Subject: ON THE MORAL BANKRUPTCY OF SILENT COLLABORATORS.
23 January 2007
Grenoble, France
Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,
"They'll screw you every time!" was the conclusion of historian Gabrial Kolko speaking with George Kenney about opportunists who successfully campaign to become "leaders" of illegitimate hierarchies. What, in fact, are the qualifications for serving at the head of an illegitimate hierarchy? Our leaders have to control all of us, to make us submit against our own self-interests in order to demonstrate that they are capable of securing the illegitimate hierarchy over which they have gained leadership status --these are the leadership qualities of today.
Restructuring the system would require a lot of work. For many of us, it is simply not worth the candle, and for others even passing on to the next generation the skills of critical thinking and systematic analysis is not worth the effort --what with retirement so close and maybe even new investment opportunities emerging. In an "everyone for him/herself" environment, the environment goes to hell, but who's counting?
The old joke is that in the last days of the last world war, every "good" Frenchman shot a Bosh in the back, in order to gain his credentials as a bona fide "Resister", as the German soldiers were trying to retreat homeward. In reality most of these frauds collaborated and profited as much as they could by turning over French Jews to the Nazis until the very end, when it became apparent that their heros would loose the war. These same people are Israel's allies today. These so-called "Resisters" are the self-righteous supporters of Israel's assassination policy against Palestinians. Their reasons for supporting Israel, they say, are "too complex" for ordinary people to understand, and they will continue to support Israel until the Israelis run out of money from America and are no longer able to finance their murderous nationalist campaign against innocent men, women and children in Gaza.... the tough guys they are!
"The only thing new in the world is the history I didn't know, indeed!"
Below, are 6 items which we at CEIMSA share with you describing the horrible crimes of careerist opportunists in their full glory. This inexcusable use of force and abuse of power might raise some questions for those of us who are not yet totally brutalized , and/or are not completely protected by a thick cloak of intellectual sophism (it wasn't our kid, after all!).
In Item A., from Professor Edward Herman , we have the graphic description of the classic technique of imperialist provocation and murder by Israeli "Defense" Forces.
Item B. is a short description of murder without provocation (whose looking, anyway?) sent to us by Edward Herman, our specialist in mass communications.
Item C., from Michael Parenti, is a call for the defense of two noble journalists who have adopted the ethical position of refusing to collaborate with U.S. military crimes against humanity by helping to destroy a U.S. military officer who successfully resisted the command to send his troops into criminal activity in Iraq.
In item D., from Democracy Now! , we see the role of the Bush administration behind the Canadian rendition of Maher Arar to Syria and their acknowledgement that physical torture would be an inevitable outcome of this bureaucratic process.
Item E. is another description from Democracy Now! of another racist policy "in good conscience": the long history of biological experimentation on African Americans by the United States medical establishment "for the advancement of scientific knowledge".
Item F., sent to us by Dr. Cathrine Shamas, is the invitation to a Gala in Paris in support of the Israeli Defense Forces, who are in need of more financial aid to carry out their policy of genocide Gaza. The rely on help from Le Monde for their funding drive.
And finally item G. is a pod cast from Truth Out covering Bill Moyers's accusation against the private profit motive gone insane.
As usual,. we thank our readers for their indulgence in this unpleasant matter of discussing the habits of those who are still in bed with the enemy in 2007.
Sincerely,
Francis McCollum Feeley
Professor of American Studies
Director of Research
Université Stendhal Grenoble 3
http://www.ceimsa.org/
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A.
from Edward Herman :
Subject: FW: Point blank
Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/815230.html
Francis,
More food for thought for the apologists of Israeli crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Ed Herman
Point-blank
by Gideon Levy
What happened in the courtyard of the impressive old building that laborer Wahib al-Dik was helping to renovate that caused a paratrooper to fire a barrage of bullets and kill him? Why did the soldiers enter the courtyard in the first place? Did Dik really intend to throw a large rock at the soldiers? And if so, does that mean he should have been killed? After being shot, Dik fell down the ancient staircase to the sand floor before the terrified eyes of his father, Maslah al-Dik. Both were in part of the group of plasterers renovating the building in their village, with funding from the Swedish government. Just 27 when he died, Wahib left four children between the ages of six months and six years, and a widow who is three months' pregnant.
The renovations have been halted. Several weeks after the killing, the bloodstains are still visible in the sandy courtyard. Also visible is the blood on the two buckets that Dik was carrying just before he was killed. The building is large and beautiful, with an inner courtyard surrounded by giant, ornately decorated arches and an old staircase that goes up to the second floor, to the place where the plasterer stood before plummeting to his death. The old ruin in the center of the village of Al-Dik, west of Ariel, near the Barkan industrial zone, was being renovated with funds from Sweden's international development agency, SIDA. The project was supposed to provide employment while preserving the structure.
"The soldier shot to kill," the project architect with the REVAC company, Khaldun Bishara, wrote. "Dik was a dedicated worker who contributed a lot to the renovation work," he added, demanding that the guilty parties be brought to justice.
The simple living room of the Dik home is strewn with toys and adorned with pictures, including many of Yasser Arafat. The doors and walls are pocked with bullet holes left over from a search by soldiers several months ago for Ayman al-Dik. The father shouted to the soldiers from inside the house that Ayman was not at home, and the soldiers fired. His brother Wahib had never been in trouble with the security forces. Every morning he set out with his father and another brother, Mahayub, for their daily labor as plasterers. About 25 villagers were hired as plasterers for the Swedish renovation project.
On Thursday, December 14, Wahib and Maslah went to work as usual, walking the short distance from their home and mixing the plaster as soon as they arrived. Mahayub did not come to work that day. One group of plasterers worked on the internal walls while another, from the neighboring village of Marda, worked on the large stones on the outside. When the renovation work is completed, the building will house the village council and will surely be one of the most beautiful council buildings in the country. It contains 14 rooms and has stood abandoned for decades. The Swedish initiative was designed to provide employment primarily to more disadvantaged groups in the village. Several elderly laborers are employed, as is one mentally retarded youth.
At around 10:30 A.M., the workers heard that soldiers had entered the village. It was recess time at school, and students had apparently thrown rocks at two Israel Defense Forces jeeps. A group of soldiers suddenly entered the courtyard through the large wooden gate, evidently in pursuit of the rock-throwers. The workers - idle since the work was halted - say that no children had fled into the courtyard. It is impossible to throw rocks at the street from inside the building, since the windows and roof face another direction, and once inside escape is impossible because the main gate is the only exit.
Maslah says that six or eight soldiers entered the courtyard. They stopped at the entrance, beneath the stone ceiling. One continued into the courtyard to where the workers were, under the stairwell on which Wahib was standing. One of the workers, a man of about 45, asked the soldiers what they were looking for. One answered that they were searching for the rock-throwers. The rest happened in a flash.
Wahib was standing at the top of the high staircase. The soldier was at the bottom, in the courtyard. Maslah says his son was holding two buckets of plastering mixture, one in each hand. The next day, the IDF said that Wahib was holding a large rock and threatening to drop it on the soldier. Maslah was just a few meters from the soldier.
A muezzin's call drifts over the houses, a donkey brays, the sounds of the village carry on. Maslah relates that the soldier began shooting at his son right away, without hesitation and without warning, aiming his rifle upward, toward the top of the stairs, straight at Wahib. The distance between them was just a few meters, just the height of the steps. A report from the hospital in Ramallah, where the body was taken, says that Dik was hit by three bullets - two to the chest and one in the right arm. The other workers say they collected 13 shell casings from the courtyard. Wahib plummeted from the top of the steps to the sandy ground. His eyes were wide open and blood
seeped from his chest as his father rushed to him.
"Why did you shoot him?," one of the workers yelled, as the soldiers hastily left the courtyard. Maslah carried his dying son outside. He pleaded with the soldiers to call an ambulance, even clutching one by the hand, but he says they hurried into their jeep and drove off, leaving him and Wahib on the road. A van belonging to the village grocer was summoned - the village has no doctor, clinic or ambulance - and it took them in the direction of Ramallah. Near Bir Zeit University they transferred to an ambulance, but when they reached the government hospital in Ramallah, all Dr. Mohammed Wahdan could do was to declare Wahib dead. "A dog is better than this
soldier," Wahib's father says bitterly.
"On December 14, the IDF killed one of our workers on the renovation project in Al-Dik," Bishara wrote several days afterward to the B'tselem organization. In the letter he said the soldiers ordered the workers who were on the ground to remain quiet, so that Wahib would come down from the roof, and then shot him without warning. He notes that Wahib was killed in front of his father, calling it a murder in cold blood. Bishara writes that Wahib did not try to run away, and died before he could receive medical treatment. He also says that the other workers said that the soldier who killed Wahib recognized him, since two days earlier he had gone into his home in search of his brother, and that they could identify the soldier. We at REVAC, Bishara wrote, ask B'tselem to sue, on our behalf, the soldier who committed the crime, the officer responsible and the IDF. We are willing to put at your disposal all relevant information.
The IDF Spokesman said this week: "On December 14, Palestinians threw rocks and cement blocks at an IDF force in Al-Dik, southeast of Qalqilyah. An IDF force that was combing the area noticed a Palestinian holding a cement block that he intended to throw at the force from a high spot, thus endangering the lives of the soldiers. The force fired in his direction and identified a hit. The force began giving medical treatment to the Palestinian, while at the same time Palestinians were continuing to throw rocks at the force. When the Red Crescent ambulance arrived, the force transferred the wounded man to the care of its medical team. An investigation by the IDF indicates that the soldiers acted in accordance with orders and procedures in order to protect their lives."
Munira, Wahib's widow is baking bread in a taboun oven in the yard of the family home. She is dressed in black. Her children run about, barefoot: Useid, 6, Asil, 5 and Sali, 3. Wais is six months old. All orphans now. We walk down the street toward the old building. We see the sign announcing the Swedish renovation project. The soldiers must have stood here before they entered the compound.
The father describes his son's last moments. He mixed the plaster and loaded the mixture into two buckets. He was standing at the top of the stairs and then fell. "Even if Wahib was holding a rock, they could have shot him in the leg," his father says. "But to kill him like a cat? Like a mouse? Let the head of the Central Command come and see what his soldiers are doing. May God take the soldier who killed my son. They say there's democracy in Israel. They say it's good. But this is no human being, this dog, this soldier. Someone said the soldier's name is Asaf, but he's not a human being, not at all, not at all."
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B.
from Ed Herman :
Subject: FW: Kafka/756: Palestinian Girl Murdered
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2007
It's okay, she probably had those lethal rocks in her pocket..
efs.
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C.
from Michael Parenti :
Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2007
Subject: [Clarity] independent journalism v. repressive state
Dear Friends,
Below is a brief statement by Sara Olson and Greg Kakesako, two journalists whom the US Army is trying to dragoon into giving testimony against an army officer who is a war resister.
If you see fit to support their struggle, please write directly to Sarah at:
<solson75@yahoo.com>
and simply say: "add my name to your statement"
thank you,
Michael
We, the undersigned journalists, academics, artists
and citizens, object to the Army’s decision to
subpoena independent journalist and radio producer
Sarah Olson and Honolulu Star Bulletin reporter Greg
Kakesako, to testify in the court-martial of 1st Lt.
Ehren Watada, the first officer to publicly refuse to
deploy to Iraq. We are further disturbed by the Army’s
decision to add independent journalist Dahr Jamail and
videographer Sari Gelzer to the prosecution’s witness
list.
It’s a journalist’s job to report the news, not to
participate in government prosecutions. The press
cannot function if it is used by the government to
prosecute political speech, and hauling a journalist
into a military court erodes the separation between
government and press. Turning reporters into the
investigative arm of the government subverts press
freedoms and chills dissenting speech in the United
States. The press must preserve its ability to cover
all aspects of a debate, not just the perspectives
popular with the current administration. We believe a
journalist’s duty is to the public and their right to
know, not to the government.
In the name of the cornerstone values this nation
claims to uphold and for which the men and women in
the military are fighting, we ask you to drop the
speech related charges against Lt. Watada and put an
end to your insistence that journalists participate in
the prosecution these charges. We need more
information, participation, and debate inside and
outside the military not less. As the LA Times
argued in its January 8th editorial: "It’s time for
the Army to back off."
Video Interview | Ehren Watada's Parents Speak Out
Truthout's Geoffrey Millard interviews Lieutenant Ehren Watada's parents on the eve of his court-martial. They spoke about their son and his courage as he faces the fight of his life.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011707A.shtml
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D.
from Democracy Now !
19 January 2007
http://www.maherarar.ca/
The Bush administration’s handling of the case of Maher Arar came under new scrutiny Thursday when Attorney General Alberto Gonzales appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee, now controlled by the Democrats. Arar is the Canadian citizen who was seized by U.S. officials during a stopover flight in New York in 2002. He was secretly sent to Syria as part of the Bush administration's extraordinary rendition program.
“We Knew Damn Well He’d Be Tortured”
Sen. Patrick Leahy Questions Attorney General Alberto Gonzales
(on Extraordinary Rendition Victim Maher Arar )
Listen/Watch/Read
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/19/1432225
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E.
from Democracy Now !
19 January 2007
Medical scholar Harriet Washington joins us to talk about her new book, “Medical partheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present.” The book reveals the hidden underbelly of scientific research and the roots of the African American health deficit. It also examines less well-known abuses and looks at unethical practices and mistreatment of blacks that are still taking place in the medical establishment today.
from Colonial Times to the Present
Listen/Watch/Read
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/19/1432231
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F.
from Dr. Catherine Shamas :
20 January 2007
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"LES ESCADRONS DES GARDES FRONTIERE ISRAELIENS RECUS ET HONORES A PARISAlors que les Organisations des droits de l’homme israéliennes ont recensé et porté de très nombreuses plaintes contre MAGAV : La Garde frontière israélienne, un gala parrainé par le ministère de la défense israélien devrait se tenir en son honneur à Paris le 21 janvier.
Plaintes pour meurtres de civils désarmés et non recherchés, humiliations, coups et blessures, usage abusif de la violence et torture sur les barrages, sur les routes, dans les villages des territoires occupés et en Israël même : on ne compte plus les actions illégales de ces escadrons, ni les plaintes déposées contre eux.
________________
G.
from Truth Out :
22 January 2007
Bill Moyers, speaking to the National Conference for Media Reform, states: "Our democracy is now put to a vital test, for the conflict is between human rights on the one side and on the other, special privilege asserted as a property right. The parting of the ways has come."
VIDEO | Bill Moyers: Life on the Plantation
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011807B.shtml