Magufuli's Reviewers and their True Colours...

Peter Fabricius's article titled "Magufuli Reveals his true Colours" (Institute of Security Studies - https://www.issafrica.org/…/magufuli-reveals-his-true-colou…) makes me wonder whose true colours are at display here?

Usually when you write, you expose yourself, you reveal your inner feelings, thoughts and views! That's what we are all doing whether we like it or not. I am an Africanist, I love my continent and its people, I love its natural resources and its struggles to manage its present and shape its future. I love to give hope, and not to rob my Africa brothers and sisters of their optimism for things aimed at improving in the future. As a matter of fact many things have improved in most African countries in the years since Independence. We have our sad stories as does Europe in the case of Bosnia, Ukraine, Chechnya, Yugoslavia, or the similar mishaps in Latin America's Haiti, Venezuela, Columbia, and other. The world is perpetually set in struggles between various factions, interests and ideologies. Perhaps these countries and peoples are pawns in this landscape. Whatever the causes or reasons, let us get back to the article on Magufuli's colours.

The article above could as well have started with propositioning what would be the case in Tanzania if the police were trigger happy as they are in the USA? What would have been the situation in Tanzania if the media was left to abuse the country's leaders the way westerners disrespect and contemptuously slander their leadership as they do President Obama in the USA? Africa is another continent, with a different set of game rules, even if we are all in a global village, we are all coming from our own individual households (countries) and retreat to these same households (countries) at the end of the day. The writer should have asked what does the majority in Tanzania want out of its leadership? Its these majority, who voted President Magufuli into State House, it is they who accepted his campaign message and his party's election manifesto. They are the ones who hold a contract with the President. So ask, what do Tanzanians want from Magufuli?

Instead the writer seems to originate from his own biases, he seems to write from biases that restrict him from seeing that its what the majority of Tanzanians (the 75% of Tanzanians who live in rural areas, or the 60% of Tanzanian voters who voted for Magufuli), want from their President. Moreover, the writer could just as well have posed the question, what would Tanzania gain or lose from these cyber critics who instead of floating respectful arguments and propositions, they want to lace their diatribes with insults and disrespect? As an African, I have minimal tolerance for anybody who is dissing leaders and adults.

In addition, the writer could have asked, what are the opposition's goals for dissing the President or trying to discredit his government in the most abusive language? Who is so naive in this adult world, to claim that the opposition is always noble in their intentions? Oppositions all over the world, are a desperate lot who usually do not spare any tricks or sinister tactics to embarrass those in power. They too should be questioned, and not taken lightly as saints with noble intentions.

The writer did not reflect on statistical evidence that proves President Magufuli is on the right course. Even the Governor of the Tanzania's Central Bank (Professor Benno Ndullu) recently shared economic indicators that prove the country is making steadfast progress as regards foreign direct investments, major infrastructure investments (e.g, the USD $8 Billon standard gauge railway and the USD $4 Billion oil pipeline from Uganda), export growth (e.g., increased receipts from mining and tourism ), healthy foreign reserves (around USD $4 Billion), increased government tax revenues (averaging TSh 1.2 Trillion monthly), and a generally positive economic climate. As a matter of fact, Tanzania is still yet to achieve the globally recommended tax to GDP ratios (thats why the Tax Authorities, TRA, are tightening tax loop holes and reigning in more sources).

In essence, the President and his intermediaries, have held several meetings with the private sector (e.g., TPSF) representatives to share economic sector analyses and projections. The message has always been, the private sector's role in industrialization of Tanzania. This President has uttered several times in public, that industrialization, by the private sector is the way forward into transforming Tanzania's economy to a middle income status. Moreover, the President has urged Tanzanian business community to take lead! Nevertheless, recently representatives from Norway's Statoil met with President Magufuli to reaffirm their resolve and commitment to go ahead with construction of a USD $20 Billion LPG plant in Lindi. They are still on course, not otherwise. But the writer wanted us to believe things were vice versa!

The writer failed to inform us or remind us of the fears Tanzania and other EAC countries had about the Economic Partnership Agreement with the EU. There are profound worries about the negative impact of this agreement to the growth of local industries, especially in more nascent economies such as Tanzania's. It is no big wonder why Kenya is more attuned to the European market, it has the industrial infrastructure to compete on a better footing than Tanzania and or Uganda, Rwanda or Burundi. Removal of tariffs for some EU imports to the EAC region might spell doom to some budding industries here. So, the writer failed to bring this argument for Tanzania. Tanzania is acting responsibly and cautiously. Tanzania's position is aimed at minimizing losses and maximizing gains, as any responsible government does.

On the replacement of limousines and 4x4s with sedans, it was not correctly observed by the writer. Tanzania's parliament has passed a motion where government purchases of 4x4s are restricted to those not exceeding 3000cc, and also the procurement being done centrally through a single entity so that savings be made on prices. Furthermore, the motion also categorically stated which type and size of vehicles would be appropriate for different levels of leaders. This is a frugal government, aiming at making proper use of state funds in order to benefit the more vulnerable Tanzanians more effectively. Moreover, the writer could have also mentioned that President Magufuli's government has amended procurement laws to arrest loopholes which enabled dishonest officials steeply mark up prices uncontrollably. This obviously paints better colours of the President's resolve to rid the country of graft and stealing of public resources. President Magufuli is doing a GREAT JOB at this.

So the writer should have been talking about what the majority of Tanzanians want, instead of placating the whims and complaints of a few foreign investors. He should have played fair to why President Magufuli is STILL VERY ADMIRED within and without the country, and why in East Africa the other Presidents also admire his steadfastness.

The writer should have talked to the Tanzanian youths who last year were very skeptical about CCM being able to produce a change setting President, and who are now 100% behind President Magufuli, and want him to travel the same course throughout his mandate. We know our colours in Tanzania, these are green, yellow, black and blue. President Magufuli was given the mandate by the electorate to hoist these colours on all flagpoles, and make our country proud, secure and free from vices.

The writer, may I conclude, has therefore shown his true colours, mainly that of bias against an African President who wants his country to prosper and emancipate itself from self inflicted or externally inflicted economic, social, political and legal injustices. It is unfortunate that African leaders who want to truly guide their countries on a path towards an economic, political, social and cultural transformation that places its citizen at the center of all change, are not given a positive press. So, for our East African Presidents, especially President Magufuli and President Kagame, you are DOING GREAT to your peoples and countries!

Keep your course...

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An epidemic aided by poverty

Rebekah Ward and Dora Curry look at the deadly outbreak of Ebola sweeping through West Africa--and how poverty and racism are enabling the spread of the disease.

August 20, 2014

AS THE deadly disease Ebola spreads throughout West Africa, some in the U.S. have been engaging in fear-mongering and racism. Others are seeing this deadly outbreak as a golden chance to profit off desperation. But what's causing the high death toll is the intersection of Ebola and poverty.

A hemorrhagic fever with symptoms that include headache, vomiting and diarrhea, as well as the signature symptoms of internal and external bleeding, Ebola is caused by a virus that is spread through contact with fluids like saliva, urine, blood and semen. There are no known cases of airborne transmission, unlike other deadly diseases like influenza. Because of this, Ebola is actually relatively hard to transmit from human to human, and is less contagious than measles, whooping cough or polio.

According to the scare merchants at Fox News, however, "The deadly Ebola outbreak in West Africa poses a threat to America." Other choice headlines include, "Here are the 35 countries one flight away from Ebola-affected countries," and "Ebola outbreak: Deadly foreign diseases are 'potential major threat.'"

The Center for Disease Control and the World Health Organization, however, both agree that there is almost no chance that an outbreak could occur in the U.S., or in any nation with sufficient medical infrastructure. In fact, in previous outbreaks, infected individuals have returned to their home countries, with no further transmission there.

Two American missionaries were flown back to the U.S. after contracting Ebola during this most recent outbreak. There was very little alarmism about these two Ebola-infected people on U.S. soil. However, some right-wingers are urging the U.S. to close all flights to and from West Africa to prevent the spread of Ebola.

This double standard reflects another component of this outbreak: racism. The renowned public health expert Donald Trump tweeted, "The bigger problem with Ebola is all of the people coming into the U.S. from West Africa who may be infected with the disease. STOP FLIGHTS!" Meanwhile, the right-wing Breitbart.com reminded readers that 80,000 Nigerians travel to the U.S. every year in an article entitled, "Air travel from Nigeria most likely path for Ebola to reach U.S." [1]

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THERE ARE several theories about the natural host for Ebola, but the most widely accepted one is that the virus lives in fruit bats. In this scenario, an infected fruit bat would come in contact with a person (possible through another animal) and introduce the disease into a human population.

But the primary mechanism through which humans become infected is contact with other humans--the vast majority of humans infected acquire Ebola from contact with the bodily fluids of other infected humans. Furthermore, doctors believe that humans can only transmit the disease after they begin to show symptoms.

Media hysteria claiming people in the U.S. (or any other nation with similar infrastructure) are at risk from Ebola is simply that--hysteria.

And while some elements the Ebola virus' natural host and life cycle remain unclear, the media obsession with the possibility of that constant consumption of bush meat or various cultural practices in caring for the dead plays a role--among the many racist assertions in the U.S. media--is a distortion of the facts fueled by racism and the desire to profit from spiking readership and viewership.

The current Ebola outbreak in West Africa is the most deadly in history. Over 2,000 cases and 1,000 deaths have been associated with it. Declan Butler, senior reporter for the prestigious scientific journal Nature, puts this outbreak in context by saying, "Since Ebola first appeared in 1976, only 19 outbreaks have had more than 10 victims...Only seven other of the few dozen past outbreaks have involved more than 100 cases."

So what has made this outbreak different? Ebola has usually been contained in remote villages, far from cities. This outbreak has spread to the sprawling urban centers in several West African countries.

The combination of urban overcrowding and completely inadequate health facilities in such urban centers creates a perfect breeding ground for this and many other illnesses. Monrovia, Liberia (population 1.5 million), Freetown, Sierra Leone (1.2 million) and Conkary, Guinea (1.7 million) have all reported growing numbers of cases.

According to Bessman Toe, head of the Montserrado County slum-dweller association in Monrovia, in some areas, up to 70,000 residents have access to only four public toilets connected to a sewage system. The UN estimates that 42 percent of the population of Monrovia are "squatters," thus living in makeshift shacks tightly crowded together. In the Kroo Bay neighborhood of Freetown, rent is prohibitively high for the structures on dry land, so many are constructing shelters on the floating garbage over the ocean.

In Guinea, there are 0.1 doctors per 1,000 people. That number is 0.022 for Sierra Leone and 0.014 for Liberia. Basic health protections, like disposable gloves, are simply not available for those few doctors practicing in these countries. And while many doctors have been sickened in this outbreak due to these conditions, their numbers overestimate the size of the health care staff which is trying to stem the tide of the infection. Ebola may be a deadly disease, but it is clearly not the root cause of these deaths.

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RACISM AND economic disparities can also seen in discussions about Ebola treatment and vaccines. The treatment known as zMapp has allowed for near-recovery in the patients who have received it in the U.S. But even following a formal request from the Nigerian government, the U.S. refused to supply the serum on August 7. The Obama administration cited concerns about the experimental nature of the drug.

The next day, it agreed to supply Liberia with doses for two doctors. Either the drug became less experimental overnight, or the sheer hypocrisy of the statement was too much to bear.

It is absolutely true that the zMapp serum is experimental. This therapy is produced in plants and is made of proteins called antibodies that bind the Ebola virus in the blood, keeping it from damaging the body. Prior to its use on the Americans, it had only been tested in monkeys. It is also true that a Spanish priest was administered the serum after returning to Spain, and the treatment did not save him.

However, the limited monkey studies that have been done indicated that the serum must be administered within 48 hours of infection to have full efficacy--and in the case of the Americans, that happened.

Two doses of the experimental treatment were secretly flown to Africa and administered to the Americans prior to their flight back to the U.S. This brings us to the central hypocrisy: Drugs are only "too experimental" for Africa if they are scarce. Already, zMapp developers say, "The available supply of ZMapp has been exhausted. We have complied with every request for ZMapp that had the necessary legal/regulatory authorization."

After the recent UN and World Health Organization approval of experimental treatments for Ebola, these countries have also been flooded with other new "treatments" for the disease.

One of the most high profile is Nano Silver. Although silver particles do have some anti-microbial properties and have been shown to bind some viruses, this treatment has never been tested in live animals, much less humans. These small silver particles, if ingested, would likely pass out of the patient without ever encountering the Ebola virus. If the treatment is injected, the side effects could be more fatal in the long term than the disease.

The Nigerian Health Minister confirmed that the country was to receive a large shipment of Nano Silver to combat Ebola. The manufacturer of this treatment also offers online sales of ear candles, hemp oil, chocolate and "mental clarity packs." Again, we see the pattern of African lives as disposable in the eyes of those seeking profit for their drugs.

People are not dying of Ebola because of "exotic cultural practices." Nor is Ebola impossible to treat and inevitably spread throughout a population.

While its symptoms are sensational and more fatal than some other diseases, the rapid, widespread nature of this Ebola outbreak can be tied directly to systemic inequality. The natural features of this disease (unclear and infrequent transmission into human populations, difficult to transmit when even basic infection prevention practices are in place) actually make it very unlikely to spread. It is the very unnatural features of overcrowded, under-resourced poor urban centers that allow the Ebola virus to thrive.

Poverty and racism are the most deadly aspects of this disease. Until we live in a world with access to healthy living conditions and quality health care for all, we will continue to see contagious unnatural disasters.

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Published by the International Socialist Organization.
Material on this Web site is licensed by SocialistWorker.org, under a Creative Commons (by-nc-nd 3.0) [2] license, except for articles that are republished with permission. Readers are welcome to share and use material belonging to this site for non-commercial purposes, as long as they are attributed to the author and SocialistWorker.org.

1.     [1] http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2014/08/08/Air-Travel-from-Nigeria-Most-Likely-Path-for-Ebola-to-Reach-US

2.     [2] http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0

The war crime state declares "peace"

The urgency of the protests and outrage against Israel's war of terror on Gaza must be maintained and mobilized to expand the movement in solidarity with Palestine.

EDITORIALS

Published by the International Socialist Organization.

August 7, 2014

THE LATEST onslaught in Israel's war of annihilation against Gaza appears to have come to a close if the cease-fire and withdrawal of Israeli troops in effect as this article was being written continue.

But the ruins of Gaza are still smoldering. The human toll has been enormous: More than 1,800 dead, including 1,300 civilians. Some 10,000 injured. The homes of 60,000 people reduced to rubble. Nearly a quarter of Gaza's 1.8 million residents on the move in search of somewhere safe to shelter from Israel's rampage.

Meanwhile, burning questions are being asked around the world: What was Israel's month-long offensive all about? And if we've seen the horrors of war for the past weeks, what will "peace" mean for the people of Gaza?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists that Israel's massacre was "justified" and that every civilian casualty was the fault of Hamas for using civilians as "human shields."

Never mind that even the New York Times acknowledged that "[t]here is no evidence that Hamas and other militants force civilians to stay in areas that are under attack--the legal definition of a human shield under international law." The BBC reached the same conclusion.

And never mind that as recently as last year, the United Nations condemned Israeli soldiers for repeatedly using Palestinian children as--you guessed it--human shields. "[Israel's] soldiers have used Palestinian children to enter potentially dangerous buildings ahead of them and to stand in front of military vehicles in order to stop the throwing of stones against those vehicles," a UN report concluded.

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EACH OF Israel's rationalizations for its rampage through Gaza make far more sense when leveled against Israel itself. Remember the kidnapping of three settler youth in June. Hamas' alleged responsibility for this crime served as the pretext for war? Now, however, we know that Israeli police concluded that the kidnappers were part of a lone cell operating independently of Hamas.

And then there's the larger truth: It's Israel that systematically detains, tortures and abuses children, provided they're Palestinian. More than 400 Palestinian children were killed during the course of Operation Protective Shield.

Stopping the rockets from Gaza? Netanyahu says Hamas fired nearly 3,000 rockets at Israel and asserts, "No country would tolerate this." But it's Israel that for years has routinely carried out assassinations in Gaza, by drone, sniper and air strike. In recent weeks, it fired some 3,000 tons of high-powered missiles at Gaza.

Rocket fire from Gaza took the lives of three Israeli civilians, and Hamas fighters killed 65 soldiers during ground operations. Of the more than 1,800 Palestinians killed by Israel, less than 25 percent were actual fighters; by contrast, 96 percent of those killed by Gaza's resistance fighters were Israeli soldiers.

Closing down the "terror tunnels"? Egypt sealed the tunnels between its territory and Gaza last year--without destroying a single neighborhood in Gaza.

In any case, the very term "terror tunnel" betrays how every utterance by Israel is designed to demonize the idea that the oppressed can and should resist their oppressors. This is an old smear, faced by the resistance of South Africa's Black majority against apartheid, African Americans fighting Jim Crow laws in the South and countless other movements--the oppressor invariably portrays the resistance of the oppressed as "extremist," "a threat to law and order" and "terrorist."

Israel hasn't accomplished on the battlefield any of the various war aims it has given publicly--and for good reason. The war was itself the aim--with the purpose of advancing Israel's long-term goal of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. In Netanyahu's own words: "There cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan."

Despite some words of criticism, the U.S. government's support for Israel's barbarism can be counted on to continue. Stopping Israel from succeeding in its goal of eliminating Palestinian society in Gaza and the West Bank will require the ongoing resistance of Palestinians--and the mobilization of concrete solidarity by ordinary people from Copenhagen to Cairo to Columbus, Ohio.

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THE POLARIZATION of opinion about Israel's Operation Protective Edge has been stark. Israel's Jewish population, the U.S. political class and the American and Israeli media stand ready to justify every last atrocity committed by Israel during the last month.

Fully 95 percent of Israeli Jews believe that Israel's war on Gaza was justified, and less than 4 percent think that Israel Defense Forces used "excessive force," according to a poll conducted in July. A solid majority believes there will be more confrontations with Hamas to come.

In the midst of the relentless bombing, the U.S. Senate voted 100-0 to stand with Israel--a unanimous vote that not even the USA Patriot Act managed to inspire. Mainstream media figures across the political spectrum--from Fox News' Sean Hannityto CBS News' Charlie Rose--criticized Arab and Palestinian spokespeople for their "anti-Israel" views. If the frenzied media defense of Israel was less than completely unanimous, it was because of the influence of independent journalists and social media commentators, which occasionally forced the mainstream media to acknowledge their shortcomings. But generally, the media simply reported Israel's deceptive and self-serving statements as fact.

As part of the truce negotiations being brokered by the Egyptian regime, Israel is demanding that Gaza be "demilitarized," while Hamas is calling for an end to the seven-year siege that has plunged Gaza into a hellscape of unemployment, malnutrition and crumbling infrastructure. But finalizing the truce may well expose even more the extent to which various currents in the Israeli establishment believe the main problem was that Netanyahu's prosecution of the war didn't go far enough.

Hamas has signaled that it is willing to concede to monitoring of Gaza's border crossing with Egypt by the rival Fatah-led Palestinian Authority (PA), as part of an easing of the siege. But it has so far refused to give up its right to self-defense. If this ends up unraveling the cease-fire, the open calls for concentration camps and genocide that have echoed around Israeli society--and not just in its right-wing and militaristic margins--will no doubt intensify.

For example, Moshe Feiglin, the deputy speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament,recently described on Facebook his vision for the "final solution":

There are no two states, and there are no two peoples. There is only one state for one people...The IDF [Israeli army] shall designate certain open areas on the Sinai border, adjacent to the sea, in which the civilian population will be concentrated, far from the built-up areas that are used for launches and tunneling. In these areas, tent encampments will be established, until relevant emigration destinations are determined...The supply of electricity and water to the formerly populated areas will be disconnected...

The formerly populated areas will be shelled with maximum firepower. The entire civilian and military infrastructure of Hamas, its means of communication and of logistics, will be destroyed entirely, down to their foundations...The IDF will divide the Gaza Strip laterally and crosswise, significantly expand the corridors, occupy commanding positions, and exterminate nests of resistance, in the event that any should remain.

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THE U.S. government--long the world's most ardent and powerful supporter of Israel--shocked many with a condemnation of Israel's July 30 bombing of a UN school-turned-shelter, killing at least 19 people and wounding many more. "The shelling of a UN facility that is housing innocent civilians who are fleeing violence is totally unacceptable and totally indefensible," said White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest.

Strong words of rebuke for Israel coming from the U.S. are highly unusual, but the circumstances show how long a leash Israel can still count on when it comes to committing atrocities against Palestinians. After all, Earnest's criticism followed the sixthIsraeli bombing of a UN shelter. Apparently, attacking five shelters was tolerable, but a sixth was "unacceptable."

When Barack Obama commented on the current truce negotiations, he talked about the need for "trust-building" and "giving hope"--the kind of empty rhetoric typically used at the end of an election campaign, not a merciless assault on civilian life.

Of course, whatever rhetorical censures that Obama and members of his administration voiced, no one threatened to withhold even one dollar of the $3 billion in annual aid to Israel, let alone call for an end to the siege that has turned Gaza into an open-air prison.

If U.S. officials made mild criticisms, the Arab states were shamefully quiet. Diana Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer and analyst, called the reaction:

remarkable. In all the other invasions and assaults on Gaza, there was at least some government that would come out and talk about how what Israel was doing was illegal and show some support. This time around, there's been nothing. The silence is deafening.

The silence was not only deafening, but it represented a shift in regional politics, as theNew York Times explained:

After the military ouster of the Islamist government in Cairo last year, Egypt has led a new coalition of Arab states--including Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates--that has effectively lined up with Israel in its fight against Hamas, the Islamist movement that controls the Gaza Strip.

Yet the Palestinian cause continues to be embraced by the popular classes throughout the Middle East--even if those who rule over them do not. And to this steadfast regional support is now added the worldwide outrage, expressed in large Gaza solidarity protests around the world.

The protests are themselves an expression of shifting tides of public opinion. A Gallup poll in July found that while a majority of Americans over 65 believed Israel's actions were "justified" by a 55-to-31 percent margin, the percentages were reversed for 18 to 29 year olds, who believed by a 51-to-25 percent margin that Israel's actions were "unjustified."

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THE PEOPLE of Gaza may enjoy greater support in world public opinion, but the fact remains that Hamas is politically isolated.

Last year's ouster of Egyptian President and Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Morsi, combined with Hamas' estrangement from Iran, leaves the Islamist leadership in Gaza without any of the backing from regional elites it enjoyed just a couple years ago. And Qatar, which has flirted with offering financial support to Hamas, has largely caved to regional pressures not to do so.

This has revealed the dead end of Hamas' strategy of attempting to ally itself with one or another Arab regime--just as the Palestine Liberation Organization tried in past decades.

Given Israel's overwhelming military superiority, the hard question remains: How can Palestinian liberation be achieved if a direct military confrontation with Israel is unwinnable?

Israel has benefited from the setbacks for the "Arab Spring" upsurges that began in 2011 with the overthrow of Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak. This gave Israel the political space it needed to carry out Operation Protective Edge. But the bitter grievances that underlay the Arab Spring have not been resolved and are bound to fuel future struggles. When they arise, they will again inspire broad solidarity with the Palestinian cause.

Beyond the Middle East, the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement represents another front in the long-term effort to expose Israeli apartheid and its systematic violations of international law and basic rights for Palestinians.

These campaigns--targeting everything from Israeli-produced hummus on college campuses, to artists performing in apartheid Israel, to international conglomerates engaged in infrastructure projects that extend Israel's settlement-building enterprise--are an essential component of raising the political price Israel must pay, both for its recent string of war crimes in Gaza and its ongoing oppression of Palestinians.

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FOR AN intensified BDS campaign to be effective in opening up another front against Israel, those who support justice must confront the political arguments used to deflect their initiatives. During the Israeli onslaught, liberal publications such as The Nationmagazine, for example, maintained a steady drumbeat of criticism of Hamas as at least partly responsible for "provoking" Israeli violence for its fighters' decision to resist occupation, as is their right under international law.

Liberal criticisms will come as no surprise to anyone who has participated in the Palestine solidarity movement. But many activists may have been taken aback by similar statements that have come from sections of the socialist left.

For example, Kshama Sawant of Socialist Alternative, newly elected to the Seattle City Council, included in her statement denouncing the Israeli war a condemnation of Hamas for firing rockets, and a call to "stand in solidarity with the ordinary people of Israel and their desire for security." The Militant newspaper published by the Socialist Workers Party-U.S. went further, denouncing Hamas for the "targeting of citizens in Israel," which has "set back prospects for united action by Arab and Jewish working people."

Such statements are especially stunning in the face of the racist war frenzy that gripped Israeli society almost unanimously--leading to the opinion poll results already cited that showed 95 percent of Jewish Israelis agreeing that Operation Protective Edge was justified.

These attitudes are not merely the result of brainwashing. They are inevitable in an apartheid system in which Jewish citizens, rich and poor, enjoy exclusive rights and material financial benefits in a militarized society built around the logic of expulsion and ethnic cleansing.

A movement that seeks to achieve justice in Palestine and the broader Middle East must champion the demands of Palestinians for self-determination and embrace the Palestinian call to organize a boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign that can undermine international support for Israeli apartheid.

If there was any sign of hope amid nightmare inflicted on Gaza in the past weeks, it was the sense of urgency and determination that animated the protests against Israel's war and expressions of support for Palestine. Because of the hard work of organizing, especially around BDS, in the past several years, the international movement in solidarity with Palestine is in a position to connect to this broader outrage at Israel's war--and continue to mobilize it for the struggles to come.

We will do so with the horrors of Israel's war fresh in mind to remember the barbarism we are fighting against--and with the determination of the Palestinian people to resist tyranny and violence to teach us what we are struggling for.

Published by the International Socialist Organization.

Material on this Web site is licensed by SocialistWorker.org, under a Creative Commons (by-nc-nd 3.0) [20] license, except for articles that are republished with permission. Readers are welcome to share and use material belonging to this site for non-commercial purposes, as long as they are attributed to the author and SocialistWorker.org.

1.       [1] http://socialistworker.org/department/Opinion/Editorials

2.       [2] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/24/world/middleeast/israel-says-hamas-is-using-civilians-as-shields-in-gaza.html

3.       [3] http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/25362-israel-uses-palestinians-as-human-shields-but-us-lawmakers-condemn-hamas

4.       [4] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/un-report-accuses-israeli-forces-of-using-palestinian-children-as-human-shields-abusing-children-in-custody/

5.       [5] http://mondoweiss.net/2014/08/deceptions-revealed-kidnapped.html

6.       [6] https://news.vice.com/article/israel-is-holding-even-more-palestinian-children-in-solitary-for-throwing-rocks

7.       [7] http://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-gaza-conflict-proves-israel-cant-relinquish-control-of-west-bank/

8.       [8] http://en.idi.org.il/about-idi/news-and-updates/july-2014-peace-index

9.       [9] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_m98GAdqKM

10.    [10] http://www.buzzfeed.com/miriamberger/anger-after-nbc-pulls-award-winning-journalist-from-gaza

11.    [11] http://www.fair.org/blog/2014/08/06/gaza-cease-fires-and-stenography/

12.    [12] http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/concentrate-and-exterminate-israel-parliament-deputy-speakers-gaza-genocide-plan

13.    [13] http://time.com/3065174/gaza-school-un-white-house-israel/

14.    [14] http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/israeli-army-summarily-executed-fleeing-civilians-southern-gaza

15.    [15] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/world/middleeast/palestinians-find-show-of-support-lacking-from-arab-nations-amid-offensive.html

16.    [16] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/31/world/middleeast/fighting-political-islam-arab-states-find-themselves-allied-with-israel.html

17.    [17] http://www.vox.com/2014/7/24/5934837/gallup-israel-gaza-americans

18.    [18] http://www.seattlemet.com/news-and-profiles/publicola/articles/israel-and-gaza-and-the-seattle-city-council-august-2014

19.    [19] http://www.themilitant.com/2014/7829/index.shtml

20.    [20] http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0

Israel's long and bloody record of war crimes

The master of terrorism

May 17, 2002 | Pages 6 and 7

ERIC RUDER exposes Israel's history of terror against Palestinians.

WHEN ISRAELI Prime Minister Ariel Sharon came to Washington last week, he was concerned with distinctions. There was a difference, Sharon said, between the conduct of his Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in Jenin and what he called the "indiscriminate, intentional murder of innocent civilians at the hands of [Palestinian] suicide bombers."

Then, Sharon thanked the U.S. for helping to torpedo a United Nations fact-finding mission to Jenin--"helping us to get out of this complicated situation." The "complication," of course, is that if what happened at Jenin were exposed, it would be impossible to deny that the IDF carries out the "indiscriminate, intentional murder of innocent civilians"--and on an incomparably more terrible scale.

What Israel has carried out in the Occupied Territories invites comparison to some of the worst atrocities of the 20th century. A comparison made by Israelis themselves. "If our job is to seize a densely packed refugee camp," an unnamed IDF officer told Israel's Ma'ariv newspaper, "he must before all else analyze and bring together the lessons of past battles, even--shocking though this might appear--to analyze how the German army operated in the Warsaw Ghetto."

This isn't the first time that someone has noticed the similarities between the Nazis' brutality against Jews resisting extermination--and IDF operations against the Palestinian resistance. "In my childhood, I have suffered fear, hunger and humiliation when I passed from the Warsaw Ghetto, through labor camps, to Buchenwald," wrote Holocaust survivor Dr. Shlomo Shmelzman in an August 1982 letter to the Israeli press, explaining why he was on hunger strike at the height of Israel's bombing of Lebanon.

"Today, as a citizen of Israel, I cannot accept the systematic destruction of cities, towns and refugee camps. I cannot accept the technocratic cruelty of the bombing, destroying and killing of human beings. I hear too many familiar sounds today, sounds which are being amplified by the war. I hear 'dirty Arabs,' and I remember 'dirty Jews.' I hear about 'closed areas,' and I remember ghettos and camps. I hear 'two-legged beasts,' and I remember 'Untermenschen' (subhumans). I hear about tightening the siege, clearing the area, pounding the city into submission, and I remember suffering, destruction, death, blood and murder…Too many things in Israel remind me of too many things from my childhood."

Israeli leaders always justify their violence as self-defense against "Palestinian terror." But Israel has long been the master at using terrorism to achieve its goals.

In the 1948 war to found Israel, Zionist forces used massacres in a handful of villages--most famously in Deir Yassin--to strike fear into the hearts of Palestinians. Some 750,000 people fled their land--settling in many of the very refugee camps still scattered throughout the Occupied Territories.

Israel's plan to carve up the Occupied Territories with heavily fortified Jewish-only settlements, populated by armed right-wing extremists has the same aim.

When the first Palestinian uprising--or Intifada--against Israel's occupation began in 1987, the Israeli state cracked down with utmost brutality. "The rate of incarceration in the territories was by far the highest known anywhere in the world: close to 1,000 prisoners per 100,000," according to a 1991 Middle East Watch report.

Nearly 20 percent of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation were detained, and about 85 percent of detainees were subjected to torture, according to the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem.

The Intifada nevertheless forced Israel to enter into peace negotiations with Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization. In 1993, the two sides signed the Oslo "peace" accords. But it soon became clear that Oslo wouldn't create a viable Palestinian state.

Israel's goal was to subcontract the job of policing the West Bank and Gaza to Arafat's Palestinian Authority (PA)--while making as few concessions as possible. Meanwhile, Israel again and again tried to renegotiate its withdrawals from areas that the PA was supposed to control under Oslo.

This is the backdrop to the second Intifada that began in September 2000. In the past 19 months, the IDF assault on Palestinians has grown ever more horrifying. "Palestinian hospitals, camps, schools, institutes and all networks of civil administration or mutual help have been attacked mercilessly," wrote York University Professor Aijaz Ahmad in April.

"Doctors, Red Crescent staff and church caretakers have been shot and killed indiscriminately. Women have been forced to give birth to stillborn children while waiting at Israeli checkposts and denied medical help. Village after village, camp after camp, have been deprived of water, electricity, consumer items, methodically and on a massive scale."

Yet despite this barbarism, Palestinians continue to resist. The mainstream media focus almost exclusively on suicide bombers who attack civilian targets. These bombings are counterproductive, giving Israel the pretext for further repression. But it's understandable why Palestinians facing such inhumanity would resort to this desperate tactic as the only hope of lashing back at their oppressors.

Nevertheless, the constant focus on suicide attacks hides the broader Palestinian resistance--from demonstrations and marches to armed attacks on military targets. We can't leave this struggle against Israel's terror to stand alone.

No peace without justice

THE STRUGGLE for Palestinian liberation is often put in terms of "ending Israel's occupation"--that is, forcing Israel to withdraw its forces from the Occupied Territories. But this can't be the whole solution.

Even if Israel retreats to its pre-1967 borders, it will still occupy Palestinian land that hundreds of thousands of people were forced to flee in 1948. Those people and their children continue to live in refugee camps throughout the Occupied Territories and around the region.

There can be no real and lasting peace without justice. Ultimately, this means replacing Israel--an apartheid state that grants full rights only to Jews--with a secular and democratic state in which everyone has equal rights.

Is this Sharon's "final solution"?

WHEN GEORGE W. Bush called Sharon a "man of peace" last month, he was either displaying his famous lack of smarts--or telling a lie.

Throughout his career, Sharon has shown an incredible capacity for brutality, bloodshed and terror. And now he may be in a position to carry out his "final solution" to the Palestinian question. "[Sharon] has always harbored a very clear plan--nothing less than to rid Israel of the Palestinians," Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld wrote last month in Britain's Daily Telegraph.

Van Creveld's article lays out a scenario in which Sharon could ethnically cleanse the entire Palestinian population from Gaza and the West Bank. "An American offensive against Iraq" or "an uprising in Jordan" would be a suitable pretext, van Creveld wrote. "[T]hen Israel would mobilize with lightning speed--even now, much of its male population is on standby."

"First, the country's three ultra-modern submarines would take up firing position out at sea. Borders would be closed, a news blackout imposed, and all foreign journalists rounded up and confined to a hotel as guests of the government. The expulsion of the Palestinians would require only a few brigades. They would not drag people out of their houses, but use heavy artillery to drive them out; the damage caused to Jenin would look like a pinprick in comparison."

The whole operation, according to van Creveld, could be finished in "eight days." "Some believe that the international community will not permit such ethnic cleansing. I would not count on it…The only country that can stop [Sharon] is the United States. The U.S., however, regards itself as being at war with parts of the Muslim world that have supported Osama bin Laden. America will not necessarily object to that world being taught a lesson--particularly if it could be as swift and brutal as the 1967 campaign."

Horrifying as they are, these ideas are all too common in Israel. Two years ago, less than 8 percent of Israelis favored "transfer," according to a Gallup poll. Today, a more recent survey shows that 46 percent support mass deportation of the Palestinians.

"Nazis never openly declared their intention to massacre Jews and Gypsies," wrote Israel Shamir in a recent article titled "The Jewish state must be de-Nazified as thoroughly as Germany after 1945." "[T]hey spoke of 'deportation' and 'transfer' as their 'Final Solution.' Even in 1938, these ideas did not have such wholehearted support in Nazi Germany as they have now in the Jewish state."

U.S. and Israel: Partners in arms

THE U.S. government claims to be a neutral party in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. But the truth is that the U.S. has backed Israel to the hilt. From 1990 to 2000, Israel received $18.1 billion in military aid from the U.S.--part of an incredible $100 billion since 1948.

What has Israel "bought" lately with its grant money--which has to be spent on hardware from U.S. contractors? One hundred F-16 fighters. Nine Apache helicopters with the Longbow Radar System. Fifteen Cobra attack helicopters and 24 Black Hawk transport helicopters.

But Israel doesn't just buy military goods. It also supplies them--to some of the most brutal dictators in the world. Often, Israel's customers are regimes that the U.S. wants to support, but doesn't want to be connected with.

So Israel helped apartheid South Africa arm itself in its war against Black South Africans fighting for liberation. Israel also shipped weapons to Guatemalan dictator Efrain Rios Montt--and helped train Guatemalan soldiers who slaughtered 5,000 Indians during a 1982 counterinsurgency campaign.

Lately, Israel has even taken to selling weapons to countries that the U.S. considers hostile--China and Cambodia, to name a couple. But U.S. officials haven't raised a peep.