Rebel News - Independent News and Analysis

For Jews, Jerusalem is its historic capital. Muslims also claim it for the third holiest site in Islam, containing the 35 acre Noble Sanctuary (al-Haram al-Sharif), including the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock.

The 1947 UN Partition Plan designated Jerusalem an international city under a UN Trusteeship Council. After Israel's 1947-48 War of Independence, it was divided between Israel and Jordan, and during Israel's 1967 Six-Day War, East Jerusalem was captured and occupied, its current status today.

Currently, around 500,000 Jews reside illegally in over 120 West Bank and East Jerusalem settlements as well as dozens of outposts. Their numbers grow daily despite occasional pledges to curtail or slow them, the latest last November when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a 10 month freeze, calling it a move to "help launch meaningful negotiations to reach a historic peace agreement that would finally end the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians."

Never mind Israel's history of past peace process futility because all previous efforts were more pretense than real, or as some Palestinians say - How can they negotiate in good faith without a willing partner? They've never had one and don't in Netanyahu, an extremist hard-right zealot.

To restore national security requires a reappraisal of the U.S.-Israeli "special relationship." Jeff Gates is A widely acclaimed author, attorney, investment banker, educator and consultant to government, corporate and union leaders worldwide.

Israel announced on Tuesday that it would build 1600 new housing units in Ramat Shlomo, a religious Jewish settlement in an area of the occupied West Bank annexed to Jerusalem by Israel. The announcement drew condemnation from Joe Biden, the US vice-president who is on a visit to the region partly to throw his weight behind US-brokered "proximity" talks between the Israelis and Palestinians that were announced just on Sunday. In an interview with Al Jazeera from the occupied West Bank, Biden explains why he condemned Israel's construction announcement (11 mar 2010).

When he visited the Middle East, then Senator Barack Obama had a rude awakening. He was on the ritual visit for American presidential candidates to Israel, which usually consist of touring sites of significance to Jews and declaring support for the state of Israel. This is important for American politicians who pay homage to an influential pro-Israel lobby, and it was even more important for President Obama. His background, his middle name, his father's religion and his associations with Arabs and Muslims made him a target of critics who claimed he would be soft on security.

We are told that President Obama has taken a leap of political faith in trying to bridge a final peace settlement between Palestinians and Israelis. The United States' new weapon is "proximity talks": if either side fails to meet American expectations, the US will squarely and publicly lay blame. If this was a sitcom it would be the opportune time to crack up laughing; regretfully this is not the case. Real people – whole generations – of Palestinians are on the verge of being locked into another decade of protracted and violent military occupation. Many Israelis' lives and hopes are at stake as well.

Without regard for the severe economic devastation and loss of life that a war with Iran would create, Israel’s agents in the United States continue to aggressively stoke the fires of anti-Iranian rhetoric and mobilize their minions on the floor of the House.  The Brzezinski-Soros machine failed in their attempt to effect regime change in Iran by way of a “color revolution” in the summer of 2009.  This has only emboldened the Israeli lobby to pursue more drastic measures. There is only one card left for them to play before provoking conflicts that will most certainly catapult the United States into direct military action against the Islamic state.

The seventh Israeli radio broadcast an interview with Professor Martin Van-Crevel, a noted world specialist in low-intensity wars. Former Professor of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Van-Crevel discussed publicly what he has been advocating for years in closed military academic circles in Israel and the United States.

In his view, the continued struggle of the Palestinians will inexhorably lead to the collapse of the State of Israel. Which is why Tel-Aviv has no choice but to \"transfer\" the Israeli Arabs and the stateless Palestinians beyond safe borders (that is, not only outside the 1948 borders but also from the 1976 occupied territories and, ideally, from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip). In the event the Europeans opposed such a transfer, in order to survive Tel Aviv will be forced to destroy the European capitals with nuclear weapons, it being understood that the Europeans will be unable to retaliate without annihilating their Palestinian friends. “

While the Israeli Government is projecting an "economic peace" with the Palestinians and calling for the recognition of a fictitious Palestinian State - deprived of land and sovereignty - Silvia Cattori has interviewed one of the leading intellectuals of the Palestinian resistance: Khalid Amayreh. According to him, the Western countries are in deep denial over the colonial reality of Palestine, which they only perceive through the prism of their Palestinian collaborators.

As an isolated incident, it would be appalling and criminal. As a regular occurrence, it's state-sponsored terrorism against defenseless children, subjected to barbarism by Israeli soldiers committing crimes against humanity to crush their will for wanting to live free on their own land - what Westerners take for granted; what Palestinians since 1948 haven't had, and since 1967, under military occupation denying their very humanity.

Nora Barrows-Friedman does heroic reporting for Pacifica Radio's KPFA Flashpoints Radio and as an activist/teacher/journalist in Occupied Palestine during regular visits. On March 8 on the Electronic Intifada, she wrote about Amir al-Mohteseb, a 10-year old Hebron child, arrested, detained, and savagely beaten after his 12-year old brother Hasan endured similar treatment a week earlier.