''My people decide the truth in sixty countries every morning. And in every one it's different.''
"President Peres, you are older than me and your voice is very loud. The reason for you raising your voice is the psychology of guilt … I know very well how you hit and killed children on the beaches."
Erdogan's outburst was his most high-profile in a series of outspoken attacks on Israel's Gaza operations. He had previously called the offensive – in which around 1,300 Palestinians died – a "crime against humanity" and demanded Israel's expulsion from the UN.
The people named in the suit include Dan Halutz, former Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff and Israel Air Force commander at the time, as well as Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, then defense minister and now the minister of infrastructure...Senior Israeli ministers have expressed serious fears during following the war about the possibility that Israel will be pressed to agree to an international investigation of the losses among non-combatants during Operation Cast Lead...The Wall Street Journal calls this 'Lawfare'. Yeah, right, the Nuremberg trials were also lawfares...
Thoughts on "The Reader"
Today I saw "The Reader," a film which was much better that I thought it would be. It was very different from most Hollywood films, in that it was filled with ambiguities. The audience is left to ponder the numerous possible motivations for several characters' actions. It was a refreshing change from the black-and-white, good guy v. bad guy tales we usually see.
*SPOILER ALERT*
I am pretty sure that most critics and probably the majority of people who've seen this film have misunderstood aspects of it. My guess is most people saw the character of Hannah Schmitz as an evil woman who had a crisis of conscience at the end of her life. To me this would be a simplistic explanation. First of all, Hannah Schmitz, if a real person, would have had an IQ somewhere between 65 and 75, along with a characterological disorder causing difficulties with empathy. The two in combination explain all of her actions, and lead to the conclusion that she cannot be held to the same standards as a more normal person. I make the assessment of her intelligence based on her illiteracy, her concrete, simplistic thinking, her obedience to authority, and her shame. All of these characteristics are common in people with borderline IQs. The characterological disorder explains her embarrassment at not being able to read despite her seeming lack of guilt over her particular actions. Probably, the character disorder would be a mixed personality disorder, with some sociopathic traits, some narcissistic traits and some schizoid traits. The schizoid traits are manifested in her isolated lifestyle, her lack of friends, and her often emotionless interactions. Her narcissism is manifested in her shame and at the end of the movie, her expressed pride in having learned how to read, totally missing the point of her old friend's question.
So, why did Hannah kill herself and leave money to one of her victims? She may have killed herself as much out of fear of the outside world as out of guilt. As for her last act of repentance, I find this very interesting. One could hypothesize that the trial and long years in prison made her realize at the very least that society found her actions very wrong, and this would have led to embarrassment and shame if not guilt. She may have wanted to be remembered as a better person. But another explanation could be that the continuing gifts of Michael Berg led to a slow character change. Someone she had hurt had to some degree forgiven her, enough to take pity on her and send her meaningful gifts that took a great deal of time to create. This type of action could spur character change. Perhaps it is the only way to create character change in such an individual.
But perhaps the most interesting aspect of the film was the response of the victim. She of course does not want to accept the money. Yet she keeps the tin box, remarking how much it reminds her of a childhood keepsake she once had. Does this indicate she saw a similarity between herself and her persecutor, and if so, was this an intended message of the film? Or could it simply be that the victim wanted to somehow acknowledge the gesture of atonement? Perhaps she was affected by the actions of Michael Berg, and his ability to at least partially forgive the woman who damaged his childhood. Perhaps the film is about a universal desire to try to be a better person, despite the enormity of crimes either perpetrated or suffered by oneself.
Only now, after most of the dead have been buried, is the first properly researched reckoning of the toll emerging. What already stands out is the striking cost borne by the children of Gaza, who make up more than half of the 1.5 million people living in this overcrowded strip of land.
When white phosphorus lands on skin it burns deeply through muscle and into the bone, continuing to burn until deprived of oxygen.
A visibly furious Ban Ki-moon condemned as "outrageous, shocking and alarming" the destruction he had seen while touring Gaza...
He is disturbed that most of the Israeli public and much of the media is blind to the fact that hundreds of Palestinians have been cut to pieces by Israeli fire power. "In the long run, it's not a war of defence. We are creating a thousand suicide bombers for the future from the brothers of the dead, the sons of the dead ... in the long term, we are creating more terror. You can't separate the war in Gaza from the fact that the Palestinian nation is under occupation for more than 40 years. I'm not justifying Hamas firing rockets but we Israelis should first look at what we are doing."
The Israeli military are accused of:
• Using powerful shells in civilian areas which the army knew would cause large numbers of innocent casualties;
• Using banned weapons such as phosphorus bombs;
• Holding Palestinian families as human shields;
• Attacking medical facilities, including the killing of 12 ambulance men in marked vehicles;
• Killing large numbers of police who had no military role.
What has made the issue even more murky - as Conor Gearty, professor of human rights law at the LSE has noted - is the way in which terrorism is less and less regarded as a "technique", albeit a horrible one, in pursuit of a political agenda. Instead, it has been deliberately redefined, largely by states, to mean a "category of person" - making it easy to ignore the underlying causes while concentrating on the acts.
None of the above should be read as a defence of terror, or even as an argument for armed resistance. The tragedy of Gaza is the acceptance on both sides that killing and oppression have more value than negotiation. And while many in the international community - and in Israel - remain stuck on the idea that the Jewish state has a monopoly on the deployment of the language of "supreme emergency", more violence is inevitable.
'We will not go down in the night without a fight'
Four exhausted children have been discovered cowering in a house next to the bodies of their mothers by staff of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which today accused the Israeli military of "unacceptable" delays in allowing medics safe access to injured Gazans.
Buttu says that from the day the Israelis withdrew from Gaza, they set about ensuring that it would fail economically. "When the Israelis pulled out, we expected that the Palestinians in Gaza would at least be able to lead some sort of free life. We expected that the crossing points would be open. We didn't expect that we would have to beg to allow food in," she said.
Buttu notes that even before Hamas was elected three years ago, the Israelis were already blockading Gaza. The Palestinians had to appeal to US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and James Wolfensohn, the president of the World Bank, to pressure Israel to allow even a few score of trucks into Gaza each day. Israel agreed, then reneged. "This was before Hamas won the election. The whole Israeli claim is one big myth. If there wasn't already a closure policy, why did we need Rice and Wolfensohn to try to broker an agreement?" asked Buttu.
Yossi Alpher, a former official in the Mossad intelligence service and an ex-adviser on peace negotiations to the then prime minister, Ehud Barak, said the blockade of Gaza is a failed strategy that might have strengthened Hamas. "I don't think anyone can produce clear evidence that the blockade has been counterproductive, but it certainly hasn't been productive. It's very possible it's been counterproductive. It's collective punishment, humanitarian suffering. It has not caused Palestinians in Gaza to behave the way we want them to, so why do it?" he said. "I think people really believed that, if you starved Gazans, they will get Hamas to stop the attacks. It's repeating a failed policy, mindlessly."
Treating Palestinians and Arabs in contempt and dealing only with those among them who are submissive, extracting from them humiliating concessions while continuing to expand illegal settlements, taking more land, more from Jerusalem, more from this, and more from that, one may wonder what are Israel and the US, the mightier, gaining with this strategy ? The rage of those who are weaker ? Their defeat ? No, not only this. What we are witnessing with this strategyis the progressive transformation, with frightening meticulousness, of a situation that could be potentially negociated into an explosive, unmanageable one.The intentional derailing of peace in the ME.
