Freies Politikforum für Demokraten und Anarchisten

palestina libera · Beiträge: 1665

Only some of the stars nominated for this year’s Academy Awards will go home with the golden Oscar trophy. But all of the nominees, winners or losers, will get consolation gift bags worth $200,000 according to a report by the Daily Beast. Among the overpriced frivolous gifts that these stars will receive are skin creams, Audi car rentals, fitness training, cosmetic surgery procedures and a 10-day first class trip to Israel, worth $55,000, care of the Israeli government.

There are a few stories within this story. We could talk about the grotesque excesses in the lives of the rich and famous in times of growing global inequality. We could mention the sickening societal obsession with unreachable beauty norms that can only be achieved through buying more fitness and beauty products, including costly surgery.

But what is a trip to Israel doing in that package?
http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/why-are-oscar-nominees-being-given-free-trip-israel-505199825

Massive Donations From Controversial Israel Supporter Follow Clinton’s Pledge to Fight BDS

Recent disclosures show that media mogul Haim Saban, a controversial supporter of Israel, is spending millions of dollars to put Hillary Clinton in the White House after Clinton reiterated a promise to use her influence to oppose a growing campaign to temper Israeli militancy through boycotts, divestment and sanctions.
http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/massive_donations_from_israeli_nationalist_follow_clintons_20160207

Malcolm X meets the freedom fighters of Palestine

Reviewing Keith Feldman’s A Shadow over Palestine and Alex Lubin’s Geographies of Liberation in conjunction induces both happiness and consternation. But before I try to clarify this bit of obliqueness, allow me to go ahead and announce that both books are superb and I urge anybody reading this review to pause now and purchase them.

Back to the obliqueness. The consternation arises from the fact that each book is distinctive despite significant theoretical and methodological overlap. Feldman and Lubin both examine the interplay of Palestinian activist and intellectual traditions with US racism and imperialism, with emphasis on Black internationalism in relation to the Arab world.
https://electronicintifada.net/content/malcolm-x-meets-freedom-fighters-palestine/15121

Israeli Arabs take their message to the White House

Quietly and under the radar of the Israeli media, Knesset member Ahmad Tibi entered the holiest of holies of America’s most important strategic assets Feb. 4: Washington’s White House, State Department and Capitol Hill. As far as anyone can remember, no such meetings have been held in the past with such high echelons and such levels of intimacy between American administration sources and an Israeli Arab Knesset member. Tibi’s international status, his popularity in the Israeli Arab community and the conspicuous estrangement between the White House and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office were probably among the factors that contributed to the setting up of the meetings.
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/02/ahmad-tibi-white-house-state-department-capitol-hill.html#

EU leadership divided over settlements

The dispute over the settlements, for years a divisive issue in Israeli politics, has recently penetrated into the heart of European politics, too. There’s growing anger in the European Parliament against President Martin Shultz, who has apparently adopted the position of the Israeli right regarding an economic project in the occupied territories.
Twenty-six members of the parliament from different factions are demanding that Schulz clarify the meaning of a Jan. 14 Facebook post by Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein: “I was pleased to hear today from European Parliament President Martin Schulz, with whom I met in Berlin, that he opposes the labeling of products from Israel.” Despite his choice of words (products from Israel, not products from West Bank settlements), it’s safe to assume that the Knesset speaker, who himself lives across the Green Line, knows that the labeling pertains only to products made in the settlements, which are not recognized internationally as part of the State of Israel.
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/02/israel-edelstein-eu-schultz-labeling-settlement-products.html#

Academic boycott of Israel takes off in Italy

There have been major breakthroughs in Italy for the campaign to boycott Israeli academic institutions.

More than 200 academics from 50 Italian universities have signed a call for the boycott of Israeli academic institutions until Israel complies with international law.

This is the first time a significant number of Italian academics have taken a public stand in support of the Palestinian-led campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS).

The move comes just months after Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi lashed out at the BDS movement as “stupid and futile” in a speech to the Israeli parliament.