New Media » Israel-Palestine

A History Of The Middle Eastside. Buy It On Amazon!

jnarvey — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 01:49:58 +0000

I mentioned on this blog a little while back that I wrote a novel in 2010. It’s called A History Of The Middle Eastside and it’s now available for purchase on Amazon.

If you haven’t quite finished your Christmas shopping (I know, I didn’t quite make the deadline for Chanukah) and like books, check it out. It’s a “Gangs of New York”-style allegory for the history of Zionism, international intrigues and the modern Middle East. It’s a bit surreal, like a Charlie Kaufman film, with some emulative touches of Michael Chabon’s “The Yiddish Policemen’s Union”. And violent, as you might expect from a gangster story. Er, perfect for the holiday season.

If you’re a book reviewer or political commentator (blogger or mainstream media) and interested in writing about it, I do have a limited number of review copies available. Contact me at jnarvey [AT] writeimage [DOT] ca

Cheers.

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How Beijing Brought Peace To The Middle East

jnarvey — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 16:44:16 +0000

For this International Day of Peace, I was generously invited by The Mark to write about a possible pathway to peace. To no one’s surprise, I chose the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And I’d like to think that if reality played out this way, we’d have a solution in about 24 hours. Read the full article, China Can Solve Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. An excerpt:

Middle East watchers and pundits are gobsmacked at the sheer speed of the talks. How could these leaders hash out an agreement in mere hours after decades of wrangling and bloodshed?

That morning, an utterly forgettable American envoy named Joe walked into the room and sheepishly addressed the Israeli and Palestinian leaders. He turned out to be an accountant. Querulous introductions followed. Next, he outlined some harsh truths.

“Look, the U.S. just can’t afford to keep pouring money down the drain and neither can our European pals,” Joe said with a shrug. “We’re broke. And our Chinese creditors, to whom we owe trillions, are threatening to call in our loans. And they’ve given us certain … conditions on our discretionary spending.”

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Obstacles To Peace

jnarvey — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 05:57:40 +0000

The latest round of Middle East peace talks has the potential to break an impasse that’s plagued international relations for too long. But as my colleagues and I noted on the CIC Scene site, the usual spoilers are still upsetting this apple cart. To wit:

Happy new year, y’all.

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Peace Talks For A Rough Neighborhood

jnarvey — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 05:56:20 +0000

The Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that launched recently have re-focused attention on one of the great Gordian knots of international politics. Lately, I’ve been contributing to the CIC Scene blog with some backgrounders on some of the challenges facing the negotiators — mainly, extremists (and their state sponsors) who have an incentive to ignite conflict.

First, I take a look at the terrorist on board the Mavi Marmara. Remember the “peace boat” in the Gaza flotilla? It turns out at least one of the crew had some experience with violence on boats:

Who is Tekir? He was one of the hijackers involved in the Black Sea hostage crisis back in 1996, when terrorists seized a boat carrying nearly 200 civilians and threatened to blow it up. According to the New York Daily News: “Nadia Naskova, a Russian woman who escaped from the ferry, said several people were wounded and that Russians were herded together and beaten.”

The hijackers were taken down by Turkish authorities. Tekir served three-and-a-half years in prison for his role in the terror operation.

What was Tekir’s role on board the boat this time? Was he one of the thugs who mobbed the soldiers? More to the point, what did the other “humanitarian” activists aboard the boat know about him – or the many Islamic fundamentalists on board belonging to the Turkish IHH, which may soon be listed officially in the USA as a terrorist organization?

I’ve also noted lately a few op eds and “hard news” articles calling for Hamas to be included in the peace process — as though there were “moderates” the Israelis might be able to negotiate with. Rather than point out the theoretical problems with such an approach, I’ve decided to simply relate Hamas’ public statements. Read them and you’ll see there’s not much point in bringing them to the bargaining table. An excerpt:

“Neither the liberation of the Gaza Strip nor the liberation of the West Bank or even Jerusalem will suffice us. Hamas will pursue the armed struggle until the liberation of all our lands. We don’t recognize the state of Israel or its right to hold onto one inch of Palestine. Palestine is an Islamic land belonging to all the Muslims.”
- Dr. Mahmud al-Zahar, Hamas leader in Gaza, The Jerusalem Post, August 18, 2005

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Why Are Palestinians Still In Refugee Camps?

jnarvey — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 22:52:55 +0000

Throw out your first answer, give your head a shake and read this insightful piece in The Propagandist from a refugee from Arab lands:

My thoughts turn to those savage days when my family fled Libya in 1967. We narrowly escaped death at the hands of a bus driver who, instead of taking us to the airport, tried to burn us alive inside the bus.

I am one of nearly one million Jews indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa who were forced to flee their ancestral homes in the last 60 years. I am now the voice of an Arab minority culture that has been ethnically cleansed…

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About That Israel Lobby

jnarvey — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 08:11:59 +0000

An excellent series in The Propagandist on why most Israel lobby critics really ought to spend far more time doing some personal soul searching rather than ganging up on the marketing people for the Middle East’s only Western democracy.

When one boils it down to the bare essentials: the Lobby is interested in presenting Israel in a positive light, of course. It recognizes that the honest and effective means of doing this is not by presenting Palestinians as evil, but to show the honest views of all parties with a vested interest in the region.

The anti-Israel gang of activists (I’d call them pro-Palestinian, but what have they ever done for the Palestinians they claim to represent?) strive to show Israel, as a place of intolerance, racism and illegitimacy. And I’ll give this to them: their propaganda methods are effective…

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Libby Davies Has To Go

jnarvey — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 04:09:01 +0000

Libby Davies can be seen on YouTube saying she thinks that chanting “long live the intifada” “sounds good” and saying (not once but twice) that Israel has been occupying Palestinian land since 1948, that “it’s the longest occupation in history,” and that it’s time for boycotts and disinvestment. – Bob Rae

People are fired up about this. Here’s video of a protest outside NDP MP Libby Davies’ office in the heart of Vancouver:

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No More Two-Track Middle East Policy From NDP

jnarvey — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 19:15:26 +0000

Probably the best thing to come out of this weird incident with NDP Deputy Leader Libby Davies is the end of an unofficial two-track policy on Israel. With the statement from Thomas Mulcair, the NDP’s other deputy leader, the idea of Israel as an apartheid state is definitively ejected from mainstream political discourse in this country.

Let’s take a quick look at Mulcair’s statement as recorded in the National Post:

“No member of our caucus, whatever other title they have, is allowed to invent their own policy,” said Mr. Mulcair. “We take decisions together, parties formulate policies together, and to say that you’re personally in favour of boycott, divestment and sanctions for the only democracy in the Middle East is, as far as I’m concerned, grossly unacceptable.”

If the NDP caucus truly believes this, then it’s a sea-change for public discussion of foreign policy vis a vis Israel and the Palestinians in this country. The ideology behind boycott and divestment campaigns against Israel are firmly relegated to the land of 9/11 Truthers, Creationists and the more nefarious minds behind the Rhino party.

For political pragmatists like myself, the BDS campaign has always been an extreme phenomenon that never carried any official support from any legitimate political party or their rank and file, or at least shouldn’t have. Yet there’s no question that NDP rank and file were far more likely to have sympathy with the “Israel Apartheid State” view than their Liberal or Conservative party counterparts (and nobody really cares what Bloc members think about this stuff, anyway).

Now, many NDP members, particularly those a little higher up in the food chain, are forced to confront the reality that the BDS ideas they’ve flirted with for years are simply not part of the NDP platform — and really never have been. If NDP supporters want to retain ties to BDS, it will have to do so in a fairly clandestine manner; in the same way that when some Conservatives decide to make a statement about pro-life abortion politics, they do so in a private venue amongst their close colleagues. The days of NDP MPs like Libby Davies coming out overtly in favor of a controversial BDS campaign are now over.

That is to say, those days are over if the NDP really do mean what they’re saying.

Libby Davies Puts Her Foot In It

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No Humanitarian Aid on Mavi Marmara

jnarvey — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 18:25:56 +0000

The story about the “peace flotilla” to Gaza and the Mavi Marmara just keeps getting better and better. The activists apparently collected all of their thrift store pants and expired pills from their medicine cabinets and threw them into a pile. From the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

Of the seven flotilla ships, only four were freight ships. The Challenger 1 (small yacht), the Sfendonh (small passenger boat) and the Mavi Marmara (passenger ship) did not carry any humanitarian aid, except for the passengers’ personal belongings. Of the four freight ships – Gaza, Sofia, Defeny and Rachel Corrie – as of June 7, SIBAT had only offloaded equipment from the Defeny…

It should be noted that:

1. The equipment does not constitute humanitarian aid in the accepted sense (basic foodstuffs, new and functional equipment, fresh medicines).

2. The equipment awaiting entry into the Gaza Strip, both at the Kerem Shalom crossing and the Defense Ministry base, has been approved by COGAT.

3. The humanitarian aid on all the ships was scattered in the ships’ holds and thrown onto piles and not packed properly for transport. The equipment was not packaged and not properly placed on wooden bases.

4. Because of the improper packing, some of the equipment was crushed by the weight in transit.

5. The medicines and sensitive equipment (operating theater equipment, new clothing, etc.) are being kept in cool storage at the Defense Ministry base. Some of the medicines have already expired, and some will expire soon. The operating theater equipment, which should be kept sterile, was carelessly wrapped.

6. A large part of the equipment, particularly shoes and clothing, was used and worn

7. The construction material must be approved by COGAT and the political echelons before it can be transferred to the Gaza Strip.

It was all a hoax. And the world fell for it.

H/T to Covenant Zone

Now, a little bit of time to savor this news until the flood of comments comes accusing Israel of bald-faced lies and propaganda — like this video footage of Mavi Marmara passengers preparing weaponry:

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It’s Over

jnarvey — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 18:21:00 +0000

“They show up wearing the kaffiyeh and shouting, and they just want to say Israel is bad, war crimes, apartheid, that is all. But that doesn’t make you pro-Palestine,” the brave Palestinian journalist and Jerusalem Post correspondent Khaled Abu Toameh told me. “That doesn’t make you pro-peace. Instead of organizing Israel Apartheid Week, they should be helping with human rights under Hamas, women’s rights under Hamas. A free press.”

From Terry Glavin in the Mark: No Israeli-Palestinian Reconciliation

Thanks to Backseat Blogger for this cartoon depicting the ruthless Israeli paintball assault on the Mavi Marvara Gaza flotilla:

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