Gilad Atzmon: Apropos ‘Peace Talks’

Needless to mention, I don’t hold my breath for the outcome of the current ‘peace talks’. As I mentioned many times before, Israelis are not interested in peace as they fail to grasp what peace is all about or what it stands for. Shalom, the Hebrew word for peace, is interpreted by Israelis and most Jews as ‘security for the Jews’. Shalom therefore has nothing to do with reconciliation or living amongst others. Shalom is a judeo-centric concept, it conveys an image of hope to one people only. The Israeli Palestinian conflict can never be resolved by a ‘shalom initiative’. Shalom is there to split the land and  separate the people. It is there to deny the Palestinians of their elementary rights such as  the Right of Return.

But let us assume for a second that I am completely wrong in my reading of the Israelis and their cultural and political understandings. Let’s for that purpose look into an imaginary scenario in which an Israeli PM wakes up one sunny morning with the unusual determination to bring about true peace. In the wee small hours, wisdom embraces him or her. He or she realises that Israel is in fact Palestine: it is stretched over historic Palestine at the expense of the Palestinian people, their livelihood and their history. He or she grasps that the Palestinians are the indigenous people of the land, and the rockets they shoot from time to time are nothing but love letters to their stolen villages, orchards, vineyards and fields.

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Learn more about the Nakba

from an Israeli who is brave enough to admit the sin...

Monzer Zimmo: Palestinian recognition of Israel, a Jewish state – Why?

http://alcanaanite.wordpress.com/2010/09/07/palestinian-recognition-of-israel-a-jewish-state-why/

Why do Benjamin Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman, and other Zionist leaders insist that “without Palestinian recognition that Israel is the state of the Jewish people, there will not be peace”?  They have declared themselves as such.  They enjoy the support of most European nations, United States of America, Canada, Australia, and many other countries in the world that have no problem whatsoever in describing the state of Israel as such.  Many Arab countries – with leaders suffering from near-sighted vision – would have no problem going along with that concept.  Almost every country with significant military, economic, or diplomatic power and influence either fully agrees with the description of the state of Israel as the state of the Jewish people or has no real problem with it.  So, why does the Israeli leadership insist on demanding that recognition from the powerless, penniless Palestinian leadership?

Here are some thoughts in that regard:

Some say that the likes of Netanyahu and Lieberman enjoy humiliating Palestinians.  Insisting on that demand gives the Israeli leadership the opportunity to further add the insult of surrender to the 62-year old injury of the open wound of the Palestinian people.  Gaining such recognition or not is of little relevance.  Continuing to insult the Palestinian people and to humiliate its leadership is what matters to those Israeli leaders; for that is their aphrodisiac.

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Lauren Booth: An Al Quds day letter to Tony Blair. From Lauren Booth, in Iran.

Gilad Atzmon: I guess that Tony Blair’s  sister in law, Lauren Booth, could easily use the phone and tell Tony what she thinks of him, his politics and his new memoir. However, being a peace activist she decided also to share it with the rest of us.  

An Al Quds day letter to Tony Blair. From Lauren Booth, in Iran.

By Lauren Booth
3 September 2010


Dear Tony,

Congratulations on your political memoir becoming an instant bestseller. I’m in Iran and have the only copy in the country.  I can tell you, its so fiercely fought over, it’s worth its weight in WMD’s. Note to Random House; have ‘A Journey’ translated into Farsi and Arabic asap, it’ll fly off the shelves in this part of the world.
Tony, yesterday I went the Al Quds day protest in Tehran. You may have heard of it? It’s the rally where Iranians gather to protest against Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine, including the Holy city of Jerusalem.

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Gilad Atzmon: Bloody Memoir

Tony Blair, a man who launched a criminal war with no end, declared once again today that “Radical Islam is the world's greatest threat”

He made the remark in a BBC interview marking the publication of his memoirs.

Mr Blair said radical Islamists believed that whatever was done in the name of their cause was justified - including the use of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.

I can’t make up my mind whether Blair’s remark is amusing or tragic for not a single  Islamic leader has ever used “chemical, biological or nuclear weapons”. If anything it is Britain and the USA who deployed weaponry that contained depleted uranium. A recent  study reveals that the Cancer rate in Fallujah, Iraq is worse than Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

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Learn More About Jewish Love

James Petras:The State and Local Bases of Zionist Power in America

Introduction
    Any serious effort to understand the extraordinary influence of the Zionist power configuration over US foreign policy must examine the presence of key operatives in strategic positions in the government and the activities of local Zionist organizations affiliated with mainstream Jewish organizations and religious orders.
    There are at least 52 major American Jewish organizations actively engaged in promoting Israel’s foreign policy, economic and technological agenda in the US (see the appendix).  The grassroots membership ranges from several hundred thousand militants in the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) to one hundred thousand wealthy contributors, activists and power brokers in the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).  In addition scores of propaganda mills, dubbed think tanks, have been established by million dollar grants from billionaire Zionists including the Brookings Institute (Haim Saban) and the Hudson Institute among others.  Scores of Zionist funded political action committees (PAC) have intervened in all national and regional elections, controlling nominations and influencing election outcomes.  Publishing houses, including university presses have been literally taken over by Zionist zealots, the most egregious example being Yale University, which publishes the most unbalanced tracts parroting Zionist parodies of Jewish history (Financial Times book review section August 28/29 2010).  New heavily funded Zionist projects designed to capture young Jews and turn them into instruments of Israeli foreign policy includes “Taglit-Birthright” which has spent over $250 million dollars over the past decade sending over a quarter-million Jews (between 18-26) to Israel for 10 days of intense brainwashing (Boston Globe August 26, 2010).  Jewish billionaires and the Israeli state foot the bill.  The students are subject to a heavy dose of Israeli style militarism as they are accompanied by Israeli soldiers as part of their indoctrination; at no point do they visit the West Bank, Gaza or East Jerusalem (Boston Globe August 26, 2010).  They are urged to become dual citizens and even encouraged to serve in the Israeli armed forces.  In summary the 52 member organizations of the Presidents of the Major American Jewish Organizations which we discuss are only the tip of the iceberg of the Zionist Power Configuration:  taken together with the PACs, the propaganda mills, the commercial and University presses and mass media we have a matrix of power for understanding the tremendous influence they have on US foreign and domestic policy as it affects Israel and US Zionism.

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Gilad Atzmon: The Lowest of the Low

Millions of ballot papers have been sent out yesterday to those eligible to vote in the Labour leadership election. Symbolically enough, this happened the day Tony Blair, the British PM who launched the criminal war in Iraq, published his controversial memoirs.

I am not holding my breath for the Labour party to make the right decision. Clearly, the same party failed to curtail Blair’s militant enthusiasm, even when it was plainly clear that the argument for the Iraq war was grounded in a dodgy dossier.

Considering the scale of the atrocities we are all complicit in thanks to the Labour government, it is my duty to remind the Labour party members who their leading candidate is, what he stands for and what interests he may serve.

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All That Jazz-an interview with Chema Garcia Martinez

Last week ahead of my Ibiza Jazz Festival's concert  I had a short email  exchange with  Spanish writer Chema Garcia Martinez (El Pais). We discussed topics to do with  Jazz,Culture,  USA, Palestine, Israel and  Jewish identity. I guess that the followers of my writing  and music may find it interesting. 

update:

To read Chema's article on El Pais

Q: Is there any reason to keep on playin´ jazz in 2010?

GA: I don’t play Jazz for a ‘particular reason’; I am not committed to this form of music ideologically or religiously. I just love it. I am entertained by the idea of reinventing myself on a daily basis and Jazz allows it to happen. However, the collapse of the music industry allows us to look at music in broader terms. While in the past we had to play within a defined style just to make sure that the record company knows how to shelve it in the record shop and in the market place, nowadays the boundaries are disappearing. At last we are free.

Q: What does the word “jazz” mean for you?

GA: Jazz is innovation, it isn’t just beauty, it is beauty in its making. Jazz is freedom. It is freedom to think and the freedom to express. Jazz is a celebration of one’s symptoms. For me Jazz is the ultimate art form. Yet I hear Jazz in Bach and even Palestrina, I can read Jazz in poetry, in visual art and architecture. Jazz is the attempt to constantly define and re-define the notion of itself. From that perspective Jazz is similar to philosophy. For philosophy is also engaged in an attempt to redefine itself through the act of philosophizing.

Q: Is it necessary for a jazz musician in 2010 to play in the US?

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I love his directness.

Here are a few words by Ken O'keefe, a solidarity hero: a man who embodies the true spirit of resistance.

You are among the conscious minority who can see amid the collective insanity of the masses who are blind.

You have a heart and you use it for so much more then the simple necessity of pumping of blood.

You are truly blessed yet this blessing is often lost in the illusions of popular culture.

You have been given the greatest gifts of all, the gifts of life & humanity… and you are wise enough to exercise and nurture them.

You are often ignored or vilified or imprisoned or worse, yet you are who you are, you are human.

You are the conspirator and co-creator of a better world, a just and peaceful world.

You are the ancestor of those yet unborn.

You are my brother, my sister, my family, and we are one.

We are Truth, we are Justice, we are Peace,

And we are indomitable!

Ken O'keefe