Contesting Global Injustice

For HISTORY of Palestinians click on this link above please and feel free to copy it and quote from it please.

http://current.com/items/89836614/history.htm

Jonathan Dimbleby has written a book called
THE PALESTINIANS

ISBN: 0704322560
ISBN-13: 9780704322561
Format: Hardcover, 256pp
Publisher: Quartet Books, Limited
Pub. Date: September 1989

This book is not available on line.....if anyone finds pages of it online please post it here.

On page 67 it says that

in 1917 there were about 57,000 jews in Palestine (the year of the Balfour Decleration) whch amounted to 9.7% of the population.
In 1936 there were 384,000 jews in Palestine, amounting to almost 30% of the population - an unprecedented increase in the history of settlement. To the Palestinians, it seemed evident that, while the politicians offered them bland words of reassurance, the immigrants would continue to arrive in ever greater numbers until Palestine was in their hands.

Jonathan Dimbleby is the presenter of BBC Radio 4's flagship programme of topical debate Any Questions? and its twin phone-in programme Any Answers?. He has presented ITV's flagship weekly political programme, Jonathan Dimbleby until the show ended on May 7th 2006. He is also ITV's anchorman on every General election night since 1997.He has written a number of best-selling books: RICHARD DIMBLEBY; THE PALESTINIANS, THE PRINCE OF WALES and THE LAST GOVERNOR.

Justivying Israeli War Crimes - from a member of the National Lawyer's Guild who went to Gaza

How does Israel explain the executions, the shooting of Palestinians point blank in cold blood? How does it justify Israeli soldiers shooting Kassab Shurrab with five bullets across the chest as he came out of his car with his hands to his side, especially as one of the Palestinian hostages sitting blindfolded by the soldiers heard the commander tell the soldier in Hebrew to shoot the civilians that were driving down the road. What about the two daughters of Khaled Abed Rabbo, Amal, age 2, and Suaad, age 7, murdered by an Israeli soldier using a semi automatic rifle before their father 's eyes as the other Israeli soldiers ate chips and chocolate? Let us not forget about Sameer Rashid Mohammad Mohammad, a 43 year old UNRWA worker, who was separated from his family by Israeli soldiers and taken to a separate room and shot in the chest? For four days after killing Sameer, Israeli soldiers held his family hostage and would make the family prepare the murdered Sameer food. Only when the Israeli soldiers left their home, did Sameer's children see that their father was executed and by their father's dead and bleeding body were piles of food. How about Farah al-Halo, 1.5 years of age, who was shot in the stomach when her family was forced to evacuate from their home at 6:30 PM by Israeli soldiers who assured them of their safety? Only 50 meters down the road they were shot at by other Israeli soldiers. Farah, with her intestines spilling from her stomach, died on the side of the road a few hours later as the same soldiers that had assured their safety watched.

Further, how can Israel explain its use of the Palestinians as human shields? Upon entering a village, Israeli soldiers would separate the men from the women. Sami Rashid Mohammad Mohammad, Sameer's brother, was taken as a hostage and forced to accompany the Israeli soldiers for four days. He was handcuffed and blindfolded and made to walk in front of the Israeli tanks and soldiers as bullets would whiz by. At other times, he was made to sit on his knees in an open field for hours while Israeli soldiers would shoot from behind him and often at his feet. These Palestinians were nothing more than entertainment for the soldiers, a child's play toy. When I asked Sami whether he saw any Palestinian militants during his time as a human shield, he laughed and said that he only saw Israeli soldiers with their blackened faces and camouflage outfits. "It was only Israeli soldiers shooting at each other," he remarked. It is thus no wonder that between four to six Israeli soldiers were killed and 24 others injured in "friendly fire."

Additionally, how can Israel explain the humiliation tactics it used against the Palestinians such as forcing Palestinian ambulance drivers to abandon their ambulance cars and drive donkey carts to pick up the dead....................................

CLICK ON LINK TOP READ BOOK ONLINE.

This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the United States been willing to set aside its own security in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries is based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives. As we show below, however, neither of those explanations can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the United States provides to Israel.
Instead, the overall thrust of U.S. policy in the region is due almost entirely to U.S. domestic politics, and especially to the activities of the “Israel Lobby.” Other special interest groups have managed to skew U.S. foreign policy in directions they favored, but no lobby has managed to divert U.S. foreign policy as far from what the American national interest would otherwise suggest, while simultaneously convincing

A seven-day Cambridge University occupation, which saw students denied access to food before being threatened with a court injunction on 1 February, achieved little in the way of concessions.

But last week 60 academics at the university sent an open letter to the vice-chancellor deploring the "heavy-handed" tactics used to crush the protest and supporting the students' calls for disinvestment from the arms industry and scholarships for Palestinian students.

Prof Priyamvada Gopal, one of its signatories, said: "It was only when the students became galvanised that we looked at writing a group letter from the academics following the lead of the students."

She believes the movement is the first signs of a new political awareness. "As yet this is a small but vocal minority, but I think we are seeing an emergence from the froth and apathy of the 1990s."

Student campaigners are making five key demands:
Firstly, they are calling on the University to immediately suspends its contract with Telephone Eden Springs, the Israeli water company which illegally bottles water from the Golan Heights, part of the Occupied Territories.
Secondly, that the University review its links with BAE Systems, which provide arms and equipment to the Israeli Defence Force, as well as other links to the Israeli military(3).
Thirdly, that a scholarship programme is put in place committed to funding 10 scholarships for Palestinian students.
Fourthly that the University broadcast the Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC) campaign to raise money for the reconstruction of Gaza on campus.
Finally, to pledge to donate unused equipment and non-monetary aid to the reconstruction of Palestinian universities.

The Israeli incursion into Gaza began on 27th December and has killed over 1,300 civilians(4) and made over 100,000 people homeless(5). Said Iain Nicol a fourth-year Mathematics student, "Israel has been targeted by 65 UN Resolutions and continues to breach international court rulings in its construction of an apartheid-style wall. Israel's blockade has severely affected the humanitarian crisis and the ability of Palestinians to see their basic human needs met".