Boycotting Durban II?

In April, Geneva will host Durban II-- the World Conference Against Racism. Obama's government has inserted itself onto the planning committee to ensure a hand in the creation of its guiding documents, but has not yet committed to going. Nice start to the "hope and change" administration-- potentially boycotting a conference about racism. The "controversy" that surrounds Durban II is that during the first Conference in South Africa in 2001, Israel was criticized to be a racist state employing Apartheid. And this was before Israel began constructing the Apartheid Wall. So naturally, Israel is a little nervous about a world conference discussing racism.

Indeed, Livni declared that, "Israel expects the free world not to participate in Durban II." But then again, the "free world" is just that--free. It is not made up of the countries still recovering from colonialism, those fettered by economic colonialism, or those under unmitigated occupation. It is the luxury of the "free world" to disengage from discussions of colonial history and racism. But do they have an obligation and duty to treat the "unfree world" with the respect of participating in a conference on Racism?

Yes.

Will they lower themselves off their high imperial horses to the level of the "unfree world" and participate meaningfully, in cooperative partnership?

We wait to see.

What a nice luxury it must be to have that distance from oppression to decide not to look in the mirror, as Barghouti urged them to, and see that the "free world" is indeed an oppressive force to others.

I hope Obama has the courage and moral clarity to send representatives to the Durban meeting, and participate in it meaningfully. Boycotting a conference on racism is neither hopeful, nor change.

gaza aftermath, day 32

Did Egypt sabatoge deal over Gaza, Shalit?
(Amal Ghazal, EI-- interesting, read this one!)

Obama officials meet with US Jews to explain their Durban II policies
(Haaretz)

Israel Palestine revisited
(Geoffrey Aronson, Guardian)

Gaza's forgotten elderly
(from PCHR)

Chasing Mirages in the Middle East
(Hasan Abu Nimah, EI)

Hamas no, Human Rights yes
(Peter Tatchell, Guardian-- for more reading on Hamas and its ideology/founding I suggest "Hamas" by Khaled Hroub, he actually contradicts to some extent what Tatchell says)

Israel braces for wave of lawsuits
(Mel Frykberg, EI)

From Gaza with love
(Khaled Diab, Guardian)

Hamas murder campaign in Gaza exposed
(Guardian)

Behind the violence in Gujarat, Gaza and Iraq is the banality of democracy
(Pankaj Mishra, Guardian)

"It could have been worse."

Often in defense of Israel's attacks on the Palestinians (and Lebanese), I have heard people backwardly praise Israel's "self-restraint" in the level of destruction and death they cause. That they have the capability of killing literally every person in Gaza, or razing every home, but chose not to, somehow is twisted into a moral stand by Israel.

So the next time someone tells you, "Well, the Palestinians are lucky, Israel could have made it much worse." Remind them that this is the same colonial logic used by Belgium in its cruel colonization of Congo, in which, "Fievez, an official of the Free State, noted that those who refused to collect rubber or else who did not meet their rubber quota, "I made war against them. One example was enough: a hundred heads cut off, and there have been plenty of supplies since. My goal is ultimately humanitarian. I killed a hundred people, but that allowed five hundred others to live."" ("Free State" was a colonial enterprise in the Congo-- for more readings on this and more on the Third World Revolution, I recommend "The Darker Nations" by Vijay Prashad. Lots of history we weren't taught in school.)

So Gaza could have been worse, and Congo could have been worse...although, look at the state it's in now...

gaza aftermath, day 9

The Indian example
(Radhika Sainath, EI-- on non-violence vs. violence as means of resistance)

Gaza appeal video
(Guardian-- the video BBC will not air)

Tony Benn makes his own appeal on BBC
(youtube video "if you won't broadcast the Gaza appeal then I will myself.")

Error of judgement
(Editorial, Guardian)

Fear and trauma in Gaza's schools
(al Jazeera english)

Writing checks for Gaza is easy. Politics is the tricky bit.
(Chris Patten, Guardian)

Americans turn to Al Jazeera for coverage of Gaza conflict
(Guardian)

3's company? not with Israel

Imminent is a unilateral ceasefire. As my friend assured me the other night that it would, it comes just before Barack Obama's inauguration and a hazy future of Israeli-American relations. Hazy in that Israel is unsure if it will receive a carte-blanche of destruction from the US government anymore. The relationship between these two nations will continue strong, while others (Mauritenia, Qatar, Syria, Bolivia, and Venezuela) have severed ties with Israel in protest of its inhumane attacks on Gaza. So Israel crammed this 3 week war in, just when Bush was fading out of public view and would surely not take any sort of action against them, and Obama--with his promises of "hope and change"-- had not yet assumed power.

Israel and the United States have signed an agreement for Gaza's border, in which the US will provide "technical assistance" to ensure that Gaza will "never again be used as a launching pad against Israeli cities", as Rice stated. Not, predictably, to ensure that Gaza will never again be starved, occupied, and strangled. It is certainly welcome news that Israel will soon cease its indefatigable attacks on the people of Gaza. God knows they need rest from bombs, shelling, blood, death, and destruction. But, as before-- this ceasefire agreement seems to be missing one key element...the consultation and agreement of Palestinians. Israel and the United States talk, and make agreements which shape the lives (and deaths) of Palestinians, without setting aside their colonialist ideals and taking seriously the words of the Palestinians. Israel runs on unilateral decisions-- its withdrawal fromg Gaza in 2005, its construction of the Apartheid Wall.

These unilateral, and bilateral decisions with the States, will not and cannot lead to any real peace. Palestinians, in the case of the Gaza attacks, Hamas, must have an equally respected and weighted voice in the outcomes of the land. Whether or not Israel likes it, whether or not Israel bombs the hell out of Gaza and builds innumberable illegal settlement-colonies in the West Bank, Palestinians exist. This is the problem Israel has faced since before its creation. Palestinians exist. When Palestinians are consulted, during "negotiations", Israel increases settlement building, continues the construction of the Apartheid Wall, continues demolishing homes, and jailing youth. But far too often-- during these episodes of bloody violence-- Palestinian representatives are not taken seriously in the creation of a cessation of violence. It just does not make sense-- you cannot create a real peace without legitimately and seriously talking with one of the two peoples involved. The US is not being bombed. The US is not being starved. The US has electricity and fuel and functioning hospitals. The US is not watching its children dying continuously with no ability to help them. Gaza is. The US should not replace Palestine in agreements, but should complement them (in absence of any real unbiased mediator). Sidestepping Palestinians reeks of colonialism, when Europeans would decide the fates of the dark, colonized "natives"-- drawing up borders that pleased their own interests, rather than those of the indigenous people, and placing sychophantic leaders, rather than democratically elected leaders from the people (ahem, Hamas). And we all know how well that policy worked out.

A real agreement must include the people of Gaza, the representatives of the people of Gaza. Hopefully Obama's administration will realize that in the case of Palestine-Israel, 3 is company, 2 is ineffective.