This post was by the sockpuppet of a user that as been banned multiple times in the past. In accordance with new site policy, it has been removed. -- Hunter

This post was by the sockpuppet of a user that as been banned multiple times in the past. In accordance with new site policy, it has been removed. -- Hunter

Earlier today I read a very good diary by Jay Elias called,

We Should All Support the Rule of Law in Israel

http://www.dailykos.com/...

But then I found myself confused by one statement. That one thing I found confusing is that it discussed the rule of law in Israel and Israelis living in the West Bank, now under military occupation, but it also referred to the actions of Palestinians in a protest. And as I read it, Palestinians should also follow the rule of law instead of protesting. I don’t know if that actually was intended, since most of the essay described Israelis on the West Bank.

The horrors of Sudan and the Darfur region we continue to hear about make for depressing news, but when children become involved, it is less easy to just sit by. Where is our government? Aren’t they supposed to represent the people? Well, one person, this person, is asking: where is our government and why isn’t it responding to the Darfur genocide?

Reading about poverty in Israel, the only thing that comes to mind is the effect of the Minister of Finance, Netanyahu’s, new policies on the economy. Like America, he made the Israeli Stock Market the fastest growing in the western world by adapting broad Reaganomic changes, like deregulation and fat breaks for business. The stock market doubled in one year I recall, and it has likely increased the number of millionaires in Israel in addition. But with predictable effects, the level of poverty among ordinary Israelis has increased.

Milton Friedman would here likely note that these so-called "poor people" are better off than they have ever been, have TVs, and many probably have a cell phone. How many people had cell phones 20 years ago? What poverty. Their lives have been improved considerably by supply side economics. The "let the private sector do it" philosophy, along with a lot of venture capitalists, unfettered by regulations and heavy taxes, makes everyone rich.

UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (IRIN) reported this morning that still further deadly floods could result after the March 27 flood from a sewage basin. Five persons were reported killed and many injured in the Bedouin village of Umm Nasser when an earth embankment surrounding a sewage reservoir collapsed (photo). Causes of the collapse ranged from weakening due to Israeli IDF bombing to local neglect related to the impoverished resources of the communities involved or the Palestinian government. The villagers have since been living in tents on higher ground provided by the UN (photo).
   

As more and more Israelis and Palestinians come to the US on speaking tours, more and more Americans are learning the truth about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the injustices, and the need to establish peace through real solutions. In this announcement from the Council for the National Interest, a group of Israeli and Palestinian women has come to the US to do just that.

This announcement was written by Terry Walz, CNI Staff and sent out on April 10, 2007 (reprinted here with CNI’s permission).

This blurb comes from a relative in the Houston area about a small bunch of people protesting the Palestinian occupation and any attack on Iran on a bridge. This is just for people in the Houston area to join in if you are against these actions.

D I S T R I B U T E W I D E L Y , the announcement goes about a Planned Houston Freeway Protest Against Israel. The pictures show past protests.
   

FREEWAY BLOGGING (PROTESTS WITH SIGNS) IN HOUSTON, TEXAS ON MANDELL BRIDGE (NOT WOODHEAD) OVER HWY. 59 (SOUTHWEST FREEWAY) ALL INVITED. Photos of previous Wednesday protests show the site.

This is an odd story about Sudanese refugees from genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. Since 2005, many have trekked to Israel from Egypt for asylum, after Egypt began suppressing demonstrations. But on arrival in Israel, they found themselves imprisoned by government authorities for long periods on a technicality that Sudan is classified as an enemy state. Private Israeli agencies are working to have 120 of them still held captive, released.

This report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (IRIN) is difficult to absorb considering that it is occurring the Palestinian territories, in places where human rights are continually violated by the military occupying power, Israel. This rights violation, the killing of three women for alleged sexual improprieties, however, is intolerable, no matter what attribution it is given. Last week, this UN office issued a similar report concerning "honor killings" in Jordan. In these countries and perhaps the Middle East in general, woman’s rights have not progressed far, except possibly among western educated peoples. Men are still not subjected to the same standards as women, and the consequences can be hypocritically severe.

According to this report (reprinted by permission),

It seems that there is a raging battle going on in Israel and Palestine for the minds of their children. This diary should be called, The Battle of the Schoolbooks, since it is all about how to divide this land, fought over now for over 60 years.

The strangest discovery about schoolbooks in Israel and Palestine is that they represent the most extremist viewpoints of the conflict. Israeli schoolbooks show an Israel without any West Bank or Gaza, no Palestinian presence. Palestinian schoolbooks show a Palestine without any Israel. There’s no Green line in discussion here. It is all or nothing.

America has lost its way as the lead advocate of human rights in the world. The situation in Darfur continues to remain in crisis as aid workers, intending to return to regions of Sudan including Darfur, are now being denied access. What is America doing about it? Whether it is due to CIA involvement with the Sudanese government in the war on terror or the quest for Sudan’s oil, the United States is no longer playing its traditional role as a human rights advocate. Human rights including genocide have been moved to the back burner, while causes more expedient than human lives are pushed into the foreground.

United Nations Under-Secretary-General John Holmes recently called for freedom of movement from the Sudanese government. What is the United States doing to make that happen?

In spite of the modernity that seems to have overtaken the well-spoken Western-educated King of Jordan, his country remains mired in antiquated traditions, and none is more loathsome than the honor killing. Honor killings of women in Islamic society appear to derive from far more than just the sexual repressive nature of the culture it molds. It appears to be a special treatment assigned to women suspected of sexual impropriety, even of the most innocent kind. It is obviously rooted in prejudice. There is no known case of an honor killing of a man, who allegedly engaged in sexual acts like adultery or premarital sex or just falling in love, a mild standard that has nonetheless lead to the honor killings of women, but not men.

This report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (IRIN, reprinted in accordance with copyright policy) tells us that woman’s rights in the Middle East has a long, long way to go.

UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs today reported continuing injuries and deaths from unexploded cluster bombs in southern Lebanon. If recalled, southern Lebanon was blanketed with cluster bombs in the closing days of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. These cluster bombs caused not only economic hardship from the inability to use contaminated farmlands, but injuries and death from unexploded bomblets as those seen below. Over one thousand Lebanese lives, mostly from the Shiite community, were lost. Along with the southern Lebanese infrastructure, this invasion may turn out to be one of the most useless and wasteful military adventures that Israel, in collaboration with the Bush administration, has undertaken.

Once again, civilians have proven to be no match for a modern military force armed with the latest weapons provided by the United States. 80% of the Lebanese dead were ordinary people. The count of maimed and wounded is unknown.

Two reports from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs show more house demolitions in East Jerusalem. The Palestinian side says the intent is to displace the Arab residents.

........FOR PEACE. Yes. Israeli and Palestinian women are tired of continued conflict. The Coalition of Women for Peace, an Israeli organization that cooperates with Palestinian counterparts to bring women together to fight for peace. These women have united and see their causes as one. An example of that closeness is the woman in this picture. An Israeli woman wearing the mask of an Arab woman intended to signal unity.