A debate - 40 Years Of Occupation

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Thu May 31, 2007 10:38

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) salutes the historic decision by the University and College Union (UCU) Congress in the UK today, Wednesday 30 May 2007, to support motions that endorse the logic of academic boycott against Israel, in response to the complicity of the Israeli academy in perpetuating Israel's illegal military occupation and apartheid system.

For further info go to:

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6976.shtml

by PaddyK Fri Jun 01, 2007 02:12

What the fella said :

"International pressure is urgently needed to scale down the tension but pressure on the Hamas and Hezbollah aggressors who initiated the tension with their unprovoked cross-border attacks, and kidnappings."

http://www.spme.net/cgi-bin/articles.cgi?ID=818

I am concerned at the lack of structure in the above sentence, it's meaningless.

I hope you are planning on serving sandwiches.

by PaddyK Fri Jun 01, 2007 11:47

All due respect to your good selves,

Michael Warschawski is a serious writer and activist whose voice definitely needs to be heard in Ireland.

http://www.southendpress.org/authors/18

Is it really productive, when you have managed to secure the man's presence at your event, to then trawl the streets to find some Zionut that will fill a vacant seat opposite him.

Tom Carew ????

http://www.think-israel.org/carew.ww4.html

Have you asked the Palestinian delegation to Ireland to send a representative to speak on behalf of the Palestinians? You folks will know that there is a huge drive on at the moment to subdue Palestinian political representation. Is there not an informed somebody to whom you could give this valuable platform for a seminar in support of Mr Warschawski, perhaps highlighting the current military surge against the Palestinian civil society?

You guys do great work but really , do the Palestinians need a Punch an Judy show in Dublin? Does Mr Warschawski need to be in one?

Tom Carew? Have I got the right Tom Carew here, the joker who said this:

+++With such a unique record of "own-goals", the Palestinians today need friends who will apply "tough love", and realism, not followers — like Robert Fisk — who will only echo their perpetual sense of victim-hood and grievance. It is pointless to try to help those who continually refuse to help themselves.+++

http://www.allenspringer.org/articles/tc060110.htm

What could this man possibly have to offer in the way of productive analysis, I think it most likely that he will just stymie the flow of information?

I urge you to reconsider !

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Fri Jun 01, 2007 15:09

Hi PaddyK,

Your comments and views are taken on board....the specific event is only one of the activities taking place during next week. We're just back from a quite impressive occupation/picket of the EU Offices in Dublin....pics and news to follow.
We wanted to have a debate.....we invited a few people, including Alan Shatter, and the new boy on the Fine Gael bloc Leo.....they didn't oblige......Tom has agreed to speak in the debate and we are actively searching for a second pro-Israeli speaker....will contact a couple of the lads of the Freedom Institute.
As discussed last night in the IPSC meeting, we still have the option to have a straight meeting with MW from Jerusalem and a couple of pro-Palestinian speakers....

Take care of yourself good friend

by Paeling M Fri Jun 01, 2007 15:37

I would advise anyone attending this event to be careful giving out personal information.

Since the same person who was involved with the IAWM has a history of sharing information with a political party is taking over this, you may think you are signing up to receive info regarding Palestine, but actually be putting yourself on the SWP mailing list. Be warned!

by Annoyed Fri Jun 01, 2007 15:48

Michael Y does not hold any position of responsibility in the IPSC. He will not have access to any personal details. The IPSC are embarrassed at the way he dragged them into an IAWM/SWP row on another thread.

The IPSC is not connected in any fashion with the SWP. The SWP does not control the IPSC nor will the SWP or its fellow travellers be allowed to destroy solidarity with the Palestinian People.

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Fri Jun 01, 2007 17:16

The main source of division between anti-war and solidarity activists in the country today, and particularly in Indymedia threads, is the fixation of a few anonymous scriblers with the SWP! This fixation and paranoia comes either from undeclared and subterranean political interests, like membership of other political organisations or other services, or the inability to get involved in any real struggles with any effect or support from people, and thus masturbating over their keyboards.
A few years ago, the usual way to attack the political work and integrity of an individual was to suggest that the he or she was "a fellow traveller" of the IRA. Now that the gunss are silent, the caps have changed but the tacric remains the same. Throw as much mud as you can and hope some of it will stick.
The two scribblers above obviously know as much about the iPSC or the IAWM or any other living political organisation as they know about the mountains on the side of the moon! The so-called 'embarassment' of the IPSC should be judged by the participation of a good number of activists in today's occupation of the EU offices and David's post re: the event. And all the work that is going in preparing for next week's events.

The rest is bullshit.

by Annoyed Fri Jun 01, 2007 18:05

IPSC members are pissed off with your posts here. I was talking to a member after my post above and he thought that might have dealt with matters. Obviously it has not.

You are a menace. Lets see what IPSC members have to say to you.

Your attempt to make the SWP into victims is pathetic. Indymedia readers know about the SWPs history of taking over and wrecking campaigns.

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Fri Jun 01, 2007 18:35

IPSC members I know, work with and speak to will be postering around Dublin City Centre tomorrow afternoon. We have a demonstration next Saturday 9th and if you are a member, or are close to one as you say, you would have got a txt to that effect.. IPSC members I know and respect stood shoulder to shoulder with militants of other progressive organisations this morning inside and outside the EU Office in Molesworth Street (pls check the other thread). IPSC members have the courage and conviction of their opinions and they stated clearly where they stand in our meeting last night - if u r a meber you would have got minutes from last night. IPSC members will be working very hard with members of other political organisations to make next week a success.

In the meantime, you can try as hard as you can to shit stir...it won't work. It was tried in a weekend conference a few months back in Glencree and it backfired on the person in question.

If you want advice, try to get involved in some constructive activity with IPSC comrades....I, on the other hand, will be waiting breathlessly for any meaningful comment that may originate from a bona-fide IPSC member.

I told you above - the rest is pure bull......

For more info on this morning, and the Press release pls check http://www.ipsc.ie/

by PaddyK Fri Jun 01, 2007 23:16

Thanks for the reply, MichaelY.

I know you guys know your stuff, I am just pre-empting the debate with a salvo of right minded logic. But If you want a "pro-Israel" speaker who would really wow the crowd you could try this individual out:

+++ "If they don't stop after we kill 100, then we must kill a thousand." He added, "And if they do not stop after 1,000 then we must kill 10,000. If they still don't stop we must kill 100,000, even a million. Whatever it takes to make them stop." +++

Fighting words indeed .. but from Who?

Dail Eireann Pest Control about the latest infestation of rats? No.

Israeli Minister for defence in relation to Hamas and Hizbollah enemy? No.

Shmuel Eliayhu, chief rabbi of Safad in relation to civilian men women and Children? Yes, the very geezer. Apparently :

"According to Jewish war ethics, wrote Eliyahu [Mordechai, Shmuel's Daddy and another holyman], an entire city holds collective responsibility for the immoral behavior of individuals. In Gaza, the entire populace is responsible because they do nothing to stop the firing of Kassam rockets."

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6987.shtml

I wonder does the "entire populace" of Israel Read this type of poison and Weep.

Good luck IPSC with the ongoing and the planned events.

by Daithi Sun Jun 03, 2007 12:49

Is this the same Tom Carew who is a former member, possibly even a former President, of the Public Service Executive Union (PSEU)? Interesting that attempts to raise the issue of Palestine within that union were blocked as not being something the membership agree on. With former or honorary members speaking out in favour of Zionism it's hardly surprising that leading PSEU members don't want to tackle this issue - better to leave contentious issues at the door of the annual drinking event which is the PSEU annual delegate conference than to risk falling out with old friends. The official Irish trade union movement, with a few noble exceptions, took far too long to support the Dunnes stores workers in their moral stand against South African apartheid - little surprise that they adopt the same attitude to Israel today.

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Sun Jun 03, 2007 13:43

Hi Daithi,

You are talking of the very same Tom Carew. Having met and spoken to him, I see him as a very straight and, interestingly, very honest pro-Israeli/pro-Zionist individual.....if you read Kathy Sheridan's piece on the elections in yesterday's Irish Times, she writes about the 'Breakfast Roll Man'...the one thing this fella has learnt, she says, is "to look after himself". He likes Sky Sports, he drinks a few pints but now prefers wine at home and doesn't wreck his head if the wife (or is it 'the mot'?) goes out shopping and spends " a bit too much"...... For him, protest politics are dead, lectures about povery and sucide don't cut it...they're not the future!! And, most likely, he voted Fianna Fail last week because the devil you know......

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Mon Jun 04, 2007 12:46

I was born in France, just after World War II. My parents spent the war in
France, suffering persecution and discrimination as Jews, but were lucky to
survive the Nazi occupation, as was most of my family, thanks to the
solidarity of ordinary French men and women. The stories of my childhood
were mostly stories of these dark years of occupation, and obviously made a
strong impact on my way of looking at the surrounding world.

Like the great majority of the Israeli people, in June1967 I had no doubt
about two things: that Israel was a weak and peaceful country surrounded by
strong and hostile Arab states, and that Israel was threatened by those
states. In those days I really feared for the very existence of Israel and
the future of the Israeli community in the Middle East. The unambiguous
military victory of the Israeli forces could be explained only by Divine
intervention, which was not a problem for me, because at that time I was
still religious. For the majority of the Israelis, who definitely were not
believers, the “miracle” of 1967 was the source of a new kind of ideology,
mixing religious messianism and brutal nationalism. Though for the majority
God didn’t exist, He nevertheless gave us this country, from the sea to the
river, and these property rights were unquestionably confirmed by the Bible,
which became a real-estate ownership certificate.

Though in those days I had no doubt that Israel was the innocent victim of
Arab aggression, I could not, however, share the general euphoria that
followed the war. Not only because my education immunised me against any
sort of messianism or nationalism, but above all because I was confronted
with an occupation. And, since the stories of my childhood, occupation was
the quintessence of evil: discrimination, deportation, death. As a Jew, I
thought, my place is with the occupied, never with the occupier,
independently of who is to blame for the war that brought about that
occupation.

This is how I found myself very quickly among the few dozen Israelis who,
already in the late sixties, decided to fight occupation and to support the
struggle of the Palestinian people for freedom and sovereignty. A struggle
to which I have devoted most of my time and energy during the last four
decades precisely because, as a son of the Jewish people, my place is on the
side of the oppressed and the victims.

Forty years have passed, and we haven't achieved our objectives.
Occupation continues and, despite the huge sacrifices of the Palestinian
people, the national liberation struggle has not achieved freedom and
sovereignty. Moreover, throughout these four decades, Israeli colonisation
has destroyed the internal cohesion of the Palestinian occupied territories,
making more and more difficult the establishment of a truly sovereign
Palestinian State.

For me, as for any other person on this Land, Jewish as well as Arab, this
anniversary is a moment for drawing a balance-sheet on our deeds, our dreams
and our achievements. Were our struggle and the sacrifice of many thousands
of Palestinian lives worthwhile? The answer is unambiguously YES.

First and foremost, because it is a moral duty. Even if failure seems the
only possible issue, a decent person has to oppose oppression and to resist
tyranny. Due to human solidarity, my family survived Nazi occupation; the
minimum I can do in a situation where my own country is occupying another
people is to be in solidarity with the victims. It is a debt I owe to those
who endangered their lives to protect us.

Second, because, though we have not yet won the war against occupation, we
have had some important achievements: the international recognition of the
right of the Palestinian people to live a sovereign life on this land; the
international as well as Israeli official recognition of the Palestinian
National Liberation movement, the PLO, as the representative of the
Palestinian people; the beginning of a process of withdrawal of the Israeli
occupation which, although aborted by Israeli sabotage, is due to be
resumed, sooner or later; the emergence of an Israeli mass movement against
occupation; and a majority sentiment, in Israel, that occupation has to end.

These achievements are not at all negligible, though they haven't brought an
end to the Israeli occupation. But who more than the Irish people can
understand that against a big power, ready to use all its might in order to
impose its rule on a foreign people and a foreign country, one needs a lot
of patience, steadfastness and determination?

These are the qualities the Palestinian people require to start the next
decade of struggle: armed with forty years of experience, successes as well
as failures, and empowered by the uncompromising will of all its sons and
daughters, supported by tens of millions of Arabs all over West Asia, the
Palestinian people will gain its full freedom and independence. This is not
in doubt, and it is the message that the thousands of Israelis who are
fighting for the same objective will raise loudly this week-end in the heart
of Tel Aviv, calling the Israeli people to give its full support to that
aspiration, in order to spare additional years of blood and suffering for
both peoples.

Can we discuss how we are to proceed?

by MLK Tue Jun 05, 2007 01:52

In response to your piece, I would like to point out that siding with the "occupied" regardless of how they got there and the course of history that lead them to that status is just fool-hearty and short-sighted. As a Jew who survived the Holocaust and WW2, it sounds like you at least acknowledge Israels sovereignty and its necessity for not only Jews, but peace-lovers and progressives the world around. Remember it is the Arabs who have instigated this conflict for 100 years, it is the Arabs who seek the destruction of Israel and not the other way around. Again, your comment that you will blindly side with any occupied peoples regardless of the history and actions that lead them to that place is just silly. In explaining why you sympathize with the Palestinian cause, please allow for some critical observance and self-reflection on the course of history. This, I assume, would be a good exercise for all those involved in this conflict, but for some reason I would only expect such actions to come from the Israeli side.

by Feyadeen Tue Jun 05, 2007 13:09

"but for some reason I would only expect such actions to come from the Israeli side."

You're going to have to explain what that "reason" might be, since your expectation is completely unrealistic. Israel has always refused to offer the Palestinians a genuine, just peace settlement, in spite of constant offers from Palestinian leaderships and the broader Arab world. The conflict endures because Israel is determined to continue occupying Palestinian land and refuses to define its own borders. Israel has in practice destroyed the Palestinian state and continues to maintain its obliteration from the face of the earth every day with extreme violence. Compared to this, the rhetorical threats of whatever Arab fanatic are puny. Michel Warschawski obviously knows far more about the experience of both the Jewish and Palestinian peoples than you do. The fact that you can serve up such dishonest rubbish and then pretend that the Israeli side is the generous, tolerant, understanding one is yet more proof of the mental contortions the pro-occupation camp will go through to justify the indefensible

by PaddyK Wed Jun 06, 2007 15:34

MichaelY asks : "Is the occupation inevitable, is it necessary or is it, perhaps, criminal?"

The question that must be asked is whether it is an occupation at all. It is undoubtedly an ethnic cleansing and colonisation process that is rigidly, and perhaps immovably, in place in the Palestinian Lands now. That is not an occupation. An occupation is a temporary military strategy. 40 Years on I dont think that can be said of Palestine.
Dr. Naseer Aruri - former member of The Palestine National Council believes it is "politicide" accepting as its ultimate goal the dissolution of the Palestinian people’s existence as a legitimate national, social, and economic entity, which may also include partial or total ethnic cleansing.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=2...13001

But Web definitions have another term for that:

Genocide : The systematic, planned annihilation of an ethnic, racial or political group

http://www.google.ie/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&defl=en&q=de...title

But if you look at the other side of the coin you will find that there is another reason why people claim this is not an occupation. Anti- Palestinian Racists are frequently heard to claim that the land cannot be occupied as it was never a sovereign territory in the first place. And that Israel has a right to pick and chose any or all parts of the land for sterilisation of indigenous people and colonisaiton by immigrants. They say it is disputed territory, not occupied. Disputed with who? I don't know... the Jordanians, perhaps, for example.

So is Palestine actually suffering an occupation at all, or is it a permanent genocidal transformation?

by MichaelY - iawm/ipsc Wed Jun 06, 2007 23:00

Just a repeat of a short invitation to all of you who care about the situation of the Palestinian people, who oppose racism and discrimination, to come and listen to Michael Warschawski from Jerusalem's Alternative Information Centre, tomorrow Thursday 7th, 19.00 hours sharp in the ATGWU Hall in Middle Abbey Street.
Tom Carew an ex-General Secretary of a Civil Servants Union will respond to Michael.
All welcome . Free entrance

by pat c Thu Jun 07, 2007 09:59

A minor correction. Tom Carew is the former president of the PSEU. This promises to be an interesting debate and would be well worth attending. Unfortunately I have a prior committment myself. I hope you get a good turnout.

by Rev MalcolmX - Church of Marx Fri Jun 08, 2007 15:06

having attended the debate last night. I can only describe Tom Carew as obnoxious in his analysis.
there should have been a person from Palestine on the platform. neithershould we apologise for using the word Zionism, apartheid wall. the person from Palestine who spoke from the floor analysis, I would fully endorse

by PaddyK Sat Jun 09, 2007 12:22

++there should have been a person from Palestine on the platform. ++

Wasn't Michel Warschawski there?

Can anybody give us a transcript or a recording or an overview of the meeting , please?

Or even a snippet?

Regards.