested in becoming doctors and engineers than in becoming fighters. When children were able to get an education, they could break away from the sectarian council estates they grew up on and learn skills on which to build a career. These are the opportunities being snatched away from Palestinian children in the West Bank and Israeli children in Sderot. Their only knowledge of the other side is through Israeli tanks and rockets launched from Gaza. Fear turns to hatred and becomes entrenched, then that too turns into further physical attacks - the cycle is doomed to start again. Sadly at the moment it's unimaginable that any sort of integrated schooling system encompassing both Israeli and Palestinian children will become widespread (despite success stories like Bridge Over the Wadi), but teaching young children about tolerance and the acceptance of others is still possible - unless schools are closed.

Above all, children on both sides should be able to focus their young lives on simply being kids. Climbing trees, splashing in puddles and getting covered in paint might not seem connected to the Israeli/Palestinian peace process but in reality it could play a huge role in creating a safe atmosphere where young leaders can grow and develop. Children who grow up surrounded by conflict are robbed of their childhood. They grow up thinking about war and the death of their friends and family, in an atmosphere of constant fear and worry. Understandably they aren't going to grow up empathetic to the other side's point of view. Destroying schools takes away that vital protective space.

It should also be recognized that any permanent peace agreement will revolve around both the Israeli and Palestinian communities being able to live side by side, with some level of economic interaction. A functioning education system is a prerequisite for a functioning economy in whatever form the final Palestinian state takes. For Israel to have an economic partner it is in its own interest to support a Palestinian school system or it risks being burdened with an impoverished, uneducated neighbor unable to support its people. It stands to reason that an educated Palestinian populace will be better equipped to engage in dialogue and negotiation rather than resorting to violence. Ongoing dialogue is the essential coda to any peace agreement becoming more than just words on a page, as difficult compromises play out in political and social reality.

Schools should provide bastions of normality, where young minds are stimulated with science, language and maths. When we take those safe havens away we'll be left with a young generation who won't have the basic skills to positively contribute to society in the future. The negative symbolism of bulldozing schools should not be lost on Israel. If an entire generation is created who instead of learning in the classroom end up learning on the streets with stones and tear gas then compromise becomes even harder. Then war will become the only game in town.

Peter Blair worked on conflict resolution in the Middle East before serving as an international election observer for The Carter Center in Guinea and Côte d'Ivoire.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The Jerusalem Fund.