Intelligence Squared US, February 9, 2010
PRE-DEBATE VOTE:
FOR: 33% AGAINST: 42% UNDECIDED: 25%POST-DEBATE VOTE:
FOR: 49% AGAINST: 47% UNDECIDED: 4%
Israel believes America's special relationship is vital. It is, certainly, to Israel. But what about for the US? Israel has no oil, enemies in many places, and a tendency to defy Washington when it perceives its own interests to be threatened, which is not infrequently.
Jewish Voice for Peace, 11 February 2010
That's just a fraction of the reality on the ground in Israel/Palestine that stands in contrast to the official story about 'the only democracy in the Middle East.'
That's the story we hear when AIPAC tries to justify the billions of dollars in military aid Israel receives. That's the story many of us grew up with.
But something is happening in Israel. The success of the Palestinian nonviolent resistance movement has led to a crackdown on Palestinians and those who support them that is unlike anything we've seen before.
In fact, on a recent trip to Israel/Palestine, activists on the ground who we work with said they needed our help. They said: "Please help us get the word out. The crackdown is growing worse by the day, yet most of what happens is invisible to the media, policymakers, and individuals. We need you to make these stories visible so we can work together to stop what's happening."
Mr. Judt was a committed left-wing Zionist as a teenager. He spent summers in Israel on a kibbutz and was active in the Jewish youth movement. But he later soured on the Zionists’ utopian vision. As he recounts of the time he spent with young soldiers, “the insouciance with which they anticipated their future occupation and domination of Arab lands terrified me even then.”
Mr. Judt has been quoted frequently on the Palestine-Israel conflict, especially the US Israel lobby, in the Madison Rafah Journal.
PATRICIA COHEN, The New York Times, February 8, 2010
In one of the short personal reminiscences that the historian Tony Judt has been writing for The New York Review of Books he mentions that he was part of the “lucky generation” born in the affluent West after World War II, free to indulge in daydreams and passions.
On January 21, 2010 54 members of Congress sent a letter to President Obama calling for an end to the Gaza blockade by Israel and Egypt. You can thank Tammy Baldwin for signing this letter and supporting an end to the suffering in Gaza here.
Philip Weiss, Mondoweiss, February 4, 2010
Israel lobbyists are calling the 54 brave congresspeople who signed the letter to Obama against the Gaza blockade "the gang of 54," and trying to light a fire under em. One of them has cold feet. From Arutz Sheva wire:
Jeffrey Heller, Reuters, January 10, 2010
JERUSALEM – A U.S. peace envoy's suggestion that Washington could penalize Israel financially to force it to make concessions to the Palestinians drew Israeli ire on Sunday.
"Under American law, the United States can withhold support on loan guarantees to Israel," George Mitchell said on U.S. television on Wednesday after being asked about the kind of pressure that could be brought to bear on Israel.
Over the past two decades, Israel has received U.S. guarantees covering billions of dollars in loans, underwriting that has enabled it to raise money overseas more cheaply.
Although such guarantees have slipped in importance and Mitchell made clear in the U.S. public television interview that no sanctions against Israel were being considered, his remarks added more discord to Israeli relations with President Barack Obama's White House.
December 31, 2009
In 2008, the total revenues for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — the leading organization in the United States supporting Israeli occupation and apartheid — amounted to $70,676,421.
In that same year, the total revenues for the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation — the leading coalition in the United States working to change U.S. policy toward Palestine/Israel to support human rights, international law, and equality — amounted to $276,747, or just 0.39% of AIPAC's revenues.
In some ways, this is a depressing statistic. In other ways though, it is inspiring as it shows how much we've been able to accomplish with less than 1/200th of AIPAC's budget.
Even Howard Kohr, AIPAC's Executive Director (whose salary alone, by the way, is nearly double our annual operating budget) agrees that the movement we are helping to lead is having a profound impact. Consider our accomplishments and his concerns about them delivered in remarks at AIPAC's last annual conference:
Palestine Population
