Newsletter 30 May 2008

Contents

1. Video from the Abir Aramin Memorial Garden
2. The latest FFIPP-UK Newsletter
3. 1948 by Uri Avnery
4. Escaping Forwards by Uri Avnery
5. U.S. prof. gives Israeli prize money to Palestinian university by Ofri Ilani
6. Prophecy of retribution by Rabbi Dr David Goldberg
7. UN says number of West Bank checkpoints on the rise
8. Israeli settlers and army started to expand illegal settlement on Bil’in land by Ghassan Bannoura
9. Road map to nowhere by Daniel Levy

1. Video from the Abir Aramin Memorial Garden

(JfJfP signatories contributed £1975 via the British Shalom-Salaam Trust) following an appeal)
http://www.combatantsforpeace.org/video.asp?lng=eng&id=playground_Abir.wmv&type=video

2. The latest FFIPP-UK Newsletter has just gone out

It includes material on, among other things, the University and College Union 2008 Congress; Norman Finkelstein being barred entry to Israel; sending books to Palestine; and Nadia Abu El-Haj’s tenure battle at Barnard

See the mailing at http://www.ffipp-uk.org/FFIPP-UK_newsletters/newsletter_080530.htm
To subscribe to the FFIPP-UK mailings email info@ffipp-uk.org

3. Uri Avnery: 1948

ONE DAY, I hope, a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission”, on the South African model, will be set up here. It should be composed of Israeli, Palestinian and international historians, whose job will be to establish what really happened in this country in 1948.
Article at http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1210454063

4. Escaping Forwards by Uri Avnery, 24 May

Despite some cynicism as to why Olmert has launched talks with Syria at this juncture (“His situation is desperate… The Attorney General is liable to indict him any time, and this will compel him to resign.”) Avnery finds reasons to be hopeful that something positive can come out of this development
Article at http://www.avnery-news.co.il/english/index.html

5. U.S. prof. gives Israeli prize money to Palestinian university by Ofri Ilani

The American mathematician David Mumford, co-winner of the 2008 Wolf Foundation Prize in Mathematics, announced upon receiving the award yesterday that he will donate the money to Bir Zeit University, near Ramallah, and to Gisha, an Israeli organization that advocates for Palestinian freedom of movement.
Article at http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/986898.html

6. Prophecy of retribution

The 1907 writings of one traveller to Palestine vividly describe the roots of the region’s enmity
By Rabbi Dr David Goldberg
Article at http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/may/29/israelandthepalestinians

7. ISRAEL-OPT: UN says number of West Bank checkpoints on the rise

Irin (The Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN), the humanitarian news and analysis service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (www.IRINnews.org).)

“During the reporting period to April 2008 some 103 obstacles were removed but 144 were added…
In April, the Israeli government announced it had removed 61 obstacles in the West Bank, though OCHA said that only 44 had been taken away and 11 had never existed. Of the 44, only five were deemed to be significant, leaving the agency to conclude that the move had “little or no impact on movement and access in the West Bank”.

News report at http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=78455
Full Ocha May report downloadable at http://www.ochaopt.org/documents/UpdateMay2008.pdf

8. Israeli settlers and army started to expand illegal settlement on Bil’in land, Ghassan Bannoura 26 May 2008

Judith Norman of Jewish Peace News writes: “The West Bank village of Bil’in has become famous for several years now as the site of weekly protests against the construction of the wall. The route of the wall separates the village itself from 60% of its farmland (mostly olive groves). The weekly protests are themselves non-violent, they but have often met with violent responses on the part of the Israeli military, which is adopting an increasingly belligerent attitude towards the protests.”

Here is an extract from the latest International Middle East Media Centre report:
“Israeli settlers under the protection of the Israeli army started on Monday morning to install homes on lands that belong to villagers from Bil’in, located near the central West Bank city of Ramallah. Iyad Burnat, of the local committee against the wall and settlement construction, said that villagers noticed the construction since early morning on Monday. Villagers tried to reach their land in order to stop the settlers but Israeli troops prevented them from crossing the wall.
…
In 2007 the villagers of Bil’in won an Israeli high court of Justice decision to remove the Israeli wall that separates the village from its land and move it away. The Israeli army refused to comply with the order for “security reasons.”

Full report at http://www.imemc.org/article/55064
For more information about Bil’in see: http://www.bilin-village.org/english/

9. Road map to nowhere, Daniel Levy, International Herald Tribune, 14 May

A few weeks old, appearing when Bush was in the Middle East, but of interest coming as it does from Daniel Levy, co-founder of the Washington-based J Street, “the political arm of the pro-Israel, pro-peace movement” set up to challenge Aipac.
“[A]s it currently stands, the Annapolis process is a chimera, and one likely to do more harm than good.”
Article at http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/14/opinion/edlevy.php