International Jewish Solidarity Network

The International Jewish Solidarity Network presents a FREE screening of… Arna's Children Screening and Discussion with Director Tuesday, June 24 at 7pm Humanist Hall, 390 27th Street, Oakland, CA 94612

$5 to $10 donation requested at door

Presented by JULIANO MER KHAMIS and DR. MERVAT AIASH of THE FREEDOM THEATRE:

The Jenin Refugee Camp, West Bank, Palestine During the first Intifada (Palestinian uprising) in 1988 an Israeli Jewish woman named Arna Mer Khamis set up the Stone Theatre in the Jenin Refugee Camp of the West Bank as a safe place for children to express themselves through the theatrical arts. In 1993, Arna was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize in Sweden.

During the second Intifada (2000-2006) the Stone Theatre was destroyed by the Israeli army's invasion in 2002. Building on the goals and legacy of the Stone Theatre, Arna's son, Juliano and residents of Jenin opened the Freedom Theatre to serve both the children and the adults of the Jenin Refugee Camp.

In just two years, the Freedom Theatre has become recognized as a leader in Palestinian theatre and the international progressive theatre community. There are partnerships with groups and theatre companies in: New York, Seattle, Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Athens, Baghdad, Beirut, Sydney, Buenos Aries, Cairo, Paris, Brussels, Milan, Calgary and Sweden. Members of the Freedom Theatre's Board of Directors include Noam Chomsky, Mahmoud Darwish, Judith Butler, Howard Brenton, among others. US advisors include Maya Angelou, Yoav Elinevsky, Danny Glover and Mariam Said.

Join the International Jewish Solidarity Network (IJSN) for a post-screening discussion about anti-Zionist Jewish activism as part of the Palestinian solidarity movement. IJSN is a growing international network of Jews whose Jewish identities are not based on Zionism but on a plurality of histories and experiences. We share a commitment to participation in the legacy of struggles against colonization and imperialism. As such, we struggle against Zionism and its manifestation in the State of Israel's historic and ongoing ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people and the confiscation of their land.

This colonial project also dishonors the persecution, displacement and genocide of European Jews by using their memory to justify and perpetuate European authoritarianism and colonialism. It is responsible for the extensive displacement and alienation of Mizrahi Jews (Jews of Sephardi, Asian and African descent) from indigenous identities, languages, histories, cultures and homelands and attempts to reduce all of our diverse cultural, religious, ethnic and racial identities to one of national identity. As such, it implicates us in the oppression of the Palestinian people and in the debasement of our own heritages, struggles for justice and alliances with our fellow human beings. www.thefreedomtheatre.org www.ijsn.net

For more information or to help out Call Jonah Aline Daniel 847/ 962-2604

And back to reality, Israeli army uses live rounds

in peacefull protest video link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF1ibN40FJE
www.bilin-ffj.org


Thank you for you continued support,

Iyad Burnat- Head of Popular Commitee in Bilin
Head of Friends of Freedom and Justice in Bilin

Email- ffj.bilin@yahoo.com
Mobile- (00972) (0) 547847942
Office- (00972) (2) 2489129
Fax- (00972) (2) 2489129

A Brief History of the Unicorn

By TIFFANY SHARPLES 48 minutes ago

In a centuries long case of mistaken identity, we've finally rounded up another suspect. The June 11 discovery of a one-year-old, one-horned deer may put Bambi in the company of the rhinoceros, the narwhal and the onyx as creatures who spawned the enduring myth of the unicorn. In this case, the single horn on the Italian deer found at a wildlife preserve in the town of Prato, outside of Florence, is attributed to a genetic mutation, but its discoverers aren't ruling out the possibility that other creatures with similar abnormalities could have been spotted throughout history, and contributed to the persistent unicorn legend. Whatever the present day implications of this discovery, however, historically speaking, scientific evidence has seldom played a role when it comes to believing in unicorns.

Before they were ubiquitous in contemporary little girl culture - and across the intellectual spectrum, from 15th century tapestries now on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art to transporting Doogie Howser in the latest Harold & Kumar installment - rumors of unicorns were passed across the continents, and through the centuries, in something akin to an enormous game of telephone.

Perhaps the best example of this is also the first written reference in Western literature to a single-horned "wild ass." In the 4th century B.C., a Greek doctor named Ctesias traveled through Persia (now Iran), in the service of the Persian king, where he heard many tales from Indian travelers about creatures back home. Later writing them down, he described "wild asses as large as horses" that had white bodies, red heads and dark blue eyes, and "a horn on the forehead, which is about a foot and a half in length." He also said that the horns were multicolored, and that the animals were so swift and powerful that "no creature, neither the horse or any other, could overtake it."

Of course, more than likely, Ctesias had never actually seen this creature himself, but was relying on other people's accounts. As unicorn expert (yes, they do exist), Odell Shepard explained in The Lore of the Unicorn, Ctesias most likely fused details of multiple creatures, including the Indian rhinoceros, to create this fantastical being. But during that era it was common for stories to travel great distances by word of mouth, and as Artistotle argued, when the tale made its way to him, was this single-horned, silvery being any more absurd to imagine than a giraffe or an elephant?

A translation error, when Hebrew scripture was rendered into Greek, added to the allure of the creature now known as the unicorn. The wild ox, a now-extinct creature rendered in bas relief profiles with one horn, was translated in Greek as monokeros or one-horned. In the Latin bible of the Christian world that became unicornos and "unicorn" by the time the English translators of King James got to work. And so, God impresses His power upon Job by saying, "Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee?"

The creature, long believed to have mystical powers - Ctesias wrote about people grinding its horn down to mix into a restorative elixir - now took on greater symbolic powers too. The unicorn both came to represent Christ, and also began to represent purity and chastity. The idea that unicorns could only be tamed by virgins became a widely held belief, and images of unicorns resting their heads in chaste womens laps, with not so subtle sexual undertones, began to appear in artwork. Likely for similar reasons of imagery and historical belief in its purity and healing powers, over time the unicorn was adopted as a symbol of power and royalty, most notably becoming the symbol of the Scottish crown.

While unicorn legend evolved in the West, in the Far East, similar creatures developed in mythology. The Japanese unicorn, or Kirin (after which the beer is named) is a fierce creature able to root out criminals, instantly punishing them by piercing them through the heart with its horn. In China, the similarly named Qilin, had quite a different disposition. It harms no creature, and its presence is considered a good omen. Reportedly, a Qilin appeared to Confucius' mother before he was born.

In more modern times, people have searched for evidence of unicorns, or in its absence, fabricated their own. Most notably was the hulking, alien-looking skeleton fabricated by a German scholar in 1663. In the 1930s, an arguably mad scientist from Maine manipulated the horns of a calf so that they grew entwined as one, proving, at least in theory that unicorns could exist - sort of. Not to be outdone, Barnum and Bailey managed to fuse the two horns of a white goat, named Lancelot, to the glee of fans throughout the 1980s.

As to why, until Wednesday, unicorns have seldom been spotted, theories vary wildly, but one of the most interesting falls squarely on Noah's shoulders. Legend holds that when Noah had to pack up the Ark in the face of the flood, the unicorns were just too slow getting to the boat (either that, or they were so proud that they were taking up more than their fair share of space, and Noah had to kick them off). As the Irish Rovers sing in "The Unicorn Song": "Close the door because the rain is falling/ And we just can't wait for no unicorns."

Of course, there are optimists who think that somehow the unicorns managed to survive, morphing, slowly over the years into the bizarre but documented flesh-and-blood narwhal, a member of the porpoise and whale family that does indeed have a single, twisty tooth which it uses for mating and to pick holes through the ice. Indeed, perhaps that's what became of the unicorns that never made it onto the ark. They took to the sea. Throughtout the centuries, the narwahl's long, corkscrewing tooth was sold as a unicorn's horn, proof that the most elusive of creatures existed.

Prime minister apologizes to native Canadians

By ROB GILLIES, Associated Press Writer Wed Jun 11, 5:25 PM ET

OTTAWA - In a historic speech, Prime Minister Stephen Harper apologized Wednesday to Canada's native peoples for the longtime government policy of forcing their children to attend state-funded schools aimed at assimilating them.

The treatment of children at the schools where they were often physically and sexually abused was a sad chapter in the country's history, he said from the House of Commons in an address carried live across Canada.

"Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm and has no place in our country," he said, as 11 aboriginal leaders looked on just feet away.

Indians packed into the public galleries and gathered on the lawn of Parliament Hill.

From the 19th century until the 1970s, more than 150,000 Indian children were required to attend state-funded Christian schools as part of a program to assimilate them into Canadian society.

Hundreds of former students witnessed what native leaders call a pivotal moment for Canada's more than 1 million Indians, who remain the country's poorest and most disadvantaged group. There are more than 80,000 surviving students.

"The government of Canada now recognizes that it was wrong to forcibly remove children from their homes and we apologize," Harper said.

"We now recognize that it was wrong to separate children from rich and vibrant cultures and traditions, and that it created a void in many lives and communities and we apologize," Harper said.

Harper also apologized for failing to prevent the children from being physically and sexually abused at the schools.

Phil Fontaine, the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations and one of the leaders seated near Harper, wore a traditional native headdress and was allowed to speak from the floor after opposition parties demanded it.

"Finally, we heard Canada say it is sorry," Fontaine said.

"Never again will this House consider us an Indian problem for just being who we are," Fontaine said. "We heard the government of Canada take full responsibility."

He said the apology will go a long way toward repairing the relationship between aboriginals and the rest of Canada.

The federal government admitted 10 years ago that physical and sexual abuse in the schools was rampant. Many students recall being beaten for speaking their native languages and losing touch with their parents and customs.

That legacy of abuse and isolation has been cited by Indian leaders as the root cause of epidemic rates of alcoholism and drug addiction on reservations.

Fontaine was one of the first to go public with his past experiences of physical and sexual abuse.

The apology comes months after Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a similar gesture to the so-called Stolen Generations — thousands of Aborigines forcibly taken from their families as children under assimilation policies that lasted from 1910 to 1970.

But Canada has gone a step farther, offering those who were taken from their families compensation for the years they attended the residential schools. The offer was part of a lawsuit settlement.

A truth and reconciliation commission will also examine government policy and take testimony from survivors. The goal is to give survivors a forum to tell their stories and educate Canadians about a grim period in the country's history.

___

Girl, gunman killed in Gaza

JTA
Published: 06/11/2008

Israeli forces killed a Palestinian gunman and a girl during a counter-terrorist operation in the Gaza Strip, local sources said.

A small Israeli ground unit entered Karara village in central Gaza early Wednesday, searching for Palestinian militiamen who have been firing mortar bombs and rockets across the border.

The troops shot dead one gunman. He was identified as a Hamas member.

Palestinian medical workers said Israeli tank fire also hit a civilian home, killing a nine-year-old girl inside. The Israeli military said it was unaware of that casualty.

A Palestinian mortar bomb fired from Gaza hit a factory in Kibbutz Nir Oz, wounding an Israeli.

Chavez urges rebels to give up

Simon Romero |
June 10, 2008

THE Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, has called for Colombia's largest guerilla group to end its four-decade struggle to overthrow Colombia's Government, a surprising policy shift just months after he called for the rebels to be recognised as a legitimate insurgent force.

Mr Chavez's comments came a day after Colombian authorities announced the capture in eastern Colombia of two Venezuelans, including one man identified as a national guard officer, carrying 40,000 AK-47 assault rifle cartridges, which the Colombians said were intended for use by the guerilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Venezuela's Government has been battling accusations from Colombian officials in recent weeks that it has tried to provide arms and financing to FARC. Venezuela might face economic sanctions if the claims are true, since the European Union and United States classify FARC as a terrorist group.

"You in the FARC should know something," Mr Chavez said in his Sunday television program, during which he also called on the rebels to release dozens of hostages, including three American military contractors.

"You have become an excuse for the empire to threaten all of us," he said, using his term for the US.

It was not clear whether FARC would heed Mr Chavez's call or even respond. While Mr Chavez is admired within the ranks of FARC as an iconic leftist leader, FARC is better prepared than any rebel group in recent Latin American history to soldier on, financing its struggle with cocaine trafficking and abductions for ransom.

Still, FARC does seem to be at a turning point. Several senior commanders in the group have been killed in the past year and Colombian intelligence operatives have recently infiltrated the group's top echelons.

Mr Chavez may have been acknowledging the possible disintegration of the group when he said in his televised remarks on Sunday: "The guerilla war is history. At this moment in Latin America, an armed guerilla movement is out of place."

The New York Times

Israeli Police Examine New Testament Blaze

United Press International - May 28, 2008

JERUSALEM, May 28, 2008 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Israeli police Wednesday are reviewing a series of photographs showing students torching hundreds of New Testaments, a police spokesman said.

Uzi Aharon, the mayor of Or-Yehuda, told the Israeli media he tried to stop the distribution of Christian literature in his city by collecting New Testaments and other "Messianic propaganda." He said students then torched about 200 of the volumes but noted he save another 200, CNN reported.

Messianic Jews, who holds both Christian and Jewish beliefs, expressed concern over the event and attorney Calev Myers said he will file a formal complaint with the national police. Myers says the torching violates a law forbidding the destruction of sacred items and another banning people from offending religions.

"I hope the people who are responsible for breaking the law will be indicted and prosecuted," he said.

Maine novelist's World War II book stirs controversy

By JERRY HARKAVY, Associated Press Writer
Fri Jun 6, 6:50 PM ET

SOUTH BERWICK, Maine - Even the staunchest opponents of the wars in Vietnam and Iraq are loath to take issue with World War II, the quintessential conflict between good and evil that became the model of a morally just war. So it's no surprise that novelist Nicholson Baker's latest venture into nonfiction, "Human Smoke," has stirred up strong feelings. After all, he questions the popular notion of the just war and indicates that Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt share blame with Adolf Hitler in setting the stage for the deadliest and most destructive war in history.


Baker makes his case through hundreds of brief vignettes culled from newspapers, diaries and secondary sources that are presented chronologically and without context or commentary by the author. The book ends on Dec. 31, 1941, as the world plunges into the abyss.

In a two-page "afterword," Baker dedicates the book to pacifists who risked public scorn and imprisonment by fighting to stave off the war.

Outraged by the invasion of Iraq, Baker said he was familiar with arguments that some wars had to be fought and that World War II is the premier example.

"If this is the war that everyone holds up as the benchmark of a morally justified war, let's look very closely at how it began, let's find out what happened, in what order and where the moments were that things could have turned out differently. Let's ask the question, 'Was it a good war?'" he said in an interview at his 18th-century farmhouse in this New Hampshire border town where he and his family have lived for the past decade.

Exploring the origins of World War II may seem something of a reach for an unconventional author known for quirky novels such as "Vox," which details a phone sex conversation and became a footnote to history after it was learned that Monica Lewinsky had given a copy to President Bill Clinton. Another novel, "The Mezzanine," explores the thoughts of an office worker who rides an escalator during his lunch hour.

Baker has written articles in The New Yorker, ranging from the history of the fingernail clipper to the workings of a movie projector, but his best-known shift to nonfiction was the 2001 "Double Fold," which lamented the destruction of newspaper archives and their replacement by microfilm.

It was while tending the British Library newspaper collection that he rescued from the shredder that Baker began reading about "the horrible period" that led to World War II and prompted him to dig deeper and try "to make some sense" of the situation.

Baker said he was surprised and shocked at the way Churchill responded to Hitler's attacks on Poland and other neighboring states by launching a relentless bombing campaign against German cities as well as a blockade that was designed to starve the enemy into submission.

"He was acting like a bloodthirsty maniac during that period. That has to go back on the record in all of its unpleasantness. We can't learn from a hero like that. It's a mistake to say that because Hitler was bad, we have to clean up the image of Churchill. Churchill was also bad," Baker said.

Baker maintains that Churchill's bellicose actions and Roosevelt's eagerness to supply Britain with ships and planes served only to prop up Hitler's standing with Germans and strengthen his hold on the country.

"It was the war — the long, slow war of bombing and blockade that fundamentally helped to keep Hitler in power," he said. "The fact that the country was attacked night after night in this way released a massive antipathy to the British."

The people in the book whom Baker looks up to include Mohandas Gandhi, the apostle of nonviolence; Herbert Hoover, who opposed the British blockade; and a handful of lesser-known pacifists who spoke out against the run up to war.

Tall and lean, with a full but neatly trimmed white beard, the 51-year-old Baker does not regard himself as "a war-minded person," but neither does he claim to be "an absolute pacifist." He is sympathetic to the Quaker tradition of nonviolence, having had Quaker forebears and having gone to Haverford College, which was founded by Quakers.

"Human Smoke," which draws its title from a description of the ashes at Auschwitz, is not meant to be a comprehensive history. Rather, he said, "it's just one journey through the thicket of events," one that captures the anguish of the period and puts human faces on those caught up in it.

The book slices and dices the years that led to war into hundreds of little anecdotes rather than a single sweeping narrative. Baker presents the facts in a detached, journalistic manner that belies his underlying passion and leaves it to the reader to sort out contradictions and infer the broader picture.

Reviews, Baker noted, have ranged from "extremely positive" to "ferociously negative." In The New York Times, William Grimes vilified "Human Smoke" as a "self-important, hand-wringing, moral mess of a book." But Colm Toibin, in the newspaper's Sunday Book Review, called it "riveting and fascinating" and "a serious and conscientious contribution to the debate about pacifism."

Among the skeptics was Holocaust scholar Michael Berenbaum, who helped oversee the creation of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. "If there ever was a war that was worth fighting it was World War II, and there is no evidence that I know of whatsoever that Hitler would have responded to passivity except to regard that as empowering him to expand," Berenbaum said. "Hitler could only be stopped by force."

From Amnesty International USA--Guantanamo Cell Tour

Dear Stephen, Thanks to the generosity of thousands of human rights supporters like you, we've launched our Guantánamo Cell Tour, bringing a life-sized replica of a Guantánamo prison cell to cities across America. The cell gives ordinary Americans a chance to see and feel what it's like to be a prisoner at Guantánamo - and send an unequivocal message that torture is wrong and detention without trials is un-American. Could you make a gift today to help Amnesty take this powerful message to more cities and towns across America? Our Guantánamo Cell Tour is designed to recruit more activists across the country to put additional pressure on Congress to close down Guantánamo prison once and for all. We want to take the cell to key Congressional districts, the political conventions and other cities and towns nationwide. The tour has already made stops in Miami and Philadelphia and now moves on to Portland, Maine. The first leg of our tour will culminate in a five-day stop (June 25-29) on the National Mall in Washington, DC prior to our lobbying meetings there and in-district ahead of the July 4th holiday. Along the way, thousands of Americans will have a chance to experience what it's like to be inside a Guantánamo cell, as well as record a protest video from inside the cell, which we'll post onto YouTube.	Help us bring the cell to more American cities this summer! Amnesty's Guantánamo Cell Tour kicked off in Miami on May 8th.
Are you able to give $50, $100, or even $250 today to help take the Guantánamo cell to more cities? Your gift will be used to fund online ads and leaflets for activists to publicize the tour, provide fuel for additional stops in the Midwest and California, and conduct media outreach while the cell is on the road. You and I have never had a better chance to bring some much needed reality about Guantánamo prison to ordinary Americans. Please make a financial contribution to help Amnesty bring a powerful, pro-human rights message - and the cell - to even more cities this summer! Thank you for continued commitment to ending the use of torture and defending human rights around the world. Sincerely, Larry Cox Executive Director Amnesty International USA

Take Action: Urge CAT's Board of Directors to Support the Foreign Military Sales Resolution

Next Wednesday, June 11, activists from the Chicago metro area will gather outside and inside of the annual Caterpillar shareholder meeting to protest Caterpillar complicity in human rights violations in Israel/Palestine.

Despite years of repeated corporate engagement by investors and organizations such as Jewish Voices for Peace and CAAP (formerly Stop CAT), as well as a host of religious organizations such as Sisters of Loretto and Sisters of Mercy, Caterpillar continues to profit from the illegal occupation of Palestinian land and territory.

Like Motorola, Caterpillar's practices best exemplify the interest of U.S. corporations putting profit first and human rights last. These corporations continue to disregard human rights concerns and refuse to investigate the countless number of allegations brought forward.

Caterpillar equipment and bulldozers are used as military weapons by Israel. They are destructive weapons specially fitted with armaments such as machine guns, grenade launchers and much more.

These destructive machines have unlawfully demolished thousands of homes, killed innocent civilians, including U.S. citizen Rachel Corrie, built illegal settlements, uprooted thousand-year old olive trees, torn up roads, and devastated basic infrastructure in many Palestinian villages.

Caterpillar must ensure that international law not is violated with its products. For example, Article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention deems the "extensive destruction and appropriation of property carried out unlawfully and wantonly" to be a war crime.

In addition, it is possible that the sale of Caterpillar equipment to the Israeli army violates the U.S. Arms Export Control Act and U.S. Foreign Assistance Act. Caterpillar profits from Israel's human rights violations of Palestinians by selling bulldozers to the Israeli army through the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program. To learn more, check out our fact sheet and links to other helpful resources.

We ask for activists all around the country to send Caterpillar a strong message. Take action now by sending Caterpillar's board of directors a letter asking them to take steps to address our concerns and build support for the shareholder's resolution that aims to hold Caterpillar accountable.

We must not let Caterpillar profit from human rights violations at the expense of the Palestinian people and their land.

PS We are selling an excellent report detailing the court case Corrie et al. v. Caterpillar. Click here to purchase.

--US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation

Spanish pop star poses nude to protest bullfighting

Tue Jun 3, 4:30 AM ET


MADRID (AFP) - One of Spain's top recording artists, Alaska, launched a campaign against bullfighting by presenting a poster of herself posing nude with three swords stuck in her back. "We need to stick some little banderillas (swords used in bullfighting) in the backs of those who think that the bull does not suffer," she said in presenting her campaign "The Naked Truth: Bullfighting is Cruel."

The campaign is the idea of Spain's animal rights association AnimaNaturalis and Britain's People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which has organised numerous protests against bullfighting.

Along with filmmaker Pedro Almodovar, Alaska is one of the leading figures of the "Movida", a socio-cultural movement that emerged in Spain after the repressive 1939-75 dictatorship of Francisco Franco.

For their part, Spain's bullfighters are planning an exhibition at the European Parliament in Brussels on June 4-5 in an effort to persuade lawmakers that the activity is valid.

Polls show a rising disinterest in bullfighting in Spain, especially among the younger generation, although arenas are regularly filled to capacity for the spectacle, which ends with the death of the bull from a well-placed sword.