Israel's High Court has narrowly upheld a law denying Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza married to Israeli citizens the right to live in the country with their spouses.

The judges voted by six to five not to cancel a four-year-old amendment to the Citizenship Law which outlaws "family unification" in Israel between Palestinians and Arab citizens of Israel.

It was passed as a one-year emergency measure in 2002 on the ground that it was needed to protect Israeli security. But the amendment, described yesterday by the Knesset member Ran Cohen, of the left-wing Meretz party, as "rooted in racism", has been renewed every year since then.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article484122.ece

When reading the news about Lebannon, all I ask is that you read the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/ and http://www.independent.co.uk/

The American press is so one sided.

Thanks

Great article by Robert Fisk -
I first realized the enormous pressures on American journalists in the Middle East when I went some years ago to say goodbye to a colleague from the Boston Globe. I expressed my sorrow that he was leaving a region where he had obviously enjoyed reporting. I could save my sorrows for someone else, he said. One of the joys of leaving was that he would no longer have to alter the truth to suit his paper's more vociferous readers.

"I used to call the Israeli Likud Party 'right wing,' " he said. "But recently, my editors have been telling me not to use the phrase. A lot of our readers objected." And so now, I asked? "We just don't call it 'right wing' anymore."

Ouch. I knew at once that these "readers" were viewed at his newspaper as Israel's friends, but I also knew that the Likud under Benjamin Netanyahu was as right wing as it had ever been.

This is only the tip of the semantic iceberg that has crashed into American journalism in the Middle East. Illegal Jewish settlements for Jews and Jews only on Arab land are clearly "colonies," and we used to call them that. I cannot trace the moment when we started using the word "settlements." But I can remember the moment around two years ago when the word "settlements" was replaced by "Jewish neighborhoods" — or even, in some cases, "outposts."

Similarly, "occupied" Palestinian land was softened in many American media reports into "disputed" Palestinian land — just after then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, in 2001, instructed U.S. embassies in the Middle East to refer to the West Bank as "disputed" rather than "occupied" territory.

Then there is the "wall," the massive concrete obstruction whose purpose, according to the Israeli authorities, is to prevent Palestinian suicide bombers from killing innocent Israelis. In this, it seems to have had some success. But it does not follow the line of Israel's 1967 border and cuts deeply into Arab land. And all too often these days, journalists call it a "fence" rather than a "wall." Or a "security barrier," which is what Israel prefers them to say. For some of its length, we are told, it is not a wall at all — so we cannot call it a "wall," even though the vast snake of concrete and steel that runs east of Jerusalem is higher than the old Berlin Wall.

The semantic effect of this journalistic obfuscation is clear. If Palestinian land is not occupied but merely part of a legal dispute that might be resolved in law courts or discussions over tea, then a Palestinian child who throws a stone at an Israeli soldier in this territory is clearly acting insanely.

If a Jewish colony built illegally on Arab land is simply a nice friendly "neighborhood," then any Palestinian who attacks it must be carrying out a mindless terrorist act.

And surely there is no reason to protest a "fence" or a "security barrier" — words that conjure up the fence around a garden or the gate arm at the entrance to a private housing complex.

For Palestinians to object violently to any of these phenomena thus marks them as a generically vicious people. By our use of language, we condemn them.

We follow these unwritten rules elsewhere in the region. American journalists frequently used the words of U.S. officials in the early days of the Iraqi insurgency — referring to those who attacked American troops as "rebels" or "terrorists" or "remnants" of the former regime. The language of the second U.S. pro-consul in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, was taken up obediently — and grotesquely — by American journalists.

American television, meanwhile, continues to present war as a bloodless sandpit in which the horrors of conflict — the mutilated bodies of the victims of aerial bombing, torn apart in the desert by wild dogs — are kept off the screen. Editors in New York and London make sure that viewers' "sensitivities" don't suffer, that we don't indulge in the "pornography" of death (which is exactly what war is) or "dishonor" the dead whom we have just killed.

Our prudish video coverage makes war easier to support, and journalists long ago became complicit with governments in making conflict and death more acceptable to viewers. Television journalism has thus become a lethal adjunct to war.

Back in the old days, we used to believe — did we not? — that journalists should "tell it how it is." Read the great journalism of World War II and you'll see what I mean. The Ed Murrows and Richard Dimblebys, the Howard K. Smiths and Alan Moorheads didn't mince their words or change their descriptions or run mealy-mouthed from the truth because listeners or readers didn't want to know or preferred a different version.

So let's call a colony a colony, let's call occupation what it is, let's call a wall a wall. And maybe express the reality of war by showing that it represents not, primarily, victory or defeat, but the total failure of the human spirit.

ROBERT FISK is Middle East correspondent for the London Independent and the author, most recently, of "The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East," published last month by Knopf.

If you get just a few seconds. PLEASE go to www.democracynow.org
And read just the Noam transcript and the Fisk one.
Very important to have this knowledge especially since we are in this Bubble of jewish funded slanted media here in the states

Four United Nations observers were killed last night in an Israeli raid on their post at the border town of Khiam in south Lebanon. The UN secretary general suggested last night that it had been deliberately targeted.

The observers, said by Lebanese officials to have been an Austrian, a Canadian, a Chinese and a Finn, were killed when the post's building and shelter were bombed.


-------------- errr! HELLO! How come this isn't front page on all the US news sites!? I don't seem to find it here! This is crazy! Or was it censored as it was an Israeli bomb that killed the UN workers? I found this on the www.independent.co.uk site.

What does the Hezbollah mean by this exactly? There are no greater cultures of death than Israel and the US-- nations that can extinguish much of life on earth by simply pressing a few buttons.

But you are right, there is no solution. If Solomon were to offer to cut the baby in half, both sides would eagerly nod their heads in agreement.

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The whole problem began when they did in fact "cut the baby in half" but some people didn't want the other people to have the other half.

Yeah America and Israel are the greatest cultures of death!! WTF

Though Americans rights and freedoms are unfortunatley shrinking by the minute under our current administration try drawing an anti Allah, Anti Jesus and an anti Moses cartoon and see which country leaves you with all your limbs intact. Or if you are a girl try driving a car in Saudi Arabia or wear some Tom Ford design and see what happens.

I truly don't think you can believe much if anything that is on the newstands in America or that is on the television. I think u HAVE to read the alt. press and the European media as these sources are NOT controlled by Jews.
America FUNDS Israels force so ALL news here is pretty slanted.
Who knew here that before Hez kidnapped Israelis that there were FOUR Palestinian CIVILIANS who were kidnaped and are still missing. This was widly reported in the UK press but doesn't seem to even appear in the US media.
So i take any US media with a pinch of salt here as its too slanted.
I saw a pundit on tv saying Hiz and Ham should 'fight' this with the ballot not the bullet - yet when Hamas was voted in the US and Israel refused to accept and Isreal arrested members of its parliament!!!
Although i do believe the bombing must stop am certain if I lived under such oppression as the Palestinians have lived for such a long time I would be fuelled into such crazy acts.
American should stop funding Israel, and should get out of the Middle East. This is about oil and $ it's nothing to do with their care of human rights and oppression, if that was the case America would have rushed into .... "Liberia" (replace that last word with one of MANY countries)

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This from BBC
British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett has protested to the US about its use of Prestwick Airport in western Scotland to transport bombs to Israel........it was ill-advised to send bombs "to arm one side in that conflict to the teeth, at a time when hundreds of civilians, many children, United Nations observers, have already been eliminated.......it is particularly provocative for the United States to have acted in this way
_____________________

Hold onto yer hats kiddos with the US funding and helping Israel like this it's only a matter of time before AL-Qaeda seek revenge.

Thank you Mr. Fish

Israel and its people deserve our support, and if necessary, our weapons. Sometimes one must defend one's self.

Ok, I dropped out of this board for a time.

When I came back I am reading that some of you would probably vote for Hamas? This is a political-military arm of radical islam which would not hesitate to hang most if not all of the members of this board. We are not talking of Che Geuverra and any romantic cigar smoking political figures. We are talking about a group who is dedicated to the utter destruction of the only democracy in the middle east that actually protects the rights of women and gays. Absent any foreign intervention the proponents of this political theology had women's clitorae removed with rusty razor blades and a woman hanged for being raped.

WTF? or is this naive misunderstanding of the actual historic events of the last 65 years?

A valid disagreement with the current administration is healthy, however, a complete disassociation and moral support for those who would see you flayed and tortured isn't. It isn't any more a Republican or Democrat thing as it is a clash of civilizations and moral relevance isn't the answer. Some things remain and have always been Wrong!

my .o2

T

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/iran/iran_revolutionary_state.shtml

Fascinating BBC radio series - listen to it... really informative.

Why isn't mainstream US media doing shows like these in the US!

This from the BBC today

Israeli security forces killed 660 Palestinians in 2006 - three times more than in 2005, according to an Israeli human rights group.
B'Tselem, which monitors human rights in the occupied territories, said the figure included 141 children.

At least 322 had taken no part in hostile acts, the group said.

In the same period, the number of deadly Palestinian attacks on Israelis has fallen - 23 Israelis were killed in 2006 compared with 50 last year.

The Israeli military renewed ground operations in the Gaza Strip after militants captured an Israeli soldier in a border raid in June.

Since June, Israeli troops have killed about 405 Palestinians in Gaza, including 88 children. More than half of the casualties were civilians, B'Tselem said.

As of November, 9,075 Palestinians were being held in Israeli jails. This number included 345 minors, it said.

Of these, 738 (22 minors) were being detained without trial and without knowing the charges against them, the group said.

The left isn't anti-Semitic, The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic,The left isn't anti-Semitic.

I find it no shock but it does sadden me .... how fast they were to execute Saddam. I certainly am NO supporter of his and don't believe he was good for the country at all... (although I must say my chum's Iraqi mother was here about 7yrs ago telling me how wonderful her life was in Iraq and how she would hate to be in America full time... now the poor woman lives in ruins after what the UK/US did to her town). If Saddamm wasn't arab he wouldn't have been executed so fast. There have been so many genocides around the world that the US/UK have NOT reacted to. Did 'they' kill Papa/baby Doc Duvallier in Haiti? Did they execute Idi Ami, Pol Pot, Tutsi/Huto's in Rwanda
what about the tyranny's in Liberia or Darfur? I could go on. His execution was tactical for the war and the pressure ($$$) that the US gives to Israel to fight the arab/israeli conflict and OIL and also some kind of moral booster for the troops or some other sick nature. His trial happened when his country was occupied. He never faced all the allegations. He was just executed fast. Again, I DO NOT support this man. But I don't believe that his swift execution is anything but trying to make two wrongs make a right. It wont.

I'm with you, Anna. This speedy hanging is so barbaric and so twisted. On a Muslim holy day, no less - it's one big "fuck you" to the Arab world by Bush, and it's not like the guy was going anywhere before he got to stand trial for other crimes, for goodness' sake. It's all so sick the glee with which politicians and media show off their arrogance. Smug bastards. Of course, I hardly think of anyone on these boards as a Saddam supporter (except Messy Bonnie, who partied with him back in the day)...it's just this whole "eye for and eye" mentality is nothing but counter-productive and solves nothing whatsoever. Who's that U.K. bitch yesterday who said that Saddam "has been held to account." Um, last time I checked, criminals faced their charges in a court of law in a civilized society...he never stood trial for all of the charges brought against him, and as was pointed out, he was tried in a country under occupation...

Death by hanging in our post-20th century world feels so strangely 'Wild West' but that's the Middle East for you. Religous extremists and despotism on the Western world's checker board.

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Why wasn't this taken to the Hague - which it should have been.
The method in which he was killed was more as an insult to the man which is so petty at this stage.
And let us NOT forget that Iraq AFTER Saddam as it is right now is MUCH MUCH MUCH worse than when that maniac was in power. And that is a FACT.

Shocked to hear of Saddam's downfall--what the fuck? So soon? Is it real? Is it made up by the conservative media press machine. A hanging, yes it does sound wild west like--Dubya probably said, Hang 'em high, followed by Git 'er done!---a shock to hear about it, but he did suck. I don't advocate what he did to his people, but then again he didn't bomb us 9/11--osama did. Where is that fucker, huh?
and why don't we put the entire Bush admnistration on trial as well--Dubya Rummy Cheney Condi, hell even Tony Blair! Still Saddam is dead, At least he won't fuck around with his people anymore. he'll fulfill the South Park guys' propechy, he'll be serviing Satan sexually in hell. And Darla, the left sure as hell ain't anti-Semitic, it never was, did you hear that from Ann and Bill?