COLINDALE London's Blog | Talking Points Memo | January 18, 2009

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Week of January 18, 2009 - January 24, 2009

THE KILLING OF UNARMED CIVILIANS - MEN WOMEN AND CHILDREN, IS A WAR CRIME

January 23, 2009, 6:18AM

KILLING OF UNARMED CIVILIANS - MEN WOMEN AND CHILDREN, IS A WAR CRIME.

Whether by the banned chemical white phosphorus, a missile or bomb dropped from an F16 or a bullet through the head. Dozens of women and hundreds of children killed by Israelis with American supplied arms paid for by US tax dollars. Is it not unbelievable that in this day and age we should allow this blatant killing of innocents on the pretext of 'defence'? Israel's embassies around the world, in NY, Paris and London, are today busy disseminating propaganda to cover up these atrocities in a desperate effort to keep influence with the new administration and we can only hope and pray that President Obama will take immediate action to stop all arms sales to the Middle East - including aircraft, tanks, cluster bombs, white phosphorus and spare parts .

Nazis in Gaza

January 20, 2009, 7:08PM

The highly respected, UK Jewish MP, Gerald Kaufman, said in the British Parliament last week, 'the Israelis are acting like Nazis in Gaza'. He was right. The young indoctrinated soldiers of the IDF, certain that all Palestinians are inferior to Israelis, killed 1300 of them - men women and children, with no mercy. The ones that were not killed by F16 bombers were shot in the head and tens of thousands injured and made homeless. No amount of propaganda from Israel's embassies in New York, London and Paris can hide the truth that these were war crimes and the ministers responsible must be brought before the international court to face charges. In the meantime, the European Union must stop trading with Israel until such time as all illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem are closed and substantive moves are made towards the early establishment of an independent Palestinian state. Until then, let Israel trade exclusively with the US and let us hope that President Obama will order an immediate ban on arms sales to the region. If these war crimes in Gaza are ignored, then democracy and the rule of law will both be damaged irreparably and Obama's great hope for peace and an end to terrorism will be dashed for the period of his presidency and for years beyond.

The absolute imperative to control NUCLEAR WEAPONS and the ambitions of those who will kill without compunction

January 20, 2009, 9:22AM

The immediate danger that the new President has to face is the reality of the fact that his predecessor has built Israel into the fifth most powerful nuclear state on the planet - the agenda for such totally irresponsible action, being incomprehensible. To have made Dimona in the Negev the largest secret nuclear weapons store anywhere, cannot have been to ensure the safety of America, or Europe or the Middle East - but it has virtually ensured that under the control of a political system that has little integrity, there will inevitably be a nuclear weapons strike in the region within the near future. The region being now so unstable and the politics so unpredictable and the hatred now so fierce in the aftermath of the massacre in Gaza that it is a merely a matter of time. That is the danger we face, in the UK, in Europe and eventually in the US and the Americas. It will then not be a matter of oil or carbon footprints but of human survival on a planet blind to the dangers it faces and the absolute imperative to control nuclear weapons and the ambitions of those who will kill without compunction in order to achieve their aims. I have no doubt that Mr Obama is more aware of these dangers than I am - the point is, how far will he be influenced by his chief of staff and others?

Holocaust Remembrance Day must include also the memory of those Palestinian lives brutally cut down by the Israeli Defence Force

January 19, 2009, 3:11PM

David Miliband, the UK Foreign Minister, is a pragmatist who, although Jewish, is prepared to confront those of his many co-religionists who avidly swallow the stuff that is spewed out daily from the Zionist Federation and the Israeli Embassy in London - without a second thought.

When the newly established state of Israel was being built-up by the original pioneer settlers and refugees, they tried to follow the strictures of Theodor Herzl to co-operate with the Arabs and other Mediterranean people who had lived there continuously in Palestine for over a thousand years. But the hard men from eastern Europe came and killed instead. This week and last week they killed again. Over one thousand one hundred men women and children. And the world weeps at the desecration of Gaza and the bereavement of its people. This year's Holocaust Remembrance Day must include also the memory of those Palestinian lives brutally cut down by the Israeli Defence Force and we must act to stop this madness and the collusion of those who accept and support the tenets of Sharon's Likud party and Ehud Olmert. All life is valuable - not just Israeli life and the world must stand-up and protect those who are oppressed, in any land. At the very least, we must stop supplying weapons to the oppressor.

UNSCR to condemn Hamas for its vicious attack

January 19, 2009, 5:10AM

How proud the Israeli Air Force must be in the success of its mission to engage with the crack Palestinian Air Force and to have successfully avoided the heavy anti-aircraft batteries of the Hamas ground forces and their deadly Iranian-built heat-seeking missiles. The vital mission of the IDF to fly in over heavily defended enemy territory and to bomb massively fortified gun emplacements, needed courage that can never be overestimated. Israel has trained its pilots for just such dangerous engagements for many months knowing that it faced an enemy, well-trained and disciplined and far better equipped with the latest supersonic Iranian fighter aircraft and Chinese built ZX42 long-range bombers able to deliver massive 1000kgs cluster bombs reinforced with white phosphorus.

Israel's freedom fighters have suffered heavy casualties over the past three weeks with hundreds dead and thousands wounded in their brave attempt to fight-off the superior Hamas forces. The UN Security Council are meeting today in emergency session to consider a motion condemning Hamas for its vicious attack on its democratic neighbour and for refusing to allow in urgent supplies to the injured Israeli civilians. The resolution is expected to pass with American support. The US are now expected to step-up their military aid to the Palestinians with $345 billion of arms shipments, over the next three months, paid for by the American tax payer.

There has been some undercurrent of dissent in the Senate, however, on the wisdom of massively supporting the Palestinians with billions of dollars whilst thousands of American car-workers are being laid-off.