tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44654125653671411912024-02-19T00:33:28.399-08:00judikazjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-89185108383073917962014-01-17T11:06:00.000-08:002014-01-17T11:06:46.329-08:00Ariel - the massacre man - gonePraise for the head
<br />
<br />
Qibya Sabra & Chatila Jenin <br />
<br />
d. Ariel Sharon 2014<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
May I introduce <br />
<br />
the Prime Minister,<br />
<br />
sage of the belly, <br />
<br />
one of us,<br />
<br />
warrior king for the emptied land of kings<br />
<br />
where he plants his feet, <br />
<br />
concrete and polished facts on the ground<br />
<br />
straddling the sea<br />
<br />
of terrorists and little girls with satchels.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Whoever speaks evil <br />
<br />
against that aged man<br />
<br />
and his top of white hair,<br />
<br />
they’ll see no evil – <br />
<br />
their eye irises <br />
<br />
indefinitely detained – <br />
<br />
Nor hear evil -<br />
<br />
Hobbling along in <br />
<br />
eyemasks, earmuffs, mouthtapes.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
The animals are eyeless in cages, <br />
<br />
You stacked the little girls in towns <br />
<br />
You stalled the small boys inside a wall <br />
<br />
concrete as the wonderful world around us.<br />
<br />
May the sky shower down <br />
<br />
candies and cookies <br />
<br />
over your tireless head. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
*<br />
<br />
In this way we all swore the head was<br />
<br />
a light bulb, the day of days, continuous. <br />
<br />
Babel head. Lit up the sky. Such gratitude. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Could not imagine the following:<br />
<br />
Popped dead, stopped dead, propped up: <br />
<br />
Head suddenly out on its own <br />
<br />
in out in out, day by day.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
What does the head dream?<br />
<br />
Beyond even his one bad dream, <br />
<br />
the tremor he immediately forgot <br />
<br />
after the first act, <br />
<br />
the long smear on the hands <br />
<br />
so long ago <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-32363215801492743202013-04-10T04:55:00.000-07:002013-04-10T04:55:44.514-07:00A thatcher (My un-tribute to)<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14pt;">A thatcher is someone who
makes a roof</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">or used to, when things were
quieter,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">was someone who sheltered
people<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">from the rain, when things
were quieter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">A thatcher took folks from
the wind<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">and layered the skin of a
human weather.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Now a thatcher exposes the
dwellers,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">rips off the roof in the
skinning wind,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">hurls down the roof on the
dwellers,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">who for cover snatch at the
straws<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">the roof-maker rains<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">on their rainwashed heads
ruthlessly<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">and in their teeth and in
their eyes<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">like a war<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">that the thatcher unnaturally
makes<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">on the dwellers. And the luckier<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">snatching more straw cover of
the undoing<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">thatch, despise the
unluckier, the colder ones.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">so that some see but many don’t<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">or do see but not why, and
think it<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">the way of a brave wise
thatcher<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">that their fellows are icy
and cold<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">in an inhuman country.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Published in Virago’s <i>Let’s Pretend,</i> 1984- even before the
miners’ strike and the poll tax horror. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">She was a politician who,
egged on by her Tory big-business chums, swept away the post-war values of
community I knew and took for granted. For all its faults, pre-Thatcher <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Britain</st1:place></st1:country-region> had
some genuine belief in equality, destroyed in the 80s by Tory governments,
replaced by City greed, and we all know the result- <b>EXCEPT</b> that the bankers
haven’t been dragged kicking and screaming back into a sense of public service.
They must be, if we are ever to get something back of that lost sense of fair
play which even older Tories had.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-73879796098699238782012-08-01T06:30:00.002-07:002012-08-01T06:30:37.912-07:00Judikaz- Olympic vistas far away or: what's just behind Adidas?<br />
<br />
<br />
Not too long ago I heard of the campaign Labour behind the Label? What does it do? Well, wrestling with the corporate world for fair play is what it does in fact but it doesn’t win any gold medals It works for millions of sweated workers mainly in South Asia and South East Asia who toil away making trainers etc for Adidas and its fellow multinationals. Adidas - just the fellow to advertise itself (and the Olympic Games) all over London aiming at bring in (to Adidas) millions of retail dollars. Meanwhile the meagre severance pay owed to Indonesian workers who help build the famous Olympic brand - well Adidas must have been overcome by a deep and pathetic feeling (which I don't share needless to say) that it can't afford to pay these last GIGANTIC sums. So goodbye to your Adidas old age if you happen to have relied on that. (There's a petition Labour Behind the L have started - you can help too by Googling them and signing it)<br />
<br />
Meanwhile on to the brightest and the best: Lord (Jonathan) Coe, our sensitive Olympic boss who Can Do No Wrong, surrounding himself with these sporting CEOs -- <br />
<br />
But hey, let's end on a truly modern note of optimism. <br />
<br />
Fact: We now boast the largest most succulent McDonalds in the world <br />
<br />
(O come, it was only Europe, lets not hype) No but the thing is, We're all beautiful beach volley players now, and the most important thing is , we really love ending our sandy day with one of those sugar packed coldcold colas- <br />
<br />
PS Mustn't be more, we're watching our weight, ha.<br />
<br />
Else London the greatest city in the stratosphere will turn into the Hugest city. ha ha - via all those Arizona size steaks or whatever they sell here in Obesity Mall - <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
And to think, all these months I 've been slimming myself down (not hard) back in coldcold Khazakstan, and then I flew here(paying my own way democratically), and Back, Back the disastrous tonnage rolled, after just two gorg - jus nights on into The Fattest Olympics Ever. <br />
<br />
Thanks as always to the big M!<br />
<br />
PS with apologies to the Sun, Moon and the Stars, Galaxy...<br />
<br />
(Why? Oh London modesty, for quietly outshining ALL.)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-55719426916065330722012-02-11T10:17:00.000-08:002012-02-11T10:34:38.609-08:00It's the owl's fault!said my he-man partner when he read this blog, between the complicated he-man exercises that keep him too busy to carry things for me. Actually he's right of course. Owls stay for no man (no woman) however eager, strong,and into training. We'll be out there again, snow or no. Breeding habits don't wait for machines.judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-57872523455593291022012-02-11T09:35:00.000-08:002012-02-11T10:15:44.610-08:00How can they so misname this most splendid owl?<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWKYTyWjLis3Km8YESe0nbjnqFtrqmcTxS-zRZXtNtCKrOSCjdFHonVPYhJjtHt7ebKXGeOvl3ZgI2BGfWpUihN_ZBYwhrfabbg9YnH0uFRfPzJvD8TW-JBt1xPgBzvP3xgyPYbLeRz6U/s1600/owl+Rodmell+2.12.+three.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 297px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWKYTyWjLis3Km8YESe0nbjnqFtrqmcTxS-zRZXtNtCKrOSCjdFHonVPYhJjtHt7ebKXGeOvl3ZgI2BGfWpUihN_ZBYwhrfabbg9YnH0uFRfPzJvD8TW-JBt1xPgBzvP3xgyPYbLeRz6U/s400/owl+Rodmell+2.12.+three.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5707933824924765362"></a><br /><br />The gorgeous short-eared owl should surely be called the wide-winged owl, for its wings have the widest spread in the UK, and best of all it hunts by day, coming to winter and hunt our reed beds for example round the Ouse south of Lewes. I've been watching it with frozen fingers and toes since December, trying to bring my partner(my he-man carrier of big-camera-tripod) together with the owl(beauty/low-flying grace.) Hm, without success. Soon the 4 or 5 owls here will be flying north again. I just had to manage with my small camera. This owl sat like a large striped cat against a sunlit hawthorn, turning its head (right?)round, then flew low away behind the wire fence, turning and banking slowly.judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-33124702707402068562011-06-10T03:31:00.000-07:002011-06-10T03:40:22.105-07:00Doonesbury and Lick you Sir?<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuGyNBN_-JRq2j6cTPLFfcY5z0kmlSS0Bn-gGETaHFWvpj3W_QLqynFuzv4SvMOrWLJdq6v7pcq_rUWC6PDM6y1lV3mU_gpAQWU469Ze41DlJ1PYdzz_rtETQ_6pe5pPWXLT46gIB2LRg/s1600/doonesburystrip1.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 110px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuGyNBN_-JRq2j6cTPLFfcY5z0kmlSS0Bn-gGETaHFWvpj3W_QLqynFuzv4SvMOrWLJdq6v7pcq_rUWC6PDM6y1lV3mU_gpAQWU469Ze41DlJ1PYdzz_rtETQ_6pe5pPWXLT46gIB2LRg/s320/doonesburystrip1.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5616537373967256834" /></a><br /><br />Two days ago I saw this Doonesbury strip and smiled, thinking of my 'Lick you, sir' piece in the 'The Odysseus Poems', which I hope would have got the unpleasant man in the last panel in a lethal lather, the Siren myth being about one of the most mysognistic myths ever dreamed up by a passing Homer...<br /><br /><em>(To set the scene: 'Now his audience hears how he left Circe to sail for Ithaka once more, and how on Circe’s advice, to escape the irresistible songs of the man-eating Sirens, he plugged his oarsmen’s ears with wax. . . though not his own; had the men tie him to the mast, and ordered them not to untie him. . .')</em><br /><br /><strong>What the Sirens sang to Odysseus: Lick you, sir?</strong><br /><br />'Sorry you left her, sorry she let you <br />leave her? Loved you, didn’t she, <br />but not as much as you thought, did she? <br />Seemed quite cool on her big fancy jetty <br />of marble when you turned and waved to her. <br />She didn’t wave back, did she? <br />Stood there and then walked into her forest. <br />Lost your queen lady, didn’t you? <br />for middleaged titties and a cunt you can’t remember. Hoist on your own mast, aren’t you, sir?<br /><br />Like being tied up, sir? you seem <br />to like getting tied up. Never mind, sir, <br />because we love it too. <br />Lick you, sir, any way you want? <br />Pour honey in those ears, clean out those <br />naughty ears? Ears can be very naughty, sir.<br />Everything you ever wanted, no waiting. <br />We’ll tie you really tightly, like you couldn’t breathe. Open you all over, ears, mouth, open our mouths <br />for the lot of you. Lick you, sir? any way you want.<br /><br />Stuff that big fat mast down our throats? <br />no problem, sir, we can take it, not like some, <br />in the eye. We can take it, oh yes, deeper. . . bigger,<br />bigger, oh. . . yes. . . YES. . . any way you want we do. Hey, captain! There’s trouble brewing round <br />the next bend for a stiff prick with two ass ears<br />for an arse. Like six heads are sharper <br />than one. Like misery looking for misery.<br />Don’t say we didn’t try to save you the trouble.<br />Anything to please a passing fucker. Honey up yours.'<br /><br />Judith Kazantzis, from THE ODYSSEUS POEMS (Waterloo 2011)judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-60676797242681265012011-04-05T05:54:00.000-07:002011-04-05T06:22:53.123-07:00Who IS George Osbourne?Possible ANSWERS 1.George Osbourne is a character in Vanity Fair, a destructive rich boy <br />who busily headed for Waterloo<br />and mercifully got his.<br /> 2.George Osbourne is a character in vanity fair, a destructive rich boy<br /> busily heading our society for its waterloo<br /> (O grant us mercifully to help George get his first....Choral Evensong. Classfied Information )judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-44246673486484539222011-04-02T03:48:00.000-07:002011-04-02T03:54:22.176-07:00Cameron's BlindfoldAnswer: The big society<br /><br /><em>(more easypeasy puzzles soon)</em>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-37852726375790098962010-10-16T06:04:00.000-07:002010-10-16T06:20:44.721-07:00Irving Goes to Gaza 2irving is now in N Africa, in Fez, Morocco, with many others, anything up to 100 drivers for something like 50 vehicles, packed with medical supplies, see my last blog. He says the shepherds along the roads are waving, everyone waving them on. You can see the link to his journey blog, last one from Algeciras waiting for the ferry to Morocco. Problem with sending out from his mobile so sez he's waiting to get to an internet cafe to send the next one. Here's his link: www.wordconvoy.blogspot.comjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-76928969456033629402010-10-13T12:56:00.000-07:002010-10-16T06:22:37.051-07:00irving goes to Gaza 1My dear friend Irving Weinman great American novelist now on the way co-driving in a long convoy from Britain to beseiged Gaza. London to Rafah gate. Taking medical supplies and school stuff and toys for the kids. He's sitting behind a giraffe and a zebra - they're sitting on the dashboard. Good blog, two posts so far, here's his blog: www.wordconvoy.blogspot.comjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-966866795100764902010-04-05T12:05:00.000-07:002010-05-30T10:55:02.914-07:00What were you doing during the Great Dick Cheyney, Father?For any answer this last election week here at home, we must gaze abroad - if you can blindfold your eyes and block your ears from the endless inane media twitter of the unfathomable galaxies, and go somewhere the very far side of the hearts and minds of Brown&Cameron, the somewhere over the rainbow where only the guntotin' lil drones go where bombs are <em>still</em> killing ordinary Iraqis every week and where even further east of the sun an unending line of British soldiers and a lot of local civilians are <em>still</em> being blown up pointlessly in Afghanistan. Alan Ginsberg once wrote a poem called <br />Howl...HO HO H O W L H O W L ...judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-15783081947771590692010-01-28T10:50:00.000-08:002010-01-28T12:39:35.485-08:00A year to remember what white phosphorus does<em>A year after Israel's bombardment of Gaza, a year after we marched and held vigil outside the UK Israeli Embassy, I followed the progress of Viva Palestina anxiously until under George Gallowway's astute and unstoppable leadership it got into Gaza. </em><br /><br /><em>Meanwhile in Cairo Mubarak tried and failed to stop many brave people from around the world (people like my Brighton friend poet Naomi Foyle) from demonstrating against its refusal to allow them into beseiged Gaza, and to protest also its present sinister work at Israel's behest to sink metal walls underground along the Gaza/Egyptian border, thus cutting the supply tunnels the sick and undernourished Gazans have mainly relied on for the past 2 and half years. </em><br /><br /><em>Meanwhile back home I thought my contempt for our own government's foreign policy (which follows a Mubarak poodle policy that Cameron if he wins the election will follow too, sure as mud) had sunk along with Brown and co into the mud pretty much as low as contempt can sink. </em><br /><br /><em>But then yesterday I listened to Goldsmith, Blair's Attorney General, at last explain his reasons publicly for saying it was legal to invade Iraq in 2003; it makes me wonder in the face of such arrogantly blatant bad argument why mud, or worse, never seems to stick where it should. </em><br /><br /><em>Iraq and Afghanistan has suffered, are suffering, and in the last century the third, or chronologically first, victim of Western rapacity has long been Palestine. </em><br /><br /><em>I agree with those who say only ordinary people now can achieve the liberation of the Palestinians, not our muddied rulers. (Oh but why not? Read below just for the business reasons.) </em><br /><br /><em>As ideological raincoats our rulers do homage to a distorted 'ethnos' picture of the Jewish people (nothing to do with the murdering Hitler, it turns in fact on a tragic but mythic diaspora invented and racheted up by militant Zionists in the last 1o0ish years). </em><br /><br /><em>As you can tell I and my husband (who is Jewish) have been reading through a israeli historian's book out last year, The Invention of the Jewish People. Historiography, slow in places no doubt, but here is a vital summary of what real history has to tell and will I hope most of all tell to the young hopefully more rational modern Israelis about what really happened to the Jews, (and to the Judean people), in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE. </em><br /><br /><em>Does so long ago matter? Well, yes, according to Jabotinsky, but read and see. </em><br /><br /><em>Meanwhile, until false ideology can be replaced with the true - and much more interesting and vivid and proud history of Judaism and the Jews in old Russia and Eastern Europe - us ordinary people, Jewish and non-Jewish, the world over, led by leading rationalist and humanist Jews, choose to stand by the 'victims of victims' as some Palestinians say. </em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br /><em>A bit of a speech I realise - oops! - but it leads to the following, which I hope you'll have a moment to read. A friend emailed it to me today as part of the global Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions Campaign. </em><br /><br /><em>For us UK shoppers, here following (wouldn't you agree) is one of the best short short summaries of why not to buy your Israeli fruit and veg and packeted herbs from Tesco - Though so sad now to see hardly a UK town without our own musclebound Tesco, our own super wealthy support of Middle East land theft! </em><br /><br />Encl: via Omar Barghouti, Israel<br /><br /><strong>Students Against Israeli Apartheid<br /><br /></strong>For the past several months Carleton (SAIA), a student group at Carleton University in Ottawa that is committed to supporting the Palestinian struggle for freedom, has been conducting research on Carleton’s investments in Israeli apartheid. The Carleton Pension Fund currently lacks any ethical guidelines, with its only mandate being the maximization of profit. SAIA has discovered that the Pension Fund, which provides retirement income for Carleton staff and faculty, currently has some $2,762,535 invested in five companies that are complicit in the oppression of the Palestinian people. In light of these findings, SAIA has launched a campaign calling on Carleton to immediately divest from the offending corporations: Motorola, BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, L-3 Communications, and Tesco supermarkets, as well as to adopt a socially responsible investment policy for all of its investments.<br />Motorola is involved in designing and implementing perimeter surveillance systems around illegal Israeli settlements and military camps in the West Bank. Motorola and its subsidiaries also have hundreds of millions of dollars worth of contracts to supply the Israeli military with telecommunications technology, checkpoint security and control systems. By providing support for the Israeli military, Motorola plays a role in ensuring that settlement expansion will continue, and that the occupation will deepen, in a clear violation of international law.<br /><br />BAE Systems is the world’s third-largest arms producer. Both BAE and its Israeli subsidiary, Rokar, contribute to weaponry used by Israel to attack Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. BAE produces cluster bombs and the F-16 combat aircraft, which were used during the 2008-2009 assault on the Gaza Strip, which killed over 1,400 Palestinians, most of whom were non-combatant civilians.<br /><br /><br />Northrop Grumman, one of the world’s largest weapon’s manufacturers, provided the Israeli military with many of the parts for the Apache AH64D Longbow Helicopter, which was described by Amnesty International as a piece of “key equipment used by the [Israeli military] in the [December 2008 – January 2009] Gaza bombing campaign.” Furthermore, Northrop Grumman is the sole provider of radars for the F-16 combat aircraft. It also assists in producing the Longbow Hellfire 2 missiles, which, as has been documented by many human rights organizations, were widely used against Palestinian civilians in Gaza.<br /><br /><br />L-3 Communications is one of the many large multinational firms aiding in the construction and maintenance of the system of military checkpoints that severely restrict Palestinian freedom of movement in the West Bank and around Gaza. The matrix of checkpoints has been condemned by human rights organizations as a brutally repressive system that violates the basic human rights of the Palestinian people. In addition to being a means of political repression and land annexation, the checkpoints constitute a tool of collective punishment, which is a crime under international law.<br /><br /><br />Tesco Supermarkets is a large United Kingdom-based international grocery and general merchandising retail chain. It has been the target of social justice activists in the U.K. for selling produce originating from illegal Israeli settlements, for mislabeling products coming from the settlements as “West Bank”, as well as for using an exporter, Carmel-Agrexco, which has been criticized for using slavery-type working conditions in its factories in the occupied West Bank. Tesco’s financial support for the illegal Israeli settlements lends them legitimacy and enables their economic growth and physical expansion, while simultaneously inhibiting the development of the Palestinian economy.<br /><br /><br />Carleton is no stranger to BDS activism, and it has a strong precedent to build upon. In 1987, Carleton divested from all companies complicit in the apartheid regime in South Africa. Carleton’s president at the time wrote a memorandum, saying, “Carleton University abhors apartheid and will do all it can to show its position on apartheid within its business practices.” Given Carleton’s past commitment to divesting from apartheid regimes, SAIA is calling on the university to once again place itself on the right side of history by ending its investments in the ongoing oppression of the Palestinian people.<br />The South African victory serves as an inspiring model for SAIA's divestment campaign, which is the first Palestine-centred divestment initiative in Canada. Hopes are high that, through a well-planned local campaign, as well as the natural growth of BDS, momentum will pick up at universities across the country and similar initiatives will emerge to form a national movement to cut campus ties with Israeli apartheid.<br />Specifically, SAIA recommends that:<br />1. The Carleton University Board of Governors, via the Pension Fund Committee, immediately divest of its stock in BAE Systems, L-3 Communications, Motorola, Northrop Grumman, and Tesco<br />2. Carleton University refrain from investing in other companies involved in violations of international law (for recommended guidelines see Conclusions/Recommendations section of the divestment report)<br />3. Carleton University work with the entire university community to develop, adopt, and implement a broader policy of Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) for its Pension Fund and other investments, through a transparent and effective process.<br />LINK TO DIVESTMENT DOCUMENT: see linksjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-24207836050246653582009-09-09T10:05:00.000-07:002009-09-09T10:09:05.246-07:00Last of the Painted Ladies, last of the nectar<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihvK6khyf5g0Nib9K8ODIwlQZ7hwpQHUEGpz7sHB6sWs3BwELVvWtZBznYupK32bpXRyxsXdPDArlvEERTxPPWXAESeUMflKS_FNRMp4zTT0V85uiZo8AFg-OMcsX94r3zzLWHtmfo-N8/s1600-h/painted+lady.JPG"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379515324472104386" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 350px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 400px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihvK6khyf5g0Nib9K8ODIwlQZ7hwpQHUEGpz7sHB6sWs3BwELVvWtZBznYupK32bpXRyxsXdPDArlvEERTxPPWXAESeUMflKS_FNRMp4zTT0V85uiZo8AFg-OMcsX94r3zzLWHtmfo-N8/s400/painted+lady.JPG" border="0" /></a><br /><div></div>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-43108820027112338452009-06-20T08:45:00.000-07:002009-06-20T11:23:26.734-07:00Prince Charles as bulldozerHistory is taught to fewer children, and known to less adults who ought to, judging by Any Questions this week. I am no exception: how many can put today's constitutional teazer pithily and to the point?<br /><br />Q: If the Queen is a Constitutional Monarch, does this mean that HRH Prince Charles (I can't recall all his other military, social, territorial, historical and Gordonstoun nicknames), so will call him PC for short (or just Plod)...Does not the link mean that Plod as Elder Son and the Official Heir to the Imperial Throne of all the - no that's wrong - anyway the British Throne of, well, us lot...is also bound to act at least publicly as her Constitutional Son and Heir, and constitutionally speaking does not this mean he must not interfere in our hard won democraticatic proceedures, whatever his views.<br /><br />And if so, (bear with me) does this mean he was acting unconstitutionally in persuading the Arab princes who own the Chelsea Barracks site to withdraw their planning application to Westminster Council just when the plans had been apparently approved.?<br /><br />Many Plod Pals, not least Alan Duncan, Tessa Jowell, Julia Neuburger, all on Question Time this week, have argued that because Plod has done great things for youth, this means that however awful Poundbury is (the name must be the clue) we the nation should support his spiking renowned architect Rogers' plans for the Chelsea site at the last moment and most undemocratically . And that we the nation should not worry about the upstairsdownstairsbehindstairs way prince Plod (AKA Plot) did it, apparently by writing a personal letter to the owners, some other prince plods. I myself found Alan-Tessa-Julia-'s arguments for Plod illogical, so gratis as an ex history BA I am supplying them with a better one:<br /><br />Anyone who submits a planning application is free to withdraw it any time, so why shouldn't the Chelsea barracks owners have done so last week? I am no legal expert but it surely is their business why they waited so long in fact years, indeed until they had the approval more or less through, to withdraw their application. And why should not Plod have given them his view? And why should they not have acted on it?<br /><br />To help all our hapless history students Alan-Julia-Tessa: Here's an analogy. I want to reduce our huge utilities bills to include a row of solar panels in the only place possible, sited in public view along the front gable, Then my stuffy great-uncle comes to supper just when I have after two years won my hard fought planning permission from the council on exceptional environmental urgency grounds... And then over a really lovely vegan supper just last night my bad-tempered grouse-shooting trad-loving rather ugly great-uncle says he won't invite me to his glamourous grouse moors any more if I don't withdraw my application after all...isn't that perfectly legal if mean of my cousin, and legal of me of course, and nobody's business but our own?<br /><br />Of course it is. Of course the little Plods said, 'of course Big Plod'.<br /><br />What would you have done? Fancy being blackballed by the biggest noble prince in the world? Of course not. We just don't understand the world importance of our great Plod to the world's developers/Royal Plods/real estate men.<br /><br /><div align="center">STATUS STATUS STATUS MONEY MONEY MONEY </div><br /><br /><br />On second thought forget MONEY just think STATUS.<br /><br />But whence comes Plod's Status?<br />This is where, logic and history-bound, I Flip, Plodpals.<br /><br />Here's the answer to question 'whence'?: Easy - Status eg power and influence, does not come from Plod's billions, nor from his biscuits, nor yet from dosh given to charity. It comes from his big big<br /><strong>constitutional status as the</strong><br /><strong>hereditary</strong> <strong>Monarch's </strong><br /><strong>hereditary Heir </strong><br /><strong>to the Throne of the UK</strong>.<br /><br />So Alan Julia Tessa, here's the point, and if if a hapless history student can get it, you should have.<br /><br /><br /><br />What's all right for you, (in theory me), is not all right for PLOD.<br /><br /><br /><br />As for you, aged PLOD, you obviously never had a history lesson in your life. (Ah yes, he had to be given one of those sham degrees, long long ago.)<br /><br />Then Write out 100 times: Must not interfere with planning applications (not to mention lots of other democratic proceedures). Why not? Because I am Prince (Plod). May (not nice but) do so only if I abdidcate and become Minister. Signed, Plod. (Another 50 for mispelling that long word. I had <em>hoped</em> you were beginning to know that one by now.)judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-30110969157847151152009-06-14T06:37:00.000-07:002009-06-14T07:22:12.193-07:00The Queen and concreteThe first blog since the winter, I see, so is everything much the same? In Gaza they are building houses out of mud because they still aren't allowed steel, concrete, glass, by Israel's kindly Military Government. I am still writing letters in protest and hope the rest of the world are doing so too, except of course, you can bet, the bankers, the top politicians, especially the certifiable Cheyne, and onetrack Rupert Murdoch. Oh and I shouldn't think the Queen is doing much about it either.<br />But at least Michelle O persuaded her to give some of the now impoverished scurvy riddled villeins of her capital a bit of space for growing veg and potatoes in the Buck Pal garden ( that big military zone we can just see full of nice trees and empty lawns over the top of the barb wire as we bus down to Victoria. (You have to sit on the top deck.) Not since the war! Patriotism!<br />Meanwhile back home I have the freedom to work away at poems and fictions , and latterly at preparing my next Open House, happily collaborating with my friend and terrific artist and artbook print-maker, Carolyn Trant.<br />Last year we held our first Open House together, as part of Lewes ArtWave. This year I am concentrating on acrylic paintings on canvas. Somebody wise said that the best rest from work was other work (Who <em>was </em>it ?) Too true for the poet, the frustrated activist. The movement of paint or ink over paper, board, canvas, charcoal over newspaper, water into charcoal, watercolour slipping into the charcoal. That rim left when it dries. Or to collage photos, preferably mine, copied and recopied....messing around... no-one wants all this junk, I know, but I do, for the time at least I'm making free this way, making hay, making gold out of flax. And if afterwards, if a glimmer remains, so much the better. Oh but what does it All MEAN.? Oh joy, Oh liberty, Oh sneezes out of straw.judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-18454639048474792732009-02-19T10:27:00.000-08:002009-02-25T13:49:14.752-08:00SUPPORTING THE PEOPLE OF GAZA<div align="center"><span style="color:#00cccc;">All </span>January the carnage, the war crimes were going on, a nightmare visited on innocent Gaza that I and I suppose hundreds of thousands of people had silently assumed was beyond even the ruthlessness of Israel, with its armaments stronger than most large nations. I did what people did over the world, city after city, joined protests, wrote, organised, gave, phoned, wrote, complained, emailed, despaired, shouted, again phoned, </div><div align="center">marched, emailed....</div><div align="center"><span style="color:#00cccc;">Our </span>politicians with few exceptions, <span style="color:#cc0000;">Poisoned by Cowardice</span>, as Blake would have said, slept their well calculated Sleep throughout, Hamas was blamed by Insane Israel for killing its own children, and our Sleepers made mooing agreement with their Snores. </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#ff0000;">But T</span>his was one long war crime, and falls within the definition of genocide. Not only bombing UN schools... there were atrocities from first to last - how could there fail to be with this cowardly bombardment, even if attacking the UN were the only atrocities the Sleepers twitched at, while as ever Insane Paranoid Israel thundered on about Hamas killing its own and human shields. </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#00cccc;">What </span>can come out of such wrong? That people are more aware? that Amnesty has called for the UK to impose an arms embargo on 'all sides', that Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions may be getting through to Trade Unions and even some companies, as well as what I think in the long run is very important, that concerned Jews with influence everywhere stand up and divorce themselves from Israel as it is now, as for that matter should anyone with influence. And us. Hope so. Go on, take courage, because of the courage of these incredibly enduring incredibly maligned and wronged people. </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#00cccc;">PS No, </span>Naturally, I am not referring to war crime master Bush who must take much of the blame for this BBC christened 'conflict'. Nor even, to his drear Dr Strangelove, last seen exiting rear in black shiny leather gloves, in a wheelchair, decanted into an enormous limousine....</div><div align="center"><span style="color:#66cccc;"><span style="color:#00cccc;">But</span> </span>tell me, last, who gets the gongs in Insane Israel meanwhile for such a heroic 'war'? Brave pilots, getting out of your unarmed drones, tossing back your virtual goggles, goodness you're back from the blood and smoke without a blood smear. </div><div align="center"><span style="color:#00cccc;">And </span>listen, now you earned your university place, to study what...yes indeed, <em>munitions design and reseach, solutions developement</em>, and what is more again, to the sound of Western political Snores gentle against the popping of champagne toasts in the offices of BAe and Ratheon etc, so you will try to continue, if the world's people don't stop you, to kill human flesh to defend your own insanity. God, what a shambles you have made of your country,in making one of the Palestinians and theirs. And what a prostitution, even worse, of the cruel deaths of all those millions of European Jews. Among them, I remember, my husband's grandparents and all that generation and their descendents, his lost cousins. And I do not forget also what your long spoliation of Jewish culture and religion by means of your bitter and selfish arrogance has done to disrespect the work of the finest and most moral thinkers and artists of the Jewish tradition.</div>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-11962068192555394342009-01-30T01:17:00.000-08:002009-06-14T06:34:37.462-07:00CHILD IN GAZA, after Wm Blake<span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#33ccff;"><blockquote><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#33ccff;">I </span>was a little child,<br /></span><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">born in Gaza ruins.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">My name was Palestinian </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">and my heart was strong.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#33ccff;">O</span>n the Israeli green </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">the little children played.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">I asked to share the play. </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">But they sent back fire.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#00cccc;">W</span>hy did they send white fire </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">which melted away my flesh?</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;">They said it was the gift</span> </span></span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">my jealousy deserved.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;"><span style="color:#33ccff;">W</span>hy did they burn me so? </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">In white bandages I die, </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">in a hospital like a ruin. </span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:arial;">Remember, what I know.</span></p><p align="left"><span style="font-family:times new roman;color:#000000;"></span> </p></blockquote><p align="left"></span></span><p align="left"><span style="font-size:85%;color:#000000;"><strong></p></strong></span><p></p>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-14142885404008072632009-01-29T05:20:00.000-08:002009-01-29T06:17:55.732-08:00Tony Greenstein, Denis McShane, and the Judaeo-NazisIt's now 10 days since Israel stopped killing the civilian population trapped in Gaza. Still no country I know of has declared that Israel's war on civilians was morally indefensible and broke all applicable Geneva Conventions and international law. Israel have barely opened the crossings to the UN trucks, let alone lifted their blockade, as demanded rightly by the Gazans.<br />As far as I know no country except the usual suspects who no one listens to, has dared talk about, still less take up the question of Israel and war crimes. certainly not Britain. certainly not the US. The UN has called for an inquiry into the crude and lethal bombing of its schools and stores. What are th member states doing meanwhile?<br />Yes, patient George Mitchell has arrive in Cairo. But when will he talk To Hamas, not to Egyptian gobetweens or to Abbas.<br />And when, finally, will Israel. The patience of Job may not win this nation to what is know as the paths of righteousness. (Very beautiful words - practise what you preach.)<br />There can be no negotiations and no peace in the middle east, which means Europe, which means us, until Israel negotiates with the elected representatives of the Palestinians.- and gives up its West Bank settlements as Palestinians have pressed for years in line with all UN resolutions, together with East Jerusalem -<br />And in this country our public service broadcaster appears to believe like Tipsy Livni that there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Gordon Brown offers our warships to stop arms deliveries to the Palestinians, while refusing even to consider a temporary suspension of our own arms trade with their oppressors. <br /><br />When will Western liberals among them especially the Jews face up to the fact that neo-imperialist, post-imperial Britain has nurtured a 60 year monster in part compensation for our war guilt: which beast not slouching but crouching in Jerusalem since 1967, as ideological monsters do obscenely mirrors its enemy, the original European monster which threatened our own freedom and murdered most of Europe's Jews (including my husband's ancestors in Russian Romania). This revengeful second monstrous birth, born of European war guilt and self-interest, must be brought into the open and disowned, just as Arab Nazism, also a part product of European racism, is disowned.<br />But how many in the British establishment including its liberal edge Britain takes the racist hatred of young Israelis seriously. Yet where does the terrifying Israeli callousness towards the murder of Gazan children come from? Out of what moral depths? Meanwhile why do so many in the Westseem happy to share such depravity? Those British mandarins who refuse to allow even a few charitable pounds money to the wretched of Gaza seem to me to share the smug cruelty of the European Nazis in their time.That's why I end by quoting from the text of Tony Greenstein's last blog: while Gordon Brown is getting his warships out to defend Israel (do we arrest Syrian trawlers in the Med or what?), <br /><br /><br />TONY GREENSTEIN<br />Wednesday, 28 January 2009<br /><a name="8765680512443149932"></a><br /><a href="http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2009/01/nazi-mentality-of-zionisms-devotees.html">The Nazi Mentality of Zionism's Devotees</a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb_90x_hF0elLeVY-yqKrT-vJZ4uZ5W_84xhKbyOC7Dyf1SQ5CjzhpO7zfY45Cl1MC0MIFp2SE-eslO_G0-ZjrlTn_7b0vbYjUzA3BfXlsGtfZaGFxVFd8njUZIUkjgZyk0jg44SteS_MW/s1600-h/Arab+baby+not+wanted.jpg"></a><br />Auschwitz gas chamber - above (see link above)<br />There is nothing more guaranteed to anger apologists for Israel's works and its soft-left 'critics' then any comparison with the Nazis. This is 'insulting to Jews'. It is defined by the European Monotoring Committee as 'anti-Semitism' - something adopted by Dennis MacShanes joke of a Parliamentary Committee on anti-Semitism.<br />I therefore decided, in the interests of fairness, to put up a few photos showing how tolerant and liberal Israeli society is. Use of Nazi epithets is, in fact, very common in Israeli society and among Zionists and it doesn't take much for one Zionist to accuse another of being a 'nazi' or anti-semitic.<br />Many of these photos were taken in Hebron and they have been daubed by the settlers there. But in case you think, oh well, they are just a few nutcases, remember that that war criminal, Ehud Barak - leader of the Israeli Labour Party - insisted at the time when the Oslo Accords were still on a life support machine - that the settlers in Hebron had to stay. So these Judaeo Nazis [as the late Yeshayahu Leibowitz, winner of the Israel Prize and philosophy professor at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem called them] are there courtesy of the Israeli Labour Party and Histadrut.Tony Greensteinjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-13202937093070713332009-01-13T08:11:00.000-08:002009-01-13T09:10:43.300-08:00Miliband and Burning the InnocentsWho said whoever is not with me is against me? I mean, recently. In Reverse: Whoever is not against me is with me.<br />Yes I'm speaking here on behalf of our favourite terror state. An unpleasant experience. Most, I'm speaking of our own long part in fashioning this well-off Frankenstein's monster. And so it goes. Still Britain does not condemn Israel's slaughter (continuing worse still as I write) in Gaza.<br />Why not? So I looked up some of the 'thriving' business we do with Israel, that 'thriving democratic country' as foreign secretary <span style="color:#ff0000;">david miliband</span> (he with the settler cousins in the West Bank) called it ...see the Guardian today. We're right there, from high tec arms to snow peas. Talking of snow, the 'white stuff' as the chic TV weather people have taken to call it, the Israelis have been dropping <span style="color:#ff0000;">white </span><span style="color:#33cc00;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">phosphorus</span> </span>on Palestinian children. Permissable in international law only as a smokescreen. This white stuff eats away/burns away flesh and kills very slowly. You can't dig it out. It goes deeper till death relieves the agony. <strong><em><span style="color:#ff0000;">Israel are burning small children like witches at the stake.</span></em></strong> This rogue state should be a pariah state (see what their distinguished historian Avi Shlaim says on this. This means no state or company or institution or person should do business with it. tourism.<br />Uhuh, have just found out my bank invests in bottled water exported by Israel from the springs of the Golan, Syrian land which Israel has illegally occupied since 1967. Water theft. Grand water larceny. Oh such a <span style="color:#33cc00;"><span style="color:#ff0000;">nuisance</span> </span>to change my bank, how disloyal, how inconsiderate...Miliband, what you've got as Foreign Secretary is a conflict of interest, in short a rotten conscience. So resign. At least you can go jump in the Thames, cool off from your self-righteousness, not like those kids in Gaza...those kids burning to death under the bombs and shells we British so lucratively help their tormenters make.<br />See Campaign aginst the Arms Trade, Amnesty, UN websitesjudikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-77890231142788683162009-01-07T13:06:00.000-08:002009-01-07T13:22:27.526-08:00Gaza: In cold blood<strong> </strong>Here's the beginning extract from Craig Murray's blog from his website dated the weekend. <br />If you dont know, Murray was the Ambassador to Uzbeckhistan sacked for objecting to our complicity with that country's torture of political prisoners. JK<br /><em></em><br /><em>Craig Murray: Gordon Brown Is a Murderous Two Faced Cunt<br /><strong>Brown is appeasing domestic horror at the Israeli massacre in Gaza by calling for a ceasefire. Meanwhile British diplomats on the United Nations Security Council are under direct instructions to offer "tacit support" to United States' efforts to block a ceasefire.<br />I have been told this directly by a former colleague in the UK Mission to the United Nations.<br /></strong>A footnote on the uses of obscenity - 7,200 people read this entry between 15.30 on a Sunday afternoon and 08.30 on a Monday morning. That's normally the slowest time of the entire week.Amazing what a catchy heading will do. Besides, if you think the title is obscene, how do you describe what is happening in Gaza?</em>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-87213783818229463232009-01-01T09:56:00.000-08:002009-01-01T11:33:06.820-08:00<strong>I AM APPALLED BY THE WILFUL CARNAGE ISRAEL IS VISITING ON THE PALESTINIANS OF GAZA. </strong><br /><strong>Over 400 dead after 6 days of bombing. </strong><br /><strong>And at the brazen lies told by Israel and repeated by the West and most of its bleating media, dumping all blame on its victims.</strong><br /><br />This carnage is the result of the cynical opportunism of a handful of European settlers in Palestine long ago, coupled with the British desire to quit fighting Zionist terrorists in defence of the majority people, the largely undefended and poorer Palestinians of the country - That was a terrible abdication of moral responsibility which this country has continued from that day to this: towards the human rights, the lives and wellbeings of a people we took under our mandate (rule) nearly a century ago. When the bombing of Gaza' schoolchildren began without warning last Saturday we saw the utter cowardice of Gordon Brown's reaction, when as always the British government of the day equated the weak and defiant resistance of the Gaza Palestinians with the whole might of Israel, the most heavily armed of the small states, possessing it is calculated 200 nuclear warheads. We know some of the reasons for british hypocrisy: our valuable arms trade, and our extensive fruit and veg trade with Israel, and the Christian/Jewish dedication to Israel as Little America/Little Europe in the Middle East. Well, finally I feel nothing but disgust for the Israeli nation; where are those great Jewish traditions of wisdom and intellectual eminence and morality I've read about down the years. Israel has betrayed its own co religionists, and the point of its own ancient myth/history as the Bible writers themselves told it. <br />Why? To enter that so-called 'promised land' you have to earn it. <br />From the early twentieth century Zionist settlers have done the opposite, dispossessing and slaughtering the indigenous population so as to grab the land, not earn it. <br />Well nothing comes for free, and the present slaughter raining down as I write on the heads of Gaza families who sit terrified and hungry in candle light and cold, this cowardly slaughter and its single aim , to force the Palestinians to give up their rightful claims to the remaining land taken from them in 1967 will be bought at a price that the occupiers and their children too are certain to have to pay, and not just their victims, those still occupied people.<br /><strong>In the meantime to fend off more futile war, to save lives on both sides, I like lots of people think we have only one choice to make israel withdraw: to sanction Israel, just as the outside world sanctioned South Africa while it stuck to apartheid</strong>.<br />But what can we the people do? Everything is useful, every protest in the vacuum left by the government and hm the socalled Opposition Well you can (I did this last Monday) go and picket the Israeli Embassy in London, or you can demonstrate wherever you live this Saturday, and meanwhile lets keep lobbying David Miliband and the Foreign Office website, and the UN General Assembly and UN Secretary General, and your own MP's website:<br />But finally it comes down to sanctions. Too late for tearful appeals from colluding governments or wellmeaning multifaith peace organisations. All very good but Zionist generals and politicians are incredibly tough and frighteningly selfrighteous. They are not stirred by the sight of dying Palestinian children. Send in the humanitarian aid, of course, answer the Charity Appeals, yes, but understand this is to put a bandaid on a people being crushed to the ground. This does not stop Goliath. The Israelis must withdraw from the seige of Gaza, leave the people of Gaza, according to international law and the agreements, themsleves parsimonious of 2005. There must be a ceasefire first and that must include the withdrawal of the seige if Hamas is to give up its own firing. Egypt must open its border crossing too.<br /><em>But only sanctions will achieve a final settlement Even the Palestinians, including the Palestinian Israelis, who stand most to suffer from trade sanctions, even their trade unions! have urged this as the only way left. </em><br /><em></em><br />The barbarians Cavafy wrote of are not at the gate, they are flying overhead in F16s: <br />So yes we should press the government to suspend the booming British arms trade with Israel.<br />But also think more direct simple food boycott, refuse to buy Israeli goods at Waitrose, Tescos etc and tell the stores why and write to head office. Push for academic boycott, against a row of israeli educational institutions which are deeply implicated in military research. Boycott all Israeli entertainment unless the group or individuals concerbed have dissociated themselves publicly from the occupation.<br />Don't go to israel on holiday. And much more.<br />Everyone can take part in sanctioning this rogue state, however long it takes.<br /><strong>Immediately, we can lobby hard to stop the January upgrade in the EU trade treaty with Israel</strong> (we can email our regional MEPs). <br />See <a href="http://www.palestine.org/">www.palestine.org</a> BDS Campaign =<em>Boycott Divestment Sanctions</em> - for further explanation of this nefarious new Trade Association Agreement with yes you guessed it our favoured trading partner ! <br /><br />And lastly not least something quick - please sign this petition below:<br />Pasted from:-----------------------------------------------------------------<br />Powered by iPetitions - <a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/">start your online petition now</a><br />Support UN General Assembly President Brockmann's Call for BDS against Israel<br /><a class="selected" title="petition text" href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/IJAN_Brockmann_BDS/index.html">petition text</a><br /><a title="signatures" href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/IJAN_Brockmann_BDS/signatures.html">signatures</a><br /><a title="tell others about this petition" href="http://www.ipetitions.com/tell-a-friend.html?id=955a7aee">email friends</a><br />The petitionPetition in support of call by United Nations General Assembly President Miguel D’escoto Brockmann for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - During the 57th Plenary Meeting on the Question of Palestine, President of the General Assembly Miguel D'escoto Brockmann broke a diplomatic taboo by describing Israeli policies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories as similar to those of the defunct apartheid regime in South Africa. D'Escoto also urged the United Nations to use the term ‘apartheid’ without fear, and recommended that the United Nations "....should consider following the lead of a new generation of civil society, who are calling for a similar non-violent campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions to pressure Israel to end its violations." Unsurprisingly, D'Escoto has been branded as an antisemite by apologists for Israel. We are appalled by the recurrent use of baseless accusations of antisemitism; they silence calls for compassion and humanity in the name of the Palestinian people. The use of such accusations to defend massive violence against civilians offends all people of conscience. The false invocation of the slur of antisemitism positions Israel, with great political and military advantage, as a victim, while desecrating Jewish histories and trivializing the real experiences and outcomes of antisemitism. Likening Israel's policies to apartheid is not antisemitic. It is common sense. Israel's policies have been widely described in these terms by, among others, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Jimmy Carter, Jamal Zahalka, Azmi Bishara, Gideon Levy, John Dugard, Omar Barghouti, Danny Rubinstein, Amira Haas, Shulamit Aloni, Meron Benvenisti, and Ami Ayalon. Calling for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel is not antisemitism. It is the recognition that only such a campaign can lay the ground for a long-lasting peace based on justice and reconciliation. In the words of Nelson Mandela, "The responses made by South Africa to human rights abuses emanating from the removal policies and apartheid policies respectively, shed light on what Israeli society must necessarily go through before one can speak of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East..." As Israel continues to ignore the growing outrage over the blockade of Gaza, and as Israel repeatedly breaks the cease-fire, blocks humanitarian aid and prevents journalists from covering the catastrophic impact of its actions, we the undersigned express our support for President D'Escoto and urge the United Nations and all member states to adopt his recommendation without delay.<br />Sign the petition<br />Fields marked * are required.<br />* Name:<br />* Email:<br />* Location:<br />Comments:<br />Display my name as anonymous on the signatures list<br />Yes, I want iPetitions to contact me on similar campaigns or petitions.<br /><br /><br /><br />>" name=submit><br /><br />Petition sponsorINTERNATIONAL JEWISH ANTI-ZIONIST NETWORK We are an international network of Jews who are uncompromisingly committed to struggles for human emancipation, of which the liberation of the Palestinian people and land is an indispensable part. Our commitment is to the dismantling of Israeli apartheid, the return of Palestinian refugees, and the ending of the Israeli colonization of historic Palestine. Read the complete charter: <a href="http://www.ijsn.net/about_us/charter/" target="_blank">http://www.ijsn.net/about_us/c...</a><br /><br />Links<br /><br />window.google_render_ad();<br /><br />The views expressed in this petition are solely those of the petition's sponsor and do not in any way reflect the views of iPetitions. iPetitions is solely a provider of technical services to the petition sponsor and cannot be held liable for any damages or injury or other harm arising from this petition. In the event no adequate sponsor is named, iPetitions will consider the individual account holder with which the petition was created as the lawful sponsor.<br /><a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/">iPetitions</a> is owned and operated by Angle Three Associates, LLC - All material © Copyright Angle Three Associates, LLC, 1998-2006 - <a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/terms.html">terms of use</a><br /><br />_uacct = "UA-307455-1"; urchinTracker();judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-3646864638058705212008-08-29T10:30:00.000-07:002008-08-29T11:26:32.027-07:00How to Bust a Savage Occupation - 2 small steps for humankind<span style="font-style: italic;">What follows is long but worth sending around I think. It comes from one of the best comment websites on the Israeli Occupation - The Electronic Intifada - In such a hunkered down colonial type society as Israel is now army refuseniks mean truer grit than John Wayne (two of these students have been arrested since). At their age I was definitely not thinking beyond lipstick and my first pair of highheels. (Crippling winklepickers actually.)<br /> Incidentally how many refuseniks over here against the invasion of Iraq, or for that matter, Afghanistan? Of course we don't have conscription.... <br /> Last weekend I watched the two boats that broke the Israeli seige on Gaza - a seige that has lasted over a year and is illegal and collective punishment, states the UN and Amnesty. Then, regretful not to be out there feeling seasick too, I sent some cash - turns out they've spend about twice as much as they managed to collect for the <span style="font-weight: bold;">2</span> years the trip took to fundraise. 2 years!<br /> For all that I hope and believe Jeff Halper when he said they'd broken the seige and now let more and more ships come with supplies to beleaguered Gaza and stand the official world to shame. Words to that effect. Hurrah for true david grit against the </span><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">whole </span><span style="font-style: italic;">goliath family. <br /> Since I bear the name of a famous Biblical woman warrior I have her ancient copyright permission to say this. </span><br /> <span class="arttitle1"><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />"We refuse to serve in the Israeli occupation"</span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"> <br /></span> <span class="text14"><span style="font-size:130%;">Statement, <i>Shministim 2008,</i> 28 August 2008 </span><br /> <br /> <span class="content"> <i>A group of high school graduates refusing their mandatory conscription into the Israeli army, objecting to Israel's human rights violations in the territory it occupies, recently released a statement outlining their position. Three of those who signed have been arrested upon refusing to serve. Their statement follows:</i><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We, high school-graduate teens, declare that we shall work against the Israeli occupation and oppression policy in the occupied territories and the territories of Israel. Therefore we will refuse to take part of these actions, which are being done under our name as part of the IDF [Israeli army].</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Our refusal comes first and foremost as a protest of the separation, control, oppression and killing policy held by the state of Israel in the occupied territories, as we understand that this oppression, killing and routing of hatred will never lead us to peace, and they are all contradictory to the basic values a society that pretends to be democratic should have.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> All the members of this group believe in developing the value of social work. We are not refusing to serve the society we live in, but are protesting against the occupation and the ways of actions which the militaristic system holds as it is today: crushing civil rights, discriminating on a racial basis and opposing international laws.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We oppose the actions taken in the name of the "defense" of the Israeli society (checkpoints, targeted killing, apartheid roads available for Jews only, curfews, etc.) that serve the occupation and exploitation policy, annex more conquered territories to the state of Israel and trample the rights of the Palestinian population in an aggressive manner. These actions serve as a band-aid covering a bleeding wound, and as a limited and temporary solution that will accelerate and aggravate the conflict further.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We expostulate the plundering and the theft of territories and source of income to the Palestinians in exchange to the expansion of the settlements, reasoning to defend Israeli territories. In addition, we oppose any transformation of Palestinian cities and villages to ghettos without minimal living conditions or income sources, enclosed by the separation wall.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We also protest the humiliating and disrespectful behavior of the military forces towards Palestinians in the West Bank: violence towards demonstrators, public humiliations, arrests, destruction of property regardless to any safety or defense needs, all of which violate global human rights and international law.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> The wall and blockades surround the Palestinian territories and serve as a halter around the Palestinian's neck. The soldiers who commit crimes under the patronage and protection of their commanders reflect the image of the Israeli society, a destructive and surprising society that is incapable of accepting its neighboring nation as a partner and not as an enemy.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> In order to hold an effective dialogue between the two societies, we, the well-established and stronger society, have the responsibility of establishing and strengthening the other. Only with a more socially and financially established partner could we work towards peace rather than one-sided retaliation acts. Rather than supporting those citizens who have hope for peace, the military cast sanctions and pushes more and more people towards acts of extreme violence and escalation.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We hereby challenge every citizen who wonders if the military's policy in the occupied territories is conducive to the progression of the peace process, to discover by himself/herself the truth and to lift the veil which distorts the reality of the situation; to verify statistical data; to look for the humane side in him/her and in the society which stands in front of him/her; to disprove the myths that were routed within us regarding the necessity of the IDF's [actions] in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and to stand up against every action which he finds irrational and illegal.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> In a place were there are humans, there is someone to talk to. Therefore, we ask to create a dialogue that goes beyond the power struggle, the retaliation and one-sided attrition actions; to disprove the "No Partner" myth, which is leading to a lose-lose situation of an ongoing frustration; and to move to more humane methods.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> We cannot hurt in the name of defense or imprison in the name of freedom, therefore we cannot be moral and serve the occupation.</span><br /><br /><br /><b>Related Links</b></span></span><ul><span class="text14"><span class="content"><li><a href="http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5922.shtml">Interview: Yehuda Shaul of Breaking the Silence</a>, Christopher Brown (1 November 2006)</li><li><a href="http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5901.shtml">Refusenik Omri Evron: "Why I can't become a soldier in the IDF"</a>, Amir Tibon (28 October 2006)</li></span></span></ul><span class="text14"> </span>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-24096257873292746632008-08-18T11:40:00.000-07:002008-08-18T12:01:49.748-07:00Mahmoud DarwishMahmoud Darwish<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><em>Written For Medyan's report for Al Jazeera online 13-14 August</em><br /></span><br />How sorry, how moved I am that Darwish has died. I knew him and I didn't know him, like the thousands of his readers who are not Palestinians. But we all have seen that here was a poet who, as Neruda spoke for Chile, could and did speak for his people. But rather different from Neruda. Darwish suffered oppression, prison and exile from his native Galillee and then from Beirut. Even in his last years, he saw his office bombed and ransacked in Ramallah, like some classical poet whose papers are lost to the barbarians.<br />Why do I say that I knew Darwish? I, like so many thousands, knew that I knew him. We knew him, not because of his life story, not even because he had the extraordinary gift of telling himself and his loves with all the magic arts of metaphor and particular notes of beauty of the great poet. We knew him because he by his classically extended poems so urgently, gracefully, irrefutably represented the ugly modern facts of Palestine, the injustice to millions he made explicit within his own single narrative.<br />How natural that he should have been able to do this, since his life was dominated by exile. In his twenties he was famous among Palestinians for his defiant verses.Yet it has taken years before English speaking translators, among them the US poet Carolyn Forche and the Irish poet Sarah Maguire, have made us English speakers familiar with Darwish.<br />But the tone of exile, of inescapable loss, of love bittersweet of a country not now his, a beloved place clinging barely to the map, a future lost among so many lives lost; and the subtle and wistful and lifelong effort to deal with this, to make something positive of it without betraying the lost ones: that is poetry of a order all humanity recognises. And it seems right and according to his own poetry of love, to trust that the whole world will now see that it is the endless resistance of the Palestinians, like a stone foundation, that has made Mahmoud Darwish not only their national symbol, but also the great world poet that he truly is.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><em>NB I review for 'Banipal' the wide-rangingArabic-English magazine that promotes modern Arab literature in the West. Look out for their memorial issue on Darwish soon</em>...</span>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-3679909100563012592008-07-24T11:46:00.000-07:002008-07-30T08:14:41.301-07:00The Sphinx and the Potter<div align="center"><u><span style="color:#810081;"> Q: </span></u><a href="http://jazaword.blogspot.com/2007/12/to-sphinx-why-make-poem.html"><span style="color:#cc33cc;"><strong>To the Sphinx: : Why a poem?</strong></span></a></div><div align="center"><strong></strong> </div><div align="center"> <strong><span style="color:#993399;">A</span>:</strong> <strong><span style="color:#cc33cc;">Poem</span></strong><br /><br />You unwrap,<br />you unsquint your eyes cautiously.<br />I am sorry: I see<br />I acted like some sort of doctor,<br />cruel to be kind, kind but firm etc<br /><br />I dragged you out backwards<br />clenched your barely known intelligence<br />before anything can be known<br />really; moulded you tartly<br />like a cook<br />with a large family to turn out for<br />(meat and two veg)<br />or a potter: more cups, they break<br />trays of<br />identical beakers.<br /><br />You would have come out in your own time.<br /><br />We can't be certain<br />at least you exist,<br />half-done, dwarfed, off shape<br />meagre, a thin subsidized<br />at least you exist.<br /><br />I wrap you up in the most exalted<br />trimmings,<br />one must guard you.<br /><br />I was so hungry and thirsty for you.<a href="mailto:C1980@"></a><br /><br /><em></em><br /><em>(Judith Kazantzis from The Wicked Queen 1980</em> <em>)<br /><br /></em> Like many women's poems this one turns on birth images. But also in there is the metaphor of a potter throwing a pot. And behind that image is.. I thought (well I used to), oh to throw the perfect poem, the pot of gold! But perfect art is only some misty marriage of the spontaneous, the wise, the universal, the pure. In real life the aim of the poem might be to stand up as the useful and handsome pot made of whatever its maker feels and thinks at the time of writing, those earthly ingredients whirled and shaped together in her act of creation.<br />Ah, so this is Genesis and I am the goddess?<br />Back to earth. To carry the craft image through, the poet is not just the wheel and its potter, she is also the potter and her kiln, sometimes turned lower, sometimes on high. Though it's not in this poem, the kiln with its slow working might, I suppose, stand for rereading, reconsideration, revision. Perhaps that's just why I didn't go beyond my potter's wheel metaphor, since the poem below is all about need nearly wrecking joy...<br /> ....A few scribbles on a bit of paper light up at the moment of writing, light up as if the momentary gas flame that flares inside could slow bake some exquisite and moving piece. Ten minutes later ....<br />But maybe, still runs the hope...<br />The poet Ruth Fainlight, whom I much admire, has many poems about the intensity, the difficulty, the inevitability, the joy, of making poetry. At random I find a poem, 'The Poet - ' in her Selected Poems (1995). Isn't this affecting and truthful poem the answer to the question, why poetry?<br />As, in its different way, was the answer my own private sphinx moodily uttered above.<br /><span style="color:#cc33cc;"></span><br /></div>judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4465412565367141191.post-46720033817037262212008-07-19T11:31:00.000-07:002010-02-28T09:24:56.878-08:00...fly continuedI photographed a dragonfly today perched on a dead leaf jutting from my garden hedge. It had fine horizontal wings, two aside, straight out like those of fulmers. Most extraordinary, there was its huge bright yellow head dominating its long long hanging body. Which were eyes, those loopy white patches below the great yellow head, or pinpoints I never saw.? Looking at my photo I saw at least that it was making a steady meal of the rim of the brown leaf held somehow between its two skinny front legs. Easy to miss, but not the mighty head, the Mekon head - though he was Evil Green - which brings me to the trial of putting my photo up here to prove this small bit of conservation. Gilbert of Selborne, you would have been proud. And what I like best, having lost sadly a loved dog, was that I could find consolation almost anywhere, on the hedge in this case, or from a dead leaf, as did my yellow dragon, who flew in circles round my head no doubt spitting ఫైర్ at this large interruption.judikazhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15276302417190516089noreply@blogger.com0