Asylum seekers are not political footballs: support Amnesty International

From Amnesty International:
The Australian Government has announced a blanket suspension on the processing of new asylum claims by Afghan and Sri Lankan nationals. This as an appalling act of political point scoring and fundamentally inconsistent with our obligations under the 1951 UN Refugee Convention. Support their online campaign by sending an email to government though their website.

Israel's security scandal: silencing journalists

The cat is well and truly out of the bag concerning the attempt to prosecute the journalist Anat Kam for revealing state secrets. She has been under secret house arrest since December and is to be put on trial on treason and espionage charges. She is accused of appropriating 2,000 documents, 700 of which were classified as “top secret” while serving in the IDF’s Central Command in 2007.

Idiots of the Day in New Zealand

The minuscule Workers Party of NZ is opposed to the establishment of an Israel Embassy in NZ for all the usual rejectionist reasons, and news reports are filtering over the internet.
This is dumb dumb dumb and reinforces stereotypes about Kiwis not always having good political sense.

Idiots of the Day in New Zealand

The minuscule Workers Party of NZ is opposed to the establishment of an Israel Embassy in NZ for all the usual rejectionist reasons, and news reports are filtering over the internet.
This is dumb dumb dumb and reinforces stereotypes about Kiwis not always having good political sense.

So what's wrong with one state or even two state advocacy?

I’ve been searching for words to express what I see as a fault in much of the current criticism or campaigning against the occupation and other actions of Israel, because it offers no positive, detailed option for the future that brings all communities forward. This seems to be the case, for example, in the websites and publicity in Australia produced by Palestinian advocates.

"Delegitimization": the new language & the covert strategy documents of the Reut Institute

In a recent report published in the Forward, Nathan Guttman reports that ‘delegitimization’ is being used at the buzz-word against critics of Israel, particularly those involved in the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions Movement such as Naomi Klein. It is a term that has been picked up in the US and the subject of extensive study and promotion by the well-resourced and apparently influential Reut Institute in Israel, which also goes for ‘Brand Israel’ (see Tikkun Olam for Reut’s bizarre world).

Israel gags news of soldier-turned-journalist under arrest

[Middle East News Service comments: Australians have been angry at a trial in China where an Australian was tried behind closed doors. Prime Minister Rudd pointed out to China not being a democracy, the law operates differently there. I wonder what he would make of a country in which a journalist has simply disappears and a gag order has been imposed on the whole matter so that nobody knows what happened to her. Even when her trial began a few weeks back, it was still illegal to mention the very existence of the case.

It cannot happen here!

Middle East News Service comments: For a few months now the Israeli Ethernet has been buzzing with mysterious rumours. I am told indirectly that there is a severe gag on mentioning a certain story in Israel. I cannot be told directly as there is a gag on the news of the gag itself. Quite apart from the gag, I have also been approached by someone’s friends with the request not to disclose any further information that I may (or may not) know. It is sufficient to say that former Haaretz Editor Hanoch Marmari probably did not write the item below for the fun of it.