China has stake in Kashmir peace

AFP - November 21, 2009

SRINAGAR: The leader of Indian Kashmir's moderate separatists said on Saturday China has a stake in peace in restive Kashmir as part of the disputed Himalayan region is under Beijing's control.

The statement came amid rising Sino-Indian tensions over a Chinese embassy policy of issuing different visas to Indian Kashmir residents and the disputed Indian border state of Arunachal Pradesh.

"I believe China is not a party to the Kashmir conflict but it has stakes as far as peace in the region is concerned," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, who heads moderate separatists, said in a statement.

Kashmiri separatists have rarely mentioned China's role in resolving the dispute over Kashmir that is mainly divided between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan. China holds a small area of Kashmir.

"China has a direct link with Kashmir as certain parts of Kashmir, including Aksai Chin, are under its control," said Farooq, adding he would soon visit China on an invitation from a non-governmental organisation.

Pakistan, which holds Kashmir's northern tip, has fought two of its wars with India over the territory since the subcontinent's independence from British rule in 1947.

Farooq, who is chief priest at Kashmir's main mosque, also welcomed a joint statement earlier in the week by US President Barak Obama and his Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao, which voiced support for better India-Pakistan relations.

"Hurriyat welcomes the approach adopted by China and America jointly in terms of addressing the issue of Kashmir in South Asia," he said.

India has bristled at the US-Chinese statement, saying it requires no outside help to improve relations with Pakistan.

Indian-administered Kashmir is in the grip of an Islamic insurgency which has claimed more than 47,000 lives by official count since the start of the revolt in the region in 1989.

China, a close ally of Pakistan, views Kashmir as a disputed region.

As the Light onto the Nations

By Gilad Atzmon
November 21, 2009

'Israel is the light onto the nations’ says the Torah. Indeed it is, and not just because the Torah says so. Israel is ahead of everyone else in many fronts. Take for instance, terrorizing civilian populations and practicing some of the most devastating murderous tactics upon elders, women and young.

The Jerusalem post reported yesterday that the Chairman of NATO's Military Committee, Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola, visited Israel earlier this week to study "IDF tactics and methods that the military alliance can utilise for its war in Afghanistan." A senior Israeli defence official added "The one thing on NATO's mind today is how to win in Afghanistan…Di Paola was very impressed by the IDF, which is a major source of information due to our operational experience."

I would advise both the Israeli official and Admiral Di Paola to slightly curb their enthusiasm. The IDF didn’t win a single war since 1967. Yes, it murdered many civilians, it flattened many cities, it starved millions, it has been committing war crimes on a daily basis for decades and yet, it didn’t win a war. Thus, the IDF cannot really teach NATO how to win in Afghanistan. If NATO generals are stupid enough to follow IDF tactics, like the Israeli generals, they will start to see the charges of war crimes pile up against them. They may even be lucky enough to share their cells with some Israelis in due course, once justice is performed.

Admiral Di Paola spent two days with the infamous IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, the man who led the IDF into Gaza last December.

In the Jewish state they were very enthusiastic with Admiral Di Paola’s visit. They regarded it as just another reassurance of 'business as usual. The visit of a NATO high supreme official was there to convince them that no one takes note of the Goldstone report. "Di Paola's visit is significant" says the Jerusalem Post, "since it comes at a time when the IDF is under increasing criticism in the wake of the Goldstone Report on Operation Cast Lead as well as a decision by Turkey - a NATO member - to ban Israel from joint aerial exercises."

However, it would be crucial to elaborate on the emerging mutual interests between the two parties, Israel and NATO. "During their meeting on Wednesday, Ashkenazi and Di Paola discussed ways to upgrade Israeli-NATO military ties as well as the plan to include an Israeli Navy vessel in Active Endeavor, a NATO mission established after the 9/11 attacks under which NATO vessels patrol the Mediterranean to prevent illegal terror trafficking". This is indeed a necessary move for the Israelis. At the moment the Israeli Navy is operating in the Mediterranean as a bunch of Yiddish Pirates (Yidisshe Piraten), assaulting, hijacking and robbing vessels in international waters. Once operating under the NATO flag, the Israelis would be able to terrorise every vessel in the high seas in the name of the 'West’. For the Jewish state this would be a major step forward. Until now the Israelis have been committing atrocities in the name of the Jewish people. Once operating under the NATO flag, the Israelis will be able to perform their piracy in the name of 'Europe’. Such a move is further evidence of the spiritual and ideological transition within Zionism from 'promised land’ into 'promised planet’.

While the Israelis desperately need NATO’s legitimacy, NATO is far more modest. All it needs is knowledge and tactics. For some reason it insists on learning from the Israelis how to inflict pain on a civilian population. More pain, that is, than it is already making. "NATO's Defence officials said that Di Paola used his meetings with the IDF to learn about new technology that can be applied to the war in Afghanistan". The Jerusalem Post reports that Israel is a "known world leader in the development of specialized armor to protect against improvised explosive devices (IEDs), otherwise known as roadside bombs." This is indeed the case. Israeli generals realised a long time ago that their precious young soldiers prefer to hide in their tanks rather than engage with the 'enemy’ i.e. the civilian population, kids, elders and women. But it doesn’t stop there, Di Paola was also interested in "Israeli intelligence-gathering capabilities and methods that the IDF uses when operating in civilian population centers." Di Paola noted that "NATO and the IDF were facing similar threats - NATO in Afghanistan and Israel in its war against Hamas and Hizbullah."

I would suggest to Admiral Di Paola to immediately read the Goldstone report thoroughly, so he grasps his own personal legal consequences once he starts to implement 'Israeli tactics’. If Admiral Di Paola wants to serve his army, he should indeed visit Israel, he should also meet every war criminal both in the military and politics so he knows exactly what NOT to do.

NATO’s chances of winning in Afghanistan are not limited, they are actually exhausted. It can only lose. Some military analysts and veteran generals argue that it is lost already. NATO has brought enough carnage on the Afghani people without achieving any of its military or political goals. Given that Israel was severely humiliated in Lebanon in 2006 by a tiny paramilitary Hizbullah and failed to achieve its military goals in Operation Cast Lead in its genocidal war against Hamas, there is nothing for NATO to learn from the Israelis. Should NATO proceed in implementing added IDF tactics, all it will achieve is a dramatic reduction of security across Europe and America.

If we are concerned with peace and we want it to prevail, what we have to do is to move away as far as we can from any spiritual, ideological, political and military affiliation with Zionism, Israel and its lobbies. If 'Israel’ is indeed a 'light onto the nations’, someone better explain to us all, why its prospect of peace is becoming slimmer and darker.

My answer is actually simple. Israel can be easily seen as the 'light of nations’ as long as you learn from Israel what not to do. In fact this is the message passed to us by the great humanist prophets Jesus and Marx. Love your neighbour, be among others, transcend yourself beyond the tribal into the realm of the universal. In fact this is exactly what the Israelis fail to grasp. For some reason, they love themselves almost as much as they hate their neighbours.

If Admiral Di Paola wants to win the hearts and the minds of the Afghani people (rather than 'winning a war’), he should first learn to love. This is something he won’t learn in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Gaza, Ramallha and Nablus are more likely.

Source

J Street seeks to undermine BDS

by Adam Horowitz on November 20, 2009

We’ve been following J Street’s attempts to counteract the growing BDS movement. First there was its aborted release of a public letter criticizing the Toronto Declaration. Then there was the workshop at its student conference called “Reckoning with the Radical Left on Campus: Alternatives to Boycotts and Divestments." The workshop didn’t go quite as planned either as many students who attended actually offered their support for divestment campaigns targeting the Israeli occupation. You would think these two initial missteps would lead J Street to reconsider which way the wind is blowing. Nope.

J Street is now working to undermine the National Campus Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions Conference that will be held this weekend at Hampshire College. The conference is being called to build "a coordinated national BDS campaign," and J Street seems to feel threatened by this. Yesterday the organization sent the following email out to its student wing:

From: "Tal Schechter, J Street U"
Date: November 19, 2009 2:49:07 PM PST
Subject: Invest, Don’t Divest!

Invest, Don’t Divest!

This weekend, a bunch of students espousing that same, tired old narrative of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a zero-sum game will converge on Hampshire College (my campus) — and I’m pretty concerned.

The upcoming conference promotes the misguided Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. This movement is spreading like wild fire on campuses across the country and we’re all going to get burned unless we speak out now.

We should be investing – not divesting – in our campus debate, in our communities and in the people who will bring about change in the region.

That’s why J Street U is launching an "Invest, Don’t Divest" campaign today to raise money for two organizations — LendforPeace.org, a Palestinian microfinance organization set up by students like us, and The Center for Jewish-Arab Economic Development, which promotes Jewish-Arab Economic Cooperation in Israel.

We’re setting a goal of recruiting 500 students like you by the end of the semester to pitch in $2 each (2 bucks for 2 states!) to support economic stability for all Israelis and Palestinians. Will you do your part right now and ask your friends to do the same?

Donating just $2 might not seem like much – but if hundreds, maybe thousands, of students like us make this "$2 for 2 states" statement together, we’ll really show the media and campuses around the country that there is a strong and growing alternative on campus to the tired debate about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And it’s exactly the right amount to ask for from cash-strapped students like us.

Let’s be honest: we have already divested from this issue too much.

When debate becomes too heated, we divest from each other and stop listening. When we feel at odds with our traditional institutions’ message, we divest from our communities and tune out. When the conflict seems too confusing, we divest from the issue entirely and leave the conversation to the extremists.

Divestment defies common sense: Not only are the Israeli and Palestinian economies deeply intertwined, but so too are the fates of both peoples and their prospects for real peace and security.

If it is peace through a two-state solution and security for both Israelis and Palestinians that we want, divestment won’t get us there.

To Jewish Israelis, divestment only reinforces the notion that they are constantly under attack, creating an environment in which it is harder to achieve peace, not easier. [1]

For Palestinians who already suffer from a weak economy, divestment only puts their society more at risk. [2]

Investing in economic stability and cooperation will help set the context for a sustainable peace, but it won’t lead to a two state solution in and of itself. That’s why we need to invest in a campus movement that advocates for peace and social justice in Israel, the future state of Palestine and across the Middle East.

Check out our website to find out the many ways you can invest in this issue on your campus.

* Table on campus and ask other students to donate 2$ for two states
* Write an op-ed to your campus paper about why we need to invest, not divest
* Organize a discussion with other groups on campus about why a broad debate is important
* Turn a push for divestment into a drive for socially responsible investment
* Enter our t-shirt design contest. If you win, we will order t-shirts with your design from Israeli and Palestinian companies for students to sell on their campuses.

Thank you for helping us build a movement that takes constructive steps towards a peaceful and sustainable two-state solution.

- Tal

Tal Schechter
J Street U National Board Member
Co-Founder of Students Promoting Israeli Culture and Information (SPICI) at Hampshire College
November 19, 2009

[1] http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1251547904

[2] http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/fd807e46661e3689852570d00069e918/bb544ccfd6f4d6968525762c004869ac?OpenDocument
———-

J Street U is the campus address for Middle East peace and security.

Lots to comment on here, but I’ll leave it at a few thoughts. This campaign is pretty indicative of the liberal Zionist take on BDS – it’s dismissive and condescending towards the strategy without making a real argument against it or offering a meaningful alternative. There is a debate to be had over whether BDS is an effective strategy towards peace, but simply labeling the movement "misguided" without saying why, or using cute puns on the word "divest" don’t really cut it. Some are trying to have this debate in a meaningful way. Hopefully J Street will follow that example and present its case in a more substantial way in the future.

It is also odd how much this campaign seems to mirror Benjamin Netanyahu’s "economic peace" proposal, which puts off forming a Palestinian state in favor of building the Palestinian economy. Divestment is about holding Israel accountable because no other body is willing to do so. Investing in Palestinian businesses is a nice idea, but does not do anything to shift the equation or provide the political pressure needed to create change. J Street seems to acknowledge this itself: "Investing in economic stability and cooperation will help set the context for a sustainable peace, but it won’t lead to a two state solution in and of itself. That’s why we need to invest in a campus movement." Frankly that gives this email the tone of an alarmist fundraising campaign for J Street–stoking the fear of marauding hordes of divesting students ("This movement is spreading like wild fire on campuses across the country and we’re all going to get burned unless we speak out now.")

J Street says it wants to promote an "alternative on campus to the tired debate about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." Good luck to them. From where I’m sitting it seems like BDS is that alternative. But maybe holding a t-shirt contest will suffice.

Canadian Liberals object after Conservatives say they’re stronger Israel backers

By Ron Csillag · November 20, 2009

(JTA) -- Canada's opposition Liberal Party is crying foul after the ruling Conservatives mailed out flyers extolling themselves as stronger supporters of Israel.

Barbs flew in the House of Commons Thursday after the taxpayer-funded leaflets were sent to electoral districts with high concentrations of Jewish voters in Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba. The mailings accuse the Liberals of participating in the 2001 UN anti-racism conference in Durban, South Africa, which the pamphlets described as "overtly anti-Semitic," and of supporting Hamas and Hezbollah.

The flyers also attacked Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff for accusing Israel of committing war crimes in its 2006 war with Hezbollah.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservatives, meantime, were lauded for refusing to take part in the Durban II conference, spurning terrorist groups, and osupporting Israel's right to self-defense in 2006. The pamphlets ask voters to choose which federal leader "is on the right track to represent and defend the values of Canada's Jewish community."

Liberal MPs denounced the mailings as propaganda filled with half-truths. They pointed out that many nations, including the United States and Israel, attended at least part of the Durban I conference, and that it was Canada that helped blunt the language in the final communiqué to Israel's satisfaction.

The Liberals also point out it was they who listed Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations in 2002.

The mailings are "totally misleading [and] false," Montreal MP Irwin Cotler, a former federal minister of justice, told the Toronto Star. They "basically seek to associate the Liberal party with anti-Semitism. This is shocking ... this has no place in Canadian politics."

But Conservative cabinet minister Jason Kenney denied the government was suggesting the Liberals were anti-Semitic. "Anyone who's suggesting that is being completely over the top and mischievous," he told reporters. "These are facts. They are on the record. They [Liberals] are uncomfortable with that."

Karen Mock, a Liberal candidate in the heavily-Jewish neighborhood of Thornhill, north of Toronto, attended the Durban I meeting as part of the Canadian delegation and as chair of the International Jewish Caucus.

"That the Tories feel Jewish voters are so gullible as to accept second-hand information and divisive propaganda on these important issues is outrageous," she said.

Other opposition parties denounced the mailings as a new low in partisan politics in Canada.

Is there any other so-called lobby that has its own state department?

by Jeffrey Blankfort on November 20, 2009

From the American Jewish Committee:

An AJC leadership delegation has concluded a four-day visit to Madrid , where it met with Spanish government officials, media and Jewish community leaders.

AJC´s interlocutors included Foreign Minister Miguel Moratinos; Secretary General of the Presidency Bernardino Leon, the key foreign policy advisor to Prime Minister Zapatero; Javier Moreno, director of the leading Spanish newspaper El Pais; the leadership of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain (FCJE); and American and Israeli diplomats.

“As Spain assumes the EU presidency in January, consultation with key Spanish officials is particularly constructive,” said AJC Executive Director David Harris, who led the delegation. “Spain will be counted upon to lead Europe in standing firm against Iran´s nuclear ambitions.”

StratCom commander: New nukes needed

By Erik Holmes - Air Force Times
November 20, 2009 16:18:42 EST

LOS ANGELES — The military’s top officer in charge of nuclear weapons issued a warning Thursday about the state of the nation’s nuclear programs, saying that new nuclear weapons need to be developed and lamenting the declining numbers of nuclear experts and scientists.

Calling the nuclear arsenal the foundation of the nation’s strategic deterrence capability, Gen. Kevin Chilton, commander of U.S. Strategic Command, said the military must invest more in the nuclear enterprise.

“First we need to fix the infrastructure that supports our nuclear stockpile,” said Chilton, speaking at an Air Force Association conference in Los Angeles. But “we can’t just continue to sustain [Cold War weapons] in our inventory. … It’s a new world in the 21st century, and we need weapons that were designed for and support the needs of the 21st century.”

Of particular concern, Chilton said, is the deterioration of the nation’s nuclear laboratories, which he called “decrepit.” These laboratories must be modernized in order to attract and retain the scientists needed to sustain a weapons program, he said.

He also said that since the U.S. no longer tests nuclear weapons, the nation must continue to invest in an aggressive stockpile management program to ensure that existing weapons remain reliable and safe.

Chilton warned that the community of nuclear experts has become dangerously small and the military has failed to replenish the talent pool since the 1980s and 1990s.

“We have skipped a generation,” he said. “We’ve got to do something about that.”

Full article

See also:

(Nuclear) Energy bill moves to the Senate

... Dr. Chu's statements were most revealing of the Obama regime's intentions:

“Restarting the nuclear power industry is very important in our overall plan to reduce carbon emissions in this country. From me, you are not going to get any reluctance. As you may know, I think that nuclear power is going to be a very important factor to getting us to a low carbon future.”

“The Department of Energy is doing with its tools everything it can to restart the American nuclear industry. With the loan guarantees, we are pushing as hard as we can on that. We are going to be investing in the future in bettering the technologies and quite frankly, we want to recapture the lead in industrial nuclear power. We've lost that lead as we've lost the lead in many areas of energy technology and we need to get it back.”

An alternative way to frame the issue would be that the bi-partisan consensus for U.S. energy policy is to direct resources toward developing new nuclear technologies, exactly what the Obama State Department is threatening war against Iran to prevent it from having access to.

What does Israel have against a Palestinian stadium?

By Amira Hass
Haaretz
November 20, 2009

A friendly game between an Arab soccer team and a Palestinian team was supposed to inaugurate the new stadium being built in the eastern part of Al-Bireh, near Ramallah, at the end of the year. "Supposed to" because the Civil Administration, an arm of the Defense Ministry, has ordered that the work be halted and is threatening demolition.

FIFA, the international soccer federation, financed the stadium as part of a larger program to promote Palestinian soccer. The stadium covers 11 dunams (2.75 acres) and will hold 8,000 seats. An Israeli contractor, in partnership with a Dutch company and a Palestinian subcontractor, constructed the field.

In October 2008, when the field was ready, FIFA president Joseph Blatter and Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad laid the cornerstone for the stadium. The governments of France and Germany are paying for the construction of stands. The outer wall, the lighting and the scoreboard are being financed by the Al-Bireh municipality, which owns the land and within whose jurisdiction the stadium is located.

In 1973, the municipality submitted for the approval of the IDF a detailed plan for the area where the stadium is now located. It received final approval from Israel's National Planning and Building Council and Supreme Planning Council in 1981. Nevertheless, on October 11 of this year, Israeli soldiers and representatives of the Civil Administration showed up at the site. They arrived via the neighboring Jewish settlement of Psagot, which overlooks Palestinian neighborhoods and was built on Al-Bireh land. They delivered a stop-work order from the administration to one of the workers (whose name was handwritten, in Hebrew, on it).

On November 1, the municipality received a "final" stop-work order - addressed anonymously to "the holder," from "the Supreme Planning Council's building inspection subcommittee," and issued by "Assaf."

The document claims that work on the stadium's stands is being carried out "without a license," and contains other standard admonitions: "You were given an opportunity to appear before the inspection subcommittee to state your case. The subcommittee has concluded that the aforementioned work was carried out without proper permission ... You are hereby obligated, in accordance with section .... of the 1966 City, Village and Buildings Planning Law, to cease activity upon and use of said land, and to raze the building ... and to restore the location to its previous state within 7 days ... If you do not act as required, all legal means will be taken against you, including demolition of the structure and any means required to restore the situation to its prior state, at your expense."

A German source has told Haaretz: "This could become a major diplomatic issue between Germany and Israel. Just imagine: A German-financed project being torn down. It would definitely be a political scandal."

Blots on the landscape

Why is the Civil Administration concerned with a soccer stadium located within Al-Bireh's municipal boundaries, which the IDF itself approved nearly 30 years ago?

It emerges that some of the land in question, which the municipality designated for a school and other public buildings in the early 1970s, had the misfortune to later be defined as being in Area C (see box). Amid the 11,000 dunams (2,750 acres) that fall within the city's bounds, there are several such Area C "blotches" - for the most part, in areas close to where the settlements of Psagot and Beit El, as well as IDF and Civil Administration bases, were built, on the lands of Al-Bireh and Ramallah. The headquarters of Jawal (the Palestinian cell-phone company) is located in Area C, as is the house of Dr. Samih Al-Abed, who heads the Palestinian team at the territory and border negotiation committee. Even part of the residence of PA President Mahmoud Abbas is in Area C.

The Al-Bireh municipality has not, however, received any maps from Israel demarcating the exact location of the parts of the town defined as Area C. Their location has been surmised, based on the tabu (Land Registry) documents submitted to the municipality, as per the 1995 Israeli-Palestinian interim agreement: The lots for which the Civil Administration did not submit documents to the city are understood to belong to Area C. But Area C is not a planning designation, per se.

"[It is] a political designation, which was supposed to be temporary - to last just 18 months," explained Al-Abed, an architect and city planner, and a former senior official in the Palestinian Planning Ministry.

"It is unjust, unreasonable and unfair to have to request and to wait for an Israeli license to build within the blotches of Area C that are within approved and recognized municipal areas," he said this week, pointing out that, "It is Al-Bireh that provides all services to the citizenry, including those bits of Area C that are in the municipal area: cleaning, garbage collection, maintenance, renovations, construction."

Musa Jwayyed, the Al-Bireh city engineer, says that over the years, various structures have been built in areas within the municipal borders that are apparently part of Area C, and that the city has also carried out the necessary infrastructure work in those areas, including preparation of a sewerage network, and the paving of roads and sidewalks - without requesting licenses from the Civil Administration.

Jwayyed: "Al-Bireh has another 18,000 dunams [4,500 acres] outside the municipal boundaries. Settlements sit on some of them, and the rest are private lands or our own land reserves. There I know I must have Israeli approval and coordination: such as for the renovation of the slaughterhouse, for reaching the municipal garbage-disposal site, for construction of a water-purification plant. But the stadium is located within the municipal boundaries that the IDF approved."

The question is: Why, all of a sudden, more than three years after construction of the entire project began and 10 months after construction of the stands started, has the Civil Administration decided to halt the work?

Ziv Nishri, the Israeli contractor who built the field, said in a telephone conversation: "The army knew about the project because it's impossible to do anything without the Civil Administration's approval. FIFA is the body dealing with the foreign minister. Without the umbrella of the Foreign Ministry, the army and the Civil Administration, nothing would be happening here."

When Nishri heard about the stop-work order this week, he was very surprised. "The plans for the stands are at least two years old. Even before we started on the project, I had the general plans for the stands, because we designed the field to fit them."

Officials at Al-Bireh city hall see a connection between the stop-work order, and the Palestinian refusal to return to the negotiating table as long as Israel does not freeze construction in the settlements, as well as the recent announcement by Prime Minister Fayyad of the planned consolidation of various Palestinian state institutions. The officials and local activists agree with Samih al-Abed when he says: "This is a typical kind of Israeli pressure, which means: 'Either you go back to negotiations or we'll punish you. We'll do whatever we can to upset your lives.'"

The coordinator of government activities in the territories responded to Haaretz: "Recently, there have been meetings and discussions between representatives of the Civil Administration and Palestinians at the very highest level, with the goal of resolving the issue of the construction of the Al-Bireh stadium. This has been in the wake of the official measures taken against the construction that was undertaken without the proper permits and in an illegal location. The Civil Administration is working with the civil-affairs ministry of the Palestinian Authority to prepare and submit an amendment to the existing zoning plan, and following that, the possibility of a permit, in principal, for the continuation of construction will be considered."

Source

Lost Livelihoods

By Eva Bartlett - November 21, 2009

East of Gaza city, on some of Gaza’s most fertile land, little to nothing is growing, and what had grown has been repeatedly mowed down over the years by Israeli military bulldozers and tanks.

I am re-visiting the region to record farmers’ words on a vital issue: water. Their wells and cisterns have also been bulldozed, pumps and motors destroyed. In some areas there is a complete lack of water; in another region east of Beit Hanoun there’s just one water source.

We see the remains of pumps, some destroyed in prior Israeli invasions, the majority destroyed (again) in the last Israeli attack, the winter massacre of Gaza.

A cascade of house roofs and beams is nothing new, and taking the photo is more of habit than of awe.

Stopping for tea at one of the farmer’s houses, I expore what’s left of their farm livelihood. They are among the hundreds who have had their citrus, olive, and other fruit trees razed, their wells destroyed, their land polluted by chemical weapons.

I’m interested in bees, and want to know more about their small-scale honey production.

Turns out it used to be much larger: in 2004 they had 250 boxes of bees, each box containing up to 8 slots of bee hives (imagine a picture frame filled with honeycomb). These were destroyed when the Israeli bulldozers cut through their land.

Prior to the winter massacre, they had 80 boxes. But after the rockets and phosphorous, 15 boxes of bees perished. Along with the razed trees, bees and honey production in general got worse and worse, the bees no longer finding the flowers needed to sustain themselves.

The farm also lost 25 sheep during the massacre, I’m told.

Two handsome camels remain: a mother and her 8 month old son.

As we walk past more of the same: artfully destroyed homes, Mahdi, a Beit Hanoun resident, mentions that his family also kept bees. 500 boxes. All were lost in 2003 when the Israeli dozers came. His family has been raising bees for three decades, but with that invasion it came to an abrupt halt.

They did try again, he said. Two months ago they re-started their bee tending, but all the bees died, for want of flowers, trees, sustenance.

We won’t bother anymore, he told me. There are no trees in the area. Everything has been razed.

Source

N. Ireland: Fermanagh skies being used to train Afghan war pilots

BY MICHAEL BRESLIN
November 18, 2009

AS Police try to establish reports of a downed plane in the Boho area on Thursday of last week, the British Army has denied that it was one of their drones.

However, an army spokesperson confirmed that the skies over north Fermanagh and west Tyrone are hosting 'rest of world' night time flight training for RAF and British Army Air Corps pilots.

A police spokesman referred enquiries about 'drones' in the sky at night to the British Army Press Office. He said that police were keen to speak to anyone who was flying in the Boho area on Thursday around the time of the 'loud bang' reports to contact them so they can be ruled out of their enquiries about a downed plane.

A British Army spokesman insisted that there was no training with unmanned drones: "Absolutely not. We don't train with drones. I don't know where they do most of their training, but I would suggest the Salisbury Plain.

Ironically, it was on Thursday night of last week that residents in an area embracing Enniskillen, Lisbellaw and Ballinamallard first heard the sound of an invisible aircraft. Then, on Friday and Saturday nights, residents in an area extending from Trillick through Irvinestown and across Lower Lough Erne were also treated to the same phenomenon. In all cases, witnesses described the sound as 'a continuous drone'.

The British Army spokesman told the 'Herald' that these were 'rest of world' operations by pilots of aircraft heading to war zones, including Afghanistan.

"As you know, with Northern Ireland being part of the UK, there is low level flying required to be done. A lot of that training, by the RAF and Army Air Corps, is done at night in order to replicate what they'll be doing overseas.

"You're talking about certain areas of, say, Afghanistan. You have desert and arid areas and, then you have areas which are lush and full of forests and green fields, so by flying around parts of Fermanagh and Tyrone you're making the exercise as relevant as possible."

The spokesman went on: "They can't do this during the day, but the guys have to get training. They can't do it in areas of light pollution and there's not much use doing it in built-up areas, such as towns and cities as this reduces the usefulness of flying by night.

"The pilots do try to change the areas they use for training so that nobody is getting grief. For instance, they use the Sperrins one week and the next week or the week after some other place. No, I don't know how long this will go on for."

Asked about one report that the training aircraft are equipped with heat-seeking equipment, the spokesman said this was 'unlikely'. "It's not something we talk about."

He was then asked to comment on one report that wind farms in the training areas are now fitted with beacons to avoid a collision.

"This would be a matter for the Civil Aviation Authority. It has got nothing to do with us. The CAA give directions for high structures and for emergency vehicles such as police, ambulance and fire tenders, or, say, the Harland and Wolff crane."

Ulster Unionist Councillor Alex Baird, who is a former civil representative with the Northern Ireland Office, said while he appreciates that the Ministry of Defence or the Royal Air Force are entitled to use the Fermanagh skies, he believes they should have been proactive in briefing public representatives about when this is going to happen.

Meanwhile, DUP Minister Arlene Foster explained: "Both Councillor Bert Johnston and myself received many calls over the weekend about the noise and length of time a night flying aircraft circled in parts of Fermanagh.

"I made contact with St Angelo Airport late on Sunday after residents in Lisbellaw expressed concern to me. The staff at St Angelo were very helpful and explained it was a military aircraft. This information was then shared around the community. I understand that many in the communities, both in Ballinamallard and Lisbellaw, were concerned at the length of time this aircraft was circling and of the noise generated from it," she continued.

"The NIO have explained there was a military training exercise in the area and that it is now finished. I was pleased both Bert and I were able to reassure the communities we represent, and my thanks go to the staff at St Angelo Airport for their assistance in getting the correct information via ourselves to the concerned residents who accepted the information we gave them."

Meanwhile, éirígí Fermanagh chairperson, Kevin Martin has expressed concern at the increasing level of British military activity in the county.

He commented: "In recent months, undercover British soldiers, who are most likely attached to the Special Reconnaissance Regiment, have also been active at PSNI checkpoints and in raids in the county.

"Yet again we are witnessing the consequence of Britain's continued involvement in Ireland. Despite the claims that the British army was going with the ending of Operation Banner in 2007, it is obvious that they are here to stay."

Mr Martin said that British military activity in Fermanagh, whether it be in training exercises or in operations against Irish citizens, was completely unacceptable: "éirígí will continue to actively oppose the British military presence in Fermanagh and across the Six Counties."

Source

IAEA Hopes to Rescue Third Party Enrichment Deal With Iran

Iran's 'Rejection' Apparently Greatly Exaggerated

by Jason Ditz, November 20, 2009

The persistent reports of Iran’s final rejection of the draft third party enrichment proposal has been greatly exaggerated, it would seem, and officials are scrambling to put forth a last ditch effort to rescue the proposal.

Mohamed ElBaradei

The P5+1 is reportedly expressing disappointment that Iran hasn’t approved the deal yet, and IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei expressed hope that Iran would take a “minimum risk” in the interests of peace and still approve the deal.

At the same time ElBaradei is urging Western officials to hold off on their oft-threatened sanctions against Iran, saying there was still time to rescue the deal.

The nuclear deal has been hugely controversial inside Iran, with many officials expressing doubts about France’s involvement in the third party enrichment process. Iran has sought to alter the deal to a direct exchange, which has met with Western opposition.

Source