Angry White Kid

Help Somerville Divest

Sorry for the late notice - letters need to be sent by tomorrow, December 1 (contact info at the end of the post). 

Hello,

My name is Liz Monnin, and I am an Organizer with the Somerville Divestment Project. In these last critical weeks of our human rights campaign before the Socially Responsible Investment resolution is voted on (12/9), we need as many of our supporters as possible to contribute to our efforts. We know that many of your members are already aware of our work, and many of your members have shown support for our campaign. We thank you for this, and we ask that you help us increase the level of support and active involvement among your membership in these next few weeks!

I am writing to you to ask that you encourage your members to support our campaign for Palestinian human rights and justice in the Middle East in one of the following ways. I am also attaching a document with the City Clerk and Board of Aldermen's addresses and email addresses. All documents (including emails and letters) that will be entered as public record must be received by the City Clerk by Wednesday, December 1 (this Wednesday!!), so please highlight the urgency of your members making their voices heard on this important issue!! PLEASE CIRCULATE THIS INFORMATION WIDELY!

Why are banks in Michigan sponsoring the Israeli army?

From ADC - Michigan:

Five major Michigan banks have recently publicized their sponsorship of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the Detroit Jewish News.

In a letter sent out last week, ADC states, 'It is quite disturbing and appalling that your institution would financially support the armed forces of a foreign country, especially a country that is engaged in one of the world’s longest and most divisive conflicts in history.'

Caterpillar Should Suspend Bulldozer Sales

A little old, but still important nonetheless.  From Human Rights Watch:

Caterpillar Inc., the U.S.-based heavy-equipment company, should immediately suspend sales of its powerful D9 bulldozer to the Israeli army, Human Rights Watch said today. As Human Rights Watch documented in a recent report, the Israeli military uses the D9 as its primary weapon to raze Palestinian homes, destroy agriculture and shred roads in violation of the laws of war.

For more on Caterkiller, see Stop Caterpillar.

The Dude is not in

No new posts until Sunday.  Going to Sonoma with family.  Have fun celebrating the genocide of indigenous nations.

One last news item:

Israeli officer: I was right to shoot 13-year-old child 

Chris McGreal in Jerusalem
Wednesday November 24, 2004

 

The Guardian

An Israeli army officer who repeatedly shot a 13-year-old Palestinian girl in Gaza dismissed a warning from another soldier that she was a child by saying he would have killed her even if she was three years old.

The officer, identified by the army only as Captain R, was charged this week with illegal use of his weapon, conduct unbecoming an officer and other relatively minor infractions after emptying all 10 bullets from his gun's magazine into Iman al-Hams when she walked into a "security area" on the edge of Rafah refugee camp last month.

A tape recording of radio exchanges between soldiers involved in the incident, played on Israeli television, contradicts the army's account of the events and appears to show that the captain shot the girl in cold blood.

The official account claimed that Iman was shot as she walked towards an army post with her schoolbag because soldiers feared she was carrying a bomb.

But the tape recording of the radio conversation between soldiers at the scene reveals that, from the beginning, she was identified as a child and at no point was a bomb spoken about nor was she described as a threat. Iman was also at least 100 yards from any soldier.

Instead, the tape shows that the soldiers swiftly identified her as a "girl of about 10" who was "scared to death".

The tape also reveals that the soldiers said Iman was headed eastwards, away from the army post and back into the refugee camp, when she was shot.

At that point, Captain R took the unusual decision to leave the post in pursuit of the girl. He shot her dead and then "confirmed the kill" by emptying his magazine into her body.

The tape recording is of a three-way conversation between the army watchtower, the army post's operations room and the captain, who was a company commander.

The soldier in the watchtower radioed his colleagues after he saw Iman: "It's a little girl. She's running defensively eastward."

Operations room: "Are we talking about a girl under the age of 10?"

Watchtower: "A girl of about 10, she's behind the embankment, scared to death."

A few minutes later, Iman is shot in the leg from one of the army posts.

The watchtower: "I think that one of the positions took her out."

The company commander then moves in as Iman lies wounded and helpless.

Captain R: "I and another soldier ... are going in a little nearer, forward, to confirm the kill ... Receive a situation report. We fired and killed her ... I also confirmed the kill. Over."

Witnesses described how the captain shot Iman twice in the head, walked away, turned back and fired a stream of bullets into her body. Doctors at Rafah's hospital said she had been shot at least 17 times.

On the tape, the company commander then "clarifies" why he killed Iman: "This is commander. Anything that's mobile, that moves in the zone, even if it's a three-year-old, needs to be killed. Over."

The army's original account of the killing said that the soldiers only identified Iman as a child after she was first shot. But the tape shows that they were aware just how young the small, slight girl was before any shots were fired.

The case came to light after soldiers under the command of Captain R went to an Israeli newspaper to accuse the army of covering up the circumstances of the killing.

A subsequent investigation by the officer responsible for the Gaza strip, Major General Dan Harel, concluded that the captain had "not acted unethically".

However, the military police launched an investigation, which resulted in charges against the unit commander.

Iman's parents have accused the army of whitewashing the affair by filing minor charges against Captain R. They want him prosecuted for murder.

Record of a shooting

Watchtower
'It's a little girl. She's running defensively eastward'
Operations room
'Are we talking about a girl under the age of 10?'
Watchtower
'A girl of about 10, she's behind the embankment, scared to death'
Captain R (after killing the girl)
'Anything moving in the zone, even a three-year-old, needs to be killed'  

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

Nuclear whistleblower accuses Israel of apartheid

Mordechai Vanunu - telling it like it is.

ATHENS (AFP) - Mordechai Vanunu, who was freed in April after 18 years in an Israeli prison for revealing the country's nuclear ambitions, accused Israel of practicing apartheid against the Palestinians.

He urged the European Union to put pressure on Israel to become democratic.

Vanunu, 50, said in an interview with the daily Eleftherotypia, in further defiance of a government gagging order, that he hoped the EU could "help the Palestinians to possess their own state and Israel to become a true democracy".

"At the moment," he added, "There exists a Jewish apartheid. Europe must do something for Israel to become a democracy for everybody."

Vanunu, who has become a Christian and lives in a room at the Anglican Cathedral in Jerusalem, said he was anxious to travel in Europe or the United States and "decide afterwards where I want to live."

But since his release from prison, he has been placed under sweeping restrictions, including a ban on leaving the country.

"The Sky is Falling!"

Especially ever since Edward Said threw a rock into Israel from Lebanon, the New York tabloids have been on an all-out crusade against Columbia University, claiming anti-Semitism and intimidation.  The latest screaming headline, shown above, was on yesterday's New York Daily News, claiming professors at Columbia have an "I-hate-Israel agenda, embracing the ugliest of Arab propaganda, and teaching that Zionism is the root of all evil in the Mideast."

This all started when a pro-Israel non-profit in Boston made a "documentary" about anti-Jewish racism at Columbia.  They specifically targeted Joseph Massad.  You can read his eloquent response to the allegations here.

What needs to understood is that this is not a campaign against anti-Jewish racism.  This is a campaign against academic freedom.  The pro-Israel crowd just can't stand it when a viewpoint other than the official Israel/Zionist position is offered.  While framed in a way to make it seem outrageous, the claims in the Daily News don't hold up under scrutiny.  Their sole purpose is to fan the flames, make a huge stink and hopefully get outspoken professors to toe the party line.  It hasn't worked so far, let's make sure that it doesn't succeed ever.

North Oakland - South Berkeley Throwdown

Advisory: Most of you will have no interest in this post.

The winds are raging in the Bay Area, meaning the gauntlet has been thrown down.  It's time for somebody to get taken down a level.  Tonight that will be Jamie, a two-bit south Berkeley transfer from upstate New York.  This kid thinks he's hip-hop cause he had a radio show in college (get this, at Vassar) and still rocks a mini-disk player. 

The beef with Jamie, beyond the paragraph above and the fact he has some played-out fifth graders' keyboard and works at Peet's next to the Claremont ("hello rich bourgeois person, how would you like your triple mocha latte espresso?"), is that this cat actually thinks that heads like MF Doom, Madlib, stones throw, etc are real good hip-hop.  This punk wouldn't know real hip-hop if it hit him in the face (which i gotta do once in a while). 

I don't got as much of a problem with stones throw as much as  I've got a problem with Madlib and more so with MF Doom.   The new Doom album (MM...Food) came out and Jamie's been talkin' it up like it's the second coming or something. Whatever, I'm not having it.  So what, some fool can cleverly title an album and its songs, so I'm supposed to like it?  Jamie's all blathering about how complex his rhymes are and how dope the beats are.  Whatever.  These kids are so lazy, they just get rich off of sampling other people's shit, and then sometimes make their own beats.  For Christ's sake...even I can make beats and sample hooks.  As for his rhymes, they ain't nothing.  He probably just flipped on the tape, sat his fat ass  in a chair, smoked a blunt and talked into a microphone. 

At this point I should note that I'm not expecting anyone to agree with me.  For a while, Byron had it right: Madvillainy = Boring, Overated Shit.  But now even the BC dot C is lovin'  on this album.  It's a shame. 

The most offensive load of crap I've heard from Jamie was when he was trying to compare Sage Francis to MF Baffoon.  He was talking about how both spin old rhymes.  Then he busts this one out from the new "MM...Crap" album and I had to check him cause Sage did that years ago.  Chump has the gall to compare Sage to that garbage.  Sage is older than old school.  That kid was rhyming when he was 8, hiding in a closet from his crazy smack-addict parents.  And I'm supposed to respect Doom cause he recorded something in '88?  Please man, go back to Shattuck.  You ain't tough just cause you got a front operation next door. 

Anyway, why should I listen to some fool wearing a mask who can't even figure what he wants his name to be?  That boy has got problems.

So what's up now, Jamie?  Step up, man.  You'll have to settle for the comments section, since you're such a punk you and boyfriendo woz  can't even get your shit together to start your sure-to-be-weak blog.

UN Conference on Islamophobia

On December 7, the UN will be having a conference on Islamophobia.  I think we should round up all the neocons, right-wing fundamentalist Christians and the pro-Israel crowd, tie them to chairs and make them sit through this. 

I'll personally pay for Daniel Pipes to attend.  Anyone want to sponsor someone else? 

New Video on Home Demolitions

B'Tselem has just released a short 30 second video on the Israeli army's  destruction of Palestinians homes.  Unfortunately, what the kids are saying are not translated.  The Israeli woman who sent this to me says they're speaking in Hebrew, though it sounds like Arabic to me.  Regardless, the last clip is of a child saying, "It was the first time I saw my father cry."

Zionist Death Squad Plans to Assasinate Palestinian Leaders

From the Tehran Times (if the link doesn't work, just go to the archives for Nov. 17):

A special Zionist commando group has been established in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to assassinate Palestinian leaders, informed sources announced on Tuesday.

The group is comprised of members of the Gush Emunim organization, which is connected with extremist Israeli settlers.

The operation is led directly by Israeli intelligence agency (Mossad) chief Meir Dagan, who is strongly opposed to the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

I was hesitant to post this, because I'm not sure how valid the information is.  I decided to go ahead and do it because it was sent to me by the email list for the Jewish People's Liberation Organization (not a group to spread rumors) and because this paper printed an op-ed by Juan Cole (and I don't think he would be submitting pieces to fraudelent news sources).  Finally, while it might seem a bit "conspiracy-theory-esque," Israel is more than capable of doing these things, and has done much worse in the past.