A lot is going on on the Israel/Palestine front in the last few days… Unfortunately I’m a bit bogged down with schoolwork and work, so don’t expect long screeds from me before the end of next week (when classes are over, though not the exams)…
Just a few interesting links for the moment.
“The Gaza Flotilla Inquiry: Afloat in a sea of whitewash”
Sunday, +972 Mag
Roi Maor going over some of the failings of Turkel Commission’s “investigation” of the Gaza siege and the attack of the Mavi Marmara; even information within the report, not to mention public announcements by officials, starkly contradict the Committee’s “conclusions”.
A kick in the Israeli Left’s collective behind [Hebrew]
Monday night, Friends of George
Itamar Sha’altiel is rightly pissed off at the Left’s decidedly lame reaction to the Palestine Papers, their decidedly lame reaction to everything else going on, and their decidedly lame habit of lamely reacting to everything — not to mention their preoccupation with stealing votes from one another rather than focussing on winning the public back from the Right. The Right, he points out, has mastered the steering of public discussion to the point that even their legislation of late seems mainly part of that manipulation. Meanwhile, the Left shows off its socially progressive legislative record, instead of asking the pointed questions that beg to be asked of those in power.
A truly inspiring rant of rage.
“The leaders got it all wrong: Palestinian view on Palestine Papers”
Today (Tuesday), +972 blog (guest post)
Maath Musleh discusses some of failings of the West Bank leadership (perhaps “ruling elite” would be a better word?), as well as Hamas, surrounding the Palestine Papers. The piece also points out that mere peace is not the end-goal:
What Abbas and his peers don’t understand is that peace is not the target. If peace was the target, then the Palestinians could have just left and handed over their land to the Israelis. There you go – no more war.
But this is not about peace. It is about rights and dignity. Of course everyone wants peace. But peace is not just an absence of war. Peace is a state of being, in which people have their rights and dignity. It’s a state of being whereby no one infringes on anyone’s rights. For the Palestinians, the state of peace is what will be when the occupation ends and the refugees have their rights and dignity.
I’ll leave you with that for now, and turn to doing the work I’m paid to do. (Case in point: putting together bibliography databases for the Baure Documentation Project.)
About the last piece, are you for real? I have no words. I just can’t start writing it angers me so much, this is ridiculous. Wow.
מה הקטע? כאילו, שלום לא אומר שהכיבוש יגמר? מה זה החרא הזה? מה זה המאמר המטומטם הזה? אני פשוט לא מבין.
וגם, ה972 מגזין האלו הם חבורה של שקרנים. תפסתי אותם (גורביץ’, כן כן, ואת ג’וזף דנה וליסה גודלמן) על שקרים גדולים כבר שלוש פעמים. באמת, חבורה של שקרנים, זה מזעזע אותי שהם מוכנים לשקר ככה בשביל המטרה שלהם. ומדכא.
Take a deep breath. I don’t get what’s wrong.
The point, as I take it, is that mere peace is not the end-goal, because there are many ways to reach “peace”, as the piece points out. The goal is a solution in which both sides are more or less satisfied with the situation. The reason we don’t have peace isn’t that there hasn’t been a peace agreement — many countries live in peace without ever having needed an agreement. The reason we don’t have peace is that on both sides, people feel their rights and/or dignity (individually and/or as a people) are not respected.
As for what you say about 972 Mag, would you mind elaborating and providing information that could prove they lied? From where I stand, with the very limited information I have, it’s hard to tell, and if I have to choose between a source that occasionally makes a mistake or even includes false information and a source that talks of soldiers “returning fire” at an old man getting out of bed, well, I’ll choose the first, in a heartbeat, every time. And the fact that the IDF is not only responsible for cases like that but embellishes them with that kind of language is much more disturbing than people on the internet being wrong or outright lying. And much more depressing.
Let me be clear: it’s not that I refuse to believe you or that it doesn’t bother me if 972 occasionally lie. It’s just that the official sources, not to mention the right wing, are clearly even worse, so I use what sources are left. And you’d be doing everyone a favor if you would call out the 972 folk for their lies and substantiate your claims with evidence of some sort. Please do that, if you can.