Life in Southeast Alaska vs Life in Occupied Palestine:
Southeast: Fish are starting to run. Commercial boats are gearing up for the first sockeye opening in two weeks. There is plenty of ice for the cooler.
Palestine: Israeli terrorists continue attacks on Palestinian fishermen. With Israeli power cuts, and dire poverty of fishermen, ice is a problem. There’s an awful story by Gideon Levy from Haaretz on June 13 about Israeli navy shooting an unarmed Gaza fisherman 15 times at point blank range with rubber coated steel bullets. They targeted his eyes. He is blind now.
June 2019, Week 2
Saturday
06.08.2019 52nd anniversary of Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty Foreign Policy Journal by Paul Craig Roberts. Today is the anniversary of the most disgraceful betrayal of the American military by the American government in American history. June 8, 1967, clear day, unlimited visibility, Israeli jets and torpedo boats tried to sink the most sophisticated US naval vessel in the Mediterranean. Even thought they killed 34 sailors and wounded 174 -70% of the crew the Israelis failed. Through remarkable courage and seamanship, the sailors aboard the Liberty saved the ship. Israel would later claim they mistook her for a 1920’s Egyptian horse carrier.
“The White House, fearing the Israel Lobby, prevented the US Navy from going to the defense of the Liberty.” Crew members were threatened with court martial and prison if they ever talked about it.
36 years later Admiral Thomas Moorer, former Chief of Naval Operations, and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, convened an Independent Commission of Inquiry. Others on the commission were Marine Corps general, and former Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps, Ray Davis, Rear Admiral Merlin Staring (former Judge Advocate General of the US Navy, and former Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, James Akins.
The Commission found Israel deliberately attacked the Liberty and,
due to influence of Israel’s powerful supporters in the United States the White House deliberately cover-up the facts of this attack from the America people.”
That cover up continues to this day.
That the cover- up is without precedent in American Naval history and the existence of the cover-up is supported by statements of Admiral Staring and Captain Ward Boston (who was ordered to do a cursory investigation and to find Israel innocent in 1967)
That the cover-up is an ongoing national disgrace.
That a danger to our national security exists whenever our elected officials are willing to subordinated American interests to any foreign nation, and specifically are unwilling to challenge Israel’s interests when they conflict with America’s interest; this policy evidenced by the failure to defend USS Liberty and the subsequent official cover-up of the Israeli attack, endangers the safety of Americans and the security of the United States.”
06.08.2019 More than 100 commercial, cultural, and sporting activities in Italy declare themselves free of Israeli apartheid IMEMC Article has a list of participants including trade unions, shops, B&B’s, and a brewery (whose owners say “beer does not go well with apartheid”) in Italy. The Italians have joined with other apartheid free zones already in place in Belgium, Norway, and Spain.
06.08.2019 Israeli forces invade Jabal al-Mukabber, abduct 5 Palestinians IMEMC Southeast Jerusalem: Night and fog raids. Jewish occupation troops attacked the village with concussion grenades and rubber coated steel bullets. Ransacked homes, black-bagged four teenagers, and a minor girl. One of the boys was injured from beating by Israeli soldiers.
06.08.2019 Israel ‘has the right’ to annex parts of the West Bank, U.S. Ambassador Haaretz Zionist extremist David Friedman proves once again that he is Israel’s ambassador not America’s. Among other things, he blames the Palestinians for no peace. Compares Israel’s presence in the occupied territories to U.S. presence in Germany, Japan, and South Korea [How many night and fog raids have American troops made in Germany, Japan, South Korea during the past 50 years?]
06.08.2019 Democrats with eye on White House increasingly willing to criticize Bibi while supporting Israel. Haaretz by Amir Tobin. As more Americans express disgust at both parties licking Netanyahu’s fingers, some ineffectual blather from democrats. None of them saying American should stop funding the occupation.
06.08.2019 Army assaults and abducts a guard of the al-Aqsa mosque IMEMC Jewish occupation troops beat-up and arrested one of the mosque guards because he tried to stop them-and the Jewish colonists they were escorting-from walking in the mosque with their shoes on, which is against Muslim protocols.
06.08.2019 Soldiers abduct a young man and a young woman near Bethlehem and Jerusalem IMEMC. Jewish occupation troops ransacked a Bethlehem area home and black-bagged 24-year-old Yousef abu Srour. Other troops black-bagged a Jenin woman for allegedly carrying a knife.
Elsewhere in the West Bank, other occupation troops threatened to steal farmers’ agricultural tools if they didn’t leave their fields, which the occupiers say is too close to an illegal Jewish colony of Shavei Shomron.
06.08.2019 Soldiers injure several Palestinians, confiscate 2 cars, near Hebron IMEMC Beit Ummar, north of Hebron. Jewish occupation troops closed the town’s main road, gassed the people, began searches and interrogations, fired rubber coated steel bullets. Then the Israelis stole two cars from villagers and left.
06.08.2019 For the third consecutive day, illegal colonists burn olive trees near Ramallah IMEMC. Jewish colonists burned more than 100 Palestinian olive trees. Jewish occupation troops responded to the attack by keeping Palestinian firefighters from reaching the fire. Local people were able to put out the fires with branches and sticks before it spread to wheat fields.
Sunday
06.09.2019 Young Palestinian shot by Israeli forces in North Hebron IMEMC. Locals report occupation troops shot a young man in the back with live ammunition.
06.09.2019 Soldiers abduct a Palestinian teen in Jerusalem IMEMC. Parents of 17-year-old reported him missing when he didn’t show up for school finals. They learned the occupation had arrested him claiming he possessed a knife.
06.09.2019 Illegal Israeli colonists try to stop the installation of cellular phone tower IMEMC. Jewish colonists, protected by occupation troops, tried to stop a Palestinian company from installing a tower on a Palestinian home in the occupied West Bank. Eventually, after a lot of yelling, the tower went up.
06.09.2019 PPS: “Israeli soldiers abduct 37 Palestinians during post al-Fitting feast IMEMC. Night and fog raids to disrupt happiness after Ramadan ending feast.
06.09.2019 Settlers break into al Aqsa IMEMC. Estimated 330 Jewish extremists made their latest provocation at the mosque under protection of occupation troops.
06.09.2019 Signs of break through on border dispute talks between Israel and Lebanon Jerusalem Post. Mohammad al Kassim. Turns out the US has been mediating between Lebanon and Israel for ten years. [how much has that cost us?]
Monday
06.10.2019 Cory Booker says he supports new anti-BDS legislation: “There are elements in the BDS movement that want to destroy the state of Israel” Mondoweiss by Michale Araia. Cory-all about the Benjamins- Booker is back in the news choosing Israeli occupation over American’s First Amendment right to free speech. Article mentions a leaked recording of Booker telling AIPAC members he wants to establish “a unified voice from congress” to oppose BDS.
06.10.2019 Palestinian medic dies from wounds suffered in Gaza IMEMC. Jewish snipers, firing at unarmed civilians from the safety of military embankments, shot 36-year-old medic Mohammad al-Jadeili in the face with a rubber coated steel bullet six weeks ago on May 3rd as the man was treated others who had been shot Jewish snipers. The bullet fractured Mohammad’s nose, facial bones, and skull.
Also from IMEMC
06.10.2019 Israel confiscates 20 dunhams in northern West Bank Israel take five more acres of Palestinian lands to pave a road to illegal Jewish colony.
06.10.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct 11 Palestinians Night and fog raids.
06.10.2019Caravan seized by Israeli forces near Tulkarm Palestinian family was reclaiming their parcel of land when Israel brought in a crane, picked up their little caravan trailer, and stole it.
06.10.2019 Hunger striking detainee Hassan al Oweiwi to be released After 69 days the hunger striker, who is being held indefinitely without trial or charges, has extracted an agreement from his captors to let him go.
06.10.2019 New York Times global edition is ending daily political cartoons New York Times by Steve Lohr. This is an actual headline. After Israel supporters hyperventilated about the NYT printing a political cartoon of Netanyahu as a seeing-eye wiener dog leading blind Donald Trump, NYT editorial page editor James Bennet has announced the paper will stop printing political cartoons. Bennet said the move was to bring the international edition “into line with the domestic paper.”
Tuesday
06.11.2019 Israeli soldiers surround a Palestinian security center in Nablus, shoot one officer IMEMC. Jewish occupation troops shot a Palestinian security center in a night and fog raid. The Israelis claim the Palestinians shot at them. Palestinians say that’s false. This was another in Israel’s escalating attacks on Palestinians. After the attack, the Israelis drove through the neighborhood shooting homes at random.
06.11.2019 Palestinian officer injured after being shot by Israeli soldiers in West Bank Middle East Eye. Back-story of Jewish occupation troops attacking police station. Palestinian police officers ordered a suspicious civilian car to stop. Turns out the car was full of undercover Israeli terrorists disguised as Palestinians. It was after this that Israel attacked the police station and shot up the neighborhood.
0611.2019 Israel lobbies German government to enforce motion defining BDS as anti-Semitic Haaretz by Noa Landau. Israel interfering in other countries’ politics, again.
06.11.2019 ‘Like a swastika, or confederate flag: how the dyke march turned the star of David into a hate symbol Haaretz by Ariel Sobel. Israeli press publishes another article about American activists not being okay with Israelis using them as props for the occupation. A better title would be ‘how Israel turned the star of David into a hate symbol.’
In other news from IMEMC.
06.11.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct two Palestinians, assault 2 children, in Hebron
06.11.2019 Army demolishes a residential building in Hebron.
06.11.2019 Israeli soldiers demolish an under construction building in Jerusalem. (they didn’t let the owners get their stuff out first.)
06.11.2019 Soldiers abduct nine Palestinians in Ramallah, Jerusalem, and Tulkarem.
06.11.2019 John Gunther Dean, U.S. Ambassador as Cambodia fell, dies at 93. New York Times. by Katherine Qseelye. Only a brief mention in the article of the assassination attempt on Dean and his family along the Lebanon border when he was America’s ambassador to Lebanon. Dean was adamant to the end that the attack; 21 bullets, 2 light anti-tank rounds, was the work of Israeli Mossad. He had the connections to trace the anti-tank rounds and found they were made in America, and were sent to Israel as part of a weapons gift in 1974.
Wednesday
06.12.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct two shepherds in Lebanese territory IMEMC Israeli soldiers crossed the border into Lebanon, captured two Lebanese shepherds, and took them to the occupied Sheba Farms zone. Lebanon is working with the UN to effect the shepherd’s return.
Also from IMEC
06.12.2019 Army abducts two Palestinians in Jenin
06.12.2019 Soldiers abduct three Palestinians in Hebron.
06.12..2019 Israel demolishes a residential shed, walls and fences near Hebron.
06.12.2019 Soldiers demolish residential shells, tents, and barns in northern plains.
06.12.2019 Soldiers destroy a well east of Tubas. A small water well a farmer used to water his plants and trees on his own lands.
06.12.2019 Israeli soldiers demolish a building, commercial sheds, injure many Palestinians near Jerusalem. Gas barrage sickened people. One Palestinian shot in the back with a gas bomb.
06.12.2019 Israeli city takes step towards becoming global food-tech center Haaretz by Ora Coren. Another “We will feed the world” article from the country that is completely dependent on imported food.
Thursday
06.13.2019 IDF gunfire left this Gaza fisherman blind. Israel won’t let him get treatment Haaretz by Gideon Levy. Masked Jewish terrorists in Israeli navy inflatable gunboats, launched in the dark from a mother ship, shot an unarmed Palestinian fisherman 15 times, at point blank range, with rubber coated steel bullets. They targeted his upper body and head. He’s blind now because they shot out his eyes. One eye was removed. They other is also dead because Israeli siege troops left the man at a checkpoint and denied him access to treatment to fix it. Impacts to his skull have also impacted his hearing and sense of smell. Israel also stole his boats.
The man is Khaer al-Saaidy. He’s married, and a father of three. Two years earlier, in a similar scenario, Jewish terrorists in a navy gunboat attacked a boat he was fishing on and shot his fishing partner in the face blinding him in one eye. Israel shot al-Saaidy in the leg that night. They arrested him and put him in prison for 14 months claiming he’d violated Israel’s arbitrarily imposed fishing zone limit. He denies that.
Levy writes, Nowhere are soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces as heroic against the defenseless than in the waters outside Gaza. Nowhere are they more cruelly abusive to the helpless people, whose only aim is to make a living, than in those waters—and no place is farther from media attention than the Gaza sea…There is no easier collective punishment for Israel to impose than restricting the zone which Gazans are permitted to fish.”
Article notes that Israel squeezed the accordion 10 times in the past 3 months, expanding and contracting the fishing zone. So far t his year, 8 wounded fishermen, 21 fishermen blackbagged, 4 boats stolen by Israel. In 2000 there were 10,000 Gaza fishermen. Today only a third of them are still fishing. 95 percent of those make less than $4.60 a day.
06.13.2019 After watching ‘Chernobyl’ one nagging question remains: What about Israel’s nuclear reactor? Haaretz. New HBO series looks at the disastrous nuclear meltdown of Chernobyl. The world’s oldest nuclear reactor is Israel’s nuclear weapons reactor Dimona.
06.13.2019 Foreign Ministry condemns Moldova’s embassy move to Jerusalem IMEMC Moldova is a small, land locked country with a lot of problems. It sits between Ukraine and Romania. The announcement was made by embattled Prime Minister Pavel Filip just before his ouster as he was trying to curry favor from the United States and Israel. The new Moldova government may rescind the embassy move. [This is exactly the same scenario as happened with Paraguay’s President Horatio Cartez announced Paraguay was moving their embassy to Jerusalem as he was being shown the door by voters. Four months later the new government moved the embassy back to Tel Aviv. Israeli’s were upset.]
06.13.2019 Female Palestinian journalist jailed for ‘Incitement’ IMEMC. 42-year-old mother of five, Lama Khater, was arrested at her home last year on July 24, 2018. She was taken to Ashkelon prison for more than a month of intensive interrogation, held without trial or charges. She’s now been sentenced by the military judges and she is supposed to be released in August.
06.13.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct a father, his wife, and son in Bethlehem IMEMC Night and fog raid in Aida refugee camp. Ransacked the home. Black-bagged the men. Article notes that three days ago Jewish occupation troops destroyed the family’s agricultural sheds.
06.13.2019 Army fires missiles into farmlands in Gaza IMEMC. Apparently vegetables are an existential threat to Israel as the Jewish state fired two artillery shells into farm lands. The Israelis also bombed homes and buildings in Gaza City and Raffah, claiming the Palestinians attacked them with toy balloons again.
06.13.2019 Israel’s month of 1,000 wildfires. Greenpeace by Dr. Jonathan Aikhenbaum. Temperatures up to 45 C (113 F) have made Israel and Palestine a tinderbox. Global warming, not Palestinians, caused over 1,000 fires in Israel, many of them spreading out of control. [Author blames Global warming, but a case can be made that the fires are exacerbated by bad Israeli land management, such as planting forests of Aleppo pine, and cutting down Palestinian olive groves where trees are spaced farther apart and are more fire resistant.]
06.13.2019 Combination of articles on today’s attacks on civilians.
Today the Israeli occupation army:
1) Abducted two Palestinians in Hebron.
2) invaded homes in Jericho, Qalquila, and Jerusalem.
3) Bulldozed over an acre of agricultural lands near Nablus.
4) Stole a Palestinian guy’s car.
06.13.2019 Jerusalem’s Christian leaders blast decision to sell old city properties to settler groups Haaretz by Nir Hasson. Christians may lose access to tithe Church of the Holy Sepulcher if Jewish extremists get control of the property. Christian leaders say the extremists bribed Christians who had no right to sell the land.
Friday
06.14.2019 Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, AOC, sign bill to stop U.S. aid to Israel IMEMC Bill introduced by senior congress woman Betty McCollum would prohibit American aid from funding Israel if it keeps trying/imprisoning children under military laws of the occupation. “Promoting Human Rights by ending Israeli Military detention of Palestinian children Act.”
06.14.2019 EU court: settlement products should be labeled IMEMC. Advocate General of the European Court of Justice has made a statement of his legal opinion that products from Israeli colonies in the occupied territories should be labeled as to where they came from so as not to mislead consumers.
06.14.2019 Greek orthodox church calls Israeli court ruling unfair IMEMC. Greek Orthodox Patriarchate trying to block sale for church property near Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City, that is being taken over by right-wing Israeli extremist colonists.
06.14.2019 Army injures several Palestinians during peaceful protest near Nablus IMEMC Jewish occupation troops gassed local villagers and shot concussion grenades at them.
06.14.2019 Jewish and Israeli scholars to German government: Boycotts are a legitimate and non-violent tool of resistance IMEMC. Acting on behalf of Israel, the Bundestag (German Parliament) narrowly passed a motion labeling BDS anti-Semitic. Jewish scholars sent them a message that what they have done doesn’t fight anti-Semitism, it does the opposite. They call on the German government not to endorse the motion.
06.14.2019 Israeli private intelligence company Black Cube out of control The Real News Network. An Israeli Television news magazine UVDA, showed focused on Israeli security companies, spying on people, including Israelis. In particular they address Black Cube, founded in 2010, which hires former (and maybe current) Israeli intelligence agents and spies who use tactics to gather dirt, intelligence, and information for the highest bidder. Many Americans learned about Black Cube when Harvey Weinstein fired them to get dirt on the women who were accusing him of sexual assault. Israelis, who are fine with entities like Black Cube spying on Palestinians, Americans, and others through nefarious means, are incensed to learn that such companies are also targeting Israelis.
The Real News Network interviews journalist Shir Hever, author of “The Privatization of Israeli security.” He says Israeli spy companies aren’t worse than those from other countries, including the U.S. but Israeli companies are having to take bottom of the barrel cases, (this is a long quote but worth it):
“Israeli security organizations are in a state of crisis. The generals, commanders, chief agents of and other security institutions are facing a daily struggle to keep Palestinian resistance under control and they’re failing. And because they are failing, they are losing public support and public legitimacy, and so they are turning to the private sector. And I think what we see with these companies like Black Cube, and NSO, and Psy Group, is that these companies reek of desperation. They take these contracts, which are very, problematic contracts, because nobody else will. And I think it’s also interesting, and very telling, that if you look at the cases, all these scandals that were now shown by UVDA, you can of course look at the case of Harvey Weinstein, Kabila, Joseph Kabila (former leader of the Democratic Republic of the Congo), is no longer in power, Weinstein did not get off the hook, and other people who hired Black Cube, were not able to use that information that they got, this blackmail material, in order get off whatever accusations they were facing. And that shows the companies are not very successful.
So they’re trying to build on their reputation as former Mossad agents or agents of other Israeli security agencies. Trying to say, ‘We are the best spies in the world because we worked for the , in order to make money-in order to survive in the world that just doesn’t need these apartheid officers who are trained at humiliating people and controlling them. I think that is the reason that these companies are taking these very, very, notorious contracts with notorious customers, and also the reason that they’re not very successful at providing a good service to their customers.”
06.14.2019 Tremors across Jordan as Trump Mideast peace plan revives old fears Reuters by Suleiman al-Khalidi. Bits of Trump/Kushner’s Zionist inspired ‘Deal of the Century’ are being leaked before official release. Apparently part of the plan is permanent displacement of Palestinians to Jordan. Jordan is already stressed to the breaking point with Palestinian refugees who make up about half Jordan’s population. King Abdullah is not on board with Trump’s deal.
06.14.2019 Israeli settlers vandalize Palestinian village IMEMC. The usual. slashed tires and spray painted star of David and racist graffiti in Hebrew on the mosque, the clinic, and homes. Village south of Nablus.
06.14.2019 Israeli soldiers injure many non-violent protesters in Nilin IMEMC. Ramallah district: Jewish occupation troops gassed the local people. and shot at them with live ammunition, rubber coated steel bullets, and concussion grenades.
06.14.2019 While Hezbollah threatens war, Israel and Lebanon quietly make history Haaretz by Amos Harel. [Israel claiming that Hezbollah is threatening war with Israel when there’s no strategic reason for Hezbollah to do that.] The article says that after almost a decade of American diplomatic efforts the Israelis and Lebanon are going to talk about maritime boundaries, and diffuse tensions.
06.14.2019 Florida passes law protecting Israel from criticism Electronic Intifada by Nora Barrows Friedman. Florida Governor, and Zionist water-boy, Ron DeSantis signed a bill making it illegal to criticize Israeli human rights violations in public institutions. Unbelievably, DeSantis sold out Floridian’s right to the First Amendment by signing this legislation while he was in Israel.
06.14.2019 Anti Palestinian groups fail to censor children’s book event Electronic Intifada. Nora Barrows Friedman. Zionists still trying to direct the library to censor ‘P is for Palestine.’ Again the campaign has backfired. Over 6,000 people signed petition to the library to resist the Zionist’s “racist attack on free speech.”
