Israeli Occupation Archive – Israel’s war against Palestine

Nation-State of the Jewish People: The Law of Return

Jonathan Cook: Herod exhibit digs up controversy

4 March 2013

Israeli archeologist Yonathan Mizrachi: “Israel wants to present the situation as if it is simply ‘borrowing’ these antiquities from the Palestinians, like it might borrow an exhibit from France or Britain. But that is not the reality in this case. It is borrowing them from the Civil Administration, which has no right to them in the first place.”

Jonathan Cook: Obama’s diplomatic overture will fall prey to Israel’s hawks

25 February 2013

Here is the rub. Mr Netanyahu already has a stranglehold on the politics of his potential peace partners. He can easily manipulate the fortunes of the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas on the two biggest tests he faces: the peace process overseen by the international community, and reconciliation talks with the rival Palestinian faction Hamas.

Stephen R. Shalom: Do we know enough?

22 February 2013

In Knowing Too Much, Norman Finkelstein [argues] that both American Jews and the American public more generally are moving away from uncritical support for Israel. This shift, he suggests, holds out the possibility that the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict may be settled at last.

Jonathan Cook: Pictures speak volumes in Oscar-nominated Israeli films

20 February 2013

Israelis have been revelling in the prospect of an Oscar night triumph next week, with two Israeli-financed films among the five in the running for Best Documentary. But the country’s right-wing government is reported to be quietly fuming that the films, both of which portray Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories in a critical light, have garnered so much attention following their nominations.

Jonathan Cook: Israel’s rightward shift leaves Palestinian citizens out in the cold

14 February 2013

Far from marking a revival by the center-left, as most media presented the results, [Israel's 2013] election results signaled a further rightward shift in the center of political gravity in Israel. Hana Suwayd of the Democratic Front, the least outspoken of all the Palestinian legislators, observed: “I believe that what happened in Israeli politics is a kind of transformation: The extreme right became the mainstream, and the most extreme people are sitting at the center of Israeli politics.”

Akiva Orr, co-founder of Matzpen, passes away

13 February 2013

Matzpen co-founder Akiva Orr died last week in Israel. He is remembered by friends and comrades around the world.

Israel’s ‘Prisoner X’ was Australian Mossad agent, documentary claims

12 February 2013

HRW’s Bill van Esveld: “The main concern is over the fact that a person cannot simply be disappeared. That is against the norms of international law. That person’s family needs to know what has happened to them. They have to be able to have access to a defence attorney and their government needs to be informed to permit consular access.”

Noam Chomsky: Why it’s “legal” when the US does it

6 February 2013

The major energy-producing countries are still firmly under the control of the Western-backed dictatorships. So, actually, the progress made by the Arab Spring is limited, but it’s not insignificant. The Western-controlled dictatorial system is eroding. In fact, it’s been eroding for some time.

Jonathan Cook: Israel’s left turn to the far right

28 January 2013

This election has been a personal blow to Netanyahu, but not to the right. Netanyahu misread the public mood, but not on the central issues that should define the left-right divide in Israel: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and decades of belligerent Israeli occupation. Far from a collapse of the right, the election demonstrated that the right is continuing to push the center of political gravity ever further rightwards.

Hannu Reime: Neither one nor two states, but a federation of the Arab East

28 January 2013

A continuous theme in … the book is the view that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a confrontation between the Zionist settler-colonialism and the Palestinian Arab people; it’s the last colonial war. Israel is a colonial-settler state, a result of settler colonialism and an instrument for its continuation. If one doesn’t understand this, one understands nothing about the conflict.

Remembering Howard Zinn

27 January 2013

We remember Howard Zinn, our friend and teacher (and among the first members of the IOA Advisory Board), who passed away on 27 January 2010, leaving a formidable legacy. In the words of his close friend, Noam Chomsky: “He changed the conscience of a generation. It’s hard to imagine how many young people’s lives were touched by his work and his life.” This writer one of them.

Jonathan Cook: Palestinian citizens wearily eye Israeli elections

19 January 2013

As Nazareth, the capital of Israel’s Palestinian minority, gears up for the country’s general election next week, the most common poster in the city features three far-right leaders noted for their virulently anti-Arab views. Paid for by one of the largest Palestinian parties, the posters are intended to mobilize the country’s Palestinian citizens to vote. They pose a blunt question in Arabic: “Who are you leaving it [the Israeli parliament] to?”

Jonathan Cook: How 20 tents rocked Israel

14 January 2013

However futile the activists’ efforts prove to be on this occasion, the encampment indicates that ordinary Palestinians are better placed to find inventive ways to embarrass Israel than the hidebound Palestinian leadership. Senior PLO official Hanan Ashrawi extolled the activists for their “highly creative and legitimate nonviolent tool” to protect Palestinian land. But the failure of PA officials, including Saeb Erekat, to make it to the site before it was cordoned off by Israel only heightened the impression of a leadership too slow and unimaginative to respond to events.

Moshé Machover: Israel-Palestine – race against history

10 January 2013

If an Arab state west of the Jordan is legitimate, then Zionist colonisation and its state were and are illegitimate. So by acting consistently to prevent a ‘two-state solution’ Israeli governments since 1967 were not behaving impulsively or opportunistically: they have been driven by a deep commitment to the Zionist self-legitimation of Israel itself.

Moshé Machover review: The intersemitic crisis

10 January 2013

The veteran Israeli socialist, Moshé Machover, has just brought out a wonderful collection of writings, chiefly his own, on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is no exaggeration to say that this book is the best possible introduction to the topic for English-speaking readers. Its inestimable virtue is that it affords a historical overview of the whole Zionist enterprise, without which it is impossible to situate the struggle in any meaningful sense, much less reach a conclusion as to how it might successfully be resolved. Machover does both these things, and the result is a volume which Anglophone socialists must read.

Lia Tarachansky: Zionjuana – Netanyahu headlines Birthright rally

10 January 2013

Since 1999, over 300,000 young Jews from around the world have embarked on the free, 10-day tour of Israel known as Taglit-Birthright. It’s considered the most effective means of connecting the next generation of the Jewish Diaspora to the state of Israel. The government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently pledged $100 million to the program.

Moshé Machover: Israel-Gaza – why did Israel do it?

6 January 2013

The success or failure of Israel’s onslaught on Gaza can only be judged against the operation’s aims.

Vote for G4S in the worst company of the year awards

6 January 2013

G4S is up for the Public Eye People’s Award 2013, the ‘name and shame’ award no company wants to win. G4S, the world’s largest private military and security company, is complicit in Israel’s occupation of Palestine and is profiting from conflict and insecurity around the world. Please take a minute to vote for G4S and then tell your friends to do the same.

Jonathan Cook: The terror lurking in a Christmas tree

23 December 2012

A recent report in the Haaretz newspaper, on an Israeli Jew who grows Christmas trees commercially, noted in passing: “hotels – under threat of losing kashrut [Kosher] certificates – are prohibited by the rabbinate from decking their halls in boughs of holly or, heaven forbid, putting up even the smallest of small sparkly Christmas tree in the corner of the lobby.”

IOA Editor: Merry Christmas, Israel!

Adalah: The 2013 Israeli Elections and Arab-Parliamentarians

23 December 2012

Adalah document covering Israeli election rules and party or individual disqualifications.

Balad: Knesset Elections Committee disqualifies MK Haneen Zoabi from running in the Israeli elections

22 December 2012

MK Haneen Zoabi called the decision “anti-democratic and illegitimate”, a form of political revenge that reflected the tyranny of the majority. “No one will determine for the Arab minority who represents it other than Arab citizens themselves,” she said. “I was elected to represent my people and, through their support, I have a legitimacy that the committee cannot take from me.”

Arab-Israeli politician Haneen Zoabi disqualified from re-election

19 December 2012

Jamal Zahalka: “Our problem is not that we are terrorists but rather that we are democrats in an environment that does not believe in democracy… We are tired of apologising for demanding full equality for all Israeli citizens. We’re tired of sitting in the dock for being patriotic Palestinians.”