The Palestine Solidarity Campaign unanimously agreed a motion submitted by JVL at its Annual General Meeting on February 14th to prioritise campaigning for the release of Marwan Barghouti, along with thousands of other unjustly incarcerated Palestinians held in Israel’s jails.
Wieland Hoban’s new collection of essays and interviews “Germany’s Jewish Problem: Genocides Past and Present”, recently published by OR Books, is reviewed here by Leah Levane.
She recommends it wholeheartedly.
Moshe Behar examines what he calls the occupation of Judaism by Zionism, the crowding out of non-Zionist Jewish forms of life by Zionist ones, including by “armchair Zionists” in the diaspora who exercise more rights than Palestinians in the territory.
Fortunately many Jewish groups both inside and outside Palestine/Israel are challenging the Zionist consensus and giving voice to a post Zionist conception of Jewish peoplehood.
By Leah Levane
This short Guardian piece spells out the methodology to kill off any chance of a Palestinian State and this purpose is openly declared by some in the government. Even the White House tut tuts about annexation but annexation is happening de facto and de jure. The Knesset decisions only enshrine what is already happening in the West Bank even while Netanyahu is sabotaging phase two of the Gaza “ceasefire”
By Leah Levane
Gaza: Al Jazeera’s investigation has uncovered yet another horror. Their investigation has found that people have been vaporised with new weaponry and that this may have affected nearly 3,000 people, who, were subject to burning at 3,500 degrees centigrade.
At a time when Reform UK has just launched its Jewish Alliance – in Central Synagogue – Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg, Senior Rabbi of Masorti Judaism UK, does well to remind us of the value so mentioned in the Torah:
“love for the ger, the stranger, the outsider, the refugee. A better word than ‘love’ might be compassion, empathy, concern.”
Or, paraphrasing Rashi: “We know how it hurts to be a refugee, so don’t go hurting others.”
By Leah Levane
Palestinians are among those being deported from the US – bound and shackled on a private jet. “Several immigration attorneys expressed shock and concern about the flights, noting that deportations of Palestinians via Israel have been exceedingly rare in the past and that facilitating deportations in occupied territory may constitute a violation of international law.” Not least because it goes against US obligations regarding, eg torture.
By Leah Levane
This is, perhaps, the most egregious examples of suppressing mention of Gaza: mi Harlow a drama group for disabled people noted at an HMD event the indisciminate killing and displacement in Gaza and the group immediately lost their funding and were banned form using all council owned premises.
By Leah Levane
The following piece contains depiction and description of hate, images of hate gestures (namely Nazi salutes), and one instance of a slur about disabled people and a racial slur, both of which have been partially replaced with asterisks. There is a crisis fermenting in British Jewry; it is being caused by Stop the Hate (StH). … Continued
By Leah Levane
What would the reaction have been if advice on whether or not to proscribe Palestine Action had been sought and acted on from someone who was the Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign or, indeed, Jewish Voice for Liberation? It does not take much imagination; now Lord Walney (previously John Woodcock) is entitled to his opinion but to expect objectivity or neutrality is unrealistic. It is yet another example of the government paving the way for the answers it wanted so that business with Israel, including arms trading could continue.