Alice Walker : Why I'm Joining the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza

Poet and Pulitizer Prize-winning novelist Alice Walker in Gaza City in 2009. Photo from AP / The Guardian (U.K.).
Why I'm joining the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza

Pulitzer prize-winning American writer Alice Walker is on board an international flotilla of boats sailing to Gaza to challenge the Israeli blockade. Here she tells why.

By Alice Walker / The Guardian (U.K) / June 27, 2011

See 'After the excitement of the Arab Spring, has the Palestine issue slipped out of view?' by Emine Saner, Below.

Why am I going on the Freedom Flotilla II to Gaza? I ask myself this, even though the answer is: what else would I do? I am in my 67th year, having lived already a long and fruitful life, one with which I am content. It seems to me that during this period of eldering it is good to reap the harvest of one's understanding of what is important, and to share this, especially with the young. How are they to learn, otherwise?

Our boat, The Audacity of Hope, will be carrying letters to the people of Gaza. Letters expressing solidarity and love. That is all its cargo will consist of. If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman. This should go down hilariously in the annals of history. But if they insist on attacking us, wounding us, even murdering us, as they did some of the activists in the last flotilla, Freedom Flotilla I, what is to be done?

There is a scene in the movie Gandhi that is very moving to me: it is when the unarmed Indian protesters line up to confront the armed forces of the British Empire. The soldiers beat them unmercifully, but the Indians, their broken and dead lifted tenderly out of the fray, keep coming.

Alongside this image of brave followers of Gandhi there is, for me, an awareness of paying off a debt to the Jewish civil rights activists who faced death to come to the side of black people in the American South in our time of need. I am especially indebted to Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman who heard our calls for help -- our government then as now glacially slow in providing protection to non-violent protesters -- and came to stand with us.

They got as far as the truncheons and bullets of a few "good ol' boys'" of Neshoba County, Mississippi and were beaten and shot to death along with James Chaney, a young black man of formidable courage who died with them. So, even though our boat will be called The Audacity of Hope, it will fly the Goodman, Chaney, Schwerner flag in my own heart.

And what of the children of Palestine, who were ignored in our president's latest speech on Israel and Palestine, and whose impoverished, terrorized, segregated existence was mocked by the standing ovations recently given in the U.S. Congress to the prime minister of Israel?

I see children, all children, as humanity's most precious resource, because it will be to them that the care of the planet will always be left. One child must never be set above another, even in casual conversation, not to mention in speeches that circle the globe.

As adults, we must affirm, constantly, that the Arab child, the Muslim child, the Palestinian child, the African child, the Jewish child, the Christian child, the American child, the Chinese child, the Israeli child, the Native American child, etc, is equal to all others on the planet. We must do everything in our power to cease the behavior that makes children everywhere feel afraid.

I once asked my best friend and husband during the era of segregation, who was as staunch a defender of black people's human rights as anyone I'd ever met: how did you find your way to us, to black people, who so needed you? What force shaped your response to the great injustice facing people of color of that time?

I thought he might say it was the speeches, the marches, the example of Martin Luther King Jr, or of others in the movement who exhibited impactful courage and grace. But no. Thinking back, he recounted an episode from his childhood that had led him, inevitably, to our struggle.

He was a little boy on his way home from yeshiva, the Jewish school he attended after regular school let out. His mother, a bookkeeper, was still at work; he was alone. He was frequently harassed by older boys from regular school, and one day two of these boys snatched his yarmulke (skull cap), and, taunting him, ran off with it, eventually throwing it over a fence.

Two black boys appeared, saw his tears, assessed the situation, and took off after the boys who had taken his yarmulke. Chasing the boys down and catching them, they made them climb the fence, retrieve and dust off the yarmulke, and place it respectfully back on his head.

It is justice and respect that I want the world to dust off and put -- without delay, and with tenderness -- back on the head of the Palestinian child. It will be imperfect justice and respect because the injustice and disrespect have been so severe. But I believe we are right to try.

That is why I sail.

[Alice Malsenior Walker is a poet, short story writer, novelist, essayist, anthologist, teacher, editor, publisher, womanist, and activist. The Chicken Chronicles: A Memoir by Alice Walker was published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Her critically acclaimed novel The Color Purple was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Walker won the 2010 Lennon/Ono Grant for Peace. This article was originally published in the British daily, The Guardian. A longer version appears on Alice Walker's blog, alicewalkersgarden.com/blog.]

Activists involved of the new Gaza flotilla called "Freedom Flotilla Two" at press conference on Feb. 7, 2011, in Madrid. (At left, Cindy Sheehan.) Photo by Dominique Faget / AFP / Getty Images.

After the excitement of the Arab Spring,
has the Palestine issue slipped out of view?

Just over a year ago, in the middle of the night, Israeli commandos boarded a Turkish ship in international waters just off the coast of Israel, opened fire and killed nine activists. The Mavi Marmara was one of six ships in the Freedom Flotilla, which was attempting to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza, and the actions of Israel's military brought widespread international condemnation.

This time, as Freedom Flotilla II sets sail over the next week, with 10 ships carrying many of the same activists who traveled last year, including Swedish writer Henning Mankell, American human rights campaigner Hedy Epstein, and writer and academic Alice Walker, the Israeli government's response will be closely watched.

This week Ron Prosor, Israel's ambassador to the UN, wrote a letter saying: "Israel calls on the international community to do everything in their ability in order to prevent the flotilla and warn citizens... of the risks of participating in this type of provocation." The purpose of the flotilla, he said, is "to provoke and aid a radical political agenda." He later added: "We are very determined to defend ourselves and to assert our right to a naval blockade on Gaza."

"The threats of violence won't deter us," says Huwaida Arraf, one of the flotilla organizers. "Nobody is going in to this lightly, but we feel it has to be done. Israel has to realize its violence against us is not going to stop our growing civilian effort to challenge its illegal policies. The size of this flotilla, the number of people involved in organizing it, even after Israel killed nine of our colleagues last year, is testament to that."

She says half a million people applied for the few hundred places: depending on how many of the 10 boats are seaworthy in time, there should be around 400 people on the flotilla.

The campaign began in August 2008, when 44 activists on two small fishing boats set off from Cyprus and managed to reach Gaza. Later that year, the Free Gaza Movement, as it became known, organized several other voyages, usually sending single boats containing small but symbolic supplies such as medicine and toys, and volunteers, including doctors, lawyers, and politicians.

Amid allegations of violence and hostility from Israel's naval forces at sea, the activists decided they would need to send a flotilla, and after months of fundraising and negotiating with NGOs from other countries, particularly Turkey, several ships met in the Mediterranean sea in May last year with the intention of reaching Gaza.

"We didn't make it to Gaza and we lost a lot of colleagues," says Arraf, "but one of the things that was achieved was that people realized what Israel's policies meant, and the violence Israel was using to maintain them. We think our action will put pressure on Israel to end its blockade on Gaza, and we hope the respective governments of all the people participating will take action and do what they should be doing, instead of having their nationals putting their lives at risk like this."

There is a danger, says Chris Doyle, director of the council for Arab-British understanding, of the Palestinian issue being overlooked -- in the west at least -- as focus shifts to countries going through the extraordinary changes in the Arab Spring. "There is a danger that people forget how important this issue is, and that it is boiling. It is still an unresolved issue. At a time when international politicians -- Obama, Cameron, Sarkozy, and others-- are concentrating so much on other areas of the region, the issue of Palestine has not gone away."

"Everyone has been so amazed and shocked at the beauty of the Arab revolutions, seeing these incredibly brave and wonderful citizens, that it quite naturally seizes the attention, but at the heart of the Arab revolutions is Palestine," says Karma Nabulsi, an academic and expert on the Middle East. "I would say it hasn't been properly covered in the west, but Palestine is central to what people -- the Arab media, the people who are participating in the Arab revolutions -- talk about all the time."

So where does Palestine fit into the Arab spring? Doyle says: "A Palestinian spring is more than possible. Many senior people within Fatah and the Palestinian authorities have been saying this is the way to go because the negotiations are not seen as credible, and they will have to adopt different tactics. I think that, on the one hand, those tactics could be against the Israeli occupation, but also it represents a threat to the Palestinian authority itself, both to Fatah and Hamas."

The flotilla "gives people heart and encouragement, that the struggle for freedom has friends and supporters," says Nabulsi. "What the flotilla did last year, these plucky little boats, was bring the entire world to look at what [the Israeli government] were doing. Not just because of the brutality of the response of the military, but it shows how simple gestures get to the heart of the issue -- breaking through the silence and the siege, and all the things that seem so big and impossible to do. They did it and they're going to do it again, and that's what is so remarkably brave."

-- Emine Saner / The Guardian (U.K.)

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Jack A. Smith : Israel and Palestine After the Flotilla / 4

The two wild cards. Iran’s Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani shown with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2009. Photo by Amir Kholoosi / ISNA.
Part 4: Two wild cards, Turkey and Iran
Israel and Palestine after the Flotilla

By Jack A. Smith / The Rag Blog / July 18, 2010

[This is the last in a four-part series in which Jack A. Smith assesses multiple aspects of the situation in Palestine, including the relations between Israel and the U.S., Israel and the Palestine National Authority, the Palestinian split between Fatah and Hamas, the action and inaction of the Arab states, the new role of Turkey, the key importance of Iran, and the future of Washington's hegemony in the Middle East.]

There are two wild cards in the region — neither of which are Arab — that are capable of complicating the U.S.-Israeli game in the Middle East.

One is Turkey, the militarily strong, largely Westernized, secular democratic republic of nearly 78 million people, with a large Sunni Muslim population. The other is Iran, a largely modernized Islamic republic of just over 67 million people, mostly Shi'ite Muslims. Both are mature societies that have at one time controlled empires -- Ottoman and Persian respectively. Both are strategically situated: Turkey between Europe and Asia, Iran between Central Asia and the Middle East.

Turkey, a NATO member and long time close ally of Israel and the United States, had kept to itself for many years. Then in early 2009 the Ankara government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan abruptly stormed onto the regional stage when Turkey sharply condemned Israel's calculatedly cruel invasion of Gaza.

A few months ago Turkey unexpectedly strode onto the international stage along with partner Brazil, announcing that they had obtained a nuclear fuel swap agreement with Iran that obviated the need for additional U.S.-UN sanctions. They believed, evidently correctly, that they had President Obama's backing for this independent mission. But when they brought back a deal that was virtually identical to what Obama originally sought, the White House backed off and treated the unofficial intermediaries like unwelcome busybodies.

In our view, what the Obama-Netanyahu cohort really wanted was intensified sanctions, not a nuclear agreement that would remove the pretext for demonizing Iran, probably in preparation for near-future aggression.

Last month -- after Israeli commandos cut down nine Turkish members of the humanitarian flotilla -- relations between Tel-Aviv and Ankara deteriorated further, and a furious Erdogan withdrew Turkey's ambassador but did not break diplomatic ties. He called on Israel to apologize for the killings and pay compensation to the nine families involved, but Tel-Aviv has refused, claiming the commandoes were defending themselves.

Erdogan announced that "If the entire world has turned its back on the Palestinians, Turkey will never turn its back on Jerusalem and the Palestinians," and took some modest steps such as banning Israeli military aircraft from its airspace.

An interview with Prime Minister Erdogan was aired June 29 on the PBS Charlie Rose program. He called Netanyahu "the biggest barrier to peace," an obvious truth about which the Obama Administration must be abundantly aware, though publicly silent. Most important, Erdogan also added that Turkey remained "a friend to Israel," but Ankara soon announced that it would break diplomatic relations with Israel unless Tel-Aviv apologized for the flotilla killings or accepted the conclusion of an international inquiry.

The next day, Foreign Minister Davutoglu met secretly in Zurich with Israeli Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer to discuss reducing tensions. Notice of the meeting was leaked by an Israeli TV station. There was no report about the outcome of the conference. Recognizing that he was intentionally kept in the dark by Netanyahu about this important event where he logically should have presided, Foreign Minister Lieberman publicly excoriated his boss for excluding him.

Netanyahu is under pressure from Washington to seek a reconciliation with Erdogan in order to keep strategic Turkey in Washington's political enclosure. Loud mouth Lieberman probably would have exacerbated tensions had he met with Davutoglu. Netanyahu needs Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party in his coalition to remain in office, which is the only reason such a hothead became Foreign Minister. Discussing the latest contretemps, the Jerusalem Post opined July 1 that "it is yet another indicator that Israeli diplomatic policy is dysfunctional."

At this point, no one really knows the extent of Ankara's geopolitical ambitions, which may determine how far Turkey will distance itself from Israel, and perhaps the U.S. as well. There's certainly a lack of dynamic leadership in the Middle East that Turkey, which seems to have good relations with all the Muslim countries, might seek to provide.

If Turkey confines itself to supporting the Palestinians and criticizing Israel, that will have an important regional impact -- perhaps sufficient to galvanize the Arab countries to take more action on Gaza's behalf, to give Tel-Aviv pause, and to induce Washington to finally get serious about ending the colonial status of the Palestinian people.

And if Turkey seeks a larger role in regional affairs beyond the Palestinian issue, perhaps in league with a couple of other regional players, this could possibly alter the balance of power in the Middle East, which is now tilted steeply toward the Washington/Tel-Aviv axis.

And where does the other wild card, Iran, fit into this scenario? Various commentators have speculated that the Islamic republic seeks to dominate the Middle East or that it wants to impose Shi'ite beliefs throughout the region, or that it seeks to destroy Israel, among other absurd speculations.

Any objective appraisal of the conditions confronting Teheran today would show that its first priority and nearly total preoccupation is national security, and its military strategy is defensive, not offensive, as Washington and Tel-Aviv are well aware. Consider this:

• According to news reports, an armada of 11 U.S. Navy warships and one Israeli ship, led by the USS Harry Truman aircraft carrier and its Strike Group of 60 fighter-bombers, passed through the Suez Canal June 18 heading for the Persian Gulf, where they will join other ships positioned near Iran. Navy battle fleets with Cruise and Tomahawk missiles and air wings roam the Arabian Sea, Mediterranean Sea, Gulf of Oman, and Indian Ocean, as well as the Persian Gulf.
• The immense U.S. base of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean is being stocked for possible war against Iran, including nearly 400 so-called bunker-busters for deep ground penetration.
• The U.S. Air Force is at the ready to quickly thrash Iran when the signal is given.
• Israel is continually threatening to attack Iran.
• The American military machine is camped on Iran's western border (Iraq), and on its eastern border (Afghanistan). The Pentagon's Special Forces troops have been probing Iran from both directions, looking for vulnerabilities, and getting the lay of the land.
• For several years during the Bush Administration, news analysts were predicting an imminent attack by the U.S. It didn't occur, probably because of the quagmire leading to a military stalemate in Iraq. But Teheran knows it likely faces a greater danger today than during the Bush years.
• Iran is under 24-hour surveillance from U.S. satellite spying and eavesdropping technologies throughout the country that can "see" every part of the country and "hear" every phone conversation, not to mention spies on the ground.
• Iran has been laboring under ever-tightening U.S. economic and trade sanctions for several decades after the Islamic revolution dispatched Washington's puppet potentate in Teheran, the dreaded Shah.
• Iran's big power friends, Russia and China, just joined the U.S. in imposing the latest UN sanctions, after diluting them (but knowing Washington would add additional sanctions of its own to compensate). This shocked and worried Teheran, though both countries are still considered allies and are not expected to abandon Iran.
• For the last decade -- at least -- Washington has been providing material support and encouragement to the anti-regime dissident movement, and the Obama government is no doubt continuing the practice.
• Washington is trying to create an anti-Iranian coalition composed of several Sunni Arab states, exacerbating ethnic and religious tensions in order to better divide and conquer.
• America's medium and long range missiles, with both conventional and nuclear warheads, are on the alert -- patiently awaiting the signal.

For its part, Teheran is continuing to support the Hezbollah Shi'ites in Lebanon and Sunni Hamas in Gaza. Hezbollah -- a political movement that leads the second largest electoral coalition in Lebanon -- criticizes Tel-Aviv as colonialist but its guerrilla defenders usually fight against Israel when it invades Lebanon. Hezbollah fighters were largely responsible for Israel's decision to withdraw its military forces in May 2000 after a nearly two-decade occupation of Lebanon, and for a second humiliation of the IDF when it returned in 2006 with guns ablaze.

Hamas is a political organization dedicated to liberating the Palestinian people from colonial domination. It is without heavy weapons, tanks, or planes to employ in its liberation struggle against the IDF so it propelled relatively primitive unguided rockets into Israel and killed up to 10 civilians over the last several years. Israel, of course, killed many thousands of Palestinians during that time.

The U.S. and Israel identify both groups as "terrorist" and Iran as "terrorist" for supporting them. In the opinion of many leftists and numbers of people in the developing (third) world, they are resistance fighters against colonial and imperialist oppression.

The government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies building nuclear weapons and declares its efforts are directed at producing energy for peaceful purposes, not bombs. Even with all the spy techniques at Washington's command, there is still no evidence to convict Iran on this charge. Yet Israel -- which is said to possess some 200 nuclear weapons in defiance of the NPT -- poses as Iran's intended victim. Iran has not engaged in an aggressive war since the first half of the 1800s (a short-lived incursion over the Afghan border), and is absolutely in no position to do so now.

Neither the U.S. nor Israel is actually worried that Iran will in effect commit national suicide by preparing to attack, or actually attacking, the Jewish State -- thus triggering a preemptive offensive or instant mass retaliation from Tel-Aviv, with the U.S. near at hand to help out.

There are two other regional concerns for the U.S. and Israel to think about over the longer term:

• One is the possibility Shi'ite Iran and majority Shi'ite Iraq eventually may bloc together in one type of close relationship or another several years hence. They share a number of interests in addition to their compatible branch of Islam -- a minority often held down in Sunni-dominated lands. They both want to be independent of U.S. threats and violence and may conclude that unity enhances their defenses.
  
  As a team they could more profitably exploit their extraordinarily huge petroleum reserves. And they are both concerned about the Kurdish independence movement, among other factors. Washington will do its best to keep Baghdad and Teheran apart. It plans to retain considerable influence in Iraq after most of America's foreign legion departs for other battlefields, but the era of puppet governments and colonial masters, despite remnants here and there, is fading into history.


• The other, perhaps even more nettlesome long term concern for Uncle Sam, is the possibility Iran might bloc with Turkey and Syria to oppose U.S. domination of the Middle East. If Iraq joined in, the four countries would stretch some 2,200 miles from the Dardanelles in the Mediterranean to the Arabian Sea. This might even induce Egypt to get moving again. It's a long shot, of course, but a potential game changer in the Arab world -- which is due for a change.

The Middle East often looks static, with the Americans ruling the roost, but that's deceptive. No one knows what is going to happen in the next couple of decades with any of the many possibilities for change that are swirling around the Middle East today, particularly as other world nations rise while the U.S. engages in what appears to be the start of a long decline.

Those bold volunteers who took part in the recent humanitarian flotilla have through their deeds obliged Israel to weaken the blockade of Gaza. That's an important change. And their efforts focused a bright light on the misdeeds perpetrated upon the Palestinians by Israel and its superpower enabler.

That's a good start toward further change, and may become a transitional moment that in time results not only in fruitful outcomes for the oppressed Palestinian people, but also for the entire region.

[Jack A. Smith was editor of the Guardian -- for decades the nation's preeminent leftist newsweekly -- that closed shop in 1992. Smith now edits the Hudson Valley Activist Newsletter, where this series also appears.

• For the entire series, go here.

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Jack A. Smith : Israel and Palestine After the Flotilla / 3

Then Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas, left, meets Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on March 19, 2006 in Gaza City. Haniya continues to function as Prime Minister, despite having been dismissed by Abbas the next year. Photo from Getty Images / Life.
Part 3: Two problems for the Palestinians
Israel and Palestine after the Flotilla

By Jack A. Smith / The Rag Blog / July 18, 2010

[This is the third in a four-part series in which Jack A. Smith assesses multiple aspects of the situation in Palestine, including the relations between Israel and the U.S., Israel and the Palestine National Authority, the Palestinian split between Fatah and Hamas, the action and inaction of the Arab states, the new role of Turkey, the key importance of Iran, and the future of Washington's hegemony in the Middle East.]

Israeli domination and the right wing government's unwillingness to compromise are the biggest problems confronting the Palestinians. But there are two other big problems.

The first is the present disunity between secular PNA/PLO, Fatah in the West Bank and, Islamist Hamas in Gaza. The two sides are far apart politically as well as geographically -- a fact exploited by Tel-Aviv and Washington. The second problem is that while supportive of the Palestinians in general, the Arab countries themselves are split and relatively weak, with several of them within Washington's sphere of influence.

Israel and the U.S. do not recognize or speak to the Hamas leaders, including Ismail Haniyeh who became Prime Minister after the January 2006 democratic election for the Palestine National Authority's Legislative Council -- which Fatah previously dominated. Hamas gained 74 seats to Fatah's 45 in the 132-member body. Four other parties gathered the remaining seats. The Bush Administration immediately joined the Israeli government in discrediting the voting, which Jimmy Carter and other election monitors said was completely honest, and in seeking to subvert or overthrow Hamas, with which Israel considers itself to be at war.

The next year, as a consequence of a virtual civil war between Fatah and Hamas, PNA President Abbas -- a former Fatah leader who also is chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) dismissed Haniyeh as Prime Minister. (The PLO has long been recognized internationally and by Israel as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.")

The Hamas leader contested the firing as illegal and continues to function as Prime Minister in Gaza only, legally backed by the Legislative Council. Abbas, who announced recently that he does not plan to run for reelection in January because of a lack of progress in negotiations, named Salam Fayyad Prime Minister. Fayyad functions in that capacity in the West Bank, without legislative approval and presumably without legal authority. He is considered to be friendly to the United States, where he lived as a student at the University of Texas in Austin while obtaining a PhD in economics -- a field in which he is said to excel.

Over the years Israel has jailed dozens of elected Hamas legislators, mostly on spurious charges. At least 10 from Hamas remain locked up in Israeli prisons. According to a June 29 report by a Palestinian researcher, 7,300 Palestinians are presently held in some 20 Israeli prisons, including 17 legislators, two former ministers, and some 300 children.

The U.S. and Israel deal only with Abbas, Fayyad, and the PNA government. They are aware that these Palestinian partners are weaker today compared to the mass support enjoyed by the organization when it was led by the legendary Yasser Arafat until his death six years ago. And President Abbas, of course, is more amenable to making concessions to Israel and the U.S. than Hamas.

The reasons for the split between the two sides are complex. It cannot be forgotten that in earlier years Israel encouraged the growth of Hamas as an alternative to the secular and leftist Fatah led by Arafat. Fatah has lost some support from a portion of the Palestinian people for various reasons, not least being the internal contradictions, rivalry, and alleged corruption within the organization. Hamas offers an extensive and popular program of social welfare, and is said to fight corruption and favoritism. As such it has gained considerable support.

Much to Tel-Aviv's regret, given its earlier hopes, Hamas turned out to be as dedicated to the national struggle as Fatah and the PLO. Unlike the PLO, Hamas refuses to recognize Israel, but has let it be known it is not inflexible when it comes to making a balanced and sustainable deal. Fatah does not recognize Israel, either. In reality, whether or not a political party "recognizes" a state has no legal significance. Recognition is a state to state affair. It's fairly certain that an eventual Palestinian state will exchange mutual recognitions with Israel.

At this stage the two Palestinian factions remain enemies, though they agree on many issues. There have been reports in recent months that both sides have been contemplating terms for a possible reconciliation. Abbas said he was willing to send a Fatah delegation to Gaza for talks, but Hamas evidently rejected the bid. The Arab League has been pressuring the factions to work towards unity.

Some kind of unity between Fatah and Hamas, within the context of the PNA and PLO, appears to be required if the Palestinian people are to achieve their goals. Eventual necessity may bring them into a working relationship, especially if serious negotiations begin to bring an independent state closer to reality.

The second big problem for the Palestinians is the lack of unity and purpose in the Arab world. Israel has worked to split the Palestinians. The U.S. has worked to split the Arabs -- or rather to reunite them within Washington's superpower sphere of influence, a process that seems to be succeeding so far.

A main purpose of Washington's strategy is to assure success for the U.S. government's principal goal of controlling the Middle East. At this point it seems the U.S. wants to reduce the Israel-Palestine irritant to manageable proportions to secure Tel-Aviv as America's surrogate at the eastern end of the Mediterranean, proximate to the strategic Persian Gulf with its oil reserves to the east, and North Africa including the Suez Canal to the west.

We will here briefly discuss the relationship between some key Arab states and the Israel-Palestine conflict, which has been going on for over six decades.

All the Arab countries give backing to the Palestinians rhetorically and some do materially as well. But very few these days -- two decades after the collapse of the first global socialist project, which supported Palestinian aspirations -- are willing to take political risks for Palestinian national liberation, given the probability of incurring Washington's wrath in a unipolar world. Only two Arab countries maintain diplomatic relations with Israel -- Egypt and Jordan, both of which are adjacent to Palestinian territory. In most cases relations between the other Arab countries and Israel are more distant but no longer antagonistic.

It may be of interest to note that the U.S. provides annual subsidies to both Arab countries that recognize Israel. Egypt gets $1.3 billion this year; smaller Jordan receives $540 million.

Egypt is the most powerful Arab country with a population of just over 80 million, and it remains influential in the region. But the days when the Cairo government sought to lead the Arab nations behind an anti-colonial and pan-Arab banner are gone with the desert winds of yesteryear, along with Egypt's once significant military forces.

Cairo today is well within Washington's orbit -- and by extension, Tel-Aviv's as well. The regime of President Hosni Mubarak despises Hamas because it is ideologically associated with its own principal internal enemy, the Muslim Brotherhood. It has thus joined Israel's blockade of Arab Gaza.

Egypt had little option in the aftermath of the flotilla debacle but to finally open the Rafah Border Crossing just before Israel announced it was going to open some crossings of its own as part its partial easing of the blockade. These crossings are the only means for people or supplies to enter and exit Gaza. Access by sea remains prohibited by the Israeli navy.

President Mubarak is now 82 and he has held office for nearly 29 years, all of them under a continuing state of emergency granting him such extraordinary powers that he has been reelected routinely without challenge. The next presidential election is in 2011 and he has not yet declared his candidacy.

Mohamed ElBaradei, left, a potential challenger to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, is not favored by Washington or Tel Aviv. Image from eatbees blog.
Mohamed ElBaradei, who retired last year as head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, may enter as a candidate. He is not favored by Washington or Tel-Aviv, who wanted him to be much tougher on Iran. Mubarak is rumored to be grooming his son Gamal to succeed him in power. It's doubtful the election will produce changes in Egypt's relationship to Israel, but nothing's ever certain.

Jordan with its large Palestinian population is in Uncle Sam's pocket because it is small, weak, and insecure about both Fatah and Hamas. The ruling Hashemite Kingdom dramatically crossed swords with the PLO by cracking down on militant Palestinian groups in September 1970 (known to Palestinians as Black September).

By July 1971 the various organizations within the PLO were ousted from Jordan, with many finding refuge in Lebanon, where they were besieged again when Israel invaded that country in 1982. Jordan's King Abdullah II may fear that either a secular democratic or an Islamic neighboring Palestinian state will ultimately undermine the monarchy. King Abdullah worked with Obama on developing the concept of a Palestinian state without military forces.

The kingdom of Saudi Arabia has received U.S. protection since the end of World War II in return for reliable access to petroleum, insuring the survival of the royal family with its particular form of Sunni Islam, Wahhabism. The Saudi government has helped the Palestinians financially and supports many of the PLO's political positions, but its close association with Washington makes it an inconsistent friend of Palestinian liberation.

The Saudis do not have formal diplomatic ties with Israel but the relationship is cooperative and friendly. A strong independent and modern Palestinian state, either under the secular leadership of Fatah or Islamic governance of a different Sunni type, is problematic for the House of Saud and constrains its support.

The oil-rich Arab Gulf States, now including post-Ba'athist Iraq (which before Washington's 2003 invasion was strongly supportive of Palestinian goals), all give a nod to the Palestinian cause but bend the knee to Washington's global power.

Syria strongly supports the Palestinians in many ways and maintains cordial relations with both Fatah and Hamas, but it is no match for Israel's regional military supremacy and America's demanding presence and keeps a relatively low profile.

President Bashar al-Assad's main interest is in negotiating a peace treaty with Israel leading to the restoration of the occupied Golan Heights to Syria, and in retaining its historic influence in Lebanon. He strongly opposed Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 2006 and expressed admiration for the resistance waged by Hezbollah, the Shi'ite people's organization supported by Iran.

Sophisticated and small Lebanon has too often been an Israeli battlefield for it to invite Tel-Aviv's ire. However, some observers believe Israel will discover a pretext to invade once again to crush Hezbollah, the non-government Shi'ite Muslim defense force, after its failure to accomplish this objective in 2006. Israeli militarists are still smarting over the failure to destroy Hezbollah, which is essential to bring all Lebanon under its control.

Israel's invasion cost the lives of 1,183 Lebanese civilians; some 4,000 were wounded, and over 30,000 family homes were destroyed or severely damaged. Throughout the month of warfare, Hezbollah sent thousands of largely ineffective though frightening unguided rockets into Israel killing 36 civilians. Hezbollah's death toll is unknown. Israel also lost 118 soldiers.

The rest of the Arab countries, including one time radical states such as Libya, continue to back Palestinian hopes and vote correctly at Arab League meetings, but do little else to promote the cause.

(More to come.)

[Jack A. Smith was editor of the Guardian -- for decades the nation's preeminent leftist newsweekly -- that closed shop in 1992. Smith now edits the Hudson Valley Activist Newsletter, where this series also appears.

• Go here for Part 1 and 2 of this series.

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Gaza Freedom Flotilla : Participants Speak Out

Gaza Freedom Flotilla participants Ann Wright and Joe Meadors spoke in Austin about their experiences. Photo by Alice Embree / The Rag Blog.
Col. Ann Wright and Joe Meadors:
What really happened on the Freedom Flotilla

By Alice Embree / The Rag Blog / July 13, 2010

Col. Ann Wright is Thorne Dreyer's guest on Rag Radio, Tuesday, July 13, 2-3 p.m. (CST) on KOOP 91.7 FM in Austin. They discuss her history in the military and as a diplomat, why she resigned from the State Department, her involvement in the peace movement, and what happened on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla.

For those outside the listening area, go here to stream the show. To listen to this show on the Rag Radio archives after the broadcast, go here. To listen to earlier shows, go to the Rag Radio archives.

AUSTIN -- Two participants in the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, Col. Ann Wright and Joe Meadors, spoke to an Austin audience July 11 as part of a statewide speaking tour. They were part of a six ship flotilla attempting to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza with a delivery of humanitarian supplies. On May 31, Israeli special forces boarded the largest ship, the MV Mavi Marmara, shooting nine passengers to death and injuring more than 40. One U.S. citizen was among the dead.

Wright and Meadors had been sailing on smaller ships in the flotilla. They described being surrounded by Zodiac boats at 4:30 in the morning, 70 miles off coast in international waters. Percussion bombs were fired on their ships, breaking windows, before Israeli special forces boarded and detained those on board. Personal items -- cameras, laptops and cell phones -- were confiscated and passengers were held on board before being removed and detained in Israeli jails. All the cargo was seized.

Ann Wright, a retired Army Colonel and career diplomat, is best known for resigning from her State Department position in protest at the onset of the Iraq War. Since her resignation she has been active in the peace and social justice movements. Wright spoke with Joe Meadors, a survivor of the 1967 Israeli attack on the USS Liberty. The Liberty was a Naval electronic intelligence-gathering ship deployed near Israel.

Meadors, who was a Navy signalman, described the attack by Israeli planes and torpedo boats that left 34 dead and two thirds of the remaining crew injured. Naval investigations of the attack were scuttled and Israel was never held accountable for the deaths. Meadors, a Corpus Christi resident, said “I knew what Israel could do.”

The Gaza Freedom Flotilla included more than 600 participants from 37 countries. The deadly attack prompted an international outcry and has increased pressure on Israel to lift the blockade which confines 1.5 million people in a strip of land about five miles wide and 25 miles long. This densely populated area was devastated by the Israeli bombing attacks launched in December 2008.

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Jack A. Smith : Israel and Palestine After the Flotilla / 2

A graffiti artist paints the face of a Palestinian child on a wall in Beirut, Lebanon. Image from EPA.
Part 2: Breaking the blockade
Israel and Palestine after the Flotilla

By Jack A. Smith / The Rag Blog / July 13, 2010

[This is the second in a four-part series in which Jack A. Smith assesses multiple aspects of the situation in Palestine, including the relations between Israel and the U.S., Israel and the Palestine National Authority, the Palestinian split between Fatah and Hamas, the action and inaction of the Arab states, the new role of Turkey, the key importance of Iran, and the future of Washington's hegemony in the Middle East.]

Israel's blockade is an act of collectively punishing an entire people -- outlawed in international jurisprudence -- initially launched as sanctions against the inhabitants of Gaza for democratically electing the Islamic party Hamas in the legislative voting of January 2006. Both Israel and the U.S. had supported the candidates of the Palestinian National Authority, which is guided by the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), a coalition of political parties of which Fatah is the leading component.

Sanctions were transformed into a stultifying siege a year later after Hamas won a virtual civil war against Fatah in Gaza, despite Washington's gift of $60 million to Fatah for training and weapons with which to crush Hamas. Since that time Hamas has ruled Gaza, and the PNA has ruled the larger occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank, with partial and occasionally coercive support from Washington and Tel-Aviv.

The blockade was so severe that the entire population of the Gaza Strip was in effect incarcerated within the small territory for the last three years. Though many foods were not allowed into Gaza, and the caloric intake was lowered, no one starved to death. That was the blockade's single saving grace. Paper and soap, cement, mattresses, machinery, toys, and thousands of other goods have been denied the people of Gaza. Cement is especially important if the territory is ever to rebuild after the IDF has reduced many of its homes, commercial buildings, industrial plants, and government offices to rubble.

AP reported that Israel announced July 5 it was lifting the ban on nearly all consumer goods and other items but will "continue to ban most travel and exports and restrict the import of desperately needed construction materials. The new rules are unlikely to restore the territory's devastated economy or allow rebuilding of all that was destroyed in last year's war." Hamas denounced the new regulations because, despite being somewhat eased, it's still a blockade.

Israel, the military superpower of the Middle East, launched a brief and punishing war against Lebanon and Gaza in the summer of 2006, generating international criticism. World opinion was outraged again in December 2008 when the Israel Defense Force returned to unprotected Gaza, ostensibly in retaliation for rocket attacks, and slaughtered 1,417 Palestinians, overwhelmingly civilians, and wounded another 5,500. Israel lost 14 people, nearly all soldiers.

(Hamas was carrying out a cease-fire for months before the attack until Israel broke the truce, which is why Tel-Aviv's justifying cry of "the rockets, the rockets," rang hollow in anti-colonial quarters.)

The plight of the people of Gaza generated support for them from around the world. The Free Gaza Movement coalition of pro-Palestine groups organized nine attempts to challenge the Israeli blockade by sending ships with humanitarian supplies toward Gaza from August 2008 to May 31, 2010. None carried weapons of any kind. All were repelled by Israel to maintain the sanctity of mass privation as an instrument of state coercion.

This May the Free Gaza Movement was joined by the Turkish Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief (IHH) in sending six ships and 663 pro-Palestinian passengers from 37 different countries to challenge the blockade. The ships, loaded with non-military supplies, combined to form a flotilla near the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, and set a course for Gaza May 30. Many of the passengers had received training in nonviolence. They had no guns or bombs.

Israeli military vessels and helicopters interdicted the flotilla on the high seas about 60 miles from the coast of the Gaza Strip. Even if the ships managed to enter territorial waters, it would have been Palestinian, not Israeli, territory, it should be noted. Heavily armed IDF Special Forces troops illegally boarded the vessels and took command. Five of the ships were subdued quickly without deaths to passengers.

The sixth and by far largest ship, the Turkish vessel Mavi Marmara, purchased earlier this year by the IHH charity, was boarded by commandos rappelling menacingly from hovering helicopters as navy speedboats circled the ship. A few passengers resisted the intruders, as they -- in the opinion of many -- had every right to do in international seas. They were brave and paid with their lives.

The commandos shot and killed nine people -- some at such close range as to suggest they were murdered. One of the slain was a U.S. citizen, Furkan Doğan, a Turkish-American youth of 19. It is probable that some of the dead and wounded were unresisting when bullets entered their bodies. One IDF sergeant, who claimed he shot six civilians, said they were all "terrorists."

The Israeli government did not plan to kill members of the humanitarian flotilla. But it created a situation where if one element of its elaborately staged act of aggression went wrong all hell would, and did, break lose.

Why didn't Defense Secretary Ehud Barak, author of the famous embellishment that the IDF was "the most moral army in the world," insist that the commandos be instructed beforehand in how to respond rationally to the possibility of encountering non-armed resistance from a few passengers?

News of the shootings immediately subjected Israel -- with its already existing human rights violations toward the Palestinians -- to intense international opprobrium. In return, the Netanyahu government's propaganda apparatus subjected the world to a plethora of self-justifications -- almost all untrue or at least gross exaggerations, but evidently good enough for the White House and Congress.

The world was told that the well-armed commandos were "lynched." They were pummeled with "bats." There were 50 "Turkish soldiers" aboard the Mavi Marmara. Later, this was changed to "75 al-Qaeda mercenaries." The ship, said Netanyahu, was a "hate boat." Many defenders of Israel in the U.S. still prefer to believe these and other tall tales. One would think that if there were 75 members of al-Qaeda aboard the big Turkish ship that they would have been arrested and punished when they were brought to Israel. How odd, then, no one was arrested -- not those who "lynched" the innocent commandos, the "bat" wielders, the "Turkish soldiers," or the "terrorist mercenaries."

Perhaps the lowest blow in this entire propaganda charade is the information from Time magazine that "the stuttering official response to the flotilla fiasco" included "among the many videos featuring radio traffic that the IDF posted online, the most obviously inflammatory -- in which a voice, allegedly from a flotilla radio transmission, can be heard snarling, 'Go back to Auschwitz'." It was, according to Time and several other sources, an "obviously edited" remark, interpolated into the tape by government propagandists -- "PR amateurs," according to a columnist in the Tel-Aviv daily Yedioth Ahronoth, the widest circulation newspaper in Israel.

Learning of the attack by armed Israeli commandos, the well known American author and poet Alice Walker wrote in support of "defenseless peace activists carrying aid to Gaza who tried to fend them off using chairs and sticks. I am thankful to know what it means to be good; I know that the people of the Freedom Flotilla are... some of the best people on earth. They have not stood silently by and watched the destruction of others, brutally, sustained, without offering themselves, weaponless except for their bodies, to the situation."

The UN Security Council did manage to pass a resolution calling for a thorough and objective international investigation of the flotilla incident, but Tel-Aviv refused to cooperate, insisting on conducting its own probe. It is said the Obama Administration arranged a compromise: in return for a partial lifting of the embargo Israel would be permitted to conduct the investigation into its own actions without outside interference.

The Obama Administration termed an Israeli self-investigation "an important step forward" -- forward toward what was left blank, but self-exoneration seems likely. Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu declared that "We have no trust at all that Israel, a country that has carried out such an attack on a civilian convoy in international waters, will conduct an impartial investigation."

Given the travesty of the probe carried out by Israel after its Winter 2008-2009 attack on Gaza, and its subsequent rejection — shamefully supported by Congress and the White House -- of the UN's impartial Goldstone Report critical of Israeli actions, there is little doubt the new investigation, which got underway June 28, will be a whitewash unless the rules are changed.

Netanyahu ventured recently that the investigation "will prove that the goals and actions of the state of Israel and the Israeli military were appropriate defensive actions in accordance with the highest international standards." That will be precisely the outcome if he has his way, but obstacles have arisen.

A speedboat escorts the Mavi Marmara near the southern port of Ashdod after the raid by Israeli commandos. Photo by Menahem Kahana / AFP / Getty Images.
Many influential Israelis were dubious about a self-investigation, and there was widespread media criticism in Israel about how the probe will be conducted -- far more than in the U.S. media, which is usually uncritical of anything the Israeli government does. In the words of the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz, the investigation seems "more and more like a farce." Gush Shalom, the Peace Bloc, has petitioned the court system to broaden the investigation and its mandate.

Then, according to Haaretz June 30, retired justice Yaakov Tirkel, who was named to head the investigation, "told the government the committee could not do its job without expanded investigative powers." He "wants to turn it into a full-fledged governmental inquiry committee with real teeth. That would allow it to subpoena witnesses and documents, warn those who testify before it that the panel's findings could harm them, and hire outside experts in relevant fields."

On July 4 Netanyahu's cabinet agreed to a limited number of changes. They included adding two experts to the panel, and said it now agreed to placing witnesses under oath. The investigation is still an in-house affair with notable restrictions, such as not being allowed to question the IDF commandos who attacked the Mavi Marmara.

Israel has claimed to be the victim of several different "existential" threats over the years, the latest being from Iran, but as we have noted before, the Zionist State faces only one existential threat -- losing Washington's support. Knowing this, Israel and its dedicated American supporters invest a huge amount of time, effort and money courting American public opinion, working diligently to elect pro-Israel politicians, and assiduously cultivating its backers in the White House and Congress.

Despite the American government's unceasing support for Israel, the majority of the Israeli population is wary of the Obama Administration, though American Jews are generally supportive. For instance, according to a June poll conducted on behalf of the B’nai B’rith World Center in Jerusalem, "65% of Jewish Israelis say U.S. Jews should criticize Obama's Mideast policy." This is based in large part on an incorrect analysis of the Obama Administration's policy toward the Muslim world, its willingness to "talk" to Teheran, and some signs of impatience with Netanyahu. Here's our view of these three matters:

1. It is obvious that President Obama's overture to the Muslim world during his Cairo speech a year ago was a public relations gesture representing no substantial change in American policy, other than in rhetoric. The purpose was to deflect mounting criticism of the U.S. from the global Islamic religious community of over a billion adherents while he wages and widens wars in several Muslim countries. The objective, to speak frankly, was to strengthen imperialism, not weaken Israel.


2. Obama's tone toward Iran is less belligerent than that of his predecessor, but his policies (such as the new sanctions) rival those of President George W. Bush. Indeed, they seem to be worse, judging by the dangerously increased U.S. Navy activity in the Persian Gulf and nearby waters, plus the grave buildup of war supplies at the U.S. base in the Indian Ocean.


3. Obama expects at least small concessions from Netanyahu, on settlements for example, in return for Washington's unstinting protection -- the purpose being to strengthen America's hold over the Arab states.

The Israeli government is also furious at Washington because the final document emerging from the month-long review meeting at the United Nations in May on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) (1) urges Israel to sign the NPT treaty and (2) set a 2012 date for a regional conference on establishing the Middle East as a nuclear free territory. When the issue of Israel came up at the 2005 NPT review one of the reasons there was no final report was because the Bush Administration refused to sign any document that mentioned Israel.

Here is Israel's problem: By signing the NPT Israel would have to acknowledge it possesses a large supply of nuclear weapons or be held in noncompliance, thus revealing its many denials were lies to the entire world. Further, the 2012 conference of Middle East nations will no doubt agree to ban nuclear weapons from the region -- obliging Israel to dismantle its weapons, which is hardly likely, or expose itself as a nuclear outlaw.

There was simply too much at political stake in the nuclear conference for the United States to once again seek to scuttle the talks, especially on one of its main issues — proliferation. The Israelis were perturbed, so the U.S. issued a statement critical of the meeting for not condemning Iran, which of course does not have nuclear weapons.

Not only the White House but both Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate overwhelmingly support Israel and many show contempt for the oppressed Palestinians.

In a mid-June article published in Foreign Policy in Focus, Stephen Zunes wrote:

Democratic congressional leaders were lining up alongside their Republican colleagues to defend the Israeli assault. Countering the broad consensus of international legal scholars who recognize that the attack was in flagrant violation of international norms, prominent Democrats embraced the Orwellian notion that Israel’s raid... was somehow an act of self-defense. The offensive by the Democratic leadership has been led by Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.), who serves as House Democrats’ unofficial spokesman on Middle East policy.... According to Ackerman, the killings were "wholly the fault and responsibility of the organizers of the effort to break through Israel and Egypt’s legitimate closure of terrorist-controlled Gaza."

Nearly all New York State members of Congress have issued statements supporting the ultra-right Netanyahu regime during the flotilla affair. New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler commented: It has been absolutely galling to watch the hypocrisy and the fury, the undeserved fury directed at Israel for taking a step in its own self defense." Said the Hudson Valley's Rep. John Hall: "I will keep working hard in Congress to ensure that Israel continues to have the full support and backing of the United States."

In late June, 87 out of 100 Senators and 307 out of 435 Representatives signed a letter to President Obama about the flotilla attack, declaring "We fully support Israel’s right to self-defense," arguing that "the Israeli commandos who arrived on the sixth ship [the Mavi Marmara]... were brutally attacked with iron rods, knives, and broken glass. They were forced to respond to that attack and we regret the loss of life that resulted."

The letter also commended Obama for the "action you took to prevent the adoption of an unfair United Nations Security Council resolution, which would have represented a rush to judgment by the international community."

Three Congressmen in particular took strong stands against the Israeli attack — Rep. Brian Baird (D-Wash.), Rep. Keith Ellison (DFL-Minn.), and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio). Kucinich wrote a letter to President Obama saying "The United States must remind Israel... it is not acceptable to repeatedly violate international law... [or] to shoot and kill innocent civilians... [or] to continue a blockade which denies humanitarian relief."

In April, according to an article by Ben Smith in Politico, 76 Senators and 333 Representatives "signed on to a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton implicitly rebuking the Obama Administration for its confrontational stance toward Israel," as though the White House had not backed down virtually every time Netanyahu waved a disapproving finger in Obama's face, or publicly embarrassed visiting Vice President Biden.

The Congressional letter blamed the Palestinians for the breakdown in talks and the lack of progress in solving key issues, noting "by contrast Israel’s prime minister stated categorically that he is eager to begin unconditional peace negotiations with the Palestinians."

Israel's unwillingness to work toward a genuine two-state settlement (or a one-state agreement with equality for all), and Washington's one-sided political, economic and military support for Israel, constitute the primary obstacles to peace between the two sides. But there are two other significant problems confronting the Palestinians as well.

(More to come.)

[Jack A. Smith was editor of the Guardian -- for decades the nation's preeminent leftist newsweekly -- that closed shop in 1992. Smith now edits the Hudson Valley Activist Newsletter, where this series also appears.

• Go here for Part 1 of this series.

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