‘Sex and the City’ Star Under Attack for Supporting BDS

(MEMO) — A leading pro-Israel activist is attempting to derail an American actor’s bid to become the governor of New York over her support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel. Cynthia Nixon, one of the stars of the “Sex and the City” television series and movies, announced on Monday that she is planning to […]

Stephen Hawking Stood up for Palestinians, Supported Boycott of Israel

(MEE) — Tributes were being paid on Wednesday to renowned British physicist Stephen Hawking – not only remembering him for the brilliance of his scientific mind but as an impassioned campaigner who lent his unique voice to causes including Palestinians’ right of resistance and to call for an end to the war in Syria. Hawking, who died […]

In Surprise Move, Trump Turns to Neutrality to Push Peace Between Israel, Palestine

February 3, 2017   |   Alice Salles

(ANTIMEDIA) While on the campaign trail, President Donald Trump disappointed many supporters of Israel’s current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. At the time, the Republican nominee “placed the burden of a peace deal firmly with Israel” alone, Haaretz reported. “A lot will have to do with Israel and whether or not Israel wants to make the deal – whether or not Israel’s willing to sacrifice certain things,” Trump said.

Despite the faux pas, Trump continued to profess his commitment to Israel, promising to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and going as far as to claim he would be Israel’s “closest friend” if he won the presidency. But perhaps one of his most talked about comments regarding Israel involved settlements.

Asked during a Daily Mail interview last May whether he thought settlement building should be stopped, Trump answered:

“No, I don’t think it is, because I think Israel should have – they really have to keep going. They have to keep moving forward.”

Because of this statement, it was a surprise to many when the Trump White House issued a statement Thursday claiming the Israeli settlement construction was unhelpful to peace.

“The American desire for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians has remained unchanged for 50 years,” the statement reads, appearing to refer to the many instances in the past 50 years when U.S. presidents have objected to Israel’s settlement expansion.

“While we don’t believe the existence of settlements is an impediment to peace,” the statement continues, “the construction of new settlements or the expansion of existing settlements beyond their current borders may not be helpful in achieving that goal.”

Instead of positioning the administration in favor of more settlements, the White House simply closed the statement by asserting that “[t]he Trump administration has not taken an official position on settlement activity and looks forward to continuing discussions.”

Dubious in nature, the statement seems to suggest that the advancement of settlements might not be positive if the goal is peace; it also suggests that the settlements themselves do not represent an impediment to peace. Nevertheless, the statement also suggests that Trump believes the “ultimate deal” is a peace agreement, making it clear the current administration hopes the Israeli government won’t take steps “that could hurt the prospects of such a deal.”

Despite the statement’s contents, some believe the Trump White House seems to make a weaker case against the advancement of settlements when compared to former administrations.

In response to the comments, groups of Israeli settlers downplayed Trump’s comments, the Associated Press reported. Instead of worrying about Trump’s concerns, they look forward to the U.S. president’s upcoming meeting with the Israeli Prime Minister. Meanwhile, Husam Zomlot, a spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, praised the statement for going “in the right direction.” Nevertheless, Zomlot said, “we need more than words to protect the two-state solution, otherwise we will find nothing to talk about when President Trump” finally discloses his policies on the conflict between the two nations.

This article (In Surprise Move, Trump Turns to Neutrality to Push Peace Between Israel, Palestine) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Alice Salles and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article to edits@theantimedia.org.

As U.S. Remains Divided on Islam, These Jews and Muslims Are Coming Together

February 1, 2017   |   Carey Wedler

(ANTIMEDIA) As the United States and the world draw lines in the sand over Trump’s new immigration policies, Muslims, Jews, and people from all walks of life are banding together for peace — both for themselves and the planet.

The EcoMe Center, currently located at the junction of Jericho and Almog, was founded in December of 2010 by a group of Israeli friends who attended the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, a program that includes Israelis, Palestinians, Jordanians, and other international students.

Though the founders are Israeli, they wanted to establish an “ecovillage” run by both Israelis and Palestinians. The ongoing divide between Palestinians and Israelis is one of the longest-running conflicts in the world and continues to inspire vitriol and protest from both sides, with many around the world criticizing Israel for illegally confiscating and occupying the land of Palestinians. Indeed, the relationship is lopsided, with Israeli Defense Forces controlling Palestinians and often committing staggering human rights violations.

Amid this seemingly insurmountable conflict, the group of friends established EcoMe in the hopes of healing these historical and current divisions. According to Arnon Shomer, a spokesman for EcoMe:

“Some of these people never met a person from ‘the other side’ not through military engagement (Israelis as soldiers and Palestinians meet them as soldiers).This creates a very deep impact on everyone who comes to these workshops. For me, the first people that I could call Palestinian friends, I met through the center, and this is one of the only places where we can meet each other on the human level, and not as political entities.”

Seeking to alter this paradigm while also helping the earth, the founders began by “contacting local people and leaders and creating events of music [and] gathering.” They “started to build permaculture structures in the place from local materials.”

EcoMe has successfully created an environmentally-conscious, sustainable community. Shomer says EcoMe has compost toilets and a water reuse system (there is no sewage system at the facility). They construct buildings from “local materials, such as palms and garbage – tires, plastics of greenhouses and anything we can find.”

The center practices recycling and has a seasonal garden where attendees grow vegetables, which are used in EcoMe’s vegetarian communal kitchen. They also have a free range chicken house, projects to help sustain beehives, and permaculture workshops that teach “biodynamic beekeeping, recycled art, and permaculture gardening.”

These efforts are all maintained by visitors to the center, who are primarily Israeli and Palestinian but come from around the world. Though most international visitors come from Europe and North America, Shomer says they have had guests from countries like Japan, Brazil, Iran, Jordan, Kenya, and Colombia. As he explains, “the ones holding the space for the workshops are living in it as a community and do a lot of community work and sharing.”

And that’s what makes EcoMe especially unique. In addition to working with the land and environment, the center places a strong emphasis on healing relations between Palestinians and Israelis who visit the center.

Rather than accepting those tensions, EcoMe seeks to help them interact with each other in a peaceful way to foster friendship, understanding, and tolerance. One of the key methods they employ in this effort is the practice of nonviolent communication (NVC). NVC was developed by Marshall Rosenberg, an American psychologist, and is rooted in finding common ground and empathy.

According to NVC’s website:

“Through the practice of NVC, we can learn to clarify what we are observing, what emotions we are feeling, what values we want to live by, and what we want to ask of ourselves and others. We will no longer need to use the language of blame, judgment or domination. We can experience the deep pleasure of contributing to each others’ well-being.”

The communication method is rooted in listening and compassion, allowing those with grievances to express their frustrations without overtly blaming or lashing out at the other person but still requesting acknowledgment and action to resolve the conflict at hand. NVC has been used for everything from marriage counseling to resolving political conflicts. In fact, in his book on the method, Rosenberg recalled his experience mediating between an Israeli and Palestinian, who were eventually able to find common ground despite their seemingly diametrically opposed views. Rosenberg also worked with individuals who are now members of EcoMe.

As one Palestinian woman, Amal Hedwah, has said of Rosenberg and her experience with him:

“It was an asset for me. He made a shock in my mind and in my soul and in my body – and now I am a new person.”

EcoMe holds an annual NVC workshop that lasts between ten and twelve days and invites Palestinians, Israelis, and other international visitors a chance to communicate with each other. “This creates a wide community of people who are now friends, and sometime partners, and committed to continue [working] for peace,” Shomer says.

According to one attendee at the center:

“I know many of us are working on the peace process as a political process, but for me, it’s looking beyond the political process. How can we engage in peace work as people who live in this land, coming from different identities, different cultures, different religions, but understanding that within all of these identities there are people who want peace, and within these ideas there are people who don’t want peace…for me, it is about the right people…being here who want to work for peace – and how we can work together.”

One of the best examples of this was the group’s recent efforts to help Palestinians clean up the remains of a tent they were living in that had been ravaged by the Israeli military for the third time in a year.

EcoMe does not seek to avoid or gloss over the historical division between Israelis and Palestinians — or Israel’s own role in it. Shomer describes the “normalization” of occupation:

“It is a ‘negative’ aspect of our work since, for Palestinians, meeting Israelis without dealing in ending the occupation is normalizing the situation of privileged citizens and underprivileged occupied people who have no rights.’

Noting the challenges of running a center that brings Israelis and Palestinians together, he continued:

“To acknowledge this is a very basic need for the Palestinian people, and many Israelis do not see it this way, and so, when meeting with each other on the human level, but neglecting the political issue, [it] creates normalization of the situation.”

The center is currently located on a Jewish settler’s land, a region EcoMe chose because, as Shomer explains, “it is the occupied territories, and we are here because we want to be accessible for Palestinians who can not come to Israel because of the separation.” Nevertheless, he says their location has drawn concerns that the center itself engages in normalization.

“This is why we decided to have a meeting about this issue with our Palestinian friends, and the main conclusion was that we need to find another place for the center that is not on settlement land,” he said, adding they are currently searching for a new location to resolve the issue.

As they work to solve this fundamental problem, however, they offer a variety of classes and methods to help those who attend find peace. In addition to NVC, EcoMe offers art workshops and yoga and meditation classes. Both practices are increasingly shown to promote well-being and reduce stress.

The center also offers language classes, “teaching Arabic, Hebrew, and English, as language is one of the barriers for understanding each other.”

Though the world currently appears to be in upheaval and citizens of the world seem increasingly polarized, EcoMe is effectively working to alter this trend one person at a time — driven and sustained by individuals who are truly becoming the change they wish to see in the world.

---

This article (As U.S. Remains Divided on Islam, These Jews and Muslims Are Coming Together) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Carey Wedler and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article to edits@theantimedia.org.

Shahtahmasebi: Why I’m Glad Trump Will Be the next President

January 11, 2017   |   Darius Shahtahmasebi

(ANTIMEDIA Op-Ed) For some people, the only bright side of a Trump presidency is that they do not have to endure the horrors of a Clinton administration. But thankfully, politically literate (just kidding) Oscar-winning actress Meryl Streep has finally provided us with one more reason to be grateful for an incoming President Trump: speaking out is sexy, once again.

As Streep informed millions of viewers across the world on Sunday:

“Disrespect invites disrespect. Violence incites violence. When the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose.”

Streep took a number of jabs at the future president, including Trump’s attempt to mock a disabled reporter (something he has denied doing, despite video evidence).

As Anti-Media pointed out this week, the Obama administration has been responsible for egregious disrespect, violence, and bullying that has gone relatively unnoticed by Hollywood celebrities.

For a while, the best criticism we had in this department came from none other than Matt Damon, who questioned Obama’s drone strike program and the NSA revelations, stating Obama had “some explaining to do, particularly for a constitutional law professor.” Damon then found renewed faith in Obama and ultimately went all in for Hillary Clinton. His support for Clinton was especially noteworthy given that he grew up as a close friend of the late anti-war historian, Howard Zinn, who is famous for saying “there is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.”

We may have lost Damon’s dissent during the Obama administration, but with a Donald Trump presidency comes a large number of famous people who have enormous fan bases and who despise the wildly racist billionaire to the extent they have no problem criticizing him at an awards show – something that would have never happened during the Obama administration.

This is promising for those of us who have cared about human rights all along, regardless of who decides to drop bombs and infringe on universal rights across the entire globe. Obama dropped over 26,000 bombs last year, yet no one in Hollywood seemed to classify this as “violence” worth criticizing. Almost half of these bombs were dropped in Syria – a country the U.S. has no legal justification to bomb in the first place.

In Yemen, the Obama administration has been backing a brutal Saudi-led onslaught that has been documented targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure.

Thanks to Obama, Trump is set to inherit at least seven bombing campaigns taking place in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Somalia. Imagine what will happen when Trump strikes his first hospital – people might actually care about it! People might actually care about the innocent people of Yemen – the poorest, most impoverished nation in the Arab world, which is currently facing a humanitarian catastrophe.

With a Trump presidency, being anti-war will be cool again. Being racist and bigoted towards Muslims will be increasingly vilified; even prominent critic of Islam Bill Maher raised Trump’s Islamophobic comments as a potential breaking point in voting for him.

People despise Trump so much they won’t even bother saying ‘but Trump inherited those wars from Obama’ — a nonsensical wild-card argument continuously deployed in order to justify Obama’s aggressive behavior. Never mind that Obama inherited two wars from the Bush administration, including one that had a withdrawal date previously set by the Bush administration. Obama withdrew from Iraq in 2011 (so that the CIA could take over), and then in 2014 began a new Iraqi operation of his own (he also drastically expanded the war on terror to at least five additional countries).

I’m glad Trump is going to be the next president. Caring about people will be cool again, even if they are from a foreign country and/or have funny-sounding names. Opposing war will unite people from all over the political spectrum, including celebrities, talk-show hosts, and likely even Clinton-supporters, who let’s face it, were supporting a warmongering criminal).

Obama’s critics have been few and far between, but the critics of Trump will be numerous, including high-ranking celebrities. Let’s use their voice to capitalize on speaking out for what is right.

With such opposition, Trump is likely going to have a hard time in office and possible he won’t even survive his first term.

Let’s hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

---

This article (Why I’m Glad Trump Will Be the next President) is an opinion editorial (OP-ED). The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of Anti-Media. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Darius Shahtahmasebi and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article to edits@theantimedia.org.

Netanyahu Faces Police Questions Over Improper ‘Gifts’

January 2, 2017   |   admintam

(MEE) Israeli police are to question Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday over whether he illegally accepted gifts from wealthy supporters, media reports said, in a probe shaking the country’s political scene.

The long-running inquiry has looked into whether Israeli and foreign businessmen have offered gifts worth tens of thousands of dollars, among other issues, according to the reports.

Attorney general Avichai Mandelblit has reportedly approved upgrading the inquiry to a criminal probe, though he has yet to confirm this.

Police and Netanyahu’s office declined to comment on Monday.

Public radio said Netanyahu has agreed to be questioned at his residence.

In a Facebook post at the weekend, Netanyahu rejected all allegations against him and said his political opponents and some news outlets wanted to bring down his government.

In July, Mandelblit said he had ordered a preliminary examination into an unspecified affair involving Netanyahu.

No details were given on the nature of the preliminary examination and Netanyahu has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.

He has acknowledged receiving money from French tycoon Arnaud Mimran, who was sentenced to eight years in prison over a scam amounting to 283 million euros involving the trade of carbon emissions permits and the taxes on them.

Netanyahu’s office said he had received $40,000 in contributions from Mimran in 2001, when he was not in office, as part of a fund for public activities, including appearances abroad to promote Israel.

He has also come under scrutiny over an alleged conflict of interest in the purchase of submarines from a German firm.

Media reports have alleged a conflict of interest over the role played by the Netanyahu family lawyer, David Shimron, who also acts for the Israeli agent of Germany’s ThyssenKrupp, which builds the Dolphin submarines.

---

This article (Netanyahu Faces Police Questions Over Improper ‘Gifts’) by MEE and agencies originally appeared on MiddleEastEye.net and was used with permission. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.