Inside Israel’s Apartheid State

An Interview with Max Blumenthal

by JOSHUA FRANK

Journalist Max Blumenthal’s latest book Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel has been one of the most controversial and enlightening books of 2013. It’s a fearless, no holds barred take on life in Israel and the brutal occupation of Palestine. Needless t0 say, not all have been happy with Blumenthal’s take on Israeli culture and politics. I recently caught up with Max to discuss his new book and the backlash he’s received from the pro-Israel coterie. -JF
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‘Hamas would recognise Israel within 1967 borders’

France summons Israeli ambassador over warning shots; US envoy calls to bolster Gaza truce PARIS/OCCUPIED-AL-QUDS: Hamas would recognise Israel if it withdraws to its pre-1967 borders, a French Jewish writer said this week after meeting the exiled leader of the Palestinian Islamist movement, Khaled Meshaal.

“He told me that Hamas was prepared to recognise Israel on the lines of June 4, 1967. He told me so several times,” Marek Halter told AFP on Monday.

The date refers to Palestinian demands for an end to Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, captured in the 1967 war.
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Protests condemn Israel offensive

As international protests against the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip continue, Israel is facing a fresh round of condemnation from around the world.

The protests followed on the heels of the UN Security Council's failure to issue a resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire despite hours of closed-door talks.

On Sunday the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union pledged an additional $4.2 million in emergency aid for Gaza and called on Israel to respect international law.

Al Jazeera

Israel Has No Intention of Granting a Palestinian State

By JENNIFER LOEWENSTEIN
There was a time when Fatah and the PFLP held the day; when few Palestinians wanted anything to do with Islamist policies and politics. Such politics have nothing to do with primitive rockets being fired over the border, or smuggling tunnels and black-market weapons; just as Arafat’s Fatah had little to do with stones and suicide bombings. The associations are coincidental; the creations of a given political environment. They are the result of something entirely different than what the lying politicians and their analysts are telling you. They have become part of the landscape of human events in the modern Middle East today; but incidentals wholly as lethal, or as recalcitrant, deadly, angry or incorrigible could just as soon have been in their places.

We must adjust our distorted image of Hamas

Gaza is a secular society where people listen to pop music, watch TV and many women walk the streets unveiled

Last week I was in Gaza. While I was there I met a group of 20 or so police officers who were undergoing a course in conflict management. They were eager to know whether foreigners felt safer since Hamas had taken over the Government? Indeed we did, we told them. Without doubt the past 18 months had seen a comparative calm on the streets of Gaza; no gunmen on the streets, no more kidnappings. They smiled with great pride and waved us goodbye.

Less than a week later all of these men were dead, killed by an Israeli rocket at a graduation ceremony. Were they “dangerous Hamas militant gunmen”? No, they were unarmed police officers, public servants killed not in a “militant training camp” but in the same police station in the middle of Gaza City that had been used by the British, the Israelis and Fatah during their periods of rule there.

timesonline.co.uk

Roseanne Barr: Israel is a 'Nazi state'

Former television star Roseanne Barr has denounced Israel's military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, labeling Israel a "Nazi state."

In a post on her personal blog, which appears at her Web site, Roseanne World, the comedienne, who is Jewish, wrote on December 30 that she had planned to travel with pro-Palestinian activists on a protest boat sailing from Cyprus to Gaza.

After an encounter with an Israel Navy vessel, the boat was turned back and sailed into a Lebanese port on Tuesday.

"I said Israel will attack any boat carrying doctors and medical supplies," Barr wrote on her blog, adding that, "Israel is a NAZI state. The Jewish Soul is being tortured in Israel."

The Jerusalem Post

Israeli troops 'move into Gaza'

Israel has carried out more than 800 strikes on the Gaza Strip since launching the offensive eight days ago, including 40 on Saturday.

The UN has warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis, and believes 25% of more than 400 Palestinians killed by Israel so far were civilians. Israel says about 80% of those killed were Hamas militants. Four Israelis have been killed by rocket fire from Gaza.

BBC News