On Chomsky, Abbas, Blair, Sabra and Shatila, Freedom Flotilla, Hebron, Settlers, Muslims, Jews and more.



Hope all of you are doing well. Sorry for the infrequent updates of PTT, due to force majeur. But this week, we are returning to our regular updating. Thanks to all of you who encouraged us during the sporadic updates. We truly appreciate your encouragement and support. We offer a lot of new items today, by some of our favourite contributors, hoping they will stimulate your minds and make you do something right for Palestine. Enjoy them and feel free to circulate, reprint with credits, link. As always, we enjoy a good discussion so join in on the discourse here or in Facebook discussions with Mary, Haitham and other contributors.

Included are: 1) a new deconstruction of Noam Chomsky's stance on Israel. It is must reading for anyone who considers him as the leader of the Palestinian movement. At best, he's just a friendly Zionist who now and then says the right things and makes a few good sound bites.
2) The absolute best piece of writing on what the meaning of the slaughter of Palestinians meant and still means. Written by one of the most talented writers and brilliant minds around, Reham Alhelsi.
3) Kawther Salam points out the details of how Tony Blair, in his position as the Middle East Envoy, came into enormous amounts of cash and made some incredible business deals with the son of Mahmoud Abbas....and how only war criminals win peace awards!
4) Dr. Boutaina Shaaban expresses how the focus on the killing of illegal settlers in Hebron is met with condemnation by the West, but points out the statistics in the area of Hebron to show that the all of this is to cover over what REALLY happens in Hebron.
5) Nima Shirazi, without any doubt THE best research-rogue-blogger has done it again. You will be hard pressed to find anything quite so complete in his presentation of how Israel's real problem has been mis-represented in order to maintain the status quo while looking like progress is being made. This paper will take you several hours to read, and more if you check out all the references and links, but boy is it worth your time.
6) Ramzy Baroud, insuperable in his analysis, as ever, informs us that the US/Muslim debate has been completely turned on its head by pre-conceived ideas. Another great think piece!
7) Anthony Lawson tells us just how the BBC Panorama "documentary" has been just another piece of propaganda. With Video.
8) Stephen Lendman has come up with an outstanding summary of how Abbas is more than just the most useless Palestinian politician on the scene, he's actually working for "massa".
9) Change we can believe in?

Jay Knott - Faithful Circle: A response to Noam Chomsky's A Fatal Triangle
Chomsky is by no means the worst example of chutzpah in the left. He is contradictory rather than duplicious. He exposes Jewish emotional blackmail. He is contemptuous of professional Holocaust survivors like Elie Wiesel. He is fearless and merciless at ridiculing the hypocrisy and hysteria for which American Jewish organizations are notorious, who claim that critics of the Lobby are anti-semitic. Some on the left also harrass and slander pro-Palestinian peace activists. Since Israel is the only beneficiary of these divisive tactics, we call them 'crypto-Zionists'.

But Chomsky's main weakness is his failure to scientifically test his assertion that Israel is an ally of the USA. On page 3, without evidence, he says that US policy favors "a Greater Israel that will dominate the region in the interests of American power".

To this end, Chomsky assumes that Arab nationalism is anti-West, whereas Jewish nationalism is pro-West. The former was allied to the Soviet Union. But this is at root a circular argument – the US supports Israel because it is an ally, and Israel is an ally because the US supports it. The reason some Arab leaders temporarily turned to Russia is because they were rejected by America, and the main reason for that is the influence of Israel. Chomsky confuses cause and effect.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/17/jay-knott-faithful-circle-a-response-to-noam-chomskys-book-fateful-triangle/

Reham Alhelsi - 28 years later, the Sabra and Shatila Massacre
28 years later and after some 20 years of useless “negotiations” between those who don’t represent us and those who butcher us, I remember Sabra and Shatila and every single massacre committed by the Zionists and their accomplices. I remember every single child, woman and man killed for the sake of Zionism. I remember every village, every town and every refugee camp that was ethnically cleansed, destroyed, bulldozed or bombed in the name of Zionism. I remember those who refused to sell their conscience, their honour and their land; I remember those who chose Palestine. And I remember those who shook the hands of the killers of our people, I remember those who “acknowledged” our killers, signed “treaties” with them and called them “our partners in peace”; I remember those who sold Palestine. And I will never forget.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/16/reham-alhelsi-28-years-later-sabra-and-shatila-massacre/

Ramzy Baroud - Regarding US Muslims, a misguided debate
Muslims must not fall into the trap of victimhood, and start dividing the world into good and evil, the West and Muslims, and so on. How could one make such generalized claims and still remain critical of the notion of a ‘clash of civilizations’? It remains that many Americans who have a negative perception of Muslims are not motivated by ideological convictions or religious zealotry. Most American clergy are not Koran-burning hateful priests, and not all media pundits are Bill O’Reilly.

There is no question that the conflict remains largely political. Misconceptions and misperceptions, manipulated by ill-intentioned politicians, media cohorts and substantiated by violence and war will not be resolved overnight. However, hundreds of interfaith dialogues and conferences will not change much as long as American armies continue to roam Muslim countries, support Israel and back corrupt leaders. Reducing the issue by signaling out a Muslim community in this country and then calling on frightened and fragmented communities to ‘make more effort’ is unfair and simply futile.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/16/ramzy-baroud-regarding-us-muslims-a-misguided-debate/

Kawther Salam - Tony Blair, a Medal for War Crimes
In Palestine, Blair used his position as envoy of the “Middle East Quartet” (UN, US, EU and Russia) to help the so-called “Wataniya projects”, which benefited his personal commercial sponsors and the group around President Abbas as well as the biggest of all fat cats Dr. Mohammad Mustafa who is Chairman of Wataniya Mobile, President of the Palestine Investment Fund and who styles himself as “financial adviser” of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The scandalous issue is that Blair, in coordination with fat cats of the PA, sucked US and OPEC donations  which were destined for small projects in Palestine like financing Palestinian farmers and unemployed people, in order to finance big projects such as Wataniya.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/14/6889/

Dr. Bouthaina Shaaban - When they shout, "We strongly condemn..."
For negotiations to succeed, the sponsors of the process should be convinced that the life of the Palestinians is at least equal to the life of a criminal settler living on a land not his own in order to steal this land and kill the people living on it. Only then, there might be some hope of achieving peace based on justice and not on killing one party and giving the occupying killing party everything it wants. When Obama, Clinton and the European Union condemn killing the Palestinians with the same strength they condemn the killing of settlers, there might be hope of a real peace in our region.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/16/when-they-shout-we-strongly-condemn/

Nima Shirazi - The Thin Green Line - It's not just the settlements or the occupation, stupid!
Through reading the articles and arguments of the progressive community against BDS, one thing becomes quite clear. The commentators feel like their grand design for a perfect Zionist future has been hijacked and sullied by the settler movement and its government (and foreign) backers. These forward-thinking humanitarians believe themselves to be the victims of a right-wing conspiracy to dash the hopes of any peace agreement. This is absurd. These Israelis and Americans suffered no actual injustice. Nothing has, in fact, been taken away from them, save perhaps their own integrity. They have been oppressed by no one. Unlike the Palestinians. And yet, the progressive discourse consistently omits Palestinian perspectives in their appraisal of the current situation. What do they want? Almost nowhere does the "Zionist left" of J Street and Huffington Post discuss what the actual victims of past and ongoing Zionist atrocities, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing want, or what tactic they believe would be the most effective to reach an acceptable, democratic, just, and peaceful solution in which all parties would be afforded equal civil and human rights, the same economic opportunities, and full political representation, as determined by international law. Apparently, these viewpoints – the voices of the victims and their descendants – are unimportant in the intellectual sphere of Ha'aretz and New York Times opinion. As Gideon Levy wrote a decade ago, "For most Israelis, the Palestinians are almost non-existent. They're like thin air…" ('An existential exercise,' Ha'aretz, 16 October 2000)
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/16/the-thin-green-line-its-not-just-the-settlements-or-the-occupation-stupid/

Anthony Lawson - BBC Bias, the Gaza Freedom Flotilla (with video)
Whatever happened on the Mavi Marmara on the morning of 31 May 2010, the BBC's Panorama team failed to give a balanced view of it in its so-called documentary, 'Death in the Med'. Even the title sounds more like that of a paperback mystery, rather than a serious analysis of Israel's worst atrocity since Operation Cast Lead.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/13/bbc-bias-the-gaza-freedom-flotilla/

Stephen Lendman - Fatah Collaborationist Israeli Ally
America and Israel were delighted with his elevation, a man seen as "colorless, moderately corrupt, and without any clear ideas of his own, except that he wants to please the white man," his masters in Washington and Tel Aviv. As a result, his "authenticity is what seems so lacking in the path cut out for" him, a stooge made president in a managed 2005 election.

Israel controlled the process, elevating him by imprisoning leading opposition candidate Marwan Barghouti on bogus murder charges, and obstructing Mustafa Barghouti for "demand(ing) total and complete reform, (ending all) form(s) of corruption, (and) mismanagement, and (working to) consolidate the rule of law."

As a result, Israeli forces arrested him during the campaign, then expelled him from East Jerusalem to prevent his planned campaign speech. He was also excluded from Nablus and Gaza, harassed and intimidated in a process rigged for Abbas, boycotted by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. In a field of seven candidates, Barghouti finished second, far behind his majority. He hasn't disappointed, gets White House photo-op rewards, and his son, a millionaire businessman, admits to "collaborat(ing) with Israel." His father does it tacitly against his own people.
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/13/fatah-collaborationist-israeli-ally/

Hijab at an Obama Rally, now REALLY?!
http://palestinethinktank.com/2010/09/16/cartoon-of-the-day-176/